Reborn with a Space: Hoarding Food and Raising My Kid

More and more vines wrapped around the water shield bubble surrounding Flora Bloom, dragging her toward Area 006.

Flora Bloom could only watch as no matter how much spiritual water she poured into the shield, it was completely absorbed by the vines wrapped around the outside. The rate of absorption was only getting faster.

If she couldn’t keep up, the vines could crush her shield at any moment and wrap around her body.

Looking out from inside her bubble, the venomous thorns on the vines made her skin crawl.

She had no idea how long she’d been holding on. While using her superpower to maintain the water shield bubble, she had nearly used up all the Concentrated Spirit Water Balls in her hands without realizing it. In a bind, Flora Bloom simply released the spiritual water from her space in a torrent, like a pillar of water, which was just enough to keep pace with the plant’s absorption.

’You’ve been absorbing spiritual water for so long, shouldn’t you be releasing your Verdant Spirit by now?!’

’Flora Bloom recalled anxiously how after she had sprinkled spiritual water on two lawns and some flowers, specks of Spiritual Energy had emerged from the plants after a short while. All she had to do was draw their Verdant Spirits into her space to be branded, then return it to them, and the plants would recognize her as their master.’

The spiritual water in her space was inexhaustible. Flora Bloom drew out as much as she could, letting the vines coiled around her water shield absorb it.

Finally, a wisp of pale pink Spiritual Energy emerged from a crack below. This wisp of energy was different from the Verdant Spirit at the quarantine wall. The Spiritual Energy of a Verdant Spirit was crisp and invigorating; smelling it would boost one’s spirits and make the air exceptionally fresh.

But this pink Spiritual Energy had a strange, overpowering fragrance. Just a single wisp entering Flora Bloom’s nostrils made her drowsy. If not for her powerful spiritual power resisting the soporific scent, the hand channeling the spiritual water would have likely stopped. The consequences would have been dire.

Without hesitation, Flora Bloom pulled these wisps of pink Spiritual Energy into her space. Once they were successfully branded, she quickly pushed them back out to return to the plant.

Upon contact with the vines, the pink Spiritual Energy was rapidly reabsorbed into the plant’s body.

The vines were still frantically absorbing the spiritual water on Flora Bloom’s shield, and she was still using spiritual water to maintain it. Meanwhile, the plant began to secrete more and more pink Spiritual Energy. These Verdant Spirits, like tiny pink pixies, swirled around Flora Bloom before she swept them all into her space in one go.

The next moment, the pink Verdant Spirits that emerged carried her space’s unique brand as they returned to the plant’s body.

Finally, a new spiritual power joined Flora Bloom’s mental link. "Master."

At the same time, from the crack in the ground in Area 006, a plant stalk half a meter in diameter emerged, retracting the vines coiled around Flora Bloom one by one.

Flora Bloom finally breathed a sigh of relief. After retracting her superpower, she realized that the plant had dragged her into Area 006 at some point.

The plant before her had a main stalk about half a meter thick. Each vine, when retracted, was only about a meter long. But there was a staggering number of them, and each was covered in dark green leaves and magenta roses.

’No wonder the fragrance I smelled when I left the mall was so familiar,’ she thought. ’It was a rose bush!’

As the dozens of vines retracted, the bodies of Shauna Wallace, Sherman Lynch, The Crown Prince, and the others were delivered to Flora Bloom’s feet.

Even Juggernaut was brought before her, bound by three of the Rose’s vines and unconscious. Only Xiao Bai, the last one to be dragged away, was unharmed, though the bloodstains on its white fur had increased.

Isla Preston, the Leopard Cat, and Xiao Bai came to Flora Bloom’s side. They stared at the half-meter-thick main stalk of the Rose and its explosive growth of branches. The Leopard Cat asked anxiously, "Boss, are you okay?"

Flora Bloom shook her head. She glanced at the unconscious Juggernaut and the eight others on the ground, then reached out and stroked the Rose that had just accepted her as its master. Its pink Verdant Spirit had almost made her drowsy earlier; she figured it must be the cause of their unconsciousness as well.

"How do I wake them up?"

The Rose’s main stalk was about half a meter in diameter but less than two meters tall. Its dense branches drooped like a weeping willow by a summer lake, incredibly tough and laden with leaves, buds, and blooming roses.

Tender green shoots were also sprouting from the main stalk, brimming with life and vitality.

The Rose’s branches swayed gently, brushing against Flora Bloom’s arm as if trying to curry favor, communicating with her mentally.

"Master, my fragrance causes people to fall into a deep sleep. If it isn’t counteracted soon, they’ll sleep for so long that they’ll never wake up."

"How do I counteract it?"

"For anyone else, it would be impossible. But for you, Master, it’s no problem at all!"

When Flora Bloom returned to the base with Isla Preston, the Leopard Cat, and Xiao Bai, the scene that greeted them made her frown.

The civilian district was in chaos. The streets and alleys were littered with scattered grains of rice and bits of flour. There were even rotten vegetables and leaves ground into a pulpy mess on the ground.

Groups of men were robbing food and water from other people’s homes. Some were even forcibly dragging a reasonably attractive woman down the street, intending to take her back with them. Flora Bloom knew exactly what for. In the apocalypse, there was only one fate for an attractive woman without a superpower: to become a tool for men to vent their frustrations.

Seeing the woman they’d chosen resisting to the death, a few of the men were overcome by their primal urges. They ripped off their shirts, about to satisfy their lust right there in public.

"Help! You animals! You’ll all die a miserable death! David Warren, you bastard, I’ll haunt you even after I’m dead!"

"Mom, I don’t want to go with them! Dad, don’t make me go!"

"Let go of my daughter! I’ll go with you!"

"HAHAHA, shouldn’t have taken you so long to figure that out! Too bad, we brothers don’t just want your daughter now. You’re coming with us too!"

"What! AH!" 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

"Dad, what are you doing?! Why are you letting them do this to Mom and me?!"

"You two should be grateful! They’re superpower users. If you go with them, you won’t starve anymore!"

"Heh heh, your father already sold you and your mom to us. It cost us brothers a whole case of instant noodles!"

Two or three such incidents were happening on this street alone. The areas with the low-rise apartments and villas were also crowded with people, and it seemed similar events were unfolding there.

As Flora Bloom, the Leopard Cat, and Isla Preston walked past, the woman who had been sold by her husband to the superpower users suddenly grabbed Flora Bloom’s ankle. Clinging to it like a lifeline, she screamed, "Save me! I beg you, save me and my daughter! She’s only fourteen! How can she be defiled by this scum!"

Flora Bloom had planned to pass by with cold indifference. Unexpectedly, the woman had a vice-like grip and refused to let go of her ankle.

When she looked up and saw Flora Bloom’s fair, beautiful face and her body, which aside from a few blood-like stains and some dust, was practically spotless compared to them, her eyes lit up.

Her eyes gleamed, her gaze darting about before she immediately turned her head and shouted to the men holding her daughter.

"Bosses! Big brothers! Look at this woman! She’s way prettier than my daughter! Take her instead! She’s so clean! My daughter hasn’t bathed in a month, she’s filthy and she stinks! Don’t take me and my daughter, drag her back with you! She’s so much better than us!"

Flora Bloom raised an eyebrow, looking down with amusement at the woman on the ground clinging desperately to her ankle.

"Heh, your selfish motherly love is truly touching. Too bad you chose to mess with me."