Hiding a House in the Apocalypse - Chapter 403



Only Noblemtl

Hiding a House in the Apocalypse Episode 403

163. Crowd (3)

The axis shook gently.

The zombie horde is coming.

There will be at least several hundred.

Even though the communicator was sealed, I could tell that the situation outside was not normal.

Doo doo doo doo doo—

Doo doo doo doo—

The sound of the armored car’s machine gun is heard.

Judging by the interval between gunshots, it appears that a significant number of them were rushing towards the armored vehicle.

He looked at his watch and took out a flare.

Pew pew pew pew–

The flare soared into the sky with a long, drawn-out sound, lighting up a corner of the night sky.

green.

This is a sign that the mission is continuing.

“How about using a communicator?”

Cheon Yeong-jae asked.

He shook his head.

“No, the communicator will be sealed until the end.”

“Still, keep communication clear······.”

As Cheon Yeong-jae was about to say something, Kim Da-ram grabbed his shoulder and shook his head.

“Listen to what your senior says. I don’t know about anything else, but when it comes to monsters, there’s no one who has better intuition than this guy.”

It’s been a long time since I’ve heard that.

Certainly, when facing new monsters, I was better at predicting their abilities, patterns, weaknesses, and strengths than others.

Many people have asked me what the secret is, but I don’t really know why.

If I had to choose one, it would be imagination?

I think that since monsters are beings built on a completely different foundation from humans, there is more room for imagination than with other enemies.

“There aren’t any booby traps, right?”

He asked, looking down the stairs.

Kim Da-ram stared blankly at Ahn Seung-hwan.

Seunghwan Ahn, who had been dazed for a moment, suddenly came to his senses and spoke urgently.

“No. There won’t be any.”

Seunghwan Ahn added.

“I was taught that it doesn’t exist.”

A horde of zombies is coming.

I sent Ahn Seung-hwan and Kim Da-ram down first and took the rear guard with Cheon Yeong-jae.

A moment later, a number of zombies passed us across the alley.

Although we were close, the zombies didn’t seem to notice us and ran towards the armored vehicle.

In response, a dull gunshot was heard.

Doo doo doo doo—

Doo doo doo doo doo—

The armored vehicle won’t be affected by zombies, but I’m worried about the bullets.

I hurried down the stairs.

There was nothing unusual about the staircase structure.

It was no different from the structure of a typical junk building filled with only facilities and equipment, without even an underground parking lot.

At the end of a featureless staircase, in front of an iron door labeled the machine room, Ahn Seung-hwan and Kim Da-ram were standing looking at the door.

Seung-Hwan Ahn knocked on the door that had a sign saying “No Entry for Authorized Persons.”

“This is Seunghwan Ahn. I came to the rescue with Captain Gyu Park.”

After a while, a voice was heard from beyond the door.

“Seunghwan?”

This is Iharu’s voice.

The voice is tired and trembling, but it is not in good health.

The door soon opened.

“Seunghwan!”

Iharu appeared.

She soon saw us and led us inside with a look of excitement in her eyes.

thud-

The door is closed.

Beyond the door was a typical machine room scene, but there was a secret passage inside a locker installed in the corner of the machine room.

As we passed through the locker, a well-made underground bunker came into view.

When I heard the words “presidential office,” I didn’t see anything like the extravagance, splendor, or spaciousness that I had imagined.

This is a typical standard government bunker.

“colon!”

There were familiar faces inside the bunker.

The survival of a team of three hunters, including Shim Hyeong-do, has been confirmed.

However, one hunter was seriously injured.

At first glance, it appears to be a fatal injury.

If it were us in the past, we would have thrown it away without hesitation.

I identified the shortcomings of the heart diagram.

They weren’t as smelted of ice as we are.

“······There was a sniper. He was probably a fanatic. He was watching us from the darkness the whole time, and the moment Hyun-taek got out of the range of the reflection field, he opened fire.”

The bullet pierced his abdomen.

Fortunately or unfortunately, he avoided immediate death.

Shim Hyeong-do decided to save his colleague who had been with him since their academy days.

Zombies, attracted by the sound of gunfire and the smell of blood, rushed toward the hunter team.

Misfortune comes in pairs, and with the sudden explosion of a loud noise, all the radio equipment malfunctioned, and to make matters worse, even the flares malfunctioned.

It was a stroke of luck that we discovered the government’s secret bunker.

“Someone in the Presidential Office gave special training to our hunters. He strongly advised them to search for this type of nameplate if they ever found it in Seoul.”

Inside the bunker, there was a faint stench of corpses.

The smell was bearable, as the ventilation system seemed to have been turned on recently.

“What is this? Did the government make something like this?”

While the maintenance was being done, Kim Da-ram told us about the origin of this facility.

