75J-Cup Auntie Min-jung's Truly Outrageous Special Skill: Breastfeeding Unlocked... [Awakening][3]
"Kieeeeeeeeeek!!!"
"Kueeeeeeeeeek!!!"
"Kueeeeeeeeeet!!!"
Rrrrrrrrrrrumble!!!
The reason Geum Tae-yang's eyes flew wide open was simple: a swarm of zombies wearing the company jumpers from his father Geum Il-bong's workplace came charging straight at him.
He whipped his head left, right, left again.
Dozens of zombies had their jaws unhinged and were barreling toward him. Tae-yang's eyes darted frantically, every nerve wound tight.
Thank god...
It was a moment of pure, hair-raising danger — and yet a sigh of relief slipped from his lips.
It's not Dad...
His father Geum Il-bong was not among them.
By now he had reached the immediate vicinity of the company building, and from this point on he kept running into jumper-clad zombies. Every single time, Tae-yang flinched hard, then checked not only their faces but the name tags on their jumpers before putting them down.
Fuck!!!!! Please!!! Please!!!!!
Thuddddd!! Thuddddd!! Thuddddd!!!
At last he forced his way inside the company building.
There were no survivors in sight. Everyone had either turned or already fled. The anxiety on Tae-yang's face only deepened, and the words coming out of his mouth grew rougher still — because among the zombies he was cutting down, he started recognizing the company uncles he had once greeted when he came here to visit his father.
Dad's got to be here... He has to still be alive...
He cleaned out every last zombie that came at him, enduring the mounting dread and crushing pressure with everything he had. Eventually Tae-yang reached the area near the night-duty room where his father would have been.
"I never believed in God before, but I'll believe starting now... Please keep my dad safe..."
The door to the night-duty room came into view. Across that door, clear signs of a struggle with zombies filled Tae-yang's sight. He began muttering to himself like a man reciting a prayer.
"I'll repent for every time I threw a tantrum as a kid saying I wanted to see Mom... All I need now is my dad... I just want to live and be a good son to him... Please, just grant me this one thing..."
Step...! Step...! Step...!
Tae-yang approached the night-duty room, a place emptied of any living presence. The closer he got, the more frantically he muttered under his breath.
He had always told himself he was a blunt, unsentimental son. But he had given everything for Geum Il-bong. His natural temperament was restless and physical, yet he had spent his whole life holding himself in check for fear of causing trouble. Studying had never been his passion — still, wanting to make his father proud, he had ground his body into dust and clawed his way into a top-tier university. And the last remaining family debt? He had taken a year off school, worked himself to the bone, and paid it off. The money he earned had covered his father's hospital bills too. That was how devotedly Tae-yang had lived as a son — and right now he was dredging up sins he had never even committed, begging God for mercy.
That was how desperate he was.
Clack!
Tae-yang's hand closed around the doorknob of the night-duty room.
He must have dropped his phone somewhere while he was running inside to hide... Or maybe he evacuated somewhere even safer...
His mouth had gone bone-dry. His hands were shaking. He forced his mind into a loop of pure positive thinking, like chanting a spell.
Click...!
He turned the knob at the same time.
Creeeeeeeak...!
Then he carefully pushed open the outer door of the night-duty room.
"Ah... Dad...? Dad...???"
Step...! Step...! Step...!
Face taut with tension, Tae-yang stepped inside. In a voice thick with dread, he called for his father as he scanned the interior.
He had taken maybe four steps into the room when—
"Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr...!"
—he came face to face with a zombie wearing a company jumper.
"Ah... Ah..."
The moment their eyes met, Tae-yang froze, pupils blown wide. The tender word on his lips stuttered and buffered, refusing to come out clean.
"Dad..."
That soft, aching word finally left him in a whisper.
The zombie inside the night-duty room was his father, Geum Il-bong.
The name on the chest tag read Geum Il-bong. Even transformed, the face was unmistakably his father's.
The instant that reality registered, Tae-yang stood locked in place for roughly five full seconds.
"Kueeeeeeeeet!!!"
The first one to move was Geum Il-bong, now a zombie. Sensing Tae-yang's presence, he locked onto him.
"Kuhaaaaaaaaat!!!"
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!!!
Zombie Geum Il-bong charged his son.
Grab! Seize!!
Tae-yang caught both of Il-bong's slightly outstretched hands.
Clang!!
The steel pipe rang out as it hit the floor — the pipe Tae-yang had been holding in his right hand. He hadn't dropped it by accident. He had deliberately let it go so he could take hold of his father's hands.
Thud-thud-thud-thud!!!
Tae-yang was driven backward until his back slammed into the wall behind him. A zombie that had lost all consciousness seemed capable of sudden, considerable force in close quarters. But the real reason Tae-yang had been shoved so helplessly was that he had offered no resistance at all.
No — he couldn't resist.
"Kuhat!! Kuet!! Kuek!!"
Zombie Geum Il-bong shoved his face in close, snapping with that distinctive zombie bite-work.
"...."
But Tae-yang did not turn his face away. He simply stared, silent, at the face of the father who had become a monster.
You knew I'd come, didn't you...
There was no threat in it at all.
A gag was clenched between Geum Il-bong's teeth. He had put it on himself, by the look of it. Bitten and turning, Il-bong had known his son would come looking for him — and he had prepared so that he would not be a danger when that moment arrived.
His hands too... there are marks...
Both of Il-bong's wrists bore the traces of restraints. He had gagged himself first, then bound his own hands. But self-tied bindings were never going to hold. After he turned, thrashing had worked them loose — leaving the wounds on his wrists.
Tae-yang saw all of it. Felt all of it. That was why he could not push back against the father pressing into him.
