Chapter 3: Chance Encounter
There were two print shops on campus, and Chen Dong was the owner of one of them. Virtually every student knew him.
Friendly and approachable, he was adept with computers and especially skilled at adjusting dissertation formatting. Every graduation or finals week, the queue of students waiting for him to format their papers would stretch out the door.
Chen Dong brought over two stools for the boys and poured them each a glass of water.
Chi Xiaoxian thanked him, but Chen Dong merely offered a modest reply. “It’s nothing, really. I heard the broadcast and felt something was off, so I pulled the shutter down early. Later, I saw you guys fleeing toward my shop, so I pulled it up a crack to check. Why didn’t you head back to your dorms? How did you end up back outside?”
“We were locked out directly,” the male student said with burning indignation. “A bunch of murderers—absolute beasts!”
“That actually happened?!”
The guy recounted their ordeal fighting off zombies outside the academic building and the dorm gates. Listening to the story made Chen Dong break out in a nervous sweat. He quickly stood up to check the windows and back door before telling them, “You two can stay here for now. I usually sleep upstairs, and there’s an empty room up there. I still have plenty of food and drinks left.”
Chi Xiaoxian chimed in immediately, “Thank you so much.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Chen Dong smiled gently. “Just serving the students, as usual.”
The guy added, “Oh, right, I haven’t introduced myself yet. I’m Zheng Yikai, a sophomore from the School of Engineering.”
“Chi Xiaoxian, sophomore from the School of Economics.”
“I know you. Your name is very easy to remember.” Zheng Yikai looked into his eyes and said, “We took a PE class together before. I was the class representative.”
Chi Xiaoxian racked his brain for a moment, unable to recall anyone by that description.
“Ah, sorry about that, my PE class—” He slammed the brakes on his sentence mid-way, as the second half was originally going to be “I skipped way too many of them.”
“You didn’t show up to class much, did you? I only saw you the first two times,” Zheng Yikai teased.
Chi Xiaoxian offered an awkward laugh. “You’ve got quite a memory.”
“It’d be hard not to remember you,” Zheng Yikai chuckled. “Two girls in class kept talking about how handsome you were, and they even asked me for your name and department.”
“Me?” Chi Xiaoxian blinked.
He rarely ventured outside, preferring to hole up in his dorm room whenever he had free time. Since entering college, the total number of sentences he had spoken to girls hadn’t even exceeded ten, leaving him zero opportunity to gauge his popularity with the opposite sex.
That evening, the owner cooked instant noodles for the two of them. Eating the steaming bowl, sweat glistened on the tip of Chi Xiaoxian’s nose.
It felt oddly refreshing—as if all the day’s built-up tension was evaporating along with the perspiration.
Suddenly, a piece of tissue fluttered right near the tip of his nose. Chi Xiaoxian froze for a second, looking up to see Zheng Yikai.
“Thanks.”
He wiped the sweat from his nose, but out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Zheng Yikai staring straight at him. He couldn’t help but think: This guy seems a little strange…
The print shop was not particularly large. The room on the first floor was stacked high with various types of printing paper. A heap of printed but unclaimed course materials was piled on the front counter, while three cabinet-style printers stood in the back, each paired with a computer.
The second floor contained two rooms. The owner occupied one and had cleared out some junk from the other, setting up a folding bed and moving in an old sofa for Chi Xiaoxian and Zheng Yikai to sleep on for the night.
Having lost his phone, Chi Xiaoxian wondered if the print shop had any spare electronics lying around, so he asked the owner. To his surprise, the owner actually had an old mobile phone and lent it to him.
The phone hadn’t been used in a long time; it took charging it up to full battery before it would power on.
Chi Xiaoxian fiddled with it for a bit and found that the basic functions were still working normally. He connected to the network and downloaded Rome.
Rome was a global social app developed five years ago. It boasted incredibly advanced language capabilities, featuring built-in translation for various languages, complete with internet slang and colloquialisms. It also integrated educational systems, social security networks, and shopping platforms—a true all-in-one app for modern life.
Perhaps to honor the memory of the pre-cataclysm world where the concept of nationalities still existed, the developers named it “ROME”—derived from “all roads lead to Rome.” To them, the United Highlands was the new Rome of this era.
Chi Xiaoxian passed facial recognition to log in, whereupon he was greeted by Rome’s classic splash screen: a map of the new world after the complete melting of the glaciers had submerged a third of the continents underwater.
A line of text floated across the map—New Home, New Future.
Chi Xiaoxian had never paid much attention to this phrase before, but today he paused to give it an extra glance before tapping on his contacts list.
