(T/N: Cheoso refers to the phase of late summer when the heat starts to diminish. It’s around August 23rd.)
Starting with Woo Kihwan, the zombie-like seniors began to appear one after another.
It’s difficult to identify them when it’s just their heads that were visible above sea level, but seeing their uniforms, they really seem to be the Third Year Class Zero seniors.
Above all, the facial expressions of the teachers confirm it.
Even Kim Shinrok looked flustered.
“…Kihwan? You kids?”
With that, Woo Kihwan raised his head and looked at Kim Shinrok and the other teachers.
These human beings drove themselves to the limit to fulfill their basic and primitive instincts.
The physiological desire to satiate hunger, and have clothing and shelter for survival.
From Woo Kihwan’s perspective, his hunger is the first thing he needs to satiate.
As if attracted by the smell of food, Woo Kihwan turned his head sharply.
His eyes wandered around the beach where the teachers and students were.
He scanned the area and his eyes landed on the group of 10 people…
“O-oh? He’s looking over here…”
“What the heck, what’s he looking at?”
“Geurin, get behind me!”
Our class had the least number of people.
Meanwhile, thanks to Hwang Jiho’s cooking skills, the flavorful aroma started to become more and more prevalent.
Just in time, Hwan Jiho applied a lot of his handmade special herb sauce to the whole chicken wrapped on the grill.
With the “shwaaa!” noise of the oil hitting the heat, Woo Kihwan shouted.
“Attack!”
“Waaaaaah!”
Following Woo Kiwan’s order to attack, the primitive people rushed in our direction to loot some food.
While the teachers and the other kids were still speechless at the ridiculous situation, Hwang Jiho moved first.
Gracefully holding a barbecue skewer in his hand, Hwang Jiho jumped to the front in an instant.
Fwaaa!
With a gold-colored energy wave, Hwang Jiho used his magic to wrap a boundary around us Class Zero freshmen.
Although Woo Kihwan and his party were faithful to their desires, they immediately stopped charging at us as they sensed the great power of the boundary that Hwang Jiho set up.
“Hahaha! Not everyone’s entitled to taste the food that I personally made!”
That doesn’t sound right coming from a guy who always volunteers to cook.
Carrying a s’more made with marshmallows, peanut butter, and graham crackers, Hani looked at Jiho and thought “why did this crazy guy give me such an expensive-looking food”.
Now Hani has to focus on holding her food tightly as she stared at Woo Kihwan.
After a while, the target of the Third Year Class Zero students has changed.
“Go!”
“Waaaaah!”
The new target was Bang Yoonseob, who was in charge of getting the waxy corn bread as his punishment for trying to smoke back in Hongcheon.
We were planning to have that bread for dessert after the barbecue, but Bbang Shuttle was attacked while on his way to distribute the snack.
“Ahk! W-what the? Z-zombies? Why are zombies here on Joo-Oh Island… Ah, ouch! The zombie bit me!”
“Bang Yoonseob!”
Bang Yoonseob’s homeroom teacher Noh Youngmi came to the rescue.
Although the teachers scolded the Third Year Class Zero students for attacking their juniors, Woo Kihwan and his group were too busy eating the bread that they took to Bang Yeonseob so they really didn’t listen much to the teachers.
Still, the kind teachers grilled meat and gave some to the Class Zero seniors as if they felt sorry seeing them sit on the floor eating bread.
Thinking of the hardworking teachers who came all the way here just to be bothered by these students, I made a suggestion.
“Let’s share some of our food with the seniors too.”
“I agree with Euishin! After all, they’re our Class Zero seniors!”
“Hahaha… It seems like they’d starve to death if we just leave them alone.”
“Even so, not just anyone can eat the food that I made.”
Except for Hwang Jiho, I and the other Class Zero kids prepared some food to give to the seniors.
The seniors ate as much as they could without a single thank-you even though we offered the food to them.
They eventually fell asleep on the sand when they got tired of eating.
Their barbarism led to their looting, uncontrollable eating, and now sleeping on the sand.
At least Woo Kihwan, the leader of them all, had his eyes opened as if he still has some stamina remaining.
