Alice woke up from her slumber and started her early morning routine. She began with a kilometer jog around her neighborhood before sunrise, followed by a 10-minute bath. Afterward, she would wear her school uniform, have breakfast with her grandpa, and head to school. That's the usual morning routine of our protagonist, Alice Shah. After school, she would take a bus to the Akinabalu Circuit to practice for the upcoming race.
"The Akinabalu Circuit feels lively today, it seems like teams are coming in to practice for the upcoming race." Alice pondered to herself.
Alice walks towards Akinabalu Motorsport's garage, located at the Akinabalu circuit. The Akinabalu CIrcuit provides garages for teams participating in the race. They usually rent a garage a week before a race to prepare their cars. As Alice walks inside the garage, she stumbles upon the manager and Ghazali standing by the break room.
"Morning Manager!" She greeted.
"Morning to you too Alice." The manager replied.
"Morning Ally" Ghazali greets Alice.
"Good morning Gaz. Wait why did you call me Ally?" Alice said seemingly surprised.
"Yep, I usually give people nicknames to remember them better." He told her.
"Whatever you say I guess." Alice said to him.
Alice proceeded to the break room and changed into her racing attire. Alice went to inspect her car and touched the number on her car feeling the responsibility for the number she represented.
"Morning kid." Sugimoto greeted her with a head pat.
"You're getting too comfortable with petting me Senpai." She said feeling annoyed by it.
"Haha, let's get to training." He chuckled.
"Ah, not lazing around this time huh?" Alice teases him.
"The manager locked away the sofa somewhere and I don't know where he hid it. So I don't have much of a choice." Sugimoto said as he scratched his head wondering where the sofa was hidden.
The manager is seen in the distance twirling his keys and smirking at Sugimoto.
"So I guess we should do some jogging right?" Sugimoto asked Alice.
"Yup, let's lap around the garages while the others get ready." Alice said to him.
They began lapping around the garages for a while. As they were jogging, they saw other teams preparing their cars. Alice although athletic, struggled to keep up with Sugimoto as he suddenly sped up.
"S-Senpai, slow down for a bit." She said to him.
Sugimoto looked behind and noticed her falling behind. Sugimoto slowed down to match her pace and continued jogging.
"You have high stamina for being a couch potato Senpai." Alice said while trying to catch her breath.
"Well, I'm used to it by now." Sugimoto replies casually.
"Used to it eh?" Alice muttered and reminisced about the times he slacked off.
"Well to be fair, you have to double your efforts since your legs are short." Sugimoto teases her.
Alice stopped jogging and stood on the sidewalk for a while. Sugimoto looked behind and saw her clutching her fist.
"SUGIMOTO!" Alice screamed as she charged at him.
Sugimoto notices Alice suddenly charging towards him and begins sprinting away from her.
"Kid, We're supposed to be training not playing!" Sugimoto said as he ran for his life.
