Chapter 67. One Trick Pony, Conquering the World (Part 2)
Shuta had, in fact, seen straight through Silence Suzuka's intentions from the very beginning. The moment she entered the long straight opposite the stands, there was no hesitation left in her stride, no trace of restraint in the way she drove herself forward.
She wasn't preserving anything for later, nor was she entertaining the possibility of a measured finish. Instead, she chose the most decisive and unforgiving option—expand the lead to such an extent that the concept of "closing the gap" would become meaningless for everyone behind her.
"I want them to do nothing but stare at my back when they reach the final straight—and realize it's already over."
The thought burned fiercely within her as her legs struck the turf in relentless rhythm, her entire body leaning forward into a posture that bordered on reckless. Yet there was nothing unstable about it. Every stride was deliberate, every ounce of force directed with clarity. The wind tore past her ears, but her focus remained razor-sharp, locked onto the invisible finish line far ahead.
From the commentary box, the tone grew increasingly strained, unable to fully conceal the disbelief creeping in.
"Is Silence Suzuka misjudging the race? Pushing at this stage—this intensity—it's far too early. If she continues like this, the risk of collapse in the final phase—"
"No," a calm voice cut through, steady and measured, carrying far more weight than the anxious speculation.
A. O'Brien stood among the spectators, his gaze fixed on the runaway figure carving through the track.
"That's not confusion. That's conviction. She's read the entire flow of this race, understood exactly what her opponents intend to do and chosen to ignore it."
There was a faint narrowing of his eyes as he continued, his tone shifting from analysis to quiet admiration.
"She isn't adapting to them. She's forcing them to adapt to her—and failing."
Behind him, the Uma Musume listening couldn't help but fall silent. Even without fully grasping the tactical depth, the sheer visual impact of the race unfolding before them was undeniable.
"I accounted for a fast pace," O'Brien went on, almost as if speaking to himself.
"I accounted for Faithful Son holding position. What I did not account for—was this level of separation, this early. That gap has already changed the structure of the race."
A brief pause followed, then a small, almost imperceptible shake of his head.
"I underestimated both her and the one guiding her."
The Uma Musume behind him spoke up after a moment, her tone steady but not dismissive.
"Even so, Kitza wasn't expected to win. This result doesn't reflect a failure in planning."
O'Brien let out a quiet breath, the earlier tension already fading from his expression.
"You're right. A loss is still a loss, but it doesn't carry the weight others might think." His gaze drifted forward again, settling once more on the track.
"Tomorrow is your race. Focus on that."
Shahtoush's eyes sharpened slightly at the mention, her confidence surfacing without hesitation.
"Mejiro Dober isn't the same type as Silence Suzuka. On this track, I don't believe she can fully express her strengths. I'll take the victory back."
"There's nothing to 'take back,'" O'Brien replied, almost amused.
"This isn't a matter of pride. Today, I sent one runner. Shuta An sent one. No team tactics, no interference. A clean result."
A faint smile appeared on his face, calm and unbothered.
"And if we lose under those conditions, then we simply lost. There's no shame in that."
For someone who had already accumulated more than enough G1 victories, this outcome barely registered as a setback. If anything, what lingered in his mind was not the loss itself, but the rarity of encountering an opponent capable of forcing such a result.
"I only wish opportunities like this came more often," he murmured quietly. "Different tracks, different conditions—Longchamp, perhaps."
While those thoughts lingered in the stands, Shuta An remained entirely focused on the race unfolding before him. His eyes tracked every movement of Silence Suzuka with unwavering intensity, fully aware that the decisive moment was approaching.
The long straight gave way to a sharp bend, one that demanded respect no matter how dominant a runner might be. Even legends were forced to yield slightly to its curvature, and Silence Suzuka was no exception.
As she approached, she tightened her line along the rail, her speed compressing just enough to maintain control. The centrifugal force tugged at her frame as she entered the turn, threatening to pull her outward. For a brief moment, her trajectory widened, her hooves carving a slightly unstable path across the turf.
But that instability lasted only an instant.
The moment she exited the bend, her stride snapped back into alignment, her posture correcting itself with almost mechanical precision. Then, without hesitation, she accelerated again.
"No way! she's accelerating again?" Shahtoush's voice broke through, unable to suppress the shock any longer.
The commentator's reaction was no less intense, the disbelief now fully audible.
"Incredible! Silence Suzuka shows no signs of slowing—none at all! The chasing pack must respond immediately, or this race is already decided!"
But for those who understood the situation, the conclusion had been reached long before this moment.
"A 900-meter straight and a gap exceeding twenty lengths," O'Brien said quietly. "At this stage, it's no longer a question of catching up. It's a matter of whether they ever had the chance to begin with."
