Chapter 50 Heavy Rain

Chapter 50: Heavy Rain

Jing Miao inexplicably ended up sitting there in the deserted hallway with these two Omegas, listening to the young man named Xiaochen tell the story about him and his soon-to-be ex-husband in a calm yet resigned tone.

"We were introduced through a family matchmaking, dated for a year, got married, then had a permanent bond... nothing out of the ordinary. He's an ordinary government worker, and I do vaccine research..." He paused, as if having a sudden, profound realization. "In our three years of marriage, the time we've actually spent together probably hasn't even added up to three months. Is that the reason?"

Jing Miao and Baitao both shook their heads in confusion.

"I wouldn't know. I haven't even had a single relationship yet," Baitao said, resting her chin on her hand. "Teacher's Wife would know, right! You and the teacher have been married for many years!"

So, both of them turned their gaze to Jing Miao.

Jing Miao leaned back slightly, flustered. "My brother and I have never been apart."

Xiaochen: "..."

"Ugh! I just got force-fed a huge bowl of dog food! I heard from friends at the Gene Research Institute that Teacher Xi leaves work on time every day to go home and be with his Omega. Damn, I thought they were just making it up!"

Baitao looked at Jing Miao with mock annoyance, then her eyes lit up. "Huh? Teacher's Wife, have you always stayed at home? Don't you have a job?"

Jing Miao nervously clutched his clothes, tentatively asking, "Is... is not working illegal?"

Baitao burst out laughing, and even Xiaochen, under the shadow of divorce, couldn't help but chuckle.

"Hahahaha, oh my god, Teacher's Wife, you're so adorable!"

Their laughter made Jing Miao even more flustered. "I... I have classes and do homework every day." His voice grew softer, and he remembered that TV drama about an Alpha who cheated because he resented spending too much money on his Omega at home. "It's not that I'm avoiding work on purpose."

Baitao was practically melting from the cuteness, feeling a surge of maternal affection. "If I were Teacher's Wife's Alpha, I'd hide you in a garden, giving you kisses, hugs, and lifting you high every day. Who would want you to go out and work?"

Xiaochen patted Baitao's arm. "Alright, alright. It's clear Director Xi's Omega has been sheltered from the ways of the world. He's probably still studying. Don't talk to him about these things."

"Thank you." Jing Miao let out a sigh of relief and started drawing circles on his knees.

If he absolutely had to work... what kind of job could Miao Miao do?

"Anyway, that's how it is. Before I entered the intensive assessment, he brought up divorce, saying we'd go for bond cleansing after I completed it." Xiaochen sighed softly. "I actually... really liked him."

"Did he ever tell you why he wanted a divorce?" Baitao asked.

Xiaochen shook his head. "It was sudden, but also not. I was very busy this year, didn't go home for three months. When I did go back, he avoided me, always going out for meals, coming home just to sleep. We barely spoke a word all day, let alone..." He turned to look at Jing Miao again. "Jing Miao, has Director Xi ever been like that with you?"

Jing Miao shook his head, a hint of his little canine tooth showing as he smiled. "No way. He hugs me every day when he comes home, talks with me, helps me plant flowers in the yard, teaches me... Brother is very good to me!"

Xiaochen, Baitao: "..."

The rain outside grew heavier, and the three Omegas sat in the hallway, engrossed in their absorbing discussion about relationship issues. It was Jing Miao's first time chatting about such topics with others, and he found it quite novel.

He listened as Xiaochen explained that after bond cleansing, an Omega would have a long refractory period, losing interest in everything. It would take a period of biological treatment and psychological support to return to normal, while the Alpha bore no burden at all.

Xiaochen returned to his initial gloom. "It's so unfair. If the feelings between us can't withstand three years of separation, then what was the point of all those solemn vows and the bond in the first place?" He looked at the wedding ring on his finger, as if confirming it to himself. "Why did I accept the bond? It was because I loved him."

Baitao sighed. "But you were already apart more than together before. He's just an ordinary office worker, and you're a scientist. Different paths don't make for good companions."

Jing Miao looked like a whole new world had opened up for him. "Huh? Even if you love him very much, you can't stay together..."

Baitao laughed. "Love isn't everything in our lives either."

Jing Miao instinctively wanted to say he didn't understand, but he swallowed the words. He lowered his gaze, pondering Baitao's statement.

