What?! I Became the Zombie Beauty in the Villain’s Arms – CH80

Chapter 80: Interest Comes First

Gu He’s heart suddenly skipped a beat.

He instinctively took two sharp steps back.

But the man’s heavy punch was faster than his reflexes. The violent tearing sound of wind in his ears made it chillingly clear that Duan Xiaolin was not playing a game.

This punch was engineered to kill.

Gu He clenched his teeth and raised his forearm to absorb the blow. The towering figure before him had completely shed his usual cold elegance and rigid composure; even his standard, distant politeness had vaporized in an instant. Beneath his dark hair, the administrator’s eyes were completely consumed by an intense, murderous hostility.

In a flash of panic, Gu He failed to clear his guard, and a brutal fist slammed directly into his forehead.

The kinetic force was staggering.

The two men clashed fist to fist, the velocity of the strikes shaking the platform. Almost every single one of Duan Xiaolin’s blows landed with terrifying precision, his raw violence running in sharp contrast to his typical, orderly administrative style.

Gu He could actually hear the sickening sound of his own bones fracturing under the pressure.

Gritting his teeth against the agony, he lunged forward, swinging his fists in a desperate counter-assault. A jarring realization flashed through his brain: this man was exponentially more difficult to manage in a physical brawl than Ling Lang.

Gu He had undergone extensive close-quarters combat training throughout his military career, logging countless hours in elite training camps and active field deployments. Prior to this shift, the general consensus across the base factions was that an asset who had lost his elemental powers was nothing compared to an active, dual-ability user. Yet, the physical beating he had just absorbed from Ling Lang was a mere baseline compared to this; Duan Xiaolin was ruthlessly suppressing his entire system.

Gu He frantically scrambled backward to open up a safe distance, panting heavily as he spoke first. “Chief Judge, isn’t this joke crossing a dangerous line?”

We are in a public sector. He fundamentally refused to believe that Duan Xiaolin would openly execute a Major General of the capital command in front of dozens of watching vanguard witnesses.

The Chief Judge of Franlun had been registered as a non-ability user for years. The historical archives noted his elemental core had completely collapsed during a massive zombie migration a decade ago, and his system had failed to recover its output ever since.

Even though this arena strictly forbidden the use of superpowers, possessing an active elemental core naturally reinforced a combatant’s baseline biology, giving them a massive edge over a regular human. Without that passive biological enhancement, no matter how much a normal man optimized his physical fitness, his kinetic ceiling shouldn’t be able to match an ability user’s.

Gu He quietly tightened his bruised fists, the look he directed at Duan Xiaolin vibrating with deep hesitation and raw reluctance.

“Your Honor, are you entirely certain your board wants to advance this script? Have your processing units calculated the institutional consequences?” He desperately fought to maintain his diplomatic composure. “It is mathematically illogical for our respective factions to lock into a permanent blood feud over a common woman. Besides, that civilian hasn’t even materialized in this sector; her mind holds zero data regarding this confrontation. If her behavioral history indicates she can vaporize from a compound without a trace, she will absolutely do it again. The next time her timeline shifts, I can help your office eliminate her permanently…”

He practically ground his teeth to force the syllables out, his handsome features twisting uncontrollably from the excruciating pain of his fractured bones. “If we destroy each other here, she is the singular asset who extracts a net gain from the equation. We will be reduced to playthings, trapped in her hands forever.”

“If you ask my opinion… cough… executing a high-stakes play where we kill a thousand enemies but sacrifice eight hundred of our own forces over a woman like her introduces an absolute structural loss for the base’s stability.”

Duan Xiaolin’s rage remained completely silent and freezing, cutting through the air like a poisoned arrow.

He raised his eyes, his expression carved from pure, unyielding lethal intent.

“Who authorized your mouth to release data regarding her?”

Without granting him another syllable of dialogue, the administrator closed the distance, violently pinned Gu He’s frame to the concrete floor, and unleashed a ruthless sequence of heavy strikes. A massive punch slammed into the general’s face with a dull boom that rattled the heavy benches flanking the arena.

An excruciating wave of agony detonated across Gu He’s skull. Not only were the structural bones of his jaw fracturing, but the sheer kinetic force of the impact caused hairline cracks to ripple through the reinforced concrete beneath his head.

He squeezed every remaining watt of his physical leverage just to force his torso up from the floor.

By the time his processing units rebooted and he attempted to broadcast an emergency command to summon his personal security detail, his indicators confirmed the worst: every local communication frequency had been completely jammed. Even the crowd of ability users packed around the training field were executing a shared lockdown script alongside Ling Lang.

It finally clicked in his brain that a retreat vector no longer existed. This assembly was a pre-programmed execution trap.

Duan Xiaolin had not merely initialized a physical assault; he had systematically severed every single survival line.

The reality felt completely absurd. How could the supreme, hyper-rational Chief Judge of a tier-one fortress actively engineer a silent execution plot over a common civilian girl?

Facing immediate deletion, Gu He decisively violated the arena parameters. He unleashed the full capacity of his elemental core, channeling a violent wave of distorted kinetic energy straight toward Duan Xiaolin’s chest.

