From Apocalypse To Entertainment Circle (BL)-Chapter 151: Back To The Mission, Finding The Enemy

The desert stretched endlessly in every direction, an ocean of pale-gold sand dunes that rose and fell like the breathing of some ancient beast. The silence was crushing, broken only by the whisper of wind and the crunch of boots sinking into powder-soft grains. At night, the desert was no gentle place—it became a realm of sharp cold, where the air bit through layers of cloth and the vast emptiness pressed against the chest like an invisible weight.

Kira marched with the squad, her boots leaving faint imprints that the wind hurried to erase. The column of soldiers moved in a thin, cautious line, shadows elongated and skeletal under the pale spill of moonlight. Their breath puffed in faint clouds, quickly shredded by the breeze. Red glimmers from equipment lights flickered intermittently, like restless stars dragged along the sand.

For all the vigilance of her body, Kira’s mind was far away.

She drifted into the mist of memories that clung like cobwebs—fragments so old they had lost shape, so eroded by time and grief they resembled broken dreams more than recollections. Faces she could no longer name flashed behind her eyes. Screams, laughter, iron bars, and fire—all interwoven into a haze she could never fully shake. Each memory was blurred at the edges, as if time itself had conspired to make them mercifully vague, yet the ache they carried was sharp, indelible.

Her steps slowed. The desert vanished. She wandered in that haze, letting herself dissolve into the echoes of a past too heavy to bear and too stubborn to die.

And then—

"Kira."

The sound sliced through the fog, steady and commanding, like a blade cutting silk.

Her name. Spoken with that unshakable authority she knew better than her own heartbeat.

She blinked hard, dragged back into the present as though surfacing from deep water. Her gaze snapped toward the man at the front of their formation—her commander.

Sian.

Even from behind, he was unmistakable. His frame was lean but unyielding, every line of him taut with discipline. His presence seemed to carve order into the very air around him. Moonlight pooled across his shoulders, gilding the edges of his cloak in silver.

The sight of him was enough to scatter the ghosts from her mind.

"Yes, Commander?" Her voice came out smooth, disciplined, not betraying the storm that had nearly carried her away. She left her place in line and approached, keeping her movements sharp, controlled.

Sian didn’t look at her immediately. His dark eyes swept across the men trailing behind them, measuring, weighing. Only after a pause did he lower his voice, quiet but firm enough to slice through the desert hush.

"If we’re attacked... protect the others."

Kira stilled. Of all the orders he could have given, this was not one she expected.

His gaze lingered on the weary squad behind them, lips pressed in a line as if the words tasted bitter. He hadn’t wanted to put it so plainly. He hadn’t wanted to make it sound like she was being reduced to a nursemaid. But he wasn’t reckless enough to gamble. These men belonged to Lan Qisheng. They were competent, yes—but competence in this world was fragile. If an enemy with power appeared, ordinary skill would crumble in an instant.

Sian’s jaw tightened. He couldn’t bear the thought of Lan Qisheng being hollowed by grief, shattered by the guilt of losing men under his watch. Better to risk Kira’s displeasure than allow such a weight to fall on Lan.

Besides, he knew her well. Without a direct order, her instinct would always be to shield him first, even if it meant stepping over the corpses of the others. That was no cruelty—it was survival, etched deep into their bones since their own world burned.

A faint smile ghosted across Kira’s lips, barely there. "Understood, Commander. I’ll keep them alive."

She bowed her head slightly in respect before melting back into formation, her sharp profile once again swallowed by the column of shadows.

The desert whispered beneath their boots.

For a while, no one spoke. The silence pressed in, thick with both the vastness of the night and the unspoken weight of Sian’s command. But Lan Qisheng, walking near Sian’s side, could no longer hold his tongue. His voice came out low, hesitant, yet threaded with unease.

"...Was it wise to bring her?"

Sian turned his head just enough to catch him in the corner of his eye. Lan’s face was hollowed by fatigue, dark circles bruising his gaze, but beneath that weariness lived something deeper—fear. Not fear of the desert or their mission, but of abandonment. Of being left to shoulder burdens alone in a world already merciless.

Sian’s mouth curved faintly, almost dismissive, though not unkind. "It’s fine. Kira may look small, but her combat ability rivals mine. She’s quick. Unflinching. When blood spills, you’ll be glad she’s here."

