After finishing his prayer, Chen Ping slowly stood up. He stood before the golden Spirit Grain plant and reached out his hand.

His fingertips trembled slightly from nervousness as he gingerly touched the lowest grain on the stalk.

Hard.

It wasn’t a dream. It was real food.

Food that could fill his belly. Food that belonged to him.

A wave of immense joy crashed over him, leaving him momentarily at a loss. He circled this golden miracle several times, grinning foolishly, a hoarse sound escaping his throat.

After quite a while, he forcibly suppressed his surging emotions. He remembered the more important matter: the harvest!

He untied the hardwood stick that had accompanied him for so long from the rope around his waist.

Gingerly, he used the tip of the stick to pry at the point where the rice panicle connected to the stalk.

The stem was tough, but it had also become fragile after ripening. He didn’t dare use too much force, afraid of knocking off the precious grains.

Little by little, he pried.

Snap.

With a soft sound, the heavy panicle separated from the stalk and fell into his hand.

It had substantial weight.

He held this first panicle of Spirit Grain as if cradling a priceless treasure.

Then, his movements became swift and efficient.

Using the hardwood stick as a tool—prying, cutting, levering—he gingerly removed each of the remaining panicles one by one. The stems of the ripened plant were easier to handle than he had imagined.

Soon, the originally tall and straight golden Spirit Grain plant was left as nothing but bare stalks standing on the Black Earth.

Before Chen Ping lay thirty heavy, golden rice panicles neatly piled up.

Each one was astonishingly full.

He sat on the ground and began processing them. Rubbing with his palms and peeling with his nails, he separated each golden Spirit Grain from its rachis.

The process required patience; the grains were hard, and the rachis were tough. He focused completely, detaching them grain by grain.

The grains fell onto the Black Earth with a faint rustling sound, a melody incredibly pleasing to his ears.

Time passed bit by bit.

Chen Ping forgot his weariness. He forgot everything outside. His world now consisted only of the pile of golden grains before him.

Finally, the last grain fell.

Chen Ping looked at the small pile of gleaming golden Spirit Grain heaped before him and let out a long, satisfied sigh.

He began to count them.

He had no better method; he could only use his hands to scoop and count, handful by handful. Each handful could hold roughly one or two hundred grains.

He counted very carefully, afraid of missing even a single one. He was grateful to his parents for having taught him numbers before they died.

One handful, two handfuls… ten handfuls… twenty handfuls…

In the end, he arrived at a number that made his heart race: six thousand grains!

A full six thousand grains of Spirit Grain!

Each grain was golden. Each grain was hard.

This was considerably more than what he used to harvest from the grain he planted before. He remembered counting rice panicles in the fields when he was a child. At most, a plant would produce about twenty panicles, and each panicle would have at most fifteen grains even at its peak yield.

This Spirit Rice was different; it produced double the grains compared to ordinary rice!

He scooped up some grains and brought them close to his eyes for inspection. Each one seemed meticulously polished, uniform in size, emitting a warm luster and a rich aroma.

He grabbed a small handful and wanted to stuff it into his mouth.

In the end, he reluctantly put it down. Now was not the time for enjoyment.

Chen Ping swallowed hard.

Finally, he peeled open one Spirit Rice grain’s husk and carefully placed it in his mouth.

A pure sweetness instantly spread across his tongue. This flavor was purer and sweeter than any porridge or mundane rice he had ever eaten.

A warm current seemed to slide down his throat, dispelling the cold hunger that had long resided in his belly.

Chen Ping closed his eyes, chewing carefully, feeling the texture of the grain shattering between his teeth. Reluctant to swallow, he chewed it over and over again.

It was the best thing he had eaten in years.

After the excitement subsided, a practical problem lay before him: how to handle this Spirit Grain?

Take it outside?

The thought arose only to be ruthlessly crushed.

Too dangerous. Once discovered, the consequences would be unthinkable.

The principle of “The Sin of Possessing Treasure”—he had seen too much and understood it too well during his years struggling at the bottom.

This Jade Pendant space was his only lifeline; it absolutely must not be exposed.

He looked around the expanse of empty Black Earth.

