"Trainer, what is the meaning of this?!"
Gold Ship stormed into the office, grabbed Fujiwara Chiya by the collar, and shook him like a rag doll.
"What? What happened?" Fujiwara Chiya looked utterly lost.
"Why is my race the Hanshin Daishoten, while Rice Shower's race is the Osaka Hai? Don't tell me you're planning to send me off to race all alone!"
Gold Ship clenched her fist.
"I was looking forward to an in-team civil war for so long, and now you're splitting us up?! How am I supposed to bully my own teammates now?!"
Ah.
So Gold Ship was having one of her episodes again.
"The Hanshin Daishoten is a three-thousand-metre race. It suits you better than the two-thousand-metre Osaka Hai. Besides, you don't actually want to run the Osaka Hai, do you? You've skipped every single two-thousand-metre pace training session."
"Ahaha, you caught me."
Gold Ship scratched her head.
Right now, the only one in the entire team who still refused to behave was Gold Ship.
Whether it was Dober, Tachyon, or Doto, all of them had changed to some degree. They had become more considerate, more obedient, more understanding.
Only Gold Ship's growth curve was a perfectly flat line.
She was exactly the same now as she had been when he first met her.
Fujiwara Chiya strongly suspected that even ten or twenty years from now, she would still be like this.
"I seriously wonder how you're going to live once you leave."
"Leave? Why would I leave?"
"You're definitely going to leave eventually. What, are you planning to be my uma musume forever?"
"Why not? Trainer can be my trainer forever, and then I can toy with you forever. Doesn't that sound like the most amazing life ever?"
"Not even remotely!"
"Trainer…"
Gold Ship's eyes turned watery, as if she might burst into tears at any second.
"Back then, you clearly said you'd become a masochist. I even went out of my way to study rope bondage and whips for you. Why are you suddenly quitting now? How could you do this to me?!"
"I never said that! You were the one fantasizing by yourself! Also, don't tell me you skipped training to go learn rope bondage?! Listen to me. Next time you dare skip training, even if you hide underground, I'll dig you out!"
"Oho? Omoshiroi. In that case, I accept your challenge, Trainer."
After saying something useless, Gold Ship began saying something even more useless.
"I discovered a problem with Shirayuki. A huge problem."
"What happened?"
"Shirayuki… suddenly lost interest in women!"
"…"
"This is an anomaly!"
"That's normal, isn't it? Shirayuki was never that interested in girls to begin with…"
Fujiwara Chiya's eyes drifted sideways.
He did not believe a single word that had just come out of his own mouth.
Gold Ship looked at him like he was an idiot.
"Are you kidding me? The old Shirayuki was as hungry as a wild beast. The moment she saw a girl's body, she'd pounce without hesitation. She abused the fact that she was also a girl and did whatever she wanted to people. Whenever she bathed with others, she'd always secretly touch their waists and thighs. I saw it all!"
"…Ahem. That's just normal interaction between girls. You're only seeing it that way because you're wearing yellow-tinted glasses. It looks perfectly normal to me. What's wrong with girls touching each other's waists a little?"
"But her eyes were super lewd!"
"…"
"The old Shirayuki never refused meat served right to her mouth. She and Trainer are both carnivores. If anyone invited her, she would absolutely never refuse. She was a man among women! She even coveted my sacred body!"
"That is absolutely impossible!"
This was the one thing Fujiwara Chiya refused to acknowledge.
Whether it was him or Shirayuki, neither of them would feel even the slightest impulse around Gold Ship.
Rather than calling her an uma musume or a girl, Fujiwara Chiya preferred to call Gold Ship "some sort of humanoid creature."
"What's that supposed to mean, Trainer? What gives you the right to assume Shirayuki never coveted my body?!"
"I…"
Fine. Never mind.
"Go on."
Fujiwara Chiya wanted to see just what kind of nonsense Gold Ship could come up with next.
"Time and time again, I preserved my chastity under Shirayuki's burning gaze. But then, not long ago, Shirayuki suddenly lost interest in me!"
Gold Ship's words were absurd beyond belief.
And yet, surprisingly, the general idea was not wrong.
Even Mejiro Dober and the others had not noticed Shirayuki's change.
But Gold Ship had noticed first.
"Shirayuki's eyes when she looks at those people aren't horny anymore. She's turned into a completely ordinary uma musume. Trainer, don't you think that's strange? Why did Shirayuki suddenly become like this?"
"Well…"
Fujiwara Chiya mumbled vaguely and did not answer.
He could not exactly say that Shirayuki had ultimately chosen him, could he?
"And that's not all. I also noticed one other strange thing. Shirayuki's expression when she looks in the mirror!"
"Expression?"
"That rich, lovestruck expression. If my guess is correct, Shirayuki has definitely found the person of her dreams. That's right…"
Gold Ship slammed both hands onto the desk and shouted at Fujiwara Chiya.
"That person is herself!"
Beside them, Darley, who had been buried under a mountain of work Fujiwara Chiya had shoved onto her, burst out laughing.
Fujiwara Chiya pulled out a handkerchief and wiped the sweat from his forehead.
Holy crap.
Fujiwara Chiya had never told Gold Ship anything.
And yet this girl was acting as if she had opened a third eye and seen straight through everything.
Her guess was already about eighty or ninety percent accurate.
No, forget that.
Gold Ship had basically guessed the whole truth!
What the hell was inside her head?
How was she even more ridiculous than Agnes Tachyon?
At least Agnes Tachyon had logic and evidence.
Gold Ship had somehow hallucinated her way straight to the answer.
"This is bad, Trainer. Very bad."
Gold Ship pinched her chin.
"My original plan was to build a harem academy for the two of you. But with Shirayuki like this, it's like putting an impotent guy into an adult anime. Completely useless! At this rate, she's just waiting to get stolen from and become the tragic loser!"
"That analogy is way too vivid…"
Darley, beside them, laughed so hard she nearly folded in half.
Fujiwara Chiya glared at her.
"So, Trainer, you need to help Shirayuki."
"Help? How am I supposed to help…?"
"Obviously, you give Shirayuki some psychological counselling. Take her outside and help her get back on her feet."
As she spoke, Gold Ship pulled out Fujiwara Chiya's training schedule.
"In March, we have two races at Hanshin Racecourse. There's a steep uphill slope before the finish line, something unique to Hanshin. We can apply to Tracen for special training, then move over to Osaka for a while. Once we're there, Trainer will have plenty of time to give Shirayuki psychological counselling."
Fujiwara Chiya listened to Gold Ship's proposal and rubbed his chin.
"But if we do that, then Tracen…"
"I can help you, Trainer," Darley said. "Leave the training here to me. Trainer can take Gold Ship, Rice Shower, Shirayuki, and the others to Hanshin Racecourse for special training."
"Is that okay?"
"Of course."
Darley gave him a meaningful smile.
Fujiwara Chiya looked down at the race schedule.
In other words…
He had another chance to go out with Shirayuki?