Stifling air, scattered streetlights, streams of people coming and going, and all kinds of noise, this was Lin Su’s first impression of the city center.
An City is a major metropolis in the central region of [1]Huaguo = China. jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_1736117_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_1736117_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });Huaguo, with a permanent population of over ten million. At night, the downtown area is usually brightly lit, with office buildings, department stores, commercial streets, snack streets, and other business districts bustling with activity.
Yet such a big city, in less than half a month, had already turned into the desolate scene before them.
Seeing it made Lin Su feel a tightness in her chest.
“Should we find a place to park?” Father Lin’s rough voice quickly broke her slight melancholy.
They were currently on a commercial street in An City. There were department stores, restaurants, hotels, and other shops here, and the Lin family’s supermarket was located on the first floor of one of the department stores. Some of these businesses had already reopened.
Perhaps because people hadn’t been out shopping for so long, this street was especially crowded. Some people were holding skewers of barbecue, others cotton candy, it looked just like the pre-apocalypse scene, if one ignored the mini air conditioners hanging on them, or the cooling patches stuck to their bodies.
Those items had sold out as soon as they went on sale yesterday. Tonight, as soon as the sun set, people could pick them up at the corresponding subdistrict offices.
Lin Su and the others had also collected a stack of cooling patches from the subdistrict office. Only after sticking them on their arms, thighs, abdomen, and backs did they head out. Otherwise, with temperatures over fifty degrees, no one could endure it.
But precisely because of these convenient tools, an especially large number of people went out today.
Their group of five rode to the entrance of the street and had to stop there, they couldn’t continue riding inside.
Yes, for this trip, they were riding electric motorcycles. They didn’t dare drive cars, worried that the extreme outdoor heat and the scorching road surface might cause various malfunctions in cars, leading to traffic accidents.
Riding electric vehicles didn’t have those worries. Electric scooters had a lower failure rate, and even if a tire was damaged, it was less likely to cause an accident while moving.
Almost everyone from Qingshui Villa who went out today was using electric scooters, bicycles, or hoverboards as transportation.
And precisely because electric vehicles had these advantages, Lin Su didn’t dare park theirs casually in roadside parking spaces.
“Let’s push the bikes to the supermarket’s back entrance first.”
After a brief discussion, everyone decided to enter the supermarket through the back door.
All of the Lin family’s supermarkets nationwide had been closed ever since the state announced that citizens were temporarily not allowed to go out. The employees working inside had also been notified to take paid leave until further notice.
Their first task upon coming to the city today was to take inventory of the supermarket’s stock. After that, once it was handed over to the relevant departments, they could temporarily wash their hands of the supermarket.
The Lin family had already agreed with the authorities that all these supplies would be donated to the government free of charge. As for how the authorities would arrange the supermarket afterward, the Lin family would no longer interfere.
However, before they even got close to the supermarket’s back entrance, they saw several people craning their necks and peering inside. Just from their behavior, it was clear they weren’t up to anything proper.
“Hey, what are you doing?”
It turned out that someone there was already swinging an iron rod in his hand and smashing it against the lock of the rolling shutter door. This shutter door was the supermarket’s loading and unloading area. Normally, once the door was pulled up, goods could be moved in and out here. After entering through the shutter door, turning left led to the supermarket’s warehouse.
Being suddenly shouted at like that, the few thieves were clearly rattled. Order hadn’t completely collapsed yet, and seeing that there were five people on Lin Su’s side, the man holding the iron rod immediately grabbed it and ran off, with several lackeys following behind him.
“Should we call the police?”
Chasing after them was out of the question, but when Mother Lin saw thieves stealing, she wondered whether they should report it.
“No need.” Father Lin shook his head. He had already arranged a handover time with the authorities, so it was better to hurry up and finish taking inventory. What happened afterward would be the authorities’ responsibility.
Once inside the supermarket, the group got straight to work. They completely failed to notice that, not far away at a corner, a young woman was staring at them with barely concealed resentment.
After the authorities announced yesterday that it was safe to go out at night, Cheng Jiajia had already come to this supermarket to stake it out.
This supermarket was located in the city center, with many other shops around it. It was an excellent place to gather supplies. Cheng Jiajia wasn’t familiar with the Lin family’s other supermarkets in the city, this was the only one she knew well.
