At the gates of Central Tracen Academy.
"La la la~"
With light, cheerful steps, Teio skipped her way out through the school gates.
The moment she looked up, she spotted a familiar figure ahead of her, dressed in green, with green eyes and a graceful, slender figure.
Teio's eyes lit up at once, and she called out with a smile, "Ah! Tazuna-san, good morning~"
"Hm?"
Hearing her voice, the green-clad figure turned around.
The instant she realized it was Teio, a flicker of surprise passed through Hayakawa Tazuna's emerald eyes.
"Teio? What are you doing here?"
Tazuna tilted her head slightly, her tone serious but not stern. "It's still class time, you know. Don't tell me you skipped class?"
"No, no, no!"
Teio immediately shook her head like a rattle drum, both hands waving frantically in front of her chest.
"Next period is cooking class. The teacher said I don't have to attend. Teio's a good girl, okay? I'd never skip class."
"Mmm..."
Tazuna considered that for a moment, and her expression softened.
"Then are you heading off to train for the Satsuki Sho?"
"Mhm!"
Teio nodded vigorously.
At that, a gentle smile appeared on Tazuna's face.
"Then go ahead."
"But be careful on the way. Stay on the Uma Musume lane, and don't bump into other people or cars, all right?"
"...Got it, got it. I'm not a little kid anymore."
Teio nodded helplessly, then obediently left the academy gates under the watchful gaze of the "Green Devil."
...
On the road.
After leaving the academy, Teio did not head straight into the Uma Musume lane.
She felt like taking a walk along the sidewalk first and maybe stopping by the convenience store on the corner to buy some honey toast.
That was when a certain Uma Musume ahead of her, still wearing the Central Tracen middle school uniform, caught her attention.
From behind, the girl looked strikingly slender, with a beautifully shaped figure.
Her smooth chestnut hair fell all the way to her waist. On her right ear was a pale aqua hairband, and atop her head, three stubborn little ahoge stuck straight up.
Her long legs were tightly wrapped in pure white thigh-high socks.
Still, the uniform she was wearing was obviously not the right size for her.
The pleated skirt was much too short.
But the strip of bare skin that should have shown between the hem of the skirt and the tops of her socks, that perfect "absolute territory," was completely hidden by a pair of safety shorts so absurdly long they covered everything.
At that point, those are just shorts, aren't they? If they're that long, can you even still call them safety shorts?!
Walking behind her, Teio could feel her inner urge to complain trembling violently.
But in truth, what really caught her attention was not the ill-fitting uniform.
It was that... this girl looked incredibly familiar.
"Mmm..."
Teio narrowed her eyes and trailed after her like a little detective, her mind racing as she tried to figure out exactly which familiar person this resemblance came from.
After several seconds of thinking and still getting nowhere, the action-first girl simply jogged a few steps forward, circled around to the other Uma Musume's side, and curiously peeked at her face.
A familiar yet unfamiliar face instantly came into view.
"Hm? I-it's... ah... um... who was it again...?"
Teio froze.
She stared at that exquisitely beautiful, completely expressionless poker face before her.
The name felt like it was already at the tip of her tongue, but for some reason she just could not spit it out.
Then the chestnut-haired girl noticed the stare at her side, paused slightly, and turned her head.
"Good morning, Teio-senpai."
"Oh, right, good morning." Teio nodded blankly.
And in the very instant the girl spoke, the pieces in Teio's mind finally snapped together: the figure, the face, the outfit, and that utterly flat tone of voice, all combining into one complete picture.
The stunning, curvy beauty standing before her instantly overlapped with the memory of a much smaller, more delicate figure in her mind.
"Bo-bo-bo... Bourbon?!"
Teio's eyes went wide as she cried out in disbelief.
"You're little Bourbon?!"
The one standing in front of Tokai Teio right now was none other than Mihono Bourbon.
"Yes."
Still expressionless, Mihono Bourbon replied in a steady, gentle tone:
"When I exited sleep mode this morning, my body had already completed formal True Blooming."
"True Blooming... I see."
Already thoroughly used to Bourbon's unique way of speaking, Teio immediately clapped her hands in realization after hearing that.
After all, it had happened to her too. She had gone to sleep one day and woken up suddenly looking older.
That kind of growth, like someone had hit fast-forward, was actually a pretty common physiological phenomenon in the world of Uma Musume.
"Then why are you here? With a change this huge, shouldn't you have gone straight to Trainer first and reported it to him?" Teio asked in confusion.
Bourbon remained calm and answered clearly in her soft voice:
"True Blooming is a standard physiological process for Uma Musume. At the present stage, it does not require an increase in Trainer's operational burden."
"Therefore, I can process my school advancement procedures independently."
Since the great majority of trainers at Central Tracen only chose girls who had already completed True Blooming as their trainees, younger girls who had not yet undergone True Blooming usually did not have trainers at all.
So ordinarily, when an elementary division girl completed True Blooming, she would report it to her homeroom teacher and then head to the academic office to handle her advancement procedures.
Chasing Light, however, was a special case.
Starting with Teio and McQueen, Kuroha had gradually taken in five younger girls from the elementary division.
Because of that, he usually handled their advancement paperwork himself.
At that point, Bourbon paused, then lightly tugged at the hem of her skirt and added:
"However, due to the update in body parameters, and because the scale of the change was relatively large, the casual clothes and uniform prepared previously are no longer compatible with my current size."
"So after notifying the academy at the academic office and completing the procedures for advancement into middle school, I was preparing to proceed to the shopping district to 'acquire clothing compatible with current body parameters.'"
"After the acquisition task is complete, I will then proceed to Trainer for final reporting."
"...Oh. So that's why your uniform looks like that..."
Teio nodded in understanding as she looked at Bourbon.
But when her eyes swept over Bourbon's school uniform, stretched tight across her frame, and the full curves the uniform could not possibly hide, the expression on Teio's face instantly locked up.
"Yes. This was the uniform prepared in advance, but..."
Bourbon trailed off.
She had noticed that Teio had suddenly frozen in place, staring motionlessly at her chest.
The chestnut-haired girl tilted her head slightly, and the ahoge on top of her head swayed with the motion.
"Did something happen, Teio-senpai?"
Teio did not answer.
Instead, she slowly lowered her head and looked down at herself.
Yeah.
If you could look straight down and see your own toes, maybe that was a kind of beauty too...
"Ugh... why did your True Blooming change you this much, Bourbon?! I only... only..."
Seeing Teio instantly go dim, as though a rain cloud had started floating over her head, Mihono Bourbon seemed to realize what was going on.
After a moment of silence, she added softly:
"The growth magnitude from this True Blooming has indeed exceeded original predictions."
"The original forecast model predicted post-growth parameters approximately comparable to Teio-senpai and McQueen-senpai."
"However, current data has now been updated to 86, 54, 87..."
"Stop, stop, stop!"
Teio jumped in fright and immediately lunged forward to cover Bourbon's mouth.
"Don't say it, don't say it! I get it already! You don't have to read out the numbers!"
Teio felt like her heart was bleeding.
Ugh... this is so unfair!
I'm only 77, and Bourbon shot up that much overnight?!
The girl who had still been a tiny, adorable junior just yesterday, the kind that made you want to pat her on the head...
Had turned into a gorgeous beauty with an even more explosive figure than Teio's after just one single night.
For a while, Tokai Teio fell into deep, total despair.
(End of Chapter)
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