There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 121 - 117. Celestial Voice

Chapter 121: Chapter 117. Celestial Voice

Just like the rest of the environment, the path Zein walked on was also dark. But along the path, there were glints of greenish light that made it seem like a metallic surface.

While Zein felt like he was climbing up, the path also felt winding down, curving left and right, and overall making him confused. He got that the platforms were sending the espers to pocket dimensions for their customized trials. But what about this path? Where was he headed to, exactly?

Zein thought he was going to the peak, where the fragment was. But this path...it didn’t feel like a stairway to the top.

In fact, he felt like he was walking in a circle--well, not exactly a circle, but like a figure 8, with an upward and downward road. If he had to liken it to something...

Yes--it felt like walking on top of a coiling giant snake.

Zein looked down then, at the pattern of lights beneath his feet. Hmm...yes, even those looked like scales.

After walking on an empty road for a long time, Zein didn’t look for a door anymore. He just walked forward while staring at the pattern on the path, until suddenly he felt the air change, and the next thing he knew, he was already in a room.

Blinking at the sudden brightness, Zein lifted his head to look at his surrounding. It was a circular room with a high ceiling, supported by pillars upon pillars, sleek black in color. The tall glass window showed him not of the safe zone’s scenery, but of the night sky and glittering stars--although Zein was pretty sure it was still daylight when he came inside.

But the black room wasn’t dark like the pathway. Across from where Zein stood, hovering above a rising pedestal, was a pulsing sphere with an undulating bright glow. The sphere let out a pillar of light shooting out through the ceiling, to a contraption at the highest peak of the tower.

Zein stared at the sphere, feeling his heart pulsing in tandem with the wave it created, as if they were resonating. Alone in the room, Zein couldn’t help but walk forward to the inviting sphere.

While walking, Zein was thinking that he might not suppose to do this, that it might be considered rude to just approach the core of the tower without permission. But the pulsing wave was calling him, and before he could decide to step back, his hand already reaching out and touching the bright light.

And just like that, once again, he was getting sucked inside an infinite world.

It was the same darkness he felt along the path. It was quiet and isolated, a little bit cold too--for that, it was different from the feeling he got from Bassena’s core. Since there was no path, he just stood there wordlessly.

He waited, but after what felt like a few minutes already, there was nothing but the emptiness that he grew annoyed. So he plopped down on the ground--if it could be called that--and just say crossed legs, crossing his arms too while at it, and continued waiting.

Just then, a laughing sound resounded within the darkness. There was no figure to be seen, but Zein felt like he was being observed from somewhere.

"You’re not Setnath," he said, flinching for a bit from hearing his own voice. He could never speak out loud in this setting before. Maybe because unlike before, he could feel his own body and move as he like.

--I’m not

The voice was crisp and clear, although sounding rather heavy too. There was a certain rattling--no, slithering sound of rubbing scales as it surrounded Zein.

--The fragment is used to manifest part of my consciousness, so the original ego is no more

"So there’s no vestige left in there?" Zein raised his brow. The two shard fragments always gave him part of Setnath’s memories, even addressing him.

But he also remembered the space where Setnath’s ego still remained was a white world, not this darkness.

--Some memories remain, I made it so

The voice told him. There was a slight pause before it continued.

--Setnath was a friend of mine

Zein narrowed his eyes, and asked in a rather sharp tone. "Is that why you invite me here?"

--That

The voice chuckled, before adding.

--And because you’re someone special for my favorite child

"Hmm,"

His favorite child must have referred to Bassena. Zein fiddled with his hand while mulling about it. There was an uncomfortable feeling in his gut about being called for his connection to Setnath and Bassena.

Not because it was him.

The mongering fear in the back of his head, about losing his sense of self along the way as a vessel, gnawed at him.

--And you, the voice said, in a deeper but softer tone.

--You’re also a special one

"...because I’m a fragment of Setnath," Zein frowned, acting unusually sulky. Perhaps because the one he talked to was a being with no constraint of time, a being that much older than him, perhaps much older than this world.

Because there was no one else here, he could act as childish as he liked.

--Do you not like it?

"No," Zein replied flatly with pursed lips.

Immediately, a laughing sound louder than before reverberated inside the space, until Zein felt like the space was vibrating. He waited in silence for the laughter to recede, thinking that unlike the administrators below, the patron deity was pretty expressive and...could he say easygoing?

Zein had been talking casually, but the voice did not berate him for being impudent. Even now, he had to listen to the deity’s cackling voice in the background.

When the laughing voice was finally gone, Zein asked then. "So you just want to see me? Or do you have any other business?"

--No, after a brief pause, the reply came back to Zein in a question.

--Isn’t it you who want to come here?

Zein froze at that response. Well...he did want to come here--not just to the tower, but to the room where the fragment was. He had resigned to the hard fact that he wouldn’t be able to, since he wasn’t an esper. But then...

--I called you here because you want to see the fragment

Oh...Zein pressed his lips. So it really was for his sake? Could the Celestial Being probe one’s mind?

--It’s resonating with you, is it not?

Zein clenched his fist. Yes, it was, so much that he walked straight toward it like a man in a trance. That even while his mind rang a warning alarm, his body couldn’t manage to comply.

