Chapter 44: I Want Sand

With Ah Hong’s help, the cement at Shi Yuebai’s house was mixed very evenly.

Shi Yuebai finished reading her book and then watched Ah Hong for a while.

“Your technique is really skilled,” she remarked with some admiration.

The wall Shi Yuebai had built herself stood in stark contrast to the one Ah Hong was building with red bricks.

At a glance, Ah Hong’s red brick wall was much neater.

Ah Hong replied respectfully,

“When we first arrived in the wasteland, we lived around here. Back then, my husband also wanted to use these red bricks to build a house.”

In their original world, after an apocalyptic disaster, the whole planet had become a wasteland.

Countless people died.

There was no need to keep count—no one could, and there weren’t enough people left to do it anyway.

Ah Hong and her husband, with their son, survived the apocalypse and had been hiding under a bridge pier ever since.

Back then, life wasn’t quite so hard. Even in the ruins, you could still find plenty to eat.

Ah Hong followed her husband, trying to build some kind of shelter.

That’s when she learned how to mix cement and lay bricks.

“Later on, food became scarcer and scarcer. Everywhere that could possibly yield food had already been picked clean.”

As she spoke, Ah Hong kept laying bricks without stopping.

“We never finished building our house. My husband went out every day to look for food, but… there just wasn’t much to find.”

She spoke with her head down, busy with her hands.

Her heart was full of bitterness.

But her eyes were dry.

Her body simply didn’t have any extra moisture left to produce tears.

Shi Yuebai didn’t say anything. Just then, Second Sister Shi and Nong Yasi came over, pushing a cart full of gravel.

They didn’t know what to say either.

Suddenly, Shi Yuebai laughed.

“Who isn’t having a hard time?”

“At least you and your husband are both of sound mind, able to think logically.”

Look at the Shi family—some are old, some are young.

If Shi Yuebai hadn’t suddenly transmigrated here, who knows how this family would’ve ended up, probably picked clean to the bone.

What does anyone have, really?

Everyone’s struggling.

So why feel sad or bitter?

Compared to most people, Ah Hong was already much better off.

Ah Hong, head down and working, took a deep breath and smiled too.

“That’s true. Actually, our life is already much better now.”

She gathered her energy and quickly finished building a wall.

Then she turned to Shi Yuebai and said,

“If only we had a sand crusher. We could turn all this gravel into sand and even plaster the wall with it.”

Shi Yuebai raised her eyebrows. “Alright.”

She didn’t say anything more, just told Shi Yaoyao to bring two cans of cat food, two radiation-free potatoes, and two bottles of water for Ah Hong.

“That’s all for today.”

“If you want more food, come back tomorrow.”

She needed to reorganize the yard. There was too much stuff piled up now, and the space was too small.

She should fence off a separate area just for storing all the supplies she’d traded for with bread.

Also, Shi Yuebai planned to talk to Guai Guai about fencing off his tarp shelter as well.

After all, there was enough cement and red brick.

And if the red bricks ran out, Shi Yuebai could keep building with stone.

Ah Hong hugged her pile of supplies, trembling all over.

It was too much—really too much.

Just for a day’s work, she’d gotten two portions of food.

And among them were two bottles of precious, clean water.

Yesterday, she’d just licked the rim of the bottle Shi Yaoyao had given her.

Clear water was different—so sweet and refreshing.

Not like the water sold in the big city, which always had a foul, bitter taste.

Ah Hong wanted to kneel to Shi Yuebai again.

But when she saw Shi Yuebai turn her head, that look of disgust in her eyes,

Ah Hong straightened up and bowed instead.

“Thank you. And, I won’t tell anyone.”

Ah Hong was no fool.

Like Nong Yasi, she suspected Shi Yuebai might be an ability user.

She knew that if word got out, Shi Yuebai could easily be skinned alive by her own team.

Or worse, people from the big city might get involved.

All the ability users in the wasteland kept their powers hidden until they could protect themselves, just to avoid this kind of trouble.

The ones who did show themselves were always extremely powerful—leaders at the very top of the pyramid.

Ordinary survivors could only look up to them.

Shi Yuebai raised an eyebrow. Seeing how tactful Ah Hong was, she didn’t bother with any warnings.

After Ah Hong left with her son, Shi Yuebai once again compared the wall she’d built with the one Ah Hong had made.

The difference was huge.

She felt a bit depressed.

All she could do was pick up a stone, cast a strength spell, and squeeze it hard.

The palm-sized stone was crushed into fine powder.

Didn’t they need sand?

Without a sand crusher, Shi Yuebai would just make some by hand.

To crush stones into sand, she had to use the strength spell.

These days, Shi Yuebai had been using the water-gathering spell every day, constantly pouring spiritual energy into the enhanced dizziness array under her feet.

She’d also used soul power to make a bridal-dressed puppet.

And she had to keep infusing the Shi family members’ bodies with fat energy.

Her body was in constant pain.

The agony of torn meridians was something only she herself knew.

Using the strength spell was just adding another layer of pain on top of that.

So Shi Yuebai didn’t care.

What she did care about was how slow she was—after crushing stones for ages, she’d only made a small pile of sand.

When night fell, Shi Yuebai had Shi Yaoyao bag up about ten potatoes and bring ten bottles of water, each about 500ml.

The two of them went to the outside of Guai Guai’s tarp shelter.

“I always knew you had a lot of stuff here, but I didn’t expect it to be this much.”

Shi Yuebai pushed a cart inside.

But after a few steps, she couldn’t go any further.

Actually, Guai Guai’s tarp covered an area several times larger than the Shi family’s.

He alone occupied most of the space under the bridge.

But inside his tarp, there was barely any room to move.

It was packed with all sorts of strange parts.

Most of the junk he’d scavenged was piled up outside the bridge pier, stacked high.

Shi Yuebai clicked her tongue.

“With all this stuff, can you make me a sand crusher?”

Guai Guai, hair wild and eyes fixed on the potatoes and water in Shi Yaoyao’s hands, replied,

“I can, but there’s no power source. You wouldn’t be able to use it.”

In other words, he could build it, but there was no electricity or fuel.

Shi Yuebai pursed her lips. Well, that was the curse of the wasteland.

But she didn’t give up. “Think of something. I need sand.”

Guai Guai glanced at her, then beckoned for Shi Yaoyao to hand over the food and water.

His voice was as harsh as a duck’s quack.

“There’s one way—modify a mechanical digging arm, and you can crush the gravel by hand.”

“Like you did just now.”

He’d seen Shi Yuebai crushing stones by hand in the yard earlier.

Why haven’t I gone out to have fun yet, and the holiday is already half over?

No, this can’t be true."