Chapter 67
Chapter 67
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 67
Chapter Title: There Were No Zombies There (1)
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"Huh? Sergeant Han!"
Eun Na-rae's high-pitched voice echoed through the lobby of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency as she spotted Sergeant Han Han-su, whom she'd worked with at Suseo Police Station.
"Hey, Eun Na-rae! You've put on some weight! Looks good on you. Must be eating well, huh? Hahaha."
Na-rae glared at Sergeant Han with wide eyes and chattered back at his greeting, which was anything but a compliment to a young woman.
"I haven't gained weight. I'm slim. I'm wearing a corset, so you can't see my belly fat."
"Really? I had no idea you were going that far. Your face looked so puffy, I thought you'd gotten fat. Must just be swelling then. Got fatty liver?"
"Whatever. Did you transfer here?"
"I was originally with the Metropolitan Investigation Unit, got in some trouble, and was temporarily at Suseo. But Inspector Eun—no, Reporter Eun—what brings you here?"
"My team leader and senior came for witness questioning. I came to pick them up. Hehe. I'm the rookie at my new newspaper too."
"Ah, the Daesung Hospital disaster witnesses, huh. The place is a madhouse over that case. Anyway, being the rookie suits you, Reporter Eun. Stick with it till you die. It's easier that way. Take care. I've got witness questioning to do."
Sergeant Han, who'd been rambling on with pointless chatter, turned to leave but suddenly remembered something and called out to Na-rae.
"Oh, right! Reporter Eun!"
"Yes? What?"
"Remember that Sacheon-ri mountain lodge you asked about before? I've got something to tell you about it. I'll call you later when I'm free."
"What is it? Tell me now."
"I'm busy. Plus, one of your colleagues' questioning is being handled by Inspector Yoon. You know him? Yoon the Blockhead. Good luck!"
Sergeant Han, whatever his rush was, finished what he had to say and scurried off.
Just then, Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong entered the lobby, spotted Na-rae, bowed deeply in greeting, and headed to the Metropolitan Investigation Unit office.
A few days earlier, when he'd fought a water ghost to save a child who'd fallen in the river, Na-rae had helped him out.
Unfortunately, upon returning to duty, he'd had to face reanimated corpses once more.
And today, he was visiting the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency's Metropolitan Investigation Unit as a witness to the horrific incident at Daesung University Hospital the night before.
The spacious Metropolitan Investigation Unit office was packed with witnesses there for questioning.
Among them were Byung-su and Dong-jin.
The Daesung Hospital disaster case had been assigned not to the local precinct but to the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency because even the precinct officers were subjects of investigation.
* * *
Inspector Yoon Il-han began the questioning mechanically.
The funeral hall, presumed to be the initial outbreak point, had no survivors.
The hospital's main building floors 1 and 2 handled payments, certificate issuance, and other administrative tasks—also no survivors there.
The two neighborhood patrol officers who arrived first on scene and four officers from the local precinct had been torn to shreds and killed.
The hospital's disaster prevention room and security team's CCTV footage had been collected by the National Intelligence Service that very day.
To get an objective grasp of the situation, Il-han started his first witness questioning with a surviving firefighter who'd been at the scene with the police.
That firefighter was Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong.
He already knew the man.
The funeral hall had 156 deaths including staff; the main hospital building had 225 including staff, inpatients, and outpatients; plus 6 police and 8 firefighters—for a total of 402 dead.
Surprisingly, there were no injuries.
Of those, around 100 were killed by gunfire from the police special forces and local precinct officers; the rest were presumed killed by knives and other sharp weapons.
The media was focusing on reports of police firing indiscriminately.
The survivors were guardians and staff from the 3rd-floor ICU waiting room, and patients and staff from floors 4 through 8, all of whom had evacuated to the rooftop.
Additionally, staff and patients in the basement had survived by sealing off the passages, it was presumed.
After Lee Ja-seong's questioning, they planned to question a young man who'd evacuated from the 3rd-floor ICU waiting room to the rooftop, a disaster prevention staffer, and reporter Kim Byung-su.
Only after asking name, resident registration number, age, address, occupation, affiliation, position, religion, and education level—typing the answers—could they get to the main questions.
The questions he needed to ask were pre-written in a Korean document.
After asking, summarizing, typing, printing for the witness to check, and making corrections, it would usually take two to three hours.
The witness questioning itself wasn't particularly difficult.
"Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong, what time did you respond to the Daesung Hospital call?"
"The report came in at 7:10, and we arrived at 7:25."
"Does it usually take that long?"
