After clearing the collapsed and hazardous houses and settling the displaced families, another problem became imminent—food.
The successive snowstorms had cut off all transportation. Some families didn't have enough grain stored away, and with no money to buy more and nowhere to buy it from, they were down to one meal a day. Some had run out of food entirely.
There was no telling when relief grain from the county would arrive. The village chief, half-dead from exhaustion, made a trip to the county government, only to find he wasn't the only one there.
Village chiefs and representatives from other towns had gathered, crowding the entire rear office. He heard some were still on their way.
Compared to before the new year, the County Magistrate Pan Jiadao, who was only in his early forties, had aged considerably. One look at his official robes told you he hadn't changed them in days; they hung on his frame, wrinkled like a wilted cabbage leaf.
