Walking Daddy

The stage-one mutants carried Mood-Swinger and followed us. Ji-Eun laid Kim Hyeong-Jun and me in an abandoned house that was falling apart and looked at me with a sad, gloomy face. I was too tired to speak, and gave them orders telepathically.

‘They might have figured out where we are. Don’t attack first. Just block off the escape route that the Family’s forces might use along Gangbyeonbuk-ro. Stay undercover and attack them when they head over to Sogang Bridge.\'

KIAAA!!!

‘If you see any zombies with glowing red eyes among the ones that are retreating, kill them at all costs, and bring their heads to me.”

The mutants responded enthusiastically and ran toward the enemies. When Ji-Eun tried to follow them, I grabbed the stage-two mutant’s arm.

‘You, stay here. If the Family’s forces noticed us earlier… They might come to investigate.’

Ji-Eun looked at me and Kim Hyeong-Jun blankly, then sat cross-legged on the floor.

I heard the zombies roaring outside. I had no clue what was going on outside. I wanted to see what was going on and give orders to my underlings, but I could barely keep my eyes open.

I knew that the best thing to do right then was to trust my underlings and wait patiently.

* * *

“Request support, request support!”

“Wait, second officer! Shouldn’t we just run away?”

"We’re asking for support because we can’t run away, you idiot!"

The second officer screamed in horror at the black creature and the chaos that it was causing. The second officer had no clue what had happened; his forces had been chasing the zombies that had been retreating when all of a sudden, they were facing a black creature that had appeared out of nowhere.

Now that the black creature had discovered them, running away was no longer an option. No matter how hard one tried to run away, it would be mere seconds before the black creature caught up. Even if the second officer was lucky enough to make it all the way to Gangnam, there was no guarantee that the black creature wouldn’t follow them all the way.

And besides, the black creature here… It was on a totally different level from the other black creatures the second officer had faced in the past. Tears and blood were trickling down from its pitch-black eyes. Within its eyes were two red dots, full of madness, and they were darting around as if the black creature was trying to track something down.

The second officer could tell that it was desperately trying to locate something. Its eyes were full of anger and murderous intent. The second officer watched it and couldn’t help but wonder what had made that black creature so angry. The black creature was slashing through all the zombies around it like a grinder, and it didn’t look like it was going to stop.

The second officer shook his fists.

“You two!”

‘Yes!"

“Go across Sogang Bridge and tell the boss about this!”

"Sorry… Sir…? You know we don’t have the right to talk to the boss…”

“Just shut up and get moving! Request support from the mutant unit!”

The two dong leaders with glowing red eyes hurried off to the Sogang Bridge. The second officer accelerated the circulation of his blood, his blue eyes flashing. He knew that they had to hold the black creature off somehow before support came.

The second officer locked eyes with the black creature. The black creature seemed to hesitate for a second, but then it opened its eyes wide and grinned. Its eyes were those of an explorer that had finally discovered the treasure that they were looking for. The look made the breath catch in the second officer’s throat.

Something didn’t feel right.

KWAAA!!!

The black creature made an eardrum-piercing sound and appeared in front of the second officer in an instant. The second officer’s eyes widened in surprise, and he covered his face with his arms as the black creature flew toward him.

Thud!!!

Even though the second officer had blocked its kick with his arms, he was still pushed back fifty meters.

He wasn’t just pushed back; he went flying backward.

The impact rattled the second officer’s brain around in his skull, and shattered the bones in his arms. His mind went blank.

\'Huh?\'

The second officer couldn’t think of anything else. He was shocked by the ferocity of the blow. As the saying went, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face. This was the perfect quote to describe the second officer’s situation.

Fwoop–

The black creature jumped high into the air, casting a long shadow on the second officer. The second officer straightened quickly and tracked the black creature’s movements. He quickly figured out where it would land and quickly twisted his body to avoid it.

Crash!!

A thick layer of dust obscured the area, and a spider web of cracks spread out from the creature’s landing zone. The second officer had barely avoided the black creature’s attack. Steam was coming off the second officer’s body, and he was grinding his teeth. His broken arms had healed themselves, and all of his senses were heightened, ready to fight.

