Chapter 132: Sentinel & Guide (IX)

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Chapter 132: Sentinel & Guide (IX)

By the time Shang Ke received the assignment, Whistler Hospital in the High District had already been placed under quarantine. A few days earlier, a Sentinel suffering from an abnormal psychic condition had been admitted to the hospital. As usual, the hospital sent a Guide to treat him, but during the treatment, that Guide unexpectedly fell into the exact same psychic state as the Sentinel.

Guides possessed stable psychic states and rarely became mentally lost. Normally, only bonded Sentinels and Guides entered sensory synchronization through psychic resonance. But this Guide and Sentinel were not partners, making the likelihood of such resonance extremely low.

After the hospital’s examinations failed to reveal the cause, they sent a second Guide to treat the Sentinel, only for the same thing to happen again. Even more worrying, over the next several days, the hospital admitted several more Sentinels with similar symptoms. Not only were they unable to receive treatment from Guides, but contact with them inflicted severe psychic damage on the Guides themselves. Every Guide who had treated one of these Sentinels found their psychic power reduced to its most basic state after regaining consciousness, leaving them almost indistinguishable from ordinary people.

Sentinels and Guides were complementary existences. If Sentinels could no longer receive assistance from Guides and instead caused them severe harm, the interdependent relationship between the two would collapse completely—and with it, Ta’s entire power structure.

The matter quickly alarmed Ta’s leadership. They suspended all Guide support from Guides to Sentinels, transferred every affected Sentinel to Whistler Hospital, and placed the entire facility under lockdown.

When Yonis arrived with Shang Ke at the conference hall on the hospital’s top floor, quite a few Sentinels and Guides had already gathered there. They greeted Yonis respectfully while casting curious glances toward Shang Ke at his side.

“How is the situation?” Yonis’s gaze lingered briefly on Mitchell before turning toward the hospital director.

“We’ve repeatedly examined these Sentinels’ psychic states. Based on the fluctuation frequencies, they’re trapped in a chaotic sensory state—what we commonly call a zone.”

A zone was a state in which a Sentinel became lost in their own sensory perception after going too long without a Guide’s mental guidance.

The director continued, “But unlike an ordinary zone, this particular condition is extremely unstable. The patients seem to be trapped inside nightmares, and their psychic power changes along with whatever they’re experiencing. That makes it extremely difficult for Guides to establish a mental link with them. Instead, the Guides end up being pulled into the zone themselves.”

The president of the Guide Association added, “This zone must have been induced by an external factor. A naturally occurring Sentinel zone would never fall completely outside a Guide’s ability to control.”

“An external factor?” Yonis asked gravely. “Sentinels have extremely strong immunity. What kind of outside influence could force one into a zone?”

“That’s exactly what we can’t figure out,” the director replied. “Before this happened, every one of these Sentinels was perfectly normal. None had been involved in any fights, nor had they consumed food that failed to meet Sentinel safety standards.”

“Time is running short. We need to find a treatment as soon as possible,” the Guide Association president warned. “If a Sentinel remains trapped in a zone for more than a month, there may be nothing we can do.”

“The best diagnostic method would be a Guide’s mental scan,” the director said with a sigh. “But we don’t dare risk another Guide.” Two Guides had already suffered psychic deterioration as a result of attempting treatment, and the regression might be permanent.

Everyone understood the danger involved. No Guide was willing to gamble their entire future merely to test an uncertain theory.

The conference hall fell silent, and the discussion reached an impasse.

The word zone stirred something in Shang Ke’s mind. He had the vague feeling that he had seen something about it before. Quickly searching through Zeder’s memories, he finally found the information he wanted.

Among the weapons the Anti-Government Alliance had developed specifically against Sentinels was one designed to induce zones. Zeder had little interest in biochemical pharmacology, however, so he had merely skimmed the material before shelving it. Although he had never read the complete file, he still vaguely remembered the names of two of the drugs involved.

If these zones truly were the Anti-Government Alliance’s doing, then their zone-inducing weapon had evidently succeeded, and even more Sentinels would probably be attacked next. Shang Ke thought again of the three Dark Sentinels he had treated not long ago. Their symptoms had been similar, but at the time, Shang Ke had suffered no psychic damage from treating them. Looking back now, that had probably only been the experimental stage.

The immediate priority was determining whether the Sentinels’ zoning had truly been artificially induced. But the director had just said there was nothing wrong with their food and none of them had suffered physical injuries. If a chemical agent remained in their bodies, the doctors’ examinations should have detected it. Unless… unless the trigger was airborne or transmitted through sound waves, stimulating the Sentinels’ minds through smell or hearing.

“I think Guide Shang Ke could try.” While he was still thinking, a cool voice suddenly sounded through the conference hall.

Shang Ke looked up. The speaker was a handsome young man of about twenty-four or twenty-five, with a touch of arrogance between his brows. He was probably a Guide as well.

He stared at Shang Ke and said slowly, “Dark Sentinels possess exceptionally great psychic power. Of the seven current patients, only one is a Dark Sentinel. Given Guide Shang Ke’s unique compatibility and Rank-S psychic power, he may be able to identify the source of the condition safely.”

The moment he said this, every gaze in the room turned toward Shang Ke.

