Shan Nai walked to the door and saw someone pinned against a large tree five meters from the supermarket by a zombie.
The man was gripping the zombie’s head with all his strength, trying to keep it from biting him, while the zombie thrashed about like a rabid dog, utterly uncontrolled.
“It’s come to this? Whew… that zombie’s fierce, its lower body’s practically falling apart…” Shan Nai leaned against the supermarket door, watching clearly by the glow of the entrance sign.
“Boss, help!” Li Jianan shouted with all his strength at Shan Nai, both hands locked tight around the zombie’s jaw.
At last, he’d found the Lucky Supermarket.
“Just run over here.” Shan Nai called back, opening the door.
The system had told her that within five meters of the supermarket, it was completely safe, but if someone didn’t make a purchase, they could only stay for five minutes.
Once that time was up, they’d be forcibly ejected from the safe zone.
Simply standing within the supermarket’s safe zone was enough to make a zombie instantly lose track of its target, so five minutes was plenty to save a life.
Shan Nai’s real reason for calling out to him, though, was that she didn’t want to let a single living person slip away.
They were all potential customers, after all!
Li Jianan had no time to think it over further, he kicked away the night raider, its gaping mouth dripping with filthy blood and drool, and sprinted like the wind toward the glowing Lucky Supermarket in the dark night.
In that moment, his feet seemed to fly, and he forgot all about the pain of his wounds.
The distance of one street took him only a few seconds.
Li Jianan felt he’d never run this fast in his entire life.
“Huff…”
He finally came to a stop just a few steps from Shan Nai, bent double, gasping for breath in great heaving gulps.
Behind him, the night raider zombie, drawn by the scent of his blood, was charging on recklessly.
Unfortunately for it, the moment it reached the five-meter perimeter of the Lucky Supermarket, it was sent flying back with a loud “bang” and vanished instantly.
It was as if it had slammed into an invisible wall of air!
And one equipped with its own defensive counterattack, no less.
Li Jianan stared, dumbstruck, at this miraculous sight, suppressing the astonishment in his heart, licking his cracked lips.
But he hadn’t had water in so long, there was barely any saliva left in his mouth.
“This one… looks familiar.” Shan Nai twirled a lock of her hair, tilting her head to size up the blood-covered man.
Although his face was streaked with blood, she could still tell his features were well-proportioned, his build tall and sturdy, a handsome young man.
“Cough, cough, a week ago, at the city entrance. We saw each other.”
Li Jianan coughed dryly a few times, his lungs aching along with it.
“That’s right, I remember now. So, are you here to shop? Just a friendly reminder, within the supermarket’s protection zone, if you don’t make a purchase, you’ve got two minutes left.” Shan Nai held up her small hand in a “peace” sign.
Oh wait, not peace, two.
Meaning two minutes.
“I’m shopping!” Li Jianan answered urgently.
He’d finally found the Lucky Supermarket after so much trouble, and now he was free of his burden, starving for days on end, he’d staked all his hope on this supermarket before even arriving. Of course he was going to buy something.
“In that case, please come in, customer.” Shan Nai stepped ahead and pushed open the supermarket door, smiling sweetly.
Anyone who was her customer deserved to be treated with courtesy.
The girl in front of him radiated an air of mystery from head to toe, utterly out of place in this world, unreasonably beautiful.
This made Li Jianan instinctively glance down at himself, would she mind him coming in looking like this, a total wreck?
He pulled out a tattered handkerchief and wiped at his still-bleeding wounds, terrified of dripping blood inside the supermarket and being seen as a nuisance.
Li Jianan held his breath and stepped inside, watching Shan Nai carefully out of the corner of his eye, and only quietly relaxed once he confirmed there was no change in her expression at all.
The little shop owner really was kind-hearted.
Shan Nai led him to the checkout counter and patiently walked him through the supermarket’s shopping notice.
Li Jianan already knew about the crystal core requirement, of course.
Crystal cores were the de facto currency of the apocalypse.
The crystal cores he’d collected before, along with his backpack, had been stolen by that gang from the Freedom Base, and over the past few days he’d gathered a few more from tier-one zombies.
But when Li Jianan reached to take out the crystal cores on him to exchange, his whole body tensed, his brow furrowing.
He patted himself down everywhere, not a single crystal core.
“Lin Rou… you really are something.” Li Jianan let out a low, cold laugh.
