After several days of nonstop work, Lan Jin finally managed to sort and store all the supplies she'd purchased into her space. By then, two of her four apartments had already been sold.
The total revenue from those two units came to 4.5 million yuan. Combined with the leftover money she still had on hand, she now had 4.8 million in her account. Just before the Lunar New Year, she made another run to the wholesale market and bought up all kinds of instant foods popular among younger people.
Instant noodles in every flavor, canned ham, canned meats, canned fish, canned fruits, self-heating hotpots, self-heating rice meals, spicy rice noodles, Nanchang mixed noodles, snail noodles, compressed biscuits, chocolate bars, energy bars... She ordered three hundred boxes of each.
While placing these orders, Lan Jin suddenly thought of convenience stores. Those places sold even more variety. There were boxed meals in different flavors. Sure, they didn't compare to fresh dishes from restaurants, but once the world collapsed, just having food would be a blessing. Who would still care about taste?
And convenience stores didn't just stock boxed meals. They had rice balls, pocket sandwiches, desserts, snack cakes, frozen bread, oden skewers... the list went on. Lan Jin contacted manufacturers directly and placed orders for three hundred units of every item.
Even though she had already stocked up on finished products like fried chicken, she still bought plenty of semi-finished foods: partially prepped fried chicken, pre-cut chicken tenders... along with staples like steamed buns, filled buns, rice cakes, siu mai. She planned to cook them all at home while shops were closed for the holiday, then store them ready-to-eat so she wouldn't need to waste water or electricity reheating them later.
In the final two days before the holiday break, Lan Jin also contacted a water supply company and ordered three thousand empty water barrels. She registered for a water card in the neighborhood. The water dispenser was right downstairs, and it dispensed filtered drinking water. With the card, five liters only cost one yuan. It was even cheaper than certain bottled water brands. She packed all the empty barrels into her space and planned to take her time filling them each day. She had no big plans for the New Year anyway, and this method would help her save quite a bit of money. Of course, she also stocked bottled water separately. Some things just couldn't be skipped.
By the time all this was done, it was already Lunar New Year's Eve.
Lan Jin had no family, and this would be her first New Year after the divorce. She and her daughter would be spending it alone. But the atmosphere between the two of them was far from lonely. In fact, it felt peaceful and warm.
They made dumplings for their New Year's meal. Twenty large dumplings and twenty small ones. Together, they finished them all, not a single one left. Afterward, Lan Jin got right back to work.
She spent one day heating boxed meals and rice balls, another frying semi-prepped food, and the next two days steaming buns, cooking vegetables, boiling rice, and making congee. Qiao Qiao was still too young to eat the same food as adults, so Lan Jin had to prepare separate meals for her, which took another two days. She also had to squeeze in time for water collection. All in all, her holiday schedule was packed from morning to night.
Fortunately, Qiao Qiao was an easy child. Lan Jin gave her some toys and let her play inside the space. She could entertain herself the whole day without fussing.
Once the New Year holidays ended, the remaining two apartments were sold, adding another four million yuan to her account.
Now that the properties were all sold, there was no reason to stay there any longer. After packing everything in the apartment into her space, Lan Jin quietly moved with her daughter to the unit across the street. Without missing a beat, she began restocking supplies again.
She bought power banks, solar power banks, solar charging panels, generators, and treadmill-powered generators. The treadmill generator was especially clever. Just an hour of running could generate enough electricity to power three meals a day. Very practical. She also got a bicycle-powered generator. Just like riding a bike, except it generated electricity too. On days when she didn't feel like running, she could just pedal instead. Exercise and power, two birds with one stone.
To prepare for extreme cold, she bought down jackets, military coats, thermal underwear, cashmere sets, scarves, gloves, socks, ice skates, sneakers, warm shoes, slippers, air-conditioning quilts, down comforters, lighters, matches, hot water bottles, heat packs, space heaters, and thermal flasks.
