Chapter 458: I’ve Already Won The Biggest Prize

"Ah—?!"

Sigrid’s entire body stiffened. But her momentum was already carrying her forward.

"WHOA!"

WHOOSH!

She shot past him. Her hooves dug violently into the dirt as she desperately attempted to brake. Her entire body leaned backwards, kicking up an enormous cloud of dust.

"Whoa, whoa, WHOA!"

She finally managed to stop several meters beyond the finish line. Then she spun around.

And there he was!

Luca was still standing in precisely the same spot with his hands were behind his back. His expression was perfectly composed like he hadn’t even broken a sweat.

"..."

"..."

"..."

Silence.

Absolute silence.

Nobody moved.

Nobody spoke.

The entire racetrack seemed to have forgotten how to breathe.

Finally—

"W-WHAT?"

One of the centaurs pointed at Luca.

"HOW?!"

Another practically fell over.

"HOW IS HE STANDING THERE?!"

"HE WAS AT THE OTHER END!"

"NO! NO, I SAW HIM! HE WAS STANDING RIGHT THERE!"

"THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!"

"WHAT KIND OF SPEED WAS THAT?!"

"HE DIDN’T EVEN RUN! HE JUST—HE JUST DISAPPEARED!"

"THAT WASN’T RUNNING! THAT WAS TELEPORTATION!"

"NO, I SAW THE DUST TRAIL! I CAN LITERALLY SEE IT NOW! HE MOVED!"

"THEN HOW FAST DO YOU HAVE TO BE TO DO THAT?!"

The racers who had been following Sigrid finally came to a halt, their mouths hanging open.

Riley stared at the ground where Luca had originally been standing. Then she looked at the finish line, then back at the ground.

"...I think I’m going to be sick."

"Mavis! Tell us!" Someone grabbed Mavis by the arm. "We won, right? Even though he crossed the line first, we still won, right? He must have cheated somehow!"

Mavis stared at the scene with glazed eyes. Even she, with all her intelligence and scientific logic, could not understand what had just happened.

The sheer, incomprehensible speed was beyond her calculation. Beyond her ability to measure. But she did no know one thing for sure.

"The winner..." Mavis said, and her voice cracked on the second syllable. "is...the Dummy Hero."

"NOOOOOOOOO!"

"MY COINS! MY BEAUTIFUL COINS!"

"I PUT EVERYTHING ON THIS RACE! EVERYTHING!"

The training ground devolved into a scene of absolute, unadulterated chaos.

Centaurs were collapsing to the ground, clutching their empty coin pouches like mourners at a funeral. Others were staring blankly into the distance, their spirits apparently having departed their bodies.

"I can’t believe it." Riley was saying, over and over. "I can’t believe it. We had him. We had him. One meter. One meter."

"I didn’t even see him move." Juno whispered, still staring at the crater at the starting line. "I was watching him. I swear on my ancestors, I was watching him the whole time!"

"Nobody saw him move." Ellie said, her voice hollow. "Because he didn’t move. He just...was. One place, then another place. Like..."

"Like a bolt of lightning." Riley finished, and the words hung in the air like a curse.

Poppy had buried her face in Thea’s shoulder, her small body shaking with sobs.

"My castles!" She wailed. "My beautiful castles! I was going to name one Poppy’s Palace and the other one Thea’s Tower and now they’re both gone! The Evil Hero stole my castles!"

The elders, on the other hand, wore smug expressions.

"Aha! We knew this would happen!"

"The Hero may be many things, but a fool who would give away an easy win? Never!"

"We placed only small bets. We are quite content with our losses."

The younger ones turned to them with accusations in their eyes.

"You knew! You all knew he was going to win!"

"Why didn’t you warn us?!"

The elders exchanged glances, their smiles perfectly serene.

"Because there are some things you have to experience yourself." One of them said. "Even if I’m the end you become bankrupt, it’s necessary for you lot to understand the dangers of betting it all on your misguided confidence."

The younger centaurs felt bitter but some of them thought that made sense, as it was a deep learning lesson which didn’t cost them too much other then some fake currency.

—

Meanwhile, Mavis realising that she and Luca had basically scammed everyone was thinking of escaping. But unfortunately she was too late as one of the centaurs grabbed her.

"MAVIS! I WANT A REFUND!"

"On what grounds?" Mavis stared at her in dismay.

"ON THE GROUNDS THAT THE HERO ISN’T HUMAN!"

"...He is human."

"THEN WHY DOES HE MOVE LIKE THAT?!"

"That’s not something I can answer!" She tried to push her away and run.

But the centaur wasn’t having it and soon others were asking the same.

"MAVIS GIVE ME A REFUND NOW!"

"THIS IS A SCAM AND YOU KNOW IT!"

"IT’S THE ALCOHOL I SWEAR! I WOULDN’T HAVE BEEN SCAMMED IF I WAS SOBER!"

Mavis pinched the bridge of her nose.

’This is exactly why I don’t like running these events.’

—

Meanwhile, the little ones had a completely different reaction.

They weren’t crying over their lost money. They weren’t even particularly concerned about the gambling operation.

They were staring at Luca with enormous eyes that were full of adoration.

"Whoa..." Nella slowly approached the edge of the racetrack. "Did you see that? HE WENT BOOM!"

"I SAW!"

