When the Water Dried Up, the Whole Village Panicked

He Bi, a college graduate, turned down a high-paying urban job to return to his hometown. He took out a 300,000-yuan loan to build a water pumping station, ending the generations-long water shortage that had plagued Xingfu Village. With a stable water supply, villagers developed crop planting and wine-making industries, boosting household incomes across the board and building a thriving life. Yet as conditions improved, some villagers gave in to greed. Claiming the water source and land belonged to the collective, they refused to cover the basic electricity costs of the pumping station. Villagers Zhao Defa and Xiao Huiwang led a mob to stir up trouble: they maliciously slandered He Bi for embezzling funds, demanded exorbitant land occupation fees at his doorstep, and even rallied others to file false reports accusing him of illegal land occupation, all to drive him out of the village. Heartbroken by the villagers’ ingratitude and relentless pressure, a disillusioned He Bi reluctantly applied to the township to dismantle the pumping station. The moment the water supply was cut off, the entire village descended into crisis: farmland cracked open, fruit trees withered, wineries ground to a halt, and villagers fell ill one after another from drinking unclean water. Their once prosperous life collapsed overnight. Racked with regret, they scrambled to find a way out, only to be quoted an outrageous price for water by an outside investor looking to exploit their plight.