Xia Qing scratched her short hair in frustration. “Yang Lao Da, isn’t eating grass supposed to be your specialty?”
*Clack, clack, clack.*
Hearing the sound of Yang Lao Da walking, Xia Qing turned around and saw that he was heading straight for her newly made bamboo chair. She quickly ran over and lifted the chair out of his reach. “Don’t! This thing really can’t withstand a single kick from your hoof. I spent so much effort making this.”
Seeing Yang Lao Da tilting his head and staring fixedly at the bamboo chair, Xia Qing suddenly got his point. “Do you want one too? Sure, there’s plenty of bamboo. I’ll make one for you right now.”
Carrying the bamboo chair, Xia Qing went to the tool room north of the kitchen to rummage for materials and tools.
From the outside, this small building looked like it had three rooms on each floor, but there were actually five. The rooms on the east and west sides were partitioned into north and south sections, and the two northern rooms both had rear windows with decent natural light.
The southwest room on the first floor was the kitchen, while the northeast rooms on both the first and second floors served as bathrooms. Xia Qing used the northwest room—the one north of the kitchen—as her tool room. Inside, she kept various tools she had brought from the Safe Zone, along with useful supplies she had scavenged around her territory over the past few days.
Since she planned to make new furniture, she had cut down quite a bit of bamboo.
Xia Qing carried out several bamboo poles, worked them over with a saw and a drill, and made a legless tatami bamboo bed for Yang Lao Da. Placing it where the sheep usually lay, she sat on it herself to test it out. “This is yours. Lying on this won’t feel cold or damp. Lao Da, come and try it.”
Yang Lao Da seemed to understand it was for him. He squinted at it for a moment before stepping onto the tatami mat, lying down on the side furthest from Xia Qing.
Xia Qing wanted to lean over and pet the sheep, but she was afraid of provoking him and having him wreck the house. Instead, she went back to the tool room and brought out a large bundle of long, thin, semi-dried grass to start weaving a cushion. In the years following the cataclysm, life supplies were scarce, and most people were forced to learn how to make household items like this that didn’t require exchanging hard-earned points.
Xia Qing quickly wove a circular cushion and placed it on the tatami mat. But when she returned after fetching her book on sheep husbandry, she found that Yang Lao Da had already claimed the cushion.
He squinted and stomped his hoof on the cushion, looking as though he was ready to pick a fight right then and there if she dared to object.
Xia Qing…
“That cushion is so small, aren’t you uncomfortable sitting on it?”
“Fine, I’ll make you one too.”
Xia Qing put the book back, brought out two more bundles of grass, and quickly wove a rough grass mat to spread over the bamboo tatami. Sure enough, Yang Lao Da took over the grass mat and stopped trying to steal her cushion.
Sitting on her cushion, Xia Qing read her book for a while to the sound of the rain until her stomach began to rumble. It was time for lunch. Having harvested nothing today, Xia Qing couldn’t bear to eat her rice or flour. She simply took out two pieces of compressed rations and ate them with some hot water.
Having eaten real meals for only two days, Xia Qing already felt that the compressed rations scraped her throat. Nevertheless, she didn’t waste a single bit, stuffing even the tiniest crumbs into her mouth. After washing it down with several gulps of warm spring water, she noticed Yang Lao Da walking over to her, twitching his nose to sniff.
Standing up, the sheep’s head was higher than Xia Qing’s as she sat on her small bamboo chair. Not wanting to be looked down upon by a sheep, she pulled her chair back a bit. “Are you full too?”
Yang Lao Da sniffed again, bringing his head closer to Xia Qing’s hand.
Xia Qing smiled. “Do you like the smell of compressed rations?”
On second thought, it made sense. The cataclysm had caused Blue Star’s agricultural system to collapse. Now, whether it was leaves or grass roots, as long as it was edible, humans would process it into food. The majority of the ingredients in compressed rations were plant roots, stems, and leaves, with a bit of essential salt added. Of course a sheep would like it.
Xia Qing went to the kitchen, chopped up a handful of evolved perilla, opened a sealed package of compressed rations, crumbled it into the grass, and served it to Yang Lao Da. “Here you go, your concentrated feed.”
Yang Lao Da lowered his head to sniff it, and sure enough, he began gulping it down.
Seeing how happily he ate, a brilliant idea suddenly popped into Xia Qing’s head. “Since you ate my rations, you have to work for me. Once the weather clears up, you’re going to pull the plow and till the land.”
