Chapter 77: The Woman Who Came to Drink Coffee
Song Yuqing hurriedly checked her spatial storage, and sure enough, the items she had purchased in her dream filled the void to the brim.
“What do you mean by that?” Liu Xiaona tilted her head and asked cautiously.
If what Master Fu said was true, and Song Yuqing truly had no recollection of entering her storage, then the manager was practically sleepwalking.
Looking thoroughly confused, Song Yuqing began unloading the mountain of supplies from her space, stacking them until they filled the open floor of the God’s Supermarket. Liu Xiaona, Gaha, and Little Meat Bun all stared at her with deep, concerned eyes.
“Have you just been too exhausted lately, manager? Maybe you forgot you actually bought all this?”
Song Yuqing shook her head. Why would she be exhausted? Liu Xiaona and Gaha did most of the heavy lifting around here. She felt more like a passive mascot than Little Meat Bun did. Still, she had been acting strangely lately—not growing physically or mentally, but constantly plagued by a weak, heavy sleepiness. However, after that long nap, she finally felt completely refreshed.
“Hey, why do you always buy such useless junk?” Master Fu scolded in her mind.
Song Yuqing looked up at the ceiling, her brow furrowing. Useless?
“How can you call this stuff useless? There’s food and drink everywhere! Medicines and weapons, too! They’re incredibly practical!” Liu Xiaona countered, reaching out to sort through the pile. She clearly felt Master Fu was being entirely unreasonable.
“Are these really useless? Then what exactly am I supposed to bring back?” Song Yuqing muttered, recalling the endless rows of shelves from her dream. Most of them had been stocked with these exact necessities.
Master Fu let out a heavy sigh. “You simply bypassed the things that actually matter.”
“But looking at the bright side, I really did infiltrate that parallel world through a dream, right?”
“Yes. Once the crew hit the milestone of three thousand zombie souls, I upgraded the abilities of every employee in the God’s Supermarket,” Master Fu declared proudly. “Your spatial attribute has leveled up again.”
Song Yuqing frowned. Accessing her storage in a dream state was considered an evolutionary leap? Why did she feel like she was losing the ability to enter the space on her own terms?
“Wait, did I get an upgrade too? How come I don’t feel any different?” Liu Xiaona asked, her round eyes wide with curiosity.
“Only one way to find out.”
Unable to contain her excitement, Liu Xiaona focused her energy and manifested a small stream of water. Following Master Fu’s silent instructions, she gradually cranked up the output until the fluid rapidly crystallized into sharp icicles.
“From now on, you don’t just drench people—you can freeze them solid.”
Song Yuqing reached out to touch the frost emanating from Liu Xiaona’s palm, a sudden chill running down her spine.
“Gaha! Gaha! Gaha-gaha!” Gaha and Little Meat Bun grinned eagerly, pointing to themselves. What about us?
“You two have received a massive baseline spike to your speed and physical strength.”
Gaha and Little Meat Bun’s eyes instantly lit up.
“One is a high-tier sentient zombie, and the other is a fully maxed-out mutant beast. What more do you two want?” Master Fu grumbled under his breath.
Song Yuqing fondly ruffled the fur on their heads. These two really were adorable. “Alright, let’s get back to work. Time to get these goods onto the shelves.”
Liu Xiaona was already a blur of motion, huffing and puffing as she organized the sprawling inventory on the floor. Driven by a sudden impulse, Song Yuqing stepped up and placed a hand flat against Liu Xiaona’s back, causing the girl to instantly break out in goosebumps.
When Liu Xiaona raised her head, she was no longer in the supermarket. She was standing inside a long, pitch-black corridor lined with heavy iron doors on either side.
“See? People can actually enter my space now!” Song Yuqing’s voice drifted in from somewhere far away, carrying a heavy, hollow echo.
Liu Xiaona went rigid, not daring to move a single inch. “Let me out! It’s way too dark in here!”
The second the words left her mouth, she flashed right back into the main lobby of the God’s Supermarket. “Incredible…”
“If we ever run into an inescapable crisis, I can pull all of you into my storage to keep you safe,” Song Yuqing said with a reassuring smile.
“Pfft! Don’t jinx us!” Liu Xiaona chided playfully, turning back to her sorting.
Gaha and Little Meat Bun diligently carried the organized crates over to the aisles, carefully following Song Yuqing’s directions to ensure everything landed in its proper retail category.
Engrossed in their tasks, none of them noticed the figure quietly tiptoeing outside the storefront window.
“Ahem… Excuse me. I’d like to purchase a cup of coffee.”
