My Dating Sim Just Got an Update - Chapter 37

“Men and women living in separate buildings? Doesn’t that mean I’d be living in the same house as Mu Ning? Absolutely not!” Ren Chenxi frowned and was just about to reject the proposal when Zhang Tongqi shouted excitedly from the side: “Yes! I’ve wanted to live away from you stinky men for ages! You’re all so unhygienic!”

Chen Gu had only intended to follow the Boss’s lead and help arrange for her to live with her boyfriend’s sister. He hadn’t expected to be roasted by one of his own. He immediately retorted, a bit piqued: “Hey, hey, hey, we don’t even live on the same floor! How do you know we’re unhygienic?”

“Ha! You have the nerve to say that? We might not live on the same floor, but the toilet and bathroom are shared! We won’t even mention the water stains you leave on the toilet floor every time, but the bathroom! Could you please take your dirty clothes and socks with you after you shower? Especially the smelly socks—they’re absolutely lethal! Don’t wait for us to find them and remind you before you take them out!” Before Zhang Tongqi could even open her mouth, another girl chimed in with a barrage of complaints. Her expression made it clear she had been tolerating this for a very long time.

“And even though we don’t live on the same floor, every time we go up to call you for dinner or a mission. Good grief, before we even reach the door, that stench wafts out! If we lived on the same floor as you, we wouldn’t die from zombie bites; we’d be gassed to death by you lot!” Zhang Tongqi added, nodding frantically with a look of pure disgust.

The words of refusal Ren Chenxi had been holding back were swallowed down instantly. Mixed-gender living with a shared toilet and bathroom… was indeed a bad idea. Sharing a single toilet with men sounded incredibly uncomfortable and inconvenient.

“Wait, are all rural houses like this?” Tang Ying asked, looking a bit overwhelmed.

“I grew up in the countryside,” Lu Ping, who was usually quiet, explained to Tang Ying. “Having one toilet per building is actually considered good. In some places, several households share a single public latrine outside…”

“Then… can’t we just build another toilet on a different floor?” Jian Dan frowned. Earlier, everyone was willing to squeeze into a classroom, but now that better housing was available, they were getting picky. Human nature is truly never easy to satisfy.

“Well… materials are scarce now, and construction supplies have to be rationed. It took a lot of effort and a pile of crystal nuclei just to buy two squat toilets and hire workers to install them. Building another one on a different floor… that’s tough!” Chen Gu felt quite embarrassed being trashed by the girls. Thinking back, they really were quite casual about cleanliness. If Sister Xi and the others weren’t willing to split the buildings by gender, they might have to build another toilet, but materials were indeed in short supply.

“Yeah, the newer buildings in the villa area are modeled after the old structures. Only the first floor has a toilet—partly to save labor and materials, and partly to conserve water.” Zhang Tongqi wanted an extra toilet even more than Chen Gu did, but… with the influx of survivors, most of the base’s workers were busy constructing new housing or defense fortifications. They didn’t have the skills to renovate it themselves, and the toilets in nearby abandoned houses had already been scavenged clean.

Listening to Zhang Tongqi’s somber tone, everyone realized the difficulty of adding a toilet at this stage. After a long silence, Jian Dan looked hesitantly at Ren Chenxi: “Sister Xi, should we…”

Mu Ning was also watching Ren Chenxi.

Feeling the weight of everyone’s gaze, Ren Chenxi gritted her teeth and nodded. “Alright. We’ll split the buildings by gender.” Hmph, so what if I live in the same house as Mu Ning? I’ll make sure I’m not on the same floor as her!

Ren Chenxi’s nod brought a collective sigh of relief, and Mu Ning felt an inexplicable sense of comfort. Rarely, she offered Ren Chenxi a soft smile and said gently: “Then let’s go to our place now? We need to move Sun Jia to the new building. Oh, and we need to get ready to move our things too~” Our place. It had a nice ring to it.

Gosh, Ice Goddess, could you stop smiling? The more you smile, the more panicked I feel!

Ren Chenxi looked away, just as Zhang Tongqi leaned in. “Sister Xi, if we’re moving, I have a lot of stuff… uh, we girls all have a lot of stuff. Can we use your space to pack it? I don’t want to make several trips back and forth.”

“Sure, no problem.” Since they were going to be neighbors, lending a few backpack slots was a small favor. After all, she still had their van in her inventory. As for the bus… Wei Yuzhe, the one with the long hair, had driven it to the base’s parking lot.

With the housing decided, there was no need to tour the rest of the base yet. The group headed straight for the villa area to see their future home.

Before going to the “New Building,” Ren Chenxi followed Mu Ning to the “Old Building.” They were essentially identical, separated only by a narrow alleyway. Ren Chenxi went to the old building first to help the girls pack, and also to see how badly Sun Jia was injured. Along the way, Chen Gu and Zhang Tongqi had mentioned how grave her condition was; if it was truly serious, Ren Chenxi wouldn’t mind using a Recovery Card on her.

