I stepped back onto the bus with a strange feeling I couldn't quite name.
The moment I'd arrived here, I'd been thrown straight into chaos. But now the street was quiet, as if everything that had just happened was a dream.
The wrecked car was still there. The body inside it would still be there too. I didn't have the time or the means to do anything about that. All I could offer was a small, silent prayer.
Why did I feel this way?
Maybe because they weren't just monsters. They were infected people.
The emotions I hadn't been able to feel in the middle of the danger came flooding in now that the threat was gone.
There would be more infected.
Would I have to feel this every single time?
I cracked the window open. The autumn night air was cold.
Whatever had fallen from the sky yesterday — it wasn't a meteor shower. It wasn't alien spacecraft. If hundreds of those things had actually slammed into the earth, nothing would still be alive. The planet itself might not have survived.
So whatever we witnessed, it was something beyond human understanding. And I had a feeling things were only going to get harder to explain from here on out.
I'd already thought this once, but I needed to stop trying to understand. Accept it. Adapt. That was the only way to get through this.
Just then, Seonghui — who'd been slumped over the table asleep — stirred at the cold draft and slowly sat up.
*Please tell me she's not already hungry.*
She looked at me with a slightly calmer expression, then shifted her gaze toward the town center in the distance.
"Still the same," she said quietly.
I was looking that way too.
I'd actually considered it — just flooring it straight through, the way I'd charged at the spider creature earlier. Ramming right into that mass of giant spiders. But I knew now that the bus's barrier wasn't free. If I drove in there and burned through all the shield and the corka…
I didn't want to think about it.
"You went to the store, right?" I asked.
She nodded weakly. Her lips trembled, but she didn't cry.
A silence settled between us. Then she spoke.
"I walked in, and then… everything goes blank."
I didn't need to hear the rest. She'd gone to the store. She'd seen what had happened to her parents. Whatever she found must have been too much. Then nothing — until she was standing in front of the house in the countryside, unable to tell if the store had been real or just something she'd imagined.
I grew up without parents. I couldn't fully understand what she was going through. Maybe that's why I couldn't find a single thing to say.
Out of nowhere, I thought of Grandpa. My only family.
*Where is he?*
I wanted to find him. He was the one who'd prepared me for something like this — which meant he probably had answers. I had so many questions I didn't even know where to start. But I had no idea where to begin looking for him.
There was nothing in the bus to go on. Just the bare minimum for survival.
My phone was dead. No way to get news from the outside world. And the bus didn't even have a radio.
The town center was dark. No lights, no hum of machines, no electronics running anywhere. Even if there had been a radio, there probably wouldn't have been anything to pick up.
Come to think of it — those people who'd tried to escape in the car earlier. The engine hadn't started, had it.
One thought led to another, and suddenly exhaustion hit me like a wall.
"Sorry… I need to sleep for a bit."
It was a request to keep watch. I didn't say more than that. She nodded without a word and turned back to the window.
She needed time to think. And I needed real sleep. I couldn't even remember the last time I'd actually gone to bed properly. I was just completely done.
The bus's corka wasn't overflowing, but it should hold for now. As long as nothing human-shaped could see the bus, we'd be fine. And if a creature showed up, Seonghui would wake me. Ideally she'd handle it herself, but.
I turned off all the lights except the small table lamp. I grabbed a water bottle, set it on the table, and climbed up to the top bunk.
*Is this the first time I've actually slept in this bed?*
Every other time I'd been out cold in the driver's seat or on the floor. Lying down properly felt almost strange. But it was so comfortable.
The moment my head hit the pillow, sleep crashed over me all at once, and I had no fight left to give.
Someone was shaking me.
Who?
I live alone.
It had felt so real.
Me swinging a sword.
Killing something hideous.
Running into an old classmate out of nowhere.
Not a dream I wanted to have again.
Well —
The moment with the sword had been kind of addictive.
Why did I miss it?
Damn it.
For a second I thought I was back in my cramped little studio apartment. Worn-down but mine.
*If only all of this had just been a dream…*
I opened my eyes. Seonghui's face was right in front of mine. The top bunk sat almost level with a standing person's head.
"Whoa!"
I jolted upright and cracked my head on the ceiling.
"Ow — what's going on?"
It was still dark outside. The table lamp I'd left on was the only light, casting a dim glow through the bus.
"They're gone."
Gone? What's gone? The food? Was she hungry already?
"The spiders. They're gone."
"What?"
I climbed down and checked the windows. I killed the table lamp so my eyes could adjust to the dark, and the outline of the town center came into focus.
Every single one of the giant spider creatures — gone. Not one in sight.
I pulled open the fridge, grabbed a water bottle, and drank half of it in one go. Still tired, but my head snapped clear.
"Seatbelt," I said.
Short and simple. I headed for the driver's seat. She followed and dropped into the passenger seat without being asked.
I glanced at her for a moment, then started the engine. Switched on the headlights. Pressed the accelerator.
The bus rolled forward — heavy, smooth, steady.
