Traveling through ancient times to survive

After staying indoors for three days, the snow outside finally stopped. Zhao Qing opened the window and looked out to see only the sky and earth were white, without any other colors.

The snow was spread thickly on the ground, probably half a meter deep.

Zhao Qing's entire family put on hats and covered their faces with cloth, leaving only a pair of eyes exposed.

Each family member had his own responsibilities. Zhao Chengchuan shoveled snow on the roof, Zhao Qing was responsible for the backyard, Zhao Dezhang helped carry buckets of snow, and the front yard was left to Zhao Deyan and Wang Mei.

Li Wu from next door heard the noise and climbed up to the roof to greet him: "Brother Chengchuan, is everything okay at home?"

Zhao Chengchuan's voice became muffled through the thick layer of cloth: "Everything is fine! Brother Li, how is your family? How is Heng'er?"

"Heng'er has caught a cold."

"Is it serious? Do you have any medicine? I have some cold medicine at home."

"It's not serious. We have medicine at home. Heng'er has already taken the medicine and is asleep."

After saying that, Li Wu also started shoveling snow. By the time he finished shoveling the snow on Zhao Chengchuan's roof, the yard was also cleaned up.

Wang Mei and Zhao Dezhang stayed at home, while the other three planned to go out and shovel a path.

First, Zhao Chengchuan called the Li family next door, knocked on the door and shouted: "Brother Li, open the door, I'm here to help you shovel the snow!"

Li Wu replied in a hoarse voice: "Brother Chengchuan, wait a minute!"

Zhao Chengchuan stayed at the Li family to help, while Zhao Deyan and Zhao Qing continued to clear the way outside.

After several families had shoveled their own yards, they saw Zhao Qing and his sister joining the snow-shoveling team. Passing by a house where no one was out, Zhao Deyan went up and knocked on the door to call for help.

When people heard the noise outside, most houses responded, but some houses were silent and there was no reaction at all.

The roofs of several poor families were crushed by the snow. Zhao Deyan turned his eyes away and didn't dare to think about it too much.

The snow-clearing team became quieter and quieter as they cleared the snow. It took two days before the roads in the village were completely cleared. Everyone followed Zhao Chengsong, the eldest son of the village chief, to count all the households.

A total of six houses collapsed, and the whole family was buried under the snow, with no one surviving. Seven other families did not light braziers at night, and all froze to death in their beds the moment the cold wave hit. Nearly 60% of people had someone die in their families, mostly frail elderly people and children, and 10% to 20% of those who survived were sick and bedridden.

The whole village was immersed in a sad atmosphere. The loved ones had passed away, but the living people did not dare to cry out loud. Because the temperature outside was so low that water would freeze into ice, someone had tried it, and when the boiling water was poured out, it would form ice beads when it hit the ground.

Some of the young and middle-aged people who were not sick were digging holes near the ancestral grave in the back mountain. The soil under the heavy snow was as hard as iron. Everyone worked hard, as if they wanted to vent all their grief.

The remaining young and strong people searched for corpses from house to house, dug deep pits, and carried the dead people into the bottom of the pits. There were no coffins to wrap the bodies. In the simple funeral, everyone bowed their heads in silence to see them off, and then shoveled the soil into the pits to bury them.

While Zhao Qing and his sister were digging a pit, Zhao Chengchuan secretly went to the old house. Zhao Yuanmu and his wife were indeed in good health and survived the cold disaster safely, but a few children of the De generation caught a cold.

Before anyone in the old house noticed him, Zhao Chengchuan sneaked back.

After bidding farewell to the deceased villagers, everyone went home with heavy hearts. The sun was shining brightly, but there was no warmth.

Zhao Qing's family dealt with the frozen chickens and cows and moved them into the cellar.

The temperature in the cellar was not too low. Zhao Qing reacted and suggested: "Dad, Mom, let's all sleep in the cellar? Most of our food, firewood and charcoal are in the cellar, so it's convenient to live down there, and it's warmer underground."

Everyone agreed to tidy up the cellar a bit to leave living space for a few people. Zhao Qing also opened a few small holes at the entrance of the cellar for ventilation.

After moving the beds, clothes and quilts into the cellar, Zhao Qing and his family officially began their cave-dwelling life.

The heavy snow stopped for three days, then started to fall again, and the temperature dropped a little.

The cellar was narrow and dimly lit. The whole world was silent with only his family left. Even Zhao Deyan, who had always been talkative, fell silent.

Zhao Qing was unmoved. Every day when he got up, he would first go out of the cellar to check the weather conditions, smuggle rice balls from the space to fill his stomach, then bring back a few buckets of clean snow, eat, and practice body-building techniques. His life was very regular.

Wang Mei couldn't stand lying down for a few days anymore, so she lit a brazier and sewed clothes and made a quilt with her eyes squinted.

Zhao Chengchuan and his two sons followed Zhao Qing to practice together. Because their bodies were not flexible enough, and Zhao Qing had already practiced the body-building technique to the advanced stage, with complicated postures and all kinds of strange movements. Zhao Qing had no choice but to teach them from the first movement of the body-building technique.

The three of them practiced for a few days, and Zhao Chengchuan expressed his admiration: "Qingya's training method is really good. In just a few days, I feel much more relaxed."

"Yeah, I thought I was just practicing blindly, but it turns out it really works."

"Yes, yes. I don't think I'm afraid of the cold these days."

The three of them practiced more and more vigorously. Despite Wang Mei's refusal, the Zhao family father and son forced Wang Mei to practice with them.

As the days passed, the snow kept falling, the gate was blocked, and everyone was trapped at home. Zhao Qing was not afraid of the cold and would appear in the yard every few days.

For fear of collapsing the house, Zhao Qing and his family shoveled snow several times when the snow stopped.

Sometimes he would meet Li Wu next door who was also shoveling snow, and Zhao Chengchuan would pull Li Wu aside and chatter non-stop, wishing he could say all the words he had been holding back for a long time all at once.

I was preparing to shovel snow again, but the road outside the yard had already been covered with snow again, and there was no trace of it. The snow line outside was less than half a meter from the top of the courtyard wall, and the whole house seemed to have sunk into the ground out of thin air.

After shoveling the snow, everyone went to the main room to take a fresh air. Zhao Chengchuan frowned and said nothing.

Wang Mei asked curiously, "Dad, what's wrong with you today? Why don't you say a word?"

Zhao Chengchuan was extremely worried: "Our courtyard wall is about two meters high. Now the snow is almost as high as the wall. If it doesn't stop, what if it buries the whole house?"

Zhao Qing: "Don't worry too much. After the house is buried, the main problem is that the air cannot circulate. People inside can easily suffocate to death. It's the same reason that the village chief emphasized that vents should be left when burning charcoal. Let's make a hole in the roof and use bamboo for ventilation."

Zhao Chengchuan was still worried: "What if the house collapses?"

Zhao Qing: "It collapses, so let it collapse. We live in a cellar anyway, so we can just dig a hole to get some fresh air."

Zhao Chengchuan: "Well, we do have a cellar to hide in, but the old house doesn't have one, and there are only a few families in the whole village who have dug a cellar."

Zhao Qing doesn't care about others, she doesn't say anything.

Zhao Deyan took over the conversation: "Hey, Dad, why do you think so much? If it's really that serious, our family may not be able to escape. God is deliberately not letting us live. What else can we do except accept it?"

Zhao Chengchuan was convinced: "You are a very open-minded guy."