Chapter 15: Be Normal

By the time Wen Zisu and the others arrived home from the banquet, it was almost ten o’clock. Su Mi was curled up on the living room sofa watching online courses on TV when she heard the door open. Su Ciyu came in, carrying a sleeping Su Yi.

Su Mi paused the video and went up to take a look.

Su Yi was sleeping soundly, his little face flushed and covered with a small blanket in Su Ciyu’s arms.

Su Mi reached out to poke him secretly. Su Yi hummed twice in his sleep, stretched out his little hand, and waved it in the air.

Su Ciyu said, “Xiao Yi just fell asleep in the car. Don’t disturb him.”

Su Mi put her hand behind her back and nodded obediently.

Wen Zisu, who had just come in behind them, was surprised to see Su Mi waiting in the living room. He lowered his voice and asked, “Yaya, why haven’t you gone to bed yet?”

Su Mi replied, “I wanted to try waiting for you to come back. I’ll go to sleep right away.”

She turned off the TV and started to follow Su Ciyu upstairs. She originally planned to quietly go behind her but then heard Su Ciyu say “eh.”

Su Ciyu asked, “How was Shen Han today?”

What did she mean by “how”?

Su Mi blinked, unsure, and said, “What do you mean? She seemed the same as usual and even drove me home tonight.”

Su Ciyu turned to Wen Zisu and said, “Zisu, turn off your inhibitor and take a sniff.”

Wen Zisu touched the inhibitor on his neck, turned it off, and moved closer to Su Mi, sniffing lightly.

He then “hissed,” leaned back a few steps, and pressed a few buttons on the inhibitor.

Both of them looked at Wen Zisu.

Wen Zisu frowned, thought for a moment, and said, “There is a bit of an agitated scent, but it shouldn’t be pheromones, just traces of mental fluctuations.”

Su Ciyu sighed, “Let’s go upstairs first.”

Su Ciyu put Su Yi to bed in his children’s room, while Wen Zisu took Su Mi to the master bedroom.

Wen Zisu took out a measuring device, had Su Mi sit in a chair, and removed the inhibitor patch from the back of her neck and the earring.

In an instant, it felt like the air in the room came alive.

What stood out were two scents. Su Mi moved her nose.

Wen Zisu smiled, “Can you smell it? It’s your mother’s and my pheromones.”

In this world, people with close kinship have low sensitivity to each other’s pheromones, but probably because it was the master bedroom where her parents lived, even after being filtered by the house purification system, Su Mi could catch some residual scents in the air.

It smelled a bit like trees and slightly sweet milk.

This must be their pheromone scents.

This was the first time Su Mi had encountered other people’s pheromones since coming to this world.

Su Mi didn’t even know what her own pheromone scent was like.

On her first night here, since she didn’t wear the pheromone-blocking earring daily yet, Su Mi vaguely smelled her own pheromones when she changed the blocking patch before bed.

It seemed like a slightly sweet, fresh, grassy scent.

She wasn’t familiar with plants and couldn’t name the specific plant species.

Now that she smelled her parents’ pheromones, Su Mi came to a simple and pleasant conclusion: her scent was like a combination of her parents’.

Ah, a combination.

Su Mi narrowed her eyes, feeling happy, and nodded to Wen Zisu.

At the same time, she asked the system in her mind, “You said this body is still mine. What about the pheromones?”

The system replied, “The pheromones are emitted from your own body’s glands, so they naturally belong to you, but…”

The system paused.

Meanwhile, Wen Zisu said, “Your mother has the scent of cypress, and mine is the more common milk scent.”

Su Mi blinked curiously, “What about me?”

Wen Zisu smiled wryly, “We’ve been busy supplementing your Beta data and haven’t had time to do a pheromone analysis. We’ll do it next time when we have time.”

“Okay,” Su Mi remembered their earlier conversation and couldn’t help but ask curiously, “Father, what were you and mother talking about just now?”

Wen Zisu smacked his head and took out a round measuring instrument, letting Su Mi sit on a chair and putting it on her head, with a strange groove fitting on her forehead.

It almost felt like nothing. Su Mi tilted her head back slightly, watching Wen Zisu fasten it while operating his communicator.

As he worked, Wen Zisu explained, “Your differentiation didn’t go well; your glands and mental strength are fragile. Otherwise, pretending to be a Beta wouldn’t have been so smooth. That’s why we restricted your outings after differentiation. There are too many uncertain factors outside, especially encountering Alphas with strong mental strength. Their mental fluctuations can easily affect you.”

Su Mi was stunned for a moment and instinctively asked, “What about Sister, who is a dual S? Would she have any impact?”

Wen Zisu shook his head, “At her high level, there shouldn’t be a problem. She just had her regular pre-heat period checkup a few days ago, which probably caused the mental fluctuations. Don’t worry.”

Su Mi nodded, somewhat dazed.

It seemed Wen Zisu’s company was responsible for the Shen family’s medical affairs, no wonder he was so confident.

Could he also know a bit about Shen Han’s “heart disease”?

But Wen Zisu’s attention had already returned to the screen, and at the same time, the bedroom door knocked twice. Su Ciyu’s voice came from outside, “Is it done?”

Wen Zisu removed the measuring device from her head. As Su Mi reapplied the blocking patch and earring, she watched Wen Zisu open the door.

Su Ciyu walked in, patted Su Mi’s head, and took over the screen from Wen Zisu.

Wen Zisu said, “The values are still not up to standard.”

Su Ciyu hummed, “Be careful outside and come home early every day, okay?”

Sitting between the two of them, facing their left and right reminders, Su Mi obediently replied, “Okay.”

Obedience was key.

Then she was sent back to her room.

