Stock Up For Natural Disasters And Cubs Survive – CH73

Chapter 73

The moment they heard there would be sesame hot pot for dinner, the children cheered with flushed, excited little faces. Even the adults were full of joy and energy.

At sunset, the orange sea of light spread across the sky like a splendid oil painting.

The swaying tree shadows in the distance and the lush green pasture nearby became the most vivid scenery in that painting.

The tiny baby carried a bamboo basket and huffed and puffed after Grandpa to pick vegetables outside the core area.

Guanguan never walked in a straight line. He would walk two steps, stop to touch the grass, then run off to the side to pick up a few strangely shaped stones.

He gently blew the dust off the stones and carefully tucked them into his little yellow crossbody bag.

These were treasures!

The old man turned back to look at Guanguan, who had fallen behind again, and called out with a smile, “Little treasure, come pick vegetables for hot pot!”

“Baby’s coming, baby’s coming!” Guanguan pumped his short little legs and ran over as fast as he could.

When they got to the slope below, they saw two large, neatly planted vegetable plots.

Guanguan pointed at the other square patch of land and widened his eyes in delight. “Grandpa, look! The corn is taller than Guanguan now!”

That was the summer corn they had planted in late June. In just one month, the green stalks had shot up, thriving and lush.

Once the corn was harvested and ground into cornmeal, it would be enough to feed them for several months.

Director Wang smiled kindly. “It’ll grow even taller. In another two or three months, Guanguan will be able to eat fresh corn.”

Guanguan folded his hands and said solemnly, “Corn is super tasty.”

Director Wang crouched down, picked a head of lettuce, and shook the dirt loose through the stones at the edge of the bed. Smiling, he said, “If you ask me, boiled is the freshest and most tender way to eat it. One bite and you can bite into the little tender kernels—fragrant and sweet. But nowadays there are all sorts of ways to eat it. Barbecue shops sell roasted corn too. They sprinkle cumin and spices on it, and that tastes great too. When the time comes, we’ll have your uncles light a fire, and we’ll roast corn outside.”

Guanguan counted on his dirty little chubby fingers and repeated three times, “Roasted corn is yummy, roasted corn is yummy, roasted corn is yummy…”

One of the uncles had said that important things had to be repeated three times!

Baby was afraid he would forget!

Guanguan, like the dogs at home, never messed with the vegetable patch. While Grandpa picked vegetables, he simply squatted there with his little hands folded, waiting obediently.

Before long, Director Wang’s two large baskets were filled with lettuce, romaine, and baby bok choy still dusted with soil. There was no more room left at all.

Only then did he say, “Here, Guanguan. These two big lettuces are for you.”

Guanguan had long been waiting for Grandpa to give him a task. He quickly hugged his little basket and accepted them, then pointed at the now-bare patch of earth and asked anxiously, “Grandpa, the veggies are gone. What are we going to eat tomorrow?”

Director Wang chuckled. “Don’t worry. These vegetables are already getting old, and besides, it’s been rainy lately. If we don’t pick them now, one good rain and they’ll all rot in the ground. Since we’re having hot pot today, we might as well harvest them all and cook them, so nothing goes to waste.”

What the old man did not say was that they had many people and very little meat, and most of them were strong grown men and half-grown boys. That little bit of frozen meat was nowhere near enough.

At least if they used the meat broth to swish vegetables through, it would satisfy their craving a little.

The old man smiled. “Tomorrow or the day after, Grandpa will start planting long beans, and I’ll plant a ring of scallions around the vegetable patch too.”

The moment Guanguan heard there would be more vegetables planted, he became happy again and ran ahead with his little basket.

Then, seeing Grandpa still behind, he hurried back again to walk slowly beside him.

The old man’s back was slightly bent. The chubby little baby walked two steps, then skipped three, while the sunset and time itself trailed behind them, never seeming able to catch up.

At the gate of the core area, a simple stone fire pit had been built, with a small iron pot set over it, boiling with hot water.

Two dogs wandered around nearby, while a circle of little “black” people sat around it.

They were all sun-blackened from working outside all day in midsummer.

At that moment, a tall, skinny boy came from the direction of the wooden cabins, carrying two large metal basins.

The old man thought to himself that those two children were not blood relatives, but they were no less than that. Everyone else had been tanned two or three shades darker, yet the two of them simply refused to tan, no matter how much sun they got.

“Brother, baby picked vegetables and came back! Look!”

The child beside Director Wang completely lost control the moment he saw his brother and charged straight at him.

Wei Cheng looked down and saw that Guanguan’s little bamboo basket held two plump, fresh lettuces.

