Chapter 62

This was the first proper meal of the New Year, and it had to be refreshing. They both went home to freshen up, and when Jian Chu arrived still damp from his shower, he remarked, "We won't need to go out anymore, so no need to shower so frequently. At least now we can use the saved water a bit more freely."

Mu Nan agreed. Although they weren't short on water, there was a lingering guilt about wasting resources with daily showers. Without needing to go outside, he and Qin Huai could just use wet wipes each day.

Seeing that Mu Nan's family still had a pumpkin, Jian Chu was surprised: "Lucky you installed the solar panels in time. Otherwise, with the high temperatures these past few days, the pumpkin might not have lasted. You should keep it to eat slowly; pumpkins are quite durable."

Mu Nan suggested, "Let's cook it. For the New Year, I'll prepare a big pot of 'Self-Heating Hotpot.' Just watch over the pumpkin." The self-heating hotpot needed water to heat up outside, and since the water couldn't be consumed, it was better to remove the contents and cook them in a pot.

Qin Huai and Yu Zibai were preparing dough. Since they couldn't make dumplings, they decided to use the snack beef jerky as filling, even though they weren't sure what it would taste like. It was better to make steamed buns or soup, considering they already had the ingredients for that.

Everyone busied themselves with their tasks, exchanging a few words now and then. Most of the conversation came from Jian Chu, with Mu Nan responding occasionally and Yu Zibai bringing Jian Chu's exaggerated statements back to reality. Qin Huai listened on the side, and the atmosphere was pleasant. Despite the limited ingredients and the piles of corpses outside, Mu Nan had even found some background sounds from past Spring Festivals, creating a somewhat festive atmosphere.

After several hours of work, although the ingredients were limited, Jian Chu managed to prepare a table full of food. The most tempting was a pot of bright red self-heating hotpot. Mu Nan poured out the fruit from the canned fruit and mixed it with ice water, creating a drink that wasn't too sweet but had a nice flavor. Without other beverages, the canned fruit juice served as their drink.

They raised their glasses.

Qin Huai said, "May everyone be safe and smooth in the coming year, and wish for health and prosperity."

Yu Zibai added, "Let's not ask for too much. I just hope we can all sit together like this again next year."

Jian Chu quickly chimed in, "We definitely will. The disaster will pass, and things will get better!"

Mu Nan said, "Cheers!"

After so long without heavy-flavored food, Jian Chu eagerly reached into the big pot with his first chopstick, picking out a piece of meat and placing it in Mu Nan's bowl instead of his own: "You're the youngest, so you get the first share!"

Mu Nan smiled and returned the favor by putting a piece of meat into Jian Chu's bowl: "You're the second youngest, so you get the next piece."

Yu Zibai said, "If we go by age, I'm at a disadvantage since I'm the oldest."

Jian Chu handed him a piece of noodle: "Here you go, your favorite."

Mu Nan put a piece of meat in Qin Huai's bowl: "Brother, Happy New Year."

Qin Huai looked at him with a smile, and after several years, was finally able to say to Mu Nan's child, "Happy New Year, Nan Nan."

Without the need to worry about going out, Mu Nan felt like he was back to the time before the earthquake, when he was trapped at home by smog and couldn't go outside. However, lounging around wasn't an option. They still needed to thoroughly check the house for leaks and seal them as much as possible. Qin Huai also stopped conserving water. After Mu Nan put all the items from the living room into the space, he cleaned the entire area inside and out with diluted disinfectant. They had moved many items from outside recently, and disinfection was necessary.

Fortunately, there weren't any holes in the living room, and the only air conditioning drain had already been sealed. To be extra cautious, Mu Nan added another layer of sealant, and he also sealed the gaps around the windows and doors. Since the virus could spread through the air, sealing these gaps was crucial, even though they were on a high floor. One room had its windows open due to solar panels, so sealing the door gaps was essential.

After sealing the kitchen door with tape, Qin Huai also sealed the bathroom floor drain. Since they still needed to use the bathroom, they couldn't seal it with tape, so they sealed the window and floor drain.

Seeing Qin Huai sealing the toilet, Mu Nan couldn't help but ask, "So, are we starting to use cat litter?"

Qin Huai replied, "Although we're not short on water, we need to prevent virus transmission. We don't know if sick people might come back, and with the outside in such a mess, the drains are already clogged. It hasn't affected us yet due to our high floor, but once more people return, it will become a problem. So, yes, we'll use cat litter."

Even though Mu Nan had prepared some water in advance out of precaution in his previous life, he didn't know what the future would hold, so he didn't use it excessively. During that period, he even ran out of water for flushing toilets, and dealing with personal needs was an awkward process. Thankfully, he got through it. That's why, in this life, when he thought about stockpiling resources, cat litter was the first thing that came to mind. As a result, he hadn't really used the toilet much and hadn't paid much attention to the drainage situation.

