AN : I wrote most of this two months ago, while I was in Weird War craze, and kept it in reserve for Halloween. I did some polishing and added the two final scenes, but apart from that, the bulk of this one-shot was written in one feverish writing session, so don't expect the same quote-unquote quality as the rest of my work.

I stumbled upon the YS series while browsing TV Tropes for inspiration for "Ciaphas Cain : Warmaster of Chaos" (it IS coming, just not soon, I'm afraid). As for the Zombie Army series, I probably spent more time pondering the lore of these games than the developers ever did : they clearly went for a B-movie, pulp fiction aesthetic, not taking anything too seriously (I mean, there are Easter Eggs where Zombie Hitler breakdances, so ...).

Still, it was funny to write this crossover, and I hope you enjoy reading it as well.

Youjo Senki / Tanya the Evil belongs to Carlo Zen. The Zombie Army series belongs to Rebellion.


After months of fighting all over the frontlines of an increasingly desperate war, I had been recalled to Berun along with the rest of the 203rd. The orders hadn't included any explanation, just that I was ordered to present myself to General Zettour as soon as I arrived. So I told Weiss to get everyone fed and rested, and went to meet the man who had more or less been my commanding officer since my battalion's creation.

He looked tired, and aged. I had known he was old – his grandchildren were only slightly younger than myself – but it was only now, with the energy he had always displayed when we met almost completely gone, that I really saw it on his face.

"As you know, Major," he began after we had exchanged greetings, "the war hasn't exactly developed to the Empire's advantage over the last months."

I kept a sneer off my face and stayed silent through an effort of will. General Zettour was, among many things, a master of understatements. The war had been going badly ever since we had utterly failed to dispose of the Republican army, allowing it to escape at Brest because everyone but me was too drunk on victory's nectar from Operation Revolving Door's unmitigated success.

"Things have gotten so bad that the Kaiser himself has taken notice. Last week, he summoned representatives of the General Staff as well as other Ministries to discuss the situation and how this conflict may be ended once and for all. Faced with his authority, there was little choice for even the most patriotic among the Empire's leadership but to recognize what I suspect you've known for some time : the War cannot be won by conventional means. Faced as we are with nearly the entire world arrayed against us, our defeat is inevitable, no matter what victories we might achieve in the interim."

"The Kaiser recognized this, and thus declared that our goals should shift from achieving an impossible military victory to securing the best possible terms for the Empire while opening negotiations."

"Our enemies have invested too much in defeating us," I pointed out, feeling it was obvious enough to be safe to say. "They won't accept anything but total surrender, coupled with reparations that will cripple us for decades."

"You are correct, Major. Which is why the Kaiser proposed a plan to make the other nations of the world to accept our terms by convincing them that pursuing the war would be far too costly."

"In other words, we might not win, but we can make sure everyone loses along with us ?"

"More or less. What I'm now going to tell you is top-secret, Major. You're only being told this because this plan will require your participation."

Oh, great. Another impossible mission being hoisted on my shoulders.

"I'll do everything in my power to accomplish His Majesty's orders, sir !"

"I know you will, Major. Now, listen. Since the war started, the Kaiser has been sponsoring a project to use magic on a strategic level, using his own personal fortune to do so. From what I understand, it was only a curiosity at first, researching the arcane lore of old in our new territories. But the initial results were promising enough for His Majesty to spend considerable sums on it over the years, and he now believes that a demonstration of what his people have achieved could be intimidating enough to force the allied powers to the negotiation tables."

I felt my mind freeze at the implications of what General Zettour was saying. Had the Kaiser stumbled on some kind of magical nuke equivalent ? I wanted to say that wasn't possible, but I remembered the destruction I was capable of when I used the Type 95. Of course, that was only possible because of Being X's interference in the creation of that cursed orb, which implied that devil was involved in the Kaiser's pet project.

On the other hand, we were losing the war, badly. Me and the 203rd could beat any number of enemy mages, but in the end we couldn't compensate for the sheer difference in industrial and manpower between us and our enemies. No country, no matter how advanced technologically or magically, could fight off the entire world and win. That was why I personally believed every member of the Imperial Diplomatic Corps should be shot for failing so badly at their job.

Given that, one final hail-Mary to get better terms was probably the best I could expect from high command. It wouldn't surprise me if the Kaiser had pulled the entire secret project out of thin air in order to convince the war-maniacs around him to even consider the option of surrender.

"What exactly are we talking about ?"

