The Villainess and I, her Zombie

Cranberry raised her brow and didn't answer, instead she patted Zombie's back and nudged him to go for his arm.

"Hey! Answer me for fuck's sake! Did you seriously said that he unlocked the soul devouring ve...nom..."

Laris stepped back pulling the arm away from Zombie's reach.

Well, that would work if he was in his previous form, now, he was slightly taller than the elven mage and when she pulled back, he leaned forward and reached out for his hand.

Lairs didn't want to surrender so she leaned back more but that only made Zombie lean forward even further.

Those actions resulted in the two of them in a rather awkward situation where Lairs was bending backward and Zombie was basically on top of her and their faces were almost touching.

"Graough. (Give me back my hand, please.)"

Zombie groaned with a rather displeased expression.

"...I feel uncomfortable, could you move away a bit...?"

Lairs said in a slightly higher pitch than usual while a drop of sweat appeared on her forehead and her legs and back trembled from the strain.

"Graough. (You made my master uncomfortable, so no.) Graough (Please, return my hand. Now.)"

Zombie responded calmly.

"Wh-what did he say...?"

Shanks nervously asked Cranberry who slouched a bit to hide her chest.

"Zombie, she wants to know if your venom is the soul devouring venom. Bite her so she'll learn."

The red-haired girl's response was ice-cold and made all the adventurers flinch.

"Graough. (Fair enough.)"

Zombie nodded and opened his mouth.

His eyes started glowing and he lowered his head aiming for Lairs's neck.

"What the fuck?! No! Stop!"

Lairs screamed and lost her balance, ending up falling on the debris.

Zombie casually took his hand out of her hands and returned to his master's side without actually biting the female elf.

"Graough? (Master, can we go back already?) Graough... (Let's just leave the clean up to them, as always...)"

Zombie tugged on Cranberry's dress and growled like a sad puppy.

His master looked at him and sighed, but the trained displeased look got ruined because she couldn't help but smile at him.

"Ha ha! Seems like only the appearance has changed."

She laughed and grabbed Zombie's hand.

"Let's go back. We've spent enough time here already, you can just report that you found no survivors and that the cause of the incident is unknown."

Cranberry's face changed into an indifferent mask as soon as she looked away from her servant and faced the Dandelions.

"Or just make up some story. Something like, probably one of his slaves went berserk and destroyed everything, or something. Your choice."

She shrugged and lead the sulking Zombie to the carriage without waiting for a response from the adventurers.

Uresha and Rotte helped Lairs get up, though they still had to support her because her legs refused to cooperate after the scare.

"Say, that whole devouring venom, I never heard about such skill. Is it that dangerous?"

Shanks picked up a bag of loot they collected by chance while searching for the arm and carried it to the carriage.

"If that fucking bitch isn't lying and it is a soul devouring venom, then we better cut off our ties with them."

Lairs, pale as a sheet, lowered her head and nervously checked if the Master-Servant duo isn't listening.

"Humans shouldn't know much about it since it's an elven legend."

She took a deep breath and said.

"Once during one of the global events, a young elven tyrant received a title Venomancer and leveling it up, he gained a horrible skill called soul devouring venom."

Even though her words suggested that she was recalling an old fairytale, her face was showing that she believed it.

"Once that venom entered the body of a living creature, it would destroy their soul, leaving only an empty rotting carcass behind."

"Shit! I touched that arm!"

Shanks jumped in panic, took out a bottle of the purplish antidote, and started pouring it on his palm.

"Fucking hell, Shan-shan, relax. Even if it really is the venomancer's venom, it's not a fucking disease, just fucking touching the poisoned body part shouldn't be that fucking dangerous..."

Lairs waved her hand dismissively.

"It's easy for you to talk! I gained a level in venom resistance just by holding it!"

Shanks didn't seem to calm down at all.

"Anyway, though the whole fucking Venomancer event happened a good few thousands of years ago, the fucking fear that the soul devouring venom skill name brings us elves remains the fucking same."

Lairs finished the explanation.

"But the venomancer was your ruler, right? Why would elves...?"

"He was a fucking tyrant. The first ones to suffer under his skill were his very own people."

Uresha asked confused but got interrupted very quickly by frowning Lairs.

"Ah...! I'm sorry..."

Uresha hurriedly apologized and went over to help the panicking Shanks.

"Sounds really rough. But why would an undead like that get such a scary skill?"

Rotte scratched his chin and looked at Lairs.

"Fuck if I know... my only guess is that another global event is coming soon but..."

Lairs shrugged but then she suddenly stopped talking feeling a sudden chill.

She frowned and looked around, she even used her skill, but there was no one alive there aside from their group.

"...there's no fucking way that such a big deal would simply start out of the blue..."

She finished her thought, feeling as if she jinxed something really dangerous.

"We should get going."

Rotte looked like he also sensed something off and grabbed Lairs's arm, pulling her towards the carriage.

"Y-yeah..."

The mage seemed so disturbed that she didn't even protest about being half dragged - her legs still felt a bit wobbly after all.

The whole group was ready to go in less than five minutes after that and Uresha shook the reins to make the beasts move.

"Huh...? The quest was completed...?"

Suddenly Cranberry called out confused.

"So it'll be route a... but what does that mean...?"

She sat back beside Zombie and fell deep in thoughts.

After that brief interruption, the group left without looking back, leaving the ruins behind.

...

But the place wasn't as lifeless as they all assumed.

One of the corpses began moving.

It was the shorter one of the two maids that Cranberry uncovered first, the young maid who threw up seeing the third maid get torn in half.

Her corpse, that was under the body of the older-looking maid, suddenly twitched and opened its eyes.

The eyes glowing with skill.

She blinked a few times and loudly breathed out before the light of the skill went out.

Her face suddenly started looking as if it was melting off and molding into a completely different shape.

Not only her face, her whole body too!

After a while, what crawled from under the other corpse wasn't a short, well-endowed young woman, but a skinny and rather sickly looking girl who had the maid's clothes hanging on her like on a scarecrow.

She could be around the same age as Cranberry and Zombie, but she seemed older than the pair by at least a year or two.

The mysterious girl trembled and flinched, glancing at all the uncovered corpses left behind after the previous group left, and held back another barf.

"...that undead is even better than what Roan has told me..."

She gulped down whatever was forcing its way up her throat and murmured excitedly.

"The elf didn't seem to tell them anything of importance but I should warn father about her..."

The girl frowned and pulled up the sleeve that was sliding off of her shoulder.

"...and I should definitely ask father to hasten his plan... I simply must have her power...!"

She smiled wickedly while combing her thin reddish hair with her fingers which made her look a bit insane.