Chapter 11: Ugly People Always Make Trouble

“From now on, we’ll only eat food with low or moderate radiation.”

Shi Yuebai made the final decision. Why had she gotten so fat?

Just a bit of food, and she’d gain dozens or even hundreds of pounds more than a normal person.

It was all because she’d eaten too much food contaminated with radiation.

As for Shi Yaoyao and Second Sister-in-law Shi, one had her intelligence forever stuck at the level of a two-year-old, and the other was blind, unable to see anything at all.

That too was because they’d eaten too much contaminated food.

If they wanted to get healthy, and not slide further down the path of mutation, the food they ate couldn’t be polluted by radiation.

Shi Yuebai took the two moderately contaminated potatoes from Second Sister-in-law’s hands.

“These two potatoes—bring them with us on the road.”

“When you and Yaoyao get hungry, eat them.”

As she held the potatoes, she silently used a purification spell, cleansing every bit of radiation from them.

Even the solanine in the sprouted potatoes was purified away.

That was the beauty of the purification spell: anything harmful to the body could be completely cleansed.

Second Sister-in-law furrowed her brow. “Yuebai, does that mean you’re not going to eat?”

Shi Yuebai didn’t answer.

She braced herself on her arms and, inch by inch, dragged herself onto the flatbed cart.

Hearing the commotion, Second Sister-in-law hurried over and bent down behind Shi Yuebai.

She slid her arms under Shi Yuebai’s armpits and, using all her strength, tried to help her up.

But with Shi Yuebai’s size, how could Second Sister-in-law possibly manage?

It was only because Shi Yuebai used her body’s fat reserves to cast two small Strength Spells.

The Strength Spell glowed faintly in her palms, giving her a sudden surge of power.

With great effort, she managed to help Shi Yuebai onto the flatbed cart.

But because Shi Yuebai was so enormous, her belly looked like a giant ball of flesh.

That ball of fat pressed down on her legs, squeezing out four huge slabs of meat.

More than half of her fat spilled off the sides of the cart, dragging along the ground.

Shi Yuebai had to reach down and scoop up the massive folds of flesh that had fallen to the ground.

Otherwise, when Second Sister-in-law pushed the cart, her flesh would scrape along the ground.

She’d soon be a bloody mess, maybe even bleed out.

That little flatbed cart could barely hold Yuebai as it was.

If they wanted to go scavenging, both Second Sister-in-law and Yuebai would have to go. They couldn’t leave Yaoyao behind, with her mind stuck at age two.

So Second Sister-in-law had no choice but to carry Yaoyao on her back.

She let Yaoyao’s thin, weak legs dangle on either side of her waist.

Then she borrowed a belt, cut from an old tire, from the strange man next door.

Second Sister-in-law strapped Yaoyao tightly to her back.

Yaoyao felt uncomfortable and was about to scream.

“Quiet!”

Shi Yuebai was drenched in sweat, filthy, stinking, and sore all over.

Her messy hair hung over her face, which was slick with a greasy sheen.

“It’s tough for everyone right now, Yaoyao. You need to bear with it.”

Yaoyao never listened to anyone, but she listened to her aunt.

When her aunt told her to be quiet, Yaoyao obediently lay on her mother’s back.

Second Sister-in-law, blind and frail, carried her daughter on her back and pushed the heavy flatbed cart.

The three of them struggled clumsily, circling the open ground again and again.

“Look at those idiots from the Shi family.”

Some people from the group stood nearby, watching and laughing at the three sickly, disabled Shi women.

“What are they doing? Lost their minds and playing with a cart?”

“Maybe all the men in their family are dead, so the three of them have gone crazy?”

“Hahaha, I swear, Shi Yuebai is just here for comic relief.”

If Second Sister-in-law had been a celebrity before the apocalypse, pushing a cart with her disabled daughter on her back, she’d look pitiful but inspiring.

But Shi Yuebai, a seven-hundred-pound fat woman, sitting on a flatbed cart and struggling to scoop up her own fat—

It was both disgusting and hilarious.

“Ugly people really do make the most trouble!”

That was how the others in the group described Shi Yuebai.

Second Sister-in-law paused, carefully turning her face toward the cart.

“Yuebai…”

“Focus on practicing. Keep pushing!”

Shi Yuebai still held the long stick Second Sister-in-law used for self-defense.

As Second Sister-in-law pushed her forward, she used the stick to sweep aside any large stones in their path.

That way, she wouldn’t tip over, and Second Sister-in-law wouldn’t have to struggle as much.

Second Sister-in-law gritted her teeth. In the past, Shi Yuebai couldn’t stand being mocked like this.

Before the apocalypse, Shi Yuebai had been a beautiful little princess, cherished and spoiled by her family.

To fall so far—she didn’t need anyone else to say anything, she could barely stand it herself.

So when people mocked her for her size, Shi Yuebai would lose her temper.

“Second Sister-in-law, people’s words, their mockery, can’t actually hurt us.”

Shi Yuebai awkwardly swung her stick, knocking a large stone out of the way.

“Today, we’re just practicing—figuring out how the three of us can go scavenging together, and getting used to this cart.”

“Tomorrow morning, we’ll be ready to set out.”

By now, Yaoyao was getting used to being strapped tightly to her mother’s back.

She reached out her tiny hand and wiped the sweat from her mother’s forehead.

Then, in a soft little voice, she said, “Go, Mama! Go, Auntie!”

Second Sister-in-law’s throat tightened, tears threatening to spill.

She turned in surprise to look at her daughter.

Her daughter, with the mind of a two-year-old, had actually said something like that?!

A surge of strength welled up in Second Sister-in-law. With a loud “Ah!” she pushed the cart with all her might.

In front of the Shi family’s tarp shelter was a patch of open ground.

Second Sister-in-law carried Yaoyao on her back and pushed Shi Yuebai around and around in circles.

From daylight until night fell.

The strange man who lived next to the Shi family’s tarp, beside a pile of junk, silently watched the three sickly, disabled women.

Not until one in the morning, when Second Sister-in-law finally felt tired, did they stop.

She was drenched in sweat, but she pushed the cart much more smoothly than when she’d started.

She’d figured out how to use her strength to avoid the potholes in the ground, so the cart’s wheels wouldn’t get stuck.

Shi Yuebai, too, had gotten the hang of swinging her stick to clear away any big rocks in their path.

When the three of them finally parked the cart and went back inside their tarp shelter,

The strange man next door crept out from his junk pile.

He quietly approached the Shi family’s flatbed cart…

Come on, everyone, let’s chat!"