It made him scared, like he was trapped inside his own body, reminded of his recurring nightmare. What if it was his future; being trapped inside his mind while his body was used by someone else? By another entity.

Just a mere vessel.

--Child, you are filled with heavy thoughts

Zein closed his eyes, mind replaying his conversation with Bassena last night. When the esper asked about what his core felt like to Zein, it got him thinking about what his own core was like.

Was it empty, just like the blank world that greeted him every time he came inside the shard’s consciousness?

"Can I...ask you something?"

Zein opened his mouth, but found it hard to make a sound. He wasn’t like Bassena, who could sound his insecurities even while being scared, who did not hesitate to face his problem.

Zein was too used to shoving uncomfortable things under the rug. People thought he was being nonchalant and gave no fuck, but it was just him decided not to think too much about those problems.

In other words, he was just running away.

When he was still fiddling with his fingers, unable to let his mind out, the voice graced him softly.

--I know what it is you’re afraid of

Zein lifted his head, even though he knew no one was there. It was just the deity’s consciousness that was left with the power he bestowed onto the tower. But still, he felt the invisible eyes staring at him deeply, keenly, and Zein bit his lips hard in a surge of unexplainable emotions.

--Let me ask you something

Zein opened his eyes wide, waiting for the question.

--Do you want to be his vessel?

"No," the answer, just like before, came immediately from his mouth; harsh, sharp, and filled with fear.

--Then don’t, the voice replied easily, to Zein’s astonishment.

--If you can make that decision yourself, that means you have your own ego

Zein felt like his throat ran dry, and he gripped his trembling fingers as the voice continued.

--The fact that you are referring to Setnath as someone else...isn’t that already telling you that you are your own person?

This time, Zein drew a deep breath. It was...such a simple thought. A simple answer, but his mind couldn’t seem to reach that conclusion, too busy fighting with his own self-doubt and pessimism.

--If that brat comes and demands your body, just kick him out and give him the finger!

The voice laughed again and Zein, who was in the middle of self-introspection, was immediately loss for words. Why was this God like this? Weren’t they friends?

Or perhaps it was because they were friends?

--Child, thinking deeply is good, I like that kind of human, the voice came back to sound gentle and benevolent, as if the cackling form before was a lie.

--But thinking too much could lead one astray

Zein looked down, gripping his fingers and exhaling hard. Yeah, he had no idea if he could really fight with a Celestial Being over his body, but...well, fighting wasn’t unfamiliar for him. Fighting for his life was all he knew about while living in the endzones anyway.

"Can I ask you one more thing?" Zein stood up then, as he felt like their conversation time was about to end.

--Is it about my favorite child?

"Can you read my mind?"

The voice did not confirm nor deny it, and instead gave Zein permission to proceed.

--Ask, Child

Staring in the direction where he felt the invisible eyes come from, Zein asked. "Why...do you give that mission to him?"

--Mission?

The voice hummed, seemingly trying to recall something.

--Ah...yes, I told him to eradicate the darkness in the east, it finally said.

--Why? There’s no reason why. He’s my warrior, is he not?

Zein tilted his head, waiting for further elaboration--if there was any. Fortunately, the deity was still in a giving mood.

--The darkness in the east happened because a fragment is damaged on its journey, so no one could manifest its power

It began to explain, and Zein listened keenly, rooted in his spot.

--Left for too long, the darkness could become stronger, swallowing the fragment, and built their own tower

The blue eyes widened inside the darkness at the sudden startling information. What? Swallowing the fragment? Building...the beasts could build a tower? Did that mean they could become even stronger?

--Should such a thing happen, there would be another war

Zein clenched his fist tightly. A war...a war between the corrupted beast and the human. And the first one who would bear the brunt of such war was those of the endzones; the borderline units and the red-zones.

--I shall not let it be done

The voice sounded low and solemn, without any trace of the earlier light-hearted laughter.

--He is the one who finished my hardest trial. I simply gave the task to someone capable enough to do it

Bassena wasn’t chosen for the mission. He broke through the trial’s ceiling and fell into the responsibility in exchange for power and blessing.

Zein nodded then, finally understood how things were rolling. Bassena’s mission, which met with Radia Mallarc’s resources, and the government’s decision to start the reclamation project that was probably pushed by the Celestial Beings.

And even his ability to find the shard fragment.

No, it wasn’t a coincidence.

It was the entangling work of the universe to prevent the planet from worsening.

Zein closed his eyes, and when he opened them, he was already standing in front of the fragment. But since his palm was still at the surface of the sphere, he could still hear the voice in his ears.

--That child will come to this room after his trial is over. How is it, do you want to stay and wait for him?

"No, there’s no need," Zein shook his head, "I have other things to do,"

He let go of the fragment and stepped back.

"Also..." he continued, although he could no longer hear the voice. But he was sure the deity was listening to him, so he spoke with a confident smile on his lips. "I have faith in him."

The air vibrated then, and the wall behind him shimmered and rippled, creating a human size transparent swirling portal. For the last time, Zein smiled before wearing his mask again and turned around.

As he stepped into the portal, he suddenly thought of something that brought him a strange joy.

"Ah...he called me human,"