Morning came.
Donghoon hadn't slept. With Yuna there, he couldn't let his guard down. He still didn't trust her. Yuna seemed to feel the same way. Her eyes were closed, but she wasn't asleep. Every time Donghoon moved, her eyelids trembled faintly.
When dawn passed and it grew light outside, Yuna opened her eyes.
“How's your ankle?”
Donghoon asked.
Yuna moved her ankle and grimaced.
“I think I can walk. Slowly, though.”
“Where did you come from?”
“Zone 5.”
“Zone 5?”
“It’s a long way south from here. About half a day on foot.”
Donghoon remembered the writing he'd seen on the barricade yesterday: “Zone 3 Survivor Base.” This was Zone 3, and Yuna had come from Zone 5.
“Why did you come all the way here?”
Yuna hesitated for a moment.
“Zone 5 collapsed.”
“What do you mean, collapsed?”
“The monsters broke through. The barricade. Three weeks ago. Several Howlers came all at once. We couldn't stop them.”
Yuna's voice dropped.
“The survivors scattered. Some went to Zone 2, and some to Zone 7. I…… ended up alone.”
“Why alone?”
“To get to another zone, you have to travel. If you run into a monster on the way, it’s over. I can’t fight. So I hid. For three weeks. I came out looking for food and got caught by a Howler.”
Donghoon nodded.
“How many zones are there?”
“There were ten originally. About a year after the ruin, the survivors gathered and divided the area into zones. From Zone 1 to Zone 10. They built bases in each zone, put up barricades, and divided the supplies among themselves.”
“And now?”
Yuna bit her lip.
“Only Zones 2, 3, and 7 are left, more or less. All the others have collapsed. Some were breached by monsters, some fell apart because the people fought each other, and some ran out of supplies.”
Three out of ten. Seven had disappeared in three years.
“How many survivors are there?”
“I don’t know exactly. The last thing I heard was…… about two hundred in total? That was six months ago, though. There are probably fewer now.”
Two hundred. Two hundred people in an entire city.
Donghoon took a sip of water and handed it to Yuna. She accepted it and drank.
“Is there someone managing the zones?”
“Each zone has a representative. Zone 2 is led by a man named Park Jeongsu, and Zone 7 by a man named Choi Yeongjin. Zone 3…….”
Yuna stopped.
“Zone 3?”
“The representative of Zone 3 was a man named Kang Minhyeok. But contact with him was lost about six months ago. No one comes out of Zone 3. There’s a barricade, but no people.”
Donghoon thought of the barricade from yesterday. A wall made from two cars. The words “Shoot on sight for hostile actions.” And no one there.
“Does anyone know where the people from Zone 3 went?”
“No. They just stopped responding one day. Zone 2 sent out a scouting party, but they said only the barricade was left. There were no signs of fighting, and no signs of a monster attack. They just disappeared.”
Donghoon thought of the list of the dead he'd seen at the pharmacy. The records stopped after two years and eight months. It could have been around the same time the people from Zone 3 disappeared.
“That thing you mentioned earlier…… the person who suddenly appeared. You said it had happened before.”
Yuna nodded.
“It was about a year after the ruin. A man suddenly appeared near Zone 5. He was wearing clothes from before the ruin and had no idea what was going on. He said he had come from 2024.”
Just like Donghoon.
“What happened to him?”
“He died three days later. To a group of Crawlers. He went out of the base at night.”
“Why did he go out?”
“I don’t know. He left without telling anyone. We found his body in the morning.”
Donghoon fell silent.
“Did he know something, too?”
“No. He didn’t know anything. Not what the monsters were or what had happened to this world. He was just terrified. He was different from you, Mr. Donghoon.”
Donghoon nodded.
The reason Donghoon was different was the novel. The printout he'd read in the military. Without it, he would have been just like that man. But that was something only Donghoon knew. And it had to stay that way.
“Yuna.”
“Yes?”
“I want to know more about this world. You said there was someone who created the zone system. Do you know anything about that person?”
Yuna looked at Donghoon. For a moment, she wore an expression like she was weighing something.
“……This might sound strange.”
“What sounds strange in a situation like this?”
Yuna gave a small laugh. It was the first time he'd seen her smile.
“There was…… one strange person in this world.”
“A strange person?”
“Someone who had been around since the beginning of the ruin. That person was the one who first created the zone system and designed the barricades. They told us the monsters’ weaknesses, the ranking system, everything.”
Donghoon's heart began to race.
“That person knew everything. From the very beginning. Where the monsters came from, how to kill them, what would appear next. It was as if…….”
Yuna looked at Donghoon.
“As if they'd experienced it before.”
Something clicked into place in Donghoon's mind.
The protagonist of the web novel. A regressor on his fiftieth cycle. Someone who had died fifty times, returned, and knew everything about the future.
“What was that person’s name?”
“Jin Seoha.”
Donghoon felt as if his heart had stopped.
Jin Seoha. That was the protagonist's name in the novel. He'd read it dozens of times. There was no way he could forget it.
The protagonist of the novel had existed in this world. Was still existing in it.
“Where is that person now?”
Yuna's expression hardened.
“Gone.”
“Dead?”
“I don’t know. He disappeared about two years ago. Without saying anything. One morning, I woke up and he was gone.”
Gone again. Like the people from Zone 3.
