"GAHHH!"

One of Weed’s friends screamed in panic as he was pushed down to the ground by a villager—or rather, was, since he had already been turned undead after he died from a bite that gouged out his left eye.

"Get away from him, bastard!"

Weed rushed to save his friend, only to be tackled to the ground by another undead villager, a man whose both arms had been torn off all the way to his shoulders.

He at least managed to block its jaw by shoving one of his swords into its bloodstained mouth to stop the undead from biting his face, yet pushing it off him was impossible.

After all, even though they had already become undead, the strength their bodies gained from the blessing of intimacy when they were alive still remained in their corpses.

Weed’s other two friends cast worried glances at them. They wanted to help, yet holding back a single undead soldier together was already taking all of their strength.

"Argh!" Weed screamed desperately, trying to muster his strength to drive his blade between the undead’s jaws and chop off half its head—until Lu-el’s axe did the beheading for him, causing the undead’s blackened blood to spurt from its severed neck, spraying onto Weed’s face.

"I told all of you, don’t become dead weight and slow us down!"

Glancing in the direction of Kaori grumbling, Weed saw her pull out her silver-white dagger from the undead villager’s head before kicking the undead off his friend, then rush toward his other two friends to kill the undead soldier they were holding back by beheading it with a single slash of her silver-white knife.

"You’re not gonna complain about the blood, are you?" Lu-el said, getting Weed’s attention back to him before helping him stand, concerned that the blood might infect him and turn him undead.

Weed wiped the blood off his face before responding to Lu-el with a different concern.

"Man, I really need to get myself a lover to become stronger."

"With that kind of thinking, you will probably have a hard time courting a girl," Lu-el muttered, offering Weed some advice, followed by a warning, "or get cuckolded by another man."

***

They continued to escape back toward the village east gate.

If it were only Lu-el and Kaori, with Lu-el’s enhanced strength and Kaori strengthening her physical abilities with Mana, they would be able to outrun the undead villagers chasing them.

However, the same thing couldn’t be said for Weed and his friends.

After just a few minutes since their last encounter, another group of undead caught up to them.

"Dodge, you fool!" Kaori muttered before kicking Weed away, then rushing toward Lu-el to dodge the incoming flame arrows.

The attack came from an undead mage girl, flying through the night sky with a dozen flame arrows around her illuminating the severe bite wound on her shoulder, her dress slipping off enough to expose her large breasts.

BOOM!

A dozen flame arrows exploded around them, scattering flames across the ground.

"Shit—my clothes are burning!"

"Roll on the ground!"

"Fuc—It’s not going off!"

"Just remove your damn clothes!"

While Weed and his friends panicked, trying to remove their burning clothes as they began to feel the burning pain through their bare skin, Kaori proceeded to handle the situation.

She grabbed one of Weed’s twin swords that he had dropped on the ground.

Remembering how she couldn’t do anything during their last fight—when Sera flew high in the night sky and threatened to obliterate her and everything with over a hundred fireballs—Kaori threw the sword fueled by anger and determination to beat Sera the next time they met.

"My sword..." Weed cried, watching his expensive sword fly through the night sky and pierce the undead mage’s head, dispersing the dozen flame arrows as it died and fell to the ground.

Seeing Weed and his friends almost naked, with only their underwear and weapons left, Lu-el decided to let them escape first.

"We’ll hold them back as long as we can," he said, despite his instinct telling him not to act like a hero during a undead outbreak event.

"We’re not running away on our own," Weed refused, but Kaori quickly shot him down.

"Just go already before I change my mind and leave you all behind instead!" she said bluntly, with clear intent to do exactly that.

Unable to argue any further, Weed and his friends retreated on their own.

***

"Stay close to me, Kaori," Lu-el said, worried for both of their safety.

He was indeed an avid fan of zombie apocalypse stories, never missing any shows, anime, or movies that premiered every year, like some kind of ritual to prevent a zombie apocalypse from happening in real life.

However, experiencing it in a fantasy world was far more terrifying than he expected.

"We’re not going to die here sacrificing ourselves, so don’t tremble like that," Kaori said, reassuring Lu-el after noticing his trembling hands gripping his weapon tightly.

Kaori then leaned her back against Lu-el, wanting to tease him in return, but she couldn’t playfully embrace him from behind given their dangerous situation.

Before they could be completely surrounded, Kaori and Lu-el charged to eliminate the undead blocking their escape route.

The villagers, soldiers, and adventurers who had become undead were already beyond saving—that was what Kaori explained to Lu-el, and what he could understand from the severe wounds that likely killed them before they became undead.

Therefore, Lu-el swung his battle axe without hesitation, cleaving through an undead villager’s body from its left shoulder through its torso to its right flank, cutting it in two.

Recovering his stance, Lu-el followed up with a wide horizontal slash that split the bodies of two more undead right through their waists.

While Lu-el fought recklessly with brute force, Kaori made sure to watch his back and eliminate the undead coming from his blind spots.

Her Moonlight Beast Fang dagger easily pierced the undead soldier’s armor, stabbing through their helmets and heads before splitting their skulls open, while her Moonlight Beast Claw knife beheaded undead villagers without resistance as she slashed their necks, cutting through flesh and bone.

The instant Kaori mentioned the presence of another undead mage hovering in the night sky, Lu-el grabbed a spear dropped by an undead soldier and threw it mid-air—only to embarrassingly miss his target by a huge margin.

"This is how you throw a spear!" Kaori shouted, once again channeling her anger toward Sera into her attack, hitting the undead mage straight in the head and killing it before it could unleash an onslaught of flame arrows.

"Then how about you help me train my aim after this troublesome event?" Lu-el said, easing Kaori’s anger by implying more than his words suggested.

"Mhm..." Kaori mumbled softly, feeling flustered as she agreed with what Lu-el actually meant.

"Once we resolve the curse of this village," she said before grabbing Lu-el’s hand and urging him to run.

After all, more than a dozen undead mages soon appeared in the night sky.