Chat:
[…I never even thought about these issues; I’ve just been sitting here watching the stream like an idiot, yelling. Seeing you guys analyze all this makes me feel like I’m about to grow a brain.]
[Same here. I’m sorry, I’ve brought shame to the Interstellar population. Self-covering face, jpg.]
[In summary, the host definitely has a secret!]
[So what is the secret?]
[How would I know.]
[I feel like we’re just one tiny clue away from figuring it out.]
[Why not just ask the host?]
Lu Xuan, who was being named, shoved the newly roasted roe deer meat into his mouth and said again: “You guys keep guessing?”
Livestream viewers: …Guess, guess, guess—you just love making us guess! You don’t give any hints, what the hell are we supposed to guess!
Lu Xuan watched them frantically roasting him and continued roasting his meat, minding his own business. By the time he had eaten nearly ten jin (5 kg) of meat and felt full, he casually adjusted the angle to let them appreciate the natural scenery of the deep mountains, while he checked his backend data.
The stimulation from the two battles easily brought a massive surge in both the livestream’s concurrent viewers and followers.
The number of concurrent viewers rose from over 20,000 to over 120,000, and his follower count had reached over 50,000!
Lu Xuan clicked on the flashing system notifications.
[Achievement “10,000 Followers” reached. Reward: One 10,000-viewer traffic voucher. Next stage achievement: 100,000 followers. Reward: Unknown.]
[Achievement “Reached 100,000 concurrent viewers” reached. Reward: 10,000 points. Next stage achievement: 1,000,000 concurrent viewers. Reward: Unknown.]
Hitting two achievements in one go—not a bad return for letting the mutant blood-sucking vine make its debut.
He then looked at his gift earnings. The exciting performance during the boar slaughter, followed by the blood-sucking vine’s display of power, were all high-light moments. As expected, many fans had excitedly thrown gifts at him. The combined value of gifts of various prices totaled over 30,000, which could be converted into over 3,000 points.
Lu Xuan converted all the points immediately.
Including yesterday’s 3,000-plus and the 10,000 points he’d just gained, his total points now stood at just over 17,000.
This number was enough for him to buy what he wanted.
As he opened the system store, he adjusted the livestream angle back to himself.
The viewers had already guessed that he was checking his gift income; seeing him open the store, they knew he was about to spend his “money”!
Some viewers immediately asked if he was going to buy out the entire stock of nutrient solutions to hoard.
“No.”
Lu Xuan denied it as he switched the page from the food category to another one. Without hesitation, he clicked to purchase the newly unlocked item: the largest storage equipment currently available, a 100-cubic-meter spatial ring.
Livestream viewers: ???
[I don’t get it. Host, didn’t you already open a 100-cubic-meter spatial ring in the newcomer gift pack? Why buy another one? To pack up your household goods? You don’t need to buy two for that, right?]
Lu Xuan made a “tsk” sound. “Naive.”
Ask any modern person—setting aside those who can’t even guarantee their basic survival—if they have enough strength and know the apocalypse is coming, what is the most important thing?
Is it food? Weapons? Or something else?
None of the above.
It’s space!
All kinds of supplies needed for survival are undoubtedly important, but in the apocalypse, if you have so much stuff, where are you going to put it?
Supplies can be hoarded, but first, you must have enough space to store them so that no matter where you go, you can keep all your supplies on your person without inciting greed in others.
[That actually sounds reasonable!]
[But 200 cubic meters is still a bit too much, isn’t it? If you’re just storing nutrient solution, even if you eat ten vials a day, that’s only about 3,000 vials a year—just a few hundred boxes. Combined, they’d only take up one corner of the space.]
Lu Xuan said languidly: “Is 200 cubic meters really a lot? There are still twenty days until the first catastrophe. During this time, I intend to buy as much space as I can get my hands on. A thousand or eight hundred cubic meters won’t be too much.”
If it weren’t for the fact that he was saving points to unlock even larger spaces, he would have bought three in one go.
[?? Is this an addiction?]
[I know many ancient-era (modern) streamers have a strange fascination with spatial equipment. Is the host also in this category?]
[Host, don’t be foolish! Distinguish the primary from the secondary! 200 cubic meters is already huge. Use those points to buy more nutrient solution! Besides, even if you buy that much space, do you have enough silver to fill it with supplies? You’ll be embarrassed if you can’t even fill one.]
Lu Xuan said indifferently: “Isn’t that what I’m earning money for right now?”
Filling hundreds of cubic meters of space would indeed require a lot of silver. The speed at which hunting brought in money was still too slow, and he hadn’t pinned his hopes on hunting from the start.
To earn big money, he had to rely on other treasures.
Lu Xuan’s gaze couldn’t help but wander into the endless deep mountains. A faint expectation appeared in his bottomless eyes.
He hoped the gains of these few days wouldn’t let him down.
After eating and taking a short nap, Lu Xuan set off again.
This time, he didn’t deliberately “fish” for prey. While traveling, he paid attention to the surroundings and deliberately bypassed areas where fierce beasts or herds were active, taking detours.
During this time, he also used the 10,000-viewer traffic voucher he had just received. New viewers who had seen the recommendation because of the traffic voucher trickled into the livestream one after another.
[An ancient-era livestream? Is he a newcomer? Never seen him before.]
[What are they doing? Jogging? The surrounding environment is just a blur, can’t see anything—are we just looking at nothing?]
[Lu Xuan? Is this the host that some blog posted about a couple of days ago who supposedly kicked a wild boar to death?]
