Chapter 106: The Global Snowfall Begins!

Su Miao planted two seeds of large green vegetables, two Chinese cabbage seeds, one soybean seed, one red chili seed, one green chili seed, and one tomato seed.

In theory, there was no need to plant so many. But if she sent them only one kind of vegetable, they might think something was wrong with it.

After all, with vegetables this large and mutated, who could say whether they were poisonous?

Besides, today was December 1, and only a few hours remained until six in the evening.

Would the temperature continue to fall then?

If it did, could these vegetables, treated with the growth potion, still grow?

Could those six people find firewood in such a short time and keep the fireplace burning long enough to warm the villa where they lived?

It was truly worrying.

From the bottom of her heart, Su Miao hoped they would survive until the next day. Then they would have fresh vegetables to eat.

Finding a rabbit to test the vegetables on in weather this cold would be far too difficult.

She could only rely on them.

After returning to the villa, Su Miao added a little more wood to the fireplace and continued inspecting the entire building, making sure there were no drafts.

Once she had confirmed that everything was secure, Su Miao returned to the fireplace, took out Potionology, and prepared to study.

“I’m not studying Potionology for now.”

Su Miao put down the book and recalled the scene outside when she had used a fireball spell to blast open the truck.

For one brief moment, her right hand, exposed to the cold, had not felt the slightest chill.

Was it because the heat from the fireball had kept her hand from sensing the cold?

That must have had something to do with it.

However, Su Miao was certain that for a certain amount of time after the fireball had been cast, her right hand had felt no cold at all. Only several seconds later had the chill reached her.

Why?

Su Miao spread open her hand. A tiny fireball appeared above her palm, radiating wisps of warmth.

As she infused it with magic power, the little red fireball began to change color, gradually turning pale blue.

She had done something similar many times before in order to stockpile blue fireballs in her magical space.

She had never paid much attention to it, but this time, she noticed.

The temperature of the blue fireball was above five thousand degrees Celsius.

In theory, with it so close to her palm, her hand should have been roasted to a crisp. Yet she still felt only a faint warmth. It was not unbearably hot at all.

“Magic power!”

Su Miao suddenly understood.

At present, her hand was like a wick, with magic power flowing through it and into the little blue fireball. Under such circumstances, no matter how terrifying the fireball was, it would not be able to injure her palm.

No, even that metaphor was not quite accurate.

Her entire body felt very little of the blue fireball’s heat.

That meant her magic power was currently covering her whole body, helping to isolate her from the high temperature produced by the blue fireball.

“Magic power covering the entire body can isolate high temperatures to a certain extent.”

Su Miao took out her notebook and began to record her thoughts. “Then can it also isolate low temperatures to a certain extent?”

That would explain why the witches in anime could continue wearing short summer dresses with bare legs in the freezing winter.

Moreover, even after enduring extremely brutal battles, those witches never suffered so much as a tear in the white or black stockings covering their legs.

Did that not mean that magic power covering the entire body also possessed a certain defensive capability?

The more Su Miao thought about it, the more excited she became, as though she had discovered an entirely new continent.

She had made up her mind.

From then on, besides continuing her research into Potionology, she would also study the magic of covering her entire body with magic power.

Her requirements were not high. As long as this spell possessed the following effects:

First, it had to remain active for a long time and maintain itself naturally even while she slept.

Second, it had to consume almost no magic power.

Third, it had to ensure that her body temperature would not be affected by extreme heat or cold.

Fourth, it had to offer a certain degree of defense—ideally passive defense, allowing her to remain unafraid of all kinds of surprise attacks.

Su Miao stopped writing and looked once more at the magical-space formation.

As for defense, perhaps she could use the formation to study some basic spatial magic.

For example, she could condense tiny spatial barriers, then connect a large number of them together to form a greater barrier.

With prolonged training, she might be able to deploy defensive magic in every direction, a full three hundred and sixty degrees, instead of placing the magical-space formation directly in front of herself every time she fought.

If someone attacked her from behind, the consequences could be extremely dangerous.

Su Miao recorded all of these ideas.

The mynah watched her curiously from the side without disturbing her.

Before she knew it, six o’clock in the evening had arrived—the time when the global snowfall foretold by the apocalypse prophecy was supposed to begin.

“It’s snowing! It’s snowing!”

The mynah called out to remind her.

Su Miao came to her senses and glanced at her phone.

It was exactly six o’clock.

“December 1, 2123, six in the evening. Global snowfall begins and will continue until May 1, 2124…”

She remembered the prophecy with perfect clarity.

Now, the snow had truly begun on schedule.

If her phone still had network access, Su Miao would have been able to see the oceans freezing over. Even the equatorial regions had begun receiving heavy snowflakes.

