It started when a bloody rain was about to fall.

Then Lin Ye, who was standing by the window, turned around and went back to the wooden chair and sat down. At the same time, he opened the old desktop computer in front of him. The case fan was covered with dust and made a tired groan when it turned.

The screen flickered several times before fully lighting up, the cold white light illuminating his profile—as distinct as a marble relief, every undulation like the Creator's most prized stroke.

Sitting on the wooden chair, Lin Ye began to type with his ten fingers on the keyboard. His movements were swift and precise, an efficiency honed by five years of apocalypse, almost instinctive.

It's the kind of certainty unique to someone who has finally found the right path after groping in the dark countless times—unhurried and deliberate, each keystroke is like placing a chess piece on a game of fate that has been calculated a thousand times.

The stock quote software and a blank notepad are opened simultaneously.

The cursor blinks, awaiting a rewrite of fate.

First, Lin Ye needs to verify the accuracy of his memory.

If the timeline remains unchanged, four days later—April 20th, next Monday—Tianrui Technology will be exposed for financial fraud, and its stock price will plummet from 87 yuan at the open to 18 yuan at the close.

A single-day drop of nearly 80% set a historical record. Countless fortunes evaporated in the torrent of numbers; some jumped from rooftops that night, and others lost their life savings.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Lin Ye clearly remembered that in the chaos following the blood rain in his previous life, he had found an encrypted diary on the body of a search team officer and learned a hidden secret:

The actual controller of Tianrui Technology secretly built an "S-level" biological laboratory deep underground at the company headquarters, which was not marked on any blueprints.

Its deep cold storage contains a batch of original serum samples that are resistant to the blood rain virus.

These samples are of immeasurable value in the early stages of the apocalypse.

Any force that obtains it can establish an elite force unaffected by the virus at the very beginning of the collapse of order—an army that can move freely in the bloodbath and need not worry about being corrupted.

This will give us an absolute strategic advantage and may even lay the foundation for a regional hegemony.

In their previous lives, these samples eventually fell into the hands of the "Dawn Council," becoming one of the core bargaining chips in its early expansion.

It was a secret society composed of seven powerful awakened individuals. With the help of these anti-blood rain virus serums, it recruited tens of thousands of armed men in just three months, making it one of the most powerful forces at the beginning of the apocalypse.

And in this life—

"Short the stock to make my first fortune." Lin Ye's fingers flew across the keyboard as he quickly wrote down the keystrokes on the computer. "Then, when the company goes bankrupt and is liquidated, and its assets are sold off at bargain prices, I'll acquire its abandoned assets at extremely low costs, especially the basement of the headquarters building..."

At this moment, Lin Ye paused for a moment, his fingertips hovering above the keyboard.

Just because I could hear the distant hustle and bustle of the morning rush hour outside the window.

The sounds of traffic, people talking, and breakfast vendors mingling together create a symphony of "daily life" played by millions of people.

No one knew that 182 days later, all of this would be washed away by the scarlet rain.

After sighing to himself, Lin Ye's hands, which had been hovering above the keyboard, moved again, and the cursor began to flash.

At the same time, the light from the screen reflected in Lin Ye's eyes, which were deep and cold, like a bottomless pool of icy water—reflecting the flickering cursor, the morning light outside the window, and something even deeper than all of that.

That is the unique gaze of a soul that has finally stood on the other side of time after crossing the abyss of death.

Finally, Lin Ye's fingers tapped the keyboard, typing out the last sentence:

"The key is to find the hidden entrance to the underground laboratory. This requires internal information and architectural blueprints. The samples must be taken silently before the bloodshed begins."

The sunlight outside the window was just right.

The newly sprouted leaves of the sycamore tree cast dappled light and shadow on the windowsill, swaying in the wind like countless golden butterflies dancing.

On the distant horizon, a few wisps of clouds were tinged with a pale rose color—in a little while, they would be swallowed up by the midday sun.

After finishing all this, Lin Ye picked up his phone, looked at the screen, and slid his fingertips across the cold glass surface.

As I scrolled down through my contacts, names flashed by—some were university classmates, some were colleagues I met while delivering food, and some were essential contacts.

Behind every name lies a memory sealed by time, a story that ended long ago.

Lin Ye's fingertips finally rested on a name that had almost been forgotten—

Chen Tianming.

My classmate for four years of university was honest and even timid, and always lowered his head slightly when he spoke.

After graduation, I got a job as a financial assistant at Tianrui Technology through connections. I earned a low salary but did the most trivial tasks.

During a class reunion last year, Lin Ye privately complained that "some things didn't look right" about the company's accounts, but at the time, he just took it as a normal grumble.

But Lin Ye remembered it now.

The first lesson the end times taught him was that all seemingly random information could become your bargaining chip for survival at some point in the future.

In his previous life, Chen Tianming died in a large-scale attack by a swarm of mutated rats three months after the blood rain fell, leaving no trace of his body.

It is said that before he died, he was trying to deliver medicine to an orphanage on the outskirts of the city—the very orphanage where Chen Tianming grew up.

Lin Ye later overheard this information from other survivors. The speaker meant no harm, but the listener took it to heart.

When Lin Ye heard the name "Chen Tianming," he was swallowing a moldy compressed biscuit, which got stuck in his throat, almost suffocating him.

That honest, timid old classmate, who dared not look people in the eye when he spoke and was bullied at work, did something that most "strong people" would not do after the apocalypse: he returned to the place where he grew up and tried to save those children who were as helpless as he was.

Then he died. His body was never found.

But now—

Lin Ye pressed the dial button without hesitation.

The receiver emitted a long, drawn-out tone, "beep—beep—", each sound like a heartbeat amplified in the silence.

Lin Ye could picture the phone vibrating on the bedside table, the screen lighting up, Chen Tianming groggily reaching for the phone, and frowning in confusion as he saw the caller ID.