Reborn in the end of the world, I scavenged in the empty city and bought for free

Thirty-seven hours later the blizzard stopped.

AM:11:00

More and more volunteers have been involved in the snow-clearing operation in the neighborhood. Last night, the Meteorological Bureau urgently issued the latest notice. The large and small radio loudspeakers in the blocks within the base were activated at the same time to announce the temporary lifting of the orange snowstorm warning. From now on, there will be no snowstorm within 48 hours, and residents can go out and move around within two kilometers of their homes.

The heads of each block took immediate action and organized nearby residents to participate in the snow shoveling operation.

Luo Mei's family was also busy clearing snow at their doorstep, mainly clearing the corridor and some snow under the community. Large areas of snow could not be cleared by manpower alone, so around nine o'clock in the morning, staff from the base rescue center were seen driving two snowplows into the community and starting to clean up.

Luo Mei was sitting in the hallway tying her shoelaces. Luo Cheng, who was standing next to her, was already getting impatient waiting in the hallway. He shouted at the door, "Sister, are you okay?"

"Wait a minute, I'll be there right away after I put on my shoes." Luo Mei quickened her movements and put the work gloves in her pocket, planning to put them on when she went out.

Zhou Ruchu, who has been getting better after taking medicine, is now cutting curtains in the living room with old sheets at home. It can be seen that her complexion is much rosier than before. Thanks to the medicines that Luo Mei brought back, plus the vegetables and meat brought back from the store, Zhou Ruchu's body has been replenished for a while. Zhou Ruchu doesn't want to lie in bed all the time, and it happened that the temperature rose a few degrees after the snow stopped outside, so she planned to do some housework to exercise her body.

Seeing my daughter and son eager to go out and shovel snow, I couldn't help but remind them: "It's still cold outside, remember to put on an extra layer of socks, otherwise your feet will be frozen when you walk."

"Don't worry, I've put on three layers of socks inside, so you won't be cold. But you should rest at home and don't get too tired. The curtains can be done when I come back." Luo Mei stood up and looked at Zhou Ruchu worriedly.

Luo's father, who had just finished cutting the side dishes for lunch, came into the living room and said with a smile, "I will take good care of your mother. You and Xiaocheng should be careful about your safety. Xiaocheng likes to run around, so you have to keep an eye on him to prevent him from getting into trouble again."

"Okay, I'm leaving now. We'll be back in the afternoon. You don't have to save lunch for us. I brought some compressed biscuits."

As soon as the door was opened, cold air immediately poured into the house. Luo Mei was afraid that the house, which had finally warmed up, would be blown away by the cold air, so she quickly closed the door. At this time, Luo Cheng outside exhaled a breath of white air and complained, "Hurry up and go down. I saw Xiaofei and the others across the street have already left. We have to hurry."

The most important reason why Luo Cheng is so concerned about the snow shoveling work is that this is not voluntary labor. In order to mobilize the enthusiasm of community residents, the community property management released a message in the owners' group overnight that any resident who participates in the snow shoveling operation in these two days can get two kilograms of rice for free.

The original purpose of snow shoveling was to facilitate travel for residents in the community. Now with free supplies available, as soon as the news was released, many people in the group expressed their desire to participate in the snow shoveling operation.

Therefore, before nine o'clock this morning, many residents were seen walking out of the community buildings with various snow-shoveling tools. They began to shovel snow either downstairs of their own units or in other public areas, such as community gardens and playgrounds.

As soon as Luo Cheng and Luo Mei went downstairs, they saw their neighbors in the same unit building chatting and shoveling snow. Although it was voluntary labor, there were actually cameras in the community. If anyone was lazy and was unlucky enough to be seen by the property staff, not only would they not get a penny, they would also be criticized in the owners' group afterwards. So the owners who registered kept complaining, but for the sake of two kilograms of rice they had to concentrate on working. After all, the supply and marketing cooperatives had not opened normally during this period, and the only channel for everyone to buy supplies was the "barter" promoted on the forum. Otherwise, they could only continue to eat the stored food at home, or wait for the base to distribute supplies in three days. However, each family was only allowed to receive one kilogram of rice and half a kilogram of flour. This was also a temporary plan formulated by the base to stabilize the anxiety of the residents.

