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The old man’s house was rigged with traps everywhere. Bells tied to alarm devices were the basics. Opening a door would pull a fishing line connected to the handle, causing a box to topple, or a heavy rock would be placed above a slightly ajar door.

Of course, none of this mattered to us.

For a brief period, we had worked as mercenaries for the Alliance, setting up traps. That experience instilled in us a deep sense of caution and even helped us predict where the old man might have set traps from his perspective.

We searched the house with extreme tension. When opening doors, Park Yang-gun tied a string to the handle and opened it from a distance, while everyone kept their eyes wide open, looking for fishing lines.

The same went for the food warehouse where the old man had stockpiled his supplies.

“There’s a lot here.”

I adjusted my mask and narrowed my eyes.

The resources were more abundant than expected. Blue plastic crates filled to the brim with soju bottles, cardboard boxes neatly packed with ramen and canned food, and sacks of rice leaning against the wall.

The boxes, meticulously organized, were stacked like supermarket displays.

“Tools too?”

Jeondohyeong pointed to the nearest box. Nails, screws, fishing lines, wires, saws, hammers, knives—it looked like they had been looted from a hardware store. There was also a decent amount of shotgun ammunition.

I roughly estimated the quantity and then turned to point at the two mercenaries.

“We can’t carry all this at once. Go back and bring the shopping carts. We’ll check for traps here and get things ready.”

“Should we bring more people?”

“Yes. About two more?”

The two mercenaries hurried off.

But we still couldn’t move. The boxes containing food felt unsettling.

“It’s not a trap that explodes when opened, right?”

“There shouldn’t be explosives.”

I quietly shook my head. The old man didn’t seem like the friendly type. He must have prepared for the day he would die and his supplies would be looted. He probably made sure the resources wouldn’t be taken intact.

‘Traps, traps. He couldn’t have made them as sophisticated as the Alliance’s.’

It wasn’t modern traps using explosives or electric detonators. Then again… I wasn’t sure. We just had to be careful.

“Search the warehouse and bring the boxes one by one to the kitchen to open them.”

The mercenaries moved diligently. I went to the kitchen first and waited as they brought the boxes one by one to open them.

Amidst the sound of swallowing saliva, the boxes were opened. Each time a box was opened, a sigh of relief followed, and time passed.

One, two, three—just as the boxes were being opened, the trap finally revealed itself.

*Sizzle!*

The moment the box was opened, a strange friction sound was heard. Sparks flew.

“Fire!”

“Water!”

I frantically grabbed a water bottle and poured it, but the fire didn’t go out easily. The flame, attached to a string soaked in liquid from a PET bottle, flickered as if it might go out at any moment.

It was oil. An oil fire.

“Bring a blanket! A blanket! Quick! No, never mind!”

I hurriedly took off my leather jacket and covered the box. Then, panting, I glared at the jacket.

Fire is no joke. If things go wrong, we’re all dead. It’s already the end of summer with no rain, and if the fire spreads through the city, we’re doomed.

The people who rushed in looked at the leather jacket with trembling hands.

“What should we do? Should we move the stuff in the warehouse first?”

“Isn’t evacuation the priority?”

I quietly observed the fire’s progress and shook my head. The fire hadn’t spread. It hadn’t clung to the leather jacket, and there was no smoke.

“It seems to be out for now.”

*Flap.* When I shook out the leather jacket, the fire was truly out. Thanks to our quick response, the structure of the old man’s trap became clear.

A PET bottle filled with what seemed like kerosene or gasoline. A string sticking out from the bottle was connected to something like paper and a matchstick.

“Matches?”

With a curious mind, I fiddled with the components.

The match’s friction surface was gathered into a small cylinder with the friction side facing inward. Inside the cylinder, an oil-soaked string and a matchstick were inserted, and the matchstick was connected to the box lid with a string.

When the box lid was opened, the matchstick would be pulled, causing friction and igniting the fire. It felt similar to a birthday sparkler. This is something worth noting.

I said lightly, “We just need to open the boxes slowly. If you feel something catching while opening, be careful.”

And so, we diligently opened the boxes. Resources piled up neatly.

***

The old man had organized everything so well that there was no need to sort the resources further. They were already divided by type and expiration date.

I nodded to our lower-tier members.

“Take 10 percent.”

“How do we measure the percentage?”

The daughter of the member family spoke, her eyes sparkling as she looked at the abundant resources.

“By count? Weight? Volume?”

She seemed eager to take as much as possible. And I knew the appropriate response to give here. Preemptive strike. Let conscience guide them.

