Wu Sihan moved fast. By the time Ye Shu was finished bathing and eating, he had already sealed off the corridor.
Outside, metal spikes jutted out a full ten centimeters—they looked menacing even from a distance, sending chills down one’s spine. With the generator provided by Fu Jingchuan powering the electric grid, the thirty-second floor was now arguably the safest place in the entire Yuhai Bay complex.
She glanced at the newly installed steel door, a profound sense of security filling her chest.
If nothing unexpected happened, she was perfectly willing to hole up on the thirty-second floor until the bitter end—so long as the rising water didn’t outpace her will.
Day sixteen of the game.
At dawn, the water swallowed the seventeenth floor.
It rose faster than ever before.
In just half a day, two floors vanished beneath the flood. By this pace, the building wouldn’t last thirty days.
Ye Shu fiddled with her radio. The signal was choppy, static alternating with intermittent ‘zzzt’ noises. Most of what came through were desperate calls for help; the nation's own safe havens had long since gone silent.
Still she tried to scan through the channels in her room—when a commotion erupted outside the door.
“Please, we have nowhere else to turn. We can’t find an inflatable boat, not even scraps of food.”
“We’re just here to borrow your raft, that’s all—nothing else! Whatever we find, we’ll split: sixty for you, forty for us…”
Through the peephole, Ye Shu could see a ragtag cluster of survivors huddled against the steel door. Confronting them were the two Fu brothers and the couple from the Wu family. Fu Jingchuan’s handsome face was utterly unmoved by their wails, but Fu Shiyi… well, he seemed a little shaken.
Lin Huiying would have liked to help these helpless souls, but the raft wasn’t hers to lend—she had no say.
Wu Sihan noticed the reluctance in his wife’s eyes—an omen of trouble. Wasting no time, he dragged Lin Huiying inside, shutting out the survivors’ pleas.
“Uncle… we hardly have anything to eat…”
“Uncle, we know how to swim—if you lend us the little boat, we could look for supplies for our moms and dads…”
Fu Shiyi’s gaze lingered on the scrawny children in the crowd, a flicker of conflicted emotion stirring in his eyes. Soft-heartedness was dangerous, he knew, in these times—but these hungry kids… He couldn’t quite bear the thought of them starving in the building.
“Fine. Anything you find, we get first pick.”
Fu Jingchuan spoke first. He stepped inside, returning with one of the inflatable rafts they’d recovered the day before and handed it out.
The band of survivors acted as though they’d witnessed a living Buddha. Overcome with gratitude, they fell to their knees, bowing fiercely. “Thank you, thank you, we’ll keep our word! When we find anything, you’ll be the first to know!”
Fu Shiyi was swept up in the hopeful mood, grinning like a child.
Fu Jingchuan, however, merely watched impassively. In his mind, he thought: Shiyi’s barely come of age. He’s never seen the darkness people are capable of. This experience—courtesy of these people—would show him just how ugly survival could be.
Ye Shu observed the scene with cool disinterest.
Kindness was fine and good, but context mattered. In a survival game, things weren’t simply black and white—misplaced compassion always came at a price.
Ye Shu quietly returned to her radio.
‘Zzt…zzzt… Longhai Community… water’s reached the twenty-fifth floor… please, help us, the rescue team…’
Nothing but fruitless pleas. Again and again: save us, save us.
Ye Shu opened her digital interface.
Player survivors: only 200,000 remaining.
[When Night Falls: Damn this game—some insane set-up, not even an introduction at the start. Those bastard capitalists demand a thousand points for info, and they have the nerve to ask for that much!]
[I’m Qingchuan in the Palace: Forty-something degrees at the start—everyone must have been misled! The day after I rented a basement room, the temperature suddenly plummeted, and that night the water poured in. If I hadn’t woken up quickly, I’d be gone now.]
[Electronic Pickle: There’s the heat, then torrential rains coming outta nowhere. Caught me utterly off guard. Good thing I was in the capital where the rescue team found me early; now I’m in a shelter. Food’s scarce—so many crackers my mouth’s raw—but hey, it could be worse.]
