Chapter 14: The Water Gathering Spell

The newly opened wasteland rarely yielded food, but it wasn’t completely barren.

It had been five years since the apocalypse, and the survivors had entered this world of ruins.

But before the end of the world, people lived in a society overflowing with resources and advanced technology.

There were always some well-packaged foods that had survived to this day.

So, the survivors who ventured into the new wasteland could more or less find something to eat.

Only the three sickly, disabled members of the Shi family came back with nothing but a pile of junk.

If these three didn’t starve to death, it would truly defy reason.

Everyone in the group was just waiting for Second Sister-in-law Shi to come into their tent and beg for food.

In the wasteland, it was all too easy to manipulate a woman with no support.

But when the three women of the Shi family returned to their tent, they showed not the slightest intention of going out to beg for food.

Second Sister-in-law Shi fumbled around, pulling out the bottles and jars they’d scavenged from a filthy plastic bag.

Shi Yuebai patted little Shi Yaoyao on the head.

“Take out all those little stones you found and count them.”

Shi Yaoyao immediately pulled out a handful of similarly sized pebbles from her pocket.

“One, two, three, four, five…”

After five, she didn’t know what came next.

Shi Yuebai patiently taught her, “Six.”

Yaoyao listened intently, nodded her big head, and said in a drawn-out voice,

“Six.”

“Very good, Yaoyao! You’re amazing. Even if Auntie went looking, she might not find so many stones of the same size.”

Praised, Yaoyao’s eyes sparkled, as if two tiny moons shone within them.

Shi Yuebai pointed out a few spots and had Yaoyao place the pebbles she’d collected at those positions.

The range of the dizziness array was slowly expanding. Shi Yuebai pressed her hand to the ground, palm covering a talisman.

She channeled her fat reserves through the talisman, converting them into spiritual energy, which she then infused into the dizziness array.

It was like recharging a battery—every so often, Shi Yuebai had to pour more spiritual energy into the array.

The more energy she put in, the longer the array would last.

But her abilities were limited. Her obese body was riddled with blockages in her meridians.

Converting ten or twenty pounds of fat at once was simply impossible.

Even just a few ounces of fat, trickling through her blocked meridians, was enough to leave Shi Yuebai in agony.

Not to mention, she hadn’t eaten or drunk anything, and had spent the whole day baking under the wasteland sun.

Her weight had ballooned by another two pounds.

Shi Yuebai was on the verge of tears—she was now up to 740 pounds.

Some people gain weight just by drinking water; she was even more extreme—she gained weight just by sunbathing.

If it were the original owner of this body, she would’ve broken down by now.

But Yuebai’s willpower was far beyond ordinary.

Even as the fat energy surged through her meridians like fine steel wires, causing pain everywhere they went, she persisted in infusing a few ounces of spiritual energy into the dizziness array.

Then she pulled Yaoyao over, placed one hand on her head, and channeled a pound of energy into her.

Yaoyao didn’t feel hungry at all; she had no idea what her aunt was doing.

But seeing her aunt’s forehead covered in sweat, Yaoyao reached out and wiped it away.

“Auntie, tired? So tired…”

With the intelligence of a two-year-old, the little girl couldn’t form a complete sentence yet.

Shi Yuebai patted Yaoyao’s head, forced a smile, her chubby cheeks piling up like a laughing Buddha.

“Auntie’s not tired. Yaoyao, go find some more little stones. Auntie needs to work alone for a bit.”

Seeing Yaoyao obediently crawl away,

Shi Yuebai turned her attention to the large washbasin they’d just scavenged.

Her short, fat fingers struggled to form a hand seal as she focused her mind.

She was casting the Water Gathering Spell.

Energy continued to circulate through her body; every bit of converted energy made Shi Yuebai grimace in pain.

But she gritted her teeth and endured, until tiny wisps of mist began to condense in the air.

The mist, guided by her hand seal, drifted toward the washbasin and gathered there.

By the time Second Sister-in-law Shi finished stacking up all the bottles and jars,

She groped around and turned back,

“Yuebai, why did we bring back so many bottles?”

“If any men break into our tent, we can use these bottles to smash their heads.”

Shi Yuebai, still concentrating, replied offhandedly.

It was a perfunctory answer.

But Second Sister-in-law thought about it and found it made sense.

It was getting late. She picked up Yaoyao, and the two of them curled up beside Shi Yuebai.

“It’s late. Let’s rest early. Tomorrow morning we’ll go into town to sell potatoes.”

The next morning, Second Sister-in-law was awakened by the sound of water.

She shot up from the ground, groping in the air,

“Water? Where did the water come from?”

There were water sources in the wasteland.

But all of them were polluted—anyone who drank from them would die instantly.

Nothing could survive in that foul, black water.

The authorities had no choice; to keep the survivors alive, they racked their brains to filter out water with 100% radiation pollution.

This “100% radiation-polluted water” was drinkable. It wasn’t good for you, but at least it wouldn’t kill you right away.

So every survivor team had to go to the big city periodically to buy water.

Ordinary people couldn’t get water.

Water resources were tightly controlled by the authorities.

And individuals couldn’t buy water—only survivor teams could purchase it.

That’s why there were no lone wolves in the wasteland; everyone banded together into survivor teams.

All just to get water to drink.

With resources so scarce, water prices inevitably kept rising.

A few years ago, when the team went to the city to buy water, they had to trade away half their food supply.

Now, even half their food wasn’t enough to buy enough water.

More than half the food survivors found would be used to buy water.

So it was no wonder Second Sister-in-law was so shocked today.

“Yuebai, did the team distribute water?”

Shi Yuebai calmly took three bottles, cleaned in the washbasin the night before, and started washing them out,

“No, I left the washbasin by the bridge pier last night. Somehow, it collected half a basin of water overnight.”

As she spoke, there was a hint of resentment in her tone.

She’d worked herself half to death all night, and only managed to gather half a basin of water.

This morning, Shi Yuebai wanted to find three clean bottles to fill with water.

On the way into town, she could put them in Yaoyao’s backpack for her to drink if she got thirsty.

But all the bottles they’d scavenged yesterday were filthy.

Shi Yuebai had to use up a third of the water just to wash three glass bottles clean.

The bottles weren’t big—the kind that used to hold canned mandarin oranges before the apocalypse.

What made Shi Yuebai even angrier was that, even after all this effort,

She’d only lost two pounds of fat overnight.

While she was burning fat for energy, her body was still piling on more.

And the rate of gain seemed to be accelerating.

Charge, charge, charge, charge, charge!"