There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL) novel Chapter 37

Chapter 37: Chapter 36. Where It Always Near

"I'll explain later," Bassena smiled amiably, still holding into Zein's shoulder with one arm. He looked around at the mass of red eyes, his own amber glowing with ferocity.

Zein heard the esper sigh, before Bassena lifted his leg lightly and stomped the ground. There was nothing happening inside the safe zone barrier, but their surrounding was drowned in darkness—a different kind than the natural darkness of the Deathzone. The darkness swallowed the confused and agitated kobolds and suddenly, the area was filled with shrieking sounds. The researchers closed their eyes tightly and covered their own ears, and the espers watched the boundary carefully.

Zein, however, was watching Bassena. The hand on his shoulder was gripping tighter, and he could see a few beads of sweat on the esper's neck and temple. The man didn't appear to be hurt anywhere, but something terrible must have happened during the last two hours if he had to use Zein as support.

The darkness that devoured the surrounding beasts was like a giant snake with countless mouths. The crunching sounds of bones breaking and the splat of blood keep on resounding for quite some time.

All the while, Zein straightened his back, making his posture firmer for Bassena to lean easier. With the hand that wasn't gripping the Black Pearl, he touched the esper's arm that flung across his shoulder.

Zein widened his eyes, almost gasping at the accumulated corrosion that went up two levels in the span of a mere two hours. "What—"

"Shush," Bassena smiled, lowering his gaze to stare at the concerned blue eyes. Zein could see it then, the exhaustion inside, the subtle deep red on the outer rim of the amber orbs. "Just guide me,"

Whatever happened to the man in those two hours, it was enough for him to use his skill until his corrosion reached the orange level. It was as if he just battled an A-class dungeon in solo-mode.

But Bassena was right, it wasn't something that should be mentioned willy-nilly, lest it would procure distress among the team. So Zein wordlessly held the hand gripping his shoulder and guide Bassena as the esper continued his onslaught on the kobolds.

"More is coming," Ron informed them. "Looks like wraiths and something reptilian, also—"

"Their kind is not important," Bassena cut the scout. "There must be an opening when they come to the boundary. Locate it, and calculate how long it'll be opening," he gripped Zein tighter as he shifted to look at Sierra. "Use your homing skill."

"What about the target, Sir?"

Bassena reached out his hand and pointed a finger against the sharpshooter's forehead. Sierra's eyes flickered for a moment as Bassena transferred his child of darkness's vision and memory—a figure in writhing black mass and billowing fog for hair, chanting something nonstop. "That. Coordinate with Ron."

"Yes, Sir."

Zein watched the exchange, and noticed how Bassena slightly panting after that, sweat trickled down his neck. He closed his eyes then, concentrating so that he could guide Bassena faster—so that the esper could use his skill to his heart's content without worrying about the corrosion level.

"Thanks," he heard Bassena whisper in his ear, and the sounds of painful shrieking and agitated growling drowned everything else. He chased out the new chains crawling into Bassena's core while destroying the ones already swimming around muddling the sea of darkness.

For a while, that was the only thing Zein could focus on. When he opened his eyes after a while, the sounds had died down, and Bassena was in the middle of explaining things.

"...it's different than this one, but the principle was the same. The one used on me was imprisonment formation, so all my senses were being robbed. That's why my skill was getting disconnected,"

Bassena still had his arm around Zein's shoulder, but when the guide's eyes fluttered open, the arm slid down, resting on Zein's waist.

"It wasn't a spell, but formation?" Han Shin gasped.

Bassena stepped back and slumped on one of the chairs, bringing Zein together with him. The guide staggered back following the pull, and ended up seated between the esper's leg. Before he could even muster a complaint, Bassena already leaning his weight forward, head pressed on Zein's shoulder and arms around the guide's waist, exhaling harshly.

The palpable exhaustion inside the soft panting breath culled Zein's shifting motion. He sat still, listening to the rather ragged breath behind him, and ended up holding the arm around his waist. There were still a lot of corroded chains inside Bassena's core, and the esper must have been feeling pretty heavy and miserable.

