The post-apocalyptic world has a space full of supplies.

Chapter 150 Ministry of Agriculture

DAY128

When Lu Yuan woke up, Yang Xiao was no longer in the room. Like everyone else, he had a regular job at the base. Lu Yuan remembered that he had been helping out in the canteen recently. He figured that Yang Xiao had rested yesterday and should be on the early shift today, having to go out early to help prepare breakfast for everyone at the base.

Lu Yuan has to go to the research institute today. The Ministry of Agriculture's rice should be ready for harvest in the next couple of days. He also needs to arrange for a rice milling machine and such. After all, even with hydroponics, rice doesn't turn into rice immediately after harvest. When they had a meeting the day before yesterday, none of the bigwigs in the Ministry of Agriculture could have imagined that Lu Yuan actually had a rice milling machine stored in his space. This has led to Lu Yuan being praised for several days. If he hadn't refused, Li Pei, the team leader from the Ministry of Agriculture, would have wanted to put his name on the honor roll in the cafeteria.

Li Pei received heartfelt thanks from all the survivors at the base and high praise from the base command for the successful cultivation of apples and rice.

When Lu Yuan arrived at the research institute after breakfast, the soldiers from the command post who had presented the commendation had just left. For Lu Yuan, this was a bit too formal, but for the other researchers from the Ministry of Agriculture, it was a recognition of their work by everyone at the base. Everyone was full of energy, as if they'd been injected with adrenaline, as they walked in.

Lu Yuan walked past rows of hydroponics racks and finally arrived at Li Pei's desk in the corner of the plantation. They had discussed the issue of installing a rice milling machine the day before yesterday, but had not yet found a suitable place. All the offices in the research institute were full, and the Ministry of Agriculture was already the department with the largest area, so Li Pei was embarrassed to take up someone else's space.

There are now at least 100,000 survivors at the South China Base. 70% of them are Chinese leaders, soldiers, and research and development personnel from various industries who were transferred here. The remaining 30% are ordinary survivors and people with superpowers who have been rescued one after another.

So even though the Ministry of Agriculture occupies the largest area, it is still not enough. They filled all the offices with hydroponics planting racks, and all the researchers shared Li Pei's small desk. If it weren't for the reliable technical experts, Lu Yuan would never have imagined how these seeds could survive in such a dense environment.

"Lu Yuan, over here, over here." Lu Yuan was at Li Pei's desk but couldn't find anyone. Hearing the voice, he turned around and found Li Pei outside the door.

"Team Leader Li!" Lu Yuan waved to him. He had originally planned to wait for Li Pei to come over, but Li Pei kept waving at him, as if he wanted him to come over.

"Let's go, let's go, we have new territory." The command leaders who came to deliver the commendation in the morning, in addition to verbally conveying the commendation, also brought great news to the Ministry of Agriculture: they would be completely withdrawing from the research institute building and moving to the new office building that Jiang Xing had allocated to them.

That building was the first office building built in the South China base. It didn't occupy a large area and was only three stories high, but each floor was a large open space. When it was built, it wasn't very practical to divide it up, so it was temporarily used as a warehouse. Now, it's perfect for the Ministry of Agriculture, which needs to place a large area of ​​planting racks.

It's not far from the research institute. There's a sign for the Ministry of Agriculture hanging at the entrance. The first floor of the three-story building still holds the living supplies that were previously used as a warehouse. Li Pei said they would be moved out gradually. Soldiers are already helping to set up planting racks on the second and third floors. These are assembled using leftover materials from the construction of the South China base, so they're being put together quite quickly.

Since the supplies stored on the first floor will be moved later, Li Pei's idea is to put the rice milling machine, incubator and other equipment on the first floor, and leave a small area for the researchers' desks. The rest of the area will still need to be equipped with planting racks after the area is emptied, so that they can better ensure the food supply of the base.

Although Li Pei and his team successfully harvested the rice they planted this time, it wasn't a bumper crop, so the quantity was not large. However, considering that they have moved to a new office building and the planting area has become much larger, they will continue to grow rice, since Chinese people cannot live without rice.

