Chapter 141 She built a ship that carried hope...
Students from Fangzhou across the country began to take action.
Under the cover of missions on the "Fangzhou Rescue" account, they formed teams of two or three and traveled to major cities across the country.
To outsiders, Fangzhou's account is updated daily, and more and more people are expressing their gratitude online. The name "Fangzhou" has even spread overseas.
Only the students and teachers knew that their real purpose was to use the attraction of large gatherings to lure out local believers.
Behind the mission are waves of devout believers being quietly disposed of.
Some had already infiltrated the shelters, some were hiding among the survivors, some were lurking in rented rooms near large hospitals, watching intently, and some devout believers were hiding in basements preaching to ordinary people, only to be caught on the spot.
Those who had been brainwashed were also taken away and separated into different groups.
These people were just ordinary people before the apocalypse, and they couldn't withstand the intense interrogation. They quickly leaked all the little information they knew.
With a large enough number of people, they can follow the clues and wipe out the local devout followers in one fell swoop.
The operation was carried out with lightning speed; Fangzhou's manpower was sufficient to allow various regions to act simultaneously, minimizing time differences.
Before believers in other parts of the country could react, hundreds had already been arrested, including dozens of infected individuals.
These infected individuals were detained in local military facilities, where countless soldiers stood guard, their gun barrels and cannons menacing and menacing. This truly embodied Tian Xuejun's earlier statement: "We're not afraid of them coming to our door, we're afraid they won't come."
Infected devout believers—intelligent zombies—can be directly sensed by the Zombie King. Imprisoning them in the most heavily guarded places in the area serves as both a deterrent and a provocation.
Knowing they could no longer be saved, some collapsed and became delirious, while others grew increasingly frenzied, cursing day and night.
However, the only treatment they received was to gag them, tie their hands and feet to prevent any possibility of suicide, and then throw them into a room deep underground.
Since they needed neither food nor water, and there were no visitors, the foreseeable future could only be spent wearing down their will in this boundless silence.
*
The operation lasted for nearly a month.
The nationwide lightning operation was just the first wave. The military and students worked together to arrest some people, but many more remained hidden.
However, the lightning operation disrupted the previously calm surface, inevitably affecting the remaining believers.
They gave themselves away a little.
Compared to their previous cautious attitude, this slight oversight was extremely rare and was quickly seized upon by Fang Zhou's group and Tian Xuejun.
Whether based on the confessions of the captured believers or by reviewing surveillance footage of their movements before their arrest, they quickly tracked down a group of believers.
By continuously reviewing surveillance footage and narrowing down the search area, they finally identified some potential hideouts.
Then, they swept them away one by one...
During this period, the devout were not entirely inactive.
The truth eventually leaked out, and after realizing that many of their companions had been captured outside S City, they launched a frenzied counterattack. Unable to confront the army and the powerful students head-on, ordinary believers turned their attention to innocent civilians.
Within a month, despite strict precautions, two shelters were breached by a combination of zombies and devout believers. Despite the army's timely suppression, a significant portion of the population was injured or infected.
In addition, several important facilities such as nuclear power plants and hospitals were attacked. Military forces cannot protect every place, and there are always weak points in the defenses. These weak points were used as entry points, resulting in countless casualties.
Not to mention the hideouts where many civilian survivor squads stayed.
For example, some spaces such as schools and shopping malls that have not been requisitioned, especially the large ones, are organized and large-scale, and can even gather hundreds of people, making them a mixed bag.
Compared to official shelters, they are more vulnerable and less protected.
If a devout believer were to infiltrate the group, the entire hideout could fall into enemy hands.
The two sides kept pulling and tugging, each trying to outmaneuver the other.
Countless criminals have been brought to justice, while many more innocent people have died.
Knowing that zombies don't need sleep, food, or fatigue, Fangzhou's students and soldiers wished they could compress their daily rest and sleep time to the shortest possible, working up bloodshot eyes.
