Ch.2525. Weapons.

# 25. Weapons

“Before I tell you about my experience, let me first share my thoughts on the fence. I believe it was built for ‘safety’ and ‘control.'”

This world is full of objects whose purpose can’t be determined by appearance alone.

Like the computer I saw recently at the Superstore, or the virtual reality machine.

Without names and descriptions attached, I would have just tilted my head wondering what these things were.

In that sense, the city’s fence is an incredibly considerate entity.

It immediately communicates its purpose and role to visitors, making it clear they shouldn’t cross beyond it.

“…I bet you’re thinking my conclusion is obvious and boring, right? I can already predict tomorrow’s messages at this time. But that’s just how fences are, isn’t it?”

Imagine someone who has no idea what a fence is or what it means.

Even such a person would immediately understand that a fence exists to protect—or confine—something, just by seeing how it completely surrounds the city. It’s that intuitive.

With such objects, it’s harder to form creative or unique impressions that differ from others.

“There’s no point in dragging out obvious conclusions—it’s just boring rather than interesting. So I’ll keep the boring stuff brief. From now on, as I promised earlier, I’ll tell you about the very special experience I had.”

There’s a huge difference between simply imagining “since it’s a fence, it must serve this purpose” like you’re studying, and physically understanding “why a fence must exist” through direct experience.

Even if the conclusion is the same, experiences gained through direct encounters are much more impactful and memorable than conclusions drawn from text and imagination alone.

I began speaking, hoping that whoever was watching through the drone would avoid making the same mistake I did—wandering carelessly outside the city if they ever came here.

“I just described the fence as representing ‘safety’ and ‘control.’ Some of you watching might think: ‘Control, sure, but safety? Weren’t people trapped and killed inside the city because of the fence?'”

By now, the people beyond the drone have become familiar with the apocalypse like me. They know countless people have died in the city—too many to count.

They also know how many people hoped to escape the freezing city.

So it must sound strange when I say the fence that prevented people from leaving represents ‘safety.’

“But that’s only half the story. This world seems so peaceful… well, not entirely peaceful. Anyway, it looks calm but actually hides dangers that could explode at any moment.”

The loud “BOOM!” I just shouted isn’t a metaphor but literally means an explosion.

I learned then that just because my current location seems quiet and safe doesn’t mean everywhere else is the same.

“Honestly, wandering the world alone is incredibly boring, even with a clear purpose. Seeing extraordinarily large buildings or donut-shaped structures might be interesting for a moment, but that also means there’s nothing to do except sightseeing.”

Despite this, the roads are filled with terrifying things like corpses and weapons, making it impossible to walk with an empty mind.

Once, I was nodding off while walking because I’d had trouble sleeping due to dreams, and I fell hard.

I was briefly relieved that the snow cushioned my fall, until I noticed a knife clutched by a dead person right next to where I’d fallen, pointing skyward.

If I had fallen just 10cm to the side… even now, thinking about it sends chills down my spine.

“Maybe that’s why. Just once before, I thought… what if I left this terrifying, empty city and just wandered freely?”

Even now, I don’t fully understand why I had such thoughts back then.

In this world, even if you pack as many supplies as possible and follow the tracks and signposts, there’s no guarantee you’ll safely reach the next city.

Going outside the city without preparation or destination signs only leads to starvation or freezing to death.

Nevertheless, past me gathered meager supplies, forcibly cut through the fence, and went outside the city.

Perhaps… it was desperation.

Now I’ve grown accustomed to solitary life in this city, but back then, I wasn’t.

Every day trembling with cold and fear, moving my legs but never seeing living people, never expecting to meet anyone.

Not even sure if I was truly alive.

After days like that, I think I felt that if I was going to die anyway, I might as well take one last chance.

“Cutting through the fence was easier than I expected. I just struck it a few times with Maximus, and soon there was a hole big enough for me to pass through. I guess in the past, the fence might have been electrified, or there might have been robots to prevent anyone from damaging it.”

Leaving the city without interference, I walked straight ahead aimlessly, following my heart’s desire and my body’s endurance.

Was it truly a desperate attempt to find hope, or just giving up on everything and walking toward death?

