Red Dot - 59

Upon hearing Jian sending signals through the walkie-talkie, Gyeong-oh came out immediately and was utterly speechless as he witnessed only two people pushing back a massive horde of zombies. Rather than retreating from such a large swarm of zombies, they were pushing forward, which seemed so impressive that it felt surreal.
While Gyeong-oh stood there in shock, a sound came from the walkie-talkie he held.

“Sir, what are you doing! Run while the guys are holding them off!”

“Oh, okay!”

Understanding the situation only then, Gyeong-oh closed the door and quickly ran towards the stairs. He had a backpack of a considerable size, somewhat similar to what Junseong had given him on the first day.

“Sir, just keep running down the stairs! You won’t see any zombies below the 4th floor!”

“Uh, okay! Got it!”

With a tense face, Gyeong-oh, who had rushed to the stairs, checked around cautiously despite Jian saying there was nothing wrong with the walkie-talkie.

As Jian, who had been observing the situation on each floor with binoculars from a distance, spent time carefully moving around and cautiously checking due to Gyeong-oh, it became increasingly frustrating.

Pushing back the zombies using the fire extinguisher in the 4th-floor corridor also had its limitations. Zombies running from the end of the corridor were gradually joining, swelling the crowd, and the water from the fire extinguisher was not limitless. Since Junseong and Changmin needed to escape when a lot of water came out, Jian had to somehow quickly get Gyeong-oh out of the building.

Jian deliberately shouted, creating a fuss.

“Sir, behind you! Behind!”

“What, what?! Behind?! Where behind?”

Even though there was no one behind Gyeong-oh, Jian’s fuss didn’t stop.

“No time to look back! Run to the 1st floor quickly!”

As Jian urgently shouted, Gyeong-oh no longer had the luxury to look around. There were indeed a group of zombies, which two men had been holding off, behind him. If they could no longer hold back the zombie horde, it wouldn’t be surprising if one or two zombies, or even the entire horde, chased after him.

Thinking like that, the scene from a zombie movie flashed in his mind, where someone surrounded by zombies was being eaten alive. Even without realizing it, he shouted while jumping down the stairs.

“Uuuh-!”

Fearing that the zombies might rush at him, he refrained from screaming loudly and just wailed through his throat with his mouth tightly closed. The extreme anxiety and fear that had accumulated while holding out alone at home pressed on Gyeong-oh.

However, he couldn’t just stay quiet as if he had been crouching quietly at home. Zombies were chasing him from behind.

Gyeong-oh felt suffocated, as if his breath was caught in his throat. While stepping down the stairs one by one, he searched the outer pockets of his jacket and took out the inhaler.

If it weren’t for the inhaler sent by Junseong and his group through the drone, he would have been gasping for breath, collapsing, and fainting in no time. Gyeong-oh was grateful to Junseong and his team for sending him the inhaler.

‘Let’s stay calm. Helping those people is me quickly escaping from here.’

He couldn’t afford to be anxious anymore. He pushed himself harder, putting more strength into his legs. Feeling a sense of relief as if his airways were opening up due to the inhaler, he thought he could run a bit more.

Having overcome the panic attack and asthma attack around the 2nd floor, Gyeong-oh was soon able to reach the 1st floor.

“Hide behind the flower bed outside the entrance! Crouch down!”

“Got it!”

Following Jian’s instructions, Gyeong-oh, crouching behind the flower bed, fervently hoped that the two men desperately trying to escape would make it out safely.

After a short while.

Kyaaah-!

Cock! Haaak-!

Shoulders twitched at the distant scream.

It sounded like the zombies from the 4th floor were rushing in.

Fortunately, the two men from earlier came to the hiding place behind the flower bed where Gyeong-oh was, and they showed their faces.

“Haah, ha… Are you okay, sir? Any injuries?”

The petite-looking young man among the two from earlier was the first to speak.

Gyeong-oh looked at Junseong and was genuinely moved.

To be asked if he was okay by someone who fought against zombies when all he could do was run away. Moreover, they helped him fight against so many zombies and safely escape, accomplishing what the police or rescue teams couldn’t. For Gyeong-oh, they were genuinely people he should be grateful for.

