"Jing Nu was beautiful, awaiting me at the corner of the city." That's the origin of Jing Shu's name. It's hard to imagine that the couple who chose such a lofty name were both such pushovers!
It could be said that Jing Shu was indirectly killed by her pushover parents. In the ninth year of the apocalypse, with dead bodies everywhere and a single bite of food enough to trade for a villa, Jing Shu accidentally activated the Magic Cube and gained a personal space where she could farm, finally allowing her parents to have a year with enough food to eat.
But she made the grave mistake of revealing to her parents how easily food was obtained. She shouldn't have underestimated the boundless sympathy of her pushover parents, fattening the ingrate and overestimating the moral bottom line of relatives and friends.
How could one trust anyone when blood relatives could turn their backs on kin, even killing, all for food?
Jing Shu regretted not having properly guided her pushover parents, allowing them to indiscriminately give aid to relatives and friends. Her mother always felt guilty, "Your Uncle's family died so miserably. It's all my fault for not being capable enough. Now, only your little aunt is left. We don't have to worry about food, and no one will know your secret. Let's just share some with your little aunt."
So, they sent common foodstuffs like cabbage and sweet potatoes from time to time. Eventually, this led to the little aunt bringing her whole family over. "Sister," she'd said, "I knew you found Wang Congsi's secret food storage. Otherwise, where did you get so much food without farming? Take us there too, and you won't have to keep bringing over such a small amount. It's not enough. Don't worry, it'll be just our two families who know this secret."
The pushover mother was momentarily stunned. How could she explain this?
Furious, Jing Shu kicked them out, and from then on, didn't give them even a single vegetable leaf.
Later, the little aunt came to cause trouble a few more times, each visit ending unhappily. Jing Shu, fearing they might come to rob her, took extra care to fortify the doors and windows. She also stopped going out to avoid trouble. But then, her pushover father's close friend arrived with his wife and child.
Kneeling, the friend held up the one hundred thousand yuan he had owed her father for thirteen years, trembling, tears in his eyes. "Lao Jing," he cried, "I finally put the money together. Is it too late?" The pushover father was so moved that he wept and readily hosted the family of three. The two men talked all night, and the next day, it was announced that the family would be staying for a while.
"If this money had come ten years earlier, it might have been useful," Jing Shu sneered, lighting a stack of bills and throwing them into the stove. "In this apocalypse, its only use is to start a fire."
"Thank goodness Uncle Sun introduced me to your mom and found work for your little aunt..." the pushover father said. Then, remembering his sister-in-law's recent pestering for food, he sighed, "This world... everyone's desperate because of food."
On the second night, Uncle Sun colluded with the little aunt. They, along with seven or eight others armed with clubs and broken glass bottles, forced their way into the house. Amidst the chaos, Jing Shu was hit on the head and knocked unconscious.
Luckily, I've stored all the food away. I won't leave any for you, even in death, Jing Shu thought dazedly before losing consciousness. But what about my poor pushover parents? The Magic Cube Space is in my mental world; no one can see it or take it away. Since Little Aunt and Uncle Sun won't be able to get the food, how will they treat my parents? If only the Magic Cube Space could hold people...
...
Jing Shu had no idea how long it had been when she was abruptly awakened by a burning sensation in her throat, as if fire were about to erupt. She coughed violently, then sat up with a start, her eyes scanning her surroundings in panicked disbelief.
What she saw was a familiar scene: pink wallpaper, a wall filled with bookshelves and a computer desk, a Hello Kitty-themed bed, and a princess canopy.
Isn't this what my bedroom looked like before the apocalypse?
Jing Shu's heart pounded wildly. Trembling, she fumbled for her phone on the bed. She found it and checked: November 1, 2022, Tuesday, 10:39 AM.
Two months before the apocalypse! She was back, ten years in the past! Back to her twenty-two-year-old self, a fresh college graduate in the bloom of youth!
Reborn?! Jing Shu clutched the quilt tightly, her knuckles turning white. She knew it wasn't a dream. The ten years of arduous life, hunger, and fear were etched so clearly into her bones. She had pinched herself purple countless times, hoping it was all a nightmare, but she had never woken up.
As if remembering something, Jing Shu got out of bed and, WHOOSH, pulled open the curtains. Soft sunlight instantly flooded in. She basked in the light she hadn't seen for ten years. Scenes from those years flashed through her mind like a movie, along with the chaotic moments before her death. Finally, with a loud WAH, she burst into tears. In this life, she was determined not to repeat the same mistakes.
Joy at finally seeing sunlight, hatred, rage, grief for her parents—in an instant, Jing Shu experienced a torrent of emotions, leaving her mind utterly blank.
After crying for a few minutes, a familiar hunger brought Jing Shu back to her senses. She ran to the kitchen and found a bowl of milk, an egg, half a cob of corn, and a steamed bun being kept warm on the stove.
Jing Shu grabbed the steamed bun and gobbled it down, then picked up the milk and gulped it. She bit into the corn. The chewy texture and the sweet, sticky flavor exploded in her mouth. At that moment, Jing Shu felt that the happiest thing in the world was simply being able to eat grains.
Although in the ninth year of the apocalypse she had acquired a personal space where she could farm, by then, many species had already gone extinct, and Seeds were even scarcer. Being able to grow enough food to survive had become an unattainable dream for most people.
Jing Shu carefully peeled the egg. She first bit off some of the white, savoring its light flavor. Then she sprinkled salt evenly on the yolk, put the whole thing in her mouth, and chewed slowly, relishing every bit.
The finest ingredients often require the simplest cooking methods. With delicacies like eggs—whether boiled, fried, scrambled, steamed, marinated, or tea-smoked—they could make the neighbor's kid cry with envy even without fancy preparations.
Young people who have never experienced famine will never understand why the elderly would pick up grains of rice that fell on the ground and eat them without a second thought.
To ensure she could eat her fill and eat well in the future, Jing Shu began to think about her Magic Cube Space.
A standard 3x3x3 Magic Cube is a puzzle made of 3x3x3 smaller cubes. To play, one scrambles the six colored faces and then manipulates the cube to restore it to its original state.
At sixteen, Jing Shu became the fastest high school student in Wu City to solve it, with a time of 6.8 seconds, after which she lost interest.
At eighteen, her father, Jing An, gave her a Rubik's Revenge for her coming-of-age gift—a Four-level Rubik's Cube, a 4x4x4 cubic structure whose English name carried the meaning of "revenge."
After a few days of unsuccessful attempts, Jing Shu didn't touch it again. Bored during the apocalypse, she started playing with it again, her solving speed increasing with each try. However, it wasn't until the ninth year that it activated. Jing Shu later pondered for a long time about the conditions necessary for activation.
It must be the speed. The Magic Cube Space only activated that one time I solved the cube in less than 30 seconds, Jing Shu mused. She returned to her bedroom and rummaged through a pile of miscellaneous items in a storage box to find the Four-level Rubik's Cube—the personal space where she could farm.
Jing Shu flexed her hands, took out a timer, and took a deep breath. After a DING from the timer, she started twisting the Magic Cube. As time ticked by, the jumbled colors of the cube in Jing Shu's hands began to align from the center, the change visible to the naked eye. Then, one by one, the colored sides fell into order. With the final twist aligning everything, Jing Shu hit the timer with a SNAP.
"00:28:59!"
Success!