8 Chapter 7. The Red of Amber Eyes

The Borderland; an even more treacherous area than the red-zone.

Zen might not know much about history, but he at least knew that the zones in this continent were determined based on how safe they were. And that safety was determined by the presence of towers and temples that came down after the Age of the Apocalypse. Like a beacon, the towers and temples got rid of the miasma and prevented dungeons from forming.

But the further the area was from these beacons, the weaker the purification effect. The accumulated miasma would be more persistent, and dungeons would form more frequently. Usually, the influence range of these towers and temples would be enough to cover each other. But sometimes, there was just an area where the influence was so thin that it was barely adequate for humans to live in. And that was the red-zone.

But these pitiful red-zones, which were equivalent to slums, really, were still preferable to the place called Borderland.

No, it wasn't a border between areas or states.

It was the border between where humans could live and couldn't. It was the land in front of the area choked full of miasma and where the beasts ran rampant; the Deathzone, the leftover territory of the beast since the Age of Apocalypse where the power of towers and temples could not reach.

The Borderland, in another word, was the frontier safeguarding the human's territory from the beasts.

And that was where Zen headed off to.

In the continent where he lived, there were three Borderlands; the north, west, and east. Since Zen lived in the Eastern Federation, his destination was set to the eastern Borderland.

As a frontier, the Borderland was somewhat similar to the red-zone; it was a place where suicidal mercenaries, unwanted ran away, and criminals on parole gathered. Half of them were there against their will, and the other half were there because they had no choice.

Zen headed there because his fake license wouldn't get scrutinized there.

And because he wanted to be drowned in situations where he needed to constantly work.

Or perhaps because he didn't think he had any right to seek a comfortable life.

His brother told him to live his life, but Zen had no idea anymore, about what kind of life he wanted to live. The freedom he seek...he realized he had lost of its meaning.

As long as the bitterness, this lump in his gut, was still lingering inside his soul, then could he still seek for that freedom?

Zen realized it was foolish. He wanted to fly?

He didn't even have any wings.

Back there, inside the darkness of his brother's room, Zen had wanted to give up.

He was tired. He didn't think there was any meaning to anything he'd do anymore. He had no more objection. No more desire. Everything just felt empty.

[You have to live your life]

How? What life?

Zen wanted to let go of everything. But his brother's last words just refused to let him go.

So he thought, perhaps if he headed to the most dangerous place, he'd find an answer. Perhaps if he stood in front of the face of death, he'd understand it, whether he want to live, or to give up. And even if he ended up losing his life, he wouldn't do it with his hand.

'That should be alright, right?'

If the twins knew what his brother thought was, they would probably beat the man senseless, so they could put some sense into Zen's head.

But they weren't there anymore.

So Zen made his journey to the Borderland, hiking the mountainside to cross over into the land where the miasma was blasting even harsher than the red-zone's storm.

He spent the last of his money to purchase clothes, camping supplies, and food, and to sleep a little more comfortably in the inn of the last town in the orange-zone before the Borderland. Behind the mountain would be an uninhabited red-zone, and then he'd reached the Borderland.

There were no sane people headed there willingly, so Zen had to make the journey on foot. The only vehicle going there was the supply cargo trucks that went once every three months, or the government-issued vehicle carrying workers.

Zen didn't mind. He'd rather spend his journey alone. Living in the red-zone made him distrustful in nature, and being around people just hiked up his anxiety, making him stay on alert all the time.

At least, he didn't mind it until he stumbled upon a cave, and heard a groaning sound.

Or was it a growl?

No, he didn't hear a sound and pursued it. He stumbled upon a cave first and decided to make his camp there. And then, he heard a sound, from somewhere deeper in the cave.

From his dungeon experience, Zen knew he shouldn't pursue suspicious sounds in the wild. Unless he was an esper, anyway, and had the power to face any kind of danger.

But there was also no way Zen could leave a suspicious sound unattended when he had decided to stay in that cave. What if the source of that sound, whatever it was, decided to attack him when he was asleep?

So Zen marched deeper into the cave, with some kind of bravado and leftover energy from his last few guiding.

And stumbled upon a pair of amber eyes.

Zen stood rooted, before throwing down his bag and taking out his knives. The eyes were attached to a crouching figure on all fours, gleaming in the dim light of the cave. It was eerie and mesmerizing at the same time.

It took a while for Zen to realize that the eyes were attached to a face. It took a while to recognize it because the face was covered in blood and dirt, and the figure was clad in swirling black miasma, like a beast.

It was then that Zen saw a shimmering red and black current on the wall of the cave behind the figure—a dungeon gate in the middle of closing.

"Oh, fuck," was what Zen said as he realized that the figure was that of an esper.

An esper on the verge of eruption.

And from the look of the blasting miasma around the esper, this person was of a high rank. At least an upper 4-star.

'There was no way this person's a 5-star, right?' Zen bit his lips.

