Bait
Like salmon fighting their way upstream, we retraced the path we had taken two days earlier.
Kraaaah—!
“So-hye, take the left!”
“Got it!”
We had spent barely two days at the camping specialty store, yet the park and the streets beyond were already crawling with zombies, as if someone had restocked them overnight.
Their brains might be rotting, but it looks like some instinct still remains.
A zombie came straight at me from the front. The instant its jaws yawned wide, I rammed the felling blade into its mouth.
Kraaaagh!
“Eat up.”
Blood ran down the blade and dripped onto the pavement. The zombie thrashed, arms flailing wildly. I shoved the blade deeper and wrenched it sideways.
Shhhk!
A far greater spray of blood erupted than before. One hard shove on the hilt and the body collapsed like a machine whose power had been cut.
“Die!”
I yanked the blade free and snapped my head around. So-hye was already bringing her long shovel down on the neck of a zombie that had fallen to the ground.
Crunch!
The sound was exactly like stepping on a cockroach; blood sprayed in every direction. Because of the slight downhill slope, the severed head rolled away end over end.
“Haa… haa…”
“Are you all right?”
“This much… haa… I’m fine…”
She planted the shovel like a cane and dragged in ragged breaths. Her face was pale and sweat poured down her, yet the eyes visible above the mask curved into crescent moons.
She still wasn’t used to killing zombies, but she had clearly steeled herself. That was the only reason she could fight without hesitation now.
My best guess was that the change had come after her call with Han Hyo-jin. Nothing else explained the sudden shift.
“Drink some of this.”
“Th-thank you.”
I held out the canteen. So-hye tore her mask off and gulped the water down.
Damp strands of hair, beads of sweat sliding down her throat—she looked like she had stepped straight out of a soft-drink commercial.
“Here.”
I took the canteen back and started walking again. Once we left the park and entered the streets, the atmosphere felt distinctly different.
“Why are there so many zombies?”
There were more of them than before, and the corpses had multiplied to match. And though it felt strange to say it about zombies, quite a few of them still looked almost fresh—as if they had only been infected a few days ago.
“I told you. This is about the time when people’s food would start running out.”
“So those people went out looking for supplies and got caught.”
“Too early to be sure. Let’s check the nearest restaurant.”
We stopped at a snack shop only about two hundred meters away. Two zombies were shambling around the building.
“This time you take the right, So-hye.”
“Okay.”
We each dropped a zombie and stepped inside. The place was a wreck. Tables and chairs lay overturned; tteokbokki and fried snacks littered the floor. It looked as if a gang of thieves had torn through it.
“Just as I thought.”
I checked the refrigerator and every cupboard. Not a scrap of food remained. The fact that even a tiny place like this had been stripped bare meant people were already desperate for supplies.
“People are starting to come outside.”
“That’s… not good news, is it?”
“It means we have to watch out for other people now, not just zombies. When we get home we’ll need to work on our clothes a little.”
“Our clothes? Why?”
So-hye tilted her head.
“Make them as filthy and ragged as possible. The kind of look that makes anyone think, ‘That bastard’s just a beggar.’ We need to kill any urge to rob us on sight.”
“So we don’t look worth looting.”
“Exactly.”
People react to what they see. There was no reason to advertise that we were carrying anything valuable. Blending in was safer.
Still, a few more weeks and the disguise will stop working no matter what we do.
Starve long enough and the body wastes away. Anyone who still looks healthy will draw suspicion on their own.
But by then it wouldn’t matter. By the time that many days had passed, our abilities would already be strong enough.
“Let’s head back. Walking around dressed like this is already a risk.”
“Okay.”
The moment we stepped out of the snack shop—
“Hey!”
A voice from the right made me turn. Two men stood there, one gripping a kitchen knife, the other a hammer, both staring straight at us.
Not a tail.
If they had been following us I would have noticed; every nerve had been on high alert. This was pure chance.
Their gazes were blatant.
First So-hye’s face, then the body hidden under thick clothes, and finally our packs and gear.
“Ugh…”
The filthy stares made her shudder and wrap both arms around herself. Of course the two men only grinned wider.
