Translator: transcendentwings
Update 2/2
The ninth level of the Yixin Building was its cap. Needless to say, there was an elevator, and there were even three staircases, one at either end of the corridor and one in the middle, just that the one in the middle was wide and decorative, connecting to the first floor lobby while the two on the ends weren’t so grand and were mainly there for utility and as a fire escape.
The marble staircase that Zhao He was now ascending was the one in the middle. It was resplendent and of an European style, even the handrails of the stairs were made of Roman columns which made it reminiscent of the British Imperial palace.
However, because of the extremely dark surroundings and his own limited artistic training, he couldn’t quite appreciate it. It only made him feel that his field of vision was wide, especially when his back was pasted against the railing as he slowly made his way upwards. One could observe upstairs as well as downstairs, all was in the palm of his hand.
Two zombies below wandered to the stairs at this moment. Fortunately, Zhao He had already reached the middle platform on the stairs between the first and second levels. He stuck close to the wall and remained motionless, morphing into a 3D poster, succeeding in his deception.
After the zombie swayed further away, Zhao He glanced at the empty stairs on the second floor and silently prayed in his heart that it would be best if the corridor would be just as clean as this. Finally, he held his breath and charged upwards!
As soon as Zhao He’s long legs were stretched out, he made it to the second floor in just a few steps. He had no time to check the circumstances down the hallway because his goal has never been this place, as long as there were steps, he would continue to climb, who cares if that corridor was deserted or crowded.
There was almost no breaks and at the moment when both feet stepped on the floor of the second level, Zhao He grabbed the railing with one hand and used his right foot as an axis to veer sharply as his left foot already began to continue upwards, judging by the magnitude, this stride could cross over three steps!
Pudong—
Zhao He was stunned when the severe pain radiated from his chest to the rest of his body. He had no idea how he, who was mounting the steps gracefully just a second ago, fell onto the steps with a baji and it was the chest again which smashed heavily against the edge of the step. Others shatter boulders on their chest while he had a boulder break his chest, not only did it bust it, it pretty much fractured it into smithereens!
Amidst the severe pain, he was only thankful that he didn’t let go of the hand that was hanging onto the banister and managed to seize the bottom rung, otherwise the fall wouldn’t have only injured his chest, but he probably would’ve also split his head until blood ran everywhere.
His body was still being wrenched down, Zhao He finally reacted that someone was hugging his thigh!
Instinct drove him to stamp his foot violently promptly and after kicking several times in a row, he turned around and saw that the girl clinging onto him was a bulingbuling Indian-style maiden. Although the angle at which she was hanging and holding onto his thigh wasn’t a very pleasant view, one could tell that she was once graceful, youthful, and beautiful in life.
The only fly in the ointment was that at this moment, she was opening her bloody mouth and latching onto his thigh tightly, not letting go. If it wasn’t for Zhao He shaking his leg vigorously trying to boot her off making her unable to land her maw anywhere, she probably would’ve been able to take a chomp out of him long ago.
And while this Indian girl over here threw herself into his arms, there were six more maidens part of this revolt dashing down the corridor from the other side!
Three of them were wearing blue, short-sleeved, simplistic military uniforms with red armbands around their arms and some of them were even holding sharp weapons that were obviously knives at first glance, but seemed like machetes in the fluctuating reflections of their blades. As a male student, Zhao He always had this fear that he would soon be dragged away and submitted to a denouncement session.
Then another pair of Latin dancers, a pair consisting of a handsome man and a beautiful woman, Zhao He even felt that they didn’t come running over rather they came twisting and prancing over!
Finally, there was a male classmate who brought up the rear, but the other’s enchanting figure and seductive charm couldn’t be broken even after the zombie transformation!
Zhao He wasn’t afraid of zombies, but that didn’t mean that he was indifferent to zombies with their makeup on! It was a crime to paint on such heavy cosmetics and put on such a flirtatious appearance just to strike such poses on such a wretched, windy night! It was a great curtain of fear!
The Indian girl immediately loosened up her hold in response to the stab and Zhao He scrambled to the third floor instantly as he still had a huge advantage in speed—After all, this was his profession and he even had a crushing dominance over other male students, let alone an infected female classmate—He made it up to the third level in a few bounding leaps, glanced down the hallway on the right vigilantly and nearly cried, there were no zombies!
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.
Qlatbea wjxlcu jcs cblrf, Itjb Lf rtba bea ilxf j yeiifa jcv yjggfifv lc atf vlgfmalbc ktfgf tlr mbwgjvfr gfrlvfv!
Dalang—
Lf vlvc’a fnfc wjxf la bea akb raglvfr ktfc Itjb Lf bcis ofia j uera bo klcv yibk qjra tlr fjgr jcv atfc jc bypfma ygertfv qjra tlr ojmf yfobgf la olcjiis ofii bc atf ugbecv.
