Chapter 4: The Clever Uses of Toys
Wu Qi’s cooking was just as good as ever. The crispy, fragrant grilled meat left Su Ruizhe with grease all over his mouth. Having been reborn from the apocalypse, his goal—aside from surviving—was to make sure he could eat meat every single day in the future.
After quickly finishing lunch, Su Ruizhe found a public phone booth and called Old Zhang. It wasn’t that he was so poor he couldn’t afford a mobile phone—he had more than enough money to buy a secondhand one. It was just that he knew the apocalypse would arrive before long. Once the signal was gone, a phone would be nothing more than scrap metal, and those few hundred yuan would be far better spent on food and daily necessities.
As soon as Old Zhang heard that Wu Qi had introduced him, his attitude became extremely warm. He happened to be free that afternoon, so he gave Su Ruizhe the address and told him to come directly to his chicken farm to meet.
Old Zhang’s chicken farm was in the rural outskirts. To save money, Su Ruizhe transferred between three city buses and then spent more than two hours on a long-distance coach before finally reaching his destination.
Old Zhang was in his fifties, and one look at him told you he was an honest, down-to-earth man. Knowing that Su Ruizhe had been sent by Wu Qi, he was incredibly enthusiastic, helping him pick out twenty chicks and twenty ducklings, all lively and bouncing with energy.
It happened to be mealtime, and Old Zhang’s wife was just as warm and hospitable. She insisted on keeping Su Ruizhe for dinner, and with such heartfelt hospitality, he had no choice but to agree. The farmhouse dinner was especially simple: a huge basin of chicken stewed with mushrooms and a big bowl of braised pork. The chicken-and-mushroom stew was made with free-range chickens raised at home—the meat was fragrant, tender, and richly flavored. As for the braised pork, every piece was perfectly layered pork belly, simmered over high heat for an entire afternoon until it was meltingly soft, dissolving in the mouth at the slightest touch! Even the white rice, cooked in a large iron pot, had an excellent texture—soft, fluffy, and fragrant. Su Ruizhe wolfed down a big bowl of rice in just a few bites. He felt a little embarrassed at first, but the Zhang couple happily kept refilling his bowl, urging him to eat more.
Before he knew it, he had completely relaxed and ended up eating three full bowls of white rice along with the fragrant meat.
“Hahaha, young people should eat more! You’re still growing!” The Zhang couple were delighted to see him eating so heartily.
After he’d eaten his fill, Old Zhang even prepared two large baskets for him. The fluffy chicks and ducklings were packed inside, chirping noisily and making quite a lively scene. Altogether, he only charged Su Ruizhe five hundred yuan.
“Alright, young man, you’d better head back now. Once it gets dark, the roads won’t be easy to travel,” the warm-hearted Old Zhang said, personally escorting him all the way to the bus stop.
“Okay, thank you so much, Grandpa Zhang.” After a brief pause, Su Ruizhe lowered his voice and said, “My family has a bit of influence in the government. I’ve heard that the weather is going to get hotter and hotter soon. You shouldn’t sell your grain outside—stock up more food at home instead.”
“Alright! Another heat wave coming, huh? Got it! Thank you, young man!”
Watching Old Zhang’s departing figure, Su Ruizhe let out a sigh. This was all the help he could offer him.
As dusk fell, the bus stop was completely empty except for Su Ruizhe. He simply put everything he was carrying into his space. When the coach finally arrived, he boarded it feeling light and unburdened.
After transferring between three buses, he finally got home. As soon as he opened the door, he saw a piece of paper stuffed under it. Picking it up, he realized it was from his aunt. Clearly, she had come looking for him again today, but finding him absent, she’d been turned away once more and had deliberately left him a note. From the force of the handwriting, Su Ruizhe could easily imagine the anger boiling in her heart. The note only said that his uncle missed him and wanted him to come to their place for dinner tomorrow.
Su Ruizhe gave a cold snort, tore the paper into tiny pieces, and tossed them into the trash.
After locking the door, he stepped into the space in a flash.
The chicks and ducklings were happily running around on the wide grassy field on the other side of the spring, each one lively and full of spirit. They seemed to be confined to that area and hadn’t gone off to wreak havoc in the vegetable garden or orchard. Su Ruizhe fetched some grain and scattered it on the ground. Watching the little creatures eat without even lifting their heads, his eyes curved with a smile.
Thinking of the chicken stewed with mushrooms and the braised pork he’d eaten at Old Zhang’s house today, Su Ruizhe couldn’t help swallowing. He had gone hungry for far too long in the apocalypse—he absolutely didn’t want to relive those painful days.
These little animals included both males and females. As long as they were raised properly, they would grow quickly. Before long, he’d not only have eggs to eat, but new chicks and ducklings would be born as well. In the future, he could indulge in meat every so often. Sure enough, no matter what you did, sustainability was key.
Su Ruizhe also planned to buy some rabbits, pigs, cattle, and sheep. Rabbits were in heat year-round and reproduced at an astonishing speed, while pigs, cattle, and sheep would simply serve to enrich his future menu. The valley wasn’t very large, but it should still be more than enough to raise these animals.
