Northward (4)
The only zombie left in front of Sheriff was one—the same one whose ribs had been shattered by that first crushing blow moments earlier.
As it staggered forward, the jagged rib fragments punching through its flesh tore the wound even wider. Through the gaps in its rotting skin, glistening internal organs coated in thick black blood were clearly visible. The sight was so grotesque that even Yubin, watching from a distance, couldn’t help but grimace. Yet Sheriff remained utterly calm, delivering a precise kick without the slightest hesitation.
Crack!
The zombie’s jaw took the full force of a 300-millimeter safety boot. It toppled, smashing its head against the rail, and Sheriff brought the hammer down on it without mercy.
Crunch!
The hammer’s tremendous kinetic energy slammed directly into the zombie’s face, snapping its neck instantly where it lay across the track. Its shattered skull lolled loosely as every ounce of strength drained from its twitching limbs.
“Haa…!”
Having dispatched no fewer than six zombies in the blink of an eye, Sheriff let out a heavy breath and wiped the sweat from his brow with the sleeve of his Gore-Tex jacket. Standing tall among the corpses with his hammer planted firmly, he looked every bit the war god—imposing, magnificent, overwhelming.
Of course, not everyone saw it that way. Right beside him, Mingu had already butchered three and was now methodically finishing off the fourth.
Whoosh—! Whoosh—!
Each time the tall, lanky monster in the brown polo shirt swung its arms and lunged, Mingu simply twisted his body with minimal effort, letting the attacks slip past while he studied its movements. He was deliberately responding a fraction slower than usual, yet the creature’s fingertips and teeth still couldn’t touch him.
“Groaaar—!”
The brown-polo monster slammed into the wall, spun around, and charged again with a thunderous roar. Mingu had seen enough. He stepped forward with his left foot and swung the machete in a wide, powerful arc.
Crunch—!
The heavy blade punched straight through the monster’s temple and lodged deep. Its neck bent at a sickening angle as it collapsed sideways. Even as the creature thrashed and slammed into the ground, Mingu kept twisting the blade, driving it deeper with cold persistence. When brain matter finally began to seep from the split skull, the monster’s howls and convulsions ceased completely.
“Definitely slower,” Mingu muttered, wrenching the machete free from the creature’s temple. Whether from prolonged darkness or some other factor, these things moved even more sluggishly than the ones he’d encountered in the subway last summer.
At this point their speed wasn’t much greater than an average young man’s. Manageable, in other words. Still, the requirement to destroy the brain made actually putting them down a delicate business.
“Yet here you are, huffing and puffing against these slow bastards.”
Mingu glanced at Sheriff and flashed his signature mocking smile, the words laced with dry amusement. Sheriff, chest still heaving, simply snorted in disdain.
“I killed two more than you, so of course I’m breathing harder! If I’d only had four, I’d have finished ages ago without breaking a sweat. Hoo…! Damn it, the stench!”
Grumbling, Sheriff covered his nose with his arm, face twisted in revulsion. The rotten odor rising from the zombies alone was nearly unbearable, but the crushed skulls and ruptured guts released something far worse. No matter how tightly he adjusted his mask, the smell seemed to pierce straight through his sinuses and into his soul.
“What do we do about this?”
Yubin glanced back with a worried frown. If those things’ reinforcements arrived tonight or tomorrow and picked up their trail… these corpses could become a serious clue.
“Drag them again?” Sheriff sighed, clearly not even wanting to consider it. They’d already spent the last three days hauling corpses around until they were sick of it. And without a cart, every single one would have to be moved by hand.
Ten corpses easily exceeded six hundred kilograms. Tying them up and hauling them would be exhausting. They were already struggling to breathe down here, with plenty of other tasks still waiting. No one wanted to add backbreaking labor to the list.
“Footprints are everywhere anyway,” Jinwoo said, switching off his headlamp and weapon light before pointing behind them. Their tracks stood out clearly against the thin layer of dark dust that had settled like fine ash. Sweeping it away would erase the footprints but leave broom marks behind. There was no wind down here to redistribute the dust naturally.
“All right. Then we abandon them and focus on disguising our direction so they can’t tell where we went.”
After a moment’s thought, Yubin nodded and picked up the icebox again. Washing away the pooling brain matter and fluids was impossible anyway. Dragging the bodies while they leaked would only leave even clearer trails.
“Yeah, yeah. Let’s take the easier route. Not that any of this is easy.”
