Chapter 38: New Seeds

Chapter 38: Chapter 38: New Seeds

Benjamin had tossed and turned until two in the morning before he slept, so the next morning he overslept.

By the time he woke, Isabella and Liam had finished cooking breakfast. Seeing the dark rings under Benjamin’s eyes, Isabella teased him with a laugh:

"Brother, were you so happy last night you couldn’t sleep? I just looked at your channel this morning, it’s already got nearly two million followers."

Benjamin blinked: "When I looked last night it was only just over a million? Doesn’t anybody sleep?"

Liam came out having wiped down the stove, saying with a laugh: "Have you forgotten time runs differently across the star systems? Some places are a whole twenty-four hours off from us. When we go to bed they’re only just getting up, when we get up they’re only just going to bed."

Benjamin nodded: "So they are, I forgot." Then he sat down at the table, opening his channel to look. Not only had the engagement gone up, the gifts were a little higher than yesterday too.

Last night he had withdrawn all thirty-seven million to his bank account, leaving only a hundred, yet today the network account held another three million two hundred thousand silver stars. Benjamin clicked his tongue:

"I thought nobody would be sending gifts anymore, I never expected this many."

Liam pushed the bowl of star-bird egg porridge toward Benjamin, saying: "A vlog channel is different from livestreaming. Livestreams only take gifts while you’re live, but a vlog channel is always open. As long as fans like your videos they can send gifts whenever they want."

Isabella laughed: "So then just leaving the channel sitting there makes money?"

"Of course." Liam nodded: "But if you don’t run the channel for a long time, with no new content to keep viewers, the channel’s performance drops, then later there’s no more income."

Benjamin nodded: "That’s exactly right. Last night I thought about a new direction already. Making videos like these needs rotation. For instance today I plant new vegetables, I can’t wait until they’re grown to post the video, that’s far too long.

I’ll film on rotation, posting whatever can go up first, saving whatever has to be filmed in stages to post later. That way there’s always new content to update."

Liam gave his brother an approving thumbs up: "You’re getting better and better. It’s like me, livestreaming cooking every day gets dull, people watch forever without getting to eat once, resentment builds up. So I’m planning to livestream cooking twice a week and drawing twice a week. The rest of the time I’ll concentrate on restoring our planet."

Isabella frowned, saying in disagreement: "You’re an Omega, and you’re pregnant besides, leave the heavy work to us."

Benjamin nodded, flatly refusing to let Liam into the fields. Liam spread his hands, explaining:

"Of course I won’t take on all the work myself. I’ll handle the technical side, the two of you handle the planting and the harvesting.

Besides, Mr. Mason is sending the farming robots this morning, once I’ve programmed them our household will have helpers working at four times the efficiency of an ordinary person. Tell me where the hard work is for me in that?"

Benjamin and Isabella looked at each other, wavering a little inside. Put the way their brother put it, it wasn’t impossible. The two of them weighed it for a long while, then Benjamin said:

"All right, but you’re not to go out in the harsh sun. Our planet is hot all year round, it only cools a little after the start of autumn. From ten in the morning until five in the afternoon you’re not allowed out."

Liam nodded his agreement. Once Benjamin had eaten his porridge, he transferred ten million silver stars each to his brother and sister. The two of them wanted to refuse, but Benjamin glared at them:

"This is my own money, I’m giving it to you as pocket money. Later on if you want some I won’t give it. The money from selling vegetables and worms counts as the planet’s shared spending, to be split three ways, a share each, once there’s a profit later. Don’t stand on ceremony with me, or I’ll be angry."

The two of them knew this came from their eldest brother’s heart, so they couldn’t well refuse further. At most, once they were earning later they could honor him in return.

Breakfast finished, the three of them began a new day of work. The weather today wasn’t very harsh, so Benjamin and Isabella planned to turn the soil in the fields to plant the next crop of Sawtooth greens. Besides that they also set aside one field as seedbed ground as Liam had asked.

By their reckoning, the seeds soaking in restoration fluid could be set to sprout today. Benjamin lifted the seeds out for Liam to handle himself, taking the restoration fluid out to the seedbed ground to enrich the soil there.

Liam looked at the improved seeds laid out on the tray, marvelling at their astonishing transformation.

The glutinous corn, which had started out white as jade, had turned deep purple, the cucumber seeds had turned apricot yellow, the sweet potato stems had turned reddish purple, the potatoes too had become powder pink. The mandarin seeds were still the same cream white as before, with no telling whether they had succeeded or failed.

In short there was no knowing until they had been grown.

Thirty-six hours in restoration fluid had both improved the seeds’ quality and hastened germination. The seeds had all split and put out root shoots, the potatoes and sweet potatoes putting out small leaves too.

