Salt-making failure

Although the elevator had warmed up a little, after all that disruption, Lin Feng could no longer sleep.

Just then, his private chat window suddenly flashed.

Ye Hua: [You there, boss? The crossbow bolts you wanted last time are ready. Please check them.]

Lin Feng: [Yeah, you don't need to make any more for me for now.]

Elsewhere, Ye Hua was halfway through typing when he saw Lin Feng's message, and his heart sank.

He had been thinking about asking whether the other man had anything to keep warm with. He had never expected the boss to stop trading with him.

What was he supposed to do now? He had already eaten all the food from their last trade.

Ye Hua: [Boss, we can still negotiate the price...]

Lin Feng: [I don't have any use for crossbow bolts right now.]

Ye Hua: [Well... all right, but I can make other things too. Take a look and see if you need anything.]

Lin Feng: [I'll ask you if I need anything.]

Ye Hua: [Okay, boss.]

Ye Hua sighed. Fortunately, a few other people were buying the arrows he made, so at least he wouldn't starve.

After collecting the crossbow bolts, Lin Feng closed the Chatroom as well.

Beep! The floor the host is about to enter is the Raft Survival Floor. There is only one raft drifting on the sea on this floor. A wooden chest sits on the raft. Opening it will yield one bottle of brandy, two Gold Coins, and one fishing rod.

Beep! Choice mission triggered. Host, please make your choice.

Choice one: Enter the floor and kill the great white shark. Reward: Beginner Melee Combat.

Choice two: Remain in the elevator without entering the floor. Reward: increased endurance.

"I choose one."

Lin Feng spoke decisively. Although the reward for the second choice looked good too, he could improve his endurance through exercise, whereas he couldn't learn combat skills on his own.

Ding-dong! Elevator descending. Please hold on.

After Lin Feng opened the door, a salty sea breeze blew into his face. Although the weather looked nice, the sight of the boundless ocean left him feeling inexplicably irritated.

Still, the mission came first. After moving the entire wooden chest back into the elevator, Lin Feng took out his shotgun and began looking for the great white shark.

Whoosh~

Before long, the great white shark that had been lurking beneath the sea finally appeared, moving back and forth underwater as though searching for an opening.

Bang!

At last, the great white suddenly bit down on the raft, trying to crush the flimsy structure in its jaws.

Lin Feng showed it no mercy either, firing a hard shot straight at its head.

The great white didn't die immediately after being shot. Seeing this, Lin Feng fired twice more, but since it had ducked underwater, the two shots had almost no penetrating power.

Soon, the water around the raft was stained red with blood. It probably wouldn't be long before other marine predators were drawn over.

The gravely injured great white would probably be torn apart too.

He just didn't know whether that would count as his kill.

However, just as Lin Feng was worrying about failing the mission, the great white surfaced again for some unknown reason. Lin Feng wasn't about to miss this opportunity and fired several more shots at it.

This time, it was thoroughly dead, without a single intact spot on its body.

Lin Feng also abandoned the idea of eating its meat. Even setting aside all the bullets in its body, shark meat didn't seem like something you could just eat casually, did it?

Going down to retrieve it now would be very unwise too. There was blood everywhere, and it would probably draw other predators over shortly.

Just as Lin Feng had guessed, the blood soon attracted a school of sharks.

The great white's carcass was soon torn into scattered chunks.

"Roar!!"

Little Velociraptor stood beside Lin Feng's leg and roared, probably feeling threatened by the school of sharks underwater.

Lin Feng had originally wanted to bring back some seawater, but that no longer seemed feasible.

Beep! Congratulations to the host on completing the mission. The reward has been issued.

An enormous amount of combat knowledge instantly flooded Lin Feng's mind.

Before long, Lin Feng had absorbed all the information.

Although his head felt a little swollen and painful, he was still delighted. With his current strength, he couldn't claim to be a match for ten opponents.

But three to five ordinary thugs certainly wouldn't be able to get close to him.

Outside, the sharks left after devouring the great white's carcass, though the cloud of blood in the water had yet to disperse.

After the sharks left, Lin Feng returned to the raft.

There was still half an hour before the elevator closed. He needed to find a way to collect some seawater in the remaining time.

Then he would try making salt. Otherwise, he didn't even have salt for his grilled meat, and after eating it for so long, he really was getting tired of it.

After he waited a while, the blood in the seawater finally began to dissipate. Lin Feng took out water bottles and filled five of them with seawater, a full five liters. That ought to yield some salt.

He just didn't know whether the resulting salt would be edible.

"Whatever. I'll give it a try first."

After returning to the elevator, Lin Feng put the pot on the Induction Cooker, then poured in the seawater. Now he just had to wait for it to crystallize.

Hopefully, this plan works.

Lin Feng prayed inwardly.

"Fuck, why does it feel like it's getting colder again?"

Lin Feng shivered as he looked at the thin ice on the pool.

He felt that the temperature had probably already dropped below zero.

At that moment, the person in the Chatroom who had a thermometer posted another real-time temperature update.

[Guys, latest temperature update: it's -5°C here now. I think I might have a fever. Does anyone have medicine?!]

[Don't even ask. Even if I had any, I couldn't sell it. I think I'm sick too, either a cold or a fever.]

[I'm so done! I can't even get enough to eat, and now they're cranking up the fucking difficulty?]

[I really envy you people with level-three elevators. You can light fires without worrying about choking to death. I came across a guy earlier who'd died in his elevator. There was a fire beside him. He probably choked to death on the smoke.]

It's below zero already?

Reading the messages in the Chatroom, Lin Feng wasn't particularly worried. He had an Induction Cooker that required no energy supply to keep him warm, so he didn't need to fear freezing to death.

As long as the temperature didn't drop too absurdly low, he would be fine.

At the current temperature, the Induction Cooker could still keep things manageable.

More than three hours later, the seawater in the pot had finally almost boiled away, and some white crystals had appeared.

"Is this stuff... really edible?"

Lin Feng spoke uncertainly. He remembered that seawater contained a lot of impurities, and evaporation alone couldn't produce table salt at all.

But under the current conditions, there was nothing more Lin Feng could do.

How about... trying a taste?

Lin Feng thought as he looked at the crystals in the pot.

Once it had dried completely, Lin Feng reached out and scraped up a layer of crystals from the bottom of the pot.

Then he stuck out his tongue and licked them.

Instantly, Lin Feng felt as though his taste buds had been wrecked.

"Fuck! What the fuck kind of * taste is this?!"

Lin Feng hurriedly took a mouthful of water to rinse his mouth.

How could he describe it? Salty with a bitter edge, bitter with an astringent edge, and for some reason, there was even a hint of used footbath water.