"Yeah, if you put it that way, maybe I didn't love him that much either. Compared to clinging to this long-cold marriage, Tianfuze means more to me. I've worked hard for over twenty years for this day. I can't give it up." Xiaochen's tone turned envious again. "Both husbands being so capable, entering Tianfuze together... that kind of luck isn't something everyone has..."

"So, are you going to give up on him?" Baitao asked, propping her chin on her hand. "Didn't you say you really liked him?"

"I don't know either. If he forces me to choose... I don't know." Xiaochen shook his head, confused. "From beginning to end, he was always my support system. I never worried about household matters. When he talked about divorce, he said he had no retreat left. Baitao, I don't know. Who exactly is forcing whom?"

Jing Miao didn't quite catch his last words, lost in his own confusion.

Behind them, the sound of rain grew louder. Sometimes the wind blew raindrops into the corridor. He could feel a slight dampness on the skin of his neck. In his ears, he seemed to hear the voices of Xi Yucheng and Su Wan.

"Siyan, this is the honor of your lifetime."

"Miao Miao is your Omega. You cannot abandon him."

Their voices intertwined in Jing Miao's memory. That was... from his childhood. Occasionally, upstairs, in the garden, in the living room where he could do puzzles, he would overhear those whispers.

Heavy and helpless. Back then, Jing Miao didn't understand what they meant.

Now, he still didn't fully comprehend. Many things seemed veiled in a thin mist, echoing in his mind.

"The rain's getting heavier. My back is getting wet. Should we head back? We've been sitting here for over half an hour." Baitao stood up, brushing the dust off her pants, and lowered her voice. "What if I get eliminated just for slacking off like this?"

"Won't happen," Xiaochen comforted her. "Tianfuze selects people with strong willpower and professional excellence, not corporate slaves for a 996 schedule."

Jing Miao remained seated, lost in thought.

"Huh?" Xiaochen looked back, noticing the increased glow from the power tower not far away. "Every time it rains, because of the lightning, the power tower can operate at saturated, excess capacity. It's really amazing."

Jing Miao's struggling mind seemed to receive a jolt of electricity. He suddenly stood up, his eyes flickering with light.

"The power tower..."

"Miao Miao!"

The words the child was about to say were scared back down his throat, and the umbrella in his arms thudded to the floor. They looked towards the source of the voice and saw Xi Siyan in a white lab coat running over from the other end of the corridor.

The interior conditions of the military base dormitories were excellent, but the exterior corridors weren't equipped with transparent screens. The entire hallway was soaked by the sweeping rain, with puddles forming on the floor.

Xi Siyan ran against the wind and rain, splashing water that wet his pant legs.

Jing Miao stood frozen for a moment before belatedly reacting and picking up the umbrella from the floor.

"Brother." He opened the large gray umbrella somewhat flustered, stumbling as he hurried towards Xi Siyan.

Before Xi Siyan could even get angry, he saw the child's eyes full of self-reproach. "I'm sorry, brother! Miao Miao... Miao Miao was supposed to bring you an umbrella... I..."

"Don't cry, don't cry." Xi Siyan was momentarily stunned by this, and could only start comforting him. "The other teachers and I had umbrellas. Could you please not run off like that? You just finished your heat, catching a chill is easy. I was scared to death when I came back and didn't see you."

Xi Siyan grabbed his slightly cold hand and pulled it inside his lab coat, pressing it against his still-heaving chest. "Not wet. It's dry inside, nice and warm. Don't cry." He lowered the tension in his voice. "What did brother tell you at home? Hmm?"

Jing Miao buried his face, wiping his tears against his chest, and whispered an apology. "I'm sorry, brother."

Xi Siyan let out a sigh of relief, patting the back of his head, and looked towards the two bewildered Omegas behind him.

"Hello, Teacher Xi!"

"Mm." Xi Siyan nodded. "Hello. What were you all doing just now?"

Jing Miao tugged at his sleeve. "Brother, we were just chatting. Miao Miao was going to bring you an umbrella, but then... then..." He lowered his head guiltily. "I forgot."

You were so caught up in chatting you forgot, how cute.

Xi Siyan smiled, "I'm glad you've made new friends, but don’t run off like that again in the future. At least send me a message."

"Okay." Jing Miao nodded and waved to Bai Tao Xiaochen. "I'm leaving, goodbye."

The two Omegas quickly waved back.

"Let's go."

Xi Siyan led him a few steps before Jing Miao suddenly stopped in his tracks: "Brother, I want to go see the power tower."

"Now? Wait until the rain..."

