Next Project Theme (2)
“AAAARGH—! Aah. Ah…”
The wife's screams, her husband's teeth buried in her neck, gradually faded away.
Is she… dead?
Any sane person would have bolted right then and there, but his legs refused to move. This was the second time the young man had witnessed death. The memory of that first time had frozen his body solid.
But no rest came for her. The woman he'd assumed was dead began to creak and twist like a marionette, then rose to her feet on both legs.
“Hueegh…!”
Bloodshot eyes, torn flesh hanging loose, and grotesque, unnatural movements.
What stood up before him was far too alien to be called human anymore.
The young man felt it in his bones: he had to run.
As he stumbled backward, the couple—now transformed into something like rabid beasts—lunged at another person nearby.
“GYAAAAAH!”
“Shit! Are you insane?! AAAH!”
The peaceful department store filled with human screams and something that sounded halfway between a cry and a beast's howl.
I have to get out of here…!
The young man wheeled around and simply ran. Getting away from those lunatics came before everything else.
But then—where was he supposed to run to?
He wasn't so dim that he couldn't piece it together: the disturbance on the first floor that the announcements kept mentioning had to be connected to those crazed things. Going down was absolutely out of the question.
So, up?
Five floors in total. Up seemed right, and he sprinted for the escalator.
“KYAAAAH!”
“RUN!!”
But the escalators were paralyzed—a jam of raving lunatics and fleeing shoppers. He veered off and changed course.
“Hah. Hah.”
He ran like a madman through the chaos-choked department store.
“Get the hell away from me!”
CRASH.
Tearing through display racks to block the beasts lunging at him, he caught sight of a door marked STAFF ONLY at the edge of his vision.
That's the place…!
A staff-only corridor was bound to have far fewer people than the middle of a packed department store. It had to be safer than this wide-open space.
Decision made, he bolted for the door.
The moment he reached it, he grabbed the handle and hurried to slip inside—then froze at the sound of a child's voice, thick with tears.
“D-Daddy?”
“Hrk. Kuh… huk…!”
He turned his head.
A man was writhing in convulsions—the same pre-symptom that seemed to precede the transformation—and beside him sat a small child, crumpled on the floor, fidgeting helplessly at the sight of him.
For a moment, the young man wavered. Open the door and flee, or help that kid who was so obviously about to be in danger? His reason screamed at him that this was an emergency he could barely survive himself, that walking away was the correct call—
—Daddy! Wook! I wost a toof!
—Daddy! Wead me the Dongha book!
But the child was exactly the age his little sister had been, and there was no way in hell he could turn his back.
The young man turned and ran toward the kid.
“Come here!”
“Wh-who are you?! No! Don't! Stop it!”
Even a grown man fresh out of his military service couldn't make sense of what was happening right now—how could a child who hadn't even started elementary school possibly grasp how much danger he was in? Whoever his parents were, they'd raised him well; he eyed the unfamiliar adult with open wariness.
Under normal circumstances the young man would have understood the child's caution. But right now, the situation was anything but normal.
“It's dangerous, so come with me!”
“B-but Daddy said… said never to go with strangers…. D-Daddy, get up! Get up!”
“Damn it!”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw it—the father-turned-beast's bloodshot eyes snapping wide open, its mouth gaping as it lunged for the child.
THWACK—
He swung his leg and kicked the thing's face away, then snatched the kid up into his arms.
“Eek! Put me down! Daddy! DADDY!!”
He clamped down on the thrashing child and ran. At the kid's screams, several of the mad things turned and started toward them—he picked up the pace.
CRASH.
It was terrifying to watch them coming, slamming into walls and hurling their bodies through display cases without the slightest care.
Shit…!
Child in his arms, the distance shrinking by the second. When the gap had closed to less than five paces—
“Over here! This way!”
A woman who looked like an employee was poking her head out from the staff-only corridor, waving them in.
The young man threw every last ounce of strength he had left and hurled himself at the doorway.
CRASH. SLAM.
The sound of bodies hitting the floor, and the clang of a steel door closing.
THUD. THUD. THUD.
Then the lunatics began pounding on the door, and the sound rang down the corridor.
“Thank… thank you.”
The young man offered his thanks to the employee who was locking the door, keeping the creatures out. She checked twice that the lock had caught properly, then turned her head and forced a smile.
“It's nothing. More importantly, are you okay?”
“Yes… thanks to you.”
