THE ZOMBIE SYSTEM-Chapter 80 - 79: Into the Abyss

"Death comes for all mortals."

The commander descended like a god of ruin. Its void blade hummed with millions of trapped souls. Each swing tore ragged scars through the sky. Reality bled where darkness touched.

Leon gripped Shadow-edge until his knuckles went white. "You hear them? The souls screaming?"

"I hear victory," the commander replied. Void energy crackled around its form.

"Sick bastard."

"Practical survivor."

Ethella’s storm magic no longer roared with authority. It hissed and faltered. Lightning barely formed barriers that bought seconds against the inevitable. He focused entirely on deflecting attacks, unable to launch a single bolt in retaliation.

"This isn’t working," Ethella gasped. Blood streamed from his eyes where dimensional pressure had ruptured capillaries. "The void energy is eating through my neural pathways."

"Any bright ideas?" Leon asked while dodging another dimensional slash.

"Die fighting," Ethella replied. "That’s all we have left."

"Wonderful plan."

"It’s honest."

Leon’s undead moved in jerky, half-corporeal lunges. Already destabilized by dimensional pressure, they attacked not to harm but to draw attention. Buying room to breathe.

Tobias launched fire magic that blazed with S-rank memories. The flames struck void armor and simply ceased to exist. Not extinguished. Erased.

"My attacks accomplish nothing," Tobias reported through their mental link. "This entity operates beyond our understanding."

"Keep trying anyway," Leon commanded. "Distraction has value."

"As you wish, Master."

Leon wished he had his Assassin, that last strike had taken her to dimension unknown.

But the commander adapted with terrifying efficiency. Its cosmic intelligence analyzed their patterns while dimensional processing power exceeded mortal imagination.

"Your tactics grow predictable," the commander observed while deflecting Ethella’s lightning. "Desperation breeds repetition."

"Shut up and fight," Leon snarled.

"Such eloquence. Truly worthy of immortal verse."

Leon directed Shadow-edge in combination with Tobias’s fire magic. Both attacks struck simultaneously at different angles, forcing the commander to divide its defensive attention.

The assault connected with void armor, sending sparks cascading through air. But the damage was superficial. Cosmic force regenerated faster than mortal weapons could inflict harm.

"Impressive coordination," the commander admitted. "But ultimately futile."

"We’re just getting started," Leon replied while breathing hard.

"Are you? Your manna reserves suggest otherwise."

Leon checked his system interface. Single digits remaining. His undead barely maintained coherence.

"He’s right," Leon whispered to Ethella. "We’re running on fumes."

"Then we burn bright," Ethella said with unexpected determination.

"Meaning?"

"Everything we have. One final assault."

The entity’s next strike bypassed Ethella’s storm barrier completely. Void energy phased through lightning like shadow through glass, reaching for the Storm Caller’s exposed position.

"Ethella, move!" Leon shouted.

Too late. The glancing hit dissolved Ethella’s left arm at the elbow. The void blade left no wound, just absence. Flesh and bone simply stopped existing where darkness had touched.

Ethella gritted his teeth against pain that transcended physical sensation. "Still attached to the rest of me."

"You’re insane," Leon said with admiration.

"Occupational hazard," Ethella replied. Lightning flickered around his shoulders as storm magic struggled to compensate for catastrophic injury.

"Can you still fight?"

"Watch me."

"Still fighting?" the commander asked with something resembling curiosity. "Admirable persistence for doomed creatures."

"We’re too stupid to quit," Leon answered.

"Stupidity is not a virtue."

"Neither is genocide."

The commander’s void blade pulsed with renewed hunger. "Genocide implies malice. I simply consume what is useful."

"Same thing," Leon spat.

"Hardly."

The battlefield itself began to twist. Platforms shattered under pressure from forces that operated outside normal physics. Stone compressed into crystalline formations before dissolving into component molecules. Metal twisted into geometric shapes that hurt to perceive.

"Platform’s collapsing," Ethella warned while conjuring a funnel of wind. "Hold tight."

Compressed atmosphere formed a tornado that threw Leon clear of disintegrating stone. They regrouped on a chunk of floating rock barely held aloft by Ethella’s weakening field.

