The Suit That Waits and the Family That Slept

An anti-zombie defense suit... it wasn't exactly a groundbreaking reward, but it wasn't bad either. I'd been thinking for a while now that I needed proper protection for close-quarters combat with the zombies.

Still, what was I supposed to make of OKJ-0000?

I pulled out my phone, intending to search for whether the thing actually existed somewhere on Earth.

First, I logged out of every portal and search site I could find. It had only been two months since the zombie outbreak swept the globe. The odds of a dedicated anti-zombie suit having already hit the market as a purchasable prototype were slim.

It could well be a classified project number — something a superpower or a mega-corporation was developing behind closed doors. If that were the case, a careless search might come back ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to bite me, letting them trace the query straight to me later.

The internet provided by the Blessed Farmland was safe from hacking, IP tracing, and location tracking. As long as I stayed logged out, there was no risk of anyone discovering who I was.

"Nothing comes up."

I combed through several search engines, but 'OKJ-0000' simply didn't exist. So it was either a secret project, or just a name Casar Aurelion had made up on a whim.

Mooo-

The dairy cow lowed at me again, staring. It looked like she was asking for food.

What do I feed her?

She needed feed or hay, and naturally, I had neither. If I'd had grass seed, I could have planted it in the field and accelerated its growth — but I didn't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠have that either. The poor animal had likely gone days without food. She'd be absolutely starving.

Should I give her some watermelon?

I had no idea whether cows even ate watermelon. I'd never raised one before.

Then something in the sudden mission message struck me as odd.

It only said to bring them. Not to raise them.

Does that mean it'll take care of the raising itself?

Crunch, crunch-

I heard the cow chewing on something. I turned my head to look at her.

Whoa!

Hay was growing thick and lush across a full pyeong of the field. I hadn't planted a single seed, nor had I spent a single coin to boost the soil. The grass had simply appeared. And the surprises didn't stop there — no matter how much the cow grazed, the hay never diminished. It grew back at an astonishing rate, always maintaining the same amount. It was less a pasture than an inexhaustible feeding trough.

Mooo-

The cow wandered off somewhere. In one corner of the field stood a small stable.

When did that get there?

Inside it was a large water trough, filled to the brim with clear water. The cow lowered her head and began to drink — and the water level didn't drop an inch.

I was witnessing a miracle being performed by Casar Aurelion. The rewards I'd received so far had been surreal too, but this felt different from those. There was something... divine about it.

Either way, all I had to do was bring the livestock here.

Chuk-bok ate roasted boar and potatoes. The cow munched on hay. I had a bowl of steamed rice with grilled cherry salmon. I'd already gone through more than half of the rice I'd stockpiled.

Maybe I should plant rice seeds in the Blessed Farmland? I'd heard that in some countries, rice is grown in dry fields rather than flooded paddies. Planted in the Blessed Farmland, rice would surely flourish. The trouble was, even if I could thresh it, milling required a rice polisher. These days, apparently, some people owned compact home milling machines and polished their rice to whatever degree of whiteness they preferred.

Did Deoksu-ri Village have a rice polisher?

Farming rice didn't necessarily mean owning one — most people took their harvest to a commercial mill anyway. But since I'd be heading to the village to find livestock regardless, I might as well look. If there was a small 220V machine there, I could bring it back and run it off the farm shack's power supply.

"Let's go, Chuk-bok."

I was heading to the village right away. The reason I was rushing the livestock rescue wasn't to claim my reward sooner — the temperature kept dropping. Without human care, the animals wouldn't last long in this brutal cold.

There were two routes from here to the village. The national highway was crawling with zombies — far too dangerous. So I started climbing the hill instead, passing my grandmother's grave and continuing upward along the same mountain trail where the village chief and Jin-beom had once come to dig up arrowroot. And then I reached the village.

Grrrrr-

Chuk-bok growled. I climbed onto the roof of a nearby storage shed and scanned the surroundings. A handful of zombies lingered near the village community hall.

Chuk-bok used to tuck his tail and whine anxiously whenever he caught the scent of zombies. But after hunting them alongside me that morning, his reaction had flipped completely. He'd firmly grasped that if he spotted a zombie, I would take care of it.

I climbed down and ruffled the fur on his head.

"Good work, Chuk-bok."

Moving quietly, I made my way onto the roof of a house near the community hall. There, under the eaves of the annex across the way, sat a small rice polisher.

Jackpot!

First things first, though — the zombies had to go.

"Hey!"

I lured them in and drove arrows into their skulls, then climbed down and finished the job, shearing through their necks with the kukri. Chuk-bok gave his tail a few easy swishes. That meant no other zombies nearby.

I began the search for livestock.

Six chickens, three black goats, four domestic rabbits, two native black pigs, and five ducks — I captured them all and herded them back to the Blessed Farmland. They bolted in every direction, and catching them was a genuine struggle. Without my enhanced physical abilities, the mission would have been flat-out impossible.

Chuk-bok did his part too, driving the animals toward me — though whether he was truly trying to help or just wanted an excuse to romp around with them, I couldn't say. Either way, he helped.

With that, seven species of animals had gathered in the Blessed Farmland: dog, cow, chicken, goat, rabbit, pig, and duck. Twenty-two heads in total.

