A few minutes later, Yichen returned, carefully carrying a tray with a bowl of light congee and some fruit. He had plastered a bright smile on his face, trying hard to hide his worry.
Zhiyuan was lying still, staring blankly at the ceiling.
Yichen cleared his throat softly. "Time to eat, bao bei." He set the tray down and gently helped Zhiyuan sit up, propping pillows behind his back. "How are you feeling now?" he asked, his voice deliberately light.
Zhiyuan looked at him for a long moment, then turned his face away, saying nothing.
Yichen's heart sank. He tried again, forcing a playful tone. "Can I ask why CEO Liang is so mad at his poor, humble bodyguard?"
Zhiyuan turned a sharp glare on him. "You yelled at me."
Yichen chuckled softly, though it sounded strained. "I'm sorry, bao bei. I just… I got so worried. I was scared."
Zhiyuan's gaze didn't soften. Instead, it filled with a deep, probing fear. "What are you all hiding from me?" he asked, his voice quiet but intense. "Am I… going to die? Is that why you brought me here? To this quiet place? So I can die peacefully?"
Yichen froze, his smile vanishing completely. "No! Bao bei, no! What are you saying? Don't ever say that!" He reached for Zhiyuan's hand, wanting to comfort him.
But Zhiyuan pulled his hand back sharply. "Stop lying to me!" His voice cracked. "There's definitely something wrong with me! That's why you brought a doctor to stay with us to treat me every day! And that weird man… he keeps watching me like I'm going to break at any moment!"
Tears of frustration and fear welled in his eyes. "Yichen, you know how much I hate it when people lie to me or hide things from me. I don't care about others… but you… you are not allowed to lie to me. You are not allowed to keep things from me."
Yichen was completely frozen. He looked into Zhiyuan's hurt, accusing eyes and felt his own heart shatter. He wanted to tell him everything. The words were on the tip of his tongue. But how could he? How do I tell you that you were pregnant with our child and lost it? How do I explain your own body to you when you don't even know what it's capable of?
He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He just stared, helpless, caught between his promise to protect him and the even more important promise never to lie.
"Zhiyuan…" he finally managed, his voice a rough whisper. "It's not… it's not what you think. You're not dying. I swear on my life, you're not dying. We're here to keep you safe and to help you heal. The doctor is here because you had a very bad internal injury. From the accident and the beating. It's… it's a delicate recovery. That's all."
His explanation felt hollow, even to his own ears. He could see in Zhiyuan's eyes that he wasn't convinced. The trust was fraying, and Yichen was desperately trying to hold the threads together with half-truths, hurting the person he loved most in the process.
That evening, Yichen was in the kitchen helping Dr. Shen prepare a simple dinner.
Dr. Shen chopped vegetables thoughtfully. "He's been in his room all day. It's not good for him. In these early days of recovery, the mind can wander to very dark places. He needs to keep busy. Light activity is also good for blood circulation. He should take a short walk. We need to distract him."
Yichen looked up, worried. "What if he gets dizzy again?"
"We won't overdo it," Dr. Shen assured him. "Just a gentle stroll. Or something to occupy his mind. Reading. A quiet board game. Anything to pull his thoughts away from… well, from everything."
Yichen nodded, understanding. "Okay. I'll ask the boss to bring some games or books when he comes back."
A little while later, Yichen carried a dinner tray upstairs. He pushed the bedroom door open quietly.
Zhiyuan wasn't in bed. He was standing on the small balcony, wrapped in a blanket, gazing silently up at the emerging stars. He looked small and lost against the vast night sky.
Yichen's heart ached. He set the tray down on the table and picked up a soft jacket from the chair. He walked out onto the balcony and gently draped it over Zhiyuan's shoulders. "Let's eat. It's getting cold out here."
Zhiyuan didn't protest. He just gave a small, silent nod and followed Yichen back inside. He sat at the small table, picking up his spoon, but his movements were slow, his spirit clearly elsewhere.
Yichen watched him, the quiet feeling heavy. He tried to lighten the mood. "Hey… do you want to watch a movie together after dinner? We can pick anything you like."
