The Lancia Rally 037 and the Ford Sierra RS Cosworth rolled into the base of the mountain, their engines crackling as they cooled, the last growl of combustion fading into the crisp night air. Gravel crunched under their tires as they came to a stop, faint steam hissing from under the hoods, curling upward under the stark glare of floodlights. The vehicles idled briefly before falling silent, their exhausts ticking with residual heat.
Both drivers stepped out. Sweat matted Yoimiya's bangs to her forehead; her breathing was heavy, her expression caught somewhere between defeat and admiration. She crossed the short distance between them, one hand raking through her hair.
"I don't know how you did it," she admitted, her voice low, carrying a thread of disbelief. "But you won. Congrats." She extended her hand—firm, honest. No theatrics.
Clorinde took it. Her grip was steady, strong. "Well," she replied coolly, "I just drove how I always do. But thanks."
Yoimiya gave a dry chuckle, her gaze sliding to the two battered machines. Scuffed quarter panels. Brake dust. A faint tang of cooked rubber clung to the air. "I spun out on that right hairpin," she muttered. "Rear kicked out and I couldn't reel it back in. Shit happens."
Clorinde's eyes narrowed slightly, but she said nothing. Bullshit, she thought. You didn't lose grip. You lost focus. But outwardly, her voice remained neutral.
"It's racing. The unpredictable happens."
Yoimiya nodded slowly. "You bet."
The unspoken tension dissolved in the shared language of racers—mutual respect born from the road itself. A nod passed between them, and they stepped away in separate directions.
The mountain had made its choice.
Back at the base, the air was electric again. The first battle was over, but the second loomed like a storm cloud. Mechanics moved with urgency, adjusting tire pressures and checking gauges. Onlookers murmured from behind barriers, their eyes shifting between the parked cars and the two approaching drivers.
Collei and Chiori walked toward one another with slow, measured steps. Neither spoke immediately. Their eyes did the talking. No pretense. No trash talk. Just mutual recognition—two competitors preparing to lock horns.
Collei broke the silence. "I'm Collei. Team Speed Stars." She extended her hand. Her tone was calm, but a wire-tight current of intensity buzzed beneath it.
Chiori tilted her head, a faint, self-assured smile touching her lips. "Chiori," she said, simply. "Pleasure's all mine."
They shook hands—brief, firm, clean. Then turned and walked to their cars.
Collei slid into the AE86 like it was second nature. The door shut with a hard click. The black-and-white paint reflected the overhead lighting like porcelain under moonlight. She cinched the five-point harness tight across her chest, one strap at a time, with the silent precision of a veteran.
A knock tapped against the window.
She turned—Keqing stood there, expression sharp, voice just audible over the ambient noise as Collei cracked the window.
"By the way," Keqing said, "you're leading."
Collei gave a single, affirmative nod. Her eyes locked forward. "Understood."
She rolled the window back up.
Ahead, the road snaked up into the mountains like a coiled serpent. The AE86 waited on the line, twitching gently as its idle ticked. Behind it, the S13 loomed in stark contrast—white and gold, Rocket Bunny kit stretching wide like armor. Its deep, guttural idle rumbled with menace.
Inside the S13, Chiori leaned forward in her bucket seat, eyes locked on the hatchback's modest frame ahead of her.
"This is it?" she muttered to herself. "This is the Eight-Six I've been hearing about? Looks like something some kid would use to learn donuts in a parking lot. Doesn't look like much to me…"
Up front, Collei glanced sideways to the line judge.
Keqing raised her hand.
Thumbs up from Collei.
Engines built pressure. RPMs climbed. Clutches hovered at the bite point.
The crowd held its breath.
Two cars. Two drivers. One winding descent through darkness and danger.
The mountain waited.
Keqing raised her hand high, her voice ringing out over the gathered crowd and the thrumming pulse of idling engines.
"Let's start the countdown!"
"FIVE!"
"FOUR!"
"THREE!"
"TWO!"
"ONE!"
"GO!"
Her hand snapped downward like a blade. Clutches dumped. Throttles pegged.
The AE86 and the Rocket Bunny S13 launched off the line, rear tires shrieking as they bit into the asphalt. A cloud of tire smoke burst into the air behind them, dissipating into the cold mountain night. Both machines surged forward, engines wailing at the top of their lungs, diving into the opening left-hander with frightening cohesion.
No hesitation. No second-guessing. Just raw aggression.
The two cars arced through the curve like twin projectiles, their chassis balanced on a razor's edge. The AE86, with its tight suspension geometry and low center of gravity, slipped through with minimal roll. The S13 followed, wider and heavier, but brutishly composed.
As they slingshot out of the corner and onto the first straight, the headlights cut clean lines through the darkness. For a moment, it was quiet—just the howl of engines and the thrum of tires carving the road.
