Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu, the Potted Plant 🪴 [Please don’t prune him!]

vs.

Hamster Man, Shang Qinghua ₍ᐢ•᷄ ᴥ •᷅ᐢ₎ྀི [Please don’t kill him, he’s smol!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

The thing to remember about this, as with all things in PIDW, is that it’s Shang Qinghua’s fault.

Really, this most undeniable of facts almost floods him with a sense of calm. Everything is right with the world if Airplane is at fault, right?

Right.

“What do you mean the original goods was a heavenly demon?”

Shang Qinghua stands in front of him, bouncing from foot to foot like he’s a six-year-old who hasn’t been allowed to go to the toilet.

Shen Qingqiu wants to hit him with his fan.

“Listen, okay,” the weaselly little man pleads, already curling in on himself. “It was only in an early draft, and I could never make it work so I just scrapped it, but it wasn’t such a bad idea, was it? Weren’t you always complaining that Shen Qingqiu was just a run-of-the-mill starter scum villain?”

Shen Qingqiu dead-eyes him. “Because he was.”

“Yeah, well he wasn’t always.” Shang Qinghua stops hand-wringing for exactly long enough to shrug like that’s a good enough defence for the crap-hole he has landed Shen Qingqiu in. “It would have made an epic finale, don’t you think? The final showdown: heavenly demon versus heavenly demon. To the winner go the spoils!”

The spoils being the entire world, and every beauty in it, of course. Nothing as satisfying as self-fulfilment or the end to a lifetime of suffering.

Watching Shang Qinghua actually smiling at him, Shen Qingqiu lets his death stare take over his whole face. As with all things that are Airplane’s fault, the promise was good, but the delivery stank the place out!

“Sure, it might have been good,” Shen Qingqiu agrees, “if it had been foreshadowed in absolutely any way at all!” Here, he gives in to the need to beat the pathetic man with his fan. “Indeed, it might have been good if you hadn’t dragged me into it!”

“Bro, bro! Bro, listen!” Shang Qinghua squeals, hands raised to protect his face, ducking out of the way with surprising agility—though, Shen Qingqiu supposes, someone used to Mobei-Jun’s particular brand of teleportation violence might just have to be agile or die.

He scurries across the room, putting his desk between the two of them, his eyes darting to the door Shen Qingqiu is blocking, and then to the window. “Wait a minute, okay, isn’t… isn’t this a good thing? You can’t be killed!”

Shen Qingqiu raises his fan in a threatening manner. “Oh? An eternity of suffering in the water prison, interspersed by bouts of dramatic limb ripping. What fun! It was one thing when I had the mushroom body to fall back on, but I can’t have the mushroom body if I can’t die, can I?”

“Well, sure, but if you can’t die, isn’t that just the same as having the mushroom body?” Shang Qinghua asks, his small hamster-like features raised in hope.

“Why don’t we ask Tianlang-Jun?” Shen Qingqiu spits, slapping his closed fan against the palm of his other hand with an impressive thwack. “He couldn’t be killed, but he’s not really living it up right now, is he?”

Shen Qingqiu takes a large step forward. His shidi takes one back, bumping up against his own wall like he thinks he’s a maiden being bullied.

Shen Qingqiu will show you bullied!

“Airplane, you don’t seem to understand,” he says. His fan makes another thwack. And another. “I can’t live like that. Like a carefully tended potted plant that has to be trimmed back when it grows too many branches.”

“Bro, please! Let’s think about this!”

Shen Qingqiu shakes his head. Thwack, thwack. Thwack! “I can’t live as a stick, Airplane! It was bad enough when I thought I had to die as one!”

Sure, he could veg out with the best of them as a young man back in the modern world. Not moving for days at a time. Too engrossed in the most recent drivel webnovel to slop its way into his lap to catch his attention. But that doesn’t mean he wants to be a potted plant, kept in the dark with nothing to do but stew in its own misery!

The thing to remember about this, as with all things in PIDW, is that it’s Shang Qinghua’s fault.

Shen Qingqiu rounds the desk, fan raised. Shang Qinghua squeaks, and tries to make a bolt for it. “You’re so violent, Cucumber-bro!”

All of An Ding Peak is treated to the sounds of a fan snapping, and their peak lord’s squeals as he is pursued by his most temperamental shixiong, the shout of: “I’ll show you violence!” echoing across the entire mountain.

(Somewhere, on Qiong Ding, Yue Qingyuan shivers without knowing why.)

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

It started with Without-a-Cure just blipping out of existence like every ailment known to the world of PIDW when brought into contact with the heavenly pillar—only… the heavenly pillar is still in the fucking abyss, thank you very much. Attached to Luo-fucking-Binghe. And so it can’t be responsible.

Shit, he hopes it’s still attached. In a purely platonic, male solidarity kind of way.

Airplane had never explicitly mentioned what would happen if it got severed, but Shen Qingqiu assumes it would just grow back like one of his arms would.

Ah, he’s honestly a little surprised that porn manufacturer extraordinaire, Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky, never used that as the excuse to have a Heavenly Dildo^TM. The only version of dp the stallion novel’s rabid fan base would ever allow.

Yawn!

In any case, Shen Qingqiu thinks he (and his chrysanthemum) would remember if he’d had that kind of reunion with the protagonist, and his—ahem—sword. Besides which, it’s still two precious years before his little charred bun rolls back into town with an actual sword, and a grievance wider than the Endless Abyss itself.

So, naturally, Shen Qingqiu had gone to his most annoying shidi for an explanation, and had left with a broken fan, and a fucking grudge!

Shang Qinghua, you loser! Just wait till Shen Qingqiu deals with you! You’ll wish it was Mobei-Jun beating your ass!

And Shen Qingqiu, even back when he had been Shen Yuan, had held grudges to his heart like Luo Bing-ge had held women.

There had been a troll once who’d called Luo Binghe a ‘two-dimensional Oedipus-wannabe’ to Shen Qingqiu’s actual face. Shen Qingqiu had doxxed him so hard, starting an internet campaign of hate so potent, he’d made the loser cry, and beg him to stop.

Asshole.

Don’t start shit if you’re unprepared to end it!

He lives his life by this one very simple rule, and expects others to do the same.

And the thing is, Shen Qingqiu had pushed Luo Binghe into the Endless Abyss, knowing full well that there would come a day when that shit would come back around to its natural end point. He’d done it anyway, believing he would willingly pay the toll when the time came that there was no other choice but for him to do so.

But the other thing is—

The very much important thing is… that he had believed it would end in the sweet release of death.

He’d believed it would end with him starting life anew in the mushroom body he’d schemed so hard to make a reality. Luo Binghe would have his retribution, yes, but Shen Qingqiu would also be free of the things he’d had no control over in this world.

Redemption = death.

Isn’t that the trope?

So let him fucking die already!

Why all this push-back? He’s just the starter scum villain. Shang Qinghua had said so himself. Making him more complex had never worked!

Fuck!

And as much as Shen Qingqiu is willing to end the shit that he starts, there is no part of him happy to spend an eternity as Luo Binghe’s basement-dwelling potted plant.

No. He’s going to need another plan.

In the meantime, he needs to figure out how he’s going to explain to Liu Qingge that he no longer requires his meridian-cleansing services without making it sound like Shen Qingqiu has ‘gone mad with grief’ again.

Shen Qingqiu isn’t a widow, Shidi! At worst, he would be a widower. But how can he be a widower when Luo Binghe isn’t even dead?!

And—and they’re not even married!

Utter nonsense.

Add to that that he’ll then have to explain to Mu Qingfang why he’s no longer accepting medical care. And then to Zhangmen-shixiong’s endlessly patient face. Then maybe they’d all have another meeting about him. Which may or may not result in him having to prove to his sceptical martial siblings again that he’s not trying to cause himself harm.

Ugh, throw him off a cliff right now, please!

Getting out of town to go solve a limb-rotting plague in a quarantined city sounds like a fucking holiday.

Sign him up!

Chapter Text

Maiden-Hearted Luo Binghe ૮ ⚆ﻌ⚆ა⸝⸝^♡‎ [Shizun?!]

vs.

The Ferocity of Demonic Courting Rituals ( ◡̀ _ ◡́ ) ᕤ [Submit, bitch!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Luo Binghe lounges upon his throne, and watches his right-hand man beat up the pathetic little hamster of a man he keeps around for… something.

Sex, right?

It has to be sex.

Luo Binghe has lived long enough to know that people are fucking weird when it comes to sex. He hadn’t had to walk three steps in the Endless Abyss of all places for there to be yet another scantily clad demon woman throwing her big-bosomed self right at his face (and other parts of his anatomy).

The look on their faces when they found out that they had nothing on offer that he could ever want was always so gratifying to the part of his heart ever yearning for his master’s touch. (The part of his heart he is talking about is, in fact, the whole thing.)

The only soft things in this world that it yearns for are Shen Qingqiu’s smile, head pats in bouncing curls, and gentle hands that pinch rather than strike. The rest of the things it wants are all hard: angles of a sculpted chest he has seen bare only once, the sharpness of the teeth that ate his pastries with abandon… the hardness of a man—of his shizun—at the height of passion (that he has never known even once in his life).

Human women are no better than demonic ones in this regard.

He only has to inhale in Huan Hua Palace for a deluge of unwanted meimeis to come rushing out of somewhere just to try to drape themselves all over him. If they knew the depraved kinds of things he wants his master to do to him, they would surely be so disgusted, they’d never desire to touch him at all.

He wants to tell them.

The part of him that is all demon wants to stake his claim for all to see. It wants to announce to the entire world that his body belongs to one man, and only that man can ever bring him over the cusp of pleasure.

He’s so tired of all this pretending, of having to ‘play nice’ with these losers. If he didn’t have to ensure his place at Huan Hua in order to one day be with Shizun, he would do it. He would watch their faces fall with vicious glee in his heart.

‘The only person who will ever know me intimately is my shizun!’ he would shout, proud and bold, a smirk turning up one side of his mouth, hoping the whole world might hear.

So, in his own way, even Luo Binghe can be fucking weird about sex. It just doesn’t feel weird because it’s about Shen Qingqiu, the only attractive person in this entire world.

He supposes everyone is like that to some extent. Even his shizun, who had visited brothels all throughout Luo Binghe’s discipleship until he’d turned fourteen, and then suddenly stopped. Part of Luo Binghe clambers with the need to assert that the reason for the change was himself. That Shizun had taken notice of him. Seen something he wanted for himself in him. Something he couldn’t get in a brothel, or from a woman—not from anyone else.

On a whim, Luo Binghe points at Mobei-Jun’s pet. “Bring him here,” he commands.

Mobei-Jun’s fist bunches in Shang Qinghua’s collar, and he drags him, bent almost double, in front of Luo Binghe.

The miserable little man squeaks, dropping to his knees. “Jun… Junshang?”

“Tell me about Shizun.”

“Ah, what does Junshang wish to know?” Shang Qinghua asks, looking up at Luo Binghe through his eyelashes.

“Has he visited any brothels during my absence from the sect?”

Shang Qinghua stares at him with such intensity Luo Binghe is on the verge of considering it rude, then his shishu seems to remember himself, blinking, and curling in on himself until he looks more hamster than man. “No, Junshang. Shen-shixiong has not visited any brothels since his qi deviation all those years ago.”

Luo Binghe doesn’t even want to admit to himself how much he needed that to be the case. How much his entire sense of self had hinged on the right answer to that question.

“And Without-a-Cure?”

Another thing Luo Binghe has learnt since leaving the safety of his shizun’s company is what people look like when they’re thinking about lying to him.

What a curious thing for Shang Qinghua to want to conceal from him.

Luo Binghe leans forward on his throne.

“Let me warn you,” he says, before Shang Qinghua can make the mistake of following through on it. “Think only of yourself, and the things I will do to you if you lie to me.”

The man’s eyes blow wide. Mobei-Jun at his side doesn’t move at all, but Luo Binghe knows what that man looks like when he’s tense.

Oblivious, Shang Qinghua noisily clears his throat. “Without-a-Cure has been… ah, miraculously cured?”

Luo Binghe raises an eyebrow. “Are you asking me?”

“No.” The hamster shakes his head, eyes falling to his own lap. “No, Junshang.”

“Go on.”

“Ah… that is, Without-a-Cure very recently stopped being a problem for Shen-shixiong.”

“How can that be?” Luo Binghe reaches forward, and grabs Shang Qinghua by the front of his robes. The man yelps, and cowers in Luo Binghe’s grip. “How was he cured?! Tell me!”

“I don’t know, Junshang!”

“How can you not know? Isn’t Shizun your shixiong?! Aren’t you all one big family?!” Isn’t that always what it was like when Luo Binghe was a member of the sect? Everyone always in his shizun’s business. Liu Qingge always sniffing around. Yue Qingyuan always desperate to be near him, something miserable buried deep behind that placid smile.

It can’t have changed so much just because Luo Binghe isn’t there.

His grip tightens.

“Junshang, please!”

“You’re lying to me! Why are you lying to me?! Tell me the cure for Without-a-Cure!”

“I’ll tell you! Yes, I’ll tell you. Please!”

Letting go of him, Shang Qinghua slides to the floor in a boneless puddle. Mobei-Jun toes him so hard any human would think it a true kick, but it gets Shang Qinghua back on his knees, and clear on what he must do.

He kneels there, wringing his hands in his lap. “Junshang, the only known cure for Without-a-Cure is… dual cultivation with a heavenly demon.”

The whole world goes white.

Perhaps Shang Qinghua says more. Perhaps Mobei-Jun beats him into a bloody pulp. Perhaps Shizun shows up wearing a single layer, dancing. Luo Binghe would not be able to notice.

His hearing feels like the static of a lightning storm.

His breathing feels—

He’s not breathing.

He’s the cure. Luo Binghe is the cure, and he always has been. He could have healed his shizun the day it happened!

But he’s too late.

Someone else—some other heavenly demon—dared to touch what’s his! Some asshole stole from him the pleasure of curing the curse he had laid upon his shizun all those years ago through his own ineptitude.

It takes many minutes—many minutes of Shang Qinghua shaking, of Mobei-Jun kicking—for Luo Binghe to come back to himself enough to be aware of his surroundings. To be able to speak. To process.

He clears his throat because it feels as though he hasn’t spoken in his entire life. That no words before this have ever mattered.

“What other heavenly demons are there?” he asks, voice surprisingly emotionless for all that it wants to crack on every word. “I thought I was the last.”

Shang Qinghua’s head ducks even further. “Answering Junshang, I—I know of only one. The heavenly demon, Tianlang-Jun, who would appear to be, given the timing… ah, Junshang’s father.”

“My father,” Luo Binghe repeats dumbly. “I don’t have a father. I only have Shizun.”

In the space left by such a declaration, Shang Qinghua trembles. Full body shivers taking over his whole being.

Luo Binghe leans further forward.

“Are you saying that Shizun and my… father…?” He has to stop, the words too absurd. “Are you suggesting that he cured Shizun?”

“This lowly one would never dare to suggest such a thing,” Shang Qinghua claims, belying the fact that he just had. “I don’t know, Junshang! I really don’t. Shen-shixiong wouldn’t tell me something like that. All I know is that Tianlang-Jun is supposed to be buried under a mountain.”

Luo Binghe considers, and then flicks his hand. Mobei-Jun, understanding, drags his little creature away.

It’s true, he really can’t see Shen Qingqiu telling Shang Qinghua of all people that he had… had dual-cultivated with anyone, let alone a heavenly demon long thought buried.

“Did Shizun know?” he asks.

Mobei-Jun pauses just short of dragging Shang Qinghua through the doorway to the throne room.

“Did Shizun know the cure?”

In Mobei-Jun’s grip, Shang Qinghua trembles. “Yes, Junshang.”

Luo Binghe doesn’t know when he is asking about. When he was a young disciple, and Shen Qingqiu was newly afflicted by Without-a-Cure? When he was seventeen years old, and teetering on the edge of the abyss? Or when he was already long thought dead?

Did Shizun really send him to hell for being a heavenly demon, and then invite another one into bed to cure himself?

Luo Binghe nods. Just once. Mobei-Jun continues dragging.

Alone, Luo Binghe stares at the splendour of a hall that means nothing without Shizun’s eyes on it, and he wonders.

Is it possible that the peak lords all knew the only cure for Without-a-Cure back when he was still in the sect? Did they simply never consider such a thing a viable cure?

Of course, he knows that human cultivators would never consider dual cultivation with any demon, let alone that one, to be a cure at all. So perhaps they had just discounted it out of hand without ever mentioning it out loud.

But, if so, then how could Shizun be cured now? And why, after everything he’d said to Luo Binghe on the edge of the abyss, had he gone back on that with the first other heavenly demon to come along?

Luo Binghe shakes his head. The armrests of his throne creak under the pressure of his hands. Xin Mo shudders at his waist, ready for blood.

The blood of a heavenly demon—his father—and one who has touched Shizun at that… that is a prize worth having.

(Somewhere, stuck under a mountain, Tianlang-Jun shudders without knowing why.)

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

“Mobei,” Luo Binghe says, watching as the man chases Shang Qinghua around again. “What are you doing to your pet now?”

Mobei-Jun’s expression doesn’t change—that is to say, his lack of expression doesn’t become any more expressive—but there’s something about the coldness of his eyes that warms up at the mention of Shang Qinghua, and his associated beatings.

“Waiting,” he says.

“For what?”

“The next step.”

And that is how Luo Binghe finds out the intricacies of demon courting rituals.

Not from a caring father as he grows to be both a good half-demon and a skilful half-human cultivator—no, Luo Binghe was raised by Shen Qingqiu’s gentle hands. And so he is a little more than twenty years old when he finds out the things a father should teach him about how to approach his chosen one from a demon viewpoint:

1. One of the parties shows interest in the other (perhaps through a beating, though not necessarily).
2. The one being pursued issues a challenge—be good enough for me or fuck off.
3. The pursuer must prove themself, rising to their chosen one’s expectations, and only in victory can the two come together as a couple.

Interesting.

Luo Binghe isn’t sure how to feel about the fact that Mobei-Jun and Shang Qinghua are perpetually stuck in the phase between the first and second steps.

Shang Qinghua, also having been raised a human cultivator like his once martial nephew, doesn’t understand Mobei-Jun’s interest.

And Mobei-Jun, having been raised a full demon, doesn’t understand why Shang Qinghua won’t issue a challenge. He thinks the man just needs to be beaten a few more times before he realises Mobei-Jun is serious about him.

Luo Binghe’s first thought is vague humour. Something in the realm of: ‘Look at these two who can’t even sort themselves out enough to be speaking the same language. Mobei-Jun thinks Shang Qinhua is playing hard to get. Shang Qinghua thinks Mobei-Jun wants him dead. What idiots!’

But he can’t help but feel like some part of this is echoing his own situation with Shen Qingqiu rather ominously.

Shizun had misunderstood him on the edge of the abyss, at the Immortal Alliance Conference, thinking him someone who could commit atrocities just because of his heavenly demon blood. Shizun had loved him so gently before that moment. So Luo Binghe can’t help but feel, given the opportunity to understand and be understood, that Shizun could come to love him again.

For this reason, he points at Mobei-Jun’s creature. “He thinks you’re trying to kill him.”

Shang Qinghua squawks, and puts his hands up as though to deny it. Mobei-Jun’s expression doesn’t change, but his fist unclenches, and he turns to look at Shang Qinghua.

Whether they sort themselves out or not after that, Luo Binghe doesn’t want to know. He’s done all he intends to, dismissing them with the wave of a hand.

The whole thing brings something to mind though.

Demon courting rituals are necessarily different from human ones. The same way that demons and humans are necessarily different in many ways.

Someone brought up by one of these groups will not automatically understand the ways of the other.

Shizun was raised a human cultivator. More than that, he had studied hard, and had emulated all his teachings better than any of his peers in order to become the second ranked peak lord of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect. His indoctrination against demons is long-ingrained.

Even if that’s true, Luo Binghe is hopeful that so long as he can show Shen Qingqiu that he is good, his shizun will come to see the truth of it for himself. For a cultivator, Shizun had been surprisingly lenient towards (non-heavenly) demons. It’s only a matter of time and exposure to make that true for heavenly demons as well.

Xin Mo grumbles at his hip, unhappy with his desire for a peaceful resolution to this misunderstanding. He tamps down on it.

“I am the master,” Luo Binghe says, “and you will obey.”

The things Xin Mo wants him to do are not going to lead him to Shizun.

Chapter Text

Shen Qingqiu, Trouble Magnet++ (˘ŏ_ŏ) [Dumbfuck author, dumbfuck novel!]

vs.

His Very Own Heavenly Demon Blood (๑•̀ᗝ•́)૭ [Brute force isn’t the only way?! How can this be?]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

The second sign of Shen Qingqiu’s newly discovered heritage appears sometime during the night. (Or the mid-morning—Shen Qingqiu is a late riser, please don’t @ him.)

He rolls out of bed, rubbing a hand down his face, and blinking hard, and just barely catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

A glimpse of his glowing red fucking eyes, and colour-coordinated zuiyin.

Well, shit!

Please excuse him as he has a panic attack over his demonic features appearing while he’s in a sect full of human cultivators!

If the system doesn’t want him to die, it’s doing a really half-assed job of it.

What if he’d ambled out onto his peak without even looking in the mirror?! He has been known to do so in his Binghe-less days!

Aiya, he even has little pointy ears and cute little fangs depressing his bottom lip. And is he… is he more attractive?!

What the fuck?!

If this were almost any other circumstance, Shen Qingqiu would be losing his mind with enthusiasm—he gets to be not just a demon (already very cool), but a heavenly demon (actually the coolest)? Sign him up! The score of the century!

But getting to be a heavenly demon right after telling Luo Binghe that heavenly demons are abominations the world cannot abide, and pushing him into the Endless Abyss just to drive that point home…

If Airplane knew what pathetic fallacy was when he wrote PIDW, the sky would be crying tears of absolute grievance right now.

Screw him, screw his life!

What’s he going to say to Luo Binghe when he comes calling in a couple short years?

‘Jk?’

‘Surprise?’

‘You wouldn’t hurt your da-ge would you?’

He’s so screwed. Gg no re. Bing-ge might as well t-bag him now.

Ugh, in any case, Shen Qingqiu can’t just give up.