The outdoor temperature in the area where Su Miao lived was approaching minus seventy-five degrees Celsius, while some parts of the Earth had fallen as low as minus one hundred and thirty-five degrees.

In Neon, countless survivors, driven onward by blizzards and freezing temperatures, began gathering their families and walking across the ice covering the ocean toward the Dragon Kingdom, hoping to find some chance of survival.

Many of them did not even possess basic warm clothing. Not long after setting out, they collapsed on the ice. The clothes were stripped from their corpses almost immediately, and soon afterward, the bodies were buried beneath the snow and frozen solid.

In the equatorial regions, several countries began warring over the volcanoes.

No one knew who had deployed a powerful weapon, but it triggered a volcanic eruption that buried millions of people seeking refuge near the volcanoes beneath black snow.

That day, cries of anguish rang through the heavens. No one knew how many survivors remained beneath the volcanoes.

Even more terrifyingly, major earthquakes struck several regions once again.

Many defenseless survivors were buried beneath the ruins, with no one coming to rescue them.

Others managed to escape from their homes, only to freeze to death because they had no winter clothing. Their deaths were utterly tragic.

Most bizarre of all, the sky remained a vast, endless white.

After staring at it for long enough, people began to feel unable to distinguish the sky from the ground.

“Minus sixty-nine degrees Celsius…”

Su Miao glanced at the outdoor thermometer and shuddered.

It was growing colder and colder.

She did not remain outside for long before returning to the villa. First, she ate some dinner to keep her body temperature up.

She had originally planned to continue eating beef hot pot, but she wanted a change of taste and did not feel like cooking. In the end, she simply ate a bowl of instant noodles, a slice of cake, and an apple.

“Your Highness, where’s mine? Where’s mine?”

Only after Su Miao had finished eating did the mynah hop onto the table, its face full of expectation.

Su Miao blinked and said very seriously, “I forgot.”

The mynah immediately flopped down on the table. “Your Highness, please give me something to eat.”

Su Miao placed some biscuits on the table. “Eat.”

The mynah instantly stood up. “Thank you, Your Highness!”

Su Miao tilted her head and watched the mynah earnestly eating its biscuits.

Was this bird a little too intelligent?

She withdrew her gaze and continued studying the magic of covering her entire body with magic power.

This concerned whether she could survive extreme cold and heat.

She studied until around midnight, added a little more wood to the fireplace, and then returned to her bedroom to sleep.

From six in the evening until then, the only things that had happened outside were the falling temperature and the heavy snow. Nothing else had occurred for the time being.

Everything remained within what she could endure. There was no problem.

December 2, 2123, eight in the morning.

That morning, Su Miao felt as though the bed had sealed her inside it. She did not want to get up.

It was a very dangerous situation, but the alarm on her phone began ringing, which meant the fireplace needed more wood.

Su Miao had no choice but to get up and go to the living room to feed the fireplace.

The flames were nearly extinguished.

Out of habit, she checked the temperature. The indoor temperature was now twelve degrees Celsius. Once the fire burned strongly again, it could rise to fifteen degrees.

The outdoor temperature was minus seventy-two degrees Celsius. It had not fallen any further.

As long as she did not go outside, the cold could not find her.

The mynah, however, had slept for several days in a row and looked exceptionally energetic.

“Your Highness, open the door and let’s look at the snow. It snowed so heavily yesterday.”

The mynah flew back and forth as it spoke.

“Aren’t you afraid of the cold anymore?”

Su Miao still remembered how the mynah had shivered at minus twenty degrees when they first arrived, nearly freezing to death.

Now that it was minus seventy-two degrees outside, it was no longer afraid?

Had several days of sleep given it confidence?

The mynah paced elegantly across the table. “Your Highness, don’t worry. I think I can handle it.”

Su Miao adjusted all her equipment. She had been planning to inspect the vegetables planted the previous day and see whether they had grown.

She opened the door, and bone-chilling cold immediately began forcing its way into the villa.

Su Miao could not help covering her eyes. Only after she had adapted slightly did she look outside.

When had the snow reached her knees?

Everything outside was silent. Heavy flakes continued to fall, and the snow on the ground kept rising.

For some inexplicable reason, Su Miao began to feel uneasy.

If the snow kept falling, would it eventually bury this place completely?

Like Antarctica. It was said that the ice sheet on the Antarctic continent was more than a thousand meters thick.

Judging from the speed of the snowfall last night, the snow had accumulated to a depth of fifty centimeters in one night. In ten days, that would be five meters; in one hundred days, fifty meters…

The thought alone was terrifying.

The mynah, on the other hand, was extremely excited. It flew out into the storm and performed several loops in the air, only narrowly missing a cheer.

