Chapter 73
[Ding-dong, congratulations! The player has completed the quest “Plant 1,000 mu of purple alfalfa” and received rewards: [High-Quality · Calf] ×2, [High-Quality · Lamb] ×2]
One day, while Xie Xingchen was sleeping soundly, he received a message from the system.
The familiar ding-dong made him struggle his eyes open.
Half-asleep, he opened the system reward mail. In the middle of a yawn, he suddenly saw the little lamb and little calf icons he’d been longing for.
In an instant, he was awake.
His eyes flew wide open, and all the drowsiness vanished.
Xie Xingchen rubbed his eyes and opened the system prompt—then caught the key detail.
High-quality lambs? High-quality calves?
Surprised, he said to the system, “Xiao Mo, why did you send lambs and calves this time—and with a quality rating?”
[System: Because the player exceeded the task requirements.]
Xie Xingchen’s mouth fell open.
Whoa—so if you exceed the target, you can get extra rewards?
From his expression alone, the system could guess what he was thinking, so—
[System: Only some quests offer over-completion rewards.]
Xie Xingchen murmured, “I see.”
He didn’t feel disappointed—instead, he thought it was pretty good.
Otherwise, if there were extra rewards every time, next time should he go all-out or not?
If he went all-out, it’d be exhausting. If he didn’t, it’d feel like a waste!
In that case, it was better to just leave it to luck.
At least then he could lie flat with a clear conscience.
While he was confidently rambling with the system, he talked himself right back to sleep.
He didn’t know when he drifted off; he only knew that when he woke again, it was already light.
Staring blankly at the wooden ceiling, Xie Xingchen’s mind was empty.
After who knew how long, someone knocked.
The familiar, slightly heavy knock made him sit up like a wandering soul.
He “floated” to the door, hair in a mess, and opened it.
Outside stood the familiar wild horses.
Seeing the herd, Xie Xingchen fell silent for a moment, then, as if on autopilot, took out sugar cubes from his space button.
After handing them over, he absentmindedly rubbed the two foals’ heads.
Only when the two foals fought to nudge into his arms did he come back to himself.
He shook his head and smiled. Leading the two foals to the stream beside the cabin, he crouched down, soaked a handkerchief, and wiped his face.
The icy, piercing cold against his skin made him jolt—finally fully awake.
All the while, the two foals pressed affectionately against him. While he wiped his face, they drank water; once he finished, the two mischievous foals trotted over—da-da—and “scratched” him with their hooves in a spoiled, clingy way.
Xie Xingchen immediately raised both hands in surrender. “Alright, alright—good babies, behave. I’ll get you mangoes right now.”
For some reason lately, mangoes on Qiong Island had had a massive bumper harvest, so Xie Xingchen had stored a whole pile of them in his space button.
But that wasn’t quite accurate.
The real situation was: all the fruits in the tropical plantation on Qiong Island had hit a bumper harvest—and not only the cultivated ones. Even wild fruit trees growing naturally outside were loaded with fruit.
It was like the fruit had ignored the seasons, ripening in this time of year the way greenhouse vegetables and off-season produce did.
At first, Xie Xingchen felt something was off, so he packed up a batch and sent it to Professor Ni, asking her to run tests at First Academy.
The results showed nothing wrong—aside from the fruit being too nutritious and having plenty of “green matter.”
So Xie Xingchen stopped worrying about it.
After all, if he could time-travel to an interstellar era, how could he insist that after so many years, fruit still had to strictly follow the old growth seasons?
He fed the two foals two mangoes, then gave the horse king three big ones. The rest he handed out—roughly one per horse.
After eating, the herd looked satisfied and prepared to disperse.
Before they left, Xie Xingchen solemnly said goodbye to the two foals.
Whether they understood or not didn’t matter—he grabbed them and talked their ears off. By the time he finished, even the horse king came over to herd the foals away.
Leaning against the wooden door, Xie Xingchen watched the herd gallop off. The dust kicked up along the way blurred his vision.
Once their silhouettes vanished, he went back inside to pack.
The planting quest was complete. He had to bring the rewards back to the livestock factory.
If Boxi said “return, return, return” again this time, then he might really have to tell the livestock factory “return, return, return.”
Sigh. He didn’t want to say it like that—but petting horses for so long hadn’t been for nothing. At the very least… he’d come to terms with it.
It’s just money.
He could earn it again!
He had so many flower fields now!
Those were all money!
When he got back, he’d increase the number of fresh flowers he put up for sale.
He had enough stockpiled flower tea to sell for a long time, and the hydrosols and essential oils he’d made would last ages too—so selling more fresh flowers was no problem at all.
