Trailing at the absolute rear of the pack, Mejiro Ryan watched the runners ahead of her begin to rapidly lose speed. She wore an expression of calm resignation.
It might sound unambitious, but she had never intended to fight for first place in this race. Her target was the top three. Because of this, when she saw the other competitors get helplessly dragged into McQueen's devastating rhythm, she simply maintained her own pace and comfortably dropped to the back.
Up in the stands, Tokai Teio watched the unfolding disaster with deep sympathy.
"I knew this was going to happen. It is true that you absolutely cannot just let McQueen run away unchecked. But if you shatter your own body's natural rhythm trying to stop her, it does more harm than good. They are definitely feeling the physical toll right about now."
It was an observation born entirely from brutal, firsthand experience.
"Exactly. This is the core terror of the Grand Escape strategy. As long as she successfully disrupts her opponents' rhythm, they will burn through their stamina too early. By the time they reach the middle leg, they simply won't have the energy left to mount a counterattack. This allows her to maintain her lead all the way to the finish line," Trainer P analyzed seriously.
Silence Suzuka was mentally furiously taking notes on her trainer's lecture. However, she suspected this specific tactic would be incredibly difficult for her to replicate. Compared to McQueen, Suzuka had two massive, glaring weaknesses.
First, a lack of raw stamina. McQueen was naturally adapted to long-distance courses, meaning her baseline stamina reserves were exceptionally deep.
In contrast, Suzuka excelled at shorter distances. Her stamina simply wasn't built for prolonged endurance grinds, yet the Grand Escape was an inherently stamina-guzzling strategy.
Second, a lack of explosive closing power. The terrifying late-stage burst speed was the ultimate insurance policy of McQueen's strategy. While Suzuka's final sprint wasn't weak by any means, it couldn't even begin to compare to the monster-tier velocity McQueen unleashed.
Because of these factors, McQueen's specific brand of the Grand Escape was fundamentally unsuitable for Suzuka.
Back on the turf.
The race had officially entered the middle leg, and Mejiro McQueen was still holding an overwhelmingly dominant lead over the entire field.
While she did technically decelerate as she entered this phase, the opponents whose rhythms she had shattered during the opening were now experiencing severe, catastrophic deceleration of their own.
Because of this, the gap between them didn't shrink in the slightest. In fact, it was actively growing larger, breeding a profound sense of despair among the chasing pack.
"Incredible!"
"Mejiro McQueen! This Uma Musume is simply far too powerful! She is leading by an astronomical margin! They cannot catch her! Is there truly not a single competitor on this track capable of stopping her?!"
The announcer had effectively devolved into Mejiro McQueen's personal hype man. Anyone with a functioning pair of eyes could see the race was already over. There was zero suspense left.
McQueen's opponents had made the wrong choice at the very beginning, and now they were forced to swallow the bitter consequences.
Several runners were already wearing expressions of utter despair. Watching her race footage was one thing, but actually facing her on the turf left them with only one terrifying realization.
Mejiro McQueen was an absolute monster!
How could anyone possibly beat a monster like this? It was mathematically impossible.
Ironically, because of this, the same runners suddenly elevated Tokai Teio—the girl who nearly caught McQueen during the Satsuki Sho—to monster status as well.
Only now did they truly understand just how absurdly difficult it was to close the distance on Mejiro McQueen.
Down below the VIP box, a group of elite horse girls watched with visible dissatisfaction.
They had come specifically to confirm whether Mejiro McQueen had truly opened the gates of the Zone. They hadn't expected her to secure the victory without even using the level of strength she displayed in her previous race.
"There is no point in watching the rest of this."
Air Groove closed her eyes, unwilling to watch the slaughter. She couldn't even imagine the crushing psychological state of the runners on the turf right now. Just trying to put herself in their shoes made her feel a chill of genuine fear.
Those horse girls had effectively lost the right to even compete against McQueen. She was running in an entirely different dimension, soaring high above the clouds. Air Groove simply couldn't see a single ray of hope for anyone trying to defeat her in this race.
"Little McQueen really is incredibly strong," Maruzensky said with a light laugh.
Even a legend like her had to admit this junior's performance was completely absurd.
What was even more ridiculous was the fact that McQueen hadn't even entered the Zone. If the legends sitting in the VIP box activated the Zone, they could pull off a similar feat. But realistically, that was suicide. Even in short-distance sprints, it was biologically impossible for anyone to keep the Zone active for an entire race.
Generally speaking, the Zone was an ultimate technique reserved strictly for the final leg because the physical toll was too massive. But if they didn't activate the Zone right out of the gate, even these seasoned veterans couldn't replicate the absolute dominance McQueen was displaying right now.
That alone proved exactly how terrifying McQueen's baseline strength truly was.
"Indeed. She hasn't even used the Zone like she did during the Satsuki Sho," Symboli Rudolf observed.
Despite her stoic expression, she was just as shocked as the others. She had secretly been running mental simulations, trying to calculate how a race against Mejiro McQueen would play out.
The terrifying conclusion was that she would have to activate the Zone in the second half of the race just to barely scrape past McQueen right before the finish line.
And that was only a theoretical simulation. In a real-world scenario, she honestly wasn't fully confident she could win. Especially since no one actually knew the true nature or limits of McQueen's Zone yet.
Is this the crushing wave of a new era?
For a fleeting second, Symboli Rudolf felt like she was growing old. Looking at Mejiro McQueen and Tokai Teio, she saw the absolute future of Uma Musume.
With McQueen's explosive debut and Teio's dormant potential forced into full bloom because of it, Rudolf had a very strong premonition. The entire racing world was about to undergo a massive, violent paradigm shift!
The final corner!
