Chapter 155

Life was hard, and the Cai family couldn't just sit back and enjoy all the food. Guo Hui wanted to grow mushrooms, so he brought his own strains of mushrooms, and Qin Huai and the others managed to get sawdust. Every process was tedious and time-consuming. In addition, he had made a lot of money selling mushrooms in Qinghe before, so he could still make ends meet for a while, so he didn't go out with the Cai family to find a job.

Cai Wenwen is a girl, and doing too much physical work will harm her health. She has no way to find easy work. Her parents and brother don't want her to go out to work, so they simply let Cai Wenwen stay at home to help in the mushroom room. Things like recording time, observing the degree of maturity during the cultivation process, and other detailed work can all be left to Cai Wenwen.

Cai Wenwen's cousin, Xiaozhu's mother, Cai Siqi, is responsible for taking care of the chores. Together with Aunt Yin, she is responsible for making the limited food as delicious and filling as possible. However, there are only a few ingredients and no matter how they are cooked, they can't make much difference. At most, they can borrow some electrical appliances from Song Jia's house and beat the coarse grains or cornmeal they bought to make it more delicate. At least the food made in this way is not difficult to eat.

Thinking that Song Jia was alone on weekdays and his brother had to work in a factory where meals were provided, it would be troublesome for him to cook by himself, so Aunt Yin asked Song Jia if he wanted to eat with them.

Song Jia thought that was okay, usually when his brother was not at home for dinner, he would just mess around, either making pancakes and steamed buns in advance, or just making some noodles. Now there was no vegetable to fry, at most if he got sick from eating these things, he would take some ingredients from home to exchange for a bag of chili sauce from Mu Nan.

Mu Nan still has a lot of small bags of chili sauce, each bag is ten grams. He eats them sparingly and puts the unfinished ones in the refrigerator. Just this small bag can last him ten days.

Song Jia not only eats for himself, but also needs to feed Niu Niu. Without dog food, Niu Niu can only eat noodles or rice buns. Aunt Yin feels sorry for Song Jia when she sees him feeding the dog with these things. She doesn't have enough food for herself, and she still feeds the dog. But this dog is someone else's dog. Although she has never raised one, and doesn't quite understand what it means to treat a dog as a family member, she won't be annoying and talkative. But every time she sees Niu Niu eating white flour buns, she can't help showing a painful expression.

Song Jia had no choice. He also understood why others couldn't understand him. People couldn't survive, but they were still feeding dogs. However, the Cai family would not say anything directly, especially Xiao Zhu, who would secretly feed Niu Niu his own food. He thought it was very good to be able to do so. Raising a large dog like Niu Niu, which is considered to be a fierce dog in the living environment in the city, he was really inferior to others in many aspects. In the past, he was clearly the first to get on the elevator, but he was asked to wait for the next one just because he was holding Niu Niu's hand.

Therefore, other people's non-malicious attitude is a rare kindness to Song Jia. Dog owners are just so humble.

The most important thing is that Aunt Yin is a good cook. She can make many kinds of noodles. Now there is no vegetable, so we can only eat rice and noodles. Noodles are the simplest, and we can also consume oil and salt from them, but it is really greasy if we eat too much. One day, when Aunt Yin saw Song Jia took half a bag of flour, she said she wanted to make fried cakes.

Fried pancakes are a very simple staple food. First, spread the dough into pancakes, and then cut the pancakes into shreds. In the past, you could add some shredded meat as a side dish, but now, you can only add some oil, salt and soy sauce and stir-fry it.

But even if it was just fried, it was delicious for Song Jia who was eating it for the first time. Except for Mu Nan's small packet of chili sauce, he hadn't eaten such a heavy-flavored food with heavy oil for a long time.

So he took a photo while eating and sent it to the small group chat of him, Jian Chu Munan and others.

Jian Chu was eating lumps of porridge at home. It was also made of flour. It was lumped into a ball and put into the pot with a little oil and salt. It tasted okay. It was simple and convenient. But when he saw the greasy fried pancakes, Jian Chu still shed envy: "What do people do?"

