After resting for only a short while, Shen Qingyao forced herself back up.
Right now, the most important thing was to start a fire!
Fire wasn’t just for keeping warm. More importantly, she didn’t dare drink the water she had collected from the river directly. She had to boil it before she could drink it!
There was a fire pit in the middle of the wooden cabin, but obviously, there was no fire in it.
And she didn’t know how to start a fire by rubbing sticks together!
Fortunately, she was lucky enough to obtain two bottles of water on her first day.
A plastic water bottle could also be used to start a fire!
The sun was still fairly strong at the moment, so she took out a water bottle, some dry grass, and wood. She kept adjusting the angle until she made sure the focused point of light was concentrated on the dry grass.
“Fssst—”
After waiting for nearly five minutes, a wisp of smoke rose up. She immediately began blowing on it gently.
As a child from the countryside, she naturally knew how to get a fire going!
Very quickly, the wood began burning fiercely!
Shen Qingyao had casually picked up quite a few stones by the river. Now, they were just what she needed to build a simple stove.
She first arranged the stones around the sides, leaving only an opening. Then she placed a carefully selected flat stone with a depression in it on top.
This thing was practically a natural stone pot!
Although the hollow was a little small and the bottom was somewhat thick, it was still better than nothing!
She cut off a small piece of cloth from her clothing, gathered some sand and wood ash, and made a simple filter. She filtered the water once before pouring it into the stone pot.
Then, she took out the pampas grass.
She hadn’t examined it carefully while she was at the river.
Sure enough, its roots were white and tender.
They were actually edible cattail shoots!
Using her axe, she cut off the roots and peeled away the outer layers, leaving behind the especially tender cattail shoots.
She tossed all of the shoots into the pot and blanched them. Then, unable to wait any longer, she picked them up with two thin wooden sticks.
Taking a bite, she found them crisp, sweet, and refreshing. Even without salt, they tasted incredibly fresh and sweet!
So this was what vegetables tasted like?
How long had it been since she had last eaten them?
She was so moved!
Most importantly, she heard the system’s notification:
“Ding! You have consumed a mortal-grade, second-rank plant containing a trace amount of energy. Your physical fitness has been slightly improved!”
“Host, a friendly reminder: gathered resources can also be submitted to the system, allowing them to materialize in the real world at ten thousand times—or even one million times—the original amount!”
Shen Qingyao froze.
Gathered resources could also be submitted?
Then why couldn’t the stones and seeds from before?
Was it because those counted as tools or materials?
And what was a mortal-grade, second-rank plant?
Could native plants from this otherworld improve one’s physical condition?
Then what about higher-grade plants?
Would their effects be even better?
Could she gain even more strength?
Also, the adzuki bean and huìhuìcài seeds she had gathered earlier hadn’t received any rank notification.
Did that mean they had no rank?
“System, what ranks are the adzuki beans and huìhuìcài?”
“Host, both the adzuki beans and huìhuìcài are mortal-grade, first-rank. However, if you repeatedly save and replant the seeds, their rank can be upgraded! Please keep up the good work!”
Something with a poor foundation would have limited room for improvement, even if it was upgraded.
“What have the others submitted?”
“Host can check the daily points leaderboard on your own!”
“Friendly reminder: Those at the top of the points leaderboard can receive additional rewards!”
She had eaten something and now had a bonfire. Her mood was pretty good, so she didn’t mind taking a short break.
When she opened the system interface, she saw that the entire chat channel had gone crazy. People of all kinds were constantly spamming messages.
She even saw people using supplies to trade for food and water!
“Please! Can any kind-hearted person trade me some water and food? I’m willing to exchange wood!”
“Blueprint for food! PM me if interested!”
“DM me to trade for food. Big brothers, this little sister is skilled at men’s body care. Totally worth the deal!”
“Torches in exchange for food! First come, first served!”
Huh?
Fire could be traded too?
She quickly pulled out a burning piece of firewood and placed it in her inventory. Then, when she took it back out, she discovered that the flame was still burning!
She immediately listed several torches on the trading market and exchanged them for a pile of wood.
She had been worrying that she didn’t have enough wood. What if the fire went out during the night?
As for blueprints, she searched through the trading market and found a dagger.
She looked at the remaining bowl of cattail shoot soup in front of her and decided to trade it away.
She needed a sharper weapon!
Shen Qingyao opened the profile of someone named Wang Guodong.
“Uncle, I’ll trade you a bowl of mortal-grade, second-rank cattail shoot soup for your dagger. Deal?”
Because his dagger was also mortal-grade, second-rank!
At this stage, food was precious, but weapons were even more precious!
The person on the other end sent several dots.
Shen Qingyao had no idea what that meant.
“Are we trading or not? It’s still hot!”
She knew all too well how tempting a bowl of hot vegetable soup was to someone struggling to survive!
“Deal!”
The other party replied decisively.
And so, the trade was completed smoothly.
After the transaction was completed, the other party sent another message:
“I’m twenty-eight.”
Shen Qingyao:
“…”
Twenty-eight, and his name was Wang Guodong?
What were his parents thinking?
“Sorry! My mistake! If you want to make any more trades, come find me. I’ll give you some extra stuff as compensation!”
“Not necessary for now!”
Shen Qingyao stared longingly at several blueprints in the trading space. After thinking it over, she reluctantly traded her remaining loaf and a half of bread for two blueprints.
One was for a Basic Workbench, and the other was for a Stone Pickaxe.
A hoe alone wasn’t enough for clearing land. She needed something that could properly dig into the ground.
The thing she had the most of was stone. She saw that someone was actually offering salt in exchange for stones, so she traded all her excess stones to him.
Judging from what the man said, he was on the sea. He could dry seawater to make salt, but he had no way of finding stones.
Stones and wood could be used to upgrade the wooden cabin.
It seemed the other party was planning ahead as well.
Shen Qingyao checked the requirements for upgrading the wooden cabin:
Wood ×100, Stone ×100
She was still short on wood, but she already had enough stone.
So, she traded some of her stones for more wood. Unfortunately, she still didn’t manage to gather enough materials for the upgrade.
Then, she opened today’s points leaderboard.
The rankings were determined by the amount of supplies each person submitted to the system.
To Shen Qingyao’s surprise, Wang Guodong was at the top of the leaderboard!
He had submitted a wild boar weighing three hundred jin!
He had actually managed to kill a wild boar on the very first day.
What a ruthless guy!
Shen Qingyao had no contact with the outside world. Otherwise, she would have known that Wang Guodong was an official representative with exceptional combat skills and was currently one of China’s star contestants.
The person in second place was a foreigner. Shen Qingyao remembered the name—he seemed to be a wilderness survival expert. He had submitted a deer!
She didn’t recognize the person in third place.
Shen Qingyao casually scrolled through the rankings. After confirming that there was no one she knew, she stopped looking.
She still had to process the pampas grass.
The leaves of the pampas grass were long, narrow, and tough, making them excellent materials for weaving.
When she was young, she had seen the basket weaver next door doing something similar. After several failed attempts, she finally managed to recreate it!
She wove several shrimp traps from the pampas grass. Then, before night fell, she hurried toward the river.