A Stand-in Alpha Awakens - Chapter 14

Jiang Lu’s WeChat on her phone and her smartwatch were always synced online, though their notification settings differed. To save the watch’s battery, it only displayed alerts for her handful of “Starred” contacts and new friend requests; everything else was hidden.

Consequently, when Jiang Lu felt her wrist vibrate on her way to the classroom, her first instinct was that it was a spam message, and she didn’t even bother to lift her hand. Very few people knew her contact information—you could count them on two hands—and she had restricted her WeChat search settings long ago.

It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that, in her memory, no one had ever successfully sent her a friend request without her prior permission.

So, after finishing the practice problems assigned by the teacher, she checked the time and swiped open the unread notification. When she saw a line of unfamiliar text under the familiar icon, she was utterly stunned.

A White Cat is requesting to be your friend.

A White Cat? Who?

…How can someone have such a strange nickname?

In her peripheral vision, she saw Liang Shuang flipping a page. Remembering her own roommate’s nicknames, Jiang Lu’s internal criticism came to a screeching halt. Compared to her deskmate/roommate “Explosive Spicy Potato Cake” or her former roommate Shao Shuyi’s “Cafeteria Escapee Rice-Eater King,” “A White Cat” really wasn’t that strange. If anything, her own nickname—which was just her real name—seemed the most abnormal.

But… whatever. She didn’t know them, and they hadn’t introduced themselves. She treated it as spam and cleared it with a single swipe.

Jiang Lu dismissed the notification. Calculating that she had enough time, she forged ahead and finished the next page of exercises early.

When the bell rang for the end of class, she had just one final sub-question left. Jiang Lu hesitated for two seconds, then declined Liang Shuang’s invitation to the restroom. Pushing her scratch paper up, she said, “Bring me a cup of water back.”

“Sure.” With that reply, the seat next to her became empty.

Jiang Lu went back to burying her head in the problem. After writing down the final answer, she looked up with a sigh of relief, only to lock eyes with a pair of “black bean” eyes. It startled her so much she nearly tore her notebook with her pen.

Chu Zishan was leaning over Liang Shuang’s desk with a grin. “Did I scare you? Seriously, Jiang Lu, you’re such a scaredy-cat.”

Jiang Lu couldn’t be bothered with her. She closed her notebook, moved it to the front of the desk, pulled out the homework for the next period, and stood up to stretch.

Chu Zishan wasn’t offended. She reached out to flip through the closed exercise book. “Hey, don’t put it away yet! Let me see how far you got. I just finished page 18, and you—Wait? You’re on chapter three? You finished the whole second chapter?!”

“Yeah, I finished it too. Aren’t you a bit slow, classmate?” Liang Shuang stood behind Chu Zishan, a cup in each hand. “Also, can you get up? This is my seat.”

“You finished too?” Chu Zishan turned around in shock, her disbelief practically falling out of her eyes. “For real? How are you two so fast?!”

Liang Shuang set the cups down, casually flipped through a booklet on the desk, and glanced back. “Not just us. Both the desks in front and behind us finished too. If you don’t believe me, go ask them one by one.”

Chu Zishan froze. Seeing she still wasn’t moving, Liang Shuang took the initiative to grab her and shove her into the aisle.

Jiang Lu watched this scene expressionlessly, unscrewed her cup to finish her water, and watched Chu Zishan run back to her seat to frantically reopen her own book. She turned toward the window with a wry smile.

Behind them, the Zhaixing Building was also brilliantly lit. But unlike the Xiuyuan Building, it wasn’t just one class or one floor; the entire building had almost no one walking around, even though it was currently break time.

Jiang Lu tilted her chin slightly, narrowing her eyes as she looked at it. She felt a faint sense of anticipation for this time next year. The book said that by then, she would have already lost her scent glands, living like a stray scavenger hiding in the few dark corners of Liancheng, barely surviving.

Jiang Lu couldn’t imagine how accurate or vivid that description was, but she knew for a fact that the ending waiting for her would never be the one in the book.

The ten-minute break ended as the bell rang. The person at the window withdrew her gaze and returned to her seat.

At the same time, an Alpha standing on the fifth-floor corridor of the Zhaixing Building, looking toward the Xiuyuan Building, let out a soft sigh. Following the bell, she returned to the classroom and pulled an unfinished test paper from her book stand.

Ever since hearing Su Mengrui’s name last night, Chu Ziyan’s heart had not been at peace. She had spent the whole day doing problems, and her error rate was ridiculously high.

Her deskmate, Gu Wenjing, was baffled. Seeing Ziyan absentmindedly filling in her name in the score column at the top, she reached out to block the pen and whispered, “Ziyan, look at what you’re doing. Your test today was a total mess. If you don’t get your act together, Old Wang is really going to call your parents.”

Chu Ziyan put her pen down and rubbed her face hard with both hands. Her voice sounded muffled: “I’ll be careful.”

Gu Wenjing sighed. “I just heard the representative say Old Zhang is doing a quiz tomorrow. I don’t need to remind you what he’s like. We’re only at the first step of the Long March; you have to hold on, you hear me?”

