Chapter 18….
The department store was, quite literally, another world.
Even though there was emergency power, it either wasn’t functioning properly or was too weak—leaving the interior dim and gloomy.
That alone was overwhelming, but what truly doubled the terror was—
“Graaaaahhh!”
—the nature of the zombies.
They preferred darkness.
When exposed to light, their movements slowed, so whenever the sun rose, they would scatter into the shadows to escape the daylight.
Tatadadadak!
And so, at this very moment, the department store had become—
a literal den of zombies.
It was a chain reaction.
One zombie let out a shriek and charged. Others, drawn by the noise, followed.
That pattern repeated itself over and over until—
[Wow; this looks like some massive zombie conga line.]
[LMAO he’s kiting them all by himself.]
[Well, it’s Ji-han. If it were any other streamer, they’d already be dead.]
[No way, there are other streamers with cracked mechanics too.]
[LOL should we make a challenge mode out of this?]
By now, dozens—no, hundreds—of zombies were chasing after Lee Ji-han.
[Uh, I left to eat, came back, and how did things get this bad? Weren’t they playing it safe?]
[Classic zombie movie cliché.]
[???]
[A side character acted like a side character.]
[Wait, what does that mean?]
[Don’t you know? Someone accidentally kicked a can, and it rolled right into a zombie-infested area.]
The reason was simple.
It was the kind of absurdly bad-luck event trigger that people half-jokingly call “rigged by fate.”
But the results went far beyond what anyone could have imagined.
Fwoosh!
[Whatever, as long as we get our dopamine watching Ji-han.]
[True.]
[But can he really escape in a sealed-off building like this?]
[Yeah, there aren’t many places to climb, so he’s just parkouring around to kite them, it seems.]
[But doesn’t Ji-han actually get scared of zombies? Is he okay?]
One by one, viewers began worrying about him.
But contrary to their concern, Ji-han’s thoughts were—
‘As long as I don’t get caught, I’ll be fine. …But Marcus and the kid, they’re the problem.’
Fwoosh!
‘Should I really be dragging the zombies along with me like this?’
Thud!
‘Can I pull it off? …No—I think I can. This isn’t my real, broken body. Here, I can.’
A grin spread across his face.
[Wait, did Ji-han just smile?]
[LOL??? You can still laugh right now? Ji-han! You’re smiling at a time like this!?]
[Has he just accepted his fate?]
Tatadadadak!
‘First, I’ll incapacitate them.’
Shhhhk!
[Sliding! Wow, what quick thinking!]
Crashhhh!
It wouldn’t be wrong to say he was enjoying himself in this situation.
In fact, Ji-han couldn’t suppress the pounding thrill in his chest.
Overwork had left his real body piled with injuries.
But the reason he had never been able to give up gymnastics was simple:
—“Hey! Ji-han!? Are you insane?”
—“Whoa, how did you even do that?”
—“Damn, senior! That was amazing!”
Every time he landed a technique, his teammates, juniors, and seniors would cheer as if it were their own victory.
[See, that’s the play! Zombies can’t slide, so he instantly bought time!]
[Didn’t he say he doesn’t even play games? How the hell did he think of that?]
[Ji-han, you’re a genius. A flat-out genius!]
And now, Ji-han had his viewers.
Of course, due to his over-immersion syndrome, he couldn’t actually see their chat at the moment.
Fwoosh!
Time seemed to slow.
His vision, now fully adjusted to the dark, scanned the supermarket interior.
‘Display stands, ladders, event banners… plenty of things to grab and climb.’
His instincts instantly cataloged every usable element.
‘The stands are at a good height. If I use them like springboards, I can knock zombies aside.’
Thump, thump, thump.
His heart, once thrashing wildly, began to find a rhythm.
‘Knocking over ladders could work… but just making obstacles won’t solve anything. Better to herd them somewhere—like a storage room—to buy time.’
His senses sharpened.
It felt as if his perception had transcended human limits, letting him view the scene from a calm, third-person perspective.
‘The freezer. Over there.’
By instinct, Ji-han had found the perfect place to trap the zombies.
“Marcus! Don’t answer, just listen! I’ll lure them into the storage room—once I’m inside, use a ladder to block the door!”
Thud!
Screeeech!
Even as he shouted, the mass of zombies slammed into display shelves, toppling them aside.
Ji-han sprinted—
Tatadadadak!
—toward the freezer storage.
‘If the food section is this big, then that storage room must be huge.’
And it would be cold.
Frozen muscles, tendons, and joints would only slow the zombies further.
If he could control the temperature, he might even neutralize them completely.
‘Some fridges still have power. If I can figure out the controls, I can do it. I will do it.’
Ji-han’s certainty grew.
He combined the information at hand with everything he could do in the moment—forming a solution.
[Uh… where’s he going?]
[Ji-han, that’s a storage room!]
[Isn’t that a dead end? Dude! Stop! STOP!]
[Game over, man. Game over.]
[Lee Ji-han’s adventure ends here.]
[LOL no, it’s not over yet!]
BANG!
Ji-han slammed into the freezer’s heavy door.
Screeech!
The massive steel door groaned open, and the noise only spurred the zombies to chase faster.
“Please, Marcus!”
“But boss! If you do that, then you—!”
“Don’t bother answering! Just trust me. I can get out on my own.”
Ji-han forced himself inside the freezing chamber.
‘Cold. Good—power’s still running.’
The freezer was indeed freezing.
His body began to stiffen immediately.
[Status Effect: Chill]
[Status Effect: Slow]
Two icons popped up at the edge of his vision, but Ji-han didn’t notice them.
Even if he had, they were just debuffs—not real problems.
