The Shockwave of the New World
The kind of disaster I thought only paranoid preppers prepared for had actually happened. (And no, I'm not talking about the zombie outbreak.)
The guy was stepping forward with his right foot, holding a kitchen knife in his right hand, darting in and out with boxing footwork. He didn't answer my question; he just smirked. He was so scrawny he looked like a dried anchovy.
Then, without warning, he lunged at the bystanders. "Aaargh!" He pounced on a middle-aged woman and drove his knife straight down into her. This wasn't human speed. He was too fast. Had he awakened some kind of ability like Jihye and me?
The crowd scattered in a panic, leaving the bastard facing off against us. Jihye drew her revolver and aimed it at him. "Get off her and get down on the ground! Hands behind your back!"
The lunatic licked his lips. "Now you look delicious." This motherfucker dares to eye my woman? The psycho suddenly charged straight at Jihye.
Click! Click! Click! Click! Jihye pulled the trigger, but let alone live rounds, not even a blank went off. She froze in sheer panic. Stepping in front of her, I swung a nearby chair.
Unlike before, the psycho grabbed the chair with both his knife-wielding right hand and his empty left hand, pulling it hard. Feeling myself losing my balance, I let go of the chair. In that brief window, Jihye snapped out of it and drew the nylon cord whip I had made for her back at the apartment.
Seeing her pull out a cheap nylon cord instead of a tactical baton, the lunatic paused, looking at her as if she were doing something bizarre. Then, he lunged at her again. But Jihye wasn't the weak girl she had been this morning. She was a proud Awakened!
The nylon cord stiffened with mana and whipped through the air at blinding speed. The bastard, who had been bobbing and weaving like a nimble out-boxer, clearly hadn't expected this. He failed to dodge completely, and his right hand was severed clean off at the wrist.
Yet, he didn't even scream. He just backed off to maintain his distance. Is this guy a zombie, not an Awakened? It was weird that he could speak and possessed basic intelligence, but his complete lack of pain after getting his hand chopped off meant he was no ordinary Awakened.
As we stood there glaring at each other, he suddenly lunged at me. "Ugh!" He tackled me, slamming me to the floor. If I had properly trained in MMA instead of swordsmanship, he wouldn't have stood a chance. Unfortunately, I only had a single month of MMA under my belt, and the only weapon on me was a dagger hidden inside my jacket!
This scrawny bastard wasn't just fast; he was incredibly strong! I managed to block and dodge his left-hand punches, but then the psycho tried to bite me. In desperation, I threw up my left arm to shield myself, and his teeth sank into it. Fortunately, since he only had one hand left, he couldn't execute any proper grappling techniques or land clean strikes.
Realizing this, he pinned me down with his bleeding right stump and reached for my throat with his left hand. I was pinned beneath him, but he had no idea I had a dagger hidden in my jacket. Slipping my hand inside, I drew the blade and repeatedly stabbed him in the ribs and thigh. Fortunately, because I was wearing a thick jacket, the flesh on my forearm hadn't been completely torn off by his bite. The psycho thrashed in agony as the blade repeatedly sank into his side and thigh.
Whoosh! Jihye stepped in, channeling mana into her whip, and slashed the thrashing bastard across the side of his neck. His carotid artery was severed, and blood sprayed in a violent torrent. "Kyaaa! Murder!" a bystander shrieked from a distance. The doctors and nurses had already fled out of sight, leaving only a few clueless civilians watching the spectacle.
Jihye and I were momentarily taken aback, but Jihye quickly regained her composure. She pulled out her handcuffs, yanked the bleeding man's arms behind his back, and locked them. "Suspect apprehended." She casually tossed the dying man to me and dragged away the handcuffed woman who was face-down on the floor beside us. We needed to get out of here immediately and dispose of this corpse.
Flash— Suddenly, a blinding light erupted outside the hospital windows. Beside me, Jihye looked utterly bewildered, having no idea what was happening. The television in the hospital waiting room flickered and died. Rumble— About ten seconds later, the ground began to shake. Ten seconds. A highly significant number. This was a trope from niche post-apocalyptic web novels that only degenerates like me read. If the epicenter of the shockwave was the center of Seoul, it would take exactly this long to reach Suwon.
