Chapter 177

Kim Dae-Young was a quick-witted guy.

However, his expression betrayed his anxiety. I grabbed him by the collar and repeated my question.

“Answer my question. What did you mean when you said someone’s going to get hurt?”

“Before that, let me ask you one more question. If you answer my questions properly, I’ll tell you everything.”

“Some guts you have there. I’d cut it out if I were you.”

“Now I see. I should've known it when you stopped that guy over there from killing me, and from the fact that you’re acting all strong yet keep on listening to me talk.. Are you fighting for the sake of people too?”

My eyebrows twitched at his question. I massaged my temples with my left hand.

“You’re digging your own grave.”

“Huh?”

“Since you’ve noticed that, now there are fewer reasons to keep you alive.”

“If I told you that I was on the same side as you, would you still kill me?”

Kim Dae-Young looked into my eyes. His expression had grown serious.

I frowned. “How can I believe what you’re saying?”

“You can go and check it out for yourself.”

“And what if it’s a trap?” I asked, raising my eyebrows.

Kim Dae-Young shrugged.

“Well, there’s nothing I can do if you won’t believe me,” he said calmly. “But if you want to kill me instead.. Can you just wait ten minutes?”

“Why do you need ten minutes?”

“I have to order my underlings to come here. I’ve ordered them to protect my people. And if I die now.. My chain of command is going to disappear, and they’ll probably attack my people.”

Kim Dae-Young had a point. He wasn’t an easy opponent, and I couldn’t manipulate him the way I wanted to. I couldn’t threaten or kill him right now. He wasn’t the nervous one, I was.

I thought about the situation and considered my priorities. Kim Hyeong-Jun could handle the zombies in the terminal alone, and since Do Han-Sol was defending the aircraft, the Survivor Rally Organization was safe. As I thought all of this through, I wondered if killing Kim Dae-Young, a potential threat, was the right thing to do right now.

I also questioned if I should be the one deciding if the survivors that he claimed to have were going to die or not, assuming that he was telling me the truth that he was in league with the survivors of Jeju.

As I stood there, lost in thought, Kim Dae-Young's limbs began to regenerate.

“Ahjussi, what are you doing?!” yelled Kim Hyeong-Jun from behind me.

I closed my eyes and placed my hand on my forehead.

I had to make a choice. I never thought that I’d have to make a decision like this the moment I arrived in Jeju Island. I took a breath and looked at Kim Dae-Young.

“Lead me to where your people are. I want to see them for myself.”

“There’s no guarantee that you won’t attack my people. Shouldn't you be showing me the survivors you brought first?”

Kim Dae-Young's question caused me to clench my fists and gnash my teeth.

“Don’t try to cross the line. You get on my nerves just a bit more and I’ll kill you and all those survivors you keep talking about.”

“What..?”

“Don’t think you have the upper hand. Get your priorities straight. My family is my priority. I couldn’t care less about your people.”

My frown was as deep as it would go, betraying the depth of my anger. Kim Dae-Young swallowed and stayed silent. His body had fully regenerated by now, and he picked himself off the floor and looked at me. I shoved him in the back.

“Now lead me there,” I demanded.

“Hey, calm down a little..”

Slap!

I slapped Kim Dae-Young in the face.

“You say one more goddamn thing, and you’ll be dead before you know it.”

Kim Dae-Young placed his hand on his tingling cheeks and ear, looking bewildered.

I wondered what kind of being Kim Dae-Young saw me as at the moment. Kim Dae-Young probably had no clue that I was on the same side as him. However, the more I dilly-dallied, the more danger my people would be in. Whether I liked it or not, I had no choice but to show force.

I had to think things through thoroughly, but also had to come to decisions and act quickly. I never hesitated, which was what kept me and my family safe.

Kim Dae-Young seemed to hesitate for a moment, but then he took a deep breath.

"Follow me."

When I moved to follow Kim Dae-Young, Kim Hyeong-Jun, who had been taking care of the zombies, hurriedly grabbed my shirt.

“Ahjussi, where are you going?” he asked me. “Do you actually believe what that bastard’s saying?”

“He said that there are survivors. I'll check it out and come back. Just take care of the zombies.”

“Let’s just kill this fella, ahjussi. We don't have to take care of everyone.”

“You’re right, we don't have to take care of everyone. But we also don't have the right to kill regular human beings.”

When it came to killing zombies or humans, I wanted to make sure if they were good or evil before I killed them.

