Chapter 45: Live Your Life
Same time, on the rooftop.
Anna approached Beom-sik, who was sitting on the air vent.
She sat down a short distance away.
“What’re you thinking about, all by yourself?”
Beom-sik turned his head silently and looked at her.
His face was handsome to begin with, but under the faint light of the dark night, it seemed even more so.
“Nothing.”
“Yeah, figured.”
There was no emotion in his tone.
No worry, no fear—he hadn’t even let out a single sigh in all this time.
But then he’d explode out of nowhere and turn into a completely different person.
To Anna, it just seemed strange.
“I’m kinda worried, though.”
Beom-sik looked at her instead of replying.
“I just ran away while watching my dad die. And I thought to myself, I won’t die until I wipe every last one of these bastards out. But if we get rescued here, I won’t be able to kill any more zombies.”
“The time’ll come eventually. Gotta be able to stretch out and sleep easy.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. What I’m scared of is... by then, what if living starts to feel pretty okay? Right now, I’m barely keeping myself alive just so I can die. But what if I stop wanting to die? That’s what worries me.”
Beom-sik stared straight through her, then cocked his head.
“Sounds like you’re already there. Not just worrying about it—you’ve already gotten that way. Haven’t you?”
“I feel so sorry to Dad.”
Tears she’d been holding back rolled down her cheek.
Beom-sik thought to himself.
He and Anna weren’t particularly close, and they’d never really had the chance to get that way.
But for her to open up like this and cry meant she had nowhere else to turn.
In times like these, you just listened.
“Even up until the morning we came to the hospital, I was nothing but pissy. We were going because I was hurt, I was sick. Getting treated and competing would’ve been good for me too, but I snapped at Dad like that. If I’d known it was the last time, I would’ve hugged him just once more.”
Father.
Beom-sik recalled his own father.
A truly vicious man.
But that didn’t mean he hadn’t loved him.
There had just never been a moment to even consider those kinds of feelings.
Even if people called Beom-sik ruthless, it didn’t extend to his family.
He’d killed his father with his own hands, but that had been to protect his sibling.
And there’d been no intent to kill.
Thinking about family was the hardest thing for Beom-sik.
Mother, siblings—they were all victims.
If he’d just grown up a little faster, he could’ve stopped it all.
What if he’d smashed his father’s head in when he was even younger?
No, the rest of the family would’ve been miserable their whole lives anyway.
There’d been no other way to stop his father.
Not even if he turned back time.
Even calling the cops—things got worse after they left.
In the end, nothing changed.
No matter who you blamed, it was the same.
“It’s the same. Even if you’d hugged him once more, the end result wouldn’t change. If things went well, you’d regret it more for going well. If they went badly, more regret for going badly. That’s how all the irreversible shit is.”
Anna wiped her tears and looked at Beom-sik.
“How do you know that?”
“I’ve been through it.”
Beom-sik remembered the day his mother died, clear as day.
He’d been young, but he remembered it perfectly.
That day, breakfast had tasted strangely off.
He’d been irritated beyond reason.
Even his mother stroking his cheek to soothe him had annoyed him.
So he’d left half his meal, slung on his backpack, and stormed out.
Her voice calling from behind, asking what was wrong.
He’d never answered.
That was the last image of his mother.
Beom-sik hadn’t cried once since then.
Not even when he learned she was dead.
Crying or grieving changed nothing.
She wouldn’t come back to life, and his voice wouldn’t reach her.
That was how Beom-sik lost the ability to express his grief.
No one had taught him how, and no one had given him the space for it.
His father had always blocked him from facing reality.
With violence. With verbal abuse.
So he’d never had the time to confront it.
Now it was too late—no courage, no will to even think about it.
He just remembered that it had happened, nothing more.
All that was left was the reality that he, born of family, had been broken by family.
“Your sadness won’t bring your father back. Same if you die—it won’t bring him back. Even if you beat every zombie to death, same thing.”
“Then what, just sit around doing nothing?”
“No. Live hard. Live your life. No one knows when they’ll die, but bust your ass for the time you’ve got. I’m a gangster piece of shit, but I lived hard while I was alive, and I fought like hell not to die. That’s all that sticks around. Not the crying or the death wishes.”
Anna let out a wry chuckle.
Right. This guy was a gangster.
She’d forgotten.
Here she was, in the prime of life, taking life advice from a thug.
But not a single word was wrong.
Live hard. Your life.
Suddenly, she remembered Beom-sik at the restaurant.
And the face he’d made dragging that bald prick who’d kicked her ankle at the yacht club.
That was Beom-sik.
A man with a rock-solid philosophy on life, who lived it to the absolute fullest.
He’d fought not to die, and he’d lived hard. Literally.
Whether it was morally right or wrong didn’t matter.
He wasn’t the type to view life through that lens.
He just gave his all to whatever situation he was in.
Anna thought about it.
What kind of life she should live.
Not the one someone else wanted. Not one that looked good to others. One she truly wanted.
She didn’t know exactly yet, but at least it wasn’t I have to die.
That wasn’t living.
Living just to die wasn’t living at all.
So she had to live first.
