Yang Fan entered the elevator lobby of Building Twelve and encountered a man and a woman also waiting for the elevator.
The two seemed to be a couple, speaking in low voices.
Although they deliberately lowered their voices, Yang Fan's hearing was more acute than ordinary people, and he could hear them clearly.
"The supermarket has started rationing food. With an ID, you can only buy ten kilograms a month, and children under twelve get half. You can't buy more than that."
"What about online platforms?"
"I just searched all the major platforms, and all the food is off the shelves."
"What should we do then?"
"It seems like something big is going to happen. The country is starting to control food supplies."
The couple started to blame each other as they talked.
"I heard rumors half a month ago and suggested you hoard some food. You said I was overreacting. Now you can't buy any, can you?"
"Is it my fault? I work overtime every day. How could I have time to buy it? Why didn't you go and buy it?"
Just then.
"Ding!"
A soft sound was heard.
The elevator had arrived on the first floor.
The couple stopped arguing and, sulking, entered the elevator.
Yang Fan followed them into the elevator and pressed the button for the seventh floor.
He sighed inwardly: "When disasters strike, ordinary people with limited access to information are always the last to know."
Yang Fan instinctively rubbed his left wrist.
There was a faint blue mark on the skin of his wrist, shaped like a glass bead, resembling a birthmark.
Soon.
"Ding!"
Another sound.
The seventh floor had arrived.
Yang Fan opened the door to his home, entered, and closed the door, exhaling a long breath.
After being out for five days, he was finally home!
He put down his backpack, pressed the mark on his wrist with his right hand, and silently chanted, "Come out!"
The next moment.
Something strange happened.
A small light blue ball, perfectly round, instantly emerged from his wrist and hovered motionlessly before him.
Yang Fan gazed at the ball and suddenly felt his vision blur, revealing a wondrous space.
In one corner of the space, there were bags of rice piled up, as many as four hundred bags, with each bag weighing twenty-five kilograms.
A total of ten tons of rice, or twenty thousand jin.
Calculated at a quota of one jin of rice per day for an adult, it's enough to eat for half a century.
Yang Fan beamed with a smile: "The ancients were right, having grain in hand brings peace to the mind!"
He carefully observed the space, feeling a secret joy in his heart: "Compared to a week ago, this space seems to have grown a little larger."
About the origin of the ball.
It's a long story.
More than a year ago.
Yang Fan began to have frequent bizarre dreams.
The most incredible thing was that everything in the dream was vivid, and upon waking, it felt as if he had truly experienced it.
For instance:
He dreamed of a boundless forest, where towering trees stretched as far as the eye could see.
The forest was unimaginably vast; even flying a warplane continuously for a month wouldn't reveal its edges.
Also:
He dreamed of endless mountain ranges, equally vast in scope.
The shortest peaks were no less than ten thousand meters high, and there were countless peaks over thirty thousand meters, true skyscraping giants.
Each mountain had distinct seasons.
The peak was covered with snowy white, below the snow line were forests dyed with autumn colors, further down were lush green woods, and at the bottom was a hot, humid rainforest.
In short.
The world in the dream was unimaginably large.
He felt it was at least a million times, maybe even a billion times larger than Canglan Star.
While soaring through the dream realm, Yang Fan often heard an inexplicable call.
Although it was in a language he had never heard, he understood its meaning.
It spoke of a world called — Primordial.
It also said all life would eventually return to the Primordial.
A year ago.
Yang Fan's dreams began to gradually change.
Besides the vast Primordial World, scenes of Canglan Star started to appear in the dreams.
Once.
He dreamt of a strange being like a Mermaid suddenly appearing in the sky, rapidly plummeting into a large lake.
Her appearance was unspeakable; she had a fish tail on her lower body, and her upper body was bare, with a face of exquisite beauty that indeed made one's heart race.
The Mermaid gently waved her delicate hand, and the lake surface surged with waves over ten meters high.
The dream had a small detail.
Beside a house was a slogan: Protect Yunshui Lake, Benefit Future Generations.
Yunshui Lake was the third-largest freshwater lake in the Great Xia Kingdom.
After waking from the dream.
Yang Fan searched online and was shocked to find that a netizen had posted about the waves at Yunshui Lake, but unfortunately, the post was quickly deleted.
Perhaps the Mermaid left a deep impression on him, so he took leave and went to Yunshui Lake.
He found that the area where the waves had appeared was actually sealed off by the military.
From that moment on.
He realized that this dream was not simple.
Eleven months ago.
Yang Fan dreamed of a faint stream of light descending from the sky, landing next to a small town, and merging into a rock.
He had an unusually strong feeling that this stream of light was extraordinary.
Yang Fan made a decisive decision - to find it!
Based on the details from the dream, he searched the internet and successfully determined the general target.
It was a small town in the neighboring Nanhe Province.
Yang Fan took a train there and searched tirelessly for three days, finally finding the rock.
The shape of the rock and the surrounding terrain didn't just resemble the dream; it was an exact match.
Only then did he realize this wasn't a dream.
But rather — prophecy!
Yang Fan managed to bring the not-so-large rock back and used a tool to split it open, revealing the small bead inside.
At that moment.
He instinctively pricked his finger, smearing blood on the surface of the small bead.
The bead vanished instantly, becoming a mark on his wrist.
He was shocked to discover a space hidden within the bead.
Yang Fan gave it a simple and easy-to-understand name — Space Pearl.
He also found that over time, the space within the bead gradually expanded.
Compared to the initial moment.
The space had doubled in size, equivalent to five times the area of this two-bedroom apartment.
*
In the Great Xia Capital, Shangjing City.
Within a certain hidden underground base.
In one corner of the base, there was a large pool measuring thirty meters square.
Stones of various sizes were placed in the pool, with many water plants floating in the water, and lotus flowers drifting on the surface.
An old man dressed in military uniform, followed by several armed soldiers, quickly approached the pool.
The old man cleared his throat and called out, "Miss Jana, we have arrived."
As soon as he finished speaking.
"Splash!"
The sound of surging waves.
The water surface rippled with large waves.
A graceful figure suddenly appeared beneath the ripples, swimming swiftly toward them.
Her upper body was a graceful female figure, with her chest adorned with shells as covering, while her lower body was a powerful golden fish tail.
With a "splash,"
The figure broke through the water surface.
A stunningly beautiful face, a face capable of toppling kingdoms, was revealed.
It was the Mermaid!
She floated nimbly on the water surface, her beautiful eyes sweeping over the crowd, and gave a revealing smile.
With that smile.
A thousand beauties blossomed in an instant.
The soldiers' breaths suddenly became heavy, their bodies reacting instantly, causing them to bend over in embarrassment.
But the old man quickly averted his gaze, not looking at the extremely alluring face, thus avoiding being caught.
He said helplessly, "Miss Jana, please do not tease us."
The Mermaid flicked her tail, rolling her eyes coquettishly, "General Lou, you're so dull."
Her accent was a bit strange, sounding like a foreigner speaking broken Great Xia Language.
With that word.
The Mermaid underwent a subtle change.
Although her face remained flawless, the irresistible allure dissipated by more than half.
The soldiers quickly returned to normal.
Clearly.
The Mermaid possessed some kind of Supernatural Power.