I’m Allergic to Pheromones - Chapter 29

In the bar, the intruding Omega quickly scanned the relatively normal environment inside, deftly passing by the dance floor before heading straight to the central counter and taking a seat, her head constantly turning to glance behind her.

“Good evening, what would you like?”

The bartender, wiping a glass, was momentarily dazzled by the girl’s stunning face. Smiling, he studied the most beautiful guest of the night, wondering in his heart whether she was an Omega sneaking out behind her family’s back to “see the world” or an overly attractive Alpha.

“Just get her a glass of water,” Su Wei followed closely behind and instructed the bartender. The man gave them a surprised look, his eyes darting between the two before setting down his towel and reaching for a glass to fill with water.

“I don’t have hot water here. Ice-cold okay?”

Su Wei frowned, displeased. “Can’t you drink more hot water?”

The bartender’s lips twitched as he barely maintained his professionalism, rolling his eyes. “I’m not an Omega.”

Coming to a bar and ordering water instead of alcohol—only Su Wei could pull off such an inhuman move.

Nan Ju’s mind wasn’t on this. After surveying the bar, she withdrew her gaze and absentmindedly took a sip from her glass, her face clouded with deep confusion.

She lifted the cup, tilting her head to examine it, her slender fingers slightly curled. Her faintly pink nails stood out in the dim lighting, exuding an innocent allure. The thin mist from the ice-cold water trailed along her graceful knuckles and the back of her hand before vanishing.

“You only got me a glass of water?”

Nan Ju couldn’t believe it.

“Drinking more hot water is good for your health,” Su Wei declared shamelessly, holding an identical glass of water, her cool and detached face full of seriousness. She then turned back to the bartender. “Didn’t I tell you to go easy on the ice?”

Nan Ju looked from Su Wei to her own glass of water and fell silent.

This was the first time someone had told her to drink more hot water in a bar. She was momentarily at a loss for words.

A faint pink lipstick mark was left on the rim of the glass.

The observing bartender couldn’t resist his curiosity and leaned in for a closer look. “First time at Fengya, miss? You seem oddly familiar.”

Nan Ju looked up and met a pair of eyes brimming with amusement.

The bartender, dressed in a white shirt, had strikingly bold orange-red short hair, the ends sticking up haphazardly. Tall and imposing, even when bending down, he exuded an aggressive aura.

Following the undone buttons of his shirt downward, Nan Ju paused for a moment before forcing her gaze to focus on a small mole near his eyelid. Then, tactfully, she redirected her attention to Su Wei’s icy expression.

“You know him?”

Su Wei nodded, introducing reluctantly.

“Ming Lian, the owner of this bar. She’s an Alpha.”

“Hey, can’t you use a few more words when introducing me?” The short-haired Alpha protested unhappily, shifting closer to the counter right next to Nan Ju. “Sweetheart, why aren’t you looking at me anymore?”

The tips of Nan Ju’s ears flushed slightly red. Out of politeness, she turned around, her gaze lingering on the other’s heavily made-up face with its drawn eyeliner: “Hello, my name is Nan Ju.”

Ming Lian pouted in dissatisfaction: “Little tangerine, you still haven’t answered me. Why did you suddenly stop looking at me earlier? Could Su Wei’s expressionless face really be more attractive than mine? Or are my br3asts not big enough to hold your attention?”

Nan Ju fell silent.

She should have known—what kind of decent person could become good friends with Su Wei anyway?

This woman had such thick skin. Couldn’t she tell Nan Ju was already being polite by not letting her eyes wander toward the bar counter?

Feeling slightly stifled, Nan Ju raised an eyebrow and retorted defiantly: “They’re quite sizable, but I prefer flat chests.”

The other woman looked genuinely surprised: “Your preferences are that particular?”

“Ming Lian,” Su Wei interjected helplessly, “she’s not an Alpha.”

This was going too far.

After curbing her friend’s habitual inappropriate remarks, Su Wei turned to Nan Ju with visible apology: “Her gender awareness is rather ambiguous. She didn’t mean to offend you.”

Nan Ju shook her head: “It’s fine.”

