Chapter 288: The Final Match (5)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 288: The Final Match (5)
“Countless strides have led to this single line. The shortest, yet longest, distance. The crowd gives a thunderous welcome to the racers as they enter the final stretch!”
The end of a long journey.
The final stretch, where they must pour out their all.
This single sprint would decide who was superior, who had striven harder.
It was time to empty their pockets of every last bit of stamina, every trick they had saved.
Yet even as the other racers unleashed their abilities without restraint, Miro did nothing special. She simply ran, her eyes fixed forward.
She didn't know any fancy tricks.
But she knew how to give it her all.
I can do it. I can do it.
She refused to doubt herself.
If she worked hard, she could win.
She had done it time and again.
Proven it time and again.
That she was not weak.
“Hah, hah…”
Her body, soaked by the rain, felt sluggish.
Her waterlogged tail was a dead weight.
Mud seeped into her shoes, a constant discomfort.
I’m out of breath. My lungs burn with cold. My thighs feel like they’re going to explode.
But she just had to endure a little longer.
Catch the Twelve Zodiac Spirits.
Catch Marine.
Soon, only two racers remained ahead of her. If she could just pass those two…!
She clenched her jaw until her gums ached and ran with all her might. That was when Lua, who had been running beside her, began to pull away.
After gaining a slight lead, she glanced back at Miro.
“What should I do, Miro? You were running better than I expected, and I wanted to race with you to the very end, but it seems you’re a little too slow.”
“Huh?”
“My apologies. I’ll be going on ahead~”
As if her words alone could make it so, Lua effortlessly pulled away.
Splat!
Mud flew back, hitting Miro. With a path now clear, Scarlet surged forward from behind.
She, too, spared a leisurely glance at Miro before continuing on.
“Grr…!”
Miro tried to summon her strength to catch them, but they only pulled farther away.
She couldn’t keep up.
Why?
She was giving it her all.
This was Miro’s current limit.
Had they grown stronger in that time?
No. Their speed was the same as she’d always seen.
They hadn’t gotten faster.
Miro had gotten slower.
The cause, as she’d feared, was the pain in her back.
The ache that had persisted ever since Iris’s blessing had dispelled the magic suppressing it now intensified as she pushed herself to her limit.
Was this the price for holding it back with magic for so long? The accumulated agony surged through her at once.
It was likely why she felt feverish despite the chilling rain.
It was a torment so severe that, had this not been a race, had this not been the finals, she would have simply given up and collapsed.
“Miro, who was fighting for the lead, is suddenly losing pace and falling behind!”
Marine, Astrophe—the rivals she had worked so hard to catch—passed her one by one.
She couldn’t fall behind now. As Miro took a great stride to chase after them…
“…Huh?”
A single, questioning sound.
The vast sky vanished.
The straight path was gone, her vision filled only with the coarse, muddy ground.
It was as if the world had tilted.
But it wasn’t the world that was tilted; it was Miro herself.
Her head pitched down.
Her body lurched forward.
It was the sensation of falling. She was collapsing.
She had put too much force into her stride. The mud caught between her hooves and shoes had stolen her footing.
A tiny mistake.
A fatal one.
The realization that this could end everything came in an instant, yet it stretched time to a crawl, sinking her mind into a swamp.
Like a flashback before death, a single moment felt like an eternity.
Not again…!
This body, again.
This pain, again.
Me, again.
Am I really going to stumble because of this?
I worked so hard.
I ran from before the sun rose until long after it set.
Hard enough that I wouldn't be ashamed.
Hard enough that I could hold my head high before anyone.
Hard enough to say I truly gave it my all.
And yet.
Because of this nameless affliction…
All of it was for nothing?
All that time?
All those dreams?
All that passion?
Was it all just going to sink into the mud?
I won’t let it…!
She had received so much help.
So much undeserved support.
At times, it had been a heavy burden.
At others, a warm hand pushing her forward.
And right now, there were people who still desperately wanted her to win.
Their hopes.
Their wishes.
I can’t betray them now.
In that instant, a piece of advice she’d once heard flashed through her mind, like a whisper.
“A caterpillar endures for a long time before shedding its skin to become a butterfly and soar into the sky. Someday, Miro, your day to fly will come.”
She had thought it was just a nice story, empty words that had nothing to do with her—but now, it was different.
She imagined it.
Shedding her skin.
A butterfly, soaring lightly.
Spreading her wings.
Herself, flying into the sky.
Fly.
It was only her imagination, but her back grew hot.
A boiling heat surged from within, but she didn’t stop.
“Engrave this scene, this sensation, into your mind, and don’t forget it. A day will come when it will be of help to you, Miro.”
She closed her eyes.
She remembered.
The world she had looked down upon from the sky.
The moment when everything was beneath her.
The feeling of the wind as she ran.
Fly…!
Her back felt as if it would tear apart.
A searing pain shot down her spine.
Her breath hitched, and her heart hammered against her ribs as if to escape.
It was unbearable.
Just as the thought of giving up began to surface, clear voices cut through the cacophony of the racetrack.
“Sisteeeer!”
“Noonaaaaaa!”
“You can do it, Miro!”
The messy cheers and the roar of the crowd.
The squelch of mud, the pounding of hooves, the drumming of rain.
In that jumble of noise, only one sound broke through.
The voices cheering for her echoed in her ears and filled her mind.
A quiet phrase resurfaced from the depths of her heart.
“I’ll be cheering for you from here. Go and enjoy it.”
Enjoy it.
This moment.
This feeling.
These cheers.
Grin.
A grin spread across her crumpled, breathless face.
It was coarse and wild, yet beautiful.
The smile of someone truly enjoying the moment.
