Chapter 21

Wen Yan had no desire to argue the point—he really was that inept. He clutched Liang Wangyou even tighter in his arms, yet fretted that too firm a grip might wake the boy, while too loose a hold risked him tumbling out. Furtively, he kept shifting his position.

After a smooth half-hour drive, the car pulled up to Oak Bay.

“Wake him up.” Liang Shijing spoke without muffling his voice any longer, yanking his suit jacket away in one decisive motion. Wen Yan clapped his hands over Liang Wangyou’s ears. “Why not let him keep sleeping?”

“He still needs a bath.”

“Can’t we bathe him asleep?”

“Do you want to spoil him even more?” Liang Shijing reached out and started patting Liang Wangyou’s cheek—pat, pat, pat, pat. The boy grumbled and stirred faintly, his face turning pink! Wen Yan seized the alpha’s fair, slender hand. “How about letting him sleep a little longer?”

Liang Shijing lazily lifted his eyelids and eyed him for a few seconds before switching to his other hand and resuming the patting… In a surge of irritation, Wen Yan huffed but held his tongue.

After several more pats, Liang Wangyou stirred groggily awake and blinked open his reddened eyes. Wen Yan seized the moment. “Little You, will you sleep after your bath?”

With Liang Wangyou’s usual sunny disposition, he’d surely agree—but Wen Yan never saw it coming. The boy’s mouth suddenly crumpled, and he burst into tears. In a mere one or two seconds, his wails swelled to a piercing volume. Just as Wen Yan leaned in to soothe him with a hug, Liang Wangyou sobbed his way upright and burrowed straight into Liang Shijing’s arms.

Liang Shijing gave his back a simple couple of pats, and the crying stopped instantly. He slumped against Liang Shijing’s chest and drifted right back to sleep.

…So he recognizes people even in his sleep.

Wen Yan was left speechless.

For so many days, Liang Wangyou had stuck to him like glue—waiting in the corridor each morning, tagging along to the Botanical Garden and Amusement Park, chattering endlessly, seeming to adore him so much… And yet, there was no true dependence after all. Their closeness was just a superficial, everyday bond. When the night deepened and he truly needed comfort, it was Liang Shijing he sought. In the haze of being jolted awake, he chose him without hesitation.

An inexplicable, unstoppable sourness welled up in Wen Yan’s nose.

“Let’s go.” Liang Shijing carried him out.

The childcare workers waiting outside the car hurried forward and took Liang Wangyou, bearing him ahead to tuck him in. The path’s ground lights glowed like hazy clusters of warm mist. Wen Yan trailed silently behind Liang Shijing, the dark red bricks slipping past his eyes and underfoot. The neck ring’s pain had never saddened him, nor had the scant time remaining—but the warmth Liang Wangyou stole away when wriggling from his arms hurt so terribly.

He stumbled slightly on the steps.

“I didn’t know he’d react like this tonight,” Liang Shijing said, steadying his elbow.

Wen Yan understood. Liang Wangyou’s deep reliance on Liang Shijing meant the man must have poured so much into him. Far from abandoning the boy to the childcare workers amid his hectic work, he must have cared for him hands-on—like that night, cradling the hand-sore child in the quiet depths of midnight and murmuring comforts no one else knew of. Because of all that, Wen Yan felt his own anger was utterly baseless. Little You, the child, hadn’t thrown a fit, yet he, the adult, had sulked for days.

“I’m not crying because I’m jealous of you,” Wen Yan said, wiping the corner of his eye. “I’m not trying to steal him from you either. I am a little sad, though I don’t even know why… Sorry…”

“I won’t blame you.”

“You must be exhausted, right?” After a pause, Wen Yan said softly.

“No.” Liang Shijing gripped his arm and guided him up the steps, denying it flatly. “Raising him doesn’t take much effort, and I don’t have much time to spend with him anyway. Most of the credit goes to you. Weren’t you just as independent as a child?”

Wen Yan lifted his thinly reddened eyes. “What?”

He had heard it clearly enough—he just wanted Liang Shijing to say it again.

After changing out of their shoes, they settled onto the large sofa in the entry hall. A gentle evening breeze whispered across their faces; the straight expanse of the Oak Corridor stretched beautifully into the night. Liang Shijing spoke in a low voice as he unfastened his cufflinks, his deep, crisp timbre utterly captivating.

“Liang Wangyou was raised almost entirely by the childcare workers before he turned three. I didn’t spend much time with him. Those years were insanely busy—I simply didn’t have it to spare. At most, I’d bring him to the Chief’s Mansion, where he’d eat, sleep, repeat, always amusing himself.”

“He’s very smart, just like you—always quick to grasp what others mean.”

“I traveled constantly back then. I’d tell him I wouldn’t be home for the next few days. He couldn’t talk yet, so he’d pull out these number cards and make me pick. The childcare workers said he’d toss one away each day, and once they were gone, he’d wait by the door.”

Wen Yan’s eyes went distant, the scene playing out in his mind.

Liang Shijing went on in his flat tone. “He loves space-themed toys. Give him one, and he’ll occupy himself all afternoon. Tremendous focus, iron self-control—if you say stop at a certain time, no tantrums. All just like you: committing words to memory in silence, then acting on your own.”

“Sometimes I worry he’s lonely, but he always finds ways to entertain himself,” Liang Shijing said. “Once he learned to talk, he called every servant’s phone in the place until he reached the Chief’s Mansion, demanding to speak to Liang Shijing.”

