A Billion Dollar Exchange - Chapter 296: New Home

The apocalypse arrived, and Irving was betrayed and killed by his own girlfriend.After his rebirth, he was chosen by the Will of the Blue Star to be an internal beta tester of the Shelter Game, starting with a [Tenfold Drop Rate] and becoming a [Necromancer]!Ferocious and brutal exotic beasts are all tamed by him, gradually forming a powerful “Exotic Beast Legion” under his command!Building sanctuaries, hoarding supplies, upgrading outer walls, setting traps...Constructing the most powerful fortress in the apocalypse!“Since I have been given a second life, I will trample those who've betrayed me once under my feet!”...When the Dark Lord descended, Irving's shelter had become the strongest on the Blue Star!“You evil creatures, dare to covet Blue Star?”“Come on! Let me show you what true despair is...”“Remember, from now on, Blue Star is under my protection! Got it?”

After being torn from the only life she knew, 16-year-old Margo is forced into a new home with strangers who call themselves her parents. Haunted by memories of her past and consumed by feelings of isolation, she struggles to adapt to her unfamiliar surroundings. School offers little relief—until she meets Lucien, a mysterious boy who appears just when she needs a friend the most.Gabriel is everything Margo needs: kind, attentive, and always ready to whisk her away from her troubles. Each night, he invites her to secret places—an abandoned playground, a fog-choked garden, a crumbling train station at the edge of town—each more unsettling than the last. Yet with every chilling rendezvous, Margo feels more alive... more seen.But something isn’t right. Gabriel never comes to school during the day. Her adoptive parents never see him. And when they catch her talking to thin air, their concern deepens into fear. They say Gabriel isn't real—that he’s a figment of her imagination. Margo wants to believe them, but Gabriel feels real. More real than anything else in her life.As the nights grow colder and more twisted, Gabriel’s true nature begins to surface. Shadows move where they shouldn’t. Time warps in his presence. And the places they visit seem to echo with whispers from another world. Margo is forced to ask herself: Who—or what—is Gabriel? Why does he only want her? And what will happen on the final night he asks her to come with him?As the line between reality and delusion begins to crumble, Margo must make an impossible choice: stay in a world where she feels loved, or return to one that barely feels real.But one thing is certain—some friendships never let go.

I returned after 10 years.

Bags of salt, spices and sugar stacked from inside the shop all the way out into the streets. Merchants loaded with goods going flooded the streets with their carriages.