After Differentiation, My Arch-nemesis Thinks I’m Fragrant - Chapter 41

That bunch of daisies was eventually turned into dried flowers by Shu Youzhan. They were carefully placed on her dormitory windowsill, shielded by a transparent glass cover; regardless of winter or summer, they remained as beautiful as the day they were first picked.

It was as if they would never wither.

Even when she finally left the military camp, she took the flowers back home with her.

Because the schedules of the two Shus completely overlapped, Shu Youzhan arrived at the Blue Planet just as the registration for the new semester was ending. She spotted Wei Shuangchi’s figure at the harbor’s shuttle transfer point.

As soon as she stepped off the spacecraft, she ran toward Wei Shuangchi. “Mom! How long have you been waiting? Have you eaten? Are you hungry? How about I—”

“Ahem…” A meaningful cough sounded behind her, the hint exceptionally heavy.

It took Shu Youzhan half a second to remember there was someone beside her who missed Wei Shuangchi even more. She reluctantly nudged herself to the side. Shu Yu, draped in a military overcoat, walked down and opened her arms toward Wei Shuangchi, a curved smile in her phoenix eyes.

Wei Shuangchi looked left and right, noticing Shu Yu’s adjutant standing not far away. She raised her hand to tuck her hair back and pulled Shu Yu’s right hand down to hold it, her tone unusually shy. “There are so many people…”

Shu Yu’s wrist moved flexibly, yet she still insistently raised her hand to pull the woman into her arms. She said in a low voice, “What’s wrong with many people? Is it illegal for me to hug my wife?”

Wei Shuangchi mumbled a few words but didn’t push her away, a curve remaining on her lips.

As she took a couple of steps toward the vehicle following Shu Yu’s lead, she couldn’t help but look back at Shu Youzhan. “How was Youyou while she was out with you this time? Why do I feel like she’s lost weight? And she’s a bit darker, isn’t she?”

With her whole heart concerned for her daughter, Wei Shuangchi looked back every three steps. This caused Shu Yu’s eyebrows to twitch upward. Shu Youzhan, who had been following closely behind them, subconsciously checked herself in her phone screen. “Really? Did I get darker?”

After scrutinizing her skin condition, Shu Youzhan hesitated for a moment about whether she should detour to buy some skincare products. But then she remembered that the Omega constitution could turn even the roughest person into someone delicate and soft, so she decisively abandoned the idea.

Thus, she said optimistically, “If I’m dark, I’m dark. Oh right, Mom, I brought you a gift.”

As they reached the car, Wei Shuangchi pushed Shu Yu to the front and got into the back seat with Shu Youzhan. Even though she received gifts from her daughter every birthday, she still felt delighted every time she heard her child was thinking of her. She asked with an incredibly expectant voice, “What is it?”

“Let me see…”

In the front, Shu Yu folded her arms, her gaze drifting through the rearview mirror at the two people in the back seat enjoying themselves. For some reason, she felt like a redundant intruder in a happy family.

Just then…

Shu Youzhan opened her backpack, allowing Wei Shuangchi to see that small bunch of flowers at a glance. “Are these… daisies?”

The movement of pulling the zipper stopped. Almost with lightning speed, Shu Youzhan pulled out the gift underneath and placed it in Wei Shuangchi’s hand. “It’s this… the flowers are very ordinary, I just picked them over there as a souvenir.”

Wei Shuangchi’s attention shifted. Seeing the several large bags of local specialties her daughter had pulled out, she grinned from ear to ear, recognizing them instantly as flavors she had once mentioned.

That had been a long time ago when Shu Yu was on a business trip and brought some back. Because the planets were so far apart and only military ships traveled between them, Shu Yu had wanted to have someone bring more back then, but Wei Shuangchi had declined, saying it was too much trouble.

The matter hadn’t been mentioned again.

But this time…

Seeing that Shu Youzhan remembered the flavors she liked from so long ago, Wei Shuangchi pulled her into a hug, her voice filled with pride. “Truly Mommy’s good baby, so thoughtful. This is exactly what I was craving.”

