Chapter 2 PART 1
Shu Ci blinked blankly, digesting Shen Ti’s words.
…Huh?
The person he’d asked for help last night was an alpha?
If he remembered correctly, the person holding him, still under the influence of the drugs, acted restrained, like a desireless and emotionless stranger beta, showing no emotional fluctuations whatsoever.
And now he’s being told that this unmoved person is actually his “passerby husband” with a 1% compatibility rate?
Granted, he hadn’t followed the plot, hadn’t done anything with Gu Lan Zhu.
But being seen and rescued by his real husband in that state… it just felt wrong.
Seeing his serious expression, Shen Ti patted him on the shoulder. “You’re too weak now, eat something first, replenish your energy. Your clothes from yesterday…”
Were truly a mess, emitting a strong, alluring pheromone scent.
“Wear mine for now. Change and come downstairs, I’ll clear the table.” Shen Ti pointed to the wardrobe and left.
Shu Ci clutched the blanket tightly, before finally getting out of bed.
He stood in front of the mirror, gasping.
The original owner’s appearance wasn’t much different from his, but it possessed a natural, captivating aura. His skin was delicate and tender, his eyes like shimmering water, his nose exquisite, every line perfectly beautiful.
Even his unruly, crimson-red short hair looked incredibly alluring on this body.
…Help, this was his expressionless face.
What kind of a fiery, earth-shattering scene must he have looked like yesterday, suffering from the effects of the drug, breathing heavily?
Was his alpha husband… incapable?
Or was this the 1% compatibility – a complete lack of attraction?
Shu Ci forced himself to look at his reflection. After getting used to the face, he picked up Shen Ti’s plain shirt, put it on, and buttoned it while recalling the original novel.
He only had three words to describe it: absurd plot, collapsed worldview, help me.
“The Enticing Sweet O” and his Alpha, with whom he was destined to have a 100% pheromone compatibility, had to go through ninety-nine eighty-one difficulties to achieve a happy ending. There were misunderstandings, abusive love, a substitute white moonlight, heart-wrenching pain, gland destruction, miscarriage, pregnancy, and running away pregnant.
…It was basically a complete collection of physically and emotionally abusive clichés.
To be honest, he wasn’t interested in this ridiculously abusive and cliché work.
If the crazy investor hadn’t offered a price that made his colleagues gasp when commissioning him to direct it, he wouldn’t have even glanced at the original novel.
They say money makes the world go round, but he felt like he’d been ground up himself.
Initially, he thought: just because the male lead shares his name, I’ll read it. But the angrier he got the more he read,
Now he had to repeatedly review the plot just to survive in the cracks of this cliché story…
Shu Ci recalled the instances where the tool-man husband appeared in the countless cliché plots.
They were few and far between.
At the beginning of the story, Shu Ci and he had only been married for about a month.
Even later, when he was entangled with Gu Lan Zhu, and they were forced to divorce by Gu Lan Zhu, becoming “ex-husbands,” the tool-man husband had never marked him.
Each of his appearances was just a fleeting glimpse.
No name, only referred to as “husband”; unknown appearance, the tool-man wasn’t worthy of being described.
And this tool-man wasn’t even present from the beginning in the original book.
After all, compared to the strong and defiant male lead, the infatuated and gentle second male lead, and the white moonlight who had a fair amount of screen time, this nameless “husband” was just an insignificant supporting character. He wasn’t given much attention except when needed.
Yet Shen Ti said the person who brought him back was the tool-man husband himself.
Was there a problem with the plot, or was the real husband actually nearby when the original owner was taken by Gu Lan Zhu for the first time at the beginning of the story?!
…Did the tool-man in the original book know he’d been cuckolded at that time???
And, did the person leaning against the car last night know he’d almost been cuckolded???
Thinking about this, Shu Ci almost missed a step on the stairs.
“Be careful!” Shen Ti, who had just placed the spoons, quickly walked over to support the weak Shu Ci.
Shu Ci straightened his back, thinking that the original owner really did have a soft waist.
He frowned and asked, “Did that person say anything when he brought me back last night?”
According to the original plot progress, there was still a long time before the tool-man husband learned he’d been cuckolded, so how much did the person who brought him here last night know?
And why would he send him to his best friend’s place if he hadn’t known something?
He called his husband “that person” because his name never appeared in the original text.
Shu Ci didn’t know what his name was, and he didn’t want to casually call anyone “husband.”
This distant address was misunderstood by Shen Ti.
Shen Ti thought that there was a rift between them because of what happened last night, and frowned.
In this society, the vast majority of omegas depend on alphas for survival. Once an omega who has been marked is abandoned, the consequences are unimaginable.
Although Shu Ci had escaped from Gu Lan Zhu’s clutches, having his lover identified as the omega with the highest compatibility by another alpha seemed no different from spiritual infidelity.
Shen Ti helped him sit down and pushed the light congee towards him.
“He didn’t say anything, just told me to take good care of you.”
Shen Ti paused after speaking, then asked, “Did your husband know you signed up for Gu Lan Zhu’s… candidate selection?”
Shu Ci shrugged, who knew?
But with his pheromones overflowing uncontrollably last night, even his real husband would have had strange thoughts.
“Do you think someone deliberately put you on Gu Lan Zhu’s wife selection list? They found out you were selected to be marked at the Central Hotel, and then called your husband over to sabotage your marriage?”
“…” Shu Ci thought Shen Ti would also be good at writing cliché novels.
He took two sips of porridge, lowered his eyes, and recalled the plot.
“Most likely, it was my relatives who signed me up.”
In the original plot, they framed him just to spite him.
As for which relative? His memory wasn’t good enough to remember every detail of thousands of chapters.
However, they probably didn’t know that he had been selected by Gu Lan Zhu and that their compatibility was 100%, otherwise there wouldn’t have been the later plot where the heir to the business empire helped him slap his malicious relatives in the face.
Maybe the cheap husband just happened to be near the Central Hotel?
Shen Ti slammed the table in anger: “I knew it! The Shu family is bullying you just because your father is dead! It’s either your cousins doing mischief, or your uncles and aunts trying to control you!”
Shu Ci raised an eyebrow, remaining noncommittal.
As a grumpy director who often bickered with editors and actors on set, he knew too well the roles of these characters in clichéd plots.
The protagonist’s family had to be bad enough, and the relatives had to be bad enough, only then could the appearance of the destined other half seem like a savior.
Even if he was a domineering CEO who committed rape and illegal imprisonment, he was still a hero who could help the protagonist change their status with one night, and save the protagonist from a fire.
Whether the protagonist became a dependent, whether they had their own will and personality, and how the protagonist’s partner treated them, didn’t matter.
Because no matter what illogical and outrageous things were done, they could be explained away. That was the necessary path to their happy ending.
In his early years, for money and survival, he did shoot several such criticized dramas. After becoming famous and having the right to choose scripts, he unfortunately encountered a tacky investor.
“Don’t be angry.” Shu Ci looked at Shen Ti’s reddened hands from slapping the table and turned to the maid standing in the kitchen. “Get a towel to put under it, or apply some medicine.”
In the worldview of this book, omegas were fragile both physically and mentally.
They were “beings who need protection and who can also arouse a strong desire to protect.”
“I will make them pay.” Shu Ci said calmly.