Chapter 4 The Handsome Man in My Dream
Having roughly sorted out her memories, Zuo Shan was exhausted after finishing processing the yams, and she began to think about getting herself a bed.
The original owner's bed was sold two years ago. At that time, the original owner was injured and needed to buy medical supplies, so Qi Yang had no choice but to grit his teeth and sell this last piece of furniture.
From then on, the two of them had to sleep on the ground with grass.
There are no carpenters in District 50. Strictly speaking, apart from special skills such as tool repair and weapon manufacturing, other skills such as tailoring, carpentry, and cooking have almost all been lost.
Most of the scavengers in District 50 don't have beds, cabinets, or even dressing tables—luxuries—because these things aren't essential for survival.
Instead, they made their own rough daily necessities such as rattan baskets and hemp bags.
Zuo Shan knew that the bed issue couldn't be rushed. What bothered her most right now was that there was no toilet paper or sanitary napkins or other feminine hygiene products in District 50.
The thought of using rough linen products instead of soft, comfortable sanitary napkins made her want to go crazy.
The advantage is that women in District 50 also tend to have irregular periods, sometimes every two or three months, and sometimes even more than six months.
Recalling the last time she had her period, it must have been four months ago. She couldn't help but feel a little nervous. She decided that if her period really came, she would stay in the house for three days to avoid bleeding everywhere.
Thinking of her aunt, she suddenly unearthed a shocking past event from the original owner's memories.
About three months ago, during a scavenging trip, the original owner encountered a mutated musk deer. The mutated musk deer releases a special fragrance during its mating season, causing all mutated beasts that smell it to enter their mating season as well.
Even humans cannot escape the poison of this fragrance. Once they smell it, they must have intercourse with someone, or they will suffer a fate worse than death.
The original owner actually wanted to escape home and wait for Qi Yang to come back so they could do it together, but unfortunately there was a group of dirty scavengers around at the time.
Among them were old men and sleazy, burly men, all of them staring at the original body with ill intent, ready to pounce at any moment.
The original owner could only flee in panic. During the escape, he was tripped by a man lying on the ground covered in blood. The original owner saw the man's face at a glance and was amazed by his appearance.
The original owner knew she had no ability to escape home, because she was already starting to feel weak all over.
Since she couldn't escape the fate of having sex with someone, she would rather choose a stranger, especially one who was handsome enough.
She dragged the man into the dense bushes. The man was clearly also affected by the mutated musk deer. Although he was still unconscious, his body had already reacted instinctively. Sensing the woman approaching him, he hugged her tightly.
What followed was an unspeakable affair between the two. Only afterward did the original owner notice that the man was wearing a purple-gold seal, a family emblem that only scions of great families could possess.
The original owner knew she had caused trouble, having taken advantage of the nobleman's unconscious state to possess his body. If he were to investigate after waking up, she feared she would face certain death.
The original owner could only flee in panic, running home without stopping, leaving the unconscious man behind, his fate unknown.
The original owner was uneasy about this for a whole month. After a month, after making inquiries from various sources, she had not heard of any important figures dying in the vicinity of District 50. She guessed that the man probably had no idea what had happened after he woke up, so she was completely relieved.
Zuo Shan breathed a sigh of relief after reading this memory.
Having been frightened during the day and having traveled such a long distance, and then busy processing the yams after returning, Zuo Shan fell asleep on the straw mat before it even got dark.
She slept very soundly that night, and in her dream she was back on the training field. As she ran, the scene suddenly shifted, and she found herself in a tall, dense thicket, embracing and kissing a handsome man.
The man's eyes were closed, and his long eyeliner revealed that he had large eyes. His lips were somewhat pale, but this did not diminish his stunningly beautiful face.
After a brief kiss, something awkward and indescribable happened. From beginning to end, the man's eyes never opened, but his body responded to her passion just as intensely.
His short silver hair trembled with the vibration of his body, and Zuo Shan's gaze was fixed on his short silver hair, giving a sense of eternity in that fleeting moment.
At the height of her passion, she suddenly woke up, recalling the dream she had just had. She guessed that this must be the scene that had happened between Yuansheng and that unknown man.
When I first received this memory of the original owner, it was actually a bit blurry, but in the dream, the scene was as clear as a movie, and even the physical sensations were so real.
The shared tension and intense pleasure she felt made her blush just thinking about it.
At this moment, the man's naturally curly silver hair at the ends seemed to still be floating in front of her eyes, and Zuo Shan shook her head vigorously.
Well, let's just consider this scene as a little something to add to our arduous scavenging life.
"Gurgle!" The sudden sound from her stomach immediately focused her senses on hunger. Eating her fill and surviving was the most important thing for a wastelander.
In the original owner's memories, most of the time she only ate one meal a day. Occasionally, if she had a better harvest, she would have an extra meal or two. She never had the experience of getting up in the middle of the night to have an extra meal.
After all, every child who grows up in District 50 is used to going hungry from a young age.
