"All right, rest."
The moment they heard Byerley's voice, Shirayuki and Chiya flopped onto the ground like two dried fish.
"Compared with half a month ago, you've improved quite a lot. It seems you haven't been slacking off."
With this kind of strict supervision, even if they wanted to slack off, they couldn't!
"At present, Shirayuki's maximum sprint distance is four hundred metres, fifty metres longer than at the beginning. If she pushes a little harder, she should be able to extend that sprint a bit more… Though I would like to keep increasing your training intensity, doing that would affect your race."
There were less than seven days left until the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.
If they continued training like this, forget winning, whether Shirayuki could even participate in the race would become questionable.
Byerley wanted Shirayuki to become faster.
She also wanted Chiya to become stronger.
Both of them possessed extremely excellent genes and could make a fine contribution to the future of uma musume. From the perspective of bloodlines, their bodies were the most compatible. If joined together, they could produce exceptionally outstanding descendants. They were each other's one true match.
But that matter could not be forced.
Byerley could not force the other party to mate. She was only responsible for developing the man's body to its limit. As long as he possessed an excellent body, choosing anyone would not be a bad result.
Of course, if possible, there were even more suitable candidates.
Herself, Darley, and Godolphin.
Children created with the Three Goddesses would push uma musume across the entire world toward a new age of glory.
However, that would also mean Fujiwara Chiya had to leave with them.
After all, the Three Goddesses had their own desires too. In fact, one could even say that the instincts of uma musume originated from the Three Goddesses themselves. Their possessiveness was far beyond what those little foals could compare to.
Before a relationship was confirmed, he was a trainer.
After a relationship was confirmed, he would become the possession of gods.
They would not let others touch him easily.
After interacting for so long, Byerley had more or less understood Fujiwara Chiya's personality. He would not abandon his own uma musume and choose to leave with the Three Goddesses.
Loving uma musume also meant loving their children.
They would not complain about that.
However, purely from the perspective of race continuation, the Three Goddesses were more suitable than any ordinary uma musume. This was the first time Byerley had encountered a human that Darley liked, that she herself found pleasing, and that Godolphin also considered decent. It was rare for the Three Goddesses' opinions to align like this.
All that was missing was the man's agreement.
Darley had once tested the man's thoughts.
Unfortunately, he had refused her.
But thoughts could change.
A perfect lamb like this had appeared so rarely. If they did not allow him to display his full value, the Three Goddesses would not simply let it go.
Do not think a goddess's blessing is so easy to accept.
Once one is watched by gods, one must be prepared to be toyed with by gods.
They did whatever made them happy.
Yes.
Whatever made them happy.
If Darley truly liked this trainer that much, she might even forcefully take him away.
The probability was very small.
But it was not zero.
After all, this was Byerley's first time seeing Darley Arabian become so interested in a trainer. She had even tentatively marked him as her possession and forbidden Byerley and Godolphin Arabian from making a move.
Byerley took out several walnuts and handed them to Shirayuki and Chiya.
"Eat some walnuts and recover your strength. After that, run another twenty laps, and today's training will end here."
"That's it?"
Fujiwara Chiya pinched a walnut between his fingers, cracked it open directly, and tossed it into his mouth. He had no idea whether these walnuts had been made out of energy bars or something, but after eating one, his body became pleasantly warm, and his stamina gradually began to recover.
"Mm. I don't mind if you continue training, but as the saying goes, before the troops move, provisions must go first. In your current condition, you cannot step onto the racecourse."
"…That's true."
Fujiwara Chiya had almost been trained into confusion.
He was training for the race, not for the sake of suffering.
If they continued running like this, then on race day, Shirayuki would have to drag her battered, boroboro body onto the track and collide with a group of tall, powerful uma musume. Forget taking first place, whether she could finish the whole race would be the real question.
They had finally won a great victory in the preliminary race.
If she ended up with a terrible placing in the Arc, he would have no face left to return to Tracen.
Fujiwara Chiya gathered his resolve.
He would charge toward the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, a race no one from all of Japan had ever won.
After eating the walnuts, Fujiwara Chiya let Shirayuki lie on his lap and rest.
She was the true protagonist of this race.
Speaking of which, it really was strange.
According to his experience as a trainer, if an uma musume ran like this, problems should have appeared long ago. Shirayuki's body easily accumulated heat. Running for long periods would cause her body temperature to rise too high and damage her muscles.
And yet, strangely enough, Shirayuki's body temperature had always remained quite stable.
Even when she was exhausted to death, there had never been a situation where her temperature became dangerously high.
It was not only her body temperature.
One time, Shirayuki had stepped into a mud pit and fallen.
Her body had not been injured either.
At that moment, Fujiwara Chiya's heart had nearly leapt out of his chest. If she stepped into a mud pit at more than ten metres per second, she should at least have twisted something. And yet Shirayuki had been as if nothing had happened.
It had been the same when she fell onto stones.
Shirayuki's skin had not even been scratched.
This made Fujiwara Chiya wonder.
When had Shirayuki's body become this sturdy?
Gradually, Fujiwara Chiya became bolder with Shirayuki's training as well.
After completing Byerley's requirements, Shirayuki would still carry out independent training at night, squeezing out her own strength completely and constantly applying pressure to herself.
It was exhausting.
But Shirayuki could clearly feel her body growing.
This race, she was determined to win.
That evening, Fujiwara Chiya returned to his dorm.
The moment he entered, he saw Gold Ship sitting on his sofa, leisurely eating potato chips while watching television.
"Gold Ship? Why are you here?"
"I saw the door wasn't locked, so I came in."
Gold Ship changed the channel and swung her arm lazily.
"Even if it wasn't locked, you can't just barge into someone else's home!"
"What do you mean, someone else's home? I don't treat Trainer as an outsider, so your home is my home."
"What the hell! Then I'll suddenly run into your room someday and see whether you can stand it."
"Sure. When no one's in the dorm, I'll open the window and tell you it's the perfect chance to launch a night raid on me. When someone is there, I'll close it and tell you that if you want to break in, you'd better be prepared to ruin your reputation."
"You…"
Fujiwara Chiya was left speechless.
He had absolutely no way to deal with this alien weirdo uma musume.
"Trainer, you went training again just now, right?"
"What about it?"
"Tired?"
"How could I not be tired?"
He was practically about to collapse.
Gold Ship's lips curled into a grin.
"Heh… Trainer, actually, seeing you exhausted to death every day while I enjoy life over here makes me feel just a tiny bit guilty. So today, the great Gold Ship-sama will rarely show you some mercy."
Gold Ship grabbed her collar and pulled upward.
As if performing a magic trick, she stripped off her clothes, revealing a pink massage outfit underneath.
She opened a bottle and rubbed essential oil onto her hands.
"I'll give you a full-body spa, Trainer!"