There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 90 - 87. First Stop

Chapter 90: Chapter 87. First Stop

"With enemies that attack indiscriminately, unless the raid captain told you to hide, just stay put in your formation. Don’t confuse the defender by scattering around."

"Projectile attacks can come from anywhere, so compress your body and raise your shield."

"Your two shields are there to protect your brain and heart--don’t mind your face! No one cares about you being pretty if you are dead!"

"If you can’t predict the timing, just deploy your shield from the start--it will recharge by absorbing mana in the dungeon so don’t bother about preserving it."

"Are you offering yourself to the beast? Stay close and press your back together--protect each other!"

"Don’t close your eyes! You’re dead meat if you can’t see the enemies!"

The espers pressed their lips at the sounds of the Guide Captain barking instructions from the back at the other guides. Sometimes not even from the back--he would come forward and snatch the guides from harm’s way, or fix their defensive posture. The quiet, reserved man suddenly turned into a naggy instructor.

Those who were positioned near the three guides would occasionally hear mumbles like so scary...he’s so scary or something like aah, I don’t want an additional set and lamentations such as he’s soo~ going to send me back to the chamber...

It made them unconsciously smile and held their laugh--not because they thought it was funny, but because it reminded them of the old days, when they just started their career. Rather than guides, they seemed more like rookie espers, and it brought some nostalgia to the squad members.

But that only applied to the three guides though. Their Captain, meanwhile, felt more like a veteran esper who had gone through life-and-death situations more times than one could count. The man knew the sign and timing of the beast’s attack better than the surveyor sometimes, and could casually deflect attacks with his daggers.

And it wasn’t just a matter about the beast that he instructed the guides. He also constantly coached them about their role as a guide.

"If you have the leeway, observed the esper’s fight. Take notice of who use their skills the most, who would have corroded the most."

"Be vigilant of your vessel’s capacity. You need to coordinate with your fellow guides and divide the cleansing properly--remember: dungeon raid is a team play."

Even about their physical condition.

"Drink your water steadily, don’t just follow the esper’s scheduled--they have a different metabolism than you."

"Regulate your fatigue level. Tell the captain or the surveyor before it hit bottom. You’re not doing anyone any good by passing out suddenly in the middle of a raid."

Rather than a trial run, it became a practical training lesson. Especially because the espers didn’t get excluded from it. Only, it was the Serpent Lord that made the critiques and assessments.

So the orange-level dungeon really turned into one huge joint combat training. The espers and the guides also learned to match each other pace, so the esper wouldn’t make the guides burn their stamina too fast, and the guides wouldn’t slow down the raid progress too much.

The one having a field day was, actually, the surveyor, whose task was to record everything that happened in the dungeon for the guild’s archive. Imagining what the R&D department and PR team would do with all of the footage made the surveyor work even harder to capture everything with his recording skills and beloved drones.

With how smoothly the raid going, it didn’t take long for the squad to reach their first resting place. The scout had found them a big pond with a waterfall on the other side. There was a quite huge clearing they could use for rest, meals, and guiding.

And it was the first real battlefield for the guides.

If Zein was already scolded them hard before, then he was even more merciless during this time. He didn’t let the esper activate a guiding tent, and instructed them to do the guiding there and then.

"Don’t get used to comfort inside a dungeon. Unless you’re in a declared safe zone, anything could happen, so you need to be able to guide while being vigilant and ready for anything," he ordered them to pick a place that could protect their back, like leaning on a boulder or a tree. "Discuss the order of the guiding with each other and the raid captain."

The three guides let out a long sigh, letting themself slump for about a minute, before straightening their back and patting their own cheeks hard. With an energetic gaze and clenched fists, they walked toward Florence to do what Zein told them to.

"Aren’t they good?" Bassena chuckled at the tall guide watching over his three chicks with crossed arms. Zein might look cold, but someone who spent a lot of time with him like Bassena could see the slight tenderness in the blue eyes.

"Well, they are the good ones," Zein replied with a slight frown. "I just hope the others could do this well too,"

Although they still got scolded here and there, Zein still commend them on the sheer fact that they weren’t whining and had a steady mind. The rest of their mistakes could be attributed to their lack of experience, which was also common in rookie espers, so he wouldn’t hold them against that.

