After listening to Kyoko's words, Kitahara smiled faintly and shook his head slightly.
"I need to confirm one thing—and add another."
He raised two fingers.
"First, about why I wanted to ask you in the first place. From what I've learned so far, Japan currently only has wind tunnel equipment for aerospace purposes. It doesn't really suit horse girls at all—most of the data and programs are redundant, and it's extremely expensive."
"So this problem may take some time to solve. Tamamo and Inari might not make it in time for this Hanshin Daishoten."
"The other point is, aside from simulating different race environments and collecting data more comprehensively, wind tunnel equipment can also be paired with parachute sprint training. After all, parachute training works against pulling force, while wind tunnel training works against drag resistance. They're completely complementary."
Being pointed out on her oversights didn't bother Miyamura Kyoko. Instead, she laughed.
"Looks like Big Brother Kitahara has it all figured out. Go ahead, then—what do you want me and Light to do?"
"Mm-hmm, I've always studied really hard. The teachers all say I'm very talented, and my grades are always the best in class. They even teach me extra things outside of class. I'll definitely be able to carry out whatever Mr. Kitahara arranges!"
Clenching her little fists, Belno light nodded over and over, like she was cheering herself on.
"It's actually very simple."
Kitahara smiled. "Kyoko, don't you have some classmates who work in aerospace companies? I'd like to ask you to check if there are any relatively affordable civilian-use wind tunnels available."
"Kawawan Enterprise has been growing, and by now we've established a solid foothold in Tokyo. Oguri Cap and the others have been performing outstandingly, and our related products are selling hot. On top of that, with Nishijin Kaisha, that major conglomerate, we've had plenty of cooperation lately and received a lot of investment… Put simply, our team is fairly well-funded now."
Spreading his hands, he summed it up:
"Since we have money, then let's just upgrade our training equipment."
"You all have shares in Kawawan Enterprise. Especially Oguri Cap and the others—their prize money is often handed directly to Ms. Konan to manage. It's only right that their treatment and benefits keep improving."
"I see…"
Exchanging a glance with Belno Light, Miyamura Kyoko rested her chin on her hand, pondering.
"As for purchase channels and cost-effectiveness, I've actually asked my friends before."
"How should I put it… the mainstream equipment really isn't suitable for horse girls."
"It's not like you can't get data from it, but horse girls' top speed won't exceed 20 meters per second. Aerospace standards are way higher than that, so a lot of the code and data are redundant—at least for horse girls."
"And all that redundancy costs extra money. The wider the data range, the higher the manufacturing cost, and the higher the price."
"Another issue is the lack of programs tailored to horse girls. If we had someone write them, that would be an additional expense."
She looked at Kitahara with some difficulty.
"Big Brother Kitahara, do we really have that much budget?"
…You'll at least have to give me a price before I can judge whether the budget is enough…
Kitahara sighed inwardly. He knew Kyoko was brilliant in medicine but a novice in business.
Before he could explain, Light raised her hand as if answering a classroom question.
"I think I can handle the programming issue."
"Eh?" ×2
Kitahara and Kyoko both froze.
"It's like this."
Pointing toward the academy, Light explained:
"The teachers mentioned that the research student curriculum is basically on par with your human universities, and it's very applied. Generally, horse girls who get accepted tend to be… um, eccentric, but extremely skilled in one area."
She scratched her head.
"I think I'm pretty normal, but my three roommates are really weird."
"One is chubby, and she's obsessed with collecting racetrack soils from all over the world. She's already got over 400 types spanning 12 generations. I don't even know how she managed it. And now she's planning to research how racetrack geology affects horse girls' performance. I don't get her at all…"
"Oh, but she's really good at geography. Geology, geomorphology, climatology, biogeography, soil science, hydrology, cartography—she scores full marks in all of them."
"Then there's the skinny one. She loves experimenting with reagents. When I first enrolled, she tried to get me to test something that could both be applied to the skin to improve complexion and drunk to boost stamina. As if something like that could exist! No way am I being her guinea pig."
"Oh, and then there's a really cute one—she's relatively normal. She just loves data too much. She can recite the slope angles, curve radii, and surface friction coefficients of every racetrack in Japan, and she can analyze how different materials for running shoes and horseshoes affect performance. That's actually useful, I think."
She spread her hands in frustration.
