Chapter 120 – Sentinel & Guide: Becoming Your Exclusive Guide – Tang Tang Is Making a Move (10)
After a warm and cozy meal, Herslet and Bai Tang took a walk in the courtyard.
They didn’t talk much, simply held hands. The silver moonlight cast a gentle glow over them, peaceful and beautiful.
“Ah He, are you going to the front lines?” Bai Tang suddenly asked, recalling a part of the plot where Herslet goes to the front lines, his fate uncertain, and is ultimately rescued by the female lead.
“Mhm, the timing isn’t confirmed yet. But when the battle against the Zerg comes, it’s unavoidable,” Herslet replied, pausing in his steps.
Bai Tang hesitated, as if deep in thought. Then he raised his little face and asked, “Then can you take me with you?”
In Bai Tang’s view, Herslet was a responsible sentinel. His duty was to protect the Alliance. Bai Tang couldn’t ask him to avoid the battlefield—but at the very least, he could go with him, right?
“No,” Herslet immediately refused. “The front lines are too dangerous. Be good, Tang Tang. Wait for me at home.”
“I don’t want to. I’m your guide—I can help you,” Bai Tang replied seriously, his small face unusually stern.
Herslet studied him for a long moment. Then the boy continued, “If you don’t take me, I’ll sneak there on my own.”
After all, he had experience running away—and with Qiu’er’s help, no one would be able to catch him.
After a long silence, Herslet finally sighed in resignation and rubbed the boy’s soft hair. “Fine, I’ll take you. But you mustn’t run around. Stay put in the back.”
“Mm-hmm!” Bai Tang beamed, tugging Herslet back toward the manor.
A couple of days later, Zerg activity grew increasingly rampant. Many people were attacked in their sleep at night. The Zerg entered the city through underground tunnels, sneaking into civilian homes. Families living on the ground floor suffered the most losses.
Strangely, even the underground areas of Border City were supposed to be protected by defensive installations. The Zerg weren’t smart enough to avoid them completely by sheer luck. The only explanation was that there had been sabotage—someone inside the defense division had betrayed them.
When this news broke out, many people were shocked.
Who was the traitor? Why would someone help the Zerg?
Soon, they thought of Simona—the one who had betrayed humanity and defected to the Zerg.
If a human was indeed helping the Zerg, it wouldn’t be surprising that they managed to bypass the defenses.
But the real question was: how did Simona know the layout of the defense system?
Could it be that…
Everyone’s gaze turned toward Hirslett, whose expression remained calm.
In front of him sat a well-behaved young boy, whom he was currently feeding desserts to.
When the boy was full and gently pushed him away, Herslet popped the leftover cake into his own mouth.
Everyone: Brother, could you at least act like a suspect?! Also—let go of that boy and let me do it!
“My study is indeed missing one defense map,” Herslet admitted directly.
The moment he said this, the room erupted in an uproar.
The chief stepped forward and questioned him sternly, “Herslet, are you admitting that you’re the traitor?”
“I discarded that map on purpose—because it was a fake,” Herslet replied fearlessly, meeting the chief’s eyes without flinching.
The chief was once an outstanding sentinel.
He had retired to the rear due to injuries, but his vast experience fighting the Zerg made him the ideal person to lead the defense division.
“What?” The chief looked momentarily flustered but quickly regained his composure.
“Do you have a plan, Herslet?” A flicker of suspicion passed through the chief’s eyes, but when he looked up again, he was once more the composed and respectable leader.
“If you had a plan, why didn’t you say anything? We nearly misunderstood you…” the others chimed in.
Bai Tang gave a small yawn, sleepiness overtaking him.
Herslet gently took the boy’s hand and said something that left everyone in shock and suspicion: “I already know who the traitor is.”
It was 8 p.m. now. If things went as expected, the traitor had likely already contacted the Zerg—and tonight, they would make a move to steal back the Zerg queen.
After leaving the meeting room, Bai Tang asked curiously, “So… who is the traitor?”
Herslet leaned down and whispered a name into Bai Tang’s ear. Bai Tang’s eyes widened in shock.
“Really? Then that means…”
Before Bai Tang could finish, Herslet stopped him.
“That’s just awful,” Bai Tang said angrily. “How could he do something like that? Isn’t he human too?!”
From within a patch of grass, a pair of shadowy eyes stared fixedly at the two of them.
The pair remained unaware. After grumbling a few more complaints to the sentinel, the boy left.
Under the moonlight, the storage room holding the Zerg queen was heavily guarded. Traps and mechanisms surrounded the area, and sentinels were on high alert.
Half of the top-ranked sentinels were stationed there—Herslet not among them.
Meanwhile, the Zerg queen, previously guarded by sentinels, had actually been moved elsewhere.
Herslet raised his wrist and warmly said goodnight to Bai Tang.
“Goodnight~” the boy replied, hugging a squirrel plushie nearly as big as himself, rubbing his sleepy eyes.
The next moment, the call ended, and Herslet’s face turned stern and resolute.
His fingers tapped rhythmically on the table as he silently counted in Arabic numerals.
He was waiting for someone—that person should’ve noticed by now.
Bai Tang, however, didn’t go to sleep as Herslet had instructed.
In a flash of white light, a small squirrel crawled out from underneath the oversized plushie.
“Qiu’er, I’m ready. Let’s head over quickly.” The little squirrel climbed onto the windowsill, the breeze ruffling his fur.
