Apocalypse Villainess? Nah, I'm Nice

To Paige Summers’ surprise, Ben didn’t retreat. He simply raised an earthen barrier, blocking the falling corpses and blood to one side.

’Is he trying to duel the Zombie Leader?’

Paige Summers pursed her lips. She didn’t rush forward, instead observing the situation from the rear while tightening her grip on the crossbow, ready to fire at a moment’s notice.

But just then, an earthen dragon shot up from beneath her feet, swiftly and decisively shoving her against the trunk of a dead tree.

’Ben...’

For a moment, she didn’t know whether to laugh or be angry.

’Since when did I become some damsel in distress he needs to protect so meticulously?’

But in the next instant, she understood why Ben had done it.

The Zombie Leader had already made its next move.

It was no longer the harmless, merely disgusting shower of corpses. A black streak, like a bolt of lightning or a deep fissure, suddenly slashed across the spot where Ben stood. The instant he dodged, a long chasm over two meters deep appeared out of nowhere in the ground beneath his feet. The dirt and rock within it had vanished without a trace!

’It was swallowed by that black streak...’

’So *this* is its Space Ability?’

No!

She immediately rejected the thought. ’This ability must have just evolved. Otherwise, it wouldn’t have kept it hidden last time. In that situation, if it had caught them by surprise, it could have used this move to swallow the members of Bloodfall whole!’

In other words, its evolution wasn’t merely cosmetic; its superpower had undergone a fundamental transformation!

’It’s gone from just storing zombies to actively attacking with its spatial power...’

But no matter how terrifying this superpower was, she couldn’t let Ben face it alone!

Below the tree, the Zombie Leader launched one black attack after another.

Fortunately, Ben’s reflexes and speed were sharp enough to dodge every one. The only result was that the ground became littered with an increasing number of intersecting pits, making it even more uneven.

The Zombie Leader, enraged, intensified its assault!

The black streaks grew larger, expanding to nearly two feet wide and a person and a half long. They struck at Ben from various angles and orientations—head-on, from the side, or slashing diagonally.

Not only had they grown larger, but their color had also deepened.

It was as if small whirlpools were forming within them.

For a couple of seconds, Paige Summers thought her eyes were playing tricks on her. But then she realized they weren’t—Ben’s evasive movements had genuinely slowed. It was as if some force from within the vortexes was tugging at his body!

’This is bad!’

Paige Summers knew she couldn’t confront those attacks directly. If she messed up, she wouldn’t just fail to save Ben, she’d get caught in them herself.

The best solution, then, was to attack the source to stop the threat!

The plan forming in her mind, she kicked hard off the tree trunk. Using the momentum, she was behind and to the side of Ben in the blink of an eye. She raised her crossbow; this time, the three-shot crossbow was set for a vertical volley. At this range, the crossbow arrows would have maximum impact!

Intercepted by her, the Zombie Leader was forced to abandon its attack on Ben. Its black void-like attacks switched to defense, materializing in front of the incoming crossbow arrows.

As expected, the crossbow arrows were swallowed by the void.

But, avoiding the black rift’s path, another three crossbow arrows came flying!

And then three more!

The Zombie Leader was furious. It had been forced from the offensive to the defensive, with no energy left to attack Ben! But it didn’t use its black, devouring superpower on Paige Summers as it had on Ben. Instead, it cunningly ejected the dirt and rocks it had just swallowed, flinging them at her again and again through its spatial rifts.

Paige Summers could, of course, dodge them, but it hindered her rate of fire. The volleys of crossbow arrows she shot at the Zombie Leader were no longer as relentless as before.

The battle fell into a stalemate.

Paige Summers was getting frustrated.

Her crossbow arrows were limited; she couldn’t keep firing indefinitely. Yet so far, she had found no way to close the distance to the Zombie Leader.

The same went for Ben.

Whenever they tried to get close, black vortexes would appear in front of the Zombie Leader.

As for other directions, it was flanked by collapsed walls piled high with earth and stone. Not far behind it was the mountain itself. Sneaking around it silently was basically impossible.

’How can we break through?’

Ben was constantly testing its defenses, repeatedly conjuring thick mounds of earth mixed with rocks and hurling them at the Zombie Leader.

But they were all devoured.

The creature’s spatial pocket was clearly enormous; it wasn’t bothered by being filled with such things.

Meanwhile, both Paige Summers and Ben had to be extremely careful of its attacks. The black vortexes appeared and disappeared without warning. If one caught them during a moment of vulnerability, their fate would likely be the same as the crossbow arrows and mounds of earth...