There were no more piercing cold winds blowing through in the passageway after the outermost stone door had been closed, which blocked the flow of cold wind from outside.
Su Mo kept walking and, after closing the second door, he could clearly feel the temperature rise in the shelter.
It was not until he walked to the main door and opened it that a wave of warmth greeted him.
Compared to the minus seven or eight degrees outside at this time, the four or five degrees in the shelter was practically a kind of enjoyment.
Glancing at the pets who were still asleep, Su Mo walked toward the bottom of the ventilation duct in the crop culture room and peered upwards for a while.
A whirring cold wind was blowing down from the ventilation duct. The temperature in the crop culture room was obviously lower than the other rooms, even lower than that of the living room.
Although the temperature had dropped significantly, the plants in the culture medium showed no signs of frostbite.
“This vegetable culture medium is simply a sacred treasure. Even sunlight can be steadily absorbed and the internal humidity and temperature is fixed even in this weather, ensuring each seedling the best growing environment…”
Su Mo tutted in amazement as he touched the tomato seedlings that had now grown more than a dozen large leaves as well as the bok choy seedlings that covered the large area.
Based on this growth rate, and with the nourishment from Big Spark and Little Spark, the bok choy in the culture medium no longer needed to be cultivated. Adequate sunlight and nutrition were sufficient for their growth.
“In ten or so days, I should be able to harvest some bok choy and taste them. The garlic on the other hand will probably take more than 20 days.”
After fiddling with the garlic sprouts that had been squished aside by the bok choy, and tearing off some bok choy leaves that were particularly “obstructive” and “unpleasant to look at”, Su Mo took them out of the crop culture room cheerfully.
Currently, the bok choy in the middle had not grown and the outer leaves had not matured either. They would give off a different flavor after chopping them up and stir-frying them in oil for a while.
The north wind mingled with snow and whirred endlessly outside. but Su Mo still felt very free even though he could not head out, so he went to the supplies storage to look for rice to steam.
“Well, at the moment, there’s no room for the treasure chests if I opened them so I’ll just leave them aside first. I’ll open them all at once when the trading system opens, or when I have more room to store them!”
Su Mo admired the wall of treasure chests while sitting comfortably on the stone bench.
There was basically no shortage of urgently needed supplies in the base at the moment, so there was no need to open the chests to take out the contents right away. It would be a real waste if he opened something fresh and had no place to store it.
The opening of the trading system was only a few days away. He would open them in large quantities when the trading system was made possible.
Furthermore, this naturally luminous wall could also be used as lighting at night.
While the rice was steaming in the pot, Su Mo picked up a cup of water to rinse his mouth and wipe his face. After scooping out some more water and pouring it onto the culture, the rice was done steaming.
Su Mo moved the pot of steamed rice aside. He then heated the pan with a little oil and stir-fried the chopped bok choy leaves. After adding a little seasoning, a plate of delicious green, stir-fried, vegetables was freshly served.
Even in this weather, the aroma of food, coupled with the heat and warmth from the steaming pot, had Su Mo feeling so great that he could simply take off in flight.
Su Mo woke up the three pets. He stirred the rice into the stir-fried vegetables and tossed it a few times. After separating the portions for the three pets, Su Mo poured the rest into his own bowl.
Su Mo ate the simple breakfast with extreme satisfaction.
It was his first meal with fresh vegetables after coming to this wasteland. The taste had a 200% boost in flavor for being natural. It was so delicious that it made one drool.
Su Mo washed the dishes after the meal, not wanting to stay even a single second longer in the living room in this weather. He then moved a few of the luminous wooden boxes directly into the bedroom and plugged in the heating pad.
Big Spark and Little Spark fluttered over in search of the heat. They laid quietly on the two corners of the small bed, feeling the warmth of the heating pad underneath. As they got comfortable, their eyes narrowed into tiny slits.
Seeing that no one was going to play with her, Oreo also ran over and jumped up and down the bed, making a mess.
“Relax, we’re going out later today. It’s too cold now, and you’ll freeze your head off if you go out!”
Oreo shook her head in disdain upon hearing the word cold. She walked valiantly and spiritedly toward the crop culture room and then back arrogantly, indicating that she was not afraid of the cold at all.
Su Mo was delighted upon seeing her tsundere-ish appearance.
He got up and forcibly held Oreo in his arms. Su Mo then lifted the blanket and laid under the covers.
“Hush, how comfortable. There’s no hot water to soak my feet in this weather, so it’s really comfortable to have a blanket to warm my feet!”
A husky’s ability to withstand the cold made Oreo become more active in this weather. Humans, on the other hand, had stiff hands and feet in this kind of weather, which made it inconvenient to move around, so outdoor activities required a lot of calories.
