Eleven hours before the apocalypse arrived.
Local time: 5 p.m.
At Xichi University, the autumn sowing event organised by the Agricultural Research Society, founded by students from the School of Agriculture, ended in the afternoon. By evening, the club members invited Fang Yangyang to eat with them at the newly opened cafeteria, where many delicious dishes were apparently being served.
Fang Yangyang was not in the mood to eat at the cafeteria. She politely declined the club members, hurried back to her dormitory, packed everything she thought might be useful into her backpack, and left the single dorm room.
Most members of the club were agriculture students, while a small number were students from other majors who had joined out of interest.
Fang Yangyang belonged to the latter group.
The original Fang Yangyang majored in a minor language. During the club recruitment period in her freshman year, a friend jokingly handed in an application form for her, and she ended up joining the Agricultural Research Society.
There was not much description of Fang Yangyang in the book. It only described the cause of her death; her popularity and social relationships were never mentioned. However, Fang Yangyang guessed that the original “Fang Yangyang” must have been a fairly well-liked sophomore. Since transmigrating, only a dozen or so hours had passed, yet quite a few club members had already warmly called her “Yangyang” and invited her to eat with them.
After leaving the dormitory, Fang Yangyang did not know where else she could go. After hesitating for a long time, she decided to spend the night in the cafeteria for now.
The cafeterias at Xichi University were open twenty-four hours a day, so that teachers and students finishing night shifts or studying for postgraduate exams could still have late-night snacks when exhausted.
In the corridor on the first floor of the cafeteria were taps for washing bowls and chopsticks, as well as a mirror.
Fang Yangyang looked at the girl in the mirror and could not come back to herself for a long time. After a while, she cupped some water in her hands and washed her face. As she dried the droplets from her cheeks with a tissue, her brows furrowed slightly in thought.
The cannon-fodder female supporting character “Fang Yangyang” not only had the same name as her, but also the exact same face as the Fang Yangyang from reality.
After several months of cancer, chemotherapy, and medication in the hospital, Fang Yangyang’s appearance had long since lost the healthy vitality she saw now.
She gently pressed the skin on her arm. It was soft and smooth, and no longer had that slow-to-rebound feeling from the swelling she used to have.
Fang Yangyang closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
She had transmigrated into a book and gained a healthy body. She could not waste this rare opportunity. At the very least, she had to live well.
With that thought, she returned to the seat where she had placed her backpack, took out her phone, and began contacting her newly acquired boyfriend, Dou Qing.
….
“No way, no way. You went out once and came back with a girlfriend?”
His roommate made a huge fuss.
“Dou Qing, you’re amazing. I thought I’d be the first one in our dorm to stop being single—” Sun Yi, who was still pursuing the campus belle of their major, poked his head down from the upper bunk. He was a local rich second-generation heir, wealthy enough to change Cayennes three times in one semester. Usually, he loved borrowing the dorm’s top student Dou Qing’s homework to copy.
In terms of intelligence, he was not lacking either. After all, he had genuinely tested into Xichi University on his own. He was just lazy by nature. In his own words—my family is this rich, so whether I study well or badly won’t affect my future inheritance. There’s no need to be too strict with myself.
“Which girl did you manage to chase?”
“…” Dou Qing said nothing. He sat in front of his computer and began typing.
Another roommate teased, “Dou Qing, are you starting work now?”
Dou Qing gave a quiet “Mm.”
Sun Yi said, “If you’re short on money, borrow from me. Don’t be polite.”
He leaned down from the upper bunk to take a look, then withdrew again when he found it boring.
Dou Qing said, “Thank you, but there’s no need.”
His roommates were all wealthier than Dou Qing.
Dou Qing had no parents. He had grown up in an orphanage. After being admitted to Xichi University, he had started taking part-time jobs from his freshman year. Sun Yi had mentioned many times that if he needed money, he could intern at his parents’ company, where they could pay him at least twenty thousand a month.
Dou Qing had politely refused.
From their time together between freshman and junior year, Dou Qing had earned quite a bit of money through part-time work outside his studies. At the very least, his daily living expenses, computer, phone, and so on were all paid for by himself. Even while earning money, he still maintained the top grade in his major and won the national scholarship every year.
People could not help admiring his time and energy management.
Dou Qing ignored the voices of his roommates. He focused intently on the file his friend had sent, reading rapidly and conducting data analysis, sending the results to his friend in real time.
The whole thing took half an hour. Only then did he have time to check his phone.
The moment he looked, he froze.
Phone messages:
[a Fang Yangyang]: Dou Qing, I’m at Jiangpu Cafeteria right now. Would you be willing to come down and eat with me?
A few minutes later.
He had not replied.
[a Fang Yangyang]: Did you not see your phone? It’s okay. Since you’re busy, forget it.
The last message had been sent ten minutes ago.
Dou Qing choked. He immediately replied to Fang Yangyang, his hands trembling.
He typed, “Sorry, I was just…” then deleted it character by character. His friend sent another message asking what he had meant earlier when he asked for more jobs recently.
Dou Qing glanced hastily at the screen and had no time to deal with his friend for now. His entire mind was immersed in replying to Fang Yangyang.
“Sorry, I didn’t check my phone just now. I’ll come downstairs to find you now.”
Fang Yangyang’s reply came slowly:
Okay, it’s fine. I’m still in the cafeteria.