He remembered how Lin Rou had shoved him hard right before running off, it must have been then that she’d taken all the crystal cores he’d fought so hard to earn from killing zombies!
“What’s wrong? Are the crystal cores with your companion?” Shan Nai noticed his expression darken and recalled he did seem to have had a female companion.
“I have no companion. One moment.”
Not wanting to think about Lin Rou any further, Li Jianan denied it firmly, his face darkening, and turned his back, awkwardly fishing through a small inner pocket of his tattered pants.
“What’s he doing…” A cat’s curiosity really was strong.
Being short, Shan Nai couldn’t see what he was doing even on tiptoe, so she obediently sat back down in her chair, thinking to herself that this man surely had some kind of secret stash, that’s how it always went in TV dramas.
Only once he pulled out a few small gray crystal cores did Li Jianan finally let out a breath. “Good thing I kept a backup.”
It wasn’t that he’d been guarding against Lin Rou specifically, these were from a zombie rat he’d encountered a few days back while catching rats. Lucky for him, he’d gotten a few small cores off it, and at the time he’d figured they were too small to bother with, so he’d just stashed them away.
Never expected they’d end up saving him now. Li Jianan gave a bitter laugh.
“Ahem…” Li Jianan turned back around and found himself staring straight into Shan Nai’s eyes, bright as stars, and his ears flushed red.
After all, they’d been hidden in his underwear’s inner pocket…
She’d probably figured that out.
Li Jianan lowered his head and quickly placed seven or eight small gray crystal cores onto the exchange machine, keeping two aside for treating his wounds.
Shan Nai couldn’t care less where the crystal cores had come from, as long as someone had the means to shop, they were her customer.
Besides, how could an adorable little orange cat possibly know that boys’ underwear had a hidden inner pocket?!
“Huh? Even crystal cores can be cute, and look how tiny this one is!” Shan Nai’s eyes went round, her moist red lips parting slightly, the very picture of a curious kitten, utterly adorable.
“Cores from zombie rats and some smaller mutated beasts tend to be quite small.” Li Jianan explained, his tone unusually gentle for once.
The girl in front of him was just too cute, she reminded him inexplicably of a cat he’d once kept, and here she was, wearing an orange-and-white cat-ear hair accessory too.
It looked incredibly soft.
Strange, why did some part of him suddenly want to reach out and rub those cat ears?!
Too shameful. Li Jianan mentally slapped himself.
This little shop owner had practically saved his life, he couldn’t afford to offend her.
The crystal cores were noticeably smaller, so the points were correspondingly much lower, the eight tiny cores only exchanged for 80 points total, roughly 10 points each.
“Alright, here’s your membership card, please keep it safe. You’re free to shop now.”
Shan Nai handed over the cat-shaped membership card with both hands, her fingertips brushing against the name “Li Jianan” printed on it.
She didn’t expect another customer to show up right as the store was about to close, what a happy day. Shan Nai half-reclined in her chair, the smile at her lips deepening.
By the system’s own assessment of her, Shan Nai was nothing if not a little orange cat content with the simple pleasures of life.
That was true, she’d cultivated in solitude for nearly a thousand years, and this kind of quiet, homestead-like retirement life suited her perfectly.
Running a supermarket, selling goods, watching shows and playing games when there was nothing else to do, tending the flowers on the rooftop, sipping fruit tea, eating good food, and not a single demon beast sneaking up on her.
Wasn’t this exactly the life she’d worked so hard cultivating for, all those years ago?
This customer only had 80 points, no point pushing the flashlight on him, a bit more food would suit him better.
But… should she mention the food in the dining area? Shan Nai found herself torn.
Li Jianan scanned a bottle of mineral water first, gulping down more than half of it in one go.
So thirsty, it was so sweet and refreshing, his hand trembled slightly around the bottle.
The abundance of supplies filled Li Jianan’s heart with wild delight.
The phrase “treasure trove supermarket” popped into his mind.
With so few points, he could only prioritize the essentials, water, chocolate cookies, rice cakes first.
Fruit… he’d just get one apple.
He hadn’t originally planned on buying fruit, but the apple’s distinct fragrance was impossible to resist.
Next time, next time he’d save up more crystal cores!
Shan Nai propped her chin on both hands, quietly watching Li Jianan carefully selecting items by the shelves, thinking he was actually kind of adorably clueless.
“Oh right, boss, is that rice bowl on the ad billboard still available?” Li Jianan suddenly remembered the tomato-and-egg rice bowl and asked.