Chapter 139: It’s one of our cows!

I travelled to the barn located at the edge of the village.

“Ah, Chief Luke! Thanks for all the hard work!”

“Thanks for all the hard work too, Neruru. How are the animals?”

“They’re all in good health!”

Neruru had the [Heart of the Animals] Gift.

As such, she was made in charge of the village’s farm animals.

At the moment, we were keeping cows, sheep, and chicken. The milk and eggs we get from them were absolutely delicious, making those some of the village’s hidden specialty products.

“““Moo~”””

“““Meeh~”””

“““Bwak bwaak”””

“They’re so adorable.”

“These ones have just been born. But wow, Chief Luke, they’re already forming a bond with you!”

“But aren’t there too many newborns? How many adult ones do we have again?”

“At the moment, approximately 200 cows, 500 chickens, 100 sheep, 50 horses, and about 50 other livestock!”

“We have that many?”

We originally purchased about 10 animals from the Brookley-san the merchant.

We did get new young ones as time passed, but the majority of the animals we had were born here.

<<Animal barn: A shed for the use of livestock. It speeds up their growth, preserves their health, and strengthens their reproductive abilities.>>

So, it really is because of the animal barn’s effects!

“But considering the demand for milk and eggs, do we have enough…?”

Our livestock might have grown in numbers, but so did the population of the village.

I was worried our supply of milk and eggs were not enough…and yet, even now, I haven’t heard of any kind of shortage of it.

“Oh. Well, to answer that, let’s go over there, toward the pasture.”

We had set up a vast pasture next to the barn area.

Well, it became a pasture, but since “pasture” wasn’t among the list of facilities I could build with my Gift, I had to improvise with a public park.

<<Public park: an area where villagers can relax and do some recreational activities. Preserves the villagers’ health and also improves their village bond level.>>

I used Facility Customization on it to increase the green tract of land until it turned a pasture. It wasn’t that far off from being a nature park, to be honest.

“MOOO~~~~~!”

“!?”

All of a sudden, along with a thunderous roar, a gigantic figure appeared. In reaction, I instinctively took a step back.

“A m-monster!?”

“Nope! It’s one of our cows!”

“Huh? That’s…a cow?”

When I looked closer, it was indeed a cow.

However, it was a cow that was easily more than 3 meters tall and 5 meters long. Suffice it to say, it was in a different league than the cows I was familiar with.

It was no wonder I mistook it for a monster.

“This child is born here in the village! It’s grown quite big, hasn’t it?”

‘Grown big’ was definitely an understatement.

“So, is that one also a milk cow?”

“Yup!”

“How could it have grown this big though…?”

More surprisingly though, there wasn’t just one gigantic cow. Looking around, I found all the cows there were equally gigantic.

“As you can see, despite their size, they’re all so meek and docile! But more importantly, these cows give so much milk!”

“MOOO~~~~~”

It made sense that cows that big would produce lots of milk.

And if there were 200 or so of these cows, the village’s demand for milk should be well satisfied.

“Just to be sure, the males still don’t produce milk, right?”

“Yup, but for some reason, nothing but female cows are being born right now.”

“Eh, is that so?”

Upon inspecting the cows leisurely grazing in the pasture a bit more carefully, I confirmed that most of them had large udders. I didn’t know much about farm animals, but even I could tell that these cows were female.

“That solves the mystery of where the supply of milk comes from, but what about the…”

“Bwak bwaak”

“!?”

Right at that moment, an ostrich-like chicken passed in front me.

“That chicken’s born in the village as well!”

“You mean I’m not just imagining that!?”

Much like the cows, the chickens born and raised here seemed to be much larger than usual.

Before long, other 2-meter-tall chickens were energetically running all over the pasture.

“These chickens lay a lot of eggs! Ahh, perfect timing! Look over there!”

I looked where she was pointing and saw one chicken ready to lay an egg.

“Huh? Her egg’s size is…normal?”

I was expecting its egg to be as big as an ostrich egg, so I was a bit let down to see that its egg was not much bigger than a normal chicken’s egg, if at all.

In the next moment though…

*pop**pop**pop**pop**pop**pop*

Eggs came out of the gigantic chicken one after the other.

“Each chicken lays about 50 eggs per day!”

“It’s the type to make up with numbers!”

“Bawk”