For extreme heat, she bought ice makers, heat-resistant clothing, fans, air coolers, popsicles, ice cream, and plain ice blocks.
The plain ice was just frozen purified water and could be bought directly from ice factories at low prices. Since ice deliveries were tricky, Lan Jin rented a small refrigerated truck, which only required a C1 license to drive. Renting it for a single day wasn't expensive. She made five trips herself, hauling all the ice back and storing it in her space.
These were flavorless ice blocks. If she wanted flavored ones, she'd need to make them herself. She planned to use the ice maker for that when she had free time. In the early stages of the apocalypse, she remembered that water and power supply in residential areas would become unstable. So she wasn't in a rush.
Just in case the temperatures became extreme, she also bought a pricey set of climate-controlled clothing and a bolt of temperature-regulating fabric. She didn't know if the clothes would really adapt to drastic temperature shifts, but the ads were promising and the price was steep. Back then, she couldn't bring herself to spend on it, but now, with the world ending, why not?
She restocked hygiene supplies too: shampoo, body wash, laundry detergent, soap, toilet paper, sanitary pads, diapers, toothbrushes, toothpaste, and small umbrellas. She'd heard that umbrellas became shockingly expensive during the apocalypse. Now that she had money and the prices were still normal, she bought as many as she could.
She also stocked up on disposable items: towels, underwear, and more. If water ever became scarce, disposable supplies would be a lifesaver. Hygiene was vital when living through the end of the world.
Lan Jin worried that if all power went out and she hadn't charged enough, they'd be left in the dark. So she also bought glass kerosene lamps, along with large quantities of kerosene and candles. Plus lighters and matches, just in case.
Since winter could be bitterly cold, she prepared charcoal stoves and a huge stash of smokeless charcoal. It would last her a long time.
The apocalypse wouldn't be clean. Disinfectants were another must. She ordered thirty boxes each of disinfectant fluid, cleaning sprays, alcohol mist, alcohol wipes, water purification tablets, and floral water.
The three thousand water barrels she had ordered earlier weren't even close to full yet, but Lan Jin didn't want to waste any. She kept taking time each day to fill more. With that supply, she didn't need as many bottled water packs. She still ordered thirty thousand bottles of 600ml purified water, just in case. Even if all of that ran out, she had spiritual spring water in her space.
Since she'd gained access to the space, both she and Qiao Qiao had switched entirely to drinking spiritual spring water. It tasted better than mineral water. Every time they spent a long day running around and felt exhausted, just a few sips of spring water would immediately restore their energy. That alone was proof of how powerful it was.
Still, water alone wasn't enough. Lan Jin also bought milk, formula, yogurt, sesame paste, lotus root powder, fruit teas, coffee, various teas, sodas, and fruit juices in every flavor.
Even after buying so much, she still wasn't done. There were things she hadn't gotten yet: meat, medicine, and proper weapons.
So she headed to the meat market and ordered five hundred pigs, three hundred sheep, and three hundred cows. All were to be slaughtered fresh. She also bought three hundred chickens, ducks, geese, pigeons, and rabbits each. She placed large orders for fish and seafood too. And separately, she ordered ten thousand trays of eggs. Each tray held thirty eggs. That meant she now had three hundred thousand eggs in total—enough to last a long time.
It wasn't that she didn't want to raise live poultry herself. She simply didn't know how to handle them, so it was better to get everything cleaned and prepped upfront.
As for weapons, regulated items were impossible to get. But knives, crossbows, arrows, slingshots, electric batons—those were all legal and available online. She bought everything she could find just to be safe.
To handle hygiene needs during emergencies, Lan Jin stocked a huge supply of cat litter. She'd read in apocalypse novels that people used it when there were no toilets available. It was clean, odorless, and much more comfortable than holding it in. During the previous life's floods, the smell from the toilets was unbearable. So she also bought a ton of air fresheners just to be sure.