What a baffling situation.
As Gu Yao's thoughts returned, she was overwhelmed by a nauseating dizziness.
All her blood seemed to rush to her head. Her limbs were weak, her brain buzzed, and her whole body felt like it was being pricked by needles.
She struggled to stay upright, trying not to fall awkwardly to the ground from the sudden vertigo.
There were gasps around her: "She got bitten!"
...What got bitten?
As her vision slowly cleared, Gu Yao frowned and looked around at the terrified students distancing themselves from her.
...Students?
Gu Yao stared blankly at the highschoolers she couldn't associate with any names, a huge question mark hovering over her head.
Wasn't she just out for a walk after dinner? Where was she?
"Gu... Gu Yao..." A girl in the crowd stammered, "Did you get bitten?"
"...?"
Gu Yao followed her gaze to her own slender, pale arm, where there was indeed a fresh, bleeding bite mark.
...Wow, who bit her? How could she not know—
Wait!
Gu Yao's pupils contracted:
A slender, pale arm?
She looked at the arm that didn't seem like hers and started trembling just like the girl before.
—This is bad, haunting!
"I..."
A crisp, pleasant voice escaped her throat, and Gu Yao's thoughts were a jumbled mess. She looked down at her now heavy chest.
Gu Yao: :D
It was too surreal. She hadn't yet figured out what was happening.
"Stop talking to her! She’s been bitten, lock her up!"
A bespectacled boy shouted, like he had flipped a switch, and Gu Yao instantly became the focus of wary glances.
Seeing several tall boys approaching with ropes, Gu Yao quickly raised her hand and pointed at her own nose: "You all call me... Gu Yao?"
"Has she already gone mad from the bite?"
Gu Yao heard someone whisper and immediately glared at them.
"Gu Yao, I'm sorry this happened to you, but for everyone's safety, you shouldn't resist." A boy with a student council badge and a gentle smile stepped forward. "After all, you were bitten by a zombie."
When he stood in front of her, Gu Yao realized he was a full head taller than her, his gaze slightly oppressive.
Ignoring him, she frowned and asked, "Zombie? And who are you?"
Her question plunged the surroundings into an eerie silence.
Someone broke the silence: "She must be delirious! She's turning into a zombie! Lock her up now!"
"Just kill her..." Another person suggested in fear.
There were two factions debating Gu Yao's fate, their voices growing louder.
The boy in front of Gu Yao raised his hand: "Enough."
Silence fell again.
He looked at Gu Yao and smiled:
"Gu Yao is usually kind and helpful. Many of us have benefited from her assistance. We shouldn't do something so cruel in this situation."
He turned to the other students, speaking passionately: "Are you willing to let this happen? Don’t you feel guilty? We are students. I know today's events have frightened everyone, but we must stick together. Empathy is what separates us from those creatures outside!"
He said, "Let's lock her up inside."
But as he turned, Gu Yao saw a strange gleam in his eyes and a slight smirk.
***
"You can't lock me up!"
Gu Yao, bound tightly, could only rage at the door.
The small, dark warehouse had no lights, was empty, and had no food, making it a desolate little black room.
Tired of shouting, Gu Yao coughed and pressed her lips together in the dark.
Before being bound and brought here, she learned the boy's name.
—"Lou Yanan."
Lou Yanan, Lou Yanan, Lou Yanan...
And zombies, and Gu Yao...
Her heart skipped a beat.
Putting these elements together—
Lou Yanan's name was so familiar!
Wasn't he the first cannon fodder villain to appear in the novel she read?
Gu Yao felt like crying but had no tears.
Then, does that mean "Gu Yao" is the short-lived, side character school belle with the same name as her?
This school belle indeed had a short life, bitten by a zombie right at the start and then turning into one and dying.
Her only notable feature was that the male lead once had a crush on her, but by the time he arrived, she had turned into a zombie and was killed, leading to the male lead's grudge against Lou Yanan.
The heartbroken male lead buried her and then set off on his journey. Along the way, he met the female lead, who eventually filled the void in his wounded heart...
It was a great story to read, but Gu Yao was currently very panicked.
It seemed that she had... become that short-lived school belle.
And she had already been bitten by a zombie, qwq.
