[Lin Zhu: Very handsome.]

Lin Zhu opened the WeChat chat interface for the third time. The last message was still his reply to the photo Yan Ruoyun had sent.

The time stamp was twenty minutes ago.

This was normal.
At an occasion gathering celebrities and powerful figures like this, Yan Ruoyun, as the head of the group, naturally couldn’t just bury his head in his phone. He was probably socializing and chatting with someone…?

That was what Lin Zhu thought.

But then he considered how Yan Ruoyun had been working non-stop for several days. Based on the timeline, he must have headed straight to the banquet hall right after getting off the plane, only having time to quickly change clothes.

…Sigh.
He was simply busier than him, a high school senior.

Just as Lin Zhu was so bored that he planned to do a few more sets of practice questions, the recently darkened phone screen suddenly rang. The lit-up screen displayed a short service number—

[Beidu First Hospital]

Seeing these words, Lin Zhu was taken aback for a moment. He suddenly remembered that half a month ago, it was this exact number that had called to notify him of his pheromone matching results.

Immediately, a bad premonition welled up in his heart.

He hurriedly answered the phone: “Hello?”

The person on the other end sounded incredibly anxious. Before the “lo” in his “Hello” could fully leave his throat, a middle-aged male voice spoke at a rapid pace:
“Lin Zhu, Mr. Lin, correct?”
“This is Beidu First Hospital, Omega Gland Department. I am the chief physician, Xu Weinan. The situation is like this…”

One minute later.

Lin Zhu hung up the phone. Without taking the time to overthink, he dashed out the door wearing his indoor slippers, completely disregarding the fact that he was currently only wearing a sleeveless loungewear tank top and shorts.

Once he got into a taxi, he quickly blurted out the name of Beidu First Hospital, unable to stop himself from urging, “Driver, can you drive a little faster? It’s an emergency.”

The driver glanced through the rearview mirror and noticed that the blond teenager in the backseat was entirely expressionless. The air pressure around him was extremely low, and his fingertips gripping his phone were white from the force.

Combined with the destination… nine times out of ten, someone in his family was seriously ill.

The driver slammed his foot on the gas pedal, utilizing his fifteen years of driving experience. “Alright, kid, hold on tight. We’ll be there in about ten minutes!”

Raindrops the size of beans beat against the speeding car, making a crackling sound, exactly mirroring Lin Zhu’s current mood—heavy and chaotic.

The doctor’s words seemed to still echo in his ears:
“…Mr. Yan accidentally consumed alcohol laced with an aphrodisiac, causing him to fall into an acute heat. Fortunately, the temporary mark you gave him previously allowed him to hold on until reaching the hospital. However, his current condition is highly unoptimistic and could be life-threatening…”
“Can you come over immediately?”

Lin Zhu closed his eyes, his lips pressed into a flat line.

If nothing unexpected happened, tonight would be the timeframe for the second key plot point. But the current situation was completely different from what was described in the original novel!

In the original novel, due to years of hormonal abnormalities, Yan Ruoyun’s heat cycle was unstable. Half a month after their encounter at the Xiangshan Club, his heat arrived early.
Even though that tide of lust was exceptionally fierce and unbearable, at least it wasn’t severe enough to be life-threatening.

…How did it suddenly turn out like this?

Lin Zhu let out a heavy breath, but his chest still felt tight, as if a large boulder was pressing down on it, making it hard to breathe.

It really was because of him, right?

Because he changed the plot, Yan Ruoyun rushed his schedule to return to Beidu early, accepted the banquet invitation, and ran into this kind of situation?

The taxi stopped at the hospital’s emergency building. Lin Zhu quickly scanned the QR code to pay, then ran into the rain toward the main entrance.

Doctor Xu had said that when Yan Ruoyun was brought to the hospital, he was already in a semi-comatose state.
His physique was special, and he couldn’t use suppressants. The doctors temporarily had no effective countermeasures, so they could only stick to the old method—soaking in cold water to alleviate the high fever of his acute heat.

Lin Zhu ran all the way to the VIP intensive care ward floor.

As soon as he stepped out of the elevator, he bumped into a man in a black suit smoking near the stairway smoking area. His deeply furrowed brows surprisingly looked somewhat similar to his own…

It was Lin Xiujie.

Their eyes met for a split second.

Lin Xiujie’s movements and expression froze. Cigarette ash fell onto his cuffs, leaving behind messy specks of greyish-white.

