Alan Panthers' family ran a tavern.
His father was a brewer, and his mother was the town's best cook.
His sister would come to the tavern after school to help out.
Kelly Panthers was a year older than his brother Alan.
Her fair, oval face was dotted with playful freckles, her eyes were large and bright, and her flaxen hair was tied in a long braid.
Her tall and voluptuous figure might not fit the typical image of a "pretty girl."
But in Alan's eyes, his sister was undoubtedly the most beautiful and toughest girl on the block.
Kelly had always disciplined Alan with her fists, but if anyone dared to bully her brother outside, Kelly would beat them to tears!
Alan went downstairs to the dining room.
His parents were still busy at the tavern up front, and his sister Kelly had prepared dinner.
Kelly's cooking skills are decent, not much worse than her mother's.
Alan sat at the dining table and just as he smelled the aroma of food, he received a series of system notifications.
Ding Ding—
Common ingredients discovered:
Rye bread!
Pork sausage!
Onion!
Cheese!
Cream of mushroom soup!
Caramel pudding!
It turns out that you can identify ingredients by touch and smell without actually eating them.
The system's built-in ingredient map automatically records the food Alan touches and identifies its nutritional and toxic properties.
Alan sat across from her at the table, picked up the fried sausage from her plate, and placed it on her brother's.
"Boys should eat more meat to grow tall and strong!"
"You eat meat too," Alan said to his sister.
Kelly smiled and shook her head. "I feel sorry for you, so I can't bear to eat the meat. I'm leaving it all for you."
"Do you think I'll be touched?" Allen scoffed. "You're so hypocritical!"
Our family has a good income, and working in the restaurant industry means we can't go without meat.
Kelly glared at her brother, but she couldn't help but laugh first.
"Kelly, are you losing weight?" Allen asked tentatively.
According to her pre-time travel measurements, Kelly was about 1.75 meters tall and weighed nearly 120 kilograms.
She looked quite well-proportioned now, with a uniquely tall and healthy beauty. But if she didn't control her weight, it would be difficult to maintain her figure after she had children.
"Hmm! I've been eating too much meat and my figure's gone... Damn it! I want to wear a beautiful tunic dress to prom!"
"If you really want to lose weight, you have to start by cutting out sweets, like crème brûlée."
Alan's kind reminder was met with a stern eye roll.
"What do you know? Women have two stomachs, and one is for dessert!"
"Well, say goodbye to your tunic dress."
"Huh?! You brat, try saying something sarcastic again?"
Kelly waved her fist at her brother.
Alan quickly ducked and changed the subject.
"Kelly, did you also take the bloodline awakening test last week?"
"I wasn't interested originally, but Lunafi asked me to go with her."
"I heard that if you test positive for extraordinary bloodline, you have a chance to awaken and become a warlock. Did you test positive for any special bloodline?"
"It's just our ancestral ogre bloodline! Too bad it's so weak, the concentration is only 3%. Low-level talent, not much of a future!"
Kelly replied glumly.
Perhaps due to her ogre bloodline, Kelly has possessed extraordinary strength since childhood, and her physique developed precociously. Her chest is so heavy, it looks like she's holding two melons.
The boys at school call her "Miss Cow" behind her back, but they don't dare say it to her face, or she'll beat them to a pulp!
When assessing a person's warlock talent, the higher the concentration of their special bloodline, the better. Below 1%, there's almost no chance of awakening.
"What if the bloodline concentration reaches 5%?" Allen asked his sister.
"That's not bad, it's considered a standard medium level."
For humans, a supernatural bloodline concentration of 1-3% is considered inferior.
4-6% is medium.
7-9% is superior.
It usually doesn't exceed 10%.
Otherwise, the appearance would reveal inhuman features, and strictly speaking, they would no longer be truly human.
"I might have ogre bloodline, too, and at a high concentration," Allen said calmly to his sister.
"That's not surprising. After all, you've been a glutton since childhood... But anyway, even if your bloodline concentration is higher than mine, there's nothing to be happy about."
Kelly attacked her brother mercilessly. "Even warlock bloodlines have different levels, and ogre bloodlines are ranked inferior!"
