Moon Theory (ABO)Ch90 - then, a familiar figure

He presses once on the trigger. The gun recoils harshly. Dirt-stained fingers tremble on the grip. The contrast is pale porcelain and dark obsidian, slender fingers and reflective diamond coating. The similarity is battle-worn – the engraving is scratched, and his fingers just the same.

The soldier he hits stumbles forward before dropping painfully onto the ground. His companions jolt in shock. Noah’s eyes constrict coldly as he presses the trigger again. Another one falls. The shots are inaccurate, debilitating but not lethal. Ru djw

“I said do not move.”

Both sides remain in standstill underneath navy skies. Storm clouds wax overhead, omens of a coming tempest. The atmosphere is bloodcurdling. At the slightest gust of wind, Noah’s hair sweeps upward, revealing a pair of haunting, unhuman eyes. There are liquids trickling down the left of his cheek; there are clear trembles in his posture; but each shaky movement only adds more to the danger.

Read more BL at chrysanthemumgarden (dot) com

He holds well to his threat. He shoots anyone that comes even a millimeter closer, and as delirious as he is, Noah is fully aware of the colonel bleeding to his death on his lap. It is helplessness, pain and unbridled fury that spur him to act. The radius around the two is a blockade. Perhaps Noah, too, is close to death, for his vision is spinning erratically, his breaths raspy, his eyes stung bloodshot. He sees in blurs of red and black.

A single omega emits killing intent stifling enough to root eight alpha men on the spot. In distortion, every second is as grueling as a whole minute. For a long time, everything is still. 67lUn

The highway is cracked beyond repair. The ground rumbles – an earthquake induced by a single military vehicle, rolling right along the center of the battlefield. It is the same familiar sound of gunfire – deadly precise, horrifyingly accurate kills of the anomalies around them. The air is stale of powder and dust.

The shooter – a tall man with obsidian hair. His uniform is as foreboding as his gait. Moonlight catches onto his silhouette. Four silver stars run along the pads of his coat. He’s alone.

“G-General Xie—” a soldier stutters nearby.

“General Xie!” Another man salutes dutifully. His eyes are widened – in terror, no doubt. “T-The situation…”

“T-The person you’ve ordered us to…” Stumbled words. “We’ve… We’ve found him!”

Pause.

Dark brown eyes are nearly lightless black. In the wan to dusk, Xie Liwei flicks his gaze to each individual soldier. He measures their postures, their every wound – under his examination, no one is left undissected. The man is of omniscience. If the atmosphere were bloodcurdling before, it is now made unbreathable. Thin and hanging off a singular atom.

Over by the vehicle, Noah is slouched over. His eyes are scrunched up, and he is coughing up a mix of blood and saliva. He is half-conscious, fully unfocused. Silver hair is streaked an ugly mess, and all of his elegant features are bruised. zDl2HX

Still, he is just as beautiful – a sharp contrast to the man a few meters away. They are not one bit alike, ignoring the shape of their eyes, the height of their nose, the angle of their brows.

Xie Xing is a broken little thing, and Xie Liwei holds himself with such power – the similarities aren’t there at all.

“You’ve found him,” General Xie repeats. Emotionless. “But why is he in such a state?”

“The omega was in an uncontrollable—” dFvygl

“You misunderstand.” The general turns toward him. The soldier would quiver in fright, no doubt, by the coldness of his voice, the brutality in his eyes. “When have I issued an order to injure him?”

“General X—”

Not another syllable is uttered before the general raises his rifle and shoots him in the head. Unhesitatingly, seven more rounds are fired – all with pinpoint accuracy. Xie Liwei handles his weapon with four, five decades of ease. The soldiers fall one after another, and soon comes silence. The ground is littered with countless dozens of corpses – humans and anomalies alike, indistinct in the way they fell.

The general steps forward. His combat boots wade through blood pools, crack through bones and limbs. He stands in front of the silver-haired young man. 1F8zTX

The latter points a pistol at him.

It’s obsidian, the color of the general’s hair, and the black diamond coating matches that of Xie Liwei’s dog tag. A shot is fired – it whiffs the colonel’s body by an inch.

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

“Do not come closer,” the young man says, his words trembling as much as his hands are.

Noah is thrown into frenzy, his mind torn astray, and the only speck of sanity is the glint in his eyes. He looks to Xie Liwei with pure, unmasked fear. And he is definitely crying now – the droplets trickle down his jaw, dripping onto Yang Rong’s pallid skin. gn OrI

“Xie Xing,” the general says – there is control in his tone, his usual coldness. There is also a certain emotion not yet deciphered, bordering sentimentality but not quite. And Xie Liwei is not one to wear his feelings on his sleeves, for his countenance remains the same stoicism.

