“That’s the last place.”

Pointing toward an arboretum with a fairly large pond nearly a hundred meters across, Ju Seongcheol continued in a tense voice.

“I think around twenty people are living there. They basically use this whole area like it’s their own territory. Blocked all the paths too. There’s a lot of barbed wire and booby traps set up around the place. That’s why we could only come this far ourselves.”

Just as he said, the trails that had once been used as walking paths by local residents were now completely blocked off with obstacles like abandoned furniture and oil drums.

And the vitality of plants—nature’s raw force—was truly incredible.

After more than ten months without human maintenance, the arboretum and park had already transformed into something resembling a half-wild forest, overgrown with weeds and brush.

Not only would zombies and people alike struggle to get inside, but even if they managed to enter, it looked like the perfect place to get lost wandering around.

“That pond’s connected to either a spring or groundwater or something. Anyway, people tried going there a few times to get water, but the bastards living there chased everybody off. Some people even died because of it. Dangerous fucking psychos.”

As he spoke, Ju Seongcheol kept nervously watching Junho’s reaction.

Like he was asking, Do we really have to give food to people like that too?

But Junho simply piloted the drone overhead while gazing down at the arboretum.

“So they’re the last group?”

“Yes. As far as I know, there’s nobody else left living on Chunui Mountain.”

“Got it. But.”

Junho glanced at Ju Seongcheol, who was drenched in sweat after climbing the mountain carrying heavy supplies.

“You really don’t care? I killed your friends last night.”

“Ah....”

Ju Seongcheol flinched before replying in a slightly subdued voice.

“Well, the truth is... they weren’t really my friends.”

“Then what were they?”

“We just met after the world turned out like this. There was this guy named Youngjin, and it turned out he’d gone to middle school with me. We weren’t close at all back then, though. And those assholes looked down on me all the time. Beat me up sometimes too.”

“Still ran around with them looting houses and killing people, didn’t you?”

“I-I never killed anyone. I killed a few zombies, but I never killed a person. Seriously.”

Junho spoke quietly to the panicked Ju Seongcheol as he hurriedly denied it.

“Really? I’ve killed plenty. Zombies and people. So many I stopped counting.”

“...!!!”

“That’s why I don’t see the people living there as bad guys. In a world like this, who’d just sit there while strangers crawled into their territory and started causing trouble? So to me, you and your friends are bigger pieces of shit than they are. You dared climb over the wall into my home.”

“Sorry. I-I’m sorry.”

“As long as you understand. Just remember why I let you live.”

“Yes....”

Ju Seongcheol nodded quickly.

There was only one reason he had survived.

Because he’d been the only one who tried to run instead of climbing over the wall yesterday.

If he had crossed it, Junho had said he would’ve tortured everything he knew out of him before killing him.

And Ju Seongcheol would’ve bet everything he owned that the large, cold-faced man standing before him absolutely would’ve carried it out.

Though to be fair, he didn’t really own much.

Still, from Ju Seongcheol’s perspective, the man called Lee Junho was an unbelievably ruthless killer.

But at the same time, he also seemed to be someone who kept his promises.

'He didn’t touch the women and actually gave people food....'

Junho had delivered food and supplies to every survivor group they encountered around Chunui Mountain.

And although he had guns and terrifying combat ability, he never once stole from the other groups or laid a hand on the women.

If it had been him, Ju Seongcheol thought he probably would’ve robbed them first and worried later.

So he had even started admiring Junho a little.

Because he was handing out food and supplies like some idiot pushover?

No.

“But seriously, I’m really not trying to act smart or give advice or anything, but the people in that arboretum probably won’t listen to you.”

“I’ll decide that myself. You guide me, I make deals. That’s all.”

“Yes, sir.”

Junho truly did make “deals” with the survivors.

Ju Seongcheol still didn’t fully understand why, but after Junho spared him and even fed him, all he could do now was follow obediently.

Then, after Ju Seongcheol carefully pushed through the brush and led them another several dozen meters downhill—

Thunk!

“Gah!”

“Stop there. Come any closer and I shoot.”

“W-wait! Don’t shoot! We came to talk!”

Startled as an arrow slammed into the ground barely a meter in front of him, Ju Seongcheol immediately threw both hands into the air at the warning that rang out from somewhere in the forest.

