Shan Nai took the two gray, diamond-shaped crystals and walked over to the checkout counter, placing the crystal cores on the exchange device. “Please look at the camera, customer,” Shan Nai reminded her.
The small lens on the device quickly scanned Yang Liu’s whole body, and the crystal cores vanished at the same time, information appearing on the display screen.
【Exchange successful】
【Card balance: 100 points】
Due to the one-card-per-person policy, Shan Nai carefully issued membership cards for both the mother and son separately.
Then, the exchange device spat out two orange, gold-embossed cards shaped like cats.
This was the first time Shan Nai had seen this kind of process in action herself. She examined the card in her palm for a moment before picking it up and handing it to Yang Liu.
“There you go, please keep your membership card safe. The card can only be used by its owner, all goods purchased from the supermarket are final sale, and reselling them is strictly prohibited, otherwise you’ll bear the consequences yourself. Please remember this, customer.”
Yang Liu watched this whole process with some astonishment.
She numbly reached out and took the cat-shaped card, glancing at it, the front had the words “Membership Card” printed on it in large letters, while the back showed her personal information and card number.
But she was quite sure she’d never told anyone her name or her son’s name.
This supermarket was strange in every way, and the owner was strange too, the cat ear headband on her head looked incredibly real, soft and fuzzy.
She looked like nothing more than a bright, adorable young girl, and yet somehow she had the ability to run a supermarket in the middle of the apocalypse.
But these were just idle thoughts.
Lucky Supermarket, running into a shop like this in the apocalypse really was lucky.
“You may go ahead and pick out your items, customer,” Shan Nai reminded her. This customer seemed to have a lot on her mind, always staring blankly at her.
Was it because she was too cute? Or was there something on her face?
Yang Liu snapped back to her senses and hurried her son over to the shelves to start calculating how much they could afford.
Thanks to the twenty percent discount, quite a few points were saved, so she bought as much water and cookies as she could.
She only bought two packs of instant noodles, since they didn’t have much extra water to spare for soaking them, so she bought more cookies instead.
With the remaining points left on both cards, she bought two servings of the meal.
The mother and son sat at the table by the window, staring at the steaming braised vegetable stew, mouths watering, hardly able to believe it was real.
“Boss… there’s a countdown that appeared on the back of my hand, what is that about?” Yang Liu had just broken a bun in half to give to her son when she noticed the string of numbers, and it startled her.
Shan Nai had already prepared for this question in advance.
“No need to worry, customer. That’s a dining time notice, if you exceed the time limit, you’ll be automatically escorted out of the supermarket. Shopping and eating share a combined three-hour time limit.”
The system had said the shop was an absolutely safe place, and this measure was just to prevent customers from lingering indefinitely.
“Okay, thank you, boss. Eat up quickly, Xiao Hang, this is a steamed bun made of flour, and this is pork…”
Shan Nai listened as Yang Liu patiently explained things to Xiao Hang, feeling a bitter pang in her heart.
Given Xiao Hang’s age, even if he’d eaten something like this as a baby, he probably wouldn’t remember it.
“Mama eat first!” Xiao Hang, though clearly craving it, obediently picked up a piece of potato and put it in his mother’s bowl first.
Yang Liu fed him a small piece of meat in return.
“Mama, so this is what meat tastes like! The bun smells so good too! Mama… why are you crying…”
This was the first time Xiao Hang had ever tasted something this delicious, and he ate with pure joy.
But when he saw the tears welling up at the corners of Yang Liu’s eyes, he quickly reached out his small hand to wipe them away for her.
Yang Liu shook her head and smiled. “Mama’s fine, eat up, just make sure you’re full, don’t eat too much, or your stomach will hurt.”
She was overcome with emotion, it had been so long since she’d tasted a normal, hot meal.
That single bite of meat instantly brought back memories of the good days three years ago, and besides, the dish and the buns tasted absolutely wonderful.
In Xiao Hang’s memory, he’d never once eaten a bun this soft, sweet, and fragrant, he choked a little on one big bite, and Yang Liu quickly opened a bottle of water, carefully pouring some into the cap, and fed it to him.
“…Mama, can I have another sip? The water in this bottle tastes kind of sweet, and it’s so clean!”
Xiao Hang’s eyes sparkled, everything here felt new and dreamlike to him.
