Pei Ying had never been much of a student. As the Pei family's playboy second young master, skipping class was nothing unusual for him.
Xin Hexue's high fever wouldn't go down, so Pei Ying sent his homeroom teacher a message asking for the next day off.
"Why is his skin so pale?"
He wrung out a towel soaked in warm water and wiped Xin Hexue's neck, wondering as he did so.
The sick young man slept peacefully, showing no reaction to Pei Ying's words.
Pei Ying prepared to wipe down his body. His hands paused as he undid the buttons, and he muttered to himself, "What am I afraid of? We're both men. He won't lose a piece of flesh if I look."
Xin Hexue's dark hair fell softly across the pillow. He slept with his eyes closed, the corners of his eyes and his lips flushed an especially vivid red from the fever.
Pei Ying had seen him wearing nothing but Pei Guangji's shirt, but this was the first time he had seen Xin Hexue's body completely naked.
He had a slender waist and long legs, with smooth, delicate skin and subtle contours across his body.
He wasn't as frail as Pei Ying had imagined,
but the body was so pale it seemed almost translucent and fragile, and it was far from healthy.
Beneath his cool, pale skin, the faint blue tracery of his veins gave the impression that a single push could knock him over.
Pei Ying had already turned off the glaring overhead light, leaving only the small bedside lamp on.
Yet the young man's body was still so white it made him dizzy.
Ah...
There was pink, too.
For some reason, the tips of Pei Ying's ears burned, and his heart itched and swelled, as if ants were biting it.
Through the damp towel, his palm could trace every contour of the young man's body and bones.
His nose felt hot.
Pei Ying hurriedly clapped a hand over his nose. The next second, he realized that the damp towel in his hand had just wiped Xin Hexue's body and still carried a trace of his cool fragrance.
Warm liquid gushed from his nose as he frantically pulled the covers over Xin Hexue.
He rushed to the bathroom to wash up and deal with his predicament.
[Pei Ying Affection Points +3]
[Pei Ying Affection Points +2]
[Pei Ying Affection Points +1]
Even though K turned off the notification sound as soon as he realized what was happening, Xin Hexue still turned restlessly in his semiconscious state.
Pink. Why was it pink?
It was exquisite, as if carved from white jade, with a hint of pink.
Completely different from the fierce-looking thing he had himself.
Pei Ying couldn't help comparing them.
Then he sat bolt upright.
It was already broad daylight outside.
Xin Hexue's temperature had returned to normal in the latter half of the night. After the IV drip was finished, Pei Ying had the doctors examine him again, and when they found nothing wrong, he sent them home.
The medicine boxes were on the bedside table.
But the bed was empty.
Pei Ying had kept watch by Xin Hexue's bed and only fallen asleep close to dawn. Looking at the time now, he saw it was already noon.
He went downstairs, following the banister.
The young man sat at the table, eating porridge spoonful by spoonful.
His face was still pale, but he looked much more energetic than he had yesterday.
Hearing him come downstairs, Xin Hexue turned his head slightly. "There's more porridge in the kitchen."
Pei Ying met his eyes, then looked away awkwardly. "Got it."
He sat down opposite Xin Hexue, but only dared stare at the bowl of pork and scallion porridge, his thoughts in a tangle.
Pei Ying found a topic to bring up. "You slept restlessly last night. It sounded like you were calling someone's name. Were you calling for my brother?"
Xin Hexue's voice had been very faint, almost a whisper. Even when Pei Ying leaned close, he could only make out indistinct syllables. The last syllable seemed to be in the fourth tone.
Because of that, he had even sent Pei Guangji a message.
[His fever is really bad. He keeps calling for you.]
Xin Hexue was surprised; he had no memory of it at all.
He gave a vague answer. "Mm... maybe."
To Pei Ying, that sounded like an admission.
He was already at an impetuous age, and his alpha nature was unwilling to admit defeat. Irritation welled up inside Pei Ying.
He had worked so hard looking after Xin Hexue all night, so why should Xin Hexue be calling his brother's name?
He rose from his seat. "I didn't sleep last night. I'm going back to bed for a while."
Xin Hexue thanked him gently. "Thank you for looking after me last night."
[Pei Ying Affection Points +5]
The situation in the Sixth District was rather tricky.
Besides the Black Snake Underground Organization, nonhuman creatures had also been involved in causing the fire at the West City Pharmaceutical Factory. It was hard to call that a coincidence.
Pei Guangji was more inclined to believe that Black Snake was secretly in league with the nonhuman creatures. Otherwise, it was difficult to explain how the underground organization had established itself and grown so powerful in the Sixth District.
The district government was corrupt, but it had never before been as weak and ineffectual as it was today.
If the district government were to fall completely behind in its struggle against the underground organization and the public security system collapsed, the disadvantages would outweigh the benefits for the conglomerates.
That was especially true for Pei Corporation, whose pharmaceutical factories were mostly located in the Sixth District.
Pei Guangji needed to return to the main family residence in the Core District and obtain more authority from the old man.
