Chapter 23
Paying the teacher a “salary” was honestly a headache.
With Ni Kunqi’s status and position, she lacked for nothing—so whatever he gave her would probably feel a bit… insufficient?
Xie Xingchen racked his brain and still couldn’t think of anything truly good. In the end, he gave up in full salted-fish fashion.
Forget it. He’d just give her some food and flowers.
One would count as filial respect, and the other would count as letting the teacher “check his homework.”
With that decided, Xie Xingchen finally felt calm.
Pink-diamond carnations represented love, charm, and respect, and their floral meaning was “passionate, youthful, beautiful.” Although they were usually given to mothers, giving them to a teacher didn’t seem like a bad choice either.
As for food…
Xie Xingchen felt that with the seasonings he currently had, there weren’t many options he could make anyway. In that case, he’d just decide later when the time came.
The teacher’s “salary” didn’t have to be paid immediately—but the flowers for the little kid had to be prepared.
He had promised little Randy that when his flower shop opened, he’d give him a bouquet. The shop was opening tomorrow, so today Xie Xingchen planned to keep his promise—he would send the child a bouquet of lavender.
Lavender helped with sleep, strengthened resistance, and had antiviral benefits, so Xie Xingchen felt it was pretty suitable for a child.
Thinking of that, he asked without looking up, “Prosperity, is the small wormhole receiver calibrated?”
Prosperity, who was checking equipment, paused and answered seriously, “Boss, it’s already been calibrated.”
After answering, Prosperity resumed his unfinished work.
Xie Xingchen nodded in satisfaction.
The small wormhole receiver itself wasn’t hard to install. Normally it could be installed and calibrated within two or three days.
But what Xie Xingchen needed to transmit through it were delicate plants, so Prosperity’s installation work had been dragged out longer.
To ensure absolutely nothing went wrong, Steward Xie on the central planet had been forced to receive several packages from Earth every day.
From the beginning—when the flowers arrived a little wilted—to now, when they arrived without the slightest damage, he was overjoyed. He even wanted to force himself to come help in the holo-mall despite being sick, which scared Xie Xingchen into refusing again and again.
After wrapping the lavender into a beautiful bouquet with creamy white gauze, pale blue paper, and light purple lace ribbon, Xie Xingchen, satisfied, tapped little Randy’s contact ID.
[Xie Xingchen: Little Randy, the bouquet is all wrapped up. In a bit I’ll send it to you by delivery!]
Randy, who was being forced by his big brother to practice spiritual power, instantly perked up when he saw Xie Xingchen’s message.
His round eyes widened in delight, and he bounced in place several times.
“Randy.” A calm voice came from the doorway.
Caught being distracted, Randy’s chubby little face immediately scrunched up like a bitter melon.
He pitter-pattered over to his brother, hugged his brother’s long leg, and blinked rapidly, trying to cute his way out of trouble.
His brother really did fall for that. He scooped Randy up and sighed lightly, almost absent-mindedly. “Spiritual training can’t be done with distractions.”
Randy pouted; his soft, fat cheeks trembled too—so cute it made people want to pinch them twice.
Randy explained in a baby voice, “Brother, it’s not that Randy isn’t training seriously today! It’s that a pretty big brother just sent me flowers!”
Hearing someone sent the child flowers, Ludwig’s tone remained calm. “Is that so?”
To people who didn’t know him, his voice might sound emotionless. But those familiar with him could hear the question in it.
Randy was definitely familiar with his brother.
Seeing his brother’s doubt, the child began gesturing wildly and babbling out a full explanation.
However—
Ludwig only grew more puzzled.
“He likes you that much?”
Would someone really like a child they’d only met once in the holo-world?
Like him enough to send such an expensive gift?
Randy nodded firmly and declared, “Yes! Randy is sooo cute. It’s normal for Brother Xingchen to like me!”
Ludwig: ?
Randy continued happily, “Brother Xingchen said the flowers are already shipped!”
The moment Randy finished speaking, an attendant’s voice sounded outside.
“Little Randy, you have a delivery! Come out and take it.”
Hearing his package had arrived, Randy wriggled down, then swung his short chubby legs and ran to the attendant.
His mouth fell open as he stared at the bouquet—fairy-like and elegant, almost half his body in size. He was so shocked he couldn’t even speak properly.
“So… so pretty!”
Hugging the bouquet, Randy was thrilled.
He turned his head and showed off to Ludwig. “Brother, look! It smells so good! Randy loves it sooo much!”
Seeing the child beam with joy while holding the bouquet, Ludwig couldn’t help letting a faint smile appear.
After watching Randy treasure the lavender bouquet for a while, Ludwig unexpectedly realized he himself felt the urge to sleep.
He paused. When he came back to his senses, he found Randy had already fallen asleep.
And even asleep, Randy was still hugging his flowers tightly.
Ludwig fell silent for a moment, then gently carried the child to his bedroom.
He teased at the purple bouquet for a bit, then carefully removed it from the child’s arms and placed it on the bedside cabinet.
Leaving the bedroom silently, Ludwig pulled out a single sprig of lavender from the bouquet and handed it to his subordinate.
Ludwig: “Take it for testing.”
