Chapter 537 - 371: The Farming Bloodline Awakens

After hearing Lin Chen's confession, Erica, for once, actually let out a sigh of relief.

"I was worried you had some kind of psychological or physical problem. Now I see I was just overthinking it. Having these kinds of thoughts and urges just proves you're a normal man."

"Anyway, enough nonsense. The question now is... how do we handle this situation?"

She never thought she'd act so crazy when she was drunk, pushing a beautiful woman into Lin Chen's arms to test his self-control. And while he was drunk too! Wasn't that a recipe for disaster?

Drinking really messes things up!

If she had to find a silver lining, it seemed that both times they got drunk, their relationship had made substantial progress.

She even started to wonder now if, after this incident was resolved, the next time they got drunk, they'd end up rolling straight into bed.

Hiss... 'Maybe drinking a bit more isn't such a bad idea?'

"I don't know what to do either."

As the most outwardly 'innocent' person in the room, Jin Meiyan took the initiative, linking her arm with Erica's and sighing softly.

"I admit I have feelings for Oppa. An outstanding man like him exudes a fatal attraction. But I never thought things would turn out like this. If I hadn't drunk so much last night and hadn't gotten carried away, things wouldn't have gotten so complicated."

"I'm sorry, Oppa. Maybe I should just leave..."

"No!"

Erica threw her arms around her. "I was the one who pushed you, and he was the one who kissed you. You did nothing wrong. We're the ones at fault. I'm the one who should be sorry."

"You also know marriage isn't in my life plan right now. I just want to see how things go with him. If you don't mind, let's just leave things as they are for now. Who knows, as time goes on, one of us might lose interest. It's not impossible."

"Huh? You mean the two of us... date him at the same time? That doesn't seem right..."

"It's fine. You've seen how busy we've been. As the restaurant gets built, we'll only get busier. We probably won't even have time to think about this stuff. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

"Yeah, yeah! I'll have to manage the restaurant and the survival experiences, plus coordinate the entire area. I'll definitely be swamped."

Lin Chen seized the opportunity to build on Erica's point. "Erica is skilled with wilderness stuff, so she can coordinate with Andre on that. I'll focus mainly on the restaurant. If it's okay, Meiyan, I'd like to ask you to handle our promotions. You're a professional blogger; you know what audiences like to see."

"That's a great idea! Meiyan, what do you think?"

Watching the two of them work in perfect tandem, Jin Meiyan felt a little moved.

She was the one who had intruded, yet now they were the ones actively trying to convince her to stay. It was a strange and uncomfortable feeling.

Once she and Erica got to know each other better, she had to tell her the truth. She couldn't let Oppa take the blame for nothing; she had to shoulder this responsibility herself.

Keeping it bottled up was agonizing. She considered herself a person with at least some conscience.

"I don't know," she said, feigning difficulty as she nodded and then shook her head. "My thoughts are a mess right now. I don't know what to do. So... I guess I'll try going along with your idea for now."

"That's great! Ness!"

Erica hugged her tightly, feeling the extreme softness of the Asian woman's body, and suddenly reached out to give her butt a squeeze.

"Wow, Meiyan, you're so soft! It's like you don't have any bones. And you smell so good. Just hugging you gets my heart racing. No wonder that guy couldn't resist last night. If it were me, I couldn't resist either."

She then felt her own butt. While not as plump as most Western women's, it was clearly a size larger than Jin Meiyan's. And thanks to her regular exercise, it felt firm to the touch.

She licked her lips, not quite satisfied. She wanted to enjoy the moment a bit longer but was afraid of scaring Meiyan away, so she turned and shot Lin Chen a glare.

"Everything's sorted, so what are you still standing there gawking for? This is our room. Go on, get out!"

Before he could react, he was pushed out of the room again.

BANG

The door was slammed in his face again.

He rubbed his nose. "Fine, I'm going."

'As long as the two of them can get along for now, that's all that matters.'

'As for the future, I'll just take it one step at a time.'

He had just returned to his room next door and was about to lean against the headboard and browse his phone when he faintly heard the girls' cheerful laughter and playful noises through the wall. Now and then, there were some surprised yelps mixed in. Listening to it made his blood boil; he wished he could charge over and join them right away.

'No, no, calm down. You've been taking things a bit too far lately.'

'The girls only agreed to try dating you, not to let you have a girl on each arm. It's nothing to be proud of.'

'Right, work. I should just focus on work!'

A man truly shines when he's dedicated to his career. Besides, wasn't that the version of him they were both attracted to in the first place?

