Apocalypse Rebirth: Reclaiming My Infinite Space
I thought the Burch family gave me a loving home when they took me out of the orphanage.
But when the global deep freeze apocalypse hit, my adoptive parents mercilessly kicked me out of the bunker to freeze to death.
As I lay dying in the snow, covered in horrific purple frostbite, my adoptive sister Kendal walked past me in a pristine designer jacket.
Around her neck was my only childhood possession—an antique gold necklace my adoptive mother had ripped off my neck to give to her.
Kendal gloated, bragging that my pendant held a magical space with infinite supplies and fresh food while the rest of the world starved.
I realized I had spent years emptying my life savings to fund their luxury cars and fake medical emergencies.
They had drained my bank accounts, stolen my bloodline's heirloom, and used my magical lifeline to live like royalty while leaving me to die.
I took my last ragged breath in that blinding blizzard, consumed by a toxic hatred.
Why was I so hopelessly weak? Why did I let them take everything from me?
Opening my eyes again, the painful frostbite scars were gone. My skin was warm.
I grabbed my phone. The screen lit up: November 12.
It was exactly three days before the world ended.
When my adoptive mother called, faking a tearful emergency to demand another thirty thousand dollars, I smiled coldly.
"Just tell me where to send the money, Mom."
This time, I'm taking my space back, and I'm going to drain them dry.
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Chapter 4
Ellery arrived at the upscale French café downtown ten minutes early. She chose a secluded booth in the far back corner, away from the windows.
She ordered a black coffee. She took off her coat and deliberately placed her mid-tier, three-hundred-dollar leather handbag right in the center of the table, making sure the logo was facing the empty seat across from her.
Twenty minutes later, Kendal finally strolled in. She was wearing a beige designer trench coat that Ellery had paid for two Christmases ago.
Kendal slid into the booth. Her eyes immediately darted to Ellery's handbag, then scanned Ellery's plain sweater, her lips curling into a faint sneer of superiority.
Ellery casually reached into her pocket and pulled out the premium black velvet box. She slid it across the table, stopping it right next to her coffee cup.
"So?" Kendal demanded, not even bothering to say hello. She leaned forward, her eyes wide with greed. "How much are we up? Dad is freaking out. He wants to know when we can pull the cash out."
Ellery took a slow sip of her black coffee. The bitter liquid burned her tongue.
"The crypto exchange is doing a scheduled weekend maintenance," Ellery lied smoothly, not breaking eye contact. "But the profits are locked in. It doubled again."
Kendal let out a loud, breathless squeal, falling back into the leather booth. Her shoulders dropped in relief. But then, her eyes locked onto the black velvet box.
Without asking, Kendal reached her hand across the table, her manicured fingers clawing toward the box.
Ellery reacted instantly. She slammed her hand down on top of the velvet, pinning it to the table. She widened her eyes, putting on a flawless performance of a woman caught hiding something expensive.
"What is that?" Kendal asked, her voice dropping an octave, her eyes narrowing suspiciously.
Ellery hesitated. She slowly lifted her hand and cracked the lid of the box open just a fraction of an inch.
The bright, warm light from the café's crystal chandelier hit the massive cubic zirconia dead center. The fake diamond fractured the light, shooting blinding, rainbow-colored sparks across the table.
Kendal gasped loudly. Her jaw literally dropped. She stared at the stone like she had been hypnotized.
"It's... it's a gift," Ellery stammered, acting deeply uncomfortable. "From that Wall Street whale I told you about. A thank-you for managing his portfolio."
Ellery let out a heavy, dramatic sigh and snapped the box shut. "It's way too flashy for me. It looks ridiculous. I'm taking it to the pawnshop on 4th Avenue this afternoon to liquidate it for cash."
Kendal's body lunged forward. Her chest pressed against the edge of the table. Pure, unfiltered jealousy radiated from her pores.
"Are you insane?" Kendal shrieked softly. "You can't pawn that! It's gorgeous! Ellery, please. Give it to me. It perfectly matches the gala dress I just bought."
Ellery frowned, shaking her head firmly. "No, Kendal. I need the cash. I'm putting together some... special emergency supplies. I need the liquidity."
