Intersections

Ki was quickly approaching the first turn and shouted. "Easy! Haw!"

In response to her words, the dogs pulling the sled had started to slow down their running speed before reaching the flag.

Rather than rushing past the flag at a greater speed that was difficult to stop or manoeuvre, the slowed down sled had enough time to be pulled to the left to make a careful turn that was perfectly done.

The footsteps behind her had grown louder as shouts repeated. "Haw! Haw! Haw!"

"Easy! Haw!"

More experienced people who were more used to rushing the races using less caution had kept a faster pace than Ki had done on the turn.

Among them was the man who had appeared behind her and shouted once they were on a wider and straighter path. "On by! On by!"

He commanded his team of sled dogs to pull him ahead at a greater speed so that they would pull in front of Ki to take her over.

An intersection of different trails had appeared up ahead which everyone could choose to enter and navigate through.

Ki observed the sled pulling up by her side as it swerved closely in front of Nova which was quite a dangerous act towards her lead dog. 'Hah. He really is playing dirty.'

She quickly shouted. "Easy! Straight! Ahead!"

The intersections ahead were to go down the middle, left or right so once she had commanded to go straight, the one ahead seemed to block her own path ahead.

It meant that they would try to get in her way the whole time on that path and would stick to her long enough to annoy or even cause her harm.

The slowed speed from her command had helped to gain some distance and control over the sled dogs so once she had reached an acceptable distance from the intersection, she changed her command. "Easy! Haw!"

"Awoo."

"Huff huff."

It was already too late for the person ahead to change their mind and head towards another direction so he grit his teeth. "Vile trickster."

Ki had entered the left intersection and increased the speed once again.

It did not take long for her to come out of the intersection where they joined up again and she had exited before the person she was competing with.

It allowed her to pull ahead and she did not see him again when she had gained enough distance to complete the first time going around the mountain area that had been set up to race on.

It was quite a smooth journey for Ki due to her being careful then the second round had begun once she crossed the finish line.

Some had taken a short break to adjust the harnesses on the dogs or to switch out dogs for the next round but Ki had chosen to keep going.

Ki pulled ahead of the others that had stopped as she continued onward.

The intersection was in front of her again so she chose differently the second time. "Straight! Ahead!"

Once she had entered the narrow path, her speed was kept steady and she was looking around carefully for any kind of obstructions.

A simple avalanche or rock fall could easily make contact with her or cause a major obstruction that could delay her or cause her to crash.

Anyone could suffer an accident in the mountains if they were the slightest bit careless especially on such a narrow straight path.

If an obstruction was placed then it would be very difficult for anyone to stop in time and even if they did, they would be stuck in place and would have a high difficulty to turn back the way they came.

Others behind would eventually catch up from behind and they would only add to the difficulty to get back out.

The trails of the sleds were on the ground in front of her eyes but she saw something a little strange among the various prints on the snow on the ground.

There were footprints among them and there were human footprints among the animal ones which meant that people had walked through recently.

Her eyes widened suddenly as a realisation has hit her, the body had become increasingly alert.

There were trails of sleds that were going off track before disappearing into different smaller openings like they had found a place to rest up but Ki did not feel that was the case. 'There are too many footprints and there seems to be some signs of dragging away.'

She made a decision once she had seen various signs ahead then called out. "Easy! Whoah! Whoah!"

The moment that the dogs had came to a halt and the sled had done the same, she suddenly jumped from her sled in a single fast movement.

Her feet touched higher up on the rocks to the side of her and her gaze turned back towards the sled that had been destroyed.

If she had made a single mistake and had been a second slower then the attack may have been successful. "Phew.. how strange."

The moment that her feet had left the sled, a strange white flame had crashed down onto the sled.

The sled had been damaged by the energy and seemed to have been frozen where the energy had touched.

Seeing that they had missed their initial attack on her, the cloaked person that had hidden further away had looked towards Ki in surprise. "You managed to avoid it. How interesting. But.. how long can you last?"

A cold and ghostly looking flame had gathered in the palm of the cloaked figure and so more had gathered in different areas. "Kekeke."

"Little beauty.. I guess you are not from around here."

"You will make a beautiful frozen statue."

Ki observed each of them and knew that she was trapped while her dogs would be put in danger too if she stayed where she was. 'What to do..'

There was no hesitation in her next steps as she stepped on each obstruction lightly like she was stepping on the air itself.

Movement techniques or qigong used the qi of ones body along with foot movements to produce different results.

One such movement was being able to jump higher or even to adjust the positioning when in the air while most others were using for speed or evasive techniques.

Ki used a light body movement technique to step onto the higher rocks that would obstruct a normal person even when the snow or ice could make it more slippery.

Her figure quickly vanished among the snow and rocks in the mountain and the cloaked people had started to look for her while yelling to each other. "Do not let her get away!"

"Move the dogs out of the way!"

"Prepare a team for the next ambush!"