During the three to five hours I close my eyes each day, all I see in my mind are faces streaked with blood and tears.
The faces of the dead, etched with resentment and hatred, jolted them awake from their brief slumber, causing them to leap from their beds, prepare themselves, and head to the next battlefield.
If we cannot save them, we must at least save their parents and children, their friends, classmates and colleagues, and the countless compatriots they care about.
The students' families living in Fangzhou may have missed the moment of maturity that night when their children first entered university, but they will not miss this one.
Those students who could remain optimistic and make jokes even during the toughest training became more silent than ever before.
The combat pod replica cannot be simulated, nor can the holographic simulation be restored. The pain of watching everything familiar crumble is excruciating.
Only then did the students truly experience it.
What does it feel like to be in the apocalypse?
...
"Prepare."
The girl leaning against the door gripped the knife tightly in her hand and silently mouthed the words.
The boy opposite him, who was his partner, nodded.
Further down the corridor, students watched intently as the girl made a gesture.
Three, two, one—
The boy kicked the door open with a loud bang, and the girl rushed in first, but then suddenly stopped.
The person behind her rushed forward so fast that his nose almost hit her back. "How did you..."
He fell silent, realizing that his classmate was trembling uncontrollably.
He looked over the girl's shoulder and into the room, his face draining of all color from his eyes in an instant.
The third person behind them bent over and started vomiting, while the expressions of the others were also horribly ugly.
They were a step too late.
Previously, they had identified several possible hideouts of devout believers based on surveillance footage.
Tonight, the group split into several teams and acted simultaneously.
The girls' squad was responsible for one of the hideouts where two devout followers might be hiding.
The task itself was not difficult, but the scene before them was completely unexpected.
The devout believers were nowhere to be seen. In the room, which was only about 20 square meters, more than a dozen corpses lay scattered about. The stench of blood was dizzying. A zombie buried its head in a woman's body, gnawing at her neck, and did not react to the arrival of the group.
The girl in the lead rushed forward and, in a fit of rage, stabbed the zombie almost through the head.
Looking down again, she was so startled that she took a half step back.
The woman lying on the ground opened her eyes.
The woman's eyes were clear, and the moment she saw her, a strong will to survive burst forth in them, almost stinging the female student.
With such severe injuries, she has almost no chance of survival.
Even if they survive, they'll turn into zombies...
Thinking this, she turned her head away reluctantly, her knife already raised, but the woman reached out and grabbed her trouser leg tightly.
She spoke a few words in a barely audible voice.
The blade hovered above his head.
The room was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
...
Fu Qing, who was with Tian Xuejun, was startled by the electronic voice that suddenly exploded in her mind.
[Host! One of the five-person student teams we sent out tonight encountered an accident; three were seriously injured, and two sustained minor injuries!]
[All nearby large hospitals are full, but Fangzhou's school hospital can treat the injured. The vehicle transporting the wounded will arrive at the school gate in five minutes...]
Without thinking, Fu Qing ran out, leaving Tian Xuejun, who hadn't finished speaking, behind her.
Tian Xuejun was completely confused. Recalling Fu Qing's expression just now, she couldn't help but feel nervous.
The black car sped into the school, and the students and parents walking on the road had no time to avoid it as the car passed through the narrow gaps between them with remarkable precision.
"Whose car is this? How did it get into the school?"
"And driving so fast..."
Everyone felt a wave of fear, but then a sharp-eyed person noticed the license plate and car model and realized, "Wait, isn't that the principal's car?!"
Fu Qing parked her car in front of the school hospital and happened to bump into Lu Yan, who was rushing out of the door with great speed.
The two men's eyes met, and before they could even greet each other, they simultaneously noticed something and looked at another car speeding towards them.
It was an ambulance. To avoid attracting attention, there were no flashing lights or sirens. In the passenger seat was a doctor wearing a riot suit over a white coat, trembling as he gripped his seatbelt. But as soon as the car came to a stop, he dutifully jumped out.
