There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 398 - 390. Testing the Darkness

Chapter 398: Chapter 390. Testing the Darkness

"An academy?" Han Shin raised his brow, quickly following Zein and walking toward the outer building. "You’re not going to use it for your clan’s headquarters?"

"Why would I do that?" Zein replied. "We have the house that my father built in the industrial complex. I would rather build another building there if I want a bigger clan house."

"Or the lakeside," Bassena added, to which Zein nodded in agreement.

"Besides, it’s better in the public eyes," Logan said. "Using this place for an institution rather than a private use--not even those people outside would have any justification to continue their protest."

Zein nodded in satisfaction. With the connection to the Old Houses’ patriarchs that he gained recently, it wouldn’t be hard to get a licensing. He had heard that a lot of people grew a massive interest in combat guides after the success of Trinity’s program. Other guilds had been asking for cooperation to teach their own guides, although Radia politely declined using the reclamation project as a reason.

"I planned to talk to the Temple too," Zein said. The council of elder priests had been trying to contact him ever since his Saint candidacy, but he had been...let’s just say he had been too busy to accept their call. "The academy will also teach guides in active duty, aside from the newly awakeners."

"Oh, that’s a trade," Han Shin snapped his fingers. "Will you have the time to establish it, though? I mean...before the Deathzone?"

Zein exhaled slowly. "Haa...I don’t know about this," he chuckled. "I’ll have to beg Radia to lend me Nadine and some kids as mentors."

"Eh, as long as the price is right," Bassena shrugged, and they continued their inspection while chuckling at the challenge further down the road.

But the place was indeed suitable for an academy. The outer building, which consisted of small housing for the servants and guards, could be turned into a dormitory and clinics for practices. The guide’s education didn’t need a lot of places; just a classroom for theory, and clinics for practice.

Combat guides, however, needed more physical training areas. And simulation chamber too, if they had the funds. Perhaps in the future. "It’s good that this place had its own training area, isn’t it?" Senan commented as he looked at the blueprint of the compound. "Gyms and all that--complete with a basement."

"Basement," Bassena snickered. "Basement that is reeked of miasma."

"How fitting," Zein smirked. "It’s like they know we’ll turn it into a combat guide training."

Well...joking aside, they did need to get rid of the leftover miasma there--which was why Eugene and Anise had tagged along with Zein today, bringing the purification device with them. And something else.

"The inner courtyard and the main hall will be the faculty office?"

"And the patron residence," Zein nodded.

"Patron?"

"Certainly," Zein glanced at Senan. "This is still an Ishtera’s property."

The old man smiled and bowed slightly at his Young Master. Of course, the running committee should still consist of people from the Ishtera household. After all, this would be Zein’s and House Ishtera’s legacy--along with the foundation that Zein could finally start again.

"This one is because of you, isn’t it?" Zein narrowed his eyes and pointed at a half-destroyed cabin.

"In my defense, I didn’t know they were holding an explosive," Bassena shrugged. "Ask Kei, really! I don’t know how to explode things!"

"You know it’s more suspicious the more you vehemently denied it?" Han Shin said with a smirk and an arched brow.

"You, shut up!" Bassena looked at Zein worriedly. "I’ll pitch in for the reconstruction, okay?"

Amidst the chuckle of the others--who had gotten used to seeing the Bassena Vaski being a puppy in front of his guide--Zein patted his boyfriend’s cheek. "Just joking," he said. "You’re easy to tease these days."

"Then you shouldn’t tease me all the time," Bassena pursed his lips, eliciting a small laugh from the guide.

"Ahem--no frolicking in public, please," Han Shin snapped his fingers between the couple’s heads, before pointing toward the infamous archive hall. "What are you going to do with that place?"

They stopped to look at the archive hall, which was still surrounded by tapes and guarded by government agents. It was still deemed as evidence, and there were a lot of things inside that needed to be scrutinized. The basements were supposed to be evidence too, but there was nothing more after the device used to generate monsters was taken away.

"Just what it intended to be; an archive hall," Zein said. "The place...further down...could be used for digital library."

"Right! Better put it to good use!" Han Shin jumped and clung to Zein’s back. It was clear to them that Zein still had a bitter sentiment toward the place that had been imprisoning his father’s remains for the past twenty-nine years, and they had actually thought Zein would have wanted to destroy it.

But, well...putting that sinister place to good use; a place that could bring more benefit to other people seemed like a more apt revenge than simple destruction.

"Let’s go to that basement," Zein turned away from the archive hall and walked to another path that led to the training area.

