Who Fox Gas had been before the war wasn’t my concern.
The war had changed everything.
Digging into the past—into a ti that would never return—was pointless.
Not just for Fox Gas, but for everyone in the forum.
We judged each other solely by what we saw in our world, through our screens.
And in our eyes, Fox Gas was a good guy.
A generous soul who had used his talents to make our prison of endless apocalypse just a little more bearable.
Because of people like him, our lives were more livable.
I, too, had enjoyed one of the many illegal conversion gas he had distributed.
I didn’t rember the title, but it was one of those land-claiming gas—where you bounced a marble around to carve out sections of the screen.
Each completed section would reveal an image of a healthy young woman.
Fox Gas had a good reputation, and he seed like the type of person worthy of that reputation.
That was the impression I had of him.
Still, since I had accepted VivaBot’s request, I needed to look deeper.
I didn’t want to know about his past.
But if I was going to find him, I had to understand who he was and what he might be thinking.
Strangely, Fox Gas was ntioned more on Failnet than in our own forum.
There was a reason for that.
He had been a big na in the gaming industry.
His identity had been exposed when he suffered a ntal breakdown during the Monster Park incident.
A normal person like wouldn’t have noticed, but insiders had picked up on clues in his old posts.
ㅇㅇ : Oh, shit. It was him? The PM of Legacy Online?
ㅇㅇ : Yeah, that guy was famous. I thought he was dead. Turns out he’s been living a pretty decent life, huh?
ㅇㅇ : Dude’s been acting like so saint on Viva! Apocalypse!
ㅇㅇ : Nobody plays the “nice guy” act better than him.
ㅇㅇ : Wasn’t he sitting on, like, a billion won?
ㅇㅇ : All built on the blood, sweat, and tears of others. As always.
There was no way to verify if these people were really from the industry.
Maybe it was just jealousy.
Failnet users resenting our forum’s community wasn’t new.
But one thing seed certain—Fox Gas had been a well-known figure.
And he wasn’t well-liked by industry professionals.
According to VivaBot, Fox Gas was very likely alive.
His account hadn’t been active, but his satellite network usage was abnormally high.
VIVA_BOT014: It could be because of so automated system he linked to our servers. But the fact is, dead people don’t generate that kind of traffic. He’s trying sothing. Sotis, even things that look like hacking attempts.
VivaBot had chosen for a reason.
Not many people could move freely in a world crawling with raiders, mutants, and monsters.
And for soone like Fox Gas, it was worth stepping out of my bunker.
I’d always thought about helping him soday.
The icon was a tempting reward.
But that wasn’t why I was doing this.
Whatever kind of person Fox Gas had been before the war…
That didn’t matter to .
Because I, Park Gyu, liked Fox Gas.
*
The coordinates VivaBot provided led to the outskirts of Yeoju, near the tomb of King Sejong.
She also sent high-resolution satellite images.
Fox Gas' hideout was an abandoned house—the kind you saw all over the countryside.
There were a few of those near my own bunker.
They were an eyesore.
Houses left to rot, never sold, making already run-down villages look even worse.
Before the war, when people still believed civilization would last forever, so idiot YouTubers had made a trend out of “haunted house explorations.”
They’d trespass, make noise, flood the place with cara lights, and leave behind piles of trash.
But Fox Gas' hideout wouldn’t be a normal abandoned house.
Using an old, ruined ho as a dummy shelter—while building a bunker deep beneath it—had been a popular idea on our forum.
If his bunker was there, it would be buried deep underground.
Yeoju had once been a governnt-designated agricultural zone.
Even after the war, it had been one of the last places still producing crops.
But when the governnt abandoned Seoul and relocated to Incheon, Yeoju was left to rot.
Fields that once grew rice were now overrun with weeds.
And in places where fertilizer had been left behind, the weeds grew taller than .
A jungle of grass, stretching in endless grids across the open fields.
It was beautiful in its own way.
But getting lost in the scenery was dangerous.
Because the creatures hiding in that grass…
They were far deadlier than any monster.
Click.
I pulled out one of the trophies I’d taken from Kim Daram—a Korean-made shotgun.
It had never been adopted as standard military equipnt because it was too heavy, but in a setting like this—where visibility was low and danger lurked in the undergrowth—shotguns were far more reassuring than rifles.
I moved cautiously through the fields, heading toward Fox Gas’ house.
Then, beyond the sea of grass, I saw sothing moving atop an embanknt.
A chicken.
A massive one.
It made sense.
Chickens were one of the most commonly fard animals in Korea.
It stood to reason that chicken mutants would exist.
But strangely, they were rarely seen.
There were many theories, but the most accepted one was natural selection.
Chicken mutants did grow bigger and stronger, with increased intelligence.
But unlike dog or cat mutants, their bodies weren’t built for hunting.
And their usual prey—bugs—never seed to mutate.
At least, in the three years and six months since the war, I had never seen a mutated centipede or spider.
Which ant that, even if chicken mutants did appear, they probably starved to death before they could spread.
The one on the embanknt was a hen.
She pecked at the ground, then suddenly turned her head to stare at .
I knew that bird eyesight was sharper than a dog's.
She had definitely seen .
But after a mont, she just ignored and kept pecking the ground.
She didn’t seem aggressive.
And she was nearly 800 ters away.
I let her be.
The Legion broadcasts had ntioned that chicken mutants tended to travel in flocks.
