The Sequel to the Romance Fantasy Was a Zombie Apocalypse – Chapter 84

“Salamander?”

“Yeah, salamander.”

“…Ah, salamander… If you put bacon on top and drizzle it with a vinegar sauce mixed with oil, there’s nothing better as an appetizer, right?”

“…You should just keep your mouth shut.”

With a frosty gaze that seemed to look down at a bug, Esmela quickly silenced the goat-bearded man.

“…”

Her gaze returned to the sky, directed at the flame-wielding dragonman swinging his claws amidst a horde of wyverns.

The idea truly was a trivial one.

Three years ago, on a day when the two were training in the royal palace.

Esmela had just finished her usual mana training, which involved forcibly injecting elemental mana into Lanit’s circuits.

On that day, the mana that Esmela used was infused with the energy of flames.

Lanit then made a suggestion.

“How about using mana mixed with the Flame of Herta for training instead of just regular mana? It might yield better results.”

It was an utterly absurd idea.

The destructive power and persistence of the Flame of Herta differed greatly from ordinary flames.

Injecting that mana into the circuits would inevitably cause not just the circuits but the entire body of the person to burn from the inside out.

Common sense would dictate that she should have rejected the suggestion on the spot.

“Let’s do it right now.”

Unfortunately, at that time, Esmela’s judgment about what was ‘safe’ was entirely skewed due to her involvement in the Zombie Incident multiple times, nearly crossing death’s threshold.

No. Rather, she was also a scholar exploring magic. The curiosity about what result that perilous experiment would bring held her interest.

There wasn’t anything to prepare.

Facing each other again, as Esmela grasped Lanit’s arm and slowly infused the mana diluted with the Flame of Herta into his arm like dropping a drop of dye into a cup of water…

“AAAAAAAH!!!!!!”

Lanit screamed violently and collapsed to the floor.

Only after watching him thrash around madly, rolling on the ground like he was set ablaze did Esmela realize what she had done.

During the hours of his convulsions, she could do nothing but hold his flaming hands and sob.

After Lanit’s fits calmed down, she managed to bring him to his bedroom and lay him down on the bed…

Yet still, the abnormally high heat emanating from his body did not subside even after a week.

Esmela could find no information about his symptoms in her own knowledge or in all the magic books in the vast library of the palace.

Giving up on finding the cause, Esmela devoted herself to caring for him, awkwardly wiping his body with a towel soaked in cold water day and night while he was sick.

Then one morning, Lanit awakened, seemingly fine as if nothing had happened.

When he saw Esmela sleeping curled up by the bed with disheveled eyes, he said, “I’ll step out for a moment, Young Lady.”

He left those words behind and jumped out the window.

Startled, Esmela leaned out the window to follow him and saw a sight…

“Just like that, Lanit, covered in red scales, was flying through the sky with dragon wings made of flames.”

As the end of the memory linked with the present, her story came to a close.

“Is that so…”

From the goat-bearded man’s blank expression, it was clear he hadn’t understood even half of Esmela’s story. Still, she didn’t mind, happily watching her butler slay the wyvern.

“By the way, watching that butler fight like that is just incredible. It’s like watching monsters battle each other…”

“Oh my. I haven’t shown you what ‘truly incredible’ looks like yet.”

“Huh? What else is there?”

“Just wait and see.”

With those last words, Esmela sealed her lips, leaving the goat-bearded man to look up at the sky where the battle was unfolding.

“Now, shall we do a quick check-in here?”

Lanit, smiling leisurely, glanced at the horde of Zombie Wyverns surrounding him.

The number of wyverns, which had been nearly 70, had already dropped to under 30.

On the ground below him lay the torn corpses of Zombie Wyverns in indescribable states.

“…”

The Zombie Wyverns, unable to attack or escape, merely hovered low, moaning as they circled around him.

As zombies craving humans, their instincts urged them to charge at an overwhelming predator regardless of their lives.

“You guys are quite pitiful. If you weren’t zombies, you’d have figured this situation out and fled by now. You should at least run away even if it’s in a disgraceful manner. Right?”

With one corner of his mouth lifted, Lanit mocked them.

“…”

Surprisingly, did they perhaps understand his provocation?

