Chapter 1 - Prologue
This novel is a serialization of a short story previously posted under the same title.
This novel is a work of fiction. It has no relation to any real organizations, persons, or institutions.
Furthermore, the infected appearing in this novel are not so-called "zombies."
And this novel is not one where the protagonist obtains powerful weapons and goes on a rampage against zombies. Since the setting is modern Japan, only familiar items appear as weapons. It's a state of "Guns? What are those, are they tasty?" Guns aren't just conveniently lying around.
Also, as the title suggests, the protagonist runs away more often than he fights. Hey you, don't call him a coward.
I would be grateful if you could read with the above points in mind.
A single small spider was crawling over my arm. A tiny spider, about the size of the tip of a pinky finger, crawling across my school uniform as if it owned the place. Previously, while I wouldn't have screamed, I would have clicked my tongue and brushed it off, but now I feel nothing. There are plenty of things more unpleasant and disgusting than a spider rolling around at the edge of the road.
I poked my face out slightly from the thicket where I was hiding. Houses lined the area across the road, but despite it being midday on a holiday, there wasn't a single silhouette of a person passing by. In this park where I am now, there isn't a single child playing. The entire town was hushed and silent.
I took a stone about the size of my palm, which I had picked up beforehand, out of my pocket and braced myself in a crouching position. My target was one of the houses lined up in front of me—a typical two-story private residence.
Aiming for the mortar wall beyond the cinder block fence, I threw the stone with all my might. The stone drew a beautiful arc in the air and hit the wall with a thwack! The sound of the impact echoed through the silent town, and at that moment, I flattened myself inside the thicket. The park's bushes, no longer maintained, had grown wild and were thick enough to easily hide someone like me.
In this day and age, making noise carelessly was a suicidal act, but this couldn't be helped. Although I still have some leeway, supplies are becoming scarce. If I don't scavenge at least one house around here, I'll be in trouble later. A certain amount of danger is unavoidable.
Five minutes passed since I flattened myself on the ground. If there were Infected nearby, they would have swarmed here long ago, but as expected, not a single soul could be seen on the road. If there were survivors inside the house I threw the stone at, they might be cowering from the sudden noise, shut inside. Or perhaps they'd flee outside, thinking they'd been found by the Infected.
Praying that no one was inside the house, I stepped out of the thicket. The spider that had been crawling on my arm until a moment ago had gone somewhere unnoticed.
I entered the grounds of the house I threw the stone at, boldly through the front. If there were Infected, walking around a street with such good visibility would be equivalent to suicide, but as long as they aren't in the vicinity, I can move around as much as I want provided I don't make loud noises.
The garden looked like it hadn't been tended to for a long time; the thick weeds had grown up to my knees. The shutters of the windows facing the street were not closed; if there were people inside the house, the shutters would definitely be shut. So, probably, there is no one in this house.
I peeked cautiously into the room through the window. No one was in the tatami-matted room. A low chabudai table, some magazines, and an opened tin can were lying around. There was no movement.
After confirming that, I took out duct tape from the backpack I was carrying. First, I pasted the tape in a cross shape around the window lock, then layered about two more pieces of tape centered on the intersection. The four overlapping pieces of tape were applied in a shape like a cake cut into eight slices.
Then, taking the crowbar hanging from my waist belt, I lightly tapped the tape pasted on the window glass. After prodding it two or three times, I applied a bit of force and struck the window with the L-shaped tip of the crowbar.
With a crack, spiderweb-like fissures spread through the window, but they didn't shatter into pieces. Since I had applied duct tape beforehand, it didn't make much noise when the glass broke, and fragments didn't fall to the floor to scatter noise.
When the glass broke, I reflexively looked around, but naturally, there was no sign of anyone approaching. I decided to proceed with the work solemnly.
When I peeled off the duct tape, the broken glass fragments came with it. I placed them on the ground, and over my leather-gloved hand, I wrapped a towel I had taken out from my backpack. After making sure my arm was completely covered, I gently thrust my hand through the hole in the window glass, felt around for the internal lock, and twisted it. The lock was released, and I opened the window and stepped into the room with my shoes on.
It was a method just like a thief's, but in fact, I was about to commit a theft. To put it euphemistically, I suppose it's "action necessary for survival." Well, what I'm doing is exactly theft, but even if someone saw my actions, they wouldn't condemn me. Because that someone would surely be doing the same thing as me.
The smell of something rotting drifted through the room. It wasn't the stench of rotting meat I'd grown all too familiar with; it was the smell of rotting food. Since several empty cans were rolling in the corner of the room, that was likely the source of the foul odor.
I scanned the room quickly, confirming once more that no one and nothing was there. However, since only this room's safety was secured, I couldn't scavenge for supplies with peace of mind unless I went around the whole house and checked the other rooms.
I hoped there might be an unopened one among the empty cans rolling on the floor, but it seemed things wouldn't go that conveniently. At least in this room, there was nothing that looked edible. A usable flashlight was placed on the chabudai, so I stuffed at least that into my backpack.
The moment I opened the transparent sliding door (T/N: shouji) and stepped into the hallway, a foul odor hit my nose. It was like being in a public toilet. Having a bad feeling, I moved toward the direction where the stench grew stronger, making sure not to make any noise.
A short way down the hallway, there were stairs leading to the second floor, and as I looked up, the source of the stench entered my eyes.
"Ah..."
