The spicy aroma rushed into his nostrils and traveled up to his forehead with each breath, causing Wei Xuan to sneeze involuntarily. The taste seemed very familiar, and he hoped its texture would be just as familiar.
Wei Xuan had quite a few dried chili peppers at home, after all, they were highly preservable, and almost every store or shop had piles of them. However, fresh green and red peppers had completely disappeared with the advent of the apocalypse. This most common seasoning and vegetable might never appear in this world again.
Luckily, Wei Xuan had managed to grow them again now.
After cutting a small piece, Wei Xuan took a deep breath before popping it into his mouth. He wasn’t someone who could handle extreme spiciness before the apocalypse. Normal levels of spiciness were fine, but those that numbed the tongue, made one dazed, and caused excessive sweating were out of his tolerance range.
Chili peppers, whether fresh, ripe, or dried, could be eaten directly. Moreover, since these were grown by himself without any pesticides or fertilizers during the cultivation process, there wouldn’t be any adverse reactions when consuming them fresh.
Chewing on it for a while, luckily, although it was spicy, it wasn’t the unbearable kind. It seemed that the chili seeds he had bought, which were often sold with flower seeds, weren’t the overly intense type. This way, people wouldn’t mistakenly grow them as ornamental plants.
After tasting the flavor, Wei Xuan felt relieved. In his mind, he contemplated what he could cook using fresh chili peppers.
Frankly speaking, due to the lack of testing equipment in his possession, and even if he had them, he wouldn’t know how to use them, he used to worry about whether he might inadvertently grow some poisonous plants that would harm him. But upon reflection, even if these pre-apocalypse crops underwent changes after the apocalypse, if he merely grew them in clean water, how could they absorb toxic substances and become poisonous?
For a plant to contain toxins, it would have to absorb and store them from its surroundings. If, under the current almost isolated conditions, they could still produce toxins, then he would just have to accept his misfortune.
Besides, every time Wei Xuan harvested the crops, he would first taste a tiny bit, so even if there was a problem, a tiny portion generally wouldn’t be lethal.
As Wei Xuan pondered the recipe for a while, he returned to the living room. After sorting through the chili peppers, he set aside a couple of plump ones with many seeds for cultivation. Then, with the remaining ones, he returned to the kitchen.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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After indulging in a satisfying and spicy lunch, Wei Xuan was sweating. After eating his fill, he leaned on Du Hang for digestion. Once he felt he could move again, he stood up and began to tidy up the pile of harvest from before the meal.
Most of the various types of seeds in the house had already been planted by Wei Xuan one after another. Aside from a few grains that hadn’t been harvested yet, the planting machine now contained various fruits and flower seeds.
After contemplating, Wei Xuan decided to try germinating and cultivating some of the smaller fruits. Even if these fruits grew smaller in size, they wouldn’t fit in the planting machine when mature. So, he planned to germinate them first using the machine, then transfer the sprouted fruits to the balcony of a room on the top floor. He would use larger pots to cultivate them.
During his previous experiments, Wei Xuan could use snow water to water the vegetables that had been transplanted to pots and planting beds. Although vegetables grown this way grew much slower than those in the planting machine, they still managed to grow.
So, in the future, Wei Xuan could water these transplanted fruits in the soil with snow water every day. Even if they grew slowly, there would come a day when they would blossom and bear fruit, right?
“But then again, even if these fruit plants grow larger in the future, there’s no need to worry about their germination stage, right?” Slapping his forehead, Wei Xuan felt like he had been overthinking these last two days. After all, he would transplant them anyway, and the planting machine was just helping germinate the seedlings. So, it didn’t matter how big they grew in the future… Did it?
Having come to this realization, Wei Xuan stopped dwelling on it. He first moved the various harvested crop fruits from today to an unused room on the same floor. He spread a layer of plastic sheet and newspapers on the balcony’s position, then arranged the grains neatly on top to dry, placing small signs with the names of different fruits beside them.
These grains had to be thoroughly dried before they could be stored. Later on, whether he wanted to cook and taste their flavors or cultivate them as seeds for the long term, he had options.
After dealing with today’s newly harvested crops, Wei Xuan went to fiddle with the fruit seeds stored at home. He selected and sorted them into the planting machine, categorizing them according to their types, waiting for them to germinate.
After planting this batch of fruit seeds, Wei Xuan didn’t bother with the other seeds. Although he was curious about what kind of crops the flower seeds at home would produce, he dismissed the idea.
As previously mentioned, he believed that ordinary crops were unlikely to mutate into poisonous plants after the apocalypse. Similarly, edible crops and artificially cultivated fruits were unlikely to become aggressive mutant plants. However, the situation might be different for ornamental flowers and plants.
