Ch 2: Opening a Survival School Before the Zombie Outbreak

Fu Qing had the distinct feeling that she had stepped onto a pirate ship with one foot.

She had a premonition that once school officially started tomorrow, her dear students would feel exactly the same way.

The thought that more than two thousand people would be suffering alongside her suddenly made things feel a lot better.

Fu Qing swallowed her complaints back down. “Forget it. What’s the next step?”

【Once naming is complete, the management panel will be unlocked.】

Naming?

Fu Qing snapped back to attention, pondered for two seconds, and said, “…Fangzhou.”

“Let’s call it Fangzhou.”

The final vessel when the flood arrives, and humanity’s last oasis.

【Approval granted.】

As the electronic voice faded, it was as if a giant holding a carving knife had etched the words stroke by stroke onto the previously blank marble stele at the school gate. The four bold, sweeping characters Fangzhou University appeared in flamboyant script.

Gold powder was added at the end. Bathed in sunlight, the black-and-gold school monument immediately gave off a restrained, steady air.

It actually looked quite convincing.

【Management panel unlocked!】

With a thought, the unlocked interface appeared before Fu Qing’s eyes.

A floating, semi-transparent screen was clearly divided into several sections:

Campus Overview: View operational status and adjust teaching objectives.

Campus Map: View overall layout, buildings, and facility distribution.

Faculty and Student Roster: View current staff and student profiles and personnel assignments.

Task List: View task progress and evaluation timelines.

Construction Shop: Exchange materials and upgrade buildings here.

……

The interface was minimalist, black Song font on a white background, exuding an old-school bureaucratic vibe. The only thing that stood out was the glaring countdown timer in the upper-right corner. Every second, the last digit jumped once.

The crimson numbers were so rich they looked as if they had been smeared in blood. Staring too long made faint zombie screeches seem to echo by her ears.

Fu Qing ignored it and opened the map.

Although the campus land designated by the system was located in a remote suburban area far from the city, its size was rather stingy, totaling only about 600 mu. The entire school had just one year level, 2,400 students. Excluding Fu Qing herself, the bare-commander principal, the total number of faculty, staff, and family members was zero. It was fewer people than many domestic high schools.

Cramped, but sufficient.

The campus was roughly a neat rectangle, facing south. The zoning was clear. Entering from the south gate, the central and southeastern areas were the academic zone. The northeastern side was the residential area, including dormitories, cafeteria, and supermarket. The southwest housed the track field and gymnasium, while the northwest contained an artificial lake and a small wooded area.

Small as a sparrow, yet fully equipped.

Because school had not yet started, the student section in the roster was locked. The faculty page listed only one name: Fu Qing.

【Faculty Information】
Name: Fu Qing
Position: Principal
Abilities: Intelligence S+, Combat S+, Survival Skills S+, Intelligence Gathering S+
Overall Rating: SSS (You will definitely become an outstanding people’s teacher!)
Courses Assigned: None
Student Favorability: ??? (Not updated)
Salary: 0 Teaching Points/month

Below that was an overall summary.

Current faculty count: 1
Current monthly salary: 0 Teaching Points/month

And a massive recruitment button—

Short on staff? No one to teach specialized courses? Try recruiting new teachers!

【Click to Recruit】
（Single cost: 10 Teaching Points）

Fu Qing curled her index finger and tapped twice against the words “Teaching Points.” “What’s this?”

System: 【Answering the host: Teaching Points are the base currency used by the management system. They can be used to purchase facilities, upgrade buildings, recruit staff, and exchange rewards in the shop. They have many uses that you may explore later.】

【Teaching Points can be earned by completing tasks and special events.】

Got it. In-game currency for a simulation management game.

Fu Qing nodded in understanding and asked, “Then what about the tuition the students pay?”

System: 【……】

She narrowed her eyes slightly, her tone gentle. “Did you eat it?”