He gets dressed, combing his long hair into some semblance of order. It’s not nearly as beautiful as when he used to let Luo Binghe loose on it, and he does have to leave the upper part ever so slightly looser to make sure that it covers the tips of his very demonic ears, but otherwise it’s still befitting his station as a peak lord.

Doesn’t hide the fucking glowing beacon on his forehead though.

Ah, could he borrow make-up from somewhere to cover it up? But wouldn’t that mean leaving the house to do so? And then what does he do about his eyes? He can’t wander around the peak with his eyes shut! Everyone would start spreading weird rumours about him again!

So he wears all white a little more often than he used to—so what?! He’d like to see which one of you freaks would dare to call him a widow to his face!

Who’s a widow? Your mother!

Maybe he could fake being sick, and just not leave the bamboo house today? Ah, no, then everyone would call for Mu Qingfang, and he’d be in an even worse predicament than he is right now.

“Liu-shishu, are you here to see Shizun?”

Dumbfuck author, dumbfuck novel!

What has he ever done to Shang Qinghua, huh? Apart from the occasional death threat in both lifetimes. And a few broken fans that are really more Shang Qinghua’s fault.

Whose head is that hard?!

Shen Qingqiu runs for the front door to the bamboo house, and slams into it just in time to stop Liu Qingge from opening it.

His shidi grunts on the other side of the door. “Shen Qingqiu? What’s going on?”

What’s going on? Clearly, what’s going on is that his newly discovered heavenly demon features are on display for the whole world to see! Please come back later! Shen Qingqiu is closed for business!

The door gives slightly behind him as Liu Qingge tugs on it. “Open the door!”

“Please come back later, Liu-shidi,” he says, and pats himself on the back for sounding completely normal—

“Why do you sound like that?!”

—or maybe not.

The door rattles hard. Shen Qingqiu holds onto it more tightly. “Shidi, really! Is this what you call manners? I really don’t feel like visitors right now. Please come back another day.”

“What visitor? We’re shixiongdi. It’s time for your treatment. Open up!”

How is any of this fair? How is he supposed to keep Liu ‘I hunt demons for dinner’ Qingge from sniffing out the most demonic of demons on his very doorstep?

And how come Luo Binghe’s cradle seal broke when he was seventeen, but Shen Qingqiu’s equivalent has lasted well into his adulthood? And even through a stupid bout of Without-a-Cure? Wasn’t Bing-ge immune to all poisons, cradle seal or not?

Saying that, Luo Binghe’s seal broke under overwhelming stress at the Immortal Alliance Conference. What stress exactly was Shen Qingqiu feeling while he knelt at the sword mound?!

Give him a break already! It’s… it’s unscientific!

“My meridians are fine right now, Liu-shidi,” Shen Qingqiu calls, his grip having to increase in pressure the more Liu Qingge pushes and pulls on the door. “This shixiong is grateful for his shidi’s care, but asks that he return for now.”

Any of his other martial siblings would disparage him for making them shout through a door to have a conversation like a couple of heathens, but not his Liu-shidi, whose volume setting has long been stuck in the abrasive range.

“What are you hiding?!”

“Liu-shidi thinks too much! What could this shixiong be hiding?”

Apart from a life-altering revelation about his heritage.

Nothing to see here! Please move along!

“You’re going to have to take your medicine sooner or later,” Liu Qingge declares ominously, the door shuddering between them.

What is this?! Is Shen Qingqiu a child making trouble for the adults?!

He’ll have you know, he’s a grown-ass man who won’t take his medicine, alright?!

“I’m naked!”

The sound from the other side of the door is oddly like a squeak, and the pushing and pulling stops immediately. So much so that the lack of resistance makes Shen Qingqiu fall to his ass on the floor with a muted thud, and a whisper of silk.

Well, shit! Who would have thought that Liu Qingge would be squeamish about seeing a naked man?

He supposes it makes sense. Besides the all-stallion protagonist, Liu Qingge is the straightest man in this whole world!

“I’ll—” Liu Qingge says, sounding strangely meek. “I’ll leave first. But I’m coming back.”

“Thanking Liu-shidi.”

Shen Qingqiu waits until he can no longer hear Liu Qingge’s footsteps, nor anyone else’s, and then he waits a little longer than that.

Eventually, he pulls himself up. The door crumples in his hand like it’s made of cardboard, his claws gouging holes in the bamboo, and demolishing a hand-sized chunk in the side.

“Shit.”

How did Luo Binghe come into his own with grace and elegance, applying every new ability with great skill, and incredible power?

He feels like the baby Giraffe Hippopotamus Dumper Chicken Liu Qingge had abandoned at his door a million years ago as some kind of offering or something. All uncoordinated limbs, and more strength than he can fathom.

No matter. It’s not the first time that Shen Qingqiu has had to adapt on the fly.

Nah, the first time was when he transmigrated into this dumbfuck novel in the first place!

Dumbfuck author!

(Somewhere, being pummelled by Mobei-Jun in an entirely new way, Shang Qinghua shudders without knowing why.)

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Several hours of meditating, and bringing his demonic qi into line, and Shen Qingqiu can finally put his hand in front of his face without seeing a crimson glow reflected on his skin.

First objective: get his ass down the mountain for some emergency make-up.

You never know when your newly discovered demonic features are just going to say, ‘screw polite company, we’re coming out,’ after all.

He makes it to the nearest relevant shop towards closing time. The only other people in it are the female shopkeeper, and a couple of ladies who look like they’ve been doing more gossiping than shopping.

All of them look slightly confused to see a man stepping into this kind of shop, but the shopkeeper comes forward to greet him after only a moment anyway.

“Is the immortal master in need of some rouge as a gift for a young lady?” she asks with a knowing smile.

Knowing, my ass! If you knew what this old man is planning to use it for, you’d run for your life!

When he used to take Luo Binghe places, the boy would turn on the charm in a situation like this, easily paving the way for whatever his shizun wanted to do. Shen Qingqiu could just stand by the entrance looking grim, and unapproachable.

Here and now, he can be neither as unapproachable as before, nor as charming as Luo Binghe.

“Face powder, please,” he says, still managing to sound grim. “As close to my skin tone as possible.”

The two women in the corner giggle, and start fanning themselves. If Luo Binghe were in town, he’d almost think they were swooning.

It was not unusual for this sort of thing to occur with increasing regularity when he was a disciple. The poor boy had never understood his own appeal, always dismissing the young women’s attentions out of hand in an uncharacteristically brutish way.

Oh, to show interest in Luo Binghe, the stallion protagonist—who was story-driven to be interested in every woman—and not have him accept you! The embarrassment! The shame!

Could you ever live it down? Or would you become dissatisfied, drifting from one place to the next, never being able to fulfil your life’s purpose?

Luo Bing-ge wasn’t a picky man by any means, bedding women generally within minutes of first meeting them. Sure, many of them required half-assing his way through a quest of some kind, or some other plot device Airplane would forget about ten minutes into the chapter in favour of some truly shocking papapa. But, overall, if you have anatomy of the soft, melon-y, and flower petal-y kind, then chances are, Luo Bing-ge would be into you!

You could even be an absolute bitch of the vaguely mariticidal sort!

All those chapters of women trying to kill their own lord husband for a variety of grievances ranging from not being slept with enough to total family annihilation, only to end up getting bedded down instead.

Who knew the heavenly pillar could even cure a desire for revenge in your family’s honour?

So—

Not. A. Picky. Man.

On occasions where his own little white lotus would clumsily rebuff future potential harem members, Shen Qingqiu could only watch from over his fan, tutting lightly.

He’d been spoilt, it’s true. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been able to stop himself. Of course a Luo Binghe who’d only been used to his master’s love and indulgence wouldn’t look as readily for approval in outsiders.

So even swooning directly in the poor little lamb’s path mostly only resulted in some bruises on the women in question when Luo Binghe stepped dramatically out of the way instead of catching them.

In any case, Luo Binghe is in the abyss, and that is not what is happening here.

“What does the immortal master think?”

Ah?

For a moment, the only thing in his brain is thoughts of a young, brilliant Binghe, too full of life to ever look away from, and he can’t make himself parse what she is asking him.

Three breaths pass, then ten. With time, he recognises the shopkeeper is holding a small porcelain pot out to him, and he takes it from her, opening it to see a pale powder inside.

He overpays, mostly to get away from this place of unwanted memories and nostalgia. He’ll check the powder against his skin in the comfort of his own home. It looks close enough anyway.

The women in the corner, still enacting some kind of swooning motion, titter and sigh as he turns to leave. Ah, perhaps there is some kind of flu going around. He thinks he heard that, right?

He turns back. “The young ladies should take care of their health,” he says. “It wouldn’t do to become ill.”

With that, he heads home, grateful to have Xiu Ya to shorten the journey. Something about thinking of all those old moments with Binghe has left him feeling a little unsettled. Like his demonic features are trying to claw their way to the surface again.

Touching down right outside of the bamboo house, Shen Qingqiu sheathes Xiu Ya.

“Shizun?”

Shit.

He tamps down on the feeling bubbling up inside him, and raises his hand in front of his face. Since he sees no reflected red glow, he turns to see Ming Fan looking confused.

Get over it! Shen Qingqiu’s pinky toe is more confused than you are!

“What happened to Shizun’s door?”

Ah.

He straightens himself up, trying to look less like some kind of teenager caught sneaking out late to be with her boyfriend.

Who’s the adult here, Ming Fan?! It isn’t you!

(Ming Fan is technically an adult, but he’s also of the weak, scrawny kind that means Shen Qingqiu is still taller than him, and likely always will be. Besides which, Shen Qingqiu looks at all of his disciples as children, and probably would still even if they were grandparents. In the same way that Shen Qingqiu believes himself to be an old man and has done since his sixteenth birthday, he believes anyone a year younger than him or more is a child and thus always will be.)

“Liu-shidi visited earlier,” he says, neither outright blaming the man, nor offering an alternate explanation. He has lost many a door to his shidi’s brutish behaviour. Internally, he shrugs. Perhaps it is not so terrible a thing if Liu Qingge gets blamed for just one more.

Ming Fan doesn’t look entirely convinced. Shen Qingqiu smiles. It feels sharp. Predatory. Quite different from the way he usually is with his disciples, even the obnoxious ones.

“What is my disciple doing skulking about here so late in the day?” he asks, whipping his fan open with a satisfying shik.

Ming Fan shudders, freezing up.

Don’t be so surprised. Weren’t you hanging about, snooping on him to report back to your best friend, Liu Qingge? Why are you surprised to have found him here, outside his own house?

Shen Qingqiu takes a step towards him. “Perhaps it is that this master hasn’t given him enough to do,” he suggests.

“No, no… uh, that is, Shizun has of course given this disciple plenty to do. This disciple simply… forgot for a moment.” Ming Fan bows. “Thanking Shizun for the reminder.”

He scurries off. Shen Qingqiu almost wants to chase him down, and punish the little weasel.

Forget it.

He has more important shit to think about.

Ah, well. Today started weak but finished strong.

He has make-up to obscure any possible zuiyin appearances. He’s going to have to test out how effective it is before relying on that, but at least it’s something.

Fangs are easy to hide if he’s careful, and notices their emergence.

His hair can hide the points of his ears well enough.

His voluminous sleeves, and reputation for being a snippy bastard who won’t give anyone the time of day, will hide his hands, and thus his claws.

So that just leaves his glowing red eyes…

In a pinch, he’ll just have to close his eyes! Not the best solution, but certainly not nothing.

Okay, so it’s basically nothing, and won’t work in front of Mu Qingfang or Liu Qingge. Not unless he’s lying down, pretending to be asleep, but—

Whatever.

Maybe he’ll think of something.

Like how there’s been talk within the sect of going and sorting Jinlan out since Huan Hua apparently doesn’t give a shit about plagues decimating the population within their borders.

Which means Mu Qingfang won’t be looking at him. And Liu Qingge will be swinging his sword at shit—or at least aggressively stomping around looking for shit to swing his sword at.

Which is fucking perfect!

Really, Shen Qingqiu is all for it—his shidi requires environmental enrichment! Shen Qingqiu is basically just being a loving older brother if he encourages such an outing, and then also tags along. It’s win-win-win, right?

He needs to get in on this!

Chapter Text

Known Shidi Bully, Shen Qingqiu (૭ 。•̀ ᵕ •́。 )૭ [Theres no point in resisting! This shixiong once had two older brothers. It my turn now!]

vs.

His Aggrieved Martial Siblings ✴૮ • ﻌ - ა❀ [Worst! Shixiong! Ever!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

With a few days to perfect his disguise as an ordinary human cultivator, Shen Qingqiu feels a little better leaving the bamboo house.

What’s he got to worry about? Not just anyone could have taken over the role of Shen Qingqiu straight after transmigrating from a modern world fuerdai, and still manage to lead the sect through a demon invasion!

Without-a-Cure notwithstanding, it really hadn’t gone all that badly! And since that only ever affected him (and occassionally took up just a little bit of Liu Qingge’s free time), could it really be considered anything but a rousing success?

Nope!

On top of that, the fact that Without-a-Cure has now fizzled out into nothingness care of his newly discovered heavenly demon blood, it really is a case of Shen Qingqiu fucking up, and being let off with a warning!

So there’s no reason to think this situation will be any different. Shen Qingqiu will adapt to being Heavenly Demon Shen Qingqiu the same way he had adapted to being Immortal Cultivator Shen Qingqiu. Only, this time, the learning curve will be much less severe—cultivators and powerful demons are not so dissimilar (no matter what they like to believe about themselves).

His confidence dips somewhat when he walks out onto his peak, and all his disciples stare at him. But a quick check of all the relevant parts lets him know that he’s in the clear as far as flaunting his demonic heritage goes. (And if he’s taken to carrying around a small handheld mirror meant for vain young ladies for just such a purpose, then who can blame him?!)

“Is… is Shizun’s hair different?” one of his disciples asks.

Shen Qingqiu works hard not to let his features devolve into a fierce glare. “A little,” he agrees.

Who asked you?!

It’s strange.

His emotions have been a little… well, sharper recently. He’s been ever so slightly crabbier with his disciples in his day to day life—chasing Ming Fan off for spying on him becaus of Liu Qingge, making Ning Yingying run two extra laps around the peak for mentioning the sword mound, and shouting at the disciple who had dared to offer him the slop from the Qing Jing kitchens.

(According to Shen Qingqiu, anything beneath Luo Binghe’s masterful cooking might as well be swill. You can’t convince him otherwise!)

No matter!

Shen Qingqiu is confident this is just a blip on the way to his new life as an unkillable demonic lord. And he’s still got two whole years to figure out how to use the mushroom body to fake his own death. After which—roaming, relaxation, and a shit tonne of reading!

He mentally rubs his hands together in excitement.

Good thing he already figured out a way to stay in touch with Shang Qinghua without giving the game away. The man has proven he cannot edit his own work, and needs a heavy hand to keep him in line. What better hand to do so than one which has never been messily detached from his best bro’s body?

In any case, he still desperately needs a break from this mountain what with all the new demon-living-amongst-cultivators stress, and it just so happens that Liu Qingge and Mu Qingfang are heading for Jinlan City today!

Tag along time!

Speaking of which, Liu Qingge has been avoiding him since their last meeting. (Shouting at each other through a door.)

Really, Shidi, did no one teach you manners?! Shen Qingqiu feels bad for you!

Despite vowing to return, Shen Qingqiu has not seen so much as a stony-faced glare pointed in his direction. Indeed, the man cannot even seem to look him in the eye when Shen Qingqiu ambles into the peak lord meeting specifically for the trip to Jinlan.

Everybody else, of course, has no problem staring.

Whatever can you be looking at? Shen Qingqiu is only half an incense time late. That’s practically early!

“Apologies, Zhangmen-shixiong,” Shen Qingqiu says. “I was held up.”

Qi Qingqi makes a very unladylike snort, which is fitting, since she is the most unladylike of all his martial siblings, and unrepentantly so. “What could have held you up, Shen Qingqiu? Your bedclothes? Your dream about Migrating Sloth Crunch Beetles again?”

Shen Qingqiu told you that in confidence, Shimei! Please don’t use his love of bugs against him!

He whips his fan open, and drapes himself over his own chair, wafting himself airily. “Shimei must be joking. How can anyone sleep with the plague besieging the poor people of Jinlan City?”

“You—”

“We are all grateful for Shen-shidi’s presence, and welcome his discourse on this matter,” Yue Qingyuan says from his side, stately and reserved.

Shen Qingqiu keeps wafting.

No point trying to show him up, Shimei! With Yue-da-ge around, this shixiong is never wrong!

Shen Qingqiu lets his fan drop just enough for her to see his hint of a smile.

It’s a bitch move, but even when he was still just Shen Yuan, Shen Qingqiu has always been at least four fifths a bitch.

Qi Qingqi seethes, which only makes his smile sharper.

Shit!

Don’t get too excited! Who knows if thinking about having sharp teeth might make his fangs appear?

Maybe he should have spent some time practising making his demonic features show themselves when he was in the bamboo house, but he’s been pretty occupied with just ensuring he can make them recede.

No matter. So long as he is careful, he’s confident everything will work out.

Shen Qingqiu can’t be denounced as a demon before the protagonist shows up! And Shen Qingqiu plans to be long gone by then.

As soon as he’s back from Jinlan, he’ll start researching how he can make the mushroom body a convincing enough corpse to get past Mu Qingfang’s scrutiny. Leaving will be bittersweet, of course, but being human stick-ed is too spicy for him!

He’s not some starter scum villain, too afraid of the outside world to ever consider changing the path that he is headed down. Shen Qingqiu is adaptable. He’s not afraid to admit defeat, and bow out.

This is Binghe’s world! Even though Shen Qingqiu got to join him in it for a little while, he’s never been foolish enough to believe that he would get to stay for the long haul.

No, Binghe will have all his wives to keep him company. It’s time for Shen Qingqiu to go.

(Somewhere, in his palace in the Demon Realm, Luo Binghe shudders without knowing why.)

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

He has an asshole of a time convincing Yue Qingyuan to let him tag along to the limb-rotting plague city, but in the end, Shen Qingqiu is the man’s kryptonite, and he can only ever hold out for so long.

Going part of the way towards convincing Yue Qingyuan is the fact that Liu Qingge will be there for brute strength, and to clear his meridians should Without-a-Cure act up.

Don’t worry, Shixiong! The only thing acting up ever again will be Shen Qingqiu!

The other part of convincing him is pointing out that the safest place for Shen Qingqiu anywhere is to be standing next to Mu Qingfang.

Now all he has to do is avoid both of them for the entire mission!

Can’t be too difficult, right? Neither of them will have too much free time to harangue their favourite shixiong in a plague city!

Score!

“Shen Qingqiu!”

Liu Qingge corners him where he’s about to set off, having already unsheathed Xiu Ya. Apparently, his shidi has decided to put the ‘naked’ incident behind them.

That’s cool, and all—

Really, Shen Qingqiu is happy for your character growth, Shidi!

—but don’t blame him for being rude!

Shen Qingqiu is nothing if not hard to pin down. Just ask Luo Binghe! In the little white lotus’ disciple days, if Shen Qingqiu didn’t want to give a direct answer, he’d have the boy going around in circles for hours.

And that was the protagonist!

Just think what this shixiong would do to anyone else!

“Ah, Liu-shidi, there’s a plague, didn’t you hear? Let’s wait till we’re there, okay? This shixiong feels fine.” And before the man can rebut him, Shen Qingqiu takes off on Xiu Ya.

He hears Liu Qingge grumbling behind him, hears Cheng Luan being hastily drawn, but he doesn’t look back.

Too bad, Liu-shidi. Can’t make me take my medicine if you can’t catch me!

“Don’t hold back on my account, Liu-shidi!” he calls back, even though Liu Qingge is far behind him.

“Shen Qingqiu!”

Fuck carriages! Shen Qingqiu wants to fly, okay?!

Wasn’t that always his least favourite part of this world (beyond his unavoidable destiny as a human stick and the gratuitous papapa, of course)? In a cultivation world—as immortal cultivators with flying fucking swords—why were any of them hoofing it anywhere?!

So unscientific!

Does that mean he sat down and had a composed, respectful conversation with his martial siblings on the matter, calmly expressing his desire to fly to Jinlan, and his belief that he is able to do so?

No! Are you surprised?

In a world created by the eminently terrible Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky, Shen Qingqiu has always been of the opinion that it is easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. And surely when they get to Jinlan and both of his shidi see that he was able to complete the journey to an exceptional standard, they’ll realise that he was right all along! What could go wrong anyway?

Without-a-Cure is a thing of the past. A hang-up from another life. He’s a heavenly demon now. With a heavenly demon’s capabilities. And even if his most belligerent shidi finds his sudden desire to fly everywhere to be disagreeable to him, what’s he going to do—pull him out of the sky?!

Of course not.

Liu Qingge likes to beat people up—demons, Bai Zhan disciples, or really anyone who so much as shows either a passing interest or some form of wrongdoing—but he’s not a murderer. Shen Qingqiu might bully him sometimes (always), but Liu Qingge wouldn’t allow him to die even so.

Which is so much to say that Shen Qingqiu is free and clear. Liu Qingge (and indeed, Mu Qingfang) might be a little unhappy with his antics, but they’d have to be able to catch him to tell him so!

“Shen Qingqiu!”

That’s his name, Shidi! It’s good that you remember your favourite bully!

Unsurprisingly, the journey to Jinlan is actually somewhat refreshing.

Sure, they’re heading there ostensibly for work, but when you cut right down to the root of it, isn’t it just that all three of them are a little too interested in weird shit?

Mu Qingfang is fascinated by all matters medical—a limb-rotting plague is basically Christmas for him! And Liu Qingge is always hunting down the next thing to pummel—a limb-rotting plague probably has an instigator he can beat up, right? And Shen Qingqiu…

Well, he’s the head of the scholars’ peak. The weird and the wonderful are his fucking forte. He’ll go toe to toe with anyone who says otherwise!

All that being said, his shidi don’t complain all that hard about his method of travel after the first leg of it. Mu Qingfang is eager to get there and get to work on a cure, and Liu Qingge is nothing if not competitive, so Shen Qingqiu gets to really let loose for the first time since Without-a-Cure made it so that at any moment he could fall out of the sky like a lead weight.

