Water flows from high to low.

You can send water from the top down, but we don’t call that “flowing down.”

Everything has a certain, irresistible direction.

Before the war, economic experts tried to predict the cycles of recession and recovery.

Their predictions were never one-way.

That famous Hyman Minsky curve — the one that spread as a meme online and eventually seeped into society at large — is, broadly speaking, about two directions: dramatic rise and dramatic fall. But between the spikes and crashes are those small, sawtooth-like waves of repeated ups and downs.

Live in the world long enough, and you’ll notice similar patterns.

You’ve probably experienced it yourself: something feels like it’s going to happen for sure, but various factors push and pull, swaying back and forth between almost and not quite, gnawing at your nerves.

Doomsday belief is much the same.

We doomsday believers predicted, from various data and circumstances, that a cataclysmic disaster would befall Earth.

I won’t bother rehashing the discrimination and ridicule we suffered at the hands of the non-believers.

It wasn’t an easy road.

Even the war that finally drove the world into ruin — just a week before it began, the leader of China’s moderates and the president of the United States had agreed to a summit, and the United Nations had announced a plan for global material aid to China.

Now, the former president of South Korea — who turned to bone inside a bunker — was known as a pro-China figure. Rumors often floated in the securities market and online that if China attacked Taiwan — more precisely, the U.S. forces stationed there — he might break the U.S.–Korea Mutual Defense Treaty and side with China.

Some people believed that even if war broke out between China and the U.S., Korea would remain a safe, permanent neutral state. Sure, the U.S. and its allies would pressure us at first, but the country would stay intact and rise to a leading role in the world.

So what happened to all those theories and claims?

Fruit that’s going to fall will fall.

Water flows from high to low.

The term “doomsday believer” is now a relic of the past, [N O V E L I G H T] but the reason I’m bringing it up again is because of a recent arrival on the board.

 Contrary to my worries, Kim Daram showed no objection to Yoo Jeong-min joining us.

On the contrary, she liked that we’d gained another woman.

They’re close in age, and Jeong-min isn’t so beautiful as to be someone Daram would feel threatened by.

Besides, objectively speaking, Yoo Jeong-min is a good person.

She’s not overly sharp-edged, but she’s not timid either — she says what she needs to say and makes her intentions clear.

Kim Daram’s husband and son seemed to like her, and Cheon Young-jae — upon meeting her — practically had sparks in his eyes.

It felt like our bunker had perked up again.

Unfortunately, Yoo Jeong-min isn’t the kind of talent who’s much help to me.

“This? Oh, I’ve done something like it before... but I’d have to look it up.”

I wasn’t an expert before, but I’d gotten some exposure to IT and learned that not all developers are the same.

In the developer world, there are gods and there are serfs.

Hunters have skill differences too, but before the war there wasn’t such a thing as a “weak” Hunter.

Even a C-rank Hunter like John Nae-non could intimidate people at a meetup by showing off his muscles.

Hunters are no joke.

Developers, though, vary wildly in ability.

Yoo Jeong-min is nowhere near the skill level of a top-tier developer.

“I told you, I’m front-end. I make stuff like the main screen you see on Viva! Apocalypse! The people who make the backend — the stuff that actually runs the site — are different. It’s a whole other job.”

You don’t even need to bring up Melon Mask, Deadmanwalking, or Ballantine — she’s ordinary enough that John Nae-non is a fair comparison.

I don’t know much myself, but she seems to know about as little as I do.

The only good thing is that she can “look things up” and make something, but the problem now is — where exactly are you going to look?

My question ended up exposing my own ignorance and lack of attention.

“Doesn’t Viva! Apocalypse! have an AI chatbot service for developers?” she asked.

A purebred, Year One member of Viva! Apocalypse! and a legendary name like me — and I didn’t know that. Meanwhile, a newcomer with a cracked phone did.

“I’m sure it was somewhere... Here, look!”

She’d opened the developer’s view.

Sure enough, the developer view had a ton of windows and menus I’d never seen — including an AI help chatbot.

“See? It’s right there.”

“...”

My pride took a tiny hit, but fair’s fair.

“So you can make it if you use this as reference?”

“Yes. I’ll give it a try. With Foxgame-nim’s comments in the code, I’ve got no reason not to. Beats baking bricks, anyway.”

It might take time, but maybe we really could restore PaleNet.

In any case, it had been a month since we arrived in Foxgame’s bunker.

Contrary to my initial fears, things were quiet — no threats from DSIRA either.

That doesn’t mean the land itself is peaceful.

Bang!

Every so often, we hear gunfire in the distance.

It’s not like the war-zone chaos north of the Han River, but fierce firefights still break out on ridgelines now and then.

Seoul, though, has apparently gone still — like a ghost town.

The shortwave broadcasts, which had been cut off since Defender’s coup, resumed to report in detail.

“Leader Jeon Si-hoon has declared an end to all conflicts around Seoul as of today. He will be forming a new government cabinet in the coming days. More details in our next broadcast.”

Details are unclear.

The board is practically dead, and Necropolis isn’t a place where you can get real truths or form public opinion.

One thing is certain: Jeon Si-hoon has finally built his kingdom.

That young man, full of rebellion, has managed to seize the world in his hands.

But I know how dangerous his ideology is.

He hates this land and the people living on it.

At first he’ll play the part of a moderate leader, but soon enough his true colors will show.

