I had been running along the hallway when a sudden thought made me stop in my tracks.
Come to think of it, I’m a zombie too. Would anything really change if I went looking for Cha Do-hyun?
It would be wonderful if Cha Do-hyun were alive — more than anything — but even if I did come across him alive, what came after that was the problem.
Because at the end of the day, I was a zombie.
Even if I went to Cha Do-hyun, that would be the end of it. I might even end up putting him in danger. Just as I’d been bitten and turned into a zombie, I could bite someone else and turn them into one too.
No — would Cha Do-hyun even want me near him in the first place? Even if I hadn’t lost my reason like the other zombies, I was still a pitiful zombie who could do nothing but limp around and growl.
“Do you think so too?”
I asked Kim Gwang-deok, who was standing blankly beside me. Of course, the only sound that came out of my mouth was “grrk, grrrrk” — but the zombie in front of me was watching me quietly, as if actually listening to what I said. I asked again.
“To everyone else, we’re just monsters, aren’t we…?”
Not that I had any intention of biting anyone, not even a little. It might be a bit embarrassing to say it about myself, but I was a fairly decent zombie, in my own way. I hadn’t lost my reason like the other zombies — I was a zombie capable of basic judgment.
But even if that was true right now, just like in the movies, there was no telling when I might lose my reason too.
…Should I go back?
Even if I did find Cha Do-hyun, if he was still alive somewhere in this school, it was obvious he’d run the moment he saw me. He was a survivor who’d managed to stay alive by avoiding zombies all this time — in a way, that was only natural.
Surviving by evading zombies — that was an instinct no human could go against.
In that case, it might be better not to do anything that could be seen as a threat. Wanting to check if he was alive or dead and actually going to find him were two different things — the latter was just my own selfishness.
The zombie in front of me seemed to react to those words and made a sad expression. Not that a sad expression was visible on an already ruined face, but the corners of his mouth were definitely lower than before.
I placed a hand on the zombie’s shoulder and gave it a few pats.
“Yeah, you’ve got it rough too.”
“Grrk….”
I had intended to say a few more words to him, but the zombie suddenly spun around and disappeared somewhere.
I slowly lowered my hand, which was left hanging awkwardly in the air. Then I watched the zombie’s retreating figure and thought, what a disloyal bastard.
That was when I was about to quietly head back to the hallway. The zombies’ groaning intensified again, and I turned my head. This time, every one of them was making gurgling sounds up at the ceiling, so I instinctively looked up at the ceiling too.
What are they hearing that’s making them do that? Just as that question crossed my mind, a loud crashing sound came from the floor above.
People.
That was definitely the sound of people. I stopped in my tracks and turned back to climb the stairs. With each step I took, the sense of a human presence grew clearer and clearer.
Just a little more… just a little more…!
By the time I followed the sound and finally reached the fourth floor, I could see it clearly with my own two eyes.
“S-save me… hah!”
Someone barely clinging to the outside of a window.
The person hanging from the window was none other than Hong Seok-hui, a student from the class next door.
I had been hoping it might be Cha Do-hyun, and the moment I confirmed it wasn’t the face I’d hoped for, I couldn’t hide my disappointment. But it wasn’t a face I didn’t know at all, so there was a flicker of something like relief. Though the fact that it was Hong Seok-hui was a downside, to say the least.
Hong Seok-hui had been a so-called school bully since middle school, the kind who swaggered around flaunting his connections. He used to boast about all the older guys he knew, and every now and then he’d bring cigarettes and a lighter to school and casually show them off — the kind of petty, childish antics you’d expect from someone that age.
Most bullies tended to wise up with each passing year and grade, but unfortunately, Hong Seok-hui was extremely, extremely late to grow up. And with good reason — even as a third-year on the verge of adulthood, he was still picking on people weaker than him and stealing money.
That wasn’t all. Until recently, Hong Seok-hui had still been throwing his connections around — connections that meant absolutely nothing for a minor. It was laughable, watching him hang around gangsters thinking he was something.
So now he’s getting what he deserves….
I almost clicked my tongue at the memory of who Hong Seok-hui used to be, but let it go. Between the two of us — Hong Seok-hui and me — we were both in the worst possible situation, when it came down to it.
No — if anything, I might be in an even worse position than Hong Seok-hui, who was being chased by zombies while still human. Being a zombie probably left fewer odds of survival than being human.
So am I the one being punished here?
While I was thinking that, Hong Seok-hui, hanging from the window frame, suddenly yelled.
“You goddamn zombie bastards! They’re all over the floor above and the floor below — for fuck’s sake, won’t you disappear?!”