The source of the foul odor that had been drifting about—I had laid eyes on its true form.
Something was hanging in the middle of the stairs. Eyes wide open as if they were about to pop out, and a swollen tongue protruding from the mouth; a plastic cord was wound around the neck of a man who appeared to be in his thirties. The end of the cord was tied to the handrail of the second floor—.
Naturally, the man was dead.
He probably didn't have a suitable place; it seemed he had tied the cord to the second-floor handrail and jumped down to the first floor. The stench of excrement drifted from the body of the man who had died by hanging. I had heard from someone before that "when you commit suicide by hanging, you end up leaking all sorts of things from every hole," and it seems that story was true.
But even seeing that corpse, no deep emotion welled up in me. Ah, again, it was a sight I could dismiss just like that. It was something unthinkable a few months ago, but now corpses are nothing more than one of the familiar sights. Besides, I've seen corpses in much more gruesome states many times; compared to those, this corpse could be said to be of the clean variety since it remained physically intact.
I didn't think, "Why did he die?" I knew the reason immediately without thinking. This man probably said goodbye to this world, which has neither dreams nor hope, a step ahead of the rest. If the only future was either being eaten alive or starving to death because food ran out, the man's judgment could be called wise. In fact, I had witnessed many people despairing of this world and committing suicide, and the man had simply joined the ranks of the dead; that was all.
Looking at this house, it's unthinkable that the man lived alone. He probably lived with his family, but the stench of rotting corpses didn't drift about. Since the man's corpse is here, it's also unthinkable that the whole family committed suicide together, so it seems the family either died leaving the man behind or became Infected.
It doesn't look like he'll get a funeral, I said to the man's corpse in my heart. In these past few months, there have been enough deaths to keep monks and funeral directors extremely busy, but the last time I saw a funeral was a month ago. Even then, it was merely digging a hole, throwing the body in, saying a few words of parting, dousing it in gasoline, and burning it. It was nothing more than such a crude thing. Both the monks and the funeral home employees have long since disappeared.
...Wait, this won't do. I have to secure the safety of the house quickly and procure supplies. I don't have time to think about dead people.
Leaving the hanging corpse, which felt like a macabre teru teru bouzu (T/N: anti-rain white doll hung outside the window), I searched the first floor thoroughly. It seemed only the man had lived in this house, as no other residents were found.
I searched the kitchen, but not a single scrap of food remained. That included everything down to the seasonings. Surely the dead man had eaten everything up. I wonder if that was also one of the reasons for his suicide.
On the first floor, I only found a few unused dry cell batteries and some tools. The reward doesn't match the labor for this, though that's usually the case.
Reluctantly, I headed to the second floor. Since there was no food on the first floor where the kitchen was, it seemed pointless to go to the second floor, but I had to check just in case. Right now, even the slightest bit of supplies is precious.
"Whoa!"
The moment I tried to pass by the side of the man's corpse hanging in a way that half-blocked the stairs, the plastic cord suddenly snapped and the corpse fell to the floor. The man's corpse slid down the stairs headfirst and then stopped. If he were human, he'd be sent to the hospital, but since it's a corpse, there's no problem. Probably the plastic cord couldn't withstand the weight and had been gradually tearing. He really gave me a fright.
Taking care not to step on the filth that seemed to have been leaked when he died and his entire body's muscles relaxed, I went up to the second floor. I went around looking into the rooms one by one, but as expected, there were no people. There was only the one corpse rolling around below.
When I opened the sliding door (T/N: fusuma) of the last room, the scent of incense drifted out. Several portraits of what appeared to be ancestors were hung on the wall near the ceiling, and there was a Buddhist altar.
I thought of something sacrilegious like whether there were any offerings, but naturally, there was nothing. I was about to take the lighter and candles placed on the altar and go back down, but I felt somewhat awkward, so I decided to offer a single stick of incense to the people of this house. I lit it with the lighter, stuck it in the stand, and for now, pressed my hands together.
Then, with an offering plate and another stick of incense in hand, I went down the stairs. I placed the plate by the side of the man's corpse rolling on the floor and placed the lit incense there. This shouldn't cause a fire.
"Please find peace."(T/N: Joubutsu shite kudasai)
I said that and pressed my hands together. Right now, both heaven and hell are likely overflowing with the dead, but I'll try not to think about that.
Even though I thought thinking about the dead was a waste, it seems I still can't forget those peaceful days until a few months ago. The custom of treating the dead with care—even though such a thing has no meaning now.
In the end, what I gained was little. Unlike before, I walked out boldly through the front entrance. As expected, no silhouettes of people were seen on the street.
I have to find another place and a lodging for tonight quickly. The place I was hiding in until yesterday has already been swallowed into the middle of the Infected territory, but I can't just hide in any random house around here either. A safe place that is hard for Infected to discover—that was what I needed most right now.
The sky is also beginning to be covered with gray clouds. It will rain soon. I can't use an umbrella because it would occupy one hand and slow my movement, but if I stay hit by the rain, I'll catch a cold. The doctors went to the other world a long time ago, and even medicine has become hard to obtain since pharmacies were looted. Since even a minor illness could become a serious matter, I must always pay attention to my health. Even if I become unable to move due to illness or injury, it's not like someone will help me.
I readjusted my backpack and started running through the empty town.
I was frustrated and just posted this on impulse. I have no regrets.
I look forward to your opinions and impressions.