AMTPA Chapter 22.1

The irritation in Ji Chenxi’s eyes eased a little, though a flicker of surprise hid between his brows.

 

If it had just been a regular message, fine — Chi Zhuo could’ve easily gotten his contact through someone else. But this one came as a private message. Seeing the new name pop up on his light-brain’s friend list, Ji Chenxi didn’t even need to guess who pulled the trick — that quiet, refined-looking female beta.

 

When Chi Zhuo’s squad regrouped, that beta had practically taken charge of cleaning up the battlefield. She’d only passed by Ji Chenxi once, barely a glance, yet somehow that single brush-by was enough for her to sneak herself onto his friend list.

 

That little silent move alone told Ji Chenxi she wasn’t just capable — she was sharp. No wonder she could stick by Chi Zhuo’s side like a right-hand aide.

 

He looked twice at the newly added contact, then finally tapped open the message.

 

【Thanks for your help at the cave earlier, Your Highness.】

 

Ji Chenxi arched a brow, lazily tapping a few times before sending a reply.

 

【Chenxi: Oh? Just a thank-you and that’s it?】

 

【Then what kind of thank-you gift does Your Highness want?】

 

Ji Chenxi had only meant to tease, but when the question of a “gift” actually came up, the fun sort of faded.

 

He hadn’t helped expecting any reward. As a prince of the Empire, whatever he wanted would be handed to him without him lifting a finger — no need to earn favors through a rescue.

 

His fingers tapped twice on the words ‘thank-you gift’, but instead of brushing him off completely, he typed back a cool:

 

[Haven’t thought about it.]

 

Once that message was sent, Ji Chenxi set the light-brain aside. His elder brother had already walked up to him.

 

The Empire’s eldest prince was named ‘Ji Anze’ — a name that sounded gentle and refined.

 

But no matter how you looked at him, “refined” was the last word that came to mind. If anything, Ji Chenxi thought the man had picked up quite a few of the classic ‘alpha flaws’.

 

Top of the list? Arrogance.

 

Then again, that wasn’t exactly rare among alphas. Even Ji Chenxi himself wasn’t completely free of it.

 

Still, that didn’t mean he had to like the man standing in front of him, putting on this whole “affectionate elder brother” act. Ji Chenxi had long since seen through Ji Anze’s wolfish ambition, yet the man insisted on keeping up that fake harmony between them.

 

As expected, the moment Ji Anze arrived, he began his usual round of concern and comfort.

 

“Chenxi, are you alright? It’s my fault for being late and letting you get scared. These star pirates are getting bolder by the day — they even dared to attack a prince of the Empire. I’ll have to ask Father to let me deal with them properly and put them back in their place.”

 

When he said it, his eyes flashed with cold fury, like he truly hated the star pirates from the bottom of his heart.

 

Ji Chenxi hummed softly in response — just enough to count as agreement.

 

Ji Anze sighed, rubbing his temples with a touch of weariness.

 

“At least you’re safe, Chenxi. If something had happened to you, I’d have no way to explain it to Father.”

 

The performance was flawless — to the point where Ji Chenxi almost had to admire it. The man’s acting had improved a lot.

 

If it weren’t for the fact that there were only a handful of people with the motive and guts to make that earlier move, Ji Chenxi might’ve actually started doubting himself.

 

His gaze slid toward the middle-aged general who’d followed the crown prince down to inspect the site — a man carrying the rank of major general.

 

That one was probably the real escort sent to fetch him. But Ji Chenxi, having read that particular “story,” knew the truth: this general secretly answered to Ji Anze.

 

Otherwise, there was no way the man would’ve allowed the fleet to drag its feet this long before coming to his rescue.

 

Chances were, there were still loyal old eyes within the squad keeping watch. Ji Anze must’ve known any more delays would be reported back — which was why he’d come in person, to smooth things over.

 

Not wanting to let his brother’s endless chatter continue, Ji Chenxi spoke up lightly, cutting the act short.

 

“Big brother, I’m a little tired.”

 

Ji Anze looked at the beautiful alpha in front of him — those tired eyes half-lidded, his expression quiet and composed — and something like pity flickered across his face.

