Three Goddesses Blessed

One Story's End

"And she clears the finish line!"

The crowd went up in a roar, their voices cheering as the woman on the track flew by the finish line yet again. This woman held her head low as she soared by the camera, a running style so unorthodox that few have attempted it without eating dirt.

Here she was, the one and only master of such a dangerous style of running: Her body low, her legs long, and she cut through the air like a knife.

She raised herself back up from such a low stance, coming to a stop as she looked back to see where her opposition had gotten in her sprint to the finish. As expected, only she had crossed yet, the closest runner up was just about to cross over and already looked discouraged by the extravagant loss.

She was ahead by over ten lengths, and such a thing was a normal occurrence for a talent such as herself.

The girl crossed the finish line and came to a stop, huffing intensely at the run she put on in an attempt to catch up. It was fruitless, but many in the audience can't fault her for trying, especially those that simply wanted to see a race.

For you see, this was the first real race our winner had in a while. The only ones on the track were her and the runner up, an unusually small pool of racers for a graded race such as this.

But alas, and has become common to say, "it's only natural when you factor her".

This special attention she received was great, the praise she was given phenomenal, the glory of being her nation's pride and joy unmatched. Why, she enjoyed every second of this for so long, for so many races where she stood head and shoulders above the rest.

She was the best! The greatest! The unmatched!

She was...

...

She was tired of it now.

Addictions spiral all who suffer from them, but is there such a thing as an addiction to victory? Can one suffer from being too good at something?

As she found out...yes, one can indeed become such.

She approached the runner up, her own breath hardly faltering as she offered the girl a hand. She looked up from her hyperventilation, seeing the calm and stoic look on the winner's face.

"You...why are you...?"

"Why not?"

She went silent for a moment, before accepting the gesture and getting to her two feet with the winner's help. She sighed and stretched her legs, shaking them and trying to loosen the soreness that was sure to come after such a powerful race.

But for the winner? She had other goals in mind.

She walked onwards and towards the announcer's stand, her arms folded behind her back in her usual authoritative stance. She was haughty yes, but all who knew her knew she earned every bit of that arrogance.

An arrogance she deemed as poison.

"Such an incredible race we've witnessed once again! For all to see, our star has taken her victory yet again!" The announcer was ecstatic as all others were, but he calmed down rather quick seeing as the winner was approaching his table.

"Ah...d-did you need something? Did you want to say something to the crowd?" His politeness was helpful, and so the winner nodded and held her hand out for the microphone.

He disconnected it from the stand and passed it over, where she tapped it a few times just to make sure it worked right. With that confirmed, she cleared her throat and looked up to the crowd.