Translators: phizzlepop, kurisu (WhimsicalReads)
Editor: mantou
Before dawn, Song Fei woke up to the sundry sounds of Zhou Yilu and Qiao Siqi snoring away. Their two methods of snoring were complete opposites. One was short and powerful, the other, long and dragged out. The two intertwined as though a shepherd boy was playing his flute to rouse the cattle, exceedingly quaint.
He felt for his phone near to his pillow to check the time. Unexpectedly, just as he reached an arm out of his blanket, the eager cold air lying in wait took the opportunity to dart right in with a whoosh.
Song Fei shivered under the covers, the cold light from his phone screen illuminating the tip of his red nose.
Beijing Time, five o’clock.
It was still pitch-black outside, and there was no sign of dawn. Song Fei was suddenly very glad that he hadn’t made it into his first choice for the college entrance examinations back then. That was an institution of higher education located in Northeastern China. It was said that every year in November, the advisors could even bring the students over to the sports field to mess around with ice sculptures.
“You’re up?” Qi Yan’s whisper drifted into his ear.
They were sleeping head-to-head with their beds side-by-side, actually not too far away from each other.
“En.”
Song Fei put down his phone, the piercing white light disappearing. Moonlight spilled into 440, and it somehow felt as though peace on Earth had been restored.
Serene. Tranquil.
Song Fei couldn’t recall a moment like this since the zombie outbreak had first begun. No eerie howling from the wind as it slipped through the cracks, no heavy footsteps from the mutants wandering the corridors. It was as if the heavens themselves had suddenly pressed down on the pause button, allowing only him and Qi Yan to retain their awareness, so they could steal a brief moment of respite.
“What’re you thinking about?” Qi Yan asked.
Song Fei actually wasn’t thinking about anything, but since Qi Yan had asked, he had to at least rack his brains to find something: “I’m thinking, if none of this had ever happened, I’d be lurking in the group right now, trying to figure out who’s attractive enough to invite over for Christmas.”
“Who do you think looks attractive in the group? “Qi Yan’s voice sounded very natural, like they were just buddies chatting.
Song Fei tried his best to summon up the photos the gay guys in their group had uploaded, each one shuffling past like a revolving lantern, and he couldn’t restrain his excitement: “That Deng Jian from the Physical Education department is just, those muscles, that figure…”
Qi Yan: “He’s pretending to be a straight guy and has a girlfriend now.”
Song Fei: “Li Zhaoxi from the Economics department. When he wears those gold-rimmed glasses of his, that ascetic vibe…”
Qi Yan: “He’s already engaging in a student-teacher relationship with someone their department just hired this year to teach finance.”
Song Fei: “Wu Zilang from the Chemistry department…”
Qi Yan: “Girly.”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Vbcu Mfl: “Xejc Wljbmtfc ogbw atf Jbwqeafg Vmlfcmf vfqjgawfca…”
Qi Yan: “Player.”
Vbcu Mfl: “Aljb Db bo atf Dlbibulmji Vmlfcmfr vfqjgawfca…”
Hl Tjc: “Jtjrlcu wf.”
Vbcu Mfl: “Glvc’a sbe rjs sbe yibmxfv jii atf ugbeqr jigfjvs!”
Hl Tjc: “P ecyibmxfv atfw joafg yfmbwlcu rlcuif jujlc.”
Vbcu Mfl: “…ufa eq!”
Vlcmf atf vjsr bo sbgf, tjqqlcfrr tjv jikjsr yffc oiffalcu. Ktf rtfqtfgv ybs jcv atf mbk revvfcis rja eq, atfc ibbxfv jgbecv, mbwqifafis vlrbglfcafv.
“Did, did something happen?” Qiao Siqi had been constantly embroiled in the chaotic mingling of movie and reality for the past two days. Whether he was flustered or afraid, none of it had felt too real to him. Occasionally, even exhilaration would thrum through him, unbidden. But, ever since the incident where the students had started killing each other yesterday to the serial jumping at night, he could no longer regard everything happening in front of him as a game or a movie. This was their cold reality. Any moment now could be Game Over for him, and there’d be absolutely no chance of replaying it ever again.
They all said that some things were too horrible to contemplate, and Qiao Siqi himself was presently in a state of horror and contemplation.
By contrast, Zhou Yilu was more composed, as he looked out the window, then at Song Fei, utterly baffled: “It’s still f*cking early, ah.”
Song Fei shivered as he jumped out of bed, then cocooned himself inside his long, black down jacket, finally feeling a bit of warmth: “The early bird gets the worm.”
Zhou Yilu crumbled. He just said it himself. Early, not the crack of dawn, ah.
After muddling their way to six o’clock in a daze, the electricity in the dorms came back on.
