There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 358 - 350. Touch of Memory (3)

Chapter 358: Chapter 350. Touch of Memory (3)

"What an honor,"

Calix received the hand of the man in front of him, who he hadn’t seen in years already. They knew each other in college instead of an esper academy, despite them both being an esper. The man had a youthful smile that never changed since their old days, but aside from that, his appearance was plain and forgettable.

And it was something he had always been carefully crafted.

"Haha, what are you talking about?" he chuckled in response as they shook hands. "I’m just a middle-aged man squandering my son’s money."

"I know," the man smirked while glancing at Radia, who was standing behind his father with a casual smile. It was rare to see this father and son pair together even in high society events, so it was rather fascinating to him. "You enjoy it so much that you rarely go home anymore, so of course it is an honor having you coming here in one of those rare moments."

"You know me really well," Calix chuckled at the deliberate attempt to make him know that this man kept a tab on him all the time.

The man rolled his eyes and turned around, telling them to follow him into the well-kept inner yard in the middle of the building. Along the way, Radia observed how the staff and other members of the House bowed their heads deeply when the man passed, despite the way he dressed like one of them.

Obviously, this man wasn’t ’one of them’.

Yuria Apsoro was the ’patriarch’, but also wasn’t. The patriarch that the public knew was his cousin, but it was this man who had decision-making authority in the clan and of course, all information the clan worked for all went through his hand. There were only a handful of people who knew about this fact, and Calix was one of them.

And that was why he accompanied his son to go here. Otherwise, Radia would have to go through the hassle of the fake patriarch. Not a desired path, when they were already pressed for time.

They arrived in a pavilion above a fish pond, and as they climbed the wooden steps, Yuria let out a sigh. "I’m a bit disappointed, though..." the man glanced back and narrowed his green-flecked hazel eyes. "You should have already left this place three days ago, but you came back, and the first thing you do is visit me," he paused for a few seconds before continuing dryly. "It’ll be nicer if you’re here to see me, you know, rather than my family’s business."

Radia tilted his head slightly; he didn’t know much about his father’s old friend because most of Calix’s time had been spent with Laurel. He thought that Yuria was just an old acquaintance, but it was clear now that they were much closer than that.

"Don’t sulk," Calix replied with a calm smile as he took off his shoes. "I’ll play with you after this."

"Don’t go back on your words," Yuria pointed his fingers to the other man.

Radia had to hold himself back from raising his brows. He understood now why his father advised him to seek Apsoro’s help without hesitation despite the uncertainty of the people involved. So he decided to just sit back and follow his father today.

Taking a seat behind the table in the middle of the pavilion. "So, in what do you require my service?" again, he glanced toward Radia. "Something about the Deathzone?"

"Maybe," Radia replied simply with a subtle smile.

Yuria leaned his back on the lazy chair, crossing his arms as he looked at Radia curiously. "I have to say, however, that we can’t go to the Deathzone without a proper contract attached to reclamation rights," he said, which was in line with the rule set by the government. "So if you want to know the condition there now, we need that contract."

"Oh, don’t worry about that," Radia shook his head and smiled at the staff that served him tea. "We don’t really need it."

"Hmm?" Yuria tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowed inquisitively at the quick dismissal. "Well, of course--you already had a map from last year’s expedition," he nodded and tapped his chin. He didn’t want to lose a chance if it was to be presented to him, however. "But things change fast in just a few months, you know."

"We never said it has something about the reclamation project," Calix said.

Yuria, who was about to lift his teacup, paused and narrowed his eyes in confusion.

"We just want to borrow your memory trace."

Radia’s summon couldn’t read something without eyes, so seeing where the boxes had been would be impossible. Yuria’s ability, meanwhile, allowed him to trace the mana attached to items, and read what the mana ’see’ instead. It was an ability that had been passed down from generation to generation for those who would become the patriarch; a rare inherited skill that didn’t need to be obtained through the Tower’s trial.

Eyes still narrowed skeptically, Yuria’s whole visage turned from a lighthearted friend to a business partner. "Alright," with a dry tone, he opened his palm. "Which item do I have to see?"

Radia took out the boxes one by one from his storage rings, still with the materials inside. He lined them up on the tea tray and shoved it lightly to the middle of the table.

"...I’m about to say that I charged per item, but I remember you’re filthy rich," Yuria pursed his lips, looking at all five boxes which meant he had to work five times.

