There were all kinds of items available for trade. Qiyu browsed for a while before choosing a listing with relatively reasonable terms. There was a chat icon on the trading page, which allowed him to send a private message to the other party.
When posting a trade, both buyers and sellers could choose whether to use their real names or remain anonymous.
Qiyu chose anonymity, so his ID appeared as a string of numbers in the chat window. He decided to test the waters first.
【ID013578: Hi, I’m offering 5 Stones for 10 Hay. Interested?】
The other party wasn't anonymous. Their ID was 【Good Night Want To Sleep】.
【Good Night Want To Sleep: ? I don’t need stones. How about 5 pieces of wood instead?】
【ID013578: You have to chop down an entire tree just to get 10 pieces of wood. That’s much harder to obtain than your hay.】
In fact, Qiyu found something about this rather strange. He had thoroughly explored the area around the wooden cabin but hadn't seen any hay. He had even tried pulling up a dozen or so clumps of wild grass to see whether they would turn into hay.
Naturally, his attempt had failed.
At first, he had assumed hay could only be obtained from treasure chests. But after seeing how much was listed on the trading page, and how most sellers weren't asking for particularly expensive items in exchange, he realized something wasn't right.
The other party was obviously trying to see how much they could get away with charging.
【Good Night Want To Sleep: What about three pieces of wood?】
【ID013578: Why would I trade wood for something I can just pick up anywhere? That would be a complete rip-off. I’d have to carry all those stones back myself, too. If I hadn’t been so busy chopping wood, I wouldn’t even need to trade for hay.】
【Good Night Want To Sleep: What do you mean, “just pick up anywhere”? You still have to go looking for fluffy grass!】
Fluffy grass?
Qiyu finally understood.
But he was certain he hadn't encountered anything called "Fluff Grass" today.
【ID013578: How about this, then? 15 stones for 20 bales of hay. I just want some hay to make my bed a little more comfortable. If we can't reach a deal, I'll make do without it.】
His words seemed to strike a chord with the other party.
【Good Night Want To Sleep: Sigh, forget it. The floor is freezing cold. Having some hay to sleep on would definitely make things more comfortable.】
The other party initiated a trade:
【Good Night Want To Sleep】 has initiated a trade with you: 20 Hay for 15 Stones. Do you accept?
Qiyu accepted.
【Good Night Want To Sleep: Hope we both get a good night's sleep tonight. Bye.】
The 20 units of hay appeared in Qiyu's backpack, and he took them out.
He immediately understood why the grass was called "Fluffy Grass."
The 20 units of hay formed a small pile. When he pressed his palm against it, his hand sank right in, although the grass itself wasn't particularly soft.
Spread evenly across the floor, it would certainly be much more comfortable than lying on cold, hard wooden boards. Cotton, however, was considerably harder to obtain than hay.
Qiyu found someone willing to exchange cotton for gloves and eventually traded half a piece of cotton cloth for 20 units of cotton. With that, he finally had all the materials needed to make a mattress.
After the familiar thirty-second wait, a 150×200 mattress appeared inside the wooden cabin.
Qiyu placed it on the wooden bed and lay down. His body sank slightly into the mattress, which gently supported his weight. He wasn't sure whether it had something to do with his stamina recovering, but lying there felt exceptionally comfortable.
However, after enjoying the sensation for a moment, he got up again. It wasn't time to rest just yet.
To be honest, sitting inside the quiet wooden cabin, Qiyu felt that having so much leisure time was a genuine luxury. The long, safe night was meant for nothing but rest.
Thank goodness for the survival game!
He opened his personal interface.
Then he carefully checked his stamina and satiety levels.
Satiety: 31/100
Stamina: 39/100
No wonder the warning hadn't appeared yet.
He remembered that after his first meal, his stamina had recovered to 90. But after exploring the area around the wooden cabin and chopping down two trees, it had fallen to 30.
The second time, he had eaten to restore his stamina to 90, then collected and carried 50 units of stone. That had been enough to trigger another warning from the interface.
This afternoon, however, he had followed the survival game's advice and raised his satiety to 80 before starting work. Even after chopping down five trees almost without stopping, he still had 39 stamina points remaining.
Chopping down five trees had consumed only 61 stamina points.
Compared to before, the difference was enormous. And the only thing that had changed was his satiety level.
Qiyu: So the survival game actually encourages players to eat until they're full?
He tapped around the touchscreen for quite some time, but he couldn't find a feedback section or a customer service page.
"What a shame," he said regretfully. "I really wanted to give you a five-star review. You're the best game I've ever played."
In the stillness of the dark night, the only response he received was, naturally, silence.
Or perhaps it wasn't entirely silent?
Qiyu pricked up his ears. Amid the deathly stillness, he thought he heard something faint.
He listened carefully, but the sound disappeared. A moment later, another faint, muffled noise drifted toward him, as though coming from somewhere impossibly far away. It was probably just the wind blowing outside, although it sounded so weak that it wouldn't have been enough to knock over a sapling.
He calmly dismissed it and decided to proceed with the most important ritual of the day—dinner.
A six-inch-tall, sweet cream cake!
The system had even thoughtfully provided cutlery.
Everything was perfect, apart from one small flaw: the room was too dark for him to admire the beautiful cake the way he could have during the day. But that tiny disappointment vanished the instant the first bite touched his tongue.
Qiyu said nothing.
He simply savored the delicious cake, one bite at a time.
After a while, a soft exclamation emerged from the darkness.
"So this is what cake tastes like."