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

Noah, frenzied, only retorts, “Get out.”

Lf rtbbar jujlc. Ca ifjra, tf aglfr ab, yea atf rtba mbwfr yijcx. C qjga bo tlw lr vberfv lc tlijglas. Lbk qjatfalm bo tlw ab yf delnfglcu lc ogbca bo Wlf Olkfl – jcv tjv tf cba vfrqlrfv atf wjc klat jii tlr yflcu? Ktf ufcfgji rajcvr atfgf lc tlr qglralcf eclobgw, cba j rqfmx bo vera, cba j kglcxif bc tlr rtlga. Ktfc atfgf lr Rbjt – lc ajaafgr, tlr ogjwf vlqqfv lc rtjvbkr, wjvf fnfc rwjiifg ecvfg atf batfg’r wjuclolmfcmf.

It really is unfortunate Noah is too tired to react when General Xie steps forward. The latter is so calm as he crouches down, a mere foot away from contact. Rationally, Noah would like to rip that rifle out of his hands, pummel him down and tear him apart. Irrationally, his body only convulses in pain, his throat constricting from the weight of broken sobs. h90XJx

Xie Liwei reaches forward and Noah flinches violently backward, cradling Yang Rong in his arms.

“Stop,” he chokes out. His vision sways once more – hectic blobs, red splatters and dark clouds. But still, he does not yield. “Don’t touch him.” Then more helplessly, his eyes scrunching in hurt. “Don’t touch him.”

Dark eyes are pensive. Xie Liwei studies his expression. Then with an unheard sigh, the general reaches forward anyway, takes off his glove and places two fingers on Yang Rong’s neck. The seconds of skin contact make Noah shake uncontrollably. He grabs the general’s forearm and yanks him away.

“I said don’t—” He pauses in between heavily gasps. “Don’t take any more…away from me…” vWzCkF

Xie Liwei forcibly pushes his hand aside. To Noah’s fury, the general can so easily overpower him with a single flick. His struggle is futile.

“Stage four hypovolemia,” General Xie says firmly. “Critical.”

Rationally, Noah should know this too. But irrationally, he cannot stand the thought of Xie Liwei being so close (it is unfamiliar, for the man had always been far, far away). He breathes rapidly, mouth parted for shuddering exhales. General Xie reaches to touch him too – on the same spot, by the nape of his neck.

Xie Liwei’s palm is leathery, worn but smooth. Noah is frozen. The touch is foreign. And unsettlingly gentle. u2gxXM

“And you, stage three,” Xie Liwei says. “Signs of concussion, fractured ribs, blunt force trauma, loss of hearing.”

Then the general begins to knead the back of his head – firm, clockwise circles along the base of his skull, soft presses on the tender of his skin. Calloused fingers slide in between wispy locks of silver hair. Foreign and also extremely uncharacteristically tender. Briefly, Noah wonders if he’d gone insane. Perhaps so, because he must’ve hallucinated that the general’s hands shook and that his face was schooled in hesitance.

And General Xie, hard-edged, cold and uncaring, is never hesitant.

“Sleep,” the man says – it comes off as an order, but his voice, too, is preternaturally quiet. V0Xtpk

“I won’t.” Noah pushes him away. “I won’t.”

“Come with me,” Xie Liwei says, his gaze hardened. “Else I will use force, Xie Xing.”

Read more BL at chrysanthemumgarden (dot) com

“Shut up.” Liquids stream searingly down his cheeks, catching onto his jaw and dripping down where Yang Rong is collapsed. There is a strong mix of blood and tears, but all his senses have dulled now. All he can make out is Yang Rong, his alpha, dying in his arms. “Shut up…” Noah rasps once more, entirely gone. “…I’m telling you…leave… I will…kill you…”

But Xie Liwei, true to his word, forces him to yield. Yang Rong is ripped out of his grip – or so Noah believes – and the alpha, in critical health, is hauled inside a combat truck. It is Xie Liwei’s vehicle, a steel-reinforced thing that is just as intimidating as its owner, and Noah does not in any way want to go near it. f6X0IF

He hasn’t a choice.

He’s forced inside, strapped onto the backseat, restrained so tightly he cannot move a single muscle. He must’ve shouted countless times to be released, but Xie Liwei continues to attend to the bloodied colonel’s wounds and doesn’t pay much attention to Noah – or so is believed, until the shouts become more like sobs, pained whimpers, soft begs.

