Chapter 57: You deserve to be unloved

On the first night aboard the ship, Xu Lin could not sleep. He kept his ears pricked for any sound, only drifting into a restless doze in the early hours of the morning.

Nothing happened through the night.

Xu Lin had not eaten since the day before and was starving. This sightseeing cruise would take at least seventeen days to reach Huakou Port in District Nine, with stops along the way. He could not survive on water alone.

After some thought, he dressed carefully, covering himself from head to toe, and left his room.

The cruise ship had everything—full entertainment facilities and countless restaurants. Xu Lin had worried about the cost; he did not want to waste the money Shuangshuang had given him. But when he asked, he learned that most of the restaurants were free.

Because he was so on edge, he ate quickly, barely tasting the food. As soon as he was full, he hurried back to his room.

He spent the day in a state of nervous tension, but nothing happened. Gradually, he began to relax.

Perhaps he was truly safe.

Late at night, when most passengers had retired to their rooms and the public areas were less crowded, he ventured out, curious to explore.

He had never been on a cruise ship before and was surprised to find it could be arranged like a massive shopping mall.

He stopped outside the cinema.

A staff member noticed him and approached. “Ma’am, would you like to watch a film?”

Xu Lin did not answer. His eyes were fixed on the sign at the entrance.

It displayed a movie poster: a rundown wooden house, and the male protagonist Elias walking away down a small path.

So people in the capital really did love this film.

Just when his mood had started to lift, something unpleasant always appeared.

Xu Lin shook his head and walked away.

Feeling stifled, he went to the deck for some air.

He leaned on the railing, staring at the dark sea.

[“Marriage is not something to be joked about!”]

[“If I ever get married, it will be to the person I love most.”]

Xu Lin lowered his gaze. The mark on his ring finger caught his eye. He covered it with his other hand, as if to hide the scar that would not fade.

[“Ji Jinxuan, I hope the same for you.”]

The sea breeze lifted his skirt, ruffling the thin veil that hung before his face. A pair of red-rimmed eyes were exposed in the deep darkness of the night.

The wind stung his eyes. Powerless, he buried his face in his arms.

“Whoa, man! Check out this gossip!”

On the other side of the deck, two people lay on loungers. One was excitedly showing his phone to the other.

They had their backs to Xu Lin and did not notice him. Their voices carried.

“Chen Yu? The one who got engaged to that young master from the Ji family a while back?”

“Now this is a real show. They’re not even married yet, and she’s already out and about like this. Not afraid of causing trouble, huh.”

“Eh, it’s an arranged marriage. There’s no love there.”

“No love now doesn’t mean no love later. I heard her pheromone compatibility with Ji Jinxuan is 92 percent.”

The other person gasped. “That high?”

“Biology wins. Once they’re married and the Alpha does a permanent mark, there’s no room for anyone else.”

“Love, feelings—they’re all jokes compared to compatibility.”

Bang!

The two people chatting looked up at the loud noise.

A glass door in the distance was still swaying slightly.

The figure of a woman in a long dress was slowly walking away behind the door.

They exchanged bewildered glances.

Xu Lin returned to his room, tore off his hat, and tossed it aside.

He took a shower and lay down in bed, wide awake.

Before he realized it, he had pulled out his phone. A tabloid news article had just been posted.

The first thing he saw was a series of photos.

A beautiful Omega was holding hands with another Alpha, laughing and talking. Before parting, the Omega kissed the Alpha’s cheek.

They looked intimate—clearly lovers.

This was the Omega Xu Lin had seen at the engagement banquet that day. He had been too shocked then to really look at her face.

She was a celebrity. No wonder she was so beautiful.

The Alpha beside her was also a woman, a head taller than Chen Yu. Her gaze never left Chen Yu, soft and gentle.

Whether someone loved or not could be seen in their eyes.

Xu Lin tossed the phone aside, lay lazily on the bed, and stared at the ceiling.

Was he the only one in the world with such terrible judgment?

Was he the only one so blind?

After a moment, he twitched the corner of his mouth, pulled the blanket over his head, and curled up.

Forty hours had passed since he boarded.

Nothing had happened.

