Chapter 643: Spring Tempers and Teamwork

With spring in full swing, plants were lush and insects multiplied fast. Old Goat soon managed to gather a small basket of bugs and strutted off toward the breeding greenhouse.

He’d seen Er feed the fish before, but there was no way he was going to deliver bugs to the fish tank one by one, not like Er did. So Old Goat propped his front hooves on the tank, loosened his grip, and—unexpectedly—the entire basket of insects toppled onto the floor instead of into the tank.

“Smack!”

Inside the tank, the fish waiting hungrily for breakfast grew frantic. They burst out of the water, only to land back down with a noisy splash.

“Cluck cluck—”

The chickens, penned up in the chicken yard, spotted the bugs but couldn’t reach them. They squawked in frustration.

Old Goat squinted at the wriggling bugs flailing on the ground, his face still wet and stinking of fish water. Without hesitation, he dashed out of the greenhouse and headed straight for Xia Qing, who was patrolling the fields.

“Thud!”

Neither human nor goat managed to knock the other over. What followed was Xia Qing pushing against Old Goat’s horns while Old Goat held his ground in a head-to-head battle. After almost twenty seconds, Xia Qing, unable to outmuscle the goat, yanked hard and sent Old Goat flying.

“Bang!”

Old Goat hit the ground, rolled over, bounced up, and—bleating furiously—charged at Xia Qing again. Man and goat got into an all-out brawl.

“Xia Qing, what’s going on? Are you two fighting again?” Tang Huai’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie as he dug for bugs in Territory Two.

When Xia Qing realized Old Goat was truly angry, she had no time for Tang Huai’s questions. She let Old Goat knock her over twice, then wrestled him until both were exhausted. Only then did she ask, “Why are you so mad, Old Goat? What happened?”

Flat on the ground, Old Goat didn’t so much as grunt. Xia Qing brushed the dirt from her clothes and headed to the greenhouse. One look inside and she immediately understood what had set Old Goat off.

She gathered up the ants and insect corpses, tossed half into the tank for the fish and the other half into the coop for the chickens. She picked some Green Lantern vegetables from the planting greenhouse, feeding the chickens, rabbits, and bugs. Then she took a handful of the most tender Greenlight Perilla and went to the sulking goat, still sprawled in his dirt pit.

“I saw the bugs you caught, Old Goat—an entire basket, that’s impressive,” she praised.

Old Goat just lay there, unmoving, right where he’d left a dent in the ground.

“It was all the basket’s fault, wasting the bugs you worked hard to catch all morning. I’ll make you a new one next time, one that’ll actually work, how about that?” Xia Qing soothed, her voice gentle, offering the grass to his nose. Old Goat instinctively opened his mouth and took a bite.

One nibble and the temper tantrum was forgotten. Old Goat kept munching, appetite suddenly voracious after all that wrestling.

Once he’d eaten his fill, Xia Qing rubbed the tiny curls on his head and murmured, “Take a break, Old Goat. We’re out of water at home, so I’ll grab some buckets and let’s fetch some from the reservoir together.”

Xia Qing drank the pure spring water from within their territory and used hot spring water from Hill Fifty for washing up. All their other water came from the river but had to be filtered first. That meant regular trips to haul water home.

She hauled out four big tanks from the house, and before she’d even called for help, Old Goat was right behind her, eager to carry the load. Hauling heavy things was his specialty, after all.

After bringing home water and eating breakfast, Xia Qing rolled out the rotary tiller, handed it over to Da Jiang and Xiao Jiang, and assigned them to dig a fish pond in the plot she’d marked out. Her own plan for the day was to check out the high-risk zone’s cleanup on Hill Fifty and see if she could dig up a couple of Green Lantern Chestnut saplings to trade with Territory Five for some orange saplings.