You wanted to see me... right to the end...
With sorrowful eyes, Tae-yang looked at the face of zombie Geum Il-bong, still snapping uselessly around the gag. Il-bong could have chosen to turn somewhere else. Instead he had chosen this night-duty room. He hadn't been able to leave — not when there was even a chance he might see his son one more time.
Tae-yang felt the desperate wish of a father who had bound himself and still insisted on remaining here.
Trickle...! Trickle...!
The moment he understood that final emotion his father had carried, tears spilled down Tae-yang's face.
"Fuck!!!!!!!!"
Scramble!!!
Tae-yang tore free of his father's hands, slipped sideways, and bolted forward.
Yank!!
Dash!!
He wrenched open the innermost door of the night-duty room and went through. It was the room with the night-shift desks and beds.
Clang!!
Then he slammed the iron door shut behind him.
"Kieeeeeeeeeek!!!"
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Zombie Geum Il-bong, who had followed him, pounded on the iron door from the outside.
Collapse!!!
Tae-yang dropped onto the bed inside. His head fell forward as if the strength had gone out of his neck.
"Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!!"
Clutching his head, he screamed.
Nngh... If I'd just gotten here faster!!!! Fuck, if I'd just been faster!!!!!!!
As the tears poured, regret crashed over him. In truth he had been as calm as anyone could be and had handled everything at speed. But with his father already turned, none of that was any comfort. The idea that he had done well and that it couldn't be helped felt like nothing but an excuse — and Tae-yang could not accept this situation on those terms.
I still hadn't done anything for him... Just a blunt, awkward son of a bitch who never knew how to get close...
A grief that felt like it would rip his chest open. He could not endure it without blaming himself — because self-blame hurt less than the raw fact of losing his father.
"Kuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!"
He thrashed and fought it, but the sorrow flooding in was so merciless that Tae-yang felt he might go insane. Clutching his head, he screamed.
He should have contacted me by now... He definitely would have messaged me around this time...
Pacing...! Pacing...! Pacing...!
Kim Min-jung was wearing a hole in the living room floor of the bunker's first level, restless beyond measure. This was the hour when Geum Tae-yang should have found Geum Il-bong. If nothing had gone wrong, he would have texted her. But there was no word.
Right. I need to start accounting for the realistic worst-case scenarios now.
Relying on pure optimism alone was no longer wise, Min-jung decided.
What am I supposed to do? Looking at Tae-yang after he's lost his father... How do I even comfort him...?
She ran the scenario of Geum Tae-yang having lost Geum Il-bong. If it came to that, she would essentially be his guardian.
"Hmm, I got the fridge downstairs activated, Mom. And I roughly checked the food storage over by the warehouse too."
Step! Step! Step! Step!
At that moment Park A-young came walking up from the bunker's basement.
"Did you? Hmm..."
"Hey, A-young. From where you're sitting — do you think this situation is going to last a lot longer, contrary to what your dad said?"
The worry on Kim Min-jung's face vanished as she composed herself and answered her daughter. From Min-jung's perspective, A-young clearly did not believe the current crisis would wrap up anytime soon. So she asked, carefully, whether Park Do-chul's claim that this would all be over soon had been complete nonsense.
"This didn't just happen in one specific area. It hit the entire country simultaneously."
"And that's not even the half of it. Similar outbreaks keep getting reported in other countries too."
"At this scale, even if the military steps in, you're looking at months at minimum."
Park A-young calmly, methodically laid out just how much of a load of crap Park Do-chul's words had been.
"Ha!"
Hearing her daughter's airtight reasoning, Kim Min-jung planted a hand on her hip and let out a long breath. It didn't sound like she was catching her breath — it sounded like she was swallowing down rage.
Definitely not the Mom reaction I used to see. The old her would've put a hand to her forehead and sighed quietly under her breath.
Having laid out the truth, Park A-young watched Kim Min-jung in silence. Ever since Min-jung had come home with Geum Tae-yang, something about her had been off — and for A-young, who had grown up watching a mother who was the complete opposite of this, it was genuinely fascinating.
"Anyway, the fridge itself is completely empty. What's in the food storage is all dried goods, canned stuff, combat rations — that kind of thing. But there's a ton of it. Bottled water too. A ridiculous amount."
She went on to report what she had found downstairs. From A-young's assessment after mapping most of the bunker's systems, this was clearly not a facility built to last only a short stretch. So she had checked the basement immediately — and sure enough, a serious stockpile of supplies was waiting there.
"But we've got three people minimum right now. Everything else aside, our water consumption is going to blow way past any estimate, A-young."
As the one who actually ran the household, Kim Min-jung pointed out that they would need to secure more drinking water.
"The construction was peaking right around the time I was stuck at home on leave, so I caught glimpses of the bunker blueprints coming and going..."
Park A-young fell into deep thought. Last year, when bunker construction had been at its height, she had been on leave and home a lot. That had given her enough of a look at the bunker's specs that her sharp mind could already run the numbers.
"I think there was a system for finding and connecting to groundwater. I'll look into that, Mom."
Groundwater. This incredible bunker had a key that could solve their drinking-water problem entirely.
"Alright. Thanks for handling that, sweetheart."
Hearing about the groundwater, Kim Min-jung's face lit with hope.
I wonder if she got hurt watching me fight with her dad earlier...?
Park A-young headed back down toward the basement. Watching her daughter's retreating back, Kim Min-jung's expression turned pained. The girl was so composed, so sharp and efficient, that it only made Min-jung feel more guilty as a mother.
In that moment, with her head spinning under the weight of too many worries, another notification window appeared before Kim Min-jung's eyes.
Special skill Breastfeeding has manifested for Supporter Kim Min-jung.