“Spica?” Toujou Kaisoku’s first thought went straight to astronomy—Alpha Virginis, the brightest star in the constellation Virgo.
Using that as a team name suggested the team had a romantic sensibility.
Spica in the West also carried connotations of harvest, which fit the umamusume ethos of hard work bringing rewards rather neatly.
“Yes, Spica!” Gold Ship—who had just been booted seven or eight meters by Mejiro McQueen—came trotting back with a leaf of grass stuck on her head, visibly thrilled to be giving the sales pitch.
“We’re not that famous yet, but we’re a pretty solid team.
Wanna give it a shot?
Just a li’l try!”
“Thank you for the invitation, but I’ve got a lot to handle.
If the chance comes up, I’ll definitely stop by to express my thanks properly.” Kaisoku deployed her standard pitch-deflection phrasing.
This kind of solicitation—she handled it on autopilot.
Only, before she could make her escape, Gold Ship’s hand clamped onto her arm.
“Young maiden…
do you wish to know the meaning of life?
Do you wish—to truly live?!” Gold Ship’s voice dropped, dead serious in its delivery.
Except the lines were a little too familiar, and Kaisoku felt a cartoon sweatdrop forming on her forehead.
Don’t tell me Z-sensei’s still flaking on updates in this world too.
Still, she shook her head firmly.
“I’m not really interested in that sort of thing—”
“Alright, Gold Ship.
If she doesn’t want to, there’s no need to force her.
Maybe another chance will come up—” McQueen stepped in to rescue her.
Compared to Gold Ship, Kaisoku’s impression of McQueen was night and day.
Contrast was doing all the heavy lifting here—next to the warm, gentle McQueen, Gold Ship registered as something straight out of chaotic evil, and every point of affection Kaisoku lost for Gold Ship, McQueen gained back in full.
“I’m sorry—I realize I never asked your name.”
“Toujou Kaisoku.
Just Toujou is fine…” Kaisoku replied earnestly.
“I really am in a rush, so I’m sorry I can’t sit in on a tryout today.
Next time, if the opportunity arises, I’d like to give it a go.”
“Understood—I’ll look forward to it.” McQueen didn’t push.
Kaisoku’s politeness had earned her goodwill, and she even gave Kaisoku clear directions to the student council so the girl wouldn’t have to wander around lost.
Grateful, Kaisoku hurried off toward the council room, leaving the training grounds behind in a rush.
The moment Kaisoku was out of earshot, McQueen got surrounded.
The cluster of umamusume who had been watching Kaisoku from a distance moved in like a wildfire, hemming her in.
“McQueen…
that girl, just now…” Her closest friend spoke first.
“Was that the legendary Toujou Kaisoku?”
“Huh?
The legendary…?” McQueen blinked, turning the name over in her head.
Then it clicked.
“She’s that one—the Tōdai exchange student?
The one and only umamusume ever to get into the University of Tokyo, Toujou Kaisoku?!”
“Just like the rumors said, huh.
Doesn’t like interacting with others—cool and aloof, practically an iceberg.
Apparently the only umamusume she ever talks to are Satono Diamond, ranked top of our year, and Kitasan Black, whose level is just a notch below Duramente’s.
She barely has any other friends—pours everything into studying and training.
Some people even say her racing ability is right up there with Kitasan’s.” A cluster of umamusume murmured among themselves.
As the sole umamusume ever admitted to the University of Tokyo, Kaisoku was famous around here—that much was a given.
On top of that, Kaisoku’s looks were one-in-a-thousand, and the iceberg persona added a layer of mystique on top.
McQueen, who hadn’t pieced it together in time, was now kicking herself for not making more conversation.
Getting to talk to an umamusume of that caliber was plain lucky.
“I recognized her right away, but I couldn’t work up the nerve to say anything…” a visibly self-conscious umamusume mumbled.
“Someone that amazing probably doesn’t want anything to do with people like us.”
“Right?
In terms of aura alone, it felt like standing next to a much-older senior.
She just entered honkaku-ka and she already has presence like that—she really is a prodigy of the century.” Her more fervent admirer chimed in.
