Apocalypse N-Student - Chapter 35



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Episode 35: The Wheelbarrow

The first time I pulled something called a ‘wheelbarrow’ in my life was when I was working in the military.

Under the command of the sergeant major, a tennis court for officers was to be built next to the parade ground. A excavator could have been called in to complete the task in half a day, but one company of soldiers worked on it for five days.

The only equipment given was a cart, a shovel, and a pickaxe.

“Manpower in the age of AI, damn it. If that’s the case, why buy fighter jets or Aegis ships? When war breaks out, just give each of us a matchlock gun and push through with human wave tactics. That’s why China failed in its industrial revolution in the past.”

I still vividly remember the senior soldier from the private school shoveling in anger and making sarcastic remarks.

When there is an abundance of human resources, there is no need to develop technology.

Because it is cheaper to use people than to use machines or equipment.

The basic principles of the steam engine existed in ancient Egypt and China, but it was England, which lost half of its population to the Black Death, that put it to good use to change civilization.

A wheelbarrow was a cheap and sturdy work tool, but it was not designed to be pulled by people.

As I stepped into the U-shaped handle attached to the front of the square cargo area, I felt strangely trapped, as if I was trapped in a cage.

As I pulled the cart by the handle, I felt as if I had become a livestock like a horse, mule, or donkey. The back of my head started to itch as if a whip would come flying at any moment.

After I was discharged from the military, I returned to college and worked various part-time jobs until I graduated, and I drove a jack and a small forklift, but I never pulled a cart again.

It was common to see carts on the road.

Whether it was Seoul or Busan, wherever people lived, carts were rolling around.

Most of the people pulling the carts were elderly men.

The older women pulled around a small cart that they could use to go shopping, and the items they picked up were the same.

Scrap paper, scrap metal, broken TVs or fans······

Even though they could not earn even ten thousand won by pulling a cart and collecting mountains of waste paper all day, the elderly people worked diligently from morning to night.

Ever since they learned to walk, they have been pulling carts as if it were natural for them to do so, like mules that pull carts all their lives.

Just as it was difficult to recall youth and childhood from their aged faces, it was also difficult to imagine them without their carts.

The old man who had been asking for a cardboard box while loitering around my hiding place was also diligently walking around the neighborhood pulling a cart.

There were a few other old men nearby pulling carts or handcarts, but I only remember that one.

It’s not just because we exchanged a few words.

I know a little bit about what kind of person that old man is.

*

About a week before the zombie outbreak, I stopped by the local supermarket because I was craving some makgeolli for the first time in a while.

After looking through the liquors displayed in the refrigerator, I chose two bottles of Geumjeongsanseong Makgeolli, but there was another customer who arrived before me, so I had to wait at the checkout counter.

The clothes and hat looked familiar, so I looked closely and saw that it was the old man who had been wandering around the hiding place looking for a cardboard box.

The old man was counting ten-won coins on the counter, stacked like a pile of shit.

The supermarket owner smiled and joined in without showing any sign of displeasure, but when they finished stacking 10 coins each, he raised his head and narrowed his eyes.

“I’m short on money. I’m 500 won short.”

“Huh? That can’t be right? I brought it from home just in time······”

The old man was extremely embarrassed, counted the coins again, and searched his pockets with a pitiful expression.

When nothing else came out, the supermarket owner pointed to one side of the checkout counter with a still smiling face.

“I think you should take one off.”

Only then did I notice the things the old man had brought with him to buy.

A bottle of Jinro Soju with a frog drawn on it and two packs of Shin Ramyun.

It seemed like a simple dinner for an old man who had been pulling a cart and roaming the streets of the city like a mule all day.

It was none of my business and none of my concern, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the soju and ramen.

The composition, props, and even the people were so perfect that I thought I might win an award if I took a photo and entered it into a contest under the name of ‘Poverty’.

“I’ll pay 500 won instead.”

It was an impulsive favor, but it was only a 500 won coin.

The old man turned his head in surprise at the unexpected help.

He stared at me with blank eyes, but he didn’t seem to recognize me.

I smiled as if it was nothing, so as not to embarrass the old man.

The old man smiled awkwardly, grabbed the brim of his hat, and bowed his head slightly.

Looking at his sunburned face, which had suddenly turned bright red, he seemed quite embarrassed and embarrassed.

