His lips were sealed tight, as if glued shut.
“Gu Lingzhou, do you love me?” Shi Yuxing repeated the question. He wanted to know whether the husband who had exchanged rings with him on their wedding day had truly meant that “I do” from the heart. He looked at the man before him—the revered general of the Empire—who now seemed frozen, unable to make a decision, silent for a long time.
“Love” and “like” were hard to distinguish. Gu Lingzhou admitted to himself that he liked Shi Yuxing, but could liking sustain love? He didn’t know. The last person who had taught him how to love was already dead.
The 24-year-old Gu Lingzhou had experienced the death of loved ones twice.
Once, his grandfather.
And once, his parents.
The starship had been twisted beyond recognition. The police said that even in death, his father had protected his mother’s head. Gu Lingzhou knew that wasn’t just a husband’s duty—it was driven by love, by a wish. His father loved his mother; he had willingly traded his own life for hers.
Gu Lingzhou had also witnessed the marriages of the Gu family’s elder generations.
And they were vastly different.
The current matriarch of the Gu family was his grandmother, Kolia. Her marriage to his grandfather was like a sandcastle built by external forces. It had been a marriage of convenience; there was no love between them. Even his father had been conceived through artificial insemination and a surrogate—a practice later abolished on humanitarian grounds for being too inhumane.
His grandparents respected each other, but they slept in separate beds, living separate lives.
His grandfather had once told him that he could say he liked his grandmother, but not that he loved her. He liked her background and influence, but he couldn’t love her temperament and character. When conflicts arose, they simply threw money at the problem—a partnership deal would restore their lives of mutual respect. He’d never apologized, and his grandmother had never lowered her head for him. Perhaps she felt the same about him—or perhaps she didn’t even like him, considering their union had broken up her original relationship.
His grandfather had been a soldier, his honors covering an entire wall. He’d died on a distant planet. On the day news arrived, Gu Lingzhou saw tears on his grandmother’s face, but privately, she had laughed heartily. That was when he understood that his grandfather had been right—his grandmother didn’t even like him.
Gu Lingzhou’s gaze gently rested on Shi Yuxing’s probing eyes. They were beautiful eyes—the very reason he’d agreed to the marriage. At the time, he’d thought selfishly: if Shi Yuxing didn’t marry him, he’d marry someone else. No one deserved those eyes—better that he protect them himself. But he was also terrified—would Shi Yuxing, like his grandmother, feel nothing for a marriage of convenience? After all, he and his grandfather were so alike.
Shi Yuxing couldn’t read the whirlwind of thoughts in Gu Lingzhou’s head. To him, it looked like Gu Lingzhou had just stood there dumbly for three minutes, giving him the cold shoulder.
Would it kill you to say you like me?!
“Forget it. Get out.” Shi Yuxing pinched the bridge of his nose and pushed him out the door. Fine—stay mute forever, you scumbag.
“Wait, Yuxing.” Gu Lingzhou snapped back to reality. “Let me think—I…”
The door closed, and the office fell silent. Leaning against the door, Shi Yuxing slowly slid down a little, staring at the things Gu Lingzhou had brought him on the desk.
“Brother, why did you stop talking all of a sudden?” Chu Xiaoyun waved a strawberry still wet with water in front of him. “Don’t you like strawberries?”
Shi Yuxing’s eyes suddenly cleared, snapping back to the present. “You eat them yourself. Brother just came to bring you some snacks. But you’re not fully healed yet—you can only have them after you’re better.”
In a fit of pique, he’d packed up all the snacks Gu Lingzhou had brought last night and delivered them to Chu Xiaoyun’s room.
“Okay!” Chu Xiaoyun, still just a high schooler, readily accepted his kindness, lured by the promise of snacks. “Thank you, brother… Brother, yesterday… my dad showed me everything.” She grew shy, like someone who’d woken up after drinking and remembered all the embarrassing things they’d said. Her cheeks flushed.
“I—that was just the anesthesia talking! I was spouting nonsense. Don’t mind it—I’m usually a very reserved girl. I’m really well-behaved…” The more she spoke, the lower her head dropped, and even the strawberry in her hand didn’t taste sweet anymore.
“Mm, I believe you.”
Silence hung in the air for a while.
“Brother, I want to tell you something secretly.” Chu Xiaoyun leaned in conspiratorially. Shi Yuxing blinked twice, waiting for what she had to say.
“Everyone at school calls me the ‘Alpha Killer,’ because over the years, pretty much every alpha who’s been close to me has disappeared.” Chu Xiaoyun looked down, sharing her teenage troubles. Shi Yuxing thought of the task he’d been given and cautiously asked: “Did those alphas move away?”
“I don’t know if they moved, but none of them ever replied to messages. You might not believe this, but I figured it out back in sixth grade. Since then, no alpha has wanted to play with me—except my childhood friend.”
