Rewrite the Apocalypse dream (by Dee Cari) novel Chapter 93

Chapter 93 A giant, pitch-black maze

Fincred

By the time the team reached the perimeter of the mall, the sky had bruised into a deep, heavy twilight. Dusk was rapidly fading, and the creeping approach of night brought a fresh wave of tension. With multiple power lines down everything was pitched in darkness. The massive shopping center loomed ahead like a dark fortress. Every entrance was completely locked down, the heavy security shutters pulled all the way to the concrete. Plastered across the glass doors was a hastily taped sign reading: CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.

“Perfect,” Julian muttered, scanning the empty parking lot. “A giant, pitch-black maze.”

“It’s secure, which means whatever is inside hasn’t leaked out yet,” Joanna countered quietly. She signaled the team to gather near a recessed employee entrance. “We need to get inside before it’s completely dark. This trip needs to be fast, and efficient.”

The group clicked on their flashlights, casting sharp, narrow beams of light against the locked metal side door. Allen stepped up with his shovel to pry it, but Joanna gently waved him back. Stepping forward, she gripped the heavy metal handle of the reinforced door. Activating her awakened strength, she gave a sudden, powerful yank. With a horrific screech of tearing steel, the deadbolt snapped, and the door frame warped completely out of shape. Joanna flung the door wide open, entirely unfazed by the display of raw power. One by one, the team slipped past the broken frame, leaving the fading dusk behind as they stepped into the suffocating darkness of the locked-down mall.

The flashlights illuminated a vast, hollow interior. Built in a massive hexagon, the mall spanned three towering levels, all of them looking down onto a central food court buried in the heart of the structure. The air inside was stale, heavy with the scent of stagnant air conditioning and quiet abandonment.

They moved quickly to their first target: a high-end jewelry store on the ground floor. The luxury watches and diamond rings gleamed dully behind the display cases.

Jake didn’t waste any time. Stepping up to the storefront, he swung his aluminum baseball bat with a brutal, ringing crack. The tempered glass shattered into a waterfall of glittering shards.

While the echoes of the smash still vibrated through the dark corridor, Joanna bypassed the storefront entirely and sprinted straight into the back storage room. A massive steel safe dominated the corner. Bracing her boots against the floor, Joanna grabbed the edge of the heavy vault door. With a fierce grunt. she channeled her awakened strength and pulled. The heavy locking bolts sheared clean through, and with a deafening screech of tortured metal, she ripped the thick safe door entirely off its hinges, tossing it aside like a piece of cardboard.

She hurried back out to the shattered storefront, her voice sharp and commanding. “The safe is open. We’re splitting into two teams. Pack up everything you can find here, including the vault contents. The rest of you, let’s go upstairs. We meet in the central food court in thirty minutes.”

The group divided efficiently. Jake, Raven, and Jolie remained at the first store. While Jake and Raven scooped diamonds from the smashed display cases, Jolie ran into the back room with heavy nylon bags to clean out the exposed shelves of the ruined safe.

Meanwhile, Joanna bolted for the escalators, leading the second team-Rachel, Allen, and Uncle Nate-up toward the higher levels. Their boots clicked rhythmically against the metal steps as they ascended into the second tier of the hexagon.

They located the second jewelry store on the middle level. Keeping up the momentum, Joanna didn’t even

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Chapter 93 A giant, pitch-black maze

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check for a door. She threw a devastating kick straight into the glass facade. The pane exploded outward, raining sharp fragments across the polished floorboards.

She vaulted into the ruined store and tore into the back room with her team hot on her heels. This storage area held two safes: a compact one sitting on a desk, and a massive, heavy-duty vault that took up almost the entire back wall. Joanna moved like a blur. She jammed her fingers into the seam of the smaller safe. tearing the door back with a sharp pop. Turning immediately to the massive wall vault, she clamped both hands around the heavy handles, dug her heels in, and yanked with everything she had. The reinforced frame groaned, buckled, and then tore completely free, exposing rows of velvet trays loaded with high end

gems.

“Bag it all, fast,” Joanna ordered, stepping back to let Rachel, Allen, and Uncle Nate swarm the open vaults with their packs.

Stepping back out into the dimly lit corridor to keep watch, she tapped the communication earpiece resting against her collar.

“Keep your guard up everyone,” she spoke softly into the comms, her voice echoing faintly down the empty concourse. “Let’s meet in the food court in thirty minutes. Be careful.”

Leaving her team to bag the jewelry, Joanna didn’t waste another second. She blinked, activating her spatial movement, and teleported completely outside the building before snapping right onto the dark, abandoned third floor. She was going to maximize every single second of their timeline.

Her solo blitz began instantly. Stopping in front of a high-end baby boutique, she delivered a swift kick to the front window. The glass shattered inward in a loud spray. Exactly fifteen seconds later, she walked out; every single shelf had been swiped entirely clean into her space inventory, leaving nothing but bare metal brackets.

Next door was a video game and electronics retailer. Joanna paused for a split second, looking at the promotional banners, and shrugged with a faint smirk. “Why not?”

She stepped through the ruined storefront and unleashed her ability. Rows of cutting-edge consoles, stacks of newly released games, VR headsets, and high-end accessories vanished into thin air within moments. She didn’t slow down. Clothing stores, specialized tech shops, and luxury fashion boutiques were systematically hollowed out in mere minutes. It was a whirlwind of absolute efficiency.

When she finally skidded to a halt in front of a massive outdoor sports mega-store, a wide, genuinely excited smile broke across her face. Her flashlight swept over rows of propane gas cylinders, heavy-duty camping grills, sturdy canoes hanging from the ceiling, weather-resistant tents, and top-tier fishing gear.

Seeing the massive stockpile, she let out a soft laugh. This was the exact reason she had stopped Jolie from wasting time haggling over prices before the lockdown hit. Why pay pennies when you can take the whole kingdom? Standing in the center of the dark aisle, Joanna thoroughly enjoyed her ultimate five-finger discount, sweeping the entire outdoor catalog into her personal space.

The entire third floor was picked completely bone-clean in less than ten minutes.

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