Dead on Mars

Cold-treated compressed biscuits were only a temporary source of Vitamin C. They helped resolve Tang Yue’s pressing situation, but they weren’t a long-term solution. The really sustainable source of Vitamin C was fresh vegetables and fruits.

Mai Dong had patted her chest and confidently assured Tang Yue that the tomato seeds on Kunlun Station were the best kinds. They had short growth periods, were disease resistant, rich in nutrients, and its seeds which had a high survival rate could be used for replanting.

Tang Yue silently looked at her chest and showed some doubt… He wasn’t sure if Mai Dong’s assurance was as negligible as her bust size.

After drinking the extracted Vitamin C solution, Tang Yue felt his physical condition improve. His body was brimming with energy, so he tried out his newfound strength. With a loud roar, he chopped at the table… The next second, he was tumbling on the ground holding his hand, while writhing in pain. “Ouch, why did I do that? It hurts so much—”

In fact, Tang Yue also knew that it was likely a placebo effect. Even if his body had been replenished with Vitamin C, the effects wouldn’t have shown that quickly. He still needed to drink a week’s worth of vitamin liquid before his physical condition would show any signs of improvement.

Today’s breakfast was naturally the wrecked biscuits from yesterday. After a night’s worth of “neglect play ¹ ,” the earthly-yellow mush had already dried up into a hard irregular chunk. There were even five clear fingerprints on it. Tang Yue frowned as he sat in front of the table for twenty minutes, lost as to how to eat it.

“Tang Yue, are you cold?”

“Yes, the cold is killing me.” Tang Yue trembled. “Why don’t you come over and hug me? We can gain warmth from each other. It’s said that women have higher body temperatures than men.”

“You are better off freezing to death.”

“How ruthless.” Tang Yue curled his lips as he tightened his clothes.

“Are you going to continue planting tomatoes today?” Mai Dong asked. “How are the seeds that had been vernalized?”

“They are still around. I’ve protected them very well. All the seeds have protruded.” Tang Yue returned to his quarters and took out the cassette from his sleeping bag. It was a tiny greenhouse. The ten seeds that had germinated previously were sitting silently in the gauze within the greenhouse. On the night the OGS’s temperature control malfunctioned, Tang Yue had started protecting these seeds.

He had made a simple modification of the cassette, and had installed a tiny light bulb inside. He had connected it to a wire and battery, using materials that were commonly found in Kunlun Station. The light bulb provided the seeds with light and warmth. Tang Yue would even use a pipette to drip a few drops of water to the gauze every day to ensure the moisture.

Tang Yue poured out the seeds from the cassette, and thanks to his meticulous care over the past few days, the sprouts were still alive.

“Since the seeds are fine, let’s take a look at the fertilizer.”

Tang Yue nodded. He lifted a container filled with fertilizer onto the desk. After the long period of fermentation, the feces were ready for the limelight. The moment the lid was opened, the rich smell of life inundated him. As Tang Yue was too close, he instantly lost his sense of smell.

He felt groggy as he stumbled backward. He put on three layers of masks before putting on a helmet.

The container’s fertilizer was brownish-black in color. Tang Yue found a rod to stir it, and clearly, the fermentation had been effective. Even though they were on Mars, the microbes in feces remained cooperative. When Mai Dong caught sight of it, she said that it looked like a container of sauce… The lady’s bad habit of using food as an analogy remained.

“Remember to test the soil’s pH values,” Mai Dong reminded.

Tang Yue took out a pH strip and roughly tested for the soil’s pH value.

“Hmm… It’s about 7.2. Neutral.”

“OK! This number is perfect. You can plant the seeds. Remember to bury the kernel root downwards,” Mai Dong said. “However, I suggest that you heat up the soil before you plant them. The most suitable temperature for tomato roots to grow in is when the soil is approximately 20°C. Raising the temperature can facilitate the roots’ growth.”

Tang Yue moved a stand and a heating machine over. He then placed the water trough over it, filled it up halfway with water, to heat up the fertilizer using a water bath.

Tang Yue vaguely remembered his middle school chemistry teacher repeatedly emphasizing that water troughs were not to be heated up. What Tang Yue was doing was strictly against the safety regulations of a laboratory, but Tang Yue no longer cared about all the rules and regulations. Unless his chemistry teacher was to appear outside Kunlun Station, no one was stopping him from directly heating the water trough.

In fact, at this point in time, Tang Yue had a frivolous feeling. If Kunlun Station was a microwave, he even had thoughts of cooking two grapes in it ¹ .

It was quite impossible to heat the soil in the container to 20°C precisely with Kunlun Station’s conditions. This was because soil wasn’t a good conductor of heat. He could heat the sides of the container, but the inner areas would remain at a low temperature. Therefore, Tang Yue used short bouts of heating as he stared at the thermometer, raising the average temperature of the fertilizer slowly.

By the time the thermometer’s reading stabilized at 30°C, Tang Yue took out the container from the water bath and left it to the side to cool. Following that, he threw the second container into the water bath.

“When the tomatoes are growing, it’s best if the environmental temperature is about 25°C. In addition, take note of the light. Tomatoes are most suited to light of 30,000 to 50,000 lx.”

“Lux?”

“Light’s unit of illuminance and luminous emittance. One lumen of light projected evenly on a square meter is one lux,” Mai Dong gave the standard answer. “When we are outside, the sunlight we see has about 50,000 lux.”

Having learned that tidbit, he observed the fertilizer container and thermometer in the water bath. “That is to say, it’s best if I provide the tomatoes the illumination of normal sunlight on Earth?”

“Yes, and you need to take note of the amount of time they are exposed to light. The tomatoes need to have at least eleven hours of light a day. This will allow them to grow faster.”

Tang Yue scratched his head. “These guys sure are high-maintenance. They are harder to serve than a man like me.”

“You have to remember that right in front of you is the most complex and frailest, yet miraculous life construction in the world. They are the outcome of millions of years of evolution. There were plants everywhere on Earth, so you thought nothing about tomatoes back then,” Mai Dong said. “But on Mars, look out the window. It’s just an endless swath of desert. Look at the cold and infinite space… More than 99% of the world is made up of inorganic substances. Don’t you think that life is a rare miracle?”

“Not only do I find life a miracle, I even find sh*t a miracle.” Tang Yue sat on the chair as he stared at the fertilizer container in the water bath. “I once felt that sh*t was something disgusting… How unbelievable it is. What was my brain thinking? Why would I hate something so adorable? This is the source of valuable life!”

Mai Dong was taken aback.

“To be frank, if we can return to Earth, I’ll be willing to be a nightman,” Tang Yue said in all seriousness as he waved his fingers, lost in his wild and fanciful thoughts while his tone revealed envy. “Think about it, endless amounts of sh*t… What a beautiful world that would be.”