The next morning, Colin Sumrs and Winnie Sumrs began going door to door, telling the neighbors in their building to go to the temporary shelter on the 23rd floor for warmth.
With the power and internet out, they couldn’t send a notice in the residents’ group chat or call anyone. Their only option was the most primitive thod: knocking on every door.
To help share her mother and uncle’s workload, lody Sumrs also got up bright and early. She was assigned the 14th, 15th, 16th, and 17th floors.
After leaving her apartnt, lody headed straight for 1602 on her own floor.
Joyce Lawson from 1601 had already moved in with Mrs. Vance. The three Lowell brothers from 1603 were dead. Zella Kane’s family from 1604 had been driven away by lody. Now, besides the Sumrs family, the only person left on the 16th floor was Maisie Lynch in 1602.
Just as lody knocked on the door of 1602, Maisie Lynch quickly opened it.
Maisie was wrapped in a thick quilt, bundled up tightly like a cocoon, with only her ashen-gray face showing. Her once rosy, full lips were tinged with purple, and a layer of white frost clung to her eyelashes. She looked utterly haggard.
What surprised lody most were the several split wounds on Maisie’s face. The blood had long since congealed, forming dark, reddish-black marks.
lody was taken aback by Maisie’s appearance. "Oh my god..." she asked, shocked. "How did you get so many cuts on your face? What happened?!"
Maisie’s lips trembled. The cold was so intense that even her gaze seed unfocused.
She looked at lody and said in a hoarse voice, "...They’re from the cold... My apartnt is too cold. A couple of days ago, I rubbed my face with my hands... a little too hard, and the skin just split open..."
In extrely low temperatures, exposed skin becos incredibly fragile; even slight force can tear it. Fortunately, Maisie’s face was so numb from the cold that she couldn’t feel much pain.
Unable to bear the sight, lody looked away from Maisie’s blood-streaked face and told her about the temporary shelter being set up on the 23rd floor.
After hearing lody out, Maisie imdiately started packing her things without a second thought, ready to head to the 23rd-floor shelter.
For one, she had run out of coal and had no heat source. If this continued, she was afraid she would freeze to death.
Also, with the power and internet out for so long, she had lost all contact with the outside world. Staying alone in this apartnt where soone had died, fighting the darkness and bitter cold by herself, had left her terrified and hopeless.
Humans are social animals, after all. Right now, Maisie was desperate to see other living people. Otherwise, she felt she would truly go insane.
After notifying Maisie, lody climbed the stairs to the 17th floor.
The two large units on the 17th floor, 1705 and 1706, had been bought by lody and were currently unoccupied. lody planned to notify the other four households on the floor.
But to her surprise, just as she reached the door of 1701, she found soone lying collapsed in front of it!
The person was wearing a gray down jacket, lying stiffly prone in the doorway of 1701. Their back faced the ceiling, their face was on the floor, and their head was pressed against the door, completely motionless.
Seeing this, lody couldn’t help but cover her mouth and gasp.
’I don’t know what’s going on, but this person is most likely dead!’
Holding her breath, she cautiously approached and leaned down to look at the back of the fallen person’s neck. She saw that their exposed skin was already covered in dark, bluish-black spots.
A shiver ran down lody’s spine at the sight, and her hair stood on end. Taking a deep breath, she plucked up her courage and reached out to feel the person’s pulse. The body was already cold and rigid, with no signs of life. He was, without a doubt, completely dead.
lody snatched her hand back in fright.
A mont later, she suppressed her fear, used both hands to forcefully turn the corpse over, and looked at the dead man’s face. She had never seen this face before and didn’t know who he was, but...
lody’s gaze slowly moved downward, and she was shocked to discover the dead man was clutching a chainsaw!
It was a portable model, not particularly large. The blade glinted coldly, and its handle was still held in the dead man’s frozen, iron grip.
’What in the world is going on here?’
lody was completely baffled.
She paused for a mont, then moved the body aside before knocking on the door of 1701.
lody knocked again and again, but after a good while, there was still no sound from inside.
After a mont’s thought, she called out, "Is anyone there? I’m from the ergency managent office! The governnt airdropped supplies yesterday, and the office has set up a temporary shelter on the 23rd floor. You can go there for warmth and to collect supplies!"
As soon as lody finished speaking, the sound of a lock turning echoed, and the door to 1701 opened a crack.
A figure in a black down jacket appeared at the door. It seed to be a young woman with long hair, probably in her twenties or thirties. She was peering cautiously at lody through the crack, a wary expression on her face.
Seeing this, lody imdiately took two steps back and raised her hands to show she was unard. "I’m not a threat, don’t worry!" she said. "You must have heard the helicopter yesterday, right? That was the governnt dropping off supplies for our complex!"
"But the amount of coal in this shipnt is really low, not nearly enough for all the residents to share. So the ergency managent office set up a temporary shelter right here in our building, on the 23rd floor. All the residents in the building can take refuge there!"
After listening to lody’s explanation, the young woman inside seed to breathe a sigh of relief.
She opened the door wider, stared at lody for a mont, and then asked, "...Are... Are you a Sumrs?"
lody was taken aback by the question. "Yes, I am. Do I know you?" she asked, surprised.
lody racked her brain but found she had no mory of the woman before her. How could she know her last na?
The woman nodded, then shook her head. eting lody’s confused gaze, she explained, "My na is Yvette Hollis. We don’t know each other, but I t your mother when I went to get supplies from Crystal Mart, and I saw you helping out there too..."
lody had often helped out at the supply distribution point, so Yvette had an impression of her.
If lody’s voice hadn’t sounded vaguely familiar, Yvette would never have opened the door. With everyone short on supplies, who knew if the person knocking was friend or foe, or soone looking to break in and rob them.
Yvette pulled her down jacket tighter around herself and said to lody, "Thank you for coming to tell . I’m out of coal too. I’ll pack up and head to the 23rd floor."
lody nodded. Then, rembering the corpse on the ground, she hesitated for a mont before pointing at it and asking Yvette, "Miss Hollis, do you know this man by the door...? He’s... dead..."
Hearing lody’s words, Yvette’s expression didn’t change. She showed no panic at the news of a dead man at her door.
She simply cast a cool glance at the body on the floor and replied in a low voice, "I do... He’s the tenant from 1702, across the hall."
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