In December, a powerful north wind snapped a dead branch and sent it crashing into the window with a sharp crack!, drawing everyone’s attention.
Everyone in the hospital room looked over at once, then turned away again.
What a dull winter.
“Ome-7, Ome-9, and ge-12 are all elevated. About how long have you been overdosing on suppressants?”
The doctor stood beside the bed holding a thick stack of reports. Several items on the page he was reading had been circled in red, so he had clearly reviewed it beforehand.
Those three readings were telltale signs of suppressant overuse in an Omega.
The man propped against the headboard had a refined face gone pale with illness, his unkempt hair falling softly over his forehead. He lifted his eyes to the doctor and replied flatly, “About three years.”
The doctor asked, “What dosage?”
Lu Sili said, “Three injections.”
The doctor looked startled. “Three every time?”
“No. I only started using three last year,” Lu Sili explained, then added, “And it isn’t three every time. Usually it’s still two.”
“Two is already an overdose,” the doctor murmured. Frowning, he kept turning through the reports before stopping on another page. “You can’t keep doing this. It can cause all kinds of complications. Have you been getting frequent headaches, nausea, dizziness, and loss of appetite?”
Lu Sili nodded silently.
“How have you been sleeping?” the doctor asked.
Faced with the doctor’s blunt questioning, a trace of resistance entered Lu Sili’s exhausted gaze. “Insomnia.”
“Are you taking anything for it?”
“Sleeping pills.”
The doctor’s frown deepened.
This frail-looking Omega had practically collected the full catalog of unhealthy habits.
The doctor thought for a moment. “We’ll run a few more tests first thing tomorrow morning. Once the results are out, come see me in the Department of Secondary Sex Characteristics.”
“My surname is Jiang.” The doctor pointed to his ID badge, then could not resist adding, “Mr. Lu, you really need to start taking your health seriously.”
Lu Sili suddenly looked up. “If I have the gland removed, will this stop happening?”
The doctor paused before answering, “If the gland is removed and you stop using suppressants, then yes, the situation wouldn’t be this severe.”
“All right. Thank you, Dr. Jiang.”
The doctor checked Lu Sili’s IV, then turned and left.
This time, Lu Sili had fainted outside and a passerby had brought him to Municipal Hospital.
Winter was Lu Sili’s least favorite season: perpetually cold hands and feet, a body more prone to illness, and roads that always turned filthy and slushy after it snowed.
Even the smell of disinfectant mingling with the hospital heating was unpleasant.
Lu Sili took out his phone and was about to call his assistant, Fiona, to ask about the year-end gala when he heard Dr. Jiang call out, “Dr. Su,” outside the ward.
He turned and caught sight of two people from behind. Dr. Jiang looked exactly like the sort of doctor patients instinctively trusted, while the man beside him could hardly have looked more different.
Lu Sili gave a rather mean little laugh, withdrew his gaze, and called Fiona.
Things were not going smoothly. After ending the call, he made several more calls to coordinate everything. By the time he came back to himself, a nurse was crying out in alarm.
“You!” The nurse cut herself off, swiftly closed the roller clamp on the IV tubing, and pulled out the needle.
“You have to keep an eye on your IV too. Look at this…”
The IV tubing was full of Lu Sili’s blood.
Lu Sili’s other hand was still resting on his laptop keyboard. He genuinely had not noticed a thing, so all he could say was, “Sorry. Thank you.”
His entire body felt awful, the place on his lower back where he had injected the suppressant was swollen and aching, and he had been buried in work. He truly had not noticed the tiny abnormal sensation in the back of his hand.
The nurse was helpless. This patient had been hospitalized for two days. She had heard he was an executive at a major company, and he was handsome too, so at first some of the younger nurses had come by just to take a look.
None of them had expected him to be an Omega, though, or for his personality to be so aloof.
“Director Lu?”
Fiona’s voice came through his earphones.
Lu Sili flexed his left hand, swollen and mottled from so many IVs, and snapped back to attention. “I’m here. I’ll handle the Jiaqing matter. I’ll meet with President Xia from Jiaqing tonight.”
