Chapter 152: Meng Ci, Let's Swap Villas
"Hey, we meet again!"
Just as Meng Ci and the others were approaching Villa No. 8, they saw Zhao Jingyu leaning against the gate with his arms crossed. Upon spotting them, he quickly straightened up.
"Got something?"
Meng Ci, walking in front, actually didn't want to deal with this guy, but he needed to enter the house and didn't want Zhao Jingyu to see the password.
"I've got my eye on your villa. How about it? What would you be willing to trade for it?"
"A thousand pounds of flour, enough for you?"
Actually, Zhao Jingyu had been eyeing this villa even before the heavy rain. He had sent people to negotiate with Liang Xiu, but Liang Xiu was unmoved and refused to swap.
Moreover, Liang Xiu claimed he was just a temporary resident and not the owner of the villa.
Initially, Zhao Jingyu wanted to force his way in, but the door was electrified, and the walls were lined with electric fences. The voltage was quite high, and no one was willing to take the risk. Zhao Jingyu had to give up.
It wasn't until the electric fences were completely disabled that Zhao Jingyu planned to bring people out in the rain to seize the villa. However, M City's military had stationed here to maintain order, patrolling frequently, leaving no opportunity to act.
These people were also unyielding, and even bribery was ineffective.
The rain grew heavier, stinging their faces, so Zhao Jingyu abandoned the idea of trying again.
Now, seeing the villa, Zhao Jingyu had the urge to claim it once more.
Meng Ci raised an eyebrow. "If you want food, I can go kill another crocodile."
"The items you offered didn't impress me."
"So, there's no way we'll swap."
With that, Meng Ci gestured for Shen Que to open the door, while he stood in front of Zhao Jingyu to block his view of the password.
Bang.
The door opened, and Shen Que and Liang Xiu walked in one after another, with Meng Ci bringing up the rear.
Seeing the door close, Zhao Jingyu, enraged, stepped forward and kicked it hard.
Hiss!
Why is this door so tough?
Who does he think he is, acting like he's still the richest man in the city in the apocalypse!
"Master, Sir has asked me to call you back."
While waiting for Meng Ci and the others, Zhao Jingyu had sent his bodyguards away. Hearing this, he reluctantly left.
The villas in West Mountain Wild were built with large distances between them, each about a hundred meters apart.
Zhao Jingyu and his group now lived in Villa No. 6.
"Uncle Liang, it's almost been a year since the apocalypse. How does the Zhao family still have so much food?"
Meng Ci, inside the house, found it strange that Zhao Jingyu hadn't batted an eyelid at the offer of a thousand pounds of flour. After all, even if the Zhao family was the wealthiest, money was useless in the apocalypse.
Liang Xiu said, "This isn't surprising."
"After all, the Zhao family isn't just rich; they have access to insider information."
"Or, before the heavy rain, they spent a lot of money to stockpile supplies when people hadn't yet realized the severity of the situation."
In fact, over these days, Liang Xiu had come to suspect that the government had been preparing for the apocalypse. The warehouses built hurriedly before the rain, filled with machines for making instant noodles and canned goods, and the cold-resistant seeds developed just as the extreme cold arrived, all suggested that the government had been well-prepared.
Thus, Liang Xiu speculated that the authorities might have known about the impending apocalypse and had made these preparations.
Families like the Zhao family, being wealthy and influential, would have received such information early on.
As for the Meng family, during that time, Liang Xiu had been busy selling company shares and handling various properties, leaving him no time to pay attention to such matters.
Liang Xiu remembered that when the villas in West Mountain Wild were first completed, many people who bought them didn't have time to renovate.
Later, while working in various parts of West Mountain Wild, Liang Xiu learned that these dozen or so villas had been renovated in a rush just a few days before the heavy rain.
Many of the villas also had high walls built around them.
For this reason, no one found it odd that Meng Ci's villa was well-constructed.
However, due to time constraints, the walls around Meng Ci's villa weren't as high as those of others.
Many of the walls were unstable and had been washed away by the rain.
After the official authorities brought in some refugees, many wealthy families in West Mountain Wild were burglarized at night, losing a significant amount of property.
Later, these wealthy families had to hire bodyguards and wall builders with food and other resources to rebuild their walls.
Naturally, Meng Ci's sturdy Villa No. 8 caught the attention of many.
However, Liang Xiu refused them all.
Meng Ci nodded.
The wealthy, whether before or after the apocalypse, have always managed to live well for a reason.
In the early stages, many people were willing to risk their lives to run errands and bring supplies in exchange for money.
In the middle and later stages, they would desperately trade these items for food.
Regardless of the time, those who suffered the most were always the common people at the bottom.
When it was time for dinner, Liang Xiu went to cook, while Shen Que and Meng Ci went up to the rooftop to install the solar panels.
Six solar panels were too few to be of much use, and Meng Ci didn't plan to spend points on more solar panels later.
He could simply go out at a certain time each day, take a solar panel from his spatial ring, and bring it back.
Liang Xiu often went out to work, so Meng Ci could easily bring back two more when he returned.
It took over an hour to connect the solar panels, and they just needed to wait for the sun to come up to start generating power.
They also planned to make use of the electrical grid on the wall.
When Zhao Jingyu returned home, he saw someone tearing down the fence around his house.
His father, Zhao Ting, leaning on a cane, stood by the door. Seeing Zhao Jingyu return, he pounded the ground several times with his cane.
"At a time like this, what do you keep running out for every day!"
"Without even a bodyguard, aren't you afraid of encountering danger?"
Zhao Jingyu stood to the side, arms crossed, indifferent.
"There are many military personnel here; what danger is there?"
"Cough, cough, cough!" Zhao Ting coughed several times, and the butler quickly patted his back.
"Young Master, please yield a little and don't argue with your father."
"Besides, have you forgotten how the young master of the Lin family died?"
Less than a month after the heavy rain, due to the increased vigilance of the families living in the villas regarding their food and supplies, it became even harder for the refugees in the camps to steal anything.
Among these villas, the Lin family's security was much weaker compared to the others.
Thus, three men took advantage of the darkness to break into the Lin family's villa, capturing the young master and demanding a ransom in exchange for his release.
The Lin family, fearing that these desperate men might not release the young master even if they received the food, sent people to inform the military and prepared the ransom.
However, the three men, hiding in an abandoned villa and extremely hungry, had already decided to kill the young master after receiving the ransom. One night, they killed the thirteen-year-old Lin young master and cooked him for food.
When the military entered the villa, they found the three men lying on the ground, full and satisfied, while the young master lay beneath them, bleeding and missing a leg.
Upon learning of this incident, other wealthy families quickly hired people to repair their fences and recruited some skilled bodyguards.
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