No reason to provoke them.
I simply noted their presence and moved on.
Soon, I reached my destination.
It was a small country ho, likely built for a retiree.
The house was still structurally sound, but the windows were shattered, and the yard was full of junk.
Among the debris, a bleached skeleton lay in the dirt.
Next to it was a rusty tricycle, tipped over on its side.
Had a child lived here?
Fox Gas’ hideout was just around the corner.
Before turning, I used a mirror to check for blind spots.
Whenever you approached a bunker, you had to assu it had already been taken over by raiders.
But there were no signs of occupation.
No movent.
No threats.
The house was a wreck—even by pre-war standards.
Cobwebs, rotting wood, collapsed beams, and a warped floor that let glimpses of the ground peek through.
A classic haunted house.
Searching these places wasn’t fun.
And in this case, there was also the possibility of traps.
I spent twenty minutes investigating.
No luck.
I couldn’t find the entrance.
Not even a ventilation shaft—sothing that every bunker should have.
I was stuck.
VivaBot had been certain that Fox Gas lived here.
But I couldn’t contact her from this distance.
And at this rate…
I was going to end up heading ho, having found nothing but a mutant chicken.
"..."
I slowly scanned my surroundings.
Allies weren’t always right.
Sotis, even our own people made mistakes.
Still, giving up easily wasn’t an option.
Other team leaders would request an imdiate retreat the mont they confird faulty intel.
I wasn’t like that.
Even when a mission seed based on false information, I considered every possible angle before withdrawing.
Because misinformation—intentional or not—was still built on so kind of logic.
And sotis, that logic led to unexpected successes.
VivaBot had claid Fox Gas’ satellite signals had been detected near this abandoned house.
That much was true.
But finding his satellite device—the Obelisk—was a different challenge.
The Obelisk was an extrely powerful transmitter, developed personally by lon Mask.
It could work deep underground with zero signal loss.
Which ant…
Trying to locate the device itself was pointless.
Instead, I needed to look for what every bunker had:
A ventilation system.
A drainage pipe.
Every raider knew to check for sewage pipes—and I wasn’t an exception.
Few bunker owners were as paranoid as , setting up their own filtration systems.
Most people just let their wastewater flow through hidden pipes, straight into a nearby stream.
I followed the small creeks, searching for any unnatural drainage outlets.
After a long and exhausting search, I finally found a pipe—but it was just an agricultural irrigation drain.
No sewage.
Nothing leading to an underground bunker.
"..."
I crossed my arms, thinking.
Had VivaBot been wrong?
The chances were looking higher.
Still, I wasn’t about to walk away just yet.
This ti, I focused on the basics—
The traces of human activity.
If Fox Gas was living here, he would’ve left so kind of mark.
Of course, so people—like —were disciplined enough to erase their tracks.
But unless there was imdiate danger, people weren’t that ticulous.
And this area?
It was too peaceful.
Even if Fox Gas was cautious, he wouldn’t have gone overboard with cleanup.
I started from square one, carefully circling the house.
I searched for footprints, broken branches, discarded trash—
Any sign of life.
I even pressed my ear to the ground, trying to pick up the faint hum of a generator.
After thirty minutes, my patience finally paid off.
Footsteps.
Soone was nearby.
I held my breath and started trailing the sound.
The mont I tried to hide my presence—
The other side did the sa.
I reassessed the situation.
They had noticed .
And now…
They were tracking , too.
I switched my shotgun’s safety to semi-auto and slid my finger inside the trigger guard.
The terrain was half-overgrown jungle—endless grass taller than my shoulders.
I estimated their position and deliberately stepped into the densest part of the weeds.
The footsteps beca frantic.
Without a sound, I wove through the tangled undergrowth, adjusting my approach.
Then—I stepped out of the grass and raised my gun.
"Hands up."
A young man and woman.
The man held an old carbine rifle.
The woman carried a crossbow, the kind raiders called a "Judge Killer."
"It’s a shotgun. Don’t try anything stupid."
BANG!
I fired a warning shot.
The thunderous blast echoed through the field.
The pair exchanged glances.
The woman looked ready to fight, but the man shook his head.
A second later, they dropped their weapons and raised their hands.
"Turn around. Slowly."
They obeyed.
Now that I could see their faces, I frowned.
Fox Gas was supposed to be a middle-aged ga developer—
A key figure in his industry, soone rumored to have made billions.
Not a pair of twenty-sothings.
It would’ve been easy to force them to lead to their bunker.
But first, I decided to ask.
"Where’s Fox Gas?"
The two exchanged a look of surprise.
Then, the woman asked, wide-eyed—
"You know the Director?"
I raised an eyebrow.
I could tell what she was really asking.
"What’s your relationship to him?"
Before I could answer, the man and woman both spoke at the sa ti.
"We’re part of Director Choi’s crew."
"We’re developing a ga together."
I finally noticed the matching rings on their fingers.
And from sowhere close by—
A child started crying.
Then, from behind them, an older man erged.
He was thin, almost skeletal.
His hair was half-white, and his eyes were sunken.
I had never seen him before.
But I already knew who he was.
"Fox Gas?"
I lowered my shotgun.
The man blinked at , confused.
Then, his lips trembled as he whispered—
"D... DSIRAE?!"
I tilted my head.
And at that mont, I felt a strange sense of duty.
Today…
I would show this man what the real Skelton looked like.
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