Chapter 212: Sunflower Warnings and the Quiet Threat of Xiang Rain

In times of calamity, even the smallest anomaly can’t be ignored, or it might spiral into a huge crisis—maybe even cost you your life.

Xia Qing moved the odd-looking sunflower out of the greenhouse, replanting it in a small shed far from the fragile vegetables. There used to be a Yellowlight wild grape plant growing inside this shed, but last month’s hailstorm had snapped its main stem. It died soon after.

Five days after Xia Qing removed the abnormal sunflower, the sunflowers in that patch quickly caught up in growth with the rest. That confirmed her suspicion. The slow growth was all thanks to that strange sunflower.

As for how it was harming the others, Xia Qing simply couldn’t figure it out.

Over the next few days, Xia Qing carefully patrolled the sunflower field, discovering three more odd sunflowers. She dug them up and moved them to the little shed too. Because she kept the soil ball intact during transplant, none of their roots were hurt. The four sunflowers wilted for two days but soon bounced back and continued growing.

Even after recovering, those sunflowers still set Xia Qing on edge. There was just something deeply off about them.

After growing closer to Hu Zifeng, Xia Qing once asked him how he’d known the bamboo with the Greenlight shoot was actually an aggressive evolver plant, back when they’d teamed up to dig for shoots at the start of April.

Hu Zifeng explained that he looked for external traits and environmental signs typical of dangerous evolved plants. For example, the Greenlight bamboo had sparser leaves than the rest. The surrounding bamboo stalks had scars from sharp bamboo leaves slicing or stabbing them, and no animals had left any bite marks on the Greenlight bamboo shoots.

The main reason Xia Qing couldn’t shake the strange feeling this time was that, aside from stunting the sunflowers around them, all four odd sunflowers matched every trait of the other Yellowlight sunflowers—the gray-green leaves, the fuzzy stems. Nothing set them apart, at least outwardly.

Xia Qing wasn’t about to share these vague hunches with anyone. She had no idea if this was just intuition or a product of some kind of evolved ability.

If it was just intuition, then that was one thing.

But if it was an ability, that would mean Xia Qing was now a four-element evolver, instead of just a three-element one. In all ten years since the start of the disaster, she’d never even heard of a four-element evolver. The thought made her both excited and uneasy.

So she decided to keep this under wraps—so secret, she wouldn’t even tell her closest companion, Boss Sheep.

After she wrapped up her plans and completed her nightly training, Xia Qing called out to Boss Sheep and the Sick Wolf, “Boss, Second, I’m off to bed! I’ll leave the territory to you two for the night. Keep a good watch, will you? I’ll make you something delicious in the morning.”

“Baa.” The second Boss Sheep heard there’d be good food, he answered right away.

The Sick Wolf looked up at Xia Qing, his skinny head tilting to the side. It was clear he was in a good mood too.

Boss Sheep couldn’t see well in the dark, so the main responsibility for night watch actually fell on the Sick Wolf.

Evolved wolves were nighttime creatures—they slept during the day, but even then, they were seriously alert. The slightest movement would wake them.

Ever since the Sick Wolf regained his eyesight and could move around again, he’d taken it upon himself to stand watch. Nothing in the territory could escape his ears, not even the wind rustling the grass.

After the great evolution on Blue Star, not only did humans gain new abilities—wolves did too. Wolves already had sharper senses, better hearing and smell, and greater speed than humans, even before evolving. Now they were even more impressive. Xia Qing herself was a Level 7 hearing-evolver, but her hearing still couldn’t match that of an average evolved wolf.

During the last half-month, two wild rabbits had sneaked onto her land at night, biting through the insect net to try and get to the vegetables in the greenhouse. They never triggered her traps, so Xia Qing stayed asleep—but the Sick Wolf caught both intruders.

Both times, Xia Qing only noticed because she heard the Sick Wolf open the door but didn’t hear him come back in. She headed out to check and that’s how she spotted the rabbits.

If the Sick Wolf hadn’t still been weak, there’s no doubt he would’ve caught and eaten those rabbits. After that, Xia Qing handed all night watch duty to him.

With the Sick Wolf on guard, Xia Qing could finally get a good night’s sleep.

Come morning, the first thing Xia Qing did once she got up with the sun was check what was sitting on her windowsill.

After releasing the Evolved Squirrel with the tracker attached, Xia Qing began leaving uncontaminated spring water, a few grains, and a wad of tobacco leaves on the sill, hoping the little guy wouldn’t go raiding other territories and get caught again.

Just ten minutes ago, Xia Qing had heard a faint rustling outside her window. Checking her phone app, she saw the icon for the Evolved Squirrel was now only two meters away—right there on the sill. This was the closest it had come since she’d set it free.

Peeking out the window, she saw the little creature hadn’t just drunk the water—it had made off with a wad of Redlight tobacco fiber, too. For a moment, Xia Qing wondered which was more tempting—the spring water, or the tobacco.

After washing up, Xia Qing told Boss Sheep and the Sick Wolf she was heading out. Then she slung on her heavy pack, grabbed the chicken cage, and left home.

She dropped the chickens and geese off in the new Chicken Enclosure, then hurried toward the abandoned cave in Area Three to bring medicine for the injured wolf.

On the way, she checked the Evolved Squirrel’s location on her phone. It seemed to have run off early, arrow pointing northwest toward Mountain 50. Maybe it was after chestnuts.

Once she got to the cave and gave medicine to the Brain-Evolved Wolf, the Wolf with the Broken Leg brought over a prey that looked just like yesterday’s—but this one was bigger, probably the mother of yesterday’s catch. Xia Qing praised the wolf, “Broken Leg, you’re amazing. These things can run fast. Yesterday you caught the kid, today the mother—impressive. But if you keep this up, will there be any left for us next year?”

The Wolf with the Broken Leg dropped its prey, turned to drink some water. Xia Qing’s worries didn’t register with him—he didn’t understand a word of it.

After checking that today’s prey was another Yellowlight, Xia Qing was convinced the Wolf with the Broken Leg was raiding the same den. She gave a serious warning, “We’ve got a third round of Xiang Rain coming in two days. You know what Xiang Rain is, right? The kind that makes plants go crazy and animals go berserk.”

Not interested in the slightest, the Wolf with the Broken Leg drank his fill and went to rest in the cave. The black wolf playing with bugs nearby was in charge of protecting the injured wolf, while only the Brain-Evolved Wolf listened seriously to Xia Qing.

Stuffing the sealed prey into her pack, Xia Qing kept talking, “Your Majesty’s been gone for a long time. If she doesn’t return, how are the rest of you planning to survive this Xiang Rain?”

The Brain-Evolved Wolf fixed Xia Qing with a thoughtful stare.

She sighed. Lack of a shared language made real communication impossible. With a heavy pack slung over her shoulders, she trudged home, cleaned the prey, then ate breakfast—and didn’t waste a second getting back to work.

At the top of her Xiang Rain prep list: harvest the peanuts.