Song Jia: "To be honest, Aunt Yin's cooking skills are not inferior to Mu Nan's brother!"

Jian Chu: "Please give me the tutorial. I will make it for Zibai later."

Song Jia just watched Aunt Yin spread the pancakes and put them in the wok, so he didn't need to ask and directly posted the process to the group. He talked to Jian Chu for a long time, but Mu Nan didn't say anything, so he tagged him @Mu Nan: "Where is he? Why aren't you talking?"

Mu Nan: "Eating."

Song Jia: "What are you eating? Let's see."

Mu Nan glanced at the beef rice in his hand, a small dish of kimchi, a plate of ready-made barbecue, a plate of cold jellyfish, and a plate of spicy clams. There was already a small pile of clams on the coffee table, with some fruits on the side, and a glass of cool orange juice at hand. Could he take a picture of this? He absolutely couldn't.

So he pushed all the snacks piled on the other side of the coffee table to the ground, took out a plate of steamed buns from the space, there were three steamed buns on the plate, one of which was filled with oily red chili sauce, and then took a picture and sent it to the group.

Qin Huai was sitting across from the coffee table, picking out the empty shells of clams from a plate. Seeing this, he glanced at him and said, "Who is it, Song Jia?"

Mu Nan hummed and showed him the pictures sent by Song Jia and Jian Chu. "They were discussing their lunches. Song Jia had fried pancakes, which he had never had before. It was also the first time I heard of fried pancakes. The pancakes were already spread out. It's not the same thing as just putting some ingredients on them and rolling them up. You have to cut them into shreds and fry them again. I don't really understand."

Qin Huai smiled and said, "The way it's eaten in the north, you can add some vegetables or something like that. If you want to try it, I'll make it for you next time."

Mu Nan sent a picture of a steamed bun, put the bun away, and continued to eat his beef rice. He also sighed: "Now Song Jia even eats with the Cai family. When the Cai family moves out, he will be so reluctant because no one will cook for him."

Qin Huai: "So he can take this opportunity to learn how to cook from Aunt Yin. It is said that Aunt Yin's mother is from the north, so she is very good at making some pasta."

Mu Nan was not interested in pasta. He thought Qin Huai might have northern blood and particularly liked pasta. "You can learn from Aunt Yin."

Qin Huai raised his eyebrows and looked at him: "Will you eat with me?"

Mu Nan was confused for a while before he managed to answer, "Occasionally?"

Qin Huai couldn't help laughing. Actually, Mu Nan didn't dislike eating pasta or something like that. He really liked to eat it when he was a child. But whenever the weather changed and the season changed, he would definitely catch a cold and get tonsillitis. He felt uncomfortable and could only eat soft things like noodles that were easy to swallow. As a result, he had an instinctive resistance to noodles. Now seeing him reluctantly agreeing with an expression that said "this is too difficult" on his face, Qin Huai wanted to pinch his face and take a bite. How could someone like him so much with just a random expression?

After Qin Huai picked out the empty shells of clams on the plate, Mu Nan picked out the ready-made clam meat and ate it. He also dipped the clam meat into the soup and waited until it was fully absorbed before putting it into his mouth. It was rare that Qin Huai was willing to make spicy flavor for him, so he cherished every bite.

After finishing the meal, there was still a small half plate of spicy clams left, so Mu Nan simply ate it while drinking a drink. While still eating, he did not forget to order dinner: "Let's have shrimp tonight, how about spicy shrimp? I haven't had spicy shrimp for a long time."

Qin Huai cleaned the coffee table and refused coldly: "No."

Mu Nan had no choice but to take a step back: "What about steamed shrimp?"

Qin Huai: "Okay."

Mu Nan could only hum quietly to express his dissatisfaction, and accidentally bit the shell of the clam into pieces. Qin Huai glanced at him and said, "Are you expressing your dissatisfaction and taking the shell out to vent your anger?"