Prosperity walked in. “Boss, do you need help?”
Seeing Xie Xingchen hauling a big bucket of water from the stream, Prosperity asked.
Before Xie Xingchen could answer, Prosperity stepped forward with perfect timing and started helping.
Xie Xingchen took out another big bucket from his space button. Together they drew more than ten buckets before stopping.
Afterward, Prosperity looked at him, puzzled. “Boss, water is everywhere. Why are you storing water from here?”
The stream didn’t even flow strongly, so collecting water wasn’t especially convenient.
Xie Xingchen clapped his hands and replied matter-of-factly, “Because the water here is clear and sweet! I’ve drunk a lot of water—this is the best-tasting by far!”
Prosperity still looked like he was thinking hard about why water could have a “taste,” so Xie Xingchen patted his head with pity. “Prosperity, you probably can’t figure this out. Let me use an analogy… say this water has more minerals and higher nutritional value. Wouldn’t that make it better? Wouldn’t I want to drink more?”
Prosperity’s eyes lit up. “So that’s how it is! Then what extra nutrients does this water have?”
Xie Xingchen smiled, spread both hands. “How would I know? It’s just an analogy. I just think it tastes clear and sweet, so I want to drink it every day.”
Prosperity: “……” So after all that, we’re back to whether it tastes good?
Which loops right back to square one: isn’t water colorless and tasteless? Why would there be “good-tasting” and “bad-tasting” water?
Robots couldn’t understand it. Robots felt humans were too weird.
Xie Xingchen chuckled. “Alright, stop thinking. Let’s go—we’ll head to the alfalfa fields and pick up Get-Rich and Long-Life.”
As he spoke, he checked the instructions he’d left for the on-site robots about feeding the horses.
After confirming nothing was missing, he got into the hovercar with a faint, indescribable melancholy.
After leaving today, it would be a long time before he could come back.
Maybe by then, the cute little foals would have grown into majestic adult horses.
Xie Xingchen: sighing cat.gif
They took the hovercar back near the starship.
Xie Xingchen didn’t stop to admire the long-missed, seemingly endless flower fields.
Considering the headache that was the livestock factory, the first thing he did upon returning was claim his rewards and deliver the animal young to Boxi.
A pair of lambs and a pair of calves—and high-quality ones gifted by the system. At last, Boxi nodded and accepted them.
Once the young were settled, there was still the fodder problem.
Xie Xingchen pulled out a bundle of purple alfalfa in normal condition from his space button (he didn’t dare bring out the most tender pasture right away—afraid Boxi would only accept that kind in the future and make life harder).
Keeping his face blank but his nerves tight, he asked, “How is it? Is this fodder acceptable?”
Please don’t say “return.” If you say “return,” then I’ll have no choice but to return you.
Yes—Xie Xingchen felt he’d been stupid.
The livestock factory was his. Why was he the one putting it on hold? If anyone should be put on hold, it should be the “freebie” management robot!
If this manager robot didn’t work, couldn’t he just replace it?
His perspective instantly “opened up.”
Boxi didn’t know that one careless word might cost him his job. Even though he still wasn’t completely satisfied with the fodder’s quality, he judged it barely acceptable.
Boxi nodded seriously. “Alright. But, Boss, I hope the fodder quality won’t be lower than this in the future.”
In other words: this was the passing line. Anything below it, he wouldn’t accept.
Hearing that, Xie Xingchen let out a heavy breath.
Great. Finally resolved.
Not lower than this? Easy. What he’d shown was only average-quality alfalfa anyway.
Thank goodness, thank goodness—thank goodness he’d been smart and didn’t use the carefully pampered alfalfa as the sample. Otherwise, if Boxi demanded “not lower than this,” then either he or Boxi would end up “unemployed.”
With that nightmare settled, Xie Xingchen didn’t want to stay another second—afraid that if he did, Boxi would say “return” again.
He hurried to the warehouse and pulled out the rest of his alfalfa.
All of it was better quality than the sample bundle he’d shown.
Boxi’s worry vanished, replaced by instant delight.
Xie Xingchen said over his shoulder, “For now, that’s all the fodder we have. When it’s almost used up, contact Prosperity and have him fetch more from the grassland.”
There was no point fetching more now—there were only four young animals, and even if they ate nonstop, they couldn’t consume much.
Boxi agreed, then started chatting with Xie Xingchen about random things.
Eventually Xie Xingchen realized Boxi was trying to ease the tension between them from the past period.
Xie Xingchen had meant to leave, but seeing this, he stayed.
After more than ten minutes of small talk, both sides were satisfied, and the conversation ended.
“Long-Life,” Xie Xingchen asked, “how are the plants we brought back from Qiong Island doing?”
