---------------
Brought to you by Valir Scans! ‌‌‌To support ‌‌our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org
---------------

A Corporate Slave Becomes a Villainous Nuisance in a Zombie Apocalypse
Episode 61
"Ahhh!"
"Your Highness!"
Let go! Let go!
I thrashed wildly, shaking my ankle free.
The rope I'd barely managed to grip swayed dangerously.
"Argh! Argh!"
Have you ever ‌‌tried supporting your own body weight with just your arm strength?
It's genuinely not easy!
Especially not when a zombie is clinging to your foot like this!
An ‌‌‌ominous sound emanated from the precariously swaying rope.
Creak.
"Ahhh!"
The rope, ‌‌‌‌unable to ‌‌‌‌bear the weight of two people, was beginning to snap.
"Ugh... ugh... ugh..."
The rope fraying apart.
My arm strength slipping away. ‌‌‌
The zombie thrashing beneath me, its teeth sinking into my shoe.
Even as I tried to remain still, this cursed zombie kept—!
I squeezed my eyes shut, my gaze having instinctively turned downward.
If I fell from here, it would be instant death.
Crackle.
"Please... God... please...!"
Snap.
"Ahhh!"
The rope snapped with anticlimactic finality.
A firm hand seized my wrist as I plummeted. ‌‌
"Your Highness!"
It was Praha.
Praha's massive hand gripped my wrist firmly.
All I could see in the darkness were those amber eyes fixed upon me.
With a single hand, he hauled me up—along with the zombie dangling from my foot.
"My foot! There's a zombie on my foot!"
"I know!"
First with one hand, then with both.
I squeezed through the narrow opening, ‌‌barely wide enough for ‌‌‌one person, head first.
At that same moment, I felt the zombie's breath as it lunged to bite near my ankle.
"Ahhh!"
I kicked with all my strength, flinging it away.
Crash!
The zombie whose head had been driven into the hole crumbled with a sickening sound.
My body tumbled onto the First Floor.
Without even looking at whoever was descending upon me, I lashed out with my foot.
"Get off!"
"My lady!"
"Get off! Get off! Ahhh!"
My wildly swung leg connected squarely with the assailant's shoulder.
"Ugh."
Only then did I realize it wasn't a zombie—it was Praha.
Despite kicking with all my strength, he didn't budge an inch, merely frowning slightly before pinning me down and shielding me with his body.
Splurt!
Blood cascaded down upon us both.
Tangerine severed the zombie's head that had come clawing after me.
Thanks to Praha absorbing the brunt with his entire body, the blood hadn't splattered across my face.
"...."
"Are you unharmed, my lady?"
"Why did you come...."
I'm desperately grateful that you did, ‌‌but....
The god told me to abandon the ‌‌rest of the party.
Why did you come to rescue me?
And why am I crying?
My eyes and nose, which had reddened in an instant, pressed ‌‌against Praha's chest.
There was no soap-like scent emanating from Praha anymore.
Only the smell of blood and faint perspiration.
Yet oddly, it ‌‌brought me comfort.
"Really, why ‌‌did you come?"
You were calling me by my name just moments ago, so ‌‌why suddenly "my lady" again?
"You should have abandoned me. That's what the instructions said to do."
I speak ‌‌well even though I was ‌‌terrified you might actually have left me behind.
I lifted my head from where it had been buried ‌‌in Praha's embrace. As I looked up at his handsome face, our eyes met, ‌‌and Praha smiled.
"There's something else worth ‌‌abandoning instead."
That mischievous grin was ‌so uncharacteristic of Praha.
Thump.
Something settled deep within my chest.
'I thought you wouldn't come.'
Perhaps I....
Should have trusted my companions more.
"...Were you worried? That Yusara had disappeared?"
Now that things are looking up, even such a terrible joke comes to mind.
'You wouldn't find this funny, would you? Not knowing Korean.'
Praha pulled me into an embrace without a word, even as ‌‌I laughed.
As for me.
'This is no time for this!'
I pushed Praha away and scrambled to my feet.
I turned to Yujein beside me.
"How did you know I was there?"
"The moment you were summoned, we were immediately summoned directly above the tomb where you fell!"
In other words....
"Right in front of the exit!"
Right in front of the exit.
If I abandoned my missing companions, I could escape immediately.
But if I didn't abandon them.
"The moment we opened the Underground door to save you... that came down in front of the exit." ‌
I turned my head in the direction Yujein was pointing.
Indeed, I could see the exit ahead.
The end of the Maze.
And iron bars descended right in front of it.
"Praha! Did you rescue Yusara?! Then let's figure out what to do now!"
But there was no time to despair leisurely.
"Kyaaaack!" ‌‌
"Kyack!"
Zombies were pouring in from the opposite direction.
On the left, the advancing zombies.
On the right, the exit sealed by descending iron ‌‌‌bars.
The price of defying the God's warning to abandon my missing companions.
And.
"I don't want to add more misfortune, but ‌‌the hourglass...."
The hourglass too had little ‌‌sand left to fall.
"Danger!"
Cyprus, ‌‌‌closest to the zombies, shoved Yujein backward.
Zombie corpses littered the area—they'd already fought once.
"Kyaaaack!"
"Not so fast!"
Cyprus's blade sliced ‌‌through the neck of the first zombie to rush forward. ‌‌
Had the wound on his shoulder reopened?
Blood glinted faintly through the tattered fabric of his clothes.
Meanwhile, the horde of zombies surged past Cyprus toward ‌‌‌us....
"Fall back!"
Praha and Tangerine joined forces to confront the zombies, but.
