Chapter 159 - 126: Peach with a Mutant Value of 27

Chapter 159: Chapter 126: Peach with a Mutant Value of 27

Hearing Huai Yu’s words, Chen Xing’s expression became rather complicated.

"With a Mutant Value of 27, you really don’t have to... Are you just craving fruit?" She sighed as she spoke. "Well, I can’t blame you. Even I’ve forgotten what real fruit tastes like."

She shot a glance at the basket of accursed peaches. "If you like them, just take the whole lot. No need to share. With a Mutant Value this high, even the wealthy families in the Imperial Capital wouldn’t bother feeding them to their pets."

Huai Yu’s face instantly lit up with joy. "Thank you, Sister Xingxing!"

The peaches’ Mutant Value was certainly a bit alarming, but as long as they were purified, they would definitely taste good. They would be the perfect supplement to help Zhou Qian recover his health.

Uncle Zaozi, who had been holding it in for a long time, finally burst into a fit of cackling laughter. "Oh, Little Yu, Little Yu. You were just criticizing me, but now aren’t you the one who wants these peaches with a Mutant Value of 27?"

Huai Yu flashed an innocent smile. "But it has a Mutant Value of 27, and its mutation direction is ’Unpalatable.’ I really want to know just how bad it tastes!

"Uncle Zaozi, don’t you want to know?

"What a fascinating mutation direction!"

At these words, even Fen Da—who was wearing a bright orange jacket and had tagged along into the warehouse after calibrating the machines out front—couldn’t help but turn his head to look at Huai Yu.

Uncle Zaozi’s colorful, bruised face scrunched up. Staring at the basket of peaches, even he couldn’t help but feel a little conflicted. "I mean, you guys went through all that trouble to pick these peaches and bring them back. Didn’t anyone even try one to see exactly how terrible they taste?"

Chen Xing was speechless.

She gave Uncle Zaozi a complicated look. As Fen Da brushed past her, he couldn’t help but mutter under his breath, "Sister Xing, did you beat the brain cells out of him?"

Huai Yu, however, asked curiously, "Do you think a plant’s definition of ’unpalatable’ is the same as a human’s?"

Uncle Zaozi fell deep into thought.

A moment later, Fen Da stood at the doorway and waved her over. "Come on, it’s calibrated. Put whatever you want to test in here."

Huai Yu rummaged around in her woven basket and pulled out a handful of round balls—pink, white, yellow, green, cyan, and purple. She took out one of each color, leaving Fen Da completely stunned.

"What is this?"

Huai Yu pondered for a moment, unsure of what name to give them. But Uncle Zaozi was already getting excited. "It’s tea balls! Top-quality tea balls! The Mutant Value is incredibly low, and the brewed tea is fragrant and cuts right through grease..."

He looked at Huai Yu. "You promised, you know. Once the testing is done, you have to save some for me."

Thanks to his loud interruption, Fen Da lost his curiosity as he pinched one of the balls and inspected it from all angles. He was young, after all, and spent most of his days adventuring in the Wilderness; he had absolutely zero interest in tea.

He carelessly tossed the items into the testing chamber. "Come back in half an hour."

Huai Yu nodded and turned back to look at Chen Xing.

The older woman patted her shoulder. "Let’s head back to the warehouse. You’ve only looked at the peaches so far. You’re not done choosing.

"Take your time and look around. I like you, so whatever catches your eye, I’ll give you a massive discount."

To Huai Yu, rather than picking out goods, it felt more like stepping into a scrap yard.

Everything in the warehouse was piled together in a jumbled mess. It seemed that after selling off the truly valuable items to wealthy clients, the team simply didn’t care about these random bits and bobs they had picked up along the way. Or more accurately, even if they did care, they were currently on vacation and likely couldn’t be bothered to organize any of it.

Now, the items were simply sorted into two rough categories—"Edible" and "Inedible"—and haphazardly heaped throughout the large, square room.

