There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 332 - 324. Wavering Pillar

Chapter 332: Chapter 324. Wavering Pillar

"He just does everything, doesn’t he?" Zein glanced at Radia, who was printing the contract he drafted for Darleon so the Iron Shield could peruse them and see if there was something they wanted to change.

"He always does," Bassena shrugged. "The only thing he couldn’t do much about is anything about Joon."

Zein turned to face Bassena with a smirk. "Now that you know, you can’t stop talking about it, huh?"

Bassena groaned slightly, burying his face in his palm. "I can’t believe I couldn’t see it!" he grumbled. "Now that I know, I feel like I should have known, especially back in the day."

Although he knew Radia and Joon spent a lot of time together, often having a sleepover, he didn’t think much about it. Well, there was also the fact that he was only a naive teenager obsessed with getting stronger, but...to think he also couldn’t catch it after becoming an adult.

"Have they been acting that well in public?" Zein asked. "I really couldn’t figure out why they needed to act like they were nemesis in front of others."

"I know, right? It’s weird," Bassena rubbed his chin. "I mean...Radia was angry, so I used to think it was natural for him to act coldly at Joon every time they crossed paths. But..."

"Joon didn’t have to?"

"Yeah," the esper nodded. "You would think someone whose neck was getting sliced would feel angrier, but I saw it, although it was brief," Bassena narrowed his eyes a bit as he tried to look at his memory. "He was smiling."

"...that is...creepy?" Zein grimaced, unconsciously rubbing his neck. His mind wandered to the scar across the soldier’s neck, and then recalling the man’s core. "But for some reason, I feel like it’s so him."

Bassena chuckled in agreement, before sighing. "Anyway, Joon never showed that he was angry or anything, but for some reason, he played into the ploy as if they were an enemy—you know, countering Radia’s banter with coldness," the amber eyes dimmed, and the esper’s tone turning low; sad and regretful. "I thought it was really bad back then, and I believed there was no hope for them to have a good relationship anymore. Radia never talked about making a guild with us again, and I had no courage to even mention it since he turned really scary if I did."

Zein pressed his lips, hiding the chuckle he wanted to make. Bassena looked like a child caught up between his parents’ divorce, and it was quite funny—not the divorce thing, but the fact that the ’parents’ were only five and six years older than him.

And then, the regret turned into irritation. "But now that I know they are together, what is this? What’s all my sadness for? This feels like a betrayal!"

"To be fair, I don’t think they’re exactly together," Zein couldn’t hide his chuckle anymore this time. He patted the confused esper and looked at Radia with a sigh. "I don’t know what happened with them, but...while they loved each other, Joon said they can’t be together yet."

"Wait...you talked to Joon about this?" Bassena looked even more betrayed now.

"I’m curious," Zein shrugged.

He contemplated whether he could tell Bassena about what Joon told him before. But he didn’t remember the soldier telling him it was a secret exactly, and now that Bassena knew about those two, what difference would it make?

"He told me that he entered the military so they could be together in the future," Zein said quietly, glancing at Radia across the room. "I think he tried to protect Radia from something, but I don’t know what."

The low, solemn tone that Zein used piqued the esper’s interest. He lowered his head and whispered his response. "Do you think there’s a connection between that and his disappearance?"

"That’s what I think," Zein nodded. "But from the way Han Joon keeps it from Radia, I don’t think we can share this."

The amber eyes narrowed, and it was clear that Bassena felt conflicted about it. Zein understood though; for Bassena, Joon and Radia were his older brothers, the family he didn’t have. So thinking that one of them—or probably both—was in danger...it would weigh his heart.

"But if it looks like it steers into dangerous territory in the future, we’ll tell him," Zein added. Bassena still looked like he swallowed a whole sweet potato, but the esper nodded in the end.

"Let’s hope that’s not the case," Bassena sighed, just in time because Radia had finished his talk with Senan regarding the contract.

Zein should be reading them too, but the content was too technical for him to understand fully, especially the part about payout and whatnot. He just let Senan and the Elder gramps peruse it and told him what they were thinking.

"Why do you look so gloomy suddenly?" The couple walked back to where Radia and Senan were, and the summoner tilted his head at Bassena’s expression. "You’re already pessimistic or something?"

Bassena opened his mouth, but he felt like he would blurt out what Zein told him earlier if he said anything, so he just closed it again and shrugged, averting the crimson gaze by hiding behind his guide. Zein held back from laughing and decided to give the esper a bit of leeway.

"Would you like to meet Arlo?" Zein asked Senan. "Bas can take you to him."

"Oh, would that be alright?"

"Yes, let’s go. He should be in the arena right now," Bassena nodded and walked away before Senan could even say anything in response. But the middle-aged man followed the esper after looking at Zein’s subtle smile, leaving the guide alone with Radia.

