On a Pale Horse (Umamusume/Youjo Senki)

[ChronOblivion]

"I can make your life very unpleasant, you midget mongrel–"

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Hoooly shit, now that's a quote that needs to be included in the complaint. A racial insult, and a strongly implied threat to use her professional influence to sabotage her future career as a punishment for disrespect.

"I guess you would have to, since all your achievements were riding on their backs."

"Whereas your greatest achievement was accomplished on your knees."

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Ooooooooh, assuming that is what it appears to be, what is a deeply brutal insult. Really hope it's actually true.

"You dare–?!" she stepped forwards, raising a hand for a moment, before blood seemed to drain from her face as she jerked back, staring at Shirogane like she had seen a ghost.

Grass couldn't see her friend's face from where she was sitting, but she could see her classmate's hand clench into a fist behind her back. Even so, Shirogane had not otherwise moved an inch.

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Killing Intent Activated.

Shirogane paused for a second, before turning to look at her square on. "Have you ever considered how odd it is, to have the losers of a race sing and dance to some peppy song about achieving your dreams as the backup dancers for the winner, usually after having their own dreams crushed, or at least set back?"

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Were tiara runners really so much weaker than those not focused on being an idol that they needed shorter runs to perform well? One would think that practicing performing so much would help build up stamina, or was the idea that they would be too tired to perform on stage properly if the races were longer?

Which was the actually important part here, the race or the marketing portion?!

Actually…now that this thought sprang to mind, the business side of the league likely was more concerned about the marketing aspect, hence the decision to allow idol focused umas their own track so they had an opportunity to shine in the race, which helped draw attention to their performance, thus helping to generate sales of merchandise and improving the financial performance of the industry.

Was her goal to run in both circuits somehow deleterious to their bottom line? She couldn't think of a way that it could be. Perhaps she wasn't as marketable since her win rate was admittedly quite paltry compared to many of her peers, but her merchandise sales were actually significant, at least in Fujisawa, which, while far from the largest city in the country, was still a large customer base.

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Appreciate the structural criticism of her league.

Would be crazy if her gate placements are deliberate.

 

[WrandmWaffles]

The America is strong in this one. Hope to see more.

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Grass is a weaboo but sometimes the Yankee leaks out.

Less than ten minutes later, Drift has concern, and Shiro has to pay the gym for a new punching bag.

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Hey she's got enough money to afford it now. But yeah throwing hands is not something many umas are naturally inclined towards but Shiro is very good at it.

I'm still not sure where the story can really go though, it's not like this is a Shonen where she can determinator her way to victory in short races?

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Let's just say that while Shiro and Hana have been focusing on her endurance and cornering, she has other talents she can try leveraging.

"- It's disorderly!" (Disgraceful)

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A disorderly charge is much less effective than one in formation. Fortunately they aren't actually trying to kill anyone on the race track.

It's Not a Mental Illness if We Win

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"If it's useful, it's a condition!"

I feel bad for Seiun, but she can probably qualify with a different race

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I'm going with that since Grass immediately got injured, they decided to give Sky the Satsuki Sho slot because Grass very clearly can't take it.

how gay Stego is towards the MC.

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The umas based off of famous stud horses kinda don't always register as female to me sometimes, especially Stay Gold and Fuji Kiseki. It's also a bit of a janky point for the story because how is the site relation supposed to work in this setting?

Like was Sunday Silence the sexiest Uma in Japan or something? Good luck Saito Kisuke, your uma sister's horse alternate demands you get laid.

Ok I didn't expect that from Shiro, kinda feels OOC actually.

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She had some experience dealing with mean girls in school this life. Also Polish mom.

One of my joys is seeing how the announcers continue to stumble on Shirogane's name in new and interesting ways.

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They've kinda got a standardized way to say it wrong for now, but it kinda made it worse.

A lot of umas and people with oshi's likely say "Onore Shirogane." Because she appears everywhere.

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Imagining game Shirogane is funny because im the alt timeline where horse Shiro got put into the altUmamusume game, before she was released (assuming she wasn't in the first wave), there'd just be this NPC Uma that shows up constantly. Players that didn't know the lore that much would be so confused.

