Chapter 1580: Cockroach Droppings with a Yi Element Content of 6.8?

Old Four quoted Yang Jin 200,000 this time to recoup the 160,000 spent on enrolling the little wolves in classes. The extra 40,000 was, of course, the broker fee for the human-wolf agent Xia Qing.

Bai Yi droppings go for 20,000 credits per jin, and according to broker market rates, Yang Jin could charge a 20-30% commission. Xia Qing's quote of 20 jin was calculated at the lowest rate.

When it came to haggling, even stingy Yang Jin perked up, saying it was impossible: "The Hui-1 premium termite colony has a population of 50,000, and the annual total droppings output is only 20 jin. To meet Sister Qing's terms, I'd probably need ten years."

Xia Qing wasn't entirely unreasonable either: "It doesn't have to be Hui-1 premium termite droppings. Droppings from any green-light animal with a Yi element content above 6 will do, as long as the total comes to 25 jin."

Yang Jin began calculating: "Gui-1 Base has a group of cockroaches with a Yi element content around 6.8. They're the premium animal manure they use to cultivate high-quality crops. I think I can get a few jin back without much trouble."

Cockroach droppings were good stuff, so Xia Qing added a condition: "Get as much as you can."

Yang Jin thought it over: "If Sister Qing puts up two vials of Injury-Suppressing Agent, I should be able to get 15 jin back."

Xia Qing raised the stakes: "18 jin, delivered within 15 days. Then I'll give you two vials of Injury-Suppressing Agent, plus the two I owe you — four vials in total."

The reason Xia Qing gave Yang Jin four vials was that during last year's third Injury Rain period, she had Yang Jin send people to Hui-1 to capture Peng Yuancai for the wolves' prefrontal cortex removal, with the payment being two vials of Injury-Suppressing Agent.

Add the two vials swapped to Yanlong the day before yesterday, the two used to treat the poisoned western wolf-thief, the one used by the severely wounded veteran in the hidden valley of Mountain Fifty, and the one used by Wu Yunlin, head of Building Maintenance at Center Nine — apart from the two vials reserved for Yang Jin, only two were left.

Xia Qing didn't feel the slightest pang using those two vials of Injury-Suppressing Agent to trade for premium manure.

Because the active enzyme extracted from Tang Huai's body had already achieved mass production, the scarcity of Injury-Suppressing Agent would drop in two months, and the price would fall accordingly. Before the market supply increased, using those two vials to trade with people desperate to lower the injury element in their bodies for premium fertilizer was an extremely cost-effective deal for Xia Qing.

Why not directly trade for or steal Hui-1's high-Yi-element termites and Gui-1's high-Yi-element cockroaches?

After Blue Star's evolution, the native environment had an important, even decisive, influence on an organism's quality. The higher the quality of the organism, the greater its dependence on its place of origin.

For example, rabbits raised in Territory Four had to regularly dig up soil from their place of origin and be fed premium green-light grass from there to maintain high quality; wild boars in the valley of Mountain Forty-Nine, Zone Three, were lively and energetic when free-range in the valley, but if caught and taken to the Hui-3 Safe Zone, with good water, good feed, and isolation from injury elements, they would still grow weak.

By the same logic, Hui-1's termites and Gui-1's cockroaches could only maintain their high quality in the local climate, fed with premium raw materials from their place of origin.

Even if Xia Qing somehow got live termites and cockroaches, she'd have to spend a fortune trading with Hui-1 and Gui-1 for the feed to raise them. So from a cost perspective, it was more economical to directly purchase finished medicine and food.

After the two misers confirmed the deal, they hung up.

The farmer Xia Qing, about to obtain 18 jin of high-Yi-element green-light fertilizer, was so excited she paced around the room several times before calming down and beginning focus training. She didn't enter the first-floor bathroom to coax Handsome Giant Wolf out of the tub until the alarm rang. After toweling him off and letting him dry himself by the fireplace, Xia Qing continued her training.

Handsome Giant Wolf stood by the fireplace until the fur on his belly was half-dry, shook out his thick coat all over, and began stretching his legs by the fireplace — a training drill Yanlong had recommended he add.

Yanlong was a very responsible instructor, especially skilled at tailoring instruction to the student. Since the fees were the same, she naturally treated human and wolf students equally, designing specialized special-training improvement plans for each.

Wolves are born athletes. Hunting demands explosive sprints, sharp turns, pounces, and tearing bites, so their hip joints, shoulder joints, and spine are inherently extremely flexible and powerful.

Yanlong's special training for evolved-wolf students wasn't about having them copy human fighting techniques, but about fusing those techniques with the wolf's core attack moves — pounce, bite, tear, shake — to form a set of "Wolf-Style Combat Arts" exclusive to evolved wolves, full of wild aesthetics.

And leg stretching was precisely the foundational training for this combat art.

This morning, after assembling the wolf students, Yanlong took out the special-training program list she had drawn up overnight. The little wolves' program filled a full page; Handsome Giant Wolf's… ran to three whole pages! Besides leg stretching, Handsome Giant Wolf also had to learn wolf-style horse stance, iron-board abs, single-limb patrol, stake-shadow steps, breath regulation, and other basic combat skills. Yanlong had even designed a few signature moves specifically for him based on his movement characteristics.

After reading it, Xia Qing saw for the first time a hope of Handsome Giant Wolf defeating his brother. Defeat Broken-Waist Wolf? Impossible. Because that guy was way too clever — he'd hide up in a tree and refuse to come down, driving the other wolves mad, and then he'd win.

Handsome Giant Wolf was far too impatient. Having only just learned basic leg stretching that day, he ran off to fight his brother, and got beaten by him again.

Xia Qing pulled her attention back, stopped watching Handsome Giant Wolf, did two hundred push-ups, then rolled quickly, picked up her sniper rifle, took aim, and in the shortest possible time steadied her heartbeat and completed an accurate shot.

This accurate shooting was, of course, simulated. After completing the shooting motion, Xia Qing continued to stare at the virtual target and began using her hearing to precisely pick out specific sounds from the ambient noise — another item in her focus training.

She first picked out the most obvious sound of Big Sheep riding a bicycle, then switched to Handsome Giant Wolf's breathing, then the wind outside the window…

"Creak… creak…"

From within the wind came the faint sound of a wolf treading on snow. She knew that footstep rhythm all too well. She stood up, swiped open the door, and welcomed her companion back from patrolling the territory: "Good work, Lao Er, come on in."

Lao Er, a layer of frost clinging to his fur, grinned broadly.

Xia Qing wiped down Lao Er's coat, then crouched and dried his freshly washed paws with an old absorbent towel, carried him to the fireplace to rest properly, then told Handsome Giant Wolf, and went upstairs to sleep, conserving her energy for tomorrow's special training and mission.

While Xia Qing slept, in the underground chamber of Mountain Thirty-Three in Hui-1's western evolved forest, the Green Dragon team members were doing their final packing; in the inner city of the Hui-2 Safe Zone, Yu Dongming, whose face bore not a single wrinkle, was pacing back and forth in his study, restless and anxious, while in the room directly above his head, the old chairman of the Chonglian Group, Yu Guanfu, put down the phone and wearily closed his eyes; the main door of the Plant Protection College experimental building at Red One University opened, and a group of professors who had been in an online meeting for over three hours filed out.

Han Yanqian, who had been waiting in the cold wind for over an hour, immediately stepped forward to meet them.