Zhiyuan looked up at him, his eyes dull. After a long pause, he said softly, "I'm not really in the mood."
Yichen felt a pang of concern. He couldn't let him sink deeper into this silence. He moved his chair closer, putting on his best pleading expression the one that usually made Zhiyuan give in.
"Please? Just for a little while? For me?" Yichen begged, his voice soft but persistent. "I'll make popcorn. We can just put something on in the background. You don't even have to watch. But don't just sit here in the quiet all night, bao bei. It's not good for you."
Zhiyuan looked at his earnest, worried face. He sighed, a sound of weary surrender. He didn't have the energy to argue. "Fine," he mumbled, looking back down at his food.
It wasn't enthusiastic, but it was a 'yes.' Yichen would take it. A tiny step away from the isolating quiet. He made a mental note to find the most mindless, cheerful movie he could.
Later, after they cleaned up the dinner dishes, Zhiyuan sat on the living room couch, waiting. Yichen had gone to the kitchen to cut some fruit.
When Yichen returned with a bowl of fruit salad, Zhiyuan glared at him. "I thought you went to get popcorn."
Yichen gave a sheepish chuckle. "Ah… we're all out of it," he lied, setting the bowl down.
Zhiyuan just sighed, a sound of pure exhaustion, and shifted slightly away on the couch to make space. Yichen sat down and began scrolling through movie options on the TV.
Bored, Zhiyuan picked at the fruit salad. Eventually, they picked a light comedy and started watching. But Yichen couldn't focus. His eyes kept darting to Zhiyuan, checking his expression, making sure he was comfortable.
Zhiyuan could feel his gaze. It was like a constant, gentle pressure. Then, Yichen slowly stretched his arms, using the movement as an excuse to try and wrap one around Zhiyuan's shoulders.
That was the final straw.
Zhiyuan suddenly grabbed the remote and shut the TV off. The room plunged into silence.
"I've had enough of this," Zhiyuan said, his voice trembling with suppressed emotion. He turned to look at Yichen. "Please stop looking at me like I'm made of glass! Stop treating me like I'm going to break any second!"
Yichen looked startled and concerned. "No, I… I'm just worried. That's all, I—"
He stopped. In the dim light, he saw tears glistening in Zhiyuan's eyes.
"Hey…" Yichen's voice softened instantly. He pulled Zhiyuan closer, ignoring his weak attempt to push him away. "Don't cry. What happened? Talk to me."
"I hate this!" Zhiyuan burst out, the dam breaking. A sob tore from his throat. "I hate feeling like this! So useless! So helpless! Like a piece of trash that needs to be watched 24 hours a day! Why?! WHY?!"
He looked up at Yichen, his face a mask of pain and fury. "What is wrong with me? What happened to me? I've searched everywhere, and there is no reason! No reason a man would just start bleeding like that from taking a shower for too long! There's something you're not telling me! WHAT ARE YOU ALL HIDING FROM ME?!"
His voice cracked on the last word, the fear and frustration finally boiling over. He wasn't just asking anymore he was demanding the truth that was being kept from him, the truth about his own body that he didn't understand.
Seeing Zhiyuan break down in tears, Yichen's own composure shattered. He pulled him into a tight, desperate hug. "Don't cry, please, don't cry," he murmured, his own voice thick.
Zhiyuan pulled back just enough to look up, his eyes searching Yichen's face, the worst fear spilling out. "Am I… going to die?"
Yichen's heart broke. He held Zhiyuan's face in his hands. "No! You are not going to die. Stop saying that. You're going to be perfectly fine." He took a deep, shaky breath, forcing a wobbly smile as he wiped Zhiyuan's tears away with his thumbs. Trying to change the subject, to escape, he said, "Oh! I just remembered, we do have some snacks. Let me go get them for you."
He started to get up, to flee from the painful conversation.
But Zhiyuan's hand shot out, grabbing his arm with surprising strength. His grip was desperate. "No. I won't let you go. Not unless you tell me the truth." His voice was low, but firm. "Or I will do everything you and the doctor have told me not to do. I swear."
It was an ultimatum. A threat born of utter helplessness.
