The creek was much livelier at night than during the day. Although he didn’t see any fish, there were many small shrimp, each about as thick as a bean sprout.

Lin Chen had originally wanted to try catching them, but before his hand even touched the water, the alert little critters vanished with a SWOOSH.

"Looks like shrimp are off the menu for now. I’ll weave a fish trap and leave it here later. I refuse to believe I won’t be able to catch you then."

He squatted by the creek and submerged the bottom of his bamboo basket, letting the clear water thoroughly soak the wild vegetables inside.

He swirled the contents gently but quickly with his hand a few times, then lifted the basket and let the dirty water drain out through the gaps in the bamboo weave.

As he held the basket steady, the beam from his Hat Lamp naturally fell on the opposite bank of the creek.

Behind a few unremarkable tree trunks, a tree with long, shuttle-shaped leaves caught his attention.

It wasn’t that the leaves themselves were particularly eye-catching—many trees had similar shapes. The real point of interest was the numerous round, yellow fruits hanging from the branches, hidden among the foliage.

He squinted and said to the camera in a low voice.

"Can anyone see that tree in the distance?"

"It’s right behind those two tree trunks—the shorter one. There are a bunch of round, yellow fruits among the leaves."

[Can’t see it. It’s too far.]

[The camera isn’t clear enough. You need to get closer.]

[All I can see is a blurry, dark, round shape.]

[Even if I could see it, I wouldn’t recognize it. Just tell us, what is it?]

Lin Chen hadn’t expected to find this here. This was one of the most useful plants in ancient Great Xia, and a very common ingredient in modern medicine.

It just wasn’t very well-known to the average person.

Instead of answering immediately, Lin Chen took off his boots and socks, rolled up his pant legs, waded barefoot across the creek, and then put everything back on.

He wasn’t too concerned about his socks getting damp at this point, but he tried his best to keep his boots from getting wet.

As he edged closer, the mysterious fruit tree slowly came into focus on camera, revealing its true appearance.

[What is it?! Just tell us already, the suspense is killing me!]

[Yeah, yeah! We won’t recognize it even if you tell us, but hurry up! I can’t wait to hear what it’s used for.]

[It’s probably not edible, right? I can sense a hint of excitement in your voice. My guess is... it’s for washing your hair?]

[Hahahaha, "washing hair," that’s a good one. I’ll bet it’s for bathing, then. It was the same in the Alaska Forest—he was so happy for a long time after finding a plant he could wash his hair with.]

A dense barrage of comments urging him to hurry scrolled across his watch. Lin Chen nodded with an amused smile.

"You guys actually guessed right. It is indeed a fruit that can be used for washing your hair and body, and it’s also a medicinal ingredient."

"Its English name is soapnut, or soapberry. Judging by the name, I don’t need to explain much, do I?"

"Not only can you use it to wash your hair, face, and body, it also disinfects and sterilizes. You can even wash clothes with it. It’s about seventy percent as effective as a commercial detergent."

"Besides cleaning, it has many other medicinal properties, but I’m not too clear on those. In any case, out here in the wild, its main use is for cleaning."

He stopped under the tree, his headlamp illuminating the longan-sized fruits from up close.

Their skins were smooth and yellowish-green, and a few of them had raised, walnut-like ridges on their surface.

"Because it has seventy percent of the cleaning power of detergent, this fruit isn’t actually edible. Nobody wants to eat a bar of soap, right?"

He snapped off a thin branch laden with fruit and tossed it into his basket. He didn’t need many; a single fruit was enough to wash his hair or face.

In this heat, they would go bad before he had a chance to use them if he picked too many.

He recalled that the ripening season for soapnuts in Panama was from January to April. This meant that about half of the fruit on the tree was still unripe.

Leaving them on the tree would preserve them for longer.

The discovery of the soapnut lifted his spirits. On second thought, he realized he hadn’t really explored this side of the creek before.

The forest on the slope on this side of the creek was down from where he’d previously found a few Bamboo Trees and the Tobacco Forest. This entire section was unfamiliar territory to him.

RUSTLE

The sound of shaking branches came from above his head.

Lin Chen snapped his head up, but only caught the afterimage of rustling leaves. The branch was empty.

’Probably a monkey?’

He wasn’t afraid of something like that. Creatures in the trees were relatively harmless. The real fear was walking through the pitch-black forest and having his light catch a pair of reflective eyes.

And he didn’t mean a wolf, but a Jaguar.

It was true that Jaguars usually didn’t attack humans, but "usually" wasn’t "never."

’What if?’

The thought of that possibility made him tighten his grip on the bamboo knife, and he became even more cautious.

After wandering through the silent forest for a good while, he hadn’t encountered any dangerous beasts, but he had run into plenty of familiar faces.

A sloth lounging on a branch, a raccoon with a pointy white nose, multicolored toads, and he even came across a few Kapibaras that were just spacing out.

"How strange. Did I wander into a zoo? What happened to all the spices and fruit that are supposed to be everywhere?"

’Are they further down?’

He thought about it for a moment, then dismissed the idea of heading down into an unfamiliar valley in the pitch dark.

The memory of his encounter with the American Crocodile in the Mangrove Forest was still vivid. Valleys were rich with fruit, and night was peak activity time for wildlife. He had no desire for a chance encounter with any other local kingpins, singly or in groups.

He changed his route, heading back toward the creek. But driven by the thought, ’Well, since I’m already here,’ he stubbornly kept searching the ground.