There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)-Chapter 76 - 74. Sick

For his whole life, Zein had never owned a room on his own. In his little house in the red-zone, he slept in the living room, and the guides of borderland slept at least in pairs.

This was the first time he had a whole bedroom for himself, larger than any room he ever lived in. And to top it off, he even had a whole office for himself in his new workplace.

And Zein had no idea what to do with that space.

He had left it to Abel and Alice’s wisdom, and just mentioned what he wanted to have there. But somehow, his office has turned into a half-gym and half-game center with fitness equipment in one corner, and a computer station in another. The rest was converted into a small sitting area and he didn’t know how, but it worked.

So Zein was now running on his treadmill while reading the list of guides that applied to the new division. As they thought, there wasn’t much. But he was honestly quite surprised that anyone applied at all.

There were eight who applied on their own, surprisingly enough. Zein had thought four or five were probably a lot already. Sure enough, the one he had marked—those whose eyes shifted as he talked about survival—was among the applicants. That was good enough.

He swept the screen to show the list of guides he had asked the siblings before. He had requested for the guides’ general physical condition and asked the staff to rank them from the highest. Not all willing applicants were included among the physically high ones, but Zein couldn’t afford to be picky.

Of course, having guides with a considerably developed physique like him would be ideal, but he needed to be realistic. Zein would rather take a weak but willing man than dragged a strong unwilling one.

If it were up to him, he would be satisfied with just taking the ones who applied. But the Guildmaster wanted to convert half of the guides into a strike division. There were six strike teams in Trinity, and Radia wanted at least two dedicated guides for each team and some reserves.

"The problem with this is the distribution of class," Zein stopped the machine and regulated his breathing while organizing his mind.

From the side, Alice delivered a towel and bottled water to the guide, as well as her opinion. "Ideally, we need two A-class other than you, Sir. And at least six B-class."

"Mm," Zein swept the hovering screen back to the list of applicants. "We’re quite lucky, don’t you think?"

Zein was most surprised to see an A-class on the list of applicants. If he recalled it correctly, it was the one who cheerfully rejoiced that she didn’t need to do emergency guiding for any 5-star anymore.

Three B-class and 4 C-class—he recognized that cheery girl Dheera, and the male one...Jin? The other he had never met before, but he was quite satisfied with the line-up. At least, those were good enough to make three teams already. One for each difficulty.

If worse came to worst and the other guides he pulled into the division didn’t show as much result as these willing personnel, he would still end up with three decent ones, so Zein was thankful for that.

At any rate, he would still need to accompany each team into at least one dungeon raid for performance assessment, so it didn’t matter for now. His real objective was to groom a select few to join the reclamation campaign next year, anyway.

"We are still short on one A-class, three B-class, and four C-class, Sir,"

Zein swept the screen again, and marked some names in the guide list. "I’ll talk to them. Can you arrange it?"

"Certainly, Sir. But what about the C-class?"

"Let’s wait for a bit,"

"Wait? Do you think more will apply?"

"Who knows," Zein answered with a subtle smile. Well, at the very least, he expected some to come at him for consultation if anything.

He closed the screen and jumped off the machine, just in time to hear a familiar voice from across the hall. Tilting his head and smiling for a bit, he walked out of the room to approach the opened door of the Chief Guide’s office.

"You almost couldn’t fill the quota again, right?" it was quite rare for Abel to sound exasperated. "What happened to you these past few weeks, Nora?"

"I’m sorry, Chief. I’ll do better,"

"Of course, you should. This week is particularly...haaa..." Zein peeked inside the room and saw Abel let out a heavy sigh. "Is there any problem? Is something bothering you?" the kind, caring tone was back now.

Zein leaned into the doorframe and crossed his arms when Abel suddenly looked at him. "Or someone?"

Seemingly realizing there was someone else there, Nora turned around and flinched as he saw Zein in his black training suit. Zein wanted to laugh because the whole situation made it seem like he was the one who had been bothering the C-class.

Perhaps he was?

"Can I talk to him for a bit?" Zein asked since the attention was already on him.