And with Shen Qingqiu’s new status as a heavenly demon hiding amongst merely extraordinary humans, it means that even Liu Qingge has a hard time keeping up with him.

Shen Qingqiu feels a bit bad for his most irrepressible shidi, who deals with sudden changes in people the same way he deals with Shen Qingqiu’s teasing: by turning red with anger, and breaking things. Usually the door to the bamboo house, but also people and their belongings.

(Shen Qingqiu has no idea, but at least in regards to his teasing, Liu Qingge turns red for reasons which have nothing to do with anger.)

“If Shidi can’t keep up, he should say. Don’t let this shixiong wear you out!”

Ah, he couldn’t resist! His shidi really does turn the most fetching shade of red.

“He may be able to keep up,” Mu Qingfang says from behind both of them, “but I certainly can’t, Shen-shixiong. Whilst it is most agreeable to see Shixiong enjoying himself again, perhaps he will allow this old doctor to arrive with the ability to still treat the plague.”

Shit. What would happen to the plot if Shen Qingqiu fucked Mu Qingfang up so much he couldn’t cure the plague? To say nothing of the fact that it would be a little embarrassing, right? Wouldn’t they be just as ineffectual as Huan Hua? And it would be all Shen Qingqiu’s fault!

Shen Qingqiu clears his throat. “Mu-shidi is right, of course. Please excuse this shixiong.”

He pulls back on his spiritual qi a little so that the speed of Xiu Ya reduces to a more manageable pace for his shidi to keep up with. Mu Qingfang appears noticeably assuaged. Liu Qingge, on the other hand, looks like someone just barged into his house, and likened his mother to a Rotund Rat-Tailed Beaver.

Whenever Binghe had dared to look so aggrieved, Shen Qingqiu had always pinched his little cheeks.

What right have you to look so bullied?! Are you a maiden? Is Shen Qingqiu your rakish, romantically aggressive suitor, huh?

Ah, his disciple and his shidi are really not so different. It’s… it makes something in Shen Qingqiu’s heart feel unsettled. Like it has nowhere to go. No place to call home.

Aiya, what is he even doing?!

There’s no point in getting himself upset. There’s still a couple of years before Luo Binghe comes back, full stallion protagonist, ready to step into his own destiny. And Shen Qingqiu is going to have to get used to the idea of seeing it from a distance.

Or not seeing it.

What’s the use in getting worked up over things he never had any control over in the first place? Didn’t he want to leave the mountain exactly to get away from the weight of his own destiny for a bit?!

That’s right!

Jinlan was supposed to be his fucking holiday!

So it’s with some chagrin that he ends up in a brothel in the plague-ridden Jinlan City, and loses yet another fan because of stupid fucking Airplane. (Remember that everything in PIDW is his fault.)

Shen Qingqiu turns.

“It really is Shizun,” Luo Binghe says sweetly, even as Shen Qingqiu’s fan cracks in his own hand.

Of course it’s really him!

Are you trying to tell him you wouldn’t recognise Shen Qingqiu in a burlap sack with mud in his hair? Haven’t you seen him with his hair mussed up in a ball because he’d forgotten to take it down the night before? Haven’t you seen him with sleep still in his eyes, and the wrinkles of his pillow still imprinted on his face?

“Shizun even changed his hair,” Luo Binghe points out, and though his hands do not move, it looks like they really, really want to. Whether to touch the hair he’d once tended to—and been allowed to touch basically whenever he wanted to—or to rip off a few limbs, Shen Qingqiu can’t say.

Either way, the Huan Hua Palace disciples gathered in a semi-circle around him, trying to close ranks, effectively restrain any such notions.

With nothing left but to face the destiny he’d carved out for himself when he pushed the protagonist towards his own, Shen Qingqiu picks up the hem of his robes, and takes one last step forward.

“Binghe.”

Chapter Text

Snarky Bitch, Shen Qingqiu ಠ⁠︵⁠ಠ [Oh, so you want to start something?!]

vs.

The Huan Hua Palace Delinquents (。△。*) [Luo-shixiong, we’ve been wronged! Luo-shixiong will give us justice, right? Luo-shixiong? Luo-shixiong?!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Shen Qingqiu clears his throat. “What’s going on?” he asks.

Whilst nobody could find fault with the protagonist’s smile, Shen Qingqiu internally shudders to have it directed at him.

Please point that thing at someone else! Too creepy!

He has the original goods to thank for his baked-in poker face, or else he’d be a sweating mess right now, in tears, and hanging from Luo Binghe’s arms. What would the demonic emperor do to him if he did that?!

At the sound of Shen Qingqiu’s question, all of the Huan Hua disciples surge forward like the back-flowing drain in his old apartment, and just as hostile! Half of them draw their weapons!

Excuse you! If you don’t know how things work around here, don’t come to him! Even if you think Shen Qingqiu is an asshole, you still have to bow down, and thank the elder for coming!

Besides which, there’s no need to try to ride on Binghe’s coat-tails. Shen Qingqiu knows the appeal, of course—he’d hugged those golden thighs with the best of them. But look how he turned out! Luo Binghe had speedrun the abyss just to get back faster to introduce Shen Qingqiu to his destiny as a human stick.

If you hang onto the protagonist, you’re more likely to end up on one of the extreme ends of the destiny scale, just so you know!

Shen Qingqiu is comfortable in the middle, thank you very much. The Goldilocks of PIDW, he doesn’t need anything fancy to get by, so long as he also doesn’t get anything too crappy either.

That nice boy, Gongyi Xiao, noticing the atmosphere, inserts himself between Shen Qingqiu and the Huan Hua Palace hooligans.

“Put your weapons away! Is this how you represent Huan Hua Palace?!”

Ah, he really is too good for this world!

Shen Qingqiu really does feel sorry for the proper and upright young man. How unfair! To be minding his own business, doing a thorough and decent job as the head disciple of one of the most notable (not one of the best, mind you) sects in the world, and then to have the protagonist just sweep in, and upstage him in his own sect, not to mention with the girl his heart desires…

Shen Qingqiu is crying tears of blood for you, young man!

A young woman breezes out from the crowd, clutching a hand to her bosom.

“How can you have time for this?” she wails. She looks at all of them as she says so, but Shen Qingqiu gets the feeling that the real target of her theatrics is Luo Binghe as she dabs her tears with the sleeve of the hand not clutched to her bosom.

Who are you to say how much time Shen Qingqiu has for anything, ah? He’ll have you know he could veg out for days without ill effects! If you can’t say the same, then all Shen Qingqiu can say is… maybe there’s a skill difference.

“Shouldn’t we all be focused on helping Luo-shixiong?! That useless thing hurt him! Why is no one trying to help Luo-shixiong?!”

Shen Qingqiu can guarantee, even if ‘Luo-shixiong’ were being besieged by all the armies of the world, he wouldn’t need your help!

Even though Shen Qingqiu wants to scoff, and knows intellectually that no plague could ever hope to hurt Luo Binghe, he still finds his eyes raking over the young man’s body until he sees the telltale spots on his bare wrist.

“You were hurt?” comes out without any thought to restraint, or propriety.

Luo Binghe, now fully into his role as the world’s greatest actor, simply shakes his head. “I’m fine. What matters is that no one else was hurt.”

Shen Qingqiu almost finds himself nodding. What an upstanding and righteous young man! Surely, if he were to step forward, settle his hands on his own hips, chest up, and smile, everyone in the brothel would swoon under the onslaught of Protagonist Charm. Woman or man. Shimei or shizun.

“Luo-shixiong is so brave. He only got hurt because he cares so much that he protected us!”

I’d bet my left ass cheek that ‘Luo-shixiong’ doesn’t care about a single one of you! (Even the ones he ‘cares about’ in a carnal manner would hardly be worthy of the term!) To say nothing of the fact that if Luo Binghe were hurt in your defence at all, it could only be a planned and calculated chess move care of Grandmaster Luo himself.

“Senior Shen must be so happy to hear about Luo-shixiong’s suffering!”

What the fuck!

Shen Qingqiu looks at Luo Binghe, who is already staring at him, saying absolutely nothing.

Having himself been infected by the fake old lady, Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel like this is all a little unfair!

What did you do to brainwash these losers, protagonist?! Well, for the women, it’s obvious—but why are the men wailing in your defence?!

Shen Qingqiu restrains the need to tut, and show these little weasels who they’re dealing with.

Did Shen Qingqiu barge into Huan Hua Palace, and piss on all of your slippers?! Grow up!

In another life, Shen Qingqiu might have considered this a time to remain silent, and be the bigger man—arguing with children far below both his age and level of cultivation is beneath someone of his generation and prestige.

But he’s also one of less than a handful of heavenly demons still in this world. And his newly discovered heritage has brought with it some newly discovered emotions.

“Nonsense!” he barks, startling all of the Huan Hua Palace hangers-on, and Gongyi Xiao besides.

Luo Binghe doesn’t startle, but the intensity of his gaze seems to boil over.

Shen Qingqiu lets the corner of his mouth raise in something resembling amusement, but far too sharp. “Is this how Huan Hua Palace teaches their disciples to treat the elders of other sects? If you feel you can speak to me in this manner without consequence, how must you speak about me when I cannot hear you?”

Without really meaning to, Shen Qingqiu takes a step forward to punctuate his speech, staring at the one who had accused him of being happy to see his little lamb injured!

If Shen Qingqiu had the displeasure of being your master, you’d all be running laps around the whole of Cang Qiong, let alone just Qing Jing Peak! Don’t think you wouldn’t!

The Huan Hua groupies as a whole look to Luo Binghe, lower lips all trembling, and expressions aggrieved.

How—how can you dare to look wronged?! Didn’t you start this?!

Shen Qingqiu lives his life by a very simple rule: don’t start shit if you’re unprepared to end it! And he expects others to do the same.

Don’t look to Shen Qingqiu’s disciple to end shit for you! Weren’t you so confident a second ago?!

“Certainly,” Shen Qingqiu continues, sniffing, “I taught Luo Binghe better than this.”

What he’d actually taught Luo Binghe was that gossip was a dangerous weapon, only to be drawn in the comfort of one’s own home to those most trusted souls in one’s private life, never to be wielded in polite company—and absolutely never, never to the face of its subject!

Luo Binghe’s mouth falls open just a little.

What? Did you think Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t dare to correct your manners just because you’re a heavenly demon now? Too bad for you! Discovering you’re a heavenly demon is going around, didn’t you hear?

Teach your henchmen better, Luo-da-ge! They make you look bad!

Gongyi Xiao, being the righteous little beacon of hope that he is, immediately steps forward. “I will apologise on behalf of Huan Hua Palace for offending you. Senior Shen, please accept my apology,” he says, bowing forward at the waist.

Shen Qingqiu catches his elbows. “Gongyi Xiao has done nothing wrong.” Here, he directs the full ice-cold force of the original goods’ glare over the boy’s shoulder at the other disciples. “If those in the wrong do not dare to apologise, how can this master accept yours?”

Shaking his head, Shen Qingqiu stares down the little delinquents.

Don’t try to bully someone far older and more intelligent than you! Shen Qingqiu hadn’t allowed himself to be bullied by children when he was child! Do you think he’s going to let them do it when he’s an old man?!

If anyone has earned the right to be a bitch, it’s him!

“You stand around me, offering insults, and drawing your blades, but have you thought for a moment what would happen if I were to draw Xiu Ya too?”

He actually does draw Xiu Ya. Lets the intakes of breath buoy him. Then, after a moment in which he feels a thrill of righteous vindication, Shen Qingqiu steps to the side, and uses his blade to cut the sower out of its clothes, confirming its identity.

Not satisfied with being sidelined by the scum villain, Qin Wanyue still has the nerve to pipe up after the Huan Hua disciples’ dressing down. Shen Qingqiu supposes that kind of confidence must come from being the first to take a ride to pound town on the Heavenly Pillar Express.

“Luo-shixiong already figured out it was a sower. He explained it all to us ages ago!”

“Does Luo Binghe need you to talk for him too?” Shen Qingqiu asks. Which is apparently true, considering he has stood there this whole time in some kind of stupor ever since Shen Qingqiu’s tirade.

Holy shit. I stunlocked the protagonist!

Qin Wanyue stutters, unable to produce anything worth hearing, which is hardly a change, turning to look at all of her comrades-in-arms, and finding nothing of worth there either.

Don’t come after him, Little Miss My-dying-wish-is-a-pounding! If you want to go bitch for bitch, Shen Qingqiu has you beaten!

Indeed, Shen Qingqiu has read her every whining internal and external monologue in the Immortal Alliance Conference chapters of PIDW: ‘Oh, Luo-shixiong, you’re so big, and strong, and handsome! Please don’t let me die this most accursed of creatures: a virgin!’

Shen Qingqiu is going to die a virgin too, and he’s an old man already! You don’t see him asking Luo-da-ge to give him a thorough drilling just to take the edge off! There are worse things than dying a virgin, okay? You could die stupid!

In Shen Qingqiu’s opinion, the world would have been a better place if she’d just shut her mouth and her legs, and let fate have her.

Luo Binghe clears his throat. “Everything I know was taught to me by Shizun,” he says, though his voice is a little weak. When Shen Qingqiu looks at him, Luo Binghe smiles, but something in his eyes makes him look unsure. How odd. Perhaps because he’d speedrun levelling up, Luo Binghe is not quite at his full stallion persona level yet.

No matter.

“How can this master dare to accept such praise?” Shen Qingqiu says, letting Xiu Ya fall back to his side. “Your manners today were certainly not taught by me.”

Again, Luo Binghe’s mouth falls open as though to argue his innocence. Shen Qingqiu glares him down.

Aren’t these your henchmen? If you don’t approve of their behaviour, how would they dare to act this way?!

Alright. Enough of this extraneous stuff.

“Since the sower was caught by a disciple of Huan Hua Palace, this master must ask that you allow Mu-shidi to study it in order to formulate a cure. We must not allow the people of Jinlan to suffer any longer.”

Luo Binghe steps forward. “Shizun, it wasn’t a disciple of—”

Shen Qingqiu raises an eyebrow. “Are you refusing?”

“No, I… it will be as Shizun says.”

With a nod of his head, and a flick of his sleeves, Shen Qingqiu leaves without another word. Honestly, it’s all too creepy! Huan Hua Palace might as well be a sect made up entirely of evil little puppets for all that they seem to have a single, unified personality. Only Gongyi Xiao seems to be different.

Speaking of which, the boy, not yet done apologising, apologises once again. “Senior Shen,” he says, bowing politely as soon as he catches up to him outside. “Please accept my apology for keeping it a secret that Luo-shixiong was with Huan Hua Palace. My master strictly forbade us from allowing outsiders to know.”

Really? Shen Qingqiu hadn’t taken you for a weasel, young man! Aren’t you righteousness personified—willing to die rather than ever be unjust?

He won’t forget about this! It’s going to take more than a ‘sorry I let you walk into a trap care of Luo Binghe totally unprepared!’

In another life, Shen Qingqiu might have felt sorry for the poor boy so easily sidelined by the protagonist—his entire life stepped into by someone else, as though he were just keeping it warm for them the whole time. But in this life, Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon, dealing with the intensity of a heavenly demon’s feelings, and the newness of all of it.

If he’d dared to reprimand Qin Wanyue in front of her future lord husband, how could he not dare to tell off Gongyi Xiao too?!

“How can this master be considered an outsider?” he asks, voice emotionless. “I am Luo Binghe’s shizun, am I not? Or is it that Huan Hua Palace would dare to stand between a master and his disciple? Perhaps Huan Hua Palace is afraid of what I would do should I find out.”

Nervous and afraid, and the only righteous creature to have ever graced the halls of Huan Hua Palace’s disciple domitories, Gongyi Xiao drops to his knees in front of Shen Qingqiu. “This junior was wrong! Please, Senior Shen, punish me.”

“What are you doing?” Shen Qingqiu asks mutedly. “How can I dare to do so? That Huan Hua Palace would keep my disciple from me is hardly the responsibility of Gongyi Xiao alone. It is, however, something I will be bringing to the attention of my Zhangmen-shixiong at the earliest possible convenience.” With that, he breezes past the boy, and off into the plague city, where he’s more welcome.

Take that, little weasel, see if Yue-shixiong doesn’t make the Old Palace Master quiver in fear for offending Shen Qingqiu!

Ah, perhaps he’d been a little harsh.

Gongyi Xiao is not a bad guy, and those puppets really are just children. Indeed, Shen Qingqiu’s scolding of them had been so severe, he had actually seen them take spiritual damage!

Meh. Maybe he’ll smooth things over later.

Or maybe not. They started the bitch fight. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t needed help to finish it.

He lifts his hand as though to fan himself, and part of his fan crumbles away.

Ah.

He really had been too shocked when he saw his charred bun already out of the abyss, and climbing the ranks of Huan Hua Palace years early.

Shen Qingqiu’s hand is soft and pale around his broken fan, which is odd. Wasn’t he infected?

Oh, right, heavenly demon blood!

Shen Qingqiu forgot even his blood had had an upgrade! Forget a sower’s rash—even Without-a-Cure cannot touch him now!

Having read more than a thousand chapters of Luo Binghe’s struggles to teach himself how to use all of his heavenly demon abilities alone, Shen Qingqiu feels like he has something of a leg up here. He commands his blood mites in the same way that he’d read Luo Binghe doing when he finally managed to get it right, and sends the order to fake having been infected.

Several red splotches reappear on his hand in the exact appearance and manner that they had appeared after the fake old lady bumped into him.

Excellent!

Shen Qingqiu is really managing this whole heavenly demon thing masterfully!

Yeah, he was supposed to be keeping a low profile—part of the conditions laid out by Yue Qingyuan for allowing him to tag along in the first place, and part of Liu Qingge’s demands when he had left him earlier.

Oh, well. Liu Qingge probably didn’t really expect him to.

Sorry, Liu-da-ge, your favourite shixiong has just been getting himself into trouble again! Are you surprised?

(Somewhere, charging about Jinlan City, Liu Qingge shudders, and knows that Shen Qingqiu is the fucking reason why!)

Chapter Text

The Protagonist, Luo ‘My First Word was Shizun’ Binghe (◍•ᴗ•◍) [Shizun, Shizun, Shizun!]

vs.

The Communication Barrier Between Himself and the Ethereal Creature Known as Shen Qingqiu  ༘₍ᐢ._.ᐢ₎🤚🏻 [Sorry, we don’t accept human language here!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Shen Qingqiu is fucking hot.

This is not news.

This is an inexorable fact of Luo Binghe’s life that he has long dedicated to memory, alongside things like ‘the sky is blue,’ ‘Ming Fan is an idiot,’ and ‘Liu Qingge can’t be trusted around Shizun.’

The empirical evidence from Luo Binghe’s years spent sharing his shizun’s house had been enough alone to prove the concept of his incredible beauty. Much of the suffering of Luo Binghe’s teenage years can even be traced back to this very truth!

Shen Qingqiu. Fucking hot.

No one would argue against it. Luo Binghe kind of wishes they would. He’d have an easier time of it if people agreed with him a little less on his shizun’s attractiveness.

Unfortunately, he is not so lucky.

Shen Qingqiu is a beauty. And all around him must suffer because of it.

Luo Binghe’s mind can’t stop circling back to this most undeniable of facts, the same way his eyes cannot leave his shizun’s perfect face.

Maybe it’s because it’s Luo Binghe’s first time standing before him as an adult, ready for anything that could happen between them. The part of Luo Binghe which had once run from Shen Qingqiu out of embarrassment and the desperate need to not have his shizun notice his physical reaction to him now no longer exists, and a very bold part has risen up in its place.

Luo Binghe will not run. Perhaps he even wants Shen Qingqiu to notice.

In any case, Luo Binghe hasn’t been this close to Shen Qingqiu in years, and the beauty of the man is a thing he cannot escape.

“Shizun,” he breathes, and it’s not even a matter of intention. Shen Qingqiu is right there, how can Luo Binghe not call out to him?

The truth is, Shizun would look good wearing a sack, rolling about on the ground, his hair streaked with mud. The same way he looks good when he first rises for the day, long silky hair uncombed, the imprint of his pillow on his face, his fine brows drawn together in a fierce but cute scowl—like a toddler frowning because he’s become tired and inconsolable.

Shen Qingqiu is always particularly crabby first thing in the morning. And always particularly breathtaking.

Shit. Luo Binghe can’t be thinking about this right now. He may not mind Shen Qingqiu noticing how he reacts to him anymore, but that doesn’t mean he wants to share it with a bunch of outsiders too. There are so many people around, and he’s supposed to be telling these Huan Hua losers what a sower is.

Why don’t they know? Aren’t they cultivators? Why are they all so fucking incompetent? Luo Binghe can’t imagine. He had an actually (scarily) competent teacher, after all.

Wait… is Shen Qingqiu running away?!

Luo Binghe calls out as sweetly as he can, even with Gongyi-fucking-Xiao practically hanging off of Shen Qingqiu like that isn’t Luo Binghe’s place! “It really is Shizun.”

Of course it’s really Shizun. Luo Binghe hadn’t needed to see the jade-like beauty of his face to know. He could recognise Shen Qingqiu by scent alone.

On a completely unrelated note, he sniffs the air, the smell of jasmine and green tea reaching his demon-enhanced sense of smell. The sweetness of a spring breeze through the bamboo forests of home. And something else around the edges that’s just too tantalising to name.

The man is perfection to every one of his senses.

Shen Qingqiu turns to face him. Luo Binghe can only smile.

His shizun looks exactly the same as always—but also like his natural beauty has intensified somehow. Like the years between them have done more than just add the blink of an eye to a cultivator’s lifetime.

Luo Binghe can’t quite put his finger on it.

“Shizun even changed his hair,” he points out, though that alone could not account for the difference. He wants to reach out, to touch that beautiful silken hair. Hair that had once been his to tend. Shizun had always found the task tedious and unrewarding, but hadn’t baulked at Luo Binghe doing it in his stead, despite the intimacy of it all.

(Had Luo Binghe also smelled it every chance he got back then while Shizun either wasn’t paying attention or had actually dozed off in the chair? Yes. Yes, he had. He’s not even sorry. Luo Binghe is a greedy creature, and Shen Qingqiu is all the treasures in this world.)

Hair the colour of the midnight sky. Eyes as starry and wide as any galaxy. Luo Binghe looks into them and sees the meaning of life, the answers to all the questions in the universe. The secrets of his own heart.