Kendal rolled her eyes so hard she practically looked at her own brain. "You and your stupid doomsday prepper garbage. You're a paranoid freak, Ellery."
Ellery's eyes flashed. She pointed a finger straight at Kendal's chest. Specifically, at the dull, tarnished gold chain resting against her collarbone.
"You want it?" Ellery asked, her voice turning sharp and unreasonable. "Fine. Trade me. Give me back my orphanage necklace."
Kendal froze. She looked down at her chest, then back at Ellery like she was looking at a mental patient.
"I'm serious," Ellery pushed, leaning in. "If the world is going to hell, I want the only thing that actually belongs to me. The only thing I have from my real parents. Give me the old chain, and you can have the diamond."
Kendal let out a sharp, mocking laugh. She didn't hesitate for a single second. Her hands flew to the back of her neck. She fumbled with the clasp, her fingers trembling with excitement.
She yanked the dull gold necklace off and tossed it onto the wooden table like it was a piece of garbage. It landed with a soft metallic clink.
Ellery's heart slammed against her ribs. She forced her breathing to remain steady. She slowly reached out and curled her fingers around the cold metal.
She pushed the velvet box across the table.
Kendal snatched it. She ripped the box open, pulled out the fake diamond, and immediately fastened it around her neck. She pulled out her phone, opened her front-facing camera, and started taking rapid-fire selfies, completely ignoring Ellery.
The moment the real gold necklace rested in Ellery's palm, a faint, microscopic jolt of electricity zapped her fingertips. It was the physical signature of the space.
Ellery stood up abruptly. She pulled a crisp twenty-dollar bill from her wallet and threw it on the table to cover the coffee.
"I have to go," Ellery said coldly.
Before Kendal could even look up from her phone screen, Ellery turned on her heel and walked out of the café.
She pushed through the glass doors, the cold wind hitting her face. She practically ran to her car. She threw herself into the driver's seat, locked the doors, and gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles. She had it. She finally had her lifeline.
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9.5
Alina was the eldest daughter of the prestigious Padilla family, but everyone mocked her as a defective dud who couldn't cast a single spell.
The moment she woke up, her father and younger sister Karina barged into her room, demanding she sign a transfer agreement to the Aethelgard Order-the most brutal faction on the continent.
It wasn't just a transfer; it was a legal disownment. In her past life, Alina didn't realize Karina was also reborn. She had dropped to her knees and begged to stay. Her reward? Her magic was violently drained from her veins by her own family. Her fiancé drove a blade through her chest, and her sister stood over her bleeding body, smiling. She had ruined her hands making potions for them, only to be discarded like trash.
The phantom pain of her chest being ripped open still burned behind her ribs. Looking at the hypocritical family waiting for her tears, she felt nothing but exhausting disgust. Why should she ever be their stepping stone again?
"For the honor of the family, you leave today."
Her father sneered as she calmly bit her thumb and pressed her bloody fingerprint onto the contract. This time, Alina didn't cry. She packed a single bag and walked out the door, heading straight for the deadly Aethelgard Order to show them what a true monster looked like.
8.0
Scarlett Hayes thought marrying James Whitmore would finally make her family see her as more than a burden.
Instead, it destroyed her life.
Framed for crimes she didn't commit, betrayed by the people she trusted most, and sentenced to prison while pregnant, Scarlett lost everything in a single night.
Then came the cruelest blow of all.
After giving birth in chains, she was told her baby had died.
The people responsible believed she would spend the rest of her life rotting behind bars.
They were wrong.
Five years later, Scarlett returns.
No longer the discarded daughter of the Hayes family. No longer the broken woman they left behind.
Now she is Commander Scarlett Hayes-a decorated war hero, the unseen force behind a global intelligence empire, and a woman powerful enough to make governments tremble.
She comes back for one reason only: revenge.
Her ex-husband, the stepsister who stole her life, and the family who buried her alive are about to learn exactly what happens when a woman with nothing left to lose takes back everything they stole.
But as Scarlett tears through the secrets of her past, one truth threatens to change everything-
the child she mourned for years may not be dead.
And the mysterious man connected to the night that changed her life has been watching from the shadows all along.
