What?! I Became the Zombie Beauty in the Villain’s Arms – CH84

Chapter 84: Leave It to Me

Pei Xiqing squeezed his hand tightly, carefully confirming that the circulating current wouldn’t turn inward to assault his tissue, before pressing further. “And then? How did it materialize inside my body? What precise category does this element anchor to?”

Her memory files recalled that the global databases in this apocalyptic era systematically divided all core abilities into three supreme classifications: Control, Assault, and Defense. Every localized mutation ultimately nested beneath one of these general banners.

Duan Xiaolin patience remained unyielding as he decoded the data for her. “The Qiong Snake functions as a dual-element manipulation, and it represents an exceptionally lethal tier. The internal architecture splits into two distinct operations: the primary is high-capacity energy absorption, while the secondary drives a curse protocol that exists entirely outside the conventional laws of superpowers.”

“…Absorption? Quantify that parameter.”

Pei Xiqing blinked, her analytical units running a rapid simulation. She calculated that executing an ‘absorption’ script against a rival combatant wasn’t a standard, simple transaction.

The man easily intercepted the underlying calculus reflecting across her features, his deep voice a smooth murmur. “The logic matches your exact hypothesis.”

Pei Xiqing’s cheeks instantly flushed a light crimson. “Your board implies… it actively plunders an opponent’s elemental core?”

“If your mind commands the script, yes,” he answered.

“That is… staggering.” Her lips remained parted in slight disbelief. “If an asset commands an operational loop of that magnitude, wouldn’t their combat metrics lock them into an invincible peak without ever requiring a single watt of physical effort?”

Duan Xiaolin didn’t release an immediate denial. Yet, tracking the subtle shift across his cold features, Pei Xiqing quickly derived that an individual commanding this supreme output didn’t simply navigate the wasteland without absorbing massive friction. The more devastating an elemental core’s ceiling, the more severe the accompanying systemic fallout—an operational invoice her novice mind couldn’t possibly calculate yet.

Predictably, his steady jaw tightened as his vocal processors validated her suspicion. “The invoice demands a absolute penalty. If your system overloads the curse protocol, your cells will permanently lose the capacity to clear both abilities for the remainder of your timeline.”

“Overload? Total vital termination of the core?”

What kind of catastrophic side effect is that? The structural cost of running the script was far too high.

She lacked the stomach to even simulate what a top-tier ruler—having dominated the global sectors for winters—would look like if their entire power matrix abruptly zeroed out. Especially inside the unyielding parameters of this apocalypse. When an apex ability user drops down to a civilian baseline, the sheer weight of their institutional liabilities and the hunting arrays of their rivals would turn their hair white overnight under the pressure.

Pei Xiqing took a prolonged interval to stabilize her breathing before dropping a secondary query. “What precise environmental metrics trigger an overload threshold?”

Thinking of the historical records, she pressed, “The massive zombie migration that breached the walls of City B a few winters back… does an engagement of that scale force the distortion?”

The man’s green eyes locked onto her face. “The infected density tracking that specific siege was ten times greater than the volume your own eyes audited last week.”

Pei Xiqing felt a suffocating tightness squeeze her chest at the mere mention of the numbers, as though a mountain of lead had dropped onto her lungs. “The structural strain on your system back then must have been entirely excruciating.”

“The file has finalized,” he noted flatly. “The past is irrelevant.”

“But the assets commanding high-tier elemental cores are forced to carry an immense wave of structural responsibility compared to our civilian lines.”

“The allocation was standard during the initial phase of the collapse,” he recounted, his level tone carrying a cold, historical memory. “A decade ago, every awakened ability user had to face an absolute ocean of the infected. Back during that calendar block, the mutation index hit a historic ceiling every rotation. It was a absolute, zero-escape filter for the human species. Tonight, the ecosystem has achieved a relative equilibrium. The vast majority of active vanguards carefully manage their output thresholds, ensuring their frames never force an overload that fractures their biology.”

