Hollow wind

JIMINs POV

My body felt like hell. And no, not because I got into a fight or had a wild night out—though at least then, there'd be a story behind the pain. No. This was the kind of ache you earned from lying motionless for four and a half day straight, only rising to use the bathroom like some half-dead vampire emerging from a crypt.

The apartment looked like a landfill. Empty cans, pizza boxes, maybe a fossilized ramen cup from last week—who knows. I lost track. Hygiene? Declined the invitation. I'm not much of a "go out and touch grass" person anyway, and lucky me, the universe threw me a bone: I live right above a convenience store. Mr. Jung's place. The man practically saved my life with instant noodles. Though he didn't live in the building, he lived a street not far from this building. Said it was built by one of his oldest daughters. Lucky man.

I blinked at the daylight slicing through my curtains, eyes struggling to focus. My hair was a mess, my head felt worse. That itchy, tight feeling behind your eyes when you've been staring at nothing for too long? Yeah. That.

Technically, I work from home, but this weekend? Productivity took a vacation. I groaned and rolled off the couch like a disgruntled walrus. I had an email to send to a client today—something vague about project updates and revised timelines, aka copy-paste bullshit.

Peeking out the window, I frowned. The street was... empty. Suspiciously so. No shouting. No honking. No drunken guy yelling about his breakup on the phone. Just silence. Eerie. And for a second—just a flicker—I thought maybe I should feel something about that. Alarm, curiosity, whatever.

But I didn't.

And that wasn't new.

I dragged my stiff legs toward the fridge, bones creaking like a haunted house door. Nothing inside. Not even expired milk. Impressive, honestly. Starvation was now on the itinerary. I sighed and accepted my fate: I had to go downstairs to the store.

Mr. Jung was the only human being I could tolerate without needing a nap after. He never asked invasive questions or made that pitiful face when I didn't smile back. I think he figured out what most people hadn't: I wasn't broken. I just... didn't feel things. Not like everyone else.

My parents called it a condition—Total Affective Void. Some rare thing to do with the limbic system, the emotional engine of the brain. Mine? Dead silent. Like someone forgot to plug it in at birth.

I grew up in a tiny village outside Busan, where the gossip traveled faster than light. After my diagnosis, people treated me like I had some ancient curse. Some were kind. Most weren't. I heard it all: "soulless," "possessed," "emotionless freak." One lady even sprinkled salt at my feet once.

If I had emotions, I'd probably be traumatized. Instead, I just nodded and walked away. Perks of the void.

My parents did what they could, unstable but trying. We were middle class people or let me say poor. Just not dirt poor and that didn't help the whole "ostracized child" thing. I left when I got a scholarship to Seoul, graduated, stayed, and sent money home. Bought them a better house. Now they're technically the wealthy couple in a town that once treated them like lepers.

Funny how things work out.

Not that it makes me feel anything. But it's... satisfying in an abstract way.

I pulled on a hoodie—not because I was cold, but because it was on the floor and I figured I should at least look like I wasn't decaying inside. My legs still hated me. Every step felt like dragging metal through sludge.

The hallway outside my apartment was quiet. Too quiet. I paused at the top of the stairs, glancing down toward the glass door that usually buzzed with life. It was weird—no jingles from customers, no murmured greetings from Mr. Jung, no hum of fluorescent lights or the occasional kid crying for candy.

Just... silence.

I made my way down.

The convenience store sat in its usual corner—lights on, shelves full-well most of them. The door was closed but broken. Well not really. Just....cracked. I hesitated, but hunger pushed me forward.

"Mr. Jung?" I called out, voice flat but loud enough.

Nothing.

The store was empty. No clerks. No customers. Not even that old lady who always hovered around the lottery tickets with a hopeful glare. I walked through the aisles slowly, scanning the room like I expected someone to jump out yelling "surprise."

But there was only me.

The place smelled wrong. Not rotten. Not metallic. Just... still. Air that hadn't moved. And maybe I wouldn't have noticed it before, but even I could tell something was off. It wasn't just quiet. It was dead.

"Mr. Jung," I tried again, stepping toward the counter.

And then I heard it.

A soft shuffle. Behind the stockroom curtain.

I waited, brows furrowing slightly. Curiosity peaking in. Maybe he'd fallen. Maybe he was sick. Old people do that, right?

I pushed the curtain aside.

What I saw didn't register at first.

Mr. Jung was there... kind of.

He stood with his back to me, body swaying gently. His clothes were soaked—dark, sticky patches of something I didn't want to name staining his shirt and collar. One of his shoes was missing. His head tilted at an unnatural angle, like his neck had forgotten how to work. And when he turned...

His face looked like it had been dragged across gravel.

Skin torn, one eye cloudy and bulging, the other missing entirely. His lips were gone, peeled back in a grotesque grin that exposed bloody teeth and shredded gums. Something was twitching in his throat—like he was trying to speak but forgot how.

And still, I didn't panic.

I just blinked.

"...You good?"

He lunged.

