Chapter 30: The Entrance to the Underground Village

The Burrow Village.

The moment I heard those words, I was at a loss for words.

The idea of mutant creatures forming a village and living together wasn’t something that appeared anywhere in the original game lore, no matter how hard you looked.

Yet now, explaining that unbelievable story to us in a calm voice, was none other than the infected girl, Lila.

“Really! Our village hides underground because we’re too scared of the androids!” she said.

“You’re scared of androids?” Serika asked, her face filled with disbelief.

“Yes… Since we’re infected, the androids attack us on sight. So the villagers are too afraid to go above ground,” Lila explained.

There was a strange logic to her words.

We always thought of mutant creatures as aggressive and violent, but here they were, digging into the earth and hiding to avoid androids.

“So, where exactly is this village?” I asked.

“It’s just a little further in this direction! There’s an entrance that leads into the tunnels!” Lila said excitedly, pointing ahead.

Oddly enough, the direction she pointed matched perfectly with the location of the “Help me” signal we had been tracking.

“…Lila, that signal… was it you who sent it?” I asked.

“Ah, yes! That was me!” she replied.

“…Really?” I said, doubtful.

Lila nodded, smiling sheepishly.

“That day… I crossed the village boundary to forage for food. But suddenly a swarm of monsters attacked, and I barely managed to crawl back.”

“That must have been terrifying,” I said.

“It was. I couldn’t return to the village, so I just sent a signal out into the air, hoping someone would hear it.”

“And by chance, we were the ones who picked it up,” I said.

“…I think I was really lucky. Thanks to you, I survived,” Lila said, smiling warmly.

I glanced at Levi and Serika.

Both of them were staring at Lila, their faces filled with complex emotions.

“…But tell me something,” I said quietly. “Lila, did you create that distress signal yourself?”

“No! In our village… there’s someone named Flacia,” Lila replied.

“Flacia?”

“Yes! She’s amazing! Everyone says if it weren’t for her, we would have all died. She can fix old parts, make fires, and even generate electricity!”

Serika’s eyes flickered with surprise.

“You’re telling me… you generate your own electricity underground?” she asked.

“Yes! Thanks to her, we can live warm and safe lives without having to go outside,” Lila said brightly.

Levi murmured under her breath.

“…Mutant creatures capable of self-sufficient underground living… this is new information.”

This wasn’t the ‘enemy’ I knew.

There was no mindless devouring, no mad howling.

These creatures were hiding, surviving, protecting one another.

A ‘mutation’ unlike anything seen in the game—or the real world.

And right now, there was a chance we could reach out to them.

“Let’s check it out,” I said.

Serika stared at me in shock.

“What?! Chanwoo, you can’t seriously be thinking—”

“Yeah,” I said calmly. “I’m saying we go to that village.”

“You can’t be serious! Even if this infected girl seems harmless, who knows what’s waiting for us inside?” Serika protested.

“Of course,” I nodded. “We’ll stay cautious.”

“But that engineer, Flacia… if what Lila says is true, she’s the one who made collective life underground possible. If they’re not hostile, it’s worth trying to establish contact.”

What we desperately needed right now was a foundation for a settlement.

Even with an underground parking lot, we had no equipment to build a workshop.

We were barely hanging on.

If they had technology, there might be something we could gain from them.

“And the fact that a communications signal—not from the R.P.M., but from a mutant faction—reached us at all… that’s already highly unusual,” Levi added quietly, cutting through the tense silence.

“The decision is yours, Chanwoo. Whatever you choose, I will follow,” Levi said calmly.

At those words, Serika sighed heavily.

“…I guess we have no choice. I’ll come with you, but if anything happens, we’re pulling out immediately,” she said firmly.

Finally, we turned back to Lila.

***

“Lila, could you… guide us to your village?” I asked.

“Of course!!” she said, her eyes sparkling.

“Actually, I’ve been wanting to tell everyone in the village about you! You’re the ones who saved me… so please, come with me!”

Spreading her small arms wide, the infected girl led the way.

We followed her, starting another long journey.

This time, not through the ruins above—but toward a new world, buried deep within the darkness.

The tunnel village, where intelligent infected beings like Lila lived, was hidden in a place no one would have ever expected.

“This way! This is the entrance to the tunnel village!”

“…Huh?”

“This toilet?”

“You’re telling me that tiny toilet bowl is the entrance to the village?”

The place Lila led us to was an old, abandoned park on the outskirts of the city.

