“…Could you maybe…” Chi Zhan struggled to say, “Button up your shirt?”
Qi Song glanced over at him.
His gaze wasn’t as sharp and imposing as the Crown Prince’s, nor was it laced with Cen Chi’s honeyed blade-in-a-smile gentleness, or Chu Xingxiao’s blunt directness. Instead, it was like a deep, bottomless pool—concealing every emotion beneath its surface.
Chi Zhan couldn’t read him at all.
It was the first time Chi Zhan had felt like he’d met his match.
He still remembered—back in the orphanage, he’d always been highly attuned to others’ emotions. Whether adult or child, whether they liked or disliked him, he could sense it immediately.
That sensitivity had become his greatest weapon. At the Intelligence Division, it made him thrive. He’d always been able to use a gentle mask to extract the information he wanted—never once failing.
But Qi Song? Qi Song was a mystery he couldn’t decode.
What was he really thinking? Sometimes it seemed like he was indulging him—was that… affection? But other times he was distant, even cold. And he was terrifyingly good at psychological manipulation.
They were both students from the Intelligence Division, but Chi Zhan knew he couldn’t match Qi Song’s unflinching composure. In that respect, he had already lost.
Qi Song was still watching him—as if he wouldn’t stop until he got an answer.
The more you talk, the more mistakes you make.
Chi Zhan sighed inwardly. He clearly still lacked polish. Just a few words, and he’d already been steered into a corner—forced to scramble for a way out.
Wait… was S interrogating him?
That thought jolted him.
This posture—it’s just like the standard interrogation stance. Immobilize the subject, then dismantle their mental defenses one layer at a time until the truth spilled out.
Well then… he couldn’t tell the truth.
No. Way. He had to win this.
“Why do you want to know?” Chi Zhan shifted the momentum with a counterattack. “Even if he did something, isn’t that normal?”
He still didn’t know what Qi Song was trying to get at. All he could do was guess and push back.
“After all, we’re dating now. I know he’d never hurt me…” Chi Zhan added lightly, as if joking. “S, are you jealous?”
Qi Song said nothing for a long while.
Chi Zhan had only been teasing. They’d only met a few times—he didn’t seriously believe Qi Song had feelings for him. Maybe it was just some Alpha possessiveness?
Chi Zhan didn’t know much about Alphas. He only knew they had a strong sense of territory—sometimes even showing possessiveness toward their friends. But as a Beta—well, a former Beta—he really couldn’t follow their logic.
And Qi Song didn’t seem like a typical Alpha. His emotions barely fluctuated. Chi Zhan had never once questioned that he was a Beta. Honestly, when Qi Song claimed he was an Alpha, Chi Zhan half-suspected he was lying.
But that guess, by sheer accident, was dead-on.
No Alpha would ever back down from someone who bore another Alpha’s scent—especially a rival’s. As long as the Omega wasn’t permanently marked, they’d fight for them to the bitter end.
Such things were rare now. Most Omegas married straight into monogamous bonds as adults—there weren’t many tug-of-war cases anymore.
Chi Zhan didn’t pay attention to tabloid drama. No wonder he was clueless about all this.
A knock came at the door. It must be the food. Chi Zhan glanced at the clock. Sure enough—thirty minutes had passed.
“You can let me go now, right?” Chi Zhan said breezily. “Can we call it even?”
“—Yes.”
Qi Song’s reply came suddenly. And before Chi Zhan could even register which question he was answering, Qi Song leaned down—just as the server opened the door—and kissed him.
***
“Hey, where’d he go?”
Tao Ran had been worried all day about Chi Zhan’s condition, even during class. When his messages went unanswered, he picked up some medicine and returned to their dorm—only to find it completely empty.
“Don’t tell me he went back to the training field…” Tao Ran muttered to himself. Growing more anxious, he went around asking classmates if they’d seen him.
Just when his worry peaked, Chi Zhan returned.
Tao Ran rushed over, full of concern—but Chi Zhan’s response was oddly dazed, his expression unfocused. Tao Ran assumed it was just a side effect of being sick and urged him to lie down and rest.
The room’s pheromone traces had completely dispersed—not a single whiff remained. But when Chi Zhan closed his eyes, the memory still burned vividly:
Qi Song’s lips on his own.
One hand gently shielding Chi Zhan’s eyes, plunging him into total darkness—so he never saw how much the waiter had witnessed. Yet that kiss… felt like it had flipped some deeply buried switch inside him.
Just like before, his mind erupted with an avalanche of unfamiliar images—uncountable flashes of scenes he’d never lived through. He couldn’t make them out clearly, but he knew one thing: the main characters were him and Qi Song. And they were doing things that had never happened in real life.
Qi Song pulled away from the kiss and looked into his eyes. Chi Zhan, breath unsteady, gasped, “You…Have we met before?”
Qi Song’s expression faltered—just for a split second.
But in that moment, Chi Zhan knew. Qi Song had understood what he meant. They had known each other before—somewhere, somehow.
Yet Qi Song shook his head, as if to dismiss the idea as nothing more than Chi Zhan’s imagination.
“No.”
Chi Zhan wanted to argue. But when the words reached his lips, he hesitated.
He couldn’t remember what he’d seen just now. The images were already fading like a dream, vanishing too quickly to grasp.
That wasn’t normal.
From the moment Cen Chi had marked him, nothing had been normal.
“Are there any side effects to temporary marking?” Chi Zhan asked aloud.
Tao Ran paused to think.
“Yeah, I think so. Omegas might develop dependency on the Alpha who marked them… crave their pheromones… and there’s also potential for depression, anxiety, even hallucinations.”
Hallucinations.
That word hit Chi Zhan like a hammer. Maybe everything he’d just seen—those strange images—were nothing more than post-marking side effects. The thought brought him a slight, fleeting sense of relief.
As for the other side effects…
