From Robinson Crusoe

Rewards have their pros and cons; a high price doesn't necessarily mean it's useful on a deserted island.

The awards given in February are proof of this.

The reward for February 15th was a beauty device, packaged in a beautifully crafted gift box with a long description, which can be summarized as a celebrity favorite that can reduce nasolabial folds and wrinkles.

In addition to the beauty device, a tarot deck is also included with the gift set, and its artistic style matches the theme of the gift box packaging.

There were also a few small bags of something called collagen jelly, an elegant handbag, a box of face masks, a bottle of facial cleanser, and all of these items together, which would probably cost more than eight or nine thousand yuan.

But for Chen Zhou, of all these things, apart from the face wash which was somewhat useful, the rest of the items combined were probably not as practical as an axe.

Not to mention that most of his work on the island is outdoors, even if he worked indoors, he didn't need to make himself look so fair and delicate.

The marks that time leaves on a person are difficult to erase, and he hopes that his appearance matches his age.

Moreover, once the challenge is over, he will return to the modern world as a young man in his twenties again, and he can dress as he did on the island.

Of course, if there were electricity on the island, Chen Zhou might try using this beauty device to see if it works.

Unfortunately, there is no electricity on the island, and the beauty device only has a small amount of power that came with it. It will probably become useless after two or three uses.

Since that was the case, Chen Zhou didn't bother trying and simply stored it in the wooden box.

He estimated that even if it remains untouched, the battery will be completely unusable in another twenty years or so, and it would be difficult to sell it even on a second-hand platform.

Coincidentally, the two rewards delivered on March 2nd and March 17th were also items that required electricity.

The first item is an electric razor.

Chen Zhou's beard always grew very quickly, and he usually shaved with a razor he brought from the ship.

Shaving requires skill. Before shaving, it's best to wash your face with warm water and then use a hot towel to soften the beard.

When shaving, the razor must be held close to the root of the beard.

When shaving, you shouldn't keep your face tense; you should keep your skin in a semi-relaxed, semi-tense state.

In modern life, Chen Zhou shaves every morning.

Once he got here, he usually shaved once a week or every ten days because the preparations for shaving were too troublesome.

Even if he reduces the frequency of shaving, sometimes his hand is not steady enough and he will still accidentally break off the hair inside the skin, irritating the hair follicles, or even more simply cut his face and bleed.

Chen Zhou had long been fed up with this troublesome and uncomfortable shaving method.

However, since he could neither create a smaller razor nor trusted others to shave him, he had no choice but to make do with what he had.

Almost every time Chen Zhou shaves, he misses his electric razor.

When he received the reward and opened the package to find the razor inside, he felt both surprised and a little bewildered.

The razor in the package was a brand he had his eye on for a long time. It would cost more than 800 yuan to buy directly, and he hesitated many times before deciding not to buy it.

Who would have thought that something you like while browsing shopping apps in modern times would appear here?

Sadly, the razor was electric, but there was no electricity on the island.

……

Sometimes Chen Zhou really admired the Time and Space Administration Bureau; the methods those responsible for distributing rewards used to torture people were becoming more and more novel and creative.

From the initial useless rewards to now distributing the accompanying items in several installments, he can only watch with envy but cannot use them.

There are even "trial card" style rewards like beauty devices and razors, letting you use them a few times first. Once you feel good about them, the battery runs out, and you have to go back to using a razor to shave.

This sense of imbalance seems to be exactly what the reward distributors want to see.

However, Chen Zhou has always been rebellious towards the Time and Space Administration. In order to avoid making himself uncomfortable, he would rather not use the razor and put it in the storage box to see who would get restless first, the Time and Space Administration or himself.

He's already been shaving for over three years, so what's another 25 years?

……

The other reward, which requires electricity, is even more outrageous.

That's a graphics card.

Moreover, that wasn't just any ordinary graphics card; it was one of the world's most advanced gaming graphics cards when Chen Zhou participated in the challenge.

RTX5090.

Released on January 30th of the year Chen Zhou participated in the challenge, it became extremely expensive due to its superior performance and the hype from scalpers.

Chen Zhou recalled that before browsing the post about "Challenging Robinson," he had seen discussions about this new graphics card on the graphics card forum.