“Take what you want. Just know that if you cross the line, bullets will fly.”

Why bother overcomplicating it? I have the gun. If they get greedy, they’ll get a hole in their head. They’ll have to restrain themselves. There’s no fairer way than this.

In the end, the family members cautiously took their share. A few bottles of soju, about 10 percent of the rice and canned food by rough estimate.

They didn’t even touch the ammunition or tools. They had seen us prioritize those items multiple times, so they didn’t dare lay a hand on them.

Yet, their faces were filled with excitement.

“We won’t have to worry about starving for a while.”

“We won’t have to pay for water either. We’ve got some breathing room now.”

The parents chatted happily as they stuffed their shopping bags and backpacks with resources, while the children fiddled with the traps the old man had set, learning their mechanisms.

Just then, the mercenaries returned. A voice came from outside the window.

“We’re back! Open the front door!”

Jeondohyeong hurriedly opened the door. Two carts rolled in one after the other. The mercenaries, sweating profusely, stacked the boxes neatly on the carts.

I quietly watched the carts and fell into thought.

‘I want to make better use of these carts.’

After today’s experience, the carts seemed important. Not just as a means to carry luggage, but as something that could be used in more diverse ways.

When passing through areas with traps, what if we sent the carts ahead? Like mine-clearing vehicles, they could be used to detect and disarm traps.

‘If we put a corpse in one, it could even trigger pit traps.’

Or maybe modify them to mount machine guns. Or attach car doors or hoods to make them feel like armored vehicles. If we connect them to bicycles, mobility would be easier too.

“Jeondohyeong. Do you still go to the Hope Community?”

“Yes. I still go. There are still people at the church since we’re in the middle of moving.”

Jeondohyeong blinked, unsure why I brought up the Hope Community here.

“Can you ask them to modify these carts?”

“Carts?”

“One for mounting a machine gun. The other to make it like an armored vehicle. And make it so it can be connected to a bicycle.”

If possible, I’d like to get more carts too. If done well, they could be used like tanks or armored vehicles. Dragging them around as mobile barricades, hiding behind them to shoot—wouldn’t that be perfect?

Jeondohyeong scratched his head and looked at the carts piled high with boxes.

“Can you explain in more detail? If you just ask me to make it, it might turn out weird.”

“Something like this.”

I gestured with my hands, explaining what I wanted. A combat shopping cart. Defensive capabilities to protect the person pushing it.

Jeondohyeong listened intently, then circled the carts and said, “We can probably dismantle and attach parts. But it might not hold up against bullets. Car doors won’t stop bullets.”

“We can attach spare police vests or bulletproof vests.”

“Won’t it look weird then?”

It doesn’t matter. It’s the apocalypse. It’s a world where we dismantle and recycle leftover resources. No matter how bizarre it looks, it fits the apocalypse.

No, even if it looks normal, we should modify it to fit the apocalypse style.

“It’s fine.”

“Then I’ll go talk to them. Oh, but we’ll have to pay something. They might give us a discount since we know them, though.”

We can pay whatever it takes. The Alliance is busy building survival zones and needs all kinds of resources.

We could just move appliances from abandoned buildings or take car doors from the streets—that would be enough.

As we were talking, our members quietly chimed in. Carrying heavy bags on their backs, they looked up at me.

“When will the next tip be?”

Having tasted the sweetness, their eyes sparkled brightly. From their perspective, the old man who charged for water was dead, and they had gotten his resources, so it was hard not to have expectations.

I leisurely dragged out my words.

“That’ll take a bit of time…”

Our next target is a survivor group of about six or eight people. They’re even armed with handguns. We need to approach them carefully.

The father of the member family anxiously fidgeted with his fingers, then clasped his hands as if in prayer.

“Isn’t it better to strike quickly before rumors spread? What if they run away?”

He meant that the resources would be lost. Greed had blinded him. It wasn’t serious yet, but he was already thinking of others’ resources as his own.

I patted his shoulder reassuringly.

“Don’t worry. We’ll definitely kill and loot—no, receive the tip and kill them for you.”

I meant it.

I had already formed an organization, and once an organization is formed, it can’t be stopped. How else would we sustain so many people without farming?

We have to keep eating, and to get what we eat, we have to loot. Even the resources we got today, if divided fairly, wouldn’t amount to much per person. To keep surviving, we have to keep looting.

I turned and gestured lightly to my companions.

“Let’s head back. Oh, Jeondohyeong, you…”

“Yes, I know. I’ll request the cart modifications.”

 

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