Free Web NovelBANG! BANG!
In the darkness, Junho pulled the trigger of his KP9 after removing the suppressor.
The rounds were slightly different from standard NATO ammunition, but even subsonic rounds weren’t exactly quiet.
And in the apocalypse night—where the entire world felt drowned in silence—the gunshots would obviously sound even louder.
BANG! BANG!
But the places the IR laser sight pointed toward had nothing to do with where Ju Seongcheol and the raiders from the library were lying flat on the ground.
The gunshots masked it somewhat, but chaos had probably erupted over there by now.
Because Junho was shooting out building windows.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
This time, Junho shattered the windows of an old apartment building forty to fifty meters away from where the raiders were hiding.
If this had been peacetime, lights would have flicked on everywhere and people would have started screaming in panic.
But that didn’t happen.
Instead—
Krrrraaaah...! Gwoooar...!
The howls of hundreds—no, thousands—of awakened zombies began echoing throughout the residential neighborhoods surrounding the university.
Right on cue, a transmission came through from Yoon Seolhee.
— We confirmed the gunshots.
“Yes. What about your side?”
— There are a lot of children, so persuading them wasn’t difficult. They agreed to follow our proposal.
“Then move immediately.”
— Yes. I already gave them ten minutes to pack. They should be able to leave within five.
“Copy.”
After ending the transmission, Junho calmly studied the footage being sent by the drone.
The drone used detachable batteries, and he had swapped in fully charged ones right before leaving the farm, so there were still about forty minutes remaining.
The reason they rotated entire drones at the shelter and in Gahyeon-ri instead of swapping batteries was because of the noise issue—and because surveillance would briefly stop during battery replacement.
But here in Bucheon, without support from the shelter, they had no choice but to replace the batteries directly despite the loud noise during takeoff and landing.
“There really are a lot of them.”
The footage transmitted from roughly two hundred meters in the air was overwhelming.
Zombie heat signatures were bursting out of buildings throughout Sosa-dong and Yeokgok-dong, rapidly moving through the streets. It looked like green paint splattered across a gray canvas.
But in some areas, the heat signatures weren’t scattered points.
They were moving together like swarms.
“Alphas....”
There were a total of five heat-signature clusters that clearly belonged to slave zombies controlled by Alphas.
Just in this area alone—part of Sosa-dong and Yeokgok-dong—five Alphas had survived and gathered hordes under their control.
Well, considering the combined population of the two neighborhoods had once been fifty to sixty thousand, that made sense.
“Alright. The zombies are here. So where are you bastards gonna run?”
Muttering quietly, Junho shifted his attention to the raiders from the library.
All they could hear were the zombies roaring.
They had no way of knowing how many zombies were moving, or from where to where.
“They’re probably shitting themselves right about now....”
And as if proving Junho correct, the panicking raiders eventually chose to retreat the way they came.
No matter how tempting other survivors’ food and supplies were, nothing mattered more than their own lives.
“.......”
Junho coldly observed the high-ground building where the university survivors were hiding.
Perhaps because they had heard the gunshots followed by the zombies’ howls, several people had climbed onto the rooftop and were peering outside.
But seeing anything in the pitch-black apocalypse night without even a single light source was impossible.
They were probably panicking, wondering if they should abandon the building and flee somewhere else immediately.
“Consider yourselves lucky.”
They hadn’t expressed any willingness to cooperate with his side, but they also hadn’t attempted to prey on other survivor groups.
That alone had saved their lives tonight.
Click.
Lowering his night vision goggles, Junho attached the tablet to the center of his tactical vest and started moving again.
Letting people who killed others and stole their belongings escape alive had never been part of tonight’s plan.
***
TWANG...! Tiiing!
“Ahh!?”
After the gunshot came the sound of a bullet striking and ricocheting only four or five meters away, making someone yelp in terror.
“Fuck. Shut the hell up.”
The leader of the library group cursed as they frantically retraced their path.
But he was just as terrified and shaken himself.
Kwoooar...! Ghuuuk...! Grrr...!
The forest trail they were running through was only twenty or thirty meters away from the residential area.
Catholic University and the nearby houses had been built along the foothills of Wonmi Mountain, so the hiking trails and walking paths used by residents naturally ran extremely close to the neighborhood.
Which meant every zombie in this district filled with villas, apartments, and multi-family housing was now converging on Wonmi Mountain where the gunshots had come from.
And the raiders were forced to hear those horrifying roars from point-blank range.
