The Alpha beside him wore an elegant gray suit. He was tall and handsome, with broad shoulders and a straight back.
He looked less like he was attending a school admissions meeting than a charity gala or jewelry auction.
Gold-rimmed glasses rested on his high nose, and his features were sharply defined. His gray mechanical eye did not draw attention at first glance.
Xi Zhengqing watched Pei Ying leave with the young man.
They were some distance away, and by the time he came to find his nephew, he had only seen the young man from behind.
Xi Zhengqing smiled. "Xiaode, you said you saw Uncle Pei at the hospital before. Uncle Pei was the one who saved that young man, right?"
Xi Xiaode nodded honestly.
Xi Zhengqing showed no obvious emotion, but his curiosity was piqued.
Had his childhood friend taken someone in?
Or...
Had Pei Guangji taken him in for his younger brother, Pei Ying?
Xi Zhengqing said, "Let's go home first."
Pei Guangji received a photo from Xin Hexue.
It was a fluffy little yellow dog.
Pei Guangji's attention fell on the hand supporting the puppy's muzzle from below. Its fingers were long and well-defined, its skin pale and smooth as frost.
The message read—
[Can I keep it?]
Pei Guangji's expression instinctively tightened. His first reaction was to refuse.
For some reason, a thought arose in his mind: he could not stand Xin Hexue keeping another dog. But the thought vanished in an instant.
Xin Hexue seemed eager for him to agree and sent a cute sticker afterward.
Pei Guangji: [No.]
[Dogs are dirty, and they shed.]
Pei Guangji saw Xin Hexue's reply.
[I can wash it clean, and the cleaning robot will take care of the hair promptly.]
Pei Guangji opened a conversation with another contact. They had not been in touch for a long time, and even dealings between their companies were handled through work email.
[Wasn't Nuwa Bionic Manufacturing developing companion pets?]
Xi Zhengqing: [Are you interested in a partnership? I can arrange for my assistant to show you around the R&D department first.]
Pei Guangji declined.
[Do you have a finished product? I want one.]
After a while, Xi Zhengqing sent several pictures. Some were finished products, while others were concept art.
[If you need one, we can customize it for you.]
[Do you want a bionic version or a fully mechanical one? The bionic version is covered in fur and indistinguishable from a real pet in every detail. It's better suited to the target audience.]
Pei Guangji: [No need.]
From the pictures of the finished products, Pei Guangji chose the one that was objectively the ugliest: a mechanical cat.
It would not shed.
It was not cute enough.
So Xin Hexue probably would not bring the pet into bed.
An image suddenly flashed through Pei Guangji's mind: the young man in fine clothes, his long hair black as ink, holding a Persian cat in his arms and unable to put it down.
It made him frown deeply.
Chapter 11: Face Blindness (11)
The Core District formed the inner circle, surrounded by District One. Ordinary people who tried to get closer to the center would find every step more impossibly difficult than the last.
Looking inward from the outer edge of District One, one could see that the Core District rose like a tower reaching into the sky. Blue-violet rays escaping from energy columns wound around its central axis like a double helix of DNA. The naked eye could make out only layers upon layers of shadowy buildings through the rays, unable to see anything in concrete detail.
The Federation was now divided into thirteen districts. While the vast majority of them were mired in poverty, decay, and chaos, their street neon lights flickering fitfully because of faulty wiring, the Core District was a world of unrestrained luxury.
Hovercraft after hovercraft found its designated floor on the tower-like Core District and docked at a berth along its outer edge.
The space extended ever inward, glittering with lights and bustling with activity, like flowers blooming across a silver sea.
A wedding hosted by any one of the three great conglomerates could live up to the "wedding of the century" proclaimed in news headlines.
Drones belonging to the major media outlets granted admission floated overhead, filming the wedding as it unfolded.
Guests in suits and polished shoes exchanged toasts, while the respectable upper-class people of the Core District wore appropriate smiles.
"Thank you for honoring my elder sister's wedding with your presence, Eldest Young Master Pei."
Xi Zhengqing spoke with a smile.
The heir to Nuwa Bionic Manufacturing stood out among the crowd in a black suit. Its custom-tailored fabric and cut perfectly showed off the Alpha's broad shoulders and narrow waist.
His refined bearing and the gold-rimmed glasses perched on his nose made him look like a typical elite and scholar.
Even though beneath the white lining of his suit was a completely semi-mechanized torso, with precision devices and patterned lines covering the serratus anterior muscles along the sides of his rib cage, biological tissue interwoven and connected with mechanical structures.
Pei Guangji had applied hair gel to his short black hair before coming. It was combed back, exposing his stern, cold features.
It was nothing more than the socializing necessary between financial clans.
Pei Guangji offered a formulaic, distant pleasantry. "Mm, it's been a long time. I believe I met your nephew last time."
