It wasn't until three days later, in the early morning, that I saw Oguri Cap again.
That day at Oguri Cap's house, since Shirayuki had given her approval for Oguri Cap to join the team, Kitahara didn't linger long. After the initial meeting and dinner, they exchanged contact information and he left.
Once back home, Kitahara resisted the urge to contact Oguri Cap and her mother again, focusing wholeheartedly on his plan since arriving in this world: preparing for the Central Tracen Academy entrance exam.
He knew full well that an outstanding horse girl like Oguri Cap wouldn't stay local forever. Going to Central was inevitable.
However, he was currently just a local trainer. If Oguri Cap went to Central, he'd be left behind due to his lack of qualifications, and they'd part ways forever. That was a situation he couldn't accept.
Not only that, but most of this world's famous horse girls either came from Central or moved there from the provinces. So if he wanted to become an outstanding trainer, getting into Central Tracen Academy was a must.
That's why, for the past month since his arrival, aside from thinking about future development paths and searching for clues related to Oguri Cap, he'd devoted all his remaining time to preparing for the Central Tracen Academy exam.
Central Tracen Academy had many rules, you could even say they were harsh. To get in, you had to pass two extremely rigorous evaluations.
The first evaluation was a written test, mainly examining professional competency. The second was a physical fitness test to assess health levels.
While trainers didn't need to compete on the track like horse girls, some training required physical stamina to keep up, like long-distance endurance runs, climbing, cross-country and other outdoor training.
The overall Central exam acceptance rate was extremely low. The first test alone had a failure rate of 70%, and the second test eliminated another 70% or so. All told, the pass rate was barely 9%.
This type of evaluation was similar to jockey exams from another world, but before his transmigration, Kitahara had never encountered such testing. The original owner of this body had lacked ambition and rarely studied hard. In other words, getting into Central Tracen Academy would be incredibly difficult.
That's exactly why, during his prep time, Kitahara never paid attention to anything else, focusing entirely on practice problems, memorization, and physical training, just like when he was studying for graduate school entrance exams back in the day.
The only thing that could pull him away from his exam prep was matters related to Oguri Cap.
According to what White Jewel said on the phone, Oguri Cap runs every day along the riverside park outside Kasamatsu Racecourse. If I just wait here early enough, I should be able to meet her...
That morning around five o'clock, Kitahara got up early and stood by the riverbank in the riverside park, holding a copy of "Central Tracen Professional Competency Basic Knowledge," looking around while thinking to himself.
Last night, while he was working through practice problems, he'd received a call from Shirayuki.
On the phone, the mother had said, "Although Oguri Cap still doesn't understand what Tracen or trainers are, she knows she can run, and she was very happy to agree to join Mr. Kitahara's team. So I'm entrusting little Oguri to you from now on, Mr. Kitahara."
The call also mentioned where Oguri Cap ran each morning, which was why Kitahara had come early to the riverside park with his reference book to wait.
"It's just, I've been waiting a while now, so why can't I see her yet..."
Not seeing Oguri Cap at the designated spot, Kitahara was a bit confused and couldn't help muttering to himself.
But just as he'd gotten halfway through his sentence, he suddenly heard a sound of rushing wind approaching from the distance, along with thunderous tremors shaking the ground like beating drums.
Drawing on his experience as a horse racing owner before transmigrating, plus the original owner's background as a trainer, Kitahara knew that was a sound only horse girls could make.
Horse girls had far too many similarities to racehorses.
In the other world's racetracks, at full sprint, horseshoes striking the ground would produce a continuous drumbeat-like sound.
Even though each race had at most twenty-something horses, when all those dense hoofbeats came together, they could completely give you the illusion of thousands of horses thundering toward you. Even the roaring cheers from stadium seats packed with over a hundred thousand spectators often couldn't completely drown out those heart-stirring drumbeats.
Horse girls were the same way. Each one looked as delicate as a human girl, yet blessed by the Three Goddesses, their delicate bodies contained power that ordinary people couldn't reach or even imagine.
Their running was just like racehorses from the other world. Every time their feet made contact with the ground, they could unleash amazing force and heart-stirring drumbeats that human running could never achieve.
Similarly, the sound of horse girls cutting through the air while running whistled just like racehorses, with a very distinctive quality.
With sounds like that in a place like this, it had to be Oguri Cap!
Kitahara immediately got excited and looked toward where the sound was coming from.
However, when he turned his gaze, he could only see a silver-gray streak.
That streak had originally been very far away, way back at the overpass at the end of the river beside the riverside park, looking as thin as a finger.
But in what seemed like just a few blinks of an eye, that finger-thin streak flashed toward him like lightning. In an instant it grew to human size while bringing with it a fierce headwind.
The strong wind kicked up weeds, debris, dust and pebbles from beside the riverbank. Kitahara couldn't help but raise his arm to shield his eyes, and his body instinctively dodged the lightning-like figure that had suddenly arrived.
Just as he raised his arm, he felt the wind stop. A moment later, he heard an emotionless, cold voice.
"Morning, Mr. Trainer. Have you eaten breakfast yet?"
Having already guessed the newcomer was probably Oguri Cap, and now hearing a voice he'd heard before confirmed it, Kitahara had some internally amused thoughts.
What the heck? Meeting someone and immediately asking if they've eaten? You're a Japanese Uma Musume, so how are you asking such a down-to-earth Chinese greeting...
Should I say that's Oguri Cap for you, never forgetting about food...
Chuckling to himself, Kitahara lowered his arm, then felt surprised.
Perhaps due to the original owner's trainer background, he instinctively calculated Oguri Cap's running speed just now.
Though the original owner had been pretty lazy in daily life and lacked ambition to prepare for Central Tracen Academy, his basic professional skills were still solid, so Kitahara could still get a rough estimate just from observation.
If he calculated correctly, she just covered that "three furlongs" in around 50 seconds, right? While this data couldn't compare to top-tier horse girls, this was just casual running.
Kitahara was quite satisfied with the speed Oguri Cap had just displayed.
"Three furlongs" was a measurement unit inherited from Europe and America, often used to indicate the time horse girls took to cover the final 600 meters. The shorter the "three furlong time," the faster the horse girl's sprint and the stronger their "finishing kick."
The game settings from the other world referenced real racehorse records, where the most elite horse girls generally had three furlong times between 33 to 34 seconds, which worked out to 18.18 meters per second.
Compared to that data, Oguri Cap's running speed just now really wasn't anything special, but to have this level just from casual jogging meant she could definitely perform much stronger on the track going all out.
For a moment, Kitahara became even more confident about Oguri Cap's future and felt somewhat eager to discuss future racing with her.
However, before he could speak, a "gurgling" rumbling suddenly echoed across the open space by the riverbank.
As the rumbling appeared, a blush gradually spread across Oguri Cap's emotionless, beautiful face.
"...Sorry, Mr. Trainer. Even though Mom told me to talk with you more today, if it's possible, I'd like to go home and eat first."