Chapter 42 (1/2)

Chapter 42 First cycle

“Sure.” Chang caught the cracker in the air and sniffed it. “It’s not musty but the smell of the cracker has faded. It won’t last for long.”

“It seems like we have no other choices.” Qing Shui looked at the small pile of crackers. “The military has already noticed us and their food reserve will soon run out. The trade of meat and crackers is going to be cut off.”

“But recently I heard someone was trying to grow crops.” Hearing the bad news, Pangzi anxiously joined the conversation “The plants outside of the base are lush and someone suggested to grow grains and wheat. If the plant has adapted to the environment, the food production cycle should be able to be shortened to 10 days!”

“It is not as simple as you think. A lot of plants that were edible before the red fog had evolved. Some of them smell and taste really bad whereas some of them have even become poisonous, how could you guarantee they are still edible by then? You need to understand all these varieties of crops are part of the plant family, they are evolving and mutating as well.” Qing Shui explained unhurriedly, “Even though they are edible by the time of harvest, what about the ten days of waiting? Are we going to eat gra.s.s and roots like the other people do in our base?”

“Then what should we do? The meat we get is easily perishable; we could have a ton of meat but it is going to be wasted in the end!” Pangzi almost yelled.

But his words only garnered silence.

“Do you remember the preservation method we were talking about a few days ago?” Chang broke the depressing silence, he glanced at Lin and said “Formalin, we need to preserve t.”

“You mean…” Qing Shui immediately thought of Lin’s suggestion when he was reminded by Chang. “You meant the same formalin that is used to preserve corpses and organs?”

“Exactly, we can dilute the formalin; and even now, the meat should be able to last for two or three days. If the meat is preservable, then our effort is not wasted; the chance of running out of food is much lower.” Chang slightly squinted his eyes and said.

“But where can we find formalin?” Pangzi asked again.

“In the hospital, there is an abundance of it.” Chang couldn’t help thinking of the first time he went to the hospital for medication. “It’s funny just how scary the word hospital sounds to me.”

“This approach is feasible.” Qing Shui stood up from the stool and said “Let’s go back to our room, it’s pretty late now, we can talk as we walk.”

Chang and the others followed him, they cleaned up the kitchen as they discussed. In a short while, the kitchen returned to what it looked like before they came.

Their dorm room looked wider and more comfortable compared to the day they first stayed there. A lot of people died in the “Deadly evolution” period, the crowded barracks had become s.p.a.cious again.

The room they had was for eight people originally, but 12 people squeezed into this room in the beginning, leaving 4 of them to sleep on the floor. However, after only 15 days, no one needed to fight for a bed anymore – because the other families had lost half or more than half of their family.

In the family of four, the older brother was torn apart by the mysterious tentacle on the second day and during the “Deadly evolution” period, the father didn’t withstand the invasion of bacterial infection; now it was only the mother and the younger brother.

As for the miserable family of three, the only survivor was the quiet young woman long before the “Deadly evolution” came. And her parent’s death almost made her collapse mentally. She relied on eating roots and barks every day and looked tortured but surprisingly she withstood all the difficulties.