I returned to the supermarket with ten underlings. There was still a lot of fresh water, canned food, and ramen in the back.

While I was getting essentials like portable burners and gas, I felt the need for several extra pairs of hands.

I turned two more zombies into my underlings and sent them back to our shelter with both arms full of supplies.

Everyone welcomed me with surprised looks when I got back. Well, they welcomed the food I brought.

“Ramen? Is this ramen?” exclaimed Choi Da-Hye, jumping up and down with excitement.

Lee Jung-Hyuk went straight for the watermelon, knocking it to see if it was ripe.

Lee Jung-Uk beamed at me, unable to hide his astonishment.

But I wanted them to wash up before they ate.

I waved at everyone to calm them down and wrote on the drawing pad.

- Shower

Choi Da-Hye shrieked as she read the word ‘shower’.

She came right up to me and asked, “What about water? Where are we going to get water?”

I couldn’t tell if she was asking me a question or threatening me.

She couldn’t hide her excitement. I saw her honesty as a good thing. Well, everyone in our group was honest. That’s what I liked about our group. I much preferred people who were straight shooters, instead of those who pretended to be nice while talking about me behind my back.

I told my underlings to leave the fresh water by the front door. They followed my orders, putting the bags full of bottled water on the floor. Some of them had water jugs on their shoulders.

The amount of water that was being piled up left the others open-mouthed with astonishment. Even the survivors from the supermarket uttered in disbelief, “We only had two bottles of fresh water for the past few days…”

I knew that surviving on two bottles must have been tough. I couldn’t even fathom their struggle. I took the drawing pad to Lee Jeong-Uk.

I pointed at the word ‘shower’ and then at the food. I wanted them to take a shower before eating. Lee Jung-Uk nodded in agreement.

Then he scratched his neck and hesitated awkwardly, as though struggling to say something. After several moments, he finally spoke. “I hope I don’t sound like a snob saying this right now…”

“Grr?”

“... But thanks for saving me, Jeong-Hyuk, and Da-Hye.”

I didn’t reply immediately.

It sure took him a while to say that. However, I was mildly surprised, since I hadn’t expected him to thank me at all.

He pointed at the bottled water, trying to steer the conversation away.

“We’ll conserve the water. Except for today. Deal?”

I smirked and nodded in agreement.

Tap, tap, tap.

So-Yeon grabbed my hand and asked, “Aren’t you going to take a shower?”

I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t tell her that my dead body didn’t need washing. As I stood there, my mouth working silently, Lee Jeong-Uk patted her and said, “Your dad’s going to be the last person to wash up.”

“Why?”

“He said he’ll wash up after taking care of a couple of things.”

“Really? Daddy said that?”

“Of course, sweetheart. I wish he would wash up because he stinks! Right?”

“Hehe, yes!” She nodded, laughing.

To my surprise, she got along with Lee Jeong-Uk pretty well. In my mind, he was the most difficult one to get close to, but she followed him as if he was the friendly next-door neighbor, or that one uncle in every family that every child looked up to.

I wondered if he had been treating her well while I’d been gone. Perhaps he was only prickly toward me. Ever since we rescued the supermarket survivors, though, he’d begun to open up to me as well.

So-Yeon’s mood seemed to have brightened, now that she was getting used to being around more people. She talked more. She laughed more. It was a good change.

‘So far so good. I’m doing my best.’

I smiled at her beaming face. Lee Jung-Uk broke the silence, snapping me out of my contemplation. “Aren’t you going to head out?”

“…”

‘It’s going to take more time to get closer to Lee Jeong-Uk.’

* * *

I took five underlings with me and went outside. The sun was still up. Beyond the reddish sky, I felt the summer breeze and the sound of bugs chirping.

I was able to enjoy the nature around me, as the breeze and the chirping covered the sounds that the zombies made. My destination was a high school that was forty minutes away. I was going to check if there were any survivors there.

Of course, the plan to move So-Yeon there wasn’t set in stone yet. I wasn’t willing to compromise on my second condition. I would only move the group once I felt, from their behavior, that they were safe to be around.

The sky lost its reddish hue as I headed to the high school, sinking into inky darkness. At night, without the sun, the streets were eerier than I expected. I passed cars and buildings with shattered windows, and the streets were littered with trash and corpses.

Zombies were running around, and some twisted their necks violently to sniff the air.

The sunless streets were a living hell. I couldn’t help but be impressed by Lee Jung-Uk’s group and the survivors from the supermarket for staying alive in a world like this for days. With the electricity cut off, the city was pitch black. I couldn’t see anything.

Even when my eyes grew used to the dark, I was constantly surprised when zombies came out of nowhere.