“Talk about what? We’ve got nothing to say, so turn around and leave. Unless you wanna die.”

“N-no, not me. Someone else.”

“Who? Where the hell is anyone other than—”

Bzzzzzz!

At that moment, the drone hovering high overhead lowered its altitude slightly, and the distinct sound of its rotors echoed through the sky.

“What the fuck is that!?”

“It’s a drone!”

Panicked voices burst out from all over the forest.

Meanwhile, Junho—hidden behind cover a short distance away from Ju Seongcheol—raised the drone back above a hundred meters and shouted:

“I know all your positions already. The drone’s got thermal imaging, so hiding’s pointless. Come out so we can talk.”

“Who the hell are you!? You little shit, I swear I’ll—”

Pang!

A tungsten pellet from the modified air rifle slammed into the tree right beside the shouting man.

“You should stop talking right there. Next one goes through your skull.”

“......!”

The moment he fired—not a bow, but an actual gun, and without warning—the forest instantly fell silent.

“I can see everything through the drone, and I’ve got firearms. But I still asked to talk. Keep in mind, if I wanted to, I could’ve killed three or four of you before we even started this conversation. So. Can we talk now?”

Quiet murmuring followed, the survivors clearly rattled.

Then finally—

“Fine! Come to the pond!”

The arboretum survivors accepted the request.

As expected, in the apocalypse, guns were king.

***

“Jo Seongho. I’m the one leading the people here.”

“Lee Junho.”

Junho exchanged greetings with Jo Seongho, a man who looked to be in his mid-fifties.

Behind him stood men and women of various ages, staring at Junho with expressions mixing hostility and tension.

Every single one of them looked filthy and worn down, but none appeared emaciated or weak.

Which meant the arboretum group still had at least some surplus food.

“So, you said you wanted to talk? About what? More importantly, aren’t you military? Can soldiers just threaten civilians like this?”

And judging from Jo Seongho’s reaction, this group seemed even more suspicious and wary than the other survivor groups.

But suspicion and caution were essential virtues for surviving the apocalypse, so Junho didn’t care much.

Something else irritated him far more.

“I’m not military. And quit talking down to me like a fucking asshole. We just met. Who the hell gave you permission to speak casually?”

“...W-what?”

Thunk!

Junho pulled several cans from his backpack and tossed them onto the ground.

“Anyway. I came here to make a deal. Whether you want to hear the offer or not is your choice.”

“T-tuna cans?”

“There’s Spam too! Is that beef!?”

The eyes of the arboretum survivors widened.

Jo Seongho himself stared down at the cans that had rolled to his feet with visibly widened eyes.

And Junho didn’t miss the flash of greed that surfaced in his gaze for an instant.

“There’s plenty more. Got several more boxes. And I’ve got these too.”

Junho reached into his backpack again.

This time, instead of tossing the items down, he lifted them high enough for everyone to see clearly.

“Multivitamins, painkillers, antibiotics too. This is a first-aid medical kit. If you want, I can give you this as well.”

“Ah...!”

Junho already knew that survivor groups like these—groups with at least some food stability—were often more desperate for medicine than canned food.

And his tactic worked perfectly.

The greed on Jo Seongho’s face became even stronger than when he’d first seen the food.

“You said you wanted to talk, right? What do you want from us? And aren’t those expired or something?”

“They’ll last several more years. The antibiotics are pills too, so they’ve lost a little potency, but they’ll still work fine for about another year. And what I want from you is simple.”

“W-what is it?”

“Just say it already.”

Everyone stared at him with naked greed blazing in their eyes—as if they would’ve rushed him immediately if he hadn’t been armed.

“You know there are a lot of other people hiding around these mountains too, right? Ever thought about joining forces with them and surviving together? There are probably over a hundred people out there. Maybe more.”

“What?”

“No, what the hell are you talking about....”

“I’m not telling you to do it right this second. Just gather the representatives together and talk. If you do that, I’ll give you several boxes of canned food and one full box of these supplies. And for reference, every other group already agreed. You’re the last place I came to.”

“...!!!”

The disbelief on their faces shifted once more into conflict and greed.

Looking between the canned food on the ground, the medical supplies in Junho’s hand, and Junho himself, Jo Seongho’s eyes flickered constantly.