“How does your office preserve this level of precise, internal data regarding the Qiong Snake’s degradation cycle?”

The more data her audio receptors processed, the faster a structural anomaly flagged inside her thoughts. A deep, staggering suspicion began to map itself across her internal ledger.

Doesn’t this precise historical file perfectly synchronize with Duan Xiaolin’s personal timeline?

She hesitated for a brief microsecond, before throwing up her courage to drop a direct query straight at his face. “Is this specific element… the exact superpower your registry permanently lost a decade ago?”

Duan Xiaolin went entirely silent.

The wind rattled the glass panes of the villa. Finally, his thin lips moved. “Affirmative.”

Pei Xiqing’s pupils dilated to their absolute limits. Even though her analytical units had pre-compiled the hypothesis, hearing his own vocal receptors release the confirmation sent an indescribable shock wave rippling through her chest.

So that is the ground truth of how his supreme peak was dismantled…

Pei Xiqing reached down, her small fingers wrapping tightly around his bandage-covered knuckles. “Then what is the compliant protocol for our domestic cell…? How can my own civilian biology house your sovereign core? The math is entirely broken. Furthermore, my identity was never coded to clear an elemental core; my timeline is structurally locked out from ever awakening. Is it mathematically probable that your power has cleared its recovery loop, and is simply utilizing my physical frame as a temporary sanctuary?”

“Does your system intend to initiate a transfer to return the asset?”

“The property should naturally revert to its legal owner…” she murmured, lowering her eyelashes to avoid his gaze.

A microscopic smile touched Duan Xiaolin’s lips. “The current cannot be extracted.”

“Is that the absolute data?”

“My office already stated the asset is registered to your name,” he murmured, his thumb lightly stroking the back of her hand. “This power belongs strictly to your board.”

“Then what is your own uniform going to do?”

“Regarding what parameter?”

“Your survival metrics,” Pei Xiqing asked subconsciously, her eyes tracing his sharp jawline.

The exact next millisecond, she ran head-on into the narrow, unblinking focus of his green eyes. Her lashes trembled under the weight of his gaze, a strange wave of sensory overload flooding her chest. When their paths had initially intersected back on the trail, his gaze had been nothing but pure ice and calculated detachment—he had projected the flawless, polite veneer of a high executive, while remaining entirely ruthless and distant underneath.

Tonight, looking down at her frame, his eyes were almost completely saturated with an intense, quiet patience—the infinite, protective tolerance of a absolute superior shielding an asset, yet shifting periodically to unmask a deep, possessive heat. For a brief flash, she actually felt suffocated by the sheer intensity of his control.

His lips moved, his deep voice cutting through her thoughts. “Why is your mind frantic to return the asset to my desk? Now that your system commands the core, zero factions inside these base walls possess the leverage to compromise your safety. Your line is cleared to execute whatever parameters your mind desires.”

Pei Xiqing forced her lips to release her unvarnished internal calculus. “If my line is running a honest diagnostic… after auditing your brief on the core’s capabilities, my own psychology harbors an intense desire to lock down a permanent monopoly over the Qiong Snake. My system wants to own the element completely. Human beings are fundamentally coded with self-interest, and my board runs the exact same script. Although my biology successfully rejects the zombie virus, the high command factions guarding this fortress are exponentially more terrifying than a common mutant horde. I am terrified that if the internal balance collapses one shift, my civilian baseline won’t possess enough kinetic leverage to protect my timeline.”

What human asset inside this post-apocalyptic wasteland would willingly decline a permanent lock on a god-tier superpower?

Worse, given her highly volatile status as a transmigrator who had plundered a dirty general’s vault, she was essentially a walking time bomb inside the inner ring, permanently tracked by high-tier threat signatures.

Securing an absolute shield for her own timeline and Xiaobai’s life was the supreme directive on her ledger.

Consequently, her internal calculations were locked in a massive, agonizing conflict.

