In the early hours of dawn—around four or five a.m.—Lu Shangjin woke up briefly. Last night, he had forgotten the time while working. He glanced at the clock in a haze and suddenly jolted awake.
A faint, lingering scent of milk candy drifted through the study. Lu Shangjin’s heart tightened as he carefully identified it, then he smiled faintly in relief. Before his legs, numb from sleep, could fully steady him, he stumbled out toward the second floor.
Yan Yi was asleep, curled up on the soft blanket like a bundled-up ball.
Lu Shangjin sat at the edge of the bed, watching him in the dim light filtered through the curtains of dawn. He knelt on the bed, carefully and quietly pulling the blanket from Yan Yi’s arms and covering him properly again. He lifted Yan Yi’s soft face, gently turning him onto his side so he wouldn’t press on the baby.
The sleep-wrinkled waistband of his pants had tugged the little rabbit tail slightly upward, exposing a stretch of pale, snow-white waist. Lu Shangjin smiled silently and helped tuck the tail back into place, pulling his clothing up a bit.
Yan Yi shifted slightly, his rabbit ears flicking before falling back over his face.
Lu Shangjin held his breath, instantly stepping back. After confirming Yan Yi didn’t wake, he sat down again.
He leaned down and lifted the rabbit ear off Yan Yi’s face, tucking it behind him. Staring at that peaceful sleeping face, he gently touched the tip of his slightly trembling nose, and his entire heart softened into a quiet, flowing warmth.
He must still have me in his heart.
Lu Shangjin sat there happily for a while, then his brows furrowed again in worry. His hand lightly touched Yan Yi’s slightly rounded lower abdomen.
Would Yan Yan like this child that came without regard for his own will? Would he resent him—and then come to resent this child who tied him to Lu Shangjin?
Carrying this little life every day… was Yan Yan exhausted and unhappy?
“I did it wrong again,” Lu Shangjin muttered as he sat beside him in frustration.
Yan Yi often moved in his sleep. His right hand scratched at the base of his tail before resting off the edge of the bed.
Lu Shangjin gently took that hand into his own, his rough fingertips brushing over the faint tattoo on his ring finger.
He kissed the small English inscription there, then quietly took out a ring from his pocket and carefully slid it onto Yan Yi’s ring finger, admiring it in silence.
Yan Yi had gained a little weight; his fingers were still slender but slightly softer now. The ring still looked a bit loose on him.
Lu Shangjin took out his phone, used a thin beam of light from the curtains, and spent five minutes finding the right angle to take a photo of their interlocked hands wearing matching rings.
He studied it carefully, then set it as his wallpaper before putting his phone away. He lay down behind Yan Yi quietly, wrapping him from behind but not fully holding him—just close enough to breathe in his scent.
He kissed the rabbit’s faintly exposed pheromone gland softly.
“I really want to mark you,” he whispered.
Drowsiness overtook him. Half asleep, Lu Shangjin dreamed again of Yan Yi standing far away, unreachable, asking coldly, “Is such a low compatibility even useful?”
He startled awake, his gland dry and burning from overuse of calming pheromones in his sleep.
Yan Yi was still safely in his arms.
Lu Shangjin exhaled slowly to steady himself and checked the time—almost six.
He got up, put on slippers, then suddenly paused and hurried back. Quietly, he removed the ring from Yan Yi’s finger, carefully pocketing it before leaving the room.
Yan Yi’s rabbit ears suddenly perked up, listening.
He heard water running in the bathroom and sat up groggily, scratching at the base of his tail under his pajama pants.
The room was filled with a faint water-lily-like calming pheromone. When he touched the bed, the warmth left by Lu Shangjin was still there.
“He came again today,” Yan Yi frowned and got up.
On the stairs, he saw Lu Shangjin in the bathroom injecting something into his arm—an injection that looked like a heat-suppression shot.
After finishing, Lu Shangjin leaned against the wall and returned to his room.
Only after his door closed did Yan Yi go into the bathroom. He checked the trash and pulled out a used syringe with the needle removed and packaging torn off.
