Minus
All preparations were complete.
Hyunmin climbed the construction ladder, perched himself on top, and swallowed hard.
When his eyes met Chaeyeon’s, she gave a single nod. He immediately dropped the sodium into the water bottle.
Then, faster than he had ever moved in his life, he hurled it through the window and scrambled down the ladder.
“Everyone, ruuuun!!!”
At Soeun’s shout, the whole group burst out through the gymnasium’s front doors.
Chaeyeon and Haejun led the way, Yujin and Sujin in the middle, Soeun and Hyunmin bringing up the rear. They had been outside for maybe five seconds when—
KWOOOOM—
A far heavier, deeper explosion than expected roared from behind them.
Krrrrrk—
Kkeogeogeogeogeogeok—
At the same instant, rough, guttural howls blanketed every direction.
Faces went pale under the murderous atmosphere; everyone pumped their legs harder. Chaeyeon silently counted the timing, then called out in a near-whisper.
“This way, all of you! We have to hide here for a second!”
They dove into the thick bushes of the flower bed and held their breath. Only a few seconds later, several zombies thundered past the bed from the side alley.
Even while gasping for air, Soeun whispered in awe at the razor-thin, perfect timing.
“How did you know? Did you actually hear their footsteps?”
“Just for a moment, I could tell them apart. That’s why I told everyone to hide.”
Chaeyeon said it like it was nothing. To Soeun it was anything but.
The rest of them had been pouring every scrap of focus into what their eyes could see. And in the middle of that chaos she had picked out footsteps from every other noise?
Whether Soeun was freshly impressed or not, Chaeyeon kept every sense locked on eyes and ears, scanning the surroundings, then soon motioned for them to get up.
“Every one of them nearby should’ve been drawn to the gym by now. Just like we memorized—behind the cafeteria—”
“Huh? Th-there…”
Sujin suddenly spotted something and pointed behind Chaeyeon. Yujin’s face hardened the moment she saw it too.
Chaeyeon slowly turned her head.
And locked eyes with it.
A figure standing motionless in the middle of the athletic field, staring straight at them.
The pure white pupils unique to zombies. Skin rotting and peeling in grotesque sheets. Worst of all, the head wasn’t merely bald—half the skull was already exposed, not a single hair left.
It stared unblinking at the group hidden in the flower-bed bushes, then twisted its cheekbones into a sickening grin.
Chaeyeon watched its arm rise, finger extending to point directly at them.
“KRAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
It screamed—loud enough to summon every zombie in the entire neighborhood.
“That’s it?! Yujin, that’s the one you were talking about!!!”
“Hah… hah… Y-yeah…! That’s the bastard!!!”
The carefully laid plan shattered into pieces.
The group that had intended to slip quietly along the flower bed was now being chased by some random freak, forced to abandon the path entirely and sprint full-speed in the opposite direction.
To make matters worse, the footsteps drawn by its roar were closing in fast. Neither Chaeyeon nor anyone else could think of a solution.
All they could do was run like hell.
“You perverted piece of shit! At least put some clothes on before you chase us! What the fuck even is that?!”
Soeun ground her teeth as she shouted. Chaeyeon agreed a hundred percent, but she had no breath left for a reply—she was too busy driving her blade into the eye of a zombie that had just lunged from the side.
Running behind her, Soeun desperately tried to scrub the image of that thing’s lower half from her mind.
How the hell could a creature whose skin looked like it had been slapped off a sunbathing Egyptian mummy keep something standing that straight?
“Fuck, fuck, fuck! If I get out of this alive, the first thing I’m doing is eye bleach!”
“Kang Soeun! Use that mouth to take one more step instead of running it!”
Chaeyeon tried to stab a second zombie that came at her, but her running posture gave her no angle. She bit her lip and pulled the blade back.
Forcing the attack would only leave her behind the group in an instant and make everything far worse. She had no choice.
Soeun saw it, understood immediately, and yelled.
“Just ignore them and run! We’re faster anyway!”
