Chapter 13
Limited Water And Electricity
The homeowner’s group chat was constantly buzzing with activity every day.
Du Yue opened it and skimmed through it. Most of them were cursing the abnormal weather. There were also some messages about the need to gather more supplies.
Some people also began to speculate that if the high temperatures continued, every household would be forced to turn on the air conditioner 24 hours a day. If that happened, it would not be long before the city would have a power outage.
Only Du Yue knew that it would not end with a simple power outage. There would be a water shortage in the future as well.
In his previous life, the government issued a power and water restriction order on September 15th. After that, power would only be supplied between 12:00 to 4:00pm. Every day, water would only be supplied between 6:00 to 8:00am, And 8:00 to 10:00pm.
The four-hour water and electricity supply in Du Yue’s neighborhood was expensive, so the best electrical and water pipes were used during the construction. That was why she could enjoy such “treatment”.
In other old and run-down residential areas, the circuits caught fire, the transformers exploded, and there were countless similar incidents. There were also many cases of deaths due to circuits burning or explosions.
Even though Du Yue knew what would happen next, she chose to remain silent because it was out of her circle of control. Telling people about it would not help, and would also cause panic among the people and bring unnecessary trouble and attention to herself.
She could only pray that the leaders of the province, city, and country would discover the problem as soon as possible and then come up with a solution before the situation was too serious.
The students had all started to use the internet at home for their classes. In order to prevent the students from dozing off during the hottest time of the day, the school had changed the time of their online classes to the two-hour period of six to eight in the evening.
They only had to study for two hours a day, and they did not have to go to school, which made the students very happy.
Although it was extremely hot during the day, and their parents did not let them go out to play, as soon as the sky turned dark, they could rush out of their homes and run to the community to play.
Even though Du Yue lived on the 16th floor, she could still hear the students playing around in the neighborhood.
Du Yue did not hate this kind of noise at all. In fact, listening to the noise even made her feel at ease.
She wished that the apocalypse would come later, or better still, never. The children could still play in groups in the neighborhood without any worries. Although everyone’s lives had been affected, at least the order of the world still existed.
However, Du Yue was well aware that these precious days of peace would end soon.
Du Yue did not spend too much time reminiscing. A few minutes later, she changed into casual clothes and drove to the mall.
There were a lot more people in the mall than a few days ago because there was free air-conditioning here 24 hours a day. Everyone had the mentality that it would be a waste if they did not freeload here.
Du Yue found a shopping cart and went straight to the snack area of the supermarket. As long as it was a snack that she liked, she put it into her shopping cart.
Snacks were not a necessity. Even if she had more, it would not affect the lives of others.
Du Yue only pushed the cart to the cashier to pay when it was full and could not fit anything else. There were two freezers next to the cashier counter with a variety of iced drinks in them. Du Yue took two bottles of carbonated drinks that she usually drank and paid for them.
When she was walking out with three big bags of snacks, she heard a few aunties secretly criticizing her behind her.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Look at this little girl. She doesn’t know how to be thrifty at all. She came to the supermarket on a hot day and did not buy any practical supplies. Instead, she bought those snacks that can’t fill her stomach!”
“Look at her, she’s as thin as a stick. I guess she doesn’t eat well and only eats these snacks! If this goes on for such a long time, she’ll definitely fall sick!”
Du Yue quietly listened to their discussion, and a smile that could not be denied appeared on her face.
She did not need to waste her breath explaining to the aunties. She, who they said was as thin as a stick, could easily put an adult man down.
Soon, three days had passed. The weather was just as Du Yue had expected, getting hotter by the day.
The buildings nowadays were basically constructed with natural light in mind; the windows of the houses themselves were large so, as long as there was a little sunlight, it would shine into every corner of the house.
When the temperature was high during the day, even if the curtains were drawn, the room would still be hot and stuffy, like a sauna.