Entering the Dark Forest for the second time, the system only provided an entry prompt, omitting the detailed introduction from her first visit.
With the "Dancing with Trees" buff active, it didn’t take long for Xia Qiu to pick up over thirty pinecones. A quick glance at her backpack confirmed it: Pinecone x57.
This time, no hidden achievements were triggered. It seemed the "Pinecone Thief" title didn’t have an advanced version.
From the world channel last night, she had learned that the Hero’s Box contained some random rewards in addition to the fixed materials. For instance, someone had found a 20-slot medium backpack, while others had gotten common tools. One player had even obtained a refined hand axe and put it up for trade on the world channel.
The game had only been running for a day, yet the world market prices were more chaotic than the character relationships in a soap opera. Before finalizing her camp location, Xia Qiu temporarily decided against trading for long logs and planks on the world channel.
Who knew? Maybe she could find a way to get long logs directly from the dense forest.
The easiest resources to gather were the ones that just required her to move her hands and bend over. Xia Qiu frantically collected materials that matched the types already in her backpack. When she was hungry, she gnawed on her dry rations; when thirsty, she took a small sip of water.
The drinking water she had traded from Song Ci’an last night amounted to only 500ml, which was nowhere near enough to sustain such high-intensity activity. When there was only a tiny drop of water left at the bottom, Xia Qiu finally left the dense forest, feeling reluctant to go.
Upon leaving, she tallied up the materials she had gathered all morning. The total haul was quite substantial. Not counting yesterday’s items, she had picked up: Short Wood x7, Pinecone x32, Red Mushroom x10, Gray Umbrella Mushroom x15, Sturdy Vine x20, Flint x10, Pyrite x5, Hematite x7, Dry Grass x10, Large Leaves x15, Stone x20...
Her backpack was stuffed to the brim, without a single empty slot left.
Xia Qiu wiped the sweat from her forehead with her sleeve. She opened her private messages, intending to trade for another 500ml of water from Song Ci’an, while simultaneously scanning her surroundings to see if any direction looked like it might have a river. Song Ci’an didn’t reply immediately, likely busy gathering resources as well. Find the original chapter at novelping.com.
There was drinking water for sale on the world channel, but the prices were ridiculously high. The asking price for 500ml of water was three pieces of long wood, and they didn’t even accept short wood as a substitute.
It was just a bit of thirst; she could endure it a little longer.
A red dot lit up in the center of the floating yellow circle. Xia Qiu thought Song Ci’an had replied, but upon opening it, she found a message from the Pioneer who had traded her a grilled fish for five red mushrooms yesterday.
[Pioneer: Friend, do you still have any red mushrooms? I still have grilled fish over here. Fair price, still five for one.]
Song Ci’an still hadn’t replied, and the scorching midday sun was already making Xia Qiu’s mouth dry and parched.
[Xia Qiu: I still have red mushrooms, and I also have gray umbrella mushrooms. I don’t want to trade for grilled fish. Do you have drinking water?]
The system automatically classified boiled water as "drinking water." Any other water drawn from rivers or pools was just considered "regular water." There was a high probability that the Pioneer was a chef. Trading for drinking water from him would definitely be cheaper than getting it from anyone else.
[Pioneer: Yes, yes! I have plenty of water. How do you want to trade?]
[Xia Qiu: Do you only want mushrooms? Do you need any other resources?]
[Pioneer: My first choice is definitely ingredients. If you want to trade something else, that’s fine too. I’m short on flint. I can give you 1.5L of water for one piece of flint.] Find the original chapter at novelping . com.
Flint was a single-use consumable when used to start a fire. Xia Qiu was a bit reluctant to part with it, but the Pioneer didn’t need any of her other resources. As for the mushrooms, she selfishly didn’t want to trade them away. The fact that the Pioneer was a returning customer for the mushrooms proved that red mushrooms could be used as an ingredient. Being non-toxic and harmless meant they were perfectly viable backup rations.
In a survival game, the most important things were undeniably food and weapons. But even if she found a river herself, boiling water would be a hassle since she had no cooking utensils.
The leather water pouch she had found in the Hero’s Box had a capacity of exactly 1L. Xia Qiu agreed to the Pioneer’s price, trading one piece of flint for 1.5L of drinking water.
This was one of the perks of the game system. If water was the only item being traded, players had the option to provide their own containers. Moreover, the trade details were clearly displayed above the transaction box, eliminating any possibility of someone playing tricks.
Noticing Xia Qiu’s thermos during the trade, the Pioneer wanted it just as badly as Song Ci’an had.
[Pioneer: Do you have any extra thermoses? I can trade cooked dishes for them. Let’s add each other as friends! I’ll give you a discount when you trade for food in the future!]
Since the other party had taken the initiative to send a friend request, Xia Qiu had no reason to decline.
[Xia Qiu: I don’t have any extra thermoses. At the time of the ***, I happened to be holding a box of miscellaneous items, so I brought them over together.]
Three words in her sent message were censored. Xia Qiu had tried to type "Blue Star earthquake," but the system had flagged it as a restricted term and automatically censored it.
The Pioneer obviously guessed what she meant.