Glorious Dyna might not have known what "turnout" meant, but she did know that for a very, very long time she had been doing nothing but eating and sleeping at the ranch, only without seeing the two-legs she was used to.
To a horse, humans were not actually that important. A horse only needed to remember the people it spent the most time with. The fact that, even after more than three months, Dyna could still remember people like Takezono and Iwamoto already counted as extraordinary memory.
"What a rare sight. I don't even dare go into her stall alone—she still hasn't quite kicked the habit of biting people. But once you see her, you'll definitely be amazed. This girl can win the Satsuki Sho. The Derby too, no problem!"
That was what one of the ranch staff told Takezono and Iwamoto when they came to visit. He had never seen a horse like Dyna, one who had grown so dramatically over a winter turnout.
Iwamoto, meanwhile, had always had extremely high expectations for Dyna's development, so he was not too shocked by how much her body had improved. What surprised him more was how quickly that ugly, slightly reddish winter coat of hers had shed away. By now it had been replaced by a glossy chestnut coat so bright and beautiful that, walking across the still half-dormant pasture in the sunlight, she looked almost gilded.
"She's gorgeous," Iwamoto said. "Her frame has come along beautifully too. Even the feel of these muscles is basically on par with a colt's now. Dyna's become one imposing young lady."
The moment he entered the pasture, Dyna trotted right up to the two-legs. She caught familiar scents from Iwamoto. If she had guessed right, that meant she was finally being taken back so she could resume training and prepare to run again.
After receiving a reward in the form of a sugar cube from Iwamoto, Dyna happily tossed her head. She truly wished she could get sugar after every race. That stuff had far more "purity" than grass. Surely only a very small number of horses ever got to eat it. That hateful chestnut tail-flower colt definitely hadn't.
Wonderful.
Yet another category in which Dyna had beaten Orfevre.
Takezono was equally pleased with how his girl had grown. Too bad Wada was still out riding. His results in 2010 had been less than stellar, though at least at the very end of the year Dyna had brought him a stakes victory, so he had managed to avoid going winless all year.
Because of that, he was still able to pick up some riding offers. For Wada, there was no question: he would seize every chance and work as hard as he could. If he kept using those opportunities to hone his riding, then maybe, just maybe, one day in some race he would be able to help Dyna through his own skill.
Rather than, like ten years ago, sitting helplessly on Opera O's back.
He had no wish to relive that experience.
Takezono had chosen to trust him. Fate had given Wada and Opera O's bloodline another chance to intertwine.
He was going to grab hold of that chance.
If Wada had to name his ambition, then it was this: one day, he wanted to ride Glorious Dyna's foal, too. And maybe, one day after that, even his son would ride one of Dyna's foals. A lineage carried through generations.
(2010 made Wada undergo enlightenment.D100 = 90.What does this mean? Apparently Wada got stronger. Congratulations.)
And so—
On March 5, the day Takezono and Iwamoto came to visit Dyna's turnout pasture, Hanshin Racecourse happened to be hosting the Tulip Sho as well: a three-year-old fillies-only G3 over 1600 meters on turf.
Originally, Wada Ryuuji had not had a riding booking that day.
Unexpectedly, though, one owner approached him and asked him to ride Kijin Hissou, the tenth favorite in the Tulip Sho. For some reason, Wada accepted almost on instinct.
The tenth favorite had basically no chance to win.
And yet perhaps more than anything, Wada wanted to prove that he no longer needed a fully automatic superhorse to win races. So that day, he stood in Hanshin Racecourse.
"They're rounding the final turn—Kijin Hissou holds steady in third! Wada urges her on! Hanshin's final contest begins! She's moving up!"
Takezono, Iwamoto, and Dyna all watched the livestream huddled around the same phone. Dyna, in truth, could not actually make out what was showing on the screen. She only thought she had spotted someone familiar, though she was not entirely sure.
Why was he riding another horse?
Dyna did not understand in the slightest.
With an irritated snort, she snatched Takezono's hat off his head and shook it violently in her mouth to vent her displeasure.
"Ohhh! Is Wada-kun actually going to win this? A major win right at the start of the year!" Iwamoto was the most excited of all. He had, after all, been the one who had practically raised Wada from the very beginning of his career. Back when people wanted to replace Wada, it was Iwamoto who had fought to keep him.
If you asked Iwamoto whether he regretted letting Opera O lose out on additional major wins, the answer would be no.
