The night had fallen.
Jiang Ye crouched by the window, scanning the dark wilderness.
He had been waiting for over two hours, with a persistent feeling that a major change was about to occur.
After such a long wait, he was losing patience, starting to suspect the messages in the chat channel were false.
Finally, his expression shifted!
He stretched his neck forward, eyes widening, and stared in shock in a certain direction.
About fifty meters ahead, something furry was emerging from the ground!
Not just a little bit, but a vast expanse of it!
Unfortunately, the darkness was too deep to see clearly what it was. However, judging by the shape of the furry things, they resembled grass!
Jiang Ye calmed himself and waited for another ten minutes.
The furry things were more numerous now, extending towards him.
It was like a slowly advancing tide, silent and unseen.
Jiang Ye put on his padded jacket and went out with his gun.
He advanced cautiously.
Thirty meters, twenty meters, ten meters, one meter!
A large patch of pale green grass appeared before his eyes!
Jiang Ye marveled, slowly crouching down to examine the blades of grass closely.
They were clearly newly grown from the ground, still tiny, essentially just sprouts. Yet, these sprouts were growing upwards at a visible rate!
Looking further into the distance, the grass became denser. The largest blades had already reached ten centimeters in height!
Witnessing this phenomenon that defied natural laws, Jiang Ye felt his mind struggling to comprehend.
In his understanding, grass did not grow in winter. When the water in the grass blades froze, it would burst the grass cells, causing the grass to die rapidly.
The wild grasses on Earth had all withered and turned yellow before the arrival of the harsh winter.
However, this planet, barren for decades, with no vegetation during its hot periods, was now, in the freezing cold, sprouting vast patches of wild grass!
In the brief moment of Jiang Ye's astonishment, the grass had advanced another meter, reaching his feet.
The wild grass, which should have been harmless, gave Jiang Ye an unsettling feeling.
He decided to act quickly to prevent the grass from surrounding his base!
He rushed back to the base and grabbed a shovel.
He began digging rapidly in the open space ten meters outside the base!
Soon, Jiang Ye had dug a large circle around the base, ten centimeters wide and ten centimeters deep, resembling a trench.
Then, he went to the warehouse.
He brought out two sacks of coal and scattered all the coal into the trench.
He also gathered many dry corn leaves and scattered them on top of the coal.
Just as the wild grass reached within five meters of the trench, about to advance further, Jiang Ye lit a fire, quickly turning the entire trench into a ring of flames!
The dazzling flames grew larger, illuminating the surrounding open ground.
Then, holding a sack of coal and waiting, Jiang Ye watched the advancing wild grass nervously.
He hoped that the wild grass, sensing the flames and heat, would retreat. If not, he would add more coal and burn them all to death!
Logically, they were just grass, and he shouldn't be overly tense, but Jiang Ye seemed to be overreacting.
However, in the middle of a cold winter night, suddenly seeing a mass of wild grass spreading like a tide was truly unnerving.
Jiang Ye decided that regardless of whether the grass was good or bad, it should not approach his base.
He had plenty of money to buy coal, so he could just burn it all night.
Having money meant being willful!
After a few minutes, the wild grass continued to advance.
Seemingly sensing the flames, the grass blades did not approach the fire ring.
Instead, they stopped about three meters away from the fire ring.
Jiang Ye breathed a sigh of relief, glad that it could be blocked.
Adding another sack of coal to the fire ring, Jiang Ye jumped out of the fire ring with his shovel.
He cautiously approached the grass, bent down, and dug up a few blades of grass with his shovel.
He carefully leveled them and carried them back to the base.
He placed them into the trading pod for scanning.
After a moment of waiting, the scan information appeared on the screen:
[Item: Snow Oil Grass]
[Item Description: Snow Oil Grass is an anomaly among plants, growing only when the temperature is below minus twenty degrees Celsius. It rapidly withers if the temperature rises above minus twenty degrees Celsius. Its internal moisture content is extremely low, and it is rich in a special oil. This oil can be used as fuel and insecticide, and it is priced highly.]
[Special Notes:
1. The oil of Snow Oil Grass is prohibited for consumption. It is highly toxic to humans, causing shock, myocardial infarction, and irreversible damage to liver and kidney function. Consumption of more than 300g will result in death within 72 hours.
2. Some creatures feed on Snow Oil Grass. Most of these creatures are also highly toxic and should not be consumed.
3. Apart from consumption, skin contact and inhalation of Snow Oil Grass oil are safe.
4. Snow Oil Grass seeds are difficult to find, being less than sesame seed size and often buried deep underground. They are tenacious in extreme cold and reproduce extremely quickly. They grow at night and go dormant during the day, exhibiting photophobia and thermophobia.]
[Estimated Price: 0.5 Credits]
Jiang Ye stared at the screen, reading it several times, and felt a slight relief.
It was just a plant, inedible, but otherwise harmless.
Thankfully, he hadn't wanted to eat grass anyway.
However, this plant was indeed very alien, its growth patterns the exact opposite of Earth plants. On Earth, most plants wither in winter. But Snow Oil Grass grew rapidly only in the depths of winter and withered as soon as it warmed up!
The universe was vast, and full of wonders.
Jiang Ye opened the chat channel. The channel was as lively as a festival, with messages flying in, everyone excitedly discussing the widespread Snow Oil Grass:
Invincible Little Black: I have so much grass here! I've been harvesting for half an hour and have already sold over fifty credits!
Chen Wei: We're rich, brothers! This grass all over the mountains and plains can be harvested and sold for money! This isn't a grassland, it's a sea of cash!
ut-sans: What a surprise! I thought I wouldn't make it through this winter, but then a god descended upon the grassland! I've already lit a pile of Snow Oil Grass, and it's burning brightly, I'm sweating from the heat!
Long Gen: Oh my god! Give me more Snow Oil Grass! Let the grass kill me! Hahahaha! I'm going crazy with joy!
Pool of Falling Leaves: My good friend froze to death yesterday, sob sob, if only she had held on one more day.
Little Black: Foolish people are still celebrating foolishly. Smart me has already harvested tens of pounds of Snow Oil Grass, and now I can buy coal for warmth.
Jiang Ye was also quite happy.
He had thought he would only be able to stay in his base, eating and drinking, for the winter.
Now that Snow Oil Grass was growing everywhere, he could harvest and sell it for money.
Moreover, the shovel of Snow Oil Grass he just dug up was worth fifty cents, which was quite profitable. With grass everywhere, he could earn money by mindlessly harvesting.
Most importantly, other colony administrators would become wealthy, and the business of Cao County citizens would surely boom.
With booming business, his own profit share would increase!
Upgrading his base wouldn't have to wait until winter ended; it would likely happen in the next few days.
As Jiang Ye was happily envisioning the future, a pinned message suddenly popped up in the chat channel.
[Disaster Orange Warning!]
[Based on the scanning results from the trading pods of this planet's colony administrators, we have determined that a large-scale growth of Snow Oil Grass has begun.]
[Based on experience from other planets, after the growth of Snow Oil Grass, the number of various creatures will rapidly increase, and animals that feed on Snow Oil Grass in the soil will also end their hibernation.]
[Within the next 72 hours, colony administrators will likely witness many unknown creatures.]
[Please prepare for defense and self-protection. We wish you good luck.]