11: Domestic stockpiling (Part 2)

"Wan, a massive theft occurred in Japan! I heard the losses are catastrophic!"

"It seems a granary was robbed! A lot of other things are missing too, but they're trying to keep it quiet and don't dare report it widely. They've even blockaded all transportation lines for the past two days and are conducting strict inspections!"

"The Authorities are overwhelmed, trying to manage earthquake casualties while simultaneously investigating the case in secret! But word is they haven't found a single lead despite all their searching; those things just vanished into thin air!"

Lin Wan couldn't help but beam as she looked at the message from her former university classmate.

If it weren't for the time constraints and the sheer difficulty making it unrealistic, she would have cleared out Japan's armory too!

This girl was her only friend in Japan; she was also Chinese, but she had stayed there to work and settle down after graduation.

Lin Wan typed back a reply,

"Wow, I wonder who could be that capable! Shasha, you need to stay safe over there too. Stock up on more food and water; I heard there might be more natural disasters coming soon."

"Mm. Got it. Don't worry."

After chatting for a while, Lin Wan had a video call with Mo Chi for an hour before drifting off into a sweet slumber. She was going to be busy tomorrow.

...

Lin Ran woke up early today.

Ever since moving into this apartment, she had been uncomfortable everywhere. After all, even though this place was over two hundred square meters, it wasn't nearly as comfortable as the Lin Family Villa.

Furthermore, her previous jewelry and designer bags were all gone. Right now, they were busy raising funds to alleviate the company's urgent crisis. The only things she had left that were presentable were two bags and a set of diamond jewelry her father had bought her when they went abroad that day.

Yet even these few items had almost been taken by her father to be sold!

After much wheedling and pestering, her father finally agreed to let her keep them only after she argued that she had no decent clothes or jewelry to wear when meeting Mo Chi.

The new car she had just switched to a few days ago was gone too! That bitch Lin Wan is truly loathsome! She'd better not let me catch her, otherwise...

Her eldest brother said yesterday that she had already returned to the country, though they didn't know where she was staying for the time being.

No wonder they couldn't find her before; who would have thought she'd run off to Japan! Didn't Japan just have a massive earthquake? Why didn't it crush her to death!

Yesterday, she had gone to Jia Ren to cry and complain, and even endured her own disgust to let him hold her. She coaxed him until he was heartbroken for her and bought her a BMW.

Even though it only cost seven or eight hundred thousand, it would do for now. Speaking of which, ever since she joined the Lin family, she had never experienced such a tight-fisted life.

Jia Ren was the boyfriend Lin Wan had dated when she was about to graduate from university. His family's business was quite large, making him a bona fide second-generation rich kid.

After returning to the country after graduation, Lin Ran saw that he was tall and handsome, and treated Lin Wan with utmost consideration in every way, so she immediately set her sights on him.

She couldn't stand to see Lin Wan happy; she wanted Lin Wan to have no one by her side, to be abandoned by everyone.

With just a few slight schemes, the two were plagued by constant misunderstandings and quarrels. In the end, Jia Ren still fell for her charms.

However, once she had him, she gradually realized that Jia Ren's family was only so-so, just a tiny bit better than the Lin family. Naturally, she wouldn't let him become her actual boyfriend; after all, she had no shortage of suitors who were better than him.

So, she had always just kept him at arm's length, stringing him along. Now, it seemed he had finally come in handy.

After everything that happened, her determination to seduce Mo Chi grew even firmer. These ordinary rich kids were nothing compared to the massive Shen Corporation.

She couldn't go two days ago because of the car situation, but today, she had to succeed. She was unwilling to keep living in this cramped place.

She dressed up meticulously, applied exquisite makeup, put on the Chanel-style suit she bought abroad, stepped into thin high heels, wore her sparkling diamond necklace, and drove the BMW Jia Ren had just bought her to Jinghua No. 1.

Upon reaching the top floor, she checked her makeup once more, sprayed a bit of perfume, and then began to knock on the door.

However, when the door opened, her sweet and shy smile instantly froze on her face.

A middle-aged man with a large potbelly had opened the door.

When he saw the fresh and youthful girl, his impatient expression instantly transformed into blatant lechery.

After sizing her up from head to toe, he said with a smile,

"Who sent you over? Not bad at all. Come in."

Lin Ran felt a surge of nausea. She took a few steps back irritably to distance herself from him and asked disdainfully,

"Who are you? Isn't this Mo Chi's home?"

So she wasn't looking for him.

Sun Weimin's smile faded slightly.

"Oh, I'm the one living in this apartment now. Mo Chi sold it."

!

Lin Ran was shocked.

Is selling houses a trend now? With such a great location, everyone is just selling them off one by one!...

More importantly, as far as she knew, this was the apartment where Mo Chi stayed most consistently and liked the most.

"Then do you know where he's living now?"

Sun Weimin stared at her straight, smooth legs, his heart stirring with desire.

He put on a kind smile,

"Mo Chi has many properties, so I don't know off the top of my head. But it's not hard to find out. I'll have to ask around. Why don't you come in and sit for a bit? I'll find out in three to five minutes."

Lin Ran hesitated.

This man clearly looked like a creep.

However, anyone who could live here was naturally either rich or noble. Besides, it was broad daylight, so he probably wouldn't dare do anything to her. Right now, finding Mo Chi's residence was the priority.

Thinking of the pepper spray in her bag, she nodded arrogantly and walked inside.

Sun Weimin closed the door, his eyes full of a successful, predatory smile.

"What's your name, miss?"

"My name is Lin Ran."

"Mm, sit for a moment then. I'll go call my friend and ask."

Then, he took a bottle of water from the cabinet right in front of her.

