Chapter 1

In my last life, a friend I’d trusted for ten years drove a knife into my heart over a single biscuit. When I opened my eyes again, we had both been reborn—right before the extreme freeze arrived.

He was convinced the apocalypse had come. He borrowed from loan sharks, rented a massive warehouse to hoard supplies, and even crowned himself king during the icebound period, killing without mercy.

But he didn’t know the truth:

This disaster would end completely after only thirty days.

While he taunted me like a madman, I didn’t expose him. I calmly requested thirty days of paid leave from my company.

This time, I’ll sit in a warm, climate-controlled room and watch—when the state machine restarts on day thirty—how he drops to his knees and sobs in despair.

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The agony of a cold blade shredding my heart jolted me awake.

The screech of a hunting knife grinding against my ribs still seemed to be ringing inside my ears.

I gasped like a dying fish. Cold sweat soaked through my silk pajamas as both hands clamped over my chest—whole, uninjured.

I wasn’t dead?

The bone-deep wind of New York’s apocalypse—Day Seven—still felt like it was raging in my joints.

Before I could make sense of anything, the smart lock in the living room chirped: beep—code accepted. Then bang—my best friend of ten years, Luke, stormed in like a startled beast and immediately slammed the door shut, locking it behind him.

His eyes were bloodshot. His gray-blue pupils pinned my face with paranoid vigilance. Even his breathing came out tight—urgent, crazed.

“Bro, it’s bad. Two days from now, 3 p.m., the sky turns blood-red and the extreme freeze hits.” He lowered his voice, fast and biting.

That precise timestamp struck my nerves like thunder.

He’d reborn too.

“The temperature drops straight to minus fifty Celsius. All comm networks go down. Outside becomes a literal meat grinder.”

Luke stepped closer, staring into my eyes for any flicker—any tell.

He was testing me with details from the last life. If I showed recognition, he’d treat me as the biggest variable and strike first.

Last life, it was this same man—who knew my door code, who swore we’d share supplies—who stabbed the knife into my chest for half a moldy oat biscuit.

Killing intent rolled through my blood like boiling surf. My nails dug into my palm.

I bit the tip of my tongue, using pain to crush the crimson rising in my eyes.

“Luke, are you out of your mind?” I shot up, slapped a hand to his forehead, and put on anxious shock. “It’s summer on the East Coast. Minus fifty? What—did Wall Street overtime fry your brain? Watching too many disaster movies?”

My hand shook—not from fear, but from barely restraining the urge to snap his neck.

“I’m not joking!” Luke smacked my hand away. But his shoulders—tight as a bowstring—collapsed in that instant.

A flash of undisguised contempt passed through his eyes, like he was looking at a dead man who didn’t know it yet.

It was pity from above. He’d stopped worrying whether I was “one of him.”

“Idiot—believe it or don’t.” He shoved me hard, playing the angry friend. “Quit your job. Sell this Manhattan apartment cheap. Take the money and come hoard in the suburbs with me. If you don’t, you won’t even know how you die.”

I staggered back on purpose, stuttering and waving my hands, face full of panic.

“Stop messing around. I still owe a ton on this mortgage! No job means no payments. You’re losing it—go drink an iced Americano and calm down!”

“Short-sighted trash.” Luke sneered and turned for the entryway. “Fine. Don’t come crying on your knees later!”

He slammed the door and left.

The thunderous impact didn’t just end our ten-year friendship—it rang the bell on his destruction countdown.

As his footsteps faded, my “panic” vanished, replaced by pure ice.

When he turned to leave, a folded piece of paper slid from his half-open jacket pocket and fell soundlessly onto the Persian rug by the door.

I walked over and picked it up.

A copy of a loan-shark collateral contract.

The lender wasn’t a federal bank—it was a notorious Brooklyn mob money shop. Luke had mortgaged his only standalone house at full value for two million dollars in cash, at a savage interest rate.

This lunatic’s understanding of the apocalypse contained a fatal miscalculation.

Last life, Luke died on Day Twenty-Nine of the deep freeze.

He never knew that on the evening of Day Thirty, the disaster would end like an illusion—gone completely.

He truly believed this short, extreme calamity was a permanent carnival of lawlessness. He believed federal law would never return.

Staring at the ink-black terms, I didn’t intend to warn him.

I laughed out loud in the empty living room.

Stop him? Persuade him? No—too cheap.

I opened my phone, went into my company HR system, and typed with calm precision. I wanted to watch him tie his own neck into the noose.

I selected the dates and requested the full thirty days of paid leave I’d saved up. In the notes field, I couldn’t even be bothered to type more than one word:

“Vacation.”

Click. Submit.

My manager’s instant approval email popped up, smooth as if scripted.

Outside, sunlight was bright. Manhattan traffic still roared. The world still ran normally.

I lifted a glass of iced water and drained it. The cold slid down my throat, watering the seed of revenge in my chest.

Luke—go ahead. Take that death-money and floor it.

Thirty days from now, at the end of the disaster, I’ll sit and watch you shatter.