Chapter 1: Boarding the Starship

“Sorry. Song-ge and I are truly in love. I hope you can forgive us.....”

In the cafe inside the port waiting lounge, at a window seat, an Omega with delicate features sat there with reddened eyes, apologizing.

Wen Yuzhi sat across from him. While listening to that halfhearted apology, he idly held the spoon in his hand and gave the coffee in front of him a slow stir.

Steaming white mist curled up, slipping over long, pale fingers. Under the sunlight, the knuckles resting against the silver spoon looked almost translucent—flawless as carved jade, lustrous white and fine-textured. Even such a simple motion, done by him, was pleasing to the eye.

Su Yu had always known that this former fiance of the person he liked was very good-looking.

He perfectly fit every beautiful fantasy Alphas had about Omegas these days: glossy, soft black hair; porcelain-white, jade-smooth skin; the corners of his eyes slightly lifted, naturally brushed with a faint blush, like peach blossom juice ground into a smear and dotted there—lush and breathtaking, making people want to reach out and touch him, to kiss him.

And ever since he sat down, the surrounding Alphas’ gazes had been drifting this way, openly or covertly—some restrained, some stunned. Their eyes almost all stuck greedily to Wen Yuzhi, while Su Yu, also an Omega sitting right beside him, was ignored from beginning to end.

Su Yu wasn’t unfamiliar with this. After all, wherever Wen Yuzhi was, everyone’s attention would inevitably focus on him.

An Omega with superior looks was the center of the crowd anywhere he went.

It was just a pity.....

As if thinking of something, Su Yu tugged at the corner of his mouth. His lowered lashes covered the gleam of schadenfreude in his eyes.

When he learned that Wen Yuzhi’s pheromones, once tested, couldn’t trigger any Alpha response at all, he didn’t ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) know how happy he was—and that feeling hit its peak the moment Liang Song confessed to him.

So what if Wen Yuzhi was pretty? So what if his background was good?

An Omega who couldn’t attract even the lowest-grade Alpha was worse than a beta—nothing but a vase with a face.

No Alpha would be willing to marry home a vase that could only be admired but not used. Not even the fiance who’d been promised to him since childhood—he tossed him aside like garbage the instant he heard the news.

Thinking that, Su Yu lifted his hand again, “inadvertently” showing off the diamond ring on his ring finger.

He looked at Wen Yuzhi sitting opposite him in silence and spoke with a hint of smugness. “Song-ge was drunk that night, so he accidentally got a little impulsive in front of the media. He didn’t mean to say those things.”

Su Yu paused, then added, “I know this is my fault too. I shouldn’t have gotten between you and Song-ge, but feelings are just like that—so inexplicable. Song-ge likes me, and I like him too. We truly want to be together!”

After saying that, Su Yu lowered his head, cheeks pink, putting on a full performance of shyness after declaring love in public. And the way he kept calling him Song-ge—his tone intimate and ambiguous—someone hearing it for the first time might assume he and that Song-ge were unbelievably close in private.

Yet after listening to that winding, roundabout “we’re in love” speech, the exquisite, beautiful Omega by the window still didn’t stop stirring his coffee. He lazily propped his cheek on his hand, thick black lashes fluttering slightly, as if thinking about something.

In fact, Wen Yuzhi really had fallen into thought.

He thought for a long time before he finally connected the “Song-ge” in Su Yu’s mouth with his own former fiance.

And it wasn’t his fault.

Liang Song was practically a stranger to him.

The engagement between the Liang and Wen families had originally been nothing more than an offhand joke their mothers made over tea after a meal. No one took it seriously. It was only later, after Wen Yuzhi’s second uncle inherited the position of family head and wanted to cooperate with the Liang family, that he dug up that old “joke” again.

Because of this, Wen Yuzhi even went out of his way to take a look at this fiance of his.

But Liang Song disappointed him at first glance.

In Wen Yuzhi’s memory, the outside world—and even his second uncle—always praised Liang Song as outstanding: handsome and talented. They even kept bringing up, over and over, how Liang Song was already taking over the family business at such a young age.

As if Liang Song were some once-in-ten-thousand-years perfect catch, praised to the skies with no equal on earth.

The bigger the expectation, the bigger the disappointment. After seeing this “perfect catch” in person, Wen Yuzhi realized just how distorted those rumors were.

Sure, Liang Song was handsome—but not so handsome it made heaven furious. And the way he looked at Wen Yuzhi wasn’t any different from other Alphas: full of lust for a pretty Omega, and contempt.

Put simply: greasy. Greasy, cloying, and smugly self-assured.

Anyway, from that day on, Wen Yuzhi never paid attention to any news about Liang Song again. In his mind, this fiance had already been marked with a big fat X—just waiting for the right chance to push the engagement off his shoulders.

If Su Yu hadn’t come looking for him on his own, Wen Yuzhi wouldn’t even have known that after his test report came out, Liang Song had staged this high-profile drama of breaking off the engagement and chasing true love.

And because of that, when Su Yu tried to say more to show off, Wen Yuzhi cut him off first. “It’s fine. I wish you two happiness.”

Su Yu: “......”

The bragging words jammed in his throat without warning. Su Yu suddenly felt like he’d punched a pillow—weak, pointless.

He glared in anger, his face twisting for an instant.

...He’d said so much, and this was Wen Yuzhi’s reaction? Shouldn’t he be furious and losing it?!

