Family Faked Zombie Siege, So I Fed Them Zombies

In my last life, to strip me of my place as the Henson heiress and make it look legitimate, my parents, my fianc, and my adopted sister staged a fake zombie siege, meaning to make me lose my mind in front of everyone.

They never imagined their little performance would collide with an actual outbreak.

Only when my parents shielded my adopted sister and shoved me out to hold off the zombies did I finally learn the truth. Lucia Henson was the Hensons' real daughter.

And I was the stand-in they'd carried home as a child, the fake heiress kept around to take every blow meant for her.

When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn to the days before the four of them ever staged that scheme.

This time I would strike first, and make the four people who ruined my life pay.

When I came back to myself, I was still at the Henson company, working through the next investment project.

The next moment my phone rang. It was my adopted sister, Lucia.

"Sis, Mom's been saying she doesn't feel well these past couple of days. I want to take her to the hospital for a checkup."

Hearing those familiar words, my hand froze around the phone.

I had lived this scene before.

In my last life I'd thought it was nothing, just an ordinary little thing. I never knew it was the first step into their trap.

"All right. You take Mom in first. I'll come find you once I've wrapped things up at the office."

"Okay."

The second I hung up, I stopped every one of the company's partnerships and started pulling the cash flow back in.

Not long after, Secretary Finch rushed into my office, drenched in sweat.

"Mr. Henson, the partners are blowing up our phones."

"Don't panic. Anyone owed compensation gets it. From this moment on, the company halts every partnership. We're moving to put all of our shares into Fox Pharmaceuticals."

My words rooted Michelle Finch to the spot. For a long moment she couldn't believe what she'd heard.

But I knew exactly what I was doing. I had to do this, even if I had to swallow every loss the company took.

Because before long, this city would fall. It would become a real-life version of Train to Busan.

Remembering the moment in my last life, when the Hensons pushed me into the zombies with their own hands and I was eaten alive, bite by bite, only made my resolve harder.

"Even if the company goes under, I'm investing in Fox Pharmaceuticals."

"But the chairman will find out for sure."

"Don't worry. He won't come after me."

Michelle still had her doubts, but she had no choice except to do as I said.

Watching her hesitate, taking one step and glancing back three times, waiting for me to stop her, I had to give her a push toward the door.

"Go on, hurry. One day you'll thank me for what I decided today."

Fox Pharmaceuticals was only a small company right now, but they held a piece of research that would decide whether humanity lived or died.

The serum for the zombie virus.

Not long after, Douglas Henson's call came through.

The ruthless look on their faces from my last life, the moment they shoved me out to die, still hung in front of my eyes.

I had known since I was small that they didn't like me. In this house, every scrap of affection belonged to my adopted sister, Lucia.

And me, I only had to do one thing wrong to earn cold looks and the sting of a rod.

I told myself it was the strict grooming an heir to Henson Group had to endure, that all of it was the duty and the tempering that came with being the Henson daughter.

It wasn't until the last moment before I died that I understood I had spent my whole life as a puppet on their strings, and the family bond I'd treasured was only ever a joke to them.

All because I wasn't their real daughter.

My hand shook as I answered, and the familiar cursing poured out of the receiver.

"Edna Henson, what do you think you're doing! Your mother's in the hospital and you can't even show your face? What, you think you can use the company as an excuse and forget everything your mother and I did to raise you!"

Before, they'd been afraid I was an ingrate who could never be tamed, so they used family duty to press me down at every turn.

On their birthdays I had to kneel and kowtow in gratitude. At meals I had to invite them to the table three times before they'd sit.

Hearing the old, familiar blame, I couldn't help a small laugh.

Plenty of the old staff at the company were his people. I'd halted partnerships on that scale, and there was no way he hadn't caught wind of it.

But he didn't mention that "big deal" at all. Instead he leaned on my mother's fake illness to put pressure on me.

"I know, Dad. Things are a mess at the company right now. When I have a free moment I'll go see Mom at the hospital. Let Lucia stay with her for now."

"By tomorrow at the latest, you go to that hospital and see your mother!"

The line went dead, and I looked at the phone and smiled.

Even when I said to his face that the company was in chaos, he didn't ask a single question.

Right now he'd love nothing more than for me to blow something up at the company, so he'd have a clean excuse to push me out of the Hensons. But I had no intention of giving him what he wanted.

I reached the head of Fox Pharmaceuticals and told him I wanted to invest.

"We're only a small company, and what we research isn't something anyone believes in. Besides, investing in something like a serum, does your head of the firm really not need to get his head checked?"

Maybe they'd been mocked one too many times, because his words came out sharp.

"You can think my head's broken if you like, whatever you want. I can put all my capital into you. But I have conditions. I need you to mass-produce the serum to the fullest extent, build a fortified shelter, and stockpile as many supplies as possible."

After hearing my conditions, he was silent for a long time, and in the end he agreed.

Maybe he took me for some rich heiress out to amuse herself at their expense, but I didn't care.

Once the apocalypse came, everyone would think only of staying alive. No one would spare a thought for details this small.

With the survival plan settled, I finally had my hands free to deal with the Hensons.