“McQueen, what impression did you get of her?
Is she hard to deal with?”
“Not really…
but she is very polite.
If anything, maybe too formal…” McQueen thought back.
Kaisoku had been courteous from start to finish, but there had been a consistent distance.
Even the refusal had been delivered like a boilerplate template.
Perhaps she really was the cold-faced, cold-hearted type.
“Gold Ship, what did you pick up?” McQueen turned to the other umamusume who’d actually exchanged words with Kaisoku. This chapter was copied from novelping.com without permission.
“Isn’t she just a regular, slightly-socially-anxious normal girl?” Gold Ship scratched her head.
“You guys are layering on some serious filters, aren’t you?”
“What are you even saying?!
She was obviously just pretending she could have a normal conversation with us!
She’s a Tōdai student, you hear me?
The exams are famously brutal—an umamusume who can crack Tōdai cannot be an ordinary person!” The apparently-diehard Kaisoku fan pushed back hard.
“No, no, no…
honestly, an umamusume getting into Tōdai isn’t really as wild as all that.” Gold Ship shrugged.
“Most umamusume just never tried.
She happened to be the first one who did—and she made it.
That’s all, isn’t it?”
“That can’t be it…” McQueen shook her head.
“But still, an umamusume who got into the University of Tokyo—she must be something special.
If the chance comes up, I really would like to get to know her better.”
“McQueen, you’re overthinking it.
For all you know, she’s over there right now thinking, ‘Why is a young lady of her caliber being so friendly with me?'”
“No way…”
“McQueen, a young lady of her caliber, being so FRIENDLY with ME—oh god, I am absolutely never washing this hand again.
Dia’s going to be so jealous when she hears about this, McQueen’s basically her idol.” Kaisoku was beaming bright enough to blow snot bubbles.
As someone who had survived art school in a past life, getting swarmed by pretty girls felt like a guided tour through heaven.
And the one who’d just chatted with her was the legendary daughter of the Mejiro household—in any gacha game, that was minimum-tier SSR material.
Could easily be UR!
“When I get home I am absolutely rubbing this in Dia’s face.
See?
I can handle things on my own.
Always treating me like a kid, hmph, it’s disrespectful.”
She strutted all the way up to the student council doors, still gloating.
But as she drew nearer to that woman, the smirk faded from her mouth.
That was the strategist who had played her.
The demon lord who had steered her down a road she’d never imagined.
The apex of Tracen Academy’s power structure.
And also her benefactor bankrolling her tuition.
Any one of those titles was well above her weight class—all four at once made the student council room feel like a final-boss castle.
Kaisoku drew a deep breath, gripped the door handle, and yanked it open.
“Hm?
Kaisoku, you’re already here.
I figured you’d gotten lost—I was about to come find you.”
And just like that, the hero Toujou Kaisoku, who had barely breached the demon lord’s castle, was ambushed at the front door!
Standing before her was the Seven-Crown Umamusume herself.
The Symboli Rudolf.
The Emperor.
The Night Lord of Tracen Academy.
The legendary Undefeated Triple Crown winner.
The strongest umamusume in history—one of them, within Japan at least.
Symboli Rudolf.
Kaisoku hadn’t expected to sample the demon lord’s aura this early.
She flinched half a step back on reflex.
Her gaze wavered from resolute to faltering; her previously upright spine bent under the pressure; her voice picked up a tremor.
“I’m so sorry I’m late…
I’m the kind of useless umamusume who gets lost inside her own school.
Truly, truly sorry…” Crap.
The social-anxiety gene in her body was activating.
Backlash—bodily backlash!
Kaisoku blamed her physical shell for every last bit of it, conveniently skipping over the fact that she was in fact genuinely terrified of a figure like Rudolf.
“Rudolf…
ma’am?”
“Hahahaha…
sorry, I’m not laughing at you.
Haha—was that a bit you rehearsed?
It’s pretty funny.” Rudolf was visibly amused.
“Sorry, sorry.
No need to be so tense.
