Lu Xuan looked up at her, his expression cold. “I hunted the prey; I’ll decide how much to keep. If you aren’t going to trade, step aside.”
Su Ying’s exceptionally limpid, alluring eyes widened slightly in disbelief that any man could be so oblivious to her charms.
Was she not pretty enough? Was her voice not soft enough to stir his heart?
She knew that in the past, whenever she used this same attitude on other men, those weak-willed individuals would be easily charmed into a daze. If she added a few more sweet words in that soft tone, she could make those lecherous men feel so good that their bones would turn to jelly, and they would do whatever she asked without a second thought.
She had expected this to go just as smoothly, but to her surprise, she had hit a wall!
Su Ying bit her pink lip, feigning grievance on the surface while feeling inwardly annoyed.
It was one thing for this Lu Xuan to be a fool in the past and oblivious to her charms, but now that he had recovered, he was still as thick as a stump—truly, rotting wood that could not be carved!
Li Jing and Zhang Chengming exchanged glances, both remaining silent.
They had heard of Su Ying’s usual behavior; seeing her delicate, soft posture, they knew immediately that her old habits were flaring up again—she was trying to coax Lu Xuan into cutting her more meat so she could take advantage of him.
The auntie waiting in line behind her urged impatiently, “Are you buying it or not? There are still plenty of people waiting behind you, don’t dilly-dally.”
“That’s right, don’t waste our time.”
“Who do you think you are, someone who relies entirely on men for support and doesn’t have to work for anything yourself?”
Seeing the unkind expressions of the women in line, Su Ying gritted her teeth in secret. She turned to Lu Xuan and said in a soft voice, “Please give me five pounds of hind leg meat and two pounds of ribs. Sorry for the trouble, Young Brother Lu.”
Ignoring the flirtatious glances Su Ying was still unsuccessfully casting his way, Lu Xuan expressionlessly handed her the meat and signaled for her to move quickly so as not to hold up the people behind her.
Su Ying: “…”
The viewers in the livestream room were laughing hysterically by now.
[Literally throwing flirtatious looks at a fool; the streamer is truly single by merit! Hahaha.]
[I never thought I’d be able to watch a good drama just by seeing the streamer divide meat; tsk tsk, wonderful!]
[This girl is quite pretty. Does the streamer really have no thoughts at all?]
[Looking at her hairstyle, she’s clearly already married. You can’t touch a married woman; the streamer is right to keep his attitude straight and maintain his distance!]
[I hate “white lotus” types the most! Well done, streamer!]
After shooing Su Ying away, it took Lu Xuan another half-hour to finish dividing the meat.
Except for a few households in better condition who traded for ten pounds at once, most families traded for three to five pounds each.
The offal and the large bones—from which he had deliberately left some meat—were sold or given away by Lu Xuan to the impoverished families that consisted mostly of the elderly and frail.
As for the front leg meat, Lu Xuan set it aside and handed it to Li Jing and Zhang Chengming.
The village chief and the Zhang family, his neighbors, had helped the Lu family out quite a bit in the past. Since he had arrived here and possessed sufficient ability, it was only natural for him to repay them on behalf of the Lu family.
The other villagers didn’t feel unbalanced by this; instead, they thought Lu Xuan was a generous man and began to view him with even higher regard.
Li Jing and Zhang Chengming couldn’t refuse and eventually accepted the meat, though they were already thinking about bringing some supplies over to the Lu house when they got home. The Lu family’s situation wasn’t great, and they couldn’t just accept such a big favor for free.
As the villagers left with their meat, Lu Xuan carried the remaining wild boar and the supplies he had traded back into the courtyard.
Seeing him about to continue processing the wild boar, Lu Qing again offered to help.
But Lu Xuan said, “Sister, it’s getting late. We should prepare lunch; Brother-in-law must be starving in the fields waiting for it.”
Lu Qing looked up at the sky; it was indeed time to prepare lunch.
Lu Xuan patted his stomach. “Let’s cook two of the wild rabbits I brought back for lunch, and take ten eggs—fry half and make egg custard with the other half. Oh, and make a bit more rice too.”
Lu Qing was stunned. Ten eggs for a single meal? What kind of household is this!
One egg cost a copper coin, so ten eggs meant ten copper coins—enough to buy two pounds of brown rice that could feed the family for several days!
And the rabbits, too—she had seen them; each one weighed three pounds. Cooking two at once? How many people were in their family? How could they ever finish that much?
Lu Qing shook her head rapidly. “No, no! That’s too wasteful!”
Lu Xuan: “We don’t need to use the family’s eggs. I picked up plenty of pheasant eggs in the mountains. Besides, didn’t many people bring eggs to trade for meat earlier? We aren’t lacking for eggs now.”
Lu Chen, who had been holding back his excitement, said to Lu Qing, “Sister, brother picked up half a basket of eggs! I counted, there are over twenty!”
Lu Qing was startled. She pulled the basket from not far away and took a look. “So many?”
Including the ones traded by other families, there were over sixty in total!
Lu Xuan said, “So don’t be reluctant; eggs are picked to be eaten.”
Lu Qing struggled for a moment, then backed down slightly: “Then… let’s just cook one rabbit, that should be enough, right?”
Lu Xuan replied helplessly: “My appetite is very big. I was never full before, but I want to eat more today. One rabbit won’t be enough.”