[Primitive animals have low combat power, so is kicking a wild boar to death really a big deal?]
The veteran viewers noticed so many new viewers appearing and quickly guessed that Lu Xuan must have used his 10,000-follower traffic voucher. So, they enthusiastically educated them on Lu Xuan’s glorious achievements, telling them not to be impatient, as there might be a high-intensity scene coming soon.
They emphasized that Lu Xuan was a Wood-type ability user who had contracted an incredibly powerful mutant plant, and that his combat power was completely on par with high-level interstellar ability users.
Many new viewers had been ready to leave because Lu Xuan was just busy trekking, but the mention of Wood-types and contracted plants instantly grabbed their attention. They finally became interested and started asking for details.
Others went directly to watch the replays of Lu Xuan’s previous streams and, upon seeing the content that interested them, clicked “follow.” His follower count began to rise slowly.
Lu Xuan wasn’t blind to the new viewers’ skepticism, but he didn’t deliberately bring up any enticing topics to try and force them to stay.
The livestream system could be his trump card, but it couldn’t turn him into a slave to the stream.
Those who liked watching his stream wouldn’t need much persuasion to stay, and there was no need to force those who weren’t interested.
However, seeing him dashing all over the deep mountains, leaping onto giant tree roots from time to time to scan his surroundings, but never making any follow-up moves, both new and old viewers couldn’t help but ask what he was actually doing? Or, what was he looking for?
Lu Xuan’s gaze locked onto the base of a massive ancient tree. He curled his lips, vaulted down from the tree trunk, and with a few more leaps, appeared beneath the target tree. Simultaneously, he shifted the livestream perspective to a red object at the base of the tree roots.
Chat:
[Eh? Is that a mushroom? It’s pretty big.]
[It looks hard and not very tasty. Did the host spend all day roaming the mountains just to find that?]
[I’ve watched plenty of ancient streams, but I’ve never seen a mushroom like that.]
Lu Xuan’s mouth twitched, feeling speechless at the ignorance of the interstellar citizens. “What mushroom? This is a lingzhi; it’s much more valuable than a mushroom.”
Lu Xuan gave the bewildered interstellar viewers a simple science lesson on the benefits and aging of lingzhi. As he explained, some who had watched other ancient-era livestreams finally remembered this medicinal herb.
Immediately, someone asked how much money this lingzhi could actually sell for.
Lu Xuan carefully picked the lingzhi and said: “The price definitely can’t compare to ginseng, but if you accumulate enough, you can still sell them for a decent price.”
Lingzhi is different from ginseng.
For ginseng, the longer it grows, the more medicinal efficacy accumulates, making it worth a fortune.
But lingzhi matures in two years; after two years, the various beneficial components for the human body begin to gradually decline.
It wasn’t that deep mountains couldn’t grow lingzhi that was decades, a hundred years, or even older, but those were just big, intimidating to look at, and in reality, no different from wooden stakes.
Because of this, the price of a single lingzhi could never compare to ginseng.
But if one wasn’t enough, then ten, or a hundred.
It was still a precious medicinal herb, after all. Selling one for dozens of taels was never a problem.
Dozens of them added together could still sell for a significant amount of money.
Not long ago, they had said that the host would be lucky to earn eighty or a hundred taels from a few days of hunting, and yet here he was, directly finding a precious medicinal herb that could sell for ten times that amount!?
Lu Xuan shared his plan with the viewers and then looked toward the endless mountain range that stretched into the distance.
“The mountain next to Yunlu Village is adjacent to the Yunlu Mountain Range, which stretches over thousands of cubic kilometers. The deep mountains are fraught with danger; basically, no living person can set foot there.”
“You tell me—just how many lingzhi and aged ginseng have been hidden away there, unpicked by anyone?”
Viewers: !!!
How many precious herbs could be found in the entire mountain range?
The answer, of course, was—countless.
Not enough space to store them? That doesn’t exist.
The only thing he’d ever have to worry about was not having enough points to buy enough space to hold the supplies he could buy!
What made it even more pleasant was that all the treasures he found in the mountain were free for the taking—no cost of investment. How could this not be considered “zero-dollar shopping” in another sense?
You have to know that people in the apocalypse love “zero-dollar shopping” the most.
[Good heavens! I’m truly, good heavens!]
[It turns out we were the naive ones! The host had it planned from the beginning; he never had to worry about not earning enough money!]
[Selling medicinal herbs is such a lucrative business! I also want to go to the ancient era to hunt for treasures and herbs!]
[Just imagining how many herbs the host might find and how much money he could sell them for… I’m numb! Wouldn’t he become rich overnight!?]
[Nutrient solution can indeed keep you full, but white rice is definitely tastier. With sufficient funds, nutrient solution is truly useless garbage; there’s no need to hoard too much.]
[He doesn’t even need to eat nutrient solution while facing a natural disaster, while we only have nutrient solution to eat every day. I won’t say who’s jealous—my heart aches for myself!]
[That hits home! Crying, head in hands!]
Lu Xuan stored the lingzhi carefully in his spatial ring and watched the viewers’ commotion for a while before saying: “Alright, I’m going to continue.”
With that, he resumed his search in the vicinity.
Perhaps the environment nearby was very suitable for lingzhi growth; not long after, Lu Xuan discovered another red lingzhi.
Then another one, two, three…
Viewers: “…” Ah… what, there’s this many?
Is this money… a little too easy to earn?