After the Victory

"Just one hundred meters to go, and Mejiro Tenma is still fleeing! But Rag Supreme hasn't given up! Rag Supreme hasn't given up!"

"Number six, Mejiro Tenma, wins wire to wire!"

Before the commentator's words had even faded, a series of translucent messages began popping up in front of Kitano's eyes.

[Horse under your ownership wins a race: 1/1 (Completed)]

[Reward: Green Omamori ×1]

[Horse under your ownership wins a dirt race: 1/1 (Completed)]

[Reward: Green Omamori ×1]

He had to admit, the system had quite a few miscellaneous tasks.

Still, those could be put aside for now.

Compared with the task rewards, the victory itself was far more worth savoring.

"Yay—"

"That's wonderful!"

Cheers rose from the front of the stands.

Only then did Kitano notice the group of young men and women occupying the front rows, all dressed in cosplay outfits.

[MEJIRO]

They held high their cheering banners, white lettering against green backgrounds.

It was clearly a racing name that had been active in the last century, yet it still remained popular among the younger generation.

He truly couldn't understand it.

Puzzled, Kitano withdrew his gaze.

"Whew—"

Once he confirmed they had crossed the finish line, Ochiai let out a long breath.

His legs, completely numb, hung limply like frogs that had been thoroughly dissected in a laboratory.

Still, they had pulled it off.

In the third race, they had finally claimed their first win of the day.

Just as expected, she's a very clever type.

Patting the gray mare beneath him as she panted awkwardly, Ochiai silently thought to himself.

Mejiro Tenma shook herself and, somewhat displeased, flung away the rough palm that had been placed on her without permission.

"Wonderful!"

Ogawa Masaru excitedly pumped his fist several times, a faint flush even appearing around the roots of his ears.

"I told you, Mr. Kitano! Pegasus really was no problem at all!"

He turned his head, instinctively grabbed Kitano's hand, and shouted.

"That's right. She really is a very clever horse."

Seeing the slightly awkward expression on Ogawa Masaru's face, Kitano let out a long breath and smiled faintly.

Though somewhat rash, the young man before him did not seem to have a bad nature.

"Come on. Isn't there still the winner's photo ceremony?"

He patted Ogawa Masaru on the shoulder.

Trophies, plaques, victory banners... naturally, a local maiden race would not have such things.

However, the winning connections would usually still gather for a group photograph after the race.

"R-Right! Let's hurry over!"

Ogawa Masaru nodded excitedly.

"Congratulations, Mr. Kitano."

On the way to the winner's photo ceremony, Teacher Tanaka also wore a delighted smile.

No matter what, Mejiro Tenma belonged to his stable, at least nominally.

Besides, for people involved in horse racing, wasn't victory itself something worth celebrating?

"Pegasus's response was really incredible!"

Meanwhile, as he led Mejiro Tenma toward the photo area, stablehand Kobayashi could not help praising her.

"As for me, I nearly made a fool of myself."

Buoyed by the victory, even jockey Ochiai made a rare joke.

Jockey Ochiai, trainer Tanaka, stablehand Kobayashi, Nishiken Farm representative Ogawa Masaru, owner Kitano, and the true star—Mejiro Tenma.

The members of the winning camp had all gathered together.

"You worked hard."

Kitano bowed to Ochiai again.

"No, you're the one who did."

This time, Ochiai reacted much more quickly. He removed his cap and bowed to Kitano as well.

"Thank you very much for your trust."

"All right, save the thanks for later!"

Tanaka clapped his hands with a smile and pointed toward the cameras ahead of them.

The people on the ground each held onto the winner's lead rope, while Ochiai raised his left hand high from the saddle.

Click—

The victorious memory of five people and one horse was frozen in the sound of the shutter.

Kitano decided to use the photo as his new phone wallpaper.

"Um, excuse me! Are you Mr. Kitano?"

After the winner's photo ceremony ended, Kitano was preparing to leave the track by circling around the edge of the stands.

At that moment, encouraged by her companions, a young woman in cosplay gathered her courage and asked him from the front of the stands.

"If there isn't another horse owner in Monbetsu named Kitano whose racing name is Mejiro, then that should be me."

Amused by her somewhat tongue-twisting phrasing, Kitano copied her manner of speaking.

"That's great! Could you give us your autograph?"

Ignoring Kitano's teasing, the girl and her companions behind her cheered at his affirmative answer.

"An autograph?"

Kitano hesitated for a moment, but he still decided to agree to this not-too-unreasonable request.

He habitually reached into his pocket, only to find no sign of a pen.

His body immediately stiffened.

He had nearly forgotten he was wearing a suit today.

"If you don't mind, please use mine!"

The girl in cosplay seemed to notice Kitano's predicament and proactively handed him a black permanent marker.

Kitano immediately relaxed and continuously signed his name on the boards the young men and women passed over one after another.

"Mejiro Tenma, first place."

After posting the image he had obtained from a staff member, along with that brief line of text, across several social media platforms, Kitano finally drove home in satisfaction.

Along the way, he softly hummed enka along with the car stereo.

Only after soaking in the slightly scalding bathtub did he leisurely open the system panel.

First came collecting the task rewards.

They were rather shabby: just two Green Omamori.

Even the race prize money had amounted to a full 2.5 million yen.

Of course, that was before deducting the jockey's and stable's shares.

However, the system's shop panel seemed to have undergone a new change.

[High-quality fresh grass: 1 Green Omamori]

[High-quality hay: 5 Green Omamori]

Two new items had appeared some distance away from the two product slots that had already been unlocked.

[High-quality fresh grass (one box): Fresh grass that greatly stimulates a horse's appetite, with slightly higher nutritional value than ordinary fresh grass]

[High-quality hay (five-kilogram portion): Carefully selected from the finest alfalfa. When used as stall bedding, it can slightly improve a horse's quality of rest]

[Note: Consumption not recommended.]

Kitano began calculating silently.

A horse's ideal daily dry matter intake was 1.5% to 3% of its body weight, while fresh grass generally had a water content of 60% to 75%. In other words, for a five-hundred-kilogram horse, daily fresh grass intake should fluctuate somewhere between thirty and sixty kilograms.

And a box of fresh grass generally weighed around twenty to thirty kilograms.

That meant one day's worth would cost at least a month of feed expenses for a local racehorse.

He could not help clicking his tongue.

The fresh grass provided by the system was priced at nearly four or five times the cost of imported fresh grass.

Was this really not some kind of predatory merchant?

By comparison, the price of the other product, [High-quality hay], looked much more reasonable.

Yet after a brief moment of thought, Kitano still bought each of the two new products once.

He wanted to see just what was so special about fresh grass worth fifty thousand yen and hay worth two hundred and fifty thousand yen.