“If it were Yuna...”
The couple had been staring blankly at Kim Hayoon with trembling eyes, then both flinched.
A moment later, Kim Heeyoung forced an awkward smile and said,
“Oh, no. I was mistaken...”
“She’s our daughter. The one I mentioned before.”
“H-honey...”
Kim Heeyoung looked flustered, but Choi Uisu looked at her with a sorrowful smile and nodded as if to say it was all right.
Then Kim Heeyoung bit her lip and looked away, and Choi Uisu continued.
“Our Yuna... it’s already been seven years since she passed away. She was exactly that girl’s age.”
“...I see. I’m sorry.”
“No, no. There’s no reason for you to say that, Mr. Lee Junho. The ones who were in the wrong were those people... and us.”
Choi Uisu spoke calmly, but every so often, deep emotions that had still not been fully washed away broke through as he continued talking about his dead daughter.
Their daughter, Choi Yuna, had been in a traffic accident on her way to school early one morning and was rushed to a nearby hospital emergency room.
An intern working in that ER had treated her.
Because of that intern’s mistake, Choi Yuna died.
It was unmistakably negligent homicide.
But the problem was that the intern was the hospital board chairman’s nephew.
To make matters worse, that chairman had been close friends since school with the director of the general hospital where the couple worked at the time.
So over years of legal battles, and under the countless threats and pressures that inevitably came with them, the couple sank deeper and deeper into despair.
In the end, after the first trial and then the appeal both ruled it a medical accident rather than negligent homicide...
Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung decided to let everything go.
“...So four years ago, we wrapped everything up and came to Moku-ri. It’s also where I lived until grade school... no, elementary school, and there were still quite a few people here who’d known my family since my father’s time.”
“Ah, so that’s why you came to Hanaareum Nursing Home every month to volunteer?”
“Yes. There are quite a few nursing homes and care hospitals around Moku-ri and places like Gahyeon-ri. The light rail around the capital region made them easy to reach.”
“I see.”
Even while answering, the couple’s eyes would not leave the children.
So Junho casually asked,
“By the way... I guess Hayoon really does resemble her?”
“...!”
At Junho’s words, Kim Heeyoung flinched, then naturally looked over at Kim Hayoon, who was in the distance looking after Kim Junseo and Choi Jiwoo.
A moment later, she weakly shook her head.
“No. Looking more closely, she doesn’t resemble her that much. It’s just... that girl has the same round face and big eyes our Yuna had.”
“......”
Even as she said that, Kim Heeyoung kept glancing again and again at the Kim siblings and Choi Jiwoo.
Seeing that, Junho said gently,
“You should at least say hello.”
“What? Oh, no, that’s...”
“You’ll be seeing them again in a few days anyway. And you’ll all be living together in the shelter for a long time.”
“Ah...”
Only then did the couple seem to fully realize that they were in a completely different environment now, one where they might end up living for the rest of their lives.
They nodded.
“Hayoon. Kim Hayoon!”
“Yes, mister!”
Kim Hayoon, who had been folding up the cuffs of Choi Jiwoo’s pants, heard Junho call her and hurried over.
“You can come slowly. Just be careful not to trip yourself.”
“Ah. Sorry.”
“No need to apologize. Anyway, say hello. These are people who’ll be staying with us in our shelter from now on. They’ll probably move in next week.”
“Ah, hello. I’m Kim Hayoon.”
As Kim Hayoon bowed politely, the eyes of Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung trembled once more.
Contrary to what they had just said, it seemed she really did resemble their dead daughter quite a lot.
“R-right. Nice to meet you. Auntie here is a nurse, and this mister is a doctor. You said your name was Hayoon, right? How old are you, by any chance?”
“Um... I’m in eighth grade.”
“I-I see. Oh dear, I’m being ridiculous, aren’t I? Asking your age the moment I meet you. I’m sorry, Hayoon.”
“No. It’s okay.”
It had not been long since she had lost her grandmother, but maybe because of her little brother Kim Junseo, Kim Hayoon was consciously trying to act brave.
And that only seemed to make the couple think even more of their dead daughter.
Noticing that, Junho said to Kim Hayoon,
“If you or Junseo ever seem sick, make sure you go to them. They worked at a general hospital for a long time.”
“Yes, mister. Then... can I go back to the kids now?”
“Yeah.”
“Yes.”
Kim Hayoon bowed once more to Junho and to Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung, then went back.
And the couple’s eyes still would not leave her and the other two children.
“The smallest one over there is Jiwoo. She lives here with her father. Her mother passed away this time.”
“I-is that so.”
“But as you know, Hayoon and Junseo don’t have a guardian. Ms. Baek Sua and the others look after them, but there are limits to that. Their grandmother died like that too, and they’re still at a difficult age.”
“I suppose they would be. Ah... that poor child, at such a young age already...”
Regret and pity clung plainly to Kim Heeyoung’s expression and voice.
Choi Uisu’s face remained calm, but his eyes stayed fixed on the Kim siblings.
“You should try getting closer to them, little by little.”
“...What?”
“In a world like this, I think it’s a good thing when people who’ve lost someone precious meet and build a new family. No...”
“......!!!”
The couple were visibly startled, but Junho continued.
“Actually, maybe it’s because the world has become a hell like this that it matters even more, don’t you think? We’re people who’ll have to live together for a long time.”
The couple’s eyes, wide and trembling without pause, slowly returned to the Kim siblings.