Inside the AE86, Collei's fingers gripped the Nardi steering wheel with deliberate tension. Her eyes flicked up to the rearview mirror—just a split-second glance.
The S13 was there. Low. Menacing. Tucked in tight like a blade waiting to strike.
"She's got the power advantage," Collei muttered to herself, voice low, calm. "There's no denying that."
Her eyes returned to the road, hands steady, feet dancing across the pedals.
"But what I lose on the straights, I take back in the corners."
The tach needle surged—8500… 9500… 10,200. The 4A-GE 20V screamed with all the fury of a high-compression demon, the tone sharp, metallic, aggressive. The revs flirted with the 11,000 RPM redline. Collei's hand snapped to the shifter—clean, mechanical—slamming it into fourth.
The AE86 jolted forward, its acceleration modest but persistent, clawing every ounce of momentum from the engine's top-end.
Behind her, Chiori's S13 surged. The turbo spooled hard, torque slamming into the driveline. The SR20DET bellowed, its guttural note ripping through the trees as she mashed the throttle, the boost gauge pinned. She was closing—just barely.
But something was off. Something didn't make sense.
"What the hell?" Chiori muttered, eyes narrowing. "This is a beginner's car. Lightweight. Underpowered. It's not supposed to be fast."
The AE86 ahead bounced slightly over uneven pavement, its tail twitching just a hair—controlled chaos. Collei was wringing the life out of that little hatchback, dragging every last bit of speed from the chassis.
"I still can't figure it out," Chiori said under her breath, tightening her grip on the wheel. "What the hell is she doing that's making it move like that?"
She downshifted hard into third, rev-matched perfectly, and floored it out of the short straight. The S13 responded with raw force, lurching forward as the turbo screamed.
"Doesn't matter," she said sharply, shaking off her doubt. "On the straights, I've got her. That's what counts."
But the mountain didn't favor brute strength. Not here.
And the corners were coming.
Fast.
Back at the base, Keqing and Ningguang stood side by side, eyes locked onto a monitor flickering with the live feed of the mountain pass. The road shimmered faintly under the cold starlight, captured in pale grayscale by the feed's infrared filters. The twin sets of headlights carved through the dark like burning comets slashing the sky—one a steady, focused beam; the other wild and furious, bouncing with raw aggression.
The low hum of the command van's generator rumbled behind them, drowned beneath the static buzz of the camera feed and the distant echo of revving engines.
Keqing was the first to speak, voice low but firm. "About our conversation earlier…"
Ningguang didn't look away from the screen. "What about it?"
Keqing tilted her head, thoughtful. "What exactly is so special about Collei's phenomenon? You've hinted at it, but you haven't given me the whole picture."
Ningguang exhaled slowly, her arms folding across her chest, her expression unreadable. "It's similar to Clorinde's 'Rapperia Zone'—but with critical differences."
She pointed to the screen as the AE86 and S13 streaked into the second sector of Mt. Kanna. "Clorinde's Zone showed up early in her career—during her first race with us. Against Heizou. Sudden bursts of acceleration. Half a car length, maybe. It's powerful, but it's… irregular. Spontaneous."
Keqing nodded slowly, absorbing the weight of each word.
"But Collei's 'Cuilein Zone'..." Ningguang continued, voice tightening with intensity. "It didn't awaken until much later. It didn't happen until her battle with Diluc. But once it did—"
She hesitated, choosing her words with precision.
"—it rewrote the rules."
Keqing arched a brow. "Rewrote?"
Ningguang's eyes were sharp now, cutting through the veil of disbelief. "Collei's phenomenon isn't sporadic like Clorinde's. It's repeatable. Controlled. And when it activates, she doesn't gain half a car length. She gains one. Sometimes two. Instantly. Like she's warping ahead in real-time."
Keqing's jaw clenched. "Two full car lengths?! That's… that's absurd."
"It is," Ningguang admitted, her tone somber. "And yet it's real. I've seen it. Measured it. Reviewed the data frame by frame. It's like the car's center of gravity becomes liquid. Like she phases into a pocket of momentum the rest of us can't reach."
Keqing looked at the monitor again, watching the AE86 cling to the inside line like it was magnetized to the asphalt.
"She's been with that car for over five years," Ningguang added. "She's grown with it. She's delivered tofu in it, raced in it, lived in that driver's seat. Every sound, every vibration, every twitch of the chassis—she knows it on a molecular level. The AE86 isn't a machine to her. It's a limb."
Ningguang's voice softened, almost reverent. "That kind of connection… can't be taught. It's earned. Mile after mile. Night after night."
She turned her gaze to the mountain's dark silhouette, etched against the silver sky. "Collei is special, Keqing. She's not just a great driver. She's on track to be a legend."
