I Got Reincarnated as a Zombie Girl

That evening, the sky above the city of Nocture radiated a golden twilight hue that had not been seen for the past three years. The gray clouds heavy with the miasma of decay had been swept clean, allowing the warmth of the late afternoon sun to touch the towering obsidian towers of the castle.

In the vast main garden courtyard of the castle, filled with blue-glowing nightshade flowers, a strong gust of wind swept across the ground as giant wingbeats parted the air.

Sol, the legendary golden dragon, landed with a grace that defied its massive weight. Its muscular legs touched the black stone paving without causing even the slightest crack, only spreading ripples of golden warmth that instantly made the flowers in the garden bloom with joy.

The moment Sol landed, another giant shadow dove down from the highest tower of the castle.

It was Noir. The Rank 7 Zombie Dragon that for three full years had been a terror to enemies and an absolute protector for the people of Nocture. Its black bones sheathed in necrotic flame stretched out and blotted the sunlight, exerting a pressure that would normally force any mortal creature to kneel in fear.

Yet something extremely strange and ridiculous happened right before Noir’s giant body touched the ground.

Instead of landing with a ground-shaking impact, Noir’s body shrank drastically inside a dense cloud of black smoke. The giant bones condensed, the necrotic flames extinguished, and from within that smoke leaped a very small, thick-furred black cat. Its eyes radiated clear emerald green, and its tail curled upward casually.

Noir no longer needed to pretend to be a terrifying guardian monster. Its Queen had returned. The strongest existence on the planet was standing in the garden courtyard, radiating an absolute protective aura. For Noir, this meant its shift as a "watchdog" had officially ended, and it could return to its most comfortable form: a spoiled cat.

Sylvia stepped down from Sol’s back, her black high-heeled shoes landing elegantly on the courtyard stones. She was still carrying Sofia in a bridal style in her arms. The blonde-haired girl hid her flushed face in the crook of Sylvia’s neck, refusing to look at anyone out of excessive embarrassment, yet also refusing to be put down.

"Meooow~"

A soft meow was heard as Noir trotted over to Sylvia’s feet. The black cat immediately rubbed its body against the Queen of Death’s calves, purring loudly like a happy little steam engine.

Sylvia stopped for a moment. A very soft, thin smile adorned her pale lips. She bent slightly without releasing Sofia from her embrace then used her free hand to stroke the black-furred head. "Good work keeping our home from falling apart, Noir. You must have been very tired pretending to be a terrifying dragon every day."

Noir meowed in satisfaction, closing its emerald eyes as it enjoyed the cold touch of its master’s hand.

At that exact moment, a golden light flared behind Sylvia. Sol, unwilling to lose in the competition for attention, had also shrunk. Its giant dragon body faded, replaced by the form of a sleek golden-furred cat with proud yet adorable sapphire-blue eyes.

Sol stepped forward with the elegant gait of a feline prince, then sat beside Sylvia’s feet and stared at the black cat in front of it with full curiosity.

"Ah, right. You two have never formally met in the mortal world," Sylvia said casually. She pointed alternately. "Noir, this is Sol. Sol, this is Noir. Both of you are my primary guardians. Behave well with each other."

Noir tilted its head, its whiskers twitching. It walked slowly around Sol, sniffing the golden fur of its counterpart. Sol, who possessed high self-esteem from the ancient dragon race, initially snorted lightly, but soon joined in sniffing Noir’s nose. For several seconds, the two entities whose true forms could destroy a continent simply stared at each other in silence in their cat forms.

Then Noir suddenly raised one paw and lightly tapped Sol’s nose before turning and sprinting toward the flower bushes in the garden. Sol meowed in protest, feeling its pride challenged, and immediately shot after the black cat. In an instant, the magical castle garden courtyard transformed into a chase arena for two cosmic beings racing and leaping over the bushes.

Sylvia only shook her head slowly at the antics of her two pets. "At least they’re getting along."

The rest of the group had already dismounted from Sol’s back (which was now a small cat). Alicia stepped down gracefully. At her side walked a sacred creature radiating pure white light, the Kirin. The sacred beast, resembling a white-scaled dragon-deer with crystal horns, walked calmly beside Alicia; every step of its hooves grew energy lotus petals in the air. The Kirin watched Sol and Noir’s departure with a peaceful gaze, as if feeling too old and wise to join a game of tag.

