Ch.2727. Plunderer (1)

Life in a zombie apocalypse is nothing short of hell for ordinary citizens.

Everything they once took for granted has vanished, and what was once everyday life has become a luxury in this world.

While countless people suffered through the disaster of the zombie apocalypse, lamenting and viewing this place as hell, there were those who considered this zombie apocalypse situation a paradise.

Jo Sun-do, the self-proclaimed King of Gyeongju who ruled the North Gyeongju area from the Gyeongju Bridge, had gained many things that were unattainable before the apocalypse.

‘The world has become a good place.’

Yes, while it was a hellish era for others, for him it had become the best of times.

Originally, indulging in luxury, embracing beautiful women, or getting high on drugs would have been nearly impossible in an era when South Korea’s public order was intact.

Jo Sun-do hadn’t been wealthy enough to afford luxuries, nor did he possess the handsome face and physique to date beautiful women.

He had no power either, and all he knew was how to commit petty crimes for survival. At most, he belonged to an organization that smuggled and distributed drugs into South Korea, but in the end, he was nothing more than a disposable courier. The only pleasure he could take was secretly stealing some of the drugs he transported to get high.

“Come here, baby.”

“…Yes.”

But when the apocalypse disaster struck, everything changed for Jo Sun-do.

The social outcast and disposable pawn had disappeared, and in his place stood the king who ruled North Gyeongju.

Jo Sun-do had been lucky.

High on drugs that day, he fearlessly beat to death an organization member who had turned into a zombie, and with that, he was able to become an Awakened.

And he was the first in Gyeongju to realize that an Awakened’s abilities could be enhanced not just by killing zombies, but by taking the lives of other people.

“Can I give you everything you want, baby?”

“Y-yes, of course.”

What followed was incredibly simple.

Abandoning common sense and reason all too easily, he instinctively hunted down not only members of his organization but also wandering survivors, plundering their resources and freely taking their lives.

The method of concealing evidence of murder or crimes committed was extremely simple.

The CCTVs in the city were no longer effective, and he would simply throw the remaining corpses to passing zombies as bait.

Then he would hunt the zombies that had eaten the corpses he used as bait.

Ah! How efficient!

For Jo Sun-do the plunderer, the zombie apocalypse wasn’t hell but heaven prepared by God, allowing him to obtain what he could never have had before!

“But baby, why that expression? Did I do something bad? Hmm?”

“No. L-Lord Jo Sun-do is the hero of this place.”

With power, any action could be tolerated.

Literally any action.

“You’re making me out to be a bad guy?”

“Huk!”

Even the evil deeds he was committing now were tolerated.

There were many women who pleased Jo Sun-do, and many young and beautiful women surrounded him, but they all remained silent, watching the unfortunate victim with bitter eyes.

The victim was essentially innocent, but these women didn’t dare think of opposing Jo Sun-do.

Of course, that was natural.

Here, Jo Sun-do was truly the King of Gyeongju.

“Save me. Save me. Save me. Save me. Save me. Save me. Please save…”

“Why are you saying such things, baby? Did I do something bad?”

With a tear-stained face, the victim begged Jo Sun-do for mercy, but it meant nothing to him, who had become a devil in human form.

In this apocalyptic world, Jo Sun-do’s word was law and truth.

Unable to resist the violence inflicted by Jo Sun-do on her body, the woman could only let out pitiful screams.

Every time her screams echoed through the room, the women around Jo Sun-do trembled and clenched their fists in anger, but they had no way to help the woman suffering from violence.

“What? How boring. Already passed out? Being an Awakened, I thought you’d last longer.”

After striking her body a few times with his trained Awakened strength, the woman stuck out her tongue and went limp.

Despite her condition being so severe that she needed immediate medical attention, Jo Sun-do lost interest in the victim as if he had merely lost a pretty toy.

“Hey, save this one!”

“Y-yes!”

Of course, he didn’t forget to have the unconscious woman treated.

Jo Sun-do’s hobby was crushing proud women who wouldn’t have given him the time of day before, beneath him.

The woman who had just been assaulted had been a capable career woman before the apocalypse, someone Jo Sun-do couldn’t have even dared to look up to, and he had been venting his base emotions by crushing such women.

