Territory and the Beasts That Inhabit It
Animals have territories. You could call it their range of activity. The area they prowl in search of food. The paths they take to escape the cold or the heat. The distance they move to survive. Humans were animals too, so it was the same for us. Each person had their own sphere of activity centered around a base. And when those territories overlapped, the competition for survival began. In a city fighting over scarce resources, the struggle for survival had started between zombies and humans, zombies and zombies, humans and humans. Everyone was sharpening their own weapons.
I stood by the window, looking down at the street. People were wandering around looking for food as usual, but something felt a little different today. There were a lot of them. Over fifty? Anyway, a huge crowd was shuffling along together, and the sheer number of them created an overwhelming pressure. Just the sound of their footsteps rolled in like a wave.
“Let’s work hard and make today meaningful too!”
“Our neighborhood association president sure is full of energy.”
With a clatter, people who had probably stolen shopping carts from the mart began breaking into the nearby convenience store through its shattered windows. They piled anything they could get their hands on into the carts—whatever food was left, of course, but also cigarettes, clothes, everything. I tapped the windowsill, lost in thought. What the hell were these people doing?
‘Apartment residents?’
The mention of a “neighborhood association president” made me think they were from the apartment complex near Villa Street. Only an apartment building could mobilize that many people. In a way, it was a power only apartment complexes could have. Rows of homes packed together like chicken coops, all those people bound together under the name “fellow apartment residents.” It was basically a factory for churning out manpower. And a large number of people was power in itself.
“Grrrk.”
A few zombies that had been loitering on the street spotted the apartment crowd and immediately turned tail and ran. Fifty-plus people seemed to scare them. The apartment residents, apparently used to zombies fleeing from them, ignored it naturally and checked their haul.
“There’s not much to eat.”
The woman they called the neighborhood association president frowned as she looked at the cart. There wasn’t much food. Instead, it was full of expensive-looking clothes, wallets, and bags. Since most of the decent food had already been cleaned out, it felt like they were prioritizing personal greed.
“Unnie, this bag would look great on you.”
They held clothes up to each other like women shopping at a boutique. I was about to lose interest at that point. They were taking things from other people’s houses? Fine by me. The stuff would just change locations for a while. If I wanted it back, I could take it anytime. In the end, it was all mine. They were just storing it for me.
But the situation took a strange turn. The neighborhood association president, now wearing a bag over her shoulder, clapped her hands and gestured to the security guard.
“You brought the ladder, right? Let’s check out the second-floor houses too!”
“What if there are people inside?”
The gray-haired security guard hunched his shoulders, and the president’s eyes narrowed sharply.
“You want us to starve instead?”
“That’s not what I meant…”
In the end, the guard muttered timidly and pushed the heavy cart. The cart, loaded with a ladder and all sorts of tools, rattled noisily. Then the people worked together to set up the ladder—and of all places, they chose my villa. Specifically, the second-floor unit where robbers had broken in last time and I had driven them off. A primal sense of aversion rose in me.
They were touching my territory? My building?
Of course, that second-floor unit only held corpses now, but I still hated it. My hand moved on its own, searching for a weapon.
‘Pistol? Zombie water gun? Molotov? No. Hold back.’
The enemy numbered fifty. If I killed them, I had to do it thoroughly. Without revealing myself. So they wouldn’t know who or why. Like a sudden accident. I was memorizing their faces when an uncle burst out from the neighboring villa. He wore a leather jacket, work gloves, and carried a steel pipe.
“What the hell are you people doing in our neighborhood!”
“What is this guy?”
The fifty people surrounded the uncle. Voices and gazes mixed with irritation and contempt pressed down on him all at once. The neighborhood association president glared at him sharply and shouted.
“Who are you? Is this your house? No, it isn’t. Why are you butting in?”
“I live in this neighborhood! Who the hell are you people, breaking into other people’s homes!”
“Ha…”
The uncle stood his ground defiantly, but the situation wasn’t good. The apartment residents closed in tighter, shoving him.
“We’re just taking a few things from empty houses. What’s your problem, huh?”
“Mind your own business. You’re surviving by taking other people’s stuff too.”
“Or maybe you were planning to steal it yourself and we beat you to it?”
I nodded to myself. This was the competition for survival. They were fighting over the resources of Villa Street. Just like beasts whose territories overlapped. The only difference was that the uncle was weak compared to that huge apartment crowd. He had no pistol, no zombie water gun. It looked like he was about to get roughed up…
That was when it happened. The uncle, who had been getting pushed around, suddenly dropped to the ground and started rolling.
“Aigo! Neighbors! These rotten apartment bastards are trying to kill us! They’re going to kill everyone in the neighborhood and loot everything!”
“When did we ever—!”
The uncle’s booming shout and the flustered apartment residents’ denials echoed loudly. Shadows appeared at windows all along Villa Street. Even the people who had been ignoring the commotion now looked outside with interest. Countless gazes. Eyes looking down at the apartment crowd from higher floors. It was the moment the confrontation between the uncle and the apartment residents transformed into one between the entire Villa Street and the apartment residents. That uncle had flipped the situation with just a few words.
