There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 520 - 513. To Use Their Weapon

Chapter 520: Chapter 513. To Use Their Weapon

"Can you move?" Bassena asked Ron. The scout wasn’t as badly injured as before--nothing was melting away--but still...bad. He was drenched in blood and pale from mana deficiency.

"No," the man replied after finishing cursing the experience of getting scattered twice by fragments. "Can someone get me the box in my breast pocket?"

"I--I’ll do it," the outpost defender, who was feeling bad for barely doing anything, helped the scout light up a golden needle Radia supplied him as a thanks for that first fragment attack.

"Haa...let me have this a bit and I’ll get up again," the man said while inhaling mana deep inside, filling his empty system again.

After giving the defender a set of regenerative serums to be given to the scout, Bassena quickly swept his gaze around. Thankfully, no one was in danger of eruption yet; Ron and Helios were in the red, but it was a low one, and they should be able to manage until they got to the Borderland.

He looked at the Humvee next, which engine was still on. Good--at least it was still operating. "Zeylo, Ishi, get everyone to the Borderland right away."

"Y-you mean...vacating the outpost, Commander?"

"Yes," he glanced at the reporters once again. "Get everyone to safety, and send these two to a healer and a guide. Here," he threw a dimensional storage pouch to the marksman. "Put the reporters’ equipment here to make room so these two can lay down."

"Y-yes, Commander."

Bassena looked at them once more before turning around. He would like it if he could make sure they were truly alright--or at least on their way--but he couldn’t afford to do it now. Finally, he made sure the remnants of the fragment’s material body fully disappeared before turning to the main base’s direction.

"Bas," Ron stared at the dark foliage above and blew an odorless smoke into the stuffy air. "Hang on."

Bassena blinked, and for the first time, a little smile cracked his stiff, agitated face. "We will," he said, before disappearing in the dark.

Or so he said.

But there he was, stopping at the edge of the forest and punching a tree until its bark broke and toppled over. He gritted his teeth and closed his eyes in an attempt to calm himself, feeling totally blindsided.

The fragment that attacked the outpost earlier most likely came from the mountainside. There was an ambush of a horde led by a fragment, and he made the mistake of thinking there was only one. Perhaps because there was no path connecting the mountainside to the jungle near the border, he stupidly assumed anyone wouldn’t be able to pass the region too.

How stupid. How careless of him. The fragments weren’t humans--or even miasmic beasts--in the first place. Who’s to say they couldn’t traverse through impossible terrain?

He was lucky that Helios reached four-star recently, and Ron was there. If it was any other espers below their prowess, he might arrive at a site of massacre instead of a rescue. And it was a good thing that he wasn’t late, because just another second...just another second, and it would turn into the mountain outpost situation.

Bassena clenched his jaw as fury was rising in his heart. Two years...more than two years had passed without any fatality and in just five seconds...five seconds that it took for the mountain outpost to send an emergency signal, they were annihilated.

"Haa..."

No. This wasn’t the time for him to dwell on his failure. There would be a time to grieve and to blame later, but he still had a war to face in the meantime.

Bassena took a deep breath and kicked the ground again, moving as fast as he could while connecting his earpiece. "Update," he asked curtly.

[We took care of one already, but the other one is running away, so the hunting squad and the mercenaries are chasing it right now] Ashur replied immediately. [We plan to move to the desert once we are fully healed and adequately cleansed]

"Be careful of another ambush--both for the chasing team and you," Bassena warned, no longer wanting to be careless. "Only move after you make sure the other fragment is down and no attack comes from the plains or the river."

[Yes, Commander]

"K,"

[Everyone has moved back to lane three, except for the scouts and those in the dungeon watchtower] Kei’s reply was accompanied by a lot of background noises. [The personnel from the main base has just arrived]

Bassena stopped again in front of the main base. With the lockdown in effect, all the remaining personnel were inside the fortified arena, including Lex who watched over everything through the command center’s screens and reported everything to Radia. The watchtowers, thus, were only manned by one esper each.

"Pull the scouts back and use only drones and radars," Bassena said after making sure the watchtowers’ guards were alert. "What about the trigger?"