Fiona said, “The doctor said you can’t be discharged until tomorrow.”
Lu Sili said, “I’m already much better. If I really can’t manage, I’ll come back after the meeting.”
“Director Lu…” Fiona sounded helpless.
Lu Sili knew what she was about to say and hurried to cut her off. “Don’t tell Grandma. Help me make an appointment with President Xia. Never mind, I’ll do it myself. Go home early once you’re done with work.”
Without waiting for her reply, Lu Sili hung up, got to his feet, packed away the laptop he had brought to work on, and took a taxi home to change for the evening meeting.
On the way home, Fiona messaged him to say that she was already heading to Lu Sili’s house and would go with him to meet Jiaqing’s boss.
As it turned out, Fiona had made the right decision. By the time the dinner meeting ended that evening, Lu Sili threw up on the way home.
After taking his medicine, Lu Sili collapsed onto the sofa. “You should go home and rest.”
The floor lamp beside the sofa was dim, its cool light falling across the left side of Lu Sili’s face. He was so underweight that his cheek was slightly hollow, making him look even more sickly beneath the cold-toned light.
Fiona reminded him that he had to return to the hospital the next day. Lu Sili stared at his phone without looking up and gave a faint hum of acknowledgment.
“If you don’t go, I’ll tell Teacher,” Fiona said.
Lu Sili lifted his eyes to her, his expression practically accusing her of playing dirty. In the end, he sighed softly. “I know.”
Fiona looked at Lu Sili as though she wanted to say something but hesitated.
“What?”
“Sometimes I think Teacher is absolutely right.”
“About what?”
“If you don’t get married, you could die at home and no one would even know.”
Lu Sili laughed and raised his right hand. “My smartwatch will call for help.”
Fiona sighed helplessly, picked up her bag, and left.
The two-story duplex villa was completely empty, without so much as a mouse. Lu Sili curled into the sofa and gently closed his eyes to rest.
This was already the third time he had fainted this year.
For an unpartnered, unmarked Omega working in the entertainment industry, there were simply too many unstable factors. Lu Sili did not allow himself to make mistakes.
Nor did he want to be controlled by pheromones.
Even though he was already thirty, Lu Sili still occasionally remembered the night, twelve summers ago, when he differentiated into an Omega.
Before that, everyone had assumed Lu Sili would certainly differentiate into an Alpha. How could the son of two Alphas possibly become an Omega?
Lu Sili had been lively, athletic, and tall since childhood, yet it took him an entire summer before he dared stand in front of a mirror and look at the organs that had changed so abruptly.
He had even wondered whether he was really his parents’ biological child, but both the test results and the doctors told him everything was normal.
Genes could be inherited from earlier generations. Two Alphas could indeed have a child who differentiated into an Omega, although the probability was extremely low.
For a long time, Lu Sili could not accept the truth. During his first heat, he remained painfully aware of the pheromones surging through his body. He panicked so badly that he locked himself in the bathroom, and the torment of the heat eventually drove him to hurt himself.
But life went on. Fortunately, medicine was advanced now and there were plenty of suppressants to choose from. Lu Sili went abroad for university and gradually found a rhythm that worked for him.
After graduating, he joined Film&Age’s US headquarters. He returned to China two years ago and was now F&A China’s Director of Distribution, responsible for film-rights sales, publicity and promotion, theatrical distribution, and other business in the Chinese market. The company also published F&A Film Times. F&A did not rank among China’s top five distributors, but its films were consistently high quality. It was the sort of small, selective company that prized quality over scale.
There were plenty of Alpha performers and industry professionals in entertainment. To keep them from affecting his work, Lu Sili used increasingly large amounts of suppressants, progressing from oral medication to injections, then from one injection to two, and this year, occasionally three.
Combined with an intense workload and irregular schedule, his health had steadily deteriorated. It had become noticeably worse after he crossed into his thirties.
But Lu Sili had no intention of getting married, especially not now.
His career was on the rise, and when his grandmother urged him to marry, what she really wanted was for him to find someone who could take care of him.
