Chapter 59

It was getting dark.

Once night fell, the small town of Hexi was completely engulfed in darkness. Of the ten streetlights on the road, only one was on. Chen Fa said this was to save electricity, as there was a curfew in the town and no one went out at night. Therefore, having one or two streetlights on each street was enough.

The town had no high-rise buildings. Shu Fu stood by the window of the second-floor room that Chen Fa had tidied up for her. Looking through the reinforced glass, all she could see was a haze of different shades of black, and the darkness seemed to blend with the rain, making everything even more indistinct.

This darkness wasn’t quiet. In addition to the pattering sound of rain, there seemed to be other noises too.

She could hear faint crying and some arguing, though she couldn’t tell which building they were coming from. In the aftermath of a disaster, there were always unstable individuals.

The residents of the town and the team members were very cautious. Even when lights were on at night, they didn’t use bright lights. Every household kept their curtains drawn, perhaps fearing that the small amount of light in their homes would attract flying insects and crawling creatures from the outside, or maybe for some other reason, so they intentionally kept everything concealed.

Shu Fu didn’t turn on any lights either. It was simply a habit of being low-key and hidden. In unfamiliar places, she always made a point to avoid standing in any light sources in the darkness.

Chen Fa must have already gone to bed. She had been busy the whole day, patrolling in the morning and afternoon. If there were any disturbances, team members would come to her for a solution.

In the morning, she had seen her grandmother take the medicine and fall asleep, then busied herself tidying up the room. Around noon, some team members Shu Fu had met came by to say the food was ready at the small restaurant and asked if Chen Fa and the newcomers were going there to eat.

Chen Fa had briefly mentioned the situation in the team while they were tidying the room together. The team was called the Yang Can Squad. “Yang” means sunlight, hoping for less rain and more sunshine, while “can” represents brilliance but also refers to the squad leader’s girlfriend, Cheng Can.

Now, in these difficult times with scarce resources, the team didn’t do charitable work and didn’t take in outsiders. Once capable individuals joined the team, they had specific tasks to fulfill. Those who were physically strong and knew some martial arts would patrol, guard the power plant in the mountains, or carry out deep searches for supplies in abandoned houses within their assigned neighborhood.

Those with certain skills would go to repair and reinforce doors and windows, maintain water filtration systems, tend to indoor hydroponic plants, raise a few chickens and ducks, or cook for the team.

The team members worked hard, and in return, they received corresponding supplies and some benefits, like free meals with limited portions.

In addition to the team members, there were also their family members—non-team members who couldn’t enjoy the same benefits as the team. Whether a boyfriend, girlfriend, or relative, anyone who wasn’t a member of the team couldn’t receive the team’s perks.

So, team members either had to find a way to get their family members a job within the team, or they had to work hard themselves and receive extra supplies to support their family.

Chen Fa’s situation was the latter. She was capable, smart, and not afraid to get her hands dirty. After joining the team, she was quickly voted in as the deputy leader, and now the resources and benefits she received were enough to support herself and her grandmother.

Shu Fu didn’t want to join the team, nor did she want to eat food from strangers in such resource-scarce times. She didn’t want to rely on Chen Fa, either. She was about to say that she could handle her own meals when Chen Fa stopped her and then addressed her team members, saying, “This is my sister, also a family member. I’ll take care of her daily life, and the meals will stay the same as usual.”

“Same as usual” was understood by the team members, meaning the same as before—one portion per person, three meals a day.

Chen Fa was the deputy leader, and there were always clever team members who wanted to get close to her and form good relationships. So, when it came to meals, they usually covered the cost. Today was no exception. After confirming, one of the team members pulled out a large three-tiered round food container wrapped in plastic from under his raincoat, carefully placed it on the table, and then left.

After the person left, Chen Fa immediately opened the container. The first layer contained three roasted potatoes, golden and crisp. The second layer held half a box of boiled lettuce. The third layer contained three plump homemade steamed buns.

The Yang Can Squad’s meals were very simple, so simple that Shu Fu felt a little sorry for them.

But Chen Fa seemed used to it. With an indifferent expression, she entered the kitchen, grabbed a rice cooker and three sets of bowls and chopsticks. When she opened the rice cooker, it was filled with hot rice porridge, likely prepared for her grandmother as a special meal for the sick.

She then took a jar of pickled mixed vegetables from the fridge and retrieved two cans from the cupboard.

One was five-spice beef, and the other was pork ribs with potatoes. She skillfully opened the cans, poured the contents into bowls, and then placed them in the microwave to warm.

With that, the simple meal quickly transformed into four dishes with one main course, including both meat and vegetables.

While Chen Fa was busy adding to the meal, Shu Fu mentioned that she had food in her backpack and added that before coming into the town, she had hidden some inconveniently packed food in her inflatable boat bag, so she could manage on her own.

