I Became a Mythical-Tier Tamer Due To A System Error

Chapter 5

After putting on my boots and changing into work clothes, I wandered around the farm.

Thanks to finishing the cleaning yesterday, it wasn’t dirty.

‘Today I can just feed them.’

Could it be that the quests were given according to the current situation?

The feeding troughs were completely empty.

Even though I had given them plenty of feed yesterday since I couldn’t tend to them in the morning, they were animals with a big appetite.

‘I’ll have to fill it again.’

The barn consisted of three pens and a small storage room.

Inside the storage room, there were things like a hearth, farming tools, and feed all prepared.

‘There’s farmland in Yggdrasil as well.’

If I remembered correctly, I had to fill the feed in Yggdrasil’s farm first.

When I opened the feed storage, I saw piles of crops.

There were carrots, hay, beans, and the like.

‘How much should I prepare?’

I checked the number of animals again.

‘Now that I’ve counted properly, there are quite a lot.’

In the first pen, there were five cows and three horses.

In the second pen, there were seven sheep and four goats.

In the third pen, there were about five chickens and ten rabbits.

‘Feeding them is no big deal.’

However, there was one thing that caught my attention.

Special meal for cows and lambs.

‘Special meal…?’

For other animals, it was simply marked as ‘feed.’

But for the cows and lambs, it specifically said special meal.

I thought about what that might mean.

‘I heard that instead of just giving cows hay, sometimes boiling up a mash is better for them.’

I remembered boiling mash while working part-time at the Yggdrasil farm.

For cows that only ate dry hay, mash would count as a sort of special meal.

‘For the cows, mash. For the chickens, scatter feed. For the rest, carrots will do. As for the lambs, I’ll hold off for now.’

To boil mash, I needed fire.

I first checked the hearth in the storage.

‘It’s gone?’

The firewood was all burned, leaving only ashes.

The last firewood yesterday had been chopped by the previous caretaker.

‘I thought today’s work might be easier…’

As expected, nothing was ever easy.

It looked like the hard labor would continue.

‘Where was the wood again?’

I picked up an axe from the storage and went to the back of the building.

As expected, behind the storage there was a pile of chopped oak logs.

I chose one, set it upright so the tree rings faced up, and raised the axe high before bringing it down on the wood.

Thud!

When the axe hit the wood, a vibration traveled up my arm holding the handle.

‘Ouch!’

My palm stung, and I almost let go of the axe from the impact.

Due to my lack of strength, the wood didn’t split cleanly.

‘Seriously… I need to build up my muscles quickly.’

I kept swinging the axe until it worked.

Grunting, I finally succeeded in splitting the oak cleanly into four pieces.

I stuffed the chopped wood into the hearth.

‘Now I need to light it…’

Looking beside the hearth, I spotted some prepared flint.

‘If I remember correctly, this was how it was done?’

There was a D-shaped striker and a cube-shaped iron pyrite.

When I struck them together as a test, sparks popped! and flew.

‘It seems hard to light the firewood directly…’

I took some hay next to the hearth, rubbed it into fine powder, and placed thin hay strands around it.

‘This should work.’

I struck the flint again — spark! spark! — and created a flame.

In an instant, the hay caught fire and smoke began to rise.

‘…Is it normally this easy?’

It felt strangely familiar, as if I had done this many times before.

Once the burning hay was tossed into the hearth, the firewood quickly roared into flames.

It was lucky I had worked part-time at the Yggdrasil farm several times before.

‘It’s just like the game. Thanks to that, I know exactly what I need to do.’

Thinking of it as a game instead of labor gave me the illusion of feeling more at ease.

I poured water into a large cauldron and added barley husks.

‘While that boils, I’ll prepare the carrots.’

I grabbed armfuls of carrots from the piles stacked in the storage.

I filled a large bucket with carrots and water.

‘Now to wash them clean.’

I scrubbed the dirt-covered carrots in the water.

Soon, the brownish dirt was gone, revealing their bright orange color.

The color was so vivid that I could tell they were healthy crops.

‘It’s not like they’re for humans, but…’

If the animals got sick because of me, it would all be my fault.

‘No slacking, I’ll do it properly.’

I cut the clean carrots into bite-sized pieces.

‘Is the mash done boiling?’

When I checked the cauldron, the water was bubbling vigorously.

‘Now I can put these in.’

I tossed in the prepared hay, beans, and mugwort into the pot.

A savory countryside smell began to drift out.

‘While that finishes, I’ll feed the other animals first.’

I filled a basket with the cut carrots and headed for the first pen.

– Neigh!

The horse stared wide-eyed at the carrots.

“Don’t choke trying to eat too fast. Eat slowly.”

– Snort!

As soon as I put the carrots into the feed trough, they started munching them down greedily.

– Moo!

At that moment, the cows in the neighboring pen bellowed.

They had been lying on the ground, but after seeing me give carrots to the horses, they suddenly stood up.

– Moo!

As if asking why they weren’t being fed, the cows stared at me with reproachful eyes.

“Yours is being prepared, so just wait a bit. I was going to give it to you anyway.”

