Chapter 1
Chapter 1
A damp smell of mold.
A sour metallic stench.
From the ceiling pipes, unknown black droplets fell—drip, drip.
Supply Warehouse, Sector C, Basement Level 3, Mapo Station Shelter, Seoul.
This was the workplace I entered and left hundreds of times a day.
“Hey. What are you doing? Move it!”
At the warehouse manager’s words, I grabbed the box I had briefly set down.
[D-Grade Mutant Giant Cockroach Carapace]
[30 kg]
Before the apocalypse, this was a weight you’d move with a hand cart or forklift.
But now it had to be done entirely by manpower.
Because electricity and fuel were not easy to obtain anymore.
“Ugh…!”
When I clenched my teeth and hoisted the metal box onto my shoulder, my knees buckled under the weight.
“You’re struggling over just 30 kilos?”
Well, you and I are different—you eat meat three times a day.
I was angry, but there was no way I could show it.
Basement Level 3 carrier.
My position was the very lowest level in the shelter.
Just as I turned the corner of the narrow corridor with a box as big as my body on my back—
“Damn it, what the hell?”
I collided hard with someone who had suddenly come out from around the corner.
It felt like hitting a rock.
Definitely an Awakened.
My body lost its balance and staggered helplessly.
Swallowing a curse, I desperately tried to steady myself.
But it was useless.
I fell sideways.
The supply box absolutely could not be damaged…!
“Ugh…!”
Stars flashed before my eyes, and my face became wet.
I didn’t know whether it was blood or contaminated water, but I managed to twist my body and catch the supply box with my back.
“Hey, porter.”
At the irritated voice, my body flinched.
Kim Cheolmin.
Ah. I’m screwed.
After setting the cargo down and standing up, the bastard pulled out a cigarette as if he had caught an opportunity.
Sssk.
A small flame ignited at the tip of Kim Cheolmin’s finger.
Before the apocalypse, you might have thought he was a magician.
But now, more than half of humanity possessed abilities like that.
D-Grade Awakened.
His power was merely ignition—just enough to light a cigarette.
But even that alone made him someone of a different status from me.
Hoo—
The cigarette smoke he exhaled poured over my face.
“Can’t you keep your eyes open when you walk?”
His combat boot kicked my shin.
It was a light kick, but it came from an Awakened.
“Ugh!”
Pain shot through me as if my leg were about to break, and my body staggered.
Watching me, Kim Cheolmin snickered.
“Dancing during work hours? You’re really something.”
As his familiar routine began, I bowed my head deeply while enduring the pain.
“…I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? That’s it? During work hours you’re supposed to work, idiot. I didn’t see you upstairs so I came down just in case, and here you are slacking off.”
It was utterly unfair.
Slacking off?
I had been hauling cargo up and down Basement Level 3 since sunrise.
But if I tried to argue, I’d definitely get beaten.
He stepped closer and tapped my forehead with his finger.
“Hey. Do you know that Awakened like us risk our lives outside just to feed parasites like you? The only reason you can eat safely in this shelter is thanks to me!”
Ptui.
Filthy spit landed on the front of my shoe.
Kim Cheolmin grabbed my shoulder and tossed me aside.
“Move, you useless bastard.”
With a casual flick of his arm, my body lifted like a sheet of paper and slammed into the wall.
Watching his swaggering back, I swallowed the surge of emotions rising in my chest.
Then I silently adjusted the box and started walking again.
Ten years had passed since the world collapsed.
By now, it was natural that non-Awakened people weren’t even treated as human.
By the time noon had long passed, the cafeteria was filled with hundreds of shadows.
The clang of metal trays, dry coughs, and air thick with despair suffocated the lungs.
Hope could not be found on anyone’s face.
Naturally.
Those eating this late were all non-Awakened like me.
Awakened and non-Awakened even had different menus.
Today’s menu was nutritional porridge.
A thin gray liquid made by grinding unidentified insect shells and plant roots together.
It smelled like a foul sewer.
After a long wait, my turn came.
When I held out my battered tray, the middle-aged man distributing food looked at me mechanically.
No.
He wasn’t looking at my face.
He was checking the mark on my chest.
[Carrier]
Without a word, he shook the ladle, draining away half the watery porridge before pouring it onto my tray.
