Chapter 686: Exchanging Bamboo Shoots

"Got it!" Kuang Qingwei answered loudly at once. "Wife, I'll weigh the bamboo shoots, you keep count and write the slips!"

"Okay!" Zhu Li answered happily. Kuang Qingwei and his wife didn't have enough points on hand right now, so after collecting the goods they could only owe everyone the payment first, and transfer the money to everyone once they sold the bamboo shoots.

The members of the Lord Alliance knew the difficulties Territory Six was currently facing and all agreed.

"We're selling 540 jin of yellow-light bamboo shoots and 55 jin of green-light bamboo shoots." Shi Du and his mother had already discussed it beforehand; the two of them carried back a total of 1,120 jin of bamboo shoots. The yellow-light ones were all sold, and of the green-light ones they only kept one big one to try fresh, since their territory had green-light vegetables to eat anyway.

Before they went, they had planned to exchange any green-light bamboo shoots they harvested to Zhang San, but this time their luck was good—they discovered six green-light bamboo trees, and Xia Qing got over a hundred jin of green-light bamboo shoots. She was definitely going to exchange them to Zhang San, so the Shi family decided to sell to Kuang Qingwei.

The other lords thought about it much like Shi Du and his mother. Qi Fu also only kept one green-light bamboo shoot. Lord Huo Lei didn't sell any green-light bamboo shoots—his son had discussed it with him in advance, and the green-light bamboo shoots dug up this time would be given directly to Zhang San as thanks.

Seeing Tan Qi also walk over hugging the only bamboo shoot she had left, Tan's mother opened her mouth, then closed it again.

When Tan Qi walked over to Zhu Li's side, Yuan Yan lowered her voice to discuss with her, "The 90 points for finding the bamboo shoots—I'll give them to you later, okay?"

This afternoon, Tan Qi had helped Qi Fu and his wife find five bamboo shoots, totaling 90 points at the price they'd set earlier. Yuan Yan, seeing Tan's mother's attitude, was afraid that if she gave the points to Tan Qi now, they'd be snatched away by her grandmother too.

Xia Qing didn't get involved in other territories' affairs. After taking the IOU Zhu Li wrote for her, she shouldered her harvest from this trip and left Territory Fifteen.

Tang Huai quickly finalized the exchange terms with Kuang Qingwei for buying the green-light bamboo shoots from him, then jogged after Xia Qing.

Wen Nengjie, who had been waiting outside the north gate of Territory Fifteen, saw Xia Qing come out carrying supplies and asked eagerly, "Sister Qing, are you selling your bamboo shoots?"

Xia Qing shook her head. "I sold my extra bamboo shoots to Kuang Qingwei. I won't sell a single jin of what's left."

Realizing the business idea he'd thought of had been snatched first by the middleman Kuang Qingwei, Wen Nengjie was secretly annoyed, but kept a respectful smile on his face. "Sister Qing must be tired after a whole day—let me carry these bamboo shoots back for you?"

"Not tired." Xia Qing refused directly, passed through the crowd to the Territory Seven road sign, and called Zhang San.

Zhang San's voice was kindly. "You dug up this many? How many green-light bamboo shoots can you offer for exchange?"

Xia Qing had gone to dig bamboo shoots this time mainly to improve the meals for her idol and Sheep Boss. "Bamboo shoots are at their tenderest and most delicious this season. Would sixty jin left for you be enough?"

Zhang San's voice was so kindly it was almost melting. "That's plenty. Just tell Yan Long directly what you want to exchange for."

Hearing Xia Qing open her mouth and exchange away sixty jin of green-light bamboo shoots, the people watching from the corridor were calculating how many points this batch of supplies was worth when they saw a tall woman without a protective mask walk out from Territory Seven. With a cold expression, she took the supplies and asked Xia Qing what she wanted to exchange for.

Those bamboo shoots were exchanged by Xia Qing for various kinds of insecticide, pesticide, and fungicide.

"Wait here." Yan Long understood that Xia Qing wanted the onlookers to know that although her harvest wasn't small, farming required heavy investment and she used it all up right away—so there was no need to keep eyeing her.

