“The RV seems a little bigger,” Fu Yinli said.
Its exterior was still gray. The body had a dent, one side mirror was missing, and two windows were broken—but somehow, it still looked slightly larger.
“Let’s take a look,” Ruan Zhe said excitedly.
First, even the door seemed a bit wider.
When she climbed inside, the entire RV felt like it had been gently pulled outward from all directions. Every object had shifted outward by a few centimeters. The distance between the stove counters was wider by about a fist. The space between the driver’s seat and passenger seat had expanded, and the aisle was now wide enough for Fu Yinli to walk through without turning sideways.
The bed had become 1.5 meters wide. The bathroom layout hadn’t changed, but it felt more spacious.
“About two percent bigger,” Fu Yinli said.
Ruan Zhe wasn’t good with numbers. “How can you even tell?”
“Feeling.”
“……”
How humorous.
In short, nothing had been added or removed—the spacing between everything had simply increased slightly. From the outside, the RV’s outline looked a little larger, the roof about three centimeters higher, the length about ten-plus centimeters longer, and the width about seven or eight centimeters wider.
Ruan Zhe recorded all the data, then checked the time. Their little observation had taken twenty minutes.
Time was life.
The two of them immediately moved all items from the RV onto the grass outside. The supplies included what Ruan Zhe had originally prepared, plus what they had scavenged from supermarkets and service stations. Their biggest haul from the town was the chaos they left behind—and the excavator.
“I’ll sort everything roughly. You choose what goes back into the RV, and we’ll store the rest in that warehouse,” she said. Everything couldn’t stay in the RV—it wasn’t safe.
And if they found more supplies later, there might not be space.
Fu Yinli’s hand was bandaged, but it didn’t seem to affect his strength. “Only pack what we need for one week.”
That worked well—he had strong physical ability, and she had extremely flexible moral standards.
“Deal.”
A week’s supplies were easy enough to plan since their options were limited.
Food: six packs of compressed biscuits, twelve packs of instant noodles, four cans of luncheon meat, one jar of peanut butter, twelve sausages, half a bag of oats, two packs of salt, one bottle of chili sauce, one bag of flour.
Drinks: twelve bottles of mineral water, one large two-liter bottle of water. Fuel: thirty liters of diesel.
Clothes: two sets per person, four pairs of underwear each, four pairs of socks, one raincoat.
Sanitation: two rolls of toilet paper, one roll of trash bags, one entrenching shovel.
Medicine: iodine, bandages, band-aids, anti-diarrhea meds, fever reducers.
Weapons: bone-cutting knife, claw hammer, pepper spray, steel pipe, axe, saw.
Tools: two lighters, one flashlight, eight batteries, one roll of duct tape, a multitool, one telescope.
Other: two packs of sanitary pads, assorted plastic bags. Toothpaste and toothbrush were already in the RV.
The remaining supplies—such as several packs of 250ml water, additional large water bottles, and three barrels each of gasoline and diesel taken from the gas station—were stored away. Since the RV ran on diesel, gasoline wasn’t useful and would instead be kept as material for Molotov cocktails.
They placed everything in the “warehouse.”
Though calling it a warehouse was generous—it was really just a drafty adobe shed with moss growing in the corners and a half-broken door. At least it had a roof.
Ruan Zhe tied a slipknot with nylon rope around the doorframe to serve as a latch.
After finishing, they didn’t rest. The broken window still needed fixing.
The driver’s side glass was covered in spiderweb cracks. It hadn’t fully shattered, but wind and rain leaked through.
Ruan Zhe pulled out a roll of wide duct tape and handed it to Fu Yinli.
He taped the cracks from the inside, covering the entire damaged area.
The tape wasn’t wide enough, so he laid strips horizontally and vertically, forming a somewhat messy grid.
“Ugly,” Ruan Zhe commented.
“It blocks the rain.”
The dent in the body couldn’t be fixed. They didn’t know bodywork, and hitting it wouldn’t help.
They also had to refill the fuel tank and water tank.
They couldn’t use the water they had collected—that was for drinking. Fortunately, near the edge of this seemingly small farm, Fu Yinli found something surrounded by tall grass.
“Is this a water pressure well?” he asked.
Ruan Zhe walked over and laughed. “That’s a hand pump well.”
It sat alone in the grass, almost swallowed by it. The iron rod was thick, the handle rusted, the pump paint flaking off to reveal black iron underneath. The spout had long dried up.
Fu Yinli tried pumping it a few times but nothing came out.
“Is it broken?” he asked. “No water.”
“You have to prime it,” Ruan Zhe said, fetching a small basin from the RV. She scooped water from the fish pond and poured it into the pump. “Try again.”
Fu Yinli pumped several times, and finally a gurgling sound came. It took many cycles, but eventually they filled the water tank.
Next was the gray water tank, used for wastewater.
Ruan Zhe was extremely grateful she had bought an RV with a microbial toilet system—otherwise they’d have to deal with a blackwater tank as well.
After finishing all this, the RV was ready to move again. Five hours had passed, including a meal and a two-hour nap inside the vehicle.
“Finally, we can plant potatoes!” Ruan Zhe said after waking up.
Fu Yinli was already prepared. “What do I do?”
The ridges had already been made. Ruan Zhe brought over the treated potato seed pieces and handed them to him.
“Sprouts facing up. Bury them in the soil. Space each one twenty-five centimeters apart.”
“Why so far apart? Wouldn’t that waste space?” Fu Yinli asked as he obediently followed instructions.
“If potatoes are too crowded, they won’t grow properly. We don’t need to save that little bit of space.”
Besides, they didn’t have many seed potatoes anyway.
After planting them, they covered them with soil.
“Our soil depth is just right. If it’s too thick, the shoots won’t be able to break through,” she explained.
“Then we water them—gently. This is called the initial rooting water. No need to water again until they sprout.”
Fu Yinli listened while watering.
What kind of novel turns a pampered young lady into someone who sounds like an old farmer?
Maybe she just knew a bit, and he knew nothing, which made her sound especially professional.
“Then let’s plant the chili and eggplant too?” he asked. “We still have seven hours.”
Ruan Zhe went to the warehouse and brought out two damp cloth bundles. “They haven’t even sprouted yet. We can’t plant them.”
The seeds were still being germinated—no sprouts had appeared yet.
With no ready seedlings or plantable crops, even with energy left, there was nothing else to do.
In the end, they studied the fish pond. The water was clean—maybe they could raise fish in the future.
Fu Yinli expanded a few more plots of land and set up ropes beside the warehouse.
Ruan Zhe washed their clothes at the hand pump well and hung them out to dry.
After that, their energy was completely used up. They ate again, and with two hours left on the countdown, they set alarms and prepared to sleep in the RV like before.
Wrapped in a blanket because of the cold, Ruan Zhe mumbled sleepily to Fu Yinli:
“Actually, I have another idea—but if I let you do more, it’ll feel like I’m exploiting you like livestock.”