Apocalypse: I'm Bound to a Mobile Lottery Shop

Chapter 34: Chapter 34: Convenience Store

The two of them walked in side-by-side. The glass room wasn’t large, about twenty square meters.

It was completely empty. The sun shone in through the glass, casting their shadows on the floor where they overlapped.

Lily Hart leaned close to Frost Shaw and said, "Check your Light Brain and see if there’s an app for the convenience store."

Frost Shaw did as she said and opened his Light Brain. Sure enough, a new app had appeared on the main screen called "Lily Hart’s Convenience Store."

’So direct.’

Frost Shaw pursed his lips. His finger twitched, and for a fleeting moment, he had the urge to uninstall the app.

But he subconsciously tapped it open anyway. A milky-white background filled the Light Brain’s screen, and then an image of the glass room popped up.

Lily Hart curiously reached out and swiped at the screen, discovering it could be rotated a full 360 degrees without any blind spots.

On the side was a column of small icons: Floor Tiles, Counter, Shelves, and so on...

’This is a lot like the management sims I used to play in the 21st century,’ she thought. ’I can decorate the convenience store however I want.’

Frost Shaw figured the most important thing for a convenience store was shelves. You couldn’t just have products scattered messily on the floor, right?

He tapped the shelves icon, and all sorts of styles popped up—two-tiered, three-tiered, single-sided, double-sided, they had everything.

Frost Shaw was dazzled by the options. Suddenly, a fair-skinned hand appeared over the Light Brain, and she tapped the screen a few times.

She set the price range to the lowest possible value. Then, Lily Hart said nonchalantly, "Go ahead and pick."

After Lily Hart’s adjustment, the display immediately became much plainer, with even the colors becoming monotonous.

He glanced at the prices: between 10 and 100 points. Frost Shaw clicked his tongue. ’Points?’ he wondered. ’Can I exchange Crystal Cores for them?’

Right on cue, Lily Hart presented Fortune, a smile on her face as she urged him on, "Hurry up. No middleman to take a cut."

Frost Shaw understood. He silently took out his Crystal Cores. Thinking about all the other things he’d need to set up, he fed about ten Level 1 Crystal Cores into it before stopping.

After he was done, he instinctively looked at the points balance in the top right corner of the "Lily Hart’s Convenience Store" app.

’Great, 650 points,’ he thought. ’If I’m careful, this should be enough... right?’

Feeling the pressure of his limited points, Frost Shaw chose two four-tiered, sheet-metal shelves from the lower-to-mid price range.

’We won’t have many products at first, so we don’t need that many shelves,’ Frost Shaw thought, his gaze landing on Fortune.

He asked tentatively, "Where did you... buy that?"

Lily Hart looked down. SWISH! She placed an order instantly, then held up a payment QR code and said matter-of-factly, "Twenty points each."

Before Frost Shaw could even say anything, he saw her holding a Lucky Cat in each hand, both of them identical in style.

He resigned himself to his fate, scanned the code to pay, and resentfully snatched the Lucky Cat from her hands, hugging it to his chest.

His slightly boyish face was expressionless, feigning indifference, yet he was clutching a ridiculously cartoonish Lucky Cat.

The whole scene was just so comically out of place. Lily Hart quietly took a few steps back and used her Light Brain to snap a picture.

CLICK! The Light Brain’s camera shutter was surprisingly loud, and it came with a powerful flash.

Frost Shaw looked over, his eyes fixed on her. The scene fell silent for a moment before Lily Hart laughed it off, saying, "I was taking a picture of the glass."

Frost Shaw pursed his lips, turned slightly, and moved the shelves he had just bought out of the app.

He was about 1.83 meters tall, and the shelves reached his shoulders. Made of sheet metal with four tiers, they looked decent enough.

He placed the two shelves back-to-back and positioned them vertically to the left of the entrance.

After setting up the shelves, Frost Shaw looked around, trying to see what else was needed, but he caught sight of Lily Hart in the corner, playing with the cat.

