The Guide is Actually a Body-Switching Esper [BL]

For the next two weeks, Damien's team was busy with dungeon inspections. Working every day from early morning till evening - with one day a week off - they inspected well over fifty Gates. It was mainly because Damien's team was incomplete for a month, therefore the work had piled up. Once they were able to catch up on all the dungeons assigned to Damien, everything should slow down again.

Lane remained well-behaved during that time. All the Gates they entered were low-ranking ones - mainly F and E, with a few D and only one C-rank. Such dungeons were too insignificant to waste the Fertilizer on, so Lane no longer lagged behind the team to 'sightsee'. As he also had no more 'allergic reactions', Damien's vigilance on him had slowly dropped.

And, after a lot of driving and walking around, they were finally done with the Gates owned by the Association - at least for the time being. Now, only some of those belonging to the Guilds remained on their list of dungeons to inspect - but they were mainly high-ranking Gates, which required not only making arrangements with the respective Guilds, but also setting aside a few days to fully inspect.

With some time on their hands, Damien brought his team to the newly formed Restricted Zone to help.

As they passed the clearance at the border, walking into the Zone, Lane couldn't help but look around. For the first time since becoming 'Noah', he was genuinely curious and excited. It was almost two months now since he had been there, and he wanted to find out how the place had changed.

"It's so empty…" he remarked in a slightly hushed voice.

The previously bustling with life city district had turned into a ghost town. Although the residents were allowed to return to their homes, many chose not to, if they could afford to do so. It was no wonder - the place was utterly destroyed. Wherever you looked, you could see traces of the fights that took place not so long ago. Even the pavement was still soaked with dried blood - it hardly rained in the recent weeks, and the Association had more important things to worry about rather than cleaning it up.

All of it just reminded people about the trauma they suffered.

But the most important factor stopping people from returning was the instability of the area. Even if all the existing Gates were cleared, who knew when some new ones might appear? And, with Mana present in the environment, there was no guarantee that monsters won't swarm out of the Gates even without a dungeon break…

"So, what exactly are we to do here today?" Lane turned to Arlo, who was walking right next to him.

"Assisting with the clean-up, I guess," the man shrugged his shoulders.

"Clean-up?"

"Helping with removal of Mana residue and foreign substances," a deep voice came from the front.

Lane turned his eyes to Damien, surprised. He didn't expect the man to join the conversation. More importantly though…

"Removal of Mana residue?" he couldn't help but ask.

"Yes. All traces of Mana and any materials from the dungeons need to be removed in order for the safety of the place to be restored," Damien explained calmly. "Otherwise, the whole district might turn into a new Forbidden Zone."

Lane raised his brows. Of course, he understood that much. That was what he was most curious about in the first place - the progress of the area developing into a Forbidden Zone. He had previously seen some photos and videos uploaded by people online, but it was hard to tell which were authentic, and which were photoshopped or simply taken in a different Zone. Not to mention, the authorities were constantly trying to take them all down, so any reliable information was hard to get.

What he was confused about, however, was that their team was sent to take part in something like that. They were all mid to high-ranking Awakened, after all. And especially Damien - to send an S-rank Esper to do a clean-up… What was going on in the Association leaders' heads? Lane truly couldn't comprehend. It was such a waste of talent! An S-rank, with such a good combat ability at that, should rather be going on dungeon raids!

But, it was not his place to complain. With his current body, he couldn't really fight anyway, so he didn't really care. He quietly followed Damien as he led them to the place they were supposed to clean.

They stopped at the entrance to a multi-story parking garage close to the main shopping street, still a fair distance away from the A-rank Gate that first had a dungeon break.

"Today, we are going to work on removing Mana residue here," Damien said, as he opened his spacial bag, taking out the tools. "It has already started crystallizing into Mana stones, so please use those pickaxes to mine them. You can ignore all other materials for the time being, as it is essential to remove all sources of Mana first."

"We will split up into three teams. Tina, you take Arlo, Hallie, Omar, Ana and Cora, and work on the third floor. Dylan, you take Abel, Kiara, Tyler, Ruth and Eric, and go to the second."

"The rest stays on the ground floor with me."

"Huh, I guess we're separated," Arlo let out a sigh, taking one of the pickaxes. "See you later, then."

"Yeah," Lane lightly smiled at the man, helplessly shrugging his shoulders.

He has been flirting with Arlo recently, as he had nothing to do during the boring low-rank dungeon inspections. They were too busy to have any private guiding sessions, so nothing happened yet, but things were going well. Lane expected that he could get some action soon. 

Of course, he didn't have any special feelings for the man. It was just a fling - nothing serious, just some fun on the side to kill some time. Same as usual…

"There you go," Damien interrupted Lane's thoughts, placing a pickaxe in his hands. "Follow me now."

He gave Lane a long, slightly reproachful look, but in the end, he didn't say anything more. Lane wasn't concerned in any way because of that - he already knew that Damien considered his behavior inappropriate. The man firmly believed that flirting had no place in dungeons and Forbidden Zones, or something along those lines. As long as it didn't intervene with their work or put them in danger though, he would let his subordinates do whatever they liked.

Damien Lennox was just kind of weird like that. Unbearably strict, but also oddly tolerant at the same time. Back when Lane was 'Evan Greene', it was the same - Damien disapproved of his behavior, and yet somehow still didn't mind.

Not thinking much about it, Lane just smiled. "Yes, Team Leader!" he called out, as he followed the man into a deeper part of the garage.

He was eager to find out the extent of the development of the Mana stones.