The first Devastation Rain had passed less than half a month ago, leaving the Evolved Forest rife with danger. This time last year, Xia Qing didn’t dare get anywhere near the forest’s edge. Now, though, both her fighting skills and gear were light years ahead of where she’d been. Even alone, she could handle the forest fringe.

“Heading out, Miss Xia?”

Lu Yuhui, leader of Chonglian’s Construction Team Six, was busy overseeing the iron mesh wall’s foundation but still took time to greet her warmly.

Last year, when Lu Yuhui led her crew to build the wall for Section Three, she’d gotten pretty friendly with Xia Qing. That familiarity was why Zhou Zhaoping had put her team in charge of the outer wall there.

To get the whole perimeter walled in as quickly as possible, Chonglian sent four separate construction teams. After Xin Yu personally inspected them, two with questionable motives got reassigned by Zhou Zhaoping—one to the eastern quarantine strip, another south—both far from Territory Eight and the Lords’ Alliance.

Xin Yu’s magnetic sense sure came in handy when dealing with outsiders.

Xia Qing exchanged a few words with Lu Yuhui, then left for Hill Forty-Nine.

A worker nearby muttered under his breath, “Didn’t they say stepping on even a single blade of grass north of the barrier costs you two thousand credits? How come she just waltzes right in?”

Judging by the question, Xia Qing could tell this guy hadn’t been part of the crew last year when they built the Section Three wall. He must’ve joined later.

Before Lu Yuhui could answer, a worker with the mixer chimed in, “Section Three belongs to the girlfriend of Qinglong Squad’s captain. Of course she’s got free run of the place—it’s basically Qinglong’s training base.”

“Tch. Another evolved just living off a man. She’s nothing compared to our team leader.”

Lu Yuhui took her time, saying, “If you care about getting a good work evaluation, keep your mouth shut and get back to it.”

Pretending not to hear a word, Xia Qing followed the familiar route into Section Three, winding down the path toward the Wolf Den. She quickly spotted wolf tracks and drag marks left by something heavy.

The tracks and signs left last night by Crippled Wolf and Er on the northern barrier had already been scrubbed by Hu Zifeng’s squad. No outsiders ever came here, so there was no need to hide anything.

This was where Er had leapt down into the valley, hunted a wild boar weighing over a hundred pounds, and dragged it all the way back up.

The fact that Er could take down a boar that big without a single squeal, then haul it up a cliff, proved just how formidable its killing power, bite force, and strength really were.

She’d underestimated Er before.

There was something else—Er must have gotten Crippled Wolf’s permission to hunt in the valley last night. Xia Qing had visited here plenty of times, drooling over those wild boar with Er, but Er had never actually gone after one until now, right after leaving with Crippled Wolf.

This only made Xia Qing appreciate how high Crippled Wolf ranked in the wolf pack: this clever wolf wasn’t just smart, he was second only to Alpha himself.

Stepping forward through a fresh layer of grass, Xia Qing strolled along, casually harvesting Devastation Grass seed heads and stuffing them in the pouch tied to her waistband.

Within three kilometers of farmland near both Hill Forty-Nine and Hill Fifty, helicopters weren’t allowed to spray Scourgebane, which would otherwise reduce the Devastation Grass seed rate. Here, Devastation Grass grew unchecked—it was already seeding.

If she didn’t cut those seed heads now, the mature seeds would either fall to the ground or blow away with the wind, only to sprout like wildfire after the next Devastation Rain and strangle out normal plants yet again.

Meanwhile, Red Squirrel was nibbling on tender leaves up a tall pine. When it saw Xia Qing walking farther and farther away, it scurried down and bolted toward Section Three, hoping to find any plant seeds Xia Qing might have dropped outside the greenhouse’s insect net.

Passing Red Squirrel’s tree hollow, Xia Qing paused to listen intently.

Once she confirmed Red Squirrel wasn’t home or nearby, she quickly climbed up, shone her flashlight into its nest, then scrambled back down after making sure there were no new kinds of dried fruits inside—her journey continued.