On a Pale Horse (Umamusume/Youjo Senki)

[guisniperman]

Wait till they find out shes actually a concrete runner.

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One day they'll find her running deliveries and go *Wait, how is she even faster?!?!?!?!*

 

[ndh]

So, the odds that Shirogane would be a hidden boss like Almond Eye.

 

[Solconbur]

Condor: "More. More! Just a little MORE!"

Shiro: "F laundry."

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Shit. That reminds me, I need to do my laundry.

 

[TheSmallSauce]

"Number one T M Megaton has the lead going into the first corner–oh what's this?! Number nine Steady Distance hugs the rails and slips past both T M Megaton and number three Meisei Opera!"

–before sliding past both of them along the rail as they lost speed accelerating sideways into the turn.

"Wooo! Go Steady!" Azuki and Matcha cheered again, hopping up and down with enough excitement that Shirogane could feel the floor vibrate slightly.

"It was a well executed maneuver," Shirogane concurred, folding her arms in thought as she watched. "But it's still early." And this set had plenty of late race threats.

"You know, now that I'm looking at it…" Taro began, glancing between Shirogane and the racetrack, her tail swishing to one side as she fired up her brain cells. "You like doing that too, don't you?"

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Looks to me that Steady's trainer, after studying and watching film of Shiro's races (of which there is an abnormally large amount for a Classic year runner) decided to incorporate the same maneuvers into her race strategy. Steady's already familiar with Shiro's preferred style, but unless it happened off-screen, they haven't raced since before Shiro started going to Tracen, right?

–her slighter frame meant she could not contest her bulkier opponent's charge to the finish line.

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I get that Steady is smaller and more lithe, and so she can't outmuscle her opponent and force them to take a different line... Shiro is even smaller than her, perhaps the smallest in her year, but we all know that she's not lacking for strength. It'll be more than a little weird for an uma who's never raced her to think that they can just force a small front runner aside, only to find that the tiniest uma is rocking the world's most hidden sleeper build.

The track was muddy from the melted snow, sticking to her shoes in a familiarly uncomfortable way. It had been bad enough that the racecourse staff had had some trouble getting the starting gate into position.

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That it's familiar is interesting, even better that it's uncomfortable. If we really are gunning to see the Devil come out to play, it would make sense to have all the race conditions as close to possible as the place where that monster was born. Let it be cloudy, muddy from the melted snow, with as large a field of competition as possible, once that clarion call sounds, Shiro gets to take part in the charge of the light cavalry.

Laundry for this racing jersey was going to be a pain.

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Notable because she does her own laundry. Living off campus can be a pain sometimes.

"Evidently you are well equipped to be a mud wrestler."

"Queeee–?! Ack!" The random comment made her lose control and start coughing, her brain trying to get enough oxygen to understand what her rival was saying.

"You have a lot of mud on your mask, by the way."

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And now we see why her brand of humor matches so well with Rudolf's: they're both retired already.

"Heh, I needed a bit of time away from all the ponies, but I don't mind seeing how the field's shaping up this year." She winked at him, one of her ears flicking playfully. "Pretty sure you get the sentiment, Kisuke-kun."

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I'll say that I coughed on my drink when I read the name. Having her half-brother be called Fuji Kisuke is genius. Also them being half-siblings makes sense since they have different mothers, which in real life is... the definition, but in the Umaverse, umas only get counted as full siblings if they share a mother.

"So it's like that, huh?" He huffed, striding around the couch to plop himself down next to her, and Fuji again was struck by how similar they looked to each other. They might have been confused for twins if not for her being an uma and him not having the white streak of hair that never seemed to show up in humans for some reason. "Too much attention from your juniors for you?'

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Fun and weird fact: white streaks or patches of fur seem to be a side effect of domestication. That kind of very selective albinism only seems to occur in domesticated animals and appears to be linked to other traits of domestication, like being more friendly towards humans.

"You are an adult."

"Gah! Don't hurt me like that Kisuke!"

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Truth nuke. The years after leaving high school seems to pass like nobody's business.

"About the Tracen runners, yeah," Fuji snorted, "but there are runners from other places involved too, so I don't have firsthand info about them, and sometimes they end up making it big too. It's also fun to see how much the talking heads get wrong."

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It does make you wonder if Fuji often participates as an advisor during training, or if she regularly shares insights with her ponies about their opponents.

"No, it doesn't look like it. Her times are not bad, but she's not nearly as dominant as Kurifuji, and lost to both Grass Wonder and El Condor Pasa already."

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Uh...

"Wait…am I reading this right? Her record is fourteen-four-ten-zero?! She's run four races this year already?!"

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If 14:4-10-0 isn't dominant... Well, it only goes to show how ridiculous the Golden Generation is. Also the Yayoi Sho is early March, isn't it? Which makes it... four races in... eight weeks? If this was in-game, she's run every possible turn that she could have run, which would make the Yayoi Sho her fifth consecutive turn of racing lol. Devs, plz nerf.

This is Shirogane, an uma with 4,700 Stamina, 1329 Power, and 1201 Guts, has No Stopping Me, a Gold Recovery in her Unique, and cannot Late Start. Has Risky Business, and the cooldown is only 1 second too. It costs 15 effective stamina. The CD is even refreshed when she ults. She has target velocity down debuff on her passive. Then, when she stacks Velocity and Accel, she gets no Pace Down Mode too, Cooldown Redction to her Unique, and her skill activation speeds up. Then, she has 30% Guts growth, so her Final Spurt…AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The K'Sante rant comes to mind lol.