[We’re still calibrating it] Kei replied with a muffled sigh. [They just have to come before we can install everything, so it’s rather complicated now, Commander]

Ah...Bassena wanted to curse as much as her. He couldn’t even tell if they were being careless or if they just had bad luck. Or was it that they had become complacent in the face of consecutive success? Yes, they were the ones who initiated the baiting trick using the shard, but had they really thought it through?

They thought the fragments would just come one by one and they could finish them off little by little.

How foolish.

How arrogant were they, to think that the Fallen Star couldn’t think of sending a troop of its worst nightmare?

Bassena clicked his tongue and started to move again. "How close are they?"

[The horde and the Specters just entered the desert, but the fragments are stopping on the horizon] Kei replied before shouting something away from the speaker. [Commander, I have a feeling that they are waiting for something. Do you think it’s...]

"Talk to Zein for now," Bassena said, hastening his steps. "He’ll know more about it than any of us."

[Understood]

The connection was ended temporarily as Kei was busy moving around to organize the personnel. While he alternated his shadow steps and ran to maintain his corrosion level, Bassena couldn’t help but think about what Kei had said earlier.

It couldn’t be...could it?

Bassena gritted his teeth. He didn’t want to think about the worst-case scenario, but if there was one thing he learned from the Deathzone, it was that they should always, always assume the worst.

Because the reality could be even worse than that.

* * *

"What’s wrong?" Zein asked the moment he saw Bassena’s eyes.

The esper wasn’t answering immediately, so he pulled the man aside, away from the hustle and bustle of the other espers who were preparing for the defense. They retreated to a higher point, so they would look like observing the field rather than having a separate, secretive discussion.

"Tell me," Zein grabbed the esper’s elbow. Normally, he wouldn’t be this pushy, but in a place that was about to turn into a battlefield, he couldn’t let the Commander look fresh out of a nightmare.

Bassena closed his eyes and leaned forward. It would look like he was whispering in the guide’s ear, but he just really needed to lean and feel the warmth of his beloved--the one he would never want to lose.

And he told Zein everything.

The guide was silent for a while, probably a full minute, before finally making a reaction. "Did you send the mountain base’s personnel to the core?"

"Yeah," Bassena pulled himself back again, straightening his shoulder. He observed the guide, who sounded dry and blase, and watched as the shaking blue eyes gradually shifted into that of his name; a calm, serene water.

"Good," Zein nodded. "We shouldn’t let the others know about it now."

"I agree," Bassena took a deep breath, scolding himself for losing his cool.

They knew--they should have known it was only a pipe dream to get through this whole operation without a scratch. They knew it would be more than a scratch--deep, gashing, decapitating wound was what they were.

But no matter what, it shouldn’t paralyze them, because then...it would be a disservice to those who fell.

Bassena opened his mouth, but closed it again as he swallowed the apology he wanted to make. "Thank you," he said instead, before turning toward the field.

On the horizon, he could see the approaching cloud of black sands and glowing red eyes, only a few kilometers away. Might seem far, but in this open desert, those creatures would enter the fourth lane in just a few minutes, and be face-to-face with them in the third lane.

Thankfully, the line of shields had been erected, and barrier stones had been spread, ready to be activated by the magicians. Defenders stood ready behind the shields, and the warriors gripped their weapons. All long-range damage dealers had stationed themselves in the towers and stone cliffs the elemental magician had made, while the supports and guides stood at the back, ready to help.

The magic bombs’ trigger was yet to be finished, unfortunately, but they had to make do. Besides, they still had a hidden weapon.

"Is she ready?" Bassena asked as the black cloud was just a minute away from the fourth lane, glancing toward the dungeon not far from the third lane.

"On your mark," Zein said, raising a communication device to his face.

"Release it."

Zein repeated the command. "Release them."

There, in front of a dungeon, was a girl surrounded by tiny flying creatures. She stared at the black cloud and raised her arm, and as she heard the command from her earpiece, she slammed her arm down, cleaving the stuffy air.

"Rampage!"

The former princess who found her small kingdom in the darkness shouted, sending her new little friends forward.

Once again, the tornadoes that had been absent from the desert for a year resurrected, swirling through the black sand and soaring to the black sky.

Hurling toward the hordes of black fume and countless red glowing eyes.