The Apocalypse Regressor's All-Purpose Shelter

Whether it was the sea or a lake, setting up a residence on an island in the middle of the water was a fairly wise decision in the apocalypse.

Because zombies could not swim, so at least from them, one would be safe.

But from a long-term perspective, it was not a very good choice.

First, in the case of islands in the sea, there were not many places that produced water usable as the most important thing: drinking water. Nine times out of ten, they had to collect rainwater and use that.

Even if an island had groundwater, they could not drink it as it was. Because its salinity was much higher than on land.

Then what about islands in the middle of a lake or a large reservoir?

Since freshwater was everywhere, if it was properly filtered and boiled, there would be no problem at all for drinking water and domestic water.

But even islands in the sea were highly likely to be attacked by raiders someday, so there was no way an island inside a lake, clearly visible to the eye, would be safe.

Above all, lakes and reservoirs in northern Gyeonggi-do, such as Namyangju, had an even bigger problem.

The water froze when winter came.

In other words, in winter, even safety from zombies could not be guaranteed.

That was why Junho was certain that the teenagers on the fishing platforms in “Cheondo Reservoir,” whose total circumference looked to be around three kilometers, had gone there relatively recently.

And he thought there was a high probability that the cause was the Alpha that had taken over the new-town Yeondeok District.

***

—Wow, how did those kids get all the way out there? Ah! There’s a boat.

Just as Yoon Youngsu said, on the floating platform, where fishing bungalows and residences in the form of prefabricated rural farm huts commonly seen in the countryside were connected together, there was a small rowboat floating.

The boat could hold five or six people at most, and the floating platform could probably take ten if they really pushed it, but normally, it was a size suitable for a family of four or five.

—Putting water aside, how are those kids surviving out there? Are they fishing or something?

“They must have taken food in when they went there. Probably not much, though. Zoom in a bit.”

—Yes.

Soon, the drone’s wide-angle camera pulled its magnification to the maximum, and the figures of the teenagers standing outside, rather than inside the floating platform and residence, came clearly into view.

Thinking that it certainly earned its expensive price tag of over ten million won, Junho carefully examined the teenagers.

'First, two boys and one girl.'

And judging from how they were saying something while looking toward the one-room-style residence, it seemed there were a few more people inside.

—Whoa? There are solar panels too?

To Yoon Youngsu, who, even now, and even in the peaceful past, had only gone back and forth between his company and home—his home also being the combined research lab and residence arranged by the company—and almost never gone outside, so he did not know much about the ways of the world, Junho said,

“Bungalows with somewhat expensive lodging fees often install their own solar panels and supply electricity that way. They’ll have a converter and a power tank, so using a refrigerator, microwave, and basic heating and cooling shouldn’t be a problem.”

Junho knew that well because, in the past, he had gone night fishing at a place similar to that.

Before the world had become like this, most rural prefabricated farm huts that had not been built too long ago also applied small-scale solar power systems in the one-to-three-kilowatt class.

—Ah, so that’s why they can fly the drone too.

“Right. At the very least, drinking water and power won’t be a problem.”

If they could use electricity, then a fishing platform like that would at least have an electric kettle for anglers, so even if they could not filter the reservoir water, they could scoop it up, boil it, and drink it.

—Whoa? Isn’t that totally sweet?

“But there will be other problems.”

—Yes?

“Scan around the reservoir with the drone camera.”

At Junho’s words, the drone floating above Cheondo Reservoir slowly moved its camera and scanned the lakeshore.

—Huh? That’s....

“Yeah. Cheondo Reservoir is a fairly famous place, so originally, there were a lot of people there.”

All around the reservoir, there were restaurants and cafés, pensions and motels.

Furthermore, since the incident had broken out during the middle of a summer holiday, it was obvious that there would have been more people than usual.

As if proving that, in the district where two-to-three-story barbecue restaurants and café buildings were clustered, there were still clear traces that someone was living there.

In other words, the teenagers on the fishing platform were by no means safe from “people,” rather than zombies.

***

—Ah? Boss, could that be...?

“What do they say? Trouble comes on the day you go out....”

At Yoon Youngsu’s startled voice, Junho clicked his tongue lowly.

The drone camera was capturing the sight of two boats just beginning to move from a place lined with motel and pension buildings, enough to have a fairly large convenience store.

And in the boats, five or six men of various ages were riding each.

In the hands of those men, who were dressed in shabby clothes, were weapons such as knives and spears.

—Looks like they’re going to catch those kids, doesn’t it?

“Obviously.”

Those men had not failed to set up a residence on the floating platform because they were idiots.

