100% Match
At that moment, the same possibility occurred to Chiya and Luo Xi: it seemed capable of explaining everything.
Heisha Draven was the first to bring it up. "You felt it too?"
He raised an eyebrow, seemingly unsurprised by the result. Even though he had already had his suspicions, they had become absolute certainty after the captain and Luo Xi came out.
Heisha didn't beat around the bush. "Her match values with all of us are high."
"You could say they're unbelievably high."
Meanwhile, in the cafeteria, Luo Ruzhuo ate as she asked Anna a question she had been meaning to ask for some time.
"Do you think it's possible for a sentinel and a guide to have a 100% match?"
The cafeteria's dishes were different again today. With something on her mind, Luo Ruzhuo ate at a leisurely pace. Anna mistakenly thought she was unhappy with today's food and picked up some of the different dishes from her own bowl to put in Luo Ruzhuo's. She answered without hesitation, "A 100% match? Hmm... it does exist in theory."
Anna knew that, as a newly awakened guide, Luo Ruzhuo didn't know many things that were common knowledge to them, so she answered carefully.
"But it's too ideal a scenario—it hardly ever happens in reality. Do you know what it means? It means two people are perfectly compatible on a mental level. The sentinel's mental barrier won't reject the guide in the slightest, and when the guide enters, purification happens automatically, even if she does nothing."
"Sounds pretty good?" Anna sighed. "But for the guide, the drawbacks outweigh the benefits. The sentinel and guide become extremely exclusive and deeply dependent on each other. Afterward, the sentinel won't accept purification from any other guide, and a long separation could send them both into a susceptible period. Not to mention that if one dies, the other will immediately die as well."
Anna summed it up: "If a guide encounters a sentinel with a 100% match, it's like she's being forcibly bound to him, even though she's willing. It's terrifying!"
She had known quite a few colleagues who, after meeting a highly compatible sentinel at work, resigned from the Black Tower to become his dedicated bonded guide and stay home as a full-time housewife.
Compared with them, Anna preferred her current life, earning her own living by purifying different sentinels.
But Luo Ruzhuo had just had her match values tested, and bringing this up out of the blue made Anna worry that the friend she had finally made would soon be snatched away by a sentinel. She couldn't help asking:
"Dear, did you meet a sentinel with a high match value?"
Luo Ruzhuo tightened her grip on her chopsticks and gave a bitter smile.
"How could I? I don't know why, but there wasn't a single sentinel in the green range on my report. That's why I was curious about what happens when you meet a sentinel with a really high match value."
She was far too unpopular with sentinels! Anna couldn't help feeling sorry for Luo Ruzhuo.
"It's okay. Matching with sentinels in the yellow range is normal for us. Besides, meeting one isn't necessarily a good thing. It means you were born to build a career at the Black Tower!"
But being too unpopular came with risks, and Anna couldn't help worrying. "But, dear, be careful around sentinels who make you feel really bad. If you meet one, check their ID on the official website first to see if they're in the red range. If they are, we have the right to refuse to purify them."
Luo Ruzhuo nodded and picked out some of the food she liked from her own bowl for Anna. "That's really useful to me. Thank you so much, Anna. I'm glad we're friends."
Her new friend was especially straightforward about expressing her feelings. Anna blushed slightly, a little embarrassed to admit that she actually liked that about her, because she couldn't do it herself.
"Oh, right!" She changed the subject a little shyly, but as she brought it up, she became genuinely puzzled again. "That red-crowned crane you purified came to apologize to me?"
"Right." Luo Ruzhuo had only just remembered. "Even though I told him it was fine, he seemed really anxious, so I told him to go apologize to you."
"After all, that male guide really did upset you."
Anna had actually only dwelled on it for a little while. After listening to Luo Ruzhuo, she had tried setting morality aside, and sure enough, she felt much better! She had immediately turned her attention to researching how to purify pollution outside sentinels-
When Lin Sheng came to apologize, she had merely nodded and said she understood.
But if it had been before... Anna thought, a little dazed, she probably would have burst into tears over that apology, like a wronged child finally returning to her mother's arms and feeling seen.
Now, she no longer needed to be seen.
Anna smiled too and said softly, "Thank you, Luo Ruzhuo." She kept the next words in her heart, unable to say them aloud: I'm glad I was able to ask you to be my friend back then, too.
They had a lovely meal, and before they left, Luo Ruzhuo finally remembered to add Anna's optical computer contact information.
Back in her dormitory, Luo Ruzhuo searched the star network for more information about match values.
The proper information was much the same as what Anna had mentioned, and the answers to questions about match values on the Black Tower's website were very official.
Then Luo Ruzhuo clicked into a literary platform and searched for "match value." A pile of book titles appeared on the page: "A high-match sentinel's overbearing love: sweet guide, don't run," "Shocking! My mortal enemy became my life partner after a match value test," "Forcibly bound by match value: three husbands love me every day"...
In the end, she couldn't suppress her curiosity and clicked on one at random. After reading for thirty minutes, she covered her eyes and backed out.
Online works generally reflected some of the specific circumstances of the society of the time:
High match values seemed to be difficult to define in this world. Luo Ruzhuo sensed that the "female guide protagonists" both loved and hated them. They wanted to meet the "him" with a high match value and immerse themselves in a romantic relationship, yet they also feared the married life beyond their control that would follow a forced bond.
Although the various sentinels depicted in every book were extremely respectful of their partners, proud of being bonded, and utterly in love with the protagonists.
But sentinels spent years away from home fighting pollution or doing other challenging work in society. Their lives were closely tied to their guides', and the guides at home couldn't help worrying that one day they would follow their sentinels to the grave.
Unlike the predicament faced by female guides, male guides had a different attitude toward high match values.
Because of their biological sex, male guides rarely developed romantic feelings for male sentinels.
To them, a high match value was merely a bonus. It didn't create an emotional bond that made them feel they couldn't be with anyone else, and the same was true of male sentinels.
Even if they met a highly compatible female sentinel, these male guides wouldn't change their own situation because of it. Instead, they would bring her into their bodyguard team, making it her lifelong duty to protect them.
As a result, in community discussions about guides' purification abilities, those in high positions were often male guides. Most of the Black Tower's upper ranks were male guides as well.
That's so unfair, Luo Ruzhuo couldn't help thinking.
No wonder that male S-rank guide was so arrogant. The whole interstellar society had his back.
Indeed, somewhere Luo Ruzhuo didn't know about, someone was already cleaning up the mess-
At that moment, the Black Tower's special containment facility was in complete chaos. The members of the Firmament Squad looked at one another, nearly driven mad with anger.