this was the closest ive ever been to crying while reading any kind of fiction. when i learned of machan i instantly fell in love with her character. since that point of first discovering her, ive always been the most focused on machan because of how the game portrayed her story of being someone who just wants people to never forget her (likely because her owner requested that but im not too sure since i havent researched that). i really relate with that dream. being forgotten is something that i never want to happen to me since it would be like all of my effort would be for naught and i think this sentiment is the same with aston machan. the real racehorse was pretty promising, winning 5 of her 11 races, 4 being graded races and placing second in another G1 race just barely behind vodka, another really strong horse of that time. there was so much potential in machan's future that was so abruptly cut short because of a disease and since this was during the time of the daiwa scarlet and vodka rivalry, aston machan was doomed to be overshadowed.
all of this stuff i learned, and the stuff that im still gonna learn about aston machan increasingly makes me want to remember her for as long as i live, and as time goes on i become more attached to aston machan, making this doujin hit my heart really hard. seeing the character i love so much being subject to such emotional pain (even if it is a fan fiction) hurts to see and it hurts me even more to know that she doesnt really get an truly good ending. the story of this doujin is really good though and even to someone who isnt such a big machanling, i would definitely recommend it to them. also sorry for this block of text, i just love talking about machan