In an instant, the competitors took off in a dead sprint. Their feet pushed off of the hard dirt that made up the track as they all burst forward. For a single second everyone was even, and then the twenty or so powers kicked in all at once. Wind, earth, water, fire, grass, steel, acid, and a melting pot of other powers flared to life. Before anyone could take a second step the race had become a desperate flurry of abilities and their owners who attempted to break away from the pack. One racer in particular flew forward with a burst of speed quickly setting the tone of the race.
"I don't believe what I'm seeing!" Matt shouted over the broadcast. "Enai Furuya of The Voyage is flying ahead!"
Bones quickly shot out of Enai's arms and legs and pulled her body forward like a giant hand pulling a puppet by its strings. They rapidly alternated making it like she was running with ten legs. She reached the first obstacle, a metal wall with footholes to climb over it. Enai's bones all pushed into the ground at the same time and then extended. The force launched Enai into the air where she cleared the wall without needing to slow down.
"Impressive," Takeshi thought as he watched Enai's technique, "she's alternating bones so that she doesn't overuse a single one and damage herself. The level of concentration needed to manage that many bones at once shows that the training they were doing must have worked."
A strange noise forced Enai to glance over her shoulder as she neared more obstacles. She saw the footholes in the wall do nothing to stop a pink slime from rushing through them. The slime reformed at the highest point to reveal Stacy's focused face.
"Come on, Stacy. I want my turn," a Racer half-cheered and half-complained at the screen near the final-leg runners.
"She can turn herself into some sort of slime," Hitsu analyzed, "this makes things difficult. She might be just as well equipped for this section of the track as Enai.
"This race has just started and it already looks like a race for third for everyone but The Voyage and The Weaving Witches!" Matt howled. "Enai has a nice lead but Stacy seems to have matched her pace!"
The crowd cheered, likely for Stacy more than the event itself. Enai didn't allow herself to lose focus as she approached the next obstacles. She pierced through another wall, climbed over a half-sphere made of metal bars, and leaped over a small trench that went through the track. Stacy hit the obstacles with the same intensity, her slime body allowing her to quickly push through any gaps in no time at all. Enai still held the lead by a fair margin as they approached the final obstacle, another metal wall that this time only had one hole. It was large enough to climb through but you would have to stop, put your legs through one at a time, and then pull your upper body through after.
"Too much time," Enai thought. She knew her lead would soon vanish if she lost any speed. Without hesitation, Enai continued towards the hole at full speed.
"Enai doesn't look like she's slowing down!" Matt announced surprised. "What does she plan on doing?"
The wall approached closer and closer until it was within reach of Enai's bony appendages. In one swift maneuver, the bones grabbed the wall all around the hole, and Enai pulled her body upward until he was parallel with the ground. She pulled her arms to her chest and pointed her body as straight as possible. The bones pulled forward and retracted into Enai's body. Enai was launched at high speeds, her body flying through the hole even faster than she had been running before. Before Enai's body could connect with the ground the bones shot out of her body and began to pull her closer to the end of her segment.
"Come on Spooky," Sel said under his breath.
Compared to the other members of his team Sel had the most amount of reasons to be nervous. Enai had a lead but not a comfortable one, his section was arguably the hardest, and Ida stood in the lane next to him.
"It's all a part of the plan," Sel reassured himself as he turned his body towards the towering mountain before him and extended his hand behind him. Enai lunged forward and retracted all but one bone from her index finger. The bone shot forward as far as Enai could manage before connecting with Sel's outstretched palm.
"Go!" Enai yelled.
Acting fast Sel was propelled into the air as fire burst from the soles of his shoes. As the momentum stopped Sel slammed his blades into the mountainside so he had no way of losing progress by falling. Then, as quickly as he could, he ripped the blades out of the mountain and shot himself upwards with a burst of flames from his feet. As he repeated the process all Sel could think was that he wasn't going as fast as Enai. While she could go one consistent speed he had to stop and pace himself. While an infinite amount of fire burns within him using enough of it to blast himself to the top would most definitely result in flames scorching another racer.
Sel breath was heavy as he climbed. The act of piercing the mountain was taking a lot out of him. He cursed the fact that he had to hold back. It was only a strange sound that would break him from his frustrated thoughts.
clink clink clink clink clink clink
An odd chorus of hard tapping sounds trailed underneath Sel. With the next burst of flames, he looked down to try and find the source of the noise. It was Ida. Her skin had changed from white to an almost sickly gray, small but sharp glinting fangs stuck out from her mouth, and most notably, her entire body from the torso down had been replaced with that of a spider. Six legs covered with a hard but flexible layer of skin stemmed from the spider-like abdomen with her upper body at the front. The sound Sel heard was her spider legs against the rocky surface of the mountain as she effortlessly ran towards the next leg of the race.
Sel slammed his blades into the mountain once again and the slowdown allowed Ida to scale past him, taking the lead in the process.
"Woah!" Matt announced, "Ida Weis has suddenly taken the lead!"
"Yes, Ida!" Racer cheered a little too loud for those around her. "Isn't she the coolest?" She asked Hitsu.
Hitsu didn't answer as he was mulling over the plan he had created.
"Ida's power is perfect for Sel's section," he thought. "This is rough. Placing Enai first was rewarding, but this was the risk."
Sel growled and panted as he watched Ida nearing the flattened top of the mountain while he was only three-fourths of the way finished. He went his frustration spiked when another racer passed him. As he stopped via his blades once again a girl with the power to turn her arms into wings flew by effortlessly.
"The Voyage is really struggling to maintain their ground on the uphill mountain!" Matt said energetically. The crowd cheered loudly, likely because they enjoyed seeing the hero team's struggle.
"Damn it!" Sel yelled without caring who may hear him. He knew that below him the pack of racers was approaching steadily. What was once a lead would quickly turn into a struggle to finish above fourth. "What the hell am I supposed to do?"
"Sel!" a yell made him look to the bottom of the mountain.
Enai stood with her face mask off and a circle of bones around her mouth. She extended them forward to make some sort of makeshift megaphone. The racers from the first leg looked at her like she was insane as she shouted.
"You can do it!" Enai yelled loud enough for Sel to make out from his place on the mountainside. "Just jump!" Enai commanded.
"Is she crazy?" Sel asked aloud, "I'm trying my best and she wants me to jump off of a damn mountain?"
Sel looked down at the sizeable distance between himself and Enai. He was very high up, the mountain itself comparable to the large buildings around it. If the mountain was thirty stories high he was nearing twenty-five. It was while he was thinking about the drop that Sel noticed something.
"She is crazy," Sel muttered to himself, "but smart."
"Sel Delmine has stopped!" Matt announced in surprise. "Have The Voyage given up?"
The crowd's cheers morphed. Some people laughed at the team's seeming defeat, some chatted to their neighbors in confusion, and others waited to see what would happen next.
"Watch this you two," Takeshi told Mirai and Shibata, "something stupid is about to happen."
Sel took one deep breath before placing his feet against the mountain. A burst of flames pushed against the titanic rock and Sel jumped, launching himself with a burst of speed and energy into the open air.
...
End of Episode 61