Since it had already been decided to leave, the three of them didn’t stay at home any longer and immediately got ready to set off.
Before they stepped out, however, Gu Zhengchu called after them.
“Wait a moment. I’ll grab some medicine. The weather’s been off lately, it’s easy to get sick. There might even be a big epidemic later.
I’ll pack some medicine to take to your parents, and a little for you two as well. Don’t take it lightly, remember to take it, and don’t skip doses.”
As he said the last sentence, he even pointed at Shen Cong with his finger.
Shen Cong instinctively shrank her neck.
She had always been physically weak since childhood, constantly giving trouble to the older Gu back then, now her father-in-law.
So no one knew better than Gu Zhengchu about her dislike of taking that bitter herbal medicine.
“I’m not afraid of taking Chinese medicine anymore. Compared to all the weird stuff we had to eat during the apocalypse, traditional medicine will feel like pure treasure, you wouldn’t even realize it,” Shen Cong muttered in her heart, though she didn’t dare say it aloud.
She nudged closer to Gu Zhengchu and followed him into the pharmacy.
This was a place she had frequented before, but now stepping inside, everything looked like a treasure trove!
Her fingers twitched as if she wanted to grab everything and store it in her space right away, leaving not a single leaf behind!
Fortunately, she restrained herself.
“Dad, can I borrow this little cart?” she finally asked, reaching for the small cart used by the clinic for transporting supplies.
“Mm, take it,” Gu Zhengchu said without asking further.
The three of them left the house, with Old Gu sitting in the back and the couple in the front seats.
On the way, no one spoke much. As soon as they got in the car, Shen Cong pulled out her phone and started calculating the morning’s expenses.
The electric car plus the solar panels had cost a little over 180,000, so she rounded it to 180,000 for calculation;
Buying the stoves cost 54,000;
The fuel was bought by Gu Kai—
Shen Cong glanced at the text notification and couldn’t help but gasp.
Eighty thousand!
How much did he buy that it cost eighty thousand?!
She instinctively looked sideways at her husband driving, saw his face calm and composed, and didn’t ask further, burying herself in calculating the remaining balance.
Their previous funds, after deducting the forty thousand spent on online shopping, left fifty-six thousand.
56,000 − 180,000 − 54,000 − 80,000 = 246,000.
Sell the house, hurry and sell the house!
Watching the balance shrink, Shen Cong felt a surge of anxiety and muttered to herself several times.
But no matter how little money remained, the necessary items still had to be bought.
Following her prior plan, she opened the shopping website again.
This time, Shen Cong was buying self-rescue and self-defense supplies:
Foldable military shovels for outdoor use + tactical gloves + camping machetes + spike-tail hand axes, 20 sets each;
Multifunctional self-defense tactical batons + anti-wolf tactical pens + multifunctional foldable hammer pliers, 10 sets each;
High-lumen flashlights + dry batteries;
Disaster-prep candles + whistles + waterproof matches;
Radios + outdoor lamps (hand-crank and solar dual-use);
Work gloves + hiking backpacks (large and small)…
As she carefully planned in her mind, she added the urgent supplies to the shopping cart.
Then she deliberately went back to the address field and changed the delivery address to the civil-servant residential complex.
Even if they wouldn’t live there later, the complex was conveniently located on the main route between Fulin and the village.
The packages would be delivered there, and she could just go collect them every day or two, low-profile, without drawing attention.
Better than sending everything to her mother, where some nosy person might notice.
After changing the delivery address, Shen Cong returned to the shopping cart and clicked checkout.
In an instant, her account dropped another 12,000.
But she still had so many things left to buy.
As soon as the car came to a stop, Shen Cong smelled the aroma of food coming from the house.
The scent made her momentarily dazed.
Seeing her parents come out to greet them, her eyes began to sting again.
But she knew this wasn’t the time to cry, if she did, nothing would get done.
“Dad, Mom,” she hurried toward them.
But the two elders didn’t even glance at her, walking past her straight to the car.
“Old Gu, you’re here, come inside and have a seat.”
“Xiao Kai, you come in too. Hurry, Mom made you some cooling tea. It’s hot out; drink a bit to cool off.”
Shen Cong, being ignored: “……”
She suddenly remembered that back when she insisted on divorcing, her parents had been cold toward her for a while, barely speaking to her at all.
It had been so long that she had almost forgotten that period.
Now, it seemed this was exactly that moment.
Feeling a bit sulky, Shen Cong glanced at the four exchanging pleasantries, but didn’t join in. Instead, she turned, took the small cart out of the trunk, and began organizing the packages in the yard.
“Leave those for later, come over here first!” Cheng Ru called loudly to her daughter.
