Chapter 5

Chapter 5: Liang Chen Ranch

Ling Mo woke up the next day sweating through her sheets. It was even hotter than yesterday.

The cats and dogs she’d brought home sprawled limp on the living-room floor, completely drained of the energy they’d had the day before.

Seeing them like that, she didn’t hesitate. One by one, she sent them into her pocket space.

She checked the swimming pool in the yard. It was full.

She stored the full pool away, pulled out a new one, and started filling it again.

She wasn’t going out today. The heat was brutal. But staying inside didn’t mean stopping the hoarding.

Phone in hand, Ling Mo kept placing orders while several tablets on the table churned through shopping carts at full speed.

She wasn’t much of a cook, so she bought a mountain of premade meals that only needed reheating. Then she added a stack of cookbooks.

At some point, it stopped being “some books” and turned into “all the books.” She bought everything she could find, even textbooks, as if she might one day get bored enough to study. The odds were low, but she didn’t care.

Buy now. Worry later.

She even purchased a bunch of courses taught by famous instructors.

When she scrolled past a page full of baby supplies, her finger stalled. In her last life, she’d spent every waking moment chasing money and never once thought about marriage. Now she was eighteen again, with disasters looming on the horizon. Who knew what her life would look like later?

Her hand still hit “buy” anyway.

Better to have it and not need it.

“Oh. Solar power banks.” She added those too.

The next few days settled into a routine. During the day, she stayed home downloading dramas and anime and shopping online. At dusk, when the temperature finally dropped, she went out to buy things in person and collect supplies from the warehouse she’d set up.

As the heat kept climbing, people started to catch on. Stockpiling spread fast, and prices rose even faster.

Half a month later, nearly everything had arrived, except a handful of the most recent orders still in transit.

That included transportation—air, land, and water. She even had someone source her a helicopter. She couldn’t fly it, but just owning it made her feel steadier.

A full third of her spending went into fuel and energy: firewood, coal, gasoline, diesel, natural gas. If she couldn’t buy enough in one go, she split it into batches.

When she checked her bank balance and saw three million left, she went a little blank. In her last life, she’d never had even a fraction of that. And the thought that popped into her head now was: I’m finally almost done spending it.

She slumped back on the couch. A Maine Coon padded over, rubbed against her leg, and let out a clingy little meow.

Ling Mo scooped the kitten up and buried her face in its soft belly, inhaling until the world felt right again.

A moment later, she pulled back wearing the satisfied expression of someone whose soul had been fully recharged. The exhaustion in her eyes was gone.

Kittens really were the cutest creatures on earth.

With the temperature outside climbing day by day, she kept most of the animals in her pocket space and only let them out occasionally.

Every window in the villa was covered with insulation pads. It made the rooms dim, but the inside stayed noticeably cooler. She even set a water-filled pool in the living room to bring the temperature down further.

She withdrew one million in cash and kept it close in case the network collapsed and phone payments stopped working. The remaining two million went right back into supplies and utility bills.

Even with all her cooling measures, she didn’t dare shut off the air conditioner. It ran around the clock. The electricity bill this month was going to be terrifying.

The water bill wouldn’t be any better. Her taps were practically running twenty-four hours a day.

Ling Mo’s daily to-do list was simple: order packages, receive packages, unbox packages, then study survival skills and scroll through wilderness forums, stealing every useful tip she could find.

A lot of the gear and tricks people discussed were things she’d never even heard of, but they were practical in a way that made her quietly grateful.

The bedroom was calm and dark. Two cats lay beside her as she leaned against the headboard. The dogs stayed in her pocket space—too filthy, too chaotic, and absolutely not allowed on her bed.

Time crept toward midnight. Ling Mo was still glued to her phone, lost in a thread and unaware of anything else.

Then a cold, emotionless mechanical voice sounded beside her ear.

“Hello, residents of Blue Star. A natural-disaster event has been detected. Congratulations—you have been selected for the Survival Game. Would you like to participate? Refusal carries no penalty, but you will permanently lose eligibility.”

Two options hovered in her mind: Yes / No.

Ling Mo sat bolt upright, frowning. Not a flicker of happiness crossed her face.

She’d read enough novels to know what survival games meant: danger, blood, death. If this was real, it was basically an alien invasion with nicer phrasing.

She hated it on principle.

But she didn’t refuse.

Opportunity was still opportunity. She couldn’t afford to throw it away. If things went truly sideways, she could always hide in her pocket space.

The moment she confirmed, her vision went black. Her body vanished from the bed.

The two Maine Coons stared at the empty spot, spun in frantic circles, and cried out in panicked meows.

Ling Mo opened her eyes to a boundless grassland beneath a huge sky.

She wasn’t alone. People stood nearby, but no matter how close they were, their faces remained blurred and indistinct.

A lot of them were barefoot and in pajamas. Some looked like they’d been pulled straight out of sleep in nothing but underwear.

It made sense. In weather like this, you sweated even at night, and clothes clung uncomfortably to your skin. Not everyone could afford to run an air conditioner all day.

The mechanical voice spoke again.

“Congratulations, players. Welcome to the first instance: Liang Chen Ranch.

“As the largest ranch on Liang Chen Star, we supply the entire Interstellar society with the finest dairy and meat products. Due to heavy daily workloads, we must recruit temporary workers to ensure fast, uninterrupted production.

“As temporary workers, your mission is to follow instructions and complete the ranch owner’s tasks excellently for three days. Those who fail to meet standards will lose game eligibility.”

The explanation sounded almost harmless. The worst outcome it mentioned was losing eligibility.

Ling Mo scanned the empty grassland. If they were supposed to follow the ranch owner’s??, where was the ranch owner? And where were the temporary workers supposed to go to receive tasks?