Wang Luan did not stay long at White Oak Hospital. After completing her tool-like task, she was free to withdraw; everything that followed was Yan Qiongyu’s responsibility.
Everyone knew that Yan Qiongyu rejected her pheromones. After a marking behavior, if any discomfort occurred, he had to be pushed into the interference room for treatment. As Wang Luan was leaving, she happened to see doctors from White Oak Hospital arriving with assistants to check on Yan Qiongyu’s condition.
The one who came was a Beta doctor. He was responsible for a basic examination. After confirming through simple physical data that Yan Qiongyu had indeed developed a pheromone rejection reaction, he transferred him to Doctor Hu for treatment.
Doctor Hu Qingyu was the director of the Omega Pheromone Treatment Interference Department at White Oak Hospital. She was a rare Omega who was still allowed to work after marriage.
Everyone tacitly believed that Omegas were fragile and sensitive, that they needed to be carefully cared for, and that they were not suited for work.
In such an environment, Omegas were kept within the household and had few opportunities to interact with the outside world.
That Doctor Hu Qingyu was able to work led many Omegas to believe it was because her Alpha doted on her and was willing to accommodate her, and they were therefore quite envious of her.
Of course, a considerable number of people also believed she was too willful, failing to fulfill an Omega’s proper duty of bearing and raising children, instead choosing to work and add burden and trouble to her Alpha.
No matter what, no one could deny that Doctor Hu Qingyu was a genius. The drugs capable of alleviating pheromone rejection reactions were developed by her own hand, and she was highly authoritative in this field.
When Yan Qiongyu was delivered before her, Hu Qingyu looked at the record screen and instructed her assistant to push the flushed, suffering Yan Qiongyu into the treatment room.
The pheromone interference room was a rather narrow small room. Once someone was pushed inside, there was no space for another person; even Hu Qingyu could only communicate with Yan Qiongyu through a door, and no one else could follow.
The teacher from the Omega Academy waited outside the door.
Doctor Hu Qingyu set the data for the interference room, but then transferred control to the “patient” inside, Yan Qiongyu.
Lying in the interference room, Yan Qiongyu set the parameters for himself on the floating screen. He had no intention of receiving treatment at all.
“Hm?” Hu Qingyu synchronized his parameter settings and frowned slightly in disapproval. “A rejection reaction isn’t a joke. In your condition, you still want to mess around?”
“I know my own situation well, Aunt Hu, don’t worry.” Yan Qiongyu’s tone was relaxed, no longer bearing the drowsy, painful look he had when first pushed in. His finger slid across his body data, his gaze clear and sharp.
Hu Qingyu had long known he was ruthless toward himself and understood his temperament. Though she disapproved of his actions, she said nothing further.
The two had known each other for a long time. When Yan Qiongyu was young, he often needed doctors for examinations and treatment due to his mental power, and thus came to know Hu Qingyu. Years ago, Yan Qiongyu had accidentally learned some of Hu Qingyu’s secrets, and their initially distant doctor–patient relationship turned into one of mutual assistance.
Yan Qiongyu was very interested in medical knowledge, but the Omega Academy did not teach such things, and he was strictly forbidden from coming into contact with any knowledge that could be harmful to people. Thus, he could only take advantage of his treatment visits to study under Hu Qingyu in private.
The time he spent learning was short, yet the results were astonishing. Hu Qingyu herself was a genius; seeing him, she felt a sense of shared misfortune, and coupled with Yan Qiongyu’s young age, their relationship had eased somewhat over the past few years.
If it had been a few years earlier, even if she watched him deliberately use simulated Alpha pheromones on himself in the interference room for desensitization therapy until he went into shock, she would not have uttered a single word.
“Did you inject the interference agent directly again today?” Doctor Hu Qingyu asked as she examined his complexion.
“Yes.” Yan Qiongyu was not as talkative as he was in front of others at this moment, and the habitual smile on his face was faint.
He focused intently on his data. With one hand, he pulled out a private smart brain from his right arm and retrieved the previously stored data inside for comparison, racing against time to conduct his own research here.
He had been using this hidden smart brain for two years. It was outside the Omega Academy’s monitoring range and was used by him to keep certain private records.
“You still haven’t found the reason you don’t reject her pheromones?” Hu Qingyu asked again.