Blood smeared the platform beneath them. Dimensional pressure made breathing difficult. Leon’s system interface flickered with critical warnings about mana depletion and structural damage.

"Status report," Leon called to his undead.

"Manifestation failing," Tobias replied. "Perhaps three minutes remain."

"Understood. Make them count."

"We’re out of time," Leon gasped while checking his reserves. "One mistake and everyone dies."

"Then don’t make one," Ethella cut in, grim and sharp. He looked more lightning than man now. Flickering, fragile, defiant.

"Easier said than done," Leon muttered.

"Since when do we choose easy?"

"Good point."

Leon’s remaining storm magic crackled weakly around fingers that could barely maintain coherence. His legendary endurance was reaching absolute limits.

"How long can you maintain flight?" Leon asked while studying the commander’s movement patterns.

"Minutes," Ethella replied honestly. "Maybe less."

"That’s optimistic."

"I try."

Around them, Armathor burned. Dimensional tears spread like infection across the sky. Reality hemorrhaged through wounds that would take millennia to heal. Citizens fled through streets that no longer obeyed normal physics.

"Think anyone’s still alive down there?" Leon asked while watching fires consume his neighborhood.

"Some," Ethella replied. "The strong ones. The lucky ones."

"What about the others?"

"We honor them by surviving."

The commander floated motionless, watching their desperate preparations with predatory patience. Its void blade pulsed like a heartbeat of oblivion while cosmic energy gathered for final assault.

"Your struggle amuses me," the entity said. Dimensional power built beyond measurement. "But I cannot be defeated by mortal determination."

"Watch us prove you wrong," Leon replied.

"Defiance without substance. How typically mortal."

"Better than cosmic arrogance."

"Is it?"

Leon studied the entity’s dimensional phasing with tactical precision born from desperation. The pattern was subtle. Almost invisible unless you were watching for specific tells.

The commander solidified completely for brief moments during certain attacks. Microseconds of vulnerability when cosmic force became temporarily finite.

"There," Leon whispered to Ethella. "Half-second gap when it solidifies for attacks."

"I see it," Ethella confirmed. "Timing will be everything."

"When isn’t it?"

"Fair point."

Tobias and the his warrior zombie gathered what power they could channel despite destabilization threatening their existence. Both undead understood the plan without needing explanation.

"Master," Tobias said through their link. "This gambit has minimal success probability."

"Better than zero," Leon replied.

"Marginally."

"I’ll take marginal."

The commander raised its void blade for what might be the final strike. Cosmic energy flowed through the weapon while trapped souls screamed their eternal anguish.

"Observe," the entity said with satisfaction. "The difference between mortal hope and infinite power."

The commander floated still, watching. Its void blade pulsed like a heartbeat of oblivion. Leon saw it then. A half-second gap in its dimensional phasing. A moment of physical vulnerability.

Against all logic, against every warning in his system, Leon surged forward. Flying low and fast toward cosmic entity that could erase him from existence.

Ethella screamed after him, too late.

"Have to try," Leon called back while necromantic energy blazed around his form.

"You’ll die!"

"Maybe."

He channeled everything into desperate assault. Shadow-edge flared black-violet, aimed for the entity’s exposed side. His system calculated trajectory while his undead moved to support the attack.

"NOW!" Leon roared.

But the moment passed. The commander turned smoothly. Dimensional phasing resumed as the vulnerability window closed. The entity had been aware of the pattern all along.

"Did you think me unaware of my own defenses?" the commander asked with predatory amusement.

The void blade rotated toward Leon with predatory calm, as though the entire fight had been building to this mistake.

"Predictable," the entity continued while darkness descended. "Your tactical thinking follows mortal limitations."

"Leon!" Ethella’s voice carried across impossible distances.

Time slowed as entropy made manifest fell toward Leon’s exposed position. The blade would strike in milliseconds, erasing him from reality before pain could register.

His system interface blazed with final warnings about imminent termination. His consciousness prepared for dissolution into nothingness.

"Wrong move, mortal," the commander said, smiling with a thousand unseen mouths.

The void blade swung.