"It is a pleasure to meet you all. I am Mejiro McQueen, and I will be joining this team. I look forward to working with you."
Inside the Team Sirius clubroom, Mejiro McQueen formally introduced herself to her new peers.
"Welcome. To think I would live to see such a gifted Uma Musume join Team Sirius right before my retirement."
The old trainer smiled warmly, shooting Trainer P a look that clearly said he was impressed the kid actually pulled it off. After all, Mejiro McQueen was currently the hottest star athlete in the central circuit. Her monstrous strength had even been officially acknowledged by the Emperor herself.
Oguri Cap paused her carrot-munching and nodded in greeting. "Hello, McQueen. I am Oguri Cap. Welcome to Team Sirius."
"Hello. I am Silence Suzuka."
Although a second-year student who had only recently run her debut race, Silence Suzuka seemed rather timid. She had just transferred to Team Sirius from Team Rigil a short while ago.
Aside from Oguri Cap and Silence Suzuka, the only other member on the roster was the hospitalized Tokai Teio.
"Do not mind this old man. I have already submitted my retirement papers. I only came by today for one last look," the veteran trainer said.
Having guided Oguri Cap through her final Twinkle Series race, he harbored no remaining regrets in his career.
"And lastly, there is me. I am P. You can just call me Trainer. Welcome to Team Sirius, McQueen."
"I will leave this in your hands, Trainer."
McQueen reached into her bag, pulled out a tightly organized scheduling document, and placed it directly into Trainer P's hands.
P looked down at the paper, his eyes widening in pure shock. "Is this... your actual career race plan, McQueen?"
The old trainer leaned over to peek at the contents. He was equally stunned. "Young people really have terrifying ambitions these days."
The Classic Triple Crown. Total conquest of the Tenno Sho. Both the Spring and Autumn Senior Triple Crowns. The Arima Kinen!
What kind of demonic racing schedule was this?
A normal athlete wouldn't even dare to dream of it, let alone attempt to execute it in reality. Every single event listed was an absolute top-tier G1 race.
For an average horse girl, winning just one of these titles was the crowning achievement of a lifetime. Winning a Triple Crown was the stuff of legends. Claiming an undefeated Triple Crown was practically a miracle.
Yet, Mejiro McQueen's ravenous ambition did not stop at a mere undefeated Triple Crown!
Both trainers fell completely silent. Was achieving something this absurd even biologically possible?
"A-Amazing..." Silence Suzuka whispered, staring at the schedule with deep admiration and envy.
She was actually a massive fan of McQueen. That aggressively dominant Grand Escape strategy was the exact racing style she idealized.
"Little P, you better not let your runner down," the old man sighed heavily. A monster-tier horse girl like this was not going to be easy to manage.
Trainer P offered a helpless smile, but his expression quickly hardened into absolute resolve. "I understand perfectly, Master."
Having inherited this old man's teachings, P was fundamentally different from the vast majority of trainers at central Trecen.
His ultimate dream as a trainer was simply to help his horse girls realize their own dreams!
That was the core philosophy of his mentor's lineage. The old man had been limited by his own capabilities and couldn't always make those dreams a reality. But P was different. This young man was a genuine, once-in-a-generation genius in the coaching world.
The fact that he had secured a central Trecen contract at his age was absolute proof of his talent.
P looked Mejiro McQueen directly in the eyes. "Since this is your vision, McQueen, I will dedicate absolutely everything I have to helping you achieve it."
Hearing her new trainer's firm declaration, McQueen allowed herself a genuine smile.
This was exactly why she had chosen Team Sirius. Any other elite trainer would have instantly tried to dictate her path and trim down her impossible schedule.
"Alright then. Suzuka, prepare for your next minor race. McQueen, we begin preparations for the Japanese Derby."
P wrote their two immediate objectives on the chalkboard.
Afterward, he sat down with McQueen to discuss her daily training regimen. McQueen had absolutely no objections to his arrangements.
Truthfully, she knew her raw physical stats had already hit a hard ceiling. No amount of standard training was going to yield significant improvements right now.
Despite studying independently in the library for weeks, she hadn't managed to comprehend any new skills. She had formulated some theories regarding the strange, borderline-Zone state she touched during the Satsuki Sho, but she simply couldn't replicate the feeling in practice.
Time flew by, and the day of the Japanese Derby finally arrived.
As Mejiro McQueen stepped out onto the Tokyo Racecourse turf, every single competitor covertly locked their eyes onto her.
Scanning the area, she spotted Mejiro Ryan. Her sister simply offered a polite nod, choosing not to say anything before the race.
McQueen recognized a few familiar faces from the game's roster, alongside several horse girls she had never seen before. Still, qualifying for a race of this magnitude meant none of them were pushovers.
"That is Mejiro McQueen."
McQueen was merely walking toward her gate, doing absolutely nothing out of the ordinary, yet a suffocating wave of atmospheric pressure washed over the other racers.
Anyone who had studied the footage of her previous runs knew exactly how terrifying this girl was.