Everyone knows it.
This cannot continue endlessly.
I turned toward the iron bars.
The bars that even Praha's magical rope could not sever.
The stone wall beside them.
"Your Highness! Do you still have the magical rope?!"
The moment the question left my lips, Praha hurled the rope toward me. I snatched it from the air.
As I unfurled the coiled length, it measured roughly fifty centimeters.
If I use it now, this will be ‌‌‌the last time.
I grabbed it and rushed straight toward the iron bars.
"It's useless!"
"I know!"
I'm not trying to break the bars!
I withdrew the ‌single arrow remaining in my ‌quiver.
The iron arrow I'd obtained from Praha.
I'd witnessed this arrow pierce through stone walls and embed itself countless times.
I wound the magical rope tightly around the arrowhead. Perhaps because it was an ‌‌‌iron arrow, the shaft was also ‌‌‌thick. After wrapping it multiple times to ‌‌ensure it wouldn't slip, I brought it down hard.
Against the stone wall beside the iron bars.
Crash!
"It works!"
Break!
Yujein, grasping my intent, rushed over and began clawing at ‌‌‌the stone with her own hands.
"Yujein! Use your sword!"
"I don't have one!"
"It's at my side!"
Striking with arrowhead and blade. Kicking with my feet. Clawing with my hands.
'The God thinks they can trap me here?'
Then I'll ‌‌smash my way out!
I should have brought a pickaxe if I'd ‌known it would come to this!
'It's ironic that a saint like Yujein is destroying her own God's Maze!'
Crash! Crack!
Under normal circumstances, it would have been impossible, but fortunately, removing the sacred artifact had ‌‌weakened the ‌‌divine power permeating the Maze.
I managed to carve out a hole large enough for one person to squeeze through, then shouted to the three others.
"This way!"
The three fighting the zombies immediately rushed toward me.
Me?
I'm already through the hole and running!
Holding Yujein's hand!
"Run!" ‌‌‌‌‌
"My lady! The zombies are ‌‌following us!"
"I know! But this place is about to collapse!"
The time in my palm—there's barely any left now!
10, 9, 8, 7....
"What?!"
"This is faster!"
Cyprus, who had been running behind me, scooped me up without losing a shred of ‌‌momentum.
He continued sprinting at an undiminished pace.
Beside us, I could see Praha doing the same, carrying Yujein as he ran.
6, 5....
The ceiling crumbled.
"Ugh!" ‌‌‌
Tangerine staggered, struck on the head by a falling stone.
"Tangerine!"
"I'm fine!"
Rumble.
The exit sealed shut.
Dust billowed thick in the air.
Light drew ‌‌closer.
4, 3, 2, 1....
Boom.
0.
"How did those ‌bastards escape?!"
"There were so many numbers, after all!"
"Even so!"
"Huff, huff...."
We had escaped the Maze around sunset.
Now night had fallen.
"Put me down already!"
"No way!"
Yujein and I were still being carried by the men as they ran.
As ‌‌‌‌we fled, Tangerine deftly oriented herself and informed us that this was the opposite side of the entrance we'd used to enter, and that the Abandoned Temple lay just a bit further ahead. ‌‌
"Which god's temple is it?!"
"I don't remember!"
Well, that hardly mattered!
What mattered was the zombies charging down this dark Stone Mountain without slipping—that was the real threat!
"Kyaaaah!"
If we slowed even slightly, they'd grab us by the hair. That's why Cyprus and Praha refused to put us down.
Sweat poured from Cyprus's body like rain as he carried me.
He was reaching his limit. ‌‌‌
"The temple is in sight!"
"But there's no point in going inside anyway!"
"At least we can close the door!"
"There must be a basement!"
I gripped my violently ‌‌‌spinning head and forced my eyes to focus.
A building devoid of light, jagged and broken in places, yet its white walls seemed to shimmer with ‌‌‌a faint luster.
A boundary stone erected ahead.
A stone marking the beginning of the Temple's domain.
The moment I crossed ‌‌‌that boundary stone.
"Screech!"
"...Huh?"
The zombies that had been rushing forward as if to engulf us from behind suddenly froze in place.
As if they'd struck something.
As if an invisible barrier had materialized.
Precisely at the Temple's boundary.
"Grrrrr..."
The pursuing zombies circled around the boundary stone.
Still glaring ‌‌‌at us, but never crossing into the Temple's territory.
"Huff, huff... Why ‌‌‌won't they come across?"
"What's happening?"
The group that had stopped turned back in bewilderment.
Yujein cried out.
"This Temple still retains the God's blessing!"
"They recognize the divine domain?"
"Heh."
Well, at least ‌‌‍things worked out.
Cyprus let out a hollow laugh.
I silently grabbed Cyprus's forearm.
"I'll set you down now, princess."
Cyprus smiled, looking at me still ‌‌‌‌perched on his shoulders.
I could see moonlight passing through the space between Cyprus's ‌‌‌‌golden eyelashes, casting a shimmering shadow in his green eyes.
"Careful."
As my feet touched the ground, dizziness washed over me.
I stumbled and braced myself against Cyprus's chest.
"Are you very dizzy?"
I leaned fully against Cyprus, who was ‌supporting my ‌elbow.
A soft sound.
Then I drew the sword tucked into Cyprus's waist.
I pressed the blade against the throat of Cyprus, who had just been carrying me as he ran.
[Abandoned Temple]
You have entered ‌‌a safe zone.
Survivors: Yusara, Praha, Cyprus, Yujein, Tangerine

---------------
Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org
---------------