【Welcome to the Apocalypse Survival Game. This game cannot be exited. Death in the game is true death. Please complete quests to ensure your survival】
【Novice Quest: Find a Safe House within ten minutes】
【Quest Requirement: An enclosed space】
【Quest Reward: A Safe House Trait, basic supplies, a skill draw】
【The quest begins when the Novice Protection Barrier fails. Countdown to barrier failure: one hundred, ninety-nine…】
Through the Virtual Screen and the Protective Barrier, Ji Li stared blankly at the zombie mere inches from his face.
A zombie? Seriously?
But if this was fake, how had he ended up here?
Seconds ago he’d been delivering food in a residential building. One turn around a corner, and a zombie had jumped him point-blank.
The only reason he hadn’t screamed was that the Virtual Screen had interrupted him mid-yell, flashing on about some game, some quest…
Ninety-one. Ninety.
Catching the jumping numbers in the corner of his eye, Ji Li’s mind snapped back into focus, and he hurriedly looked around for the so-called Safe House.
Only when he turned his head did he realize he wasn’t alone. Dozens of other people stood around him, each shrouded in a cylindrical pillar of light just like his.
Some wore pajamas, some business suits, and one was pushing a shopping cart loaded with goods—clearly in the middle of a shopping trip.
The area around those people was clean and clear, while he stood at the very edge of the crowd, back to everyone, face-to-face with the zombie pressed against the outside of his barrier.
When you’re unlucky, even your transmigration spot is the worst one available.
Just as Ji Li was grumbling internally, a man’s voice bellowed nearby: “What the hell is this thing?! Let me out!”
Before the words had even finished, the zombie pressed against Ji Li’s barrier moved.
It lunged toward the source of the voice, but with the barrier blocking its body, its legs outran its torso, and it shot forward in a grotesquely twisted posture.
It wasn’t alone. Every zombie wandering nearby was drawn by the man’s booming voice, charging over one after another, slamming into other people’s barriers and sending screams rippling through the crowd.
“AAAAAAAH—!”
“Get away! GET AWAY!”
“What is this thing?! Why am I here?!”
The zombies, which had been fixated on clear targets, scattered at all the screaming, swarming the noisy barriers, pouncing and gnawing. The shrieks grew more piercing, drawing in even more zombies—a vicious cycle.
Watching this unfold, Ji Li closed his eyes in despair.
The good news: they were the voice-activated model of zombie.
The bad news: their moves were straight out of Train to Busan.
No—it wasn’t time to give up yet! Ji Li forced his eyes back open and checked the countdown first.
Seventy-six.
He steadied himself and was about to call out when several voices rang out ahead of him.
“Stop screaming!”
“Keep it up and you’ll die!”
“Shut up!”
The voices overlapped. Ji Li focused and saw that the people speaking were men and women alike—but without exception, all of them stood at the center of the crowd, far from the zombies.
Good people still outnumber the bad, huh.
Ji Li silently swallowed his own words and studied the zombies careening everywhere, a thoughtful look crossing his face.
With the barriers in the way, it would be hard to fully test how the zombies sensed the living—but from the looks of it, it was by hearing.
And their behavior—attacking with their bodies, running on their legs—was still fundamentally human. That meant no mutation.
With a weapon, and without getting surrounded, escape shouldn’t be difficult.
Ji Li patted himself down from head to toe and finally pulled off the yellow helmet on his head, giving it a couple of test swings.
At minimum, it would work as a club.
Glancing up at the countdown—fifty-three seconds left—Ji Li swallowed hard.
Next: pick an escape route. In other words, find where the quest’s Safe House was.
The best choice was the Grey-Brick Building closest to the crowd, roughly fifteen meters from him in a straight line.
But though it was close, his position was on the outside of the crowd. Getting there meant cutting straight through the zombie horde—extremely dangerous.
Besides, Ji Li kept feeling that there was something wrong with this answer being practically shoved in the players’ faces.
He tilted his head back and studied the Grey-Brick Building, and the longer he looked, the more puzzled he became.
