Chapter 280: Simulation
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 280: Simulation
Two weeks remained until the final race.
It was enough time to prepare for the race, but too short to dramatically improve her skills.
The best they could do in that time was to sharpen her senses, steel her resolve, and devise a strategy.
“Miro, how did it feel running from the back?”
“It was definitely good. It was comfortable just focusing on catching the person in front of me without worrying about who was behind. I think I can do it like this in the finals.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“About what?”
“Scarlett will be in the finals, too. She’ll probably be right next to you.”
“Ah…”
Miro had run alongside Scarlett before. Her intimidating presence was beyond words.
She was a monster, plain and simple. It felt like she’d once driven a chariot, slaughtering everything in her path.
“In that case, I’ll run from the front again…”
“That’s not a bad idea, either. But Lua Swift will be waiting for you.”
“Ah…”
She hated that idea, too.
Who in their right mind would chat during a race? Apparently, someone right here.
Whenever Miro was near, Lua would chatter on and on. She’d no doubt do the same in the finals.
Just imagining it made her eardrums itch.
“Then, I’ll just break away…”
“Are you confident you can outrun fifteen people?”
“…”
In the end, she was left with nothing.
“There’s nowhere for me to go.”
“As they say, there’s no paradise for those who flee.”
“Sigh… The others probably don’t even think about me, do they? They just run however they want without worrying like this.”
Karami offered a bitter smile in place of an answer to Miro’s self-deprecating lament.
“Can I even win…? I can’t even picture it.”
She couldn’t paint a picture of herself winning against those monsters.
And it wasn’t like a miracle would happen and her skills would suddenly skyrocket after just two weeks of practice.
“Haaaah…”
Miro let out a long, heavy sigh that could drag down anyone who heard it.
This was where he, as her trainer, had to step in and help his athlete.
“If you can’t imagine it, let’s experience it directly.”
“How?”
“Let’s run a mock race.”
*
Miro’s training ground was Rin’s Dream Garden.
Being a fantastical space, Rin could create anything she desired within it. In the Dream Garden, Rin was a god.
Recently, however, the Dream Garden had undergone a major transformation.
“Whoa, what is all this?”
Miro, her reaction bordering on horrified, whipped her head around.
The space, which once resembled a celestial realm, had been transformed into a young girl’s room, filled with cute decorations.
That in itself wasn’t a problem. The real issue was the decorations themselves.
Karami picked up a doll.
Black hair.
Black eyes.
A vaguely familiar outfit.
“It’s the trainer.”
“That’s me.”
A doll that looked like Karami.
A blanket with Karami’s face on it.
A Karami wall scroll.
A Karami figurine.
A Karami dakimakura.
A Karami acrylic stand.
Every single decoration was Karami-themed.
Rin had apparently been greatly inspired by the athlete merchandise sold at the racetrack and decided to decorate like this.
“What do you think? Rin put a lot of effort into this. Isn’t it decorated well?” Rin asked, her expression triumphant.
To Karami, the subject of this obsession, it looked like a yandere’s room straight out of a thriller manga.
“We’re always together. Is there any reason to decorate like this?”
“You just don’t get it, Master. Being by your side and owning your merchandise are two completely different things. It fills a small void, you know? It’s a satisfaction that’s hard to put into words. It’s amazing!”
“Ah, I see.”
Karami forced himself to look away.
“All that’s missing is you, Master. Won’t you stay here and laze around with Rin forever?”
“I refuse. I came here to ask for a favor.”
“Tch, you don’t have to be so sharp about it… So, what’s the favor?”
“Please create a track with the exact same conditions as the Harpanel Racetrack. And the other finalists, too.”
Practice that felt real. A virtual simulation. He intended to provide the best possible training environment, more useful than any other.
“Master, you know Rin is competing against you this time, right? Even if it’s you asking, isn’t this a cheap trick?” Rin said, hugging a Karami cushion tightly.
True. But what if he offered a condition that Rin would find acceptable?
“If you grant my request, I’ll do one thing you want when it’s your turn.”