Then Junho quietly asked:

“So? You willing to do it?”

Of course, there was no need to hear the answer.

***

“That’s the place. I lived there with the others.”

Ju Seongcheol’s exhausted face finally regained a little life after spending nearly the entire day climbing around Chunui Mountain and Wonmi Mountain since dawn.

Probably because they had finally arrived home.

And because he was finally about to receive “his share.”

“There aren’t any other people nearby?”

“There are, but everyone stays hidden at this hour. You can see why, right? There’s an apartment complex right next to us. Almost a thousand units there. That’s why we only went outside before sunrise or after it got completely dark.”

The villa where Ju Seongcheol and his group had been staying was roughly a kilometer from Junho’s house.

Not far from Kkachiul Station, surrounded by large apartment complexes, with dense clusters of detached homes and townhouses farther out.

But after so long without maintenance, the landscaping trees planted around the villas and apartment buildings along the mountain slope had grown thick enough to block visibility completely.

Meaning that as long as they stayed quiet and avoided making noise, it was possible to survive there relatively safely.

“I see. By the way, the guy staying inside and those girls really had nothing to do with the dead ones?”

“Y-yeah. The girls were all brought there by force. At first they got... forced into things and stuff. But where can anyone survive now anyway? If they go near the subway stations or places like Sang-dong or Jung-dong, they’ll obviously get eaten by zombies. So they’ve just been living like that for a while now.”

Whenever Ju Seongcheol talked about the women, he looked even more energetic—almost excited.

Well, maybe he thought that now all the guys he claimed weren’t really his friends were dead, the women would belong to him.

But whether that happened or not meant nothing to Junho.

In a world heading toward collapse, the way people chose to survive was their own responsibility.

“Here. Your promised share.”

Junho handed over the backpack he had refilled after returning to the house three separate times.

“Th-thank you, boss. Seriously, thank you so much.”

Even after spending the entire day watching Junho obsessively stick to strict “trades,” Ju Seongcheol had still clearly harbored doubts until now.

Only after actually receiving the supplies did he finally grin broadly in relief.

He repeatedly bowed his head while struggling to sling the heavy backpack over his shoulder.

With this much, he could probably survive at least a month without worrying.

Maybe that was why.

Feeling a strange sense of familiarity toward Junho, Ju Seongcheol cautiously asked:

“But boss, can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“What you were telling people today while handing out food and medicine. About everyone joining together and surviving together. You said the representatives should meet up and at least talk first. And then after that, you’d make another proposal.”

“I did.”

“Right. But... do you really think that’ll work?”

Even in the short time they’d known each other, Ju Seongcheol had realized that aside from being overwhelmingly strong, Junho was also extremely cold-headed and smart.

More importantly, if anything, he was the exact opposite of righteous or naive.

And yet someone like that had spent the entire day handing out food and supplies trying to gather together the survivors of Chunui Mountain and Wonmi Mountain.

People who had survived this long in the apocalypse and been left with nothing but suspicion, greed, and malice.

“Whether it works or not, I don’t know either.”

“Huh? Then why...?”

Junho turned toward him with a face colder and more indifferent than ever.

“Whether they choose to unite like I suggested, or whether they start fighting each other over the things I gave them—that’s their choice.”

“.......”

“If they choose the first option, I’ll give them all the remaining food, generators, and fuel left at my house, ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) and ask for their cooperation with what I’m planning to do. But if they choose the second?”

“I-if they choose the second?”

“If they start fighting each other, things’ll probably get very loud, right? For example, imagine the people we met earlier storming this villa to steal the supplies in your backpack. What do you think the zombies in that apartment complex would do?”

“Ghk...!”

Where large numbers of people gathered, Alphas with hordes of slave zombies gathered too.

Then what would happen if hundreds of desperate survivors started tearing at each other over food?

“The zombies will swarm the area. And if the survivors ignore my proposal and give in to greed, we’ll use that opportunity to enter Sosa Station from the control center.”

That was what Junho had told Yoon Seolhee and Kim Jimin earlier, when they initially failed to understand his plan just like Ju Seongcheol now.

And though he still didn’t fully grasp the entire situation, a chill suddenly crawled down Ju Seongcheol’s spine as Junho’s flat voice quietly drilled into his ears.

“I just gave them a choice.”