End of the World Broadcast

“Hmm, judging by how the space to step is decreasing as we go, it seems we’re almost at the section where food was sold.”
Broken and damaged items and corpses filled the floor, making it impossible to tell which places were safe to step on and which weren’t.
Thinking it was meaningless to look for empty spaces on the floor, I raised my head and looked up at the ceiling.
Hoping that the sensation I felt under my feet was anything but human.

“By the way, given this condition, I’m not sure if there will be anything left to eat.”
Clearly, until just now, I had confidently said that places like this would have more food compared to convenience stores or small shops.
But being in a place where looking anywhere makes my chest tight and my head complicated, I’m gradually losing confidence.

“Still, there should be some preserved food… maybe a few bundles of canned goods?”
In today’s world, there are only a few types of food I can eat without worry.
If I had to pick the most representative ones, they would be completely sealed canned goods that have escaped the flow of time, and solid preserved food made by connecting several small cubes like a stick.
Occasionally I pick up pills that claim one pill can replace a meal, but unfortunately, perhaps because they were for dieting, while they do give a feeling of fullness, they don’t provide strength to the body like real food does, so they’re not suitable as food supplies.

“If after all this trouble, the shelves are empty or only rotten food remains, I’ll really want to cry.”
Actually, even canned goods and preserved food can only be stored relatively longer compared to other foods; they’re not completely free from the effects of time, so I don’t know if they’re truly ‘intact food.’
That’s one reason why I bother to heat canned food that could be eaten cold.
But since I haven’t had any major physical problems from eating them so far, and if I can’t eat even those, there would be absolutely nothing to eat in this land where not even a blade of grass grows, so I have no other choice.

“I need to move my legs a bit faster. If the shelves are empty or only rotten food remains, I’ll have to hurry back to the mart I visited before.”
Although the city has become unfriendly to wanderers in many ways since the electricity was cut off, fortunately, there are still signs in the mart that I can see and follow.
Following the pillars that kindly inform what is sold here, I walk past numerous shelves and step into the food section.

“Good. Looking at the scale, it would be more strange if there was nothing to eat. Let’s quickly gather what we need and quickly leave. While it’s nice not to be covered in snow and wind, I still don’t want to stay in a place like this for long.”
Shelves that would be about three stories high in an ordinary building stretch out beyond the sign that says ‘Food.’ Actually, at this scale, it would be more accurate to call it a district rather than a section.
Although it has lost its past glory with most shelves now empty and the surroundings in utter chaos, the scale is so large that I could still see boxes remaining here and there.

“Among those boxes, surely there must be food I can eat? This is somewhat exciting. This time, I hope there are delicious canned goods.”
To thoroughly look around the shelves up to the highest points would take about half a day.
People watching the video might say I’m taking too long when I just said I would quickly gather supplies and leave.
But being able to gather food that would last for days, or even more than a month, in just half a day is a miraculous thing from my perspective.

“Let’s start from the top!”
With a broad smile, I took out a long ladder that had been buried under corpses and hung it on the shelf.
It was an extremely enjoyable shopping time.

“Hah, I think I’ve looked around most of it now. It was a fairly successful shopping trip, wasn’t it?”
As I expected, there were quite a lot of foods I could eat here, including canned goods.
Beyond individual or bundled items on the shelves, there were even cases where an entire large box was filled with canned goods.
Of course, without a Ketencrate or Hover Bike, I can only carry an extremely small portion of it, but isn’t it something that I found edible food at all?

“But… it feels a bit disappointing.”
Considering the days when I rationed even a single can of food for fear of running out, this should be a situation where I not only smile but dance with joy.
Ironically, my expression as I looked down at the box full of canned goods was anything but clear.

“It seems even people suffering from hunger didn’t want to taste terribly unpalatable food.”
Uncooked beans. Bread pieces with sardine flavor. Mint pineapple flavored chicken stew. Even unripe insect flavor.
I gathered food from various shelves, but somehow they were all made with extremely polarizing ingredients.

“Who on earth would eat such things…?”
Given that they remain even after the apocalypse, it seems even people from that time avoided these foods.
Even if mass production of various species was possible, was there really a need to make such foods that only a minority of enthusiasts would seek?

“I know, I know. In my current situation, caring about taste or such things is a luxury.”
Initially, I only hoped for any edible food to remain, but now that I’ve obtained various foods, I’m now considering things like taste and quality.

“Indeed, the saying ‘you can fill the sea, but not human greed’ is true. Even though I know that getting delicious canned food isn’t necessarily a good thing, I still feel this way.”
Even if I’m lucky enough to get a fantastic canned food in this situation, I will surely get used to the happiness it brings before long.
After all, taste is just a part of sensation, and sensation is ultimately just a form of knowledge and phenomenon.
Just as magic, which was fascinating at first, loses its interest after seeing it repeatedly, happiness too will become familiar.
Still, as long as it remains, I could maintain a consistently mild happiness, but as everyone knows, food doesn’t appear infinitely.
What if I eat all the canned food I have? What if I then search for more delicious canned food, or at least food of a similar quality, but can’t find any?
From then on, I would suffer eating the dry and subtle-tasting canned food I’m eating now.
Repeatedly muttering depressing words like ‘the one I ate before wasn’t like this,’ just imagining it is depressing.
Yet right now, I’m happy just to be able to warm my stomach even with that dry food.

