[Esports] Pheromones say we're a match made in heaven.

Wednesday was a gloomy day with a damp, cold wind howling, and the weather forecast predicted sleet.

A taxi stopped in front of a European-style building, and Chi Feifan got out, wearing a scarf.

As soon as you step outside, a cold front whistles past.

There's a Western restaurant on top of this European-style building, and it's extremely difficult to make a reservation. I visited it once when I was in college.

He stood downstairs, looked up, and nervously pressed down his hair, which he had just had cut at the barbershop.

Although he didn't dye his hair back to black, he still got it cut and trimmed. Before, the hair at the back would have covered his neck a bit, but now it's completely cut to the normal length for a man's hair.

The restaurant was very warm. Chi Feifan took off his scarf, thought for a moment, straightened it, and hung it in the crook of his arm.

This scarf was a gift from Qin Yi. This morning, he accidentally knocked over a cup on the table, wetting the one he was going to wear, so he had to take out the new one to wear.

Chi Feifan spotted the figure sitting by the window at a glance.

Even though he hadn't seen her for so long, his intuition told him that it was his mother.

Chi Feifan quickly took a few steps toward that spot, his heart pounding wildly.

But when he was almost there, he stopped and slowed down, afraid that he would look reckless.

The woman sipped her tea, admiring the view outside the window. Hearing a noise, she turned around and saw Chi Feifan standing by the table. She parted her red lips slightly and said, "Xiao Fan, you're here."

Chi Feifan sat down opposite him somewhat awkwardly.

The woman looked him over carefully, and her first words were: "You've lost a lot of weight."

Chi Feifan placed his hands on his lap, staring at the water glass in front of him, his hands gripping his pants so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

I don't know what to say.

A few days ago, when he learned that his mother was finally going to meet him, he was so excited that he couldn't sleep all night. But as the date drew closer, he felt more nervous than happy.

"These past few years, I've always been worried about you being alone in China. How is your second differentiation treatment going?"

Chi Feifan's tongue was stuck to his palate, making it difficult for him to speak clearly. He could only keep drinking water: "It went quite smoothly."

"That's good." The woman suddenly placed her hands on the table and sighed gently, "You're still as quiet as you were when you were little. Have you suffered a lot these past years without your mother by your side?"

Feeling as if he'd been electrocuted by those words, Chi Feifan looked up. The woman hadn't changed much since he left; she was still beautiful and capable, just a little unfamiliar. He couldn't be as affectionate and playful with her as he had when they were children.

"It's alright," Chi Feifan said.

Immediately, he rubbed his fingers against the cup, realizing he couldn't just ask questions one by one like squeezing toothpaste, so he took the initiative: "And Mom, are you doing well abroad?"

The woman opened her mouth, about to answer, when a blond, light gray-eyed foreign man walked straight past the table. She immediately called out to him in English, "Owen, you're past."

Chi Feifan stared blankly.

Then the strange foreign man turned around, said "Oh my god," clapped his hands with a look of sudden realization, went behind the woman's chair, pulled out the chair next to the woman, and sat down.

Chi Feifan then realized that the tableware placed next to his mother was not because the waiter had set it out too much, but because there was already a third person there.

"You spent a full ten minutes in the bathroom."

"Sorry, this place is so big, I almost got lost."

"Just ask the waiter next time; all the waiters here speak English."

Chi Feifan stared at this typical Western elite man, who was about the same age as his mother, and sensed something was amiss.

A bunch of gibberish in English drilled into his ears, like a sharp stick stabbing into his brain. He was stunned for a moment, and only after he recovered did he feel a little pain.

After the woman finished speaking to the man, she suddenly grabbed Chi Feifan's hand, which was resting on the table.

"Xiao Fan, there are two important things I want to tell you when I come back to China this time."

Chi Feifan looked at her slowly and obliviously.

"First of all, Mom is getting married. This is my fiancé, Owen. Owen doesn't mind that I have a child, and he likes you very much and wants to become a family with you."

"Secondly, we came back to China this time to help you with the formalities. I will handle things with Chi Jianye... Xiao Fan, Mom is here to pick you up. Let's go live abroad together."

*

Inside Hawk base, a team of people are packing their luggage.

With visas and everything sorted out, Chen Yangyang booked a flight to San Francisco for tomorrow afternoon. They needed to go a few days in advance to adjust to the time difference.

Chen Yangyang checked the weather forecast for tomorrow again and again, praying that it wouldn't snow and that the flight wouldn't be delayed.

