13

Chapter 13

Kwak Hanmuk’s mouth fell open.

“…Wow.”

He rushed over in a single bound and slung an arm around my shoulders with a thump.

“I’ve been called a madman wherever I go, but I’ve never had the chance to call someone else one.”

Flashing his pointed canines in a grin, Kwak Hanmuk praised me.

“Goyo, you really do seem completely insane.”

“Thank you.”

When I thanked him, he even burst out laughing.

I picked up another baseball bat for Kwak Hanmuk and presented it to him.

Encouraged by his enthusiastic support, I told him my plan.

“There’s a group that has occupied a convenience store.”

The people occupying the large convenience store had committed every crime possible in a zombie world, including murder, arson, and looting.

There were five or six of them, and if left alone, they would remain a thorn in the player’s side until the very end of DZD.

To the point that zombies seemed preferable.

In an apocalyptic world where public authority had collapsed, a little vigilante justice was necessary.

The fastest strategy was to dispose of them at the outset.

“Let’s go.”

After hearing my rough explanation, Kwak Hanmuk asked no further questions and tucked the baseball bat beneath one arm.

With Kwak Hanmuk sauntering behind me, I reached our destination. The large convenience store had a remarkably straightforward name.

DEAD CONVENIENCE STORE

Its pristine front windows gave an unobstructed view of the interior.

DZD’s zombies had lost their senses of sight and smell and responded only to sound, so there was no need to cover the glass.

When I recognized the convenience store, a System Window appeared.

◆ Main Quest: Drive out the group occupying Dead Convenience Store.

You have embarked upon a reckless attempt to achieve a swift Clear.

The convenience-store occupiers, who are perpetually filled with rage, are formidable opponents and want to make you a snack for the zombies.

However, you believe the adventure may succeed if you have a powerful companion.

The System Window was right. I would never have attempted this if I were playing alone.

But right now, I had someone reliable to depend upon.

“That’s the place.”

The instant I pointed at the convenience store, Kwak Hanmuk shot forward like an arrow.

Crash!

His baseball bat swept out in a refreshing arc and shattered the storefront window. Kwak Hanmuk leaped inside with the shards of glass.

The men who had been lounging against the display shelves and laughing among themselves hurriedly rose and grabbed their weapons. One even carried a gun he had found somewhere.

But none of that meant anything before Kwak Hanmuk.

Bang!

The gunshot echoed in every direction.

The bullet struck an innocent bag of snacks.

The unfortunate potato chips exploded beyond recognition, and a baseball bat came crashing down on the gunman’s head.

After the dull thud of impact, the man collapsed face-first.

Kwak Hanmuk effortlessly caught the gun as it fell from his hand.

He shoved it into his waistband and swung the bat at the other men, who were faltering.

One man took a direct blow and flew like a baseball into a display shelf, knocking it over. Cups of Buldak-flavored noodles showered down on top of him.

Kwak Hanmuk stepped onto the fallen shelf and jumped. A clean kick cut through the air and slammed into a man clumsily gripping a knife.

There was an enormous difference between a professionally trained soldier and a group of men in their early twenties who hadn’t even served in the military.

The disparity was embarrassing to mention.

I watched comfortably from behind and did little more than swing my baseball bat whenever one of the men writhing on the floor attempted to rise, putting him back down.

The first man Kwak Hanmuk had beaten groaned painfully as he spoke.

“F*ck…. Who the hell are you bastards…?”

Ah!

I hurried over to the man.

And rescued a cup of Buldak-flavored noodles that was moments away from being soaked in his blood.

The valuable food had nearly been ruined.

After turning the cup around to confirm it was intact, I asked,

“Why are you curious?”

The man was staring up at me with wide eyes. I tilted my head and said,

“Knowing who I am won’t make your doomed life last any longer.”

“What? …Ghk!”

When the man tried to shout something with an incredulous look, I struck him once with the baseball bat.

He could no longer spout anything unnecessary. He obediently closed his eyes and lost consciousness.

Kwak Hanmuk was still running wild.

I organized the scattered food while I waited, and before long, the only sound remaining inside the store was the groans of unconscious men.

You have won the battle against the occupiers of Dead Convenience Store!

The victory couldn’t have been cleaner.

