Chapter 239: Re: Sentinel & Guide

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Chapter 239: Re: Sentinel & Guide

Yonis stood outside the emergency room, desperately suppressing psychic power on the verge of overload as he endured the agonizing wait. The hospital corridor was deathly silent, the oppressive atmosphere so heavy that no one else dared even breathe too loudly.

Time crawled by second by second, as though it would never end. Yonis wanted it to pass faster, yet dreaded hearing news he could not bear. At some point, the doors to the emergency room finally opened. What greeted him, however, was the regret on the doctor’s face.

“I’m sorry. We did everything we could.”

Everything they could? What was that supposed to mean? If they had truly done everything they could, shouldn’t his Keke have been saved?

The doctor was about to say more, but Yonis had already shoved past him and rushed into the emergency room. The instant he saw the person lying motionless on the operating table, his entire body seemed to freeze. He stood rigidly in place as all color drained from the world around him.

Just moments ago, Shang Ke had smiled and told him, “He is the only partner I recognize.”

And now he lay on a cold operating table, his body utterly devoid of warmth.

From the first moment Yonis saw Shang Ke’s spirit animal, this man had entered his heart. It was not merely because of their psychic compatibility, but because something in Shang Ke had touched his very soul. There had been no sweet words or solemn vows; they had simply, naturally, drawn closer and closer. Only now did Yonis realize that he had never once told him, “I love you.”

Shang Ke’s gentleness and thoughtfulness had made Yonis believe he was the only person in the world qualified to possess him and protect him. Yet he had allowed Shang Ke to be killed right before his eyes.

“It’s so dark… Is anyone there? Please save me…”

“Don’t be afraid. I’m here to save you. I’ll protect you from now on. I’ll never let anyone hurt you again.”

I’m sorry. He had broken his promise…

Yonis’s eyes turned bloodred. The psychic power he had been forcibly suppressing inside himself instantly slipped beyond his control and erupted violently in every direction.

“Yonis, don’t!” Several anxious voices rang out in succession as people tried to stop him.

Once a Rank-A Dark Sentinel’s psychic power went into overload, the destructive force was terrifying. Worse, large numbers of Sentinels and Guides were gathered here. The slightest mistake could trigger a psychic chain reaction and form a massive psychic storm. If that happened, ordinary people would not be the only ones in danger; even high-ranking Sentinels might not survive.

Yonis fought to rein himself in with the last shred of reason he possessed. But every time he thought that he would never see Shang Ke again, grief and despair surged over him like an endless tide, drowning him wave after wave.

The entire hospital was engulfed by his berserk psychic power. Every Sentinel raised their defenses, struggling against the tremendous psychic waves crashing over them.

“Yonis!” The director and the others repeatedly tried to establish communication with him, but every attempt failed.

Once a Dark Sentinel with such formidable self-control truly lost control, no Guide could provide effective mental guidance. The only person capable of calming Yonis had died only minutes ago.

“Yonis…”

“Yonis… do you want…”

“Do you want to kill your own child…?”

Child? That single word brought a moment of clarity to Yonis’s chaotic mind.

“Shang Ke was pregnant. He was carrying your child!”

A roar filled Yonis’s head. For a moment, he thought he had heard wrong.

At that moment, the director rushed over and seized his arm. “Wake up! The doctors just detected a second life-sign inside Shang Ke. Our priority now is keeping the child alive. We have to remove the embryo from the gestational parent as quickly as possible.”

Male Guides had an extremely low chance of becoming pregnant, and even when conception occurred, survival rates were poor. The slightest complication could result in fetal death. Now that the gestational parent had died, every additional second of delay meant greater danger.

A child? His child? Yonis’s rampaging psychic power gradually subsided, but he remained completely motionless, staring blankly at Shang Ke on the operating table.

Once Yonis had calmed down, the director immediately ordered the doctors to begin the embryo transfer.

In truth, the doctors were not optimistic. A male Guide’s body had great difficulty sustaining a pregnancy, and once conception occurred, the embryo normally needed to remain in the body for at least three months. With the gestational parent already dead, however, they had no choice but to transfer it early. The danger was obvious.

People hurried back and forth around him, but Yonis seemed unaware of any of it. His eyes held only Shang Ke.

An hour later, the embryo was successfully extracted and transferred into an artificial womb. Everyone present broke into relieved smiles.

Looking at the faintly glowing, pearly-white seed of life beneath the glass cover, the emptiness in Yonis’s eyes finally stirred.

“It’s a miracle!” the doctor exclaimed excitedly. “I’ve never seen an embryo with such powerful vitality.”

“The gestational parent deserves the credit. With injuries that severe, he held on for nearly seven hours and bought us precious time to preserve the embryo.”

“Exactly. His will to live was extraordinarily strong. His heart stopped several times, and every time he fought his way back. Unfortunately…”

Yonis no longer heard what came after that. His vision had blurred.

A hand landed on his shoulder, and then the director’s voice reached him. “This is the child your Guide fought with everything he had to leave behind for you. Don’t let his efforts go to waste.”

Those words—don’t let his efforts go to waste—finally steadied Yonis.

He thought he could learn to be a good father.

Because this child was the only piece of Shang Ke he had left.

