Chapter Text
His work at HS Group was, at best, moderate. While he managed to handle some matters from his own company (and other more personal ones) from afar, part of his time was devoted to being the perfect secretary at Shen Wenlang’s firm.
It was his way of paying back the favors Shen had done for him, while also ensuring there would be even more to collect later. A virtuous cycle, as he once said.
Still, there wasn’t much for him to do. Most of the workload fell on Gao Tu, who worked tirelessly, without pause, until every last task was complete. In a way, Hua Yong admired him. Working so relentlessly for someone who could barely restrain his bluntness when speaking to him, insulting him over and over… Hua Yong often wondered if he himself would be willing to endure the same for Sheng Shaoyou.
And yes, he would.
For a hundred years, even. He would endure the most humiliating insults if it meant staying by his beloved’s side.
Perhaps that was why he believed himself capable of understanding Gao Tu’s heart. Shen Wenlang was not an easy man to deal with, too arrogant and coarse. Any ordinary person would rather pick up dog droppings in the park than spend more than five minutes with him. And yet, Gao Tu had spent over ten years at his side, or so he’d told him.
He couldn’t help but pity him, just a little.
*
Hua Yong considered himself an observant man. He noticed things others normally wouldn’t, and knew how to take advantage of them. An extra word, a twitch of a smile that slipped past control, every secret was laid bare for those who paid just a little more attention.
That’s why, when his workload increased at the same time as Gao Tu’s absences did, he wasn’t surprised. It was to be expected. In recent weeks, Gao Tu had looked increasingly worn down, sickly. With enormous dark circles under his eyes and skin far too pale, the difference between him and a walking corpse was barely noticeable. His condition never seemed to improve, because he didn’t wait until he was fully recovered before coming back, making his stints in the office shorter each time.
For example, Gao Tu had returned the day before, but that morning he could barely complete a single task. Making mistakes here and there, his eyes struggled to stay open, and it seemed as if he might collapse onto his desk at any moment.
It was all Wenlang’s fault. His stubborn yet possessive self couldn’t stand not having Gao Tu around every day. He would threaten to fire him or replace him if he didn’t return quickly, something Hua Yong knew he would never actually do but something the poor Gao Tu kept falling for, time and time again.
*
When Gao Tu accidentally deleted an account record, Hua Yong knew it was time to send him home.
“I’m so sorry, Hua Yong,” Gao Tu said as soon as they stepped out of HS Group. He could barely stand, leaning a hand against one of the columns to hide it. “I’ve been nothing but a burden to you lately.”
Hua Yong smiled gently and shook his head. “Don’t worry. I know it’s bigger forces that’ve brought you to be here.”
Gao Tu returned the smile, forced and tinged with shame, before looking away.
“You even went to the trouble of calling a taxi for me…”
“You’ve done the same for me, it’s no trouble.”
It truly wasn’t.
To Hua Yong’s surprise, he had come to feel a certain affection for Gao Tu. The consequence of spending so many hours together.
Gao Tu was painfully honest and easy to read; he couldn’t lie even to save himself. He was kind and considerate, a good person, but he didn’t flaunt moral superiority or judge others. His calm, humble demeanor, perhaps laced with a bit (a lot) of low self-esteem, made him someone Hua Yong didn’t mind spending time with.
Not long after, the taxi he’d called arrived. They exchanged a brief farewell, a promise to return the favor that Hua Yong declined, and Gao Tu began walking toward the car.
He didn’t make it halfway before collapsing.
*
“For now, he’s stable. Let’s not say well, but at least he’s no longer in immediate danger of dying… for now.”
Hua Yong tilted his head with curiosity. The doctor sighed and walked over to the door to lock it. Then he turned back, his voice low as he spoke without taking his eyes off Gao Tu lying in the bed.
“You’re the first person from his circle I’ve seen. Although he’s mentioned his father and sister, I’ve never met them. I worried he didn’t have any friends, given his situation.”
With another sigh, he turned to look at Hua Yong.
“I shouldn’t be telling you this, since it’s doctor-patient confidentiality, but my duty is to save lives, and this can’t go on. Sometimes you have to sacrifice things to achieve a greater good, don’t you think?”
Hua Yong nodded. He knew that better than anyone.
“I see you’re an Omega, and that makes me think you might understand… or at least I hope so.” the doctor cleared his throat, and Hua Yong narrowed his eyes, waiting. “Gao Tu is actually like you, an Omega. He’s been pretending to be a Beta for years, taking suppressants since he first showed up.”
Given the delicacy of the moment, Hua Yong swallowed his smile.
His suspicions had been confirmed.
Although he’d been eighty percent sure Gao Tu wasn’t the Beta he claimed to be, he had left room for doubt. Supposedly, he had an Omega partner; it wouldn’t be strange for some of their scent to cling to him. But the faint aroma Hua Yong caught was so strong, so raw, that it couldn’t come from anyone else. It was his own.
And now there was no doubt.
“He hasn’t given his body any rest, and this is the consequence. I’ve told him he’s killing himself, but he won’t listen… I don’t know how much longer his body will last before… completely collapsing.”
