Infected Without a Wound

The rickety ladder they'd climbed had snapped partway up — exactly the kind of accident they'd been dreading — but somehow, impossibly, the young man and his group made it to the top alive.

They'd held on to hope after the announcement told them the sixth floor was safe. Once they actually got up there, however, they quickly realized things were far from good.

"Why exactly are you people in charge of our restaurant's ingredients?"

"Because it's a state of emergency! We're the ones who cleared out the zombies — is it really so much to ask?"

"Ha! Anyone listening would think we just handed everything over for free. We helped too, you know! And those weapons you used to deal with the zombies? Where do you think they came from? Did you forget we gave them to you?"

It was the food court staff and the sheltering customers, locked in a bitter standoff. The young man, wary of the venomous atmosphere, approached them carefully and made his presence known.

"Excuse me."

"A s-soldier? Good Lord. Are you with the rescue team?"

The mistake had come from his uniform, and he shook his head to correct it.

"No, sir. Today's my discharge date, you see. I stopped by the department store and got trapped here, that's all. I'm a civilian."

"Ah…."

They sagged with disappointment for a moment before their eyes sharpened, sweeping over the young man, the female employee behind him, and the child.

"You're not faces I recognize. How exactly did you get up to the sixth floor? We've blocked every entrance — escalators, emergency stairs, the elevators."

"I'm sorry? Weren't you the ones who told us over the PA to come up here?"

"That was the security-room guy who monitors the CCTV. He did that on his own."

"Ah…."

The young man's brow darkened at how unwelcome they were making him feel.

"I asked how you got up here."

"The service elevator's… ladder. We climbed it."

"Damn it. We'll have to block that off too."

"No need. The ladder's snapped."

"Well. Lucky us, then."

With an air of well, you're already here, they finally let the young man and his group in.

"You, sir, come this way. And you — the lady and the kid — we'll need to search you over there. Believe me, I hate this as much as you do, but given the circumstances, I hope you'll understand."

"It's fine. I'd have done the same."

Only after the search confirmed no bites, no wounds, was any freedom granted to them.

"You can stay in that section."

Following the direction of the man in the food court uniform, the young man moved off — and at last reunited with the female employee and the child.

"Minsu! Over here!"

"Are you all right, Sua? You seemed badly shaken ever since you almost fell in the elevator."

"I've gotten a little better now. But Minsu, did you have to take your clothes off too? They only let one or two people in, but they made me strip right in front of everyone! I thought I was going to die of embarrassment. You were embarrassed too, right?"

"Barracks life gets you used to that sort of thing, so… I was fine."

"Really? So men who've done their service just don't care about being seen naked, huh…."

"No, that's not it, it's just that I'm used to—"

"Goddammit. Are you kidding me?!"

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

The two of them, nerves easing a little now that they'd reached a safe zone, had been chatting with the drowsy, nodding-off child between them when the shouting erupted.

"Are you serious? All we're saying is that everyone should pool what they have to survive together — how is that worth getting this angry over?"

"And who decided you get to make that call?! We bought that stuff with our own money! It's not enough that we're being asked to share our food and water — now you want to seize it by force?!"

"Ha. Hey! When did we ever take anything by force, huh? Is it not simpler for everyone if the food and drinking water are gathered in one place and managed? Did you not do your service?"

"You son of a—!"

The voices of the department store customers and the staff kept climbing, the argument going nowhere fast. The young man tried to look away, but when the child beside him woke and began trembling at the adults' quarreling voices, he stepped in for her sake.

"Everyone. Please calm down, all of you."

"Who the hell are you now? If you just got here, stay out of it!"

"I don't know the full situation, but survivors fighting each other like this… it isn't right. You all know that better than anyone. Even working together, there's no guarantee we'll survive."

"Who said we wouldn't cooperate? It's them acting like we owe them our food and water, like it's only natural!"

From what the young man had overheard, the customer representative's demands had indeed gone too far. With the staff holding the advantage in numbers, pushing that kind of unreasonable line would only end badly for them.

Still, the young man had no intention of taking the staff's side and nursing a grudge from the customers.

"There's something more important than all this."

"And that would be…?"

"The corridors. We need to check them, don't we? Things may be safe right now, but who knows what variables could come. We should split people up and reinforce the barricades properly."

Even this — the finger-pointing, the struggle over who held control and who owned the supplies — was nothing more than their bodies' desperate flailing for survival. Without a guarantee of safety, every word of it was empty air.

"Fine. Let's do another inspection first and talk afterward. Everyone's running ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠too hot."

"Ahem. Agreed."

Just as the young man had suspected, the barricade had been shaken badly loose by the zombies drawn to their raised voices.

"We'd have been in real trouble without you, my friend. A barricade on the verge of collapsing… Say, do you think the zombies have some kind of intelligence?"

The young man shook his head.

"If they did, we wouldn't still be alive."

"Fair point."

By the time the barricade inspection was finished, it was nine o'clock. A little early for grown adults to sleep, but these were people who had lived through the surreal, and one by one they began to doze off anyway.

"Let's set a night watch. Four from our side, four from yours. Two-hour shifts."

"Sounds good."

The representatives chosen by unspoken agreement — one from the staff, one from the customers — settled the watch rotation. By a stroke of luck, neither the young man nor the female employee was assigned to it.

