I'm still alive

I approach the front of the tent made with a layer of crude cloth and quietly lift the door. Then he lifted his eyes and looked in ten million, only the sound of breathing. Quietly, the children are gathered in one place and asleep. A poor facility where even heating facilities do not exist, children in it hugged each other to overcome the chilly cold, soothing sadness and fatigue.

These are the children who followed the hard way for adults to walk. Such children were desperately stockpiling their stamina to walk one more step while adults were busily preparing for their departure, and not to be a burden anymore. I slowly went into it, looking at Eden's children who had matured so early, with mixed eyes.

It's a short time before sunset. During the day when the sun was up, I ran from place to place, leading my sick body, and soon planned the details of the operation tonight with the surrounding boundaries. And only after a moment had passed and the orange twilight hung over the forest was I able to complete everything I could.

Chae-yeon, who was stamping her feet and shaking when she heard that I was hurt, but she swallowed tears alone because she knew I was having a hard time. I came here to see the child for the last moment of the day.

I endured and endured it so much that my hands that sweep down my face are shaking slightly. Although it was only a short time of 20 minutes, I searched for Chae-yeon and the children, turning my eyes to leave a picture in the frame of memory. And the steel implanted in the heart reacted with the child's magnet and naturally turned its head toward it.

'Uh...'

As I approach there quietly, Chae-yeon grumbles and curls up in her sleep. In that small space, Chae-yeon and our children were gathering to share each other's body temperature, with tears on their faces and times when they couldn't wash up.

I walked past the bedclothes carefully so that the children wouldn't wake up. Then, sitting next to Chae-yeon, who was asleep, she lifted the blanket that the child kicked up to her neck.

A swollen face and legs. How hard and hard it was, the children showed no sign of getting up, even though I sat right next to them. It's a pity. My mouth feels bitter. However, I couldn't stop a strangely happy smile from leaking out of Chae-yeon's face, who was breathing softly. The time Chae-yeon met me must have been short enough to feel like a moment in life, but I don't know when it was covered like this. I slowly closed my eyes, turning the child's bangs aside.

'Daddy....'

A small hand that held my finger tightly down from my forehead at that moment. Chae-yeon gently frowned on her peacefully asleep face and gave me strength in her hand holding her finger as if she were telling me not to go. I was startled and looked at her face, wondering if Chae-yeon had woken up, but the child was still asleep.

Maybe he grabbed my hand in his sleep. Chae-yeon turns around calling her dad. Dad. That short word that touched my heart closed my eyes and gave me a deep sigh of remorse.

Chae-yeon calls me Dad and Kang Soo-ryeon calls Mom. Of course the real parents were not me and her. A memory that I wanted to forget. The face of the child's biological father and mother, who died on the road, is as clear as a scar imprinted, and the scene of the day, which was cruel as if everything in the world was falling apart, passes by like a lantern.

Will Chae-yeon remember the terrible sight? No, I thought it would be better if I didn't remember and kept growing like this. You keep smiling like this......... I hope to meet good friends and good people and live happily ever after. I put the memories of the cruel past in my eyelids, and open my eyes quietly brooding over the heart-beating moment that I first met with my child.

I didn't take my eyes off Chae-yeon's face. And I plant that moment of happiness and trembling in my heart at my source so as not to forget it until the moment of death. As time went by, and the time to go out of the tent approached, my hands slowly trembled. The sorrow that makes my eyes dim rises from the inside. I have lingering feelings I have to go, but I can't get my hands off. But let it go for the moment I prayed and prayed for the grey city again. I slowly let go of the child's hand, looking at the ceiling.

He busily moved and began to find the bag that the child had brought. And under the blanket that Chae-yeon was covering, I could find the Kitty bag that I brought out of the goshiwon. The bag that I told you to keep in the park bathroom that day.

Despite countless hardships and hardships, the child did not forget and kept his memories with me. At one point I swept and swept down the dirty kitty bag with my rough hands.

And I put my diary in my bag with the end of this last letter.

From now on, I will finish recording. This record is the last letter I send you, and it's a simple diary and a reference book for the future. The conversation between me and myself in solitude has become an autobiography that has taken a path together with countless great people in a simple escape from reality. And I hope that the diary of the poor man that I wrote in this little diary will be the last button to continue my life even after I die.

I'm still alive.

*

[His diary ended at the end of this chapter. The diary, which even the party expected would have disappeared, was found totally unexpected in Chae-yeon's bag, and we have been writing the book based on the records. And the story recorded from now on is based on the testimony of an old man (real name: Uhm Jae-hyeong) who survived with him.]

*

When I came out of the tent, the orange twilight, which was in full bloom in the sky, was gathering darkness. And in the middle of it was an old man, fully armed, silently looking up at the sky, waiting for me. I took a big breath, and soon I lift up the guns and equipment I put up beside the tent and walk forward. Then the old man, who was looking up at the sky for a long time, turns his eyes to this side and asks

"It was okay to stay longer, but why didn't you wake me up and talk to me?"

"It's all right now."

In 20 minutes now, it's time to gather people and start for the operational area. It took an hour just to get there, so it was not good to delay the time. I slowly look at the old man, rolling my bitter insides in my mouth.

What we have to do at the same time is attack the containment area and escape operations that send people out. The face of the old man who was in charge of the task seemed to be filled with tension as they had to be subtly beaten.