“…Colonel Yang…” the young man musters out, his vision long compromised. “Yang Rong…” He sees in splotches of white, and he repeats the same name over and over again. “Rong-ge…”

“He will be saved,” comes the cold voice up front. Xie Liwei does not spare an ounce of sympathy. “Sleep.” VRuO0v

Noah doesn’t sleep.

But he cannot do much anyway – all he can do is watch pathetically. In and out of consciousness he goes as the vehicle rolls through forsaken soil. Xie Liwei drives through the breaks of wind. It must’ve been thirty minutes past eventide when Noah starts to sag on his seat, his body lolled pathetically downward.

“Sleep,” Xie Liwei says again – it comes off as an order, but his voice, too, is preternaturally quiet. “When you wake, you will not see me again.”

But why is it that Noah, for all that he despises the man, feels an inexplicable urge to stay awake? aqiuIJ

The vehicle brakes an unknown time later.

“Xie Xing.” Xie Liwei is suddenly in front of him, undoing the clasps of his restraints. “Come with me.”

Noah topples forward, and Xie Liwei may have been there to catch him.

— 5OBwdp

Xie Liwei taps his identification card. A metal door slides open. The sensors make a soft, inaudible beep before deactivating. His combat boots, infused with rain and blood, make quiet squelches as he walks down the hall.

The air is infused with heavy antiseptic. This underground facility is not particularly advanced (none can hold to the standards of those in the Nexus), but there aren’t many viable options in the ravaged district. The interior is simple – white walls, dome-shaped ceiling, black stone flooring. Not much activity can be heard here – just several carts being rolled, some low conversations taking place, occasional hums of machinery.

Xie Liwei reaches the main section.

An employee, a young female worker in dress code, spots him. Her eyes widen in surprise and she hastily bows to pay her respects. VKYiHo

“General Xie, it is an honor…!”

She quickly examines his body – no visible signs of injury, not a speck of blood on his rain-washed uniform. Only his gloves have been discarded. Confusion shows on her face, and before she could ponder any longer, Xie Liwei gives a small nod of acknowledgement.

Chrysanthemum Garden.

“I have business to discuss with Dr. Edith. Urgent.”

She reassumes professionalism right away – “please follow me,” she says as she leads him further down. They pass countless untaken beds. The hospital sees very few patients, and the one or two soldiers who remain are in critical condition. They don’t take infectees here – no places do, and most only admit those who’ve suffered weapon misfires, catastrophic falls, surface wounds that don’t require them to be shot on the spot. On one bed lies a young teenage girl with heavy gauze wrapped around her head. g3fZer

“We’ve begun charging more as per Nexus protocol,” says the nurse to cover the silence. “Fewer patients have shown from the slums.”

Xie Liwei only nods in response. Very obviously not interested in small talk. The nurse quickly ushers him into the next section over, gives a few polite words and then leaves. Sitting on the desk in front is a woman in her late sixties with graying short hair. Upon noticing his presence, she lets out a light gasp.

“…What a surprise!” she says as she quickly leaves her workstation, shimmying toward him. “If it isn’t General Xie! Goodness – how long has it been? For you to be here in the flesh… and as handsome as you were two decades ago! What can this old lady do for you?”

He gives a small gesture, motioning for her to follow him out the door. “Dr. Edith. I’ve brought two critical care patients. I need you to clear the left ward and oversee them personally.” q5jfFi

“Personally?” Dr. Edith repeats, though she follows him regardless. “Is there a problem?”

“Patient one requires immediate surgery and transfusion. One bullet embedded in the upper latissimus, six incisions along the ribcage, heavy burns along the back. High fever. Other symptoms unknown.” General Xie lists it out directly, much to the ever-growing surprise on the doctor’s face. “Patient two requires more examination. He is only asleep at the moment, but there may be heavy injuries. Two fractured ribs, ruptured right eardrum, grade three concussion, trauma. Check for signs of internal bleeding.”

Surprise has long turned to concern when Dr. Edith responds with delay, “…My goodness. I’ll say, General Xie, that with those injuries, it’d be a miracle for them to survive. The first one especially – has he a body of steel?” She gives a small laugh and says teasingly, “These are those young men from your platoon? Have you put them through hell and back?”

“They aren’t,” he responds simply, heading near the exit of the facility. “Though I reckon you know of them. Bring the stretchers.” iLuUlt

She raises her eyebrows but does as requested. “There are not very many of you soldiers that I know, General Xie,” she replies through the clinking of metal. “None have lived long enough for me to recall.”

“I believe this facility carries anomaly blood samples?” he says as he aids her with the equipment.