Relieved they wouldn’t be hauling corpses, Sheriff strode forward with renewed energy.
“Oh my God, oh my God! This is too horrible.”
The Witch squeezed her eyes shut and shuddered violently as the group picked their way through the bodies. One track was packed with crushed skulls, while a severed zombie head lay rolling on the other. It really was grotesque. Still, there was space to walk if you were careful.
“Here. Step this way,” Yubin said, pointing out the clear spots.
“Okay! Okay! I’m trying, so don’t leave me behind. It’s just too scary. Oh, shit!”
The Witch raised a trembling hand in a wait gesture and took slow, careful steps. The way her feet shook, she looked like a tightrope walker balanced dozens of meters above the ground.
“No conscience at all, pretending to have such a weak stomach. This is the same bitch who threw people to the zombies as food.”
Unable to contain his irritation any longer, Sheriff hurled the barb. The Witch ground her teeth and shook her head fiercely.
“I didn’t do it! How many times do I have to say it before you believe me? That was a crime committed by Doctor Oh at the Yongsan headquarters!”
“Bullshit. Say something believable for once, huh? If we raided your company’s facility in Busan right now, we’d find plenty of survivors locked up there too.”
Sheriff turned his back on her as if he couldn’t be bothered, spitting the words coldly. The horror of the video showing the Little Chairman’s “meal” was still burned into his memory. Just thinking about anyone from Taeyang Group made his blood boil. Cruel, wicked bastards—no better than demons.
“If you really don’t believe me, come with me to the South Area and see for yourself! I’ll prove it!”
The Witch kept babbling—excuses or persuasion, it was hard to tell—but Sheriff simply waved her away like a bothersome fly.
“Talking about going together? Am I insane? Why the hell would I go there? Do I look that gullible just because I accepted your surrender?”
“Damn ass…!”
The Witch glared at Sheriff’s back and muttered the curse under her breath. Being ignored seemed to infuriate her beyond endurance.
“Ugh!”
She nearly hurled the plastic bag she was carrying but stopped herself at the last second. Even afterward she kept breathing hard, seething with resentment.
She really is crazy…
Yubin clicked his tongue inwardly. Even as a hostage, she refused to yield an inch. It painted a vivid picture of what kind of person she must have been before all this.
Shock or not, her constant whining, complaining, and arrogant tone were almost unbearable. He was tempted to abandon her on the spot. But…
“Huuu…”
Yubin let out a long sigh, forcing down his rising anger. She wasn’t just an annoying complainer—she was a bargaining chip that could save countless prisoners. He had to endure.
Thud. Thud.
The group resumed walking in heavy silence. The Witch’s occasional outbursts whenever they passed a corpse broke the quiet, but otherwise they moved without a word. Everyone’s mind was occupied with simulations of what awaited them outside Gunja Station, and the air down here was simply too foul to encourage conversation.
They had traveled roughly three kilometers along the tracks—only about two and a half in actual underground distance—yet they were already approaching their physical limits. The stagnant, stench-filled air was oppressive. It felt like climbing an oxygen-starved mountain.
“Huu…”
When they finally reached the Gunja Station platform, the entire group bent over at the waist, each of them letting out deep, exhausted sighs.
“Let’s get out. Haa…! I can’t take any more of this. My head feels like it’s going to explode…”
Sheriff jumped up onto the platform without hesitation. Mingu and Jinwoo followed without objection. They had trained their bodies relentlessly for three months, but nothing had prepared them for breathing air thick with the rot of corpses. Not that endurance training could fix something like this anyway.
Sniff—! Sniff—! Achoo—!
Even Samsuk-i, now on the platform, shook its head vigorously and sneezed, clearly trying to clear its nostrils.
“Looks like even he struggled. How the hell do the rats survive down here? Ugh…”
After pulling Yubin and the Witch up, Sheriff wiped sweat from his face and shuddered.
Cholera. Plague. Malaria.
The names of terrible infectious diseases floated through Yubin’s mind. A vast, formless dread washed over him. Even if they killed every zombie in the country, it wouldn’t end there. When tens of millions of corpses began to rot simultaneously, an entirely new catastrophe would begin.
“Ugh…!”
Yubin shook his head sharply, casting the dark thoughts aside. This was no time to worry about a distant future. If they didn’t secure food and a safe place to sleep immediately after leaving the station, they would die long before any epidemic could spread.
No. Absolutely not.
