Chapter 171: Zombie Siege Practice
As Yu Wei was fleeing for her life, she had seriously thought about how she could possibly get into the dormitory building.
The concentration of zombies in the main entrance hall was the highest. The dorm supervisor's office and security room beside it didn't seem safe either. Was her bestie planning to create a diversion? Or was there some secret passage?
She had imagined many methods, but absolutely none of them included the scene before her eyes—
Scaling walls and flying across eaves?
From the 6th floor??
And then going back up???
In fact, the moment she saw the figure on the building, she thought some students had been driven to jump by the sudden catastrophe, and that she herself was about to become the unlucky victim of falling from a great height and walk into the end of her life.
Before she could even think of her last words, she saw the figure slow down before reaching the ground.
Yu Wei: "..."
Only then did she see clearly that a hemp rope was tied around the "jumping girl's" waist, extending all the way up to the sixth-floor balcony. With an agile step against the wall, she stopped suspended more than a meter above the ground.
The girl glanced at her and took out the phone at her waist:
[Bestie: Yu Wei?]
Yu Wei froze, then immediately understood that the other party didn't want to make any noise and hurriedly typed: [It's me! You're...]
Tang Xinjue: [Come over. Be careful.]
Yu Wei nodded vigorously. After looking around and confirming no one was nearby, she cautiously bent over and jogged beneath Tang Xinjue.
Looking up and seeing her face at close range, her nose suddenly stung, and tears welled in her eyes.
Ah, this was her reliable bestie!
Tang Xinjue silently examined her for a moment, then tossed another rope into Yu Wei's hands.
[Grab it.]
For some reason, Yu Wei felt that her "bestie's" personality seemed a little different from what she remembered. But she had no time to think about it and immediately gripped the rope tightly.
After all, she firmly believed that nobody in the world would jump down from the sixth floor just to impersonate her bestie.
[Um, are we climbing up like this...]
Yu Wei had only typed half the sentence nervously when she suddenly felt her body become weightless—The other party directly scooped her up by the waist!
The scream that was about to escape her throat stopped abruptly. Covering her mouth, Yu Wei heard zombie growls and footsteps.
The sounds weren't only coming from the main entrance, but also from above...
The infected in the second-floor dorm rooms. Had they discovered her?
At the same time, Tang Xinjue said softly: "Hold the rope tightly. Don't make a sound."
Then, with one arm around Yu Wei, she swung upward with the other, stepping on the head of an infected that had rushed out from the second floor and leaping to the other side—
Repeating this over and over as she climbed upward, leaving the roars far below.
...
When she finally grabbed the sixth-floor balcony railing and her feet were set on solid ground, the first thing Yu Wei did was bend over and vomit.
Then she raised her head and happened to glimpse an infected slowly crawling out onto the neighboring balcony. Its bloodshot eyeballs turned toward her and then plopped out.
Yu Wei: "...Bleurgh!"
She vomited even harder.
After calming down, she immediately turned around to look for her bestie. "Sis, this time thank you... all?"
Four girls came into view.
Yu Wei's voice caught.
Her bestie... had suddenly become four people??
In the silent air, she finally remembered belatedly: During the entire chat, her bestie had always used "we" as the subject.
...So who exactly was her bestie?
"Um." The only girl with a short bob answered. "We need to conduct an inspection first. After confirming you're safe, you can choose whichever one of us you want as your bestie."
Yu Wei immediately patted her chest and guaranteed her innocence. But when she saw the blood covering her arms, she couldn't help becoming a little frightened and asked quietly: "What if I got infected by accident?"
Guo Guo thought for a moment and answered seriously: "Sorry, then we don't have a bestie like you?"
Zhang You pulled out a scalpel. Zheng Wanqing silently lifted a shovel.
Tang Xinjue replied gently: "Then you may have to go back to wherever you came from."
Yu Wei: "..."
Fortunately, after examining her, Zhang You quickly gave the results:
"She doesn't have any wounds, and no blood got into her eyes or ears."
If there were no new methods of infection in this dungeon, then Yu Wei's safety was basically confirmed.
Then she looked at Yu Wei and asked sternly: "You didn't go bite any zombies, did you?"
Yu Wei: "...Why would I bite zombies!!"
