At this point, people seemed to have stopped caring about whether their living environment was clean or not.
Food is what they care about most.
With food, people can fill their stomachs and have hope of survival.
Due to food shortages, the currency has already suffered severe devaluation.
In ordinary times, some law-abiding citizens have begun to lose their morals in order to fill their stomachs.
Those who already disregarded morality joined various organizations and criminal gangs.
People were dying of hunger and disease every day, and murder and arson had become commonplace.
Xu Lai's building has completely become the territory of Xiong Zhong and his gang.
Xiong Zhong and his team have stopped selling daily necessities to the residents.
If residents really want to buy, they can exchange it for something more valuable, such as cigarettes, alcohol, gold, medicine, or antiques.
Xiong Zhong, as the nominal building manager, along with his henchmen like Wang Cai, began demanding monthly protection fees from the residents under the guise of protecting them from harassment by outside criminal gangs.
Protection money was not accepted in cash; instead, residents were required to pay in rice or something more valuable.
Take rice as an example. Each household needs to pay rice to the family on the first day of each month, based on the number of people in the household.
Adults pay one jin per month, and minors pay half a jin per month.
Xu Lai's family consists of four adults and one minor, and they need to pay her four and a half jin of rice every month.
If it's meat, one pound of beef is equivalent to five pounds of rice, and one pound of pork is equivalent to two pounds of rice.
Of course, if rice is unavailable, hard currencies such as tobacco, alcohol, gold, medicine, and antiques can be used as payment.
Normally, the amount of rice a person pays per month is negligible.
But in this special time when the area has been flooded for two and a half months, and almost every household is short of food, and a tael of rice can save a life, the importance of this pound of rice is self-evident.
On the first day of the eighth lunar month, when Xiong Zhong led a group of thugs to collect protection money, several households were unable to pay it.
Those who couldn't pay protection money would have their names written down by Xiong Zhong's underlings.
If they fail to pay protection money for six consecutive months, they will be forced to move out of the building, and their houses will be taken over by Xiong Zhong and his gang.
They rented the houses to people outside who could afford protection money, so they could continue to collect protection money.
This regulation left the residents of the building angry but unable to speak out.
However, everyone was overwhelmed by the power of Xiong Zhong and his dozen or so menacing-looking thugs. They were no match for him, especially since the thugs also had guns!
Everyone had no choice but to swallow their anger and pay.
As the situation outside became increasingly chaotic, the Xu and Xiao families locked the blast doors at the fire escape and the corridor exit for safety reasons.
When Xiong Zhong and his gang came to collect protection money, Xu Haiguo from the Xu family and Xiao Rui from the Xiao family directly passed their five jin and three jin of rice through the gap between two specially made steel bars on the upper half of the fire escape explosion door.
The lower half of the explosion-proof door in this fire escape is made of a single solid piece of specially made steel, while the upper half is hollow.
"Why did you two families change the doors here? And lock them up! Open them now!"
The blond-haired man, who was in charge of collecting protection money with three thugs, was somewhat unhappy.
Xu Haiguo used to work on construction sites; he'd seen all sorts of blond-haired guys!
He quickly picked up a bottle of good wine that was placed to the side and handed it to the blond-haired boy outside the door with a big smile.
"Young men, we have elderly people and children at home. We're not afraid when you're here, but we're worried about bad people coming to cause trouble when you're not. This wine is a tribute to you young men!"
Xiao Rui also took the opportunity to slip two packs of cigarettes to him.
Xu Haiguo spoke eloquently, and the wine he sent out was indeed a rare and excellent wine.
Before the natural disaster, a pack of cigarettes from Xiaoshan would have cost at least two hundred yuan.
The blond-haired man was quite satisfied, so he didn't say anything more and led the group of thugs away.
After paying the protection fee of five kilograms of rice, Xu Haiguo and Xiao Shan greeted each other and went home.
Xu Lai brought her entire family of five, including Wanzi, into the space.
After more than three months, the crops planted in Xu Lai's space finally ripened.
Excluding the pond, poultry and livestock pens, and vegetable garden, which occupy half an acre.
The remaining five and a half acres, and two acres of pasture, had already been harvested to feed fish, sheep, and rabbits.
The remaining crops include half an acre of potatoes, one acre of wheat, and two acres of rice.
The golden rice and wheat swayed gently in the breeze.
The plump grains on the rice and wheat ears are full of hope for a bountiful harvest.
Potatoes take up the least area; the potato stalks are over a meter deep, and the leaves have already turned slightly yellow.
The rows of soil beneath the leaves, cracked open by the fruit, proved that the sweat of the five family members had not been in vain.
"Let's get to work, let's harvest the potatoes first!"
Farming is Xu Jiangming's favorite thing to do, and he enjoys harvesting crops even more.
He put on a straw hat, grabbed a hoe, and couldn't wait to go down into the potato field.
Xu Haiguo and Song Qiu'e also put on hats, one carrying a hoe and the other a bamboo basket, and followed behind their second uncle.
Before their rebirth, Xu Lai and her brother were most afraid of going to the fields, because it was tiring, sunny, and would make them dirty.
However, Xu Lai was reborn, and Xu Chao also had some life experience, and both deeply felt the importance of food.
Xu Lai carefully placed the meatballs, still attached, in the kitchen that had been built under a shed next to the pool.
Then my brother and I put on sun-protective clothing and straw hats, each carrying a basket, and chased after them.
Five people dug potatoes together, with Xu Haiguo and Song Qiu'e responsible for pulling the potato vines out of the potato rows.
Xu Jiangming was responsible for using a hoe to dig the potatoes out of the ridges.
Xu Lai and Xu Chao were responsible for picking up all the dug-up potatoes and putting them into baskets.
"These potatoes are huge!"
This was the first time Xu Lai and Xu Chao had ever dug potatoes in their lives. They were extremely excited to see the plump potatoes, bigger than an adult man's fist, lying in the potato pit.
"one two three……"
Xu Chao even got interested and counted how many potatoes could grow in one potato patch.
Xu Jiangming chuckled and replied, "The quantity is definitely not small!"
"Second Uncle, this potato patch actually produced sixteen potatoes, ten of which are big!"
Xu Chao was incredibly excited.
Xu Haiguo and Song Qiu'e became happier and happier as they pulled, feeling like they had inexhaustible strength.
Five people harvested half an acre of potatoes in about half a day, pulling, digging, and picking them up.
There weren't many baskets for potatoes. After Xu Lai and her brother filled a few baskets, they split into twos and carried them to a corner of the warehouse.
First, weigh the potatoes, then pour them from the basket onto the warehouse floor and spread them out evenly.
After these potatoes have been dried in a shady place for five days, they can be stored in dry sand.
This method allows potatoes to be stored for a year without sprouting.
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