Chapter 34: Earlier Than Expected?

The ominous words displayed on the encrypted terminal screen refused to leave Rhaevia’s mind.

The message had not simply stated that she was awake, but that the 3S Guide had awakened earlier than expected. That single distinction carried a heavy weight. It implied a calculated timeline rather than a random twist of fate.

Rhaevia stood silently beside the high viewport of the flagship’s medical wing, her arms crossed tight against her chest as distant stars drifted past the dark glass.

Someone within the sprawling interstellar network had anticipated her awakening long before it occurred. Someone had been waiting for her dormant mental pathways to fracture.

Her slender fingers slowly tightened into pale fists against her sleeves. How could anyone have predicted such a phenomenon?

She had never spoken to a soul about the terrifying changes occurring within her physical core. She had never mentioned the disjointed memories that belonged to a completely different lifetime.

Most critically, she had never revealed to anyone that she was not truly the original Rhaevia Rythundeir.

She was a transmigrated soul, a female general who had fought through the apocalyptic end of Earth, slaughtered mutated hordes, and delivered the final blow to the Zombie King.

Yet she had opened her eyes inside the body of a twenty-year-old noble daughter abandoned on a restricted death world.

Her eyes darkened into icy pools as she stared into the cosmic void. What had truly happened to the fragile girl whose body she now inhabited?

The question had lingered in the dark corners of her mind since the moment she woke up on Planet V-17. Transmigration should have been an impossible anomaly, yet the fragments of the original girl’s suppressed memories painted a far more sinister picture than simple bad luck.

She remembered the vague memories of a cold testing chamber, the humming diagnostic instruments, and the harsh whispers of adults discussing an E-rank classification.

She remembered the crushing despair of a girl deemed useless trash by imperial society, followed swiftly by a secret abduction and disposal. Was that tragic sequence of events truly a string of coincidences?

Rhaevia slowly closed her eyes, letting her analytical mind dissect the timeline. What if the original awakening test was never an accurate measurement? What if the weak, pathetic rank recorded in the imperial registry had been a deliberate fabrication from the very beginning?

Her eyes snapped open, a sharp light flashing across her dark pupils.

"What if..." she began softly, her clear voice cutting through the quiet room.

Major General Raevor Veyr, who had been standing several meters away reviewing tactical intelligence data on a transparent tablet, immediately looked up from his work. His dark, piercing gaze locked onto her still frame.

"What is it?" Raevor asked, taking a slow step toward her.

Rhaevia turned away from the viewport to face him directly. "What if my original mental rank was never E-rank to begin with?"

A heavy, suffocating silence settled over the private observation chamber. Raevor’s dark brows drew together as his analytical Sentinel mind processed the staggering implication.

"You suspect your initial academy diagnostic test was manually falsified?" Raevor questioned, his deep voice dropping into a low, serious register.

"I don’t merely suspect it," Rhaevia replied, her posture completely erect and unyielding. "Whoever sent that transmission knew I would eventually awaken as a 3S Guide. That means they were fully aware that something extraordinary existed inside this body long before I ever set foot on V-17."

Raevor placed the heavy data tablet onto a nearby metal console with a soft metallic clink. "If your official E-rank rating was an artificial cover..."

"Then someone deliberately suppressed my mental pathways using high-level military technology," Rhaevia finished flatly, her tone devoid of fear.

Raevor’s strict expression hardened into pure, unyielding steel. "Why go to such extreme lengths against a young noble daughter?"

Rhaevia did not offer an immediate answer because another troubling question loomed far larger in her mind. Who had authorized her original kidnapping and abandonment on Planet V-17?

The original girl had been snatched from the capital star domain and dumped on a restricted death world that had been closed to the public for over three centuries.

Why leave an allegedly useless E-rank Guide on a planet infested with high-density Zerg swarms? Why hide her physical form in a forgotten sector of the galaxy?

Most importantly, why had the ancient, subterranean facility buried beneath the wilderness recognized her biological neural signature as a Sovereign?

Every single truth she uncovered only dragged her deeper into a web of ancient secrets and high-level military treason.

Suddenly, the data tablet resting on the console emitted a sharp, high-pitched chime. A brilliant red alert banner began pulsing rapidly across its translucent display interface.

Raevor immediately glanced down at the incoming diagnostic feed. "Rhaevia," he said, his tone carrying an edge that caused her to instantly turn back toward him.

"What did you find?" she asked, walking over to the console with swift, fluid steps.

"My intelligence team managed to bypass a secondary encryption layer," Raevor explained, angling the holographic screen toward her line of sight. "This deep file was heavily buried beneath your initial academy intake records."

Rhaevia leaned in close to inspect the glowing blue characters floating in the air. The header displayed an official Imperial Military administrative seal stamped with classified clearance codes.

[PATIENT: RHAEVIA RYTHUNDEIR]

[AGE AT TESTING: 16]

[AWAKENING ASSESSMENT: RESTRICTED]

Her breathing stilled slightly as Raevor tapped his personal clearance key against the terminal frame, forcibly cracking the final security firewall. The corrupted data stream unraveled, revealing a single, deeply archived medical evaluation report.

Rhaevia’s dark pupils contracted sharply into tiny points. The original medical report from four years ago did not contain a single mention of an E-rank baseline.

The system interface explicitly showed that someone had manually overwritten the original telemetry ledger with false administrative inputs.

Beneath the altered classification code was a single line of partially recovered diagnostic text:

[ORIGINAL MENTAL ENERGY READING: UNCLASSIFIED]

[AWAKENING POTENTIAL: [LEVEL BLACK CLEARANCE REQUIRED]

Rhaevia stared silently at the glowing text, her heart thumping heavily against her ribs. The evidence was irrefutable. Someone had systematically hidden her true potential long before her soul ever transmigrated into this physical frame.

They had locked away her existence, classified her power, and thrown her to the monsters on V-17 when the suppression began to fail. Someone high within the Imperial hierarchy had known exactly what she would become if she ever woke up.

Raevor closed the file interface with a sharp flick of his wrist, his dark eyes locking onto her calm face. "They didn’t abandon an E-rank failure, Cadet Rythundeir. They attempted to erase a threat to the throne before it could mature."

Rhaevia met his gaze, her lips curving into a cold, dangerous smile that belonged to a battle-hardened general. "Then it seems their plan failed spectacularly, Major General."