Chapter 71: Losing Control in the Rain

These long, thick bamboo strips have one end buried and fixed at the field's edge, while the other end is tied to the top of a long bamboo strip fixed on the opposite side of the field, forming an arched frame of the rain shelter.

After erecting a series of arched frames spaced half a meter apart, top crossbeams and side secondary beams are used to secure the arched frames, then a door header and front braces are installed, completing a standard rain shelter frame measuring one hundred fifty meters long, four meters wide, and three meters tall.

Although the crops inside the shelter are currently all under one meter tall, the rain shelter absolutely cannot be lower than three meters. If it's lower than three meters, first, it would be inconvenient for people to move around inside, and second, the catastrophically evolved crops would rapidly grow at least twice their size in a short time, destroying the rain shelter.

After the frame was set up, rainproof cloth was laid over it, and every available fastening—iron wire, nylon rope, cloth strips—was used to stretch the rainproof cloth tightly over the frame, with the edges firmly weighted down, completing the rain shelter.

The rain shelter she built is so professional that even the planting specialists from the Safe Zone would have to call it professional.

Xia Qing spent five years on a construction crew, and she helped build more than half of the specialized greenhouses at the Safe Zone Planting Center. So the greenhouses on her territory are certainly professional enough—only the materials can't compare with those at the Planting Center, but a shelter built with bamboo boards can absolutely withstand two days of ninety-millimeter catastrophic rain.

Territory Three's northwest is embraced by Gaoshan on two sides, making it unlikely to be hit by strong winds, but Xia Qing, out of ingrained caution, still carried out every step with great care.

The sweet potato and pumpkin shelters, which only vine and don't grow tall, can be lower. But Xia Qing has no shortage of bamboo or rainproof cloth, and since the sweet potatoes and pumpkins are next to the potatoes, Xia Qing plans to combine the three crops and build a standard shelter.

Although she had enough materials, Xia Qing wouldn't indulge the pumpkin vines' bad habit of crawling everywhere. She straightened and coiled each of the evolved pumpkin vines, which were over ten meters long, and tucked them neatly into the rain shelter. Looking at the orderly green bundles, Xia Qing felt an unusual sense of satisfaction.

After the large shelter was finished, Xia Qing also built rain shelters to protect the two patches of red-light peanuts, Sheep Boss's pasture, and a large patch of evolved Bai Mao chicken-dropping vines on her territory. By the time she was done, night had fallen completely.

Xia Qing still had enough materials left for one more standard shelter, but she had absolutely no intention of giving any to Zhao Ze or Tang Huai. Instead, she distributed these materials among the various rain shelters as backup supplies.

At ten o'clock the next morning, the clouds thickened from partly cloudy to overcast, and a southeast wind carrying moisture came whistling in. Xia Qing immediately put on her protective suit and hurried with Sheep Boss to the small hut by the fields.

This hut was built by Xia Qing some time ago in her spare time, using building materials salvaged from the abandoned village. The small hut has a pointed roof, one door and one window, and is twelve square meters, used by her and Sheep Boss to rest.

If catastrophically evolved crops are not removed promptly, they will affect the surrounding crops. If it's a dangerous catastrophic evolution, the consequences of not clearing it in time are even more severe.

However, Xia Qing wasn't too worried about her crops developing medium- or high-danger catastrophic evolutions. Because the vast majority of the seeds on her territory came from the Safe Zone, and these seeds have been bred over many generations—as long as the red catastrophic rainfall doesn't seriously exceed the standard, the likelihood of dangerous catastrophic evolution is very low.

Dangerous catastrophic evolution refers to when a creature, after catastrophic evolution, gains enhanced new abilities that pose a threat to humans. This threat includes the catastrophically evolved creature releasing toxins, or evolving active attack abilities.

By danger level, dangerous catastrophic evolutions are divided into high, medium, and low three grades. The dangerous evolved tree that appeared on Xia Qing's territory during the first catastrophic rain, Tan Junjie said, belonged to medium-grade dangerous catastrophic evolution.

Medium-grade danger—ordinary evolved people might not be able to withstand it.

Over the next two days and forty-eight hours, Xia Qing had to patrol the fields every hour, promptly removing catastrophically evolved plants and guarding against and killing dangerous catastrophically evolved animals.

Xia Qing had already spoken to Hu Zifeng, telling him that if she couldn't handle it alone, she would ask Hu Zifeng's squad to come reinforce.

Sheep Boss, who lost control during this year's first catastrophic rain, might lose control again in this catastrophic rain. If it loses control again, at best it will wreck the place, at worst it will completely lose its senses and become a violent, highly aggressive catastrophically evolved animal.

Therefore, Xia Qing had another important task during the second catastrophic rain: protect Sheep Boss, and absolutely must not let it go berserk again.

Xia Qing had two options: one was to give Sheep Boss a soothing capsule in advance, the other was to keep Sheep Boss by her side at all times. The soothing capsule had too many side effects, so Xia Qing chose to keep Sheep Boss with her at the field's edge, accomplishing both.