Why did it look so familiar?
Not that he’d actually seen it before—but its neat, symmetrical shape, and windows utterly free of clutter, gave him an odd sense of déjà vu… Windows?
A string in Ji Li’s mind snapped taut. He recalled the quest requirement, and a garden of colorful curses bloomed in his chest.
Son of a—so THAT was the trap!
Ji Li ground his molars and looked around for another target.
Fortunately, there were plenty of buildings nearby, none too far away. The problem was the greenery was too lush; under the cover of branches and leaves, it was hard to make anything out.
Twenty-six.
Growing anxious, Ji Li pressed himself flat against the barrier, scanning rapidly.
Suddenly, his gaze caught—and locked onto a flash of white hidden in the tree shadows. The longer he looked, the brighter his eyes grew.
A statue! A human statue facing the road!
It was a bit far off to tell who it depicted, but that didn’t matter.
Grey-Brick Building, a human statue, dense landscaping, rows of buildings—four big characters surfaced in Ji Li’s mind.
A university campus!
No wonder it had looked familiar! That little building was the same style as the old teaching building at his own college!
No clutter because those were classrooms. No residential building or office block would ever have windows uniformly that clean.
And only schools erected statues of famous figures. Nowhere else used human statues as decoration, and even when they did, never upright realistic portraits like this one.
Having confirmed it was a university campus, Ji Li’s excitement lasted less than a second before his mood plummeted.
Nearly two-thirds of the teaching building’s windows were shattered, meaning the crisis had broken out in broad daylight, people panicking and fleeing blindly, shattering the windows almost completely.
And the quest required the Safe House to be an enclosed space.
Fifteen.
A bead of sweat slid down Ji Li’s temple. For a moment he couldn’t decide where to run—until a flash of inspiration struck.
There was one building every university had, and it was guaranteed to be intact!
The Gatehouse!
Ji Li whirled and looked toward the end of the drive, and finally, through a gap in the overlapping branches, glimpsed a corner of the Gatehouse in the distance.
Given its special position and duties, the Gatehouse was usually the first place to fall in a disaster—which meant the odds of it being damaged were low.
Even if he ran up close and found it wouldn’t work, switching targets would be easy. After all, the surrounding zombies would all have been drawn over by then.
Ten.
Decision made!
Ji Li used the time to crouch down and cinch his shoelaces tight, wound the helmet’s chin strap around his right hand several times so it couldn’t fly off, and finally stood facing the Gatehouse.
Five.
The Suit Guy diagonally ahead was drenched in sweat, glancing hesitantly at the people around him. When he noticed Ji Li standing with his back to the crowd, he visibly froze.
Three.
Everyone had gone completely silent. The zombies, having lost their targets, began drifting through the crowd, and every person silently prayed the creatures would wander away from them.
One.
Ji Li coiled the strength in his legs, and the instant the barrier vanished, he launched like a spring, covering the road in a few strides, leaving the screaming and wailing behind him.
He didn’t dare look back, running single-mindedly toward his target—completely missing the two people following behind him.
One was the Suit Guy. The other was a middle-aged woman in high heels who had appeared from who knows where.
All three ran for the Gatehouse. Ji Li led; the middle-aged woman’s heels gradually overtook the Suit Guy; and a lone zombie brought up the rear.
As the zombie closed in, the Suit Guy’s face twisted, and he hurled his laptop bag, smashing it hard into the woman’s back.
She shrieked and pitched forward, knocking Ji Li to the ground. The Suit Guy seized the chance to vault over the two of them, leaving the zombie to pounce on the middle-aged woman.
Ji Li turned, saw this, and snatched up his helmet, slamming it into the zombie’s head. Its skull knocked sideways, the bite met empty air, blackish-red fluid splattering, and a wave of stench shot straight up his nose.
Choking down his nausea, Ji Li rasped quickly: “Run! Now!”
The middle-aged woman didn’t hesitate—kicked off her shoes, threw a thanks over her shoulder, and scrambled up and ran.
Ji Li smashed the zombie twice more, then rolled to his feet while it was still reeling.
