Chapter 169 – Jeju Airport

After a long flight, we entered Korean airspace, approaching Jeju Island.

Curious about the situation on Jeju, Yerim and I headed to the cockpit, where there were windows, after hearing that the island was visible.

Looking out from the cockpit, we could see Jeju Island in the distance.

From afar, Jeju looked just as it had in my past life, when I had visited several times during vacations.

There was no smoke or fire, and the forests and villages were intact, not destroyed or burned.

“Jeju seems to be safe,” Yerim sighed in relief as she looked at the island, though it seemed too early to relax.

As the plane descended and flew over a coastal village, we began to see differences from the past.

There were no moving cars on the village roads.

Instead, hastily constructed barricades were set up everywhere, and bloodstains were scattered on the ground.

The village looked no different from the mainland of Korea, indicating that Jeju was not safe either.

“Don’t tell me… here too.”

Yerim’s spirits sank, but I felt somewhat reassured.

“Still, it seems they’re holding on.”

“Huh?”

“There’s only bloodstains, no bodies. That means they’re maintaining enough order to clean up the bodies.”

It was worse than expected, but not the worst-case scenario.

And soon, we found out why the situation here was worse than anticipated.

As the transport plane flew over the coastal village and passed over a beach.

This was Woljeongri Beach, located in the northeast of Jeju.

Of course, there were no vacationers, only an empty stretch of sand.

No, it wasn’t empty.

Corpses were scattered across the beach, and there were even bodies floating in the water.

Moreover, among the floating bodies, some dead were rising from the water and coming ashore.

Zombies were walking up from the seabed to Jeju.

And from the beach houses, smoke rose as zombies coming ashore were shot and fell again.

Zombies whose heads exploded with a single shot, floating on the water.

Just like what we had seen in Japan, Jeju was now fighting zombies that had come from the mainland.

They seemed to be holding the line at this beach, but Jeju was a large island.

There was no way they could block the entire coastline.

Naturally, the entire island had become a battlefield.

Even so, the fact that they had cleared the bodies showed that the people on Jeju were fighting well.

Flying over the beach, the plane approached Jeju Airport.

“Still no contact with the control tower.”

“It’s not a military base, just a civilian airport. There’s no way anyone would still be in the control tower.”

“I guess so.”

As Jeju Airport came into view, the co-pilot clicked his tongue quietly at the unresponsive control tower, and the pilot shook his head at him.

Listening to their conversation, Yerim tilted her head in confusion.

“But didn’t the surviving Korean military gather on Jeju? Then there should be some planes left, right? Maybe even helicopters?”

“Is that so?”

The pilot frowned at Yerim’s words, and she awkwardly brushed off his serious response.

“No, I just thought that might be the case…”

Yerim’s assumption was just her own thought, but this time, she wasn’t wrong.

Shortly after, we saw Jeju Airport, filled with numerous military aircraft.

However, most of those aircraft were no longer operational.

Many had crashed near the airport, turning into scrap metal, and even the few intact planes seemed to have been abandoned.

As the transport plane approached the airport for landing, we realized why the planes had ended up like that.

Countless birds rose from the sea and the airport surroundings into the sky.

The birds that come to mind when you think of the sea—seagulls.

But the birds flying up now were not the kind that would steal your snacks.

Instead of white wings, they had dirty wings stained with black blood, beaks hardened and darkened with blood, and wounds revealing their innards.

They were dead birds. Undead.

Dozens, hundreds of undead seagulls flew toward the transport plane.

A single bird could cause a bird strike, leading to a plane crash, and a plane in the landing phase couldn’t avoid a sudden swarm of undead seagulls.

As the pilots turned pale and frantically pulled on the controls, I turned to call the party members in the cargo hold.

Other planes might not have been able to avoid the undead birds, but this plane had no need to worry.

Because this plane had a mage.

“Yelena! Zahina!”

Not just any mages, but two top-tier mages.

“Shield!”

“Cut them down!”

They were excellent party members who knew exactly what to do just by hearing their names.

Yelena’s shield enveloped the plane, and Zahina’s wind blades rained down on the undead seagulls.

Swoosh!

The wind blades sliced through the seagulls, sending them plummeting to the ground.

The wind blades didn’t cut off all the seagulls’ heads, but they were more than enough to sever their large wings.

The seagulls, now wingless, fell to the ground.

Some of the fallen seagulls might still be able to move, but that was a problem for later.

Since Zahina’s wind blades were cast without looking outside, they didn’t catch all the undead seagulls.

But that wasn’t a problem.

Yelena’s shield protected the plane.

Before the seagulls could reach the plane, they collided with the shield and fluttered around, trying to attack, but soon, they all fell to the ground.

This was thanks to Yerim’s divine power.

Seeing the grotesque undead seagulls outside the window, Yerim had prayed to the gods.

