After hearing this, Qiao Jiajin didn’t hesitate and handed over the cloth bag from his waist. Lin Qin followed suit immediately after.

Tiantian looked at these two, her expression somewhat unnatural. But since she was after all in a weaker position, after much deliberation, she still handed over her cloth bag.

Qi Xia took all the cloth bags, sat to the side and began fiddling with something. Before long, he discarded an empty cloth bag, stood up and said to the three, “This time we earned five people’s worth, a total of ninety-five ‘Dao.’ This number can’t be evenly divided among four people, so we can only add the one we had left from the beginning to make it ninety-six, twenty-four per person.”

He handed the three cloth bags forward and said to them, “I’ve packed them for you. Remember to count them in front of me—I won’t acknowledge it afterwards.”

Tiantian hurriedly reached out to take the cloth bag, opened it and counted. It was indeed twenty-four ‘Dao,’ not one missing.

Lin Qin and Qiao Jiajin hung their cloth bags back on their waists.

“Aren’t you going to count them?” Qi Xia said. “I’m a liar, after all.”

“It’s fine.” Lin Qin shook her head. “If I find out later that some are missing, I’ll just rob you.”

“Yeah, don’t pull that.” Qiao Jiajin also waved his hand. “Where to next?”

Qi Xia looked at the bear arm in Qiao Jiajin’s embrace, thought for a while, and said, “Let’s go get something to eat…”

…

The group’s idea was simple. If they could cook this bear arm, as long as it could fill their stomachs, they could swallow it no matter what it tasted like.

However, in this dilapidated city, finding the necessities for cooking was extremely difficult.

Clean water, a stove, a pot, a lighter—they had none of these things.

The group wandered through the abandoned buildings in the city for over an hour and still came up empty-handed.

When they reached an abandoned restaurant, Qiao Jiajin finally couldn’t bear it anymore.

“This won’t work.” He threw the bear arm on the ground and moved his aching wrist. “We’re carrying dozens of pounds of meat around everywhere. If we don’t starve to death, we’ll die from exhaustion.”

“Thanks for your hard work.” Lin Qin said with a smile to Qiao Jiajin. “Want me to carry it for a while?”

“That won’t be necessary.”

“I feel like this place has great potential.” Tiantian looked around the restaurant and found that it wasn’t severely damaged.

Sure enough, after searching around a bit, the group found an aluminum pot under a table.

The pot looked fairly clean, just slightly deformed.

“As for firewood, it’s everywhere here.” Qi Xia looked at the damaged furniture on the ground. “The only things we’re missing are water and fire.”

“I’ll go check the kitchen.” Tiantian walked directly toward the restaurant’s back kitchen. “Maybe there’s water there.”

Qi Xia nodded slightly and began searching the room for other useful items. After a few seconds, Qi Xia felt something wasn’t quite right and said to Qiao Jiajin, “Qiao Jiajin, you go with Tiantian. Watch out for ‘natives.'”

“Makes sense.” Qiao Jiajin also nodded and walked toward the back kitchen. But before he had taken three steps, he heard Tiantian’s voice from afar.

“Huh? What are you doing here?”

“Oh! Sister, you’re here too!”

The voice talking to Tiantian was female.

Qi Xia and Qiao Jiajin immediately ran toward the back kitchen. As soon as they opened the door, they found the slightly chubby girl standing there.

She extended her hand, affectionately holding Tiantian’s arm, and said to everyone, “Why are you all here? What a coincidence!”

Qi Xia looked coldly at this woman, his expression somewhat displeased.

“You followed us?”

“Huh?” The girl showed an expression of complete disbelief. “How is that possible?! I came here first.”

Qiao Jiajin also didn’t know what the situation was. Why would this girl specifically wait for them here?

“Are you looking for something?” The girl asked again.

“Yes, we’re looking for water and fire.” Tiantian answered.

“Water and fire?” The girl laughed again. “That’s great—we have both here.”

Under Qi Xia’s cautious gaze, the woman led Tiantian to a cupboard. She stood on her toes, opened the cupboard door, and inside were indeed several plastic buckets filled with clean water.

Then she pulled out a lighter from her pocket. “Look.”

Qi Xia felt that all of this was far too coincidental, as if it had been arranged by someone.

Tiantian happily took the lighter the woman handed over and asked, “Little miss, are you really going to lend this to us?”

“Sister, don’t be so polite.” The woman smiled harmlessly. “We survivors should be helping each other.”

Tiantian immediately felt good about this woman and thanked her repeatedly.

“What do you want?” Qi Xia asked from the side.

After hearing this, the chubby girl turned around with a blank expression and answered, “What do I want? I don’t want anything. I’m just helping you out.”

“That better be the case.” Qi Xia paid her no more attention and turned to collect things that could be used as firewood.

“That brother is very strange.” The girl blinked her large eyes. “Why is he so guarded against me?”

“That’s just his personality. You’ll get used to it.” Tiantian also said with a smile. “Little miss, what’s your name?”

“Sister, just call me Xiao Xiao.”

Lin Qin looked at Xiao Xiao from the side, always feeling something was off.

This girl had a slightly plump build and broad shoulders, wearing an extremely baggy T-shirt, but her face was quite thin, disproportionate to her body shape.

“Xiao Xiao, stay and eat something with us.” Tiantian said. “The four of us can’t finish that bear arm.”

“Mm.” Xiao Xiao nodded happily.

Seeing that this girl called Xiao Xiao was deliberately concealing something, Qi Xia stopped pressing her. He only hoped she wouldn’t show off her incompetence and try to deceive him here.

Qiao Jiajin found a few bricks and built a simple stove, throwing some scrap wood inside and lighting it.

With Xiao Xiao’s help, Tiantian washed the pot clean and boiled a pot of water.

Qi Xia was processing the bear arm on the side.

He often cooked at home, but had never cooked a bear arm before. He could only treat it like a chicken for now.

After briefly scalding it with hot water, he plucked the fur, peeled the skin, and rinsed the blood clean with fresh water. He insisted that Xiao Xiao not touch the ingredients, and no one objected.

Qiao Jiajin took out a rusty kitchen knife from the kitchen, sharpened it briefly, chopped the processed bear arm into two sections, and threw the whole pieces directly into the pot.

This was the most perfect cooking method they could manage.

Meat soup.

Watching the water in the pot slowly come to a boil, making “gulu gulu” sounds, the group sat around together, quietly watching the iron pot without saying a word.

Before long, Lin Qin asked, “Will bear meat be tasty?”

“Delicious.” Qiao Jiajin immediately nodded. “Haven’t you eaten bear paw before?”

“You have?” Tiantian turned her head to ask.

“I had the fortune to eat it once.” Qiao Jiajin said. “That taste—I’ll never forget it. If I ever get out of here, I definitely want to eat it again.”

After hearing this, Tiantian shook her head helplessly. “You’re really a desperado.”

“Desperado?” Qiao Jiajin was amused. “Tiantian, are you silly? It’s not like I’m going to kill a bear myself—I’d just go to a restaurant.”

“Eating bear paw is illegal.” Tiantian added another sentence. “No matter how good it tastes, so what? Do you want to go to jail for it?”

“What nonsense are you talking about?” Qiao Jiajin looked at Tiantian with slight disdain. “When did eating bear paw become illegal?”

Tiantian frowned. She always felt that sometimes she got along well with Qiao Jiajin, and sometimes they weren’t on the same wavelength at all.

“You really should spend more time online.” Tiantian sighed. “Don’t always display your ignorance so matter-of-factly.”

“‘Online’?” Qiao Jiajin scratched his head. “You mean… that ‘Internet’ thing that became popular a few years ago?”