"Brother Huai." The onlookers didn't dare provoke Xia Qing, who was bristling with weapons and murderous intent, so they asked Tang Huai for information. "Can we exchange for Territory Seven's medicines?"

In the past, there were no walls outside the territories, and no one dared leave their own territory, so these people only knew Zhang San was the commander who had quelled two disasters and the person in charge of the P3 laboratory, that he had good things in hand, but they had never directly exchanged supplies with Territory Seven.

Tang Huai was active in every lord channel and got along well with everyone, so he answered directly. "As long as you have relatively rare and good-tasting green-light food, you can try bringing it to exchange with Territory Seven."

Hearing this, several people's eyes began to spin—clearly scheming. Tang Huai snorted coldly, warning them to behave. "If the vegetables or meat you bring over don't meet green-light quality, or are spoiled, then you'll be blacklisted by Territory Seven and they won't trade with you in the future. Last spring, a piece of meat Territory Two exchanged with Territory Seven wasn't packaged properly and went bad by the time it was delivered, so Territory Two was blacklisted and became a refused-associate."

Hearing that even Territory Two, which had Sufeng backing it, didn't dare offend Zhang San, those few schemers clearly restrained themselves.

After taking the exchanged supplies from Yan Long, Xia Qing walked west along the corridor, returning to her own territory.

Tang Huai trotted along beside Xia Qing, chattering nonstop. "How did you harvest so much this time? I remember this time last year you teamed up with Beard Feng's squad and only brought out about 1,300 jin of bamboo shoots."

Xia Qing glanced at Tang Huai. Tang Huai explained with a cheeky grin, "Good hearing, can't help it—caught it on the wind."

Xia Qing couldn't be bothered to fuss over past matters and answered calmly, "When we teamed up last year, only Guan Tong and I in the team were strength evolvers."

With few strength evolvers, the supplies brought out were naturally less. Also, the paths hadn't been opened up back then, and there were plenty of fierce beasts on Mountains 50 and 49, so going in and out of the Evolution Forest carried a high danger coefficient.

This year, going to dig bamboo shoots, more than half the route had already been opened up, and there were no large animals on the Third Peak of Mountain 50 or on Mountain 49, so the risk on the way there and back dropped. That's why Xia Qing dared to gather only two defenders, yet bring six strength evolvers and one ten-year-old speed evolver to dig bamboo shoots.

Still, six strength evolvers being able to carry out over three thousand jin of bamboo shoots also exceeded Xia Qing's expectations.

Shi Du, whose strength evolution level was five and a half, carried out 900 jin of bamboo shoots. Adding the other supplies he carried, his load reached about 950 jin.

This time last year, Xia Qing, a level-six strength evolver, carrying over seven hundred jin of supplies and returning to the territory at forced-march speed, ended up with both shoulders swollen, and obvious pain in her back, waist, and both legs.

Although the route was easier this time and the return speed wasn't raised to a normal collection squad's regular pace—they even rested twice along the way—Shi Du carrying nearly a thousand jin of supplies over 15 li was still risking his life.

The others' situations were about the same. Xia Qing understood that they dared to push this hard for two reasons: first, out of trust in her as their captain; second, because opportunities like this were rare. The lords all lacked points, so they hoped to seize this chance to harvest more supplies and exchange them for what they needed.

After Xia Qing returned to her territory carrying supplies, she received a warm welcome from Sheep Boss.

Xia Qing didn't stand on ceremony. She put her backpack directly on Sheep Boss's back, steadying it with her hands and letting it carry it home. As they walked, Xia Qing chatted with it. "Boss, today I saw Little Whitey in the Evolution Forest. It was with what seemed like a pretty fierce weasel—don't know if it was hunting or busy with something."

"Baa~~~" Sheep Boss answered in a pinched, winding voice. Smelling the bamboo shoots, its mood was super good—whatever Xia Qing said made it happy.

"I also ran into a honey badger. Honey badgers like eating snakes—hopefully it can wipe out those qiang snakes that suddenly popped up in this part of the Evolution Forest."

"Baa~~~"

"Did any of our chickens hatch today?"

"Baa~~~"

Xia Qing smiled. "Alright, let's go home and eat bamboo shoots first. We'll talk about the rest after."