Lin Yue stepped out of her apartment, the heavy steel door clicking shut with a finality that felt like a coffin lid.
The hallway was a scene of pure, unadulterated "Low-IQ" behavior.
A middle-aged man was banging on a neighbor's door, screaming about a phone signal.
A woman was sitting on the floor, clutching a designer handbag and wailing to a God who had clearly checked out for the season.
"Useless," Lin Yue muttered, stepping over a discarded suitcase.
She didn't run.
Running was for people who didn't understand stamina management.
She moved at a brisk, calculated pace, her eyes scanning the stairwell. The elevators were death traps, anyone with half a brain knew that when the "Automated Defense" kicked in, the first thing to go would be the power grid.
As she reached the lobby, the Public Announcer boomed again, its voice echoing off the concrete walls.
[T-MINUS 105 MINUTES. THE SUPERMARKET PERIMETER IS NOW AT 40% CAPACITY. DELAY WILL RESULT IN RESOURCE DEPLETION.]
The announcement triggered a fresh wave of panic. A group of young men charged past her, nearly knocking her over. One of them looked back, shouting, "Move it, lady! If you're slow, you starve!"
Lin Yue didn't even blink. She just watched their retreating backs.
Greedy and loud, she thought.
The perfect target for whatever is waiting in those shadows.
Outside, the air was thick with the smell of burning rubber and something metallic—blood.
The "Infected" were visible in the distance, cordoned off by high-voltage fences that hummed with a lethal blue light.
They were waiting for the 120-minute mark.
They were the "cleanup crew."
Lin Yue's destination loomed ahead: The Sector 4 Supermarket. It wasn't a friendly neighborhood grocery store.
It was a massive, windowless fortress of corrugated steel, guarded by mounted turrets that followed the movement of the crowd with cold, robotic precision.
The entrance was a bottleneck of desperation.
She didn't have a plan.
She hadn't made a list.
She didn't need to yet.
She just knew that if she didn't get food and water, she would die, and that was too simple an ending.
"I'll just get the basics," she thought, her eyes narrowed. "Get in, get water, get food, and get out. Then, I'll watch. I'll see what happens to the fools who stay past the two-hour mark. I'll see what the 'Infected' actually do."
She saw the "Male Lead" types already trying to organize a line. "Everyone, stay calm! If we work together, there's enough for everyone!" a tall man with a hero complex shouted from the steps.
Lin Yue felt a surge of genuine disgust. "There's never enough for everyone, you idiot," she hissed under her breath.
The crowd surged forward like a dam breaking as the heavy steel shutters ground upward. Lin Yue didn't push.
She tucked her elbows in and let the momentum of the desperate mob pull her through the entrance, her eyes darting between the overhead signs.
She didn't run for the aisles.
Instead, she pressed her back against the cool metal of the interior wall, letting the first wave of frantic bodies collide and scream past her.
Her eyes scanned the ceiling, tracing the plastic hanging signs until she found what she needed: a directory map bolted near the customer service desk.
Aisle 4: Bottled Water.
Aisle 9: Canned Goods.
Aisle 12: Household/Hardware.
She memorized the layout in ten seconds.
The crowd was already a swirling vortex of greed.
A woman tripped, her glasses skidding across the floor; a man stepped on them without looking, his eyes fixed only on a shelf of bread.
Lin Yue watched a father literally drop his child's hand to chase after a rolling tin of meat.
The stench of sweat and panic was thick, but beneath it was something sharper, the metallic tang of desperation.
It was a smell she found almost nostalgic.
It smelled like the world finally showing its true face.
She reached Aisle 4 just as a man in a business suit was frantically sweeping everything into a cart.
"I need it all!" he barked, his tie undone.
"My family is in Sector 5, I have to provide!"
"There's an entire pallet of the high-electrolyte stuff in the back storage." Lin Yue said, her voice dropping to a confident, flat whisper. "The staff hid it for the high-ranks. Go before the others see."
The man's greed short-circuited his common sense. He bolted, leaving the half-full cart behind.
Lin Yue didn't hesitate.
She stepped up to the abandoned cart and began a cold, systematic audit.
The man had indeed been hoarding, there were large bags of rice, dozens of cans of beef stew, and several boxes of protein bars in the cart, along with the water.
She tossed aside the bulky, low-calorie items, keeping the high-density food and the water jugs.
Then, she saw it. Tucked under a pile of napkins in the child-seat of the cart was a small, black handgun—a compact 9mm.
She picked it up. It was cold, heavy, and smelled of oil. She didn't wonder why a businessman had it; she just tucked it into the waistband of her jeans, hiding it under her jacket.
Free loot, she thought, a faint, dry amusement flickering in her chest.
She spent the next few minutes moving through the aisles, looking for a better vessel.
Her current backpack was already straining.
Near the luggage section, she found a high-capacity tactical rucksack with reinforced straps.
She swapped her bags, transferring the water, the cans of stew, and several packs of long-life batteries she'd snagged from a nearby shelf.
[00:45:12]
She had time, but her new bag was reaching its limit. If she took more, she wouldn't be able to climb the stairs back to her apartment.
She knew when to stop.
She slipped out of the supermarket, avoiding the main exit where people were now fist-fighting over a spilled bag of rice. She found a shadowed corner behind a stack of rusted shipping crates, a perfect vantage point to watch the "Main Event."
Across the street, the 'Hero' from earlier was still trying to manage the chaos, but he had run into a problem.
"You can't go in!" the Hero shouted, his voice cracking with panic. "Look at your eyes! You're turning! You're one of them!"
The man slumped, his voice sounding like sandpaper. "I'm... just... tired... I haven't slept since... since this started. I just need... meds..."
"Zombie!" a woman screamed from the crowd, pointing a trembling finger. "Look at him! He's not breathing right!"