Now that Qin Huai mentioned it, he agreed to use the cat litter. It might feel a bit awkward at first, but he hoped he'd get used to it.

Qin Huai said, "Hasn't your space been upgraded?"

Mu Nan was puzzled: "Upgraded?"

Qin Huai explained, "You said you can now see what's inside without opening the box."

Mu Nan realized: "Oh, right. What's up?"

Qin Huai smiled, "Don't store household waste in the space. Seal it in plastic bags and dispose of it next door. Once the elevator is running again, I'll take it down."

Mu Nan's face turned red, and he said, "Alright. Ugh, why do people have to eat, drink, and take care of their needs? It's such a hassle."

Qin Huai laughed, "If you didn't eat, drink, or take care of your needs, you'd be immortal. There's no need to be embarrassed; I was the one who cleaned up after you when you were a toddler."

At that time, when Mu Nan was just under three years old and had just started preschool, he was still shy and scared. When he needed to use the bathroom but didn't dare tell the teacher, he ended up having an accident and ran to find Qin Huai, crying. Qin Huai, who was five years old and in a higher class, was initially worried and panicked when he saw Mu Nan crying, only to find out that it was just an accident.

Mu Nan quickly covered his mouth, "I know you have a good memory, but can we move on from things that happened before I was three? We still need to eat!"

After a busy afternoon, they had managed to eliminate all safety hazards in the house, sealed and disinfected everything they could. Mu Nan rearranged the bed and small table and began bringing other items back in. It was time to start eating.

Even though they were in an air-conditioned room, they were still sweaty from all the activity, so they both took a quick shower. Mu Nan pulled out a dining table from the space and set it with food. He brought beer for Qin Huai and a drink for himself. When Qin Huai came out of the shower, Mu Nan cheerfully said, "Brother, come over, it's time for our New Year's meal!"

The table was filled with fish, meat, shrimp, and alcohol, with a pot of plump dumplings in the center. The computer was playing a New Year's Eve program from an unknown year, adding a festive touch to their small New Year celebration.

Thanks to Qin Huai's generous donation, all the medical staff at their camp were now wearing masks. Previously, there were only a few masks available, used by those in the tent designated for infectious disease patients. Now, though still not plentiful, there was at least one mask for each medical worker. However, after just one night, the number of patients had noticeably increased.

Xu Ming, a veterinarian, could handle some external injuries and emergency treatments but wasn't trained for infectious diseases. It would be a waste to use him as a nurse, so he remained in the tents for injured individuals, handling sutures and amputations.

No new survivors had arrived in the past couple of days. Xu Ming hadn't checked the statistics for the camp, but it seemed to be quite crowded. The camp covered dozens of nearby communities, and it was uncertain if the number of survivors had exceeded ten thousand.

Reports indicated that other areas were in worse conditions. Their camp had a central hospital that managed to rescue some medical staff, so many survivors received treatment and survived. In contrast, other areas, with hospitals too far away, missed the critical rescue window and faced a severe shortage of medical supplies. Even those pulled from the ruins with a chance to survive ended up watching their loved ones struggle and die slowly.

Xu Ming considered himself mentally strong. His ability to empathize was poor the grief at a veterinary clinic was often as intense as at a human hospital. The heartbreak of pet owners when their animals passed away could sometimes be more direct than the grief over a human death. Yet, he never showed any emotional weakness. It seemed he was born to wield a scalpel but feared that his lack of reverence for life might lead him down a dangerous path, which is why he chose to be a veterinarian.

He usually hid behind his gentle and humble demeanor. Over time, this had become almost instinctive—helping those in need or showing sympathy to the young, even though these were just outward displays, rarely touching his inner self.

But now, for the first time, he couldn't bear to look at the devastation outside.

After drinking some water to calm his emotions, Xu Ming left his quarters and headed to the injured tent. Yesterday, someone's leg showed signs of necrosis, but there wasn't the necessary condition for surgery at the time. Today, he had to check again. If it was beyond saving, amputation would be required. However, with no operating room or precise instruments, he would have to rely on his experience. In such harsh conditions, the patient might not survive.

While he was mentally rehearsing treatment plans, he suddenly heard a weak child's voice crying about stomach pain.

Xu Ming stopped in his tracks and followed the sound, finding a woman with a dirty, disheveled appearance, sitting in a corner with a six- or seven-year-old girl in her arms. The child, though dirty, had a noticeably pale, sickly complexion, with lips devoid of color. She was curled up on her mother's lap, wearing tattered rags instead of proper clothing. Her exposed skin, though dirty and blackened, showed signs of severe malnutrition: a sunken abdomen, prominent lymph nodes, and an overall half-conscious state. The child instinctively cried out to her mother in pain.

