How Zombies Survive in the Apocalypse

“…”

Although there was a clear presence, there was no response from inside the warehouse. 

A moment of silence passed. At the end of it, Aiden spoke again.

“If you’re there, say something.”

“What… what is it? Are you really a person?”

“Yeah. Sent here by the Union.”

A deep sigh was heard in response.

“Damn it…! Those bastards finally!”

It was a male voice. However, Aiden warned him as the voice was louder than necessary.

“Keep it down. Do you want to attract zombies?”

“Oh, right. Sorry. It’s just… I got a bit excited seeing a person after three days.”

Three days.

Had this man been hiding here since the day the base collapsed?

Aiden’s mind became complicated with the unexpected presence of a witness.

Meanwhile, the man asked a question.

“But how did you get here? There were corpses scattered everywhere. Did you kill them all?”

“No way. They are still here. I just… came in quietly.”

“…”

The man remained silent for a moment after Aiden’s words.

He knew well how absurd it sounded for Aiden to talk about coming quietly into this small swarming base.

But quickly changing the subject, the man spoke with enthusiasm.

“Anyway, are you here to rescue me now?”

But Aiden shook his head.

Not possible for today.

“Not today.”

“What do you mean?”

“Honestly, I didn’t think there would be a survivor. So, I wasn’t prepared to rescue you.”

Aiden said without adding a single lie. 

It was all true. 

If he thought there was a survivor, he would have brought Arian with him from the beginning.

“So, I’ll come back tomorrow.”

“Are you telling me to spend another night here?”

“If you’ve seen outside, you’d know. We need preparation to avoid those things.”

Of course, the man inside the building also knew that. However, Aiden, who boldly came to the man in this swarming base of hundreds of zombies, wasn’t what he expected.

“But you came all the way here. Can’t you just take me with you?”

“Are you confident that you can follow me?”

“What…”

“In that case, open the door and come out. Just like you said. But if you do that, you might probably die.”

The man stopped speaking at Aiden’s words.

If the man really opened the door and came out, it would be quite inconvenient for Aiden.

However, the man who had been hiding here silently for three days wasn’t reckless.

“For heaven’s sake… Will you really ome tomorrow?”

“Of course. Just that, before I go, I have something I want to ask.”

“What is it?”

“Can you tell me what happened here? What can you tell me about the situation?”

The man paused for a moment. Then, he refused Aiden’s request.

“I’ll tell you that tomorrow. If you get me out of here, I’ll tell you that a hundred or a thousand times. Just make sure to come on time.”

The man seemed to have noticed that Aiden had come to investigate the incident.

In an attempt to create a reason for Aiden to come tomorrow, he said.

“Fine, let’s do that.”

“You must come. Tomorrow, it’s going to be out of water and food! Got it?”

“I got it.”

This, too, was like another request for Aiden. Rescuing this man was equivalent to fulfilling the Union’s quest to uncover the truth.

“What’s your name?”

“…Liam Smith.”

“I’m Aiden Lee. Well, see you tomorrow morning.”

As Aiden was about to leave, Liam’s voice caught up with him.

“Oh, wait a moment.”

“What is it?”

“There’s something you need to know. It’s about the command post behind this building. A large building. Be careful there. There’s a mutant.”

Aiden, who had already noticed the presence of mutants, nodded calmly.

“Did you see what kind of mutant it is?”

“Yeah. A weird guy with a chubby body, and he’s got iron rods sticking all over his body.”

“Hedgehog, huh.”

It was a mutant Aiden had encountered in the basement of a hotel once.

Aiden recalled the memories from that time.

“Do you know it?”

“I do. He can’t come out when the sunlight is strong. As long as you don’t make noise, there’s probably no need to fight. Is there anything else?”

“…No.”

“Alright, then see you tomorrow.”

With that, Aiden left the building.

And as he looked at the sky where the sun was setting slowly, he left the base.

* * *

The next day.

Aiden had already explained the results of the exploration to Arian and had planned the operation to rescue Liam trapped inside the base.

However, there was something he didn’t anticipate.

That was the weather today.

“This is… getting complicated.”

Aiden furrowed his brows, pondering.

Even though it was morning, the sky was dark.

Thick clouds covered the sky, and on top of that, an immense downpour was falling down.

“It’s raining.”

“Don’t you feel something strange?”