Qiao Siqi filled up a thermos with cold water, plugged in his immersion heater, then powered it on. While waiting for the water to boil, he sighed with emotion: “It’s probably just us few brothers who’re living this delightfully in the apocalypse.”
The water finished boiling, so they brushed their teeth and washed their faces. After that, the four early birds split up the remaining instant noodles. No one dared to touch the apple, afraid that it’d render their breakfast useless.
After padding their stomachs, the only food they had left in their reserves was half a box of chocolates and a pack of shrimp crackers.
Zhou Li eyed the huge chocolate gift box, then its extremely disproportionate exquisite contents that could be counted on one hand, and felt it was very unfortunate: “Since it’s all chocolate in the end, how great would it have been to stock up on some Snickers instead? What’s the point of buying these showy chocolates anyway.”
Song Fei sighed weakly: “Da ge, that wasn’t purchased with the purpose of self-enjoyment, but prepared as a gift for a girl.”
“Who, ah? “Zhou Yilu glanced at the chocolates, then glanced at the musical instruments on the wall, and somehow just connected the dots, “The guitar player?”
Song Fei had been surprised by Zhou Yilu’s guess at first, but soon changed his mind after thinking for a bit. Whether it was learning the guitar or buying chocolate, weren’t these all for picking up girls, the motives were entirely identical, and it was nothing hard to guess at. 440’s thirstiest Ren Zhe-tongxue had practically made his way through half the girls in the History department after flirting his way through first- and second-year, but just hadn’t been able to land himself a girlfriend.
Song Fei savored the pure happiness that came from reminiscing over his roommate’s tragic journey for love, the corners of his lips lifting up naturally.
Just that, this happiness was too short-lived.
Right as the corners of his lips lifted up, they immediately dropped back down again, and what followed was the panic he’d been suppressing these past few days.
For days, Song Fei had been forcing himself to not think about Wang Qingyuan, Xiang Yang, and Ren Zhe. Those were his closest friends in this school. If something had happened to them, Song Fei felt that he wouldn’t be able to bear it. So as soon as his mind began to stray and make up all kinds of conjectures, he’d immediately tell himself that the three of them must be safely hidden in the library right now, and just like him, were trying hard to survive in these desperate times.
Suddenly, someone lightly patted him on the shoulder twice.
Song Fei turned around, and met Qi Yan’s gentle gaze.
“Even you’re alive and well, so they must be doing just fine.”
Song Fei knew that Qi Yan was trying to comfort him, but he really didn’t want to express any appreciation for it at all.
When there was finally a glimmer of light on the horizon, four hot-blooded men ready for battle gathered around Zhou Yilu’s masterpiece— floor plans for the Fen Duo Duo supermarket.
“This is the main entrance. Going in, there’s the sales area. There’s an administrative office and staff lounge near the back. At the very back, there’s the warehouse area and the back door. Zhou Yilu had only made a rather rough sketch, but after his explanation, they could follow along just fine.
Song Fei’s knowledge of Fen Duo Duo was limited to the front entrance, the gondola shelves, and the checkout counter. He had no idea that the inside was so richly packed.
“The sales area is full of zombies. We’ll die if we go in like that,” Qiao Siqi had seen the conditions clearly when he’d been running back to the dormitories. “Should we go through the back door and directly enter the warehouse?”
“The warehouse may not be safe either,” Zhou Yilu shook his head. “And I’m mostly worried that the back door may not be unlocked. If we run over and find out that it’s locked, then have to backtrack to the front entrance, it’ll end up being even more cumbersome.”
Song Fei understood: “Then we might as well directly go in through the open front doors, then trap them inside by closing the doors and beating them all up!”
Zhou Yilu nodded.
Qiao Siqi felt like he was listening to a tall tale: “The inside is completely filled with zombies. Who exactly will be beating the other up after the doors are shut ah!”
Qi Yan however, asked, “How do we shut the doors?”
“The supermarket doors use floor springs, no bolt lock, just a floor patch lock. But, we don’t have the key, so we can’t lock it up. We can only use something to hold down the stainless steel handles from the inside. ”
Song Fei interrupted and asked, “Can’t we bind them together?”
Zhou Yilu: “Of course, that’d be much better. A mop or broom or whatever would actually be easily broken through if they were to ram at the door.”
Song Fei scampered over to his own thermos, then pulled out his bicycle chain lock from behind it, and waved it around: “How about this?”
Zhou Yilu and Qi Yan exchanged a look—
“Perfect. ”
Qiao Siqi felt that these three comrades of his were dreaming: “Can you guys please wake up. Sure, closing the doors will thwart the zombies outside, but we’ll be locked up with the zombies inside, and then what? Grab some Sachima from the shelves to threaten them with, and tell them not to try anything funny?”