She wanted to go upstairs to get her backpack, but Chen Fa grabbed her and pulled her back from the stairs.

“Stop fooling around. I’m a deputy leader. It’s just an extra portion of food. No need to save it for me!” Chen Fa pulled her back to the dining table, letting her eat first. She herself scooped a bowl of porridge, took a large plate, added half a bun, some boiled lettuce, some pickled vegetables for the porridge, and finally two pieces of five-spice beef, then went upstairs to bring food to her grandmother.

Of course, Shu Fu couldn’t eat first. She waited for Chen Fa to come downstairs, and only then did they share the simple lunch together.

During lunch, Chen Fa told her that the food in the team wasn’t really that bad. Next to the town of Hexi was Qinghe, and no matter how tight other supplies were, fish was never lacking.

The large Malaysia team had two boats. The bigger one was for the team’s own use. As long as the weather wasn’t too extreme, they would go out to fish every day. The smaller boat was rented out to the team members and residents of the areas they were responsible for. The fish caught could be traded at the grocery store or kept for personal use.

The fish in the nearby waters were large, and when there was a food shortage, residents could exchange various things for fish, enough to eat their fill.

Those seemingly useless gold items in the town could be traded for supplies in Lucheng, where the team there accepted such goods.

Compared to the Yang Can team, the locals were more trusting of the Malaysia team. When the two teams divided the streets, many people moved to the Malaysia team’s district and gradually got used to the bartering system.

The Yang Can team didn’t have boats, but when they evacuated from Lucheng, the roads were still clear, so they managed to bring plenty of supplies with them, attracting some capable individuals to join.

For example, the hydropower station in the mountains had suffered problems during an extreme natural disaster, with unstable power supply and frequent outages. Later, Yang Can’s team managed to repair it, so now they controlled the power station, and the Malaysia team had to trade other supplies if they wanted to use electricity.

Items like rice, flour, daily necessities, hydroponic vegetable seeds, healthy live chickens and ducks, and fish were all available for trade.

In short, both teams had what the other needed, which allowed them to maintain a relatively peaceful situation after several conflicts.

In the town of Hexi, fish was the least valuable, mostly because of the lack of clean, drinkable water. Therefore, the cooking style was simple. Fresh fish was usually made into grilled fish or steamed fish. Sometimes, when there was too much fish that couldn’t be eaten in time, it was smoked over firewood to make dried fish and extend its shelf life.

When Chen Fa got to this point, she saw Shu Fu hesitating with a piece of steamed bun in her mouth, and immediately understood that she had caught the main point. So she continued, “Well, there is fish in the lunch, but I told them I’m allergic to it, so they always change it for me. You can call me picky or troublesome, but after seeing the fish that survived the flood zone… I don’t want to eat fish anymore.”

“Maybe one day, when things get worse, and supplies are even scarcer, I’ll eat it, but not now… You shouldn’t eat fish either. If you want meat, I have lots of canned food, including lunch meat. It’s not as fresh, but at least it’s reassuring to eat…”

A few days ago, Shu Fu had just eaten a homemade grilled bass on the drifting island house: …

**

Of course, Shu Fu understood Chen Fa’s concerns because she had been bothered by it as well.

If she hadn’t had the automatic water area fishing rod with “one-click sterilization” features, she probably wouldn’t have eaten fish either.

However, she felt that Chen Fa’s concern about eating fish wasn’t just about that.

After all, in peacetime, people did eat piranhas and sharks, with piranhas even being praised by many as high-protein, nutritious, and delicious…

Shu Fu reached out to pull the curtains, took out the lottery wheel, and began spinning.

The first spin: Blue fourth prize: Raft fencing ×5

The second spin: Red third prize: Fruit gift set ×10

Both prizes were very practical. The raft fencing was something she had wanted before, and fruits were always welcome.

Because the wristband space was limited, she didn’t claim the fruit gift set yet, so she wasn’t sure which fruits it contained, but the red gift set had never been disappointing. She planned to store this prize in the lottery wheel and claim it when her stocked fruits in her wristband were used up.

She was satisfied with the prizes, though not overly so. After all, she wasn’t on the drifting island house anymore, and this town gave her a weird feeling. At this stage, she needed the personal protective shield more.

But this prize was hard to come by, so she realized that before the next lottery, she’d need to wash her hands carefully, apply some fragrant hand cream, and pray sincerely to increase her chances of good luck!

This was Shu Fu’s first night in the town. The room was too small to set up the raft, and although only Chen Fa, her grandmother, and she were living in this small building, this was her first night outside the drifting island house in a long time. Since it was still early, she couldn’t sleep.

