Hiding a House in the Apocalypse

Chapter 1: Elder Kim

The story of how the world went to ruin and became a mess is a long, tedious, and complicated one, but within it, there are always interesting chapters.

Let's call it my wise preparation for the future, Park Gyura.

The idea that a crisis is approaching humanity has been discussed by intellectuals, from old scholars to YouTuber Lekka, but among ordinary people, only two types have actually prepared for the crisis.

Either the wealthy who have so much money overflowing that they can build bunkers on their private land, or madmen who deny reality and invest everything in ambiguous possibilities.

I am the latter.

As soon as I sensed the crisis, I boldly disposed of my assets and prepared for the impending disaster.

I didn't inherit much wealth, but I had saved up.

I worked in a profession where I had to save money, and towards the end, I worked like crazy, sleeping for only about four hours a day, while learning skills in the meantime.

Simple electrical work, construction, heavy equipment operation, drug and chemical synthesis, basic medicine, and more. If I couldn't understand something, I bought books or instructional videos to keep for reference.

The most important thing was deciding where to set up my base.

It wasn't easy to make that decision.

I sought advice from survival experts, civilians who survived in war zones, wilderness explorers, and the community of "Viva! Apocalypse!" which I will introduce later.

After careful consideration and deliberation, I selected a place based on four key criteria.

First, a place where there are no people around, and where people are unlikely to come even in a similar situation.

Second, maintaining an appropriate distance from a major city.

Third, the terrain of the hiding place.

Fourth, the price.

The first one is fundamental.

For someone preparing their own fortress for the apocalypse, the most dangerous threat is not monsters or zombie hordes, but other humans.

In fact, humans have been the major threat to my apocalyptic life all along.

However, its not easy for humans to live solitude.

The second condition may seem to contradict the first, but it is a very important requirement.

If you can maintain contact with the city, you can obtain necessary supplies and valuable information in a similar situation.

Venturing out into the dangerous outside world from a secure hiding place is very risky, but not being able to see the approaching massive storm from inside the bunker is a guaranteed death sentence.

The third condition is the foundation for the ongoing struggle that will last until my death.

The hiding place must be able to monitor all directions and not be easily discovered from the outside.

Defence is the next consideration, no matter how easy the terrain is to defend, once the hiding place is discovered, it won't be easy to protect it alone.

Among all animal species, humans have the most intelligence.

Oh, soil quality and underground water are important too.

The ground should be soft enough to dig deep inside, and underground water will be my source of drinking water after the water supply is cut off.

Of course, all these conditions had to be considered within the limits of my wallet.

Money may become worthless when the world collapses, but to prepare before that happens, you need money in the end.

The place I eventually chose was a secluded field nestled between an Air Force base and a golf course.

It was sparsely populated, easy to observe, and at an appropriate distance from the major city, but it had a fatal flaw.

The land was a blind spot, meaning there were no roads.

I had to negotiate with the adjacent landowners, offering free labour for harvesting crops and a usage fee in exchange for the right to use their land.

It wasn't an easy task.

"You came from Seoul? Alright, let's do our best."

I don't remember the name of that old man now, but his last name was definitely Kim. He was the owner of the land, a sturdy and stocky man with a thick Chungcheong Provinces accent, and he was in his seventies, but my first impression of him was not very good. [TL: The Chungcheong region in korea is divided into two provinces so we dont know which province it is ha ha ha.]

As luck would have it, even someone like me, who had experienced detachment, occasionally felt a sense of irritation, thanks to Kim Elder's constant nagging.

At every opportunity, he would fuss and demand everything to be returned to its original state. Blocking the only road with obstacles was a daily routine, and he frequently came by to ask for help with various tasks.

When he showed up at my container home at 3 in the morning, knocking on the door and asking for assistance, I truly felt the urge to push him off a cliff.

Well, what could I do? It was a cheap deal.

With the money I saved on buying affordable land, I invested it all in heavy equipment, construction materials, and everything necessary for survival.

