Both route 1 and route 2 require you to finish your polytechnic education and serve out your NS. Given that you're probably in Year 1 of polytechnic, it is too early to pigeonhole yourself to be "soft skills" and not "mugger". There are subjects in polytechnic that are mugger-type, academic, and then there's other subjects that give you an opportunity to show off your "soft skills" be it presentation skills, speaking, marketing, etc.

Given that polytechnic is going to be in your future and the future is what you make of it and how hard you work for it, there is no reason not to join the polytechnic rat-race to give yourself the best position and grades possible to make your decision after you finish your national service committments. If you actually worked hard enough, you could open up route 3, which is entry into one of the local university's degree programs. It is much too early to give up on working hard and just cruise through polytechnic.

At the end of the day, education in a formal tertiary degree institution still outweighs a part time degree in terms of ranking by employers.