“Keep moving,” I murmured.
So-hye nodded and started walking again.
Then hurried footsteps closed in from behind. I spun, drawing the felling blade and the axe in the same motion. The two men had already closed the distance.
Figured as much.
I loosened my grip on the axe and flung it in a hard, straight line at the forehead of the man charging from the right.
Thwack!
The axe buried itself dead-center. The man went down with a strangled grunt, as if he had been clubbed.
“Y-you fucking—!”
His partner skidded to a halt the instant his friend dropped. Or rather, he tried to.
Shhhk!
“Gah—gahk…”
The felling blade punched clean through his throat. Blood ran in thick rivulets down the tip that had emerged from the back of his neck. The kitchen knife clattered to the ground.
Thud!
I pulled the blade free and the body crumpled.
A sudden, fierce surge of energy rolled through me and made my whole body tremble. It was nothing like the sensation from killing a zombie—cleaner, purer somehow.
“A-are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
So-hye had even dropped her shovel and was patting me down. I gently caught both her arms and eased her back; only then did she calm down.
“I never thought they’d just charge us without a single word…”
She stared at the corpses on the ground and muttered under her breath. Her whole body was shaking; the shock was obvious.
“They’re not idiots—they didn’t need to talk. Their goal was robbery from the start.”
Still, attacking the second we turned around was pure stupidity. I would have shadowed us quietly and waited for a moment of carelessness.
They had probably acted that way because of So-hye. One man each, they must have figured, and victory was guaranteed.
“So-hye. Could you kill a person if you had to?”
“……A person.”
She lowered her eyes to the bodies. She tapped the shovel lightly against the pavement, hesitating.
“…I’d need a little more resolve for that.”
“Understood.”
To me there was no real difference between killing a human and killing a zombie. Both were equally dangerous.
So-hye, on the other hand, still drew a hard line between them. Zombies weren’t people, so it was all right to kill them. That was how she had been thinking.
That’s why she’s hesitating.
She would need some time to accept it.
“L-let’s go back. Quickly.”
“Right.”
At her urging we picked up the pace. Fortunately we met no one else after that.
“Finally…!”
The moment we reached the studio apartment building, So-hye let out a long sigh of relief. The way she bounced on her toes in pure joy was almost cute.
“Let’s go in.”
“Yes…!”
She hopped up the stairs ahead of me; I followed one step at a time. Just as we were about to step onto the second floor—
“Huh?”
A soft, startled sound came from above. When I climbed higher I found So-hye frozen in the doorway.
“Aren’t you going in?”
“Uh, th-that is…”
I moved up beside her and looked down the hallway. Every single door stood wide open—including ours.
“Hmm.”
The barricade was flung open. I didn’t even need to check the wooden wedges we had jammed in place.
“Wh-what on earth…?”
So-hye bolted for our unit.
I followed. Beyond the open door everything was chaos.
No need to look any closer.
My place was exactly as expected—trashed. Every box of instant noodles was gone. The refrigerator and cupboards stood empty.
The sight made me clench my fist and break into a broad grin.
They took the bait…!
The little rats had finally walked into the trap.
“Seong-won…”
I turned at the voice behind me. Even with the mask hiding everything but her eyes, I could tell So-hye was on the verge of tears.
“Everything… they took everything… all the things you gave me…”
She staggered toward me and collapsed into my arms. I wrapped her gently and patted her back.
“I thought we could finally rest…”
“No need to take it so hard. I already expected this.”
“You expected it?”
“Yes.”
She pulled back just far enough to meet my eyes.
“Who… who did this?”
“That’s what we’re about to find out. Coming with me?”
Her grip tightened on the shovel. Knuckles cracked, and then she nodded.
“Yes. Let’s go together.”
“Then let’s move.”
Walking out like this felt a little off, so we hid the packs we had brought with us inside the apartment first—someone else might still show up.
“Let’s go.”
“Yes…!”
We walked down the hallway side by side. My heart hammered so hard I instinctively pressed a hand to my chest. My feet practically bounced as I climbed the stairs.
I wonder who finally took the bait.