“Woo Kihwan, what happened? Where’s Professor Im Yeonhwa?”
On behalf of the other teachers, it was Ham Geunhyung who asked Woo Kihwan.
Hearing the name ‘Im Yeonhwa’ seemed to make Woo Kihwan tear up.
While Woo Kihwan loudly cried his heart out, the teachers felt flustered once again.
“When the typhoon hit, it destroyed all of our food storage… So it became every man for himself for survival…”
They had to become self-sufficient on that uninhabited island.
It sounds amazing at first, but when you don’t have the proper knowledge or tools for it, it’s bound to be pretty miserable.
The thought of distilling seawater to drink, having to eat fruit not knowing if it’s poisonous or not, and grilling fish without seasoning…
It made my head hurt.
Woo Kihwan talked about their miserable life on the uninhabited island and finally reached the main point.
“While we were doing underwater training, I found a frozen entrance to the other world… When I smashed it, a poison-like thing started to come out…”
A frozen entrance to the other world.
Poison.
As soon as I heard those words, I remembered something.
A frozen point.
The suppressed collision point between the two worlds was controlled using freezing temperature and poisonous air.
This freeze-type technology, which was like a time bomb in itself, was planted everywhere on the Korean Peninsula.
‘The Third Year Class Zero faced one themselves…! So there’s a frozen point near Joo-Oh Island too!’
I thought they were just busy in a boot camp.
So then what happened to their homeroom teacher, Im Yeonhwa?
Don’t tell me the teacher sacrificed herself so her students could escape…
“What happened to Professor Im Yeonhwa?”
It was Kim Shinrok, who knew about the existence of frozen points, who asked.
Hwang Jiho was also squinting and looking our way.
Soon enough, Woo Kihwan spoke in a wistful voice.
“She told us it’s a long way to go before the thing is over and so she sent us away… so she faced the whole thing by herself…”
So she faced the whole thing on her own!
Even Hwan Jiho has experienced the pain of his insides melting due to the energy poison and the antidote given by Hyangrok.
Is that strong homeroom teacher Im Yeonhwa really just a human?
“Even poison doesn’t shake our amazing homeroom teacher, huhu… we can’t win against her! Aish… we tried our best to fight, but we had no choice but to escape… But then we all felt hungry… Huhuhu!”
Woo Kihwan cried out loud as if all the pain that accumulated had exploded.
“…You should’ve asked the school or the association for help.”
“Then it would feel like we lost to our homeroom teacher!”
Even if they didn’t ask for help, it seems like the Class Zero seniors already lost big time to Im Yeonhwa.
After crying for a while, Woo Kihwan’s energy was all used up and he fell asleep.
Hwang Jiho, who seem to have confirmed the situation, spoke in a low voice.
“I got a call from the association through Im Jihwa. Looks like they found one of the frozen points. They’re taking care of the information now.”
The strong homeroom teacher Im Yeonhwa must’ve contacted Im Jihwa, her older sister and head of the satellite management team.
‘It’s a relief that those two are sisters.’
If it had been reported to the association through the public, the information would’ve been difficult to manipulate.
As if having the same thoughts as me, Hwang Jiho looked pleased too.
“I’m sure they didn’t expect this to happen near where we’re having our vacation, but I’m sure the researchers would be pleased that they have another sample to research on. Oh, and they’d have to contact Im Yeonhwa to get their stories straight.”
More than the teacher, I think Woo Kihwan and the other Class Zero kids were a bigger problem.
Fortunately, Woo Kihwan was obviously out of his mind so I bet even he himself would doubt what he says.
Kim Shinrok briefly summarized what Woo Kihwan said before we talked about a different topic.
That’s when Joo Soohyuk approached us.
“Professor! Shall we move the sunbaenims to the dorms?”
“Leave it to us. I’m sorry this happened out of nowhere. I’ll talk to the Joo-Oh Group staff too.”
“Haha, no it’s alright. Actually, I invited the military school kids too. It’s alright since we have enough food prepared at the dorm.
As expected of the title hero.
Kim Shinrok glanced toward Yong Jegun, signaling him to help in moving the kids.
