Chapter 4: The Lord's Rights

Two months ago, when she came with the combat squad to clear the territory, Xia Qing had already scouted this entire area thoroughly. Territory No. 3 covered six thousand mu, making it the third largest in area among the two hundred territories that had been cleared.

To thoroughly eliminate the evolved harmful creatures, all arable land within the territory had been cleared and burned, and the three abandoned villages inside had been sprayed twice with strong insecticide and repellent.

Xia Qing had taken part in the village pest-eradication work the whole time, so even though the sky was already dimming, she wasn't worried about being attacked by evolved creatures as she walked into the abandoned village where the grass was taller than a person.

Pushing through the waist-high wild grass, she entered the most intact two-story self-built house in the middle village, set down her bag in the first-floor living room, went out to gather some dead branches, closed the door, lit a fire, and checked the things she had received from the hall.

One primary purification filter cartridge, capable of purifying 200 liters of lightly polluted fresh water.

Thirty jin of compressed rations—eaten sparingly, enough for four months.

Six jin each of evolved wheat, mung beans, cotton, and small potatoes, plus one packet each of evolved pumpkin, cucumber, tomato, and eggplant seeds. If these seeds can be grown well, they'll be ready to eat in four months; vegetables will be ready even sooner.

What Xia Qing regretted was not receiving any evolved sweet potatoes. Last year, when she followed the Azure Dragon combat squad on a mission, Xia Qing had been given a small piece of evolved sweet potato, and its wonderful taste still lingered in her memory.

Because rations and seeds were distributed by the bag, Xia Qing couldn't be sure whether all lords received the same kinds of seeds—she'd have to find a way to inquire.

After putting away the seeds, Xia Qing took out the old phone she had just received. When she turned it on, she found two green vertical lines on the screen, and the display flickered on and off. This was perfectly normal—any phone that could still power on and work in the tenth year of the apocalypse was a good phone, no matter what.

On the phone's home screen was a Word document called "Complete Guide to Planting," which illustrated over thirty safe and optional crops in detail; sweet potatoes were among them. Xia Qing didn't look closely, set the phone aside, and pulled out the equally "excellent" little radio the base had issued to lords.

After the catastrophe collapsed the vast and efficient modern communication systems humanity had built, using simple radio sets and receivers to send and receive information became the primary means of long-distance communication for a long time. Even today, many ordinary people inside the safe zones still rely on them.

Hui-Three Base has now restored signal coverage within the safe zone, but communication quality is far below pre-catastrophe levels. Inside the safe zone, phones can only be used for calls, text messages, and the Hui-Three Base mission platform app. Signal towers outside the safe zone haven't been repaired yet, so there's no cell signal in Xia Qing's territory.

After placing the base-issued phone and radio together with the one she was currently using, Xia Qing took out the land-use rights certificate. After carefully reading the text on the back, her eyes gradually lit up.

The broadcast repeatedly said the rights of lords would be protected, but never mentioned any specific protective measures.

During the catastrophe, attacks by evolved flora and fauna on humans were certainly terrifying, but what felt even more hopeless was the slaughter, plunder, and bullying by one's own kind. Among those who died after surviving the first three years of the catastrophe, at least thirty percent were killed by other humans.

Xia Qing's father was "accidentally killed" by a high-level evolved human during a beast attack on the safe zone.

Xia Qing watched that scene with her own eyes, but because she lacked the strength, she still couldn't avenge her father.

In today's scarcity of food and supplies, lords who had left the safe zone's control, held grain, and stood alone naturally became fat prey in many people's eyes.

Lords without sufficient strength might at best have their hard-won harvests stolen, at worst lose their lives for it. This was the main reason why, even knowing high-level evolved beasts had been driven out hundreds of miles, many still didn't dare leave the safe zone to farm.

So, to let lords farm with peace of mind, in addition to promising to dispatch troops on round-the-clock patrols, the base granted lords one important right:

The land-use certificate states that all resources within the marked boundaries belong to the lord. Anyone who enters the territory without the lord's permission commits the crime of illegal trespass and will be severely punished according to law. To protect the lord's person, property, and other rights from ongoing illegal infringement, any act taken to stop such infringement—even if it causes harm or death to the infringer—constitutes legitimate self-defense.

Simply put: killing someone who trespasses onto your territory is not a crime!

Her chance to avenge her father—hadn't it just arrived?

Xia Qing picked up a thigh-thick branch beside her and snapped it easily, tossed it into the fire, stretched hugely, and pulled over her enormous canvas bag.

This two-hundred-jin canvas bag held all of Xia Qing's worldly possessions: one set of bedding, one sleeping bag, a pack of simple cooking utensils and seasonings, a large pack of carpentry and electrical tools, two large packs of building materials, six knives, a long-used small radio, a powerful slingshot, and a hundred and fifty books—covering gardening, planting, animal husbandry, carpentry, electrical work, house renovation, and everything in between.

After her mother passed away, planning and preparing for the new post-catastrophe life became Xia Qing and her father's favorite thing to do when they were tired. After her father's death, it became the main force keeping Xia Qing alive.

In the tenth year of the catastrophe, she finally walked out of the safe zone and began a new life.

Xia Qing packed the books one by one into waterproof, moisture-proof storage bags, then opened her clothing pack and took out a phone hidden inside.

The phone the base issued to lords couldn't contact the outside world within the territory, but hers could. Strictly speaking, this phone was called a "satellite communication terminal"—a gift from her parents for her college entrance exam the year the catastrophe struck.

After the only Huaguo satellite communication system capable of global coverage was restored in the third year of the catastrophe, all satellite communication terminal equipment became hotly contested resources. Within Hui-Three Safe Zone, some had traded satellite phones for life-saving food and medicine, and many had lost their lives over them.

After her father was killed and Xia Qing had to share a dormitory with outsiders, she hid this phone away, only turning it on when she was sure it was safe—to watch old videos and photos, and to receive satellite text messages publicly sent by the nation and Hui-One Base headquarters, learning what was happening outside Hui-Three Base.

The last time she had turned it on was New Year's Eve—exactly sixteen days ago. Now that she was in her own territory, Xia Qing could use her phone without worry.

After turning it on and connecting to the communication satellite, the phone quickly received over a hundred disaster warnings, news items, and announcements. Xia Qing read through them one by one; the content was the same as before—the information in the texts and short bulletins she had already gotten from the radio, with one exception.

Fifteen days ago—that morning of the first day of the New Year—an unknown number had sent her a text message. That unknown number and the message content were already deeply etched into her mind. Because on the same day, three minutes earlier, the phone she used inside the safe zone had also received a text with the same content from that same number.

Dear readers, the author would like to make a note here about the naming conventions for creatures in this book: (since it hasn't gone on sale yet, I'm putting it directly in the main text)

On Blue Star, the evolution of all creatures is divided into two types: ordinary-level evolution and evolution that exceeds ordinary level. For reading convenience, when creature names appear later in the text, ordinarily evolved creatures will use their original names directly, while super-ordinarily evolved creatures will have the word "evolved" added before their name, such as evolved potato, evolved snake, etc.

Following this logic, high-level evolved creatures whose evolution exceeds five times the ordinary evolution of their species will have the four characters "high-level evolved" added to their name, such as high-level evolved potato, high-level evolved snake, etc.