Yang Liu stroked his head and pushed the bottle over to him. “Sure, go ahead and drink.”
If there was one thing in shortest supply right now, it was water.
All the water outside was contaminated, the only way to get drinkable water was through special means.
Either you found a water source that predated the apocalypse, or you relied on a water-type ability user or a research team to purify it.
But either way, the cost was never small.
Looking at the clean, sanitary bottled water, Yang Liu couldn’t help but feel like crying again, wondering how her husband was doing, wishing so badly she could share this with him.
But she could only allow herself a moment of sorrow, she had to pull herself together. Her son still needed her.
Shan Nai watched quietly as the mother and son used their buns to soak up every last bit of the sauce, eating until the bowl was completely clean, before finally feeling reassured. She poured herself a cup of the body-strengthening, beauty-nourishing tea and took small sips.
That should be enough food, right? One serving of stew was a fairly large portion, and the buns were the large size too, she’d only eaten half of one herself before feeling full, saving the other half for her next meal.
【Rest assured, Host, the portions are more than enough!】
“Hm? How do you even know what I’m thinking?” Shan Nai asked silently in her heart.
【Er, er… what if I told you the two of us have a special mental connection, would the host believe that?】
“Not a chance, don’t go snooping on me for no reason, hmph.”
The system wisely shut up.
Yang Liu watched with a smile as her son finished the last bite of his bun, then took out a worn handkerchief to wipe his mouth for him.
She’d thought about opening another bag of cookies, but perhaps because she’d been hungry for so long, just the bun and the stew had already filled her up.
Better to save what she could.
The countdown on the back of her hand showed 40 minutes remaining, so Yang Liu started packing up her bag, neatly stowing away the goods she’d just bought, if she rationed carefully, these supplies could last quite a while.
Outside, the sky had already gone dark, and zombies wandered aimlessly through the streets.
Passing by the brightly lit supermarket, they showed absolutely no reaction whatsoever, as if it had been automatically filtered out of their awareness.
Faced with this sight, Yang Liu was utterly astonished. She snuck a glance at Shan Nai, thinking to herself that the little owner of this shop must be someone with tremendous power!
She finished packing her bag, put the dishes away and returned them to the food window, then took her son’s hand and came over to stand in front of Shan Nai.
“Was the food to your liking?” Shan Nai stood up as well, asking with a smile.
“Yes, very much so, thank you so much for opening this shop, boss!” Yang Liu bowed deeply.
“Thank you, big sister, you’re so pretty! And those cat ears on your head look so real, they even move!”
Xiao Hang tilted his head up, staring at the pale yellow cat ears on Shan Nai’s head, his eyes shining, full of curiosity.
He’d seen a cat once before, it had been adorable, just like this big sister.
Shan Nai froze, her expression stiffening slightly. Her cat ears had been showing this whole time?
“System, why didn’t you warn me about this!”
No wonder this mother had kept examining her so closely earlier!
This was so embarrassing, surely they wouldn’t get suspicious of her, would they…
【They’ve been out all day. I figured the host didn’t mind, and besides, there’s no way for you to retract them anyway, so I let it be, they’re so cute, right?】
Shan Nai had nothing to say to that. At least she didn’t have a tail, or there really would have been no explaining it.
Fine, fine, she’d just pass it off as a cat-ear headband.
“Hehe, they’re real, meow~”
Shan Nai stretched out her hand in a paw-swiping motion, deliberately teasing Xiao Hang, making the little boy giggle.
It had been a long time since Yang Liu had seen her son smile like this. She gazed at him as if he were something precious, then turned back to ask Shan Nai one more thing. “Excuse me, will this supermarket always be here?”
She couldn’t shake the feeling that Shan Nai was somehow mysterious, surely it wouldn’t just vanish the moment she walked away?
“Yes, it will. Please come again, and if you get the chance, would you mind helping spread the word about us?”
Wonderful, Yang Liu decided she would find somewhere nearby to settle down, searching for her husband while also trying to find a way to get more crystal cores.
With this supermarket around, there was hope that they wouldn’t starve to death.
“Of course! Well then, we’ll be on our way.”
“Bye-bye, pretty big sister.”
Xiao Hang gazed at Shan Nai, reluctant to leave.
“Goodbye.”
Shan Nai walked them to the door and waved with a smile.