Ch.32Chapter 5. Having No Secrets Is a Poor and Empty Thing (3)

The distribution office map was divided into zones: industrial, commercial, agricultural, middle-class, and slums. No upper class.

Still, it was easy to prioritize search areas because each zone had newspaper delivery quantities marked alongside. More newspaper deliveries meant more people concentrated in an area, and more people meant more supplies.

The first place I visited was the agricultural wholesale market, about 30 minutes from the distribution office.

It had a spacious parking lot, small shopping district, agricultural machinery and vehicle repair centers, and even a seed research testing facility all gathered together.

Judging by how proudly it was labeled “The Lifeline of Our Region” on the map, I could imagine how dependent people were on it.

But when I got close, there was nothing but stench, smoke, and ruins.

I parked my car a kilometer away. I climbed up a large billboard ladder commonly seen along highways and observed for 30 minutes.

Burned and charred buildings. Collapsed repair centers. Vehicles with doors torn off. Trampled zombies.

Not just one or two. They stretched out regularly like yellow dotted lines in the middle of the road. All of them had fallen facing the same direction, with their backs to the market.

Why did they look like this?

I could see dried bloodstains on the asphalt road. They were difficult to notice because they had dried up over time. The bloodstains also extended in a consistent direction, the same as the direction the zombies had fallen.

I opened the map and drew a straight line with my finger. It led to Rambert Village. This was the work of the military police. They had used helicopters with cages containing bleeding humans and zombies to lure the zombies gathered at the market.

“At least it should be safe.”

I drove into the parking lot. Cars, corpses, buildings—they all looked similar in that only their frames remained while their contents were completely empty. Even the fuel ports of all the cars were left open. Someone had drained all the fuel.

Vines had seized all of these things. I wondered why these weeds were breaking through even the asphalt cracks.

I looked at a building about the size of a small shopping mall. Smoke was faintly billowing out—I wondered what could burn for so long.

I entered the foul-smelling market.

There were traces of people having lived together. Burned makeshift beds. Charred oil drums. They had even torn off car doors to use as barricades, but it seemed everyone had been taken in the end.

Seeing the rusted guns with blood caked on them, torn clothes, and bite-marked bulletproof helmets, I could guess what kind of end they had met.

In the middle of all that garbage stood a lone display stand. Plastic vegetables and fruits were on display. While the originals had rotted and collapsed, these eternal replicas eloquently testified to what this place originally was and what it should have been.

Below it, I saw a sign that read <Seed Cultivation, Testing, and Sales Room 2F>.

Gripping my M4 carbine, I slid up the stairs and then picked up a piece of stone from the floor and threw it.

Tick. Tick. Tick…

No sound came back. Only sunlight streamed in through the windows. The stench of rot was even stronger than downstairs. I flung open the door to the testing room, the source of the revolting smell. It was as high-ceilinged, long, and wide as an auditorium.

One side was a hydroponic testing area, the opposite side was soil cultivation. And all of it was covered by grotesquely overgrown plants. That’s where the stench was coming from.

The first thing I noticed was cucumbers. They were about the size of large radishes, with stripes running along the skin like young pumpkins, but the bumpy texture confirmed they were indeed cucumbers.

The reason for the stripes on the skin was that the flesh inside had grown too quickly, causing the skin to split.

The vines were thick and the leaves too large. Above them, yellow flowers drooped like broken umbrellas, adding to the grotesqueness.

Cucumbers weren’t the only things that had grown this way. Pumpkins. Blueberries. Grapes. Tomatoes. All had grown to ridiculous sizes, all had burst, and all had withered.

<Growth Day 20>

That’s what was written on the acrylic board. Not even a funny joke. Dumbfounded, I crossed through the cultivation test area and stopped in front of an information board. I saw academic conference posters plastered all over it.

<Emergency Seminar on Excessive Plant Growth in Some Regions of Elza>

<Research Report Meeting on Fertilizer Expansion Following Soil Fertility Depletion>

<Report on Abnormal Behavior of Wildlife, Similar to Rabies Symptoms?>

<10 Years of Achievement in Cybele Cultivation Process Commercialization – Liberation from Hunger. How Should Government Support Project Expansion Proceed?>

<Public Forum on Coexistence of Cybele Cultured Meat Industry and Traditional Livestock Farming>

The last one had a red marker line drawn diagonally across it with “Fraudulent Robbers” written on it. The handwriting was neat and tidy, but the hostility it contained was clear.

Cybele. Cybele. I try to recall memories from before falling into this world.

When collecting items, one would inevitably pick up trash, and true to the game developers’ tendency to put effort into unnecessary details, simple descriptions were often included. The name Cybele was mentioned there.

Like <Mackerel Can – Cybele Company canned food. The mackerel has been boiled and steamed until the bones are mushy. Contrary to people’s prejudice, the broth is quality olive oil>.

One of the fiercely contested battlegrounds, “The Laboratory,” was also set in Cybele Research Institute. The interior was maze-like and complex, but it had many high-value items, so intermediate and advanced users often flocked there.

But what research they did there wasn’t well explained. Few people were interested. The game didn’t have much of a story, and the developers weren’t particularly interested in dropping such hints. Most players, including myself, were only thinking about how to easily obtain and sell high-value items.