Anything else that might be happening—say, with the Huan Hua Palace disciples who might as well not exist for all the space they take up in Luo Binghe’s consciousness—he cannot say. Shizun is the world, and Luo Binghe is merely a little soul caught in his vortex.

Shen Qingqiu picks up the hem of his luxurious robes, and takes a step forward, finishing his ascent of the stairs, and coming to stand at last toe to toe with Luo Binghe on even ground.

“Binghe,” he says, that sweet lilting voice drowning out everything else in the world. Shen Qingqiu should only ever say his name. Should only speak to him. And whatever else the people around them are squawking about, Luo Binghe does not have a clue. Something fries in his brain with that one word.

Shen Qingqiu clears his throat. “What’s going on?” he asks.

Was his voice always that sultry? It was of course, but there also seems to be an extra layer to it now.

Is he doing it on purpose?

That can’t be the case. Shen Qingqiu would never openly try to sound so… so provocative. He’s never needed to, for one thing, his natural appeal more than enough to attract everyone who so much as walks past him in the street. For another—

See, the thing is, Luo Binghe had lived with Shen Qingqiu for three years. Which is perhaps not a long time from an immortal cultivator standpoint, but to Luo Binghe, that had been a large chunk of his total lifetime. And Shen Qingqiu, when measured against that life, had been (is) an even bigger fraction of it than simply the time he has spent in it.

And the other thing is, when you spend that kind of one-on-one intimate time with someone, you learn about them. Shen Qingqiu… is not a man who understands his own appeal. Nor acknowledges it exists. Luo Binghe remembers trying to convince him Liu Qingge had ulterior motives towards him. The whole conversation had been an ordeal of repetition and frustration. Like they were talking different languages but still using the same words, his shizun so violently sure of his own lack of appeal that he actually thought Luo Binghe was talking about Liu Qingge wanting to kill him instead!

‘You,’ he’d wanted to say, ‘are beloved by all. Desired by all. You will never make your interest in another known, and be denied.’

Does Shizun still not understand his own appeal? What did Tianlang-Jun do to make him realise he was wanted? Or was that just a medical matter to Shen Qingqiu? A way to neatly heal himself from an affliction he had long suffered? It must have been, right? His shizun would never willingly be with a heavenly demon without extreme extenuating circumstances.

Luo Binghe shakes away the thought, lets it shake him to the core besides. He looks at Shen Qingqiu. Looks at his cold beauty, and his warm eyes. And he hungers.

Shizun always looks so put-together, a statue made from jade, as beautiful and unmoved as the gods. Is it wrong that Luo Binghe wishes he was a little more… moved by his disciple’s return?

Luo Binghe had often dreamt of a reunion involving more tears and assorted bodily fluids and his master hanging from his arms, wailing. A scandalous dream, to be sure, but in the barrenness of the Endless Abyss, only dreams such as these could keep him going.

Shen Qingqiu is turning his best teacher glare on the rabble around them, looking disapproving and hot. Luo Binghe is a man lost in his own desires. Lost to Shen Qingqiu’s ethereal beauty. Lost until—

He gets a faceful of Gongyi-fucking-Xiao, inserting himself between Luo Binghe and the one true love of his life.

“Put your weapons away! Is this how you represent Huan Hua Palace?!”

Luo Binghe blinks. When did these assholes draw their weapons? He can only blame his lack of awareness on Shen Qingqiu’s aura, and the fact that if Huan Hua had really tried to start some shit, a single burst of Luo Binghe’s demonic qi would have driven them all to their knees at Shen Qingqiu’s feet. His shizun was never in any danger, and never will be. Not while Luo Binghe breathes.

Shen Qingqiu’s beautiful face turns a kind smile upon Gongyi Xiao. That’s—

That’s Binghe’s look!

Gongyi Xiao is unworthy! Luo Binghe hadn’t even had to try especially hard when he got to Huan Hua Palace to outshine him entirely, taking both his (wanted) place as head disciple and his (unwanted) place as the focal point of the Little Palace Mistress’ attention—to say nothing of all the other women.

“How can you have time for this?” Qin Wanyue wails.

Where did she come from? Why is she so loud? Can’t she see Shen Qingqiu is standing there, being hot? Who wants to listen to her?

“Shouldn’t we all be focused on helping Luo-shixiong?! That useless thing hurt him! Why is no one trying to help Luo-shixiong?!”

Shen Qingqiu’s eyes rake over Luo Binghe, sending a delicious shiver straight up his spine, and back down again. No plague could ever hurt him—something Shen Qingqiu must know. He’d known more about heavenly demons than Luo Binghe had at the edge of the abyss. And whilst Luo Binghe may be a heavenly demon, he would hasten to bet that his voracious reader of a shizun still knows more than him on the subject.

“You were hurt?” Shen Qingqiu asks, eyes lingering on Luo Binghe’s bare wrist, the fake sower’s rash visible for all to see.

Shizun is talking to him!

To avoid his voice coming out as a shrill squawk, Luo Binghe breathes deeply, and then shakes his head, trying to channel the confident, magnanimous persona he’s been practising entirely for this moment. “I’m fine,” he says. “What matters is that no one else was hurt.”

“Luo-shixiong is so brave. He only got hurt because he cares so much that he protected us!”

Luo Binghe only ‘got hurt’ because it pleased him to do so. It’s hard to accuse someone of being a heavenly demon and have other people believe you if that person is actively suffering from a sower’s rash! It has literally nothing to do with Qin Wanyue, and never did. As soon as Luo Binghe realised he and Shen Qingqiu would be meeting again here, it was basically Step One in his Seduce Shizun Manifesto.

“Senior Shen must be so happy to hear about Luo-shixiong’s suffering!”

Luo Binghe stares at Shen Qingqiu’s impassive face. At the slight drawing together of his brows as he turns his gaze on Luo Binghe.

He’s so pretty!

Luo Binghe can barely breathe. He’s almost trembling in anticipation.

“Nonsense!” Shen Qingqiu barks, startling everyone around them, including that turd, Gongyi Xiao. That suits Luo Binghe just fine. Shen Qingqiu should be displeased with them. Luo Binghe can be good for him! Everyone else is just a letdown. Luo Binghe will be so good!

Although…

How can he get Shen Qingqiu to speak to him like that? Perhaps in a more intimate setting without all these outsiders around? Perhaps whilst holding a whip or a cane… or Xiu Ya?

Shen Qingqiu smiles, a sharpness to the edge of it making Luo Binghe tremble. “Is this how Huan Hua Palace teaches their disciples to treat the elders of other sects? If you feel you can speak to me in this manner without consequence, how must you speak about me when I cannot hear you?”

Something in Luo Binghe’s mind shifts all the way to the side. Shizun never argues with those beneath him. He finds it to be ‘punching down,’ as he’d put it. Something beneath someone as lofty and powerful as him. The fact that he’s doing it here and now is—

It’s fucking hot.

He watches his shizun round on one of the Huan Hua disciples whose name Luo Binghe had never bothered to learn. Watches him eviscerate him with his eyes.

“Certainly,” Shen Qingqiu says, flashing those bright eyes towards Luo Binghe, “I taught Luo Binghe better than this.”

What?!

But… but Luo Binghe’s innocent! He isn’t with them! They don’t speak for him! He hasn’t even been listening to what they’ve been saying!

Luo Binghe is barely a moment away from throwing himself to his knees at his shizun’s feet when—

The usurper, Gongyi Xiao, steps forward and bows to Shen Qingqiu in his place! “I will apologise on behalf of Huan Hua Palace for offending you. Senior Shen, please accept my apology,” he says.

That’s his place, apologising to Shizun, and wheedling to get back into his good graces!

Shen Qingqiu even catches the boy’s elbows! “Gongyi Xiao has done nothing wrong.”

The shiver that runs the length of Luo Binghe’s spine at his shizun’s icy glare sweeping over him would be delicious if it wasn’t accompanied by him lumping Luo Binghe in with those Huan Hua losers, and singling Gongyi Xiao out!

“If those in the wrong do not dare to apologise, how can this master accept yours?”

Shizun! This Binghe has been wronged!

“You stand around me, offering insults, and drawing your blades, but have you thought for a moment what would happen if I were to draw Xiu Ya too?”

He actually does draw Xiu Ya.

It’s the first time Luo Binghe has seen it since the edge of the abyss—the blade brilliant and bright and stained with Luo Binghe’s own blood. Luo Binghe kind of wants to see it that way again. Some part of Shizun should always be covered in some part of him.

If it has to be Xiu Ya and Luo Binghe’s blood, so be it.

“Luo-shixiong already figured out it was a sower,” Qin Wanyue wails. “He explained it all to us ages ago!”

Shen Qingqiu’s glare is enough to turn the lava pits of the Endless Abyss to ice, cold enough to burn. “Does Luo Binghe need you to talk for him too?” he asks.

No! That girl doesn’t have a clue what I’m thinking, Shizun! This Binghe can speak for himself!

In an effort to do so, Luo Binghe clears his throat. “Everything I know was taught to me by Shizun,” he says. And maybe it’s a little weaker than he would have liked, but nothing about this first meeting has gone the way he’d planned! His nerves are a little frayed. Even when Shen Qingqiu looks at him, Luo Binghe can’t make his smile anything more than watery.

“How can this master dare to accept such praise?” Shen Qingqiu says, letting Xiu Ya fall to his side. “Your manners today were certainly not taught by me.”

His glare disarms Luo Binghe entirely.

“Since the sower was caught by a disciple of Huan Hua Palace, this master must ask that you allow Mu-shidi to study it in order to formulate a cure. We must not allow the people of Jinlan to suffer any longer.”

No! Shizun, Binghe is your disciple! Yours!

Luo Binghe can’t allow this misunderstanding to persist! He steps forward. “Shizun, it wasn’t a disciple of—”

Shen Qingqiu raises a cold, beautiful eyebrow. “Are you refusing?”

How can he explain if Shizun won’t even let him profess his undying loyalty to his one true master?!

“No, I… it will be as Shizun says.”

With a nod of his head, and a flick of his sleeves, Shen Qingqiu leaves without another word. Luo Binghe stands in shock.

What just happened?!

Was this some kind of fever dream? Was the last incense time really spent with Shen Qingqiu openly mocking the Huan Hua Palace disciples’ strength, intelligence and competence in increasingly catty and attractive ways?

Is Luo Binghe having some kind of medical emergency?

How could Shen Qingqiu have changed so much in his absence? Or… or was Shizun always like this? Perhaps where Luo Binghe couldn’t see him?

He knows Shen Qingqiu had often liked to gossip with him when they shared the bamboo house. It hadn’t been all that unusual for him to verbally tear people apart with efficiency and precision when they weren’t around to hear him. But Luo Binghe had always assumed that no one outside of the place they shared their most intimate moments had ever had the privilege of witnessing such a thing.

(Luo Binghe thinks feeding Shen Qingqiu his cooking is the height of romance and intimacy, and frankly, so does Shen Qingqiu even though he doesn’t know himself well enough to even think about it. So, of course, they both equally think the bamboo house is the most intimate place in the world.)

In these moments, he had most often spoken of an author called ‘Airplane.’ And although Luo Binghe had been scouring the libraries and book shops he’d come across ever since he learned the kind of stories his shizun likes to read, he’d never found any such person.

Shen Qingqiu had always made it clear that Luo Binghe should never let any of what he said reach outsiders—that although he had certain (brutal) opinions about people, he didn’t actually want to hurt them. It was only with Binghe that he desired to share them, not with the people he was eviscerating.

Luo Binghe doesn’t have words.

He stands there blinking, trying to reconcile what he knows about kind, sweet Shizun with the sultry creature who just walked all over Huan Hua Palace and left, hips sashaying, not a care in the world.

He wants to spend all day thinking about it (and all night), but Gongyi Xiao has trailed after Shizun like he thinks he’s Shen Qingqiu’s disciple! Luo Binghe can’t let that stand!

He pushes outside just in time to see Gongyi Xiao drop to his knees in front of Shen Qingqiu. “This junior was wrong! Please, Senior Shen, punish me.”

That’s—that’s Luo Binghe’s fucking place, on his knees, begging to be punished by Shizun!

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

When Luo Binghe had heard that Cang Qiong was sending a delegation to Jinlan to deal with the recent epidemic and that Shen Qingqiu would be one of them, he’d discarded all his plans just to be there to see him again.

To protect him again.

Originally, he hadn’t intended to see Shizun again until he was sure of his footing, already well established as Huan Hua Palace’s new palace master. He hadn’t intended to see him before Luo Binghe had an entire sect of righteous cultivators behind him to say that he was right and good and as human as any of them.

But in the face of danger to his shizun, Luo Binghe really is still just that little disciple Shen Qingqiu had given a home, and doted upon.

He hadn’t been able to help himself. What if Shen Qingqiu had contracted the plague, and his already weakened health was adversely affected?

Shang Qinghua may be right that Without-a-Cure no longer bothers him, but Luo Binghe hasn’t been able to verify that for himself yet. And if there is one thing his shizun is prone to doing, it’s putting himself in danger for the sake of people who don’t matter.

In a million lifetimes, Luo Binghe couldn’t have stood idly by. His heavenly demon blood is the cure. The perfect defence against any plague.

Really, from the moment he’d found out that Shen Qingqiu would be there, Luo Binghe couldn’t have been anywhere else.

The trouble had been that he had to take the Huan Hua Palace disciples with him. Of course the Old Palace Master wouldn’t allow Luo Binghe to go without sending a gaggle of his own for what the old lizard had termed ‘support,’ but which Luo Binghe knows to be an attempt to grab glory.

The Old Palace Master is no fool. From what he has already seen, he must have known that Luo Binghe would return from Jinlan victorious.

But Luo Binghe refuses to call him ‘Shizun,’ nor to dissolve his connection to Shen Qingqiu—sweetly, and with the charm he has learned means he will get his own way—but refuses nonetheless.

So if Luo Binghe were to succeed in Jinlan City, wouldn’t that just be saying that Shen Qingqiu, and thus Cang Qiong, had succeeded, no Huan Hua Palace required?

The Old Palace Master couldn’t allow that.

Beyond that, Luo Binghe can admit that he’d needed the legitimacy of Huan Hua to be able to approach Shizun again and not have him react as he had on the edge of the abyss—wasn’t that the entire point?

So Luo Binghe had been forced to meet Shizun for the first time in years surrounded by a flock of clucking hens. He’d been forced to tune them out as they’d disrespected Shen Qingqiu, being rude, and carrying on like Luo Binghe would ever look between Shen Qingqiu and them, and choose them.

What a joke!

If his master had commanded him to cut them all down then and there, he would not have thought twice.

And instead, Luo Binghe had been chastised along with them. Meanwhile, Gongyi-fucking-Xiao could stand next to Shizun, and be praised and touched by him!

Luo Binghe is so angry, his heavenly demon features threaten to force themselves to the surface even though he has long gained firm control over them.

Part of the reason he hadn’t intended to see Shen Qingqiu sooner is that Luo Binghe had known he would go weak, laying aside his plans—that he would want to fall to his knees, begging for a reconciliation. He’d known he would be a quiet thing, waiting for Shen Qingqiu to say something he could work with. To have some small indication of where to start to get back into his good graces.

The trouble is most of that conversation had left Luo Binghe on the back foot, unsure of where to go to move forward. Every moment, Luo Binghe’s skin had been itching with the desire to rear up, and attest, ‘I’m not with them, Shizun!’

Of all the things Shen Qingqiu desires disciples to be: small and cute is the first, and competent is the second.

If you can’t be the first, you had better be the second.

Huan Hua Palace possesses neither category in any great abundance, accepting all those who can pay their way rather than those with talent. And the Old Palace Master only sends out those who are too old to be cute, and too young (and ill-taught) to be competent.

By the law of averages, even a truly worthless sect would have at least one worthwhile disciple—the same way that even the best sect could have a good-for-nothing in their midst.

Gongyi Xiao, as much as he hates to admit it, was the only good part of Huan Hua Palace before Luo Binghe arrived. The rest—even Qin Wanyue, who had thought herself saving a horrifically injured mortal disciple when she found him—are all worthless creatures.

What Qin Wanyue had seen when she looked at him, bloody and half-crazed, was an opportunity. She had noticed him at the Immortal Alliance Conference—everyone had. She had noticed his skill, and the fact that he would become something powerful one day. And that he was nice to look at.

Luo Binghe is living under no illusions that he is unpalatable to the eye. The amount of women who have thrown themselves at him since even before he left the safety of Shizun’s home is no small number.

Even back then, they’d looked at him as a chance. A bet to be made on the future. As Shen Qingqiu’s most favoured disciple, the worst he could do was become a rich and revered immortal cultivator. Hardly a poor choice if left at that. The fact that he was beautiful too had just driven home the need for them to get in there early. To try to stake a claim before he was old enough to know any better.

Luckily for Luo Binghe, he had learnt the nature of his heart early. The only person whose advances would have been welcome were those of the man who had sheltered him when he was nothing.

Glory hounds, and people looking to profit off of latching onto him—the entirety of Huan Hua Palace—are merely courting their own destruction.

He wonders what the Old Palace Master would think of the fact that Luo Binghe, the disciple he so desperately wants for himself and Huan Hua—the disciple who had so easily won that ill-fated Immortal Alliance Conference despite being dragged down by Huan Hua disciples—had come from the streets.

If Shizun hadn’t given him a home, wiped the dirt off his face with his own precious hands, and taught him everything he knows about both cultivation, and every obscure plant and creature in this world, there would be nothing of him to want.

Shizun had believed in him when he was nothing. Why now, when he is worth Huan Hua’s attention only because Shen Qingqiu had made him so, would he ever look their way?

There is only one who deserves his love and attention. And only one whose love and attention Luo Binghe desires.

Lobbing the sower’s corpse over his shoulder, Luo Binghe pushes his way out into the street, racing after Shen Qingqiu. The Huan Hua Palace disciples all startle, and scatter. He’s already far ahead by the time they compose themselves enough to rush after him—too far ahead for them to ever keep up.

If there’s one thing to feel grateful towards his heavenly demon blood for, it’s his ability to outperform any normal cultivators. Those of Huan Hua, who had only survived the Immortal Alliance Conference because he and Shizun had been there to protect them, cannot even be considered normal cultivators.

By the time he gets to the Jinzi Weapons Shop where the Cang Qiong delegation are stationed, he sees Liu Qingge pushing Shen Qingqiu into a chair. “Sit,” the man says, and points right at Shen Qingqiu. “Wait.”

Shen Qingqiu frowns, always unhappy to be sidelined. “I’m going too!”

He stands, and is pushed back into the seat again. “You would only slow me down,” Liu Qingge barks.

Luo Binghe conceals himself to watch.

“Shen-shixiong, Liu-shixiong has told me you haven’t been willing to get your meridians cleared recently,” Mu Qingfang says. “Have you at least taken your medicine?”

Luo Binghe recognises the look of his shizun feeling aggrieved. It’s not quite the same look he’d given Luo Binghe whenever the boy prepared his medicine without telling him—that look always had a touch of fondness around the edges, as much as he berated Luo Binghe for disregarding his master’s authority.

Although such a thing could never be true—his master’s authority is absolute—the man does sometimes need a little extra coaxing towards the most agreeable outcome.

The last time Luo Binghe had prepared his medicine and some sweets to take the edge off the bitterness, he had actually grown bold enough to place the sweet in Shen Qingqiu’s mouth himself.

His dear shizun had been in the process of arguing that he was not a child, and didn’t need to be prodded into taking his medicine (Shizun has a great many virtues, but self-awareness is not one of them), when Luo Binghe, driven by temporary madness and a boldness caused by his shizun’s own indulgence of him, had simply popped the sweet between those lush, pink lips himself.

For the most infinitesimal of moments, the tip of Luo Binghe’s thumb had sat upon Shen Qingqiu’s tongue. Both of them had frozen, just staring at each other, Shizun’s brows drawn together in the closest thing to shock that ever appears on his face.

For that moment, although it almost drives Luo Binghe mad to think it even now, it could be said that Shen Qingqiu had tasted Luo Binghe.

Luo Binghe shakes his head.

He can’t be thinking about this right now. That way can only lead to him making mistakes.

But if Mu Qingfang is asking about medicine, and talking about Shen Qingqiu’s meridians needing cleared, does that mean that Cang Qiong don’t know that Without-a-Cure is no longer a problem? Or that Shang Qinghua was mistaken?

It would make sense that Shen Qingqiu would be unwilling to tell righteous cultivators that he had cured himself by dual-cultivating with a heavenly demon—especially one that Cang Qiong had been partly responsible for imprisoning.

But it would also make sense with everything Luo Binghe knows about his shizun, that Shang Qinghua had simply added together the pieces of the puzzle he himself knows—that Without-a-Cure can only be cured by dual cultivation with a heavenly demon, and that Shen Qingqiu is now cured—and come to all the necessary conclusions on his own without thought for corroboration.

“Shen-shixiong mustn’t overexert himself. Liu-shixiong is right in that you should stay here and rest, lest a bout of Without-a-Cure put you both in a perilous position. I will prepare your medicine,” Mu Qingfang says, and Luo Binghe knows that he is also saying: ‘And I will watch you take it!’

It calms something in him to know that he is not the only one who has noticed that Shen Qingqiu is patently unwilling or unable to take care of himself without external force, but it also makes something inside him open its hungry maw. Nobody can be allowed to know such intimate details of his master’s personality and life as Luo Binghe himself does.

“When you’re done, you should go up to your room to rest,” Mu Qingfang adds, with the tone of a man used to talking unruly children into taking their medicine. “Liu-shixiong can clear your meridians when he returns.”

Shen Qingqiu says nothing, but the dejectedness of his posture makes it obvious that he has mostly given up in the face of his martial siblings’ combined efforts against him. He stands anyway, and is pushed back down by Liu Qingge. Luo Binghe wants to rips his arms off for daring.

Mine! that creature inside him shrieks.

It shrieks again as Shen Qingqiu stands, and Liu Qingge pushes him down two more times.

“Liu-shidi must be careful,” Shen Qingqiu says eventually. “Don’t let any part of a sower’s skin touch you. It is highly infectious. Don’t be lured in. You must attack from a distance.”

Liu Qingge grunts, the brute’s preferred means of acknowledgement.

