Chapter 48

Mu Nan tidied the house over and over again, and put all the food and drinks, even the bed and the small coffee table into the space. If the air conditioner was not too troublesome to install, and if their building did not collapse in the previous life, he would have wanted to take down the air conditioner and put it in the space first. Although it did not collapse in the last life, what if there was a difference in this life? But even if it collapsed, it didn't matter much. He had another high-temperature resistant one in his space, so he would not have to worry about using it when he had the conditions to settle down in the future.

After checking the house carefully several times, Mu Nan was still a little worried. It was not that he was worried that something was missed at home, but he was still frightened by the terrible earthquake. A disaster that could destroy the world was about to happen, and he couldn't suppress his panic just thinking about it.

Qin Huai watched him walk around the house anxiously and did not stop him. If letting him check again and again like this could relieve his anxiety, then let him check it out. But seeing Mu Nan's face getting paler and paler, Qin Huai couldn't help but reach out and hug him: "Don't be afraid, relax, no matter what happens, we will be together, as long as we are together, there is nothing to be afraid of, right? We have a lot of things, and we are well prepared. No matter where we are, we can settle down smoothly. If you really can't control your panic, then count your space and take a look at the things we bought. Do you feel safe?"

Mu Nan nodded, took a few deep breaths, and tried to calm himself down. It was because he had experienced it once and knew that all the chaos started from this earthquake that he felt even more panicked and scared. But if he thought about it carefully, since natural disasters could not be prevented, there was no point in being so scared. Besides, they were well prepared and could always feel more confident than others. Thinking of this, he felt a little calmer.

Seeing that he had calmed down, Qin Huai let him go, walked to the balcony, lifted the curtain and looked. The sun was about to set, but it was not completely dark. There was still a little light in the sky. But Qin Huai did not plan to stay at home any longer. Mu Nan said that the earthquake occurred after dark, but the exact time was unknown. Instead of staying at home and thinking about it, it would be better to go outside and maybe he could relax a little.

At this time, because there was still some light outside, not many people went out, so the two of them simply sat at the entrance of the corridor for a while. The green garden that used to be lush and green was now bare. Later, the grass on the ground dried up and the trees planted died. The people in the community flattened the entire green area, for fear that the dead trees would cause a fire. Later, some people tried to grow vegetables at home, so they secretly dug the soil in the community, you dug a little and I dug a little. Now the whole small garden is bare with only a pit left, so now they are sitting at the entrance of the corridor, looking at the unobstructed small garden, and can see the sun's rays sinking little by little in the distant sky.

Mu Nan asked, "Should we call them down later?" Although the building didn't collapse, the whole process of going downstairs could easily cause trampling. In his previous life, he didn't remember if anyone died in a trampling when going downstairs. No one expected such a tragic earthquake at that time. After he escaped, he was completely stunned and couldn't recover for many days. Naturally, he didn't have the mind to pay attention to other things. But they usually didn't go out unless they had nothing to do. It seemed that there was no reason to suddenly call them down.

Qin Huai let him lean on his shoulder for a while: "Don't worry, I'll send them a WeChat message later to see if they can come down."

After it was completely dark, Qin Huai took Mu Nan to the open space in the community and sent a WeChat message to the small group using the reason he had just thought of.

Qin Huai: "Mu Nan and I are going to the night market in the small square. Do you want to come with us?"

Mu Nan, who was standing by, looked at the message he had sent and said, "Brother, didn't they say that there would be some strange phenomena in the heavens and the earth before an earthquake? I just took a closer look and there were no birds flying around or ants moving around. The whole environment was very peaceful."

Qin Huai was actually also observing the surroundings, but there was indeed no sign of an earthquake. All of this happened just like the sudden smog and high temperature, which came in an instant without any warning, and everything seemed so weird.

"If there were signs, the country should have issued a warning long ago. If the state machinery had detected such a serious earthquake in advance, it would not have been possible to conceal it. It is possible that even the state machinery could not detect it, and even the sensitive animal world failed to warn of the crisis in advance. It is probably just like the smog and high temperatures, which happened for unknown reasons. Perhaps many, many years later, people will dig out the causes of these natural disasters, but now, it is obviously beyond our cognition."

Someone in the small group quickly replied to the message, and Xu Ming quickly said "OK", asked them to wait, and went downstairs after getting ready. After a while, Jian Chu also responded and said that they would go together.

Mu Nan breathed a sigh of relief when he saw this. It was good that he could come down.

When they came down, people were already coming back from the cooling station. When Jian Chu saw the two brothers, he smiled and asked, "Why do you have the leisure time to come down and take a look today? Normally, you would stay at home if you can."

Qin Huai said: "I want to see what can be bought at the night market stalls in the small square opposite."