Silence settled like mist. Only the pulse of engines—faint, rhythmic—kept them tethered to the moment.
And Ningguang, as it turned out, was absolutely right.
Up on the course, the second sector was already underway—a brutal stretch of switchbacks and hairpins that tested reflexes, grip, and nerve. The AE86 led the charge, slicing through the S-curves with ghost-like finesse. The Rocket Bunny S13, loud and feral, trailed close behind, its boosted engine snarling through the night like a wolf in pursuit.
Inside the AE86, Collei was locked in. Both hands on the wheel, fingers tense but precise. Her eyes flicked across the road ahead, her breathing shallow but rhythmic.
She entered the first right-hander of the S-curve, dialing in just the right amount of steering angle. Weight transfer, throttle feathered—perfect.
And then it happened.
The rear tires gripped harder than physics should have allowed. The chassis twisted just so. And in a blink, the AE86 vaulted forward—an entire car length—like it had been slingshot into the next dimension.
Inside the S13, Chiori's eyes widened in disbelief. "What the hell was that?!"
She gritted her teeth, slamming the accelerator to the floor. The turbo howled in response, the boost gauge pegged as the S13 surged forward, fighting to reclaim lost ground.
She caught up by the time they exited the S-curves, but her chest heaved from the effort.
They hit a short straight. The S13 bellowed. The AE86 stayed just ahead.
Then came the hairpin.
Collei braked late—unreasonably late. She kicked the clutch, tapped the shifter down, and pitched the car in. All four tires screamed, the rear end flaring outward in a perfect arc.
Then boom—another burst.
The AE86 surged ahead again, like the hand of some invisible god had grabbed its spoiler and flung it forward.
Two car lengths. Gone in an instant.
Chiori's hands trembled. "What the fuck is she doing? That's not possible!"
But she didn't back down. Not yet. Her straight-line speed was still superior. The next straight let her close the gap. One car length. Then a half.
Collei glanced in the rearview. Her lips curled upward.
"Still chasing me, huh?"
They approached a tight right-hander. Collei flung the AE86 sideways in a full four-wheel drift, her countersteering razor-sharp. As the car exited the corner, the Cuilein Zone activated again—the AE86 launched forward in a streak of green-tinged motion blur, its taillights carving neon hieroglyphs into the night.
Chiori braked into the same corner, but when she exited—the Eight-Six was already gone. Two car lengths. Then three. Then four.
Her grip tightened until her knuckles went white. "She's pulling away... again?!"
Another left-hand hairpin approached. Another burst. The AE86 flew through the exit, now five and a half car lengths ahead.
Chiori was silent.
No screaming. No cursing.
Just awe.
Then she saw it. A faint glow. Cyan-green light enveloping the AE86 like mist catching moonlight. And then—wings. Ethereal, translucent, stretching from the sides like some mythological creature reborn from steel and rubber.
Chiori's breath caught.
"She's… she's flying."
The AE86 dove into a long sweeping left, and with one final activation, it vanished—devoured by the mountain shadows.
By the time Chiori reached the same corner, the AE86 was gone.
She let off the throttle, heart pounding. "It's over."
A pause. Then, a soft, reluctant smile. "She's good. No—she's brilliant."
Fifteen minutes later, the base of Mt. Kanna was alive with energy. Cheers erupted from Team Speed Stars. Laughter, clapping, the rhythmic thump of car doors closing—joy in motion.
In the center of the celebration, Collei and Clorinde stood tall. Hands clasped, shoulders back, eyes gleaming. With their free hands, they each raised a single finger in unison—number one.
Their smiles weren't forced. They were unguarded. Real.
From a distance, Ningguang watched, her arms still folded, her expression softening.
"They've evolved…" she whispered.
She glanced up at the stars—at the cold sky that had watched all their battles, their scars, their triumphs.
"One more expedition," she murmured. "One last challenge before it ends. Then... Ace versus Ace. Collei and Clorinde. The final reckoning."
Her gaze dropped back to her drivers—those two reckless, brilliant souls who now basked in the spotlight not as rivals, but as comrades.
"They've changed," she said aloud. "And I'm proud to be their team leader. Very. Fucking. Proud."
She stepped forward, cutting through the crowd, then pulled both girls into a tight, unapologetic hug.
"I'm proud of you," she said, voice thick with emotion. "Both of you."
Collei and Clorinde smiled at each other, their bond forged not just in victory—but in trust, grit, and respect.
The night wound down slowly. The air was filled with laughter and engine noise, but in their minds, a quiet anticipation had begun to build.
Autake Pass awaited.
Their final expedition.
The beginning of the end.
But for now, Team Speed Stars celebrated under the stars—a night they would never forget.