Potatoes and sweet potatoes could be cut into small pieces each bearing a sprouting eye for planting. There were five kilograms of sweet potato and four kilograms of potato soaked in restoration fluid, the remaining five kilograms of sweet potato and six kilograms of potato unsoaked. Liam planned to cut up all the sweet potatoes they had, while of the potatoes, beyond the four kilograms soaked in restoration fluid he only meant to cut three more tubers.

Mostly because he loved eating potatoes, so for lunch today he planned potato stir-fried with minced meat.

Liam had reminded Benjamin earlier to leave a little restoration fluid for him, which was needed now. He carefully used a knife to cut the potatoes and sweet potatoes into small pieces each bearing a sprout.

This work called for deftness, because newly grown potato and sweet potato sprouts were very brittle, one careless flick and they snapped clean off the tuber.

Once the pieces were cut, Liam dipped their cut faces in restoration fluid, then arranged them on a perforated alloy rack to dry. Potatoes done, then the sweet potatoes, it took Liam over an hour to cut both.

As for the tubers that hadn’t been soaked, Liam cut them along the sprouting eyes too, then dipped them in the grass ash Isabella had burned a few days before.

By the time he had cut the lot it was nine o’clock, so Liam stretched to ease the stiffness.

[Ting! Urgent request from a system stall, accept or not?]

The blue cat’s voice suddenly sounded in his head, Liam’s body going still at once. He hurriedly closed his eyes, going straight into the soul space.

"What’s happened?"

The blue cat answered: "A host is in critical condition, their system is sending an emergency distress signal. And among the level-one stalls only we have the right medicine."

Liam said quickly: "Then trade right now, what are you dithering about."

The blue cat immediately set its claws flying, the trade going through fast. One person and one cat waited in silence for word from the other system. After a while, the blue cat’s ears twitched a few times, then it turned to Liam:

"The other system reports its host is out of danger. It wants to trade for a few more items now but doesn’t have enough goods, it’s asking whether the host is willing to extend credit."

Liam blinked: "You can do credit?"

"When a host faces a threat to their life, the system has the right to make an emergency request and take goods on credit to save the host’s life first, paying it back gradually later."

Liam nodded: "Then go ahead and trade with them."

The blue cat set to work again. This time the wide-area electric gun nobody had yet traded for went to the other side too, which showed how dangerous things were over there. Once the blue cat had finished, Liam asked:

"Do you know what happened over there?"

The blue cat nodded: "I do, their system told me. The host there is the one who traded you two time-freeze storage boxes last time. He’s a cardiologist. Besides the two storage boxes from you, he also traded for a few items for treating heart disease. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

Every item he produced shook that world, drawing the government’s attention. He also honestly declared the Cross-World Trading Hall System.

But instead of profiting from fair trade in goods, those lunatics simply arrested him outright, meaning to cut his head open to study. His system helped him escape from where he was held, but he himself was critically wounded.

With no other options left, his system had to put out a call for help across the whole system network."

Having explained, the blue cat looked at Liam, its tone shaking a little as it advised him: "Host, learn from this man, you have to hide yourself well, you must never let my existence be exposed. Systems like us can escape back to the Master God’s space to wait for rebuilding, but you hosts aren’t that lucky.

Once a contract is forcibly dissolved, the host’s soul is damaged completely, from then on dissolving entirely into the void. An ordinary person who dies still has a chance at reincarnation, but hosts whose souls are damaged while still alive die for good."

Liam’s face darkened slightly as he asked: "Didn’t you say before that if I don’t reach level six in three years the Trading Hall is forcibly shut down?"

The blue cat shook its head: "That’s closing, not dissolving the contract. It means the Trading Hall shuts until the host meets the conditions to start it again, at which point the stall resets to level 1.

Dissolving the contract is us separating ourselves from the host’s soul. Forcibly dissolving it harms both sides, the host’s soul is damaged, while we have our maintenance code wiped leaving only the core code, having to go back to the Master God’s Space to be rebuilt. Roughly put, all that’s left of us is the heart, the body stripped of all its flesh."

Hearing that, Liam shuddered, trying to think back over whether he had let anything slip anywhere. In his earlier livestreams, he didn’t seem to have revealed where these ancient foods came from, so perhaps he should find some reason to cover it, to keep the Research Institute’s hand from reaching him. Otherwise by the time they discovered a problem it would be too late.

"Woof Woof, tell me, how should I explain the ingredients that appear in the livestreams and these things I’m planning to grow?"

The blue cat swished its tail, answering:

"That’s simple. This world has thirteen primordial planets, the fruit and vegetables common on the market all developed from seeds found on those planets. Every year countless mercenaries and adventurers go there looking for new things, what they find being appraised and then sold to the Research Institute. Items judged worthless get sold openly as souvenirs. Just blame it all on them."

Liam patted his chest, letting out a breath of relief.

Thank goodness there was a way out, or however many lives he had wouldn’t have been enough to pay for it. He would have to be more careful from now on. Thank goodness he had only traded for food, nothing that drew attention.