Back home, Si Cheng saw Yun Qi looking at him hesitantly, while his mother-in-law pushed Jun Jun and Le Le in their stroller to go for a walk, giving Yun Qi a wink as she left.

Watching Yun's mother walk out of the yard and close the gate, Si Cheng turned around and hugged Yun Qi's waist. "Qi Bao, is there something you want to tell your husband?"

"Why don't you call your mother and see if they'd consider building a house in the village? That way, it'll last. Otherwise, how will such a large family make a living?" After her mother's repeated persuasion, Yunqi finally spoke to Sicheng. Speaking of her mother-in-law, Yunqi didn't know what to say. Having decided to abandon her back then, why was she coming back now? Because Sicheng had been refusing to answer her calls, Uncle Gao had been calling frequently these past few days, simply expressing how difficult his sister's life was and urging mother and son to understand each other and help each other if possible. At first, Yunqi thought it was just simple reconciliation, until Aunt Yunqi called to reveal the truth: the other party was after the duplex apartment.

When Si Cheng first heard the news, he remained silent for the entire afternoon. It wasn't until that evening that he told Yun Qi, "If you're too weak to get up early, you shouldn't have any expectations of her. We just don't have a mother-son bond." Yun Qi hugged him and comforted him for most of the night.

Hearing Yunqi mention Gao Shuzhen again, he thought for a moment and shook his head in rejection. "Don't worry about them anymore. I have no feelings for them. Apart from her, everyone else is a stranger to me. She shouldn't have set her sights on you. If we let them move in, who knows what kind of trouble they'll cause? When she gets old, I'll repay her for giving me life. Tell your mother-in-law and the others not to care about what others say. If my uncle calls again, tell him to come directly to me."

"Wouldn't this be a bit much? This is just letting them build their own houses in the village. Otherwise, life will only get harder as time goes on. When she has her own family to take care of, she probably won't bother with me."

“Silly Qi Bao, you can completely ignore her and don’t care what others say. You need to know how difficult this world will be in the future. They dare to covet your house now. Even if I ignore her, she’s still trying to persuade you through your uncle. I don’t want to take any risks with their kind of nature. I can’t bear to make things difficult for you even a little bit. If we live closer, I’m afraid they’ll take advantage of you and make things even more difficult. It’s better to nip it in the bud.” Si Cheng leaned his head on Yun Qi’s shoulder and said softly.

"If we let them live in the city forever, what will happen when a major disaster strikes and supplies are scarce?" Yunqi said, expressing her concerns.

"We'll see when the time comes." Thinking about these things, Si Cheng couldn't make up his mind.

"I wonder what will happen here in the future. After the earthquake, it seemed like all high technology disappeared, and we couldn't even afford to use a telephone. I wonder what kind of disasters this place will experience?"

“There shouldn’t be a major earthquake here, otherwise they wouldn’t have designated this area as an escape route,” Si Cheng said, offering his guess. “But the weather should remain pretty much the same regardless of the duration of the earthquake, so we need to be fully prepared.”

"We have no advantage now because we don't understand the situation here. We can only rely on ourselves from now on. I wonder if all the coastal areas have been evacuated?" Yun Qi lamented that he couldn't be as prescient as the characters in rebirth novels.

"Most of them should have evacuated, but some old-fashioned people are said to be reluctant to leave their homeland. Some were even more outrageous, demanding that the government compensate them for their losses, but they were eventually forcibly expelled."

The couple chatted for a while longer until Yunqi felt a bit engorged with milk, at which point Sicheng went out to find the two little babies to help their mother relieve the pain.

Meanwhile, in the low-rent housing in the west of the city, a family was also arguing.

“I told you I wanted to go north, but you insisted on coming here, saying it was close to my parents’ home and I knew a lot of people here. And what happened? You’re going to live in a house like this. Now you’re even saying you want to move to the countryside. I’m not going. If you two want to go, you can go by yourselves.” Zhang Xiaohan berated Gao Shuzhen, while everyone else remained silent, not a single person saying a word in her defense.

"I didn't know it would be like this. I haven't been back for so many years, and who knew that everyone would have changed so much?"

"How dare you criticize others? Don't you even know your own character? You've neglected your parents, siblings, and children for so many years. That's a matter of morality. Who would dare to associate with you?"

“We all agreed to stay here back then, and you didn’t object, so what’s the point of saying all this now?” Seeing his daughter-in-law’s increasingly outrageous remarks, Lian Qingfeng quickly stopped her.

"Aunt Gao, Xiao Han is just anxious, especially since a truckload of supplies hasn't arrived yet. She doesn't know if they can be found. That's why she got a little upset. I'm so sorry." Seeing that his father was angry, Lian Jianpeng quickly came out to apologize.

"Qingfeng, you decide this time. Should we go to the countryside or stay here? We don't know when this natural disaster will end. There are so many mouths to feed, and we can't find work. None of you want to do manual labor. It's all out of pocket and no in income. We can't hold on for long."

"Why can't you keep going? Aunt Gao, you can't keep things from me." Hearing this, Zhang Xiaohan jumped up again, and even Lian Jianpeng looked at Gao Shuzhen with suspicion.

Helpless, Gao Shuzhen took out a notebook from the house and handed it to Lian Qingfeng, "Take a look for yourselves. This is a record of our expenses over this period of time, and how much is left."

After Lian Qingfeng finished reading, he handed the notebook to Lian Jianpeng. After everyone had read the expense records, their expressions changed.

"How come there's only such a small amount left?" Zhang Xiaohan was still a little doubtful.

Gao Shuzhen glanced at her cheap daughter-in-law and said indifferently, "You can do the math. You used to be able to spend money recklessly because you had rental income every month. Everyone knew how much that money was. Every year, the savings were used to buy more property. We reconciled the accounts every year. Now, houses are worthless. That's why there's so little left. If you don't increase your income and cut expenses, you'll starve sooner or later."

Even Zhang Xiaohan remained silent, but everyone still didn't want to move to the countryside.

"No matter what jobs you can find tomorrow, you have to start doing them. Even if you have to work yourself to death, I need to see your earnings." The head of the family, Lian Qingfeng, gave a direct and firm order, ignoring the expressions of resistance on everyone's faces.