There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL) novel Chapter 319

Chapter 319: Chapter 311. Campers

"I was gone for a week and so much happened," Abel came back to his office, fresh out of honeymoon, being greeted by the news of Zein being sick, and then, later, about Zein being abducted. "Can’t help the spotlight, huh?"

Zein scoffed and threw the week-long report to the newlywed. "Isn’t it nice to be away while everything happened?"

"You know what? You’re right. It’s nice to not be the one who dealt with all of that," Abel laughed, looking very much the opposite of how he looked on the week before the wedding.

Seemed like married life treated him well—or rather, the honeymoon.

"But no one knows?" Abel asked.

"No one but Nadine," Zein replied. "I think, other than Shin and Rina, no one else in Trinity knew," he added.

Well, aside from Bassena and Radia, of course. The people who cleaned that building and caught the people meant to smuggle Zein out were the team from Mortix, so no one else in the guild knew about the abduction.

"Never a dull moment," Abel shook his head, but the teasing stopped there. "You’re alright, though?"

"What do you think?"

The soft brown eyes narrowed, looking at the beautiful face that was now free for all to see. The blue eyes were as deep as ever, but also clearer. "I don’t know what happened to you exactly, but I’m glad something positive seems to come out of it," he commented.

Zein was shedding his protective blanket, and it was something worth celebrating despite it being a byproduct of an awful experience. Actually, that would be all the more reason for a celebration.

Abel was happy, to see that he had come back from a happy honeymoon to a brighter-looking Zein.

At least he did, until Zein told him he would be away again for a day or two, and Abel had to catch up to ten days of work alone.

Perhaps eager to prove his promise to Zein, Askan Bellum worked fast. Just two days later, he managed to talk to the former guildmaster, and the man agreed to talk to Radia in three days. And so, Zein and Bassena made a trip to the lakehouse the day before Radia’s meeting as a distraction for Varion. They even did it so openly, using the helicopter with Trinity’s emblem on it.

"What did you tell the construction workers?" Bassena asked as they walked down the gravel path from the newly built helicopter pod on the higher ground of the estate.

"That the Serpent Lord wants to go camping beside the lake, so they should go on a vacation instead," Zein said with a smirk. "They were very obedient when your name was brought up." _{fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm}

"Thanks for the compliment," Bassena pursed his lips. "Camping sounds fun, though."

Zein chuckled and held the esper’s hand to appease the man. "Yes, it sounds fun. So I already brought all the necessary camping equipment."

Bassena looked down at their intertwining hands. Even now, it still made his heart race when Zein took the initiative in this kind of thing. It brought an immediate flush to his cheek, and a jolt to his heart, as if he was a schoolboy in love.

"You need to teach me how to fix the camp, though. I have no idea how those things work," Zein said. He only asked Jock to get him a complete set of camping equipment and hadn’t checked on them, but he was sure they were all things that former end-dwellers like him had never used.

"That’s fine and all, but..." Bassena looked at the only building in the estate, the one they walking to right now. "The house seemed to be habitable already."

It had been three months since Zein commissioned the construction of the estate. The place no longer looked like a haunted place; the road had been built, the field had been cleaned, and the house finally looked like a proper cabin. It was yet to be completed, but the exterior was pretty much done—thanks to the wonder of green-zone expensive machinery. Once the interior work and the details were done, they could start filling the house with furniture by the time the flowers bloomed in full.

Talking about flowers, the orchard had been fixed, and the small forest around the lake and the estate had been replanted. They used growth boosters and fertilizers made with ingredients from the dungeon, so the trees already looked like they were planted years ago. It was expensive, but looking at the orchards that started to blossom, and the foliage that started to appear, it was worth it. Only the garden was still bare, because Senan said he would plant it by hand, and grow it naturally like the way Lucia did it. Obviously, Zein had no objection to that.

Circling the house to the backyard, they were greeted by the main attraction; the lake reflecting the blue sky that glittered beneath the sunlight. It was already beautiful the last time they came here, but now that the surroundings had been cleaned and replanted, and the deck had been rebuilt, it got even more breathtaking.

"I’m starting to get tempted to just live here..." Bassena said.

"What about your mother’s apartment?"

"We can always keep it as a townhouse," Bassena shrugged. "It’s already an owned property anyway, so there’s no need to think about rents—just taxes and utility money, mainly."

Ugh—taxes. Zein still had no idea how to do his taxes. Alice told him about it before, but Zein had never been good with numbers and calculation, so...

"We can’t commute with an aircraft every day," Zein commented. With how busy they were in the face of the reclamation project, it wasn’t viable for the two most important members to live in another area. "But it’s nice to know we have a vacation house."

"Which can be used for a camping site, nice." Bassena grinned as they walked toward the deck. It was much better now, with concrete foundations and wooden planks.

There was nothing on top of the deck and the walkway toward the lake, but it was easy to imagine a set of patio chairs and tables, even a set of grills. Zein stopped before the deck and recalled the dream he had before he got a fever. A dream of a perfect world.

"You okay?" Bassena’s face entered his vision, looking curiously at his blank face.

The real one.