The Villainess and I, her Zombie

"How about no?"

*BOOOOOOOOOOOOM*

The blue undead scoffed at the approaching deformed goblins and launched himself straight up, disappearing in the thick fog above the fort with no trace whatsoever.

"Wh-where he go?!"

The mutated goblin-like creatures growled frantically looking around.

"Stay formation!"

Champions kept them all in check, although they were just as much confused and confounded as their underlings.

The blue undead knight appeared out of nowhere, killing a staggering amount of their troops, and then, just as it looked like they would have an actual chance to counter-attack, he just went and backed off?!

No.

The creatures instinctively knew that the blue undead didn't leave them alone and that he will be right back - the only hope all - even the champions - had, was that their commander will be able to continue spawning enough new troops so that they would not be the ones facing the opponent like that.

They regrouped and reinforced their defensive positions and waited, attentively observing the surroundings and trying to pierce the thick mist in front of them with their beady eyes.

---

Meanwhile, somewhere above the goblins fort, the blue undead was slowly losing the speed of his ascension, while pondering about his next step.

Which magic would be the best?

Of course, holy magic was out of the question - even though he had the resistance about it, that did not overwrite the natural weakness of his species and pointless self-harm wasn't part of his battle tactics – as hard as it was to believe.

Similarly, with fire - the only reason it had the bonus points was because of the affinity with his mount - which apparently must have been Baron, as no one else had fit the bill, considering that the class that Zombie received, was called Dragon knight, and the mount had an affinity with it.

Yes, fire was Baron's element, but it certainly wasn't Zombie's - it was the second most effective method of getting rid of the pesky undead from the caverns and crypts hence that the adventurers used - the probability of setting himself on fire during the everyday life was already extremely high and it was with no additional sources of flames.

That left him with the remaining four.

Though, honestly, the choice was already made, right?

Even though the air, water, and earth might have been good too, the blue undead had no reason to pick any of them up - the promise of the bonus points was far too promising to let it pass - besides since the knowledge of magic was a requirement for one of his higher-ranked formes, wouldn't it be appropriate t stay in the same theme?

"System, I chose death branch."

The blue undead spoke out loud just as the force of gravity started claiming him back.

/Death branch of nature magic selected\\\\

/You receive subclass: Death magician\\\\

/Calculating...\\\\ 𝐟𝓇ℯ𝒆we𝒃𝘯𝒐νe𝑙.co𝚖

/Your affinity with death granted you two magic spells

Draining touch (level 1)

Mark (level 1)\\\\

The system messages popped up one after another, proving to him that his decision wasn't wrong – after all normally, the magician has to learn the skills for themselves or level up their class – o subclass as it was in Zombie's case – before they will be able to use any spells at all.

"Khahaha! This is fun~ let's see what exactly those two do!"

Zombie couldn't hold back and started laughing while the wind was howling in his ears as he was falling through the fog.

The blue undead's eyes shone with white light and his golden shield began glowing with a slightly off-color white light that seemed almost gray but not quite.

The next moment he passed the thickest fog and the goblin's fort with all the deformed creatures was right there below him – all of the monsters were at the ready and in formation, learned prepared for the undead's return.

"Perfect~!"

Zombie giggled using the emergency dodge and acrobatic skills to make himself stay on target – the strongest champion goblin of the bunch outside that surrounded himself with other champions and at least five dozens of the basic deformed goblins.

Though, even though they were supposed to be champions – so monsters that looked different than a standard creature out of the batch, those ones in the fort were only slightly bigger than the basic kind.

It was an interesting observation, but it could have waited – the ground, not so much.

"LET'S BEGIN ROUND TWO!"

*BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM*

Roared the blue undead knight bashing his golden shield into the champion monster that did its best to counter but failed miserably under the strongest explosion yet.

/Multiple high-level monsters defeated

Multiple mid-level monsters defeated

You receive the EXP\\\\

"UGHAAAAA...!"

The choir of pained voices raised as the shockwave caused by the hit that one-shot a whole bunch of strange creatures while all that survived not only got a concussion and had trouble withstanding up straight but also gained a new interesting decoration – above their bulky heads a burning black flame appeared, pulsating in the rhythm of their heart.