Su Miao removed her gloves and raised her hand. With several consecutive fireball spells, she blasted and melted the snow in front of the courtyard, clearing a path.

It was worth mentioning that the area where she had poured the potion residue was thriving. The flowers and grass had grown remarkably well.

Apart from being covered by a thin layer of snow, they had not been buried.

Their roots were extremely moist.

Su Miao walked out of the courtyard and looked toward the area where she had planted the vegetables.

The tomatoes, green vegetables, Chinese cabbages, red chilies, tomatoes, and soybeans had all successfully sprouted and grown.

The tomato plants were more than a meter tall, with over twenty tomatoes growing on them. Half of them had already ripened, their bright red color making them look delicious.

The red chili plants were eighty centimeters tall, with red chilies hanging all over them. They appeared to be growing exceptionally well.

The soybeans had grown somewhat wildly. Just like those in the vegetable room, they spread countless vines like weeds. At the same time, a great many plump soybean pods had grown on them. A rough estimate suggested that harvesting them all would yield more than twenty pounds without any difficulty.

The green vegetables were about ninety centimeters tall—large and sturdy.

The Chinese cabbages were around seventy centimeters tall and equally robust.

The growth potion had been a tremendous success!

“What enormous tomatoes! What enormous tomatoes!”

The mynah flew straight toward the tomato plants, preparing to eat one.

“Don’t eat…”

Su Miao immediately stopped it.

The mynah halted in midair and looked at her in confusion.

Hadn’t these tomatoes been planted by Her Highness Su Miao?

It had watched her planting them only yesterday.

“They might be poisonous,” Su Miao said softly.

The mynah shot backward and narrowly avoided taking a bite.

Although it did not know exactly what was going on, from that moment onward it remembered one thing: it was best not to eat anything planted by Her Highness Su Miao at random. It might die.

“Let’s go back inside first,” Su Miao said.

Now that she had confirmed the vegetables could grow in the freezing temperatures and snow, she felt relieved.

All that remained was to determine whether the growth potion was poisonous. If it was not, then no matter what happened, she would never lack vegetables to eat. That was very important.

Still, she would have to test the toxicity of any growth potions she refined in the future.

At noon, Guo Yixing, Luo Zhengyi, Chu Zekai, Yu Feng, Teng Jingyu, and Sun Rong arrived.

“Look! What is that?”

Guo Yixing saw the tomatoes, green vegetables, Chinese cabbages, red chilies, tomatoes, and soybeans growing outside Su Miao’s villa. His face was filled with astonishment.

“Have we come to a fairy-tale world?”

Teng Jingyu could not believe her eyes.

They remembered clearly that at this time yesterday, nothing had been growing in the snow.

Yet after arriving in front of Su Miao’s villa and seeing the thriving flowers and grass in the courtyard, the vegetables outside no longer seemed entirely impossible to understand…

But how could this be possible?

Aside from mutated plants, what else could grow so large in a single night?

“Can we pick a tomato and eat it first?”

Yu Feng stared longingly at the bright red tomatoes.

He had not eaten vegetables in a very long time, and each of these red tomatoes weighed at least two or three pounds. They looked incredibly delicious.

“Aren’t you afraid the tomato will eat you instead?” their captain, Sun Rong, warned. “Don’t forget whose vegetables these are.”

The six of them trembled inwardly.

These had all been planted by the witch. Who would dare steal them?

They trudged through the thick snow toward Su Miao’s villa. To their surprise, only a thin layer of snow covered the courtyard, and it was clearly fresh accumulation.

“Your Highness, we have come as agreed.”

Sun Rong stepped forward and politely knocked on the door as he called out.

The door opened. Su Miao glanced at them, her expression cold and taut, then pointed in the direction from which they had come.

“Go there and pick all the mature vegetables.”

Sun Rong and the others exchanged glances.

Had all the vegetables planted outside been prepared for them?

With these vegetables, careful rationing would allow them to make it safely through ten days or half a month of this frigid winter.

For a moment, they felt that the witch Su Miao was actually a good person—especially when she was not holding a gun.

“Thank you, Your Highness!”

Sun Rong’s body trembled slightly. “Your Highness, please forgive my boldness, but these vegetables won’t eat people, will they?”

Su Miao blinked. “I don’t know. You can try them.”

The six of them stared at one another.

Was Her Highness the Witch a little too unreliable?

The thought had barely arisen before Sun Rong extinguished it in his heart.

Having such thoughts was far too dangerous.

At that moment, the mynah flew out and said, “Hurry up and pick them! Hurry up and pick them! Her Highness means that you should take all the mature ones. Wait until the unripe ones mature before picking them. Don’t worry about running out after you finish these.”

Joy spread across Sun Rong’s face, and he hurriedly bowed.

“Thank you, Your Highness!”