Chapter 2

Although some people helped to block it, TongYan was inevitably filled with a few glasses of wine.

He had never touched this thing before, and his memory began to fragmentafter getting into the RV. When he woke up, for a moment or two, he couldn’tfigure out where he was sleeping.

In front of him was a large bedroom that faced the sun, with a simplelayout, the main colors being black, gray, and white. A desk was placed by thewindow, and two layers of curtains were hung over the bay window, unlike hisoriginal bedroom, which had a large French window.

This was Zhuo Xiang Ming’s house, their marriage house.

TongYan got up, took a bath while enduring a headache, and pulled out the familiar isolationpatch from his bag and stuck it to his nape before opening the door.

The two-story duplex house was very quiet. Tong Yan stood at the top ofthe stairs for a while, confirming that Zhuo Xiang Ming was away.

He remembered that before going to the chapel yesterday, he also asked TongYang how he should address Zhuo Xiang Ming. Calling him uncle was a bitold-fashioned, calling him elder brother in front of Lin Yue Hua was alright, butsaying it to the person himself was actually somewhat awkward.

It seems that Zhuo Xiang Ming doesn’t intend to embarrass him today.

It was already eleven o’clock, the refrigerator was packed, Tong Yanwent to the kitchen to make a sandwich for himself. With milk heated up in themicrowave, it made for a nutritious brunch of eggs, milk, meat and vegetables.

Hewas sober, and his belly was full, but he couldn’t just stay in the room.Fortunately, the house wasn’t very big, he didn’t have to wander around much beforefinding the back door. He opened the door, and a small rose garden came into view.

The black ground was soft, the growing roses were also pleasing to theeye. Tong Yan slowly walked over and cautiously looked down at this flowerfield, which didn’t match the house behind it.

“Ka-cha.”

TongYan was a little distracted, he turned around to find that it was just thebutler robot following him.

Apicture of Tong Yan reaching out to the lovely flowers was partially spit out fromthe small slot on its chest. Its electronic eyes flashed, and it moved to TongYan’s side and beeped, reminding him to take the photo.

They had already made contact. Before the marriage, this butler robotcalled Dudu was sent to Tong Yan’s house several times. It had collected variousinformation about Tong Yan, including the details of his life and habits.

At this time, in Dudu’s programing, Tong Yan and Zhuo Xiang Ming had thesame master status.

TongYan was also familiar with it. After pulling out the photo, he thought abouthow best to destroy the evidence while asking casually, “What were youdoing just now?”

The electronic lights on its round head flashed again, and a cute butsomewhat impassive voice sounded: “Starting program, Task No. 1 makebreakfast, clean the bathroom, charge. Task No. 2 wash the dishes, tidy up thekitchen, charge. Task …”

TongYan: “Why do you always charge?”

Dudu: “Type B-5 battery has already been used for 144 months and 23days. 12 months and 23 days beyond the specified period of use, 6 months and 23days beyond the recommended replacement battery deadline of …”

“Yourmaster hasn’t changed your battery.”

Dudu: “Theoretically, at this moment, Tong Yan is also Dudu’s master.”

Um … got it.

Thefirst day after the wedding was ordinarily the start of the honeymoon. Tong Yanstayed with the butler robot for the whole day, Dudu reluctantly leaving to rechargeever so often. Seeing its constantly flashing electronic eye, Tong Yan was alsoreluctant to part from this newly established friendship. Finally, he moved hisfeet, following it to its charging station. Dudu was very happy, playing ashort jingle, it didn’t shut down, the two chatting while it charged.

“What’s a marriage?”

Dudu was a little puzzled, but since Tong Yan was waiting for an answer,it quickly found a definition: “Marriage is a legally established contract. It refersto the civil law in which two people willingly establish a spousal relationshipin accordance with the conditions and procedures prescribed by the law. Furthermore,they undertake the rights, duties and other responsibilities arising therefrom.”

“The spousal relationships in this nation includes, but are notlimited to, AA, AB, AO …”

“Wow.” Dudu skimmed over thousands of more information than itread out, included among these was countless poetry praising marriage, even somecheesy pick-up lines-“Were you a book in your past life, otherwise, why doI want to sleep every time I see you?”

“Very profound.” Was its final evaluation.

“What about your honeymoon?” Who knew what kind of web page it hadopened up now, “According to the popular science posted here, a honeymoon shouldfollow a wedding.”