He smiled. “Very impressive!”

Guanguan grinned, showing his little white teeth. “Grandpa picked them!”

Wei Cheng said, “Then Guanguan is impressive too.”

Sun Dali was just adding firewood. He turned around and quickly took the metal basins from Wei Cheng’s hands, his eyes widening at once. “That’s so much meat! We’re really going all out!”

Wei Cheng found an excuse. “These meat rolls are about to expire, and they’re taking up space in the fridge. We don’t have much diesel left, and what little is left has to be saved for winter. Uncle Yi and the others said we should use electricity-hungry things like the fridge as little as possible.”

At present, only their cabin had electricity. The others still used flashlights and candles for lighting. As for boiling water or cooking instant noodles, they used the little gas canisters and portable burners Wei Cheng had distributed to them.

Sun Dali scratched his head and laughed. “That’s true. If that tanker truck hadn’t been intercepted, we’d be a lot more comfortable.”

The two heaping basins of beef rolls made Wang Sumin and Sun Xiaoyue swallow hard.

Sumin looked at the sesame paste packets and assorted bottles and jars on the ground and said with a smile, “My hometown is North City. I can mix up a proper dipping sauce and hot pot base for everyone, if you’d like. I’m not sure whether it’ll suit your tastes, though.”

Guanguan was the first to nod. “We’ll like it! We’ll like it!”

Yi Qi laughed so hard. “Is there anything Guanguan doesn’t like to eat?”

Guanguan immediately thought for a moment, failed to come up with anything, then flopped into his brother’s arms. Clearly he was embarrassed.

Wei Cheng rubbed his younger brother’s little head. “We’re not picky eaters. We’re good babies.”

Off to one side, Shen Zheng, who was burning mugwort to drive off mosquitoes, looked up and said, “I used to go to North City on business trips. Out of all the places there, what I liked most was that sesame hot pot. I didn’t expect Sister-in-law to be from North City. We’re really in for a treat today.”

Sumin felt a little shy and laughed. “Oh my, I’m not even sure I can make it the way you all like…”

Sun Dali chimed in from the side, “Don’t be modest, Xiaomin. Didn’t you always love making swished meat hot pot for us before? Everyone, trust me—my wife used to be a cook. She’s got real skills.”

Everyone cheered and shouted that they were looking forward to it.

Everyone had something to do. Uncle Shen was burning mugwort, Sun Dali and his wife were preparing the broth and dipping sauce, and Yi Qi and Shen Zheng were helping Director Wang wash vegetables.

The children were all thrilled too, and in the end Wei Cheng took them away to wash their hands and faces.

Wei Cheng led Guanguan toward the cabin, and Guanguan looked back every couple of steps, terrified that the sesame hot pot would start without baby.

“Don’t worry. They wouldn’t dare start without you, even if they ignored everyone else.”

Sun Xiaoyue, Mingming, and Xiaotiao finished washing and immediately ran outside again like a gust of wind.

Taking advantage of that, Wei Cheng slipped into the safehouse and poured some cool water from there into the sink in the little cabin.

Everyone reused water. For instance, the water used for washing faces in the morning could not be thrown out; it had to be kept for washing hands or feet at night.

Their generator was only a small wilderness model, with very limited power. It could not increase water pressure at all, so the farm’s daily-use water was always drawn from their own cabin.

Fortunately, Wei Cheng was clever and very good at exploiting system loopholes.

For example, for the farm residents’ drinking water, he would directly give them large buckets of mineral water. But for washing up, bathing, and personal hygiene, he would fetch bucket after bucket of water from the kitchen in the safehouse for them to use.

That was especially true when they had needed large amounts of water for mixing mud and concrete while building the base.

This way, they had saved quite a lot of twisty coins.

Still, to outsiders, that often-locked little cabin simply looked like it held abundant food and plenty of water.

The moment Guanguan plunged his dirty little map-like hands into the sink, gray streaks of mud spread over the water.

“Wow, the water’s cool! So comfy!”

Wei Cheng picked up the hand soap and said, “Where are your palms?”

“Here!” Guanguan immediately held out his pudgy little hands.

Wei Cheng pressed the pump three times into his hands and said with a smile, “Now rub up some bubbles.”

Guanguan rubbed and rubbed and rubbed. In no time his hands were wrapped in white foam.

“Brother, look! Cotton candy!”

As he said that, he opened his mouth toward the air and took a huge pretend bite, shaking his head in delight. “It tastes like Guanguan!”

Wei Cheng glanced at the grayish water and teased, “Really? I thought it tasted like mud.”