It was just someone resting their ample bosom on the bar counter right in front of her face—nothing she couldn’t handle.

After some thought, determined not to lose this exchange, Nan Ju added: “Quite pale though. Oh, I meant the color of this water.”

The ice cubes clinked crisply in the glass as the clear water rippled.

Ming Lian’s eyes widened in surprise before she covered her mouth with a laugh, deciding not to tease further. She turned to prepare a gradient pink drink and slid it toward Nan Ju.

“New menu item—’Peach Blush.’ My treat.”

Pale mist curled from the glass. Nan Ju took an experimental sip through the straw, her tongue pressing against her teeth as she savored the cool flavor. Her gaze inadvertently drifted to Ming Lian’s hands resting on the counter.

A blooming bellflower tattoo adorned the back of the woman’s hand. When she’d leaned in earlier, Nan Ju had caught a faint scent of burning bellflower—the smoky aroma wasn’t unpleasant, just distinctive.

“You added mint?”

Ming Lian nodded with a smile, the small mole on her eyelid becoming visible as she lowered her gaze.

“No alcohol—you can drink this, right?”

Nan Ju rested her chin on the counter and nodded, the straw leaving an imprint on her lips as she looked up at Ming Lian like a quiet, well-behaved little creature.

“Do flower-selling girls come around the bar at night?”

Her clear, bright eyes made Ming Lian’s heart skip a beat instantly.

“No, minors aren’t allowed in bars. Even adults can’t come in to sell flowers—they’d have to stay outside at most.”

Nan Ju nibbled the straw, disappointed: “I see.”

Ming Lian felt an itch in her heart, and remembering Su Wei’s comment about Nan Ju not being an Alpha, she entertained some unconventional thoughts: “You like flowers? I could have someone buy some for you.”

“No need, my whole courtyard is full of them.”

The concentration of beauty at the bar counter had become too intense, drawing numerous covert and overt glances. Su Wei gripped her glass and met each gaze challengingly, her dominant pheromones instinctively suppressing same-s3x rivals, quelling all covetous looks.

A phone vibrated softly. Nan Ju flipped over the device she’d been clutching, her expression shifting as she nimbly slipped off the barstool.

“I’m stepping out to take a call.”

Su Wei stood up to follow.

“I’ll go with you.”

“Are you really tagging along to the restroom? What are we, elementary school kids holding hands to pee?” Nan Ju chuckled at Su Wei, waving as she walked away. “Relax, this is your turf, isn’t it?”

Her slender figure disappeared into the crowd. Ming Lian lazily tapped her glass with a cocktail stirrer. “Snap out of it. Who is she to you that you’re so worried? Even her bathroom trips need guarding?”

Su Wei sat back down, eyeing her well-endowed but otherwise useless friend with mild disdain. “Her name is Nan Ju.”

“Nan Ju? So what? Wait—Nan Ju? That Omega from the Nan family?”

Ming Lian’s jaw dropped. Recovering, she squinted suspiciously at Su Wei. “What are you doing bringing her to a bar? Premarital s3x isn’t illegal, but it’s still shameless, you know? I wholeheartedly condemn your cradle-robbing behavior!”

Su Wei: “…”

“I might’ve believed you were a decent person if you’d left out that last part. Besides, we’ve already called off the engagement. We’re just friends now.”

“Huh? Are you out of your mind? You’re letting go of such a spicy little Omega?” Ming Lian practically lunged over the bar counter, her tightly buttoned shirt straining dangerously as she glared, poised to grab Su Wei’s tie.

The domineering CEO, who disliked close contact, frowned and leaned back.

“I’m not interested in Omegas.”

Ming Lian scoffed, retrieving her glass with a smirk, her voice dripping with schadenfreude over the music and clinking ice.

“That’s not what you said when your secondary gender developed. Too old to keep up now?”

The bar’s music faded, and clover-shaped lights streaked across the ceiling like shooting stars, glittering in the dimness.

Su Wei tilted her head up at the shimmering lights, deliberately turning her back on Ming Lian’s taunts. “It was a mutual decision. No one rejected anyone.”

