Chapter 25: Good Farming Luck Today, But...
Bang!
Swoosh—
Having finally dropped the seventh zombie, Kim Jun blew across the smoking barrel and slung the rifle over his shoulder.
“Whew.”
With everything handled, he climbed back into the car.
He pulled a box of slugs from the driver’s compartment and loaded them one by one.
During the quiet moment, Eun Ji slipped on her glasses and studied the remaining storefronts.
The optician’s shop was gutted; nothing worth taking. The adult arcade, PC café, and karaoke bar beside it offered nothing useful in their current world. Worse, they were all basement-level. The thought of descending into those dark spaces made his skin crawl.
Eun Ji narrowed her large eyes and scanned the distance. Then she spotted something.
“Oppa.”
“Yeah? What’s up?”
“If we’re still gathering supplies… could we check that place?”
Kim Jun followed her finger. A beauty salon sat a short distance ahead.
It had a retro feel for a college neighborhood, but no better targets had appeared. He shifted into gear without hesitation.
“Beauty salon, huh? Good call. Let’s go.”
His own hair had grown out from the short military cut he preferred, turning into a shaggy mess that kept stabbing his eyebrows. The girls with their long, flowing locks would need proper tools to maintain them. It was a necessary stop.
He covered the short distance and parked in front, already mentally preparing for another sweep.
But the moment they saw inside, both he and Eun Ji grimaced.
Three zombies inside. They looked like a stylist and two customers—all elderly women.
“Shit. That’s annoying.”
“They’re right there in front of us…”
The neatly packaged shampoos, soaps, and beauty supplies were genuinely tempting daily necessities, but the situation was messy.
“Damn, that’s a shame. We only have two hair dryers anyway. Drying everyone’s hair every morning is already a battlefield.”
Kim Jun clicked his tongue, ready to drive away.
But Eun Ji kept staring into the salon, then spoke softly.
“Oppa.”
“What?”
“Should I get out and lure them?”
“…Have you lost your mind?”
Kim Jun’s expression turned stony. The woman who had been the perfect partner only minutes ago had suddenly thrown out a reckless idea.
“How many lives do you think you have to talk like that?”
“It’s doable.”
“Doable my ass! What if something goes wrong while you’re out there unarmed?”
Eun Ji glanced around and calmly explained her plan.
“I have this whistle around my neck. I’ll step out, stand in front of the door, and blow it. The zombies will react and come. You can shoot them from the car.”
“You want to play bait alone?”
“Isn’t that the only way to secure the important items?”
Kim Jun studied her, realizing she was completely serious.
This was the same woman who, on the day he rescued the top stars and ordered everyone to strip so he could check for bite wounds, had quietly said, “Just leave me behind and take the others.”
The one who, even after moving into the house, remained wary of him yet silently took over every household chore.
The iron-wall girl who had noticed the condoms, realized he was sleeping with the others, and simply said, “I understand, but that won’t happen with me,” while keeping her distance. She even maintained emotional space from the variety-show members she had worked with for years—except for her big sister Gaya—yet during supply runs she became a flawless, mechanical partner who supported him without complaint.
And now she was casually offering to throw her life on the line for basic hygiene products.
Watching Eun Ji, whose personality refused to fit into any simple category, Kim Jun fell silent for a moment.
Oddly enough, even though zombies were visible in the gap between the car and the salon, the three inside showed no intention of coming out. They shuffled slowly, almost lazily.
“Let’s handle it all at once.”
“Are salon supplies really that critical?”
“The more hygiene items we have, the better. Plus I saw shampoo and body wash for sensitive scalps in there. That’s the exact brand I used to buy…”
“So because they have your special shampoo, we absolutely have to raid this place?”
“It might sound strange, but I need it. That’s why I volunteered to be bait despite the risk.”
“Sigh… Fine. I understand.”
Kim Jun accepted her reasoning and decided to clear the zombies and loot the salon.
But he locked the car door so she couldn’t leave.
“!?”
“Supplies matter, but they’re not worth a human life.”
Dismissing her offer to act as bait, Kim Jun loaded the shotgun, double-checked both pistols, and steeled himself.
The piercing horn blast tore through the entire alley.
It was Kim Jun’s trump card—using noise and light to pull aggro, a technique he had perfected.
Beep— Beep— Hoooooooooonk!
He kept hammering the horn. The salon reacted instantly.
Crash!
Crunch—
The three zombies inside smashed through the glass door and began shambling out.
