24: The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind

“View skill description.”

“[SSS-grade Skill Ice Seal Thousands of Miles: You will possess the supreme power of the Ice Emperor, capable of freezing everything in the world!]”

After reading the skill details, Chen Ming lightly touched an empty soda can placed in front of him with his fingertip.

The soda can was frozen into a block of ice almost in the blink of an eye.

Not only that, through experimentation, Chen Ming also discovered that he could freely determine the hardness of these ice blocks.

He could make them as hard as iron, or as fragile as foam, shattering upon contact!

“If I use this move on zombies, wouldn’t I be able to slaughter millions, tens of millions of zombies in an instant?”

Chen Ming found it hard not to suspect that if the apocalypse were likened to a game...

Then, for others, the difficulty of this game would be extremely hard.

But for him, the difficulty was set by default to: Very Easy!

It was as if the game developer was afraid he would die, providing meticulous care.

“Ice Seal Thousands of Miles, huh?” Chen Ming said jokingly, “Ten thousand miles is ‘wan’ (ten thousand), one hundred thousand miles is also ‘wan’, one million miles, ten million miles, one hundred million miles, they are all ‘wan’!”

Combining it with SSS-level, Chen Ming felt that he might be able to freeze the entire globe?

He wasn't so suicidal as to do something like that; it was mainly pointless.

“[Fishing in progress...]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining Mixue Lemonade + 10!]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining Solar Panel + 10! Compressed Storage Battery + 10!]”

“Solar panels! These are good things! And they come with compressed batteries for power storage? Quite thoughtful.”

Although the renovation project by the security company also included these, Chen Ming welcomed any additional ways to store electricity.

Without electricity, many things couldn't be used, and a lot of fun would be lost.

“[Fishing in progress...]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining a 3500G single-player game installation package!]”

Just like that, a way to relieve boredom in the apocalypse was delivered right to his doorstep.

A 3500G game, Chen Ming was very curious how many years it would take him to complete it.

“[Fishing in progress...]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining a fully automatic washing machine + 1!]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining a box of Osmanthus Cake!]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining a roll of mosquito-proof screen window!]”

“[Fishing successful! Congratulations to the host for obtaining a nail clipper + 1!]”

...After half an hour of effort, still no sign of a skill, Chen Ming simply gave up.

He glanced at the time in the upper left corner of his phone.

The timing was about right; most people would be asleep by now.

Chen Ming opened the satellite map function, and after some searching, he identified several target warehouses that he could tackle, with potentially significant gains.

He picked up his skateboard, stepped onto it, and entered a completely invisible state.

Until he had thoroughly mastered his balance, Chen Ming intended to use the skateboard instead of sword-riding, prioritizing safety.

Still not using the main entrance, he flew out from the balcony.

Following the best route updated in real-time by satellite, he headed to the Nantian Storage Warehouse located in the south of the city.

This warehouse was primarily responsible for supplying goods to various supermarkets and individual stores.

What would originally be a ten-minute journey, Chen Ming reduced by nine-tenths.

Upon arriving at the Nantian Storage Warehouse, Chen Ming could see many people driving cars, blocking the main entrance.

As he got closer, the conversations became clearer.

“General Manager Meng, for you to do this at a time like this, isn’t it a bit too underhanded!”

“That’s right! Give us some goods, everyone gets rich together, and we can cooperate more in the future, wouldn’t that be better?”

“General Manager Meng, we’ve cooperated for almost eight years, can’t you even give your brother this much face?”

Facing everyone's heartfelt pleas, the warehouse owner, Meng Liang, responded, “Oh, there really are no goods. We’ve known each other for so long, would I lie to you?”

“To prevent Rob and malicious hoarding, the higher-ups already moved the goods, preparing for centralized distribution to avoid market disruption,” Meng Liang explained earnestly.

If Chen Ming hadn't entered the warehouse through a ventilation window and seen the shelves piled high with various goods, he would have probably believed his nonsense.

Clearly, Meng Liang also wanted to seize this opportunity to hoard a wave of goods, then gradually release them after prices skyrocketed several, dozens, or even hundreds of times, directly becoming a multi-billionaire!

Unfortunately, he ran into Chen Ming.

After the last employee turned off the lights and left the warehouse.

Chen Ming began his grand sweep.

Food, daily necessities, Simmons mattresses, paint, tools... goods worth several hundred million were cleared by Chen Ming in just a few minutes, a quick and decisive operation.

Rumble!

Hearing the sound of the door opening, Chen Ming was not flustered at all.

“Those idiots actually believed it. How could I forgo the fortune at hand to talk about so-called brotherhood with them?”

Meng Liang’s voice entered his ears.

Tonight, he planned to carefully inventory the remaining goods and formulate a plan for selling them in batches to test the waters.

However, when he pressed the switch and the overhead lights turned on one by one, Meng Liang was dumbfounded.

The vast warehouse now contained only empty shelves.

“What’s going on? Where are the goods? Where are my goods!” Meng Liang stretched out his hands, grabbed the collar of the worker next to him, bristling with anger and questioning fiercely.

“I, I don’t know,” the worker said, looking bewildered.

“Surveillance, quick! Go check the surveillance footage! Oh, and we need to call the police! Damn it, they’re even stealing from me!”

Meng Liang was practically grinding his teeth, clenching his fists, vowing that once he caught the culprit, he would make him pay a heavy price.

“General Manager Meng, I’m afraid that won’t work,” the worker said suddenly as he was about to leave, looking up.

“Why not? Was it you who stole my money after all!” Meng Liang reached out, trying to grab the worker again.

This time, however, the worker was quick and dodged him.

“General Manager Meng, that’s not what I mean. You should really look at those surveillance cameras yourself,” the worker said, pointing.

Meng Liang looked up suspiciously.

He saw that every surveillance camera was covered with a towel.

Chen Ming had anticipated this; even if he could be completely invisible and undetected.

The scene of goods being taken into the infinite storage space would definitely be recorded by the monitors.

Therefore, Chen Ming had prepared a countermeasure in advance.

Meng Liang, not believing it, personally went to the monitoring room.

Then, he was dumbfounded again.

The last footage captured by the monitors showed that in the mere few minutes between their arrival, goods worth hundreds of millions had vanished without a trace, as if evaporated into thin air.

“How, how could this happen?” Meng Liang slumped to the ground, his face filled with despair.

Based on what he had seen and known, he couldn't offer a reasonable explanation for this.

Although he had weathered many storms, such a bizarre incident was a first for him.

Meng Liang knew very well that even calling the police wouldn't do much good.

Because they simply wouldn't know who did it.

To move goods worth hundreds of millions in just a few minutes, without anyone noticing, was this truly something a human could do?

Chen Ming didn't care how confused he was; he seized the time and headed to the next warehouse for harvesting.