Against The Ashes || Sim Jaeyun 18+

Warning: this story contains mature themes And is for mature audiences only. You have been warned.

Five years after the world ended, the dead still won't stay down.

They roam in rotting packs-cannibalistic nightmares driven by hunger alone. One bite. One deep scratch. That's all it takes to turn. The living are outnumbered, outmatched, and running out of places to hide.

Sammy has survived anyway.

Alone. Armed. Unbreakable.

She isn't fragile. She isn't hopeful. And she doesn't believe in happy endings. Trust is a luxury that gets people killed, and she's learned that lesson the hard way. She avoids cities, avoids groups, avoids anyone who might slow her down-or stab her in the back.

But rumors travel even in a dead world.

Whispers of a fortified base in Korea.
A stronghold run by seven men who rose when the military fell.
They take in survivors-men, women, children-and turn them into fighters.
Not just to survive... but to rebuild.

Sammy wants nothing to do with them.

Until the dead corner her.
Until she's outnumbered.
Until someone steps out of the chaos and saves her life.

Sim Jaeyun is everything she doesn't trust-dangerous, controlled, and one of the seven men she's spent years avoiding. He believes in structure. In loyalty. In a future.

Sammy believes in survival.

In a world where love is as deadly as the dead, choosing to trust him might cost her everything... or give her something worth fighting for.

Because sometimes, the most dangerous thing in the apocalypse isn't the monsters-
it's the person who makes you want to live again.