"Your mental power development is too poor, making it difficult for you to comprehend spells!"
"To put it bluntly, you're just a gluttonous strongman, not a true warlock!"
"As a lady, I have no interest in such a barbaric and vulgar bloodline!"
"A lady..." Allen was astonished. "Sister, how could you have such an illusion?"
Bang!
Kelly punched her brother in the head.
Alan felt as if he'd been hit by a club. Stars suddenly appeared in his eyes. He touched his forehead and saw a bump.
"I'm not as idle as you. I have to help in the kitchen after dinner!" Kelly pushed her plate away, turned around and left angrily.
Alan felt his stomach and seemed still not full, so he ate all the leftovers from his sister's meal.
Looking at the two empty plates, Allen felt something was amiss.
After finishing two nutritious and filling dinners, he didn't seem full, just not hungry.
Putting this doubt aside for the moment, Allen walked into the adjoining kitchen.
Kelly was busy at work.
The Panthers' tavern was just an ordinary mom-and-pop shop.
Dad was the bartender and mixologist, managing the front-of-house business.
Mom was the chef in the kitchen, proficient in frying, grilling, and deep-frying.
There used to be a young kitchen helper in the shop, responsible for chores like picking vegetables and washing dishes.
Sometimes, a family incident had happened, and the young woman resigned.
The shop couldn't find a suitable kitchen helper, so Kelly came to help out after school.
Alan also occasionally came to help out.
Unfortunately, his mom and sister always disliked his clumsiness.
Allen carried the plate to the kitchen and washed it.
Before crossing over, he'd been studying abroad. Wanting to enjoy affordable, satisfying hometown cuisine, he'd had to buy groceries and cook them himself.
Over time, washing pots and dishes, and cleaning the house, became a skill he'd perfected.
Kelly was sorting mushrooms. She glanced up at her brother and smiled, praising him: "Good job! Good work! You're doing a good job. You've made progress!"
Alan wiped his hands and watched his sister pick a mushroom from a pile and casually toss it into the wooden basin beside him. Something struck him.
"Kelly, is that a poisonous mushroom?"
"Hmm! Amanita phalloides. It looks ordinary, but it's actually inedible!" Kelly picked up a mushroom and showed it to her brother.
"What happens if you eat them?"
"I've never eaten them. I heard they cause hallucinations and make you see all sorts of weird things, like you're drunk."
Alan nodded and asked his sister nonchalantly, "What do we do with these poisonous mushrooms? Feed them to the pigs?"
"Stupid! Pigs would get poisoned if they ate them!" Kelly glared at her brother. "Just throw them away and pray a homeless person doesn't dig them out of the trash and eat them!"
"Got it." Alan picked up the basin and walked over to the trash can.
Turning his back to his sister, he pretended to dump the poisonous mushrooms into the trash can.
While Kelly wasn't looking, he secretly kept two mushrooms and stuffed them in his pocket.
Kelly carried the basin of washed mushrooms to her mother at the stove.
Alan returned to the restaurant alone, pulled a poisonous mushroom from his pocket, and sniffed it carefully.
Just as he was debating whether to take a small bite, the system delivered its identification:
"Common ingredient found, tiger amanita!"
"Rich in nutrients, hallucinogenic (Level 1 toxin)."
Alan checked the system's built-in ingredient guide and, sure enough, found the entry for "tiger amanita."
Holding the poisonous mushrooms, he remembered the system's previous tip: consuming poisonous substances could accumulate poison resistance, ultimately increasing the level of resistance.
Since he already had Level 1 poison resistance, consuming a Level 1 poison like tiger amanita would theoretically protect him from poisoning, right?
Intrigued, Alan bit off a tiny bit of the poisonous mushroom.
As expected, he felt no discomfort at all.
The experience bar representing his accumulated poison resistance grew slightly, but it was still a long way from reaching Level 2.
Alan simply stuffed both mushrooms into his mouth.
The result was disappointing.
The poison resistance bar didn't budge at all!
"It seems that only the first consumption of the same poison will increase poison resistance."
Alan pondered and came to a conclusion.