Chapter 20
Unwilling to accept it, He Erwang pulled up his collar and sniffed it. His brows relaxed slightly. “The clothes seem fine…”
He muttered softly, but that faint salty, damp smell still refused to disappear.
“Wait, I know!”
He directly raised his arm to his nose and took a sniff. His reaction was enormous—his entire head turned sharply to the side. “Yue!”
Qin Ye’s gaze sharpened slightly. He had already realized what was going on.
He also raised his arm decisively near the side of his face. He did not even need to press it against his nose to smell that strange odor.
And once they became aware of it, everyone felt as if the air was filled with a salty, damp smell. After being baked under the sun and mixed with the heat of the human body,
it truly smelled like something ready to be tossed into a wok and stir-fried.
Especially Gu Shengsheng.
The others had only taken a bath. He had soaked all of his clothes in seawater and washed them too.
Now, from top to bottom, inside and out, his whole body smelled like hot salt.
As long as Gu Shengsheng lowered his head, whether it was his clothes or his exposed skin, he felt like he had turned into some kind of pickled salty seasoning.
That smell was extremely overpowering.
His face darkened as he lowered his collar, even carefully smoothing it flat.
His subconscious told him that he needed to pay attention to his appearance outside.
But… with this stink now, what was he supposed to do?
On the verge of tears, he asked aggrievedly, “I stink so much now. What do I do?”
It was not exactly pure stink, but it was just… the smell was too strange—too awful.
Qin Ye’s face was cold, and his mood was clearly not good either.
He turned back to look at the sea behind him. The boundless blue waves glittered on the surface, refracting a transparent, crystalline shine under the sunlight. It was extremely beautiful.
But now, the first thing he thought of when he looked at it was that salty, damp smell mixed with sweat, a little stinky.
He took a deep breath.
He really did not know which was easier to accept: not showering for several days, or showering and becoming salty all over.
“Let’s go back.” He had no solution either.
So, when Shen Jinfeng and Mo Fan finished building the wooden house, moved all the remaining firewood inside, and finally waited for the rest of the team to return,
what they saw were four not-so-good-looking faces.
Qin Ye’s face was cold.
Qi Xiu was expressionless.
He Erwang looked like he was sulking.
Gu Shengsheng looked extremely wronged.
The four of them had almost exactly the same aura. Their gazes toward him were all somewhat evasive, with a faint sense of having lost all hope in life.
What happened?
Shen Jinfeng looked at them in confusion. “Did beachcombing not go well?”
Qin Ye and the others shook their heads.
Mo Fan stood outside and jogged a few steps over. At one glance, he saw the full harvests in the leaf baskets.
“Holy crap, you had a huge haul! You’re still not satisfied? Why do all of you look like your parents died?”
[Hahahahaha, because I gained food, but lost “cleanliness.”]
[Because we brought back food, but turned ourselves into “food.”]
[Bro, go up and smell them and you’ll know.]
[Now I’m itching with curiosity. I really want to know what exactly that smell is like. Is it really that soul-stirring—vomit-inducing? I mean, I don’t think saltwater smells bad.]
[Saltwater doesn’t smell bad, but the smell of saltwater plus slightly damp clothes, then baked under the sun, is extremely intense. I suggest upstairs personally try it.]
[The theme of this season is survival. Hunger, water shortage, survival crisis—we haven’t really seen any of that for now. At this point, it looks like the hardest test the guests are facing is bathing. I’m dying.]
[How do they solve this? How else can they bathe? They already worked so hard just to distill a little pure water to drink. To distill enough for one person to bathe, would Gu Shengsheng have to work day and night for several days?]
[So our current lives really didn’t come easily. We need to cherish water resources! Be grateful to the motherland!]
[Upstairs’ vision and ideology—thumbs up!]
In the livestream, after getting no response, Mo Fan found it a little strange. He stepped forward a few paces, preparing to lend his teammates a hand and move the seafood into the house.
“Take a look at the house Boss and I built! Uh, mainly Boss built it. Isn’t it super impressive?”
The few of them looked at the wooden house standing before them, antique and fragrant, as if it had stepped out of a history book. Their eyes were filled with amazement.
Qin Ye pulled himself together, his brows and eyes softening as he praised, “It’s incredible!”
He avoided Mo Fan’s outstretched hand and turned to Shen Jinfeng. “Little Captain, the shape of the eaves you built, the window view, and the dougong design are as ingenious as Su-style gardens. I’ve never even seen this kind of style before.”
After all, real estate had developed vigorously in earlier years, and the Qin family had naturally been involved.
There were many projects involving antique-style architecture and Chinese gardens, so he had developed some eye for it.
Shen Jinfeng nodded at him.
Unexpectedly, Qin Ye knew his stuff. This was something he had learned in a book world he had once transmigrated into, from a royal garden designer of that time.
Qin Ye smiled and asked him, “After we get out, can I invite you to help design some blueprints for my company?”
Only, after saying his talent-recruiting line, he suddenly remembered what was wrong.
Wasn’t it possible that Shen Jinfeng liked him?
By extending this invitation now, wouldn’t he be giving the other party exactly what he wanted?
He hurriedly raised his head and, sure enough, saw Shen Jinfeng looking at him with a somewhat strange expression.
“We’ll talk after we get out,” Shen Jinfeng replied.
Qin Ye’s hand tightened around the basket.
Sure enough, he had agreed without even asking about the price!!!
Qi Xiu was also praising him from the side, and his words were even more direct. “Boss, you’re practically my reborn benefactor. Without you, I might not survive tonight.”