The wyverns, who had been bewildered between fleeing and attacking suddenly seemed to find their resolve, letting out threatening cries and glaring at him with malice.

“That’s right, that’s how it should be. Since you’ve shown me your courage by fighting till the end even if it means you’ll die…”

Suddenly, his mouth began to glow red.

“…I should grant you the fitting end.”

As Lanit tilted his head back and opened his mouth wide, a burning flame surged forth.

Sensing instinctively the danger of that action, the wyverns sped towards him with all their might, but—

With an overwhelming show of force, the Zombie Wyverns were met with the dragon’s breath spewing from Lanit’s mouth, instantly turning to ash without leaving a single corpse behind.

“My, oh my…”

And at that moment, as Lanit burned the wyverns with his breath, the City Guards held their breath, observing the whole battle.

“…Was that, just now, a breath attack?”

Barely pulling his eyes away, the goat-bearded man asked Esmela.

“Yes. That was a breath attack infused with the Flame of Herta.”

“Wow. I never thought I’d see a person transform into a dragon and spew dragon breath in my lifetime…”

“Oh? No, technically right now, his state is more of a half-salamander, so strictly speaking, it’s a salamander breath…”

“Did you all see? That young man just shot out dragon breath!”

Ignoring Esmela’s counter, the soldiers became engrossed in discussing what they had just witnessed among themselves.

“…Well, I suppose this is the level of commoners.”

She gave up on persuading them and turned her gaze back towards Lanit.

“Still, the initial start isn’t so bad. It’s proceeding according to plan…”

Esmela wore a sinister smile and slowly watched Lanit flapping his flame wings as he flew towards her.

“Young Lady, how was it?”

Lanit, feeling the ruggedness of his voice due to his dragon transformation, spoke to her.

“Excellent.”

His first-ever compliment from her. Lanit bowed gracefully as a butler in response.

In a bizarre scene, a human covered in red scales saluted the young lady of the Ducal Family clad in light armor.

However, due to the lingering memory of the earlier battle, the soldiers also felt an inexplicable awe at this scene.

“Is the control of the dragon transformation going well? You didn’t lose your sanity like the first time you transformed, did you?”

“Though my personality seems to have become a bit rough, I managed to control myself fine. It certainly seems that Spinel is effective.”

“Good, that’s great.”

As the two discussed the dragon transformation, Lanit suddenly felt a gaze directed at him and turned his head.

“…”

He immediately noticed that twenty soldiers were staring at him with expressions difficult to explain.

“Seeing this kind of appearance would make anyone scared…”

Interpreting their expressions as coming from fear, Lanit quickly began the process of releasing his dragon transformation.

“Phew—”

Exhaling a long sigh as if to release the heat building in his chest, he closed his eyes and imagined a small fireball igniting near his heart.

Gradually, little by little, the image of the fireball slowly dwindled…

*Flare.*

Finally, as the fire within his chest completely extinguished, a brief gust of wind emanated from Lanit in all directions.

“Ugh…”

Esmela, closest to him, covered her face with her arms and waited for the wind to die down before lowering her arms, and…

“Did I return to my original self properly?”

Before her stood Lanit in his usual form.

“Yes. With that usual lackluster face of yours.”

Despite the exasperating sarcasm, Esmela greeted him with a bright smile.

“By the way, what should we do about those over there? It might negatively affect the surrounding environment, so I think we should cleanly dispose of them…”

Lanit pointed to the corpses strewn on the ground as he asked Esmela.

“What do you mean by that? What a waste.”

“A waste? But there’s nothing we can do with them, right?”

Whether monster or human, once they’ve become zombies, every part of their body loses its value as material.

Skin and flesh rot and should be discarded, and the magic stones embedded in the monsters’ chests also become tainted by unknown toxins, thus lacking suitable applications.

“There’s plenty to gain. We need to take even just a part to show to the market to prove our accomplishments.”

Suddenly, Esmela turned her head towards the soldiers.

“In that regard, everyone, could you gather the magic stones from those wyvern corpses over there for us?”

With a fresh smile, she made a fearsome request of them.

“And if you happen to scratch a single magic stone in the process… be prepared for punishment that fits that negligence.”