Chapter 243 - 210: Still Growing

Chapter 243: Chapter 210: Still Growing

For 422 catties of vegetables, Boss Tang offered a price of 15 points per catty.

Compared to the astronomical prices from two months ago, this seemed quite affordable. It wasn’t that Boss Tang was lowballing her; it was simply because June had arrived. The vegetables that every household had managed to squeeze into whatever available space they had were now mostly ready for harvest.

The aftermath of late March’s heavily polluted rainstorm was gradually fading. People’s lives were getting back on track, and their diets were slowly returning to how they were before the apocalypse.

Zhou Qian wasn’t too familiar with vegetable prices, but Huai Yu had been selling them constantly. She intimately understood the market fluctuations. Looking at the more than six thousand points that had just hit her account, she was incredibly satisfied.

Meanwhile, Zhou Qian casually strolled around the shop before pointing to a video game console. "Are you still going to buy this?"

It would be quite convenient for her to charge it at his place.

Huai Yu hesitated for a moment. "Forget it!"

When she didn’t have many points, she had desperately wanted to buy it. But now that her savings were once again approaching twenty thousand, she suddenly couldn’t bear to part with the money.

With the transaction complete, her mind was still fixated on getting thirty catties of white sugar. She quickly dragged Zhou Qian and rushed toward the grain and oil store.

It had been a while since their last visit, and the store had stocked up on quite a few new products. There were even several jugs of soybean oil. However, due to the unique nature of these soybeans, the lowest Mutant Value among them still hovered around 16. The sight made Huai Yu frown.

As for the rice and flour...

She looked up at Zhou Qian. "How about we buy these at the Golden Yuan District?"

They still had to go to the hospital later, and lugging around heavy sacks would be too inconvenient.

Zhou Qian hadn’t even properly explored the trading market before, so what would he know? Naturally, he just went along with whatever Huai Yu suggested.

However, while rice and flour were too bulky to carry, sugar was a must.

Huai Yu then asked, "Boss, do you still have any white sugar?"

The shop boss lifted his eyelids to glance at her, then sized up the tall and burly Zhou Qian standing beside her. Only then did he reply.

"Yes, I have exactly twenty-one catties and four taels left. The twenty-one catties are still sealed. It’s high-quality sugar from six years ago, going for eight points per tael. How much do you want?"

GASP!

This price truly made her heart ache.

But after doing a quick mental calculation, she gritted her teeth. "I’ll take it all!

"Do you have coarse salt? If so, I’ll need thirty catties of that as well." Summer was here, so she needed to prepare everything that required curing and sun-drying in advance.

Caught off guard by such a large order, the boss immediately jumped to his feet.

"Yes, yes, I do! You’ve got great foresight, little lady! I’ll get it for you right now!"

A short while later.

Once they stepped out of the store, Zhou Qian chuckled. "You’re certainly willing to spend a lot when it comes to food."

She couldn’t bear to drop two thousand points on a game console, yet she hadn’t hesitated to shell out over a thousand points for white sugar.

Huai Yu happily touched her face. "I’m still growing! And growing pretty fast, too. I’m already a bit taller than before."

Although the difference in the marks carved on her door wasn’t obvious, she was genuinely growing. If not for that, why else would she have stocked up on even more expensive nutrient solutions this time, despite how awful they tasted?

She really wanted to grow up to be as tall, cool, and handsome as Sister Chen Xing, knocking lumps onto people’s heads with a single punch... Ahem.

But the most important thing was still to get more meat.

Huai Yu decided that when they went to the hospital later, she would ask Chen Xing if there was any regular schedule for the convoys returning via the highway exit. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be able to handle staking the place out in the middle of the night every day.

But for now—

She wiggled her toes inside her tight, cramped shoes. She was going clothes and shoe shopping!

Now that she had money, she was never buying secondhand again!

Zhou Qian carried the dozens of catties of salt and sugar she had just bought on his back. Looking at Huai Yu’s skipping, joyful figure, she momentarily overlapped with his memories of Zhou Ning, who had also loved shopping and pretty clothes.