After checking the System Window announcing our victory, Kwak Hanmuk smacked his lips.

“That’s it?”

As though disappointed, he needlessly swung the baseball bat through the air.

“You’re the best, Captain Kwak.”

I gave him an emphatic thumbs-up with both hands.

I hope to make frequent use of you in the future, Captain.

Kwak Hanmuk grinned at my heartfelt flattery for the sake of the future. Resting the baseball bat on his shoulder, he said,

“That was f*cking fun. Goyo, let’s do this again sometime.”

As it happened, there were many opportunities for him to shine in DZD.

Hitting zombies hard, smashing zombies into pieces, sending zombies flying into the distance, and so on.

As I basked in the satisfaction of giving him work suited to his aptitudes, a System Window appeared.

You continue to hesitate over registering ‘Mo Haein.’

However, Registration is an essential process for your growth as the System.

You believe it may not be a bad idea to accept a small risk and register ‘Kwak Hanmuk’ first.

Would you like to register ‘Kwak Hanmuk’?

Since I wouldn’t register Mo Haein, the System had now gone so far as to negotiate a compromise with itself.

Having become accustomed to ignoring System Windows, I picked up a backpack from the floor.

You have obtained a Backpack, expanding the items you can carry.

DZD had no basic Inventory, so farming a backpack was essential.

It was a design choice intended to enhance realism, but having to pack every individual item made it terribly annoying.

I began stuffing food into the backpack. As I picked up one of the Buldak noodle cups, I happened to examine the wrapper.

Buldak flavor, born in the fiery grave that burns ■■■!

It resembled Korean cup noodles, but the writing on the wrapper was bizarre.

When I had inspected the item description in the game, it merely gave a simple explanation of what flavor the food was.

I had never seen the wrapper itself, so I examined some of the other food around me.

Tuna mayo fished from the boiling River of ■.

Salmon mayo fished from the bubbling River of ■.

Even the triangular rice balls were appalling. If this hadn’t been a zombie world, I wouldn’t have touched them with the tip of one finger after reading those descriptions.

“Goyo, what is it?”

Kwak Hanmuk had picked up a bag of chocolate candies. He tore it open and poured the whole thing into his mouth as he asked.

“All the descriptions are strange.”

“That’s normal for a Trial.”

True enough, item descriptions were often peculiar as well.

Read only on MUGEX

While I packed the food, Kwak Hanmuk threw several snacks into my backpack, then neatly tied up the convenience-store occupiers and arranged them in a corner.

Once he finished, he cracked his knuckles.

“So, should we kill these bastards?”

“There’s no need for you to go to the trouble, Captain. They have a use.”

This much food seemed sufficient to divide among the three of us. Slinging the backpack over my shoulders, I looked through the window.

“Urrrgh….”

Drawn by the gunfire, zombies were dragging their feet toward the convenience store. Even at a glance, there were dozens surrounding the place.

“Let’s feed the zombies before we go.”

I returned exactly what the convenience-store occupiers had done to survivors they kidnapped from the Green Zone.

I used them as bait.

Kwak Hanmuk and I escaped the horde safely. Watching the zombies feast, Kwak Hanmuk whistled softly.

“Now I think we should go to the Green Zone and join Captain Mo.”

“Yees.”

He obediently followed me, then abruptly asked,

“Goyo, you’re twenty-four?”

“Yes.”

“Seven years younger than me.”

Click.

I heard a gun being loaded.

Walking ahead of him, I stopped. Hoping I was wrong, I slowly turned around.

“Even when you know a Trial is a kind of illusory space that repeats endlessly, once you’re actually faced with it….”

But the muzzle of his gun was pointed at me.

“Even one of the Compatible who’s been trained to hell and back by the Trial Response Agency finds it difficult to act without that much hesitation.”

Kwak Hanmuk mimicked gunfire with his mouth: bang, bang.

“But Goyo, you go and feed people to zombies just like that?”

Now that I heard it aloud, it was a reasonable suspicion. But I had only done it because we were inside a Trial. If we weren’t, I would also….

Hmm.

Remembering Park Seonggyeon turning into a golden firework, I revised my thoughts.

“I suppose I’m a little coldhearted.”

“A little?”

“Well, I need to survive too.”

Kwak Hanmuk literally cackled.