While Gyeong-oh was touched, Junseong and Changmin crouched behind the flower bed, listening carefully. Just as the zombies chasing them seemed to reach the second floor, soon a groaning sound echoed near the first floor. Due to the passage of time since losing sight of Junseong and Changmin, the zombies seemed to be wandering aimlessly again, not actively searching.

With a relieved expression, Changmin looked at Junseong. He checked the time and observed the surroundings.

‘The time we gained is almost the same. So, during the time it takes us to climb the cloud bridge, there’s no chance of zombies popping out.’

Junseong, recalling events from saving Gyeong-oh in the dream, moved forward. Gyeong-oh followed him, and Changmin, bringing up the rear, lowered his pipe, preparing for a potential zombie attack.

“Don’t worry. No zombies will appear while we climb the cloud bridge, so you can relax.”

Gyeong-oh asked how he could be sure, and Junseong simply continued walking. Finally, standing at the end of the cloud bridge stairs, they were greeted by Doh Han-seo, who was smiling warmly.

“Good job.”

Gyeong-oh, looking at the tall handsome man he hadn’t noticed when watching through the drone, was captivated. He had never seen someone so good-looking among the people he had met.

“I got bored waiting, so I cleaned up the surroundings a bit.”

And for the first time, he saw someone casually laughing while piling up zombie corpses.

Gyeong-oh, watching the red blood dripping from Han-seo’s knife, had to desperately suppress the impending panic attack.

* * *

After rescuing Hwang Gyeong-oh and gathering inside the container office, the air felt different with just one more person.

It felt a bit warmer, and there was a human smell, so to speak.

Perhaps that was why Jian’s face also seemed to brighten up.

“Having more people feels nice!”

“But we only gained one more old man… What’s the big deal…”

“Sir, please stop talking! Among us, you’re the oldest!”

Gyeong-oh felt a pang of something painful in his chest at Jian’s cheerful words.

Even at a glance, he was in his late thirties, while the rest were all in their twenties, and Jian was even a high school student. Being among them made him feel unnecessarily depressed due to his age.

Watching Gyeong-oh cautiously, Junseong took the last corner of the calorie bar from the bar provided by Junseong and took a bite. After swallowing the water, he looked at Junseong.

“But please explain… sir.”

“As Jian said, speak comfortably. Where should I start with the explanation?”

Junseong intended to tell everything today anyway, so he planned to reveal the facts one by one when asked.

Gyeong-oh, unsure where to start, pointed at his backpack. The quite bulging backpack seemed like it might contain a lot.

“Why did you tell me to bring those… and how did you know I had them?”

Junseong also directed his gaze to Gyeong-oh’s backpack.

“As you know, rescue operations are hardly taking place. At best, we’ve checked a few major places on the first or second day.”

Junseong looked around at everyone, intending to reveal the truth one by one.

“Until now, it’s strange that there has been no broadcast or notification, leaving everything abandoned. There’s no plan for rescue, guidance to shelters, or any information on how to resolve this situation.”

This was the same in the dream.

Even in the dream, there was only one rescue team, seen in the hospital, and thereafter, there were no minor broadcasts related to rescue. It was strange that no action was taken, despite the obvious presence of survivors everywhere. To investigate further, it was best to go to the outskirts’ shelters directly.

However, even in the dream, Junseong had never been to the shelter on the outskirts.

To get to the shelter, one had to board the rescue helicopter on the second day, but Junseong had rarely boarded it at that time.

There were only three seats left every time, and he let his younger brother and his friends sit in those seats. If he boarded, he had to leave one person behind, so he didn’t want to choose that option if possible.

However, as the dream repeated, he inevitably had to forcibly exclude one person and board himself to find a solution to the zombie situation.

He thought that by moving with the rescue helicopter to the shelter on the outskirts of the city, he might gather additional information. He wanted to know why the rescue team hadn’t been sent and why the survivors in the city were being left in such a state.

Strangely, whenever Junseong’s helicopter tried to cross over to the outskirts of the city, something strange happened.

Thunk-

As if the noise was mixed, his vision blurred, and his ears felt stuffy. His body stiffened, and breathing became difficult.

Then, at some point, he lost consciousness, and when he opened his eyes in surprise, he was back in the middle of his apartment.

In other words, whenever he tried to go to the outskirts on the rescue helicopter in the dream, the dream was forcibly ‘reset.’ Like when he was murdered or committed suicide by someone else.