His gaze swept over that small mountain of gold before settling on the fertile soil.

A bolder idea—one that made his heart race even faster—irresistibly surfaced: Plant them! Right here! Plant all of them!

Six thousand seeds. If they could all grow into plants like the one he just harvested…

Chen Ping didn’t dare imagine the sight.

He remembered clearly: the single Spirit Grain plant occupied an area only about the size of a palm.

He estimated the extent of the Black Earth. While not particularly vast, planting several thousand plants would be more than enough.

Memories from childhood surfaced—following his parents to dig for food in the fields. One acre of land could support roughly forty thousand seedlings of mundane rice.

Spirit Rice might be sturdier than mundane rice seedlings. Even so, this piece of Black Earth could definitely handle ten thousand plants without issue.

His six thousand seeds could be completely planted here.

No time like the present.

Chen Ping felt strength surging through his body; all previous fatigue vanished completely.

He picked up his hardwood stick and began scratching lines on the ground. He needed to plan this out.

Not too dense—too dense wouldn’t allow for good growth, and harvesting would be troublesome. But also not too sparse—too sparse would waste land.

Recalling the spacing in mundane rice paddies and combining it with the size of that mature Spirit Grain plant, he used the stick to draw shallow furrows on the ground, dividing it into several large sections.

Then, he began digging holes.

Using the hardwood stick as a shovel, he moved along the marked rows at regular intervals, digging shallow small holes about half-a-finger deep.

It was laborious work that tested his patience.

Chen Ping bent over, digging hole after hole. Surprisingly, it was easy digging; there was no resistance at all.

Every thrust of the stick, every scoop lifting a small handful of soil, carried indescribable anticipation and strength. This was no longer drudgery; this was sowing hope.

He dug carefully, trying to make each hole roughly the same size and depth.

During breaks, he glanced at the pile of golden grains and looked at the rows of small holes he had already dug, mentally calculating.

Plant a single grain per hole?

No.

What if some seeds didn’t sprout? Or grew poorly?

Six thousand holes planting seed by seed would take too much time.

Moreover, he vaguely felt that this Black Earth was magical; the seed germination rate should be high. He remembered villagers planting beans in his childhood—sometimes they put two or three seeds per hole to ensure emergence, then thinned out weaker seedlings later.

Spirit Grain was different, but the principle should be similar.

How many grains per hole was appropriate?

Chen Ping looked at the grains in his hand.

Six.

He decided to put six. This way, he maximized the guarantee that each hole would have seedlings emerge, without affecting growth due to overcrowding.

After all, planting fields with a single hole meant planting ten to fifteen seedlings. A mere six seeds was actually planting less. If necessary, he could pull out weaker ones later.

Planting six seeds at a time was also convenient; a thousand holes would finish planting the six thousand seeds.

A thousand holes was still a significant workload, but compared to digging six thousand individual holes, it was much less effort.

Method decided, Chen Ping sped up his pace.

He no longer pursued absolute uniformity; as long as the spacing was roughly appropriate and the holes were deep enough to bury seeds, it was fine.

Bent over like a tireless farmer, he moved across the Black Earth, leaving behind rows of neat small holes.

Sweat soaked through his ragged clothes, sticking them to his back. His arms were sore from the repetitive motion, and the web of his hand reddened, rubbed raw by the hardwood stick.

But his heart burned, filled with drive and energy.

Every time he straightened and looked back at the continuously extending land dotted with small holes, he felt a step closer to hope.

Finally, a thousand small holes were dug.

They were densely packed, arranged within several planned areas like a giant chessboard.

Chen Ping straightened, using the back of his hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead. He let out a long exhale—breathlessness, tiredness, satisfaction, and relief all rolled into one sound.

He looked at the thousand waiting holes, then at the pile of gleaming golden grain.

His tired face broke into a satisfied smile. It reached his eyes, crinkling the corners—a genuine, heartfelt expression he hadn’t worn in years since his parents passed, since the world turned cold and indifferent.

This smile held the promise of a future nurtured by his own hands and sweat. It was hope born of perseverance and a stubborn refusal to give up, no matter the odds stacked against him.

Time to begin sowing.