342, April 20th, 7:00 AM.
Tang Li pulled back the curtains, and the piercing sunlight flooded the room.
Outside, a blazing sun hung high in the sky.
From April 1st to April 20th, though only twenty days had passed, Jiangcheng had undergone earth-shattering changes.
Before Qingming on April 5th, the snow within Jiangcheng's seven shelters had been cleared, including the ice blocks used to construct snow tunnels and ice fortresses, all of which were melted, smashed, and removed.
It was fortunate that the clearing was completed before Qingming.
In the subsequent fourteen days, daytime temperatures began to rise sharply, and the nights no longer dropped to minus fifty degrees Celsius, at most minus thirty degrees Celsius.
This was similar to the situation after Hanlu last year, when temperatures plummeted, and the diurnal temperature difference reached forty degrees Celsius.
However, due to the presence of snow, the daytime temperature was not very high at first, not exceeding ten degrees Celsius at its peak.
But the scorching sun caused the snow to melt rapidly.
By today, not a trace of ice or snow could be seen, even in the great river where snow had been piled.
Tang Li also knew that after Guyu today, the second warm season after the extreme post-apocalypse would officially begin!
From April 2nd onwards, Tang Li and Tang Guo also wore electromagnetic radiation shielding suits and helped clear the snow.
Tang Guo did it to earn points, but Tang Li did not.
She wanted to find an opportunity to collect snow into her space and then remove it to gain spatial energy.
After all, if items could be collected into the space and then removed to gain spatial energy, which could then be used to replicate supplies, then anything could be removed and anything could provide energy.
Snow, river water, soil, bricks, and stones – these ubiquitous items could naturally be removed as well.
However, since Tang Li explored the advanced uses of her space last November, she had not yet found an opportunity to collect large amounts of snowmelt, water, soil, and stones into her space.
This was because when Tang Li collected things into her space, anything that was connected would be collected together, not just a small part as she willed.
Therefore, she had to separate snow, river water, soil, and stones from their main bodies before collecting them into her space.
Otherwise, if her space was large enough, she might collect connected rivers, lakes, and seas globally, or even the entire Earth, into her space, and that would be a huge problem!
When she was in City A, she did not participate in the excavation of snow tunnels because she did not want to get too entangled with the Self-Rescue Federation. After the snow was frozen by the ice layer of the snow tunnels, she naturally lost the opportunity to collect snow into her space.
When it snowed, she did use a basin to collect some snow into her space.
However, after removing that small amount of snow, her space did not increase much, and it was not even as good as feces.
As for soil and stones, under the extreme cold, it required great effort to dig them, and it would make a lot of noise, attracting attention from others.
Therefore, it was not until this time, while participating in the snow clearing in Jiangcheng, that Tang Li found an opportunity to collect a large amount of snow into her space.
However, the result was disappointing.
The spatial energy contained within the snow, or rather, the water, was very small.
Tang Li collected snow for a whole day, estimating several tons of snow, but the spatial energy she gained was less than that from a discarded mobile phone she had collected before.
However, Tang Li was not disappointed.
Scarcity makes things valuable.
Tang Li had not expected ubiquitous items like snow, river water, soil, and stones to contain much spatial energy.
Moreover, this was not a bad thing.
The fact that removing snow and water yielded little energy meant that replicating water resources also consumed little energy.
Therefore, in the prolonged drought in the coming period, Tang Li was not worried about how much spatial energy replicating water would consume.
After the snow melted, Tang Li also drove to the outskirts to dig up some soil and collect it into her space.
The energy contained in the soil was slightly more than that in water, but it was still far less than that in metal.
Tang Li also discovered that the spatial energy gained from removing soil collected into her space was related to its fertility.
The more fertile the soil, the more energy it contained; the more barren the soil, the less energy it contained.
If the items containing spatial energy were ranked, then snow, river water, soil, and stones would naturally be at the lowest end.
And the item with the highest energy content, to Tang Li's surprise, turned out to be delta particles!
When collecting snow, soil, and electromagnetic radiation shielding suits into her space, Tang Li would always collect the attached delta particles along with them.
Because the space was connected to Tang Li's consciousness, she could easily distinguish the delta particles.
What's more, the electromagnetic radiation shielding suits were originally replicated from the space. After being collected into the space, they disappeared directly, leaving only the delta particles.
Although these delta particles were very small and scarce, the spatial energy density they contained was the highest among all the items Tang Li had collected into her space and removed.
Before this, the item with the highest energy density Tang Li had collected into her space was a human corpse!
Of course, because delta particles were very scarce and not easy to collect, the best way to expand her space was still to collect corpses.
However, Tang Li's space was already sufficient for her needs, and she did not need to replicate supplies on a large scale. Therefore, she was not in a hurry to expand her space, nor did she need to specifically collect these items rich in spatial energy.
She continued to collect various discarded items.
Especially appliances that had been destroyed by the geomagnetic storm.
Opening her bedroom door and walking out, Tang Guo had already woken up and was busy in the kitchen.
Although Tang Li still had a lot of food in her space, Tang Guo did not know that Tang Li's space could replicate supplies. She only thought that the more she ate, the less food there would be.
Furthermore, she did not want to rely on Tang Li all the time and take Tang Li's things for granted.
Therefore, in the past few days, Tang Guo often took the salary Tang Li gave her, exchanged it for ingredients at the exchange, and came back to cook food for Tang Li.
Seeing Tang Li come out, Tang Guo took out the egg pancake she had fried to a crispy, tender texture, cut it with a knife, and left the kitchen.
On the dining table, there was congee, pickled cucumbers, and the steaming egg pancake that Tang Guo had just brought over.
In this post-apocalyptic world, it could be considered a feast.
For Tang Guo, this table of dishes would have cost quite a few points.
But as the points balance in her account grew, her heart also settled, and she was willing to spend more points to improve her quality of life.
While eating breakfast, Tang Li casually turned on the television to watch Jiangcheng's morning news.
With communication cut off everywhere, it was impossible to see national news. However, Jiangcheng had its own television station.
As soon as she turned on the TV, she heard the host reporting:
[After the inspection of the "Foolish Old Man Plan" expert group nationwide, the final sites for the underground cities of Longcheng, Jiangcheng, Shancheng, and Haicheng have been determined and will commence construction soon...]