I stepped back—from instinct, and the man slammed into the wall behind me, snarling like some rabid animal. His fingers clawed at the air between us, nails cracked and blackened, skin peeling in long, flaking strips.

That's when it finally clicked.

This wasn't sickness. This wasn't senility. This was something else entirely.

I grabbed the closest thing—some overpriced umbrella—and jabbed it toward his chest, forcing him back. He didn't scream. He didn't bleed. He just growled, like something inside him was furious I wasn't already screaming.

"Right," I muttered. "Guess you're not selling soju today."

I backed away slowly, keeping the umbrella in front of me like a sword. Mr. Jung crashed into the shelves, knocking over bottles and snacks like a wind-up corpse.

And I ran

What's that?

But that thing downstairs... wasn't Mr. Jung.

My fingers trembled slightly, not that I acknowledged it. I dropped the umbrella—bent and sticky—by the entrance and walked back into my apartment like I hadn't just seen my landlord try to eat me.

Mr. Jung had always been a quiet man. Kept his head down, handed me my snacks, and never asked too many questions. I didn't like people who asked questions. But now? His face looked like it had been chewed by something with no sense of manners.

I sat down on the floor and stared at the door.

Something was wrong.

Not just with Mr. Jung—but with everything.

Stillness clung to the air like wet cloth. I used to think the noise of the city was annoying—cars, kids, sirens, yelling—but now that it was gone, the silence screamed. I could hear the hum of my fridge. My heartbeat. The creak of the ceiling. A distant sound outside—low, dragging, like shoes scuffing concrete.

I walked to the window.

The street that never slept looked like a paused video. No traffic. No shouting. A bike lay abandoned near the sidewalk. A car door was left open, keys dangling from the ignition. And further down the block... someone limped in slow, staggering steps. Then another.

I squinted.

Was that blood on their clothes?

And why were they moving like their bones forgot how to work?

I stepped back.

Okay. I was definitely missing something.

For once in my life, I turned on the TV.

The remote clicked. Static. Then a screech of white noise before the screen snapped into chaos—news anchors in makeshift studios, military logos flashing, words scrolling violently across the bottom of the screen.

NATIONAL EMERGENCY

OUTBREAK ALERT: INFECTED IDENTIFIED AS ZOMBIES.

SEOUL, BUSAN UNDER MARTIAL LAW

I blinked. "Zombies?" I echoed, voice as flat as ever.

Is that what that was? I didn't know much about zombies. Never watched horror. Didn't care for fiction. My brain struggled to connect the rotting thing downstairs with the word 'zombie.' Seemed like something people made up to feel excited about death.

But apparently, they were real now.

The news anchor's voice trembled as she repeated the alert. Her eyes darted offscreen, like she was reading bad news in real time.

"—government forces have been dispatched to Busan and Seoul. Evacuation attempts failed in most sectors. Citizens advised to stay indoors. Lock all windows. Do not engage with the infected."

My fingers pressed against my thigh as if trying to ground me.

Busan.

I picked up my phone and called home.

It rang.

And then—"Hello?"

My mother's voice.

"Jimin? Is that you?"

"Yeah."

"You're okay?" she asked, breathless. "You didn't go outside, right?"

"I did."

She cursed quietly. My father's voice murmured something in the background.

"We're in incheon now," she said. "Busan was the first to fall. The government came—soldiers, tanks, helicopters. It was all over the news. We were lucky to get out. They moved us into a camp. Everyone's being relocated."

"Camp?"

"It's safe. For now."

"That 'for now' doesn't sound very convincing," I said, my voice flat, though my grip on the phone tightened.

"We just got here yesterday," she continued, voice lowered. "They said the infected were mostly in Seoul and Busan, but now... they're spreading. We heard over the radio that Daegu might be next."

I glanced out the window again. A figure stumbled past, missing a shoe, head twitching unnaturally. His arms were limp, but his mouth moved—biting at the air like it wanted something it couldn't name. I said nothing.

My mother went quiet on the line.

"Jimin," she said, her voice barely above a whisper, "don't wait. If you can get out—go."

"Go where?"

"I don't know. Anywhere but there."

We both knew that was meaningless. If this infection had already swallowed two major cities and was creeping into a third, "anywhere" no longer existed. Still, I nodded even though she couldn't see it.

"I'll call again when I can," she said. "We love you—"

The line went dead.

I stared at the screen. No signal. I checked again. And again. Nothing.

The lights flickered once. Then twice.

My mind went to the only neighbour I had. We were the only two people mr jung rented to.

His apartment was down the hall—a single father. Two kids. I didn't know their names. Just saw them sometimes on the stairwell. The boy always held his sister's hand like he was the older one, even if he wasn't.

Wonder if they've turned to zombies too or something or maybe he also hasn't heard about those creatures coz why the fuck was I just only knowing now. Though I can't blame anyone but myself for that. Maybe if I was a bit social, I could have known sooner. Anyway, there's nothing to do now.

I sat there, staring at the wall like it was going to give me answers. It didn't. Of course it didn't. Nothing did anymore.

I couldn't stay here.