This was Li Po’s first time stepping foot onto the fourth floor of Bai Lou.

The hallway wasn’t empty; quite a few people were moving around, but all of them were wearing specially made protective suits, making Li Po, in his regular clothes, stand out. Though their faces were hidden behind masks, the hurried pace of their steps made it clear that they were all busy.

As he passed by an Alpha, a strange smell hit Li Po’s nose, causing him to frown in discomfort.

It wasn’t the usual smell of blood or disinfectant that was common on the third floor. Instead, it was a sharp, chemical odor, much like something from a laboratory. Either way, it was unpleasant.

The eye drops in his palm felt cold, and Li Po held them tightly, holding his breath as he walked forward.

Before coming here, Bian Lu had warned him not to enter any room except the Temporary Rest Room, nor touch any experimental equipment, or else even Bian Lu wouldn’t be able to cover for him if something went wrong.

From that, Li Po knew the fourth floor wasn’t simple. While his curiosity was piqued, staying alive was more important. So, he kept his gaze straight ahead, passing rooms labeled Incineration Room, Hazardous Sample Storage, and Pheromone Artificial Synthesis, among others, before finally stopping in front of the Temporary Rest Room.

“Knock, knock, knock.”

There was no identification system or doorbell here, so Li Po raised his hand and knocked the old-fashioned way.

The door opened, and a fluffy head poked out. The owner of the head had a round face—it was Yu San, the one desperately needing the eye drops.

Yu San was practically at his wit’s end. His eyes had been itching unbearably, and he had tried all kinds of methods to stop the itch—short of gouging them out. When he heard someone knocking, he rushed to the door and yanked it open. But when he saw it was a pretty Omega standing there, a suspicious blush spread across his cheeks, and his voice instinctively softened, “Did Doctor Bian send you with the drops?”

Li Po nodded and handed him the eye drops.

“Thanks.”

Before the words were fully out, Yu San grabbed the drops and hurriedly squeezed them into his eyes. Normally, he wouldn’t want to be caught doing something as unrefined as pulling his eyelids apart and applying eye drops in front of an Omega, but his eyes were itching so badly that another second of waiting would have driven him to scratch them out.

After applying the drops, Yu San’s eyes were bloodshot, with his eyelids swollen and red. But he didn’t seem to notice, just blinking hard as he waited for the drops to take effect.

A few moments later, the unbearable itchiness subsided significantly, and Yu San let out a relieved sigh, looking at the Omega with gratitude. “Doctor Bian’s medicine is really effective. Thanks for bringing it to me.”

But the Omega didn’t respond. Instead, he was staring directly at Yu San’s face.

Yu San froze. In all his years, he had never interacted with an Omega before, let alone been stared at so openly by one. And this Omega was particularly beautiful, so much so that he was momentarily dazzled.

“Uh… Do you need me to walk you back?” Yu San, now feeling a little awkward from the Omega’s intense gaze, stammered out the offer.

It wasn’t until then that Li Po snapped back to reality.

He silently observed the Alpha’s eyes, his thoughts brewing.

“What’s going on with your eyes?” he suddenly asked gently.

Yu San was taken aback by the Omega’s concern, his face flushing even more. “N-Nothing, probably just rubbed something into them after an experiment without washing my hands.”

“Are you allergic to the eye drops?”

Yu San blinked in surprise. “No, I’m not. The drops work really well. My eyes were super itchy, but now they’re much better.”

Hearing this, Li Po frowned, still unsure. After a moment of thought, he lifted his eyes and gave the Alpha a slight smile. “Can I take a closer look?”

No Alpha would refuse a request from such a gentle and beautiful Omega, and Yu San was no exception. He was practically dizzy from the sudden fortune of having such an attractive Omega show concern for him, like a pie had fallen from the sky. “Of course!”

Then he watched as the Omega took one step closer, then another, and another…

Yu San was so nervous that his hands were shaking, and his breathing became erratic. Just when he thought the Omega would get right up next to him, Li Po stopped.

Li Po kept a respectful distance, neither too close nor too far, and narrowed his eyes slightly, carefully examining the Alpha’s swollen, bloodshot eyes and the strange, unnatural veins spreading across his eyeballs.

Suddenly, he noticed something that made his heart skip a beat.

If he wasn’t mistaken, those veins were slowly spreading, creeping across the Alpha’s eyeball little by little.

At first, it wasn’t very obvious, and Li Po hadn’t been too suspicious, assuming the redness was just due to lack of sleep. But after the Alpha applied the eye drops, he had watched the eyes swell up rapidly, with an eerie red tint appearing, and the veins seemed to retract slightly, almost as if they had been stimulated and forced to pull back.

