When Sa Gi-hyeok drowsily opened his eyes, he saw two people who had opened the toilet stall door. One woman, one man. They were holding hatchets and knives.

Ordinary survivors. If they had been marauders, he would already have a knife in his body. Sa Gi-hyeok reflexively opened his mouth.

"You should knock. If someone's using it, it would be embarrassing for both of us."

"The water's been out for ages, who would use a bathroom for—wait, what are you doing here?"

The man looked at Sa Gi-hyeok in disbelief. Sa Gi-hyeok groggily gathered his wits, but with nothing in his stomach, he still felt weak. He instinctively spoke.

"Do you have any food? I haven't eaten anything for nearly three days. Please give me a little."

"If you're hungry, go outside and put some snow in your mouth."

The woman spoke harshly, and Sa Gi-hyeok looked at her with pity.

"Well, snow is actually just water. Which means you can't get calories from eating snow. It's not a crime to not know this. No need to be embarrassed."

The man and woman blinked, exchanged glances, and almost simultaneously sighed. They smacked their foreheads in frustration and raised their hatchets.

"We saw footprints in an area where no one goes, thought a marauder had crept in, but it's just some weirdo."

"I got all tense for nothing."

Sa Gi-hyeok looked up at them curiously.

"Are there marauders here too? I haven't seen a single person."

"There are plenty of usable abandoned items here. So marauders from nearby come to take anything useful."

"Aren't those scavengers?"

Marauders weren't people who picked up trash. Having worked as an executive in a marauder organization, he knew this well. Marauders targeted people and killed them.

The woman glared at Sa Gi-hyeok as if he were ridiculous.

"Everyone's a marauder. With food shortages, it's only natural to hunt people when you see them."

"Well that's true... So are you both marauders too?"

"Of course. Why, scared now?"

The woman and man raised their weapons threateningly. Their blades gleamed in the light filtering through the bathroom's narrow window.

Sa Gi-hyeok laughed unconsciously. This is what passes for marauders? Perhaps because this was a sparsely populated area of the city, their standards were lower. Compared to those demons fighting over limited resources in densely packed urban areas...

"You're laughing? We're people who hunt marauders. Do you know how many people I've killed with this knife?"

The woman frowned deeply as she swung her knife through the air. It was certainly a skilled and menacing display, but at this point, it seemed incredibly benign.

'My former companions would have killed without saying a word.'

Conversation was unnecessary. The opponent wasn't a person but an animal that provided food when killed. That's how they viewed it, killing regardless of age or gender. If they conversed, it was only as a means to kill more easily.

Sa Gi-hyeok's eyes sparkled. Could these be people with goodwill? They seemed genuinely like good people.

"Have you ever killed children too?"

"Are you crazy? I might not be able to take care of them, but why would I kill children? Are you human garbage?"

They still had humanity. Sa Gi-hyeok was touched and expressed his admiration.

"You're both incredibly kind. It's nice to meet you. I don't know how long it's been since I've met people like you."

"...Is he insane? Forget it. Let's go. Killing someone like this would be more trouble than it's worth."

The woman withdrew her weapon with disgust.

The man also lowered his weapon after looking Sa Gi-hyeok up and down to see if he had anything valuable. No bag, no weapon in hand. His clothes were a useless suit. Fighting would just waste energy for no gain. Getting injured would be a loss.

"Yeah, let's go. ...Mister. If you want to die, go die somewhere else. There are marauders around, so head that way."

These types of people appeared occasionally. People who had given up on life and wandered searching for family, people who had lost everything and roamed while begging, people whose minds had broken from stress and simply wandered.

The man thought Sa Gi-hyeok was one of these people and spoke these words, but suddenly Sa Gi-hyeok pulled out a pistol from his jacket.

"I haven't finished talking."

They might be the people he was looking for. He couldn't let them go. He needed more conversation.

The two survivors froze for a moment, but soon the woman spoke coolly.

"If we fight in this street, you'll be in danger too. Let's just pretend we never saw each other and move on."

"Wow."

Sa Gi-hyeok exclaimed in amazement. They were completely different from those demons in the city center. In the city center, the moment you aimed a gun, they would try to stick a knife in your neck.

'These are the people I've been looking for.'

Look at this goodwill, trying to resolve conflict through dialogue. This is humanity. This is human warmth.

Sa Gi-hyeok, excited and with his brain not functioning well due to lack of energy, blurted out without thinking:

"No. I've been looking for people like you. I want to join your group. Please accept me. I truly have no malice."

The two survivors backed away. They examined Sa Gi-hyeok's face with bewildered expressions, then became terrified.

"Is he insane?"

"Hey, let's split up and run! We can't bring someone this suspicious with us!"

In an instant, they turned and fled from the bathroom, splitting in different directions.

Hope disappearing before his eyes. Sa Gi-hyeok waved his pistol and chased after the woman. He couldn't let this opportunity slip away, so he pursued the woman who seemed to have less stamina.

"Where are you going! You need to hear me out!"

"Ahh! Don't follow me!"

"I can't! I'll follow you to the end! How can I let go of a target I've finally found!"