I acquired excavators, loaders, drilling machines, forklifts, and more.

Calling in professionals to build just one bunker might have been cheaper and more specialized, but my plan was to constantly expand and improve my own shelter.

My 220,000 square meters of land was the foundation and stronghold of my life in a collapsing world, something I identified with myself.

Naturally, I initially hired people.

With only knowledge gained from the internet and lectures, I couldn't match the skills and know-how of professionals in the field.

"No, sir. Are all these yours, sir? What exactly are you planning to do?"

The construction workers, upon seeing my collection of heavy equipment, all had a surprised reaction.

"Well, I somehow got interested in this field."

I replied somewhat ambiguously, trying to gain their favour.

At first, the clients were hesitant to participate in the work themselves, but after buying them drinks and treating them to meals a few times, they eventually started working as if we were on the same team.

From them, I learned knowledge that was like blood and bones, things that couldn't be obtained from lectures or textbooks, such as how to dig into the ground, how to support the excavated land, the ideal mixture and construction methods for cement, and more.

But here came the trouble.

As the actual construction work began, Elder Kim started causing problems.

"No, what on earth are you doing that requires you to gather people and work tirelessly? Did you get the development permit?"

After about a month of enduring his complaints, I had a sense of why Elder Kim was acting this way.

He seemed to simply need an outlet for his stress.

His aging body, unsolvable work, overwhelming loneliness, and impending death were the sources of frustration that I could vaguely understand as well, being the cause of his annoyance.

Well, looking at his reputation, it seemed that his temperament wasn't that great to begin with.

His nickname was "Horo-Ssang-Nem" a term used to describe a grumpy old man.

Thanks to that old man's antics, my construction of the first bunker was constantly disrupted, and eventually, it led to the discontent of the labourers.

I wasn't exactly a gentleman either, so I reached my limits of patience and found something unexpected one day a car parked in Elder Kims distant house that I hadn't seen before.

It was a quite flashy new Benz.

There was a man like Elden Kim but much larger, and a middle-aged woman with a sharp tongue stood beside him.

"Is that Horo-Ssang-Nem's family..."

The words slipped out of my mouth involuntarily.

Elder Kim never talked about his family.

I could tell he had a family because he would frequently fiddle with his phone and occasionally attempt to make calls, but I had never actually seen them.

However, that day, I discovered the true stain on Elder Kims mind.

"No, we want to buy this land. We'll take care of everything. Why are you making a fuss when we're willing to take care of it? Huh!"

The man who resembled Elder Kim grabbed him by the collar like a toy.

The woman with a sharp tongue just watched without any intention of intervening.

Rather, she seemed to be silently encouraging the man, probably her husband.

"That damn bastard used to take all those damn shots when he was younger, but now he's giving prime land to his sister and worthless land to his eldest son. Do you know how much he disrespects me these days?"

The man's voice grew louder and louder.

It seemed like there had been a lot of pent-up emotions.

Even someone like me, who had experienced detachment, could see that Elder Kims temperament was pushing the limits.

"The bastard is living in a much better apartment than me now, but I, the eldest son can't even afford to send his grandson to an English kindergarten!"

His anger was constantly amplifying, reproducing emotions and increasing their intensity from within.

"Are you selling the land or not?"

When the man raised his fist, I loudly coughed.

The man stared at me with an angry expression.

I didn't know what to do.

He continued to glare at me, then slowly lowered his fist and mumbled something incomprehensible.

Meanwhile, Elder Kim, whose collar was grabbed, was strangely nodding with a weary face, his gaze fixed on his crumbling house.

"Damn it!"

The man cursed and released Elder Kim before heading towards the Benz with his wife.

As he opened the door of the Benz, he shouted angrily, "Starting this Chuseok, we won't be bringing Youngjin!" [TL: Chuseok is Korean thanksgiving festival and I would guess Youngjin to be his grandson]

After the car left, I pondered for a moment.