After taking another look at the clear spring water, Su Ruizhe thought about buying some tools tomorrow to dig a small fish pond in the open ground and raise some fry. He remembered Zhan Yun once saying that he liked eating fish.
Thinking of Zhan Yun made Su Ruizhe want to sigh again. How was he supposed to get closer to him? Someone as guarded as Zhan Yun would definitely have no goodwill toward people who approached him for no apparent reason.
Sigh…
Shaking his head, Su Ruizhe decided not to dwell on it for now. Just like yesterday, he picked a large amount of vegetables and fruit, put them into bags, and prepared to take them out to sell the next day in exchange for cash.
He also needed to stock up on more daily necessities, as well as clothes and medicine. In the apocalypse, all of these would be nonrenewable resources.
There were simply too many things to do and too many things to buy. He only hated that time was too short and money too scarce. Once the relocation notice came down, he would definitely be the first to sign the contract. Three hundred thousand yuan—who knew how many things that could buy?
Unfortunately, he remembered that it would be at least another month before the relocation notice was issued. In his previous life, the apocalypse had arrived less than five days after he received the relocation money.
Sigh… Tomorrow he would just continue selling vegetables. At least he could still earn close to a thousand yuan a day.
—
The next day, Su Ruizhe once again carried the fresh fruits and vegetables he had harvested from his space to sell outside the East Street vegetable market. It seemed that the aunties and moms who came out early to buy groceries had gotten extremely high-quality produce from him. Even though his prices were a bit higher, they were still more than willing to buy from his stall. After all, his goods were fresh and delicious—and supposedly homegrown!
The morning passed quickly. After packing up his bags and handcart and brushing the dust off his clothes, Su Ruizhe left right away. He still had quite a few things to buy today.
He randomly picked a beef noodle shop and, after eating two big bowls of braised beef noodles, headed straight for the secondhand market.
He really didn’t have much money right now, so this was the only place he could try his luck and hunt for bargains.
However, after wandering around for a while, he didn’t see anything that caught his eye. Most of what was sold here were secondhand electronics, but with the apocalypse just around the corner, he had no interest in spending money on such scrap metal. He was in dire need of cash now—every cent had to be spent where it mattered.
Just as he was about to leave the secondhand market, he suddenly noticed a very inconspicuous stall tucked away in the far corner, displaying a pile of toy guns.
More precisely, they were toy air guns—a type of toy gun that fired plastic pellets using compressed air or a small amount of propellant. There were large and small ones, all modeled after popular firearms seen in TV dramas: pistols, revolvers, semi-automatic handguns, submachine guns, and so on. Still, they were obviously toys, quite different from real guns at a glance. Carrying them around wouldn’t cause panic.
Su Ruizhe’s eyes immediately lit up. To other people, these toy air guns were just children’s playthings—once loaded with plastic pellets, they could at most be used to shoot balloons or birds, with virtually no lethality. But to Su Ruizhe, they were the perfect weapons, tailor-made for him!
“How much are these guns?” Suppressing his excitement, Su Ruizhe walked over slowly and asked in a casual, browsing tone.
“Three hundred each. There are thirteen in total. If you really want them, three thousand for the lot.”
The man selling the toy guns was a middle-aged man dressed rather shabbily. He wore metal-framed glasses, his eye sockets were sunken, and he looked listless overall. Although these toy guns weren’t worth much, collecting so many must have taken some effort. Su Ruizhe guessed that something had happened in the man’s family, forcing him to sell them. So he didn’t haggle at all—he simply took the money from his pocket and bought all the toy guns on the ground in one go.
Thirteen toy guns in total, large and small, with all kinds of models. The man even threw in some plastic pellets. After letting out a heavy sigh, he left.
The vendor at the neighboring stall also sighed. While Su Ruizhe was crouching down to pack up the items, the man chatted with him briefly. It turned out that this seller had been setting up his stall at the secondhand market for several days. His teenage son had passed away, and these toy guns had all been things his son loved. The family was short on money, so he’d brought them out to exchange for some cash.
Every family had its own hardships—no one had it easy.
Carrying the toy guns, Su Ruizhe left the secondhand market, found an empty public restroom, and stored everything in his space.
Three thousand yuan—almost all the savings Su Ruizhe had earned over the past three days from selling fruits and vegetables—had now been spent entirely on these toy guns.
To anyone else, it would look like sheer foolishness. But to Su Ruizhe himself, this was an exceptionally good deal.
Whether before or after the apocalypse, guns and ammunition were never things ordinary people like him could obtain. To others, these were just toys, but to Su Ruizhe, they were something entirely different.
Su Ruizhe’s ability was extremely special. He could turn the vegetables and fruits grown in his space into weapons. Just like in a certain hugely popular game, the peas from his vegetable patch could be transformed into green bullets. Loaded into toy guns, they could be used almost like real firearms—an extremely effective method for dealing with low-level zombies.
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