How Zombies Survive in the Apocalypse

“Smell?”

Only after hearing those words, did something faint register in Aiden’s sense of smell.

It was… an unusually sweet scent.

More like a fragrance, it was flowing through the corridor from somewhere.

“This, smells like food…?” Ella remarked. 

As she said, the scent evoked the image of refreshing fruit and seemed to stimulate one’s appetite.

However… for such a smell to waft from a haven abandoned for over two years was unrealistic.

“…Seems like there’s something.”

Aiden continued to trace that sweet scent.

The origin of it was a classroom at the end of the corridor.

Aiden cautiously reached for the door, then looked back at Ella right behind him.

“It’s better if you step back.”

Aiden didn’t know what was inside. So, he signaled Ella to step back, and although she wore an displeased expression, she didn’t rebel against his words.

After Ella had moved a sufficient distance back-

Thud!

Aiden opened the door.

Instantly, a thick scent engulfed him, almost paralyzing his nose.

Even for Aiden, whose olfactory perception was inferior compared to an average person, the intensity was enough to furrow his brow.

And inside the classroom filled with that scent.

Even Aiden, who had never seen anything like it in his life, was met with a mutant.

“This is…”

It was… like a single tree.

The body of the zombie, which served as its foundation, was leaning against one side of the classroom wall.

From there, finger-thick stems spread like roots to the wall and floor.

On top of that, protrusions resembling leaves sprouted, and there was no other way to describe it than eerie.

An appearance like a vine created from a zombie.

The spread roots and leaves covered half of the classroom.

“…”

Disgusting yet mysterious, Aiden drew out his weapon against the mutant.

However, even after a few seconds, the mutant zombie showed no signs of movement.

“Is there something inside?”

Ella asked.

Despite the clear sound of a human voice, there was no reaction from the mutant.

During that time, Aiden thoroughly examined the appearance of the zombie.

The vine-like body adhered tightly to the wall and floor, and inside, there seemed to be no bones at all.

Does that mean… its ability to move has been completely lost?

“Maybe you should… No, wait.”

Aiden, who was about to call Ella to show her this sight, realized a moment later that he had become aware that the source of this overwhelming scent was a zombie.

Aiden closed the classroom door again and stepped back.

Then, he began to open one window after another in the corridor.

“What are you doing?”

“The smell seems to be created by a mutant.”

Aiden explained to Ella. A zombie turned into a tree, with a body so transformed that it lacked even bones.

“Have you ever seen such a mutant?”

“Never. Crazy… well, something like that… no, wait.”

Ella’s voice, mixed with surprise, paused for a moment.

Then, her brow slightly furrowed.

“I think I heard about it.”

“Heard about it? Who did you talk to?”

“From a junk dealer I met before. That person definitely mentioned a plant-like mutant. The name was…”

As if having trouble remembering, Ella scratched her head.

“Plant! Yes, that was the name. But… that was nothing more than a rumor. It was like a story pulled out like a ghost tale…”

Ella conveyed what she remembered to Aiden. In some city in the southern United States, there is a city covered with mutants that have turned into plants.

And anyone who passes by that area becomes a zombie just by inhaling the spores that come out from there.

As she said, it was more like an urban legend than information.

“For heaven’s sake… what’s going on? Surely just smelling this scent won’t turn you into a zombie, right?”

Ella asked, feeling uneasy.

Whether the mutant here was the protagonist of the rumor or not, Aiden couldn’t be sure.

Aiden slightly nodded.

No matter how peculiar the mutant  was, just smelling the scent, as in the rumor, had a low probability of getting infected with the virus. In that case, the virus itself would need to undergo a transformation, and, at least so far, there was no precedent for such an event.

However, it could still be harmful enough, so there was no need to test it unnecessarily.

“Step back.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I need to deal with that.”

Aiden pointed in the direction of the classroom.

Upon hearing that, Ella questioned:

“Is it really necessary?”

A question that seemed to imply why bother with unnecessary actions.

In a world like this, not knowing and avoiding could be a wise decision.

However, Aiden replied calmly.

“We need to find out. Then, that knowledge might be helpful next time.”

Aiden returned to the classroom and approached the trunk of the plant inside.

The floor covered with roots and stems of the plant.

Aiden cautiously stepped on the floor.