Song Fei gave him a sidelong glance: “Do you have a better way?”
Qiao Siqi was speechless. If there were only zombies inside the supermarket, they could still get someone fast-footed to act as bait, drawing the zombies outside, subsequently reproducing a game of “Snake” while on the run, taking the lead and doubling-back to the vacated supermarket, lock the door, and done. But, now there were zombies inside and outside the supermarket. Only someone tired of living would run around the entire world acting as bait.
The thermos was already bubbling up.
Song Fei went over and unplugged the immersion heater before taking it out. Afterwards, he patted him on the shoulder: “Johns, if we can’t even deal with the mutants in a single supermarket, later on, there may be an entire school’s worth, a city’s-worth, or even an entire Earth’s. Do you still want me to go on?”
“You’ve already gone far enough,” Qiao Siqi shook Song Fei’s hand off his shoulder testily, “Also, my name’s John.”
Coming up with a battle plan took no more than ten minutes, but 440 had fallen into an awkward silence. As youths of the motherland who’d been born and raised in prosperous times, they’d greened the country by planting trees, visited orphans and widows, and swept the tombs of heroes, with Lei Feng as their role model. There were hundreds of ways they could make their country proud, but it most assuredly didn’t include getting into fights.
Ever since they were little, their teachers had always exhorted them to quarrel all they wanted, but never resort to violence.
“Forget it, let’s leave it up to fate,” Zhou Yilu abruptly stood up, “I’ll go make a scabbard, so I don’t accidentally hurt myself.”
An artisan must first sharpen his tools if he wanted to do his job well.
Qi Yan: “I’ll go sharpen my knife.”
Qiao Siqi: “I’ll also go take another look at my knife again. There’s too d*mn many functions, I’m starting to get confused.”
Song Fei: “I’m going to… fan my fan?”
In the blink of an eye, it was half past seven. The night had retreated, and daytime had arrived.
Extremely satisfied with the scabbard he’d made using several textbook covers + tape wrapped around it, Zhou Yilu made kaka sounds sheathing and unsheathing his knife, experiencing what it was like to be ‘quick on the draw’ as he asked Song Fei, who was leaning against the balcony door and fanning himself: “How’s the weather, is it suitable for breaking out?”
Song Fei snapped the fan shut with a huala, his dignified air looking every bit the part of a plainclothes Qianlong-ye on an undercover inspection tour, as he nodded to his companion: “Quite suitable.”
Zhou Yilu stood up in high spirits, wanting to open the door and go onto the balcony to soak up the first rays of morning sunlight.
However, just as his hand made contact with the door frame, he flinched.
Outside, a misty veil surrounded the landscape, obscuring the mountains and clouds, an airy, ethereal gossamer.
—The fourth day of the zombie siege, haze.
Author’s Chapter Summary:
The early bird gets the worm, can't see our hands in front of our faces!
The translator has something to say: the longer a vinegar jar ferments, the more distinct its sour scent… en, Qi Yan is fast approaching premium quality vinegar lvl
Premium quality vinegar xD
Thanks for the chapter!
every ch im convinced he’s this much closer to getting ready to smash this entire box of lightbulbs to pieces~
thanks for reading!
So he was jealous? xD I didn’t notice that…
Thank you for the chapter 💜
i laughed when Song Fei cluelessly answered his question properly and actually had an entire sequence of guys on his list too. also, how Qi Yan already knows all this gossip is sus is he some kind of part time fbi agent, full time vinegar jar
thanks for reading! <3
Jiayou! I hope you can prevail and get some food
Thanks for the chapter! <3
the beautiful description for smog rlly had me appreciating the author-dada’s love for sarcasm, truly iconic
thanks for reading!!
Qi Yan, Qi Yan … 😂
Good luck to our boys! I hope #1 – they get what they need, #2 – the zombies don’t get any of them, #3 – their fellow humans don’t sabotage them!!
trying to see how many CHs he can hold it in for before exploding and taking down all the lightbulbs with him… the best part is Song Fei thinking about Ren Zhe’s tragic love conquests while he’s basically singlehandedly destroyed, directly or inadvertently, any of Qi Yan’s attempts to get anything remotely romantic done. 1 pt does go to the zombie apocalypse for ruining their lunch meeting tho
Haze – perfect weather for a food hunt :’D For humans bc other humans won’t see them so easily but suprise attacks from zombies can happen easier too. Good luck guys~
Thx for the ch ٩( >ヮ<)۶
Song Fei posturing at the window rlly misled me haha poor Zhou Yilu just wanting to enjoy some nice, fresh air QAQ
thanks for reading! <3
Thank you for the chapter ❤️