Tracen Academy. Training grounds.
A 1400-meter simulated race was about to get underway.
Simulated races were a staple of Tracen Academy life. Every month, the school hosted one in a different category, with race dates and matchups decided by lottery.
Today, it was King Halo's turn to take the field.
The purpose of these simulated races was to give trainers a clearer picture of each uma musume's abilities and the distances suited to her running style. The participants were almost always uma musume who hadn't yet been signed to a trainer or team.
After enrollment, uma musume typically trained for half a year before entering official races — time enough for a trainer to get a solid read on them. That said, the three-to-five-year window after maturity was an uma musume's "adolescence," a phase of explosive growth where progress came in waves. So the data from that first six months was only a reference point. The real work of constant calibration fell to the trainer — which was, after all, their job.
This was King Halo's first public appearance since enrolling, and plenty of trainers were studying her from the sidelines. She was, after all, the daughter of champions from both sides of the Atlantic. Even if she'd inherited only half her parents' talent, she'd still carve out a place for herself in Japanese racing.
Thanks to her pedigree, King Halo had the special privilege of joining any of the teams Symboli Rudolf recommended.
Even if she lacked ability, her family background alone guaranteed Tracen Academy would look after her. Right after she enrolled, Symboli Rudolf had already tried to arrange a trainer for her — but that kind of preferential treatment was purely about respecting her parents, and King Halo herself wasn't particularly fond of it.
More importantly, she knew exactly what kind of trainer they'd picked out for her.
On the surface, the trainer in question was also from a distinguished lineage, part of a team that had been a national legend in its heyday.
But those achievements belonged to the previous generation. The current trainer had only been permitted to enroll at Tracen Academy through his father's connections.
Although that guy was actually the main protagonist of the Uma Musume game's main storyline, the story itself made it clear: he was a late bloomer. The original [King Halo], under his guidance, didn't manage to win even a single G1 until her final year. By the time of the second main storyline, he was training newcomers and still coming across as inexperienced — visibly passive in how he handled them.
A trainer like that — protagonist or not — didn't satisfy King Halo.
Because there was no way he could design a perfect training regimen for her. If anything, he might actively get in the way of her training.
Not every trainer had the confidence to put an uma musume through Extreme Training.
A trainer without much skill would rather play it safe than take risks.
King Halo didn't accept Tracen Academy's arrangement.
She chose to run in the simulated race instead — to use her own ability to attract a better trainer.
...
A young man stood near the training grounds, a staff ID badge around his neck, watching the uma musume lined up for the race.
He quickly picked out King Halo.
After all, he'd come here today specifically to observe her.
"So that's the King Halo the Chairwoman mentioned. Doesn't exactly look easy to approach."
King Halo had a somewhat standoffish look about her, and the aura she gave off was sharp and disciplined. A girl from such a distinguished background, with that kind of serious personality — for someone who had only just become a trainer, the challenge level was steep.
What's more —
"King Halo must have looked into my background. That's why she didn't accept the arrangement."
He knew the Academy's original plan. The higher-ups had wanted King Halo to sign with him.
Two legacy heirs paired together — the media coverage alone would have generated enormous buzz and traffic.
When he'd first heard about the plan, he'd been excited. Even a little hopeful.
Background aside, he was still just a trainer fresh out of school — of course he'd get his hopes up for his first contracted uma musume. Let alone one who was the daughter of two champion bloodlines. He'd never dreamed he'd be able to sign a young lady of that caliber.
But his excitement had been premature. The higher-ups wanted it, but King Halo herself had no interest in the suggestion.
The moment she signed up for the simulated race, her position became impossible to misread.
While the young master was busy sighing over this disappointment, another trainer from his same intake arrived at the training grounds.
"So that's the kid the senpai have been talking about. She really does give off a different vibe."
Dressed in standard staff attire, Trainer P's heightened perception caught the gap in power between King Halo and the other racers, and his expression shifted to one of genuine surprise.
It was the first time he'd seen a disparity this wide in a simulated race.
No wonder she'd been granted exam-free admission — a genius of legendary stock.
"I wonder what her running style is. The training data suggests she's got incredible aptitude across multiple styles. Numbers like these would make her a Stalker, probably — but if her burst off the gate is fast enough, Front-runner could work too."
Trainer P thought it through carefully.
He was imagining what he would do if he were King Halo's trainer — how would he plan this race?
Even with a power gap this wide, where victory was essentially guaranteed, how she won still mattered.
Every race drained an uma musume substantially — far more than ordinary training. That was why, as a rule, uma musume had at least a month between races.
Training was about targeted growth. Even under Extreme Training, reasonable planning and recovery time were non-negotiable. But races were different — in a race, a runner had to throw everything into pursuit of that one win. Skills, ZONE, Flow — unleashing all of them in full took a punishing toll on the body.
So knowing when to have an uma musume hold back in unimportant races — that was a trainer's craft, too.
And that was exactly what Trainer P was weighing right now.
...
"Didn't expect King Halo to take part in a simulated race."
"Yeah. Didn't the Uma Musume Committee reach out to the Chairwoman about slotting her into that team?"
"Tch, the nerve of those Committee bastards. Meddling in uma musume-trainer contracts just for the hype — do they have any sense of shame?"
"Now, now. The arrangement wasn't without reason. She is a young lady from a prestigious family. Pairing her with a young master from another prestigious family makes sense. And the young master is, after all, the heir of that old master."
