Chapter 34
Everyone was dumbfounded.
They’d seen people who loved money—but they’d truly never seen someone say it this bluntly: “I love money!”
Especially the long-time frontline “melon-eaters” (hardcore gossip netizens).
They’d seen far too many celebrities and influencers craft personas like “I don’t love money” or “I’m not short on cash.” But when had they ever seen a rich guy who was clearly insanely wealthy—yet wouldn’t even allow people to say he didn’t love money?
This… this world actually had such a flirtatious, totally unpretentious, dazzling little menace?
Everyone: Emmm… love it, love it.
[Fish Who Loves Eating Cats: So… when exactly is Boss Xie going to put the food and flower tea on sale?]
[Lack of Sunshine Like Lack of Oxygen: Seriously! Please don’t hold back out of pity for us! We really aren’t short on money! Boss Xie, hurry and list it already—my kid is drooling just watching!]
[Hungry Woodpecker: [woodpecker crying.jpg] BO—SS—XIE! Do you see your babies’ tears? Our tears are flooding harder than the Alpha Mega Waterfall! Please, I beg you, be a human! ????????]
Xie Xingchen: “……”
Xie Xingchen: No f**ks to give.
Xie Xingchen: So there really is a foodie living inside everyone, huh.
Xie Xingchen suddenly felt that making that post might not have been a great idea.
Sure, he did plan to expand Earth Trading House.
But originally, Xie Xingchen wanted to keep a low profile for a while—spend some time stockpiling food first, then drop a big wave of hype later.
That’s right—stockpiling food.
He discovered that as long as he was willing to spend revenue, the food produced by the food machines could actually be stored, with a maximum storage period of one month.
This feature was super cost-effective. Once enabled, it only cost 1,000 star-coins in revenue per day, or 30,000 star-coins in revenue per month.
Unfortunately, back then, the machine manual was too long, and the storage setting was hidden way too well, so Xie Xingchen only just now realized the food machines even had this feature.
Xie Xingchen: Felt like he’d lost… just a tiny few hundred million.
[Xie Xingchen V: Don’t worry, it’ll be listed! Just not right now. Please be patient—at the latest, I’ll expand Earth Trading House within this month QAQ]
After posting that message, Xie Xingchen didn’t dare read the comments and immediately logged off.
Xie Xingchen: Estimated the comments were already exploding 0.0
And he was right—“exploding” was an understatement.
This time, there were even signs of paid trolls in his comment section!
It really showed how much this newly minted planet owner, Xie Xingchen, was attracting envy and hatred.
Because in the Star Alliance era, “paid trolls” were ridiculously hard to come by.
Nowadays, everyone receives a light-brain at birth, and each light-brain account is bound to their citizen ID—strictly one person, one account.
Under those conditions, hiring trolls costs a fortune!
Unless you’d seriously offended someone, most people wouldn’t spend that kind of money just to stir trouble.
The batch of trolls under Xie Xingchen’s comments was the handiwork of a certain planting-planet heir from earlier.
They’d long been unhappy with Xie Xingchen selling premium green plants at low prices.
Originally, everyone planned to use the Plant Association entry issue to block him and force him to bow his head—who would’ve thought Xie Xingchen wouldn’t take the bait?
He didn’t even submit an application to join the Plant Association!
And because Xie Xingchen’s planting planet had only just begun developing while his holographic shop was already booming, he couldn’t do business with other planet owners or companies in the short term—so they had no easy way to vent. In the end, they could only choose the dumbest method: disgusting him online.
But what they didn’t expect was—
No matter how bloody the comment war got, Xie Xingchen didn’t even look.
Villains: suffocatingly frustrated.
Since he’d decided to add a food shop under Earth Trading House, Xie Xingchen no longer planned to do group-buying for scallion-oil noodles and candied roasted chestnuts.
But even so, the variety of food he had was still far too limited.
Thinking of this, Xie Xingchen couldn’t help turning his gaze to the scallion pancake machine.
The scallion pancake maker could only produce 1,000 pancakes a day, and those 1,000 were already spoken for. If he wanted more scallion pancakes to sell in Earth Trading House, the fastest option right now was—
Upgrading.
Spend 20 million in revenue to upgrade the scallion pancake maker to LV2, increasing output to 2,000 pancakes per day.
After allocating 1,000 pancakes to group-buying, he’d still have 1,000 scallion pancakes, 1,000 portions of scallion-oil noodles, and 1,000 portions of candied roasted chestnuts to list in Earth Trading House every day.
Not daring to pin his hopes on luck, Xie Xingchen gritted his teeth. After hesitating for a while, he decided to spend the money.
[Ding-dong]
[System Notice: 20,000,000 star-coins revenue deducted. Scallion Pancake Maker level was 1. Current level: LV2]
After deducting 20 million in revenue, Xie Xingchen had 16.72 million in revenue left.
