Chapter 3

Wen Yan’s mind was a tangled mess.

He couldn’t leave—not since Liang Shijing had uttered those two words, “No good.” The army stood in neat formation on the sidewalk, waiting at attention. Through the privacy-tinted windows of the official vehicle, he couldn’t tell if Liang Shijing despised his sudden return or regarded it with cold indifference. The mirror-like surface merely reflected his own hesitant face and a vast expanse of blue sky.

Only lovers grew especially red-eyed upon meeting; enemies had no need to see each other at all.

One second of hesitation, two seconds… Wen Yan gripped the door handle, steeling himself to demand answers no matter what. But the official car suddenly roared to life and sped away.

Wen Yan stood frozen in place.

The street fell silent once more in an instant. Behind him came the sound of a door opening. Li Li stood under the eaves of the small building, his face etched with worry. No matter what, Wen Yan couldn’t bring him any more trouble. He mouthed “sorry” and hurried away.

Sunlight bathed the entire Capital. Traffic flowed like a black dragon, merging far off into the high-rises. The roads stretched on endlessly, without beginning or end. Wen Yan drove aimlessly through them. He had no home anymore—no destination, no retreat.

Liang Shijing had cordoned off the street and sharply ordered him away, but that didn’t hurt so much. What truly pained him was “No good.” He couldn’t think calmly about its truth right now. He was too exhausted to flee, starving, with his gland throbbing in agony. If he didn’t rest soon, he might veer off the elevated highway mid-drive. So he pulled into the nearest hotel, checked into a room, showered, swallowed more than his usual dose of painkillers, and collapsed onto the pillow in a dead faint.

When the sunset claimed the sky’s last rays, the doorbell rang.

A waiter stood in the hotel corridor, pushing a meal cart, flanked by two black-suited bodyguards who had materialized from nowhere. Their muscular frames and steely gazes marked them unmistakably as soldiers.

“Good evening, Mr. Wen. Dinner time,” the waiter said with a friendly smile.

Assuming it was standard hotel service, Wen Yan stepped aside to let him in first. In a hoarse voice, he asked one of the bodyguards, “Did Liang Shijing send you? How long have you been watching me?”

“Orders from superiors,” the bodyguards replied stiffly, hands crossed at their fronts. “We are prohibited from speaking with you.”

“Sorry,” Wen Yan murmured.

The hotel desk had been repurposed as a dining table. Under the brilliant lights, the food steamed with mouthwatering aromas. To muster the strength for thought, he needed to eat. Wen Yan took small bites, steadily working through the meal. The waiter hovered nearby the whole time, tapping notes into a tablet with a stylus—likely another soldier in disguise.

Deep into the night, 3:15 a.m.

The balcony door eased open a crack, and a pair of bright eyes peered through the narrow gap.

By chance, Wen Yan first locked eyes with the two bodyguards on the left neighboring balcony. He turned, then met the gaze of the two on the right… He simply flung the door wide and stepped out to assess the situation. Beneath the night sky, every ground-level exit bristled with armed soldiers, while squads of special police patrolled relentlessly back and forth.

He fretted through the night until dawn. Wen Yan tried to leave the hotel, but though the bodyguards shadowed his every move and let him go anywhere, his world remained boxed within the Capital. Even at the pharmacy for barrier patches, they paid ahead of time. When he asked the hotel staff about the deserted premises, they parroted the same refrain: “Orders from superiors. We are prohibited from speaking with you.”

This strange blend of freedom and confinement lasted just two days before Wen Yan’s mindset cracked.

From flat-out disbelief to nagging doubt, then spiraling anxiety over those two words: “No good.”

Did Liang Shijing hate him enough to hate the child too? To abandon the child just because he was “no good”? But they had made promises; Liang Shijing had agreed. If he’d reneged, any mental or physical trouble would be devastating for a five-year-old. The boy might not even pinpoint what felt “no good.” He was so young, too young to save himself.

Idle hands bred wild thoughts, and wild thoughts shattered calm, driving one into blind alleys of irrationality. After pacing countless laps, Wen Yan lunged for the suite phone and punched in the number.

A faint electronic hum, then a flat mechanical voice: “Please enter password.”

Wen Yan typed it in.

“Welcome to the Chief’s Mansion special line. Your location has been logged. This call will be recorded.” A beep, followed by a polite human voice: “Hello, Chief’s Mansion of the Alliance. How may I help you?”

Wen Yan’s lips quivered: “…”

“Hello? How may I help you?” the voice repeated.

“Liang… put me through to Liang Shijing.”

Dead silence fell, like a severed line. Wen Yan knew they saw him as some brazen, disrespectful antisocial type. Liang Shijing deserved the title Chief Liang—and Wen Yan knew it, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it.

Chief. Chief Liang. Chief Wen.

Liang Shijing was the current Chief; Wen Zecheng, his father, the former one.

“This line lacks sufficient clearance,” the voice snapped coldly before disconnecting.

Wen Yan clutched the receiver in a stupor, then dashed to the door, pleading with the bodyguards. “Please, could you call Liang Shijing for me?”

“Orders from superiors. We are prohibited from speaking with you.”

“Not even a phone call?” Wen Yan paced frantically. “Report to your superiors. Liang Shijing—no, Chief Liang—will take my call.”

“Orders from superiors. We are prohibited from speaking with you.”