He stood there for a moment, the warmth and tenderness in his eyes spilling out like sunlight, before taking long strides to catch up with her.

Moments later.

However, that warmth and tenderness soon vanished without a trace.

Zhou Qian stared at the bulging gunny sack. Seeing the individually plastic-wrapped clothes, shoes, and socks stuffed inside, his face was tenser than when he had been crushed under four hundred catties of vegetables—even though the sack itself wasn’t heavy to carry.

"Didn’t you say we’re going to the hospital later, and that it would be too inconvenient to carry a bunch of stuff, which is why we didn’t buy rice and flour?"

But now, they had an entire sack filled with clothes and shoes. How did that make any sense?

"You bought way too many clothes!"

"It’s not that many!" Huai Yu aggrievedly tugged at the T-shirt she was wearing. She had worn it for months while doing heavy manual labor. Despite the fabric initially being of decent quality, it had been worn down to a tragic state. "I look like a little beggar right now."

She then lifted her foot slightly. "My shoes are too small now, too. Brother Zhou Qian, have you heard the story of the Little Mermaid? Every step she took on land felt like walking on knives. If I don’t buy new shoes, I’m about to become a mermaid myself.

"Also, I’m hitting puberty. My chest..."

The next moment, Zhou Qian firmly clamped his hand down on the top of her head, making her yelp "OUCH!" and snap her mouth shut.

Zhou Qian had truly never taken care of a teenage girl like this before.

When Zhou Ning was this age, she had boarded at school, and their parents were still around in the beginning. He had been stationed at the base, while she had her best friends and classmates to chat with. She would spend her time glued to her phone, fangirling over celebrities, watching TV, and shopping online...

He hadn’t needed to worry about any of those things back then.

Now, looking at Huai Yu shrinking her neck back and looking pitiful, he felt utterly helpless. He had no choice but to hoist the large sack onto his shoulder and silently trudge forward.

He wondered if they would be able to leave these things at the front desk when they got to the hospital later.

As it turned out, they naturally could.

The familiar nurse had a very deep impression of this brother-sister duo.

Seeing Zhou Qian arrive for his follow-up examination, she directed him to place his things in the corner of the counter while unable to hold back her praise.

"You’re looking great! You must have been eating very well and getting good nourishment at home.

"And the scar on your face doesn’t look nearly as deep anymore. It looks quite natural now."

The nurse wasn’t just offering empty flattery. In this day and age, who didn’t have a few scars on their body?

This was especially true for the Defense Army, who constantly risked their lives. It was perfectly normal for them to have marks on their faces and bodies. If the general public hadn’t been so accepting of this, that auntie on the bus wouldn’t have tried to play matchmaker the moment she laid eyes on him.

Zhou Qian thought about their meals recently. It really had been quite good.

Glancing at Huai Yu, he felt a little embarrassed. He loosely curled his hand into a fist, placed it against his lips, and cleared his throat.

"She... Little Yu is still growing. What kind of foods should she be eating on a daily basis?"

The nurse smiled, then looked Huai Yu up and down, unable to suppress a chuckle. "Little sister, you’re growing rather quickly!"

Setting everything else aside, even when she was wearing baggy, ill-fitting clothes before, it had been obvious that she had a scrawny, washboard-flat frame. But now, after not seeing her for a while, not only had she filled out with a bit of flesh, but her figure was also beginning to show faint curves.

Although she was still thin and her complexion wasn’t rosy enough, her overall appearance was no longer poor.

"Isn’t she developing a little too fast?" the nurse asked, a hint of concern in her voice.

Huai Yu, however, felt this was only natural. Her true age was already in her twenties or thirties. Although she didn’t know why she had regressed in age, it was probably normal for her to grow a little faster.

As long as she didn’t age rapidly too, there wouldn’t be a problem.

Because of this, she shook her head. "No, everything is perfectly normal with me."