Water could be obtained even without being in the middle of the reservoir, and the pension district was blocked off by walls, so as long as the front gate was properly sealed, it was safe unless zombies in the thousands rushed in all at once.

And the nearest village to the reservoir was also more than five hundred meters away, but from the look of it, everyone there seemed to have either died or left.

In other words, there was a high probability that those men were the strongest survivor group at Cheondo Reservoir.

Or perhaps, a raider group.

So there was no need for them to bother living on a fishing platform in the middle of the reservoir.

“They probably just left it there as a shelter to use if an emergency happened.”

—And those kids went into that place however they wanted?

“Yeah.”

On top of that, among the outsiders who had dared to violate their territory, there was a girl.

Minor or whatever else, in a world where law and morality had already collapsed, the possibility that raiders made up of starving males would keep human decency was extremely low.

—Ah, fuck. Boss, I don’t think I can watch this anymore. What do we do?

But Yoon Youngsu was one of the few who knew and kept “decency,” both before the regression and now.

That was why, instead of his usual light tone, he spoke in a somewhat heavy voice.

—Well, it’s not like there’s anything we can do about it. I’m just not going to watch any more... huh?

Yoon Youngsu’s surprised voice.

“......!?”

And Junho was also rather surprised.

Because among the teenagers on the floating platform, two people had come out carrying something and were standing on the outer deck.

What they held in their hands was none other than bows.

And judging from the size and shape—

—Isn’t that archery?

“That’s right. Archery.”

The male and female teenagers were holding not hunting compound bows, but competition recurve bows, and they were nocking arrows and just beginning to aim at the boats crossing the reservoir.

“Youngsu, measure the distance.”

—Right now... about one hundred ten meters. Oh? Are they shooting right away?

As if it were a lie that he had been somewhat stiff and gloomy just moments ago, Yoon Youngsu’s voice was now full of anticipation.

But Junho thought that would not be the case.

When he had been making preparations for the apocalypse after his regression, including the construction of the shelter, Junho had looked into almost every kind of weapon, including firearms.

And naturally, bows, led by compound bows, had been among the candidates.

But after investigating bows in various ways, Junho had decided to give up on them.

Because learning them was too difficult, and their range was not as long as he had expected.

Well, in the past, English longbowmen or famous archers had supposedly hit targets over two hundred meters away, but in general, one had to think of them as being under two hundred meters, with an effective range inside one hundred meters.

And even that was for skilled archers.

Normally, it would be thirty or forty meters at most.

At that distance, hitting the head of a zombie rushing in like mad was not just difficult, but practically no different from throwing away one’s life. Because there were not many cases where only one or two zombies moved around.

Furthermore, in order to shoot a bow, one absolutely had to expose one’s body.

Leaving zombies aside, no human would stupidly stand still after seeing an opponent within one hundred meters trying to shoot an arrow at them.

In other words, in terms of “killing effectiveness,” bows were extremely inefficient weapons in the apocalypse.

That was why Junho had excluded bows from the category of weapons to be used at the shelter.

—Ninety meters. Now... eighty meters.

Right after Yoon Youngsu’s excited voice was heard—

Piiiing...!

Since he was watching through the drone camera, the sound could not actually be heard, but the arrows shot by the male and female high school students must surely have made a sound like that.

But the arrows disappeared into the surface of the water several meters away from the boat, and the men laughed at the two of them.

However, that was only for a very brief moment.

The two high school students did not care and once again nocked arrows onto their strings and shot their bows.

From their third and fourth shots respectively, the arrows began falling right near the boats.

Then the men riding in the boats showed startled and flustered reactions.

In the apocalypse, bows were indeed inefficient weapons.

But that was when the target moved quickly or acted unpredictably. When the target was a boat approaching slowly while being rowed, as it was now, the situation was different.

Furthermore, because of inertia, it was difficult to change the direction of the boats.

In the end, one or two arrows began striking the boats.

—Wow! Those kids shoot well, don’t they? Are they athletes?

“Looks like it.”

Junho was fairly surprised as well.

From about seventy meters away, the arrows shot by the two high school students were hitting the boats.

Junho, who had investigated bows fairly diligently until removing them from the candidate list for shelter weapons, knew that this was not an easy thing to do.

Moreover.

—Ah, but they can’t hit people. Is it because they’re amateurs? Damn, what a waste.

“No. It might not be that they can’t hit them. It might be that they aren’t hitting them.”

—Excuse me?

The men riding in the boats, startled by the increasingly accurate shots, panicked and tried to turn the boats around.

But that was not something that could be done in a few seconds.

And because they stupidly tried to turn the boats themselves when they could have just rowed backward, their sides were fully exposed.