At most she had stolen a phone from one... Thinking of this, Yu Wei hurriedly took out the phone that had already powered off: "Does anyone have a charger?"
Zhang You said: "No. The entire campus has lost power."
Yu Wei felt as if she had been struck by lightning. "It's over, then I can't send out my recording!"
After a lengthy explanation accompanied by gestures, the four finally understood why she had been sighing so much.
It turned out that after they first lost contact, and after Yu Wei escaped from the security room, she had panicked and run into the cafeteria.
The cafeteria happened to be free of zombies, so she slipped into the kitchen. But not long after entering, she heard voices and footsteps outside.
To avoid being discovered, Yu Wei decided to go all in. She pulled out the partitions and storage boxes from a freezer and hid inside. Soon afterward, the kitchen door opened, and she heard a somewhat indistinct conversation.
"I recorded the second half with my phone. It's a pity I can't listen to it again now. Otherwise I'd definitely remember it more clearly."
Yu Wei was extremely regretful and could only rack her brains to reconstruct it from memory:
"As soon as they came in, they started talking about viruses, antidotes, research, and stuff like that. They also mentioned a bunch of terms and English words I couldn't remember. Oh right, at the end they said there still weren't enough zombie samples, and the antidote research had stalled. The antidote couldn't be deployed until after at least the fifth round."
The girl clapped her hands: "Then I heard voices outside again, saying things like 'Infected people are coming, go back quickly, don't come out again,' and then they left."
By the time she crawled out of the freezer, shivering, there was nobody left outside. Only distant zombie growls remained.
After that, she continued fleeing until she found a FamilyMart that had already been completely looted and hid there, eventually making contact with the four people of Room 606.
“…That’s my whole experience,” Yu Wei recounted in detail, wiping the blood off her body.The four had originally thought the frequency of her messages in the chat app came from a desire to vent under the pressure of danger. Only now did they suddenly realize—she was genuinely talkative.
By the time Yu Wei finally finished happily recounting everything that had happened on the road, less than three minutes remained before the next radio broadcast.
Tang Xinjue glanced below the balcony and returned to the dorm room, closing the window.
The zombies that had been attracted by the two of them earlier not only hadn't dispersed but had gathered in even greater numbers, as though they could sense the scent of food on this wall, greedily opening their mouths.
Inside the room, after summarizing the information Yu Wei had provided, Zhang You went straight to the point: "The people in the cafeteria should have come from the laboratory."
—The source of the zombie virus leak, and the only way to end the instance: the school lab.Most of what they had discussed was easy to understand, but one piece of information made everyone's hearts skip a beat:
...What did "fifth round" mean?
After turning that information over in her mind, Tang Xinjue suddenly spoke: "We've seen that number before."
"Where?" Everyone asked in surprise.
A flash of inspiration struck Guo Guo: "I remember now—the entrance examination!"
There had been a question on that examination paper: "Which of the following items cannot be bitten through by a fifth-day zombie?"
When Tang Xinjue repeated the question, the others immediately remembered as well.
Although the questions on that paper had seemed obscure and bizarre, they had indeed all been related to various dungeons. Applied to their current situation, it meant the danger posed by zombies would very likely increase day by day.
"Fifth day, fifth round... Could one day equal one round? Meaning zombies evolve once every day?" Zheng Wanqing smacked her forehead.
The laboratory conversation implied that the antidote couldn't be developed until at least the fifth round of zombies appeared. In other words, they would have to remain in this dungeon for at least five days.
"How far can zombies evolve?" The moment Guo Guo heard the relevant term, she immediately became alert. "They won't end up like the elves, right?"
Thanks to the elves, she was practically developing psychological trauma toward the word "evolution."
The four simultaneously turned to look at the little white fluffball that had been moved into a plastic basin. It was still sleeping soundly, completely unlike the sanity-destroying form Blue Elves had evolved into before.
"Sigh. I really want to know whether the zombies will continue mutating and when rescue will arrive. But who are we supposed to ask?"
Meanwhile, Yu Wei, exhausted after finishing her tidying up, slumped to the floor, still muttering to herself.
Tang Xinjue, however, said: "It's fine. About that question, we'll meet the person we can ask in ten seconds."
Yu Wei jolted. "What? Ask who?"