For a horse, Opera O had already achieved more than enough.
For a person, though, he had saved a young man's dream.
Back then, Wada had almost been hit hard enough to stop wanting to be a jockey at all.
"The winner is Kijin Hissou and Wada! A shocking upset from the tenth favorite—the assassin hidden beneath the tulips!"
Wada won by a nose.
That early-season stakes victory was, for him, repayment for everything Dyna had given him over the course of the previous year. Facing the cameras, it seemed he could smile a little more easily now.
Good. Then he should hold on to that state and keep moving forward.
(The odds of Wada winning the Tulip Sho: D100 = 99 (?) )
"All right! Then we should settle on the date for Dyna to be brought back in, shouldn't we? I say she should return before next Friday and resume training. There are only a little over forty days left until the Satsuki Sho. Time to get her back into racing condition."
That was Iwamoto's suggestion, and Takezono had no objections. So they decided Dyna would return to the training center on March 10 and be put back to work.
"Hellooo, I'm coming in?"
In the early hours of March 10, a member of staff stepped into the stall. Given the distance involved in transportation, Dyna had to leave the ranch at dawn. This was Hokkaido, after all, and the central training center was still a fair way away.
But as the staff member on night duty, he had spent all of the previous evening hearing constant neighing and kicking from Dyna's stall. It had made him deeply uneasy. What if, on the night before she was supposed to leave, Dyna somehow managed to injure herself fooling around in the stall? He might as well commit ritual suicide in apology.
As a green rookie with little experience, he was badly scared. Still, after pestering a senior on the phone, he had gotten the following advice:
"Bring sugar cubes or carrots or something and feed her. If she lets you touch her, then rub her a bit too."
Armed with this secret technique, he finally worked up the courage to enter. Even so, all those rumors about how brutally Glorious Dyna bit people still made his heart pound.
Then, once inside, he saw that Dyna was not lying lazily on her hay pile as usual. She was making wildly exaggerated, vigorous movements in the cramped space of her stall. She only quieted a little when she noticed he was carrying sugar, but even then the restless energy didn't completely leave her.
"All right, all right... look what I brought, okay? You're leaving today. Wouldn't it be better if you rested a little?"
The staff member carefully approached.
Just as expected, the chestnut filly opened her mouth and bit onto his uniform. But this time she did not use much force. There was no imagined ripping sound, no cloth being shredded apart, and that eased his nerves a little.
He offered the sugar cube. Dyna sucked it down with terrifying speed, and the staff member relaxed completely.
Looks like Glorious Dyna just wanted somebody to keep her company.
What a sensitive little—well, big—filly.
At least, the staff member had genuinely never seen a filly with muscles as outrageous as Dyna's. Thinking of how the owner and trainer kept saying "Glorious Dyna's target is the colts' Triple Crown" made the whole thing feel faintly terrifying.
But then again, this was Glorious Dyna.
That made it feel... less absurd somehow.
After all, she was still undefeated, a racehorse who had already gone overseas and won.
"Well, since you're clinging to me like this, I don't have much choice. I only brought that one sugar cube—and one carrot. Go ahead and eat it."
He held up the carrot.
Before he even saw what happened, Dyna had vacuumed that down too.
Once she realized the two-leg had no more sweet things to offer, she bit his hat and flung it out of the stall.
—An hour later—
The horse trailer arrived at the ranch.
Led out by the staff, Dyna was more visibly restless than ever. Normally she strode forward in long, confident steps, but now she was reduced to quick little tap-tap-tap-tap steps, visibly resisting the interior of the trailer.
Only with enormous effort did the staff manage to load Glorious Dyna inside.
As the trailer drove farther and farther away, they could still hear her faint neighing.
"When did she turn into this? Before, she felt like a pretty gentle mare."
"No idea. After she left, I checked the stall over and over, but I didn't find anything strange. So weird."
"You'll never really know what a horse is thinking. But anyway, now that Glorious Dyna's gone, the next thing to think about is the trainer. Let's go take care of the others."
"Yeah. Let's turn the others out tomorrow and inspect all the stalls thoroughly. If there's some dangerous insect or something in there, that'd be bad."
The staff chatted in small groups. Since the early morning rush had already kept them awake, they decided not to bother sleeping again. Instead, they went off to tend to the horses who had been roused by Dyna's inexplicable racket.
