18: In the apocalypse, kindness is a luxury.

The woman collapsed in the snow, her quilt falling open to reveal the thin clothes she wore underneath.

The men clutched the stolen supplies and left quickly, disappearing into the alleyway.

The entire process took less than three minutes.

The woman lay prone in the snow and wailed, her cries sounding exceptionally shrill on the silent street.

Qin Lin's car was parked fifty meters away.

Su Yuran's hand gripped the car door handle tightly, her knuckles turning white.

"They... they stole her things..." her voice trembled. "Qin Lin, can we... can we help her? She still has a child..."

Qin Lin did not move.

He watched the woman crawl through the snow toward the apartment entrance, picking up an empty milk powder tin that had been tossed out and sobbing as she held it.

Then, he shifted gears, preparing to leave.

"Qin Lin!"

Su Yuran grabbed his arm.

"We can't just leave like this! She needs help! We can give her a little food, just a little."

"And then?"

Qin Lin interrupted her.

Su Yuran froze.

"Give her a little food, and then what?"

Qin Lin turned his head and looked into her eyes.

"Those men might come back. If they see us giving her food, they'll target us. Or, if others in this building see that we have food, they'll come asking too. If you give to one, do you give to the second? The third?"

His tone was calm, but every word was ice-cold:

"Our food is only enough for the two of us for a few days now. If we give it away, we'll go hungry. If we go hungry, we won't have strength. Without strength, the next time we encounter danger, it'll be us who dies."

Su Yuran's lips trembled: "But... but she still has a child..."

"I know."

"But this isn't a fairy tale. This is a disaster-stricken Apocalypse. Resources are limited, and everyone is struggling to survive. We can't help everyone."

He pointed at the woman.

"Look closely. She's dressed thinly, yet she can cry outdoors for this long. That means her home still has residual heat; she hasn't reached a dead end yet. People truly at a dead end don't even have the strength to cry."

The car started slowly and drove away from the residential area.

In the rearview mirror, the woman clutched the empty milk powder tin and slowly walked back into the building.

The apartment door closed askew, like a crooked mouth.

Su Yuran kept watching until she could no longer see it.

Then she turned back, tears falling.

"Why is it like this..." she choked out. "It's only been eleven days... only eleven days! And people have already become like this..."

Qin Lin drove in silence.

After a long while, he finally spoke:

"Have you ever seen someone driven mad by hunger?"

Su Yuran shook her head.

"I have," Qin Lin said.

He was talking about the year of the Apocalypse he had experienced in his past life.

"People starved to the extreme can kill for half a biscuit. They can swap children to eat. They can sell everything they have to sell, including dignity, their bodies, and their loved ones."

His voice was very calm, as if stating a fact.

"This is just the beginning. After some time, you will see even more. You will see the world turn into Hell."

Su Yuran covered her face and cried silently.

"What about the government?" She looked up, her eyes red and swollen. "The police? The army? Are they not doing anything?"

Qin Lin sighed.

"They can't keep up," he said. "The whole country is in disaster. Transportation is paralyzed, communication is cut off, and the command System must be affected too."

"Grassroots police and community workers must first ensure their own survival before they have the chance to care for others."

He pointed out the window: "Besides, how do you know they aren't doing anything? Maybe in some places, the police are still maintaining order, and the army is still distributing supplies."

"But a city is too big, and the disaster is global."

"Rescue forces scattered to every corner are like a cup of water poured into a desert—gone in an instant."

The car drove past a police station.

The gates were tightly shut and the windows were intact, but there was no one inside.

The police car at the entrance was half-buried in snow.

"See, there should be someone on duty here," Qin Lin said. "But it's empty now. They might have been reassigned to a more important place, or... they might have evacuated on their own."

Su Yuran stopped talking.

She watched the scenes passing by outside the window:

Empty streets, tightly closed doors and windows, and the occasional pedestrian, all in a hurry, warily eyeing their surroundings.

Order was collapsing.

Civilization was fading.

The most primitive side of human nature was emerging.

"What about us?" she suddenly asked. "Will we... also become like that one day?"

Qin Lin glanced at her.

"No," he said. "Because we will become strong. Strong enough that we don't need to steal from others, and strong enough to protect what we have."

He gripped the dagger at his waist.

"In the Apocalypse, kindness is a luxury. But if we are strong enough, we can afford it."

Su Yuran only half-understood.

But she didn't ask to help the woman again.

The car continued forward, getting closer and closer to the Science and Technology Park.

Along the way, they saw several similar scenes:

Small-scale looting, disputes over a bit of supplies, and the weak being bullied.

Every time, Qin Lin chose to detour or speed through.

From her initial shock, anger, and sadness, Su Yuran gradually became silent.

She was adapting.

Adapting to the rules of this new world.

At noon, the car arrived at the New Energy R&D Center on the other side of the Science and Technology Park.

The buildings here were more modern, with all-glass curtain walls.

But many of the glass panes were shattered, and wind and snow poured in, leaving the office area inside in a mess.

Qin Lin stopped the car and first measured the temperature.

The outdoor thermometer showed: -44°C.

It was about the same as outside the park.

He drove slowly around the R&D center while continuously monitoring the temperature.

First building: -44°C.

Second building: -45°C.

Third building: -44°C.

No obvious abnormality.

Qin Lin was in no hurry.

He parked the car in front of a relatively intact building and decided to go in and take a look.

This time, Su Yuran didn't ask to follow. She knew she couldn't help and might even hold him back.

"Lock the doors," Qin Lin said. "Don't open them for anyone who approaches."

"You... be careful," Su Yuran said.

Qin Lin nodded, took his gear, and got out of the car.

The glass doors of the building were shattered, so he walked straight in.

The lobby was very dark, with only the light from the snow reflecting through the broken windows.

Files and computers were laid out in an orderly fashion.

Qin Lin turned on his flashlight and walked toward the directory sign.

"Photovoltaic Lab... third floor."

He found the safety exit and headed up.

The stairwell was colder than outside.

But Qin Lin noticed that the temperature was fluctuating.

It wasn't constantly decreasing; it was oscillating.

One flight of stairs was -45°C, the next was -43°C, and the one after that was -46°C.

This wasn't normal.

If it were a constant low temperature caused by a fragment, there should be a clear center of low temperature, with the temperature increasing as you moved away from it.

And this fluctuation... Qin Lin stopped and felt it carefully.

Then he understood.

It was the wind.

The building's windows were broken, and the wind blowing in created turbulence in the stairwell.

Wind from different directions brought air of different temperatures, which created fluctuations after mixing.

This meant that the fragment might not be in this building, or its temperature field had been dispersed by the wind.

Qin Lin continued upward and reached the third floor.

The door to the Photovoltaic Lab was open.

It was a mess inside; petri dishes were shattered, and the solutions had frozen into ice.

Qin Lin swept his flashlight over every corner but didn't see any glowing crystals.

He measured the temperature: -45°C, about the same as the stairwell.

It wasn't here.

Qin Lin exited the lab, preparing to go to the next building.

Just then, he heard a faint noise.

It wasn't the sound of the wind.

It was... the sound of metal clashing?

It came from downstairs.

Qin Lin immediately turned off his flashlight, held his breath, and hid at the corner of the stairs.

Footsteps.

Very light, but they were definitely there.

More than one person.