The sight before them was incredible. It didn't look like a supermarket display at all, but more like a warehouse stacked to the ceiling with goods, every kind imaginable, each one packed in boxes.
"See that? Satisfied now?"
Click.
The lights went off. Jing Shu pulled Grandma Jing out of the room, slammed the lock shut, then swiftly stored all the rice and flour into the Cube Space.
Grandma Jing smacked her lips, still savoring the moment. "I wasn't done looking yet… I didn't even get to count how many bags of food we've got left. Why're you in such a rush, girl?"
Jing Shu could only sigh. If Grandma Jing saw too much and remembered it all, how was she supposed to bluff her next time?
Grandma Jing whispered excitedly, "There were dozens, maybe hundreds of sacks of rice and flour in there, stacked like a mountain. How did you even buy so much, my dear granddaughter?"
Jing Shu pouted. They'd already eaten more than half of that stock without realizing it, and it had only been three years. Looked like she'd have to start growing rice in the Cube Space soon. Not yet though—she still didn't have good seeds.
She missed the Wuchang rice from the northeast, the crimson royal rice from Yutian, and the tribute rice from Zhefeng. Jing Shu had standards when it came to food.
Maybe she should rush that guy who promised her seeds again. It'd been half a year already—what if something happened to them? She'd be damned if they got buried in this mudslide. Maybe she should go out and check…
"They said you needed to buy at least a few hundred sacks to qualify for wholesale, so I just… went for it. Hid them in the basement. Cost me a fortune, and I didn't dare tell Mom. Grandma, please don't let it slip."
Grandma Jing nodded like a pecking chicken, finally reassured. "Rice'll grow bugs if it sits too long. You better take good care of it."
"Got it. I'm going to dig the canal now." Jing Shu pulled on her rubber boots, hoisted a customized iron shovel, and headed out to dig.
Life at the Jing household had returned to its usual rhythm. Eat when hungry, drink when thirsty, work till you drop. But the atmosphere wasn't quite the same.
Mudslides weren't as frequent or deadly as earthquakes, but they didn't stop once they started. They kept flowing—slow, sticky, thick like glue. Anything caught in it was gone for good.
No one in the Jing family had been reborn, so they were all on edge. What if the mudslide buried their villa? Every evening after dinner, they'd open the back gate and check the hillside. The villa walls were already buried under several dozen centimeters of mud, but the diverted stream around the family's front grave markers kept their area clear. That was enough to ease their minds—for now.
Still, the mudslide had caused huge damage and made everyone's life harder. Jing An's livestock farm had just started to recover, only to be ruined again. Housing the animals, feeding them, finding new feed—it was all a mess.
Su Lanzhi's Agricultural Department wasn't faring much better. Before, there were options. Now they had no choice but to use hydroponics and growth catalysts for vegetables. Even the artificial sun zone had started flooding with mudslides. They couldn't stop it, so everyone was working overtime to harvest as much as possible. Su Lanzhi had already been working for seven days straight.
Thankfully, Jing Shu's Red Nematode Factory wasn't in terrible shape. She'd poured a lot of money into it recently, and with some massive rocks she'd bought from Qian Duoduo, the flow had been diverted just enough.
But the mudslides had destroyed farmland, which hit people's food supplies hard. Those with working lights and heating could still grow a few crops indoors, but now that mudwater had risen through the soil, most plants were dead.
In short, there was even less food to go around.
No wonder people were jealous of Qian Duoduo's Xingfu Shiyuan. The whole place was built from stone, same as his base, so the mudslide couldn't touch it. Everyone was green with envy.
Things weren't looking good in Ningshan City either. In just ten days, they'd had to evacuate to the last two resettlement zones. Dozens of trucks ran back and forth every day, hauling precious supplies.
If this went on, they'd have to abandon Ningshan City entirely.
But where would everyone go?
Wu City was the only choice.
It was a metropolis of over a million before the apocalypse, and even after three years, hundreds of thousands had survived. If that many people flooded into Wu City, the government's burden would skyrocket. Hundreds of thousands of hungry mouths couldn't just be ignored.
Then again, Jing Shu didn't really care. In her past life, she'd been too busy starving to think about such things. This time, it wasn't her problem either.
What she was really curious about was the timeline. In her previous life, the Tyrant had taken power not long after this. But now, she'd saved the current leader's life. How would things play out? Would the Tyrant still come? And if he didn't, would Qian Duoduo still end up getting squeezed dry?
Honestly, even Jing Shu wanted a piece of Qian Duoduo's fat sheep now. Xingfu Shiyuan had become a paradise in this wasteland.
Food quality across Wu City had dropped again. They didn't even make it to the Lantern Festival before switching from pure insect patties to dirt-blended ones. The taste? Terrible. Regular worm patties were tough but still edible if you added salt. Mix in soil though, and it was like chewing on firewood.
At least the dirt worm patties were cheap, only 0.5 virtual coins each. Otherwise, it'd be a crime. Jing Shu's Red Nematode Factory still made pure meat ones, of course. She had to—she owed the government too much money and paid it back monthly in patties.
Thankfully, the tension didn't last long. Even Grandpa Jing finally relaxed a bit.
Then the "dirt digger" profession exploded overnight, all thanks to a news feature that aired at seven:
"Are red nematodes gone? Only because we ate them all. Are mudslides scary? Not at all. In fact, they'll be China's main food source for the next year. The more they flow, the fuller our bellies!
Now, please welcome Mr. Liu, who made millions by digging dirt and baking patties, to teach us how to become real dirt diggers! Let's learn how to eat soil—and how to eat it healthily!"
"When the mudslide hit, I saw the business opportunity right away. I'd spent ten years in Africa, so I know exactly how to make delicious dirt patties.
I contracted a mountain hollow, hired workers to dig, partnered with landfills and the government. Faced a ton of challenges, but I never gave up."
The whole show was bizarre. Every time someone watched it, they came away thinking, "I could totally get rich doing that too."
By the next day, when Grandpa Jing went to check the mudslide again, he couldn't help feeling like he was staring at a river of gold. Even Jing Shu frowned thoughtfully and wondered, "Should I… start a dirt patty factory too?"