Creating a recruitment ad was hardly any trouble at all for Kuroha now.
He only spent a few minutes looking up standard hiring formats online, along with the average hourly wage for part-time Umamusume.
Then, with a casual stroke of generosity, he directly raised the hourly pay to the highest normal bracket and even added an appealing bonus subsidy on top of it.
Once he finished editing it, he posted the sincere-looking recruitment notice to his "Uma Friend Circle."
[Job Posting: Chasing Light Team Seeks Auxiliary Run-Along Umamusume]
[Job Duties: Assist team members with daily running training, tactical drills, resistance testing, and related work.]
[Compensation: Starting at 3,000 yen per hour, with generous bonuses and subsidies.]
[Requirements: Priority given to applicants with stakes race experience. Must be able to maintain a steady pace, have a resilient personality, and follow instructions well.]
At the end, he also included an email address for résumé submissions.
And then, almost immediately, the response exploded.
The post had only been up for a few minutes, yet the number of likes shot past four digits as if strapped to a rocket.
And it was still rising at an absurd pace.
The comment section below erupted on the spot.
[Trainer Kuroha is recruiting auxiliary run-along partners?! I have a G2 stakes victory on my record and only retired recently. Can I count as one of the candidates?]
[The pay is so high! But I'm really weak. I've never even won an open-class race, so I probably won't get picked... sob.]
[The job is seriously just running alongside people? And the hourly pay is this high? Is this for real?!]
[Looks like... Chasing Light is probably the first team at Central Tracen to publicly pay for auxiliary training Umamusume in a serious, official way, right?]
Very soon, a veteran Umamusume from the industry replied within the thread.
[That's right. In the past, our teams usually had trainers swallow their pride and beg retired seniors from their own teams, or from other teams, to help with training either for free or at dirt-cheap rates.]
[Waaah, I hope the other teams can keep up with the times and follow Chasing Light's example too! I really don't want to keep delivering takeout anymore. Working in the wind and sun all day is miserable.]
Soon after, another Umamusume with a very newbie-looking profile picture asked in an innocent tone,
[Huh? But if you're delivering takeout, aren't you running around every day and training your stamina too? Isn't that pretty good?]
The Umamusume who had been complaining about food delivery immediately replied with a "helpless facepalm.jpg" sticker.
[How could anyone possibly run on foot for several hours straight? That's concrete, not turf. It wrecks your knees. And it's exhausting. Of course you use an electric scooter, idiot!]
Before long, the comment section was packed with active racers and retired Umamusume alike.
Everyone was talking animatedly.
But overall, nearly all of them were filled with longing for this high-paying, relatively easy job.
Quite a few even began recommending themselves directly in the comments, afraid they might miss the opportunity if they were too slow.
"People are really enthusiastic..."
Kuroha scrolled through the blazing-hot comment section under his "Uma Friend Circle" recruitment post.
Then suddenly, a flash of inspiration hit him out of nowhere.
He lifted his head and slowly looked around the vast Mejiro training grounds surrounding him, with their expansive space and excellent facilities.
The idea in his mind became clearer and clearer.
"Maybe... I should just build one myself."
Right now, the Mejiro training grounds that Kuroha and his Umamusume were using had originally come from the support he received after becoming the 담당 trainer for Mejiro Ardan and Mejiro McQueen and signing a cooperation agreement with the prestigious Mejiro family.
All the tedious daily work at the training grounds, such as equipment maintenance, turf upkeep, and logistics support, was in fact being handled by staff dispatched by the Mejiro family.
But times had changed.
Back when he signed that agreement, he had only just been a local trainer working out of an empty athletics field.
At the time, he had been in Oi trying to help Fujimasa March pursue the South Kanto Triple Crown.
Not only had he been strapped for cash back then, he had also been supporting two Umamusume. He had been so broke it was almost laughable.
But things were different now.
For Kuroha, money really had become nothing more than a string of dull numbers.
Prize money cuts from countless top-tier races, endorsement dividends, appreciation from assets under his name...
Even if he did absolutely nothing and just lay around, the money flowing in every day would still be enough to leave ordinary people speechless.
He was not interested in money for its own sake.
But if spending money could buy better conditions for his girls to train under, then no amount was too much for him.
Inside the trainer's office, Kuroha was flipping through the thick stack of résumés in his hand.
"If I can build a fully independent Chasing Light training ground with even better facilities..."
"Then I can openly recruit top-tier specialists in fields like nutrition, sports science, and psychology to join Chasing Light."
"And for auxiliary training Umamusume like these, a professional team could handle long-term recruitment and management."
"If we get to the point where, whenever we need a certain kind of training, we can immediately pull out a whole group of Umamusume for any position, any racing style, any personality..."
"...then the team's training efficiency will definitely increase by a huge margin."
Hm...
But after thinking about it again, if he really did something like that,
then Chasing Light would only become more and more terrifying, more and more professional. It would probably deal a devastating dimensionality gap blow to the other Central teams.
At that thought, Kuroha pondered for a moment, then quickly let it go.
Forget it. As things stood, Chasing Light was already a dimensionality gap strike against the other teams anyway.
A little more or a little less probably would not change the final outcome.
...
After fermenting overnight, the recruitment post on "Uma Friend Circle" had completely exploded in popularity.
