The Baseline
One thing I'd noticed watching those beast zombies was that just because they were dead didn't mean they'd abandoned their instincts.
Most of them still carried enough judgment to know not to pick a fight with the wrong opponent — the kind of sense that said if they screwed up, they might die a second time.
Flutter—
Cawww—!
Of course, there were exceptions.
I kept trying to make eye contact with a particularly appetizing pheasant zombie, baiting it, when it wasn't the pheasant that came at me but a flock of other birds. I blocked them with one hand.
I grabbed the first magpie by the neck, shook it hard to scatter the others, then flung it to the ground and dusted the filthy feathers off my hand.
I need a ranged weapon.
I had a crossbow and arrows stashed away, but those felt more like the others' trump cards. Didn't feel right using them for something like this.
I briefly considered just biting the bullet and buying a slingshot from the crow, then clicked my tongue and dropped the idea.
"Uuurrgghh..."
Grab—
"Urgh?"
"Isn't there a premium-grade Hanwoo cow wandering around somewhere?"
I grabbed the face of a male corpse shambling toward me and tore it right off as I muttered.
"Ghk, ghk-ghk-ghk."
The corpse, its neck forcibly ripped free by irresistible force, let out something close to a scream through its misaligned vocal cords.
I brought back about two heads for starters. Even so, more than a week into the apocalypse, everything was well past its expiration date, so the hair came out in clumps and I couldn't carry many.
"Grrrrrr..."
When I started juggling them in front of the dog, it definitely seemed interested.
Its wariness of me was so strong it just kept growling, but its eyes were locked on the heads — that much was obvious at a glance.
"If you want to eat, try standing up."
As if telling me to go fuck myself, it stayed sprawled out, irritably scratching its ear with a hind leg, then bared its teeth.
I should establish the hierarchy first.
I rolled my eyes and glanced up at the second floor of the main building — Na Sehee was nowhere in sight. I'd heard she seemed pretty interested in the library. Maybe Yejin had taken her there.
In other words, this was the moment.
Holding a head in one hand, I slowly edged closer.
It bared its teeth even more clearly, on guard. But it couldn't refuse food.
It looked ready to chomp the head right out of my hand, so I gave it a little push toward its mouth.
It opened wide on cue, ready to bite my hand — hell, my whole forearm — so I yanked my hand back and slapped the arrogant bastard across the face.
Crack—
...Whuff?
It stared at me, completely dumbfounded, looking for all the world like it was saying, Did you just hit me? So I reminded it of its place.
"Wait."
At that word, its eyes flipped even further and it lunged for my head, so I grabbed its jaw, pressed down with everything I had, and said it again.
"I said if you want to eat, you wait."
Fuck off!
It shook its face free of my grip and shoved its maw at my face again, so I drove my elbow into its jaw without mercy.
Thwack—
But that wasn't nearly enough. It snorted like it was just tickled, ground its teeth, and lunged again. I had to smack it back several more times to hold it off.
"Wait. Wait. Hey — wait!"
Wait, my ass! Would you wait if you were me?!
That was what its gleaming eyes seemed to scream as it charged desperately. I grabbed its collar and started grinding my foot into the underside of its jaw — when suddenly I heard someone nearby.
"...Oppa. What are you doing?"
Yejin was standing there with Yu Jeong-a, looking utterly baffled.
I was about to freeze when the dog kept trying to bite me without a care in the world, so I locked both arms around its neck in a chokehold and answered.
Ghk... ghk. Ghk.
"Obviously playing with it. Big dogs like this need a lot of exercise, you know."
"R-right, of course."
"Yeah, yeah."
"...Jeong-a has something she wants to tell you, Oppa."
I looked at Yu Jeong-a while wrestling the thrashing dog, and she was so flustered she couldn't even greet me.
"Wh-where on earth did you get a dog like that? The size of it..."
"It died once and came back. I don't know the details either."
"...A z-zombie dog?!"
"One look at its eyes and you can tell."
The moment she locked eyes with it at my words, Jeong-a flinched and had no choice but to step back.
