Hiding a House in the Apocalypse - Chapter 30



Only Krnovel

25. Sea Monkey Papa

I have never raised an animal.

Having spent a long time in a place where I couldn’t keep animals and having to deal with mutations often, I didn’t have a positive view of animals.

In reality, none of the hunters with war experience raise animals.

Meanwhile, in our community, a small number of users raise animals.

Those who actively raise animals are friends who have chosen group survivalism.

Anonymous424: Our dogs

Dies_irae69 : Go see our dogs

These guys, who form groups with like-minded friends or family, tend to dominate a fairly large area, focusing on houses exposed to the outside rather than bunkers.

Because there are so many mouths, food reserves cannot keep up with consumption, so farming is necessary, but farming inevitably requires large areas of land.

Well-trained dogs help secure a large territory.

They can be used to establish boundaries, to intimidate and drive out outsiders, and in some cases, to be used in combat.

But their love didn’t last long.

Dies_irae69 : My dogs. I killed them all······. With my own hands······.

It can’t be helped.

Not killing an animal that has started to change through mutation is no different from committing suicide.

As such, raising animals in a time of destruction requires a certain level of determination.

If you are prepared to kill the transformed animal,

Or maybe you have a greater determination to embrace a transformed animal.

Here’s someone with a bigger resolve.

He raised a sea monkey.

*

It was when I was becoming more accustomed to life in the era of destruction and began to accept destruction as a part of life that I came to know about Sea Monkey Papa.

Even at the beginning of the war, I was pretty tight.

They would stand by for hours with guns drawn, checking their equipment to a degree bordering on paranoia, even if there was only a suspicious shadow on the horizon.

It seems that the days were long since I experienced destruction for the first time as an individual and not as a hunter.

As time went by, I became accustomed to the changing circumstances and gained experience, which made me more relaxed.

It was around that time that I, a community lurker, started writing.

At that time, Sea Monkey Papa was an unpopular user with similar tendencies to me.

I try to attract attention by being creative, but I don’t get the attention I put in.

In my case, I was just unlucky, but Sea Monkey Papa had the wrong route from the start.

Who in the world would feel cute or touched by something like a sea monkey?

Most people who first saw his post clicked on it because they were curious about what the heck a Sea Monkey was, and when they realized that the Sea Monkey was nothing more than a flea in a tank, they clicked the back button without a second thought.

The official name for sea monkeys is brine shrimp, and they are literally shrimp-like.

Because they have strong adaptability to the environment, don’t die easily, are not difficult to raise, and are very active, they were in the spotlight as ornamental animals in the late 20th century, but they quickly lost popularity and are now relegated to the status of mortal beings that children raise for a short time as educational materials and then kill them all or flush them down the toilet before they die.

Sea Monkey Papa was an expert at editing videos, and in each video he uploaded, he included detailed explanations and breeding information, trying to spread awareness of the existence of Sea Monkey, which we are not very familiar with.

He used exclamation marks with great frequency.

Of course, popularity is at the bottom, but Sea Monkey Papa seems to know this fact and has prepared a masterpiece.

It was a combination of several tedious and technical tasks.

Feeding the sea monkeys glow-in-the-dark food to make them glow in the dark, carefully adjusting the lighting so that the poor camera can capture the sea monkeys’ appearances without blurring them even in the dark, beautiful new-age classical music, glowing sea monkeys swimming, multiple angles, slow motion, elaborate subtitles, and an excessive amount of exclamation marks.

A video of the painstaking process of putting these things together was posted on the bulletin board.

SeamonkeyPAPA: “danse en groupe”, a magnificent and magnificent nighttime dance by the self-luminous sea monkeys

I was about to post something around the same time, so I clicked on his post, and SeaMonkeyPapa added an awkward comment, saying that he invested a full 18 hours to film and prepare the video.

18 hours.

My video only took a minute.

It’s amazing sincerity.

As always, reality is harsh.

If we were to reenact that scene, it would probably feel something like this:

unicorn18 : Red Archive Hotaru-chan.jpg

SUNBI: The squeaky buttocks of a hot western woman

SeamonkeyPAPA: “danse en groupe”, a magnificent and magnificent nighttime dance by the self-luminous sea monkeys

Defender: Authentication

Anonymous118: Super Maria no-installation executable version

SKELTON: (Skeleton Video) Skeleton’s Beatbox (3)

If you just look at the titles, the scenery isn’t much different from now.

But when you click on the View Count feature, the dark truth is revealed.

unicorn18 : Red Archive Hotaru-chan.jpg (22nd)

SUNBI: The thrilling buttocks of a hot western wife (Episode 93)

SeamonkeyPAPA: The magnificent and majestic nighttime dance of the self-luminous Seamonkeys “danse en groupe” (8th episode)

Defender: Authentication (232 times)

Anonymous118: Super Maria no-installation executable version (1,023 times)

SKELTON: (Skeleton Video) Skeleton’s Beatbox (3) (5 times)

Yes, that’s right.