With that, a silence settled between the two of them. Neither knew what you were supposed to say in a situation this unreal, and neither had the energy to speak anyway.
“WAAAAAH. Daddy. Daddy…!”
A wail broke the silence. The young woman moved to soothe the child.
Pat, pat.
“It's okay. That was really scary, wasn't it? You're safe here.”
*Sniffle.* My daddy. *Sniffle.* That mister kicked him, kicked him so hard. *Sniffle.*
“I'm sorry?”
At the woman's look of bewilderment, the young man offered a quick explanation.
“The boy's father… something was wrong with him. He'd turned like the others and was about to maul his own kid, so I had no choice but to—”
“Oh… so he became a zombie…. That explains it….”
“A… zombie?”
“You don't know what a zombie is?”
The woman, still gently patting the child, looked up at him with a pitying expression. She seemed to have some idea of what was going on—some theory about the whole situation. The young man opened his mouth to ask her about it—
RATTLE. RATTLE.
THUD. THUD.
The door began to shudder, the pounding growing louder by the second.
“For now, shouldn't we move somewhere else? It doesn't feel safe here.”
“Good idea. Do you happen to know a safe place?”
“I do. Follow me.”
Questions still churning in his head, the young man followed the woman.
Click.
He snapped photos as he made his way around Haedong Yonggungsa.
“Whew…. So this is the last one.”
He'd toured every famous spot Busan had to offer, scouting locations in person and sketching out the skeleton of his next project's story as he went.
Story hadn't been the main draw in the games he'd made so far, so he'd never put much weight on it—but this time, he intended to invest in the narrative too.
Time to show them the full spicy flavor of Korean melodrama—shinpa at its finest.
The future's global OTT giants had already proven that Korean-style tearjerkers played well with overseas audiences. There was no reason not to mine that vein.
Better yet, he didn't have to worry that building a story around classic Korean melodrama would earn him howls of criticism from his own countrymen. In this era, it still went down smooth even at home.
Clichés were clichés for a reason—yes, they'd been squeezed to the marrow by now, but they were used because they worked on mass audiences. And in this era, nobody had even gotten close to squeezing them dry yet.
Clack. Clack.
Seated on the train with his laptop balanced on his knees, he started putting together a rough planning document.
The game's setting would be modeled on Busan. Genre: open-world zombie survival. Camera: third-person over-the-shoulder. Graphics: near-photorealistic 3D. With sandbox elements mixed in.
With every line he wrote, he wondered whether his current headcount could actually pull this off on schedule—and yet, with every line they wrote, his people kept finding ways to deliver results. That was simply what developers at his studio were.
That said, he could predict the complaints. The workload's insane, I'm exhausted.I'm going to quit.
Does the Korean job market look like a joke to you? Perks that put the chaebols to shame, salaries fatter than any major corporation's—where exactly were they planning to go? Did they really think landing somewhere better than PlayForge would be easy?
Of course, people don't choose jobs on money alone, so some turnover was inevitable. In the future, plenty of workers would come to value work-life balance over raw salary.
His veteran staff he'd already remolded in his own image, but among the newer hires—the ones his hands hadn't fully shaped yet—there were bound to be a few seriously eyeing the exits.
But if burnout hit and they quit? Give it a few months at their new job, and they'd figure it out.
Ah. I'd rather work a little harder for this money at PlayForge after all.
Ah. They only chip in a little for meals here, forget housing support, and my commute eats up two hours round trip. PlayForge's benefits really were decent, weren't they.
There was no paradise in the place you fled to. Once they'd tasted the bitter dregs of the working world, they'd miss PlayForge—guaranteed.
And then, right around the time the fruit felt ripe, his company would reach out.
Come back.
The door to reemployment is always open.
And then he would greet the returning quitters with a beneficent smile, arms wide, moved to tears of compassion. The moment they walked back in, it was over. An employee who returned of his own free will would never leave again. From then on, the thought of walking out of PlayForge wouldn't even enter their dreams.
“Heh heh heh.”
Well, a few would still prize their work-life balance and stay gone—but then it simply wasn't meant to be.
Some might argue it was better to hire extra hands and trim the crushing workload rather than shower a single employee with money. Normally, that would be right. Fatigue piles up, and productivity rots.
But this industry worked a little differently.
One skilled, seasoned veteran was worth more than two bodies. The more people you added, the more time you burned just talking to each other. Explaining what this chunk of code does, explaining why that chunk of code is necessary—every minute lost to that was pure waste.
