Worried about getting too cold and catching a cold in the rain, worried about sweating too much and getting heat exhaustion when it clears up...

Ling Chengyan instructed the temporary cooks to go to the county to purchase mung beans, heatstroke prevention, and mosquito repellent medicines, to provide strong logistical support for the team members.

The outcome proved that their work was essential, as the special patrol team members had the most intense workload and completed the largest amount of tasks, with none of them showing symptoms of heat exhaustion.

The other emergency personnel showed signs of dehydration, dizziness, and other heat-related ailments before noon.

The cooks from the special training team quickly brought over a heat-relief soup, letting them drink it and rest for a while, gradually reviving their spirits.

The next day, a local support team arrived, a group of uncles and aunts set up tents, and prepared large pots of cool, thirst-quenching herbal tea for the flood prevention and rescue personnel to drink at any time.

Facing the smiling faces, despite the sweat, of the logistics uncles and aunts, the flood prevention personnel felt somewhat uneasy. Filling and stacking sandbags seemed to lack technical content and was merely a matter of physical labor accumulation. However, finding and dealing with underwater piping issues were not going well at all.

The turbid river water, low visibility, combined with the fast river current and the increased pressure from the depth of the river, all added to the difficulty of finding the piping outlets underwater. From the first day noon, when the divers arrived and began working, until the next evening, after a day and a half, only one piping outlet was found.

Finding piping outlets underwater is hard, and reinforcing them is even harder...

During a meeting, Fan Gong made a metaphor: "It’s like a sore with pus; if you don’t want to puncture it and still want the medicine to be effective, you have to be extra careful."

Ling Chengyan didn’t understand much about these technical matters and thus didn’t interrupt, just listened quietly.

Although the water level was high, with the potential danger of piping, there was no continued rainfall along the river line. After reaching a peak, the water level stabilized and did not rise further, allowing the exhausted people a slight respite.

Even Fan Gong’s usually serious face revealed a hint of a smile: "The weather is on our side; in another week, the water level should gradually recede."

Contacting the meteorological department confirmed that there would be no significant rainfall along the river line within two to three days. Any precipitation would be isolated showers or light rain, which wouldn’t significantly affect the situation.

Everything seemed to be turning for the better. Some special training team members even joked about requesting a half-day off after completing their tasks, to visit the county or city, and bring back some southern specialties. Ever since arriving here, although they’ve been to several places, they’ve only seen sandbags and river water. They hadn’t even seen many southern beauties, let alone big southern men.

Ling Chengyan’s hearing is too sharp, so she inevitably overheard some of these jokes, but she didn’t mind. This flood prevention and rescue mission refreshed the team members’ understanding of physical exertion. Originally, running a forty-kilometer weighted cross-country seemed nothing compared to spending a day loading and transporting sandbags, especially when being on the riverbank involved not only severe physical exhaustion but also mental tension and fatigue.

The tension stems from the fact that the seemingly solid riverbanks actually have many hidden dangers and could collapse at any time.

The fatigue results from the repetitive and simple mechanical labor, done over and over for ten to twenty hours continuously, which is unbearable for anyone.

However, the weather is unpredictable, and the three-day forecast without rain didn’t come true. Less than three days of clear weather passed when, on the third night, heavy rain fell again, torrents of rain pouring down...

The flood prevention and rescue personnel, who had just started to smile a bit, tightened their nerves once more, with serious expressions, making their way through the thick veil of rain dressed in raincoats.

Fortunately, after a few days without rain, it provided a breathing space. The outer edge of the embankment was reinforced, and the top of the embankment was raised by thirty centimeters...

As for the underwater piping problem that hadn’t yet been resolved, besides praying, there was nothing else they could do.

The backup sandbags prepared during the clear days were carried to the riverbank, and all the logistics personnel retreated, with extensive evacuations of villagers in the river vicinity taking place once more...

The rain continued relentlessly. In the first half of the night, everyone fought on the embankment, stacking sandbags, driving wooden stakes for reinforcement, and even brought in over a dozen truckloads of cement and concrete blocks...

A part of the personnel was dispatched to search for potential piping issues along the riverbank, a task assigned to Ling Chengyan and the special training team due to their exceptional reconnaissance abilities, along with experienced hydrological technicians, pairing one technician with one special training team member to patrol sections.

Ling Chengyan, with her sharp hearing and eyesight, naturally went to check for piping issues, while the team members left on the embankment continued reinforcing the embankment under the leadership of their team leaders.

Perhaps from the few days’ pause in rainfall, the rain gathered more force this night, with large, dense, and intense raindrops that made it nearly impossible to open one’s eyes even while wearing a raincoat.

There was nothing they could do about it. The inspection for piping issues couldn’t afford any delay. They could only walk two steps and wipe the rainwater off their faces, walk two steps, and wipe the rainwater again...

In such heavy rain, the sound of rain was loud. Even someone with Ling Chengyan’s hearing found it difficult to detect the faint sound of water seeping from small piping issues, let alone others.

Thankfully, each group had an experienced hydrological technician with them. Before heading out, they each held a bamboo rod over a meter long, prodding the ground as they walked... Piping issues, besides having a spring-like water outlet, would gradually carry away small sandy soil particles due to the outflow, gradually forming a small mound around the spring eye.

If a piping issue had formed recently and the mound was not obvious, using a bamboo rod to prod the soil would produce a slight hollow feeling.

Of course, these signs are easy for experienced hydrological technicians to identify, but finding piping issues is really not easy for someone with no experience at all.

Ling Chengyan was also holding a bamboo rod, shining a flashlight, her body hunched over, meticulously searching every patch of land.

She found that this posture not only allowed for a closer search for piping issues but also prevented rainwater from hitting her face, making her vision clearer.

Considering that the previous days involved continuous search and inspection, many piping issues along the outer edge of the embankment had been found and reinforced.

Now, with the rain beginning again, the possibility of new piping issues forming was small.

Ling Chengyan and her partner were assigned a five-hundred-meter search task; several times, her partner had to stop to rest.

Long periods of bending over would cause stiffness in the back and dizziness. Standing up and being inundated by rain would quickly cause eye discomfort, swelling, and pain...

The seemingly light patrol duty was actually extremely difficult and exhausting.

Ling Chengyan didn’t care about gender differences, and when her partner had to stop for the third time to rest, she gently patted her partner’s back with her palm.

She was tapping acupuncture points, using a technique passed down through the Ling Family, which soon eased the pained expression on her partner’s face, who thanked her repeatedly.

Ling Chengyan waved her hand and gestured forward: "We need to hurry up."