Though that wouldn’t stop him from nagging.

"But with the first trial run going well, the rest of the guides wouldn’t be able to make excuses, right?"

So far, they could reason that Zein was just built different, which was actually correct. Or that he had trained for as long as he lived, and he couldn’t expect them to do the same within the short time. But with this first batch of three guides doing well enough, it proved that normal guides could also do it, and that the new division wasn’t a joke. It might even motivate the other guides to do better and trained harder, and more sincerely.

"If the result won’t convince them, the bonus and incentive those three receive probably will," Zein finally shrugged.

As long as he got the team for the reclamation project, it would be enough.

Bassena laughed at that. "Well, that’s always a sure way--where are you going?"

"I need to supervise their guiding," Zein answered while waving his hand to the esper.

Another aspect of his training was the guiding itself. He needed to teach them how to guide efficiently within a short time. The lesson these guides received in the Temple did not include any shortcut or know-how from field specialists like him, especially how it was to guide inside a dungeon that had miasma in the air.

And while Zein had no formal education from the temple, he had struggled with his own way for seventeen years. From when he knew nothing, to find out little by little by himself, Zein had almost two decades of precious experience to be imparted. And most importantly, unlike the educator in the Temple, Zein could see inside other’s mana systems, including the guides.

So Zein could easily give pointers to the guides in the middle of their cleansing, which resulted in a smoother, yet quicker process. It was the guides that were most surprised by their result, and their respect for their boss just grew bigger with that.

Zein stood by them until he thought they were getting used to his advice, before sauntering toward the pond--or was it a lake?

It reminded him of the first-ever lake he saw, the one created by the core fragment. This one wasn’t as serene or beautiful, but it was a clean body of water nonetheless. There were even fishes there, he realized it when he crouched beside the lake and scooped the water.

It was cold and refreshing, and made him want to laugh. How was it that a dungeon had a better environment than a red-zone? He let the water spill from his palm, making ripples on the surface that reflected his face. His face and someone else.

"Is it safe to drink?" he asked.

"If it’s safe for fish, then it should be," Bassena sat on the boulder beside the guide. "But there might be harmful parasites so it’ll need to be boiled first--or better yet; just drink the water we brought."

Zein raised his brow as he stood up, reminiscing about his old days. "We never do that..." he realized. "We probably had enough resistance with how dirty everything is."

Well, some of the things in the dungeon did look miles better than the ones in the red zone, even the poisonous-looking ones. He knew some people who got sick or even die because they ate poisonous fruits, since they never had that back home. Zein himself learned his lesson after watching an esper from Umbra throwing up for a week or so after eating a random berry.

"Don’t...do that anymore..." Bassena advised warily, looking keenly at the blue eyes while holding the guide’s hand.

"I never got sick from it," Zein shrugged, but looking at the esper’s genuine worry, he chuckled softly and patted the bronze cheek. "Fine, I won’t."

Only then that Bassena exhaled in relief. Zein looked toward the lake again, staring at the waterfall while the esper mischievously caught his retreating hand and put it on top of his head instead, requesting more pats.

The waterfall was quite big since the cliff was a tall one. He could see a scout perching on top of the cliff, watching the perimeter. While stroking the platinum strands, Zein caught a flow of energy behind the curtain of water. It wasn’t from a beast though, since the mana was pure.

"Hey, there’s something there," Zein patted the esper’s head once before directing it toward the waterfall.

Bassena opened his eyes and squinted. "Oh, you’re right," he snapped his fingers, and a sliver of dark string fleeted across the lake. "Hmm..." the esper smiled craftily for a second, before hiding it behind a nonchalant face. "My child doesn’t know what it is, do you want to check?"

Zein looked down, eyes narrowed in suspicion at the strangely eager tone. But he also wanted to go through a waterfall and enter a mysterious cave behind it. He never did it before, and it sounded fun.

"Hmm?" Bassena tilted his head, asking again when Zein did not respond.

"...sure?"

Without missing a beat--or rather, before Zein changed his mind--Bassena stood up and put his hand on the guide’s waist.

"Flo, we’re going to check the waterfall!" he informed the 4-star esper quickly, who could only blink in surprise before the two raid supervisors disappeared with a scattering of darkness.

"Uhh...okay?"