"The details are top-secret, above even my pay grade, I'm afraid," said Zettour with a small apologetic smile. "From a practical perspective, His Majesty told us that five large-scale spells would be deployed across the entire Empire, which would theoretically result in mass devastation of our enemies. The Kaiser made it clear that his research group didn't have the resources to repeat this even if it works perfectly …"

"But our enemies wouldn't know that, at least not right away, which would at least give us some time," I finished his line of thought. "And what if," I asked cautiously, "God forbid, that gambit should fail and the rituals come to nothing ?"

"Then," replied Zettour with a heavy sigh, "it is His Majesty's will that we surrender, in order to prevent unnecessary and pointless suffering of the Empire's population. We'd then accept whatever terms our enemies would offer us, though I'm given to understand our diplomats would try their best to avoid the Federation gaining too much influence. In that regard, we are fortunate that they are almost as disliked as us among our enemies."

I nodded to signify my understanding. Of course the commies weren't trusted, they hadn't exactly covered themselves with glory in the war. Really, all they had done was throw wave after wave of bodies at us, turning the Eastern Front into a mass graveyard worthy of the Rhine front at its worst. Even their allies, who had profited from that slaughter the most on a grand strategic scale, must be rather leery of anyone willing to employ that kind of method, not even to win, but just to put pressure on the Empire.

Still, this confirmed what I had suspected. This whole 'strategic use of magic' thing was a lie, designed to mask the Kaiser's intent to surrender so that he could avoid having himself and his family being shot by the Red Army. Given what they had done to their own royal family, I could understand his caution; in fact, I applauded it. I only wished he hadn't taken so bloody long to realize what had been blindingly obvious to me.

"I see." I fought hard to keep my elation at the prospect of peace off my face. It wouldn't do to be seen as lacking in fighting spirit and end up being executed just before the end of this damned war, after all. "If true victory is impossible, then that is indeed the most rational course of action, regardless of how distasteful it might be."

Zettour must have bought it, because he nodded solemnly instead of castigating me for cowardice.

"With that in mind," he continued, "you and the 203rd will participate in this operation. The war has left us with precious little mages, and we are mobilizing as many of them as we can without causing the collapse of all frontlines."

He handed me a thick sealed envelope. Here are your deployment orders. You will be sent to the Easternmost ritual site, partly to assist with the casting and partly to ensure it is not disturbed. Its location is some distance behind our lines, but if our enemies learn of our efforts, they will surely do their utmost to stop us.

"Very well. If I may, sir, what's the operation's name ?"

"The Kaiser personally named it. Appropriately enough, this last throw of the dice to safeguard the Empire's future is to be called Plan Z."


Mary Sue flew through the skies alongside her comrades, straight toward the Devil's lair. There was nowhere for the Devil to run this time. She had to stand her ground and fight instead of fleeing. The intelligence from Albion was clear on that, even if they had no idea what else was going on in the ruined medieval castle where Degurechaff and her followers had been stationed. The orders they had managed to intercept had been incredibly light on details, but they had been clear : the Rusted Silver had to hold the line and protect the place no matter what.

Mary didn't care what the Imperials were hiding in the castle, and it wasn't her job to find out. She was part of the operation because she was the only one with the God-given strength to match the spawn of Satan that had murdered her father and so many other brave soldiers since the Empire had unleashed their evil upon the world.

As they approached, she detected that all-too familiar magical signature. With the power of God coursing through her limbs, she shot ahead of the rest of the attack group, not hearing the calls of her CO to stay in formation. Nothing mattered except Degurechaff.

The Devil saw her approach, and rose up to meet her. Once more, the two of them clashed in the air, unleashing tremendous amounts of mana as they did their very best to kill each other. Mary unleashed every bit of power God had given her, focusing it through the lens of her faith and her rage at this monster in the shape of a child that had killed so many all over the world in the name of her deranged bloodlust. Degurechaff fought back, but she couldn't run this time. She was chained by her orders, bound by them like a true Devil of ancient myth. This time, there were no tricks, no last-minute gamble.

It was a straight fight, and one chosen by God could not fail in such a contest. More and more power poured through Mary, a strength greater than ever before. God Himself was blessing this fight, she knew, telling her that now was the time to finally bring the Devil to justice. Indeed, to her fallible mortal mind, it seemed as if there was a sense of urgency in His voice, even though she knew such was impossible. How could the Lord be afraid ?

The two of them crashed to the ground in what had been the castle's courtyard, sending broken stones raining all around them. Atop her nemesis, Mary fired her weapon, again and again, and at long last her shots broke through the Devil's shields and into her flesh.