"Xiao Ran, have some water first. Mo Chi's whereabouts are a bit hard to track, but it's no trouble for me. Give me a few minutes."

Lin Ran saw that he was relatively polite, and seeing that every piece of furniture in this apartment was worth a fortune—even the floor mats cost tens of thousands—she gradually lowered her guard.

She always maintained the image of a refined young lady in public, so she nodded with a smile,

"Thank you, I'll have to trouble you then."

Seeing Sun Weimin go inside and hearing the sound of him making a phone call, Lin Ran felt even more that he probably wasn't a bad person.

Seeing the unopened water on the table, she picked it up, twisted it open, and took two sips.

Five minutes later, she suddenly felt dizzy, and her consciousness began to scatter.

Vaguely, she saw Sun Weimin approaching her with a lewd smile.

She wanted to run, she wanted to scream, but her eyelids grew heavier and heavier...

Her body felt weightless as he carried her into the inner room...

...

Lin Wan set out early in the morning.

Passing through a street of breakfast shops, she first went to stockpile a wave of breakfast food.

"Boss, a hundred baskets of various flavored soup dumplings, five hundred servings of tofu pudding and wontons."

"Boss, a hundred servings each of various porridges. Two hundred each of wraps, meat-stuffed pancakes, vegetable-stuffed pancakes, chicken cutlet pancakes, and ham and egg pancakes!"

...

"No rush, I'll come pick them up around ten o'clock. This is an extra mid-morning meal for the workers."

Lin Wan picked five or six larger breakfast shops and ordered everything she liked to eat.

Then she drove her truck to the wholesale market.

This area was lined with shops side-by-side, carrying every category of goods; it was the largest wholesale market in the city.

They started getting busy as early as four or five in the morning, and with the bustling crowds, buying any amount was considered normal here.

The first stop was the grain and oil market.

She stockpiled various types of rice, millet, white flour, potatoes, and sweet potatoes by the ton.

Soybean oil, peanut oil, rapeseed oil, olive oil, sesame oil, and other cooking oils.

Soybeans, black beans, red beans, purple rice, mung beans, barley, oats, corn, and all sorts of miscellaneous grains.

She wanted a lot, so she arranged with the merchants to pick them up this afternoon or tomorrow.

Immediately after, she went to the seafood and meat wholesale market.

All kinds of seafood, various fish and shrimp, as well as shellfish and seaweed; she got a bit of everything available.

Fresh pork, pig trotters, chicken, chicken feet, drumsticks, wings, fish, beef, duck, mutton, and so on—she took as much as they had.

Fruit and vegetable wholesale market.

Apples, bananas, durian, cherries, sour cherries, mangosteen, grapes, strawberries, cantaloupe, watermelon, oranges, blueberries, longans, etc... five hundred boxes of each.

Tomatoes, eggplants, kelp, green onions, garlic, ginger, green beans, lettuce, baby bok choy, Chinese cabbage, pumpkin, broccoli, cauliflower, chives, cucumbers... and all sorts of mushrooms.

Seed and sapling wholesale market.

Seeds for vegetables, fruits, mushrooms, grains, miscellaneous grains, beans... and so on.

Saplings for pears, cherries, pomegranates, winter dates, honey peaches, peaches, apricots, oranges, and various other trees.

Finally, she went to the agricultural byproduct market.

Honey, goji berries, various flavors of tea, and flower teas.

Tofu, dried tofu, tofu skin, bean sprouts, and various other soy products.

Chili peppers, Sichuan peppercorns, spices, cinnamon, bay leaves, star anise, salt, vinegar, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, and other seasonings.

Also brown sugar, white sugar, and rock sugar.

Chicken eggs, goose eggs, duck eggs, and quail eggs.

Milk and yogurt.

Various flavors of canned goods.

Bread, self-heating hot pots, cup noodles, river snail rice noodles, boneless chicken feet, potato noodles, rice noodles, vermicelli, grilled sausages, hot and sour rice noodles, hot pot base...

She stockpiled enough for two people for a hundred years.

Daily necessities market.

Towels, face towels, toilet paper, sanitary pads, laundry detergent, soap, pots and pans, disposable kitchenware, various stoves, egg incubators, egg steamers... and so on.

Anyway, her money plus Mo Chi's was inexhaustible; as long as she could think of it now, she bought it all.

On the way back with the first batch of stock, she stored it all into her space. She also stopped to pick up the breakfast she had ordered in the morning; the timing was perfect, everything was fresh from the pot and piping hot.

She continued busily like this for over a week before she finally finished hauling all the items she wanted and placed them all in her space.

At this point, there were less than twenty days left until the Apocalypse.

Mo Chi would make time to return to the Mountaintop Villa every day, sometimes staying for an hour, sometimes for only ten minutes.

Lin Wan could feel his exhaustion and busyness, but every time she asked, he always said he would handle it and told her to just focus on stockpiling in peace.

Now that the stockpiling had temporarily come to a close, Lin Wan planned to go to the Shen Corporation to find him today.

To her surprise, just as she reached the road opposite the Shen Corporation and took out her phone to call Mo Chi, a black commercial van with tinted windows stopped in front of her, and she was quickly abducted into the vehicle.

Lin Wan didn't even have time to react.

The car sped off like an arrow from a bow, and her phone was immediately snatched away.

Lin Wan forced herself to calm down. She saw two men who looked similar sitting to her left and right.

This is...

"Shen Moxuan? Shen Moling?"

The man on the left sneered, his voice cold,

"Smart, but you've got it wrong. My eldest brother is already thirty-five; I'm not that old. The one driving in front is my eldest brother. I'm Shen Moling, and the one to your right is our third brother, Shen Mojiang."