The Villainess and I, her Zombie

With each hit, the golden body of the giant hydra liquidated around the wound and would turn into a hardened golden scab that would not regenerate as soon as the Kopia's fire-augmented blade passed through.

Zombie was using the chance he had – the electric charge of Cranberry's attack had already faded leaving only the aftereffect in form of the paralysis status that would fade in a few more seconds.

The difference between the blue undead shredding every single piece of the previous form of the sigil monster was that he thought that the beast had no life signature.

But, well, that wasn't true.

It was just that before, he expected a truly massive life signature and basically dismissed the tiny little light of the actual body of the monster – of course, that the precious shell that it could create did not count as a living being, how could it?

So now, when the monster was not moving around, the only thing left to do was to get to that golden danger noodle and kill it – which the blue undead was already doing, making use of the gut wrencher skill that Kopia's morbid blade form allowed him to use – and together with Cranberry's fire enchantments stacked on Kopia, cutting through the hard artificial body was as easy as if it was made out of butter and not gold.

The blue undead cleaved and slashed his way through the ridiculous amount of reaches that amounted to the royal avaritia form of the remnant until he finally reached the original body.

"Sss....! (S-stop...!) Ssssss...! (L-lets make a deal...!) Ssssss! (I-I didn't actually want to eat any of you...!)"

The tiny snake was trying its hardest but the effects of the paralysis were still in effect so it could only try to sweet-hiss its way out of the rather unfortunate situation...

"My clothes are almost completely burnt, so let's leave that conversation for your second incarnation, alright?"

Zombie smiled and nodded his head benevolently.

"Ssss...? (S-second incarnation...?)"

The golden snake hissed in confusion, taken aback by the seemingly kind behavior of the blue undead.

"That's right."

*SHING*

Zombie nodded and cleaved the little snake in half – not only the sigil on top of its head but the entirety of the noodle body – and the heat of the fire enchantment was enough to evaporate both halves instantly before they even got a chance to splash onto the molten gold of the dead shell.

/Sigil monster defeated

You receive EXP

Level up

Level 4 >>> Level 30

All skills and affinities increased

Status points greatly increased

/You receive 289 new quests

/You completed 42 quests

Reward granted

/All conditions met

Do you want to rank up?

Yes/No

Zombie was flooded with a stream of messages before he even landed on the ground, as only the original body of the sigil monster – so the tiny golden snake – disappeared while the entire gigantic shell of the golden royal avaritia form fell to the ground with no trace of life – or disintegration – whatsoever.

And with the death of the sigil monster – the red and black dome disappeared too, connecting the arena back to the outside world.

"..."

Though with the dead silence that befell the baffled audience, the difference was barely recognizable.

*thunk*

"...huh...?"

Zombie gasped as Kopia freed herself from his hand and bounced away, before burrowing herself into the ground to wait for the stacked fire enchantment to end.

*SPLASH*

"UGH...!"

The next moment, a giant waterball smashed into the blue undead almost swiping him off of his feet, not doing that much damage but certainly putting out the fire burning his clothes and hands.

"...you could have warred me, you know...?"

Zombie shook his head like a dog and complained drenched to his core, as he turned around to face Cranberry.

*pomf*

As soon as he did that, the red-haired girl who was already by his side hugged him and nuzzled her cheek against the top of his head.

"I was so worried, you did not have to be so reckless, we would find another way to deal with it..."

The little girl sighed with relief before pulling away from her blue familiar.

"...You reek of burning..."

She complained, sniffing around and her face scrunched up.

"Yeah - having their arms turned into a charcoal will do that to an undead."

Zombie laughed and nodded, showing off his blackened hands – that were actually in a much better state than expected, though that was mostly due to the benefits of suddenly gaining twenty-six levels out of the bat.

"...my idiot..."

Cranberry muttered with a happy sigh.

"Don't worry – I'm fine."

Zombie laughed and patted her back while moving his head around so that he could see the red dragon – who should have suffered the worst damage being bitten by four heads and pinned down...

"(Master! Look! I got stronger! Are you proud?!)"

"...that's my boy..."

But instead of being wounded and pitiful, Baron was standing tall, showing off his glistening wings that seemed to get even bigger than before – actually, the red dragon started looking much sturdier, as now there were visible contours of powerful muscles working underneath his scaly skin – which made Zombie breath out in relief and nod at him with a smile.

"Mom! Mom! I am level 25!"

At the same time, Roan began shouting with excitement, unable to hide his joy, as he ran over to the VIP section of the audience seats from where the queen was watching the show.

"T-twenty five...? Dear heavens – what even was that monster...?!"

"Level 25 without dealing the killing blow?! But there are four of them including the dragon! How much experience did that thing give them?!"

"While we're at it, can someone explain to me where in the world did that dragon even came from?!"

"Who cares about the dragon?! The dragon is a dragon – what in the world is that undead?!"

"What did Greeds feed the little prince for him to be able to hold back such a massive beast while he was still level 1?!"

"Young lady Pride was a caster all along?! I wasn't dreaming, right her casting speed was so fearsome! Was that a skill too?!"

The blond prince's voice acted as a trigger for the audience to erupt into an emotional mess one would expect after witnessing the overwhelming performance of the whole group against the sigil monster.

"Everyone, calm down."

Then it was all silenced by the blond queen standing up and rising her hands.

"We don't have a full picture of what had occurred here – but I promise you that the investigation will be thorough."

|...greedy bitch, she will try to find a way to use this whole thing against us...|

Zombie scoffed internally – but there was no response this time, which only made him more worried.

"To make things even a little bit clearer for the rest of us, I will hire the appraiser we have on hand for today's celebration to appraise the young heroes..."

The queen added, looking around, watching the approving faces of the gathered nobility.

"...who, I'm sure, are all really keen on learning that information themselves."

She finished her sentence with a benevolent smile, staring right at the little blue undead.

|Ah... that's how it will be this time – she realized that I summoned Baron and wants to see what else I can do...|

Even without any response from the sealed overseer, Zombie did not stop thinking to himself, as he glared right back at the avatar of greed.