Chapter 40
There was no way he could increase the quantity!
Unless the system decides to bless him with a few more food machines.
Knowing exactly how powerful food was, Xie Xingchen stayed as quiet as a chicken even when his StarBlog got flooded.
Xie Xingchen: I don’t dare say anything or ask anything.jpg
But as time passed, the power of food kept fermenting. Even if he played dead, he couldn’t keep his peace.
Earth Shop’s food went explosively viral across the Star Alliance!
And the speed of it was faster than a skyrocket—like it blasted off on a rocket.
After all, the Star Alliance had tons of streamers.
And today, Xie Xingchen had generously sold a total of 45,000 portions of food. Add in the non-streamer netizens who joined the hype, and just the food “unboxing” streams alone reached over a thousand, let alone the fact that a few big-name streamers with unused holographic-stream quotas got insanely lucky and snatched Earth Shop food!
Netizens instantly went wild.
They threw money at gifts, desperate to make those top streamers do full holographic food livestreams!
With both money and hype on the line, the big streamers weren’t stupid. They all agreed to the fans’ requests.
And just like that—someone poked straight through a whole food nest.
Netizens poured in with shining eyes and crawled out dazed and dreamy.
After several high-quality unboxing streams, not only was Xie Xingchen’s StarBlog getting flooded, but his three stores got hit just as badly.
So badly that the message boards for all three stores filled up multiple times. They filled up so much that StarNet Mall’s AI brain sent him N reminders, giving Xie Xingchen a splitting headache.
Honestly, if his contact info weren’t private, he would definitely be getting even scarier message-bombing.
Xie Xingchen: (:???)
This… might not be the kind of fame I wanted.
Xie Xingchen wore a bitter expression. Right now, he genuinely felt miserable.
So, no matter where you go, are foodies really the building blocks of the world?
So many civilizations, so many taste differences, and at the same time, the flower shop was selling sunflowers with 5% green-substance content—yet the combined impact of all that couldn’t beat plain old food?
Xie Xingchen complained internally nonstop.
He felt like these interstellar people had some kind of problem.
But what he didn’t know was that the reason no one noticed the sunflowers right away was simply because he had trained everyone into a habit: not reading product details.
Other greenery shops tried to list green-substance content down to ten decimal places. But Xie Xingchen? Not only did he never label the content, his product details barely contained anything besides the name and origin.
Did anyone even need to open the details for that?
Wouldn’t you just look at the purchase link and product name?
Over time, everyone learned Earth Shop’s product details were basically useless, so they naturally missed the information Xie Xingchen specifically uploaded—that the sunflowers had 5% green-substance content.
On top of that, interstellar “real food” was rare and expensive. When Xie Xingchen’s food at 100 star-coins appeared, who could compete?
Even food that actual Earth humans considered delicious—dropped into the interstellar food desert—was basically a dimension-reduction strike.
So the once-ignored food instantly became the ultimate traffic password.
Xie Xingchen found it deeply troubling.
He sighed. “Get-Rich… I don’t even dare go online anymore.”
Netizens were too crazy.
The moment he went online, it was all screaming—terrifying.
Get-Rich, who had been diligently doing chores, paused and turned around, completely puzzled. “Why?”
He knew many people were discussing his master, but couldn’t he just block it? Why would he not dare to go online?
Xie Xingchen sighed again and said seriously, “Because the moment I go on, I see a pile of people begging to buy more. There are too many.”
Get-Rich scratched his head, feeling something odd.
If he knew the word “humblebrag,” he might have used it to describe his master’s unconscious flexing.
But as a qualified robot, even if he had the urge to roast, solving his master’s problem came first.
Get-Rich offered seriously, “Increase food tasting slots?”
Hearing the words “food tasting slots,” Xie Xingchen smiled.
Right—this place did have something like tasting slots.
And usually, they could make a lot of money!
But here came the problem… the profit was big, but the upfront cost was big too.
To create tasting slots, the provider had to buy a device. The device could analyze food components and flavor, run deep simulations, and then upload data to StarNet Mall so users could purchase the tasting experience.
Convenient, right?
Yes, very convenient!
But Xie Xingchen didn’t have that kind of money.
Those machines were usually insanely expensive!
Buying one would cost a fortune.
And even after uploading results to StarNet Mall and making money, the mall would take 50%.
Xie Xingchen: Emmm… that feels so painful.
Xie Xingchen immediately deflated. “Get-Rich, you can’t just stay home doing chores every day—you need to get out into the world. Look at you. You’ve been doing chores so long you’ve lost touch with the masses! Tasting slots? Does your boss have money to buy that machine? Your boss still owes StarNet Mall 60.39 million star-coins in shop payments.”
