Transmigrated as My Aunt in the 70s

Chapter 621: Chapter 614: Shoddy Construction

Tian Xinhua and the others were racing against time on the front lines, using their flesh and blood to fight against the fierce flood. Seeing the leaders so bravely taking the lead, all the government officials were passionately stirred and joined the liberation army soldiers in carrying sandbags to block breaches.

But there was one person who seemed absent-minded, and that was Vice Mayor Qian Hongfei, the same man whose wife couldn’t bear to bring out food from their family building.

Why was Vice Mayor Qian so distracted? It was mainly because of the multiple breaches in the dam.

He was the main person responsible for the construction of this dam. The project had been supervised by him from start to finish, along with the City Committee Building. The former was built when he was still the Director of Water Conservancy, and the latter after he became Vice Mayor, with less than three years between the two projects.

Of course, during this process, he must have profited quite a bit. Faced with such enormous temptation, anyone would find it hard to resist, not to mention Vice Mayor Qian, who was already fond of taking small advantages, and he had a wife even more inclined to do so.

Vice Mayor Qian, of course, heard Tian Xinhua’s earlier remarks about wanting to settle accounts, which was one of his main fears. What terrified him even more was that City Committee Building.

The dam wasn’t of good quality? Then the family building might not be much better!

His parents, wife, and son were still at home?

What if the building collapsed? Wouldn’t his whole family be ruined?

Would it collapse?

It shouldn’t collapse, right? After all, the water inside the city wouldn’t be too deep, and even if the building’s quality were worse, it wouldn’t be so bad as to be unable to withstand water, would it?

Vice Mayor Qian kept consoling himself. Although he really wanted to go back and check now, everyone was busy with flood fighting, so how could he go back alone?

"Mayor Yu, have we sent anyone to the City Committee Family Building?" Tian Xinhua crawled out of the water and asked Mayor Yu on the shore.

"Where is there anyone available? The entire G Province is flooded, and even with all the G Province military region’s soldiers deployed, it’s not enough. The leaders say the support troops from the XN Military Region are on their way and won’t arrive here until the earliest by tomorrow morning." Mayor Yu forced a wry smile, painfully pounding his knee with his hand.

"What’s wrong, is your rheumatism acting up again?" Tian Xinhua asked.

"Yes, it’s nothing, it’ll be fine after a while." Mayor Yu said bitterly, cursing his own uncooperative body, which let him down at such a critical moment.

"Have a sip; it’s a special medicinal wine from my wife’s family." Tian Xinhua took out Qiong Wine from his pocket and offered it to Mayor Yu.

After drinking the Qiong Wine, Mayor Yu felt much better and gave Tian Xinhua a thumbs-up, "This is really good wine."

Tian Xinhua looked out at the vast floodwaters, unable to hide his worry for Sisi and their child. Even though he guessed that Sisi had life-saving measures, he couldn’t help but worry, what if he guessed wrong?

"Don’t worry, the family building is four stories high; as long as they stay on the roof, they’ll be fine. Besides, they just need to hold out until tomorrow. When the support troops arrive, they’ll free up people to rescue them. For now, let’s focus on defending this dam!" Mayor Yu comforted Tian Xinhua, despite also worrying about his own aging wife.

"Damn it, once I find out which bastards built this dam, I’ll make them eat bullets. It’s been less than six years, and it’s already cracking. Who knows how much money was embezzled from inside." Tian Xinhua said through gritted teeth.

The uneasy Vice Mayor Qian shivered outside.

Neither Mayor Yu nor Tian Xinhua, in their state of urgency, thought about whether the family building could also be a shoddy construction.

On August 6th, at two o’clock in the afternoon, the rain gradually stopped, but the sun did not come out. The sky remained overcast, weighing heavily on people’s hearts.

"Mom, there’s a really long crack here, and so many ants." Du Du, sharing toys with a group of kids at home, suddenly pointed at the living room wall and shouted loudly.

Sisi ran over at the sound, only to see a crack like a long snake indeed appearing on the wall, the width of the gap at least a centimeter, with many black ants crawling out, making one’s scalp tingle.

Sisi ran to the other households and discovered the same situation; several other homes also had cracks.

How could this happen?

Wasn’t the building constructed just four years ago?

Sisi didn’t have time to think about the reasons. The urgent thing was that they had to leave here, or if the whole building collapsed, they would all be doomed.

"Everyone, pack your things quickly; we have to leave here. The building is about to collapse, hurry up." Sisi shouted at the top of her lungs on the third and fourth floors, causing everyone to get in a frenzy again.

"Why would it collapse? Mr. He, didn’t you say the building was safe?" Someone questioned Sisi.

"The building is a shoddy construction, unable to withstand the flood, and it already has cracks. We have to leave quickly." Sisi patiently explained that if she had known how inferior this building was, she would have tried to leave a long time ago.

"Oh no, what should we do now? We wouldn’t have listened to you if we had known. The water wasn’t so deep then!" Someone complained.

"I didn’t stop you from leaving before. Instead of crying now, you’d better quickly prepare floating things. I won’t wait for you." Sisi sneered and stopped talking to such idiots, taking Du Du home to pack.

Sisi took out a rubber raft from Space, pumped it full, put thick clothes and a life jacket on Du Du, armed herself, and brought some biscuits, candies, and other food, as well as some common medication, three water bottles, two with drinking water, and one with Qiong Wine, all packed into a waterproof backpack.

She had already stored some important things from the room in Space. After thinking, she also took out a bundle of rope; she needed to tie Du Du to herself to prevent any accidents.

After fully preparing, Sisi went outside and saw that after some chaos, everyone began preparing, following her suggested methods, looking for anything that could float, like wooden boxes, bed boards, basins, and doors.

"Sister Peng, stay with me later, we can look after each other." Sisi found Sister Peng, who was tying doorboards, and handed her a life jacket.

"Okay." Sister Peng accepted without hesitation. Lives were on the line; any more courtesy would be impractical.

"Sister Peng, I think this house can hold up for a while longer. Let’s cook a meal so everyone’s full and has the strength, then pack some dry food to carry. Who knows how many days we’ll drift on the water." Sisi suggested.

"I’ll follow your lead."

Sister Peng agreed wholeheartedly, gathering some prepared women to cook rice. They didn’t make anything too complex, just cooked all the rice and made simple rice balls, which were both filling and easy to carry.

By three thirty in the afternoon, everyone had eaten their fill and carried a fair amount of food and water. Sisi wasn’t sure how to survive in the floodwaters, but she recalled an article from her previous life suggesting moving to higher ground and against the water flow to escape.