Chapter 2

Dad was about to explain, but I pressed a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

"Don't say that, Uncle Garrett. I'm just doing a kind deed by helping Aunt Cassia see what kind of man she married. I'm sure great things and luck's coming my way for what I've done."

Garrett turned to Dad and snarled. "What a sharp-tongued brat!

"We're cutting ties right here and now, Milton! From now on, I won't lift a finger to help, even if your family starves and begs on their knees.

"Ronnie, let's go."

Ronnie disgustedly brushed at the wet stains on his clothes and shot me a look of pure disdain.

"Ugh. I never wanted to come to this dump in the first place. It reeks of poverty.

"Let's go, Dad. When I land a steady government job, I'll live it up while they're stuck regretting everything in this shabby little grocery store."

I watched them walk off and whistled. "Take care, Uncle Garrett!

"Oh, and even if you've severed ties, remember to pay back that 5,000 dollars you owe my dad, or I'll post the whole story in the family group chat and pin it to the top!"

Garrett stumbled and nearly face-planted on the pavement. Then, he rushed off without looking back.

There was a chime before the system said, "Uncle Garrett's blood pressure is spiking! +200 rage points.

"Rewards include 20 pounds of fresh premium beef!"

20 pounds? It wasn't a massive haul, but in an apocalypse where fresh produce and meat weren't available, it would go a long way.

While I was going through the inventory in my mind, my parents looked at the mess on the floor and sighed. "He's still your uncle, Flint. After this, we won't even be family anymore."

After tonight, there would only be the living and the dead. Family wouldn't even mean a thing again.

I dropped my smile, and my gaze turned sharp. "We're better off without a family like that, Mom.

"I have some insider information that the freezing doomsday is going to hit tonight. From now on, we're locking down the grocery store and letting no one in, no matter who it is."

Mom and Dad were skeptical, but I'd been the one calling the shots in the house for years now, and the conviction in my voice was hard to argue with. In the end, they nodded.

While they cleaned up, I walked up to the entrance of the grocery store and muttered to myself, "Use the safehouse upgrade card."

The ordinary rolling shutter immediately transformed into a titanium-alloy explosion-proof door. Every window silently shifted into bulletproof glass, and a top-tier thermal insulation layer integrated itself into the walls.

When everything was set up, I checked the clock on the wall and noticed that it was 12:00 am.

The lively carolling and chiming of bells had suddenly stopped. In its place was the bone-chilling, howling wind.

In just ten minutes, the temperature had plummeted from 23 to -58 degrees Fahrenheit and still showed no signs of stopping. Heavy snow fell in thick sheets, carrying a strange, deadly virus within them.

In my past life, Garrett's family had stayed after dinner to play poker cards and narrowly avoided the freezing cold outside. They'd seized my parents' warm master bedroom and forced them to squeeze into my room.

But in this life, they were still on the road after the Christmas Eve fallout.

…

I sat in the grocery store, which was maintained at a steady 78.8 degrees Fahrenheit, holding a roasted chicken drumstick I'd pulled from my system inventory.

While I took a large bite, Mom and Dad were wrapped in blankets, visibly shaken as they looked out at the terrifying blizzard.

"Good thing we listened to you and stayed in. What's going on with the weather these days?"

That was when the family group chat blew up with notifications.

Garrett: "Milton! My car broke down halfway home, and we're freezing out here. Where's your delivery truck? Come pick us up right now!"

Ronnie: "Uncle Milton, my hands are numbing from the cold, so hurry up! If you're not coming, we're calling the police!"

As I listened to Garrett's shivering voice over the sound of the howling wind, I let out a cold sneer.

Oh? Weren't we supposed to have cut ties? Now that things got tough, they came crawling back to us for help.

Did they think we were that pathetic? It was bad enough that we had to endure his arrogance, so why should we risk our lives to save them in such terrible weather?

I pressed on the voice message button and replied in a lazy, bored tone, "Oh, bad timing, Uncle Garrett. I never got my driver's license, and Dad's been drinking, so he can't drive either."