[Yamamoto Tajima: Baka! You people even have food? Damn you, Dragon Country folks!]
[DurianSoyRice: What the hell, this rain is unreal—Japan’s whole island got buried by the flood! Shocked me for a year! This isn’t a black rainstorm, it’s straight out of my nightmares.]
[Dream Island: Coordinates, Zhu Mu Lang. Rain’s heavy, but we’re safe.]
Forum arguments flared up—players from Huaxia and the Sakura Islanders at each other’s throats.
Ye Shu couldn’t find any Jade Lake City players on the feed, or maybe the ones still out there had no intention of revealing themselves.
It was only from the comments that she’d learned Jade Lake City had been the first to fall in the Dragon Kingdom, suffering catastrophic losses. Aside from the Yuhai Bay area, which just barely held on, nearly everyone else had either been evacuated by the rescue teams, or would remain here forever.
……
That afternoon, Ye Shu made a simple meal: scallion oil noodles and rich beef bone soup.
Fu Shiyi sniffed the beef broth; suddenly, the plain noodles in his hand tasted rather bland.
He’d thought life was pretty good with his third brother, but next to Ye Xiaoshu’s cooking, it paled in comparison.
Night fell, eight o’clock drawing near. The survivors returned, eyes glowing as they carried supplies salvaged along the way—but the glow faded at the thought of having to share this hard-won food with the thirty-second floor.
“Brother Liu… are we really going to hand over the supplies?”
The frail man beside Liu Daqiang gazed at the supplies with distress—he wasn’t thrilled about sharing.
“They only lent us a raft. Do they know how much effort it took to fish this stuff out? This sixty-forty split is bullshit—should’ve been thirty-seventy, or just give them ten percent!”
Liu Daqiang’s eyes glinted. With a sly tone, he added, “They’ll never know the difference. We’ll keep the best for ourselves, give them scraps as a favor.”
Thirty-second floor. The mood was grim.
Fu Shiyi scowled at the two soggy packets of crackers in his hands—the contents reduced to mush, black bits clinging to the sides, barely edible. He struggled to keep his anger in check. “Brother Liu, you’re not being fair. Is this really supposed to be all the supplies you’ve got? We agreed on sixty-forty beforehand.”
“Little Brother Fu, you know what it’s like outside—Jade Lake City’s flooded top to bottom. It’s almost impossible to get food, or even just move around. You should be grateful I’m giving you anything at all.”
It was all Liu Daqiang could do not to blurt out, ‘Don’t push your luck.’
“So you have no intention of cooperating, huh? Fine. Return our raft, and I won’t press about the supplies.”
From behind Liu Daqiang, one of the kids piped up, hearing Fu Shiyi ask for the raft back. “Bad uncle! You can’t take Daddy’s raft—it's ours! You’re all bad people, shameless—”
“That’s our stuff. Why are you taking it?”
“You’re all monsters with no shame…”
Eat from the same bowl, then curse the cook.
Fu Shiyi looked apologetically at Fu Jingchuan, feeling a storm of emotions inside. These were the people he wanted to save? Calling them ingrates wouldn’t be far off—burning the bridge as soon as they’d crossed it. If not for the electric fence, who knew what they’d try.
Fu Jingchuan was unfazed. If they’d kept the deal, he wouldn’t have said more. As it was, losing one raft to learn the truth about human nature was worth it—money well spent.
Who could survive such a storm? Certainly not the kind or pure-hearted—those people were long dead.
“The supplies are clearly hidden on the twenty-third floor. You broke your word, so naturally, I’m taking my raft back.”
His words landed coldly, and a ripple of panic chilled everyone present. Only their own people should have known where the supplies were stashed—how could that have been exposed so quickly?
With a flicker of menace, Fu Jingchuan revealed the black pistol in his hand. Liu Daqiang’s face turned grim, a presentiment of approaching disaster settling in his chest.