The crescent moon was high in the sky; thin clouds streamed away from the glowing disc like banners. It turned out that sneaking into a farm wasn’t as easy as you’d think when you were a dragon, despite how sneaky we were supposed to be in this world.

  Cows really didn’t like giant flying lizards. Who would have believed it? It was honestly kind of offensive. I hadn’t doused any of them in acid, and they still treated me like I was going to eat them. Didn’t they know I was wearing my Ascot of Urge Suppression? They were perfectly safe. Assuming I didn’t drop them on the flight back to the dungeon.

  I’d spent the last five minutes trying to corral one of the stupid beasts into a corner so I could snatch it up without hurting it too severely.

  “Easy there, dude. I’m not going to eat you!” Yet.

  The cow rolled its eyes in fear as I slipped ever so slowly closer. I was four metres away now, that was when the fucking things usually bolted but this one didin’t really have anywhere to go. I’d stalked it into a corner of the field, and the stout fences left it very little room to escape. This time, I would claim my prize. The rest of the herd had fled to the furthest reaches of the field, so it was just me and the lady.

  The animal snorted and suddenly charged, head down and horns forward. It took me by surprise, and I had to flap my wings hard so I could jump over it. My legs flashed down as I passed over the beast, and my claws sank into its flesh.

  “Sorry, sorry, sorry! Please don’t die!” I muttered as I fought to gain altitude, hauling my prize aloft. It bucked and thrashed. You really don’t want me to let go, you stupid cow! The flight back to the lair wasn’t a long one. I was stealing livestock from the outlying farms that surrounded Fidler’s Mill.

  As I passed through the magical membrane that kept the wind out of my hoard room, I released the extremely distressed cow. I landed behind it and spread my wings to prevent this one from bolting straight out into the void and plummeting to its death, as several of the earlier catches had done. That particular lesson I had learned the hard way, and there was a pile of pizza-cows at the foot of Mount Bob as testament to the learning curve.

  The three Greebles pounced on the cow and looped a rope over its neck. It took all three of them to stop the beast from bolting out of one of the other entrances to my lair. They began wrestling the beast towards the hatch that led to my dungeon.

  “This is a good one!” said Hango. “A fine pair of balls on him! Can I fry them up?” he asked, glancing at Kat, who was standing with her arms crossed over her breasts and splitting a glare between me and the Greebles.

  “Balls? Again?” I grumbled as Kat stalked over to me.

  “Horns equals balls. I told you that before!” she snapped, glaring up at me.

  “I'm not so sure it does! They’ve all got fucking horns! Getting one of the damn things to stay still long enough to catch it is hard enough! Checking their undercarriage at the same time is impossible!” I grumped as I settled down onto my hoard and revelled in the feeling of gold beneath my scales.

  “Well, you’ve now got three bulls and no lady cows, lizard. I am not wildly optimistic that your herd is going to grow. Unless you know something about animal husbandry that I don’t?” she finished in an acid tone of voice.

  “I’ll go try and catch some lady cows,” I muttered as I raised myself up and moved towards the edge of my lair.

  “And get some chickens as well!” Kat yelled as I leaned forward to fall out into the night sky.

  Flying at night made life without balls worth it. I’d come to the conclusion that genitals are overrated. My new species existed solely as people who had been reincarnated, according to Kat, and I had no reason to doubt her on this issue.

  My midnight black wings cut through the air as I circled Fidler’s Mill to find a farm I hadn’t already tried to hit this evening. Sheep weren’t on the menu. Not menu! Sheep weren’t part of the plan. I was looking for large, sturdy, identifiably female cows. The agricultural floor wasn’t infinite, and Kat had convinced me cattle were the best option to fill it.

  Unfortunately, all the cows I’d caught tonight were of the dangly variety.

  Why can’t it just be obvious which ones are female? I grumbled as I circled down towards yet another farm.

  I landed well away from the enclosure. I’d learnt that particular lesson on my first attempt. Cowardly bloody cows. I eyed the herd, trying to figure out which ones were female.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  They all had horns, and I made a note to point that out to Kat when I got back. The cows were determined not to make this easy for me. It wasn’t like I didn’t have enough on my plate. The dungeon, bizarre minions, my millennia-old guide who acted like an angry teenager half the time… Now I was reduced to checking the undercarriage of cattle to see if they were an in-y or an out-y.

  When you read about a nascent hero being isekai’d, his adventures generally don’t involve checking under a cow to see whether its genitals are external or not. Being stuck in a dragon body hadn’t been bad thus far; in some ways, I loved it. Now that the broader reality of this world was setting in, I kind of wished I were just a human.