Then my legs went weak and I almost collapsed to my knees.
A parent nearby reached out to help him, but he weakly waved his hand, saying, "It's nothing, I just get a little carsick..."
After saying that, he leaned on the carriage, his spirit unwavering despite his disability, and began to sway as he tried to open the carriage door.
The driver was a boy, who immediately walked towards the principal after getting out of the car.
Fu Qing recognized him; he was Fang Zhou's student and one of the five members of the attacked squad.
Of the five, three were seriously injured and two were slightly injured.
In the darkness, using the lights from the buildings behind her, she squinted and discovered that the boy had a large abrasion on his thigh, with blood seeping out, but he seemed completely oblivious to it.
Since he was the one who drove the ambulance, it means that he probably thought it was too slow and took the driver's seat halfway there.
Despite his injury, he drove fast and steadily to successfully bring his injured classmate back, which should have been an extremely reliable and admirable act.
But the moment he saw Fu Qing, the boy's expression went blank for a moment, then his lips tightened and his eyes reddened.
"headmaster……"
Like a child who has been wronged outside, enduring all the way, the moment they see their family, their emotions finally explode.
He slowed his pace, approaching Fu Qing hesitantly, as if unsure how to organize his thoughts. Finally, he squatted down, buried his head in his knees, and burst into tears, sobbing, "I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry..."
Lu Yan sighed with pity, and without daring to delay, ran to check on the injured people inside the car.
The boy's uncontrollable sobs grew louder. Fu Qing looked down at him and felt that his sadness was not simply due to his classmate's injury.
There are many more things he can't say for the time being, but his classmate's injury became an outlet for his emotions.
"A group of students who excelled in the school's first aid course have been urgently transferred to the school hospital. Just find any one of them, have them bandage you up, and then don't think about anything, just get a good night's sleep."
The boy heard the principal's voice above him, in his usual calm tone, but the words he spoke were unfamiliar.
She was trying to calm herself down.
"No matter what happens, it's not your fault."
After a long pause, the boy gave a hoarse "hmm," then looked up and pointed behind him: "You should go and check on the injured person."
A stretcher was just lowered from the carriage, and Fu Qing quickly stepped forward. It was Yin Zi, the girl in charge of the team.
Her clothes were soaked with blood around her abdomen, and her face was as pale as paper, but when she saw Fu Qing, she still struggled to get up.
Lu Yan wanted to stop her, but when he caught a glimpse of her distorted expression, his hand paused in mid-air.
Hatred consumed Yin Zi's entire consciousness, causing her to forget the pain in her body and her worries about her injuries.
With all her might, she said, word by word, "Headmaster, the devout believers are secretly gathering ordinary people together on a large scale, allowing the evolved zombies to infect them one by one."
Everyone knew that the devout had lost their humanity, but no one expected them to be so brutal.
Every word Yin Zi uttered seemed to be imbued with vitality.
"They threw unarmed ordinary people one by one to face the evolved zombies that even we found difficult to deal with... The remaining people were treated like prisoners, like livestock, with a dozen or even dozens of people locked in a small room."
"If they fail, they throw the body back into the room, in front of the deceased's relatives and friends, and then call the next person over."
"The rest can only wait to die."
“When we arrived, the remaining survivor told us to go and rescue the others. She clearly remembered where they were being held, but when we got there, there were only five evolved zombies left. We were too late.”
"...We're too late, Principal."
She repeated it, finally breaking down in tears, "We couldn't save them!"
The surroundings were deathly silent.
Upon hearing the news, Bai Tang, Xu Mingyue, and Hao Zhenye, who had rushed over, suddenly took a deep breath, their faces turning ashen.
Lu Yan held onto the stretcher, his hands, which never strayed from the scalpel even an inch, trembling violently uncontrollably due to his rage.