And in the profile of the two of them, Junho could clearly see that what was blooming now was no longer pity or sympathy from before, but expectation.
***
Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung did not need long to adjust to the container residential zone.
They had been part of Junho’s plans from the start.
And because of the hopeful feelings they already had toward the Kim siblings, the couple tried even more earnestly to adapt themselves to the shelter’s structured routine.
More than anything, they were fundamentally good people—people who, even after losing their daughter so tragically, had still gone every month of their own free will to volunteer at nursing homes and care hospitals.
Of course, in Choi Uisu’s case, darker feelings had taken root in him along the way.
But to Junho, who had lost his parents once as a child and again after becoming an adult, that was more than understandable.
In any case, once the couple officially became shelter members, they stood there with still-awkward faces and properly introduced themselves to the others.
“...What is all this?”
“It’s the health screening results and ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) vaccination records for me and my daughter and son. Ah, I’ve also got the doctor’s note and copies of their medical records. Want those too?”
“N-no, I mean, when did you even get all this...”
Choi Uisu looked flustered at the pile of paperwork Baek Hail was holding out to him.
“Like I said earlier, before coming in here, we got full checkups done. Got every vaccine you could think of too—tetanus, hepatitis, all kinds. And at the time, our boss Junho here said it’d be a good idea to get copies of medical notes and stuff too, so I went ahead and got them.”
As Baek Hail said that proudly, Choi Uisu looked around at the others.
“Then the rest of you too...?”
“Yep. The boss took care of mine too, as part of the benefits.”
“I got mine done with my brother.”
“Good grief. I was wondering why my brother suddenly showed up acting like that back then, but this is why. I don’t have things like doctor’s notes, but I’m healthy and I got all my shots too.”
After Yoon Youngsu, Junhyeok, and even Choi Haneul all said they had gotten full health screenings and all the necessary vaccines, Choi Uisu was left speechless.
“W-we haven’t yet...”
“Me and Junseo neither.”
Choi Jeongwoo and his daughter, along with Kim Hayoon, spoke carefully as they watched the others.
At that, Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung brightened at once.
“Ah, then would you like to come to the medical room and get a basic checkup and some tests? It looked like you’ve got most common vaccines here too, so we can give those if needed.”
“Ah, yes! Thank you, doctor. Jiwoo, you should say thank you too, right?”
“Thank youuu!”
“Thank you. Junseo.”
“Thank youuu.”
The couple nodded with pleased eyes as they watched Choi Jeongwoo’s gratitude and the three children bowing so deeply they nearly folded in half.
In the end, it seemed people really could heal from—or at least forget—a painful past and hardship when they had hope and something to do.
Of course, there was no guarantee they would ever be fully healed, and it would take a long time.
But our shelter had plenty of time.
***
About a week passed after Choi Uisu and Kim Heeyoung entered the shelter.
It was now mid-to-late September, a little over a month since the apocalypse had begun.
In the meantime, the outside world had completely lost power and running water.
Even Gahyeon-ri, where there had once been occasional lights here and there, was now swallowed by total darkness.
The high-performance PTZ cameras installed at each guard post and at Hanaareum Nursing Home, as well as the drones, now had no choice but to film exclusively in nighttime thermal-imaging mode once the sun went down.
“You really don’t need to worry. We already got the full aerial map and 3D mapping with the drones.”
“Good. Make sure the drones keep a close eye on the points I marked.”
“Yep. We can already tell a fair bit through the nursing home PTZ camera and the CCTV camera at the safe house you set up before, boss. We’re also flying drones in the morning and evening.”
Seizing the communications relay station and turning Hanaareum Nursing Home into a strongpoint really had been the right strategic call.
The CCTV at the safe house set up in the upper floors of the villas and apartment buildings could only monitor the surrounding two to three hundred meters in a limited way.
But thanks to the PTZ cameras mounted at the relay station and the nursing home, plus the installation of the repeater, it had become possible to see almost all of Gahyeon-ri as if it were in the palm of their hand.
Of course, for that to be true in the literal sense, a drone would have to be in the air twenty-four hours a day.
And considering the number of drones they had and their lifespan, that was impossible.
That said, if they truly wanted to, it wasn’t as though it would be completely impossible either.
Anyway, once the infrastructure went down, the speed at which the world was collapsing only accelerated.
Junho made no effort to learn what was happening in Seoul or other major cities.
It would be the same as before regression anyway, and if the people in the shelter saw it, it would shake their morale and only add more stress.
So Junho focused only on Gahyeon-ri and the surrounding area.
For now, the thugs from Hanchang Development had completely taken over the country-house neighborhood and had started expanding toward the townhouse complex.
Since the power and water had only just been cut off, the people living in the townhouse area still had not managed to form any kind of real group.
Two or three households a night were being dragged off by the thugs, or else getting torn apart by zombies when they went out searching for water or food.
From the looks of it, within two weeks the place would be completely seized by the gang, just like before regression.
While continuing surveillance on Hanchang Development, Junho ordered them to focus their monitoring on the so-called “Sangdong,” the most densely populated part of Gahyeon-ri, which included two apartment complexes and the nearby villa district,
and on “Jungdong,” where most of Gahyeon-ri’s longtime local residents lived further down along the road—
more precisely, on the area in between those two places.
Because that spot connected directly to the shelter’s main-gate access road, and for now, it was the only road vehicles could use to come in or out.
