“With so many mouths to feed, isn’t making porridge too troublesome?”

Bai Youwei said while eating:

“Making porridge is very time-consuming, and it doesn’t fill you up. If you’re not careful it easily burns. If it’s not because a patient has a weak stomach, why go to the trouble of cooking porridge?… The city just had this incident a few days ago, so food should be quite abundant. Why make porridge of all things? Look, the porridge even has dried shrimp and mushrooms—”

Bai Youwei scooped up a spoonful of porridge and waved it in front of Shen Mo’s eyes.

Then she stuffed it back into her mouth, saying unclearly: “Courtesy demands reciprocity. We can’t take advantage for nothing either. You should take some food upstairs.”

Shen Mo’s lips curved slightly: “Just sending food? Don’t you want me to go up and gather intelligence?”

Bai Youwei’s expression didn’t change, and her porridge-eating movements didn’t pause even slightly. “Don’t you want to?”

Shen Mo gave an almost imperceptible smile and generously admitted: “I do.”

Though he and Bai Youwei’s personalities differed by a hundred and eight thousand miles, somehow their thoughts often coincided unexpectedly.

Shen Mo thought some more, then said: “Let Teacher Cheng go. Both being teachers, they’ll find it easier to talk.”

“Take Tan Xiao along,” Bai Youwei said. “Don’t let the old man get bullied.”

Shen Mo: “What, being protective?”

Bai Youwei paused, seeming to think of something. After a few seconds of silence, she said flatly: “He’s not bad.”

Shen Mo looked at her deeply, then stood up and went out, standing at the door: “Teacher Cheng, please come here for a moment…”

……

While Bai Youwei and Shen Mo analyzed the teacher and students upstairs in the dormitory, they didn’t know that the people upstairs were also studying them.

“One tall guy, one delinquent youth, one old man, one disabled person…”

The students sat in a circle, looking at each other.

No matter how you looked at it, this combination was extremely strange.

“Everyone doesn’t need to worry too much.” The female teacher sat among them, her tone gentle. “They can take in an elderly person and care for a disabled person, so they definitely aren’t evil-hearted people. We’ll mind our own business and stay out of each other’s way.”

A girl with twin ponytails muttered: “But that cripple is so fierce…”

Before she could finish, the teacher fixed her with a stern stare.

The girl knew she’d said something wrong and felt somewhat wronged, saying even more quietly: “I’m not the one who said it—she said it herself.”

“She can call herself a cripple, but we cannot.” The female teacher looked at the students before her and reminded them again: “When you’re away from home, absolutely do not engage in verbal disputes. It does no good for anyone. Understand?”

“Understood, Teacher Tu.”

The students responded one after another, with the twin-ponytailed girl also nodding uncomfortably among them.

Another student asked: “Teacher Tu, when are we going into the fog?”

Teacher Tu was silent for a while, then turned her head to look to one side—

There on a dormitory bed lay a male student with a pale face, thick white gauze wrapped around his chest, eyelids half-drooping, quietly listening to everyone’s discussion.

Tu Dan sighed silently in her heart, withdrew her gaze. “…After Zhang Tianyang’s injury improves a bit, we’ll go in. When we go, we also can’t all go in—half will stay behind. If the food runs out by more than half and we still haven’t emerged from the fog, those who stay will take the food and head south along the Yangtze River… to find another shelter.”

“Teacher Tu…”

“Teacher Tu, please don’t go…”

Several girls’ eyes moistened, reluctantly clutching at their teacher’s clothing. The boys also reddened around the eyes.

Looking at these young faces, Tu Dan’s heart was filled with mixed emotions. She held their hands, speaking word by word: “We must go into the fog. This is intelligence purchased with lives. Let me ask you—what is the first rule of the game?”

The students choked out: “Refuse the game, become a doll!”

“Yes… Refusing, escaping, will only increase its malevolent feelings toward us, without any help.” Tu Dan looked at them. “We must go into the fog.”