8 Chapter 8

Accompanied by a hoarse, piercing electrical hum, Tong Shu opened her eyes.

Zhu Cheng was fiddling with a small radio, about the size of a palm. It looked quite old; he probably picked it up from someone's house upstairs.

"Director Zhu, have you heard any news?" Tong Shu walked over and asked.

"Oh, Xiao Tong." Zhu Cheng looked up at Tong Shu. "Sigh... It's too hot today. The helicopter can't fly over, so they told us to find a place to hide in the sun first."

"Is it only in our Z city? Or..."

“Nationally… no, globally! This is a global catastrophe!” Zhu Cheng said in anguish.

Tong Shu frowned.

She died too quickly in her previous life and didn't have much useful information. As a reborn person, she has no control over the future.

Wang Jie walked over, leaned close to Tong Shu, and whispered in her ear, "I've checked, it's risen again."

Around 8 or 9 o'clock, the temperature returned to yesterday's 80-plus degrees Celsius.

"...Mommy, I'm so hungry." A child's voice, trembling with tears, came from not far away.

"Sweetheart, bear with it a little longer." The child's mother hugged him tightly. "Mommy will go find something for you to eat tonight."

The residents hiding in the air-raid shelter looked at the mother and son, their faces showing complex emotions.

They were among the fastest to react. When the disaster struck yesterday, the air in their homes felt like it had been evaporated; their nasal passages and throats were so dry they were about to bleed. The situation was so urgent that there was no time to react. All they could do was call their families as quickly as possible, escape through the emergency exits to the basement, and then, with the help of the community, enter the air-raid shelter.

Some survivors of the burning apartment building escaped from their homes wrapped in wet blankets, and by the time they reached the basement, the blankets had been dried by the high temperature.

Very few people brought supplies down with them, and the few who did were mostly concerned about their families. Everyone was waiting for government aid.

Seeing the child crying, Shu Hua couldn't bear it. After thinking it over, she took out a small bottle of milk from her backpack and walked over to the mother and child.

"I don't have anything else here, so I'll give this bottle of milk to the child to tide him over."

"Ah! Thank you! Thank you so much, ma'am!" The child's mother stood up, took the milk, and bowed repeatedly in gratitude.

Shu Hua quickly waved her hand and turned to go back to her family.

"Hey, young lady!" A burly man walked over. "Do you have any food left? My child has been starving since yesterday. I'll give you a hundred yuan, sell me some!"

"This..." Shu Hua looked troubled as she glanced at her husband and daughter.

"I'm sorry, Uncle, we don't have much left." Tong Shu stood in front of Shu Hua and said, "As you can see, there are so many people in our family. We don't know when this weather will end, so we have to survive first, right?"

When Tong Shu's uncles heard her speak, they all stood up. Seeing such a large group, the man realized they were not to be trifled with and could only awkwardly say, "Yes, yes, I'll go find something to eat upstairs tonight..."

After everyone left, Tong Shu pulled her mother back to sit on the sleeping bag.

Inside the air-raid shelter, people kept casting seemingly casual glances at you.

"Ahua, you shouldn't have been so kind," Shuli whispered, scolding her sister. "Do you think things are still the same as before? Neighbors are still friendly and help each other out?"

“Going out to find food now could mean death!” Shuya chimed in. “Even if they see you have food, they might steal it from you, but it’s still better than risking your life!”

"But...but..." Shu Hua also felt a little wronged; the child was still so young.

"Alright, let's not get involved in this again." Tong Songming patted his wife's shoulder. "Our whole family has already returned safely, which is enough to make people jealous. If they see the supplies, they might unite against us in the long run."

“My uncle is right,” Qin Xiaoxiao said.

Seeing her mother looking a little dejected, Tong Shu quickly changed the subject: "It's alright, Mom. You can sneak into the tent and eat something. We'll all take turns eating in the tent, just be careful not to let anyone see us."

Shu Hua nodded and walked towards the tent.

"Dad." After watching Shu Hua walk away, Tong Shu lowered her voice and said to Tong Songming, "Tonight, Brother Jie, Sister Xiao, and I will go to the house to bring some things out. You and your uncles will stay here and keep watch over everyone."

Tong Songming understood his daughter's meaning; she wanted the supplies to be properly channeled. Looking at his daughter, who seemed to have grown up all of a sudden, Tong Songming felt a mix of emotions. Even though he didn't want his daughter to take risks, with the disaster raging, he couldn't protect such a large family by himself.

"Okay, be careful, the temperature won't be low at night." Tong Songming looked at his daughter and whispered his advice.

Tong Shu nodded.

In the middle of the night, Tong Shu and the other two put on radiation protection suits and walked out of the air-raid shelter.

Besides them, many other people were also preparing to leave the air-raid shelter, taking advantage of the brief drop in temperature at night to go outside and find some supplies.

The underground parking lot was right outside the air-raid shelter. Tong Shu's apartment building wasn't far from the air-raid shelter. The three of them, with one flashlight, quickly found the sign at the stairwell entrance.

Tong Shu's home is on the 12th floor. Normally, it takes less than two minutes to take the elevator, but now climbing the stairs has taken quite a bit of effort.

The three of them walked up to the sixth floor in one go, and gradually they started to feel exhausted.

Wang Jie is doing a little better; he still goes to the gym regularly. Tong Shu and Qin Xiaoxiao, on the other hand, can only move slowly by holding onto the escalator.

After finally reaching the 12th floor, the three rested briefly before splitting up to continue their work.

Wang Jie first checked the floor and found that, except for Tong Shu's house which was closed, the doors of the other three houses were wide open, and the things inside were scattered all over the floor. It seemed that although the owners were in a hurry when they left, they still took some supplies with them.

