Still want to change seats?

For Wu Qie, the entire sequence of events he witnessed was actually very simple—

A swarm of students had gathered at the back of the classroom, crowding around to watch Zhao Shu and Lin Zuwen tugging and pulling at each other.

When he walked into the classroom, that same swarm of students suddenly scattered again.

Zhao Shu returned to his seat with a completely normal expression.

Lin Zuwen, however, looked pale, like someone who had just recovered from a serious illness.

With his backpack on and his head lowered, he moved to another empty seat in the corner.

It wasn’t far from Zhao Shu, but still clearly separated.

The Omega looked utterly lost.

Wu Qie more or less knew what had happened.

But he couldn’t be bothered to ask.

Because he wasn’t the one who wanted to change seats or throw a tantrum.

Strictly speaking, everything happening right now had nothing to do with him.

He was just a heartless geography teacher.

The class bell rang.

Standing on the podium, under the unprecedentedly enthusiastic gazes of the students, Teacher Wu lowered his head, opened the textbook, and flipped to the page marked with Class F’s progress.

After hesitating for a moment, he began reading today’s lesson straight from the book.

“Last week we talked about monsoon climates and ocean currents…”

It wasn’t that Wu Qie was deliberately being perfunctory.

The number of students in this class who actually brought their brains to school was very small.

Zhao Shu counted as one of them.

But the monthly exam results had come out two days ago.

They hadn’t been officially announced yet, but Wu Qie had already learned the results in advance—

Out of a full score of one hundred, this guy had scored thirty-three in geography.

News like this didn’t even need to be spread deliberately.

The teachers who graded the papers had already passed it around verbally until everyone knew.

When Wu Qie had gone back earlier to get his teaching materials, even the math teacher from next door had wandered over, smiling slyly, to ask him whether thirty-three points was some kind of romantic game between fiancés.

At the time, Teacher Wu had been holding a globe in his arms.

He hesitated between three options: breaking down emotionally, vomiting, or smashing the globe directly into the math teacher’s face.

In the end, he chose to say with righteous indignation—

“No.”

And at this very moment, the Thirty-Three-Point Player was sleeping.

Sleeping very soundly.

Wu Qie’s gaze drifted lightly over the top of his head.

Seventeen minutes after the bell rang, the students’ curiosity about Teacher Wu, no matter how high it had initially been, couldn’t overcome their complete lack of enthusiasm for studying.

Their gazes began to wander.

A girl in the back row had even taken out a compact mirror and started adjusting the curve of her false eyelashes.

Wu Qie used one hand to spin the globe slightly while explaining the behavior of tropical cyclones over the ocean.

With the other hand, he picked up his phone and sent several messages to the Thirty-Three-Point Player.

[Wu Qie: Your geography score in the last monthly exam was 33.]

[Wu Qie: You’ve completely disgraced all the Alphas in the world.]

[Wu Qie: Don’t you care about your reputation anymore?]

[Wu Qie: Get up.]

[Wu Qie: No sleeping.]

……

No one around noticed anything strange.

But Lin Zuwen, who had been keeping his attention fixed on Zhao Shu and Wu Qie, found it difficult not to notice that something was off.

He saw the black-haired Beta on the podium.

While reciting the PPT content during pauses in his lecture, one hand absentmindedly fiddled with the oversized globe.

The other hand had picked up his phone.

He tapped it twice.

At the same time, not far from Lin Zuwen, the phone in Zhao Shu’s desk drawer vibrated twice.

Lin Zuwen: “……”

After Alpha and Omega differentiation, both gained sharper vision and hearing than Betas.

In the military, these two genders were often more likely to stand out because of those advantages.

Lin Zuwen was no exception.

He saw Zhao Shu, who had been lying there with his eyes closed, his brows faintly furrowing as if disturbed by the phone’s vibration.

Then he opened his eyes.

Zhao Shu rubbed them, took the phone out of the drawer, looked at it for a while, and then lifted his head.

His gaze went straight toward the figure leaning against the podium.

—Lin Zuwen’s heart went cold.

Lowering his long, delicate eyelashes, he forced himself to look away.

For the first time, Lin Zuwen felt that the heightened senses given by secondary gender differentiation were more like torture.

It was probably because he had always liked Zhao Shu.

So when he discovered that his pheromone scent had differentiated into agave leaves, he wasn’t surprised at all.

He was certain that his pheromone compatibility with Zhao Shu was very high.

Even though the medical report hadn’t been done yet.

But that day, when the boy had leaned down and bitten his neck, the fear and tension of being marked hadn’t appeared at all.

All he remembered was that his eyes had blurred with tears.

That happiness.

That sense of security.

Every cell in his body, every drop of blood seemed to cheer and surge with joy.

Everything was telling him—

He had differentiated into an Omega meant for this Alpha.

But less than a week later, that same Alpha had cruelly declared that he did not belong to him.

Lowering his head, Lin Zuwen felt a suffocating tightness in his chest.

His breathing grew rapid.

His throat felt clogged.

He wanted to cry.

His differentiation period hadn’t fully ended yet.

Before leaving the hospital, the doctor had warned him to avoid emotional fluctuations and avoid people, things, or objects that could stimulate him.

Lin Zuwen knew.

But he pretended not to understand.

Because those things… all had something to do with Zhao Shu.

“Hey, Lin Zuwen?”

A voice suddenly sounded.

Someone poked his waist.

Lin Zuwen raised his hand and rubbed his eyes before turning his head.

Across the aisle beside him, a classmate—an Alpha—was stretching out his arm, poking him with a ruler.

His name was Xie Yi.