After giving the horses all the carrots, I headed to the boiling cauldron.

The mash still seemed undercooked.

‘I’ve never boiled it before, but in the game it was supposed to cook for about an hour.’

Alright.

If I didn’t know, I might as well follow the game.

‘Sorry, cows, but you’ll have to wait a little.’

I decided to feed the cows last.

‘Then I should go to the second pen.’

Once again, I filled the basket with carrots and put them into the feed trough.

“You’ve been waiting, right? Now it’s your turn.”

– Baa\~.

– Moo!

The sheep and goats began eating the carrots.

– Meeeh\~.

The lamb, in particular, seemed quite hungry, bouncing and running around.

I stopped in my tracks at the sight.

‘Right, the special meal.’

The quest had told me to prepare something other than carrots for the lamb.

‘That’s right, since it’s young, it might have trouble eating carrots.’

The lamb seemed to be only recently born, with a very small body.

It could choke on solid carrots.

Shouldn’t I give the young one something in liquid form?

Thinking that way, I quickly reached the answer.

‘The lamb’s special meal… would be milk.’

That had to be it.

Besides, it was the best way to supplement its nutrition.

After feeding the sheep and goats carrots, I picked up the empty basket and stood up.

– Meeeeh\~.

It bleated as if asking why I wasn’t giving it food.

“Just wait a little, you brat.”

I hurried to the storage and pulled out a pot. Then I filled it with milk for the lamb.

‘Might as well warm it up before giving it.’

I set the pot near the hearth.

Bubbling—foam began to rise in the milk.

I poured it into a feeding bottle until it was full.

After checking the temperature with my hand, I held it out to the lamb.

Perhaps knowing its meal had arrived, it grabbed at my clothes and fussed.

– Baa\~.

When I offered the warm milk-filled bottle, the lamb instinctively put it in its mouth.

“I was going to give it to you anyway, so stop fussing, you rascal.”

The bottle filled with warm milk was pressed into its mouth.

To a modern 21st-century person, the raw milk smelled somewhat gamey and heavy, but watching it gulp it down was strangely satisfying.

“Good, huh?”

– Meeeeeh\~!

Just as the lamb bleated in response to my words—

Your lamb friend feels affection for you!

Your lamb friend gives you a gift in gratitude!

I blinked, staring at the lamb drinking milk and the floating message.

‘What, a gift?’

Instinctively, I patted myself down with one hand, but of course, there was nothing there.

The lamb was still rolling its eyes back in bliss as it drank.

But to say it had given me a gift…

‘…No way.’

Realizing something, I immediately checked my status.

Health: 1

Mana: 4

Strength: 1

Willpower: 1

Agility: 2

‘It went up!’

My eyes, which had been slightly drooping from fatigue, shot wide open.

In the stats made entirely of 4s and 1s, a new crack appeared: the number 2.

The gift from the lamb was exactly this—

My Agility stat had increased by 1.

‘Doing farm work raises my abilities.’

I hadn’t even imagined this possibility.

Of course, not all stats had gone up, just one number by a tiny bit.

It was modest, but still—this was something.

Compared to the hopeless days before, the situation had completely changed.

‘This means farm work isn’t a waste of time, right?’

It was encouraging.

Hadn’t I been worried that I’d get stuck on this farm, fail to meet promotion criteria, and end up expelled?

Just knowing that this work wasn’t a waste of time was already a great achievement.

“If you’re giving me something, couldn’t you just throw in some extra points too?”

Muttering a request it couldn’t possibly understand, I roughly ruffled the lamb’s head.

‘Suddenly, this farm work feels doable.’

I felt as if some energy was rising inside me.

With a brisk stride, I moved to the other animals.

After filling the feed troughs for the chickens and rabbits, it was finally time for the last part.

Grunting, I carried the pot filled with mash and placed it in front of the cows.

“Now you’re the only ones left.”

By now, my arms were trembling, and my whole body was drenched in sweat, but—

Feeding horses – Completed

Feeding goats and sheep – Completed

Feeding chickens and rabbits – Completed

Special meal for cows and lambs – Cows (Incomplete)

Total obtainable points: 10 pt

‘I’m about to get the points.’

That thought alone kept me going until the end.

I tilted the pot, pouring the mash into the feed trough.

– Moooh\~.

The moment the mash spilled into the trough, the cows buried their heads into it.

And with that sight, the long-awaited message appeared before my eyes.

Daily quest completed!

You receive a reward for taking good care of your animal friends!

You have earned 10 points!

‘I finally got them.’

Immediately checking the top of the Animal Farm screen, I saw the remaining points had risen to 10.

It was as satisfying as seeing a paycheck deposited into a bank account.

‘Just four more days, and I can make Hwayo grow.’

I would be able to buy the Happy Nest, my goal.

‘And now, I also have a way to gradually grow myself.’

To someone who didn’t know, it might look like I was just doing farm chores.

‘Who cares if it’s not glamorous? The important thing is being able to grow.’

Just knowing I had the opportunity gave me a sense of relief.

As I thought that, I was scratching the cow’s head.

Rustle!

From not far away, I heard the sound of someone’s footsteps.