Chapter 27 Heavy Rain
In the following days, Lianhua Village was hit by torrential rain.
With a deafening roar, lightning illuminated the entire room.
With a cry of "Wah!", Wan Qiqi woke up from her dream. Her two little ones were clinging to her tightly, their tears soaking the hem of her clothes.
Chen Yongnian got up at some point, lit the oil lamp, and walked to the bedside. "Wife, I'll comfort Pingping."
As he spoke, he picked up Pingping, gently patted the child's back, and walked back and forth in the room.
Wan Qiqi sat up, hugged An'an in her arms, and gently coaxed her, her gaze following Chen Yongnian as he wandered around the room.
He caught a glimpse of the puddle on the ground out of the corner of his eye and couldn't help but frown.
As the puddle rises straight up, you can see water droplets hanging from the thatch covering the roof beams, falling one by one onto the ground.
Listening to the sounds of wind and rain outside, and looking at the puddles on the ground, Wan Qiqi felt that this house was really too dilapidated!
Even though she lived with her grandmother in the countryside for a while when she was a child, it wasn't to this extent.
She had a vague feeling that the wind would whip up the thatch on her head and raindrops would pelt her face in the next second.
This illusion lingered with Wan Qiqi as she slept, and in her nightmares, she saw houses being blown away, floods sweeping through the entire mountain village, and taking away the two little ones.
With a murmur, Wan Qiqi woke up from her dream.
She didn't know how long she had slept; all she could hear was the sound of rain hitting the doors and windows.
As dawn broke outside the window, Wan Qiqi carefully climbed out of bed. The place where Chen Yongnian had been sleeping had been cleaned up, and he was nowhere to be seen.
The moment Wan Qiqi opened the door, her trouser legs were immediately soaked by the splashed mud.
The rain intensified and showed no signs of stopping.
Wang walked back from outside the courtyard, her clothes almost completely soaked.
She glanced at Wan Qiqi and said softly, "Go to the main room."
Wan Qiqi glanced back at the sleeping Pingping and An'an, then quietly closed the door.
"Chen Lizheng said that everyone should stay home for the next few days and be prepared to evacuate at any time." Wang took off her raincoat and hung it on the wall.
Wan Qiqi walked in and asked, "Mother, is this serious?"
“We haven’t recovered from the last flood yet, and we don’t know when this rain will stop. The river has already overflowed, and it might… it might not be long before the village is submerged.” As Wang spoke, a sense of desolation appeared in her eyes.
Wan Qiqi then recalled what she had seen in the past few days.
Lianhua Village is located in a low-lying area between two mountains. When it rains and landslides occur, the village is easily flooded with mud and water.
There is also a large river downstream, and whenever the upstream water rises, Lianhua Village will inevitably be affected.
Nestled against the mountains, it was originally a good place, but unfortunately it has been hit by repeated floods, causing great suffering to its inhabitants.
Unfortunately, there were no modern dikes in ancient times, so when faced with rain and floods, they could only let things develop as they were.
Thinking about all this, Wan Qiqi wished she could bring modern technology to ancient times!
But she's not some all-around genius; she can't build dams!
Looking at the rain outside, Wan Qiqi sighed softly, "Mother, this is just the worst-case scenario. Who knows, maybe Lotus Village will be able to escape this disaster?"
"I hope so!" Wang's mood grew increasingly somber.
“Mother, what are you afraid of? We survived the last flood, why are you afraid of this?” Chen Yongliang comforted Wang Shi with a smile.
Wan Qiqi also believes that there is no hurdle that cannot be overcome; take it one step at a time, and things will eventually get better.
Because of the heavy rain, the outdoor kitchen was unusable, so the three brothers set up a makeshift stove in the main room to ensure their daily meals.
After a few days, the dry firewood stored in the house was almost used up, so they had to bring in wet firewood and mix it together.
The main room was filled with the wisps of smoke rising from the damp firewood, which made Wan Qiqi cough for quite a while.
Thinking that Wang and Chen Yongliang would have to sleep here that night, she had the idea of building a house again, but looking at the few copper coins in her wallet, she had a headache.
"My lady, why don't you go inside and rest?" Chen Yongnian felt a pang of pity when he saw Wan Qiqi coughing.
Li Chongniang was also sitting in the main room, completely unaffected by the smoke, still holding needle and thread in her hand, doing something.
Wan Qiqi took it and looked at the embroidered pattern on the handkerchief, and couldn't help but praise, "It's so beautiful!"
Li Chongniang glanced at her, said nothing, and continued what she was doing.
She was skilled at needlework, and people in the village often gave her copper coins to embroider handkerchiefs.
After a while, everyone knew that she was good at embroidery!
It's just that the Chen family didn't have the money to buy handkerchiefs; otherwise, she could have embroidered them and sold them, earning more than she would have for others.
Seeing the envious look in Wan Qiqi's eyes, Li Chongniang suddenly felt a sense of pride, realizing that she had something that Wan Qiqi was better at!
Wan Qiqi thought to herself, "Embroidering in such a dark environment must be bad for my eyes."
At that moment, Chen Yongliang rushed in from outside, shouting, "Something terrible has happened! Someone has fallen into the well!"
"What? Who fell into the well?" Wang asked with concern.
Chen Yongliang sat down, took a breath, and immediately continued, "It seems to be Granny Liu from the village. She said she hadn't been seen for several days. Someone saw her going to fetch water, but she hasn't returned. Today, someone fetched water and found something in the water. After pulling it out, they discovered it was Granny Liu."
Li Chongniang had just taken a sip of water when she heard this. She immediately spat out the tea in her mouth and gaggled for a while, her face turning pale.
"Which well is it?" Chen Yongxing asked while reassuring Li Chongniang.
“Which well could it be? The one at the village entrance…and we drank from it too…” Chen Yongliang’s expression grew increasingly grim as he spoke. “So we drank water from a corpse!”
After Chen Yongliang finished speaking, the family's expressions changed, and they felt a tightness in their throats and a vague urge to vomit.
Wan Qiqi sat calmly in place and said indifferently, "We are not drinking well water, but rainwater that I collected."
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