Exhausted from the longest day of his life, the young man sank onto his makeshift bedding of piled clothes, and sleep took him almost instantly. And then he dreamed — of a memory that, if only he could forget it, he would erase without hesitation. And yet one he never, ever wanted to lose.

"…Aaagh!"

"…hey! …up! …help me!"

The instant the truck was about to meet his sister, some commotion outside ripped him out of the dream and dragged him violently awake.

"Uwaaagh!!"

"Get the hell up! If you don't want to get bitten, everyone get up, NOW!"

He scrambled upright and scanned his surroundings.

"Why are zombies in here?! What was the watch doing?!"

"We don't know! Someone was sleeping fine one second, and the next they turned!"

For all their worry about the horde outside, the zombies had already breached them from within.

"Check the body! Look for bite wounds, anywhere!"

"There's nothing — nothing but its crushed skull!"

"Don't tell me…?"

When the chaos finally settled, the survivors who had lived through even a midnight uproar learned the truth.

You could be infected without a single wound.

Having finished walking the staff through the design document with the projector, I began issuing orders.

"Programming Team's first objective is to complete the prototype as quickly as possible."

"Hmm. W-would it be possible to get an exact d-deadline…?"

"The faster, the better. This time, I'll practically be living with the programming team, so don't worry too much about it."

Unlike ACD, I wasn't planning to build a codec or a voice chat system as a separate workstream, so the prototype wouldn't take all that long. My rough estimate: three months at the outside for the prototype, up to eight months for the polished vertical slice we'd show publishers — a year in total.

"The Art Team will work under Team Leader Cha Juhui's direction, with only the team leader coming to me for final approval. The graphic concept should lean as close to photorealism as we can manage. Once Juhui sketches out the zombie forms, the playable characters and NPCs, and the building exteriors, I'll review them."

"Photorealism…? We've always built our games with dot or cartoon graphics, though. Can we really pull this off?"

"I understand the worry, but all of you have grown a great deal since then. You'll have breathing room until the prototype is done — treat it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠as training and keep honing your craft."

"Yes, sir…!"

With the art assignments handed out, I turned at last to Daniel, who had been standing with his arms crossed, staring at the design document glowing on the projector.

"Daniel. This time the sound effects have to feel a little more real. The shuffling of zombie footsteps, the impact of the player's strikes, doors creaking open, windows shattering — the list goes on. You've got a mountain of work ahead."

"What about the assets I already built?"

"They need to be more realistic. To put it mildly — every sound you can hear in everyday life might have to exist in this game. And on top of that, you'll need to compose the BGM."

"Hmmm…."

"Can you handle it solo?"

"I'll give it a shot, won't I. When's the deadline? Sound effects and BGM combined."

This game would be no easy challenge for Daniel either. Even Dot Hero and ACD put together might not match its sheer volume.

"That depends on how fast development moves, but… a year at minimum, same as the programming team."

"Generous."

"No. It'll be tight."

This time, we were going to create what was nearly a world of our own.

Even if it was confined to a single region — Busan, the model for the game's setting — its density would be extraordinary.

Ancient Scroll, Red Dead Salvation, Fallout, the GTM series — the titles that define the open world. Works that took years upon years of development, and we were daring to go toe-to-toe with them.

We might have to hire more staff partway through because we'd run short of hands. Having never built a game this massive, we might burn whole weeks wrestling bugs no one predicted.

One thing was certain: this would be harder than anything we'd developed before. Not just me — every last one of my employees would have to level up.

"D-Director. I have a question."

"Go ahead, Jaemin."

"Th-then will this project ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠also release on PC? Th-through Storm?"

"Good question. Our next title will not be a PC-only release."

"Th-then…."

"That's right. We're going to consoles."

Even if mobile and PC continued gobbling up the industry's pie bite by bite, the console's position in the future would remain rock solid. Some players, after all, game on nothing but consoles — and I intended to use this opportunity to put our work in front of exactly those users.

"D-Director, c-consoles are a somewhat different development environment from anything we've d-done before…."

"Don't be scared, Jaemin. Mobile and PC were both firsts for us too, and you nailed them. Consoles will be no different."

Every project at PlayForge has been a challenge, and this one would be too. Jaemin nodded, apparently convinced.

"Th-then will it be Naso's Z-Box, or Sonia's F-FlagStation?"

He'd already worked out in his head that Nendo's handheld wouldn't have the horsepower to run it, and hadn't even bothered to mention it. That's our proud Programming Team Leader for you.

"I don't know yet."

"…I'm sorry?"

I laughed as Jaemin scratched his head in bewilderment — and who could blame him? In this era, console games were normally developed for a chosen platform from day one. The development environments of Naso's Z-Box and Sonia's FlagStation were wildly different, and while Z-Box was one thing, building for FlagStation meant writing FlagStation-native code.

"Through the vertical slice, we'll develop with the Z-Box in mind for now… but if the terms aren't good, we'll have to swing over to Sonia."

"Ah…."

Jamin groaned at the prospect of possibly doing the work one and a half times over. But hey — if we had to go with the side whose conditions were drastically worse, so be it.

"Let's prepare thoroughly."

So that whether it was Sonia or Naso, neither of them would have any choice but to offer us the best terms in the business.