Half an hour after the catastrophic rain began, under Xia Qing's stroking and soothing, Sheep Boss showed no signs of losing control. She felt a little relieved and went to patrol the rain shelters.

Xia Qing took a small bundle of fresh grass from the rack and placed it in the trough. "Boss, eat some grass first, I'll go take a turn in the shelter and be right back."

Sheep Boss stood up to eat grass, and Xia Qing, wearing her protective suit, left the hut and stepped onto the path that had emerged from the ground surface, patrolling in the planned order.

After one full circuit, not a single crop on her territory had undergone catastrophic evolution.

This was because Xia Qing's rain shelter was built so professionally that it didn't leak, and the drainage around the shelter worked well. Protected by the rain shelter and drainage ditches, the crops inside hadn't yet come into contact with the catastrophic rain, and the concentration of catastrophic elements in the air hadn't risen to a level sufficient to trigger catastrophic evolution in the crops.

But as the concentration of catastrophic elements in the air and soil rises, the risk of catastrophic evolution in the crops will also increase.

Xia Qing hurried back to the hut. Seeing that Sheep Boss's mood was normal, she took off her protective mask, threw a few sticks of wood into the small stove built of broken bricks in the middle of the room, used the smoke and heat to drive away the evolved insects, then opened the Lord Channel to keep close watch on the latest developments in the surrounding territories.

In case dangerous catastrophically evolved creatures appeared in the surrounding territories, she had to immediately come up with a response plan to prevent the danger from other territories from spreading to Territory Three.

Before the catastrophic rain had even completed its second hour, the first lord to report catastrophic evolution in crops on his territory was Zhao Ze of Territory Four.

None of the lords were surprised, because Zhao Ze hadn't even built enough rain shelters—part of his fields were directly exposed to the catastrophic rain, so it would be strange if his crops didn't undergo catastrophic evolution.

At this point, Xia Qing felt a hint of anxiety, took out her detector to test the rainwater, and found that the catastrophic rain had already reached Orange level—the danger had escalated.

Xia Qing went around the fields again, and the crops were still in good condition.

As the catastrophic rain pattered on into the third hour, Kuang Qingwei reported that some cotton had undergone catastrophic evolution. "Qi-ge, I see the catastrophically evolved cotton has grown a lot of flower buds—do we really have to pull them out? Isn't it possible that after catastrophic evolution, it might still produce cotton?"

Qi Fu answered, "They must be pulled out, otherwise the cotton next to them will also be affected and undergo catastrophic evolution."

"So many flower buds—how many cotton bolls would that grow?" Kuang Qingwei was reluctant. "It's fine even if the cotton undergoes catastrophic evolution, right? As long as it grows cotton, that's all that matters…"

No one paid him any attention, and after Kuang Qingwei muttered a few more times, he fell silent. Everyone understood that catastrophically evolved plants must be removed, because if a large area of the same kind of plant undergoes catastrophic evolution, it could give rise to dangerous catastrophic evolution. At that point, it wouldn't be a matter of how many cotton bolls you could grow, but whether you could save your life.

Half an hour after Kuang Qingwei finished muttering, Xia Qing directly felt his dilemma. Because two cotton plants in her own cotton field had also undergone catastrophic evolution—the plants shot up from thigh-height to a person's height, and all the newly grown branches were fruit branches, with flower buds on them that numbered well over fifty at a quick count.

Xia Qing efficiently used a shovel to dig up the catastrophically evolved plants, roots and soil and all, and transplanted them far away to the cultivated land outside the rain shelter, letting them continue to grow there.

Even if a not-very-tall cotton plant undergoes dangerous catastrophic evolution, with Xia Qing's abilities she can completely eradicate it.

Four and a half hours later, the catastrophic rain stopped. On Xia Qing's territory, eighteen cotton plants, thirteen mung beans, and twenty-six wheat plants had undergone catastrophic evolution—without exception, all from the fields where filtered water had been used for seed soaking. In addition, six of her red-light peanut seedlings had undergone catastrophic evolution, and two yellow-light soybean seedlings had also undergone catastrophic evolution.

The forecast said the second catastrophic rain would last forty-eight hours, but in just over four hours this many crops had already undergone catastrophic evolution—how much would be lost in forty-eight hours?

Xia Qing felt a wave of irritation, immediately returned to the hut, took off her protective mask, and gulped down several mouthfuls of spring water.

Sheep Boss's mood also showed obvious fluctuation. Xia Qing stroked its fur, fed it a few mouthfuls of spring water, and took out a few pieces of green-light dried bamboo shoots for it to gnaw on. The fact that both she and Sheep Boss felt obvious irritation at the same time meant the concentration of catastrophic elements in the air had increased again—the next rain might be Red level.

Red level means more dangers will appear.

The second wave of catastrophic rain was indeed Red level. Kuang Qingwei was cursing on the Lord Channel, because a worker on his territory had suddenly lost control of his emotions and gone berserk, destroying a large patch of mung beans and damaging the rain shelter.