Chapter 327: Rain, Rumors, and a Threshing Machine

Xia Qing didn’t know much about companies or stocks, but just looking at Xin Yu’s three-story villa, the high-end equipment she used for evolved carvings and the rare Green Lantern plants she traded, Xia Qing could tell Xin Yu’s shares were worth plenty of credits. It was clear Xin Yu also held serious sway in the Chonglian Group.

No wonder Xin Yu told Tang Huai he wasn’t qualified to talk terms with her!

The truth was, Tang Huai just wasn’t in the same league.

He might have a reputation for being ruthless— but honestly, who here isn’t?

Xia Qing lugged the thresher back home, carried it up to the rooftop of the loft, hooked up the battery and started threshing.

The thresher’s design was simple. You poured the corncobs in, and iron blades spinning at high speed would rub and strike them until the kernels separated from the cobs, each flowing out from a different chute.

This thing was loud when running. Er Gou and Old Goat kept well clear, and even Xia Qing, with her sensitive hearing, had to plug her ears with cotton. When the threshing was done, her ears were still ringing.

She spread the corn kernels out to dry, covered them up, then tossed a rain cover over the cobs. She figured she’d clean up properly when she got back from delivering the thresher to Territory Ten.

As she hauled the thresher downstairs, Xia Qing heard Zhao Ze’s mother on the walkie-talkie: “Xia Qing, is the thresher working well?”

This thing was so noisy, even regular folks without boosted hearing could hear it from a couple kilometers away.

“It’s great,” Xia Qing replied. “Only a few broken kernels, most of the corn’s off the cob. Shi Du, you there? I’ll bring the thresher to the signpost at Territory Ten for you right now.”

Most of the kernels were off, but there were still some clinging to the cobs. That’d need some manual work. Qi Fu said, “Threshers were always like this before the catastrophe. The drier the corn, the cleaner it comes off.”

Xia Qing was halfway there with the thresher when she ran into Shi Du coming to pick it up. She handed it over and asked, “Did those snakes survive?”

“Only one Green Lantern didn’t make it, the rest pulled through,” Shi Du grinned. The dead viper wouldn’t go to waste— it’d be used as medicine for his dad. He asked cheerfully, “Sister Qing, that rabbit still alive?”

Xia Qing paused before answering, “It’s eating and drinking, so it should pull through. Where did you catch it exactly? I want to see if I can find a mate for it.”

If she managed to pair them, there’d be baby bunnies in the future.

Shi Du told Xia Qing the exact spot where he’d trapped the rabbit, even warning her about all the dangers in that patch. Xia Qing listened closely and returned to her territory.

As expected, Tang Huai still wasn’t by the signpost at Territory Two. Xia Qing knew where he’d be: lurking along the wild grass wall between Territory Two and Territory Nine.

Tang Huai was trying to eavesdrop on what was happening in Territory Nine. Xia Qing had just asked Shi Du about the rabbit as an excuse to stand on the north side of Territory Nine and secretly eavesdrop herself.

Inside Territory Nine, Li Si was arguing heatedly with a man. They weren’t yelling, so Shi Du couldn’t hear, but Xia Qing caught every word.

That bit of accidental eavesdropping gave her two important clues:

First, both price hikes for the high-efficiency compost starter in Territory Nine were ordered by Deputy Captain Liao of the Blazing Fire Squad.

Second, the one researching chemical compounds in Territory Nine wasn’t Li Si, but the man arguing with Li Si.

Xia Qing had heard his voice before. Three months ago when Zhang San and Tan Junjie led people into Territory Nine to search for dangerous chemicals, this same man had shouted furiously to block Tan Junjie from searching, then later tore into Assistant Xiao Liu.

That explained so much!

Li Si, as a plant cultivation expert, clearly understood how synthetic chemicals could disrupt Blue Star’s evolved biosphere. There was no way she’d waste time on chemical compounds.

Li Si wrote the Green Bean Growing Manual and developed the high-efficiency compost starter. But the chemical compound for driving away birds— the super-toxic stuff that could silence any living thing— though it went under her name, actually belonged to the man she was fighting with.

Turns out the Blazing Fire Squad had sent two teams into Territory Nine, and there was a huge rift between them.

It was likely that Li Si and Assistant Xiao Liu had deliberately exposed the dangerous chemicals, letting Zhang San and the Inspection Team come clean out the hazards.

That’s why, when Xia Qing thought back, Li Si’s fierce resistance that day sounded almost staged.

So what about this time?

Was Zhang San’s involvement in making compost starter also tied to Territory Nine or the Blazing Fire Squad behind it?

The more Xia Qing thought about it, the more tangled things felt.

She shook her head. No matter how messy it got, her strategy stayed the same: stay far away from Territory Nine, keep her secrets locked down, and quietly keep farming.

Xia Qing rushed back home, climbed up to the roof, and started pulling the leftover kernels off the cobs by hand.

Most of those were either broken kernels or tiny ones from the top of the cob. She worked them off, put them in a little bag, and set them aside to feed the chickens.

That’s how it went— she ate the best Green Lantern corn she harvested, and fed the scraps to her hens!

Before she’d even finished cleaning the cobs, the thresher noise from Territory Ten cut out. Judging by how long they used the machine, they’d gotten about the same early corn yield as her.

Over the next two days, Xia Qing tracked the sound of the thresher from different territories. Everyone had planted from the same two pounds of corn seeds Luo Pei supplied. Territory Five had the highest yield, then Xia Qing and Territory Ten, followed by Territory Six, Territory Four, and last was the ever-wayward Territory Two.

Territory Twelve and Territory One just weren’t in the same league. As for Territory Eight and Territory Nine, they didn’t use the thresher, so it was impossible to tell their harvest.

It wasn’t just Xia Qing who could figure it out— all the other lords had noticed. She even heard Zhao Ze’s mother next door raising her voice at her son.

When everyone finished threshing, a rainstorm rolled in. The forecast said it’d drizzle for three straight days. At least it wasn’t going to turn into a deadly thunderstorm.

The rain left the lords both grateful and anxious.

The good part: three days of steady rain would soak the fields through, and after the harvest, they could just fertilize and plow for the next crop without the back-breaking slog of drawing water from the river.

The bad part: no one’s early corn harvest had completely dried out for storage.

For Xia Qing, who’d already dried hers close to eighty percent, the rain was just trouble, not a blessing. She didn’t mind watering fields— Old Goat actually enjoyed that kind of work.

She pulled down her rain cover so the crops late in their growth wouldn’t take a beating from the rain. The undried corn went into her storage room to finish drying once the sky cleared.

Rainy days didn’t mean resting— Xia Qing went out to the fields to pick blackened mung bean pods. The rain was light, but sitting in the greenhouse you could hear it tapping clearly on the rain cover.

The sound wasn’t annoying at all, not to her or to the wolf and goat. With a pouch tied at her waist, Xia Qing moved through the mung bean field picking pods while Old Goat and Er Gou lounged in the greenhouse, one half-napping, the other chewing cud with eyes closed.

Suddenly, Er Gou’s eyes snapped open. He lifted his head, staring toward the Buffer Forest.

Moments later, Xia Qing heard the camera’s alarm go off.

An intruder had just been caught by the camera up on the High Slope.