Chapter 210: Dangerous Sunflower

The corn plants had grown past 1.6 meters tall, with the vigorous ones already above head height—tallest among the crops planted in the territory, and also the hardest kind to spot when dangerous evolution occurred.

Knowing long ago that the third Evolution Rain was coming, everyone had of course prepared in advance. Shi Zhong replied, "I piled up a half-meter-tall earthen ridge in the corn shed."

Kuang Qingwei replied, "Shi-ge's method is great—why didn't I think of that? I made over twenty tall stools; during the Evolution Rain I'll set them up in the corn shed and stand on them to watch the cornfield."

Compared to tall stools, earthen ridges were easier to move back and forth on, so Xia Qing and Qi Fu had also built earthen ridges in advance.

Tang Huai suddenly spoke up, "Xia Qing, you definitely can't hold out alone for seventy hours. How about I come help you? A hundred points a day will do."

Everyone:...???

Xia Qing refused crisply, "I've already hired hands to help guard the territory."

Tang Huai was about to say more, but his father cut him off, "Tang Huai, if you've got nothing to do during the Evolution Rain, come back and work."

"Okay, Dad." Tang Huai answered. He also knew Xia Qing wouldn't agree, but he was very curious about how the mad sheep and sick wolves in Territory Three were doing, and wanted to go take a look.

Hearing Tang Huai had stopped making a fuss, Zhao Ze asked quietly, "Luo-ge, if my territory can't keep up with the work, can I invite people from your territory to come help?"

This was also what the owners of Territories Five, Six, and Ten cared about—they all pricked up their ears to listen.

Luo Pei answered mildly, "During the Evolution Rain, most of the main force members of the Azure Dragon Squad have to garrison the Safe Zone, so I'm short on hands too. Each territory can only send two or three people to help—fifty points a day for ordinary squad members, a hundred points a day for standard evolved members, two hundred points a day or more for advanced evolved members, and weapons consumed fighting evolved creatures will also be charged for."

This hiring price was quite high by Safe Zone standards, but protecting a territory and protecting the Safe Zone were different in difficulty—territories faced more uncertainty and danger, so the high price was reasonable.

For lords planting at least ten mu of crops, these points were nothing. Zhao Ze answered first, "Many thanks to Luo-ge for lending a hand at such a dangerous time. I'd like to hire three standard evolved members to help."

After Qi Fu, Kuang Qingwei, and Shi Zhong each reported their hired numbers, Tang Huai couldn't hold back again, "Captain Luo, didn't you guys open up over a thousand mu of wasteland? Sending out this many people, will you still have enough?"

Hu Zifeng immediately shot back, "As long as no one rotten to the core releases evolved rats during the Evolution Rain, our manpower will be enough."

Everyone:...

Tang Huai, shouldering the big iron pot of being "rotten to the core"...

Luo Pei answered mildly, "Although we've opened quite a bit of land, most of it is still empty, so it doesn't take many hands."

Tang Zhengpo exchanged words with Luo Pei, "Captain Luo, are you planning to plant overwintering wheat?"

Luo Pei replied, "Yes, but we haven't gotten our hands on good wheat seed yet."

Tang Zhengpo caught the implication, "Same here. I'm planning to plant more wheat to contribute to the base—I've been busy looking for good wheat seed."

After the two lords, farming thousands and hundreds of mu respectively, finished their exchange, the smaller lords planting a dozen or several dozen mu continued theirs.

Kuang Qingwei asked, "Qi-ge, if I pull off the cotton bolls that don't have many bolls now and dry them, will the bigger bolls below be able to flower?"

Qi Fu wasn't sure either, "By reason it should work, right?"

"You can pull them off." In the lord channel, a long-absent, cold voice rang out.

The owner of Territory Nine, Li Si, who had been taken away over a month ago for illegally storing large quantities of prohibited chemicals in her territory, had returned!

Li Si was an expert in planting. The lords were surprised to hear her voice, and immediately seized the chance to consult her on methods for dealing with the Evolution Rain.

Kuang Qingwei quickly asked, "Fourth Sis, is it okay to pull the cotton off and put it in the shed? Or do I need to bring it home and put it indoors?"

Li Si answered coldly, "After pulling them off, remove the leaves and put them somewhere the Evolution Rain can't reach, where the roots don't touch soil but air can circulate, to avoid piling up and going moldy. After the Evolution Rain passes, spread them out to dry in the sun—the fully formed bolls will crack open one after another."

Kuang Qingwei replied immediately, "Got it, thanks a lot, Fourth Sis. The weather's been bad lately—take care of yourself and drink more hot water."

Everyone scrambled to ask a few questions. Li Si's voice, though clearly weary, remained professional in her answers—apparently over a month of interrogation and detention hadn't done her any real harm.

As for how she'd spent the past month, everyone was curious, but they all knew their limits and didn't open their mouths to ask.

Xia Qing also asked, "Fourth Sis, is the likelihood high that yellow-light sunflowers will undergo dangerous evolution?"

Li Si replied calmly, "What you took out from the Safe Zone was evolved dwarf oil sunflower seed, with a growth period of about seventy-five days. If you sowed it right after bringing it back, the oil sunflower seedlings have now passed the seedling and bud stages—the slow-growing ones are in the flowering stage, the vigorously growing ones have entered the mature stage. The probability of evolution occurring during the flowering stage is higher than during the mature stage."

"As for the probability of evolution, it depends on how well the planting greenhouse isolates Evolution Elements. During the red Evolution Rain lasting over an hour and a half in the eighth year of the Calamity, oil sunflowers at three bases in Hui City underwent dangerous evolution—the plants shot sunflower seeds outward at high speed, causing massive casualties."

Sunflowers that shoot sunflower seeds at high speed—wouldn't that just be a machine gun...

The sudden red Evolution Rain in the eighth year of the Calamity, which caused massive casualties, was everyone's nightmare. They hadn't expected that within that nightmare, disasters they didn't know about had also occurred.

Qi Fu asked without much confidence, "Fourth Sis, after two years of cultivation and optimization, the stability of oil sunflowers should have improved, right? Otherwise the Safe Zone wouldn't have sold the seeds for everyone to buy and plant, right?"

The oil sunflower seeds had been publicly sold by the Territory Management Department at the July agricultural products trade fair—nearly all lords had bought the maximum of two hundred seeds and planted them in their territories.

Before hearing Li Si say all this, they'd still felt that sunflowers past the flowering stage and into the mature stage had a high chance of safely weathering the third Evolution Rain. But now they all regretted not planting a few days later. Because sunflowers in the flowering stage, even if they evolved, couldn't shoot out sunflower seeds.

Why? Because the flower heads of sunflowers in the flowering stage haven't grown seeds yet!

Li Si answered Qi Fu's question coldly, "I didn't test the quality of this batch of oil sunflower seeds, so I can't answer your question."

As for why she hadn't tested them—of course, just a few days after bringing the seeds back, the dangerous chemicals incident happened, and then Li Si was arrested.

Just as everyone was on edge, Li Si suddenly called Xia Qing out by name, "Xia Qing, why are you concerned about the possibility of oil sunflower evolution?"