Chapter 2 — The 100x System

To my utter astonishment, the apartment directly across from mine turned out to be the new home of Lu Sheng, my younger sister's childhood sweetheart. When they were little, the two of them were inseparable, constantly playing and running around together. Later on, Lu Sheng’s family received a substantial government payout for land acquisition, packed up a small fortune, and moved away from our old village. Yet, upon running into Lu Sheng again now that he had grown into a remarkably handsome young man, my sister instantly resurrected her childhood crush and began clinging to him shamelessly. When the apocalyptic torrential rains finally struck, despite my firm refusal to offer any assistance to his family, my sister secretly waited for me to step out before raiding a full third of our carefully accumulated supplies and giving them to Lu Sheng. That betrayal left me utterly helpless, with no recourse other than locking our front door deadbolt to prevent anyone else from coming to plunder what remained. It was then I realized that, in the eyes of my sister, I was worth less than a man who had never shown her a single ounce of genuine gratitude.

Completely disillusioned with her, I simply said, "It doesn't matter."

My sister giggled, skipping over to link her arm through mine. "Heh-heh, you're the absolute best, sis! I knew you wouldn't stay mad at me over such a trivial thing!"

I gently pried her fingers off my arm. "I'm feeling a bit tired and am going to turn in early. You should get some rest too."

The moment I turned my back, I slipped into my own bedroom and immediately began mapping out a concrete plan to find a secure sanctuary. I had previously purchased a portable wind-powered generator, ensuring that even when the cataclysmic storms cut off the municipal grid, I would still have an uninterrupted flow of electricity. Every essential provision had already been gathered in abundance; now, all that remained was to quietly wait out the final countdown. My sister, utterly confident in her newly acquired resizing system, felt zero anxiety whatsoever. She had simply spent a few hundred yuan of her allowance on some instant snacks, locking them away tightly in her own room as if she lived in absolute terror of me stealing her food.

Ultimately, I made the resolute decision to abandon this main apartment. If I continued to hide out in the open spaces here, even if I shrank my physical form, there was still a terrifying probability that they would eventually discover me. Thus, my gaze fell upon an alternative location—the hidden panic room located inside my own bedroom. This was a tiny secret compartment I had deliberately constructed during a recent home renovation, a detail I had never once shared with my sister. The room was no larger than a standard bathroom, but to someone of my soon-to-be-shrunk proportions, it would function as a sprawling, impenetrable fortress. The heavy vault door required my personal smartphone to unlock, meaning I had zero fear of my sister ever stumbling upon it. Even if she somehow managed to locate the entrance, there was no physical way for her to force her way inside.

Furthermore, I had driven my car out to a desolate wilderness more than a dozen kilometers away, utilizing the minimization system to compress an entire mound of fertile earth down to a miniature scale, hauling it back alongside a collection of resilient seeds so I could cultivate my own crops and achieve complete self-sufficiency. I even shrank several young, leafy trees to bring along with me.

In the blink of an eye, the various furniture and appliances I had ordered online were delivered. At this point, exactly twenty-four hours remained before the endless deluge was scheduled to begin. I had deliberately set the delivery address to my old, derelict family home in the countryside, a village that had been largely abandoned years ago with practically no living residents left. Inside that empty house, I piled up all the furniture, electrical appliances, foodstuffs, and miscellaneous tools. Taking advantage of the desolate surroundings where not a soul was in sight, I activated the shrinking system, compressing every single item down to a tiny, manageable size before packing them neatly into prepared storage crates. Finally, after a brief moment of hesitation, I made the bold choice to shrink the old concrete-tile house itself, taking the entire structure with me. Though somewhat weathered and aged, with a little simple renovation, it would serve as a perfectly functional dwelling once again.

Utilizing the cover of the dead of night, I drove back to the city apartment and carried all of those miniaturized treasures directly into my hidden panic room. Throughout these past few days, my sister had been in a state of feverish excitement, entirely convinced that her own preparations were foolproof, and she paid zero attention to my comings and goings.

Inside the panic room, I had already installed a sophisticated closed-loop air filtration system, guaranteeing that even if I remained sealed within this space for years, I would never have to worry about a lack of oxygen. I left five large bottles of mineral water un-shrunk, instead emptying them into a small earthenware crock to serve as my primary water reservoir. Soft, ambient lighting was wired throughout the chamber, fully controllable with a few taps on my smartphone screen.

After a grueling night of meticulous arrangement, the interior of the secret room had transformed into a thriving, miniature farm. Tiny, microscopic baby chicks let out faint, muffled chirps as they burrowed their downy heads into the artificial turf in search of imaginary earthworms. Just beyond the borders of this pastoral farm sat my tiny, compact house, fully outfitted with every necessary modern appliance. At last, I could finally let out a breath of relief and calmly wait for the apocalyptic downpour to descend.

