Chapter 2

He really had gotten an "Interstellar Mall"!

Had a stroke of luck fallen into his lap? Or was he about to step into a trap?

After thinking in silence for quite a while, Qing Mengzhu stood up and figured out how to use the Interstellar Mall app to scan the things in the room.

The bed, cabinets, clothes, ornaments, electronic devices, and so on were all gray. The system showed that they could not be sold.

Qing Mengzhu returned to his personal center. It showed that he was an interstellar seller in an agricultural and pastoral area, so perhaps he had to sell vegetables and meat?

He stood up, hurried to the kitchen, and rummaged through the freezer for some dried shiitake mushrooms a friend had given him before. Then he began scanning them.

"Beep, beep-"

A faint sound rang out, and the scan results appeared.

Qing Mengzhu looked down. This time, the dried shiitakes were not gray, but there was red text in the box: "No reselling!"

Why couldn't he resell them?

Was it a requirement of interstellar law? A risk-avoidance measure by the Interstellar Mall itself? Or was there something special about him as a star seller, such that only things he produced could be sold through the Interstellar Mall?

There was too much information. Qing Mengzhu frowned, struggling to make sense of it.

He simply took a notebook, sat down at his desk, and slowly wrote down his various guesses and analyses about the Interstellar Mall.

After writing for half the morning, he finally calmed down.

He stood up, took the pages he had written on to the kitchen, tore them up, and slowly burned them in the sink. Then he plugged the sink and turned on the

water

tap, filling it halfway. He dispersed the ashes, stirred them into a gray solution, and only then let it drain.

After washing up in the bathroom, Qing Mengzhu changed into clothes for going out, slung on a bag, and left.

He bought a sticky rice ball at a breakfast shop outside his residential complex and ate it with a cup of soy milk. Then he hailed a car by the road and headed back to his hometown.

Qing Mengzhu's family had lived for generations in the far suburbs of Vine City. As the city developed, the area had become part of the near suburbs. Even driving back from the city center took only fifty minutes to an hour.

His father's generation had moved into Vine City proper and hadn't paid much attention to their hometown.

The main reason they hadn't transferred their household registration was that Vine City had developed so rapidly into an international metropolis that everyone thought their hometown might eventually become part of the city too.

They had kept the family property there, and if it were ever demolished for redevelopment, they might receive a substantial payout.

Of course, given the current situation, many people were no longer so optimistic.

Thanks to the rapid economic growth of recent years, Qing Mengzhu's hometown had also developed well. Every family had built a villa-like home, the country roads were clean and wide, and even the environment around the village had been well preserved.

With its green mountains and clear waters, it looked like a tourist area.

The car pulled up outside Qing Mengzhu's old home. He paid, got out, and looked at the small courtyard in front of him.

The old two-story house, which had once looked beautiful, now seemed a little dilapidated.

Qing Mengzhu glanced at it, pulled out his key, and went inside, then turned around and locked the courtyard gate.

Several large jars in one corner of the courtyard had been planted with vegetables and flowers. Now, only the old perennial Chinese chives were still growing.

He bent down, pinched off all the chives, gathered them into a small bunch, and opened the Interstellar Mall to scan them.

The result came quickly as he waited with bated breath.

The scan gave an estimated price in green text: "Chinese chives: 216 g. Estimated value: 0.007 star coins. Please sell items worth at least 10 star coins."

Did that mean the price was too low? The system wouldn't take them?

Qing Mengzhu stood up, surveyed the courtyard, and then opened the Interstellar Mall to scan it.

Sure enough, the chives were the only thing he could sell. Everything else was gray.

After thinking for a moment, Qing Mengzhu put his carrying basket back on and headed out toward his family's fields.

He was going to see if there was anything he could pick there!

Over three generations, his family had accumulated a total of 13.3 mu of land allotted by the village. Adding the wasteland they had reclaimed on the mountains and by the river brought the total to around 15 mu. Besides that, they also had two hills and two large lotus ponds.

No one was renting the fields anymore, but it was spring, and land that had been cultivated for years would always sprout some of the crops once grown there.

The same went for the mountains. There should be wild vegetables and mushrooms there.