She was still thinking about what her daughter had said over the phone about “not divorcing.”
Seeing that Shen Cong had indeed brought her son-in-law and in-laws home together, Cheng Ru had no choice but to believe her daughter was telling the truth.
Although Shen Cong really didn’t want to repeatedly recall those painful events, she knew she had to explain.
So she didn’t hesitate. After accompanying the family back inside and sitting down, she recounted to the elders what she had already told Gu Kai.
When she finished, she took two ID cards out of her space and handed them over: “Mom, Dad, I know you don’t believe me, but I can only say this is all true. These are your ID cards, take a look for yourselves.”
Because the village was so far from the city, and her parents had passed away more than half a year earlier, Shen Cong hadn’t gone to cancel their IDs at the time.
Precisely for that reason, she was able to produce them now.
Cheng Ru and Shen Jianyi took the two small gray plastic cards, and for a moment their faces darkened.
What their daughter was saying was simply too incredible to believe.
Yet, seeing her attitude and the items she had brought, their hearts began to waver.
Shen Cong then looked at Gu Zhengchu.
Because her father-in-law had died early, during his lifetime the government had not conducted a new census, and there hadn’t been time to issue an ID.
So she had nothing to prove it at the time.
However—
Shen Cong thought for a moment, then took a book from her space and handed it over.
“Dad, this is the book you held in your hands before you passed. I think a patient gave it to you before dying. At that time, your mind wasn’t fully clear, and I heard you muttering, ‘Too late… too late.’ I didn’t understand what you meant, so I kept the book safe all this time.
Now I return it to you, hoping this time it won’t be too late.”
Gu Zhengchu took the slightly worn book, its pages yellowed with age, and looked somewhat shocked.
He flipped through a few pages, and his brow tightened.
“This should be a medical book, right? I see diagrams of acupoints here, though I don’t understand them,” Shen Cong added.
After her father-in-law passed away, she had gone through that tattered book more than once, but apart from those few acupoint diagrams, she hadn’t understood anything else.
The book was clearly an ancient text, with characters that looked like traditional Chinese, but many of the characters Shen Cong had never seen before. The writing was obscure and difficult to understand.
In any case, holding the book in her hands, it might as well have been written in a completely foreign language.
Cheng Ru and her husband also leaned over to take a look, and seeing it, they were a little more inclined to believe their daughter.
After all, no matter how they looked at it, this book wasn’t something their daughter could have forged, and she had no reason to!
Seeing that her parents were still skeptical, Shen Cong sighed and had no choice but to use the method she had previously used on Gu Kai, addressing the three elders: “Dad, Mom, let’s go to the backyard. I’ll show you a little trick.”
When Shen Cong’s parents first saw the house and fell in love with it, the main reason was that it came with a very large yard.
The front yard had been beautifully arranged by the older couple, creating a scene at every step. The backyard had been turned by Shen Jianyi into a vegetable garden.
However, the couple was older and not used to hard farm work.
No matter how grand the idea, reality was always harsher.
Although the vegetable garden was large, in reality only a small corner of it was being used.
They had planted a few small vegetables, some peppers and cucumbers, while the rest of the land remained idle.
Shen Cong walked ahead and stopped in the middle of the empty plot.
Before anyone could understand what was happening, a brand-new electric car appeared out of nowhere in the center of the yard.
For a moment, it felt as if even the air had frozen.
The three elders stared straight at the car, completely stunned, unable to utter a word.
“Did this also come from your… space?” Cheng Ru asked, her voice urgent and almost breaking.
“Yes,” Shen Cong explained, “Gu Kai and I bought this today. In the post-apocalypse, electric cars are much more convenient than gasoline ones.”
She sighed and continued, “Dad, Mom, I know it’s still hard for you to accept this. I don’t know how else to prove it to you.
After my divorce from Gu Kai, I was in a bad mood and locked myself in my room studying foreign languages every day, paying attention to nothing else. So if you want to ask me about world events that happened during that time, I really don’t know.
All I know is…”
Shen Cong thought for a moment and said, “It should be just these past couple of days, my sister called to say the student dorm I applied for didn’t go through because it was too late. But my brother-in-law went to check and said he could help me rent a place near the school, and that the conditions there are pretty good.”
“Stop talking, I believe you. I believe my daughter wouldn’t joke about something like this.”
Shen Jianyi, who hadn’t said much until now, patted his daughter on the shoulder, his eyes full of concern and tenderness.
Although what his daughter said today was shocking, he knew his child well enough to trust that she wouldn’t lie about something like this.
Especially with all these facts laid out in front of them.
“I believe, I believe. Mom believes too.”