“Definitely because you’re too old! You can’t even tell apart shades of red lipstick Omegas wear!” Ming Lian declared triumphantly.

In the Omega-only restroom, Nan Ju dialed her assistant Nian Gao.

“What did you mean by that WeChat message? Did you find her or not?”

“You located her this morning but lost her by nightfall?” Struggling to rein in her frustration, Nan Ju gritted her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut, lashes trembling. “Search elsewhere. Send me the coordinates of every place she’s been since leaving the orphanage.”

Hanging up, Nan Ju braced her hands on the sink, gripping her phone. She glared at her reflection before slamming a fist into the mirror.

“Ow! Damn it!”

The mirror remained intact. Nan Ju, now cradling her throbbing hand with teary eyes, hissed in pain.

Stupid fragile Omega physique—she’d forgotten!

Worse, behind her, a masked woman emerging from a stall gaped at the scene. “Are you… okay?”

Nan Ju sniffled, stubbornly blinking back tears before snarling, “I’m fine!”

Watching Nan Ju clench her fists in frustration, angrily punch the mirror, then withdraw her hand in tears, the woman at the scene curved her eyes in amusement. As she observed the hasty retreat, she couldn’t help but murmur, “How amusing.”

Too embarrassed to stay, Nan Ju quickly fled the restroom and returned to the bar counter, asking Su Wei for car keys.

“Lend me your car. I’ll return it soon.”

“Sorry, not interested,” Su Wei coldly rebuffed someone trying to hit on her before turning around—only to pause. “What happened to your eyes?”

Nan Ju stubbornly wiped her damp eyes with the back of her uninjured left hand, lying through her teeth. “I bumped into a door. Never mind that—just give me the keys. It’s urgent.”

Su Wei fell silent.

She still remembered the last time Nan Ju had brushed her off with some nonsense about not being able to smell pheromones due to a cold. This girl wouldn’t tell the truth if her life depended on it.

“Call me if you need anything. Don’t do anything reckless.”

The keys landed in her palm. Nan Ju gave a heavy, nasal “Mhm” before striding toward the bar’s exit without looking back.

Ming Lian returned a step too late with roses in hand—only to find no trace of her.

“Where’s my Omega?”

Su Wei sat at the bar counter, propping her chin with one hand in a deliberately aloof pose. “Gone.”

The black Maybach weaved through streets and alleys, but inside, Nan Ju’s emotions were far from the calm rationality she had imagined.

She had seen the address sent by her assistant and the surveillance footage.

Bai Cha had appeared in the frame of multiple cameras—dashing across dangerous roads, sheltering from rain at a bus stop, stumbling by a roadside flower bed, buying food at a 771 convenience store, calling her from a red public phone booth.

That small, fragile figure, like a panicked stray cat, had wandered through the stormy night with nowhere to go.

She had traversed the entire city, yet in this vast metropolis, not a single light had been lit for her.

The thought of that rainy night—when she had slept soundly, oblivious to the abnormality in their call—made Nan Ju’s eyes burn. She regretted it. If she hadn’t hesitated so much, she should have taken her home long ago.

“Calm down, Nan Ju. Calm down.” She bit her lip hard, the taste of bl00d and the persistent pain from her injured right hand pulling her teetering rationality back from the edge. The speeding car’s tires screeched against the pavement as it jerked to a sudden stop by the roadside.

“If I were you, where would I go?”

In the boundless night, where would a homeless soul wander?

A tall road sign stood ahead, its arrows pointing clearly left and right. The sky was heavy, starless, thick clouds obscuring even the faintest glimmer of the moon.

Ahead, shadows loomed—crooked, unfinished buildings stood in the darkness like monstrous houses waiting to devour.

“You promised to paint the clouds pink for me.”

The girl’s voice seemed to whisper in her ear, soft and gentle, like the pad of a kitten’s paw—pitiful yet endearing.

Nan Ju’s gaze, fixed on the distant shadows, suddenly brightened as if struck by realization. She swiftly grabbed her phone and dialed a number.

