Beast Taming: My Beasts Grind, Die, and Respawn

Chapter 53: Three Fragments and a Grudge

Chapter 53: Three Fragments and a Grudge

"You’re doing it again," Elsa announced from the doorway.

Jin didn’t look up from his phone.

"Doing what?"

"That."

She gestured at all of him—the lying down, the phone, the lizard asleep in the corner and the general atmosphere of a room where nothing productive would ever occur.

"You acted responsible for, like, one week. You checked things. You got through a national examination. And now you’re back to being a—a houseplant that owns a reptile."

"I’m working."

"You’re lying down."

"I can do both. It’s a gift."

Elsa crossed her arms. "On what? What could you possibly be working on?"

Jin raised his phone without turning the screen toward her. The cheap puzzle-game icon remained safely in place, protected by the Engine’s perception filter.

"Rehabilitation schedule. I’m tracking his inflammation, food intake and weight-bearing progress so we don’t reinjure the leg before it’s stable. Data Appraisal."

He delivered the explanation in the bored monotone of someone reading a medical form.

"It’s what the C-Rank talent is actually for."

The irritating part was that the explanation was almost completely true.

Elsa narrowed her eyes.

She could recognize one of Jin’s excuses from three rooms away. She had been listening to them for years.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t find a hole in this one.

She marched toward Glitch, crouched and examined the injured leg herself, fully prepared to discover evidence of neglect.

The swelling was down.

The wrap was clean and correctly applied.

Glitch opened one golden eye, decided she wasn’t worth waking up for and returned to sleep.

The leg was, provably, healing beautifully.

Elsa scowled at it as though it had personally betrayed her.

"Fine," she muttered. "But you’re still a houseplant."

"Noted."

From the other room, Arthur spoke without looking up from his mug.

"Leave them alone, Elsa."

"Dad, he’s—"

"The bandage is right. The animal is getting better." Arthur paused. "The boy knows what he’s doing with that leg."

Elsa threw up her hands and left.

Jin glanced toward his father.

Arthur still didn’t look over, but his quiet support settled somewhere warm inside Jin’s chest.

Then Jin returned to the boss timer.

Later that afternoon, he noticed that the countdown had changed.

He had been running the AFK route through the ordinary slime fields. When he checked the boss window, the timer had fallen farther than the passing hours could explain.

Jin opened the information panel and finally read the detail he had previously ignored.

Defeating enough ordinary dungeon creatures could shorten the daily boss timer once during each reset cycle, creating one limited bonus rematch.

After the bonus activated, further kills wouldn’t affect the timer until the next daily reset.

Jin’s eyes sharpened.

That was fine.

He had a grudge and a fragment to extract.

He deployed Glitch.

The fifth time they faced the Moss-Crowned Slime King, it wasn’t frightening anymore.

Four days earlier, the creature had killed Glitch in ninety-three seconds while Jin watched with his heart in his throat.

Now Glitch entered the arena like a worker arriving for a familiar shift.

The fight was almost routine.

Almost.

During the second phase, the Slime King changed the pattern of its mire bloom. The wave expanded wider and faster than before, cutting off the low route Glitch normally used to approach the core.

For half a second, Jin had no answer.

The route was gone.

Glitch created his own.

Instead of forcing his way through the spreading mire, he pressed himself against the edge of the Slime King’s enormous body.

He used the boss as protection from the boss’s attack, remaining inside the narrow space the expanding wave couldn’t reach.

Jin hadn’t taught him that.

Jin hadn’t even considered it.

When the mire receded, Glitch was already in position.

He struck the blue core before it finished surfacing.

The Slime King collapsed.

Jin released a breath.

"Okay," he said quietly. "That one was yours. That was good."

Glitch’s tail flicked with pleasure.

The reward screen appeared.

[Skill Fragment Obtained: Lesser Regeneration — 3/3]

[Matching Skill Fragments Detected]

[Combine Fragments?]

Jin sat upright.

"Finally."

He selected:

[Combine]

The three fragments spun together, dissolved into streams of light and reformed as a single item at the top of his inventory.

[Skill Book Created: Lesser Regeneration]

Lesser Regeneration: Gradually restores minor wounds and physical stamina by consuming stored energy. Cannot restore destroyed organs, regrow limbs or prevent death from severe injuries.

Jin read the description twice.

Not a cure.

Not immortality.

The limitations were written clearly. Minor wounds. Stored energy. No protection against fatal damage.

It was a slow recovery effect that ran on the body’s own reserves.

Useless against anything capable of killing Glitch quickly.

For grinding, however, it was nearly perfect.

Fewer deaths.

Less time lost to respawn timers.

Longer AFK routes and more accumulated growth in every session.

Jin had improved the efficiency of their entire farming operation.

It had only cost him four days, several deaths and a personal grudge against probability.

He assigned the Skill Book to Glitch’s avatar.

[Compatibility Confirmed]

[Skill Learned: Lesser Regeneration]

The small cuts Glitch had received during the fifth battle began closing.

There was no dramatic flash of light. No miraculous instant recovery.

The wounds gradually became shallower. A scratch across his shoulder faded over the next minute while the skill quietly drew energy from his reserves.

Noticeable.

Controlled.

Exactly as the description promised.

Jin watched the final scratch disappear and felt the farming calculations rearrange themselves inside his head.

The real Glitch didn’t receive the skill.

Of course he didn’t.

It was digital growth, waiting inside the Engine alongside everything else—Combat Instinct, Agility, Vitality, Harden proficiency and now Lesser Regeneration.

All of it remained locked behind one button Jin still refused to press.

Jin looked toward the real Glitch.

Sleeping.

Breathing slowly.

The injured leg stretched out, its swelling almost gone but its internal tissue still finishing the slow process of repair.

If Lesser Regeneration existed inside that body, the leg might already be—

Jin stopped himself.

That was exactly the kind of thought that caused people to rush.

The skill would remain there tomorrow.

Glitch only possessed one real body.

Jin opened the Sync panel.

It had grown heavy.

[Unsynchronized Growth Accumulated]

[New Skill Pending: Lesser Regeneration]

[Estimated Synchronization Load: High]

High.

Not Moderate.

Several days of grinding and a complete skill were waiting to pour through the soul-link into Glitch’s real body.

Jin remembered the hunger after their previous Sync. The trembling muscles. The exhaustion. Glitch consuming an absurd amount of food and then sleeping for eleven hours.

A load this large would probably leave him exhausted for an entire day.

Jin checked the leg again.

The swelling was almost gone. Glitch could stand and walk without pain. The injury wasn’t completely healed, but it was stable.

Nearly ready.

One more day.

Jin would give the leg one more honest day to strengthen before forcing several days of accumulated development into the body.

He closed the panel.

"Tomorrow," he told the sleeping dragon. "Tomorrow, we cash out."

Glitch didn’t stir.

Four days of fighting.

Several deaths.

One boss dragged from terror down to routine.

A complete Skill Book built from persistence, bad luck and a personal grudge.

All of it waited behind a single button.

[Sync]