The more Shi Yuxing listened, the tighter his brow furrowed. He’d read some psychology books—some children, being young, didn’t even realize they were being isolated or bullied. “Xiao Yun, if you ever experience violence, you must tell your parents and teachers. We’re not afraid of those who hide in the shadows, okay?”
Though young, Chu Xiaoyun was no fool. “Don’t worry, brother. My omega friends don’t believe those rumors—they’re all really kind people.”
Her spirits dipped again, the smile fading from her lips. “But I feel guilty. Maybe I really am a jinx—I’ve harmed all my alpha friends.”
“Xiao Yun, the number of missing persons on remote planets could add up to the entire population of the Imperial Planet. Some might have been eaten by sudden Zerg attacks, others might have fallen ill or moved. None of that has anything to do with you.” Shi Yuxing wasn’t the best at comforting people, perhaps because Chu Xiaoyun shared the surname Chu with that person, or perhaps because her ordeal after school had moved him.
A faint smile returned to Chu Xiaoyun’s lips. “Brother, I actually know you’re here on behalf of the police. You can let them in—I think I’m stable enough now.”
Shi Yuxing blinked in surprise. In the girl’s eyes, he saw resilience and a composure beyond her years. After confirming multiple times that she was truly okay, he nodded, stood up, and opened the door—coming face to face with Gu Lingzhou and the others who had been waiting. Their eyes met, and he looked away first, giving a nod to An Bao in his police uniform: “She says she’s ready.”
“Tang Jue and I grew up together—just a few buildings apart. Because of the ‘Alpha Killer’ rumors, I kept my distance from him early on. But we still ended up at Baiyun Middle School together. I’d run into him sometimes, and he’d say hi. That day after school, I stayed late because I hadn’t finished my homework. I left around 9:15—didn’t have a watch, but I heard the seniors’ dismissal bell, so I knew the time. On my way home, I saw Tang Jue. Two men were tying him up. He told me to run. I recognized his voice, but I couldn’t see him clearly—it was raining, my eyesight’s bad, a couple hundred degrees of nearsightedness, and I have astigmatism at night. I couldn’t make out the two men holding him at all—”
In the dark, rainy night, puddles on the ground reflected shattered streetlights. A transparent umbrella suddenly crashed into a puddle, splintering it completely. The girl screamed for help as she ran, her hand reaching into the outer pocket of her schoolbag—inside was a craft knife.
The kidnappers tailing her toyed with her like cats with a mouse—unhurried, impossible to shake off, closing in step by step.
Her bag was heavy. As she ran, she pulled it off and hurled it backward. Rain and tears blurred her vision. She hit one of them in the foot, enraging her pursuer. She was tackled to the ground, rain soaking through her uniform. She caught the sickening stench of alpha pheromones. The kidnapper’s hand closed around her throat, ready to strangle her then and there—silencing her forever.
He wore a black mask, his hair very short. Even when his eyes were wide open, they were small—single-lidded.
Her body burned with heat. Adrenaline surged, giving her strength. She wanted to live.
“Shhhhk—” The sound of a blade sinking into flesh.
With all her might, Chu Xiaoyun drove the knife toward the man’s eye. Blood and a scream erupted, accompanied by an even stronger burst of pheromones.
“You little bitch!” The man clutched his gushing eye—red seeping through his fingers, dripping down in a horrifying stream.
He kicked her away. The back of her neck struck a pile of gravel at the roadside. The impact dealt a devastating blow to her gland. Just as he was about to attack her again, someone called out to him.
“His accomplice called him ‘Wuchang,’ telling him to hurry—the noise was too loud, people were coming.” Chu Xiaoyun touched the cast on her neck, pressing her lips together. Tears that had pooled in her eyes burst forth like a breached dam. “My gland hurt so much… I don’t remember what happened after that. It was too painful.”
Chu Xiaoyun’s mother embraced her poor daughter, and the two of them dissolved into tears.
An Bao, in his police uniform, said: “Small phoenix eyes, buzz cut, black mask—show her if this matches.” The officer beside him held up a 3D head model on a tablet; Shi Yuxing glanced at it too.
Chu Xiaoyun nodded, her sobs escaping in waves. She added between sniffles: “He also had tattooed eyebrows. I saw clearly when he was choking me.”
“Haven’t you reached Tang Jue’s parents or relatives yet?” An Bao asked another officer. “The surveillance was broken, and we can’t reach anyone? That’s way too coincidental.”
The officer replied, “Captain An, we’ve contacted the father. He said if the kid’s dead, just burn him anywhere and be done with it. His biological mother went missing years ago—the family already had her household registration canceled. His grandmother has also passed away. Besides his father, there are no other relatives.”
Hearing this, Shi Yuxing frowned. He couldn’t believe such a heartless father existed in the world.
“Officer, maybe I can provide some information.” The father of Chu Xiaoyun, who had been silent for a while, stood up.
Leave a Reply