Shu Yu’s voice slowly drifted from the front seat. “Oh, so a certain someone was asking me about your tastes every day for the past two days, just to wait for today to borrow my efforts for her own credit?”

“Achi, the things your ‘baby’ brought were swiped from my office last night—”

“Let’s be clear about who is actually thoughtful, hmm?”

If Shu Yu had known Shu Youzhan would be this sneaky, she wouldn’t have had the adjutant send the things directly to the house from the spacecraft.

On this trip, she hadn’t just brought back processed products; she had directly hired the indigenous people to come and produce them on the Blue Planet so Wei Shuangchi could eat her fill.

In the end, all the words she wanted to hear were intercepted by Shu Youzhan.

Hearing this, how could Wei Shuangchi not understand? However, she only smiled helplessly. Watching them perform their habitual “fight for favor” drama, she couldn’t help but say, “I thought after you two went out together this time, your relationship would definitely be different when you came back… Why is it still the same?”

Shu Yu let out a hum from her nose. “You’ll have to ask your ‘good baby’ that. Some little kid pretends to be working hard to get stronger on the surface, but behind her parents’ backs at the military camp, she was secretly with someone at night—”

As soon as Shu Youzhan heard this, she knew her mother definitely found out about what happened with Zhao Qinglan that night. After all, it was Shu Yu’s territory; such news being reported was only natural.

However, having her thoughts exposed by a parent like this made her feel shy. she hurriedly interrupted, “Mother, your tone is too sour. There’s no need to frame me just to make Mom like you more, right?”

“I wasn’t being ‘secretive.’ I was being perfectly open.”

Wei Shuangchi was completely confused by their conversation. “Open about what?”

Shu Yu glanced through the mirror with a half-smile. “Dating…”

Shu Youzhan: “…”

She struggled to explain, wanting to say they weren’t dating. But saying they weren’t dating made her behavior of taking Zhao Qinglan to a remote place look suspicious, fitting the definition of “secretive.” Yet, if she admitted they were dating…

Her ears turned red instantly.

Wei Shuangchi looked at her with considerable surprise.

Shu Youzhan grumbled, “No, it’s just that Zhao Qinglan was injured at the time, so I took her to the infirmary, and then we chatted while walking. We aren’t dating.”

“Mm, not dating. You just kept the flowers she gave you like a treasure and brought them back as a souvenir,” Shu Yu retorted without skipping a beat.

Shu Youzhan didn’t know where to start denying it. She could only wail and hug Wei Shuangchi, faking a cry like a child throwing a tantrum. “Mom, look at her! She’s always targeting me, boohoo… Mother is mean to me, she kept torturing me at the camp… and now she’s accusing me of puppy love, I’m so miserable…”

A familiar situation, a familiar sandwich filling.

Wei Shuangchi could only discipline both sides. On one hand, she knew Alphas were very possessive of their partners, so Shu Yu was always jealous even of her own child. On the other hand, she more or less guessed that something was brewing between Shu Youzhan and Zhao Qinglan.

But that was Shu Youzhan’s own business. As a parent, she didn’t need to overstep and nip anything in the bud.

So, she simply pretended not to hear either side and smilingly changed the subject.

“Sister Shu, you’re finally back!”

The next day…

Grade 11, Class 1…

Pei Yi, who hadn’t been able to contact her all summer, let out a massive sigh of relief when she finally saw Shu Youzhan appear in the classroom on the first day of school.

She didn’t even notice the expression of the morning study representative as she walked over and shook Shu Youzhan’s hand.

“I thought you were going to take a leave of absence like that Zhao girl. It scared me to death.”

Shu Youzhan let her pull her arm, her other hand propping up her head. Her attention was on the problems in front of her as she said casually, “Why would I take a leave? I don’t have a guaranteed admission slot; I still have to take the exams.”

Speaking of which…

She cast a distracted glance toward Pei Yi’s area. There should have been a set of desk and chair there, but it was now empty.