Jian Chu sighed, "We want to buy some clothes, we have nothing to wear." We don't have many summer clothes, and now there is not much water, so it is impossible to wash every day. We can only save as much as possible to wash together, and we can't use detergent. There is not enough water to wash several times, so we can only soak in water to remove the sweat smell. It would be better if we could have two more clothes to change. If I had known this would happen, I would have directly bought hundreds of vests for five yuan each online, and I would have saved water.

Xu Ming said, "The small night market across the street has only been open these two days, right? I heard that many of the things there are stolen from other people's shops."

There is definitely no food, so most of the things there are clothes, pants, shoes and the like. Yesterday, someone posted photos of the night market in the group, and some people even put out some gold ornaments in exchange for water and food. I don't know if those gold ornaments were also stolen.

As they were talking, several people were walking towards the small square opposite the community. There were quite a few people there, but the distances between the stalls were quite wide. Maybe one reason was that the distance was too close and the smell in the stuffiness was not very pleasant. Another reason was that they were probably afraid of being robbed, so they kept a safe distance to prevent the stalls from being crowded and someone from stealing things.

However, this also made things convenient for Mu Nan and the others. The venue was more spacious, and when there was any movement, it would be easy for them to run through the stalls to a more spacious area, to avoid being in a panic due to a large crowd, which might lead to accidental injuries.

There are quite a lot of stalls in the small square, some selling cheap toys, some selling clothes and shoes, some selling pots and pans, some selling books, and even selling various discs. However, there are more people walking around than buying. Most of the stalls have price lists, and you don't need to ask how much something costs, just look at the sign and you'll know. You can bargain, but if it's not what you want, no one is too lazy to ask. So there are many people, but it's not noisy at all. Everyone is shopping quietly.

Jian Chu quickly found a stall selling clothes. There was a sign on it saying, "Two hundred yuan per piece," with any clothes or pants available.

Seeing the price, Jian Chu wanted to roll his eyes: "It's not a brand name product. It looks like one of those things that cost three for a hundred yuan. It's not food or drink, but it's so expensive."

Mu Nan on the side said, "But there are still quite a few people buying." There was a crowd in front of the stall, picking and choosing. I don't know if they have adapted to the sky-high prices nowadays and think that two hundred yuan for a piece of clothing is cheap, or if they are afraid that prices will become more and more expensive in the future and they may not be able to buy a piece of clothing even for two hundred yuan. So there are quite a lot of people buying. Compared with the book stall next to it, it is considered to be very crowded.

Seeing that Jian Chu and the others did not move forward, Mu Nan said: "Don't you want to buy it? If you don't buy it now, the price may go up in the future." Although he knew that the price would not go up any more, after tonight, the money would be worthless, so there was no point in keeping the money. It would be better to just buy something.

Jian Chu shook his head: "Forget it, we only have a few pieces of clothes to wear in rotation." If they had the extra money, they would have bought food a long time ago. Looking at the vendors, Jian Chu felt that maybe he really had to break into people's houses and steal things.

As they continued walking forward, they saw a group of people dragging a cart of things. As soon as they arrived at the small square, they were surrounded by people. They even put up a fence, as if they were planning to let a few people in at a time. Mu Nan stretched his head to peek inside: "What are they selling? There are so many people surrounding them before the goods are even taken out. Are they selling food?"

Xu Ming, who seemed to be surfing the Internet whenever he had nothing to do and always paying attention to the dynamics of the group, said with a knowledgeable attitude: "It is indeed selling food, selling self-heating pots."

Mu Nan was shocked. How could Zihaiguo still be sold at this time?

Xu Ming said: "It seems that when they first started to stockpile goods, a group of people bought a warehouse of goods and planned to stockpile them and sell them at a higher price later. However, they did not expect that the current situation is worse than they expected. It was a good decision to stockpile that batch of goods at the beginning."

Mu Nan saw those people opening boxes of Zihaiguo and directly put up a sign, 500 yuan a box, any flavor you want. A piece of clothing is only 200 yuan, as long as it is edible, it really doubles the price by more than ten times.

The high price is enough to discourage many people, but some people still buy it. A Zihai pot contains vegetables and meat. In today's conditions, meat and vegetables are really hard to come by. Not to mention being full, if you buy a box and take it home, the whole family can have a meal with some rice. And the Chinese New Year is coming soon. If you buy it and keep it for the Chinese New Year, it can be considered a feast. Who would have thought that one year, eating a bowl of Zihai pot could be considered a feast?

Mu Nan asked Qin Huai in a low voice: "How much money do we have left? Do you want to buy it?"

Qin Huai said, "There are less than ten thousand left, buy it." If they buy it now, they will have a source of things when they can't wait any longer and want to take them out to satisfy their hunger. After all, they will have to stay in the rescue tent for a few days, and they can't fill their bags with food in advance. Putting some water and some food in it can also be said to be preparing to go out to the night market to see if they can exchange for something. If they have too much, it will be like preparing to flee.

