The Villainess and I, her Zombie

There was an abandoned house on the outskirts of a small village.

Many years ago someone got murdered there and from then on everyone in the village kept away from that place.

But it wasn't haunted or anything.

It was just a normal sturdy-built house with a nice wide basement.

The Dandelions and Superbia were able to convince the village elder with few coins to rent them that basement for a few hours.

The basement and an old barrel that although wasn't leaking was in a bad enough state to get thrown away.

Uresha and Rotte filled the barrel with the water from the village's well and carried it back into the basement where Shanks was finishing tying up the unconscious beautiful man to the chair.

Shanks looked at the barrel and then at Cranberry, circling around it with furrowed brows as if she was trying to remember something.

"Young lady, if you wanted to drown him a bit, you could have told me before I finished..."

He said in a sulking voice.

"Ha?"

Cranberry glared at him with disgust and frowned.

"That's not why you...?"

Witnessing such a reaction, Shanks immediately knew that he was off with his prediction - and by a lot.

"If you're done here, why don't you see what's taking Roan so long, it's only a few common herbs that are supposed to be endemic to this region. Move it."

She chased him out and started staring back at the still water in the barrel.

For the moment, Zombie had absolutely nothing to do so he was crouching in the corner drawing in the dust with his index finger.

Rotte and Uresha already learned that it wasn't too smart to interrupt Cranberry when she was acting like that, so they just awkwardly stood by the door hoping that their leader will return with the prince as fast as possible.

"...was a robbery in a broad daylight! That much money for a single stack of some grass?! Why did you pay him what he demanded?! I almost had him!"

The blond prince's voice leaked in even before the door opened.

"The poor guy has to eat something too, he was almost crying..."

Shanks responded calmly.

"That was the point! Why should I pay for something that I can be given for free? Isn't that how things are supposed to be? It's not my fault that he was so bad at trading!"

As the prince was complaining, Shanks opened the door and both of them entered.

"Your highness, for someone with such low LUC stat, your barter skill is absolutely terrifying..."

The rat-faced man muttered under his breath and quickly approached the red-haired girl who was glaring at them with an unamused expression.

"Sorry for the wait, here."

He handed her a small pouch without getting into any details, judging it to be not only unnecessary but dangerous as well.

"...haa... finally!"

Cranberry rolled her eyes and crushed and wrung the insides of the pouch into the barrel without even checking the content first.

In an instant, the whole basement was filled with a strong medicinal smell, rather specific and not very pleasant too...

"Zombie, come here."

"Graough? (Yes?)"

Cranberry called and Zombie instantly appeared by her side.

"How precise can you be with producing your venom?"

She asked while causally wiping her hands in the captured man's expensive-looking cloak.

"Graough? (Very, why do you ask?)"

The blue undead grumbled tilting his head curiously.

"I need you to pour exactly half a teacup of your soul devouring venom in here."

The red-haired girl tapped the edge of the barrel with her knuckles and looked up at her servant.

"Will you be able to or should we send someone to get us an actual teacup?"

"...did... did she just said 'soul devouring venom'?!"

Roan gasped in shock looking between the Dandelions but no one was keen to answer.

"Graough. (Sound easy enough.) Grough. (Here.)"

Zombie simply shrugged his shoulders, leaned over the barrel, opened his mouth, and when his eyes shone, a stream of translucent liquid shot from his teeth right into the water.

"Graough. (Done.)"

Zombie said wiping his mouth.

Only then did he realized that everyone except Cranberry was looking at him with abhor.

Cranberry was only slightly frowning.

"Graough... (Yeah, yeah, I'm gross, I know...)"

Zombie rolled his eyes and grunted.

"Graough? (But what now?)"

He changed the subject by lightly tapping the side of the barrel.

Although there was no visible change to the water once its surface settled, everyone could feel the eerie aura emanating from the liquid.

"...haa... now we just..."

Cranberry responded but stopped talking again.

She frowned and looked at the rest of the group.

"You want to back all the way to the door just in case."

She said shooing them away.

"...?"

Uresha, Shanks, Rotte, and Roan, all looked at each other and hastily obeyed the indirect command.

"Zombie, hand."

Cranberry extended her hand expectantly and her blue undead hurriedly followed up and loosened the stitches connecting his right arm together.

Then, using the stiff blue hand, Cranberry scooped a bit of the concoction and with a casual swing, she sprayed it at the unconscious beautiful man's face.

The effect was instantaneous.

Wherever the droplets hit, a brown steaming spot would appear and thin black veins would show up digging through the victim's skin.

"...ah... aaahhhh... AAAAAAHHHHH!"

The man started groaning in pain, then he woke up and started screaming his lungs off while his body convulsed and twitched - but was otherwise unable to move thanks to the constraints that Shanks had put on him.

"Wh-what did you do to him...?"

Roan asked hiding his arms behind his back to not show the goosebumps he got from fear.

"Death's ichor."

Cranberry shrugged her shoulders while scooping another portion of the mixture and splashing it at the captive causing him to wriggle in pain and shout a lot more.

"AAAAAAHHHHH! AAAAAAHHHHH!"

"Elven recipe. They never expected that another Venomancer with soul devouring venom would appear, so they literally wrote it in their chronicles for everyone to see."

Cranberry explained speaking over the tortured cries.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Venomancer?! Don't tell me...?!"

Roan became pale as a sheet and glanced at the indifferent Zombie watching the struggling man.

"Death ichor is a mixture that turns off and blocks any skills from being activated for a certain period of time. As you can see it's also rather unpleasant for the subject too."

She smirked watching the man wriggle in horrible agony.

"Don't you think that it's too much...? Young lady, If you just want to..."

"AAAHHH! GHAH! N-NOOOOOOO!"

The good-hearted Uresha wanted to speak for the tortured man but the said man started wriggling much harder when his face seemed to began melting off...

"Ha. So it really is true..."

Cranberry smirked watching the beautiful man morph into someone completely different.