"Is it always like this?" Her brother wondered. "It sounds a bit…weird when they put things that way, kinda like my mom talking about the girls I know."

"Really?" Fuji tilted her head questioningly, "It sounds more like when they talk about athletes in general."

"Oh yeah…I don't really follow that either, so I didn't really know." Kisuke sat still for a moment, his train of thought derailed for a moment. "You know, my mom was wondering if you had a boyfriend or a husband."

"What?!" Fuji sputtered, spinning to face him. "Why would she care about that?!"

"Beats me," her half-brother shrugged, holding his hands up disarmingly. "Guess she really wants grandchildren."

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Asian grandparents, the only question on their mind every time it comes around to New Year if you're single...

"Are you in a relationship yet?"

Or if you're in a relationship:

"When can we expect great-grandchildren?"

Then if you've been single for a long time:

"You aren't getting any younger, you know? Soon you'll be too old for anyone to want you."

"I don't see how either, but the immediate follow up was about whether I could ask you about whether any of your school brats would make a good wife." From the look on his face, Kisuke had not enjoyed that conversation. Fuji certainly wouldn't have.

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Probably a deeply uncomfortable conversation, but a reality that the scions of these racing families cannot escape.

They didn't usually talk about their family situation, because it was a bit…weird, like it often was in families that had a serious tradition of uma racing.

Sometimes it was unavoidable.

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Yeah, looks like the blood of Sunday Silence is in high demand.

 

[MARch Of Time]

Pressure built behind her eyes.

Her lungs burned, and her legs felt numb, but–

"The Condor has passed!"

Yes!

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See how hard she works, how much she must press in the moment, how it takes a toll on her, all for victory-!
And then-!!

"Evidently you are well equipped to be a mud wrestler."

"Queeee–?! Ack!" The random comment made her lose control and start coughing, her brain trying to get enough oxygen to understand what her rival was saying.

"You have a lot of mud on your mask, by the way."

"Noooo!" Why did you have to do that, Shiro?!

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Shiro, BARELY losing to CONDOR in a SHORT DIRT RACE, and it's just casual easy breath as usual. Because mud and cold ain't no thang to the Silver Eagle.

A certain Eagle's Trainer: "So another new skill, rapid slick-mud cornering while hugging the rail and in the lead while being pressured, hmmm"


Still, it had to happen this way. The Silver Eagle's moniker must gain more infamy, it is written

 

[LeonTrollski]

And good on Tensei for finding something besides the endless drudgery of the corporate lifestyle to shoot for.

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His main objection to the idea of becoming a trainer before was that Umas are too rambunctious and it would be troublesome to manage them. If he's mostly been interacting with the level headed Shiro, and sweetie pies Taiki Shuttle and Urara it's not so surprising that the idea isn't as objectionable anymore.

Though, he should perhaps be wary of the sample size here.

 

[cyrus622]

On the outside again? Unfortunate track conditions again? Unreasonably tough lineup again? Shiro really can't catch a break... like ever huh?

 

[Maiden_Soliloquy]

On the outside again? Unfortunate track conditions again? Unreasonably tough lineup again? Shiro really can't catch a break... like ever huh?

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The universe had to balance out her titanium legs and infinite stamina.

 

[Acerer]

"Yeah, but she's got some indestructible legs," Fuji scoffed, ears flicking indignantly. "She's basically a pure stayer though, so with the shorter races for first years she doesn't look as impressive."

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I wonder if some of the racing families might be thinking about throwing sons at her to get those indestrustible legs into the bloodline. Getting sponsorships and patronage attached with rich bois trying to woo her would be pretty funny.

 

[Gem]

I wonder if some of the racing families might be thinking about throwing sons at her to get those indestrustible legs into the bloodline. Getting sponsorships and patronage attached with rich bois trying to woo her would be pretty funny.

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It has been said before. However it still bears repeating. Had Shirogane been a horse IRL, every racing family with particularly fragile legs (you know who you are) would be scrambling and on their knees to get her blood into their families.

Not only does she have infinite stamina and legs of steel, her speed is honestly no joke. The only reason she's perceived as slow as because she's competing with some of the greatest horses that had ever been seen.

 

[Gforce1000]

Not only does she have infinite stamina and legs of steel, her speed is honestly no joke. The only reason she's perceived as slow as because she's competing with some of the greatest horses that had ever been seen.

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Given that she's been right on number 1's heels in most of these races she probably would have won most of them outright in any other year. Her being one or two years older and going down in history as basically god-empress of the uma for hitting 14/0/0/0 (so far) could be a funny omake or something.

First she's freaked out by the shrines people are making to her, then she finds it kind of funny as a way to spit in X's eye, and then she's making bank off branded shrine merch.

 

[Maiden_Soliloquy]

The only reason she's perceived as slow as because she's competing with some of the greatest horses that had ever been seen.

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Probably going to have some people going, "If only if she was born earlier/later, she would be been The Greatest of that generation."

then she finds it kind of funny as a way to spit in X's eye,

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I honestly think Shirogane could actually care less about him. He had been a nonfactor for so long, both in this life and the later half of The Soldier's Life.