Who Is He?
“Ying Zhu, you… got me last night.”
As soon as Ying Zhu walked in, Chen Nanqing said this.
Ying Zhu was an Omega, while Chen Nanqing—who said it—was a tall, handsome Alpha. Hearing that sentence from him felt extremely strange.
Ying Zhu frowned slightly, adjusted his pants calmly, sat down on the sofa, then looked up at him.
“How much did you drink?”
It was afternoon. They were at a friend’s wedding gathering. The ceremony hadn’t started yet, and everyone was just hanging out. There were seven or eight people in the room—Alphas and Omegas—all acquaintances.
The air smelled faintly of alcohol, mixed with the lazy warmth of the afternoon sun. Ying Zhu felt the guy was either drunk or heat-struck.
The others clearly knew what was going on. They were all holding back laughter.
Chen Nanqing sat next to Ying Zhu, excited and eager.
“I’m serious. I’m not joking.”
Ying Zhu felt a headache coming on. He replayed the sentence in his mind, but couldn’t make sense of it.
“What do you mean?”
Chen Nanqing began explaining.
He was the type of Alpha who often acted on impulse. A few days ago, out of curiosity, he wanted to know what it felt like from an Omega’s perspective, so he bought a restricted memory card.
A “memory card” is a device that stores memories.
Years ago, a company called Hippocampus Tech developed artificial hippocampus chips implanted into the brain. These chips store memories as data, like a walking surveillance system.
With technological upgrades, their VR system now allowed full sensory simulation—touch, smell, taste, sight, and sound.
As long as the brain is functional, you could experience someone else’s memories through VR.
So, Chen Nanqing bought a memory card from an Omega’s perspective.
It turned out to be exactly what he expected—but with a surprise.
“The one in the memory… was you,” he said. “That shocked me.”
The room burst into laughter.
Ying Zhu ignored them and stared at him. “You’d better be joking.”
Chen Nanqing tossed him the card. “See for yourself.”
A VR headset was brought over. Ying Zhu put it on and inserted the card.
The memory began.
The viewpoint was from someone lying down, looking upward—the perspective of the memory owner.
Ying Zhu could feel the emotions and sensations of the person in the memory. It was intense and overwhelming.
Then—
He saw his own face.
Close, vivid, unmistakable.
He was watching himself from another person’s perspective.
It felt… like he was experiencing himself from the outside.
The realism was shocking. He could feel the overwhelming intensity of the moment—the kind that made the person in the memory tremble.
The memory owner was also an Omega.
Normally, there would be a mismatch when experiencing another gender’s perspective, but in this case, it aligned too well.
That made it even stranger.
He was seeing himself, feeling everything, while being fully aware of it.
The emotions were intense, almost unbearable.
“…Ying Zhu…”
The voice called his name softly, trembling.
Then he saw himself lean down and kiss the other person.
The memory ended quickly—just over two minutes.
Ying Zhu removed the headset, his expression dark.
The room fell silent.
After a long moment, Chen Nanqing asked, “It’s you, right?”
Ying Zhu didn’t answer immediately. He just stared at the memory card.
Memory cards couldn’t be copied, but this one was clearly just a fragment—cut from a longer memory and sold in pieces.
There were no clues—no clothing, no clear voice, no visible face of the other person.
Everything was from a first-person perspective.
Which meant—
He had no idea who the other person was.
Ying Zhu clicked his tongue.
This was… seriously strange.
Who exactly was that person?
As an S-level omega, Ying Zhu possessed an arrogance and dominance that rivaled alphas. Among high-ranking individuals like them, once their level reached a certain point, their superior traits could even override gender and secondary sex characteristics.
He didn’t doubt that, physically, he was capable of driving another omega to the brink like that. But he had absolutely no memory of ever having such an intimate relationship with any omega.
And from what he had just seen in that memory, the other party knew his name. That raised an even bigger question—how daring did this person have to be? To actually upload and sell such a memory of him on the dark web?
Ying Zhu took a deep breath and stood up. He glanced at Chen Nanqing, signaling for him to follow.
Chen Nanqing suddenly felt a bit uneasy. He exchanged looks with the others before, under their sympathetic gazes, heading toward the balcony.
Ying Zhu stood there, one hand in his pocket, leaning casually against the railing. The wind stirred his soft black hair, and his profile was strikingly handsome. Dressed formally for the wedding, his well-fitted suit accentuated his tall, slender frame. From appearance alone, it was hard to believe he belonged to the omega class, supposedly the weakest of all.
Hearing Chen Nanqing approach, Ying Zhu didn’t even turn around. He went straight to questioning him.
“Where did you buy that memory card?”
“On the dark web.”
With the widespread implantation of artificial hippocampus chips, the government had long established regulations.
By law, memory was considered a private asset. Individuals had the right to transfer, sell, or even pass it down within legal boundaries.
However, explicit or violent memory trading was strictly controlled. Though banned on the surface, underground channels still existed—the dark web being the largest marketplace for such restricted content.
Ying Zhu slipped the memory card into his pocket. “I’m taking this. Send me the seller’s information later.”
His tone was cold, distant—his status and strength naturally creating an untouchable aura. Even his good looks felt out of reach.
Chen Nanqing glanced reluctantly at Ying Zhu’s pocket but didn’t dare object. “The seller’s info is hidden. They used a temporary ID.”
A temporary ID meant a one-time identity—after the transaction, all records were wiped completely.
Ying Zhu frowned. That made things difficult.
After a moment of thought, he asked, “Do you remember the title or description?”
Since it hadn’t been long, Chen Nanqing managed to recall a few keywords.
They were crude, vulgar phrases, making Ying Zhu frown repeatedly. But that made sense—such content relied on shock value to sell.
If the seller had split one complete memory into fragments, the titles likely followed a similar pattern. Searching those keywords might yield clues.
Just then, the wedding ceremony was about to begin. Ying Zhu temporarily set the matter aside and walked out with Chen Nanqing.
The weather was beautiful—bright sunshine, almost painfully so.
Standing among the guests, watching the couple, Ying Zhu—normally cold and detached—felt an inexplicable trace of bitterness.
As if he had once had something… and lost it.
After the ceremony, he skipped the banquet and drove alone back to his family’s old residence.
It was midsummer. The evening air was heavy with heat. An elderly woman sat beneath a cassia tree in the courtyard, enjoying the breeze.
“Grandma,” Ying Zhu said softly, handing his car keys to a servant before crouching beside her. The cold edge he carried outside softened completely in her presence.
The old woman turned her cloudy eyes toward him. “Xiao Zhu, where did you go today?”
“A friend’s wedding. It was crowded, so I came back early.”
She looked at him, then suddenly asked, “When will you bring a boyfriend home?”
She had developed Alzheimer’s years ago. She forgot many things—but never forgot to urge him to get married.
Ying Zhu smiled helplessly, gently holding her frail hand. “Grandma… can’t I just not get married?”
She touched his head, puzzled. “How could that be?”
Sparrows lined the power wires like a string of commas as the sky darkened.
After chatting for a while, he helped her inside, had dinner, then went to his study and opened his laptop, logging into the dark web.
The idea of searching for explicit memories starring himself still felt surreal.
After a pause, his fingers moved across the keyboard, entering the keywords Chen Nanqing had mentioned.
Then he pressed enter.