7.1
I was the top commander of a black-ops military program. After slaughtering my way through a hellish mission, I reached the extraction helicopter, trusting my second-in-command to watch my back.
But the moment our hands locked, he didn't pull me up. Instead, he plunged a syringe of lethal neurotoxin directly into my neck.
He aimed his gun at my chest, coldly stating that I was too dangerous to live. My lungs stopped, and I died in a pool of my own blood. But the endless blackness suddenly shattered. My consciousness violently forced its way into a new, broken shell. I woke up in a freezing alley, soaked in muddy rain.
This body belonged to seventeen-year-old Eliza Wyatt. A massive wave of foreign memories crashed into my brain. Her own younger sister had just stood at the top of the stairs with a mocking smile, watching street thugs beat Eliza to death.
"Take good care of the Wyatt family's eldest daughter. Tonight is the night she finally disappears."
The endless humiliation, the cold stares of her family, and the brutal betrayal by her own blood flashed before my eyes. Why was this fragile girl treated like garbage and pushed to her death by the very people who should have protected her?
I looked down at my pale, trembling hands. The top commander was dead, but in this bleeding shell, Eliza Wyatt was very much alive. I picked up a switchblade from the bloody puddle and stood up in the storm. It was time to hunt.
9.7
Elara Voss was rejected by her Alpha on the night of the Blood Moon - cast aside as a nobody with no wolf, no rank, and no future. She ran. But fate had other plans.
In the human world, she collides with Damien Crest - cold, ruthless billionaire by day, the last living Shadowking by night. He offers her a contract marriage. She has nowhere else to go.
But ancient markings are awakening on her skin. A god is whispering her name. And Kael, the fearsome Werewolf High King, has declared across all supernatural realms that she is his fated mate.
Two kings. Two worlds. One woman who was never supposed to matter.
They all rejected her once. Now they'll burn their empires down to claim her.
7.7
I trusted the wrong people in my past life.
My supposed lover and my sweet sister conspired against me, locking me inside a burning warehouse to die.
But the man I had spent my life hating, my ruthless captor Damien Sterling, rushed straight into that inferno and burned alive just to try and save me.
In my past life, I was utterly blind. I believed Julian's forged documents and Scarlett's fake affection. I even tried to assassinate Damien with a silver dagger they provided, breaking the heart of the only man who truly loved me. I died choking on thick ash, realizing too late who the real monsters were.
Why was I so incredibly foolish? Why did I let their vicious manipulation turn me into a weapon against the one person who would sacrifice absolutely everything for me?
Opening my eyes again, the phantom smell of smoke vanished.
I was sitting in the bloody water of Damien's bathtub, right after my staged suicide attempt.
When my sister sneaked into my penthouse suite and handed me the dagger to kill him again, I didn't hesitate.
I grabbed her hand tightly and plunged the sharp blade directly into my own shoulder.
"Please don't kill me, Scarlett!"
This time, I will ruthlessly ruin them both, and I will never let Damien go.
7.9
Estrella Ward gave five years of her life to her husband, draining her trust fund to save him from bankruptcy and raising his son as her own.
But one night, she woke up in a freezing hotel room, drugged, with a stranger's bite marks on her skin.
Her husband burst through the door with cameras, his vicious family, and her ten-year-old stepson, publicly framing her as a cheating whore.
The horrifying truth soon surfaced: her husband had drugged her himself, selling her body to his Wall Street boss to secure a senior partnership.
Estrella fought back with hidden security footage, blackmailing him into submission after discovering she was pregnant with his boss's child.
But fate dealt a cruel blow. She was diagnosed with aggressive, terminal breast cancer.
She refused to abort the baby to keep her leverage, but the cancer spread too fast.
She died alone in a cold hospital room, her vengeance unfinished, while her husband and his cruel family celebrated.
They thought they had successfully buried her and her secrets forever, escaping unpunished for destroying her life.
But when she gasped for air and opened her eyes again, she wasn't in a cold grave.
She was in a sterile hospital bed, looking at the perfectly manicured hands of Brooklyn Thompson—the notorious, empty-headed socialite everyone despised.
Estrella's soul had survived the abyss.
"You're going to pay for every drop of blood."
She clenched her new fists, the fire of her vengeance burning brighter than ever.