With spring settling in by March, Dyna's state of mind improved by the day. Every morning during training, she could see branches budding and fresh green shoots emerging. Wada and TM Opera O gradually increased her workload each day, all so she could tackle the slope at Nakayama Racecourse with greater ease.
"Alright, keep it up! Last set of stair-turn jumps! Faster, faster!"
That morning, they were training on the stairway by the riverbank. Wada stood at the top, and every time Opera O or Dyna leapt up another step, he blew his whistle once. It also made Dyna painfully aware of just how vast the gap was between herself and a top-class racehorse girl.
When she tried jumping two steps at a time, Opera O, with her supple body and powerful legs, could casually spring three or even four at once with her hands behind her back. Dyna could only stare in utter defeat.
"Hah... I'm exhausted... How on earth did Ms. Opera O train herself like this?!"
"Hm? Ah, that?" Opera O answered breezily. "Back then, Wada didn't understand anything, so I just trained however I liked. To put it simply, I only skimmed the training plans he gave me. They were useful, but not by much."
Up above them, Wada nearly spat blood.
He knew perfectly well how much of a useless rookie he'd been back then, and how completely he'd been carried by Opera O on his way to becoming the youngest G1 trainer of a horse girl.
But now he could win races with his own ability while guiding Kiseki Sharp, thank you very much! And he had a feeling—no, a conviction—that Kiseki Sharp would win a Grade 1 someday. More than one, even!
Dyna found the exchange a little hard to endure, but it only made the father-son dynamic between those two feel even more deeply ingrained. Thankfully, she didn't have such a troublesome trainer herself. All she had to do was bury her head in training and pick her races.
"Oh, right," Wada said suddenly, sounding a little tense. "Oguri Cap and Gold Ship already talked to you about registering for the Classic series, right?"
Back in the day, Wada himself had failed to recognize true talent. As a trainer, he hadn't believed TM Opera O could even qualify for the Satsuki Sho, and had nearly missed registration entirely. In the end, it was only because Oguri Cap persuaded him that he submitted the form, paving the way for the birth of the Century-End Overlord.
Once was enough.
He absolutely refused to let history repeat itself with Dyna.
Leaping onto the final step, Dyna wiped the sweat from her brow and replied, "No need to worry. The idiots at the JRA have been pestering me every month to register, so I already submitted the form ages ago. Even without a prep race, I'm guaranteed a place in the Satsuki Sho. The real thing I need to worry about is that I've never actually gotten to know Nakayama as a course, right?"
That was true enough. In some ways, Wada's anxiety was excessive. For a racehorse girl who had won a G1 at Longchamp in her debut year, the JRA would probably have loved to fill out the registration paperwork for her themselves. If Dyna somehow hadn't entered, the ones losing their minds would definitely have been them.
Still, whenever Dyna thought of Longchamp, she couldn't help recalling Danson Dream bumping into her chest coming out of the final turn. At the time she'd been too tense to dwell on it, only vaguely feeling that Danson Dream had gotten awfully close.
"Training's over Wada, Ms. Opera O, I'll head back first Don't forget to pack, okay? We're going to Chiba in a few days!"
Even as she left, Dyna didn't forget to remind them about her plans. Only after getting a response from Opera O did she finally feel reassured enough to jog home.
These days, the training had produced a noticeable increase in her strength. Since Opera O and Kiseki Sharp were always there to accompany her, every session was judged as a kind of competitive run, and the fatigue that built up in her body would melt away during a single hot bath.
Every day, the mailbox in front of the shop was stuffed with envelopes. Dyna always brought them in on her way back, though they were usually nothing more than ads and sales flyers—rarely anything useful. After all, people communicated through LINE now. Handwritten letters felt absurdly old-fashioned.
But today, buried in the pile, was one from Boso Futaba Academy in Chiba City.
Dyna could more or less guess what it was. After showering and changing into comfortable clothes, she sat down solemnly at her vanity, opened the letter, and tossed the rest of the junk mail into the trash.
This is a letter everyone wrote together. When the children heard that Miss Light Dyna was coming here, they were all so happy. A lot of them are your fans, too! We haven't even met yet, but they were already too excited to wait. So as the teacher looking after them, I came up with this idea! If it feels presumptuous, then I sincerely apologize!
—Amemiya Renshi
"Pfft... what an adorable teacher. There's no way I'd be upset."
Adjusting her glasses, Dyna read through the pages one by one. Some children had only written a few lines. Others had drawn rough but heartfelt crayon pictures. That familiar warmth slowly climbed into her chest, until she hugged the whole bundle and rolled around on her bed with it.
"Wow... there's even a drawing of Nakayama Racecourse. They put so much thought into this."
At the very bottom of the stack was a picture all the children had drawn together: in their imagination, Dyna winning the Satsuki Sho at Nakayama. The figure was crude, just a chestnut-colored block of crayon, and the racecourse itself showed white crack-like streaks through the green where the wax hadn't filled cleanly. But to Dyna—who had no artistic sense to speak of and judged everything by emotion alone—it was the most beautiful picture in the world.
After admiring it for a while, though, she muttered softly:
"It'd be even better if there were a little Golden Giant beside me, looking like she was about to hiss. In the Satsuki Sho, I'm absolutely going to beat her black and blue."
There were no crayons in her bedside drawer, but there was an ordinary pen. Picking it up, Dyna added a black-outlined chibi dog next to the crayon drawing.
That was probably one of the few genuinely mean little hobbies in her heart.
"Golden Giant... I'm going to keep chasing you down... forever."
Just thinking of that orange color made her chest puff up irritably. Sure, she was physically weaker than Golden Giant. She wasn't as tall, either. But her explosiveness was greater, her figure was better—
—and she had more fans than Golden Giant, too!
Maybe it was an outlet for her frustration, but Dyna jabbed the pen-drawn little dog hard with her finger. The only result was a smear of wet black ink staining her fingertip, forcing her to make another trip to the washroom.
By the time she came downstairs, Ms. Nagasakura was already in the kitchen preparing ingredients. Dyna still made a point of helping out a little every day, just to keep her feel for the work. As for who her partner would be, that depended entirely on who showed up first.
Since she'd told everyone they only needed to be there before opening, the truth was nobody had to arrive particularly early—but over time, everyone had somehow fallen into the habit of coming in two or three hours ahead anyway. Because of that, the preparation phase never felt rushed.
Coming to the shop was basically relaxation.
"By the way, Ms. Nagasakura, when we go to Chiba in a few days, I'm leaving the shop in your hands!"
"Okay~ You, Gold Ship, and the others just focus on the event. I'll enjoy pretending to be the manager, then?"
Her teasing made them both laugh, and the whole kitchen brimmed with cheerful energy.
As Dyna kneaded dough and shaped the bread, that crayon drawing of her victory kept surfacing in her mind. She simply couldn't keep the smile off her face.
Ha!
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 178)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 126)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League ( 126 )
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter110)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter130)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter89)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter157)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 77
From Junkman to Wasteland 66
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 46
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 133
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 65
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 125
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass 84
The Way the Umamusume Look at 68
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 143
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 65
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 76
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 66
My Cyberpsycho Girlfriend 65
Uma Musume: The Dark Trainer 115
Uma Musume: A Calamity Born fr 99
I, a Reincarnation-Loop Player 53
The Violent Girl Group Is Beat 75
Uma Musume: The Horse Girl Who 66
Uma Musume: From Beginner 75
Becoming a Horse Girl, I Will 52
Uma Musume: I Want All 51
I Can Copy Unique Skills 53
A Guide to Aid in the Underwor 26
Summoning an Evil God, but the 27
Supernatural Multiverse 27
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