I know you're there.
After those words, a tuft of white ahoge behind the cover twitched slightly.
Following a brief hesitation, the Uma Musume with chestnut hair and violet eyes emerged tentatively from behind the cover, looking visibly uneasy.
"Um... I'm so sorry, Kitahara-san. I didn't mean to disturb you. I didn't mean to cause you any trouble. I'll leave right away..."
As she finished speaking, she turned hastily, her movements almost panicked, as if fleeing from the scene.
But before she could take more than a few steps, a somewhat helpless voice called out from behind.
"Stop."
The instant the voice sounded, Meisho Doto's footsteps halted.
But this wasn't due to her consciously obeying that voice.
In fact, due to her extreme panic at having been discovered, Meisho Doto's mind was in complete chaos, and even now, as her feet stopped, her mind was filled with the urge to flee.
Yet when that voice rang out, it was as if some spell had been cast upon her; no matter how desperately she tried, her feet refused to move even an inch.
But once she realized this, confronted with a body that seemed no longer hers, dominated by an instinct that overwhelmed even her consciousness—
Far from feeling panic, Meisho Doto instead became visibly calmer, a faint sparkle lighting up her eyes.
Perhaps, for someone else, encountering such a situation might bring confusion or even terror.
Yet for Meisho Doto, who had experienced this countless times in the past, this was precisely the state that most reassured her.
Never mind fear or confusion—once she realized that even after these several years, her body and instincts were still just as obedient as back then—
Her previous worry about whether her body could still be "controlled" evaporated instantly, and her tail wagged happily behind her.
Then, accompanied by footsteps approaching from behind, that voice spoke again.
"Alright, relax. I'm not blaming you, there's no need to run away..."
With the fading of that voice, Meisho Doto regained control of her own body.
After a moment's hesitation, she timidly turned around, hands clasped in front of her chest, slightly hunched over as she spoke carefully.
"Kitahara-san... I really wasn't trying to bother you. I just happened to spot you near the track and followed without thinking. I'll be more careful from now on..."
Facing her words, Kitahara Sota did not immediately respond.
Instead, he looked Meisho Doto up and down, his gaze lingering briefly on her excessively developed chest, causing him to sigh inwardly.
Now, don't misunderstand. It wasn't as if Kitahara harbored any inappropriate thoughts about her.
He merely felt a bit of disbelief—clearly, compared to several years ago, this child's appearance had changed to the point of being almost unrecognizable.
But this inferiority complex of hers... Why hadn't it changed even a bit...?
Speaking of Meisho Doto, she was one of the Uma Musume Kitahara Sota had taken care of a long time ago.
But unlike other Uma Musume, Meisho Doto hadn't been looked after by him just once, but rather a full three times.
This wasn't because Kitahara Sota favored her and actively sought her out to care for her repeatedly.
Quite the opposite. Meisho Doto was precisely one of those "Little Ancestors" that Kitahara had previously mentioned—the type who gave him headaches even at the mere thought of them.
Even among those "Little Ancestors," she was undoubtedly one of the heaviest hitters.
If given a choice, Kitahara Sota genuinely would rather never meet her again.
The problem was, due to her parents' work, Meisho Doto often moved from place to place.
Coincidentally, two of those times happened to be to locations where Kitahara himself had also moved, causing her to run into him again and again.
As for the remaining time, it was because Meisho Doto had gotten swept up in an Uma Musume hunting incident, and after various twists and turns, he had rescued her.
More concretely, a few years ago, Kitahara had been following carrot trails to find food for Eclipse when he discovered a house with three carrots hanging outside.
It was Doto's home.
As usual, he knocked on the door and asked what the occupants needed. But he received a peculiar request he'd never heard before, completely outside his expectations.
"My child is a bit clumsy. Can you please help us deal with her?"
At first, Kitahara had been bewildered.
What kind of problem is that? Isn't it normal for children to be clumsy?
But when he actually met Meisho Doto in person, he instantly understood—
This was definitely not just a small problem, but a huge one.
It's not like he hadn't met mischievous troublemakers or clumsy kids in his previous travels—Special Week, for example.
But he'd genuinely never seen anyone clumsy to this degree—clumsy to the point of being a walking disaster.
The simplest example was an ordinary walk to school:
Meisho Doto managed to get her foot caught in the door leaving home, then immediately turned around and slammed into a tree, knocking a bird's nest onto her head.
