"A late start—? No! 'Late' doesn't even begin to describe it; Gold Ship hasn't even moved one step!"
"Just what is going on?! She has already been completely left behind by the other competitors!"
The many people in the stands who were eagerly anticipating Gold Ship's performance, seeing what was happening before their eyes, could only have their jaws drop.
No one expected for Gold Ship to immediately hit them with her Gold Shippiness— an absolutely catastrophic late start!
By the time Gold Ship seemed to finally start running, at least two to three seconds had already passed.
"It's over; the gap's already to wide..."
In front of the TV, the Mejiro sisters could only rub their temples as they watched this buffoonery.
"A three second delay... that's impossible to make up, right?"
"She might be able to win if she stays as close to the inner lane as much as possible for the rest of the race... but the inner lane is already occupied."
"Gold Ship is forced to run as an End Closer now, and if she wants to overtake— unless some kind of miracle happens and everyone running starts avoiding the inner lane, she'll have to overtake from the far outside."
Mejiro Palmer, who usually ran as a Runaway, was equally unoptimistic about Gold Ship's current predicament.
In her opinion, the chances of recovering from such a devastating mistake and then turning the tide was near zero percent.
"It's going to be hard to win now..."
Mejiro Bright, crossing her hands, said with some worry.
"Seriously! That $*)&(!$ Gold Ship! This is an actual race! What in the ($@! she doing?! Does she think this is a @$@)$(* joke?! That !@^#! *)%@*$! $@$*%)!!! %_)&%!^(*!!!!"
Mejiro McQueen, who had initially thought Gold Ship had changed from her ways, even fully placing her trust in her to avenge her past failures, became so angered by Gold Ship's actions that she began bursting out cursing, startling everyone in the room.
As Mejiro McQueen's sisters, though they would occasionally hear Mejiro McQueen swear, she usually only did so during baseball matches, and even then, it was an extreme rarity.
Hearing such foul language coming from the normally, polite, elegant, and dignified Uma Musume... was a real eye opener to them.
Still, they could understand what their sister was going through; everyone, and especially Mejiro McQueen was expecting Gold Ship to actually take this race seriously and win, but right from the start, Gold Ship immediately set the difficulty to hellish, truly making people want to cuss her out.
As for Tokai Teio's reaction to Gold Ship's start, her initial confidence had turned into worry.
She didn't know what was going through Gold Ship's head at this moment, but Teio was sure that at such a serious time like this, even Gold Ship wouldn't intentionally cause trouble.
As for why... Tokai Teio didn't know; it was just a gut feeling.
Still, with Imanami there watching her, Teio seriously doubted Gold Ship would sabotage herself like this without any reason.
So... did she do it on purpose?
"Gold Ship... good luck, you must win..!"
For some reason, Tokai Teio felt even more nervous watching the live race than if she were racing herself.
This time, she desperately hoped Gold Ship knew what she was doing, and as she said, successively encourage the listless McQueen to overcome her inner demons.
...
"This is bad! Gold Ship's in sixteenth place!"
In the stands, Meisho Doto watched the race with great tension, unconsciously imagining herself into the race, as she said towards Wada and the others with concern,
"It'll be very difficult for Gold Ship to win now... she doesn't even have Aura or a Zone!"
"Overcoming this solely using physical prowess, even I can't do it!"
"Hmm... has the Unsinkable Golden Ship encountered a setback at the start?"
T.M. Opera O was also frowing at this scene, deep in thought.
She had originally been very confident in Gold Ship; although she wasn't entirely sure on how strong Gold Ship was, she could vaguely sense that there was more to her than she was letting on.
At least GII level— was T.M. Opera O's personal assessment of Gold Ship.
However, now, Gold Ship seemed to be unable to show her special qualities.
Of course, due to the Gold Family's inherent robust physique, Gold Ship would undoubtedly have more than sufficient stamina to run this 1800-meter mile race.
But, whether her physique would be enough to completely overturn this race from last place was a seperate thing entirely.
"This is bad! She's basically capsized in a ditch! That! Idiot! Gold Ship!"
Orfevre was also shouting anxiously, wishing she could race in Gold Ship's place.
With her strength, if she unleashed her Aura, eleven out of fifteen of these little GIII Uma Musumes would definitely be scared away.
"It's Gold Ship after all... were we thinking too much?"
Tosen Jordan did a facepalm as her eyes flashed with exhasperated dissapointiment.
"How can she win now... everyone came here to watch her race, even if she doesn't care about her reputation, shouldn't she at least take this a bit more seriously? —Ow?!"
"Orfevre, she's your sister."
Ikezoe silently withdrew the hand that had flicked Orfevre's head and said to both her and Tosen Jordan,
"A late start is just a regular occurance for Gold Family Uma Musume, she'll definitely find a way to turn the tide."
"And Orfevre, did you forget? During your first Debut race, your start was equally as catastrophic as Gold Ship's right now. Are you bullying your little sister?"
"I- Ikezoe, I'm not bullying her; I'm worried!"
Orfevre immediately moved to defend herself, let out an indignant huff.
"Gold Ship doesn't have any abilities beyond just her skills and body! How can she win like this?"
"Sigh... Orfevre, you need to remember that Gold Ship never went all out at all whenever she ran with you all."
Seeing Orfevre getting heated, Ikezoe rubbed Orfevre's head to calm her down.
In turn, Orfevre started to cool down which caused a small smile to appear on Ikezoe as he continued.
"Not only that, Gold Ship is Trainer Imanami's Uma Musume, right? Look at him now, he doesn't look worried at all!"
"So don't worry, Gold Ship will have her ways."
Hearing this, both Orfevre and Tosen Jordan seemed to regain some of their lost confidence in Gold Ship, as the turned their gaze towards Imanami.
Just as Ikezoe said, Imanami's expression, though more serious than usual, was not tense at all.
He was simply observing Gold Ship run, without letting a single worry show on his body.
...
To be honest, Imanami himself didn't know how strong Gold Ship really was.
Even using his understanding of Gold Ship from his previous world, alongside the many months the spent taking care of the Gold Ship of this world, he still couldn't gauge Gold Ship's limits.
While no one understood Gold Ship, perhaps Gold Ship understood everyone.
However, Imanami was sure that he could trust Gold Ship.
Though she usually looked unreliable, this child would never dissapoint if she promised to fulfil someone's request; especially if they were her friends.
Maybe Gold Ship was a hidden master who always hid her strength, or maybe Gold Ship was truly just a lazy Uma Musume with no outstanding abilities.
But, since Gold Ship had actively approached him with this choice, she would surely be able to fulfil her promise.
"So run, Gold Ship. Go bring back McQueen, I believe in you."
"As the perfect combination of the Gold and Mejiro bloodlines... you can definitely be the Uma Musume who changes everything."
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Rest of fiction: She's just an anime horse girl! What the fuck is happening???!!!
Gold Ship: Moo.
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If you spot any errors, feel free to comment about it and I will fix it as soon as I can.