In the blink of an eye, he had already dashed to the “fallen object”, and only saw a shiny carving knife glittering on the marble floor.
Zhao He came to his senses in an instant and immediately ran away without even looking back, hollering loudly as he did so: “Wu Zhou—”
In the lifeless Yixin Building, the sound was like a peal of thunder, piercing straight through the sky!
Not too far in the distance, the door to a classroom swung open swiftly. Before Zhao He could identify the protruding head clearly, he heard a familiar voice: “Zhao He, over here—”
Wu Zhou had a hoarse voice and his tone was already usually not so pleasant, and was even harsher-sounding when roaring loudly.
But at this moment, only four words came to Zhao He’s mind amidst the surging warm current, the calls of nature.
The moment he rushed into the classroom and when he whirled around to slam the door, Zhao He finally saw that besides the group of demonic dancers, there was also a team with knives that had newly joined them on the third floor. The murder weapons looked the same as the carving knife that was hurtled at him before, but because the door was closed at that instant, he didn’t capture it clearly.
Pengpengpeng!
The classroom door was pounded on madly and there was even a ramming charge!
Wu Zhou, Zhao He, and Feng Qibai, the trio, braced themselves firmly against the door, but they didn’t make a peep, only resisted silently, for fear of making the zombies beyond the door more agitated.
After about five minutes, the slapping and smashing gradually weakened then after about another two minutes, it disappeared completely.
Just as Zhao He was about to open his mouth, Feng Qibai made a shushing gesture then pointed at the interior of the room, signaling him to converse over there.
The three of them quietly moved to the back of the room and only then did Zhao He recognize clearly that he was not in an ordinary classroom, but a sculpting classroom. There were two compartments, one on the inside and the other on the outside. The outside portion had a door and a window, except for the fact that there were no tables or chairs, the structure was no different from that of ordinary classrooms. The inside space seemed as if it were segregated after, and had no windows or doors. It was appropriate to call it an “inner room” because it was more isolated and private.
There were some semi-finished sculptures placed in the two areas some of whose overall shape could be seen while others were still bundles of mysteries and the paintings on the wall were the works of masters from different periods such as the Statue of David, Venus de Milo, Discobulus and various others, setting up a strong artistic atmosphere.
As soon as they entered the room, Wu Zhou gave Zhao He a bear hug!
Zhao He’s eyes soured, but he still put on an act as he patted the back of his comrade-in-arms’s head, teasing: “This kind of excited hug should wait until after your ge snatches some medals from the Global University Games ba.”
Wu Zhou let go of his comrade-in-arms, and the lingering emotions of agitation gradually morphed into reluctance: “Then wouldn’t I not have the chance to embrace you again in this life!”
Zhao He made a face and punched him angrily.
Wu Zhou broke out into laughter.
Feng Qibai was also a little thrilled by his comrade who dropped down out of nowhere, but he had always been the type not to express his emotions so outwardly. Although he was always evaluated as cold and melancholic, he was, after all, an artist ma, and possessing a bit of a maverick temperament wasn’t a negative thing. So after hesitating multiple times, he still swallowed the warm and intimate words and went straight for the main purpose: “Where did you come from, why is it just you?”
Zhao He was used to his calm temperament and stiff face, so he didn’t make a fuss and reported the situation at the Gewu Building in detail.
After finishing, he breathed a long sigh of relief: “I reckoned that the two of you didn’t return and just happened to see the corpse of the zombie that the two of you pushed down, then I followed the scent of the Hualu shui to find you both.”
“The two of us wanted to go back, but we’d have to be able to escape first ah.” Wu Zhou had a desperation on his face, “This building is full of a group of crazy dancers, the fact that we were able to locate this hideout here was already escaping from death.”
These words jabbed at Zhao He’s sore spot and immediately held the hands of his comrade in sympathy: “Don’t you miss our sports institute very much?”
Wu Zhou gripped back hard: “The building is neat and orderly and the students are simple and rough!”
Feng Qibai narrowed his eyes at his two comrades-in-arms and reminded lightly: “When you guys speak ill of other people’s departments, can you please considerately avoid the protagonists involved?”
Zhao He let go of Wu Zhou, turned to Feng Qibai and professed from the bottom of his heart: “If you were clutched by a bulingbuling Indian girl on the thigh, then you will understand how I feel.”
Feng Qibai pointed to the protective goggles placed to the side that were dry but still had visible saliva marks and shrugged: “Then let us switch off, I’ll let the Indian girl hug my thigh and you let the senior from ballet nibble on you.”
Zhao He: “. . .”
Wu Zhou sighed heavily and pulled the two of his companions to sit down: “One toiling away at a hard life shouldn’t embarrass another industrious person, okay.”
Following Feng Qibai’s supplemental knowledge, Zhao He finally understood the layout of the Yixin Building clearly for the first time. Although there were nine levels, they belonged to four different sub-departments of dance, painting, music, and sculpting. The first and second belonged to the dancers, the third and fourth to the sculptors, the fifth and sixth to the painters, the seventh were where the offices resided, and the eight and ninth for the musicians.