She took just a few more steps, was distracted by a cat, bumped straight into a pole, then blindly stepped into a pothole. When she crawled out, a passing watering truck drenched her.
Arriving at school, she got caught in the gates, stumbled going up the stairs, and finally, while getting up, smacked her head against a fire extinguisher box...
If any ordinary person encountered such a scenario, they'd at least question the meaning of their existence, if not outright lose their sanity.
Yet for Meisho Doto, that morning's experience was merely a trivial snapshot of her life—something she was entirely used to, barely even qualifying as particularly unlucky.
After confirming the situation, Kitahara immediately recognized that this was indeed a serious problem, so he accepted the request from her parents.
But unexpectedly, although his original promise was to help solve her clumsiness—
After some time, Kitahara realized that rather than fixing the problem, he'd effectively ended up babysitting their child instead.
How to put it...?
It wasn't that Meisho Doto's parents didn't love her; rather, they both seemed incredibly career-focused—straight-up workaholics—so their attention towards her was limited.
Not that they didn't love her, but much like Kitahara himself often got caught up in single-threaded thinking—
The two eccentric parents would often become so absorbed in their work, each assuming the other was taking care of their precious daughter, that they'd inadvertently leave her home alone.
Especially after Kitahara arrived—once they realized they could directly pass Doto off to him, accelerating improvements to her condition while freeing themselves up for overtime—
Those two parents completely let loose, practically leaving Meisho Doto entirely to him.
Unless Kitahara actively reached out, they wouldn't even ask if she stayed out all night.
Facing such a situation, Kitahara felt helpless.
But since it did indeed help him work more closely with Doto to improve her circumstances, he initially just casually mentioned it to the parents. Upon seeing their lack of reaction, he eventually gave up.
Afterward, Kitahara's nightmare truly began.
Not that Meisho Doto had an unpleasant personality or disliked him—far from it. Her personality was exceedingly gentle and obedient, and with her prior experiences combined with her parents' indirect pushes—
It took Kitahara less than two days to earn her trust, eventually making her clingy and extremely reliant on him.
As days passed, Doto's trust and dependency only grew, until finally she became practically obedient to his every word.
But the issue was that even though Meisho Doto was now so attached, her clumsiness problem hadn't improved in the slightest.
And because he was always with her, Kitahara himself became the primary victim of her catastrophic clumsiness.
Breaking glass, tearing curtains, ruining food, destroying potions, and nearly starting fires several times—
Kitahara knew Meisho Doto didn't mean any harm; many times, she was even trying to help him.
But precisely because of this, he suffered even more deeply.
With those mischievous brats, Kitahara could at least just call their parents afterward and have them disciplined.
But with Doto... never mind discipline—even after suffering repeated misfortunes, he had to endure the pain himself while comforting the extremely remorseful Meisho Doto...
It was exhausting.
Even with Kitahara's considerable capabilities back then, which weren't quite as absurd as now, Meisho Doto's issue was uniquely challenging.
Despite exerting all his effort, Kitahara hadn't been able to completely fix her clumsiness or even significantly improve her deeply ingrained inferiority complex.
He'd only managed slight improvements before ultimately gathering what he needed from that place and leaving.
The real turning point arrived during their second meeting.
The second encounter was the aforementioned Uma Musume hunting incident.
Originally, after leaving that place, Kitahara Sota thought he'd never see her again for the rest of his life.
But who could have known? During an investigation into a certain Uma Musume hunting group, he ran into her again.
That particular hunting group was one of the largest Kitahara had ever come across. And it wasn't just Meisho Doto who'd been captured—counting all of them together, there must have been seven or eight Uma Musume crammed into the cage.
Although Eclipse and his veteran Uma Musume companion had been with him at the time, Kitahara had worried that a direct assault might push their enemies to desperate measures.
So he'd decided to sneak inside alone first, free all the little ones quietly, then signal his teammates to charge in afterward.
Thanks to past experiences, even though their opponents were reasonably alert, he managed to smoothly free the captured Uma Musume one after another, safely sending them all away.
But when it came time to get Meisho Doto out, an accident inevitably occurred.
It wasn't that Kitahara made a mistake—it was that Meisho Doto, during her escape attempt, unsurprisingly caused plenty of unexpected noise.
Not only had their enemies become immediately suspicious, but they quickly discovered all the little ones were already gone, and rapidly began organizing a search.
