Chapter 523

Rosie wasn't one for idle talk; she always had a plan in her head.

"We could go fishing, dry the fish in the sun to kill off any lingering viruses, and then bury the salted fish in a pit. Before long, we'll have maggots."

That's how they did it at Ocean Point Naval Station, and Rosie had learned the ropes long ago.

Once the maggots hatched, they could use them to feed the poultry, which would then breed and multiply.

A decade of hard work was finally paying off. Rosie wasn't about to just sit back and rely on Arcadia.

Stella was all in.

They started with chickens, ducks, geese, and quail-ten of each, all nestled into the incubators.

After some discussion, Stella and Jasper decided to take to the sea and fish.

With no overfishing to worry about, the ocean was teeming with life.

They rose at the crack of dawn, rowing their dinghy out to deeper waters before bringing out the fishing nets.

Neither had much fishing experience; even casting the nets was a challenge.

They watched instructional videos over and over, and after several tries, they finally got the hang of it.

They cast the net and slowly circled with their boat.

When it was time to haul it in, they were stunned to find hundreds of pounds of fish in their catch.

Several species were represented, some normal, others deformed.

Stella voiced her concern, "Rosie, are these deformed fish okay to use?"

"They're fine," Rosie assured her confidently. "At Ocean Point Naval Station, the fish that looked fine went to the cannery, while the deformed ones were used for maggot fermentation."

She took the opportunity to educate her siblings, "Experts in maggot farming say most viruses weaken over generations of replication. Plus, many infected hosts develop antibodies."

Stella scratched her nose thoughtfully, sensing some logic in Rosie's words.

Whether right or wrong, they would see the results in practice. She couldn't let doubts undermine Rosie's confidence.

more times, ending up with

to avoid any

Arcadia, spreading the fish on the beach

the fish with a stick, whispering to Jasper,

of the sea, or

"Would you dare eat poultry raised on

to quash his sister's enthusiasm.

feed them to the wolf

supplies; they could wait to eat the poultry

him a knowing look,

smirk, "What about you? Will

as silk,

a conspiratorial grin, then

weeks of labor, they had dried over two thousand pounds of salted fish and decided to dock

boulder was already a good hundred meters above sea

days of drizzling rain, the barren, brown earth sprouted some frail weeds, yet they showed a

time to

withered, others stood

pit, lined it with a tarp, and dumped in dozens of pounds of salted fish,

breeze carried the pungent scent

few days,

collected them daily, feeding them to the poultry

a legacy of former

and

had built the coops back when the new villa district was still

day and chilly winds at night, the

shelter, but Stella, ever the pragmatist, fetched a

so

bigger, Jasper fenced the area around the tent, allowing them to

tended the fields, Stella busied herself mostly

the sweltering summer heat, and as the cooler autumn arrived, the dandelions, though scraggly, blossomed,

slowly bringing hints of green to the landscape. Having served as maggot feed, the thoroughly decomposed fish

and the planting season was off, resulting in sparse and weak

counted on the wheat to fill

she didn't worry about Rosie. It was Snowflake that

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