Chapter 430: Toon Bell Pods

After delivering the rooting powder to Territory No. 8 and picking up the exchanged supplies, Ji Li got out of the vehicle and returned to Territory No. 7, while Zhong Tao and Zheng Kui continued driving the patrol car south to deliver supplies to the lords of Territories 11 through 26.

After watching Ji Li walk off into the distance, Zhong Tao couldn't wait any longer and tore open the cold, black packaging bag Xia Qing had given him. When he saw the note and the supplies inside, he was stunned.

Zheng Kui, who was driving, glanced at him. "What is it? What scared you like that?"

Zhong Tao was afraid of being overheard and didn't dare make a sound; he just waved the note in front of Zheng Kui.

"Squeak—"

After Zheng Kui clearly saw what was written on it, he was so startled that he slammed on the brakes.

Under the effect of inertia, Zhong Tao's body lunged forward; it looked like his head was about to smash into the front windshield. But he couldn't be bothered about his head and clutched the black bag in his hands tightly.

Zheng Kui grabbed Zhong Tao just in time, preventing his head from hitting the bulletproof glass. Looking left and right and confirming no one was around the vehicle, Zheng Kui lowered his voice and asked, "How much?"

Zhong Tao held up two fingers: eight jin!!!

Zheng Kui took a deep breath, read the note Xia Qing had written over and over several times, and only then said, "Take it all back home for the kids to eat."

The meat of a high-grade green-light evolved animal raised in the Evolution Forest has a nutritional value far higher than that of poultry fed at breeding centers. If given to children to eat, it could very likely induce the awakening of an evolved ability.

Zheng Kui's wife and child had died in this year's third Scourge Rain; now he was all alone in the world. Zhong Tao's children were still young and in a stage of rapid growth.

Zhong Tao certainly wanted it, but he was even more aware that for ordinary people like him and Zheng Kui, meat of this quality might only come their way once in a lifetime.

So no matter how much he wanted it, he couldn't reach for it. "Xia Qing wrote it clearly — for personal consumption. Lao Zheng, you eat it yourself. Even if it doesn't induce an evolved ability, it'll definitely boost your resistance. I'll wrap the meat in thermal film; let's deliver the supplies fast, and once we're done, hurry back. We should make it back to the safe zone before the ice melts."

Zheng Kui nodded, restarted the car, and floored the accelerator.

"To tell you the truth, Lao Zheng. When Xia Qing first came out of her territory, I saw she was one of the few evolved lords, and her territory was right on the edge, so I wanted to get closer to her and get some benefit." Zhong Tao wrapped the head up, put it in a cardboard box in the back, and not feeling reassured, piled two more boxes on top before continuing, "Back then I really didn't expect she could have this kind of ability."

Zheng Kui grunted in reply and reminded Zhong Tao, "This is just between the two of us; we can't tell our families either."

"Don't worry, they couldn't beat it out of me." Zhong Tao figured, "We can't take this meat for nothing; we need to get some supplies Xia Qing needs and send them over. What do you think would be appropriate? Fertilizer?"

Zheng Kui had a different opinion. "Territory No. 8's compost fungus powder is already on sale; with Xia Qing's ability, she won't be short on fertilizer. Thermal insulation material is more suitable than fertilizer."

"You've got a point. Let's figure out together what would be good…"

Inside Territory No. 3, Xia Qing put two thousand jin of crab-shell fertilizer into the warehouse. After returning to the house, she first used uncontaminated spring water to dissolve the rooting powder, then soaked the two hundred chive roots she had exchanged into the water.

Operating as she went, Xia Qing told her two companions, "These are chives. You two don't like them, but they're my food — stir-fried with eggs, mixed into meat filling, both taste great."

Sheep Boss squinted and stood nearby watching; Sick Wolf sniffed it and lost interest, walked over to the food dehydrator, and raised his head to sniff.

