THE ZOMBIE SYSTEM-Chapter 48 - 47: Broken Ground

Leon’s elite mage zombie materializes mid-fall, skeletal hands weaving desperate patterns in the air. Wind magic catches Leon’s plummeting form three stories above the top floor, slowing his descent just enough to prevent instant death.

He crashes through clay tiles and wooden beams, the impact driving breath from his lungs in explosive gasps. Pain radiates from his already broken ribs as fragments of the Upper District’s finest architecture rain down around him.

The building beneath him belongs to the Middle Quarter Merchant, a sprawling manor with manicured gardens and servants who polish silver by candlelight. Leon’s fall through their roof sends housemaids screaming through marble corridors.

"Master Hendricks!" A butler shouts from below. "Something’s fallen through the atrium ceiling!"

Leon tries to rise, blood pooling beneath him on expensive Persian rugs. His vision swims as concussion wars with determination. Through the hole he’s torn in reality, stars begins to glitter like accusatory eyes.

A shadow blocks out those stars.

Tobias descends like divine judgment wrapped in flame. He doesn’t fall, he aims himself downward with the precision of a guided missile. Fire trails behind him in spiraling ribbons that illuminate half the district.

Leon rolls aside as Tobias impacts the rooftop with force. freewebnøvel.coɱ

The explosion of landing sends shockwaves through the manor’s foundation.

Tobias rises from the crater he’s punched through solid stone, flames wrapping around his form like living armor. His eyes blaze with supernatural fire that makes the surrounding destruction seem trivial by comparison.

"Did you really think you could handle me?" Tobias asks conversationally. "I’ve been hunting monsters longer than you’ve been breathing."

Leon coughs blood onto marble floors that probably cost more than his family earned in a decade. "Just getting started."

He summons his warrior zombie, but Tobias moves before the command fully forms. The S-Rank’s fist connects with Leon’s ribs in a blast of superheated air that lifts him clean off the ground.

The impact sends Leon cartwheeling through the manor’s east wing. He crashes through a library where books explode into confetti around his tumbling form. Leather-bound volumes that scholars would kill for become kindling as Leon’s body demolishes centuries of accumulated knowledge.

Tobias stalks through the wreckage, each footstep leaving smoldering prints on wood that ignites spontaneously from proximity to his aura. His voice carries the weight of absolute authority backed by absolute power.

"Did killing an A-rank give you teeth, rat? You think you can face a lion?"

Leon staggers upright among burning philosophy texts, one eye nearly swollen shut from shattered glass. His system interface flickers weakly, health bars pulsing critical warnings that paint his vision red.

He gives a mental command.

His elite mage and assassin zombies materialize on either flank, moving to surround Tobias in the ruined library. The undead servants position themselves with tactical precision, seeking angles of attack that might penetrate supernatural defenses.

Tobias flicks his fingers dismissively.

A ring of fire detonates outward from his position, expanding in all directions like the shockwave from an explosion. Ancient texts burst into flame. Wooden shelves crumble to ash. The very air ignites in patterns that defy physics.

Leon’s zombies halt their advance, forced back by walls of flame that promise instant incineration.

The assassin attempts her phantom split technique, creating duplicates that dart through gaps in the fire wall. But Tobias tracks the real one with predatory focus, snatching her from mid-blink with casual precision.

He slams her into the marble floor with enough force to crater stone. Dark ichor spreads in abstract patterns as spectral bones crack like kindling.

The mage zombie responds instantly, weaving protective magic around Leon’s battered form. Spectral armor materializes just as Tobias’s backhand sweep connects with Leon’s skull.

The magical protection prevents immediate death but does nothing to absorb the raw kinetic force. Leon flies through what remains of the library’s east wall, bouncing off courtyard tiles like a skipped stone.

Tobias follows at his own pace, flames swirling violently around his form in a cyclone of controlled rage. Each step cracks stone that has stood firm for three centuries.

He grabs Leon by the collar, dragging him across decorative tiles like a discarded coat. Leon’s body leaves dark streaks on artwork that previous owners commissioned from master craftsmen.

"You think your undead protect you from the living’s wrath?" Tobias growls, voice crackling with barely contained fury. "You stole from me. My family. My pride. I’ll strip you to nothing."

He lifts Leon overhead and hurls him into the training tower that sits beside the manor’s northern courtyard. The impact sends Leon crashing through reinforced walls designed to withstand siege weapons.

Smoke trails behind his tumbling form like ash in hurricane wind.

Leon’s body screams in protest as he struggles through the damage. Multiple fractures. Internal bleeding. Probable concussion. His zombies flicker in and out of manifestation as his concentration wavers.

But they return to him, battered but standing. The elite mage’s eye sockets burn with purple fire while the assassin tests her restored mobility with predatory grace.

Leon thinks through waves of pain that threaten to drag him under. Tobias’s strength isn’t just raw power—it’s refined through decades of warfare. Tactical. Experienced. This is what S-Rank means when backed by generational combat knowledge.

His assassin zombie splits again, creating phantom clones that lunge from three directions simultaneously. The diversionary attack buys precious seconds as Tobias sorts real from illusion.

But he allows the strikes to connect, grabbing the real assassin by the throat despite twin blades punching through his flame aura. His grip tightens until spectral bones crack, then he drives her into the courtyard stones hard enough to leave a crater.

Leon lunges with Shadow-edge drawn, going for the blind spot while Tobias is engaged. The dark blade seeks the gap between flame and flesh, channeling every point of mana Leon can muster.

Tobias catches the weapon barehanded.

Flames wrap around Shadowedge’s crystalline edge, superheated air making the metal glow cherry-red. Leon watches in horror as his blade melts like butter under a forge, dark mana dissipating into harmless smoke.

"You’re not ready," Tobias mutters, voice carrying disappointment more cutting than rage. "You’re not worthy."

His spinning backhand launches Leon across the entire training field. Shadowedge dissolves from his grip mid-flight, its destruction severing their connection permanently.

Leon crashes into the courtyard’s far wall, stone blocks shifting under the impact. Blood fills his mouth as he struggles to breathe through ribs that grind against each other like broken machinery.

His zombies flicker in and out of sync with his wavering consciousness. The mage’s purple flames dim to barely visible sparks. The assassin’s form grows translucent as her connection to this realm weakens.

Tobias begins walking slowly across the plaza, each footstep leaving glowing embers that mark his passage like a trail of fallen stars. The flames around his body burn brighter with each step, building toward something that promises to end this confrontation permanently.

"You brought this reckoning," he says, voice carrying across devastated courtyard. "All of it. I’m just finishing the sentence."

Leon grits his teeth until his jaw aches. Blood runs freely from wounds that paint abstract art across expensive stonework. His vision blurs as shock wars with stubborn determination.

But his mind remains clear enough to send one final mental command to his undead.

The fight is not over. But this round belongs to Tobias Virell.

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