What would he have done? In his previous life, would that even count as an answer?
Hearing this, Ying Zhiyu was unusually silent for a moment.
Until the car behind honked, he snapped out of it and restarted the vehicle.
After some time, looking straight ahead, he first asked: “Why are you suddenly asking this?”
During the Alpha’s silence, Li Xi’s gaze never wavered from him.
Hearing the question, he looked away and lowered his eyes, telling Ying Zhiyu about Li Yue.
Ying Zhiyu fell silent again.
A moment later, he spoke slowly: “Considering your fourth sister’s upbringing, it’s no wonder she has this kind of thought.”
Li Yue probably didn’t have ill intentions; she didn’t mean to trample on others’ dignity.
Yet this was the arrogance inherent to a dominant.
They could hardly understand what even a small decision might mean to someone else.
A casual word, a command from a dominant could determine the subordinate’s entire life.
Pain or sorrow, a dominant could never truly feel.
The stolen opportunities, the scornful malice, the contempt for ants—they could never empathize.
Or perhaps, it simply wouldn’t happen to them.
They didn’t bother to consider it.
Back home, after a day out, Li Xi wanted to shower.
Ying Zhiyu stopped him first, asking: “Are you upset?”
Li Xi shook his head: “No.”
Yet he didn’t turn around, answering with his back to the Alpha.
Ying Zhiyu smiled, wrapping his arms around him from behind, burying his head in Li Xi’s neck: “I let you be unhappy on your birthday, isn’t that a big guilt of mine?”
Li Xi didn’t hesitate; instinctively, he tightened his grip on Ying Zhiyu’s hands, interlocking their fingers.
He exposed the most vulnerable and sensitive spots to the Alpha.
After a while, Li Xi spoke calmly: “I asked—it wasn’t your fault.”
He already knew the answer, didn’t he?
The young Alpha seemed gentle and casual, yet his pride and resilience had never bent.
All the restraint he had practiced since childhood was merely waiting for the right moment.
If he had truly forced Ying Zhiyu, wouldn’t he have known the answer?
Would he even hope for the Alpha to say something?
To thank him for forcing him?
Ying Zhiyu rubbed his neck lightly, whispering: “Don’t overthink. I didn’t answer because that hypothetical isn’t real.”
He lifted his head, one brow raised teasingly: “All that money? Do I look like a fool who would refuse?”
Feeling the interlocked fingers tighten, Li Xi remained silent.
Whether it was disbelief or something else, he didn’t know.
Ying Zhiyu stroked their knuckles in a soothing manner, then suddenly asked: “Has your last heat of the year come yet?”
It had, actually.
Li Xi didn’t answer—recently, the Alpha’s lab had been busy, often returning home near midnight.
Tonight, Li Xi was particularly intense.
Every time Ying Zhiyu thought it was enough, Li Xi would return, as if afraid there wouldn’t be a next time, or making up for the missed days.
Several times, he called Ying Zhiyu’s name: “Ying Zhiyu.”
He responded: “Mm.”
But afterward, Li Xi said nothing, only to call again a short while later.
Eventually, the Omega grew truly tired, considering Ying Zhiyu’s hands, they simplified the activity over the past two months: the Alpha lying back and enjoying, the Omega working diligently.
By dawn, Li Xi finally lay back beside Ying Zhiyu.
Ying Zhiyu ran a hand through his sweat-damp hair; Li Xi hadn’t fallen asleep, and he felt Li Xi circle his left wrist, then loosen slightly to avoid pain, yet stubbornly held on.
Ying Zhiyu recalled Li Xi’s earlier question in the car.
He hadn’t lied; he truly didn’t know the answer.
Objectively, Ying Zhiyu admired Li Xi’s ability, decisiveness, and courage.
He also supported the Omega becoming truly independent. Nurturing AO wasn’t just a gender issue—first, an Omega needed their own sense of security.
Not reliance on anyone else, nor the false stability provided by another’s pheromones.
So early on, in the fourth year of their previous life, Ying Zhiyu had performed a temporary mark in the car.