“I know it’s called Operation Mirage.”

“Operation Mirage?”

“It was a top secret project so there was no set name, but those involved in the project called it Operation Mirage.”

The question of whether the President will survive has been a topic of constant interest to the public since the war.

His survival was unknown until the end, and with the collapse of Incheon, he was forgotten from people’s memories.

Maybe he’s dead.

A deepfake video produced by the Jeju government was aired in Incheon, but no one in Jeju actually knew about the president’s whereabouts.

There have been many stories about missing presidents on PaleNet as well.

There were interesting stories and some ridiculous ones, but they had one thing in common.

The point is that the president we elected is highly suspicious.

Before becoming president, he was accused by his rivals of being a Chinese spy, which may have been true.

It seems that he was extremely suspicious of those around him during the war.

“The president didn’t seem to trust anyone. Not his aides, not his security chief, not his allies.”

Project Mirage was launched amidst paranoid distrust.

The gist was the nature of war.

According to the war simulation results, the two countries would shower each other with nuclear weapons and enter a lull three months after the outbreak of war.

It was a nearly perfect conclusion, but it was also wrong.

Those involved in the simulation expected negotiations between the two countries to follow, but China collapsed so quickly that no negotiations took place.

Anyway, the president was trying to figure out how to survive those three terrible months.

According to his calculations, the Yongsan bunker is by no means a safe place.

Even the idea of ​​taking refuge in Jeju was not appealing to him.

Believing that there are spies everywhere, he must have had nightmares repeatedly about his private plane being hit by a missile fired by the Chinese, American, or perhaps even South Korean military and crashing to the ground.

For similar reasons, he also refused to serve on a US aircraft carrier.

At the end of the war, the president decided to live in seclusion in Seoul, where he was born and where he felt most comfortable.

3 months of promise.

In a shelter where you can endure that short yet long time.

That’s how Project Mirage began.

Secret bunkers were created everywhere, and information was cleverly fragmented so that only a very small portion of the information could be known to any one person.

The fact that he told his only trusted chief secretary about a common feature of the secret bunkers – nameplates bearing the names of past kings of the Joseon Dynasty – gives an idea of ​​the nature of the project.

We are in one of those secret bunkers.

“Could this be the bunker the President used?”

Cheon Yeong-jae suddenly said.

“well.”

I examined the injured person.

If it were in the past, they would have abandoned me and even if I was injured, they would have told my teammates to abandon me and leave.

That’s the Hunter way we were taught in school.

But times have changed.

Unlike back then, humans have become incomparably rare, and friends with different beliefs than us are active on the front lines.

The stretcher that Shim Hyung-do and his colleagues were making seemed like a symbol of changing times.

I opened my heavy mouth as I gazed at the bitter yet warm change.

“······It’s probably not that important.”

The important thing is the information I got from Sim Hyeong-do.

I have obtained a valuable piece of information about an unknown entity called the Screamer.

The moment a loud noise was heard, the entire radio began receiving strange waves, then started transmitting a bizarre sound that had never been heard before, and the internal circuits were completely burned out.

It seems that an unknown power causes resonance in the radio, causing an overload that is difficult to handle, rendering the radio useless.

These are known powers so far.

However, the NP equipment that Iharu was carrying on his back – the Necropolis Radio Reception Device – was not damaged at all.

It was constructed in a similar way to other radios and received far more signals, but was safe from the screamers’ screams.

Certainly, the waves of the Necropolis and the voices of the dead certainly hold unknown powers that we are unaware of.

The detailed mechanism will be a subject we will have to study in the future.

“How long will it take?”

I asked Sim Hyeong-do.

He spoke for 20 minutes.

“The armored vehicle has been engaging the zombies for a while now. Reduce the time to 10 minutes.”

Cheon Yeong-jae gestured to me.

I went and saw it.

There was a twisted corpse.

Judging by the fact that the head was missing and part of the upper body was crushed, it appears that a fairly powerful explosion probably occurred near the face.

“It looks like he put a grenade in his mouth and blew it up.”

Kim Da-ram, who had been watching, suddenly said something.

Cheon Yeong-jae searched the body diligently.

Even though the skeleton was twisted and dried, the stench and unpleasantness would still remain, but Cheon Yeong-jae searched the corpse’s groin area thoroughly without hesitation.

“uh?”

While searching the groin area, or more precisely the back of his pants, Cheon Yeong-jae suddenly let out an exclamation.

Looks like I found something.

“Look at this.”

It’s a notebook.

I looked at my watch.

There are still 8 minutes left.

Thinking that time was passing so slowly, I looked at the contents of the notebook that Cheon Yeong-jae was looking through.