During the final half-day leading up to the storm, my sister scurried back over to Lu Sheng’s apartment. Lu Sheng’s family members appeared to hold almost zero affection for her intrusions, yet my sister remained completely unfazed, stubbornly wedging her way into Lu Sheng's private room. More than once, I overheard Lu Sheng's mother complaining bitterly to the elderly neighbors lingering downstairs: "That brazen girl across the hall has absolutely no sense of boundaries. She's a grown woman, yet every single day she barges straight into my son's bedroom. It's utterly shameless."

One of the neighbor women immediately chimed in with a teasing laugh, "Well, I reckon she's probably sweet on your boy! Sounds like you'll be welcoming a daughter-in-law into the family soon enough!"

Lu Sheng's mother scoffed in utter disgust, spitting out a sharp retort. "Hah! You have no idea what you're talking about. She utterly bombed her university entrance exams, and now she's past twenty years old without a single respectable job to her name, living entirely off her older sister like a parasite. Looking like a beggar and dreaming of marrying my son? In your wildest dreams! My boy is tall, handsome, and gainfully employed—she is entirely out of her depth."

"Ain't that the truth—"

I remained entirely silent, pretending I hadn't heard a single word. With exactly one hour remaining before the torrential rains were set to hit, I dialed my sister's cell phone.

"Hello? Sis, what is it?"

My tone remained flat and completely devoid of emotion. "There's an emergency at the office. I have to work late tonight, so I won't be coming home."

My sister hesitated for a brief second, but ultimately, she didn't offer a single word of caution regarding my safety. Instead, she simply replied, "Oh, alright then. I'll just find something to eat myself. Bye!"

Hmph, just as I expected—she would never waste a breath reminding me to stay safe. In any case, my phone call was merely a tactical distraction designed to cement the illusion in her mind that I had already permanently left the apartment.

Instantly, I manipulated my smartphone, remotely unlocking the hidden panic room within my bedroom, slipped inside, and pulled the heavy security door shut behind me. This time, I activated the minimization system once more, with one crucial difference: the target of the shrinking beam was not an inanimate object... but my own physical body.

A sudden, dizzying wave of weightlessness washed over me. In a matter of seconds, the shrinking process was complete, and the previously cramped panic room suddenly expanded into a vast, boundless horizon. The primary reason I dared to take such a staggering risk with my own physical form was because of a distinct observation I had made in my past life: items that had been artificially magnified by the system would miraculously revert to their original, natural scale once the apocalyptic rainstorms finally ceased. Consequently, I deduced that the shrinking function would operate under the exact same logic—when the deluge eventually subsided, the system's effect would naturally dissipate, restoring everything back to its true proportions.

Gazing out over my newly tilled patch of earth, the verdant green rows of saplings, the bustling flock of tiny chicks, and my cozy little homestead, a profound wave of absolute peace washed over me. From this moment onward, I would never again need to cower in terror or despair over the cruel whims of a ruined world.

Taking advantage of my sister's continued absence from the apartment, I secretly installed a network of discreet, miniature security cameras both inside our main living space and out in the public hallway, allowing me to monitor every single movement and disturbance straight from the screen of my phone. I even managed to rig one up directly opposite the doorway of Lu Sheng's apartment. The resolution on these particular lenses was exceptionally high, capturing crystal-clear footage accompanied by audio so sharp that even the faintest whispers could be heard with startling clarity.

Once everything was fully secured, I slipped my phone into the pocket of my tiny trousers, hoisted a miniature hoe over my shoulder, and stepped out onto the soil to begin the arduous work of tending my crops. Once the land was neatly plowed, I carefully sowed my seeds, spread a fine layer of nutrient-rich fertilizer, and watered the earth with meticulous care. A lively swarm of baby chicks darted around my ankles, pecking playfully at the dirt. I gave an impatient flick of my hand to shoo them away, then ripped open a micro-bag of feed to scatter across the ground for them.

Checking the live feed streaming from my phone, I could see that the relentless sheets of rain had already begun to lash against the outside world—though the populace remained blissfully ignorant of the grim reality that this storm was destined to rage on without end. Across social media platforms, countless voices were already whining about the impossible traffic and the impossibility of commuting to work.

As for myself, I was now utterly divorced from the outside world, with my smartphone, laptop, and tablet serving as my sole lifelines to reality. As the days bled together into an endless blur, the rain refused to relent, reducing the city's infrastructure to a state of catastrophic gridlock. Back in the main apartment, my sister didn't give my sudden disappearance a second thought—doubtless assuming I had long since perished out in the rising floodwaters.

Throughout these quiet days, I remained blissfully insulated within the borders of my tiny agricultural haven, spending my hours tending the earth, cultivating fresh vegetables, and raising my flock. The only minor nuisance to speak of was that those darned little chicks possessed an insatiable habit of sneaking over to pillage the fragile, tender sprouts of my freshly planted greens.