And yet —

Chuk-bok didn't count as livestock. To be fair, dogs were a legally ambiguous category. Under the Livestock Act, they counted as livestock, which made mass breeding and sale legal — but under the Livestock Products Management Act, they weren't livestock at all, which meant they couldn't be slaughtered for food. People called dogs "companion animals" while living inside this contradiction.

So where do I find the last species?

I lifted my head and gazed into the distance — and beheld an unbelievable sight.

You've got to be kidding me.

Far off in the distance stood a single donkey. It suddenly came back to me: there'd been a donkey experience park a dozen-odd kilometers away, a place where visitors could see and even ride them. The outbreak had most likely scattered the animals after their owner perished, and one of them had wandered here.

It was looking this way. I beckoned to it, and it hesitated. Donkeys were supposed to be remarkably clever. After a moment's deliberation, the animal started toward the Blessed Farmland — and finally stepped inside the barrier.

I glanced around. A hefty bag had materialized out of nowhere. That suit had to be inside it.

It even came with repairs. Casar Aurelion really was considerate. But still—

Why is this thing so heavy?!

The bag was insanely heavy. Even with my strength doubled, it felt substantial. Something was off. How was I supposed to hunt zombies wearing something this heavy?

My Amplification Coefficient was a measly 2.0. One of the conditions for completing the third mission was raising it to 5.0 — so reaching 10.0 was a distant prospect indeed. In game terms, a level-2 character had just been handed a level-10 item. Frustrating that I couldn't use it right away, but seen from another angle, that only meant it was that good.

That said, my earlier guess had been wrong. No nation or corporation would be building a suit an ordinary human couldn't even put on. Which meant this was dedicated armor Casar Aurelion had prepared for me and me alone.

I opened the bag. In stark contrast to its staggering weight, the suit was remarkably thin. The material had to be several times denser than tungsten or gold.

Does a substance like that even exist on Earth?

Whatever it was, the suit's coloring was strikingly cool — and it gave off a subtle, uncanny sheen, metallic and yet somehow not. A thought occurred to me out of nowhere: maybe Casar Aurelion possessed power bordering on omnipotence. If so, the deity could surely grant far more certain rewards.

My greatest concern right now was keeping the Blessed Farmland hidden from others — and, if it ever were discovered, making sure no one could take it from me. How wonderful would it be if the field had something like a magic barrier ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that kept unauthorized people out?

Even better if I could layer a stealth function on top, rendering it visible to my eyes alone. Or a perception filter that made everyone else incapable of even registering the field's existence — that would be absolute perfection. I'd be able to suck on the honeyed sweetness of the Blessed Farmland without a moment's worry about being discovered.

But Casar Aurelion hadn't given me a fish. He'd given me a fishing rod. Instead of casting an ultimate barrier to protect the field, he'd opened a path by which I could grow infinitely stronger myself. The message was clear: get stronger, and guard the Blessed Farmland with your own hands. And the price of that strength was hunting zombies.

Once again, everything came back to a single conclusion.

The zombie apocalypse and Casar Aurelion are definitely connected.

A new day dawned. Today I was heading somewhere different to hunt — the paddy field where I'd once stood watch by the steel cage. That place was an excellent hunting ground too. The zombie density was just right, and if anything went wrong mid-hunt, I could take refuge inside the cage.

I grabbed my weapons and stepped outside the Blessed Farmland, glancing back at the animals. They were all busy eating the feed Casar Aurelion had provided for them. With them around, the hundred-pyeong field felt cramped — but I'd be expanding it to a thousand pyeong soon enough, so it didn't matter. Besides, the Blessed Farmland absorbed their droppings instantly and even purified the stench, so there was no real inconvenience.

"Let's go, Chuk-bok."

With Chuk-bok at my side, I made for the paddy field. When we arrived, several zombies were clustered around the steel cage. Strange — I hadn't lit any fires, yet they were all gathered in one spot.

Not that I'm complaining.

I climbed a nearby utility pole and lured them in, dispatching them without much trouble. Then I approached the cage and peered inside — and I understood why the zombies had gathered here.

There were people inside the cage. Corpses, to be precise. Zombies pay no attention to the dead; the reason they still lingered nearby was that these people hadn't been dead for long.

Two adults, two children. A family of four, it appeared, who had died locked in each other's embrace. I didn't know where they'd come from, or why they'd ended up all the way out here — but one thing was certain: they'd fled from zombies and hidden inside the cage. And then, surrounded day after day, they must have endured within those steel bars until the cold and thirst ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠claimed them.

"May you rest in peace."

I was about to leave when I noticed a piece of paper clutched tightly in the woman's hand.

I shouldn't look.

I ignored it and walked away. But a few steps on—

Haaah—

I let out a long sigh and turned back to the cage. I drew the paper from the dead woman's fingers and unfolded it.

A fire blazed brightly near the steel cage. But this was not the same kind of fire I'd lit before. I was burning the family's bodies, honoring the woman's final wish. Completely cremating four corpses meant replenishing the firewood over and over — so there I was, standing a lonely vigil beside the cage.

The light of the flames drew the nearby zombies in.

Hsss-

Hsss- hsss-

From inside the cage, I drew my bow and drove arrows into their skulls, one after another.