“Not for medical usage, but I do a bit of research with them from time to time. I am nowhere near as talented as some of the youngins nowadays,” she replies with another laugh. Then she weighs his words again, pauses, and widens her eyes. “You’re asking for… anomaly blood samples? Are my ears failing me again, Xie Liwei?”

He doesn’t answer. gF0iow

“Allow me a minute,” he says, motioning for her to stay inside. “Clear the path. Make sure there are no spectators.”

Dr. Edith stands in confusion, though she does as requested.

A minute later, a raven-haired young man is rolled in through the door. He is half-dressed and covered in heavy gauze. Blood red still seeps through layers of fabric, staining the stretcher underneath him. His physique is densely trained – solid muscles, prominent sculpts, concaves not hidden even under bandages. If not for the white wrap around the top of his head, his features would be even more striking. The doctor recognizes him at a single glance.

“…My goodness!” she exclaims for the nth time. “Is this not the young colonel Yang Rong, the little boy you’ve raised up? What in heavens has happened?” z4adKB

General Xie ignores her. In the meantime, the doctor quickly goes over to inspect, already rolling the patient down the halls in a hurry. “And the rumors say Colonel Rong Rong will never land himself in the intensive care unit… a load of bull! You look at him and tell me whether he’d denotated a dynamite on his back. Young people these days truly don’t know fear! Xie Liwei, bring the next patient over!”

Two minutes later, General Xie arrives in the closed-off ward, carrying with him a ghostly pale young man. Small droplets of rain are caught onto his gray lashes. His hair, a soft silver, is pooled onto the general’s shirt. His cheeks, wiped clean of dirt, are covered in cotton sponges. There is care in the way his wounds are dressed – every small cut daubed with disinfectant, taped neatly with adhesives.

Please support our translators at chrysanthemumgarden (dot) com

Dr. Edith is in middle of attaching an arterial line.

“General Xie,” she says while turning around, “you will need to aid me in surgery—” FEG0M

The doctor pauses in shock.

General Xie gives a nod. “I will provide assistance, though I must tend to other tasks in an hour’s time.”

With that, he places the young man onto the radiography table. The action is fluid – unless viewed very closely, none would notice the slight hesitance, the millisecond pause before his arms leave the young man’s feeble body.

“There will be a specialist arriving shortly,” he says. “When it’s deemed safe, consider transporting them to the Nexus facility for a more thorough checkup.” 261CLy

Xie Liwei swiftly repositions the young man’s body and strips him off of his trousers. “In three days’ time, the First Platoon will be stationed in the vicinity,” he continues to say without much emotion. “The two will need to be evicted.”

Dr. Edith still stands in stupefy. Then, as if jolted back to reality, her widened eyes slowly regain understanding. She sighs softly, lowering her voice to match.

“Xie Liwei, you’ve brought your son.”

At that, General Xie pauses. He stares at the young man’s bruised body, traces his dark eyes across scars that seem to run miles long, marring every part of his otherwise porcelain frame. Silver hair, spectral-like skin – the young man looks even more otherworldly when asleep. s035Df

“I cannot be considered his father.”

Dr. Edith only smiles softly and resumes treating the colonel on the bed. The topic remains on the other patient, however. “He’s grown into such a handsome young man,” she says. “He looks like her, doesn’t he? How beautiful, too.”

The x-ray generator makes a low buzz. General Xie steps out of the protective window and walks toward the young man again. There is uncertainty in his form, even more so when he reaches a hand to brush back a tuft of silver.

“I suppose he does,” he replies. Ever-stoically. “I had believed he would die like her as well.” CaDO1L

“He hasn’t died.” Dr. Edith smiles at him. “The young ones are always so full of energy. Isn’t that good, Xie Liwei?”

“…” He pauses before replying. “Perhaps.”

Dr. Edith chuckles. “I am not the first doctor to wonder what you are thinking in that head of yours.”

“You are not,” he responds. “There is another.” g8 OaP

On cue, his transceiver lights up. Static overtakes the white noise of the ward, and then comes a young man’s voice. Slightly out of breath and very, very angry.

“General Xie.” The person speaks darkly. “My arrival is in ten. Do make sure you are out of sight by then.”

Chrysanthemum Garden.

“Doctor Shi,” he replies as he gives one last stroke on his son’s hair. “I trust you can handle the situation.”

The young man laughs – it hints sardonic. “Designating another person to care for your mess – indeed, it is very like you, Xie Liwei.” IjYu8L

Author: can you believe we’re at chapter… 90?! that means we’re less than 20 chapters away from MT’s ending! ahh, thank you for sticking with me for so long!

and thank you so much @Robot Butterflies for the kofi!

it means a lot for me, a smol writer, to have your support ; ; see you next chapter ♡