“This wooden house—its beauty is only its most insignificant advantage!”
Only, as they spoke, Mo Fan tried several times to help, but was avoided each time.
So he walked to Gu Shengsheng, who was at the back. This time, he did not ask and directly reached out to take it.
In the end, good grief. This basket was no different from an empty one.
“Gu Shengsheng, why are you trembling when it’s this light?” Mo Fan asked in confusion. “No, wait. What’s that smell on you? Why are your clothes wet?”
Gu Shengsheng looked at him and opened his mouth to speak, only to let out a huge sneeze.
“Achoo!”
Hearing the sound, Shen Jinfeng looked over and walked a few steps to Gu Shengsheng. His gaze sharpened.
“You went into the sea to bathe?”
And actually came back wearing wet clothes?
He placed his hand on Gu Shengsheng’s pulse.
Not good. There were already early signs of catching a chill, and Gu Shengsheng’s own physical constitution was really… a little too weak, wasn’t it?
Judging by the pulse, he would probably develop a high fever tonight.
With only the box of cold medicine left in the team, he likely would not be able to endure it.
One had to know that when stranded on a deserted island, food and water were the first things to solve.
After that, the most unpredictable things were extreme weather and physical condition.
An ordinary person, encountering even one of these, might not be able to hold on.
However, when Gu Shengsheng saw his expression darken, he misunderstood.
Gu Shengsheng pulled his hand back and instinctively took a step back. “Earlier, I washed myself and my clothes in the sea. Seawater is salty to begin with, so I don’t smell very good now. Stay farther away from me…”
Qin Ye’s tone at the side also carried some regret. “Sorry. I didn’t think that far. We all bathed, so now we smell a bit unpleasant.”
Hearing that bathing had been Qin Ye’s idea,
Shen Jinfeng exhaled and ignored it.
Instead, he pulled Gu Shengsheng. “Go sit inside the wooden house first. I’ll make a fire for you. Take off the wet clothes you’re wearing and dry them before putting them back on.”
Gu Shengsheng still wanted to decline. “The weather is hot. Wearing wet clothes isn’t cold. They’ll dry in a while.”
Shen Jinfeng did not waste words with him. He only pushed him directly inside and lit the fire.
“Don’t wear wet clothes. You’re about to catch a cold.” He did not state the consequences too seriously.
But Gu Shengsheng was not stupid. He immediately realized the urgency of the situation. Besides, he did indeed feel the warning signs of a fever. His head was a little dizzy.
He hurriedly took off his clothes. “Boss, you should go out first too?”
He raised his head with a bit of embarrassment, only to discover that he was the only one left in the house. Shen Jinfeng had long disappeared.
[Shen Jinfeng’s observation ability really is very sharp, and he considers everything so thoroughly. He really looks like a perfect team leader.]
[If he hadn’t said it, no one else on the team realized this problem. More serious than the unpleasant smell is the risk of getting sick!]
[Forget the rest of the team. Weren’t the tens of millions of people watching the livestream also laughing and joking, only caring about the fun?]
[Actually, you can’t really blame the others for not thinking of it, right? With such strong sunlight, it was only a cold-water bath. It’s just that Gu Shengsheng’s constitution may be on the weaker side, so he sneezed.]
[No matter what, he shouldn’t wear wet clothes… But Gu Shengsheng couldn’t exactly come back shirtless either. Difficult.]
[Not thinking of it is normal, but doesn’t Shen Jinfeng deserve praise for seeing something was wrong at a glance?]
The audience saw Shen Jinfeng leave the wooden house and directly stand in front of Qi Xiu. “Hold out your hand.”
Qi Xiu did not understand, but obediently stretched out his hand.
After taking his pulse and discovering nothing abnormal, Shen Jinfeng moved on to the next person.
He Erwang droopily held out his hand. He had also realized that they had not considered things properly just now. So many people had actually not thought to make Gu Shengsheng stop wearing wet clothes.
It would have been better to let him come back shirtless.
If Gu Shengsheng got sick, it would be troublesome.
“Boss, you can even take pulses? So impressive.”
“Is Gu Shengsheng all right?”
After finishing his pulse, Shen Jinfeng found that, fortunately, the purple-haired kid had pretty decent physical condition.
He raised his eyes and looked at He Erwang’s somewhat guilty expression. His gaze flickered, and he only gave a faint “Mm,” without comforting him.
The last one was Qin Ye.
Qin Ye did not need reminding and stretched out his hand himself.
“Sorry,” he said in a low voice.
After taking his pulse, Shen Jinfeng was somewhat surprised to discover that Qin Ye’s physical constitution was actually the best among them.
He relaxed inwardly.
Now that he heard Qin Ye actively reflect on himself,
he withdrew his hand with a cold face and said thoughtfully, “You brought back a lot of food from beachcombing, which is a merit. But you failed to notice your teammate’s physical condition, which is a fault. Merit and fault offset each other. You’re even.”
“What?” Qin Ye looked down at the young man before him with some confusion.
Shen Jinfeng was very serious as he introduced, “I found some tasty things. Originally, you had a share too. Now you don’t.”
“Qin Ye, do you have any objections?”
He felt that not letting someone eat delicious food, and making them watch while he ate delicious food, was the greatest punishment!
Looking at the young man’s solemn expression, Qin Ye inexplicably felt his fingertips itch, and his Adam’s apple slid uncomfortably.
He said, “No objections, Little Captain.”
