Breeding Mare Auction: A Gentle Breeze Arrives

[Got a site message~(￣▽￣~)(~￣▽￣)~. I'd thought there was no chance at all ╰(￣▽￣)╭. The boomerang came back much faster than expected ╰(°▽°)╯. First, I'd like to thank everyone for your support. If you hadn't kept voting and commenting, I wouldn't have been able to keep going. Thank you all, Thanks♪(･ω･)ﾉ]

After deciding the racing schedules for the four newly acquired racehorses, Zhang Jun spent several days enjoying a life of focused online classes at home, learning ranch management experience offline, and occasionally visiting the two stables at the training center to see the horses.

As time reached the fourth week of October, Zhang Jun calculated his funds again. After deducting the boarding fees for six active racehorses and the expenses for four mares, he still had one million left to use. He breathed a sigh of relief.

The fourth and fifth weeks of October, along with the first and second weeks of January, were known among industry insiders as Breeding Mare Weeks in Huaxia's southern provinces.

Breeding mares and mares that had retired earlier from the southern provinces would be registered for auction over the weekend of the fourth week of October. The lists would be announced and transportation arranged from Monday through Wednesday of the fifth week, with auctions beginning on Thursday.

Racehorses retiring in November and December, meanwhile, would be registered during the first week of January, with auctions beginning in the second week.

Although he had already prepared six excellent mares, Zhang Jun still intended to visit the breeding mare auction and see whether there were any outstanding newly retired mares worth buying.

Unless a ranch had gone bankrupt, breeding mares that had already been bred for several years were only put up for auction if they were underperforming culls. Zhang Jun had no interest in them.

Since he had no experience attending breeding mare auctions, Zhang Jun called Luo Fei.

Luo Yong was only responsible for club matters and only attended auctions for foals, yearlings, and two-year-olds. Breeding mare auctions were not on his schedule.

Luo Fei was also taking Luo Heng to the auction to buy some horses, using it as experience for when Luo Heng would later take over the ranch's breeding operations. After receiving Zhang Jun's call, he readily agreed to bring him along and share his experience.

The auction list was released soon afterward. A total of 1,635 mares were participating in Min Province's four October breeding mare auctions, with 409 mares in each auction.

Of those, 764 were newly retired mares. Some of the mares that had retired in February and March had already been bred.

Zhang Jun's target was only those 764 racehorses. Although some had already been bred, he did not mind. On the contrary, he could even get an extra foal out of it.

Over the past few days, Zhang Jun had discovered another useful function of the system while watching videos. He could also see a horse's attributes through showcase videos posted on auction, ranch, or club websites.

[Thumbs up]

He was now using the showcase videos released on the auction website to examine the attributes of the 764 mares. However, because the auction videos were continuous, he inevitably saw the attributes of quite a few other mares as well.

After spending three days checking the attributes of all 764 mares and more than 400 breeding mares, Zhang Jun marked every mare on the list whose offspring attribute exceeded five points or who possessed a positive hereditary trait.

At the previous online auction, which had only contained a little over a hundred mares, there had been two mares with an offspring attribute of six and six mares with an offspring attribute of five or with traits.

Zhang Jun had originally thought that there would be seventy or eighty mares at the breeding mare auction with offspring attributes above five or with hereditary traits of their own, but the actual number was far lower than he had expected.

Forty-three—there were only forty-three mares across these four breeding mare auctions in Min Province with offspring attributes above five or a positive hereditary trait, including mares that possessed both positive and negative traits.

There might also have been cases where mares with traits had an offspring attribute below five when examined, but such horses had never been within Zhang Jun's consideration anyway.

Zhang Jun frowned at the list in his hand and thought for a while before coming to terms with it.

An offspring attribute of five was already enough to make a mare an excellent breeding mare at a ranch. Even the lead mare of a tiny ranch might only be at that level.

The mares appearing at auction had been culled by their ranches to begin with, so only forty-three was normal. Besides, thirty-six of them were newly retired mares, which further supported that possibility.

Zhang Jun opened the pedigree charts and race records of the marked mares. Based on their bloodlines and records, he crossed several mares off the list—those with excellent bloodlines and outstanding records, as well as the older mares. Their prices would likely exceed his acceptable range.

In the blink of an eye, only ten mares remained on the list. They were all newly retired mares with excellent bloodlines but poor racing results, or poor bloodlines.

Zhang Jun took a deep breath and used two points on each of the ten mares. The newly unlocked attributes soon appeared before him. His luck was not bad—six of the ten horses unlocked their remaining breeding attribute.

Based on the unlocked attributes, Zhang Jun crossed five mares off the list. Three of those mares had an offspring attribute of five but possessed negative factors, while the other two had positive factors but offspring attributes that were too low.

