The Omega Who Canceled the Engagement Ended Up Falling for Me - Chapter 3

“Why are you even asking? It was so obvious, couldn’t you tell?”

On the way back, Min Se’s face was cold, her tone biting: “I told you their family situation is special. Can’t you read the room?”

“The fact that they call you ‘Dr. Xu’ is a compliment to you. Where are your manners and upbringing? Don’t you know how to be humble? You didn’t even greet the elders when you walked in, and you didn’t say goodbye when you left. Who are you trying to spite with that attitude?”

Xu Qing looked at Ms. Min calmly and stated coldly: “It seems you only know how to take your anger out on me. You were certainly polite enough in front of Boss Fu.”

Min Se: “Are you mocking me?”

“I wouldn’t dare, Ms. Min,” Xu Qing said, gazing out the window with a chilling expression. “I just think that family is quite disgusting. They disgust me, and I can’t just stand there like an idiot; I have to say something.”

“That is the future mistress of the Fu family. She didn’t do anything intentionally to provoke you.”

Ms. Min was actually starting to make excuses for the Fu family.

Xu Qing had only asked where Fu Shuang was, and a room full of people had stammered, unable to give a straight answer. It was obvious they were the ones with a problem.

Especially that mistress kept by Fu Hengxi—in a setting like that, she actually had the nerve to try and introduce her dim-witted son to Xu Qing.

What kind of rubbish was that?

Xu Qing was still speechless thinking about it. She looked down at her phone and scrolled to a missed unread message from the afternoon; she froze.

As she read the message while listening to Ms. Min’s lecturing, the corners of her lips curled up. She said nonchalantly, “You’re right, but I have absolutely no desire to associate with that family anymore.”

“What did you say?!” Min Se said in disbelief. She slammed on the brakes, the tires screeching harshly against the concrete. She pulled the car over to the side of the road and said fiercely, “Say that again?!”

“I said, I don’t want to associate with that family.” Xu Qing didn’t even lift her head, carefully finishing the message on her phone with a calm expression.

Anger flashed in Min Se’s eyes. She had intended to scold her senseless daughter severely, but she held back and said with irritation: “You are marrying their daughter, not marrying into their family. Whatever their family members are like has little to do with you. At most, you’ll just have less contact in the future. As long as things look okay on the surface, that’s enough. Do you understand?”

Xu Qing raised an eyebrow at her: “It’s already reached this point, and you’re still certain things will work out between me and that person from their family?”

“Why wouldn’t it work? You have a job, an education, and your looks and gender are top-tier. You saw the Fu family’s attitude just now—they were polite enough to you. If nothing goes wrong, the wedding can be held by the end of the year. Don’t think about anything else, just get ready for the wedding.” As Min Se spoke, she picked up her thermos and took a large gulp of water.

“According to your logic, since I’m top-tier in every aspect, shouldn’t I be allowed to pick them just as they are allowed to pick me? The Xu family is respectable, after all. With your current status, Ms. Min, couldn’t you find any wealthy and powerful family? Why must we intermarry with that family of nouveau riche?” Xu Qing began making “outrageous” remarks, poking at Min Se’s sore spots.

Min Se took a sharp breath and said sternly, “Xu Qing, what exactly do you want?”

Xu Qing smiled and handed her the phone to look at.

“What is this?” Min Se looked at her suspiciously.

“A breakup notice. To be more accurate, a notice to call off the engagement. After all, I’ve never even held her hand, so I can’t really call it a breakup,” Xu Qing said with a laugh. “It’s quite interesting. If I had seen this message earlier, I wouldn’t have gone to the Fu house with you tonight. It was so redundant.”

Min Se adjusted the glasses she wore for driving, lowering her head until the lenses were almost touching the phone screen. Her brow furrowed deeply as she slowly read: “Dear Ms. Xu, I am writing to you in haste to inform you that our absurd relationship has finally come to an end. Congratulations on gaining your freedom; I, too, can finally breathe a sigh of relief.”

The further down she read, the more Ms. Min’s brow furrowed, her expression resembling the “elderly man on the subway looking at a phone” meme.

“I apologize for notifying you in this manner. If I could, I would be willing to visit in person to express my apologies, but currently, I am busy with my studies and work every day and cannot spare the mental energy to deal with this. I believe it is the same for you—constrained by your family’s arrangements, you only agreed to this marriage out of necessity, leaving you in a dilemma.”

“I knew long ago that this marriage was a mistake, but at that time, my mother forced me to swear on her hospital bed that I would marry you. To let her leave this world without regrets, I pretended to agree to this marriage.”

“In fact, I believe in non-marriage, celibacy, and meritocracy. I utterly loathe the current society with its class stratification and gender inequality. Equally loathsome to me are the Fu family, the Xu family, and you.”

“My only relative is already in the ground. Now, the Fu family has nothing to do with me. They can be responsible for the engagement they set until the very end; who knows how they will clean up the mess? Regardless, this no longer concerns me. I will pursue my love and wander the world with the person I love. I hereby notify you: we shall not meet again!”

Min Se’s face grew longer and longer. Xu Qing couldn’t help but find it funny; she took a sip of water to ease the awkwardness but ended up choking with laughter.

“Finished reading?” Xu Qing suppressed a smile. “Ms. Min, congratulations on things not going your way.”

“This kind of thing cannot be taken seriously,” Min Se glared at her. “What are you so happy about?”

Xu Qing blinked: “I don’t know, maybe because I’ve regained my freedom?”

Min Se pressed her temples, the veins on her forehead throbbing. She said somewhat weakly, “When did this happen?”

