Even if hoarding supplies will make him the target of public criticism, Yu Zhiye felt like it was a great idea!

  Especially since he’s got a secret space to hide all his supplies.

  Too bad… when he returned to the store, the three teams had already stationed guards to wall off the aisles.

  On one side: Lackey B, Mob Character C. On the other: Baldie Tae and the timid Mob Character A.

  All of them were giving him unfriendly looks that clearly told him to not get any closer.

  Greed didn’t nerf his IQ.

  Though his actions toed the line and drew plenty of aggro, he will never push anybody to the point of turning murderous, at least not when he lacked the chips to play.

  Safety first. Unless they force him to the point of desperation, there’s no need to cross the bottom lines of these folks.

  Besides, there’s only so many of them. They can’t guard the whole store!

  Avoiding the line-up of guards, Yu Zhiye went around to the beverage fridges.

  Unguarded – almost completely out of their line of sights.

  That worked in his favor.

  Wearing a smile, Yu Zhiye shopped around and sneakily added a few cold drinks to his inventory.

  A can of strawberry milk, a can of orange soda, and even a bottle of Sadorade.

  Yu Zhiye then glanced at the few leftover drinks.

  “Meh. Leave some behind to give them an illusion… where to next? Hmm… I remember there was some apples when I went to grab oranges earlier...”

  GPS: Next destination on the right.

  Passing by the fruit racks, a sleight of hand casually stacked all but one of the apples into his inventory.

  x5 Apples acquired!

  Then, Yu Zhiye acted like nothing happened and casually strutted back with hands behind his back.

  The four-man team of guards all eyed him with suspicious looks, but seeing his empty hands, none bothered making trouble.

  It didn’t take long before he reunited with Jack.

  “Back so soon?” Jack looked Yu Zhiye up and down. “Didn’t grab anything else?”

  Yu Zhiye put on a helpless face and shrugged. “They blocked off access to the aisles.”

  “Yeah? Good thing I went earlier then. Bwahahaha!”

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  “Yep.” Yu Zhiye nodded along then took out three apples and handed them over to Jack. “Here, give these to her later. She seems to like em.”

  “The little missy? Aight, will do.”

  “Cool. Then... Jack, I ma go make myself a quick breakfast before heading out.”

  Jack gave him a thumbs up. “Go for it, Steve.”

  Obviously, what Yu Zhiye said was mostly just an excuse. Where he went? That was obvious.

  Back in his hideout’s shack, all the acquired supplies got dropped off again.

  Now, his pile of living supplies was finally looking somewhat better. At least, he won’t starve or die of thirst in the short term.

  What next? Swap in his fishing loadout: mainly the fishing rod. But there’s a few other supplies on the requirement list.

  “Water, that’s a must. Let’s just… keep one full bottle in inventory. That should be enough for my fishing adventure. Oh, and let’s take the bag of Sindomie along.”

  He’ll be needing that soon.

  “That left four slots. One is for sand, another for stone. So technically two. Hopefully I don’t catch too much junk today.”

  That’s that. Time to go fishing.

  Out through the portal then back in the stalls.

  When he met Jack again, Yu Zhiye casually invited. “Breakfast together? Or…”

  “Haha. Don’t worry bout me, Steve. It’s still early. I’ll do my morning exercises first, then I’ll munch later with the little missy.”

  “Oh, alright. You do you. I ma head out then. I shouldn’t be far. Come find me if anything’s up.”

  “Aight. Be careful out there.”

  There’s no need to say more. The uncle wasn’t an NPC giving quests.

  Squeal…

  The back exit got shoved open. What greeted Yu Zhiye was the desert at sunrise.

  “Oh, what a beautiful sight...”

  The morning glow really gave everything a different feel, even though it was the same sandy dunes, the same rock formations—

  “Huh? Strange…”

  Yu Zhiye felt something was off about the mountainous terrain in the distant, but he couldn’t pinpoint exactly what was wrong.

  “Eh. Must be my eyes playing tricks on me.”

  He didn’t think much about it and got down to business.

  Step out? Nope, not yet. Instead, he took out his bag of instant ramen and started crushing it.

  Crack. Crack. Crack…

  What’s up? Breakfast while watching the sun rise? Nah. He wasn’t that romantic.

  In fact, he didn’t even tear open the bag. It was simply crushing the noodles inside. After that?

  Yu Zhiye gingerly held the bag out then started shaking it hard like a rattle!

  Shak! Shak! Shak!

  Such a loud commotion even attracted the attention of the uncle doing morning push-ups. It goes without saying how effective this was!

  As for what he’s trying to aggro? Wasn’t that obvious?

  Shak! Shak! Shak!

  The longer Yu Zhiye shook the bag, the more nervous he became. He wanted to shrink back his hand so bad!

  But he kept shaking it and shaking it…

  It wasn’t until at least a full five minutes passed before he stopped.

  “Phew. Doesn’t seem like there’s any death angels lurking in the morning.”

  Yu Zhiye stashed the unopened bag of ramen, wiped off his soaked forehead, gave a thumbs up to the uncle behind then bravely stepped out.

  Nothing happened. No jump scares. No sudden death to bring an end to his story.

  “Lucky me. Alright, no time to waste. Let’s use my time wisely while the temperature’s still somewhat cool!”

  Without further ado, Yu Zhiye hurried over to the quicksand zone they discovered yesterday.

  But when he went in that direction, the first thing he noticed was…

  “Huh? Where did all the sand pits I dug out go? Did they get refilled overnight? How?”

  Must’ve been the wind, right?

  Yu Zhiye was somewhat baffled and his every steps became more careful because he lost track of where the quicksand shore was.

  Soon, he arrived at where he estimated the quicksand zone to be.

  “The fishing zone should be ahead.”

  His handy-dandy fishing rod appeared in his hands and the line got cast out just like yesterday, but…

  Today, he was met with silence.

  “Huh? Where’s the kerplunk sound effect?”

  Yu Zhiye realized something was wrong, but he didn’t believe in evil!

  He reeled his line back in, moved a few paces forward, then cast his line out again.

  Silence.

  To the left. Silence. To the right. Silence.

  “No way…” Yu Zhiye stood there, staring blankly at the normal-and-safe sea of sand all around.

  “Where did my fishing spot go?!”