Just saying “60.39 million” made Xie Xingchen’s heart tremble.
His debt wasn’t even paid off yet—why would he mess with tasting slots?
What you can’t get is always the best. Let them quietly refresh the hot searches and enjoy the hunger marketing.
With no money, hunger marketing was all he could do. The moment Xie Xingchen thought about his debt and the price of tasting-slot machines, he turned into a salted fish again.
Ah, whether they can eat it or not doesn’t matter. If they can’t, treat it as willpower training.
The important thing is, everyone’s young—why are they yelling about food every day? How are they going to accomplish anything big in the future?!
Stimulated by his debt, Xie Xingchen decided to just smash the pot and stop caring.
Other people had to carefully design hunger marketing, but he was genuinely hungry, not marketing. In that sense, he’d already done right by the netizens!
But speaking of this, he had to start calculating money.
Flower shop: 9 types of flowers, 10,000 stems each. Revenue: (199 + 199 + 299 + 299 + 299 + 399 + 399 + 499 + 999) × 10,000 = 125,910,000 star-coins.
Food shop: 3 types of food, 15,000 portions each. Revenue: 300 × 15,000 = 4,500,000 star-coins.
Flower tea shop: 9 types of tea, 20,000 jars each, 10,000 star coins per jar. Total: 20,000 × 9 × 10,000 = 1,800,000,000 star-coins.
All three stores combined: 1,930,410,000 star-coins.
After calculating the exact amount, Xie Xingchen froze on the spot.
Xie Xingchen: corners of mouth gradually rise.jpg
Tasting slots, wait for me—I’m coming!
One day’s revenue reached 1.9 billion star-coins?
Xie Xingchen: I’m back alive.jpg
That much revenue revived him instantly.
After spending lavishly to repay his debt, his account still had 1,906,020,000 star-coins left.
He was moved to tears. Since coming to Earth, he’d never been this rich!
Buy it—buy the most expensive one. It’s just a tasting slot machine. Who can’t afford it?!
He boldly opened the Mechanical Commerce store.
But the next second—
He expressionlessly closed the page.
Xie Xingchen once again deeply understood: he was still just a poor salted fish.
A basic food testing device costs over 100 million star-coins; expensive ones cost tens of billions?
Heh. The holo-mall already had a built-in taste system—why the hell was it so expensive? Only an idiot would buy it!
In reality, not many people bought something that expensive. But there was a behavior called—renting.
Tasting slot machines were precision large-scale devices. Cheap ones weren’t very useful; the more expensive, the more capable. People serious about tasting slots naturally choose the best machines.
But who could buy something that expensive?
Buy it just to use it a few times?
That’s a joke.
So on big planets where demand was high, rental services appeared. For just a few hundred thousand star-coins, you could rent one use.
But on remote frontier planets, that was a fantasy.
Right now, the nearest big planet to Xie Xingchen was a major habitable world of mechanical lifeforms—and it would take three days by a large spaceship to get there.
Xie Xingchen said, “Get-Rich, I finally understand why nobody likes opening up remote frontier planets.”
The development cost was too high!
You had nothing, you had to suffer through pioneering, and you had to build infrastructure—space infrastructure.
Xie Xingchen: 🙂
So tired. Didn’t want to talk.
Didn’t want to go. Too much trouble.
To go, he’d have to fly his starship to Yuyang Star first, then transfer to a large spaceship.
He wasn’t very good at piloting his starship.
What if he got lost?
Or ran into alien beasts?
Xie Xingchen looked full of worry.
He hated Star Alliance policy.
Why couldn’t he let someone else do the testing for him?
So annoying!
He closed StarNet Mall and looked at the high-hanging moon in the sky, letting out a sigh.
Only when his communicator rang did he snap out of his gloom.
He didn’t expect that when he answered, it would be Ludwig—someone who rarely contacted him.
Seeing Ludwig, Xie Xingchen was a little surprised. “Ludwig? What’s wrong?”
Oh, my friend—why do you look as troubled as I do?
Ludwig was silent for a long time, then looked at Xie Xingchen with a subtle, accusing gaze.
At first, Xie Xingchen didn’t understand.
Ludwig’s voice was low. “You said before… that if there were new things next time, you would prioritize us…”
Xie Xingchen: ?
Did… did he say that?
Xie Xingchen thought for a moment, then looked baffled.
He remembered. He did say it—but… wasn’t that just an adult’s casual social line? Like “We should have dinner sometime”? Ludwig took it seriously?
Seeing that Ludwig was expressionless yet faintly aggrieved, Xie Xingchen was rendered speechless.
God knew he really just said it casually!
