Because of the lack of materials, Lu Yuan discussed with everyone and decided to use local materials. They demolished some unused houses and reused some of the materials. As for the lack of concrete, Lu Yuan had to find another way. The priority now was to move and demolish the houses and prepare all the materials before starting work.

Although they are all supervisors, everyone has to participate in the work. Lu Yuan is not a rich man, and he can't feed everyone. He can only make these people work for him in this way and then feed them. This is already considered to be Lu Yuan being particularly conscientious.

The drainage system was redesigned. The original plan was to build a continuous drainage pipe around the perimeter of Zone 3. The final plan was to relocate everyone to live together. This would allow for unified management and reduce material waste. Zone 3 only had about 30 people. Apart from children under 10 and the elderly over 60, there were only about 20 people left. Now, everyone was a member of the workforce.

With fewer people, the work progress will naturally slow down, and the area of ​​the drainage ditch will also be reduced accordingly, as long as it can be guaranteed that it will not be washed away by the flood.

So, the massive demolition plan finally began. However, without concrete, building drainage ditches was practically impossible. When floods came, drainage ditches without concrete would likely collapse in no time. As for drainage pipes, Lu Yuan simply ignored them. Now was not the time to worry about aesthetics. However, Professor Zhu and his wife were clearly not happy. In their words, Lu Yuan had spent so much effort just to build a large toilet flushing system, which made them, two expert professors, lose face.

In order to get concrete, Lu Yuan specifically searched online for several concrete plants in Qingshui City and several nearby cities. Unfortunately, all the concrete plants were shut down due to a lack of power supply.

However, Lu Yuan was still unwilling to give up and went to each factory one by one to take a look.

Finally, perseverance paid off. Lu Yuan drove to a place more than 100 kilometers away from Qingshui City and found a concrete production plant with dozens of broken-down tanker trucks parked inside.

Just as Lu Yuan was about to leave, a group of people suddenly jumped out, startling Lu Yuan so much that he almost drew his gun.

There were five people on the other side, including two adults and three children. Everyone was filthy and looked very miserable.

The man glanced at Lu Yuan and asked a question.

"Hey bro, are you looking to buy concrete?"

If you asked someone else this question, they would definitely think you're a fool. They're already struggling to make ends meet, so how could you possibly afford to buy concrete? Are you going to eat it at home?

But Lu Yuan was different; he was there specifically for concrete, and upon hearing the other party's words, Lu Yuan was overjoyed.

Do you have concrete here?

So the other party started talking non-stop, recounting to Lu Yuan how he had been deceived.

This man, named Sun Tao, was originally an unremarkable office worker. His family was quite well-off, as Lu Yuan could tell from the three children around him. Before the apocalypse, prices were already ridiculously high, and raising a child required careful consideration. However, he had three children in one go, which meant that his family couldn't afford it without a lot of money.

The factory was originally owned by someone else. A month after the apocalypse, food prices skyrocketed, and many people, seeing the situation was dire, began to sell off their possessions, even their houses and cars. Sun Tao thought he had gotten a bargain, buying the concrete factory for less than 300,000 yuan. However, the lack of vehicles was a major problem, so he bought 30 concrete mixer trucks at 5,000 yuan each, ready to make a big splash.

However, less than a month later, the government began to restrict fuel. Without fuel, the tankers became piles of scrap metal, the factory had no electricity and could not operate, so the concrete in the factory area turned into dirt. In the end, Sun Tao stayed at the factory every day to survive, hoping that another seller would take over.

"Brother, the factory is yours. Not 998, just 500 jin of rice! The factory is yours! How about it?"

Sun Tao led Lu Yuan on a tour of the factory and its interior.

"Hehe! Brother, I'd be a fool to buy this. How about this, I'll take all the concrete raw materials in your warehouse, 300 jin of rice! I'll also take a few tanker trucks and two freight trucks."

The other party agreed without hesitation after hearing the story, but he would not be responsible for the transportation. After all, there was no fuel left. Originally, there was still some fuel in these tankers, but in order to survive, he had to drain the fuel and exchange it for food.

These tankers are now completely empty of oil.

So Lu Yuan gave ten catties of pork as a deposit, and then drove home.

Hearing Lu Yuan say that the concrete had been obtained, everyone cheered. After all, the irrigation ditch had been dug and now they were just waiting for the concrete to arrive. With no work to do, the quality of everyone's meals had declined. Many people were thinking about the meat they had eaten a week ago. Although it was just two pounds of minced pork steamed with rice, the smell of meat made everyone's mouths water just thinking about it.

Then Lu Yuan led a few people to get several hundred kilograms of gasoline and went to the concrete plant again.

Having received the grain, Sun Tao was so excited that he ignored Lu Yuan and the others, and took his wife and children to the small house to cook porridge.

Soon, after everyone's busy work, several concrete mixer trucks and several trucks were finally started. After a lot of work, everyone was covered in mud and cement, but they were all very happy because Lu Yuan promised them that they would get meat to eat when they went back with the people who came to work today.

The truck made three trips back and forth before it could bring back all the concrete that hadn't expired from the warehouse.

It must be said that Professor Zhu's abilities go far beyond simply building water conservancy projects; he is even very familiar with concrete preparation methods.

Under Professor Zhu's guidance, more than twenty men and women began loading gravel and cement into the concrete mixer truck. After some mixing, the concrete pouring finally began.

Looking at the drainage ditch that had already taken shape, a sense of accomplishment rose in everyone's hearts. They hadn't felt this way in a long time. The hardship of living for more than half a year had left everyone only remembering how to eat the next meal, and they could hardly remember anything else.

...

February 7, 2027, will be the first year after the apocalypse. In that year, the human population will plummet from seven billion to three billion, making it arguably the greatest disaster humanity has ever faced since its birth.

Watching the New Year's Gala on TV, everyone's eyes welled up with tears. Apart from Lu Yuan and Xiao Shan's family, everyone present had lost family members to varying degrees.