Coconut leaves went without saying. The poultry in the Cube Space ate whatever was available.
Naturally, the coconut trees could not be wasted either. Jing Shu went to the charcoal plant and used the immovable machines there to press the coconut trees into over a dozen tons of compressed charcoal, stocking ample fuel for the colder and colder weather ahead.
At the same time, Jing Shu decided to keep the boiler room running for the entire second year. There was plenty of charcoal now.
Nothing produced in the Cube Space ever went to waste. If Jing Shu could repurpose something, she did, creating a neat closed loop of a biological cycle.
When next year's torrential rains came and everything turned soggy, Jing Shu would have to prevent food from molding. The Cube Space was large for now, so Jing Shu would store everything inside first. If mold really set in, crying would be useless.
Jing Shu also needed to make more desiccant. Otherwise thick mats of mildew would crawl up the corners and walls, a perfect warm nest for every kind of bug.
Within a few months in the previous life, buildings were covered in mold. All kinds of bugs crawled everywhere, and bright, multicolored mushroom sprouted.
There was mold outside the buildings and dampness inside too. You can imagine the result. If the first year killed with heat, the second year's damp killed just as surely. Many people ended up with chronic rheumatism.
If you have never lived through it, you cannot understand. In unending rain, houses soaked for months let water seep into every layer. It dripped from everywhere. It dripped bugs. Clothes, quilts, mattresses, everything stayed wet and icy cold. Nights were colder still. People lay awake shivering and woke from the cold over and over.
You woke with aches all over. The sensation of damp qi entering the body was miserable. Look away for a moment and clothes or bedding would mold. By morning, tiny bugs would be crawling all over them.
Steam from bathing collected into huge drops on the ceiling. That was how every household lived in the second year. Big drops beaded on ceilings and walls, always falling, while rain outside seeped in with a vengeance.
In the previous life, Jing Shu's daily routine was to hang a plastic bag above the bed and collect a sackful of red nematodes and water by morning. Sometimes a red nematode would drip into the mouth as a midnight snack.
During the one hour of power each day, Jing Shu blasted everything with a hair dryer. Blow and blow, pride and joy, ahem, off topic.
Speaking of desiccants, before the apocalypse Jing Shu had stockpiled plenty of quicklime specifically for that second year. Some had been used earlier on traps in the villa during the chaos. The rest would serve as desiccant.
Its moisture absorption was among the best. Aside from releasing large amounts of heat when it absorbed water, there were no real drawbacks. It was perfect for the villa's courtyard and wall corners.
As for calcium chloride, the best for adsorption, it was too expensive and Jing Shu needed too much, so Jing Shu did not buy it.
Instead, Jing Shu installed dehumidifiers in the villa, used central air's dry mode, fired up underfloor heating, and ran the wall-hung boiler for warm air. With all these big guns, Jing Shu refused to believe the house would stay damp. If it did, Jing Shu would think of something else.
She also planned to add another waterproof layer to the villa, but that would have to wait until the torrential rains and flooding. There was no good excuse to do it now.
Jing Shu finished a bowl of ice cream with a happy sigh. The first year of the apocalypse was still the easiest. The later years only got worse, and the preparations she needed only multiplied.
Just as the artificial sun finally fulfilled its mission and the public no longer lacked water for the moment, and just as Jing Shu finally stole a breather, the chat groups grew lively. The saga of the solar distillers drew to a close.
After finishing the water distribution, the government turned around and saw a whole crowd of goblins causing trouble again. A pyramid scheme, of all things. Enraged, they used an iron fist. Anyone whose account held more than a thousand virtual coins was arrested within two days, and the public got a lesson.
[Wang Chao]: "@Zhang Lingling, pay me back my hard-earned money. Let's all punish her together."
[Wang Can]: "Scammers, the lot of you. Promised we would earn together, then ran off with our money to live it up. Some class monitor you are. What a witch."
[Shi Lei]: "Even when water was tight, the dribble you collected wasn't enough for a sip. I went broke buying a collector. Worse, my relatives cut ties with me. You have harmed people."
[Wang Chao]:"Exactly. I bought three and dragged my family and friends into it. Now water isn't scarce, I can't recruit anyone. The worst part is the collector does not even work. You talked such a good game. Look at us now."
This was the crowd-pleasing scene from the previous life. Back then, Jing Shu had already left the group and missed the show. In this life, Jing Shu cracked Brazilian pine nuts, sipped watermelon juice, reclined in the massage chair, and enjoyed the drama.
It felt great.
Meat pies do not fall from the sky. Only traps do. Unless you are Bill Gates and make money with your eyes closed, earn through your own work and collect the fruits of your labor.
[Mu Xiaoxuan]: "Today's news says knockoff water collectors popped up nationwide and harmed a lot of people. The ring leaders have been busted and sent to labor rehabilitation. I heard the top of the pyramid made thousands to tens of thousands of virtual coins. They blew it all on rice and flour, which were recovered. The app was shut down too. No more recruiting."
"Then shouldn't victims be compensated in virtual coins?"
"The government said no compensation. Bear the consequences."
Zhang Lingling came out sobbing. "Listen to me. I am a victim too. Otherwise I would have been arrested. I opened 20 accounts and lost everything. I pulled everyone in for your own good, so we could all make money. Some of you did earn a few dozen points. You are better off than me. You lost a dozen. I lost a few hundred."
[Wang Chao]: "I don't care about the rest. Just return what I invested and I will give back the distillers."
[Xiao Yun]: "Right. Refunds. You sold this stuff for a living and now you want to cry to us?"
Zhang Lingling cried in the group about how miserable she was, how sincere she had been, and how she had never expected this ending. She begged forgiveness for the sake of all their years as classmates.
[Zhang Lingling]: "How have I treated you all? What kind of person am I? If I meant to scam you, let my family be washed away by floods next year and crushed by an earthquake the year after."
She thought about swearing to be struck by lightning and decided it was too scary. If the bet was herself, she did not dare. Better to bet the family. The drought would kill them anyway. Where would a flood even come from?
She really have to give a thumbs up to her own cleverness.