Chapter 61
There was no time to grasp what had happened.
Shin Hae-jun and I hurriedly put our clothes on and rushed outside the car, without questioning who went first.
As soon as we did, we saw a massive horde of infected, and the realization that this vast number had all been inside the power plant made my spine tingle. With such numbers, it might have been too much even for Shin Hae-jun and me. If we hadn’t escaped initially, we would have been torn apart and killed without a chance.
“We definitely lock the door when entering the power plant, right?”
“That’s right. Someone must have opened the door for them.”
“Someone…?”
No, no. That’s not important right now. What’s crucial is that the infected horde is heading towards the town, where people are sound asleep, completely unaware.
“The people…ugh!”
As I tried to move quickly, my legs momentarily gave out, and I staggered. I barely caught myself on the car door, but I could feel my thighs trembling uncontrollably, and I had the sense that I wouldn’t be able to stand properly.
“Maybe we shouldn’t have gone for that last round.”
I rolled my eyes at Shin Hae-jun, who was making smug jokes despite clearly seeing my condition. But since he was also looking at me, our eyes met. Only then did the embarrassment and shame start creeping up my face, and the back of my neck began to burn. I shook my head, covering my neck with my palm.
“Now is not the time for that. First, we need to figure out what to do about those infected…”
“You get in the car.”
Shin Hae-jun abruptly cut me off mid-sentence. Get in the car? Did that mean he planned to fight them alone? I didn’t quite understand.
“Excuse me? I must have misheard you.”
“I’ll lure the infected away. You drive into town. Warn the people and find a sniping position. And wait there. Got it?”
“…..”
I didn’t even think to make a joke about whether he trusted my driving skills. Instead, I just stared at the infected horde still pouring out of the power plant, blackening the ground beneath them.
“Can you lure them?”
It was practically a wave-scale horde of infected. Suggesting he could lure them all away by himself was ridiculous.
“You might end up luring yourself to death.”
At that, Shin Hae-jun chuckled.
“Now you’re cracking jokes too, Lieutenant Min. You’ve grown up a lot.”
“No, that’s not what I meant…”
“Go ahead. I’ll follow behind.”
“General!”
I instinctively grabbed Shin Hae-jun’s arm with urgency, but he didn’t flinch. Instead, a cold gun was clenched in the hand that had just embraced me tenderly.
“Lieutenant Min.”
He continued speaking as if his core identity was simply that of a soldier acting on instinct.
“We can never leave anyone behind.”
That it’s our duty as soldiers to always guard the rear, that is our mission… is what he seemed to say.
Was he saying this because of orders he had received? Or had he always carried this mission, but the orders forced him to pretend otherwise?
“Move. Quickly!”
I couldn’t tell which way he was more inclined, but following Shin Hae-jun’s words seemed right for now.
“Please be careful.”
I hurriedly got into the car, turned the steering wheel, and Shin Hae-jun began running in the opposite direction from me.
🕂
Bang!
Having gotten somewhat close to the infected horde, Shin Hae-jun fired a shot into the air. Most of the nearby infected turned their heads toward him with eerie clicking sounds.
“Shit, there’s so fucking many of them—”
———!
Before his words could finish, the infected screamed and charged at him, and Shin Hae-jun swung his rifle and started running as far away from the city as possible.
Rat-tat-tat-tat! Bullets flew towards the infected’s heads, beautifully blowing some of them apart. But that was it. Merely taking down a few would not stop this vast horde.
Shin Hae-jun pulled the pin on a grenade and threw it towards them. Thunk, roll roll, the grenade hit the ground and tumbled a few times before releasing a force that seemed intent on tearing everything nearby to shreds. Kwaaang! The infected were sent rolling, torn apart by the grenade blast, most with shrapnel embedded in their bodies. But that was all. The ones with intact heads, or in other words, with brains still alive, moved their limbs without paying any attention to their bodies’ condition.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat! Bang! Boom!
Gunshots and explosions echoed alternately. Although Shin Hae-jun was being pushed back, this might be enough to somehow prevent them from advancing towards the city.
“I need to make sure I don’t die.”
Now that Ahyeon was gone, getting bitten meant the end.
Unlike before, he couldn’t luckily rely on her help to remain human today.
So he had to protect himself somehow while fighting them off… Huh?
The urgent train of thought couldn’t continue. Shin Hae-jun’s eyes trembled as he took in a certain sight.
Gangwon is where many variant infected creatures have been sighted. That means among the infected creatures here, it’s impossible to tell which ones are variants. It could be one out of ten, or one out of five. That’s why Shin Hae-jun had decided to engage them without considering whether they were mutants or not.
But his assumption was wrong.
“…Fuck.”
It was ten out of ten. They were all mutant infected.
And not just ones with enhanced physical abilities that Shin Hae-jun had seen before, but rather…
“Thinking… they’re thinking.”
Raising dead brains to ‘think’ like humans.
Otherwise, how could they give up chasing Shin Hae-jun right in front of them and opt to run towards the city?
They abandoned just one human, Shin Hae-jun, and chose thousands of humans instead. This wouldn’t be possible without ‘thinking.’ If they were the original thoughtless infected, they would move to devour the immediate prey rather than forgo it for a potentially bigger gain behind them.
Thinking? Does that mean the virus can inject ‘thought’ into corpses? The words of the high-ranking officers, drawn from his speculation, lingered in his mind. However, Shin Hae-jun was convinced that they were indeed thinking, especially after encountering the infected creature he had questioned Ahyeon about earlier.
The virus must have been dormant. It waited for prey to come into sight while lying dormant. So when it saw Ahyeon, it manifested instantly, like that!
If Ahyeon wasn’t a carrier, she would have ended up the same way without a doubt, and she might have had to sacrifice an arm or leg in the process. So… thanks to her antibodies, Ahyeon survived, but other humans won’t. Unaware that their seemingly healthy counterpart is actually infected, they will die without even realizing it.
“We’re screwed.”
Gripping a gun in each hand, Shin Hae-jun leapt high with his exclamation and charged into the midst of the infected, opening fire.
Rat-tat-tat-tat! Bang! Bang!
———!
The fight between the infected creatures and humans. Shin Hae-jun swung his gun, punched, slashed with a knife, and then grabbed the gun again, repeatedly struggling to somehow tie their feet and hold them down.
This was contrary to Shin Hae-jun’s traits, those he had shown so far—unless ordered, he didn’t care whether humans lived or died and didn’t particularly mourn their deaths. That’s why Ahyeon found it more puzzling.
Shin Hae-jun was also surprised by himself. Why was he behaving like this? Why?
“…Ah.”
Bang! Bang! In the midst of firing, Shin Hae-jun let out a wry chuckle. He finally seemed to grasp the reason for his actions.
“In this world where dozens die when I close my eyes and dozens more turn infected when I open them. What could be greater than that?”
The image of Ahyeon, smiling brightly while praising new life, was stuck in his mind.
“So, I always wished for Eunjin’s happiness.”
Ahyeon kept coming to mind, always hoping for others’ happiness more than her own.
“Huuk….”
Remembering her crying because she couldn’t protect the happiness of others, wishing she wouldn’t grieve any further.
So.
“We can never leave anyone behind.”
He willingly chose to be the one left behind. Going so far as to discard the life he cherished so dearly.
The fact that all of this was because of Ahyeon was utterly ridiculous, but it allowed Shin Hae-jun to feel his emotions purely.
“I like her.”
Bang!
The bullet fired by Shin Hae-jun pierced through the infected’s head, and another one immediately lunged at him.
———!
I really, really liked her.
Shin Hae-jun muttered one last time.
🕂
Thank you for reading! ♡
🥺