“It’s not that easy! And some of them are actually faster than—”
Chaeyeon cut herself off mid-sentence and threw herself sideways.
A zombie’s nails sliced through the air right where her waist had been.
“Did it scratch you?! Hey! Im Chaeyeon! Did it get you?!”
“I dodged clean—stop looking this way and just run!!!”
Chaeyeon accelerated until she matched Soeun’s stride, grabbed her arm, and urged her forward. Soeun started to snap back, then glanced behind them and went white.
“Guys!!!”
Sujin, gasping and barely keeping up at the rear, finally went down. Yujin, still holding her hand, froze and whispered in pure despair.
“No…!”
Both sisters’ feet stopped.
Sprawled on the asphalt, Sujin looked once at her scraped-up knees, then up at her sister.
“Unnie. Leave me. I think this is as far as I go.”
In that split second Soeun and Chaeyeon locked eyes, clenched their teeth, and spun back toward them.
“Hey! Kang Soeun! What the hell are you—”
Soeun completely ignored Haejun’s shocked shout, shoved the dazed Yujin aside, and hauled Sujin up.
Puhk—!
At the same moment a golden blade punched straight through the eye of a charging zombie.
“Stop spacing out and run! We’ll take care of your sister!”
“Y-yeah…”
Yujin missed the chance to answer and scrambled after the two high-school girls.
At first she had thought, with sinking dread, how long can she even last carrying her?
But Soeun kept running without the slightest sign of strain, and that dread flipped into stunned amazement.
…W-what? It wasn’t just the fencing unnie who was incredible?
Whether Yujin was reacting behind her or not, Soeun carried Sujin in a princess hold and whispered,
“Okay, think you can run now?”
“…Y-yes.”
Sujin stared at Soeun’s face with strangely hazy eyes, then quickly nodded, dropped down, and got her footing back.
“We’re almost there! Just cut toward that annex and it’s the cafeteria!”
Hyunmin’s shout put color back into every face.
Most of the zombies had been pulled toward the gym. If things went even a little right, they might actually live. And it was actually happening.
Haejun reached the cafeteria building first, forced his hammering heart and lungs to calm down, and looked toward the rear yard where the truck was parked.
His face went deathly pale.
Before Hyunmin could even ask what was wrong, Haejun whipped his head around and said one thing to the group catching up.
“…We’re completely fucked.”
Hyunmin followed his gaze and saw the swarm of zombies packed around the truck like they were guarding it. Words failed him.
Cornered with a two-meter wall at their backs and nowhere left to go, the group watched the pursuing zombies close in one after another, jaws gaping wide.
Chaeyeon stood at the front and cut down every one that lunged, but her stamina was clearly at its limit.
“Hah… hah…”
Blood ran down the blade and soaked into the cracked asphalt.
Chaeyeon wiped her sweat-soaked forehead with the back of her hand and staggered as she looked ahead.
She could still handle the ones that had chased them this far. But both she and the others already knew the truth.
It didn’t matter anymore.
All she was doing was buying a few extra seconds for lives that had already been driven into a dead end. Even so, Chaeyeon could not lower her sword.
…At the very least, I’m killing that pervert bastard with my own hands.
If she died without even getting revenge on the one who doomed them, she’d be too pissed off to adapt to zombie life properly.
“Keuk-keuk-keuk-keuk…”
As if mocking that resolve, a grotesque laugh drifted closer.
Shuffling, weak footsteps. The naked bald thing came into view. Everyone sucked in a sharp breath.
Only Chaeyeon exhaled the breath she had taken, long and deep, and raised the blade she had been holding low, leveling it at the grinning freak.
“Hey. Stop sending your buddies first and acting tough. Come at me yourself.”
You tiny-dicked bastard.
At those last words the twitching corner of its mouth froze, then slowly dropped.
Its pupils rolled around a full three-sixty while it seemed to think. Sujin, already terrified, pressed her back harder against the wall and trembled.
