Take out a box of hot and sour noodles and soak them; the waiting time always seems very long.
My phone is flooded with messages in the neighborhood group chat. Some say it's the end of the world, while others say it's just a cold wave caused by a high-altitude cold vortex.
The argument escalated, the temperature dropped again, and people's fears rose once more.
Even after experiencing death once, fear remains.
A text message came in.
Second Uncle: "Yaoyao, where are you now? I'm very worried about you. Would you like to come to my house? We've stocked up on lots of food and drinks."
Jiang Yao sneered.
She's not going!
It was because of a text message and a word of concern from her second uncle that she brought her stockpiled supplies and sought refuge with their family.
Within a few days, they devoured her supplies. In order to conceal the existence of the space, they quickly exhausted her living supplies and drove her out.
Jiang Yao was still naively convinced that her second uncle's family really had no food left.
She endured hunger and walked through the streets in the bitter cold, her clothes offering no protection against the piercing pain of the icy chill.
In order to find food, she walked in extremely cold weather for a long time, which caused her feet to suffer severe frostbite and nerve and muscle necrosis.
She eventually died on that extremely cold night.
This time she will not repeat the same mistake.
In a 21°C room, wearing pajamas, I sit on a warm heated kang bed, eating soaked hot and sour noodles and fruit while watching TV.
This kind of life is very comfortable and enjoyable.
After extreme cold and storms, the military will set up shelters during the hottest period.
A knocking sound came from outside the door.
Who is it?
The surveillance footage showed it was our neighbor, Aunt Zhang.
I don't know when it started, but the northwest wind began to blow, and it felt like a knife cutting my face.
"Aunt Zhang, what brings you here on such a cold day?"
“Xiao Jiang, we’re planning to go to the mountain across the street to gather firewood. You’re unfamiliar with this place, so we can all go together and look out for each other.”
"Besides, I don't see anything left to burn on this hillside in front of your house."
As Aunt Zhang spoke, her eyes darted into the yard. Seeing only a small bundle of firewood left, she pouted and said, "On such a cold day, you won't even invite me in for a seat?"
To avoid causing unnecessary trouble, she quickly said, "Oh, that's wonderful, Aunt Zhang! I was just worried about having nothing to burn!"
"I dismantled all the furniture in the house. I was wondering what would be left to burn after all that was burned?"
"Aunt Zhang, I'll go get the axe. Let's set off now!"
Aunt Zhang originally wanted to take this opportunity to see if the girl, who stayed at home all day, was hiding a lot of firewood.
Unexpectedly, they couldn't even get through the door.
The outside temperature is now close to -35 degrees Celsius, so in order to conceal that I have enough matches to burn, I still have to put on a show.
If she doesn't go out, wouldn't that tell everyone she has a lot of firewood? Wouldn't that invite people to come and steal it?
Jiang Yao was full of energy when she went up the mountain to chop firewood. She bundled the chopped firewood together and dragged it home.
After several trips, Jiang Yao had accumulated enough firewood to burn for several days.
The original idea was to build safe shelters in rural areas because there was no shortage of food, but unexpectedly, what was lacking in the end was firewood.
I was freezing when I got home, so I rubbed my hands together and quickly went to the bathroom to run a bath.
Right now, all I want to do is soak in the bathtub, put on a nice face mask, and watch a movie.
When I came out of the bathroom, the indoor temperature had dropped a few degrees, and the outdoor thermometer showed that it was already -40 degrees Celsius outside.
As temperatures continue to drop, several elderly people in the village have frozen to death in the past few days.
As the temperature dropped lower and lower, the car became very difficult to drive. Jiang Yao put on her thermal underwear and drained the gasoline from the truck.
Although gasoline won't freeze, cars will have difficulty running at such temperatures.
For the next few days, I stayed at home, and whenever I had free time, I would take out flour and make steamed buns, twisted rolls, bean buns, meat buns, etc., to eat when it was inconvenient to eat them.
I cook different dishes every day. All the finished food is packed into disposable containers and stored online.
Outside, the cold wind howled, but inside the house, the stove was burning brightly. In such a comfortable environment, one could take a nap on the warm kang (heated brick bed) when tired.
I was woken up by a cell phone ringing in the morning; it was a call from Liu Yuanjiang.
"Miss Jiang, hello, I'm Liu Yuanjiang!"
"That's right. I heard that you rented several warehouses in Area A and Area B before, and stored a lot of food and supplies in them."
"The prices in supermarkets are too high right now. I think you have so much food that you can't finish it all. Could you lend me some?"
"Once this cold wave ends and life returns to normal, I will immediately return the equivalent amount to you."
"Manager Liu, to tell you the truth, I do have a warehouse in Area A, and I do store some food there."
"But before the cold wave arrived, the warehouse supermarket in Zone B had already started its trial operation and promotions, and the goods had already been delivered to Zone B."
"Given the current situation, it's unclear whether the food and daily necessities in the warehouse and supermarket are still there."
"Manager Liu, if you could go to Zone B and get some food for me, I'd like to waive the money."
"Miss Jiang, I have elderly parents and young children to support, please have pity on me! I'm only calling you because I'm truly desperate."
"Manager Liu, it's not that I don't want to help you."
"I didn't expect the cold wave to last for a month, and there's no sign of it stopping even after so long."
"If I had known this would happen, I wouldn't have gone back to Area A and been starving and freezing in this dilapidated house..."
Beep beep beep...
Manager Liu hung up the phone so quickly; he must be really afraid I'd ask him for food!
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