"Song Jincheng took me to see the power tower before," Jing Miao’s eyes lit up again. "During the rain."

***

"Hurry, put on the teacher’s raincoat." Song Jincheng looked at the approaching storm and helped Jing Miao wrap up tightly. "You just got over a cold a few days ago, you can’t get sick again."

"Okay, Teacher, please stay here, don’t follow me." Jing Miao looked at Song Jincheng with concern.

The power tower at AA University operated on an external cycle, with the energy load meter located outside, so Jing Miao had to go outdoors to record the data.

"Ah, I’m fine. If the values change too much for you to remember, just call me." Song Jincheng patted his back. "I’m healthier than your little frame. Twenty years ago, I could swim in the river in winter."

Jing Miao pouted: "You said that was twenty years ago. And I can remember, no matter how many numbers."

Song Jincheng laughed heartily: "Alright, alright, be careful."

Bean-sized raindrops began to fall, clattering against the transparent glass. Song Jincheng keyed in the third transformation formula of Polaris at the main control console, threw the hand lever, and the flickering electric light briefly vanished before reappearing—many times brighter than before.

Jing Miao crouched in the heavy rain, rapidly memorizing the numbers on the instrument panel as the curve gradually approached the expected peak.

"Just a little more, just a little more..." The boy’s slender, pale fingers pressed against the rain-soaked glass panel, growing as pale as the falling temperature.

Just as the curve neared its peak, it suddenly plummeted. The surrounding glow vanished once more into the rain, leaving only calm.

Still a failure.

Jing Miao returned to the main control room, soaked through, and shook his head in response to Song Jincheng’s hopeful gaze.

The old man was only briefly disappointed before smiling again: "It’s okay, Miao Miao. At least it proves that Polaris isn’t wrong." He turned back to the main control panel and restored everything to its original state.

Thunder rumbled amidst the rain. Jing Miao unbuttoned his raincoat and found his clothes underneath still damp in many places.

Water droplets dripped from his fingers onto the floor, reflecting Song Jincheng’s slightly hunched figure in the puddle.

"Teacher, I still want to try reverse operation." The boy lowered his head, staring at his feet. "The central city has a rainy season that lasts all through autumn and winter, with heavy storms like this every few days. A single thunderstorm provides a power tower with energy equivalent to 10.5 full-power operations. If we could store and convert all the overflow energy, we’d directly reduce nuclear power consumption tenfold. Isn’t that the ultimate goal of Polaris?"

Song Jincheng’s shoulders shifted slightly. He turned around, and the boy’s slender figure stood out starkly in the shadows.

"Miao Miao, I know your capabilities, and I believe in you." Song Jincheng sighed. "But reverse operation requires shutting down the entire power tower system and inputting new calculation theorems upon restart. The cooling time for this process is fifteen minutes. However, there are only six power towers in the central city now. If any tower stops working for more than ten minutes, the Isolation Barriers of three districts will briefly fail. The resource expenditure for a restart is enormous, and the consequences are unpredictable."

Jing Miao lowered his head, silently clenching his fists.

"Without absolute certainty, my application won’t be approved." Song Jincheng walked over, took off his sweater, and draped it over the boy’s shoulders. "Maybe next year, or the year after, the central city will have a seventh power tower. Then, as long as we maintain the first six in operation, we can easily pause one tower for experiments."

The sweater still carried the old man’s warmth—perhaps more than just warmth.

It held a senior’s kindness, a teacher’s admiration, and a colleague’s trust.

"But Teacher, the power towers now handle more than just the Isolation Barriers—ordinary electricity, communications, networks, production, daily life... Will we ever really get a chance to try reverse operation? Just because it’s deemed unreasonable, because I’m the only one who can successfully calculate it, and because I’m a newly adult Omega, our entire team’s hypothesis is dismissed..." Jing Miao sighed. "It makes me sad."

Song Jincheng smiled. Outside the window, the sky was terrifyingly gloomy, yet the wrinkles on the old man’s face seemed like rays of light piercing through the gloom.

"That’s their ignorance, not your fault." Song Jincheng patted his own chest, as if trying to dispel the child’s gloom with the dull thud. "We don’t need to wait for the rain to stop. You must believe in your own strength. We aren’t trying to find balance among six stars. From the very beginning, Polaris was about creating a seventh star in the midst of an impossible storm."

That star belonged to Jing Miao.

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Finally unlocked, a burst update of three chapters as compensation—woohoo!