The end-of-class bell rang, and Duan Xiyan immediately got up and headed to the school infirmary.
Given how high Yu Zhen’s fever had been earlier, he probably still needed to rest for a while, but Duan Xiyan intended to check on him anyway, just in case he needed anything.
People are always exceptionally fragile and in need of companionship when they are sick; this was a prime opportunity to repair their classmate relationship.
However, Duan Xiyan did not expect that the moment he stepped into the infirmary, before he could even walk toward the inner room with the hospital beds, the school nurse called out to him. “Hey, classmate, the boy from the other room already left.”
Duan Xiyan paused, stunned.
He had been running such a high fever just a moment ago, yet he had already left on his own? But Yu Zhen had not gone back to the classroom, so where did he go?
“When did he leave?” Duan Xiyan asked.
“A while ago, about ten minutes. Why, didn’t he go back to the classroom?” The nurse frowned.
She had heard rumors floating around the school, including talk about a sophomore Omega who lacked pheromones, meaning he suffered from AO gender identity disorder. The moment the student earlier had asked for a suppressant, she instantly connected the two.
Even though that young boy lacked pheromones and could not be marked, he was still ultimately a fragile Omega. Plus, he was very good-looking, and wandering off alone during his physiological period could spell trouble if anything happened.
Receiving Duan Xiyan’s negative answer made the nurse grow anxious.
“Oh dear, how can he wander around during his physiological period? Go look for him quickly.” If she had not been the only one on duty today and unable to leave, she would have rushed out to look for him herself.
Hearing the phrase “physiological period,” Duan Xiyan froze.
He had assumed Yu Zhen was simply running a fever; he had not expected it to be his physiological period.
Basic knowledge about this world from the original owner’s memories instantly surfaced in his mind: an Omega’s physiological period, commonly known as heat, indeed involves running a fever.
The image of Yu Zhen curled up in the restroom stall, flushed all over, flashed across Duan Xiyan’s mind.
No wonder Yu Zhen’s expression had been so strange just then.
With no time to ask further, Duan Xiyan turned and left the infirmary.
It had only been ten minutes, and given Yu Zhen’s condition, he could not have walked far; he should still be somewhere on school grounds.
Where would he go?
The original owner did not have Yu Zhen’s contact information, but there was one person who might be able to reach him: Yu Zhen’s friend from the competition class, Lu Qifei.
Yet the thought of Lu Qifei’s guarded, keep-away attitude made Duan Xiyan hesitate.
Just then, the class bell rang.
Well, now the feasibility of asking Lu Qifei for help plummeted even further. No need to hesitate anymore.
Amid the ringing of the class bell, students lingering outside the teaching buildings hurried toward their classrooms. Duan Xiyan pondered for a moment and walked toward the only building where no students went.
[D: Do you know any places in the school where nobody usually goes?]
[Wu Hu: The rooftop, the small garden… wait, no, sneaking couples go to those places.]
Wu Hu was utterly baffled by Duan Xiyan’s out-of-the-blue question, but he still searched his mind.
[Wu Hu: I remember now. There is one place nobody would ever dare to go.]
At this, Wu Hu deliberately kept him in suspense.
Duan Xiyan could not wait: [Where?]
[Wu Hu: There is a laboratory on the top floor of the science building. An explosion happened there years ago and people died, so it got sealed off. They say every night you can hear faint crying coming from inside, along with clattering explosion sounds.]
It was a classic campus ghost story trope, making Duan Xiyan’s eyelids twitch heavily and his heart skip a beat.
In his past life, Duan Xiyan had lived in a sanatorium. While funerals were not happening every other day, he would occasionally run into gurneys draped with white sheets being pushed down to the basement sub-level when taking the elevator.
He had even almost become one of the people being pushed away himself.
Logically speaking, seeing it often enough should make one indifferent, and he should not be afraid of such things. Yet, of all things, Duan Xiyan was most terrified of ghostly, unsubstantiated nonsense.
How did that saying go: firmly disbelieving, while simultaneously firmly terrified. That was exactly what Duan Xiyan was like.
Duan Xiyan’s heart strongly resisted, but deep down, he had a hunch that Yu Zhen was in that haunted laboratory.
Approaching noon, the sun blazed brightly. Duan Xiyan looked up at the nearby science building, where Boston ivy climbed and covered the entire wall, vibrant green.
They said that ivy always grew exceptionally well on buildings with heavy yin energy.
Under the bright sun, Duan Xiyan shivered out of nowhere.
He forced himself to look away, ignoring the ivy, and braved his way toward the science building with a somewhat rigid gait.
The science building had five floors. When he climbed to the third floor, Duan Xiyan felt as though he had used up all the courage accumulated across both his lifetimes.
Because nobody had visited in a long time, the hallway was desolate. Through the thick dust-covered windows at the stair landing, he could vaguely see the ivy leaves outside, their swaying green shades seeming to exude something eerie.
In April, when the temperature was gradually warming up, Duan Xiyan wrapped his arms around himself, rubbing the goosebumps on his arms through his school uniform jacket.
The hallway was too vast; he kept having the illusion that someone was following right behind him. Every time he stopped to listen closely, it turned out to be just the echo of his own footsteps, with nobody else around.
When he finally climbed to the top floor and stepped out of the deadly stairwell, before Duan Xiyan could even catch his breath, he grew even more on edge.