Behind Alicia, Stacia floated down using her ten magnificent black wings. Celes and Aurellia followed behind her; their faces looked far more relaxed and energetic thanks to Alicia’s Spirit Emperor healing magic.

"Let’s go inside," Sylvia said without preamble, still carrying Sofia in her arms. She led the way across the main castle gate that opened automatically to welcome the arrival of its true owner.

Inside the castle, the atmosphere felt warm. Crystal torches glowed with elegant purple light, illuminating the thick red carpet stretching along the corridors. High-ranking undead servants lined up along the sides of the hallways immediately bowed in unison until they nearly kissed the floor, not daring to look directly at the absolute authority of their Queen.

Instead of heading to the throne room or the dining hall, Sylvia turned toward the right wing of the castle, going straight down the corridor that led to the royal private chambers.

"E-eh? Sylvia?" Sofia finally spoke softly, realizing the direction of their steps. "Aren’t we going to hold an evaluation meeting with Zark and the others first? Reports on territorial damage... food supplies... placement of the tens of millions of newly submissive wild zombies..."

"Sshh," Sylvia cut her off in a low voice, pressing one finger against Sofia’s lips. "Zark is a competent general; he can handle those living corpses. As for the city’s administrative affairs and evaluation..."

Sylvia stopped walking for a moment, then turned back to look at Alicia, Stacia, Celes, and Aurellia who were trailing behind them.

Sylvia’s differently colored eyes locked straight onto Stacia and Alicia. "I am delegating the castle evaluation duties to the two of you. Celes and Aurellia will give you their condition reports. Right now I do not wish to be disturbed by numbers, strategies, or any other nonsense."

Without waiting for their agreement, Sylvia resumed walking with long strides, taking Sofia with her toward the end of the corridor.

Upon reaching the double doors carved with silver that belonged to her bedroom, Sylvia pushed them open with gentle telekinetic magic, stepped inside, then flicked her fingers toward the air.

BZZZTTT! CLACK!

Three layers of dense black absolute magic formations instantly enveloped the door and walls of the chamber. The room was now sealed from the space and time of the outside world. No sound, magic, or even god-level entity could penetrate it without permission from Absolute Death.

Outside in the corridor, the group that had been left behind fell silent for a moment.

Stacia folded her ten black wings, then pushed her glasses up her nose while letting out a long breath. "Good grief... she just woke up from a three-year-long sleep, and the first thing she does is seal herself inside a room again?"

Alicia chuckled softly, a melodious laugh like the chime of wind bells. The crystal crown above her head glowed gently. "Just leave her, Stacia. You know yourself how possessive our little sister is toward what belongs to her. She missed Sofia, and Sofia missed her. Let them rest."

Aurellia, leaning against the corridor wall, only grinned widely. "I thought our Queen would immediately demand a big meal. Turns out the ’food’ she meant was something different."

Celes lightly elbowed Aurellia’s waist. "Watch your mouth, Aurellia. If Her Majesty hears that, you could be thrown into an empty dimension."

"Alright, alright," Stacia clapped her hands, summoning dozens of cheerfully glowing grimoire parchment pages that circled around her. The glasses-wearing girl spun to face Celes and Aurellia with eyes sparkling full of work enthusiasm. "Our Queen is free to be lazy, but Nocture’s bureaucratic system and defensive magic must not stop beating! Celes, Aurellia, show the way to the main office. I need every record, the latest geospatial maps, detailed logistics supplies, and population distribution data from the last three years!"

Seeing Stacia’s overflowing enthusiasm like a mad scholar, Celes and Aurellia could only smile in resignation. Both bowed respectfully to Alicia and Stacia, then led the way toward the Queen’s office.

The main office of the castle was a very spacious circular room filled with bookshelves that towered up to the ten-meter-high ceiling. In the center of the room stood a round marble table projecting a three-dimensional holographic map of the entire land controlled by Nocture.

The moment they entered, Stacia immediately flew and sat cross-legged in the air, floating above the holographic table. Her ten wings moved gently while her hands danced, manipulating hundreds of data points at once. Her ability to process information was now at a conceptual level; she could absorb the contents of a thousand-page book simply by looking at its cover.

"So, tell me about the condition of our mortal population," Stacia ordered casually, her eyes focused on the numbers continuously spinning in the air.

Aurellia pulled a velvet chair and sat, stretching out her long legs. "These past three years have been a hell of survival. Before the Earth’s Avatar forced the appearance of the Zombie King, waves of attacks occurred every month. But thanks to the underground hydroponic farming system designed by Lady Sofia and the supply of neutralized mutant meat, starvation never became a major issue."

