Today, Melody Summers harvested the first batch of vegetables from the farmland in the Arcadian Space.

The cabbages were fresh and crisp. Melody had just discovered the processing workshop’s pickling function yesterday, so she decided to experiment with the cabbage and pickle a jar of sauerkraut.

The green beans had completely covered their trellises. It took her several hours to pick them all. She planned to keep some in the warehouse for later and move the rest to the villa’s kitchen. It would be enough to feed her family of six for at least two weeks straight.

The peppers were a brilliant red. Melody planned to use some to make fresh chili sauce and dry the rest.

...

Buoyed by her successful experiment, she confidently expanded the cultivated land, sowing several more types of vegetable seeds and even planting some honeysuckle.

Melody Summers spent every day recently toiling in her vegetable patch. The tornado was just three days away, on April 1st, and the renovations and reinforcement of Crystal Mart were also nearly complete.

*

Early in the morning, Melody Summers went to Crystal Mart to inspect the reinforcement work. She was very pleased with the results. While she was there, the renovation team’s supervisor was constantly on the phone, taking one appointment after another for more renovation jobs.

"Business is booming for you guys today," Crystal Lynch teased.

The supervisor smiled and replied, "You bet. The National Weather Service issued a warning yesterday about strong winds across the country in three days. So starting today, we’ve been flooded with orders to reinforce windows in high-rises."

’Good thing we started early,’ Melody thought. ’Otherwise, we might not have even gotten a spot in their schedule.’

After seeing the renovation team off, Melody Summers called her suppliers.

She and Crystal had contacted various suppliers well in advance, ordering large quantities of food and daily necessities.

Before long, truck after truck began to arrive, lining up to deliver goods to the supermarket’s entrance.

Colin Summers and Winnie Summers helped count and organize the stock while familiarizing themselves with the supermarket’s operations. Crystal Lynch’s father, Finn Lynch, and her brother, Shawn Lynch, came to help as well.

Over the next two days, the two families installed new shelving in the supermarket and neatly arranged all the products on them.

With all the preparations complete, the day of the storm arrived.

Melody Summers had her aunt, Grace Sutton, take the day off from work and come home early. She also reminded Crystal Lynch that a severe windstorm was expected tonight, urging her and her family to be careful.

Crystal’s father had also seen the national severe wind warning. Still uneasy about how well the reinforcements on their high-rise apartment would hold up, he decided the family would sleep at the store for the night.

*

By evening, the weather had turned exceptionally grim. A single, massive black cloud blanketed the sky, looking as if it might press down from above, with faint flashes of lightning and rumbles of thunder stirring within it.

That evening, a few customers came into Crystal Mart. They chatted as they stocked up on food:

"Look at the sky. It’s so dark, there’s definitely going to be a downpour today or tomorrow. I’d better stock up and hide out at home."

"I heard it’s not rain, but strong winds. Good thing I had our windows reinforced a few days ago. We live on the 25th floor, and the building always sways whenever there’s a strong wind. It’s terrifying."

"The kindergartens and elementary schools are all closed. Both my kids will be home tomorrow, and my parents are coming over to help watch them. I need to buy a lot more food to have at home."

The customers chatted as they scanned their items and paid.

Crystal Lynch was ecstatic. Business at the supermarket was finally picking up.

*

「Nightfall.」

The renovations on the new house Austin Hale and Joanne White had bought were nearly finished. Joanne had promised to get their marriage certificate with Austin as soon as she received her university diploma in June.

Austin felt like a successful man now—he had a house, a car, a wife-to-be, and a child on the way. He was in high spirits and treated Joanne to a candlelight dinner to celebrate their journey from college sweethearts to soon-to-be-newlyweds.

Later that evening, as they were sharing an intimate moment in the bedroom, they suddenly felt the building shake. A few loud bangs echoed from outside the bedroom door, followed by what sounded like screaming.

"Ah! Is it an earthquake?" Joanne White cried out.

Austin Hale quickly threw on some clothes and tried to go see what was happening. But as soon as he stepped onto the floor, he couldn’t keep his balance. The world was spinning.

Another deafening BOOM, and the floor-to-ceiling window in their bedroom shattered. A furious wind blasted in, and several dark shapes hurtled through the broken window.

Austin didn’t have time to dodge and was nearly hit. He scrambled to the side of the bed, a pathetic sight. Looking closer, he saw they were broken tree branches, hurled in by the gale.

Joanne White was violently thrown from the bed by the wind, about to be slammed into the shattered window. Luckily, a nightstand broke her fall. She crashed to the floor and clung desperately to the bed’s leg in terror.

The wind kept flinging debris and broken tiles into the room. A torrent of cold air rushed into their mouths and noses, making it impossible for Austin and Joanne to breathe. The suffocating sensation nearly overwhelmed them, threatening to pull them into unconsciousness.

Joanne wanted to scream her lungs out, but no sound would come. She couldn’t make a single peep; her mind was filled only with the howling of the wind.

*

At the villa in The Metropolis Residences.

Melody Summers and her family couldn’t sleep either. The wind was howling outside, a sound so loud it had even woken up their grandmother.

The family gathered anxiously in the living room, watching the scene outside.

"I’ve never seen a wind this strong in my entire life. The trees in the greenbelt outside are being uprooted! Our roof isn’t going to be blown off, is it?" Grace Sutton asked, worried.

"It won’t, Aunt Grace. Our house has been reinforced," Melody Summers said comfortingly. "The epicenter of this tornado isn’t here. We’re in a relatively safe area."

"It’s strange. Our country is so mountainous. A tornado this large is truly rare," Miss Lowell remarked.

Tornadoes mostly occur on the Vesperian Plains, where there are no mountain ranges to block the monsoons, making it easy for thunderstorm-driven tornadoes to form. But China is mountainous, so tornadoes are uncommon.

Thinking of this, Miss Lowell sighed. "It seems the world is truly descending into chaos."

The villas and lower floors were relatively fine, but residents on the upper floors of the high-rises felt the buildings sway. Many thought it was an earthquake and rushed downstairs.

Fortunately, the building managers in each high-rise reacted quickly. Afraid that residents would run outside and be blown away, they blocked the fleeing crowds while shouting, "It’s not an earthquake! The shaking is from the wind! Everyone stay calm and don’t go outside!"

A few moments later, Melody Summers received a message in the residential complex’s group chat. It was from property management, reminding everyone that the shaking was caused by the wind. They advised residents to take shelter on lower floors or in the basement, stay away from open areas outside, and keep clear of floor-to-ceiling windows.

Some of the homeowners who had run downstairs gathered anxiously in the ground-floor lobby, staring at the scene outside.

Two hours later, the world finally fell silent.

"It’s finally over. Even an earthquake isn’t this scary. My apartment is on the 22nd floor, and the shaking was so intense I almost fell over."

"I’m on the 27th. Not only was the floor shaking, but the wind outside sounded like ghosts screaming. I was so scared I ran all the way down in one go. I don’t even know how I managed to run down 27 floors. I usually get winded after just five."

"Me too, me too! I thought it was an earthquake, so I didn’t even get dressed. I just wrapped a blanket around myself and ran."

"I was in the middle of a game when the floor started shaking and I heard this wailing sound. I thought a monster had jumped out of my computer! I was so scared I threw my mouse and just ran for it!"

"I’ve been pulling all-nighters for work all week. I thought I was hallucinating, that my great-grandma was coming to take me to the other side."

The crowd lingered in the lobby, reeling from the lingering fear. After a while, they began to disperse, talking amongst themselves as they headed back to their apartments.