I used this strategy in all of my submitted runs, but I didn't realise that it wasn't allowed in other games, so I'm not sure if my runs should still be considered valid.
I've updated the game rules to show when to start and stop the timer, but there's not really any other major rules apart from that, just beat all levels in whatever category you're running as fast as possible. If you have any more specific questions I'd be happy to answer them for you.
I did some more routing, we can skip 4 orbs in the later game by collecting everything in Perilous Plains:
2nd orb in Dangerous Desert 4 2nd orb in Misty Marsh 2 2nd orb in Fungi Forest 4 2nd orb in Snowy Slopes 3
Skipping one of the orbs in a level would mean having to collect all of the smaller orbs in the level instead. I assumed that would be slower, but I haven't really looked into it.
I routed and ran this game a while ago, only just found out that it's on speedrun.com. My current PB is 57:06 but I don't have a recording for it, I am working on getting a new recorded PB. If anybody would like me to show off the route in some other way I would be glad to do so.
Also, this is a really cool and underappreciated speedgame, I would love to see more people get into it.