The Apocalypse Took Everything, This Time I Hoard It All First
Chapter 2: Space

Chapter 2: Chapter 2: Space

Luna Dawson inspected every inch of the small courtyard, then strolled along the bank of the quietly flowing river inside her space, trying to reach the edge of the dense fog.

The distance was too great; she walked for what felt like ages but couldn’t reach it. With a mere thought, she tried teleporting and instantly appeared before the fog. A jolt of excitement shot through her. ’How convenient!’

She reached out to touch the white mist, but it felt as though a transparent barrier was blocking her way. She could vaguely make out the river flowing into the distance behind the fog, but the view was indistinct.

A million thoughts raced through her mind. ’Can this space be expanded?’

’Is this current area...’

’...just a drop in the ocean of this world?’

’Does it expand by consuming gold or jade? Or by doing good deeds? Or maybe by absorbing Crystal Cores?’

The next moment, Luna Dawson was back on her sofa.

She tried placing her hand on the safe. With a single thought, the gold and jadeite bracelets inside were instantly pulled into her space.

Luna Dawson was ecstatic. She could actually retrieve items from a distance!

Next, she pulled everything from the living room—including Rollo and Little Tiger—into the space.

The moment their eight little paws touched the grass, the cat and dog jumped in surprise. The cat’s pupils narrowed into thin slits. Full of curiosity, the two of them looked left and right, sniffing everywhere to get familiar with their new surroundings.

Before long, the two little critters were running toward the Spiritual Spring, whining and whimpering beside it.

Luna Dawson got the hint. She scooped some spirit spring water into a basin and set it on the grass. The two little ones lapped it up eagerly, not stopping until they had licked the basin clean.

Seeing how drawn the animals were to the water only strengthened Luna Dawson’s suspicions.

After quenching his thirst, Rollo leisurely patrolled his new territory in the courtyard. He lifted a leg to mark a spot under the withered tree, then began tearing around wildly, having the time of his life.

Little Tiger, meanwhile, sauntered over with his tail held high and began rubbing against Luna Dawson’s leg, trying every trick in the book to get her affection.

Luna Dawson eagerly retrieved the bag of gold and jade bracelets. Her brows furrowed. ’Well, so much for that. The space didn’t absorb them...’

Slightly disappointed, she picked up Little Tiger. Cradling him in her arms and stroking him gently, she walked into the courtyard and lay down on the rattan chair under the withered tree.

’It’s fine. I’ll just have to try doing some good deeds when I get the chance and see if that accumulates any merit,’ she muttered to herself, kneading the cat’s chubby belly. "Little Tiger, from now on, you can call me Dawson the Great Philanthropist."

The light inside the space was soft and the temperature was pleasant. She had specifically measured it with a thermometer, a hygrometer, and a timer.

The temperature was a constant 25°C, and the relative humidity held steady at sixty percent. The flow of time here was also different from the outside world—at a ratio of about five to one.

Five hours inside the space was equivalent to only one hour in the outside world!

There were still over three months until the apocalypse on December 12.

In her past life, at the stroke of midnight on December 12, an unprecedented Geminid meteor shower had rained down on Blue Star. The virus carried by that meteor shower was what triggered Year Zero of Earth’s great mutation.

’Now that I’ve been reborn, what’s the next step? It’s a no-brainer—rally the whole family and hoard supplies!’

Luna Dawson exited the space and surveyed the home she had lived in for just a year. She had chosen this house specifically because it was large, with two floors and six rooms.

The first floor served as her studio and the second was her living quarters. It also had a terrace, which was perfect for the pets to run around on, and there was plenty of room for her mother and brother whenever they came to visit.

Luna Dawson had gotten into social media during her sophomore year of college. Seeing many of her classmates shooting short videos, she decided to give it a try for fun and kept posting.

Over time, she accumulated a decent following, occasionally accepting sponsorships and hosting a weekly livestream to sell products.

To date, she had amassed over two million followers, making her a minor, but locally famous, influencer.

The master bedroom on the first floor served as her streaming studio.

The spare bedroom was lined with shelves displaying various snack samples sent by her sponsors, along with all sorts of dog food, cat food, wet food, and cat litter.

In her previous life, it was this stockpile at home that had allowed Luna Dawson to survive for a long time, but it had also caused her to miss the crucial early window for collecting Crystal Cores.

