Chapter 319: Harvest Season in the Evolved Fields

Xia Qing crouched at the edge of the pit, studying those two colorless, scentless and almost transparent oddball Devastationweeds. After a careful look, she decided to move them fifteen centimeters farther out, pushing them well away from the spring.

Back in Bai Seven Base, where these Devastationweeds originally grew, it was deep in the heart of the Evolved Forest—dry and cold. By comparison, Hui Three Base was warm and damp.

If she just planted them in her territory at the same distance from the Pure Spring as before, the weeds might not stand the humid air. They could rot or melt away from all the moisture.

Sure, she didn’t have to pay for them if they died, but each lost plant meant losing a million—enough to cover an area bigger than Hill Forty-Nine. The thought alone made Xia Qing wince.

It wasn’t just about the money. Who could promise there’d never be a time she’d be poisoned by synthetic toxins or go berserk from too much Devastation Element in her own body someday? In a pinch, Devastationweed could save her life.

So these two Devastationweeds—she had to treat them like precious ancestors.

Pinching up a bit of local soil that Yang Jin brought back, Xia Qing noticed it felt wetter than when she dumped it out of her pocket yesterday.

That just wouldn’t do. Too much moisture and the roots would start rotting. She had to make the soil more breathable.

Thankfully, she’d thought ahead about drainage when planting. The pit she chose already had two crevices underneath. Otherwise she’d be yanking out the whole arrangement and drilling holes in the pit right now.

With cracks for drainage, soil moisture shouldn’t be rising. That meant the soil still wasn’t draining or ventilating well enough. She’d have to mix in some gravel to increase airflow and improve drainage.

Which kind of gravel would be best?

After carefully checking out the existing gravel bits in the soil, Xia Qing made up her mind—she’d use the leftover gravel from making the Yi Stone Protector, sifted out from the dirt near the Yi Stone.

That stuff felt just like the gravel bits already found inside Devastationweed roots.

No time like the present.

Xia Qing hurried home, fetched the gravel, and gently lifted out her two little ancestral weeds. She worked the gravel into the soil and moved their planting spots fifteen centimeters outward. Then she closed up the pit.

To help airflow, Xia Qing left a gap at the pit’s edge instead of sealing it tight. Since the spring might draw in small animals, she took extra precautions—spraying insecticide and disinfectant around the stone pit so nobody would rip open the insect netting and trash her Devastationweeds for a drink.

She’d done all she could for these finicky little ancestors. Whether they lived or died was up to fate now.

After snapping off some toona leaves for Old Goat, Xia Qing headed home, whipped up breakfast, and hurried to the corn greenhouse.

She’d planted the two jin of corn seeds Luo Pei gave her in late June. Out of those, 1,900 seedlings sprouted for a germination rate of sixty-three percent. After losses from Devastation Rain and various setbacks, she had 1,415 left—meaning a quarter of the seedlings didn’t make it.

All told, of the 3,000 early corn seeds, only forty-seven percent survived to harvest. The patch of seeds from the Safe Zone next door did even worse—since they were lower quality, only thirty-two percent sprouted and made it to harvest.

That was just the new normal for crop growing on Blue Star after the Great Evolution.

Thanks to pure spring water and Zhang San’s soil pesticide, Xia Qing’s corn harvest rate was the highest in all her territory.

And with her skills improving, unless some disaster struck, she was sure next year’s corn would be even better than this year’s. She truly believed it.

The corn plants from late June had yellowing and withered lower leaves and husks, a sign the corn was ready for harvest.

Wanting to till the land easily, Xia Qing decided to dig up the entire corn plant, roots and all.

For this sort of work, you needed a special hoe—the blade just ten centimeters wide but twenty long, thick and razor-sharp, set at a right angle to a half-meter wooden handle. Definitely a small farming tool.

Qi Fu called it a ‘mini-mattock.’ It took some bending and muscle-work to use, but it got the corn out way faster than a regular shovel.

As a Strength-Based Evolutionary, Xia Qing was never short on power. She swung the mini-mattock with practiced ease, clearing a plant a second and felling over a thousand stalks in forty minutes.

Glancing over the neat, orderly rows of toppled corn stalks, Xia Qing wiped sweat from her brow and swung her mattock high. “Old Goat, Er, look! This is the kingdom I’ve conquered for you!”

Old Goat barely looked up from nibbling grass inside the cornfield, but Er Gou, out by the fence chasing grasshoppers, gave Xia Qing a big show—sticking his tongue out, going ‘hahaha.’

Meanwhile, Red Squirrel perched on a stone by the shed, waving its fluffy tail and angling for a free handout.

Xia Qing gulped down some sweet spring water, wiped her brow, and began stripping corn from the forty stalks she’d set aside along the ridges.

A pity—of all the two thousand-some stalks between both plantings, not a single Green Lantern showed up. Xia Qing carefully picked out the Yellow Lantern corn with the lowest Devastation Element and the biggest, plumpest ears to save as seed for next year.

She peeled the husks off, snapped the ears clean and stuffed them in her pocket. The stalks were green, the husks a faded yellow—but the kernels themselves came out pure white.

The early patch produced white corn, the late one yellow. Xia Qing hadn’t figured out what difference it made yet, so she’d save some of each and plant both next year.

Shelling corn was farm work that caught Old Goat and Er Gou’s interest right away. Watching rows of pearly corn appear, Red Squirrel nearly wagged its tail off, darting around in hopes Xia Qing would share an ear soon.

Not likely an ear, but maybe a couple kernels. But with all the corn still on the cob, they’d have to work for their snacks.

Er Gou came over and sniffed Xia Qing’s peeled corn, lost interest and went back to munching leaves. Then, copying Xia Qing, he used his teeth and paws, finally working a cob loose and yelping at Xia Qing, “Awooo! Awooo!” in glee.

“Good boy, Er. So smart!” Xia Qing took the cob he’d freed, stowed it in her pocket, and scratched his chin.

Er Gou wagged his tail happily, picked another cob and started in with teeth and claws.

Old Goat, clutching a leaf, wandered over to the nearest ear and tried copying Er Gou’s trick—one hoof stomped down on the cob, but…

He stomped the corn straight into the dirt.

Old Goat shot Xia Qing a guilty look, then scraped the cob back out, pinned it down, and yanked at the husk with his mouth—only to tear the ear clean in two.

He stared at his broken half-cob, growing more annoyed, and called out to his partner, “Baa!”

“What’s wrong, Old Goat?” Xia Qing heard the call, walked over and stared at the half-destroyed ear in his hoof, at a loss for words.

Seriously? A corn cob over twenty centimeters long, and it only grew two kernels—and both were shriveled up like warts. She wanted to dig them out right away!

A hundred days of hard work—and you give me two kernels? Come on!

“It’s not your fault, Old Goat. This corn just doesn’t know how to behave.” Xia Qing checked the plant for the rest of the cob.

Seriously, the other half was even worse—it only grew a single kernel.