Apocalypse Star House Hoarding-Chapter 104

Like Yu Xi, Lin Wu could maintain his composure and enjoy a moment of peace in private, no matter how dire the mission world’s conditions were. However, there was one difference: since his journeys through apocalyptic worlds began, his view of food had been purely practical, focused on convenience and filling his stomach. But now, he was entering a whole new realm.
He set out an impressive assortment of condiments: seafood sauce, sesame oil, vinegar, pepper oil, sesame paste, beef sauce, satay sauce, mushroom sauce, and even jars of minced garlic, chopped scallions, cilantro, and celery.
“Sometimes, it’s easier to just boil everything and dip it in sauce,” Lin Wu explained.
Yu Xi glanced at the over twenty jars neatly arranged before her, feeling a bit one-upped. Not wanting to be outdone, she continued taking out ingredients.
With ample time, she chose supplies she’d bought along with a few truckloads of goods in a parking lot in the mountains. Since coming to this world, she had collected party supplies, store-bought items, and five truckloads of provisions. One truck was filled with various supermarket items, mostly fresh ingredients that required preparation.
Both of them worked efficiently: one washed and sliced the vegetables while the other sautéed a spicy base with scallions, ginger, garlic, and lard, then brought it to a boil with water. Yu Xi placed the pot on the island cooktop, arranging ten or so plates of hotpot ingredients on both sides.
Knowing Lin Wu liked marbled beef, she prepared two large plates of it. In addition to essentials like tripe, duck blood, and a variety of seafood such as abalone, clams, tiger prawns, and sole fish, she was ready for a hearty hotpot meal.
In this rare moment of tranquility, Lin Wu sat across the bar, watching Yu Xi through the rising steam. He couldn’t help but feel curious about her. In previous missions, she had shown her real face, just as he had, since neither of them had an identity in those worlds. This time, however, they both had identities in this world. He was assigned someone else’s appearance, yet she still looked like herself.
He pondered further. Lin Wu had inherited Feng Xu’s memories, and in this world’s history, “Yu Xi” had purchased the villa next door a few years ago, but the “Yu Xi” from back then clearly wasn’t the same Yu Xi sitting before him now.
Recalling in more detail, he could even roughly pinpoint when the original “Yu Xi” had been replaced. It seemed to align with the time she began remodeling her villa with acid-resistant materials—preparing for the apocalypse with knowledge only someone like her would have.
A strange hypothesis crossed his mind. Was it possible that, in the two previous worlds where they’d met, she had also been assigned a specific identity? Though she appeared in different stages of life, her face was always the same.
If so, it was as though these worlds were tailored to give her a preset identity.
This led him to more questions: Who exactly was Yu Xi?
Was she truly a fellow Outer Tower mission player like him? Or was she a higher-tier mission player from some undisclosed inner region of the Tower?
Once this thought took hold, other details started to fall into place. She possessed various tools he had never seen or heard of before. One or two unusual items were one thing, but with so many different types, it became hard to ignore. Perfumes, masks, a hair dryer, foundation—all disguised as beauty products yet incredibly effective.
Unlike him, she never seemed to use common cards or tools, as though she belonged to an entirely different system.
Smiling at his own wild theories, Lin Wu shook his head, feeling guilty. Yu Xi had never tried to hide anything from him, and here he was, needlessly speculating. Maybe she really was an Inner Tower player or even someone higher up, but it didn’t matter. He knew who Yu Xi was, and that was enough.
His gaze lingered on her face, feeling secretly grateful to see her for a third time. Yet he suppressed the emotion, not wanting her to notice.
They were all essentially the walking dead, each potentially from a completely different world. With only limited time between missions, constantly being thrust into new tasks, indulging in emotions seemed pointless and irrational. In the System Tower, lust was cheap, but true affection and love were the rarest luxuries. Those who dared to trust and wholeheartedly love someone had already vanished completely—deception was the norm, and those who kept their emotions in check survived the longest.
“What’s on your mind?” Yu Xi noticed Lin Wu’s gaze. “Is there something you want to add to the mission plan? Feel free to speak up. I may be the team leader in name, but your input is crucial.”
Lin Wu composed himself and replied, “The plan itself is solid, but I have one request.”
“Go on.”
Lin Wu set down his chopsticks and said seriously, “I want you to stay in the villa area and not join in on this mission.”
…
Yu Xi pulled aside the metal shutter, revealing that the acid rain had started again—another black acid rain, without even needing a test to confirm it. Everything in the villa district, except for the buildings encased in nano-ceramic alloy, had already been corroded away.
Lin Wu, leading a team from the community, took an acid-resistant armored vehicle to the industrial zone where the lab was located. According to the two mutated survivors, after Cheng Yuan released the other captive test subjects, a brutal confrontation erupted between the experimenters and the lab personnel. Security forces from the upper levels, well-armed and experienced in combat, joined to protect the researchers.
The weakened test subjects suffered heavy losses in the clash. In the end, Cheng Yuan and a few others opened the sealed ventilation doors, allowing outdoor acidic and toxic gases to flood in. The researchers and security personnel, unprepared with protective equipment, were quickly overwhelmed.
The tide turned, and the researchers retaliated viciously, decimating the test subjects. Though the subjects eventually emerged victorious, it was a pyrrhic victory, with only a handful of survivors remaining.
Before Lin Wu left, Yu Xi drew a rough floor plan of the lab for him, based on the descriptions from the two survivors. She understood Lin Wu’s reasoning: her safety was paramount to both of their lives, making it safer for her to stay at the villa. Besides, someone needed to hold down the fort in case more intruders arrived during their brief absence.
Fortunately, these precautions proved unnecessary. The lab wasn’t far from the villa area, and with the armored vehicle, the mission went smoothly. Lin Wu not only returned with the drug and research data but also a batch of stored food and water—just in time to relieve the villa community’s pressing needs. Both the original residents and refugees received an equal share of these resources.
During his absence, Yu Xi gathered information from radio broadcasts and conversations with refugees, gradually pinpointing the locations of the city’s official shelters.
They decided to deliver a few vials of the drug and all of the research data to several large, established official shelters. Yu Xi and Lin Wu personally drove to multiple shelters, transporting the injured refugees along with the supplies. At each stop, they left the research data and some of the wounded.
Though these shelters also suffered from shortages, their medical systems were still operational, and the injured would fare better there than in the villa. Additionally, by bringing the drug research along, they hoped the shelters might offer some added care to these wounded individuals.
Naturally, the families of the injured who remained unhurt stayed at the shelters as well. Although the accommodations weren’t as comfortable as the villas, the underground location offered sealed doors and air-filtration systems, allowing residents to live more freely without constantly wearing protective gear.
Afterward, Yu Xi and Lin Wu returned to the villa area to continue their cautious survival.
About half a month later, the temperature began to rise, climbing from an already sweltering 30 degrees to nearly 40.