Yan Lin thought something felt off about this, so he told Chu Zhiwei right away.
He didn't lower his voice on purpose when he spoke.
Every male present was at least an S-rank ability user, so they heard every word clearly.
River had already been feeling like his pollution value had somehow gone down, so the second he heard Yan Lin say that, he pulled out his pollution value detector and ran a test on himself.
Soon enough, he turned to You Lu. "My lady, my pollution value has dropped by 3 points too."
You Lu and Chu Zhiwei wore the exact same confused expression.
A male's pollution value never drops on its own, and neither of them had purified their own husbands' pollution for anyone that day.
Even if they had done the purifying, there was no way it would only bring the value down by such a tiny margin.
Chu Zhiwei thought for a moment, then looked at her other husbands. "All of you, test your pollution values too."
You Lu told her own husbands to do the same.
More than twenty husbands took turns testing themselves with the detector, and the results showed that every single male there, no matter what their pollution value had been before arriving, was now 3 to 5 points lower.
Chu Zhiwei couldn't help turning to look at Yunyang. "Yangyang, did you do a group purification?"
"No, I didn't."
Yunyang was confused too. How could eating a meal lower their pollution values?
There were no records of anything like this in the entire Federation, so at first the three females didn't even connect the change to the food.
But after they asked all their husbands what they had done that whole day, they realized that other than that dinner, their daily routines had been completely normal.
The only thing in that dinner that they never got to eat on a regular basis was the young vegetable shoots Yunyang had grown.
Verifying this was simple enough. Yunyang had Butler Five pick more of the vegetable shoots and give them to Rong Jin to cook.
Then she picked out the few husbands with the highest pollution values from the group to eat the newly cooked shoots and run another test.
Yan Lin was one of the ones selected.
He was more than happy to cooperate, and did everything Yunyang said without a single complaint.
Unfortunately, after those few husbands finished another serving of stir-fried pea shoots, their pollution values didn't drop any further.
You Lu was sure the vegetable shoots were the cause. "Yangyang, is it because they already ate some once today, so the values can't go down any more right now?"
That was very possible.
Yunyang nodded. "Then you all can come over to my place again tomorrow to test this out?"
You Lu and Chu Zhiwei had no objections.
The second Yan Lin heard that, he was already thinking that if they kept running tests the next day, he'd get to eat those sweet, delicious vegetables again.
But the very next moment, a very important thought hit him like a ton of bricks.
If they kept the tests going tomorrow, his pollution value couldn't be lowered before then. That meant his lady wouldn't favor him tonight!
Yan Lin felt like the sky was falling. Once they got back to Chu Zhiwei's villa, he looked at her with big, pitiful eyes.
"My lady..."
Chu Zhiwei looked at him, amused, and reached out to ruffle the top of his head as he leaned in toward her.
"We can skip it for tonight. I'll make it up to you once Yangyang finishes her tests."
Yan Lin was instantly satisfied, and nodded so fast his hair bounced.
Meanwhile, Yunyang tested the pollution values of her ten husbands, and found that the highest one was Fu Shiyi, at only 34 points.
And she had drawn Fu Shiyi's name on her schedule that morning.
Seeing her hesitation, Fu Shiyi leaned down and gently brushed his nose against hers.
"My lady, you should get a good rest tonight."
He voluntarily gave up his chance to be favored.
That was one of Yunyang's favorite things about Fu Shiyi: he knew when to step forward, and when to step back.
She kissed him on the lips. "Then you will stay with me to rest tomorrow night."
"Alright."
After kissing Fu Shiyi, Yunyang gave every one of her other husbands a goodnight kiss one by one, then headed back to her own room for the night.
The next day, the three best friends each brought out the husband with the highest pollution value from their households. After testing their initial pollution values, they had the men eat the vegetable shoots.
Qin Mo stood by, holding the pollution value detector.
Once the three men finished eating the shoots, he tested each of them a second time one after another.
Fu Shiyi's pollution value dropped from 34 to 31.
River's pollution value dropped from 51 to 47.
Yan Lin's pollution value dropped from 67 to 62.
Even Yunyang couldn't believe the results.
Her vegetable shoots really could lower pollution values?
This was an incredibly important discovery. After running a few more verification tests, Yunyang promptly packed up all the data and sent it to Si Zhao.
At that moment, Si Zhao was buried in government affairs, but since the message was from Yunyang, she dropped everything immediately to open it.
The second she finished reading the message, Si Zhao shot to her feet.
"Your Majesty, what's wrong?" He Youchuan moved the chair out of the way just in time to keep her from bumping into it.
"Yangyang says they've discovered that fresh vegetables can lower pollution values." Si Zhao's expression was bright with excitement. "Youchuan, prepare the starship. We're going to Yangyang's place."
If this was real, far fewer males in the Federation would lose control and turn feral, and the soldiers stationed on the remote border stars wouldn't have to rely on inhibitors to get by.
No government matter could be more important than this!
Of course, she couldn't just leave all her work completely unattended.
So Si Yanning was forced to take over all that unfinished business.
Si Yanning: ᵀᵂᵀ
Mom is so mean!
I'm still a minor orc!
Si Yanning's wails never reached Si Zhao's ears. After telling her other husbands to direct any urgent matters to Si Yanning, she took He Youchuan and several of her imperial husbands and set off for Planet H2978.
Two hours later, the starship touched down.
Si Zhao hurried straight into Yunyang's manor.
Before she even saw Yunyang and the other two, she noticed the archaic-style plants and vegetables growing in the manor first.
Si Zhao had toured the archaic botanical garden on Planet S28 before, and she often visited the cultivation bases on the central planet, but none of the archaic plants or vegetables there grew half as well as the ones in Yangyang's manor.
How did Yangyang manage to grow them so well?
Si Zhao was lost in that thought as she walked toward the villa, and Yunyang and the other two, who had been alerted by the robot butler, came out to greet her at the same time.
"Sister Zhaozhao."
Yunyang had barely gotten the greeting out when Si Zhao reached out and grabbed her hand tightly.
"Yangyang, is what you told me true?"
Yunyang swallowed the rest of the small talk she was about to say. "It's true. Since you brought your imperial husbands with you, why don't you let them try it out?"
Si Zhao nodded hard, and immediately had her other imperial husbands run the test.
He Youchuan, however, had just been favored by her not long before, so his pollution value was at 0, and he had no chance to take part in the trial.
The other imperial husbands first tested their baseline pollution values, then ate the vegetable noodles Yunyang had her husbands prepare for them, before testing their values a second time.
Two of the imperial husbands whose pollution values were over 30 both saw their values drop by 5 points.
The third imperial husband, whose pollution value was only 28, saw no change at all after eating the vegetable shoots.
That meant the vegetable shoots worked the same way as the spiritual power purification that females used: they could only lower a male's pollution value to 30 at most.
Even so, this was earth-shattering good news.
Si Zhao immediately got to work arranging things, sending researchers from the cultivation base to learn from Yunyang.
She was completely certain that the ordinary vegetables the Federation grew didn't have this special effect.
So she figured the difference must be in Yunyang's unique planting methods, which made her vegetables far more effective than anything the cultivation bases could produce.
Under Si Zhao's arrangements, a large group of researchers soon settled down on Planet H2978 to learn everything they could from Yunyang.
But it didn't take long for the researchers to realize there were some things they simply could never learn, no matter how hard they tried.