“What was the name of that bar Bai Cha went to sell flowers at last week?”

“Fengya.”

Her right hand holding the phone trembled slightly from the pain. Nan Ju frowned, trying to recall where she’d heard that name before, momentarily dazed.

She had just stepped out of that bar moments ago.

Had they been that close?

Were they going to miss each other again?

The car made a U-turn, roaring through the heavy night as it carved a path forward, accelerator pressed to the floor. Nan Ju couldn’t help glancing at the time on her phone, quickly calculating whether Bai Cha might have already left.

The bar only started getting crowded after dark. Ming Lian had said she didn’t allow minors to sell flowers inside – the little kitten only sold them by the roadside and would leave once they were gone.

Nan Ju had come too early, missing the kitten’s usual selling time.

The red light seemed to last for centuries during those two endless minutes. Nan Ju compulsively pressed on her injured right hand, barely managing to suppress her impatience.

Her mind was filled with images of Bai Cha’s bruised face and that soft voice on the phone. She felt like she was submerged in bitter, sour water – just a slight shake would send the acrid liquid dripping down.

Her heart felt heavy, as if carrying a restless rainy night within it – the storm raging, the sky pitch black, with nowhere to hide. She could only stand there, waiting for light to suddenly appear from somewhere.

“We agreed I’d take you home. Don’t you dare wander off.”

The straight road stretched into the distance. A slender figure walked along the roadside, arms full of crimson roses. The wind lifted her black hair, revealing exceptionally clear, beautiful eyes.

Nan Ju parked by the bar’s entrance. As she got out, she stumbled on the steps, the pendant on her phone jingling loudly.

Su Wei’s call came through at the most inopportune moment.

Nan Ju quickly declined it, her eyes scanning the corners near the bar, searching for that slender figure.

The phone rang again. Irritated, she answered with a frown: “What is it?”

On the other end, Su Wei immediately detected the sharp displeasure and anger in Nan Ju’s tone and got straight to the point: “Don’t come back to the bar yet. An Alpha in rut nearly marked an Omega.”

An Alpha’s rut period shared similarities with an Omega’s heat. During this physiological phase, Alphas became extremely agitated, instinctively craving Omega comfort, and might even show hostility toward others of the same s3x through confrontation or scent suppression.

Severe cases required mandatory isolation.

In some ways, it resembled the territorial behavior of lions competing for mating rights in the animal kingdom.

Among prides, male lions would clash over females, with losers being driven out or even killed – a brutally savage process.

Standing beneath the climbing roses outside the bar’s fence, Nan Ju multitasked: “Got it. Did you get into a fight with someone?”

“Not me.” Su Wei glanced at the man currently being stepped on by a masked Omega, then at her friend standing triumphantly on a table with hands on hips, her mouth twitching. “Ming Lian knocked him out barehanded.”

As for that particularly fierce little Omega… better not mention that.

“Knocked him out? Good. Tell Ming Lian from me – put some real force into it, no need to hold back. If she ends up in jail, I’ll bail her out.”

The wild wind disrupted the night, scattering blooming pink roses that drifted down—some landing on Nan Ju’s head, others falling to the ground to be swept away by the breeze or crushed underfoot by passersby.

A petal struck Nan Ju’s face. She lowered her gaze and spotted a patch of unusually deep color at her feet. Crouching down, she picked up a rose petal nearly buried in the dirt, cradling it in her palm as her eyes shimmered with light.

“Found you.”

The bar had two back doors. Nan Ju followed the trail of scattered rose petals, winding her way until she reached the mouth of an alley.

This spot was nearly five hundred meters from the Elegance Bar, flanked by a sloping incline and dense roadside trees that blotted out the sky, casting eerie shadows on the ground.

The wind had scattered the petals, making their path hard to trace. Nan Ju had relied on instinct to find this place.

Behind her, dim streetlights flickered. Ahead lay a dark, silent alley. Standing at the threshold between light and shadow, Nan Ju wrinkled her nose at the petals strewn across the entrance and stepped forward without hesitation.

The deeper she went, the more petals she found. At a bend in the path, a bouquet of crimson roses lay discarded on the ground, its blooms shattered and trampled.