"See? They're all weird, right? I can only really talk to the last one. I can't understand a word from the other two."
"And yet they say I'm the weirdest one. How am I weird?"
"I study perfectly normal things, like material structures, crystal defects, phase diagrams, amorphous states… You need all that knowledge to make proper horseshoes, right?"
"And fluid dynamics, heat transfer, mass transfer and control, thermodynamics, chemical equilibria—if you don't understand those, how can you evaluate running shoes, sportswear, or load-bearing gear?"
"Plus engineering drawing, mechanical design and manufacturing, electrical engineering, material heat treatment, mechanical properties of materials… Sometimes my mom asks me for advice to help with her production line. Isn't it normal to know some of this?"
"See? I'm totally normal. They're the weird ones."
…No, you're not normal at all. What kind of teenage horse girl masters all that already? … ×2
Kitahara was dumbfounded. Kyoko too.
Both were graduate students, but Kitahara in business and Kyoko in medicine. Kitahara could understand a bit about soil and racetrack data, and Kyoko about biochemistry. But all the stuff about fluids, crystals, and curvature? They only recognized the terms.
At best, they vaguely knew thermodynamics had three laws, but couldn't even recall what they were.
…Maybe the most incredible member of the team isn't Oguri Cap, but Light herself… ×2
They exchanged a bewildered look, both realizing the same thing.
"…Ahem, Light, you… really work hard."
Kitahara coughed awkwardly, patting Light's shoulder.
He finally recognized that the horse girl who had entered Tracen Academy with the nation's top score was not just talented—she was a terrifying genius far beyond his imagination. He'd been too focused on training and races to notice what kind of prodigy she really was.
"Um… what you just said, does that mean you can solve some of the wind tunnel issues?"
He decided to keep his expectations conservative.
"Mm-hmm, exactly!"
Light nodded vigorously, excited."When I was taking metalworking courses, I had to use lathes and design software. They required constant debugging, so I learned a bit of coding to save time."
"The teachers and some classmates who were good at coding taught me. If we have existing equipment, I should be able to debug or even rewrite the programs. If I can't manage alone, I can ask my teachers or classmates for help. They may be weird, but they're very passionate about their specialties."
"That way, whether we reduce unnecessary programs and hardware or directly commission a custom build, we can save a lot of money. My mom handles production lines this way too. Those wind tunnel companies may be big, but their processes should be the same in principle."
"…That's… an enormous help, really…"
Kyoko smiled wryly, shaking her head at Kitahara.
"Sometimes I think I might become Japan's youngest female doctor of medicine. But compared to Light, I feel like that's nothing at all…"
…Wait, Kyoko, hold on. Why does that sound so smugly humble?
Then Kitahara realized—not only was Light a technical genius, but Kyoko was a medical genius as well. For someone in her early twenties to already be on track for a doctorate was enough to crush most people.
"…Anyway, if Light has the technical side covered, then Kyoko, you can take her to the companies, get the specs, and pass me the pricing."
Kitahara coughed again, steering the topic back into his comfort zone.
"Once we confirm the product, I'll compare for the best cost-performance option, and we can integrate it into training."
"No need to trouble Yuzuhara or Komiyama. And don't tell Oguri Cap and the others yet. We'll keep it between the three of us until everything's set."
Both Kyoko and Light agreed without complaint. After that, they left together.
The past two days had gone almost too smoothly: resolving the PR crisis and arranging the wind tunnel plans. But Kitahara wasn't surprised. From the beginning, his plan was to maximize every resource to support training and racing. As a management expert who knew the industry well, if he still worried about money and equipment at this point, that would be absurd.
Now that things were moving faster than expected, he needed to prepare more quickly. He thought the wind tunnel might take a while to sort out, but at this rate, it could be ready in a week or two. Which meant he should already look for a site at the academy to house it.
Naturally, he went to talk with Tazuna. Since the team's founding, she had assisted with everything under Chairwoman Akikawa Yayoi's direction. Finding a location shouldn't be a problem.
He also thought about probing her about the Phantom Horse script. But after confirming with Tazuna that a site could be arranged, he decided not to rush. For one, he hadn't even read the script yet—it might cause misunderstandings. For another, as if on cue, Masato Kurokawa himself came to the academy that very day.
So after a brief chat with Tezuna, Kitahara hurried to his office.
"Sorry, sorry, Kurokawa. I was meeting Ms. Tazuna. You know her, right?"
