A Guide to Raising Snake Spirits - Chapter 19

Guanyue Xi was indeed planning to give that Teacher Lu a taste of his own medicine.

Back when he was a student, he hadn’t bothered because it was too much effort. Now, however, he didn’t have to worry about GPA or graduation, so he had plenty of ways to mess with the man.

The black-haired guide scrolled through his cloud storage. Eight years’ worth of scattered data and random files were piled together, but he eventually found what he was looking for from his eighth-grade archives.

After browsing for a moment, a satisfied expression appeared on his face. He saved the find into his email drafts.

He wasn’t going to send it just yet, though, because he had a class to teach.

In the classroom, Baishi Qing’s ears perked up at the sound of approaching footsteps the moment he felt the mental link activate.

A guide’s footsteps were very distinctive. They landed lightly, yet carried a slight rustling sound of friction. It often made people imagine the person walking had a somewhat lazy personality, someone who didn’t even want to lift their feet fully off the ground.

Sure enough, a familiar figure entered the room a moment later. It was the same black-haired guide he had seen that morning. Now, he had transformed into a teacher, wearing a professional uniform trench coat with an approachable smile and a shallow dimple on one side of his face.

Because Baishi Qing had sensed Guanyue Xi’s approach through their mental link, he remained relatively calm when he entered.

The other three in the room, however, were a different story.

Rendong, the sentinel with the explosive curly hair, poked his partner frantically. His eyes practically screamed, “Isn’t that Baishi Qing’s guide?”

Ye Ran, annoyed by the constant poking, leaned his body away in pain to escape Rendong’s harassment.

The class monitor also looked surprised, glancing back and forth between Baishi Qing and Guanyue Xi.

The black-haired guide had used some method to hide the scent of combined pheromones on his body. This meant that aside from the monitor’s group who already knew, the other students remained oblivious. Even if they could smell the scent of lemon on Baishi Qing, they wouldn’t associate it with Guanyue Xi as long as he kept his own pheromones tucked away.

Rendong was fidgeting in his seat. He wanted to open his mouth but didn’t dare. When you discover the new teacher is “involved” with your bro, do you stay silent to keep the secret, or do you blab and get beaten to death by said bro?

Ye Ran swallowed his words and pretended he knew nothing.

Baishi Qing watched with a complicated expression as his guide walked up to the podium, opened the lecture notes, and introduced himself.

Apart from the few who knew the truth, the other sentinels were mostly curious, observing the new teacher with fresh interest.

Guanyue Xi had been teaching lower grades for a week now, so he was already a pro at this. The students in the special class were generally older and easier to manage, at least compared to the talkative third-graders.

As he lectured, he occasionally made eye contact with the students. To play the part fully, the black-haired guide didn’t go out of his way to look at Baishi Qing, nor did he intentionally avoid him.

“I just mentioned that there are three essential points to basic piloting theory. What are they? Can anyone answer?” Guanyue Xi opened the roster on his terminal, his finger sliding across the virtual screen. “I’ll pick someone at random.”

His gaze and fingertip brushed past Baishi Qing’s name. Guanyue Xi looked up and met Baishi Qing’s eyes, which were already fixed on him. The guide’s eyes held an unreadable glint of amusement, but his finger didn’t stop. He kept sliding and called on a stranger’s name.

The unlucky sentinel who was called stood up, stuttering as he flipped through his terminal, “The first point is, never let your eyes leave the control panel…”

The professional Teacher Guanyue finished class right on time and headed to his new workspace.

The Tower provided decent benefits for teachers. Even a student teacher like Guanyue Xi was assigned his own small cubicle. Since the special class was far from the lower-grade building, he was given a new office in this block.

Just as Guanyue Xi was touching his new desk with a sense of novelty, the gray-haired sentinel followed him in.

Guanyue Xi looked up and asked with a smile, “So, are you surprised to see me?”

“Yes,” Baishi Qing nodded. “The scent, how did you do it?”

“There’s a specific pheromone-masking spray,” Guanyue Xi said, seemingly pulling a small bottle out of thin air from behind his waist and waving it in front of Baishi Qing. “Otherwise, what would combined sentinel-guide pairs do on missions? People would sniff them out instantly during a stakeout.”

“Can I see it?” Baishi Qing lowered his eyes. He had been so busy catching up on the basics this past month that he hadn’t had time to look into these niche gadgets.

Guanyue Xi handed it over generously. “Go ahead. It’s used often in competitions and training. If you participate in the upcoming Ghost Catching Contest, you’ll need it too.”

It was a silver metal bottle, only about two fingers wide. Baishi Qing tested the nozzle on the back of his hand. The mist was colorless and odorless, forming a thin film on the skin immediately. Upon sniffing, the scent of pheromones was gone.

Specialized humans could restrain their own pheromones, but they couldn’t control the scent left by someone else during a marking, which is where these props came in.

After examining it, Baishi Qing handed the spray back and asked, “Will you be our class teacher from now on?”

