Jing Shu figured that much of it might be due to climate shock. Sixty degrees Celsius was already uninhabitable for humans, which was why the state decided to relocate residents out of Hainan using cargo ships and trains. After all, Hainan was tropical and stayed warm even at night, but in the Northeast, nighttime temperatures dropped to over ten degrees below zero, while daytime temperatures soared past forty degrees.
It turned out that the Science Channel, which had been warning about massive floods for an entire year, was finally proven right. In the second year of the apocalypse, floods came, and Hainan was truly submerged. Those who survived were moved to tears, grateful that the state had insisted on evacuating them despite pressure and resistance from many who refused to leave their homes.
Even the African savannas, which had been suffering from severe drought, were half-flooded.
As for those underground tunnel homes that had been dug earlier, the scenes there were horrific. The lucky ones who built in higher ground avoided flooding, while those less fortunate were trapped in tunnels tens of meters underground, unable to escape once the water rushed in.
If the underground dwellings in Africa could be described as clinging to life, then the few island nations scattered across the globe could only be called doomed, destined to vanish entirely from the world map.
Jing Shu absentmindedly fiddled with the Cube Space in her hands when she heard her father say, "Now that the trains have stopped running, your older brother called to say that the elderly man staying at Su Meimei's place won't be able to leave. Weren't you planning to see him when he left? Looks like that's not happening."
Su Lanzhi said irritably, "Then let's find another time to visit. My brother said Su Meimei treats that old man like her own father. She never treated our parents that attentively when they were alive. Hmph."
If Jing An hadn't brought it up, Jing Shu would have forgotten about that old man—a ripple caused by the butterfly effect. Given how scarce food was now, was Su Meimei really taking good care of him? Knowing Su Meimei's stingy nature, Jing Shu found this worth investigating.
That evening, Jing Shu had her usual extra meal, finishing off the last few roasted quail and a pot of chicken soup with mushrooms. Then she went back to her daily Cube Space training, entering a meditative focus. This routine had gone on for half a month. Jing Shu was stuck at a bottleneck. Her mindset had shifted from determination to frustration, and now she felt like punching something every time she picked up the cube.
The novels she had read about breaking through bottlenecks with a bit of effort and leveling up in a flash? Total lies. Jing Shu was starting to doubt if she was even fit to be the owner of the Cube Space. She had been working on it for seven or eight months and still hadn't advanced.
More than once, she had hurled the cube away, tempted to stomp on it. But each time, she calmed herself down, picked it up like an ancestral treasure, and kept practicing. Her motivation was simple: being able to store more food and supplies.
But lately, Jing Shu's temper was terrible. Best not to provoke her.
Before bed each night, Jing Shu had added a new habit: checking the traps in front of and behind the villa, inspecting the poultry, checking the fish pond, and taking note of the second batch of frogs that had matured. They were ready just as the carrion scavenger outbreak was happening, making this batch even more valuable than the last.
Despite the temperature climbing higher every day, far fewer people stayed indoors. Everyone was out hunting for supplies, especially knives and iron rods. During this time, the community aunties had unleashed their formidable gossip network, knowing exactly which homes had deaths and which families were on their last legs. They had already marked their targets, waiting to swoop in as soon as someone died, both to call the body removal line and to scavenge their supplies.
Most robbers were ordinary people, targeting those with food stores. They had no interest in old, unattractive women with nothing worth taking. Bluntly put, they were not even worth robbing.
Of course, there were also family gangs—whole families, young and old, robbing others for food and trading stolen knives for meat. But far more people were drawn in by the lure of rewards for reporting crimes.
Now, if a robbery or murder happened in any Wu City community, it would be reported within minutes. People did it for the points.
Wang Qiqi organized a crew: some searched for knives, some tracked robbery cases, some followed suspects to confirm their identities, and others handled the calls for body removals.
Wang Dazhao sent a message, confirming that Zhetian's next target was the Petrochemical Community base near Ai Jia Supermarket. They planned to bomb the petroleum facility and destroy the extracted crude oil.
Jing Shu realized she had been overthinking it when she suspected Zhetian was after her. In her previous life, she had been too busy scavenging knives to trade for meat to pay attention to Zhetian. She didn't recall hearing anything about a petroleum base being bombed.
"The Petrochemical Community base supported Ai Jia Supermarket's operations before the apocalypse. It was filled with people working in the oil industry, and there's an armed police station nearby. It should be safe, right?" Jing Shu reminded Wang Dazhao to be careful and avoid having his information collected.
By the time Su Lanzhi was finally free, several days had passed. The family braved the fifty-two-degree heat, bringing ten marinated eggs and half a jar of pickles, and first stopped by Uncle's house at Xishan, then drove another seven or eight kilometers straight to Su Meimei's home.
Along the way, Jing Shu downed three bottles of mineral water.
"Jing Shu, how can you waste water like that? We just take a sip to moisten our lips. I only let Su Long have a tiny mouthful," Auntie couldn't help but scold. "Lanzhi, you should control Jing Shu. She should learn to save water."
"I spent two months stockpiling supplies before the apocalypse precisely so I could live better afterward. And you're telling me to save water now?"
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From here on out, I've decided to render Wucheng (乌城) as Wu City for consistency. I've already gone back and updated earlier chapters with this change so everything lines up.
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I'll be adding a brand-new chapter in the Auxiliary Volume that serves as a little guide to Jing Shu's family and extended relatives. The author introduces them using relationship titles (like "Second Aunt" or "Eldest Uncle"), but I've decided to balance those with actual names whenever possible, so things don't get too repetitive or confusing later on. In this chapter, I'll explain how the author wrote it in the original and how I've chosen to translate it here.
Since Jing Shu's family will play a bigger role later, I figured this reference chapter would help keep everything clear. That way, if you ever forget who's who, you can just peek back at this guide.
I'll also include a little section on Jing Shu's ability she get from Rubic Cube, and her "numbered pets" so you can track them easily. The author tends to list them in a pretty straightforward way, but I'll organize them here for quick reference.
Basically, think of this Aux chapter as a mini family tree + ability & pet index, written in a way that matches how I've been translating names and titles throughout the story.
One more thing—if anyone happens to catch the actual name of Jing Shu's Second Uncle (the husband of her second aunt, Jing Zhao) in an earlier or future chapter, please let me know! You can leave a comment directly on that exact chapter, or just drop it under the new Aux chapter. I'd be really grateful if you help me fill in that missing detail.