The wood crackled in the flames, warm gases filling the small house, the firelight illuminating his profile.
Su Changxing leaned back in his chair, his gaze appearing dazed, wondering if he had overlooked anything after all.
He didn’t have the energy to think about other issues, only how to solve the immediate predicament and stay alive.
At that moment, he was just an ordinary man, except for the memories of before, there was no difference—a frail body and insignificant spirit.
With the sound of the oat bar being chewed, he ate the whole bar, leaned back in his chair, and drifted into a drowsy sleep.
...
"Hiss～"
Su Changxing suddenly opened his eyes, feeling a burst of cold, shivering, the fire in the furnace had died down leaving embers, the room was pitch black, outside it was already night, only faint moonlight pierced through, the sound of wind outside had disappeared too.
He put on his dried outer clothes from the furnace, shivering, tidied up the firewood, stacking it in the fireplace, then tore newspaper into strips and placed them on top, continuously fanning them, trying to use the embers to ignite them.
Only seven matches left in the matchbox, so he needed to save them, otherwise once used up, he’d have to consider methods like rubbing sticks to start a fire.
After several attempts, he reignited the fire in the furnace.
At this moment, he felt exceptionally hungry, and opened the only remaining food: a bag of potato chips. Potato chips are fried and can replenish a lot of energy, and they taste quite good.
Crunch crunch.
The sound of cracking potato chips echoed in the room, Su Changxing ate potato chips while staring at the fireplace blankly, contemplating what to do next.
He definitely couldn’t stay here anymore, or he’d either freeze or starve to death.
It seemed that there should be other humans in this world, as the snacks in the drawer clearly hadn’t expired.
Therefore, as long as he could find other human settlements now, surviving wouldn’t be a difficult task.
As for other issues, they’re considerably complex.
He could see his own appearance through the reflection on the window glass, still maintaining his original look, rather than possessing someone else’s body.
If this body was still the original one, why did it become so frail?
And even if this was just a ordinary world, with his current status, escaping here was almost impossible.
Just an ordinary mortal, surviving is already a very difficult matter.
He felt somewhat powerless, even though he had nearly possessed God-like Power before, facing such situations rendered him helpless.
"Leave when dawn breaks."
He made a decision, knowing the longer he stayed in this empty house, the higher the probability of his death. Although it’s also dangerous to go out in his current state, there’s only this one path.
Su Changxing recalled the notebook in the drawer, turned around to open the drawer, took it out, the cover’s glue had peeled off, and the corner was missing a whole piece, opening it.
Familiar words met his eyes, he recognized them, the handwriting was not pretty but simple and neat.
The notebook roughly recorded hunting routines, the owner was an employee at a can factory, keen on hunting.
The first half wasn’t anything special until one page, the owner of the diary lamented that luckily their place was quite remote,
It seemed to indeed be this way, for several months in a row, the diary’s owner still lived a peaceful life, going hunting with his son every week.
Until he turned to the last page.
"If the guess is correct, this world is also in an apocalypse, which wouldn’t be surprising."
He closed the notebook, his thoughts turned chaotic, what he previously thought seemed optimistic, perhaps only a part of humanity remains in this world, or has been entirely extinct.
And he might die for the same reason.
Contemplating, he closed his eyes and fell asleep again, when he opened his eyes again, the fire in the furnace was still burning, had gotten a bit smaller, faint light came through the window.
"Cough cough～"
Su Changxing felt his throat uncomfortable, coughed lightly twice, picked up the can but found it was already empty.
He hesitated a moment, took the empty can to the door, opened the door, the wind and snow had stopped, it was no longer a world of whiteness, appeared somewhat serene, could see lush mountains and forests in the distance.
This world is clean, beautiful, without those messy things.
"Really cold." He shivered, feeling it was still bearable.
Taking a walk around the house, he discovered a water jar, but it had no water or ice inside, just piled snow.
Su Changxing filled an empty can with snow from the jar, then returned inside, placing the can on the stove.
There was snow everywhere, so he wasn’t worried about dying of thirst; however, the snow water was definitely not clean or safe.