Yubin bit his lip hard and steadied himself. Death might hover over them constantly in this world, but he refused to die here like this. He still had to return to Big Island, see Jenny’s beautiful smile again, feel the ticklish touch of her soft, delicate fingers in his hair, and hear her playful, affectionate voice. He wanted to dream of tomorrow once more.
“What are you grinning about by yourself? You okay?”
Jinwoo nudged him in the ribs. Yubin quickly schooled his expression into seriousness.
“No, it’s nothing… Just denying reality for a second.”
“All right… let’s see what’s waiting for us. You three keep some distance. Don’t crowd too close.”
Sheriff, taking point alongside Mingu as they climbed the stairs, glanced back with a warning. There was a chance of running into zombies right outside the station. From here on, they needed to be far more cautious.
“Shouldn’t I take the front? I think it’s safe to use the gun now,” Jinwoo said, approaching Sheriff just before the ticket gates.
“It would definitely be better, but…”
Mingu and Sheriff exchanged a look. In terms of raw anti-zombie lethality, Jinwoo was clearly superior—especially in open areas where they had to watch every direction at once.
The real question was whether they could risk gunfire in this environment. They weren’t sure how far the sound would carry through all the surrounding concrete. If the situation outside wasn’t too dangerous, staying quiet and hidden for today might be wiser.
“You don’t have that thing, right? You didn’t bring it?”
Sheriff made a small gesture like turning a dial and asked Yubin in a low voice. Yubin answered quietly enough that the Witch wouldn’t hear.
“Of course I dumped it in the Han River. We had to prioritize this.”
He lifted the icebox containing Terra’s blood bag. Even after everything they’d been through, the container sealed with blue tape remained tightly closed.
“Ah… right, but still…”
Intellectually, Sheriff understood that discarding the equipment was necessary to hide their connection to JL. Emotionally, he still regretted it. From now on they would have to navigate dangers using only their senses and intuition, without the zombie detector.
“Fine. Then let’s ask the shaman. Any chills? Goosebumps? Feel any heavy ghost energy up there?”
Sheriff turned to Jinwoo. If his zombie sense was picking up serious danger, they might as well rest here and move one station farther underground.
“Not really. Just… normal?”
Jinwoo shrugged. “Normal” simply meant dozens of zombies lurking or wandering somewhere nearby.
“Good. Then Jinwoo takes point. Mingu and I will guard Yubin and this woman from behind. But first—”
After outlining their formation for exiting the station, Yubin looked at the group.
“Have you all clearly decided where we’re going before we move?”
“Huh? Aren’t we heading to where that bastard soldier locked up the women? I think the building was six stories. That height should be decent, and there might still be some of the food we left there.”
Sheriff answered without hesitation. Jinwoo immediately shook his hands in refusal, expression serious.
“That place is no good. It’s full of windows—we wouldn’t be able to turn on any lights at night without the glow leaking out. Let’s go to the theater. You know, the one we were thinking of using as our base.”
“Huh? I didn’t even consider that. There’s no food there.”
Sheriff shook his head. Seeing the immediate clash of opinions, Yubin let out a small chuckle.
“Heh. You were really planning to just charge outside without any plan? You guys really…”
Put kindly, they were brave and aggressive. Put bluntly, they were reckless to the point of stupidity. The three of them getting trapped in Jabeolle had been no accident.
“We’ll settle in the theater and retrieve supplies from the six-story building. I don’t want to worry about light leakage either.”
After a moment’s consideration, Yubin offered the compromise. Being with friends was one thing, but spending the night with a half-mad villainess in complete darkness would be stressful. The enclosed structure of a multiplex theater would solve that problem.
“Fine, let’s go with that. No point being stubborn about it…”
Sheriff scanned the area map on the station wall and nodded.
Whiiiing…
A cold wind thick with complex odors blew down the stairs. Jinwoo pressed himself against the wall and cautiously peeked upward. The visible slice of sky was small, but for the moment there were no zombies in sight and no howls to be heard.
He watched the eerily still scene for a full five minutes before asking, without turning his head, “How’s it looking over there?”
Sheriff, staring up the opposite staircase, answered curtly.
“Nothing.”
Good news. Samsuk-i’s calm silence meant no humans carrying the scent of gunpowder nearby either. It was time to step out into the streets of an ordinary zombie-infested world.
“Let’s go!”
Jinwoo took a steadying breath and bounded up the stairs with Samsuk-i at his side.
“Move out!”