Su Li was jolted awake by his phone alarm at 7:40. Just waking up, he was still groggy, with a faint headache. He reached over to the nightstand, grabbed his phone, and turned off the alarm. Feeling the urge to pee, he climbed out of bed. "I drank too much again last night. I really can't keep this up." Su Li’s mouth was dry, his throat burning like it was on fire. The night before, he’d been entertaining an important client. To seal the deal, he’d gone through three rounds of drinking—dinner, KTV, and a late-night snack. Even with his decent tolerance, he couldn’t handle it. He’d sneak off to the bathroom, stick his fingers down his throat to throw up, then come back and keep drinking. Over and over—drink, puke, drink again—until he was dead drunk. He couldn’t even remember how he got home. "Ugh, another blackout," Su Li muttered, his head heavy and foggy. Deep down, he sighed at the harshness of life. Going it alone in a strange city wasn’t easy. He sat up in bed, slipped on his slippers, and immediately noticed they were wet. "Huh? Why’s the floor so damp?" Su Li snapped wide awake and scrambled to his feet. Had he left a faucet running while drunk last night, flooding the place? Seeing the floor soaked everywhere, Su Li hurriedly checked the kitchen and bathroom, confirming no leaks. "Weird. No leaks anywhere, but the floor’s drenched, like it’s been flooded. Could a pipe have burst somewhere?" "But I’m on the top floor—it can’t be water dripping from upstairs. Forget it, I’ll deal with it after work." Su Li shook his head, feeling overwhelmed. He hated麻烦. This was his rental. The building had thirty floors, and his unit was on the top floor. He glanced at the time—almost 7:50. He had to be at work by 8:30, and the bus ride to his company took about twenty minutes. He couldn’t afford to dawdle, so he rushed to brush his teeth and wash his face. Since he’d gone to bed so late, his eyes were still throbbing. While washing up, he instinctively pressed a towel over his eyes for about ten seconds before pulling it away. His eyes felt better, and he perked up a bit. Lowering the towel, he turned his head and noticed the bathroom window—covered in frosted film—was barely cracked open. He reached out and pushed it fully open. Peering outside, Su Li’s eyelids twitched. "This... this is..." His pupils dilated as he stuck his head out the window and gasped. Through the window, all he saw was shimmering water. No high-rises, no roads, no cars—just water. "How is this possible?" He couldn’t help but cry out, his heart pounding wildly. He immediately shut his eyes, trembling slightly. "I must have kept the towel on my eyes too long. It’s a hallucination," he thought to himself, rubbing his eyes before opening them again. Outside the window, it was still water. He even spotted a blue plastic slipper floating on the surface nearby. *Bang!* He slammed the window shut, a chill running through him. He bolted out of the bathroom, stubbing his toe on the doorframe in his haste. The pain made him break out in a cold sweat. Ignoring his injured toe, he limped to the balcony and yanked open the curtain. Then he stood there, frozen, his body rigid, heart racing, hands trembling uncontrollably. Through the balcony’s row of windows, Su Li finally saw it all clearly. The city he could see was completely submerged, turned into a vast, endless expanse of water. Only a few scattered buildings poked out in the distance. All the visible structures were over thirty stories tall; anything below that was underwater. His building was exactly thirty stories, and only his top-floor unit remained above the surface. Everything from the twenty-ninth floor down was flooded. "This can’t be real... I must be dreaming!" Though Su Li was twenty-seven and had weathered two years of society’s harsh realities, his mind was still mature enough, but now he was filled with terror, unable to accept what his eyes showed him. He pinched his left arm hard. He pinched so hard that a large bruise formed instantly, making him wince. The sharp pain and the vivid reality before him convinced him this was no dream, no hallucination. His chaotic mind slowly calmed. He looked down at the damp floor. Could this be the real reason for the dampness? Had the city been suddenly flooded while he was drunk and asleep last night? But if such a massive flood had struck, how could there have been no noise? Or had he been too drunk and passed out too deeply to hear anything? Suddenly, an idea struck him. He opened his door, stepped into the hallway, and pounded on his neighbor’s door. Besides him, two other households shared this floor. He didn’t know them well—only that the neighbor next door was a young, fashionably dressed woman who’d moved in recently, about two or three months ago. Their schedules overlapped, so they ran into each other often, but they’d never spoken. Most of the time, he saw her alone, though occasionally she’d bring a guy home. He’d run into her three times, each with a different man. "Hey, anyone home?" Forgetting politeness, Su黎 pounded on the door until it rattled, but no one answered. Getting no response, he rushed down the hallway to another door. He remembered a young couple lived there, with a noisy Chihuahua. Just as he was about to knock, he noticed the door wasn’t fully closed—it was ajar. "Anyone home?" He paused for a few seconds, and when no one replied, he pushed the door open. Inside, the living room was a mess. By the entrance, two pairs of shoes sat by the shoe cabinet: a pair of men’s leather shoes and a pair of women’s heels. One of the men’s shoes was flipped over, sole up. A trash can lay on its side, its contents spilled out. On the dining table near the door sat two round plastic takeout containers. One still had half a bowl of soup; the other had tipped over, spilling soup across the table, now congealed.