Even so, he took a detour back to the Halfway-Up-the-Mountain Villa first.
It was already evening.
Dim twilight filtered through the curtains, illuminating the shadowy outline of a figure beneath the covers.
His thin lips pressed into a straight line, Pei Guangji approached the bed in silence. The high fever should have subsided by now; Xin Hexue's sleeping face was peaceful.
Noticing the other's lips move slightly, he bent down to listen. "Guangji..."
Pei Guangji suddenly remembered the message Pei Ying had sent him.
His heart shook.
He hadn't expected...
Xin Hexue to have been so seriously ill.
Or to have kept looking for him.
Pei Guangji had thought that Xin Hexue's meaning was clear when he brought the contract to the study that day, and that he should have understood theirs was merely an ordinary transactional relationship.
He frowned.
Just then, Xin Hexue's eyelashes trembled. Pretending to have just woken up, he sat up and said in delight, "Guangji?"
Soon, he lowered his eyes. "No, Mr. Pei."
It was as if the delight just now had been Pei Guangji's momentary illusion.
The atmosphere froze for a moment.
Pei Guangji said, "...Has your fever gone down?"
He was still bent over, and the young man's slightly cool forehead easily met his own.
Xin Hexue drew back before he could react.
Pei Guangji was still absorbed in the sensation of their foreheads touching.
Xin Hexue said shyly and reservedly, "Mr. Pei, my fever has gone down."
A beat late, Pei Guangji straightened up. "Mm, that's good."
[Pei Guangji Affection Points +5]
Xin Hexue pressed his lips together and smiled.
[Big brother, you woke me up just in time.]
K: [...Mm.]
Pei Guangji didn't stay that night, going straight to the Core District.
Pei Ying hadn't taken the next day off; he still had school. When he got up, there was no movement on the second floor. Xin Hexue probably wasn't awake yet.
Pei Ying hurriedly searched the living room for the exercise book he had tossed onto the sofa, threw it into his schoolbag, and headed to school with a piece of toast in his mouth as usual.
He didn't pay attention in class, sleeping most of the time.
He was only awake between classes.
He ate lunch at the upscale restaurant on the third floor of the cafeteria.
During the lunch break, his deskmate, a beta who was the math class representative, asked him, "Pei Ying, did you bring your exercise book? You're the only one who hasn't turned in the last assignment. I have to hand it in to the teacher."
Pei Ying casually pulled it out of his schoolbag and opened it on his desk. "I didn't do it."
He tossed it out without even looking at it, then lay down on his desk, ready for a nap.
His deskmate asked in surprise, "Didn't you do it? Why did you only write it on scratch paper instead of in the exercise book?"
The beta looked over the work on the scratch paper, finding it very strange. "Aren't all your answers correct? Your working even hit every point needed to earn marks."
Pei Ying sat up, a red mark pressed into his forehead, his expression impatient. "I said I didn't do it..."
His voice suddenly trailed off.
He stared fixedly at the free-flowing handwriting on the scratch paper.
It wasn't his handwriting, either.
He snatched the exercise book, with the scratch paper tucked inside, back from his deskmate. "I'm not turning it in. Just tell the teacher I didn't do it."
Pei Ying looked at the two sheets of scratch paper again and again.
Damn it, the working is so detailed. Xin Hexue won't think I'm an idiot, will he?
Pei Ying had deliberately left it undone. After all, whether he knew how to do it or not, he would always be a failed reject in the Pei family. Playing the part of a playboy would make his life
easier.
But he didn't want Xin Hexue to think he was an idiot.
Pei Ying frowned hard enough to crush a fly.
He remembered something else and asked his deskmate, "You're a beta too?"
It was as if he had only noticed his deskmate's gender for the first time. Xin Hexue was a beta too.
Pei Ying instinctively wanted to ask whether he had missed something in sex ed. Was that part of every beta pink?
Not just the one down below, but the ones up top too?
But Pei Ying wasn't quite that stupid.
He immediately realized that Xin Hexue was probably the only one like that.
His deskmate was bewildered and thought he must still be groggy from sleep, asking about other people's gender. "Then I'll tell the teacher you didn't do it. Oh, right, the parent-teacher meeting is this afternoon. You gave the invitation to your parents, right?"
The students at South City No. 1 High School were either rich or privileged, and the school accordingly liked to put on all sorts of empty formalities to make things feel more ceremonial.
Pei Ying said, "What invitation?"
His deskmate said, "You weren't there when they were handed out during the break, so I tucked yours into this exercise book for you. I forgot to remind you. You didn't lose it, did you?"
Pei Ying flipped through the exercise book, but there was nothing in it except the two sheets of scratch paper.
He suddenly felt as if he were sitting on pins and needles.
Chapter 9: Face blindness (9)
Class Eleven was at the very end of the fifth floor of the teaching building, far from the teachers' offices, the restrooms, and the hot water room. It had originally been the quietest classroom.
All of a sudden, more students began passing through the corridor and fooling around there.