Gu Bei kept his head down while speaking, his exposed hands were already blue and purple from the cold, and water was still dripping from his body.

Ya Ya was wrapped in Qiao An'an's coat, but Gu Bei wasn't wrapped in anything. He came over to block the door with everyone as soon as he left the pond.

Moreover, Gu Bei, who couldn't swim, still jumped in to save Ya Ya after she fell into the water.

Qiao An'an felt there was no need to punish a child who had realized her mistake. Besides, she knew her own child well; perhaps Ya Ya had wanted to play by the pool on her own. So she said to Gu Bei, "The water is very cold. I'll go boil some water. You and Ya Ya should take a hot bath quickly, or you might catch a cold."

Gu Bei's parents went out to work not long after he was born.

He had always stayed at home with his grandfather. Although his grandfather treated him very well, he could never replace his parents. Qiao An'an had been very good to him before, but this time she gave him a feeling of being treated like a mother. Suddenly, his nose tingled and he cried silently.

These past few days, Gu Bei has been acting like a little adult.

Extremely strong.

Qiao An'an didn't expect him to cry, but when she thought about how he was still a child, and how she herself had to be driven to and from school by her parents when she was that age, while he had to take care of his elderly grandfather and face man-eating zombies, crying in this situation might not be a bad thing.

So, Qiao An'an put her arm around his shoulder and gently patted his back: "It's okay, it's okay..."

Grandpa Gu Bei thought about the suffering his grandson had endured since the end of the world, and tears welled up in his eyes.

Chi Xiaoyu quietly filled a large bucket with water, lit a fire, and boiled the water for the two children to bathe in.

After changing the children's clothes and giving them a bath, Qiao An'an decided to build a wall around the pond with bricks to prevent the children from accidentally falling in again.

There were no bricks readily available at home, so they had to be transported from the backyard.

However, the bluestone slabs used to build the fence in the backyard are extremely heavy. It's exhausting to carry them even once through the tunnel, let alone many times. Grandpa Gu Bei said, "Wouldn't that kill someone?"

Qiao An'an also felt quite tired. She had spent half a day carrying bricks to build the wall on the side, and she was still so tired that she could hardly lift her arms: "Then let's make a fence out of wood? Anyway, there's plenty of wood on the back mountain."

Grandpa Gu Bei stared at the wall at the back of the living room and asked, "Was there a door there before?"

Buildings used to have front and back doors, and Qiao An'an's old two-story house was no exception. However, when Qiao An'an was doing a live stream to renovate the house, she thought the iron gate at the back was ugly, so she dismantled it and built a wall around it.

When Grandpa Gu asked, Qiao An'an replied, "Yes."

Grandpa Gu Bei carefully examined the small door in the warehouse and then observed the patched-up position on the wall. He said, "The workers simply removed the door, blocked it with some bricks at the back door location, and then plastered the wall. The door frame is still plastered inside. We can just push away the bricks blocking the door and then put the iron door back on."

Qiao An'an thought it was a good idea.

They have now blocked the road into the mountains.

The mountains behind are all purely forested areas with almost no people, so they don't need to worry about zombies appearing behind them. After opening the door at the back, it will be much easier to enter and exit the wheat fields and go into the mountains.

However, Qiao An'an was still a little uneasy. Although there were no zombies in the back mountain, there were quite a few in front. Zombies are sensitive to sound, and if it weren't for Chen Zhou's help, the iron gate in front might have been smashed open by the zombies: "Won't the sound of smashing the wall attract zombies?"

Grandpa Gu Bei thought these were no big deal: "Just wrap a thick cloth around the hammer, and put a thick quilt on the wall, and there won't be any sound."

As expected, experience matters!

Qiao An'an gave Grandpa Gu Bei a thumbs up and then started smashing the wall.

This was physically demanding work. Qiao An'an swung a hammer wrapped in thick cloth, while Gu Bei and Chi Xiaoyu each held onto a corner of the blanket and got to work.

Seeing that he couldn't help much, Grandpa Gu went to the kitchen to prepare dinner.

They ate a lot of meat that morning.

Grandpa Gu Bei wasn't going to eat any more meat. Thinking that there was still a lot of pickled vegetables that Qiao An'an had stir-fried that morning, Grandpa Gu Bei washed the rice and corn and prepared to cook a Northeastern-style corn porridge.

For his main dish, he prepared chive boxes. He cut the chives, cleaned them, and chopped them. In another pan, he heated oil, cracked four eggs into the pan, scrambled them, and then added them to the chives. He drizzled soybean oil over them, added salt, MSG, dark soy sauce, and light soy sauce, and stirred until fragrant. He then set them aside.

Then I took some more dough from the flour bag and kneaded it.

The dough for chive boxes doesn't need to rise. After kneading, let it rest for about ten minutes before wrapping. Then, fry the wrapped chive boxes in oil until both sides are golden brown.

These chive boxes need plenty of oil; they're only delicious when they're bursting with oil when you bite into them.

When Grandpa Gu Bei finished making lunch, Qiao An'an and the others had already finished rebuilding the wall. Gu Bei and Chi Xiaoyu moved the bricks from breaking the wall to the edge of the pond to use for repairing the fence.

Qiao An'an stayed behind to assist Grandpa Gu Bei, the technician, in installing the iron gate.

The door frame on this wall was perfectly fine and hadn't been touched, so it was easy to install. The only downside was that a lot of the original coating on the wall was knocked off when it was being demolished, which looks quite ugly from a distance. But it's the apocalypse now, so looks don't really matter that much.

Even after the iron gate was installed, Qiao An'an was still a little worried.

She also brought out the heavy solid wood tea table that she had bought for the sake of decorating. When the renovation was being done, the workers said that people nowadays pay attention to the art of tea, and this table for drinking gongfu tea looks good and will attract fans, so Qiao An'an spent a lot of money to install it. But in fact, Qiao An'an likes to brew tea in a large cup and drink it in big gulps after it cools down. She can't tell the quality of the tea leaves, as long as it quenches her thirst. So although she bought this table, it has been sitting idle in the living room. Now it comes in handy.

With such a heavy table and a sturdy iron door, even if there were zombies or bad guys behind it, they wouldn't be able to easily break down the back door.

After doing all this, Grandpa Gu Bei called everyone to wash their hands and eat: "Everyone is exhausted from yesterday and today, so hurry up and wash your hands, eat, and go upstairs to rest."

Qiao An'an washed the dust off her face and hands with well water, then looked up and asked everyone, "Have you seen Ya Ya?"

While pumping well water for everyone, Gu Bei said, "When we were breaking down the back door, she said she was sleepy, so I carried her upstairs to sleep."

Hearing Gu Bei say that, Qiao An'an felt much relieved. After washing her hands and face, she went upstairs to call Ya Ya for dinner.

Ya Ya is usually most enthusiastic about eating, but this time Qiao An'an called Ya Ya in bed several times, but Ya Ya didn't respond. Qiao An'an immediately felt something was wrong and hurriedly reached out to hug Ya Ya in bed. When she hugged her, she was shocked to find that Ya Ya was burning up, and her small face was flushed red.