“Don’t be rash,” Shen Qingqiu scolds him, and Luo Binghe’s fist almost crushes the hilt of his sword to dust.

No one should ever, ever be on the other end of Shizun’s fond scolding but him! Definitely not Liu-fucking-Qingge, who isn’t intelligent enough to know to be grateful. The man just grunts again, and races out into the streets after the sowers.

Luo Binghe waits until Shen Qingqiu has taken his medicine, and gone to the weapons shop’s central courtyard to return to his upstairs room. Then he enters with the sower’s corpse for Mu Qingfang.

And then it’s time.

Time to go after his shizun. Time to finally have a private, civil conversation about the past.

And the future.

(Somewhere, not so far away, Shen Qingqiu shudders without knowing why, but very reasonably blames Airplane.)

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

When Luo Binghe was young and clueless and naive, he’d thought his shizun a little odd. A little strange for a cultivator—or a human besides.

Cultivators, especially those raised in a sect of Cang Qiong’s renown, are not lenient towards demons. They do not ask why something was done, only mete out punishment for it. They do not take into account shortages of native food supplies, habitat change, or breaches of territory as sufficient justification to attack humans. They don’t look for a solution that will result in everybody living—they kill the demon, and move on.

This is the justice of humans.

But Luo Binghe knows of more than one occasion—of more than seventeen—where his own precious shizun had gone out of his way to arbitrate fairly between humans and demons. Any other cultivator, even one predisposed to being upright and just, would have baulked at the idea of having to use up their own resources and time in order to reach such a conclusion. At the first sign of it being difficult in the way of talking to the demons involved, rather than in the way of brute force, all thoughts of true fairness and objectivity would have been long over.

Even from a day-to-day life standpoint, cultivators are taught to be cold creatures, stiff and boring. To dress themselves in countless layers of silk and gilded metal, to put distance between themselves and the secular world… to be paragons of virtue and class.

Most senior cultivators within a sect will not take a spouse, thinking worldly affairs to be beneath them, so consumed by cultivation, and the desire to be considered loftier than their peers.

Shizun is not like them. He has always been warm.

Ah, perhaps ‘always’ is the wrong way to put it. But Luo Binghe likes to consider that Shizun was always meant to be warm.

There had been rumours around the sect that the reason Shen Qingqiu’s personality had changed so abruptly is because the qi deviation he had had when Luo Binghe was fourteen had resulted in severe memory loss.

What kind of memory could be so awful that the forgetting of it could result in a shift so large?

It hardly matters. Luo Binghe is glad that it is gone, that it can no longer bother Shen Qingqiu as it once did.

What matters is that Shizun—warm, kind, fair Shizun—had stood at the edge of the abyss, and not given Luo Binghe a chance to explain. How is it, after everything they have been through together, that Shizun is so determined to misunderstand him?

Luo Binghe has never seen Shen Qingqiu react so strongly to mention of any demon as he had when he found out that Luo Binghe was a heavenly demon. He’d been scared. Actually scared. He’d looked cold and angry. But Luo Binghe had known him so long at that point. With time, and looking back on that moment in the dream realm over and over again, Luo Binghe had come to the conclusion that in those moments… he was scared.

Of what, Luo Binghe does not know.

Could the memory Shen Qingqiu had forgotten… could it have been about a heavenly demon?

Could all the times in Luo Binghe’s youth, when Shen Qingqiu had seemed especially cruel, been because he was scared? Because he lived his life in fear?

Could it really have been fear of him, this boy that he’d know for almost half Luo Binghe’s life? Or was it fear of something else?

Something niggles at the back of Luo Binghe’s mind, but the silence does not give weight to his thoughts.

All Luo Binghe wants—all he wants—is to have Shen Qingqiu look at him as he used to. To accept him in their shared spaces as he used to. To love him as he used to. But… will Shizun even listen to him, knowing what he is?

No matter what Luo Binghe says, Shizun seems unable or unwilling to hear him.

Chapter Text

Mr. Adaptable, Shen Qingqiu 🔥(„• ֊ •„)੭🔥 [This is fine!]

vs.

His Ult Ability to Make Himself Misunderstood &(᨟ ͜● ᨟)& [Oh, don’t worry, Binghe, Liu-shidi is only upset with me because I was naked last time!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

So, in retrospect (of the kind that comes with sitting down in a quiet room by yourself, and rehashing your entire day), perhaps Shen Qingqiu shouldn’t have rebuked Luo Binghe right to his face.

Or at all.

He doesn’t know what he was thinking. He’d even been mean to that poor steamed cabbage, Gongyi Xiao. The world has never known a less abrasive creature!

It’s like his old internet gremlin days all over again—one minute he’d be happily minding his own business, reading a chapter of a webnovel, and the next he’d be ripping Airplane a new asshole, and verbally eviscerating his entire family line.

Deserved, certainly called for… but perhaps unwise. Didn’t it just open him up to all the freaks and weirdos who had an opinion (the wrong one, so many wrong opinions, fuck’s sake, he’s never met so many people with the wrong opinions—)?

He still remembers the person who had told him: ‘Don’t worry. Luo Binghe won’t sleep with you anyway!’ Because Shen Qingqiu had dared to disparage the fact that Airplane had Luo Binghe seemingly trying to papapa his way through an entire matrilineal branch of a particular noble family.

What a joke!

When people start shit, Shen Qingqiu just seems to black out, and ream them out with the business end of a cactus. And he’s right to do it!

But maybe not this time, ah?

Shit, shit, shit!

Shen Qingqiu had actually dared to berate Luo Binghe, and Luo Binghe’s henchmen, and his starter girlfriend. To their faces!

Fuck!

If he wasn’t done for, he is now. In PIDW, even the people who had only thought very, very loudly about how stupid Qin Wanyue [insert air-headed harem member here] was had been invariably reduced to a human stain at the protagonist’s feet. And rightly so! Luo Binghe shouldn’t have to take anyone’s shit. Aren’t his wives an extension of himself?

It’s just hard. Shen Qingqiu had already been a somewhat prickly creature, delighting as much in showing his claws and teeth as in getting along with people—his life as Peerless Cucumber is evidence enough. But now that he is a heavenly demon with actual fucking claws and rip-your-throat-out fangs, who can blame him for his personality being a little sharper too?

Ah, yes… the other heavenly demon in town, that’s who!

If only Shen Qingqiu had been allowed to mooch a lift (and thus a bodyguard) off of Liu Qingge! But Liu Qingge, that grumpy shidi of his, hadn’t bothered to save him any face. Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon! He can keep up!

Liu Qingge also hadn’t left him any space to argue, which is why he’s stuck waiting around his room for the next thing to blow up in his face. After treating Luo Binghe and his groupies like that, there had been no fucking way he was going to sleep, alright?! So what else was he supposed to do but rehash the day’s events?

The trouble is… doing so had led him to feeling more like a viewer than a participant, and so he’d realised the crucial part—that he’d been so far up Luo Binghe’s asshole, if he’d spoken again, it would have come out of the protagonist’s very own mouth!

What the fuck is wrong with him? Sure, Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon now, but does that mean he can just walk up and slap Luo Binghe’s face?!

No!

He loses himself to thoughts of the many varied ways Luo Binghe had taken revenge for embarrassing him in the original novel. That boy had had a chip on his shoulder the size of the Endless Abyss—his revenge always had to be a hundred times worse than the treatment he had received. Will Shen Qingqiu’s end be worse then because when he fucked Luo Binghe over, the boy hadn’t been able to see it coming?

He isn’t even aware of the time when he hears two knocks on his door.

Oh, shit.

What’s he supposed to do about Liu Qingge? He’s spent all this time thinking about Luo Binghe, but Shen Qingqiu has more than one problem in his life right now! And they’re both big and grumpy members of his martial family, current and former!

Although he does need to talk to his irrepressible shidi—about things like protecting him from a heavenly demon out for his life and limbs—doing so in a private room will only make the man more eager to clear his meridians as a precautionary measure. Better to talk to him in a crowded street!

Oh, I’m sorry, Liu-shidi! Now’s not really the time, is it? Look at all these people! There’s a plague going around, didn’t you hear?

And probably the best moment to ask for help protecting himself against a heavenly demon is not the one directly preceeding the moment where he lets it slip that Shen Qingqiu is himself a heavenly demon! Liu Qingge already thinks he’s nuts. They’ve only just barely gotten past the whole ‘naked’ incident.

Wait.

“Ah, Liu-shidi?” he calls out. “I’m already naked!”

The sound of the room’s double doors splintering with the force of an angry heavenly demon far outclasses what Shen Qingqiu had managed to do to the bamboo house’s door just a few days ago.

And there stands Luo Binghe.

Shen Qingqiu was right. He shouldn’t have berated Luo Binghe or his cronies earlier. Now he’s fucking pissed!

“Shizun appears well,” Luo Binghe says, lips curved up at the corners in a way that feels entirely too sharp.

Oh, shit!

“Shizun really has become something of a promiscuous man.” Luo Binghe’s voice is sweet, but the words are anything but! “I didn’t believe the rumours, but now that I hear it from Shizun’s own lips, how could I dare to deny it?”

Shen Qingqiu’s left eye twitches. “Prom—” he tries, but the concept really is too ridiculous. “Promiscuous?!”

Shen Qingqiu is a pale-ass virgin, protagonist! Don’t mistake his lofty immortal appearance! Shen Qingqiu is a poser! A poser!

Luo Binghe swans over towards him, hands behind his back, smile never faltering for a second. “What else would Shizun call a man with multiple partners?”

Is… is this a trick question?! What would Shen Qingqiu call a man with six hundred wives, and another few hundred girlfriends/one-night-stands? He would call that man ‘Luo Binghe!’

“Indeed, this disciple heard much talk of you consorting with the heavenly demon, Tianlang-Jun.”

What the fuck?! Who’s been talking fucking shit about him? Such particular weird fucking shit.

“And here you are calling so sweetly for Liu Qingge—”

It really is clear that one man’s ‘calling sweetly’ is another man’s ‘refusal of entry.’

Out of habit, Shen Qingqiu tuts, and says, “Liu-shishu.”

What the fuck is wrong with him?! It’s like when he’d gone to Shang Qinghua after Without-a-Cure had blipped out of existence, and the man had told him that Shen Qingqiu is actually a heavenly demon, that he’d lost part of his self-preservation instinct! Like his mother’s cat going limp in the face of danger—only, Shen Qingqiu doesn’t go limp so much as go around bitch-slapping the protagonist!

Luckily, unlike poor little Momo the cat, Shen Qingqiu hasn’t lost all of his survival instinct. He grabs his fan, and fucks off out the window, darting off into the distance as soon as his feet hit the ground. In another life, dramatic irony would probably necessitate the arrival of a bout of Without-a-Cure right about now, but Shen Qingqiu can once again thank the original goods (not fucking Airplane!) for his foresight in being a heavenly demon.

Luo Binghe’s mocking voice follows him. “It seems like Shizun is willing to be intimate with everyone. It was only earlier today that he was being so kind and gentle to Gongyi Xiao.”

Kind and gentle? What scene were you watching, protagonist?! Shen Qingqiu had been an equal opportunities bitch earlier. Gongyi Xiao has been reamed out as thoroughly as you have!

Shen Qingqiu lifts his hem a little and runs faster, tearing through the alleys of Jinlan like a man fleeing from responsibility the morning after an ill-thought-out tryst.

“Shizun even had relations with a heavenly demon despite his claims that they are the one creature the heavens cannot tolerate,” Luo Binghe calls out, sounding closer. “It’s really making this disciple feel that there is something specific about him that Shizun objects to so. Won’t you tell this disciple what it is?”

Why does that sound so… so like a jilted maiden asking her former lover why he doesn’t want her anymore?!

Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel like this whole story is going off the rails. What better time to call in back up? 

“Liu Qingge!”

Really, if there’s a better time for his most brute force shidi to be standing next to him and grumpy, Shen Qingqiu doesn’t want to know what it is. Whereas before, he might have worried for his shidi’s sake to have him go up against the protagonist, now he’s got the backup of a heavenly demon shixiong right beside him!

“Shizun is still calling for Liu-shishu. Won’t Shizun call for this disciple instead?”

Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t dare!

He runs.

Could he jump on Xiu Ya and fly? Sure. But whilst he had easily been able to outrun Liu Qingge by such a method, Shen Qingqiu knows the rules of this world—the protagonist is the protagonist for a reason. When it comes to pure power output, no one can outperform Luo Binghe in a straight test. His only option is to weave his way through the streets long enough for Liu Qingge to get to him. And then they can stand side by side. One heavenly demon and one of the strongest cultivators in the world has to be at least enough to make Luo Binghe think twice, right?

Adrenaline spikes in his system, carrying him forward. Every time Luo Binghe gets close, Shen Qingqiu manages to duck around him and sprint into the distance, his robes a whisper of silk slipping through Luo Binghe’s grip.

In another life, perhaps Luo Binghe would simply be playing with his food at this point, but in this life, Shen Qingqiu is holding his own. A heavenly demon for only a few days, and already screwing over the protagonist!

Shen Qingqiu recognises the slight drawing together of the man’s brows as the confusion that it is as he sweeps past him. Luo Binghe quite rightfully can’t imagine how his once-sickly shizun can manage to keep evading him.

“Shizun is feeling so energetic tonight!”

What’s the matter, Luo-da-ge, did you expect Shen Qingqiu to just roll over? If you want his ass, you’re going to have to fight him for it!

Although Shen Qingqiu is certainly no protagonist, he is still a cultivator of no small renown, and of heavenly demon blood at that. He’s spent many years honing his skills with the enthusiasm of a NEET finding out that video games get to be real life now, only to then get a completely unwarranted upgrade later in life. He’s basically the anthropomorphism of the Lost Orphaned Royalty trope.

Everybody bow down! Shen Qingqiu is your king now!

So by the time Luo Binghe manages to slam him against the wall of an alley, striking the back of Shen Qingqiu’s head, neither can be said to be unaffected. They’re both out of breath, heaving great racking breaths into overworked lungs. Both glaring fiercely into each other’s eyes. Luo Binghe’s are the colour of blood, his zuiyin a fiery emblem on his pristine face. Shen Qingqiu is barely holding onto his own human disguise.

Something feral and old in him had forgotten why he was being chased, running purely for the thrill of it, for the feel of being nimble and free. For the thrill of being the most powerful creature Airplane had ever conceived of, only beaten by one of his own kind. And only because the story dictates that a post-blackening Luo Binghe can never, ever lose.

Even in this position, Shen Qingqiu can’t help the primal feeling surging up inside him.

Fight, it goads. Win.

There’s something strange about Shen Qingqiu in this moment. Something prickly and abrasive, and formerly known as Peerless Cucumber. Only now it has the diamond-hard claws and teeth of a heavenly demon that likes to play with its food, even if they’re buried just under the surface.

His hands go to Luo Binghe’s shoulders, nails digging into the meat of them. The fact that his claws don’t immediately come out and pincushion the protagonist is force of will alone. If this is what Luo Binghe would do to his decidedly human shizun, what the fuck would he be willing to do to his heavenly demon shizun? Shen Qingqiu isn’t going to find out, okay?!

It’s hard to breathe with Luo Binghe’s hand clutching his throat, holding his back against the wall. The coldness of the stone is doing its best to leech the heat right out of him. Which is its own method of choking him. Like jumping in an ice-cold lake, and having shock knock all the air out of you.

The back of his head pounds his pulse back to him, his vision swimming with sparks, and static.

Pressed close, and right in front of his face, Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel like Luo Binghe is even more peerlessly beautiful. Not a single one of Airplane’s countless descriptions over a thousand tawdry chapters had ever done the boy justice.

Even halfway to a concussion, Shen Qingqiu could never look away.

“Shizun doesn’t want to talk about Liu-shishu? That’s alright. We have plenty to talk about. I heard Shizun was out buying make-up for a young woman,” Luo Binghe says, voice velvety and smooth, even as it promises a terrible retribution.

Young woman, his ass! Is Shen Qingqiu a young woman?! He’s an old man, okay? He’s an old man or he’s your little wife—you pick!

Also… heard where? Where did you hear, protagonist?! Who’s keeping you up to date on the blow-by-blow of Shen Qingqiu’s daily life? Have you enquired about his laundry too?!

Luo Binghe is really creeping him out with all the weird threats he’s been making about Shen Qingqiu’s (imaginary) sex life. Is he trying to warn Shen Qingqiu off because even an imaginary woman must belong only to him? But that doesn’t make any fucking sense—Luo Binghe was talking about his own father a moment ago, and his martial uncle! It’s not like he wanted to be doing them instead.

(Not that Shen Qingqiu is doing them at all, please stop saying so!)

Unless it’s a kind of ‘nobody can be having as much sex as the protagonist’ sort of situation. But even that’s still a fucking weird thing to bring up to your shizun on the eve of your revenge. Isn’t Shen Qingqiu about to be human sticked? Why is Luo Binghe worrying about where he’s been putting his cucumber?

I haven’t been ploughing your women, okay, protagonist?!

No matter what Luo Binghe’s reasoning is for any of this, Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel that his poor downtrodden lotus’ blackening is entirely complete! How could this man really be described as the little lamb who had bleated ‘Shizun’ so mournfully for all those years whilst taking shelter in Shen Qingqiu’s vast shadow?

Breathing deeply, Luo Binghe shuts his fiery eyes for one moment, then two. When he opens them again, they’re back to their usual darkness, his zuiyin slipping under his human disguise alongside them.

Shen Qingqiu’s throat bobs against Luo Binghe’s hand. It’s uncomfortable, and makes that old, sharp thing inside him ache with the need to extend its claws. Under his nails, Luo Binghe’s shoulder muscles feel meaty and strong. Shen Qingqiu digs in a little.

Luo Binghe—whose non-strangling hand has been making a map of Shen Qingqiu’s face this whole time, like he’s feeling up one of his wives-to-be—blinks, and pulls it back. Those dark eyes, instead of continuing to hungrily eat Shen Qingqiu up, turns to the hand in question.

He rubs his thumb over his fingertips, back and forth, back and forth, staring at them, his brows drawn together. “When did Shizun start wearing make-up?” he asks, finally turning back to look at him.

Well, this is embarrassing.

“This master has never bought make-up for a young woman,” Shen Qingqiu says. It probably can’t hurt to make it clear that he hasn’t been moving in on any of the protagonist’s women, right?

Luo Binghe rubs at Shen Qingqiu’s forehead, where most of the make-up he is wearing is located. Shen Qingqiu knows he won’t find anything—although the heavenly demon in him feels scarily close to the surface, it hasn’t broken through yet.

“Why would Shizun feel the need to wear make-up all of a sudden?”

Who says it’s sudden? Maybe Shen Qingqiu likes painting his face, and wearing lingerie. What’s it to you?!

Luo Binghe, unsatisfied with what he has been able to find out, runs his hand through Shen Qingqiu’s subtly different hair. He holds it in his hand, neither gentle nor rough. “How much did Shizun change while this disciple was away?”

Shen Qingqiu looks away, holding off the need to clear his throat.

More than you know! Guess what, we’re birds from the same flock. Bees from the same hive. Without another way to put it, you and I, we come from the same hometown!

Briefly, he wonders if Luo Binghe would be willing to let him off gently purely for the fact that they are the last couple of able-bodied heavenly demons in existence. Ah, probably not, right? How could the protagonist stand to have competition? Wouldn’t keeping another heavenly demon around just be like asking for trouble to show up later?

Pity.

“Shizun is so attractive, but still feels the need to change his appearance. Is this disciple to think that Shizun has taken a younger lover, perhaps from amongst his own disciples?”

Ew. Okay, all the other accusations were weird enough, but this is too much! Have you met Shen Qingqiu’s disciples? Most of them are cute little beans, incapable of almost anything. And the rest still feel like his children!

Oh… wait. So Luo Binghe’s worried about Ning Yingying, and how she’s faring in a lecher’s care? So that’s what this has all been about. Finally, the world is starting to make sense again!

“This master does not touch children,” Shen Qingqiu says, glaring at Luo Binghe. If he makes nothing else clear, that is being underlined right the fuck now, okay?!

Luo Binghe’s hands tighten—both around his neck, and in his hair. “Not all of Shizun’s disciples are children.”

What the fuck is this about, protagonist?! Shen Qingqiu hasn’t been sniffing around your women, okay? He accepts he’s probably going to be a (temporary) stick—but he’s absolutely not becoming a eunuch!

Besides which, didn’t Shen Qingqiu raise Ning Yingying? Isn’t she the daughter of his heart? Doesn’t she deserve better than a man whose attention won’t stay on a single wife for more than half a day at a time once they’ve been amalgamated into his harem?

“Even so, they’re all my children. And what about you?” he asks, chin jutting forward. “How many little girlfriends have you had?”

The expression on Luo Binghe’s face is almost anger, or perhaps shock. Maybe something in between. “This disciple is chaste.”

Shen Qingqiu almost finds himself nodding in sympathy. Really—just two single men and former roommates hanging out in an alley, commiserating their lack of female companionship together. It might even explain why Luo Binghe seems so unable to curb the negative effects of Xin Mo if he has not been dual cultivating. At least some of his weird paranoia has to be caused by that, right?

Although it still brings up some concerning questions—like what the hell happened to Luo Binghe that he hasn’t been collecting wives and girlfriends like Shen Qingqiu had once collected PIDW merch? (Profligately and with little regard for quality.) And if he hasn’t been collecting them, why the hell is Qin Wanyue there? Shouldn’t she be dead or something?

Luo Binghe’s hand moves from Shen Qingqiu’s hair to his back. “My heart can be moved by only one person,” he says, “how could I dare to touch another?”

Ah, Yingying really is lucky.

Perhaps this is all for the best then. Perhaps Shen Qingqiu’s inclusion in the story has somehow changed Luo Binghe’s upbringing enough that he’s happy to be a monogamous man. Well, good, then. Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be happy to send any daughter of his off to be just one of several hundred. Who’d want one six-hundredth of a husband? Wouldn’t that be like seeing him for half a day every year? And that’s only if he never went to work!

Ning Yingying deserves better!

“What is Shizun thinking about that takes so much of his attention away from this disciple?”

“Ning Yingying, of course,” Shen Qingqiu says reasonably.

What is that expression, protagonist?!

Too scary!

