Treating a Fool to Sunflower Seeds

Asphodel, Fortia City, Upper Hive, District Nine, Residential Zone Eighteen, Street 33, Zhou Yun stood beside the wide street, looking at the exquisitely crafted metal street sign.

According to Lena, District Nine was the old district of Fortia City's Upper Hive, with a history stretching back tens of thousands of years.

This district was also the dividing line between the Upper Hive and the Lower Hive. The two of them had entered the Upper Hive through the heavy gates at the entrance of this district.

Even as an old district with a long history and the closest to the Lower Hive, the streets in this district were still wide and the buildings neat.

The air around still carried the smell of chemical reagents used for purification, but it was still considered fresh compared to the Lower Hive.

The lights were bright enough to replace the sun, and straight arch bridges, crosswalks, and connecting corridors linked the buildings. Bright lights dotted them, looking like stars twinkling at a glance.

Beneath these buildings were shops and private workshops, and along the roadside were neat stalls selling the products of these workshops.

Having lived in the crowded alleys of the Lower Hive for so long, Zhou Yun felt a bit dizzy upon suddenly arriving in the Upper Hive.

It even reminded him of the city he lived in during his previous life.

Zhou Yun walked east along this Street 33, looking at the goods sold along the way.

Asphodel's large factories mainly produced military products, while the goods sold on the streets here were all from private workshops.

These private workshops purchased raw materials from merchant ships arriving from alien planets, processed them into goods, and sold them on the streets.

The prices of these goods were enough to make any Lower Hiver's face turn pale and their fingers tremble.

But Zhou Yun had money.

Lena, that big idiot—no, Lena—had bought two Upper Hive passes from him.

At four times the price, and one of them was Zhou Yun's.

But when Zhou Yun took the pass from the PDF guarding the entrance and exit between the Upper and Lower Hives, Lena's eyes widened, and she exclaimed in astonishment repeatedly.

She marveled at how Zhou Yun knew important people who could make the PDFs do their jobs, and at how worth it the money was.

It made Zhou Yun's conscience feel a little uneasy.

However, as soon as he took the large sum of money from Lena, his conscience was immediately put to rest.

After arriving in the Upper Hive, Lena didn't take any action.

Instead, she skillfully found a street stall and sat down, seemingly waiting for something.

While Lena was waiting, Zhou Yun wandered around the nearby streets.

Although he had a lot of money in his pocket, it was still only local Asphodel currency, which wouldn't be very useful once he left Asphodel.

The Imperium was too vast; almost every planet had its own currency system, or formed a common currency alliance with a few neighboring star systems.

The currency of the Asphodel system was pegged to Bloodstone in the Governor's vault. Every Asphodel currency could be exchanged for a certain amount of Bloodstone.

It was a blood-red gemstone commonly found on Baal, like the blood of Sanguinius. Even the Blood Angels often used it as adornment.

Asphodel's currency was therefore called Blood Coin.

Zhou Yun exchanged seventy percent of his money for Blood Coins, including the money from the automatic infantry rifles and the two passes.

He then put the Bloodstone into his Fourth-Dimensional Pocket and sold it, bringing in a total of 660,000.

Zhou Yun's savings also reached 1.4 million.

He kept thirty percent of the Blood Coins for living expenses.

Zhou Yun's steps stopped at a stall by the roadside.

It was a food stall.

Asphodel's local sun was toxic with radiation, making it almost impossible to grow normal crops.

Food supplies almost entirely came from nearby agricultural worlds, from the endless seas of farms shrouded in thick yellow-green fertilizer-laden atmospheres.

The food sold at this stall was mostly processed from melons.

They were cut into chunks, the flesh a greasy, dark yellow, resembling fat from some unknown melon, and palm-sized, stir-fried seeds of a large melon-like crop.

Zhou Yun could roughly imagine how large this melon-like crop was.

It was very likely a giant, high-yield crop grown on an agricultural world.

"A portion of stir-fried melon seeds? Or roasted melon flesh?" the Upper Hive woman tending the stall asked with a bright smile.

Zhou Yun glanced at the woman and noticed that her mental state was significantly better than that of the Lower Hive residents.

He took out a few Blood Coins from his pocket and bought a piece of greasy, dark yellow melon flesh and a bag of stir-fried melon seeds from the woman's stall.

Carrying the stir-fried melon seeds, Zhou Yun returned to the stall where Lena, that big idiot, was and sat opposite her.

"Eat?" Zhou Yun took out a palm-sized melon seed from the bag and shook it at Lena.

He pushed the bag towards Lena and began to crack open the large seed with his teeth.

The huge sunflower seeds were satisfying to eat, releasing a fragrant plant oil aroma in Zhou Yun's mouth.

Lena looked at the sunflower seeds Zhou Yun offered her with a hint of surprise.

These seeds were enormous; there were only nine in the entire bag.

"I ate these kinds of sunflower seeds when I was little. As I recall, they weren't cheap for someone from the Lower Hive."

Lena picked up a seed and said hesitantly, "You've spent too much."

It's fine, I just scammed all the money from you anyway.

Zhou Yun chewed on the seeds, not voicing this thought.

He swallowed them and nodded at Lena, saying, "Just eat yours."

"In my hometown, it's tradition to treat friends like you to sunflower seeds."

Hearing this, Lena even gave Zhou Yun a grateful look.

But before she could put the seed in her mouth, she suddenly remembered.

"Wait, didn't you say last time..."

"That the tradition in your hometown was to tease me, a fool, and buy fools sunflower seeds?"

Lena the great fool—no, Lena—her eyes widened instantly.

"Ahem." Zhou Yun coughed twice, smoothly changing the subject. "What are we waiting for here?"

"Oh, we're waiting for that actuary and mathematician."

Lena cracked open a seed and said, nibbling on it.

He was fooled that easily? Easier to deal with than Oglins.

Zhou Yun glanced at Lena.

He found that Lena's intelligence was generally normal, even outstanding in some aspects.

Zhou Yun had seen her handle gang affairs and manage accounts with extreme efficiency.

This at least proved Lena wasn't foolish in a physiological sense; in fact, she didn't look like it either.

But... but in certain matters, she seemed to possess a bizarre slowness and stupidity.

This appeared to be more of a mental issue than a physiological one.

Psykers were always susceptible to the influence of the Warp, falling into mental illnesses.

Such as madness, irritability, depression, autism, or being overly sensitive.

Lena might have been deeply affected by the Warp, but her symptom was... becoming a dunce from time to time?

Zhou Yun even suspected that this occasional foolishness was Lena's mind's instinctive self-protection, cleverly preventing her from falling into true madness.

After all, Oglins were, for the most part, more resistant to Chaos corruption than other humans.

Zhou Yun's mind raced with random thoughts.

"Look, she's here, the actuary and mathematician I told you about."

Zhou Yun followed Lena's pointing finger.