What?! I Became the Zombie Beauty in the Villain’s Arms – CH98

Chapter 98: Your Wife Knows

Xia Jingyu was taken aback. She stared blankly at the pitch-black muzzle leveled at her face. For a fleeting second, she assumed Duan Xiaolin was targeting one of the prisoners behind her. But as two seconds ticked by, a chilling realization settled over her eyes. “Chief Judge,” she asked, her voice tight, “what is the meaning of this? Am I suddenly your prisoner, or do you suspect my unit is connected to the recent chaos in the base?”

Had their purge investigation genuinely locked onto her as a target?

Or…

She smelled a completely different trap closing around her.

Before Duan Xiaolin could release a syllable, Qiu Chao interrupted. His voice, muffled from behind his featureless mask, carried a dull, warning tone. “General Xia, your assigned duties and deployment missions hold absolutely zero correlation to Franlun’s operations.”

Xia Jingyu frowned. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Ling Lang stepped forward, a mocking sneer touching his lips. “You should be asking your own system that question. Are you genuinely trying to claim you didn’t know the recent sabotage events at the base trace directly back to the personnel your unit escorted from headquarters?”

Xia Jingyu froze, genuinely stunned. “How is that mathematically possible?”

“The evidence is irrefutable,” Ling Lang lied smoothly. “Want me to escort you next door to view the logs?”

“Absolutely not.”

Ling Lang chuckled. “Let’s go. It’s just next door.” He gestured lazily toward the corridor.

Xia Jingyu hesitated for a few seconds before her analytical training snapped her back to reality. She planted her boots firmly. “Captain Ling Lang, there is zero tactical utility in trying to trick my station. I won’t be fooled by a fake data stream. Do you honestly calculate that I would march into this fortress escorting a column of spies? Every single operative under my command is a hardened veteran from headquarters, directly answering to my father. Their compliance bars would never permit them to act like rabid, smuggling dogs to compromise this base.”

Ling Lang leaned casually against the rusted iron bars, raising a white brow. “There’s no point broadcasting your defense to my desk. I lack the bandwidth to process it. Why don’t you direct your formal appeal straight to the Chief Judge?”

He had definitely just run a deception script on her. However, he was also highly curious to uncover exactly what Xia Jingyu had done to trigger his brother’s lethal protocols.

“Your Honor, what is your tactical objective?” Having stabilized her internal panic, Xia Jingyu forced herself to ignore the gun barrel. If any other operative in the wasteland had drawn a weapon on her, she wouldn’t have felt an ounce of genuine threat; she could have initiated a counter-strike in a microsecond.

But the man holding the weapon was Duan Xiaolin.

If his system had fully calculated a lethal strike, the probability of her successfully countering it was an absolute, flat zero.

“The objective is perfectly simple. I intend to liquidate your timeline,” the man stated, his voice a freezing void. “Commander Xia should possess the tactical intelligence to see that.”

Xia Jingyu’s lips twitched into an expressionless, rigid line. “The Chief Judge commands such absolute, terrifying leverage that he can execute a high-ranking asset without a second thought. Just like how Major General Gu He was quietly vanished from the grid a few days ago.”

“Consequently, your boots will not clear this dungeon tonight.”

The cold, heavy steel of the muzzle pressed directly against the center of her forehead.

That singular, simple movement felt as though an unbreakable suppression field had been cast over her system. As the highest-ranking female general in the apocalyptic command structure, she was suddenly paralyzed, entirely unable to execute a physical evasion.

She could even detect the terrifying, suffocating aura radiating from his frame—an oppressive signature she hadn’t felt from him in years.

It was the distinct, crushing pressure of an active, high-tier elemental core.

Xia Jingyu gritted her teeth, desperately fighting the supernatural suppression just to keep her chin raised.

“You are at least obligated to release the parameters behind the execution! If your office desires my father’s supreme seat, he has already transmitted the offer to surrender it to you multiple times. Why resort to this extreme violence? You command absolute power and limitless resources. Could it be a total monopoly over the base? Doesn’t Franlun already maintain a complete stranglehold over the logistics?”

Her processing units were completely redlining, desperately trying to calculate what possible variable in this apocalypse could have forced a hyper-rational entity like him to execute a tier-one general in a dirty underground cell.

Duan Xiaolin possessed zero desire to waste bandwidth on a conversation. He had never harbored a habit of explaining his operational logic to a dying asset.

There was an absolute void of human warmth in his green eyes. He stared at her exactly as one would look at a piece of inanimate, broken machinery.

Accepting her deletion, Xia Jingyu closed her eyes. The sharp, mechanical click of the trigger mechanism echoed in the cell, signaling the imminent detonation against her skull.

Right at that exact microsecond, Qiu Chao reached up, yanking his white mask from his face. “Since there are zero unauthorized assets in this room, my vocal track will just lay the data bare. This containment breach was my fault.”

He casually tossed the featureless mask onto a blood-stained table, unmasking a face that violently contradicted his brutal, sadistic reputation. His features were remarkably delicate, gentle, and almost surprisingly childish. He possessed a quintessential “baby face.”

Considering he was the exact same chronological age as Duan Xiaolin, an outsider would never calculate that he was already in his early thirties. It was even more mathematically impossible to reconcile those soft, youthful features with the horrifying, vicious torture methods he regularly deployed.

The mangled tissue, shattered bones, and pooled blood painting the cell floor were entirely his handiwork.

Qiu Chao ran a gloved hand aggressively through his messy hair. “Brother Duan, the security lapse falls entirely on my ledger.”