“First Tianlang-Jun, then Liu-shishu, and now Ning Yingying. It would seem that Shizun’s preferences are not limited to humans or demons, to men or women, nor to older or younger lovers. Is there anyone that Shizun wouldn’t happily touch, or is it only this disciple?!”

What the fuck?! What is with this phrasing?

Before he can register his objections, Luo Binghe slams his hand against the wall next to Shen Qingqiu’s head so hard, the wall crumbles and the shockwave echoes around the alley.

Listen, okay? When Shen Qingqiu was young and thus a more dramatic creature, he might have once daydreamed about bidon (壁咚), and how it might apply to his life in any number of ways, but this isn’t really what he’d had in mind, okay?

Luo Binghe’s face is cold, and shadowed in a way that makes him appear almost ill. His dark eyes so human before are now the colour of hellfire, of destruction, of a heavenly demon’s inexorable rage.

“Wasn’t Shizun so eager to be naked for Liu-shishu before? Here,” he says, grasping hold of Shen Qingqiu’s collar. “Let this disciple help you.”

A few things happen all at once:

1. Luo Binghe yanks on Shen Qingqiu’s robes so hard that they split down the back, falling off his shoulder, leaving it entirely bare, pale skin on view for anyone to see. He shivers in the sudden cold.
2. Luo Binghe stops clutching him around the throat, instead raising that hand to cup the side of Shen Qingqiu’s face. His thumb depresses Shen Qingqiu’s bottom lip, slipping between his teeth, and straight onto his tongue. The sharp tip of Luo Binghe’s claw makes an indent in the centre of Shen Qingqiu’s tongue.
3. Shen Qingqiu bites.

Chapter Text

Confused Newb, Luo Binghe  (⌁° ‸ °⌁).ᐟᯓ ᡣ𐭩。°💫 ‎ [Shizun, please make sense!]

vs.

The Human Contradiction, Shen ‘I Make Trouble for Myself and Others’ Qingqiu (˙༥˙(👈🏻 [Boop!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Luo Binghe’s life hasn’t made sense for years now.

From a little after the start of his fourteenth year, Luo Binghe has only known two unshakeable truths about his existence.

The first: that Shen Qingqiu is all the safety in the world.

The second: that Luo Binghe loves him.

Even with all the things that have happened to him in the intervening years, Luo Binghe can’t bring himself to think any differently.

‘Cognitive dissonance,’ Shen Qingqiu had called the feeling once, in reference to a book he had also called a ‘stinking trash fire if the fire was by the docks, and people kept throwing fish innards into it.’

Shizun could be colourful when it came to books. Or anything that riled him up. Luo Binghe wonders if that’s still the truth.

That too is something Luo Binghe has had to reconcile within himself.

• Shen Qingqiu is a lofty immortal cultivator, far more mature and refined than anything Luo Binghe can ever hope to be.
• Shen Qingqiu is a voracious consumer of pornography. Not even of the somewhat tasteful, quiet kind.

It is unreconcilable.

Cognitive dissonance.

• Shizun is the kindest, most tolerant person in this world.
• Shizun threw him away.

His hand tightens around Shen Qingqiu’s elegant neck. “Wasn’t Shizun so eager to be naked for Liu-shishu before? Here,” he says, grabbing a fistful of Shen Qingqiu’s luxurious robes. “Let this disciple help you.”

Luo Binghe yanks on his collar, baring the left side of his body almost entirely from the waist up, his creamy, pale skin glowing in the moonlight, highlighting all the beautiful planes and angles of his form.

Shen Qingqiu shivers.

Luo Binghe shivers right along with him.

Entranced, he releases his grip on Shen Qingqiu’s neck, sliding that hand up to cup the side of his face. His shizun doesn’t resist.

Luo Binghe’s thumb presses down on Shen Qingqiu’s full bottom lip for just a moment before he pushes in.

His hands are much bigger than they were when he’d dared to pop that sweet treat into Shen Qingqiu’s mouth after he’d taken his medicine all those years ago. And Shen Qingqiu’s mouth around his thumb seems so small.

It awakens some fire within him that was only sparking before.

The tip of Luo Binghe’s thumb is touching that same pink tongue between those same lush pink lips. The sharp tip of Luo Binghe’s claw makes an indent in the centre of his tongue.

Shen Qingqiu bites him.

Cognitive dissonance.

• Shen Qingqiu would take on an incurable, potentially fatal poison to prevent any harm from coming to Luo Binghe.
• Shen Qingqiu pushed Luo Binghe into hell.

Sometimes, when Luo Binghe looks at Shen Qingqiu, it’s like he’s seeing two people, one laid over the image of the other.

Luo Binghe moans, the pain in his thumb connecting him to his shizun. So long as Shen Qingqiu is hurting him, he’s only looking at Luo Binghe. “Shizun will need to do more than that if he wants this filthy disciple to stop touching him.”

To punctuate his statement, he uses his free hand to caress Shen Qingqiu’s partially exposed chest. It’s the wrong hand, and he mourns the fact that the hand caught in Shen Qingqiu’s mouth would have far better access to the bare side of his body. But he also can’t bear to remove it.

Shen Qingqiu bites harder.

Luo Binghe laughs, actual joy creeping into his heart after so long. “Why did Shizun run away so determinedly? This disciple called for you for such a long time. But now it seems that Shizun doesn’t want to let go, so this disciple cannot help but feel overjoyed.”

Shen Qingqiu’s perfectly unmoved jade face glares back at him, his eyes narrowing in contempt. It’s the kind of look that used to make Luo Binghe shiver for entirely different reasons. The man is a beauty, first and last, but his appearance is a far cry from his usually extremely put-together veneer, and it’s making something in Luo Binghe stand up in recognition.

His hair—which he had never changed once from Luo Binghe’s fourteenth year until, apparently, during the time that they were parted—is worn more loosely around his ears, hanging lower around them. Because of that, and their spirited chase across Jinlan, wisps of fine midnight-black hair have slipped free to frame that perfect face. His cheeks, prettily flushed, and his skin covered with a sheen of exertion making it appear dewy and soft.

Shen Qingqiu has always been attractive—peerlessly beautiful—but seeing him ruffled up like this, and knowing that Luo Binghe is the cause of it all…

I did that! the thing inside him crows. It only wants to mess him up more.

He has his shizun pressed up against a wall, the beauty of Shen Qingqiu’s body half-bared to him, one creamy shoulder peaking out of teal robes, his chest heaving from exertion and anger, glossy long hair cascading across his shoulders and down his back. There is only one thing in this world that can make him more beautiful in this moment…

His shizun isn’t biting him hard enough for his teeth to break the skin, so Luo Binghe helps him out, raking his own flesh across the man’s canine hard enough to pierce himself. It’s easier than he’d expected, his shizun’s teeth surprisingly sharp.

Shen Qingqiu lets go in shock, several of Luo Binghe’s scarlet drops of blood staining his lips like lip stain used at the pleasure houses.

Mine, says the part of Luo Binghe which yearns, ever, to sink his claws into the things he loves. I made him look like that.

A thrill rises up Luo Binghe’s spine as he imagines what his shizun would look like with his own heavenly demon mark painted on that pristine forehead in Luo Binghe’s dirty demon blood.

In a fit of jealousy, he uses his sleeve to rub the make-up off of his shizun’s perfect skin. How dare it touch him? Nothing should stand between them, not even a powder his shizun had taken to wearing for unknown reasons.

Definitely not if it was for someone else’s benefit!

And anyone who could make Shen Qingqiu feel like he needs to cover up nonexistent flaws isn’t worth his effort anyway. Even if he has flaws, Luo Binghe only wants Shen Qingqiu to bare them to him. To show him how it makes the distance between them lessen.

A Shizun the world thinks is perfect is an unreachable Shizun.

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

There’s probably a hundred words to describe this, or maybe a thousand, but Shen Qingqiu can only think of one: ‘inappropriate.’

He props himself against the wall, surprised his knees don’t send him crashing to the ground, hands at his sides digging into the stone behind him.

“Presumptuous!” Shen Qingqiu barks, his voice hoarse. Even as a heavenly demon himself, Shen Qingqiu has been half-strangled by the protagonist. Anyone would sound hoarse, okay?!

Luo Binghe smiles, eyes flashing. “I am as Shizun made me.”

Shen Qingqiu lets his own hand come to rub his tender neck. “You have some nerve treating your shizun like this! Aren’t you concerned someone will misunderstand?”

The protagonist might not be concerned, but Shen Qingqiu sure is! If anyone had seen anything that has happened in the last ten minutes, could it even be explained? A long lost, once thought dead disciple returns to his beloved master’s side, but instead of a heartfelt reunion, it leads to a chase of cat and mouse across a plague-ridden city culminating in a rough feel up job in an alley, complete with hand in mouth action!

Indeed, if anyone had seen anything that happened in the last ten minutes, Shen Qingqiu might just evaporate! No revenge required.

Everyone move over, Shen Qingqiu’s boiling point is humiliation!

“Shizun is so worried for this disciple. Naturally this disciple can only feel happy.” At this, Luo Binghe, having stepped back when Shen Qingqiu released his thumb, crowds him again. Shen Qingqiu’s hands come up in defence.

Isn’t… isn’t this the cover of a romance novel?!

Shen Qingqiu, bodice-ripped and pale chest heaving against the protagonist’s juicy pecs, clutching the man’s muscular upper arms in his long, fine-boned fingers, barely able to keep the scraps of his robes covering all the relevant parts during their struggle—

Ah.

Shen Qingqiu had forgotten to struggle, okay?!

He had forgotten, but surely some struggling could happen now, right?

Pushing back on that firm but pillowy chest, breathing heavily, Shen Qingqiu barely manages to get a sliver of space between their bodies. Frustrated, he asks, “Do you think I won’t tell anyone?”

“I think you absolutely won’t tell anyone,” Luo Binghe agrees, his smile dazzling as he looks over all the exposed things his shizun won’t be telling anyone about. “Shizun’s face is as thin as the rice paper doors in the bamboo house, and only half as able to stand up to prodding.”

Shen Qingqiu can’t help but find himself mentally nodding along—the amount of times Luo Binghe had had to replace the paper on their doors over the years was truly quite extraordinary. If anyone were to be knowledgeable about their various attributes and the comparative attributes of the man he had spent three years cohabitating with, Shen Qingqiu supposes it would have to be him.

“Shizun shouldn’t worry,” Luo Binghe says sweetly. “Even if he were to shout the truth from the rooftops, would anyone dare to believe him?”

Ah, Shen Qingqiu thinks. So it’s like that?

It seems it really is true that the protagonist plans to have his revenge the same way he had in the original PIDW. Which is a little strange. Shen Qingqiu thinks he would remember any bodice-ripping scenes with the scum villain because he obviously would have torn Airplane a couple of new assholes over that one.

Either way, it’s clear.

Before Shen Qingqiu dies (or at the very least becomes a customisable pruned potted plant), Luo Binghe will first utterly destroy his prestigious reputation, accusing him of this crime and that crime. Whether he had, in fact, committed the crimes in question or not, evidence will be provided in the affirmative! And eyewitness testimony. And with the evidence and witnesses right there, who could ever believe the word of a scum villain?

Game, set, and match!

Luo Binghe will be free to toy with him in the water prison, bringing him out on such occasions when he can really rub it in Shen Qingqiu’s face—perhaps at his many weddings!

(Yes. Indeed. Shen Qingqiu does not realise what it says about him that he considers watching Luo Binghe get married over and over again to be the height of torture. It could be said that, of all the multitudes of people in this world, the person Shen Qingqiu knows the least is himself.)

It takes Shen Qingqiu a moment to realise that while he’s been imagining tortures, Luo Binghe has just been staring at him!

What is this tableau, protagonist?!

Why is there no attack incoming? Why is Shen Qingqiu’s outfit the thing which has suffered the most in this weird-ass showdown? And why… why is Luo Binghe just standing there, holding him, and looking like he’s got nothing else planned for the day?!

Focus, protagonist! Isn’t this your revenge? Who’ll take it seriously if you don’t?

Shen Qingqiu clears his throat. “What is it that you want from me?” he asks, because someone should really get this thing going, right?

Luo Binghe’s smile is vast, his hands wandering. “This disciple wants nothing more than to have Shizun looking at me.”

Ah, Shen Qingqiu thinks. So it’s like that.

He immediately imagines a scenario in which the victorious stallion protagonist, back from his years long trip to hell care of his scummy master, enacts a large-scale show in which Shen Qingqiu is forced to watch him pick apart all the facets of his life one by one.

“And what of Jinlan City?” Shen Qingqiu asks, nose in the air because he is, at heart, a poser. “Should they all be looking at you too?”

If before Luo Binghe could be said to be unruffled and amiable, as though just out for a night stroll with a precious female companion who had eventually ended up in his arms, then after Shen Qingqiu says these words, he can only be described as stroppy and disagreeable. Like a finger jabbing already bruised flesh, the reaction is severe.

“The extent of the hatred Shizun feels towards his own disciple is truly unparalleled. I must admit I can’t understand where it comes from,” Luo Binghe says. “Didn’t you craft me in your own image? Didn’t everyone in Cang Qiong say you had trained up your replacement without ever intending to leave?”

What?

What asshole said that?

Shen Qingqiu scowls.

He shouldn’t really be surprised. His martial siblings are always having weird meetings about him and his living habits. It really is rather tiring.

Honestly, the next time someone likens him to a young widow bereaved on the eve of her wedding, he might just decide to use his retired skills as Peerless Cucumber for evil instead of good!

How could he even be called a widow? Luo Binghe is still alive! Alive! Shen Qingqiu was one of only two people who even knew his disciple would be perfectly alright, if a little charred around the edges! So it’s not like he would have even been acting like a widow since he knew that Luo Binghe was fine.

(No, Shen Qingqiu has no idea what it says about him that he thinks the only reason he couldn’t be Luo Binghe’s widow is that the man is still alive, and for no other reason.)

In any case, he’s gotten used to ignoring his martial siblings’ antics, passing most gatherings by spacing out. If he misses a few of the more granular details in peak lord meetings as a result, so what? Does the peak lord of the scholars’ peak need to know how much laundry isn’t getting done on the beast taming peak?

Nah. He’ll pass, alright?

Wait. What were they even talking about?

“I am half,” Luo Binghe says, “half heavenly demon.”

Ah, right.

His hands fist in what’s left of Shen Qingqiu’s robes. “Even if all heavenly demons are pure evil, doesn’t the half of me born to a human mean I have the choice to be good?”

Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel this is all a little unfair—isn’t this exactly like a rakish male love interest in a novel of a certain kind simultaneously both feeling the female protagonist up against an alley wall, and begging her to see the good in him?!

Luo Binghe’s expression is five parts desperation, and one part anger. If he were still that fluffy little lamb Shen Qingqiu had once sheltered under his wings, this could even be described as his pleading face.

Luo Binghe had not often pleaded with him in those days, most of the time indulged and pandered to like a rich man’s privileged little puppy. But on the occasions he had had cause to do so—if cause could be described as throwing a tantrum because Shen Qingqiu was going on a night hunt with Liu Qingge without taking Luo Binghe along—he’d looked exactly like this.

Like the world didn’t make sense to him anymore, and he expected Shen Qingqiu to fix it for him.

Shen Qingqiu can only keep his silence.

Don’t you understand, Luo-da-ge? Not only do you not have a choice, but Shen Qingqiu doesn’t have one either! Do you think he wants to be akin to the scum at the back of the fridge when you realise that smell you’ve been ignoring for three months isn’t just going to go away?

Narrative roles exist for a reason.

Shen Qingqiu wishes he could be the kindly old mentor figure forever. He wishes this was the kind of story that would allow for that. But the truth is… they all die in the end.

How else will you learn to stand on your own if Shen Qingqiu doesn’t let you out from under his wings?

“Don’t you know how much of a hypocrite that makes you sound?” Luo Binghe sneers. “‘Race doesn’t matter at all… unless it’s that one!’”

Ah, if only you knew, protagonist! Shen Qingqiu is the biggest hypocrite in this world. He threw you into the Endless Abyss for being a heavenly demon… whilst being a heavenly demon himself!

Shen Qingqiu looks away without saying anything—

—and flinches dramatically to the side, because now Luo Binghe’s fist is in the wall where his head had been!

So now we’re moving into the revenge portion of this reunion? The world is starting to make sense again! Yes, yes, please continue! Shen Qingqiu is rooting for you, protagonist!

But instead of continuing his attack, Luo Binghe seems to back off without actually moving away. He closes his eyes for a moment, and breathes. “Alright,” he says at last. “Then what made Tianlang-Jun different?”

Excuse me?

“Different than what?” Shen Qingqiu finds himself asking, too curious to keep quiet.

“Than me! Isn’t he my biological father? Isn’t he a full heavenly demon? What makes him the exception? What makes him better than me?”

Shen Qingqiu blinks. What is this insecurity? Could speedrunning the abyss have really set Luo Binghe’s emotional maturity back by so much? Maybe if he had spent a little more time cooking in the abyss, the stallion protagonist personality would be a little more baked in.

Shen Qingqiu’s first instinct is to deny ever having met Tianlang-Jun. To say, ‘Beyond a resemblance to you, how would I even pick him out of a crowd?’ How could he be accused of this very specific hypocrisy if he’d never so much as shared the same oxygen as the man?

But hadn’t Cang Qiong, and Yue Qingyuan specifically, been a part of imprisoning Tianlang-Jun? Maybe it’s verifiable somehow that the original goods had had cause to meet him at some significant event.

Fuck. He should have asked Shang Qinghua to fill him in on the original goods’ life up until Shen Qingqiu took the reins. He’d just figured it didn’t matter too much what with the OOC lock off and his qi deviation as a legitimate reason for a personality change.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t know what to say, and so he says nothing, just stares at his own hand on Luo Binghe’s chest. Whatever Luo Binghe takes from this is hard to say. Still holding him like they’re on the cover of some tawdry romance, he pulls Shen Qingqiu closer, clawed hand on his waist, eyes flashing.

Half in shock, Shen Qingqiu’s hand slides higher up the protagonist’s chest. Just as he thinks Luo Binghe is about to do something drastic, the boy’s eyes move down. Something in his expression darkens. “Shizun was infected?”

Indeed, the back of Shen Qingqiu’s hand still retains the small red patches he had willed it to have earlier, once he had realised he was immune. Luo Binghe takes firm hold of his wrist, and using the hand with the still bleeding (why the fuck is it still bleeding?!) thumb, he rubs it, feather-light, across the back of Shen Qingqiu’s fake-infected hand.

Nothing happens.

Luo Binghe frowns. The space between his brows draws together. Thankfully, he’s too busy looking at Shen Qingqiu’s hand to look at his face, or the momentary flicker of realisation might have been obvious.

Shit. Maybe Shen Qingqiu should do something here.

Somewhere inside of Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe’s blood mites are being hopelessly bullied by the much more numerous blood mites of a heavenly demon far older than him. Indeed, if Shen Qingqiu can be said to be getting bullied against a wall by Luo Binghe, then Luo Binghe’s own blood mites can only be said to be experiencing the same treatment by Shen Qingqiu’s blood mites. They’ve been corralled into some unknown corner of Shen Qingqiu’s circulatory system where they’re being held in place ‘against their will’ and kept from misbehaving.

Which doesn’t solve the actual fucking problem at all. Even if Shen Qingqiu were to let Luo Binghe’s blood mites have free rein and do whatever shit they want, they cannot cure an illness that does not exist!

Still, maybe he can confuse Luo Binghe into believing he’s cured him.

Of course, heavenly demon blood mites don’t work on other heavenly demons. The offending particles simply get rendered inert and flushed from the host system. But what part of Shen Qingqiu has ever been able to truly hurt Luo Binghe? Luo Binghe’s little blood mites are just extensions of the man himself—and aren’t they cute?!

Luo Binghe’s frown can only deepen. His thumb continues to stroke the back of Shen Qingqiu’s affected hand. Panicked, Shen Qingqiu commands his own blood mites to free Luo Binghe’s, ushering them towards the supposed damage, and putting them to work ‘curing’ it, whilst also commanding his own to restore his pristine skin.

Shen Qingqiu’s breathing is on the verge of becoming erratic. His hand tightens into a fist in Luo Binghe’s hold, but the man just keeps looking at the back of Shen Qingqiu’s hand until every last splotch of red is gone. Something in Luo Binghe’s face isn’t quite right, but the frown ebbs away eventually all the same.

Satisfied with his work, Luo Binghe looks back at his face as he brings the back of Shen Qingqiu’s hand up to his lips, kissing smooth, moonlight jade skin.

Something in Shen Qingqiu’s brain starts to spark and short circuit.

What… what is this narrative?

Did Luo Binghe’s upbringing under Shen Qingqiu’s gentle hand really change everything so much? Did it really make the once-stallion protagonist’s flavour of revenge so… incomprehensible?

Luo Binghe’s smile is a very fierce thing, indeed. He leans forward, bringing the same hand Shen Qingqiu had bitten back up to his cheek. Here, he uses the offending thumb to smudge the red stain of the blood already on Shen Qingqiu’s lips.

“Shizun has ingested my blood,” he says, smile wide, unbearably pleased with himself. “Shizun and I can be said to share one body.”

Shen Qingqiu blinks. His entire mind switches off. He’s just gone. The logic centre of his brain, done with his shit, refuses to compute. Go on without us, it says.

“Your blood won’t work on me,” Shen Qingqiu mumbles, in a daze, his lip dragging against Luo Binghe’s thumb.

Luo Binghe tilts his head. “What does Shizun mean?” he asks, stroking the back of Shen Qingqiu’s hand that he had supposedly healed just moments ago.

Shit.

Why did he go through all that trouble only to blurt out the truth like a soap opera harlot at somebody else’s wedding?

So long as Luo Binghe thinks him a squishy human, he’ll be more inclined to be gentle before the torture starts. Can’t have the prisoner expiring before he gets to the prison, right?

“Oh, I see how it is,” Luo Binghe says, nodding.

What do you see?!

Shen Qingqiu feels the need to shrink back, but the habits of many years as a consummate poser make him straighten himself up instead.

“Shizun and Tianlang-Jun are of one heart,” Luo Binghe says, voice bitter, grip tightening. “No matter. Tianlang-Jun might be an older heavenly demon, and a full one at that, but I guarantee there is nothing weak about my blood.”