What was this person doing alone in a high-class dungeon anyway?

Just like zones, dungeons were classified by colors. The colors of the gate indicated the level of miasma inside the dungeon. It was actually the origin of how zones were named in the first place.

The red and black gate was classified as the high-class zone. And no high-class zone meant to be attempted solo, even by the highest 5-star esper.

'Unless he actually came to the dungeon with other people and ditched,' Zen pressed his lips, tightened his clothes and pulled up his hood, making sure his skin was covered and protected. He breached the swirling miasma and grasped the bloody and dirty face beneath those amber eyes.

Immediately, a feeling like he was being sucked into the abyss enveloped him. Zen gasped, and coughed even with the filtering mask covering him. There was nothing he could do—it was just one of that low-quality stuff. The miasma came inside his vessel like a storm, like a flood of dirty water.

But it wasn't enough.

The swirling miasma surrounding the esper was gone, so Zen could at least recognize it was a man, a young man at that, probably a little younger than Zen. The man groaned and growled at the feeling of corrosion being absorbed.

But even with Zen's extraordinary speed, the corrosion was persistent. It was way graver than that annoying young esper's case. This man was really just a minute away from eruption. The corrosion inside his system was like a mud field, undulating black smoke that stained his skin black—although it was also covered in blood. The sclera was almost completely red, as if trying to match the amber glows from his irises.

Zen realized in dread that if he didn't come into this cave, or if he decided to ignore the sound, then the man would erupt, blasting him within the explosion.

But that wasn't what he really worried about.

He knew now that the man was definitely a 5-star esper. Should the man erupt, then the blast might even decimate the mountain range altogether, along with the towns behind it. A 5-star eruption, after all, could be classified as a calamity worse than a dungeon break.

Zen didn't think his life was all that worthy, but the towns, the residential areas, the people living within them...

Not to mention the kind of monster the husk of a 5-star esper would become.

That was why Zen attempted the guiding in the first place.

That being said, for the first time, Zen felt that he was slow. The rate at which he absorb the miasma was slower than the rate at which it corroded the esper's system. At this rate, he wouldn't be able to curb the eruption at all. In that case...

There was only one thing he could attempt.

Zen stared at the amber eyes that slowly flickered in recognition. The pale-colored eyelashes fluttered as the esper blinked at him. Zen grasped the bloody cheek, and absorbed the miasma as much as he could so the esper was cognitive enough.

Zen closed his eyes, and pondered hard.

Guiding was done with skin-to-skin touch. Generally, it was enough as long as the guide could access the esper's skin. The most common way of guiding was by hand holding.

But the more area the guide touched, the better the guiding would be. In theory, the closer it was located to the core of esper's magic power, the better. The wrist, the neck, and above the heart was the preferred point of guiding.

The point of guiding, however, wasn't 'touch' but 'connection'. In that case, there was one method that was way more effective than the others; the closest to the core, the very embodiment of the word 'connection', which was through copulation.

Zen exhaled, and stared at the amber eyes once more. They were shaking. The man was also hurt, the black blood of the beasts mixing with the man's own red.

Zen had never done a sexual guiding before. It wasn't a rare occurrence in the red-zone. He heard that it was a widespread practice even in the safer zone, especially by the low-class guide that seek better performance. There were even brothels in some places that were specifically filled with guides who had those preferences. Even the government-issued center had rooms catered for this method. After all, guiding also had a pleasurable effect on both the esper and the guide.

That was all fine if the guides prefer it. But most of them didn't. Low-class guides did it so they wouldn't get fired. And some did it because they were forced. Because espers were the alphas and nobles of humanity, most of them thought they had the right to demand service from other people as a tribute.

'I'm the one keeping you safe,' they would say. 'Do as I say' they said.

That was what most espers like in the red-zone. The moment Zen saw one of the guides being violated, he ran into Alma and Zach and beg them to teach him how to fight. It was during those times that he realized he had his unique trait of energy conversion. He fight his way until those espers thought forcing him was a waste of time. He hid his face, and his body, bringing knives, staying vigilant.

He vowed to never do sexual guiding, because once he gave in, they would think he would do it every time.

But desperate times needed desperate measures.

There was no way this situation could be saved with normal means. Unless there were several guides working together to absorb the corrosion, doing it normally would not be enough.

Right now, Zen was like making a tiny hole in a dam to extract the water inside. What he should do, however, was to break the dam and let the water flood out.

And there was no way of doing it normally.

Zen gritted his teeth and dragged the esper away from the closing gate, leaning the man into the cave wall. He proceed to slap the esper's cheek until the man groaned and his almost closed eyes flickered open, staring at Zen dazedly.

"Hey, can you hear me?" Zen asked, shaking the esper into consciousness.

"...who...?" a weak-sounding baritone, husky and hoarse from exertion, flowed from the slightly parted lips.

"You...do you mind a sexual guiding?"

It was time to break his vow.