Xu Ming approached, but the woman defensively clutched the child and resisted his approach.

Xu Ming had no choice but to stop at a distance and said, "Your daughter is ill. She needs treatment."

The woman looked at him with a numb expression: "Can she be treated? Is there still hope?"

Her daughter had been sick for two days, starting with vomiting and diarrhea. Initially, she could drink water and eat a little, but after being moved to the back tent, she couldn't keep anything down, only crying out in pain. In less than a day, the diarrhea turned to blood, accompanied by a high fever. The woman saw that everyone in the tent had similar symptoms. The severe cases were already taken out, and the so-called treatment was just waiting for death.

They say that a great disaster brings a great epidemic. With no rescue, they were surrounded by ruins buried with countless dead. They couldn't leave or escape. There were no hospitals or medicine. Treatment? What could be done? Just some anti-inflammatory drugs and antibiotics to endure.

The woman herself was also sick, with vomiting, abdominal pain, and a fever, alternating between chills and hot flashes. Diseases that could once be cured with a shot were now fatal. In the tent, it was just waiting to die in pain, and it seemed better to die outside for a bit of peace, at least without the constant despair and suffering. Her child's father was buried under the ruins; after so many days, he was definitely gone. Now only the mother and child were left, both ill, and what was there to treat? Enduring for a few more days was just more suffering; death seemed like a release.

Xu Ming knew that it was indeed incurable and that there were no specific medications; it was only a matter of relying on one's own immune system to endure.

Xu Ming stepped back and didn't insist any further. Whether the woman could be saved was unknown to him, but the little girl could no longer hold on. With her lymph nodes swollen beyond treatment, it seemed likely she only had a few hours left. It was already the loss of both a husband and child, and asking a mother in such a state to remain strong seemed the most cruel thing to him.

After reporting the situation of the mother and daughter, Xu Ming did not pursue it further. This was not an isolated case; some people fear death and struggle to live, while others fear life and await death naturally. To Xu Ming, these were personal choices.

Ultimately, the person needing amputation did not survive. Amputation is a major surgery, and even in times of abundant medical resources, such surgeries come with fatal risks. Now, with everyone mentally prepared, the doctors and nurses who performed the surgery calmly had the body removed, although this calmness might have been only surface-level.

Xu Ming changed out of his surgical gown. He was not the lead surgeon; even though he had performed many similar surgeries on pets, he would not be allowed to be the lead surgeon unless there were no other doctors available. So, in terms of mentality, he was probably the calmest among everyone.

However, when he finished cleaning and disinfecting and was leaving the surgical tent, he heard a commotion outside. He looked over and saw a young nurse, only twenty years old, who had been assisting earlier, sitting on the ground, breaking down in tears. She had graduated from a medical school only a few years ago and had been working as a contract worker at the hospital. During the smog epidemic, she chose to stay at the hospital because the hospital promised that those who participated in rescue work would be given permanent positions. Shortly after she became permanent, she faced extreme heat and then the earthquake.

From the smog until now, her nerves had never relaxed, and the number of deaths she had seen was likely more than that experienced by many veteran nurses. The death of the patient who needed an amputation might have been the last straw that broke the camel's back, and the girl completely broke down and could no longer cope.

Xu Ming thought the girl was quite strong and brave. Many doctors and nurses had broken down during the smog period, and with the continuous rise in death numbers due to the extreme heat, her persistence until now was truly remarkable, considering she was only in her twenties. But what could breaking down achieve? One could avoid the work, but they couldn't escape the current hopeless environment.

The rescue work was over, and after so many days, the chances of finding survivors were almost zero. So, now began the task of removing the bodies. Some protective suits had been found in the hospital, and aside from the doctors in the infectious disease tents, the soldiers responsible for body removal also wore protective suits. For those participating in body removal for food rations, they were given a mask and gloves. They only needed to clear the collapsed ruins, and if they found a body, they would call the people in protective suits to handle it, trying to avoid direct contact with the body without protective gear.

Even so, this job still carried a high risk of infection, so few were willing to do it, and the progress of body removal was very slow. The area marked for cremation had black smoke rising from it from just after dark until it was light again. The entire city was shrouded in the black smoke of burning bodies and the omnipresent stench of decay.

As the sun set, Mu Nan slightly lifted the cover to take a look outside. The situation outside was increasingly reminiscent of the darkest times he had experienced in his past life. As people slowly recovered from the earthquake, the despair that could not be reversed seemed more terrifying than the epidemic outbreak. Even though he was hiding upstairs and could not see anyone outside, he could still feel the overwhelming sense of despair.

