As it turned out, that night, Rice Shower slept alone in Zero's bed.
In reality, Zero had just woken up midway.
[Efficient Sleep LV5: After use, sleep effect becomes five times. One hour of sleep equals five hours of sleep.]
Don't ask how she obtained this skill; she suffered a lot for it back then.
As for waking up so early... it was naturally to deal with Rice Shower's situation.
She exchanged her cosplay outfit with the Three Goddesses for an antidote to the potion's effects. She just needed to put it in Rice Shower's milk tomorrow.
Although she had suspected that the Three Goddesses were deliberately playing a trick on her, this time the Three Goddesses really didn't seem to have tampered with anything, which made the result even more absurd.
The medicine Air Groove made was already, in some sense, comparable to drugs produced by Goddesses.
But for now... it's probably best to go out and train.
In the past, she wouldn't frequently use this sleep method, only when necessary.
Of course, the main reason was that Rice, while sleeping, instinctively hugged her and almost suffocated her awake.
The Big Rice Pudding was too big.
But now, it can finally be resolved... Zero placed the potion on the table and left.
An Uma Musume like her, who gets up at dawn to train... must have something wrong with her, right?
But if nothing unexpected happens, training at dawn seems to be the most suitable method for her?
After all, during the day she mostly had to deal with various matters, and at night she still had to play games and such.
In any case, I'll try to adjust my schedule.
The February wind was still somewhat cold, but it was nothing to her.
Recalling that time in the mountains, truly only a madwoman like her would train like that.
For grit training and physical conditioning, she would directly torment herself outdoors in the dead of winter.
Like forging iron, she constantly relied on the power of nature to temper her body, then used the system to heal her damaged body, and then repeated the process endlessly.
Even if it could be healed, the pain of injury and continuing to train with an injured body would be enough to drive anyone mad, and she didn't know how she endured it.
She also wondered what she would be like without this system as a foundation... But according to the Three Goddesses, there really should be such a parallel world, and if possible, she would quite like to race against her other world-line selves.
If it were soon, that would be even better, she already felt herself about to break through again.
On her own ability value panel, the completely capped ability value limit already showed signs of breaking through. Recently, it had been repeatedly exceeding the limit and then being restricted back, jumping back and forth like that.
Even though the Three Goddesses hadn't explained it to her, Zero vaguely felt that if she broke through this limit, then without deliberately acting, even a draw would be a luxury, let alone a loss.
Should those other legendary opponents... also be put on the agenda soon?
Her daily training, more than strengthening, was used as an excuse to "maintain her state" to hypnotize herself into trying to stabilize that changing value, so that the limit wouldn't be broken so quickly.
But enduring like this was not a solution. If the Three Goddesses tried to pull another prank on her next time, she would forcibly keep them to run a few laps with her.
Thinking about this and that, Zero began to jog slowly on the deserted track.
Running at full speed was absolutely out of the question; if she pushed herself to full speed now, the grass field, which had just been maintained by the workers last night, would turn into a mud pit.
Speaking of which, she had a terrifying dream a while ago.
It was about Princess Kawakami, who, due to her immense strength, always accidentally broke pencils, so she simply gripped a pencil very tightly.
After a while, when she opened her hand, the part of the lead that had been gripped had turned into a diamond.
Even though they weren't that familiar, why did she always dream of such terrifying things...?
It seems the impression of the other person's forehead was just too deep for her.
Similarly, A-fune always did various strange things in her dreams.
She even dreamed of Teio turning evil and locking the Emperor in a basement, but Teibo, while a bit mischievous, wouldn't go that far, would she?
It couldn't be a setting like 'Teio of Darkness,' could it?
There were also various bizarre dreams where character settings broke down; for Ling, her dreams were quite amusing, like those strange documents.
Ah... speaking of which, shouldn't she find someone reliable soon?
Recently, Trainer Okino and A-Hua's relationship has been warming up... or rather, it's always been quite ambiguous, but perhaps they've become a bit more honest due to various reasons lately?
And the Trainers from other teams who will come here for training later are mostly already settled down, making her, the only single one, feel out of place.
But with her physique... if she were to get pregnant someday, would uninformed people call the police if she walked with her lover?
She remembered one time when Little Special, after eating her fill outside, boarded a train with a bulging stomach and a child offered her a seat; everyone teased her about it for a long time.
But Little Special is famous now... at least she already has her own fanbase.
However, her path ahead will not be easy; let alone the Undefeated Triple Crown, the sheer difficulty of even a normal Triple Crown is beyond ordinary words, and her classmates are all incredibly talented opponents. If they all train together here, there will certainly be communication between Trainers and team members, making it difficult to formulate tactics and conduct targeted training in advance. It seems she'll truly have to rely on on-thespot reactions.
Although Special Week on the racecourse makes her relatively at ease, recalling her appearance during her first makeup exam last year and her usual silly demeanor, that sense of ease turned back into worry.
Rice Shower, too; the dream she just had was also why she woke up early.
The dream was of a world like her original one, a world of horse racing without Uma Musume.
Although it was the Kyoto Racecourse, the commentator said it was the Takarazuka Kinen, so there must have been an earthquake at Hanshin Racecourse or something; and in that race, Rice Shower was participating.
She was still so petite, but her physical condition seemed a bit poor.
Then she watched as the other party stumbled and rolled before accelerating on the long uphill of the third turn.
Falling and rolling at that speed, the outcome... she couldn't bear to watch the subsequent development; she knew what the result would be. In the past, when she dreamed of herself as a racehorse and fractured a bone, there had been similar arguments, and it was that old man, who shared a name with her grandfather in this life, and her jockey who had saved her, even threatening suicide.
At least, she didn't want to see a similar situation happen.
As for McQueen, there's really nothing to worry about; compared to Rice Shower, McQueen might not have as high a long-distance talent, but she saw the effort the other party put in.
McQueen is very diligent, and with her assistance, achieving her dream is only a matter of time. Teio has also matured a bit... as long as you don't mention the 8300 (honey, similar in shape to the katakana ハチミ).
She truly couldn't understand how Teio could drink that ten-times concentrated honey.
The situation of both teams is very stable; Ling only hopes that everyone can run healthily.
Ah, speaking of which, I haven't checked Special Week's weight recently. I'll take her to get it measured this afternoon.
Thinking about this and that, Ling finished her jog.
Even after running for so long, she wasn't even out of breath; it's truly getting more and more ridiculous.
Shaking her head, she returned home to start baking bread.
Since Rice Shower was here, she had to prepare the food the other party liked.
She would make some soft bread; baguettes were out, she was afraid Rice Shower would chip her teeth.
Finally, she would secretly add medicine to the milk, and A Mi could come back!
It absolutely wasn't because she disliked those puddings, absolutely not.
Anyway, she would change back sooner or later, so wouldn't it be better to change back early and resume training sooner?
Just pretend you're listening, don't hurt Rei Zai's fragile heart.
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