"So, what did you think of their attitude toward you?"
Clark pressed his lips together and lowered his head, his tone somewhat subdued. "There were quite a few student athletes at Metropolis University. About half the track team consisted of professional athletes."
"They trained incredibly hard, almost without a day off all 365 days of the year. The training was intense and lasted a long time, and they got injured easily."
"Before, the upperclassman who brought me into the club told me this path wasn't easy. It was practically trading away your lifespan for results."
"Some people trained hard for years, only to be unable to compete in major events because of injuries. Once they missed that opportunity, they never got another one. They could only return to their hometowns to become PE teachers or switch careers."
"I'm not a student athlete, and I don't have any professional athletic training, but I can easily run far better times than they can. The coach praised me for being talented, called me a genius, but I always felt guilty."
"Because I wasn't relying on hard work, or even talent. I was completely different from them. They thought this was already an incredibly gifted performance, but in reality, I'd been trying hard to restrain my strength. I could do far, far more than this."
"The way they looked at me held jealousy, envy, and some anger and malice. But I could understand all of it. If I were in their place, I probably wouldn't be able to keep my own mindset under control either."
"You know? When the coach asked me to enter a long-distance race, I refused without even thinking, and the way everyone looked at me changed."
"To them, it was an opportunity that required desperate struggle and enormous effort to