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

Under an endless expanse of golden sand, the merciless sun beat down upon the earth without mercy.

According to their instruments, the surface temperature had already climbed beyond 42°C.

Beneath the shelter of a naturally formed rocky cave, two figures dressed in crude heat-resistant suits crouched behind a boulder, keeping a close watch on the energy station in the distance through their binoculars.

"Are you sure this is going to work? Maybe we should just turn back."

Vander ran a hand over the canteen at his side, feeling how little water remained inside. Once again, he began considering whether retreat might be the wiser choice.

It wasn’t that he was a coward. He had personally witnessed the terrifying combat ability of sentinels as they tore through alien creatures, and he knew exactly how deadly they could be. They weren’t the first civilians to attempt stealing supplies from a sentinel facility. Others had tried before them.

Almost none had ever returned alive.

And unlike sentinels, ordinary people like them had little chance of surviving an encounter with an alien creature in the open desert. If they were unlucky enough to cross paths with one, death would be the most likely outcome.

Zade, however, was surprisingly understanding.

"If you’re scared, you can go back."

The two of them had spent three days and three nights making their way here.

Inside the energy station, a single high-voltage storage unit could provide enough electricity to support several dozen people for nearly half a year. Zade had already made up his mind—he wasn’t leaving empty-handed today. They had to bring something useful back with them.

Vander stared at the endless stretch of barren desert behind them and swallowed hard.

The thought of making the journey back alone frightened him even more. An alien could emerge from the sand at any moment, and there would be no one around to save him.

He lifted his canteen and drained the final mouthful of water.

Then, with no other choice, he settled back down beside Zade and continued hiding.

"What is that?"

Zade’s puzzled voice suddenly broke the silence.

Vander snatched the binoculars from his hands and raised them to his eyes.

Several dozen meters away, a lone figure was staggering across the sand.

The stranger was unusually tall and broad-shouldered, with a firearm strapped across his back.

The two men recognized him almost instantly.

A sentinel.

His combat uniform bore the insignia of the Sentinel Tower, though it had been worn and damaged almost beyond recognition. Something was clearly wrong with him. He stumbled forward as if barely able to remain upright, while one hand gripped a laser sword and swung it wildly through the air in completely erratic arcs.

"Holy shit—a sentinel! Run!"

Vander immediately scrambled to his feet, ready to bolt.

A sentinel’s senses were frighteningly acute. They could pick up even the slightest disturbance from several meters away with terrifying precision, and Vander had absolutely no intention of dying here.

Before he could get anywhere, Zade grabbed him and yanked him back down.

"Where the hell are you going?"

"Where do you think? You want to stay here and die?"

"Wait." Zade narrowed his eyes. "Something’s wrong with that sentinel."

Still unconvinced, Vander reluctantly lowered himself behind the rocks again.

Through the binoculars, the sentinel’s movements looked increasingly unnatural. His entire body was rigid as he stumbled forward, each step stiff and disjointed.

He looked less like a living person and more like a walking corpse.

"What happened to him?"

"Shh. Keep quiet."

Two minutes later, the sentinel suddenly pitched forward and crashed face-first into the sand.

His eyes remained wide open, frozen in a vacant stare. His chest no longer seemed to rise.

He appeared to be dead.

Then something horrifying happened.

The corpse began convulsing violently.

His limbs jerked against the ground as though something inside his body was desperately fighting to tear its way out.

Without warning, the fabric across his back split apart.

His spine snapped with a sickening force.

A small, grotesque alien creature forced its way through the bloody opening in his back, crawling free, drenched in blood as a piercing shriek tore from its throat.

It had consumed the sentinel’s organs from the inside, using them as nourishment until it reached full development. Only then had it ripped its way out of its host.

The sentinel must have been implanted with eggs by a broodmother.

Vander felt his scalp prickle. His entire body began trembling uncontrollably.

Zade shot him an irritated glance.

"Keep shaking like that and it’s going to notice us."

Vander immediately clamped both hands over his mouth, terrified that even the sound of his breathing might give them away.

The alien didn’t spare what remained of the sentinel either.

Within moments, it devoured the corpse completely.

That was precisely what made these creatures so revolting—and so dangerous.

They weren’t limited to reproducing through their own nests. They could implant their eggs directly inside a human body, where the larvae were notoriously difficult to detect and remove. The parasite would feed on the host’s internal organs as it developed, gradually growing stronger while remaining concealed.

Worse still, an infected person didn’t immediately display obvious symptoms.

They could continue moving among other humans without anyone realizing what they carried.

By the time the creature matured enough to burst from its host, it was usually already too late. One hidden infection could easily trigger another wave of casualties.

During the Great Migration, humanity’s population had once plummeted to fewer than several hundred thousand.

616 bordered North 600, and this particular sentinel had wandered all the way here from the north without any apparent destination.

His squad had abandoned him during an operation to eradicate an alien swarm.

Vander and Zade assumed the gruesome scene had finally reached its end.

They were wrong.

A specialized spacecraft suddenly descended from the sky and landed nearby.

Several soldiers emerged, each wearing an unfamiliar mask that concealed their identity.

Without hesitation, they deployed a high-output electric containment net.

The juvenile alien barely had time to react before electricity surged through the mesh, immobilizing it. The soldiers swiftly secured the creature inside a reinforced cage and carried it aboard the ship.

Vander stared after them in confusion.

"That ship came from Central, didn’t it? Why would they capture an alien?"

Zade looked equally baffled.

The two watched silently as the spacecraft rose from the wasteland and disappeared toward the upper atmosphere.

Humanity had gone to extraordinary lengths to relocate to Terra for one primary reason—to escape these horrifying creatures.

Most of the humans who had been abandoned on Earth during the migration had long since died.

Only an insignificant fraction had managed to survive.

Those survivors became known as the Wildfolk.

Zade finally lowered his binoculars. The confusion on his face quickly disappeared, replaced by his usual composure.

"Whatever they’re doing has nothing to do with us." He tucked the binoculars away. "Don’t forget why we came here today."

They had a station to rob.

***

When Bunny opened her eyes, she found herself lying in an unfamiliar bed.

The pillow beneath her head was black. So were the sheets and blankets. In fact, nearly the entire bedroom was decorated in the same restrained palette of dark, cool tones. Even the floor was a deep charcoal gray.

Aside from the essential furniture, there was almost nothing decorative in the room.

Everything was immaculate. Not merely clean, but meticulously arranged, as though every object had been assigned an exact position and deviation from that order simply wasn’t tolerated.

The entire space carried an unmistakable sense of discipline and control.

Still disoriented, Bunny stared blankly at the silver Newton’s cradle sitting on the bedside table.

Where was she?

Before she could make sense of anything, the bathroom door opened with a soft creak.

Warm steam drifted into the bedroom.

Cyrus stepped through it.

He wore a gray bathrobe loosely tied around his waist, its collar falling casually open below his collarbones. His black hair was still damp from the shower, droplets of water clinging to the roots and occasionally slipping down the strands.

The clean fragrance of shower gel mingled with the cool, smoky scent of burning wood, gradually filling every corner of the room.

Even the bedding wrapped around Bunny had absorbed his scent.

It surrounded her completely.

For one strange moment, she had the distinct impression of being a little white rabbit that had accidentally wandered into a predator’s private territory.

The instant Bunny saw Cyrus, however, all sleepy confusion vanished.

She reacted as though she had just seen a ghost.

Grabbing the blanket tightly against herself, she scrambled backward until she was pressed into the farthest corner of the bed.

"What are you doing?"

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