Boiling might help, but there were still significant safety risks.
In his current status, even a minor illness could kill him.
Meanwhile, Su Changxing tore down the curtains, spending about half an hour tearing them into strips, wrapping them around a wooden stick to make a torch.
The torch wasn’t for lighting, but for warmth, to extend the time and distance he could walk in the snow.
Leaving here was quite an adventurous move for him; he might get lost in this forest and freeze to death.
The water in the can was completely boiled, steaming hot; he set it aside for a while, then drank most of it in one go, discarding the rest with more impurities.
Repeating the previous steps, he boiled another can of hot water, but this time he didn’t drink it; instead, he blocked the opening with curtain rags, wrapped the entire can, and placed it in his pocket, feeling the warmth from the can.
This way, he could somewhat keep warm and have a bit of water as a supplement, without needing to directly consume snow water.
Although there was chopped wood in the house, he didn’t find an axe anywhere, which seemed to have been taken by someone before.
Lighting the torch, Su Changxing pushed the door open and hit the road, following the snow-covered path.
Unfortunately, after walking for barely half an hour, the cold wind started blowing; Su Changxing didn’t turn back and kept moving forward. Here was the foot of the mountain; moving further down, he would definitely find inhabited places, like a small town.
The torch extinguished in the cold wind, almost burned out; he tossed it aside without hesitation, shivering as he moved forward.
His stamina was gradually decreasing, his bodily functions deteriorating, his footsteps becoming heavy, and he was gasping for breath.
Finally, a stretch of road appeared below, causing a flurry of emotions; he walked down, onto the road, and saw a car stopped in the distance, covered in white snow.
"Not bad luck!"
Su Changxing sighed with relief, just in need of a rest; it’s warmer inside the car than outside, at least blocking the cold wind, and perhaps he might find something useful.
If the car could run, that would be ideal.
Though he could see it, he walked over twenty minutes to reach the car, noticing a figure sitting in the driver’s seat.
Su Changxing raised an eyebrow and figured it was probably a dead person; this was the first person he’d seen in this world, though not a living one.
Sure enough, as he approached, he saw the person slumped over the steering wheel motionless, with a layer of frost covering their skin.
The car door wasn’t locked, so Su Changxing opened it, dragged the corpse from the driver’s seat and tossed it outside; it was a middle-aged man with deep wrinkles on his forehead, without any visible wounds, seemingly frozen to death, and the corpse hadn’t decayed, clearly not dead for long.
He was wearing thick clothing, including a deep blue down coat and a tight sweater underneath.
Su Changxing unhesitatingly pulled off the down coat from the corpse, rubbing it with snow inside and out, then put it on himself.
He was very cautious, avoiding further contact with the corpse; from previous journal entries, he knew a disease was spreading in this world, and this person might carry the virus. Too much contact with the corpse might lead to infection.
He didn’t want to barely survive only to die from an unknown disease; until he better understood this world, all actions must be cautious.
With the down coat shielding him from the cold, sitting in the car’s passenger seat, he quickly felt much warmer.
The car’s trunk was messy, seemingly rummaged through, leaving nothing useful, except for a small bagged bread left in the corner, half the size of a palm.
Yet for him, it was life-saving; after long hours on the road, he was extremely hungry, his stamina almost depleted, urgently needing food.
Su Changxing devoured the small bread in a few bites, while drinking most of the water from the can.
Then he attempted to start the car, discovering the battery was dead.
But how could the battery be dead when the corpse hadn’t decayed?
"Could it be the battery is broken?"
He thought perhaps this person was driving when the battery failed, leaving them stranded, coincidentally during a snowstorm, eventually freezing to death in the car.
"Looks like you were extremely unlucky too." Su Changxing glanced sideways at the corpse on the road, lamenting.
He didn’t rest in the car for long, deciding to take advantage of the current good weather and continue on the road.
The weather here was quite peculiar; if another storm like yesterday’s occurred, survival was uncertain.
Luckily, he now had a down coat, providing decent protection against the cold, so at least he didn’t need to worry about freezing to death along the road.