A clear chime rang out at the starting gates, and one figure after another exploded onto the track.
"They're off! Not a single runner left behind!"
The words had barely left Ms. Musashi's mouth when a certain Demon King suddenly eased off the throttle and drifted to the very back of the pack.
[Slow Start]
If this had been the game, that exact notification would have popped up over Gold Ship's head right then.
Preparation complete, Gold Ship surged forward the very next instant.
She had no intention of staying at the tail of the pack. Third-rate scrubs like these didn't even have the right to serve as her pacers.
'This race has no screen time for the likes of you!'
A crimson aura erupted around her, and she unleashed a gate-wide interference skill without a shred of mercy.
[Demon King Aura]
A double restriction on both speed and stamina!
The moment the Flash-tier interference hit, the expressions of several racers shifted dramatically.
Gold Ship had never once entertained the notion of holding back — or rather, this skill had been invented specifically to whip the weak into shape. If you couldn't break through her aura, then you weren't qualified to be her opponent in the first place.
'Interference at this level…?'
[Symboli Rudolf] was encountering a foe of this caliber for the first time. Whatever confidence she'd had moments ago was now replaced with a cold sweat trickling down her back. Instinctively, she glanced toward Tokai Teio — that child actually contends with opponents on this level?
Beside her, [Air Groove] was getting a bad feeling of her own.
How on earth had opponents of this tier ended up matched into the same race as them?
This was just plain bullying!
[Venus Paques] and [Tokai Teio] from McQueen's world wore expressions of pure disbelief.
'What is this?!'
[Tokai Teio] was experiencing interference of such overwhelming power for the very first time.
'Is this really something a demonic force can achieve?!'
[Venus Paques] was equally thunderstruck.
The two of them, belonging to an older version of the world, had their entire worldview rattled in that instant.
Ms. Musashi's voice rose sharply. "There it is — a Flash-tier skill from runner number 13! As you can see, the moment she unleashed it, several racers have been visibly affected!"
Beside her, Mr. Kojiro chimed in, "What a ridiculous skill."
Up in the stands, many first-time spectators wore baffled expressions.
Then, with the help of veteran fans sitting nearby, they finally grasped the concept of skill tiers. One after another, their faces twisted into expressions of sheer shock — you've got to be kidding me, isn't this literally a superpower?!
"Oooh! So that's the [me] they call the Demon King! She's as strong as advertised!"
The young-adult version of [Gold Ship] from World 1 let out a delighted cheer.
'Get 'em, other [me]! Take my share with you and go crush McQueen!'
Even though Mejiro McQueen was her own teammate, that didn't stop her from wanting to see McQueen cry.
Now that he understood skill tiers, the young Trainer P shot a worried look toward Mejiro McQueen.
But the very next instant, his expression settled back into calm.
'That's our McQueen — she really has grown this strong.'
Mejiro McQueen's body shimmered with a prismatic radiance, and one of her eyes was alight with purple flame.
After a chain of aptitude skills flashed across her, [Focus] and [Solid as a Rock] locked in, and with ZONE and Flow layered on top, she looked less like a runner and more like a bird of prey, soaring across the turf.
The Demon King's skill washed over McQueen without leaving the slightest mark.
Mejiro McQueen had already surged to the very front. No surprises there.
She showcased a perfect, utterly dominant start, calmly claiming the lead position in the opening stage. The way she ran, it was as if no opponent in this race was on her level.
Whether it was Rice Shower with her ZONE active, or Kitasan Black entering Flow, both were being outright overpowered in terms of raw speed.
The flawless synergy of her stats and skills, reinforced by layered buff states, meant Mejiro McQueen's start put her leagues ahead of every other runner.
If you had to sum it up in one sentence: Mejiro McQueen's lead was unshakable.
And after securing that lead, her speed kept climbing steadily.
The faint glow around her body wasn't dazzling, yet it was breathtakingly beautiful — the kind of strength you'd expect to see in a dream.
Ms. Musashi didn't sound surprised at all. "As expected, number 6 takes the lead!"
She'd already witnessed this runner's front-running style back during the last Strongest Series tournament.
That absolute immunity to every other runner's interference had left an indelible impression on her.
It wasn't that she'd never seen a racer with purification abilities — but a racer like Mejiro McQueen, who could ignore opponents' interference throughout the entire race while maintaining a massive lead? This was her first time.