Therefore, Li Pei's initial plan is to install two rice milling machines, which they will use alternately while harvesting rice. After all, it's not like the harvested rice has to be delivered to the canteen immediately, as the canteen currently has enough grain in stock. Moreover, although the area has increased, Li Pei still hopes to save more space to install more planting racks.

By the time Lu Yuan and Li Pei had set up the two rice milling machines, it was past lunchtime. Unlike in the evening, the base canteen no longer served hot food after 10 p.m., but it did serve food all day at noon. After lunch, there would be steamed buns and other breakfast items.

"Let's go to the cafeteria for lunch first." Li Pei once missed dinner because he was adjusting the culture water. After that, he would urge the researchers to go eat first whenever it was mealtime. He just didn't expect that one of them was too excited and the other was really too busy to remember. Luckily it was noon, otherwise he would have had to eat that awful mushroom and chicken instant noodles again.

When he arrived at the cafeteria, Lu Yuan looked around but couldn't find Yang Xiao. However, it was a busy time for the cafeteria, and the plates that had been used up had to be washed and the empty lunch boxes had to be refilled. Lu Yuan was too embarrassed to bother Zhong Qiang to ask about Yang Xiao, so he could only get his food from Li Pei and find a random spot to eat.

“Our last attempt to hatch eggs failed,” Li Pei said, eating scrambled eggs while recalling the Ministry of Agriculture’s egg-hatching project. After all, now that the problems of vegetables and rice were solved, the next issue was protein and meat.

The meat and eggs stored in the base had long been used up. Now they were eating pre-cooked meals brought back from some pre-cooked food factories that the supply team had raided. They were really grateful for the invention and production of pre-cooked meals. Although the nutritional loss was huge, in this post-apocalyptic world, being able to eat a bite of scrambled eggs with tomatoes was such a happy thing.

“Xiao Yang said it was because the eggs you gave me last time were wrong,” Li Pei said with an embarrassed smile to Lu Yuan. “You know, I’m a professional in planting, but when it comes to hatching chicks, none of us at the base are professionals. Fortunately, among the survivors rescued by the rescue team this time, Xiao Yang’s family owns a farm, so he’s a professional in this area. So after we finish eating, I’ll have to call him over so we can go and discuss the hatching issue.”

"Yes, no problem." Lu Yuan didn't understand anything about fertilization or non-fertilization, so he didn't understand why the eggs failed to hatch last time. Now that there are professionals, they can find the right solution.

Lu Yuan always felt that in this apocalyptic world, he was a complete waste. He majored in history in college, a completely irrelevant field in this post-apocalyptic era. Furthermore, he hadn't developed any superpowers yet, and his physical condition was so poor that even a random elementary school-aged superpowered individual could easily beat him up. If he didn't wear his mecha suit when he went out, he'd instantly turn into an icicle. Speaking of this mecha suit, while it might have some combat capabilities, he couldn't control it at all, and on the battlefield, it was more likely to cause trouble for his own side.

He usually envied Ji Lang, Lin Yun, Liu Jia, and Wang Sanhai. Although every trip away from the base was dangerous, they always managed to rescue people upon their return, which was all so admirable. As for Gu Nanfeng, who was currently researching the evolution of superhumans at the research institute, it was so advanced that he couldn't understand it at all. Pei Sihao seemed to be well protected by his family and had a job at the hospital, but he was actually very professional and considered an important member of the base hospital.

Although Li Minze and Wei Cheng seemed half-baked, they were genuinely serious about researching exoskeletons. Whenever Lu Yuan went to help, he only provided his own exoskeleton for their research; he couldn't offer any real assistance. Even Yang Xiao and Zhong Qiang, who usually helped out in the base's canteen, were taken along by Ji Lang and the others for special missions.

Although Lu Yuan's work at the Ministry of Agriculture seemed to be just a warehouse providing equipment, instruments, seeds, and eggs, there were finally things he could actually help out, which allowed him to rediscover some of his self-worth as a person from his self-perception as a warehouse worker.