>>531172024
TM Opera's career is essentially the equivalent of those anime transformations where a character burns through all their potential in one go and becomes a shell of themselves after-ward. In their Triple Crown year, they had middling results because their jockey Ryuji Wada had no idea what he was doing. So much so that other jockeys at the time publicly mocked him for wasting his horse's potential.

But in the Year of the Overlord? He decided he'd allow Opera to decide how they'd race. This led to such astounding victories as the defeat of the Shadai Blockade where, even when Wada had given up, Opera found a way to win while it's opponents conspired against it. But all of that came to an end when Meisho Doto, who'd came in 2nd in race after race after race, finally brought the Century's Master low. With that loss, the curtain fell on the legend and TM Opera limped toward retirement as though a knife had been thrust into it's back.

It's year of dominance will never be forgotten. It won Opera everything, but it also cost Opera everything.