Mu Nan spat several times before clearing the residue in his mouth, and rolled his eyes at Qin Huai. As a result, the next bite of clam meat he took was sandy. This was the first bite of sand in the whole dish. It must be because Qin Huai activated the taunt skill on him that he was so unlucky!

Mu Nan, who had eaten and drunk enough, collapsed on the sofa and didn't want to move. Seeing Qin Huai clean up the coffee table after dinner, he deliberately ordered him: "I want milk tea, I want you to make it, iced."

Qin Huai: "I just finished my meal. Wait two hours before drinking."

Mu Nan: "Then make a cup now and put it in the refrigerator. It will be ready in two hours."

There was clearly plenty of ready-made milk tea in the space, but seeing how he was deliberately ordering people around, Qin Huai gently pinched his nose, and only let go when the tip of his nose turned red, then took out two milk tea bags from the cupboard and made some for him.

Mu Nan lay on the sofa proudly, swinging his feet, rubbing his stomach and burping.

As a result, Qin Huai came back in not long after he left, holding a milk tea bag that he hadn't had time to make. Seeing that he looked a little serious, Mu Nan quickly sat up and asked, "What's wrong?"

Qin Huai said: "Zhou Chuanghong just sent me a message that a group of locusts will be coming soon."

Mu Nan exclaimed in surprise: "Locusts? A batch? How many are in a batch? How could there be locusts?"

In his entire life, he had never seen a group of locusts except in those disaster movies. At most, he had seen some grasshoppers caught in the grass.

Qin Huai shook his head: "I'm not sure, but everyone will receive the news soon. This situation seems to be quite serious. If it's just a small number, it's impossible for the base station to notify the entire network. You can tell them in the group. Although they will receive the news later, it's always better to prepare in advance."

Mu Nan quickly sent a message in the courtyard's large group, tagged Jian Chu and Song Jia several times, and even notified the girls.

Qin Huai went upstairs and closed all the doors and windows on the roof tightly. The one-way mirror that was previously pasted on the outside was also movable, because he was worried that if there was strong winds and heavy rain again, anything blown by the wind would hit it and it would be broken, so it is now easily put away.

After thinking about it, he asked Mu Nan to take out some large baffles from the space to cover the balcony doors on the second and third floors. As for the windows, he simply used some old cotton wool that Mu Nan took out to block them outside. He didn't know how many locusts there were, but he would rather treat them according to the most terrifying level in the disaster movies he watched with Mu Nan, and never take it lightly.

After seeing the message sent by Mu Nan, Jian Chu called Yu Zibai immediately and asked him to find Xu Ming and ask them to go home quickly. It would be terrible if the situation became serious again and they were trapped outside.

Song Jia also quickly called Wu Zheng and told him to come back first even if he had to take a leave.

Song Jia knew the news, and naturally the Cai family knew it too. However, the Cai father and son might be working, and the phone could not be reached. So Guo Hui came to find Qin Huai and planned to borrow his car. He planned to go to the construction site to pick up Uncle Cai and Cai Wentao.

Qin Huai gave the car keys to Guo Hui. Yu Zibai and the others were also planning to return from the farm. The farm received the news earlier than Qin Huai. As soon as the government received the message, it sent a copy to the military and another copy to the information department, and then directly notified the farm to prepare for protection.

There are people on the farm who have applied to live in the farm dormitory, which is free, so when this situation occurs, it must be the people living on the farm who stay behind to guard the farm, and Yu Zibai and Xu Ming will not be needed. Yu Zibai even made a special call to Wu Zheng and asked him to stay in the factory. Yu Feng will drive them home and pick up Wu Zheng on the way.

Because of the locusts' notification, the whole courtyard became busy. After about ten minutes, their mobile phones received a group notification from the base station.

Some people did not take it seriously, thinking that they were just locusts. They had no food to grow outside and those green plants would have been killed by the scorching sun long ago. If locusts really came, they would just be delivering food.