But she had tried yesterday. The locks on both the front and back doors of the supermarket were too sturdy, and there had also been many official patrols. After thinking it over, Cheng Jiajia decided to come today, when there were more people around, to fish in troubled waters.
Even the few punks who tried to pry open the door earlier had been deliberately egged on by her.
She didn’t expect them to be so useless.
Nor had she expected the Lin family to show up today.
The more Cheng Jiajia thought about it, the angrier she became. But she didn’t dare sneak in after them. The various official institutions were still operating normally; if she got caught stealing, once the real disaster arrived later, she definitely wouldn’t be able to survive it.
With that thought, Cheng Jiajia could only head to a nearby pet shop she had previously scoped out.
Don’t underestimate pet shops. Cheng Jiajia had read plenty of post-apocalyptic novels and knew that pet shops’ cat litter, cat food, canned cat food, dog food, and freeze-dried products were all good stuff. Cat litter could be used as toilet material, and many high-priced foods from reputable brands had especially high meat content in their cat and dog food.
Right now, money could still buy grain, so naturally no one thought much of the items in pet shops.
Following her prior reconnaissance, Cheng Jiajia pushed open the pet shop’s glass display door and went straight inside.
This pet shop had previously taken a high-end route and had quite a few cats and dogs inside. Whenever she passed by before, she would sigh that people were worse off than cats and dogs. But now, the cats and dogs in the shop had presumably all been taken away by the owner, leaving only empty iron cages behind.
The shop’s surveillance system was basically just for show, so Cheng Jiajia moved quickly, stuffing everything she saw into her space. Iron cages, pet toys, pet grooming products, cat litter, cat and dog food, canned food, everything was swept wholesale into her space.
Although the temperatures had been very high these past few days, none of the food had gone bad. Even if it did, in a future when people couldn’t get enough to eat, it would still fetch a good price.
And just like that, without the slightest burden on her conscience, Cheng Jiajia swept clean all the nearby shops.
Cafés, cake shops, toy stores, women’s goods shops, gift boutiques… she turned down nothing, sweeping everything into her stash. The thrill of “zero-dollar shopping” made her not worry in the slightest about exposing herself.
In fact, quite a few people were doing the same thing as Cheng Jiajia. Across the country, on that very night, petty theft of all kinds cropped up in many places. However, serious crimes like home-invasion robbery were still relatively rare.
Yet such an incident happened precisely in Qingshui Villa.
“Hurry up and move everything out.”
Residents in the high-rise area never expected that home-invasion robberies, something that hadn’t happened in peaceful times, would actually play out tonight.
And what these people were after wasn’t gold, silver, or cash, but the rice, flour, grain, and cooking oil the residents had stockpiled at home.
“That’s impossible…”
Because it was finally possible to come out in the evening to get some fresh air, many people had gathered in the corridors to chat. Naturally, their apartment doors were left open for ventilation.
Now that had made things convenient for those robbing supplies.
These people were dressed normally, some even wearing cooling patches. Only their faces were covered with masks, making them hard to identify. Altogether, there were twelve of them, a sizable gang.
The residents were afraid of the knives and clubs in their hands, but there was no way they were going to let them take their supplies.
Sure enough, someone had already rushed forward with fists raised. The two sides quickly started fighting, and some quick-thinking people had already called the police.
The villa area wasn’t spared either.
“Boss, are you sure this is the house that runs a supermarket?”
Six sneaky figures, as if they had known all along, headed straight for Building No. 1 where the Lin family lived as soon as they entered the villa area.
Unlike the high-rise zone, the villa area had few residents to begin with, and everyone had their own connections. Since going out was finally allowed, most families had gone out together today, young and old alike.
So the place was eerily quiet, perfect for doing something shady.
Unfortunately for them, the Lin family’s gate had been reinforced. Even with tools, it took the group half an hour to pry open the courtyard gate.
By that time, the Lin family had already completed a preliminary inventory of the warehouse and finished the handover with the authorities. They had also arranged the handover for the Lin family’s other four supermarkets in An City. As for the rest of the Lin family’s supermarkets across the country, full responsibility had been entrusted to the relevant local departments.
With everything prepared, Wen Shiyun checked the time, it was already two in the morning. Today’s shopping plans could only be put on hold for now.
Meanwhile, Lin Su was holding her phone and laughing out loud.
“What’s up?” Wen Shiyun leaned over to take a look, and his expression immediately darkened.