– 6.28 12:30 Appointment KK

– 6.30 21:30 Appointment TVB / Last year’s ruling will be mentioned

– 7.02 By-election

– 7.03 (slanted marks, indecipherable)

– 7.06 QQT is my fault, don’t forget.

– 7.08 22:10 BYN visit planned / K4Q will be on standby.

…

…

This is a partial excerpt from a notebook that is half-weathered and soaked in the corpse’s mud, with a significant portion missing.

Even if it had not been damaged, it would not be easy for others to understand the contents of this notebook.

As you can see from the contents, it is a record written only for me and can only be understood by me.

Cheon Yeong-jae looked through the notebook, but there was no trace that could specifically identify the owner.

However, the last visible page is soaked in the corpse’s fluid and is not easily removed, so Cheon Yeong-jae is struggling to remove it, even applying saliva to it.

“It makes my stomach feel good.”

Kim Da-ram said something.

I agree.

“colon.”

Ten minutes have already passed.

The injured person was carried on a stretcher.

He nodded and instructed them to turn on the radio.

Beep beep beep–

As soon as the radio signal was detected, a transmission was immediately sent to the armored vehicle.

“This is Sierra One. Sierra One. Secure the missing person, return immediately······.”

Even before I finished the radio transmission, I felt something.

Although I could not feel any sensation with my eyes or ears, a strange stimulation as if my brain itself was tense sent a chill down my spine like an omen.

Immediately after that.

Kiiiiiiiiiii——

A strange scream echoed from afar.

“Turn off the radio!”

It’s late.

The radio, which was already turned on, picked up unknown waves on its own and played unknown sounds back to us.

“······.”

It is a sound that is a random mixture of various types of sounds such as nasal consonants, nasal consonants, long consonants, and sibilant consonants.

As creepy as it may be, such chaotic noise surprisingly had a direction and a conclusion.

I don’t know why I find such an unpleasant coherence to such a bizarre noise, but I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way.

Looking at Kim Da-ram’s gaze and Cheon Yeong-jae’s eyes, confusion and fear appeared.

The radio let out a short, perhaps unintelligible sound and a puff of black smoke rose.

An ominous silence fell after that.

Everyone was overwhelmed by the power of the incomprehensible monster.

Here, there are no exceptions for school graduates, academy graduates, new recruits, or veterans.

We have once again confirmed what kind of enemy we are dealing with.

infinity.

Infinity implies that it cannot be handled.

Fear begins to spread across everyone’s faces.

I too am not free from infinite fear.

But at least I know what I have to do.

“This is why I ordered the radio to be sealed until the end.”

Find the center.

“He sees radio waves, just as we see the world in visible light.”

Take your eyes off despair.

“What about NP equipment?”

I ask again.

“What about NP equipment?”

Calmness returned to the sight of my colleagues who had once been shaken by the storm.

In particular, the faint smile on Kim Da-ram’s lips brought to mind a scene from the past.

She gave a thumbs up so that no one could see.

He snickered and stared at his subordinates.

“are you okay.”

“It works!”

Srrrrung-

I picked up an axe.

It’s not something I’m used to, but I guess I’ll have to use it someday.

“Seung-Hwan Ahn or Haru Lee. Follow right behind me.”

Woof woof—

Zombies are waiting outside.

There could easily be hundreds of them in a small area.

Maybe the fanatic sniper who caused the casualties is eyeing us.

But I won’t hesitate.

I was the first to climb the stairs, kick open the door, and confront them.

Squeak!

Struggle was my daily life.

In or out of the shelter.

*

Inside the armored vehicle.

The man of persistence, Cheon Yeong-jae, tore off the last page of the notebook that was stuck to him.

The last page was so badly damaged that it was difficult to read, as it had been glued together with sap, but at least one sentence was legible.

– I decided to meet Kang Han-min tomorrow.

That was the last record left by the deceased.

“Why Kang Hanmin all of a sudden?”

“Why is Kang Han-min coming out from there?”

A name that suddenly popped up changed the entire atmosphere of the armored vehicle.

“What? Did Kang Hanmin go there?”

“Who is it? The real president? Who else but the president would meet Kang Han-min separately?”

“Did that person ever come back to Seoul from Jeju? He was never in the news.”

“What about Senior Kim? Wasn’t he a member of the National Assembly in the past?”

“I was a jerk. I had no real power. But it’s strange that Mr. Kang’s name came up? Judging from the fact that he only wrote his initials like a code and then his real name, it’s clear that the writer treated Mr. Kang specially.”

As all sorts of speculations flew around, I kept my mouth shut and looked out the window.

One guess – perhaps close to the truth – occurred to me as if I had seen it in a dream.

It’s probably not that important.

I just see zombies running towards us outside the window.

A group without a leader.

Wasn’t our appearance like this before the war?