"Ugh, it tastes terrible."
Ten-year-old Watson held the brick-like black bread in his hand and put it into his mouth. He controlled his strength carefully and avoided using teeth-breaking force.
As the eighth son of a down-and-out baron at the Holy Dragon Kingdom's eastern border, Watson felt lucky enough that he still had bread to eat for his three daily meals.
The Holy Dragon Kingdom was located in the center of the world. It was warm like spring all year round and had abundant produce, which only served to encouraged sloth in people. Tens of millions of people lived in that land, and one in a thousand was a noble.
However, one should not assume that a good life awaited them just because they became a noble.
It was the duty of a noble to exercise control and be responsible for the management of land under their name. Since there was too much land, they paid a large amount of taxes to the country annually. Some nobles were heavily in debt, and the Gary family that Watson belonged to was one such example.
They owned a hundred acres of fertile land but failed to hire workers due to his father's incompetency in managing the land. As a noble, he was bad at farming, so the land was already overgrown with weeds. If not for the family's chicken farm, everyone would have starved to death.
Life was already difficult to begin with, and Watson's 40-year-old idiot of a father could only rue their misfortune while drinking heavily and ploughing his 38-year-old mother every night. He seemed eager to create another ninth sibling for Watson.
"When will this life end?"
Watson sighed. He endured all his suffering and swallowed that black piece of bread.
"Watson, why are you daydreaming here? If you have the time to daydream, why don't you come hunting with me? You've only been able to drink salted mincemeat soup every Monday recently, and if this goes on, you might only see meat once a fortnight."
A crisp voice sounded behind him. Watson turned his head and saw a young girl pushing open the door of the three-story wooden house.
The young girl had a petite stature and carried a hardwood bow on her back. Her thin clothes were wrapped in a hide skirt. Her long purple hair was tied into a ponytail and she had a tender, far face. Meanwhile, those round amber eyes of hers were brimming with energy.
Watson's turned his eyes and landed his gaze on two places.
Her fair thighs covered in visible fine hair could be seen under her hide skirt when it swayed in the breeze. Her slightly bulging chest—the result of just entering puberty—made her look cuter than cute, making it difficult for anyone to take their eyes off her.
Unfortunately, he was unable to have any evil thoughts towards that young girl.
"Scarlet, I'm…not going hunting."
Scarlet, the seventh-born in the family, was only one year older than him. Compared to her eldest brother who went out to look for work, their second eldest sister who had been sent to the town after her magical talents had been noticed, and the rest of the older siblings who were either physically weak or did not like to go out, Scarlet was rather reliable as she knew how to lighten the family's burden.
However, Scarlet's archery skills were merely average. Hunting down a wild rabbit took her several days of hard work to produce sharp wooden arrows, and it was hard to say which side was more profitable.
"You're not even going to come along for something that interesting? Forget it, you can stay here and help to look after the chicken farm. It's better than daydreaming."
Scarlet's excited expression gradually cooled down. She went hunting purely out of interest and supplementing her family's expenses was merely incidental. Upon seeing that Watson did not understand, she muttered a few words of disappointment before turning around and leave.
It was a chicken farm that was located in the backyard, the size of a football field.
Upon hearing Scarlet's words, when Watson arrived here, he just happened to see two youths around the age of 16 walk out from within. They were strong-looking and looked almost identical to each other.
"Third Brother, Fourth Brother."
These were his two older brothers, Zeke and Zenoah. They were rumored to be twins born on the same day and possessed a special ability called telepathy, enabling them to understand each other's thoughts to a certain extent.
"Have you've come to take care of the chicken farm, Watson? What a coincidence. The hens have just laid their eggs. We want to exchange some for toys, so don't tell Father."
Zeke reached out and patted Watson's shoulder. He had a shifty look on his face as he pointed at his bulging chest. The white eggshells could vaguely be seen inside.
Zenoah whistled. "A hundred eggs should be enough to exchange for some candy and a slingshot for bird hunting! If we're lucky, we might even be able to exchange them for two good glass balls that we can play with."
"Got it. I won't say anything."
Seeing his two brothers leave, Watson squatted on the ground like a deflated rubber ball.
What could he say? He could not even stomach his meals, let alone play. What was he to do if his family was full of unreliable people?
It had rained the previous day, and a puddle on the ground reflected his dark brown hair. His ten-year-old body was very delicate and only his eyes had a look of helpless maturity. Anyone who looked solely into his eyes would have thought that he was 30-years-old.
He was not originally from that world and used to be a stereotypical office worker back on Earth. Because of his miserable six-to-nine life all year round, he could not resist uttering, "I don't want to live miserably like this." God eventually fulfilled his request by letting him transmigrate into the body of a baron's eighth child a week ago.
Watson grabbed a handful of chicken feed from the simple wooden chicken shed and threw it on the ground. He looked at each of the thin and dull-looking hens as they extended their necks and scrambled over to gobble up the food. He then said resentfully, "If there is ever a day I can't take it anymore, I'll kill all of you and treat myself to a good meal."
It was not easy for him to come to another world. So be it if he could not make a name for himself and become a hero, but he was not even able to live a rich life. All he could do was worry about these hens every day and spend his life in poverty, before finally dying of disease or hunger…
The pain almost brought him to tears.
[Faint sadness detected. Super Fusion System is activating.]
[Activation successful. The host has obtained the ability to fuse all things and improve their quality! Magical beasts, ores, gold coins, magic…the system capabilities is limited only by the host's imagination.]
Could it be the legendary Midas Touch?
It was rumored that every transmigrator would be receive a blessing from the heavens and it turned out to be true. Watson was stunned. He suddenly felt an inexplicable message enter his mind, and a row of small glowing words floated above the head of the hen in front of him.
[Subject to fuse: Ordinary Hen]
[Ability: laying an egg a day (after fusion, the production speed and quality of the eggs will be increased)]
An increase in production speed?
Watson's eyes lit up. Ordinary hens would usually lay only one egg daily, or two, at most. There were more than a thousand hens in the chicken farm as of then. As long as they each laid an additional egg every day, the family's assets would double.
He was getting excited at the thought, so when the system asked, [Has a suitable fusion target been detected and is it ready to fuse?], he immediately agreed. [Initiate fusion.]
Whoosh!
With a soft sound, a white glow suddenly appeared in the two hens that were eating in front of him and they collided, turning them into a hen that was several times larger. It approached his feet and rubbed its head affectionately against him.
[Fusion successful!]
[Fused object changed to: Hen King]
[Ability: lays two delicious eggs daily]
All creatures that had been fused by the system would be 100% obedient to him. Not only did the production rate of that 'Hen King' increase, the taste of the eggs increased too.
Watson lowered his head and rubbed the hen's huge head. He looked around and suddenly had a bold idea. If fusing two hens brought about such a big change, what would happen if he fused all the hens present?
Boom!
Watson willed his thoughts into action, and all the hens in the chicken farm burst into a glow at that moment. They morphed into a huge colorful ball of light right before his very eyes and let out the faint cry of a hundred chickens.