It is a zombie/virus (if you have watched All of us are dead, you can see the similarities) apocalypse in late 2026, where one scientist had gone way too ambitious to revive his son with a serum. Where he had accidentally created a virus that does bring back the undead, but it gradually makes them change until there is nothing left for you to recognize.

You are in this moment of time, be it a veteran, or a skilled hunter, or a newbie who just heard of the news in their apartment. Your role is up to you, along with how far you take the story.

Small background:

It all started when a scientist, Dr Park, had wished to revive his only son. Who had died from a bullying incident and was pushed off the school roof by one of his bullies.

Dr Park had managed to get to his son while the boy had only a few minutes to live. Dr Park had used some serum which he calls, GSD (G12 system decoder) which was designed to decode the natural human system and biology to help rewrite it. But it was not compatible with his son.

But it had brought the boy back to life. For the first five weeks, Dr Park had documented the progress of his son’s health. On the sixth week, which was late July, Dr Park had recorded how his son had begun craving meat, from tender meat to those that still had blood in them.

When he had reached the seventh week, that was the beginning of August, Dr Park was excited to share his work with the world live as his progress videos were getting attention from big bodies like the WHC (World Health Collation) and local hospitals. During this live recording, he had recorded his son biting into his wife’s neck.

But that manic energy and cannibalistic hunger seemed to have vanished the minute the boy saw his father. Where he began to step away from his wincing mother and walk to his father. Speaking as though nothing happened.

As Dr Park checked the live chat, millions were telling him to run. To kill the boy. But Dr Park did not do that, he simply walked to his wife and for the split second that the screen was on the wound, it began to clot a bit faster than normal human wounds.

Which led to Dr Park calling it the effects of the GSD serum at work. Taking the bite from his son as some violent reaction instead of what it actually was.

When he turned to capture his son, the boy was gone. But Dr Park was elated with the clotting and his wife healing faster.

The escalation:

The boy, who had left home. Simply went out to a party, as a government drone had documented and as CCTV cameras showed.

What many found weird at the party during an investigation. As a WHC official, who happened to have been watching the entire broadcast at the time, had requested to interview the teens at the party.

During the interview "The attendees recalled that he spoke unusually close to everyone, laughing loudly and breathing heavily into conversations. Many assumed he was simply drunk.

Yet, over the span of three days. Most of the attendees had reported to hospitals more often. Many had also began taking up more social sports, which was odd to the officials as they had described themselves to be more indoors and quiet people. More surprising were the types of sports they were involved in.

Most being sports where more people were attending. One introverted girl had reported to the authorities after this strange change. Explaining how she would never go to any football or soccer game. Or by the off chance she did, she never stood so close to people and asked to drink from their cups or share a bite with them.

One of the investigators, a warden in one of the juvenile institutions. Explained how one of the troubled teens went around biting those who called out his odd behavior. Only reverting to a calmer state when a trusted warden was in the room or when one of the other teens acted as though they did not see the teen’s violent outburst.

He referenced the livestream Dr Park had shown, explaining how the boy in the video resembled the troubled teen.

With that report many others came with the same. Bar owners explained how some customers would try to sink their fingernails in the wrist, specifically over the pulse point if denied a drink. Or how nurses explained how some patients acted violently and bit the doctors if they were questioned intensely over their odd behavior and only calming down if a trusted person walks in or when the questioning stops.

After this, well, during some days before mid-August. Most of these infected people began showing more physical signs. Some showed sharper teeth, others, longer fingers, a few showed an arched posture with their heads pointing forward. A rare number looked entirely human and those were the scariest and deadliest.

Unlike the more obvious infected, who still try to act normally, these more human infected have few who openly admit to being infected during testing. Others offer compliance during testing. But what makes these ones the most scary, is their ability to hide traces of the virus in their blood.

The stages:

The first stage is often where the individual is feverish, a bit sickly for a good week. This stage is perfect to administer the antidote. Which is highly effective in this stage and can stop the infection.

Which WHC had forced Dr Park into making, though the Dr could do so willingly as he was still elated with his GSD serum. The only push he had to making the cure was watching his son, who had reached a monstrous stage and appearance, consume his wife and friends.

The second stage is where the abnormal features appear and where their craving for meat is still manageable. This stage is advised to keep wounded humans from the infected during this stage. As their instincts often override their secondary instinct to protect or default to normalcy around other non infected.

The cure is still advised to be given during this stage, though any deformaties would remain long after the cure.

Stage Three was initially believed to be terminal. This assumption proved incorrect following the continued mutation of GSD.1.

it is a stage that even the mimics cannot contain their human appearance much longer and where the infected become mindlessly aggressive and begin to emit the scent of decay,

The reason it was not considered the final stage, is because the first infected, had bloated up to monstrous size and targets many populated zones alone and emits a scent that seems to infect people, though not as much as saliva or blood does, the person is still at risk of becoming one of the infected if not treated well.

The son, or, the first infected was named after the serum that started it all. He is, GSD.1