A divine power field spread around her, centered on the plane, and the undead seagulls couldn’t withstand Yerim’s divine power.

As the undead seagulls fell to the ground, the transport plane landed at Jeju Airport.

The runway was mostly intact, though littered with wrecked planes, but the transport plane we were on was capable of landing on aircraft carriers.

After a short roll, the transport plane came to a stop in the middle of the runway.

Once the plane stopped, we exited through the open cargo door.

“They said they’d come to greet us… but no one’s here.”

The co-pilot, who had also stepped out, frowned at the empty runway.

We had come to Jeju because the Korean government had contacted us via satellite phone.

The U.S. government had arranged for us to land at Jeju Airport, the closest airport to our destination, and the Korean government had granted permission.

That’s why we had come to Jeju.

“Looking at the situation, they might not have needed to give permission…”

“Did the people in power on this island lie to us?”

“Whether they lied or the situation just got worse…”

Looking around, it didn’t seem like this had happened recently.

If so, then it was a lie…

If it was a lie, we needed to send the plane back quickly.

“Thank you for your hard work. It’s best if you leave quickly. Are you heading to Japan?”

“Yes. To Misawa Base. The last remaining base in Japan.”

Misawa Base was a U.S. military base located at the northern tip of Japan’s mainland.

The last remaining U.S. military base in East Asia.

It had avoided satellite attacks and, being on the eastern coast, hadn’t yet been attacked by undead coming from the sea, so it was still intact.

But it was unclear how long it would last.

There was no need to tell the pilots, who were using it as a stopover on their way back to New York.

“What will you do after we leave?”

The co-pilot was more concerned about us being left behind at the empty airport.

“Don’t worry. We’ll be fine.”

Having come to Jeju, getting to Daejeon wouldn’t be difficult.

We could search the coast for abandoned boats and sail north.

Even if we couldn’t find a boat, it didn’t matter.

Our party had two mages.

One of them was the daughter of a divine tree, capable of controlling wind and water, so even a makeshift raft would be enough to get us to the southern coast.

Remembering the earlier magic, he saluted us and returned to the plane.

Whoosh!

Shortly after, the plane’s propellers spun, and the plane made a sharp 180-degree turn before starting to taxi down the runway.

As the plane began to move, people who had come late to greet us appeared on the opposite side of the runway.

“Good thing we sent the plane off.”

Yerim sighed as she saw the vehicles approaching on the runway.

It was understandable, as the vehicles were all military, and they exuded a sense of hostility and wariness toward us.

They didn’t seem ready to attack immediately, but the killing intent was unmistakable.

Feeling the killing intent, the party members looked at me.

Their eyes asked if we should attack.

I shook my head.

Even if a fight broke out, we needed to hear them out first.

We needed to know what had happened to make them hostile toward us.

Shortly after, two two-and-a-half-ton trucks carrying soldiers and a tactical vehicle with a mounted machine gun stopped in front of us.

At the same time, machine guns and the soldiers’ rifles in the trucks were aimed at us.

At my instruction, Yelena had cast an invisible shield in front of us, but seeing those gun barrels didn’t feel good.

“Don’t move! If you move, we’ll shoot!”

“Damn it! We should’ve stopped the transport plane! Why did we let it take off?”

Then, the soldier manning the machine gun shouted, and a middle-aged man in a suit who had stepped out of the vehicle expressed his frustration.

The absurdity of the situation left me speechless.

“I’m going to hear it again. Did they really think the plane would land safely…”

The middle-aged man muttered to himself, then gestured toward us.

“Damn it, everyone get in the car. The minister wants to see you in person.”

At the man’s words, a soldier who had also stepped out pointed his gun and ordered.

“Hand over all your weapons and get in the car.”

Still half-dazed by the absurdity of the situation, I finally spoke up at the soldier’s command.

“Hand over our weapons?”

The man who was about to get in the car frowned at my words.

“No, didn’t you say you were going to meet the minister? Are you saying superhumans from another world are going to meet the minister armed? That’s nonsense. The minister made a big concession by agreeing to meet you in person, so you should at least put away your weapons.”

I couldn’t tell where things had gone wrong.

So, I answered the last question first.

“Then, will you also put away all your weapons?”

“What? Are you looking for a fight?”

My answer didn’t sit well with him.

It was a perfectly reasonable statement.

Only because I remembered my past life could I respond so politely.

To help him understand, I repeated myself kindly.

“No. I just don’t understand.”

I drew my sword, returning to my true form—a medieval knight.

“I don’t see why I should listen to you. I have no intention of meeting this minister.”

As I drew my sword, Yelena and Zahina’s magic spread around us.

More than ten fireballs floated in the air, and electricity surged over the tactical vehicle and trucks.

Zzzzt!

The soldiers who had been aiming their rifles stiffened as the electricity coursed through their bodies and collapsed backward.