It was afternoon at Tracen Academy. The sound of sweat dripping onto the gray track mingled with the ragged gasps of training horse girls.
Except for one corner of the track.
There, a silver-haired shadow was performing what could only be described as a bizarre act of self-torture, completely at odds with the disciplined training of the others.
Yorozuya Eiyuu felt like she was about to die. No, she felt worse than dead. Every muscle in her body screamed in agony, a lingering echo of the morning's hellish session. But beneath the pain, she could feel the phantom of monstrous strength and the aftershocks of the neurotrophic supplement.
Stronger? Did I get stronger?
She wasn't sure. Right now, all she could feel was the urge to tear her own limbs off.
The other horse girls on the track gave her a wide berth. From their perspective, a girl who had been standing still for ten minutes suddenly began twitching and muttering to herself. She looked like she had heatstroke. A group of them stood nearby, pointing and whispering.
"Hey... isn't that the 'Lucky Lolita' from Fuji Kiseki's dorm?"
Eiyuu heard their whispers as a distant, distorted hum. The world around her seemed to warp and melt, the ground shifting like an oil painting. It was a side effect of the sensory overload.
Everything was spinning. Everything was chaos.
A torrent of power, the remnant of the "Phantom Dragon," was rampaging through her body, a chained beast straining against its shackles.
She wanted to run.
Her body shot forward like a cannonball, leaving an almost invisible afterimage in its wake. The ground cracked under the explosive force of her start. A sound like a sonic boom ripped through the air, sending a nearby flock of birds scattering in terror.
High-speed drifts, sudden lateral shifts, chaotic and unpredictable footwork... she moved like a discordant dance across the track. She was a blur, a streak of light that defied logic.
As she blazed past a group of horse girls who were practicing their starts, they were hit by a gust of wind so powerful it nearly knocked them over.
One of them screamed. "Ghost!"
Yorozuya Eiyuu, in a fleeting moment of clarity amidst the sensory storm, thought to herself, Ah... I've been found out!
The onlookers on the track scattered in terror.
"Gah! My eyes!" Saki yelled from the sidelines, shielding them with her hand. The pain was apparently contagious. "She's so fast!"
But her voice was filled with excitement.
Kitahara stood beside her, stopwatch in hand, her expression frozen in disbelief. A thin gray shadow flashed past her, and she instinctively clicked the button. Her other hand, holding the watch, was trembling.
"How is it?" Saki asked nervously.
"She broke... she broke the 800-meter record..." Kitahara stammered, her voice cracking. "And the Symboli Rudolf training record... Now she's... she's approaching the G3 race qualifying time..."
"What?!" Saki shrieked. "Isn't she a newcomer who's been training chaotically for just a few days? How is that possible?!"
Kitahara stared at the unbelievable numbers on her stopwatch. The world seemed to be crumbling around her. Just a few days ago, this girl was a complete amateur. Now, she was a monster.
The commotion had attracted the attention of the other trainers. Their initial expressions of confusion and pity had morphed into shock and awe. They looked from the silver blur on the track to the indifferent, black-haired youth leaning against the railing. He had a look on his face that said, "This has nothing to do with me."
That maniac... That was the name they had given him, and it was now spreading through the crowd.
Sakikawa ignored them all. His virtual screen displayed Eiyuu's real-time data, her heart rate, her speed, her trajectory. He watched the numbers climb, his expression unreadable.
The furious race finally ended. The afterimage faded from the track, and the world returned to normal.
The roaring sound in his ears subsided, but the feeling of shock remained.
Kitahara and Saki exchanged a look. "My eyes aren't playing tricks on me, right?" Kitahara whispered. "That's her... the girl from yesterday? Fuji Kiseki's dorm mate?"
Saki stared, her mouth agape. "She... she was being beaten into a pretzel this morning..."
It was her. The girl they had seen being "tortured" by that man. This wasn't training. This was some kind of twisted ritual!
They turned their furious gazes on Sakikawa, who was still leaning against the railing, looking bored.
"I'm breaking... this level of sensory stimulation is just too much..." he muttered to himself, pinching the bridge of his nose as if annoyed by the whole affair. He then turned his unnervingly calm eyes towards Eiyuu. "Just this?"
A demonic voice echoed in his mind. He straightened up, about to head toward the track.
"You call this acceleration?!" Kitahara shouted, unable to contain herself. She stormed over to him. "My grandma scrambling eggs at the market has more rhythm than this! Why don't you just teach her to fly?!"
The surrounding trainers murmured in agreement. Was this man human?
Saki grabbed Kitahara's arm. "Don't!" she hissed. "This person is sick! Can't you see the look in his eyes?"
On the track, Eiyuu's mad dash came to an end. The last of the "Phantom Dragon's" power fizzled out. Her body, soft and pliant just a moment ago, now felt like a lead weight. Before she could even process it, her legs gave out.
She collapsed.
The next second, she was caught.
She was being held up.
A hand, surprisingly steady, was supporting her.
Her entire body screamed. Every muscle fiber, every bone, every joint was on fire.
But beneath the agony, there was a memory. The exhilaration of the run, the thrill of speed, the feeling of absolute, unrestrained power. It was an addictive sensation.
This power... it was hers.
The pain felt like a small price to pay. It was a testament to her own strength.
A new desire, a thirst for that power, began to burn within her. She wanted to feel that again. She wanted to feel that surge of power that could shatter her own soul.
She pushed herself up, dragging her exhausted body through the crowd of shocked onlookers. They parted for her like she was a monster. She walked until she stood before Hyuuga Sakikawa.
"I..." she began, her voice trembling, not from exhaustion, but from a budding excitement. "Have I... become stronger?"
Sakikawa looked down at her. His gaze was like that of an appraiser examining a rough, unpolished diamond. He reached out and patted her on the head, a gesture that held no warmth whatsoever. "It's got nothing to do with me," he said, a devilish smile spreading across his face. "But... not bad."
"Since you're so eager," he continued, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "I've 'arranged' next week's training schedule for you."
His eyes, burning with a strange, calculating fire, were already looking past her, planning her debut battle. It was time to test his 'product' and collect some practical combat data.
Just then, a notification appeared in his vision.
[The 'Phantom Dragon' initial adaptation is stable. Gene stabilization is confirmed.]
[Unlocking the next stage of gene optimization—[Bedrock Dragon].]
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