The barbaric, unrefined violence we glimpsed on the bus when leaving Seoul — that’s the true nature of the Jeon Si-hoon faction.

It’s common knowledge that his ranks hold more foreign-looking people than Koreans. When I saw them in person, I heard more foreign languages — especially Chinese — than Korean.

“So Jeon Si-hoon finally took Seoul.”

Kim Daram reacted like it was inevitable.

She’s not fond of Jeon Si-hoon.

Like other citizens’ committee members in Seoul, she once cheered for the young hero — but from her high position, she must have been able to see his true nature.

In fact, she was once nearly arrested by his soldiers.

She won’t talk about it, but it seems she personally took down quite a number of the pursuit team.

No one here has a high opinion of Jeon Si-hoon.

Only Yoo Jeong-min seems to see him as a hero — but that’s just ignorance.

As for me, I don’t have much to say about Jeon Si-hoon himself.

Him taking Seoul was as natural as water flowing downhill.

The real problem was the board.

A new “influx type” had appeared — and was getting on my nerves.

From the start, our board had a hostile attitude toward newcomers.

It was always pay-to-join, and you needed Melon Mask’s Stargazer Obelisk satellite unit to connect.

That changed somewhat with the introduction of Necropolis, but the bad image of newcomers was set long before.

Joining our board meant one of two things: either you scavenged a unit whose owner was gone — like a beggar picking it up — or you killed the owner and took it.

Later, once enough board members had died, buying one in trade became common. But that didn’t mean we had to be nice about it.

Anyway, whether scavenged, stolen, or bought, some newcomer had appeared on the board and was rubbing me the wrong way.

Anonymous5034: Check out my bunker. Isn’t it killer?

An anonymous in the 5000s.

If our school had lasted and produced a 33rd graduating class, maybe it would feel like this.

Anyway, this wet-behind-the-ears newbie had posted pictures of a bunker I knew well.

“What the—”

Cheon Young-jae, still fussing over his hopeless attempt to impress Yoo Jeong-min with style, saw my screen and reacted.

“Isn’t that the bunker we stayed in? The government one!”

I nodded.

“Yeah. That’s it.”

When we left, I’d already figured it would be taken over.

The beggar types hanging around even when we were there had been eyeing our territory.

Once we were gone, they’d bury themselves in it like mudfish and pick up every last scrap we’d left behind.

A well-camouflaged bunker is hard to spot from afar, but up close — especially to suspicious eyes — no camouflage can hide it.

The best disguise is to make passersby see it without a second thought — that’s bunker camo 101.

Anyway, someone had found our old bunker and taken it. Worse, these raccoon-like bastards had a Viva! Apocalypse! satellite unit and were using it to post crap that got under my skin.

Anonymous5034: Heard from folks here that the last crew bailed in a panic. Lol.

Anonymous5034: What a bunch of morons.

Anonymous5034: I mean, damn, if you’ve got a palace bunker like this, you hold it to the death. Not run off over a little civil unrest in Seoul.

Anonymous5034: Judging by that bus ride, they must’ve had ties to the army or the old puppet government. Hope they died miserably.

“Wow, this punk...”

Young-jae couldn’t hide his outrage.

“...”

I was pissed too.

But the Skeleton — the mythical name at the top of all Viva! Apocalypse! players — saw another angle.

This wasn’t just random sneering.

There was emotion in it.

Meaning: they knew us.

Anonymous5034 was likely a neighbor from our old area.

Otherwise, why go to the trouble of writing long posts just to slam strangers?

Best to ignore provocations like this.

At least, that’s the smart play.

But the youngest in our bunker — mentally speaking — Kim Daram didn’t think that way.

She was arriving at similar conclusions to Anonymous5034.

“We didn’t make a mistake coming here, right?”

Foxgame’s bunker is big and luxurious, sure — for an individual.

But it doesn’t give each family the apartment-sized space the old government bunker did.

Kim Daram’s family once had 35 pyeong to themselves. Now they have 15 — and it’s still the biggest room here.

One bathroom.

They had to dig a latrine outside.

That’s just how it is.

This is Foxgame’s personal bunker.

No matter how rich a doomsday prepper is, why would they build two bathrooms?

Bunker designers like me, obsessed with extreme efficiency, didn’t even set aside separate bathrooms — I’d put the toilet dead center.

Foxgame splurged on a whirlpool tub, but even he didn’t make the mistake of adding a second bathroom.

If he had, every member of our board — me included — would’ve mocked him for it.

Kim Daram doesn’t get that sensibility.

“The washing machine’s not great either. It seemed nice at first, but more and more little inconveniences are showing.”

She makes these pointed “to herself” comments so everyone can hear.

“...”

Of course, compared to the old bunker with its own laundry room, this place will always fall short.

She trusted me enough to come here at first, but people’s hearts are tied to their daily comfort.

If life gets inconvenient, they start doubting.

“I thought this place was great, but... after a while, I’m not so sure.”

The final push for her doubts came from the shortwave broadcast.

A clear-voiced female announcer brought news from the Jeon Si-hoon government:

“Today, Leader Jeon Si-hoon’s new government cabinet declared a full amnesty for so-called Jeju collaborators, Jeju committee members, and the puppet lawmakers they appointed. That’s right — Korea will be one again.”

The moment I heard that, I looked at Kim Daram.

She was looking at me.

She tilted her head slightly.

“We didn’t make a mistake, right?”