“Did he say anything before he disappeared?”
Yuna shook her head. Then she stopped. It seemed she'd remembered something.
“There is one thing.”
“What?”
“A few days before he disappeared, he said something strange. Only to me.”
Yuna looked at Donghoon.
“‘This time, it won’t work.’”
Donghoon turned the words over in his mind.
This time, it won’t work.
This time.
That word snagged in his mind. “This time” implied there would be a “next time.” Or that there had been a “previous time.”
The protagonist of the novel was a regressor. On his fiftieth cycle. When he died, he returned to the beginning. “This time, it won’t work” could mean he wouldn't be able to achieve his goal in this cycle.
If Jin Seoha was the protagonist of the novel, then this world was one of Jin Seoha's cycles.
The novel Donghoon had read was about the fiftieth cycle. But this world might not be the fiftieth. Jin Seoha had said, “This time, it won’t work.” It was a cycle in which he still hadn't succeeded.
Donghoon's thoughts became tangled.
“Yuna, I have one more question.”
“Yes?”
“Jin Seoha…… Did it seem like this wasn't his first time in this world? Like he'd experienced something like this before?”
Yuna slowly nodded.
“From the very beginning. He wasn't confused on the first day of the ruin. He moved like someone reading from a script. Like he knew what would come next.”
Donghoon closed his eyes.
The protagonist of the novel was a regressor. A man named Jin Seoha had existed in this world, and he knew everything. Then he'd said, “This time, it won’t work,” and disappeared.
The novel and this world were the same world. But the novel was the story of the fiftieth cycle, while this world was a different one. He didn't know which cycle it was.
The information in the novel Donghoon had read was based on the fiftieth cycle. If this world was a different cycle, there could be differences from the fiftieth. The types of monsters, when they appeared, the number of survivors, the order of events. They were mostly the same, but the details could be different.
He couldn't blindly trust the novel's knowledge. Rule six, which he'd written down yesterday: “This world is like the novel, but the timing is different. Don't blindly trust the novel's information.”
It wasn't just the timing that was different. The cycle was different, too.
Donghoon opened his eyes.
“Yuna.”
“Yes?”
“Whether it's Zone 2 or Zone 7, we need to get to somewhere with people. There’s a limit to what we can do alone.”
Yuna nodded.
“Zone 2 is closer. About half a day northeast from here. But…….”
“But?”
“Park Jeongsu, the representative of Zone 2…… doesn’t take outsiders in easily. They have to share their supplies. If we show up empty-handed, they might kick us out.”
Donghoon looked at the ax.
“We’re not empty-handed.”
Yuna looked at Donghoon.
“If someone can kill a Howler alone…… they might let him in.”
“Let’s go.”
Donghoon stood up and gathered his backpack. Water, canned food, a first-aid kit, a flashlight, rope. He slipped the ax onto his belt and put the hammer in his backpack.
Yuna tried to stand, then grabbed her ankle and grimaced.
“Can you walk?”
“If I go slowly.”
Donghoon thought for a moment. Then he swung the backpack around to his front and turned his back to her.
“Get on.”
“I’m fine. I can walk.”
“Moving slowly is dangerous. We need to travel during the day, but if we run out of time, we’ll have to walk at night.”
After hesitating for a moment, Yuna climbed onto Donghoon's back.
Donghoon left the base.
It was bright outside. The sky was gray, but it was daytime. It was the time Crawlers hid in dark places.
Donghoon walked. Even with Yuna on his back, he could move quickly. Enhanced stamina and strength. The price of five Crawlers and one Howler.
As they walked, Yuna spoke.
“Mr. Donghoon.”
“Yes?”
“What do you think…… is going to happen to this world?”
Donghoon hesitated for a moment.
It ends when the rift is closed. That was what happened in the novel. But that was the story of the fiftieth cycle. This world was a different cycle. He had no way of knowing whether the same ending was possible. And he couldn't talk about the novel.
“……We just have to survive. We can find a way.”
Yuna grew quiet behind him. A long while later, she spoke.
“When you put it that simply, it almost sounds like it really could be that easy.”
Donghoon didn't answer. He just kept walking.
Donghoon walked.
He passed through the ruined city, crossed cracked roads, and slipped between abandoned cars. The rift in the sky grew farther and farther behind them. That meant they were moving away from the west. A good direction.
Donghoon thought as he walked.
This world was the same as the novel. But the cycle was different. The novel's protagonist, Jin Seoha, had already disappeared, saying, “This time, it won’t work.”
Then was this a failed cycle? The cycle Jin Seoha had given up on?
Donghoon shook his head.
Survive.
He knew the ending of the novel. But he didn't know how this world would end. The cycle was different. No one knew whether the ending of the fiftieth cycle was possible in this one. But Donghoon would survive. That was what he was best at.
Donghoon didn't stop walking.
Northeast. Toward where the people were. Toward Zone 2.
He could feel Yuna's warmth against his back. The warmth of another person, for the first time in three years. No—for Donghoon, it had only been two days.
It was a strange feeling. Not being alone. Donghoon had been comfortable alone his entire life. He'd never been good at fitting in with people. He'd been told he didn't talk much, showed no expression, and was impossible to read.
But now……
He didn't mind not being alone.
Donghoon walked through the ruined world with a person on his back and an ax at his waist.