After soaking the chive roots, Xia Qing walked into the kitchen. "The jerky still needs two hours to dry. Let's cook snake meat porridge for lunch — Sheep Boss eats cabbage stems, how about it?"

This snake meat was very tough; Xia Qing was afraid she couldn't bite through it stir-fried, so she decided to dice it small and boil it into snake meat and vegetable porridge.

She and Sick Wolf would eat the good stuff, but of course she couldn't shortchange Sheep Boss. Xia Qing took a big cabbage from the vegetable storage room, cut some, mixed it with bran for Sheep Boss, added a tiny bit of salt, and made a nutritious and tasty concentrated feed for Sheep Boss.

The cabbage was very fresh. Xia Qing picked up a piece and stuffed it to Sheep Boss, gave Sick Wolf a small piece, and also ate a piece raw herself. It was clearly a fresh cabbage harvested only a few days ago — it looked dewy and moist, but eating it had an astringent taste, which was the common flavor of edible vegetables after the Catastrophe.

Some say it's the taste of Scourge elements, others say it's the taste of other pollutants. The flavor isn't pleasant, but it makes one feel very satisfied, because many people simply can't afford natural food and can only use compressed rations to stave off hunger.

Xia Qing, too, was only able to eat vegetables and grain every day after she came out to farm. After eating more of them, she discovered that the native vegetables of this territory had a milder astringent taste.

After one person, one sheep, and one wolf had carefully tasted the cabbage, Xia Qing offered her review: "This cabbage has plenty of moisture and a nice texture. Does Sheep Boss like it?"

Sheep Boss's face was expressionless.

"Does Wolf Lao Er like it?"

Sick Wolf, who had been panting happily, immediately shut his mouth and stared at Xia Qing seriously.

Got it — understood, neither of them liked it.

Xia Qing crumbled half a compressed ration into the concentrated feed, stirring as she spoke: "I see the pods on the Chinese toon tree are almost ripe. The day after tomorrow or so, let's clip them off, harvest the toon seeds inside, and put them in the greenhouse to sprout toon shoots to eat. How about it?"

Chinese toon pods are the fruit borne on the Chinese toon tree. The fruit of the Chinese toon is a capsule, called a toon pod or fragrant pod; it is oval-shaped and hangs on the tree in clusters like grapes. When the toon pod ripens, the fruit's color changes from green to yellow, then gradually to dark brown.

Once the fruit is fully ripe, it splits into five valves, revealing the white central axis and seeds inside, looking just like a little bell — which is why it's called a fragrant bell pod.

All this knowledge about the Chinese toon tree was gathered by Tan Junjie and sent to Xia Qing. When Xia Qing saw the materials, she simply couldn't imagine what a bunch of green grapes growing on a Chinese toon tree would look like.

This year, Xia Qing watched the Chinese toon bloom in May or June, and the green fruits that grew gradually enlarge, only then realizing that its capsules, like bananas, grow upward. Clusters of fruit growing together really do look a lot like grapes.

This morning, when she carried the giant python back to the territory, Xia Qing passed under the Chinese toon tree and noticed that the fragrant pods on the tree had already turned from yellow to yellowish-brown, showing signs of splitting — the right moment for picking, as the materials said.

After the toon seeds are harvested, they can be used to propagate saplings, and also to sprout vegetable shoots, press oil, and for medicinal use.

Of course, this is the Chinese toon tree from before the Catastrophe. As for what uses the Chinese toon seeds of the tenth year of the Catastrophe have, that has to be analyzed case by case, because Chinese toon trees in different natural environments can differ in their degree of evolution, or even in their direction of evolution.

With the precedent of the green-light chestnuts, Xia Qing wasn't sure whether this Chinese toon tree could produce seeds, or whether they could sprout.

So, after harvesting the fragrant pods, Xia Qing had to first see whether the toon seeds could sprout.

"Baa." Sheep Boss had a particular fondness for toon shoots; hearing Xia Qing's words, he immediately happily chimed in.