“Yes, Teacher Qiushui told me a few days ago, right after you invited me to, the mental defense class.” Guanyue Xi hesitated for a split second when mentioning it, but continued naturally, “I’ve already found some dirt on him. I’ll report him later.”

Baishi Qing didn’t seem particularly concerned about the disciplinary actions. He hummed in response and then asked, “Will you be spraying that every time you come to class from now on?”

Guanyue Xi, “…”

Guanyue Xi gave an ambiguous answer, “Maybe I won’t later on.”

“Okay,” Baishi Qing replied.

Guanyue Xi actually had something else he wanted to say, but he hesitated, wondering if it was appropriate for him to bring it up. However, not saying it felt even more inappropriate.

The black-haired guide took a deep breath and said, “Actually, your mental domain is much better now, and you aren’t at risk of a mental breakdown anymore. Teacher Qiushui asked if you wanted to move into the Tower’s dormitory. Living there might help you get closer to your classmates. What do you think?”

He felt a bit anxious, worrying that his words sounded like he was kicking him out, but it would be worse if Qiushui were the one to tell him. Fearing the potential awkwardness, he blurted out the whole sentence without stopping for air.

Guanyue Xi waited for a response. But instead of an answer, he only felt the mood on the other end of the mental link plummet.

Guanyue Xi fell silent.

In reality, uncombined sentinels and guides on Planet Specia rarely lived together. Their awareness of secondary genders was even stronger than the awareness of male and female. For ordinary couples, they could get a divorce after having children, but for specialized humans, if they accidentally formed a permanent bond, it was a “till death do us part” situation.

If it hadn’t been for Baishi Qing’s crumbling mental domain at the start, he wouldn’t have stayed in Guanyue Xi’s apartment in the first place.

“Okay,” he heard Baishi Qing say.

Guanyue Xi couldn’t quite remember what they said after that, or perhaps they didn’t say anything at all. When it was time for the next class, the gray-haired sentinel simply went back.

Guanyue Xi swallowed the sentence, “You can come back and stay on weekends if you want.” After all, Baishi Qing’s mental domain wasn’t fully healed yet, so there would be plenty of opportunities to talk later.

Then again, since he had no plans for a permanent bond, maybe it was better to keep some distance.

The black-haired guide awkwardly picked at the corner of his desk, trying to pull himself together.

Thinking about it, he and Baishi Qing were like a landlord and a tenant, with Teacher Qiushui acting as the agent. If the landlord let the agent tell the tenant to move out without saying a word himself, it would be quite rude.

After leaving Guanyue Xi’s office, the gray-haired sentinel returned to his seat and sat down in silence.

His terminal was flashing with red notification dots from a flood of messages, but Baishi Qing wasn’t in the mood to check them. He ignored Rendong, who was winking so hard beside him that his eyes were practically cramping.

The monitor held down the explosive-haired sentinel’s restless hand.

This class was Situation and Strategy, taught by an old guide with snowy white hair. He had to be at least two hundred and fifty years old, and he spoke with such spit-flying passion that his lecturing sounded like a rhythmic, droning incantation.

Baishi Qing, who was supposed to be taking notes, stared at the blank page on his terminal. He hadn’t processed a single word.

Was the guide telling him he couldn’t stay there anymore? It was expected, he and Guanyue Xi were effectively strangers.

Yet, his mind kept replaying the image of the small spray bottle and the way the guide looked when he asked, “What do you think?”

That evening, Baishi Qing went back to pack his things at Guanyue Xi’s apartment.

Guanyue Xi’s door had been repaired immediately after Baishi Qing’s rut ended, but he had still been staying in the guest bedroom recently.

As Baishi Qing packed, Guanyue Xi realized that because the sentinel had stayed for such a short time, he had very few belongings. Everything fit into two bags, mostly clothes. Even as a guide, Guanyue Xi could have easily carried them both.

Guanyue Xi watched him for a while, feeling an uncomfortable nagging sensation in his heart.

He opened his mouth and said to the sentinel, who was zipping up a bag, “Come to my office later, I’ll give you a mental cleaning.”

“Okay,” Baishi Qing gave him a faint smile.

After arriving at the Tower, Teacher Qiushui was waiting at the dormitory entrance. She led him to his assigned single room.

They took the elevator up several floors and walked down a hallway before stopping at a door. Qiushui told him to scan his terminal. He tapped his wrist against the sensor, and the door slid open.

“This is your room,” Teacher Qiushui introduced warmly. “Your neighbor is Xiang Heng. You two should be quite familiar by now, right?”

“Thank you, Teacher Qiushui,” Baishi Qing said, holding his two bags.

“You’re welcome. It’s getting late, get some rest,” she said with a smile. “If you need anything, just ask the electronic butler. The Tower provides some supplies.”

It wasn’t appropriate for her to stay in the male sentinel dorms for long, so she left shortly after.

Baishi Qing looked around the small room. It had a wardrobe, a desk, a chair, and a single bed. It was small but complete, decorated in a style similar to the classrooms, with one small window.

The gray-haired sentinel didn’t unpack. He uncharacteristically abandoned his usual sense of order and simply flopped onto the bed, staring at the ceiling.