“What can be done to help him?”
“Beyond convincing him– or forcing him to stop taking or injecting suppressants, nothing. There’s no point starting treatment if he keeps poisoning himself.”
After a few seconds of looking at Gao Tu with the worried eyes of a doting parent, the doctor’s face lit up.
“Although… there is a way, but–” He hesitated.
“Uh?”
“It’s more of a myth than a guaranteed solution, which is why I’m not sure I should even mention it.”
“I think with a problem like this, you have to share everything you know.” Hua Yong said with a small smile.
“His cycle and everything about his Omega nature is so deeply unbalanced and damaged… A decade or two ago, it was believed that a possible cure for this problem was the knot of an Enigma. Their pheromones are strong enough to alter an Alpha’s physiology, it’s expected they could also repair a damaged Omega.” with his hands in his jacket pockets, he walked back toward the door. “But even the existence of Enigmas is uncertain, let alone their supposed healing powers.”
Hua Yong’s gaze swept over Gao Tu. The slight rise and fall of his chest was the only sign he was alive.
“Personally, I’ve never encountered an Enigma.” the doctor said as he unlocked the door. “And I’ve lived fifty-eight years.”
Still looking at Gao Tu, Hua Yong allowed himself a faint, disdainful smirk. “Neither have I…”
*
Hua Yong reviewed his options.
To the public eye, he was an omega. He could pretend he hadn’t heard a thing and watch from the front row as Gao Tu slowly carried out his own destruction. No one would have any reason to reproach him.
Or he could help him.
Saving someone from death was no small thing; he was certain Gao Tu would feel indebted to him forever. And if that information happened to slip unexpectedly to Shen Wenlang in the future, he had no doubt that, knowing it, Wenlang wouldn’t be able to refuse him anything he asked. Gao Tu mattered to him more than he liked to admit.
The business world was like a dungeon full of wild beasts, consumed by rage, pretending to be civilized and from the highest ranks of society. Gathering as many allies as possible was never a bad idea. Unexpected situations always arose, and having a variety of people willing (or obliged) to help him was the smartest move.
After much thought, he decided to let Gao Tu choose. In the end, it was his own life.
And his own body.
*
Gao Tu replayed the last three days as if they were a film.
The moments before he fainted were blurry; he barely remembered them. Only that he’d nearly cried out of pure frustration at work, and that he had spoken briefly with Hua Yong. After that, everything went black.
The next thing he remembered was waking up in the hospital, his body numb. Breathing felt heavy, and his eyes hurt. Hua Yong was right beside him, wearing an expression Gao Tu had never seen before.
“You’re awake,” Hua Yong murmured, more to himself than to anyone else. “How do you feel?”
“Fine.” he lied. He didn’t feel fine at all. He wanted to vomit, but his stomach was empty.
He wanted to cry.
He wanted to cry because his body hated him, and he hated it just as much. He felt completely detached from it, like a soul unable to find its rightful owner, wandering from person to person. But in his case, he couldn’t leave. He was bound, trapped in a prison from which he would never escape.
For the next two days, Hua Yong took care of him, ignoring all of Gao Tu’s pleas for him to go home and stop worrying.
“Your perfect attendance…”
“My perfect attendance was ruined a long time ago, Mr. Gao,” Hua Yong said with a smile. “Shen Wenlang will survive without us, isn’t that what you always say?”
Yes. That was what he always said.
“Haha, yes.” Gao Tu forced a laugh, doing his best to ignore the painful pressure in his chest.
When he was finally discharged, Hua Yong offered to take him home.
“You’ve already done so much for me. Let me go back on my own so you can return to your life.”
“You’ve been discharged, but you still need to be under observation,” Hua Yong replied, helping him change clothes. He had even brought new ones so Gao Tu wouldn’t have to put on the dirty suit he had arrived in.
While waiting for Hua Yong to finish signing some documents, Gao Tu’s eyes stung as he caught sight of his reflection in one of the hospital’s wide windows. Wrapped in delicate Omega clothing, carrying that warm scent, he wondered what his life might have been like under different circumstances.
*
“My apartment isn’t in this direction…”
“I know. I’m taking you to mine.”
Gao Tu turned toward him, stunned. Hua Yong met his gaze for a few seconds, smiling, before looking back at the road. Gao Tu was too exhausted to waste his limited energy on pleas that would go unheard, so he simply returned to gazing out the window at the passing cityscape, still wondering when Hua Yong had gotten this car.
Was it his? Borrowed? And if it was– No, that wasn’t Shen Wenlang’s car. Gao Tu shifted uneasily in his seat. The car Hua Yong was driving looked even more expensive than Shen Wenlang’s…
He had heard rumors.
Rumors that said Hua Yong was a consort (he preferred that term, since the other was far too degrading for his taste). That on the days he didn’t leave the company in a taxi, it was always handsome Class S Alphas who took him home. Gao Tu had never given these rumors any thought; after all, he was the one who accompanied Hua Yong most of the time, and the Alphas who offered him rides had always been Sheng Shaoyou or Shen Wenlang. He had never seen anyone else around him.
