Ashen God
Chapter 46: Sudden Increase in Appetite

Chapter 46: Chapter 46: Sudden Increase in Appetite

Zhao Yalan urgently summoned Spiritual Power to shield her mouth from the scalding hot soup dumpling. But by the time she looked up again, Zhang Yanhang had already disappeared without a trace. She hurriedly chased after him, wanting to find Zhang Yanhang, but standing outside the shop, Zhao Yalan could only see a figure gradually vanishing at the horizon.

"This is fast? This is ridiculously fast! Could the Speedster be right by my side?!"

Zhao Yalan initially wanted to catch up, but her gaze inadvertently swept over the nearby street. She discovered to her amazement that this jerk, who had kicked her shoe off yesterday causing her to limp and pick it up which in turn led her to be late for class, was running even faster than the cars on the road, with an overall speed that was just outrageously abnormal.

...

Zhang Yanhang, with top speed as previously described in the options, indeed took only a minute and a half to complete the entire distance.

Zhang Yanhang was not surprised that his speed now surpassed ordinary cars in the city. Because the general speed limit on city roads was around 40KM per hour, which translated to about 11 meters per second, and his speed had already reached 14 meters per second. Therefore, surpassing cars on ordinary streets with his speed was quite normal.

Besides, even if he was running on highways with higher speed limits, Zhang Yanhang could still surpass the speed of cars by further boosting his speed with the enhancement of Spiritual Qi.

After smoothly returning home, Zhang Yanhang took out the breakfast he had just bought from his Waist Bag. This time, he had bought a total of four baskets of pork soup dumplings, two bowls of millet porridge, two tea eggs, a bowl of pork wontons, and a beef pastry.

Right, as could be inferred from the lunch Zhang Yanhang bought yesterday, his appetite was considerably larger than that of an ordinary person. So he ate enough to satisfy two to three full-grown adults in one meal.

If one were to ask why the reason might be that ordinary food contains too little energy, and for Awakeners who have developed Superpowers, the related burdens and consumption were much higher than that of ordinary cultivators. Hence, to acquire more nutrients, they need to consume large amounts of food.

Well, this was the explanation given by experts from the Empire. Generally speaking, such a sudden increase in appetite was actually quite common among Awakeners. However, ordinary cultivators did not need to worry about this at all as their appetite generally remained the same, and even decreased to a certain extent because their flesh was nourished by Spiritual Energy.

In fact, if the appetite of ordinary cultivators also increased, it’s likely that the Empire would consider delaying the time to start universal cultivation. Otherwise, the universal cultivation would lead to an unprecedented food crisis, with a quarter of the global population going hungry. No matter how you think about it, the consequence would be extremely dire.

By the way, Zhang Yanhang’s appetite had increased by about double since awakening his Superpower. He used to be satisfied with just two baskets of buns and a bowl of porridge, followed by a bowl of wontons. For his height and weight, this amount of food was quite normal. Of course, it wasn’t normal after the increase.

As for how to resolve this issue of increased appetite? The answer is simple: just diligently practice Cultivation. Elevate oneself to Second Tier through cultivating a Cultivation Method, and one will automatically acquire the ability of grain avoidance. By then, one can completely replace the energy provided by food with Spiritual Power.

That is to say, once one is promoted to Second Tier, even if one just drinks a bit of the northwest wind (which brings Spiritual Energy), one will be satisfied.

When that time comes, if one still wants to continue eating, it will entirely be for the pleasure of indulging one’s taste buds.

However, as much as grain avoidance in some ways is a good thing, from another perspective, it’s also a bad thing. After all, if everyone practices grain avoidance, no one will consume food anymore, and the economy will certainly decline, likely causing a large number of restaurants to go bankrupt and inevitably leading to a massive wave of unemployment.

But for ordinary people to cultivate themselves to Second Tier would require a long time and during this period, the Empire would definitely lead the relevant industries to transform and gradually diminish the power of the looming wave of unemployment.

In fact, at present, the Empire has many emerging industries that need to be vigorously developed—all related to Spiritual Qi, because, after all, the Spiritual Qi Recovery has occurred, so related industries must catch up.

So, since the Empire chose to actively initiate universal cultivation, it indicates that the Empire has made thorough preparations. Engaging in an unprepared battle is certainly not the Empire’s style.

Zhang Yanhang, while eating his breakfast, opened a news video to see what major events had happened yesterday. In fact, this was also a habit of Zhang Yan, he liked to watch the news while eating to help him stay informed about recent policies related to Awakeners and any changes.

Because Awakeners were a new group, various minor adjustments often occurred. Therefore, as a bona fide stakeholder, Zhang Yanhang naturally needed to pay attention to these matters.

As expected, yesterday’s top news story was still related to Awakeners, but not those from the Empire. Instead, it was about an Awakener from the small African nation of Gambia who, due to his own strength, incited a civil war.

But to call it a civil war would be more apt to describe it as a one-sided thrashing. This Awakener, immune to the attacks of guns, simply ignored the siege of hundreds of military and police officers and stormed into the presidential palace, killing the president.

As for Gambia, Zhang Yanhang was actually quite familiar with it. After all, this country had an extremely arrogant foreign policy and was skilled at flip-flopping in its stance. It had left the Commonwealth seven years ago, only to rejoin two years later. It had boasted wildly about conquering North America in one day and even threatened Russia that it would send troops to help them establish a genuine "democracy" and "soil oil."

With a total national population of only two million and a GDP of less than ten billion, the combined military and police forces didn’t even reach four digits, yet their foreign policy involved constant erratic flip-flopping. Zhang Yanhang really couldn’t comprehend this country.

In fact, except for the founding father, almost all of the country’s presidents had come to power through such strange methods.

About such civil wars occurring in small African countries, Zhang Yanhang was already somewhat accustomed. In fact, ever since the beginning of the Spiritual Qi recovery to the present, the chaos in Africa has hardly ceased. Every once in a while, there would always be a powerful Awakener who refused to submit to national control and would embark on a path of rebellion.