CHAPTER 376: NEW SCHEDULE

Ethan stopped staring at Lane. At least for now, at least so openly.

But Lane had earned himself another watcher to replace the Guide. Clara. The woman had always been keeping an eye on him, of course, ever since they had been assigned to the same team, since Lane was her brother’s boyfriend that she didn’t approve of... But now, the situation had gotten even more complex. Somehow, Lane managed to earn Clara’s respect (at least a bit, when it came to work stuff), but also heighten her suspicions, although not as ’a useless fuckboy who is not good enough for my brother and might end up cheating on him’, but rather as someone who had a lot to hide (even if not necessarily from Damien). As a result, she was now watching him like a hawk, trying to figure him out.

It was fine, though. Clara was the lesser of two evils. If she were to find out anything she shouldn’t, Damien would be able to convince her to keep her mouth shut. And there was also an unexpected benefit of it - because she was watching Lane more closely than before, Ethan had to take a step back and be less of a nuisance. He didn’t want to cross Damien’s sister, since unlike Lane, he needed all the support he could find, and if he were to be caught staring at Lane too often, it could be interpreted in the wrong way...

And besides, there was nothing they could find out anyway, no matter how hard either of them tried to spy on Lane. Because over the next few days, Lane was extremely well-behaved... At least for his standards. He didn’t do much, he just followed the team around as they went on the inspections. It was boring as hell, so sometimes he chatted with other teammates, played with some fidget toys, or even downloaded offline games to play on his phone as they were walking around... It was hardly how a Field Agent should behave at work, while inspecting dungeons, but he didn’t wander around, or do anything TOO inappropriate.

He was just... slacking off. And it was not something worthy of reporting to the Allens for Ethan (not because it wasn’t wrong, but because that was to be expected of Lane), and nothing surprising for Clara, which would help her figure things out. Lane was just being Lane.

Of course, that’s not to say that Lane didn’t care at all about what was going on around him. They were inspecting inactive Gates in the Restricted Zone around the Lapis Lake. Since there was a mysterious reactivation of one of the Gates in this area in the recent days, naturally, Lane (and everyone else, but for vastly different reasons) was curious to see whether that was an isolated incident, or there was something more going on.

But there wasn’t. Perhaps it was because the remaining Gates located in the Restricted Zone were lower-ranking, or maybe that grassland dungeon had been targeted by someone (possibly Blanc) for any other reason, Lane didn’t know. But it didn’t make him feel any better.

Quite the opposite, actually. If the other, low-ranking Gates, were to also reactivate, then he could suspect that perhaps it was some unknown phenomenon that the scientists had no idea about yet. At least Blanc wouldn’t waste the Fertilizer on any random F-ranking Gates.

But no. It was only that one C-rank Gate, which left Lane just as puzzled as he had been.

The plus of this situation, though, was that they were able to finish their inspections ahead of their updated schedule. It took a lot of long hours, and very few days off in between, but eventually, they were done. They inspected all the Gates located within the Restricted Zone around the Lapis Lake, then those in the newest Restricted Zone created around the Gate with the parasite monsters (currently being cleared), and with this... There was nothing more left for their A-rank team to do.

At least for now.

"Thank you for your hard work," Damien said, as they gathered in a conference room for their ’final’ meeting. "From now on, you can all return to your original teams. Our work schedule starting tomorrow will be as follows..."

He clicked on the laptop, displaying the next slide. It showed a calendar, marked with two different colors. One represented the time everyone would work with their original teams. It covered the majority of the days. The other was the time they were going to work with this make-shift A-rank team. It consisted of one week per month, plus one day each week for team training.

And finally, there were days off. One per week.

...Of course, that wasn’t a definite schedule. With the Association, nothing was ever definite, especially days off. Especially in the recent months, when there was so much going on. It was more like a suggestion. ’You might get a day off then, unless something comes up.’ It might not have been said openly, but Lane knew the Association too well not to understand that.

The days off weren’t the biggest problem with this schedule, though. With the A-rankers constantly switching between the two teams, it was just... too messy. Even Lane, who didn’t know much about making schedules and such, could tell that much. There were people from several teams on their A-rank team, and each of those teams had a lot of mid to high-ranking dungeons to inspect every week. Even if there were no incidents, such as a Gate reactivation, delays could happen from things like unfavorable weather conditions inside a dungeon...

How could they possibly hope to coordinate several teams so well? This schedule they had created was bound to fall apart within the first month, Lane was willing to bet on it!

He scoffed, rolling his eyes, as he leaned back in his seat. He was tempted to raise his concerns, mocking the Association...

But he didn’t. It was Damien who was the leader of this team. He might not have been the one to devise this plan - he was just following the orders coming from the top, and this schedule wasn’t created by him - but he was the one presenting it, and Lane didn’t want to cause Damien trouble.

Besides, Damien had already explained it to him beforehand. The reason behind this ridiculous schedule was that the Association couldn’t afford to keep all those high-rankers in one team - they were all needed in their respective teams for safety reasons - but they were also hoping to develop an elite force within the organization. If they just let everyone go back to their respective teams until a few months later, when they were needed to join forces for the inspections in the Restricted Zones again, all the team synergy they might have developed in the short time they had spent together would have fallen apart...

In other words, they wanted to have a cookie and eat it.

It was clear that they were quickly losing control of the situation. With their lack of personnel, especially when it came to high-ranking Awakened, it was only a matter of time before the Association fell apart. And when it happened...

Lane’s secret organization would step in to take their place.

Perhaps it was for the best. Since Damien wanted to be a public servant and work for the government, if Lane’s side became a government, then wouldn’t everything work out? And if Lane put a ring on it on top of that, then it might be possible to drag the man to his side...

The corners of Lane’s mouth twitched, rising higher and higher in a satisfied smirk. A moment later, though, he quickly schooled his expression, as he felt two pairs of eyes staring straight at him.

Ethan and Clara. As always. He ignored both of them, though, and turned his eyes back to the front, pretending to listen to Damien’s presentation, as the man explained all the details about their joint trainings and whatever else was there that needed to be said. There was no need for Lane to remember any of it, since he had Damien on his side, and he had more important things to think about...

That is, what he was going to do over the next two days. Because, unexpectedly, they were all given two days off before the new schedule was going to be implemented...

And Damien had promised to reserve one of them entirely for Lane, without ruining it with any work or his sisters’ company.

It was already early September. Not only was it almost Damien’s birthday, but it’s been around nine months since Lane had planned to take Damien out on a shopping spree. NINE MONTHS, and he still hadn’t had an opportunity to do that. And there was still the fancy car he had bought for Damien that was waiting in the garage... He wanted to present them to Damien BEFORE his birthday.

After all, if he did it later, they would lose their impact, when compared to the birthday present that he had planned...