Under her bewildered gaze, Tang Xinjue gestured toward the radio in the center of the dorm room.
"—Ding-dong!"
The broadcast began right on schedule.
This time the host wasn't Lili but the original Xiao Ming. It sounded as though a cat had stepped on his tongue. Every word was stretched out endlessly, as though he wanted to use two sentences to fill half an hour.
By the time he finally, unwillingly, reached the conclusion, the group had extracted only one useful piece of information from the long, tedious speech:
Someone was establishing a small survivor outpost on campus and inviting surviving students to join.
"In addition, we have an announcement. After learning that the Student Union's contact information has been leaked, and in order to satisfy everyone's enthusiasm for communicating with the Student Union, we are immediately adjusting the calling rules—
Each phone number may ask only one question. Once that limit is exceeded, the number will immediately be placed on the Student Union blacklist and will never be answered again!"
After reading the announcement, Xiao Ming finally seemed relieved.
"If there are no questions, then today's broadcast will end—"
Before he could finish, the phone rang exactly as expected.
This time, however, the voice that came through wasn't Tang Xinjue's but an anxious male voice:
"When will we receive relief supplies? Why can't we connect to outside signals? My roommate was bitten and he needs treat—"
"Sorry, classmate." Xiao Ming interrupted him cheerfully. "You've already exceeded the question limit. According to the new rules, we will not answer any of your questions and your questioning privileges have been permanently revoked. Goodbye."
The boy's pleading and shouting were cut off instantly as the call was disconnected.
Having learned from the previous example, the second caller was much calmer. This time it was a girl: "Hello. I'd like to know if there's any way to treat a classmate who has started mutating."
"The Student Union already said during the previous broadcast that only the laboratory's research results can deal with this virus leak. All you can do is hold on until then. Next caller."
"I'm a student from Room 505, Building 5 of the boys' dormitory. I'd like to know the contact information for the student outpost."
"You'll have to find that yourselves. The Student Union is merely passing along this good news. Students eager to join may want to observe the 'gg' signs outside. You might find a surprise. Next caller—"
"Hello," Tang Xinjue spoke.
Listening carefully beside her, Yu Wei wasn't sure if it was her imagination, but the leisurely voice from the radio suddenly paused, as though it had encountered someone it really didn't want to meet. Several seconds passed before it spoke again.
"...You may only ask one question!"
"That's fine." Tang Xinjue smiled. "May I ask how long the zombie evolutionary mutation cycle is?"
The radio fell silent again for several seconds.
Clearly, Tang Xinjue had once again asked a question they hadn't anticipated.
It sounded like an ordinary question, but it assumed as a premise that zombies possessed an evolution cycle, forcing the Student Union to provide a direct answer.
Xiao Ming replied sullenly: "According to current research, it's twenty-four hours."
—Exactly as they had guessed.
Tang Xinjue politely thanked him. Before she could finish saying "thank you," the Student Union side hurriedly hung up.
A few seconds passed without any new calls. Delighted, Xiao Ming said: "It seems everyone's questions have been answered, so today's broadcast..."
Another ringtone sounded with perfect timing.
Xiao Ming choked and had no choice but to answer. "Hello?"
"Hello." This time it was Zhang You's voice.
Xiao Ming: "..."
Student Union: "..."
How can you still call in?
They had miscalculated again.
At the same time, inside Dorm Room 606, Guo Guo and Zheng Wanqing were already holding phones, preparing to dial—Or more accurately, they were holding SIM cards, ready to insert them into the neighboring dorm's phone at any moment.
The phone itself was locked in the chat interface, but the SIM card wasn't.
One SIM card meant one phone number.
Meanwhile, they had also temporarily "borrowed" the phone Yu Wei had taken from a zombie. According to the Student Union's rules, each number could call once. They had at least five chances!
Watching their actions, Yu Wei suddenly understood. She immediately lifted her shirt and started rummaging through her pockets.
"Do you need phones? No problem, I have some!"
As her shirt lifted, a whole string of various phones appeared hanging around her waist.
"When I was taking phones from zombies, I was worried one or two wouldn't have enough battery, so I just grabbed every one I could. There are probably around ten or so total. Do you think that's enough?"
The author has something to say: ---
Student Union: Miscalculated again.
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