【……】 The electronic voice stammered. 【Constructing buildings in the current world also requires expenses in many places…】

These funds were usually defaulted to replenishing system energy. Big shots who bound systems typically focused on what rewards points could exchange for. As for real-world money, it was just worldly possessions. But why did this host refuse to play by the rules?!

The system felt wronged.

Fu Qing snorted softly, and the system immediately went silent with a buzz.

“You can take the tuition, but there’s one condition,” Fu Qing said, brooking no refusal. “For students from poor families, reduce or waive tuition, and allocate scholarships to support their living expenses. They’ll have a lot to do this year. They can’t afford to spend all their time working part-time jobs.”

“Also, if we need to establish a reward and punishment system in the future, bonuses will be funded from tuition income.”

The system seemed to relax, replying quietly and helplessly, 【Okay.】

Only then was Fu Qing satisfied.

As for herself, she did not need the money.

When Fu Qing was in high school, her parents had died in an accident, leaving behind a considerable inheritance. When she bought spicy hotpot earlier, she had glanced at her online banking. The money was still sitting obediently in the account. It was not enough to make her fabulously rich, but it was more than enough for an ordinary person to lie flat for life.

Unfortunately, Fu Qing was destined never to enjoy the lingering warmth of her parents. In less than a year, that money would become worthless paper. Whether the account held seven digits or eight made no difference.

Rich or poor, beautiful or ugly, before an unreasonable virus, all beings were equal.

Even if used to purchase supplies, the cash she had on hand was more than sufficient.

Rather than covet tuition she could never truly use, she might as well take the chance to rein the system in.

Scrolling down, the task list section flashed with “new” and refreshed with two new tasks.

【Main Quest: “The Beginning of Everything”】【Description: You now possess a university campus of your own. The school plaque is blank. A good name is the beginning of everything. Give your school a name that rolls off the tongue!】
【Requirement: Name the school (Completed)】
【Reward: 30 Teaching Points】

Fu Qing clicked to claim it. Thirty Teaching Points acquired. The shop page below unlocked with a click.

She did not rush to look at the shop. Instead, she scrolled down to the second task.

【Main Quest: “An Unforgettable First Day”】【Description: A good beginning is half of success. Tomorrow is freshman registration day. Students from all corners of the land will gather here with expectations for knowledge and anticipation for a new life, and you will become their guide.
——Surely they can’t wait to know your name!】
【Requirement: Complete the freshman registration event; introduce yourself before the entire school (Incomplete)】
【Reward: 50 Teaching Points】

…Who would be dying to know the principal’s name?

The corner of Fu Qing’s mouth twitched.

Even if the system wanted to issue newbie-phase transition tasks, it should at least put some thought into them.

Still, given the special nature of this school, an opening-day speech explaining the basic situation was probably unavoidable.

And so, after going in circles, they returned to the original problem.

【…Host, so how exactly do you plan to make the students accept that the apocalypse is coming?】

The system watched as Fu Qing clicked through every panel in sequence and finally fell into thought. Unable to help itself, it asked.

It had reviewed past data and knew how naïve and foolish humans could be. Even when disaster truly struck, many still refused to believe it. Some thought it was a film shoot and tried to take photos with zombies. Some tried to shout at zombies to awaken their reason. Some ignored advice and insisted on going out for a stroll. Their ends were naturally the perfect annotation of the words “courting death.”

It believed Fu Qing had seen even more than that.

And now there was still a full year, with no immediate evidence proving the virus would erupt. To make students believe it, and to truly accept this school’s teaching model from the bottom of their hearts, was simply an impossible task.

Even if they could not withdraw, they still had countless ways to skip class. Leaving early, faking illness, hiring substitutes. There was no shortage of tricks.

If Fu Qing had to expend massive energy playing mind games with students, it would only waste precious reversed time.

So this problem had to be solved.

Under the system’s anxious gaze, Fu Qing closed the panel. “They don’t need to accept it.”