Mejiro McQueen began her acceleration!
A massive wake of white air violently tore through the wind resistance!
By this point, the only runners still managing to hold a steady, albeit distant, pace behind McQueen were Mejiro Ryan, Biwa Hayahide, and El Condor Pasa.
Despite being the leading chasers, the gap between second place and McQueen had already widened to a staggering nine lengths.
And McQueen's true explosive phase was only just beginning!
This is way too exaggerated! El Condor Pasa thought in pure disbelief.
She assumed McQueen would inevitably suffer a slight speed drop navigating the final corner. Instead, not only did McQueen completely ignore the concept of deceleration, but she actually accelerated! How were they supposed to catch up to that?!
Even top-tier runners like El Condor Pasa naturally lost speed on bends compared to straightaways. But Mejiro McQueen was a complete anomaly.
She began building momentum inside the curve, and the exact millisecond she hit the final 200-meter straight, she detonated her final burst!
A brilliant, iridescent rainbow erupted from beneath her feet. In a flash of light, it looked as though she had triggered a video game ultimate attack. She seemed to vanish entirely, instantly reappearing drastically further down the track!
Unbelievable. El Condor Pasa mentally threw in the towel regarding first place.
With silent, mutual understanding, the trailing horse girls immediately shifted their focus to fighting for second and third. However, El Condor Pasa and Biwa Hayahide severely underestimated Mejiro Ryan. Ryan had been quietly hoarding her stamina since the middle leg, and her closing sprint was terrifyingly potent.
Having their rhythms shattered twice by McQueen's erratic pacing, El Condor Pasa and Biwa Hayahide could only watch helplessly as Mejiro Ryan blew past them.
The only problem was that barely moments after Ryan entered the final straight, the deafening sound of McQueen crossing the finish line echoed across the stadium.
Ryan's fiercely determined eyes instantly glazed over in pure confusion.
"Huh?"
It was a race devoid of any suspense!
Mejiro McQueen had successfully captured the second jewel of the undefeated Triple Crown. The eyes of the entire world were locked onto her.
"Congratulations to Mejiro McQueen for successfully claiming the crown of the Japanese Derby! This Uma Musume is now an undefeated double-crown champion! She is only one single step away from the absolute glory of conquering the Triple Crown! Can she actually achieve it?! Is a brand-new legend being born right before our very eyes?!"
Almost every spectator in the stadium was screaming her name.
The glory of absolute victory truly was an unparalleled delicacy. McQueen flashed a genuinely radiant smile. In that fleeting moment, it felt as though the warm, brilliant sunlight of early spring had physically manifested on the turf.
Whether it was the breathtaking view from the absolute front, or the deafening cheers of the crowd after a victory, these were her greatest treasures. This was the absolute meaning of her existence as an Uma Musume.
However, her mood soured considerably during the mandatory Winning Live that followed.
She could not fathom the point of this post-race idol concert. She had just finished a grueling race and wanted nothing more than to go back to her dorm and take a hot shower.
She was just singing a song that had been covered thousands of times, dancing choreography that had been repeated endlessly. Why were these fans getting so riled up over it? She wasn't even putting any actual emotion into the performance, yet they were completely satisfied.
Fans really were an incredibly easy demographic to fool.
The moment the performance ended and she stepped off the stage, her manufactured idol smile vanished instantly.
The stage crew watched her sudden shift in demeanor without batting an eye. They were used to it. This was already her third Winning Live.
Watching the young girl's retreating back, they couldn't help but feel a deep sense of awe.
She was truly terrifying.
She had performed three post-race concerts so far, and every single one of them had been a solo performance. She had completely eliminated every other competitor by the required margin.
Inside the dressing room, McQueen changed out of her idol outfit and prepared to head back to campus.
The moment she opened the door to the hallway, she bumped into the members of Team Sirius. Her eyes immediately landed on Tokai Teio, who was sitting in her wheelchair. Teio was currently signing a drawing board for a very small horse girl standing in front of her.
McQueen recognized the two little horse girls instantly.
Seeing them forcibly reminded her of the absolute trainwreck that was the third season of the Uma Musume anime. These two were the main protagonists of that disastrous season. Back in her old life, she had actually liked them quite a bit when playing the game.
Not only were their character designs beautiful, but their in-game skill kits were exceptionally strong. At the very least, they were drastically more meta-relevant in the game than her own character or Tokai Teio.
But that anime adaptation was deeply disappointing. They heavily nerfed the visual effects for the races.
Forget about the Zone; the anime barely even showcased basic skill activations. In the first few episodes, they teased a horse girl who seemingly entered the Zone, only for her to suffer a forced career-ending bone fracture a few races later, essentially deleting her from the plot entirely.
"McQueen-oneesama! I am a huge fan! Could I please get your autograph?!"
Seeing McQueen, Satono Diamond's eyes lit up like floodlights, and she enthusiastically bounced over.
Despite the barrage of meta-commentary flashing through her mind, McQueen maintained her aloof, aristocratic elegance.
"Very well."
She casually signed her name. She made no attempt to be affectionate with the young fan, projecting an aura of cold unapproachability.
Seeing this, Tokai Teio helplessly rolled her wheelchair forward to intervene.
"Look, McQueen. These are our two biggest fans! In everyone's eyes, the great Teio is already acknowledged as your fated rival! The Hero of Crimson Flames! How about it? That is the brand new title the media just gave me! Pretty cool, right?"
"..." McQueen stared at her, completely deadpan. "Whatever. I am going back."
She had originally planned to ride back to the academy with her team, but she completely lost the mood for it. Seeing Tokai Teio stuck in that wheelchair made her feel inexplicably irritated.
That idiot was definitely going to claw her way back onto the turf, right?