Chapter 295 - 173: The Importance of Brown Rice! A 10x Bounty Mission! Rice Cultivation Is a Must

Chapter 295: Chapter 173: The Importance of Brown Rice! A 10x Bounty Mission! Rice Cultivation Is a Must

Chen Chong couldn’t even be sure if his own resources would be enough to get him through so many different ecological environments.

Let alone the other members of his team...

Chen Chong knew that as a leader, if he couldn’t guarantee his subordinates had enough food to survive, morale would inevitably crumble over time.

At that point, his original reason for building the team would be completely destroyed. The school would plunge into a state of chaos even worse than in the initial days of the transmigration.

Forget about preserving the school’s population for the final settlement reward; it would be a question of whether anyone could even survive.

This was precisely why Chen Chong was so desperate to stockpile food and paid such close attention to cultivating crops, raising livestock, and managing the fish in his pond.

He was afraid of facing an extreme situation and wanted to ensure he had enough food stored at home to survive any difficult times that might come.

But now, this bag of Brown Rice gave him hope.

If he could cultivate this Brown Rice into paddy rice, a high-yield staple crop, he would gain another stable, high-quality food source.

Even if it couldn’t completely solve the food problem, it would mitigate the shortage to the greatest extent possible.

Just then, Xu Jun came over, looking both excited and puzzled.

"Who brought in these two bags of seeds? To have rapeseed and even rice that can sprout... that’s just bizarre."

Chen Chong didn’t find it particularly strange.

After all, the people at the school were a motley crew, and they brought in all sorts of things every day.

That included the teachers and security guards.

For example, there was the veterinarian from the Survival Association and the seeds the Fighting Club had bought before.

If it weren’t for this whole transmigration situation, who would have thought there was a student who knew how to castrate pigs?

Although he didn’t know which teacher or guard these two bags of seeds belonged to, he figured they were brought in inadvertently, or perhaps were intended for a teaching experiment.

As for why the owner didn’t plant them...

Chen Chong had no idea.

Maybe they planned to save them to trade for supplies, or maybe they didn’t have a Farmland Card to plant them.

But in the end, it worked out in his favor.

In any case, whatever the reason, these two bags of seeds were a truly wonderful surprise.

In Chen Chong’s eyes, their value even surpassed the total value of all the supplies from this raid.

Xu Jun asked again, "Brother Chong, since this rice can sprout, doesn’t that mean we hit the jackpot raiding the apartment rooms?"

He had clearly also realized just how important plantable rice was.

Before, he’d always looked down on rice, all because Chen Chong had once said that processed white rice had no planting value.

Some people at the school refused to believe it. After looting rice from the cafeteria, they didn’t eat it or sell it at the trading market, but instead tried to plant it themselves.

The result was that after being buried in the soil for a full week, not only did the rice fail to sprout into paddy, but it also rotted completely, losing all its nutritional value.

And now, the value of Brown Rice that could potentially sprout was, needless to say, immense.

To the people at the school, it was an absolute treasure of immense rarity.

Faced with Xu Jun’s excitement, Chen Chong slowly shook his head.

He hadn’t let the excitement go to his head. Instead, he began to analyze the current pros and cons and the specific situation with the Brown Rice.

"We can’t get happy too soon. Whether they’ll sprout, or how many will sprout, is still an unknown. We’ll only know after we plant the seeds."

The rapeseed was a sure thing; as long as it was stored properly, most of it should sprout.

And judging by the condition of this bag of seeds, they had been preserved quite well.

As long as he found a plot of farmland, planted them, and cultivated them carefully, he should be able to see seedlings growing before long...

But this bag of Brown Rice...

It was a crop that was inherently difficult to preserve. Although it looked fine, there was no guarantee its quality hadn’t been affected by factors like moisture or spoilage.

Not to mention, Brown Rice itself has a very low germination rate.

And this bag wasn’t very big, only about two pounds, which further reduced the probability of the seeds sprouting.

However, Chen Chong estimated that even with the worst luck, at least a tenth of the seeds in this bag would sprout.

As long as some seeds could sprout, it wasn’t a big problem.

At worst, the cultivation cycle would just be a bit longer.

