After Cristiano left, André began calling for the standard equipment of every transmigrator: the system.
Unfortunately, starting from "Open Sesame," André mentally cycled through every activation phrase he'd ever read in web novels. He tried everything—random passwords, magic words, even ridiculous stuff like "System Activate" and "Initialize." Nothing worked.
"What the hell? Why?" He was starting to feel genuinely numb. How was he supposed to play this game without a system? Weren't systems standard-issue equipment for transmigrators? Damn it, he'd already struck the pose, gotten into character, and now he was being told there wasn't one?
If there wasn't going to be a system, why even let him transmigrate in the first place? He would've been better off just reincarnating as a baby.
Realizing half the usual transmigration benefits were missing, André began to seriously wonder if he should just take another bottle of sleeping pills and call it quits. What could he even accomplish here? Looking at the face in the mirror—which could give a Bond villain a run for his money—he figured no beautiful woman would ever fall for him anyway. That was at least half the joy of life gone right there.
André couldn't understand it. They were both named Ronaldo or some variation thereof, and most importantly, Cristiano was the golden boy while he looked like he'd been carved by someone with a grudge. Cristiano looked like a bloody underwear model. André looked like he could audition for a heavyweight boxing film. What was God—or whoever was in charge upstairs—thinking when he molded this body?
Whatever. Being able to live again was a stroke of insane luck. If he died again and didn't get another chance, wouldn't that be a massive waste? Fine. Ugly as it was, this body was absolutely incredible in other ways.
Standing shirtless in front of the cracked mirror, André looked at the muscles covering his frame, his firm pecs, his carved abs. He even felt an impulse to touch them himself, just to confirm they were real. This was mainly because his previous body—Marcus's scrawny English frame—had never come close to these conditions.
Forget it. Such narcissistic thoughts were unbecoming. Looking at the absolute pigsty his room had become, André decided to clean up. Even though he wouldn't be living here much longer, his ingrained habit of cleanliness made it impossible to tolerate this indescribably messy hellhole any longer.
After finally finishing the cleanup—which took the better part of an hour—André realized he needed to properly adapt to this body. Otherwise, if he kept tripping over his own feet like a newborn giraffe, people would think there was something wrong with his brain.
With that in mind, André grabbed a football and headed to the patch of grass behind the dormitory building. He chose this spot because his subconscious—André's inherited memories—told him no one would disturb him there. From the depths of those memories, he also knew the original owner of this body hadn't completely given up on improving himself. He'd found this hidden spot within the youth training complex with great difficulty. Basically no one came here, and someone had even set up a makeshift goal. André used to come here often for extra training.
To be honest, while André's physical talent was absolutely freakish, he'd never been able to master football properly. He'd failed to learn even many basic skills. This was also why Castilla had given up on him. Raw talent meant nothing if you couldn't control a ball.
When André arrived at the secluded training spot, Castilla happened to be hosting two guests that day. One was the current Real Madrid head coach, Zinedine Zidane. With him was his former teammate from the Galácticos era—and a legendary figure in Real Madrid's history—Fernando Hierro.
During this summer's Spanish league off-season, Hierro had taken over as head coach of the Segunda División club Real Oviedo.
Many people might not be familiar with Real Oviedo, but it was a club with serious history in Spanish football. Founded in 1926, it had competed in La Liga for thirty-eight seasons before slowly declining, even dropping as far as the third tier.
This time, after Hierro took over Oviedo and assessed the squad during pre-season, he'd begun reshaping the roster according to his own vision. However, as a Segunda División club, they had to be frugal with investments. Thus, he'd thought about visiting Castilla to see if he could find some players suitable for his team.
Truthfully, though, he didn't have high expectations for this trip. He knew that if there were genuinely suitable players, Real Madrid wouldn't just hand them over. At most, it would be a loan deal. And even for loans, they wouldn't necessarily send them to him—Oviedo competed in the same Segunda División as Castilla, after all.
He also realized it had been far too long since he'd returned after leaving Real Madrid. This was Zidane's era now. Last season, Zidane had even become the only head coach in Champions League history to lead a team to three consecutive titles.
"I'm truly sorry, Fernando. I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you today."
"It's alright, Zinedine. I didn't come with particularly high hopes. Go handle your business. I'll take a walk around. It's been ages since I've been here, and I want to see what's changed."
"Alright. I'll wait for you at the gate."
After finishing his chat with Zidane, Hierro began wandering through the Castilla youth training complex. Without really paying attention to where he was going, he found himself approaching the spot where André was training.
Although Hierro wasn't a product of Castilla's youth system himself, he had deep affection for this place. When he'd played for Real Madrid's first team, he'd often come here to train with the youngsters. He even knew about the spot where André was currently located. Back in the day, he'd been the one who'd asked the Castilla staff to install that dilapidated goal.
At that moment, André didn't notice Hierro standing in the shadows, watching him.
André was currently in a state of pure, unfiltered joy. After about half an hour of adapting to this body, he felt like he'd discovered buried treasure. Previously, because Marcus's physical stats had been so ordinary—weak, slow, uncoordinated—even when he could visualize certain moves in his head, his poor physique made them practically useless in actual matches.
But this body was different. Completely different.
It had explosive power. Incredible physical attributes. And most importantly, André discovered that this guy's hundred-meter sprint speed wasn't affected by his 1.9-meter height. André tested a couple of sprints and estimated this body could run the hundred meters in around eleven seconds. Maybe faster.
Best of all? His tall stature didn't affect his agility in the slightest.
André tried loads of clever dribbling moves—feints, stepovers, quick direction changes. He found that many moves he wouldn't have dared attempt in his previous body could be completed easily by this frame, with zero physical discomfort.
Meanwhile, Hierro—standing to the side, partially hidden by a fence—was absolutely stunned.
This towering teenager possessed absolute ball sense.
Hierro even rubbed his eyes, genuinely wondering if his vision was playing tricks on him. This couldn't be real.
The most crucial part was that this player with absolute ball sense also possessed a genuinely freakish physique. Watching this shirtless teenager constantly testing agile moves, complex feints, and rapid changes of direction, Hierro felt like he was witnessing something that shouldn't be possible.
Could you imagine a guy who's 1.9 meters tall, built like an absolute tank, pulling off an Elastico?
Most importantly, Hierro genuinely felt this kid executed it better than Ronaldinho—that buck-toothed Brazilian wizard himself.
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