Culinary God in Wilderness

Chapter 430: Chapter 264: The Last Night (Part 2)

"Cassava must be cooked thoroughly. You absolutely cannot eat it if it’s not fully cooked, or you’ll get poisoned. To be safe, it’s best to cook it for as long as possible. That includes the white peel I removed earlier—that’s also poisonous. It tastes bitter, so you have to peel it off. No cutting corners."

"Also, cassava itself doesn’t have much of a special flavor. It’s best to cook it with sugar. That way, you get a sweet cassava soup, which is great both hot and cold."

Since he needed sugar, his only option was mangoes.

So, when he dropped things off for Erica earlier, he had taken a detour to pick over a dozen large mangoes. He planned to mash them into a puree and add it as a sugar substitute.

After he finished all the steps for the cassava, he couldn’t be bothered to move. He simply grabbed a few warm pieces of smoked crocodile meat from the smoker rack, tore them into strips, and had a little snack.

He had to admit, the crocodile meat smoked to this point had the perfect texture. It wasn’t like fully-dried jerky; it still retained some moisture in the middle, and eating it felt a bit like having American-style smoked meat.

To ensure the cassava was completely cooked through, he checked on it after an hour of boiling, added a little more water, and let it cook for another half hour. Finally, he left it covered to cool down naturally.

He couldn’t worry about whether this would affect the texture for now. With limited resources, safety was the top priority.

The moment he lifted the lid again, a rich mango aroma wafted over him.

The bamboo tube sections were filled with a thick, golden-yellow fruit pulp. When he scooped it with a spoon, it stretched into fine threads, almost reaching the consistency of honey.

The cassava, originally a pale yellow and wood-like, had been cooked until it was semi-translucent. It looked glutinous and incredibly soft, somewhat resembling taro balls.

SLURP.

He scooped up a piece and slurped it into his mouth. The mango sweet soup’s texture was just as it appeared—thick like a stew. The cassava was half-glutinous and half-starchy, tasting like a combination of taro balls and sweet potato.

This was wild cassava, after all, not a cultivated variety. Achieving this kind of texture was far beyond his expectations.

He had even braced himself for it to taste bad, but it turned out to be much better than he’d imagined.

’If I had used the domestic cassava variety specially cultivated for making sweet soups, it would probably taste even better, right?’

He didn’t eat much, just tasted about three pieces before putting down his spoon.

"The easiest way to test if you’ve been poisoned is to taste a small amount and stop. Then, wait for a while to see if your body has any adverse reactions. If nothing happens, you can eat more with confidence next time."

"If you feel unusually unwell, I’d advise seeking medical attention immediately."

Maybe it was because he had already hunted the American Crocodile, but he no longer felt any nervousness or anticipation. He was just calm, in a state where nothing really mattered.

And in this state, whether eating breadfruit or the sweet cassava mango soup, he didn’t gain even a single point of happiness.

「When the time came to the final day.」

He suddenly found this day a bit hard to get through.

He couldn’t dismantle the bamboo house yet, since he still had to spend the night in it.

The bamboo aqueduct, however, could be dismantled. With the trench aqueduct on the ground, the farm’s water supply wouldn’t be affected.

He didn’t need to do anything about the bamboo raft by the sea either. It was tied to the shore, so he could just let it soak in the sea and rot naturally. Since it was made of pure bamboo, it wouldn’t pollute the environment—a return to nature, in a way.

In other words, he had almost nothing to do for the entire day and just had to wait it out until dawn the next morning.

Fortunately, as he lay listlessly on his bamboo bed, staring blankly at the azure sky outside his window, the familiar sound of a helicopter engine grew from a distance. A dark shadow flashed overhead, heading straight for Erica’s location.

’What’s going on?’

Half an hour later, a few familiar figures appeared before him.

"Lin, do you have any more adventures or crafting projects planned for today?"

Robert knocked on his door and walked inside. "If you don’t have anything planned, we’ll start tallying your score early. After all, your points are already locked in."