Nowadays, many people have become accustomed to eating insects, and some even think that if there are enough locusts falling from the sky, they might be very cheap. Fried locusts should taste good.

Some people have even started making preparations, but their preparations are completely different from Qin Huai's defensive preparations. They plan to catch locusts, and when the locusts really fly over, they will catch as many as they can. These are free stuff, and they will not lose money whether they sell them or eat them themselves.

After receiving the notice, some people who thought more comprehensively took their own water containers to the water station to fetch water. After all, not every family has a well. Many people still fetch water from the water station, thinking that it is all groundwater. It is completely unnecessary to spend so much money to dig a well just for the convenience of not having to go out and queue.

So there is already a long queue at the water station now. Many people are still talking about locusts, but the direction of their conversation is eating. They lament that now most crops are grown indoors. Once the door is closed, locusts will not break through the wall, so there is no need to worry about the food being eaten. What's more, it is not known whether the food has been successfully grown. Except for the rumor that there will be potatoes next month, there is no news at all about food planting.

Mu Nan was lying on the balcony on the third floor. Qin Huai had covered the windows of the room with a quilt, probably to prevent locusts from hitting him. But at the moment, everything outside was quiet, so quiet that there seemed to be no sound of wind at all.

Mu Nan stood on the balcony for a while, but there was no movement, so he had to close the balcony door again and went into the house: "Brother, how many locusts do you think there will be? I saw a lot of people in the community group light up their weapons and said they were going to catch locusts."

Qin Huai said: "The number should not be small."

Mu Nan sighed: "I don't know when they will come. If they come during the day, then those who are ready to catch the insects will have worked in vain. However, the locusts can't stand the high temperature during the day.

Thinking of the locust law, Mu Nan said, "Does this count as a severe drought? Isn't it said that a long drought will lead to locusts? But how long has it been since the last rainstorm and flood? It's only been more than two months. Last year and the year before last, it was hot for almost a whole year. The longest time was half a year without a drop of rain. That's considered a drought."

Qin Huai: "These locusts must have come from the north. It is said that there has been no rain there for a whole year. Even in winter, it is dry, cold, and frosty. There has not been much snow. So when winter is over, the remaining moisture mixed with the dryness and high temperature has become a breeding ground for locusts. I don't know if these locusts have become stronger as they move south, or if only a few are left."

Qin Huai inspected the upstairs and downstairs again out of concern, then drew a lot of water from the well and carried it into the house. Song Jia and the Cai family did the same, drawing the water and storing it in the house first, to avoid the inconvenience of drawing water when there were too many insects outside.

Fortunately, the well they built is water-pressure type and is wrapped tightly, so there is no need to worry about insects falling into the well and contaminating the water source.

Qin Huai fetched water outside, and after carrying the water in, Mu Nan directly put it into the space, so as not to have to carry the bucket up to the third floor, which was also very tiring. After storing enough water to last for three to five days at home, Qin Huai closed the door. They were not short of water, and there was a lot of water in the space, but they also had to make it look good.

As soon as they went up to the third floor, they heard Niu Niu's cry from next door. Mu Nan hurried to the balcony on the third floor, but did not dare to open the door. Instead, he tried to look out through the gap in the blockage, but his brother covered it too tightly and he could not see anything.

But you can't see them in your own house, but you can see them on your mobile phone. Someone took a picture of the locusts flying over. It was a black swarm. The entire night sky was covered by locusts, flying towards you in dense swarms.

At this moment, the large group of locusts has not yet flown to the front, but through the pictures taken by others, it can be seen that a group of "locust troops" are attacking in the distant sky. It is more spectacular than the scenes in those locust plague movies. And because it is really happening before our eyes, it makes people even more frightened.

Dogs have much better hearing than humans, so even though the locusts hadn't come close and they couldn't hear any sound, Niu Niu had obviously heard it and was screaming wildly in the house because she was scared.