“Krrarak, krruk. Krrguk.”
About ten seconds later it stopped rolling its eyes, stared straight at Chaeyeon, and babbled something she of course couldn’t understand.
But the way that thing between its legs was twitching made the meaning pretty clear.
Roughly ‘I’m going to take you down and fuck you first,’ something like that. Whatever.
If a girl like Sujin had heard it she would’ve just fainted on the spot. Chaeyeon didn’t flinch. Instead she deliberately stuck out her tongue and slowly licked her lips.
“Go ahead and try.”
That unexpected reaction made the blank face split into a wide grin again. It cracked its neck threateningly and started walking toward her.
Tudduk, tuk—
The moment it stepped into her range, Chaeyeon drove the sword forward with everything she had.
Puhk—!
The tip that had been aimed dead-center at its pupil instead punched through its palm.
The blade stopped, buried in the middle of the torn, peeling skin of its hand. The face hidden behind that hand slid sideways until its eyes met Chaeyeon’s.
The look said, Now what? Chaeyeon answered by yanking the blade free in the blink of an eye.
If it blocks, I just stab again!
Freezing up over a variable this small would be even dumber.
The tip flew at its pupil a second time, just as fast, just as merciless—exactly the speed of someone who had zero hesitation left.
But even Chaeyeon, extraordinary in both body and mind, could only freeze at what came next.
“…What?”
The sword did pierce the pupil. Her full-power thrust wasn’t the kind of thing you could read just because you’d blocked it once.
What she never saw coming was the thing raising both arms and clamping both hands around the blade while its eye was still skewered.
It slowly pulled its head back. The eyeball, still stuck on the tip, came free of the socket trailing a bundle of nerves.
It watched the whole process like it was nothing, then let go with one hand, plucked the eyeball off the blade, and casually shoved it back into its own face. Then it grabbed the sword again.
If she had yanked free in that brief moment when one hand left the blade, she might still have had a chance. But even Chaeyeon short-circuited at the sight; rational judgment was impossible.
The match was decided.
She came back to herself too late and tried to pull the sword free, but the metal locked in those two hands refused to move. The thing savored the panic on her face, then suddenly cocked its head.
When its eyes met Soeun’s, the body that had been about to charge forward locked up solid. That was the end of any last resistance.
“Keuk! Keuk! Keuk! Keuk! Keuk!”
It laughed like it was choking on pure joy.
Chaeyeon glared at it in pure frustration, still unable to let go of the trapped sword, tried one more yank—then the thing simply tightened its grip and she had no choice but to release it with a startled “Ah—”
Whoosh—
Clang—!
The fencing foil clattered across the asphalt.
With that bright metallic ring, the laughter stopped.
The manic smile wiped clean off its face. It reached out, grabbed Chaeyeon’s clothes, and tore them straight open.
She staggered from the violence, then glared at it with pure murder and tried to back away. It opened its mouth wide and pointed inside, then swept a finger around at the surrounding zombies before looking at her again.
The gesture was simple and brutally clear: quietly get on your knees and get eaten by me… or get torn apart by the rest of them. Choose.
“….”
She had steeled herself more than once since the end of the world began.
But those had always been preparations for death. She had never once imagined being raped by a walking corpse.
For a moment the fear surged up—because in the end she was still just a girl—but Chaeyeon glanced back at the others behind her and finally, weakly, nodded.
Apparently pleased by how quickly she went quiet, the thing gave a disgusting smile and reached for her underwear.
“Hey.”
A sudden voice made it freeze.
It turned its head. Standing there was a man, and their eyes met.
“What the hell are you?”
Completely ordinary build. Completely ordinary face.
And yet… why did its body stop moving on its own?
The man’s gaze, resting on the fire axe so soaked in blood it had gone black and crusted, leaning against his shoulder, held something that matched the pure white of a zombie’s pupils—something that did not belong to a human.
“What kind of corpse tries to rape a girl?”
“Want me to cut that stick of yours off?”