"You, not even a formal employee, what right do you have to talk to ?"
"Hey, Xiao Xiao isn’t a formal employee anymore either, so now I have the right to talk about her."
...
The argunt eventually ended in a narrow victory for Wang Danai. Wiping his dry lips, he said, "Let’s go, have breakfast. Many people are dying to get in just to eat at our cafeteria."
Thinking she would ask about recent events, Jing Shu followed Wang Danai into the cafeteria.
There were fewer people eating now, and the two of them managed to get a bowl of mushy noodles and a small plate of Mushrooms mixed with greens and seasoned with salt without having to queue.
In her previous life, Jing Shu would have dread of such bland food, but in this life, she just couldn’t bring herself to eat it. She was truly spoiled.
Finding a spot to sit down, Jing Shu pushed her food towards Wang Danai. "You eat. I already had breakfast before I ca."
"Then eat another portion! I could eat five portions of food this good. Are you stupid?" Wang Danai said in disbelief.
"COUGH, COUGH. I have a small appetite; I can’t eat anymore," Jing Shu lied with her eyes wide open.
"Alright then. Hey, I like people like you. Thanks!" Wang Danai gobbled down the al.
"What’s happened these past few days? Are the ones allocated for to cultivate doing well?" Jing Shu asked.
"Hey, speaking of this, I also find it really strange. The gastrodia you treated used to grow all crooked and twisted, but ever since you cured them, I’ve been checking on them daily, and they’ve been growing better and better. Also, those Honeysuckles allotted to you—President Zhou said they were in your care—ever since he said that, the Honeysuckles have been growing as if they have their own spirit. They’ve been flourishing more each day; those that didn’t flower before are now blooming, and those that grew deford are now growing properly. Even though they aren’t as good as before the apocalypse, at least they’re almost at the standard for dical use."
Wang Danai rattled on like beans pouring from a bamboo tube, "And those astragalus you planted are also sprouting! The germination rate is much higher than others’, and there have been no strange symptoms like those found in other people’s plants. It’s almost as if, even without care, your plants are able to thrive. But President Zhou said it’s because your Seeds are good; he said you must have soaked them in so special way."
Jing Shu nodded in surprise. It seed the effect of the Spiritual Spring was even greater than she had thought. Last ti, to avoid attracting too much attention, she had used a highly diluted Spiritual Spring. She hadn’t expected that even so, it would still be much better than other dicinal materials and that they would be fine for so long without any care.
"That’s good. What about these people, though? There are a lot of new faces today, and the familiar ones from last ti seem to be missing," Jing Shu asked.
When it ca to this, Wang Danai’s face showed an expression of shared sorrow. "So were laid off, so demoted. After all, the dicinal Materials Association only has so much space; we don’t need so many people wasting food. The lower tier comprises those pharmaceutical factories that stopped operations. The pharmaceutical residue after dicine preparation can be made into inferior tablets. The efficacy is certainly average, but it’s better than nothing. The higher-ups are planning to resu operations of the pharmaceutical factories, which is really tough work—the working conditions are much worse than ours."
Jing Shu let out a long "Oh." That explained why she had heard that the dicinal Materials Association held high status, yet initially only had seven official employees—they were still in the process of rging.
Wang Danai added, "These people have been here for over a week now. The higher-ups said we have to consolidate the planting of dicinal materials from our entire Provincial City and then distribute the well-prepared dicinal materials to the prefectural and municipal levels. By centralizing the supply, we can increase efficiency and effectiveness. That’s why they called together experienced cultivators from the whole Provincial City. This is just one group that has arrived; there’s another on its way."
Wang Danai looked around and whispered, "I’ve heard that among this group, there are indeed people from families specializing in dicinal materials. Today, Chairman Tie put you on such a high pedestal; those people from the dicinal families will probably co to give you trouble soon after hearing that."
Wu City only had a population of four million, but the entire Provincial City had thirty million. Even if around 15% had died, that still left twenty million. Calculated at a ratio of one in ten thousand, the dicinal Materials Association would probably have over a thousand mbers by then. That would be quite lively.
As for the trouble Wang Danai ntioned, Jing Shu felt it wasn’t a big deal. She just wouldn’t answer any questions; after all, she genuinely didn’t understand the professional aspects.
Wang Danai quickly relayed all sorts of gossip and matters related to the dicinal Materials Association. After finishing their al, the two then started to get busy.
Others were genuinely busy.
Jing Shu’s busyness... well, it was just checking on the gastrodia, Honeysuckle, and astragalus she was growing.
According to Wang Danai, their growth was promising. In Jing Shu’s opinion, it was just diocre, not even on par with the weeds in her villa’s garden.
But even so, they were growing much better than many of the dicinal materials here.
Who could bla them? Many dicinal materials were as difficult to cultivate as flowers.
Jing Shu thought, if she had these three types of dicinal materials ready for use, plus leeches—which also counted—she could take the opportunity to secure this niche before anyone else started raising leeches. Then, if she cultivated two more types of dicinal materials and solved a few more problems, the position of vice president would surely be hers.
But the dicinal Materials Association wasn’t idle; they were already cultivating dicinal materials for the most prevalent illnesses. Although the quantities were small, they were enough to handle ergencies.
That ant the varieties she could choose to cultivate were very limited. To plant more, she would have to opt for sothing scarce.
Seeing aloe also included among dicinal materials, Jing Shu’s eyes lit up. She really shouldn’t be so rigid; it didn’t matter whether it was technically a dicinal herb or not, as long as it had dicinal effects.
"I can plant the Bodhi Tree! Besides, Bodhi is the nesis of parasites! Most importantly, these Bodhi Seeds were given to by Mu Xiaoxuan, which is a clear advantage. I have nothing to fear from checks." A lightbulb went off in Jing Shu’s head. Initially, she had always thought about cultivating the Bodhi first but wasn’t sure how to present it.
But now she had this opportunity. As a mber of the dicinal Materials Association, with the ability and experience to cultivate a variety of dicinal materials, and since her classmate Mu Xiaoxuan had given her these Seeds, she could just say she planted them and they grew.
If one day parasites were to wreak havoc, bringing out the Bodhi would not only save more people but also significantly improve her own standing. Parasites were a real horror for people in the apocalypse, and she hoped no one in this life would die because of them.
Acting on her thought, Jing Shu took the Bodhi Seeds from her space, planted them directly on the rack, and entered the planting information into the database for verification.
The Bodhi grew very quickly; it needed to be repotted once a month and could be used as dicine in four months. So, there was definitely enough ti to cultivate the Bodhi.
She had originally intended to propagate it by cuttings, which would be faster, but for the sake of ’fair play,’ she opted to grow it from Seeds instead.
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