Central Tracen Academy.
Inside Ginjirou's private trainer's office.
At this moment—
the air in the room seemed to have congealed.
Ginjirou sat behind his desk, fingers interlaced and pressed beneath his chin, elbows braced on the tabletop.
His signature sunglasses hid his eyes, making his whole demeanor look stern and heavy.
"…"
The old man's Adam's apple bobbed slightly, as if he were locked in a fiercely difficult internal struggle.
But he knew that lingering pain was worse than quick pain. Some words had to be said eventually.
"I want you to transfer teams. To Chasing Light."
The moment the words fell, Ginjirou tightened his lips and nervously watched the girl's reaction through the narrow gap beneath his sunglasses.
He waited.
Maybe tears. Maybe questions.
Back then, when this child had left her hometown of Kasamatsu and come to Central all alone… how heartbroken she had been.
That image—those clear, always-bright eyes filled with tears—was still burned into his memory.
And now, even if he was a washed-up old man who lazed around all day, he'd still been with her for so long…
"Sigh…"
Thinking that far, the old man's gaze dimmed. A sour, indescribable ache welled up in his chest, and he let out a quiet sigh, about to say a few comforting words.
However—
"Chasing Light?"
The ashen-haired girl in front of him didn't redden at the eyes like he'd expected. Instead, she tilted her head in curiosity, the little cowlick on top of her hair bouncing twice with the motion.
She blinked. "The team with Trainer Kuroha and March and the others?"
Ginjirou froze, then instinctively nodded.
"Mm… yes."
"Okay."
Oguri Cap nodded without the slightest hesitation.
"…"
"…"
Silence.
A dead, absolute silence.
In that instant, it felt as if a crow flew through the room going "Caw—caw—" and left behind a string of black ellipses.
Berno Light, for her part, didn't look surprised at all.
She simply sat on the sofa to the side, staring at the two of them with a baffled expression, not understanding why Ginjirou suddenly wanted Oguri Cap to transfer teams.
"Cough! Cough—cough!!"
A full thirty seconds passed before Ginjirou finally choked on his own saliva and broke into a violent fit of coughing.
All the sadness he'd prepared for, all the mental rehearsal, shattered into dust right then and there.
"You… cough—cough…"
Flustered, the old man pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his mouth, then cleared his throat awkwardly, trying to recover that serious atmosphere from before.
"Oguri, don't agree so quickly. Before you formally transfer, I need to explain clearly why I'm asking you to do this."
"Mm."
At those words, the casual ease on Oguri Cap's face faded a little, her expression gradually turning serious.
After years on the Central circuit, even if her nature remained pure and straightforward, her understanding was no longer as narrow as it had been back in Kasamatsu.
She knew what "transferring teams" meant.
Just as Ginjirou had thought during the Yasuda Kinen—if he sent her to some unfamiliar team, she would absolutely resist, and might even throw a sulk.
But… if it was Chasing Light.
If it was Trainer Kuroha, if it was the team where March ran.
Oguri Cap asked herself honestly, and found she didn't feel much rejection at all—if anything, there was even a faint, hidden sense of anticipation.
Still, she understood something else, too.
Even if Ginjirou had been looking a bit lazy lately, he would never make a decision like this for no reason.
Behind the desk, Ginjirou fell into thought for a moment, as if reorganizing the logic of his speech after Oguri Cap had knocked it off course.
After a long while, he finally spoke, voice low.
"Oguri, yesterday's Yasuda Kinen… you felt it, didn't you?"
"I…"
Oguri Cap bit her lip instinctively.
As the "Grey Monster," as a Uma Musume who had once stood at the summit, her pride wanted her to speak like she always had before—to say loudly, I can win.
But when the words reached her mouth, she couldn't force them out.
In the end, she lowered her eyes and said quietly.
"…I can't win."
Oguri Cap understood it painfully well.
Her strength had reached a hard, solid bottleneck.
Power, stamina, speed—everything felt like it had pressed up against an invisible ceiling. No matter what she did, she couldn't find a way to push higher.
But these past few days, while training alongside March, she had been able to feel it clearly—
Even though March, in terms of raw base attributes, was also like her, struggling to climb any further…
March's overall strength was still steadily improving.
March was still piloting her small boat, inch by inch, upstream under Kuroha's guidance—pulling farther and farther ahead of her…
"I can't win… is that what you're saying?"
Behind his sunglasses, Ginjirou's eyes flashed with sharp light, but there was no blame whatsoever in his tone.
Oguri Cap clenched her teeth. Her hands on her knees twisted the hem of her skirt tightly, and after a moment of unwillingness, she nodded.
Seeing that, Ginjirou continued.
"And the distances you and March specialize in are almost completely the same."
"Her aptitudes are even broader than yours. That means that in the vast majority of G1 races you can enter in the future, you'll basically be running into March."
"…"
Oguri Cap fell silent.
Only the ticking of the wall clock remained in the room.
A moment later, the ashen-haired girl suddenly lifted her head. In her clear eyes, a stubborn fire burned as she answered without hesitation.
"…But I don't want to run away."
Even if she couldn't win, she didn't want to avoid battle by fleeing from it.
(End of Chapter)
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