Chapter 23: Only 998, Just 998!

Jing Shu really didn’t want to livestream. The apocalypse was almost here—who had the mood for this? But back then, in order to scrape together some money, she’d told her family she was going to become an internet celebrity and do food livestreams. She’d managed to swindle a few million out of them, draining the family’s savings. Now, with everyone watching her, did she dare not go live?

She had to at least put on a show. More importantly, she needed to process her food into semi-finished products so it would be easier to use during the upcoming apocalypse, saving both time and space.

“You should at least bring something out, or people will complain,” Grandma Jing said nervously, eyeing the things Jing Shu had set up inside and outside the villa. “You’re starting already? Aren’t you going to say a few words to liven things up? At the very least, you should introduce what you’re selling—give a little shout or two.”

Jing Shu: … Do you think shouting a couple of times will bring in a crowd? This is just like hawking wares on the street.

Even the elderly aren’t so easily fooled these days.

“There’s something rustic about all this ‘modern’ stuff—rustic and modern all mixed together. The boiler room looks just as ugly as the ones in the countryside. And why are you raising chickens and ducks now?” Grandpa Jing complained. “You can’t do it like this. Let me help you fix up the chicken coop.”

So, on the first day, Grandpa Jing, who’d just been worried about becoming famous, immediately got busy working on the chicken and duck pens, his bustling figure adding a strange touch to Jing Shu’s rather lonely livestream debut.

At Grandma Jing’s insistence, Jing Shu said a few perfunctory words to appease her:

“Hello everyone, today I’m making a lot of chili sauce to give to relatives and for myself. If anyone’s interested, tip me 998 yuan and DM me your address—I’ll mail it to you.”

She even put up a title: “A Rich Second-Gen’s Farmhouse Food Diary—Only 998, Just 998!”

The vegetables, chickens, ducks, and cows from her space were all life-extending treasures. 998 yuan per serving wasn’t expensive at all. Besides, she didn’t actually expect anyone to buy—it was just a high price to justify stockpiling food for herself.

The content she recorded each day would automatically be saved as videos. Jing Shu looked back at the cringeworthy videos from ten years ago—well, from a month or two ago in this timeline—and thought she’d been so silly, she quickly deleted them all.

Jing Shu set up a washing area, a chopping area, and a marinating area to ensure the whole process was clean and free of additives. That way, when her parents asked why she hadn’t made any money, she could at least say, “Look, I worked hard and took it seriously!”

On the fifth day of drinking the spiritual spring water, Jing Shu’s strength and endurance had noticeably improved. Lifting crates of 60 liters of chilies was no problem at all. She was in charge of washing the red chilies.

Grandma Jing, fully geared up, used the automatic meat grinder to crush the chilies—a simple and easy task.

Washing the vegetables was a massive job. Jing Shu had harvested 12 square meters of red chilies from her space. The produce from her space was always top quality—each chili was crystal clear, fresh, plump, and there were tons of them. Even though they weren’t dirty, just washing them took over two hours.

Grandma Jing couldn’t sit still. She started explaining what made a good chili, how to tell if vegetables had been sprayed with pesticides, and even demonstrated with the chilies for the viewers.

A few old fans showed up, joking, “Did the beauty change careers?”—and that was about it. Not even a single person complained about the high price. Jing Shu found it a bit strange.

It was so quiet, but Grandma Jing was still happily chatting away.

Jing Shu buried herself in work. The apocalypse was only a month away—who had the mood to livestream? Peeling and mincing garlic, peeling and chopping onions, peeling and crushing tomatoes—each task was huge. It was noon by the time all the ingredients were washed, chopped, and ready.

Seeing that Grandma and Grandpa Jing were looking a bit tired, Jing Shu added a drop of spiritual spring water (diluted in 1000ml) to their drinks, deciding to give them a dose every day. The next few weeks would be busy—she couldn’t have them running out of energy.

