Rain tapped a steady rhythm against the shattered roof of the old hut. In the stillness, a body stirred beneath the remnants of a rotting straw mat.
Song Lian awoke to the scent of damp wood and earth, her eyes fluttering open to a ceiling half-consumed by decay.
A droplet landed squarely on her cheek, cold enough to send a jolt through her system. She gasped, sitting up abruptly, only to be met with a wave of nausea and disorientation. She was not on the plane anymore. Her mind reeled.
The plane… there was a storm. Lightning. Screaming.
And then… nothing.
Now, she found herself surrounded by warped wooden beams and mud-caked floorboards. The walls barely stood, eaten through by time and neglect. A crumbling hearth sat cold and cracked in the corner. Outside, towering trees loomed over the structure like ancient sentinels, mist clinging to their gnarled limbs. A forest, vast and silent.
She blinked, trying to process the impossible.
I'm alive… but where am I?
Her body ached in places she didn't remember injuring, her ribs throbbed, her knees were scraped raw, and her right wrist bore bruises where a seatbelt must've held fast. But it wasn't just pain or confusion that stirred her panic, it was the sheer absence of everything familiar.
No buzzing city life. No hum of electricity. No voices. No machines. Nothing.
She forced herself to breathe. Calm down. First, assess. You've survived worse.
And then, like a whisper in her chest, she felt it.
A presence—warm, still, and infinite.
Song Lian's lips parted in disbelief as she reached inward, toward the one thing she had hidden her entire life. Her soul-bound space. The vast, invisible storage realm she'd been born with and one she'd spent years filling with everything from emergency supplies to construction materials. A secret she had never dared reveal.
It's still with me…
Her hand trembled as she summoned a small item. In a soft shimmer of light, a familiar object appeared in her palm: a sealed thermal blanket, still dry and tightly wrapped. She laughed under her breath with a shaky, relieved sound.
You haven't abandoned me.
Tearing open the package, she wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and stood slowly, surveying her surroundings. Her once-crisp blouse was stained with mud and torn at the hem. One heel had snapped clean off. Her phone was gone. In its place, she had something far more valuable.
Reaching into her space again, Song Lian pulled out a duffel bag from her emergency survival cache: black cargo pants, a windproof jacket, gloves, and a set of heavy-duty boots. She changed quickly, comforted by the routine of preparation.
Her space responded to her thoughts as if it, too, had been waiting for this moment.
She pulled out a bottle of water, a vacuum-sealed protein bar, and a tactical flashlight. A warm glow cut through the darkness as she flipped the light on, revealing cobwebs in every corner and claw marks on some of the wooden beams. Animals, she noted. Or worse.
She walked to the doorway or what remained of it. Beyond, the forest stretched endlessly, trees swaying gently in the cold wind, their roots coiled like sleeping dragons. Mist blanketed the underbrush. There were no power lines. No roads. No trail of smoke.
This wasn't just the wilderness. This was a different world. And she was completely alone.
A lesser woman might've broken down. But Song Lian wasn't lesser. Orphaned at six. Fending off predators in foster homes. Building a logistics empire from scratch. Hiding a power no one would believe.
She had lived through abandonment, betrayal, and poverty. This? This was just another challenge.
Step one: Shelter. Step two: Food. Step three: Survival.
She set to work immediately. From her space, she summoned a tarp, rope, basic tools, and a portable solar lantern. She patched the leaking ceiling with plastic sheets and reinforced the weak beams with pre-cut steel rods from her prefab construction kits. She laid out a proper sleeping mat on the driest patch of floor and opened a portable stove beside the hearth. The cabin might've been a ruin, but it had potential.
Next came food. Rice, dried mushrooms, canned chicken, and soy sauce boiled over her electric stove with a portable solar panel charging beside her. The warm aroma chased away the damp cold. For the first time since waking, she felt human again.
The following days blurred into motion.
Each morning, she woke before the sun and expanded the structure room by room. Walls became stable. Floors were leveled. A water collection system was set up using collapsible tanks and gutters lined with tubing. The compost toilet was installed in a makeshift washroom. She dug a shallow trench to divert excess rainwater away from the cabin.
Tools appeared from her space as needed. Nails, planks, LED lanterns, sanitation supplies, even packets of flower seeds, anything to reclaim the land from rot and shadow. By the end of the first week, it wasn't just a shack. It was home.
She had marked her territory with solar garden lights and strung chimes near the treeline. Song Lian had even started planting vegetables in raised beds made from storage crates. Lettuce, carrots, bok choy, and green onions. A small grove of fruit trees figs, citrus, and plums she was growing near the back under the shelter of a stone outcrop.
Peace, finally. Until the twelfth night.
It was late. The rain had begun again, gentle but persistent. She was just finishing a bowl of rice porridge when the chimes outside jingled in a strange rhythm. Not wind. Something was moving.
Song Lian stood quickly, switching off the lantern and stepping quietly to the doorway. The trees beyond were dark, but the motion sensors she'd placed earlier flickered in warning.
Her hand reached for the baton she kept at her waist, a high-voltage stun rod, compact but effective. Then rustling. A stumble. A heavy groan. From the mist, a man emerged.
Tall. Robes shredded and soaked. His hair clung to his face in thick strands. His right arm hung limp, crimson spreading across the fabric. He looked up at her, eyes wild with fever and desperation.
"Please…" he rasped, swaying forward. "I… mean no…"
His knees buckled, and he collapsed face-first into the mud. Song Lian didn't move at first. Her grip on the baton tightened. She scanned the treeline, senses alert for pursuers. Nothing. Silence.
Cautiously, she approached the body, crouching beside him. His pulse was weak. Breathing shallow. His clothing made of silk, but worn out. Embroidered with royal patterns. Symbols of nobility hidden beneath grime.
Who is he?
"Damn it," she muttered, eyes narrowing. Of all the things to crash into my life…
She called forth her medical kit. Whoever he was, Song Lian wasn't about to let someone die on her doorstep. Not yet.