Chapter 1111: Chestnut Season and Changing Tides

Thanks to Yang Jin’s incredible speed, he managed to avoid every wasp along the way. So this whole assignment wrapped up smoothly, and they finished before it was even 7:30 in the morning.

After breakfast, Xia Qing fed all the critters in her territory. That’s when Xin Yu finally drove in through the south gate of Section Three to deliver the automatic door. She wanted to drop it off herself so she could help Xia Qing peel chestnuts and catch up for a bit.

The three bags of chestnuts Xia Qing brought home today all came from the Yellow Lantern Chestnut Trees.

This year, in the chestnut grove, four Green Lantern trees and seventeen Yellow Lantern Chestnut Trees all bore fruit. Two days ago, Da Ya handled the harvest for the Green Lantern chestnuts with the robotic arm. Xia Qing was too swamped, so Da Ya just hauled them straight back to Territory Seven.

With Xia Qing’s careful management, the chestnut grove produced forty more jin than last year—totaling 370 jin of Green Lantern chestnuts. After a phone call with her Idol, they agreed she’d save 200 jin for him and take the remaining 170 jin herself.

According to their deal from last year, Xia Qing had to give Zhang San 400 jin of Green Lantern chestnuts every year for five years. If there weren’t enough Green Lantern chestnuts, Yellow Lantern ones would fill the gap at a rate of four to one. That means this year, she still owed Idol 800 jin of Yellow Lantern chestnuts.

Why a phone call? Idol said he didn’t want to see her lately—even if Xia Qing went to Territory Seven, she wouldn’t be allowed into his lab. Xia Qing never thought just moving a single machine out of the lab would make him this mad.

The Green Lantern chestnuts were already harvested. The three bags Xia Qing carried back today were all Yellow Lantern, and since none of them could be used as seeds, she just needed to peel them and let them dry for a couple days. Once the moisture was gone, they could be stored away in the supply room.

Xin Yu brought out a folding stool and sat in the yard under the insect-proof canopy Xia Qing had made with bamboo poles and netting, learning to peel chestnuts alongside her.

Xia Qing demonstrated, saying, “Even though the chestnuts are ripe and the sticky burrs aren’t as clingy anymore, they can still stick to your gloves. So you shouldn’t peel them by hand. Instead, use two pairs of pliers to grab the crack here, pull both sides apart, then flip and shake the chestnuts into the basket.”

Xia Qing had just tipped five chestnuts into the basket when a little snowfield squirrel poked its head out of her coat pocket, leaped into the basket, grabbed a chestnut, and climbed onto her shoulder. It twirled the chestnut around with its tiny paws, then used its big front teeth to crack open the reddish-brown shell and started munching away.

Jasmine, perched on Xin Yu’s shoulder, got worked up. She flapped her wings and shouted, “Xiao Yu! Xiao Yu! Xia Qing! Xia Qing!”

Not bad—an improvement, at least Jasmine could finally get one name right. Xia Qing tossed a chestnut from the basket to her. “Nice going, Gua Gua.”

Jasmine swooped in, snatched the chestnut in her beak, landed, pinned it to the ground with a claw, and started pecking the shell open to eat the sweet chestnut inside.

After feeding Xin Yu’s raven, Xia Qing handed a chestnut burr to Goofball sitting on the nearby folding stool, then lifted the insect net and tossed another chestnut outside.

A streak of red shot past—something caught the chestnut before it even hit the ground and vanished without a trace. The flock of birds waiting in the tree to freeload started chattering angrily.

But none of the birds dared swoop down to peck at the chestnuts protected by the canopy. Lying outside was a fierce wolfdog—the Guardian of Section Three, a bird-slaying legend. All the local birds were downright terrified of it.

Watching all five chestnuts disappear in a flash, leaving only one behind, Xin Yu just laughed and grabbed the pliers. She wasn’t as strong as Xia Qing, but she could definitely handle this kind of work.

While they peeled chestnuts, Xin Yu asked, “What do you do with the chestnut burrs after you take the nuts out—compost or dry them for firewood?”

Xia Qing deftly peeled as she answered, “They’re useful. I noticed that in the places where I left burrs last year, hardly any Devastation Grass grew during this year’s three bouts of Devastation Rain. Third Brother’s tests showed that burrs have a chemical that inhibits other plants—and it works on Devastation Grass too.”

Xin Yu perked up. “Allelopathy?”

After the cataclysm, Xin Yu didn’t go back to regular school, but kept up with private tutoring at home, so even without a junior high diploma, she had plenty of knowledge. Otherwise, she’d never be able to lead Chonglian’s research team on animal taming.

“Exactly. But as the chemical in the burrs fades over time, it gets less effective.” Xia Qing went on, “Third Brother said this allelopathic element is one of the reasons chestnut trees can stay so healthy, but it’s even more suppressive to normal plants, so it’s not worth extracting.”

Xin Yu nodded. “We can’t expect too much from evolved plants. Fruit you can eat, with good taste—that’s rare enough nowadays.”

Xia Qing cracked open a chestnut burr Goofball had given her and handed it back so he could dig out the chestnut himself. “True. There are so many fruits we can’t eat anymore.”

Xin Yu shared the latest news: “Fire Phoenix’s source of Pure Spring Water was destroyed. The attack did even more damage than expected. That’s a huge blow for Hui One too.”

“Apocalypse will definitely face severe punishment, and Hui Eight will be held responsible as well.” Pure water is precious and irreplaceable at every base—the loss of such a resource is a major crime.

There are probably still unknown sources of Pure Spring Water hidden deep within the Evolved Forest, but they’re usually guarded by fierce evolved beasts. Harvesting them is extremely risky.

Besides Pure Spring Water, the Evolved Forest also has some Green Lantern water sources where the Devastation Element Content is below 5 per mille—like the one Xia Qing found on her way back from Mount Twenty-Six, where Evolved River Moss was growing.

But that water source is way too far from the Safe Zone, and the surrounding area belongs to huge beasts. The cost of using helicopters to haul water out would be higher than just building a water plant in the Safe Zone to produce distilled or top-grade filtered water. It’s hardly worth the trouble.

“Those maniacs in Apocalypse—they’re not even afraid of dying, so sanctions aren’t going to scare them.” Xin Yu added, “The investigation into Peng Yuancai already led straight to Hui One Base Director Chen Dianming. Odds are he’s going to take the fall. Fire Phoenix and Chen Dianming are close—if he goes down, there’s no saving Fire Phoenix either.”

Xia Qing caught on, “If the Deputy Director can’t carry the blame, then the Director himself will have to. I bet we’ll soon hear rumors about Chen Dianming’s ‘suicide.’”

Xin Yu split open a chestnut shell with the pliers, flipped it, then gave it a sharp shake. Four glossy chestnuts tumbled into the bamboo basket. She sighed. “It all depends on how far the top brass wants to take the crackdown this time.”

If they dig deep enough, even the General Base Director of Huicheng could be forced to step down.

That said, this incident wasn’t nearly as bad as what happened back in the Hui One underground lab, so it’s probably not enough for Huicheng to change its General Base Director again.

If the top position at the General Base doesn’t change, then nothing will really change—just swapping out the Director won’t fix anything if the departments and research institutes aren’t thoroughly cleaned out.

As long as the management at the General Base stays put, the Yu family that runs Chonglian will never get hurt. After all, since they took over Chonglian, the Yu father and son have showered these people with all kinds of benefits.