Chapter 289: Chapter 282: Night-time Visitor_1

“Hmm, I’ll be going back first!”

Her face turned beet red, and she almost fled in disarray.

On regular days, she liked to stay at home alone, reading, playing the zither, and tending to her flowers; she must have also practiced cultivation, a typical well-bred lady. Apart from buying books, she seldom went out.

This kind of homebody girl was particularly thin-skinned.

Her self-esteem was also extremely strong.

Even though she secretly yearned to marry Qin Niu, she still appeared very bashful when the matter of marriage was brought up to her face.

In this world, many people saw shyness as a form of beauty.

When girls were shy, they indeed looked very cute.

“We’re going to finalize the marriage tomorrow; why are you still so shy!”

Qin Niu watched her graceful figure disappear and couldn’t help but smile widely.

Picking up a pancake she had made and biting into it, he savored the fragrant, oily taste—quite excellent, though it was a bit tough to chew.

After finishing the pancake, Qin Niu took the freshly harvested Ancient Banyan Tree Blood and went upstairs to the granary.

He began cultivating the bees that had hatched these past few days.

Moving them back home for rearing made it much more convenient now.

Deep inside the hive, more than twenty honey-producing bees were busily at work.

You could see them making honey.

The piece of honeycomb was only the size of a palm, and the honey inside was milky white in color, not yet sealed with wax. They constantly spat out liquid from their mouths, and the queen glands on either side of their bodies also kept secreting glandular substances.

Then, combined with saliva, it was stored little by little within the well-constructed honeycomb.

The honey-producing bee was a special breed, rare in number.

The amount of honey produced by an ordinary honey-producing bee was more than five to six times that of other worker bees.

These twenty-plus honey-producing bees, having been cultivated by Qin Niu, were of a higher grade than ordinary ones. However, after their advancement, the speed of making honey had actually slowed down a lot.

But what they were making was Royal Jelly.

The nutritional value was far higher than ordinary honey.

Qin Niu now wished he could have more honey-producing bees to obtain more Royal Jelly.

He spent almost an hour cultivating all the new bees.

Looking at those robust War Bees, he subconsciously took out the Green Demon Bee eggs to check.

Hmm, there seems to be a change!

Qin Niu was excited to find that fine lines had appeared on the surface of the bee eggs.

He had been feeding them with essence blood every day, and it seemed to have had some effect.

Out of joy, he bit his fingertip again and dropped a drop of fresh blood on the bee egg.

The bee egg slowly absorbed the essence blood.

The process was very slow, and it required careful observation to notice that the blood was diminishing little by little.

Qin Niu was particularly looking forward to its early hatching.

Unfortunately, although he had obtained Green Demon Bee eggs, he hadn’t acquired the true bee-rearing secret technique of the Green Demon Bee.

Now he could only grope his way forward.

Fortunately, he had killed several formidable Insect Masters from the Nine Insect Gang and had searched some notebooks recording their bug-rearing experiences from their corpses.

Many Insect Masters would write down their experiences in nurturing bugs during their growth.

For revisiting and verifying later.

Qin Niu also had this habit. When he cultivated termites, bees, and other creatures, he would record their rearing methods, evolution timings, and the new abilities they acquired after each evolution, and so on.

It’s said that the palest ink is better than the best memory.

Only by recording their growth process could he avoid mistakes the next time he checked. He could also continuously summarize and improve based on the results of cultivation.

This Green Demon Bee egg would likely hatch soon, but as for how it should be reared next, he had no idea.

It couldn’t be that he was going to rely on the honey bees to feed it, right?

He went back to his room, took out several notebooks he had searched from the Insect Masters, and read them carefully to learn from their bug-rearing experiences.

That uneasy feeling lingered in his heart.

Out of caution, he decided to make some preparatory measures.

“Xiao Qing!”

“Master, I’m here!”

Xiao Qing hadn’t been sleeping, but studying the Seven-Star Sword Technique in the adjacent room.

At the sound, he immediately came over.

“You’ll sleep inside the earth cellar tonight, and don’t come out if you hear anything.”

The earth cellar was originally used to store sweet potatoes, pumpkins, and other foodstuffs.

Qin Niu had built it but had never used it.

Inside, it was dark, damp, and the air was poor, making it an unsuitable place for people to live.

Given the current situation, for safety’s sake, he decided to have Xiao Qing hide in the earth cellar.

In case there really was any danger, he wouldn’t have any reservations.

After arranging for Xiao Qing’s hiding place, he turned to the termites he carried with him.

“Old Five, lead a hundred soldier ants to guard every part of the house. If anyone invades, immediately alert me.”

The pets Qin Niu trusted the most were still his termites.

They were small in size and had sensitive smell and perception, which made them ideal for positioning in every corner of the house to serve as hidden sentries.

As night fell and the crescent moon gradually rose into the sky.

After his bath, Qin Niu, clothed, came to the backyard to practice cultivation.

He usually only wore shorts for his cultivation practice, but today he had donned the King Pig Leather Armor.

The Ice Lotus and the Strange Vine had both taken root and were alive.

This once again proved the marvels of the Everlasting Spring Technique.

As long as a plant had a breath left, it could almost certainly be revived.

Such an outstanding cultivation technique, yet no one had bought it, which could only mean that the mainstream direction of cultivation was still geared towards combat.

Non-combat cultivation techniques had almost no market.

Moreover, since it was an incomplete scroll, even fewer people were willing to buy it.

For the same price, one could buy an entire scroll of a common cultivation technique. Iron Cloth Technique and Barbarian Bull Technique were both good choices.

Qin Niu disliked fighting and killing, preferring to nestle in the countryside, cultivate the land, breed insects, and live a carefree and comfortable life.

If possible, he wished to be at peace with the world.

He was very indifferent towards fame, fortune, and power.

With his current conditions, if he joined the army, he could definitely become an officer, but he had no intention of enlisting.

He carefully inspected the Ice Lotus.

Though it had taken root and was alive, its condition wasn’t good.

Its petals were somewhat wilted, and it lacked the stunning beauty it had the first time he saw it. Only a slight trace of cold air emanated from the plant.

The herbs planted around it were affected by the cold air and some had already suffered from frost damage.

This indicated that it wasn’t suitable to be planted in soil, but needed to be planted in water.

Qin Niu contemplated hiring someone to dig a lotus pond in the backyard specifically for the Ice Lotus.

In any place, as long as one had the money, almost anything could be accomplished.

He sat beside the herb garden, began to close his eyes, and entered into cultivation.

The Ink Blade lay on his lap, ready for battle at any moment.

As the crescent moon began to sink in the west, the night deepened further.

Gusts of night wind brushed the earth, and the herbs around Qin Niu swayed in the breeze like dancing spirits in the darkness.

“Master, something’s happening!”

The termite sentries positioned within the house for vigilance sent him a signal.

The enemy hadn’t invaded from the front yard but from the backyard.

This showed that the person acted with extreme cunning.

Qin Niu, appearing relaxed on the outside but tense on the inside, immediately stopped cultivating and readied himself to confront the invader.

A shadowy figure easily scaled the wall and entered, eyes brimming with boundless killing intent, heading straight for Qin Niu.

One could see that the figure stumbled slightly, disheveled, indicating he was quite injured.

“You little beast, die!”

The hoarse and aged growl was fraught with overwhelming hatred.