The woman he'd rescued—Su Wan'er—was now studying the self-proclaimed "landlord" with a wary eye.
He was soaked to the bone, his hair matted into clumps by rain and dust, resembling a bird's nest. His face was streaked with dried blood and black grease, but his eyes were alarmingly bright. When he grinned, revealing a set of white teeth against the grim, rainy night, it made his overall appearance seem exceptionally… unreliable.
His bizarre welcome speech, in particular, made her seriously wonder if she'd just escaped a den of wolves only to land in a lunatic asylum. Compared to the vicious thugs of the Stray Dogs gang, this man posed no immediate threat, but his mental state seemed highly questionable.
Chen Shouzhou paid no mind to Su Wan'er's guarded gaze. He hadn't been this close to another living person in ages, and the reservoir of sarcastic remarks and jokes inside him was about to burst. He continued his "welcome ceremony" like a machine gun: "Don't look at me like that. I'm your savior, you know. Sure, our 'safe house' is a bit rustic at the moment—no water, no power, no Wi-Fi, and a few large holes in the walls for natural ventilation—but the neighborhood is peaceful. See? Just the two of us. Nice and quiet. If you ever get bored, I can tell you some pre-apocalypse jokes. I guarantee they'll make you laugh so hard you'll forget you're hungry."
Su Wan'er continued to stare at him in silence. Then, she slowly raised a hand, pointed to her throat, and shook her head helplessly. She was trying to tell him she couldn't speak, couldn't respond to his enthusiasm.
"Oh, you can't talk?" Chen Shouzhou's eyes widened in realization. He slapped his chest, his grin growing even wider. "No problem! I can make enough noise for the both of us! My list of good qualities is short, but being a chatterbox is at the top. I can talk from Day One of the apocalypse all the way to humanity's return to the moon. From now on, you'll be in charge of listening, I'll be in charge of talking. Perfect division of labor, a pleasure doing business with you!"
Su Wan'er: "..."
She was now certain. There was definitely something wrong with this man's brain. And yet, for some reason, his incessant, goofy chatter and those bright eyes shining in the darkness managed to slightly ease the tension that had gripped her all night. At least he didn't seem malicious.
Chen Shouzhou rambled on about his "grand plan"—to turn this dilapidated warehouse into the strongest, most comfortable, and safest sanctuary in the wasteland. As he spoke, he enthusiastically led Su Wan'er back to the warehouse that had just been the stage for a "great battle."
The Stray Dogs were gone, leaving behind only a mess and the lingering, acrid smell of chili in the air. Chen Shouzhou pointed at the kicked-in iron door and the hole in the roof, spreading his arms as if to embrace the world. His tone was full of passion: "Behold, our future home! With a little renovation, this will be the wasteland's equivalent of a luxury sea-view apartment—even if the view is of a sea of ruins."
Su Wan'er looked at the scene and fell silent once more.
"Ahem, the hardware will get there, slowly but surely," Chen Shouzhou said, not at all embarrassed. He walked to an unremarkable spot on the floor, crouched down, knocked on it, and then beckoned to Su Wan'er with a mysterious air.
He focused his mind and recited silently, "Activate 'Basement Warehouse'!"
A miraculous scene unfolded. The slab of concrete floor seemed to come alive, silently sinking downward to reveal a pitch-black entrance with stairs leading down into the darkness.
Su Wan'er's pupils constricted. For the first time, a look of utter disbelief crossed her face. This was beyond her comprehension, beyond any known technology of the post-apocalyptic world.
"Heh, the landlord's secret stash. Jealous, aren't you?" Chen Shouzhou raised his eyebrows smugly, savoring her shocked expression. "Come on, let me show you our 'deluxe lower-level storage room.' In the future, we'll install password locks, fingerprint scanners, iris scanners—the works!"
The newly unlocked basement warehouse was about twenty square meters, dry and well-ventilated—a perfect storage space in the wasteland. Chen Shouzhou immediately began his "hoarding hamster" routine, moving all the treasures he'd identified with his [Resource Appraisal] skill—the military-grade canned food, the gasoline, the generator—and organizing them neatly inside.
As he worked, he hummed an off-key rendition of a pop song, mumbling to himself: "One case of beef cans, on the left, this is hard currency. Half-barrel of gasoline, far from any ignition source, on the right, this is a strategic asset. Oh, and this wrench—from now on, this is our household's guardian treasure. It needs to be enshrined…"
Su Wan'er silently watched him bustling about. She watched him treat things others would see as junk like a child with a new toy, storing them with immense care. This motor-mouthed madman, it seemed, was genuinely planning for a future. The corners of her tightly pressed lips unconsciously curved into the faintest of smiles, like a snow lotus blooming quietly in the dead of winter—fragile, yet resilient.
However, they were unaware that the danger had not passed.
A few hundred meters from the warehouse, amidst some ruins, Zhao Tie was staring intently at the warehouse through a pair of binoculars, his face so grim it looked like it could drip water. "Dammit. To think there was a tough nut hiding in a damn shack," he spat. "A shame about that girl…"
"Boss, that kid… he's a bit spooky. What was that golden light earlier?" one of his underlings asked, still shaken.
Zhao Tie smacked him on the back of the head. "Spooky my ass! He probably had a flashbang or something! The kid's skinny as a monkey, how tough can he be? He must've used his knowledge of the terrain to play tricks on us! Keep your eyes peeled. Don't let a single fly get out of there!"
He barked orders at the men behind him, "Set up sentries around the perimeter. Don't let them escape! At dawn, we hit them again! I want to see what other tricks he has up his sleeve!"
Night deepened, and the rain stopped.