Entering, Kitahara apologized upon seeing that Kurokawa had been waiting. At the same time, he carefully studied his expression.
He was curious what had really happened in the past. Kurokawa likely knew. Kitahara wanted to see how he'd react to Tezuna's name.
But perhaps because of his deep self-control as the head of a top conglomerate, Kurokawa showed no change at all. He simply smiled.
"No need to be so formal, Kitahara."
He waved a hand."Let's be more casual from now on—at least in private."
"I'm here to deliver the script. Here."
He hadn't even brought a briefcase, just a thick stack of papers in a kraft envelope.
"Alright, I'll read it carefully. If I have any insights, I'll be sure to share them with your esteemed mother."
Kitahara peeked at the blank cover, assuming the title was inside, and repeated his promise.
"No need to rush. My mother spent years writing this. She always said that creative work depends on inspiration. If the time isn't right, it's useless to force it."
Kurokawa reassured him, then glanced around the office and out the window toward the campus.
"I happened to be free today, passing by, so I thought I'd stay a little."
Smiling at the view outside, his face softened with nostalgia."I remember when I was a child visiting here, it wasn't this spacious and modern. It improved a bit in middle school, but the major expansion must have been after I went abroad."
"So, Chief Trainer Kitahara—would you indulge this horse girl fan with a tour of Tracen Academy?"
The joke was obvious. With Kurokawa's status, even Akikawa or Symboli Rudolf would give him a tour. As an honorary board member through Nishijin Kaisha's support, he'd certainly already seen the campus.
Clearly, he just wanted to chat. Kitahara smiled easily."Sure. How about we grab a meal together too?"
"No need. I still have work later, and my driver's waiting."
"Busy as always, huh."
"Sigh, we all are."
They chatted idly as they left the office, walking along the corridor.
Both had started casually, but as workaholics, the conversation soon shifted to their jobs.
"…The economy's sluggish, markets are down. That can't be helped. But the board doesn't care—they see the stock price dip and start yelling that I'm too young, too rash. Hah! A bunch of idiots…"
Kurokawa now looked nothing like a mighty corporate leader, more like a weary salaryman venting.
"Enough about me. How are things on your end, Kitahara? You mentioned… wind tunnel equipment? I was too caught up in my rant to listen."
"Ah, it's just training equipment."
Patiently, Kitahara explained what he'd discussed with Kyoko and Glory, then summed it up:"In short, with this equipment, our data collection for mid-to-long-distance races will be smoother, leading to better analysis and application."
"That means for Oguri Cap's final Classic race—the Kikuka Sho—as well as other middle and long-distance races, we'll have a much greater chance of victory."
"And once we've mastered its application, we can look for the right time to popularize this training method. Only…"
He gave a wry smile."It won't spread easily. Even a basic setup is expensive, even with Kyoko and Glory cutting costs."
"Wind tunnels, huh… I actually encountered this when talking business abroad. Some foreign horse girl teams do use them."
Kurokawa frowned slightly."So internationally, they're ahead of us. If I recall, the U.S., U.K., and France already have horse-girl-specific wind tunnels. I even saw one in America. You're saying we don't have any here?"
"If we did, would Light, Kyoko, and I be going to such lengths?"
Kitahara rubbed his temples, exasperated."It's precisely because we don't have any that we need to investigate, compare, and finally either custom-build or modify one ourselves."
"If not for your support—Nishijin Entertainment's funding for Kawawan Enterprise—I wouldn't even dare think about it."
"I see…"
Kurokawa stroked his chin, then said:
"On the corporate side, Nishijin already funded you, so I shouldn't interfere further."
"But personally, I can still sponsor you a little. Not much, but consider it my support for Oguri Cap and the others. I already buy their merch anyway—always directly from Kawawan Enterprise."
"…Eh?"
Kitahara was stunned. Their products were so popular that even the head of one of Japan's top conglomerates collected them?
"And one more thing," Kurokawa continued with a smile.
"Nishijin has several aerospace partners. I can't convince them to fund your team—if I could, I'd have convinced them to bankroll some movies first."
"But I can ask them to lend you a few engineers. That, they'll agree to."
"Don't worry. I'll reach out later. That way, your horse girl in charge of this won't have to fight alone. As a loyal fan of your team, I'll lend a hand too."
End of Chapter