Right now, the entire StarNet knew Wen Yuzhi was a useless vase with defective glands—so defective that even his fiance couldn’t endure the engagement and chose to break it off.

In other words, Wen Yuzhi was the one who’d been abandoned! How could he still look like he didn’t care?!

Su Yu was stunned—and bewildered.

But he still remembered why he’d come today—besides showing off to his “love rival” how good Liang Song was to him, he also had to cut off the last sliver of possibility between Wen Yuzhi and Liang Song.

Thinking that, Su Yu forced himself to calm down. He raised his chin, trying hard to create the posture of a victor. Unfortunately, his looks weren’t as bright and gorgeous as Wen Yuzhi’s, so doing that only made him look awkward and out of place.

“This is the apology gift Song-ge and I prepared. I hope you’ll accept it. And one week from now, Song-ge and I will be holding an engagement banquet first. If you can come to attend.....”

“I won’t be going to the engagement banquet.” Wen Yuzhi waved his hand before Su Yu could finish. “And this apology gift....”

He opened the box Su Yu pushed over. Inside was a necklace that looked quite expensive.

But Wen Yuzhi only swept his gaze over it casually before looking away.

“Thank you, but I rarely wear gemstones of this purity. If Liang Song told you to bring it, don’t use this grade next time. Otherwise, if people find out, they’ll think the Liang family is the stingy type.”

When he said that, Wen Yuzhi was genuinely offering Su Yu advice, sincerely.

His voice was clear and fresh, his enunciation always unhurried. So even when he said something that would directly embarrass Su Yu, it didn’t sound aggressive or overbearing.

Even so, Su Yu’s face still flushed red all at once.

Especially when he noticed that Wen Yuzhi was also wearing a gemstone necklace today, his expression became even uglier.

That deep, water-blue color shimmered under the sunlight, flowing with prismatic light—like a quiet, profound starry sky. From afar, it gave off a steady kind of splendor.

No comparison, no damage. Compared to that gem, the necklace Su Yu brought simply couldn’t measure up.

Even Su Yu had to admit it. After seeing the gem at Wen Yuzhi’s throat, looking at the necklace he’d carefully chosen only made it feel cheap and tacky, no matter how he looked at it.

Wen Yuzhi watched calmly as Su Yu’s expression shifted again and again.

Of course he’d said all that on purpose. Su Yu’s malice was obvious. Wen Yuzhi wasn’t an idiot—he could see through such petty tricks.

And besides, it was the truth.

Su Yu wanted to find a sense of superiority over him with an expensive gem, but he clearly hadn’t bothered to learn what Wen Yuzhi’s mother used to do.

“Explorer” was only the least remarkable of Madam Jilanya’s titles. In her early years, Jilanya had always been an excellent jewelry designer.

As her only child, Wen Yuzhi could honestly say the thing he lacked least was gemstones. The two mineral veins in his name alone sent him countless rare and precious gems every year.

If it wasn’t the best—top quality—Wen Yuzhi couldn’t even be bothered to pick it up and wear it.

.........

In the end, Su Yu still left in disgrace.

He’d wanted to press down his “love rival,” but instead Wen Yuzhi wouldn’t budge no matter what—oil and salt didn’t enter at all—and Su Yu ended up losing face in a big way.

He was probably rushing back now to go cry to Liang Song.

Wen Yuzhi, however, didn’t care in the slightest.

Whether it was Liang Song or Su Yu, to him they were nothing but irrelevant passersby. And Liang Song breaking off the engagement on his own had even helped him—it made it possible for him to leave the Wen family smoothly.

In view of that, Wen Yuzhi decided to “repay” him before leaving.

He opened StarNet. News about the Liang family’s eldest young master bravely pursuing true love was sitting at the top of the trending list.

Unlike Wen Yuzhi’s anonymity, Liang Song was a fairly well-known figure on StarNet, since he often appeared at various business events. The “rich scion of a powerful family” label had earned him a huge fanbase online.

When the engagement-break news first came out, there had already been plenty of reports. And then Liang Song’s “century confession” for Su Yu right afterward shook the entire net.

At the banquet where he confessed to Su Yu, he openly stated that he didn’t like the fiance his family had arranged for him—and he exposed Wen Yuzhi’s gland problem in front of the reporters.

So in this melodramatic farce of breaking off an engagement and chasing true love, no one blamed Liang Song for being fickle. Instead, Wen Yuzhi—the Omega—became the joke of the circle overnight. Even netizens rushed to support Liang Song for resisting this kind of family-arranged marriage.

“What year of the Star Calendar is it already? How is anyone still doing political-marriage feudal garbage?”

When Wen Yuzhi scrolled past that comment, he even liked it.

Exactly, exactly. What year of the Star Calendar is it already—how could his second uncle still be this feudal?

Better to learn from Su Yu. “True love” and “freedom,” every other word.

So progressive. So open-minded.

Then Wen Yuzhi reposted the news about Liang Song confessing to Su Yu onto his own page, and even offered his blessings to this “century true love.”

[Perfect match. Please lock yourselves together.]

After finishing that entire set of operations, Wen Yuzhi didn’t care what kind of impact the repost would cause. He shut off his light-brain, and the notification sounds of countless incoming messages cut off in an instant.

Just then, the port’s broadcast announcement was also informing passengers that the starship was about to depart.

Wen Yuzhi grabbed his luggage in one motion, tossed the powered-off light-brain into a trash can, and then walked onto the starship without looking back.

—Bye-bye, that disgusting Wen family, and his ex-fiance.