Lin Su had software installed on her phone that allowed her to directly connect to and control all the cameras at home. Right now, the screen clearly showed a group of people prying at the Lin family’s front door. As for the courtyard gate, it had already been forced open.
“Don’t worry, I’ve already triggered the alarm system.”
At the same time, outside the Lin family villa, the man in the lead had already kicked the front door several times.
“Damn it, what kind of door is this? It won’t even pry open?”
One of the lackeys behind him was already sensing something was off and muttered softly, “Boss, how about we switch to another house?”
But by then, it was too late to switch.
When Lin Su and the others returned, they arrived just in time to see those people being pressed down and escorted out by the police one by one.
With the current temperatures, responding to a call was no easy task. It was said that vehicles and tires capable of withstanding high heat already existed, but production was limited and they were supplied only to special departments.
The police who came to arrest these petty thieves were still riding electric bikes.
“Director Wu, these people are…?”
Father Lin rode his small electric bike straight up to Director Wu, who was talking with the police.
Seeing Father Lin, Director Wu immediately said, “Old Lin, you came back just in time. The lock on your courtyard gate was pried open. They couldn’t get through the front door, though. Go check if there’s any loss and report it together to the officers.”
Father Lin already knew someone had tried to break into their house before returning, so he stayed calm and went inside first to check the situation.
Meanwhile, Lin Su had already turned her gaze to the row of thieves being taken away in handcuffs.
She didn’t recognize a single one of them, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off.
Quite a few neighbors also came back around this time. Everyone gathered together, pointing and whispering at those people.
Lin Su walked over and directly asked Lai Huaming, who was speaking nearby, “Brother Lai, do you recognize those people?”
Lai Huaming’s expression was a bit conflicted. Then he nodded and said softly, “They seem to be from one of the nearby villages.”
Their residential complex was right on the outskirts of the city, so there were naturally villages nearby.
“Hey, hey, Xiao Su,” he added in a low voice. “Let me tell you something, but you absolutely can’t spread it around.”
Quite a few people in their residential complex were actually from other places who had moved in later, and naturally they didn’t want to clash with the locals. The Lin family was the same, outsiders as well, just ones who had settled in An City much earlier.
Lin Su understood Lai Huaming’s thinking perfectly. Especially now, when things were clearly about to descend into chaos, being cautious was never a bad idea.
After the thieves were taken away, the next few days passed peacefully.
Every day, the Lin family went out to inventory each of their supermarkets in An City and hand them over to the authorities one by one.
By the time all the handovers were completed, they realized that the city center had become much livelier than it had been on their first outing.
That evening, with no tasks left, Father Lin, Mother Lin, and Father Wen all stayed home to rest. The only ones who went out were Lin Su and Wen Shiyun.
The two of them simply rode a single electric scooter toward the city center.
“Cooling patches, cooling patches! Newly arrived cooling patches—800 yuan per patch, no regrets buying, no getting cheated…”
“Rice, rice! Vacuum-packed rice! One hundred yuan per jin, no bargaining…”
“Solar power banks, solar power banks! Just 1,999 yuan each—1,999 only! Once they’re gone, we’re heading home…”
As soon as they reached the city center, they saw that the liveliest street was lined on both sides with all kinds of stalls.
Some stalls sold food and drinks, others clothing, and still others various daily necessities, medicines, and even the anti-heat products that had recently been officially released.
Seeing so many stalls, Lin Su couldn’t help wanting to see what she could buy.
Noticing this, Wen Shiyun simply told her he’d wait off to the side and let her squeeze in on her own to browse the stalls.
Lin Su smiled and agreed, quickly starting to look around.
After passing several stalls, she found that they were selling things she already had in her space, so she wasn’t very interested in buying. But then she spotted a stall piled high with cooling patches. This item was purchase-restricted, each person could only buy thirty patches per month. One outing required at least six.
The reason the Lin family could go out so freely every day was because, after donating so much supermarket stock, they had been rewarded by the authorities. Their family was allowed priority access to officially produced supplies, with no purchase limits.
But at this stall, with so many cooling patches on display, it was obvious that many people had bought them not for personal use, but to resell.
“Miss, want some cooling patches? Eight hundred each, not expensive. If you buy more, I’ll even give you a 1% discount.”
Eight hundred yuan per patch and that wasn’t expensive? Lin Su was speechless. On the official app, these sold for eighty yuan each. A tenfold markup, and he still claimed it wasn’t expensive.