"HE WAS THERE AND THEN HE WAS THERE!"

"HE’S SO FAST!"

Another little one was practically bouncing in place.

"Evil Hero! Evil Hero! Do it again!"

"YES! DO IT AGAIN!"

"CAN YOU RUN ALL THE WAY AROUND THE VILLAGE?!"

"CAN YOU RUN FASTER THAN LIGHTNING?!"

"CAN YOU RUN ON WATER?!"

Luca looked at the little ones and chuckled.

"Perhaps another time."

"YAAAAAY!"

The children erupted into cheers. One of them even attempted to imitate his movement, crouching down and thrusting herself forward.

"BOOOOOOM!"

She immediately tripped over her own hooves.

"OW!"

The others burst into laughter.

But amidst all the commotion, Sigrid hadn’t moved.

She was still standing beyond the finish line, while her gaze was fixed on Luca.

’What...was that?’

She replayed the moment in her mind.

The starting position.

The finish line.

The distance.

The speed at which she had been running.

’I didn’t even see him move.’

Her ears lowered slightly.

’In fact, I didn’t see anything.’

She remembered the sound.

That tremendous, sudden cracking noise.

And then he was there.

In that moment she realised that all this time he had been playing and holding back.

The restrictions. The divine rules that bound him turned him human. But this was not a duel. There were no swords drawn, no challenges issued. He was free to be what he truly was.

And what he truly was...

An immortal.

A being who’d done things so extraordinary that the gods themselves had placed limits on him.

And she had thought she could beat him in a race. She had thought her speed was special.

’Haa...How foolish of you Sigrid.’ She let out a wry smile and shook her head mockingly. ’To think that you could actually defeat and attain glory for the entire village...what childish ambitions.’

But even as the chaos of crushed dreams swirled around her, Sigrid felt no disappointment at all.

It was strange. She had lost and yet, as she stood there watching Luca walk toward her with that insufferable smile on his face, the only thing she felt was...

Pride.

A deep, swelling, undeniable pride that made her chest feel too small to contain it. Because the man who had sat on her back, stroked her fur and kissed her senseless behind the privacy of the stables was magnificent.

And if anyone was going to defeat her...

It should be him. It could only ever be him.

"You’re smiling." Luca said, stopping in front of her. His head tilted, curiosity flickering in his eyes. "You just lost everything you had, and you’re smiling like you won the whole world."

He frowned warily as he added, "Don’t tell me this is one of those moments where the girl is smiling but she’s secretly furious inside, because I’ve seen that before and it never ends well for me."

Sigrid’s smile only widened. "It’s nothing like that."

"Then what? You’ve got that look. The one that says you’re thinking about something."

"I was just imagining." She said, her voice taking on a dreamy quality. "How fast you already are as a human. And then I was imagining..." She paused, her ears twitching. "How fast you would be if you had the lower half of a horse as well."

Luca thought about it.

"You would be unstoppable." Sigrid continued, warming to the idea. "Faster than anything that has ever existed. You could probably run across the entire continent in the time it takes me to draw my sword."

"Maybe." Luca said, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. "Or maybe not. The physics of it might get complicated." He studied her for a moment. "Let me ask you something. Would you prefer me as I am now? Or would you rather I had horse legs like the rest of you?"

Luca knew how these things worked—different races tended to prefer partners with similar features. An elf was more attracted to another elf. A beastkin to another beastkin.

It was simply how attraction functioned in this world. And he was genuinely curious where Sigrid stood.

But Sigrid didn’t hesitate. Not for a single heartbeat.

"Human." She said, her voice firm and certain. "I would much rather you stay exactly as you are."

Luca’s eyebrows rose. "Really? Not even a little tempted by the horse legs?"

"If you had the lower half of a centaur." Sigrid pointed out. "I wouldn’t be able to carry you as my rider. You wouldn’t fit. The whole covenant would be pointless."

"That’s...actually a very practical answer."

"And besides." Sigrid added, her voice dropping so low that Luca almost missed it. "I wouldn’t be able to take your...s-sword out and play with it the way I do if you had a centaur’s lower half."

Luca’s head snapped toward her. "What was that?"

"Nothing!" Sigrid’s face erupted in crimson. "I said nothing at all! The wind! It was the wind!"

"That was definitely not the wind."

"It’s very windy today! Let’s go!"

And before Luca could press further, Sigrid dropped to her knees with the speed of a soldier taking cover from enemy fire.

"Get on! The races are starting again and I want to watch!"

Luca climbed onto her back, still chuckling. "You know I heard you, right?"

"You heard nothing! Get comfortable and be quiet."

"As my commander commands."

Sigrid rose to her full height and began walking toward the crowd that was already forming for the next race.

"Are you going to bet again?" Luca suddenly asked out of curiosity.

She was quiet for a moment, watching the racers line up at the starting post. The thrill of the gamble was still there, lurking beneath her skin like an itch she couldn’t quite scratch.

But then glanced behind and got her answer.

"No...Not at all."

"Really? The great winning streak is over?"

"I’ve already won the biggest prize I could possibly get." Her voice was barely a whisper. "I don’t need anything more."

Luca opened his mouth to ask what she meant—but Sigrid was already plunging into the crowd, her voice rising to join the cheers as the next race began.

And if her cheeks were still faintly pink, well. It was probably just the cold.