Chapter 307: Exchange Eggs?

Chapter 307: Chapter 307: Exchange Eggs?

An oil press was an appliance Xiaqing urgently needed.

Xiaqing had grown her own peanuts, corn, and sunflowers. By next May, she also expected to harvest several hundred pounds of rapeseed. Naturally, she didn’t want to sell these oil-producing crops only to turn around and buy expensive cooking oil from the Safe Zone.

There was another point: even if she was willing to pay a high price, she couldn’t get good oil. So, pressing her own oil was more cost-effective.

Xiaqing wasn’t the only one who thought this way; the other Lords had also been talking about it for the past few days.

During the agricultural trade fair, the Territory Management Department had sold sunflower and corn seeds to the Lords for them to plant. But now that the harvest was approaching, the Lords couldn’t find an oil press anywhere. Not only were there none through public channels, but even well-connected people like Kuang Qingwei and Zhong Tao couldn’t get their hands on one.

What did this mean? It meant the base’s management wanted to buy back all the sunflower seeds and corn from the Lords.

Without an oil press, the Lords couldn’t process their sunflower seeds into cooking oil, which was easier to store. They would have to sell their harvested sunflower seeds quickly, without any prompting from the Safe Zone.

In his attempt to get an oil press, Kuang Qingwei had specifically asked Zhang San, but Zhang San hadn’t responded. Xiaqing had assumed Zhang San didn’t have one, so she planned to wait for Yang Jin to return from gathering herbs and trade with him. After all, Xiaqing had an underground storeroom equipped with a Yi Stone and a temperature and humidity control system, so her sunflower seeds wouldn’t spoil even if she kept them in her territory for a year.

But Xiaqing hadn’t expected Ji Li to offer to trade her an oil press today. He had also warned her not to mention the trade to anyone, which further confirmed Xiaqing’s earlier suspicions.

Whatever the base’s reasons were, Xiaqing was going to keep enough for herself before selling any surplus. She had taken risks and worked hard to farm her land for no grander reason than to eat well and be full.

Seeing Xiaqing return, Chen Zheng, who was clearing weeds, stopped what he was doing and waved to greet her.

Even though Xiaqing had only been gone for a little over two hours, and her territory had wolves, sheep, and surveillance cameras, she had still asked the "Security Team" to come watch over the place for her. This was because she had traded for Hu Zifeng’s team’s services with Pollution-free Spring Water. After mid-March next year, she would have to pay points to use them.

Whenever Chen Zheng and his brother came to help guard Xiaqing’s territory, they would also do some farm work on the side in exchange for vegetables. It was a deal that satisfied both parties.

When Xiaqing walked over, the usually composed Chen Zheng pointed excitedly at the newly installed camera and said, "Sister Qing, this camera is top-notch!"

The camera was indeed top-notch. "But the price is top-notch too," Xiaqing explained. "It’s a hundred times the cost of a regular one."

A hundred times...

The price was terrifying. Chen Zheng immediately gave up the idea of trading for one from Territory Land No. 7 to study it.

Chen Cheng reported the morning’s events to Xiaqing. "The Lords were still talking about oil pressing and the autumn harvest this morning. Tang Huai heard our micro-tiller running and asked about it several times, but I didn’t say anything. A hen was clucking about an hour ago, so she probably laid an egg."

When Xiaqing left the territory this morning, she had attached the weeding wheel to the micro-tiller and asked the Chen brothers to clear the weeds behind the house. Operating the micro-tiller was Hu Zifeng’s team’s favorite job. In just one morning, they not only cut the weeds but also used the bulldozer and excavator attachments to fill in the large pit Xiaqing had left from digging up a tree yesterday.

Xiaqing explained the afternoon’s arrangements to Chen Zheng, then hurried home to check on her First and Second. They had taken a medicinal bath that morning, and she wasn’t sure if they had recovered yet.

