WS - Chapter 144

Chapter 144

Yu Nianbing and Zhuang Jiachuan spent the better part of the day hiking until they reached the mountainside, where they finally spotted something edible.

The small tuft of fluff that the wind carried to Yu Nianbing's eye was a white dandelion.

On the slope just ahead and a little higher to their left, Yu Nianbing discovered a small patch of dandelions.

This patch, barely over a square meter, had already lost most of its fluffy seeds; the little white puffballs on the stems were sparse, with hardly any fluff left.

The green patch of dandelions nearly blended in with the surrounding weeds. If that little tuft hadn't happened to drift into Yu Nianbing's eye earlier, they probably wouldn't have spotted this small dandelion patch from the direction and angle they'd been walking.

Although dandelions that have already formed puffballs—and whose puffballs have mostly blown away—will definitely be a bit tougher and less palatable, they weren't out here seeking the freshest wild delicacies.

A single fresh dandelion, stem and leaves plus the root underground, makes for quite a mouthful of food.

While dandelion has a somewhat peculiar taste, compared to eating grass roots and tree bark, that peculiarity was clearly something they could work to overcome.

Given the circumstances, even a mosquito is meat. As she dug, Yu Nianbing explained to Zhuang Jiachuan that pretty much the whole dandelion plant was edible. Encouraged, Zhuang Jiachuan grabbed a stone he'd picked up and soon was digging even more vigorously than Yu Nianbing with her stone knife.

Hunger—these past days they had been barely maintaining a state of low satiety, eating only enough each day to survive. Zhuang Jiachuan's desire to supplement their food was no less than Yu Nianbing's.

"Let's just dig these up. The rest we'll come back for, mud and all," Yu Nianbing said, glancing at the sizable pile of dandelions they'd gathered. "Almost the whole plant is edible, but you can't eat too much at once. If we dig up everything, it won't keep well—we'd have to dry it. Eaten fresh, dandelion still has a bit of a vegetable-like texture; if you dry it and then boil it, it'll probably be like chewing tea leaves."

Zhuang Jiachuan didn't know much about such things anyway, so whatever Yu Nianbing said was fine by him. But he looked up at the sky and raised a different concern. "Judging by the sky... I'm guessing it's already one or two in the afternoon? Calculating, we've probably been walking over six hours. Do we still want to push on? The plan was to return to camp for the night, and we didn't bring a lighter. If we don't turn back now, we'll either have to walk back in the dark or spend the night out here relying on flashlights."

"We'll return to camp for the night. We won't go far—just a little further up," Yu Nianbing said. Although she wasn't satisfied with today's harvest, Song Shiyue back at camp, who would wake in the deep of night, was more important. Based on the pattern of the past few days, barring the unexpected, Song Shiyue had a high chance of staying awake longer tonight.

It was a dilemma either way. Even for Yu Nianbing and Zhuang Jiachuan, who weren't carrying anyone, climbing a mountain that hadn't been developed by the production team was genuinely strenuous.

Without comparison, there is no harm.

This route was far more difficult than the mountain paths on the production team's planned route the past few days. Not only were there no trails, but obstacles were everywhere... Crevasses and fallen trees went without saying. Even in places that looked passable, you'd often suddenly hit a vertical drop that forced a detour.

If they wanted to cover the entire mountain, they'd have to stay on it for at least over two days. For Yu Nianbing, that was too long to be away from Song Shiyue. If they didn't stay and turned back, then today's trek would be wasted.

But in Yu Nianbing's view, the cave they'd passed through during the Yaoxing Storm lay right below this mountain, and it was very likely this mountain had also been within the cleanup zone.

Today, Yu Nianbing simply wanted to come up, check the situation, and try their luck. If the yield was good, after resupplying back at camp, the mountain would be worth exploring again. But from the look of it now, tomorrow they should go check the neighboring mountain, one entirely outside the production team's planned route.

Zhuang Jiachuan saw himself as a bodyguard and laborer. Whatever Yu Nianbing, who knew how to find food, wanted to do, he would just follow.

After roughly calculating the time, Zhuang Jiachuan quickly agreed with Yu Nianbing's suggestion to push on a little further.

The dandelions they'd dug up weren't heavy; Zhuang Jiachuan casually packed them into his bag and carried them.