He searched the medicine cabinet—only a few suppressants were left.
Yan Yi paused.
Then he quietly pushed the box back into place, tossed the syringe back into the trash, washed his hands, and stared at himself in the mirror with frustration.
He refused to think about anything related to Lu Shangjin again. He went upstairs, locked himself in his room, and sent a message to the group chat, tagging everyone.
Yan Yi: Want to go out for a few days?
Tan Meng: Okay.
Cang Xiao’er: OKOKOKOKOK I want to go to Yunnan, what about you guys?
Bi Ruijing: ??? No.
Bi Ruijing was removed from the group chat.
The next afternoon, Lu Shangjin rushed to the airport after receiving the news. Yan Yi and the others were going through security.
Yan Yi looked back and saw Lu Shangjin anxiously watching them, then pretended not to notice and walked into the terminal with Cang Xiao’er.
Inside the waiting hall, Yan Yi stared at the endless messages on his phone without responding.
Later, Lu Shangjin transferred 300,000 yuan and sent a message: “Have fun, baby. I miss you. Please send me photos.”
Cang Xiao’er leaned over and said, “He treats you so well. No one calls me baby.”
Yan Yi paused, then smiled slightly and turned off his screen. “Baby.”
The three of them traveled together in Yunnan for ten days.
Lu Shangjin desperately wanted to see photos, but Yan Yi didn’t send a single one.
Eventually, he found a group photo of the three omega friends on Bi Ruijing’s social feed.
Lu Shangjin enlarged it, staring at Yan Yi’s smiling face, then couldn’t help but smile as well. He printed it and hung it on the study wall.
After a few more calls from doctors, he calmly turned on his computer and resumed work.
On the day of pickup, Lu Shangjin arrived an hour early.
Yan Yi saw him and asked casually, “How did you know I was coming back today?”
A faint smell of disinfectant clung to him—he had likely just left the hospital.
“I don’t trust you running around with our little baby,” Lu Shangjin said, loading the luggage.
Yan Yi didn’t respond much. When he got into the car, Lu Shangjin’s mind went completely blank.
The tattoo on his right ring finger was gone.
It felt like lightning splitting through him—everything went dark.
After returning home, he silently made Yan Yi a bowl of pumpkin porridge, then went back to his room.
From behind the door, Yan Yi heard the sound of things being smashed.
At the dining table, Yan Yi stirred the warm porridge, staring at the scar where the tattoo had been removed.
It hurt unbearably to erase that love, leaving behind an unhealable scar.
He had thought erasing it would feel satisfying, imagining Lu Shangjin’s reaction—anger, confrontation, maybe revenge. But none of it brought him relief.
He touched his increasingly obvious lower abdomen.
“Baby… are you happy with this?”
That night, Yan Yi opened the study door again.
He saw Lu Shangjin asleep at his desk under a single lamp. On the wall beside him was an entire collage of framed photos—every one of them from their travels.
There were also candid shots of Yan Yi sleeping, staring out the window, all carefully collected.
Yan Yi saw an old photo of a young Lu Shangjin with a small rabbit child.
He also saw neatly arranged tiny baby clothes and shoes.
He stood there frozen, fingers tightening on his clothes.
Then he slowly bent down in pain as the baby inside him kicked violently from emotional disturbance.
Unable to hold it in, he collapsed, whispering to the child:
“Be good… Dad hurts…”
“Be good… Dad really hurts…”
He knocked over an ashtray.
The study door burst open.
Lu Shangjin rushed in, eyes red, lifting Yan Yi into his arms and carrying him upstairs while urgently releasing calming pheromones.
The baby calmed down slightly.
Yan Yi, exhausted, leaned against his shoulder.
Lu Shangjin refused to let go, sitting on the bed holding him tightly.
But when he tried to touch Yan Yi’s abdomen, Yan Yi pushed his hand away.
Lu Shangjin stubbornly placed it back.
“He’s my child too. I want to touch him.”
“I want to touch him…”