Cooking Gourmet Meals in the Apocalypse

Chapter 258: Chapter 255: Leisurely Life

The hotel was sixteen stories tall, a safe height.

Even if the zombies evolved again, they couldn’t reach the upper floors without using the stairs.

She parked a sedan right outside the hotel’s main entrance, then led Meng Hu through the front doors.

Once inside, she immediately bolted the door shut.

She could deal with any zombies already inside, but if more started trickling in from outside, she’d have her hands full.

She swept the first floor but saw no zombies or monsters.

The doors and windows were intact. She closed any that were open.

She searched around until she found a key ring, then headed down to the basement.

First, she lowered the rolling shutters over the two exits.

Then she went back up, deadbolted the stairwell door, and thoroughly checked the second floor.

She closed what needed closing and locked what needed locking.

She did the same for the third floor. In fact, she deadbolted the access door on every floor she ascended.

As for the fifth floor and up, there was no need to keep locking the doors.

If a monster got through the second-floor door, she would know and could make the best decision on how to react.

If all the doors were locked, it would also be inconvenient for her to escape.

Still, for safety’s sake, she carefully inspected every single floor.

There wasn’t a single zombie to be found.

The top floor consisted of two large suites.

Chen Xing chose the slightly larger one, Room 1601.

It had an extra-large living room and a conference room, separated by a set of double sliding doors.

Chen Xing dismantled the sliding doors, creating a single, open living space.

The bedroom had a massive open-air balcony.

At the edge of the balcony was a glass-walled swimming pool. Lying in the bedroom and looking out, it seemed to connect directly with the sea.

Chen Xing was very satisfied with the place. However, with the constant danger outside, it was unnecessary to replace everything with her own belongings. It would be inconvenient to pack everything up if she had to leave in a hurry.

So, she only changed the bedspread, sheets, pillowcases, and comforter. The sofa was leather, and she just disinfected it along with the tables, chairs, and stools.

The kitchenware, however, definitely had to be replaced with new items.

Anyway, she had plenty of kitchen supplies, so it wouldn’t be a huge problem even if she couldn’t take them with her.

The only problem was, there was no power.

Chen Xing had to take out a generator and connect it to the room’s electrical system.

After taking out the generator, Chen Xing remembered that the building had its own backup generators.

When she was in the basement closing the shutters, she had seen many small doors, like the ones for low-voltage electrical rooms.

So, after eating, she ran downstairs again.

After searching in a few places, she finally located the generators.

Whether they worked or not, she’d take them first and figure it out later.

When she returned to the top floor, she set up a grill on the balcony.

Now she could have a barbecue whenever she wanted.

Just then, a notification about an upgrade came from her space.

Two of her three spaces, which hadn’t leveled up in two days, were now ready to upgrade.

It seemed these spaces had never upgraded at all when they were with Cadar, but they leveled up frequently after coming into her possession.

She guessed it had something to do with the spring water.

With these consecutive upgrades, Chen Xing felt as if she possessed an invincible power.

She was only now realizing that she benefited no matter which space upgraded; her physical abilities were constantly improving.

Even her personal electricity storage capacity had increased.

She saw that her reserves were more than half empty.

Chen Xing ran up to the roof, where there was a row of solar panels.

’Any kind of electricity is good for me.’

So, she placed her hand on the input line of the solar panels, which were already fully charged.

However, while the panels seemed to hold a lot of power, they only managed to fill her reserves up to the halfway mark.

Back in her room, she turned to her own generator.

This thing would keep running as long as it had fuel, so she patiently fed it gasoline, charging her reserves up to two-thirds full.

The rest could be slowly topped off by the solar panels.

Lying on the sofa, Chen Xing entered her space to tinker with the newly upgraded areas.

In her courtyard, two full rows of pink and white cherry blossom trees stood like something out of a painting.

Beneath the trees, black cats were playing.

After a few trials of drinking the spring water in the space, they had become remarkably perceptive.

They now executed her commands instantly.

Returning to the house inside her space, Chen Xing saw it had grown quite a bit larger and decided not to add any more furniture for now.

It wouldn’t be too late to fill it up once the upgrades slowed down.

The Jiezhi Space had gained a few more grid squares, and Chen Xing was puzzled. ’What are these for?’

In the afternoon, she put on a swimsuit and went for a swim in the pool.

She didn’t know how she knew how to swim. She had only intended to splash around, but to her surprise, she found herself stroking her arms and starting to swim.

Her form even seemed quite standard.

She placed a small tray with watermelon and a drink by the poolside.

When she got tired, she’d rest at the edge and have a sip of her drink.

The afternoon passed quickly, and evening arrived.

She began to prepare dinner.

She made Dry Pot Chicken, stir-fried tripe, pork with pickled cabbage and vermicelli, stir-fried greens, steamed eggs, and cucumber and carrot sticks with dipping sauce.

She finished eating before dark.

She didn’t plan to keep the lights on after nightfall, as it could attract monsters or, worse, malicious people.

When she was bored, she stood on the balcony and gazed at the nocturnal sea view.

Before long, drowsiness crept in, and she went into her room to sleep.

Lately, to let Meng Hu properly absorb the spring water’s power, she had been keeping him in her space whenever there was nothing going on.

She only let him out at night.

The night passed in silence.

The next day, she had a self-made breakfast of fried dough sticks and soy milk, sesame balls, vegetable buns, and seeds.

Then she entered her space to tend to the ripened vegetables.

After harvesting, she planted a new batch of seeds.

She spent her mornings busy in her various spaces and her afternoons swimming or reading.

Several days slipped by quietly. She had never experienced such a leisurely life.

In her previous life, she was constantly on the move just to survive.

If she wasn’t fighting monsters, she was scavenging for supplies.

She wouldn’t have dared to even dream of carefree days like these.

This day was the same as any other: gardening, tending to flowers, and swimming.

In the evening, she made herself a large grilled lobster and a creamy pasta.

After dinner, she admired the sea view for a bit before going to bed.

Not even two hours later, she was jolted awake by a strange noise.

Meng Hu was also pacing anxiously by her bed, glaring menacingly at the bathroom.

When Chen Xing reached the bathroom, the sound seemed to grow louder.

It was coming from the toilet.

’Could it be rats?’

Chen Xing immediately backed away to the doorway.

Just then, from out of the small toilet bowl, a rat much larger than a normal one scurried out.

Most frightening of all, once it was out, its body rapidly swelled, doubling in size as its fangs jutted out.

In the blink of an eye, it was as large as a medium-sized dog, its fangs as long as those of a zombie.

And more rats were still pouring out of the toilet.

Disgusting!

’It’s not about how scary it is... it’s the fact that it’s crawling out of the toilet. That’s what’s so disgusting.’

Chen Xing immediately summoned several of the black cats that had been playing in her space.

The mutated rat showed no fear upon seeing the black cats.

Its expression grew even more ferocious than before as it charged toward them.