TuxedoTranslations

Chapter 100

Not long after Lin Mingfei left, Xia Tong squatted on the sofa for a while longer. It quickly became obvious that he was starting to feel empty and bored.

First he curled up on the sofa for ten minutes. Then he jumped down and wandered around the living room twice. After that he went back to curl up on the sofa again. This frequent and meaningless routine repeated about seven or eight times before Xia Tong finally bored himself senseless. He flopped onto the sofa, limbs sprawled out, and stared hopelessly at the ceiling.

“Gege… when are you coming back…” he muttered to himself.

As if the heavens had heard his prayer, the doorbell at the club entrance rang.

Xia Tong instantly sprang off the sofa and ran toward the door in wild excitement, like a little Pomeranian wagging its tail furiously, scampering along while calling, “Gege, gege!”

He forgot one thing: the entrance to the Polaris base had a high-level access control system. Outsiders couldn’t get in without an authorized key card, and the five members of Polaris—including He Youjin—always carried their access cards with them. They would never need to ring the doorbell.

But the little omega missed Lin Mingfei so much that he rushed over in a burst of excitement and opened the door without hesitation.

A tall, thin person stood outside. His whole body was wrapped in the biting cold of the night. The lighting under the corridor was dim, giving everything a gloomy feel.

Xia Tong didn’t see clearly who it was. Smiling so widely that his eyes disappeared, he eagerly moved forward to hug the person—only to have the other party push a hand against his forehead to stop him.

That hand was large and ice-cold. The touch made Xia Tong shiver, instantly clearing the heat from his head. Then he heard an unfriendly laugh beside his ear.

“Who did you think I was? Zero? Or Timer?” the person mocked coldly. “Or do you act like this with any alpha in the base?”

Xia Tong’s eyes widened.

Now he could see the person clearly. Tall and skinny, with a long face. His skin had a pale, corpse-like tint, perhaps from being exposed to the cold wind for too long. On such a freezing night he was wearing only a thin padded jacket, looking depressed and disheveled. Yet he seemed completely unaffected by the cold, standing there staring at Xia Tong with a sinister expression.

No matter how slow Xia Tong might be, he could feel the hostility radiating from the other man. Instinctively he tried to retreat back inside and close the door.

But it was too late.

Ping Shuai had already forced his way across the threshold. He was taller and stronger than Xia Tong. He slammed his shoulder into Xia Tong’s, nearly knocking the frail little omega to the ground.

Xia Tong felt the man looked vaguely familiar but couldn’t remember where he had seen him before. Seeing the stranger barging straight into the base, he panicked. He Youjin had repeatedly warned them not to let outsiders into the base, and before leaving today he had even reminded Xia Tong to lock the doors before bed.

Xia Tong stammered anxiously, “W-what are you doing? Who are you? I don’t even know you! Y-you… get out!”

He tried to push Ping Shuai away, but Ping Shuai easily grabbed his wrist and twisted it behind his back.

“Who am I? You don’t even know who I am? Who the hell are you pretending for?” Ping Shuai snarled viciously. “You don’t know who I am, huh? Fine—I’ll tell you exactly who I am!”

With that, he dragged Xia Tong toward the upstairs bedrooms.

“Ah—ow, ow, ow! Let go!!” Xia Tong cried out. His wrist felt like it was about to break in Ping Shuai’s grip. He stumbled as he was dragged along, tripping over his own feet several times until tears sprang from the pain.

Ping Shuai had no pity for him.

He knew the omega was good-looking—he had seen Xia Tong’s photos more than once on Shi Ya’s Weibo before. But whenever he thought about how Xia Tong had used that pitiful appearance and affected behavior to seize his place on the team and occupy the magpie’s nest, Ping Shuai felt nothing but disgust.

The louder Xia Tong screamed, the more satisfied Ping Shuai felt.

He dragged Xia Tong roughly all the way to the bedroom door upstairs and kicked it open with a loud bang.

“Look! Look at this!” Ping Shuai pointed into the wide-open room and sneered. “This used to be my room! I put up those posters on the wall! I bought the cushion on that chair! The charging outlet by the bed! The rug on the floor—! You’re living in my room and telling me you don’t know who I am? Are you doing this on purpose?!”

Xia Tong froze for two seconds before suddenly lifting his head.

“You’re Ping—”

He stopped for a moment, then clenched his teeth and shouted angrily, “You’re the one who refused to come back from Sabertooth and kept saying Zero, Timer, Fatty, and Xiao Bo weren’t good enough!”

Ping Shuai choked on the words.

He hadn’t expected Xia Tong to know the situation so clearly. Polaris had probably already completely excluded him. The five of them were now a single unit. They shared secrets among themselves, huddling together and talking about how terrible he—the outsider—was.

Shame and rage surged up together.