Yong Jegun perfectly understood Kim Shinrok’s gaze, and Jegun looked annoyed.
Even so, he helped move the Class Zero seniors to the dorm with his spatial skills.
* * *
After the barbecue party, each of us was free to hang out in our own rooms.
There were activities prepared for all the classes to hang out all together, but everyone agreed that the first day should be spent freely.
Since the whole resort was rented, each class was assigned its own floor.
The lounge on our floor felt especially spacious because there were only a few kids in our class.
After Ham Geunhyung and Yong Jegun called the association to talk about Im Yeonhwa, the space felt even wider.
The kids lined up with board games that they individually packed.
They spoke with disappointed faces.
“I was going to stay up all night and play with Professor Ham Geunhyung though!”
“That’s right. I wanted to get back at him because I completely lost last time. I’m also curious about how good Prof. Yong is with games…”
“Me too. I wanted to play games with Professor Ham Geunhyung…”
Hearing the story of a spring picnic with Ham Geunhyung at Han River, Min Geurin looked sad.
Seeing my playable character so sad made me want to help in searching for Im Yeonhw so that Ham Geunhyung can quickly go back and play with everyone in our class.
But then, it’s difficult for me to move now.
“But still, 10 kids from our Class Zero are gathered for the first time! We finally hit double digits!”
With the addition of Mok Wooram, the students in our class finally became 10.
If I leave now, it’ll be 9 people.
A single digit.
Seeing Kim Yuri so happy, I can’t just leave now.
“Hey… Wooram? You won’t be able to play if you sit too far away.”
“This amount of distance seems appropriate to me. Thank you for your concern.”
Mok Wooram, who chose the seat farthest from Kwon Lena but still distanced himself from the other kids, answered politely.
Whenever he had time, Mok Wooram took notes of possible questions that the other kids would ask, especially Kwon Lena.
He memorized and practiced the answers accordingly.
‘Doesn’t it take bare minimum common sense to be able to answer simple questions like that?’
It seemed extraordinary that Mok Wooram decided to do his best to put up a front of being a normal person instead of fixing his mental state.
Of course, even if he tried his best to pretend to be normal, his peculiarity cannot be hidden.
Although it’s painfully obvious that Mok Wooram was strange, the kind-hearted Class Zero kids dismiss it by saying “he’s a unique person!”
The usual Song Daesok would say an inappropriate thing, but it seems that Song Daesok was on better behavior than usual.
He sometimes kept his mouth shut and observed the kids quietly.
‘…Is it because he’s thinking about satellites?’
I took notice of how Song Daesok would eye the kids as if he was studying them, but my playable character has improved his personality after a long time.
I can’t bear to reverse his progress so I just shut my mouth.
Also, knowing that Song Daesok behaved very much like a child at the beginning of the PMH game, I’m seriously rooting for him.
We then set up a board game that can be played by ten people.
As the kids began to fall asleep one by one, the remaining ones started another board game that can be enjoyed by a small number of people.
“Hahaha! It looks like the winner will come out in the next turn.”
“…”
Hwang Jiho and Hani were in a neck-and-neck race in a one-on-one psychological board game called “Ghost”.
Hani seemed to think about whether to move the blue piece forward or to disrupt Hwang Jiho’s formation and knock down his red piece.
Kim Yuri was still awake and watching the two happily.
Maeng Hyodon was watching too but he didn’t seem to understand what the game was about.
“I-isn’t she feeling cold…?”
Mok Wooram was fidgeting while looking at the sleeping Kwon Lena.
Mok Wooram seemed to be anxious even though he blocked the air conditioner from hitting Kwon Lena’s body.
He even covered her with two layers of blankets.
“I’ll get more blankets and snacks from the lobby.”
“AH, thank you!”
Either as vice-president or someone who’s actually much older than these kids, it’s only natural for me to take care of them.
When I went down to the lobby by elevator…
“Oh, you’re still awake.”
I ran into Yoo Sanghoon, who seemed to have come for the same items.
I was going to greet him and quickly get out of there, but Yoo Sanghoon spoke quickly.
“Let’s talk.”