Someone in the stands spoke up. "That Mejiro McQueen is incredible — I don't really get all this skill stuff, but I know uma musume when I see one, and that running form is just gorgeous!"
With the [Demon King Aura] pressing down on the entire field, Mejiro McQueen's radiance stood out all the more.
Many spectators seeing Mejiro McQueen for the first time were instantly won over.
Meanwhile, the bloodthirsty spectators from World 5 were shouting in disbelief. "No way! How could our Kitasan Black fall behind at the start? That's impossible!"
When they'd first seen Kitasan Black take the field, they'd assumed all they had to do was cheer her on like they always had. So why were they watching her trail the pack?
Kitasan Black, our ideal uma musume — bring us another victory!
Nearly every spectator from World 5 was red-eyed with frustration.
'As expected of Big Sis McQueen — she really is strong!'
Rice Shower's pitch-black aura devoured the crimson light flooding the field, and she tucked in smoothly behind McQueen.
Watching from behind, Gold Ship's face twisted in frustration.
Sure, people always said a gate-interference specialist like her was disgusting.
But she had something to say too — characters like McQueen and Rice Shower are the truly disgusting ones!
And yet…
'If it weren't for them, this race wouldn't be any fun!'
Even as she ran at a disadvantage, Gold Ship's heart was pounding with exhilaration.
This was the race she'd been craving.
A race utterly unlike the ones against weaklings — one where she could go absolutely all out!
'But hey, Kita — you're the one who lit the fuse on this race, and this performance isn't cutting it. If this is all you've got, you can go back and keep those losers at the rear some company!'
Gold Ship began accelerating, charging up behind Kitasan Black and Tokai Teio.
'Catching up, huh? So you aren't dumb enough to just sit at the back. You talk big, but you actually run with caution — Demon King. Well, I'm not giving you any opening to pass me!'
Tokai Teio felt the crushing weight pressing down on her and quietly adjusted her breathing to adapt to the pressure. She couldn't activate her ZONE here — her ZONE wasn't a passive, always-on type like McQueen's. Hers was a single-use trump card, and it had to be saved for the decisive moment.
Still, even without ZONE, she was confident she could hold off the Demon King.
'So this is Senior Gold Ship's gate interference — it's no joke. But—'
Kitasan Black kept her expression flat, grinding her way through the Demon King's interference by sheer force of will.
'Don't kid yourself into thinking this level of pressure can pin me down!'
Flashes of skill activations sparked around her body.
She was stacking her own skill buffs to cancel out the interference.
The effect of the gate skill on her amounted to little more than an unpleasant sensation — the actual impact wasn't much.
Her eyes were fixed forward.
Senior McQueen really was terrifyingly strong. And Senior Rice Shower was an opponent she couldn't afford to underestimate either.
'Even now, I can't see any hope of winning.'
The thought echoed in her mind, and the aura around her began to stir restlessly.
Her seniors' strength was exactly what she'd expected.
From the day she'd been born, she'd understood with painful clarity just how far away that [sky] truly was.
It was precisely because she saw that gap so clearly that she had once given in to despair.
The old her had chosen to look away, to play dumb, to pretend she knew nothing.
But that was all in the past now!
Now, she had decided to face this [hell] head-on!
'Can't win, can't possibly win — yeah, I know, I get it. The current me isn't good enough. No one knows that better than I do. But if the current me can't win, then I just have to surpass [the current me]!'
Could she really… do that?
No — she had to.
Kitasan Black's crimson eyes filled with threads and shadows.
Flow began to mutate.
What should have been a state of still-water clarity now twisted into something wild and feverishly passionate!
Flow, after all, meant flow-state — simply put, a state of ultimate concentration, a state of unleashing one's full potential.
It was Mejiro McQueen who had first discovered and demonstrated this ability.
And the form she showed while in it was the picture of perfect competitive composure.
But—
No one had ever said that was Flow's one and only correct form.
In fact, the opposite was true.
Flow, at its core, was an expression of pure self-interest — an explosive state generated in service of one's own goals.
What this state revealed was the face of one's [ideal self]!
And Kitasan Black's ugly ambition and hunger — those were precisely the keys to unlocking this power!
'Hm?'