He reached up and covered his eyes.

Just now, when he saw the narrow metal sliding door of the dorm, all he could think about was the dark automatic door at the guide’s home.

In his mental domain, the green anaconda crawled into the hollow of the central giant tree, hiding back in the darkness and coiling into a large mass.

Actually, not much changed after the move. Guanyue Xi still taught the basic piloting class and accompanied him to the mental defense class. Sometimes, he would call Baishi Qing to the office for a mental cleaning.

They saw each other quite often. The black-haired guide still smiled when they met, and they made eye contact during class. The guide’s grayish-blue eyes, like lake water, were the same as ever.

The student teacher’s office didn’t have a comfortable sofa like Guanyue Xi’s home, only two chairs facing the desk. Usually, they would each sit on one side and close their eyes. A skilled guide didn’t need physical contact to find the mental domain.

But they no longer went home together.

One day after class, Guanyue Xi returned to his apartment.

The sentinel had taken himself and his belongings away completely. The guest room looked as if no one had ever lived there, and even the door the sentinel had broken had been restored to its original state.

The black mamba slowly climbed its climbing rack, hanging there like a piece of dried snake meat.

Guanyue Xi had a dream again.

This time, it didn’t seem to be Baishi Qing’s dream, but his own.

When specialized humans first awakened, their spirit bodies weren’t fully mature. They often started in an egg form, hatched, and then grew slowly.

Guanyue Xi remembered that when he was eleven or twelve, the black mamba was just a tiny snake egg. Later, it hatched into a small snake before growing into the long one it was today.

But the dream was different. This egg was huge, larger than both of young Guanyue Xi’s hands. He had to hold it in his arms.

Young Guanyue Xi had read in a book that there was a large bird in the desert with eggs twenty centimeters wide, but he felt this egg was even bigger.

Holding the egg, young Guanyue Xi was talking to someone, “How long will it take to hatch?”

Another childish voice replied, “A month if it’s fast, maybe half a year if it’s slow.”

“What about this egg? Is it fast or slow?”

“It should be slow,” the other person seemed unsure, their voice hesitating. Then, as if afraid he would be anxious, they added, “But maybe it will be very fast.”

“Fine, I want to be the first one to see it when it hatches!” Young Guanyue Xi sighed like an adult. “I want to know what it looks like.”

“I’ll let you see,” the voice said.

Guanyue Xi didn’t remember if he ever saw it. In fact, if not for this dream, he wouldn’t have remembered this memory at all.

He even doubted if it was a real memory or just a chaotic dream fabricated by his brain.

Guanyue Xi rubbed his neck, climbing off the sofa in pain. He had accidentally fallen asleep there, and the consequence was waking up with a stiff neck.

The best way to judge a vague childhood memory was to ask his parents.

After he was discharged from the hospital, his parents had continued their tour of the galaxy. It seemed their travels were more biological to them than their own son.

Guanyue Xi sent a message to his mother.

[Guanyue Xi: Mom, do you remember if I had any playmates who were specialized humans when I was a kid? Or did I ever mention a big white egg?]

His parents were ordinary people and couldn’t see the eggs of spirit bodies, but they should still remember things.

Actually, Guanyue Xi found it strange. He seemed to be at an age where he hadn’t awakened yet in the dream, but he was holding an egg. Could it be that it wasn’t a spirit body egg, or was the dream just distorted?

He waited a long time before his mother’s reply reached his terminal. When he opened it, he was speechless.

[Mom: I can’t really remember, honey. The signal is bad where we just arrived. Why don’t you go home and check the photo albums yourself? Love you, muah!]

Taking advantage of the weekend, since Baishi Qing was no longer staying with him, Guanyue Xi took the express maglev home.

The infrastructure on Planet Specia was efficient, and this line was already back in service. However, the previous explosion had left him with some psychological trauma. Sitting on the maglev, he kept worrying it might blow up again. This time, there was no second sentinel around to catch him.

Fortunately, probably due to the gruesome state of passengers after the last explosion, all seats now had emergency seatbelts. It was less comfortable, but the safety factor seemed much higher.

Guanyue Xi was anxious to get home. The hour-and-a-half journey felt like sitting on pins and needles. He then remembered his mom suggesting the albums while his dad had claimed they were water-damaged. He hoped he wasn’t making a trip for nothing.

It wasn’t until he reached the study and stood before the bookshelf that Guanyue Xi breathed a sigh of relief. All the albums were neatly lined up on the top shelf, labeled by year, with no signs of damage. In his eyes, these albums suddenly felt more like family than his own parents.

His dad must have organized this. His mom never touched housework or tidied up.

The black-haired guide pulled over a ladder, climbed up, and took down everything from age five to fifteen. Fearing he might have misjudged the age in his dream, he took a wide range.

Guanyue Xi opened the albums eagerly.

His family used high-end electronic albums. These were storage hard drives with electronic screens, claiming to last five hundred years without damage. All the photos were moving images, preserving the owner’s most vivid moments.

Support A Guide to Raising Snake Spirits