The Fake Son Wants to Live [BL]

Chapter 106: Chapter 106 - Run for your life

After the call cut, Bian sat frozen, the phone still pressed to his ear though the line had long gone dead.

His lips trembled, then he bit down on them hard—so hard he tasted blood.

Everything... everything had gone off-track.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to unfold.

He’d planned it all. A neat little trade. A clean swap. Jian’s rare, alien-blooded body for safety. For comfort. For power. But now... now the world was burning. The sky cracked open. The city howled with screams. People were dying, and the grayling descent had begun far too early.

His hands shook as he lowered the phone to his lap.

He could no longer control the chaos. But he could still survive it.

There was only one card left to play.

He dug his nails into his palms. ”The stone,” he whispered. ”That stone Jian kept all through his youth...”

He could give that to the Farians.

No, he wasn’t their lost prince—not by blood, not by right. But Jian was. And that information was worth something. If the stone really did what he suspected, if Jian’s blood and that artifact had a connection to the old Farian monarchy... then surely they would listen. Surely they’d want the one who carried their sacred relic.

And Bian could offer it to them—if not Jian himself, then the next best thing.

Knowledge.

He swallowed hard and glanced over his shoulder at the figure sprawled out in the backseat.

His grandfather.

Still unconscious, lips parted slightly, brow furrowed even in his sedated sleep.

A fresh wave of anxiety washed over Bian.

He couldn’t let anything happen to the old man. Not yet. Not while he still needed Jian to fetch the stone. If Grandpa died now, Jian would never come back. He might let the whole world rot before handing over what Bian needed.

And Bian couldn’t allow that.

”No more mistakes,” he muttered under his breath. ”If I want it I have to get it myself.”

He pressed his foot down hard on the pedal, spinning the steering wheel until the car skidded dangerously close to the edge of the broken street. Smoke rose in columns in the distance, and flashes of unnatural blue fire lit up the horizon as alien crafts began their slow descent.

”I have to get it,” he said again, more firmly this time. ”It’s back at school...”

Their school.

It had been outside the city, nestled between a valley and an abandoned factory sector. Back then it felt remote—annoyingly far.

Now, it was his only salvation.

If he reached it in time, he might be able to retrieve the stone and leave the blast zone. And if the Farians found him with it in hand—maybe, just maybe, they’d take him in.

Maybe they’d protect him. Maybe they’d value him for what he knew.

Even if he wasn’t their prince, he could still be important.

He could still live.

With that desperate hope simmering in his chest, Bian tightened his grip on the wheel and turned the car around sharply. Tires screeched against cracked asphalt as he veered through the debris-littered street, dodging broken lamp posts and shattered glass.

His jaw clenched, teeth gritting as he accelerated, lungs tight with panic and possibility.

Behind him, Grandpa shifted in the backseat, murmuring faintly in his sleep.

Bian dared not look back.

The clock was ticking.

But driving back was a nightmare.

The city was no longer the place he knew.

What used to be familiar intersections, bus stops, and blinking crosswalks had turned into a mangled stretch of devastation. The initial blast from the alien descent had carved out entire streets. Buildings leaned precariously against one another, some already reduced to dust and jagged steel. Smoke poured from open windows, and sirens wailed in the distance—only to be silenced one by one.

Bian gripped the steering wheel tightly, sweat dripping down his temple as he zigzagged through chaos.

Cars were abandoned everywhere—people must’ve fled on foot, leaving their doors open, engines still humming. Mothers had left baby strollers behind. Phones were scattered on the pavement, ringing endlessly with no one left to answer. He had to drive on the sidewalks, over broken glass and debris, sometimes even through half-collapsed storefronts just to keep going.

Every few seconds, he glanced at the rearview mirror, checking on his grandfather.

Still unconscious.

Still breathing.

”Just hold on,” he muttered under his breath, swerving violently to avoid a half-fallen street lamp.

Traffic on the outskirts was worse.

People were desperately trying to escape—lines and lines of cars stuck in a standstill. Some drivers were sobbing into their steering wheels. Others screamed out of windows, begging for space, for passage, for hope.

Bian couldn’t afford to wait.

He cut across a divider, his car nearly scraping against the barrier as he took an illegal route through a fenced-off alley. Somewhere deep in his chest, guilt gnawed at him for dragging Grandpa through this.

But he shoved it down.

The stone pendant. I need that pendant.

Once out of the city’s dying heart, the road cleared a little. Bian took a deep breath. For the first time in an hour, his hands stopped trembling.

The school wasn’t too far now.

He could already see the low hills on the horizon.

He turned sharply onto an old country road that used to lead to their school—a quiet lane lined with trees and rusted guardrails. Silence began to return, broken only by the crunch of the tires over fallen branches and debris.

And then—

CRACK!

The ground shook beneath the car.

”What the—?”

The left side of the road gave way as something massive surged beneath it. The asphalt split open like paper. A tendril—no, a tentacle, thick as a tree trunk—erupted from the earth, slamming against the hood.

The car spun wildly.

Bian screamed.

The vehicle flipped—once, twice, before crashing sideways into a ditch with a deafening crunch. Glass shattered around him. The airbag exploded against his chest. His ears rang. Blood dripped down from a gash on his forehead.

He gasped for breath, heart thundering in his chest. ”G-Grandpa...!”

He turned—

The old man lay slumped in the backseat, face pale, still unconscious. A trickle of blood seeped from his temple.

”No, no, no—” Bian scrambled to undo his seatbelt, but his fingers were slick with blood. The panic made him clumsy.

Thud.

A massive shadow loomed over the wreck.

A slimy, inky black tentacle slithered across the roof, scraping metal.

Thud. Thud. CRUNCH.

The windshield cracked as something slammed into it from above. A horrible squelching sound followed—a screech like metal being twisted and chewed.

A single, gaping eye blinked from behind the smoke.

It was an octopus-like alien, but bigger than any living thing had a right to be. Its skin shimmered in sickly colors—blue, black, and iridescent purple. Its suckered limbs gripped the side of the car, peeling the metal like fruit skin.

”No!”

Bian screamed.

Instinct took over.

He threw the door open and scrambled out, falling onto the gravel. He didn’t even look back.

He ran.

He ran, slipping and stumbling over rocks and shards of metal. His body screamed in pain. His vision swam. But he didn’t stop. Didn’t dare to.

Behind him, the creature let out a screeching howl—an unearthly cry that rattled his spine.

He could hear the thing slithering after him, its limbs pounding against the road, crushing everything in its wake.

I left him.

The thought punched him in the chest as he sprinted through the trees. I left Grandpa behind...

But he couldn’t stop now.

Tears blurred his eyes as he pushed forward, lungs burning.

The world was falling apart, and all he could do was run.