Thump!
Miro took a powerful, unyielding step forward.
“I…!”
With everyone pushing her onward, this pathetic pain was nothing.
“I will… flyyyyyyyy!”
A single cry drowned out every other sound in the world, soaring toward the heavens.
The sky was blanketed in dark clouds.
As if a spotlight had found the star of the show, a single beam of white light pierced the darkness and fell upon Miro.
Shhh-RIIIP!
A pair of pure white wings erupted from Miro’s back, scattering blood.
They were reminiscent of an angel’s wings, yet wilder, sleeker.
They perfectly filled the empty space on her back where her clothes had torn, as if they were always meant to be there.
For an instant, the cheering stopped.
The racetrack, a moment ago a cacophony of shouts and roars, fell silent, frozen.
They knew what a winged horse was.
A creature of fantasy, like the unicorn.
A horse granted the Mandate of Heaven to fly.
A Celestial Steed.
The fantastical species, Pegasus.
Before this sight, which none had ever witnessed, all thought ceased. Time itself seemed to slow.
But for some, none of that mattered.
No matter how she had changed, there was only one thing to do.
“Sister!”
“Noona!”
The desperate cries of the children rang out.
“Ruuuuuuun!”
──Fwoosh.
Her white wings spread wide.
Miro lifted her head.
Her gaze locked forward.
Her destination reflected in her eyes.
Her goal enshrined in her heart.
The moment she engraved those two things within her, she kicked off the ground.
Thump!
With a beat of her wings, she launched forward as if taking flight.
The straightaway before her was no longer a track.
It was a runway.
Not a path made for running, but one prepared for flight.
Miro moved.
“Here I gooooooo!”
Sprint.
Faster than any myth.
Soar.
With the hopes of everyone on your back.
*
Someone drew a sharp breath but couldn’t exhale.
The stadium, which had been roaring with cheers, was now as silent as a muted film.
Every eye was fixed on a single figure.
On the girl who ran with angelic white wings, scattering a dazzling white light with every flap.
Miro ran.
Her body was low, stretched long and forward, almost skimming the ground.
This wasn’t just running.
It was a takeoff, a sprint to build speed just before flight, the coiled spring of a leap toward the sky.
Her hooves struck the ground, launching her into the next stride before the mire could take hold.
The mud could no longer restrain her.
The wind she kicked up blasted through the spectator stands like a sonic boom, shaking them to their core.
And then.
The silence shattered.
“IT’S MIROOOOO! THE UNDERDOG MIRO IS A PEGASUS! SHE’S SOARING WITH PURE WHITE WINGS, IT’S MIROOOOO! WAIT, IS THIS EVEN LEGAL?! ISN’T SHE FLYING?!”
She wasn’t.
She was executing her signature light-footed steps at such a high speed that her nimble movements merely gave the illusion of flight. She was, in fact, still firmly striking the ground with every stride.
The powerful beats of her wings added to her acceleration, but they were a part of her own body, not some external tool. It was merely an application of her own abilities, no different from a mage using mana for a spell.
The other racers felt the violent shift in the race’s current more keenly than anyone.
Something with an overwhelming presence was closing in from behind.
They were dying of curiosity, their heads instinctively wanting to turn, but they fought the urge. An alarm bell screamed in their minds that to look back now would be the end.
But not looking didn’t change the outcome.
Miro blew past Kiss, who had long since fallen behind after burning out.
A single white feather drifted in her wake.
Kiss’s eyes went wide as she watched, an involuntary gasp escaping her lips.
“Whoa…”
Beautiful.
So incredibly beautiful.
So beautiful that Kiss, who called herself an idol, felt utterly pathetic in comparison.
Miro began to hunt down the racers who had overtaken her.
“An unexpected awakening from Miro! She’s blazing down the course in a sprint that borders on flight! She closes a gap of more than five lengths in a single breath, chasing down the leaders! And what’s more, this racer isn’t struggling—she’s smiling!!!”
The broadcast cameras, not just at the track but all across the world, zoomed in on Miro.
She was sweating, drenched in rain.
Her hair was a tangled mess in the wind.
Her face was streaked with mud.
But none of those flaws registered next to her radiant smile. It was a magnetic smile that you couldn’t look away from, one that made you want to cheer for her.
Unaware that she was captivating the world, Miro just smiled even more brightly and pumped her legs harder.
Before she knew it, only four racers remained ahead of her.
The Twelve Zodiac Spirits.
Lua.
Iris.
And Scarlet.
Unable to withstand the encroaching pressure, Scarlet finally glanced back.
A three-length gap.
No, two?
Now one.
And then, she was right there.
In a flash, Miro was running beside her.
Scarlet couldn’t tear her eyes away, but Miro didn’t spare the others a single glance.
Her gaze wasn’t on her rivals or the finish line, but somewhere far beyond, toward the infinite sky that stretched over the track.
As if she had no interest in the earth below.
As if she longed only for the vast heavens above.
She passed them one by one, her eyes fixed on that distant point.
The annoying gale scattered with a single beat of her wings.
The earthbound chariot could not hope to shake the soaring Miro.
And just like that, Miro, who had struggled so much just to see their backs, now surpassed them with ease.
At long last, she crossed the finish line.
A moment of silence hung in the air.
“FIRST PLAAAAACE! It’s not the Unicorn, not the Twelve Zodiac Spirits, not the Gale, not the Chariot—IT’S MIRO IN FIRST PLAAAAACE! MIRO, WHO HAS WROUGHT A MIRACLE, STANDS AT THE VERY PINNACLE OF VICTORY!”
Along with the announcer’s call, a roar mixed with screams erupted from the crowd, crashing down onto the track like a tidal wave.