 

“Chenxi must’ve had a rough time, getting chased by star pirates all the way to this tiny planet,” he said softly. “But there’s one thing I can’t quite figure out, and I wanted to ask you about it.”

 

Ji Chenxi lifted his gaze slightly, his smile calm and polite.

 

“Go ahead, brother.”

 

“Were you with someone else before we found you?”

 

Ji Chenxi hadn’t expected the question to be that blunt. His eyelids lifted a little higher.

 

“Why would you say that, brother?”

 

Ji Anze didn’t flinch under the deflection. His voice stayed warm, the tone all gentle concern.

 

“I’m only worried about you, Chenxi. Surely you didn’t take down the Red Scorpion pirate group all by yourself. But right now, we can’t find any trace of whoever was with you. I just don’t want you to be taken advantage of.”

 

Now that caught Ji Chenxi’s attention. The man was digging a hole — and trying to make him fall right in.

 

After all, his ability level was officially listed as ‘S-class’.

 

If he admitted he’d wiped out the Red Scorpions on his own, people would start questioning that rating.

 

But if he admitted someone else had been there, they’d start asking who that person was. Either way, Ji Anze would find a way to drag Chi Zhuo into it.

 

Then again, maybe not. Maybe the Red Scorpions hadn’t shared all their intel with his dear big brother.

 

If that was the case, Ji Anze might not even know Ji Chenxi had been with Chi Zhuo — or that Chi Zhuo had forces moving in the shadows.

 

So, this was probably a test. Ji Anze was fishing to see if Ji Chenxi had someone powerful backing him.

 

After a quick bit of mental math, Ji Chenxi let a faint frown crease his brow, a touch of confusion in his voice.

 

“What do you mean by that, brother?”

 

Ji Anze’s tone grew even softer, almost coaxing.

 

“Chenxi, I don’t mean anything by it. I just worry you’re still too young and might be deceived. If that person truly destroyed the Red Scorpion pirates, why didn’t they take you with them? Why leave you alone on this harsh little planet? Don’t think I’m nagging — I just don’t want to see you hurt.”

 

“I know,” Ji Chenxi replied quietly. “You’ve always cared for me the most. When I was little and ran off from the palace, it was you who found me and carried me back. I remember thinking then that you were the best big brother in the whole world.”

 

The memory seemed to catch Ji Anze off guard for a moment. He couldn’t help but picture it — a teenage boy trudging through dark alleyways, carrying a tiny, porcelain-faced child on his back, as if holding up his entire world.

 

But what had come after that fond memory was his mother’s harsh punishment — and her scathing words, full of disappointment and fury.

 

Remembering it now, Ji Anze’s expression softened for real this time. He reached out and brushed a hand over the young man’s silver hair, his tone light with nostalgia. The youth’s face was too striking, too beautiful — at this age, he still looked more like a boy than a grown man.

 

“So you still remember that, Chenxi? Back then, you were so tiny and soft. I didn’t even dare to hold you, afraid I might hurt you somehow.”

 

“I really liked you back then,” Ji Chenxi muttered under his breath.

 

“We’ve both grown up now.”

 

Ji Chenxi nodded slightly. They had indeed grown up.

 

He still remembered — his brother used to be a beta, yet braver than most alphas, gentle like sunlight in the early morning. But after Ji Anze’s secondary differentiation into an alpha, everything changed. That warmth vanished, replaced by pride and pretense — the perfect mask of a classic alpha, polished and false.

 

That small moment of shared nostalgia, at least, stopped Ji Anze from digging any further.

 

“If you’re tired, Chenxi, get some rest,” Ji Anze said, standing up. “We can talk later.”

 

Just as he was about to leave, Ji Chenxi spoke again.

 

“Brother, I don’t have any interest in that position. Whether it’s you or Second Sister who ends up sitting there — it makes no difference to me.”

 

Ji Anze froze, surprise flashing in his eyes as he looked back at the younger man, whose lashes were half-lowered in lazy calm.

 

The beautiful alpha tapped his lips lightly with one finger and added,

 

“Just this once, brother.”

