Finding a Means of Transportation 2
We had obtained the Shelter—an absolute sanctuary more secure than anywhere else. Yet every human we had met on the road to get here had been a complete bastard. Unconsciously, we had come to regard every survivor outside the Shelter as a potential enemy.
But Kang Po-gyeong’s story revealed another side of the outside world.
“Of course there are plenty of those cannibal bastards who raised us like livestock, and trash like Park Seok-su who live by plunder and rape. But they are not the only ones out there.”
She took a sip of coffee and continued.
“They are relatively few in number, yet there are groups that, as the world collapsed, banded together even more tightly than before and created their own rules and order simply to survive.
There are also cases where even moderately trashy people cooperate to stay alive and gradually form larger forces. In fact, Park Seok-su’s group is one of those moderately trashy collectives that grew by absorbing the smaller groups around them, using the weapons I handed over as their foundation.”
“So how do they survive? Do they trade or something?”
Yeong-ju asked.
“Yes, that is correct. Usually they maintain symbiotic relationships by exchanging unique skills or resources that only they possess with other groups. For example, a technician who can repair vehicles sells that skill for weapons or food, and a group that has secured a large stock of medicine may receive protection from other groups in exchange for sharing it.”
Then Nam Po-gyeong looked down at her newly created right hand and gave a bitter smile.
“…Or they simply attack with force and plunder.”
The law of the outside world…
Two months ago
Remaining 50th Division — Second Supply Depot
Lieutenant Colonel Seo Guk, officer in charge of the supply depot, clutched his throbbing head and pushed himself up from the cot. The culprit was the few miraculously intact bottles of soju he had discovered the night before behind the broken refrigerator of a convenience store he had stumbled across while on patrol.
Unable to resist the long-denied temptation of alcohol, he had downed two bottles alone and fallen straight to sleep.
“Colonel! Wake up! Enemy attack! Enemy attack!”
The urgent shout of a soldier bursting through the barracks door instantly burned away his drunken haze. He threw on his combat uniform and dashed outside.
Ratatatat! Ping! Ping!
Dozens of bullets poured down like rain from far beyond the defense line.
“Where the hell did those crazy bastards get so many guns and so much ammunition?!”
Lieutenant Colonel Seo Guk cried out in shock as he ran toward the line. At that exact moment a thunderous KWAANG erupted and the barbed wire on the most vulnerable right flank collapsed under the weight of a one-ton truck. From the truck bed, plunderers armed with clubs and knives leapt down, roaring like beasts.
“Third Platoon! Fourth Platoon! To the right! Stop those bastards by any means necessary!”
Seo Guk sprinted toward the breached line with the soldiers around him, desperately trying to command the battle.
And at the very heart of that chaos, a woman was leisurely stepping over the collapsed wire mesh and walking straight toward the warehouse.
She was tall for a woman, a blood-stained machete in one hand and a pistol in the other. It was Sim Geum-a, leader of the largest and most aggressive of the four plunderer groups.
“Stupid bastards. You really thought we’d charge you head-on, didn’t you?”
She sneered and gave her orders.
“We’re taking the warehouse! Kill anyone who resists and tie the rest up! Set up a defense line so those military bastards can’t get any closer, pour oil around the perimeter, and start the fires first!”
At her command the plunderers moved with perfect coordination and began seizing the interior of the warehouse.
“Boss, it’s too loud. At this rate the zombies will come swarming.”
A female subordinate beside her said worriedly. Sim Geum-a only laughed.
“Isn’t that even better?”
She jerked her chin toward the other plunderer groups locked in a fierce firefight with the soldiers.
“We just pretend to take an active part in the fight. While those idiots and the military bastards keep each other busy, we quietly siphon off the food. Got it?”
With that she walked toward the most vulnerable rear wall of the warehouse. Several of her men were already smashing it open with a massive hammer. She watched them with a thoroughly satisfied smile.
Exactly as she had expected, the gunfire and explosions drew every zombie in the surrounding area.
In an instant the battlefield became a three-way free-for-all of pure hell. The soldiers now had to fight both zombies and plunderers at once, while the other plunderer groups were swept under the very wave of death they themselves had summoned, screaming as they fell.