TongYan: “We don’t need it, anyway, ours is a fake marriage.”

Dudu immediately searched for the keywords “fake marriage”,hesitating, it said a moment later: “There’s no such thing as a fake marriage underthe law. As long as you receive a marriage certificate and go through theproper procedures, it has a legally binding effect.”

“The fake I mentioned is not this kind of fake.” Tong Yan didn’tknow how to explain it, “A true marriage is between two people who love eachother, but neither of us loves the other, so it’s a fake marriage.”

“Okay.” Dudu said.

After chatting about this and that for a long time, Tong Yan ate a lunchthat wasn’t too early or too late. Feeling sleepy, he went back to sleep.

But when he laid down, he couldn’t sleep much. Tong Yan was distractedby the earlier topic of a honeymoon. He was about to start school soon, Zhuo XiangMing was also busy with work, and besides, getting married was the only taskthey needed to accomplish, so, no one had brought this up.

Oh right, someone had brought it up.

When they were settling the wedding details with the planner, Zhuo XiangMing never showed up. Tong Li Qin and Tong Yang were two straight men with no taste,so most of the discussion was between Tong Yan and Lin Yue Hua.

Whenit came time to talk about the honeymoon trip, Lin Yue Hua had brought upseveral places for Tong Yan to pick from. Although Tong Yan really didn’t wantto go, after all, Zhuo Xiang Ming was basically a stranger, he also couldn’trefuse outright, politely saying: “It doesn’t matter where I go, why don’t youask Brother Xiang Ming first, Auntie? See which best fits his work schedule.”

Asa result, Zhuo Xiang Ming only had two words to say: No time.

The earpiece’s sound wasn’t quiet, plus, Tong Yan was seating nearby, henaturally heard it. Lin Yue Hua had smiled at him consolingly, yet awkwardly,and said, “What nonsense are you saying? How can you leave out thehoneymoon?”

Zhuo Xiang Ming didn’t know that Tong Yan was present, saying bluntly,“I really don’t have the time. Coming out to get married is already enough.Besides, we don’t know each other. What kind of honeymoon can we have? Mom, don’t…”

“Okay, okay, I won’t call you again.” Lin Yue Hua hurriedly cut offthe phone call.

The honeymoon was thus unveiled. Lin Yue Hua originally liked Tong Yan, butafter this incident, she felt significantly more aggrieved for him, and treatedTong Yan even more gently. The clothes she ordered could form a small hill, hopingto compensate Tong Yan a little bit.

Of course, that was the first time Tong Yanheard Zhuo Xiang Ming’s voice.

Originally, Zhuo Xiang Ming always came up was all sorts of excuses to notcome, so he’d unconsciously imagined the other man to be strict and fierce. Beingforced to marry Tong Yan, he naturally wouldn’t treat him nicely in the future.

But after that day, Tong Yan’s anxious heart relaxed a little.

Although Zhuo Xiang Ming had rebuffed Tong Yan,his tone was gentle, and there was no hint of resentment towards him. Instead,he’d reasoned with Lin Yue Hua in a rather earnest manner, Tong Yan even felt thathe’d heard a trace of helplessness.

Thus,Zhuo Xiang Ming’s impression in Tong Yan’s mind became a little gentler. TongYan felt that his personal safety would be guaranteed … at least the other manwas unlikely to treat him violently.

TongYan thought, nervous: It’s too easy to domestically abuse an omega, let alone asick omega. If Zhuo Xiang Ming wanted to make him suffer, he wouldn’t need todo anything. He could just release some pheromones, and he’d immediately dropto the ground.

It wasn’t until he was on his way home from work that Zhuo Xiang Mingsuddenly remembered that he was married.

He realized that he wouldn’t be the only one in the house. From now on,there’ll be one more person at the dining table, the eighteen-year-old Tong Yan,his newlywed spouse.

Thismade him feel some complex emotions.

Because of this and that reasons, the two people always missed eachother. Except for the few days when they took their wedding photos, Zhuo XiangMing never saw Tong Yan again.

Yesterday, at the wedding, the two met for the first time after morethan half a month, but the wedding process was very complicated, there was nochance to have a proper talk. This lasted until the RV drove them home, the excitementover. Then he and Tong Yan were finally left alone in the back seat.

Unfortunately,Tong Yan was drunk, very drunk. He was leaning his whole body limply againstthe window, his originally fair face was painted in a red flush, and the tip ofhis nose was exuding a fine sweat. He looked awfully hot, he closed his eyesand reached out to pull off his bow tie, but he had no energy, and couldn’tpull it off no matter how much he tugged.