She had noticed this the moment she arrived, but Shu Youzhan had waited until now to mention it as if in passing. “By the way, I remember I had a seatmate. Why are her desk and chair gone now?”

“Oh, that…” Pei Yi immediately replied. “Apparently, her leave of absence has been extended indefinitely. She won’t be back this school year. Since there’s a transfer student in the next class, they moved the desk over there.”

“Why, do you miss her?” Knowing the truth, Pei Yi gave her a gossiping look.

Shu Youzhan looked at her for a moment. After a summer of training, her aura had been transformed; it was now as sharp as a blade. It made Pei Yi break into a cold sweat, thinking she had said something wrong.

However, the next instant, Shu Youzhan withdrew her gaze and lowered her head to look at her work calmly. “How could that be?”

She said, “It’s just inconvenient to have one less desk to pile trash on.”

A distant galaxy…

An endless desert harbored boundless danger.

Yet, the only thing illuminating this land was a cold, silver-white light, like a permanent night where only the moon hung.

Even the wind that blew whispered of loneliness.

A comrade with the number 061 engraved on their chest plate sat beside Zhao Qinglan. Looking out from the campsite into the distance, they cursed softly, “I hate this place the most… sometimes you can’t even see a bird. The patrols can drive a person crazy… Last time, some rookie brought a parrot thinking it would relieve the boredom. Guess what? During a sandstorm, the bird went crazy and flew right into it. Gone in an instant.”

Zhao Qinglan was focused on cleaning her long rifle, over and over again. Her expression was serious; it was unclear if she was listening.

The other person rambled for a bit then suddenly turned to her. “Hey, I remember you have a partner. Why are you willing to come to a place like this to suffer? I think those with family can apply to skip places like this. You have such delicate skin and look good, why torture yourself?”

The hand holding the cloth paused. Zhao Qinglan looked up. The cold light fell, making her complexion appear even paler and her eyes darker, like a deep abyss.

“It is precisely because someone is waiting for me that I must come,” she said softly.

061: “?”

Realizing the other person didn’t understand, Zhao Qinglan didn’t mind. However, the topic immediately brought to mind the person who, before their parting, was clearly unhappy but endured those emotions out of reluctance to say goodbye.

Her heart softened instantly.

Her expression shifted, and that unapproachable, sharp aura blurred. Thinking of the documents she kept submitting—and which the military kept rejecting—regarding opening military recruitment to all genders, Zhao Qinglan took a light breath and exhaled.

Her voice sounded as if it had been polished by the grit of this place, deeply raspy.

“If you have ever seen someone truly stunning, you would look forward to seeing her spread her wings and show her brilliance in this vast world.”

“Assuming she has no path forward and stands before a cliff, then even if you must grind your bones to make a road and crush your flesh into the mud, you would certainly want to build a path to the heavens for her.”

061 didn’t have much literary grace and felt they didn’t quite understand all the meanings behind her words.

However, from the fragmented words Zhao Qinglan spoke and her currently resilient demeanor, there was an inexplicable sense of being moved. 061 asked vaguely, “Is it worth it? Maybe they won’t even appreciate it, or maybe you’re being too reckless. Is this person that important to you?”

Zhao Qinglan curled her lips slightly. The silver light in her eyes blurred. She looked down at the weapon in her arms. When her eyes were half-lidded, they looked like a high-hanging crescent moon. “It’s worth it…”

“No one is more worth it than her—”

“She is the most incredible person I’ve ever met. Resilient, yet optimistic and cheerful, like a little sun that always gives strength to those around her. No matter what kind of opponent she faces, she always grinds her teeth and chases after them, as if the words ‘difficult’ or ‘give up’ don’t exist in her dictionary.”

“Even if I didn’t do these things, perhaps if she just waited another ten years, she would still get her wish. She can always create miracles…”

The teammate couldn’t help but interrupt, “Then why are you still…?”

Zhao Qinglan’s voice grew even softer.

“But I can’t bear it.”

How could I have the heart to watch her suffer so much?