*tump*

"Oh-ho!"

The blue undead landed amongst the green pulp that was still a squad of deformed goblins troops only a second ago and raised his brow, watching at the pulsating black flames wi curiosity.

"Fascinating – the drain had replenished my HP or so it feels, but what will happen if I will kill someone who has been marked?"

*SPLAT*

The blue undead pondered and immediately put his plan into motion, smashing the squishy new troop with his golden shield and sending his sticky remains into the wall of the canteen.

"Hmm... I don't feel much difference, but I think it did something? Maybe it replenished more of my HP?"

*WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM* *WHAM*th

Zombie thought out loud before going wild on the goblin-like monsters, although he actually managed to properly hold back and not mutilate at least some of them.

...too much...

/Multiple mid-level monsters defeated

You receive the EXP\\\\

The blue undead grinned seeing the new but very familiar message and grinned before his shield shone with violet light.

*WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM*

With a strange, buzzing sound the shockwave that erupted froth was actually vaguely violet which allowed Zombie to notice that it was actually shaped like his own shield...

"GHAA!"

"RETREAT! RETREAT!"

/Multiple mid-level monsters defeated

Multiple high-level monsters defeated

You receive the EXP\\\\

Tey dying words of the goblins getting crushed behind the walls of their fort and the violet shockwave shield turned into an entire choir as the attack cleared out most of the forces in one go.

It definitely had to take a lot of mana, but for some reason, the blue undead didn't notice the particular feeling that should e present when a player spent a vast amount of mana at once.

"Hmmm...? Could it be that as long as the monster is marked by the black flames, when I will kill them I will not only recover the HP but MP too? That would be ridiculously convenient!"

Zombie gasped and straightened his back, looking at his shield with approval.

"Khahaha! Kopia, did you see? You were jealous about the swords but in the end, the shield may turn into my favorite equipment while you are sulking~"

"!!!!!!"

The blue undead laughed and spoke to the sheathed sword at his waist – the sword that trembled as if she flinched from shock...

...but even with that taunt, Kopia didn't release her threads that she kept herself sheathed with...

"Oh, come on, I have skills I want to test out! Aren't you curious about Impale? It must be something good since the dragon name didn't overpower it~"

"..."

He added but the sentient sword remained silent as if she was just another run of the mile sword.

"Fine – I do have other skills want to test out after all."

The bleu undead shrugged his shoulders before turning to the former headquarters building which was clearly the spawning ground for the deformed creatures.

"Hey! You there – whoever you are! Keep your troops coming! I love me some more EXP and training!"

The blue undead smirked and shouted, putting his hand next to his mouth to make himself louder.

He called out as another batch of creatures emerged from the inside.

"...?"

Surprisingly enough some of them looked almost like scaly balls because their growths were som overgrown while some had basically none of them and were clearly far more agile.

"Interesting... Are you perhaps adjusting your creation settings in real-time? If I wasn't concerned that there's an odd goblin orgy going on inside I would actually go and check what's going on on the inside!"

The blud undead laughed mockingly while already preparing and unleashing another skill that destroyed the squishy new troops with ease.

"Hmm... I wonder if this whole corrosive breath will affect the buildings or not... do I want to risk it...?"

The blue undead who completely lost the sense of urgency as honestly as long as the new spawns had time to properly 'dry out' and mature even a little bit, their defense was nonexistent.

Zombie went ahead and checked on the life signature pulsating inside the headquarters – surprisingly enough despite pumping out a monster after a monster I did not seem to get any weaker than it was at the beginning.

Though, as Zombie was going to go back to the easy EXP grind, the signature started moving and stood up!

"...huh...?"

The blue undead tilted his head and furrowed his brows, - the part that he took for the torso of the monster turned out to be the creature's head - in which case it meant that its bulbous head was at least five times bigger than its body.

After standing up, the creature started moving towards the exit with wobbly steps without creating new underlings, and after a few seconds, the massive double door opened n full - because that was the only reason for the creature's head to pass through them.

"Eww..."

Zombie furrowed his brows and scoffed in disgust glaring at the creature that appeared in front of him.