Shuta An, standing near the rail, let out a quiet breath as he watched the distance between Suzuka and the rest become something almost abstract.
"They were all waiting," he murmured, half to himself. "Waiting for Faithful Son to act, waiting for a signal that never came."
His gaze sharpened slightly, a faint edge entering his voice.
"They built their entire race plan on someone else controlling Suzuka. That was their mistake."
Faithful Son, the supposed counterbalance, had neither the experience nor the decisiveness required to challenge that kind of pressure. And once Suzuka committed fully, once she turned her resolve into raw, sustained acceleration, the gap between them stopped being tactical—it became fundamental.
As the final stretch unfolded, Shuta An tilted his head slightly, his focus narrowing completely onto the figure charging toward the finish.
"Come on—keep going," he muttered under his breath, the intensity in his eyes betraying none of the calm in his posture. "Show them exactly what this means."
Ahead, Silence Suzuka pressed forward, every step heavier than the last, yet none of them slowing. The wind roared past her, her breathing sharpened, but her rhythm—her rhythm remained unbroken.
Behind her, the others had long since fallen into irrelevance.
Still, she did not relax.
Every stride carried purpose, every movement driven by something deeper than victory alone. This was no longer just a race—it was a statement, one carved into the track with unyielding momentum.
"I'll prove it—to everyone watching."
Her thoughts burned brightly, unwavering even as her body approached its limits.
"That Ann and I…cannot be stopped."
With that final surge, she lowered her center of gravity, driving through the last meters with everything she had left—and crossed the finish line.
For a brief moment, silence seemed to grip the entire racecourse.
Then, the commentator's voice returned, strained and uneven, as if struggling to reconcile what had just occurred.
"SILENCE SUZUKA—HAS CROSSED THE FINISH LINE—!"
It was a victory that had been predicted, yet never imagined in this form. Not like this. Not with such overwhelming finality.
In the stands, FaithfulSon's Trainer could only stare at the result, his expression caught somewhere between confusion and disbelief.
"How…how is this possible?" he muttered quietly. "That pace…that distance…and she still didn't collapse?"
His voice faltered, the answer eluding him even as it became painfully clear.
"Is she…something beyond what we understood?"
2:05.95 — the digits blazed across the scoreboard the instant Silence Suzuka crossed the finish line, her time cutting through the air like a blade that no one present had the means to parry. For a fleeting second, the entire racecourse seemed to fall into a stunned vacuum, as though even the wind had forgotten how to move.
"This… this—! Silence Suzuka has shattered the International Stakes record!" the commentator's voice tore through the silence, cracking with disbelief.
"She's taken 0.45 seconds off the long-standing benchmark set by Troy nearly thirty years ago!"
Before that number appeared, there had still been room—however narrow—for doubt. One could have argued that the field was weak, that the gap was circumstantial, that today's dominance was merely the product of compromised opposition. But the moment that time burned itself into the scoreboard, such reasoning collapsed entirely under its own weight.
To cling to that notion now would mean diminishing every champion who came before—names etched into history like Dahlia and Roberto—reducing their legacies to something lesser simply to preserve a fragile excuse. That was no longer a perspective anyone present could afford to hold.
No matter their prior expectations, the officials of the British URA Association and the stewards of York Racecourse had no choice but to acknowledge what stood before them—a performance that transcended comparison.
And yet, among all those shaken by the result, none were more quietly unsettled than Shuta An himself.
His gaze lingered on the scoreboard, the number refusing to settle into something familiar. He had accounted for favorable turf conditions, had calculated the advantages, had even envisioned a clean, dominant victory. But in his projections, anything under 2 minutes and 07 seconds had already been an ideal outcome.
Not this.
Not 2:05.
"Did I underestimate Suzuka?"
The thought surfaced unbidden, sharp and uncomfortably precise. He did not reject it. Instead, he let it linger, dissecting it with the same rigor he applied to race strategy.
What she displayed today surpassed every prior performance in the Twinkle Series—not by a margin, but by a qualitative leap. It was no longer merely excellence; it was a statement. A culmination. A definitive proof of concept.
Her magnum opus.
"With this alone…her standing in the Dream Cup will surge," he concluded inwardly, the implications unfolding with quiet inevitability. Popularity, expectations, pressure—everything would escalate from here.
He exhaled slowly, shaking his head as if to dispel the residual shock.
"I'll ask her directly after the winning live," he murmured, grounding himself in the only certainty that remained—her own perspective.
—
When the time for the winning live arrived, the stage lights gathered around Silence Suzuka like a gentle halo rather than a blazing spotlight. There was no flamboyance in her presence, no overwhelming choreography—only a calm, almost introspective stillness that contrasted sharply with the storm she had unleashed on the track.