He was on the soccer team.

His pheromones smelled like mugwort mixed with leather.

Xie Yi wasn’t very tall but he was built solidly.

His skin had been deliberately tanned into a bronze color.

When he smiled, the canine teeth belonging to an Alpha looked especially white and sharp.

Xie Yi and Zhao Shu didn’t get along.

That was common knowledge in the school.

Lin Zuwen frowned at him.

“What is it?”

Xie Yi pulled the ruler back.

His gaze roamed boldly over the Omega curled up behind the desk.

Seeing his pale skin and reddened eyes, he thought of a rabbit.

He lifted a finger and pointed to the back of his own neck.

“Your anti-bite collar loose?”

Most of the class were Betas.

They could smell pheromones but couldn’t really distinguish the information inside them.

But when an Omega released pheromones carrying strong courtship signals—

Alphas could feel it.

Hearing that, Lin Zuwen’s face turned red and white.

The shame made his toes curl.

Subconsciously, he raised his hand to press down on the anti-bite collar around his neck.

His entire body tensed.

“Want me to check for you?”

Xie Yi said with a grin as he reached out.

“Zhao Shu already has a marriage contract now. He probably won’t have time to care about you anymore.”

“We’re classmates after all. Our families also know each other.”

“Helping out a little isn’t a big deal.”

His rough finger brushed across the back of Lin Zuwen’s hand, leaving behind a strange, unpleasant sensation.

Lin Zuwen’s limbs felt weak.

His face went pale.

With just a single finger, the Alpha easily pushed his hand aside.

Lin Zuwen felt the man’s hand slide across the aquamarine pendant hanging from his collar.

Xie Yi hooked a finger, trying to slip it between his neck and the anti-bite collar.

The unfamiliar and repulsive Alpha pheromones invaded his senses.

Lin Zuwen felt like he was suffocating.

“SCRR—”

A chair screeched loudly as it dragged across the floor.

A blur passed in front of him.

Lin Zuwen only felt a huge force dragging him—chair and all—aside.

Immediately afterward, an Alpha’s figure lunged forward from behind him.

A long leg kicked straight into Xie Yi’s chest.

“f*ck!”

Before Xie Yi could react, he was sent flying into the wall behind him.

His back slammed heavily against it and his vision went black.

The kick hadn’t held back any strength at all.

The intense pain in his chest made him realize that at least one or two ribs might have broken.

He couldn’t even make a sound.

Struggling to lift his head, he saw Zhao Shu standing there with a dark expression.

Like a god descending from the sky.

He stood between Xie Yi and the terrified Lin Zuwen.

“You tired of living?”

Zhao Shu asked expressionlessly.

On the podium, Teacher Wu still had one hand resting on the globe.

This time he genuinely hadn’t reacted in time to what had suddenly happened in the classroom.

From his perspective, everything had been fine.

The Thirty-Three-Point Player had been awakened from sleep by his messages.

He wasn’t sleeping anymore.

Although he still wasn’t paying attention in class.

Instead, he had spent several minutes staring at Wu Qie with a dark, eerie gaze.

After those few minutes, Zhao Shu’s expression had suddenly changed.

For a second, Wu Qie even thought this Alpha’s morning temper was so bad that he might murder his fiancé just for waking him up.

But the truth proved—

Zhao Shu didn’t want to kill him.

Without any warning, the young Alpha suddenly stood up.

He strode across the classroom.

Then kicked another Alpha in the class flying with one kick.

Amid the shocked screams of everyone present, he calmly stepped forward.

And protected the pale, fragile Omega who had just moved away from him behind his back.

Everything had happened too fast.

While Wu Qie was still stunned, he suddenly thought about the self-criticism speech under next week’s flag-raising ceremony.

As the teacher present during the incident who failed to stop it, he might also have to contribute eight thousand words.

The previously calm classroom instantly fell into chaos.

“Stop fighting! Stop fighting!”

“Holy shit, Shu-ge, are you trying to kill him?! Stop!”

“Ahhh Xie Yi’s coughing blood! Don’t touch him! Don’t touch him! And don’t hit him again!”

The words “coughing blood” snapped the dazed Teacher Wu back to reality.

He jolted and rushed off the podium toward the center of the crowd.

No one else dared to step forward.

Only the black-haired young man forced his way through the crowd.

Just as Zhao Shu raised his fist to punch Xie Yi again, Wu Qie quickly grabbed his elbow.

But Wu Qie was a Beta.

A Beta’s strength couldn’t possibly compare to an Alpha’s.

The Alpha who had been stopped grew impatient.

With a casual swing of his arm, he didn’t even bother looking to see who the idiot behind him was.

He simply used brute force to fling away the person trying to stop him.

“BANG—!”

“SCRR—!”

Two harsh noises rang out as something heavy slammed into desks and several desks were knocked out of place.

Zhao Shu couldn’t be bothered to care.

Nor did he bother to look.

Turning back, the young Alpha asked Lin Zuwen in a hoarse voice—

“So?”

“Still want to change seats?”

Lin Zuwen trembled.

He shook his head.

Tears spilled out instantly.

Zhao Shu’s lips twitched.

He was just about to say something when suddenly someone behind him shouted—

“Holy crap! Teacher Wu, are you okay?!”

“……”

Zhao Shu’s sharp black pupils shrank instantly.

He turned around.

Among the wreckage of three or four overturned desks behind him, the black-haired Beta was slowly getting up with someone’s help.

One hand was supporting his lower back.

He frowned.

For a long time he couldn’t say a single word.

He only silently shook his head to indicate he was fine.

But he looked like he was in serious pain.