The level of seriousness was about the same as “Let’s eat together next time.”
But Ludwig took it seriously!
Mechanical lifeform cuties were way too earnest.
Xie Xingchen’s feelings got complicated.
He didn’t know whether to scold himself for “speaking without thinking.”
Anyway, being confronted by the person himself… was extremely awkward.
He said it, so he didn’t try to deny it, and couldn’t deny it.
He sincerely apologized to Ludwig, then thought seriously for a long while before offering a solution:
“Ludwig, how about tomorrow I let you try those foods again? If you want them, we can talk.”
Now that he had more revenue, he wasn’t completely unable to increase output.
Compared to buying a tasting slot machine, upgrading the food machines was obviously far simpler.
Hearing this, Ludwig’s lips lifted slightly—he clearly seemed in a great mood.
Then he sent Xie Xingchen a 30%-off card for Mechanical Commerce.
Xie Xingchen: …I didn’t ask for this, but you’re giving too much!
A 30% discount card—how much could that save him?
His brain wanted to refuse, but his hand clicked “Accept” on its own, and he hurriedly said, “This isn’t right. This card is too valuable.”
Ludwig chuckled.
Xie Xingchen’s reaction was funny, but seeing how much he liked the gift made Ludwig happy.
He was happy that the gift he gave was genuinely appreciated.
Xie Xingchen had already planned to provide Ludwig more food; now that Ludwig was so “with it,” he felt even more willing to give more.
And since he’d accepted Ludwig’s discount card, he couldn’t very well let Ludwig lose out. In the end, he not only offered food, but he also generously promised to provide flowers and flower tea.
But considering the online sale quantities were limited, he could only supply Ludwig once in a while, and how much depended on his production.
Ludwig didn’t get upset. He was satisfied.
When Xie Xingchen said that, Ludwig’s black gem-like eyes lit up instantly.
He looked at Xie Xingchen steadily and thanked him sincerely: “That’s already enough. Thank you, Xie Xingchen.”
Hearing thanks made Xie Xingchen visibly happy too—his smile was so bright it was like turning night into day.
The two—who could be called friends—were in equally good moods.
So they didn’t hang up like usual. They left the call open and chatted casually. And as they talked, the conversation eventually turned to the tasting slots everyone online was begging for.
Once tasting slots came up, Xie Xingchen couldn’t help but rant about the terrifying prices of tasting-slot machines.
Ludwig didn’t talk much, but he was an excellent listener. He quietly listened to Xie Xingchen’s worries and complaints.
It suited Xie Xingchen perfectly—he only wanted someone to vent to.
It wasn’t that he had no money… it was that his money seemed too small. Compared to what he needed, what he could earn right now was like a faint firefly glow.
He had just made a fortune today. He had been happy just a moment ago. But then he saw the tasting slot machine prices.
And those prices made him think about how much it would cost to develop Earth.
In an instant, pressure surged over him like seawater.
Xie Xingchen suddenly lost confidence.
He feared spending his whole life and still failing to reach his goal.
But he couldn’t tell anyone what that goal was, so all he could do was complain about machine prices to release his stress.
Complaining to the owner of Mechanical Commerce that Mechanical Commerce machines were too expensive—across the whole galaxy, only Xie Xingchen would dare do that.
And the boss being complained at, not only didn’t get angry, he quietly became an emotional trash can—this direction was already bizarre.
But what came next was even stranger.
When Xie Xingchen finally quieted down, Ludwig—the owner of Mechanical Commerce—suddenly asked:
“You want to rent a tasting slot machine?”
Xie Xingchen nodded helplessly and repeated, “Yeah. It’s too expensive to buy, and it’s not worth it. Renting is great. One use is only a hundred-something thousand star-coins; even a higher-quality one is only a few hundred thousand. That’s still way cheaper than buying a whole machine. It’s just that my place is too remote—there aren’t any big planets nearby.”
He didn’t even insist on a human civilization planet anymore—any big civilized planet would do. But Earth was so remote that only small planets surrounded it.
Ludwig listened carefully, then said:
“Next week, Mechanical Commerce is delivering the newest tasting-slot device to the human civilization’s central planet. We’ll pass near Earth. If you need it, I can stop by Earth first and rent the machine to you, then continue to the central planet.”
Xie Xingchen: ?
Xie Xingchen: !
His mouth fell open. He couldn’t help asking, “For real?!”
Ludwig nodded. “For real. This is a newly released machine. Its realism will be higher. We plan to deploy it to rental shops on the central planets of each civilization.”
Xie Xingchen’s eyes lit up. Without hesitation he said, “Hahahaha—then hurry up and come! I’ll be waiting for you on Earth!”
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