OFR – Chapter 22 Working overtime late at night.

Twenty minutes later.

Mu Bai returned to the basement, and with a thought, he entered the mysterious space.

He placed the five juvenile arowanas into the magical storage. Although the fish had been weakened, twenty minutes wasn’t enough to be fatal, and once inside the storage, they were frozen in a completely still state.

After handling that, Mu Bai checked the cultivation timer for the orchids and saw there were still seven hours left until completion.

It looked like by six or seven in the evening, he’d be able to harvest and sell them.

In addition, he noticed that the orchids, which had originally only six blossoms, now had thirteen thanks to the special space, and they even showed signs of blooming further.

That made him very happy—after all, once an orchid reached fourteen blossoms, it counted as top-tier. At that point, each plant would be worth tens of thousands.

The more blooms, the greater the value.

And given that these orchids had been nurtured in the mysterious space, their appearance was already outstanding. Even with the same bloom count, they would fetch much higher prices than normal orchids.

“These two orchids could bring in a lot.”

Mu Bai quickly calculated the profit, estimating it would be over 300,000 yuan. With seven more hours of cultivation, they were guaranteed to reach the top-tier level.

After some thought, he opened the Host Panel to check his stats.

Host: Mu Bai
Mysterious Space Level: 1 — Two planting/breeding slots, time flow ten times faster than outside.
Online Currency: 405 network copper coins

[Host Daily]

• Daily check-in: Completed today. Tomorrow’s check-in will grant 30 coins.
• Daily online spending: 0, converted network currency: 0.
• Random tasks: None.

“Two beginner growth cards per arowana… five fish means ten cards. I’ve only got five, so I’ll need to exchange for five more. Looks like I’m short on currency. I’ll just wait until I sell the orchids and then spend more online to top it up.”

Seeing that his funds weren’t enough to cultivate the arowanas, Mu Bai decided to wait until after selling the orchids, then he’d continue spending online to generate currency.

Not to mention, he wasn’t sure yet how many bottles of basic nutrient solution would be needed.

After considering it, Mu Bai left the space.

It was already lunchtime, so he tidied up and went out to eat.

After lunch, he wandered through the jade market, checking prices—since upgrading the mysterious space in the future would definitely require jade.

Time flew by, and soon dusk fell. It was already past six in the evening.

He had been browsing the jade market for four to five hours and learned that jade was generally classified into two types: nephrite (soft jade) and jadeite (hard jade).

Soft jade was usually what people meant when they casually spoke of jade, while jadeite was better known by its popular name—feicui (emerald jade).

Both kinds came in five grades: worthless, common, superior, top-grade, and rare treasure.

Most jade on the market was worthless or common, selling for just a few yuan to a few dozen yuan per gram.

Superior jade, usually famous varieties, sold for hundreds per gram.

Anything higher than that wasn’t something ordinary people could afford. In fact, superior or above was rarely seen on the market at all.

Seeing it was dark, Mu Bai stopped wandering, grabbed dinner at a small restaurant, then returned to his rented basement.

By now, it was around 7 p.m.

At that moment, the two orchids had finished cultivation.

He grabbed the jade pendant around his neck and entered the mysterious space.

“Ding! Congratulations, Host. The two orchids have completed cultivation. Nutrition has reached saturation. Further absorption of space energy will have no effect. Harvest now?”

The prompt appeared as soon as he entered.

Without hesitation, Mu Bai chose to harvest.

Two super top-grade orchids with seventeen blossoms each appeared in his hands.

Lush green leaves framed the bluish-violet flowers, seventeen in total, looking like a dozen butterflies dancing in the air.

“Super top-grade.” Mu Bai’s eyes lit up.

Regular top-grade orchids started at tens of thousands apiece, so although these hadn’t reached the “rare treasure” class, they were definitely super top-grade—each easily worth over 200,000.

Carefully holding the two orchids, he exited the space.

He placed them on the table, snapped a few pictures under the desk lamp, and sent them to Han Mengyun.

Originally, he had planned to post one for sale on Nanjing’s online orchid forum, hoping experts there would help evaluate the price.

But since he had promised Han Mengyun two orchids the other day, he couldn’t back out now.

After sending the pictures, he messaged her:
“President Han, two super top-grade orchids. Take a look—how much are you willing to offer?”

It was now a little past seven. Early winter evenings got dark quickly, and by eight it was pitch black.

Normally, the Fengyun Flower Exhibition Hall staff would have gone home by now, but tonight the building was still brightly lit.

That was because Nanjing’s annual Flower and Plant Exhibition & Auction was coming soon. Any exhibition hall with a name in the city was busy preparing its entries, and Fengyun was no exception.

Most of the staff were working overtime, the purchasing manager especially—still making calls to industry contacts even after seven o’clock.

On one hand, he was searching for top-grade plants to acquire; on the other, rallying votes for the exhibition.

Every year’s exhibition included a voting event—not for the exhibition halls themselves, but for the plants on display. The public voted for what they thought was the finest specimen.

Still, since the votes went to the plants, each hall competed fiercely to field the best entries. High-ranking plants meant prestige and powerful publicity.

So competition was always intense.

Meanwhile, in the top-floor office, Han Mengyun sat frowning at the list of plants her secretary had compiled for the exhibition.

To her frustration, Fengyun’s lineup was weak this year.

Even counting the pieces she had just acquired from Mu Bai, the collection looked thin.

The problem wasn’t only the number of top-grade plants, but the lack of a real showpiece.

Her most valuable specimen at the moment was a double-spiked flamingo flower worth 800,000. It was a super top-grade, and rare at that.

But at the annual exhibition, the biggest halls always unveiled plants near the rare treasure level—or even actual treasures.

Compared to that, her flamingo flower still fell short.

“Sigh… hopefully I can gather a few more super top-grades in the next few days. At least then it won’t look so bare.”

She knew full well that rare treasures were almost impossible to find.

So she wasn’t expecting any miracles—only that she could add a few more super top-grades to bolster the lineup.

“Ding-dong.”

The WeChat notification sound chimed.

“Hm? At this hour? Who’s messaging me after seven?”

Han Mengyun rubbed her temples, picked up her phone, and casually opened WeChat.