Chapter 413: He doesn't appreciate being surveilled

"There's a new spy the queen sent to keep an eye on me."

Zombie sighed leaning against the crimson-red-haired girl in a fluffy dress wrapped around his arm.

It was annoying.

What would that make it? Fourth one? Fifth?

The deal the two of them made behind the closed door clearly stated that he would only contact the agent sent by the queen once every week to exchange information - and not to be put under constant surveillance.

What was most annoying about those spies was that Zombie couldn't be sure that they aren't important characters essential for the special quests - but as long as it was someone whose life signature he did not recognize - well...

"There's a nice back alley - and it's on our way to the road to the Great northern forest, master."

The crimson-haired girl hugged and tugged on the blue undead's shoulder and motioned at the dark passage between tall brick buildings where the lights of the street lanterns would not reach.

"Good call, Kopia. Let's lose this annoying tail."

Zombie smirked and instantly beelined towards the conveniently empty alley.

She was rather new to this job - born in a poor family, she got picked up by the branch of the Envy family working directly under the crown.

As it turned out, she had a knack for being a spy - with an inborn affinity for masking her presence she was almost perfect at tailing others from the shadow while staying invisible.

A few days ago her teacher and direct superior contacted her and she was assigned a new job - trailing a very peculiar undead that retained all of his free will and was actually doing a mission for the queen herself.

It was an odd mission but at the same time very reasonable - how anyone could truly trust a monster, even if that monster appeared to be so human-like?

With a few similar missions under her belt, she knew that it shouldn't be a high-stake mission, and found it as a chance to get some important experience and recognition in the right circles, necessary for receiving more well-paid jobs in the future.

Though her teacher did not share that opinion and went as far as to warn her more than seven times during their brief conversation to not get too close to the target, and even lend her an artifact - a ring that would warn the user about the life-threatening danger.

It was really odd - the old spy did not want to get into details - but she never took him for such a worrywart...

It almost felt like he was caring for her as if she was his own granddaughter - which wasn't that surprising considering their age gap.

"I guess he's getting too old for this business, spies have no use for families unless they are needed to blend in for a mission."

She sighed to herself after making sure that the distance between her and the blue undead was big enough that she could safely follow him without causing any suspicion.

The weird teenage-looking blue bastard got himself an escort, some short crimson-haired fancy dressed girl that seemed around twenty-something, that was clinging to him like it was normal - but money could buy everything in the envy territory, so that part maybe wasn't that odd.

The two of them disappeared into a dark alley - and even though the spy didn't want to even think about the undoubtedly morally repulsive reason for doing that - she had to follow them just in case.

So to escape those thoughts she started thinking back about her teacher.

"...I guess that I could go hang out with him after this mission will be over, the old people like to have someone to talk to, and I guess that doesn't change even when it comes to spies."

She said to herself with a soft smile, deactivating her detection+ [sight] skill and stealthily getting down the roof of the ruined system's faith chappel, before mixing in between the thinning passerby.

She wasn't in a hurry - she had already memorized the whole map of the city including all the hidden passages and shortcuts, and the alleyway her target entered was merely a simple passage leading to the entertainment district with no branching path anywhere along the way.

She would simply glance past it to check up on her target and rush to the other side before he will be finished.

...in the first place, could an undead even do those kinds of things?

Or maybe he was going to simply eat the girl in a literal sense?

Undeads, even those who had enough intelligence left in them to be considered equal or smarter than humans weren't considered as members of the intelligent races for a reason.

"..."

The spy moved casually, walking past the alley as if she had no interest in it and...

*thunk*

"...ah..."

A thin blade of a heavy dagger painted black to make it none reflective stabbed into her temple and pierced through her skull before she even felt the ring on her finger vibrate - and in the same heartbeat, something pulled on the crimson threads attached to the dagger and the dead spy was pulled into the dark passage so swiftly that no other passerby even noticed her disappearance, too busy with their own daily lives, going home after a day's worth of work.

"Huh, the queen sent a girl this time, huh - looks like she was banking that I wouldn't harm someone innocent looking. What an annoying woman."

Zombie clicked his tongue, searching through the pockets of the dead spy that he sat up against the wall deep within the alley where plentiful droppings betrayed the quite large population of small rodent monsters that were the rats of this world.

"Hey, Monty, how about this thing?"

The blue undead asked, raising the ring he just took off of the corpse's finger up to his ear, right to his golden snake earring.

The little serpent stopped acting like an inanimate object, blinked, and licked the offered artifact with its split tongue.

"Ssssssss. (Danger detection skill, the ring is old and the effectiveness of the skill is rather poor.) Sssssss? (Same with the materials used, maybe it was just someone's good-luck charm?) Sssss. (It's pretty trash.)"

Monty declared after the white light faded from its golden eyes.

"Must be, it certainly didn't do shit for her."

Zombie nodded and put the ring safely in his pocket out of reflex.

"Good job, thank you, here."

Zombie smiled and patted Monty's tiny head with his index finger while taking out a small golden brooch with his other hand and offering it to the snake.

"Sss! (Ah!) Sssss?! (You got me more snacks?!) Ssssss! (Master, I love you!)"

*gulp*

Monty's eyes lighted up and its jaws opened up at far wider angle than it should be physically possible even for a snake and it gulped the entire piece of jewelry in one bite even though it was much bigger than itself - at the same time, as soon as it closed its jaws, its body didn't show any signs of it swallowing the brooch whatsoever.

"Kopia, that black coating was a great idea- she saw nothing even with detection skill."

Zombie turned to Kopia who, back in her humanoid form, was wiping off blood and pieces of brain stuck to her legs.

"Te-he~! I saw that woman you made a deal with using this on her daggers and decided to try it out!"

The humanoid blade's face lighted up with a proud smile and she threw the used handkerchief on top of the corpse.

"Master, are you going to melt this one too?"

She asked curiously, lightly kicking the soft leg of the dead spy.

"Nah, let's leave it here, the little monsters from these parts will do well in place of my venom."

Zombie waved his hand dismissively and motioned at Kopia with his chin so that Monty on his ear glistened with gold light.

"Come, the Envys should start pursuing us any moment now - let's not make Olive wait - I feel bad taking him away from spending time with Mirabelle and Cranberry."

"Let's!"

Kopia jumped up happily and wrapped her hands around his right arm.