Long-Life, the head of planting management, answered without hesitation: “All seven crops have been planted. Licorice is doing best, chamomile second. The others are average. Only the rice seeds don’t seem to adapt to the local climate and soil—they’re still a bit listless.”
He didn’t know whether rice was just delicate, or whether this climate wasn’t as suitable as Qiong Island’s. Either way, the rice had wilted since planting.
Xie Xingchen was prepared for that, so he wasn’t too disappointed.
He changed direction toward the river. “Let’s go to the rice paddies.”
Maybe sending some spiritual power into them would help.
If not, then in the future he’d probably have to grow rice only on Qiong Island.
Long-Life had no objections and followed him obediently to the paddy.
Knowing his boss was about to channel spiritual power, Long-Life smartly stood on the ridge at the edge and watched Xie Xingchen work in the water.
Channeling spiritual power could be fast or slow. Speed depended not only on the planter’s spiritual power level, but also on how finely they could control it.
Xie Xingchen’s spiritual power level wasn’t low, and his fine control was extremely strong, so the process took longer—but the results were far beyond an ordinary planter’s.
After just one round of spiritual power, the rice seedlings seemed to revive. Their yellow-green leaves turned emerald green. With a bit more, they’d likely become deep green.
Covered in mud after climbing out, Xie Xingchen went to the river to wash his hands and feet.
The autumn wind was sharp; even the river water carried late-autumn chill.
Just washing up made him shiver. He decided that next time he’d definitely wear protective gear.
After washing, he climbed back up and walked away along the ridge.
On the way back to the starship, Xie Xingchen suddenly noticed many more little rabbits around the flower fields. And they weren’t afraid of people—hopping around cheerfully.
Xie Xingchen: ?
He hadn’t been gone that long, right?
Why did it feel like everything had changed so much?
Finding it strange, he turned and asked, “Long-Life, do you know where these rabbits came from?”
Long-Life looked back at him with a weird expression.
Seeing that look, Xie Xingchen remembered Long-Life had been out clearing land with him before, so he probably didn’t know either.
So Xie Xingchen stopped a planting robot he vaguely recognized—one that was weeding nearby—and pointed at the bouncy rabbits. “Xiao A, where did these rabbits come from?”
The straightforward robot Xiao A answered, “Feifei brought them.”
Feifei brought them?
Why would Feifei bring rabbits?
Don’t tell me… emergency food storage?
Xie Xingchen’s interest stirred—spicy rabbit heads flashed before his eyes.
But the next second—
Xiao A said flatly, “It asked us to help raise its kids.”
Xie Xingchen: ?
Kids? What kids?
Feifei had kids?!
And that many?
His pupils shook. He even forgot to ask how Xiao A could communicate with Feifei—he just felt dazed.
Xiao A continued: “Feifei said the kids were too annoying. They kept pulling up carrots in its field every day, so it had their parents dump them here.”
Xie Xingchen: Emmm.
Yeah… that was totally Feifei’s style.
Normal people: “When in doubt, quantum mechanics.”
Feifei: “If annoyed, summon the human servant.”
What could Xie Xingchen do with a partner like that?
All he could do was smile, nod, and say: okay, got it, sure—let’s do it that way.
After leaving Xiao A, Xie Xingchen looked at the rabbits along the way, his feelings complicated.
Only after returning to the starship and his familiar room did that feeling fade.
On his first day back, Xie Xingchen couldn’t be bothered to cook and didn’t want to make Get-Rich cook either, so he drank a bland nutrient solution and went straight to the bedroom.
It was only a little past noon, but after working in the paddies, he was already ready to wash up and sleep.
A hot shower chased away the chill. Then he sat in the drying area, enjoying warm air softly blowing over him.
This was the bathroom’s smart drying zone, located on the “dry” side of the separated wet-dry layout. Smart air panels were installed on all sides, and it came with a comfortable waterproof sofa and a refined unisex vanity.
Xie Xingchen never used the vanity, but he was a regular in the drying zone.
To enjoy it even more, after installing a small wormhole receiver, he’d even bought an expensive waterproof sofa bed made of special fabric.
Now he lay on that sofa bed, drifting toward sleep under the dryer’s warm breeze.
When the dryer stopped, Xie Xingchen fell asleep in the soft, cozy sofa bed.
About an hour later, his body clock woke him and ended the short nap.
He didn’t find it strange at all that he’d fallen asleep in the drying zone—he wasn’t even slightly surprised.
After all, if he did find it strange, he wouldn’t have bought the sofa bed.
Stretching, he returned to the bedroom, got under the blanket, sat at the head of the bed, and opened the StarNet marketplace.