Those corpse-white pupils, gleaming with a beast's madness — even someone as composed as her found them hard to face.
It stood taller than the average adult man's waist, and its snarling teeth, slick with black drool, made it look like a full-blown monster.
And here I was, casually restraining this creature that straddled the line between dog and monster — Jeong-a had no idea how to react.
She finally managed to open and close her mouth a few times, swallow, and get to the point.
"I might be able to repay the debt I owe you sooner than expected, Sijun."
"...Did you figure out another way to use the Cube?"
"No. If anything, it's more of an application. Let me show you."
She immediately pulled it from an inside coat pocket. That blue light always looked unnecessarily flashy.
She closed her eyes, gripped the Cube in both hands, seemed to focus on something, then walked over to a flower bed and picked up a tree branch.
"...Oh."
Right in front of Yejin and me, it began to change little by little.
A blunt, cylindrical branch — and yet it was transforming into the shape of a blade.
It seemed to take more concentration than expected. Jeong-a wiped cold sweat from her brow despite the weather, opened her eyes again, and said:
"Any close-range weapon in the shape you want. As long as I have the materials, I can make it. I'll make them for you."
I let out a short laugh and took the branch she handed me, turning it over in my hands. (While still holding the dog, of course.)
"I never even thought of using it this way. That's incredible."
I'd honestly just thought of her as a firepower mage out of a fantasy novel.
But this was basically Fullmetal Alchemist.
That changed everything.
Jeong-a seemed relieved by my expression. She exhaled, her tension easing — then nearly dropped the Cube when the dog suddenly barked and thrashed.
"Let's check it properly after lunch. Rest easy until then."
"...Yes. Thank you."
"No. At this point, I should be the one thanking you."
Looking down at the branch, I couldn't help a crooked grin.
Playing Guan Yu might actually be possible for real.
After wolfing down lunch, I was about to drag Jeong-a to the gym when Na Sehee grabbed me.
Then, with a single sentence — I'm hungry — she tried to plant a surprise kiss on me right in front of everyone. Chaeyeon managed to stop it by shouting at the top of her lungs.
"Hey! Cut it out! You're going to do that right in front of us?!"
"Kya-u?"
Is there a problem?
When Chaeyeon's killing intent started reaching past Sehee and toward me, I finally sighed, let go of Jeong-a's arm, and dragged Sehee off to a corner.
Meanwhile Yejin, looking put out, gave a rough explanation to the bewildered Jeong-a.
Watching Jeong-a's eyes go wide as she stared our way, and the middle schoolers watching with bright red cheeks and keen interest, I suddenly wanted nothing to do with any of this.
"We'll do it later. In your room."
Hungry. Now.
You promised.
"...Tell me one thing you want later."
Then that's fine.
As if nothing had happened, her dull eyes sparkled into a smile and she peeled away from me. I shook my head and turned to Jeong-a.
"Let's go. Gym. Right now."
"...You're not going to?"
Going to do what. I looked at Jeong-a with a sour face, and she seemed to snap back to her senses, bowing her head in apology.
"No. You've got nothing to apologize for. Just... ugh. Never mind. Let's go."
I ignored the girls, whose mood had turned distinctly weird, waved off the guys who were staring with pure envy, and the two of us left the main building.
A short while later we awkwardly opened the door to the gym in silence, and a wave of cold air greeted us.
Jeong-a, who'd been dragged along without even an outer layer, flinched and hugged herself. I took off my jacket, draped it over her shoulders, and headed straight for the weight bar display.
"Th-thank you."
And finally I pulled out a twenty-kilo weight bar and showed it to her.
"This is the only thing I want. Turn this crude bludgeon into a bladed weapon."
"Ah..."
I added, as she stared at it blankly:
"If the material isn't enough, I was thinking of adding extra metal. Would that work?"
"...Yes. I think so. If that's what you want, Sijun."
Once it was finished, unlimited training until I could swing it freely.
Time to graduate from the light bar.
I smiled contentedly and gripped the handle with all my strength.