At the end of the testing area was a laboratory enclosed by glass walls. A person was standing on tiptoe by the laboratory window. They had hanged themselves with a rope from the ceiling.

Their body, neck, and arms all hung limply, giving them a strangely dejected appearance. Their face wasn’t visible as they were looking out the window and their long hair covered it.

Wind blew through the laboratory window. The researcher’s body swayed. They kicked the wall with the tip of their shoe. At the end of the wall, I saw a wooden shelf marked <Free Gift>. Packets of divided seeds were displayed.

Tomatoes. Carrots. Onions.

“You want me to take them?”

As if urging me, they kicked the wall once more. I opened the laboratory door and carefully approached. I crossed the lab and picked up the seeds. I thought I might be able to grow something if I put them in a water bottle with tissue.

Following the dead person’s gaze, I also looked through the window. There was a pile of dead people in the open space. Those who had been taken by zombies, and zombies themselves. Vines covered them like shrouds.

There was a crumpled placard under the wall.

<Until hunger disappears. Researchers, you are the hope of Elza!>

As I was about to leave the laboratory, I turned back. I tied a knife to a mop handle and cut the rope.

The researcher, now standing on the floor, seemed about to collapse sideways, but then lay down facing the sky. With arms and legs stretched out, they looked as if taking a nap. They seemed strangely relieved, as if having completed their task.

Sunlight covered her. Her yellowed lab coat, stained with time, was dyed golden and radiant. Better than any shroud or coffin.

* * * * *

My second destination was the Rowing Country Golf Club. It has a fairly spacious golf course, resort, amenities, water supply facilities, and even solar power facilities.

The interior is also spacious. About 20 buildings, large and small. Of course, there’s no guarantee the facilities are intact. Judging by the “slumification” marked on the distribution office map, it seems things had already gone as far as they could go even before the world ended.

That’s why this place is either occupied by a gang, settled by a survivor group, or crawling with zombies—one of the three.

The reason I chose this place despite that is because I’ve been here so often that it’s as familiar as Rambert, it’s in a basin making reconnaissance easy, and there are multiple entry routes allowing for free infiltration and exit. Those are the three reasons.

Moreover, with the gang forces having been crushed in Rambert, their strength should be weakened.

Of course, not all members would have gone there. The structure would be that while a charismatic and strong leader enjoys his harem at the base, the moderately strong ones go out to plunder and return.

But no matter how brave as a lion or strong as a bear one might be, they become powerless when limbs are blown off. Even if some remain, they’re just a handful of remnants who can shoot well. That much, I can handle without difficulty.

If not, I can just run away.

Such mishaps can be avoided with good reconnaissance. And I have time to spare. While driving the pleasantly bouncing car over the hill, an accident occurred.

Right at the top of the hill, the engine died. I turned the key again, but there was no response.

“Hey, what? You’re not dead, are you? I just filled you with gas not long ago.”

I tried to calm my pounding heart and tried again. Drrrr. Drrrrrr, Kaboom! Clunk… I’ve heard these sound effects in cartoons. That’s the sound an old car makes before it breaks down.

What’s the problem? I checked the dashboard. The engine temperature had broken through the H mark.

I applied the brakes, got out of the car, and looked underneath. Green liquid was leaking along the path I had come. It was radiator coolant.

“I’m screwed.”

In the middle of the road? It just stops like this? This car came all the way here creaking and groaning?

“Grrrr.”

Sure enough.

Zombies are crawling out from all directions on the road beside me. I could shoot them with the carbine without any problem, but the real issue is elsewhere. If I make a gunshot sound, all the zombies in the area will come flocking.

Judging by the absence of bloodstains on the road, the military police helicopters probably didn’t come this far.

“Should I get into the cargo compartment?”

That’s nonsense. I’d just be wrapped up in a pile of zombies like carrots in kimbap. Moreover, the driver’s cabin and cargo compartment are separated, so I couldn’t escape that way either.

This is a terrible position.

“Ah, shit.”

For now, I have the carbine and hunting knife, plus about two magazines I took out of the ammo box, so I climbed onto the car. If I hold out up there and stab their heads with the knife, I might be able to endure somehow. If I wrap my coat around my hands as makeshift gloves, it could provide some protection.

The zombies approached within 30 steps. I climbed onto the car. They saw me but didn’t seem to recognize me as food. I started to take off my coat.

That’s when it happened.

Over there. Something glinted on the opposite hilltop. I instinctively lay flat on the car. A zombie’s head flew off. A phsst sound followed.

A sniper. Someone was shooting from over there with a silenced sniper rifle.

“Oh shit.”

I grumbled while holding my breath. I pressed closer to the car. Another zombie poked at the fallen one and then knelt down.

Another one’s head flew off. Phsst.

“This is crazy.”

I crawled back into the driver’s seat. A horde of zombies walked out of the forest. They chewed on their fallen comrades on the ground. I fastened my seatbelt and released the brake. In that state, I repeatedly bumped my body against the seat.

Thump. Thump.

The car slowly reversed. Rather than reversing, it would be more accurate to say it rolled backward. The zombies that were eating their comrades stared blankly at me. I leisurely raised my middle finger at them and firmly gripped the steering wheel.