Lin Zhu couldn’t help but widen his eyes, his gaze overflowing with wordless shock and astonishment.

He stammered to ask, “Is… isn’t it uncomfortable…?”

Yan Ruoyun was terrified of making a mistake that would result in tossing and turning for ages before they could rest, so he only let the youth feel it for a fleeting second before quickly pulling his hand away, simultaneously replying, “It’s alright, not too uncomfortable.”

In reality, that wasn’t the case at all.
This was purely an act of helplessness.

Approaching thirty years old, ever since he completed his second differentiation at eighteen, Yan Ruoyun’s heat periods had always been difficult to endure, but he had truly never experienced something like this before. Right now, he just felt uncomfortable everywhere.
To be honest, if it weren’t for Dr. Xu’s instructions, he really wouldn’t want to accept this kind of auxiliary treatment method.

According to Dr. Xu’s feedback, he would still experience intermittent fevers over the next few days. If he continued to recklessly overdraw his body’s limits like this, he would probably be transferred to the Internal Medicine department right after leaving the Omega Glandular department, and might even have to take supplements for a while.

Speaking of which, tonight, Lin Zhu had spent the entire time entirely focused on helping him restore his normal hormone levels, while he himself…

The man’s expression was calm and placid. Lin Zhu couldn’t guess what the other was thinking at this moment. He unconsciously curled his fingers, the pads of his fingers seemingly still retaining that cold touch from just now.

Lin Zhu stared blankly for a moment, tried to hold back, but still couldn’t help asking in a tone of disbelief, “…Does doing this really not harm the body? What if you need to use the bathroom in the middle of the night?”

Yan Ruoyun gazed at the youth’s slightly sluggish and innocent expression, and suddenly really wanted to laugh… He actually did let out a couple of chuckles, and then fulfilled his duty as the older one, explaining to this half-understanding child.

“It won’t, did you misunderstand what it’s used for?” Yan Ruoyun touched his face. “This thing is a physiological auxiliary device specifically for Omegas in their special periods to control themselves. It’s more or less similar to suppressant products…”
He paused, then added:
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t harm the body.”
“Otherwise, the doctor wouldn’t dare let me use it.”

That was true.

Lin Zhu nodded, not fully understanding but feeling it made sense. His blond hair rubbed against the pillow, blooming outwards like a dandelion.
Yan Ruoyun raised a hand to gather the dandelion back together, suddenly adding, “Of course, there are also categories specifically developed for Alphas to use, but… the difference in usage between the two is huge.”

The man stroked the youth’s short hair, his wrist feeling slightly sore and swollen.
After a few seconds of silence, he suddenly said:
“Little dog Lin, you won’t need to use it.”

Before Lin Zhu could react, the man quickly turned around, pressing his back tightly against the youth’s chest. “Alright, there’s nothing else to ask. Go to sleep.”

Lin Zhu: “…Oh.”

After quite a while.
Lin Zhu finally smoothed out the indescribable restlessness at the bottom of his heart. He closed his eyes sleepily, unconsciously tightening the arm wrapped around the man’s waist, and said softly,
“Ge, good night.”
“…”

The night gradually deepened.
Beidu City’s autumn rainy season had already lasted for a week with no signs of ending; instead, it was growing more intense.

Midnight.
Outside, a fierce wind howled and torrential rain poured. Thunder mixed within the sound of rain, like the unwilling roar of a giant beast from the vault of heaven.

Around three or four o’clock, Lin Zhu had a completely nonsensical dream.
He dreamed that he broke free from the control of gravity, floating all the way into the clouds, and pulled the red sun hanging in the blue sky into his arms—
The sun persistently radiated high heat.
This heat burned Lin Zhu’s skin, scalding him so much he almost couldn’t hold on. But he didn’t care, simply tightening his grip with all his might, refusing to let go.

Suddenly.
A gust of damp, slightly astringent sea breeze drilled into Lin Zhu’s nose, intermingled with the scent of peppermint smoke, smelling inexplicably exhilarating.
This scent was intensely rich, fiercely striking Lin Zhu’s nerves, forcing him to wake up from his dream.

Just as he woke up, before his eyes even had time to open, Lin Zhu heard a low, hoarse, soft call.
“Mng… Lin Zhu, I feel so uncomfortable…”

It was Yan Ruoyun’s incoherent murmuring in a half-asleep, half-awake state. Accompanied by an inorganic ‘beep-beep’ sound.
Lin Zhu’s sleepiness was instantly scared away.

He hurriedly lifted the thin blanket to take a look. Sure enough—the electronic screen of the subcutaneous monitor on the man’s arm had turned red again, the numbers jumping back and forth between five and seven hundred.
…Yan Ruoyun was having an acute heat flash again.