His heart was bleeding. But the moment his eyes landed on the upgraded, even more sci-fi-looking scallion pancake machine, that pain eased noticeably.
Good grief!
Xie Xingchen couldn’t help but sigh: “Good grief!”
Setting everything else aside, the upgraded scallion pancake maker looked really nice.
So this was the kind of appearance you could only get by spending money!
Same silver-white color, but the LV2 machine was simply glossier than LV1. You didn’t even need to touch it—just looking at it, you could tell the LV2 quality was superior.
Xie Xingchen stepped forward and set all three food machines to store 1,000 servings per day for half a month.
[System Notice: Scallion Pancake Maker, Scallion-Oil Noodle Maker, Candied Roasted Chestnut Maker settings complete. Setting: 15 days/store 1,000 servings daily. Storage fee: 45,000 star-coins revenue.]
16.72 million ? 0.045 million = 16.675 million
Compared to the 20 million he’d just lost upgrading, the storage fee was basically nothing!
Still, he needed to use his remaining money carefully—after all, he had to buy a large quantity of eco-friendly food containers and expand Earth Trading House on StarNet Mall.
The container cost probably wouldn’t be huge since the materials weren’t rare, but expanding Earth Trading House would likely burn a lot of money.
Shop expansion costs 10,000 star-coins per square meter. Xie Xingchen wanted to open two additional sections—one for flower tea, and another as a food corner.
If he integrated those two areas into the existing flower shop, he’d also need to set up public space… add it all up, and it would require quite a lot of area.
Or… buy a separate storefront?
After all, street-facing shops seemed to do better than “shop-in-shop” setups.
Most importantly, his current shop was at the end of the street, so as long as he paid, the road might be able to extend outward.
Following that thought—if he bought all the storefronts along the newly extended section, then… could Earth Trading House eventually become a whole shopping street?
Resting his chin on his hand, Xie Xingchen sank into thought.
If he really wanted to do this, he’d have to buy up all the initial expanded storefronts at the very beginning. Otherwise, if someone spotted his plan and paid to buy a few of the newly expanded units, his “shopping street” dream would be dead.
Or… buy a plot of land from the system.
His shop was already at the end of the street, and there was no road behind it anyway.
If he bought a big piece of land from the system, could he build a huge mall behind his shop, instead of awkwardly trying to expand this tiny storefront?
It wasn’t that he thought expanding space was bad—just that if it was only internal expansion, the facade would still be tiny!
Even if the inside expanded massively, the system wouldn’t let your shop front look like a giant castle—otherwise what about all the other small shops?
It’d look totally out of place!
Xie Xingchen kept analyzing different approaches, and in the end he felt buying land was best—because once he owned the land, he could build either a mall or a whole street of shops as he liked.
However—
Reality wouldn’t allow it!
Xie Xingchen asked in disbelief: “Why not?”
[StarNet Mall Customer Service: Dear, because that commercial street is configured that way. If you want to build your own shop into a mall, we recommend doing a shop relocation.]
Xie Xingchen: ?
He was stunned: “Shop relocation?”
Why is it so complicated?!
[StarNet Mall Customer Service: Yes, dear. In order to maintain street aesthetics, there’s really no other way. Over the years, many wealthy shop owners have chosen this relocation method.]
In other words, other rich people do it this way, so you can only do it this way too.
Xie Xingchen still refused to give up. “Is there really no other way?”
[StarNet Mall Customer Service: There truly isn’t, dear. After all, we also need to consider the feelings of mall customers and other shop owners—no one wants to suddenly see strange, weird buildings while walking down the street, right?]
Xie Xingchen: No f**ks to give.
The customer service was absolutely right!
Even in the old, relatively “simple” human world, there were tons of bizarre buildings—let alone in today’s multi-civilization mix. Without rules, StarNet Mall really might become a bizarre zone full of bizarre architecture.
[StarNet Mall Customer Service: Dear, don’t be sad. Although you can’t buy a large plot of land for personal construction, expanding the street is feasible. I checked—your shop is at the end of 123 Street. If you need it, we can apply to extend the street. According to system settings, your street can still expand to many more storefronts.]
The “retirement street” had never been crowded—actually, the shops there had never even sold out—so of course there was still room to expand.
But that room wasn’t huge. At most, it could add about one-third more storefronts.
Now Xie Xingchen had made his decision.
But he’d still have to wait half a month before he could implement it.
The flower fields continued expanding.
And as the fields expanded, Xie Xingchen’s warehouse stockpile of flower tea also grew to a sizable amount.
Standing in the center of the flower fields and gazing at the endless sea of blossoms in the distance, starlight flickered in Xie Xingchen’s eyes.
