What Should I Do If My Ex-Girlfriend's Pheromones Smell Too Good? - Chapter 32

Chapter 32: Accident

For Shu Qiong, today was a day where everything went smoothly.

Not only was the shooting training in the day easy, but by nightfall, Shu Qiong—who had been recharging her energy all day—quickly finished her halved physical training session. Just past 9:30 PM, she clocked out with a heavy sense of accomplishment.

She ran to a corner to wait for Yan Xiangyu and the others, watching everyone else struggle through intensive physical conditioning while she sat there eating snacks to pass the time.

Yan Xiangyu was running laps with weighted gear. She had two kilometers left. As she ran past Shu Qiong, she couldn’t help but laugh at the sight of Shu Qiong’s bright, sparkling eyes. She simply stopped, stretched her muscles, and walked toward her.

“Go back. Didn’t you say you were determined to get a hot bath tonight?” Yan Xiangyu asked.

Shu Qiong enthusiastically twisted open a bottle cap and handed over a bottle of electrolyte water, with energy bars of various flavors laid out on her knees. “You don’t understand! Watching others work like crazy while I sit and rest feels incredibly good. It’s still early anyway, I’ll wait for you guys. I’ll sit here a bit longer.”

Yan Xiangyu didn’t say anything more. She didn’t reach for the bottle either; instead, she leaned her head down and took a sip directly from Shu Qiong’s hand.

“…”

Shu Qiong’s hand nearly trembled, almost dumping the water all over Yan Xiangyu’s face. Fortunately, a mecha engineer’s hands were steady enough; she froze in place, stiffly holding the bottle to feed her.

“Hello, is this Shu Qiong?”

A strange female voice suddenly sounded. Shu Qiong snapped out of it, and she and Yan Xiangyu both turned to look. A graceful figure was walking toward them. Her neat black hair was just short of shoulder-length, the corners of her eyes tilted up slightly, and she wore a pair of small purple studs in her earlobes.

It was Xin Xiuyun.

Shu Qiong frowned imperceptibly, not understanding why she had come over.

“Hello.” Her tone was polite but carried obvious confusion. “Is something the matter?”

“The instructor is looking for you and me. He wants us to go to the equipment room right now.” Xin Xiuyun smiled gently, making an inviting gesture. “Shall we?”

Yan Xiangyu stared at the newcomer without blinking. “Why just the two of you?”

Shu Qiong was about to ask the same thing but was beaten to it, so she simply looked at Xin Xiuyun with an inquiring gaze.

Xin Xiuyun pinched her earlobe, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Her movements were natural and her tone casual. “He also called for your schoolmate Chang Xichun, but she hasn’t finished her physical training yet, has she?”

Shu Qiong understood. After the afternoon training, the instructors had basically grasped the shooting levels of the second-floor trainees. She, Chang Xichun, and Xin Xiuyun were the top three. Perhaps the instructor thought the standard shooting drills were too easy for them and wanted to make specialized arrangements?

Shu Qiong nodded and asked, “Alright, which equipment room?”

When Xin Xiuyun smiled, her elongated eyes narrowed into curves, making her look even more like a beautiful fox. “I’ll lead the way.” After saying that, she tilted her head toward Shu Qiong and took the lead toward the exit.

Shu Qiong had no choice but to follow. After just two steps, feeling the day-night temperature difference and the cold wind outside, she hurriedly dashed back. She grabbed a random jacket emblazoned with the Military Academy crest from the rest area and gave Yan Xiangyu a quick wave.

Yan Xiangyu watched them leave. She pursed her lips and returned to the training area. A few minutes later, she finished her final two kilometers of weighted running and went to the instructor to clock out.

“Instructor, may I ask why you sent for Shu Qiong?” After clocking out, she asked as if in passing.

The second-floor instructor was a capable-looking woman in her thirties. Hearing the question, she looked up in surprise before saying, “Oh, mainly to discuss mecha position selection. I need to understand the students’ respective mecha vocations and the types of mecha they belong to, so I can adjust the training requirements and content over the next few days.”

She recognized Yan Xiangyu, opened the background training records, and saw that although her shooting scores weren’t flashy, her overall data was very impressive. She smiled and said, “Your various metrics are all very good. An instructor will come looking for you tomorrow as well.”

Yan Xiangyu thanked the instructor and left, yet a faint sense of unease lingered in her heart. She pressed the back of her neck; it felt slightly hot, though the suppressor patch was still firmly and securely covering her gland.

In the rest area where the Military Academy students’ coats were hanging together, Yan Xiangyu walked to her own jacket and reached out to take it, throwing it on casually. However, she froze just as she put her arm into the first sleeve.

The sleeve length was wrong—it was a bit shorter than her own jacket. Yan Xiangyu leaned down to sniff it. Sure enough, she smelled a very faint, light scent of brandy. Her mood eased slightly. She hesitated for a moment but finished putting on the incorrectly sized jacket. She didn’t button it, merely pulling the lapels together.

Yan Xiangyu returned to the dormitory in an unsettled mood. No one was there, and the coat rack was empty. Shu Qiong wasn’t back yet. She sat and waited for five or six minutes, but there was still no sign of her.

Opening the communication interface on her wristband, she saw her message hadn’t been replied to. Scrolling up, the last conversation was still from noon.

“Tsk.”

Yan Xiangyu injected herself with a dose of suppressor in the arm, rubbed her temples, and left the dorm to return to the training hall.

During night training, all trainees were on the first floor. She quickly found Chang Xichun. Chang Xichun was currently doing frog jumps on the track, looking like she had lost her will to live. Her bangs were stuck to her forehead with sweat, and she was startled by the figure that suddenly appeared beside her.

