Chapter 3 Golden Finger Not to pursue the male lead, but simply to save the world…

Chapter 3 The Cheat Ability: What If I Don't Go After the Male Lead but Simply Save the World?

Jin Yanqiu didn't understand why the system was so excited and asked, "What's wrong?"

The system was very anxious, as if it were about to jump out of the screen. "Host, if you don't win Wei Lian back, this world will be doomed! You're a kind person. In the book, you saved many talented people from Wei Lian's sword, and you promoted many talented people from poor families. With their help, Wei Lian's military campaigns went smoothly. But the rebirth woman has a different personality than you. She won't do such things. If Wei Lian ends up with her, he won't be able to unify the empire!"

Jin Yanqiu was speechless. What did it matter to her if Wei Lian couldn't unify the empire? Heroes emerge in troubled times. Even without Wei Lian, there would surely be a Wang Lian or a Zhang Lian to unify the country.

System 899's voice choked with tears. "Host, you must go after Wei Lian. Only by going after Wei Lian and helping him unify the empire can you save this world!"

Jin Yanqiu didn't want to do it. "I'm not interested in that kind of psycho killer male lead." She had no interest in Wei Lian, especially now that there was a rebirth woman who was hostile to her by his side!

That rebirth woman had saved Wei Lian's life, and they were already betrothed. If she tried to go after Wei Lian now, she would be asking for death.

The little system wailed, "But if you don't go after the male lead and help him unify the empire, this country will fall into two centuries of war. The population will drop by over ninety percent, and you and your family will also die..."

Jin Yanqiu trembled and sat up abruptly. "Why would that happen?"

The system sobbed and played a video on the system panel for Jin Yanqiu.

In the video, sheepskin-clad cavalry let out short, excited whistles, driving a group of emaciated people. Occasionally, they hit the slow runners with wooden sticks, splitting their heads open.

By the roadside, a naked infant with a large head and a tiny body lay dead. Black-red blood spread from the body of an old woman who had died. The body of a man hanging from an old locust tree had been stripped of its flesh...

Massacres, exchanging children to eat them, "two-legged sheep" (humans treated as livestock)... All kinds of brutal scenes made her physically sick.

It was no different from the Five Barbarian invasions in history.

The system kept sobbing uncontrollably, begging her to go after Wei Lian. "Host, if things continue as they are, the Great Qi will fall into endless war. The Hu people will come south to burn, kill, and loot. In just ten years, the population of Great Qi will drop from the current fifty million to ten million. Then plagues will break out, the population will continue to decline, and Central Plains civilization will be destroyed..."

Jin Yanqiu's heart sank again and again. She held back the nausea rising from her stomach and asked expressionlessly, "Is this the future?"

"Yes, this is the future of this world if you don't end up with Wei Lian," the little system said with tearful eyes. "Host, please, you must go after Wei Lian!"

Jin Yanqiu drew a deep breath. "Fine, I'll go after him. What cheat ability can you give me?"

The rebirth woman had been gunning for her for the past two years, clearly wary of her. If she didn't have some edge, she would be killed as soon as she got close to Wei Lian.

The little system curled up, embarrassed. "S-sorry, I'm not very useful. I can't give you a spiritual spring or a space, I can't make you prettier, and I don't have any magical medicines..."

Was she seriously getting nothing? Jin Yanqiu lay back down, figuring she might as well just give up.

This was a time of chaos!

In the original book, she had a father commanding an army of a hundred thousand and a wealthy maternal grandfather, which allowed Duke Wei to think highly of her and have his son propose marriage.

But now her father had been demoted, and most of her grandfather's wealth had been taken by the main branch of the Qian family. What could she rely on to win Wei Lian's hand?

But the little system continued, "Host, I can only help you provide food that was thrown away or wasted in your original world. And there are limits to how I do it..."

"What did you say?!" Jin Yanqiu instantly perked up and looked at the system panel.

The little system said, "Host, I'm sorry, I'm not very useful..."

Jin Yanqiu interrupted it. "Show me the food you can provide."

Soon, some items appeared on the system panel.

Rice that had been thrown away because it was past its expiration date, potatoes discarded because they had sprouted, lumpy sugar, biscuits close-to-expiration...

The system explained weakly, "Although many of these are near-expiry or expired foods, the system has verified they're safe to eat! Some of them are thrown away by households that bought too much and couldn't eat in time, and others are discarded by supermarkets or wholesalers..."

Jin Yanqiu certainly knew that rice past its expiration date was still edible.

She had grown up in the countryside. Rice at home would be kept for a long time, even with weevils, and they would still eat it.

But city people weren't like that. Some of her coworkers rarely cooked; when they bought rice and couldn't finish it, if it got bugs, they would throw it away immediately.

Even if it didn't get bugs, if they hadn't finished it after a few months, they would throw it away.

But this rice was still perfectly fine to eat.

Before she had traveled, a certain country had been short on rice and released a large amount of aged rice onto the market, even giving it a fancy name like "old rice."

They didn't even consider last year's rice to be "old"; that was only for the year before. The "three-year-old rice" or "old old old rice" on sale was grain from four years ago.

Modern people could eat "old rice," so people in this era would be even less choosy!

Most importantly, the wasted food wasn't just rice!

In her previous life, Jin Yanqiu had been very thrifty, often buying discounted or near-expiry food at the supermarket. She knew that any food not sold by its sell-by date would be thrown away.

