Inevitable Betrayal
I gripped the hammer tightly, gauging the distance between the old man and me. The gap… It was awkward. Just close enough for him to swing that iron pipe. He'd already dropped into a batter's stance like a baseball player. I'd take the hit before I could even lift the hammer. No chance to draw the gun hidden in my pocket either.
One step back, and he took one forward. He muttered to himself, voice low and rambling. "You, Jeon Dohyeong, Park Yanggun… the ones who slipped out of the Hope Community… You've got plenty of places to go back to. Maybe you're even a spy."
The distance stayed the same. I swallowed hard. Getting clubbed with an iron pipe? Bones breaking? Infection setting in? It was the same as dying. My heart hammered against my ribs. The world felt like it was collapsing. How did it come to this? Everything had been going according to plan until the very end, when it smashed through the guardrail and plummeted off the cliff.
The old man, who'd finally changed his mind, had turned into a madman who killed people over suspicion—and now he was trying to kill me first. I had no idea how to fix this. Could words even work? The man was drowning in paranoia. Listening to what he said, it felt like he'd already crossed a river he could never return from.
"Especially you. Fake name, fake tracks. No matter how hard I searched the internet, nothing about you showed up."
"That's because I don't use social media."
"Yeah? Then when, where, and how exactly did you learn from that Professor Kim? No matter how I think about it, there's no connection between you two."
He'd already investigated me. It wasn't difficult. A few calls to people in the Hope Community would've been enough. My time as Deacon Kwon Dain, my role handling disaster measures by claiming I'd studied under Professor Kim—there was no answer. Only one way to clear this suspicion.
Kill him. Dead men can't suspect anyone. The cleanup worried me, but this wasn't the time to think about it. If I didn't kill him, he'd kill me. I pulled up my killing intent and widened my vision. The filthy road under moonlight. Scattered corpses and trash. Abandoned cars. Street trees and traffic signs. The old man approaching, eyes fixed only on me.
"Why did everyone in Peace Villa die? Why did Hope Church fall apart? Why did you end up fighting the apartment guys after talking so nicely? Why does only death follow wherever you go?"
"That's baseless suspicion." I slipped behind a car as cover, pouring as much indignation into my voice as I could. "It's not that corpses appear wherever I go. This world is already overflowing with them."
"No. That doesn't matter. My suspicion does. I can't trust you. So—"
The prelude to an attack. The pipe, already drawn back, pulled even farther. Power coiled in his arms. No time left to think. I dropped straight down as a low grunt reached my ears.
"Die."
My hair stood on end. The pipe swept past just above my head in a near-horizontal arc. My baseball cap twisted sideways. A second later and it would've connected. Then the pipe came crashing down again. I was just trying to stand. I barely threw myself sideways and rolled; the impact grazed me with a heavy thud.
The gun. I needed an opening to use it.
"Jeon Dohyeong! What are you doing!"
When I shouted, the old man's movement faltered for a moment. The shadow of Murder Supporter Jeon Dohyeong fell across his mind. That instant of doubt was enough. I drew the pistol, aimed, and pulled the trigger in rapid succession. Bang bang bang. Three shots rang out.
Breathing hard, I looked up at him. His hands fumbled over the gunshot wounds in his chest and stomach. The iron pipe slipped from his fingers and clattered loudly to the ground. He stared at my gun, then let out a hollow laugh.
"…A gun? That voice yelling about gunshots at the apartments—that was you too. It was you. You fired the gun back then."
"You realized it too late."
He'd even remembered the voice? I'd left behind quite a few clues to be suspected over. I slowly stood up. The old man staggered and sank to the ground. It was over. Now I just needed to finish him.
Hammer raised, I spoke one last time. "Goodbye."
"You… you won't die peacefully either. Living like this…"
He left a curse as his final words, but I only smiled at him. Just as betrayal couldn't be stopped, neither could death. Only one thing mattered.
"How you die isn't important. How long you live is the real question."