Five months later, the child had gradually taken shape. The doctors told Yonis that it was a healthy Sentinel baby—and, like him, a Dark Sentinel.

Yonis was faintly disappointed. He had hoped the child would be a Guide who inherited the exceptional genes of his birth father.

Seven months later, the child displayed his first psychic fluctuation. The sheer pressure made every infant in the hospital burst into frightened cries. Several Sentinels were affected as well; their psychic power reflexively counterattacked, surging toward the tiny life still developing inside the artificial womb.

The artificial womb screamed an alarm. Hospital staff mobilized at once, attempting to shield the child from the psychic attacks. Before they could act, however, the child’s psychic power changed again. Somehow, he drew the psychic power of every nearby Guide toward himself, forming a massive mental barrier around his body. The gathered power drove off the Sentinels’ psychic attacks and provided him with Guide support.

Nothing like it had ever occurred in Ta’s recorded history. It was normal for a Sentinel’s psychic power to retaliate reflexively; that was simply a form of self-defense. Guide support, however, had always required conscious control and could never be drawn out by an outside force—except by a bonded partner. Yet this unborn child could compel every Guide around him to protect him. In other words, if he wished, he could draw on the psychic power of any Guide at any time and, in the future, choose virtually any Guide as his partner. For a Dark Sentinel, a type normally plagued by extremely low Guide compatibility, such an ability was almost inconceivable.

Some researchers speculated that the child’s genes had been influenced by those of his birth father, producing a mutation that allowed a Dark Sentinel’s constitution to accept the psychic power of every Guide. Such a mutation was unquestionably of enormous significance to the future evolution of Sentinel and Guide abilities.

Ten months later, under the attention of countless people, the child was safely removed from the artificial womb. He drew his first breath of air and announced his arrival with a loud, vigorous cry.

Yonis held the child in his arms and felt the powerful vitality in that tiny body. A strange mixture of emotions rose within him—joy, grief, heartache, longing…

Keke, our child has been born. Can you see him?

To help raise the child, the Guide Association selected an excellent Rank-A Guide for Yonis, someone who could both care for the child’s daily needs and serve as his psychic mentor.

But Yonis did not want an outsider intruding into the space that belonged to him and Shang Ke, so he refused the Association’s help without hesitation.

The Association had never intended to force the matter and was prepared to defer to the child’s guardian. Unfortunately, events took an unexpected turn. Not long after Yonis brought the child home, a strange psychic overload occurred. The child’s psychic power triggered a reflexive counterattack from Yonis’s own, nearly causing a tragedy.

After losing Shang Ke, Yonis’s psychic power had become extremely unstable. He normally controlled it well, but any outside stimulus could cause it to flare instantly. During this incident, if Yonis had not suppressed himself with everything he had, the child might have been seriously harmed.

Given the circumstances, the Association had no choice but to temporarily revoke Yonis’s guardianship and forcibly separate him from the child. He was permitted to visit only in the company of a Guide.

Yonis repeatedly tried to learn how to be around his son normally, but every attempt ended in failure. In the end, he had no choice but to accept the cruel reality. The child had been his only remaining emotional anchor, and now even he had been taken away.

Standing alone in the empty villa, Yonis suddenly felt as though he no longer had a home.

To bury the pain, he threw himself into his work, fighting the anti-government alliance and various terrorist organizations. Visits that had once taken place every three days gradually became every five days, then every ten, then once a month… The longest gap lasted seven months.

The child slowly grew up in the Guide Association. He saw his father so rarely that distance settled between them. Even when they did meet, they exchanged only a few words and spent most of their time together in silence.

To outsiders, Yonis was a great hero. To his son, however, he was cold, heartless, and utterly unqualified to be a father.

He had never attended one of his birthdays, never asked about his studies, never shown concern for his daily life… The boy longed for his father’s attention, yet it seemed that Yonis’s heart contained only duty and missions.

That resentment continued until the year he turned eighteen. Yonis promised to return and celebrate his birthday with him. Outwardly, the boy rejected the offer, but inwardly, he looked forward to it.

Yet in the end, Yonis broke that promise too.

What his son received instead was a cold urn of ashes.

Yonis had died on a mission. Not even his body had been recovered.

The young man asked, “Did he leave any last words?”

The person who delivered the urn replied, “No. Sir Yonis didn’t have time to leave a message.”

Had he truly not had time—or had he simply had nothing to say?

The young man silently accepted reality. Calmly, he arranged his father’s funeral and buried Yonis beside his birth father.

A few days later, he returned to the old villa to sort through Yonis’s belongings and discovered a locked room.

After finding the key and opening the door, the first thing he saw was a table covered in models and toys. If he was not mistaken, every one of them was something he had played with as a child. Several thick photo albums filled the drawers as well, documenting his growth in painstaking detail from childhood onward. The last album contained photographs of his father and birth father together. The man standing beside Shang Ke looked utterly unlike the father he remembered. That smiling, affectionate man seemed to be the real Yonis—his eyes overflowing with love for his partner and enthusiasm for life.

When the young man turned to the final page of the album and saw the handwriting there, the grief he had suppressed for days finally broke free, spilling out with his tears.

To our beloved child. May you know peace and happiness all your life.

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