And on top of that—
TWANG...! Thud!
Gwoooaaaarrrr...!!!
“Huff, huff, huff....”
With bullets obviously aimed at them and the zombies’ howls growing noticeably closer, the leader of the library raiders felt overwhelming terror that nearly made his legs give out.
But they had to keep running.
Maybe the shooter sucked at aiming, because the bullets kept missing. And the zombies had poorer vision at night and still hadn’t pinpointed their exact location.
If they could somehow make it back to the library, they might survive.
TWANG...! Fweee!
“Fuck.”
If only those gunshots would stop.
“B-boss. Hek... huff....”
“Why the fuck are you talking? Just run.”
“N-no, that’s not it. The gunshots. Hek... they’re not getting farther away. Huff....”
“What...?”
The leader slightly slowed his pace.
The exhausted raiders behind him slowed as well, and the man in his forties who had spoken quickly continued.
“Huff, huff. I’m serious. The first shots came from the mountain near the university, right? Then they should sound farther away by now, but they still sound the same.”
“He’s right. Huff... we’ve been running for two or three minutes already. They should’ve gotten quieter by now. But....”
TWANG...!
Everyone flinched violently at the latest gunshot.
And the raiders’ leader clearly realized his companions were right.
“Goddammit. So what, huff, he’s chasing us while shooting? Huff... why?”
“I-it’s that bastard.”
“What...?”
Ju Seongcheol caught up to the leader and spoke in a visibly trembling voice.
“It’s that fucking Lee Junho bastard. The one handing out food and supplies yesterday.”
“What? Why the hell would he...?”
The leader of the library raiders looked utterly dumbfounded.
That young punk who had proposed some laughable nonsense about everyone working together to survive.
He had pretended to listen because the guy was giving out food, but he’d never had any intention of joining such ridiculous fantasies.
In a world like this, hundreds of people living together?
And while taking care of useless little brats who only consumed food?
Bullshit.
Where would the food even come from?
No, before that—was there even a place in all of Bucheon where that many people could hide from zombies?
That was why he had only pretended to discuss things with the leaders of the other survivor groups while completely ignoring Junho’s proposal.
Of course, he had felt grateful toward the young guy named Lee Junho.
Because he handed out food and medicine?
As if.
He was grateful because it helped him narrow down the locations of other survivors hiding out there.
“Fuck, this ain’t moonlight aerobics. Huff... why the hell is he doing this?”
“T-that’s....”
Unable to admit that Junho seemed to be specifically tracking him, Ju Seongcheol desperately spun his brain.
Then he quickly came up with a believable excuse.
“He told me this before. Said if you hand out food and supplies to survivors, there’ll definitely be people thinking different things....”
“What? Is he talking about us right now—”
“And then zombies would gather, and he’d use that chance to do something.”
“Ha....”
The leader of the library raiders let out a scoff dripping with irritation and rage before abruptly stopping.
“......!?”
“Boss?”
The leader turned toward his confused companions, face twisted viciously.
“You all heard that, right? That little punk wants to use us. Fuck that. You just gonna let it slide?”
“Huh? B-but he’s got a gun. How are we supposed to deal with someone with a gun...?”
“Hey, Hardware. Even a mutt’s got home-field advantage in its own yard. Fuck’s sake, this is our neighborhood. We’ve lived here over twenty years. Even if he knows the roads, we know them better.”
“Mmm....”
“And it’s nighttime. We outnumber him by a lot. Fuck, with these numbers, doesn’t this seem doable? He hasn’t even hit us once.”
“Still....”
“God, you’re pathetic. Hey, Convenience Store.”
The raider leader—who had lived here since the subway first came into Sosa-dong—continued with a grim expression.
“If that bastard keeps firing, zombies are gonna swarm us. You wanna go back to the library dragging monsters behind us?”
“Ah....”
“We deal with him now. Fuck, otherwise we die.”
After a brief silence, the man who used to own a convenience store spoke savagely.
“...Yeah. Fuck it. Let’s do it.”
“That’s right. He’s not even a real soldier anyway.”
“Boss, let’s lure him toward the sports park. It’s wide open and there are plenty of places to hide there.”
These people had also survived over ten months in an apocalypse where human life was worth less than flies.
They had killed at least a few zombies or people themselves.
And now it was dark, and fear for their own survival made people bold.
So they made their decision.
“Fuck, his shooting sucks anyway. He’s nothing special.”
