How to Make a God (1)

The world was destroyed.

No, it was being destroyed.

It was slowly rotting from the inside, due to the oil disaster that started in Africa.

Most of the people who filled the streets became restless dead.

They couldn’t eat or die, and they only wandered around looking for other victims.

The dead became more dead, and the new dead made others dead.

Seven months since the disaster began.

Now, our group was the only people left in this city.

“Yuseong. Why don’t you do as I say?”

Of course, if we searched thoroughly, we might find some other survivor groups somewhere.

But as far as I knew, the people I saw in front of me were all that was left of humanity.

I looked at the man who was leading them.

The man with a sturdy physique was the most conspicuous person in our group.

He moved around with a shovel on his shoulder, and he spoke to me with a regretful face.

“It’s not that hard, is it?”

“No, why do you want me to pretend to be a company employee now?”

“That was my dream, okay? Becoming a company president.”

The man who spoke to me was Shin Donghyun.

He was the undisputed leader of our group.

He was the oldest by age, and he also took on the tough and dangerous tasks.

He was a respected person by all the members of the group.

But he had one goal that he couldn’t let go of.

His longtime dream was to start his own business and hear people call him president.

He had worked hard and saved money for his business, but the world had gone to hell right before he could start it.

“Remember we found a fish cake shop last time? Let’s take that and sell fish cakes in front of the company.”

I gave him a constructive idea and advised him.

He suggested making fish cakes with the machine we found on our last exploration.

I didn’t know if he could make them, or if we had any ingredients left.

But if we pretended to do something similar, maybe others would also pretend to buy them.

There wasn’t much left to entertain ourselves in this ruined world.

“No, I want to hear you call me president. That’s my dream, you know?”

“…Do you like being a president that much?”

“That’s the best. That’s why our group name is that. Company.”

He was the one who gave us that name after he rescued me from the isolated company.

No one objected to him now.

That’s why we also called our base camp the company.

It was a funny story, if you think about it.

A company in a destroyed world.

If you weren’t someone who would plant an apple tree the day before the end, you wouldn’t like that kind of story.

“What’s the point of being a president in a useless world where money doesn’t matter?”

It didn’t take long for things like bank balances and overdrafts to turn into data scraps.

They had no value now.

Cash could be used as fuel, but money stuck in accounts was impossible.

Everything I had accumulated in my life was gone in vain.

The numbers that lost their meaning had no more worth than a toy gun from a stationery store.

Even though I realized that, there were still many people who collected bills as a hobby.

The self-proclaimed president in front of me was one of them.

“You know I’ve been collecting money from the stores I searched, right? What if the rescue team comes looking for us?”

“Let’s just burn it for fuel, okay? If they were coming, they would have come by now.”

But he still seemed attached to money.

Donghyun shook his head firmly and gave me a hint.

The other members who watched him also chuckled.

He seemed determined today.

Since there was nothing else to do but joke around, I decided to play along.

“Anyway, call me. President.”

“…Yes, yes. President.”

I reluctantly answered as he wanted.

He seemed a bit happier then, and he patted my shoulder and said.

“That’s right, Cheon Director. The weather is nice today.”

“I’m a director?”

“You can do that much, right?”

“How much does a director make in our company?”

I asked him with a sarcastic laugh.

Snicker.

The self-proclaimed president, who was in a good mood, stretched out his palm and said.

“500 million won.”

“Wouldn’t the company go bankrupt if you pay that much?”

“I’m willing to take the risk. So stick with me.”

“…Yes, yes. President. Please pay me on time.”

As we exchanged this tedious conversation, we soon arrived at the edge of the safe zone where the barricade was set up.

The barricade that blocked the road was erected to drive away the dead.

It was the result of what we called the pioneering work among us.

Of course, what we had to do today was not pioneering work, but exploration work in the secured area.

The company employee play was over now.

He arrived at his destination and started to scatter people according to the plan he had set up beforehand.

“Alright, everyone, be careful today!”

The purpose of the exploration work was diverse.

Searching for survivors who were missed.

Searching for luxury goods or necessities.

Searching for preserved food.

Especially, finding things like alcohol, cigarettes, or food was the main goal.

In the case of ramen, even the last product produced had reached the borderline of expiration date, so we needed to find it as soon as possible to eat it without any problem.

He divided the people into two-person teams and didn’t forget to warn them.

“Keep your radio on. Contact me if there’s any problem.”

“Aye, aye.”

“We cleaned it up once, but be careful in case any monsters pop out.”

“Hey, we’re not kids, don’t worry and go with Yuseong.”

Naturally, I was in the same team as Donghyun.

We were familiar with each other, and we both preferred each other.

He delivered all the precautions and started to walk with me to the deserted street.

Thud. Thud.

The sound of our footsteps echoed on the withered street.

Maybe it was because our colleagues who were next to us disappeared.

The atmosphere became silent in an instant.

“It’s suddenly quiet.”

“What are you talking about? We were always the loudest.”

“Really? I think I was pretty quiet.”

“Yuseong. You’re becoming more and more conscienceless as I see it.”

I shrugged my shoulders quietly at his insincere remark.