Lying in bed, Su Mo decided to look at the chat channel before the system’s eight o’clock harvest.
He focused mentally and a blue display screen appeared at the center of his field of vision.
After clicking on the World Channel, a ripple flashed by and streams of messages began to scroll quickly across the screen.
As Su Mo’s gaze focused, the scrolling began to slow down and gradually reached an acceptable speed for human eyes before finally coming to a halt.
“Good God, it’s freezing! Is there any good brother at the basin? I’ve become a legend by choosing the high mountains. I’m so cold!”
“I’m at the basin. The falling snow has turned into rain. Heh, I have collected half a bucket of water from morning till now. I tried boiling it and it’s drinkable!”
“The water problem has now been solved, but do you guys have enough wood at your place? I wore a sweater when I came and it was so cold!”
“I’ll plan as I go. If I can’t bear the cold, I’ll collect more plant fibers and pile myself in the middle and not go out.”
“This damn weather is going to last for more than ten days. Besides, the snow won’t be gone immediately after the disaster. If you don’t get more supplies now, don’t tell me that you’ll only head out after the snow?”
“Yeah, that makes sense. Too bad it’s a waste of food to go out and work now. We’ve almost killed all the mutant creatures around us.”
“Eh? I heard that thousands of people from three shelters joined forces to fight over two hundred Centaurs a few days ago, and they won the battle. Who knows how many supplies you can get from over two hundred Centaurs! How envious!”
“What’s there to be envious of? Do you know how many people died? More than 500 people! It was five of us against one Centaur, and we almost didn’t win. This group of beasts are really amazing…”
The chat channel seemed to remember personal preferences as more and more messages were browsed through.
A prompt would deliberately pop up when players exhibited certain browsing tendencies, asking if they would like to block similar messages from popping out.
For example, there were still some people crying about their poverty on the World Channel. Some of them were even living as beggars, begging others to give them some food or supplies.
Who knew what kind of thoughts these people had.
They clearly had hands and feet, but did not go out to look for a way to survive. Instead, they crouched within their shelters doing some useless work and tried to trick random and kind-hearted players to hand out alms.
Su Mo made an expression of slight disgust when he was looking through those messages. Suddenly, a prompt popped out. After tapping yes mentally, the begging messages instantly disappeared, all of them blocked from the game panel.
As for the advertising messages that remained, Su Mo looked at them one by one with great interest.
“Death Fire Sea Shelter is recruiting senior 2D players. We’re looking for male players that have a high body fat percentage of at least 22%, who can endure hardship and are unafraid of exhaustion. Once recruited, we guarantee a daily supply of at least 300g of food and 200ml of clean water. Preferential treatment. Anyone who is near XX location and wants to join, please contact me quickly!”
“Faisal Society is recruiting combat-conscious players. No requirements for height and physique, as long as your combat abilities are passable. After joining the shelter, we will guarantee half a catty of food per day, which contains at least 100g of meat. We’re located at XX. Those within 200 miles please take a look.”
“Tac Sanctuary is recruiting players with life skills. As long as you have the skills to produce a large amount of basic items, you can come join us. We have enough players with combat abilities to ensure your safety and also plenty of food for you to get through this cold winter. As long as you’re willing to work for long hours. we await your arrival at XX location!”
“Flying Tiger Shelter is currently located at XX. We have spotted an army of about 150 Taurens nearby. Are there any large-sized shelters in this location that can cooperate with us to attack them? When the time comes, the spoils will be distributed according to contributions. If we take them down, we’ll have enough supplies for the winter!”
….
The advertisements posted by each shelter were very interesting. Su Mo looked at them for a while and suddenly realized that Faisal Society was one of the three shelters that had earlier been talked about by the solo players in the World Channel.
The other two shelters that worked with them suffered heavy losses after the battle with the Centaurs. One of the shelters even had less than 40 people left.
….
The three shelters were then merged into one. The treasure chests emerged and meat harvested from more than two hundred Centaurs would be more than enough for them to survive this cold winter.
“More and more magical races are targeting humans but, at the same time, some powerful shelters can turn the tides and devour the small races that have not yet fully developed in power. Sure enough, the only way to survive in the wasteland is to continue killing.”
After scrolling through several times, Su Mo suddenly had a clear understanding of the current situation of humans.
Given that the western shelters only recruited elites, they could rely on their combat strength to attack when they encountered these magical races in the early stages. They eradicated these races before they could develop.
The eastern shelters, on the contrary, were overly cautious when facing these magical races due to their subpar strength and leadership, which was further hampered by their ineffective subordinates. They were far behind the West and the current situation was precarious.