"Tally it, tally it! Go on, tally it up!"

Hearing this news, Lin Chen shot up from the bed and started helping move all his food inventory out of the cellar.

According to standard procedure, the show’s crew would collect and take away any retrievable food.

While Daniel and Hei were busy taking inventory, Robert pulled a notebook from his briefcase, and Ariana came over to conduct the final routine physical examination.

Behind Robert, Erica craned her neck, peeking over his shoulder at the notebook, seemingly trying to see just how high Lin Chen’s score was.

Robert shot her a wary glance and turned his body to the side. He only turned back after flipping to Lin Chen’s page, afraid she might see the other contestants’ data.

His eyes scanned the notebook a few times. Although it wasn’t the first time he’d seen it, he still felt a sense of surreal shock whenever he looked at the dense data.

"Do you want to hear your prey score now, or wait for the final results to be announced tomorrow morning?"

"I’ll wait for tomorrow," Lin Chen said, waving his hand without hesitation.

’What’s the point of just hearing the prey score? I’ll just have to hear it again tomorrow anyway. Besides, I can’t find out my ranking right now, so I might as well not listen.’

The haul from the cellar wasn’t that large. It was mainly some sweet potato starch, a few leftover potatoes, the remaining smoked venison jerky from before, and the smoked American Crocodile jerky he had just made yesterday.

Compared to the thousand-plus kilograms from the Alaska trip, this amount seemed much more normal.

"Alright, then. Keep some food for your dinner tonight. Assemble on the beach at dawn tomorrow. We’ll arrange for a speedboat to pick you up."

After the tally was complete, the crew didn’t linger and set off in Andre’s direction.

Watching them leave, Lin Chen raised an eyebrow.

’Looks like that guy finished his hunt too. Otherwise, the crew wouldn’t be going over to tally his score at this time.’

"So, how are you feeling? Confident?"

Erica nudged him with her shoulder.

"Whatever happens, happens. As long as I tried my best, I don’t have any regrets."

"So what are you going to do for the rest of the day?"

"...What else is there to do besides lie around and stare into space?"

Erica glanced at her watch. There were still three hours until dark.

"The competition is pretty much over anyway, so it doesn’t matter if we’re recording or not. Let’s just chat."

As she spoke, she unexpectedly plucked the camera Lin Chen had just clipped to his chest, held it up with her own, and pointed them at her face.

"To all our viewers, please come back tomorrow morning for the final tally. Our schedules are pretty much done for the day, our scores have been calculated, and now we’re going to chat about some topics that aren’t suitable for broadcast. See you all tomorrow~"

’Huh??’

’What does she mean, "topics not suitable for broadcast"?’

Before Lin Chen could react, the girl placed the cameras on the bamboo table inside, aimed the lenses at the beautiful forest outside, and pulled him out of the house.

"Didn’t you want to ask me about the United States last time? Go ahead."

Seeing her completely serious expression, Lin Chen’s mouth twitched, but he decided not to get hung up on the unimportant detail of the "unbroadcastable topics."

"I’ve been thinking a lot recently, and there’s a question I’ve been wanting to ask. Since the ’kill line’ is targeted at the poor, how does a little rich girl like you know so much about it?"

"Let me correct you on one thing. I’m not the rich one, my mom is."

Her expression remained calm as she pinched her chin in thought for a moment, seemingly considering how to phrase her response.

"You have a good point. Normally, people who are financially stable don’t really come into contact with this dark side of society. They might not even want to believe it’s an objective reality."

"I used to be one of them. That is, until my maternal grandfather was injured in an accident at work. After being unable to pay the exorbitant medical fees, he went bankrupt. Their house was repossessed, and my two grandparents were forced onto the streets, which in turn caused his condition to worsen."

"And being on the streets means you can’t afford nutritional supplements or high-quality food. Without proper nutrition, the body heals slower. Then there’s the problem of bathing, general hygiene, and so on. It all spirals into a vicious cycle that’s impossible to escape."