Chapter 32: Clearing the Fields and Taming the Hillside

Early the next morning, Xia Qing gnawed on two pieces of dried rations for breakfast and headed straight for the potato and sweet potato patches. She crouched at the edge of the fields, listening closely. With practiced precision, she pinpointed the spot where pests were hiding underground. In one swift motion, she dug them up with her little shovel—the worst of all root pests—Evolved Grubs.

Xia Qing scooped up the Evolved Grub, which was desperately trying to burrow back into the dirt, and flung it high into the air.

Four evolved magpies circling overhead swooped down in black streaks, all fighting for the treat. A few stray feathers fluttered gently to the ground at Xia Qing’s feet. These four magpies were the ruling birds of her territory, but fortunately, even after their evolution, their diet hadn’t changed. They never turned their sharp beaks or claws on her, so they coexisted peacefully.

Grubs are the larvae of scarab beetles. The more dazzling an evolved scarab looks, the more terrifying its bite. A level-three evolved scarab has a bite so strong it could snap a finger-thick wire or plastic pipe in one go. If an evolved grub latches onto the main root of a seedling, that plant’s got no hope.

These evolved grubs had grown resistant to both the repellent and pesticide Xia Qing received, so hand-picking was the only way to deal with them. Ever since hearing the radio instructions, removing grubs had become part of her daily routine.

Every sweet potato shoot and every sprouting potato in these fields was precious to her, so this patch was always Xia Qing’s first stop for pest control. Grubs that targeted her treasures were doomed.

Evolved grubs had beefed up their bite, but they still didn’t move fast through the soil. After clearing out an area of a hundred square meters around her sweet potatoes and potatoes, Xia Qing made sure none of the grubs would reach the roots by morning. Only then would she head to the grain fields to keep cleaning.

By the end, the four evolved magpies had eaten their fill and flown off, leaving only two great egrets still waiting for treats. These two had just moved into her territory a few days ago, settling in a small grove of dawn redwoods next to the reservoir.

Last winter, when she was clearing the Evolver Forest, the tallest redwood in that grove developed a terrifying defense—it would shoot razor-sharp leaf needles in all directions if provoked. If Luo Pei hadn’t noticed the danger in time, Xia Qing would’ve been turned into a human pincushion. If those two egrets had visited last winter, not a feather would be left.

After making a circuit of her farmland, Xia Qing started testing the Xiang Element levels in her crops. She found that seedlings irrigated with mountain spring water had readings a tiny bit lower—about one part per thousand—than those watered from the reservoir, even when both used filtered soaking.

The lower the Xiang Element in a plant, the less likely it is to suffer Xiangification during a Xiang Rain. Fewer affected crops meant a bigger harvest for her.

Mountain spring water might be able to reduce the Xiang Element in seeds and seedlings, which thrilled Xia Qing. Sadly, her spring was far too small to cover all her farmland.

She wandered up the hillside north of the reservoir to check in on her newly discovered soybean sprouts, garlic sprouts and spinach. The soy and garlic sprouts weren’t edible, but she could pinch spinach leaves for food.

Any edible green plant would catch Boss Sheep’s attention. After coaxing Boss Sheep over to the northern hill for some perilla, Xia Qing sprayed Evolved Camphor Leaf Water around her spinach patch, then started measuring the Xiang Element in the surrounding vegetation.

Most grasses around the soy and garlic sprouts glowed yellow on her tester, but around the spinach, green signals outnumbered the rest.

Xia Qing poked the ground with sticks of different lengths as makeshift markers, then worked her way up the hill, checking everything from tiny blades of grass to trees ten meters high. She missed nothing.

Hard work paid off. After scanning in this grid-like fashion, she found a gently sloping belt over five meters wide and more than 130 meters long that wound uphill to the spring. Most plants in this zone weren’t human food, but many rated yellow, and even the red-light plants here had Xiang Element levels between fifteen and twenty-five per thousand. If she ever ran out of proper food, she could get by on these for a while without tragedy.

There were noticeably more edible green-light plants near the spring, which explained why Boss Sheep loved grazing there. Oddly, the area upslope of the spring didn’t fit the pattern—it was all red-light plants with high Xiang content. Even the steeper belt from the Evolved Perilla patch up to the chinaberry trees on the highland—about five meters wide by 120 meters long—was mostly yellow-light plants, some red, and the least green.

All that scanning took two days, but Xia Qing was so delighted by the rewards she felt like seaweed drifting on the tide—she’d found two belt-shaped slopes together nearly two mu in total area. She called them her planting zones.

Once she cleared all the inedible plants out of these new planting zones, the whole area would be converted into stepped fields. The crops now sprouting in her trays and those she’d soon trade for, even new sweet potato vines for cuttings, would all go into these belts in time.

With that plan in mind, Xia Qing’s gaze returned to her sweet potato and potato fields.

She itched to dig up every sweet potato and potato and move them here…

But people say moving makes trees die and people thrive. If she dug up those shoots and something went wrong, what if the sweet potato vines died off completely? Or the potatoes got so mad they refused to sprout?

Lacking real planting experience, Xia Qing didn’t dare risk it, so she gave up on the idea and happily got back to clearing the planting zones.

Xiang Grass? Yank it up and burn it after drying.

Red-light shrubs? Cut them down, dig up the roots, dry and burn the lot.

Red-light trees? Saw them off, dig up the roots, dry and burn everything.

All manner of nasty evolved insects? Eliminate them.

Evolved snakes, frogs, centipedes? Catch them alive. Once Zhong Tao came to swap out her Portable Tester’s reagent, she’d use the fresh batch—she was all out.

If rocks big or small got in the way, she hauled them out. What if the planting dirt wasn’t deep enough? She’d dig up more and fill it in.

While Xia Qing was bustling around her territory, her phone rang. It was Zhong Tao. “Hey, you around? Huzi and I are coming over to set up your waterwheel.”

“I’m here,” Xia Qing replied. Strength Evolver Huzi wasn’t just a solar power installer—he could handle waterwheels too. He was the skilled worker; she was just the muscle.

Xia Qing dumped the soil from her basket into the new terraced field and picked up her haul of evolved creatures, heading to the reservoir. She wasn’t there long before Huzi and Zhong Tao arrived.

Seeing the old bike Huzi was carrying, Xia Qing was totally stunned.

So Tan Junjie’s so-called manual waterwheel was actually made from a converted bike? Who would’ve thought to put the two together? Was she really supposed to pedal by the reservoir?

The reservoir bank wasn’t dangerous, so no one wore protective masks. Xia Qing’s surprise was written all over her face, and both men burst out laughing.

Zhong Tao grinned. “Trying to picture what a waterwheel looks like, aren’t you?”

For once, calm and sharp-tongued Xia Qing was absolutely baffled. “I really can’t imagine it.”