The Devil kept struggling, her face a mask of anger and determination. She tried to reach for the orb around her neck, but Mary forced her hands away, not wishing to let her wounded enemy perform some kind of last-ditch self-destruct move or another equally spiteful manoeuvre. She held the beast down as she bled out, her movements growing weaker and weaker, until she at last stopped moving and breathed her last.

For several seconds, Mary remained atop the corpse of her slain foe. Then, at last, the realization of what she had done penetrated the fog of battle.

She had done it. She had done it ! The Devil was dead. Her father was avenged. God's will had been done …

Then, in the tomb beneath the castle, the ritual reached completion, simultaneously with the four other rituals conducted across the Empire. Behind each of the five mages taking part in the ritual, an individual bearing the mark of the Kaiser's personal guard raised his pistol and shot the mage in the head, adding their blood to the offerings of blood and life that had been made in other locations across the Empire, which together formed a specific pattern.

In a single, awful second, reality was briefly sundered. Invited in by the calls of mortals, a terrible power had entered the world from which it had been kept for thousands of years. Only a handful of humans could have even begun to guess as to the metaphysical implications of what had just transpired, and one of them laid dead beneath Mary Sue.

For a moment, Mary Sue's senses simply blacked out, her mind unable to process what was happening. She fell into absolute darkness, alone but for the sensation of eyes gazing upon her, and of claws reaching out for her. She felt her panic rise, threatening to overwhelm her completely.

Then, suddenly, her senses returned and she was back to her latest battlefield, but things were hardly better there. She couldn't feel God's presence anymore, couldn't feel His power flowing through her. She couldn't hear His voice guiding her, reassuring her that her cause was just, that her path was righteous. Instead, all she could hear were screams of pain and horror, and indistinct, mocking whispers.

She … she had killed so many people. Some of them had been Imperials, yes, and thus deserving of death, but also her own allies, slaughtered by the hundred as her spells missed their target while she hunted the Devil. In fact, she had killed a lot more of the latter than of the former, due to repeatedly falling for Degurechaff's provocations.

Her mind recoiled from the enormity of what she had done, unable to reconcile what she knew to have happened with how she felt about it now. Perhaps mercifully, her attention was soon drawn elsewhere, for underneath her, the Devil's corpse twitched, then lurched at her, eyes glowing red and a guttural growl emanating from her mouth. Her teeth bit deep into Mary's throat, tearing through her flesh and releasing a torrent of blood. The reanimated Devil tore out a chunk of her throat, and Mary watched in shock as she chewed and swallowed, heedless of the blood pouring down her mouth. Never before had Tanya von Degurechaff looked more like the apostle of Hell Mary had long known her to be.

In the distance, she saw the other dead Imperials rise with burning eyes and fall upon her comrades, as well as their own living brethren. Mary's CO was trying to rally the survivors of his group, only to suddenly vanish, burned to ash by a gout of fire conjured by the Devil. In her hands, Mary's nemesis carried that strange orb she had used to wreak her bloody work all across Europe, now burning with the same infernal color as her soulless eyes.

They had failed, she realized as the darkness closed in, and the consequences of their failure were worse than they could possibly have imagined. No, she had failed. She had been too focused on the Devil, and had missed what else was going on in the castle. Now the Empire had shown their true colors by unleashing Hell on Earth, with the Devil of the Rhine as their infernal champion. The Apocalypse was there, she thought deliriously as her lifeblood poured out of her.

Oh, God, she prayed with the last of her strength, forgive me …


Berun was burning.

The fires had started by accident, but there wasn't anyone to take them out. Everyone was too busy fleeing from the monsters roaming the streets in hordes thousands strong, or else desperately hiding in the vain hope that they wouldn't be found sooner or later. Now, entire districts were ablaze, and the skies were choked with black smoke. The sounds of the raging infernos were mixed with the more distant ones of battle, where pockets of survivors still held against the hordes, and the unending, unrelenting screaming that came from no human throat and could not be escaped, no matter where you were or how you tried to block it out.

One of the General Staff had claimed it was the soul of the Fatherland screaming. For all Zettour knew, he was right.

As far as Zettour could tell, the hungry dead had first come out of the Kaiser's own palace, but they had spread quickly, with more popping out of the ground everywhere in the capital. An old European capital like Berun had many graveyards, and with the Empire's proud military history, that meant that there were a lot of dead soldiers in the ground. Now it seemed like all of these fallen heroes had risen again as a walking abomination hell-bent on feasting upon the flesh of the livings. Soldiers who had died only weeks ago shambled alongside the animated skeletons of medieval knights, still clad in their old, rusted armor.

