The Villainess and I, her Zombie

"(A-an undead...?! Noo! Go away! Don't eat me! I will burn you!)"

The young dragon trembled in fear but still tried its best to spread its wings to appear as menacing as possible in the limited space of the shallow caver that was just a slightly upgraded burrow dug in stone by the passage of time and the abuse of elements.

|It knows that fire is effective against the undead.|

Zombie pointed out.

|Dragons are naturally smart, they have the genetic memory, or rather simply have access to a portion of the system database from an early age, case in point, this guy.|

Patience explained

|But you don't have to worry, during their first few years the dragon's throat is too delicate to withstand the use of the fire breath skill so they don't learn it until they are four years old. If the trivia I have access to is correct, this one should be at most two – which means he has the mental capacity of a seven-year-old human.

"(Go away!) *kweeh* *cough* (U-uuugh...!)"

The young dragon tried out and despite what the sealed overseer said, it sure tried to breathe fire at the blue undead in front of it, but ended up only producing a pained squeak and choked on some smoke that came out of its jaws before accidentally sharing a pitiful sob when it cried that its attack failed miserably, and flapped its wings hoping for the best.

"..."

And that made the blue undead flinch too – but certainly not because he was actually scared of the scared monster's desperate threats.

No.

The thing that made the boy freeze in shock was the physical condition of the little dragon – well, little for the standards of its species at least.

The poor thing was in a horrible state! Its wings looked crumpled as if they were tied up for days without even the slightest consideration for the monster's health, and there were many spots where the red scales peeled off and revealed irritated skin oozing with a yellowish goop.

Until that point, Zombie always thought that the red dragon's terrible health during the first kill party of the first playthrough was caused by the long term effects of eating the frenzy rabbit filled to the brim with corpse venom and being artificially sustained in the state of perpetual poisoning by its captors from the Greed family – but that was clearly not the case.

"Hey, buddy. What happened to you?"

"(Go away!)"

The blue boy asked in a worried voice and extended his hand towards the young dragon but the only reaction he got was for the monster to cried out in his head using the telepathy skill and backing right into the cave's wall and causing even more scales to fall off.

|It's bad. The pipsqueak is too scared to listen to you even with the backing of the beast master affinity.|

Patience pointed out sounding surprisingly concerned.

"It's alright, little one. I mean no harm. See?"

Zombie was agreeing with Patience but that alone was not enough to make him back off – instead, he raised his hands up showing his open palms to the red monster – trying to make it realize that he wasn't going to hurt it.

"(Go away! I-I might not be able to burn you, but I can bite you and it will really hurt! The humans who took me away from my nest all started crying when I bit them!)"

The young dragon hissed and scratched the cave's floor with its unimpressive claws while baring his slightly more impressive fangs.

|All started crying...? He's not a very good liar, right?|

Patience pointed out, slightly amused.

|He does seem a lot more innocent than I remember him.|

Zombie nodded in agreement observing the little dragon who looked more and more pitiful as it was realizing that it might be over for it.

|Maybe nearing his death's door he developed more dignity... Though in three years he would mentally be around the level of a high schooler, so maybe it was just trying to act cool despite its situation?|

The sealed overseer suggested sounding as if she was tilting her head.

|So... like a phase.|

|It wasn't a phase, Zombie! Not for him, at least. But what can we do about him now?|

|...good question...|

The two joked around a bit before returning to the problem at hand.

"Alright, you won. I'll back off."

Zombie sighed and started crawling back.

"(...h-huh...?! Wait, really?!)"

Once again the young dragon failed to cut off the telepathic link in time and overshared in utter confusion.

"Yeah. I know what's your problem – you're hungry."

The blue boy shrugged his shoulders and declared with a confident expression.

"Wait here a bit, I'll get you something to eat – and if you will be the one to kill it, then maybe you receive enough experience points to level up and heal up a little bit too."

Zombie tilted his head and nodded while crawling through the low entrance.

"Wait a bit – we should find you something like the rabbit before – which was also a gift from me by the way."

He added before leaving and covering the entrance with the shrubs and bushes.

"Seriously, stay here, I'll be right back."

The boy leaned down and waved his finger at the little dragon's life signature since he couldn't see it normally anymore.

"(D-don't come back! Stupid undead! If you come back I will eat you!)"

"Pffft... yeah, as if! Stay put and be ready for some a meal!"

The hidden red monster tried to be brave and sent one more telepathic message after leaving blue boy which honestly only caused Zombie to snort and wave his hand dismissively back towards it.

|Food...? Really? Even if he is young, dragons are highly intelligent – of course, the majority that you met were affected by the fog that stripped them from said intelligence and left just monsters acting upon their instincts, so you wouldn't really know that.|

Patience sighed, sounding as if she shook her head in disappointment.

|First of all, he's a baby – with a big body and the mental capacity of a seven-year-old, but still a baby. It's scared and his tummy is rumbling, of course, he will be uncooperative.|

The blue boy scoffed at the sealed overseer and began walking around searching through the area with his life signature detection.

|His tummy is rumbling...? You already like him too much! He's the size of a small horse!|

|Doesn't matter, still cute, and needs food – stop being jealous over everyone we meet.|

Patience complained but got scoffed at again.

|Wh-who is jealous over you!? Maybe in your dreams!|

The sealed overseer sounded extremely embarrassed and tried to mask it with anger but failed miserably.