Rebirth: Leading Families to Survive in the Apocalypse novel Chapter 9

Chapter 9: An Unnatural Phenomenon

Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Over the next few days at the exhibition, Su Jin frequently snuck off to the other halls to look for supplies she could hoard.

After getting off from work on the third day, she pulled Assistant Zhang away, saying that she wanted to treat him to a meal. In actual fact, she led him to an empty warehouse in the outskirts. She had contacted the person in charge of the warehouse in advance and rented the warehouse at the last minute for a month, paying three times the usual price. She only asked for a month just in case, because she was planning to put away everything she was getting delivered here within five days.

Assistant Zhang drove to the place Su Jin entered into his navigation system. Once there, he watched as Su Jin paid up, signed the contract, and received the warehouse keys, all the whole feeling completely mystified.

Su Jin saw the utter confusion in his eyes and burst out laughing.

“I’ll tell you why later. Come on, dinner’s on me.”

That finally snapped Assistant Zhang back to his senses. Su Jin said she was buying dinner, but he was the one who chose the venue. After all, he knew the area better and could determine which stores were tastier.

Eventually, they settled on a local cuisine restaurant closer to Su Jin’s hotel. The place was relatively quiet too, without too much bustle.

Assistant Zhang’s full name was Zhang Chuyang. Over dinner, there were several times when he had to resist the urge to ask what Su Jin rented the warehouse for, but he held his tongue. He was waiting for Su Jin to broach the topic herself.

The roasted goose at the restaurant Assistant Zhang chose was just too delicious. Although the goose skin was thick and fatty, it was not cloying to eat and even tasted faintly of a fruity smoke. When Su Jin bit into it and reached the tender flesh underneath, she could feel her taste buds singing.

The way Assistant Zhang looked so hesitant to talk opposite her made the food taste even better. He looked just about good enough to gobble up.

Once she was about eighty percent full, Su Jin decided to put the man out of his misery. She gave him the story she had thought up in advance.

Su Jin told Assistant Zhang that she was planning to start a supermarket back at H City. Since she was in G Province now, she thought she might as well buy some stock in advance and store them in a warehouse, so she could move them to her supermarket once it opened.

It was a bit of a stretch, but to her surprise, Assistant Zhang seemed to buy it completely.

“I see, I see. So that’s why you’re in such a rush to go back, because you’re opening a supermarket soon. Then your store must be pretty huge, huh? You wouldn’t need such a big warehouse otherwise.”

“It’s not that big, but it is two stories tall. I can display plenty of stuff.” Su Jin was finding it easier to lie through her teeth these days.

“You’re richer than I thought. If I’d known, I would’ve asked you to treat me to a meal at a five-star hotel.” Assistant Zhang acted dismayed.

The two of them teased each other for a little longer, and Su Jin told Assistant Zhang that she would give him the keys to the warehouse before she left so he could return it to the owner on her behalf.

The truth was she knew that no one would care about a measly warehouse key a month later. Before that, she would leave some supplies in the warehouse for Assistant Zhang. Hopefully, he would be able to reach them, and she would be able to repay him for saving her life back then.

After the two of them were done eating, Su Jin secretly noted down the restaurant’s delivery hotline. The food tasted great, so naturally she had to take some away and share them with her family.

Back at the hotel, Su Jin called the bespectacled knife seller again, asking him to send her goods directly to the warehouse on the outskirts. It was in the same city and not that far away, so the bespectacled man repeatedly told her that it was “no problem at all”. What did she think he would say? She was his biggest customer, such a minor request was nothing to him.

Now that she had a warehouse to go back to, Su Jin became even more unrestrained with her buying. She bought a few paddy huskers, flour processors, and even some small-sized oil presses at the designated hall. At the AI-themed hall, she bought a few of the newest generators, the type that worked well on solar power alone.

With these, they would have electricity even in the dimension. She was happy just thinking about it.

After all that, she only had slightly over a million left from all the money in both her and Lu Hao’s savings. Su Jin sighed. Money was too easy to spend, and there were still a bunch of things she had yet to buy. Lu Hao mentioned that he had some stocks on the market, right? Once she got back, she would ask him to cash in on them, or else they would be reduced to scrap paper once the apocalypse hit.

Over the past few days, Wei Xiaoyan’s performance at the exhibition steadily improved. Someone must have given her advice, because she stopped slathering on the make-up and stuck to professional suits instead at work. Su Jin guessed that it was Wang Linda’s doing.

Anyway, that meant Su Jin barely had anything to do anymore. Whenever she had time, she would sneak off again to see what she could buy.

Finally, it was Friday, the last day of Su Jin’s work at the exhibition. On that day, even the ever-busy Wang He dropped by the exhibition and gathered everyone before the workday ended. Since they were off tomorrow, he said the company would treat everyone to dinner that night.

The atmosphere at the branch company had always been very relaxed.

It was probably because they had an open-minded general manager in Wang He. He was really lax in his management, all things considered, usually allowing his employees to work as they pleased. He even set up a reward system to encourage everyone to perform better, and every so often he would organize a routine dinner or karaoke session.

The branch company was relatively new, but their sales accomplishments were not lower than those of the HQ, which had a large factory behind them. Su Jin was certain that if it were not for the apocalypse, the branch would definitely be able to overtake the HQ in sales within a year. For that, Su Jin actually had a healthy amount of respect for Wang He.

As everyone was dismissed, Wang He purposely called out to Su Jin and asked her to attend the dinner that night.

Wei Xiaoyan was standing behind Wang Linda, her hands trembling as they gripped the hem of her clothes tightly. She had thought that the dinner would be to welcome her as the newest member of the team, but Mr. Wang had not even mentioned her name. It was so unfair!

The dinner was held at a seafood restaurant closer to the exhibition center. It was only two streets away, so everyone just walked there.

Su Jin walked with Assistant Zhang, who constantly chattered about how famous the restaurant was. He even listed out the celebrities who had eaten there before, showing Su Jin pictures of their signature dishes on his phone.

Su Jin truly felt that Assistant Zhang would make for a great travel and shopping bestie.

When they were almost at the seafood restaurant’s doorstep, they suddenly heard a loud crash followed by some screams. Su Jin immediately saw a man covered in blood collapsed on the curb.

The man lay face-down, one of his legs all mangled from his fall. He looked, for all intents and purposes, dead.