ITF Chapter45

His body felt warm all over, especially his chest.

A familiar voice snapped Bai Heting out of his dissociation, “Do you have any idea what you just did?”

Bai Heting blinked groggily and found himself in Luo Congye’s arms. The two of them were standing in a small, plainly furnished room with little space to spare.

There was only a desk, a stool, and a narrow bed in this room.

It didn’t even have a window.

“Why am I here?” Bai Heting murmured.

He was still somewhat out of it; he had absolutely no recollection in his mind of how he had ended up here.

Seeing that the person in his arms finally responded, Luo Congye let out a long sigh of relief. The general had just embraced his own Alpha guard right in front of a crowd of domestic servants. But a headache like that was best left for Mister Su and Adjutant Qiu to deal with.

“Weren’t you asleep?” He tilted his head, his voice as soft as a drifting feather. “Was there an emergency military matter?”

His breath brushed against the neck, turning into a stream of heat that slowly flowed into the chest. Bai Heting relaxed his tense nerves and gave a perfunctory “En.”

He looked as though he had lost his soul, prompting Luo Congye to guess, “Is it very troublesome?”

It was indeed troublesome, but Bai Heting diverted the subject, “Is this your room?”

The young Alpha heart against his chest suddenly lost its rhythm. Luo Congye bit his lower lip in embarrassment, and only after a few seconds did he answer in a low voice, “Yes.”

His room was neater than Bai Heting had expected; every surface within view was clean and orderly. Bai Heting pushed him aside and walked toward the only place where things were actually in disarray.

“Ah—” Luo Congye cried out in surprise.

Unfortunately, it was too late.

The room was only two steps wide, and Bai Heting had already picked up the small dagger from the desk.

“You made this?” He asked.

Luo Congye swallowed nervously, “How is it?”

Fair fingers traced over the wooden hilt, carved with a flame motif.

Bai Heting said candidly, “Quite rough.”

Luo Congye felt as if his heart had been poked full of holes by that small dagger.

Bai Heting flipped the dagger twice in his hand and added, “But it feels good in the hand.”

With that, he picked up the leather sheath from the desk, unbuckled his own belt, and equipped the sheath onto it.

Luo Congye let out another “Ah.”

“What’s wrong?” Bai Heting looked at him while buckling his belt back up.

Luo Congye wasn’t satisfied with this dagger either, which was why he hadn’t been able to bring himself to give it away. Yet, Bai Heting had already slid the dagger into the sheath at his waist. He took it as a matter of course without even asking what the dagger had been made for. Luo Congye had no choice but to swallow his thousand unspoken words and murmur, “Nothing much.”

Bai Heting’s hand still rested on the hilt. He said thoughtfully while stroking the pattern with the pad of his thumb, “Do you miss your old name very much?”

Luo Congye hadn’t expected him to ask this. He quieted down for a moment and avoided a direct answer, only saying, “I like my current name very much.”

Bai Heting fell silent too.

He once liked his current name very much too.

Until tonight.

“But I don’t like your name, General.” Luo Congye said in a small voice.

Bai Heting froze for a moment.

He nearly thought he had misheard, “Why?”

His name was taken from an ancient piece of foreign poetry and bestowed upon him by the king himself. Throughout his entire life, he had never heard anyone utter such treasonous words.

Luo Congye hesitated, stopping himself before finally letting out a sigh. “Never mind. A name doesn’t represent much anyway.” Then, as if talking to himself, he murmured, “A rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.”

The words sounded overly poetic, giving Bai Heting a layer of goosebumps. He took a deep breath and said with a sinking, disdainful tone, “What on earth are you talking about?”

“You’ve never heard of it?” Luo Congye was somewhat surprised. “It’s a very famous line from a theatrical play. But…” He paused, adding with a guilty conscience, “I read it in a book.”

That book was one he had once read in Bai Heting’s private library.

“Theatrical plays,” Bai Heting sneered with contempt. “When would I ever have the time to read that sort of thing?”

Luo Congye choked on his words.

Bai Heting asked again, “I sent you to get an education and learn to read, just so you could look at this kind of stuff every day?”

Of the general’s stern reprimand, Luo Congye only truly registered the first half. Years earlier, when he had sneaked into Bai Heting’s private library and been caught, he had not been severely punished. Instead, he was sent to school. He had always believed it was the steward’s personal favoritism toward him, never once imagining that it had been authorized by Bai Heting.

After all, Bai Heting had never summoned him even once.

“Why are you looking at me?” Bai Heting knit his brows. “Am I wrong to scold you?”

Luo Congye obediently averted his eyes.

He pulled a clean sheet of paper from the desk, picked up a brush, and dipped it in some ink.

Mystified, Bai Heting asked, “What are you doing now?”

Yet his gaze involuntarily drifted toward the tip of the brush in Luo Congye’s hand. The ink quickly bled into the brown paper, leaving behind sharp, free-flowing black lines.

Luo Congye set the brush down and asked him, “Is it still ugly?”

Bai Heting picked up the sheet of paper.

It certainly wasn’t ugly anymore.

Bold and powerful, executed in a single flowing stroke; truly excellent calligraphy.

“It’s decent.” That was his assessment.

Luo Congye was stunned.

He had practiced writing these three characters even more fluently than his own name, and at this moment, he finally couldn’t help but question the general’s aesthetic taste.

Tracing his own name on the paper with a finger, Bai Heting said softly, “What you said isn’t right. A name means that someone cares about you.”

People who don’t care about you would never want to give you a name.

“Someone cares about you.” Luo Congye blurted out.

The moment the words left his mouth, he immediately realized his slip of the tongue and corrected himself, “About you, General.”

Absorbed in his own thoughts, Bai Heting did not reprimand him for his impudence. “In some ways, you are very much like me. I saved your life, so you grant me unconditional loyalty.”

Except, at this very moment, he had begun to question his own loyalty.

How could Bai Yi be that person…

The one who, in Luo Wanyin’s words, could not even appease her hatred even if he were hacked into a thousand pieces…

His father.

“However,” he said flatly, “the only reason I saved your life is because your father once did me a favor.”

Luo Congye froze.

The riddle that had puzzled him for many years finally had a rational answer.

He let out a cold sigh. “Then I suppose he did at least one good deed.”

“There is no need for you to hate him so much.” Whether he was convincing Luo Congye or himself, Bai Heting continued, “An Alpha is naturally capable of marking multiple Omegas. With a status like his, it is not surprising to have a few illegitimate children.”

His face remained expressionless as he uttered these words. Luo Congye gazed at his profile silently, and after a moment, took a half-step toward him before trapping him in the narrow space between the small desk and the wall.

“But an Omega can only be marked by one Alpha.” He embraced Bai Heting from behind with his lips pressed close to his ear, their movements as lingering and intimate as swans intertwining their necks. “If I mark an Omega, I will stay with him until death.”

This was a confession that was neither direct enough nor subtle enough; a man as clever as Bai Heting could not possibly fail to understand it. He raised his hand and pressed down on the gland at the back of Luo Congye’s neck, correcting the reckless Alpha’s choice of words, “If you mark me, you will die.”

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