GREEN · the Thicket · Wildgrowth

MINT

The Optimist

Cheerful in ninth. Genuinely delighted in fourth.

The shard

A Thicket shard that landed somewhere pleasant and drew broad conclusions from it. Mint is the least burdened marble on the grid and there is real doubt about whether it has understood what the Descent is for.

Oh, that was mine. Well — I will come back for it.
MINT

How Mint races

Mint responds to being overtaken. Not to being in front, not to the finish approaching — to loss, specifically, and only afterwards. Every place Mint concedes buys a second of genuine effort, so a Mint race reads as a saw-tooth: dropped, recovered, dropped, recovered, all of it apparently enjoyable.

The signature

Delighted

A place is lost, and one second later Mint arrives back at it looking pleased about the whole exchange.

What it costs

It fires strictly after the loss. Mint can recover a place and can never prevent one, which makes it structurally incapable of defending a lead.

The tell

Where the rest of the grid pulls a worried face, Mint's comes up happy. It is the only marble that looks better the worse things are going.

Feeds on

bumpersplinkoorchard

Comes apart in

runIn

The voice

Hear Mint

An "oo-YEE-hap" that lifts in the middle and lands neatly. It is not possible to hear this as bad news.

In the race mix — E5, 659 Hz, The answer

A major third above whatever just sounded — the one consonant reply from outside the scale. It only ever plays after a place is lost.

The record

18thChampionship

10Points

2Starts

0Wins

0Podiums

4thBest

4.5Average

4thLast out

R05 4th of 6 last-gasp steal
R04 5th of 6 last-gasp steal

In the stands

Nobody has ever been upset by a Mint result, which after thirty rounds turns out to be worth something.

Rivalries

MINT

Two Ways Not To Steer

One decided everything before the drop. One decides nothing, ever, until after.

1–12 meetings

INDIGO

Indigo picks a lane at the top and will not revisit it under any circumstance, including a wall. Mint has no plan whatsoever and responds only to having already lost something. Between them they cover the entire space of not making a decision during a race, and they arrive at the finish in more or less the same place.

On a clean descent Indigo is untouchable and Mint has nothing to react to. On a messy one they swap, completely.