Squelch-

It wasn’t as hard as tree branches. On the contrary, there was a strange liquid feeling inside, as if stepping on someone’s flesh, making him feel disgusted.

Aiden proceeded, enduring this feeling.

In the meantime-

“Hmm…?”

Something caught his eye.

It was a structure covered by the stems of the plant.

Aiden thought it was just furniture like a chair or a desk lying on the floor. But upon closer inspection, it turned out to be not furniture but someone’s corpse.

“A person… No, a zombie.”

Aiden mumbled as he looked at the corpse.

There was hardly anything left of the original shape, and only the clothes were buried in vines.

Certainly, the traces weren’t just one or two.

Clearly distinguishable ones were at least seven.

Counting the ambiguous ones, it exceeded twenty.

In other words, at least seven zombies had died on the stems of this plant. It was too many for zombies to coincidentally collapse here.

So naturally, Aiden came up with one conjecture.

“Could it be attracting zombies…?”

The unique scent emitted by this plant was strong enough for Aiden to perceive it intensely. Therefore, even ordinary zombies could probably recognize it without a problem.

Perhaps this scent could act as bait, luring zombies to this mutant.

Fortunately, it didn’t seem to have that much power over humans.

“…A bizarre one.”

Aiden evaluated the Plant in that way.

It was more alien than any other mutant he had seen.

Aiden cautiously approached the trunk of the Plant.

However, even when Aiden approached the point where he could see the torso of the Plant, it didn’t react at all.

Thud!

Aiden pierced the head of the Plant with a crowbar.

The sensation felt at the end was not significantly different from an ordinary zombie.

But maybe because it was originally motionless, it was impossible to determine if it was dead or not.

To handle it properly, he would have to set it on fire, but it wasn’t the right situation for that now.

So, just as Aiden was about to step back.

“Hmm?”

Suddenly, the torso of the Plant swelled up.

And that bulge soon connected to the stem from the torso, reaching even the remains of the zombies covered by the stem.

“Tsk…!”

Sensing something strange, Aiden immediately ran toward the exit.

In the mere seconds it took for Aiden to reach the exit, the volume of the entire stem of the Plant had already expanded several times.

Boom!

Finally, with the sound of an exploding balloon, the remains of the Plant exploded.

Disgusting fluid sprayed near Aiden as he barely made it out of the entrance.

It was… the bodily fluid of a zombie.

The dark green blood that filled each stem of the plant exploded in all directions with the blast.

“What’s happening… Ugh…!”

Hearing the sound, Ella, who had approached, took a step back, looking at the splattered fluid in disgust.

It was a natural reaction.

The rotten blood of a zombie was so dangerous that it could be considered a mass of viruses. If an ordinary person had been directly hit by this explosion without knowing, they might have turned into a zombie without resistance.

In that regard, it was unfortunate but fortunate that Aiden didn’t use the rotten blood.

“Are you okay…?”

Ella cautiously checked Aiden’s condition.

Except for a few drops of blood that had splattered during the battle and the contamination of his pants from the recent explosion, Aiden was unharmed.

Having confirmed this, Ella let out a short sigh.

“Leave it as it is!”

Ella said frustratedly, but Aiden reached the opposite conclusion.

Stimulating the Plant was the right answer. Since he was alone and the creature was inside the classroom, he was able to avoid the unexpected explosion.

If he had encountered such a creature in the open without knowing anything about it, he might have faced a much more difficult situation.

“We’re safe now.”

Aiden looked around the classroom again.

The interior, painted in rotten blood in all directions, was literally a mess.

However, the mutant Plant were no longer visible.

Literally, due to the explosion that burned its own body, there was no shape left.

“Anyway, it seems we’ve dealt with this. Now, let’s explore the surroundings.”

Ella looked at Aiden as if he were speaking casually, somewhat bewildered.

“Aren’t you surprised?”

“I’m not that kind of person.”

After that, Aiden and Ella searched the fifth floor.

Whether the Plant had consumed all the zombies on the same floor or not, there was no sign of other zombies.

So, the fifth floor was completely empty, and thanks to that, they could easily find the warehouse where supplies were stored.

“Here, this way!”

Ella’s excited voice echoed in the central corridor of the fifth floor.

When Aiden went to see, he saw that one room had been completely converted into a medicine storage room.

White shelves, reaching the ceiling, extended along the walls.