A tall woman wearing a thick face mask stood awkwardly at the threshold of the God’s Supermarket. She held a thick hemp rope, trailing a line of five captured zombies hitched to the end. Her voice sounded deeply bizarre, carrying an unnatural, highly unpleasant falsetto twang.
Song Yuqing studied her from head to toe. She swore she wasn’t the type to judge based on appearances, but this particular customer radiated an indescribable, unsettling strangeness.
“Coming right up!” Liu Xiaona called out. She stepped forward, effortlessly took the leash from the woman’s hand, and tossed it toward the security vortex.
Ding~ Five primary zombies processed.
Eligible for fifty rations, ten medical units, five equipment pieces, or…
The woman cut the automated prompt off impatiently. “Coffee. I asked around—five zombies buys a cup of coffee.”
“That’s correct,” Song Yuqing replied with a polite, professional nod.
“Gaha.” Gaha blinked, gesturing for the guest to follow her up to the second floor. Still feeling a bit uneasy, Song Yuqing trailed a few paces behind them.
As they ascended the staircase, the woman swayed her hips with an exaggerated, aggressive posture, made all the more prominent by the tight pencil skirt she wore. Song Yuqing practically had to look away. It had been an incredibly long time since she had encountered someone with such an eccentric, baffling aesthetic.
The moment they stepped into the café, before Song Yuqing could even begin her standard introductory pitch, the woman marched straight behind the water bar. She grabbed a clean glass and held it directly beneath one of the automated taps.
“Oh? You already know how the system works?” Song Yuqing asked, genuinely surprised. Had this woman somehow caught a glimpse of their broadcast promo too?
“I’ve asked around,” the woman replied, her eyes crinkling into a squint as she smiled behind her mask. She tapped her fingers rhythmically against the counter, selecting a fire-attribute roast from the interface while she waited for the cup to fill.
“Where are you from?” Song Yuqing asked conversationally.
“The next town over.”
“Wow, is our God’s Supermarket already drawing a crowd from the neighboring territory?” Song Yuqing asked automatically, though her brow instantly furrowed. The next town over? She walked all that way through the wasteland wearing a restrictive skirt that blocks her stride?
The second the tap cut off, the woman snatched up the cup, spun around, and leaned her back against the bar, pointing her face away from Song Yuqing and Gaha as she drank.
Song Yuqing exchanged a swift look with Gaha, who silently slunk around to the woman’s flank to get a better look at her face. Anticipating the move, the customer slammed the empty glass down, swiftly hooked her mask back over her nose, and turned away.
Gaha: “…”
“Delicious. I’ll definitely be back,” the woman mumbled, immediately making a beeline for the stairs. Song Yuqing and Gaha hurried down after her.
“Wait a moment!” Song Yuqing called out, reaching a hand to lightly pat her shoulder, but the woman executed a smooth, clever pivot to dodge the contact.
“Is there a problem?” the woman asked, her eyes crinkling into that masked smile again.
“It’s just… hunting zombies in an outfit like that can’t be very practical, right?” Song Yuqing pointed directly at the tight skirt.
“I happen to like it. Besides, didn’t your shop rules state that customers are free to dress however they please?”
Our rules?
The knot in Song Yuqing’s stomach tightened. Everyone loved looking their best, but this was a brutal apocalypse where survival was the absolute bottom line. Even if the neighboring territory had somehow escaped the worst of the cataclysm, a survivor wouldn’t just wander the wastes dressed like a catalog model.
Choosing not to press her, Song Yuqing silently escorted her down to the first floor.
“By the way… do you sell the protective suits you’re wearing? Are they genuinely zombie-proof?” the woman asked, pausing right at the exit.
Song Yuqing looked down at her own system hazard suit and gave a firm nod.
The woman’s eyes sparked with a sudden, intense excitement. “Excellent! I’ll be back to buy one very soon!”
As the exclamation left her mouth, her artificial falsetto slipped completely, revealing a rough, deep, unmistakably masculine baritone.
Realizing the blunder, the customer instantly clipped her voice back into a strained pitch. “I will be back to buy one very soon.”
Without waiting for a response, she spun around and bolted down the alley, entirely indifferent to the heavy blocks of ice pelting her shoulders.
“Well, whoever that was certainly has thick skin,” Song Yuqing muttered, sticking her tongue out at the retreating figure.
“So… I take it that guest means trouble?” Liu Xiaona asked, looking up from her crates.
Song Yuqing shook her head slowly. “That wasn’t just any guest. If I’m not mistaken, that was the Grand Seer himself—Wan Youzhi.”