‘Not a bad response.’
Facing a dangerous enemy alone? Then gather people. For something improvised, it was pretty good.
“What kind of person is this!”
“Let’s go. There are plenty of other places.”
In the end, the apartment residents turned away under the watchful eyes of Villa Street’s residents. If they touched the uncle here, the people of Villa Street would think they really were here to kill and loot, and they’d come rushing out with murderous intent. Fighting with real killing intent was difficult.
So it seemed like today would pass as another peaceful day, but I glared at the retreating backs of the apartment crowd.
‘This isn’t going to end with just one incident.’
Resources in the city were steadily shrinking. In a city where you had to somehow obtain food that wasn’t yours to survive, conflicts would only increase. Unlike now, when people lacked the resolve to truly kill or be killed, soon they would fight with their lives on the line.
If a war-like battle was on the horizon, what would people do? Conscription. They would organize troops based on one of humanity’s strongest weapons—sociality. Because the easiest and quickest power to obtain was numbers.
Not long after the apartment residents left, someone pounded violently on my front door. Thud thud thud. From beyond the door came the voice of the uncle I had seen earlier.
“You all saw how those apartment bastards acted, right? If we don’t want to get screwed over, we need to band together as neighborhood folks! If you’re interested, come up to the rooftop of the villa next door later!”
“…Yes.”
When I answered shortly, the uncle left without hesitation. After that, I heard him knocking on the neighboring units and the ones below, delivering the same message before moving on. I adjusted my mask.
‘He’s trying to gather people?’
Was he planning to unite the residents of Villa Street into a group? Just like those apartment people? Honestly, it wasn’t a brilliant idea. Even if he gathered everyone from Villa Street, it wouldn’t be as easy to churn out manpower as an apartment complex. Was it really the right choice to play up a characteristic that was inferior to others? Wouldn’t it be better to become more vicious instead? Malice was the easiest and surest option, wasn’t it?
‘Well, simple malice alone isn’t enough…’
I turned my gaze to the map spread out on the desk. A map with several circles drawn around the villa. These weren’t the sloppy territories of Villa Street or apartment humans, but the domains of truly vicious, heavily armed beasts. The Hope Church that was running smoothly even after we left, the archery club that shot arrows, the police station that dominated its district, the gym base of the survival-combat protein-eating muscle zombies, the territory of the muscle zombies who had learned siege warfare, the Tower of Life that had cleaned the streets with Botox… To keep enjoying my marauding life while competing with these kinds of groups, a lot of effort was needed. I had to refine my malice elegantly and turn it into my own weapon. Something like a more precise scenario or a more lethal scheme.
I tapped my knee as I thought.
‘If I leave them alone, they’ll mess with my villa eventually anyway. Might as well use this chance to deal with them and gain some experience.’
“Then I’ll go alone.”
I waved at Jeon Dohyeong and Park Yanggun. I had decided to participate as the representative of the villa I lived in, Peace Villa. Park Yanggun nodded indifferently, as if he couldn’t care less, while Jeon Dohyeong shifted his weight back and forth like an anxious person.
“You’re not planning to cause another accident, are you? Something feels off.”
“What accident?”
Anyone listening would think I caused trouble every day. On the contrary, I was the one constantly getting swept up in accidents. I let out a dry laugh and headed to the rooftop of the neighboring villa. A lot of people had already gathered there. Professional survivors who were still alive. Armed with blunt weapons, they opened and closed the door to greet the street’s residents. The uncle who had called everyone together asked me,
“Where are you from?”
“The Peace Villa next door.”
“Ah, a neighbor! Come on in!”
A little time passed. No more people came. That meant everyone who was coming had arrived. The uncle cleared his throat loudly, looked around, and spoke in a low voice.
“Everyone. The apartment bastards backed off, but this is really just the beginning. Even if they’re only looting empty houses for now, how long will that last? The day will come when they start killing people to get food.”
He spoke with some logic. It wasn’t a wrong prediction. The people remained silent, subtly agreeing. The uncle, gaining confidence, continued while making eye contact with each person one by one.
“Even if it’s not the apartment bastards, if we stay scattered like this, we’ll get picked off one by one by other robbers. So what should we do?”
I quickly raised my hand and said,
“We should unite as one and strike first. We should get revenge.”
“Huh?”
The uncle, who had brightened at the words “unite as one,” turned to me in confusion. Had he only planned to gather people for defense? But that was too passive. It wasn’t what I wanted either. I looked around at the people. Some looked well-fed and healthy, but many looked weak from not eating enough. Hunger would be their motivation.
“Those rotten apartment bastards attacked our neighborhood. Why should we just take it? Let’s go take food from the apartment too.”
“Wait, hold on. How are we supposed to deal with that many people? And how do we even open the apartment doors? That’s impossible and way too dangerous—”
The uncle tried to smooth things over quickly, but it was too late. Sparks had already ignited in the eyes of the hungry people. I pulled out a taser from my pocket.
“A gift from a cop friend. If you shock a door lock with this, it opens. This is our chance to take all that food from the apartment.”