–

As the saying goes, the first time is strange, the second time is familiar.

Lin Zhu hugged Yan Ruoyun from behind, controlling him with one hand to keep him from struggling; with his other hand, he brushed aside the ends of the man’s hair, exposing the gland at the back of his neck.
In less than twenty-four hours, Lin Zhu had already bitten into his gland multiple times. This lump of soft, white flesh was covered in deep, heavy bite marks, already unable to bear any more torment, having become red and swollen.

As soon as Lin Zhu pressed his canine teeth against it, he noticed the man in his arms unconsciously try to dodge away, yet at the same time he couldn’t help but lean even closer to him.
Both fearful, and yearning.

The situation was urgent, Lin Zhu couldn’t let him dodge away.
So, he scooped the struggling Yan Ruoyun back, clasped the person tightly in his arms, and began to gently soothe him.
He pecked kisses on the gland while coaxing: “Good, be good… a kiss won’t hurt.”

At this moment, the dynamic between the two seemed reversed, and Lin Zhu became the dominant one, while Yan Ruoyun merely called out in a trembling voice with a clouded consciousness: “I feel so uncomfortable…”
“Lin Zhu, uncomfortable…”

At first, the man mumbled vaguely about being uncomfortable, that his body felt bad. After a few breaths, he could no longer speak, leaving only unconscious calls. He called Lin Zhu’s name, looking exactly like a drowning man desperately crying out for help to someone on the shore.
Lin Zhu responded to each one in turn, not letting a single sentence drop empty.

At the same time, he recalled the process from the previous time, patiently helping the Omega in his arms stabilize his hormones.
This bout of physiological heat came suddenly. Yan Ruoyun’s cheeks were flushed red, and his bangs were already damp with sweat. His brows were tightly knitted, his eyelashes trembling non-stop, the eyeballs beneath his closed eyelids moving restlessly.

“It hurts…”
After a short while, he began crying out in pain again.

There was nothing that could be done about this.
Yan Ruoyun had grown up pampered and privileged since childhood. Even though he wasn’t the sweet-looking type, an Omega’s skin was always fairer and more tender than an Alpha’s.
During the previous hormonal imbalance, he had already been bitten until his skin was slightly broken by the sharp-fanged Alpha, seemingly already incapable of enduring a second round of biting.

At this moment, the man only felt his body was incredibly heavy. It hurt everywhere, and burned dreadfully, as if someone had poured a whole pot of boiling magma into him, almost cooking his internal organs.
“Hah…”
The only thing that could bring him a trace of coolness was the hint of peppermint smoke in the air.

Instinctively, Yan Ruoyun wanted to obtain more.
However, he was clamped around the waist by a lean, powerful arm, unable to move even a fraction.

The man struggled to turn his brain, which had already melted into mush, and finally thought of a method.
Tremblingly, he grabbed the other hand of the youth behind him…
“Lin Zhu, save me.”

The man cried out for help over and over.
The roots of Lin Zhu’s ears went entirely numb, a tingling sensation shooting straight to his brain. He hallucinated colorful fireworks exploding before his eyes, splashing out countless sparks carrying the smell of gunpowder.
Dazzling, scorching, and making one unable to stop.

Deeply trapped in physiological heat, the man probably didn’t know what he was actually doing, but Lin Zhu’s mind was clear. His face radiated heat, a massive sense of shame enveloping his heart, while in an even deeper place, there was an unspeakable wave of excitement and sweltering heat.

“…Ge.”
He couldn’t help but mutter softly, as if echoing the name from the man’s mouth.

As soon as his voice fell, Yan Ruoyun seemed to unconsciously move, his slender limbs curling up even tighter.
Every movement, every syllable, every breath of his… seemed to be releasing the exact same message to Lin Zhu.
—Save me.
—Only you can, I only let you.

And so, Lin Zhu took several deep breaths, during which his mind kept flashing back to the illustrated popular science in his biology textbook.
The book said that a male Omega’s reproductive cavity was hidden very deeply, its structure complex and convoluted, difficult to find.

However, when it truly came time to apply this related knowledge, Lin Zhu suddenly realized that textbook science couldn’t be completely trusted either.
Just as the youth was generating doubts about the authority of a certain medical branch in the ABO world, he suddenly heard a seemingly familiar sound.

…It was the agonized cry of the stray cats in the back alley that he had heard countless times deep in the night.

A moment later.
The subcutaneous monitor died down, no longer emitting its annoying screams.
Meanwhile, Lin Zhu let out a long breath. He tightly hugged the cat that had fallen asleep in his arms, and finally closed his tired eyes.

Outside the window, the sky was about to brighten.