Chapter 7

Friday after school, Lu Heyang was packing his textbooks when He Wei came in through the back door, leaned against his desk, and asked, 'After dinner tonight I'll send you straight home?'

'So tame today.' Lu Heyang looked up at him. He Wei had not stopped stirring things up for weeks now — the scenario of going home right after dinner simply did not exist.

'That's not it. I'm going to Chengxi,' He Wei said. 'I noticed you don't seem to like that place.'

'I never said I didn't like it.' Lu Heyang pushed his chair back under the desk.

'You like it? You actually like it?' Seeing Lu Heyang start to walk out, He Wei went after him and slung an arm across his shoulder, grinning. 'I'm not worried that some precious young master like you won't adapt to a place like that — besides, from childhood till now I've never seen you take a liking to anything. I really can't read you.'

'Then stop trying.' Lu Heyang said. 'If I didn't like it, I wouldn't be going with you.'

He Wei gave a cheerful whistle. 'Alright, I'll have them add a seat.'

Out of the classroom and onto the overpass, students from PE class were streaming back across the way in twos and threes, racquets and jump ropes in hand. Lu Heyang and He Wei cut through the crowd and, at the very back of it, spotted Xu Ze.

He was alone again — not belonging to any class group, not even, it seemed, to the Preparatory Academy itself. The sense of drift was severe: silent, quiet, his gaze angled slightly downward as he walked, looking nowhere in particular, as though thinking something through, or perhaps simply elsewhere.

An Omega came running up from behind, hesitated a moment, then reached out and patted Xu Ze on the shoulder and spoke to him.

Xu Ze stopped, tilted his head to look at him, and seemed not to have caught what was said. He bent down a little to listen — which somehow made the Omega embarrassed, who shoved a bottle of drink into his hand, turned, and ran. Xu Ze was left standing there, looking at the bottle in his hand; after two seconds, as if slowly registering what had happened, he turned to look back at the Omega, who was already long gone.

When he turned, the white suppressant patch on his nape was exposed.

'Tell me — is he pure, or just slow on the uptake?' He Wei asked Lu Heyang with a smile, then added, 'That kind of personality is pretty rare around the Preparatory Academy.'

The man's surplus of curiosity was acting up again. Lu Heyang chose to keep his mouth shut, lest he fan He Wei's appetite for discussion into something stronger.

Xu Ze stood holding the drink a moment longer, then started walking again. He raised his head and, two meters ahead, saw Lu Heyang and He Wei. The brief blankness on his face and the stiffness in his body were, for an instant, unmistakable — and He Wei saw every bit of it.

'It's true,' He Wei said, low. 'He really does seem afraid of you.'

'Why couldn't it be you he's afraid of?' Lu Heyang asked him at last.

He Wei looked thoroughly wronged. 'I'm a brand-new transfer student. Why on earth would anyone be afraid of me? There's no logic to it.'

To prove his own harmlessness and goodwill, when they came up to Xu Ze, He Wei offered him a greeting: 'Hey.'

Xu Ze looked at him, said nothing, gave a single nod, and brushed past them.

'So cold. So cold.' He Wei exaggeratedly shivered. 'He is definitely not afraid of me.'

'If a stranger greeted you, you'd find it strange too,' Lu Heyang said. 'Stop looking for trouble where there isn't any.'

He Wei, though, suddenly laughed with mischief. 'I have a feeling — if Xu Ze were in our circle, you two might actually get along rather well. Both of you have that face that refuses to indulge, that asexual cold look.'

Lu Heyang asked, 'Meaning you and I don't get along?'

'How could we not!' He Wei immediately hooked his shoulder, grinning. 'If we didn't get along, where would these dozen-odd years of friendship come from~'

A little past eight in the evening, Lu Heyang, He Wei, and Gu Yunchi went together to Chengxi. The Underground Club was as crowded and chaotic as ever, thick with competing scents. The three of them stood out too much — the moment they stepped out of the elevator they were being watched, and at some point a purple chip had been slipped into Gu Yunchi's hand.

The Alpha who had stuffed the chip winked at them. 'A gift. Just have a little fun.'

Gu Yunchi didn't even look. He tossed the thing straight back into the man's hand. 'Don't need it.'

'Oh dear, no eye for the room — our Young Master Gu has hundreds of billions to his name, how could he possibly look twice at a little thing like this.' He Wei bumped Gu Yunchi's shoulder. 'Right?'

Gu Yunchi swept him a glance.

'Last time I heard — that Alpha, what's his name, also from the Preparatory Academy — in the Casino, lost this much in a single night.'

He Wei said it, holding up a number with his fingers as he spoke.

Lu Heyang asked, 'Eight hundred?'