“Graaaghhh!”
Tatadadak!
Ji-han darted deeper inside.
One zombie, then two, then three… the entire horde squeezed themselves in after him.
[Hey, that’s a dead end!]
[Zombies behind you, wall in front. What’s your plan here?]
[Ji-han! Dying like this doesn’t count as content, you hear me!?]
“Hrrmph!”
But Ji-han didn’t stop.
He inhaled sharply—and pushed himself harder.
“Grrrraaaaaahhh!”
The zombies surged forward.
Their limbs bent unnaturally, but they never slowed down.
[They’re catching up! Dude, they’re catching up!]
[The growls are getting closer!]
[WTF, are these like special zombies? Why are they so fast??]
[Holy crap, this tension… damn!]
Tatadadak!
Pwak!
[Wait, what?]
Thanks to manager Kim Su-ho’s camera controls, the viewers were watching from Ji-han’s first-person perspective.
Which meant they were about to witness the impossible.
“Hyaaap!”
The first sound was his sharp battle cry.
The wall loomed closer in their view.
Then his legs came into frame—slamming into the wall.
The problem was—
Pabababak!
[Wait… is that even allowed?]
[Physics engine just broke, right?]
[No way. No freaking way.]
—he didn’t stop at one step.
One step. Two. Three.
Ji-han began to run up the wall.
His movements transcended human possibility.
Four steps. Five.
The higher he went, the quieter the chat became.
Pwak!
At last, he reached his limit.
He pushed off—and the camera view spun.
Whirrrrrl!
His body twisted in a graceful arc, spinning beautifully through the air.
Bang!
He landed perfectly.
Flawless. Not a single misstep.
The chat froze.
[Uh.]
[?]
[????]
[What did I…]
[What did I just watch?]
Then, it exploded with praise.
[Ji-han, are you insane? How’s anyone else supposed to follow this?]
[This wasn’t “genius,” this was “monster genius.”]
[Dude, you scare me. I’m afraid of you now.]
[Fine! Do it all yourself then! What the hell, man!]
[So what are the rest of us supposed to do if we don’t have cracked mechanics like that?]
[Forget “perfect play”—he just became the wall itself.]
[LOL I’m speechless. Not even swearing covers it anymore.]
[Clip it, someone clip it already!]
[We’re gonna be watching Ji-han replays in TAS forums all day.]
But Ji-han didn’t have time to bask in their praise.
The electric thrill surging through his body—the dopamine of pulling off a flawless technique—he had to suppress it.
‘No time to stop. I need to escape before Marcus locks the door.’
Not even in thousands of practice runs had he ever nailed a move so cleanly.
‘Let’s go back. Quickly.’
Normally, Ji-han would have shouted in triumph.
But this time, he clamped his mouth shut—
and sprinted toward the exit.
“Wow.”
It was her day off, which explained her messy appearance as she sat slumped in front of her computer.
The blackout curtains were still drawn. The only light in her little world came from the monitor.
“Wow.”
Soft exclamations slipped from her lips again and again.
“…Beautiful.”
Beautiful. Gorgeous.
There was no other word she could think of to describe what she had just seen.
“What… was that?”
Running up the wall? That was pure physical ability, nothing else.
“Ji-han, what the hell was that?”
Her interest in Lee Ji-han had started when a clip donation popped up on a different streamer’s channel—one she usually watched.
That clip mostly showed him pulling off godlike physical stunts.
‘Well, sure, he’s handsome.’
But awkward mannerisms.
A small, quiet voice.
Zero interaction with viewers.
In other words, he had all the worst possible traits for a streamer—relying on sheer stunt performance alone to carry his channel.
‘Sure, it’s dopamine-fueled…’
But nonstop stunts were a double-edged sword.
Even viewers would eventually burn out from the intensity.
‘I’ll just watch until the department store section, then switch back.’
That had been her plan—just a quick glance, then back to her usual stream.
“…But what the hell was that?”
What she had just witnessed was more than enough to steal her soul away.
Pwak!
Whirrrrl!
An impossible leap.
A breathtaking spin midair.
Ji-han twisted his body, rotated multiple times, and landed in flawless form.
It only lasted a few seconds.
But in that moment, all focus was on him alone.
Black hair fluttered, long lashes brushed down, sharp nose catching the light, and lips curving upward in a gentle arc.
He looked like a sculpture carved by the hands of a meticulous god.
“Wait… but how could I even see that in such darkness?”
Tap, tap, tap, tack!
[Hey guys, wasn’t the place completely dark? But I swear I saw his face clearly.]
[? Weren’t there lights?]
[When Ji-han jumped, the whole room lit up for a second.]
[Su-ho, did you mess with the lighting?]
[What are you talking about? Focus on the stream, please.]
[No, seriously, it was weird. A light shone from behind him.]
[You saw that too? I thought it was just me.]
[There was a halo effect! Don’t tell me the manager staged that?]
Chat exploded with speculation.
[Just tell us—was there a halo behind Ji-han, yes or no?]
[Why would I do that!? Regulars know I don’t even know how to set that up!]
The manager, Guardian, typed awkwardly.
But the viewers didn’t believe him.
[I’m telling you! I saw the halo!]
[Ji-han, even in the darkness, you shine!]
[Ji-han, please—I beg you! Have at least one flaw! Don’t be this perfect!]
[If you’ve got a halo too, what are the rest of us supposed to do!?]
[I looked in the mirror after watching this stream and realized I’m just a squid.]
That night, Ji-han’s stream left behind a strange mystery.
And in the days that followed, his fandom gave it a name:
[No, seriously, there was a halo!]
—“The Lee Ji-han Halo Incident.”