Xu Lin almost felt like he was just on a vacation.

He had thought he would reach his destination without incident.

Until eight hours later. He was eating in the dining hall when he received a message from Zong Ningshuang.

Just four words: [He found out.]

It was abrupt, but Xu Lin understood immediately. His scalp prickled with alarm.

Before he could think of a plan, the dining hall’s alarms suddenly blared, each piercing siren cutting through his nerves. The diners grew restless, some pressing against the portholes to look outside.

Xu Lin looked too. In the distance, at the edge of the sea, he saw dozens of speedboats with bright lights heading toward them.

His eyes widened. His heart leaped to his throat, pounding so hard he could barely breathe. He gasped.

Ji Jinxuan had caught up.

Gritting his teeth, Xu Lin forced himself to stay calm.

As he turned to leave, he bumped into a man.

“Watch where you’re going!”

Xu Lin had no time for anything else. In a flash of insight, he slipped the pocket watch into the man’s pocket.

If Ji Jinxuan had tracked him here, it meant Shuangshuang had been discovered. Ji Jinxuan probably knew exactly how they had been communicating. There was no point keeping these things.

A cruise ship was not like land. No matter how big, it was still just a vessel in the vast ocean—its space was limited.

Finding him was inevitable, only a matter of time.

Less than ten minutes after Xu Lin left the dining hall, a bigger commotion erupted from the place. Peering over the railing, he saw the ship surrounded, and Alphas swarming aboard like ants.

He was looking for a place to hide, still in the hallway, when he suddenly came face to face with several Alphas carrying guns. He froze. They glanced at him—just a glance—then pushed past him like bulls, kicking open room doors and searching. Screams erupted from the cabins.

They had not recognized him.

Xu Lin lowered his head and saw the dress he was wearing.

He played along, feigning terror like the other passengers. The Alphas finished searching the rooms and brushed past him.

The moment they were gone, he hitched up his cumbersome skirt and ran. As he ran, he tore off his hat and tossed it into the sea. He gripped the phone Shuangshuang had given him, gritted his teeth, and threw it into the water as well.

One stroke of luck did not guarantee another. They would soon notice something was off. If he stayed in the same disguise, he would be found.

The ship was now crawling with Alphas.

He was not sure he could escape.

If he could not…

Then he would die. Drowning in the sea would be better than dying in a cage.

He blindly ducked into a room—a staff break room—and collided with a steward holding a cup. Half the water spilled onto Xu Lin.

“Oh, I’m so sorry! Are you alright?”

“Sorry.”

The steward reached out with a handkerchief to dab at his clothes, then froze when he heard a man’s voice come from the woman before him. Before he could react, his vision went black, and he crumpled.

Xu Lin had knocked him out. He stripped off the steward’s uniform.

The ship’s alarms were still blaring.

The echoing sirens reverberated through the endless night.

Xu Lin ran into Alphas everywhere he went. He dodged and weaved, making his way down to the tenth deck concert hall. There, he came face to face with the round-faced Alpha.

What rotten luck.

The other man spotted him and immediately let out a sharp cry, attracting more Alphas from nearby. A crowd of them swarmed in.

“Damn it.”

Xu Lin cursed under his breath.

He threw a heavy punch at the round-faced Alpha’s nose. Blood streamed down. The Alpha’s shout cut off abruptly, like a chicken whose neck had been wrung. Taking advantage of his pain, Xu Lin hooked an arm around his neck, wrapped his legs around his waist, and took him down.

The Alpha struggled for breath, his face turning red. Xu Lin grabbed the revolver from his waist. As the others rushed in to help, Xu Lin rolled under the rows of chairs and slipped away.

Xu Lin had been scrapping since childhood. The concert hall’s layout was complex, making it hard to corner him—everything became an obstacle. Like a fish, he slipped through the encirclement. At the doorway, another Alpha was about to enter.

Xu Lin charged into him, sending him stumbling backward. Before the Alpha could get up, he was only in time to see Xu Lin’s retreating figure. He instinctively reached for his waist and swore loudly. His combat knife was gone.

Back in the concert hall, the round-faced Alpha complained as he got up, his face covered in blood.