"Uncle Liu, have you almost finished sweeping this area?" Every household has a planned area. These are the areas given by the property in advance according to the number of people who have registered. In fact, it is not that much. Each household needs to sweep an area of ​​about 200 square meters within two days. However, because the snow is thick, it is easier to work if there are many people at home, but it will be more difficult if there are few people at home.

"Luo Mei, why did you come down so late? Hey, it's just you and Luo Cheng? Is your father not at home?" The middle-aged man who was working raised his head, holding a snow shovel he made himself. In fact, he just found a wooden stick and a relatively hard piece of iron to make it. Most of the snow shovels of the people working today were made by themselves in a similar way.

Because of the snow removal operation, some hardware stores in nearby blocks opened early, which also boosted the sales of many stores. During this period, not only were shovels selling well, but processed materials such as iron sheets also became popular.

The snow shovels in Luo Mei and Luo Cheng's hands were brought back by their father when he was working in the dungeon, so they didn't have to worry about not having tools.

"My dad is at home taking care of my mom. Luo Cheng and I will do it today, and my dad will take over tomorrow." Luo Mei answered with a smile and immediately started shoveling snow with Luo Cheng.

Many people came to the community one after another. On the white open space in the community, one could see people wearing various thick down jackets or cotton jackets working hard. Snowplows drove to the roads in the community, and in a few hours, the snow in the middle of the community was piled to both sides, making the cleared roads easy for cars to pass.

The temperature gradually warmed up after one o'clock in the afternoon, and it was only about minus thirty degrees Celsius. Although it was still very cold, it was much better than the weather in the past few days which once reached minus sixty degrees Celsius. Unfortunately, the sun did not come out and the sky was gloomy during this period.

After working for two hours in a row, Luo Mei took out the compressed biscuits, shared them in half with Luo Cheng, and then took out the pear soup that had been stewed in advance in the thermos.

The pear soup inside was still hot. After stewing it with rock sugar, my whole body felt warmer after drinking it.

Just as the two siblings were sharing their lunch warmly, there was a sudden roar in the sky, followed by a dozen helicopter transport planes flying overhead.

"Sister, those seem to be supplies up there, right?" Luo Cheng pointed at several giant boxes hanging under the transport plane, which immediately reminded Luo Mei of the airdrop helicopters sent by the government at the beginning of the apocalypse.

"It should be supplies, yes, but the government hasn't announced any airdrops in the next two days. Maybe they're making other preparations." Luo Mei murmured after taking a bite of the compressed biscuit.

Luo Cheng squinted his eyes and watched the dozen or so military planes flying overhead. These planes were not flying very high, and the roar of the planes caused people below to talk a lot. Even many people in the house ran to the balcony to watch the fun.

"Sister, that direction should be the rescue center. If all the supplies are delivered there, it means there may be some mission in the near future. Maybe after this snowstorm, the base will start to provide assistance to the disaster victims nearby. Let's go and take a look then."

"Look at you, you know about this before the notice is even sent out? It doesn't look like relief supplies to me. The rescue center is not in the city center. It may just be a temporary supply point. Didn't they say recently that the supply and marketing cooperatives in the block will resume business in two days? To me, it looks more like supplies distributed to major supply and marketing cooperatives." Luo Mei is a few years older than Luo Cheng, so her perspective on things is a little more mature. She inferred the real purpose of the supplies from the flight direction of the military aircraft.

In fact, Luo Mei's speculation was indeed correct. After the snowstorm showed signs of stopping, the base immediately took out a part of the supplies from one of the reserve warehouses in the base and distributed them to various supply and marketing cooperatives. On the one hand, it was to dispel the false rumor that there were no reserve grain warehouses in the base, and on the other hand, it was also to appease the anxious emotions of the base residents.

The two siblings were busy working all afternoon. At five o'clock in the afternoon, a broadcast was made in the community, notifying all residents who had participated in the snow shoveling work to go to Building D in the community with their ID cards to collect today's share of supplies.

The property management company of the residential complex where Luo Mei works is considered to be a relatively formal and responsible company. From the very beginning of formulating the plan, they had already taken into account the possibility of residents cutting in line and falsely claiming supplies, so they hired a number of D-level hunters from the Hunter Association in advance to maintain order on site.

There were quite a few people who came to collect reward supplies in the morning. When Luo Mei and Luo Cheng arrived at the property gate, a line had already started to form in front of them. It was estimated that there were about 20 to 30 people, and behind them there were more people who came one after another. There were at least a hundred people involved in the snow shoveling work in the morning.