“Got it!” the system replied cheerfully, and instantly teleported its host to Herslet’s location.
Herslet had deliberately chosen a different site for the real queen’s storage—and he hadn’t told anyone, not even Bai Tang.
Bai Tang had cleverly used their communication to let the system pinpoint Herslet’s location.
There was bound to be a battle tonight—otherwise, Herslet would never have sent Bai Tang away.
Bai Tang had come to deeply understand this: his dear hubby always tried to protect him no matter what.
A black shadow silently crept toward the Zerg queen.
Just as it was about to succeed, a white wolf suddenly leapt out and clamped its jaws tightly onto the black figure.
It was a snake—a sentinel’s spirit form.
The white wolf bit down hard on the snake’s weak spot.
The serpent thrashed left and right, writhing in pain, but couldn’t break free from the wolf’s grip.
“Still not going to come out?” Herslet said to the empty darkness ahead.
From the shadows, the director stepped forward, wearing a sinister smile.
“As expected of someone from the Shelley family—your observation and judgment are always this sharp. But tell me, how did you know it was me?”
Villains die from talking too much. Heroes miss opportunities for the same reason.
Though Herslet had never heard of this saying, he had no intention of explaining anything.
“Does it matter? The moment you stood against humanity, you became the enemy.”
The director barely had time to react before Herslet struck—fast and hard—sending him crashing to the ground.
But both of them were sentinels.
Once the director recovered, he dodged Herslet’s next punch and counterattacked.
He hadn’t come alone. While the two were locked in combat, Simona quietly arrived.
But the Simona of now could hardly be called human.
Her exposed skin was covered in tiny needle-like protrusions, her complexion an unnatural bluish hue, and behind her trailed a long insect-like tail from her tailbone.
She lashed out with her tail at the white wolf.
In the split second the wolf loosened its grip to dodge, she snatched up the Zerg queen.
Simona smirked triumphantly and glanced at the two evenly matched combatants.
But in that brief moment of distraction, a small figure dropped from mid-air and snatched the queen right out of her hands.
Simona whipped around—only to find that a squirrel had ruined her plan.
She recognized that squirrel—it was Bai Tang’s spirit form!
Time and again, he had ruined her plans, even causing her to become this half-human, half-insect monstrosity she now was.
“Tang Tang, the female lead has her eyes on you,” the system warned.
The next instant, Simona’s long tail came crashing toward him.
Bai Tang leapt from left to right, using his agility to dodge her relentless attacks.
Simona was furious—again! Always like this!
Bai Tang always managed to dodge her no matter how hard she tried.
Meanwhile, in the fight outside, the director was gradually being overpowered.
He shouted into the room, “Take the queen and go!”
Herslet brought the director down with one decisive move, but when he turned around, he saw the black snake coiled tightly around a small figure—it was the squirrel!
Tang Tang’s spirit form—how could that be…
A spirit form is a part of its host. If it is seriously injured or destroyed, the host will suffer severe backlash—possibly even death.
“Let him go,” Herslet said coldly.
Simona stared at Herslet’s handsome face. It was probably the first time she had seen him so truly on edge.
The little squirrel was being squeezed tighter and tighter. The white wolf bared its teeth nearby, growling—but didn’t dare take a step forward.
Then Herslet realized something was wrong.
That wasn’t just Bai Tang’s spirit form—that was Bai Tang himself!
The bond between sentinel and guide allowed him to sense it. He could feel that Tang Tang was in deep pain.
A faint phantom began to appear around the little squirrel’s body—the spirit form was trying to manifest, unable to bear the pain.
“You give him to me, and I’ll give you your man. One for one,” Simona said coldly.
“Otherwise, I’ll kill him.”
Herslet tightened his grip on the limp, dog-tired director and stepped forward.
“You let him go.”
“You first.”
The two sides stood in a tense standoff.
The little squirrel was already being squeezed so tightly by the snake that its eyes were rolling back. Bai Tang felt like he could no longer breathe—his nose was completely starved of air.
“We release at the same time,” Herslet said firmly, unwilling to waste more time negotiating.
Just as he threw the director toward her, Simona also ordered the snake to release the squirrel.
Herslet instinctively moved to catch him—but halfway through the air, the squirrel was suddenly wrapped up in a strip of blue-green, soft flesh.
Simona? There was no way she would let go of someone she hated so deeply.
He had fallen into her hands—she wasn’t going to just let him go. Impossible.
The white wolf sprang forward with all four legs, leaping up to bite down on the retreating insect tail.
Simona cried out in pain and loosened her grip just slightly—enough for the white wolf to grab the squirrel by the scruff and carry him back to Herslet.
Simona still had a shred of reason left. She knew she couldn’t win this fight, and she wasn’t planning to drag it out.
With the Zerg queen and the director in tow, she fled.Herslet didn’t pursue. His only concern was Bai Tang.
The little squirrel lay limp in Herslet’s palm while the white wolf paced nervously nearby. There was almost no weight in his hand.
He gently shook the little squirrel, and then noticed something was wrong—its form was fading.
It was just a spirit form. It wasn’t really Tang Tang.
The white wolf didn’t understand. It saw the squirrel disappear and thought it had died. It let out a soft, mournful whine. Herslet closed his eyes, focusing on Bai Tang’s mental presence.
It wasn’t strong—but it did carry a message, faint yet clear.
He stood up, looked in the direction Simona had fled, gritted his teeth in frustration, and muttered: “You little troublemaker.”