At eight o'clock in the morning, the sky was bright.
This was the second day since Qi Yan escaped back to the dormitory, and the third day since the dormitory was besieged. Like Song Fei, the students who had initially stayed in the dormitory were suffering from enormous mental and physical exhaustion, and it wasn't just 440 who needed food.
The early bird catches the worm. The building was already covered with all sorts of students. Some were agile and fast as lightning, some were struggling to move, and many more were preparing to climb out. Some had just climbed out but found that they really couldn't do it and had to use their hands and feet to climb back in.
Normally, this kind of scenery would be absolutely worth sitting down and enjoying with some sunflower seeds. But now, Qi Yan, Song Fei, and Qiao Siqi stood on the balcony, gazing at the bustling, even somewhat comical, scene, and were filled only with fear and trembling. The encouraging conversations they had exchanged after the lights were turned off last night seemed like soap bubbles, utterly insignificant in the face of this apocalyptic spectacle so close, almost within reach.
Yes, the end of the world.
The three of them had no idea how the outside world had changed. Perhaps it was still plagued by zombie hordes, or perhaps the situation was under control. But whatever the case, they had neither the will nor the ability to care. They were not yet twenty. When they were having a blast, the world seemed so vast that they could fly into outer space, but most of the time they were stuck on the ground, their world shrinking to just this school campus.
What you see before your eyes is everything.
When classmates who usually joked and discussed which girl in the art academy was the prettiest suddenly kicked the classmate below them over a food dispute, causing him to fall to his death, the slowly flowing blood reddening the asphalt road that was no longer recognizable as its original color, the three of them couldn't imagine what kind of apocalypse could be more cruel and desperate than this.
"How about... we forget it?" Song Fei subconsciously grabbed Qi Yan's clothes, not wanting him to take any more risks.
Qiao Siqi didn't speak; he stared intently at his classmate lying on the ground downstairs. The classmate had fallen badly, but was still alive, his body convulsing, looking like he was about to die but was still trying to get up. Several mutants seemed to have smelled something and swarmed out of the dormitory building. The classmate didn't even have a chance to struggle; in an instant, he was dead. His face was a bloody mess, his body ripped open, like an antelope being preyed upon by big cats in an animal documentary, a lifeless, delicious meal.
In a zombie movie with its ever-evolving plot, this kind of scene would be questionable, let alone be considered a serious crime; it wouldn't even qualify as a proper scene.
But it is real.
Joskey swore that the most disgusting, bloody, and terrifying zombie movie he had ever seen was not as deadly as this.
Qi Yan gave Song Fei a reassuring look and took the clothes from his hand: "Be prepared, the gains may not be too many."
Qiao Siqi snapped out of his daze and quickly walked over, shaking his head: "Food isn't important, safety comes first."
Song Fei agreed, immediately echoing, "If it doesn't work, we should retreat quickly. We still have plenty of points to make."
Qi Yan smiled. He looked at Qiao Siqi, who was an arm's length away, and then at Song Fei, who was only an arm and a half's length away. After lowering his eyes and pondering for a while, Qi Yan made a snap decision, grabbed Song Fei, and kissed him hard on the lips.
Song Fei was terrified.
Qiao Siqi was stunned.
Releasing Song Fei, Qi Yan, without a word, leaped from the edge of the balcony to the adjacent one. The balcony door was ajar, the dormitory door was wide open, and the dormitory was a mess, with faint traces of blood on the floor. Qi Yan didn't dare linger and immediately jumped to the next adjacent balcony. The moment he landed, two mutants rushed in from the balcony where he had been standing. Qi Yan looked at them across the balcony; they were two ferocious and anxious faces, their outstretched arms waving frantically because they couldn't reach him.
Qi Yan jumped across two more balconies at top speed, finally reaching 437, and then began to climb upwards.
There are still two silly people sitting on the balcony of room 440.
The last time Qi Yan was this enthusiastic was when they first slept together. After that, the enthusiasm faded, and their daily interactions turned into verbal sparring.
"How does it feel?" Qiao Siqi was the first to react. He swallowed hard and sincerely asked for advice.
Song Fei savored the memory for a moment, then smiled and said, "Not bad."
Qiao Siqi: "In TV dramas, if the male lead does this to the female lead before leaving, she usually doesn't come back."
Song Fei: "..."
While Song was wishing Qiao would never come back, Qi Yan had already climbed onto the balcony of room 637. His insistence on drinking boiled water stemmed from the belief that in the current situation, every bit of safety mattered. Besides, since they were going to search the dorm anyway, taking an extra electric kettle wouldn't make much difference.
But he didn't expect that there would be someone in 637.
According to Qiao Siqi, he forgot his keys, and one of his roommates was not home. He frantically knocked on the door but no one answered, so he ran all the way to the fourth floor and was rescued by Song Fei. But the 637 in front of him had exactly three people: one tall and strong, one short and fat, and one of average height and build.
At first, Qi Yan mistook them for mutants and was so frightened he almost ran away. However, he soon realized they weren't mutants, but people. He then assumed they were Qiao Siqi's roommates, until he saw them rudely rummaging through drawers and cabinets.
