Socially Anxious Girl Starts Hoarding Before the Apocalypse

Chapter 13

Wen Qian got up early to finish dinner after the end of the holiday, moved her computer downstairs to the coffee table, and went online to download videos.

Wen Qian even shopped online for some USB drives, transferring things she had previously downloaded on her computer, as she was not very good with computers and had not deleted the movies and TV shows she had downloaded before.

Thinking that she might not have the chance in the future, Wen Qian even planned to buy a DVD player, one that could play discs and plug in USB drives.

Although they have been mostly phased out now, they can still be bought online, and the prices are not expensive either.

Wen Qian shopped on her mobile phone while listening to news broadcasts, buying charging flashlights commonly used in rural areas, and hand-cranked flashlights. She placed orders for home solar panel boards.

Now even slightly larger villages or road junctions in the countryside have installed solar street lights.

Wen Qian also ordered several radios for herself, some hand-cranked, some solar-powered.

The next day when Wen Qian woke up, she had been having fewer and fewer dreams recently. She was busy hoarding things, which consumed too much energy, and she had been sleeping very soundly every day.

Whether she dreamed or not, Wen Qian was worried. But there was no solution to the anxiety and fear, the only thing that could alleviate it was to make preparations to the best of her ability.

Once she started work, Wen Qian did not stop except to go to the bathroom and drink water. Her colleagues said she was too diligent, sometimes even calling her but she could not hear.

Amidst many distractions, Wen Qian felt it was a good thing that she could still stay focused, although she felt her eyes and cervical spine were not so good after staring at the computer screen for so long.

Especially her cervical spine, sometimes when working overtime she would feel dizzy. There were employees who had started the company with the boss. One of them could no longer get out of bed due to cervical spine problems.

To avoid having this kind of problem when she got older, Wen Qian could only put reminders on post-its to get up and move around every now and then, but the effect was limited.

Work time passed quickly. At lunch, a male colleague next to her lamented the dire situations in foreign news as he looked at his phone.

"Last year's wildfires are only being extinguished now? I don't think they're extinguished, there's just nothing left to burn now."

The female colleague next to him also shook her head: "You probably haven't seen the latest news yet. There's another new fire somewhere else. It feels like they never stop."

"It feels like there are particularly many disasters this year?"

"No, it was like this before too, you just didn't pay too much attention. Disasters happen on Earth every day."

Wen Qian listened to everyone and nodded, "That's true, if you search, things like this happen every year. It's just that our environment is relatively peaceful, but natural disasters are still quite common every year."

"The power of nature is not something humans can fight against. Glacier melting and abnormal climate is very common now."

Everyone agreed with what she said. The speed of environmental degradation was intensifying. In the past, protecting the environment was just propaganda and advocacy, but now people could feel the fragility of the environment.

Speaking of which, they talked about how foreigners would go crazy hoarding toilet paper whenever a disaster struck, which colleagues found quite amusing.

Chinese people hoarded food first, while some foreigners hoarded toilet paper first. Anyway, hoarding something was the right thing to do.

Taking this opportunity while they were talking, Wen Qian asked colleagues what they would hoard. An enthusiastic female hoarder said she would buy all kinds of things during the two major shopping festivals every year.

Grains, snacks, tissues and so on.

Some people would hoard rice, flour, oil - habits left over from the days of staying silently at home a few years ago.

Mentioning this, everyone reacted that they did not use to hoard much before, and would even feel their family members' hoarding habits were not good.

But after that incident, everyone became more disaster-conscious, and those family members who liked hoarding finally stood tall and were affirmed by their families.

Wen Qian also said she liked hoarding things herself, it made her feel less anxious.

Some colleagues felt there was no need to hoard too many things, or they would expire.

They went from talking about environmental deterioration, to the end of the world, then from the end of the world to migrating planets, and finally to aliens.

Regarding the apocalypse, some colleagues joked that if that day really came, not having to go to work would be pretty good.

Wen Qian felt that if such a day really came, she would definitely want everything to go back to the way it was before.

Wen Qian had finished her meal. She was a little interested in her colleagues talking about finding a new home, and decided to go home and check if there were any related documentaries to watch.

Humans rose on this planet, but also destroyed and eroded everything on it like cancer cells, perhaps they would self-destruct one day.

If she was not afraid of being considered crazy or being taken away, she really wanted to tell everyone that disasters would really happen.

It was just that she could not say it. She had also typed out the things about her dreams on the computer before, but did not have the courage to post them.

She was worried people would not believe her and mock her. She was also worried people would believe her, which could expose her.

Wen Qian decided she would first see if anyone else posted similar posts. With so many people in the world, there must be some who were worried like her.

Imagined things must have at least some basis in reality. There must be similar people with similar concerns, right?

Wen Qian decided to post when she got home today.

After work, while Wen Qian was waiting for the bus, she checked the delivery path of her packages to see where her things had arrived.

Wen Qian had already attracted the attention of the staff at the delivery station near her residence because she had so many packages. They would call to remind her how many had arrived that day.

Fortunately, Wen Qian used separate addresses for her three shopping apps, otherwise it would be even more eye-catching if they were all in one place.

Wen Qian would be leaving in the future. Even if she bought a lot of things now and was remembered, it did not matter.

Not revealing one's wealth was something Wen Qian had been taught since she was very young.

From primary school to university, almost every school Wen Qian attended had thieves. The thieves were never caught, so Wen Qian was very careful about preventing theft.

Thieves were not necessarily poor, some were addicted, some found it thrilling, some felt their things were not as good as others' so they stole them.

In primary school coins from the drawer may have gone missing, or a newly purchased protractor disappeared.

In middle school a newly bought padded jacket hanging in the hallway was taken away.

In university everyone in the dorm had their laptops stolen, and high quality fitted sheets hanging outside were sometimes stolen too.

The more Wen Qian thought about it, the more she felt she should buy more tools for self defense.

Things that could be used for self defense all had a certain lethal capability, so they were basically prohibited from being sold both in physical stores and online.

Whenever Wen Qian saw officials confiscating knives, guns and the like, she found it incredible. There were even machine guns, mortars and other weapons turned in by the public.

She did not know how all these people obtained them. Could they really all have been family heirlooms?

But in any case, Wen Qian had to prepare tools for self defense.

This had to go from plan to execution.