After licking the food bowl clean, Yang Lao Da trotted to the sheep pen to drink some water, then came back to lie on the grass mat. The distance between him and Xia Qing was now a tiny bit closer than before he ate the rations.
Xia Qing felt that the tatami was quite comfortable, so she rolled over and continued reading about how to raise sheep. After flipping through the entire book, she turned her head and found that Yang Lao Da had already closed his eyes and fallen asleep.
Her hands itched to pet him, but the moment her hand reached out and touched his wool, Yang Lao Da bolted upright, giving Xia Qing a fright as well. Man and sheep stared at each other for a moment. Xia Qing decided not to lower herself to a sheep’s level and backed down first. “The rain has stopped. Shall we go out and take a look?”
With that, Xia Qing put on her protective suit. Stepping outside, she noticed that the grass in the courtyard was only ankle-high, its growth rate noticeably slower than the previous night. This was because the Qiang element content in this morning’s rain was lower than last night’s.
This was a good thing.
Xia Qing went to the west courtyard to check on the transplanted ginger and garlic. Fearing that some weed might have grown thorns, venom, or animalistic traits that could entangle or bite her, she weeded the pesky grass as she walked. A distance of just dozens of paces took her over ten minutes to cross.
Although they weren’t directly watered by the rain, the sudden spike in atmospheric Qiang elements during last night’s red-level Qiang Rain could still trigger Qiang evolution in living organisms. Xia Qing peeled back the rainproof cloth and indeed found that one ginger plant and two garlic plants had mutated. Not only had they shot up in height, but the color and shape of their leaves had also changed. Xia Qing pulled out the Qiang-evolved seedlings. Instead of being disappointed, she was extremely happy, because after two rounds of Qiang Rain, the majority of her ginger and garlic had actually survived.
After covering them back up with the rainproof cloth, she cleared away the Qiang-evolved weeds in the west courtyard, giving them no chance to develop any formidable offensive capabilities. However, before she could finish weeding, the rain started up again, forcing Xia Qing to head back inside and continue huddling indoors.
The rain fell intermittently for three days: one at the highest-risk red level, two at the orange level, one at the yellow level, and the rest at the blue level. After three days of Qiang Rain, Xia Qing’s territory was completely covered in vegetation. The best-preserved areas were the courtyard and paths she had repeatedly cleared, where the grass was only calf-high. In contrast, the uncleared areas had grass growing over two meters tall, completely swallowing Xia Qing from view.
Once the sun came out, the Qiang element content in the air dropped while the Yi element content rose. Consequently, the growth of Qiang-evolved organisms slowed down, which was favorable for the growth and activity of Yi-evolved organisms.
Bathed in the warm sunlight, Xia Qing patted the only speck of white amidst the boundless, multi-colored mutated plants—Yang Lao Da—and felt her spirits lift. “Lao Da, let’s get to work.”
Using compressed rations as bait, Xia Qing was finally able to touch his wool. This was the most delightful thing to happen to her during the three days of Qiang Rain. “Let’s go! First, we’ll clear a path. We need to fetch water and gather perilla and toon sprouts.”
Mushrooms after the rain? Xia Qing didn’t want to poison herself to death just yet.
Yang Lao Da clearly had no desire to step his dry hooves into the wet, soggy grass, remaining motionless under the front eaves. Xia Qing, clad in her protective suit, didn’t force him either—not that she had the ability to. “Once your big sister has plenty of points, I’ll exchange them for an evolved dog’s protective suit for you to wear. When I’m even richer, I’ll get you a custom sheep-sized one.”
Xia Qing slung her sprayer over her back, tucked her sickle and machete into her belt, and set off.
The courtyard had already been cleared six or seven times, so there was no danger there, but once she stepped outside the yard, it was hard to say. Since the tall grass obstructed her vision, Xia Qing relied entirely on her evolved, exceptional hearing to detect the slightest movements within a two-hundred-meter radius. She pulled weeds while spraying insect repellent. Before she could even leave the village, her phone rang with a call from Zhong Tao.
Upon answering, before Xia Qing could even hear Zhong Tao speak, a sharp, piercing wail came through the line.
Xia Qing knew this voice all too well. It was Feng Wen, her roommate of over four years.
For Feng Wen to be crying like this, had something happened to her brother Feng Teng, or was it Yang Jin, the captain of her beloved Azure Dragon Team?