“Ahhh!!!”
At five o’clock in the morning, Chu Ning jolted awake in bed, her face filled with terror. Under the dim light, she looked around at her surroundings. Her heart skipped a beat as she quickly turned toward the wall, found the light switch, and turned on the lights.
Staring at the familiar yet strangely unfamiliar room, Chu Ning held her phone for a long while before finally realizing what had happened.
She had been reborn.
She had returned to seven days before the apocalypse.
The thought of the apocalypse sent a violent shiver through her body. Wrapping her arms tightly around herself, she could still vividly feel the agony of being torn apart by countless bites. The memory alone made her blood run cold.
When the apocalypse arrived, the law of the jungle ruled once more. The strong preyed upon the weak, as though the world had reverted to its most primitive state.
In her previous life, Chu Ning had been just like everyone else—completely unprepared when the apocalypse suddenly descended. There was the black rain that turned anyone it touched into zombies, the torrential rain that lasted for three straight months, followed by extreme cold, scorching heat, and countless other disasters. There were terrifying man-eating zombies, dwindling supplies, and desperate humans who had long abandoned morality and humanity…
Seven days later, the sky would suddenly turn completely dark, and black rain would begin to fall. Everyone would fall into a deep sleep. When dawn arrived, those who awakened would be divided into three groups: people infected by the black rain who became flesh-eating zombies, those who awakened supernatural abilities, and ordinary humans who remained completely unchanged.
Thinking of this, Chu Ning hurriedly removed the smooth red bead hanging around her neck. She bit her finger hard until it bled and squeezed several drops of blood onto the bead.
The blood was instantly absorbed into it.
The next moment, the bead disappeared, replaced by a faint crimson phoenix mark on the index finger of her left hand.
Her vision blurred.
When she opened her eyes again, she was standing inside another world.
Blinking in astonishment, Chu Ning was overjoyed and immediately began exploring every corner of the space.
Inside stood a four-story villa constructed from an unknown material. Beneath it was an enormous underground warehouse, the same size as the villa itself but much taller, at least five meters high by her estimate.
Each of the four aboveground floors measured approximately one hundred and fifty square meters, with ceilings around four meters high. There were relatively few rooms—three bedrooms, two living rooms, one kitchen, and three bathrooms. The fourth floor served as an attic storage room, while the second floor featured a spacious open terrace. Outside the first floor was a small plot of black farmland measuring roughly five square meters.
The villa itself was almost empty, furnished with only basic furniture.
However, every faucet inside supplied clean drinking water.
Chu Ning’s eyes lit up with excitement.
In the apocalypse, food and clean water were the scarcest resources.
Throughout her previous life, she had never known that the red bead was actually a portable spatial storage.
It wasn’t until her so-called “best friend,” Song Xiaoxiao, pushed her into a horde of zombies that she finally revealed the truth.
Song Xiaoxiao had been Chu Ning’s university classmate and roommate.
In reality, their relationship had always been rather ordinary.
Chu Ning’s parents had died when she was young, leaving her to grow up dependent on relatives. Having experienced the warmth and coldness of human nature from an early age, she had developed a reserved personality and rarely formed close relationships with others.
Yet the day before the apocalypse, Chu Ning had happened to return to her university.
It was during that visit that the red bead she had worn since childhood was stolen.
When the apocalypse broke out, chaos engulfed the entire campus. A group of survivors, including Chu Ning, had taken refuge inside the gymnasium. With the power out and panic everywhere, it was impossible to tell who had stolen it.
She had only been saddened for a short while.
Soon afterward, survival consumed every ounce of her energy.
Fortunately, she later awakened a Wood-type ability and barely managed to survive by relying on its healing powers.
Even so, she ultimately couldn’t escape the betrayal and schemes of those who coveted what she had.
Chu Ning took a deep breath.
A trace of icy determination flashed across her eyes as she temporarily pushed thoughts of Song Xiaoxiao and the others aside, focusing instead on studying this mysterious space.
Her parents had given her this bead on her tenth birthday.
It was also the very same year they both died in an accident.
For the next ten years, Chu Ning had lived in her eldest uncle’s house, where she endured endless neglect. She often went hungry, and whenever she resisted, the entire family would beat her mercilessly.
Only after she was admitted to university at eighteen did she hire a lawyer and finally reclaim the two apartments that had rightfully belonged to her.
After her parents passed away, her uncle had become her legal guardian because she had no other close relatives.
Not only had he taken possession of her parents’ savings, but he had also occupied both of their apartments.
One was a luxury apartment in the city’s prime downtown district.
The other was a one-hundred-and-twenty-square-meter apartment in an older but bustling residential neighborhood.
Her uncle had given the luxury apartment to her cousin as his marital home, while the second apartment had been rented out for profit.
As for Chu Ning herself…
She had spent those ten years sleeping in the family’s storage room.
After recovering the properties, Chu Ning immediately listed the luxury apartment through a real estate agency.
Because of its excellent location—and because she intentionally lowered the asking price—it sold quickly for five million yuan.
She used part of the proceeds to completely renovate the second apartment.
After enduring several more visits from her uncle’s family, who came only to harass her, she once again hired a lawyer to recover her parents’ savings, as well as ten years’ worth of rental income they had illegally pocketed.
She also installed an extra heavy-duty security door for her home.
Perhaps frightened by her determination to pursue legal action, her uncle’s family never came to bother her again.
Enjoying the long-awaited peace and quiet, Chu Ning eventually withdrew the lawsuit.
Now…
The money from selling the apartment could finally be used to stockpile supplies.
With a thought, she left the space and switched on every light in the apartment.
Opening the refrigerator, she found it well stocked with ingredients.
She enjoyed cooking, so her double-door refrigerator was usually about half full.
After thinking for a moment, she realized that with the spatial storage, she could stockpile enormous quantities of food.
If only the space could preserve freshness…
She quickly took a frozen slab of pork belly and placed it inside the space.
Then she gathered yesterday’s meat sauce and some cucumbers before heading into the kitchen.
Working swiftly, she prepared herself a large, steaming bowl of fragrant zhajiang noodles.
She placed another bowl inside the space before happily sitting down to eat the freshly made one herself.
Slurp!
It was incredible!
It tasted absolutely amazing!
Tears welled up in Chu Ning’s eyes.
How long had it been since she had eaten such delicious, piping-hot food?
It was unbelievably good.
She devoured the entire bowl of noodles in a matter of minutes.
With her stomach pleasantly full, she took a sip of ice-cold cola and let out a deeply satisfied burp.
Stretching lazily, she walked over to her computer and began typing up a list of supplies.
After renovating her apartment and covering her living expenses over the past two years, she had only 4.5 million yuan remaining in her account.
Once the apocalypse arrived, money would become the most worthless thing in existence.
She intended to spend every last cent before then.
Food.
Water.
Medicine.
Cold-weather gear.
Heat-resistant supplies.
Ice makers.
Space heaters.
Generators.
Vehicles.
Gasoline.
Solar heating panels.
Personal hygiene products.
And weapons.
She only had seven days.
Every second counted.
Before leaving the apartment, Chu Ning entered the space one more time.
More than an hour had passed.
The pork belly she had placed inside remained completely frozen.
The bowl of zhajiang noodles was still piping hot, with steam rising from it as though it had just been cooked.
Chu Ning was overjoyed.
This proved that the space could preserve items perfectly.
She decided to leave both items inside for longer testing before stepping back out of the space.
After changing into a set of athletic clothes, Chu Ning hailed a taxi to a used-car dealership, rented a seven-seater van, and drove toward Jiang City’s largest wholesale market.