The sudden system notification sound startled Liang Yuan.
He quickly stood up and looked around, finding nothing unusual.
Moments later, he calmed down, with a look of surprise in his eyes.
"System?"
The next moment, a system interface appeared before his eyes.
Host: Liang Yuan
Constitution: 0.8
Power: 0.9
Agility: 0.8
Spirit: 0.7
Mutation Progress: 0%
Points: 1 point
Number of Lotteries: 0
Lottery Items: None
This interface floated in front of his eyes like a layer of transparent fluorescence. He reached out to touch it but felt nothing.
This left Liang Yuan bewildered: "Am I hallucinating?"
He hurriedly checked himself all over, finding nothing wrong. The system interface still displayed in his vision.
After calming himself, Liang Yuan focused his attention on the system.
After a round of research, he roughly understood the function of the system.
It's a lottery system, displaying his physical attributes and allowing him to draw items using points.
However, this lottery required the expenditure of points.
"These points must be the ones the system mentioned when it told me I killed a mutated sardine and earned points."
But Liang Yuan wondered, when did he kill a mutated sardine?
"Let's try a draw."
Feeling nervous, Liang Yuan quickly clicked on the lottery button.
At once, the 1 point quickly disappeared, and a wheel appeared before his eyes.
The wheel was divided into many sections, and a quick glance showed items like bread and soy sauce.
The wheel spun rapidly and completed the lottery process within a blink of an eye.
"Congratulations, you have won a bottle of Lao Gan Ma."
Liang Yuan was momentarily stunned, then his eyes widened as he saw a bottle of Lao Gan Ma in his inventory.
He instantly revealed a look of joy: "It's real!"
With a thought, the bottle of Lao Gan Ma appeared in his hand.
Excitedly, Liang Yuan opened the bottle, and the spicy aroma hit him, making him salivate.
Without hesitation, he dipped a finger and put some in his mouth.
The salty and spicy taste nearly brought him to tears.
After half a year of heavy rain, who knew how long it had been since he had tasted chili.
He constantly worried about food, having been trapped by the flood for half a year, and households long out of food and water.
He had managed this long by storing some ahead of time, but even so, his supplies were running low.
This sudden appearance of a lottery system that could draw food filled him with both surprise and joy.
In this apocalyptic flood, the lottery system appeared like a ray of hope, showing him a glimmer of life.
"As long as I have enough points, I can draw more food!"
"But... these points..."
Liang Yuan frowned, puzzled by the system prompt to kill mutated sardines: "Where did the mutated sardine come from?"
Feeling curious, Liang Yuan quickly checked the kill records through the system.
"A nail you shot was accidentally eaten by a mutated sardine, successfully killing it."
Liang Yuan was stunned. He had only used the nail gun on people who tried to barge into his house, never on fish.
Suddenly, he remembered something, rushed to the window, and looked outside.
The pitch-black sky revealed little.
Torrential rain hit the water's surface, making a loud splattering sound.
Liang Yuan picked up a flashlight and shone it on the water's surface.
From the tenth floor, he saw many floating household items: mattresses, bed boards, foam boxes...
It seemed some had made makeshift boats, tethered to windows outside using ropes.
Apart from the junk, there were also quite a few bloated corpses floating!
Liang Yuan's gaze lingered on the corpses, deep in thought.
"Could it be that someone I injured earlier fell into the water and was eaten by sardines?"
Feeling strange, he realized he had inadvertently killed a mutated sardine?
But then again, a mutated sardine is still a sardine, right?
Sardines live in the sea, so how did one end up here?
"Could sea water have flooded into the Yangtze River and reached Linjiang City?"
The thought caused Liang Yuan to feel a sinking dread.
The situation was dire. If the downpour continued, even living on the 32nd floor wouldn't be safe.
His brows furrowed, puzzled about what 'mutated' sardines meant.
Had sardines begun mutating?
What happened to this world?
Worry filled his heart, and he gazed over the water, deep in thought.
"Linjiang City's elevation is considered quite high here. Few buildings are taller, just a few landmark buildings at the city center."
"No, going to the city center is a death wish. If the rain doesn't stop and the water keeps rising, even landmark buildings will be submerged."
"Where else nearby has higher ground?"
"Sun Mountain? Meishan?"
He quickly considered his options. When the flood began a month ago, he had downloaded offline maps of the whole country and hand-drawn a Linjiang City map, getting a good grasp of its topography.
So he knew which nearby buildings and hills were at higher elevations.
Linjiang City, located in Jiangnan Province, had no lofty mountains. The highest point was Cangqiong Mountain, at 341.7 meters, on the east shore of Taihu Lake.
But it was quite far from Liang Yuan's location, requiring crossing a development zone.
The wild storm outside was unsuitable for travel.
More importantly, during thunder and lightning storms, he spotted huge shadows moving under the water.
"If sardines have mutated, could other sea creatures have mutated too?"
Unless absolutely necessary, Liang Yuan didn't plan to leave Meidu Garden right now.
Suppressing his chaotic thoughts, Liang Yuan turned back to the kitchen, taking out the defrosted meat and green peppers from the sink.
His home had not just an upright refrigerator but also a large freezer.
He hadn't bought this large freezer but rented it.
Originally, it was for stocking popsicles and ice water for himself and the workers during renovations.
He planned to return it after the renovations, but then the heavy rains hit.
So he kept the freezer and stocked up at the nearby supermarket, with items like pork, sausages, vegetables, and tofu.
The upright refrigerator was also filled with things like eggs.
But six months later, with the water level rising, the power system had long collapsed.
The fridge only worked thanks to a portable petrol generator.
Back then, the developer had cut his power, leading him to borrow the generator from a friend.
But now the home was running low on petrol. Though he only ran the fridge a few hours daily, petrol was running out.
Before the water submerged the first floor, he had risked fetching petrol from abandoned vehicles several times, accumulating enough to last half a year.
"Once this batch of petrol runs out, there's no chance of getting more."
Looking at the vast waters outside, Liang Yuan sighed. The generator was useful, but in these conditions, getting more petrol seemed impossible.
"Oh well, it doesn't matter. The food in the fridge is almost gone anyway."
He felt a twinge of loss but quickly accepted it.
Without supplies, the fridge was just an ornament.
Initially, he had tried to gather more supplies.
But by then, the second floor was flooded, and the underground garage had become a whirlpool.
Some had mistakenly been swept into the garage, never to return.
Witnessing this, Liang Yuan had decisively retreated, surviving on his stockpiles by rationing.
But even so, his supplies were dwindling, and the outlook was grim.
As he sliced the meat, Liang Yuan mentally inventoried his remaining supplies.
"Oil, salt, sauces, I'm good on those, I've got plenty left from the boxes I bought."
"But meats and vegetables are running low, and soon I'll be out."
"Still have four bags of rice, a decent amount of grains, and five sacks of flour."
He glanced at a corner with the remaining rice, only four bags left. He had initially brought back ten 10kg bags.
Back then, the crowds made it hard to buy more. Getting those ten bags was thanks to knowing the store owner.
Many couldn't get any at all.