She had to keep struggling to survive.
Once the struggling ended, she’d have to keep flapping her wings toward somewhere.
And if she died then, like Beom-sik said, a shell would remain.
The shell of having struggled and flapped her wings.
Yeah. Survive first.
Think after.
Whether to wipe out all the zombies or follow her dad.
Survive first, then decide.
Not live to die, but survive so she could think and agonize while alive.
“Got it. I’ll try thinking that way.”
Beom-sik nodded, a faint smile on his lips.
Screeech!
That was when it happened.
The rooftop door swung open, and Jaejeong came up with the rest of the group.
Quite some time had passed, and with no telling when the helicopter might show, they’d hurried.
“Get some rest?”
Jaejeong asked as he approached.
Beom-sik nodded, while Anna smiled to hide her reddened eyes.
Choi PD walked to the edge of the rooftop and peered down at the ground.
“Looks like there might be more survivors around here.”
“Why’s that?”
Minyoung asked, her face curious.
“There were fireworks earlier. Thanks to that, the number of those things in the hallway got cut in half. There were more at first, but the second the fireworks went off, they all hurled themselves out the windows. I thought at first, Why set off fireworks? But after thinking about it, I figured it was to lure them out. Pretty smart, right? Did you hear it? You guys showed up right after.”
“Ah...”
Minyoung gave an awkward smile.
“Actually... that was us.”
“You? For real?”
Choi PD’s eyes went wide.
“Yeah. Anna over there with the bow—she shot a fireworks arrow. We came all the way here through the sewers from the pier.”
Minyoung gave a brief rundown of what had happened, and Choi PD’s jaw dropped in astonishment as she listened.
She realized the people who’d saved her weren’t ordinary at all.
A cop who could pop open a near-150kg manhole cover with one hand, an archer who shot fireworks arrows, an old man swinging a machete like it was nothing, a gangster afraid of nothing, a BJ who knew the terrain inside out, and even a doctor.
Hard to imagine them banding together like this.
DPS, support, healer, tank.
No, no.
Choi PD shook her head.
Old habits—thinking in game terms.
Still, it was a fantasy lineup.
And they could even call in a rescue team.
She didn’t know how long they’d stick together, but she had to prove her own worth.
But how?
In the old world, being a PD got you applause from everyone. Not anymore.
In this world, it was a useless skill.
No one was watching broadcasts.
Speaking of which, when was that helicopter coming?
“How long till it gets here?”
“Who knows. Dad might.”
Minyoung glanced at Youngman.
“Soon. If it’s coming from the West Sea, won’t take long.”
“The noise’ll draw a ton of them, though.”
“No need to fret. We’re leaving from the roof anyway. No matter how they thrash, they can’t climb ten stories.”
“Not sure if this is rude to say, but your speech is really unique. You seem younger than my grandpa, but you talk like someone from even further back.”
“No offense taken. See... I was raised under my grandfather’s hand, and I spent more time overseas than not, so it came naturally, I suppose. Even my wife thought it odd at first. Saw me as a bit slow-witted.”
“Mom did?”
Minyoung asked, surprised.
“Aye. But the mother you knew was the aged version. Your father still sees her as she was in her twenties—clear as day. Big eyes like yours now, asking all sorts of questions.”
“Mom never told me any old stories.”
“She was just like you, lass. Expressions, speech, mannerisms—all of it. You’re the spitting image of your mother. That’s probably why she had no tales to tell.”
The two were deep in conversation when Jaejeong, gazing at the distant sky, tapped Beom-sik on the shoulder.
Beom-sik, who’d been looking out, followed his gaze.
And...
Whump-whump-whump-whump-whump!
The faint thrum of rotor blades grew louder, closer.
The group looked up with excitement.
A Black Hawk.
Beom-sik and Hyun-soo recognized it from movies.
For Jaejeong and Youngman, it had been ages since they’d last seen a transport chopper like this.
As it descended, the lights pouring from countless buildings illuminated its fuselage in stark relief.
The Black Hawk weaved freely through the urban canyon, heading straight for the broadcasting station.
But Jaejeong’s expression twisted oddly as he watched.
“L-look at that!”
Choi PD pointed frantically somewhere, and everyone’s eyes followed.
The infected in the surrounding buildings had heard the roar and were swarming to the windows.
It was an astonishing sight.
Most of the buildings were clad in floor-to-ceiling glass, exposing the horde’s forms in lurid detail.
Like prisoners in the jails of hell, stretching out for salvation.
The problem was that it was happening in nearly every building.
At least five high floors per structure.
At altitudes matching the helicopter’s.
Uh... that looks dangerous.
The zombies were crowding the glass in overwhelming numbers.
If they kept shoving like that, no curtain wall would hold.
And sure enough, Jaejeong’s fears became reality moments later.
Crack! Craaaack!
Cracks spiderwebbed across the thick glass.
The powder from the fissures whipped away in the prop wash, vanishing into the wind.
“Wha—whoa? It’s breaking!”
No sooner had Choi PD spoken than the horror unfolded.
Bang!
With the sound, the glass in nearly every building surrounding the helicopter shattered to pieces.
Infected People