The final turn!
Seiun Sky seized the race's pace once more.
As her Flash skill lit up, the racers behind her stared in disbelief. They hadn't expected Seiun Sky to possess a Flash-tier skill — and to spring it precisely at the moment they couldn't activate skills of their own. The timing was unbearably cruel.
"She's amazing."
The students watching were stunned. They'd expected this race to be King Halo's solo show. They'd never imagined Seiun Sky — whose regular scores had always been middling — would emerge as the protagonist of this race.
"A Flash skill?"
"What's going on with this student? Her training data doesn't match. How does someone with barely-passing scores pull this off?"
"Don't tell me... King Halo's about to lose?"
"The timing of that skill was perfect."
Hearing the crowd, both P and Fukunaga found themselves sweating for King Halo. It genuinely looked bad — the gap she had to close was too large.
Symboli Rudolf frowned. "A miscalculation?"
She suspected King Halo had underestimated her opponent.
She could see the young lady hadn't shown her full ability yet, but the reason didn't matter — right now, King Halo was at an overwhelming disadvantage. Nearly ten lengths to close in under a thousand meters. Not impossible, but brutally hard.
"Halo, come on!"
Urara shouted from the sidelines.
And in that very instant, King Halo began to push.
Wind and wave surged, the echo of a wave rolling through the air. A white wind-wave rose like a soaring blue dragon.
A dragon's roar sounded. Rainbow light extended from beneath King Halo's feet toward the track ahead, and her form blazed forward in a heartbeat!
[As the Dragon Meets the Clouds (Flash): Overtaking from the outer lane on the final turn — massive speed boost!]
In the blink of an eye, King Halo shot up from the back of the pack. Even racers who spotted her path didn't dare step into her line under that overwhelming pressure.
And even if they tried, they couldn't block her. She was too fast — no one could react in time. Not everyone possessed the mind's eye.
"What explosive power!"
The crowd was stunned.
They'd assumed Seiun Sky had it in the bag, but now King Halo's burst shook their certainty. This was only a simulated race — yet the presence of these two had forced the intensity well past what it should've been.
But that was what made it compelling.
King Halo locked her eyes on the line ahead. She didn't possess the mind's eye, but running at the rear the whole time had let her map every competitor's position — and the skill [King's Field of View (Flash)] activated. Though its trigger was subtle and it offered no flashy speed or acceleration, no Flash-tier skill was ever weak. It gave King Halo, who lacked the mind's eye and full-field perception, a near-equivalent vision of the course.
Last 800 meters. 700. 600...
[The Long Road to Ideals (Flash)]
The path to victory revealed itself to her.
Because she had been calculating her opponents' efforts and the track's remaining distance every second, her "eyes" could see her victory clearly — and that was why she ran so calmly.
A faint smile curved her lips as she carved through the field. In no time, she was tucked in right behind Seiun Sky, with less than 100 meters to the final straight.
The gap to Seiun Sky was under three lengths!
Like a sovereign charging into battle — unstoppable!
...This is unbelievable. Miss King Halo, you actually caught up from that far back? Seiun Sky felt the pressure behind her and couldn't help glancing over her shoulder. That one look sent a shiver of excitement through her whole body. The lead she'd earned through tactics had just been erased.
Miss King Halo was truly astonishing!
Seiun Sky fixed her gaze ahead. The final straight was waiting — less than 400 meters. Don't worry, she told herself. The advantage is still mine. She wouldn't let Miss King Halo overtake her. This was her race to win.
"Two Flash skills?"
"Truly the scion of legends!"
Watching King Halo deploy two Flash skills, the trainers of Tracen Academy felt as though they were witnessing the birth of a new queen. What they didn't know was that internationally, prodigies of this caliber weren't actually uncommon — there were quite a few, in fact.
They simply didn't have the eye for it yet.
Symboli Rudolf thought: Wrong. King Halo just used three Flash skills — one of them was for her eyes. So she really does have more hidden in reserve.
She looked back at the race.
She wanted to see Seiun Sky force more out of King Halo — to drag her hidden ability further into the light.
But unfortunately, Seiun Sky had no intention of firing another skill. Or rather, it wasn't that she didn't want to — she simply couldn't.
At the final 200 meters, King Halo drew even with Seiun Sky.
She cast a sidelong glance at her opponent.
Seiun Sky, soaked in sweat, teeth clenched in tense concentration, wasn't sparing a single thought for anything else. She looked like she was still going to fight.
"Well fought."
With those words, another Flash lit up beneath King Halo's feet. Seiun Sky, feeling the pressure beside her, turned pale. Her composure shattered. She hadn't imagined King Halo could still be holding reserves at this point — holding enough reserves to offer her a critique mid-race and activate yet another Flash-tier skill.
You've got to be kidding me—?
Seiun Sky's will was draining away in real time.
She knew she'd already lost.
Looking at King Halo — regal, sovereign — she was completely subdued by the ability on display. She'd run the race of her life. She'd shown everything she had. And King Halo, who clearly could have stopped her at any time, had chosen to let her run her race out — let her reach the point where she thought she was going to win — and then, with perfect timing, revealed the crushing gap between them and defeated her, cleanly and openly.
How could anyone help but respect that?
[Emperor's Pride (Flash): If the tactical execution of this race is flawless and composed, activate at the final 200 meters — maximum speed boost!]
Like a bolt of lightning, King Halo blew past Seiun Sky. Her speed was still climbing. A monstrous finishing sprint unfolded — though the skill only triggered in the final 200 meters, its burst lived up to every ounce of the name. In this domain, King Halo had absolute confidence she would never lose. In sprints, she was confident she could beat even McQueen.
