Chapter 133: Piano

San had never seen Astin cry like this; in fact, he had never seen Astin shed a single tear before.

That habitually cold, stubborn, foul-tempered crocodile was currently acting like an obedient, gentle child, radiating absolute dependency and deep attachment to her.

Su couldn’t fathom when Astin had become so intimate with Bunny.

He was the one who used to loathe Guides above all else—the very man who, when Bunny first arrived at the Sentinel Tower, sneered at San and cursed him for competing to be a Guide’s obedient dog.

Where on earth had things gone wrong?

One’s own failure wasn’t terrifying; what was truly unbearable was a rival brother beating him to the punch.

It had long been established that San hated Astin—because Astin was the child of a mistress.

San’s eyes turned bitterly cold, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the handle of his sidearm. Tearing off his comms headset, he walked straight out of the simulation pod without looking back.

After eliminating the final hostile target, Tyr noticed that San had gone offline.

When he located Bunny and Astin, he instantly grasped what had unfolded.

Tyr was an exceptionally observant Sentinel; many things required no explicit explanation for him to piece together the broader picture.

Before concluding the session, Tyr called out to Bunny, offering a deeply loaded remark:

"Miss Guide, once a balance is shattered, restoring it to its original state is rarely simple."

Much like Xander, Tyr had witnessed far too many of his squadmates perish; compared to petty jealousy over affection, his sole desire was for everyone to stay safe and sound.

Because he had already lost his own younger brother.

"However, I trust that you possess the ability to maintain trust and tactical cohesion within the team."

Bunny assumed Tyr was encouraging her to integrate into the squad as quickly as possible and keep pace with their training, nodding earnestly in response:

"Understood. I will."

Though their interpretations were entirely misaligned, they somehow landed on the same wavelength.

***

Dusk — 7:00 PM

A violent sandstorm raged relentlessly outside the Sentinel Tower.

Grim news reached the base interior: Cyrus was severely wounded, his massive blood loss plunging him near the brink of shock, his life hanging by a thread.

How could a man leave for a routine patrol only to return in such a state?

When Bunny arrived at the central command room, Xander was already retrieving the memory chip from the patrol drone.

Cyrus’s last recorded coordinates had vanished near Defense Post 44—in City A, less than 50 kilometers from the sector border.

He had spent over ten full hours inside City A, where he had undoubtedly encountered severe peril.

Fortunately, he had managed to break free, though he collapsed from extreme blood loss on his way back to the tower. The patrolling drone spotted him and immediately transmitted a priority rescue alert to headquarters.

Yet he had been exposed out in the wilderness for nearly 12 hours without suffering a single attack from Aberration swarms.

Those monsters possessed a sense of smell so acute they could catch the scent of blood from dozens of miles away.

Once a Sentinel fell unconscious, their spirit guide could no longer maintain combat readiness either. Was Cyrus merely blessed with absurd luck, or was there something else shielding him in the dark?

Bunny felt that Cyrus was shrouded in layer upon layer of secrets. Not only did he lack a functional mental landscape, but his spiritual sea was a complete black hole.

"Scans are complete. Zero parasitic infection detected."

Xander set the pad aside. After a brief pause to reflect, Bunny decided to head down to the medical bay for a quick check.

The situation was far from reassuring. The data terminal displayed multiple compound fractures throughout his body, ruptured internal organs, an intracranial hematoma, and countless chemical burn wounds.

Liam only regained consciousness on the third day. The second his eyes fluttered open and he realized Cyrus was lying in the adjacent medical pod, he was so thrilled he looked ready to light fireworks in celebration.

Yet Bunny couldn’t shake an unsettling feeling: a significant portion of those wounds simply didn’t resemble anything inflicted by Aberration swarms.

Cyrus remained submerged inside the medical pod for five full days. Every single day, after finishing her instruction modules, Bunny would pop over to cast a quiet glance through the glass.

Cyrus maintained terrible relations with the rest of the squad; apart from Bunny, not a single soul came by to visit.

On the evening of the fifth day, Cyrus was nowhere to be found. He had presumably awakened, yet he wasn’t inside his quarters, leaving his whereabouts completely unknown.

Bunny held several pressing questions for him, yet searching the facility yielded zero trace of his presence.

Just as she prepared to turn back, the faint, melodic strains of a piano echoed from a dark corner of the storage vault.

Bunny had only stepped inside this storage vault once before when setting up the soothing chamber. The vast space was cluttered with abandoned relics left behind by personnel who had garrisoned the Sentinel Tower over the past century, along with ancient artifacts preserved from Earth.

The nutcracker doll Bunny had gifted Rain had been excavated from this very pile.

Stepping forward in her fluffy slippers, she noticed the door left slightly ajar, warm particle-light spilling through the narrow gap. Sitting with his back to the entrance, Cyrus was perched before an extraordinarily ancient grand piano.

An unmistakable heavy melancholia clung to his frame, evident from the slump of his shoulders alone.

He wore a loose gray bathrobe, his dark roots rich as black ink, his entire posture swallowed within deep shadows.

Bunny couldn’t identify the piece he was playing, yet the resonance of human music carried an innate universal language.

The tone of this antique piano was remarkably rich and deep. As his slender knuckles danced over the ivory keys, fluid notes spilled forth like liquid moonlight—beginning as a soft, rhythmic patter of gentle rain before escalating into a soaring crescendo, the downpour turning fierce, a wild tempest snapping flower petals in its wake.

Before one surge could subside, the pitch softened once more, shimmering like light across a tranquil lake, until the piece concluded by wrapping around the listener like a vast mountain valley overflowing with wild roses.

Yet it felt as though he were using the keys to purge something pent up deep inside.

Bunny stood at the threshold, thoroughly captivated by the melody.

Until the music ground to an abrupt halt with a dull, heavy clatter.

"How much longer do you intend to stand there and spy on me?"