Celes added, standing beside the holographic map while pointing at several red markers. "Our main problem yesterday was the shrinking of living space. The outer obsidian walls had begun to erode from the acidic miasma of elite zombies. Zark and his troops had to go out every three days to clear the moats. But now... with the annihilation of the Zombie King and the submission of tens of millions of wild zombies across the continent thanks to Her Majesty Sylvia, this territory is practically safe."

Alicia, sitting gracefully on a leather sofa in the corner of the room while stroking the white mane of the Kirin, smiled softly. "That means the survival phase of humanity has ended. Stacia, can you begin restructuring the protective formations? We must change them from attack-repelling formations into earth-purification formations. If Sylvia plans to make this place a permanent home, the land outside must once again be covered in trees, not just pools of blood."

"Absolutely possible!" Stacia replied enthusiastically. Her grimoire pages began forming complex geometric blueprint patterns. "With Zark’s undead army now controllable as tireless manual labor, we can rebuild civilization infrastructure five times faster than the pre-apocalypse era!"

The office was now filled with warm discussion about hopes for the future. The heavy burden of death and extinction had been lifted, replaced by plans for construction, city planning, and the recovery of a world now fully under the absolute peace brought by Death itself.

Far from the hustle of bureaucracy and office discussion, behind the double doors covered by three dense absolute formations, time seemed to stop turning.

The main bedroom of the castle was very spacious, dominated by elegant silver, black, and gold. Divine moonlight from the underworld seemed to have been brought along through a specially created spatial window, refracting soft silver rays that fell upon the king-size bed in the center of the room.

Upon that bed with its black silk sheets, the emotional tension that had been held back for three years finally shattered completely.

Sylvia laid Sofia down on the soft velvet pillows. Sofia’s blonde hair spread messily yet looked so beautiful against the dark sheets. Sofia’s breathing was slightly uneven. Her blue eyes, which usually radiated the firmness of a cold commander, had now completely melted, filled with longing, tenderness, and absolute surrender to the girl above her.

Sylvia pressed down on her slowly, caging Sofia’s body with both arms. Sylvia’s raven-black hair fell cascading, framing her pale and charming face, creating a curtain of privacy that separated them from the entire universe.

There were no more words that needed to be spoken. Words were too poor to describe the weight of three years of separation.

Sylvia’s differently colored eyes gazed straight into the depths of Sofia’s blue eyes before she finally leaned down and joined their lips.

The kiss was gentle at first, an affirmation that both of them truly existed here, that this was not a hallucination born of battlefield exhaustion. Yet that gentleness was quickly ignited by the sparks of deep longing, transforming into a kiss that was demanding, deep, and filled with absolute possession.

Sofia returned it with equal intensity. Both her arms rose, wrapping tightly around Sylvia’s neck and pulling the Queen’s slender body even closer. Their breaths mingled. Sofia’s warm body temperature from her sacred mana blended perfectly with the porcelain-cold temperature of Sylvia’s skin.

WUSSHHH...

Sylvia’s conceptual authority was not merely destructive magic; it was reality manipulation at the most fundamental level. As their kiss deepened and desire filled the room, Sylvia did not need to bother using her hands to remove the bothersome clothing.

With a single wish from Absolute Death, the black night gown Sylvia wore and the remaining dirty combat clothes on Sofia’s body... slowly unraveled. Those garments transformed into tiny particles of light dust that floated in the air, swallowed by emptiness before finally vanishing without a trace.

Now there was no longer any barrier between them. Only skin touching skin, witnessed by the dim artificial moonlight entering through the window. Sofia’s eight invisible angel wings spread out, encircling both their bodies and enveloping the bed in a warm, private cocoon of golden light.

A soft, restrained sigh escaped Sofia’s lips as Sylvia’s cold fingers traced the curves of her body with a worshipful touch, igniting a fire that could be extinguished by no one except the black-haired girl above her.

Earth might have just been saved from the apocalypse. Millions of living corpses might be prostrating outside. Yet for Sylvia and Sofia, their universe that night was only as large as the bed they occupied.

And let the rest of that long night, with all its whispers of longing, racing breaths, and burning soul union, remain an absolute secret locked tightly behind the sealed door. Because tonight, the Queen had returned, and she intended to reclaim every moment of lost time from her embrace.