Although more than half of them were empty, there was still a considerable amount of medicine left.

“Wow… This is really something!”

Seeing this, Ella exclaimed.

While examining the medicines on the shelves, Aiden spoke up.

“Calm down.”

“Huh? Oh… sorry.”

At Aiden’s voice, Ella, who belatedly realized his presence, blushed.

“Before that, let me ask. What exactly do you want in terms of medicine?”

“Something valuable.”

“You don’t know about medicine?”

The poked woman couldn’t deny it and frowned.

The medicines here were not consumer-grade drugs found in regular pharmacies, but rather specialized pharmaceuticals that had been in a large hospital.

So, most people could only recognize them by their packaging or bottles, and often had no idea what the medicine was.

Due to this, in requests like this, most junk dealers brought back loads of worthless medicines like ointments for eczema or constipation pills.

“Do you know?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“I was a doctor.”

Ella’s eyes widened at the calmly uttered words.

“Who? You were a doctor?”

“Until three years ago.”

“Really?”

“Is there a problem?”

Seeing Ella’s reaction more intense than expected, Aiden asked.

In response, Ella made a bewildered expression.

“No, what I meant was…”

Ella hesitated for a moment.

Then, the words she uttered turned out to be a somewhat unexpected request for Aiden.

“By any chance… do you know how to treat patients?”

Upon hearing this, Aiden put down the medicine bottle he was examining and stared at Ella.

In response, Ella took a few steps back.

“Well… what is it?”

“Where does it hurt?”

“No, crazy. It’s not about me. It’s… my younger brother.”

Now that Aiden found out, the health of the family she was traveling with didn’t seem to be in good shape.

“So, I came here to find a job and medicine while looking for it.”

“What’s your brother’s illness?”

“I don’t know.”

“You came looking for medicine without knowing the diagnosis?”

It was an absurd story.

Ella seemed to be aware of that aspect and, instead, became more annoyed.

“So, what should I do about it? I don’t know what I don’t know.”

“…”

“Anyway! I was planning to find medicine here and show it to those gangsters as bait. Maybe there’s medicine for my brother among them if I bring a bunch of anything.”

Hmm, Aiden swallowed a sigh.

It seemed like a quite dangerous and reckless attempt, but it was the best she could do without medical knowledge.

So, Aiden understood Ella’s situation and put down the medicine bottle.

He brought a nearby chair and placed it in front of Ella.

“Sit down for now. Even if I can’t see the patient directly, I can at least provide some advice.”

“Advice?”

“Think of it as a consultation. Just answer the questions I ask.”

With that, Ella sat down hesitantly.

“What should I tell you?”

“First, the patient’s symptoms.”

Ella nodded her head.

She carefully recalled the symptoms her younger brother had shown.

“At first… he was just tired. He said it was hard to walk even a little, and I thought he was just exaggerating. But it wasn’t. Nowadays, he can’t even get up.”

“And?”

“Also… oh, blood comes from his mouth. But it doesn’t stop. He even vomited blood. Anyway, he’s not in good condition. He feels like he’s definitely going to die.”

Aiden asked when these symptoms started, whether there were any other symptoms, and what measures Ella had taken.

Ella answered in her own way.

“Um…”

Soon, a few possible diagnoses flashed through Aiden’s mind.

Although he had only heard the symptoms from the patient’s family and nothing was certain, he continued to ask questions to get as close to the truth as possible.

“So, how did he eat?”

“He had enough rice. He’s not starving.”

“That’s not it. Do you remember what he ate? At least in the past month.”

“What he ate…?”

Asking her to tell what she had eaten in the last month was, in a way, an unreasonable question.

However, without thinking too deeply, Ella answered.

“He ate ham. Two months ago, we were lucky to find a bunch of canned hams.”

“So… did he eat only ham for the past two months?”

“Yeah. Well, it’s not like we can choose menus in today’s world.”

With Ella’s continued explanation, Aiden could extract one likely diagnosis from his deductions.

Fortunately, the disease that Ella’s brother seemed to have was quite easy to diagnose and treat.

“Is it possible that blood is coming from his gums? Are his teeth also loose?”

“Yes.”

“Does blood mixed with feces also come out?”

“Yeah, just like you said! Do you know what it is?”

Aiden nodded.

“Have you heard of sepsis?”