Yichen looked down at the hand clutching his arm, then slowly sank to his knees in front of the couch. He placed his head on Zhiyuan's lap, hiding his face. His shoulders began to shake.
"I can't," he whispered, his voice muffled. "I'm not strong enough to tell you. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…" The apologies spilled out like a prayer of penance. "I shouldn't have done that. It's all my fault. All my fault. I'm useless. I couldn't protect you…"
Zhiyuan looked down at the crown of Yichen's head, confused and alarmed. "What are you talking about? What did you do?"
Slowly, Yichen raised his head. His eyes were red-rimmed, filled with a sea of guilt and love. He took Zhiyuan's cold hands in his own, holding them tightly as if they were a lifeline.
"Bao bei…" he began, the words feeling like shards of glass in his throat. "You… you had a miscarriage."
The words hung in the air.
Zhiyuan froze. His entire world seemed to stop for a second. Then, a choked, disbelieving laugh escaped him. It wasn't a happy sound it was the laugh of someone confronted with something so impossible it could only be a joke. "What…? That makes no sense."
Yichen didn't smile. His expression was one of profound sorrow. "Zhiyuan… it's true." He took another shuddering breath, preparing to deliver the second, even greater shock. "Have you… have you ever wondered who your mother is?"
Zhiyuan stared at him, uncomprehending.
"Your own father… Wenhao… he gave birth to you. Himself."
This time, there was no laughter. Zhiyuan went completely still, as if turned to stone. He slowly pulled his hands out of Yichen's grip, as if burned.
"Stop playing around," he said, his voice flat and cold. "I'm not in the mood for jokes."
Yichen looked directly into his eyes, his gaze steady despite the tears. "I know it's… the hardest thing to accept. To believe. But it's the truth. You can ask Dr. Shen. He was there. He helped deliver you."
He laid the impossible truth at Zhiyuan's feet, waiting for the world as Zhiyuan knew it to crumble and reshape itself around this unimaginable reality.
The silence that followed was absolute and suffocating. It was as if the world had stopped spinning, leaving only the two of them suspended in a vacuum of shattered reality. Zhiyuan's face, already pale from illness, became utterly bloodless, a waxen mask of shock.
He stared at Yichen, but his gaze wasn't focused on him; it was fixed on some horrific, internal abyss that had just cracked open. His mind, trained for business strategies and boardroom battles, frantically tried to process the words. Miscarriage. Your father gave birth to you.
They were separate concepts, two impossible sentences that, when forced together, formed a picture so alien it threatened to unravel the very fabric of his identity.
"No," he whispered, the word barely a breath. It wasn't a refusal directed at Yichen, but a desperate denial to the universe itself. "That's... insane."
"Zhiyuan—" Yichen started, reaching for him again, needing to anchor him.
"Don't touch me!" Zhiyuan recoiled violently, scrambling back on the couch until his back hit the armrest. He brought his knees up, wrapping his arms around them, making himself as small as possible. A defensive, childlike posture. His wide, disbelieving eyes darted around the room as if seeking an escape from the words themselves. "You're lying. You're all lying to me. This is some... some twisted game."
His voice gained a hysterical edge. "A miscarriage? How could I have a miscarriage? I'm a man!" He spat the word, the foundation of his self-concept. "My father... my father was a powerful CEO! A man! You're telling me he... he was a woman?" The logic was crude, born of sheer panic.
"No," Yichen said, his voice low and urgent, trying to cut through the spiraling terror. "Not a woman. He was intersex. He was your father in every way that mattered he raised you, loved you, built an empire for you. But biologically... he could carry a child. He carried you."
He inched forward on his knees, a supplicant before a crumbling altar. "And you... you inherited that biology from him. You're what some would call an Omega. A male who can conceive."
Zhiyuan shook his head, a frantic, jerky motion. The physical symptoms of the past weeks the nausea, the cravings, the fatigue, the fainting, and finally, the bleeding all crashed into his memory with horrifying new clarity. They weren't signs of a mysterious, fatal illness. They were the milestones of a pregnancy. A pregnancy he hadn't known was possible. A pregnancy that was now... gone.