Luckily they were all slow walkers. The horn’s impact might have drawn others, but Eun Ji quickly scanned the surroundings.
“Thirty meters behind us. Walkers. Four or five of them.”
“Nothing in front. The residential alley?”
“Hard to tell, but they’re pretty far. No runners, as far as I can see.”
Kim Jun started the engine the moment he heard her report.
When the salon zombies stepped outside, he had already created distance. He stopped the car roughly ten meters away. Sure enough, they followed.
Their sluggish pace gave him plenty of time to prepare.
He glanced back once more, took a deep breath, and when they closed to five meters he pulled out the competition air rifle he had taken from the gun shop where he spent the night trapped with Emily.
It was compatible with the lead pellets and could fire multiple shots quickly.
Kim Jun cracked the window and sent a stream of pellets at the three zombies approaching the car.
Thump— Thump— Thwack—
With each compressed-air hiss, a zombie crumpled.
After dropping all three, he carefully turned the car around in the narrow alley and confirmed the fallen bodies ahead. Then he raised the shotgun toward the slow-moving figures still approaching from the far end of the street and fired.
Gunshots cracked through the quiet alley as zombies fell one after another.
Even so, Kim Jun kept a sharp eye on the three salon zombies he had dropped at close range, making sure they stayed down.
The three elderly zombies with permed curls—probably attacked mid-haircut—had collapsed after a single pellet each and showed no signs of getting back up.
Once the distant threats were eliminated, Kim Jun told Eun Ji to grab the oil from the dashboard and stepped out of the car.
He lit a cigarette, then poured the Zippo fluid she handed him over the fallen salon zombies and flicked the burning cigarette onto the pile.
Whoosh—
The stench of burning flesh mixed with gasoline rose, but both of them endured it behind their masks as they stepped over the corpses and entered the salon.
“All right. Quick and thorough. Let’s clean this place out.”
At Kim Jun’s words, Eun Ji moved like she had been waiting for permission. She immediately began grabbing shampoos for sensitive scalps and every care product in sight.
Kim Jun stood guard exactly as he had at the bookstore, sweeping every direction with his weapon ready. The slightest suspicious movement would be met with a barrel.
After securing all the hygiene products, Eun Ji moved on to the drawers.
She collected unused razors, thinning shears, clippers, hair dryers, curling irons, perm papers, hair dye, and every other beauty tool she could find.
“You know how to use all that?”
“…I was in the beauty vocational track in high school.”
“Nice!”
Several of the girls had been complaining that their hair was turning into a wild mess. Now they had proper tools for long-term survival.
While Eun Ji searched for anything else useful, she finished by taking the mirrors last.
Kim Jun watched her, then looked around the interior.
“You done?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll grab a few things for myself.”
He walked inside with his gun, stopped in front of the sink, drew the axe from his belt, and brought it down hard on the boiler’s wiring and pipes.
Bang— Bang—
He ripped the entire boiler unit free, separating wires, pipes, and components. Eun Ji gathered every loose item that had fallen to the floor and packed them all.
By the time they finished both looting runs, the sky had grown dark again.
Kim Jun felt genuinely satisfied. This was the first time a supply run had gone so smoothly with a partner who matched his rhythm perfectly. He turned the car toward home with a light heart.
But the journey back proved to be another trial.
Zombies suddenly lunging into the headlights made the entire scene feel like the genre had flipped from survival to straight horror.
In the pitch-black streets where the single headlight was the only illumination, silence stretched on. They dealt with zombies along the way and barely reached the house.
Screech— Ding— Ding— Ding—
The sound of the engine shutting off announced their arrival.
“You worked hard today, Oppa.”
“You too. Good job.”
The pair who had just completed a major haul encouraged each other before stepping out.
Kim Jun sprayed bleach across the vehicle to wash away the zombie blood, then scraped up the remains and burned them with lighter fluid.
“Whew. Finished.”
They wiped the soles of their shoes with bleach one last time and finally entered the house in good spirits.
Yet for some reason, the girls’ expressions were grim despite the mountain of supplies they had brought back.
Once everything was stored, the entire group gathered.
With serious faces, they told Kim Jun and Eun Ji what had happened while they were gone.
“Oppa…”
“What is it? What happened?”
“The water’s cut off.”
“…Oh, damn.”
They had known the electricity wouldn’t last forever, but now the water supply had finally run dry too.
Kim Jun headed straight to the bathroom to assess the situation.
The tub was full. The sink and every basin they owned had been filled to the brim. But no matter how hard he twisted the faucets, not a single drop emerged. The kitchen sink was the same, and so was the rooftop tank on the third floor.