“Left! The left defense line is collapsing! Second Platoon, support now!”
Lieutenant Colonel Seo Guk’s voice cracked and tore, nearly drowned by the endless gunfire and screams. The scene before his eyes was a hell more terrible than any training he had ever endured in his entire military career.
In front, plunderers fired with desperate fury. On the flanks, other plunderers tried to scale the walls and pour inside. And worst of all—
Grrraaaahhh—!
Endless hordes of zombies poured in from every direction. The gunfire had been the perfect invitation.
“Damn it…! Damn it!”
He emptied his K-1 rifle, spraying bullets indiscriminately at the charging zombies and plunderers.
“You want us all to die together, you sons of bitches?!”
His desperate shout carried across the chaos and reached the plunderers on the far side—where Park Seok-su stood.
“Fuck! Push! Just push through, you bastards!”
Park Seok-su sprayed his K-2 rifle while roaring at his men. Before his eyes the soldiers blocking the way and the zombies charging those same soldiers were tangled together in utter pandemonium.
“Boss! There are too many zombies! At this rate we’re in danger too!”
“Shut up! The moment we open that warehouse door, food for a lifetime pours out! Those military bastards are almost finished! If we give up now, we’re all dead!”
Only greed and the pure madness of survival burned in his eyes. He was ready to shoot without mercy anything that stood in his way—soldier, zombie, or even his own subordinate.
But the tide was turning against him. Exposed in relatively open ground with little cover, the plunderers became easy prey for the zombie hordes flooding in from every side. Horrible screams of his men erupted all around.
“Boss! The Seogu guys are running!”
“The Keungogae Station guys are pulling out too! We’re the only ones left!”
The alliance crumbled as futilely as a sandcastle. When every other plunderer group abandoned the fight and fled, Park Seok-su finally understood he could hold no longer.
“Fuck…! Retreat! We’re retreating for now! Scatter and regroup at the hideout!”
He kept firing until the last possible second, then threw himself into the darkness simply to live. In that hell he had only one thought left: he had to survive.
That day’s battle ended with no victor.
The soldiers suffered catastrophic losses and barely held the defense line, yet more than half the supply depot was burned or looted. The other plunderer groups, far from obtaining food, lost most of their strength and fled in every direction.
Only Sim Geum-a’s group—having siphoned off the greatest quantity of food while suffering the least damage amid the chaos—emerged as the sole, unknown victor.
From that day forward, only unbreakable distrust and hostility remained thick among the survivor groups of Daegu. And they all understood the new truth: there could never again be such a thing as an alliance. From now on it was either trade… or plunder.
She paused to catch her breath, then calmly continued with the aftermath of that three-way battle from two months earlier.
“I was still receiving treatment for my arm at the time, so I did not see it myself. I heard every detail of that day from the subordinates who returned to Park Seok-su’s hideout after the fighting ended.”
Nam Po-gyeong’s voice trembled as she spoke.
“When I learned that the weapons I had handed over simply to stay alive had been turned against the 50th Division—where I myself had once served, even if only residual forces remained—I was utterly stunned.”
Believing it was her own fault, Nam Po-gyeong covered her face with her left hand.
“After that incident the power balance in Daegu completely changed. The other plunderer groups that had suffered massive losses began to be absorbed or eliminated by the group led by the woman named Sim Geum-a. Because she was the sole victor who, though it was never certain, had secured the greatest benefit from that chaos.”
She lowered her hand again and looked at us as she continued.
“Some of the weapons I handed over have almost certainly fallen into that woman’s hands by now.
Whether she siphoned them off during that raid or obtained them elsewhere, I do not know, but she acquired an enormous stock of food and used it as bait to trade supplies with groups from every direction, growing her forces like a snowball. Excluding the residual 50th Division, she is now large enough to rank among the top three survivor groups in all of Daegu.”
At last she produced the clue to the hope we had been searching for so desperately.
“The moving vehicle I saw was also something I witnessed at the site of that very trade—where Park Seok-su, cursing the whole time, had no choice but to hand over weapons and receive food from Sim Geum-a’s side.”
She lifted her head as though recalling the vehicle from memory.
“I am certain that vehicle from back then is still in that woman’s possession.”