Basically, what happens when an extra life goes horribly wrong?
A bite from a Goomba transmits a vicious disease to the hero of the Mushroom Kingdom, and when Mario makes his way back to the castle, matters only get worse when he starts eating the mushroom people and turning them into flesh-eating monsters. The story continues with gritty visuals and is Not Safe for Work by any means, and every chapter so far is covered with explicit gore of some kind. The narratives bounces between the past and the Crapsack World of the present, and there are plenty of crossovers with characters from the Sonic, Legend of Zelda, Castlevania, and Megaman games.
Written by Fanfiction of the Dead.
Not to be confused with Disney's Z-O-M-B-I-E-S (2018).
This fanfic contains examples of:
- Anyone Can Die: The first character to turn into a zombie is Mario, and it only goes downhill from there.
- Decoy Protagonist: Besides Mario, who started the outbreak, there's Princess Peach and Sonic. Both are bitten in the first chapter they appear in, yet neither of them turn into zombies, and Peach managed to heal the wound with magic. It isn't until the end of chapter 6 that they finally succumb to the infection and start killing other characters.
- Downer Ending: By the time the story ends, there is no hope for a cure.
- Our Zombies Are Different: Type M. The zombies, mostly referred to as 'creatures', eat flesh, spread the infection which reanimates it's victims, but it hasn't been explained what actually created these zombies. Most characters refer to them as a "plague" but none are absolutely sure. Takes cues from an old zombie film called "Braindead" where even appendages and body parts are reanimated.
- Raising the Steaks:
- There are undead mushrooms (Toads) walking around, and Goombas, Parakoopas, hedgehogs, and princesses...
- Things really hit the fan during The Stinger when a Colossi, the Phalanx; a winged behemoth from ''Shadows of the Colossus, appears after being bitten... the Colossi are humongous, unnatural beings and even they can be afflicted.
- Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain: This is Mario's method of taking down Goombas normally. In the first chapter, this DOESN'T work.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Tails after Rotor, Bunnie, and Antonie are all killed by a zombified Peach and Sonic.
- Species Title: Named for the Zombie Apocalypse premise.
- Zombie Apocalypse: The premise.