I thought it over, then called Douglas.

"Dad, I'm heading to the hospital to see Mom now."

"Hold on, don't rush. Lucia got your mom a good-luck charm and left it at the house. Swing by home first and grab it."

"Okay."

In my last life, this was exactly how they lured me back. They already had the whole show staged and waiting for me.

I played along, acting like I knew nothing, and went home. The drive back was ordinary, right up until the moment I was about to leave again.

Downstairs erupted. Screaming, tearing, cries for help, rising over one another.

I walked to the balcony and looked down. Zombies were already loose in the complex, blood and bodies everywhere.

I dialed Douglas, letting my voice shake.

"Dad, there are zombies in the complex. I don't dare go outside."

His voice was strained around the pleasure he was hiding, forcing out anger as he roared at me.

"Your mother is in the hospital and you're joking around with me? If you really don't want to come see her, then I'll pretend I never had such an ungrateful daughter. You don't need some clumsy excuse!"

I took a sip of water to wet my throat, then kept going, keeping the terror in my voice.

"It's true, Dad. There's blood all over the complex, and dead people. I'm so scared. How is it on your end? Are you and Mom and Lucia still safe?"

"Edna Henson, you are a heartless, ungrateful wretch. All those years your mother and I spent raising you, wasted. Now that you're grown, now that your wings are strong, your mother lands in the hospital and you can't even come once!"

"Dad, I really am not lying to you. Why won't you believe me!"

"Enough. I've sent Justin Farley to pick you up. If you still won't come, don't blame me for cutting all ties between us as father and daughter!"

Douglas hung up in a fury, and I sat at home waiting for Justin to come get me.

In my last life Justin did come. They were all in on it together, and they had Justin act out being killed by a zombie right in front of me. When I broke down and told Mom and Dad, he showed up beside them again, untouched, without a scratch.

They'd even set up a livestream, broadcasting every one of my reactions, so that in everyone's eyes I was a woman who'd lost her mind. Then they seized on it to strip me of my status as the Henson heir and cast me out.

Not that it mattered. I was never their real daughter, so throwing me out of the Hensons was only fitting.

It was just that, right before I died, I overheard Douglas on the phone telling someone that I'd already been dealt with.

So being pushed out to serve as a shield against the zombies wasn't his idea alone. Someone had instructed him.

But this time, as long as Justin dared to come, I could make their whole plan fall apart and draw out the person who was really scheming against me.

Not long after, Justin actually pulled up in his car. Looking at that familiar face, something in my chest pulled tight.

In my last life, apart from the Hensons, this man, my fianc through an arranged business marriage, had been the closest person to me.

But he was one of the accomplices who destroyed me too. His heart only ever held Lucia. Every moment with me had been an act.

A knock came at the door, and Justin's voice carried through it, warm and full of feeling.

"Edna, are you okay? Are you hurt? Open the door and let me see you."

"Justin, did you get bitten? It's so dangerous out there. How did you even get here?"

"I came to take you to the hospital, and it turns out everything you said was real. Edna, you can't stay here, it isn't safe. In a minute I'll lure the zombies downstairs away, and you make a run for it and meet up with your dad and mom."

I called out toward the door, frantic.

"Then what happens to you? It's too dangerous, you can't do that. Come inside and hide with me."

I called, but I had no intention of opening the door.

In my last life, the very first infection source had appeared right here, downstairs in this complex.

Back then Justin had gotten lucky. On his way down he never ran into a real zombie.

This time his luck was going to run out.

"It's all right, Edna. As long as you live, I'll do anything."

Then footsteps faded away down the corridor.

I stayed at the window, watching every move Justin made.

Just as I expected, the moment he reached the bottom he started his performance.

A zombie in special-effects makeup lunged from the side and knocked him down. He wailed for a moment, then went still.

The "body" was left for a few zombies to drag off.

But I caught it with a sharp eye. In a corner not far off, a red-eyed zombie stood out from all the rest.

"There it is. The infection source."

I grabbed the car keys and went straight down, slipped into the garage, backed the car out, and drove it right into the crowd of zombies.

I steered close to Justin on purpose, rolled down the window, and put on a show, crying and screaming as if my heart were being torn out.

Once I was sure the real zombie had been drawn over, I hit the gas and drove hard toward Fox Pharmaceuticals.

On the way, Douglas called on video and launched into another round of scolding.

"You ungrateful girl, why aren't you here yet? Going to give me the zombie story again? I'll let everyone see your true colors right now."

"Dad, there really are zombies. Justin was protecting me and got bitten to death by one."

A strange smile spread across my father's face.

"Is that so? Then who is this, standing right beside me?"

The camera swung around. Justin was standing shoulder to shoulder with Lucia, the two of them a perfect match, handsome man and lovely woman.

But right now my eyes were fixed only on the streak of crimson under Justin's collar.

"Is that so? Then I must have been mistaken."

My reaction let them all down. After all, seeing Justin back from the dead, I was supposed to fall apart, to shriek like a madwoman.

In my last life they really had driven me to that. This time, the ones about to fall apart were going to be them.