There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL) novel Chapter 49

Chapter 49: Chapter 48. An Old Acquaintance

Han Shin had been staring at the screen in front of him with squinting eyes, brow knitting at the latest article on the Serafi Continental Journal when his office intercom rung.

[Sir, a call from Miss Abe] came from the speaker and made him shift his eyes.

"Naomi?" Han Shin pushed the connecting button and heard the representative’s voice flow through the speaker. "What’s up?"

[Sir Han, I just received notice that a Mortix travel permit was used at the gate of Althrea]

"Hmm, yes? What’s about it?" Han Shin leaned back on his swivel chair, and tilted his head in confusion. Mortix had subsidiaries in almost every zone of the Eastern Federation, and at least one in every other area. Mortix staff traveling to Althrea, where Mortix Holding was situated, wasn’t really something weird.

And why was she reported that to him, a shareholder, instead of the one working in Mortix?

[Every travel permit from Mortix is equipped with a unique code that contained information about the permit’s origin. The said permit was coming from Area 14 headquarters]

"And?" Han Shin frowned at the ceiling, still confused.

[And no staff from here have a travel schedule to Althrea this week]

"What? So someone forges the permit or something?"

The voice paused for a bit before continuing in a careful manner. [There was a permit granted to someone that wasn’t a Mortix staff, Sir]

"Huh? You granted someone a—" Han Shin, who was leaning far into his seat, almost toppled forward from sudden movement. "Zein?!"

[It’s the only plausible reason, Sir] she replied. [Which is why I’m contacting you, since I couldn’t reach Sir Vaski...]

Han Shin had an inkling that rather than couldn’t be reached, Naomi was just too scared to talk to Bassena directly. But that wasn’t important now.

[I don’t have the authority to check the screening detail of Althrea gate, Sir, so my report ends here]

"Uh, yeah, thanks anyway. Good job!" Han Shin swiftly ended the call and called his secretary and assistant, which immediately peeked inside his office. "Aurel, can we get a recording of the visual screening from the gate? I need a picture of someone using Mortix’s travel permit this morning."

"It’s possible if it’s just that one person, Chief, I’ll get to it right away," the secretary swiftly turned back to her desk, and Han Shin shifted his gaze to his assistant.

"Wanho, where’s your hyung right now?"

The assistant glanced at his commlink for a bit before answering. "Ah, today is the guide’s re-assessment and measuring day, so Minho-Hyung is probably in the office screening for potential recruits..." his voice trailed when he saw Han Shin’s lips parted open, looking dumbfounded.

"Today is...what?" Han Shin blinked, scenarios fleeting inside his head. It was just a coincidence, right? "Call...no, let’s go down to the HR," he stood up and hurriedly walked away with his confused assistant in tow. "Aurel, send me the picture as soon as you get it!"

As a healer, Han Shin wasn’t the athletic type. It could even be said that he was quite lazy. But now, he was racing through the elevator and Trinity’s stupidly long hallway down to the HR department while pressing the button on his commlink.

"Ah geez—where is that bastard?" he turned toward Wanho and asked in a hurry. "Where’s Bas?"

As expected of his all-knowing assistant, Wanho answered immediately. "The Vice Guildmater entered the isolation training chamber ten hours ago."

"What the hell—is he a monk or something?" Han Shin grumbled. He entered the HR floor with a frown, and went straight to Director’s office. "Minho-Hyung, can I talk to the staff you stationed at the Agency—"

"Stay there and keep an eye on him! What do you mean he’s—the hell is Celestia doing there?! I’ll go there myself so just hang tight and look for him! You’ll be dead if he comes out with Celestia!"

Before Han Shin could hope to be heard, he was getting blasted by the HR Director’s loud, agitated voice. The man was fussing over the screen and the documents in the other staff’s hand, and only lifted his head after hearing the healer’s footsteps.

"What—oh, Shin, good timing! I just got word from our agent at the Central. There’s a new A-class guide coming out of today’s measurement, and he’s unaffiliated to boot. So—"

"What’s he looked like?" Han Shin cut the excited Director, staring at the man anxiously.

Minho looked at the rare expression on Han Shin’s face, before relaying what his staff told him earlier. "Black hair, blue eyes, SavAsh black combat unit...ah, we don’t know what he looked like because he wore a mask, but it doesn’t matter...right?"

The Director and the staff all stared at the healer that suddenly crouched down on the office’s floor with an agonized groan, a message from his secretary containing a picture of certain someone blinking in his commlink.

"Wanho, go to the training chamber and tell Bas to come out right this instant," Han Shin said with a sigh.

"What reason should I give him, Chief?"

Han Shin exhaled and got up slowly. "Tell him his precious Guide is about to get stolen by Celestia," he heard a slight gasp followed by hurried footsteps, and then turned his gaze toward the HR Director. "Bas will get that guide here even if he has to raze the Central building to the ground. Just ready the conference room and..." he started to type in his commlink, before grimacing toward the HR staff. "The Guildmaster will be here today,"

* * *

It was funny how he had a whooping seventeen years of career without ever having been measured once. Zein had tried to imagine the process when he had planned to take an official license four years ago, but the real thing turned out to be... anticlimactic?

When he entered the building, he followed the line of people and ended up at a registration desk. The worker asked for a document, which was supposed to be either a temple’s certification of awakening, or an associate guild’s introduction letter. Fortunately, the Captain’s recommendation letter worked as a legit document, so Zein found himself holding into a numbered badge and sitting in the waiting room.

He spent about two hours observing the people around the waiting room. The sitting area was obviously filled with guides, but there were people in suits or wearing guild badges standing around the hallway outside of the waiting room. Just like in the Towers and Esper Association building, agents from guilds and mercenary groups were diligently scouting for new recruits.

Some of the guides, however, already came with a guild staff, or already wearing guild badges and uniforms. These guides were either already contracted to a guild or here for reassessment—to see if their vessel managed to increase or not. Someone who came for measuring and was still unaffiliated like Zein could be counted with two hands.

And among those eight, Zein couldn’t help but stand out with his branded combat uniform. Not to mention his rather tall and buff physique for a guide. He looked more like an edgy assassin-type esper with his mask and all-black appearance. His observing, deep blue eyes only made the other guides flinch and scooted away from him. Almost two decades of blood and death made him full of sharp edges—something that was common in the end-zone, but made him feel like a manic killer in this part of the continent.

Not that Zein never killed someone before.

When his number was called and he stood up, almost all the people around his bench flinched and looked down. They were all unlicensed guides that had never seen a battlefield or touched miasma before, so it felt quite funny for Zein, like seeing his ten-year-old self navigating through a rogue guild.

The government agents in charge of the measurement also froze when Zein came inside. They had to double-check his application form and the copy of the recommendation letter, even asking him if he was really a guide and not an esper in the wrong building.

After that fiasco, in the end, he only needed to stand on a pedestal and put his hand over the measuring tablet.

"Ah..." it was then he remembered that the A-Class guide was the five-star esper equivalent of the guide’s community. They were so rare that on average, only one would emerge in an area. _{freewebnøvel.com}