This… this is slander!

Tianlang-Jun wasn’t even in the original novel. Shen Qingqiu had only found out about him from Shang Qinghua after he’d discovered the author was a transmigrator too. How can Shen Qingqiu and Tianlang-Jun really be said to be of one heart?!

Forcing Shen Qingqiu’s head fully back against the wall, Luo Binghe shoves his thumb back in Shen Qingqiu’s mouth, the taste of blood flooding over his tongue. Struggling fully for the first time all evening, Shen Qingqiu kicks out at him, his foot connecting with Luo Binghe’s shin. Of course, Luo Binghe is a heavenly demon, and the protagonist besides, so it does nothing.

Maybe it’s obvious that Shen Qingqiu is panicking for no reason—he’s a heavenly demon now, what does he have to fear? To say nothing of the fact that they’ve literally just been through this. Luo Binghe’s blood mites can do nothing in his body.

But Shen Qingqiu has spent so many years in this world knowing that he would one day be subjected to horrible torture by those very blood mites now crawling around inside his throat. It’s hard to then accept that they hold no fear for him anymore, added to the fact that Shen Qingqiu grew up resolutely human. In his first life and most of this one, the idea of swallowing someone’s else blood could only fill him with disgust.

Luo Binghe only sends more blood pouring into him as he struggles.

Don’t you understand? No matter how much blood you make me drink, my own will nullify every drop!

It’s only with Shen Qingqiu’s continued flailing that he manages to knee Luo Binghe in the crotch. The crotch! The stallion protagonist’s epic golden finger. His sword of swords. His Heavenly Pillar! The part of him more effective than a seasoned hostage negotiator! And Luo Binghe—

—moans.

Wait, what?

Shen Qingqiu isn’t some feisty demon realm love interest putting up a token struggle in her efforts to increase her desirability, and thus her standing in the harem!

He’s been miscast. Miscast—do you hear?!

Winded, Luo Binghe catches himself on the wall behind Shen Qingqiu. Taking that as a gift if ever there was one, Shen Qingqiu slides out of his grasp. Bent double and reflexively gagging, he tries to spit up as much of the blood as he can manage, the pieces of his robes doing what they will.

“Shizun shouldn’t try so hard to be rid of this disciple’s blood,” Luo Binghe says, and covers his mostly bare shoulders and back with something soft. When Shen Qingqiu looks at it, it’s clear that it’s Luo Binghe’s very own outer robe! The post-cuddling cover-up. Harem Edition.

Luo Binghe crouches down in front of him, his hand cupping Shen Qingqiu’s jaw, tilting his shizun’s head back.

“No matter what you do, nor where you go, nor who you love,” Luo Binghe says, pressing the bloodied pad of his thumb where Shen Qingqiu’s zuiyin hides beneath the surface, “part of me will always be inside you.”

Chapter Text

Hapless Cultivator, Shen ‘Nothing to See Here’ Qingqiu /ᐠ - ˕ -マ‎ [idk, fuck me, I guess!]

vs.

The Weight of Public Opinion ૮ ˙Ⱉ˙ ა [Rawr!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Trudging back to the weapons shop wearing the protagonist’s robe as a cover-up to avoid abject nakedness is an exercise in Shen Qingqiu’s ability to stick his head in the sand and mentally sing ‘nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, I can’t hear you, I can’t hear you,’ to drown out even his own thoughts—of which he is the undisputed master.

What’s there to see here? What walk of shame? Shen Qingqiu wasn’t out here doing anything tawdry. You’re tawdry!

It’s not his fault Luo Binghe lost his fucking mind and decided to grope up the closest adult man to hand. It’s probably because the poor boy hasn’t invested any time in getting a harem together yet, and so he’s unable to withstand Xin Mo messing with his mind—making all his actions weirdly sexual, no matter who they’re directed at. Even his scummy master!

Luo-da-ge, don’t you have standards?!

Ah… in retrospect, perhaps Shen Qingqiu has answered his own question. Luo Bing-ge from the original PIDW had never had any standards.

All applications welcome! Please form an orderly line. No shoving necessary. Applicants will be wifed-up in the order in which they are received. Undressing before you are called may increase the speed at which your application is processed.

He was truly a standardless man-whore, accepting of all, even those who would try to kill him. Looking at it that way, Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel sorry for his little lamb.

This time around, at least Luo Binghe has tried to be different, remaining celibate for his one true love, Ning Yingying. 

And so he should!

Shen Qingqiu hadn’t waited overly long after his transmigration to drill it into the girl that she is deserving of far more than a man who will happily papapa his way through the known universe as both punishment and reward—the answer to everything—and never even give her the title of empress to soothe her broken heart.

If Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t let a man make a life vow to him, take him to bed, and then immediately slap his face for him by doing the same to all the other jiejies—ahem, geges—in town, then no daughter of his will accept those fucked up terms either!

Shen Qingqiu raised a spoiled boy, but he’s never raised a fool! Yingying won’t be taking any of your shit, protagonist. Tender and sincere wooing or no ass for you, Luo Binghe! Do you hear this master?!

In any case, he’s not getting any sleep tonight. What a fucked up day it’s been!

Somewhere inside him, Luo Binghe’s poor little blood mites have been rounded up again. They’re currently squirming around—no doubt in pain, the poor things! Shen Qingqiu had commanded his own blood mites to go easy on them whilst still being no-nonsense against what can only be classed as deadly (cute!) little killing machines.

Ah, but he can’t help but feel a little sorry!

Shen Qingqiu can only shake his head for their plight. Imagine being dispatched to take out the protagonist’s scum master only to find that he’s had a giant upgrade that not only makes it entirely impossible to do so, but also makes his body completely inhospitable towards you!

Too frustrating!

If he were a different kind of man entirely, he might feel sorry enough to actually do something about it. Ah, well… Shen Qingqiu has always had a lazy streak to him. No use in wishing he had a different nature. That way lies the struggle of fruitless effort and eventual disappointment.

They’ll live, the poor little things. They can hang out where they are, next to his right hip, until Shen Qingqiu gets himself out of this mess and far from Luo Binghe. Then they can either live out their days with him if they choose to behave, or go on their way in the wider world and maybe make it back to Luo Binghe one day. By which point, it won’t matter if they tell him that Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon.

He’ll be long gone!

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Jinlan is free, the plague cured, all the sowers caught.

Shen Qingqiu almost feels like he’d missed the whole ordeal. Like he was off swanning about while the real work went down.

(This is accurate. There’s an alley somewhere in Jinlan that stands in accusation with a suspicious collapsed section about Shen Qingqiu’s height, some chunks lying around shaped like Luo Binghe’s fist.)

Still, it’s a good ending to a horrible chapter.

Liu Qingge is grumpy when Shen Qingqiu finds him. Not that this is an unusual occurrence for his most ill-tempered shidi.

The fact that he’s grumpy about Luo Binghe is also not a particularly odd occurrence in the span of their lives.

Even when trying to comfort him, Shen Qingqiu only knows how to bully his shidi, giving in to the urge to poke him between the brows.

“What’s this expression, ah?” he chides with fondness. “Didn’t you win? Wasn’t the plague cured, and the sowers caught within a day of us showing up here?”

Liu Qingge turns a fetching shade of red.

Meanwhile, since the quarantine on the city has been lifted, and the gates opened, many of the key figures of various sects arrive.

Yue Qingyuan comes over. Not far behind him, Huan Hua Palace’s Old Palace Master is flanked by Luo Binghe, whose eyes, when they land on Shen Qingqiu, seem to flash with overwhelming anger.

Shen Qingqiu lets his hand fall. So he’d let it come to rest on Liu Qingge’s shoulder, so what?

Why are you more upset about it than Liu Qingge is, protagonist? Please allow Shen Qingqiu to bully his shidi in peace!

“You don’t look well,” Yue Qingyuan says, his expression mournful. “This mission was too much for your health.”

Shen Qingqiu’s health is fine, thank you very much! He recently had the king of upgrades! It’s just that his former disciple is really rather vindictive.

“This shidi is just a little tired,” Shen Qingqiu tells Yue Qingyuan, and immediately gets contradicted by Mu Qingfang and Liu Qingge! Who both tell Yue Qingyuan that he’s not been taking his medicine or letting Liu Qingge clear his meridians.

What little shits! Isn’t Shen Qingqiu your martial brother too? Where’s the solidarity Cang Qiong is so renowned for?! Don’t the twelve peaks stand together against outsiders and overprotective sect leaders?

Shen Qingqiu sighs. Clearly Gang-Up on Shen Qingqiu Day is progressing nicely. He doesn’t like it! Shen Qingqiu is the one who bullies his martial siblings, not the other way around!

Just as Shen Qingqiu is about to flap his hands in the air in frustration, it seems like all of Jinlan has started speaking at once.

What the fuck is all this commotion?

A large group of men and women gather, headed by Jinlan City’s governor, who is dressed in mourning robes. He throws himself to the ground at Luo Binghe’s feet, wailing his thanks, his gratefulness to Jinlan’s saviour.

Shen Qingqiu mentally rolls his eyes. Didn’t Mu Qingfang cure the plague? And it can’t be said that Liu Qingge did nothing. Even if Cang Qiong had never sent anyone to help out, wouldn’t Luo Binghe have had to go door to door, giving everyone the same thumb treatment as he’d given Shen Qingqiu last night if they wanted to be free of the plague? In which case, every person here, lacking Shen Qingqiu’s very particular upgrade, would be a slave to Luo Binghe’s blood mites. Would they be falling all over their asses to thank him then?

He watches the wailing and prostrating a while longer.

Who’s he kidding? Clearly these people are already slaves to the man. They’d probably only thank him for the honour of having their saviour’s blood inside them.

What little weasels!

Shen Qingqiu opens his fan so he can watch without being observed. The governor goes on praising Luo Binghe, culminating in an ingratiating smile towards the Old Palace Master, and the phrase, “The Old Palace Master should be incredibly proud—only exceptional masters can raise exceptional disciples.”

The Old Palace Master plumps up like a Ribbon-Frilled Baboon Chicken—PIDW’s version of a peacock, but with a giant red ass because the brightness of its eye-searing tail feathers just wasn’t enough for Airplane. (Don’t ask Shen Qingqiu, he doesn’t fucking know.)

In any case, it produces quite a reaction in Shen Qingqiu, the bitch in him just hankering to come out and verbally slap some people around, like earlier with the Huan Hua Palace delinquents. (He hadn’t really been punished for that, after all. He’d just been made to drink some blood that can’t even hurt him. Something in Shen Qingqiu says that going unpunished might as well be encouragement!)

“Who raised him?” Shen Qingqiu asks, not looking directly at any of them, simply wafting his fan, the picture of polite disinterest.

Say what you like about Shen Qingqiu, but he’s never been out-posed, okay?

The governor of Jinlan turns towards him, face shocked. “Excuse me?”

Everyone in succession turns to look too, at this creature who would dare to interrupt their ass-kissing.

If you’re going to kiss some asses, can’t you at least find better ones than the Old Palace Master’s old, wrinkly ass? Shen Qingqiu feels a little queasy!

“I said,” Shen Qingqiu says, more loudly, because apparently some bitches can’t hear well. “‘Who raised him?’” Here, he whips his fan shut with a satisfying shik, and uses it to point at Luo Binghe, whose eyes widen. “Didn’t I do it?”

Even taking into consideration the fact that Shen Qingqiu hadn’t been in this world when Luo Binghe first became a disciple, and the fact that the boy’s own inherent talent could only mean his rise to fame was a sure thing before Shen Qingqiu had first met him… even then, Shen Qingqiu isn’t going to accept the idea that his intervention made nothing in Luo Binghe’s life better. And he damn well isn’t going to accept that the Old Palace Master did a fucking thing!

Didn’t you meet Luo Binghe this year, asshole? What great defining effect could you really have had on this grown-ass man, huh? The ants on the edge of the abyss had a more defining effect on Luo Binghe’s personality as he plummeted past them!

The governor looks between Shen Qingqiu and the Old Palace Master, as though unsure of what to do. Well, since he doesn’t know, maybe Shen Qingqiu should help him out. He walks towards Luo Binghe, and incidentally the governor and Old Palace Master as well, all eyes on Shen Qingqiu.

“Who raised you?” Shen Qingqiu asks his wayward disciple. “Was it him?” Here, he points to the Old Palace Master with his fan, raising an eyebrow.

Luo Binghe’s eyes sparkle.

The Old Palace Master scowls but, of course, Shen Qingqiu isn’t looking at him. “What is Peak Lord Shen trying to—”

“No,” Luo Binghe says, interrupting the Old Palace Master. “What Shizun says is correct. I was raised personally by Cang Qiong Mountain Sect’s Peak Lord Shen Qingqiu in his very own home. Everything I know was taught to me by him.”

Something flashes in his eyes, but he doesn’t contradict Shen Qingqiu in front of all these people. Indeed, he says every word straight to Shen Qingqiu’s face as if they are the only two people in the world.

Anyone might be right to suggest here that Shen Qingqiu is pushing it a little bit, but even if he had pushed Luo Binghe ass-first into the abyss, did that really negate his years of careful, indulgent teaching? Could the Old Palace Master really take credit for Shen Qingqiu’s patient teaching of the little lamb about sowers, or how to hold his sword properly?

And that’s another thing!

“Whose waist did you fall against repeatedly when you were this tall?” he asks, raising his fan to indicate somewhere just below his chest in height. 

“Naturally, it was Shizun’s waist this disciple held,” Luo Binghe says, something truly intense in his gaze.

Um… phrasing?

“Who held your hand up when Zheng Yang was too heavy for you to hold alone?”

Luo Binghe’s smile only gets wider. “Naturally, it was Shizun whose hand I held.”

Shen Qingqiu nods. “Indeed. A teacher for a day, a father for a lifetime.”

Up to this point, Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe have both just been staring at each other, speaking only to each other, leaving the large group around them shuffling back and forth on their feet, everyone feeling a little awkward. But now, with those words from Shen Qingqiu, if anyone else were to look into Luo Binghe’s fiery eyes at this moment, they would surely burn alive.

“As such, wouldn’t I be remiss in letting you make mistakes?” Shen Qingqiu asks, opening his fan again to waft it about.

“What Shizun says is correct. This disciple doesn’t have a father. He only has Shizun. Since young, every morsel of food that has sustained this disciple’s body was placed on his lips by Shizun’s very own hand.”

Phrasing, Binghe! What the fuck!

The atmosphere around them just gets increasingly strained. The people of Jinlan and the assembled cultivators can’t help but look at them and feel that this master and disciple pair are truly rather odd.

However, Shen Qingqiu has nothing in his eyes but Luo Binghe, and nothing in his thoughts but what Luo Binghe will answer him. “So what do you say when someone compliments your upbringing and your master, but they refer to an outsider in his place?” he asks.

As though Luo Binghe were still a little disciple sharing Shen Qingqiu’s table and his food in the bamboo house, he perks up like this is one of his shizun’s many tests of his progress. “I say, ‘I accept this generous praise on behalf of my master, the Qing Jing Peak Lord of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect, Shen Qingqiu, who has taught me everything I know, and nurtured me tenderly with his own hands.’”

That phrasing though. Eh... close enough. There probably aren’t that many opportunities to practise public speaking in the abyss, right?

“Good boy.”

Reflexively, and without really thinking about the possible consequences, Shen Qingqiu reaches out to pat his thick curls. Luo Binghe ducks his head to make it easier for him with their newfound height difference, but there are several loud throat clearings before his hand can land.

The governor smiles in an uncomfortable way. “I see,” he says, though he seems unwilling to heap the same kind of praise on Shen Qingqiu as he had on the Old Palace Master, no matter how much more deserved it is.

What do you see?!

His gaze on Luo Binghe, Shen Qingqiu says, “It’s good that you see. The Old Palace Master wouldn’t want to be accused of stealing the praise meant for another.”

The Old Palace Master is old and crafty enough to understand Shen Qingqiu’s words for an accusation when he hears one!

Good! Shen Qingqiu wasn’t trying to be subtle!

Shen Qingqiu glances to the side to make sure his barb landed, and feels vindicated to see the Old Palace Master’s face puffing up like a Great-Billed Squashed Pufferfish. When Shen Qingqiu turns back towards Luo Binghe, he’s in exactly the same ducked-head position, but he’s suddenly several paces closer, as though he’d teleported. Shen Qingqiu reaches his hand out again—

It’s at this point that the caught sowers start making a ruckus, and everyone turns to the idea of what to do with them in order to avoid looking at Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe any longer. With his head pat interrupted yet again, Luo Binghe seethes. Meanwhile, under urging from Yue Qingyuan for his shidi’s opinion, Shen Qingqiu finally turns away from Luo Binghe, offering the only solution: “Burn them.”

Qin Wanyue, that aspiring human fleshlight, moved by the crocodile tears of the littlest sower, comes to hang off of Luo Binghe, even if the reception she gets from him is akin to oil meeting the non-stick surface of a frying pan.

Don’t you understand, Pocket Pussy Princess? Like Fire-Breath Swamp Baboons and the Greater Desert-Dwelling Sand Shark, the two cannot mix!

“Luo-shixiong, don’t you think it’s too cruel?” she asks. Shen Qingqiu can barely quell the urge to roll his eyes.

Too cruel? This is Luo Binghe you’re talking to! One day, he’ll keep his old master as a potted plant, pulling off limbs left and right, and you’re asking if he thinks burning is too cruel?

Luo Binghe, whose gaze has not left Shen Qingqiu since almost the moment he’d come into view in the first place, simply affects a smile at this, though who it is aimed at is too hard for Qin Wanyue to tell. She stands off to the side, frustrated and powerless. Shen Qingqiu doesn’t feel the need to go easy on her.

“If Young Miss Qin finds it too cruel, why not climb in there yourself, and kill the sowers with your spiritual blade before we burn them?”

At this, Qin Wanyue pouts at being called out, and then subsequently scowls.

“Ah,” Shen Qingqiu says. “Is it that you would rather Luo Binghe put himself in danger to soothe your feelings?”

When Shen Qingqiu got up today, he really hadn’t had any intention of going full bitch, but these little cretins are really too much! Luo Binghe told him just last night that he was chaste, so how come Qin Wanyue is even alive right now?

In any case, Luo Binghe has apparently decided to be faithful to his one true love, and Shen Qingqiu would rather personally present Luo Binghe with his own balls than believe that that person could be Qin-fucking-Wanyue, whose life goal is to be dicked down by the protagonist.

Shen Qingqiu raised a spoiled boy! Why would he want a starter fleshlight when he can have a partner of substance and beauty? Someone who can challenge him both intellectually and physically. Ning Yingying may not be in the Heavenly Demon club, but she’s no joke, okay?!

Ning Yingying is a far superior specimen, herself a talented and skilful cultivator. And she has far better goals for her own life than ones related to a man’s dick. Anyone would be proud to call her their daughter. Shen Qingqiu, certainly, is proud.

“Immortal Master Shen is being too serious,” the Old Palace Master says. “Disciple Qin is just a child.”

“Oh, then it’s my mistake.” Shen Qingqiu laughs, and wafts his fan about in front of his face so nobody can see anything but his eyes. “With the way she hangs around my Binghe, I assumed they were of a single generation, and Binghe is certainly no child—he caught most of these sowers himself.”

Luo Binghe makes a noise. Shen Qingqiu doesn’t quite know what it is. It sounds choked. Soulless.

At the same time, Qin Wanyue, unsatisfied with how she seems to have ended up both on the pointy end of Shen Qingqiu’s opinions once again, and as a child in everyone’s eyes, comes forward to state her objections.

“Qin-shimei should think about it,” Luo Binghe says before Shen Qingqiu can get his claws in her again. Even then, he doesn’t turn away from Shen Qingqiu to look at her. “Either you are a child not of the same generation as me, or you should be able to handle those sowers yourself.”

Qin Wanyue flaps her mouth for a moment as though she’s going to argue, but then shuts up, pouting and folding her arms in front of her chest, slumping her head forward to glare at the ground.

“Alright,” Shen Qingqiu says when it becomes clear that she’s not going to argue with the protagonist. “Let’s get on with it.”

Just as he’s considering how best to do it, one of the sowers throws itself against the barrier near him. “Please, Immortal Master Shen,” it wails. “You said we wouldn’t get hurt if we did what you said!”

What the fuck!

If you’re going to slander someone, at least make it believable, okay?!

Although everyone in Jinlan had already been looking at him a lot today, Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel like these stares are entirely different! 

“Immortal Master Shen,” the Old Palace Master says, a sparkle in his eye. “What could this mean?”

What do you think it means?! It means you’re one of those assholes who enjoys watching their fellow cultivators be slandered so that you look better!

Then, because the Old Palace Master had said so, a whole gaggle of obnoxious losers pipe up with accusations about him starting the plague!

Um, excuse me, didn’t he get here yesterday?

“Surely, the Old Palace Master isn’t accusing this master of wrongdoing? Weren’t you eager to accept praise that my disciple caught all these creatures? And didn’t I just advocate for their destruction to prevent the loss of any other lives?”

The Old Palace Master shrugs, a slimy smile cracking open that old, wrinkled face. “Perhaps Immortal Master Shen is simply trying to cover up his crimes.”

Shen Qingqiu snaps his fan shut. “What crimes?! Is a sower who murdered many countless hundreds here to be believed over a cultivator of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect who came at his own personal risk in order to help?!”

“It must be investigated.” 

What investigation? Isn’t this just a case of he said, he said?!

Thankfully, his martial siblings rally around him. Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan surge forward to bracket him in, while Qi Qingqi argues with the Old Palace Master on his behalf. Shen Qingqiu can’t help but feel a little moved. Luo Binghe, meanwhile, still very close, stares at him with the intensity of several suns.

Could he really be behind this? If so, then why hadn’t he contradicted Shen Qingqiu earlier when he’d ridiculed the Old Palace Master for daring to accept praise for a disciple another man raised? Surely, that couldn’t just be to throw him off—to make now hit him in the face even harder?

Just then, one of the little Huan Hua weasels he’d ripped a new asshole for yesterday steps forward. “I feel it is important to point out that Peak Lord Shen clearly had a sower’s rash on his hand yesterday—we all stand witness to that fact—but he lacks one today.”

Shen Qingqiu internally sighs.