The memory of the alley, the cold concrete, the crushing fear, the brutal impact of the kick to his abdomen. The searing pain he'd dismissed amidst the adrenaline. He'd thought he was being murdered. In a way, he had been. A part of him had.
A choked, ragged sound tore from his throat, halfway between a sob and a retch. He clutched his stomach, the site of both the violence and the profound, invisible loss.
"The... the baby?" The question was a ghost of a sound.
Yichen's composure finally broke. A tear traced a path down his cheek. "Our baby," he confirmed, his voice raw with grief. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know. You didn't know. If I had... if I had any idea..." He trailed off, the weight of his failure crushing him anew.
Our baby.
The words detonated in Zhiyuan's soul. The child had been Yichen's. A piece of them both, created in love and lost in violence.
He looked at Yichen the man who had fought assassins for him, held him through withdrawal, worshipped him with a fierce, unwavering devotion. The man who was now kneeling before him, shattered by a shared tragedy Zhiyuan hadn't even been aware of.
"Why?" he finally gasped, the word laden with a thousand questions. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"Dr shen forbade it," Yichen admitted, the confession bitter. "He said the shock could harm your recovery. And I... I was a coward. I couldn't find the words. How do you tell someone that their entire understanding of their own body is wrong? How do you tell them you failed to protect something so precious?" His head bowed again. "I thought I was protecting you by staying silent. But I was just hurting you more."
The tears came, not the frustrated tears of earlier, but deep, wracking sobs of grief for the child he never knew, of shock for the truth about his father, of terror for what his own body meant for his future. He wept for the loss of a simple, understandable reality.
Yichen didn't try to hug him again. He just stayed on his knees, within reach, his own silent tears falling, sharing the burden of the unbearable truth he had finally laid bare. The secret was out.
Zhiyuan pushed himself up from the couch. His legs felt weak, but he walked toward the stairs.
"Zhiyuan, wait," Yichen said, quickly getting up to follow him.
"Stop," Zhiyuan said, his voice flat. He didn't turn around. "Just... stop following me."
"Please, let me be with you," Yichen begged, his voice soft and scared. "Don't be alone right now."
Zhiyuan paused on the first step. He took a shaky breath. "I need to think. I can't think with you... with you looking at me like that. I just need to be by myself."
"Bao bei, I'm so sorry," Yichen whispered, taking another step closer.
"I know you are," Zhiyuan said. He still didn't turn. "But sorry doesn't change it. Sorry doesn't make me understand. I need time. Just give me some time alone."
Yichen wanted to argue. He wanted to hold him and never let go. But he saw the stiff line of Zhiyuan's back. He heard the quiet plea in his words.
"Okay," Yichen said finally, the word hurting his throat. "Okay. I'll be right here if you need me."
Zhiyuan didn't answer. He just walked up the rest of the stairs. Yichen followed slowly, a few steps behind, his heart pounding with fear.
At the bedroom door, Zhiyuan paused. His hand was on the knob. "Don't come in," he said, his voice quiet but firm.
"I won't," Yichen promised, stopping a few feet away. "I'll stay out here. I promise."
Zhiyuan opened the door. He stepped inside the dark room. For a second, he stood there in the doorway. Then, without looking back, he closed the door. A soft click as the lock slid into place.
The sound felt like a door slamming on Yichen's heart.
He stood there for a moment, staring at the wood. Then, all his strength left him. He leaned his back against the door and slowly slid down to the floor. He pulled his knees up to his chest.
He could hear nothing from inside the room. The silence was worse than shouting.
He put his head in his hands.
"I'm so sorry," he whispered to the empty hallway. "I'm so sorry, Zhiyuan. It's all my fault. I should have told you sooner. I should have protected you better. I'm so useless."
He listened, hoping for any sound. A footstep. A sigh. Anything. But there was only silence.
He spoke again, his voice a little louder, hoping Zhiyuan could hear him through the door.
"I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere. I'll wait right here all night if I have to. Just... please be okay. Please don't hate me."
He wiped his eyes with his sleeve. "I love you. I love you so much. And I'm so, so sorry"
He rested his head back against the door, staring at the ceiling. He would stay there. He would guard the silence. He would wait for the door to open, no matter how long it took.