“Well, I’m not sure.”

Arian shrugged her shoulders in response.

Aiden’s question was thrown in as a precaution.

Because of the stories about radioactive rain falling from the sky before.

But in reality, the imminent problem was not rain but the clouds.

Clouds this thick blocked a considerable amount of sunlight.

In other words, the mutants hiding inside the building might come out into the open.

Of course, they wouldn’t move around as freely as they would during the night. But if it rained on a clear day, they would react to much smaller stimuli.

And if they became certain of the presence of prey, they would undoubtedly come out of the building.

In short, those who couldn’t come out at all were forced to remain outside under the current circumstances.

Aiden saw this as nothing but bad news.

There must be mutants inside the base.

“Should we change the plan? Or postpone it until tomorrow?”

So Arian asked.

But now, either option was difficult.

Aiden’s plan was focused on efficiently handling hundreds of ordinary zombies using the weapons he had.

But even if mutants popped out, the ordinary zombies wouldn’t go anywhere.

The process of dealing with them itself was ultimately pointless.

Maybe considering a delay until tomorrow could be reviewed.

But that was inconvenient for Liam, the survivor they met yesterday.

Therefore, Aiden decided to proceed with the operation despite the risks.

“No, let’s proceed as planned.”

“What if a mutant pops out in the middle?”

“We’ll hunt it down.”

Understanding, Arian nodded.

She already knew the identity of the mutants.

Was it Hedgehog, as Aude mentioned?

The Hedgehog mutant was confronted by them with nothing but conventional weapons in the narrow basement of a hotel.

So, in a broad battlefield like the one they were in now, with ample weapons, they could easily hunt it down.

“Alright, let’s go.”

Aiden and Arian each grabbed their weapons.

Arian had her usual machete, and Aiden, in addition to his rifle and handgun, carried a large and sturdy bag.

They moved towards the runway just like yesterday.

And as they reached the point where a small bush ended, Aiden stopped.

“…”

He looked at the runway from there.

Until yesterday, the place where zombies wandering around the base perimeter could be seen at a glance.

However, now, due to the pouring rain and mist, the visibility was significantly obscured.

“We need to get a bit closer.”

The original plan was to snipe the zombies from this location, first clearing out the zombies outside the base to secure a safe area.

However, now, the situation was such that even a hundred meters of visibility wasn’t properly secured.

“Do we need to get incredibly close? Will sniping work like this?”

Arian asked worriedly.

As she rightly pointed out, calling shooting a target less than a hundred meters away sniping would be a stretch.

But Aiden wasn’t the only one whose vision was obscured due to the pouring rain.

“It doesn’t matter. They won’t be able to respond anyway.”

The zombies’ visibility was also limited due to the rain.

Moreover, suppressed gunfire wouldn’t spread far in this heavy rain.

Even at a fairly close distance, zombies wouldn’t be able to trace the sound or find Aiden, which means that it could have the same effect as sniping.

Even at a fairly close range, zombies will not be able to track the sound or find Aiden

Aiden took out a rifle equipped with a suppressor and carefully walked down the runway.

Immediately afterwards, blurred images of corpses appeared.

Aiden raised his gun in the midst of pouring rain.

A gunshot from a suppressor that was difficult to describe, a mixture of the sound of a gunshot that had lost its momentum as if it had been weighed down and the sound of air escaping, rang out.

At the same time, a zombie has fallen on the ground.

But.

“Kiiii…”

The zombies nearby just looked around and didn’t react in any way.

Although they barely recognized the gunshot, they were unable to track its location or find Aiden and his group hiding in the heavy rain.

It was just as Aiden anticipated.

“Let’s move like this.”

Using the same method, Aiden started dealing with the zombies outside the barricade one by one.

There were moments when their location was discovered by zombies in the process, but those zombies were swiftly cut down by Arian’s machete as they approached.

“It’s done. That was the last one.”

Arian said as she watched a zombie fall with a pierced head.

With just one walk around the base, Aiden’s group successfully handled the zombies outside the base without making much noise.

But it was too early to feel relieved.

This was just the beginning.

“We can’t fight like this inside, can we?”

“Of course not. The density is too high. So, let’s proceed with the plan as intended.”

Holding a heavy bag, Aiden entered the base alone.

And Arian, standing outside, facing the pouring rain, waited for Aiden to return.