“Mhm…” Chu Ziyan nodded at the test paper. She took a deep breath and picked up her pen to write her name correctly on the side margin.

However, her eyes seemed unable to focus. No matter what she looked at, her brain could only identify three words: “Su Mengrui.”

Unfortunately, Su Mengrui was unaware of this.

In the second-floor study of the Su family villa, Su Mengrui—who was strictly forbidden from leaving and ordered to reflect on her actions—currently had one foot propped on the corner of the solid wood desk and the other resting on a metal trash bin. The soft ergonomic chair enveloped her.

Her anger having subsided, Su Mengrui was browsing through a tablet with great interest. New photos kept loading on the screen. Although the clarity and angles varied, the subject of every photo was the same.

Smiling, serious, walking, running, jumping, front view, profile, back view, long shot, close-up… everything was there.

The one she never tired of looking at was the last one, featuring the girl wearing a pair of transparent-framed glasses. The person who sent the photo said it was a candid shot taken last year when they ran into her at a bookstore. That fair, exquisite face did look more “green” than it did now, but the way she looked in glasses gave off an air of being cultured and steady. These two opposing temperaments intertwined in the young girl, leaving onlookers nothing but stunned.

Tsk… what a shame. If only she had been born two years earlier.

Su Mengrui thought regretfully, tapping the screen to save the photo and add it to her cloud album. Her phone’s gallery refreshed in sync. After a moment’s thought, she extracted the photo and set it as her home screen background.

Tracing the profile on the screen, Su Mengrui took a deep breath, climbed out of the chair, and walked to the window to look down. To be honest, whether she was so angry she wanted to go mad or so stunned that her heart was racing, she desperately wanted to see that Alpha who should only belong to her.

She wanted to see her, to personally smell her pheromones, and then kiss her scent glands. That would surely be a more wonderful taste than strawberry ice cream.

Su Mengrui felt her throat grow dry and itchy, and her heart was restless.

No, I have to find her. Right now!

The moment the thought of going to No. 1 High arose, her lazy bones could no longer stay still. She leaned out of the window, confirmed that the spot where the black Bentley usually parked was empty, and hurried to the study door to twist the handle.

The handle turned, but the lock remained intact.

Su Mengrui punched the door panel, then turned to open the bathroom door inside the study. The bathroom window was different from the one in the study; it wasn’t completely sealed, but the opening was extremely small. She stood on the ledge and tried to stick her head out. Once she confirmed she could fit, she stepped onto the exterior window ledge and slowly moved to the balcony of the neighboring room. She carefully dodged the housekeepers, ran down the outdoor stairs at the back of the villa, and escaped.

Not daring to drive, Su Mengrui took an electric scooter used by the staff from the garage. Only after leaving the villa complex did she hail a taxi to Liancheng No. 1 High.

When Su Mengrui got out of the taxi, the third period of evening self-study at No. 1 High had just begun. To kill time, she sat in a shop across from the school and played on her phone. Within minutes, several @ mentions popped up in her WeChat groups.

Bored, she opened the chat and saw the same people from last night asking where they were meeting tonight. Irritated, she replied with a single word: Get lost.

The group messages moved fast, and her reply was soon buried under pages of new text. Finding it uninteresting, Su Mengrui exited WeChat. Realizing she still hadn’t gotten Jiang Lu’s contact information, she opened her SMS history and began searching.

When Song Wushuang received Su Mengrui’s text, she was staring blankly at her exercise book. Feeling her phone vibrate, she glanced suspiciously at her desk drawer. Seeing the name “Jiang Lu” in the middle of the screen, she irritably replied: I don’t have it!

The teacher on duty was sitting at the podium preparing lessons. Hearing the movement, the teacher looked up, saw Song Wushuang holding her phone with both hands, and crooked a finger at her with a dark expression.

Song Wushuang: “…”

Outside the school, seeing the exclamation mark at the end of the text, Su Mengrui’s temper flared. She was about to hit the call button when the screen flashed—a call from “Mom” took over the display.

Su Mengrui answered, and Su Ying’s interrogation hit her like a landslide: “Su Mengrui! Where have you run off to now?! Are you trying to kill me?! Would staying home for one day really kill you?! I’m giving you ten minutes. Get home immediately!”

Su Mengrui knew she would say that. She softened her voice: “Mom, don’t be so excited. I just came out to find a friend. I’ll be back soon, really. I promise you, I won’t drink, and I’ll definitely be home before curfew, okay?”

Su Ying’s head throbbed. “Who exactly are you looking for? Don’t tell me you’re looking for Chu Ziyan again!”

“Oh, Mom! You’re so smart! I am here for Ziyan! Really, I’m waiting at the gate for her to finish class right now. If you don’t believe me, I’ll take a video for you!” As she spoke, Su Mengrui’s tone shifted, “Anyway, Mom, my phone is low on battery, I can’t talk anymore. Bye!”

She hung up, switched her phone to silent via the shortcut bar, and took a three-second video of the school gate from a distance to send to Su Ying’s WeChat. Before waiting for a reply, she stuffed her phone in her pocket, crossed the road, and walked into the small alley to the left of the school wall.