“Holy crap!” She slumped to the ground, her legs giving out. “Yu, you…”

Yan Xiangyu’s eyes were pure obsidian. The overhead lights of the training hall shone as bright as day, but her long eyelashes cast two shadows over her eyes, making them look even deeper, like two pools of brewing emotion.

“Senior Chang,” she said with a mix of truth and lies, “the instructor is looking for you.”

Chang Xichun was more than happy to stop training. She scrambled up, brushed the dust off her pants, and asked, “What is it? What’s the matter?”

“I’m not sure,” Yan Xiangyu said without any emotional fluctuation.

Chang Xichun actually walked toward the instructor. “Instructor, Instructor! I heard you were looking for me?”

The instructor glanced at her doubtfully. “Are you finished with your physical training? Come find me after you’ve clocked out.”

Chang Xichun scratched her head, refusing to give up. “Don’t be like that! If you’re looking for me, it must be something very important! Surely that’s more important than this damn physical conditioning?”

“…” The instructor waved her away like a fly, sending her back to the training area. “Trying to skip training? Not a chance!” Finally, she added, “By the way, bring your schoolmate Shu Qiong and Superior’s Xin Xiuyun with you when you come back. Your situations are similar, so I’ll talk to you all together.”

Yan Xiangyu’s gaze snapped directly toward them. She took two quick steps forward and asked rapidly, “You didn’t call them away earlier?”

“No.” The instructor frowned. “My time is valuable too, you know. I thought I’d wait until Chang Xichun finished clocking out, then call all three together to be more efficient…”

Yan Xiangyu suddenly took a deep breath, turned abruptly, and marched out of the hall. The instructor, baffled, shook her head and turned her gaze back to the light screen. Chang Xichun was even more confused. Enduring the soreness in her legs, she chased after her. “Yu! Did something happen?”

Yan Xiangyu walked a few steps. Once the cold wind outside hit her, the icy air helped her feverish head calm down slightly. “Xin Xiuyun took Shu Qiong away. Where is Jin Yan? I need to see her.”

“Huh?” Chang Xichun’s eyes widened. “Took… took her away? Where… where could she take her?” She hurriedly led the way. “I know where Junior Jin is.”

Jin Yan was startled by Yan Xiangyu’s dark expression, thinking she had somehow offended her recently. However, searching her mind, aside from calling her “Yan B-King” at the start of school, their relationship had remained at a point of grudging friendliness. Of course, that point was named Shu Qiong.

She froze, a realization striking her like a lightning bolt. “Did something happen to my daughter?”

Yan Xiangyu gave a heavy nod and then glanced to the side. As expected, she saw Superior’s Fang Yingying next to her. The latter had her arms crossed, looking cold and out of the loop.

“Superior’s Xin Xiuyun. Where is she?” Yan Xiangyu’s first sentence was, “She took Xiao Qiong away under the pretext that the instructor wanted to see them.”

Only then did Chang Xichun react. “Xin Xiuyun lied! The instructor clearly hasn’t looked for them yet! Could… could she be planning something against Shu?” She nervously twisted her fingers.

Qin Liang, who was listening nearby, wanted to ask what kind of harm an Omega could do to an Alpha like Shu Qiong, but seeing the grim expressions on everyone’s faces, he swallowed the question.

Jin Yan’s reaction exceeded everyone’s expectations. She immediately became very panicked, almost jumping from where she stood. She only felt that she had been too careless—how could she let her “daughter,” who suffered from opposite-sex pheromone intolerance, walk away alone with a strange Omega!

Since the start of school, Shu Qiong hadn’t had an episode, which had undoubtedly caused both the person involved and Jin Yan, the one in the know, to lower their guard. Jin Yan suddenly had an ominous premonition.

“Quick, quick, quick! Contact our academy’s accompanying doctor, get ready…” Jin Yan shouted anxiously, then looked up and asked, “How long has it been? Can we contact either of them?”

Yan Xiangyu said icily, “About half an hour. I can’t reach Xiao Qiong.”

As the only person present with Xin Xiuyun’s contact info, Fang Yingying also tapped her wristband and sent a few messages asking where she was. “No reply for now,” she said, spreading her hands to show the communication interface.

Yan Xiangyu only knew that Xin Xiuyun had hinted they were going to the equipment room. The problem was, the base was too big and had too many equipment rooms; they couldn’t search through them one by one.

“Equipment room…” Jin Yan paced in circles trying to think of a strategy, sweat breaking out on her forehead from anxiety.

Yan Xiangyu suddenly spoke in a deep voice, “Wait! I remember that the equipment rooms here can’t be entered without an instructor’s permission card.”

Many places in the training base had permission regulations. For example, the building housing the equipment: to prevent training items and firearms from being tampered with or stolen, the entire building was equipped with signal jamming devices. Every equipment room door also required a retinal scan and instructor ID authentication.

“Their signals are being jammed!” Jin Yan slapped her head. “No wonder they can’t reply to messages.”

“Let’s go,” Yan Xiangyu stepped toward the exit. “We’re going to the equipment building.”

“You mean… the lounges?” Jin Yan pondered for a moment, finally ending her initial anxious confusion and analyzing calmly. “Since it wasn’t the instructor who called them, Xin Xiuyun can’t get into the equipment rooms. If she really wants to achieve something and needs the signal jamming of the equipment building, she could only take her to the lounges on each floor!”

Yan Xiangyu pressed the back of her neck again, her tone frigid. “The equipment building has five floors, with one lounge on each floor. We’ll split up and search.”