Chapter 3 Part 1

The sound of more than twenty zombies flooding into the hallway instantly made the surroundings noisy. Do Ji-hyuk and Yoo Min-ho, puzzled by the out-of-place beastly noises, stood looking at the end of the hallway. Just then, a high school student who got off the elevator stopped walking toward the building entrance and looked in the direction of the sound.

It was the high school student zombie who had once chased me to the real estate office. First impressions were such a scary thing. Seeing the high school student, who looked like a perfectly normal person, made me feel unfamiliar and sent a shiver down my spine. But the thought didn’t last long. A zombie running at full speed from the end of the hallway attacked the high school student. There was no time to delay any further.

“F*ck, open the door right now! You need to cooperate if we’re going to get out of this f*cking place or not!”

As I grabbed Hyeon-ho by the collar and shook him, he smiled with a playful look on his face. His expression, which seemed to be deliberately provoking me, made me furious.

“Why are you so angry? I’m here, living in this f*cked-up world you created without complaint.”

“…What?”

“If you die, you can just start again, can’t you? You can’t die anyway. You, me, everyone here.”

“…F*ck. If you don’t open the door right now, I’ll throw you to the zombies first. If you get bitten, you’ll turn into a zombie too, won’t you?”

But even with my threat, Hyeon-ho just laughed silently. If my guess was correct, the person who had been sending me text messages and the one who lowered the shutter was this man named ‘Hyeon-ho’. In the movie, Do Ji-hyuk, who hid in the management office to avoid the zombies, lowered the shutter later, but by then, a significant number of zombies had already spread outside. In other words, the world was doomed from the start. However, this place was similar to the scenario I wrote, yet there were subtly different parts.

First of all, the two main characters, Lee Chae-eun and Cha Min-jae, were missing, and the rest of the characters were completely different from the actors in the movie. It was somewhat strange to consider this a movie, a novel, or even a world of its own. But by far, the strangest thing was the man in front of me.

…No matter how much I racked my brain, I had never written about a man named ‘Hyeon-ho’. It wasn’t that I couldn’t remember him because he was a minor extra. The real estate agent in the original was unmarried, so this character couldn’t have existed in the first place. Moreover, ‘Hyeon-ho’? Hyeon-ho was the pen name I used when I wrote the scenario.

“It’s a joke. A joke. Of course, I’ll open it for you. I don’t want to die either. Even if I die, I want to die peacefully, not as a stinking beast.”

After confronting me for a while, he suddenly made a smiling face, pulled a key out of his pocket, and opened the management office door. Click, as soon as the fire door’s lock turned, I shoved Hyeon-ho inside. Feeling anxious, I looked back at where the zombie was and saw the high school student shaking in the middle of a pool of blood. The other one had already found a new prey and was running towards us. F*ck, how much do these bastards have to eat to feel full? It seemed like the sensation of fullness had been deleted.

In a hurry, I pushed the real estate agent and Do Ji-hyuk inside and turned around to see that, f*ck, Yoo Min-ho was nowhere to be seen. Where the hell did this crazy bastard go! I wanted to go into the management office and lock the door right away, but it was impossible without Yoo Min-ho. The zombie was less than five steps away.

It was running so fast that with every step, the zombie’s dangling eyeball was about to fall to the ground. A weapon, what could be used as a weapon? Unfortunately, a cutter knife wouldn’t do much damage. Three steps, two steps. The zombie was right in front of me before I could even do anything. Was this a failure again? That was the moment I thought so.

Thwack-.

Suddenly, Yoo Min-ho appeared behind me and struck the zombie’s head with a bright red fire extinguisher. Due to Yoo Min-ho’s enormous strength and the zombie’s running speed, the zombie’s head was literally smashed to pieces right before my eyes. The moment blood splattered everywhere, I instinctively turned around and covered Yoo Min-ho’s face. This was because getting blood in the eyes could easily lead to infection with the zombie virus.

“…What, don’t cover it, move aside!”

“F*ck, I told you not to touch the fire extinguisher! You can get infected by blood! Do you want to turn into something like this too?”

“…What? Crazy, it’s not dead? Is this even a person?”

“Just get inside quickly!”

As I was about to push Yoo Min-ho inside, the zombie, whose forehead was completely caved in, clung to my waist. Goosebumps rose from my back, and I felt nauseous.

“Ah, f*ck, I’m really going crazy!”

One of the eyeballs that had popped out when it was hit by the fire extinguisher seemed to have burst, leaving one eye socket empty. It was truly a horror scene. I gouged out the zombie’s remaining eyeball with the cutter knife I was holding. But the zombie, which couldn’t feel pain, just opened its mouth wider while still holding onto my waist.

Now, I could see the high school student turning into a zombie and running towards us. As the end came to mind, the cruel sensations I had experienced countless times revived in my head, and I fell into a state of panic. I didn’t want to die like this again. I wanted to live. I really, really wanted to live.

“Cover your face!”

It was the moment I was in a panic, not knowing what to do. Yoo Min-ho started screaming and hitting the head of the zombie clinging to my waist with the fire extinguisher like a hammer. Thud, thud! Every time I felt the impact, my whole body swayed. Nevertheless, the arms around my waist didn’t loosen, so he grabbed both of the zombie’s wrists and forcefully pulled them off. It was an incredible display of strength.

“Come inside quickly!”

I heard Do Ji-hyuk’s urgent voice from behind. Yoo Min-ho, who had pulled the zombie off my waist, pushed me inside and tried to close the door as he entered, but a zombie’s hand suddenly came through the gap and grabbed his forearm. My vision became dizzy. If the fingernails dug into his flesh, all this effort would be in vain.

In a hurry, I looked around and saw a fire ax placed inside the management office. Thinking that something proper had finally appeared, I took out the ax and shouted.

“Everyone, turn your heads!”

Chop! Thud!

…Crazy, I never thought I’d have to chop someone’s wrist with an ax in my life. The sensation felt through my two hands holding the handle was eerie. Moreover, the fire ax was not as heavy or sharp as I thought, so it didn’t easily cut through the bone. I became impatient and started stomping on the tattered wrist with my heel. It was truly a state of selflessness.

“Haa… Ha! F*ck, f*ck.”

After repeating it several times, the wrist was finally severed, and the iron door closed. At the same time, a loud noise, like a torrential downpour, began to ring out from somewhere. It was the sound of zombies gathered behind the door, pounding on the iron door. Now, relieved that I was alive, I collapsed on the spot from the exhaustion, then got up and examined Yoo Min-ho’s forearm. I needed to check if there were any wounds inside his clothes.

Fortunately, the bare skin inside the denim jacket was smooth. But my relief was short-lived as I noticed the bloodstains on Yoo Min-ho’s pale cheek. Although contact with the skin wouldn’t cause infection, I wiped his cheek with the back of my hand out of unnecessary apprehension. Finally, confirming that both of Yoo Min-ho’s cheeks were clean, I felt the strength drain from my body, and I collapsed back onto the floor. The ceiling seemed to be spinning.

“F*ck, what are those things? Did they all go crazy at once?”

Yoo Min-ho asked in a confused voice, but I didn’t have the energy to answer. I turned my head to look at Hyeon-ho, and he was sitting in front of the CCTV in the management office, staring at something. I could see the real estate agent next to him, looking at the spot on his neck where the cutter knife had touched, speaking with a worried expression.

The thought that we had evacuated to the safest place since I opened my eyes in this damn building brought a mix of emotions. The biggest emotion among them was relief. Even if we failed this round, the relief that we could reach the management office in the same way. But unlike me, a heavy silence continued in the management office.

“…Could it be, did you bring us here to protect us from those things?”