Ping Shuai grabbed Xia Tong by the collar and lifted the entire omega off the ground.

“You’re feeling pretty proud of yourself, huh? Other than being an omega—with an alpha-compatible gland and a reproductive cavity—what the hell else do you have?” he cursed viciously. “Aren’t you just using those biological advantages so they’ll carry you to wins while you lie back and enjoy free rank points? A rank-boosting slut?”

“You’re the rank-boosting slut!” Xia Tong struggled desperately. His collar tightened around his delicate neck, leaving rings of red marks. “I’m not like that…! You’re just bad at the game—!”

“I’m bad?” Ping Shuai laughed angrily. “I won three consecutive Royal Mausoleum League championships with Zero! Back then you didn’t even know where the hell you were! And you dare say I’m bad?”

“You are bad—you’re only good at talking!” Xia Tong retorted stubbornly, baring his teeth at him. “If you were really that good you would’ve replaced Goblin a long time ago!”

“…Those four bastards are in it together!”

The mention of Goblin stepped squarely on another of Ping Shuai’s landmines. He lost his temper completely and raised his hand, ready to hit Xia Tong.

Xia Tong shut his eyes in fear.

At that moment Ping Shuai heard a series of clack-clack-clack sounds.

He glanced down and saw a small pink robot repeatedly bumping into his ankle.

“Please stop harming the omega. Otherwise you will be punished by justice from the heavens. It will be very miserable. Very miserable.”

Debang’s LED eyes blinked as the little robot delivered the lines in a flat, robotic monotone.

“What the hell are you supposed to be? Since when is it your place to lecture me!” Ping Shuai kicked Debang away. “Get lost!”

The robot spun across the floor and smashed into the corner of the wall, breaking into pieces. But its voice system seemed to still be running. Amid crackling static, the little robot continued emotionlessly announcing:

“You’re doomed… doomed… doomed….”

Ping Shuai glanced at the chick-sized omega in his hand and sneered. “I’m doomed? The one who’s doomed is clearly—ahh!”

Before he could finish, someone rushed in and twisted his elbow backward. The attacker’s knuckles struck a nerve in his arm, and Ping Shuai instantly felt his entire limb go numb, like a screen overtaken by static. Trembling, he loosened his grip, and Xia Tong fell free.

The little omega clutched his neck and staggered back two steps before collapsing onto the floor, panting hard.

Meanwhile, Lin Mingfei’s expression had turned terrifyingly cold. His gaze swept over the glaring red marks on Xia Tong’s neck and wrist. Without hesitation, he kicked the back of Ping Shuai’s knee—hard enough that there was even a cracking sound of bone.

Ping Shuai cried out in pain.

“Zero—I came here—”

“Shut the hell up,” Lin Mingfei snapped. “Or I’ll dislocate your temporomandibular joint.”

Ping Shuai immediately fell silent, slowly curling up on the floor.

With him quiet, the only sound left in the room was Debang, still repeating over and over:

“You’re doomed, you’re doomed.”

Compared with the current situation, the robot’s words were eerily accurate.

Xia Tong watched from the side for a moment. Gradually his courage returned. Somehow he found the strength to scramble to his feet. Pointing a finger at Ping Shuai, he bounced around smugly.

“If you hit me, you’ll be miserable!! Did you hear that!! I warned you and you didn’t believe me!! Serves you right!! Hmph!! If you’ve got the guts, try hitting me again!!”

Lin Mingfei: “……”

What was wrong with this little creature???

Hadn’t he just been beaten up? Shouldn’t he be sniffling and hiding behind Lin Mingfei asking for comfort? Why was he suddenly acting like he’d been injected with adrenaline and looking so punchable?

Xia Tong had really changed. Earlier Shi Ya had scared Lin Mingfei half to death with that warning call, making him worry that Ping Shuai might hurt Xia Tong in retaliation.

Meanwhile Debang—despite being smashed like that—still had a functioning voice system and CPU. It even continued educating a certain overexcited little someone.

“Xia Xiaotong, please do not make such unreasonable and absurd requests. Be a normal person. Otherwise he really will hit you.”

Xia Tong: “!!”

He had always trusted Debang’s words completely. At once he covered his mouth with his hand and began quietly sucking in breaths of pain.

Lin Mingfei let out a long sigh. He felt like he must be going crazy—actually thinking at a moment like this that this robot was pretty damn wise.

“Hey,” he couldn’t help arguing with Debang, “aren’t you usually great at calling the police? Why didn’t you call them today? Huh? So you only know how to bully me, right? You artificial idiot?”

“The police station is too far. Police cars are too slow.”

Debang paused for a moment, as if seriously calculating, then answered in a crackling mechanical voice:

“You, this alpha, are faster.”

Feel free to buy me a coffee/show your support on ko-fi! Thank you ❤