The IV was administered on the second floor. Mu Nan lay on the sofa with an IV stand next to him. Xu Ming, who was well-versed in preparing medications, handled the IV fluid. Basic knowledge of treating colds and fevers was universal, even though Xu Ming was a veterinarian. Just because he studied veterinary medicine didn't mean he couldn't understand basic medical care for humans. In the past, strict regulations prevented veterinarians from treating humans; breaking these rules could lead to fines or even imprisonment. But given the current circumstances, someone with basic knowledge was far better than someone who knew nothing. Xu Ming was responsible and not the type of unscrupulous doctor to take risks with treatment. He used conservative doses for Mu Nan, preferring to give more frequent injections rather than administering a strong dose all at once.
After setting up the IV drip and attaching it to Mu Nan, Xu Ming turned to Qin Huai and said, "This contains some cephalosporin. Although the conditions are difficult now, I still need to remind you —absolutely no alcohol. That could be deadly. Removing the needle is easy; just press lightly on the injection site and pull it out."
Qin Huai nodded. "Thank you."
Xu Ming smiled and said, "It's not easy to get these medications nowadays. You still have enough for two more injections. Let's see how he responds. However, his tonsillitis is quite severe." Xu Ming wasn't curious about where Qin Huai had obtained the medicine; his previous medical station had these supplies too, though they were scarce and required multiple approvals before use. Since the earthquake, production had been limited, making these medicines even rarer. Xu Ming had heard that a military doctor had specifically sought out Qin Huai earlier. In times like these, people with connections had better access to resources than the average person.
Qin Huai said, "He's had this issue since he was young —prone to tonsillitis. When he was little, the inflammation was so frequent that doctors suggested removing his tonsils. But when his parents heard he'd have to eat liquid food for over a hundred days after the surgery, they couldn't bear it and kept delaying the procedure until it never happened."
Xu Ming said, "It's good his parents hesitated. While removing the tonsils can prevent such inflammations, it also removes a layer of defense. For someone like him with a weak immune system, respiratory issues would only get worse. The IV is done, can you handle removing the needle yourself?"
Qin Huai nodded. "Yes, thank you."
Xu Ming smiled. "No need to thank me. This IV should help reduce the swelling a bit. He should be able to handle some liquid food soon. I'll be going now—let me know if you need anything."
After seeing Xu Ming out, Qin Huai returned to the second floor and lifted Mu Nan's IV stand. "Let's go upstairs—you'll be more comfortable in bed."
Mu Nan sighed, coughing a few times before slowly following Qin Huai to the third floor. Sleeping was impossible, so Qin Huai put on Mu Nan's favorite anime to distract him. He adjusted the pillows to make Mu Nan more comfortable, and the two of them leaned together on the bed. When Qin Huai's phone rang, Mu Nan glanced over and picked it up to text for him.
"You've stopped being gentle," Mu Nan typed. He had seen people confess to Qin Huai before, including some upperclassmen who had given him love letters to pass on to Qin Huai. In the past, Qin Huai had always politely thanked the admirers and gently declined. But now, his rejections were downright cold.
Qin Huai glanced at him. "I have a family now—why would I be soft-hearted toward anyone else?" He gave Mu Nan a serious look. "Do you want me to be gentle with others?"
Mu Nan quickly shook his head. He wasn't jealous, let alone wishing for Qin Huai to be kind to anyone else.
Qin Huai continued, "In the future, if anyone confesses to you, you need to reject them coldly and without hesitation. Don't give them false hope. A clean break may hurt in the moment, but indecision is far crueler in the long run."
Mu Nan pouted and typed on his phone, "People have lined up to confess to you your whole life. I've never even experienced what it's like to be confessed to."
Qin Huai laughed and pulled him into a hug. "Didn't I confess to you?"
Mu Nan turned his head and glared at him, furiously typing, "That wasn't a confession. You just kissed me out of nowhere!"
Qin Huai chuckled. "Want to hear a cheesy pickup line?"
Mu Nan raised his eyebrows at Qin Huai, who responded, "Companionship is the longest confession of love. I will spend my whole life confessing my love to you."
Mu Nan exaggeratedly shivered, feeling overwhelmed by how cheesy Qin Huai was being. Qin Huai pulled him closer, preventing him from moving away, and said, "Besides, there are many things you don't know."
Mu Nan turned his head to look at him, silently asking what else he didn't know.
Warming Mu Nan's hand, the one that had received the injection, Qin Huai recalled, "When you were little, there was a girl in your class—I can't remember her name, but she always had a ponytail with a bow in her hair. One day, she came up to me and asked if she could marry my brother when she grew up. I told her no, and she ran off crying."