But I didn’t forget to say thank you.

“······Thank you.”

For a moment, I felt a little curious and fond of the old man whose name I didn’t even know.

The old man neither bowed grovelingly nor whined slyly in a worn-out manner.

He was far from being classy or experienced.

What I felt from the old man was probably a sense of pride that knew shame.

One of the few positive values ​​that grows in the open field of humanity, something that is always lacking even in those who live without want, and is extremely rare in poor places.

Compared to the psychopathic old men who harassed my friend with their senseless antics and sent him to prison, the old man’s reaction of blushing in embarrassment over a mere 500 won was quite refreshing and humane in a good way.

Just like characters from Chekhov’s short stories.

I even thought about treating him to a whole chicken, but the old man bowed his head again with an awkward expression to express his thanks, then left the store holding a plastic bag.

After paying for the makgeolli and coming out, the old man was gone.

After that, I occasionally saw the old man pulling a cart around, but I never spoke to him or greeted him.

That very same old man was robbing the supermarket where he had bought soju and ramen with a bundle of 10-won coins.

When our eyes met, the old man screamed in surprise, quickly loaded the soju onto his cart, and hurriedly disappeared down the steep alley.

The movement of the cart, which was quite heavily loaded with luggage, was heavy, showing how much and where it had been robbed.

“Isn’t that old man the one who collected waste paper?”

Jong-seok also remembered the old man, perhaps because he had seen him come and go.

“Yes. He is alive.”

No matter how you lived before, that was all that mattered in a world that had fallen apart.

Survive, and keep living.

*

Two days later, I met the old man pulling a cart again.

As usual, I flew my drone to scout the surrounding area, and artificial movement was captured in a shabby alley at the foot of a mountain about 300 meters to the southwest.

As I lowered the drone and zoomed in, I noticed something moving underneath the fluttering tarpaulin.

The cold had eased considerably and the snow had melted considerably, so it was time for the zombies to wake up from their dormant state and become active.

People lost their lives to cold and hunger even while indoors, but zombies did not die easily because they were already dead corpses.

Most people who had their limbs ripped off, their waists cut off, or been buried in heavy snow for over ten days survived, as long as their brains were not destroyed.

If a zombie has really awakened, we need to check its condition and eliminate it immediately.

Perhaps because they instinctively know that it is advantageous to stick together to deal with humans, zombies have a tendency to gather together and form groups.

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It is common for a group of about 10 to form a single group, but depending on the situation, large groups of hundreds or thousands can form.

No matter how many zombies gather, waves will not form unless you artificially create an overcrowding situation like in Operation One-Wan-Kill.

Zombies trapped inside a building can’t move, so there’s no big problem, but zombies wandering outside will grow in number like weeds if left alone.

If it was far away, I would just ignore it, but 300 meters was a bit ambiguous, but it was a dangerous distance.

Determined to eliminate him, he and Jong-seok left the hideout armed with shotguns, crossbows, and spears.

He moved as fast as possible, stabbing his spear into the heads of the corpses he saw through the melted snow.

The narrow alley leading to the mountain village was at a high altitude, so the warmth of the sunlight was faint.

While I was aiming my crossbow, Jongseok kicked the tarpaulin with his spear.

As expected, a zombie was lying on the ground, writhing.

The zombie turned its head and bared its teeth, but its stomach was crushed by the handle of the overturned cart and it was unable to move like a rat caught in a trap.

He aimed for the face, placed his index finger on the trigger, then hesitated and lowered the crossbow.

“uh?”

Jongseok also opened his eyes wide as if he recognized it.

Although the weather had gotten a little warmer, it was still winter and the accumulated snow was still there, and the zombie’s face was black and rotting.

Both eyes were black and his right cheek was torn open, exposing his bloody, yellow teeth and gums.

Although his face was seriously damaged, the remaining facial features, the clothes he was wearing, and even the cart he was riding on were enough to confirm his identity.

It was the old man who pulled a cart and collected waste paper.

It wasn’t hard to guess what was going on.

You might have gone indoors to farm and gotten bitten in the face by a zombie that was hiding there.

After barely escaping and returning, he lost all his strength and collapsed along with the cart, dying from excessive bleeding and turning into a zombie.

