Reborn as an A-Rank Guide: Trapped By The Crazy Sentinels

The single sentence seemed to set the whole room off. Xander reacted first, lifting her onto the sofa and crouching to examine her ankle.

"Why didn’t you say anything about the injury?"

With so many eyes on her, Bunny felt awkward. "It’s just a sprain. Nothing serious."

Guides were naturally more delicate than the thick-skinned sentinels. Xander administered a dose of regenerative serum, then carefully worked the joint back into place.

A soft sound slipped from her throat. Her pink toes curled tightly; the pale, tender arch of her foot almost disappeared inside his large hand.

In the quiet living room, that faint hum rippled through the men like a subtle current.

Were women’s feet always this small? It felt exactly like pinching a kitten’s paw.

Illai actually managed to sound serious for once. "Your ankle is swollen so much and you still claim it’s nothing?"

If this had been one of those pampered guides from Central, there would already be tears, drama, and threats of hanging themselves.

Arden’s gaze lingered on the slender line of her ankle. So thin—thinner even than... He quickly shook the crude thought out of his head. This was not the time. The fact that the aliens had begun actively luring humans was a dangerous signal.

Cyrus watched Bunny curled obediently against Xander’s chest. When had these two grown so close?

In truth, Bunny simply found lying against Xander’s chest softer and more comfortable than the sofa. An excellent human cushion.

"Starting today, until you have enough ability to protect yourself, you will not leave the sentinel tower again."

Even with 3S-level protection, accidents could not be completely prevented. A guide’s physique was barely better than an ordinary person’s; their only real advantages were resistance to contamination and radiation.

Bunny could not afford any mishap.

"I’ll arrange for them to take turns training you—endurance, combat, marksmanship, field first aid, demolitions... even how to pilot an aircraft."

"Miss Bunny, can you accept that?"

After facing the aliens head-on, Bunny already understood how vital physical conditioning was. She nodded and answered Cyrus with firm resolve.

"Yes."

Brandon soon led her away for a full-body scan in the medical room. Certain queen-type aliens were capable of implanting parasitic eggs inside a human host.

Once she was gone, Cyrus lowered the long leg he had propped against the opposite knee and delivered a cool warning.

"Don’t let it happen again."

Xander knew the remark was aimed at him. He remained silent on the sofa.

Only after the others had drifted away did Tyr step forward and give Xander’s shoulder a comforting pat.

"Don’t take it to heart."

Tyr and Xander were the two most senior sentinels currently stationed in District 616—one with ten years, the other with nine.

Xander’s previous teammates had died off one after another until the roster finally stabilized over the last five years.

The two of them shared the closest bond, nearly a decade of life-and-death brotherhood.

As a top-tier 3S+ sentinel, Xander had been the undisputed leader of the zone before Cyrus’s abrupt arrival. Strength decided rank; fists earned respect. Xander had no problem accepting that principle.

Cyrus had never publicly revealed his true mental-power ranking, yet his military command ability was undeniably outstanding. Whether under Xander or under Cyrus, the 616 maintained the lowest casualty rate of any sentinel tower.

As long as nothing major went wrong, putting up with Cyrus’s foul temper was tolerable.

What Xander could not stomach was the man’s sense of superiority and arrogance—the same trait the other team members often complained about.

Cyrus had been conceived and born the ordinary way, unlike the rest of them—hybrids grown in vats who emerged already in their teens or fully adult. He possessed real parents and a childhood none of them had ever known. At his core, he simply regarded himself as different.

The world’s hierarchy worked that way: they were born lower, and Cyrus carried that awareness like a birthright.

Outside of work and combat he kept almost entirely to himself, scorning the idea of friendship with the others. During one heated argument he had even called them products of inferior genes, soulless refuse.

It was not only Liam; none of them particularly liked him.

The greatest cruelty of human nature is using another person’s misfortune as a spear and driving it in until it draws blood.

Xander did not believe Cyrus’s warning was solely about today’s incident. He offered Tyr a meaningful smile.

"No. He simply doesn’t like other people touching something he’s already set his eyes on."

When Bunny had been resting in his arms earlier, Cyrus’s stare had nearly burned a hole through him.

Tyr fell silent, unsure how to respond.

Xander gave a soft blink of those striking glass-like eyes. "But Bunny is not an object."

She was a living person with her own thoughts and will.

Whoever could make her fall for him first—that would be true skill.

Tyr understood what his brother meant. Xander intended to issue a challenge to Cyrus.

The pink-haired man was usually a man of few words. After a long pause he finally managed:

"Good luck."

***

When Bunny left the medical room, the evening sun was already sinking toward the horizon.

Sunny had told her it had not rained here for nearly two hundred years.

She absently touched the necklace at her throat. A flash of vivid blue in the corner of her eye drew her attention.

Xander was swimming in the pool.

From the waist up he was a strikingly handsome human form, skin the cool porcelain-white of someone who had spent years in deep water. Muscle flowed in clean lines; his waist and abdomen were tightly defined, the sharp V of his hips disappearing beneath the surface along with raised, faintly blue veins.

The mermaid tail itself was breathtaking—long, layered fins in a gradient of deep ink-blue that dissolved into silver scales like crushed diamonds, moving with graceful power through the clear water.

Sunset poured across the surface like liquid gold, refracting into brilliant colors across every overlapping scale. The thin, gauze-like fins behind his ears fluttered gently with the current.

So beautiful.

Bunny could hardly look away.

She remembered then: Xander’s spirit form was a variation of a siren.

—Splash!—

He broke the surface. Water streamed from the dense arch of his brows, the tips of his lashes, and the bridge of his nose. Damp blue hair clung to his face; those deep-sea glass eyes were cool and distant, veiled in a soft sheen of moisture.

He noticed her standing dazed at the edge and called to her gently.

"Bunny?"

She crouched down, the compliment leaving her without thought. "Xander... your tail is gorgeous."

He swam over at once, folding his arms along the pool’s rim and resting his chin on them.

"Want to touch it?"

She had never seen a living merman before. Excitement and curiosity tangled together. "May I?"

Xander lifted the massive tail clear of the water. Bunny reached out carefully. The scales were cool and sleek beneath her fingers, glowing with a faint blue luminescence.

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