Calix replied with a playful wink, while Radia took out a piece of paper and put it beside the tray. "We narrowed it down to these sites. You just need to pinpoint the location."

Yuria took the paper and scanned it, curling his lips slightly. "I like it when my client does the legwork first," he said, before adding with a sharp gaze. "But it won’t affect the rate."

Both Calix and Radia just smiled subtly--a trained smile that showed nothing to their counterpart. Yuria just kept his sigh and proceeded to take a box from the tray. "Eternal dungeons, huh?" he stared at the box and the hazel eyes went still, unblinking, as the green flecks moved around the black pupil like an asteroid belt of a planet. "This is...hmm..."

Yuria frowned and wordlessly put down the first box before taking another. Calix and Radia watched as the man continued with each box while making scribbles on the list of eternal dungeons that Radia had provided. When he finished with all five boxes, he stared at the now cold tea blankly for a minute, before frowning in contemplation.

When he looked up to meet Calix’s gaze, his frown had gotten deeper. "I’m going to ask you first--"

"I thought you never asked your client’s objective?" Calix said with a raised brow.

"No," Yuria lined the box back on the tray, fiddling with them instead of giving them back to Radia. "But if someone asked me about the man I saw in those memories, I have no obligation to not share the information."

The corner of Radia’s eyes twitched, but Calix replied calmly. "Fair enough."

"Are you looking for him?" Yuria asked.

"...Yes," it took Radia a while to answer it. And when he did, he looked at Yuria with guarded eyes. "What do you know about him?"

Yuria lifted his cold cup and poured out the cold content. "The military put him on a missing personnel list, but they are not looking for him actively."

"Why?"

"Because Major General Han Gyeong told the others not to," Yuria took the teacup and served himself a new warm tea, "So that’s the extent of our interest," he shrugged, flicking his gaze toward Radia and added with a playful smile. "I didn’t know you still had a good relationship with him."

Radia ignored the remark and just got back to business. "Did you see what he did in these dungeons?"

"No," Yuria replied more seriously now that Radia didn’t seem to be in the mood for some playful banter--which was rare. "He only took the materials when he was about to leave the dungeons," he tapped on his teacup as he recalled what he saw from the boxes. "I could see that he did hard labor there, however. On two occasions, he came back injured."

"I see," Radia suppressed the ache in his heart and took out another item. "Please look at this one’s too."

Yuria raised his brow and put down his steaming cup so he could take the small, plain black flash drive. He immediately activated his ability and this time, his unblinking eyes shook a little bit.

"...what the hell?" Yuria muttered as a frown appeared on his forehead. He gripped the flash drive tighter as if it would allow him to look into it more. Radia and Calix watched the man’s face shift from contorting in shock to astonishment. When he finished, he started at the flash drive hard. "This one..."

"Yes?"

Yuria snatched his teacup and gulped the still-steaming liquid before taking a deep breath. "This is...I’m not sure, but I think it’s inside a dungeon managed by the military--I don’t know which one," he shook his head and narrowed his eyes. "But..."

Radia straightened his back and leaned slightly to the table, shooting Yuriel an eager, inquisitive gaze.

"There’s a building with a modern facility there; a big one, almost like a fortress--no, like the central military headquarters, but half a size smaller," Yuria continued. "The guards..."

He stopped and frowned deeply, putting the flash drive very carefully on the table as if it were a dangerous weapon. "The guards are not...humans."

Calix crossed his arms in contemplation, and Radia tapped on his commlink, pulling out the photograph of the Specter’s core they stored in Mortix’s vault. "Is there something like this in that place?"

"I’m not sure," Yuria tilted his head to look at the picture more clearly, but shook his head in the end. "I can only see the rooms and passages where he passed while carrying this flash drive, and I don’t think there was this thing in the places he passed."

Radia frowned and held back the frustrated sigh trapped in his lungs. He had hoped there was a clear connection between this operation and Horin’s involvement with the Deathzone’s force, but it seemed like even going this far wasn’t enough.

At the very least though, they knew that there was a non-human entity involved in this operation.

"It seemed like he activated an alarm when he took the data and retreated immediately," Yuria said again.

"Is there no hint about the location?"

"No," Yuria sighed. "There was an interference with the mana when he ran away, probably a barrier or anti-mana devices."

The pavilion descended into silence then, as the three espers fell into their own contemplative thought.

"Hey," when his new tea became lukewarm again, Yuria looked at Calix with a serious gaze. "What kind of things are you chasing exactly here?"

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