For dinner yesterday, she ate more than a pound of starchy yams. Eating this kind of food once a day would be a luxury. Zuo Shan decided to endure it and wait until dawn to go out into the wild to scavenge for edible wild vegetables for today's breakfast.
But once the hunger pangs, it's impossible to suppress it, so she has no choice but to get up, drink a large glass of water, and temporarily appease her stomach.
To stop herself from wanting to eat, she decided not to sleep anymore, got up, and started rummaging through the dark to find the yam strips she was preparing to dry.
The aroma of food wafted over, making her even hungrier. She finally made it to 10 a.m., and calculating that there were still six hours until dawn, she picked up her burlap sack and the essential tools for scavenging and headed out.
The Green Algae Star rotates once every 36 hours, so a day and night here is also 36 hours long, and very few people go out at 10 a.m.
The scavenging area in District 50 is all within the energy shield built above the safe zone. Outside the energy shield is a high-radiation area, which can kill people in just half a day.
Inside the protective shield, the period of excessive solar radiation is only four hours around noon, between 10 pm and 4 pm in summer and between 11 pm and 5 pm in winter.
During this period, scavengers will seek out shady places to avoid strong radiation, otherwise their skin will be burned quickly, and the probability of developing skin cancer will be extremely high.
The upper levels of the safe zone also dispatch mercenary groups to periodically clear out mutated beasts that enter the energy shield. Over time, most mutated beasts that have gained sentience no longer dare to come.
However, this seemingly safe scavenging area is occasionally smuggled in by low-level mutated beasts, such as the giant squirrel from yesterday.
After all, mercenary groups can't monitor people 36 hours a day, so scavengers can only accept their bad luck in such situations.
However, mutated beasts that are not particularly powerful usually only attack a small number of people, and will avoid groups of people.
Because mercenary groups hunt mutated beasts in teams of at least seven or eight, over time the mutated beasts in the wild have become less likely to provoke groups of people.
The scavengers in District 50 therefore preferred to go out in groups, then split up in the wilderness, each relying on luck to examine the shrubs and grasses.
Fortunately, after the plants mutated, they became larger and grew at an astonishing rate. Even though only a few were edible, most wasteland residents could barely survive.
Thinking of this, Zuo Shan couldn't help but sigh: "Indeed, when God closes a door, he always opens a window."
There's always a glimmer of hope left for people.
At 10 a.m., the sky was filled with twinkling stars, like cleansed diamonds set against a deep blue backdrop. Such a beautiful sight made Zuo Shan unable to resist taking a picture with his wristwatch.
Wasteland technology is quite advanced. Every resident is issued a wristwatch at birth. It serves as an identity marker, a communication tool, and a miniature optical computer.
Overall, it has many more features than the phones she used before, such as the ability to choose holographic projection when making calls.
Furthermore, the watch features a dual charging mode, with both solar energy and its own bioelectricity providing the power for normal operation.
However, in order to reduce their own energy consumption, the residents of District 50 have turned off the bioelectric charging function of their watches and rely solely on solar energy. After all, if they can't even feed themselves, who would want to waste their own energy to keep their watches running?
After enjoying the beautiful scenery, Zuo Shan started jogging, which is one of the daily training exercises she must do as a long-distance runner.
Now that she's in this world, professional training is even more necessary. After all, before, running fast was for winning trophies, but now it's to help her escape from the jaws of beasts.
The mutated giant squirrel I encountered when I first transmigrated here yesterday still gives me chills. I guess encountering mutated beasts again will be a regular occurrence in the future, so training my speed and endurance is urgently needed.
Wasteland kids learn from a young age to run for their lives when they encounter danger, but they haven't received professional guidance and training. They have good explosiveness, but their endurance is far inferior.
Zuo Shan jogged along the path his original self used to take to scavenge in the wild, while planning his scavenging route for the day.
In places that people frequent, there are very few edible grass leaves to harvest. Sometimes you might not find a single edible grass leaf all day, which is normal.
The original owner's gains yesterday were purely due to sheer luck; they are something that can only be encountered by chance and cannot be sought after.
However, Zuo Shan still wanted to try his luck in the area where the original body had gone yesterday, because wild yam plants usually have very developed roots and stems. Since he was able to dig up a section, there must be more.
Why didn't the original owner continue digging? The reason is actually quite simple: she didn't recognize this kind of thing at all.
The native inhabitants of the planet Green Algae are skilled at cultivating wheat and rice, but they know very little about wild edible plants.
The original owner found this piece of wild yam purely by chance. At the time, she was using a cutting knife to examine a wild leek leaf growing close to the ground when she lost her grip on the knife and accidentally stuck it headfirst into the soil.
Then he cut open the root of the wild yam and heard the voice broadcast that the root was non-toxic and moderately radioactive. Although he had never seen such a thing before, he still dug it out without hesitation.
It turned out that the old woman following behind her didn't recognize it either. She had only overheard the voice broadcast and then, seeing that she had dug out such a large piece, she had the wicked idea.
Zuo Shan's heart pounded as she belatedly realized that since the scavengers of Green Algae Star had such little knowledge about wild edible plants, did that mean she would be able to harvest more food in the future?
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