The reason for the speculation is very simple. When the natural disaster struck, the majority of the tea trees in the tea plantations should have died, but those major tea-growing provinces, presumably to preserve the seeds, would definitely have kept some.
Due to the flood, in order to preserve seeds, they would likely distribute a few tea trees to all the water bases. As for the tea frying technique, consider that before the disaster, even small workshops had begun to mechanize tea frying" - there were no professional tea fryers left.
At this time, due to the machinery not being repaired, the tea leaves one drinks are most likely fried by novices. The tea fryer could very likely be an Awakener with a Fire System ability and a non-combat profession since energy is currently a problem as well.
Official Liam was shocked by Dong Tianyu's analysis, but he quickly regained his composure.