He wasn't a mutant, nor was he Joschi's roommate; he was just like me, here to scavenge the dorm.
Qi Yan didn't dare to go inside rashly, so she stood on the balcony, waiting quietly at a distance.
The three people inside were so engrossed in their search that they didn't see him at all. It wasn't until they finally discovered that there was nothing to eat in the house that they kicked over a stool in a fit of anger. When they looked up, they finally saw Qi Yan.
"Who is it? Standing there like a dead man, not saying a word!"
Qi Yan smiled in a friendly manner, her voice light and lacking any imposing tone: "I came here to find something to eat."
"No need to look anymore, there's nothing here!" The man sneered as he walked out of the balcony and came to Qi Yan, looking him up and down like a searchlight.
With the situation at three against one, a head-on confrontation would be pointless. Qi Yan immediately tried to prove his innocence by patting his clothes and pockets, and anyone with eyes could see that there was nothing there.
"Damn it!" Frustrated by his fruitless attempt, the man quickly climbed over to the neighboring balcony.
The two people behind quickly followed.
638 seemed unsafe, as the three men quickly leaped into 639. Qi Yan watched as they smashed the sliding glass door to the balcony of 639 and swaggered inside.
He frowned slightly and slipped into 637.
The house was a complete mess; those who knew better would think it had been ransacked by classmates, while those who didn't would have thought it had been robbed. Qi Yan went straight to Qiao Siqi's wardrobe, found the wool coat he had mentioned, and felt an electric kettle in the large, hidden pocket inside.
High-power electrical appliances are like hermits; some hide in the wilderness, while others hide in the city.
Qi Yan put the electric kettle into the zippered pocket of her clothes, looked around, and finally gave up on searching for it again. Qiao Siqi said that they still had some food in their dormitory, and this food should have already been shared with the other students.
Turning back to the balcony of 637, Qi Yan pondered his next move. Originally, he planned to walk down 637, 636, and 635, but judging from the way those three had acted, the area ahead had obviously been cleared out... Qi Yan lowered his eyes, thought for a moment, and then had an idea.
Stealthily jumping onto the balcony of 638, Qi Yan didn't dare linger and quickly leaped into 639 as well. In the instant he stood up, he unsurprisingly saw the wide-open dormitory door of 638 in his peripheral vision, and vaguely caught a glimpse of a mutant figure flashing past the doorway.
The sliding door to the balcony of room 639 was smashed to pieces. Most of the broken glass went into the room, while a small amount splashed onto the balcony, where Qi Yan stepped on it, making a faint creaking sound.
Qi Yan's original plan was to head straight to 640 without stopping, so he could get ahead of the three others and loot the dormitories after 640 first. But as he turned to jump to the next room, he suddenly caught a glimpse of room 639 and found it completely empty.
This situation caught Qi Yan off guard. After a moment's thought, he realized that there probably wasn't much in 639, and that group of people had quickly gone to 640.
Qi Yan was somewhat annoyed. At this rate, before he could even get ahead of those people, they would have already cleared out the entire sixth floor. There weren't many dorm rooms left after 640 to begin with.
Or should we just skip the sixth floor and go to the fifth?
As Qi Yan pondered this, she leaned out from the balcony to see how fierce the competition was on the fifth floor.
But as soon as he stuck his head out, he heard a loud "bang"!
Caught off guard, Qi Yan was so startled he almost fell over. He tried to listen carefully, but the sound was even more anxious than he was, practically blasting at his eardrums—
"Hold!"
"Oh shit!"
"Go to hell!"
The curses were right next to them, mixed with the sounds of chaotic fighting.
Qi Yan narrowed his eyes sharply. It was the voices of those three people. 640!
Clearly, the three people who were ahead of them encountered trouble.
Qi Yan's thin lips were pressed into a straight line, seemingly indifferent, but in reality, she was torn between two conflicting emotions.
To save or not to save?
"Qi Yan—"
Johns' concern could be heard on the wind.
"What are you standing there for? Move!"
Qi Yan rolled her eyes, too lazy to pay attention to him, but suddenly the scene of Qiao, the third wheel, telling him how he was dragged into the house by Song Fei at the last minute and he almost wanted to hug Song Fei and call him daddy surged into her mind. For some reason, the scales of her heart, which was originally in a dilemma, gradually tilted in one direction.
Qi Yan was a man of action who acted on his thoughts. Once he made up his mind, he didn't hesitate any longer. He took out the fruit knife hidden at his waist, unfolded the folding blade, gripped it tightly, and leaped onto the balcony of 640 without the slightest hesitation. The moment his feet touched the ground, he rushed into the house...
"I'll fucking pay you back if you don't give it to me!"
Then he froze.
The scene in 640 was completely beyond Qi Yan's expectations.
The dormitory door was tightly closed. There were no mutants, only four students, three standing and one lying on the ground—a typical scene of a group beating.
Instant noodles were scattered all over the ground, two bags of which had been crushed in the chaos, with noodle crumbs everywhere.
The person on the ground had given up resisting, curled up with their head in their hands, their white down jacket had been kicked and was covered in dust, and in some places you could even see clear shoe prints.