“I have urgent business with Liang Shijing!” Wen Yan burst out, his anger as harmless as a kitten’s swipe.

“Orders from superiors. We are prohibited from speaking with you.”

“!!”

Sunrise to sunset, nightfall to dawn—days slipped away.

Wen Yan crumbled in silence.

Yet silence was the privilege of those in power. Liang Shijing had ensnared and tormented him with mere scraps of words, without ever showing his face, leaving him dazed, anxious, in agony. The hotel phone went fully dead. The bodyguards now barred him from the room. This eighty-square-meter luxury suite had become his cage. The only voice came from the wall-mounted TV, now airing live coverage of the Alliance Eight-Nation Chiefs Summit.

The camera panned across the spacious, brightly lit conference hall, its red carpet stretching out beneath long tables where the leaders of the Alliance of Eight Nations sat in pristine rows. The Chief of the nation’s most powerful country naturally claimed the head seat. The broadcaster delivered a solemn report on the planning of space jump points, and the camera smoothly pulled back to reveal the full panoramic view.

Liang Shijing sat at the head of the table in a sharp, structured black suit—double-breasted with six buttons, the bottom two left open. The premium fabric clung perfectly to his broad shoulders and narrow waist. His hands were crossed on the conference table, exposing, thanks to those undone buttons, a strikingly minimalist diamond tie clip shaped like an oak leaf against his abdomen. Flecks of brilliant fire sparkled across the screen in tiny glints.

Wen Yan stared at the tie clip in confusion. The longer he looked, the more his head throbbed.

But even more striking than the gem’s brilliance was Liang Shijing’s impassive face—features of superior quality, brows and eyes sharply handsome. Flanking his table on either side sat the leaders of other nations, ranging in age. Against their backdrop, he stood out all the more exceptionally. The audio feed muted one leader’s speech, and Liang Shijing’s expression remained utterly neutral, as if he were listening while somehow remaining utterly detached.

Moments later, the other seven leaders cast their votes on the “Regulations on Live Replacement of Artificial Glands” proposal. Staff members placed seven crisp white documents before him.

Liang Shijing twisted off the cap of the pen beside his left hand and scrawled the decisive word: “Reject.”

The proposal ultimately failed to pass, but Wen Yan paid it little mind. He racked his brain for a way to reach Liang Shijing, his thoughts drifting off into the ether. If not for the influence of his pheromones, once Wen Zecheng’s true nature came to light, he would never have had the chance to cross paths with Liang Shijing. And without that, there would never have been a child between them.

Three days of restless torment later, the bodyguards delivered an electronic tablet. Its photo album held three short video clips.

The first one:

Sunlight poured through a light blue, anti-slip corridor, flooding it with clear, brilliant light. The close-up shot glided smoothly to the end of a classroom. Through the one-way glass, Wen Yan spotted twelve children, about five or six years old, seated with their backs to him.

Being an Alpha was a feeling all its own.

Amid the sea of small backs, Wen Yan’s eyes locked instantly on one little boy. He sat ramrod straight, his hair neatly styled in handsome, short spikes. His ink-green school uniform, styled like a tiny suit, was ironed without a single wrinkle. Everything about him was small—his little head, his little shoulders and back, his little elbows—all combining into one tiny person.

Wen Yan paused the video and watched it over and over for a very, very long time.

The second one:

In a distant shot at sunset, a vast grassland stretched across the center of rolling hills. From the right edge of the frame emerged Little Alpha, dressed in equestrian gear and a black obstacle helmet. He led a pure white warmblood pony step by step toward the middle of the scene. One boy and one horse against the sunset—it was beautiful, like a painting refined by the passage of time.

Little Alpha mounted with crisp efficiency, gathered the reins, and soon they were off in a steady trot—clip-clop-clip-clop. Amid the coach’s infrequent corrections, delivered in a low-frequency murmur, Wen Yan cranked the tablet’s volume to maximum and scrutinized the coach’s lip movements. He pieced together hazy phrases in a daze:

“Little You, steady your support.”

“Little You, check the reins—drive the steps.”

“Diagonal traverse.”

Wen Yan murmured the words to himself.

The third one:

A fixed high-angle shot overlooked an empty indoor ski arena. Little You was bundled head to toe in ski gear, snowboard tucked under his arm as he reached the top of the 35% advanced slope. He set the board down and checked the bindings.

By this point, tears were spilling onto the back of Wen Yan’s fingers.

Little You knew so many things and could handle so much on his own. But he had always been alone.

In the video, “Little You” finished inspecting his gear, then edged sideways and launched down the slope with rock-solid stability. The camera tracked him closely. Wen Yan could clearly see his gloved little hands, the precise lean of his spine as he shifted direction—the howling cold wind almost seemed to whip across his own face. Then, out of nowhere, Little You glanced back over his shoulder. His eyes, shielded by black goggles, pierced straight through the lens, locking onto Wen Yan behind the screen.

It was the first time Wen Yan had seen Little You’s face. But panic flooded it in an instant. With a resounding crash, Little You slammed into the safety netting and vanished in a burst of flying snow.

The tablet flipped and clattered to the floor. In the dizzying whirl of the screen, Wen Yan bolted for the door, shouting in blind panic, “I need to see Liang Shijing!”

This time, the bodyguards offered no rote prohibition on conversation. Instead, they stepped aside respectfully. “Please.”