I do owe you a proper apology for the scheming on my end—my intentions were good, but at a basic level I did withhold certain things from you.”
thank you for the tuition waiver.” Inside, Kaisoku was hollering This scheming old fox is rotten to the core, I don’t trust a word.
Outside, not a peep.
“The reason I started paying attention to you goes back to that race you had with Kitasan Black.
I’d been watching Kitasan for a while—she has real potential.
But I happened to spot the talent shining off you, too.
You may not have much confidence in yourself, but I don’t think I’m wrong about this.
An important friend of mine agrees.
She thinks very highly of your potential.” Rudolf explained, unhurried.
“Honestly, I didn’t really expect you to pass the Tōdai entrance exam.
That was all you.
And the principal’s office didn’t bend anything—your interview and your written exam were both excellent.
You got into Tōdai on your own effort.
My involvement had very little to do with it.”
“Then…
why did I end up at Tracen Academy anyway?” Kaisoku asked, quieter now.
“I thought that was part of the plan you and the professor cooked up?”
“Ah, that one—because the University of Tokyo and Tracen Academy already have a strategic partnership.” Rudolf answered plainly.
“Plenty of umamusume, after graduating from Tracen, do go on to top Tokyo-area universities.
Waseda, even Kyoto University—all popular picks.
The only place no umamusume ever chose was Tōdai.”
“Eh?” Kaisoku tilted her head.
“Why not?”
“Here’s the thing.
Most universities relax admission requirements a little for umamusume—at a basic level, bringing in umamusume is an investment.
It raises the school’s profile, and gives ordinary students more motivation to work.
Tōdai is the one school that, historically, has never received a single umamusume application.” Rudolf shrugged.
“Part of it is Tōdai refusing to budge on their admission line.
Part of it is that Tōdai, prestigious as it is, hasn’t traditionally had much to draw umamusume in…
To fix that, Tōdai has been planning an exchange program with us for a long time.
You are the very first umamusume from the University of Tokyo to come to Tracen as an exchange student.
You represent Tōdai.
Your competing is, from their perspective, the best advertising they could ask for—ideally, attracting lots more umamusume to apply to Tōdai in the future.
That was their stipulation.”
“So what this boils down to is—I fit both schools’ criteria, and the two schools decided to…
bet on me?” Kaisoku finally got it.
The whole thing wasn’t the two schools ganging up to manipulate her—it was both schools using her racing as publicity.
Tōdai has no umamusume had become such a running joke that, whenever Tōdai’s representatives sat down with other schools, the other side would make a point of stuffing an umamusume into their delegation just to dunk on them.
One humiliation piled on another, and Tōdai started treating every rare umamusume applicant as if she were gold.
And then Kaisoku aced the written exam.
The interview, with her looks, her presence, and her overall level all top-of-the-curve, was practically a formality.
How could she not pass?
Just like that, Toujou Kaisoku became Tōdai’s new standard-bearer.
The banner read: We’ve got umamusume too.
And not just any—top-tier ones at that.
Maybe Tōdai was being a little immature about it.
But the pride-driven urge to prove a point wasn’t hard to understand.
Every other university had umamusume on their rosters.
Only Tōdai’s column said zero.
Of course that stung.
And Rudolf herself didn’t care whose flag a particular umamusume was carrying—so long as a talented umamusume shone out on the track, she was satisfied.
No wonder Tōdai and Tracen had teamed up like thieves in the night.
Once she saw the full picture, Kaisoku couldn’t help exhaling.
No wonder both schools had been bending over backwards to make things easy.
Tuition waivers, uniforms delivered in advance—and uniforms were normally out-of-pocket—every pothole in her road had been quietly paved over before she hit it.
“So—we value you highly.
I don’t want there to be any misunderstanding between us, which is why I called you in on your first day to clear the air.
Although, I forgot how big Tracen is.
I should have had Maruzensky pick you up.” Rudolf stroked her chin, mildly dissatisfied with her own oversight.
The moment she said it, though, Kaisoku’s face blanched.
“Please—no!
Madam President!
Please, I beg you!
Please never have Maruzensky-nee-san pick me up again!
I’d like to not die young!”