The nighttime temperature dropped to around 20°C. It wasn’t very hot indoors, but it was still a little stuffy and humid. The bedding was just changed by Chen Fa. It was hot weather, so there was no need for blankets, just a light cover was enough.

Shu Fu couldn’t sleep, so she sat up against the headboard. The floor lamp was too far away and too bright, so she took out a small charging table lamp from her wristband and placed it on the bed. Then she took out her notebook and pen and began flipping through the disaster outline she had recorded earlier.

As she reviewed, she slowly drank a bottle of strawberry milk, and after finishing, she circled the words “aquatic life mutations.”

This was the only disaster that hadn’t occurred yet. The strange disease this time was probably related to it.

Shu Fu turned to a new page and recorded the known details.

First, there were definitely sick people in the Yang Can team, because Chen Fa had said the “symptoms were similar,” so it was likely more than one person, which was why Tang Ping had been preparing and delivering medicine. But Chen Fa seemed quite wary of this disease, almost paranoid at times. For example, Chen Fa’s grandmother, who clearly had a cold, fever, and pneumonia, was still forced to take medicine on time simply because her symptoms were similar to those of the disease.

Second, the network in Hexi Town had been down for a while, and the locals had no idea if there were more sick people outside. When they crossed the flood zone to exchange supplies, they never mentioned anything about the strange disease to those they traded with, acting as if it was a taboo subject. This was why the Yang Can team knew so little about the sicknesses happening outside.

Usually, curing diseases and understanding the situation outside should be more important than keeping secrets, right?

Shu Fu was curious, but since Chen Fa hadn’t explained it clearly yet, there must have been her own reasons. She wouldn’t push for answers.

Since she couldn’t leave Hexi Town right now, she decided to relax and wait for the next task to appear.

It was a pity that the secret of her space couldn’t be revealed, or else she could help Chen Fa and her grandmother with extra meals. She felt a little guilty hiding in her room and making something extra when the door was locked like this.

But it was unavoidable.

As Shu Fu thought this, her hand instinctively reached into her space and took out a bowl of clean cherries, slowly eating them…

She sighed self-deprecatingly while eating, thinking to herself that, indeed, it’s easier to fall into luxury than to get back to simplicity…

And since she couldn’t sleep this early, how about putting on some headphones and watching a variety show?

**

Chen Fa’s grandmother, Chen Yuezhen, was a former literary soldier. Even when she retired, she still maintained the habit of daily physical training. So, compared to people of her age, she was in great physical shape.

According to Chen Fa, whenever her grandmother visited home during her university holidays, she would find opportunities to sneak attack her, testing whether she had been lazy while in Suicheng or if she had kept up with her daily physical exercises and self-defense training.

Although she was elderly, her strong foundation allowed her to recover gradually. Even without the conditions for IV drips or anti-inflammatory medication, the few boxes of medicine Shu Fu had brought helped her regain her strength over four or five days.

Not only could she get out of bed, but she also began using the limited furniture and household items in the house for simple physical exercises.

The first time Shu Fu saw Chen Fa’s grandmother doing squats with a towel over her head, she stood still for a full minute.

Chen Fa, seeing this, casually placed her hand on Shu Fu’s shoulder and said, “Just doing squats shows she’s being very restrained. It means her body hasn’t fully recovered yet. Just keep watching, you’ll get used to it.”

Shu Fu: …

However, Chen Yuezhen’s recovery was limited to the building.

Whenever someone other than the three of them appeared in the villa, Chen Yuezhen would retreat to her room on the upper floor and lie back down in bed.

Tang Ping came every other day to deliver medicine. Chen Fa always received it gratefully, but once he left, she would pour it down the drain, wash the thermos, and wait for other team members to bring her food so that she could return the thermos to Tang Ping.

As for the other team members, even if Chen Yuezhen didn’t retreat to her room, they wouldn’t recklessly go upstairs. After all, this was Chen Fa’s residence. They would only ask about Chen Yuezhen’s condition when they came over.

Chen Fa would always answer briefly.

Some of the more naive team members, after asking, would gossip privately, saying that the frequent natural disasters were already terrifying enough, and now so many people were getting sick. There was no medicine, and once someone got sick, it was hard to recover…

The person who spoke was quickly stopped by other team members nearby, and they looked back at Chen Fa several times before leaving, as if afraid she would be upset.

The nights in the town were never truly quiet, with cries and arguments often heard in the darkness. Sometimes they would stop quickly, but other times they would drag on intermittently for a long time.

On Shu Fu’s fifth night in the town, she was suddenly awakened in the middle of the night by a shrill scream from outside. The scream stretched out, sending a chill down her spine.

Since Chen Fa’s building was close to the street, she couldn’t tell if the sound came from the street or the residential area where their team was staying.

