Chapter One

After the extreme cold apocalypse arrived, to snatch the half-pack of shriveled crackers I had left, my ex-girlfriend Sarah didn't hesitate to kick me into an abyss, leading to my death.

But I didn't actually die—I was reborn seventy-two hours before the extreme cold apocalypse descended.

My phone on the table suddenly lit up with an incoming message.

[Sarah: Jason, that limited edition Chanel bag costs eight thousand dollars. Transfer the money to me immediately. Otherwise, forget about this weekend's date. I won't go out with a broke loser who can't even afford this.]

Looking at those familiar words, a cold smile curved at the corner of my mouth.

In my previous life, I had maxed out my credit cards like a tail-wagging dog to satisfy her bottomless pit of demands, only to be betrayed to death by her own hands during the apocalypse.

Seeing that I hadn't "instantly replied" with a transfer screenshot as usual, Sarah's voice call came through immediately.

"Jason! Are you deaf? How dare you not reply to my message!" As soon as the call connected, Sarah's shrill voice pierced my eardrums. "My patience is limited! If you can't deliver that bag to me today, we're breaking up! You'll never get to touch me again!"

I felt no anger, and was too lazy to waste any emotion on someone who would soon be dead.

Action always takes priority over meaningless arguments.

"Sarah," my voice was as calm as a block of ice, carrying an oppressive force that made it hard to breathe. "Your monetization period as a gold-digger has officially ended. Go find the next stray dog on the street willing to provide for you—provided you can survive this weekend."

Before the shrieking could start on the other end, I decisively pressed the hang-up button and blocked her number and all her social media accounts without hesitation.

Severing this fatal attachment, only one absolute goal remained in my mind: survive, and survive with crushing superiority over everything else.

I quickly opened my mobile banking app and entered a string of passwords.

This was the seven-million-dollar trust fund my grandfather had left me, originally restricted until I turned thirty, which I now forcibly unlocked using the emergency clause.

Looking at the string of zeros in my account balance that made my blood surge, a sense of grasping destiny by the throat arose spontaneously.

Ten minutes later, I grabbed my car keys, leaped into my black Ford Raptor pickup, and headed straight for the city's largest "Blackstone Survivalist Outdoor Equipment Store."

The store owner was dozing behind the counter.

I slapped a black card onto the glass counter.

"No nonsense. Clear out your warehouse for me." I stared into the owner's dazed eyes and gave my order. "All extreme survival rations with shelf lives over five years! Every piece of professional polar cold-weather gear in the store! Emergency antibiotics, wilderness water purification tablets—load them by the box!"

"Sir... are you sure?" The owner swallowed.

I tapped the black card coldly. "Add a full ton of the highest-proof bourbon whiskey! Load everything onto my truck within thirty minutes. One minute over, and I'm going to the next store."

Money transformed into the most efficient execution power at that moment.

Dozens of employees ran frantically between shelves. Boxes of supplies flowed like water into my truck bed.

Swipe the card, sign, all in one smooth motion.

Looking at my fully loaded arsenal of hardcore supplies, the pent-up frustration in my chest was swept clean. I jumped into the driver's seat and dialed the number I had blocked for three whole years.

In my previous life, I had treated my parents' frantic stockpiling of supplies and reinforcing the basement with steel plates as persecution complex, even moved out and completely cut ties with them over it.

But these old folks who even installed blast nets in the sewers were the true prophets.

"Speak." The call connected, and my dad Bill's voice was still rough and rigid.

"Old man, a polar vortex is coming to North America." My words came rapid-fire as I floored the accelerator. "Take Helen immediately and go to that abandoned mine on the back side of the Rockies where you stockpiled all those cans. I'm bringing supplies back right now."

Two seconds of dead silence on the other end.

If this were a normal family, there would definitely be half an hour of questioning, crying, or explanations. But facing these two ultimate survivalist maniacs, there was no such wasteful talk.

"You little punk, you finally stopped treating your old man like a lunatic?" On the other end, not only did my dad show no doubt, but he let out a heavy sigh of relief and released an extremely excited laugh. "I told you that abnormal air pressure was building up to something big! Your mom and I are already at the mine. Helen just started up the heavy-duty generator in the underground shelter, and the perimeter surveillance network is fully online."

"Good." I couldn't help but smile.

"You have one hour to get your ass back here." Bill barked the order loudly. "Otherwise, I'm welding that half-meter-thick reinforced steel blast door shut, and I won't care if you freeze into a popsicle outside."

Forty minutes later, the elevation kept climbing.

The abandoned mine at the end of my sight gradually revealed its menacing full appearance. In the clearing in front of the mine's blast door, my bear-sized father was chomping on half a thick cigar, holding a heavy demolition axe in his hand.

On the observation platform nearby, my mom Helen with her sharp short hair was setting up rows of heavy recurve bows and cold-resistant barbed wire on the defense line.

Seeing my pickup truck bed almost sinking from the weight of supplies, Helen broke into a fierce smile. "Well done, kid! You finally understand us."

"Knowing how to stockpile—you've finally got some of your old man's blood." Bill exhaled a puff of smoke and slapped the truck body hard.

I smiled knowingly and jumped down from the truck.

From this second on, all the estrangement from my previous life vanished without a trace. Our family's apocalypse "survival iron triangle" alliance was officially formed.

Just as the last item of supplies was moved into the bunker, the sky suddenly changed dramatically.

The originally clear sky was splashed with thick ink like fresh blood, an eerie dark red instantly devouring the horizon.

The car's shortwave radio crackled with the weather station's alarm, distorted by severe interference: "Warning... highest-level extreme cold vortex has breached the stratosphere... temperature plummeting catastrophically... evacuate... evacuate immediately..."

Wind speed soared to hurricane levels within minutes. The disaster's arrival was even earlier than my memories from rebirth. The extreme cold countdown: only three hours remaining!

"Time to close the door!"

Bill roared and slammed down the red master control button on the wall.

Accompanied by deafening mechanical bearing friction, the half-meter-thick reinforced steel blast door at the mine entrance slowly descended behind me and completely sealed.

Outside this heavily fortified steel fortress, a true absolute zero human hell was about to descend.

Sarah, who had lost my monthly support and didn't even have a decent cold-weather coat, I wondered what degrading posture she would assume to barely survive in this blizzard capable of freezing North America's entire power grid?