Walking Daddy

Chapter 85

We shadowed the dogs as they moved onto the streets.

They were moving stealthily along a path with no zombies, which made it likely that they had already secured a safe route to their food storage.

I watched their movements and then turned to Kim Hyeong-Jun.

'They’ve probably done this hundreds of times.'

'I bet they could even do this at night with their eyes closed.'

The dogs that attacked Seoul Forest had entered through tunnels carrying arrows, crossbows, and army knives, but the guys in front of us were casually roaming through the streets with clubs.

Nevertheless, they seemed comfortable and unruffled. They were probably used to this, having done it over and over again.

After about fifteen minutes of following them, the dogs, who had been silent up to then, exchanged a few words.

“Are we almost there?”

"No one died on the way, right?"

Making silly jokes, they entered the subway station.

I couldn't help but be surprised when I read the sign above the subway entrance. It said: Line 7 Konkuk University Station Exit 3.

Konkuk University Hospital was to the left of the subway entrance.

Kim Hyung-jun also looked around, then raised his eyebrows.

‘Wait, ahjussi. Isn’t this Konkuk University Hospital?'

‘Yeah.’

‘They kind of led us here, huh?'

Kim Hyeong-Jun smiled faintly, as if we’d marked one thing off our to-do list.

However, I sensed something strange.

There were countless zombies camping in front of the hospital entrance. The way they had gathered suggested that someone had intentionally blocked off the hospital entrance, as if they were trying to keep survivors away from the hospital.

This strangeness made me suspicious. I rubbed my chin and took a closer look at the surrounding terrain.

I took in the zombies that were all gathered up together, the subway transit station, the hospital, and the university…

After thinking about it for a while, I realized why this place was being used as a food storage.

This place was basically a maze.

Kim Hyeong-Jun walked carelessly toward the subway entrance. I quickly stopped him.

'Wait.'

'What? Why?'

'We’re at a geographical disadvantage here.'

'Huh?'

'Look at the hospital entrance.'

Kim Hyeong-Jun saw the crowd of zombies, then looked at me with his head tilted to the side. It seemed like he didn’t understand what I was trying to say.

I sighed.

‘Konkuk University Station is a transfer station. Lines 2 and 7 intersect, and you can even enter Konkuk University Hospital via the underground linkway. Can’t you tell by the zombies gathered by the hospital entrance?’

‘Uh, no, not really.’

'This place is built like an ant's nest. But they’ve only blocked off one entrance… So it’s probably safe to think that the other entrance is a trap.’

‘Trap?’

‘Even if the other entrance isn’t a trap, there are way too many entrances through the subway to the hospital, excluding the hospital’s main entrance. There’s no way of telling where the survivors are, exactly, and there’s a high chance that we could either get lost or lose the dogs if we follow them in.’

Kim Hyeong-Jun nodded with his jaw dropped to the ground as if he had finally caught on to what I was trying to say to him this whole time.

I then pointed at one of the entrances for Konkuk University Station Line 2 across the intersection.

‘It’s difficult to keep your eye on all the entrances to Line 7, and we can’t even see all the entrances to Line 2 from here. There's even an underground linkway to the hospital, so there’s a chance they might slip away through the rear exit of the hospital.'

‘There’s a rear exit as well?’

‘Konkuk University Hospital is connected to Konkuk University. If you go out through the rear exit of the hospital, you can also leave through the front or back entrances of the university itself. There’s no way we’ll be able to track down the dogs again once we lose them.'

'Then why can’t we just follow them and kill them right now?'

‘What if they use the survivors as hostages? Are you going to endanger the lives of the survivors as well?'

Kim Hyung-jun scratched his forehead with a troubled expression.

I let out a sigh.

‘Focus Hyeong-Jun. The survivors’ lives are at stake.’

‘So what do you want to do?'

'We shouldn’t be the ones going in. We should wait for them to come out.'

'So you want to keep an eye on every entrance?'

‘As of now, that’d be the safest thing to do. You never know what can happen underground. I’m not sure if there are lights down there, and you can’t see anything in a subway when there’s no light. It's better to wait here than to lose them in the process.'

‘You’re right. If there’s no light, it’ll probably be difficult to tell the survivors and dogs apart too…’

Kim Hyeong-Jun smacked his lips and lost himself in thought for a moment. With another smack of his lips, he continued,

'Let's get our underlings first.'

‘You keep an eye on all the entrances and exits of Line 2. I'll keep an eye on Line 7 and the back door of the hospital.'