What Aiden brought inside the barricade were all sorts of explosives and booby traps.

After placing them around the entrance without any hindrance from zombies, he planned to lure zombies to the entrance and sweep them away at once.

Arian thought it was a pretty decent plan.

However, the problem was that the loud noise could stimulate the mutants inside the base.

Arian steeled herself for what was to come and waited for Aiden to return.

After some time.

“It’s done.”

Aiden, holding the shrunken bag, returned to the entrance.

He removed the suppressor from his rifle and looked back at Arian.

“Are you ready?”

From this point on, Arian’s role was crucial.

Until a sufficient number of zombies gathered, Arian had to block the entrance.

Arian glanced at the twisted iron door in front of her. One side was properly closed, but the other side was severely bent, creating a gap for two or three people to pass through.

Estimating the area she had to defend, Arian nodded with her usual calm expression.

“Okay, let’s get started.”

Saying that, Aiden fired his gun.

The ferocious gunfire was different from the delicate sniping just a while ago.

Switching to automatic fire, Aiden pressed the trigger deeply, emptying the entire magazine in an instant.

Tat-tat-tat!

The storm of gunfire swept away a few zombies, turning them into pieces of meat that fluttered through the air.

Several times as many zombies as before turned their heads at the sudden noise.

Following that, they saw Arian, holding a machete.

The appearance of prey that looked almost human immediately ignited madness in the eyes of the zombies.

And-

“Kieee!”

“Kaaah!”

They charged.

The undead corpses roared all at once at the appearance of their prey and rushed towards Arian.

However, compared to the number of zombies, the entrance that Arian was blocking was extremely narrow.

The waves of corpses pushing against each other soon collided with the twisted iron door.

Bang!

Fortunately, the iron door withstood the impact.

Although countless hands of corpses reached out through the pierced entrance that the iron door couldn’t cover.

Chwaack!

They were swiftly cut down from the elbows by the blood-soaked blade.

“Kii-“

Perhaps sensing something strange, the zombie in the front made such a noise.

But now, it couldn’t retreat.

Just like a crowded train, numerous kin were pushing it from behind.

Arian’s eerie blade slashed the neck of the pushed zombie. The one following immediately had its chest split, and the one wedging in next had its legs severed.

This way, three, five… in an instant, dozens.

The number of zombies brought down by Arian suddenly increased.

However, the momentum of the zombies remained unchanged, even Arian’s speed, which transcended common sense, was gradually being caught up by the frenzied rush of the creatures.

Tat-tat-tat!

Meanwhile, Aiden was diligently creating noise to attract more zombies.

But gunfire alone wasn’t enough.

To lure all the zombies inside the base, a massive explosion that would drown out even this rain sound was needed.

So, Aiden took another bomb in his hand.

A flashbang designed to create a concussion using only the sound, striking the human cochlea with its explosive noise.

For a base of this size, it would serve as a bait covering the entire area and still have some left.

“Arian, I’m using the flashbang!”

“Got it!”

Even as Arian swung her machete frantically, she responded.

Without hesitation, Aiden threw the flashbang over the heads of the zombies.

Booooom!

The tremendous vibration of the air shook the base.

Even zombies that never took their eyes off their prey turned their heads at the explosive noise.

So, for a very brief moment, silence passed.

“Kiaaaaa!”

Soon, the zombies regained their senses and rushed back towards the entrance.

While Arian continued to cut down zombies, they relentlessly pushed forward.

The ones pushed to the side pounded the twisted iron door and the barrier as if they were crazy, and their numbers gradually increased.

The number of zombies drawn out from deep inside the base to the entrance was much larger than before.

Therefore, the pressure on the entrance became overwhelming.

Finally, Arian reached a point where she could no longer hold on.

“Aiden!”

Arian called Aiden’s name.

It meant this was the limit.

However, Aiden also had no intention of dragging out the time any longer.

“Retreat!”

Aiden signaled.

Arian and Aiden withdrew behind the barrier as if splitting.

At the moment the zombies, like a collapsing dam, were about to burst out beyond the barrier.

Another thunderous explosion occurred, and the ground vibrated.

Explosives, mines, and claymores installed all over the entrance exploded simultaneously, and the fragments scattered in all directions.

With the storm of steel, the screams of the corpses, which had been boiling until just now, were torn apart and erased as if torn.