After a few attempts, he groaned aggrievedly.

Lin Yue Hua hadn’t exaggerated at all. Tong Yan was really beautiful,not feminine, but the kind of good-looking that radiated youth. Even though he wascurrently frowning in irritation, he still looked cute.

Zhuo Xiang Ming looked at him in interest. After a while, seeing himstill not accomplishing his task, he reached out to help him. But suddenly, theboy twisted around and fell right into his arms.

Thisbrought along a very light fragrance of cape jasmine.

His nape was firmly fastened with the isolation patch, he must’ve beenreally hot, otherwise, his pheromones wouldn’t come out like this.

“Tong Yan?” Zhuo Xiang Ming called out to him tentatively.

But the person in his arms only knew that he was fighting with a bowtie, looking uncomfortable and frowning tightly, he bit his lips and whined:“Ah … ah, hot … it’s hot …”

Seeing that the omega was about to cry, Zhuo Xiang Ming hurriedly helpedhim untie the bow tie, twisting open a few buttons while he was at it.

Hisoriginal intention was to make Tong Yan feel more comfortable, but when hiseyesight fell on the fair and delicate, soft looking skin that was so unlikehis own, Zhuo Xiang Ming felt that he seemed to have done something dangerous.

He once again reached out and fastened some of Tong Yan’s buttons, leavingonly the top one open, so the boy wouldn’t choke in his crooked sleepingposition.

“Hmm …” Tong Yan finally felt comfortable, his brows quicklyunfolding. He leaned on Zhuo Xiang Ming’s shoulder, not forgetting his manners evenwhen half asleep, “Thank you, brother …”

Probablybecause of drunkenness, he’d slurred his words, the second half of Tong Yan’s“Brother” was chewed on, making a weird sound.

However, even after the bowtie was taken off, Tong Yan didn’t settledown for a long time. He started rubbing his face against Zhuo Xiang Ming’sneck, his fluffy hair sweeping across Zhuo Xiang Ming’s chin and neck, hissweet omega pheromone hovering over his nose. Who knew what he was trying toconvey through his groans and hums, but in any case, it sounded a littlecoquettish.

Although Mr. Zhuo was born with a silver spoon, and was handsome and sophisticated,he’d studied the classics for more than ten years. He had only one ambition, takeover Wall Street. In the past, there were many omegas who casted flirtatiousglances towards him, but Zhuo Xiang Ming was naturally unreceptive to these things,he’d lived to a good age while keeping control of his emotions. When faced withhis lukewarm responses, the other parties naturally retreated.

So,this was his first experience with this kind of thing. He sat perfectly straight,not knowing where to put his hands, let alone how he should move.

Eventually,Zhuo Xiang Ming grasped Tong Yan’s shoulders, wanting to push him back onto hisseat. That’s when he finally understood the meaning behind Tong Yan’smovements: His face was sweaty, and his hair was sticky, making him feel itchy.

Zhuo Xiang Ming breathed a silent sigh ofrelief and pushed Tong Yan’s hair aside, arranging it behind his ears. Sureenough, the boy immediately calmed down, and obediently laid down on hisshoulder, mumbling, “Thank you, brother …”

*

Thecar came to a stop, and the driver lowered the partition, saying, “Mr.Zhuo, we’ve arrived.”

Zhuo Xiang Ming got out of the car, remembering the illness that Lin YueHua had brought up before the marriage, he felt somewhat apprehensive as he crossedthe front entrance.

To summarize, pheromone stress disorder wasphysical pain resulting from psychological factors. In order to help Tong Yan passthrough this sensitive period, he must first get him used to alpha pheromone, thenonce his sense of security increased, he could leave the house without worry.

But this was easier said than done. Aside from the intimate acts ofhugging, kissing, and sex, Zhuo Xiang Ming really couldn’t think of any other wayto perform “pheromone desensitization.”

Holding an eighteen-year-old boy in his embrace, all in the name of“therapy”. Just thinking about it made Zhuo Xiang Ming feel like abeast.

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T/N:

This chapter was much easier to translate. I put a little * to denote that the flashback is over. There are quite a lot of flashbacks in this story, but it’s not always clear where they start and end. At least to me.

I’m not sure what the plural form of omegaand alpha are. I’ll just still to omegas and alphas for now.