I’m not sure, but walking freely after letting go of everything felt light.

It happened to be a day when the sun stayed out for a long time. I vaguely remember smiling as I stepped through flowing water and looked up at the wide open blue sky.

“As I walked through snow and water, experiencing the quietly flowing world… suddenly something strange appeared in my vision.”

The time I spent wandering freely after leaving the city was less than half a day.

A distance where I could still faintly see the city buildings if I looked back.

But there they were, in a place you’d never discover unless you deliberately left the city or spent time looking carefully from a rooftop.

“First, there were ‘No Entry’ signs scattered on the ground, and fences lower than the city’s spread out widely. And inside were massive machines I’d never seen before… and collapsed buildings.”

I’m guessing the large, mostly metal objects were weapons.

Firing missiles, defending against missiles, or flying through the sky to attack enemies one-sidedly—they closely resembled the old weapons I’d seen in books.

“Why would such terrifying things be near a city where people lived? Unable to contain my curiosity, I tore through the fence just like when I left the city and went inside. Looking back now… it was really reckless.”

If the city was a human graveyard, the place I visited was a weapons graveyard.

It contained weapons from as old as those I’d seen in books to ones so complex I couldn’t even imagine how they operated.

“At first, I thought they’d brought decommissioned weapons here for exhibition.”

But the weapons showed signs of actual use—bloodstains, gunpowder burns—and though obscured by the overwhelming size of the weapons, there were dead people too.

“All those people had necklaces inscribed with ‘For Our New Homeland.’ It’s a romantic phrase, but what did it mean? Why did they fight with blood on their bodies while wearing such necklaces? Who were they fighting?”

Even after escaping the city, I continued to follow death.

And at the end of the dead soldiers and weapons was another endless snowfield.

The difference was that unlike the snowfields near the city, this one had warning signs with terrifying skull images erected everywhere.

“…There were corpses there. Corpses with upper and lower bodies separated. Bodies so blown apart you couldn’t even tell what the person originally looked like.”

What stopped me from moving forward was an instinctive warning. A sensation that dominated my entire body—if I took another step, I would truly die.

I was startled by this warning from my body, which had been gradually losing its sense of life, and stepped back.

“Just in case, I picked up a gun lying around and threw it hard. Do you know what happened? The gun, spinning forward through the air, suddenly exploded with a BANG.”

A violent explosion that seemed to blow away all the silence that had settled on the world, fragments flying through the air tearing at skin.

The memory of nearby chunks of flesh splattering everywhere, some sticking to my body, is still nauseating even now when I’ve grown accustomed to death.

Death, which I had only vaguely imagined, suddenly struck. If the explosion’s range had been slightly wider, or if there had been a mine closer, or if I had foolishly walked into the area where the mine exploded after throwing too short and seeing nothing happen…

I would certainly have died.

In an even more miserable state than those who died coldly in the city.

Perhaps I would have been quietly erased from the world without even realizing I was dead.

Realizing this, my mind—which had been foggy all day, perhaps for weeks—suddenly cleared.

At the same time, cold sweat poured down my body, and tears flowed again from eyes I thought had dried up from crying too much.

Only after facing death did I truly realize I was alive.

“Learning to value your life… it was too extreme an experience for such an obvious lesson, but I think that experience is why I’m still alive today.”

Now when I see open areas or suspicious places, I first throw something nearby, and if I’m still suspicious, I push a corpse in first.

Of course, there haven’t been any mines inside the city where ordinary people lived… but in this world, you never know when such weapons might appear.

“Anyway, after that experience, no matter how bored or tired I get, I never go outside the fence. The fence that seems confining and may have starved many people to death became a signal to me—inside here, I can move around with peace of mind.”

Just as normality is closer to an ideal, I learned then that being boring and unchanging means stability.

“So be careful when you go to unknown places. And always remember that the peace we take for granted exists only because threats are invisible… Someone must have worked incredibly hard to create this peace.”

Because life is more precious than anything else… and truly the only unique thing in this world.

“Well, that’s my experience. Though I’m not really one to talk, since I still enter suspicious buildings sometimes despite all this.”

I smiled slightly, saying that’s just unavoidable for a wanderer.