Of course, these zombies had then been reinforced by the reanimated corpses of their victims. It seemed that anyone who died, no matter how, rose anew as one of the walking dead, so long as their corpse still had its head attached. Men, women and children; civilians or soldiers : it didn't seem to matter to the abominable powers at work here.

"Is this Plan Z ?" he murmured to himself. "Is this truly what the Kaiser intended all along ?"

He hoped, more deeply than ever before in his life, that it wasn't. That at least it was some unforeseen consequence, some catastrophic failure that had unleashed this Hell. Because if this had always been the plan, then … then the enemies of the Empire were more right than they knew in their propaganda. If their Emperor had done this willingly, then they were an evil nation that needed to be destroyed for the sake of all human life, all their works turned into dust and the very memory of their existence expunged.

The sound of banging against the door of his office, which had been going on for some time now, suddenly stopped, pulling him out of his miserable contemplation. According to the clock on the wall, he had been standing there for over three hours, watching as his Empire's capital fell after the dead had broken into the headquarters and he had barely managed to escape and take refuge here. Frowning, he turned, just in time to see the pile of furniture he had dragged in front of the door explode, throwing him to the floor, back to the now shattered window he had just been looking out of.

This one wasn't shambling like the rest. It – he – walked like a man, or rather like a soldier. He wore the uniform of one too, though Zettour knew of no Imperial unit in that particular jet-black color. A patch on his breast marked him as a member of the Kaiser's personal guard, and Zettour felt a sudden surge of hatred at the sight. An ornate gun and sword hung at his belt, the latter dripping with blood. His face was a crimson skull, lit from within by infernal fire, and behind him stood a pack of zombies that had, mere hours ago, been part of Zettour's own staff.

The General wasted no words : there was no one to see his last stand. He merely drew his pistol and fired. It had been decades since he had last fired a weapon in anger, but he'd kept up his training, and every shot was on target. But every bullet was stopped before hitting, slamming into a translucent barrier that shimmered into existence around the creature.

Magic, Zettour recognized with horror. This creature was capable of using magic, at least to the level of casting bulletproof spells. It wasn't a particularly impressive display compared to what Zettour knew mages were capable of, but the implications were mind-boggling. The General's mind quickly came to the terrifying conclusion that this calamity was more than a plague of sorts : this was a true, existential threat to Mankind. Before, he had thought the zombies to be mindless animals : a grave threat, yes, but surely one that the Allied forces surrounding the Empire, armed with artillery and arcane technology of their own, would be able to contain and purge.

Now, he wasn't so sure, and that uncertainty was more than he could bear. Not only could the black-clad undead wield magic, he also clearly had some kind of control over the other zombies, since they hadn't immediately swarmed around him to get to Zettour. Images of the entire world being made in the image of present Berun filled the General's mind, and he fell to his knees, tears running down his face. But his torments weren't over yet : in fact, they were only beginning.

"Rejoice, General Zettour," groaned the zombie officer in a sick parody of a human voice that echoed in unnatural ways and seemed to dig into his brain with every word. "The Fatherland calls upon you to serve once more. You have been chosen for a special duty."

Zettour immediately tried to turn his gun on himself, reasoning that a quick death with his last bullet was better than whatever this monster had planned for him. He wasn't sure the small-calibre pistol would be enough to keep him from being reanimated, but it was the only option left to him – his office wasn't high enough that throwing himself through the window would kill him for sure.

Before he could shoot, however, the weapon was torn from his grasp, as three of the undead hurled themselves at his arm, before more added themselves to the pile, pinning him to the ground but not doing any real damage.

For the first time in his life, General Zettour knew true despair. The dead dragged him, a pair of bloody hands forcing his head up so that looked up at the monster.

"Why ?" Zettour couldn't help himself asking. "Damn you all to Hell, why do this ?!"

"It was the Kaiser's will," answered the undead commander, now speaking like a zealous prophet. "You and the others failed, and so he took things into his own hands before you defeatists dragged us all down with you. No matter the cost, no matter the consequences, we will endure, and we will prevail. The Fatherland will never fall !"

Before Zettour could answer, the monster placed its cold hand on his head – and then there was fire, pain, and a darkness that did not last.


President Pierre Michel De Lugo looked at the map of Francois, and wondered just how it had all gone so wrong.