 

For a split second, Ji Anze’s carefully maintained gentleness almost slipped. It felt as if Ji Chenxi already knew something — yet his face showed not a single crack.

 

When the room finally fell quiet again, Ji Chenxi casually lifted his light-brain and glanced at the last message he’d received.

 

【Then I owe Your Highness a favor.】

 

‘A favor, huh?’ Ji Chenxi couldn’t quite read Chi Zhuo’s meaning behind those words.

 

Was he brushing off the whole “biting the gland” incident like it was nothing?

 

Or did he mean — debts are debts, and grudges are grudges?

 

Ji Chenxi closed his light-brain and shut his eyes, a flicker of irritation crossing his face.

 

In the original story, there had been no scene of him being chased by the Red Scorpion pirates. After all, Bai Anran had been his childhood friend, and if he was marked, he would have noticed — there was no way he’d travel through space as if nothing had happened. In that version, he was simply the gentle, caring male supporting character who occasionally checked in on Bai Anran. To him, it was nothing more than awkward concern without any romantic basis, which, in the novel, became the kind of love quietly held in one’s heart but never expressed.

 

Was this book really prophetic? Or was the world he lived in itself a book?

 

After Ji Chenxi’s starship took off, the task of gathering information fell to a large team.

 

They cleaned each corpse, extracting information: identities, causes of death, and so on.

 

It was a long, tedious process, and many were assigned to it. One person, while sorting through a particularly mangled corpse, fingered a small chip hidden within. The chip was black and lodged in the seam of the corpse’s black glove — unnoticed by anyone around.

 

That person followed the team, helping move corpses, record data, and collect leftover mecha weapons scattered across the small planet.

 

Once all the work was done, he finally returned to his quarters. Casually, he inserted the chip into his household robot. The sweet-looking, charming machine shuddered with scrambled signals. Then, surprisingly, the robot began moving on its own, even without commands — motions rigid but fluid, almost human.

 

She stretched her body casually, feeling her newly acquired form, then muttered in dissatisfaction,

 

“Ugh, I hate being so weak and useless.”

 

The man ignored her, his eyes dark.

 

“Household robots aren’t weak or useless.”

 

“You’re making me angry,” the sweet robot said, crossing her legs carelessly. Her short maid skirt barely covered her pale thighs.

 

“Second-in-command, I told you not to get involved with the snake so early. If the snake’s people had cleaned the corpses any better, you’d be dead here on this tiny planet, without anyone ever knowing your name.”

 

“I wouldn’t say ‘without anyone knowing,’” she replied. “After all, I was the deputy of the Red Scorpion pirate group.”

 

The man, his face mostly hidden beneath his hood, rubbed at his temples in frustration.

 

“You really have a death wish, don’t you? Next time you die, even if the boss personally orders me to save you, I won’t lift a finger.”

 

“Oh, come on, Xiao San, don’t be so heartless!”

 

He didn’t take the bait, his tone flat.

 

“Talk. What was it like, making contact with ‘Mamba’?”

 

The maid-dressed household robot’s lips curved upward into a wide grin.

 

“SSS-levels really are something else. He took all those forbidden drugs and not only survived, but actually woke up right when they were supposed to send him into total collapse. Can you believe it? When he killed me, he could see again.”

 

The man scribbled notes while listening, then paused, pen tip still against the page.

 

“He killed you himself?”

 

“Sort of — but not exactly.”

 

“Don’t play games with me, or I’ll make sure you stay trapped in that maid bot forever.”

 

“Tch, Xiao San, don’t get so grumpy. It wasn’t his hands that did it — it was his spiritual beast. I think that black mamba of his bit into my neck and squeezed the life out of me. Though, to be fair, he was fast — when he grabbed my throat, I thought he was gonna snap my neck, but instead he tossed me straight to his snake. Maybe he realized breaking my neck wouldn’t really kill me?”

 

The man stopped writing altogether, his eyes narrowing as he studied the robot from head to toe.

 

“You didn’t leak any information, did you?”

 

“Of course not.”

 

“Good. His condition shouldn’t be any better than yours. With that much illegal stimulant in his system, even an SSS-level body shouldn’t have been able to wake up — let alone stabilize his spiritual realm.”