’Boss Hart never takes anything seriously.’

Frost Shaw looked away, but the gentle profile of her face appeared in his mind’s eye, the faint smile on her lips as she played with the little cat impossible to ignore.

"Boss Hart, when are we opening?" Frost Shaw walked over and squatted down beside her, making small talk.

Lily Hart raised a hand, and a light screen appeared before her. She opened the calendar, glanced at it, and said casually, "Tomorrow, I guess."

’If it’s tomorrow, then why are you even looking at a calendar? Hello?’

Frost Shaw was a little speechless, but given Boss Hart’s usual intimidating presence, he didn’t dare say anything or ask any questions. He could only nod and agree.

Lily Hart thought he had finished setting everything up. She turned to look, only to see just two sheet-metal shelves.

’They’re just standing there in the middle of the glass room, all sad and lonely. It’s too crude.’

Lily Hart turned back and glared at him. "This is it? What have you been doing? You just added two shelves? You plan on opening for business like this?"

"It’s enough," Frost Shaw said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

She stood up, walked around the shelves twice, then put her hands on her hips and surveyed the area.

"There’s no counter. Where do you plan to ring people up? There’s no freezer. Don’t you want a cold drink in this summer heat?" Lily Hart asked, bewildered.

"Expensive," Frost Shaw uttered a single word.

Lily Hart was left speechless. It was a very practical problem. She patted Frost Shaw’s shoulder earnestly and said, "Young man, you..."

She couldn’t bring herself to lecture him, because she was a penny-pincher herself.

She changed the subject. "Fine, we’ll decorate properly when we have money. You hear me? Don’t ruin my, Lily Hart’s, good name."

Frost Shaw nodded obediently and held out his hand to her. "The goods."

Lily Hart had a moment of realization. She turned her back, opened her Light Brain, scrolled to the "Expiring Soon" category, then turned back around and said, "Go ahead and pick from here."

Frost Shaw leaned in, getting close to the light screen. For a moment, the two of them were quite close.

She flicked her hand, pushing the light screen a little closer to him to make it easier for him to see.

The "Expiring Soon" section mostly contained food and daily necessities, but they were all items with long shelf lives, like bread, crackers, ham, and pre-packaged meals. There was no fast food or anything that needed to be cooked on the spot.

As Frost Shaw browsed, he couldn’t help but be amazed. It was all so cheap. If the conversion rate was one Crystal Core to fifty points...

...he wasn’t sure how much the sack of Crystal Cores in his personal storage could buy here, but it was probably enough to feed him for years.

At this thought, Frost Shaw suddenly grew serious. "Boss Hart, don’t let anyone else see this page. Otherwise, it could get you killed."

But then he remembered Boss Hart’s miraculous abilities. ’If she didn’t want them to, other people probably couldn’t even get close to her.’

Frost Shaw looked down again at her slender arm, which was right in front of him. ’If I wanted to,’ he thought, ’I could silently freeze her into an ice sculpture right now.’

The thought flashed through his mind, and Frost Shaw startled himself. How could he have such a despicable thought about Boss Hart?

Lily Hart reached out and smacked him on the back of the head. Due to their height difference, she had to stand on her tiptoes, looking for all the world like an impatient older sister scolding her brother. "Hurry up and look," she chided.

Frost Shaw snapped back to reality. He rubbed the back of his head, his lips twitching into a slight pout as he resignedly returned his attention to the light screen.

He chose several items that were relatively scarce in the apocalypse: bottled water, crackers, bread, sausage links, crispy instant noodles, ramen cups, and so on...

They were all things that were non-perishable and popular in the apocalypse—items you could eat right away when you were hungry.

If you were out on a mission in the wilderness, being able to eat a bowl of hot ramen after a long, tiring day was a godsend.

Frost Shaw didn’t buy too much at once, afraid it wouldn’t sell. He bought thirty bottles of water and only twenty of everything else.

Lily Hart leaned in to see his selections. They were reasonable, with prices that were neither too high nor too low.