The two continued further up the mountain.

Unfortunately, this mountain was truly barren.

After leaving the dandelion patch, they walked for about another half hour, until finally this expedition ended when Yu Nianbing found a chestnut tree.

The tall chestnut tree was thick with branches and leaves, right in the season to bear chestnuts, yet it... had almost no fruit.

If it had borne none at all, they could have mocked it as a problematic tree, outwardly strong but inwardly hollow, and after a sigh, moved on.

But when they looked up and carefully scanned the tree, they could actually make out two or three chestnuts hiding beside leaves. Even from such a distance, you could see their round bodies and thick, long spines—they were clearly solid, real chestnuts.

"As expected, this mountain was also cleared by the production team. Let's go back," Yu Nianbing said, having circled the tree and given up on continuing.

"I think I can give it a try. These few ought to be edible, right? Even just a couple mouthfuls of meat—roasted or stir-fried, they'd be so fragrant." Leaning against the tree, Zhuang Jiachuan tilted his head back until his face was almost parallel with the sky, but he swallowed his saliva, unwilling to give up.

Yu Nianbing gauged the height and position of the chestnuts and didn't think it was something they could attempt.

Zhuang Jiachuan knew he couldn't pick them, but if picking was out, there had to be another way.

Just as Yu Nianbing was temporarily shooed away from under the tree and watched the chestnut tree quiver under Zhuang Jiachuan's shaking and ramming, the other team ahead had reached the moment to launch their bamboo rafts.

The aftershock from the previous night, the every-man-for-himself panic during it, and the bamboo raft swept away by the river—all of it had shattered the flimsy camaraderie that had arisen from their shared choice to abandon two burdens.

So today's rafts, on one hand, had to be cobbled together from the leftover scraps they'd previously disdained because all the good materials were used up—paired with passion gone and adrenaline drained, work efficiency plummeted. It ended up taking as long to build one raft as it had taken to build two the day before.

It wasn't until the afternoon that they could finally launch and cross the river.

Eight people, two rafts.

Zhao Da and Zhao Er were naturally together, and they casually picked Mu Xingzhou and Wang Daming as well.

The remaining Captain Yang, Director Zhang, Ni Jinghe, and Guan Yongyi automatically formed the other group.

Since Zhao Da and Zhao Er had been the ones who saved that raft the day before, no one objected to letting them pick either raft or people first.

Unexpectedly, Zhao Da and Zhao Er suddenly developed a sense of fair play. Instead of just taking yesterday's well-crafted raft, the one made of good materials in the heat of passion, they proposed a game of rock-paper-scissors after the groups were formed.

Best of three; Zhao Da lost to Captain Yang.

Zhao Da's group got the newly made raft, letting Captain Yang's group take the better one. Whether they secretly felt pleased was another matter.

This seemingly fair scene looked completely different in the eyes of Captain Yang's group compared to the viewers.

"Shit, he threw it on purpose, didn't he? Taking the raft that's obviously worse material than yesterday's—easier to tamper with, right?"

"Didn't they discuss swimming skills before bed yesterday? Who can swim again? I can't quite remember."

"Zhao Da, Zhao Er, Captain Yang, and Ni Jinghe—four people can swim, perfectly split between the two groups. It actually looks... pretty fair."

"??? Where's the fairness, friend? Look, Zhao Da and Zhao Er are dragging along Mu Xingzhou and Wang Daming. Wang Daming's selfish face can't be hidden anymore. If something happens on this raft, it'll all be under Zhao Da and Zhao Er's control."

"Hmm... they're about to make a move..."

"I'm saddened by my own lack of emotional reaction."

"Ah, no matter what, Mu Xingzhou doesn't deserve to be killed. If it weren't for the Yaoxing Storm, if things hadn't been pushed to this extreme, maybe Mu Xingzhou and Feng Qianqian could still be fine together. Actually, I'm quite into that kind of secret celebrity romance..."

"I hope Mu Xingzhou survives. I think Feng Qianqian will make it, and I hope Mu Xingzhou gets to see the person he abandoned appear before him, safe and sound. Maybe that's the best punishment for him."

"No matter what we wish for, it's all in vain. Shit, they're in the water!"

......