Mu Nan went to line up. The stall only allowed two or three people to enter at a time. If there were more people, they were afraid that the food would be snatched away, so the line was a bit long. Yu Zibai also pushed Jian Chu, signaling him to line up.

Jian Chu quickly shook his head: "Too expensive." Things that used to cost forty or fifty yuan at most now cost ten times as much. With five hundred yuan, they could buy more than ten bottles of water. Moreover, he couldn't bear to eat it even when it was forty-five yuan. Now that it's so expensive, he would be even more reluctant to do so.

Yu Zibai smiled and said, "Go ahead and buy a box. We'll eat it during the Chinese New Year. We have to eat some meat all year round. Go quickly."

Jian Chu looked conflicted, but he still stood behind Mu Nan obediently. Xu Ming, who was standing beside him, directly transferred a thousand yuan to Jian Chu: "I won't wait in line, buy two boxes for me."

He has been working for many years as a veterinarian, and his monthly salary is not bad, so he still has some savings. If he is not generous to himself now and is stingy, it would be a pity if he cannot buy delicious food even if he wants to spend money in the future.

The line was long, but moved quickly, and soon it was Mu Nan and his group's turn. Mu Nan bought four boxes directly. He wanted to spend all the remaining money, but that was too irrational, so he only bought four boxes. This was also based on the precedent that Xu Ming had bought two boxes by himself.

While Mu Nan was selecting flavors, Qin Huai noticed that in the groove of the flower bed where the green plants had long been stripped, in the bumpy soil, a group of ants were moving in one direction. It seemed that there was a sign, but it appeared too quickly. After thinking about it, he took a picture of this scene and sent it to the officer Shi Yuanfei.

Shi Yuanfei was on a day off today. Even though they were already used to the high-intensity drills, their bodies could bear it, but they might not be able to bear the pressure of many people dying every day, so proper rest was necessary. When he saw the WeChat message from Qin Huai, he thought the other party was asking for their reward, but when he opened it, he saw a photo of a group of ants.

Shi Yuanfei was full of questions. Why send him such photos? You can't just send them to him to share whenever you see something new. Shi Yuanfei didn't react for a moment. He put down his phone and prepared to go to the cafeteria to get food. But after taking two steps, he was suddenly startled. He immediately turned back, grabbed his phone and carefully checked the photos sent by the other party, and then immediately ran towards his superior's office.

Finally, Jian Chu also bought two boxes of Zihaiguo, thinking that since it was the New Year, he would have a good meal. As for what to do in the following days after the money was spent, he would think about it later. When he put the bought Zihaiguo into his bag, he couldn't help but sighed: "It seems that I really have to move bricks next year. I just don't know if there are any threshold requirements for moving bricks."

Yu Zibai put the bag on his back and asked, "Do you want to continue shopping?"

Mu Nan said quickly: "There are still a few stalls ahead that we haven't checked yet, let's go see what they're selling."

As a result, before he took two steps, he felt dizzy as if he was stepping on cotton and couldn't feel his feet firmly.

Qin Huai hurriedly pulled Mu Nan and ran, saying to Xu Ming and the others, "Hurry and run to the open space!"

They hadn't reacted yet, they just ran instinctively, and then the air raid sirens sounded everywhere. But although their country occasionally has earthquakes, it is not a country with frequent earthquakes. When it comes to earthquake avoidance, many cities don't even have a systematic concept. Unlike some countries, when the alarm sounds, the people can immediately take corresponding shelter measures. So when the air raid sirens sounded, many people were still confused and didn't understand the situation.

But this state of confusion only lasted for a few seconds, and soon everyone found that the ground beneath their feet was shaking. There was an earthquake. This was the first thought that popped into everyone's mind. Some stall owners were even busy collecting things on their stalls at this time. After all, all they could feel now was just a shaking, and the shaking was not strong. Naturally, they did not run for their lives at the first moment. Some people who just came to the night market even took advantage of the chaos, grabbed things from other people's stalls and ran away, and did not forget to take advantage of them at this time.

This slight shaking was only a starting signal. Soon the shaking of the ground became stronger and stronger, so strong that people couldn't even stand firmly on the ground. Qin Huai and his companions didn't run too far. They only ran to the center of the small square and were knocked to the ground by the strong shaking. The violent shaking made it impossible for them to get up. Qin Huai dragged Mu Nan into his arms and held him tightly. Since they couldn't run away, they could only stay where they were as much as possible. Mu Nan also said that he dreamed that the small square was later used as a resettlement site, which proved that there shouldn't be much damage here. Now no matter where they ran, they might be crushed under the collapsed buildings. They could only stay where they were and leave it to fate.