Should I pretend not to have seen Elder Kim sitting there helplessly, or should I say something comforting?

For now, I needed Elder Kims cooperation, even though I didn't particularly like him.

Suppressing my annoyance, I approached him.

"You saw everything."

Elder Kim said without looking at me.

His gaze was still fixed on his deteriorating house.

I took out a candy bar and put it in my mouth, then crouched down next to the old man, looking at the old house he was staring at.

"Is he your son?"

"Do you have parents?"

I shook my head.

"They passed away in an accident."

"I see."

"It was a long time ago. Anyway, you seem to have a big problem?"

"I didn't give away the cheap land."

Elder Kim sighed heavily as he watched the departing Benz.

"When I gave it away, that land was much more expensive..."

"You mean the land you gave to your son."

Kim Elder nodded and took out a cigarette, not looking at me.

I helped him light it, and he started talking with a bitter laugh.

"I treated the land I gave to my daughter was like your land. It was just worthless farmland. But who could have known that a 10-lane road would be built in front of it? Who could have predicted that a tunnel would be dug on that piece of land, and a new city would be developed?"

His life turned out exactly as expected.

He wasn't a great or good father.

He was just an insignificant father who frequently administered punishments to his family and wielded violence.

He lived his entire life as a grumpy old man, but in his last days, the land he had received became valuable, levelling him up to a wealthy father.

If that hadn't happened, his children might have cut ties with him a long time ago.

To quickly end the conversation, I asked abruptly, "Why don't you sell that house? Selling it and moving somewhere else would solve the problem, wouldn't it?"

"I can't. I can't do that."

The old man exhaled white smoke and looked up at the sky.

"My late wife's spirit is there. She put up with someone like me all her life..."

I still couldn't figure out what I had done right in his eyes.

One thing was clear: that short conversation had created a 10-lane road in his heart.

After that day, he no longer blocked the construction vehicles from coming, and he didn't complain anymore.

With no clashes, our relationship naturally improved, and from my side, I even approached Elder Kim to offer my help with labour.

There was no harm in getting along with a neighbour from the next town, after all.

There was something else.

Elder Kim taught me knowledge about agriculture, something that was difficult for a city dweller to learn.

"Farming is important. The lunar calendar is important. The solar calendar is useless. You need to follow the lunar calendar. It's all about the solar terms. Solar terms are crucial."

He even vaguely noticed what I was trying to do.

"Are you one of those recent survivalists? A doomsday preparer or something like that?"

"Well, something like that."

"To do that, don't you need some land or something similar? Even if the world collapses, you still need to eat vegetables, right?"

"Is there anything you can grow underground?"

"With sunlight, water, and fertilizer, you can grow anything. Nowadays, seedlings are so good. The most important thing is dedication."

After that, several solar terms passed, but his children never came to visit.

When China started a war and launched missiles that struck the metropolitan area, Elder Kim rushed to my bunker.

It was the first time I had seen him in such a bewildered state.

"Please, find out what happened to my son."

After communication was restored and the list of casualties was confirmed, I had to deliver the unfortunate news.

Elder Kim just shook his head silently.

He didn't cry or sob.

I wondered what had come over him.

"Now, the world is about to collapse. Would you mind coming to my bunker if you'd like?"

I made an inappropriate suggestion that didn't align with my principles.

Elder Kim raised his head and looked at me.

He smiled at me.

"Just wait a moment. I have something to prepare."

"Do you have something to prepare?"

"I have something to give."

He was a man who could smile more warmly than I had imagined.

When I found Elder Kim again, he was hanging from the crumbling house's main beam, like a swaying reed.

Beneath his lifeless body, carefully wrapped seedlings lay.

There was no way to recover his remains.

The nuclear attack alarm echoed from all directions, heralding the end of the world.

I quickly gathered only the seedlings and took refuge in the bunker.

Ultimately, it was a wise choice.

Following that, the raging flames of nuclear fission consumed the collapsing house and the remains, leaving no trace behind.

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