011 The Missing Iron Plate

Chapter 11: The Disappeared Iron Plate

After tricking her Aunt and cousin, Ji You felt very happy. Once her body no longer felt strange, she immediately got up and hurried to the bus stop. The autonomous floating bus ran on a fixed route, with departures every five minutes, rarely experiencing issues like overloading or delays. Ji You didn't have to wait too long before a bus heading to district 10 arrived, and she quickly boarded; the floating bus swiftly set off.

40 minutes later, she arrived and got off the bus. Her house was located deep inside the district, requiring a 5-6 minute walk to reach. Along the way, ceaseless booming noises filled her ears...

Those were the sounds of spaceships dumping waste. During daytime, this booming never ceased and the residents of district 10 were used to it. Ji You? Having lived here for more than half a year, she had forced herself to adapt.

If she couldn't adapt, moving was the only choice. On the same planet, districts 5-6 were far from the waste-dumping sites and thus free of the roaring noise, but moving required money. Uncle Ji's family had even embezzled Ji You's family funds to move out of district 10.

Speak of the devil, and he shall appear.

Ji You had only walked a few steps when her communicator rang. She looked at her wrist and saw the caller was her Uncle Ji Weimin.

Clearly, Ji Weimin bore ill intentions.

Ji You hesitated, wondering whether to answer. But she felt she hadn't done anything wrong. Ji Yan's predicament was entirely self-inflicted. So what was there to fear?

She answered the call.

Ji Weimin's face immediately appeared, his brow furrowed, his eyes staring at Ji You with disdain as he commanded, "You little beast! What are you playing at? Get over to the police station in district 6 and clear up this misunderstanding now!"

Obviously, the matter had reached Ji Weimin. His plan was for Ji You to show up and clarify it was all a misunderstanding so that the police would drop the charges against Ji Yan.

However—

Would Ji You oblige him?

Ji Weimin was always domineering and autocratic, never imagining his niece would dare defy him.

Ji You stared at him, tugged at her ear, and said, "Old beast, what are you saying? Straighten your tongue and speak clearly, otherwise, I can't understand if it's human language."

Before her words even settled, Ji Weimin on the other end was already furious, raising his hand as if to slap her.

Ji You gave him a sweet smile and then immediately hung up.

Ji Weimin, staring at the disconnected interface, flew into a rage, "This little beast! She's turned the heavens upside down!"

While cursively swearing, he tried calling again, but Ji You wouldn't answer, repeatedly cutting off the call. Ji Weimin was redialing when suddenly a notification sound said: "You have been blocked by the recipient…"

What!!!

Ji Weimin slammed his fist on the desk with a loud thud.

**

On this end, having successfully infuriated Ji Weimin to the point of smoke coming from his seven orifices, Ji You felt even better. As she walked, she even hummed a tuneless song: "I am a little sheep~little sheep~little sheep~I'm not afraid of the big bad wolf~ big bad wolf~ big bad wolf~"

She continued until she reached the end of the street, stopping at the last row of houses. Ji You's home was a beautiful two-story building that, besides its spacious rooms, also boasted a front and back yard, covering a significant area. All thanks to Ji You's father, Ji Qiang, who had been a C-level Physical Strength User and an interstellar mercenary. However, when Ji You was five, he died on a mission, and not long after, overwhelmed by grief, Ji Mu also passed away…

Even though her home's front and back yards were expansive, they contained no plants, just bare earth, which distressed Ji You greatly. She wanted to plant something, like vegetables, flowers, or fruit trees…

However, the soil on this planet was severely polluted and totally unsuitable for growing plants. Even if some plants managed to survive on this land, the fruits and roots they bore would contain high levels of toxins, making them inedible for humans. What's more, some of the gases released by these plants also contained toxins, causing irreversible harm to human health—this was why no one on the garbage planet cultivated plants.

Passing through the front yard and back home, Ji You collapsed onto the sofa.

This trip was entirely fruitless, netting a loss of 4 credit points.

Ji You rubbed her temples, thinking about quickly going into the Star Network to toil and earn back the 4 credit points spent on transport, but exhaustion kept Ji You slumped, utterly unwilling to move.

Physically resembling a salted fish, Ji You's mind gradually emptied.

...

She suddenly remembered the Iron Plate in her consciousness and shuddered: she almost forgot about it.

Almost instantly, Ji You sat up straight, staring at the stark white wall, took a deep breath, slowly closed her eyes, focused her mind, and delved into the depths of her Conscious Sea—

Nothing!

Nothing!

Nothing!

After searching several times, the Iron Plate was gone.

Gone...

Really disappeared.

Ji You was startled, quickly opening her eyes. The first thing she saw was the still stark white wall; she closed her eyes again, telling herself to stay calm, ignoring everything, not thinking of anything, letting nature take its course...

And then—

Slowly—

Ji You's eyelids became heavier and heavier.

And then—

Unknowingly, she closed her eyes and fell into a deep sleep.

When Ji You woke up, it was already broad daylight; checking the time, it was 9 AM. She was startled and leaped off the sofa, pulled up her Light Computer contacts, and saw:

[Missed call—from Uncle Xie Yi]

Ji You had planned to go with Uncle Xie Yi, Ryan, and Grandma Jenny to the West District Wilderness on No.10 Street today. That area wasn't a protected zone and hardly any garbage ships dumped waste there anymore. Although there were no garbage piles to pick through, the wilderness of the West District grew a wild plant called Iron Pear Wood, an incredibly magical plant. Its roots could extract fibrous materials that were both pliable and strong. Ordinary metal weapons couldn't cut through it, and even Level 1 to 3 energy weapons couldn't either. Thus, it was often used as a standard weapon for Mecha, primarily for various climbing purposes—

However, despite its wide range of uses, Iron Pear Wood wasn't rare, as it wasn't fussy about its growing conditions and was widely cultivated on every planet. This also meant that the price of Iron Pear Wood wasn't high.

Its purchasing price was generally about 8-15 credit points per pound, depending primarily on its quality. If the quality was high enough, the purchase price could reach 20 credit points per pound.

Iron Pear Wood on garbage planet 101 grew in harsh environments, producing only the lowest quality, with a constant buy-back price of 8 credit points. Ji You and a few neighbors had collected it several times; if they didn't encounter any crisis or unexpected situations, they could gather about 2-3 pounds a day, making it a quite decent income.

However, Iron Pear Wood grows outside the protected areas, and encountering Star Beasts in the wilderness poses a great risk, so generally, without a team or powerful weapons, residents of planet 101 wouldn't easily go to collect Iron Pear Wood.