"M-me?" Nora looked visibly panicked, and Zein couldn’t help but think like he became a villain again—that grim reaper from last week.

Even Abel smirked playfully behind the desk, hiding his smile behind a stack of paper—even though he sounded so worried earlier. "Sure," he said, as if relieved he could pass on a burdensome thing to others. "Get him back in one piece."

"What do you think I am?" Zein scoffed as he pulled away from the doorframe and hook his finger at the C-class guide, telling the man to follow him. "A grim reaper?"

This time, Abel couldn’t hold back his laughter, almost as if he wasn’t just letting out exasperated concern a minute ago.

With that, Nora had no choice but to follow Zein inside the tall guide’s office. Glancing at the C-class, Zein was wondering now—what happened to that high-handed, coquettish red-zone guide, and why he became this timid, weak, fragile entity.

Leaning into his desk, Zein contemplated his plan again. He had wanted to put Nora inside his division initially, for the sheer reason that the man already experience the harsh environment of the red-zone and went inside the dungeons a few times.

But looking at this man who couldn’t even meet his eyes, Zein was forced to reconsider. He couldn’t find it, the high mental capacity that he expected Nora to have. When he saw how timid the man was during their first meeting in Trinity, Zein thought it was only because of shock of finding Zein here—and probably feared of being found out about working in the red-zone, which was normal.

But remembering what Abel said before, it seemed like the man had been like that since before Zein arrived here, and Zein wondered why.

"W-why are you calling me here?" the guide stuttered for a bit, peeking at Zein’s contemplative face. "Is this...about what happened in the r-red-zone?"

Zein tilted his head, and as if suddenly remembered, the C-class added in a hurry, "S-Sir?"

Zein didn’t actually mean to have a hierarchy showdown though. He just suddenly realized that he was never thinking of that: finding out what happened to that dungeon and the cause of the outbreak. Of his many days staying here and finding out Nora was here, he never thought of cornering the guide and asking him what was going on back then.

Was he...already come to terms that it was inevitable?

"Not really," Zein replied with a shrug. "Well, I’m curious, but I don’t think you’re ready to talk about it," the blue eyes stared closely at the defensive expression and darting eyes.

The wandering eyes blinked and opened wide, finally staring at Zein. "You...you won’t...?"

"But what happened to you?" Zein narrowed his eyes slightly at the sight of the hunching guide who nervously fiddled his fingers. "You used to rule over all other guides with confidence like a queen, rallying them against me. You used to stand confidently next to the strongest person and talk back to others,"

With every word from Zein that reminded him of the past, Nora grew paler. But his frown also grew deeper, as if he was angry, and in the end, he let out a loud shout—it was fortunate that the door was closed.

"It...it’s none of your business!" he yelled with balled fists, scrunching his face in frustration.

Zein crossed his arms. So it seemed like there was truly something wrong with his situation here. If Zein had to guess, then it might have something to do with how the man was clinging to that A-class clique. "It’ll be my business if I put you in my division."

The previously agitated face faltered then, and the guide took a step back unconsciously. "W-what? Why? Is...is this a payback—"

"Don’t falter yourself, I’m not that concerned about you," Zein cut the man swiftly. "I simply think you will do well since you’re already experienced with harsh environments and dungeon diving."

The man paused and just stood there looking at Zein’s impassive eyes for a whole minute, before replying in a shaken voice. "I...I don’t want to..."

"Hmm...why not?" well, it was to be expected. If he wanted to join, he would have applied on his own. Zein already knew he would have to do some convincing, but before he could even say anything more, Nora had already opened his mouth.

"Why do you think I came all the way here?" the guide almost snapped. "You...shouldn’t you be the one who knows best about it?"

Zein tilted his head in confusion, but the other guide’s serious expression made him close his mouth to listen.

"You’re already here in the green-zone, you can live a nice luxurious life with your new status," the man looked so flabbergasted at Zein that he almost seemed laughing. "But why are you so adamant to live in danger? A guide specialized in dungeon raids?"

Now the man was truly laughing, although it was quiet and bitter sounding.

"You...aren’t you sick of living that kind of life?"