"Today, I'll be singing 'Definitely Can Fly into the Sky,'" she said softly into the microphone, her voice carrying a quiet sincerity. "It's a song I cherish—I hope it reaches all of you."
The melody began—subtle, restrained—and in that instant, Shuta An's expression shifted. Recognition flickered across his eyes. He knew this song. Not intimately, perhaps, but enough that fragments of its lyrics surfaced naturally in his mind.
As Suzuka sang, her voice flowed with a clarity that felt almost fragile, yet unwavering.
"Even now, I haven't fully let go of the fears I carried since childhood…
And yet, through gentle melodies, I learned to face what I once tried to hide…"
Her free hand rose, fingers curling softly as if grasping something intangible—something only she could see.
That single motion carried an inexplicable weight.
Though many in the audience could not follow the meaning of the lyrics, they did not need to. The emotion translated itself effortlessly, threading through their senses and settling deep within their chests. It was as though their hearts had been quietly, firmly taken into her grasp.
Shuta An's eyes widened, the realization striking him with unexpected force.
"So this is her stage presence…"
It had been some time since he last witnessed her winning live up close. Each Uma Musume under the Sadalsuud banner possessed a distinct performance identity—Oguri Cap's grounded sincerity, Tokai Teio's evolving elegance shaped under the shadow of Symboli Rudolf—but Suzuka's had always been the most understated.
A stationary singer. Minimal movement. Pure focus on tone and atmosphere.
And yet today, with nothing more than a single, deliberate gesture, she had drawn him in completely.
"Enchanting," he murmured under his breath, the word escaping before he could refine it further.
—
After the performance concluded, he found her waiting near the entrance of the underground passage. The noise of reporters lingered at a distance, restrained but persistent, their cameras capturing what fragments they could.
He had already refused interviews without hesitation. "Tomorrow," he had told them. "We'll talk tomorrow."
Now was not the time for public statements. Not when every word carried the risk of shifting unseen pressures onto others—most notably Mejiro Dober.
Suzuka's victory had been expected.
Its magnitude had not.
And that difference mattered.
As long as Dober retained her competitive edge, comparison would be inevitable. The burden would follow naturally.
"I'll need to speak with her—ease that tension before it sets in," he noted internally, already planning his next move.
Beside him, Silence Suzuka closed the remaining distance without hesitation, her fingers slipping into his hand with quiet familiarity. The flashes of cameras did not deter her. To her, this gesture required no justification.
Shuta An tightened his grip in response, the warmth grounding him as they began their return.
"Your performance today exceeded everything I anticipated," he said, his tone steady but sincere. "Even by your standards—it was extraordinary."
Suzuka smiled lightly, her expression carrying a softness that contrasted with the ferocity she had shown on the track.
"While I was running, it felt different. Lighter. As if everything aligned perfectly."
She glanced at him briefly, the hint of playfulness surfacing beneath her calm demeanor.
"Perhaps it was because Ann was watching."
He let out a quiet breath, half amused, half contemplative. "Even so, your margin of victory—your pace—those aren't things that happen by coincidence."
She tilted her head slightly. "My opponents were very cooperative, you could say."
"That's one way to put it," he replied with a faint shake of his head. "Faithful Son ran far too conservatively. In a front-running contest, hesitation is fatal. Her trainer will have to answer for that."
Suzuka nodded in agreement, her tone calm.
"Yes— once you yield the initiative, it's already over."
Their conversation flowed naturally, the intensity of the race gradually dissolving into something quieter, more personal.
—
Yet the true surprise of the day had not revealed itself on the track.
It awaited them at the hotel.
The moment Shuta An stepped into the lobby, his gaze locked onto a familiar figure seated in the lounge area—a presence so unexpected that it disrupted his composure entirely.
"Oguri?!!"
Without thinking, he grasped Suzuka's hand and closed the distance in quick strides, stopping before Oguri Cap with unmistakable urgency.
"You're here? What about Sapporo—did something happen?"
Oguri Cap calmly finished the tea in her cup in a single motion, setting it aside with her usual unhurried composure.
"Everyone came," she replied simply.
"..Everyone?" The word hung in the air, his mind racing to process its implications.
Then—
"Ann!"
The voice struck from behind, bright and unmistakable.
Before he could turn, a familiar weight collided with his back, the force carrying both momentum and affection in equal measure.
He didn't need to look.
"Berno," he said, exhaling as recognition settled instantly. "Did you gain weight?"
"I did not!" Berno Light shot back, dropping down and immediately pinching his cheek in protest, her expression puffed with indignation. "Don't make things up!"
Despite her protest, her eyes gleamed with excitement, unable to conceal it.
"This time, it's not just us," she continued, her voice lifting with barely restrained energy. "Everyone from the Sadalsuud team—and even the partners from the training camp—we all came together."