Although he hadn't grown them himself, he ought to be able to sell things he picked himself too, right?

Qing Mengzhu ran along the field ridges and riverbank all the way to the fields, where he indeed found quite a few wild seedlings of rapeseed, scallions, sword lettuce, and other vegetables.

The rapeseed in particular had already put out tender yellow flowers. They swayed in the spring breeze and looked beautiful.

He ran into the field, quickly pinched off a handful of tender rapeseed shoots, and scanned them with the Interstellar Mall. The next moment, green text appeared in the scanning box: "Rapeseed shoots: 127 g. Estimated value: 0.006 coins. Please sell items worth at least 10 star coins."

Panting, he looked at the words on the screen. Sure enough, the wild vegetables he gathered could be sold too!

Author's note:

Here we go!

I made a small change to the wording of the synopsis and added the relationship status. The plot hasn't changed. Enjoy reading!

Chapter 2

Qing Mengzhu's family's fields had been cultivated for many years, and quite a few vegetable seedlings grew there.

He picked whatever he found, gathering every wild vegetable he recognized.

After more than five hours of work, he scanned his haul with the Interstellar Mall app. The results showed that he had gathered 112,430 grams of wild vegetables in total, or about 224 jin. Altogether, they could sell for 4.3 star coins, still short of the minimum for a sale.

He couldn't be said to have slacked off, gathering so many vegetables in one afternoon, yet this was still the result. He felt a little discouraged.

The only thing worth celebrating was that, while scanning, he had discovered that the Interstellar Mall gave different prices for vegetables of the same kind. It might award star coins based on their quality.

That meant if he could get high-quality vegetables in the future, star coins would be a little easier to earn.

Unable to sell the vegetables, Qing Mengzhu had no choice but to divide them into bags and laboriously carry them home.

He was truly exhausted that day. He had a little instant noodles, tidied up the house, turned on the electric water heater, and took a bath before finding time to reply to his WeChat messages.

Zhao Hexi had specifically asked how he was doing. Upon learning that he had returned to the countryside, he told him to get some rest and that they could meet up when they had time.

Before nine o'clock, Qing Mengzhu had already climbed into bed and fallen fast asleep.

Early the next morning, Qing Mengzhu got up, had a simple bowl of noodles, and took an old woven sack from the house, intending to go out and gather more wild vegetables.

He refused to believe that a whole day's effort, combined with the wild vegetables he had gathered yesterday, wouldn't add up to even ten star coins.

Their area was part of Jiangnan, and at this time of year, mornings were still quite cold.

As soon as Qing Mengzhu stepped outside, he saw white mist drifting above the crisscrossing rivers. The lush green fields and mountain forests appeared hazily through it, looking especially beautiful.

Because the river network was so dense, there were many large ponds and small lakes in the area, with farmland in between. Many field ridges had been preserved, unlike on the great plains elsewhere, where they had been leveled to make mechanized farming easier.

As he walked along a field ridge, plenty of mud stuck to his feet, making them feel uncomfortable. But breathing in the crisp air and looking at the countryside, his spirits still lifted.

He wasn't the only one up early.

On the way, Qing Mengzhu saw a group of middle-aged women dressed in bright colors.

Carrying baskets, small shovels, and little hoes, the women came toward him.

As the two sides drew near, one of the women greeted Qing Mengzhu warmly. "Young man, are you out digging wild vegetables too?"

Qing Mengzhu smiled. "Just digging a few. Aunties, what have you all gathered?"

"Oh, all sorts of things." The women held their baskets up for Qing Mengzhu to see. "Shepherd's purse, mugwort, artemisia selengensis, dandelions... Later we're going up the mountain to gather bracken, wild garlic, and mushrooms."

Qing Mengzhu looked at the plump, tender wild vegetables in their baskets with a little envy. "Those vegetables look wonderful."

The women immediately pointed the way. "Go dig over there. There are lots of wild vegetables there, and they're tender too."

Qing Mengzhu took their friendly advice and went to dig for wild vegetables in those fields.

The women had indeed chosen a good spot. The only drawback was that the fields had already been dug over, so there were somewhat fewer wild vegetables.