Liu Yingchun looked rather haggard, muttering something to herself with a pained expression, as she shakily approached and gently stroked Yin Zi's hair.
Many people who realized something was wrong and came over to help covered their faces in distress, thinking of the hellish scene.
Fu Qing stood motionless, everything around her seemed extremely distant at that moment, with only Yin Zi repeating the same phrase over and over again, as if it had become an obsession or a spell: "We're late."
She finally understood why the boy in charge of driving was crying.
He wasn't crying about his own and his classmates' injuries; he was crying because he couldn't save those innocent ordinary people.
His apology was an apology to all the victims who died in fear and never received rescue.
Even if Fu Qing lets him get a good night's sleep, from now on, countless nights will see before his eyes the dozens of people he couldn't save today.
This mission will forever leave a scar on the hearts of these five people.
Yin Zi's voice overlapped with the memories retrieved from the simulation pod, specifically the first life of "Fu Qing," who said, "Long ago, humanity had no hope of turning things around."
Is she going to make the same mistake again?
Fu Qing questioned himself in his heart.
...Will she have to wait until everything is beyond repair this time?
[Host, what are you thinking about?]
The system sensed something was wrong from the long silence and spoke up nervously.
[You're different now than in your first life; you no longer have any cheat codes protecting you! The Zombie King can summon all zombies, including evolved ones, to his side in a continuous stream, even arranging them in formation... Just imagine that scene!]
Even Fu Qing in his first life, with his invincible cheat ability, nearly died countless times from those terrifying sieges. You couldn't do it, and you can't do it now!!
Even if the number of evolved zombies under the Zombie King's command is far less than it would be a few years after the apocalypse, it still doesn't matter. A horde commanded by the Zombie King is a completely different concept from the zombie hordes of the late apocalypse. Even you in your second life never faced such a scenario! Besides, you've already rested for a year!
[The body is like a machine; if it's not used for a long time and doesn't receive high-intensity exercise, it will rust and decay... You are not the same person you used to be, do you understand? Host, host?!]
It had never spoken so much in one go before, while Fu Qing remained silent.
The system screamed inwardly.
It had sensed something was wrong long ago. Ever since its host said "Let me think about it some more" to Lu Yan, it felt as if something it didn't understand was quietly happening.
Until this moment, it finally had a flash of inspiration and understood everything.
—【Are you planning to sacrifice yourself to lure the zombie king?!】
The system, unusually, lost its composure.
Once Fu Qing dies, she will no longer have the chance to commit suicide. In other words, even if the humans of this small world manage to usher in their fourth life, they will not be able to find a super-strong host like Fu Qing who is 100% stable and will live to the end.
It seemed to foresee its own inevitable defeat.
[You should remember, this is humanity's last life, right? At the current pace, the chances of winning are still quite high, but once you die, I will be forced to bind to another host, and who knows what this new host will do to Fang Zhou...]
[Fangzhou will be finished then, and all your hard work this year will have been for nothing!]
Having witnessed Fu Qing's dedication to teaching students and building infrastructure, the system didn't believe she would be willing to give it up.
For the past month since reading the memories, Fu Qing has been hesitant and has not yet made a decision, mostly because she is worried about Fang Zhou's future.
But now, the system suddenly can't read her expression anymore.
Yin Zi's stretcher was pushed away, and everyone else was looking at her, but Fu Qing looked up and glanced at the campus where she was.
The clear moonlight cast a silent shadow over the tall teaching building. The campus lights twinkled in the night, a rare tranquility amidst the darkness of the city.
Indeed, as she wished, it became the ship that carried hope in the chaotic world.
But many more people sank in the flood.
She built an oasis, but countless people died before they even reached it.
If it cannot carry everyone ashore, if it cannot shelter every thirsty traveler, then what meaning does the so-called Noah's Ark, humanity's oasis, distant hope, and unattainable lighthouse still have?
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