I always lift my hands slowly over my shoulders as an old man does to me, shaking off the burden of heavy loads. And shoulder-to-shoulder with the old man and face the terrible reality accurately. I'm scared, I'm scared. But that's all. The blowing wind hit our faces and we began to move into the dark, where it began to be thickly laid. I ask the old man.

"Did you persuade him well?"

"At first he cried and told me to kill him instead. By the way, Dong-yoon asked who else to leave it to, and he finally said yes. By the way, when did that coward grow up so much?"

The old man moved his steps with a blissful face that was out of time, and I laughed incoherently at the answer, imagining a dragon-pal crossing the street as a naked man for the first time. He seems to have persuaded Yongpal, who has to carry out other operations, as an old man who is controlling his party.

In this operation, our rescue team will be divided into two groups, Team A, Team B. Team A will lead the guards who actively supported the school and attack the blockade area. And Team B leads the escape operation, eliminating the risk of remaining on the smuggling route, and safely sending people out.

Each of the group had experience leading the residents in Eden, so there was a belief that dividing them into these two groups would do their part enough. And it was now the Yongpal brothers, the mainstay of the strong survivors, who took the lead role in Team B, which included Park Da-hye and Kim Hye-jung and office radio personnel.

"Leader of the group."

As I walked in contemplation, I arrived at the vacant lot. Then he lifted his head gently at the sound of calling me, and made eye contact one by one with those who had gathered in the vacant lot and were looking this way with hot eyes. Silence, silence. In the woods where the complete darkness had subsided, the moon was shining down today and the faces of the people were subtly illuminated.

"Have you all eaten?"

At the moment of heightened tension and fear, my first words spread among the people. But those who hear the first words nod their heads with a faint smile as if they knew it would be. The words that I always said first when I stood before them.

Even at this moment, which may be my last assignment, I give my constant routine of regards. And people say they ate with a gentle nod. And the old man slowly comes to my side for the final checkup and tells the group that is hardening their facial expressions.

"As always, speed and teamwork are key to this operation. Team A's goal is to look away rather than kill, so don't overdo it and engage as loudly as possible. And Team B leads the people out of the containment area as soon as Team A sends the radio. Team A has a separate way out, so don't just stand around waiting for us. Okay, Yongpal?"

Yong-pal, whose eyes are still full of water, stands proudly in front of Team B and nods his head. Behind them were Kim Hye-jung and Park Da-hye, who had swollen eyes, and radio personnel who had not seen each other for a long time.

The old man quietly swept his gray hair and checked the gun, as if he had finished his words, and instead, the silver-rimmed glasses that were between the guards walked forward with rare heavy armor.

"The guards are ready, too."

It is a security force that was cut in half by Eden's defense of the wall that lasted for a while and the soldiers' raid last night. But they all applied for the operation without a single dissenting vote, and at this moment they were gathered here to join us in the operation.

The guards, who fought and fought against our party in the early days of Eden, were now hidden and turned into reliable comrades. I nodded and finally made eye contact with people.

There was no vigorous chant or blood-boiling fighting. But without it, I and people can fully understand what each other thinks of each other. An intangible energy that touches the surroundings, it was a bond stronger than blood made by sharing hardships and adversity, and a bond of homogeneity that allowed one to know each other's thoughts without speaking.

I slowly pull the trigger.

Click.

And all the people who gathered here responded, as I did, by pulling the trigger.

*

"Dong, Mr. Dongyun."

On the way to the front of the line, I stopped by the halfway point where the lodging company was gathered. Then Kang Soo-ryeon, who was organizing her luggage with Kim Si-eun on one side of the street, found me and rushed to her arms.

Both my hands, clasping my neck, and my trembling voice, were telling me how much she cared about me. And I, too, embraced her without hesitation, closed my eyes to capture the scent that was coming into my head. Kang Soo-ryeon stammered and said,

"Are we in the lead again?" I'm sick, too, can't I leave it up to someone else?"

Of course, they did not inform the residents of Eden of the existence of Team A on the grounds that the old man may cause guilt and confusion. Of course, the same was true of Kang Su-ryeon and other hostesses, and thanks to the rescue workers who had been keeping their mouths shut for some time, they have been able to keep it a secret so far. Kang Soo-ryeon continued to feel my wounds and shook her hands bitterly until this moment when she had to go quickly.

"Sorry."

But I could only say a short apology to her. Knowing that there is a team A heading to the extremity, she would scream, "You can't die." I feel a terrible dilemma that I have no choice but to deceive the truth for her and Chae-yeon.

And when I see Kang Soo-ryeon crying that she is not my apple, I feel that the steel planted in my heart is hardened through tempering. What I wanted to protect, and why I live, I was not confused anymore.

I made a promise to meet her outside again and moved slowly along the never-to-be step. The eyes of the residents who are fixed to me every time I move. There was a bright glow in the eyes of hope that had long been forgotten. It's dark; it's foggy. The far-sighted lighthouse, which exists on an invisible sea, only imbues the purpose of wanting to live.

One, two, three. The more I moved my steps, the more and more people began to follow me quietly. The beginning of an operation that one knows without speaking. The silence and stillness that informs it pass by us with a Sinabro like the sound of the wind blowing. I was in front of him, and now there was nothing in front of me. The fear disappeared when the fist was tightened.

After dark comes a brighter dawn.