“Damn, why is he always coming for me?”

He looked up and saw his colleague at the door, equally pale.

Xu Lin ran, his lungs burning, the taste of blood in his throat.

His stamina was not what it used to be.

Even so, he dared not stop.

But as he had said, no matter how large the ship, finding him was only a matter of time. And he was only one person, not a machine—he would have to stop and catch his breath eventually.

After the concert hall, he ran into several more groups of Alphas. On the third encirclement, he was cornered on the deck.

By then, he had little strength left. He managed to grab an Alpha as a hostage, pressing a gun to his head, forcing the rest to hold back.

He retreated step by step across the deck. Two meters behind him was the railing. Below was the bottomless sea.

The waves crashed against the hull with a roar.

He had been running for so long, but he still had not seen Ji Jinxuan.

He had to escape before he appeared. But his fear materialized—Ji Jinxuan arrived.

They had not seen each other for two days. The last time had been across that alley.

Xu Lin had not expected Ji Jinxuan to look like this in just two days.

His lips were pale, dark circles under his eyes. Though dressed neatly and trying to act normal, he could not hide the sickly pallor beneath his skin.

He was unwell.

Xu Lin looked at the muzzle guard covering the lower half of his face. He had only seen Ji Jinxuan wear it a few times, when his pheromones were unstable.

That was probably why it had taken Ji Jinxuan two days to come.

Xu Lin curled his lips and sneered. “It’s only been a few days, Young Master Ji. Looks like life hasn’t been kind to you.”

“Is it your heat? What, couldn’t find an Omega to help you?”

“You came all this way in this condition, making such a spectacle. Not afraid of causing a stir now? What if your fiancée finds out? How would you explain that?”

Xu Lin laughed. “Oh, look at me. I forgot—Young Master Ji can have any Omega he wants. With a fiancée with such high compatibility, who knows, maybe that fake engagement could become real. And if you don’t want the fiancée, you’ve got the skills to change anyone’s glands. Any Beta or Alpha you fancy, you can turn them into whatever Omega you want.”

“Everyone knows your talents, Second Young Master Ji.”

“In your eyes, other people are just ants you can crush at will, aren’t they?”

Ji Jinxuan stood still, quietly watching him. His hands hung at his sides, clenched, his fingertips white.

Xu Lin said, “A bit early, but I don’t know which Omega you’ll end up marrying. Let me offer my congratulations in advance.”

He drawled the next four words: “Happy wedding.”

Xu Lin kicked the Alpha in front of him aside and aimed the gun at Ji Jinxuan’s forehead.

Ji Jinxuan did not move. He let him point the gun.

The Alphas behind him were all on high alert.

“Come home, Xu Lin.”

After a long pause, that was all Ji Jinxuan could say.

Xu Lin laughed bitterly.

He shot out the porthole not far behind Ji Jinxuan. Glass shattered across the floor.

Xu Lin ignored the guns now trained on him.

“You’re really not afraid of death, Young Master Ji. If I’d known you valued your life so little, I would never have meddled.”

Ji Jinxuan’s eyes went still.

How could he not understand?

Regret.

Xu Lin regretted it. He regretted shielding him from that explosion. He regretted ever knowing him.

Ji Jinxuan could not find other words. He only repeated stubbornly, “Let’s go home and talk.”

That sentence ignited Xu Lin’s fury.

He looked at Ji Jinxuan. “Home? Where is home to you?”

“You know better than anyone where my home is. Do I need to remind you?”

“Six years of playing games. Aren’t you tired yet?”

Ji Jinxuan did not want to hear any more. He took a step toward Xu Lin.

Just one step, and Xu Lin reacted as if bitten by a snake. He fired a shot at Ji Jinxuan’s feet, stopping him in his tracks.

He could have shot him. But he did not.

A faint, unspoken relief washed over Ji Jinxuan.

Yes, Xu Lin still hesitated. Before, when the gun was pressed to his forehead, Xu Lin could have ended his life with that bullet. But he had not. In the end, he had moved the gun away.

Even now, with so much hatred, perhaps… perhaps he still could not bear to kill him.

But that relief shattered within seconds.