Luna Dawson decided that as soon as it was light, she would find a real estate agent to list the house, determined to liquidate her assets and hoard more supplies.

She stored everything portable from the house into her space, then teleported in herself. She took out her laptop and, while her mind was still fresh from her rebirth, created an encrypted folder.

She began to plan the supplies her family would need, categorizing items and listing quantities. Her fingers flew across the keyboard for over three hours before she finally stopped.

She couldn’t help but mumble, "There’s so much to buy... The money I’ve earned over the past few years won’t be nearly enough..."

She looked at the balance on her banking app—several hundred thousand—and couldn’t help but sigh.

After getting all her thoughts in order, Luna Dawson’s mind and body finally began to relax.

She looked out at the grassy field, now cluttered with all her belongings from home, and a profound sense of security washed over her.

She glanced at her phone. 6:30 a.m.

’Mom should be up and having breakfast by now.’

The mere thought of breakfast made Luna Dawson’s mouth water uncontrollably. She swallowed hard, an instinctive, sour tang rising on her tongue.

Physiologically, this body wasn’t hungry. But two years of starvation and constant fear sent her scrambling for the refrigerator.

From the fridge, she pulled out a large container of peeled durian, a can of ice-cold beer, and last night’s leftovers: spicy stir-fried crawfish and sour and spicy boneless chicken feet.

Sitting at the dining table, her fingertips tingled and her knuckles turned white from gripping her chopsticks so tightly. She was filled with a desperate eagerness.

In the apocalypse, she had been lucky to find anything clean to eat, often reduced to gnawing on raw, mutated snake meat. And now, spread before her were all of her favorite foods!

PSSSH! With the pull of a tab, she cracked open the beer. One gulp of the icy liquid and she felt completely revitalized.

A sudden thought struck her. The refrigerator had been without power for a while, yet the beer was still ice-cold. ’Can the space preserve things?’

She quickly exited the space, filled a cup with hot water from the dispenser, and took it back into the space to run an experiment.

After setting the cup down, she returned to the table to continue her feast. Her mind had been starved for so long, but her stomach’s capacity was still that of her pre-apocalypse self. She ate too much, too fast, and soon her stomach was so bloated she felt nauseous.

After struggling for a dozen or so minutes, she couldn’t hold it back any longer and ran to the bathroom to throw up.

The burning sensation of stomach acid in her esophagus was sheer torture.

She rinsed her mouth and drank a cup of spirit spring water, which brought immediate relief. She kept reminding herself that from now on, she had to be careful, careful, and even more careful when she ate.

...

The sun rises early in summer, and the sky was already bright. She took out her phone and dialed her mother’s number.

BEEP... BEEP... BEEP...

"Luna? What’s wrong? Why are you up so early?" Rosalind Dawson’s gentle voice came through the phone.

Hearing her mother’s voice, Luna Dawson felt a lump form in her throat. There were a million things she wanted to say, but not a single word would come out.

"I... Mom..." Sobs and choked gasps were all that followed. "Waaaah... sniff... waaah..."

During the two years of the apocalypse, she had struggled to travel from Southen back to her hometown. She had searched the route, a journey of less than a hundred kilometers, back and forth several times.

No matter how hard she tried, she could never find her family, never knowing if they were dead or alive.

The overwhelming sense of loss and longing could no longer be contained. Her nose stung, and tears streamed from her eyes as she broke down, letting out all her pent-up grief in a torrent of sobs.

How could Rosalind Dawson possibly know what her precious daughter had been through? Hearing her sobs, she was utterly horrified.

She quickly asked, "What’s wrong? Did one of those haters attack you again? Just let them run their mouths, Luna, don’t even read it. Don’t take it to heart, okay? There, there... it’s okay..."

Her mother assumed she’d had a bad livestream, was under pressure from a sponsor, or was being savaged by haters online. Luna Dawson cried for a little longer before gradually getting her emotions under control.

"Don’t be sad. Stop crying, sweetie. Your eyes won’t be pretty if they get all swollen. Why don’t you come home? You’ve been busy for a month; you deserve a rest. Come home, and Mom will make you all your favorite foods," her mother coaxed.

Luna Dawson cried for another moment, then composed herself and said, "Okay... Mom... I’m driving home right now. I can be there by noon. You and Miles wait for me..."