# Chapter 1: Reborn Before the Apocalypse
The studio apartment was modest but elegantly furnished. On the bed lay a young woman.
Her features were delicate, her skin pale as porcelain, with wavy dark hair spilling across the pillow like seaweed, giving her an almost dreamlike quality.
But right now, the woman was drenched in sweat, her expression twisted with agony.
Suddenly, she shot upright, clutching the blanket, gasping for air.
Beads of sweat rolled down her porcelain cheeks, tracing a path down her slender neck before disappearing into her collar.
Sophia gasped for a long while before her eyes, frozen on one spot, finally began to move.
Looking around at her surroundings, she felt dazed. Where was she?
Had someone rescued her?
But who would rescue her? And how could anyone have saved her?
The acid rain had come suddenly, pouring down from the sky like a waterfall.
Not just her—everyone caught out in the open had been corroded by the acid rain, not even given a chance to run.
Even if someone had saved her, in the apocalypse, where could there possibly be a room this clean and tidy?
And the blanket in her arms still carried the warm scent of sun-dried fabric.
Wait—
Sophia's eyes flew open as she stared disbelievingly at everything around her.
Wasn't this the apartment she'd lived in before the apocalypse?
Realizing this, her heart began to pound so violently she thought it might leap out of her throat.
Sophia threw back the covers and searched the bed with trembling hands, finally finding her phone beneath the pillow.
The screen clearly displayed today's date: May 20, 20XX.
Looking at that date, tears streamed down Sophia's face.
She was back!
She was really back!
After ten grueling years of survival in the apocalypse, only to meet a miserable death in the end—she had actually returned to three months before the apocalypse struck!
Sophia didn't bother wiping away her tears. Shakily, she unlocked her phone with her thumb and opened her banking app.
When she saw the balance—three hundred million dollars—Sophia let out a huge breath of relief.
In her past life, the apocalypse had come without warning.
By the time everyone realized something was wrong, money had already lost its original purpose.
Sophia had plenty of it, but she couldn't buy supplies with it.
All that money had turned into useless numbers.
This time, she would not let this fortune go to waste.
She was going to spend it all!
Turn it all into supplies!
But where would she store so many supplies?
"If only there was a space..." she murmured.
The moment she said this, Sophia thought of something.
When she was young, her mother had given her an emerald necklace, telling her to wear it close to her heart.
The emerald was bright green, square-cut, with no particular design to speak of. But her mother had said it was a family heirloom.
In her past life, she had worn that necklace until the world grew increasingly chaotic. Too afraid to wear it around her neck anymore, she'd kept it tucked against her body.
Yet at some point, it had been lost, and she'd been heartbroken for a long time.
After all, it was the only keepsake her mother had left her!
But now, the necklace was still around her neck!
Sophia unclasped it and held the emerald in her palm, an idea forming in her mind.
"In stories, family heirlooms usually have a storage space inside. I wonder if mine does..."
She got out of bed, slipped on her slippers, and walked to the kitchen.
Sophia picked up a paring knife. Without hesitation, she sliced her fingertip.
Her slender, pale finger was cut open, blood welling up. Sophia didn't even furrow her brow—she simply pressed the emerald against the wound.
Something miraculous happened!
As soon as the blood touched the emerald, it was absorbed.
The stone's color deepened, quickly transitioning from bright green to dark crimson.
When the emerald turned blood-red, a flash of red light burst before Sophia's eyes, and the stone vanished.
Gone, too, was the wound.
If not for the blood still on the knife, Sophia might have believed everything before had been her imagination.
At that moment, an image appeared in her mind.
It was a gray, misty space. Inside, there was nothing.
Sophia herself couldn't enter, but she could sense the space's size and every corner of it.
The space was ten meters high and roughly the size of ten football fields.
Sophia glanced at the knife in her hand and thought, "Store."
The knife vanished from her grip.
And in the corner of the space, a paring knife lay perfectly still.
Sophia, not yet finished, thought "Retrieve"—and the knife reappeared in her hand.
After experimenting several more times, Sophia finally calmed down.
Her mother hadn't lied to her!
This really was a family heirloom!
And the stories hadn't lied either!
Family heirlooms really did contain spaces!
Before, she'd been worried about having nowhere to store the supplies. Now she only worried whether her money would be enough to fill this space.
Sophia put down the knife and walked to the refrigerator.
Inside the side-by-side refrigerator were all sorts of ingredients, neatly arranged.
Fruits, vegetables, bread, yogurt, eggs.
In the bottom freezer compartment: various meats.
Sophia reached in and grabbed bread, yogurt, and fruit, cradling them in her arms.
Using her elbow to close the refrigerator door, she carried the food to the living room and sat down on the carpet.
She tore open each item one by one and ate ravenously.
For ten years in the apocalypse, even the coarsest meal had been a luxury.
Those years, to survive, Sophia had chewed bark, eaten grass roots, and even eaten dirt.
Now, biting into soft bread, fragrant yogurt, and crisp sweet fruit, Sophia felt so happy she could cry.
She took a deep breath and held back the tears.
She couldn't cry!
She had so much to do!
She had to eat her fill—every minute was precious and couldn't be wasted!
When she could eat no more, Sophia stopped.
Looking at the yogurt with just two sips left, she thought about it and stored it directly in the space.
She wanted to test whether this space had a preservation function, so she could better plan what supplies to stockpile.
Of course, Sophia wasn't idle. After eating and drinking her fill, she returned to the bedroom and opened her laptop.
Opening a blank document, Sophia began planning what supplies she needed to buy.
It was May 20th. Summer hadn't officially started yet, and the temperature was very comfortable.
But starting today, the weather would gradually grow warmer.
At first, the slowly heating weather didn't alarm anyone.
After all, summer was supposed to get hotter day by day.
It wasn't until late August, when the weather remained scorching and temperatures hit 113°F, that people finally sensed something was wrong.
It was also then that many realized—it seemed they hadn't had rain in a whole month.
Without rain, and with temperatures only climbing higher, people's patience wore thin. Everyone rushed to buy supplies, and rumors of the apocalypse began circulating from that point.
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