What impressed him was how thoroughly the girls had prepared. They had filled not only washbasins and rubber tubs but even the bowls from their last dumpling-making session and every empty soju bottle.
“Hmm.”
He quickly calculated their total water reserves.
Then he gathered everyone and they ate a minimal late dinner—salad made with as little water as possible.
“All right, let’s break this down. In a long-term survival situation, water is non-negotiable. Just for drinking, the average is 2.5 liters per person per day.”
“When you add washing and cooking, it’s easily ten times that.”
Lessons drilled into him during his military days—emergency water and food requirements. Originally meant for wartime when water infrastructure was destroyed. Now it was their reality.
“Power plant’s dead. Every last drop in the pipes has been drained. This is what we’re left with.”
“Cooking rice is going to be the first problem. And washing dishes…”
“We already switched to mostly disposables last time, and everyone washed using the stored water. You all endured well until now.”
Having said that, Kim Jun laid out their new policy.
“We have three full water jugs from the purifier we looted today. That’s roughly sixty liters.”
At least drinking water was manageable for a while.
“Showers are the real issue. We’ve been sharing water by filling basins for four or five people at a time.”
Mari, the doctor most sensitive about hygiene, spoke up. Rana asked cautiously.
“Can’t we collect the used bathwater, boil it, purify it, and reuse it for several days?”
They had been using used water to flush the toilet, but she wondered if they should conserve even that. Mari shook her head.
“Doing that long-term will cause bigger problems. The water is already full of body oils and waste. If you keep filtering and reusing it, eventually it stops being cleaning at all.”
“Is that so?”
“If bathwater sits around, it becomes a breeding ground for bacteria. If multiple people keep pouring that same contaminated water over themselves…”
“It’d basically be a sewage bath… Yeah, I’d rather just not wash.”
When Rana quickly gave up, Emily spoke.
“Then should we ration out wet wipes? We can at least wipe our eyes and brush our teeth.”
No one called the suggestion dirty. That was how luxurious their previous lifestyle had been—showering once every three days with limited water, and some girls had used generous amounts before climbing into bed with Kim Jun for passionate nights.
“The bathroom situation is the most critical, isn’t it?”
Even if they used the gray water as sparingly as possible for flushing, it was still finite.
“We should use the toilet in the camper we added last time. It uses chemical agents instead of water. The waste breaks down on its own, so we only need to empty the tank occasionally.”
“Sigh. Everything from one to ten needs attention.”
Kim Jun began issuing clear orders.
“Good. Gaya, since you’re the oldest, I want you to monitor everyone’s water usage every day. Especially the water stored in bowls.”
“Yes, Oppa.”
“Mari and Nanika, you still have the purification filter we made before, right? Keep recycling water with it. From now on we’ll boil water for drinking.”
“Understood! Nanika, let’s get to work together.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
Next he turned to Do Kyung.
“Do Kyung, you’re the strongest of the girls, right? If we run low, open the rainwater tank in the backyard with Emily and haul some back. Think you can handle it?”
“Yeah… I learned how to use the corrugated hose and valve wrench, so I can do it.”
“You’ve officially become our water carrier.”
After giving those orders, he looked at In Ah.
“You’ve handled all the farming and cooking with limited water until now. We’ll keep farming since it’s essential, but the real priority is food—mainly rice and soup, yeah?”
“Yes. I’ll focus on dishes that use as little water as possible, like today’s salad.”
“And keep salt to a minimum.”
“Understood.”
That left Rana and Eun Ji.
“Eun Ji, we’ll need to search for a new water source on the next supply run. Rana, you’re in charge of housework right now, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Even if the house gets a little dry, no wet mops. Laundry is also a problem, so the washing machine is off-limits for now. Only hand-wash absolutely necessary underwear. And all used water goes into the toilet. Clear?”
“Yes, I understand. We’ll do it that way.”
Once again the surviving top stars tightened their belts and entered strict water conservation mode.
That night, Kim Jun took apart the boiler he had brought back, studying its components.
The numerous hoses, pipes, wires, pump, and heat-exchange sensor made his fingers itch with possibilities.
“I was saving this as a last resort… but it looks like we’ll have to use it after all.”
The relatively abundant life they had enjoyed for over two months had finally reached its limit.
But there was no rule that said they had to die. Using his own knowledge and the machines stored in the warehouse, Kim Jun began planning a self-sufficient water system, just as he had done for electricity.