Interstellar Farming: I Make Potions and Climb to the Top

Ning Xuan shot him a speechless look. Ignoring him, she took off Di Youlin’s neck ring, bit her finger, and dripped her blood onto the runes on the back. These runes would automatically extract the pheromones from her blood and store them inside the ring.

If the wearer showed symptoms of being in heat, the ring would detect it and inject the stored pheromones into their body, allowing them to remain lucid.

"The Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm—when do you plan on going?" Ning Xuan asked him.

"I just had a breakthrough, so now isn’t the right time. I’ll go when I hit my next bottleneck," Di Youlin replied, having already considered the question.

Ning Xuan and her group had completed the Black Forest mission together, earning three months of access to the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm. This access was granted in the form of thirteen keys to the realm.

"Then I’ll give you your key first. You can go whenever you want." Ning Xuan took a palm-sized Mystic Iron Box from her Space Button.

Ning Xuan dripped her blood onto the patterns on the Mystic Iron Box’s surface. With a click, the bronze lock sprang open, revealing a silver key wrapped in Jiao Xiao. There were three keys left; after giving one to Di Youlin, only two would remain.

The remaining two were for Ning Xuan and Chen Nan; everyone else’s had already been distributed.

"I won’t be going anytime soon. Contractor, please hold on to it for me for now." Di Youlin didn’t take it.

Ning Xuan didn’t know where Di Youlin was going. She prepared some medicine for him and, as she was seeing him off, told him that no matter what happened out there, he could always return to her.

After Ning Xuan finished speaking, Di Youlin gave her a deep bow. He then straightened up and walked away without a single glance back.

Di Youlin didn’t dare turn back. He didn’t want Ning Xuan to see the tears in his eyes.

With Di Youlin gone and the graduation ceremony and party concluded, Ning Xuan held the key to the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm. She decided to go there before the people from Ying Yaoshi arrived.

Ning Xuan walked into the dining room, key in hand, and saw Yu Mingche gazing intently at her. A jolt went through her mind.

’Crap, I completely forgot about him.’

’This Contractor, a Governor, had sent a formal request to visit and I was the one who called him over to help me out. He did his part, but I’ve been so caught up with Di Youlin these past few days that I completely forgot he was here.’

"Morning! Have you eaten? Um, is the food to your liking?" Ning Xuan asked, making awkward small talk out of guilt.

"It’s fine, Contractor. Are you planning to go to the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm? I’ll accompany you." Yu Mingche’s eyes were on the key in Ning Xuan’s hand, which he had recognized at a glance.

"Do you have a key? I think mine only lets one person in," Ning Xuan asked.

"I do," Yu Mingche said with a nod.

"But the instances of the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm are all separate spaces. We wouldn’t be able to run into each other," Ning Xuan explained.

"I’m very familiar with the place. I can find you," Yu Mingche insisted.

"Alright, if you want to go, then we’ll go together," Ning Xuan agreed with a nod. "Have you been settling in okay these last few days?"

"I have, Contractor. The food here has a very unique flavor; I like it a lot," Yu Mingche said, looking at the salt-and-pepper fish skin, cumin-roasted meat, and various soups on the table.

The salt-and-pepper fish skin glistened with an amber sheen, with fine, golden spices sprinkled over its crispy surface. Slices of lemon, thin as a cicada’s wing, were curled into crescents and elegantly arranged around it.

With a light bite, the skin shattered between his teeth. The savory taste of sea salt and the tingling numbness of mountain pepper clashed on his tongue, weaving together into a unique flavor. 𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Can you tell what it is?" Ning Xuan said with a smile. "It’s roasted skin from the Silver Scale Fish found in the lake at Oasis Fairyland."

’When Yu Mingche was in his Little Fox form, he loved eating Silver Scale Fish. I wonder if he still likes fish in his current form.’

Throughout the meal, Ning Xuan, trying to make it up to him, paid close attention to Yu Mingche’s experience, and the atmosphere between them was pleasant. Nine-tailed served the final soup course and then silently withdrew.

As Ning Xuan was packing for the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm, Tang Xue found out about her plans and decided to join. So, the five of them—Ning Xuan, Yu Mingche, Chen Nan, Tang Xue, and Min Wu—boarded a Starship together, bound for S135 Planet, the location of the Spiritual Cultivation Secret Realm.

Ning Xuan and her party boarded a large passenger Starship. Its route included stops at twenty-three planets, with S135 Planet being the third to last.

Ning Xuan had never undertaken such a long interstellar journey. Her previous trip from D618 Planet to the Central Star had only involved seven planets.

Ning Xuan gazed out of the Starship’s viewport. Every Star Domain they passed through had a unique landscape, but without exception, each vista was tinged with an air of danger.

"Yu Mingche, look quick! What are those?" Ning Xuan pointed as firefly-like lights zipped past the viewport, fluttering what looked like crystalline wings, just like beautiful butterflies.

"That’s a particle-butterfly cloud," Yu Mingche explained. "It’s formed by the collision of high-energy particles from the Starship’s engine with interstellar dust."

"Look at your three o’clock," Yu Mingche said, pointing to a blue vortex outside. "See that? It’s a dark matter eddy. Once you get pulled into one of those, there’s no coming out."

"A dark matter eddy? Is that the kind of vortex that forms a black hole?" Ning Xuan asked.

"They’re different. A black hole is another type of dark matter eddy, but with far greater energy," Yu Mingche replied, though he wasn’t quite sure how to explain it better.

"Xuanyuan, look over there! How magnificent!" Tang Xue exclaimed in awe.

Ning Xuan turned her head and felt her breath catch in her throat. Suspended against the dark backdrop of space was a nebula tens of thousands of kilometers in diameter, looking as though a god had knocked over a palette of paint.

Clouds of gas in every color imaginable formed various shapes—a fiery orange-red, a vibrant green, an eerily bewitching crimson. The colors, while distinct, complemented each other, creating a strange and beautiful harmony.

"All stations, prepare for transit!" The moment the captain’s voice rang out, the viewports switched to holographic projection mode.

Ning Xuan watched as the massive Starship entered a pocket of absolute darkness. The octagonal warp drive at the stern unfolded, casting out ribbons of light. As the Starship broke through the boundary of the dark space, the void erupted in a brilliant cascade of light.

This was the most difficult transit of the entire journey. Once it was complete, the rest of the trip should have been risk-free.

But just as the transit ended, disaster struck. The captain and crew, having been completely absorbed in the difficult maneuver, were ambushed and taken control of by Star Thieves who had been lying in wait among the passengers.