After assembling the keyboard, Qin Yi glanced at his phone.

It was already past 10 p.m., and Chi Feifan hadn't returned from dinner yet.

He considered it for a moment, then sent two messages to Chi Feifan. He waited for a long time, but there was no response from the other end.

Qin Yi picked up a thick coat and greeted Chen Yangyang, saying, "I have something to do, I'm going out for a bit."

Chen Yangyang was busy supervising Wang Kang and the others, and upon hearing this, she didn't have time to ask any further questions. She could only loudly remind them, "Don't come back too late!"

Qin Yi waved his hand to indicate that he understood.

The restaurant where Chi Feifan and his group ate was by the river, almost an hour's drive from Hawk. He had shamelessly coaxed the restaurant's exact location out of Chi Feifan the day before.

However, when Qin Yi arrived at the restaurant, it was already closed and there were no customers inside, only the waiters cleaning.

They're not at the restaurant, did they go home?

Qin Yi thought he had missed his chance, but when he sent another message to Chi Feifan, there was still no response.

Qin Yi gripped his phone tightly.

For an Alpha, once they've identified an Omega, they'll feel uneasy if that Omega leaves their sight for even a moment.

Qin Yi has been trying his best to restrain himself every day during this period, not interfering with Chi Feifan's life, and not letting his possessiveness be too obvious.

But now he regrets it.

His pheromones were swirling around him, and several waiters in the restaurant cast wary glances in his direction.

Qin Yi adjusted his hat and tapped his bracelet in the darkness, only to find that Chi Feifan's sharing permissions were still enabled—his location was 233 meters away from him.

Qin Yi's eyes caught the small red dot on the bracelet, and he turned and walked outside.

He remembered that Chi Feifan wasn't wearing many clothes when he went out during the day. He had been outside for so long in such cold weather without going back. Something must have happened.

Perhaps this meeting wasn't as wonderful as I had imagined.

With the help of the wristband's location tracking, Qin Yi quickly found Chi Feifan on a bench.

The street was deserted, and the streetlights next to the benches cast a cold, white glow.

Chi Feifan sat on the cold iron bench, his legs bent and hugged to his chest, his head buried in his arms, only his wind-blown hair showing.

His hands hung limply outside, already frozen stiff, and even turned a bit red and purple from the cold wind.

Qin Yi's pupils contracted slightly, and he put his phone away.

Suddenly, someone reached into his scarf and touched his neck, as if checking his body temperature. Chi Feifan froze instantly, his whole body tensing, but the familiar scent enveloped him, and he knew who it was without even looking up.

"Why are you sitting here all alone? Are you crying?" Qin Yi's voice came from the side.

Chi Feifan looked up with his eyelids taut and his face expressionless, as if he really was just sitting there in the wind in the middle of the night because he was upset: "No."

"Your voice isn't that nasal; you'll get sick if it's like that."

After saying that, Qin Yi unzipped his jacket, and the large clothes wrapped around the person next to him.

His coat was large and thick enough to keep out the cold night wind.

Chi Feifan struggled for a moment.

Qin Yi tightened his arms around her, saying in a way that left no room for refusal, "It won't be cold in a bit. You're too cold. If you move around any more, we'll both get infected."

Chi Feifan stopped moving and silently pressed himself against Qin Yi.

The long-lost warmth, carrying the scent of Qin Yi's pheromones, spread throughout my body in the darkness.

"Were you unhappy to see your mother today?" Qin Yi asked in a deep voice, then waited patiently.

After a long time, Chi Feifan still didn't make a sound. Just when Qin Yi thought that Chi Feifan didn't want to talk to others about his family affairs and wanted to take him back first, the person in his arms suddenly let out a breath.

"No, I'm not happy..." Chi Feifan's voice was very soft, more like he was muttering to himself, "but I'm more nervous. I don't know what to say to her."

Hearing the slightly trembling tone in Chi Feifan's voice, Qin Yi's heart clenched tightly.

His gaze darkened, and he frowned slightly, but his tone remained as gentle as before as he asked kindly, "And then?"

There was another long silence, with only the rustling sound of the wind whipping up plastic bags on the ground and the sound of the river water lapping against the riverbank in the distance.

"Then we exchanged a few words. She didn't seem to change much, but it felt like everything had changed again." Realizing his words were disjointed, Chi Feifan paused and added, "I realized we seemed like strangers."