Just as Chen Shouzhou and Su Wan'er thought they could finally breathe a sigh of relief, a scrawny black dog stealthily approached the warehouse. It was soaked and emaciated, its eyes filled with a mixture of fear and hunger, but it didn't dare get too close.
Chen Shouzhou spotted it. After a moment's thought, he retrieved a bar of compressed biscuit from the basement—a precious treasure he had just acquired—broke it in half, and tossed it over.
The black dog sniffed it hesitantly but was ultimately overcome by hunger and devoured it ravenously.
"From now on, your name is 'Xiao Hei' (Little Black)," Chen Shouzhou said with a grin. "Congratulations, you are now the second tenant and first head of security of this safe house. Guarding the fort is up to you now. Do a good job, and I'll give you a raise—canned bones."
After finishing the biscuit, Xiao Hei didn't leave. Instead, it lay down at the warehouse entrance, staring warily into the darkness. Suddenly, a low growl rumbled in its throat, its fur bristled, and it stared fixedly in one direction.
A chill ran down Chen Shouzhou's spine. He instantly knew something was wrong. He silently gestured to Su Wan'er, pointing at the basement warehouse, signaling her to hide.
A flash of worry crossed Su Wan'er's eyes, but she did as she was told.
Chen Shouzhou grabbed his "guardian treasure"—the rusty wrench—and quietly climbed onto a high shelf, peering outside by the light of the moon.
Several figures were skulking around the warehouse, setting something up. It was Zhao Tie's men! They hadn't gone far; they were setting up sentries!
"Dammit, they just won't give up," Chen Shouzhou cursed under his breath. He didn't make a sound, merely observing their movements, memorizing their positions and numbers. Only after they had finished and left did he climb down.
He knew a fierce battle was inevitable. He walked over to the old generator and muttered, "Alright, old friend, time to get to work." Following the instructions from his [Resource Appraisal] skill, he gave the generator a swift, hard kick in a specific spot.
Whir… whir… CHUG-CHUG-CHUG!
The generator sputtered and then, incredibly, roared to life. A weak current lit up a single, broken lightbulb in the warehouse, its dim yellow glow barely pushing back the darkness. He was deliberately revealing his presence, letting the sentries see someone was still there, hoping it would make them lower their guard and not launch an all-out assault in the middle of the night.
Next, he began to set his second wave of traps. He carefully poured the half-barrel of gasoline along several key paths near the entrance, using strips of cloth as fuses that led back to his hiding spot. After that, he turned off the light, hugged his wrench, and leaned against a pile of crates to rest, leaving only Xiao Hei to keep watch at the door.
Time ticked by. The sky began to pale.
In the darkest hour before dawn, the sentries finally lost their patience. Two figures, shrouded by the morning mist, crept forward, crouching low with machetes in hand, moving stealthily toward the broken main door. They were the scouts Zhao Tie had sent to see if their target had fled.
Xiao Hei shot to its feet with a suppressed growl.
Chen Shouzhou's eyes snapped open. There was no trace of sleep in them, only an icy clarity.
"They're here."
The moment the two scouts stepped into the warehouse, their feet snagged on the tripwires, causing them to stumble.
"It's a trap!" one of them shouted.
But it was too late.
Without a moment's hesitation, Chen Shouzhou flicked his lighter and ignited the fuse beside him. The flame shot forward like a serpent, racing along the trail of gasoline.
WHOOSH—!
A wall of fire erupted at the warehouse entrance, the roaring flames instantly engulfing the two scouts. They were turned into human torches before they could even scream. The blaze lit up the entire area, turning night into day.
The other sentries in the distance saw the sudden inferno and, terrified, scrambled back to report to Zhao Tie.
Before long, Zhao Tie arrived with his remaining men, but they only dared to watch the burning warehouse from afar, too afraid to approach. The wall of fire was like an entrance to hell. They couldn't understand how that scrawny kid could be so ruthless.
After a standoff of nearly half an hour, as the fire began to die down, Zhao Tie's expression grew uglier. He knew the night's assault had been a complete failure, and he had lost two more men. More importantly, the calmness and cunning his opponent had displayed filled him with a sense of dread he had never felt before.
"Fall back!" Zhao Tie roared through gritted teeth, unwilling to concede.
But he wasn't done. He pulled a dagger from his belt and pinned a piece of animal hide to a dead tree near the warehouse. On it, scrawled in charcoal, was a single line: "You're not an ordinary person."
It was both a warning and a challenge.
With that, he and his battered gang disappeared into the morning mist.
The battle, or rather, the one-sided ambush, was over.
Chen Shouzhou waited until he was sure they were gone before emerging from his hiding place. He dusted himself off and walked to the entrance, staring at the two charred corpses, now barely recognizable as human. His stomach churned, but he forced the bile down.
This was the wasteland. It was kill or be killed.
He tore down the note, crumpled it into a ball, and stuck it on the wall as a decoration. "No shit," he muttered. "An ordinary person would already be dead. And you call this handwriting? Pathetic, even for a wasteland illiterate."
He went back inside. Su Wan'er had already come out of the basement and was wiping down a table with a cloth, as if trying to make their "home" a little cleaner.
She looked at him questioningly when he returned.
Forgetting about the note, Chen Shouzhou grinned and formally extended his hand. "I almost forgot the official introduction. Hi, I'm Chen Shouzhou, a librarian dedicated to telling bad jokes in the apocalypse, and now the landlord and future master of this safe house. Welcome!"
Su Wan'er looked at his outstretched hand, then at the sincere, slightly goofy smile on his face. After a moment's hesitation, she finally reached out and gently shook it.
Though she still couldn't speak, her eyes told him everything: Hello, Chen Shouzhou.