Regardless of how viewers on StarNet now felt about Mu Xingzhou, they definitely despised the Mu brothers—who had concealed the Yaoxing Storm info and set a terrible precedent by causing a huge mess for the hazard prediction measures across star systems—along with their accomplices Zhao Da and Zhao Er, far more.

Given the multiple private discussions Zhao Da and Zhao Er had held earlier, the launch of the rafts likely spelled danger for Mu Xingzhou.

When forced to choose between two dislikes, people pick the lesser. Even many who said in the danmaku that they'd lost all feeling for Mu Xingzhou's safety actually broke into a cold sweat for him the moment the rafts entered the water.

Among them was Wang Mancang, who already detested every member of that advance team on Wilderness Planet, yet still held reverence for life.

Even with a thoroughly detestable person sitting before him and a thoroughly detestable problem he had to resolve, Wang Mancang still couldn't resist sneaking glances at the livestream on his StarNet screen from time to time.

The StarNet era had an interesting quirk. Sometimes, if you pretended well enough, even face-to-face, the other person might not be able to tell whether you, with your head tilted and gaze slightly unfocused, were thinking, daydreaming, or sneakily watching your StarNet screen.

At least for the better part of the day, Wang Mancang had kept an eye on the StarNet livestream, and Li Longsheng sitting across from him hadn't noticed at all.

"I tell you, your company's rules are no good. How can her insurance beneficiary be herself? This daughter of mine is so filial—she always thinks of her dad. If anything happened, she'd definitely want the money to go to me. You people must not have explained things clearly when you got her the insurance," Li Longsheng said, lounging on the sofa opposite Wang Mancang, his feet propped on the coffee table and jiggling. With a grand wave of his hand, he continued, "Didn't you say an insurance agent would come? Where is he? Why isn't he here yet? A big company like yours, you're not trying to swallow my daughter's insurance payout, are you? Maybe I should just wait at the front gate."

Despite saying he'd wait at the front gate, Li Longsheng showed no inclination to stand up. Instead, he groped a piece of cake from the coffee table and ate half in one bite.

But the cake didn't seem to suit his taste; he soon tossed the remaining half back onto the table.

Wang Mancang's gaze shifted from the personal-perspective StarNet screen floating before him, flicked over the pastry plate on the coffee table now dusted with the ash from Li Longsheng's jiggling foot, and finally settled on the gaunt man. He forced a smile onto his plump face. "Soon, almost here."

Truly, timing is everything. Who could have guessed that a small oversight would let him not only leave the Blue House but also show up at the company's doorstep? Early in the morning, this disreputable-looking man plopped himself down right outside the company, telling everyone he met that he was looking for Song Shiyue's manager. If a senior executive hadn't spotted him later, who knows how long the embarrassment would have dragged on.

After going back and forth for most of the day, it all boiled down to money.

If the higher-ups hadn't ordered Wang Mancang to carefully explain to Li Longsheng why he couldn't receive compensation due to the program's issues, Wang Mancang would have long since found a way to get rid of him.

Now... he had to first satisfy Li Longsheng's questions about getting money and report back to the higher-ups before he could take action.

But the people from the program team had all been arrested, and the insurance company had probably lost their shirts this time—who knew if they even had a shirt left, since everyone was still alive and injuries might still increase... The compensation procedures hadn't been finalized yet. Hearing that the company on Song Shiyue's side was asking, they said they'd send someone, but dragged it from morning to afternoon, leaving Wang Mancang alone to deal with this... thing.

Just as the livestream showed Zhao Da's group launching their raft, Wang Mancang, who was nearly at his wit's end and wanted to skip explaining things to Li Longsheng, finally saw the arrival of a young insurance guy who kept wiping sweat.

On Wilderness Planet, Zhuang Jiachuan had shaken until his arms ached and rammed until his head spun, but those two or three chestnuts just swayed gently on the tree, showing no sign of falling.

Under Yu Nianbing's repeated persuasion, Zhuang Jiachuan finally gave up on those stubbornly attached chestnuts, and they turned back to dig up the dandelions.

Those few little chestnuts were surprisingly stubborn.

On the other hand, the large bamboo raft was unbelievably flimsy.

Of course, on the raft, only Mu Xingzhou and Wang Daming found it unbelievable.

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