Rin’s ears and tail shot up as if to pierce the sky.
“You really mean that?”
“Of course, as always, as long as you don’t cross the line.”
“Alright. If Master is willing to sell his body for this favor, then Rin will concede!”
“Hey, your choice of words…”
“Sniff, to sell your body for my sake… I’m so moved, Trainer.”
“…”
Rin opened the door and stepped out.
In the blink of an eye, the Harpanel Racetrack had been created outside.
She had created illusions of the fifteen finalists. They stood there blankly, staring straight ahead like dolls.
“Whoa, it’s exactly the same.”
“This is basic stuff for Rin.”
Isn’t this kind of training basically cheating? Miro wondered.
“Trainer, is this really okay? Last time, when I said I wanted to run on the track, you said no for the sake of fairness.”
“There’s a huge difference between that and this. Before, it would have been an abuse of the racetrack manager’s authority. Now, I’m simply utilizing my own abilities as a trainer. This is why it’s so important to have a good trainer.”
“Is that how it is?”
“That’s how it is. Enough chatter. Let’s practice.”
Miro and the fifteen dolls entered the starting gate.
The difference in mindset was enormous. Miro felt a slight tension, but none of the crushing pressure of a real race.
The gate opened, and the simulation began.
The dolls of the front-runners—Iris, Jibiosin, and Kiss—shot out to take the lead. However, due to a difference in ability, Kiss was pushed back to third place.
The two leaders sprinted as if they had no need to pace themselves, creating a massive gap between them and the rest of the pack.
It became an ultra-high-paced race as the other runners also went all out to catch them.
The dolls used the same abilities as their real counterparts: Iris used her blessing, Lua her gale, Marin her wave-riding, and Scarlett her terrifying leg strength.
The race ended with Jibiosin in first, Iris in second, Scarlett in third, Miro in fourth, and Lua in fifth.
The Dream Garden was a fantastical space, but Miro was a real person, so she expended her stamina just as she would in reality.
She flopped onto the grass, panting heavily.
“So, how was it?”
“Pant, pant… Impossible! Those two… they’re just too fast!”
“But you still beat Lua. And the gap with Scarlett was only one horse length. With practice, I’m sure you can catch Scarlett, too.”
“But in a real race, the conditions will be worse than this.”
“That’s probably true.”
Psychological pressure, strategic battles…
Not to mention, a real race has countless factors that a simulation can’t replicate, all tangled together, which could lead to a completely different outcome.
“But that’s true for the other racers as well, not just you. In fact, it could even work in your favor.”
“You think so? Still, I don’t think I can beat those two. They’re in a league of their own.”
“You never know what might happen. Of course, if you’re aiming for first place, you’ll have to run better than you did just now.”
You have to win, at least in the simulation. If you go into the real race with the mindset of ‘it’ll work out somehow,’ without even putting in that much effort, you won’t achieve anything.
“This is a rare opportunity. Don’t just run blindly. Analyze your opponents’ preferred running positions, their spurt timings, and even their habits.”
“Okay. But Trainer, can’t I get some kind of enhancement?”
“You mean like what Marin was doing?”
“If I could just do that, I feel like my chances of winning would go up~”
“That might be true, but there’s nowhere near enough time to practice it now. And you don’t need it. Your contract with me is more than enough.”
You already nearly caught up to Marin without using any abilities. No, at that point, you basically did catch her.
This isn’t the time to covet what others have. It’s important to maximize the abilities you can currently use.
Miro took Karami’s advice to heart and repeated the race.
Each time she raced, the overall rankings were similar but not fixed.
Iris and Jibiosin went back and forth, alternating between first and second place, while Scarlett and Lua also had a fierce, evenly matched rivalry.
Rather than obsessing over her rank, Miro focused on analysis, running on the outside, slightly away from the main pack.
By taking a step back and adopting the perspective of a spectator, she started to see her opponents’ habits, things she’d never noticed before.
The telltale signs right before they spurted, the positions they broke away from, and even their maximum speed when going all out.
It was, in a word, a cheat-level training environment.
Miro steadily accumulated data.