He didn’t seem to dislike my answer, but since this was Captain Kwak, I couldn’t be certain it was enough to pass his test.

Kwak Hanmuk was the sort of man who could laugh like that and still pull the trigger.

“I simply… have clear priorities.”

Continuing slowly, I approached Kwak Hanmuk.

I stopped directly in front of his gun.

“And you’re included among those priorities, Captain Kwak.”

Kwak Hanmuk stared at me. His gaze asked why, so I answered.

“Because we’re a team.”

We’re on the same side now, so please stop suspecting me. I don’t stab my teammates in the back.

…I couldn’t say that outright, but there was no way Kwak Hanmuk had failed to understand me.

He immediately laughed and tucked the gun back inside his varsity jacket.

“I can’t beat you, Goyo Hyungnim.”

I didn’t know why he was calling me Hyungnim, but I promptly replied,

“Thank you for trusting me.”

If he had kept the gun trained on me, matters could have become difficult in several ways, so this was a relief. I didn’t want to make Kwak Hanmuk’s head explode.

I took Kwak Hanmuk to a gun shop.

In the original game, you could only learn its hidden location and method of entry after completing all kinds of miscellaneous Quests.

But I guided Kwak Hanmuk there as though it were my own home, and he looted the items as though it were his.

Seeing Kwak Hanmuk follow without a word gave me a slightly strange feeling.

I hadn’t given the Trial Response Agency a proper explanation.

Samra alone knew that I had experienced the Trials and people connected to them through games.

Yet after forming the Special Mission Team, the Trial Response Agency had pressed me no further.

Kwak Hanmuk was the same. He said nothing even as I revealed walkthrough information and the locations of rare items.

‘I suppose they don’t care what I am, so long as I can close Trials.’

Their attitude made it obvious that they intended to use me as a tool.

I knew the Trial Response Agency valued practicality, but it certainly didn’t behave like a government institution.

By the time we finished farming the gun shop, the sun was already setting.

Now carrying an additional duffel bag, I headed toward the Green Zone with the blazing red sunset at my back.

Zombies moved slowly during the day, but their speed increased after dark.

If we didn’t want to be chased by running zombies, it was best to reach the Green Zone before nightfall.

DZD was divided into four areas.

The Green Zone was a safe area where survivors lived.

Only a tiny number of zombies appeared there infrequently—few enough for the survivors to handle.

The Yellow Zone was where the player first started the game and where zombies began appearing in earnest. Their numbers were low by day but doubled at night.

The Red Zone teemed with zombies regardless of whether it was day or night.

And finally, there was the Dead Zone.

The entire Dead Zone was always treated as nighttime even when the sun was up, and a type of creature known as a ‘Dead Zombie’ appeared there.

They were zombies with far greater strength and speed than the ordinary variety.

The research facility that served as the delivery destination was located in the Dead Zone.

If following the standard strategy, the player couldn’t begin making deliveries until sufficiently strengthening their abilities.

Naturally, that method had nothing to do with me.

Before entering the Green Zone…

I asked Kwak Hanmuk to handle one task at which he would excel.

Highly amused, he readily accepted my request.

Once we entered the Green Zone, the number of zombies shuffling around noticeably plummeted.

The survivors had gathered at an elementary school.

The people guarding the steel gate, which was wrapped in barbed wire, gave us deeply wary looks.

By now, having only two or three people point guns at me no longer bothered me. I opened my backpack for them to see.

Their eyes widened at the sight of all the food inside.

“I’ll give you information about food supplies, so please bring me a woman named Morae. She should have arrived here today.”

Suspicions and everything else took a back seat to food. One person hurriedly ran inside.

Before long, a man who appeared to be in his fifties emerged with several subordinates in tow.

“Where did you get the food?”

Mo Haein was nowhere to be seen.

Kwak Hanmuk and I looked at one another.

There was no possibility that a handful of such unimpressive men could prevent Mo Haein from coming outside.

If she remained silent despite surely noticing the commotion beyond the gates, there was only one explanation.

She had failed to reach the Green Zone.

Why?

There was no reason that should have happened, making it all the more puzzling.

Kwak Hanmuk frowned with a hum. Then he lowered his voice and whispered to me.

“I think Captain Mo… may have been bitten by a zombie.”