He restrained himself and ate only half before drinking some water to rinse his mouth.
Then he opened his personal panel. The chat channel was bustling with activity:
【Tell Me To Do Homework When You See Me: Help! I hear something outside my door! It sounds like claws scratching against it!】
【Mi Qiou: Me too! But it sounds like someone is crying outside my wooden cabin, going "wuu wuu wuu." It's so scary, aaaah!】
【Choosing A Name Should Not Be Too High Profile: I'm freezing! Nobody told me it would get this dark at night! Not only is there no electricity, there isn't even a single candle! I'm scared of the dark!】
【Turkey Falling In Love With The Oven: Even prison can't be this bad, right? During the day, I thought living out here in the middle of the wilderness wouldn't be so terrible, but now I seriously just want to die.】
【Benbo’erba: Is everyone hearing something different? I keep hearing this faint, mournful music. It's absolutely terrifying!】
Being alone in such an unfamiliar environment was frightening enough. During the day, it was still somewhat bearable, but once night fell and everything was plunged into pitch-black darkness, that fear intensified dramatically. Under so much pressure, quite a few people were beginning to break down.
Qiyu: ?
Puzzled, he listened carefully and confirmed that he couldn't hear anything where he was.
After thinking for a moment, he gripped his axe in one hand, held his breath, and quietly crept toward the door.
Still, there was no sound.
Looks like I got lucky.
Qiyu breathed a sigh of relief.
【My Fate is Determined By Me, Not The Heavens: Torches for sale. I've posted the details and trade requirements on the trading page. Feel free to take a look if you're interested.】
Qiyu opened the trading page and saw that 【My Fate is Determined By Me, Not The Heavens】 had listed a batch of torches. There were currently 37 remaining. The listing allowed automatic trades, with each torch priced at 2 units of wood.
【Torch: A burning flame that may dispel the cold and fear. Burn time: 3 hours.】
By the time Qiyu finished reading the description, only 35 torches remained.
【Monkey Number One: I worked my butt off chopping down a tree and only got 10 units of wood! You're charging 2 units for a single torch? That's way too expensive!】
【Five Blessings: Boss, how did you get something to start a fire with? Can you give us a hint?】
The sudden appearance of 【My Fate is Determined By Me, Not The Heavens】 and his torches had sent the chat channel into a frenzy.
Qiyu didn't buy a torch. Instead, he put the extra basic backpacks he had crafted up for trade.
Crafting a workbench required 50 units each of wood and stone. Judging by the numerous messages in the chat channel, some players still hadn't unlocked one.
After giving it some thought, he listed the wooden bed on the trading page as well.
He didn't enable automatic trading for either item, choosing instead to let interested buyers make their own offers. Since he had nothing else to do at the moment, he figured he might as well take the opportunity to see what people were willing to offer.
Sure enough, as soon as he listed the basic backpack, plenty of people expressed interest in trading for it.
However, no one wanted to part with wood, a basic resource everyone needed. Instead, they offered all sorts of random odds and ends: sour wild berries, gold rings, and even someone asking whether they could trade badges featuring their favorite character.
Qiyu: ? I don't get it.
He rejected every offer.
Before long, however, he finally found something that caught his attention.
【I Am A Little Unlucky Myself: Hi, I have a bag of sunflower seeds. Would you be interested?】
【Sunflower Seeds: Contains 50 sunflower seeds】
Qiyu: Huh?
He didn't hesitate for a second.
【ID223987 has sent you a trade request】
When 【I Am A Little Unlucky Myself】 finally received the basic backpack, he was still somewhat dazed.
That went so smoothly?
He had expected the other party either to ignore him or to try to bargain down his offer.
After all, that was what had happened to him plenty of times already.
Following the advice of the local big shot, 【My Fate is Determined By Me, Not The Heavens】, he had explored the area surrounding his wooden cabin and discovered a wooden treasure chest.
Inside the chest, along with a bottle of water and a pair of gloves, he had found this packet of seeds.
Never mind whether he would even survive long enough to grow flowers in this survival game. The real problem was that he was an absolute disaster when it came to plants!
Anything he tried to grow inevitably died. He had even managed to kill a cactus!
He had figured he might as well trade the seeds for something useful, but apparently, the other players were thinking along the same lines. Whenever he initiated a trade, no one even bothered to respond. Even those who showed some interest in the seeds only asked whether he had vegetable or grain seeds instead.
As someone who normally spent all his time lounging around, he had worked diligently all day chopping down trees—and had only managed to fell two.
Now he couldn't even lift his arms.
Even after dismantling the two treasure chests he'd found, he was still 10 units of wood short.
When he saw someone offering a basic backpack for trade, he decided to try his luck. To his surprise, the seller accepted his offer immediately.
What a cool, taciturn big shot.
The next moment, however, the supposedly aloof and taciturn big shot sent him a message:
【ID223987: Do you have any more seeds?】
【I Am A Little Unlucky Myself: Nope, big shot. I only opened one packet.】
Qiyu fell silent.
【I Am A Little Unlucky Myself】 wasn't particularly good at socializing either, so their conversation ended there.
This transaction gave Qiyu a new idea.
After discovering that his special ability was cultivation, he had tried cutting off a few branches and sticking them into the ground, digging up grass with its roots intact and replanting it, and burying wild fruit pits in the soil.
None of those attempts had produced any reaction.
If treasure chests in the game could contain seeds, perhaps he needed to plant those seeds himself?
But how exactly was he supposed to plant them?
No one had ever taught him how.