He took a few deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down. Then, he picked up his phone and called Andre and Wang Jun to get an update on the latest developments.

After that, he checked in with the ship captain and learned that a pod of gray whales might appear within the next week, but they could also change course and disappear, so he shouldn't get his hopes up.

It was only mid-April, and the weather wasn't warm enough yet. As summer approached, the whales would become more active, so it was normal for them to be hard to find now.

And so, his last day off came to an end.

When the sun rose the next day, he was already up early, driving to the restaurant site with a fresh stock of various spices.

He hadn't been there for a few days, and the foundation was noticeably higher than before. In a few more days, it would likely be level with the ground, and then construction of the upper structure could begin.

Once it reached that stage, things would move quickly, essentially signaling that the entire project was entering its final phase.

Andre had already found some suitable plants based on the 3D virtual model of the restaurant and marked their locations on a map. As soon as the first floor was built, they could be transplanted immediately.

With the addition of Jin Meiyan, an expert in flower arrangement, she produced an upgraded design for the first floor in just two days. It filled every usable space with all sorts of flowers and plants without creating a sense of being crowded.

Just looking at the design made you feel like you were in an Elf Garden, as if the very air was filled with the fragrance of flowers.

The restaurant's interior would primarily feature a modern-meets-forest-style decor, while the outdoor area would be completely transformed into a forest garden, with all partitions made from living plants.

Creating such a garden wouldn't be a huge undertaking. It only required laying down a mesh grid. The rest was all transplanting work related to the plants, which could be done at the same time as the second-floor construction and interior decorating.

Building on this, Lin Chen proposed a new concept.

Seasonal mixed planting.

Purely natural varieties of flowers and plants are seasonal; some only bloom for one month a year. The restaurant couldn't just be open for one month, could it?

Therefore, to create the impression of having flowers all year round, they had to consider the seasonality of the plants to ensure different flowers would be blooming in every season.

How to further improve the distribution and combination of the plants while ensuring this was a matter for everyone to discuss, as all four of them were experts with some knowledge of botany.

However, Jin Meiyan's expertise was different from the other three. She was mainly responsible for the arrangement and visual effects, while Lin Chen, Erica, and Andre were in charge of selecting suitable plants.

During that week, they also launched their third lucky fan experience event.

The result of this live-stream's random drawing was much more in line with his expectations: they selected a very ordinary young man in his early twenties.

He was quite surprised to be chosen and arrived full of excitement and loaded with outdoor gear.

His goal was clear: he wanted to complete a hunt with his own hands.

He didn't have a gun license, and you couldn't get one in this town anyway, so his main weapon was a hunting bow.

Under the guidance of Andre, a professional Hunter, he personally shot a grouse, two wild hares, and a pigeon within three days. He also used baited traps to catch several lemmings and European rabbits and made a spear from a branch to catch a few sea fish.

Compared to this guy's thrilling and rewarding journey, the first two groups Lin Chen had led seemed rather mundane, more like they were just on a picnic.

This was also exactly what he had hoped for. Making Andre the guide was indeed the right choice.

Freed from this work, he now had more time to deal with the construction project.

Besides the restaurant, which was nearing its final stages, and the road construction, which was over ninety percent complete, he was also preparing to start a new project.

A farm!

This would include growing fruits and vegetables and raising some basic poultry.

Not only would they have to fence off a suitable area and start plowing the fields, but they also had to design a symbiotic cycle between the animal and plant zones.

A proper farm-to-table system must be a closed loop. For example, animal manure would be fermented into fertilizer for the fields, and leftover fruit and vegetable scraps would be made into feed for the animals. They would also need to dig a few fish ponds to raise crabs, prawns, and some fish suitable for angling.

These areas would all be developed around the restaurant, which meant they would have to clear more trees. This was something he needed to discuss with Jin Meiyan and Erica.

Once the road construction crew finished their work, they would immediately start on building the farm.

Compared to building roads, these uncles, who came from farming backgrounds, were actually more experienced in this area and gave Lin Chen a lot of practical advice.

Their efficiency at plowing the fields was even higher than their road-building. Every morning, they would head into the forest, hoes on their shoulders, as cheerful as if they were returning to their own homes. They dug with incredible enthusiasm.

As they dug, they would discuss which vegetables and fruits to plant based on the local weather, temperature, and humidity, what fertilizers to use, and whether or not to build greenhouses. Anyone who didn't know better would have thought this crew were local farmers who lived and worked here.