At that time, there was no 5090 graphics card in the domestic version, only the 5090D. The 5090 graphics card had to be purchased from overseas, and its price reached a terrifying 30,000 yuan.

The graphics card delivered on March 17th was an overseas card, and with three "Republic of Gamers" logos on the fan, you can imagine that its price was probably over 3 yuan.

Chen Zhou wasn't very knowledgeable about computer components, but he estimated that this graphics card might sell for 35,000 yuan, or even 38,000 or 39,000 yuan.

If the island had electricity and internet, give him a computer and let him install this graphics card to play games; that would be awesome.

Unfortunately, he had nothing but this expensive graphics card.

It's like inviting someone to dinner and preparing a huge amount of the world's finest ingredients in a remote, desolate place.

Bear paws, lobsters, king crabs, premium beef, camel hump...

Just as the guests were savoring the deliciousness of the ingredients, they were told that there were no tools for starting a fire or any seasonings available, and if they wanted to eat, they would have to eat it raw. Who could stand that?

Fortunately, Chen Zhou had hardly ever played games growing up, and his knowledge of computer hosts was limited to watching the flame wars in the graphics card and Tualatin forums on Baidu Tieba.

For most people, having a great graphics card but not being able to play games would be incredibly frustrating, but for him, it wasn't so bad; it wasn't that hard to accept.

……

Having learned his lesson from the previous mysterious rewards, Chen Zhou was once again somewhat disappointed with them.

As he braved the rain to head to the beach, he found himself feeling the same way he had when he first arrived on the island—anxious and uncertain mindset.

He thought that this might be the effect the Time and Space Administration wanted.

After the anniversary rewards increased their threshold, he could no longer adapt to these strange and unusual rewards and began to yearn for items with higher practical value.

……

Walking down the mountain path, Chen Zhou couldn't help but chuckle as he looked at Laifu wagging its tail not far ahead and the locals pushing carts along the mountain path beside him, their faces showing no sign of worry.

“When I was going through the most difficult times, I was never as restless as I am now. Now that I’m doing better, I’ve become even more greedy.”

The natives and Laifu never had such worries. Isn't it better to be happy and not be troubled by those unrealistic things?

Chen Zhou straightened his straw hat and comforted himself.

"Life is like this, it's normal to have more disappointments than successes, there are joys and tears."

No matter how glorious one was in the past, one cannot guarantee that one will not fall into poverty in the future. As long as one can see the sun rise tomorrow, one must live actively. Compared to the life-or-death struggle with the natives, compared to the risk of the Spanish conquering the island, how important is a mere reward?

Could it possibly allow me to leap from the Iron Age to the Electrical Age?
Why worry or be anxious about this reward? Can't we live without it?
Are we going to starve to death?

……

Adjusting his mindset, although he still had some expectations for the reward, Chen Zhou at least managed to appear indifferent on the surface.

That's enough for him, he thought.

As a challenger, he didn't want the Time and Space Administration to be able to keep track of his mind at all times; he hated the feeling of being manipulated and having his progress planned out for him.

If he could, he would even prefer to replace all his actions with madness.

Unfortunately, if he really becomes a "mentally ill person," it might just be what the Time and Space Administration wanted. A normal person participating in the challenge is not as interesting as a madman participating in the challenge.

……

Before Chen Zhou even reached the wooden and stone wall, the natives immediately cleared a path for him.

After the third-anniversary rewards, the area of ​​the transdimensional cutting shrank back to its original size, forcing the natives to dismantle the wooden and stone walls they had painstakingly built once again.

Although the natives had wasted their time, it made Chen Zhou realize—

It turns out that the size of the mystery reward is not fixed.

The range of the transdimensional cutting depends on the size of the reward. He used to think that the mysterious reward could only send something the size of a medium-sized excavator at most.

After observing the changes in the cutting area and measuring the floor space occupied by the pile of building materials, Chen Zhou was even hesitant to imagine how large the mysterious reward could possibly be.

He wouldn't dare dream of an aircraft carrier, but he could certainly fit the size of a heavy truck or a yacht.

However, neither heavy trucks nor yachts are realistic dreams.

The natives are already busy sorting and cutting the wood and stone; all Chen Zhou needs to do is take the reward with him.

……

Enjoying the thoughtful service from the locals, Chen Zhou first glanced at the size of the reward.