What the headlights revealed was devastating.
Barely a building left standing. The whole area looked like it had been bombed flat.
Wrecked cars, trucks, and buses were scattered across the road in every direction. The ground was smeared with blood and chunks of something I didn't want to identify.
I wasn't going to try.
*Wait.*
I hit the brakes. Seonghui looked at me, confused.
The convenience store from yesterday was right beside us. The glass was shattered and part of the wall had crumbled, but it was in better shape than I expected.
"There was a classmate of mine in there."
"Who?"
I couldn't remember his name.
I watched the store for a moment. Nothing moving nearby. The store was on the left side of the bus, so I flipped on the exterior lights. The beam reached inside well enough.
"We might not get another chance to come back. Let's stop."
I wanted to get Seonghui to her parents' store as fast as possible. But supplies came first.
She nodded. I went to the back, strapped on the shield, and picked up the sword.
"Huh."
"What?"
My arm didn't hurt. I unwrapped the bandage. The wound was completely healed — skin smooth and clean, like nothing had ever happened.
"It's all healed."
Seonghui didn't look surprised. She'd already been through it herself.
So it wasn't her ability. It was the bed. The bus's bed had done it. One more thing I knew now. A useful thing.
We stepped off the bus carefully, leaving the door open. The plan was simple: first sign of anything wrong, we sprint back. We moved toward the convenience store in short, cautious steps.
The glass door was already broken. No need to open it.
I checked behind the counter. Just a bloodstain. No one there.
The refrigerators were all off, of course. No sounds anywhere. The inside was trashed. Hard to tell whether people or creatures had done it.
The drinks and alcohol in the fridges were untouched. That answered it — creatures. People would've taken everything.
I found a roll of fifty-liter trash bags behind the counter. I tore off half and handed them to Seonghui.
We needed to carry as much as possible. Small bags weren't going to cut it.
"Double-bag everything. They'll tear."
I started sweeping instant noodles off the shelves. She moved to the snack aisle.
"You're pretty good at this," I said. A throwaway joke.
She didn't answer. She moved on to the next aisle — household essentials.
I grabbed a can of ale and a bottle of soju from the alcohol fridge and dropped them in.
*Will outside items get restocked too?*
I was curious. I'd have to test it one bottle at a time.
There was a first aid section. Painkillers, cold medicine — I took all of it.
In the freezer section, I found ice cream that had melted and dumplings that had thawed. I grabbed every variety of dumplings. Already thawed meant we could cook them right away. It'd only been about a day — they should still be fine.
We filled four fifty-liter bags between us, two each, and headed for the exit.
Just before stepping out, I thought of the guy who'd been working here. He probably wasn't the owner, but still. I grabbed a notepad from the counter and scrawled a quick note.
*I'll pay you back. — Jinwoo*
Back on the bus. Drinks went into the fridge wherever there was space. Everything else got sorted into the storage compartments.
Having actual variety finally made me feel a little better — even with the fridge that refilled itself and the food storage that never seemed to run out.
There was still plenty left in the store, but I wanted to leave it for anyone else who might come through. Honestly, I could've taken more. But there wasn't really room for it anyway.
I put the thawed dumplings on a plate and reached for the microwave. That's when Seonghui grabbed my wrist.
"There's oil."
I caught the look in her eyes. Sharp.
"Then you're frying them."
I went back to the fridge and pulled out the soju bottle I'd just put in. Then I closed the door.
"Please."
Then I opened it again.
"Damn it."
Outside items didn't restock. Only the things that had been there from the start came back. Good to know.
*Next time this thing upgrades, I hope there's more variety.*
I was already expecting more from this strange bus, already adapting to it like it was normal. There's a saying that goes — give people or animals too much and they'll never be satisfied. Turns out it's true.
Especially people. Give them everything without question and they adjust to it instantly. Then the moment you give them even slightly less, they grumble. Some of them get downright nasty. If you want to stay on good terms with someone, you have to know when to hold back.
*Where did that train of thought even come from?*
My brain was running in too many directions. I put the lukewarm soju back and grabbed one of the domestic beers that had restocked itself.
"Beer goes with potstickers," I muttered.
She didn't respond. She just kept frying the dumplings, her back to me. I couldn't tell what she was feeling, but something about the way she stood felt heavy. Like she wanted to get to her parents' store and also dreaded it in equal measure. Like she needed a reason to take a little longer.
Watching her, I found myself thinking about when we were kids. The three of us at my place, making instant noodles together all the time. We always fought about it — someone wanted them undercooked, someone wanted them fully done, someone had opinions about how the egg should be.
Over instant noodles, of all things.
We had noodles now too. No eggs, but still. We could eat together like that again.
*I wonder where Heesung is.*
It'd be nice if all three of us ended up in the same place.
The potstickers came out golden and crisp, and Seonghui set them on the table. Beyond the window, the first pale blue light of dawn was spreading across the sky. The shape of the town center slowly came into view.
We sipped our beers and ate our potstickers in silence, watching the morning come.