Finish line crossed.
In that final 200 meters, with Seiun Sky never slowing down, King Halo still completed the overtake — and by the time she crossed the line, she'd pulled out more than five lengths. That monstrous 200-meter burst left the spectators speechless.
Symboli Rudolf's expression tightened.
Four Flash skills.
She was not a step behind the American prodigy El Condor Pasa that Rudolf had staked her hopes on — and this wasn't even King Halo's full ability. You could tell from the composure she still carried after the finish. For this young lady, the race had been a warm-up at most.
Those Flash skills almost certainly hadn't been run at their maximum effect either. They'd been put on display for the benefit of the audience.
It seems Trainer Fukunaga really isn't the right fit. Very well — let's see who you choose, then.
Symboli Rudolf had made up her mind. No matter whose team King Halo wanted to join, even if it was Tojo Hana's, she would approve the request. As for El Condor Pasa — well, El Condor Pasa could compete with this young lady on her own merits when the time came.
The contract had always contained a clause for this contingency. No one had just expected the contingency to actually arise.
It all came down to King Halo's own choice now.
The race ended.
Seiun Sky came over to King Halo.
"I lost. You really are strong."
She'd lost, and she accepted it completely.
She'd also realized King Halo had been holding back for her. Otherwise, the defeat would have been uglier.
"Do your best, Miss Seiun Sky. I look forward to our next match in an official race."
King Halo could seem standoffish, but that was entirely the original template's legacy. She herself wasn't arrogant. She placed no weight on her bloodline or family name.
"Mm. I'll come back and challenge you once I'm stronger."
Seiun Sky smiled.
They exchanged contact information after the race and became friends. Friendship among uma musume was simple like that.
After the simulated race, King Halo returned to her dormitory. On her desk sat P's letter. She'd read it a while back, but she'd been wavering. P's ability was undeniably strong — McQueen and the others had vouched for him — but that didn't automatically make him her best choice.
P's capability as a trainer was excellent, and he had the protagonist-specific stat panel — balanced development across the board. Whether in training design or in observation of attributes, P's panel rated at an excellent level. Combined with his near-maxed execution and emotional intelligence, P was destined to become a legendary trainer.
But King Halo understood something else about him clearly — P wasn't the best at any single skill.
If she were grading him, each of P's abilities sat at T1. Only his EQ and personality hit T0. By contrast, some senior trainers had lower average scores than P, but their single strongest ability might sit at the absolute peak.
Take Tojo Hana — her observation was flawless.
Trainer Kuronuma — his training design was flawless.
Within their respective specialties, P couldn't match them.
That was the source of King Halo's hesitation.
P's ability really was strong.
None of P's skills were top-tier, but the man had no glaring weakness — and he was that rare kind of trainer who genuinely respected his racer's wishes.
The combination gave the impression that passing on him would be an obvious loss.
But King Halo wasn't swept along by that impression.
She knew exactly what she wanted. She wanted to grow stronger — stronger than she was now. And P had never displayed that kind of ability. McQueen and the others had always designed their own training. P had never demonstrated the kind of world-breaking training capacity she was looking for — his training skill wasn't top-tier.
So King Halo decided to keep P as a backup.
She'd already looked into his situation.
In this world, P had enrolled at Tracen Academy but hadn't inherited his Master's team — because in this world, P's Master hadn't made it into Tracen. Oguri Cap belonged to Tojo Hana's team, which left P an unknown rookie inside the academy. There was no risk of him quickly finding a contracted racer.
And King Halo knew P well. As long as she'd caught his attention — and she had — and as long as she didn't sign with anyone else or openly reject him, his focus would stay fixed on her.
So King Halo decided to reach out to Trainer Kuronuma first. He was still searching for his ideal uma musume at this point — he'd leave the academy a year from now and eventually be moved by Mihono Bourbon's talent while traveling.
King Halo knew even Mihono Bourbon wasn't actually Kuronuma's ideal uma musume, because Bourbon hadn't been able to complete Kuronuma's final training regimen. If she were being honest, Kitasan Black was the uma musume Trainer Kuronuma dreamed of.
Because at this stage, Trainer Kuronuma believed firmly in talent-first ideology.
King Halo arrived at Trainer Kuronuma's office.
He was a senior trainer with his own office and the right to form a team. But Kuronuma currently had zero contracted racers — not because academy racers looked down on him, but because he looked down on the current crop. Plus, his observation wasn't monstrous like Tojo Hana's. By the time he noticed a promising bud, someone had usually already snapped it up.
That was why he'd eventually leave the academy.
Trainer Kuronuma didn't refuse King Halo's visit. Even he knew she was the standout student of the term.
"Sit down. Something to drink? Canned coffee?"
"Sure, thank you."
Trainer Kuronuma set a can of coffee down and settled into the sofa across from her. Behind his dark glasses, his gaze sized her up.
He might not have Tojo Hana's observation, but experience was enough to tell him King Halo had trained her body well.
"What brings you here? Speak freely. You're not here to propose a contract, are you? If it's you, Tojo Hana wouldn't turn you down either — she has the best resources."
"Oh? And what if I said I did want to sign with you?"
King Halo frowned. It seemed Kuronuma wasn't particularly interested in being her trainer — not what she'd expected.
Kuronuma fell silent for a moment, then shook his head.
"No. I'm honored that you'd recognize my ability, but in your situation, signing me wouldn't benefit you. My training regimen couldn't push you further. Your body has likely already hit its current ceiling. What you need is a professional tactical team — Tojo Hana can give you that. You also need skill transmission from a master. Unfortunately, there aren't any skill-master trainers in Japan at the moment."
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