'Mm.' He Wei nodded. 'Later his father sent people to drag him back. Word is he got a beating — bad enough to land him in the hospital. Three days out of class.'

'Sounds like the sort of thing that would happen to you,' Gu Yunchi observed.

'What are you talking about — what's fun about gambling? With eight million I'd much rather buy a new car.'

At the mention of cars, Gu Yunchi's face took on a look of distaste. 'Pink interior. I don't know what sort of person would actually sit in your car.'

'Heyang sits in it every day,' He Wei said, perfectly composed.

Gu Yunchi turned to Lu Heyang. 'Sitting in there doesn't make your whole body itch?'

'No choice. I don't have hundreds of billions to my name — I can only bum rides off other people,' Lu Heyang replied.

He Wei clapped him on the shoulder and laughed out loud. Gu Yunchi turned his head away, expressionless, too lazy to say another word.

Inside the venue, He Wei had booked second-row seats this time. The big screen lit up; Lu Heyang looked up at the fighter names. He Wei glanced up too, then suddenly remembered something. 'Oh — the ticket seller told me Number 17 might not be fighting tonight.'

Lu Heyang's motion paused, briefly. He said nothing, and sat down in his seat.

After several bouts, the mat inside the Octagon Cage was already spattered with blood, and the crowd had been worked into a frenzy, their shouts shaking the rafters. Only Lu Heyang sat quietly in his seat. He glanced at the Wristband — still on its lowest setting, untouched since he had come in.

Another bout ended. The big screen went blank — no more fighter names, no more betting information. Halftime had arrived.

He Wei, hoarse from shouting, sat down to drink some water and idly checked his Mobile Phone. Lu Heyang propped his chin on his hand, his eyes half-lowered, looking at nothing in particular. Gu Yunchi tilted his head toward him. 'You look out of it.'

'A bit tired.' Lu Heyang lowered his hand. 'I'm going to—'

The end of his sentence was swallowed by a sudden scream. Lu Heyang looked up — from the fighters' tunnel a crew-cut Alpha had emerged, savage-faced, a knife scar running from his left brow all the way down to the right side of his jaw, cleaving the whole face in two.

Lu Heyang's gaze swept past him, then tilted slightly, looking behind the crew-cut Alpha.

Number 17.

Same as last week — the upper half of Number 17's face was painted in oil colors, and he wore a cheap pair of black athletic shorts that ended at the knee. Today his hands were wrapped in fingered gloves, already well-worn.

'Number 17's going on — MMA tonight.' He Wei, excited, nudged Lu Heyang with his elbow and held his Mobile Phone out for both him and Gu Yunchi to see.

On the screen was a message the ticket-selling Alpha had sent ten minutes earlier: Number 17 would be fighting during the halftime break. Because Number 17 had left too early last week — the match hadn't been bloody enough — he was being punished tonight with a no-prize-money exhibition bout.

He also said Number 17 was punished like this almost regularly, and the reason was always the same — he won, and then he left; his hands weren't cruel enough.

'Makes sense.' He Wei turned off his Mobile Phone, watching the two Alphas walk into the Octagon Cage. 'Still just a teenager. It's a good thing his hands are clean.'

Number 17 stepped into the center of the Octagon Cage, head bowed, adjusting the strap of his glove. The referee, perched on the fence, called out to him, and Number 17 turned his head.

When he turned, the white suppressant patch on his nape was exposed.

Someone in the crowd was shouting 'Number 17' again, and Number 17 lifted his head toward the stands, his face still perfectly calm. Because this was a halftime exhibition match, the atmosphere was looser; his gaze lingered on the audience a little longer than last time — perhaps as long as two seconds.

In those two seconds, Number 17's gaze happened to fall on the second row, and at a certain moment — unmistakably — his whole body went rigid for an instant. Only after a brief daze did he look away, dropping his eyes to the rubber mat beneath his feet.

The opening whistle sounded. The opposing crew-cut Alpha was already in stance, but Number 17 was still standing upright, arms at his sides, looking faintly elsewhere — until the crew-cut's fist came crashing toward him, and he finally snapped back, snapping an arm up to block, barely dodging in time.

He Wei immediately hissed. 'Number 17's not in form tonight.'

The words had barely left his mouth when Number 17 took a punch to the jaw, his whole body slamming back into the wire mesh, almost too unsteady to stay on his feet.

In just a few exchanges, the atmosphere had been stoked back to fever pitch. Lu Heyang turned the Wristband up a notch, leaned forward slightly, elbows on his knees, fingers laced together and pressed lightly beneath his chin.

Gu Yunchi glanced at him. Lu Heyang was staring at the Octagon Cage, and the 'a bit tired' of two minutes ago seemed to have vanished from his face all at once.