“Squeak—”

“Squeak—squeak squeak—squeak—squeak squeak—”

Ban Xia was amused even with her eyes closed. Early in the morning, these rats, their calls more melodious than singing, rising and falling, with rhythm and cadence, like a symphony orchestra.

She opened her eyes, immediately running her hand through her messy hair. Fortunately, no rats had crawled in during the night.

She climbed out of bed, making it creak, and the rats under the bed instantly fell silent. Ban Xia could imagine these rodents in the middle of their concert all looking up anxiously at the ceiling, worried that the blackboard might suddenly collapse. The girl cleared her throat: “Distinguished guests, I’ll count to three, and those who haven’t left by then…”

Before she could finish, the rats scurried away right under the girl’s eyes, disappearing within seconds.

“…will be selected as lucky guests to stay for breakfast.”

Ban Xia rubbed her hair.

“They run so fast.”

In the past, Ban Xia had tried to block the rats out. She had searched the room thoroughly from top to bottom, sealing up every possible gap that rats could get through, ensuring not even a needle could get in. But when she opened her eyes the next morning, a pair of pitch-black little eyes were staring at her, with a pointed wet little nose sniffing about.

Ban Xia had sighed quietly then—it wasn’t all bad, at least breakfast was sorted.

Now Ban Xia no longer tried to block the rats. These little creatures could appear from all sorts of unimaginable places and disappear into equally unimaginable places.

She jumped out of bed with a bounce, pulled clothes from the chair back and put them on, then drew a circle around September 7th on the wall.

When not going out, she just wore an oversized white shirt with only shorts underneath, and bare legs walking back and forth in the house.

Until winter came, there wasn’t any need to wear clothes.

Ban Xia would prefer to go naked, but the Teacher stopped her. The teacher said clothes weren’t just for warmth and decoration—they distinguished you from beasts. If you don’t wear clothes, one day you’ll merge into this wild world and forget your human identity.

Ban Xia said wouldn’t that be fine too? Humans come from nature and return to nature, we’re all hairless apes!

The teacher smiled and said you’re not an ape, you’re a young lady.

Ban Xia asked what’s wrong with being a young lady?

Young ladies should be beautiful, you’re the most beautiful young lady in this world. Going without clothes would be letting the world take advantage.

The teacher said this while squishing and stretching her face.

“Am I beautiful?” Ban Xia made faces at the dirty bathroom mirror. “I don’t even know if I’m beautiful or not, I’m face-blind.”

The Colgate toothpaste on the sink had been rolled into just a skin, but Ban Xia still stubbornly squeezed it, spreading the last bit of greenish toothpaste onto her toothbrush.

Looks like this toothpaste won’t be usable tomorrow. She’ll have to cut it open with a knife then, surely there’ll be some more to scrape out from inside.

Rule Number One: Maintain dental hygiene!

This was the rule the Teacher had set for her. Even if the world ends, you must brush your teeth every day!

The teacher had once taken Ban Xia to thoroughly raid half of Qinhuai District’s supermarkets and convenience stores, acquiring mountains of toothpaste and toothbrushes, all piled up in the room downstairs.

Ban Xia figured these toothpastes would last her at least twenty years.

After brushing their teeth and washing their face, the girl scooped water from the large barrel in the bathroom corner into a plastic basin, then squatted down to wash her face.

The bathroom’s built-in ceramic sink was unusable, having broken years ago with a large crack in the bottom big enough to stick a finger through, so she had to use the basin instead.

The big red barrels for storing fresh water were found by the Teacher. There were two of them, placed side by side in the bathroom, taking up half the space—where the shower stall used to be. These plastic barrels were a meter tall with lids, perfect for storing fresh water. Whether for drinking or use, Ban Xia drew water from these barrels. On average, one barrel of water could last three to five days.

After washing her face, the girl casually poured the water onto the floor outside the bathroom, washing away the dirt and dust on the ground.

She didn’t need to conserve water, because Nanjing didn’t lack fresh water.

Ban Xia’s main source of fresh water was rainfall. Nanjing was a rainy city, with regular precipitation for eight months of the year. Humid temperate cyclones would come from the sea, bringing abundant rainfall. From March to October, this long period was Nanjing’s typhoon season.

After finishing her morning routine, Ban Xia tied up her hair in a ponytail. Next was making breakfast.

“Dad! Mom! What should we have for breakfast?” Ban Xia held a hair tie in her mouth, humming an unclear tune. “How about porridge? Dandelion porridge? I picked them up yesterday, they should still be fresh. If you don’t say anything, I’ll take it as a yes!”

Sure enough, no one spoke.

That meant unanimous approval—today’s breakfast would be dandelion porridge.

Ban Xia was always very good at reading her parents’ minds.

The kitchen was just on the other side of the bathroom wall. This was a three-bedroom, two-living room apartment—one master bedroom, two secondary bedrooms, one living room, one dining room, and finally one kitchen and one bathroom.

When cooking, she had to close the kitchen door and open all the kitchen windows to ensure proper ventilation before laboriously lifting out the stove from under the counter.

“This thing is so heavy.”

An old-style honeycomb coal stove—heaven knows where Teacher had found it. The stove was half a meter tall, cylindrical, with a ventilation hole at the bottom covered by a lid. This thing was originally meant for burning honeycomb coal—cylindrical briquettes that could be stacked vertically in the furnace, but you had to make sure all the holes in the coal briquettes aligned from top to bottom. The holes ensured air circulation: air entered through the ventilation hole at the bottom, passed through the aligned holes in the coal briquettes, and finally came out of the furnace. The coal would only burn with proper air circulation.

Ban Xia didn’t have honeycomb coal now.

But she had a wall of firewood.

Each piece of wood was as long as a palm and as thick as two or three fingers, stacked heavily against the kitchen wall, piled up higher than a person.

All this firewood was split by Ban Xia. Nothing was more abundant in Nanjing than wood, with camphor and oak trees growing lush everywhere. She would cut down trees, saw them into sections, then split them bit by bit into small firewood, and pile them on the balcony to dry. Fresh wet wood couldn’t burn—it would just produce rolling smoke—so after splitting, the wood had to be dried. First dried on the balcony, then dried in the kitchen. First split, first burned; later split, later burned. No matter which piece of wood, by the time Ban Xia needed to burn it, it would be properly dried.

In this world without natural gas or coal, Ban Xia’s only fuels were gasoline and wood.

She was too frugal to use gasoline.

So most of the time she burned wood.

Ban Xia rolled slightly thinner firewood with dried leaves into a bundle—this made excellent tinder, easily ignited.

But Tinder alone wasn’t enough; it still needed to be lit.

How to light it?

Since the day humans mastered fire, methods of making fire have been iteratively updated. Friction fire with wood was too time and energy-consuming, so people learned to use minerals to make flint and steel. When making fire each time became too troublesome, people learned to preserve fire with charcoal. Just cover half-burned charcoal with fine ash, and it would greatly delay the time for the fire to go out. Smoldering fire always lasted longer than flames. Such fire could even be carried in a box, ready to use at any time.

Ban Xia carefully took out a metal box from under the stove.

This was the fire starter.

The eternal fire starter.

She opened the box, took out a lighter, and with a “click” lit the fire.