"Normally around 5 minutes, but it overlapped with rush hour traffic, so we were delayed. We were fast; the follow-up teams were luckily held up by the roadblocks."
"Ah, luckily... Yes, you responded to a fire report?"
"Yes, a fire was reported. The fire location was given as the 3rd floor of Daesung University Hospital's main building, the ICU ward."
"Who made the report?"
"A Daesung University Hospital disaster prevention staffer."
"Had you visited Daesung University Hospital before?"
"Yes, frequently. I was there early yesterday morning too."
"What for?"
"Previously for fire inspections since it's our jurisdiction. Yesterday morning, we responded to a fire at a commercial building, admitted severely injured Fire Lieutenant Park Soo-chang. I stayed in the ICU waiting room until morning, met his wife and son, then left."
"Back to Daesung Hospital. Upon arrival after the report, where was the fire?"
"There was no fire anywhere."
"What was the situation at the scene when you arrived?"
"There were zombies."
"Pardon?"
"Zombies were eating people."
Il-han stopped typing and looked at Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong.
Lee Ja-seong was a middle-aged man with a rigid, honest-looking face.
He'd look like a farmer in the fields, a fisherman at sea, or a teacher at school.
"Could you elaborate?"
* * *
Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong began describing the situation in detail.
What we'd been told on the way was that there was a fire in the ICU ward on the 3rd floor of the hospital's main building.
Since a colleague was hospitalized there, we hurried as fast as we could.
The odd thing was that police had also been dispatched due to a hospital security report of drunks causing a disturbance in the lobby...
There were more police than expected.
They'd arrived around the same time as us, so we thought it strange there were so many.
There were no visible fire marks on the building exterior.
Still, we had to check inside, so we geared up and entered.
No fire signs, so police had gone in first; we followed, heading to the reported fire point on the 3rd floor via the lobby...
We entered the lobby entrance, noting the oddity of body parts and blood splattered around the main building.
That's when we heard gunshots and screams.
And right before our eyes, the police who'd entered first were being eaten alive.
Some resisted, but it was hopeless.
There were just too many of them.
They filled the entire 1st floor from the lobby...
It was my first time seeing it, but I knew what they were.
Walking corpses. Zombies.
When a bitten police officer stood up, they stopped biting him.
That officer then lunged at his colleague and bit his neck; the attacked one had his nape torn out, blood gushing, seemingly dying instantly.
But the one we thought dead instantly rose again, saw us, and approached.
Our team rushed to help, but it bit our team member's face instead.
Shocked, I yanked the zombie's arm, and it came off clean.
Sticky blood oozed from the stump, congealed like it had hardened.
Definitely not living blood.
Even with its arm torn off, it didn't scream, just kept biting our team member's face.
Then it chewed and swallowed the flesh.
I backed away in shock as they swarmed our team.
Then they came for me.
To save my comrades, I gripped my axe and fought.
Until their sticky blood coated my hands on the axe...
Eventually, we were surrounded.
There were just too many...
Then a tall man came running at terrifying speed and threw me out of the building.
He threw out the unbitten comrades too.
As we tumbled outside, our other team members rushed over; I stopped the few trying to enter the hospital.
"No! Don't go in! Please!"
Even if I hadn't stopped them, they probably couldn't have.
Later, when the police special forces and additional officers arrived, the entrance was blocked like an invisible glass wall—they couldn't get in.
They had to borrow our axe to break the lobby glass to enter...
Anyway, after the special forces went in, riot shield police followed; I think the plainclothes ones didn't enter.
After that, the massacre began, as you know.
But it wasn't a massacre like the media says.
I called them zombies, right?
Anyone seeing them would know they were zombies.
There were zombies in that hospital.
* * *
"Do you know who threw you out of the building, Captain?"
"Yes. I didn't know that day, but I found out today. He's here... That gentleman over there."
The person Fire Captain Lee Ja-seong pointed to was reporter Kim Byung-su, waiting for his questioning.
Byung-su, seeing Inspector Il-han staring at him, responded with an awkward smile.
* * *
A young man sat before Il-han.
He was a 23-year-old college student who'd come to visit his high school teacher's sickbed in the ICU ward with five friends.
"You told the 5th-floor nurse there was a fire?"
"Yes."
"You sounded the fire alarm too?"
"Yes."
"Was there a fire?"
"No."
He answered so firmly.
"Then why did you lie about a fire?"
"To evacuate people quickly."
"Why evacuate? No fire—what was the need?"
"It's hard to explain, but I did it because of what I saw on the 3rd floor."
"What did you see on the 3rd floor?"
The young man hesitated a moment, then pulled out his smartphone and showed two videos.