He no longer cared about military regulations or institutional compliance bars. The singular directive remaining on his ledger was to clear this coordinate alive.

But before the rogue elemental energy could bridge the gap to the administrator, a massive wall of white-hot fire violently erupted into the path, neutralizing the strike. Ling Lang stepped forward, his palm blazing with high-tier flame manipulation.

The vanguard captain let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Can’t follow the baseline parameters, Major General? Your system only endured a handful of moves before your compliance bars hit zero and you cleared your superpower?”

Blood streamed rapidly from Gu He’s nose and mouth, and he violently spat a dark crimson puddle onto the cracked stones. Wiping his chin with a trembling, dust-caked forearm, he desperately tried to stabilize his core to launch a secondary elemental strike.

Ling Lang vaulted onto the main stage, his white brows knitting into a lethal line. “Deploying an elemental field? Excellent. My own core holds zero hesitation when it comes to burning your uniform to ash.”

A brilliant, terrifying aura of high-intensity energy began to wrap around the captain’s frame.

But before he could initialize an assault script, a large palm calmly dropped onto his shoulder from behind, anchoring his momentum.

Ling Lang instantly reined in his elemental core, stepping back half a pace. “Brother.”

Duan Xiaolin smoothly slid his tailored suit coat back over his broad shoulders, his long fingers gently smoothing out a minor wrinkle in the linen. Reaching into his pocket, he drew out a thick file, tossing the documents flat onto the blood-spattered concrete in front of Gu He’s knees.

“Three winters ago, on the night of October 14th, a brutal frontier massacre completely wiped out a registered agricultural sector, triggering a massive investigation file at global headquarters,” the administrator stated, his level voice entirely devoid of warmth. “The mastermind who authorized the systematic liquidation of five hundred civilian lives overnight matches your exact signature.”

Gu He knelt on the bloodied floor. His head, which had been hanging low to conserve energy, suddenly snapped upward. His pupils dilated in sheer shock.

“Your office… is releasing fabricated data!” he roared.

Duan Xiaolin reached down, smoothly drawing a standard tactical sidearm from Ling Lang’s utility belt. He cycled the chamber with a crisp click, pressing the cold muzzle flat against the center of the general’s forehead. “The physical exchange we just finalized functioned as a kinetic diagnostic. The automated tracking systems have flawlessly verified your exact physical geometry, weight distribution, and motor habits against the archival sensor logs extracted from that massacre. Your identity matches the commander who directed the movement.”

A large, blue electronic display interface hummed to life on the arena scoreboard behind them.

The video files mapped a real-time layout comparing the exact combat maneuvers Gu He had deployed during the physical brawl against a blurry, low-resolution silhouette captured by a frontier surveillance node three years prior. The behavioral overlap and structural synchronization registered at a staggering ninety percent.

“The mathematical overlap is a corruption of data! It isn’t my file!” Gu He shouted frantically, his political mask completely shattering. Look up at the cold muzzle of the weapon, his chest heaved. “Chief Judge, does your desk preserve absolutely zero room for a tactical negotiation? Your memory must retain the log of the state dinner you shared with my biological father. His division has funneled immense structural value into the high command over the winters. No matter how much institutional leverage your office commands, you lack the sovereign authority to summarily liquidate an active Major General without a supreme trial, correct?”

Duan Xiaolin’s finger remained steady over the trigger mechanism. “His registry has indeed funneled immense value into the fortress. Consequently, my office will permit your uniform to enter the water dungeon, where your system may select its preferred methodology for vital deletion.”

“You…! Duan Xiaolin! Your board is deploying blatant slander to execute a political purge!”

“Whether the data sheet registers as slander is an irrelevant parameter. Why doesn’t the Major General first break down the exact merits that cleared his trajectory to secure a general’s badge at such a young age?”

The exact second the query cleared the air, the remaining psychological control on Gu He’s face completely collapsed.

“Three winters ago, prior to that frontier deployment, your registry didn’t even command a basic squadron line. Yet, following that calendar block, your card repeatedly logged first-class military merits while executing standard scouting missions.”

Duan Xiaolin slowly scanned the crumbling lines of his face. Monitoring the frantic spike in the general’s emotional meters, a cold, venomous sneer touched his lips. He reached down with his free hand, violently twisting his fingers into the collar of Gu He’s uniform to drag his face close.

Releasing a low murmur that only their respective audio receptors could intercept, his voice was a chilling whisper. “Even if the data overlap returned a flat zero… do your processors truly calculate that my office cares about the legality of the file? My board requires a clean contribution sheet as well.”

The blue veins on Gu He’s forehead bulged violently against his skin. Like a completely broken madman, his eyes locked onto Duan Xiaolin’s face.

It finally registered across his systems that this terrifying Chief Judge was never a righteous protector of the peace. He was an apex predator who operated on the exact same wavelength as himself—only exponentially more ruthless when it came to manipulating institutional structures and putting strategic interest above all else.

Squeezing the absolute last reserve of his bio-cellular matrix, his elemental core detonated into a frantic arc of high-voltage lightning energy, violently swinging his forearm upward to discharge the killing field straight into Duan Xiaolin’s face.

Like this novel? Read Advance Chapters (PDF & EPUB Format)