The number of views for Sea Monkey Papa’s masterpiece is only 8.

Only 8 times.

That means you invested 18 hours and only got 8 views.

Considering that one user can post multiple times, this means that less than 8 people clicked on his post.

Even if I were Sea Monkey Papa, I would have despaired.

Let’s say you can lose to named players like Defender or Anonymous118 (now Foxgames).

But it doesn’t make sense that the number of views is so far behind that of a vulgar butt bone that was uploaded after about 10 seconds of thinking about it and saved in a dirty folder by a now deceased scholar.

Even though I won against Skeleton, that won’t be much of a consolation.

Maybe that’s why.

Sea Monkey Papa seemed to be in deep despair and hardly posted anything after that.

Sometimes all I do is react to Dragon’s comics.

While I was transforming from an unpopular user to a notorious user, he remained a vague user whose presence was vague and not easily recognized even when he disappeared.

Time passes and it is now Christmas time.

Sea Monkey Papa suddenly created a popular post.

SeamonkeyPAPA: The seamonkeys have grown up!

The moment I read his writing, I found myself muttering to myself.

“You’re alive.”

What is more than that?

The title feels strange.

I clicked on the article out of curiosity.

“······?”

A sight that was hard to believe even after seeing it unfolded.

The place was a reservoir.

It didn’t look much different from the reservoirs around my area, but in the dark, murky water, something large, white, with red eyes and a long tail was squirming.

SeamonkeyPAPA: At some point, our babies suddenly grew so much that I couldn’t handle them anymore, so I put them in a reservoir, and before I knew it, they had grown this much haha

I saw it for the first time.

Mutations occurred in primitive animals like sea monkeys.

There is a description in the Kyledos webtoon that crayfish turn gray-white, but it is probably just a cartoonish pretense. To human eyes on a gray-white land, everything appears gray-white.

Mutations occur only in higher animals that have a brain, a spine, and breathe through lungs.

In China, I have seen giant rats, cats, dogs, and pigs, but I have never seen giant cockroaches or civets.

But that common belief was completely shattered by a single photograph.

The identity of the child-sized monster swimming around the reservoir with its many disgusting legs and long tail is unmistakable.

It’s a mutated Sea Monkey.

“······.”

I hesitated for a moment.

Should we report this shocking discovery or not?

The fact that mutations can spread to such lowly animals is a thousand times more serious than cracks or monsters.

This means that perhaps humans could be destroyed by mutations before the cracks or monsters.

Right now, my only connection is Woo Min-hee.

I don’t really want to get involved, but this isn’t something the principal should get involved in.

Personal identification number: REDMASK

This is the first time that Kim Da-ram has been contacted using his personal identification number since he disappeared.

As before, Woo Min-hee received calls one after another.

One of the few good things about her that is made up of flaws.

“Oh my. Senior. What’s going on? Your side is looking for me. I thought you’d never contact a bad kid like me. Why? Did you run out of food or something?”

It’s still the same when it comes to irritating people.

“···A mutation has occurred in invertebrates.”

“Invertebrates?”

“Yes. Invertebrates. Something like shrimp larvae.”

“Sea Monkey?”

“!!!”

For a moment, a very dangerous assumption flashed through my mind.

“······How about that?”

“How could you? I was just wondering. I raised a sea monkey when I was in elementary school. They all died, though. I just suddenly remembered. Is there a problem with the sea monkey?”

“I found out that the sea monkey has grown huge. It’s a mutation. I’m sure of it. Mutations are occurring in invertebrates too.”

“Oh, really? Thanks for telling me, but I already knew that.”

“okay?”

I knew I had a big gap.

But it seems the gap was bigger than I thought.

It seems that my shock was normal for her.

“Anyway, I have something to do right now.”

Beyond the speaker, a dull thumping sound could be heard.

Is it at the dock?

I’m curious about what you’re up to, but we’re not close enough to ask about personal things.

Strictly speaking, our relationship is a bad one.

“Merry Christmas.”

“Senior. Isn’t it too early? There are still three days left?”

“When will you contact me?”

“That’s right. Merry Christmas to you too, senior.”

I hung up the phone and took a moment to catch my breath.

I thought back to the conversation we had just had.

What I remember most is Woo Min-hee’s immediate response, “Sea Monkey?”

“······.”

Surely, it could be a coincidence.

Probably so.

I want to believe that.

But we can’t let our guard down.

Woo Min-hee is a guy who has always liked things like communities.

Actually, I was the type of person who didn’t even enter group chats.