 

“But he did wake up,” the robot said, her tone almost playful. “He woke up, killed me, and even used his pheromones to suppress me. Maybe your miracle drug wasn’t that strong after all, hmm?”

 

The man bit down on the end of his pen, his eyes dark with thought.

 

“No… the drug was fine. No one under Mamba could’ve cracked it that easily. So where did it go wrong? His sight came back, his pheromone control returned, even his spiritual form’s intact… no, something’s off — something’s very off.”

 

While the man was tearing his hair out in frustration, the people around Chi Zhuo were in just as much chaos.

 

When their head of the family had returned, everything had seemed fine. But as soon as he boarded the starship, a flood of orders came down — clear, precise objectives. Not only would the Red Scorpion pirates be eliminated for good, but anyone who had secretly aided them would be made to pay.

 

This mission had always been partly a trap to lure enemies out, and Chi Zhuo held absolute control over it.

 

Everything had gone smoothly. Their head of the family even tapped and poked at his light-brain, as if chatting with someone, carefully reading each word, weighing every sentence. Even Bai Han couldn’t help but smile.

 

Though their head wasn’t particularly old, he had no friends around him. This little prince, having shared the hardships of the mission, had earned a bit of rapport. Their head not only helped him but subtly hinted to tamper with his light-brain — a small tweak that, unexpectedly, only added one more name to his friend list.

 

Bai Han smiled faintly and quickly returned his attention to the tasks Chi Zhuo had assigned.

 

It was at that moment that Chi Zhuo suddenly fell into unconsciousness again. The wild surge of pheromones almost sent the alphas on the starship into a frenzy.

 

Bai Han immediately activated the ventilation system while also engaging the scent-neutralizing device. With the air circulating quickly, the alphas barely managed to regain their composure.

 

After placing Chi Zhuo into the medical pod, Bai Han began a thorough examination. The more she checked, the grimmer her expression became.

 

“Miss Bai, what should we do?” asked the middle-aged man who had briefly met Ji Chenxi before, bowing respectfully.

 

Bai Han ignored him and drew two more vials of blood for analysis. By the time the tests were done, her face was as pale as chalk.

 

“Call Mr. Hua. I have urgent matters to discuss with him. You won’t need to come in later.”

 

When Mr. Hua, still wearing his bionic mask, entered, Bai Han immediately set up multiple layers of protection, ensuring no one could see what was happening inside.

 

Mr. Hua’s expression turned grave.

 

“Xiao Bai, what is it?”

 

“The master’s pheromones are destabilizing.”

 

“How is that possible?!”

 

“I don’t even know what’s really happening right now,” Bai Han said, tension in her voice. “By all logic, it should be slowly stabilizing, but I suspect the master forced his spiritual energy ‘before’ his pheromones had fully settled.”

 

“Do you have a solution?” Mr. Hua asked.

 

“Two options. First, remove the glands entirely.”

 

“That’s definitely not an option,” Mr. Hua said immediately, just hearing it.

 

“Then there’s the second,” Bai Han continued. “We can re-inject the pheromones extracted from the master’s glands earlier. Those pheromones aren’t highly antagonistic with his own, so they could neutralize the destabilizing ones. There’s about a seventy percent chance it could stabilize the breakdown. But if we force another pheromone in while his own is still weak and unstable, it could create dependency between the two pheromones — plus some side effects I can’t fully predict.”

 

Mr. Hua’s forehead was already slick with sweat. He wondered why Bai Han, who could make the decision herself, had to drag him in. Was this because of the master’s punishment? If things went wrong, the two of them would die together.

 

Seeing the look on Mr. Hua’s face, Bai Han shook her head.

 

“I didn’t call you in to drag you down. It’s just that something this important shouldn’t be decided by me alone. If the master were conscious, I’d ask him directly. But since he’s unconscious, the only person I can consult is you.”

 

“Neither option is good.”

 

“True. But they’re the only options I can think of.”

 

“What if we simply never touch that pheromone again?”

 

“Then naturally, there’d be no effect.”

 

Mr. Hua exhaled softly.

 

“Then option two it is.”

 

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