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

The fifth day of the apocalypse.

The explosion that day seemed to be just a flash in the pan, and the thick smoke returned to calm a day later, making it impossible to imagine what was happening in the World Trade Center a few kilometers away.

The flood water level has stabilized since it rose to the entrance of the fourteenth floor stairs in the previous two weeks, and there is no sign of further rising this week.

The sixteenth-floor staircase security door is still kicked or slammed by angry people every day, but it has never been broken open.

One reason is that it is no longer raining, and people would rather stay in the public corridors than in the narrow staircases. However, at the moment only the public areas from the 16th to the 18th floors are accessible. However, at least 17 or 18 families are homeless, and everyone is crowded in the three-story corridor, making it extremely inconvenient to move around and live.

The property management company subsequently held several owners' meetings to propose whether there were any owners willing to accept the flooded residents. Unfortunately, the owners of the 15th to 18th floors chose to remain silent. Although they sympathized with the suffering neighbors, no one wanted to accept a potential time bomb in such an environment.

At present, everyone in the corridor has laid mats or sheets on the floor, and the floor is filled with daily necessities. Some important supplies are tightly wrapped in bags or cartons, for fear that others will know how much "wealth" they have at home.

When people usually make fires to cook, the whole corridor is filled with smoke. Some people burn wood, some burn coal, and some burn cardboard. The food they cook is always watery white rice or noodles, or potato soup. Even if they want to cook a little, they have to wait until the whole family is together before they dare to eat instant noodles and canned food.

Regarding the water source problem, no one knew which supplier of water purification tablets was, but the family sold several large boxes of water purification tablets, one board of 100 tablets, directly to the neighbors, but they had to exchange them for two kilograms of rice. This immediately caused public outrage, and the family was almost kicked out of the corridor. Finally, the property management intervened and asked all the owners who were interested in needing water purification tablets to pool together five kilograms of rice and five kilograms of potatoes in exchange for about ten boards of water purification tablets. Basically, each household got half a board.

Every day, I can always see people fetching water in buckets or washbasins at home between the stairs on the 14th and 15th floors. After bringing the water back, they filter out the mud and sand with gauze and then put in the water purification tablets. Those who are a little more particular will let the mud and sand sink to the bottom overnight, then scoop up the clean water on top and put in the water purification tablets.

At first, everyone felt uncomfortable in their stomachs after drinking the water, and many people went to the toilet.

At the end of the corridor, the property management set up a small area of ​​several square meters with bed sheets. Each household had to find a way to use plastic bags or paper bags to solve physiological problems. It was far away from the main living area. At first, the owners were a little disgusted, but they gradually got used to it over time. After all, people can't always go to the toilet, but they all tacitly threw the garbage into the flood area in the other direction.

Jiang Tian and Jiang Chi didn't know what they used to exchange for the twenty packs of water purification tablets, and they directly gave two packs to Gu Tongwan.

In fact, Gu Tongwan had this thing in his space, but if he didn't accept it, Jiang Tian would probably think too much, so he still took two packs of sausages in exchange.

In the past two weeks, a lot more people have gone out to search for supplies. Each building has spontaneously organized itself. Those who have kayaks can provide them and charge a certain amount of supplies as a fee. Those who don't have kayaks draw lots and go out under the arrangement of the property owner.

The first week was relatively smooth, and most people were able to bring back a lot of useful supplies, including expired biscuits, canned food, or various snacks. The lucky ones were also able to find instant noodles, self-heating rice, and dried meat.

The Jiang siblings and Gu Tongwan also went out a few times during this period, and they still went to Zhenning Building. However, before leaving, Gu Tongwan reminded the siblings to be careful of snakes, insects, rats and ants in the building, but did not mention the matter of insect and animal mutations. After all, such phenomena do not occur frequently at present, and she cannot guarantee that others will believe it.

In the next few times, everyone tried to act together as much as possible. However, when we came for the second time, many places in Zhenning Building showed signs of having been searched. Someone must have also set his eyes on this place. After all, although there are few residential areas nearby, it is not ruled out that other people may come here at the risk of their lives to search for supplies.

The second time, they directly packed up all the biscuits and some self-heating foods from the live broadcast room of the radio and television station and took them away. At Gu Tongwan's suggestion, Jiang Tian also took several down jackets and thermal underwear. Although she preferred to take food, the little girl would never refuse anything Sister Gu asked her to do.