It wasn’t difficult to explain why Zhao He ran into all sorts of strangely costumed people on the first and second floors, but was met with a bunch of Xiaoli Feidaos on the third.
However—
“Do they usually dress so formally during regular practice?”
“This isn’t called practice, it’s called rehearsal.” Feng Qibai corrected.
Zhao He made a face: “It’s about the same anyway ma.”
Different majors seemed as if they were segregated by mountains, Feng Qibai gave up and answered directly: “The incident occurred just before the New Year’s Day party so they were rehearsing with the full set of makeup and costumes on the weekend.”
Zhao He was enlightened: “So that Indian girl should be performing an Indian dance. I think I also saw a Latin dancer, but that military uniform performance should be quite special. . .”
Feng Qibai: “Ballet, ‘The Red Detachment of Women’.”
“. . .” No wonder he kept detecting the air of righteousness and patriotism.
Even if Feng Qibai wasn’t too interested, they did, after all, enter and exit the same building, thus he was inevitably influenced by the passionate style of the dance department every day. Occasionally, he would even meet an overly enthusiastic one who would be able to start busting out some moves in the lobby on the first floor. It was okay if he ran into a girl, but when he bumped into male classmates who were shooting flirtatious glances at him, he only wanted to chuck his carving tool over.
However, the colder Feng Qibai was, the more popular he was as well. The ambiguous WeChat messages he had received since he entered the university could make up a complete collection of interested parties. Not only were there maidens, but youths as well. It was such that he ultimately quit the WeChat group of the Arts department and preached the philosophy of out of sight, out of mind.
But there was no need to share these heartaches of the past with his comrades: “You mean that Qi Yan and the others will act tomorrow night?”
Zhao He nodded: “That’s what Qi Yan stated.”
Feng Qibai was skeptical, after all, time was precious to them now: “Could it be to trick you into going back to the canteen first that he said so on purpose?”
“Probably not,” Zhao He mulled it over, “He was completely exhausted when he was able to locate Song Fei. That guy has never fought battles he was unprepared for so it is unlikely for him to continue forging ahead recklessly.”
Only then was Feng Qibai reminded of the tales Zhao He retold about Qi Yan’s heroic feats of dashing back and forth for several hours in order to save the beaut. In addition to its unbelievability, he also couldn’t help sighing: “True love.”
Zhao He was taken aback, Wu Zhou was also surprised: “You already knew?”
Feng Qibai frowned: “How could that be possible.”
Although it had almost been half an hour since Zhao He divulged the heart-rending retelling of how Qi Yan trounced the world while Song Fei routed Qi Yan, Wu Zhou was still immersed in shock thus upon seeing Feng Qibai taking it so calmly, he was naturally puzzled.
“This kind of thing is too common,” Feng Qibai was in a rare giving mood so he explained further, “In our department, it won’t even earn a demerit.”
Zhao He sincerely raised his hand and weakly pled for advice: “Then may I ask, what needs to be done to be punished with a demerit?”
“Not too sure,” Feng Qibai blew at his bangs, his gaze pure and transparent, “I’m a very obedient student.”
Zhao He narrowed his eyes in doubt, but couldn’t unearth any of the other’s weaknesses.
Wu Zhou glanced at the four blood-stained carving knives of various models neatly lined up on the floor then recalled Feng-tongxue’s chilling fighting figure in a flashback and stiffly turned to gaze out the window quietly.
Ah, the moon tonight was truly. . .
“Stop admiring the moon,” Feng Qibai’s cold voice reined Wu-tongxue’s back in, “Since the eight of us are scattered now, we must find a way to communicate with each other. It’s best to be able to convene after they retrieve the radio.”
“Communicating is easy,” Zhao He cleared his throat, “Just holler bei. I just sang several hours of ‘My Fair Princess’ and my wickedly compelling singing skills have been trained to the highest level. I think my vocals have pretty much recovered by now and I feel that I can still roar for another five hundred years.”
Wu Zhou suddenly saw the light: “F*ck, so that was you ah. I couldn’t hear it too clearly and thought a zombie was howling ne. If you don’t believe me, ask Feng Qibai, I was even discussing with him ne, what kind of zombie was it ah, wailing like that for half the night like a cat yowling mating calls.”
Zhao He: “. . .”
Wu Zhou: “Uh, but after listening to it for so long, it was actually quite stirring. . .”
Zhao He: “The way you tried to salvage it was too rigid!”
Author’s Chapter Summary: An assembly of manic dancers at the Yixin Building, no need to fret over comrades contacting!
The translator has something to say: finally not alone, WZ and ZH could be a comedy duo and FQB is truly. . . unfathomable, why is it always the quiet ones?
Lmao love how the girl bulingbuling zombie is just called INDIAN