The subordinate bowed respectfully. “Yes, Lord Alsop.”
Ludwig Alsop—Marshal of the Mechanical Civilization. His father was the “Human Rebel,” the former human mechanical master and the founder of the Mechanical Civilization—Deren Alsop.
As a human, Deren became the leader of the Mechanical Civilization, but until his death, he never turned himself into a mechanical lifeform.
Unlike most people who feared death, Deren faced it calmly and freely. He could accept the fact his life was nearing its end, and he could wait quietly for death to arrive. The only thing he regretted was that he couldn’t continue accompanying the child he had saved—and converted into a mechanical lifeform—until adulthood.
After Deren passed away, Ludwig, in a twist of fate, rescued a one-month-old baby while clearing beasts on a remote planet under Mechanical Civilization control. In order to save the child, he replaced the baby’s heart with a mechanical heart.
From that day on, he gained a little brother—and the Mechanical Civilization gained a rare infant.
After handing the lavender to be tested, Ludwig suddenly said, “Tomorrow’s training is postponed by half a day.”
Subordinate: “Yes, Lord Alsop.”
With no further instructions, the subordinate—whose body was silver-white metal—retreated.
Roses, lavender, carnations, osmanthus, and jasmine were scanned and uploaded into Xie Xingchen’s flower shop listings.
Xie Xingchen had originally planned to do bouquet business, but after he filled the shop with beautiful, moving bouquets…
He hesitated.
Based on flower prices in the galaxy, a single ordinary flower that contained no dark matter would be priced at at least 100 star-coins—and that was already considered cheap.
If a flower contained green matter, then it was a different story.
Its price would rise with the green matter content. 1,000 star-coins per flower would be “vegetable price” cheap.
And Xie Xingchen’s flowers mostly contained 1%–2% green matter, with some reaching over 5%.
Priced by green-matter percentage, each flower in his shop should cost at least 1,000 star-coins.
Which meant a bouquet would cost…
Tens of thousands.
Xie Xingchen: deep inhale
Would anyone actually buy flowers that expensive?
If nobody bought them, what would happen to his quest?
Anxious enough to stomp his feet, Xie Xingchen finally came up with an idea.
He opened the mall’s decoration page and searched “vase.”
Instantly, a dazzling array of exquisitely crafted containers—made of gemstones, diamonds, glass, and crystal—appeared before him.
He looked through them twice, then chose three sizes: mini, small, and medium gemstone vases.
Then he sorted the flowers by size: one flower, three flowers, ten flowers, arranged inside the vases.
He took down half the bulky bouquet listings, and filled the newly freed space with these vases instead.
When everything was done, Xie Xingchen finally felt satisfied.
Xie Xingchen: hands-on-hips proud
So pretty—and cheaper, too!
In this galaxy without century-long marketing lies, diamonds were basically cabbage-priced.
Plus, gemstones had special synthesis methods. Aside from gem varieties that contained green matter themselves, gemstones weren’t expensive at all.
Xie Xingchen: This is solid.
The next morning.
Not even having time for breakfast—only drinking a tube of nutrient solution—Xie Xingchen logged into StarNet Mall.
“Earth Trading House” looked beautiful after his renovation. With the colorful flowers added, it felt like a lively, elegant, fairy-like “Wizard of Oz” world.
Of course, his pricing was also “beautiful.”
Standing in front of the shelves, Ni Kunqi froze.
The cheapest jasmine branch was 199 star-coins, and the most expensive rose was only 399?
Ni Kunqi frowned. “Xingchen… are you selling only flowers without green matter?”
Xie Xingchen blinked, confused. “Of course not.”
He was a cultivator—why would he sell flowers without green matter? If he was selling, he would obviously sell flowers with green matter!
Ni Kunqi: shocked
Pointing at the price tag, she couldn’t find the words.
Xie Xingchen immediately understood—but he didn’t care at all. “I’m not trying to become the galaxy’s richest man. This price is already very reasonable.”
He didn’t know how hard it was for others to cultivate flowers, but for him it felt… pretty simple?
If green-matter plants weren’t so expensive right now, he would’ve wanted to lower the price even more!
What was this “hundreds of star-coins per flower” nonsense? A few dozen would be enough.
Remembering how this student used to generously spend money for classmates and contribute to the class, Ni Kunqi couldn’t help sighing.
Her student truly treated money like dust—a gentleman.
Ni Kunqi looked at Xie Xingchen and said firmly, “You will definitely succeed.”
Xie Xingchen smiled and accepted the blessing naturally. “Thank you for your good words, teacher.”
Ten o’clock was the opening time Xie Xingchen had set.
At exactly ten, the fog around Earth Trading House began to dissipate.
As half the fog cleared, a fairy-like flower shop gradually revealed itself.
“Wow—what shop is this? Why is it so pretty?!”
“Also, what kind of blue is that? It’s gorgeous! Does the system even have that color?”
“…”
“Eh? This looks like a flower shop?”
“Waaah, the decoration is so refined! And the flowers look so beautiful!”
The people of the “retirement street” were stunned into silence.
Faced with the fairy-like storefront and bouquets so gorgeous they made hearts flutter, the well-off crowd linked arms in small groups and stepped carefully into this little slice of heaven.
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