Goodbye, My Hero

I sprinted toward the source of the screams echoing from the orphanage’s underground chamber.
Without hesitation, I cut the basement door in half with my sword.

Slash!

The staircase before me plunged deep into the earth. The air was heavy, almost suffocating, but I pushed forward, descending step after step. The screams didn’t stop. They sounded like dozens of voices crying in agony all at once.

When I finally reached the bottom, I found myself in a cavernous basement. In the center stood a crimson altar, carved with strange, unrecognizable patterns, and beside it, an unfamiliar statue loomed.

Then I saw her.

A woman with long, unkempt black hair, pale skin drenched in blood, and eyes glowing a deep, unnatural red. She was surrounded by the corpses of nuns and every orphan who had lived here.

“Val…”

Her name left my lips before I could stop myself. I was certain..It was her.

The sight reminded me of the Zombie Queen, but something was different. The Queen I’d seen before was an old version, she is decaying ruler who commanded her undead from the palace altar above. This… was something else entirely.

A system notification flashed before my eyes.

[FLOOR 3 BOSS HAS APPEARED!]

[YOU ARE NOW FIGHTING A BOSS!]
《NECROVAL, THE ZOMBIE QUEEN》

[BOSS LEVEL 5]

She is the real boss of this floor, and she has 5 layers of HP.

“You… Necroval!”

The name clicked in my head. From the very start, her name had sounded familiar. Now I understood, her real name was Necroval, the Zombie Queen.

She laughed, then locked eyes with me.

“Ah, so you finally came, Kyouze. Wait… you already know who I am? Hahaha, I’m so happy you do!”

“What have you done?” I shouted, drawing my sword. “Why did you kill everyone here? You once told me they were like family to you!”

Her expression darkened. “What do you mean, Kyouze? I saved them… look.”

She raised her hand and cast her skill, and before my eyes, every corpse in the room twitched, shuddered, and rose as zombies.

The sight was horrifying.

“You misunderstand me,” she said. “I’m not the villain here. They are. This whole kingdom is rotten! I saved them from their own evil… and I will burn this city to the ground!”

A murderous aura radiated from her as a strange circle of glitching code formed beneath her feet. Skeletal remains scattered across the floor stirred, fusing together into an army of the dead.

My heart sank. “Why… why are there so many bones here?” Then the truth struck me. “No… don’t tell me—”

“That’s right, Kyouze,” she said, glaring at me with fury. “This orphanage has always hidden its darkest secret below ground. It was a place for executions… sacrifices to their so-called gods. This is the city’s true face… and the kingdom’s as well.”

Her voice broke as rage bled through her words.

“Their twisted faith claimed countless lives… even my family’s. I will never forget the day I watched them die with my own eyes.”

I could feel her pain. It was real. Her trauma wasn’t an act.

“But here’s the cruel joke,” she continued. “The gods they worshipped weren’t gods at all… but something called the Abyss. The king and his noble scum all wanted immortality.”

Abyss… The word stirred something in my mind. Could this be connected to the Abyss Dungeon?

She went on, voice trembling with hatred.

“When I learned the truth, I tried to escape… but the guards caught me. They turned me into a test subject, letting the Abyss seep into me until I became its vessel. They called it Necro, an Abyss core fused with my body. I was tortured for months… until the day I finally gained this power. And now, with the Abyss at my side, I will destroy every last one of them!”

Her body erupted in glitching code.

Another notification appeared:

[The city has fallen into chaos! Zombies have taken control!]

I couldn’t believe how fast she had turned the entire city into her undead domain. But I had no choice. I had to be strong. I had to stop her.

“Val… damn it… I should’ve killed you the moment we met!” I charged forward, swinging my blade, but the zombies shielded her with their bodies.

Slash! Slash!

No matter how many I cut down, more kept coming.

Val’s body began absorbing the blood and remains of every fallen zombie. Her form twisted, merging into a massive abomination that filled the basement. The walls groaned as the space collapsed around us.

I turned and ran. If I stayed, I’d be buried alive. Zombies chased me up the stairs, but I kept cutting them down until...

Bam!

I burst through the orphanage doors just in time to see the entire building crumble.

From the rubble, a colossal zombie, three times larger than before, rose into the night. I could see Val’s body embedded in its forehead.

“Damn it… it’s so huge!”

The beast roared, and the city’s horde began rushing toward me from every direction.

Slash! Slash!

My stamina and energy were already down to a quarter, but they kept coming. I knew I had to strike the main body. If I destroyed the head, if I reached Val....It would all be over. But the swarm wouldn’t let me through.

They chipped away at my health bit by bit.

“Damn zombies! You only fight in groups!”

Val’s laughter cut through the chaos.

“Kyouze… I wish we could have met under different circumstances. You were the first to grant me a request. The first to ever give me a gift…”

For a moment, her voice sounded almost human again, as if a fragment of her old self remained.

“I’m truly grateful. But unfortunately… you have to die here. Goodbye… Hy Hero.”

The giant zombie’s fist came crashing toward me.

“Let me tell you something!” I roared, unleashing my EtherCode skill, [Overburst Slash]. Lightning surged along my blade before firing in a laser-like arc.

Slash!

The giant’s arm disintegrated into ash.

“I’m not your Hero. And the one who’s going to die here… is you.”

I activated one of my trump card [Auto Hunting Drone], a support item I had earned by defeating Watcher Drone.exe.

From a burst of glitching light above me, a swarm of heavily armed drones descended.

[Auto Hunting Drone activated!]

[Engaging all enemies within range!]

The real battle had just begun.

...

..