Radia crossed his arms, crimson eyes narrowed. "He acts so well in front of the camera, but otherwise..."

"He can’t lie in front of people he cares about," Zein chuckled. "Adorable, isn’t he?"

"Ugh," Radia rolled his eyes and walked back to his desk, taking out a new golden needle box and opening it, only for Zein to push his hand down, closing the lid.

"A bit too much today, isn’t it?" the guide remarked lightly. "You said you’ll take mine if I take too much, so it should mean I can do the same to you."

The crimson eyes hardened for a few seconds, and Zein almost thought Radia would get angry. Fortunately, the summoner closed his eyes and leaned back on his chair, hand slipping away from the tin box. As Zein took the box away and stowed it in Nyx’s hand, Radia remained motionless, wordless.

"I tried to contact his squad member through someone else," Radia spoke when Zein took a seat in front of the desk. The guide raised his brow, listening intently as Radia continued. "No one knows where he is. No one knows where he went."

"What? How could that be? Isn’t he a soldier?" Zein frowned.

He never served in the military, but the borderland unit commander, Agni Khan, used to be a soldier of special forces like Han Joon. From what the man told him, the military watched their soldiers like hawks; every movement was logged, every leave permit scrutinized. Han Joon had gone for almost two months, so there was no way the military didn’t know about it.

"To be exact, his squad members have no idea where he is. We don’t know if the higher-ups know something," Radia shrugged.

"But...isn’t his father..."

At the mention of Joon’s father, Radia instantly scowled. "If Joon disappeared, his father would be the one to cover it the most," he spat hatefully. "He hates having something ’smear’ his reputation."

Right—Zein remembered that the man was also Shin’s horrible father.

Radia chewed on his inner cheek, eyes darted in agitation. He looked so confident and domineering just an hour ago, but now...he looked like any nervous lover out there. "Actually, he wasn’t considered missing until the second week of this month."

"Huh?"

"The squad members said he was gone for an official solo mission after the new year, and afterward, came back to the base shortly before taking a personal leave," Radia continued, rubbing his lips so he wouldn’t bite them. "He came back after that leave, and immediately took a solo mission again, and..."

"That’s when he went missing?"

Radia sighed, but he shook his head at Zein’s conclusion. "The mission was completed, but he went missing on the way back to the base," the summoner said. "He hadn’t been seen ever since."

"What? This is—" Zein stood up, frowning deeply. No wonder Radia had been so sensitive about Joon. "Shin said he knows nothing of his brother’s whereabouts. Is the military not saying anything to him?"

"I don’t think so," Radia shook. "He’s declared missing, but it’s something happening often to a special force agent like him. They are still trying to look for him—or so his squad members said—and by regulation, his conditions would be relayed to his father, not Shin."

Ah...

Zein sat down again. They probably thought since they already told the father, there was no need to reach out to another family member. "Should we tell Shin?"

"...I’m still contemplating," Radia groaned. "I only found out yesterday, so...haa..." he closed his eyes again, skull throbbing heavily and heart stinging horribly. "I feel so dizzy."

"What are you going to do?" Zein asked carefully, watching the confidence vanish from the crimson eyes.

"...I don’t know," Radia muttered weakly from the lips that did not know defeat before. "I can’t think right now."

Zein felt his heart jolted, clenched by an unspeakable fear. It took him a while to digest it, but he realized what it was soon enough. Instability; it was the fear of having the pillar supporting their umbrella crumbled.

Seeing someone so powerful, so confident, so sure of everything looking so miserable while muttering ’I don’t know’ was shaking his confidence too. It made his stomach curl, and it was scary to think that he had been standing beneath a canopy made of someone else’s hard work and tenacity.

"Hey, about this case..." Zein said hesitatingly. "Let’s just postpone it for a—"

"No," Radia flicked his gaze; hard and fierce and unyielding as usual. "I am not in a position where I can rest just because of my personal business, Luzein."

"But..."

"If anything..." Radia paused to take a deep breath. "I need to do this so I don’t have to think about him all the time. I need to do this...so I don’t have to feel like a failure."

Zein pressed his lips. Joon was right; the more Radia got nervous, the more he would run around making sure he was busy. "Okay," he sighed in the end.

Radia huffed and softened his gaze, looking at Zein with a wry smile. "So, what do you want to ask me?"

"Huh?" the blue eyes blinked in surprise.

"What? Aren’t you staying behind because you want to ask me about something?" Radia tilted his head; there was no longer a trace of vulnerability in his face.

"Haa...you’re like a ghost," Zein shook his head, grimacing at how much Radia always managed to see through him. "But yeah, there’s something I want to consult you about."

"Go on,"

"...it’s about the shadow guard..."

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.