She was going to die! Wuwuwuwu...
Honestly, she was still in a state of utter confusion.
So bewildered… the question marks were practically overflowing from her mind.
She had transmigrated for no reason.
She had inexplicably changed genders.
She hadn't been hit by a truck, nor had she died. She had just gone out for a walk after a big dinner and suddenly felt dizzy, then ended up here.
What on earth.
She had tried. She was still just an ordinary person, without any of the powers that usually appear in novels, and without any system, which is one of the perks of transmigration.
Maybe the only thing she had going for her now was her good looks.
"Gu Yao" should be one of those top beauties because when the male lead later mentioned her, it was always with nostalgia and sentiment, making her the perfect "white moonlight."
But Gu Yao didn't want to be the "white moonlight." She just wanted to live.
Calm down, calm down! Think carefully.
If this really was the novel she had read, then...
Then Gu Yao only wanted to shout to the heavens:
She didn't finish reading it!!!
She panicked even more.
Calm... calm down! At least she had read up to the middle and later parts. As long as she could survive now, she could definitely navigate her way smoothly.
Hmm... This should be the very beginning of the novel since the school belle she had become hadn't died yet.
The zombie crisis had broken out without warning, and all the surviving students of Nohai First High School had taken refuge in the cafeteria. They survived for two weeks on the ample food supplies inside, until the male lead, who had just begun to awaken his abilities and ascend to the peak of his life, arrived. Under the protection of the military organized by the government, they evacuated the school.
But what did this have to do with Gu Yao? By then, she would already be dead.
...So, she needed to save herself!
Gu Yao had read the novel up to the middle, so she knew that once zombies reached a high enough level, they would regain their intelligence. Although she wasn't sure if it was the same person as before... it was still better than being a mindless, groaning creature, right?
Alright! Save herself! Self... self-rescue...
“……”
She tried to move.
Gu Yao: ...Why would they tie me up so tightly? qwq
Forget self-rescue, just wait for death.
***
Fever.
Her whole body was trembling with muscle spasms.
Gu Yao was so uncomfortable that she couldn't even open her eyes and could only lie weakly on the ground.
Bound tightly like a mummy, she lay there, looking from a distance like a maggot.
It had been three days.
No matter how much she shouted, no one came in.
The blood on her arm had dried, leaving a conspicuous bite mark.
——They were just waiting for her to die.
The zombie virus was spreading through her body, replicating and proliferating, making her skin increasingly pale. As the virus clung to various parts of her body with the blood, it eventually reached her brain.
Gu Yao couldn't hold on anymore, whimpered, and fell into endless darkness.
She felt nauseous and dizzy, her heart was racing, then suddenly she became weak and her pupils turned into deep, lifeless gray. She exhaled her last breath of life and unconsciously inhaled the breath of death.
...
When Gu Yao woke up again, she felt an overwhelming sense of fatigue.
She was very tired but couldn't fall asleep.
Hmm... probably insomnia, Gu Yao thought, maybe from the stress.
Hadn't she almost died just now?
Luckily, she hadn't.
But she didn't know why she was so tired, as if she couldn't control her body at all.
She could now only muster the strength to move a finger while fighting off an overwhelming sense of fatigue. Even that small effort felt as exhausting as running several kilometers, and there seemed to be something stuck in her throat, preventing her from even calling out.
Gu Yao sat on the ground, half-dazed, her gaze fixed on the tightly closed door in the dim light. One thought echoed in her mind:
“I’m so tired; I don’t want to move.”
After waking up, she felt as if she had become lazier.
Now, reduced to a state of idiotic fatigue, she sat there, motionless, like a statue.
Time passed slowly, and Gu Yao lost track of how much time had gone by. Suddenly, the door creaked open.
Light, which she hadn't seen for a long time, streamed in, and Gu Yao's eyes moved.
A boy's voice came from outside, full of amazement:
"She's already turned into a zombie."
Gu Yao: ?
Who's turned into a zombie?!
Gu Yao was furious, trying to muster the strength to refute, but all the words she had prepared in her mind turned into a short, hoarse sound: "Wu-uh—"
It sounded like a raspy howl.
Gu Yao: ...
What the...?