Granted, that was a programmer's math; the art team was a different story.
If someone on the art team wants to leave, well—so be it.
He'd move heaven and earth to keep the art team's core people, but junior artists? Compared to programmers, they grew on trees.
“Ladies and gentlemen, this train will be arriving shortly at Seoul Station. Passengers getting off, please prepare to—”
Lost in the planning document, he'd arrived in Seoul faster than he'd expected.
After leaving the station, he called Daniel before heading home.
“Daniel. I'm in Seoul. You're at home, right?”
[Yes. I'm home. You want to take Som-mungchi back? We'll see each other at the office tomorrow anyway—should I keep him tonight?]
“No, I'll come get him. Send me your address.”
[Okay.]
Address received, he headed for Daniel's place.
“Welcome! My sweet home!”
Daniel's apartment was an upscale officetel whose monthly rent the young man couldn't even begin to guess. He'd heard about the move ages ago, but he hadn't realized his friend was living somewhere this expensive.
“A jeonse lease?”
“No. No. I own it.”
“Understanding real estate invincibility—you're practically Korean now.”
“Of course.”
The man was already drawing a fat salary, and on top of that he took a cut of Dot Hero's revenue—so it was hardly a shock that Daniel could afford a place like this.
Though by comparison, Jo Yihan himself lived somewhere far more modest. He spent more of his life at the office anyway; what was the point of buying an expensive place?
“Here. Take him.”
“Som-mungchi. Come here.”
He reached out to take Som-mungchi from Daniel's arms—and the cat wrenched his head away. Sulking, apparently.
“Nyanyanyat!”
Ignoring the protest, he picked the cat up, and Som-mungchi immediately started battering him with soft little paw pads. Five days without seeing him—the little guy was angrier than expected.
“Calm down.”
He'd anticipated this and came prepared with a Churu treat. The cat went absolutely feral for these things; one of these and the grudge would melt away—
Swish.
Good grief. Som-mungchi refused the Churu.
“Oh…. You were eating these just fine earlier.”
“Hmm…. It's fine.”
Get him home, play with him a bit, and he'd be nuzzling Yihan's hand like nothing ever happened. However hard it was to coax a sulking cat out of it, could it really be any harder than coaxing a sulking girlfriend?
“I'm off. See you tomorrow.”
He left Daniel's officetel and hailed a taxi.
“Come on. Let it go.”
“…”
“I said I'm sorry, didn't I? I can't exactly take you on a business trip.”
“Nyat!”
Som-mungchi wailed as if demanding to know why business trips were off-limits when the office was fair game. Yihan slipped a hand into the carrier and stroked him gently.
“The hotel I booked says no pets—what am I supposed to do about that? Besides, cats hate unfamiliar places, remember?”
“Nyat.”
“And you're still saying take you anyway? Hmm. I'll think about it next time.”
There was no chance the cat understood a word, but he offered his excuses all the same. He kept talking to himself and petting the little one for a long while, and eventually the anger seemed to ease—Som-mungchi shifted into a position that made him easier to pet.
Though not entirely forgiven, it seemed. He still wasn't granted the paw pads.
“We're here~”
“Thank you. Card, please.”
He got out of the taxi and walked a short stretch to his building.
“Nyat!”
The moment he opened the carrier door, Som-mungchi shot out like an arrow. Apparently those few empty days had made him miss the place something fierce. Maybe the scent he'd left on everything had faded, because the cat threw himself into rubbing against the walls and furniture with great devotion. Yihan watched him for a while, then got to his own tasks.
First, he unpacked the luggage in his carrier and plugged in the laptop to charge. Aired the place out, ran the washing machine. A little housework later, his stomach was starting to growl.
Too much hassle. Should I just order delivery?
Trekking across all of Busan had left him more drained than he'd realized—by the time he got home, everything felt like too much effort.
Right. Delivery it is.
Delivery apps hadn't gone mainstream yet in this era, so he dug out one of the flyers stuck to his front door and hunted for a decent restaurant.
Been a while. Maybe bossam—boiled pork wraps.
He'd serve Som-mungchi a gourmet tuna can as a special treat, and treat himself to one too.
He picked up his phone, and just as he was about to place the call, the screen changed.
“Hello?”
[Hey! Hyung, I get out of the army tomorrow—did you prep my present or what?]
He'd completely forgotten.
His future employee was being discharged tomorrow.