Chirp… chirp…
Kuck-doooo!
The small, insistent chorus of birds threaded through the pre-dawn hush, answered a heartbeat later by the rooster's brazen call. Light had not yet claimed the sky—only the faintest bruise of gold hovered at the horizon—yet the village of Red Leaf was already being roused, gently bullied into another day.
Kael lay sprawled across the thin mattress, limbs heavy with the residue of sleep. The rooster's cry sliced through the quiet like it did every morning, sharp and familiar. His eyelids fluttered, stirred, then parted. Above him the low thatch beams of his small room swam into focus, dark ribs against the paler weave of the ceiling, comforting in their unchanged geometry.
"Umm… another good morning," he murmured, voice gravelly. A wide yawn cracked his jaw as he pushed himself upright, the coarse blanket sliding from his shoulders. His gaze drifted, habitual now, to the silent counter hovering at the edge of vision like a ghost only he could see.
[Downloading—99.99% (23 Seconds Left)]
Kael exhaled through his nose, a soft, resigned sound. Well… let's just see what this countdown is actually about.
He settled back against the wall, arms loose across his knees, waiting. The percentage ticked forward with excruciating patience.
One month. Thirty days since he had opened his eyes inside this stranger's skin—a stranger who bore the same name, Kael, and very little else.
He had woken in a town near the Red Leaf village, body a map of bruises, ribs tender, lip split, the copper taste of blood still lingering on his tongue. Someone—something—had beaten this body bloody before he arrived in it.
The past occupant had been a beggar. Yet fate, or luck, or something crueller, had intervened: a man—now his master—had found him crumpled in an alley, carried him to this village, and nursed him back from the edge.
Ten days of broth, sleep, and slowly mending flesh. Ten days in which the hollowed stranger's frame had begun to fill out again. Exercise. Work. The steady clang of hammer on steel in the smithy where he now served as apprentice. Muscle returned where only sharp bone had been.
----
Kael let out a long, slow breath.
"Fooh… finally. Show me what you are."
He counted in silence—three… two… one… zero—and the dam broke.
A torrent of crisp, electric-blue notifications cascaded behind his eyes, sharp and insistent, flooding the dark theater of his mind.
[System Download Complete]
[Congratulations on awakening the Breeding Bull System]
[System Skill: Absolute Breeding – Unlocked]
[System Function: Absolute Status – Unlocked]
[System Function: Absolute Appraisal – Unlocked]
[System Function: Infinite Inventory – Unlocked]
The information didn't arrive in neat paragraphs. It poured in like molten metal—searing, then cooling, fusing itself directly into muscle memory and reflex.
The sensation was eerily familiar: the same overwhelming rush he had felt the first morning he opened this body's eyes and found another man's life already living inside his skull.
Only this time there was no skull-splitting agony, no sickening vertigo. Just a steady, almost sensual pressure as new instincts knitted themselves into place behind his ribs.
When the flood finally ebbed, Kael sat very still, breathing shallowly through his nose, letting the knowledge settle.
He exhaled again, softer this time.
"So… basically, breeding women gives me power. Correct?"
The question hung in the quiet room. No chime answered. No helpful prompt scrolled across his vision. Just silence.
Kael rubbed the heel of his palm against one eye, a tired half-smile tugging at his mouth.
"Well… let's just first see what this Absolute Status function is about."
From what had already rooted itself in his understanding, it sounded like a numerical mirror—his body reduced to clean, cold figures: strength, stamina, vitality, perhaps more esoteric values he hadn't yet grasped. He wasn't certain of the exact shape it would take, but he had time. A few quiet minutes before the household stirred fully awake—
"Kael, dear? Can you come help me with the water?"
The voice drifted through the thin wooden door—melodious, warm, carrying the gentle authority of someone who had rocked cradles and soothed fevers for decades. A mother's voice, even if not his own mother's.
Kael blinked once. The glowing afterimages of notifications flickered and dimmed at the corners of his sight.
He rose smoothly from the mattress, bare feet meeting the cool, packed-earth floor.
"Coming, Madam Lysa."
He pushed the door open. A slant of pale morning light fell across the threshold, carrying with it the faint scent of woodsmoke, dew-soaked grass, and the clean metallic bite of the well outside.
Whatever this Breeding Bull System was—whatever power it promised—he set it quietly aside, like a half-read book left face-down on the table. There was water to carry first.
----
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