  I found a likely target, and my head snaked down to the ground. I felt like a pervert, but we needed some lady-cows to make baby-cows. Calves. Whatever, I was going to eat the damn things sooner rather than later anyway, so wasn’t too worried about their pronouns. It was hard to make out in the dim moonlight, but I was pretty sure this one was female. Whatever those things were, they looked like udders.

  I jumped the fence with a single flap of my wings. The cow I’d set as my target took one look at me barreling towards it and bolted away, as did the rest of the herd. I tried to keep my eyes locked on the one I wanted, but cows all look the same in the moonlight to a city-dragon like me. I lost her as she ducked and weaved through the herd like a professional boxer ducking jabs.

  Screw this. I took flight and stooped as I passed over the terrified mammals, snatching one up in my claws and heading back to the lair.

  “That, Bob, is yet another bull,” Kat said with a sigh. I sighed as well. Then I ate it in two mouthfuls.

  Biomass stored:

  214 KG

  Biomass required for evolution: 60 KG.

  I didn’t seem to gain the actual weight of the animals I ate, only a modest proportion of their total mass. I belched and picked my teeth with one of the bull's horns. I flicked yet another barbed spine out that I’d managed to work loose.

  “I think this is going to be a numbers game. I’m going to stop being picky and just steal enough cattle that I have to get some females. It’s a fifty-fifty chance, or it should be,” I said, tossing the horn out of the lair.

  “You’d think you’d have managed to catch one by now if that was the case,” Kat laughed.

  I turned and leapt out into the void once more. I was done messing about. I went through the farms like a bird of prey; cattle were like rabbits to me. I stooped, snatched up a screaming beast, and flew off into the night. An hour later, I had acquired a dozen lady-cows, and I’d eaten three more bulls. It turned out I was luckier than I was good, at least as far as judging cow genitals went.

  Biomass stored:

  304 KG

  Biomass required for evolution: 60 KG.

  Chickens were easier. Most of the coops were built with integral wooden floors to keep out predators that could dig, and they were solidly part of the construction. I was stealing infrastructure now. I’d graduated from taking single animals to snatching up a whole flock in one fell swoop. This had the advantage that I didn’t have to count cockerels and hens. I just lifted them wholesale and was happy to let the minions sort it out.

  I had just settled onto the roof of my fourth chicken house when I heard something. I looked up and glanced about. It had sounded like a click that was loud enough to echo over the noise of screaming birds.

  There was another click and a thwang. Something glanced off my side, armoured scales doing what god intended them to do.

  “Jesus!” I yelled in surprise. Usually, I’m pretty agile when I’m flying. When I’m in the process of yanking a chicken coup off the ground, I’m more lumbering than graceful. “Don’t shoot!” I yelled, wings pumping desperately to give me some altitude. I only needed one more batch of chickens, according to the ever-fractious Greebles.

  “Drop my chickens, you varmint!” Even with the wind, screaming birds, and my frantic wingbeats, I could hear the crossbow being rewound.

  “Look! This is all a misunderstanding! It’s really not what it looks like!” This prick had stapled his chicken house to the ground somehow. With a rapid series of flaps, I finally pulled it free, and I shot into the air, the wooden hut dangling below me.

  “So long, sucker!” I crowed as I fought for altitude. Something skittered across my flank before a shiny thing shot past me on an upward trajectory.

  “I’ll get the hunters after you, dragon!” The man below called out.

  Ah shit. Kat had mentioned hunters, and I didn’t think I was quite ready to take on all comers. I needed to get stronger. Or find a way of stealing animals that didn’t involve dickhead farmers running to cry for help afterwards. I contemplated circling round and dousing his farm with my acid breath. I wasn’t quite there yet. If whatever came after me threatened the hoard, I might fly back and take some revenge. The cold part of my mind, which I genuinely hoped was part of becoming a dragon and hadn’t been lurking within me when I was human, made a note of the farm in relation to Mount Bob as I flew back home.

  Bad dragon! Don’t acid-burn the farmers you’re stealing from!

  I briefly considered finding some way to pay for what I’d stolen. The overwhelming reaction I felt was definitely not part of my human nature. Fuck no!

  “You been in the wars?” Kat asked as I deposited the hut in front of the waiting greebles.

  “Gotta watch out fer them crossbows. Yup. They can mess you up!” said one of the Greebles. My head snaked round to look at my scaly body, and the little bastard was right. I had a faint line up my flank, a few shards of metal glittered in the light of the lair where they had broken off and gotten wedged in my armour.

  “Huh. That’s worrying.” I looked over at Kat. “I thought I was a flying tank and it would take some asshole with a magic sword and total disregard for his own safety to hurt me?”

  “You aren’t there yet. Take that cock-ring off your finger and see how you fare against a crossbow bolt. You’ll be a Shish-Ka-Bob, Bob. You’re just getting started.”