In a fraction of a second, the missing data string finally clicked inside Xia Jingyu’s brain.

It was about the anomaly in the laboratory yesterday.

She had deployed a tactical bypass to breach Qiu Chao’s secure suite and intercepted a highly classified medical file.

Xia Jingyu’s eyes snapped open, staring at Duan Xiaolin in pure, unadulterated shock.

Is he actually executing a purge… to protect that zombie woman?

Her logic circuits rejected the calculation.

How is that mathematically possible?

After several seconds of stunned silence, staring down the barrel of the gun, she suddenly let out a sharp, incredulous laugh. “Your Honor… Your Honor! I never calculated that your cold, mechanical heart actually possessed the capacity to execute a high-ranking asset over a common woman!”

Following her initial shock, a twisted sense of smug, gloating joy surged through her chest. “Your Honor, it appears your system cannot escape the baseline laws of humanity either! The scales of this universe are truly balanced. You will eventually pay a massive invoice for these actions. You’ve finally descended from your untouchable, hyper-rational peak. You are no longer that disgusting, unfeeling monster.”

Her smile turned brazen and arrogant. “I process the logic now. It appears your office is permanently silencing my file for her sake.”

“Deactivate your anxiety parameters. Although my line previously attempted to secure a romantic alignment with your desk, my optical sensors are no longer tracking your file. I won’t harbor any prejudice against her timeline. Still, your operational logic is far too ruthless, Chief Judge. I haven’t even positively identified the target asset, yet you are instantly launching a lethal strike.”

She couldn’t suppress a deep, internal sigh of disbelief.

It appeared this specific woman was an absolutely critical priority to his system. Currently, Xia Jingyu was nothing more than an unstable, uncertain variable in the equation. With his massive institutional leverage, Duan Xiaolin could easily suppress the fallout. She lacked the immediate logistical reach in this sector to act on the intelligence, and his execution protocol would permanently sever her connection before she could transmit the data.

He was perfectly willing to burn a tier-one general to ash just to completely vaporize a potential threat to her existence.

In the dim, bloody light of the dungeon, the man’s green eyes remained entirely dark and unreadable. She couldn’t decode the calculations shifting behind them, nor did she want to. She continued, her tone shifting into a rapid negotiation. “My vocal track can remain permanently sealed. I swear zero data regarding that medical file will ever clear my lips. I can even deploy my medical divisions to help engineer a stabilization protocol for her condition. To be absolutely clear: this is not a tactical threat. It is a formal request for clemency. Furthermore, I request your desk does not penalize Qiu Chao. I was the operative who executed the lock-picking bypass to breach his laboratory.”

She had studied the absolute, unyielding laws governing Franlun.

A disciplinary penalty could range from a “light” sentence of permanent, solitary imprisonment to immediate execution on the spot. Franlun had never simply discharged or expelled an operative for logging a critical error—because any asset who made a mistake had either already endured a catastrophic physical punishment, or their eyes were permanently closed.

Qiu Chao’s system hadn’t genuinely executed an error. She was the one who engineered the breach.

If the supreme commander leaked this security failure, Qiu Chao would face severe disciplinary action from the Franlun board.

Duan Xiaolin’s internal calculus remained completely unmoved by her negotiation. His posture was as unshakable as a mountain.

He was absolutely not an entity whose firewalls could be breached by sentimental, verbal pledges.

He tilted his head a fraction. “Regardless of your promises, your system remains an active explosive device that could detonate at any microsecond. My office despises leaving unsealed evidence on the board.”

He vastly preferred to execute a complete, permanent data wipe.

Xia Jingyu gritted her teeth. “Chief Judge, your core is carved from solid ice. If she ever accessed the logs regarding this execution, her psychology would categorize you as a terrifying, ruthless monster.”

“Her system will never intercept the file.”

“Fine.”

There was zero utility in continuing the broadcast.

Curiosity had permanently liquidated the cat.

A deafening gunshot shattered the heavy silence of the cell.

The high-velocity round tore through the air, tracking a perfect trajectory straight for the center of her forehead.

In a blinding flash of motion, Qiu Chao’s hand snapped out, violently snatching the bullet straight out of the air. Even though his palm was heavily reinforced by an active elemental shield, the sheer kinetic velocity and scorching thermal friction of the round severely shredded his tissue.

He tossed the crushed, smoking slug onto the concrete. “Brother Duan, Marshal Ye is currently stationed at headquarters, actively awaiting her unit’s return. If our division liquidates her timeline tonight, what data packet do we transmit to Ye’s desk?”

“Does your system calculate that I care about his desk?”

“Negative… but Brother Duan, this execution is mathematically unnecessary.” Completely ignoring the blood rapidly dripping from his mangled palm, Qiu Chao closed the distance, leaning in to drop his voice into a frantic, low whisper directly near Duan Xiaolin’s ear. “Does your tracking radar not realize that Xia Jingyu and your wife actually executed a private intersection outside the church? Xia Jingyu even deployed a kinetic shield to save her life once. Their systems were practically registering as friendly allies. If you permanently delete Xia Jingyu… and your wife’s database somehow uncovers the log, what specific evaluation do you think her psychology will assign to you?”

“Brother Duan, how many cycles has your timeline been linked to hers? You must currently project the image of a towering, majestic, flawlessly righteous protector inside her mental matrix. That girl operates on an incredibly pure, innocent baseline—she hasn’t even executed a basic mutant before! Are you absolutely certain you want to authorize a bloody, high-profile massacre right here?”

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