From Lu Sili’s perspective, that did not sound unreasonable at first. But why should anyone else have to do that? Why should someone marry an Omega in poor health who was constantly busy with work?
That would be far too unfair to the other person.
Early the next morning, Lu Sili went for the two tests Dr. Jiang had ordered. One was a gland examination that required drawing blood from the gland area with a very fine needle. Lu Sili was not afraid of having blood drawn, but the gland was sensitive and the pain was much sharper there. By the time he endured the procedure to the end, he was covered in cold sweat.
The nurse drawing his blood was an older woman. She put away the needle and picked up a blocking patch to cover the gland area.
“Hm?” The nurse gave a small sniff, then immediately realized how rude that was to a patient. She suppressed her curiosity at once and applied the blocking patch.
Her hands were warm. Once the patch was in place, she gently massaged around the puncture site a few times and reminded Lu Sili, “Don’t peel it off for two hours.”
Lu Sili nodded and got up to leave.
The nurse tidied her instruments, picked up the labeled blood tube, and turned it to look at the pheromone-scent entry. It read: burning cypress.
“A woody-scented Omega… burning… could it be…”
Municipal Hospital was the largest Grade-A tertiary hospital in Licheng, and plenty of people were waiting for the elevator. Lu Sili stood at the outer edge of the crowd.
He did not get into the first elevator. There were simply too many people.
Lu Sili thought to himself that he really should avoid public hospitals in the future. They wasted so much time and offered no privacy.
“Lu Sili.”
Someone called his name.
Lu Sili turned around. A doctor in a white coat stood there holding two blue folders.
Every button on the white coat was fastened. Underneath it he wore a pale-blue crew-neck sweater over a white shirt, and even the shirt was neatly buttoned all the way to the collar.
He wore silver wire-rimmed glasses. His nose was straight, his eyes gentle, and his skin looked good too. He had the face of someone who lived an extremely healthy life.
“Mm…” Lu Sili found him vaguely familiar, but could not remember his name.
The other man noticed and showed neither embarrassment nor annoyance. Instead, he smiled gently and explained, “Su Yuan. Su Yuan from Class 2 at Yingnan No. 3 High School.”
Lu Sili remembered now. They had been classmates, although he did not have much impression of him. He could only give a polite, professional smile. “Su Yuan. Long time no see.”
Su Yuan smiled, lowering his gaze briefly before looking up again. “Yeah. It must have been twelve years. What brings you to Municipal Hospital? Are you feeling unwell?”
“Just a minor problem. I came in for some tests.” Lu Sili had barely finished speaking when the elevator doors opened. It was crowded inside too, but the people near the doors shifted to make a little space, and the two of them stepped in together.
In the cramped elevator, Lu Sili and Su Yuan were squeezed tightly against each other. Neither spoke. Lu Sili stared at the seam between the elevator doors, where the metal surface held a faint reflection.
Only when he looked at that reflection did he realize that Su Yuan was actually half a head taller than him.
In Lu Sili’s memory, Su Yuan had been skinny and not very tall in school. He had worn thick glasses and always walked with a stoop. Even his face was little more than a blur in Lu Sili’s memory.
He had been the kind of four-eyed Beta who could disappear into a crowd of students like a tile vanishing in a matching game.
In short, there had been nothing particularly distinctive about him. He was hard to notice.
The reason Lu Sili remembered even that much was because, during the first semester of their final year, he and Su Yuan had been assigned classroom-cleaning duty together. Lu Sili had a lot of extracurricular activities back then and was always late. Although he had told Su Yuan to leave his share for him, every time he arrived late, Su Yuan had already finished it.
The elevator stopped again midway and another person got on, nearly shoving Lu Sili straight into Su Yuan’s arms.
Lu Sili’s protruding shoulder blades pressed against the firmness of Su Yuan’s chest. Who would have thought that beneath that restrained, almost ascetic face was such a solid build?
The rise and fall of Su Yuan’s chest and the sound of his breathing were both unmistakable. The elevator heating was too strong, and the hot air steamed Lu Sili’s face red.