She sent a photo of herself sitting in the cafeteria.
The girl had snow-white skin, and between her brows was a clear, unforgettable grace. Her eyes were bright and pure, and the corners of her lips lifted slightly.
Dou Qing was stunned by her beauty in that one photo. It took him two seconds before he sent back a single word:
“Okay.”
As he closed his laptop, he explained to his friend that he had something to do and had to leave for a while. He also briefly answered the question about taking on jobs.
[To give my girlfriend better material conditions.]
He hurried downstairs, still lingering over the photo his girlfriend had sent him.
Looking at it again, Dou Qing noticed a familiar figure behind Fang Yangyang. His eyes narrowed. After identifying the person, his heart sank.
Yan Fengji?
He quickened his pace towards Jiangpu Cafeteria.
…
Ten hours before the apocalypse arrived.
Fang Yangyang took the original owner’s phone out of her backpack. The original owner’s lock screen password and bank card password were the same as hers.
This coincidence made Fang Yangyang frown, but she had no time to think too deeply about it.
Xichi University was the safest place in the early stage, because the male lead, second male lead, and third male lead were all there. In addition, the entire university was full of elite talent. When Huaguo’s military later learned that about sixty percent of Xichi University’s teachers and students had survived, they gave priority to transferring them to a safe base.
In the apocalypse novel, the place where the male lead first began to display his organisational ability was this Jiangpu Cafeteria.
The apocalypse arrived at four in the morning, while the students were still asleep.
At six in the morning, the students with early classes woke up and screamed when they saw the pitch-black darkness outside. The whole sky was covered by black clouds. The greenery near the dormitory area grew wildly and twistedly; branches shot everywhere, leaves expanded in size. The stray cats and dogs that had long lived on campus and had collectively been neutered by the veterinary students of the medical school also swelled in size, drooling through sharp fangs, their eyes blood-red.
…
Jiangpu Cafeteria became a temporary shelter for nearly a hundred teachers and students. Both the male lead and the second male lead were there.
As for the third male lead—
Fang Yangyang recalled that in the original apocalypse novel, it had briefly mentioned that he safely survived the early stage in a cafeteria in another dormitory area, until he later gathered with the male lead, second male lead, and the others.
Fang Yangyang had thought about whether she should tell the other people in the book that the apocalypse was coming.
But in the end, she did not say anything.
In this novel, the main characters and supporting characters were all intelligent. If she said the apocalypse was coming, probably no one would believe her. And once the apocalypse really arrived, her words would become evidence for others to question her.
There were ten hours left until the apocalypse arrived.
Tomorrow at four in the morning, while everyone was deep asleep, the apocalypse would descend.
The world would never be the same again.
Fang Yangyang went to the cafeteria convenience store and bought bread and mineral water, stuffing them tightly into her backpack.
Ten bottles of mineral water. Fifteen pieces of bread.
The backpack she carried was a rough cloth backpack the original owner had kept in the dormitory and usually used for hiking trips. It had a large capacity, sturdy fabric, and was suitable for long-distance travel and everyday rushing about.
The style was a pink-blue colour girls would like, with butterflies and plush ornaments attached to it, so it did not look too conspicuous.
After finishing her chat with Dou Qing, she placed the backpack back at her original cafeteria seat. There was a book on the table, marking the seat as occupied, so no one would come sit there. At this hour, apart from people eating, there were only a few scattered students revising at the tables.
In a few more hours, there would be fewer and fewer people in the cafeteria.
In the end, only the night-shift chefs and a few teachers and students returning from experiments to the dormitory area to buy late-night snacks would remain.
Fang Yangyang’s palms were sweating. The moment she thought of what would happen ten hours later, anxiety and unease churned in her chest.
She went to the cafeteria tap to wash her hands again.
Just as she picked up a tissue to wipe the water from her hands, she suddenly heard someone call her from behind.
“Fang Yangyang.”
The voice was deep and elegant, like the sound of a cello.
The young man approached step by step. He was still wearing the white shirt and black trousers Fang Yangyang had seen on him a few hours ago.
They made him look incomparably handsome.
“…” Fang Yangyang froze. She subconsciously took a few steps back.
The young man seemed somewhat dissatisfied by her fearful reaction. He breathed very lightly and slowly, carrying a cold frostiness as he restrained his emotions. Step by step, he forced her back until she was pressed against the corridor wall.
Yan Fengji lowered his head. His gaze slid from her thick, black lashes, down to the elegant tip of her nose and her softly pressed lips.
He asked her, “You’re dating someone?”
Fang Yangyang was confused. She had not known that the original owner actually knew Yan Fengji.
Wait. They knew each other?
“Yes. I’m dating someone.”
Without time to think too much, Fang Yangyang blurted it out.
Yan Fengji let out a cold sneer.
“With Dou Qing?”
Fang Yangyang frowned. She lifted her face and glared at him angrily.
“What? Do you have a problem with that?”
The handsome young man stared at her face for a long time. After a while, he withdrew all his sneering mockery towards “Dou Qing”; even his coldness faded.
The hand hanging by his side moved slightly. With difficulty, his voice hoarse, he asked:
“Why Dou Qing?”
There was an unmistakable cold sarcasm on Yan Fengji’s face.
“I messaged you today and asked if you wanted milk tea. You didn’t reply.”
“And then you got together with Dou Qing.” Fang Yangyang: “…………”
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