Not even a week ago, the end of the war had seemed in sight, even if no one doubted the Imperials would make a fight out of it. Parisee had been liberated and the foreign invaders cast out of most of the Republic's territory. Their expeditions in the Dark Continent had been forced to flight, even the dread Devil unable to stand against the combined might of the Allies. They had been pushing in from the West and the East, and the seas were the domain of the Kingdom's navy, cutting the Empire off from external markets. Their spy networks had reported that Imperial support for the war at home was waning, and there were even rumors the Kaiser himself had begun to get involved to force his military leadership to consider surrender.

Victory had been inevitable, though those in charge had known better than to say so out loud after the series of seemingly impossible reversals the Empire had pulled off earlier in the war. And now … this. Not even in his worst nightmares had De Lugo thought things could go so badly so quickly.

Nobody knew exactly what had happened. What was clear was that, suddenly, the dead soldiers of the Rhine had risen from their muddy graves. The Allied armies had been caught off-guard and on the move, and been utterly slaughtered. The survivors had fled, with only a fraction making it back to territory yet free of the undead threat. At first, their hysterical accounts had been dismissed, believed to be the result of some trick of the Empire. Perhaps the Imperials had hidden troops underground and launched an ambush, or perhaps they were using some new chemical weapon that affected the mind of the soldiers.

But denying the truth had soon become impossible, for the dead had surged from the Empire's old borders and into the lands of those who had waged war upon it for years. All across the continent, the dimming embers of war had ignited once more, in a blazing inferno more terrible and awful than ever before.

Those few Allied agents still alive in the Empire's own lands, fewer of them every day, spoke of a fate far worse having already befallen the Republic's own enemies. There was only a fraction of the Empire's population still alive, and while part of De Lugo reeled at this genocide, another, colder part of him considered all these bodies added to the undead hordes and shivered in fright. Allied Intelligence had also produced a working theory as to what had happened : apparently the Empire had been about to unleash some last-ditch magical weapon to intimidate the Allies into accepting to end the war on somewhat favorable terms. If that was true, and if their so-called magical weapon was responsible for the walking dead, then clearly something had gone horribly wrong.

With the bulk of the Allied artillery lost in the initial undead assault, their best weapon against the zombie swarms were mages. They could fly out of the dead's clawing reach and rain down fire upon them without fear of reprisal. Some of the dead could still use firearms, but their accuracy was atrocious, and mages were well-used to protecting themselves from such attacks. But there were only so many of them, and they could only do so much. A mage battalion could wipe out thousands of zombies in one sortie, but there were millions of them out there, with more pouring out of the Empire every day. Entire wings had completely exhausted themselves trying to buy time for the evacuation of cities and fallen short, ending up drained of mana and devoured by the hungry dead.

The Allied commanders had been forced to order their mages to preserve their own lives above all other strategic considerations. The cold arithmetic of this new war meant that a flight mage was worth more than a hundred, a thousand civilians. Not all of them had obeyed those orders, and even those who did weren't completely safe. Several squads sent on reckon or purging missions had simply vanished, and while desertion was possible, the fact that their magical signatures hadn't been detected again suggested a darker fate. After all, even a deserter would want to keep their computation orb, as the ability to fly was their best chance to survive the hellscape the Empire had unleashed upon them all.

Still, at least they had mages. The Russy Federation had never fielded them, officially due to their communist ideology but in reality because their Premier was paranoid about allowing the existence of any sort of power he couldn't control. As a result, the last reports the President had received from the Eastern front spoke of the Red Army breaking apart, not even the infamous political officers of the Federation able to maintain discipline in the face of the walking dead.

Parisee still stood, but the hordes of the dead were approaching. They were slow, but they didn't need rest or supplies, and could continue to march all day and night. Evacuation had been considered, and tens of thousands had already fled on their own, filling the roads and making logistics even more difficult to manage. But De Lugo wouldn't abandon the City of Lights again.

If the dead had simply been the mindless horde they had appeared to be at first, then the situation wouldn't have been so dire. But there were signs that such was not the case, as paranormal events had spread all across Europe in the wake of this apocalypse. Radios picked up cruel laughter, distorted music, and even the voices of dead people describing their own demise in vivid detail, even on encrypted frequencies. Objects moved without anyone touching them, always with malicious purpose. Even here, in the Francois President's home, a book had fallen off the shelves and started bleeding ink all over the carpet, forming unholy patterns that had required a flamethrower to remove, which was why he was now using another office.

Apparently, things were worse the closer to the source of this madness one got, though De Lugo wasn't sure it wasn't only due to nerves. He certainly wouldn't begrudge the soldiers if it were. God knew his own nerves were frayed enough nowadays.