Facing this sudden turn of events, Kitahara had two choices:
One was to hide Meisho Doto somewhere safe and escape alone, signaling his teammates to storm the place and rescue her afterward.
The other was to keep moving forward, taking along Meisho Doto—who would almost certainly cause more accidents—to escape, and only then signal his teammates to attack.
Clearly, the first choice was more rational, more likely to succeed.
After all, Meisho Doto had just proven her clumsiness remained completely unchanged. Her emotional state was now extremely unstable due to the situation she'd created.
Taking her along was obviously not a wise decision. It would be far safer to leave her quietly hidden, waiting for rescue.
But after only a brief moment of thought, Kitahara made a decision—one that even now filled him with lingering fear when he looked back on it, yet he still never regretted:
He chose to trust Meisho Doto.
"Doto, listen. Next, I'll need you to help me do something."
Hidden inside an empty water vat, he held Meisho Doto by the shoulders, carefully explaining his escape plan to her.
After finishing his explanation, he honestly laid out their current situation.
He told her plainly that if she made even a single mistake at any step, neither of them would make it out alive.
Hearing this, Meisho Doto almost burst into tears.
"I—I can't do it, Kitahara-san. It's impossible for me…"
"No, you can do it."
Kitahara gazed at her steadily and spoke softly:
"Do you still remember how we used to be together? Back then, when I tried to help you with your clumsiness, I asked you to do lots of things, didn't I? And didn't you always accomplish them beautifully?"
"But…but those were all just trivial things..."
"No buts, Doto."
He interrupted her gently, eyes calmly meeting hers:
"Whether it's opening bottle caps, baking pastries, or simply walking to school safely, none of those tasks are fundamentally different from what I'm asking you to do now. It's all about following the plan I set out for you."
"Honestly, I have another option—I could leave you here hiding and escape alone to get help."
"You'd probably agree with that idea, thinking that it would at least improve my chances of escape."
"But Doto, do you know why I'm not choosing that option?"
Meisho Doto stared blankly for a moment, then instinctively shook her head.
Then, in the next instant, Kitahara pulled her gently into his arms.
"Because you're truly important to me, Doto."
Just like he'd later do with Agnes Digital, Kitahara held Doto close.
Leaning close to her ear, he spent nearly ten whole minutes rambling endlessly about "Why Meisho Doto is Important to Kitahara Sota."
But unlike Agnes Digital, his words weren't merely praise—he also frankly admitted her clumsiness sometimes frustrated him.
Yet none of that diminished his fondness for her.
"I admit it—I really do appreciate those who are capable, smart, and obedient. But Doto, you have your own shining points."
"Your trust in me, your kindness towards others, your spirit of never giving up no matter how many setbacks you face—I've seen all these things clearly."
"I know it might sound unbelievable, but your existence has never been merely trouble to me. You've also allowed me to see something genuinely wonderful."
"You're definitely not as worthless as you believe. I've always believed you can do everything others can, maybe even better."
"If my words alone aren't enough to convince you, then right now, I'm willing to bet my own life in your hands—to prove how deeply I trust you."
Kitahara looked at her seriously:
"I trust you can do it, Doto."
Meisho Doto couldn't immediately reply to Kitahara's words.
But at that moment, as she looked into the earnest face of the man—no, the boy—in front of her, a strange feeling rose up inside her heart.
It felt as if dried wood left abandoned in the desert had finally encountered rain; as if a fish stranded helplessly on a scorching beach suddenly felt the return of the rising tide.
She, who'd always been burdened by inferiority, weakness, confusion—who'd even wondered at times if a freak like her, causing nothing but trouble and misfortune, deserved to live in this world—
At that very moment, she found the meaning of her existence.
---
T/N: @ _ @
"Mm. If you've read this far, I suppose you're at least a little invested."
"If you want to support the translator, there's a Patreon here: patreon.com/wisetl. It's optional—think of it as tossing a few extra coins on the counter. Early chapters are just a bonus side-effect of that support."
"This place also has its own strange currency… Powerstones. For every 100 Powerstones the story gets, you'll receive 1 bonus chapter. 100ps = 1 chp, 200ps = 2 chp, 300ps = 3 chp… you can do the math."
"If you'd rather talk than throw money or stones, there's a Discord: discord.gg/wisetl. Go there if you want to complain, theorize, or poke the translator for more updates. Just don't expect me to mediate your arguments."
Say thank you to Maomao guys