Along with the increasingly powerful vibrations, there were constant rumbling noises like thunder in my ears. The huge sound of the collapsed houses was almost enough to burst my eardrums. The scorching heat, the dust everywhere, and the rapid heartbeats due to panic made it hard to breathe.

The broken roads, collapsed houses and downed power lines plunged the night into an even darker darkness.

Rumble, rumble and collapse, crashing to the ground and hitting people's hearts.

Mu Nan took out two wet towels from the space, and after struggling several times, he finally handed them to Qin Huai. Qin Huai pressed him in his arms and covered his face with the towel with one hand, otherwise he would really suffocate in the dense dust.

They could no longer care about the people around them. From time to time, some rubble hit them. Every time there was a loud noise in their ears, they felt as if a building had hit their heads. This vibration and loud noise lasted for a long time, and at one point they could not hear anything in their ears. It was buzzing, like being suffocated in deep water, the kind of suffocation that made their internal organs churn, and a fishy and sweet taste welled up in their throats.

The entire earthquake was an extremely long process. Even though they were not trapped in the building and were not fleeing in panic due to death, the waiting in between was also like the feeling of being infinitely close to death. Qin Huai could do nothing but hold Mu Nan tightly in his arms and press him under his body. Even though he had prepared himself mentally for a world-class natural disaster, he realized at this moment that he was not as strong as he thought, just like the lives in this earthquake, as small as sand.

The entire earthquake did not last long, perhaps only a few minutes or more than ten minutes, but the collapse of houses caused by the earthquake was endless. When there was no movement underground, there were only slight tremors on the ground caused by the collapse of some damaged buildings. Almost an hour had passed, and there was no intact piece of land left. All you could see was dust floating in the air.

Qin Huai endured the dizziness after the earthquake and went to check on Mu Nan. Mu Nan was lying on the ground, unable to move. He could not hear any sound in his ears, and it was buzzing as if he was isolated from the world. He felt someone patting him, and he knew it must be Qin Huai. He struggled to open his eyes, but his face was covered with a layer of dust or dirt. His eyelids were so sticky that they felt like a thousand pounds and he could not open them at all. So he could only squeeze Qin Huai's hand hard to tell him that he was still alive.

Qin Huai took a long time to calm down from the dizziness, and dug out his backpack from a pile of rubble that had fallen from somewhere. Fortunately, they were in the center of the small square, and the surrounding houses were at least separated by a road, so at most some stones flew over, but no other large objects were thrown at them, so the food and water in his bag were still intact.

Qin Huai poured water on a towel, wiped Mu Nan's face, wiped off some of the sticky dust on his mouth and nose, and helped him up from the ground and fed him a few sips of water. Mu Nan choked and coughed after drinking two sips. He felt like there were many small stones in his throat. He tried hard to cover his mouth and nose with a towel, but he still inhaled a lot of dust. However, this cough made him sober up a little. When he opened his eyes, he saw Qin Huai, who was covered with dust like a terracotta warrior, and couldn't help shouting in a hoarse voice: "Brother..."

Qin Huai was relieved to see that he had finally regained consciousness. He also said in a hoarse voice, "I'm here. Don't be afraid. Drink some water. It's okay. The earthquake is over."

Mu Nan took two sips and pushed the bottle to Qin Huai's mouth. Qin Huai drank the remaining water in one breath with the sand in his mouth, stuffed the empty bottle into his bag, held Mu Nan in one hand, and checked the environment around them. However, because the power was cut off, it was already night, and now it was covered by the diffuse dust, so he couldn't see anything. Qin Huai glanced at the watch on his wrist. With the help of the luminous hands, he could still see an approximate time. It was only half past twelve, and there was still some time before dawn.

"Close your eyes and lie down for a while. If there are no aftershocks, nothing should happen here. When we recover, we'll see if anyone can arrange a place to hide from the sun. If no one can, we'll go home first, if our home is still there."

Mu Nan lay there for a while, and couldn't help but got up and spit out a few mouthfuls of water. The stuffiness in his chest was finally relieved a little. Qin Huai let Mu Nan lean on him with heartache, and gently stroked his chest, trying to make him feel more comfortable.

In just a short while, some of the people who had been running here seemed to have recovered. In the midst of the dust, Qin Huai vaguely saw the outline of a human figure slowly and unsteadily crawling up from the ground. The man seemed to look around in a daze, and when he fully realized the environment he was in, he couldn't help but kneel down on the ground. He seemed to want to cry, but his neck seemed to be strangled by something and he couldn't make any sound. Only an extremely hoarse hoarse sound could be heard.

Qin Huai hugged Mu Nan tightly, feeling the heartbeat in his arms, and gradually regaining the warmth of his own body.