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Chapter 11
At 3 p.m., Shu Fu returned home, just before the window and door installation team was due to arrive.
Throughout the day, she had visited 15 gas stations. At each station, she purchased six 30L portable fuel containers, taking away 180L of gasoline. In total, she had stockpiled 2,700L of gasoline across 15 gas stations, spending nearly 20,000 yuan on fuel alone, excluding the cost of the containers.
Having never driven a car or visited a gas station in this world, Shu Fu’s mind was still influenced by the restrictions on fuel purchases from her original world. By the fourth gas station, she began to feel uneasy, fearing someone might confront her for hoarding fuel and report her to the authorities.
But in reality, no one paid her any attention.
Even so, she remained cautious, choosing gas stations that were further apart and frequently stopping at nearby underground parking lots to empty the portable containers into her storage space and take short breaks.
Two of these parking lots happened to have supermarkets nearby. She seized the opportunity to stockpile fresh produce, dairy, meat, seafood, and bottled water.
She didn’t take time for a proper meal, satisfying her hunger with quick bites of bread retrieved from her storage space.
One of the farthest gas stations she visited was near a wholesale farmers’ market. She detoured there and purchased a large quantity of vegetables, fruits, seafood, ready-to-eat items, dried goods, frozen meats, and semi-prepared products like dumplings and meatballs. Renting a cart, she made several trips to load everything into her car, filling every corner except the driver’s seat before finally leaving.
Now her storage space held 101 portable fuel containers, each 30L, totaling 3,030L of fuel. Since the containers were uniform in size and neatly stacked, they didn’t take up much space.
On her way back, Shu Fu stopped by a wholesale market to buy 20 rectangular storage bins, each half a cubic meter in size. These bins were lidded and stackable, both when empty and when filled.
Her plan wasn’t to store items but to use them to stockpile water.
The water tank on her raft could hold only 500L, and the purifier produced just 10L of clean water daily. While this was sufficient, the raft didn’t have a heating system, meaning all the water was cold.
Even though the raft’s interior was temperature-regulated, cold water wasn’t ideal for washing up. Boiling water with a kettle took too much time and electricity. Her solution was to fill these bins with warm water, around 60–70°C, for washing and cleaning. Each bin could hold 500L, and with 20 bins full, she would have enough water for a long time.
By now, the agricultural products she had purchased were safely stored in her space. She stopped by a food court to pick up takeout meals and drinks from several restaurants she hadn’t had a chance to visit before.
Her last two stops were near her residential area. First, she visited another water supply store to order 40 cases of bottled water, each containing four large bottles, and arranged for delivery to her garage. Then she stopped at a grain and oil shop, where she filled her now-empty car with rice, flour, cooking oil, grains, and various seasonings.
Her rice consumption was modest—3 to 5 pounds per month. At the higher estimate of 5 pounds monthly, this batch of staples, combined with her previous stockpile, would last her several years.
By 3:40 p.m., the window and door installation technicians arrived during a lull in the rain. They brought tempered laminated glass, sliding security windows, and a stainless steel grille door custom-made to fit her front door.
The grille door was a later addition she had requested over the phone. Similar to the security windows, it was installed outside the main door and was also sliding, adding another layer of reinforcement.
Since the laminated glass was installed on the interior, Shu Fu emphasized durability over aesthetics. As a result, the installation process was relatively quick.
During this time, she went to her garage to sign for the delivery of 40 boxes of canned meals, pre-packed rice dishes, and dehydrated vegetables that she had ordered the previous day. She also used a folding cart to retrieve items she had ordered online from the parcel lockers.
With this round of pickups, nearly all her online orders had been delivered.
By 6 p.m., all tasks were completed.
Looking at the reinforced windows and smoothly operating grille door, Shu Fu thanked the workers and sent them off before cleaning her now-dirty apartment, sweeping and mopping the floors.
By 7 p.m., she was finally done with everything and collapsed onto the sofa, utterly exhausted.
After zoning out for ten minutes, she suddenly sprang up and headed to the bathroom to wash the storage bins she had purchased earlier. Adjusting the water temperature, she began the repetitive task of filling them with warm water.
The apartment’s gas water heater, which she had installed after moving in, was more expensive than an electric one but offered the advantage of instant hot water without any capacity limitations.
Gas was also cheaper than electricity, making it more economical in the long run.
