Countdown to the apocalypse: 5 days.
7:40 a.m.
It had seemed like a perfectly ordinary day. Chu Juan and her husband finished breakfast together and prepared to leave for their respective jobs.
While changing her shoes, Chu Juan took out her phone and scrolled through it.
Lately, most people had developed the habit of checking the news on their phones. Reports about a meteorite had begun circulating three months earlier, and talk of disaster had been relentless over the past month or two.
At first, things had still been kept somewhat under control. Then, at some point, grain prices had begun rising again and again, more police were out on patrol, construction projects sprang up everywhere, factories expanded their hiring, and so on...
Even the most ordinary citizens could vaguely sense that something was wrong.
Especially over the past few days.
Rumors kept coming, and plenty of online pundits offered their analyses: an apocalypse, natural disasters, earthquakes, the destruction of Earth... Every rumor was more outlandish in its own way.
Many people even believed that the planet was about to be destroyed, and humanity would vanish from the world completely, just like the dinosaurs.
Everyone was on edge.
Of course, deeply ingrained habits were hard to change. Despite the endless rumors, most people still went to work or school as usual. Even with their minds unsettled, they continued going about their business.
Still, they could not help buying some food to keep at home.
Chu Juan and her husband had done the same.
But today was different. After checking her phone, she froze.
"Honey, why aren't you changing your shoes?" her husband asked.
Chu Juan swallowed and held up her phone, her expression grave. "Honey, something might have happened."
Countless notifications flooded her phone screen-
[In twenty minutes, the government