Apocalypse Mode: My Cheat Code Virtual Boyfriend - Chapter 20

This task took three full days to complete.

Although the rubber boat was advertised as puncture-resistant when sold, Bai Xun still proceeded with extreme caution, working bit by bit. These items would be needed in the future, and right now, they couldn’t be bought even with money.

Over these three days, Bai Xun didn’t just focus on cutting industrial-strength adhesive. He also studied the control panel in the cockpit.

The control panel provided a map of the sea and land navigation routes. He hesitated over whether they should search for land now that they had the ocean ark.

For the time being, the sea seemed relatively free of major dangers. On land, not only were there mutated monsters, but they might also encounter other humans. Sometimes, people could be far more dangerous than monsters.

According to the map on the control panel, the nearest land was a straight-line voyage of 20 days away. The city they had originally come from was now submerged, and the closest land was in the opposite direction.

After careful consideration, Bai Xun decided to wait until the heavy rain ended before searching for land. If conditions on land were unfavorable, they could live on the continental shelf near the coast.

On the twenty-seventh day of the apocalypse, the rain began to ease up from the early morning, shifting from heavy downpours to moderate showers. The waves on the sea gradually calmed. The heavy rain would completely stop in another two days.

The third-floor glass greenhouse was temporarily repurposed as a seedling nursery. Seedlings were cultivated in flowerpots, and by the time the vegetable seeds sprouted, the rain would have stopped. They could then be transplanted into the planting boxes on the deck.

Bai Xun didn’t know how to grow vegetables. With the few packets of vegetable seeds he had brought from home, he was certain he wouldn’t succeed.

So, he took out the limited stock of seeds left on the ocean ark.

The seeds from the ocean ark ignored seasons and soil conditions and didn’t require fertilization. As long as they were sown in soil, they would definitely sprout.

Because the time flow in the game differed from the real world, Bai Xun couldn’t be sure how long it would take for the seeds to sprout, grow, and mature. To experiment, he decided to plant five seeds of each vegetable type.

Using the crafting table’s synthesis function, Bai Xun used 10 units of clay to make 10 small flowerpots filled with soil. Then, with 2 wooden planks, 1 bottle of resin, and 4 iron nails, he crafted a table. A simple planting observation area was now ready.

Cheng Wei effortlessly carried the table up to the third floor, while Bai Xun followed behind with the flowerpots. Soon, the glass greenhouse was transformed into a temporary seedling nursery.

The glass greenhouse had no lighting. Originally, it was just a non-functional structure for watching sunrises or basking in the afternoon sun. Bai Xun used the crafting table to make a hanging lamp with 1 iron block, 1 unit of synthetic plastic, and 1 bottle of resin.

Then, he and Cheng Wei both stood on the table. Cheng Wei held Bai Xun’s legs and lifted him up, while Bai Xun raised the hanging lamp and pressed it against the ceiling.

The lamp was installed.

Although it seemed rather unconventional, it was indeed efficient. None of the five of them knew anything about electrical work. If they had to wire it themselves, mixing up the ground, live, and neutral wires would have been disastrous.

Cheng Wei helped Bai Xun down. In his hands, Bai Xun felt as light as a feather. Holding him by the waist, Cheng Wei steadily placed him back on the ground.

Once Bai Xun was standing firmly on the ground, he felt an urge to squeeze Cheng Wei’s arm muscles. No wonder people said dumplings should be eaten piping hot, and men should be strong and sturdy. A man with solid arms truly felt incredibly reassuring.

Cheng Wei jumped down from the table. The quality of the table produced by the workbench was top-notch, even though it was just a thin wooden plank with four legs, it didn’t crack in the middle when both of them stood on it.

With everything ready, Bai Xun took out two chopsticks, one for each of them. They took turns poking five holes in each flowerpot.

After all the holes were made, they counted out five seeds from each packet, carefully placed them into the small holes, and used the chopsticks to push the soil over them to cover them up.

The watering can in the tool room was meant for the large planting boxes on the deck. Using it on the small flowerpots on the table would flood them.

Bai Xun went downstairs and returned with a large bowl of water, which he had drawn from the water storage tank. A few spoonfuls of water for each flowerpot would suffice.

After watering all the flowerpots, they used toothpicks to attach small labels indicating what vegetables were planted, sticking the makeshift flags into the soil. They could come back to water them again tomorrow.

If they wanted to expand their planting in the future, they would face a new problem: a shortage of irrigation water.

On the lower level, there were two water purifiers and one water storage tank. One water purifier could only purify 30 liters of water per day, so two would yield 60 liters.

What did 60 liters of water mean?

A single shower required about 20 liters of water. This 60 liters wouldn’t even be enough for the five of them to take one shower each.

Currently, the only available water source was the large amount of mineral water stored in the kitchen simulator. But if they were reluctant to use it for drinking, how could they possibly use it to water vegetables?

The weather was relatively cold now, so soil moisture evaporated slowly. The vegetables only needed to be watered once a day. According to the in-game watering can’s capacity, planting all the vegetable seeds would require about 10 liters of water.

In addition to watering vegetables and showering, there were other water needs. They would have to make two more water purifiers at the workbench to meet the demand.

The water purifier used the most materials aside from the diving suit. To craft one water purifier, they needed five iron blocks, three copper ingots, two gold ingots, ten pieces of synthetic plastic, five bottles of natural resin, and ten iron nails.