“Fuck······”

Unlike when he saw the frozen corpses, Jong-seok’s face was distorted miserably.

It was a natural reaction.

The death of a corpse whose identity you don’t know and the death of a person whose face you know can’t be the same.

Jongseok muttered with great difficulty.

“Life is fucking······”

After patting her shoulder comfortingly, he stepped forward holding the spear.

Jongseok grabbed my arm with a surprised look on his face.

“What are you trying to do?”

“I should send it.”

Jongseok’s gaze turned to the old man who had become a zombie, and soon the strength left his hand and he let go of me.

As I approached, the old man opened his mouth wide.

The instinctive response of a zombie craving human flesh.

The sad struggle of a deformed fate that appeals for mercy.

He thrust a spear into the old man’s left eye, which had become cloudy and black.

The old man slumped as if freed from a curse as the blade gently pierced his eyeball, damaging his frontal lobe and cerebrum.

He wiped the bloody and brain-stained blade on the old man’s clothes and, together with Jong-seok, pushed the cart to one side.

He struggled so hard that his lower abdomen, which had been pressed against the handle, was torn open, and dark red blood and internal organs spilled out onto his eyes.

The cart was full of junk.

An antique wall clock with a large gold tassel, a half-torn umbrella with the Rolls-Royce logo, an expensive cast-iron fireplace, and an ornate picture frame with gold decorations…

There was also food.

A bundle pack of 5 Samyang Ramen and two bottles of soju.

If the old man had arrived home safely, Jong-seok would have silently packed the ramen and soju that would have been his last supper before he turned into a zombie.

“Are you just going to leave the body like this?”

“okay.”

It’s hard to imagine when the world is in good health, but in the apocalypse, it’s difficult to even properly collect the bodies of your family members.

You can’t dig the frozen ground with a shovel, and if you burn it, zombies and looters will flock there.

There were more than five corpses that we saw on our way here, and when the snow melted, more would appear here and there, but we couldn’t make graves every time.

“Let’s cover it with this.”

Although I didn’t feel like it, I had no choice so I moved the cart and covered the old man’s body.

He was crouching with his lower abdomen pressed against the cart handle, so it fit him perfectly, like a custom-made coffin.

After a brief moment of silence to pray for the old man’s soul, he pulled out the spear he had stuck in the snowdrift and turned around.

At the corner of the alley, I looked up the slope that the old man was trying to climb by pulling his cart.

The shabby mountain village, where not a single bit of pure white snow had melted, was quiet and without even a trace of smoke from a fire.

Somewhere out there, where the birds chirp in emptiness, there must be an old man’s dwelling.

He shook his head as if to draw the line that he probably didn’t have any family or pets waiting for him, and returned to his hiding place.

*

I returned to the hideout and was resting when Jong-seok boiled some ramen.

He took out a glass and poured some soju into it.

But there were three bowls.

“······Is that what it was just now?”

“Oh. Since you got it for free, I should pray for its peace.”

Jongseok and I started eating quietly, offering a bowl of ramen and a glass of soju for the old man in an empty seat where there weren’t even any chairs.

I also drank soju.

The cheap diluted soju with sweetener added to the alcohol was incomparable to the liquors that were piled up in the warehouses.

It was just bitter, without any flavor or scent.

Like a life without any purpose or meaning.

After barely finishing half a sip, I frowned and put my glass down, but suddenly I became curious.

What would this soju taste like to an old man?

I’ve never asked and never will, but it’s not hard to imagine.

······Ugh, it’s bitter. But it’s sweeter than my life. I’ll drink soju for this taste. I’ll drink soju.

I savored the pungent alcohol that tickled my mouth and stared blankly at the old man’s ramen, which was still steaming.

The scene where he felt extremely embarrassed after receiving 500 won in help, the scene where he came out of the neighborhood supermarket with a box of soju, and the scene where he floundered like a zombie at the end created a strange ripple in my heart as they depicted a great tragedy.

The meaning and fulfillment of life are as much a part of each person as death, but there is a clear difference between being forgotten and being remembered.

Even if a life is lost in the world without accomplishing anything, if there is someone who pours a drink at the spirit tablet, then the life is not completely meaningless.

Believing so, I lifted my glass and drank the remaining half of the soju.

It was still bitter and astringent, but unlike before, it felt a little sweeter.

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