Zhou Jiayue looked around in surprise, only to discover that apart from herself, no one else seemed to have heard that strange voice.
Zhou Jiayue composed herself and quickly headed home.
At this time, her father, Zhou Lihua, had not returned yet, while her younger brother, Zhou Jiajun, would not be out of school for another half an hour.
Zhou Jiayue glanced at her parents’ bedroom door, which was still tightly closed.
After sighing, she quickly returned to her room.
Zhou Jiayue cautiously tested the waters. “System?”
There was no response.
She frowned. Then, as if she had thought of something, she picked up a book.
【System activated. Book detected. Recyclable.】
In the blink of an eye, the book in Zhou Jiayue’s hand disappeared.
A moment later, a small golden house appeared in her mind.
Zhou Jiayue pursed her lips and approached the little house with her consciousness. The instant her consciousness touched it, everything before her eyes went black.
When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in a spacious, empty room.
There was a bookshelf in the room, and only one lonely book sat on it. It was the exact book she had just taken out.
The moment Zhou Jiayue appeared, a line of words appeared on the wall of the room.
【Golden House System, dedicated to the continuation of civilization.】
【The host can currently obtain points by collecting books. Point acquisition mechanism: one book equals one point.】
【Book collection methods: 1. Physical recycling. 2. Scanning and reading.】
Zhou Jiayue understood. Physical recycling meant collecting books directly into the system space, just as she had done moments ago.
As for what the points could be used for, Zhou Jiayue continued reading.
【1 point can be exchanged for 100 RMB.】
Zhou Jiayue: !!!
Her dark eyes instantly lit up.
Fortunately, she still had her senses about her, so Zhou Jiayue continued reading.
【Points can be used to purchase items from the shop. The system shop will unlock when the host reaches 100 points.】
The system shop? Was it really what she thought it was?
To accumulate one hundred points as quickly as possible and unlock the system shop, Zhou Jiayue took out every book in her room.
She did not even spare the exercise books she had stuffed under her bed to use as makeshift footrests back in middle school.
From the introductory books she had used when she first learned to read, to the textbooks and exercise books from her school years, every single book counted. There were so many that, astonishingly, she had more than one thousand books!
Zhou Jiayue used physical recycling for all of them. More than one thousand books disappeared from before her eyes in an instant, while her points rapidly increased.
【Ding! 1,232 books collected. Current points: 1,233.】
【Ding! System shop unlocking requirements met. The system shop will now be opened.】
【Ding! System shop successfully opened!】
Then Zhou Jiayue saw that a small shop icon had appeared beside the little golden house in her mind. With a thought, a dazzling array of goods appeared before her.
【Food Section: 1 point can be exchanged for one jin of rice.】
What the hell? That was such a rip off!
If one point could be exchanged for money, then one point could buy thirty or forty jin of cheap rice outside!
【Weapons Section: 100 points can be exchanged for one dagger.】
Weapons were essential in the apocalypse. During a special period like that, this could be considered, even if it was expensive.
Zhou Jiayue continued scrolling down.
Huh? They even sold books.
【10 points can be exchanged for one book.】
Zhou Jiayue: …
There were an enormous number of items in the system shop. The farther she went, the more expensive the items became. Correspondingly, their functions and quality also became increasingly impressive.
This made Zhou Jiayue curious about what the final item would be.
She directly jumped to the last page.
【Interstitial Space: Contains 100 cubic meters of space, has a freshness preservation function, is soul bound, and can grow. Limited time flash sale price: 2,000 points. Countdown: 30 minutes.】
Interstitial Space!
A powerful desire immediately flashed through Zhou Jiayue’s eyes.
She absolutely had to get this!
In the apocalypse, the most frightening thing was not natural disasters, but humanity itself.
During the period of torrential rain, she had once personally witnessed a family being robbed because someone accidentally learned that they still had a considerable amount of supplies at home. That very night, their door was broken open, and all the supplies in the house were stolen and taken away.
No matter how carefully one guarded against others, there would always be moments when something slipped through the cracks.
Once she had stockpiled her supplies, she certainly would not go around announcing it to everyone, but she was still afraid of what might happen if someone found out.
But if she had this Interstitial Space, then even if people discovered that she had supplies, she would not have to worry about them being taken away!
This was truly a treasure!
The countdown had already reached 29 minutes and 48 seconds.
Zhou Jiayue wasted no more time. She grabbed the keys to her little electric scooter and rushed out.
She remembered that there was a huge book clearance sale at Xinyue Plaza today, with three books for ten yuan.
Zhou Jiayue quickly ran downstairs, hopped onto her little electric scooter, and sped to Xinyue Plaza in five minutes.
She parked her scooter and hurried over to the book stall.
“Boss! I want to buy books!”
Zhou Jiayue bought one hundred books first.
One hundred books filled her entire scooter. If she bought any more, she would not be able to ride it.
She needed to first ride somewhere deserted and put the books away, then come back and buy more.
Seeing that she was buying so many books, the boss happily gave her a discount and charged her only three hundred yuan for the one hundred books.
So Zhou Jiayue said, “Boss, I will come back to buy more later. Prepare some for me first, and make it a little cheaper.”
The boss grinned. “Sure. If you come back and buy another one hundred, I will take another twenty yuan off.”
Zhou Jiayue nodded, then took the one hundred books and rode to a nearby blind spot where there were no surveillance cameras.
【Ding! 72 books collected. Current points: 1,305.】
Zhou Jiayue frowned.
Seventy two books?
She had clearly seen the boss bundle ten books together, and he had given her ten bundles in total.
There was no way any were missing.
Could it be that identical books did not count toward the points more than once?
Thinking this might be the case, the second time she went back, Zhou Jiayue asked the boss to give her one hundred different books.
The boss was rather surprised that she had actually returned, but readily agreed to this small request. This time, he only charged Zhou Jiayue 280 yuan.
【Ding! 100 books collected. Current points: 1,405.】
【Ding! 100 books collected. Current points: 1,505.】
【Ding! 100 books collected… Current points…】
【Ding…】
After going back and forth eight times, only two seconds remained.
Zhou Jiayue did not even have time to wipe away her sweat before hurriedly clicking the exchange button.
【Ding! Congratulations, host. You have obtained Interstitial Space. 2,000 points deducted. Current points: 5.】
She had gone from having everything to having almost nothing in an instant.
But after sensing the space bound to her consciousness, Zhou Jiayue felt that it was worth it.
With the Interstitial Space finally in her possession, Zhou Jiayue could at last breathe properly.
She wiped the sweat from her face. Her cheeks were flushed, but her eyes were shining brightly, filled with hope for the future.
Seeing that there were still plenty of books left at the stall, Zhou Jiayue had no intention of letting them go.
There really were a lot of books at the stall. They were of all kinds, with at least ten thousand books in total.
However, most of the remaining books were duplicates of the ones Zhou Jiayue had already bought, so after collecting another two hundred or so books, she stopped.
【Current points: 256.】
Time to wrap things up and go home!