He had muted almost all group chats. The remaining unread messages were mostly from Zhang Wensheng asking where he was, so Chi Xiaoxian simply called him back directly to let him know he was safe.
Hearing that Chi Xiaoxian was lying low in a print shop, Zhang Wensheng let out a long sigh of relief. “You lucky bastard, your old man was worried sick.”
Chi Xiaoxian huffed softly, “I’m too exhausted today to pick a fight with you over who’s the father.”
Zhang Wensheng asked, “They got food over there? You got a place to sleep?”
Glancing at Zheng Yikai, who was lying on the sofa scrolling through his phone, Chi Xiaoxian replied, “Yeah.”
The phone suddenly vibrated. Chi Xiaoxian glanced down and saw it was an alarm, labeled “Son.” The old phone had been dead, so the alarm had only gone off now that it was charged.
He stepped out of the room and went next door, intending to ask the owner if he needed the alarm kept on. However, he found Old Chen slumped in his lounge chair, fast asleep, with noisy background music from a TV drama playing on the phone beside him.
If it were his former self, he might have turned it off for him. But now he knew better; he had realized that older people often enjoyed sleeping with background noise, and turning it off would actually wake them up.
Take his grandmother, for instance. Every time he turned off her TV, she would stubbornly insist, “I’m not asleep! I was still watching that, why’d you turn it off…”
Chi Xiaoxian returned to his room and placed a video call to his grandmother.
His grandmother lived in the Tenth District of the Southern United Highlands. Chi Xiaoxian had lived with her up until college, only moving to the central Third District after getting accepted into the First University of the Highlands. The Tenth District was quite far from the Third—a three-hour flight away—so Chi Xiaoxian generally only visited during holidays, relying on daily video chats to stay in touch.
After connecting and chatting for a few minutes, Chi Xiaoxian realized that nothing seemed out of the ordinary in the Tenth District. He chose not to bring up the events at school, fearing it might give the old lady a fright—her heart wasn’t in the best shape.
He asked roundaboutly, “Do we still have food at home?”
“Food? When do we ever run out of food at home? There’s still a mountain of stuff left over from New Year’s! Are you coming back these next few days?”
“No, no, no, I was just asking. Over the next few days, make sure to stock up on extra food and avoid going out too much. It’s too hot outside, don’t go getting heatstroke.”
“I know, I know. I keep the electric fan running all day.”
Just before hanging up, she suddenly shifted the topic: “Don’t go wandering around outside yourself lately either. I heard something about your area… oh right, the psychiatric hospital. Some lunatics escaped.”
“Lunatics?” Chi Xiaoxian froze.
Could she be talking about the zombies?
He tapped into Rome’s built-in news page. The top pop-up headline read: Fire Breaks Out at Highland Psychiatric Treatment and Prevention Hospital. He clicked in to read the details, but the page suddenly froze. No matter how many times he refreshed, it wouldn’t respond. It was only when he backed out to the chat screen that the app functioned properly again.
He unmuted several group chats and found his classmates discussing today’s events as well. Some expressed panic and despair, others calmly shared guides on how to defeat zombies, while some analyzed the hidden truth behind the incident…
The display on the old phone was far from sharp. After reading through so many messages, Chi Xiaoxian’s eyes grew hazy, but he still wasn’t sleepy. He wandered downstairs and flipped through the stack of printed papers on the front counter, trying to find something interesting to pass the time.
Military Theory Review Manual—pass.
Esperanto Exam Predictions—pass.
Advanced Mathematics Past Exam Practice—pass, pass, pass, a decisive pass.
…
After sifting through for a while, just as he was about to give up, he suddenly spotted a manual that looked completely out of place among the rest. Printed on the cover were the words Apocalypse Survival Guide, without the printer’s name or major.
Why would anyone print something like this? Is it course material?
Chi Xiaoxian flipped to the table of contents and saw three chapters: Extreme Weather—Survival Guide for Extreme High and Low Temperatures, Wasteland (Radiation Zone) Survival Guide, and Deadly Virus Outbreak Survival Guide.
Printing items in the shop generally required students to scan their campus cards, so a light watermark was printed on the top right corner of each page, consisting of a student ID number followed by a four-digit print date. This manual was no exception.
Chi Xiaoxian couldn’t recognize the person corresponding to the student ID, but the print date happened to be yesterday.
Nearly thirty years had passed since the series of disasters triggered by global warming in the year 2040. It had also been fifteen years since the Three United Highlands were constructed at an astonishing speed. Words like disaster and apocalypse had gradually faded from people’s minds, replaced in media outlets by terms like New World, Highlands, and New Home.