Guanguan stretched his neck up to correct him. “Not mud. Guanguan. Brother, you eat some!”

Wei Cheng imitated him and chewed on the air twice.

Guanguan looked at him expectantly. “Does it taste like Guanguan?”

Wei Cheng burst out laughing. “Like a little stinky baby.”

Guanguan nodded. “Then it’s Guanguan flavor!”

He sniffed his own little shirt and giggled. “Baby smells funny!”

Wei Cheng laughed so hard. “You don’t smell funny. That’s the smell of the mugwort Uncle Shen was burning to keep the mosquitoes away.”

He changed the child’s shirt twice a day. No matter what, he could not possibly stink that much.

A few days earlier, Director Wang and Sun Dali had gone up the mountain to cut timber and search for streams nearby.

Summer meant a lot of sweat. T-shirts and underclothes needed constant washing. If they could find a stream, it would make life much easier. Unfortunately, they had not been lucky. There was no stream in the nearby forest, but they had found large patches of lush mugwort.

Mugwort had a strong smell, so after it had been burned for a while, that scent clung to all of them.

He helped Guanguan scrub his hands clean, then wiped the child’s warm little face with a damp towel.

“Guanguan can go eat hot pot now.”

Guanguan looked up with a damp little face and hugged his brother’s leg, acting spoiled. “Brother…”

Wei Cheng played dumb knowingly. “What is it?”

“It’s so hot outside.” This little rascal had even learned how to hint now.

Wei Cheng suppressed a laugh. “Yes, it’s hot, but that can’t stop us from eating hot pot.”

“Give baby cola. If not, I’m gonna make trouble!” Guanguan waved his little fists around bravely, speaking up for baby.

Wei Cheng had actually planned to let the child drink a little soda anyway. He smiled and asked, “That sounds terrifying. How exactly is baby going to make trouble?”

Guanguan folded his arms, stuck out one little foot, thought for a moment, then wore the fiercest possible baby expression and said the most cowardly possible thing: “Baby won’t dream about brother tonight!”

Wei Cheng could barely hold back his laughter. “That is very serious.”

Guanguan nodded earnestly. “Very serious. Think about it. If Baby Guanguan doesn’t show up in your dream, won’t you be sad?”

In the child’s world, he believed that his dreams were also his brother’s dreams.

Wei Cheng mimed wiping away tears with both hands. “I would be sad.”

The moment Guanguan saw his brother “crying,” he stamped his foot anxiously. “Brother, don’t cry, don’t cry! Guanguan will dream about you twice tomorrow, okay?”

Apparently, if he did not get cola tonight, then he was not going to dream about him tonight.

A baby with very firm baby principles.

Wei Cheng smiled. “You can have cola, but not too much. All right?”

Guanguan gave a delighted cheer. “Yay!”

Wei Cheng took Guanguan into the safehouse storage room and, remembering they had no staple food, reached up to take down four packs of plain hanging noodles from a box on the shelf.

He also picked out a few room-temperature drinks and some bottled water. Those had all been scavenged by the two of them back on the highway.

Then he noticed a small black cloth pouch at the bottom of a paper box. Opening it casually, he found it full of gleaming gold jewelry.

Some belonged to him; some had been things they had picked up.

He glanced at Guanguan, who was wandering around beside the shelves with his hands behind his back, and thought that, if he got the chance, he wanted to have a pair of little bracelets made for Guanguan.

The child’s arms were fair and chubby. Two little gold bracelets on them would be adorable.

“Guanguan, let’s go.”

When they reached the gate, the fragrant smell of hot pot rushed over them all at once with the evening breeze.

“I was just about to go in and call you. Come on, come on, it’s time to eat!”

When Yi Qi saw the cola and bottled water in Wei Cheng’s hands, he laughed. “Looks like we’ve got cola tonight.”

As soon as the word cola was heard, everyone except Director Wang and the two dogs lit up with delight.

Tonight, every child would get a cup of cola.

Guanguan’s cup was a little smaller than the older kids’ cups, but he did not compare and he did not get upset.

He knew he had lots of things he could eat himself, but he could not share them with the other children.

Wang Xiaotiao took a careful sip of his cola. “My cola is so sweet.”

Guanguan also puffed his lips and sipped his soda, then looked up with a smile. “Baby’s cola makes bubbles!”

Sun Xiaoyue and Mingming also held their own little plastic cups carefully in both hands and sipped them a little at a time.

Before the meal had even begun, the children had already drunk all their cola.

The two dogs’ bowls were set beside them too. Little Apricot focused on eating his own jerky and dog food, but Gray Cub was restless and kept trying to sample the humans’ swished meat.