Lan hesitated, chewing on his lower lip. His question, when it finally came, wasn’t born of idle curiosity. It carried the ache of longing—the need to understand the man he followed so faithfully, the man whose presence filled his chest with something he dared not name.

"You and she... have known each other a long time?"

Sian read the subtext effortlessly. Normally, he would have brushed the question aside, cast it into silence as he so often did. But tonight, with the desert so vast and suffocating, he allowed a sliver of his past to surface.

"When she was taken to the Institute, I was already there." His tone was steady, but each word clanged like iron links. "We became comrades—she, I, and a handful of others. Together, we planned our escape."

A wry curl touched his lips, though his eyes remained cold. "Ironic, isn’t it? We fled one hell only to deliver another. We burned the Institute to ashes and painted its halls red with the blood of those who built it."

The memories slammed back into him with brutal clarity: smoke choking the air, the shrieks of men and women begging for mercy, the corridors slick with crimson.

Lan’s chest tightened. He felt no pity for the slaughtered. What twisted in him was sorrow for Sian—for the cruelty he had endured, for the torment etched into him like scars that no blade could erase.

"...How long were you there?" Lan asked softly, as though fearing the answer.

Sian’s eyes grew distant, their darkness reflecting nothing of the desert moon. "Long enough. Long enough to lose count of days, of months. Long enough to forget what it meant to be human. They experimented on us until names dissolved, until sanity cracked. Some lost themselves completely. Some... forgot their own faces."

The faint smile vanished, leaving only a grim mask. "We knew the world outside might be another kind of hell. But remaining there as tools, as toys for their experiments, was worse. So we turned the power they gave us against them."

He let out a low, bitter laugh—an ugly sound, raw in its hollowness. "Strange, isn’t it, Lan? They forged our strength, and it was that strength that annihilated them."

There was no triumph in his voice. Only the echo of a wound that would never heal.

Lan swallowed the urge to reach out, to offer comfort. He knew some wounds were untouchable—press too close, and the person you wished to soothe would only bleed harder.

The squad pressed on, the night air tugging at cloaks, grains of sand spilling off boots in trickles. At first, the soldiers stayed sharp, eyes darting, rifles gripped tight. But minutes bled into twenty, thirty. No enemies. No movement. Nothing but dunes shifting in silence.

Their discipline frayed. Murmurs rose, bitter as grit between teeth.

"They drag us out here for what?" one muttered under breath.

"...Babysitting freaks," another hissed.

"Don’t trust them. Not her. Not him."

The words spread like a sickness. Distrust thickened, cloaked in mutters sharp enough to cut. Even Lan, walking near the rear, heard the venom in their whispers.

Sian ignored it. His expression remained a mask of calm, unreadable, unshaken. Kira, at the front, heard every syllable yet betrayed nothing—her stride steady, gaze sharp.

Until suddenly—she stopped.

Her body went still, a taut string drawn to its limit.

Her hand snapped upward, fingers cutting the air in a signal older than any of these soldiers, a command drilled so deep it required no voice.

Drop.

The column froze, instinct overriding complaint.

The mutters were strangled to silence. Breathing hitched. Even the desert seemed to be still.

Kira’s eyes narrowed, a predator’s gaze slicing through the dunes ahead. She had felt it—an invisible shift in the air, subtle but unmistakable.

And then they saw.

From the crest of the dune, the desert opened into a vision of unnatural brilliance.

Rows upon rows of vast tents sprawled across the sand, stitched into the shape of a fortress. Men and women moved with mechanical precision, entering and leaving, their shadows crossing beneath the blaze of floodlights. Black-clad guards stood rigid at every corner, statues carved in vigilance.

The camp blazed like a wound in the night. Generators roared, vomiting out power that fed towering lamps. The floodlights split the desert open, turning midnight into false day—so bright it stung the eyes, so stark it stripped the sand of shadow.

To the soldiers, it looked like salvation—an oasis of energy in desolation. But Kira tasted only the danger woven thick in the air, danger so palpable it pressed against the skin like invisible claws.

Behind her, the men shifted uneasily, caught between awe and dread. Lan’s pulse drummed in his throat, his breath sharp.

Kira’s lips curved into a thin, cold smile.

The mission had truly begun.

And somewhere in that blazing fortress of tents and light, death was waiting.

Not all of them would walk back out of this desert alive.