Every year, over 10 billion tons of food get wasted worldwide!

Ten billion tons! That was ten billion tons!

Even if she needed to feed a billion people, she could give each of them one ton of food per year—that was 2.7 kilos per day.

And Great Qi only had 50 million people.

If all that food were given to her...

Even though the system said there were limits to giving her food, Jin Yanqiu couldn't help getting excited.

Even if the system only gave her a small amount of food, there were things on the system panel like "sprouted potatoes" and "Zhonghuang soybeans," "Denghai 605 corn," "Shannong 28 wheat"!

Jin Yanqiu didn't know much about agriculture, but she had been a country girl in her previous life and had run estates in this life. She knew the difference between modern crops and those of this era was enormous.

The soybeans she ate in this era were as big as mung beans—some even smaller than mung beans!

Jin Yanqiu looked at the system. "System, let's talk about something. What if I don't go after the male lead and simply save the world?"

The little system, afraid she'd be angry, looked confused. "What?"

Jin Yanqiu smiled. "899, you're not a useless system. You're the most useful system in the world!"

After transmigrating, Jin Yanqiu had always kept a low profile.

The Great Qi was an insane country. In Luoyang, the noble sons of great families would often take "Cold Food Powder" for fun, powder their faces, and apply makeup, believing weakness was beautiful.

If men were so weak, women had to be even weaker.

Jin Yanqiu always felt out of place with them. Using the excuse of poor health and needing to care for her sick mother, she never attended social gatherings.

To outsiders, she, the Jin family's young lady, never left her home.

But in reality, she went out all the time.

Her mother was in poor health, and when she was around ten years old, she began managing the family's properties. Because her father always complained of hunger in his letters, she paid especially close attention to their several farm estates.

Then she discovered that in this era, not only were grain yields low, but everything depended on the weather.

What was even scarier was that they seemed to be living through a Little Ice Age.

The weather had been getting colder year by year, and across the country, natural disasters like torrential rains, cold snaps, and droughts were happening all the time.

The common people of Da Qi were very tolerant, but peasant uprisings kept popping up, simply because life had become unlivable.

In such an era, what did war depend on? Food and supplies!

In the future given by the system, the Hu people were terrifying—they marched without even carrying army rations, simply catching people to eat, calling them "two-legged sheep".

But if she had enough instant noodles and sausages to hand out, those Hu people might line up to help her build the Great Wall.

All the common people wanted was enough to eat.

Jin Yanqiu took a deep breath and asked the system, "There are restrictions on the food you give me—what are they?"

The system answered right away: "I'm a world-saving system. My job is to save the people on this land. The energy I run on is their genuine gratitude. Host, if someone is grateful to you, you can earn Gratitude Points. For one Gratitude Point, I can give you one kilo of food."

As long as someone was grateful to her, she could get food? She wondered how grateful they had to be... Jin Yanqiu asked again, "Can you give me any kind of food?"

The system lowered its head, its voice weak: "No, Host. What food I can give you also depends on how many Gratitude Points you have. When you hit 10,000 points, I'll unlock a food item for you. When your total Gratitude Points reach 100,000, I can unlock a second type. When you reach 1,000,000 points, I can unlock a third type. Then for every million more points, you get another food to unlock."

Jin Yanqiu’s excitement cooled somewhat, but she quickly perked up again.

Unlocking the first food only needed 10,000 points. That wasn't too hard.

And once she unlocked one type of food, it would be easy to earn more Gratitude Points.

She was sure that if she gave people food, they'd be grateful!

Right now, her father had 5,000 laborers under him, and the troops he used to lead numbered 100,000—all of them could give her Gratitude Points.

With that thought, Jin Yanqiu asked again, "Do the Gratitude Points start counting from when you bonded with me?"

The system said, "No, Host. If people were grateful to you before, those count too. Let me see... Host, you've got 54,351 Gratitude Points right now, and you can unlock one type of food!"

As it spoke, a line of text appeared on the system panel: Gratitude Points: 54,352 (54,352 usable).

She actually had more than fifty thousand points! And the number was still going up!

Sure enough, the Gratitude Points displayed on the panel were one more than what the system had said.

Jin Yanqiu saw the word "Expand" below that line, clicked on it without thinking, and saw the source of the Gratitude Points.

"Mu Guang +1, Xiao Tao +1, Zhang Li +1, Cao Sheng +1..."

Xiao Tao was her maidservant, Zhang Li was Commander Zhang, and Cao Sheng was one of the children she had rescued.

Jin Yanqiu looked through and found that everyone in her group had contributed Gratitude Points, probably because she'd given them those flatbreads.

As she scanned down, only Mu Guang's points seemed a little weird.

Three years ago, Mu Guang had joined the army; they hadn't seen each other in three years. Why was this person still grateful to her?

But at that moment, Jin Yanqiu had no time to care about Mu Guang.

She was pumped about having over fifty-four thousand points.

With so many points, she could not only unlock one type of food but also get 50,000 kilograms of that unlocked food!

Generally speaking, an adult man needs about one kilogram of grain per day. Fifty thousand kilos of grain could feed her dad's 5,000 laborers for at least ten days.

It sounded like a lot, but if she gave each of them a kilo a day, they'd be grateful and she'd get her points back.

Jin Yanqiu thought that was a sweet deal.

Now the only question was what food to unlock first.