It was difficult to spot them with the naked eye, while it was impossible to remain unnoticed by them, given their acute sense of smell and sight.

I varied my route and snuck through small alleyways, trying to avoid the zombies as much as possible. I did so because I knew I might have to bring everyone along with me later. I was looking for a route where we would encounter the least number of them.

I could turn them into my underlings, but I considered that the worst-case scenario. I didn’t want to go through the acute headaches again, or suffer more broken teeth. It took more than just sheer grit to get through such pain.

I wasn’t planning to increase the number of underlings unless it was absolutely necessary. I counted the current ones I had with my fingers. To my surprise, I had exactly sixty underlings.

‘A leader of sixty zombies.’

I felt a sense of power.

I kept on walking through the darkness, my mind preoccupied with all manner of thoughts. Before I knew it, I saw the high school in front of me.

A wall, taller than the average person, surrounded the school. There were two ways to get in, the front gate or the back gate. Both were steel sliding gates. I approached the front gate slowly, following the wall. As I got closer, I heard voices from behind the steel gate.

“Wait. So what happened to Mr. Kim?”

“I don’t know. I heard he confronted the principal or something.”

“Man, I can’t tell who’s telling the truth.”

“Well, both sides are telling the truth, that’s why. But you shouldn’t just move around unless you want to die like a dog.”

“But there’s no guarantee that a rescue team is going to come. It’s already been weeks. And what are we going to do about the food?”

I stooped down instinctively, a jolt of surprise running through me. Even though they were whispering, I knew that this was a conversation between living people. I had harbored the slightest hope, but I couldn’t believe there were actually survivors. From what they’d said, it was clear that there were more survivors.

I had to know what the situation was inside. I lined up my underlings against the wall behind me. I commanded them to bend over, the same way I’d ordered the others this morning, to form a platform for me to stand on. I clambered up onto their backs so that I could see the entire school.

There were a total of five floors, but it seemed like that the first floor was the only one being occupied.

A couple of classrooms on the first floor had light shining out of them. The lights flickered through the curtains the way candlelight would.

There weren’t any high-rise buildings nearby where one could observe the entire school. Thanks to this, it seemed like the zombies that had developed their sight couldn’t see the lights coming out from the first floor.

‘How are the people on guard duty protecting themselves from the zombies?’

After all, the zombies would attack once they smelled living flesh.

I rested my chin on the top of the wall as I observed the lookouts.

I looked more closely at them, and noticed that they had smeared zombie blood all over themselves. I couldn’t believe they would do something that disgusting. I supposed there wasn’t anything one wouldn’t do in order to survive.

Now that I had confirmed the presence of survivors, I had to take a look inside.

I led my underlings to the rear of the school and arranged them in the same manner. After climbing over them, I landed on the other side of the wall without making a sound.

I thought my landing would make a noise, but surprisingly enough, my body was light as a feather. Now that the sun was down, my physical capabilities far surpassed what I could do when the sun was up.

I immediately fashioned an escape route just in case I got caught by the people in the school. I lined up some desks and chairs along the wall. They seemed to be extra items that weren’t used in the barricade that the survivors had created. The makeshift platform wasn’t that sturdy, but it was more than enough for me to make the jump over the wall. After preparing my means of escape, I spied a back door far away that led into the building.

I made my way over, silent as a cockroach. However, it was shut tight, locked and chained.

I hastily searched for an open door. However, all the doors, including those in the back and to the left and right, were locked. I knew that it would be no trouble to break in, since they were glass doors. If I did so, though, all of my sneaking around would have been for naught.

I came to the conclusion that there was no other way than to go straight in through the main gate.

At that moment, I directed my gaze toward the second-floor window. The window seemed broken.

‘Bingo. Let’s enter through there. I guess the saying ‘if there is a will there's a way’ is really true. All right, let's give this a try.’

It wasn’t the ideal time to test my physical capabilities, but I had no other choice. I jumped as high as I could, concentrating all my strength into my legs. I felt my thighs expand as my calves compressed.

I leaped.

I barely got my hands onto the windowsill. I couldn’t believe what I was capable of.

‘Wait, I can jump this high? I wonder how high my vertical leap is.’

It looked like it was well over a meter. I got chills knowing what I was capable of. It felt as though I could momentarily defy gravity, a feeling I’d never experienced before.

I had now gained confidence in my physical abilities, something I’d never had before. I vaulted through the window and stooped low. I saw a barricade blocking the stairway to the first floor.

Given the way it had been set up, I could see that the survivors here had underestimated what the zombies were capable of.

As I crouched there, I heard footsteps coming from the first-floor hallway. I laid low, focusing on the sound of the footsteps.