Chi Zheng walked through the darkness, pulling a fully loaded trailer. He had casually shoved his flashlight into his coat pocket; in truth, he did not need lighting to move freely in the dark.
He had known from a very early age that he was not human. Even now, whenever he wished, he could clearly detect every change across the four levels of the entire warehouse; tracking and locating specific individuals was even easier.
Take Lin Xia in the room next door, for example. Xia Xia had just been working inside the stall cart, but now, for some reason, he was walking in the direction of the cold storage, seemingly looking for him.
Snap—
Chi Zheng switched on the flashlight. He did not want Lin Xia to discover his anomaly. For so many years, he had been masking it well—so well that Lin Xia never knew his true identity and surrendered his complete trust to him.
And he, too, trusted Lin Xia with all his heart. When he was still in an ignorant, primal state, he had already identified Lin Xia as his own—a partner he was willing to support and provide for.
He was willing to be exactly what Lin Xia liked and what he was most accustomed to.
Before the particle storm broke out, he had already noticed that the Zenith Star containers were wrong.
The lead-lined containers held living creatures in a dormant state, and these creatures emitted a strange odor—neither pleasant nor unpleasant, but certainly not something that should be found in the Fourth District, let alone being dropped into the city center.
But what did that have to do with him?
Chi Zheng expressionlessly dragged the small cart toward the outside.
This world had already been thrown into chaos, but as long as those people didn’t come to provoke him, he didn’t care where they were or what conspiracies they were plotting.
He only cared about Lin Xia.
“Chi Xiaozheng!”
Lin Xia stood at the entrance of the cold storage, cautiously peeking inside.
“Chi Xiaozheng, are you there?”
“I’m here.”
Chi Zheng flickered the flashlight toward him.
“What’s the matter?”
“You don’t need to find the goods I asked for earlier. Bring the trailer out; I have something to discuss with you.”
Don’t need it?
Chi Zheng looked at the trailer that was already packed to the brim and emptied it without hesitation.
He pulled the empty cart out of the cold storage.
“What is it?”
“I have a new discovery.”
And so, Lin Xia recounted everything he had received from the customers’ evaluations, then shared his own hypothesis.
“So, I think we can try using that tiger from the third floor. If the feedback is good, it means the stall cart needs mutated creatures as ingredients; collecting ordinary ingredients is useless for us.”
At this point, Lin Xia scratched his head.
“But I’ve never processed a mutated creature. That thing looks so strange—I have no idea what parts are edible and what aren’t. Would you know how to tell?”
Hearing him say this, Chi Zheng nodded.
“Then let’s move it down first and take a look.”
Thus, the two returned the way they came. The mutated tiger was still lying dead in the third-floor corridor. Since it had been shot in the head, the part below the neck remained completely intact, looking not much different from an ordinary tiger.
Watching Chi Zheng hoist the tiger carcass with ease, Lin Xia began to feel a bit worried.
It was true that Chi Xiaozheng was very strong, but no ordinary human could lift a heavy object weighing over 500 catties. If they cut away the parts that couldn’t be eaten, the remaining weight would likely not be enough.
The orange-level task required collecting 500 catties of ingredients. They had previously collected 100 catties of ordinary ingredients, leaving a gap of 400 catties.
“It looks big, but you picked it up with one hand. Is this tiger filled with air? I doubt we can even get 100 catties of usable ingredients out of it.”
“Sigh, we’ll still have to find other mutated beasts to make up the weight…”
He kept muttering to himself, completely unaware of the momentary stiffness in Chi Zheng, who was walking in front of him.
Chi Zheng was now on pins and needles, terrified that Lin Xia would suddenly get the whim to try lifting the tiger himself; if that happened, his superhuman arm strength would be exposed in a heartbeat.
Sigh, why was I so careless? Why did I just pick the tiger up like that!?
Fortunately, Lin Xia was also immersed in his own thoughts and didn’t feel anything was amiss.
“If simply putting items into the stall cart counts as collecting them, we could actually use the stall cart as a transport tool.”
Lin Xia fantasized while walking.
“It’s like the ‘personal storage space’ in novels—take it out when you need it, pack it full, and then put it away. We can travel light, and then when we arrive at the destination, we can take it out again to unload. It’s convenient and labor-saving.”
“Hmm, the orange-level task requires using up all the ingredients. Since this tiger is so big, we have to determine which parts are edible and which aren’t. Otherwise, it’ll be a waste if we process too much.”
Hearing this, Chi Zheng, walking in front, released his conscious tentacles to sniff around various parts of the dead tiger.
“The thighs are definitely edible.”
He pointed to the mutated tiger’s massive, muscular hind legs.
“Doesn’t it look like a cross between a tiger and a bullfrog? Bullfrog legs are delicious, so the hind legs of this mutated tiger should be delicious too.”
He said it so definitively that Lin Xia shone his flashlight on the mutated tiger’s hind legs, pressed down to check the elasticity of the meat, and felt it made perfect sense.
That’s right! He wondered why it looked so familiar—it looked like a bullfrog!
If he cooked the mutated tiger legs using the method for bullfrogs, perhaps his plan would work!
“Is there anything else?”
Anything else?
Chi Zheng shook his head.