Early the next morning,
when Kuroha stepped into the trainer's office, his email inbox was already crammed full.
Among them, almost all were résumés sent by retired Central Umamusume with stakes-level credentials.
Mixed in were also a small number of applications from local circuit Umamusume and active racers trying their luck.
As for those last two categories, Kuroha only gave them a brief glance before skipping past them.
The local Umamusume were simply too weak.
After retirement, some of them probably could not even outrun Nice Nature as she was now, newly entered into her Classic Year.
They would not be able to serve as effective practice partners.
As for those active Central Umamusume...
They had not even sorted out their own training plans yet, so why were they running over here just to make a little spending money?
Kuroha shook his head helplessly and continued screening the applications.
Among these retired Umamusume who had signed up,
many had wins in open-class races or even G3 events.
There were also quite a few with G2 victories.
But as for truly top-tier G1 Umamusume, there was not a single one.
Which made sense.
An Umamusume who had won a G1-level major race usually would not be short on money at all.
Naturally, they would not think much of this kind of "getting paid to run alongside other people" work.
Well...
Except for a few with rather unusual personalities.
"This uma... hm. One G3 victory, and she's a Front Runner too. Stable pace control. Worth considering."
"This one... can handle both Late Surger and End Closer styles? Still has late-race burst left. Also worth considering."
Kuroha scrolled through the résumés with one hand while taking notes on paper and selecting suitable candidates.
Then, when he opened the next résumé, his mouse suddenly froze.
His expression instantly turned strange.
"Why is she here trying her luck too?"
On the computer screen, a single résumé had been opened on its own.
In the upper right corner was a photo of an incomparably beautiful girl with silver hair, golden-red heterochromatic eyes, and a somewhat cool, aloof aura.
And below that, the most eye-catching line on the page read:
International G1 Wins: Five!
Among them was the Japan Cup, one of the most prestigious international races in the eyes of Central.
The girl's name was...
Folkqueen.
The hurricane of New Zealand, the former strongest Umamusume of the Atlantic.
Looking at that familiar, cool beauty in the photo, Kuroha's face showed a trace of surprise.
During this period, the two of them had barely met outside of weddings.
Although Folkqueen now lived in Tokyo,
the two of them usually only saw each other during the monthly weddings Kuroha regularly held.
"...Is Queen really that short on money?"
Kuroha stroked his chin in thought for a moment.
But he did not hesitate for long. He directly added her name to the accepted list and clicked send.
No matter what exactly Folkqueen was thinking,
a world-class top Umamusume of this level was absolutely a treasure.
Even if her ability was too strong to be directly useful for Rice Shower and Nice Nature's current resistance training,
she could still be of tremendous help to Mejiro McQueen, who was about to begin her overseas campaign.
...
At that same moment, in a corner of Tokyo,
inside a pink-decorated room that looked soft and girlish all over,
ding~
As Kuroha clicked accept on his side, the screen of a pink phone on the bedside table lit up and gave off a crisp notification sound.
A while later,
a strand of silver hair poked out from the gap in the blankets, followed by a pair of long, fluffy silver horse ears rising upright.
Only then did a delicate face emerge, still bleary with sleep.
The girl yawned and opened her striking golden-red heterochromatic eyes.
After staring blankly into space for a while, she finally stretched out a pale arm, picked up the phone, and opened the message.
The instant her gaze landed on the conspicuous "Application Successful" notification on the screen, her whole body visibly froze.
Her brain shut down for a full three seconds.
Then this top Umamusume, known as the Hurricane of New Zealand,
turned pink all over at a speed visible to the naked eye. The flush spread from her long neck upward until even those silver horse ears were dyed completely red.
And then,
"Pfah!"
It was as if the entire girl had turned into an overloaded steam engine. She looked about ready to shoot scalding vapor out of the top of her head.
"Ahhhhh! What the hell was wrong with me last night?!"
Folkqueen shot upright in bed, slammed a pillow over her face, and kicked wildly at the blankets with both legs, letting out a cry of utter self-destruction.
And just as she was rolling all over the bed in peak social-death agony,
a teasing, expectant little laugh suddenly seemed to ring out in the quiet room.
"Oh my, isn't this actually pretty nice?"
At the sound of that voice, Folkqueen's body stiffened violently. She abruptly turned her head and looked toward a large dressing mirror lying against the bedside.
In the mirror, her own stunning face was reflected back at her.
But the astonishing thing was that the "herself" in the mirror had a pleased curve at the corner of her lips instead, smiling quite happily.
The girl in the mirror lightly touched her cheek, excitement glittering in those golden-red heterochromatic eyes.
"That way, I'll finally have a proper excuse to go play with Kuroha again."
"Lately, every time I see him, it's only from far away at those girls' weddings. I never get a chance to get close to him. It's been so frustrating!"
"Y-you-you-you... what are you saying, Folk?!"
The silver-haired girl, or rather Folkqueen herself, pointed at the mirror image with a trembling hand, her entire face burning red.
"Mhm~"
Inside the mirror, the silver-haired girl blinked those bewitching mismatched eyes and smiled with a hint of playfulness.
"Who knows?"
"Can you really say... that wasn't what you were thinking when you pressed send last night?"
"Ahhhhh! Stop saying that already!"
The room filled with the girl's panicked scream.
(End of Chapter)
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