He glanced at the pistol resting near the table's edge. Over the last few days, the temptation to just end it all had grown stronger and stronger. He had always been able to ignore its siren song before, but now … Now it was becoming a challenge.

After all, was he not at least partly to blame for this horror ? If he had accepted defeat after the Battle of the Rhine, what now seemed like an eternity ago, instead of mustering the remaining troops of the Republic at Brest and forming his government in exile, then the war would have ended. The Kingdom and the States wouldn't have had any casus belli to join the conflict. The Empire wouldn't have been cornered to the point where it was willing to sink to such depths.

Or perhaps nothing would have changed, but De Lugo found it difficult to believe, arrogant as it may be. And so he stared at his pistol, and contemplated the end.

Then he thought of all the people who yet lived in the Republic, of the damage his suicide would do to morale. How many would follow his example, leaving the rest bereaved and even more defenceless ? Even those who hated him for prolonging the war at least drew strength from that anger.

He shook his head and returned his gaze to the map. Not today, it seemed. Perhaps tomorrow it would be different, but for another day at least, he was President of the Francois Republic, with all the duties that came with the title.


Colonel Lergen felt strangely calm, even as the world around him fell to ruin. Perhaps it was because some part of him had expected the world to end for years now, due to his acquaintance with a certain Major. Or, far more likely, he was simply bottling it all up because now wasn't the time to have a nervous breakdown.

He'd been on his way to inspect one of the military depots north-west of the capital when the madness had begun. With the war dragging on, everyone at Staff Headquarters had been forced to shoulder on more and more duties, though he'd known that was nothing compared to the situation on the various fronts.

The depot had been well-stocked, which had certainly been useful since then. He had taken command, gathering every soldier in the vicinity and turning it into a makeshift fort. There were also some civilians who had run for the depot when the walking dead had arrived, though its isolation meant only a handful had made it. Lergen had put them to work bringing ammunition to the walls and helping the medics care for the wounded – as well as making sure their own dead didn't rise again. It was grim work, but necessary.

The depot had been dug into a mountain, meaning there was only one direction the undead could come from, and they had made that approach into a killing field where they could hold more or less indefinitely so long as their supplies held up. The more time passed, however, the more zombies came to attack them. There was thousands of them now, treading over the gory remains of the previous waves. Given how remote this place was, it was clear that something was guiding them – Lergen recognized some of the uniforms in the throng, and he knew these soldiers had been stationed at the capital, days of marching from here.

If they'd come walking, of course. The thought of the zombies knowing how to use trains to move across the country and making use of the infrastructure the Empire had been so proud of to spread their evil faster was an unsettling one to say the least.

Suddenly, the radio next to him started to stutter with static, before speaking in a childish voice :

"One two, big sis' coming for you …

Three, four, she opened the door …

Five, six, up the river Styx …

Seven, eight, now it's way to late …

Nine, ten, she's riSeN AgaiN !"

Lergen kicked the device, breaking it and silencing the song. This was far from the first radio they'd lost like this, and he knew there was no point in trying to repair it once the corruption had touched it. There were fewer infernal manifestations during the day, but as soon as the sun set, everyone in the base could hear the whispers, just at the edge of being understandable, mocking and taunting them.

"Colonel !" One of the soldiers called out to him, pointing at the sky. The moon was out in full, casting a baleful red light over the land that was still strong enough to see by. And where the soldier was pointing was the silhouette, unmistakable for anyone who had spent time on the front lines, of a flight mage.

Except there were no flight mages left in the Empire. There had been, back when this had all started, but they had vanished, wing by wing. And it wasn't because they had fled this doomed country, though Lergen wouldn't have blamed them overmuch if they had. No, someone – something – had hunted them down one by one, and Lergen had a grim feeling he knew exactly what.

After all, he couldn't possibly mistake that small, terrifying silhouette for anyone else.

"Don't shoot," he ordered, while gesturing for them to stand back. "You couldn't hurt her anyway."

She descended from the sky like a Hell-sent angel from myth, and looked equally as terrible as she landed next to Lergen. The Argent had always been pale, but now hers was the pallor of a corpse. Her mouth was caked in dried blood, as was her uniform. She looked more like a vampire than ever before, and not the pretty ones from recent media. No, here was a monstrous blood-sucker, a harbinger of plague and strife that preyed upon the living to sate a thirst that could never be truly quenched.