The three men finished their beating and kicking, finally stopping, panting heavily. The two who were clearly henchmen immediately bent down to pick up their instant noodles. The taller, stronger one glanced at Qi Yan and chuckled, "What's up, buddy? Following us?"
Only after he finished speaking did he notice the knife in Qi Yan's hand, and his eyes immediately lit up: "This thing of yours is pretty good, can we borrow it?"
Food can sustain life, and weapons can save it; anyone who wants to survive knows this perfectly well.
Qi Yan looked at him quietly for a while, then spoke up: "I can lend it, but when are you going to return it?"
The man's face darkened, and without saying a word, he suddenly reached for the stool next to him!
Qi Yan was startled and instinctively dodged backward, only to find the balcony door right behind her. Her back bumped into the closed side with a loud thud, sending a shiver down her spine.
Fortunately, the person was just swinging the stool, not throwing it, otherwise the stool leg wouldn't have just grazed his nose, but his head and the sliding glass door would have been smashed together.
It should be said that this student wasn't so heartless as to kill everyone he saw.
But if someone throws a chair at their classmate at the slightest disagreement, how far is that from being utterly insane?
"Stop talking nonsense, give me the knife!" the man shouted again.
Qi Yan remained expressionless, silent, and motionless.
The two men who had just finished picking up the instant noodles panicked. One of them handed the instant noodles to the other and rushed over to try and take the knife!
Qi Yan gritted his teeth and frantically swung his arms, creating countless flashes of sword light: "Anyone who comes near, I'll kill them!"
That's how fights are: the stubborn are afraid of the ruthless, and the ruthless are afraid of the reckless. The three men originally wanted to use their numbers to intimidate and beat the knife, and that would be the end of it. But damn it, everyone here went through nine years of compulsory education, and there's no martial arts component in the college entrance exam. Faced with the gleaming blade, everyone chickened out.
With the two sides locked in a stalemate, the three finally gave up on seizing the knife and left with their spoils.
Qi Yan was merely bluffing; he might not dare to actually hurt anyone. So, he decided to stop while he was ahead and clear a path for the other party.
"They didn't leave me a single drop, they're even more corrupt than those Japanese devils, damn it." The white down jacket on the ground got up, wiped the blood from his nose with his sleeve, and another red stain appeared on the gray-white cuff.
Seeing that Qi Yan was still holding the knife, the man in the white down jacket smiled wryly and shrugged: "Classmate, you're too late. There's really nothing left."
Qi Yan had no idea what state of mind he was in, and he actually asked the other person, "What will you eat from now on?"
The man in the white down jacket picked up the stool that had fallen to the ground, his movements so slow, like a frail, lifeless old patient.
After finally righting all the fallen stools, the man in the white down jacket sat down on his own stool and gave Qi Yan a wry smile. He didn't answer Qi Yan's question; he simply said, "I was really worried you'd stab one to death."
Qi Yan glanced at the wardrobe next to him. All the wardrobes in the boys' dormitory were the same, with a gap of a few centimeters between the bottom of the wardrobe and the floor tiles. At this moment, a cold light was gleaming from that gap.
"You were beaten up like that and you didn't even use a knife. I was at most robbed of a small, broken fruit knife. To kill someone for that would be insane."
The expression of utter despair in the white down jacket was replaced by surprise. Following Qi Yan's gaze, he also looked under the cabinet, and in an instant, he understood. A rare smile appeared on his face: "You're quite cunning." As he spoke, he bent down and pulled out the thing hidden under the cabinet.
A gleaming sushi knife.
Qi Yan glanced at the thing in her hand, feeling an awkward sense of embarrassment, like Dong Shi meeting Xi Shi.
"Luckily, the three of them didn't notice." The man in the white down jacket sighed, carefully wrapping the knife in his tattered clothes, almost reverently. "It's a pity I didn't listen to customer service. If I had bought the whole set, I'd be a three-sword style master now!"
If it weren't for the vast difference in weaponry, Qi Yan would have liked to kick him a couple of times: "If you had held this thing in your hand just now, you wouldn't have killed anyone, just scared them a little, and they wouldn't have left you with nothing to eat."
"No, no, no!" The man in the white down jacket shook his head like a doll in a car. "This knife is incredibly sharp, I'm not kidding, it cuts through iron like mud! If I don't scare them properly, they'll lose their heads!"
Qi Yan was speechless. He could swear on his final exam results that this guy had definitely photoshopped his fighting power after wielding a knife, and it was a completely mindless photoshop!
"If they had insisted on taking your knife," the man in the white down jacket suddenly asked, "would you have actually stabbed them?"
Qi Yan remained silent.
The man in the white down jacket laughed, with a hint of helplessness and melancholy, and a touch of childish smugness: "We're both modern college students with principles."
Qi Yan felt relieved and laughed: "In short, stupid."
The man in the white down jacket pointed to the dormitory door behind him: "Those outside aren't human anymore, and we inside will be forced into becoming inhuman sooner or later." He paused for a moment, then looked up with bright eyes, "But I'd rather wait."