Two red dots appeared through the dust. Before the two locked eyes again, the second officer’s blue eyes flashed, and he enhanced his physical strength.

‘Here it comes…!’

The second officer relied on his animal instinct and twisted his upper body. At the same time, the black creature’s hand passed over the second officer\'s head. The second officer twisted their back to evade its attack, and used the momentum to drive into a solid uppercut.

Crack!

Despite being the one to hit the black creature, the second officer’s fist shattered as if he’d just hit a solid steel plate. The black creature looked at the second officer and grinned at his bewildered expression, then chomped down hard on the second officer\'s fist.

The second officer gasped out of fear and took a couple steps back. He had lost his fists in a single attack.

\'So the gap between this creature and me is this big?’

After he had acquired his blue eyes, even the gang boss had stopped treating him dismissively. The second officer was planning to become the boss’s right-hand man and dominate Seoul, and later on, even the whole of Korea.

But what was this? The second officer couldn’t believe the gap between him and the black creature. This was like a professional soccer player playing in a local pickup game. He was a blue-eyed zombie, after all.

The second officer’s blue eyes flashed in a burst of frustration, and his severed right limb quickly regenerated.

“You filthy beast! You’re only a beast after all!” He yelled, straining so hard that the veins in his neck were popping out.

The second officer thought about how he’d gotten to his current position. He had killed humans who had begged for their lives, and ruthlessly chewed up zombies that disobeyed orders. He’d killed all of the dong leaders that acted arrogantly, and had secretly eaten the brains of others that were supposed to be baits. And in the end, he had eaten the first and third officers to get himself to where he was.

He could control two thousand four hundred underlings, and had three stage-two mutants under him that the boss hadn’t given him permission to have. Yet even with all this authority and power, the second officer felt as though he was going up against an almighty being, one that was impossible to beat.

Tear!

In a flash, the black creature tore off the second officer’s right leg. It all happened so quickly that the second officer hadn’t even noticed.

The second officer only understood what had happened after he lost his balance. Only then did the idea of death creep up on him.

“Hey you bastards! Don’t just watch, help me!!” he yelled toward the remaining dong leaders.

He had led four dong leaders over to Gangbuk. Now that two had gone back to Gangnam, there had to be two others left. But to his surprise, no matter how hard he tried to look for them, he didn’t see any dong leaders.

‘They abandoned me?’

The second officer trembled in anger, realizing that the dong leaders had betrayed him. He gritted his teeth and promised himself that, as long as he was alive, he would hunt them down to the very end. And that he would kill every single one of them once he got back to Gangnam again.

Splash, splash.

He heard the wet footsteps approaching, and licked his parched lips. He turned toward the sound, and saw the black creature with a wide grin on its face.

“You crazy bastard…”

The second officer gritted his teeth, and the light in his blue eyes flared up again.

Even though the other dong leaders had ran away, he knew that two of the dong leaders had crossed over Sogang Bridge. He knew the tables could turn at any moment, once the dong leaders had secured support from the boss.

The second officer tried to stay optimistic and bolstered his fighting spirit. He regenerated his severed leg, calmed his nervous heart with deep breaths, and clenched his fists.

He tried to focus on the black creature again, but something roughly four hundred meters away caught his attention, and he could hardly believe what he was seeing.

It was the dong leaders who were making their way to Sogang Bridge, and they were being massacred by unknown stage-one mutants. There were dozens of stage-one mutants mercilessly slashing the dong leaders into pieces. And all of them were colored red.

The second officer was taken aback. Cold sweat trickled down his forehead.

‘It was a trap?’

A black creature in front of him, and dozens of mutants behind him. The second officer couldn’t think of any possibility other than this being a trap to lure them in from the start.

They had gotten caught in the trap that those bastards had set up. There was no way out, and struggling so hard to survive only made things more painful.

The second officer’s face turned red with fury.

"I see… So this is how it’s going to go.”

The second officer clenched their fists and sent out an order through his mind.

\'All troops, gather here.\'

It was all or nothing.

If death was the only option, there was no other choice than to fight till the end.