Gao Tu sighed and decided that a short nap would be far more useful than thinking about stupid rumors.
When he woke, nothing could have prepared him for what he saw.
A massive, luxurious building loomed ahead, shining like a thousand stars.
Slowly, he turned back to Hua Yong.
“We have a lot to talk about.” Hua Yong said, smiling once more, though this time the tender glint in his eyes was gone. “I want us to be comfortable.”
*
To put it simply, neither of the men in that room was what he claimed to be.
When Hua Yong told him he knew he was an Omega, the first thing Gao Tu thought about was throwing himself off the balcony.
What if he told Shen Wenlang? What if, after that, Wenlang never wanted anything to do with him again, hating him forever? Gao Tu felt his eyes fill with tears again.
Since when was he this sensitive?
Hua Yong must have sensed his desperation, because it didn’t take long for him to admit that he, too, had been pretending to be something he wasn’t.
He was an Enigma, and the CEO of X Holdings. He had formed an alliance with Shen Wenlang for reasons Gao Tu didn’t need to know at that moment.
And that…
That explained a lot. Chiefly, why Shen Wenlang had suddenly shown up with an Omega at his side after years of loudly proclaiming how much he hated them.
“But that’s not why I brought you here.” Hua Yong said, leaning casually against the kitchen counter, across from where Gao Tu sat on the other side of the island. “I know you’re dying, and I think I can help you to avoid that.”
Gao Tu had been staring into his glass of water, thinking about the chain of events in recent days and how unreal it all felt, but those words made him look up.
“H-how…?”
“Your doctor told me it’s believed the knot of an Enigma could help with your hormonal imbalance… and several other things.”
Until now, Gao Tu had even doubted that Enigmas existed. He’d heard of them since childhood, but had never seen one with his own eyes. Was it really possible that such powerful beings, capable of bending the will of the highest-ranking Alphas, walked among them? The thought alone sent chills down his spine.
Despite the suddenness and weight of the confession, Gao Tu believed him. How else would the miserly Shen Wenlang agree to spend time with him?
Deep down, he tried to silence the annoying voice in his head suggesting he was just looking for excuses to avoid the truth. That Shen Wenlang would never choose him, never make him his first choice. And besides, what reason would Hua Yong have to lie about something like that?
Gao Tu must have been deeply lost in thought, because he didn’t notice when Hua Yong moved to stand right beside him.
“But he wasn’t sure it was true,” Hua Yong went on. “But I wouldn’t be telling you otherwise if I didn’t believe it could work. I’ve seen firsthand that my pheromones can change certain things in Alphas, I don’t see why it wouldn’t do the same for Omegas.” The smug grin he gave was downright wicked.
Alpha? What Alpha?
Sheng Shaoyou?
And what could have chang—? Oh.
Oh.
A flush spread across Gao Tu’s cheeks. The first hint of color his face had shown in weeks.
“With my team of scientists, I’ve been working for some time to develop a product that would hide my scent and give me that of an Omega. I wanted it to last for hours. Something like that doesn’t come out right on the first try, and one of our failed attempts, while it suppressed my natural scent, didn’t replace it with another. It left it neutral, like a Beta’s.” Hua Yong said, absently toying with the glass in Gao Tu’s hands. “If it works the same way for you, I could give it to you… I’d just need to keep some so I could reproduce it for you to keep using.”
The idea was… wonderful.
“Since it’s a perfume, you wouldn’t have to ingest or inject it. You’d stop causing yourself so much damage.”
“But you’re not giving it out of the kindness of your heart, are you?”
The Enigma smiled, satisfied. “What I like about you is that you’re not so naive.”
Gao Tu stiffened as Hua Yong stepped closer. He was terrifying for someone with such a pretty face.
“You’ll have to return the favor, but not immediately. In the future, when I decide I need you.”
Unexpectedly, Hua Yong reached out, gently brushing Gao Tu’s hair back. Not forceful, just a feather-light touch, without meeting his eyes. The gesture only made Gao Tu more nervous.
“We don’t have to sleep together if you don’t want to. But you’re so weak… and knowing what the doctor said, if you keep giving in to Shen Wenlang’s demands, I’m afraid your body won’t hold out.”
Before, he had only needed two days to get back to work. Now, even after nearly four, he still wasn’t recovered. He felt exhausted and nauseous, not only physically but also mentally. Walking felt like dragging bags of stones tied to his ankles. Breathing hurt.
Hua Yong was right. Pushing himself past his limits would only send him to an early grave. And while living hurt, he had a sister and he would never forgive himself if his negligence left her alone.
“I can also ask Shen Wenlang to give you thirty days off. We’ll make up another illness, and you can come back once you’re fully recovered.” Hua Yong searched his face, but Gao Tu shrank away, avoiding his gaze. “But if you want something faster…”
Gao Tu thought about it.
Then he thought about it again.
And once more.
Weighing the pros and cons, the good and the bad.
If doing this meant ridding himself of even part of his suffering…
“Let’s do it.”
“Uh?”
“I want to do it. Let’s try… see if it’s true.”
And for the first time since arriving at Hua Yong’s apartment, he met his eyes.