All his past misdeeds seemed meaningless now — clinging desperately to the railing, Hong Seok-hui was nothing more than a human reduced to sheer survival instinct. Even as I was thinking this, Hong Seok-hui hung from the window frame, his skin turned pale white.
I hovered in place, unable to approach or move away from him. I still had my reason, but I was unmistakably a zombie in appearance, and I didn’t think I was in any position to actually help him.
So I was about to turn away and leave Hong Seok-hui to his desperate struggle for survival — when a name I could have done without hearing called out from behind my head.
“Han Jae-i?”
I flinched at hearing my name — my name from when I was alive, before I became a zombie.
It was strange, being called Han Jae-i by someone even in this state, and at the same time it made me nervous. If Hong Seok-hui could recognize me, then surely others could recognize my face too.
And I found myself thinking that I wanted that someone to be Cha Do-hyun. Of course, the simple concept of recognizing who I was and the concept of being glad to see me were entirely different things — but even so, a strange sense of anticipation rose up in me.
That was why, instead of ignoring Hong Seok-hui’s call, I glanced back. I wanted to test whether I looked more presentable than I thought. So I turned my body and responded to Hong Seok-hui — but the reaction that came back was far more brutal than anything I’d hoped for.
“Ha — fuck, so it was true that you turned into a zombie in place of Cha Do-hyun.”
Contempt. Hong Seok-hui’s face was smiling when I looked at him, but what was hidden beneath it was pure contempt.
That contemptuous gaze of Hong Seok-hui’s had already been in place before he’d spotted me hanging from the window frame, but the moment it was directed at me, an indescribable feeling washed over me.
The constant scraping sounds from the zombies’ throats and the sound of the rain that had been ringing in my ears — for a brief moment, I couldn’t hear them. More accurately, they’d been drowned out by a ringing in my head — that was the better way to put it.
Was it because of the name Cha Do-hyun? Or because I’d just received confirmation with contempt from another person — so it was true you turned into a zombie. Or was it all of the above.
While I stood frozen for a moment, Hong Seok-hui looked down to assess the state of the hallway on my floor. Above Hong Seok-hui’s head, dark bluish hands and falling drops of saliva were visible in abundance, but the hallway where I was standing had relatively fewer zombies.
Having quickly grasped the situation, Hong Seok-hui shoved off the window frame he’d been hanging from and leaped into the hallway on my floor. He worked out regularly, by the looks of it — despite being 180cm tall, his body moved with ease.
While I was still unable to shake the ringing in my ears, Hong Seok-hui strode toward me. And in that split second, Hong Seok-hui’s outstretched foot drove hard into my solar plexus.
The impact scattered the ringing that had been making my ears go numb, and I was sent toppling backward before I could do a thing.
Thud — I think I heard something like that. I blinked, feeling the back of my head throb from where it had hit the hallway floor.
Above me, a dull white ceiling. And I felt something large pressing down on my upper body as I lay there looking at it. I looked up at Hong Seok-hui, who had taken up space on top of me in an instant.
“What is this — even as a zombie, you’re pathetic and weak. Damn, even Cha Do-hyun would be horrified seeing you like this.”
That’s what he said. I raised both hands and grabbed Hong Seok-hui’s ankle. But before long, a hard kick bent my wrist back and slammed it into the floor. Instead of a groan, what came out of my mouth was a zombie-like grrk sound.
I twisted my mouth like a snarling animal and bared my teeth. At that, Hong Seok-hui kicked my head again.
My head snapped sideways and the rattling sound in my throat stopped. Something began to trickle down from the ear I’d scratched with my pinky earlier.
“Who the fuck are you baring your teeth at, you bastard. I almost died out there because of these shitty ass zombies.”
“…….”
“Ah — of course you have a personality like that, that’s why your own classmates abandoned you. Did you tear into your classmates and eat them too? Just looking at you, it’s pretty obvious you did.”
I wanted to turn my head toward the sound but my buzzing head was heavy. I tried to glare at Hong Seok-hui at least with a sideways glance. But Hong Seok-hui, as if even that wasn’t acceptable, stomped down and ground his foot into my jawbone.
“Where the hell do you think you’re rolling your eyes at, you monster.”
Even as he did that, Hong Seok-hui looked me over from head to toe, checking if there was anything worth taking from me. Then his gaze stopped somewhere.
My chest. More specifically, the name tag on my left side. Hong Seok-hui ripped the acrylic name tag off my chest without hesitation and said:
“I’m gonna need your name tag, Han Jae-i. This could actually be damn useful. I’ll put it to good use, yeah?”
