Chapter 11: The Temperature Has Finally Dropped

Liu Mu re-examined the records of Heitao A, confirming that the seven-day Burning would end tomorrow, but there were no detailed data change logs, which made her somewhat anxious. Given the current situation, could the temperature actually drop?

Time seemed to move extremely slowly. Zhang Xiaoyong, huddled in the arms of his sister Xu Xiaofeng, also felt the heavy atmosphere and dared not speak. His large eyes were filled with tears, and it was a long while before he leaned into his sister's ear and asked in terror, "We aren't the only ones left, are we?"

Although the voice was soft, both adults heard it clearly.

"No, we aren't," Liu Mu did not want to shatter the child's last hope; the psychological training they had received over the past few days was enough. "Those who have survived until today will not die. They have already experienced this temperature once, and besides, the scale of the fire back then was much more severe than it is now."

Indeed, now that the Burning had lasted for several days, large-scale fires would no longer occur, unless there was another sudden disaster.

Liu Mu frowned slightly, harboring the worst-case scenario in her heart; Niu Boyi's restlessness seemed to confirm this.

Worry was useless. That day, the three people and one dog still performed their daily physical training, ate a sufficient amount of food, and then Xu Xiaofeng continued to tutor her younger brother.

Over the past few days, Zhang Xiaoyong's lessons had shifted from traditional literacy and mathematics to natural sciences and the survival courses taught by Liu Mu; they tacitly agreed that they probably wouldn't need much traditional cultural knowledge in the future.

By the afternoon, the falling ash began to increase, almost to the point of blotting out the sky and sun, and one could even see tiny black stones within the ash.

By dusk, the wind had actually picked up.

The dry wind stirred the burning ash, leaving the sky outside in total darkness.

"It must be the volcano in the neighboring county that erupted," Liu Mu finally voiced her earlier speculation. "The temperature rose and fell too quickly; it doesn't look like a meteorite."

"Which volcano?" Xu Xiaofeng thought for a while, but simply could not recall any volcano near them.

At this moment, Zhang Xiaoyong was the first to remember, standing up to ask, "Is it the Niangniangling dormant volcano mentioned in our nature class? But the teacher said it last erupted in ancient times."

He couldn't specify which dynasty, but as one of the local tourist attractions, it had been mentioned in the local natural science textbooks issued by the school.

After her brother said this, Xu Xiaofeng also remembered, "Niangniangling Sinkhole? Oh my, the last time we went to visit, it had already become a lake; how could it still erupt?"

"It should be related to this incident," Liu Mu recalled that she had indeed heard about a volcanic eruption in her past life, but the eruption time had been at least a year apart from the seven-day Burning. "Perhaps a meteorite fell over there and cracked the volcano open. Besides, didn't the news often say that the sea to our east is a seismic zone? This place was always fragile to begin with."

As someone who only graduated from junior high, she had studied geography for two years, but she couldn't explain it clearly either. Since the apocalypse began, let alone studying, she had been running around every day just to survive; what she knew was truly limited.

Conversely, Xu Xiaofeng, who had attended over two years of high school, knew more. If her parents hadn't died in a car accident during her senior year, leaving behind her brother who wasn't even three years old yet, she might have already graduated from college and had a proper job.

However, in Liu Mu's view, any "proper job" was just working for someone else; it was better for them to run their own small business and be their own Boss.

After being reminded by her, Xu Xiaofeng was basically able to think it through. "If it really is just a volcanic eruption, the temperature should continue to drop soon. I just don't know when we'll be able to go out."

Regarding going out, Liu Mu was no longer certain either.

But she was also worried about another thing. In her past life, there were reports of volcanic eruptions everywhere before the animals underwent Mutation. Although she didn't know if the two events were directly related, and wasn't sure if this volcanic eruption was an isolated case, what if?

What if animals started to undergo Mutation after the seven-day Burning? How many humans would be left alive then?

Over the next few days, the training intensity for the three people and one dog became even greater. The reason Liu Mu gave was, 'Without a strong body, it is impossible to survive outside.' This didn't require much explanation from her; with the new surveillance footage, Xu Xiaofeng and Zhang Xiaoyong understood the stakes themselves.