Xiaqing hadn’t even made it back to the house when Sheep Leader charged out, ready for a fight. Judging by its speed, the discomfort from the medicinal bath was long gone.

After her own bath last night, Xiaqing’s shoulders and heels had felt much looser this morning, and she had been looking for a chance to test them out. Without a second thought, she met the charge head-on.

WHAM!

The human and the sheep collided with force. One went flying—and unsurprisingly, it was Xiaqing, who was at a disadvantage in both weight and strength.

While in mid-air, Xiaqing twisted her torso, quickly changed her posture, and used the momentum of her descent to kick at Sheep Leader. Sheep Leader didn’t dodge or yield, meeting the blow head-on with its spiral horns.

The Chen brothers, who had just reached the West Buffer Forest of the Third Territory, heard the commotion and winced in sympathetic pain as they looked back.

The hobbies of the two ’lords’ of the Third Territory were truly something ordinary people couldn’t appreciate.

In the Second Territory, Tang Huai heard the familiar sounds and immediately asked, "Xiaqing, Xiaqing, what are you doing?"

Xiaqing, having just returned from Zone 3, hadn’t had a chance to turn on her walkie-talkie, so of course she couldn’t hear him.

So, Tang Huai switched to a high-powered loudspeaker and yelled in the direction of the Third Territory, "Ahem, ahem. Xiaqing, what are you doing? Turn on your walkie-talkie."

Everyone...

Xiaqing knew Tang Huai couldn’t have anything important; otherwise, he wouldn’t use this method but would have gone directly to the northern barrier of the Third Territory to make a fuss. She enjoyed a good, thorough fight with Sheep Leader before finally turning on her walkie-talkie. "Looking for me?"

Tang Huai responded immediately. "Yeah, what are you up to? I’ve been trying to reach you for a while. I heard a hen clucking in your territory—not that I was eavesdropping, of course, they’re just really loud. Are your eggs for trade?"

Xiaqing didn’t refuse outright. Since chickens crow and cluck, she couldn’t hide the fact that she had them in her territory. So, Xiaqing decided to use the eggs to trade for high-quality goods. "My chickens only started laying the day before yesterday, so I have very few eggs. I want to trade for Green Light Soybean seeds or Green Light Carrot seeds."

Zhong Tao had visited many times, and each time Xiaqing had checked the Lords’ trade request list that he carried, but she had never seen these two crops on it.

Originally, Xiaqing had a chance to trade for Green Light Soybeans, but the Lord who owned them died in the third Harmful Rain, and his territory was repossessed by the base.

Carrots are highly nutritious vegetables that can be stored for a long time. But unfortunately, this plant’s evolution was unsuccessful, so seeds suitable for open-air cultivation within a territory were very hard to find.

Zhang San didn’t have these two types of seeds either. The reason was simple: Zhang San didn’t like to eat them, so Territory Land No. 7 didn’t grow them.

Tang Huai had neither. "Can’t I just trade for them with points?"

"No." Xiaqing’s refusal was blunt. She only had two laying hens, and the eggs they produced wouldn’t even be enough for herself before winter. She wasn’t short on points, so of course she wouldn’t sell eggs for points. She only wanted to trade for the Green Light Seeds she desperately needed.

Li Si spoke up. "I have Green Light Carrots. What kind of trade are you proposing?"

She hadn’t expected that Li Si would also want to trade for the eggs from her chickens.

Li Si wanted eggs, and Xiaqing wanted carrots. Their needs matched, so a trade was certainly possible. Xiaqing stated her price, "Fourth Sister, I’m raising Green Light Chickens, and they lay fertilized, hatchable eggs. A male chick is worth one thousand points, and a female is worth two thousand points. So the eggs aren’t cheap—750 points each. How many points are your carrots?"

It was Assistant Little Liu who answered Xiaqing. "Miss Xia, you’ve probably heard that carrots are susceptible to the Harmful Element and need to be grown in an environment free of it. Because the cultivation cost is high, the selling price is also high. It’s five hundred points per pound."