For Huai Yu, it was like tumbling into a dragon’s treasure hoard.

"There’s so much stuff!" she said, her delight completely genuine.

Chen Xing rubbed her nose awkwardly. "To be honest, this is all stuff we collected in the past... When we first formed our expedition team, we didn’t have much experience. We thought everything we saw was rare and ended up hoarding all this junk like a bunch of scavengers."

Now that their team was more mature, they had developed their own system for calculating which items offered the best return on investment for their trips. Aside from unexpected anomalies like those peaches, they rarely brought back worthless items anymore.

Looking at the piles of clutter now, Chen Xing felt a headache coming on—and she wasn’t the only one; the rest of the team felt the exact same way. In fact, they had been meaning to do an inventory check for over half a year, yet no one had managed to fill out even a single page.

Seeing how genuinely happy Huai Yu was, and looking at her pale, frail little figure, a surge of tender affection welled up in Chen Xing’s heart.

"So go ahead and pick whatever you want. Don’t worry about the points.

"After all, selling these things one by one is too much of a hassle, and we don’t have the patience to set up a stall. If you hadn’t come along, we were planning to box it all up and sell it to a junk dealer."

Just as she was speaking, a man’s voice rang out from the doorway. "Junk dealer? I’ve already contacted him. I told him to come over this afternoon."

Accompanying the voice, a middle-aged man walked in from outside. He looked to be in his early thirties, with dark skin and a tall, thin frame, though his facial features were rather plain.

Chen Xing smiled. "This is Chen He. You can just call him Brother Chen."

She then turned her smile to Chen He. "This is a young girl I just met. We hit it off really well. It just so happens that her home is missing a few things, so I let her come over to pick some out."

Chen He sized Huai Yu up, then glanced at Uncle Zaozi, who was keeping quiet off to the side, before cracking a smile. "So you’re Ah Xing’s friend? Go ahead and pick first, then. We’ll give you a discount when it’s time to pay."

As he spoke, he looked around the warehouse. "I just don’t know if the junk dealer will still be willing to offer a good price this afternoon once some of the better goods are gone."

His words were rather blunt. Huai Yu stared at Chen Xing with wide, innocent eyes, while Chen Xing’s expression darkened slightly. She cleared her throat.

"Ahem.

"Little Yu brought some tea balls to sell, and Fen Da is currently adjusting the testing machine. Why don’t you go take a look?"

Hearing this, Chen He let out an exasperated sigh. "Ah Xing, you always just do whatever you feel like.

"We spent so many points to get that testing machine back, and it costs a lot just to turn it on once. Why do you let people toss any random garbage into it..."

Still grumbling, he turned around and walked out.

The room instantly fell silent.

Huai Yu stood there, unsure whether she should stay or leave.

After a long moment, Chen Xing took a deep breath and smiled at her. "Ignore that cheapskate, Little Yu. Just pick whatever you like. We were always going to sell this stuff to the junk dealer for a flat rate anyway, so it’s not like we’re losing out."

Huai Yu hummed in agreement and squatted down, her feelings a tangled mess as she half-heartedly dug through the pile. When she turned her head, she noticed Chen Xing absentmindedly kicking a plastic storage box with her foot.

Huai Yu thought for a moment before offering thoughtfully, "Sister Xingxing, if you have things to do, go ahead and take care of them first. I can just take my time picking things out here, is that alright?"

Chen Xing instantly breathed a sigh of relief. "Then I’ll go wait up front for the test results. I’ll come let you know as soon as there’s news. Take your time, there’s no rush."

As soon as she left, Huai Yu immediately picked up the plastic storage box that had just been kicked around. She found that it was made of sturdy material and didn’t even have a single scratch on it. Delighted, she set it aside.

She then looked at the two small mountains of junk on either side of her. After a moment’s thought, she simply started from the pile right by her feet, sorting through it piece by piece.