“What, not dodging? Are you betting that I’m a bad shot? Or that I won’t kill you?”

Xu Lin guessed his thoughts, smiled, glanced at the remaining bullets in the cylinder, and casually delivered his death sentence: “Congratulations.”

“Hope you have four lives left.”

Before he finished speaking, a powerful force tore through his shoulder, then another through his right arm.

Blood gushed out. Only when the bodyguards rushed to shield him did the pain slowly spread through his limbs.

Drops of blood fell, extinguishing his last illusions.

He had thought the next bullet would pierce his heart.

But it never came.

When he looked up, his pupils dilated instantly.

Xu Lin’s movements seemed to slow in his eyes.

He saw him toss the gun away. He saw him vault over the railing without a backward glance, throwing himself into the abyss of the dark sea.

His mind went blank. Instinct took over. He lunged forward, catching Xu Lin’s wrist just before he fell.

Xu Lin was light. Like a kite, he hung from Ji Jinxuan’s grip.

And yet he was so heavy. If Ji Jinxuan let go, he would be swallowed, gone forever.

Blood poured from his arm and shoulder, but Ji Jinxuan felt no pain.

Something was wrong inside him, overriding the pain of the gunshots.

He had been extracting his pheromones too often, injecting reagents into his gland. Even an S-grade body had limits. His gland had been damaged. He had been suppressing the symptoms with medication, but one day, it all overflowed, and his heat erupted without warning.

Ji Jinxuan was already at his limit. He had forced himself here. Now with two bullet wounds, he barely had the strength to pull Xu Lin up.

Xu Lin looked at him silently, his eyes cold and distant.

He slowly tore off the suppressant patch on his neck.

The intense pheromones hit Ji Jinxuan like a wave. His hands trembled, nearly losing their grip.

“Xu Lin… stop!”

Ji Jinxuan gritted his teeth, his brows twisted in pain, cold sweat streaming down his pale face. Even so, he would not let go. Xu Lin grew impatient. He drew a knife, raised it high, and brought it down hard.

With a dull thud, the blade pierced through Ji Jinxuan’s palm, pinning his hand to the ship’s railing. Blood sprayed.

Ji Jinxuan groaned, nearly losing his grip from the shock.

“This is the benefit of low compatibility. Second Young Master Ji, are you satisfied with your experiment?”

“Xu Lin!”

He sounded angry.

Warm blood dripped onto Xu Lin’s face, staining his cheek.

“Why are you angry? Isn’t this what you wanted?” Xu Lin asked, puzzled. “Turning me into the Omega you wanted, making me into what you desired, disregarding my will, caring only about your own happiness. You pushed ahead alone, all for your own selfish reasons. Failure is what you deserve.”

“I’m curious. In your heart, do I even count as a person?”

Ji Jinxuan froze.

Xu Lin placed his hands on Ji Jinxuan’s fingers and pried them open, one by one.

“Xu Lin!”

“If I can’t be a person by your side, there will be other places in this world where I can.”

Xu Lin glared at him, fierce and unyielding. “I will never be anyone’s accessory. Not before, not ever.”

“Ji Jinxuan, you deserve to be unloved.”

Xu Lin said, “Go to hell.”

The warmth disappeared from his palm. Xu Lin’s figure sank into the dark sea below, like dissolving foam.

Ji Jinxuan pulled the knife from his hand, leaving a gaping, bloody wound. Blood poured out like water.

The Alphas rushed to support him, urgently trying to administer suppressants.

Ji Jinxuan pushed them away, scrambling to vault over the railing. Several grabbed him, shouting: “No! Young Master!”

“We’ll find Mr. Xu Lin! You need the suppressant, or you’ll—”

They shouted, they struggled, chaos reigned. But soon, the frantic, thrashing Ji Jinxuan went limp. He had passed out.

A hand quietly withdrew from his arm. An empty syringe fell to the floor.

The panicked group turned and saw the newcomer. They all breathed a sigh of relief, eyes welling up like they had seen a savior.

“Young Master Zong.”

Zong Xi stared coldly at the bloodied, unconscious Ji Jinxuan. He turned away in frustration.