March 11.
"Ow, ow, ow! Why are you biting people again?!"
The assistant was on the verge of tears. He had honestly believed the bond between them had grown strong enough. Who would have thought that, after so long apart, Dyna's chosen method of greeting would be to sink her teeth straight into him again?
And she had bitten hard this time.
"The ranch people said she'd been like this for quite a while. Apparently she kept acting like she was afraid of something. But they checked the stall and never found any abnormal creature or anything. So I'm thinking maybe we should let Dyna go swimming first and see if she can relax."
"That doesn't really look like fear to me... but whatever. I'll take her over to the pool, then. Hopefully she doesn't bite me again."
The assistant sighed, but training still had to be done.
During turnout, Dyna had put on dozens of kilograms. How much of that was effective gain, he had no way of knowing. That would have to wait until after a timed work, when Iwamoto gave further instructions.
After the swim, Dyna's temper did improve a little.
But on the way back, they ran into Orfevre—who had not spent the winter on turnout, but had instead continued racing.
Of course, Orfevre's current biggest win was still... a maiden.
And after so many races without proper rest, even that beautiful chestnut "tail-flower" coat of his had become visibly worn and exhausted.
But no matter what shape Orfevre was in, Glorious Dyna would recognize him.
And now, the balance of power had reversed.
Glorious Dyna was the big one now.
So just when both assistants thought the two horses were going to pass one another peacefully, Dyna suddenly lunged and bit toward Orfevre's ear.
The shock of it turned Orfevre into a round-eyed old grandpa horse on the spot. He shrank back and did not even dare snap back at her.
The horse in front of him was bigger, bulkier, and radiating aggression. For a moment it was hard to tell which of them was the filly and which the colt.
That was Orfevre for you: bully the weak, fear the strong. Back when he had the advantage of being a colt, he had gotten excellent mileage out of harassing Dyna. But now...
How could a filly be bigger than a colt?!
Orfevre questioned the meaning of horse life itself, though all he could do was hide behind his staff member while pretending to act tough.
"Hey, hey, hey! Don't push your luck!"
Only with all his strength did Dyna's handler manage to haul her back by the lead rope and calm her down. Even after she stopped trying to menace Orfevre, however, she kept snorting at him.
That scuffle knocked her out of absolutely perfect condition, and once the assistant apologized and brought her back to the stall, he sighed heavily as he filled her feed.
Then again, what else could they do? Let her be.
As long as Dyna could win races, that was what mattered.
—
3 p.m.
Dyna, who had been so restless, finally settled down completely. Of course, she also noticed that the trainer and assistants rushing to the stalls all looked pale and miserable.
That uneasy sensation that had been making her so agitated vanished. Dyna stuck her head out from the stall.
Something had seemed to shake the ground a few times just now. But she was only a horse. If the unpleasant feeling was gone, then all that remained was for her to eat.
"Thank goodness the damage here wasn't too bad…"
Though the earthquake was tragic, seeing the horses unharmed soothed everyone a little.
Especially seeing Iwamoto's current representative horse, Glorious Dyna, repeatedly pawing at her now-empty feed tub.
That, more than anything, reminded them that they had to get themselves together and go comfort each horse in turn.
—
"Nakayama Racecourse has been badly damaged. Repairs are expected to take until October. So the Satsuki Sho will be moved to Tokyo Racecourse."
"However, there's one problem. Dyna's emotional state after the quake was actually very satisfactory, but her condition while running has me seriously worried."
That was what Iwamoto told the visiting Takezono and Wada, patting Dyna lightly on the face.
Takezono's reaction was immediate and unbothered.
"Then we let her race once first. Use a race as fuel and push her hard!"
"That is one option. The problem is, Yayoi Sho is already over. Should we go with a fillies-only race instead?"
"No. We choose the Spring Stakes. Orfevre also needs that race as his stepping stone into the Satsuki Sho, right? Then we'll block him dead in his tracks!"
As everyone knew, after the ranch incident, Takezono had become very petty.
Especially where Orfevre was concerned.
Wada: ?
When Wada noticed that even Iwamoto did not object, he simply accepted it.
Yes.
This was indeed Takezono, all right.
All Wada needed to do was think about how to ride the horse to victory.
And so—
New objective added!
G2 Spring Stakes!
Strong rival: Orfevre!
Join here to read ahead.
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Checking In in Demon Slayer 65
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