Mu Nan was instantly shocked.
Qin Huai continued, "There were also girls who often asked you to go get fried chicken and milk tea after school. You were so oblivious, thinking only about food, that you didn't realize their intentions. Once, you ate so much you had stomach trouble for two days. I had to warn one of them, telling her not to take you out for junk food anymore. After that, those girls stopped hanging out with you, didn't they?"
Mu Nan remembered this incident well. Back then, he ate without restraint, indulging in spicy and cold foods until it made him sick. Qin Huai had warned his friends, and after that, their little group dissolved. Mu Nan had been too guilty to even protest at the time.
As Qin Huai spoke about the past, he recalled each incident vividly. "And then in middle school, you co-hosted a flag-raising ceremony with a girl, didn't you? You also co-hosted a performance together. That girl once tried to sneak a love letter into your backpack, but I caught her and confiscated it. I told her not to let these things distract you from your studies."
At that, Mu Nan was furious, looking at Qin Huai with a face full of complaint. He angrily typed a message: "How could you do that? A teenager who never receives a love letter doesn't have a perfect youth! You robbed me of my perfect adolescence!"
Mu Nan thought to himself, he wasn't bad-looking. In high school and college, he had distanced himself from others, but in middle school, he was still pretty outgoing. It wasn't like he was completely clueless—there were plenty of middle school romances around him. Turns out Qin Huai had been blocking all his potential romantic interests!
Qin Huai smiled and comforted him, "I've been with you since birth, and I'll stay with you until death. Isn't that more perfect?"
Mu Nan huffed, still a little upset.
Qin Huai coaxed him, "You've always been more popular than me. There's always someone trying to take you away from me. I have to hide you, like a dragon guarding its treasure, hiding even the slightest glimmer so no one notices. That way, no one will try to take my treasure."
As Qin Huai spoke, he kissed his "treasure," but the treasure wasn't happy. Mu Nan turned his head away to avoid the kiss and typed, "Contagious."
Qin Huai laughed and said, "I've heard that if you pass a cold to someone else, you'll recover faster."
Mu Nan rolled his eyes. That ridiculous saying, the kind you'd only hear in cheesy romance dramas, was obviously nonsense. But Qin Huai didn't care—he figured it was worth trying, nonsense or not.
The injections worked faster than just taking medication. By the time Mu Nan received his second shot, his throat had stopped swelling, and his cough had significantly improved. As Xu Ming adjusted the IV drip, he said, "One more shot tomorrow, and then you can just take medicine to stabilize your recovery."
Mu Nan nodded with a smile, his voice hoarse as he said, "Thank you."
Xu Ming smiled back. "Try not to speak—drink more warm water and rest your voice."
Qin Huai ruffled Mu Nan's hair before walking Xu Ming downstairs. Once they reached the first floor, Xu Ming said, "A doctor I know, who's staying at the hospital, messaged me this morning. Recently, the number of injured people has increased significantly. Some are lucky enough to make it to the hospital with a faint pulse, but many die on the way, and the hospital can only perform autopsies to determine the cause of death. Most of these cases are from Zone 3, though there have been a few home invasions in Zone 2. Fortunately, because there are soldiers stationed in Zone 1 and regular patrols, things here are a bit better."
The undamaged apartment buildings were now called Zone 1, while the low-rise villas in their area were designated Zone 2. Zone 3 consisted of standalone houses built later with limited materials. The standalone houses, built quickly and with shallow foundations, took about half a month to complete. Each house was smaller than the row houses in Zone 2, about 100 square meters, but with a two-story duplex design to maximize space. The homes were made of wood and concrete. After all the row houses filled up, people who had completed the quarantine period were assigned to the standalone houses. Due to the higher population density and less strict management, home invasions had become rampant in Zone 3. The cold weather also slowed police response times, exacerbating the problem.
Xu Ming shared this information to warn Qin Huai: "With the exchange points closed and temperatures still dropping, I'm not too worried about most things. Our country's gun control is strict, and this area is under military jurisdiction. For now, our group's physical strength is enough to ensure our safety. But extreme weather is unpredictable, and I fear this cold wave may be just the beginning."
The current temperatures were already causing crimes even in military-controlled zones, and the root cause was the harsh environment. If temperatures continued to drop, food shortages and a lack of essential supplies could make things even worse. Once the water and power systems failed to withstand the cold, who knew how dire the situation could become? Even though the government was keeping things stable for now, relying solely on it wouldn't be enough. Xu Ming felt that they should start preparing—whether by stocking up on food or securing cold-weather supplies, doing something was better than doing nothing.