Because each household is assigned a fixed area to collect supplies, each household can only receive two people's share of supplies at most. That is, even if a family has six people participating in the labor, they will only receive two people's share of rice in the end.

In order to maintain fairness, the property management initially allocated a relatively equal amount of cleaning area to each household, so there was no such thing as "the more you work, the more you get" or "getting something for nothing".

Probably because of the presence of the psychic hunter, the order of the entire queue was relatively good. Luo Mei and Luo Cheng each received a portion of rice. Although the two siblings were physically and mentally exhausted after a hard day's work, when they held the fruits of today's labor in their hands, their hearts were still filled with joy, and their tired bodies and minds were also comforted.

The two of them immediately jumped back home to show their families the fruits of their labor.

As soon as he got to the corridor, he could smell the aroma of cooking ingredients in every household. Luo Cheng used his sensitive sense of smell, wrinkled his nose and smiled, saying, "The one next door should be making noodle dumpling soup, and the one in front should be making compressed biscuit meat porridge. Oh, this one also has scrambled eggs?" He became greedy again and couldn't help muttering, "I wonder what we're going to eat tonight. I haven't eaten eggs for a long time. It would be great if Mom is willing to make egg custard tonight."

"Okay, just bear with it for the next two days. Mom said that the day after tomorrow is New Year's Eve, and we will have a good meal then.

"Really? I thought we wouldn't celebrate the New Year this year. After all, we don't know what's going on outside. Fortunately, the snow has finally stopped." Luo Cheng is at an age where he loves to play. In addition, he was still young at the beginning of the apocalypse. He didn't get to enjoy a happy childhood before he followed his family to the base. Therefore, he didn't get to see many good things to eat. In previous years, the family would have at most two meat dishes during the New Year. It was very different from the New Year that Luo Mei celebrated when she was a child.

As soon as I opened the door after returning home, I was greeted by the smell of food. Zhou Ruochu was making pancakes in the kitchen, and Luo's father was sitting in the living room repairing the tools he had used before. He nodded when he saw the two children came back.

Luo Mei and Luo Cheng immediately ran to the kitchen, and the kitchen of several square meters suddenly became crowded with three people.

"Mom, look, a pound of rice." Luo Cheng held the rice in his hand and shook it in front of Zhou Ruchu. He looked very proud, as if he was busy showing off in front of himself.

Zhou Ruochu smiled and said, "You must be tired today. Go and wipe your hands quickly. Dinner will be served soon."

Luo Cheng glanced at the stove, where he saw pancakes made with a mixture of flour and compressed biscuits. There was also some stewed winter melon next to it, and a plate of fried shredded carrots left over from this morning on one side.

These vegetables were all brought back from the store. Zhou Ruchu had been reluctant to eat them. After all, vegetables and meat were unavailable now. He could only eat a small amount of vegetables with rice porridge or pancakes every day. Although the food was simple, he was much happier than other neighbors who could only eat canned mutant rat meat bought from the supply and marketing cooperative.

There are less than two days left until the 30th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. If the snowstorm had not stopped, the Luo family would not have planned to celebrate the New Year. After all, supplies had to be used sparingly, and these supplies would at least allow the family to last until the end of March before the base issued a rescue notice.

"I just received a notice from the construction team saying that if it doesn't snow on the fourth day of the New Year, we will have to go back to work." Father Luo put down the hammer in his hand and began to wipe the safety helmets that would be used in the dungeon.

"So soon? Aren't you going to wait until after the Lantern Festival?" Zhou Ruochu had just come out of the kitchen with dinner and was a little surprised when she heard her husband's words.

"It's a temporary notice. The shifts after the fourth day of the Lunar New Year to the Lantern Festival can be paid double wages. If you go after the Lantern Festival, you will only get normal wages. I think the double wages for these ten days added up are not a small amount, enough for us to live on for another month. Besides, I will be very satisfied to be able to spend a few days of Spring Festival at home with you guys." Father Luo couldn't help but sigh. After all, in the past few years, let alone the Spring Festival, he couldn't even come back to reunite with his family for several holidays and was busy building the underground city.

Luo Cheng's brain was very quick. Although he was young, he was as good at finding out information as the adults. When the adults were talking, he suddenly interrupted and said, "Dad, I heard that there are monsters in the dungeon. Is that true?"