She stood by the window, looking out for a long time. She vaguely saw the door of one of the small buildings in the lodging area open, and several people ran out into the rain and entered another building. After a while, those people came out again, seemingly with more people in tow, though she couldn’t tell what they were carrying. They didn’t return to their original building, but instead turned a corner and headed deeper into the lodging area, quickly disappearing into the rain-soaked night.

Since there were only two streetlights on the entire street, it was so dark that, no matter how hard Shu Fu tried, she could only make out vague silhouettes.

But from her perspective, anything that made people run out into the rain in the middle of the night, especially in such dark conditions, had to be something serious.

She believed that everyone in the area must have heard the noise, but not only did the people in the nearby buildings not come out, even Chen Fa and Chen Yuezhen, who were next door, didn’t make a sound.

The next morning, the team members who brought breakfast had dark circles under their eyes and looked like they had suffered from insomnia for most of the night.

Their appearances clearly indicated that they knew what had happened last night, but they didn’t bring it up. After placing the meals down, they left quickly, speaking less than usual.

As Shu Fu watched a few team members leave, Chen Fa patted her shoulder from behind, pulling her thoughts back. “The town isn’t exactly peaceful, especially after dark. That’s why I told you not to go outside after nightfall.”

Shu Fu remembered that on her first day in town, Chen Fa had warned her not to leave after dark.

At first, she thought it was because of the disputes between the two teams—some issues that couldn’t be resolved during the day might escalate at night, when the dim light made it easier for people to act under cover. But now, she realized that Chen Fa’s warning had nothing to do with the big team from Malaysia.

Shu Fu didn’t mind whether she went out or not, but after several days of eating and drinking at Chen Fa’s, she felt embarrassed, almost guilty. She even secretly sneaked in extra snacks at night, feeling like she was doing something wrong.

The situation in Hexi Town was completely different from when they were in Lou Yuncheng. The order had already collapsed, and the chaotic times had arrived. At this stage, she couldn’t just leave Chen Fa and live outside on her own.

So she planned to go out during the day, using the excuse of “fetching the supplies she had hidden when they came ashore” to prepare a reasonable waterproof travel bag and bring some extra meals for Chen Fa and her grandmother.

“Keep your supplies hidden, I have plenty of canned food here. It’s enough for us.”

Shu Fu: …

Could she say that she didn’t want to eat canned food anymore?

In her space, she at least had vacuum-packed braised beef, roast chicken, soy-scented duck, steak, pizza… she could even fit a small bottle of cooking oil in there. If she sliced the steamed buns and potatoes and fried them, they’d taste a lot better than the current boiled or grilled food…

Though she didn’t speak, her expression said it all.

“…” Chen Fa rubbed her forehead. In the end, it was her “wishful thinking.” She reached out and pinched Shu Fu’s cheek, then sighed. “Okay, I don’t need to patrol today. Let’s go tomorrow. Tomorrow, when I go on patrol, you can come with me. I’ll show you the route, let you familiarize yourself with the boundary lines of the two teams, and then you can get your supplies.”

Shu Fu understood. Chen Fa was worried she’d get lost or accidentally wander into the other team’s territory. “Then tomorrow, we’ll both go out. What about your grandmother?”

“It’s fine. Just like before, when I leave, I’ll lock the door. She’ll stay in her room. We’ll be back by noon anyway.”

Chen Fa was very serious about her work. Since she didn’t have patrol duties during the day, she spent some time drawing a simple map of Hexi Town, marking the location of their lodging and outlining the boundary lines of the two teams.

But the town wasn’t well-planned, with many narrow alleys and side roads. Chen Fa’s drawing skills were also just passable. The two of them sat at the table, heads close together, discussing the map for a while. In the end, they decided to personally show each other the safest routes out and back to the town tomorrow.

Because of this, when a team member came to deliver lunch, Chen Fa took a moment to briefly explain the plan for tomorrow.

**

The next day, Shu Fu woke up early. She had prepared a waterproof travel bag the night before, so today, she only needed to leave the town, find a suitable spot near the water, and pretend to take out the travel bag.

She changed into her outdoor clothes and made all the preparations. Just as she was about to leave, her wristband suddenly vibrated.

She immediately had a bad feeling.

Taking advantage of a trip to the bathroom, she checked her wristband, and sure enough, a new task had arrived.

【Within 24 hours, complete the check-in task for Hexi Town Shanshui Lodging, Building 4, to receive a 10% progress on the Level 4 Raft. (Current progress on Level 4 Raft: 25%)

Note: Failure to complete this task will result in a 20% deduction from the progress.】

Shu Fu: …

Hexi Town Shanshui Lodging, Building 4?

That’s the building where Chen Fa is staying right now!

She had been living there for six or seven days!

What does this mean?

Did the task experience a delay?