“It’s truly a good world, isn’t it? Right?”

“…”

It truly was a good world.

Of course, it was only good from Jo Sun-do’s perspective; the woman who had been beaten to a life-threatening state and the slave treating her couldn’t sympathize with his words.

The maximum resistance they could offer was simply to remain silent.

“What are you doing? Slave girl. Not answering? No, save this girl right now. If you can’t save her, you’ll die!”

The morality once imposed on them had disappeared, and he lived as he pleased, with slave boys and slave girls managing the household for him.

Even if a slave or two died, no one dared complain to Jo Sun-do.

From the beginning, anyone with a conscience who complained about Jo Sun-do’s evil deeds had long since disappeared.

“Don’t tell me you want to end up like those who staged a slave rebellion last time?”

“N-no, sir!”

Those with conscience who opposed Jo Sun-do all became his food.

North Gyeongju was his kingdom.

If he commanded it, one must live, and if he commanded it, one must die.

But the slaves dared to rebel against Jo Sun-do, and as the King of Gyeongju, he showed no mercy to the slaves who dared to rebel.

It was a massacre where everyone involved was killed.

Not only the leaders of the rebellion but also all those associated with them were killed.

The only slaves who survived the rebellion were the female slaves who had been sexually exploited for their beautiful appearances.

Of course, they had only survived physically; even now, they were nothing more than meat dolls decorated in the bathroom to satisfy the sexual desires of Jo Sun-do’s subordinates.

‘I’m scared.’

For the women who had witnessed their fate to the end, Jo Sun-do was truly a tyrant, and so, with frightened expressions, they supported the woman who was starting to foam at the mouth and have seizures, trying to save her life as they left the room.

As the slaves disappeared in an instant as if fleeing, Jo Sun-do looked around the empty room with a bored expression.

“Even this gets boring after a while.”

Always the same women.

Always the same pleasure.

Always the same luxury.

At first, because these were actions he couldn’t have taken before the disaster, he had enjoyed happy days, but now even that had fallen into a boring routine.

He no longer felt anything new when embracing the women he had captured.

He now thought of the current luxury as something natural.

But realistically, it was impossible to enjoy any more pleasure than this.

The body of an Awakened didn’t get high easily even when using the drugs he was used to.

He could get high if he used beyond the limit, but Jo Sun-do had strictly avoided that.

“Damn that Yu Su-seong. And that bastard Jeong Dong-geon.”

Even the house he lived in now was a building he had plundered because it was one of the best.

At first, he thought it was fine, but now he felt it was too small for the King of Gyeongju.

That’s why he wanted to quickly recruit Yu Su-seong, known as a professor of architecture among the survivors, but Yu Su-seong had ignored the proposal from him, the king, and had joined the Balhut Cult.

“I might not understand Yu Su-seong, but Jeong Dong-geon! You should have stayed with me!”

Not only Yu Su-seong but also Jeong Dong-geon, whom he had thought was of the same kind as himself, had gone with him.

He had thought that Jeong Dong-geon, who like himself had been suppressing dissent with overwhelming power and force, would surely understand his noble feelings!

Why had that guy abandoned his existing position and given up being a king!

He thought he was the only one who understood him!

This beast in human form couldn’t understand the behavior of those two.

“Well, thinking about it now, there were many women I should have taken when I had the chance.”

The Lee Hyeon-a and Lee Su-a sisters.

It wasn’t just once or twice that he had wanted to change those sharp faces into ones contorted with pain and screaming.

When he went to Bahamut’s temple, he had countless thoughts of secretly kidnapping them and making them his.

“That young cult leader girl looked tasty too. If I had known, I wouldn’t have just tested the waters but would have taken her right away.”

And finally, Choi Yu-na.

He often thought about Yu-na with regret even now.

Back when Jo Sun-do hadn’t yet shown his wolf’s fangs, he had thought many times about devouring Yu-na, who was in the survivor camp.

Plus, he wanted to correct her habit of caring for useless things.

Of course, Jo Sun-do’s plans were ruined by the appearance of mutant zombies, and taking advantage of the chaotic situation caused by the mutant zombies, Yu-na had fled far away.

‘Damn it.’

So Jo Sun-do’s base fantasies ended there.