Li Po didn’t believe Bian Lu’s eye drops were so magical that they could make the veins recede just like that. After thinking it over carefully, he spoke, “Have you been doing any experiments recently? Any related to pollutants?”

Yu San, who had been hoping for the Omega’s affection, was instead met with this question. Confused, he rubbed his nose and repeated, “Pollutants?”

Li Po, still calm, nodded. “Yes.”

Seeing how serious the Omega was, Yu San finally realized he had misunderstood. He quickly sobered up, pushing aside his distracting thoughts, and began to seriously consider the Omega’s question.

Experiments with pollutants? He had done quite a few lately, but the most important one had been destroying parasitic samples of pollutants. But could he tell the Omega about this? Would it violate any rules? Yu San hesitated, troubled.

However, the higher-ups in S District had already notified all the operatives about the parasites, so the Omega must already know about them. He probably just didn’t know who had destroyed them. In that case, why not tell him? It could be a chance to show off. After all, Yu San had been single for 26 years. If he didn’t act soon, he’d end up as an aging leftover Alpha, with no Omega ever wanting him.

With that thought in mind, Yu San made up his mind and told the Omega about the incident, leaving out the sensitive details.

Li Po’s eyes widened in surprise.

The parasitic pollutant samples had been destroyed? When did that happen? How had he not known?

And the Alpha standing before him had been the one responsible for the destruction? In that case, could he have been infected by the pollutants? Li Po didn’t have medical training, but his gut instinct told him that something was off about the veins in the Alpha’s eyes.

Having witnessed two instances of parasitic infections, Li Po knew these parasites had incubation periods.

The first Alpha had tentacles lurking in his stomach, waiting until the last moment to strike just before medical personnel could bring him into Bai Lou. The second Alpha, Hong Mao, had been infected during a mission but didn’t show any signs until a few days later during training, when the parasite finally revealed itself.

And this Alpha…

Li Po glanced up, uncertain, looking at him again.

If a simple bottle of eye drops could make the veins retreat, it indicated that if the Alpha was indeed infected, the infection wasn’t deep yet. The first two Alphas had been caught in the late stages of infection when it was too late to save them. But if this Alpha was caught early, could his life be saved?

The memory of the first Alpha’s self-destruction was still fresh in Li Po’s mind. If possible, he didn’t want to see anyone else die because of a parasitic infection. In this world, pollutants were the enemy of humanity, and if someone were to die, it should be a heroic death in battle, not a disgusting one from a parasite sneaking inside them, leaving them with no body to bury.

Lost in thought, Li Po’s expression turned melancholic. His usually upturned eyes drooped slightly, making him look pitiful.

Yu San, noticing this, was utterly bewildered. “What’s wrong?” he asked awkwardly.

This wasn’t the reaction he had expected at all. He had imagined the Omega’s eyes lighting up, praising him for being so amazing, not looking so sad and standing there silently in front of him.

Li Po raised his eyes at the sound of Yu San’s voice, looking straight into the Alpha’s eyes with a serious expression. “Bai Lou has a reagent that can detect pollutant infections, right?”

Yu San, still dazed, nodded dumbly, not understanding why the Omega would ask such a question. “Yeah.”

“Can you go get tested?”

Yu San froze completely.

Wait, what? Why was the Omega asking him to test for a pollutant infection? What did he mean by that?

Seeing the Alpha’s shocked expression, Li Po decided not to hide anything anymore. “I suspect you’ve been infected by a pollutant. The veins in your eyes are a sign of the parasite.”

Yu San felt like he had been struck by lightning.

He looked at the Omega in shock, his mind going blank. Images of the events from the day they destroyed the samples flashed through his head, but he couldn’t recall anything unusual. Except for when he had taken off his gloves to rub his eyes in the incineration room…

But the parasitic samples had already been destroyed by then!

Yu San was completely stunned.

Seeing him standing there in a daze, Li Po didn’t push. Not everyone had the mental strength to accept the possibility of being infected by a pollutant, especially when the only two known cases in S District had both died—horribly.

So, Li Po just stood quietly, waiting for Yu San to respond.

If Yu San didn’t believe him… then he would deal with it later.

After a long while, Yu San finally came to his senses. Even though the Omega’s words were just speculation without any solid proof, he couldn’t shake them off. After all, he knew his own body, and the state of his eyes these past few days had been too strange to be explained by a normal infection.

Thinking about it, he gave the Omega a serious look. “Alright, I’ll go get tested.”

Then, with some hesitation, he scratched his head and shyly asked, “Uh, would you mind coming with me?”

Li Po blinked in surprise. Quickly, his brow arched slightly, and he gave the Alpha a faint smile. “Of course.”

At that moment, Yu San felt like he had just been shot through the heart.

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Should I change Bai Lou to White Tower?