The power wasn’t hers to keep; her moral compliance bars refused to let her plunder it permanently. More critically, this specific elemental core was the ultimate currency Duan Xiaolin required to preserve his sovereign dominance over the base factions. She had already mapped out a plan to execute a tactical retreat into the wilderness to survive if her files were compromised; but if Duan Xiaolin’s non-ability status was exposed to his political rivals, his life metrics would hit absolute zero within a week.

Too many high-clearance eyes were monitoring his desk.

She lowered her chin, her thoughts turning thoroughly gloomy as she tried to calculate a compromise that would protect both of their timelines, entirely oblivious to the fact that the man’s green eyes had softened to their absolute limit as he watched her expressions.

Before her processing units could crash from the load, a large hand calmly smoothed down her damp hair. “Cease the return scripts. Your willpower forced the compliance loop; your station has earned the right to deploy the core. As for my own uniform, your board requires zero anxiety.”

He noted smoothly, “My own data sheets never calculated a secondary awakening path for my core. Yet, during the physical engagement against Gu He’s division today, my internal matrix registered a distinct energy resonance—the baseline is restoring itself at a velocity that exceeds our laboratory models.”

Saying this, he raised his left palm, unmasking a brief, microscopic spark of cold green energy that crackled across his skin before dissolving back into his pores.

One shift, his sovereign peak would fully restore its parameters. This massive breakthrough was an entirely unexpected dividend Pei Xiqing’s presence had funneled into his system.

“An active recovery?!” Her eyes instantly lit up, the internal gloom vaporizing. “That simplifies the math perfectly!”

“Once the threshold clears the initial milestone, a secondary discharge is mathematically guaranteed, and the frequency will scale over the upcoming calendar blocks.” Duan Xiaolin slid his large arm securely around her narrow waist, pulling her clean, post-shower scent straight into his chest. “Mm.”

“When did the secondary resonance manifest?” she asked excitedly, her hands dropping onto his shoulders as she leaned in. “Does your system detect a physical sensation right now? Is there a specific sector of your internal organs registering a thermal spike? Your dantian? Your circulatory grid? Or perhaps…”

The man firmly locked her flailing wrists down against his chest, his Adam’s apple executing a slow, heavy shift before his deep voice vibrated through the quiet. “Not yet. But if your frame continues to drive this level of physical friction against my chest, a structural spike is definitively guaranteed.”

Pei Xiqing’s vocal track instantly jammed, her entire posture locking into absolute, rigid compliance within a microsecond.

She quietly raised her lashes, a brilliant wave of crimson embarrassment flooding her face, her eyes turning wide and wet with sudden moisture. “My query… was strictly tracking the recovery timeline of your elemental core.”

He let out a low, dangerous laugh. “My data stream was tracking the exact same element.”

Pei Xiqing mustered her remaining psychological courage to mount a countermeasure, staring into his lenses. “Then state the ground truth—does your internal matrix register an active shift tonight?”

“Regarding the elemental core? My analytics return a blank,” he pondered for a brief interval, his eyes dark. “My singular strategy is to execute a fusion script the exact microsecond the energy breaches my perimeter. The remaining variables rest entirely with the laws of fate.”

“To think your office actually acknowledges a variable like fate,” Pei Xiqing murmured, a sudden sequence of past memory logs flashing through her mind—specifically the intense, dominating interactions she had survived under his hand. She reached up with a long, slender finger, playfully hooking the tip under his sharp chin. “Hearing your vocal receptors release a submissive syllable like that is an extreme anomaly. It completely contradicts your operational style.”

“My division holds zero counter-scripts for the parameter,” he noted, a trace of helpless amusement touching his mouth as he let her finger hold his chin. “Otherwise, my station wouldn’t have navigated a decade-long non-ability flatline.”

Pei Xiqing’s clear eyes rolled in a slow, highly deliberate circuit as her brain finalized a sovereign deployment file.

“Then… does your office desire to run a quick test, and temporarily transfer the custody of your fate straight to my ledger instead?”

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