“Ah. But still, I want to eat delicious food at least once!”
But despite knowing all this, being unable to shake off trivial desires is what makes us human, I suppose.

“Let’s organize the luggage first. My backpack’s been getting skinny lately, but it’s going to get fat again after a long time. I’m a bit envious.”
I put each piece of food I found into the backpack I had placed on the floor to climb the ladder.
It would have been convenient and nice if I could fill it sitting in one place, but unfortunately, because I had wandered around various shelves, I had to move to find boxes I had dropped on the floor here and there.

“By the way… seeing scenes like this often makes me think it’s somewhat fortunate that I wasn’t born in the same time as these people. Although I’m lonely and cold being alone, at least I’m not facing life threats from others.”
Although I’m looking for survivors because being alone is painful, cold, and lonely.
If the people I found were to be suspicious of me rather than welcoming me, or if they were to threaten me with weapons demanding what I have… I think that would be very sad.

“Ah. There are canned goods here too… I see.”
People fallen on the floor often held rotten food or broken appliances.
The inside of the backpack carried by someone who died while looking up at the ceiling was the same.
And the common point among these people was that they had wounds created by others somewhere on their bodies.

“…Seeing how actions taken to survive led to death like this, it makes my heart heavy.”
If they had known that the choice to come here to stock up on food would instead hasten their death, would these people have come here?

“Even though these are items you tried to protect until death… since they are meant for the living, I’ll take them.”
I apologize to those who met their deaths while tightly embracing their bags, and transfer several preserved foods from inside to my backpack.
Muttering quietly that this is an act of lessening their lingering attachments.

“Good. I think I’ve gathered enough. Can you see how fat it’s gotten compared to before? If I use it sparingly, I won’t have to worry about starving for a month!”
My mood isn’t always like this, but generally, it becomes happier or more depressed in proportion to the weight of my backpack.
After all, the heavier the backpack, the more tools I can use and the more food I can eat.
In that sense, my mood right now was extremely elated. If it weren’t for this place, I might have danced with joy.

“Let’s stop looking for food here. Before going outside, let’s visit the electronics section once to see if there are any items I can use, and then look for a place to sleep.”
This place isn’t that bad an environment for sleeping, but still, I didn’t want to fall asleep next to corpses piled like mountains.
It’s as if I’ve become part of them. Because there was a feeling that if I closed my eyes, I might never wake up again.

“There were times when I had to spend a night in places like this because of snowstorms outside. Maybe it’s because of the environment, but every time, I’d have sleep paralysis and nightmares about ghosts…”
Once, I dreamed of walking around a dark street, and unlike usual, the people on the street weren’t lying down but standing straight.
Seeing that, I thought they were alive and approached them with a smile, but no matter how much I spoke to them or waved my hands, they just stood there without moving.
But when I moved, only their eyeballs followed me.

The sight was bizarre and frightening, and as I tried to escape in various directions, hundreds, thousands of pairs of eyes appeared from somewhere, all looking at me and smiling at the same time.
They didn’t make any laughing sounds or make bizarre expressions, but rather, it was their quiet smiles that made it even more frightening.

“At worst, I’ve woken up from a nightmare only to be hit with sleep paralysis, unable to move, crying like a child and begging for help… Anyway, I don’t want to spend the night here, so let’s look around quickly and leave.”
…Still, the scariest part was that I couldn’t tell anyone about such terrible dreams.
Sometimes, when dreams were too vivid, I would think that perhaps I, too, had died just like these people, and was just wandering alone in the afterlife.
In that sense, I can’t express how fortunate it is to have someone to talk to, even if it’s through a drone.
At least this drone, and the living people beyond this drone, are proving that I’m alive, right?

“…Although there’s still no response so far.”
Even though I’ve spent more than half a day in the mart by my perception, the drone still remained silent.

“Isn’t it about time you sent a message?”
I firmly believe a message will come if I wait… but when exactly will that be?
Wondering if keeping the drone on was the problem, I even turned it off and on again, but there were still no new messages, so I questioned the drone directly.
And at that moment.

-There are transmitted messages. Would you like to check them?
“What?”
As if the drone had understood my words.
A voice from the controller announced that new messages had arrived.
With trembling hands, I pressed the confirm button on the controller.
Then, similarly, a translucent window appeared above the controller.

[My god, what are those corpses?]
[Are you filming an apocalypse concept movie?]
[Wait, wait, this is too cruel! Are you okay?!]
The messages that appeared this time were clearly addressing me.

[Is it okay to pick locks like that?]
“But… the timing seems strange?”
To be precise, they were addressing ‘me from yesterday.’