“Right. Give me a K2 rifle and I’d hit every shot. That little punk just got lucky finding a gun.”
“Let’s do it.”
“Yeah. Let’s fucking do this.”
Their fear quickly transformed into anger.
And mixed into that anger—
'Fuck, if I had a gun....'
'I’d kill that bastard and take over the library. Hell, maybe even all of Wonmi Mountain.'
—was each person’s private desire to betray the others the moment an opportunity appeared.
“Fuuuck. Let’s do this.”
And so the library raiders decided to fight back against the “kid” who had merely gotten lucky enough to obtain a gun.
They changed direction toward the sports park—their chosen battlefield.
But their resolve collapsed in less than ten seconds.
Kiiiiiiing...!
“Ughhh!”
A massive, horrifying noise suddenly echoed through the night sky, making the raiders jerk their heads around in shock.
Illuminated by moonlight, a large medium-sized drone was flying low not far from them.
EEEEEEEEENG...!
“W-what the hell? Why’s there suddenly a drone?”
“How the fuck should I know!? It’s loud as shit!”
Even from twenty or thirty meters away, the drone’s rotor noise was loud enough to drown out conversation, making the raiders grimace.
But soon they realized something.
The position of that huge drone flying low while producing deafening noise.
And what its flight direction meant.
KWOOOAAARRR...!!!
“Ah...!?”
The zombies that had already reached the alleyways beneath the retaining walls in the residential area simultaneously snapped their heads toward the sound.
They still couldn’t see it yet.
But the direction they were staring in—
Was exactly where the raiders stood.
“R-run!”
The instant the leader shouted—
The library raiders bolted without hesitation.
EEEEEEEEEEENG...!
The drone pursued them from behind.
KRAAAAH! KYAAAAH!
And countless zombies charged through the darkness like evil spirits as they chased after the drone.
***
“.......”
Expressionless, Junho manipulated the drone controller.
Altitude: roughly twenty meters.
At this height, the sound would be deafening from the ground.
And for tonight’s operation, he had also restored all the drone’s LED lights that he normally kept covered with electrical tape.
A flying object suddenly appears, making enormous noise while flashing bright lights?
Every zombie awakened by the gunshots would rush toward it like moths to a flame.
Of course, ordinary zombies would eventually stop chasing after a few minutes once they realized it wasn’t human.
“But Alphas and slave zombies are different.”
The Alphas would try to identify what that flying object—clearly being used by human prey—actually was and where it was going.
And if they spotted the humans running ahead of the drone?
“They’re here.”
Confirming that one of the Alpha-controlled zombie swarms had attached itself to the fleeing library raiders’ flank and rear, Junho switched the drone to follow mode on the fastest-running raider, then grabbed his weapon and sprinted.
Through the trees and brush, he could see the heat signatures of the raiders who had become perfect bait to lure the zombies.
And then, among the pursuing zombies, Junho spotted the Alpha itself—radiating an intense white heat signature that stood out like a fluorescent lamp.
'One, two.'
Two out of the five swarms had detected the library raiders and begun pursuit.
KRAAAAH...! KRAAAAH...!
Aaaaagh...!
Along with the excited roars of predators that had discovered prey came the scream of a raider who tripped while running and tumbled down the mountain trail.
Unluckily for him, he rolled directly into the alley beneath the retaining wall where zombies were running.
The raider was instantly torn apart.
Ignoring it, Junho ran several times faster than both the zombies and the raiders, reached a preselected point, canceled the drone’s follow mode, and took manual control again.
“Not there. Right, you need to go that way.”
Within the range of the shelter’s wireless network around Gahyeon-ri, the AI Akina usually controlled the drones.
But that didn’t mean Junho had neglected practicing himself.
For moments exactly like this, he had personally flown the shelter’s drones whenever he had spare time, practicing all kinds of advanced maneuvering.
And the results of that training were now unfolding beneath Bucheon’s night sky.
“Yeah, that alley. Keep going straight and you’ll hit Sosa Station. Everyone runs pretty well.”
Whether all of them or not, Junho’s goal was to gather the zombies of Sosa-dong and Yeokgok-dong into one place.
Why?
“Once I kill the Alphas, this area becomes manageable.”
To find Choi Hyunwoo and Kim Taeyoung, then cross Sosa Station again and move through the mountains toward Oryu-dong, the top priority was eliminating the Alphas that could identify humans through their slave zombies.
And to gather those cunning cannibal monsters together—
Nothing worked better than vividly alive prey like those raiders.