It was clearly far less than what other non-Awakened received.
Even knowing it wouldn’t work, I couldn’t help but ask.
How was I supposed to do heavy labor with this little food?
“Um… Is this the correct ration? It’s very different from the others…”
Without even looking at me, the distributor answered in a mechanical voice.
“Starting today, rations for simple labor personnel are reduced by 30%. Emergency directive from the Management Department. Don’t argue.”
Emotionless eyes turned toward me.
“Got a problem?”
A problem?
Of course I had a problem.
The porridge on my tray wasn’t even half a portion.
But the moment I said that out loud, even this little bit would be taken away.
I sat down at a table with a gloomy heart.
Grrr—
Seeing the unidentified insect mutant pieces floating in the porridge made my mouth water.
Before the apocalypse, this would have been unimaginable.
But now this kind of thing was the only source of protein.
I silently shoveled the porridge into my mouth when whispers rose nearby.
“I heard the 3rd Expedition of the Capital Defense Corps was almost wiped out yesterday…”
“They say the rumors about food running out are real.”
A few days later.
All non-Awakened were summoned to the central plaza.
Murmurs of anxiety spread like a disease through the cold air.
On the platform stood Park Sangjin, the shelter’s chief administrator.
To his left and right stood several D-Grade Awakened—including Kim Cheolmin—lined up in an intimidating formation.
A bad feeling stabbed down my spine.
Park Sangjin lifted a megaphone.
After a burst of static, his steel-like voice froze the plaza.
“…Therefore, our Mapo Shelter has made an unavoidable decision for survival.”
Restructuring inefficient manpower.
That was the phrase that came out of his mouth.
“Parasites who contribute neither combat ability nor specialized skills and only consume the community’s food can no longer be tolerated. Those whose names are called will be expelled from the shelter immediately.”
Expulsion.
The plaza stirred at that single word.
Because expulsion was essentially a death sentence.
Park Sangjin looked down at the list in his hand.
Names were called one by one.
It didn’t take long to realize.
They were all porters like me.
Only carriers were being called.
My heart sank like a block of ice.
“Sector C Carrier, Kang Sinhyeok.”
I doubted my ears.
But my name echoed clearly through the plaza.
When I lifted my head, a man who had been called earlier ran toward the platform screaming.
“Administrator! I’ve worked harder than anyone every day! I can carry cargo, repair equipment—anything! Please give me one more chance!”
Others cried out from all sides.
Park Sangjin looked down at them as if they were insects.
“The cargo you carry all day could be moved by an F-Grade Awakened in one hour.”
It was a cold reality.
The porters—including me—were dragged away like baggage by D-Grade Awakened.
“Let me at least take my belongings!”
“My daughter! My daughter!”
“Honey! Honey!”
Screams and wails erupted.
But even the families hiding on the far side of the plaza turned their heads away.
Because the moment they became associated with the expelled, they would be discarded too.
In the distance, the North Gate came into view.
A gigantic ark protecting humanity from mutants.
Seeing the shelter’s only entrance snapped me back to reality.
“Let go! Let go of me!”
I resisted with the last of my strength.
But before the power of the Awakened gripping my arms, I was no different from a newborn baby.
And so…
I was expelled from Mapo Shelter, to which I had devoted ten years.
Boom!
With a heavy thunderous sound, the steel gate behind us slammed shut.
It was the sound of the last connection with the world being severed.
About a dozen of us inefficient personnel were thrown into the middle of the ruins.
Looking around helplessly, I saw that everyone else was middle-aged men.
Naturally.
Even non-Awakened women could give birth to Awakened.
So shelters tried to keep them inside as much as possible.
But…
What irritated me more was that among the expelled, I was the only one in my twenties.
Why was I the only one who never awakened?
They said the younger you were, the higher the probability of awakening.
What was I supposed to do now?
The outside world I saw for the first time in ten years felt overwhelmingly bleak.
“Everyone, pull yourselves together!”
At that moment, a rough voice cut through the despair.
It belonged to Section Chief Choi, who had apparently been a construction site foreman before the apocalypse.
He had overseen the porters on Basement Level 1.
Even he had been expelled?
