Three Days Was Enough
Still, being metal, it held out for a few hits.
But there was only so long a doorknob built for nothing more than turning could stand up to the crushing weight of a sledgehammer.
Crack—
It finally shattered completely, tore free of the front door, and clattered onto the hallway floor.
"Heh heh heh heh heh heh."
All three men standing in the corridor abandoned any pretense of composure, grinning so wide their mouths looked ready to split.
After years locked behind bars with nothing but their own hands for company, civilization had collapsed, they'd been set free, and at last they could savor the fruit of it. Who could blame them for laughing?
And the targets were schoolgirls in uniforms straight out of every fantasy they'd ever had. Brains fried on overflowing lust, drool running down their chins — it wasn't hard to understand.
Not that it made the sight any less disgusting.
"Hey, you dumbass. Wipe your damn mouth."
"Ah, fuck. What now?"
The man with the sledgehammer in one hand and the other groping his crotch twisted his face into a scowl and glared.
The other man looked back at him with equal contempt.
"You ever think about how much of a pain in the ass you're gonna be later if you keep acting that disgusting?"
"Later? The fuck is later?"
"You absolute brain-dead piece of shit. What, you gonna hit that top-shelf stuff once and throw it away? You keep them. Make a proper little whorehouse out of them."
Faced with that calm, logical plan, the fuming man had no choice but to shut his mouth.
Yeah — the bastard talked too much shit, but his head worked, no question.
"Everybody keep your faces under control and handle them gentle. I don't want any ear-biting or them bolting every five minutes down the line."
With that, the man slicked back his hair — matted with every kind of fluid — into a gutter-grade comma style, then leaned in toward the door again, listening.
He wanted to eavesdrop — no, gauge — whatever thrashing the girls inside were doing.
Instead, a clear voice cut through, carrying a tone none of them had expected.
"Excuse me. Mister. Just so you know, we can hear all of that. And honestly, don't you think any chance of earning goodwill went out the window the second you started smashing the doorknob?"
"...Cute. Putting on the whole calm act and everything. But that mouth of yours isn't cute at all."
A woman ought to be obedient. A high school girl, even more so.
When the reaction wasn't anything like what he'd hoped for, the man's cheek twitched. He shot a look at the guy beside him and spoke again.
"Don't despair too hard, though. World's like this now. Better to put out for us and stay alive than let those corpses tear your little holes open, right?"
If you think about it, you should be thanking us. Don't you agree?
The crude, nauseating filth of it was too much for Sujin — she gagged out loud — and the other girls' faces twisted as well. All except one.
Chaeyeon let out a quiet snort of laughter no one else could hear. Completely unfazed by the murderous atmosphere, she stepped right up to the front door.
Then, with barely a handspan and a door about to give way between them, she spoke to the man in a near-whisper.
"Mister. You guys are the ones who should be grateful. Want to know why?"
"…"
"If the oppa who owns this place hadn't just left, you wouldn't even have had time to open your mouths."
The man thought of the person one of his buddies had glimpsed earlier.
"...What kind of bullshit bluff is that, you little whore?"
He finally couldn't hold it in. Muttering that, he stepped aside from the door, and the sledgehammer lined up on the electronic lock.
Whooosh—
KRAAAANG!
A full swing obliterated the lock, battery and all.
The impact was so brutal the metal door buckled inward. Eyes bloodshot with lust, the man wound up and swung again.
Like the doorknob before it, the lock dropped to the floor. Through the hole it left, the three men could see a woman's pale, slender neck and long hair swaying beyond.
Gulp—
Unable to hold back any longer, the sledgehammer man lunged forward, shoving a thick arm through the gap to seize that tempting throat.
What came out of his own throat instead was a sudden scream of pure horror.
"Uh? Gyaaaaaaah!!!"
The hand he yanked back was soaked in blood.
Something sharp had bitten deep into his wrist — half-severed, spraying blood like a fountain. This was no minor wound.
"Y-you fucking bitchhh!!!"
Lust flipped to rage so fast his brain shorted out. He flung the sledgehammer aside, charged the door, and slammed into it with his whole body.
With the knob and lock destroyed, the door hung on nothing but the hinge screws, rattling violently under his bulk.
"C-calm down! Calm the fuck down! You don't need to do that — just clear these out and—"
The other man barely managed to restrain him, then pulled a box cutter and sliced away the remaining brackets still holding the lock and knob plates.
KRAAAANG—!
A full-power front kick blasted the door open. Teeth grinding, the man stormed inside without a second's hesitation.
"You fucking mutt of a bitch — three days on nothing but water and I'll turn you into a pure anal—"
Shunk—
"Save that stuff for each other. You pervert."
