Help! I Do Not Want to Guide a Disaster

Chapter 143: Halo Was... Nice

"I think my phone has been hacked," Pei Luo suddenly said, pulling Wenzhi and Duan Ze’s attention. They had been left alone in the living room while the Espers were doing who knows what somewhere else in the safehouse.

After eating breakfast together, everyone had decided to do their own thing. Wenzhi had been idly texting Chenxi, Duan Ze was completely focused on his laptop, and Pei Luo had been pacing around, on and off calls with different people.

There hadn’t been much conversation except for Wenzhi and Duan Ze occasionally speaking to each other about faction business until Pei Luo abruptly brought up the hack statement.

"I think that is how the Old Blood found out that we were planning to meet with Wenzhi," Pei Luo continued, staring down at his screen in disbelief.

Wenzhi didn’t even look up at first, his tone flat. "That’s rather convenient."

Pei Luo stiffened. The harsh reality finally set in, and he realized with absolute certainty that Wenzhi did not trust him at all.

Wenzhi, seeing that realization dawn on the other Guide’s face, rolled the lollipop back into his mouth before continuing. "Look. I do not care if you are with the Old Blood in or not. As long as we are in this together to destroy them, it’s all okay."

"Why would I lie about the Old Blood hacking into my phone?" Pei Luo asked, a deep frown carving into his face. In a sudden burst of frustration, he tossed his phone directly onto Wenzhi’s lap. "Take it and check for yourself."

Wenzhi looked down at the device resting on his thigh, then slowly looked back up at Pei Luo. "I do not want to check."

"And I do not care if you trust me or not!" Pei Luo snapped.

"Then why are you so worked up, huh?" Wenzhi asked smoothly. He picked up the phone and carelessly threw it right back.

Pei Luo caught it against his chest as Wenzhi rose from the couch. Duan Ze looked between the two of them, his lips parting like a child stuck in the middle of watching his parents quarrel, but before he could squeeze a word in, Pei Luo spoke first.

"I am not worked up," he retorted, his voice trembling slightly with suppressed rage. "I am just telling you that Su Zheng and I are not with the Old Blood. Even though you have been betrayed by Zhaohe, we aren’t her. I do not even know why you seem to doubt us when it is because of you and Xinyuan that I lost everything."

Wenzhi, who had already begun turning away to leave the room, stopped dead in his tracks.

The casual indifference bled entirely out of his posture. The living room suffocated under a sudden, freezing silence.

Wenzhi slowly turned back around to look at Pei Luo, his grey eyes narrowing into sharp, icy slits. "Is that so?"

"What is going on, guys?" Duan Ze asked, his voice completely helpless against the heavy tension.

"Am I lying?" Pei Luo demanded, his chest heaving as he stared Wenzhi down.

Wenzhi let out a long, slow sigh, the sharp edge of his anger giving way. "I’m not a jerk, okay? You helped me. You lost everything because of it, and me saying sorry isn’t going to fix any of that. But you absolutely cannot blame me for not trusting you right now. We aren’t like we were before."

"And why is that?" Pei Luo asked, his frown deepening as he looked at Wenzhi with a mix of hurt and intense frustration. "Halo was... nice. Back when we weren’t just getting swallowed up by all the mainstream violence."

"So we just miss our quiet times in Halo? Is that what’s getting us all worked up?" Duan Ze interjected, a relieved smile breaking across his face. He looked visibly relaxed now that it was clear his friends weren’t actually going to start throwing punches at each other.

Pei Luo raised a single brow, a subtle admission that Duan Ze had hit the nail on the head.

Wenzhi sank back down onto the couch, his posture loosening. "We can’t go back. Might as well deal with what is right in front of us."

Pei Luo gave him a long, intense look, his voice dropping into something steady and sincere. "I am your friend, Wenzhi. Way before Xinyuan, way before Zhaohe... you can trust me. I promise you I would never betray you. Besides, they hurt me. Might as well hurt them back."

Wenzhi stared at him for a second, then gave a slow nod. "That’s comforting."

Duan Ze smiled, looking thoroughly satisfied that the peace had been brokered, before he immediately turned his full attention to Pei Luo. "So, Kaiwen told me that you and Su Zheng are married."

Wenzhi definitely hadn’t expected that. His eyebrows shot up. "Oh?"

"Yeah," Pei Luo explained, a sudden, genuine wave of excitement breaking through his rough exterior. "We met after I ran away, right when I realized the Old Blood was hunting me down after... everything. It was a rough time, but we bonded, and it turned out our compatibility was insanely high. Eighty-eight percent. And apart from that, just look at her, she’s gorgeous. Who wouldn’t want to marry her? I was honestly stunned when she actually agreed."

Both Wenzhi and Duan Ze just stared at him, their expressions twin masks of quiet amusement at how quickly the Guide had turned into a smitten husband.

But the light moment was cut short. Wenzhi’s phone buzzed sharply in his pocket. He pulled it out, his amusement instantly evaporating when he saw the sender’s name on the screen.

[Chenxi: You guys have to come back. Zhaohe’s gone.]

Wenzhi immediately snapped to his feet, his fingers flying across the screen as he shot a reply back.

[Wenzhi: What do you mean gone?]

The response came almost instantly.

[Chenxi: I mean she left, boss.]

"What’s wrong?" Duan Ze asked immediately, picking up on the sudden shift in Wenzhi’s demeanor.

"Zhaohe left," Wenzhi said, his voice flat and hard. "We have to go back."