As he had encountered mutant plants near the green belt before the apocalypse, although he hadn’t encountered any more mutants in the city, he had heard about them in his past life. According to his observations, these mutants were likely to arise from ornamental or landscaping plants, or even from wild plants.
Once everything that needed to be dried was properly dried, and the seeds that needed to germinate were soaked, Wei Xuan wandered around the room for a while before shifting his attention elsewhere. “I should prepare for winter in advance…”
Currently, it was only mid-September, and even though the lingering heat of summer, known as the “autumn tiger,” was still around, the mornings and evenings were gradually becoming cooler.
Last year, thanks to having sufficient solar power batteries and electric heaters at home, he had spent a comfortable winter. Coupled with the fact that his body was experiencing some minor issues, and he wasn’t as sensitive to changes in temperature, he had successfully endured his first winter without any problems.
However, at this moment, Wei Xuan was thinking ahead. Setting aside the issue of turning into a zombie for now, he pondered the fact that electronic appliances had a lifespan. If these devices broke down in the future, even if he had equipment for energy conversion, he would still need functional electric heaters. With all these thoughts, he considered how to handle warmth in the house when all these devices inevitably broke down.
Even with windows and doors sealed, the winter would still be cold without heating devices. To tackle this issue, he decided to enhance the insulation of the rooms by applying spray polyurethane foam.
As mentioned earlier, the concept of “insulation” wasn’t just about maintaining high or low temperatures, it applied to both. By applying this foam to the walls, the house where Wei Xuan resided would naturally be warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Regardless of how the weather changed in the future, as long as he could control the room’s temperature, he wouldn’t have to worry about temperature fluctuations.
When he built the cold storage room, he hadn’t used up much of the spray polyurethane foam. Even if he remodeled his home now, there wouldn’t be any problems at all!
Moreover, there was still plenty left in that factory. After using up these supplies, he could take some of his companions and go back again, the only concern was to avoid encountering the group of zombies.
With these thoughts in mind, Wei Xuan excitedly led Du Hang around the room, then stuck his head out and carefully inspected the exterior walls. Afterward, he sat at the table, beginning to sketch and plan the future home improvement work.
His physical strength hadn’t fully recovered today, and since thinking and planning didn’t require physical effort, he continued to work until he grew tired of drawing and planning. Then, he simply hugged Du Hang’s waist, and they both went to bed together for rest.
The next morning, when Wei Xuan woke up, he finally felt much better than the previous days. The annoying resentment and complaints were absent, and he felt a sense of renewed vigor.
After getting up and freshening up, as he returned from the bathroom, he inadvertently caught sight of something placed on the cabinet next to it. Suddenly, he realized that due to the arrival of that convoy, he had completely forgotten about something important…
He picked up the infrared thermometer on the cabinet. Wei Xuan somewhat helplessly pointed it at himself. They said that it only takes twenty-one days to form a habit, but when unexpected situations arise, some habits must be suspended.
A “beep” sound rang out, and as Wei Xuan adjusted the gun-shaped device in his hand, he looked at the screen. Suddenly, his whole body stiffened…
He remembered that his temperature had been around 28 degrees when he measured it a couple of days ago. But now… how could it suddenly drop to 26 degrees?!
Two degrees, it had dropped by a full two degrees! This change was much more dramatic than changes of a fraction of a degree or even one degree at a time!
He hadn’t measured his temperature for only three or four days, and his temperature had dropped by two degrees. If he didn’t measure it for a month or two, would his body temperature eventually drop to zero degrees?!
He should eat more snowflakes. Maybe that’ll help.
Thank you for the chapter!
Yes, that would never speed up the process. I’m thinking his “awakening” caused this.
Cool, pfft… Probably a side effect of his increasing abilities.
Thanks for the update 🤣❤️🤣❤️
Maybe every time he used his ability his temperature drops…🤔
His ability only slowly awakens his zombie cells, he is slowly turning into a half-zombie, but only a conscious and unwilling human flesh. That’s my theory.
But no desire for human flesh and a zombie with a conscience!*
Du Hang can probably eat chilli right? Cause the ‘taste’ is basically it activating the pain cells.
but the zombies can’t feel pain….
If they can feel aggrieved, they definitely can feel pain 😅
well, emotional pain, yes, but feeling frustrated, and feeling an actual burning sensation are a bit different haha
Well this will turn into a whole scientific conversation for which we do not have means to find data and will rely on purely speculation, so it seems only the author will ever know
true haha! I guess it doesn’t actually matter, does it? I always find myself getting too invested in these types of theories!
Why 0c? This makes no sense, or at least not in the world building so far. Even dead bodies can’t reach 0c without external help! 😑