Wei Zhuo’s breathing stopped for a moment.
The little cat had dropped its tail, and he felt like a fish in a pond that was dizzy from trying to catch its teasing rhythm.
The sound of his chest rising and falling vibrated in his eardrums loudly and clearly.
The sound was so loud, but fortunately, a guide’s hearing wasn’t as sharp as a sentinel’s.
He unconsciously pressed his Adam’s apple, suppressing the abnormality that seemed ready to rise to his throat.
Military boots stepped steadily onto the carpet, and the seat beside Xin Hexue sank with his weight.
Wei Zhuo sat beside him, his expression calm, as if merely conducting a routine inquiry with a colleague.
“Have you gone to see Ji Yushan?”
“No.”
Xin Hexue lowered his head. With his hair swept aside, the fair curve of his neck on the right was fully exposed, still carrying the damp sheen left by wet hair.
Wei Zhuo averted his gaze. “Why not?”
Xin Hexue pursed his lips. “I don’t want to.”
Ji Yushan was the head of a lab in the Central Military District’s Sentinel and Guide Research Institute, focusing on the mental bonding and neuroscience between sentinels and guides, a cutting-edge intersection of psychosomatic science and modern human neuroscience.
In other words, because this field still lacked a systematic theory and mature clinical experience, sentinels and guides who had already matched but later encountered spiritual or psychological issues couldn’t seek help from ordinary hospitals. They usually became regulars at Ji Yushan’s lab as patients.
Xin Hexue had suffered from skin hunger even before successfully bonding with He Botian.
Wei Zhuo knew this. After all, they had been roommates at the military academy for two years and comrades on the front lines for another two.
After successfully matching with He Botian, Xin Hexue’s condition had come under control, perhaps because they regularly engaged in both physical and mental bonding.
Wei Zhuo’s gaze darkened further.
But after He Botian’s death, the illness returned with a vengeance, possibly worse than before.
This was normal and common. The vast majority of matched sentinel-guides could never recover from losing their partners, often developing various mental or physical issues.
An old guide professor from the Sentinel-Guide Joint Military Academy was one such example. After her bonded sentinel died in battle, her mental power plummeted from A-rank to C-rank. She couldn’t even transition to a public guide afterward because she could no longer conduct successful mental guidance. In the end, the Empire arranged for her to teach at the academy. She had been Xin Hexue’s teacher for the course “Sentinel-Guide Relationship Management.”
Perhaps the worsening skin hunger was just the beginning.
Wei Zhuo frowned deeply and his tone became stern, “You need to see a doctor if you don’t want your mental power to decline or develop other illnesses.”
He looked righteous and stern. If Xin Hexue hadn’t caught sight of the imposing shadow beneath the sentinel’s uniform from the corner of his eye, he might have believed Wei Zhuo truly had no thoughts about him.
Someone like this, was he even a sentinel?
Was he planning to endure until the next cosmic explosion?
Xin Hexue frowned.
In his impression, Sentinels who entered intimate relationships were all like He Botian, who was as if he was suffering from skin hunger toward him and wished he could hug him twenty-four hours a day within visual range, if there were no outsiders.
When there were outsiders, He Botian would settle for second best and choose to hold hands.
Wei Zhuo’s current love value was 87. Xin Hexue actually was not in a hurry, but the other party’s heartbreak value showed no improvement.
Xin Hexue just wanted to probe for a breakthrough point.
Since the other party was not cooperating, he could also go find K to resolve it.
Xin Hexue restrained his expression lightly, then grabbed the pajamas that had fallen by his leg.
Wei Zhuo saw the young man bite his lip, and in the state of being shirtless, he faintly showed a bit of embarrassed expression.
He picked up the pajamas again, his eyes still damp with the moisture caused by his condition, and whispered, “Sorry, for causing you trouble. It’s just that after He Botian left… I didn’t know who to ask for help.”
Xin Hexue’s eyelashes trembled, “Besides him, you’re the only person I’m familiar with and deeply trust.”
Wei Zhuo’s whole body froze, like a strong pine on top of a mountain peak, not moving at all.
Xin Hexue’s pink lips were pursed so tightly that the center turned white, and he said again, “Sorry.”
