Chapter 97: Anomaly

By the time Cyrus escorted Bunny back to the residential quarters, another fresh five-finger mark adorned his cheek.

Yet compared to a slap, something far more infuriating awaited him.

The front door to Cyrus’s room had been forcibly dismantled by Liam.

The culprit had spent half the day scouring the quarters for his wife, only for Sunny to roll over and inform him that Bunny had gone to discuss matters with Cyrus.

How could he tolerate that?!

What kind of business takes two full hours to discuss?!

Liam had banged on Cyrus’s door for ages without response—completely unaware that Bunny had been dragged down to the confinement sector.

Having been tormented by Cyrus on numerous occasions, Liam knew better than any other Sentinel just how deep and scheming that old bastard truly was.

Bunny approaching him on her own was the exact equivalent of a helpless little rabbit offering itself straight into the wolf’s jaws—she would be devoured right down to the bone!

Driven mad with anxiety, the young Sentinel threw a fit and tore Cyrus’s door straight off its hinges.

Cyrus escorted Bunny back to her room. Standing before his own half-destroyed, creaking door frame and the utter wreckage inside—resembling a village ransacked by bandits—he drew a deep breath, fighting to suppress a wave of blinding fury.

Ten minutes later, Liam—who had still been searching for his wife—was thoroughly beaten to a pulp by Cyrus and landed straight inside a medical pod.

When Xander finished his late-night training and walked into the living room, Cyrus was lying on the couch with his eyes closed, resting his mind.

Xander never understood why this guy preferred sleeping on the couch over his own bedroom—though tonight, it was likely because Liam had flipped his bed frame as well.

Almost immediately, Xander’s sharp eyes caught sight of the claw marks across Cyrus’s chest.

It wasn’t just a single scratch, but several deep, reddened trails scattered across his skin, looking remarkably like the work of a distressed kitten.

Alongside them were deep, intimate bite marks.

They stood out with startling, blinding clarity against his cool-toned, muscular chest, piercing Xander’s eyes with a sharp sting.

Aside from Bunny, he couldn’t think of a single person in the base who would have the nerve to leave such marks on Cyrus.

They were blatantly left by a woman struggling in resistance.

Xander’s breathing turned ragged in an instant. He knew Bunny had always disliked Cyrus—her habit of sitting as far away from him as possible at the dining table made that abundantly clear.

Did this bastard force himself on her?!!

A surging wave of ocean-blue mental threads lashed out toward Cyrus with destructive force, carrying the wild, tempestuous scent of the open sea.

Moments before the razor-sharp mental strike could land, it was instantly blocked by a pitch-black psychic barrier that materialized out of thin air.

BANG!

The two immense mental forces collided violently, generating a vortex of turbulent air currents that exploded outward in waves. Every Sentinel across the facility felt the shockwave simultaneously.

Except for Bunny, who was fast asleep like a log.

Tucked away in the corner quietly recharging, Sunny was hurled straight into the air by the blast.

Cyrus’s counterattack was nothing short of catastrophic, even while he remained lying completely motionless on the sofa.

Xander dropped to one knee, clutching his chest in pain as he barely anchored his footing to avoid being sent flying.

Cyrus opened his eyelids, his post-kiss bliss with his girl thoroughly ruined by Liam and Xander.

"Watch your step, Xander."

Xander was far past listening. Having harbored resentment toward Cyrus for a long time, the fire in his chest erupted, and he swung a heavy fist straight at that revolting face.

"You bastard, what did you do to her?!"

Xander’s movement speed was terrifyingly quick—fast enough that his body left virtually no visible afterimages.

Yet right before his heavy fist could shatter against Cyrus’s face, the man vanished entirely from the spot.

"What did I do?"

A low, raspy chuckle echoed from behind. Cyrus materialised at Xander’s back like a phantom.

"Naturally, I did whatever I wanted."

Shameless, suit-wearing beast!

Blinded by intense rage, Xander wanted nothing more than to smash Cyrus’s back molars straight out of his jaw.

Cyrus was in no hurry to end it; a rare opportunity to stretch his muscles was a welcome distraction.

Xander ranked as the undisputed second strongest in the entire squad—there was no chance he would collapse after a single trade.

In the blink of an eye, the two clashed all the way up to the rooftop, where howling winds whipped across the observation deck. Under the cold moonlight, the silent Sentinel Tower stood tall and imposing, resembling a giant frozen in time.

They had been trapped in this wasteland for years on end. Endless violence, slaughter, and crushing isolation had long stripped away their last shred of humanity, scattering the ashes across the barren, windblown sands of this ruined planet.

Life was overwhelmingly hollow. They had grown so numb that finding a reason to exist felt utterly impossible.

After all, their ultimate destination was death anyway.

Even among their own kind, each Sentinel existed as a completely isolated island. Their days dragged on in a repetitive, soul-crushing routine—like fish trapped in a shrinking puddle, watching their lives evaporate under a scorching sun as suffocation slowly set in.

Perhaps their only fleeting sense of pleasure lay in the bloodthirsty thrills of hunting Aberrations—a pathetic outlet through which they could validate their survival.

Bunny’s arrival had been an anomaly, but also a startling surprise.

She was a pebble thrown into their predictable, dead-end lives, sending ripples across the stagnant water.

Gales picked up from every direction, blowing their hair into wild disarray as their flying coattails melted into the pitch-black night.

Xander caught his breath in heavy, ragged wheezes, his gaze toward Cyrus sharp with raw disgust. "A beast like you should have been crushed into fertilizer by the military, not exiled to a wasteland to keep tormenting people."