'Got it.'

We ordered our underlings that were hiding in Apartment Complex L to come to us immediately. After about two minutes, I saw eight hundred underlings appear a distance away, making their way quickly toward us.

As per our earlier agreement, Kim Hyeong-Jun headed for Line 2.

We both placed underlings with vision on nearby rooftops so that we could keep an eye on each other, and I monitored all the entrances related to Line 7 and the rear exit of the hospital.

Being patient took a toll on me, and the endless waiting made me nervous. During this time, which felt like an eternity, I focused my senses on the entrance of Konkuk University Hospital and Exit 3 of Line 7.

I waited and waited for something to happen.

After about thirty minutes of waiting, I received a signal from one of my underlings.

- Motion detected.

I quickly got up and ran to the underling that had sent me the signal.

As expected, they hadn't come out of Exit 3. The underling that had sent me the signal was watching the rear exit of the hospital, which faced the university.

I went around to the rear exit via the main road instead of going past the hospital's main entrance so that I could avoid the dogs.

As I neared the rear exit, I saw the dogs with six survivors. The survivors were tied up, linked together like a chain of sausages. The dogs were dragging them somewhere.

The dogs didn’t take them to either the front or the back entrances of the university.

Although they were dogs, they were still human. They took an indirect route that ran along the parking lot and next to the biology department. It seemed they were wary of the street zombies as well.

I knew better than to attack them. It was far too dangerous for me to do so.

I knew I had to wait until they were further away from the survivors.

Thud!

The sudden sound of footsteps drew my attention.

They were rather loud, as if someone was stomping on the ground to avoid tripping. Startled, I quickly looked to the side.

My eyes landed on Kim Hyeong-Jun.

'Sorry. Were you surprised?'

'Keep your head down.'

I furrowed my brow and refocused my attention on the dogs. They had stopped in their tracks and were looking around cautiously.

I wondered if they’d heard Kim Hyung-Jun's footsteps.

Kim Hyeong-Jun quickly crouched down next to me.

'I hope we didn’t get caught because of me.'

‘No, we haven’t been caught yet. But we can’t let our guard down. We have to wait until the dogs and survivors are separated enough.’

‘Do you think the dogs will move further away from the survivors? I mean, their job is to watch over the survivors.’

'But it’s not like we can attack them right now either.'

I furrowed my brow. Kim Hyeong-Jun sighed and spoke up.

‘Ahjussi, I’m going to play a trick.'

'A trick?'

‘Ahjussi, just do as I tell you to do.'

‘Okay. What do you want me to do?’

'Follow me, and look angry.'

‘What?’

Kim Hyeong-Jun got up and took a deep breath, and soon started walking slowly toward the dogs.

'Hey! Hey!!!’

No matter how hard I yelled at Kim Hyeong-Jun, there was no way he was going to hear me.

I had no choice but to follow him.

I couldn’t figure out why he was acting so rashly today. I wondered if it was because it was his first time rescuing survivors.

I knew that Kim Hyeong-Jun wasn’t usually such a foolish guy…

“Sto, Stop!”

The dogs were taken aback when they saw us. All of them raised their clubs and started looking at each other, trying to figure out what they were going to do next.

I stopped worrying and decided to play along. I had no choice but to go with his plan, since we’d already exposed ourselves.

Kim Hyeong-Jun ignored their orders and walked toward them slowly with his hands behind his back. I followed him with a furious expression.

When he was about a meter away from the dogs, he stopped walking and looked at me calmly.

'If both sides are in an awkward situation, the side that doesn’t panic wins.'

'What?'

‘Ahjussi, you’re going to act like my superior from now on. You have to act adamant and be angry no matter what.’

‘Hey, acting isn't really my….’

'Just frown, ahjussi.'

Kim Hyeong-Jun quickly glanced at the dogs after he was done talking. They seemed stunned, not knowing how to react.

After a moment, one of the dogs—the most muscular one amongst them—stepped out.

The man took a look at Kim Hyeong-Jin and me and then swallowed. He asked Kim Hyeong-Jun a question.

“Are you perhaps the new dong leader?”

Kim Hyeong-Jun furrowed his brow and kicked the man in the shin.

He screamed in pain and limped away, then quickly bowed and said loudly,

"My apologies, dong leader! I’ll make sure I don’t make the same mistake again!”

My jaw unconsciously fell open after seeing what was unfolding in front of me. I sensed the other dogs staring at me, and pretended that I was yawning and staying calm. I went back to frowning again, and the dogs looked at each other in confusion.