The “Villa Area” was merely a comforting name the survivors had given the place. What they called villas were actually just simple, common rural self-built brick houses. They weren’t like the luxury villas in Ren Chenxi’s original world; these didn’t even have plaster on the walls. The inside was the same color as the outside—the raw hue of stone, brick, and cement.

Mu Ning, fearing Ren Chenxi would be repulsed, quickly explained that paint was hard to come by and workers wouldn’t waste time on aesthetics. She added that when they went on scavenging runs to further cities, they would look for paint, tiles, or wallpaper to spruce the place up.

Ren Chenxi didn’t mind the plainness. In the apocalypse, as long as a house was sturdy, waterproof, and had basic amenities for a bit of comfort, it was enough. Who cared about fancy decorations now? Well, except the Fan family—their luxury mansions were as gaudy as palaces. They probably monopolized all the decoration materials in the base.

Speaking of gaudy decorations… Ren Chenxi instinctively looked at Tang Ying. As a Level 3 user, Tang Ying’s crystallized objects were much stronger than ordinary brick. Having her “plate” the inside of the house with crystal might be a good option. However, they should only do it to the interior walls. As for the exterior… they’d better not. In a sea of plain brick houses, a glittering crystal palace would be far too eye-catching and attract too much hostility.

They were just ordinary folk, unlike the Fan family who flaunted their status with ostentatious displays. It was better to stay low-key.

Tang Ying, who was looking around curiously, felt Ren Chenxi’s gaze and turned back. Seeming to understand exactly what Ren Chenxi was thinking, Tang Ying actually gave her an “OK” gesture.

“…” Did this girl want to crystallize the walls herself, or has she just become accustomed to my ‘oppression’?

The interaction between Ren Chenxi and Tang Ying made Mu Ning feel stifled again. She gave a light cough to reclaim Ren Chenxi’s attention. “This building is where we currently stay. We have a lot of things, so I’ll have to trouble you.”

Lady, I intended to help your teammates move, I didn’t mean you! Must you be so familiar? Ren Chenxi wanted to refuse with dignity, but thinking about the house she was renting… she stayed silent. Fine, it’s just a few backpack slots. I won’t bicker with her over this!

Without a word of protest or refusal, Ren Chenxi quietly followed Mu Ning toward the building on the left. This made Mu Ning’s mood significantly brighter. The front door of the building on the right was locked, so Jian Dan and the rest followed Ren Chenxi in a grand procession to inspect the interior structure of the “villas.”

Entering the front door, there was a large kitchen on the left. Ren Chenxi could see an old-fashioned stove—the kind that held iron pots on top and burned wood underneath. The space to the right of the entrance was filled with miscellaneous items. To the group’s amazement, the area under the windows was neatly lined with flower pots containing various vegetables.

Ah, right—Mu Ning was a dual Water and Wood user. With such powers, it would be a waste not to use them.

Seeing Ren Chenxi staring at the plants, Mu Ning said, “I’ll move these pots to the new building in a bit. Everyone can pick whatever they want to eat.”

Chen Gu and the other guys: “…” Boss, at least leave a couple of pots for us!

After touring the kitchen and the plants, they moved further in. Next to the stairs was a bathroom, with a separate toilet stall on the other side and a sink in the middle. Ren Chenxi, coming from the modern era, was impressed; the rural house was quite sophisticated with its “three-way split” design, even if the toilet was just a squatting one. The walls of the toilet area were roughly plastered with cement, while the shower area was actually tiled, looking much cleaner. If only the laundry basket in the corner wasn’t overflowing with stinking clothes and socks.

“Ah, ah, sorry! This, this… who left their clothes here again? I bet it was Ge Yijin; he was the one staying behind to look after Sun Jia yesterday…”

Caught red-handed by a group of girls, Chen Gu and the other guys rushed into the shower room in embarrassment and hauled the laundry basket out. Ren Chenxi felt relieved that she had made the wise choice to separate by gender. However… the Ice Goddess had looked like a neat freak in university; how did she tolerate these slovenly men?

Sensing Ren Chenxi’s confusion, Mu Ning quickly explained: “I’ve never actually walked in on a mess like this. Usually, when everyone is here, I’m the first one to use the bathroom!”

“…” I get it, you’re the leader, the highest status. It seemed as long as she hadn’t showered, her lackeys wouldn’t dare touch the bathroom.

Having dealt with the laundry basket, Chen Gu clearly wanted to move away from the topic of the bathroom and the men’s poor hygiene. He abruptly changed the subject, pointing to the stairs: “The first floor is just the kitchen and bathroom. Shall we check out the second floor? Though the girls live there, so it’s not convenient for the guys to visit. Oh, right, Sun Jia is on the second floor. Sister Xi, why don’t you check her injuries?”

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