Seeing Shen Cong standing alone in front of them, her expression carrying a depth of weariness and suffering they had never seen before, and remembering the hardships she had endured, Cheng Ru’s eyes instantly turned red.
She walked over and hugged her daughter, gently touching her face, her voice hoarse with worry and affection: “Congcong, let’s not stand here, let’s go inside and talk.”
“Let’s go inside. We need to discuss this properly,” Gu Zhengchu added from beside them.
Although they said they would talk inside, no one spoke immediately after entering the house.
For the three elders, even if they believed the news, they needed time to digest it.
Finally, Gu Kai broke the silence.
“Mom, Dad, Shen Cong and I have discussed this. Tomorrow I’ll go back to my unit to resign and return the dormitory. According to Shen Cong, both the Fulin community and this house were unharmed after the earthquake, so we’ll keep these two houses and handle the civil servant apartment and my father’s house.”
None of the three elders objected to this.
If the apocalypse really came, the family needed to stay together.
Since living separately wasn’t possible, handling unnecessary property was necessary.
“I’ve sold the jewelry and watches. I also plan to sell the car I’m currently driving. Dad, you should deal with your car too. Your car was damaged in the earthquake and never recovered, it can still fetch some money if sold now.”
“Not yet,” Shen Jianyi waved his hand at his daughter.
“My car is too old, it wouldn’t sell for much. Didn’t you just mention needing to repair the house? Then we’ll definitely need a car. Keep it for now, at this moment, time is more important than money.”
Since money had been mentioned, the couple immediately realized the situation and looked at Shen Cong, asking, “Do you guys have no money left?”
“Not much. We only have just over 200,000 now, and this amount won’t be enough to do anything significant in a critical situation,” Shen Cong answered calmly and honestly.
“I’ll give you the money,” Shen Jianyi said immediately.
“Wait,” Cheng Ru stopped her husband. “No need to rush to give her money just yet. I was thinking, since we’re all here, why don’t we first divide the work?
Now that preparations are starting, renovations and gathering supplies, we definitely can’t rely only on the two kids. We and Old Gu should help too. Let’s split the responsibilities; everyone takes care of their own part. That way it’ll be more efficient.”
Before retiring, Cheng Ru had worked in school administration and was very organized.
She had been too shocked earlier, but now that she’d regained her composure, she immediately took over coordinating the overall plan.
Everyone in the family had no objections.
After some discussion, they decided that Gu Kai and Shen Jianyi would mainly handle the renovations of the two houses. Although much of the work would be contracted out, someone needed to oversee it at home.
At the same time, Gu Kai also had to help Shen Cong buy supplies. Some large items were too much for Shen Cong alone.
Purchasing seeds and grains would be Shen Jianyi’s responsibility.
Gu Zhengchu’s first task would be handling his own house, with Shen Cong assisting him in moving.
Most importantly, they needed to move the existing medicines and equipment from the clinic.
In addition, he would also be responsible for buying any Chinese or Western medicine and nutritional supplements the family might need later.
Cheng Ru would mainly handle food preparation. In the coming days, while cooking would not raise suspicion, she needed to turn the purchased grains, vegetables, and meat into as many finished and semi-finished products as possible.
That way, if everyone ran short on food, cooking wouldn’t produce smells that could draw unnecessary attention.
Besides this, Cheng Ru also had to supervise Shen Cong’s shopping.
For example, when she learned that the couple had paid for the electric car in full without realizing they could have financed it, Cheng Ru nearly exploded.
She deeply questioned their shopping judgment.
Based on this distrust, when Shen Cong mentioned pawning the house, Cheng Ru immediately called her child who worked at a bank.
After asking only a few questions, she completely overturned Shen Cong’s plan.
“The pawnshop will only loan up to half the house’s value, and their appraisals are generally low. Don’t pawn it, take the house to the bank for a mortgage. We have several properties, so a combined assessment could easily get us at least 70% of the house value. That’s much better than a pawnshop.
Tomorrow, go see Chen Xu, Xiao Kai, you and Shen Cong go together. Besides the civil servant apartment, mortgage the Fulin property too. We don’t know what the future holds, so first get the money in hand.
Even if we need to repay the loan later, our family is big, we can handle paying off a house.”
Shen Cong was instantly enlightened by her mother’s words.
She finally realized that there were other ways to handle things.
It became clear to her that she really wasn’t cut out for managing finances. Knowing this, she was more than eager to immediately hand over control of the family’s funds.
The others clearly shared Shen Cong’s thinking. Even Gu Zhengchu voluntarily said that once the house payments were recovered, they should also be handed to Cheng Ru, letting her manage them centrally.