The women and talents he had so wanted to obtain had long since slipped from his grasp.

They had already established a massive force in South Gyeongju beyond the Gyeongju Bridge, and he hadn’t forgotten that they were still threatening Jo Sun-do.

However, Jo Sun-do didn’t dare harbor thoughts of attacking the Balhut Cult, which was carrying out such aggressive expansion.

“Damn it. Damn it. Damn it!”

As his thoughts reached that point, the heat that had felt good gradually cooled.

Jo Sun-do couldn’t understand the actions of the cult and didn’t want to acknowledge them.

He simply couldn’t accept the fact that his kingdom was crumbling because of a strange dragon called Bahamut.

Of course, Jo Sun-do hadn’t remained idle.

It was Jo Sun-do’s ability to spread propaganda on the Gyeongju community and other regional communities, claiming that Bahamut’s existence was a lie, and to gather plunderers who lived in the shadows of Gyeongju to form a force to counter South Gyeongju.

However, with the existence of Bahamut alone, Jo Sun-do was being forced into an unreasonable fight.

“I don’t understand! I don’t understand!”

So, placing all the blame on Bahamut, he shouted loudly that he couldn’t understand those who followed Bahamut.

Why had they sworn allegiance?

Why did everyone follow that monster without hesitation?

“That thing is a monster!”

That thing is not human. It’s a monster.

But why is there no hesitation?

Now that such good times had come, why didn’t the cult acknowledge him as the ruler of North Gyeongju?

They are useless.

They should be thrown in the trash.

“Boss, I’m back.”

“Oh, yes. Did you get the goods?”

A somewhat useful subordinate had returned.

To alleviate his gloomy mood a bit, Jo Sun-do asked his subordinate to hand over the requested items.

“Well, I couldn’t get them.”

“What? Is it that difficult to get a pack of cigarettes?”

“The thing is, they said they’re not doing barter anymore.”

“What nonsense is that?”

Nonsense.

Pure nonsense.

Surely they weren’t thinking of trading with the now worthless currency of this country?

Jo Sun-do was about to interrogate his subordinate, suspecting he might have secretly consumed the resources he had given him, but…

“There’s nothing I can do! Everyone says they only trade with coins issued by the Balhut Cult.”

“Again! Again! Again! It’s those Balhut Cult guys!”

Again, it’s the Balhut Cult.

Again, Jo Sun-do could feel his kingdom crumbling because of that dragon.

“So they’re not doing barter anymore from now on?”

“That’s right, boss. They said that without coins issued by the Balhut Cult, trading is impossible… That’s what they said.”

“Then what should we do? Plunder South Gyeongju? Or maybe make counterfeit money?”

“B-boss. I don’t know about inside North Gyeongju, but isn’t it dangerous to cause trouble in the Balhut Cult’s territory? If we’re not careful, we could become enemies of the cult.”

“Balhut. Balhut… Ahaha. So you’re saying it’s dangerous if we turn the cult into an enemy?”

Why do they believe in that dragon?

Why don’t they swear allegiance to me, the King of Gyeongju?

Am I not the protagonist of this world!

I, Jo Sun-do, am a powerful leader with immense strength!

“Ha. This is ridiculous.”

“Y-yes? So it’s safe… Kuhek?”

Those who dare to insult me die.

It didn’t matter anyway.

There were many subordinates who followed him, and if necessary, there were even more slaves who would die for him.

“Gather everyone.”

“B-boss?”

So he would show them.

His governance and influence as the King of Gyeongju.

And he would declare to the Balhut Cult, which dared to oppose him, that he was the king.

“Can you believe this? Would you believe in such coins if you were in their place?”

Yes, the cult would eventually fail.

Even if they didn’t fail, Jo Sun-do would forcibly make them fail.

“Ha. That wasn’t like me.”

Yes, quietly observing the situation wasn’t Jo Sun-do’s way.

“Right. We’ve been playing too nicely. Let’s do it our way.”

“B-boss? War?”

“That sounds good.”

Plunder, take, and violate.

That’s the truth of the current world.

Yes, it’s about returning to the good world.

“I’ll turn this nightmarish world back into paradise.”

Death to the hateful Balhut Cult that’s turning it back into a nightmarish world.