I want to bite him. I don’t want to bite him, but I want to bite him. I suppressed the instinctive urge that surged up in me all at once and swallowed down the bitter saliva rising in my throat.
But it wasn’t easy. The more Hong Seok-hui’s shoe sole ground into my jaw, the more I felt an inexplicable thirst. A feeling similar to when I’d seen the human corpses scattered across the classroom floor….
That was when it happened. The sound of zombies flooding over from the floor below came drifting up. Hong Seok-hui, mid-grind on my jaw, let out a curse under his breath — barely audible. He tensed his body rigid, as if ready to bolt at any moment.
“Goddamn motherfucker, these nauseating zombie bastards….”
Hong Seok-hui muttered. I lay there looking up at him and made a grrk, grrk sound. At that, Hong Seok-hui twisted his mouth up into a grin.
Not a grin of joy — the particular rancid smile Hong Seok-hui sometimes wore when he bullied people weaker than him. That smile, soaked in malice and a kind of madness, grated on my nerves in a way nothing else did.
I felt the corners of my eyes grow hot as I stared up at Hong Seok-hui. Noticing this, Hong Seok-hui leaned his face down closer and spoke in a vile voice.
“Hey, you know what?”
I don’t. I don’t want to know. My instincts were simply boiling, aimed at Hong Seok-hui as the target. I was in the middle of focusing on that slowly rising sensation when, once again, an unexpected string of words came out of Hong Seok-hui’s open mouth.
“Cha Do-hyun already abandoned you.”
“…….”
“That’s why I treat you like trash, Jae-i. Honestly, why would you even throw yourself like that for someone — look at you now. Pathetic.”
In that moment I couldn’t help but go still. My head knew that Hong Seok-hui was saying it the way he always did — empty words meant to torment — but even so, my breathing lurched wildly and completely out of control.
Cha Do-hyun abandoned me? He abandoned me? When, and what did he say when he did? Is it certain that Cha Do-hyun actually ran from here?
There were so many things I wanted to ask, anxiety amplifying endlessly, but unfortunately I couldn’t produce words that Hong Seok-hui could understand.
In the end, the only thing I could do was struggle with everything I had beneath Hong Seok-hui’s foot. But with every thrash, the pressure only grew stronger, and I let out a ragged breath.
Even as a zombie and I’m still like this! For some reason I felt a burning sense of indignation — but even so, the reason I couldn’t fully resent Hong Seok-hui was that the anxiety surging up inside me again and again was giving weight to his words.
Maybe I had made a foolish choice, just as Hong Seok-hui said. But no matter how many times I was abandoned, I would never regret my choice. It was only the fact that I’d had to hear something like that from someone like Hong Seok-hui that made a swell of bitter fury rise up in me.
Then I can’t just let him walk away.
“…….”
Instead of twisting my body in Hong Seok-hui’s grip, I focused on my hearing. The sounds of the zombies that had started from the floor below were getting closer and closer. The sound of them bounding up the stairs, the hollow metallic clang of bodies hitting the railing.
By the time the mass of zombies had finally reached this floor, I found my opening. Strength returned to my bent wrist, and I felt whatever had been flowing from my ear stop.
He’s going to run.
Hong Seok-hui gauges the direction the sound of the surging zombie horde is coming from. The moment he turns his body, I lift my arm. I grab Hong Seok-hui’s ankle as he tries to flee and drag it hard.
I felt undamaged flesh being pushed between my short fingernails. The sensation was unpleasant, but the feeling was satisfying. Hong Seok-hui turns back to look at me with a stream of sharp curses.
But he didn’t have a moment to turn his body back to me. The zombie horde was surging toward him from behind my back, and that was what his eyes had locked onto.
Hong Seok-hui runs. The zombie horde rushes past, threading through the gaps on either side of me as I lay practically flat on the floor. At that ridiculous sight, I burst out laughing for the first time since becoming a zombie. Haha—.
The mass of zombies all pour out of the hallway chasing Hong Seok-hui, and I lie back down on the now-empty hallway floor. When I turned my head slightly, the darkened sky was visible through the hallway window. A full day had already passed.
I gazed at the faint moon hanging in the black sky, then turned back to look at the ceiling. With no electricity, the only way to make out shapes was by the pale blue light of the moon.
Toward the ceiling bathed in moonlight, I stretched out the hand I’d used to scratch Hong Seok-hui. Between my short nails, I could see the shred of flesh that had come off Hong Seok-hui. The blood soaked into it was drying fast.
I looked at my wound-covered hand for a while longer, then quietly pushed myself up from the floor. Because a target had appeared.
Find Hong Seok-hui.
That was my first objective.