Kim Hyeong-Jun ground his teeth audibly.

“GRRR!!!!”

This caused all the dogs to start apologizing, bowing deeply from the waist. The first dog that had bowed was trembling, his legs quivering visibly. He seemed too scared to even lift his head.

Kim Hyeong-Jun placed his hand on the man's shoulder, and the man took a deep breath and straightened his back. After a moment, Kim Hyeong-Jun looked at me.

‘Ahjussi, go to the survivors and pretend to examine their faces.'

‘You want me to keep this expression?'

'Yeah. Pretend like you're examining prey.'

I wasn’t on board with this part of the plan, but Kim Hyeong-Jun's plan seemed to be working, so I decided to go along with it. I frowned and walked in between the survivors.

Sob… sob…

I could hear the survivors crying. Their hands were tied up with rope.

None of them even thought of fighting back or escaping. All they did was avoid my gaze and look down.

I looked at Kim Hyung-jun after taking a brief look at the survivors.

'What should I do now?'

'Come here and hit me.'

‘Hit you? Where?'

‘The face or stomach. Anywhere. Just hit me, and look threatening.’

I couldn’t help but sigh. He was really making me do things I wasn’t comfortable doing. But then, I heard the dogs swallowing collectively after they heard my sigh.

I wondered if they were nervous.

I walked in front of Kim Hyeong-Jun and hit him in the stomach gently, apologizing as I did so. Kim Hyeong-Jun groaned and fell to his knees.

‘I don’t think I hit him that hard…’

I sighed and furrowed my brow, feeling sorry and confused. The dogs each clasped their hands tightly together and looked down.

I wondered if my expression was evoking even more fear in them.

I gave the dogs a sidelong glance then squatted in front of Kim Hyeong-Jun.

‘Hey, hey! Hyeong-Jun! What do I do now?'

'Ahjussi, go stand with the survivors.'

I had no clue what kind of plan he had in mind. No matter how hard I thought, I couldn’t figure out where this was going. But I walked toward the survivors anyway.

Kim Hyeong-Jun stood slowly, his face a mask of pain. He took several deep breaths, clearly trying to control the pain. He then grabbed the dog in front of him by his collar and started shaking him violently.

“I’m sorry!”

The leader of the dogs apologized reflexively. Kim Hyeong-Jun glanced at the survivors and shoved the leader again.

“GRRR!!!”

“Dong leader, are you unhappy with the ones we brought? Do you want other ones?”

Kim Hyeong-Jun widened his eyes in fury and nodded violently.

“We’ll bring more of them right now! Please wait a moment!”

The man gestured to his subordinate to follow him, and they headed toward the rear exit of the hospital.

I could hear the dogs speaking in agitated tones as they walked away.

“How many humans are there left?”

“There are seven of them.”

“Bring them all!”

"What? Then what about next time?”

“Then what? Do you want to die here, right now? We have to please the dong leader right now if we don’t want to die!”

"There's no proof that those two are dong leaders."

“Can’t you tell just by looking at them, you bastard? They have red eyes, and they recognized us right away! And so what if they’re not the new dong leaders? They couldn’t even talk. I bet they’re hungry as hell. We don’t have the time to think about this and that!"

As the man who seemed to be the leader berated him, the dog that was trailing behind them snuck a look at us. After a moment, he took a deep breath and said,

“You’re right, the dong leader of Seongsu-dong is dead. That’s why they sent two dong leaders this time.”

“You get it now? You fucking idiot.”

"Damn… No wonder you’re the leader among us."

“You stupid bastards. Can’t even read between the lines. If it weren’t for me, everyone would have died over there.”

As the two dogs entered the hospital, Kim Hyeong-Jun secretly looked at me.

I noticed his gaze and looked at him. His face was serene.

‘Now this is what you call improvisation, ahjussi.'

Kim Hyeong-Jun’s plan left me speechless. I was amazed by the fact that he had come up with something like this in such a short time. I never imagined that the conversation we’d eavesdropped on at Apartment Complex L would come in so handy.

Kim Hyeong-Jun gestured for the remaining dogs to follow him. All of them followed him obediently, their faces full of fear. He lined them up against the hospital wall and took turns slapping them on the head one by one.

The dogs all said the same thing when they got hit, even though they had no clue why they were getting hit.

"My apologies, dong leader!"

At this point, Kim Hyeong-Jun was just bullying them.