Chapter 10
When Prince Joshua fell silent, Haas, who was standing beside him, asked,
“What was different from the rumors?”
“I clearly heard that the Duke hated my sister.”
“Oh. That’s a famous rumor.”
Haas nodded as if he already knew.
No matter how tight-lipped the servants were, the imperial palace was the birthplace of rumors and where all kinds of gossip gathered. Even people who didn’t care about rumors would hear plenty if they stayed in the palace for a few days.
—It seems the Duke treats the Princess very coldly. The maids there cry every time.
—What? That’s nonsense. The Duke treats my sister very well.
—Oh my, Your Highness. You really didn’t know?
Prince Joshua had only seen the two of them at official events, so this was the first time he had heard such stories.
—The Duke of Pankratio really, really hates the Princess.
—……
—Sadly, the Princess is deeply in love with the Duke.
The words, spoken with pity, echoed in Joshua’s ears.
Stop.
Joshua, who had been walking straight ahead, suddenly stopped and frowned as he recalled Alphius’s face from earlier.
“No matter how I think about it, that rumor feels wrong.”
If the rumor were true, then what he saw would be far too strange. The Alphius he had seen looked exactly like someone who had lost a lover.
—I hope we find her as soon as possible.
His rough way of speaking still sounded sincere.
And like Joshua himself, Alphius seemed unable to accept Isabel’s disappearance—or her death.
That was why, at that moment, even Joshua, who had been ready to mock him, ended up closing his mouth instead.
“Huh?”
Joshua stopped in front of a lake. Haas called out to him in confusion.
“Your Highness?”
Joshua’s reflection appeared in the water—blue eyes and platinum-blond hair that looked just like Isabel’s.
“My sister…”
Joshua stared sadly at his reflection, then lifted his gaze to the densely packed trees.
“Where in the world are you?”
As if asking the forest for an answer, he smiled sadly and lightly tapped the surface of the lake with his fingertip.
The water rippled, swallowing his reflection.
But the cruel forest gave no reply.
***
“Hey!”
Cersian’s voice echoed through the vast mountains. Hey, hey, hey…
“Aren’t you coming back here?!”
With a pale face, Cersian screamed as he ran toward the zombie like a madman.
It was hard to believe this frantic man was the same Cersian who usually stayed calm.
“Who told you to eat dirt?!”
At the end of his gaze was a zombie with dirt smeared all over her mouth, her platinum-blond hair hanging loose as she smiled brightly.
[You foolish thing.]
“Spit it out! Spit it out!”
[You don’t even know how to eat dirt?]
Cersian smacked her back a few times, but she only shrugged and tilted her head side to side.
[I’ll teach you myself. Sit here. Now, ah—.]
“Get that away from me?!”
She actually tried to offer him dirt.
Cersian shook his head wildly and leaned back, but by then his own face was already covered in dirt.
“You’re insane! Hey! Don’t put that in my mouth!”
Cersian screamed in despair at his ruined face. But as if that was her chance, the zombie shoved dirt straight into his mouth.
[You can’t even eat it when it’s given to you.]
“Ptoo! Ptoo! Are you seriously crazy?!”
Cersian shouted lowly in frustration.
“Ugh. You idiot!”
[You’re the idiot.]
Of course, the two of them had no idea that they were both thinking the exact same thing about each other.
‘I’m the human here. I have to endure this.’
Cersian wiped the dirt from her mouth with the back of his hand and clicked his tongue.
Then he picked up the outer coat that had fallen to the ground and draped it over her shoulders.
“Wear your clothes properly—”
Thud!
Before he could finish, the zombie roughly threw the coat onto the ground.
“……”
[……]
A brief silence fell between them.
“You—this—”
Perhaps her animal instincts were still intact, because the zombie seemed to realize she had done something wrong.
‘I’m human. I’m human.’
Cersian tried to calm his boiling anger by repeating that to himself. Just then—
“Kyaa!”
The zombie suddenly turned and ran off.
Without looking back, she began hopping and running across the field.
Cersian stared blankly at her retreating figure.
“Damn it…”
He clenched his teeth.
When he first met this zombie, he had considered locking her in the basement in case she was a mutation. But she seemed too human, and his conscience stopped him. Before he knew it, they had spent a long time together.
Whenever he was with her, Cersian felt like his sense of time disappeared.
“Hey! Hey! Don’t eat dirt again!”
Because she caused trouble nonstop.
The zombie smeared muddy dirt all over Cersian’s face again.
[Try it. It tastes good.]
“Mm—! Hey! Stop that!”
Look at this.