On her chest, the Type 95 Elenium computation orb blazed with the same baleful inner illumination. Lergen suddenly was reminded of Doctor Schugel's claim that the weapon's creation had been divinely inspired, and he briefly wondered if this all was God's punishment of them all for the Great War's many sins.

"Major Degurechaff," he greeted her.

"Colonel … Lergen." She had to force every word out. Her hands twitched, and he wondered if she wanted to throw a salute but couldn't.

"Report, Major," he told her, forcing himself not to show fear, drawing on his long experience at dealing with that devil. "What happened ?"

"Plan Z," she rasped. "The Kaiser … betrayed us. Death and life, sundered. Chain of command … made into a spell leashed around our throat. Cannot … disobey. Bound ... shackled … enslaved !"

It was the first time Lergen had heard the Major speak with such emotion, such anger, in her voice. Then the meaning of her words actually hit him. The Kaiser. Lergen had to fight to stay on his feet. The Kaiser had done this ?!

He had heard rumors about Plan Z, though not much else. The Kaiser finally getting involved in the war had inevitably drawn attention. The entire affair had been placed under the uttermost secrecy, but you couldn't move so many mages at once without it being noticeable. Like everyone else, Lergen had assumed Plan Z was about the deployment of some kind of magical superweapon.

But this ?! This had been the Kaiser's plan ?

"Explain, Major," he heard himself say through the shock.

"Five … rituals. I was at one … east. Mary Sue … killed me … and I … killed her." She gestured to her bloody mouth. "Hers," she added by way of explanation.

Somehow, Lergen wasn't surprised that the Major had killed her long-term nemesis by tearing her throat out. Even without the zombie apocalypse, it wouldn't have shocked him. Even the fact that they two had killed each other was something he would've expected.

"What does the Kaiser plan to do now ?"

She shrugged. "Don't … know. But … seen things. Rebuilt factories. Assembly lines. Officers … dragging shamblers to working stations."

"Even now," said Lergen, surprised to find that he could be even more appalled at the whole situation, "he is still preparing to continue the war ?"

"Yes !" She gave a bitter, coughing laugh. "True … total war."

"Like your paper predicted," whispered Lergen to himself, "all these years ago."

The undead devil cocked her head to the side.

"Uh. Never knew … you read it."

Before he could answer, she raised her rifle and fired. The shot passed just past Lergen's head, burning his hair and cracking his glasses, flew over the wall and exploded right in the middle of the zombie horde. In one moment, thousands of the shambling horrors were wiped out, incinerated far beyond any chance of getting back up again.

"Oh. Missed," said the Major with something that vaguely resembled a smile. "What … a shame. Used almost ... all mana. Need to withdraw now. Have to follow ... orders."

Oh, thought Lergen faintly as he understood. It seemed she was just as cunning as before, still finding ways to follow the letter of her orders while following her own inscrutable agenda. But then, if there was anyone he'd have bet would somehow be able to keep their wits despite being turned into an undead monstrosity, it would have been her.

"Goodbye, Major," he saluted.

"Hrrk. See you ... Colonel. Won't work ... twice. Next time ... Be prepared."

Then she flew away, back to the skies from whence she had come. Lergen turned back to look at his men, who were staring at him with awed expressions.

"What are you all standing there for ?" He shouted. "On the move, everyone ! Squad one to three, get out there and clear out the survivors ! The rest of you, prepare for departure ! We are leaving this base and moving north at dawn ! Make sure to bring radios, our only chance is to reach the coast, contact a ship and get out of here !"

He knew the Kingdom had ships in the northern sea, and hopefully not all of them had been reassigned in the wake of the apocalypse that had befallen the Empire. Once they made contact, Lergen would've to convince them to risk sending someone to pick them up. Fortunately, he did have intel that he was fairly certain no Allied captain would be able to pass up. Information was vital in war, and this was a war for the very survival of Mankind.

There was no doubt in Lergen's mind that the Empire would go down as the worst country in all of History. For the rest of their lives, he and his men would be pariahs, despised by all who knew of their heritage, even if they'd nothing to do with unleashing this plague upon the world.

But that was fine with him, so long as History continued. He needed to tell the world what Degurechaff had told him. For though the notion that the Kaiser was responsible for all of this made him want to start screaming and never stop, the Major had also given him the first fragment of hope since this had started.

After all, if the dead had a leader, and that leader were to be killed …


Down on his knees, alone in the dark, Adelheid von Schugel prayed. His lab coat was torn and dirty with gore, his hair was a mess, his glasses were cracked and there was a nasty cut on his forehead dripping blood into his eyes. His face was gaunt, and there was only despair in his eyes.