Qin Huai understood what Xu Ming meant and asked, "What do you have in mind?"
Xu Ming replied, "Getting food might be a bit tricky, but luckily I have a decent stockpile from the past. With the weather this cold, food won't spoil as easily, so for now, that's not a big concern. But relying solely on underfloor heating seems a bit risky. The electricity we're using now comes from stored energy, and since there aren't too many people living here, it's holding up. But it won't last forever, and we can't count on natural gas because there's no way to transport it. Eventually, the heating will stop. I'm thinking about stocking up on some long-burning fuel and maybe even building a heated bed (kang -A traditional bed-stove in china)."
Being from the south, Xu Ming had never paid attention to such things before. He had the idea but no clue how to implement it. He could gather firewood from outside, but building a kang seemed like a technical task, and he wasn't sure if it could be done in his house. He remembered seeing this kind of thing on TV, mostly in single-story houses, so if they were to build one, it could only be on the first floor. That would work, though, as there was a small living room and a garage. If they remodeled, he and Jian Chu could live separately without disturbing each other. But the real question was how to build it.
Qin Huai said, "Let's start by gathering some firewood. There are still some fallen trees outside that weren't cleared and are now buried under the snow. We can split those into firewood first, and I'll figure out the kang situation."
Xu Ming wasn't trying to pass the problem to Qin Huai. He simply wanted to share his thoughts so they could brainstorm a solution. After all, building a kang was something he needed to explore. Qin Huai had connections in the military, and Xu Ming thought he might be able to ask around for advice since none of the doctors or nurses he knew were familiar with this kind of thing.
Qin Huai didn't need to ask anyone about building a kang. Mu Nan's space was full of blueprints, from simple to complex, for building all kinds of structures, including a kang. In fact, Qin Huai had been thinking about building one for a while. His house was fine—being a standalone unit, he could remodel the small living room on the first floor without touching the garage. He wasn't skilled enough to install a kang on the second floor, as the chimney system would be too difficult to modify. So if they needed to rely on the kang for warmth, they would have to live on the first floor.
When Mu Nan saw Qin Huai discussing how to build a kang in the group chat, he gave him a thumbs-up. Qin Huai smiled and asked, "What's this? You're praising me before we've even started?"
Mu Nan typed on his phone, "Good thing you chose this house. If we were living in an apartment, we wouldn't be able to build a kang!" He hadn't even considered this when choosing their home, proving he hadn't thought it through enough.
Qin Huai said, "It's still uncertain whether we can pull it off." If they were to build one, it would have to be an old-fashioned kang, as they could still get bricks and cement, but installing proper chimney pipes might be difficult. Without a pipe, they would have to settle for stacking bricks to create a makeshift version.
Mu Nan was full of confidence in Qin Huai: "My brother is Superman—he can do anything!"
Even though they had the blueprints for building a kang, gathering the materials wasn't easy. They would need to purchase supplies from the military. Qin Huai contacted the soldier from the exchange point to ask how many exchange points would be required for cement, bricks, and sand. Since these weren't food items, and despite the scarcity of reconstruction materials, getting enough for a kang wasn't out of the question. The soldier didn't outright reject Qin Huai's request and said he would check.
While waiting for a response, they started discussing the firewood situation. There were fallen trees near Qin Huai's house, but they were covered in snow. They decided to drag as many as they could to the garage, which was big enough to store the wood. Cutting the wood outside would make too much noise, and they would have to bundle up against the cold. It was better to bring it inside and cut it slowly.
Mu Nan's IV drip were done, and his throat no longer hurt when eating, though his cold wasn't completely gone, and he still had a bit of a cough. Qin Huai wouldn't let him go outside in the cold, but Mu Nan wasn't the type to sit idle while everyone else was busy preparing for winter. So, he joined Song Jia and Jian Chu in the garage to help chop wood. The wood had been frozen solid after being buried in the snow for so long, and it took two or three days with the garage door open to the indoor heating before it thawed enough to chop.
Over the next few days, they managed to haul back all the trees they could find within walking distance, but it was clear that the amount of wood they had gathered wasn't nearly enough. Qin Huai, Xu Ming, and Yu Zibai decided they would have to go further out to look for more wood, leaving Jian Chu, Mu Nan, and Song Jia to chop the wood at home. The injured person, of course, would remain bedridden.
Although they didn't have axes, they had plenty of knives. A cleaver wasn't ideal for chopping wood, but it would do in a pinch. However, chopping wood without a proper chopping block was tough work, and they had to chop the wood directly on the cement floor, which eventually cracked from the constant impact.
