Chapter 102: Blooming

"No problem, but the Princess holds grudges, so you won't be able to adopt the kitten."

Like owner, like pet—Zhang San is petty, and the cats he raises are petty too. Xia Qing stared helplessly at the filthy Sheep Boss, unsure how to respond.

Zhang San hadn't expected this situation either. "How about I exchange the kitten's twenty thousand points for Green-Light chickens for you? This clutch hatched seventeen Green-Light chicks—seven roosters and ten hens. Once they're a month old, I'll send them all over. If points are still short, I'll hatch another clutch for you?"

Hearing "Green-Light chicken," Xia Qing's spirit returned. "Thanks, Third Brother. Seventeen chickens are enough for me to eat—no need to hatch more. Do you have any other evolved animals to trade?"

The points for the ten hens she'd already paid with two hundred spinach seeds; the seven roosters were seven thousand; one evolved cat was twenty thousand. In other words, Zhang San still owed her thirteen thousand.

Zhang San had deep pockets—if the cat wouldn't work, surely he could trade her something even better.

Zhang San was silent for a few seconds. "Besides the evolved cat, I only have an evolved Green-Light dairy cow left."

Evolved... Green-Light... dairy cow?!!!

The light had barely lit up in Xia Qing's clear black-and-white eyes when Zhang San went on, "The calf has already been traded away. Now there's only one bull and one cow left, and the milk-producing cow can't be traded to you. How about you take the bull and raise it? It can't produce milk, but it can produce manure."

Xia Qing???

Idol, do I look like an idiot to you?

"I'm afraid I'd raise the cow poorly and delay your milk supply. Could I use my remaining points to trade for milk from you?"

Zhang San refused flatly. "I need to keep the milk for myself to drink. Whatever I can't finish, I'll make into milk powder for when the cow isn't producing."

……

What kind of idol is this? Not the slightest consideration for the fans' feelings?

Xia Qing gave up on trading for animals and turned to plants. "Third Brother, could I use my remaining points to trade with you for Green-Light rice seeds and some basic medicines?"

Zhang San happily agreed to these terms. "I just happen to have a batch of high-quality Green-Light rice seedlings. I can transplant them in the next few days—I'll give you a hundred. Get your paddy field ready first. One hundred points per seedling, so a hundred seedlings is ten thousand points. The extra three thousand points are my compensation for failing to keep my promise and trade you the kitten."

After saying that, Zhang San briefly explained to Xia Qing how to prepare a paddy field.

"Thanks, Third Brother." Xia Qing's eyes were brimming with tears.

If Blue Star had a Top Idols ranking and her Third Brother wasn't on it, Xia Qing would be the first to protest.

She couldn't raise a cat, but life had to go on—especially since she needed to catch the wolf that had sneaked into her territory to drink water and pet her sheep, and make it compensate for her losses.

Over the next few days, Xia Qing prepared the rice paddies and harvested mung beans while keeping an eye on Sheep Boss's movements.

In three days, Xia Qing had prepared two mu of rice paddies and harvested over fifty jin of mung beans, but hadn't caught so much as a single wolf hair. She interrogated Sheep Boss; the creature just squinted its eyes without reacting.

So Xia Qing changed her strategy. She hypocritically took out two small bags of Green-Light dried bamboo shoots and a small bag of bamboo rat jerky, packed them into a little basket, and handed it to Sheep Boss, speaking softly: "Boss, your friend must like meat, right? When it comes next time, give it this jerky. The Green-Light dried bamboo shoots are for it to pick its teeth with after eating the meat."

Sheep Boss saw the good food and finally opened its half-squinted eyes. Xia Qing left satisfied.

Another day passed. Sheep Boss carried the little basket in its mouth up the hillside. Xia Qing grabbed her weapons and tiptoed after it to the big camphor tree, only to find that this idiot had torn open the sealed bags with its teeth and eaten the Green-Light bamboo shoots and bamboo rat jerky itself!

Even after it finished eating and wiped its mouth clean, the wolf never showed up.

Damn it! A sheep eating bamboo shoots is one thing, but eating jerky too?!

