There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL) novel Chapter 643

Chapter 643: Side Story 2. Dance of Flame and Shadow - 2

Flashes of Red.

Curdling, eerie red. Blood red. Blood all over his body.

And then black.

Thick, like curdling ink. Blood, looking like ink. All over his hands.

Splash

Agni raised his head, staring at the reflection in the hazy mirror. He let the water run for two seconds, just to pretend he could afford the luxury, before turning it off with regret. If he could, he would let the water gather and dunk his head in to cool off, but...

The reflection showed him the reality. His once dark but blazing eyes were nothing but an abyss, sunken. His skin was dry from the harsh air riddled with miasma, and a hint of wrinkles was visible on the face, which was once said to be the epitome of youthful.

What youth? Agni chuckled bitterly. He spent his youth in the military, and the moment he hit thirty, he was thrown to this place. The grey gate of hell. Where letting the water run for two seconds was a sin.

Just five years...and the light in his eyes was gone. But even while his outer appearance made him seem to aging fast, he felt even older inside, as if he had died and come back to life over and over again.

Perhaps he did.

If it came down to it, this aging thing worsened in the past year. Ever since he had to step up to fill his friend’s position when he hadn’t even finished his grieving.

Inhale...exhale...

Agni muttered the words softly like a meditative mantra, closing his eyes and pretending that he wasn’t there. Hell--he could pretend that he was in the military boot camp and everything felt so much better already.

"Captain!"

At least, until someone interrupted his alone time. "Haa..." a long sigh came out almost in reflex. "Can’t you give me like five minutes to myself?"

His deputy, Eshter, leaned against the bathroom door and grinned. "What? Are you jerking off or something?"

"I wish," Agni groaned. It felt even more disappointing because he hadn’t felt much arousal since that last mission that doomed his fate. These days, he merely did it to ensure he wasn’t impotent. Yet. He stared at Eshter through the mirror. "What is it now? Is someone fighting again?"

"Nah, they spare you this time," she waved her hand. "But the agent from the headquarters will be here later, so you better check the outpost for the latest report."

"Why don’t you do that and report to me?"

"Because I don’t have my own coffee maker in my bedroom?"

Agni rolled his eyes at her smirk and threw the tower he had just used. With her laughter trailing him, Agni went to the outpost. Well, at least he could get rid of unnecessary depressing thoughts if he worked.

It was a regular day, so only two espers and one guide were stationed there. All of them were in the outpost, huddling around a bubbling pot of watery coffee. They raised their head when Agni came, but came back to their coffee after a brief ’Hey, Cap’.

"Hey, how’s the day?" Agni asked while rummaging through the outpost’s log.

"Nothing much, except for someone going inside the Deathzone."

Agni turned his head and stared at the esper incredulously. "You call that nothing much?"

"Hey, I tried to stop them!" the esper shrugged. "I yelled, I gave a warning shot, I tried to chase them--the whole thing, you know? But that person suddenly disappeared."

"Disappeared?"

"Yeah, like...melting into the ground?"

The other esper gave a better alternative. "Shadow."

"Right--melting into shadow!" the first esper snapped their fingers. "Anyway, since we properly warned them, their safety is no longer our business."

Indeed. While people knew Deathzone wasn’t a place they should enter even for a challenge, sometimes some stubbornly came to test themselves or record themselves for that social media thing or whatever. What a bunch of madmen. It would be too bothersome if they had to chase those people every time, so it was decided that giving warnings was enough.

Why should they care if people want to waste their own limited life?

"Haa..." Agni sighed. Again. He could easily accept such thinking if he wasn’t the Captain. "We shouldn’t let anyone cross the boundary in the first place."

"Not too many psychos it seems," the staff shrugged. _{fгeewёbnoѵel.cσm}