“The rest doesn’t taste good, and it’s not edible.”
“This thing is covered in poison glands; only the hind legs are cleaner. You have to be extra careful when processing it.”
For the sake of safety, Chi Zheng took matters into his own hands. He found a fire axe, chopped off the two hind legs of the mutated tiger in a few swift motions, and used a sharp knife to scrape away the scarred skin and lymphatic tissue, revealing the pale-green meat underneath.
Lin Xia wanted to debone them, but Chi Zheng said that the mutated tiger’s bones were porous and brittle; if he stewed or fried them bone-and-all, the meat would be tender and the bones crispy. Besides, the customers of the stall cart were not necessarily human, and they might have strong teeth, so there was no need to worry about wasting the bones.
“Even after removing the bones, there’s definitely not enough to make 400 catties.”
Chi Zheng felt a bit guilty saying this, intending to bluff his way through.
Unfortunately, while he could fool Lin Xia, he couldn’t fool the stall cart. Lin Xia submitted the two hind legs as ingredients, and the cart’s weight display showed 200 catties, which gave him a huge shock.
“It’s this heavy?!”
Lin Xia pulled on one of the hind legs to test it and found that the weight was indeed significant.
That was fine, too. The previously stored ingredients plus the two mutated tiger hind legs reached the weight requirement for the yellow-level task. Next, he just needed to combine these ingredients into 10 recipes, consume them all, and get an passing rating, and the yellow-level task would be complete.
Of course, if he wanted to pursue the high-level orange task, a mere passing grade wouldn’t be enough. However, Lin Xia hadn’t thought that far ahead yet. After all, he had collected a portion of ordinary ingredients earlier, and these were all points-deduction items in the customers’ reviews. Whether the mutated tiger could compensate for those deductions was something even he wasn’t confident about.
One step at a time, I suppose.
Chi Zheng chopped the two hind legs into small pieces, and then it was Lin Xia’s time to shine.
In order to consume the ordinary ingredients to the maximum extent, he added staple food elements to every recipe. Leg meat with buns, leg meat vegetable pancakes, leg meat mixed fried rice, mixed braised meat, mixed vegetable stew, stir-fried mixed meat and vegetables, dry-pot leg meat with cauliflower, braised leg bone and mixed meat soup…
Lin Xia was dizzy from the work, but he dared not rest. The orange-level task had a 24-hour time limit; he couldn’t waste a single second. He had to finish the yellow-level task and get the feedback as soon as possible!
He worked steadily like this for several hours. The 200 catties of ingredients were finally fully transformed into finished products, and Lin Xia selected the ten he was most satisfied with and stuffed them into the “microwave.”
Chi Zheng sniffed and felt that the food prepared by Lin Xia Xia was indeed much more delicious. Before, he had thought the tiger meat was bland and uninteresting, but now, looking at the steaming food on the cart, his mouth began to secrete saliva.
Su—Could the portions that aren’t handed over be his dinner?
“Ding!”
The “microwave” chimed, the cabinet door popped open, the 10 plates of food had vanished, and a stack of small cards appeared on the rectangular tray.
With previous experience, Lin Xia promptly used 1 unit of energy to enable synchronous translation. This time, he received 5 customer review sheets. Averaging it out, the translation cost per sheet was only 0.2 units of energy—which was already a great deal!
—From an anonymous Mr. (Ms.):
An astonishing taste! To be able to make such delicious texture out of inferior scraps is a very rare experience in my lifetime!
This stimulation, like an explosion, very well masked the quality of the scraps. I know that it is difficult for an apprentice to obtain good ingredients, so a person who cooks with heart deserves to be encouraged. I am willing to adjust the rating of this dish to ‘Good.’
—From a Mr. %@@# of ＠＆＆％￥＃＆％￥:
This is the tastiest meal I’ve had from the ％＠＃ monthly subscription meal plan. Although the ingredients were very average, I only bought the cheapest set, so what more can I ask for? Its taste already makes me feel like I’ve profited!
If this quality can be maintained, I am willing to continue paying for the monthly subscription next month. I like the crispy texture of the bones; it makes my ￥＃＠ teeth feel very comfortable. I hope to eat it again next time. I think the quality of this meal is very excellent!
Seeing this, the front windshield, which had returned to its clean state, appropriately displayed a notification.
—Congratulations on receiving your first contract intent form! Excellent apprentices sometimes encounter enthusiastic customers, but they could also be scammers. In any case, they have sent you a contract invitation. Do you agree?
Lin Xia thought for a moment and clicked the “No” button.
As the notification implied, perhaps someone really liked his food, but the possibility of them being a scammer couldn’t be ruled out. Before he fully understood this evaluation mechanism, he had to be cautious—cautious and then even more cautious. He would absolutely not make any risky decisions.
After reading all five feedback sheets, Lin Xia had harvested two “Excellent” and three “Good” ratings. There were still 5 recipes that had not received feedback, but based on the opinions received so far, the path of using mutated ingredients was likely the right one.
He took a deep breath, opened the upgrade task panel, and let his gaze drift past the yellow-level task area, focusing on the orange-level task.
Three “Good” ratings, and five with no feedback.
Whether the progress bar for the orange-level task moves forward or backward depends on this!