Niu Niu's screams, the terrifying scenes in the video, Mu Nan grabbed Qin Huai's arm and said nervously: "Xu Ming and the others haven't come back yet."

Qin Huai hugged Mu Nan into his arms, and the two of them went into the bedroom: "It will be fine. If we are stuck on the road, they are in the car after all. If not, we can stay on the farm."

Mu Nan: "If locusts have nothing to eat and go crazy with hunger, will they eat people?"

Qin Huai had no way of answering this question. He was not an entomologist and did not understand the habits of this thing. Even if he had basic common sense, how could he judge with common sense at this moment? The world had long since subverted the common sense known to humans.

When Niu Niu stopped her panicked roar, Mu Nan heard a huge buzzing sound outside. No, it should not be described as a buzzing sound, it should be a rumbling sound. In addition to this, there was the sound of locusts constantly hitting the baffles blocking the window and door, da da da, one after another continuously.

Mu Nan hugged Qin Huai tightly, and even felt that the barrier they had erected outside was too weak and not safe at all. With such constant collisions, the thin layer of wood would probably not last long before it was broken. If the wood was broken, there would be windows behind it. If the windows were broken, she couldn't imagine what the scene would be like if the house was invaded by locusts.

The Cai family was the first to return. Although locusts had come, the network was not disconnected. After the Cai father and son were picked up by Guo Hui, they had kept in touch with their family. So when the car was about to drive back, Cai Wenwen ran out of the house and opened the yard door for them. However, they could not stay in the yard at all. The locusts were everywhere, and when they saw people, they would even cover them all over.

Cai Wenwen screamed and slapped herself. Hearing the screams outside, Mu Nan was startled and quickly stepped out of Qin Huai's arms to see what was going on outside, but Qin Huai held his head down: "Don't move, I'll go and take a look."

Mu Nan quickly pulled him and shook his head: "No, I'll go with you."

Qin Huai had no plans to go out, he just wanted to go downstairs and look out through the peephole. When he went downstairs, he saw Aunt Yin hitting Cai Wenwen with a blanket. The people in the car did not get out, and they could not get out at all. They simply drove directly into the garage of Song Jia's house, and then Aunt Yin pulled her daughter into the house. The iron gate of the yard could not be closed because these locusts were too ferocious.

On the other side, Jian Chu pulled a video in the group, and Song Jia took out his mobile phone to film the situation for them. After the car entered the garage, the people in the car got out, but many locusts flew in with the car, and the body of the car was densely covered with insects. At this moment, the people of the Cai family were killing the insects with their bare hands, and several of them died with just a step.

Song Jia's face turned pale when he saw this scene. When had he ever seen so many locusts? This was completely different from the locusts he had imagined. Cai Wenwen, who had just been pulled into the house by Aunt Yin, was crying. Cai Wentao hurried over to check, only to see that Cai Wenwen was covered in blood, her face and body, her clothes were torn, and her legs were bloody.

The injuries on her body were caused by the locusts that had just pounced on her and wrapped her whole body.

Fortunately, they were just external injuries, because Aunt Yin ran out in time and Cai Siqi rushed to help drive them away, so they were just minor scars. It was just because of the bleeding that they looked a little scary. However, although there were many wounds, they were not serious or fatal. Cai Wenwen couldn't stop crying because she was just scared.

Some people came back this time. Yu Zibai and Xu Ming were still on the way, but they kept in touch, so Jian Chu knew that they were almost there. The iron gate had just been opened and not closed. In addition, Jian Chu had some experience from the previous situation, so when they were almost there, he put on thick clothes and covered his face with layers of clothes. As soon as the car entered the yard, Jian Chu hurriedly opened the garage: "Hurry up, hurry up!!"

Yu Feng drove the car covered with locusts directly into the garage. Jian Chu slammed the door shut, blocking the locusts outside that were trying to fly in, and slapped the car with a small blanket, trying to kill as many as he could.

After making sure that everyone returned safely, Mu Nan breathed a sigh of relief. It was so horrible, so deadly.