In her desperation, she had taken her stepsister to find that scumbag, begging him to save her brother.
In the end, she was schemed against by the cheating couple, lost her chastity, and was even dumped by the scumbag.
After that, although her brother woke up, his intelligence regressed to that of a six-year-old.
As for her, she was framed by her stepsister and charged with attempted murder.
After being convicted, she and her brother were exiled together to Desolate Planet DQ008.
Su Yue raised her hand and gently stroked her lower abdomen.
This child was an accident. The original owner had only discovered his existence a month ago.
Toward this fatherless child, the original owner had once felt hatred and resentment, but in the end, she couldn’t bear to get rid of him.
Or rather, given her situation, if she had aborted the child, she herself wouldn’t have survived.
After all, this was a desolate planet—they had no money for medicine, nor could they afford a medical pod.
Su Yue lowered her head and looked at her slightly rounded belly, a warm feeling rising in her heart.
Unlike the original owner, she felt only love for the child in her womb.
During the ten years of the apocalypse, she had once had family by her side.
But later, they all died, leaving her alone—solitary and struggling—enduring ten long years in that ruined world.
Now, things were different.
She had her brother, and a child who would be born in half a year…
Though their current situation was miserable,
she was confident she could gradually improve their lives.
Soon, Su Yi brought over two basins of hot water.
Su Yue opened the instant noodles and soaked them.
Sitting nearby, Su Yi watched, swallowing repeatedly.
After a while, Su Yue judged the time was right.
She opened the lids, added the seasoning packets and beef, then stirred with chopsticks.
“Eat.”
After finishing, she handed a pair of chopsticks to Su Yi.
Su Yi took them and immediately started eating.
Su Yue also began eating.
“Mmm—so good! Mmm—this is really delicious, Yueyue!” Clearly starving, Su Yi wolfed it down.
Su Yue smiled at him and also ate in big mouthfuls. She was starving too.
In less than two minutes, both of them finished their noodles—even the soup was completely gone.
Su Yi stared at the still half-full can of beef nearby.
Su Yue smiled.
“Go ahead and finish the canned food too.”
Su Yi immediately reached for it.
But after picking it up, he poured it into Su Yue’s bowl instead.
“Yueyue eat. Yueyue has… little baby.” As he spoke, he glanced at her belly.
Su Yue felt a surge of emotion.
After hesitating for a moment, she took out two loaves of bread from her space.
“I’ll eat the canned food. These two breads are for big brother.”
After saying that, she handed the bread to Su Yi.
She was still very hungry—those two packs of instant noodles hadn’t filled her up.
And her brother, with S-level mental strength, consumed more energy than ordinary people even without piloting a mech—he would only be hungrier than her.
Su Yi’s eyes lit up.
“Okay!”
Biting into the bread, he looked utterly satisfied.
“So tasty! Mmm—this bread is really delicious, Yueyue! It’s even better than natural food!”
Su Yue’s gaze shifted slightly.
Natural food… these came from before the apocalypse, so of course they counted as natural food.
Yes, although this era’s technology was highly advanced, natural food was extremely scarce.
The reason was that seeds for edible crops were too fragile, making cultivation very difficult.
Because natural food was rare, its price was correspondingly high—usually ten to a hundred times more expensive than synthetic food.
Thus, ordinary people mostly consumed synthetic food or nutrient solutions.
The taste and nutritional value of synthetic food and nutrient solutions were far inferior to natural food.
The Empire had already concluded that long-term consumption of natural food improved the rate of mental strength growth compared to synthetic food.
Even for those who couldn’t afford it regularly, the official recommendation was to consume at least two kilograms of natural food per week.
Only then could mental strength remain stable and the body stay relatively healthy.
She and her brother had been on this desolate planet for over three months. During the first two months, they had eaten natural food a few times, but the rest of the time they relied on synthetic food and nutrient solutions.
Recently, they had become so poor they couldn’t even afford those anymore.
That was also why she had fainted the previous afternoon.
“As long as it tastes good.” Coming back to her senses, Su Yue smiled.
“Let’s work hard together so we can eat natural food every day in the future!”
“Mm!” Su Yi nodded firmly.
“I’ll work hard to dig energy stones so little sister and the baby can eat delicious food!”
Su Yue smiled but didn’t correct him.
By tomorrow, her brother would understand.
After a night’s rest, when she woke up the next day, Su Yue indeed felt much better.
As soon as she opened her eyes, Su Yi arrived.
Carrying a basket on his back and holding a sickle and a hoe, he came to say goodbye.
Because Su Yue was in poor health, Su Yi had been going out alone to dig energy stones for the past half month.
Clearly, he intended to do the same today.
Yes, there were energy stones on DQ008.
This was also the main reason why DQ008 could serve as an exile planet.
There were two types of energy sources in this era: energy crystals and star beast cores.
Energy crystals were refined from energy stones and were the most common energy source in the interstellar world.
Energy stones existed on planets where star beasts lived, and their yield was not low.
Star beast cores, however, were much rarer.
Low-level star beasts didn’t have cores, while high-level ones did—but they were extremely dangerous.
Although a single high-level star beast core contained immense energy, very few people dared to hunt them.
Most star beast cores used by the Empire came from battlefields or powerful mercenary groups.
Her brother, like her, was now a criminal without a mech.
Let alone high-level star beasts—even low-level ones posed great danger.
So ever since arriving at DQ008, like other exiles and some of the lower-class natives, they could only survive by digging energy stones.
And their situation was even worse than that of the natives.
Because they were criminals, they had to hand over 100 jin of energy stones or 2,000 star coins to the Imperial recycling station every month.
Since there were two of them, they had to pay 200 jin of energy stones or 4,000 star coins.
With her poor health and pregnancy, most of the burden had fallen on her brother.
Now, she had to make a change.
“Big brother, I’ll go out of the city with you,” Su Yue said.
“How can that be? Yueyue—Yueyue has a baby, you need to stay home and take care of it.” Su Yi refused, his eyes drifting to her belly.
Su Yue smiled and gently stroked her stomach.
“The baby is still small and staying quietly inside me. There’s no need to take care of it for now.”
“In less than half a year, he’ll be born. We need to earn more star coins while we can, so he won’t go hungry.”
Su Yi frowned, feeling her words made sense, yet something still seemed off.
Su Yue took out three pieces of bread and two boxes of milk from her space.
“Here. Let’s eat first before setting out.”
Even after resting for a night, she still needed to replenish her strength—and so did her brother. This was something she had to be willing to invest in.