Crunch. The hammer caved in his face. I continued the work in silence, then searched his pockets. A bundle of keys and a notebook were all he carried. Opening the notebook revealed densely written pages. Information gathered from conversations with people on Villa Street, plus whatever he'd found online—their hometowns, schools, workplaces, relatives, movements after the apocalypse… I flipped through quickly and stopped at the page with my name. The most suspicion was written there.
Kwon Dain? Kim Dain? What was his real name? Why hide it? It started with questions like that, then moved to the murders in Peace Villa, the fact that he was an aspiring scenario writer, the trail of deaths left wherever he went, and personal information that couldn't be found online.
I glanced down at the old man's corpse. "I was going to recruit him. And this is how he betrays me."
A world where distrust and betrayal were inevitable. A world with no one worth trusting. A world where even your own allies would attack you. The apocalypse.
Plip. Plip. Raindrops began to fall. I looked up. Dark clouds had rolled in, swallowing the moon. A downpour was coming. I pulled my cap low and walked toward Villa Street.
Rain poured down. Soaked to the bone, I fell into thought. The cleanup was the problem. Two paths lay before me. One was to keep Villa Street intact. It was possible. The people who'd come for lettuce had been robbers, and we'd barely escaped. The old man was dead—because of that lettuce leak. I could use the leak as a scapegoat to bind everyone together.
The other path was elimination. There was still some trust left. I could go in claiming I needed to report the lettuce leak and crack their skulls. Cleanly remove everyone except the robber accomplices, and resources would become plentiful.
Rumble— Thunder cracked and lightning flashed. In the rain, I felt summer. Rain, wind, lightning. A laugh slipped out. "The apocalypse comes, the apocalypse has come."
Everything would eventually fall apart. Infrastructure would fail and farming would stop. With the old man gone, Villa Street would scatter. Betrayal would come no matter what. This was the best timing. The moment to clean out Villa Street. If I hesitated like the dead old man, just suspecting and doubting, it would be too late.
"Let's clean house."
Time to quit this half-baked survival community game and return to being marauders. I splashed through puddles and headed back to Villa Street.
First stop: the lettuce leak and the rice seller watching him. The corpse-storage house on the second floor of Peace Villa where I lived. I opened the front door in one motion. Two terrified faces stared back.
"Why are there so many corpses in here?"
"My leg… my leg…"
Corpses arranged like people eating at the table, lying neatly under blankets as if sleeping, fixed by the window as if watching the view, leaning against the wall as if watching TV—the house had been decorated to feel lived-in. The rice seller, looking uncomfortable, turned at the sound of my footsteps.
"You're back? What happened with the people who wanted to trade lettuce?"
"They were robbers. I barely got away."
"Ah… We really would've all died if they'd actually sold lettuce."
I walked up to him naturally. "How's it living in a corpse-storage house?"
"Well, it's… a bit unpleasant to look at—"
"Then die."
Eliminated. The hammer struck his head in quick succession. Heavy thuds echoed several times.
"Huh?"
The lettuce leak looked up at me, eyes shaking. When he tried to stand despite his broken leg, I spoke quickly. "That old man—he's gone crazy. He's trying to kill all the smokers and drinkers. We need to escape."
"What…?"
"Escape first!"
He just stood there stupidly, not understanding the situation. I moved behind him, shoved his back, then brought the hammer down on the back of his head. Thud. He fell forward and escaped the apocalypse.
Calmly, I recalled the list from the old man's notebook. Still so many people left to kill. I'd rather save bullets if possible. I needed Supporter Jeon Dohyeong after all.
When I reached his house, he hung up his call and greeted me. His eyes went to my hammer. Wet with blood and rainwater.
"What did you do? Who else did you kill?"
"Killed the old man. Grab your weapons. We need to kill everyone on the street."
"…Who are we killing? Why?"
He really didn't know what was happening. I sold out the old man who'd betrayed my expectations. "That old man suspected us of being spies from the Hope Community. He was going to kill us all."
"He did seem dangerous, but… still, there's no reason to kill everyone on the street—"
"Jeon Dohyeong. We can't stop now. The old man killed the lettuce leak, and I killed the old man. Before Villa Street explodes, we have to kill them all first."
The brakes were already gone. We would run at full speed and crush them all to death.