He wanted desperately to keep swinging, to see if he could kill the thing outright. But with two more zombies sprinting over, Ji Li decisively gave up and bolted for the Gatehouse—just in time to see the Suit Guy open the door and usher the middle-aged woman inside.
Then, right in front of him, shut the door.
Ji Li’s eyes went wide with disbelief.
How can a person be like this?!
This is murder!
Ji Li wanted to charge over and smash the door down, to drag the Suit Guy down with him—but the zombies closing in behind gave him no such chance. He could only run flat-out, without a single pause.
Past the Gatehouse, out the school gate—Ji Li took one glance and ran for the road to the right.
His luck held: the campus sat in the suburbs, the surrounding area still under development, nothing but construction sites and empty lots in every direction. Zombies were scarce—only a handful wandering the road.
But his luck was also rotten: the only intact building in sight was far away, and the cars along the road were all smashed beyond recognition, useless as a Safe House.
Panting hard, Ji Li glanced back. The three zombies showed no sign of slowing. He hissed under his breath:
“Damn it!”
Should’ve run deeper into the campus!
But there’s no medicine for regret in this world. A path you chose yourself, you run down crying if you have to.
The one blessing: he’d trained long-distance running in middle school and spent the last two years working nonstop. His fitness was solid—his PE-test time for the 1,000 meters was two minutes forty.
As long as he found a Safe House before his strength gave out, he would live!
Ji Li steadied himself, eyes locked forward, and ran flat-out toward his target.
Three minutes later.
Swallowing the taste of rust in his throat, lungs screaming as if they might burst, Ji Li peered through the wrought-iron fence at the layout inside.
The building he’d spotted sat in the back half of the lot; in front of it lay a small plaza and a parking lot. Getting inside meant climbing several flights of steps.
In his current state, forget the steps—one more hundred meters and he’d collapse. Thankfully, there was a Gatehouse beside the main gate.
Ji Li panted toward it, but before he could even find the door, two zombies inside made him veer straight for the parking lot.
Damn it—two zombies in the Gatehouse!
Running on the fumes of his last breath, Ji Li timed his moment, slid under an SUV, and before the zombies could catch up, grabbed a door handle and yanked!
It didn’t open.
Undeterred, he vaulted onto the hood of a sports car, jumped to its other side, then gripped the handles of two adjacent cars and wrenched with everything he had—
Still nothing.
Car after car, all failures. Ji Li’s legs had turned to jelly, his breath coming like a bellows, sweat streaming into his eyes and dyeing the rims red.
Should’ve never played the hero…
Next time—if there is a next time—he swore he wouldn’t play the good Samar—
Click.
The soft thunk at that moment sounded like heavenly music. Ji Li yanked the door open, dove inside in one motion, and slammed it shut behind him.
He’d thought this would complete the quest, but no notification came—and the zombies had already charged, thudding against the car, their blood-smeared, corpse-pale faces pressed against the glass, sniffing everywhere for the scent of a living person.
Ji Li had been queasy from the sprint already, but to make no sound, he could only clamp a hand over his mouth, fighting the urge to retch, burying his head against his legs and forcing his breathing slow and quiet.
It was agony.
Starved of oxygen by the exertion, his brain was screaming at his body to breathe harder—and he was trying to crush that reflex.
Within a single minute, darkness crept into the edges of Ji Li’s vision, the rust taste spreading through his mouth as if he’d vomit blood the next second.
Thankfully, the endurance paid off. With no sound to guide them, the zombies gradually calmed and began wandering aimlessly. Ji Li kept his head buried until the Virtual Screen popped up.
【Congratulations, Player Ji Li, on completing the Novice Quest. Safe House bound. Distributing rewards】
【Safe House scan complete. Trait acquired: Mobile】
【Supply reward: Steamed Bun x1, 300ml Bottled Water x1】
【Now drawing skill…】
【Congratulations, Player Ji Li, on drawing the skill [Copy LV1 – Preparedness Averts Peril]】
Ji Li: “…BLEURGH!”