The convenience of the gas water heater had her considering whether to install one on her raft. However, since the raft lacked gas and electricity, and she wasn’t skilled enough to install one herself, it remained just an idea.
Even if she could manage it, she wouldn’t dare use an electric drill to make holes directly into the wooden walls of the raft house. Ultimately, this led her to decide on stockpiling warm water instead.
For dinner, she cooked a simple bowl of vegetable noodles and paired it with a box of braised food—five-spice shredded chicken.
While waiting for the water to be filled and stored, she decided to use the two chances she had for the prize wheel.
Her luck was average—she won two fifth-place prizes: one blue and one red.
The blue fifth-place prize was a “wooden tub for the shower room,” and the red fifth-place prize was two 50-pound bags of rice.
The rice was vacuum-sealed in a packaging style similar to what’s commonly available in the market, except the bags were unbranded, just plain nylon composite film bags.
After claiming the wooden tub, the prize wheel displayed [Placed] next to it, but the tub didn’t appear in her home. Realizing what it meant, Shu Fu closed the living room balcony curtains, put away the sofa and coffee table, and brought out the raft.
Sure enough, in the shower area of the raft’s wooden house, a half-human-height circular wooden tub had appeared, fixed against one side of the wall opposite the showerhead.
Above the tub, on the wall, there was now a wooden faucet, presumably for filling the tub directly with water for bathing.
However, since only cold water was available, she wasn’t about to waste her stored hot water on a bath. Thus, for now, the wooden tub wasn’t particularly useful.
Through these prize draws, she had come to understand the categories of rewards: red prizes seemed to be food and supplies, blue prizes were physical additions to the raft house, and green prizes (based on her guess) were energy-related items usable on the raft.
Among these, red and green prizes were very practical, while blue ones were less so—she could arrange furniture herself.
Her raft house currently housed a wooden coffee table, a single-seater sofa, a few aluminum storage racks, and boxes of organized clothes, shoes, bedding, and other daily necessities.
She wondered what the gold-tier prizes she had never won would be like.
Tuesday, Moderate Rain
Shu Fu didn’t go to work again. In the morning, she braved the rain to move her car as part of a task and, while doing so, found a tabby cat hiding under her car to escape the rain.
The cat had an owner who lived on the fourth floor of her building, in the unit near the stairwell.
The tabby was originally a stray. She remembered the family’s teenage son—around sixteen or seventeen—had picked it up as an abandoned kitten when she first moved in.
The building’s poor soundproofing meant she often heard the boy playing with the cat when she passed the fourth floor. Recently, however, the cat had started roaming outside more frequently.
Tabbies are a naturally wild breed. She guessed that the cat was growing up, becoming curious about the outside world, and the open stairways of the building were particularly inviting for climbing.
The tabby, drenched from head to toe, looked at her with wide, naive eyes. Its unique blue eyes, rare for its breed, complemented its beautiful fur, which was tinged with brown and streaked with silver.
Though she had heard the cat meow before, this was her first time getting a good look at it—about three or four months old and very cute.
Perhaps it was sick because it didn’t run away but weakly took two steps toward her.
From beneath her raincoat, Shu Fu extended her hands, holding out a thick, soft towel. She wrapped the tabby cat up snugly.
The tabby meowed as though it wanted to struggle.
“Don’t move,” Shu Fu said, tightening the towel. “I’ll take you home.”
Maybe the towel’s dry, soft texture comforted it because the cat stopped struggling and nestled quietly, meowing softly twice.
When she arrived at its home, the family inside was arguing—over the missing cat. The boy insisted on searching for it before heading to school, while his mother, annoyed, argued that his studies were more important.
The boy accused his mother of not wanting the cat and wishing it would run away, to which she angrily denied it, insisting she would look for it herself.
When Shu Fu knocked, the boy’s father answered the door. She had seen him a couple of times before—a quiet, unassuming man.
He frowned slightly when he saw the tabby wrapped in her towel. The boy, however, was overjoyed, exclaiming, “Little Buddy!” as he rushed over to take the cat from her hands, thanking her profusely.
His sudden movements startled the tabby, which wriggled slightly and let out two more meows.
“Thanks,” the boy’s mother said, walking over, though her expression didn’t show much gratitude.