It was a usual conversation for us.

“Let’s check this place today.”

He stopped in front of a building after walking for a while and scanned its exterior.

We stopped at a place that looked like it could collapse at any moment, a precarious two-story building.

It was not a metaphorical expression, but a building that was literally in a dangerous situation.

The spire of the church next to it was broken and hit the upper part of the building, and cracks were spread on the walls and the roof.

It was a place that anyone would understand if it collapsed at any time.

“The building looks pretty bad, doesn’t it?”

As I commented on the state of the building, Donghyun pointed at the crumbling building with a smile.

And then he gave me a half-reasonable and half-bullshit explanation.

“That’s why we have to check it out now. If it collapses, everything inside will be gone.”

“Well, that’s true.”

“Of course, if it feels too dangerous, we have to get out right away.”

He finished his words and grabbed the doorknob.

Creak.

As the glass door opened, the dusty scenery of the building came into my eyes.

The first floor had a shopping mall vibe with shops lined up, and there was a staircase leading to the second floor in the corner.

Cough, cough.

I coughed involuntarily as I breathed in the dust.

“Yuseong. I’ll look around the first floor, so you check out the second floor.”

Donghyun, who was looking around the mall, told me he would take care of the first floor.

Since we had cleared out the dead once, there wasn’t much chance of trouble.

The problem was rather the condition of this building.

I nodded obediently and accepted his suggestion.

It seemed better to look for things one by one than to search the same space together.

“Let’s do that.”

“Then I’ll leave it to you. Contact me if there’s any problem.”

“You’ll hear me if I just scream, what are you talking about?”

We finished our short conversation and I started to climb up the stairs to the second floor.

Of course, I didn’t forget to mutter to myself with anticipation for the future.

The biggest wish in my heart right now was ramen.

And not just any ramen, but mild ramen that I hadn’t tasted for a while.

“I wish I could find some ramen.”

I blurted out my inner voice as I climbed up the stairs to the second floor.

It wasn’t a bad habit to talk to myself when there were no dead around.

In fact, until I met the self-proclaimed president on the first floor, I had endured by talking to myself while isolated in the company.

At that time, I felt like I would go crazy if I didn’t do that.

Now it has become one of the habits that are hard to fix.

It was a habit that I acquired after the disaster happened.

“It wouldn’t be bad if we had some decent beer…”

“…”

As I was looking around the second floor, I suddenly felt a presence and stopped walking.

Somewhere on the second floor, a faint humming sound was coming out.

I wondered if there were any dead around, so I tightened my grip on the shovel, but I soon realized that it was not the case.

The humming sound in my ears was unmistakably human.

And it was close to a woman’s voice.

“Could it be.”

Could it be that there were survivors who we missed last time.

That thought crossed my mind.

I followed the faint sound in my ears and slowly looked around the hallway.

I headed for the direction where the humming was coming from.

And when I found the glass door, I saw the person behind it.

“…A survivor?”

There was someone reading a book in a store that looked like a comic cafe.

There was a black-haired girl wearing a T-shirt that didn’t fit her body.

She was sitting in a corner of the cafe, humming and reading a book.

I watched her for a while, and then opened the glass door and entered the comic cafe.

The first thing that stepped on my foot when I entered the store was a torn page of a comic book.

The dust and paper scattered on the floor proved what had happened here.

“It looks like someone came in.”

And as she looked at me, the girl who was reading the book opened her mouth.

There was something strange about the girl who had black hair down to her waist.

I looked at her for a moment, then turned my head and looked around the half-ruined store.

Except for the torn comic books, there didn’t seem to be any big problems.

Thud.

I put down the shovel on my shoulder and asked her a question disguised as a greeting.

“I didn’t expect to find any survivors. Are you hurt anywhere?”

But there was no answer from the girl who was asked.

I didn’t know if she was shy or didn’t want to answer.

But no matter what she said, there was only one thing I had to do now.

I took out the radio that I had hung on my waist.

And I tried to inform my colleagues who were elsewhere about the survivor I found.

“Donghyun hyung, I think I…”

“Shh.”

But as I was about to press the transmit button on the radio, I stopped my hand when I saw what the girl did.

The girl who didn’t say anything suddenly raised her hand.

She put her finger on her mouth and made a gesture to be quiet.

She didn’t seem to like me reporting to others.

I didn’t know if she was worried about meeting strangers or didn’t want to reveal that she was here.

But it seemed clear that she didn’t want me to call anyone else right now.

I tried to reassure her by telling her about our survivor group.

“You don’t have to worry. It may sound funny, but our company, no, group doesn’t have any bad people…”

“One is fine, but it’s hard to show mercy when there are too many people.”

“Mercy…”

“It means it’s hard to let them go peacefully.”

I couldn’t understand what she meant at all.

Except for the fact that she avoided meeting people.

She seemed reluctant to introduce me to other people right now.

But I couldn’t ignore it and move on as if nothing happened either.

I needed some compromise.

I looked at the girl with an odd atmosphere for a while, and then made a short conclusion and told her.

“Well, you seem to be very shy… You don’t have to force yourself to call anyone else.”

I decided to postpone reporting for now.