Both Tokai Teio and Gold Ship, running nearby, felt the shift in her aura.
'Something's changed with this one.'
Kitasan Black's next stride landed with such force that the turf itself tore free beneath her.
[Demon King Aura]
'What?!'
Gold Ship, who had no idea Kitasan Black could wield her signature skill, was caught completely flat-footed. Locked down by her own technique, her furious charge staggered for a split second.
'You bastard!'
Snapping out of it, Gold Ship glared daggers at Kitasan Black's back.
Was this the talent McQueen had mentioned?
Tokai Teio had been holding her own against the Demon King's single stream of interference with room to spare.
But now…
Drenched in sweat, Tokai Teio watched in stunned disbelief as Kitasan Black blew past her. Just like Gold Ship, she'd had no idea Kitasan Black could do this — and caught utterly off-guard, she took another Flash-tier interference skill square in the chest. Suddenly, even drawing breath felt like work.
'Kita can even pull this off?'
The truth was, Tokai Teio had once tried to imitate her seniors' skills herself. But the best she could manage was a version one tier weaker than the original. And what Kitasan Black was demonstrating now? Equal in effect to the genuine article!
This was something even she couldn't do.
'Oh no. If that's the case, doesn't that mean this race could have up to five Flash-tier interference skills flying around?'
Tokai Teio's eyes flickered with alarm.
She didn't have the gate-immunity that McQueen and Rice Shower did.
As for the competitors from other worlds behind them, they were being pressed down so hard they couldn't even lift their heads.
The race had barely cleared the opening stage, and their stamina was already nearly half-drained.
So this was the intensity of this race?
'So this is the realm that lies beyond [the strongest]!'
[Duramente] was drenched in sweat, her body screaming in protest — and yet her heart was pounding with pure exhilaration.
Every distracting thought had long since been swept from her mind. All she wanted was to lose herself, body and soul, in this race.
[Satono Diamond] was flushed crimson with frustration.
'Damn it, there's nothing I can do at all!'
Just like at the Arc de Triomphe, all she could do was trail at the back of the pack and watch her classmate's back recede into the distance.
Beside her, [Satono Crown] was gasping for breath in great, heaving gulps.
The intensity of this race far exceeded anything she'd imagined, and she'd long since given up clinging to any hope of luck.
In a race of this caliber, no amount of luck could compensate for a gap in raw ability.
"Runner number 2 is picking up the pace! She's blown past number 7 and is now charging at number 5!"
The current order of the race was:
First place — number 6, Mejiro McQueen, leading the pack by five lengths.
Second place — number 5, Rice Shower.
Third place — number 2, Kitasan Black, barely three lengths behind second.
A cascade of Flash activations lit up the field.
The multi-skill synchronization technique that had once been Tokai Teio's exclusive signature — a move only her ultimate talent could pull off — was being deployed with effortless ease by Kitasan Black, whose raw talent surpassed even hers.
The aura around Kitasan Black was now every bit the equal of Rice Shower in full ZONE. Watching Kitasan Black close in, Rice Shower instinctively reached for [Fusion] to lock her down — but the very next instant, her intuition screamed at her not to. She had a premonition: using [Fusion] on Kita would only put her in the worse position.
'I see… I can't fuse with Kita's current state.'
Rice Shower's expression turned grave as Kitasan Black drew level with her.
'Do I need to pin Kita down here? No… there's no need.'
[The Overlord]'s thoughts flowed with icy precision.
She could see that Kitasan Black's current state demanded enormous stamina.
This mutated Flow had flipped from being an energy-conserving state into an explosively expending one.
It was remarkably similar to Gold Ship's Overload Mode.
No — they were practically the same thing at the root.
Rice Shower let Kitasan Black pass her unchallenged.
As a stalker-type runner, the only reason she'd been running this close to the front was that the other runners were simply too slow. She hadn't actually wanted to hold such an advanced position in the first place, so there was no reason for her to waste stamina grappling with Kitasan Black in this state. Better to let Kita challenge McQueen instead.
[The Overlord]'s cold logic served only one thing — victory. Emotions held no sway over her.
And so, in that moment, Kitasan Black made her charge at Mejiro McQueen's first-place position.
McQueen wasn't about to take Kita's challenge lightly — but she wasn't worried either.
'Let's see how much you've grown.'
...
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