Chapter 427: Shan Ying Versus Zhang San

The planting greenhouse within Territory Three is fifty meters long and six meters wide, with a total indoor area of 300 square meters. Subtracting the corners and walkways, the planting area is 250 square meters—less than half a mu of land—but for Territory Three, which has only one person, one sheep, and one wolf, the vegetables grown here are more than enough to eat.

These 250 square meters were divided by Xia Qing into 25 small vegetable beds running north to south. Each bed is 1.6 meters wide, with 0.3-meter ridges separating adjacent beds. The beds were made this narrow to make it easier to squat on the ridges later for weeding and fertilizing.

After tidying up the vegetable beds, Xia Qing leaned back against Sheep Bro, her feet touching the sick wolf's big paw, ignoring Zhou Xun's voice in the lord channel clamoring to search every territory for the suspect who blew up the helicopter, and scribbled in her little notebook, considering what to plant in this greenhouse.

Eggplant, green beans, cucumber, pumpkin, and chili—these five vegetables have already been planted for two crops this year. The fresh vegetables and dried vegetables of these five types stored in Xia Qing's underground vegetable cellar will last a long time, so there's no need to plant them this winter.

Spinach is the first thing to plant. By January, the premium nutrient solution in her hands will be nearly used up, and she'll need fresh spinach juice to make nutrient solution.

Xia Qing now has only 1,200 high-Yi-element spinach seeds left. She can plant 400 this time and save the rest for next spring when the weather warms up.

The hundred ordinary green-light spinach seeds given by Zhang San, because they weren't irrigated with unpolluted spring water nor protected with Yi stones, only 28 plants matured in the end—13 green-light and 15 yellow-light—yielding 7,500 green-light seeds and 8,800 yellow-light seeds.

To avoid drawing attention, 400 ordinary green-light spinach seeds will be planted, and the remaining seeds will be used to trade for supplies or seeds with other territories.

The second thing to plant is green-light perilla.

Perilla doesn't demand much in terms of fertilizer and water. Even when planted in ordinary soil, its Qi-element growth per crop is around 3‰, making it a highly stable plant variety. That's why the base's planting center grows it in large quantities, making it the main raw material for producing the No. 3 compressed rations.

The green-light perilla in Xia Qing's territory grows in a planting zone with high-Yi-element soil, so its Qi-element content only increases by about 1.2‰. Most of it remains green-light when it sets seed, so Xia Qing harvested nearly ten thousand green-light seeds. She generously allocated 2,000 seeds, planning to fill three vegetable beds.

Planting so much perilla serves no other purpose than to make her companion Sheep Bro happy. This morning, to "save her," Sheep Bro dared to fight the human-planted powerhouse Yan Long to the death, and even called in powerful "reinforcements," which moved Xia Qing deeply.

The third vegetable to plant is green-light alfalfa, for the same reason as the second—to feed Sheep Bro!

Compared with perilla, alfalfa's stability is far worse. Back in spring, someone in Territory Four was spying on Territory Three from a tree and was caught by Xia Qing. Zhao Ze used 20 stalks of green-light alfalfa to apologize to Xia Qing.

At the time, Xia Qing planted the alfalfa in the planting zone and tended it carefully. The Qi-element content measured then was around 4.3‰. After two Qi rains, only 18 plants survived to set seed, but only 1 remained green-light at 4.8‰; the other 17 turned yellow-light, with Qi-element content between 5.5‰ and 7.5‰.

Fortunately, the single remaining green-light alfalfa produced 3,000 alfalfa seeds.

Alfalfa is a perennial plant. This lone surviving green-light alfalfa has already passed through its seed and juvenile stages and entered maturity. In principle, as long as it isn't severely damaged, its Qi-element content won't increase rapidly anymore, and it will remain in the green-light period for a long time to come.

So next autumn, Xia Qing can still obtain around 3,000 seeds from this green-light alfalfa plant.

With a grand sweep of her pen, she allocated 1,500 seeds for Sheep Bro to plant in the greenhouse.

The fourth plant Xia Qing originally planned to grow was wheatgrass. Unfortunately, too many things have happened recently, and she hasn't had time to go to the Evolution Forest to look for edible wheatgrass seeds. And the two wheatgrass plants she grew in flower pots, for some unknown reason, withered and died without setting seed.

She hopes Xin Yu will quickly act and finish off Xu Pin, hopes the Blaze people will get out of this territory soon, so that Xia Qing can rush to the Evolution Forest before the Qi snow to collect edible wheatgrass seeds, and then go dig up the peanuts from Mountain Fifty.

Thinking of peanuts, Xia Qing gently stepped on the meritorious sick wolf's big paw with her foot, then opened her phone to check the red squirrel's location and found that this injured little fellow was actually still hiding in the sheep shed.

"Third Brother, you there?" In a gap between Zhou Xun's cursing, Li Si spoke up coldly.

Xia Qing put down her pen and listened closely.

"Speak."

Although her idol only said one word, Xia Qing could tell he was in a good mood. She figured the 400 jin of premium evolution green-light python meat she sent over had pleased him greatly. Die-hard deep-pit fan Xia Qing grinned.

A stranger's voice, in a familiar tone, asked and introduced herself: "Third Brother, this is Shan Ying. You've got time now, right? I'll come find you, and we'll have lunch together."

Xia Qing raised an eyebrow. Shan Ying of the Blaze Squad should be on good terms with Zhang San—no wonder the Blaze Squad sent her.

Unexpectedly, Zhang San's voice turned flat: "Since you joined Blaze, your skin has gotten thicker."

"Third Brother really hasn't changed at all." Shan Ying's voice carried a smile. "Was yesterday's beef to your liking? I also brought twenty jin of premium evolution green-light meat, non-artificially farmed. Shall I bring it to you now?"

Twenty jin?

Xia Qing heh-hehed.

Zhang San also heh-hehed: "I have no interest in eating meat, no interest in wasting time having a meal with you, and even less interest in participating in your big project."

Zhang San's blunt refusal in the lord channel cost Shan Ying face, and her voice also went flat: "Third Brother, being a little willful is fine, but if you refuse to cooperate with me out of willfulness and let the common people who could have been saved continue to be tormented and driven mad by Qi elements, that's going too far."

Zhang San's voice was deep and measured: "Are you trying to teach me how to do things?"

Shan Ying's temper wasn't small either, and she locked horns with Zhang San: "I wouldn't dare, and I don't have that qualification either. I'm just, based on the most basic conscience of being human, giving you a friendly reminder."

"Friendly? Fine. As long as you produce thirty thousand high-Yi-element green-light spinach seeds within ten days to promote planting and boost the whole population's resistance, and prove your conscience with action, I'll agree to discuss cooperation with you."

"Well said!" Xia Qing clapped.

Damn it—hoarding high-stability spinach seeds without promoting them, and yet having the nerve to stand on the moral high ground and criticize my idol!

Shan Ying's voice went icy: "Third Brother, these are two completely different things—don't mix them together. We're a private research base, with no state funding. If we lose our main business income, what do we use to buy materials and do research, and push forward the major research projects in our hands? You know perfectly well that if any one of our projects is shelved, it's a major loss for the country and the people!"