Because the recent fruit harvest was so abundant, and he didn’t want it to go to waste, Xie Xingchen planned to open another shop on Earth Trading Co.’s specialty street—a fruit shop.
But since fruit harvests weren’t always guaranteed, he didn’t plan to list fruit daily. If he had surplus fruit, he’d list it; if not, he’d close the shop.
So he didn’t plan to advertise this fruit shop widely.
He’d just open it casually; customers could buy casually.
Maybe because Earth Trading Co. had set a good precedent, after it became famous, the decoration interface now offered many templates—ethereal, fresh, fairy-tale, forest-themed, and more.
These styles resembled Earth Trading Co.’s aesthetic, but after blending in design elements from other interstellar civilizations, they formed a unique beauty of their own.
Beautiful. Really beautiful.
The kind of design that made you want to buy the moment you saw it.
After browsing, Xie Xingchen felt there was no need to torture himself thinking about décor details. He might as well just buy a limited template—faster and prettier.
After comparing options, he chose a “Forest Fairy Tale” shop design by a rising designer from a plant civilization. He even spent extra time digging through the décor center and—amazingly—found fairy-tale forest-style fruit display shelves that matched perfectly.
After paying for the renovation, he happily selected the “Hide” option.
With this option, the shop wouldn’t be surrounded by mist; instead, it would be disguised by the system.
To everyone except the owner, the shop would look like an unrenovated, unopened default storefront.
After finishing the décor, he went to the mechanical market and bought a transport hovercar and a small wormhole receiver.
He bought the transport hovercar because with only one hovercar on Earth, both travel and deliveries were inconvenient.
As for the small wormhole receiver—simple.
The tropical plantation was already selling fruit. So instead of transporting fruit here and then shipping it out, it was better to ship directly from the source. Costs would spike short-term, but long-term it was better.
It saved transport fees, reduced labor, and most importantly improved freshness.
Produce wasn’t like other goods—freshness mattered.
A few hours more or less might look insignificant, but picky customers could taste the difference immediately.
At noon on the third day, the mechanical market’s delivery starship arrived at the spaceport.
Because the shipment needed to go to Qiong Island, Xie Xingchen went to the spaceport himself. He opened permissions and had the small ship depart from the spaceport and continue on to Qiong Island.
As the mechanical market’s top-tier VIP, Xie Xingchen had high privileges—even the delivery personnel were senior engineers from the nearest store.
Installing the small wormhole receiver, checking delivery robots… the engineer’s service was extremely attentive.
When they were leaving, Xie Xingchen even gave them two boxes of coconut-scent energy liquid. The engineer was so excited they kept saying they’d come again next time.
It amused Xie Xingchen.
He said that if they came again next time, he’d probably have new flavors by then and would let them taste those too.
After seeing off the delivery ship, Xie Xingchen returned to the plantation.
Based on the yield estimates from the system planting robots, he had a clear sense of numbers.
After setting aside what he needed, he listed the surplus fruit in the fruit shop. For the product details, he attached the fruit quality test report Professor Ni had helped with.
Even though it sounded simple, it was surprisingly tedious.
There weren’t many product links, and he shamelessly reused the existing report text, but just uploading the product images took him ages.
And even then, he didn’t get any truly good photos.
By the end, Xie Xingchen almost wanted to pay someone online to take marketplace product photos for him.
He did end up doing that later—but not this time.
After this round of “photo trauma,” the next time he needed photos, he was so scared he posted a request online: he’d pay, and he’d even ship a whole box of the products to the photographer. After shooting, they could keep the items—just send him the photos.
Somehow, a bunch of famous photographers showed up.
Instead of shooting celebrities, they shot product photos for Xie Xingchen—and produced images that were realistic, gorgeous, and extremely professional.
But that’s a story for later.
For now, Xie Xingchen spent half the day uploading a batch of photos that weren’t ugly, but were definitely not good-looking either.
He reviewed everything, ran the system self-check, confirmed there were no issues, then set listing quantities at 80% of the fruit numbers provided by the planting robots.
Mangoes, lychees, longans, passion fruit, coconuts, lemons, bananas, jackfruit, papayas, tomatoes… more than a dozen links, quantities set one by one.
Finally, just as he was about to click the [Confirm] button, he received a system message.
[Ding-dong, congratulations! The player has successfully lit up the “Peony” entry in the Codex. The system rewards 500 EXP. Please check the System Codex for details.]
[Ding-dong, congratulations! The player’s EXP has reached 1313. Progress toward the next level: 1313/8000]
“……”
[Beep-beep, congratulations! Listing successful. Earth Trading Co.’s Fruit Shop is now open. Please set the opening time.]
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