There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL) novel Chapter 499

Chapter 499: Chapter 492. Surfacing

"Fuck..." one of the espers in the watch tower facing where the advancing squad left before muttered under their breath as they checked the guns once again.

Another esper who had been watching the area through the tower’s binoculars turned and whispered anxiously. "Is this really true? Are they really..."

"Sush--we don’t know," the Guard Division’s Captain, Savis, said quickly to reassure the other espers--but more importantly, to reassure himself. "We just know there’s an emergency, but that doesn’t mean they’re dead or anything."

"But--"

"No," Savis shook his head. "I don’t believe Sir Vaski would be defeated," he said while clenching his fists behind his back. "Not when he’s with Sir Zein."

"...yeah," the esper who was checking the gun nodded. "Yeah, you’re right."

That was what they needed to tell themselves. Because if they truly lost Bassena and Zein, there was no point in continuing this project anymore. There would be no hope of progressing further, even if they put their life on the line.

That being said, it had been fourteen hours after the start of the protocol, and there had been no further news from the advancing team. Naturally, people had been getting more and more tense. While they were watching the border with anxious hearts, the temporary Commander, Ashur Iddina, came to deliver some rations and check in on them.

"Anything to report?"

"No, Sir," the Guard Captain replied without taking his eyes off the monitor. "No movement or alert from the radar."

"Status?"

"Everyone is in their position; all turrets are in the ready,"

"The guides and supports are inside the stadium," Iore, who followed Ashur there, gave her report too.

"Good," Ashur nodded and left the watch tower with Iore to visit the other towers. They had been doing it every several hours, making sure everyone was ready for whatever they would face while they were waiting for more news. He could feel the increasing tension every time he checked on them, even though the base looked as peaceful as ever from the outside. Peaceful and quiet.

At this point, he didn’t even care whether it was good news or bad news, as long as there was one. He sighed inwardly and turned his head toward the spire above the stadium. "What about Chief Han’s deputy?"

"She’s--oh, there she is," Iore pointed at a healer who was running toward them. As Han Shin’s deputy, she was also in charge of most of the base’s devices, including the translation device.

"Sir!"

"Did you get something? Anything?" Ashur asked with renewed hope as she saw the healer’s animated face.

He had thought it wouldn’t take long to interpret the shard’s mana length. Unfortunately, the process involved assembling the interpretation device first. In the past three months, there had been no use of it because of Zein’s presence, so the device had been neglected. It took hours to assemble, and even then, the translation needed even more time.

The shards had been vibrating heavily and letting out mana wave after mana wave rapidly. Like hearing someone talking at high speed, the machine faced difficulty in capturing and interpreting the waves into decipherable context.

"This," the healer bent down with panting breath, reaching out her hand with several paper strips on it. "Here, this is all the machine could get."

Ashur took the strips of paper and read it from the top, brows furrowed at the limited, broken message. "Twins fine, twins fine, victory...wuuu?"

"...whoo~" the healer raised her hand and made a celebration pose, adding swiftly when Ashur and Iore looked at her with raised brows. "No, that’s just how the device interpreted it!"

"Alright, but...isn’t this a good thing? Then what..." Ashur looked at the next strip of paper and knitted his brows even more. "Wait--what is this? Oh, no...coming...below...below..."

The healer bit her lips and Iore took the next strip of paper, which only contained one word being repeated again and again in bold letters, as if screaming the urgency.

BELOW BELOW BELOW BELOW

Ashur ran abruptly toward the nearest tall building to take a vantage point while talking to his commlink through the open channel. "Guard Captain, direct all guns to the ground! Scout, watch the ground! Enemies will come from the ground--I repeat, enemies will come from the ground," his voice rang through the commlinks. "All stand-by espers to take a higher position!"

The base, which had been quiet and falsely peaceful for the whole day, stirred up immediately. The guns above the watch tower started to move, and the espers spreading around the base climbed the nearest building.

[Sir! Vibration coming from underneath section G-14] a report came from one of the scouts.

"Squad 1 and 2 to G-14," Ashur jumped from the building and ran along the rooftops of the tents on the eastern side of the base. "I repeat, Squad 1 and 2 to G--"

Suddenly, he could hear a thundering sound coming from where he was headed. The ground shook like an earthquake and exploded, sending rocks and dirt sprouting into the air like a fountain.