The system had imagined all kinds of possibilities, only to receive these five airy words. It froze for a moment. 【What?】

“When the apocalypse arrived, no one taught the survivors how to accept it either.”

How to accept that family and friends they saw every day had become ugly, mindless zombies. How to accept that a once happy, peaceful life could be wiped out overnight. Cities ground to a halt, order collapsed, compatriots turned into wandering monsters, and all one could do was flee in panic, becoming something worse than a monster: a monster’s prey.

No one asked whether they could accept it.

Fu Qing only knew that those who couldn’t accept it all died.

And then the survivors grew accustomed to smashing open zombie skulls, to slitting the throats of living people who came to steal supplies, to filthy, broken living conditions, to food that insects, ants, snakes, and rats had crawled over, and to the jungle law of death and rebirth.

They changed from prey into hunters.

“Humans have an adaptability to environmental change far beyond imagination. Throw them into it, and they’ll learn to accept it themselves,” Fu Qing said. “This is a road that must be walked, and a road that cannot be avoided.”

There was no teaching more profound than firsthand experience.

Her gaze was steady. Clearly, she already had a plan.

Fu Qing tapped the title of the second task with her fingertip. The flickering light finally reflected a fleeting trace of mischief in her eyes. “I believe tomorrow’s registration day will be, for them, extremely, unforgettable.”

*

The next day, at the gates of Fangzhou University.

“Xiao Shuang, this is your school?”

The middle-aged man helped unload a suitcase from the trunk, his gaze drifting again and again toward the school gate behind her. His smile carried a hint of something else. “Wasn’t this supposed to be a top-tier university? Why does it look… kind of small.”

He stopped just short of saying shabby.

The woman leaned out from the car window. “Exactly. We drove all the way here and didn’t even see a convenience store. Go any farther and we’d be in the mountains.”

Song Rushuang took her luggage, trying to use her thin frame to block her uncle and aunt’s scrutinizing stares. Failing, she kept her face expressionless and said, “Auntie, I heard this is the new campus. It just went into use this year. Maybe the surrounding development hasn’t caught up yet. It’ll get better.”

“You can’t even order delivery here. Sis, these next four years are gonna be rough.” Her cousin Song Xiang lounged in the back seat with his legs spread, playing on his phone, openly gloating. “Over six hundred points on the exam, and this is it?”

Xu Feng smacked her son lightly on the head. It made a sound, but she didn’t use force. “What nonsense are you talking about!”

“It’s true. What kind of lousy school is this? Small and remote… Who knows if you’ll even find a job after graduation…”

Song Xiang muttered in dissatisfaction after being hit. The couple wore angry expressions, yet the corners of their mouths could not help lifting.

Song Rushuang and Song Xiang’s fathers were brothers. They married and had children in the same year, one girl and one boy. For some reason, from that point on, Song Xiang’s father developed a sense of superiority. Every family gathering afterward centered on showing off his precious son. Unfortunately, the heir failed to live up to expectations. Song Xiang’s grades had hovered around passing since childhood. He scraped together just over four hundred on the college entrance exam. In contrast, Song Rushuang’s beautiful score made their family so furious they avoided her parents’ family the entire summer.

If not for the fact that both cousins reported to school on the same day, and Song Rushuang’s parents had signed up for a tour group and gone abroad, unable to send their daughter themselves, asking her uncle and aunt to bring her along, who knew when the two families would have met again.

Now, looking at this “poor and pitiful” little school squeezed up against the mountainside, the long-suppressed resentment in Song Xiang’s family suddenly dissipated. Smiles crept into their eyes and brows.

See? A six-hundred-point school isn’t all that impressive either!

Song Rushuang pretended not to hear, mentally complaining about her unreliable parents ten thousand times, and offered a polite smile. “Uncle, I’ll head in first.”

“Alright, go on.”

Her cousin’s family drove off humming cheerfully, still gloating. Only then did Song Rushuang turn around. She looked up and down at the school she would conservatively spend four years in. Her expression collapsed completely.

“No way. Is it really this small??”