Printing this right now—wasn’t that a little too coincidental?
He pulled up a chair, sat down, and began reading under the dim light. The manual covered a wealth of content: food gathering, safe houses, weapon setups, and much more. The font was small, and combined with the dim lighting, Chi Xiaoxian could only skim through it roughly until his eyes landed on a line rendered in bold black text:
“Keep exercising, build endurance, improve your physical condition, and stay prepared to fight zombies at all times!!!”
For Chi Xiaoxian, a guy who hated exercise so much that he would skip eight out of ten PE classes, this sentence undoubtedly made him feel a bit uncomfortable.
His interest in reading withered instantly.
Yawning, Chi Xiaoxian closed the manual and carried it upstairs, preparing to go to sleep.
Though many things had transpired today, he didn’t feel overly anxious or terrified.
He was born with very low emotional volatility. If his heart were compared to a lake, no matter what happened, it would be like a falling leaf landing in the center—at most creating a few gentle ripples, but never stirring up any real waves.
Seeing him lie down on the folding bed, Zheng Yikai asked, “Going to sleep so early?”
“I usually like staying up late, actually, but I’m a bit tired today.”
“Yeah, get some sleep then.” Zheng Yikai switched off his phone screen. “I’ll sleep early too.”
He reached out and turned off the light, plunging the room into a dark swamp of silence.
Chi Xiaoxian quickly drifted off to sleep, even falling into a strange dream. In the dream, he stood by a grayish-yellow seashore. He had never been to the ocean, yet he felt the damp sea breeze brushing against his face, coarse sand scraping the skin of his left cheek.
It felt odd—almost like a hand.
In his hazy slumber, a gentle tapping noise sounded at the door. Even in his dream, Chi Xiaoxian could feel the polite restraint in that sound—desperate to be heard, yet seemingly wanting to avoid detection.
Suddenly, his logic snapped back, yanking him forcefully out of the dreamland.
There are zombies outside right now—who the hell is knocking on the door?!!
He sat up abruptly. The moment he opened his eyes, he was startled to see someone standing right beside his bed.
The moonlight illuminated a small patch of the room, casting a soft glow on Zheng Yikai’s broad face. Chi Xiaoxian composed himself.
Yet, seeing Chi Xiaoxian wake up so suddenly, Zheng Yikai’s expression turned somewhat peculiar, his features shifting in a restless, chaotic fashion.
A moment later, his expression returned to normal. Nudging his chin toward the floor below, he signaled Chi Xiaoxian to listen to the knocking sound outside.
Just as the two were tensing up, they heard movement from the neighboring room, followed by the slapping sound of slippers dragging across the floor.
Old Chen got up and left his room. Seeing the two of them standing stiffly in the room, he paused for a second. “Why aren’t you sleeping?”
“There’s someone outside…”
“Oh, right, right.” Old Chen acted completely unbothered. “Don’t worry, it’s not a zombie.”
He walked downstairs to a corner piled with junk. A hidden back door was located there. To prevent zombie break-ins, Old Chen had locked it tight and wedged a chair against it.
“Who is it?”
“Me.”
Old Chen moved the chair aside to unbolt the door. Standing on the staircase, Chi Xiaoxian used the faint moonlight filtering through the door to make out the person who walked in.
Clear, fair skin, cool and sharp brows…
Hey, isn’t that the student TA?
Hearing the movement from upstairs, the male student raised his eyelids and glanced over impassively. When his gaze met Chi Xiaoxian’s, he raised an eyebrow slightly, looking somewhat surprised.
“How come you didn’t head back to your dorm either?” Old Chen asked.
“I was in the lab the whole time.” After saying this, the guy unslung his backpack.
Only then did Chi Xiaoxian notice how bulging the backpack was. It hit the table with a heavy thud, looking impressively heavy.
Having just read the Apocalypse Survival Guide, Chi Xiaoxian guessed it was packed with survival supplies. Otherwise, why would this guy stuff so much into his bag on an escape route?
He recalled that during their escape this afternoon, the guy’s backpack had been completely flat and thin.
Just as he was pondering, the male student began unpacking items from his bag.
A laptop, a mouse, one book, two books, three books, four books…
Once everything was unpacked, he turned to Old Chen and said calmly, “By the way, I need to print something to read tonight.”
Chi Xiaoxian: “…”
Respect.
I still don’t know your real name, but your title is officially “The Ultimate Tryhard.”