Yonis said coldly, “Shang Ke is Ta’s only Dark Guide. Lucien, if anything happens to him, I wonder whether you can withstand the wrath of every Dark Sentinel in the country.”

Lucien was also a Rank-S Guide and enjoyed tremendous prestige throughout Ta, but to Dark Sentinels, Shang Ke was the truly irreplaceable one.

The moment Yonis finished speaking, several Dark Sentinels in the hall immediately shot Lucien hostile looks. There are so many of you ordinary Guides—why don’t one of you go? We Dark Sentinels finally got a Guide of our own, and you people still won’t leave him alone!

“Oh, forgive me. I nearly forgot,” Lucien said sarcastically. “His Excellency Shang Ke is precious national property. Naturally, he isn’t someone just anyone can ask to act.”

Mocking expressions appeared on the other Guides’ faces as well, making no attempt to conceal their dissatisfaction with Shang Ke.

Yonis swept an icy gaze across them, and the Guides immediately looked away, none daring to meet his eyes.

Lucien, however, remained completely unfazed. “Sir Yonis, if I remember correctly, you and Shang Ke are not formally bonded spouses. You therefore have no right to make decisions on his behalf. Whether he accepts this proposal should be his choice.”

The words struck Yonis directly where it hurt. Without a registered bond, he had no legally established claim over Shang Ke. Anyone could use that fact as justification to separate the two of them.

“Sir Lucien, although Yonis and I have not formally registered our bond, he is the only partner I recognize.” Shang Ke took Yonis’s hand and smiled. “He has the right to refuse any unreasonable request on my behalf.”

Warmth flooded Yonis’s heart as he tightly squeezed Shang Ke’s hand in return. This was the first time Shang Ke had openly acknowledged him as his partner—and as his only one!

Mitchell lifted his eyes and glanced in their direction.

Lucien said coolly, “So you have no intention of examining that Dark Sentinel’s condition?”

Examine his condition? What an absurd understatement. Was this the sort of “condition” one could casually examine? Yonis snorted coldly.

“Not necessarily,” Shang Ke said instead. “I can try.”

What? Yonis whipped his head around. Hadn’t Shang Ke just said Yonis had the right to refuse unreasonable requests on his behalf? Why had he changed his mind so quickly?

Shang Ke seemed to guess what he was thinking. “Yonis, this isn’t an unreasonable request. I think I should try.”

Yonis frowned at him.

Shang Ke continued, “Trust me. I wouldn’t agree if I didn’t have some confidence.”

Confidence? Even if he were ninety-nine percent certain, Yonis still wouldn’t dare risk that remaining one percent! His face remained taut as he said nothing.

“Yonis, since Shang Ke is willing to try, why not allow it?” the director said. “It’s only a mental scan. If he notices anything wrong, he can withdraw immediately.”

If it were really that simple, why weren’t any of the other Guides volunteering? Yonis understood the director’s motives perfectly well. He simply wanted to witness a Dark Guide’s abilities firsthand.

And he was not the only one. The president of the Guide Association and several others were equally interested, so one after another, they urged Yonis to agree.

Yonis did not care what anyone else thought, but Shang Ke insisted on trying. In the end, he relented on one condition: he would remain at Shang Ke’s side to protect him.

The director had complete confidence in Yonis’s strength and readily agreed.

After making some preparations, the two entered the ward where the Dark Sentinel was being kept, while everyone else watched through the monitors outside.

Shang Ke studied the Sentinel on the bed. His expression shifted repeatedly between pain and terror, his entire body held in an extreme state of tension.

A Guide’s support for a Sentinel mainly consisted of six core functions.

First, mental scanning—a general scan of the Sentinel’s psychic state.

Second, mental guidance—untangling and redirecting disordered psychic power.

Third, grounding—calming the uncontrollable emotions produced by a Sentinel’s psychic overload.

Fourth, mental healing—repairing damage to the psyche.

Fifth, mental barriers—blocking sensory stimuli such as sounds and smells that could overwhelm a Sentinel.

Sixth, psychic resonance—when a bonded Sentinel and Guide bring their psychic powers into sync, producing formidable offensive and defensive power.

What Shang Ke intended to perform on this Dark Sentinel was only the most basic first step—a mental scan. Before doing so, however, he first constructed a mental barrier around both himself and Yonis, isolating them from anything that might pose a danger.

“Huh? Why didn’t we think of constructing a mental barrier first?” The director’s eyes lit up as he watched from the monitoring room.

Normally, a Guide would first probe a Sentinel’s condition, make an accurate assessment, and only then begin providing Guide support. Very few Guides built a mental barrier beforehand because doing so reduced the efficiency of their assistance.

But Shang Ke’s approach was clearly the safest.

“His mental barrier is beautiful,” one Dark Sentinel could not help exclaiming. Although most people could not see psychic power with the naked eye, instruments could render it visible. Psychic barriers took the form of meshes with gaps of varying sizes; the smaller the gaps, the stronger the psychic power.

Shang Ke’s mental barrier was fine and perfectly uniform, blending seamlessly with the psychic power of the two Dark Sentinels in the room. Pale-blue light shimmered through it, making the entire space seem submerged beneath the sea.

As expected of a Guide specifically compatible with Dark Sentinels—his compatibility was extraordinarily high.

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