An ancient tree of unknown age next to the science building had a canopy that rivaled the roof. Untrimmed, luxuriant branches reached over the guardrail into the hallway. To Duan Xiyan at that moment, they looked like countless ghostly hands reaching inside.
He had no choice but to hug the wall, though he did not dare lean too close, after all, who knew which room among this row of empty laboratories was haunted, and whether leaning too close would lead to a sudden head-on collision with something?
Duan Xiyan swore he would pass out immediately, right then and there, on the spot.
The long hallway felt like the gaping maw of a man-eating monster. Duan Xiyan’s throat tightened, and every step felt like a march to his doom.
As he walked further, the wall began to change; the color of the paint showed a clear fault line. It was obvious that section of the wall had been repainted later.
Duan Xiyan mustered his courage and reached out, gently picking off a fingernail-sized piece of the new paint to reveal the charred remnants of an explosion underneath.
Duan Xiyan’s expression tightened.
Right at that moment, a rustling sound came from behind, and a dark shadow rushed forward amidst swaying tree shadows.
“Ah! Stay away!” Duan Xiyan slammed head-on into a window. Whether due to age or disrepair, the window burst wide open from his impact!
Yu Zhen woke up precisely at that moment.
The moment he opened his eyes, a teenager clinging to the window frame, holding his nose and closing his eyes tightly, came into view.
With a blank mind upon waking up and the discomfort of his physiological period, Yu Zhen thought he was hallucinating or still dreaming. After steadying himself for a few seconds, he finally confirmed that the person frightened into opening the window with his nose was none other than young Master Duan.
The commotion of the window breaking was too loud, startling a sparrow that had just flown into the corridor into flight. It landed on the guardrail, bobbing up and down.
A faint scent of woody floral fragrance drifted in the air. This scent carried a sharp, aggressive edge, yet it brought to mind a flower whose feathers had been ruffled by a startled passing bird, blooming in a chaotic mess.
After another two seconds, until the glands at the back of his neck grew slightly warm, Yu Zhen realized this was Duan Xiyan’s pheromone.
When an Alpha’s territory is violated or stimulated, they subconsciously release pheromones to warn intruders; this was practically an innate physiological instinct.
Feeling the restlessness within him subtly threaten to return, Yu Zhen’s brow knitted again.
He had no idea what kind of stunt young Master Duan was pulling this time, being so relentlessly persistent.
Duan Xiyan waited for a good while. With no further movement behind him, the soul that had almost flown out of his body finally returned. The soreness radiating from the bridge of his nose made him gasp and almost cry out.
He seemed to have knocked something open.
Duan Xiyan slowly opened his eyes with trepidation, locking gazes directly with a hazy silhouette inside the laboratory.
The laboratory was very dark, and the figure almost blended into the darkness, with only its eyes faintly reflecting light.
Duan Xiyan gave a start and almost passed out for real, but remembering he was here to look for Yu Zhen, he looked closer and realized the figure was indeed Yu Zhen.
The lighting was already dim, and because of the heat, Yu Zhen had taken off his school uniform jacket, wearing only a black T-shirt, making him even harder to see.
So the campus ghost story Wu Hu mentioned was fake after all. He knew it; he still had to believe in science. The tight string in Duan Xiyan’s brain finally relaxed.
“Why did you run all the way here?” Duan Xiyan held his nose, his voice carrying a slightly muffled nasal tone.
A trace of grievance, one Duan Xiyan didn’t even realize was there, tinged his words, as if he were blaming Yu Zhen for running off to such a terrifying place.
Yu Zhen thought: Shouldn’t that line be mine to ask you?
The usually arrogant young Master Duan was currently clinging to the window frame, holding his nose, his eye rims slightly red with residual undried tears, looking rather pitiful as he stared at him.
In short, it clashed somewhat with Yu Zhen’s memory of the young Master Duan who only ever looked at people through his nostrils.
Objectively speaking, Duan Xiyan was blessed with exceptionally fine features, deep-set eyes, three-dimensional facial structures, bearing a hint of northwest ethnic minority flair from certain angles. Yet his jawline was not overly sharp, presenting a slightly contradictory beauty.
His eye shape was also distinctive, with the outer corners tilting slightly downward. Usually, when he slanted his eyes to look at people, his punkish attitude was punchable; but right now, gazing at Yu Zhen with watery eyes, he looked rather pitiful instead.
“The school nurse told me you weren’t running a fever, but having your physiological period,” Duan Xiyan said when he received no reply, adding, “I was worried you wouldn’t be safe, so…”
Before Duan Xiyan could finish, the other interrupted him.
“So you ran over here to release Alpha pheromones? On purpose?” Yu Zhen’s voice was somewhat hoarse.
Being worried about his safety, that reason was far too flimsy.
An Alpha approaching a physiological-period Omega while carrying pheromones, unless he was a fool completely ignorant of basic biological common sense, could only mean ill intentions.
After all, they weren’t each other’s comfort or anything.
Though…
Yu Zhen closed his eyes with a sense of embarrassment, his Adam’s apple bobbing.
After Duan Xiyan recognized him, his emotions clearly relaxed, and the aggressiveness within his pheromones vanished entirely, turning gentle and quiet.
Surrounded by the soft woody floral fragrance, the discomfort in Yu Zhen’s body found relief. A tiny stream of heat radiating from his gland surged through his bloodstream across his limbs, bringing wave after wave of indescribable, tingling numbness.
An Omega without pheromones… could actually be comforted?