The scent of roses, carried by the evening wind, mingled with a medley of foul odors—rotting fish, harsh lye soap, and something else unidentifiable yet nauseating.

Even covering her nose and mouth couldn’t keep the stench at bay. It clung stubbornly, seeping into every breath.

Were there Alphas here? And more than one?

Nan Ju felt she’d come to the wrong place. Her head swam from the stench, her stomach churned, and her eyes reddened.

Reason told her to leave immediately—to stay away from unfamiliar Alphas. Yet an inexplicable conviction urged her forward.

A single thought could lead to heaven or hell. She had missed Bai Cha too many times. One wrong step, and she might lose her again.

Nan Ju glanced back one last time. The alley stretched endlessly, its high walls blocking any light, narrow and suffocating.

Bending down, she picked up a rusted, bent pipe from the corner, released her grip on her nose, and strode around the bend.

Voices rose—lewd laughter and whistling cutting through the alley’s silence. Three tall boys had cornered something—or someone—shoving and groping.

“Run now, huh? Weren’t you fast earlier?”

“Damn, is this brat even an Alpha? Got stamina for days.”

“Eh, let’s find out. Too short to be fully presented. If it’s a little Omega, we’re in luck.”

In the shadows, the bullies reveled in their cruelty and lust, trying to force a presentation with pheromones. Soon, one spat in disgust.

“Fvck, no scent. It’s just a Beta.”

A companion kicked at the shadowy figure curled up in the corner, eyeing the exposed sliver of pale, slender calf with sudden, restless hunger.

“Who gives a sh1t? Betas are better—won’t cry like Omegas. Chased this far, might as well take the edge off.”

“Gurgle—”

A soda can came rolling swiftly, interrupting the scene.

Nan Ju tightened her grip on the hard metal pipe, her face dark and her voice icy cold: “Get lost. I won’t say it again.”

“Another pretty girl?” The man who’d just spoken about venting his frustration stepped forward, his hair dyed yellow and eyes bloodshot. He looked at Nan Ju standing not far away, his gaze heavy with lust.

“Boys, this chick is smoking hot.”

When the first person had their leg bone shattered by Nan Ju, the atmosphere shifted dramatically.

The few Alphas who couldn’t win fled like beaten dogs, and the entire alley fell eerily silent.

Nan Ju panted lightly, a streak of bl00d trailing from the corner of her eye, staining her lashes. She tossed aside the tightly gripped pipe and wiped her face roughly before rushing toward the corner behind her.

The kitten was curled up in the shadows, motionless. Fear gripped Nan Ju as she tried to lift them from the ground, only to be met with fierce resistance.

“No, don’t.”

Nan Ju froze, her eyes instantly reddening. She dropped to her knees, steeled her heart, and gripped the other’s shoulders, flipping them over and pressing them tightly against her chest. Patting their back soothingly, she murmured, “It’s me. I’m here. I came to take you home.”

“Don’t be scared, kitten. Your sister’s here now. I’m so sorry—I came too late. I’m sorry.”

The person in her arms, who had been struggling wildly, suddenly stilled. Their body trembled, soft hair brushing against Nan Ju’s neck. Like a kitten, Bai Cha sniffed weakly before whispering, “Sister…”

In the chaotic, filthy alley, a faint, water-like scent of pheromones spread, overpowering the surrounding stench.

Nan Ju, whose head had been throbbing from the foul air, suddenly felt revitalized. She hugged the kitten tightly, nuzzling them and taking a deep breath—refreshed and invigorated.

“Ugh, are you some kind of angel cat? With built-in air purification?”

Thank god, this was her paradise!

She had to take them home—no, she had to keep them by her side every single day!

Overcome with excitement, Nan Ju suddenly noticed something was off. She cupped the other’s chin, tilting their face up, and froze.

Bai Cha lay weakly against her, cheeks flushed an unnatural red, lips slightly parted as they panted—exactly like the symptoms of an Omega in heat described in books.

“Bai Cha, wake up. Are you… in heat? Or is this your differentiation?”