Making two water purifiers would use up most of their stored materials.

Once crafted, the water purifiers could simply be placed on the ground. As soon as they made contact, they would automatically extend pipes to connect to seawater and the water storage tank. They could be turned on and used immediately.

After finishing everything, Bai Xun put on his raincoat and went up to the deck. On the twenty-seventh day of the apocalypse, the weather was noticeably clearer than in the previous days. The rain didn’t sting as much when it hit him, and visibility over the sea was much better.

Bai Xun went to count the large planting boxes on the deck. It had been too long since he last played the game. He knew there were many planting boxes but had forgotten exactly how many.

He pulled out the small gardening shovel he had brought from home and began counting while digging into the soil in the planting boxes.

There were a total of 48 planting boxes, all large containers that reached waist height. With a single shovel, he dug out firm, dark soil. Bai Xun felt that planting boxes of this height could even accommodate a few fruit trees.

After counting all the planting boxes, he leaned over the railing and looked out at the sea, thinking to himself that he should go diving to collect trash once the weather improved a bit more.

Back when he had completed the game and amassed a large amount of resources, he had remodeled the ark into its current aesthetically pleasing form. After that, he rarely played. Now, the ark was beautiful but lacked sufficient security, as he had dismantled all the defensive installations.

After making 10 flowerpots and 2 water purifiers, the remaining materials were insufficient to fully arm the entire ship.

Just to create a metal hull for the ship required 120 iron blocks, 100 iron nails, and 60 steel bars, they were still far short of the needed materials.

They still had 90 bottles of fuel oil, so they didn’t need to worry too much about power generation or the operation of the sailing engine. By gutting the fish taken from the storage locker and processing their entrails in the fuel production machine, they could produce several more bottles.

Therefore, they could now convert all 320 resource cubes into materials to see if they could first upgrade the ship with a metal hull.

Arriving at the resource recycler, Bai Xun specifically brought Cheng Wei and Bai Yu along. With three people trying their luck, surely not all of them would have terrible luck, right?

In the game, the resource recycler could convert 99 resource cubes at a time, with the obtained materials automatically appearing in the game’s inventory.

The Star game system didn’t provide them with an inventory. If 99 materials were spat out at once, they’d likely be buried under them. Converting 10 cubes at a time for a “ten-draw” was about right.

Bai Xun pulled open the glass cover of the input port, tossed in 10 resource cubes, pressed the button, and waited for the conveyor belt at the output to spit out the materials.

The resource recycler clanked twice, then the conveyor belt started moving, dropping out 6 lumps of clay, 1 bottle of natural resin, and 3 wooden planks, none of them usable.

Terrible luck confirmed.

Bai Yu rolled up her sleeves and pushed her brother aside: “Move over, you non-legendary! Let me show you what it means to be blessed by the luck gods!”

Bai Xun stepped aside as she threw in 10 cubes and slapped the button.

The resource recycler clanked twice, then spat out 4 iron blocks, 2 gold ingots, 1 roll of fabric, and 3 steel bars.

“Hahaha, I told you! Brother, your hands are really unlucky!” Bai Yu, having hit 7 out of 10, immediately gloated and taunted Bai Xun.

“Hmph! Cheng Wei hasn’t drawn yet! Quick, avenge my shame!” Bai Xun pushed Cheng Wei forward, determined to turn the tables.

“Hmph, as expected of a pair of… good friends, ganging up to bully me, huh? Bring it on, let’s see who’s the real luck king of this ship!” Bai Yu almost slipped up but quickly recovered.

“I’ll give it a try.” Cheng Wei tossed in the resource cubes and pressed the button.

The resource recycler spat out 3 bundles of rope, 4 dyes, 2 wooden planks, and 1 iron nail, clearly another unlucky hand behind the scenes.

“Tsk tsk tsk, step aside, both of you. Go sort the materials. This is still my job.” Bai Yu shook her head in pity, deeply disappointed with their performances.

Bai Xun had no retort and could only go fetch more resource cubes for this lucky lady to draw ten at a time, while Cheng Wei sorted and stored the dropped materials at the conveyor belt end.

After all 320 cubes were fed into the resource recycler, they obtained a total of 85 iron blocks, 25 copper ingots, 10 gold ingots, 15 silver ingots, 45 steel bars, 20 pieces of synthetic plastic, 10 bottles of natural resin, 60 iron nails, 10 wooden planks, 5 lumps of clay, 15 rolls of fabric, 10 natural dyes, and 10 bundles of rope.

Overall, the conversion rate for the needed materials was quite good. Combined with the unused stock materials, they were now only short 16 iron blocks to upgrade the ship’s metal hull.

Not too far off.

When the weather clears up a bit more, they’ll try diving to collect trash, aiming to gather 16 iron blocks in one go for a major upgrade to the ship’s hull.

There are also some other defensive facilities on the workbench, which they’ll make at the same time.

…

Day 29 of the apocalypse, 8:00 AM, sunny.

The brilliant sunlight, absent for a month, now bathed the deck. Squinting through the gaps between their fingers, the dazzling golden sun felt like something from a past life. Their eyes stung slightly from the brightness, but the sensation was simply wonderful.

Taking advantage of the good weather, it was time for them to dive and collect trash.