The Ludicrous Escapade Pt.3

Inherited

"Oh, look. The sun's starting to rise." You brought up a hand to shield your eyes from the blinding light. "Ah, shit. I didn't put on sunblock yet." You started sifting through your bags for it.

"Sunblock?" Gyro was holding a hand mirror while carefully applying his green lipstick. He needed to look good when he crossed the finish line in first place. "Is that the lotion stuff you usually put on your skin in the mornings?" Gyro had assumed it was just part of your daily makeup routine or something.

"Yeah. I get sunburned easily, so it helps prevent that." You let out a relieved sigh once you found the bottle.

"Then I guess it's good that we're already done with the desert stage. Winter should be coming soon, too." Johnny rubbed his lips together after reapplying his own lipstick. "But let's speed up a bit. We're nearing the final stretch."

Before long, all of the lead racers were gathered together. The usual leading racers, Sandman and Diego, were there. Pocoloco, Gaucho, Baba Yaga, and Dot Han had also managed to make it that far.

For some reason, Diego was sticking right behind Gyro. Under his left eye, his nickname 'Dio' had been written on his cheek in gold. It was probably a result of the corpse eye.

"Dio... on that mountain he's come to understand his Stand ability." Gyro watched Diego from the corner of his eye. "Is he going to start something here? Will he attack us?"

Johnny didn't think so. "There's no way Dio would risk getting disqualified right here in front of the goal where the balloons are all watching. He's planning to defeat you in this stage without breaking any rules. To him, moving past you is as good as moving past Sandman, which would lead him to victory. It's his fighting intuition!"

"His senses were already pretty good, but they've been heightened even more by his dinosaur ability." You were sure that Dio was already calculating everything about all of your horses.

Between the racers and the goal was a large lake. From the looks of things, there appeared to be two possible paths to take. A route to the right that was longer but had flatter ground and a route to the left that was shorter but much rockier.

"We have to go right, Gyro! Don't you dare say left!" Johnny knew his friend had a habit of picking the riskiest option. "Think of the horses! The key to victory will be how much rest we can give our horses!"

The Zeppeli pointed at his map rather aggressively. "Look, the depth of the lake is only 2.2 meters at its deepest. Valkyrie can cross it. The length is only 450 meters, super short." And without spending any time to discuss it with the group, he just went right on into the water. Diego followed right behind him.

"This is so stupid..." You encouraged Moxy to tag along. Gyro's plans usually ended decently. Though you supposed he had also never actually won in any of the stages so far.

"What? You've gotta be kidding!" Johnny was still standing at the edge of the lake. "Fuck! Damn it, Gyro!" He decided to follow along with the rest of his team. "This is nuts, Gyro! It's like a horse carrying another horse while crossing! The water resistance requires muscles that aren't normally used! What if there's mud at the bottom?! At that point our horse will be finished!"

"If that happens, I could have my Stand pull them out or whatever." If you felt like it, you could even ask Wamuu or Kars to just carry Moxy across the lake from underwater.

"We'll just go at a slow pace so we don't have to worry about it. That way it won't stress their limbs." Gyro was explaining his reasoning. "I'm going just the speed I need to get ahead of the rest of the people going around the lake! I'm sure that's what Dio's planning, too! I'm going to get one hundred points on this stage! No matter what! Or else we'll be even further from victory! I came to this race to win! My fatherland is waiting!"