Mu Nan massaged his sore waist, handed his knife to Jian Chu, and walked over to get a drink of water. "This is exhausting. I think I should be the one going out to find wood, and leave the chopping to the others—this is real hard labor!"
Jian Chu, sitting on a small stool as wood chips flew around him, replied, "Zibai said he's run into a lot of people looking for wood in the past few days. People are becoming more aware of the crisis, likely worried the underfloor heating will stop, so they're all out gathering things to burn. If the three of us went out, we'd only be running around. I can fight, but you've only trained with your brother. I doubt you've had much real combat experience. And Song Jia looks like he doesn't know how to fight at all. I'd be dragging you both along just to escape."
Mu Nan said, "Yesterday that soldier replied. He said we can get red bricks and cement, but it's not cheap. It's one point for fifty bricks, and I need at least four kangs. I don't even know how many bricks each one will take."
Jian Chu replied, "Probably about a hundred bricks per kang. Four of them will be a lot. Will they deliver, or do we have to pick them up ourselves? The snow is so deep outside that transporting them will be quite the hassle."
Mu Nan "I'm not sure, because they haven't confirmed how much is available yet. They just gave me the price first, and I need to figure out how much we need before they can tell us more."
Jian Chu put in some effort and split a tree stump, then got up from his small stool, stretching his neck and muscles: "After a few days of no work, all the strength I built up is gone. This is exhausting."
Song Jia smiled at him. His task was slightly easier, just processing the larger chunks of wood Jian Chu chopped to make them smaller and easier to light. Both large logs and kindling were needed: large logs burn longer, but smaller pieces are easier to start. Feeling the wet wood that had thawed, Song Jia couldn't help but say, "Is there a way to dry these out a bit? They feel too damp to catch fire."
Jian Chu replied, "We can just pile them on the floor in the small living room on the first floor and let the underfloor heating dry them out. Once we get the fire going, damp wood won't be a problem. There's an old saying that goes, 'If you have enough wood, none of it is wet.' Once it catches, it'll be fine."
Mu Nan wasn't too worried about this. He had plenty of fuel stored in his space, including smokeless coal. But he wasn't sure where they'd set up the stove. If they installed it outside, he might have to be discreet with the coal, but if it was indoors, setting up a proper vent would be tricky. Burning coal indoors was dangerous; without proper ventilation, carbon monoxide could be deadly, even if they were warm.
While they were taking turns chopping wood, someone knocked on the door of Mu Nan's house. Since Jian Chu and the others were chopping wood in the garage, they heard the doorbell clearly. If it had been Qin Huai returning, he wouldn't have knocked. If it were someone from outside, the dog, Niuniu, would have barked. The only likely visitors were Song Jia's female neighbors.
Jian Chu clapped his hands clean. "Come on, I'll go with you to see what they need."
It was two girls, one with short hair named Tu Juan and the other, Sun Sisi, who had spoken to them the most. As soon as the door opened, the girls enthusiastically greeted them.
Mu Nan stepped back a bit, letting the girls in. The wind and snow outside hadn't stopped, and despite the short distance they had walked, their clothes were already covered in snow.
Once inside, Sun Sisi got straight to the point: "I wanted to ask if, next time you go out to gather firewood, could you take me with you? I have a cart, and I promise I won't be a burden."
Back when the ruins were full of wood, everyone had focused on collecting food and supplies instead of picking up firewood scattered everywhere. As the weather turned colder and people were busy earning points to trade for food, no one had time to gather wood. Most of them had arrived with nothing and prioritized filling their stomachs. Now that the cold weather had really set in and work had stopped, the sense of crisis was growing stronger.
Sun Sisi had thought about gathering things to burn for a while, but it wasn't safe to go out with so many people around. Staying home alone didn't feel safe either. Back then, she didn't know the men next door at all, but now that she knew they were trustworthy, she felt more at ease. Seeing them hauling piles of wood back over the past few days, she and the others discussed it before coming over.
Worried that they might think she would be a burden, Sun Sisi quickly reassured them: "I'll just tag along for safety in numbers. I'll take care of myself and won't need any help. Is that okay?"
Mu Nan and Jian Chu exchanged a glance, unsure if they could make the decision since Qin Huai was in charge of going out. So Mu Nan said, "Let's wait until later. I need to check with him first."
Sun Sisi replied, "Alright, let's exchange contacts in the meantime. It's cold running over here, even though we're just next door."
That was no problem. Both Jian Chu and Mu Nan exchanged contact info with her. Since they were all living in the same courtyard, having each other's numbers made things easier.