* * *

I continued to talk to Kim Hyeong-Jun so that he wouldn’t lose consciousness. If Kim Hyeong-Jun stayed quiet or trailed off in the middle of a sentence, I woke him up, even if it meant that I had to slap him.

Rustle, rustle–

Just then, I felt a presence outside the building. I wondered if it was the stage-one mutants returning with the dong leaders’ heads. With the slightest sliver of hope, I turned my head toward the direction from which the footsteps were coming.

Bang!

Contrary to my expectations, the wall of the building folded with a loud crash. Cement dust flew across the room. Through the dust, I heard a blood-curdling voice.

“Ha, these fucking bastards. I wondered where you had gone. Sorry, we couldn\'t find you sooner.”

Red eyes flashed through the thick dust. The four red eyes were locked on Kim Hyeong-Jun and me.

It was the dong leaders. They had tracked us down. I frowned and tried to get to my feet, but the world grew hazy and seemed to twist in front of me.

‘Is there something wrong with my inner ear?’

Both of my legs were trembling helplessly. I was in no shape to fight.

As I toppled helplessly to the ground, the dong leaders hesitated, looking puzzled. After a moment, the dong leader who was standing behind asked his compatriot a question.

“Hey, aren’t those eyes the same as the officer’s?”

“They’re the same color… But aren’t they a little different?”

“His eyes aren’t glowing. They look like the eyes of a dead fish.”

The two of them whispered to each other for a while, then grinned.

"These bastards… I bet they’re done. They’re probably exhausted.”

“I can’t believe this day has finally come. If we eat the brains of these two, won’t we become officers too?”

"Hey, I call dibs on the one that fell down."

“Then I’ll eat the one who’s swaying from side to side.”

The two of them slowly approached us with grins on their faces. There was no way I could let these puny dong leaders have the best of us. It wouldn’t be fair to let a dong leader take my life after I had survived black creature after black creature.

The dong leaders came closer like hyenas circling their prey, making slurping sounds as they approached.

Swift—

At that moment, a woman who was sitting in the corner got up. The dong leaders quickly turned toward the corner when they felt the presence of a third being. Then they saw Ji-Eun.

When they saw Ji-Eun, their expressions grew puzzled, and they began to whisper to each other again.

“Hey, what is that?”

“How would I know? Isn’t it just a zombie?”

“Are you sure it’s just a zombie?”

"It doesn’t seem like a mutant."

The dong leader wasn’t wrong. Ji-Eun looked no different from an ordinary street zombie. In terms of size, her intimidating presence, and in every other way, she was pretty similar to the zombies on the streets. Ji-Eun seemed shy, approaching the two of them with timid footsteps.

The dong leaders laughed out loud.

“I got scared for nothing! What the fuck.”

“Was she infected by blood? I don\'t see any bite marks.”

"It doesn\'t matter whether she’s clean or not. Let\'s not waste any more time and get this over with. I bet the second officer is going to give us hell again.”

The dong leader clenched his fists tightly, his red eyes flashing.. He rushed toward me, and I desperately raised my limp arms to defend my face.

Slash–

Unexpectedly, I didn’t feel anything hit my arms. I doubted myself as to whether or not I had properly defended myself. I knew the dong leader couldn\'t have missed from this distance.

When I slowly opened my tightly closed eyes, I saw a sight that defied explanation. The dong leader that had been rushing toward me, brimming with killing intent, was standing motionless. One other thing was different about him… His head was no longer there.

After a moment, red blood spurted from his severed neck. The room went dead silent at the sudden fountain of blood. The other dong leader blinked slowly, staring at his comrade who had just lost his head. Someone was standing motionless right next to the surviving dong leader and glaring at him.

It was Ji-Eun. I slowly lowered my gaze and looked at her hands. Her fingers had grown about thirty centimeters longer than before. They had turned into sharpened blades, and the blood trickling down from them glistened in the moonlight.

"My… child…”

She was frowning, but the depth of her sadness seemed indescribable. Her usual calm face was nowhere to be seen, and the way her brow was furrowed sent chills down my spine.

Hers was a woman’s face, full of regret.