The auction began soon afterward. Zhang Jun and Luo Heng followed Luo Fei to the auction, and along the way, Luo Fei kept imparting the experience he had summarized to the two of them.

Just like at the two-year-old auction, the officials first took the stage to explain the honors earned that year by the offspring of the mares being sold, then presented awards, and only afterward did the auctioneer take the stage to begin the auction.

Of the remaining five horses, the one whose attributes Zhang Jun had fully examined would appear on the third day. Each of the other four would appear on a different day.

The auction progressed somewhat slowly. By noon, they had only reached Lot 150, and they estimated that additional lots would have to be auctioned that evening. Fortunately, the horse Zhang Jun wanted was Lot 175, and she appeared not long after the afternoon session began.

w(ﾟДﾟ)w

The moment she came out, Zhang Jun sucked in a sharp breath. The mare was led out by four or five grooms tugging on her. She kept jumping and shaking her head, dragging several of them along unsteadily.

"Wouldn't she kick Zuihuayin and the others if I brought her home? No way, no way."

Zhang Jun shook his head and immediately gave up on buying her. He did not want to bring a lunatic home and have her injure the six well-behaved children at Jianzhou Ranch, or Shadow Hunter and Cloudstream Flying Shadow.

Still, it was not a waste. Together with the mares he had crossed off and several newly examined mares with an offspring attribute of five or positive factors, he recommended them to Luo Fei and Luo Heng, giving corresponding evaluations.

For example, there was a nine-year-old mare Zhang Jun had examined and found to possess Iron Pony's explosive acceleration factor. His evaluation was that her offspring had a very small chance of better acceleration than the offspring of other mares, though he did not know what her ability to produce offspring was like.

Luo Fei and Luo Heng only chose to buy mares Zhang Jun had evaluated as having offspring-producing ability perhaps comparable to so-and-so at their ranch. They did not make a bid on Lot 175 either—they were afraid she might injure horses or foals.

Time passed quickly. By the afternoon of the third day, the other two mares Zhang Jun had marked both turned out to have problems. One came from a maternal line with hereditary glass legs and had herself retired due to suspensory ligament inflammation.

Zhang Jun's study of bloodlines had not yet reached that level. He only learned about it after Luo Fei told him.

As for the other mare, her price kept soaring for some unknown reason. It quickly exceeded 500,000, far beyond Zhang Jun's acceptable range.

"Next up is Lot 210, A Gentle Breeze Arrives, a five-year-old gray mare. Her sire is..."

As the auctioneer's voice rang out, a gray mare whose coat had already faded to white was led out. Zhang Jun immediately focused.

This mare named A Gentle Breeze Arrives was the excellent mare whose two breeding attributes Zhang Jun had examined. Her offspring attribute was seven, and she possessed Copper Pony's health and speed factors.

Moreover, A Gentle Breeze Arrives had a decent record: seven wins in thirty local races, including one CN3 victory. Her bloodline was simply poor. Both her sire and damsire were stallions that produced low-quality offspring, and her maternal-line descendants had poor records as well.

"...She has never been bred. So, shall we start the bidding at 100,000? 100,000~"

The auctioneer began his chanting call. More than ten seconds passed before a buyer raised a hand. "Here!"

The auctioneer immediately turned and gestured. "This buyer at the rear left bids 100,000! Any higher offers? How about 110,000? 110,000..."

Once someone had made a bid, the other interested buyers began bidding as well. The price gradually rose to 270,000, and Zhang Jun finally raised his hand. "Here!"

The auctioneer gestured. "All right! This young buyer bids 280,000. The next bid will be 290,000. 290,000..."

One of the original three bidders immediately chose to give up. Seeing a newcomer join, the remaining two hesitated for a moment before one middle-aged man raised his hand to increase the bid just before time ran out.

(｡･∀･)ﾉﾞ

Zhang Jun did not hesitate and immediately raised his hand again. "Here!"

Seeing Zhang Jun's determination, the middle-aged man also chose to give up. Only one middle-aged woman remained, still hesitating.

After hesitating for a moment, she raised her hand and increased the price to 320,000. Zhang Jun immediately raised it to 340,000, and the middle-aged woman gave up as well.

The auctioneer chanted for another minute. Seeing that no one else increased the bid, he brought down the hammer. "Thank you to this buyer for taking A Gentle Breeze Arrives with a bid of 340,000. Please proceed to the room after the auction ends to complete the transaction. Next up is..."

(~o~)

Zhang Jun breathed a sigh of relief. Among all the mares he had seen, A Gentle Breeze Arrives' breeding ability was second only to Chasing Lightning's. She was also an immediately useful breeding mare who could be bred next year. It was wonderful that he had secured her so smoothly.

The auction continued, but unfortunately, no more outstanding mares appeared afterward. Even the mare on the fourth day withdrew from the auction before her lot came up, so Zhang Jun did not bid again.