Hearing this, Lu Qing stopped trying to talk him out of it.
Thinking that whether it was eggs or meat, it was all brought back by Lu Xuan anyway, if he wanted to eat, why shouldn’t he? She suppressed the heartache of spending so much and nodded: “Alright! I’ll cook it for you!”
Upon hearing that there would be meat and eggs for lunch, Lu Chen’s eyes shone with joy, his previously hard-earned composure vanishing instantly. He exclaimed excitedly: “I’ll go get the firewood and get the stove fire going right now!”
The viewers in the livestream became excited as well.
[Finally reaching one of the biggest highlights of a plane livestream—the eating segment! I’ve been waiting for this for a long time!]
[And there are main courses today! Finally, it’s not the watery porridge and light side dishes from the last two days. It’s been tough.]
Although the interstellar civilization was technologically advanced, due to special radiation in the universe, the soil, flora, and fauna on most habitable planets had mutated, making them impossible to plant or consume.
People could only use technology to extract useful elements to create nutrient paste. Eating natural food was only possible after the livestreaming system was developed and deployed to various planes a century ago. Even then, natural food was scarce and would be snatched up the moment it appeared on the market.
Eating a meal made of natural ingredients at a restaurant could cost ten thousand star coins, which the average interstellar citizen couldn’t afford.
If you can’t eat it and you’re craving it, what do you do?
Naturally, you can only watch those who can afford it livestream and share their food to “quench your thirst by looking at plums.”
But those who could afford it usually came from prominent backgrounds, and not many were willing to livestream. Thus, the real growth of “eating streams” came from streams of planes with superior environments.
Seeing the viewers acting as if they were celebrating the New Year, Lu Xuan simply shifted the livestream camera to the kitchen, allowing them to supervise and wait for the upcoming lunch.
He then opened the system interface.
There were four icons on this page: Livestream, Mall, Messages, and “My Dashboard.”
“My Dashboard” allowed him to view various data, including fan count, exchanged points, livestream replays, and achievements—the latter currently grayed out and unclickable.
Skipping the other functions, Lu Xuan clicked directly on the “Points Exchange” icon.
Here, gifts received in the livestream room could be converted into points. Points were the currency needed to purchase items in the Points Mall.
For the past two days, he had been staying in the village to familiarize himself with the basics. His livestream content had been bland, and the food had been poor. His popularity had hovered at just over a thousand online viewers, with only two or three hundred followers, and gifts were negligible.
Today was different. Not only had his popularity risen significantly, but he had also received quite a few gifts while hunting.
[Do you want to convert all gifts into system points? Please enter the specific amount.]
Lu Xuan chose to convert everything.
[Exchange successful.]
[Current total points: 120.]
The exchange rate between gifts and points was ten to one. 120 points meant he had received gifts worth 1,200 star coins so far.
For a newcomer, this wasn’t a bad number.
Seeing that his account balance was finally not at zero, Lu Xuan opened the Points Mall.
The Points Mall contained many items from the interstellar civilization.
They were divided into several categories based on their function: Food, Clothing, Medical, Daily Use, Transportation, Weapons, Entertainment, etc. It was essentially everything one could need. However, most items in these categories were currently grayed out and locked; he couldn’t see their specific prices or purchase them.
Currently, only one or two items per category were available for purchase—for example, nutrient paste in the food category, common household medicine in the medical category, basic men’s and women’s clothing in the clothing category, and tables and chairs in the daily use category.
The prices weren’t high. A dose of medicine cost 20 points, with options for cold, anti-inflammatory, or pain relief medication. Tables and chairs were generally priced between a few dozen and over a hundred points.
The cheapest was the nutrient paste—each tube cost only ten points. Despite being only 100g, it was enough to provide the energy needed for a full day. One tube a day meant he could cover his basic survival needs for only three hundred star coins a month—very convenient.
However, convenience and flavor were two very different concepts.
Lu Xuan spent thirty points to purchase three nutrient pastes of different flavors. Almost the moment he clicked “buy,” the three tubes appeared in his hands out of thin air.
The nutrient paste looked somewhat like a popsicle, though only half the length of a regular one.
Lu Xuan bit into the original flavor to taste it.
The texture was soft, like flour paste that had been overcooked and mixed with too much water, but without the natural grain fragrance; it was bland, tasteless, and very thin… it had absolutely nothing to do with being “tasty.”
He tasted the other two—fruit and meat flavors—and found that the product was just “selling dog meat under a sheep’s head.” Despite the labels, they were filled with artificial flavoring and were not even as good as the original.
The only redeeming quality was that it was truly filling.
He had expended quite a bit of energy in the morning and hadn’t eaten much, so he had been starving. After eating the three nutrient pastes, the hunger that had made him want to devour the wild boar raw was significantly relieved.
However, his appetite was much larger than an ordinary person’s. For a regular interstellar person, one tube could last a day, but he would need at least ten or so.
Of course, that was just a figure of speech; he didn’t plan on actually buying them for sustenance.
Is chicken, duck, fish, or meat not tasty? Is beef, mutton, or pork not fragrant?
With creatures that fly in the sky, swim in the rivers, and run in the mountains—so many pure, natural ingredients waiting for him—he wasn’t like an interstellar human with no other options. There was no need to treat nutrient paste as a staple.
Compared to nutrient paste, he was much more interested in other high-tech products possessed by the interstellar civilization, such as… storage space.