Judging by the complicated looks on the faces of other students passing by, they were probably all thinking the same thing.

—Feels like I got scammed.jpg

Some local students even fell into deep thought: Had there always been a school at this address? When was it built? Why didn’t they remember at all…

Come to think of it, the whole application process felt muddled in retrospect. They only remembered checking materials for a long time, then somehow a single thought appeared in their minds: this university is the most suitable for me.

Beyond that, they had no other thoughts.

They had happily looked forward to it all summer. Only upon standing at the school gate did it feel like a bucket of cold water had been poured over their heads, jolting them awake.

Who am I? Where am I? What am I doing here?

???

A crowd of students with question marks practically floating over their heads gathered at the gate, their gazes clear and bewildered.

They followed the flow of people to the entrance and found two burly, stern-faced security guards standing there, shouting through loudspeakers: “Parents must stop here. Only students are allowed inside. Freshmen, please line up in a single file to receive supplies.”

Several parents carrying large and small bags immediately exploded.

“University campuses are supposed to be open! What kind of rule is this?”

“With this much luggage, if parents can’t go in, will your teachers help carry it?”

As Song Rushuang passed, she even heard an aunt urgently instructing her son, “Underwear and socks are all in this bag. Bring them home on weekends to wash. And don’t boil water yourself, you might get burned. Ask your roommate to help. If that doesn’t work, just give him a few yuan each month…”

Song Rushuang: “…”

Reality tells us that when you meet one Song Xiang, it means there’s a whole nest of them lurking in the shadows.

The parents argued fiercely, but the security guards were iron-faced and impartial, strictly adhering to their employer’s rule: not a single parent was to be allowed into the school today.

The well-trained security team sealed the campus as tightly as an impenetrable wall.

The line shuffled forward in messy order.

Finally it was Song Rushuang’s turn. She received the so-called “supplies”—

It was actually a pure black watch.

Song Rushuang let out a surprised “Huh?”

She had heard of schools giving out thermos cups, cultural T-shirts, canvas bags at orientation. This was the first time she had seen such a high-end gift.

Maybe her future alma mater wasn’t as shabby as it looked!

The watch was finely crafted, without flashy decorations, yet its design was grand. On the edge of the dial, a few simple strokes outlined a small boat swaying in floodwaters. The minimalist logo made Song Rushuang fall in love at first sight.

“Is this a custom watch from our school? The logo looks like Noah’s Ark, right?”

Ark. Fangzhou. The association came easily.

“My friend’s school just gave them a set of bookmarks. This watch looks so good. If I send him a picture, he’ll be so jealous.”

“The principal’s generous!”

Someone else keenly noticed that the watch had functions like a compass and temperature display, and several mysterious buttons along the side of the dial.

“Is this a tactical watch? What are all these fancy functions for?” he wondered aloud.

The person beside him guessed, “Maybe they’re worried we’ll wander into the mountains and get lost?”

In the background, the loudspeaker above the gate looped: “Please wear the watch properly on your wrist. During your time on campus, do not remove the watch…”

The students chatted excitedly, completely ignoring the reminder.

Amid the noise, Song Rushuang obediently put the watch on.

To her surprise, the moment the strap clicked snugly into place, a faint ring of light lit up around the dial. Like an electronic device booting up, a point of light circled once and finally stopped beside the largest button.

It was clearly a guiding design.

Puzzled for two seconds, Song Rushuang pressed the button. In the empty air above the watch face, a three-dimensional panel suddenly popped up.

She jolted. “!”

Students beside her walked past chatting and laughing, turning a blind eye to this blatantly unreasonable scene.

It took Song Rushuang a moment to realize that this was a panel only she could see.

Several lines of text were projected clearly across it—

【Biometric verification successful.】

【Student Information】
Name: Song Rushuang
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Dormitory: 1-1111
Current Points: 0
Current School-wide Ranking: n/a (will update after the first assessment)

₊˚.🎧📓✩