At lunch, Grandma and Grandpa Jing’s appetites skyrocketed. Both said they shouldn’t eat too much, since older people can’t digest well and overeating can be serious. But their stomachs kept growling—they couldn’t help but eat their fill. It was odd; they hadn’t had much appetite or felt hungry in ages.

“The more work you do, the faster you digest, so you get hungry. If we do this much work every day, we’ll definitely have an appetite every day,” Jing Shu said with a sly smile. She was starting to really appreciate the benefits of the spiritual spring water. Even Subject No. 1 was still lively and energetic, showing no signs of aging, even though the spring water had been diluted by half.

The only side effect was… they were eating a lot more… *burp*.

That afternoon, Jing Shu and Grandma Jing started cooking chili sauce on the stove, using two large pots at once. They added the crushed chilies, doubanjiang, tomato paste, sugar, vinegar, and salt, boiling and stirring until the water evaporated. Then they turned off the heat and mixed in minced garlic, onion, and MSG.

Jing Shu packed the chili sauce into 2-liter airtight jars. All those crates of chilies yielded just 50 jars—about a tenth of the total. Smelling the long-missed aroma, Jing Shu couldn’t resist—she grabbed a steamed bun, slathered it with chili sauce, and wolfed it down… slurp! So delicious!

This chili sauce could stay fresh for years if sealed and refrigerated. She left some in the kitchen and stored the rest in the basement as precious reserves.

The first day’s quiet livestream ended with Jing Shu’s mouth full of chili sauce. Grandma Jing looked worriedly at the mountain of chili sauce. “If we can’t sell this, we’ll be eating it until the year of the monkey.”

Hopefully, it wouldn’t sell! If it did, Jing Shu would actually be troubled. She set aside two crates of chilies to dry on the third floor for chili powder—an essential ingredient for making spicy beef jerky.

“You’re livestreaming again? So you still want to be famous, huh? Have you thought about that contract yet? There are two people in line now—I’ve held them off for you, but if you don’t decide soon, I can’t help you anymore.” Zhu Zhengqi suddenly messaged her.

Jing Shu slapped her forehead. How could she have forgotten about this mess? In her previous life, after she cooperated, she and Zhu Zhengqi never crossed paths again. He’d acted as a broker, took his commission, and disappeared from her world—she hadn’t seen him once in ten years of the apocalypse. Who’d have thought, in this life…

“I’m just streaming for fun. Why don’t you go ahead and arrange for those two people? I’d feel bad making them wait for me.”

Sure enough, Zhu Zhengqi started persuading her again—when WeChat didn’t work, he called. He even hinted at inviting Jing Shu’s whole family out for a meal. Jing Shu could only stall: “Let me try for another month or so. Give me a bit more time. If I’m still not popular in the last month, I’ll definitely come to you.”

She really didn’t want to be famous again, nor did she want anything to do with Zhu Zhengqi. Wouldn’t it be better if they just went their separate ways?

“Fine,” Zhu Zhengqi finally relented.

Just as Jing Shu breathed a sigh of relief and got back to her daily space inspections and fifth-level Rubik’s Cube practice, Zhu Zhengqi started stirring up trouble.

After watching Jing Shu’s livestream at 10x speed, Zhu Zhengqi sneered, “998? Are you crazy for money? And you still want to be famous like this? Hmph, fine, let me speed up the process for you, so you don’t think this business is so easy.”

Zhu Zhengqi, feeling sorry for her, even spent 2,000 yuan just to hire people to flame Jing Shu. With no popularity and no attention, and with countless people cursing her every day, if anyone did show up and saw so many people bashing a streamer for selling something worth a few bucks for 998, they’d join in too.

She was just a fresh graduate—could she handle it? Hmph.

“In less than three days, you’ll be begging me for help. I’ll have to raise the price—not five, but a hundred thousand!” Zhu Zhengqi could already picture Jing Shu coming to him in tears, begging for his help."