In other words, there were now far more targets than at the beginning, and the situation had become much easier for arrows to hit.

Even so, the arrows shot by the two high school students lodged in the sides of the boats, as if they had agreed beforehand, instead of hitting people.

“Those kids have never killed people before.”

—Ah....

If it had been Junho himself, he would have simply punched holes through their heads.

But the high school students, with gaunt faces that still clearly showed how young they were, were obviously “deliberately” not hitting the raiders in the boats.

And that meant—

—Boss. Those kids... seem like good kids, don’t they?

“...Yeah. It seems that way.”

But at the same time, they were foolish ones.

At least in the apocalypse, one could not act like that.

Because the possibility that the men on the boats, who were now rowing back toward the place they had come from as if their tails were on fire, would give up was zero percent.

Since they had been hit once, it was obvious they would prepare thoroughly and come again, and there were many ways to block arrows, unlike bullets.

—Ah, that’s a shame. Looks like they’ll get caught soon.

“.......”

Junho thought so too.

If the raiders prepared something like wooden shields at night and quietly approached from several directions in multiple boats, there was no proper way to deal with them using bows.

Furthermore, if some among the raiders were good swimmers, the chance of them being breached was even higher.

If it was fast, they might be in danger tonight.

—Tsk. Well, it can’t be helped. It’s not like there’s anything we can do for them....

“No. It would be better to save those kids.”

—Excuse me!?

Yoon Youngsu seemed truly surprised.

Because not once had Junho ever saved someone out of half-baked love for humanity or sympathy.

Every time he had helped or saved someone, it had been a “transaction” done with the interests of our shelter in mind.

Of course, among those who had received Junho’s help, quite a few did not regard it that way and thought of him as their benefactor.

In any case, however, it was also true that such people had brought large and small benefits to the shelter.

And now, Junho had said something that seemed as if he intended to break the principle he had maintained for nearly a year.

—Boss! Have you finally awakened as a hero of justice...! Practicing broad and deep love for humanity....

“Stop talking bullshit and look closely at the clothes those kids are wearing.”

—Yes?

A moment later.

—Whoa, that’s... the school of the kids at the nursing home, right?

“Yeah.”

That was right.

One of the high school students on the floating platform was wearing the upper half of the gym uniform from “Yeondeok High School,” the school attended by the kids Junho had saved when he eliminated EoktenZ.

And that meant—

“Those kids haven’t been at the reservoir for long. Then they’ll know the situation in Yeondeok District well.”

It meant they were important sources of information who, as of right now, likely knew best about the dangerous Alpha said to have taken over that place.

***

“Photos? Suddenly?”

“I don’t know either. Junho is asking me to take some photos of you guys and send them.”

At the words of Go Seokjin, whom they had now come to regard as something close to a biological uncle, the three high school students who were living well and working hard at Hanaareum Nursing Home exchanged puzzled glances.

“Hey, hey, don’t just stand there like that. Let’s take them first, take them. He asked me to send individual photos and a photo of the three of you together, you know? Back in my day, I was—”

“No, thank you.”

“We’re fine. Uncle, seriously... we’ll take them ourselves.”

Saying that, the three male and female high school students each took out smartphones from their pockets.

They were the latest models that had come out before the apocalypse, and Junho had distributed them to them as well after recently farming Technomart and bringing them back.

Click. Click. Click.

Like it was the peaceful era, they took selfies in all kinds of poses and with cute—or strange—expressions, then used the shelter chat program created by Yoon Youngsu to send the photo files.

“You can’t even take proper family trip photos, and yet you were going to....”

“No, well....”

Go Seokjin, who was one of perhaps three or four Koreans among all Koreans serious about photos who was absolutely terrible at taking selfies, could only smack his lips with an embarrassed expression at his wife’s scolding.

In any case, the photos of the three high school students, who were eating well and living well at the nursing home, were delivered to the shelter control room.

And immediately saved to Junho’s phone and tablet as well.

“Let’s go, Purdy.”

Woof!

After checking the photos, Junho called Purdy, and Purdy, who was finally going out with his master again after a truly long time, barked powerfully and leapt into the passenger seat of the multipurpose electric vehicle.

“Hyung, are you really going to be okay? No matter what, isn’t it a bit much to go with just Purdy?”

At Junhyeok’s worried words, Junho gave a faint snort of laughter and replied.

“It’s fine. No need to use an ox-slaughtering knife to kill a chicken. It’s close, and this time, I’m more than enough on my own.”

“Uh... y-yeah.”

The younger brother, who wanted to ask back whether his older brother himself was not precisely that knife for slaughtering an ox—or rather, a bull or North American buffalo—could only laugh awkwardly.