Chapter 4: Road to Survival 3
Chu Yian quickly retreated back into the balcony, her legs turning weak as she heard the screams from next door. Further away, people were still running for their lives on the Sports Ground and in the Cafeteria; everywhere she looked was a living hell.
Fear, daze.
Her clothes were soaked with sweat, and her whole body was trembling uncontrollably, as if she had just been fished out of the water.
Her ears were ringing, and she couldn’t hear any sound;
Her brain went blank, and her vision was blurred.
After an unknown amount of time, she snapped back to her senses and remembered she had a phone.
The messages on her communication apps were about to explode.
Chu Yian looked at a group chat labeled [Class of ’22 Geology].
[Help, there’s—4:12 PM]
[I’m in the office of Lab Building 4, the police line won’t go through—4:06 PM]
[Did anyone escape? I’m hiding in the 3rd-floor restroom of the teaching building, I’m so scared—4:06 PM]
[Everyone, find a place to hide as soon as you hear the broadcast. A group of lunatics is attacking people outside the school, the school security is almost at their limit—3:59 PM]
[Why is the air raid siren going off? I’m resting, it’s so noisy.—3:55 PM]
…[I heard a riot broke out at the high-speed rail station, and the area near the Shopping Mall has been cordoned off. Does anyone know what happened?—3:43 PM]
These messages could be traced back to as early as twenty minutes ago.
It turned out that not even half an hour had passed since the riot began, yet it felt like a lifetime to her.
Knowing that others were still alive in the school, she began trying to call various public service numbers. When they wouldn’t go through, she started searching for official news releases.
Got it!
She stopped at a page with a blue background and white text, which contained only two lines.
[A large-scale riot is currently occurring in Shigang City. The Shigang City Police Bureau has released the following information:
All citizens are advised to stay indoors as much as possible, stay away from rioting crowds, and prepare at least three days’ worth of food and water while waiting for rescue.]
Seeing the information above, she intended to follow the instructions first. She plugged her phone in to charge and began taking inventory of the items in her dormitory.
A girls’ dormitory never lacked snacks.
She found a total of four mangoes, half a bag of milk powder, red dates, and a snack variety pack larger than a pillow, which contained over a dozen bags of snacks—mainly fried dough twists, chips, dried fruit, and jerky.
It was enough to last her for a while.
Wait, it seemed she couldn’t just stay put and wait for rescue.
The realism of the experience almost made her forget she was in an eerie game, and the final requirement of the game was to reach the rescue location within five days.
But where was the rescue location?
How was she supposed to go out and find the rescue point in this situation?
The thought of this made Chu Yian restless again. She used her phone to search for any information regarding rescue points until she could no longer stay awake and fell asleep slumped over the desk.
The Next Day—
Chu Yian woke up startled from a nightmare.
The sky was currently a dull grey, and it was very quiet outside, with only the occasional growls of the infected and the sound of heavy, slow footsteps shuffling around.
She picked up her phone to check the time; it was five in the morning.
The signal on her phone was gone, and no pages would load.
The power was out too.
Fortunately, she had charged it all night without unplugging it; her phone battery was at 97%.
But with no internet and no way to make calls, what use was a phone?
Chu Yian washed her face and sat back down, eating snacks to stave off hunger while scrolling through other content on her phone. However, without the internet, the phone couldn’t do anything; it could only serve as a glowing flashlight.
She was becoming withdrawn and anxious.
She flipped through it for a long while and was about to put the phone down when she saw a small hidden icon—the radio.
A radio is also called a wireless receiver.
It is a machine that uses electrical energy to convert radio signals and listen to audio signals transmitted by broadcast stations. Anyone with a bit of knowledge about radios knows that when telecommunications and the internet are both cut off, these electronic products that rely on radio waves to transmit signals are absolute lifesavers.
Chu Yian’s spirits instantly lifted. She opened the radio function on her phone and began tuning the frequency.
At first, there was nothing but constant static.
With nothing else to do while trapped in the room, Chu Yian spent all her time researching it. Near ten o’clock, the static suddenly turned into a voice:
[Hello everyone, this is District 11 Radio Station.]
[A global viral disaster has recently broken out. Normal humans will be infected immediately if bitten. The virus has a rapid onset; the infected will die within ten seconds and transform into Zombies after death to attack healthy humans.]
[Main characteristics of zombies: normal vision, hearing five times that of a normal human. During the transmission state, they will attack targets with the peak physical ability they had as a normal human; they enter a dormant state when there are no targets for transmission.]
[Please note: There is currently no therapeutic vaccine. Stay away from the infected.]
[Please note: Fulen County in X City is the only safe rescue zone in District 11.]
[This message will repeat on a loop.]
A safe rescue zone!
Chu Yian’s spirits were bolstered; she hadn’t expected to actually hear the location of the safe zone. Suddenly, she felt like she had a goal to strive for and something to look forward to.
But where was Fulen County in X City?
Thinking of this, she was stumped again.
However, she soon noticed a line of small print in the bottom right corner of a pile of school documents on her desk—
[Published by the Propaganda Department of Guangda College, C City]
Besides the flyers, several tickets she had scrounged up in the dorm were also clearly for travel from various cities to C City.
Great, that perfectly ruled out the possibility of her being in X City.
Chu Yian took a deep breath, feeling immense pressure at the thought of her long road to escape.
But she still had to go.
Otherwise, even if she stayed safely in the dorm for five days, the end result would still be death.
She looked at the water and food she had found and prepared to pack them up, starting her preparations for departure.
Wait!
Chu Yian suddenly remembered that she seemed to have drawn a prop before entering the game. She opened her hand and looked at the small pattern in the center of her palm.
Her palm grew slightly warm, and the treasure box instantly appeared in her hand.
The box was only the size of an earphone case, unable to hold anything at all. Under the command of her will, the box instantly grew to the size of one cubic meter. The entire box emitted a golden light, and several large words appeared directly above it—
[Do you wish to use the skill: Something from Nothing?]
Skill ‘Something from Nothing’: The treasure box randomly produces an item within the game. This skill requires a three-day cooldown after use.
Chu Yian recalled the relevant details, finally feeling like this was actually a game.
She chose yes.
The box opened automatically, its interior filled with white light. She reached in and felt around for a while until she touched something that felt like a block of iron—cold and heavy.
A transparent game screen popped up in front of her.
[A 9mm caliber, single-shot pistol with infinite ammunition]
[Note: This will be reclaimed at the end of this game round.]
[Item’s Inner Voice: Having me is your blessing!]
Having you, I’m truly impressed!