Through successive generations of cultivation, he would surely be able to obtain more rice seeds and achieve large-scale planting.

But now...

Chen Chong suddenly realized that whether the seeds would sprout was a secondary issue. The most difficult problem was where to plant this Brown Rice.

Rapeseed, and most of the other crops he had, only needed farmland to grow.

But rice was different. As a crop that was extremely dependent on water, it needed an environment like a paddy field to sprout and grow.

If he planted it in farmland, it would only work if they were a specific drought-resistant variety of rice seed, but this bag was clearly not that.

In other words, to cultivate this Brown Rice, he first had to find an environment like a paddy field to make it sprout.

The problem was, he didn’t have any paddy fields at his base right now. Even the mud pond, which was relatively similar, couldn’t meet the planting requirements for rice.

Despite rice’s high yield, which made it the undisputed king of staple foods, it was actually a crop with extremely demanding and delicate growing requirements.

If you didn’t take perfect care of it, it would just up and die on you.

So, to cultivate this bag of Brown Rice, he had to meet all the conditions as best he could. There was no room for carelessness.

"Zhang Meng, have you heard of anyone getting a Building Card like a ’Water Field’ or ’Paddy Field’?"

Zhang Meng paused, thought for a moment, then slowly shook his head. "I don’t think I’ve heard of anything like that."

Huang Mao asked doubtfully, "Brother Chong, do Building Cards like that even exist?"

Chen Chong replied, "I’m not too sure either. But the types of Building Cards that have appeared so far are all over the place—Farmland, Mud Ponds, Grasslands, Fences, all sorts. I’m guessing there might be Building Cards like ’Water Fields’ or ’Paddy Fields,’ I just haven’t gotten one myself."

"Brother Chong has a point," Zhang Meng said. "I think there should be a Card like that, or something similar. Why don’t I go ask around?"

"Do it."

Chen Chong nodded. "Especially within our team. We’ve taken in several hundred people now. Someone might have a Card like that, or at least have news about one."

"Here’s the plan. Notify the people at the gymnasium and the information exchange station. Post a bounty mission to acquire such a Card at a high price."

"If anyone has this type of Card, I’m willing to trade resources worth ten times its value for it!"

"Even if someone just provides information about it, regardless of whether we ultimately get the Card, I’ll give them five pounds of Blood-tooth Python meat as a reward."

Wang Biao agreed without a second thought. "Got it."

Xu Jun hesitated at the side. "Brother Chong, a trade for ten times its value... isn’t that a bit of an exaggeration?"

Before Chen Chong could speak, Jia Wen began to explain, fanning himself with his feather fan. "My Lord, his lordship’s decision is not an exaggeration."

"You must understand, if we can successfully cultivate and propagate paddy rice, our food problem will be greatly alleviated. It’s far more valuable than cultivating ordinary crops."

"If someone really has such a Card and has held onto it instead of selling it at the trading market, it proves they aren’t short on food for the time being, or that they also intend to save the Card for their own use."

"In that situation, if you only offer to trade for equal value, or even two or three times its value, they will never agree easily."

"But an offer of ten times its value? No matter how much they cherish that Card, they will definitely be tempted by such a staggering offer. Even if they’re from the Survival Association, it would be no exception."

"What’s more, to be safe, his lordship also promised that anyone who provides information will receive the meat of an Extraordinary Creature. Even if the Card’s owner isn’t tempted, if they let slip the slightest bit of information, it will allow us to track the Card’s movements."

"With this two-pronged approach, we are determined to acquire this type of Card. But if there’s still no news..."

"...it can only mean that no such Card exists, or at least, none have appeared yet. In that case, there’s truly nothing to be done."

Xu Jun had a sudden realization. "Oh, so that’s how it is."

’It would be best if we find one. If not, I’ll have to build a paddy field from scratch if I have to.’

Chen Chong was dead set on cultivating rice.

After all, it was the key to their future food reserves.

Even if cultivating it proved to be a long and difficult process, Chen Chong would never give up easily.

"Let’s go. We’ll head to the gymnasium now, post the bounty mission, and then see what’s changed with our team after a day of settling in..."

...