Shu Fu didn’t mind; she hadn’t helped for thanks. She always acted according to her conscience, without expectation.
As she climbed the stairs back to her apartment, she heard the mother scolding the boy for being late and urging him to focus on his exams.
The boy, half-listening, noticed the tabby seemed ill and insisted on taking it to the vet, sparking another argument. Amidst this, the tabby’s anxious meowing continued…
Completing this simple task earned her a 5% progress increase and one spin on the prize wheel.
[Congratulations! You’ve won Fourth Prize: Front Door Canopy]
[Would you like to claim your prize? Yes/No]
This time, it was a blue-tier prize, slightly better than the “wooden tub for the shower room” she had won previously.
Shu Fu deployed the wooden raft, and at the top of the front door of the wooden house, a rectangular wooden canopy extended outward. The canopy was level with the house, extending about half a meter outward, with two natural wooden square posts at the outer corners on either side. Between these posts and the house were waist-high wooden railings.
Previously, the area above the wooden raft outside the house was empty, making it precarious to stand there without risking falling into the water. Now, with the addition of the canopy and railing, she could stand safely at the door without worrying about the raft’s movements causing her to fall.
This blue-tier prize seemed quite practical—while she could arrange furniture herself, these fixed structural additions were beyond her capability to implement on her own.
In the afternoon, when the rain eased up, Shu Fu gathered her documents and drove to a nearby bank. She left 5,000 yuan in her account for emergencies and withdrew the remaining cash. The 5,000 yuan, combined with her available credit on various online platforms, would cover her online shopping needs for the foreseeable future.
During the transition period between the city’s disaster phase and full evacuation, having cash on hand would be essential in case of internet disruptions. Later, when the city was fully submerged and abandoned, leaving it a silent water city, money—whether in the bank or in hand—would become meaningless.
The thought of a deserted, quiet water city and her solitary existence within it made Shu Fu sigh. She could already sense the inevitable loneliness ahead.
For the next two days, a mix of moderate and light rain persisted. Shu Fu stayed indoors, ordering delivery daily—Sichuan cuisine, sushi, milk tea, desserts, bread, fresh produce, fish, meat, dairy, carbonated drinks, snacks, and household essentials.
By Thursday afternoon, the moderate rain had turned into a torrential downpour. The sky darkened ominously, and the rain came down as if the heavens had sprung a leak—dense, urgent, and relentless.
As evening approached, the citizens of Suicheng received a uniform lightning and thunderstorm disaster warning on their phones. With the painful lessons of the last storm still fresh, public transportation, including subways, buses, and taxis, came to an immediate halt.
It was rush hour, and those still at work or school had no choice but to remain indoors. The few people outside hurried into the nearest sturdy buildings to seek shelter. Private vehicles on the roads had their windows tightly shut and moved at a crawl, while some drivers pulled over to wait nervously for the storm to pass.
The first bolt of lightning streaked across the sky as Shu Fu finished securing all the windows and doors in her home. She entered the floating island house, deploying the wooden raft in her living room for safety.
Though her home hadn’t sustained damage during the last thunderstorm, Shu Fu preferred to take no chances. Her floating wooden house provided a guaranteed five hours of safety daily, so she made full use of it.
She turned off the main power switch in her house, plunging it into darkness. With the curtains between the living room and the small balcony left open, no light could escape to the outside even if there were lights on inside—it was too dark for anyone to see through.
Inside the wooden house, a rechargeable energy-saving lamp on the wooden coffee table emitted a warm orange-yellow glow, softly illuminating the space.
From outside the house, even if the lamp was turned to its brightest setting, its light barely seeped through the frosted glass windows, appearing as a faint and indistinct glimmer.
Due to the limited space in the living room, the wooden raft could only be placed lengthwise, with the front door facing the balcony. Once the door was closed, the view from the house’s windows was limited to the walls of the living room.
The dim living room contrasted sharply with the relentless flashes of lightning outside, which illuminated the storm in an erratic, almost eerie rhythm. The booming thunder that followed reverberated through the air, shaking the walls and creating an oppressive atmosphere that left Shu Fu unsettled.
Initially, she thought the storm would pass quickly, just as the last one had. Even if it were more severe, she expected it to last no more than half an hour.
But an hour had passed, and the darkened sky outside continued to flash with blinding bolts of lightning. The storm showed no sign of relenting.