Fortunately, four days later, which was the eleventh day after the disaster began, the temperature outside dropped off a cliff. By this morning, it had already fallen to just over sixty degrees.

For people before the apocalypse, this was still a temperature that could kill, but for humans who had experienced the last few days, they felt they had finally ushered in a glimmer of hope.

Xu Xiaofeng cautiously kept Liu Mu and Zhang Xiaoyong from going to the surface, and after observing for another four days, confirming that the temperature was slowly dropping and showed no signs of rising again, all three breathed a sigh of relief.

The high-temperature disaster had finally passed!

On the sixteenth day, in the early hours of the morning, a fighter jet flew over the Scrap Station, and Liu Mu could no longer sleep!

Of course, she didn't care where these planes were going or what they were doing; she only knew—she could go out!

Changing into a set of lightweight, flame-retardant coveralls and packing enough food and ice water into her insulated backpack, she returned to the surface.

Ten minutes after leaving the underground, Heitao A also provided an air quality report; no high-risk radiation was detected, nor was there any toxic gas. Except for the lingering heat, everything seemed to have returned to normal.

The outdoor temperature dropped to 46°C on the morning of the sixteenth day. As someone who had been through this, Liu Mu knew this was basically the standard temperature of the apocalypse.

Those who could survive had likely made it through this hurdle, and Liu Mu pushed out her small tricycle.

The small tricycle looked dilapidated, but all three wheels had been replaced with high-temperature-resistant ones by the masters under Hu Xing, the frame had been repaired, and it had been converted to electric; it was sturdy and practical.

Stepping onto the familiar small tricycle, although she couldn't take Niu Boyi with her, Liu Mu felt jubilant. Clattering along, she exited the gate of the Scrap Station.

Seeing Liu Mu's figure from the surveillance, Xu Xiaofeng was truly worried, but she still kept an eye on the situation around the Scrap Station, keeping in mind what Liu Mu said before leaving: don't answer to anyone who comes, and definitely don't open the door.

Unless the rescue military found them, the siblings could consider for themselves whether to leave, but they must never let anyone know about the situation in the Scrap Station's basement.

Of course, it was impossible for Xu Xiaofeng to abandon Liu Mu, but Liu Mu was also thinking for their sake; at a time like this, places with more people might be easier.

As for why Liu Mu could leave so confidently, not fearing that Xu Xiaofeng would take her things, one reason was that she trusted her character, and the other was that she didn't care about such a small amount of supplies.

Even after staying together for half a month, Liu Mu had not let Xu Xiaofeng and Zhang Xiaoyong walk around other areas of the basement, so they naturally didn't know exactly how much she had hoarded.

On this trip out, her goal was very clear: she was heading straight for the Steel Rolling Mill.

The paper mill was in the east of the city, downstream of the river, the Steel Rolling Mill was in the south of the city, and the Victory Waste Acquisition Station happened to be in the middle of the two locations; thanks to the county town being quite small, it was convenient to go in either direction.

Of course, she had also been paying attention to the military's movements early on; the planes were heading toward the volcano in the neighboring county, and she guessed that nine times out of ten, it had truly erupted.

The ground was piled with thick ash, and those major roads built at great expense were now full of cracks of all sizes, many still emitting thick smoke; it was estimated that the underground cables, fiber optics, and the like were already mostly destroyed.

In the parking lots along the road, there were rows of cars burned down to almost just their frames; these were also steel, but compared to Liu Mu's target, they were still a bit lacking.

Along the way, the scene was even more miserable than in her past life; the houses on the ground had almost all become dangerous structures, and some were still burning inside.

Bypassing these dangerous places, Liu Mu arrived at the Steel Rolling Mill three hours later; not only was there not a single person along the way, but she didn't even see the shadow of an animal.

In fact, at this time, many animals had escaped the disaster; they hid in sewers or deep wells and such, and many survived, especially insects and rats.

Liu Mu went straight into the factory building; there was no need to go to the dormitories or the workers' duty rooms. Without thinking, either there was no one, or... they had likely all melted.

The system was activated, and she collected a batch of steel that had not yet cooled down.

For today's operation, she had already spent the previous day piling less important items from her space into the Scrap Station.

However, Heitao A had another benefit, which was that collecting scrap could not only store it, but also decompose it directly, though this required consuming some energy.