After walking past a few more stalls, Lin Su could already feel that prices outside had skyrocketed to an absurd level. And many sellers had begun refusing electronic payments, demanding cash instead.
Sure enough, Lin Su stood in front of the stall for only a short while before she saw three people come over to buy cooling patches. They didn’t buy many, but all of them paid with cash.
“Boss, why can’t we scan to pay now?” Lin Su asked tentatively.
Seeing that Lin Su was a pretty young woman, the stall owner was relatively friendly toward her. “The power goes out all the time these days. Who knows when electronic payments might stop working altogether? Cash is better. You feel at ease holding cash, whenever you use it.”
As he spoke, the stall owner glanced at Lin Su again, then leaned in and lowered his voice mysteriously. “Since you’re good-looking, I’ll give you a tip. Among us stall owners, some people have already stopped taking money.”
Not taking money meant barter only. This trend was progressing frighteningly fast.
Lin Su merely sighed inwardly a few times. After that, she wandered around a few other stalls and found that prices really had skyrocketed.
In the end, she didn’t buy much. She spent ten thousand yuan on two hens and squeezed her way out of the stalls.
“Well?”
As soon as Lin Su came out, she noticed Wen Shiyun’s brows tightly knit.
“On the street with the shopping mall, a lot of shops have been completely emptied. But the surveillance cameras didn’t capture anyone moving things out.”
The moment he said this, Lin Su immediately understood what was going on. In An City, who else could pull this off if not Cheng Jiajia? She didn’t expect her to move so fast.
Cheng Jiajia really was fast. She had practically swept through half of the small shops in the city center. If the shop owners hadn’t gone back to find their stores completely empty and called the police, no one would have believed something like this could happen.
The relevant departments in An City had already taken notice. But no one had imagined that someone might be stealing things using a spatial ability. At the moment, they were only considering whether there was some method that could transport goods away without making a sound.
Of course, these considerations from higher up hadn’t been made public yet.
After hearing that Cheng Jiajia had directly emptied entire shops, Lin Su’s understanding of that woman’s greed rose to a whole new level.
Those shop owners who returned to find their stores completely bare, how desperate must they be, in times like these?
The two of them didn’t linger in the city. Carrying the two hens they had just bought, they headed straight home.
Unexpectedly, when they got back, they found that there were guests at the house.
“Where did you two run off to? I came straight over after getting off work just to find you…”
As soon as they stepped inside, before Lin Su could even put down the hens in her hands, she heard He Qingfei’s teasing, slightly aggrieved voice.
Lin Su said cheerfully, “We’ve finished dealing with the hospital matters!”
During this period, the busiest institutions were hospitals. She didn’t expect that both siblings from the He family would be back.
That’s right, the He Rongxuan sitting on the sofa was already chatting with Wen Shiyun.
“There’s no end to how busy it is. Our director told us to start rotating shifts so we can go home and check on things…”
Recently, after people were allowed to go out at night, many had heard about home robberies and burglaries in An City. Quite a few doctors’ families were double-income households from the hospital; once both parents went to work, only elderly people were left at home with the children, so it was only natural to worry.
“Then did you go home?”
The two of them chatted idly, and the topic eventually turned to blister disease.
“Right now, they’re saying blister disease is caused by direct exposure to sunlight. Some professors disagree with this view, but there’s only so much data, and research results won’t come that quickly.”
He Rongxuan was the first to speak, explaining the situation of blister disease to everyone.
“Most of the patients in the hospital now are blister disease patients. In the mildest cases, the skin on an entire arm has already disappeared, leaving only part of the subcutaneous tissue. Even if skin grafting is done in situations like this, the results won’t be very good…”
Having seen so many blister disease patients, He Rongxuan had developed a deeper understanding of the illness.
“The most severe case has already had both arms amputated. Now the subcutaneous tissue in the legs is also rotting. The worst outcome is that even both legs can’t be saved.”
In times like these, losing both hands and both legs, even if the person is saved now, it will likely be very difficult for them to struggle on and survive in the future.
“So you have to be careful about sunlight. The authorities have protective suits that can provide isolation, but they probably won’t be put into civilian use.”
At that moment, Lin Su caught a rich, fragrant smell in the air and immediately changed the subject. “Mom, are we having beef brisket noodles?”
It was already 2 a.m. Their family usually had a late-night meal around this time, then went to sleep afterward.