The moment he took his eyes off her, she had already sat in a corner, stuffing dirt into her mouth—and now she was trying to feed it to him too.
He covered his face in horror.
“Why am I even doing babysitting like this… No, no. This is all for research. For research…”
Cersian shook his head, denying reality.
He reminded himself again and again that he was only taking care of her for experiments.
“Nom… nom…”
But he didn’t even have the luxury to think.
Hearing a suspicious sound near his ear, he jumped up immediately.
“Nom nom…”
“…Nom nom? What are you eating now?!”
“Nom nom nom nom.”
Realizing she had been caught, the zombie chewed even more vigorously.
Cersian rushed over. In one move, he grabbed her chin and held out his hand.
“Spit it out. Spit it out.”
The zombie shook her head in refusal.
But faced with Cersian’s stubbornness, she finally sighed deeply and spat what she had been chewing into his palm.
“What were you enjoying so much?”
Cersian narrowed his eyes and looked at the green lump in his hand.
“…Grass? And it’s poisonous, too?”
He stared at the grass, clearly marked with bite marks, in disbelief.
He stopped her from eating dirt, and now she was eating poisonous plants.
“What are you, exactly?”
Cersian looked at her in shock, but the zombie only smiled innocently back at him.
He suddenly remembered the antibody experiment he had done last night using her blood.
“She’s seriously strange.”
His blood, which contained antibodies against zombies, did not mix with normal zombie blood.
But when this mutant zombie’s blood was mixed with another zombie’s blood, it behaved as if it were alive—sticking together, then separating repeatedly.
‘It mixes, but it doesn’t. Does she have antibodies or not?’
Even Cersian, who had studied zombies for years, couldn’t make sense of it.
With no clear conclusion to draw, he decided to keep her close and observe her for now.
‘Someday… will I have to use her as a test subject?’
To Cersian, research and experiments were as natural as breathing. But this time, he didn’t feel like doing it.
‘This is strange. Why do I feel like this…?’
A strange platinum-blond zombie who liked eating dirt and grass, and unlike other zombies, clearly had her own will.
Without him realizing it, she had slowly carved out a place beside Cersian, who had always lived only for his research.
‘Why is it so hard to imagine her not being here?’
He couldn’t even imagine days without her anymore.
‘But she’s still a zombie. A test subject.’
Someday, he would have to lock her in the laboratory.
The zombie, unaware of his complicated thoughts, simply kept chewing the grass.
Crunch, crunch.
Cersian snapped back to his senses.
‘No. I’ll think about that later.’
He shook his head as if it hurt, brushing the thoughts away. Then he reached out and grabbed the grass with a suspicious look.
“I told you not to eat it. Why do you keep eating it? Are you hungry?”
Why did she keep chewing grass?
Cersian tilted his head.
“Then should I give you meat?”
Normally, he threw animal carcasses he found in the forest to the zombies locked in his basement.
But strangely, he didn’t want to do that to her.
“It feels wrong.”
Just imagining her burying her face in rotting meat made him uncomfortable.
While she was chewing grass, the zombie noticed a butterfly flying nearby and slowly opened her mouth.
“Hey.”
Seeing that, Cersian jumped up.
The zombie managed to catch the butterfly and tried to put it into her mouth.
“Wait.”
Cersian ran.
“Don’t eat it! No! No!”
He ran again.
Barely managing to pull the butterfly from her hand, he released it back into the air and then bent forward, exhausted.
The zombie’s strongest desire was hunger.
That was probably why she ate dirt, grass, and now even tried to eat a butterfly.
“Let’s go shopping.”
There was a village not too far away by carriage.
He needed to buy some meat. At this rate, she might start chewing on trees.
“It won’t take long by carriage…”
Catching a ride wasn’t the problem—he could always pay a passing carriage.
The real problem was the zombie.
Looking at her filthy state, Cersian sighed deeply.
“Let’s wash up first.”
He decided to clean her at the nearby lake.
“Up you go.”
[Kyaa—!]
Cersian lifted her up so she couldn’t resist. The zombie seemed to find it fun and waved her hands excitedly.
‘What is this?’
Then he noticed something strange and narrowed his eyes.
‘A scar on her foot?’
There was a scar on the top of her foot. Its shape was unusual—like a crescent, as if from a bite.
‘Is it new? No… it doesn’t look like it.’
He tried to grab her ankle for a closer look, but she struggled, and he ended up dropping her.
“How can she be this strong?”
Cersian stared in disbelief as the zombie ran around again.
She didn’t care at all.
[Try eating dirt. It’s tasty.]
Once again, she shoved a handful of dirt toward his mouth.
