The air in the medical suite didn't just feel cold; it felt pressurized, like the inside of a deep-sea bell nearing its breaking point.
He Chen stood in the center of the room, his chest heaving with a rhythmic, violent cadence. He was a man built of sharp angles and expensive tailoring, but right now, the elite facade was cracking. With a jagged movement, he ripped at his silk tie. The fabric hissed—a sound like a dying gasp—before a platinum button snapped, bouncing off the reinforced glass floor with a crystalline ping.
"Director He, please... sit down. We need to administer the inhibitor." The head physician's voice was trembling, her feet glued to the floor three meters away. She knew better than to approach an S-grade Alpha during a feral collapse.
He Chen didn't sit. He turned, his eyes a map of broken capillaries and raw, unbridled hunger. "The inhibitor is useless," he rasped. His voice sounded like it had been dragged through gravel. "You know as well as I do. When the mark is rejected, the core doesn't just destabilize. It burns."
Ten days. It had been ten days since Lin Shu, his fiancé of seven years, had fled the country with a nouveau-riche Alpha. Lin Shu hadn't just left; he had used a neuro-stripper to scrub He Chen's temporary mark from his scent gland. To an Alpha of He Chen's caliber, it was more than a breakup—it was a biological lobotomy.
"The Bureau has been running the database for seventy-two hours straight," the executive assistant stammered, holding a tablet like a shield. "Because of your unique S-grade frequency, the 75% compatibility you had with the Lin family was already a miracle. Finding another match... it should have been impossible."
He Chen's hand slammed onto the medical table, the thick steel groaning under his palm. "Then why aren't I dead yet?"
"Because... we found a 96%."
The room went silent. The hum of the air conditioner felt deafening.
"Repeat that," He Chen commanded, his pheromones flaring so sharply the doctor gasped, her knees buckling.
"A 96% match. A perfect harmonic resonance. But... there's a problem." The assistant swiped the screen, projecting a holographic profile. "He's not on the high-society registry. He's a 'Ghost Omega.' His records were wiped ten years ago. We only found him because he recently applied for a low-level security license in the Third District slums."
He Chen looked at the image.
The man in the photo didn't look like a "doll." He had a buzz cut so sharp it looked like it could draw blood, eyes narrowed into cynical slits, and a thin, jagged scar running beneath his right earlobe. He was wearing a grease-stained security uniform, sitting on a plastic stool at a roadside stall, a cigarette tucked behind his ear, staring at the camera with a look of pure, unadulterated boredom.
Chu Ci.
The name hit He Chen harder than the pheromone crash. Memory, long buried under layers of privilege and cold ambition, clawed its way out. A boy who had once been a ward of the He family. A boy who had been branded "delinquent" and "unrefined" before being cast out into the winter streets a decade ago.
"Him?" He Chen's voice dropped to a whisper.
Suddenly, a phantom sensation ghosted over his skin. It was the smell of frost-bitten pine needles and bitter, crushed tobacco. It was the scent he had spent ten years trying to forget—the scent he had once labeled as "the smell of a stray."
"Prepare the car," He Chen said, his eyes darkening to the color of a stormy sea. "And bring a restraint kit. If he won't come willingly... drag him."
The Third District smelled of ozone, stagnant water, and desperation.
Chu Ci leaned against a rusted lamp post, the flickering orange light casting long, distorted shadows over his boots. He had just finished a double shift at the warehouse, and his left leg—the one held together by an outdated, grinding metal brace—was throbbing with a dull, rhythmic ache.
He didn't hear the car. His left ear was a graveyard of silence, a souvenir from a fire long ago. He only noticed the change in the air when the street dogs, usually bold and vicious, suddenly whimpered and fled into the darkness.
Then, the heavy, velvet hum of a high-end engine filled his good ear.
A black armored Maybach, sleek and predatory, pulled to a halt inches from his toes. A group of men in tactical suits stepped out, forming a wall of muscle and suppressed aggression.
Chu Ci didn't move. He took a long drag of his cigarette, the ember glowing bright in the gloom. He flicked the ash onto the pristine black hood of the car.
"You're blocking the sidewalk, boys," Chu Ci said, his voice a low, melodic rumble. "Some of us actually have to get home to sleep."
The rear window slid down with a silent, expensive mechanical whir.
The interior of the car was dark, but He Chen's eyes were glowing with a faint, terrifying iridescence. The Alpha's presence was so thick it felt like physical weight pressing down on Chu Ci's lungs.
"Get in, Chu Ci."
Chu Ci paused, the cigarette smoke curling around his face like a shroud. He laughed—a sharp, jagged sound that didn't reach his eyes. "Director He? To what do I owe this honor? Did you run out of caviar, or did your little White Lotus finally realize you're a sociopath?"
In a movement too fast for the human eye to track, He Chen lunged.
A hand like a steel shackle shot out of the window, bunching into Chu Ci's collar and jerking him forward. Chu Ci's chest slammed against the car door, his head forced inside the cabin.
The scent hit him like a physical blow. It was the smell of a god in decay—bitter, majestic, and terrifyingly familiar.
"I don't have time for your games," He Chen hissed, his face inches from Chu Ci's. His breath was hot, smelling of expensive whiskey and raw desperation. "My stability is at 12%. You're the only match in the city. You're coming with me."
Chu Ci's vision blurred as the Alpha's pheromones tried to force his Omega instincts to heel. But Chu Ci wasn't a normal Omega. He was a survivor of the pits. With a grunt of effort, he clamped his hand over He Chen's wrist, his fingers digging into the expensive suit sleeve.
"Is that how you ask for a favor these days?" Chu Ci whispered, his eyes narrowing into dangerous slits. "Ten years ago, you told me I was 'garbage from a gutter' that would never be fit to stand beside you. Now, you're begging for my gutter-scent to save your life?"
He Chen's grip tightened, his knuckles turning white. He could feel Chu Ci's pulse thudding against his palm—fast, defiant, and intoxicatingly compatible. The 96% wasn't a lie. It was a gravitational pull.
"Name your price," He Chen gritted out, his fangs beginning to ache behind his gums.
Chu Ci smirked, a drop of blood trickling from where his collar had cut into his neck. "Twenty thousand an hour. No credit. No 'old times' sake.' You pay for every second I have to breathe your air."
He reached into the car with his free hand and patted He Chen's cheek, a gesture of ultimate disrespect. "Pay the deposit, Director. Then, maybe I'll let you live another night."