Wei Zhuo: “…Okay.”
Xin Hexue lifted his gaze. The Sentinel was desperately suppressing and controlling his emotions, and there was a deep silence in those unfathomable ink-black eyes.
Wei Zhuo enunciated each word forcefully, “I can help.”
The thin pajamas fell lightly onto the carpet.
The moment the warm and dry big hand touched his back, the long-suppressed and never-relieved skin hunger broke out completely.
The experience of losing control of his nerves after the senses were sharpened dozens of times made Xin Hexue curl up on the beige cotton-linen sofa.
He bit his lips so hard that they left teeth marks, yet even so, a faint sound like a cat’s purr still slipped out from between his lips and teeth.
Wei Zhuo looked calm, as if he was facing an important scientific research topic, rather than helping a widowed Guide relieve skin hunger.
He took a square pillow from the end of the sofa and helped Xin Hexue place it in front of him.
Without fabric in between, his fingertips directly touched the white skin of the back.
Wei Zhuo: “Does it feel a bit better touching here?”
Xin Hexue’s knuckles instantly clutched the white zipper on the side of the square pillow.
Without hearing a reply, Wei Zhuo’s fingers moved upward, pressing on the skin where the shoulder blades protruded.
Xin Hexue’s torso had low body fat, so it was naturally covered with a thin layer of muscle, forming slight undulating lines. Compared to Sentinels, it was much weaker, but compared to normal male humans, it was still in the range of mature development, and even his body development was very beautiful.
Under the ceiling light, his shoulder blades were thin and prominent, and his waist was slender.
The young man lay prostrate on the sofa, his skin glistening like snow, only the elbow joints were slightly tinged with pink.
Water droplets formed from the wet hair accumulated along the spine, like bright pearls and jade dew.
As Wei Zhuo’s palm pressed and slid along the elegant spine line, Xin Hexue’s shoulders trembled, his entire body flushed with pink.
It was as if a faint red glow was reflected on the surface of a snow mountain, melting softly under the sunlight.
Xin Hexue’s nails clutched the white zipper on the side of the pillow, making a scraping sound, along with a completely disordered breath, “Slower… slower…!”
The blue whale in Wei Zhuo’s mental landscape let out an excited low-frequency call, surfacing from the icy blue ocean, its breathing spray forming a rainbow.
Wei Zhuo’s pupils contracted, and he unconsciously released invisible mental tentacles, tentatively touching Xin Hexue’s skin.
The great stimulation made the back muscles tense.
The back muscles from the middle of the shoulder blades to the bottom suddenly spread open into long, white wings.
When the wings unfolded, the feathers flapped against Wei Zhuo’s face.
It did not hurt, it was soft, like a stack of plump soft clouds, their spirits intertwined.
The sentinel’s rational nerve suddenly broke, and his mind was lost.
The blue whale dived into the deep sea, charging and smashing into a moving small iceberg.
Countless bubbles in the sea swayed and burst.
……
Wei Zhuo fell into the memory of the first time he saw Xin Hexue.
It was at a banquet.
At that time, Wei Zhuo had already gone against his parents’ wishes and had been studying at the Sentinel-Guide Joint Military Academy for two years. After another two years, he could graduate and then apply to formally join Legion A.
The Wei family he came from was a great noble family entrenched in the imperial capital for hundreds of years, close ministers guarding the Emperor. The descendants of the family originally did not need to participate in frontline battles.
He could have lived peacefully in the imperial city like those decaying old nobles. At least, according to the current expansion speed of the Folded Zone, the imperial city would not become a monster’s nest within the next few decades.
But Wei Zhuo was unwilling.
He did not want to be like those noble Sentinels indulging in debauchery.
Their bodies were strengthened by drugs, strong on the outside but empty inside. Their mental landscapes were desolate, so small that you could see the end at a glance.
He had seen the poverty of frontier towns, and had seen people who lost their closest family and friends to monsters, so he could no longer sit high above in the inner city of the imperial capital, trapped inside the walled Garden of Eden.
At that time, Wei Zhuo had not returned home for a long time. After enrollment, he had lived in the dormitory or in the garrison camp at the border for two years.