Xi Zhengqing was the second child of his generation in the family, with an elder sister eight years his senior.
At the mention of him, Xi Zhengqing waved to the little boy in the distance. "Xiaode, come say hello to Uncle Pei."
Xi Xiaode had grown up in the Sixth District and rarely faced occasions like this. A little timidly, he said, "Uncle, Uncle Pei."
Pei Guangji gave a slight nod.
Xi Zhengqing did not press his nephew. "That's all. Go play."
Dressed in a little white suit as a page boy, Xi Xiaode ran off to find his mother.
Xi Zhengqing watched him go and said, "That Beta from the slums died. When I went to take care of the aftermath, Xiaode was covered in injuries."
The affairs of wealthy families were not kept entirely under wraps, and Pei Guangji had heard something about it. But he had no intention of commenting on another family's affairs, so he merely said politely, "The child seems to be doing fairly well now."
The eldest daughter of the Xi family was an Omega. If her life had followed its usual course, she would have been matched with an heir from one of the other two great financial clans or a prominent middle-ranking family in the Core District, forming a marriage alliance.
But she had fallen in love with a Beta from the slums of the Sixth District, severed ties with her family, and eloped for true love.
It was not a good decision.
The Beta had only coveted her wealth and beauty.
After prolonged domestic abuse, the Omega, now a mother, had snapped and successfully killed him to protect her child.
Although the Xi family had been utterly disappointed in their eldest daughter at the time, they would never allow their own blood to remain outside the family.
She had a powerful family, so dealing with the aftermath was very easy.
Now she had returned to the course her life was originally meant to take.
"Xiaode has undergone two months of psychological treatment." Xi Zhengqing still showed the basic concern an uncle ought to have for a younger member of the family. "He hasn't quite adjusted to life at his new school. The doctor suggested we get him a comfort dog."
As though remembering something, he took out his communicator and showed Pei Guangji. "At Xiaode's request, we adopted a stray dog he was very fond of at school."
Xi Zhengqing's gaze held a faint hint of probing. "Its fur is yellow. It's really beautiful once it's been washed clean, isn't it?"
Pei Guangji's gaze fell on the photo of the familiar little yellow dog. He gave a noncommittal reply. "Mm."
Xi Zhengqing said gently, "It's a pity. It's a stray and lacks the basic training of a comfort dog. Although Xiaode likes it, that doesn't change its lowly breed and bloodline."
The man spoke in an unhurried manner, refined and mild. The arrogance of an upper-class man flickered beneath his gray mechanical eye.
His words seemed to carry an implication.
Pei Guangji frowned and did not agree. "You're rather talkative today. What are you trying to say?"
Xi Zhengqing said, "You'll have to ask Old Mr. Pei. Have you secretly taken someone in? He probably thought our friendship was close, since we grew up together, and sent people to ask me about it."
Pei Guangji's eyes darkened.
Five months had passed, from summer to early winter, since he had brought Xin Hexue back to the villa in South City.
During those five months, Xin Hexue had gone out only a handful of times, probably just once to attend Pei Ying's parent-teacher meeting in his place.
Probably because he had been coming and going from the villa in District One so often, and had visited and stayed at the family home less frequently, he had aroused the old man's suspicions.
Everyone the old man had previously sent to South City to investigate had been intercepted and sent back by him, without exception.
The old man had probably run out of leads and turned to Xi Zhengqing, but he had greatly overestimated the superficial friendship between the four childhood friends.
His communicator vibrated with a message alert, and Pei Guangji looked down.
Xi Zhengqing saw him check his communicator again out of habit. "A message from your lover? You must have checked your communicator at least ten times since the banquet began."
The dinner had only started an hour ago.
Pei Guangji was checking his communicator almost every five or six minutes.
Xi Zhengqing asked, "An Omega?"
Pei Guangji shook his head. "A Beta."
Xi Zhengqing watched with interest as Pei Guangji replied to the person on the other end. Although he could not see the messages, he could guess what was going on from the sudden softness in his childhood friend's eyes.
His childhood friend had probably been bewitched and fallen into a trap set by a lower-class person.
Just like his eldest sister, who had fallen in love with a Beta from the slums.
Xi Zhengqing asked casually, "That mechanical cat from before was for him, wasn't it? Did he like it?"
Pei Guangji said, "Well enough."
When he had brought the mechanical cat back to the villa, he had followed his special assistant's advice and put it in a red-and-white gift box.
After opening the package, the young man had glanced at him as though he wanted to say something, but in the end, he had smiled gently and thanked him.
He had even taken the initiative to hug him.
He must have liked it.
Although the young man had suffered an episode of acute gastritis before, and Pei Guangji had not been at his side.
But he was only a lover, after all, and there was no need to go that far. Pei Guangji had simply left him a black card as compensation.
The mechanical cat had also been a gesture of reconciliation.
Since then, their life together had been in harmony.