An Unfamiliar Ceiling
I ended up inside a zombie apocalypse novel. An unfamiliar… ceiling. I’d just wanted to try it out, but it really was a completely unfamiliar ceiling. At least I was definitely alive. I was inside a building, after all. It seemed a survivor had helped me. After I killed all those zombies, maybe they’d felt grateful and saved me?
“……Huh?”
I sat up, and as the blanket slid down, my naked body came into view. My brain froze for a second. Wait, why the hell am I completely naked? I could understand taking the clothes off. Yeah. I’d been bitten pretty badly, so maybe the fever made them strip me. But why the fuck does my body smell so nice?
“……………………”
I hurriedly sniffed my arm. It smelled like someone had properly washed me with body wash. So that meant they’d taken off all my clothes, washed my hair, laid my naked ass on the bed, and even tucked me in with a blanket. The moment I realized that, my face burned with heat. Look, after entering the novel, I’d stopped feeling embarrassed about having a woman’s body. It was my body now, so I’d just rolled with it. But that didn’t mean it was okay for someone else to see it. Even when I went to the bathhouse, I still covered my crotch and moved carefully.
“…..Ugh.”
More importantly, my body had healed completely. The stomach that had been covered in bruises was now pure white like white jade, and my arms and legs were smooth without a single scar. Since walking around naked wasn’t exactly ideal, I wrapped the blanket around myself like a burrito and slowly climbed off the bed. This seemed to be inside an apartment. Looking out the window, it was the first floor. It was definitely near where I’d fought. The scenery I’d run past was visible from the veranda.
“More importantly, where are my clothes……”
Being naked felt a bit weird. I knew no one was around. Actually, now that I thought about it, it was a little scary. Worried I might have been sexually assaulted, I frantically checked my body, but thankfully there were no signs of that. No strange sensation in my lower belly, no stinging in my crotch. Comparing it to the information I’d read in the novel, my body was close to normal.
“Fucking idiot.”
When I looked around the house again, it looked like a place where a woman lived alone. The survivor was definitely female. Just looking at the note on the dining table made that clear. The neat handwriting, the women’s suit hanging in the living room. And on the table was kimbap wrapped in a cloth.
“Aha.”
The note was written in neat handwriting that was obviously a woman’s. It said this:
I couldn’t trust the military so I stayed hidden, but I saw you fighting. It looked like all the zombies were dead, so I brought you here. I used the water I was going to take with me when I left to wash you. There was still some gas left, so I made kimbap with it. Eat it before you go.
Your clothes are folded on the desk beside the bed. I put your bag next to the bed too. I roughly organized your stuff inside it. Anything useful as a weapon should be in the master bedroom.
“Oh……”
It was exactly as the note said. The clothes I’d been wearing were neatly folded on the desk beside the bed. I’d expected them to be filthy, but they looked like they’d been washed once, so I could wear them without feeling gross. And as for weapons in the master bedroom, I found something very satisfying.
“Whoa.”
It was a large, heavy baseball bat. I had no idea what it was made of, but it was insanely heavy. When I tapped it, it didn’t sound hollow at all. At this weight, I figured one swing could kill a zombie. I slung it over my shoulder.
“Ultimate Lee Yeji. Revival.”
I spouted some nonsense for fun, then, since I was hungry, I grabbed the kimbap on the table. It wasn’t sliced, but that didn’t matter. I could just tear into it with my mouth. It didn’t seem spoiled. It was a bit cold, but I was grateful for any food at all. I wondered how long it had been since I’d eaten rice, and before I knew it I’d devoured all six rolls of kimbap.
“……………………”
Even after eating all six, I was still a little hungry, so I slung the bag over my shoulder. I chewed on a chocolate bar from the bag as I opened the front door. There were no zombies outside. It looked like she’d already cleared them out on her way.
Normally I would’ve wandered around the area in this situation, but I didn’t have time right now. I had to get back to the PC Bang before it got dark. Since the Pointer had appeared, other variants would show up soon too. If there were variants that handled chasing, there had to be ones that handled the actual hunting. And the ones in charge of hunting were the Hunter types.
They were variants that could do both bipedal and quadrupedal movement. Basically, they were faster than Runners. When a Pointer evolved, it became a Marker. Those things reacted to a Marker’s pheromones and chased prey. Then truly horrible things would happen. Pointers and Runners could be shaken off once you left their line of sight. But once you fought a Marker or Hunter, they’d chase you for weeks. It would turn into an unplanned siege battle. So I had to get back before those things showed up.