Sitting at her desk, Su Mi first checked her chat with Xu Nanqiao.

After returning home, she immediately warned Xu Nanqiao about running into the Yang family and told her that they might come to ask for forgiveness in the next few days.

Su Mi also thoughtfully reminded her: Sister is worried about your safety and said she’ll send someone to protect you. Be careful when you go out these days ^^.

But Xu Nanqiao didn’t plan to sit and wait. She proactively asked Su Mi for Yang Er’s contact information.

At first, Su Mi was a bit worried, but after doing some questions, she realized that Xu Nanqiao probably didn’t want the Yang family to come to her house.

After all, she lived in a close-knit old neighborhood, and if the Yang family caused a scene, it would be very troublesome, with moral coercion forcing her to forgive.

Moreover…

Recalling the interference from the protagonist’s mother in the original plot, Su Mi shrank her neck.

It was better to let Xu Nanqiao handle it herself.

She messaged Xu Nanqiao: Let me know once it’s handled.

Xu Nanqiao: Mm-hmm, I will.

Before bed, Su Mi scrolled through her phone and instinctively opened her chat with Shen Han.

The latest message was still the few courtship excerpts she had sent to Shen Han.

Maybe the antagonist was busy again, so there was no reply.

However…

Su Mi checked the blackening value and her eyes lit up.

The current blackening value was only 80%!

That means it had dropped another two percent since she came downstairs after reading.

The recent interactions with Xu Nanqiao seemed to be related only to her own subtle “persuasion.”

So Shen Han liked this kind of thing? Pretending not to listen but actually absorbing everything and being “inspired” by her?

Su Mi got excited and decided to strike while the iron was hot.

She carefully searched through the system’s data library, repeatedly filtering, and sent Shen Han:

“Knowing at 25 is too late! Ten sentences to get into the heart of an Omega”

“Top ten wife-chasing crematoriums in literature”

“Regrets: If only I loved her earlier”

This time Shen Han responded very quickly.

Shen Han: [Image]

Opening the picture, it was the block button on their chat.

Su Mi: “…”

Listening to everything but still so fierce?

Su Mi quickly replied with a shushing emoji.

And sent a goodnight message.

Sneakily: Sister, I’ll bring Nanqiao over next Saturday, okay ^^?

Shen Han: Mm.

Ending the chat, the blackening value remained at 80%.

Su Mi turned off the communicator screen, snuggled into her warm quilt, and hummed contentedly.

This week’s task was still successfully completed, and next week awaited the fixed plot point.

She reviewed in her mind, and the next week, there would be an event where the male and female leads would interact. Soon, she drifted into sleep.

Meanwhile, Shen Han had just finished at the private club’s court, exhaled lightly, and wiped her sweat.

Secretary Zhuang stood beside her, handing over the next day’s work plan.

Shen Han flipped through it, picked out the key meetings, giving some instructions, and then hesitated for a moment.

“Wait a minute.” She called to Secretary Zhuang, who was about to leave.

The lights on the court behind them had already gone out. It was early spring, slightly cold, and the trees outside stood still in the night.

In the cold night air, Shen Han paused, then said, “Have you noticed that Su Mi seems to have changed a bit since her differentiation?”

Secretary Zhuang thought for a moment and said, “There is a bit of a change, but…”

He hesitated before continuing, “But Miss Su has always been quite attentive to you. From what I can see, there’s not much difference from before. You postponed your meeting today to send Miss Su home. Did you notice something?”

Shen Han denied, “No.”

She lowered her eyes, silently pondering Su Mi’s behavior today.

As Secretary Zhuang mentioned, Su Mi had always been attentive, but there was still a difference between before and after her differentiation.

Before, she could clearly see the ambition and greed in the girl’s eyes, all for the benefits she could get from the Shen family for the Su family.

As the head of the Shen Group, Shen Han was surrounded by such people. Those with desires were the easiest to control. Keeping them around for amusement wasn’t a problem as long as they completed the tasks assigned to them.

But now, it was different.

The clear sense of purpose was gone, replaced by something else.

It was no longer as easy to see through, and she couldn’t figure out what Su Mi was really after.

Shen Han thought about Su Mi’s behavior.

The sudden close relationship with Xu Nanqiao, the clumsy obedience, the inexplicable talk about “liking”…

While she was mulling over this, Secretary Zhuang suddenly said, “Miss Su did say some strange things to me today.”

Shen Han raised her eyes and looked at Secretary Zhuang.

Secretary Zhuang spoke straightforwardly, “She mentioned that there were no other Omegas around you and that she was unique to you… things like that.”

Seeing that Shen Han did not respond, Secretary Zhuang continued, “I tried to comfort her, saying that in your eyes, she was indeed unique. Then Miss Su seemed a bit stunned and said she hadn’t seen you happy in a long time.”

“Speaking of which, Miss Su seems very concerned about her differentiation into a Beta.”

At this point, Secretary Zhuang felt he might have found the correct answer and hastily tried to clear up any misunderstandings.

“That’s all I know. I don’t have a close personal relationship with Miss Su.”

Shen Han: “…”

She gave her renowned efficient secretary a look.

“Be normal.”

She understood Secretary Zhuang’s theory but didn’t believe it.

Frowning, Shen Han said, “Send me the test reports from that day again, and the room’s pheromone detection report.”

Secretary Zhuang respectfully agreed, hesitated, and asked, “Do you plan to conduct another test?”

Shen Han noncommittally hummed.

“We’ll see.”

Author’s Note:

Su Mi: Secretary Zhuang, kind words bring good karma 🙂

• The susceptible period is the stage of unstable pheromones or mental strength.
• The heat period is the estrus period. I didn’t want to use a different word, so I changed the name.