Kim Hyeong-Jun studied my face closely, then finally sighed, his face difficult to read. He looked me straight in the eyes so that Kim Dae-Young couldn't overhear us.

'Take your underlings, just in case.'

‘...’

‘If you don’t take your underlings with you, ahjussi, I won’t let you go. My underlings and I can handle this area, so take your underlings with you.’

'I'll leave Ji-Eun behind, then.’

Kim Hyeong-Jun nodded and went back to cleaning up the zombies again. I ordered my stage-one mutants to follow me at a distance of three hundred meters. Kim Dae-Young was a step ahead of me, taking the lead. It was now completely dark outside, unlike what it had been when I first entered the terminal. I heightened all my senses as I followed Kim Dae-Young.

“Where are we going?”

“To a rental car company.”

Kim Dae-Young guided me to an area where there weren’t that many zombies. I asked him a question as I examined the surroundings.

“Are you saying that your people are at a rental car company?”

“It’s a good place to do defense. It's in a corner, and the car alarms go off when the zombies hit them, making them good guards.”

“What if zombies gather after hearing the cars go off? Have you not thought that through?”

“There’s an escape route, of course. And, about the alarms.. It’s more of a means of guarding against other beings than zombies.”

“Other beings?” I asked, with my eyebrows raised.

Kim Dae-Young frowned.

“The Hounds,” he said.

The Hounds. The slight emphasis that Kim Dae-Young placed on that word made it sound like some sort of group. If Kim Dae-Young was really a zombie fighting for the sake of other survivors, then this group called The Hounds had to be a group that hunted humans.

I wondered if it was similar to Seoul, where there had been the Family on one side and the Survivor Rally Organization on the other. Perhaps this was happening on Jeju Island as well.

“Are these Hounds a threat to humans?” I asked him, scratching my eyebrows as I did so.

"That’s right.”

“Are they zombies or humans?”

“They’re zombies. They can think, just like us.”

“How many of them are there?”

“I haven't figured that out yet. But I'm sure there are quite a few zombies with red eyes among them.”

It seemed like this group had quite a lot of members. However, more members didn’t mean anything to me. Numbers were meaningless to me. They probably had a boss, and it was important to figure out what their boss was capable of.

I looked over at Kim Dae-Young.

“Is there a zombie with blue eyes like me in this group called The Hounds?”

“I haven’t seen one. By the way, I wanted to ask you that; why are your eyes blue?”

"You don’t need to know.”

I couldn’t and didn’t want to explain everything word by word. I still had my doubts regarding Kim Dae-Young, so I couldn’t give him too much information. Besides, he had yet to eat a black creature’s brain, which was another reason not to have to tell him about it.The debut release occurred at N-ov3l-Bin.

He stopped in his tracks and looked at me, as though this bothered him.

“I know you’re wary of me. But, as I said before, I’m also fighting alongside humans.”

“That’s still up for debate.”

“Why are you so suspicious about everything?”

“If I wasn’t, I would’ve died a long time ago,” I replied calmly.

Kim Dae-Young stopped asking questions. After we passed through several narrow alleys and got onto the main street, I saw the zombies on the streets gathered up in one place, crying out and resonating. When they resonated like that, it was a signal that a zombie wave was about to happen.

I wondered where they were headed to. We were quite far from Jeju Airport. Kim Dae-Young squinted at the zombies and noticed that something wasn’t right.

“Do you mind if we walk a bit faster?” he said.

“Are your people around this area?”

“The first line of defense is around here.”

First line of defense.. There were a lot of rental car companies concentrated around Jeju Airport. It seemed like Kim Dae-Young had used the cars from the car rental companies to build layers of defense.

Kim Dae-Yong clicked his tongue vigorously.

“Since the street zombies were gathered at Jeju Airport, I expected them to be here as well.. But there are just too many of them,” he said.

“...”

"And this is because of you folks.”

Kim Dae-Young frowned and glared at me.

“I have one question for you,” I asked him, staying calm.

“What.”

“Do you know anything about black creatures?”

“...!”

Kim Dae-Young’s eyes widened as soon as I mentioned a black creature, and his expression grew puzzled. Judging by his face, it seemed like there was a black creature on Jeju Island as well. It made sense. In fact, it’d be strange for there not to be a black creature, given the six hundred and seventy thousand people who had resided here before the virus spread.

Kim Dae-Young wet his parched lips before speaking.

“And what if I told you that I did? What are you going to do about that?”

“What color were they?”