Placed in the center of the wooden and stone wall are four identical plastic boxes. The boxes have no markings on their surfaces and at first glance look somewhat similar to the packaging of military products that were once delivered to the island.

However, upon closer inspection, it can be seen that the plastic used for their outer packaging is different from that used in military products, indicating that they are civilian products.

However, these boxes were all quite large, and judging from the dents in the sand, they were also quite heavy, which rekindled Chen Zhou's previously extinguished anticipation.

……

The carts brought by the indigenous people were parked next to the woodland above the beach, where the soil was firm enough for the carts to travel on.

If you try to take the easy way out and push the cart into the wet sand, you'll find it impossible to move an inch.

Chen Zhou stepped forward alone, pried off the pull tabs on both sides of the plastic box, and tried to lift it up.

The contents of the box were heavier than Chen Zhou had imagined, estimated to weigh over 50 kilograms.

This weight was nothing to Chen Zhou. He was no longer the unhealthy giant he used to be. The past three years on the island had made him strong enough that he could easily lift something weighing over 100 pounds with one hand, let alone 50 pounds.

But Chen Zhou was strong, and the poor-quality pull tabs on the plastic box couldn't support the weight of the contents inside.

Chen Zhou exerted a sudden burst of force, and the pull tab on the right side of the box snapped, causing the box, which was being lifted into the air, to fall onto the sand.

With such poor-quality pull tabs, the box itself was naturally of poor quality; when it was hit on the sand, it actually cracked.

Several flimsy plastic fragments flew out, leaving an irregular hole in the pull tab on the side of the box.

A light drizzle fell on Chen Zhou's straw hat. He was still clutching half of the pull tab, staring helplessly at the plastic box lying askew on the beach.

……

"Well, the rewards you sent before were bad, but at least you put some effort into the packaging. This time, you've even started to skimp on the packaging."

While complaining, Chen Zhou threw away the plastic pull tab, squatted down, and peered into the hole on the side of the plastic box.

Since the "blind box" already has an observation hole, he won't take it home and open it.

He was also curious about what was inside the box and why it was so heavy.

……

Although it was raining, the island was not dark.

Above the beach, the clouds, like a slightly thick veil, obscured the sun, but could not completely block its rays.

Chen Zhou stuck out his buttocks and looked awkwardly into the box. He could only see a rectangular object with many buttons of different sizes scattered on it, and there seemed to be a small screen on the side.

"Holy crap, it looks like an energy storage battery!"

Based on his intuition, Chen Zhou quickly came up with a reasonable guess as to what the reward inside the box might be.

……

"Quickly, quickly get a few people to move some large wooden planks to cover these boxes and prevent them from getting wet!"

Guessing that the box contained a storage battery, and thinking about the flashlights, shavers, and even beauty devices at home that urgently needed charging, as well as the electric tools in the auto repair kit and the appliances in the blacksmith's gift set, Chen Zhou could no longer remain calm.

"A leap from the Iron Age to the Electrical Age."

He originally just said it casually, but who would have thought it would actually come true.

At this moment, Chen Zhou had long since forgotten his previous mental preparation, and no longer cared about hiding his thoughts under the watchful eyes of the Time and Space Administration. He had only one thought—

We must transport these energy storage batteries to the cave dwelling smoothly, without allowing them to be damaged in the slightest.

Then, take off!
The real takeoff!
……

The natives were moving and arranging planks and stones, their attention completely off the chief.

They were all a little flustered when they suddenly heard Chen Zhou shout.

The group occasionally exchanged a few words as they moved the planks, and the constant sounds of rain, waves, and wind made the place somewhat noisy.

They didn't hear what Chen Zhou said at first, and could only stand there dumbfounded.

It wasn't until Chen Zhou repeated himself that the two more astute natives hurriedly ran over and held up a wide wooden plank to cover the plastic box.

The other natives were slow to react, only belatedly selecting wide planks after seeing their companions complete the order, causing Chen Zhou's blood pressure to spike.

Although he hated zebras, he had to admit that sometimes having a few more perceptive natives like zebras was a good thing.

It just so happens that Zebra is mixing syrup today, so I went to use the mixer.

If the zebra were here, this would never have happened. (End of Chapter)