Tong Shu and Qin Xiaoxiao had already entered the house. Although everything in the house was properly placed in its original position, the green plants that were originally placed on the windowsill had been baked by the high temperature until they were dehydrated and withered. Many of the decorative items and furniture that could not withstand high temperatures had also deformed to varying degrees.

This was only because Tong Songming had already renovated his home; otherwise, it would most likely have burned down completely like other apartment buildings.

The three of them closed the gate carefully, locked it, and followed Tong Shu into the island.

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The island's year-round temperature of around 20°C finally freed the three of them from the suffocating heat.

Tong Shu and the others didn't dare linger for long and hurriedly arrived at the store, picked up shopping baskets, and began selecting items.

With so many people and eyes in the air-raid shelter, it was unlikely that you could get a decent meal. Tong Shu opted for convenience foods like compressed biscuits and self-heating hot pot.

Wang Jie simply carried two large buckets of drinking water.

Qin Xiaoxiao took some tissues, mouthwash, batteries and other consumables.

The three paid at the self-service checkout machine, took their belongings, and left the island.

As they were tidying up supplies in the living room, they suddenly heard rustling voices coming from the doorway.

Tong Shu was very alert. She signaled Wang Jie and Qin Xiaoxiao to keep quiet, then walked to the door and looked out through the peephole.

Outside the door, Hao Jia and her father, Hao Dadong, were gesturing with a fire axe towards Tong Shu's house.

"Jiajia, is it really possible to find food at Tong Shu's house?"

"Don't worry, Dad! I saw them buying bags of stuff into the house with my own eyes!" Hao Jia's cheeks were tanned, but her eyes gleamed with greed. "They said it was a team-building event, but that might fool the old folks downstairs. I never saw them take anything out of the house!"

"Okay, okay. Dad will chop this door open right now." After saying that, Hao Dadong spat twice on his hands and swung the fire axe to smash the door.

Tong Shu pushed the door open immediately.

Hao Dadong was so startled that he dropped the axe, which then slammed heavily onto his feet.

"Oh my god!"

Hao Dadong was in so much pain that he couldn't straighten his back. He held his legs and gasped for breath, tears streaming down his face.

Wang Jie stepped forward and snatched the fire axe from his hand, pointing it at the father and daughter and shouting sternly, "You two! Breaking into someone's house so late at night?! What do you want?!"

"Dad! Dad, are you alright?" Hao Jia asked her father repeatedly.

Seeing that Hao Dadong was in too much pain to pay attention to her, Hao Jia had no choice but to stand up with her hands on her hips, point at Tong Shu and the others, and shout fiercely but weakly, "How was I supposed to know you were still alive! Everyone in this neighborhood who's still locked up is considered dead out there! Leaving them here is a waste, what's wrong with my dad and me finding some food?!"

"Who are you saying is dead?!" Qin Xiaoxiao rushed out of the room and reached out to grab Hao Jia's hair.

"Come on! Hit me! If you hurt my dad and then hit me, you'll have to pay us back for everything!"

Tong Shu reached out and stopped the furious Qin Xiaoxiao, then looked Hao Jia up and down: "Hao Jia, let's not even talk about you and your dad planning to break into a house and rob someone. We went back to the air-raid shelter last night and have been down there all day. All the residents of our community are there. What about you? Where did you and your dad come from?"

Hao Jia was speechless upon hearing this, and after a long while, she said guiltily, "My family doesn't like people huddled together in a smelly mess, it won't work!"

In fact, when the temperature suddenly rose, Hao Jia's family took their gold jewelry and a bunch of valuables and ran to the underground garage, preparing to drive north to escape.

However, before they even left the garage, they discovered that many people had died outside, which frightened the family so much that they turned the car around and drove back.

Fearing that someone might take advantage of the chaos to rob, they avoided the community director and did not follow the organization to the air-raid shelter. Instead, they drove their car to a corner of the underground parking garage, away from the crowd, and secretly hid.

Hao Jia had never experienced hunger or hardship in her life, and yesterday afternoon she started crying and complaining that her parents hadn't brought any food. Hao Dadong was annoyed by her crying, so last night he and Shi Pingxiang went to the homes of several people on the first floor of nearby buildings and took a lot of supplies that others hadn't taken.

As they were eating bread in the car that evening, they noticed a lot of people coming out of the air-raid shelter, so they quickly got out of the car as well. Remembering that he still had a lot of things to move and worried that others might come to his house and take advantage of him, Hao Dadong hurriedly took his daughter up to the 12th floor to pack up.

The father and daughter took everything they could from their home and even ransacked their neighbor's house.

Hao Jia harbored a grudge against Tong Shu. Not content with carrying large bags and small packages, she insisted that her father ransack the Tong family's house as well.

Unfortunately, Tong Shu and the others were also at home packing supplies.

It's better to just take the stuff and leave! If they find out that our car is full of supplies, and then they tell the people in the air-raid shelter, won't they all come and rob us?

Tong Shu could tell from her expression that she had something to hide, but she was too lazy to waste time with Hao Jia now. Pointing her finger at Hao Jia's nose, she said, "I don't care what you're up to, but our whole family is here right now. You'd better think carefully before you do these things. I'll be coming up a few more times. If I find anything missing from my house, I'll find you all, no matter where you're hiding. You'll have to give back whatever you took!"

After saying that, Tong Shu picked up the packed supplies and headed towards the stairwell. Qin Xiaoxiao also turned around and locked the door. Before leaving, Wang Jie pointed at the father and daughter with a fire axe, then carried two buckets of water and followed his sisters.

Hao Jia's eyes turned red with anger as she looked at the well-packaged and varied fast food in Tong Shu's bag.