That time, Li Xi had even been grazed by stray bullets during an attack.
Since then, Ying Zhiyu had let go.
No more secret competitions or passive resistance—he accepted their marriage and willingly took on the responsibilities of an Alpha in a family.
He could provide respect, unconditional support in work, but for a long time, it seemed to stop there.
Ying Zhiyu had struggled to overcome that inner barrier.
Thus, those “heart-throbbing” signs he had consciously or unconsciously ignored…
Those adjustments to the marital agreements, those precious and rare anniversary gifts, those children—who hadn’t even reached the point of inheritance disputes yet—yet still bore all the pressure and refused to leave the marriage.
Deep down, Ying Zhiyu probably just hoped Li Xi had never allowed his heart to be touched.
He hoped Li Xi only needed support in career and family. Then all the benefits and conveniences Ying Zhiyu received as a son-in-law of the Li family—money, influence, smoothly advancing research projects—he could give back in return.
They would remain a “relationship of equal exchange.”
In the previous life, that disastrous beginning—where the dominant, ignoring his dignity and trampling on his autonomy, acted with arrogance—Ying Zhiyu wouldn’t have known how to come to terms with it without truly facing life and death.
If in this life he hadn’t reexamined all the subtle traces of the past, he wouldn’t have known how many more years of negotiation they still needed.
But Ying Zhiyu thought:
If he hadn’t died in the previous life…
They probably would have kept entangling forever. Wouldn’t that have been another form of a lifetime?
“If you feel the time is right, should we have a child?”
Ying Zhiyu asked softly.
The hand gripping his wrist stiffened, and Li Xi slowly lifted his head.
Ying Zhiyu smiled faintly at him: “I think we’re actually ready, aren’t we? Last time, didn’t we even take the condom off?”
He wasn’t naive—he could even sense whether there was a barrier or not.
“Then no more medicine,” the Alpha’s features sharp and gentle, he gazed at Li Xi and asked, “By the way, was the medicine bitter?”
Li Xi’s dark eyes stared at the young Alpha, initially silent.
After a long pause, he spoke deliberately: “Two.”
“Huh?” Ying Zhiyu raised the tail of his sentence, momentarily confused.
Li Xi said: “Two children.”
One heir wasn’t enough—they needed at least two.
Ying Zhiyu paused for a second: “…Okay, I’ll try my best.”
No sooner had he said this than he felt a warm body press against him. He froze for a moment.
…Start trying now?
Glancing at the faint light slipping through the blackout curtains, before Ying Zhiyu could suggest discussing it, Li Xi asked: “Have you thought about what you want to name the child?”
This question, Ying Zhiyu realized, he truly hadn’t considered.
So the Alpha countered: “Any ideas yet?”
Since Li Xi asked this way, it was likely he already had names in mind.
The bedroom fell silent again for a moment, then Li Xi answered: “Xuan, Jian.”
Hearing this, Ying Zhiyu was inexplicably silent for a moment as well.
“Li Xuan, Li Jian?” the Alpha repeated slowly.
Without Li Xi specifying which “Xuan” or which “Jian,” Ying Zhiyu automatically made the connection.
He lowered his gaze, looking at the other pair of eyes in the darkness.
Li Xi pressed his lips together, rare for him to avert his gaze—first turning his face away, then probably not wanting to miss seeing the Alpha, he turned back, raising a hand to cover Ying Zhiyu’s all-seeing eyes.
The Alpha didn’t mind; his eyes remained curved in a smile in Li Xi’s palm. “Are you trying to complete my set of brush, ink, paper, and inkstone?”
Ying Zhiyu—‘Yu’ (聿) meaning “brush.”
Ying Yan—‘Yan’ (研) meaning “inkstone.”
‘Xuan’ meaning “black,” as in Xuan Gui, Xuan Yu, Xuan Xiang, all signifying “ink,” and ‘Jian’ meaning “stationery.”
Li Xi didn’t deny it.
Indeed, he had that intention.