Taking advantage of the excuse of going to the bathroom, Gu Tongwan came to the 17th floor again. The strange thing was that the two human skins and the piles of rat skins had disappeared completely, leaving only some dark red marks on the floor. If you didn't look carefully, you would never guess that there were two corpses here.

Jiang Tian and Jiang Chi also said that the bodies of Liu Cheng and others on the 20th floor had also disappeared, as if they had never existed.

As for the reason for their disappearance, Jiang Zhi guessed that they might have been dragged away by the hungry rats in the building.

Gu Tongwan thought so too, but he vaguely felt that something was wrong. However, he had no clue after digging deeper, but at least it must have been done by a mutated animal or insect.

On their way back this time, they saw another small kayak coming towards them. It was a young couple. The woman was sitting behind the man, paddling hard. The man had a machete hanging around his waist. The kayaks of both parties just passed each other.

Jiang Tian turned her head to look at the woman, then frowned and said, "This woman and that man seem to be from the property management, but... I haven't seen them for a long time."

Jiang Zhi said: "Maybe he was trapped in another building before."

Jiang Tiantian nodded, and then put the matter between them behind her and looked at Gu Tongwan: "Sister Gu, do you think we can dry potatoes in this weather? We still have some potatoes at home." Although they have sprouted, they should still be edible after removing the sprouted parts, so she was reluctant to throw them away.

Gu Tongwan raised his head and looked at the cloudless sky. The sun was not very strong during these days and the temperature remained at 28 or 29 degrees. This kind of weather was neither too hot nor too cold, and it was the most comfortable time of the year.

“You can try it at noon, but the potatoes need to be boiled first, then cooled and sliced ​​before drying.”

"Ah, I thought it was dried directly in the sun." Jiang Tian was inspired again.

When they returned to the community, although each of them was carrying several large bags, everyone was used to it. Now those who were able to leave the community to search for supplies basically came back with so many things in their hands.

When they parted at the door, Gu Tongwan took out three boxes of biscuits, three buckets of hot and sour noodles, and two large bags of dried meat from his bag and gave them to the Jiang siblings as usual.

She gave them 20% of the supplies she had looted as kayaking expenses. Although she had her own speedboat, it was not convenient to move around in such an environment. Even if the speedboat made a very quiet sound, she could not guarantee that she would not be targeted when she went out or came back. Therefore, it was better for them to go out together.

After returning home, I saw Aoao and Tutu were still dozing off. Recently, they became excited at night and only dozed off during the day. However, they would still be very excited after only sleeping for four or five hours.

I fed them 10 kilograms of meat each in the morning, and they haven't asked for anything else until now. Since taking the satiety pills, it seems that they don't crave meat as much as before, but it's not that they don't like meat. If they are fed 30 kilograms of beef, they can still eat it, but they won't feel too hungry if the amount is small.

It seems that the 200 points in the lottery were worth it, at least it could save her several hundred kilograms of weight a month.

At 5:30 in the afternoon, the corridor was bustling with activity. Chen Yan picked up a piece of wrapping paper and lit it with proficiency. Next to it were some furniture that had floated up from the stairs. She had dried them in the sun for two days. This chair could be chopped up and used as firewood to cook several meals.

The smell emitted after burning furniture is unpleasant and even contains toxic gases, but basically every household does this.

Chen Yan's family of four includes her, her husband, and her parents-in-law. They had corn porridge for dinner. The corn was brought from the countryside by her parents-in-law before the natural disaster. They brought 50 kilograms of it. She didn't like it and complained to her parents-in-law about the effort. But now she knows the benefits of corn kernels. Putting them together with white rice to make porridge has a strong aroma, good taste, and is more filling.

The food at other families is actually similar. In order to save food, most people cook porridge.

Chen Yan grabbed a handful of corn kernels and put them into the white rice porridge. She could vaguely smell a hint of meat amid the various smoky smells.

"Beef brisket stewed with tomatoes?" He couldn't help muttering to himself, saliva quickly overflowing from his mouth, but he soon smiled bitterly and shook his head. Who can eat meat at home these days? There is no water or electricity, and even meat can't be kept for too long. In all likelihood, he was hallucinating because of hunger. After thinking about this, his nose was covered with various smells of smoke, and he couldn't help sneezing a few times.

"Hallucination, everything is an illusion, but I really want to eat meat..." Chen Yan murmured, and her husband who was sleeping soundly beside her turned over and made a "smack" sound with his mouth.