There was the option of sleeping here, but that felt too risky. There wasn’t much to block the entrance with, and since it was the first floor, zombies could get in. She must have run away knowing that too.
“Goddamn it.”
The watch in the bag said it was already 6:44. The sunset would disappear soon and darkness would fall. I hurried out of the building and retraced the path I’d run earlier. Thankfully, no zombies appeared. The reason was obvious. I’d smashed all their heads in, so of course they wouldn’t show up.
After running for twenty straight minutes, I successfully reached the officetel where I’d been staying. I ran a bit farther, opened the emergency exit, and slipped into the PC Bang.
“Whew.”
I felt incredibly proud. It had been a bit of a sucker move, but I’d saved people, so it was only natural. Lee Yeji and her parents would live safely under the military’s protection. All three of them were decent people, so they’d do well even in the military. I would’ve liked to joke and tell them to live strong there too, but I didn’t have the energy.
The reason was obvious. This baseball bat. It was ridiculously heavy. It didn’t seem to be made of aluminum, but I couldn’t guess the material. Still, there were advantages. Weight meant power. Power meant destructive force. Or something like that. Anyway, since it was heavy, swinging it would definitely pack a punch. It would be a useful companion, just like my solid steel knuckles. And unlike the others, I’d probably be able to use it for a long time.
“From now on, your name is Dialogue and Peace. It’s a name honoring the two seniors who left us first.”
Of course the baseball bat couldn’t answer. But for some reason I felt like it nodded, so I drank some bottled water while thinking that. To swing this thing properly, strength training was essential. And there was a gym on the fourth floor here. So I pulled out the “Cooperation” I’d carefully hidden under the bed. I hoped this baseball bat wouldn’t part ways with me as easily as Dialogue and Peace had.
“Ugh.”
I wanted to open the gym right away, but I was too scared. If I knocked on the door and zombies came down from above, it would be annoying. So for today, I decided to check the fifth and sixth floors. If I had time, I’d go up to the seventh. And since it was getting dark, I’d need light, so I took out a flashlight too.
“Preparation complete!”
It was truly Ultimate Lee Yeji. I thought that no matter what zombies came, I could crack their skulls open, and climbed the stairs with that confidence. As I went up, I realized something strange. There were almost no zombies on the emergency stairs or regular stairs. I was almost at the fifth floor, so they should’ve started appearing by now. But if there were no zombies, that was good for me, so I didn’t mind.
The entire fifth floor was a reading room. Strangely, there wasn’t a single sign of life.
“……………………”
Not even any zombies. It was weird. From the traces, it looked like people had been here and then fled. Overturned drink cups on the floor, open books. But even after searching the entire reading room, I couldn’t find a single zombie. Just in case, I opened the bathroom, but there was nothing. No zombies on the emergency stairs or regular stairs either.
“Hmm………”
I figured the people on the fifth floor must have fled to the sixth or fourth floor. But there hadn’t been any zombies on the fourth floor. Maybe they’d run to the coin karaoke place? But there weren’t many corpses there either. The number of plants was too small to think all the students in the reading room had died. So there was only one conclusion.
“It’s the sixth or seventh floor.”
I didn’t know if the roof was open, but given the circumstances, it was highly likely the people had gathered on the sixth or seventh floor. But there were no zombies on the sixth floor either. Just a ton of trampled, dried-up plants. I didn’t know exactly what these plants were, but I knew what category they belonged to. They were the edible-type plants that started appearing from the middle of the novel. Plants that bore fruit to provide nutrients for the zombies. Of course humans could eat them too, and there were survivor groups that cultivated them. They’d probably grown thickly throughout the building, borne fruit once when there was no water, and then withered.
“This is weird.”
There were three academies on the sixth floor. I searched all of them, but there were still no zombies. The floor was just covered in dried plant debris. The seventh floor had a PC bang, and it was the same—only plant remains everywhere. This was so strange that I kept searching the entire building. I spent three whole hours turning over every place zombies might be, but there was nothing. The only place I could think of was the roof. The stairs leading up from the seventh floor to the roof were packed with dried plants.
“Haa……”
I wanted to go up right away, but I couldn’t right now. It was dark outside, so I wouldn’t be able to fight properly. Instead, I gathered some frozen food from the seventh-floor PC bang, went down to the basement, heated it up, ate, and went to sleep.