As soon as He Qingfei heard “beef brisket noodles” and smelled the aroma in the air, she couldn’t help asking, “Isn’t this Liu’s Beef Brisket? Ahhh! Susu, you actually stocked up on this…”
Lin Su replied with a smile, “If you want some, take two jin back later. I bought quite a lot, it’s all frozen in the freezers!”
On the surface, in a corner of Lin Su’s living room, there were six freezers placed there. They were filled with all kinds of meat and absolutely wouldn’t arouse suspicion.
Meanwhile, He Rongxuan was already asking Wen Shiyun where the two chickens in the corner had been bought. Keeping two chickens at home wasn’t bad, at least they could have eggs to eat every day.
Wen Shiyun laughed and said, “Ten thousand yuan for two of them!”
Hearing this, He Rongxuan was so shocked that he jumped up.
Mother Lin, who had just come out of the kitchen, was also startled when she heard that ten thousand yuan had been spent on just two hens. No matter how rich you were, paying ten thousand for two chickens was jaw-dropping.
“With prices rising like this, is no one doing anything about it?”
There was nothing that could really be done. At best, you could only say that in this kind of trade, the willing fall into the trap. Having seen plenty of this, Wen Shiyun silently thought so to himself.
Meanwhile, Lin Su was already eating beef brisket noodles with He Qingfei, listening as she ate to the conversation between Father Lin and Father Wen at the dining table.
The two elders weren’t talking about anything else, but about the group of home-invasion robbers in the neighborhood a few days earlier.
After these people were taken back to the police station, their backgrounds were quickly investigated. As expected, they were villagers from the surrounding villages. They had come to Qingshui Villa to rob things because they’d heard that a supermarket owner lived there.
As for who had told them, that still couldn’t be traced.
“So I’ve already spoken to the official contact. I asked them to announce that all the supplies from our family’s supermarket have already been donated.”
Making this public had its pros and cons. The advantage was that everyone would know their family’s supermarket no longer had supplies and wouldn’t keep thinking about going to them to buy things. The downside was that some people might suspect their family of having secretly hoarded a large amount of supplies.
Lin Su hadn’t wanted to make this public at first. But earlier today, she discovered that someone else had also donated their company’s supplies, which made her decide to go public as well.
Still, Lin Su also made up her mind to find an opportunity to visit the surrounding villages. This time, the police had stepped in and taken those people away, but who knew about the future.
Before long, everyone in Qingshui Villa knew that a big boss who ran a chain supermarket lived in their community, the very supermarket that had been the first to launch a massive promotion back then. Now, this supermarket owner had directly donated all of the supermarket’s inventory.
Their family didn’t have much in the way of supplies anymore.
Their family had exchanged supplies for official protection.
Their family had exchanged supplies for materials through the official app.
In any case, ever since the authorities announced a list of charitable entrepreneurs the next day, when neighbors chatted with Father Lin again, they were no longer asking him to share supplies. Instead, one by one they said that Old Lin had been muddle-headed.
Faced with words like that, Father Lin remained remarkably calm.
The days passed smoothly again for a few more days. Then good news came from the city.
“Are they really getting ready to hire workers? What skills do they need?”
“I want to give it a try. There’s no money left at home.”
“I’ll try too. Even if the pay is low, it’s fine, they provide meals…”
As people gradually gained a deeper understanding of the extreme heat, and as the production of protective isolation suits sped up, it became possible for people to go out freely at night. The commercial streets outside began to regain a bustling look, and hopeful smiles returned to people’s faces.
In addition, after official statistics were compiled, shortages of certain supplies were discovered.
So the authorities prepared to restart some factories to produce materials that were currently in short supply.
As soon as the recruitment notices were posted, they gave many people hope.
Some even began to feel that the apocalypse wasn’t so unbearable after all. At the very least, the state was taking care of their food and basic needs.
Although they weren’t being fed for nothing, their freedom to earn a living was guaranteed. And with life having been relatively stable for half a month, people could finally start getting back into a working rhythm.
Lin Su didn’t join the scramble for these positions. In times like these, anyone rushing to factories to look for work was doing so because their family was struggling.
Over there, the recruitment drive was proceeding at full steam.
Meanwhile, Lin Su, Wen Shiyun, and the He siblings, who were on holiday again, set off together. The four of them rode electric bikes, slowly traveling along the suburban road. This time, they had a mission: to get certain things straightened out.
References[+]