The remote research facility should have been safe from the occult phenomenon ravaging the rest of the Empire. But while Schugel's continued experiments in developing the next generation of computation orbs were no longer as costly as the ones which had led to the creation of the wonderful Type 95, progress still came at a price. When the world had been cut off from God's Grace, the facility's morgue had been occupied by the corpses of two Imperial flight mages who, after being wounded in the field and no longer able to perform their duties, had been reassigned to his laboratory.

He had told his superiors that only exceptional mages were suited for his research, but apparently the war's situation had gone so bad that even his genius went unheeded. Unsurprisingly, the unfortunate mages had perished after only a few of the tests Major Degurechaff had survived months of, only to rise from their storage units and tear through almost the entire facility. The two zombie mages had eventually been brought down by detonating some of the prototype missiles they had been working on while they were in the same room, but by that point there had been dozens of other undead roaming the facility.

Schugel had only survived by hiding in this room, where the most valuable research and artefacts were stored. The thick metal doors had kept the undead at bay. By his best estimates, that had been two weeks ago. He'd run out of food a week in, and drank the last of his water two days ago. Finally, the power had been cut, leaving him with only a few candles to keep the dark at bay – and he was down to his last one.

Schugel was delirious, and he knew it, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered anymore. He had lost the guidance of God, the shining voice that had shown him how to perfect the Type 95 so that the infidels might be struck down by His apostle. The certitude that had inhabited him ever since then, the unshakeable knowledge that he was doing His will in all things, wasn't there anymore. In other circumstances, he might have blamed himself, and searched for the failure that had earned him the disfavour of Heaven, but given that the dead walked the earth and hungered for the flesh of the living, he was reasonably certain the cause of all this wasn't anything he had done.

Was it because they had lost the War against the infidels ? Schugel was removed from its day-to-day operations, but even he knew things hadn't been going well. Before, he hadn't paid it any mind, seeing it as God testing His faithful. And perhaps that had indeed been the case, but they had failed His test, and now He had turned His back on them in disgust –

A sound coming from the direction of the room's entrance drew the scientist's attention away from his misery. He had long since tuned out the relentless pounding of undead fists on the reinforced door, but this was something else. The pounding … the pounding had stopped ? He hadn't even noticed -

Suddenly, the metal shrieked as it was torn asunder by a mage blade, and the pieces fell, revealing a silhouette against a light that was blinding to Schugel's weary eyes. He blinked several times, clearing his vision, and saw who it was who had broken into his sanctum.

He recognized her, though they had only met a handful of times. She was a memorable woman, after all.

"… Lieutenant Serebryakov ?" he whispered in shock.

Degurechaff's second-in-command looked very different from when he'd last seen her. There was a massive hole in her abdomen, from which her guts hung like rotten fruit. Her skin was bloodlessly pale, her eyes aflame with scarlet light. Her Type-97 computation orb rested against her chest, glowing with the same fey illumination, and the scientist in Schugel couldn't help but wonder how this was possible.

"Hello, Doctor Schugel," said the revenant. Behind her, he could see the broken corpses of his research team, instantly recognizing the damage as done by a mage blade.

He tried to swallow, but his mouth was too dry. "Did you … did you come to rescue me, Lieutenant ?"

She chuckled, the sound filled with malice that had no place coming from someone like her.

"No, Doctor. Believe me, you will soon wish you'd the luxury of starving to death in peace. But the Kaiser requires your services once more. If he'd sent the Major … well, she probably would have found a way to grant you the mercy of a quick and final death, if only so that she wouldn't have to endure your presence for the rest of eternity. But someone among his courtiers remembered her letters asking for reassignment away from you, so they sent me instead."

"I don't understand," he croaked out in growing terror. Serebryakov smiled.

"You will," she promised. "It will not help."

She walked toward him, and he skittered away from her on instinct, until his back hit a shelf and he could go no further. She loomed over him, still smiling, like Death itself but promising a fate far more cruel. Was this really Serebryakov ? Or was something else wearing her flesh, using it to walk the lands of the livings ? But no, what she had said implied that the identity of the zombies mattered somehow.

So many unanswered questions. So many untested hypotheses. He was going to die, and his life's work would never be complete. Somehow, faced with his doom, this was the thought dominating Schugel's mind.

"Do try to struggle," Serebryakov purred as she brought her left hand closer to his skull. "It won't help either."

Schugel had just enough time to mouth the first word of one last unheard prayer before the undead Lieutenant pressed her hand on his forehead, holding him in place with an iron grip.