The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 213

Chapter 213: 213 | Adequate is the New Excellent

We completed the second lap.

Camille was starting to slow. Her lead had shrunk to maybe five feet and her breathing was audible from twenty feet back. Theo had closed the gap and was running just behind her left shoulder with the patient confidence of someone who knew exactly how this was going to end.

The back of the pack was spreading out now as individual fitness levels became impossible to hide. Rina had fallen behind, her steps heavy and her face flushed with effort. Percy was running beside her, his notebook somehow still in his hand, offering what looked like pacing advice that she was too winded to implement.

I pushed slightly harder, letting myself move up in the pack without being obvious about it. My body wanted to run, actually run, to use the strength and speed that the System had given me. Holding back felt like trying to breathe through a straw when you had perfectly good lungs.

But the alternative was worse. Steele was still watching. Her tablet was still recording. And somewhere in the data she was collecting, she was building a profile of each student that would inform how she treated us for the next two years.

I needed her profile of me to be useful.

Strong enough to be taken seriously. Weak enough to not be investigated. Mysterious enough to keep her guessing. Consistent enough to be believable.

It was exhausting, being strategic all the time. I understood why Caden defaulted to underperformance. It was just easier.

We rounded the corner into the third lap.

Theo made his move. He accelerated past Camille with a burst of speed that caught her off guard, opening up a gap of his own while she struggled to respond. Her earlier pace was catching up with her now and her legs weren’t answering with the same authority they had at the start.

Camille’s face twisted with frustration. She tried to respond, to dig deeper and find another gear, but her body had already given what it had to give. She was running on willpower now and willpower only got you so far when your muscles were full of lactic acid.

"She’s going to hurt herself," Felicity murmured.

She was right. Camille was pushing through the wall instead of accepting that the wall existed, and that kind of stubbornness could lead to injuries that took weeks to heal.

Theo crossed the line for the start of the fourth lap with a comfortable lead. Camille was second but fading. The middle of the pack had compressed as the stronger runners pulled away and the weaker runners fell behind.

I was in maybe seventh or eighth place, exactly where I wanted to be. Fast enough to be respectable. Slow enough to not raise questions.

Felicity had dropped back slightly, her breathing more labored now. She was in decent shape but not great shape, the kind of fitness that came from general activity rather than dedicated training.

"Go ahead," she said when she noticed me matching her pace. "You’re holding back for me."

"I’m holding back for lots of reasons."

"Flatterer." She smiled despite her obvious fatigue. "Go. Finish strong. I’ll be fine."

I hesitated. Part of me wanted to stay with her, to offer company through the final lap the way Percy was offering company to Rina. But she was right that I was holding back, and holding back too obviously was almost as bad as not holding back at all.

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