Liang Yuan nodded, "That’s good." NovelHub
"I have some good news for you too. The raft that Wang Ze and his team left behind is almost finished."
Old Ma’s words made Liang Yuan’s eyes light up, and he immediately said: "Let’s go, take me to see it."
Zhao Kai and Ding Yan, who were nearby, were also interested when they heard this. Instead of hurrying back, they quickly followed Old Ma and Cai Zhi to the rooftop of Unit Six. View the correct content at NovelHub
On reaching the rooftop of Unit Six, they saw a square raft, approximately twenty meters long and wide, appear before them.
The main structure of the raft was made of steel pipes, with over a dozen pipes interlaced and tied together horizontally and vertically.
On top of the steel pipes, wooden floorboards from the original houses were pieced together using a mortise-and-tenon structure, neatly laid on the steel pipes to form a platform.
Beneath the steel pipe frame, a large number of plastic barrels, plastic bottles, and other lightweight buoyant materials were filled in.
As Old Ma led them around, he explained, "Cai Zhi and I used the adhesive from mutated sea cucumbers to coat the seams of the wooden floorboard, sealing them tightly so they won’t crack."
"We’ve also secured the plastic fillers underneath very tightly."
"Around the edges, we’ve used empty bottles so that a lot of water can be stored inside."
"Of course, with you around, we never have to worry about water storage, but considering the raft might be used for something else in the future and you might not be here, we included this design."
"Also, if you look around, we’ve made propellers out of electric fans, driven by batteries, so we can speed up underwater."
"On the raft, as you suggested, we’ve built a simple canopy structure to shield from the wind and rain. There’s also a mast with a triangular sail that can be manually raised and lowered."
"The entire raft is about 200 square meters. We haven’t tested it in the water yet, so we don’t know how much it can carry."
"Now all that’s left is to put it in the water. So, should we pick a day to test it?"
Old Ma and Cai Zhi’s eyes were full of light as they eagerly rubbed their hands together.
For this raft, which had consumed so much of their time, they were full of anticipation.
Liang Yuan’s heart was also bursting with excitement. He said, "Test it! We must test it!"
Old Ma said, "The only problem now is figuring out how to move the raft down."
Cai Zhi added, "Yes, the raft is too big. It definitely can’t fit through the staircase. Old Ma and I think we need to use a zipline to lower the raft down to the fourteenth floor."
"Not the fourteenth floor, the fifteenth floor," Old Ma corrected.
Liang Yuan was stunned, "What?"
"You’ve been gone a few days, and the water level has risen again. It’s almost at the fifteenth floor now," Old Ma said with a worried expression.
"If this continues, I don’t know how many more days these thirty-two floors can hold out."
His words brought a heavy silence to the group.
Finally, Liang Yuan broke the silence, "We make our own luck. Our raft is ready, so we’ll take as many people as it can carry for now."
"If the first trip is successful, and we can safely reach Meishan or Yangshan, we can think of a way to come back for the others."
Liang Yuan’s words immediately relieved everyone’s spirits.
Old Ma, Cai Zhi, and the others, after all, had spent so much time with the people in this building.
Though there were quite a few bad apples, like Liu Changfa from before.
More were innocent common folks.
Some were even kind-hearted.
Like the aunts Granny Li brought in from the countryside. They were honest rural folk who later moved to the city with their children.
Leaving them here to wait for death, everyone felt bad inside, even if they didn’t say it.
But there was no choice; the raft could only hold so many people.
Some people would inevitably be left behind.
But now, with Liang Yuan saying they might return after the first trip to Meishan, the burden in everyone’s hearts lightened considerably.
No one felt like they were abandoning their old neighbors.
"Liang Yuan, then we’ll start building the zipline and lowering the raft in the next couple of days," Cai Zhi said eagerly.
Liang Yuan smiled, "Alright, this will be up to you and Old Ma then."
Meanwhile, Liang Yuan began to think. It seemed he needed to urge everyone to catch more fish in the coming days to earn more points.
This chance won’t come again any time soon.
Once he boarded the raft for Meishan, earning points would be entirely up to him.
After a moment of thought, he made up his mind.
"Increase the exchange rate, encourage everyone to catch fish overnight."
"And notify Elder Lin and Dr. Yang. We have to take this opportunity to earn big in the next few days."
Leaving the job upstairs to Old Ma and Cai Zhi, Liang Yuan took Zhao Kai and Ding Yan back to the thirty-second floor.
In 3201, people were still busy exchanging fish.
Liang Yuan suddenly remembered he had been away at Building 77 for three or four days and wondered how many fish had been caught during that time.
Thinking about this, he quickly went home.
He immediately saw Cai Yao and Yang Mei counting the fish while Sister Wu and the others maintained order.
"Brother Liang is back!"
Someone shouted, and everyone turned to look at the door.
People started greeting Liang Yuan.
Yang Mei quickly raised her head, her forehead covered with sweat, soaking her hair bun.