Guanguan hugged the troublesome little border collie. “Hot water is hot! Your puppy paws will get hurt!”

Gray Cub was very smart. It was not that he did not know the water was hot—he simply wanted to eat people food.

Yi Qi rubbed Gray Cub’s head. “You can’t have that. There’s a lot of salt and sauce in the soup. If you eat that meat, your fur won’t stay pretty.”

The moment he heard that, Gray Cub launched himself right out of Guanguan’s arms.

Guanguan had never seen Gray Cub move so fast before.

Gray Cub obediently went back to chewing the dog food in his bowl.

As for Little Apricot, he had long since cleaned out his dinner. Only one strip of jerky remained in his bowl, and no one knew whether he was full or saving it for someone.

The meat rolls in the iron pot floated to the top. The first batch was ready, and everyone got a heaping bowlful.

The adults mixed their own sauce. Aunt Sumin, worried that the children would not know any better and would eat too much sauce and make their throats too salty, carried the sauce bowl around and portioned it out for them.

When she got to Guanguan, he was already holding up his bowl obediently, waiting.

Sumin ladled three small spoonfuls of bright-colored sesame dipping sauce into it and said, “Guanguan, taste it and see if it’s flavorful enough.”

The child was very serious about it. He mixed the meat rolls around carefully until every single piece was coated in sauce, then solemnly lifted one to his mouth.

His dark eyes sparkled. “Guanguan is fainting from how yummy this is!”

“So cute.” Sumin rubbed the child’s face.

Everyone praised that first bite of sesame hot pot endlessly. Each slice of meat was wrapped in a thin, rich layer of sauce, full of the fragrance of sesame paste and the savory richness of fermented tofu, yet what still stood out most was the fresh, tender meat itself.

The grown men devoured an entire bowl of meat in just a few chops of their chopsticks. Meanwhile, more meat rolls had floated to the top of the pot.

Yi Qi took a huge gulp of cola and exclaimed happily, “With this dipping sauce, even shoe leather would taste good!”

Little Guanguan, sitting beside him, had sauce all around his mouth. In utter seriousness he said, “Guanguan would taste good dipped in it too!”

Everyone burst out laughing at that innocent remark.

Wei Cheng wiped the child’s mouth with a wet wipe. “Guanguan is a baby. Babies can’t be eaten.”

Guanguan held out his little hand. “Then can we dip Ultraman in it?”

Sun Xiaoyue, who had also turned into a little sauce-smeared kitten, replied, “No. Ultraman is plastic. If people eat plastic, their tummy hurts!”

“I don’t want tummy hurt!” Guanguan, hearing that, hurriedly stuffed more meat into his mouth. “Meat is yummy!”

Those two huge basins of beef rolls really let everyone eat to their hearts’ content. At the end, they added fresh lettuce, baby bok choy, and a bundle of noodles to the pot.

By the time night had fully fallen and the firewood had burned out, there was not even a drop of broth left in the pot.

—

The next morning, a light drizzle had started.

Still, true to routine, everyone got up at five o’clock. Each person took their own gun and small crossbow out to the wide pasture beyond the core area to practice.

At first, Sun Dali had felt his heart ache over the “wasted” bullets, but Shen Zheng had said to him, “If you don’t waste bullets today, then tomorrow the bullets will hit us and our families instead.”

After hearing that, Sun Dali never asked about it again.

Among all of them, the greatest improvement had been Aunt Sumin.

At first she had been terrified of firing a gun. Now she could pull the trigger without changing expression, and the number of rings she hit kept getting better and better.

Sun Xiaoyue, Mingming, and Xiaotiao were also taking turns with the small crossbow. None of the children lazed in bed, and none of them complained of being tired.

They had all suffered their way through together and knew how hard-won their present life was. To them, the words protect the farm had become the most important thing in the world.

So the task of preparing breakfast fell to Wei Cheng, the child.

Since they had had hot pot the night before, this morning’s meal was simple: rice porridge with pickles.

“Brother! Save me!”

Wei Cheng, who was in the kitchen scooping out pickles, immediately hurried over at the sound and found a naked-bottomed child hanging off the edge of the bed.

“Brother, don’t save me yet, this is fun!” Guanguan braced his hands on the bed and swung his little chubby legs back and forth.

They thumped against the wooden bed frame like two little drumsticks.

Wei Cheng was afraid he might fall, so he lifted him up and set him on the bed. “Why are you awake so early? It’s not even six.”

Guanguan said, “It’s raining. Baby wants to go play!”

“All right then, come with Brother to deliver breakfast to the uncles first.”