Soon. Just wait a bit longer and he’d be able to harvest the joy of a bountiful yield!
As for right now…
Time to try some spicy rabbit head!
He turned away from the flower fields and returned to the starship.
It was time to deal with that fat rabbit in the kitchen!
As he walked, he asked Long-Life beside him, “Long-Life, can you kill a rabbit?”
Xie Xingchen could kill chickens and ducks, but not rabbits.
So he placed his hopes on the robot.
Long-Life froze for a second, as if he couldn’t understand why his owner was asking a medical robot to kill a rabbit.
Long-Life couldn’t help “disinfecting” himself once (as if running a self-check). After confirming there were no bugs, he answered cautiously:
“…I can?”
Xie Xingchen instantly relaxed.
You can? Great!
He’d picked the right robot, after all!
He’d always said it—how could someone who studied medicine not know how to dissect (not really).
Killing a rabbit and dissecting should basically be the same thing, right (not really).
Hearing his owner ramble and swap concepts shamelessly, Long-Life suddenly rebutted:
“No.”
Xie Xingchen: ?
Xie Xingchen looked at Long-Life in surprise and praised him. “Not bad, Long-Life—you learned to talk back? Are you evolving into a mechanical lifeform?”
Long-Life paused for a long time, then replied in a calm tone: “No.”
Xie Xingchen didn’t care about his unusually calm tone.
He was already used to how rational these robots were.
The day they became emotional—that would be a miracle.
Teasing his robots was its own kind of fun.
Only after he teased Long-Life until he stopped talking did Xie Xingchen finally stop, still feeling unsatisfied.
Kitchen
A fat rabbit lay leisurely inside its cage. Its chubby paws held a tender green vegetable, and it munched away happily, completely unaware that someone was coveting its plump body.
The first thing Xie Xingchen saw upon entering the kitchen was that fat rabbit lounging like a boss while eating.
Honestly, he’d never seen such a calm rabbit.
He couldn’t help staring at it curiously for a couple more seconds.
Xie Xingchen was extremely satisfied!
Let it go?
How could that be possible!
Such a good-looking rabbit—of course he couldn’t let it go. He was definitely going to eat it!
With eyes full of “tender affection,” he patted the fat bunny’s head, while his mouth practically drooled with craving.
Without hesitation, he turned around, briskly handed the plump rabbit to Long-Life, and said with a bright smile:
“Here, Long-Life—leave it to you.”
But—
Just as Long-Life took the rabbit, Xie Xingchen heard the familiar system notification chime in his ear.
[Ding-dong, congratulations to the player for discovering a pet—Rabbit.]
[Ding-dong, congratulations to the player for triggering the daily quest “Traveling Bunny,” reward: 500 EXP]
[Ding-dong, congratulations to the player for obtaining a companion—Fat Bunny. Please pack its luggage and send your bunny companion traveling~]
[Ding-dong, the travel-loving bunny will be away for long periods of time, but it still dearly loves its human companion—each time it returns from traveling, it will bring back travel souvenirs and travel photos obtained during the journey.]
Xie Xingchen’s eyes widened.
Looking at the red-eyed rabbit in Long-Life’s hands, he couldn’t help asking from the depths of his soul:
What is this—an interstellar version of the traveling rabbit?
Then… could there be a “cold-cold version” that travels across the galaxy in the future?
Xie Xingchen laughed at his own unreliable idea, but couldn’t help marveling: the game system was insane.
Seeing that the owner had handed him the rabbit and given no further instructions, Long-Life paused. A minute later, he grabbed a knife, held the rabbit by its ears, and was about to leave.
Xie Xingchen nearly got scared to death. “Long-Life, wait—don’t get excited! Put down my traveling bunny!”
Long-Life turned back, puzzled. “Aren’t we killing the rabbit?”
Xie Xingchen snatched the rabbit back in one motion and turned ruthless instantly:
“Kill your head! The bunny is so cute—how can you kill it?!”
Long-Life: “……”
Master, you’ve changed. Earlier, you clearly said: “Bunnies are so cute—how can you not eat it!”
Xie Xingchen didn’t care what Long-Life thought. Holding the rabbit, he gently stroked it and said warmly:
“Baby, when do you want to go traveling? Why wait—how about right now?”
Then, with eyes full of amusement, he continued:
“You’d better remember—you’re a rabbit spared by my knife. When you travel, bring back more souvenirs.”
Thinking of that frog from the past that loved taking photos, Xie Xingchen changed his wording again:
“If you like taking photos, that’s fine—but remember to take them in resource-rich places! And your photos must include coordinates, got it? It’s the interstellar era—whether you’re a human or a bunny, you have to keep up with trends. Photos without coordinates are backwater photos!”
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