Chapter 24
As I made my way down the stairs, I noticed the candle-lit classroom on the first floor. I stealthily made my way toward it, so that I could have a peek inside. There were about twenty kids in a circle, talking amongst themselves.
‘Wait… Talking?’
No—they were crying in silence.
“Why aren’t the teachers coming back?” one of them said, sobbing.
“You idiot, you still don’t get it, do you? They abandoned all of us!”
“No! They said they’d be back with food.”
“Do you think people who go out to get food take all the weapons with them when they leave? How do you think they’ll bring all the food back?”
The male student, sitting across from the female student, raised his voice. It seemed like the young, able-bodied adults had grouped up and made a run for it, leaving only the helpless children and the elderly behind. I wondered where the elderly were. I squinted, but could not make out any elderly individual. There were only children and teenagers, of varying ages.
Click.
The sound of a door knob being turned came from somewhere down the hallway. I quickly hid myself in the next classroom.
Thud, tap. Thud, tap.
The footsteps sounded weird. They were weak, and alternated with thudding sounds, as if whoever it was was walking with a cane. I peeked down the hallway to see what was going on. An elder with snow-white hair was walking down the hallway, their head sagging down. Concern and anxiety were written all over this elder’s face. After a moment, a man with a fully-grown beard followed the elder through the door.
“Sir!”
“Oh, yes?”
“You left your onigiri here.”
“It must’ve slipped my mind.”
The white-haired elder with white hair addressed the man with the fully-grown beard as the principal. I hadn’t seen his face the last time I was at the school. He looked very gentle and kind, an image that did not match the way he’d raised his voice previously.
The white-haired man hesitated for a moment after receiving the onigiri. He then offered half of it to the principal.
“Have you had the chance to eat yet?”
“Of course, sir. You should eat before it gets cold.”
“I know you haven’t. You’ve been on lookout duty all day. Let’s eat.”
“No, I’m alright. Thank you, though.”
“My arm’s starting to hurt. Come on, take it already.”
The principal persistently refused the onigiri with a nervous, sheepish smile. Eventually, the elder forcefully placed one half of it into the principal’s hand.
The onigiri was pathetic. It was made with crumbly rice, and probably smaller than an adult male’s fist. However, the two still possessed a shred of humanity. I felt stifled and uneasy as I watched them, and the uneasiness soon turned into unexplainable anger.
‘Who am I mad at? Toward the younger adults who left them behind? Or toward this damned world?’
These people were locked up in here for life, just for the sin of remaining human. They were doomed to spend the rest of their lives in this jail disguised as a school. I was watching human beings go about their lives as people, and yet I was wracked by an unexplainable feeling of guilt and sadness that I did not expect.
I had known of their plight since the week before. However, I hadn’t been able to render them any assistance. I’d faced several issues in the process, but now, looking at them, they all seemed like excuses.
After a moment, the principal and the elder began to converse.
“Sir, did Madam Mal-Sook make it back yesterday?”
The principal didn’t say anything. The elder muttered something to himself, then patted the principal on his shoulder.
“She used to run all over the place when she was young…”
The elder didn’t finish.
The principal let out a sigh, and spoke in a grieving tone, “It’s all my fault. If I had paid more attention, Madam Mal-Sook would’ve—”
“Stop.” The elder cut him off and gave him a pat on the back. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I know you’ve been doing your best, taking care of people like me. You don’t have anything to apologize for.”
The principal remained silent.
“And you should have some of the food that you went out with her to get.”
“No, I wouldn’t dare…”
“Don’t feel guilty.”
After that, the elder made his way back to the classroom.
Thud, tap. Thud, tap.
The sound of his cane receded down the hallway, leaving the principal alone in the silent hallway. He stood there, unmoving, his head drooping down. He let out a long, heavy sigh.
His sigh sounded like it contained all the guilt that he’d stored up inside. His shoulders dropped, and he collapsed to the floor like a falling leaf.
He was crying in silence, a fist in his mouth instead of the onigiri. I knew he had a lot on his shoulders. However, there was probably no one he could talk to about it. The responsibility, guilt, and helplessness that weighed the principal down filled the hallway.
* * *
There didn’t seem to be any other beings inside the school. I didn’t see any zombies like me, or any traces of the black creature. I wondered what had happened during the week I’d been gone. I hurried back to our apartment to figure out the answer to my question.
I had to go ahead with our initial plan, but we had to tweak it so that it was more moral. There was absolutely no time for any role-playing.
As soon as I got back, I explained the situation at the high school. It took a couple of hours to get them to understand what my intentions were. Lee Jeong-Uk stroked his chin with his hands.
“Let’s go tomorrow.”
He was now volunteering to go with me. I felt his resolution behind his words. He also needed a purpose in life. He needed something beyond the safety, protection, and survival of everyone here, something more fundamental that would keep him going. I took his answer as a ‘yes’.
I met Lee Jeong-Uk’s gaze and nodded. He returned it slightly, as if he knew what I was trying to say. Then Lee Jeong-Hyuk got up from the kitchen, and took out the precious stainless steel spear.
“I’m not sure if you’ll need this, but just in case.”
Lee Jeong-Hyuk passed the stainless steel spear to Lee Jeong-Uk with a smirk on his face. He received the weapon from his younger brother and returned the smirk.
The next day would be the first time we would be moving as a team. Not because someone asked a favor, or by force, but as a team united behind one purpose.