Because he had applied to join the reserve legion, compared to ordinary Sentinel students, his frontline combat experience started from the second year of military school, not in the fourth year before graduation.
At only twenty years old, Wei Zhuo still lacked sufficient combat experience. Therefore, even though his combat power level was the rare 3S, he still accidentally suffered a very serious injury in the last operation.
A monster’s sharp teeth deeply pierced the blue whale’s tail, tearing the flesh.
The blue whale’s tail fin was almost necrotic and had not yet fully recovered. The military academy and reserve legion both granted him two months of leave to recuperate.
Unable to bear his parents’ constant urging, Wei Zhuo still returned to his home in the inner city of the imperial capital for his father’s birthday banquet.
The banquet was luxurious, nobles came and went, glasses clinked, and the shiny marble floor reflected the glamorous hems of everyone’s formal attire like a water surface.
Wei Zhuo, dressed in the Joint Military Academy uniform, appeared at the banquet looking completely out of place. His parents held his shoulders, enthusiastically introducing their outstanding second son to the guests.
This Sentinel was undoubtedly the beloved son of heaven.
However, the parents of this son of heaven privately persuaded him, “Ah Zhuo, the frontlines are too dangerous. We heard from the military that you were injured again recently. Come back, don’t work so hard.”
“If you want to show your talents, we can arrange for you to join His Majesty’s Imperial Guard as a captain and serve the Emperor. How about that?”
Wei Zhuo did not think much of it.
“I serve the Empire, I fight for the future of humanity.”
A familiar blankness appeared on his parents’ faces. They really could not understand this child’s thoughts.
Life is only about a hundred years and there was just one life. Isn’t it good to live a peaceful and safe life in the Imperial city without facing the dangers of the Folded Zone like the civilians on the frontier, struggling on the line of life and death? “Alright, for the future of humanity…” the father repeated awkwardly, then thought of something and immediately said, “We secured a marriage for you from His Majesty. Is your mental pollution severe? The other party is a Guide, very strong. Although he has not yet left the White Tower, it will be soon. Once he comes of age, you can immediately match and marry! You fighting on the frontlines makes us so worried…”
Wei Zhuo coldly interrupted, “Enough.”
A Guide who had not even left the White Tower? At most seventeen years old.
They had not asked his opinion at all, and unilaterally arranged a marriage that perhaps everyone else already knew about, except for he himself, who was kept in the dark.
Wei Zhuo felt extremely suffocated.
No wonder, when he first arrived, he saw that several Guides had been invited to the banquet.
A silent flame burned in his chest. It was not the first time he felt disappointed in his parents, but having his marriage controlled and arranged still made the fire burn through his internal organs.
The banquet was chaotic and noisy, and to a high ranking Sentinel, all the clinking glasses and high-heeled shoes on marble sounded extremely piercing.
Suddenly, Wei Zhuo noticed someone touching his mental body.
Because the blue whale was not used to the banquet hall environment, it had quietly swum out early on, roaming freely in the open garden.
A gentle touch fell on the blue whale’s injured tail fin, and the whale let out a happy call.
‘Who?’ Wei Zhuo’s face turned cold, leaving his parents with only one sentence, “If you don’t want the name Wei Zhuo to leave this family, then immediately cancel the engagement, you have one month as the deadline.”
He saw his mental body at the corner of the hedge in the garden trimmed like a maze.
Beside it was a… black-haired Guide.
His eyebrows and eyes were beautiful, and he looked slightly immature.
After seeing him, the other party stood up from the swing chair and said politely, “Hello.”
The blue whale, which had shrunk to only half the height of a person, happily bumped into the Guide. The Guide patted its tail fin and soothed, “Don’t make trouble.”
The strange touch spread along the nerve network to Wei Zhuo’s brain like an electric shock.
Wei Zhuo frowned uncomfortably and said in a low voice, “Please keep your distance from my mental body.”
……
After the recuperation period ended, Wei Zhuo returned to the military academy.
It happened to be the start of the new enrollment season.
On the way, he heard Sentinel classmates discussing. Among the ten Guides admitted this year, one actually had 3S-level mental power.