The starting lineup today was remarkably sparse. There were only nine runners in total.
The rest of the qualifiers had officially withdrawn. Once McQueen formally registered, many horse girls realized they had zero chance of winning. Rather than wasting their energy and morale on a guaranteed loss, they opted to prepare for other, less suicidal races. There were plenty of graded stakes available. Surely they wouldn't run into this white monster everywhere they went, right?
McQueen ignored the heavy stares of her opponents. She calmly went through her warm-up routine, thoroughly soaking in the electric atmosphere of the stadium.
It truly was entirely different from her lonely simulation runs. This intoxicating, electrifying tension was something she could never get enough of.
She could physically sense the auras of the other runners. She could hear their rapid breathing and the heavy pounding of their hearts.
Right now, every single one of them viewed her as the ultimate enemy.
Heh. It was absolutely perfect.
Up in the grandstands, the members of Team Sirius were gathered to watch the race. Even Tokai Teio had come to spectate, sitting quietly in a wheelchair.
"So frustrating. I originally planned to run in this race, too."
Teio stared fiercely at the white silhouette waiting by the gates. She wanted nothing more than to sprint down there and challenge her right now.
"Your health comes first. You do not want to be left behind by McQueen permanently, do you? Your only mission right now is to heal," Trainer P said sternly.
The physical toll of Teio's Satsuki Sho sprint was incredibly severe.
Teio's legs were naturally fragile. Ironically, it was this exact unique physiology that allowed her to execute the iconic Teio Step. By forcefully detonating her latent potential three times in a single race, she had completely shattered her own limits and exposed this fatal flaw.
Thankfully, they caught the damage early and treated it immediately. Otherwise, her racing career would have ended right there on the Nakayama turf.
Trainer P had ruthlessly vetoed all of Teio's desperate requests for early hospital discharge or short-term race registrations.
Since her dream of an undefeated Triple Crown had already been annihilated by McQueen, prioritizing her long-term physical health was the only logical choice.
Right now, Teio's only lingering desire was to face McQueen in a fair, all-out rematch. Because of this singular goal, she was surprisingly obedient.
Getting utterly crushed by reality was undeniably the fastest way to force someone to grow up. The slightly arrogant, playful Tokai Teio had matured drastically since the Satsuki Sho.
"Honestly, Trainer, you worry too much. The great Teio's body won't break that easily," Teio teased.
Her tone sounded similar to her old self, but P could clearly hear the hardened resolve beneath it.
She had grown.
P felt a wave of melancholy. If possible, he never wanted to see Teio forced to mature through such a brutal defeat.
He had once promised to lead her to an undefeated Triple Crown. Back then, neither of them could have predicted that Mejiro McQueen harbored the exact same ambition. For a rookie hero to encounter the ultimate demon lord before she even had time to level up was just obscenely bad luck.
Beside them, Oguri Cap was busy demolishing an entire family-sized bucket of fried chicken, her cheeks completely stuffed.
Silence Suzuka, however, was staring down at Mejiro McQueen with stars in her eyes. She couldn't wait to see that beautiful running form again. She could never get tired of watching it!
During her own recent debut race, Suzuka had also utilized a Grand Escape strategy to eliminate her opponents by an overwhelming distance.
The media was already dubbing her "the next Mejiro McQueen." But Suzuka knew better than anyone just how massive the gap between them truly was.
Even during their joint team practices, she could only ever chase McQueen's back.
She desperately wanted to know what the scenery at the absolute front looked like.
The race officially began. A massive wave of cheers erupted from the audience, thousands of voices screaming McQueen's name in unison.
Down on the turf.
The countdown hit zero.
Bang!
A violent shockwave of white air exploded outward. Mejiro McQueen surged to the absolute front of the pack like a fired shell.
The gap widened at a horrifying velocity. The trailing horse girls grimaced, realizing they had absolutely no choice but to accelerate and give chase immediately.
Terrified of letting McQueen build an insurmountable lead, every single runner was forced to shatter their own natural rhythm right out of the gate.
"Mejiro McQueen!"
"McQueen-oneesama!"
The crowd ignited the second they saw her explosive opening.
This was it! This gorgeous, devastatingly aggressive running style was exactly why they loved Mejiro McQueen!
Damn it! Why does this feel so agonizing when the race just started?!
The runners whose rhythms had been violently disrupted wore expressions of pure suffering.
In a standard, realistic race, it was virtually unheard of to push the pace to this extreme so early. A horse girl's body was not forged from iron. They needed time to gradually acclimate to the track's flow before burning their reserves for the final leg.
But caught in McQueen's gravitational pull, they were forced to overload their engines from the very first second just to stay in her rear-view mirror.
Even though many of these runners and their trainers had specifically drilled to counter this exact scenario, overcoming it on the live turf was a completely different nightmare.
The consequence of this forced, premature acceleration became painfully obvious. By the time the pack reached the middle leg, several horse girls were already running on completely empty stamina reserves.
More ps = more chapters