Surviving the apocalypse with a wife and a system! [GL]

Thinking this through, Bai Li lifted an empty backpack and slung it over one shoulder, just for show. It was not for actual use. It was just there to make her look like she was going out to carry back a few simple things. If anyone saw her, they would probably think she was just being practical and trying to help. Then she reached for the handle of her Tang sword. The blade was sharp and clean, and the weight of it in her hand gave her a little more confidence. It was the kind of weapon that made her feel steady, like even if the world outside was full of danger, she still had something solid she could rely on. Bai Li took one last look around the apartment, made sure she had not forgotten anything important, and then prepared to leave.

On the other side of the building, inside room 2004, Hu Xuecheng was absolutely furious.

He stared at Bai Li’s reply on his phone screen for a long time, his face twisting little by little until the anger almost seemed to eat him alive. The message itself was not even very long, but that was exactly what made it so irritating. It felt cold. It felt lazy. It felt like Bai Li had sent it without even bothering to take him seriously. To Hu Xuecheng, that was worse than being openly insulted. He hated that kind of calm attitude. He hated the way she seemed like she could stand there and look down on him even from far away. His chest rose and fell a few times as he tried to swallow the rage, but it only made him feel more upset. He had already decided in his head that Bai Li was just some girl who had gotten lucky. In his mind, she should have been scared by now, should have softened up, should have known better than to push him. Instead, she had the nerve to answer him like that. That kind of attitude was basically asking for trouble.

He marched over to his bedroom with fast, hard steps and yanked open the drawer beside the bed. Inside was a heavy loaded gun, hidden neatly under a few other things. The moment his hand touched it, his expression shifted a little. It was not calm, but it was more certain. For a man like Hu Xuecheng, a weapon was not just a tool. It was the kind of thing that made him feel powerful. Ordinary people in Country A could not legally keep firearms, and that was the way the law was supposed to work. But people like him did not live by normal rules. He had his own shady paths, his own dirty contacts, and his own illegal channels. If there was money to be made and danger to be handled, someone somewhere would find a way to get him what he wanted. High-grade guns and live ammo were not exactly easy to come by, but Hu Xuecheng had never been the type to worry too much about where things came from. He only cared that they worked when he needed them.

Hu Xuecheng gripped the gun tightly, his fingers wrapping around the handle until his knuckles went pale. He turned it over in his hand once, feeling the cold weight of it, and his anger slowly sharpened into something uglier. He was the kind of man who hated being embarrassed in front of anyone. The more Bai Li ignored him, the more he felt like she was slapping his face in public, even if nobody else could see it. His ego could not take it. The more he thought about her reply, the more his blood seemed to boil. He already had a bad temper, and now that temper had nowhere to go except straight into his head. He began pacing back and forth in the bedroom, muttering to himself under his breath, cursing Bai Li over and over again. Every step was heavy. Every breath felt rough. The gun in his hand gave him a little bit of confidence, but it was not enough to calm him down. He wanted Bai Li to be scared. He wanted her to regret ever opening her mouth. He wanted to make sure she would never dare speak to him like that again.

The more Bai Li thought about the number, the more clearly she could see the road ahead. One hundred and fifty-six cores sounded like a decent amount on the surface, but once she started dividing them up in her mind, it still felt tight. She needed food. She needed clean water. She needed weapons, medicine, and maybe some useful tools if she could find them. She also needed to think about the interdimensional market again, because that place had already shown her that anything could be bought and sold there, as long as she had enough cores and enough judgment not to get tricked. Last time, she had gone in with a bit of hope and a bit of confusion, and the result had not been pretty. She had bought things that looked tempting at first glance, but were not actually useful enough to justify the price. That kind of lesson hurt, because every crystal core had been earned with sweat and danger. This time, she did not want to repeat the same mistake. If she was going to spend, she had to spend on things that truly mattered. A little greed in this kind of world was not a bad thing. It was survival.

She also knew she could not be soft about the supermarket downstairs. The supplies in that place were not endless. If she hesitated, someone else would take them, or they would spoil, or the zombies would smash through and ruin everything. In the past few days, Bai Li had learned something very simple. In a disaster like this, waiting was the same as losing. Anyone who moved slower than the danger would end up paying for it.

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TO BE CONTINUED.