Qin Huai sat next to him. As the sun was setting and the sunlight was less glaring, he pulled the cover back a bit more and sat with him, looking outside.

Mu Nan leaned on Qin Huai and said, "Brother, I never thought the world we live in would become like this."

Qin Huai gently touched his face and said, "It's okay, don't be afraid. I'm here."

Mu Nan smiled and said, "I'm not afraid." With Qin Huai by his side, he wasn't afraid at all.

When the sky outside was completely dark and Mu Nan could see a few distant fires from the building, he knew they were burning bodies. He stopped looking and lowered the outside cover and the thermal curtain inside the room. "What do we eat later?"

Seeing that Mu Nan was not letting the outside situation affect his appetite, Qin Huai felt relieved. "Anything you want to eat."

Mu Nan thought for a moment, "How about barbecue?"

Qin Huai nodded, "Sure."

Although he couldn't feel the joy of eating skewers at a lively night market, re-watching thousands of anime episodes and sitting by the bed with Qin Huai, drinking wine and eating barbecue, was still quite comforting. However, Mu Nan looked at Qin Huai's mature yet sharp features and then at the anime on the computer, and couldn't help but ask, "Brother, do you find watching this with me boring? We can watch a movie if you prefer."

Qin Huai didn't mind, "It's fine. This washing machine is okay, but it's still hard for him to be a student even after working for so many years."

Mu Nan laughed and said, "What washing machine? I'm a drum washing machine!"

Qin Huai supported him to prevent him from kicking over the small coffee table.

After eating and drinking to their fill and tidying up, Mu Nan and Qin Huai returned to the bed. Mu Nan continued watching his anime, while Qin Huai worked on his own computer. Mu Nan glanced over and saw a bunch of characters on the screen. "Brother, what are you doing?"

Qin Huai replied, "Trying to make some small games for you, since there's nothing else to do."

Mu Nan suggested, "How about making a snake game, but instead of squares, use the items from my recipe?"

Qin Huai looked at him and said, "That might be a bit difficult." Since the internet was down, he couldn't directly find materials online and had to do it himself. But seeing Mu Nan's sparkling eyes, Qin Huai said, "I'll give it a try."

Mu Nan watched anime for a while and then pulled up some makeup videos he had saved earlier. He thought that when winter came and water resources were less scarce, he should learn how to apply makeup. For now, it wasn't necessary since there wasn't enough water for washing his face: "In the future, I'll try to make my face look sallow and haggard."

Qin Huai replied, "You could just rub your face on the ground to make it look dirty."

Mu Nan said, "Just checking, you never know when it might come in handy." He had bought a full set of cosmetics when he and Qin Huai were shopping in B City, getting everything recommended by the sales assistant, just in case.

As Mu Nan was about to take out those cosmetics and compare them with the beauty blogger's tutorials, there was a knock on the outer iron door. It was a bit distant, as if it was coming from the anti-theft door installed at Yu Zibai's place.

Mu Nan quickly closed his laptop and turned to Qin Huai. Qin Huai said, "It might be the military checking the buildings. I'll go check it out."

Mu Nan got up and said, "Be careful."

Qin Huai nodded, put on his mask, and grabbed a small crossbow before carefully opening the door. As Qin Huai opened the door, Yu Zibai next door was also opening his door to check, and someone with a flashlight was shining it into the stairwell.

Seeing that the people behind were wearing military uniforms, neither of them let their guard down. They kept their distance and asked, "Is there a problem?"

The person with the flashlight knocked on the anti-theft door blocking the stairwell and said, "You have a pretty high security here. Have all the people on this floor returned? Are there any sick people?"

Yu Zibai, realizing the current situation when he saw Qin Huai wearing a mask, didn't approach and waited. Qin Huai asked, "Could you please show your credentials?"

The person didn't expect Qin Huai to be so cautious. Their uniforms clearly indicated their identity, but they still showed their military ID, thinking to themselves that they were glad they had brought their ID while checking the buildings.

After looking at the credentials, Qin Huai said, "Only the family from No. 3 came back a few days ago; they should have packed up and left again. There's a family from No. 7, a doctor who joined the medical team and hasn't returned. The other three families are all here."

The person made a note and didn't ask them to open the iron door. Instead, they said, "We'll record your door number and the names of the household heads for our statistics."

Qin Huai provided his and Mu Nan's door number and names, and Yu Zibai gave his and Jian Chu's information. The person said, "If there are any sick people in your home, get them to the medical station at the camp as soon as possible. There are doctors and nurses there. Don't try to tough it out at home."

Seeing them nod, the soldiers said, "You can go back inside. Try not to go out if you don't have to." In the center of the epidemic area, it's better to stay at home and survive if possible.