Sa Gi-hyeok ran excitedly, grinning widely, and the woman, glancing back briefly, threw her bag in panic.

"There's food in here, please!"

"I don't need food—ack!"

His foot caught on the bag. With a crash, Sa Gi-hyeok rolled on the hard ground, and though he groaned and tried to stand up again, he collapsed without strength.

Sa Gi-hyeok stretched out his gun-holding hand and desperately shouted:

"No! Don't go!"

But hope instantly disappeared beyond his field of vision. Sa Gi-hyeok muttered gloomily.

"Ah... Why did they run away?"

He hadn't said anything threatening. He hadn't used tactics like bait or disguise, but had spoken honestly.

Sa Gi-hyeok glanced at the bag his foot had caught on, looked around, and skillfully rummaged through it to find food.

The food was just chocolate, but it was still calories. Sa Gi-hyeok dejectedly put the chocolate in his mouth, unable to brighten his expression despite the bitter and sweet flavors spreading in his mouth.

"Considering they even gave me food, they must be good people. ...Wait a minute. Did I threaten them?"

With nutrients supplied to his brain, his thoughts began to flow properly.

Sa Gi-hyeok sighed.

"I made a mistake."

He shouldn't have drawn his gun—he had buttoned things wrong. The warmth he had finally found was lost due to his mistake. But it was alright. The possibility he sought had grown.

Sa Gi-hyeok slowly chewed and swallowed the chocolate, then set out on the road again.

***

He wandered the snow-white city without a destination. Just walking, walking, and walking more. Sa Gi-hyeok fought against dizziness and headaches as he moved forward one step at a time.

He met quite a few people along the way, but none were the people he was looking for.

People who attacked unfamiliar strangers without reason, people who ignored Sa Gi-hyeok because he had nothing, people who fled at the sight of the pistol in his pocket, people who just wanted to kill him...

Sa Gi-hyeok's body, barely escaping, gradually deteriorated. Wounds from falling or being attacked didn't heal properly, and what little food he occasionally found was running out.

The sensation of approaching death. But Sa Gi-hyeok's eyes became increasingly clear. Determination formed in his pupils.

'I never thought it would be easy.'

This was the apocalypse. A world where production had ceased. As Kim Da-in had said, conflict and strife were the realistic foundation of survival. People who couldn't abandon goodwill would have died long ago, and those who survived were all survivors worn down by reality.

Finding people with goodwill in such a world would require a miracle.

That day, too, was a day when Sa Gi-hyeok was walking aimlessly in search of warmth.

"A child?"

Sa Gi-hyeok stopped walking and looked at the middle of the road. In the middle of the desolate road, a young child was sniffling and fidgeting.

The child saw Sa Gi-hyeok too and blinked.

Sa Gi-hyeok slowly approached and spoke.

"Why are you alone? Don't you have someone looking after you?"

"I do. We got separated because of zombies. I don't know which way to go back."

A clear voice, surprisingly articulate for a child that age. Despite being attacked by zombies and losing their guardian, the child wasn't crying or panicking.

Sa Gi-hyeok crouched down with concern, made eye contact with the child, and took their hand.

"Oh my. You should at least hide inside a building. It's cold out here. Look at your hands. They're colder than mine."

The child's hands were icier than his own, despite his poor physical condition. Sa Gi-hyeok, who had been vigorously rubbing the child's hands, suddenly paused.

'My hands are warmer.'

A lightning realization struck him. Sa Gi-hyeok looked down at the child's hands with wide eyes.

The warmth wasn't far away. It had been within him from the beginning. The same was true of goodwill. There was no need to seek out people with goodwill. He simply needed to show goodwill himself.

"Ha, haha."

Sa Gi-hyeok burst into clear laughter. The answer he had been searching for while wandering this city like a snowy field was here. He jumped up and took the child's hand.

"Let's go. Let's find your guardian together."

"Okay."

"Where were you attacked?"

The child nodded obediently, began to speak, and followed Sa Gi-hyeok.

Suddenly, the marauder within Sa Gi-hyeok screamed. This was a trap, it said. The child was just bait. The child would lead him into a trap.

But Sa Gi-hyeok smiled and ignored the voice in his mind. Instead, he took the pistol from his pocket and threw it by the roadside. A pistol wasn't a means to express goodwill.

'I don't care if I die.'

He had risked his life to find his goal. Now that goal was inside him. The path he was walking was the path to realizing his goal. Whether his life was in danger no longer mattered.

It was enough to hold warmth, show goodwill, and run this path with all his heart. He was fine with being shot and falling while walking this path. Because he himself would become proof of goodwill. Because people would see him and know that goodwill still remained in the world.

Sa Gi-hyeok muttered to himself:

"Mr. Kim Da-in. Being deceived by you once is enough."

Kim Da-in, who had infected people with malice. He simply needed to do the opposite. Instead of finding answers in the world, he could change the world himself. By coloring people with goodwill one by one, the world might change a little.

Surely he, a real con artist, couldn't be worse than Kim Da-in, who had been ordinary.

Sa Gi-hyeok stopped falling and walked straight ahead, leaving footprints in the snow.