When they reached the first floor, Lu Sili stepped out and immediately backed away two steps. “I’ll get going, then. See you.”
“All right.” Su Yuan pushed his glasses up and said goodbye. He knew perfectly well that theirs was the sort of relationship where you said “long time no see” and then, immediately afterward, “see you.”
Su Yuan watched Lu Sili turn away after giving him a polite smile. Only after even his back had disappeared from sight did Su Yuan reach out and press the button for the elevator going up.
After a full day back at the office, Fiona knocked on Lu Sili’s door that evening.
“Come on. Time to go home. Teacher called to ask about you.”
Only then did Lu Sili remember it was Friday. By habit, he was supposed to go home and have dinner with his grandmother. Just thinking about it made his head hurt.
He put down his pen, leaned back in his chair, and looked up at Fiona. “Does she know?”
Fiona said, “She knows. She asked me.”
By the time they arrived, dinner was almost ready. When Lu Sili entered, his grandmother was tending her flowers and plants in the courtyard. He called out to her, but she ignored him.
“Teacher.” Fiona walked over to her. “It’s cold. Let’s go inside.”
His grandmother glanced at Lu Sili and let Fiona support her into the house. She had clearly been waiting for him on purpose, yet she still insisted on sulking at him like this. Lu Sili followed behind them with a helpless sigh.
Once they were nearly finished eating, his grandmother started in.
“If you don’t have time to find yourself a husband, I’ll find one for you. Otherwise, quit your job.”
“Do you think suppressants are good for you?!”
“Look at your face. You’re skin and bones. If you faint and fall, you don’t even have enough flesh to cushion your bones.”
“Lili, don’t just sit there without saying anything!”
Lu Sili had not had much appetite to begin with, and being nagged continuously made the food in his stomach churn. He looked up. “This time was an accident, Grandma.”
His grandmother was so angry she nearly slammed down her chopsticks. “You’ve fainted three times in one year. Do you have any idea how dangerous that is? Stop overdosing on suppressants.”
Lu Sili sipped his soup. “All right, all right.”
Ever since Lu Sili returned to China, marriage had been the centerpiece of every family dinner, and he was thoroughly sick of it.
Before, he had always brushed the subject aside. But this year, even he could feel how drastically his health had declined. The first two times he fainted had happened at home. Fainting in public this time had shaken him, and an idea he had repeatedly put aside because work was too busy surfaced again.
Remove the gland. Solve the problem once and for all.
With that thought in mind, Lu Sili called his private physician after returning to his own home.
A few days earlier, he had fainted outside and been taken to Municipal Hospital by a passerby. The results of the tests performed there had already been forwarded to his private physician, Luke.
“Can you recommend a hospital and a doctor?” Lu Sili asked.
Luke knew Lu Sili’s physical condition better than anyone. He gave a nearly inaudible sigh over the phone. “Shangbei People’s Second Hospital is currently one of the best in the country. After that, Licheng Municipal Hospital and Jianghe City’s Specialized Hospital for Secondary Sex Characteristics are both very good.”
Lu Sili frowned slightly. “What about a private hospital?”
Luke said, “You could use one, but Director Lu, gland removal is a Level IV surgery. In terms of expertise, even the best private hospitals right now aren’t as strong as the three public hospitals I just mentioned.”
Public hospitals were crowded, there was no dedicated person handling everything for him, and privacy was poor. Lu Sili did not like them very much.
But if Luke said so, Lu Sili could only accept it.
“Then help me schedule the surgery. Make it after the New Year. I’m too busy before then.”
“Director Lu.” Luke was helpless at the way Lu Sili talked about a Level IV operation as casually as circumcision. He wanted to explain that gland-removal surgery was high-risk and had physical requirements Lu Sili currently failed to meet in every possible way, but if Lu Sili were the sort of person who listened to advice, he would never have driven his own body into this state in the first place.
After thinking for a moment, Luke went straight for the one thing that might stop him. “Director Lu, gland removal requires written consent from either an immediate family member or a partner.”