A Sentinel said, “So what if it’s 3S? There must be some flaw. You guys don’t know, originally this Guide had a marriage arranged by His Majesty before leaving the Tower, but ended up being rejected by the Wei family?”
A companion mumbled, “Really? But that’s a Guide…”
The Sentinel added, “We’ll see soon enough, right? In my opinion, it may be because he’s extremely ugly. Guides are so rare, otherwise, what reason would there be to reject the engagement?”
Wei Zhuo pursed his thin lips into a line.
He returned to the dormitory.
Although he had not lived in the dorm for two months, the common area was still tidy and spotless.
His roommate across the hall, He Botian, was very particular about cleanliness.
There was originally an empty room at the end of the corridor in the dormitory.
But outside the room, Wei Zhuo saw a newly posted dormitory roster with an extra name.
Clattering sounds came from the entrance.
Wei Zhuo turned his head in the common living room.
He Botian was carrying luggage that clearly did not belong to him and greeted enthusiastically, “Please come in.”
Wei Zhuo saw the new roommate. It was the very beautiful black-haired Guide.
Not ugly.
……
Wei Zhuo struggled to pull his consciousness back from the bubble-like memories of his mental landscape.
The young Guide beneath him had already been completely messed up by him, and was drenched all over.
The naked, snow-white body had been turned over at some point, and the front was sinking into the sofa.
The sofa was made of cotton and linen. Maybe while originally trying to relieve the skin hunger, it had rubbed against him. His breathing rose and fell, the two red tips protruded, the chest slightly arched with a thin muscle curve.
The young man’s lips were bitten to a deep red, the upper half of his face was covered, and from beneath the back of his hand spilled the transparent shine of physiological tears.
Wei Zhuo realized that his finger had barely squeezed into the wet redness.
It was only his thumb, shallowly inserted up to the second knuckle, yet was tightly clenched, unable to move forward or back.
Xin Hexue whimpered and shook his head.
But in the end, when Wei Zhuo’s fingertip unintentionally brushed past, he took in the finger joint, his lower abdomen convulsed sensitively, and a wet, transparent liquid gushed out.
It completely soaked the Sentinel’s palm.
[Wei Zhuo love value +5]
Xin Hexue’s whole body went limp. He turned his head to lean against the square pillow, and before losing consciousness, he murmured, “He Botian…”
Wei Zhuo’s expression instantly became cold and heavy, and he abruptly stood up.
He stood there like a stone, staring at the unconscious Guide before him, motionless.
[Wei Zhuo heart break value +5]
……
When Xin Hexue woke up again, his whole body felt fresh and clean.
At eight in the morning, outside the bedroom’s one-way floor-to-ceiling window, everything was white, and it was clearly snowing.
Wei Zhuo must have finished a series of cleaning tasks and even carried him back to the bedroom.
The bedroom had a big bed large enough for two people to sleep in. After all, it was originally where Xin Hexue and He Botian lived together.
All of He Botian’s belongings had not been discarded. On the nightstand were couple’s matching mugs, and when the closest was opened, their windbreakers could even be seen hanging together.
Xin Hexue: [How much is Wei Zhuo’s heartbreak value now?]
K: [Wei Zhuo’s heartbreak value is currently 15.]
It had increased by ten points compared to before he fell asleep last night. It seemed that Wei Zhuo had carefully noticed the bedroom’s arrangement.
Xin Hexue took out his communicator, and an email immediately popped up in real time.
It was from the Sentinel-Guide Joint Military Academy in the Central Military District.
The original old Guide professor had retired, and there was no suitable candidate to take over the teaching.
They invited him with generous terms to join and teach the course “Sentinel-Guide Relationship Management Studies.”
It looks like he could see the gray puppy again.
Xin Hexue absent-mindedly replied to the message and agreed to the school’s invitation.
He then slid to the text message interface. When he saw the text messages, his eyebrows raised slightly.
[Wei Zhuo: Sorry.]
[Wei Zhuo: Yesterday, I was only influenced by a mental riot.]
[Wei Zhuo: Don’t misunderstand.]
[Wei Zhuo: You don’t have to take it to heart.]