In one lonely corner stood a forgotten public restroom.

Specifically, it was the last stall of the women’s bathroom.

Once inside, Lila pointed confidently at the toilet, as if she were used to it.

In a hushed whisper, Serika said, “Chanwoo, this smells like a trap. It’s obviously bait.”

“Exactly! It’s way too suspicious. Let’s just assume we’ve stepped in crap and leave.”

“Well… still… it feels like a waste to end our journey over a single toilet.”

I muttered bitterly, feeling like I had no choice.

The two androids remained tense, their eyes filled with killing intent as they glared at Lila, who stood in front of the toilet.

Levi was itching to draw her sword, while Serika looked ready to grab me and flee at a moment’s notice.

Amid the suffocating tension, Lila cheerfully rolled up her sleeves and said with a bright smile,

“Then, let me show you! The secret toilet-opening method!”

Click.

Lila confidently turned the toilet handle.

Whoooosh.

The murky water swirled down the drain, but unlike a normal flush, the water didn’t refill.

Instead—

Creak…

A low, unfamiliar mechanical sound echoed from within the toilet.

A faint vibration traveled through the floor to the tips of our toes.

And then—

Clatter!

The entire toilet began to shift sideways, trembling slightly as if rotating.

Beneath it, a dark hole was revealed.

“…A hole?”

“Hehe, yep! This is the entrance to the tunnel village!”

My jaw dropped in disbelief.

Whoever designed this was a genius, but the people actually using this in real life were just as impressive.

Levi stared intently at the toilet and said firmly, “Chanwoo. This structure is excessively elaborate for simple concealment. There is a high probability something valuable lies within.”

Beside her, Serika let out a nasal chuckle and smirked bitterly.

“This is shady no matter how you look at it. No sane person builds a village entrance through a toilet.”

I took a deep breath and nodded.

The water had already drained, and the toilet lid was slowly opening with an unbelievable mechanical noise.

“…But the lid’s already open.”

I forced a smile.

“Since we’ve come this far, we might as well see it through.”

Beneath the toilet, a perfectly round tunnel, clearly man-made, slowly came into view.

The two androids stayed alert, but in the end, we cautiously took a step closer to the entrance.

Shuffle. Shuffle.

Below the hole was a sloped tunnel, like a giant slide.

Tiny light bulbs were strung along the ceiling in a neat line.

“Wow, all the lights are working?”

“There must be over a hundred just at the entrance.”

“If that’s the case, there must be an even bigger power network down there…”

At first, when I heard ‘tunnel village,’ I imagined a few shabby mud huts.

But this… was way beyond anything I had expected.

Crumple. Crumple.

As we carefully followed Lila down the stairs, I couldn’t help but mutter in awe, “Seriously… who could have built something like this?”

“Hehe. My sister did.”

Lila turned around and puffed out her chest proudly.

“Flacia did all the designing and maintenance herself. She set up the electricity, the communication systems—everything!”

The name ‘Flacia’ came up once again.

A figure we had heard about several times already.

A person who generated power underground, maintained the systems, and made communication possible.

‘An engineer among intelligent infected beings.’

The idea itself was bizarre, dangerous—and deeply intriguing.

“Here we are!”

Lila came to a stop in front of a door.

In the darkness, a rusty mechanical sound creaked as a CCTV camera mounted by the door slowly turned its head.

The camera’s mechanical eye scanned over each of us in turn.

On one wall, an old terminal and an electronic intercom were attached, and above them, a faded screen flickered to life.

[Scanning… Visitors detected.]

[Unidentified biological reactions. Infected companion confirmed.]

“We’ve been recognized!”

Lila’s eyes sparkled with excitement.

“It’s okay. Flacia will open it soon!”

“I can’t believe a village of mutated creatures has this kind of infrastructure…”

Serika narrowed her violet eyes and muttered under her breath.

“We don’t have enough information. About Flacia, about this village—nothing’s been verified yet. Acting on uncertain data is dangerous.”

Next to her, Levi remained on edge, still gripping her sword and staring at the door.

“Whether it’s dangerous or not, if it’s the path you’ve chosen, Chanwoo, I will follow you. I am your bodyguard, after all.”

My sweat-drenched palms trembled slightly with cold.

Beyond this door was the unknown.

A forbidden domain untouched by the laws of either mutated creatures or androids.

Right now, we were reaching out into the world of the infected.

Whether that hand would grasp the key to salvation—or sow the seeds of disaster—no one could say yet.