I urgently barked at Jihye, "Jihye, follow me, quick!" I ran in the opposite direction of the flash, heading deep into the building, far away from any glass windows. "Get down on the floor, close your eyes, cover your ears with your hands, and keep your mouth open! The shockwave is about to hit!" Jihye complied without a word. Taming her this morning was definitely the right call. But her posture was wrong. "Keep your stomach and chest off the ground!" Jihye glared at me with annoyance, but she adjusted her posture anyway. Is this the effect of the Brand? The compulsion didn't feel absolute, but she still obeyed in the end.
BOOM—! Exactly two minutes after the tremor, several nearby windows shattered with a deafening roar. Jihye was startled, and thinking it was over, she tried to stand up. I told her to wait a few more minutes. Once I was certain the danger had passed, I stood up with her. I immediately pulled out my smartphone to check the internet. Sure enough, there wasn't a single bar of reception, and the 'No Signal' icon was displayed. However, seeing that the phone itself wasn't fried, the EMP's impact on the Suwon area seemed to be limited, whatever the exact cause was.
Meanwhile, the fast-moving bastard had already died. I guess he wasn't some kind of superhuman after all. Since he was just a fast-moving zombie, let's call him a Fast Zombie. I had been too distracted by the nuclear explosion to notice, but a status window had popped up in the meantime.
You have received 1 Lottery Ticket from your Branded companion, Choi Jihye.
Ah, so killing zombies drops lottery tickets? And I can automatically receive tickets from the bitches I've branded. I looked to my side and saw Choi Jihye glaring at me, her face pouting like a child who had just had her toy stolen. "What's wrong, Jihye?" "Do you like stealing my stuff?" "I didn't steal it. The system took it automatically." Jihye's expression softened slightly at my explanation.
"Let's move this corpse and the woman to the patrol car first. Even if communications are down, our smartphones aren't dead, which means the police radio network might still be active. Though with the phone lines down, no one will be able to call in reports anyway." Together, we dragged one corpse and one living person to the patrol car parked in the hospital lot. As we hauled a bloody male corpse and a thrashing, newly conscious woman past them, the people who had crawled out of hiding after the explosion stared. However, seeing Jihye's police uniform, they assumed it was official police business and minded their own.
First, we loaded the male corpse into the passenger seat. I hadn't noticed earlier because of the chaos, but my mouth tasted dry and metallic, and a persistent burning smell hung in the air. We threw the thrashing woman into the back seat. "Give me the cord." Taking the nylon cord from Jihye, I looped it behind the woman's neck with my right hand, crossing it into an 'X' in front of her throat.
I wrapped the ends around my left and right hands a few times and pulled with all my might. Suffocating someone by blocking their airway takes about ten minutes, but strangulation blocks the carotid arteries—much like a rear-naked choke—cutting off blood flow to the brain. They lose consciousness in about ten seconds and are guaranteed dead within a few minutes. With her hands cuffed behind her back, she couldn't offer any real resistance. I waited a few minutes, but no notification window appeared. I guess killing zombies doesn't guarantee a drop every single time.
I decided to scratch the lottery ticket I had just received from Jihye.
◈ Acquired Points:45 Points
Oh, 45 points! But is that a lot or a little? Since I got it from a Fast Zombie and not a normal one, it must be a decent amount, right?
First, let's raise my Strength, which is the only single-digit stat. Raising Strength to 10 consumed 1 point. Oh, this is a steal! Then, raising Agility by 1 consumed 2 points. Ah, so once a stat reaches 10, does it cost 2 points per level?
Since I need to brand another bitch, I raised my Intelligence and Empathy to 20 each. That cost 20 points for Intelligence and 20 points for Empathy. I dumped the remaining 2 points into Agility, bringing it up to 12. Fighting that Fast Zombie today made me realize just how crucial Agility is.
My maximum Mana had increased from 10 to 20, and my current Mana pool had filled from 0 to 10. We decided to take Jihye's patrol car back to Jeong Minji's officetel. Looking out at the streets, it was absolute pandemonium. Roads were blocked everywhere by car accidents, but the police cars, ambulances, and tow trucks that would normally be dispatched were nowhere to be seen. Some people had simply abandoned their vehicles, while others were desperately trying to find detours.
"Jihye, let's dump this trash somewhere and get going." Jihye looked at me as if I were the piece of trash. What? I was just calling garbage what it was. We dumped the two corpses in a quiet, deserted alleyway and retrieved the handcuffs.
When Jihye and I returned to Minji's officetel, Minji was waiting demurely at the entrance like a young bride waiting for her husband—albeit with duct tape firmly covering her mouth.