“No.” Yan Qiongyu confirmed it repeatedly—this situation was not a coincidence. He found it difficult to say whether this was good or bad, but he knew he had to find the reason.
“Aunt Hu, I’ve collected her gland fluid. Help me go to the lab and extract her pheromone data to take a look. I’m fine on my end; there must be something unusual on her side.”
He was staying in the hospital, which made it convenient for him to do his own things occasionally when no one was around during treatment, but there was no way for him to sneak into the laboratory to run such experiments, so he could only ask Hu Qingyu for help.
Hu Qingyu glanced at him and agreed.
Yan Qiongyu pondered it and decided he still had to find a way to obtain Wang Luan’s past physical data, especially her pheromone data, so that proper comparisons could be made.
The troublesome part was that, coming from a noble family like the Wang family, all aspects of Wang Luan’s physical data were confidential. Obtaining them would likely take some effort.
For Yan Qiongyu, the fact that his pheromones did not repel Wang Luan’s was not only a minor personal issue he faced, but also a major problem he needed to solve in pheromone research, because this situation was simply too special.
Before Yan Qiongyu’s treatment ended, Doctor Hu said to him, “Your engagement banquet should be coming up soon as well.”
“It should only be announced after the third marking ends,” Yan Qiongyu replied. He could guess that only after three successful marking attempts, confirming that there was a possibility between them, would this engagement truly take effect.
“Having a fiancé is good too. At least after marriage, you’ll be freer than you are now.” A trace of weary helplessness appeared on Hu Qingyu’s face.
“Freedom?” Yan Qiongyu echoed meaninglessly, smiling as he closed his eyes and waited to be pushed back to the ward.
ততততততততততত
The third marking was still carried out at White Oak Hospital. Wang Luan did not need reminding and brought a bouquet of flowers with her. She came and left in a hurry, maintaining a guarded and silent attitude. After cooperating with him to collect gland fluid, she left, without the slightest entanglement.
Yan Qiongyu was very satisfied with this state of affairs. Holding the Wang Luan pheromone data given to him by Hu Qingyu, he returned to the Omega Academy. Just as he had expected, that very day the schedule for his engagement banquet with Miss Wang Luan was sent to his smart brain by the Wang family’s butler.
He was currently a seventh-year student. Starting from the seventh year, adult Omegas gradually gained fiancés and could go out under various pretexts.
By the eighth and ninth years, nearly half the term had to be spent accompanying their Alpha, to facilitate complete marking.
Underage lower-year students could only remain on campus to study and live. Yan Qiongyu had not returned to school for some time; upon returning this time, he was immediately met with visits from many classmates.
As the grade head of the seventh year, Yan Qiongyu was also the leader of the entire grade. In the past, he had often led the seventh-year students of the Iris Division in confrontations against their counterparts from the Rose Division.
However, such subtle factional relationships could not last long, and now they were facing a split.
After several students from the Iris Division gained fiancés—and ones more outstanding than that of their grade head—internal factions became increasingly apparent.
Yan Qiongyu paid no attention to their little maneuvers. In the past, when he was bored, he still had the interest to play along with them; now, there was no need to waste time on them.
What they wanted and what they saw were, after all, different. Yan Qiongyu had never had a true companion in the real sense.
“Several of them have had a change in attitude recently. They clearly wouldn’t have been like this before. You don’t know—during the days you were in the hospital, they often privately went to drink tea and chat with people from the Rose Division.”
“Their engagement partners are all nobles, so they’ve already started to feel more noble than you.”
“And Xuefeng and a few others,those who used to follow you around, they don’t come anymore. They’re feeling pretty smug!”
The classmates who were relatively close to Yan Qiongyu spoke indignantly, waiting to see his reaction.
How could the always “gentle and friendly” Grade Head Yan blame his former friends over this? He naturally expressed magnanimously that he did not mind, and even invited the classmates with fiancés to attend his engagement banquet in a few days.
The classmates who complained to him the most had not yet confirmed their own fiancés, and had no one who could take them to attend. They could only offer verbal consolation, while openly and covertly asking him about matters concerning the Wang family.
Using the excuse that he needed to rest, Yan Qiongyu persuaded the chattering classmates to leave, then leaned back on the sofa in his private lounge and closed his eyes to rest.
Before long, three unhurried knocks sounded at the door.
“Come in,” Yan Qiongyu said as he opened his eyes.