But while I was contacting Woo Min-hee, there was chaos on the bulletin board.

Defender: No, just kill them all. They look dangerous, don’t they? They’re called mutations.

SeamonkeyPAPA: Shut up, you murderous bastard who grew up without a parent! What kind of uneducated, low-class bastard are you to tell me what to do? That’s my kid! I raised him! That’s my kid!

Defender and Sea Monkey Papa.

The collision occurred between two users who had no contact with each other.

As I watched the keyboard battle between the two, I was filled with wonder.

What should I say?

Break it a little.

Until now, I thought of Sea Monkey Papa as a quiet, respectable middle-aged gentleman who just liked Sea Monkeys.

His voice was also gentle and had a mature feel, giving off a strong intellectual vibe.

The bunker, which was brightly lit, also looked quite spacious.

I thought he was a leisurely professional in his early to mid 50s.

However, the true face of Sea Monkey Papa revealed in the keyboard battle was completely different.

Rather than saying it’s ugly, I’d say it’s childish.

He spewed out a torrent of vulgar and degrading swear words that I would never want to put into words. 30% of his swear words were vulgar language referring to genitals, and the remaining 30% were insults to other people’s parents. The rest was filled with exclamation marks that dogs and Sea Monkey Papas love.

I couldn’t just watch it, so I put a profanity filter on it.

SeamonkeyPAPA : Dog**!! Dog****!!! You*****! You piece of shit!******* ******ya! ​​*********!! ********!!

It changes like this.

Defender, on the other hand, responded calmly, but it was a well-known fact that his patience was not very high.

Defender: I’m saying this because I’m worried about you. If you want to lose, then do it yourself. By the way, I wish you would take back what you said about swearing at our parents.

Defender: That reservoir in your picture. I know that reservoir. I think you know where it is.

In that moment, the cold gaze of the Defenders, especially my brother’s, appeared before my eyes as if drawn in a painting.

This is a bit dangerous, isn’t it?

Not just me, but everyone on the bulletin board must have felt this.

Now the Defender is serious.

If I were SeaMonkeyPapa, I would apologize or at least take my hands off the keyboard.

But Sea Monkey Papa didn’t do that.

SeamonkeyPAPA : *********!!!!

“ah.”

Defender: Die?

SeamonkeyPAPA : Dog*****!!!

SeamonkeyPAPA : Dog********!!!!

“This is not it.”

This is way beyond the line.

No matter how much the Defender says he won’t touch his bulletin board friends, this is not it.

I immediately sent a message to SeaMonkeyPapa.

SKELTON: Defender, what you say is right. It’s dangerous. Apologize and end it. Are you fighting childishly like kids?

It’s a kind of mediation.

If Sea Monkey Papa wanted, he was willing to appease Defender.

Whether it’s Miuna or Gouna, I don’t want to see another fellow user and bulletin board user who spent time with us disappear.

After a while, a reply came from Sea Monkey Papa.

Message from SeamonkeyPAPA: *******!!!!

Is that because there’s a profanity filter on it?

Or maybe it’s because what happened to him and the change in his image was so great.

The user who sent me the message didn’t look like SeaMonkey at all, nothing more or less.

Message from SeamonkeyPAPA: No fun, no way, no way.

SKELTON : ********

*

Defender: Authentication

Two days later, the Defender’s post was filled with eeriness and mystery reminiscent of a horror movie.

The Defender used the reservoir as a coordinate and went to find Sea Monkey Papa’s residence.

I don’t know if he’s being sincere or just saying it to make people happy, but Defender was planning to shake hands with Sea Monkey Papa and post a proof of apology there.

The Defenders found the bunker without difficulty.

The door inside the bunker was open, and inside was what appeared to be SeaMonkey Papa’s SeaMonkey set, an old laptop, and other miscellaneous equipment.

But, Sea Monkey Papa was nowhere to be seen.

It wasn’t just Sea Monkey Papa.

Inside the bunker, the shadow of poverty and deprivation hung gloomily.

Defender: That human, they’re almost out of food and supplies. Judging from the state of the boiler, it looks like they haven’t lit a fire or heated the place for a long time. It’s brave of them to even write on the bulletin board.

The only food the Defenders found on Sea Monkey Papa was a week’s worth of moldy dry bread, two boxes of soju, and half a bottle of 17-year-old whiskey lying on the floor with the lid open.

Defender remembered the certification that Sea Monkey Papa had uploaded and drained the water from the reservoir.

To kill all those disgusting mutations.

When all the water was drained, there wasn’t a single sea monkey left.

In the muddy mud, a corpse with bones lay at attention like an exclamation mark.

A carefully crafted subtitle came to mind, saying that sea monkeys will die if placed in fresh water.