* * *
Unlike our initial plan, our preparations began early in the morning. Lee Jeong-Uk, Lee Jeong-Hyuk and Kang Eun-Jeong were part of the group. We knew that the people in the school would be suspicious if Lee Jeong-Uk entered by himself. I could foresee the questions they would be asking.
‘How did you survive by yourself? Why did you come here? Have you been spying on us?’
We came to the conclusion that it had to be a group of people. Lee Jeong-Hyk volunteered, while the Lee brothers vetoed Choi Da-Hye from joining. Someone had to stay to take care of So-Yeon and the children in case something went wrong. Kang Ji-Suk raised his right hand to volunteer, but of course, the Lee brothers ignored him.
We realized that there could be a problem in communication if the group comprised only rugged men. A vote was put forth, and based on the majority, Kang Eun-Jeong was selected to come with us. Surprisingly, she went along with our request.
- I have to do my part.
That’s what Kang Eun-Jeong said to me.
Since we had more people, I brought more underlings with me. I made my thirty blue-colored underlings form a tight circle around everyone. Lee Jeong-Uk noticed that I wasn’t in my best condition, and approached me.
“Is something wrong? Did you not get enough sleep?”
He knew that I didn’t need sleep. His joke merely highlighted his concern for me. I chuckled while pointing at the zombies near the apartment entrance. He stared at them blankly, then looked at me with disbelief. “Wait, they’re all your underlings?”
I growled an affirmative in my throat-rending voice. The previous night, while everyone had been sleeping, I’d gone around to recruit more underlings. Well, I didn’t recruit them because I wanted to. I was almost obligated to do so. I turned the zombies near apartment block 104, the one that we were located in, along with those near blocks 105 and 103.
That night alone, I recruited fifty-two underlings. I pushed them one by one until I was on the verge of fainting. My head almost split as I continued throughout the night. Thanks to my work, though, we had increased protection.
I was planning to take care of all the zombies within our apartment complex. I wanted to create a place where everyone felt safe, a safe haven that did not exist anywhere else. That was my grand plan for our apartment complex.
Lee Jeong-Uk patted me on the shoulder and smacked his lips. He knew that I suffered physically when I created more underlings. His gesture conveyed a million thanks. Then, he took a deep breath and looked at Lee Jeong-Hyuk and Kang Eun-Jeong.
“Ready?”
Lee Jeong-Hyuk and Kang Eun-Jeong nodded, their expressions betraying their nervousness. As he looked at them, Lee Jeong-Uk smirked and remarked, “Just do what So-Yeon’s dad says. He’ll make sure you’re safe.”
Everyone knew I couldn’t speak. I was basically a living corpse. But his joke was enough to lift the team’s spirits. I caught Lee Jeong-Uk’s eyes and nodded. He sighed, then said in a slightly bitter tone, “I don’t think I ever made it to school on time back in the day.”
‘That’s something to be proud about,’ was what I wanted to say.
* * *
The school was as silent as a tomb when we got there. I ordered my underlings to keep everyone else hidden, then knocked on the closed steel door.
Thud, thud, thud.
There was no response after the three knocks. All it did was attract the attention of the surrounding zombies. I glared at them with wide-open eyes. My bloodshot eyes were enough to threaten them. They all avoided my eyes or stepped backward. I wondered if the ones without vision felt my glare as well. I had figured out from the beginning that these street zombies and I were different.
As I stood in front of the wall, I thought to myself, ‘Should we jump over?’
I assumed that talking to them would become more difficult if we did so. I wanted to enter the school together with everyone else in the most proper way possible, but the situation did not allow us to do so. There was no other option but to barge in.
I ordered my zombies to make a platform, the same way they did the first time I’d come to the school. I sent Lee Jeong-Uk, Lee Jeong-Hyuk, and Kang Eun-Jeong over the wall. Just before Lee Jeong-Uk went over, he reminded me about our plan.
“If things go south, let’s go with what we agreed on earlier.”
We’d come up with a plan before we left the apartment. It wasn’t a grandiose plan. The plan was to get Kang Eun-Jeong to scream at the top of her lungs as we broke in. All those inside the school would be shocked to see us, and freeze. If any street zombies made their way in while we were at it, I would take care of them.
I nodded back to Lee Jeong-Uk, hoping for the best.
* * *
The sun was at its highest. I could feel the intense heat scorching my body. The streets shimmered with the heat. I sat on a wooden swing and waited for the others who had gone inside. As time flew by, I got more desperate.
‘What if they get caught before Kang Eun-Jeong screams? What if the people inside start attacking without asking questions?’
My negative thoughts swirled around like the heat haze shimmering over the street surface. I shook my head violently to get rid of them.
‘There’s nothing to worry about. They can still make it work through negotiation. The people inside haven’t lost their humanity.’
I continued to wait, assuming that the delay was merely because there was much for my group to explain.
“…Here!”
A familiar voice interrupted my thoughts. Someone was screaming desperately at the top of their lungs. I wasn’t sure how far away the voice was. It was so small that it barely made it through the shimmering heat haze. Someone far away was begging for their life. I stood up, my senses alert.
“Here! This way!”
It was a person’s voice. And it wasn’t just one person. From the voices and footsteps, there seemed to be at least two or three people.
I looked toward the sound. It was coming from the other direction, away from the school. I’d been drawn to the voice for a simple reason. It sounded very familiar. I knew I’d heard it somewhere before. A face drifted into my mind, and I could see him shouting in anger.
It was the principal’s voice.
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