They followed one of Mallarc’s guards who showed them the way to the training court at the back of the compound. There was an actual dormitory here, along with a physical training facility and the questionable basement.

"Looks perfect," Zein smiled. Just needed a bit of fixing up for all the nicks and cracks from the fight. But it’d still be easier than building the whole thing.

Just one thing...

"Gods--it’s still reek!" Han Shin waved his hands in front of his face, scrunching his nose at the miasma wafting from the basement. "How can those people live around this place!"

"Perhaps that’s why their brain is so twisted," Bassena clicked his tongue. "I heard the summoning device was only made twenty years ago--it really was a good thing that old man Darleon got out before then."

"Yeah; can’t imagine people passing this place and not thinking there’s something wrong," Han Shin shook his head. "It smells like a dungeon!"

Zein took out his mask from the storage ring, finally using it again after quite some time. The researchers followed suit, while the Lawyer and the financier just stepped back. They had no business there, so they wouldn’t get inside like the others.

"Let’s go," Zein activated his mask and headed inside the gym. The guard pointed into something like a trap door, from which the miasma was leaking. He carefully yanked the door and the rest of the group hurriedly climbed down the stairs to the basement.

To be honest, the miasma content itself was only as much as a low-rank dungeon. But the miasma in dungeons usually spread across a wide field. In an enclosed space like a basement, however, the miasma congested until it grew thick--to the point that it still felt rather heavy even after more than a week.

"Let’s try the device," Zein looked at Eugene and Anise, who swiftly nodded and took out a device that Zein had familiarized himself with during the Deathzone expedition. This one, however, had already gone through several upgrades.

"We reached a hundred-meter radius now," Eugene said proudly. "If we placed several of them strategically, we could build a headquarters easily."

"And we still tried to improve the radius even now, so there’s hope that it’ll grow even wider," Anise added while setting the device in the place that seemed to be where the summoning device used to be at.

Zein looked around the basement as the researchers activated the device, and then stared at the ground, rubbing the blackened floor with the sole of his combat boots. The stain, however, was persistent; definitely made by seeping miasma, not dirt or blood.

And that stain persisted even after the purification device was activated for quite some time. The miasma in the air got absorbed rather quickly, but it still persisted within the walls and the floor. The black stain stood out even more after the air was cleared up.

"As expected," Eugene sighed, looking at the persistent miasma disappointingly. "It couldn’t get rid of the miasma that had been seeping for too long."

"They basically taking root here," Senan stomped the floor lightly.

"Mm," Zein walked to the device then, nodding at the researchers. "Let’s try it, then. Bas--"

"On it," Bassena roused his mana and clapped his hands once, enveloping everyone in darkness. The only source of light came from the purifying device, which had dimmed slightly too.

Nightfall? Senan and the Mallarc’s guard raised their brows, but they knew enough to just keep their mouth and waited. They realized that the dome of darkness had intentionally shrunk so it was only enveloping the training hall and the basement.

They watched Eugene taking out something from the Mortix’s storage ring then--something that Senan and the guard had never seen before.

The shard fragment of Setnath.

Eugene and Anise hurriedly ran to hide behind Han Shin. Only after the others were at a safe distance that Zein carefully take out the shard. The researchers had attached a pedestal on top of the purifying device that mimicked the one used in the Tower and Temple--perfect to put the shard in.

Zein placed the shard gently and let it do its job. With a soft vibration, an undulating wave of pure mana spread out, slowly eradicating the stain.

"Oh! It works!" Han Shin exclaimed energetically. But then, after a while, the stain didn’t seem to disappear completely. "Oh..."

Zein had expected this, however, so he wasn’t as disappointed as the researchers. The shard did have a bigger effect than the man-made purification device, but it seemed to fail to completely purify something that had been deeply embedded for decades. The safe zone in the Deathzone was quite possible only established through years of purification efforts.

Having expected this, Zein calmly put his hand on the shard. Slowly, he channeled his mana to the stigma on the back of his neck, calling out the power of Setnath. It became more comfortable for him now, using the power that he had been avoiding so much all this while.

Unlike his own refreshing mana, the power of Setnath felt like fire, bursting forth from the back of his neck to the tip of his fingers, pouring into the shard and calling forth the dormant power within it.

The two sources of power resonate with each other, and with a blast of pure mana, the black stains on the walls and the floor evaporate under a bright, shining light.

It only took three seconds.

"Damn, Zein," Han Shin laughed. "What can we do without you?"

Well...at least the experiment was a success.