 

[Darkwood]

Ok I didn't expect that from Shiro, kinda feels OOC actually. But then again she usually goes straight for the kill when fighting so maybe it is in character.

Or did Hana say this? The text implies it was Shiro but it's not clear.

Staring down a Polish Hussar who sees you as an enemy must be terrifying. Good luck to that lady.

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I believe that was a retort from Hana, as I read it the text implied she said it because the previous remark was aimned at Hana and only Hana would have prior knowledge of who the woman was.

 

[Critian Caceorte]

Like was Sunday Silence the sexiest Uma in Japan or something? Good luck Saito Kisuke, your uma sister's horse alternate demands you get laid.

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Well, either that or SunSil is Cafe's ghost Friend, that IS the most popular theory of the bunch.

 

[GarfRed]

Imagining game Shirogane is funny because im the alt timeline where horse Shiro got put into the altUmamusume game, before she was released (assuming she wasn't in the first wave), there'd just be this NPC Uma that shows up constantly. Players that didn't know the lore that much would be so confused.

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People screaming out about her in event in game, waiting for her to be finally released as an actual umamusume. While casual fans are baffled at the reception of this supposed NPC Uma.

 

[Tomato]

One of my joys is seeing how the announcers continue to stumble on Shirogane's name in new and interesting ways.

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I mean that's literally how her name is spelled in Japanese. Without it written in English/Polish it is a 100% accurate pronunciation. Japanese is a language where phonetic spelling is 1 to 1 accurate to pronounciation.

This is useful in normal situation but requires writing down loan words in strange ways.

As a famous example, Google is written in Japanese as "guguru".

Edit: it would actually probably be "Oruzeru" but the difference is tiny.

 

[Yonlionz/Amber]

Killing Intent Activated.

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Nah, that was just Shiro indicating a line was about to be crossed. Proper intent to harm would have made that bureaucratic Karen topple over backwards, and Killing Intent? That'd just inconvenience the janitorial staff.

 

[JKD_666]

More importantly to me is what it translates to. I may be willing to open Google translate but it's still annoying to do.

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Don't stop your charge, let's go!/let's strike!

 

[Jadalier Rune]

Honestly, I think having Shirogane win here would be the more unpopular option given how her strengths and weaknesses are presented.

Sure Shirogane has worked on her weaknesses, but it's still shouldn't be enough to overcome the strengths of her peers yet who have all been working on their own weaknesses.

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I love that she's balanced and not overpowered as fuck. it makes a completely engaging story instead of having an OP slop shit. She's strong in some areas and she's weak in some areas that's terrific.

"I will require ten... no, twelve standard-sized bento boxes to dispose of the body, once I dismember it. I shouldn't have any trouble with the weight. All I need is to find a place to dump the evidence."

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And I think she's a little too fat. I think you need a couple more boxes there, Shiro. Hmm, where to hide a body.

 

[RandomNew]

Whoo it's been thousand of years!
New chapter! Thank you!

Ah Shiro, planning murder already.
An aspect of Tanya that I kinda miss.

Will this situation awakened Shiro competitive spirit???
Hope so!

 

[Tiypo]

Like was Sunday Silence the sexiest Uma in Japan or something? Good luck Saito Kisuke, your uma sister's horse alternate demands you get laid.

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I know Sunday Silence is supposedly Cafe's ghost friend, but from what I know, the actual horse was SERIOUSLY obsessed with McQueen. It was so bad that he would throw fits if he was let out to pasture before McQueen, so any Uma version would probably be quite down bad in the yuri department.

 

[Herofox]

I know Sunday Silence is supposedly Cafe's ghost friend, but from what I know, the actual horse was SERIOUSLY obsessed with McQueen. It was so bad that he would throw fits if he was let out to pasture before McQueen, so any Uma version would probably be quite down bad in the yuri department.

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Wasn't McQueen a stallion irl?

Then again, irl Grass and irl Special Week had an incident so maybe that's not so far off lol.

 

[Sir Bidoof]

Overall a decent chapter.

I think there should maybe be a bit more acknowledgement by characters that Shiro failed at the end at least partly because she was distracted by Grass Wonder injuring herself, but that is a relatively minor quibble.