He must have been targeted by Kim Cheolmin.
I’d seen them argue several times.
Dusting himself off, he stood up and looked around at us with blazing eyes.
“Are you going to sit here and die like this? United we live, divided we die! First we find a safe place, then food and weapons!”
“But we don’t even know the roads outside…”
That was true.
Since the day of the collapse, carriers had never once been outside the shelter.
“I know the way!”
There was a strange force in Section Chief Choi’s voice.
“Trust me and follow me! Let’s show those bastards that even non-Awakened like us can do something if we stick together!”
Maybe it was the strength in his voice.
But even I felt a little energy returning.
He was right.
Even weak non-Awakened, when gathered into a group, were enough to deter small mutants.
“Get lost!”
“Get lost!”
Like a group of cavemen, we shouted curses while slowly advancing.
Section Chief Choi pointed toward a huge hill visible in the distance.
It was piled high like a mountain with scrap metal and garbage.
“I heard there’s an emergency supply warehouse near that massive waste hill. It was built by the Capital Defense Corps before the shelter was constructed.”
A supply warehouse used by the Capital Defense Corps?
There would surely be combat rations and canned food left.
We began moving, following Section Chief Choi.
Following the tiny hope blooming in the hellish ruins.
“KRAAAH!”
From the darkness came a tearing scream that didn’t sound human.
The man walking at the very back suddenly flew into the air, then slammed into the ground with a wet sound.
Clamped onto his neck was a red-eyed beast.
A D-Grade Mutant—Contaminated Wild Dog.
“Help me!”
…We hadn’t realized.
Where waste gathered, predators that fed on it would also gather.
A simple, obvious fact.
Amid the screams, I coldly scanned the surroundings.
Damn.
There weren’t just one or two.
A pack of starving wild dogs had surrounded us in an instant.
They weren’t ordinary animals but mutants.
Hunters that moved systematically to isolate prey.
“We can defeat D-Grade mutants if we work together! Grab anything that can be used as a weapon!”
Despite Section Chief Choi’s shout, people screamed and scattered in every direction.
“Grrr…”
As the people fled in all directions, the contaminated wild dogs surrounding us turned their heads in confusion.
When several of them began chasing fleeing people, a gap opened in the encirclement.
There!
I had barely taken a few steps when—
My foot caught on a scrap metal pipe lying on the ground and I crashed forward.
Crack!
A horrible sound came from my ankle, and extreme pain burned through my brain.
This… it’s completely sprained.
As I struggled to get up, a man ran past me.
“…Section Chief Choi!”
He glanced back when he heard me.
But then he turned his head and ran forward without looking back.
The man who had shouted about being a team just half a day ago was abandoning me.
At that moment, the last trust I had in humanity shattered.
But if I were in his place, I probably would have done the same.
Humans…
Always put themselves first.
I laughed.
During the ten years I spent in the shelter, I had never thought of myself as human.
Something less than human.
But facing death, a desperate instinct for survival burned from deep inside me.
I can’t die like this.
But in this condition, I couldn’t outrun them.
Then the waste hill caught my eye.
Right.
If I can’t use my legs…
I’ll use my hands.
Like a four-legged beast, I began crawling up the waste hill using my hands and knees.
My fingernails shattered, and the skin of my palms tore open.
Maybe I would die of tetanus in a few days.
Still, I forced my body to move.
The sound of heavy breathing and claws scraping metal grew closer behind me.
I didn’t even need to turn my head.
One contaminated wild dog had followed me.
“Kyaaah!”
I struggled desperately to live, but sharp pain exploded in my side.
“Ugh!”
After biting me once, the beast pulled away, blood and flesh dripping from its jaws.
I can’t run anymore…
Instinctively, I groped around.
Something cold and solid landed in my hand.
This is…
A wrench?
A tool only the technicians inside the shelter could use.
At that moment—
Ding—
A clear mechanical chime rang directly inside my mind.
What… auditory hallucination?
Startled, I opened my eyes.
An unbelievable sight appeared before me.
A translucent blue window filled my vision.
[You have awakened as Workshop Owner.]
[Work protocol activated. First tool recognized.]
At the same time, the entire world began to sparkle.
No.
More precisely—
The entire waste hill was glittering.