“A black creature is black. Does it come in different colors?”

“Its eyes. Were even its eyes black?”

Kim Dae-Young glanced to the side as though thinking, then answered after a moment.

“The last time I saw it was a month ago, so I don’t remember exactly.. But they were the same colors as yours.”

"Are you sure?"

"I am, since I realized that black creatures had blue eyes because of it. But the bad-tempered guy that was with you at the airport also had blue eyes. What's the difference between me and him?”

“What do you mean? It’s your strength.”

Kim Dae-Young flinched and asked nervously, "You.. How many underlings can you control?”

"You don’t need to know.”

“Can’t you tell me?”

“If the zombie at the airport earlier had considered you as an enemy and gone after you seriously, you would’ve died without knowing it.”

Only then did Kim Dae-Young finally realize where things stood between the three of us, and closed his mouth. It seemed he had realized just how easy Kim Hyeong-Jun and I had been going at him.

After a moment, Kim Dae-Young cleared his throat and spoke up again.

“If you’re that strong.. Can you deal with the Hounds?”

“Can you fight the Hounds on equal footing?”

“I can go toe-to-toe with their officers.”

If their officers were of the same strength as Kim Dae-Young, who controlled one thousand underlings, they couldn't harm the Survivor Rally Organization even if they attacked us with everything they had.

Kim Dae-Young looked at me cautiously.

"You.. Where are you from?” he asked.

“Seoul.”

"Seoul? Did Seoul fall as well?”

Kim Dae-Young didn’t know anything about what had happened, or what was going on. Well, to be fair, I also hadn’t known anything before meeting Tommy from Russia, so perhaps his reaction was natural. I looked at him in pity and sighed.

“There’s no country in the world where humans are guaranteed to be safe,” I replied, “except for Canada.”

“The whole world is done for?”

“Why do you think I came all the way to Jeju Island?”

“...”

Kim Dae-Young’s mouth dropped open, and he seemed lost in thought. After a moment, he flashed a warm smile.

“You truly are a zombie that lives for humans.”

“...”

“You’re trying to clean up the zombies on Jeju Island, aren’t you? Since it’ll become a safe haven as long as you get rid of all the zombies.”

I said nothing in reply. However, Kim Dae-Young continued to speak with a satisfied smile.

“Can my people join yours?”

“That depends,” I answered bluntly.

Kim Dae-Young looked me right in the eye.

“Please lend me your strength. I’m actually.. not too confident.”

“About what?”

“It’s been difficult, handling everything alone. The Hounds, people’s expectations.”

I frowned at the absurd notion, and tilted my head. “You mean you’ve been fighting the Hounds alone?”

Kim Dae-Young replied with a bitter smile.

“What else was I supposed to do, with no other zombies around to help me?”

His bitter smile hit me differently, making me reconsider his words.

“Crowd psychology sure is scary,” he continued quietly.

“...”

“It doesn't matter what kind of person someone was before the world was turned upside down. When the world falls into a state like this, any beings that exist in such a world would also go crazy. Regardless of whether they’re human or zombie.”

I considered Kim Dae-Young with a calm expression. It seemed like he was in his early thirties. I could understand the weight he had been carrying on his shoulders all this time. No matter how hard the people at Shelter Hae-Young had worked and tried, my shoulders were always heavy with all the responsibility. As their expectations grew, there were moments in which I became all that they placed their hope in, which made it harder for me to live every day without worrying.

This didn’t mean that their expectations toward me were bad. It just made it more difficult to be nice all the time. I just had to be called stupid by people who were messed up and hear criticism that I wasn’t doing a good enough job of taking care of my own interests. Despite all this, though, I still had to get the job done. And people like us were oftentimes called heroes.

I smacked Kim Dae-Young on the back fairly hard, so that the sound of my slap echoed. Kim Dae-Young looked at me in bewilderment, and I couldn’t help but laugh at his dumbfounded face.

“Chop, chop, let’s go. We don’t have time.”

“Huh, really? You really had to hit me? You couldn’t say it in words?”

Kim Dae-Young smacked its lips and looked away as though he were feeling slightly miffed, and kept leading the way to his people. As I watched him walk off, I thought to myself that I’d found someone pretty decent. If whatever Kim Dae-Young had said was true, he would be welcomed in our organization.

I just hoped that his group of people were logical, rational humans since that was the ultimate factor in joining the Survivor Rally Organization. The ability that made people people. I just hoped that they hadn't lost their humanity.