Wei Cheng took out a clean T-shirt and shorts and dressed the child.

This little one never had any waking-up temper. He was very cooperative—lift your hand and he lifted it, kick your leg and he kicked it.

Guanguan hugged his brother’s neck and said expectantly, “I want to wear the little bee raincoat!”

The child rushed straight outside. Seeing the two stacked-up dogs in the doghouse, he waved and called, “Gray Cub, Little Apricot, come out and play!”

Unable to resist the temptation, Gray Cub wanted to dash outside too, but Little Apricot bit him by the scruff and refused to let him.

Guanguan, seeing that his brother was wearing a raincoat too, thought of something. “Brother, do the doggies have raincoats?”

Wei Cheng nodded. “They do. Then let’s put raincoats on the dogs too.”

Guanguan tapped himself on the chest. “Can the doggies also wear little bee raincoats?”

Wei Cheng said, “Let Brother look first.”

He opened the system shop and searched for pet raincoats. Scrolling down, he actually found two bee-themed dog raincoats.

With their yellow-and-black stripes, the little bee raincoats made all three of them—each one rounder than the last—look less like bees and more like plump baby tigers.

The rain grew heavier. By the time Wei Cheng and Guanguan reached the pasture, the others had already retreated into an unused cabin.

“Breakfast’s here.”

When the two of them arrived, they saw all the adults gathered around Director Wang.

The two of them hurried over too. “Grandpa, what happened?”

Guanguan, too short to see past everyone, squeezed his way through and let out a startled cry. “Grandpa’s foot is hunchbacked!”

Yi Qi could not help laughing. “Your grandpa’s foot isn’t hunchbacked. It’s swollen.”

“So what happened?”

Director Wang waved his hand. “It’s nothing. The target stand wasn’t stable and fell on the top of my foot. It doesn’t hurt at all.”

Wei Cheng looked at Yi Qi, who nodded. “It’s fine. Just swollen from the impact. I put a medicated plaster on it—two or three days and it’ll be better.”

Seeing Director Wang like this, Wei Cheng could not help but feel guilty. “Have we all been too tired lately?”

Shen Zheng patted Wei Cheng on the shoulder. “If we want to live comfortably now, then we have to work hard. We don’t have the advantage in manpower. If we don’t practice shooting and crossbows properly, then when other people come knocking, how are we supposed to stay alive?”

The adults and children alike all wore determined expressions. Not one of them said anything discouraging or retreating.

As soon as the weather cleared, everyone went back to the watchtower to keep working.

Even with his swollen foot, Director Wang refused to rest. He sat on the ground spreading mortar onto bricks.

For over a month, whether under wind and rain or scorching sun, everyone at the farm—young and old, male and female—had been building the core area watchtower.

Before Sun Dali’s family had even arrived, two-thirds of the foundation had already been laid. Now the square concrete base, around two meters long, sat solid and firm, with four steel pillars nearly seven meters high rising straight into the sky. About two meters below the top sat a steel platform ringed with railings, and above that was a steep little roof of welded sheet metal. That would one day become the place where they watched for danger.

Beneath the platform there was a hatch. Open the platform cover, and below it was a line of steel stairs descending all the way down to the concrete base.

None of them were professional builders. They were making this tower out of common sense and what they had read in books. Along the way they failed and tried again, again and again, until at last they had anchored this rough little tower deep into steel-reinforced foundations.

While Yi Qi and Sun Dali welded the steel structure, Shen Zheng, Director Wang, and Sumin slowly built up the concrete around the stairs—the higher the better. Shen Zheng and Sumin were in charge of laying it, Director Wang mixed the cement, and the children, led by Chengcheng, helped push small carts of bricks and sand. Altogether, they did this simply to make sure the watchtower was steady, and that climbing the stairs would be safe.

They had worked and rushed, yet still failed to finish within the half month Wei Cheng had originally hoped for. From July into late August, while the scallions and long beans in the vegetable plots grew thick and green—

The watchtower was finally finished!

Thankfully, no one from Watcher Community had come knocking in all that time.

A seven-meter-tall tower sounded simple when you said it aloud, but when they actually built it, it had cost this whole family half their lives.

From the previous winter all the way into autumn this year, no one on the farm had rested for even a moment.

Wei Cheng’s ears rang with everyone’s cheers.

Yet the voice he had wanted to hear all along had not come.

Guanguan flung himself into his brother’s arms. “Brother, the tower-tower is finished!”

At that moment, the familiar voice rang in both brothers’ ears.

[Congratulations! You have successfully completed the three major tasks: strengthening the fence, establishing the farm core area, and building the watchtower!]

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