“The time shows it was sent this afternoon. I had just finished work and was busy going home to do what you ordered, so I didn’t have time to check,” Xu Qing said cheerfully. “The wealthy heiress’s thoughts are quite advanced. I wonder what your thoughts are after reading it?”

Min Se: “Absurd.”

Xu Qing said with a grin: “But I find it very interesting.”

Min Se was flustered, hesitating as if she wanted to say something but didn’t know what. In the end, she just rolled her eyes at Xu Qing and restarted the car.

Xu Qing happily started scrolling through short videos, heartlessly enjoying herself.

“Starting tomorrow, I’m giving you ten days to find her.”

Halfway home, Min Se suddenly spoke.

Xu Qing found it funny: “On what grounds?”

“This is your responsibility. If you had been a bit more proactive and encouraged her after you returned to the country, how could things have ended up like this?” Min Se said, and in her frustration, she slammed her fist against the steering wheel.

Xu Qing was startled and reminded her, “Ms. Min, you’re going a bit too far.”

“Am I? Look at what you’ve done since you returned! Your fiancée’s mother was buried yesterday, yet you didn’t know a thing about it, and you still don’t even know where she went! You are too negligent; you’ve disappointed me so much!”

“Because of your negligence, Fu Shuang chose to run away from home. You didn’t even grasp the last chance you had. How did you have the nerve to ask where Fu Shuang was in front of so many people at the Fu house?”

Xu Qing took a quiet breath. “Ms. Min, do you have to attribute it that way?”

“Otherwise? Who else can be blamed for this? The Fu family will also think it’s your responsibility. How am I supposed to explain this to your father? Your sister is already like that; if something goes wrong with your marriage too, how can I show my face to anyone?”

Xu Qing: “If you feel you can’t show your face, you can just stay indoors.”

“How dare you,” Min Se was fuming with rage, pointing at Xu Qing. “How can you speak like that? After sending you abroad, you’ve become more and more undisciplined!”

The car was still moving on the road, but the driver, Ms. Min, had lost emotional control.

Through the glass, Xu Qing saw a car in the adjacent lane brush past them. She was so scared she didn’t dare speak, raising both hands in surrender to soothe Ms. Min’s emotions.

If anything happened on the road, she would never need to find out where her fiancée had run off to.

Min Se grumbled incessantly. Midway, she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes, seemingly forgetting she was driving. The car accidentally drifted into another lane, forcing the car behind to dodge frantically. The driver caught up, rolled down the window, and shouted profanities: “F***! Do you even know how to drive?”

Min Se ignored it. Xu Qing’s heart was pounding. She looked at Ms. Min with a pale face, whispering a reminder to focus on driving and promising to find Fu Shuang’s whereabouts.

She didn’t want to argue with Ms. Min; she would accept whatever she said.

Ms. Min’s behavior today was very different from Xu Qing’s previous impression of her. On the surface, she still seemed shrewd and capable, but in reality, she was full of flaws. She could only say polite clichés; her mind didn’t move fast, and her emotions were unstable. Only her desire to control her children had become stronger. Once things slipped out of her control, she became hysterical and unreasonable.

Stripped of her respected status as a retired female leader, her inner refinement was no higher than that of a peasant woman.

Maybe I’ll be like her when I grow up.

Stable, day-to-day life would eventually kill her, making her mediocre and cowardly, unable to even speak words of resistance, only capable of pointing the gun at those weaker than her.

Xu Qing thought numbly, while Ms. Min’s voice continued to repeat in her ear:

“Call her, go to her school to find her, find her teachers, call the police—whatever it takes, you must find her.”

“An Omega woman who has run away from home is very likely to encounter danger outside.”

“No matter what method you use, you must find her!”

But she finally managed to escape the family’s control with great difficulty. Am I really supposed to drag her back?

Is marrying into the Xu family anything other than another pit of fire?

Xu Qing dealt with Ms. Min’s entrustments with superficial compliance, but her thoughts drifted far away. She thought about the offer from that foreign architectural design firm. If she had chosen to stay abroad, would she be busy drawing blueprints every day now, working late into the night in a skyscraper with a group of young and talented colleagues?

Returning to the Xu house that night, Ms. Min suggested that Xu Qing stay overnight and go look for Fu Shuang after work tomorrow.

Xu Qing refused.

She still maintained that sensible and obedient persona, gently reassuring the elder not to worry.

The moment she turned and put on her helmet, gripping the handlebars, she finally felt free.

After ten o’clock, the streets finally shed the busyness and bustle of workers, gradually cooling down amidst the night markets of barbecue stalls and bars.

After riding for an hour, Xu Qing parked her bike in front of a bar. Smoking a cigarette, her whole body radiated the dangerous aura of a “bad youth”—a “stay away” vibe.

The bar was on the first floor. Many people were going in and out, and every time the door opened or closed, Xu Qing could hear the singing from inside.

She stared blankly for a while, letting her thoughts go, imagining the scene of throwing a fit at the Fu house with a funeral wreath and then acting out at the Xu house.

Perhaps seeing the beautiful smile hanging on her lips, a young man about to enter the bar initiated a conversation: “This your bike?”

Xu Qing: “Yeah.”

“Very cool.” The young man gave a shy thumbs-up.

The singing from inside came through clearly again. Xu Qing felt like a drowning person finally breaking the surface, taking a sudden, deep breath of fresh air.

She stubbed out the unfinished cigarette, loosened the top few buttons of her shirt, and threw her black suit jacket—the symbol of decency and status—into the trash can.

To hell with it. Tonight, we drink until we drop.