Wen Yan laughed, and in his haze, it seemed a faint smile tugged at Liang Shijing’s lips.

“Big ideas for such a little guy. Later on, he even bossed the bodyguards into bringing him over. He’d arrive, see I was working, and not disturb me. Tired, he’d tuck himself in. Awake, he’d hobble out with his shoes on the wrong feet and ask when I’d be home…”

Wen Yan’s smile froze for an instant.

“He used to look just like you. These last few years, less so,” Liang Shijing said evenly. “Grow him a bit more, and you get what you see now: nothing uniquely standout, nothing that needs special mention. Seldom sick, seldom in trouble…”

“Thank you.” Wen Yan’s spirits lifted once more, light as air, on the verge of floating away.

“Didn’t you want to see his childhood photos?” Liang Shijing’s index finger tapped his thigh, abruptly shifting gears.

“Can you show them to me?”

“Tomorrow. It’s too late tonight.”

The harmony between them felt especially warm that evening; they parted with goodnights in the corridor. Wen Yan ambled slowly to the edge of the terrace outside his room, bathed in cool moonlight. The grass beneath the night sky took on an inky green hue like lichen; where skyline met horizon, a brilliant, hazy ribbon of the Capital’s nightscape gleamed. A cool breeze teased his hair tips, tickling his earlobes.

Liang Shijing’s low, resonant voice lingered in his ears… No matter how those death-defying foreign media branded him—“dictator,” “New Policy Chief,” “autocrat,” “defender of the old aristocratic clans,” terms laced with backhanded praise—Wen Yan had never bought the rumors about the man.

His parents had died in an “accident” during his youth. His enemy ascended to the throne of power. After years of patient endurance and suffering in the shadows, he finally achieved his great revenge—yet he might have savored only those fleeting few days of joy before tumbling headlong into the treacherous whirlpool of an omega’s pheromones.

By all rights, following such a brutal path of growth, Liang Shijing should have matured into a man with a shadowy personality, careening down the same path of madness as Wen Zecheng. But his true character had no connection to any of that. He was simply too intelligent and powerful for anyone else to presume to judge or critique. That reputation for being sharp-tongued and caustic was nothing more than the impotent resentment of those who could only gaze enviously at his back.

Beneath that icy, unyielding exterior lay a hidden softness unknown to the world. He had reserved it entirely for Oak Bay…

When the topic turned to Liang Wangyou, those cold, piercing eyes warmed with sincere affection, and his thin, straight lips curved into a fond smile. There was none of his usual aggression or severity. Wen Yan reflected that if, all those years ago, Liang Shijing had ignored his wishes and forced him to bear Liang Wangyou not out of a desire to torment or avenge himself, but simply to give that softness a place to reside… then no matter how devastating the side effects of those sedatives he’d been given, or how rapidly the neck ring was now hastening his gland degeneration…

Wen Yan welcomed it all with open arms.

Liang Shijing was nothing but a complete victim, a truly good man through and through. He had never done anything wrong. Wen Yan hoped from the bottom of his heart that Liang Shijing would have a wonderful future…

He prayed for it earnestly.

Late into the night, he returned to his bedroom and went to sleep, eagerly anticipating tomorrow. Liang Shijing had promised to show him photos of Liang Wangyou from when he was little…

The next day dawned under a clear blue sky, in the Oak Bay first-floor laboratory.

“Director Hu, here’s this month’s surgical research report.” A team member rushed over, breathless.

“Any other reports that need signing? Bring them all at once.” Hu Li rolled over in his chair and bellowed toward the bustling lab.

At the lab benches of varying heights, several team members dropped what they were doing upon hearing him. They frantically sanitized their hands with quick-dry alcohol, then streamed out through the disinfection corridor. Papers rattled and printers whirred as they churned out reports and summaries, clutching the steaming sheets and jostling forward in a noisy scrum.

“Director! Sign mine first—the reaction crucible’s about to blow!”

“No good, the experiment reaction window is only three milliseconds!”

“Me, me, me! Director Hu, listen—Level One toxic gas is leaking!”

Who could believe this was the elite Alliance Top Medical Team? They were all paragons of serenity when bonuses were being handed out, but the moment signatures were needed, they turned into raving maniacs, spinning tales of Oak Bay’s imminent doom. Hu Li grumbled inwardly that this was exactly how they’d driven him to premature baldness. He scrawled his approval in a illegible mess across the stack. When he reached the medicine inventory list, his eyes flicked rapidly over it. “Why are two bottles of strong painkillers missing?”

“Huh?” One team member, lollipop bobbing in his mouth, shoved to the front. “Missing? I didn’t snag any to munch on.”

The inventory was logged by the junior-most team members, and the quantity column plainly showed two bottles short starting a week ago. Hu Li stared at the stark date in black and white, and unbidden, the memory surfaced of that afternoon when Wen Yan had come to see him. He slammed his palm on the summary sheet, shot to his feet, and barked, “Let it explode if it’s gonna explode. Let it leak if it’s leaking. Even if the world ends, I’m heading to the Chief’s Mansion first!”

Chief’s Mansion

“Chief, Hu Li’s here. Says he has something important to report.” Cheng Zhu knocked lightly on the half-open door, his voice steady and unruffled.

“No time right now.” Liang Shijing turned from the window, phone still in hand.

“It’s about Mr. Wen,” Cheng Zhu said.

“Let him in.” Liang Shijing ended the call wordlessly, strode back to the desk, pulled out his chair, and sat.