Xia Qing stormed over and had a fierce fight with Sheep Boss, then gave up on watching the sheep to catch the wolf.

The main reason she stopped paying attention to that wolf was that she'd been too busy these past few days.

The hundred rice seedlings Ji Li had sent over—Xia Qing soaked them in pollution-free spring water overnight, then planted them in the paddy. The Yellow-Light mung beans and Green-Light mung beans, she also soaked as seeds in spring water, then planted one mu and two terraced plots.

After planting the two jin of Yellow-Light corn Luo Pei had sent, Xia Qing immediately started top-dressing the crops.

Approaching the end of June, not only were the cotton blossoms growing more beautiful, but the wheat, peanuts, alfalfa, and potatoes had all bloomed. Flowering is a critical period in plant growth—top-dressing is a must.

Xia Qing hauled the remaining crab shell fertilizer and worm castings from home to the field, first digging trenches to bury fertilizer for the two-fen wheat plot and irrigating it.

Sheep Boss had already turned treading the waterwheel into a cool leisure sport, so irrigating was extremely convenient for Xia Qing: just block the channel leading to the fish pond and open the one leading to the wheat field.

After watering the wheat field, Xia Qing praised Sheep Boss for a few minutes, then top-dressed and watered the potatoes, and went on to fertilize the alfalfa.

She only had eighteen Green-Light alfalfa plants—fertilizing and watering took just a few minutes. Then Xia Qing hurried to the three peanut terraces. Calling them three terraces was generous; there were only two hundred and ten peanut plants in total—thirty-five Green-Light, one hundred and seventy Yellow-Light, and fifteen Red-Light. Fertilizing went quickly too.

But when Xia Qing stood beside the first peanut terrace, she realized things weren't that simple. She couldn't say why, but Xia Qing just felt something was off about the Green-Light peanut plant tied with the red cord.

The air toxin detector on her arm hadn't lit up, so the peanut blossoms weren't emitting any toxin.

The peanut's stems and leaves hadn't suddenly shot up, nor had they sprouted sharp spines or bristles—it didn't seem to have evolved aggressively. But Xia Qing still didn't dare let her guard down, because any Green-Light plant that could survive in the wild into the tenth year of the catastrophe must have some life-preserving trick.

Could Green-Light peanuts shoot leaf darts like the Green-Light bamboo in the Evolution Forest?

The weather had grown hot now, and her territory had been thoroughly cleared several times, so Xia Qing didn't wear protective gear while working in the territory. To be safe, she went home, put on her protective suit, and returned to the peanut terrace.

She first carefully poked the peanut's branches and leaves with a shovel—everything normal; then she used the shovel to dig open the soil beside the peanut and buried the fertilizer—still everything normal.

Was she overthinking it? Xia Qing stared at this Green-Light peanut swaying slightly in the wind for a while, then ran to her private training ground, caught a palm-sized evolved mantis, brought it back, and threw it at the Green-Light peanut seedling. The mantis immediately grabbed the peanut's stem.

Then, a terrifying scene unfolded: the instant the evolved mantis gripped the peanut stem, every peanut leaf its body touched suddenly split open, and the leaf veins pierced into the evolved mantis's body.

The palm-sized mantis only trembled twice before going still. Five minutes later, the Green-Light peanut's leaf veins had drained the mantis's bodily fluids dry. The vein-needles withdrew from the mantis, stretched out, and at a speed visible to the naked eye, grew new leaf flesh and epidermis, re-arming themselves into leaves that looked perfectly ordinary.

If not for the mantis mummy lying beneath the peanut seedling, Xia Qing would truly have suspected she was hallucinating—that the scene just now was something she'd imagined……

……

……

……

!!!

Evolved Green-Light peanuts are actually even more fearsome than evolved Green-Light bamboo—they can precisely hunt and kill any living thing that approaches!

No wonder Green-Light peanuts can still be alive in the tenth year of the catastrophe. Anyone with this killer skill couldn't be wiped out!

Can peanuts grown from a plant like this even be eaten? Or rather, will she live long enough to eat them?

So, should she feed the Green-Light peanuts crab shell fertilizer and worm castings, or feed them bugs?