Soeun had been hiding by the dresser. The instant the man's attention locked on Chaeyeon, she drove a kitchen knife deep into his side.
The blade went in without a shred of hesitation, ripping straight through the organs beneath his ribs.
The stunned man sucked in a sharp breath, sensed the danger, and tried to lurch backward — but Chaeyeon's follow-up gave him no chance.
Thwuck—
A long, slender blade shot straight for the man's wavering pupils — eyes already a chaotic mix of pain, shock, panic, and fury.
It punched through the pupil like tofu, severed the optic nerve, and drove clean through into the brain beyond.
When Chaeyeon pulled the blade free, the eye came with it, nerve and all. The sight was so gore-soaked that Soeun beside her — and the men watching from beyond the doorway — went rigid without meaning to.
Chaeyeon herself didn't so much as flinch. She simply stepped aside as the man's corpse crumpled.
Then she wiped the blood spattered across her face with the back of her hand, looked at the two remaining uninvited guests, and spoke.
"Anal isn't bad, I guess. But this is more my style. If you gentlemen want to join the fun, come on in."
She gave her lips a slow, deliberate lick afterward — so sadistic that Soeun's face twisted into something strange before she could stop it.
...Was that actually my type?
She almost believed it.
Naturally, the two men left standing had no intention of stepping through that doorway.
When they'd first stormed the villa, every nerve had been fixed on whatever other men might still be inside.
To find out the girls they'd written off as the prize were actually the bosses — that was enough to leave anyone reeling.
Two high school girls, soaked in blood and exhaustion, staring them down with a pair of blades. On one hand, the sight was so hot it made them want to jump them right there. On the other, give in to instinct and they'd end up exactly like the corpse on the floor.
...These fucking high schoolers. What the hell...
The man genuinely couldn't believe it. They'd been eating knife-meals since before prison. They knew exactly how soft the little blood bags huddled in that apartment ought to be.
Even the tough-guy prospects who swaggered around school and then drifted into their world — a few kicks and a couple of shallow cuts and they shook like leaves. That was normal.
"What the fuck is wrong with these crazy bitches??"
One of them had been hiding by the shoe rack, and the way she stabbed looked practiced. The other had clearly handled that damned fencing foil more than once or twice.
They could handle a box cutter and throw a punch, sure — but reach was not something you overcame easily.
Every fiber of him wanted to rush in, pin them down, and teach them every lesson in the book. One wrong move, though, and it was eyes and brain getting skewered. Hard pass.
"Ptui. Unless you want that psycho to put a hole in you and reverse the whole arrangement, how about you get lost?"
Soeun spat once, trying to settle her stomach against the vivid, living stench of blood rising from below — nothing like a zombie's — and forced herself to sound casual as she threw the line at him.
Im Chaeyeon. That crazy girl. Even so, without a single moment of hesitation...
Inside, she was shaken. Watching her friend commit a murder that brutal and then stand there like nothing had happened left her reeling.
Chaeyeon, for her part, paid Soeun no mind. She simply stood there, staring at the blade as red blood dripped steadily from its edge.
The man rolled his eyes, held the standoff a moment longer, then studied her carefully and spoke.
"How's it feel? First time killing a person."
"Not much different from a zombie."
"...What?"
He'd been hoping to rattle her, flip the situation. That answer was nowhere on the list of things he'd expected.
Chaeyeon met his eyes and smiled brightly. Blood painted across a pale cheek, pink lips a little torn from the ordeal — the smile looked almost like a painting.
"Men who break in to rape helpless girls. Corpse-monsters that eat people. No difference."
It didn't bother her.
Killing one human like this? Nothing.
She gave the fallen corpse a couple of casual taps with her bare foot, then raised her blade again and leveled the tip at the man.
"So. Are you leaving, or staying?"
She'd done it once. Twice, three times — no reason she couldn't do it again.
He locked eyes briefly with his buddy, who kept glancing sideways for cues. In the end, he had no choice but to swallow the humiliation.
...Fuck. Of all the things — backing down because of some girls.
If it'd been just one of them, maybe he could've forced it. But the entryway was too narrow. Pushing through both of them was impossible.
Grinding his teeth over and over inside, the man swore he would pay this insult back in full.
They headed back down the stairs they'd climbed, passing one smashed-in front door after another.
After taking out their frustration on a trembling hikikomori who had no idea what to do in his living room, they made their way toward the van parked across the entrance —
"...The hell are you?"
A man was sitting in the driver's seat of that van, waiting for them.
"Was it you bastards? The ones who parked this piece of shit like this?"
Meeting those eyes — overflowing with irritation — the man found himself swallowing the stream of curses he'd been about to spit.
Because right beside his van, a row of corpses with their heads caved in lay sprawled across the ground. And no matter how he looked at them, those weren't their handiwork.