The man opened his mouth:
“…Lin Zhu? Why are you here?”

Lin Zhu really didn’t have time to chat with anyone.
Panting, he swept his gaze across both sides of the corridor, then turned right around and sprinted toward the ward area where Yan Ruoyun was located.

A middle-aged doctor in a white coat was standing in front of a certain ward at the end of the corridor. Frowning, he was flipping through a few sheets of A4 paper, his expression very grim.

“…Doctor Xu, I’m here!” Lin Zhu ran up, panting as he asked, “What should I do now? Establish a temporary mark with him again?”

[The doctor], hurriedly began to explain.
“…solve the problem. Mr. Yan’s current condition is very similar to his secondary differentiation. The high temperature has reached the extreme…”

Lin Zhu couldn’t understand the meaning of the numbers on the report handed to him, but as long as he could read, he could understand the line of diagnosis results at the bottom of the table.

—Premature gland failure, organ damage.

Doctor Xu, an expert in the Omega gland department, calmly used a black pen to point at the values on the report.
“Look here. The normal value doesn’t exceed 170, but Mr. Yan’s has already soared to 7000… extremely severe pheromone resistance.”
“When a normal Omega enters their heat cycle, the sex hormones in their body rise, prompting the glands to rapidly secrete more pheromones to successfully attract an Alpha’s attention…”
“But Mr. Yan’s situation is very unique.”
“Due to his gland defect, he hasn’t been able to relieve any of his heats through marking or suppressants, relying solely on his personal willpower… But the human body has its limits. Ingesting this aphrodisiac this time is equivalent to detonating a landmine that has been silent for ten years.”

Pheromone resistance.

This was even more terrifying than the ‘excessive pheromone secretion’ that Lin Zhu had suddenly experienced at the Xiangshan Club previously.
This meant that Yan Ruoyun’s glands had completely lost their sensitivity. Persistently and madly secreting pheromones would undoubtedly accelerate the rate of his organ failure.

If this dragged on, it would definitely affect his lifespan.

The emergency department had already installed a subcutaneous monitor on Yan Ruoyun’s upper arm to conveniently observe his body temperature and hormone levels at all times.
And Lin Zhu’s mission was to soothe him as quickly as possible, specifically until the monitor’s values turned back to the green color that symbolized normality.

Before Lin Zhu entered the ward, Xu Weinan shoved the items brought over by an intern into the teenager’s hands. Looking at the other party’s cold yet slightly youthful face, he confirmed:
“You might need to perform a deep marking. Do you know how to use these?”

Lin Zhu glanced at the two items in his hands—a box of condoms and a bottle of lubricant. He nodded, and with a muffled sound, stepped into the intensive care ward where Yan Ruoyun was.

At this time, Doctor Xu advised again,
“I’ve been in charge of Mr. Yan’s condition for ten years, so I understand his situation the best… His current condition, apart from the influence of physiological factors, probably also involves psychological factors.”
“He personally resists being dominated by Alphas. If you can get him to let go of his psychological baggage, the soothing effect might be more thorough, which will be greatly beneficial for his subsequent treatment.”

Lin Zhu’s hand rested on the door handle as he quickly replied, “Okay, I understand.”

The moment he officially stepped into the ward, he vaguely heard an unfamiliar electronic voice ring out in his mind.

[Beep—]
[Character Synchronization sequence automatically activated. Retrieving original plot fragments. Commencing character calibration…]
[Extracted keywords are as follows: Fury, Resentment, Jealousy…]
[Matching the Host with the highest priority keyword…]
[Match successful: Fury.]
[Current synchronization rate: 30%]

The air circulation system in the intensive care ward was running at maximum power, but it still couldn’t purify the dense pheromones in the air.

But Lin Zhu couldn’t smell the pheromones yet. Unaware, he looked toward the hospital bed in the center of the room. After finding the bed empty, he suddenly realized…

Yan Ruoyun was currently soaking in cold water in the bathroom.

The bathroom door was shut tight. Faint sounds of splashing water could be heard from inside, but there was no way to tell exactly what the situation was like in there.

Lin Zhu walked over in a few steps and raised his hand to turn the doorknob—it didn’t budge. Someone had locked it from the inside.

He knocked on the door expressionlessly.
“Ge (Brother), it’s me.”
“Are you awake? Open the door for me.”