"That kid got in through the back door without taking a single exam, didn't he? Who knows how much of the old master's craft he actually inherited?"
"Even if the young master's skill is lacking, the old master's still around to guide him."
A group of trainers were openly gossiping off to the side. Even though it was gossip, they carried themselves with upright posture — they'd gotten in on merit, after all. Looking down on a back-door transfer wasn't something they needed to hide.
And trying to rush King Halo into a contract the moment she enrolled — that was something most trainers simply couldn't stomach.
If that sort of thing got normalized, would it mean that from now on, every time a genius appeared, they'd be handed off to trainers from prestigious families by default?
Of course, if the young master had real ability — if he earned their respect through merit — they'd have nothing more to say.
But the problem was, he'd skipped the entrance exam entirely. Walked in through connections. And inherited his predecessor's team the moment he took office.
That was an insult to everything trainers stood for professionally.
Hearing all this from nearby, the young master in question silently clenched his fists, suppressing his anger, telling himself he'd prove them all wrong in time.
He couldn't really argue back, though. He'd missed the entrance exam because he'd been sick, and his father had pulled strings to get him in.
He did have some confidence in his exam abilities, though. He might not have scored at the top, but he was sure he could clear the passing threshold. Even though he didn't have his father's unique gift, growing up at his father's side had given him theoretical grounding he wouldn't trade for anyone's.
He just lacked that one special ability the legendary trainers possessed.
As for King Halo rejecting him, he felt a pang of disappointment — but he didn't take it too personally. A young lady like her looking down on an unproven trainer like him was, frankly, the most natural reaction in the world.
"So the kid showed up, huh. Hope he pulls himself together — wouldn't want him tarnishing the old master's name."
Nishizaki Ryu was also watching the race, and he'd noticed the young master standing apart from the crowd.
The boy's father was a senior Nishizaki deeply respected. He'd heard about the young master's situation. He wasn't passing judgment.
But he'd say this much: this was the kind of world where only results spoke. Even standing on the shoulders of ancestral glory, anyone without their own ability would eventually be pushed aside.
Come to think of it, the reason he'd taken interest in this overhyped young lady — the one the tabloids couldn't stop lavishing praise on — was precisely because King Halo had refused the Academy's arrangement. If she'd accepted it, he would have written her off as just another mediocre heiress blinded by her family's past triumphs.
"Let's see it, then, King Halo. Show me whether you can live up to that name of yours."
...
The race began.
The runners burst from the gate, noticeably faster than in ordinary training.
Two reasons for that: mentality, and distance. Sprints were all about speed, so runners kept their focus razor-sharp at the starting gate.
At this distance, passing opponents later was difficult. It wasn't uncommon for the early leader to hold on to victory all the way through. So regardless of running style, everyone ran more aggressively.
And over short distances, stamina conservation hardly mattered.
Short-distance races weren't as easy as they looked. Yes, in terms of race rank, sprints were the lowest tier — but no race, no matter the distance, was ever easy.
Sprints tested explosive power. A runner with a slow start couldn't adapt to this distance at all — she'd be dumped to the back of the pack from the opening gun.
King Halo's start out of the gate was textbook.
The trainers nodded. She hadn't shown anything dramatic in terms of speed, but the smoothness of her gate exit was already above passing. And for a first race, a slow start wouldn't have been unusual — a stable gate exit alone was a good mark.
So her exit earned an excellent evaluation from them.
"As expected of a prestigious bloodline. Her first race, and she's keeping her cool."
King Halo's past records were blank. She hadn't even participated in elementary school sports meets. As if she'd been carefully saving up her abilities.
After the start, King Halo tucked herself into the middle of the pack, refusing to rush forward, strictly controlling her position.
The other racers kept their guard up against her.
This position… is she looking down on us?
Chaser? That's a surprisingly conservative running style.
Seeing King Halo settle into the back half of the pack, the other runners were a bit thrown. They'd all assumed she'd go with the orthodox Stalker style.
Reputation didn't always reflect ability, but King Halo's background was overwhelming. The daughter of champion bloodlines on both sides of the Atlantic wasn't someone to dismiss. And her training data from the past month had been dazzling — that pentagonal stat chart loomed like a mountain over everyone's heads.
Seeing her choose Chaser was genuinely unexpected.
"That positioning — and she's going Chaser, of all things."
Compared to the fast-starting Front-runner and the orthodox Stalker, Chaser was the least flashy of the main running styles. Racers who chose it usually had some weakness — poor stamina, slow starts, that sort of thing.
Not always, of course. Sometimes a trainer would tailor strategy to the venue and the field, assigning a runner a style different from her usual one.
But this was a simulated race. Such subtleties didn't apply.
Closer was a different story — not worth discussing. Runners of that style were either too weak to keep up or freaks of nature with their own temperamental brilliance. Unless forced to, no trainer would voluntarily build a Closer strategy. In the real world, Front-runner, Stalker, and Chaser dominated. Closers were rare.
An all-rounder like King Halo, with that pentagonal stat spread, would typically go Stalker. Stalker didn't get discussed as often as the flashier styles, but in reality it was the running style without weaknesses — the perfect style, and the one best suited to racers with raw talent.
...
Get 20+ chapters ahead on - P.a.t.r.e.o.n "RoseWhisky"