Apocalypse Rebirth: Making Billions With My Fortune-Telling Skill

​Though April didn’t really care about what happened to the rest of the world as long as she, her pets, and her primary benefactors were completely safe, there was a specific conversation she had shared with Xavier the previous week that had stubbornly stuck to her mind.

​If I had the kind of power you had, I would warn more people. Of course he assured her that he wasn’t trying to shade her, it was just his own thought.

She thought about those words all night, wondering if she even needed to take that step or if she should just act the way she had been this whole time. She desperately wanted to ignore it because the world had done nothing but hurt her in her past life.

But then she thought about other things. The fact that there were those who were hurt by the world as well, those who truly needed a chance to survive and not be used as stepping stones.

She pondered... In her last life, if someone had pulled her out of the clutches of the Morgans and had revealed to her that the apocalypse was coming, she would’ve believed them. Not because she believed in fairytales, or fiction, but because they had helped her and she trusted them.

If she had prepared more, she wouldn’t have had to rely on others, used and then dumped.

These were the thoughts that ran through her mind on that one night after hearing those words from Xavier.

April knew the reality of human nature. If she simply stood on a street corner or posted online claiming to be a legendary seer who foresaw the end of the world, no one would listen.

They would call her a lunatic, a fraud, or an attention-seeker. They would laugh, and when the first day of the catastrophe arrived, they would still step outside and get torn to shreds by the undead.

​But she could be cryptic and she could start small.

​Through her fortune-telling stall, she could read the lifelines of the citizens who came to her. She could foresee the exact disasters awaiting them. If her vision showed a customer dying or turning into a zombie on the very first day of the catastrophe, she would simply twist the truth.

Instead of telling them the world was ending, she would give them a highly specific, direct warning: Do not go outside on this specific date. Find a secure, windowless room, stock it with food, and do not open the door for anyone. People who want to kill you are after you.

​Depending on how their individual fortunes played out, she could guide them to safety.

​But April was not a saint. She had limits to her patience.

She could only bring herself to help those who came back a second or third time—the ones who had already confirmed her initial readings were terrifyingly real with small first or second fortune readings, and returned seeking more guidance.

She could not be bothered to waste her breath, her energy, or her skills on first-time skeptics who would only hear her words, doubt her, and walk away laughing.

And this was also why she was charging. They say things that people don’t use money to buy are often taken for granted. If they spend money on this fortune reading, their conscience and greed would at least push them to see if it’s true or not so as not to waste the money spent.

April let out a soft, barely audible sigh. She felt she was going far too out of her way with this level of preparation, especially for a world that had treated her so poorly in her past life.

​But it was a compromise.

​This would be the absolute most she could do for humanity. That way, once the sky turned red and she looked out the high glass windows of her mountaintop fortress, watching the beautiful, peaceful landscape projected by her massive defensive dome, she could sip her hot tea with a clear conscience.

She would have peace of mind, knowing... she at least tried to warn them.

​”I am no saint, Nat,” April said softly, her unblinking eyes returning to meet his intense stare. ”But I cannot call myself a villain either. I am somewhere in-between. And at the end of the day, I am only human.”

​Nat stared at her, the confusion slowly fading from his face. He looked at the quiet, solemn weight in her eyes, recognizing the raw, heavy truth behind her words. For a long moment, he didn’t say anything. He just stared.

​Then, a low, incredibly warm chuckle escaped his throat.

​”Somewhere in-between,” he repeated, his voice surprisingly gentle as he leaned back. ”I like that, sweetheart. The world has enough boring saints and loud villains anyway.”

She stared right back at him. As always, he didn’t take anything serious, she felt.

”But, saint or villain. It doesn’t matter,” Nat suddenly murmured, his eyes darkening as he slowly leaned in across the table.

​Before April could pull back, he brought his head closer and bumped his forehead gently against hers. He sat with his back hunched over, his hands still shoved deep into his coat pockets, holding her gaze at an incredibly intimate, unblinking distance.

​”Because,” he said, his deep voice vibrating right against her skin. ”...at the end of the day, I’ll be the villain for you. And if you ever need a saint, I bet Xavier Reed’s got that all covered.”

​April’s brow furrowed slightly at his proximity, her voice cutting through the space between them. ”That’s not what I mean.”

​She opened her mouth again, about to tell him plainly that she didn’t need either of them to be anything for her in this life or the next, but Nat didn’t let her finish. With a slow, deliberate pressure, he tilted his head, his forehead pushing her head back even further.

​For a suspended, heavy heartbeat, the space between their lips shrank so drastically it felt like he was going to kiss her right there in the dim light of the booth.

​Instead, Nat just grinned, his teeth catching the low light.

​”You don’t have to want something for us to want to give it to you,” he said, his voice laced with a knowing amusement, as if he had just read her mind and bypassed her defenses entirely. ”Remember that.”

​Before she could react, he pulled himself back, his hand finally leaving his pocket just to playfully flick her forehead.

​”Now,” Nat chuckled, sliding out of the booth and offering her that lazy, magnetic grin once more. ”Let’s head back.”

April stayed entirely still in the quiet corner of the dim, exclusive lounge. She lifted her hand, her fingers lightly brushing the spot on her forehead where he had just flicked her.

​You don’t have to want something for us to want to give it to you.

​The words echoed in her mind, heavy and strangely persistent. Throughout both of her lives, April had operated on a strict, transactional system. You paid a price, you received a service. You worked, you survived.

No one had ever offered her anything without demanding a pound of her flesh in return, let alone tried to force safety, luxury, and devotion onto her when she hadn’t even asked for it.

​Yet here they were. Xavier, completely restructuring his multi-billion-dollar schedule just to teach her how to fly a helicopter. Nat, casually handing over a multi-billion-dollar black market weaponry haul and offering to play the villain just to keep her safe in a ruined world.

​They were both moving faster than her calculations, constantly stepping over the lines she drew, not to take from her, but to give.