"I didn't sense any beast around the camp, so I tried to probe around the ruin. It took me a while to realize I'd been put through an illusion. When I came to, the formation was unleashed and I was trapped inside a void prison," Bassena explained, still with face buried in Zein's shoulder. "I used every skill that I have to try to break free, to no avail."

Every skill—Zein turned to look at the blonde head buried in his shoulder. So that was why his corrosion spiked up two levels. In an environment rich in miasma, using every skill nonstop for two hours, and probably in a frantic state of mind...

"Every skill?" Han Shin suddenly stood up. "Is that including the [Second Skin of Immortality]?"

The healer's voice, which was usually cheery and youthful, dipped low. The black eyes frowned, a clear tension in his face. Zein felt Bassena still at that, before the esper lifted his face. "Will I appear like this if I used that?"

Han Shin narrowed his eyes. "But you did plan to use that, didn't you?"

Bassena shrugged. "Thankfully I don't have to resort to that,"

"I'm telling Radia," Han Shin sat down again, arms crossed and pouting.

"What skill are you talking about?" Zein asked after a while, since he lost the context of their conversation. What kind of skill was that, to make Han Shin look agitated?

Bassena laid his head on Zein's shoulder again before answering. "Hmm...just something like a safety net. If I fall into life and death situation, the skill will heal me and put me into a temporary invincible state, including getting rid of all debuff and entrapment spells."

"That—"

"Yeah, but you have to be IN a near-death situation!" Han Shin hissed. The implication was clear—since there was no enemy, Bassena would have to inflict self-harm until he was near death to activate the skill. "And it can only be used three times, isn't it? No—you only have two times left!"

Zein whipped his head and stared hard at the esper, brow dipped low above the stern blue eyes. Bassena casually shrugged with a tired smile. "Well, thanks to you, I don't have to."

There were a lot of things Zein wanted to say to the esper, but the man's last sentence brought him back to the dagger that he had sheathed. The Black Pearl...when Zein 'borrowed' it from Bassena before the expedition, he had never thought that it could be used this way.

"Right, that!" seemed like the topic also enough to drag Han Shin's attention away from the immortality skill. "How's that happen? Has it always been capable of doing that all along?"

"It does, although I had actually forgotten about it," Bassena laughed weakly. "I put my seed of darkness once inside, a long time ago..." he paused to stare at Zein. "How do you know how to summon me with that though?"

They looked at Zein then, who was actually feeling flabbergasted himself. "I don't know," he titled his head, staring at the dagger strapped to his thigh. "I just...accidentally cut myself during the commotion..."

"Huh..."

Bassena took Zein's hand, looking at the still-fresh cut in the guide fingers. "Ah..." Han Shin snapped his hand and the cut was immediately closed and healed.

"...did you call my name too?" Bassena asked.

"Well, yes," Zein shrugged, "since you're missing and all,"

The amber eyes curled into soft crescents before getting buried on Zein's shoulder again, lips stretched wide behind the black uniform.

"Umm...but what kind of creature could conjure something as strong as that?" Ron tapped on his temple, frowning in anxiety.

Right—they hadn't talked about the most important issue. The forces that surround them were annihilated already, but not the looming danger.

"Not only that, but we also have to take into account on how they can use concealment that even deceive Sir Vaski," Eugene added. "It seemed like they knew who they have to isolate and strike when the opportunity comes."

"A high degree of intelligence usually present in the beasts within high-class dungeons," Anise chimed in. "So there's a possibility that they came out of high-class dungeons. But we also made a theory about how the creatures in the Deathzone might develop over time."

"You mean, like leveling up?" Sierra widened her eyes.

Anise nodded with Eugene. "Since here they wouldn't face being hunted like the creatures in other dungeons. Mister Ron also said that the creatures in Deathzone tended to be stronger than their dungeon counterpart."