On this occasion… although he’s not actually infected, and incapable of being infected, they really are being too unfair! If he wasn’t a heavenly demon, he would be as infected as any other poor sod! And really, the biggest part of why he doesn’t have a rash is that he hadn’t thought to put it back after he’d let Luo Binghe believe he had healed it. Mostly because he’d been distracted by the groping, and the nakedness, and the squiming little Luo Binghe mites inside him, okay?!

Fuck’s sake!

Luo Binghe isn’t infected either! For exactly the same reason! Just because one heavenly demon schemed a bit harder than the other, can they really be treated so differently?!

“No matter what the Old Palace Master would like to believe, slander is not proof.”

“But there is so much of it,” the Old Palace Master says, smirk turning up the corner of his mouth. “If so many people have so many things to say about Peak Lord Shen, at least some of them must be true.”

What the fuck is this reasoning?! So, in order to convict someone of something, you just have to get as many people as possible to claim that it’s true?

At this point, Liu Qingge growls, “What things?!”

Please, Liu-shidi, I know I’ve bullied you relentlessly these past years, but do you really not love your shixiong anymore?! Haven’t they been doing enough crap slinging? Why are you asking for more?

Here, the Old Palace Master turns his attention to the group around them at large, talking loudly so as to be heard by all. “Peak Lord Shen abuses and grievously harms his disciples. Even if he has done nothing else, how can he be considered innocent?”

Oh, Shen Qingqiu is not standing for this shit!

“If I have grievously harmed my disciples, only they can say. You, Old Palace Master, do not count amongst them. And anything else can only be gossip—something someone of the Old Palace Master’s age and standing should not lower himself to partake in.”

“Whilst my shidi is not generally inclined to pamper his disciples,” Yue Qingyuan says in agreement, his face stony. “He is not a harsh master.”

Who are you defending here, Zhangmen-shixiong?! Have you met Shen Qingqiu’s disciples?! Those little sheep haven’t known a day’s hardship in their lives! The only disciple who could be said to have suffered for knowing Shen Qingqiu is Luo Binghe, and he’s currently saying nothing!

Shen Qingqiu raises his eyebrow. “Is gossip really sufficient for the burden of proof in the Old Palace Master’s eyes?”

“How can it be considered gossip when it comes from Cang Qiong Mountain Sect itself? Disciples talk, Peak Lord Shen. Even to disciples of other sects.”

“And what is it they talk about specifically?”

If Luo Binghe’s going to call him out on pushing him into the Endless Abyss, he’s going to have to do it now! Shen Qingqiu is so done with this shit!

Do you hear me, Luo Binghe? Now or never! You’re going to have to agree that he was a good master or a scum villain—and Shen Qingqiu is not going to let you go back on it later!

Shen Qingqiu looks at him. Luo Binghe has been staring at him this whole time, expressionless, but something intense about his eyes.

The human fleshlight comes even closer to interrupt, apparently feeling the need to insert her own opinions on behalf of her unrequited beloved—as if Luo Binghe would even need anyone to defend him, let alone this ineffectual creature.

“Didn’t Peak Lord Shen order a precious young disciple to fight a demon with hundreds of years worth of cultivation behind him? One who wore spiked armour tipped with incurable poison? Wouldn’t we all consider that abuse of the highest order?” She clutches one hand to her bosom, her expression truly harrowed, the performance of a lifetime.

Um, excuse you, who ended up suffering years of Mu-shidi’s disapproving concern, and Liu-shidi’s brusque care because of that poison?! Not Luo Binghe!

Indeed, Shen Qingqiu had known back then that only Luo Binghe would be unharmed in such a situation, not yet knowing his own heavenly demon status, and still he had protected him by pure instinct, throwing himself in the line of fire. From an objective standpoint, wasn’t Shen Qingqiu the one who had come off the worst in that situation?

Even if that were not true, what was the alternative? Let the demons rampage the entire sect so that there would be nothing for Yue Qingyuan to even come back to, nor any disciples left for Liu Qingge to save upon leaving the Lingxi caves?

Would that have been the more acceptable solution?

Bullshit!

“If Luo Binghe feels like I abused him in that moment, he can tell me himself.”

Here, all eyes in Jinlan turn on Luo Binghe, some in shock, a few suspicious, but most adoring—though Luo Binghe could not see them even if he wanted to, his eyes already full of one man.

“Perhaps the boy is simply too afraid to go against you,” the Old Palace Master says in mock concern. “We all saw how you led him in his answers earlier, and how he went along, unable to say a word against you.”

Too afraid?! Whose thumb was in whose mouth last night?!

And how can he say Shen Qingqiu led Luo Binghe in his answers?! Wasn’t Luo Binghe’s weird phrasing all his own?!

Shen Qingqiu turns to Luo Binghe, who continues to stare at him, as if the situation around them isn’t even happening. “You,” he says, pointing at him. “Are you afraid of me?”

Luo Binghe blinks, but otherwise shows no change in expression. “Answering Shizun, this disciple is not afraid.”

Of course he’s not fucking afraid. As if the demonic emperor and biggest, baddest heavenly demon to ever exist would tremble before the likes of his old shizun!

Looking at Qin-fucking-Wanyue, Shen Qingqiu lets his iciest glare fester. “Right or not, Luo Binghe knows it himself.” 

Turning back to him, Shen Qingqiu steps forward. “Don’t you remember? No one believed in you in that moment,” Shen Qingqiu says. “But I did—I knew you would win.”

A shiver seems to run through Luo Binghe’s entire body, the source of which, Shen Qingqiu cannot say.

“Did I abuse you that day? Or did I protect you as well as I was able?”

Luo Binghe swallows. “Indeed, when Shizun placed his delicate body between this disciple and harm, taking upon himself a curse because of my own negligence, I could not have had a clearer glimpse at his tender heart.”

What are with those adjectives, huh?

Fuck it! Shen Qingqiu is going all out.

“I have always believed in you,” Shen Qingqiu says. He flicks his eyes over to a now scowling Old Palace Master and Qin Wanyue amongst others, then doubles down. “Even the Old Palace Master was surprised when I bet all my worldly wealth on Luo Binghe at the Immortal Alliance Conference.” He turns back to Luo Binghe himself. “I believed in you that much.”

Luo Binghe’s eyes are shimmering.

“And I was right to do it.”

If Shen Qingqiu’s disciples—namely, Luo Binghe—hadn’t been at the Immortal Alliance Conference that day, none of the Huan Hua contingent there would have even survived to be upset with Shen Qingqiu! This is the level of audacity Huan Hua Palace encourages.

No more!

If audacity were a subject they taught in formal education, Shen Qingqiu would already have his PhD—he’d already be the head professor at the best university in the world! He took over a guy’s fucking life! Moved into his house, slept in his bed, took his name for his own, got his disciples to call him master, and took every little bit of favouritism his Zhangmen-shixiong sent his way! Shen Qingqiu might just be the most audacious man in this world!

“Here and now, tell me the truth,” Shen Qingqiu says. “Was it really so bad being taught by me? If you were to do it over, would you have chosen differently? You’re going to have to pick, Luo Binghe. Is it Qing Jing… or is it Huan Hua? You can’t have both.”

A bold thing to say to the protagonist, who can have anything he wants at any time of his choosing… but what can he say? Shen Qingqiu is feeling bold today.

“Look at this,” the Old Palace Master sneers, trying to rile up the crowd. “Peak Lord Shen is trying to force Luo Binghe to appear unfilial!”

“On the contrary,” Shen Qingqiu says directly to Luo Binghe. “If you want to be free of the bonds of master and disciple today, you only have to tell me. I swear, in front of every person here, never to hold it against you. So… is it the Old Palace Master, or is it me?” he asks. “You absolutely can’t have both.”

There is a long moment of silence in which everyone in the area holds their breath.

“Naturally,” Luo Binghe says at last, and all eyes turn to him once again. “In this life… in any life—”

Yes?!

The Huan Hua Palace delinquents—including Qin-fucking-Wanyue—stare at Luo Binghe like they know there is only one right choice, and that he will make it.

“Out with it!” Qi Qingqi shouts.

Liu Qingge scowls, ready to beat an answer out of him.

Yue Qingyuan’s face becomes even more troubled.

“—this disciple will only ever want Shizun.”

“Which shizun?” Shen Qingqiu asks, angry at this whole farce. Even if he’d ultimately been a bad shizun, he’d really tried his best with what he’d been given, and wasn’t he still a step up from the original goods?

“There is only one Shizun,” Luo Binghe says, clear voice ringing out for all to hear. “This disciple will never acknowledge another.”

“And home?”

“Home is the bamboo house on Qing Jing Peak. If I were to die… that is where my soul would reside. So long as Shizun is there.”

The bated breath of a sea of unhappy people gets released.

“There,” Qi Qingqi barks. “Does that sound like a disciple who has been abused by their master?!”

(No, indeed, most of the people in Jinlan are thinking this sounds an awful lot like a disciple and master who like each other a little too much, if you get what they mean.)

Shen Qingqiu, meanwhile, gets stuck on the word ‘die’ like there was ever a danger of such a thing happening, his mouth going dry, and his brows drawing together. He wants to step forward and pinch Luo Binghe’s cheek, and make him promise he’s never going to die.

“Nobody can blame Disciple Luo for being confused,” the Old Palace Master says, though his expression has become closed-off and decidedly more bitter. “In any case, the accusations levelled at Peak Lord Shen are too great to be dismissed out of hand. Huan Hua Palace has the capability of housing him until his trial.”

‘Housing,’ he says! As though kneeling in the Water Prison surrounded by a wall of acid is like a nice Airbnb in the woods!

“What trial?” Liu Qingge growls, fed up of all these people, and their talking. He really is Shen Qingqiu’s favourite shidi!

The Old Palace Master smiles. “Naturally, Jinlan City deserves an explanation.”

Well, they’re not getting one from me!

“Shizun would never side with a demon,” Luo Binghe says. “Between humans and demons, he will always pick the former.”

That’s not necessarily true. In fact, hadn’t Shen Qingqiu always picked you, no matter the argument?

Don’t forget the time you said Ming Fan was making you feel bad—Shen Qingqiu made him run around the peak for hours, and coddled you!

Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe had both known the truth that day, but Shen Qingqiu had looked on it as sparing Ming Fan from an ant-related death whilst soothing the protagonist for how he actually had been wronged by the boy in the past.

Shen Qingqiu knew you were a demon before you did! And in that moment, like in all others, didn’t he choose to accept your version of events?

In another life, perhaps Shen Qingqiu would have seen the crowd clamouring for a fight, splitting itself into two factions, as something he needed to temper personally. In another life, he might have offered himself up to protect both sides, knowing his time as Shen Qingqiu was now done.

In this life, Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly fucking demon, and Luo Binghe has been surprisingly backing up all the outrageous things he’s been saying. (Alas, still with that weird phrasing, but he can hardly complain!)

“It is with this master’s regret that he cannot partake of Huan Hua Palace’s ‘hospitality,’ Old Palace Master.”

Hospitality, his ass! Shen Qingqiu is not eager to live in your dungeon, weirdo!

It’s at this point that the world decides that he has not been thoroughly screwed enough today. Zhangmen-shixiong was right—he really shouldn’t have come. It’s bad for his health, okay?!

“Shen Jiu! Is it you?”

Qiu-fucking-Haitang!

Can Luo Binghe’s wives leave him alone already? He doesn’t want to play this game!

“Your wife is calling for you,” that would-be purveyor of Shen Qingqiu’s doom says, “and still you won’t look at me.”

Who wants to look at you?! If you want your husband, why aren’t you plaintively calling for Luo Binghe? Shen Qingqiu is happy to be cucked, okay? He gives his permission! 

Shen Qingqiu feels like he’s living in a soap opera. Just like that, Qiu Haitang becomes the next target of all the eyes in Jinlan. Even Luo Binghe turns to look at her, his expression tinged with fiery interest.

“Wife?!” Qi Qingqi screeches, drowning out the shock of his other martial siblings.

You’re not the only one who’s shocked, Shimei!

“We shared mutual affections, were betrothed young, and haven’t seen each other in many years, and still you will not look at me?”

Oh, fuck, no! Not today, bitch! Shen Qingqiu is done!

He turns to look at her, and is frankly unimpressed. Although she has the look about her of someone who could be amalgamated into Luo Binghe’s extensive harem (pretty, but not so pretty as to show up again once she’s in there), Shen Qingqiu had raised this world’s version of Luo Binghe for many years. He wants only the best for his former fluffy lamb.

Shen Qingqiu raised a spoiled boy, okay?!

“You say that you know me, but I do not know you,” he says, voice as cold as his expression. “And you say that we’re married, that we shared mutual affections, but how can this be? There is one very simple, very good reason why none of what you said can be true, and that reason is—”

Is he pausing for dramatic effect right now? Shen Qingqiu would like to refer you back to the aforementioned poser designation. He’s as much a poser as he is a bitch, and he’s all bitch, okay? Yes, he’s fucking pausing for dramatic effect. All the people in Jinlan, residents and visiting cultivators alike, hold their breath.

“—I’m a cutsleeve.”

Yes, that’s right, Shen Qingqiu is going with the tried and true method of deny, deny, deny! And what does it matter if he’s lying about being a cutsleeve? The fact that the protagonist exists in this world means that every woman is for him whether he wants her or not. So Shen Qingqiu might as well benefit from being known as a cutsleeve!

He has no shame, okay?

Luo Binghe’s eyes flicker as they look at him. His mouth falls open just a little, pink and soft, and… is that a tiny little hint of fang there? Sure, it must be shocking to hear your ramrod-straight master announce he’s gay, but Luo Binghe better be careful he doesn’t get noticed!

Shen Qingqiu will not be held accountable for you outing yourself, okay?!

There are various shouts of outrage. At what, Shen Qingqiu doesn’t know. He’s only looking at Luo Binghe.

“So am I,” the boy says, to even more violent shouts of outrage.

What? The ‘outing yourself’ Shen Qingqiu was referring to was the heavenly demon club membership card, not coming out of the closet! What the fuck is this?!

Luo Binghe doesn’t pay attention to any of the various degrees of swooning and anger going on around him. All he says is, “In this, as in all things, Shizun and I are of one heart.”

Again… what?! Shen Qingqiu seems to be having trouble understanding human language right now. Also… phrasing? Doesn’t that make it sound like—

“Enough,” the Old Palace Master says. 

Several things happen all at once at this point:

1. Huan Hua makes a move to try to seize him, having received a signal from the Old Palace Master to go on the offensive.
2. Many of the assembled cultivators and some citizens of Jinlan who have sided with Huan Hua over Cang Qiong see this happening, and lunge forward to try to grab Shen Qingqiu.
3. Yue Qingyuan, Liu Qingge, and Qi Qingqi immediately raise their weapons in his defence, rallying around.
4. Qin Wanyue (perhaps motivated by her most recent and most public rejection from the protagonist) throws her spiritual weapon forward to strike Shen Qingqiu.
5. Faster than anyone, Luo Binghe surges forward, and grabs Shen Qingqiu’s wrist.
6. Adrenaline spikes in Shen Qingqiu’s system, and all of his demonic features make themselves known.

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Luo Binghe’s life hasn’t made sense for years now.

More specifically, his shizun hasn’t made sense for years now.

Sometimes, when Luo Binghe looks at him, it is both like he is seeing that ethereal creature who tormented him on a daily basis in the bamboo house, appearing in a single layer with hair unbound, fresh and soft from sleep or a bath—and like he is the coldness on the edge of the abyss, gaze uncaring, heart unmoved even as his most favoured disciple fell. Luo Binghe doesn’t know how to reconcile that within himself.

Cognitive dissonance.

Just last night, Shen Qingqiu was distant, and closed off. Too far from Luo Binghe’s reach, even for how he was in his arms against the wall of an alley, a whisper of breath between their skin. The two of them all alone in the world. His shizun half-undressed.

And today, Shen Qingqiu has been doing nothing but publicly acknowledging him as his disciple, over and over again. He’s been effusive in his praise, and gentle in his manner. Even willing to pat Luo Binghe’s curls again! (He hadn’t actually been allowed to feel that delicate hand in his hair because they got fucking interrupted, but Shen Qingqiu had been willing!)

It wouldn’t matter so much if Luo Binghe could predict which version of his shizun he was going to get at any given time!

When they were alone, Shizun had been unwilling to acknowledge him, thinking him capable of inhuman things. When they were in front of a crowd of people, he’d done nothing but acknowledge him, going so far as to fight the Old Palace Master over him. But when they’d been in front of the Huan Hua Palace disciples in the brothel, Shen Qingqiu hadn’t wanted to acknowledge him at all!

It doesn’t make sense!

Cognitive dissonance.

Last night, Shen Qingqiu had been of one heart with Tianlang-Jun. Luo Binghe’s blood hadn’t even been strong enough to counteract Tianlang-Jun’s. (And how dare that good-for-nothing make a physical claim to his shizun?)

But today, Shen Qingqiu had said basically everything Luo Binghe wanted to hear, and then some. He admitted to being a cutsleeve—Luo Binghe’s childhood dream! (Although Luo Binghe’s dreams tended to be a bit more risqué than what had happened today—usually culminating in Shizun admitting to uncontrollable feelings for him, and kissing him.)

Luo Binghe’s shizun has always been tricky, and inconstant, producing clouds with one turn of the hand, and rain with another.

Luo Binghe has long known that if Shen Qingqiu doesn’t want to be pinned down, he can talk circles around anyone to get out of it. That everyone is slave to the whims of his personality. That his opinions are loud and as immovable as Cang Qiong Mountain itself—unless he changes his mind.

During Luo Binghe’s young discipleship, Shen Qingqiu had glared at the hamster, Shang Qinghua, if he would look at him at all. After the abyss, Luo Binghe had found out that the two of them were the best of friends, often spending long days off-peak together.

At the Immortal Alliance Conference, Shen Qingqiu had loved him enough to bet all his worldly wealth on Luo Binghe’s good outcome. At the edge of the abyss, he had cut Luo Binghe with Xiu Ya, and kicked him down into hell.

Shen Qingqiu hates reading stories with convoluted plots, characters whose motivations are watery at best, and porn that might have been written by someone who had never been in the same room as a naked woman before, but Luo Binghe had once suggested he stop reading them, and he will never, never do it again.

He is the sharpest man alive. He is oblivious to everything not said directly to him in plain words. Suspicious to a fault, and far too trusting.

Shen Qingqiu is a man of contradictions. Of coldness sharp enough to flay, and tender-hearted warmth enough to comfort any lost soul. Of fairness that knows no race, and inexplicable grudges. Of hate… and love.

Cognitive dissonance.

• He is the most frustrating man alive.
• He is the only man Luo Binghe will ever want.

Watching him today only stokes the fire within his heart that bears Shen Qingqiu’s name.

Watching him reject that awful woman claiming to be his wife. (If Shizun has a wife, it’s Luo Binghe! Let anyone dare to say otherwise! Luo Binghe tended to him personally for years, living with him in his house, feeding him with his own hands, cleaning up after him, loving him from afar.)

Watching him acknowledge Luo Binghe as his favoured disciple, and Qing Jing as Luo Binghe’s home.

Watching him… turn into a demon right before Luo Binghe’s eyes.

Cognitive dissonance.

• Shen Qingqiu is a righteous human cultivator.
• Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon.

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe, the Male Lead ᕙ( •̀ ᗜ •́ )ᕗ [I’m coming, Shizun!]

vs.

The Bitches He Doesn’t Have to Pretend to Like Anymoreヽ(ó﹏òヾ) [Run!]

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

“Well,” Shen Qingqiu says, mostly to himself. “This is embarrassing.”

As it turns out, Shen Qingqiu hadn’t needed Luo Binghe to destroy his reputation for him. He was well capable of doing it himself.

Of course, after his run-in with Luo Binghe last night, he’d entirely forgotten to put make-up on his forehead, or to cover the tips of his ears with his hair, or…

Shit. There really is nothing for it, is there?

Guilty or innocent, Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon, so of course Jinlan is his fault. The sowers were his doing. The plague brought on by him. Qiu Haitang was used and abused by him. His disciples were grievously harmed by their cruel master.

Everything bad that ever happened in the Human Realm in his lifetime must be related to him in some way.

The thing is… he’d always planned to leave. He’d always known that the hard cut-off point for his life as Shen Qingqiu was when Luo Binghe made it back from the abyss, fully blackened with a heart full of revenge.

It’s just that he hadn’t known it would be this soon. That he wouldn’t get a chance to say a quiet goodbye. To take anything with him from Qing Jing.

That he wouldn’t be able to kneel at the sword mound one last time, and pray… that Luo Binghe would be happy.

Fuck.

Of all the people staring at him with mouths hanging open, Luo Binghe is, of course, the most breathtaking.

What must he be thinking right now? Probably what a hypocrite his shizun is, right?

Shen Qingqiu clears his throat, and pulls his wrist out of Luo Binghe’s shock-slackened grip. “On second thought, I think I’ll be going.”

Leaping onto Xiu Ya, he takes off into the sky, knowing none of the cultivators here will be able to keep up with the qi reserves of a heavenly demon—apart from Luo Binghe, of course.

Behind him, Liu Qingge shouts, “Shen Qingqiu!”

“Sorry, Liu-shidi,” he calls back, “now’s not really the time for a chat! Look after my disciples for me, won’t you? Don’t beat them up!”

“Shen Qingqiu!”

“Shixiong will be thanking you, then!”

It’s only when he’s hundreds of li away, his face wind-beaten, his fisted hands chilly, that he has enough presence of mind to think:

Wait a minute, did Luo Binghe just say he was fucking gay?!

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon.

The thought bounces around in Luo Binghe’s head like the little ball in the game Shizun had once taught him to play. Each of them holding a little paddle, knocking the ball to each other across a table. Back and forth. Never pausing for a second.

Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon.

A heavenly demon.

Like Luo Binghe.

He is, of all demons, the only one able to stand on equal footing with Luo Binghe.

Because he’s a heavenly demon.

Like Luo Binghe.

The only two left in this world.

He imagines a pair of Willow-Necked Swamp Vultures, mated for life, and unwilling to part, even facing the end of their genetic line.

The species is barren—able to mate, and produce genetically similar offspring only with members of another species. But Shen Qingqiu had been studying them when Luo Binghe was a disciple, and he’d documented the fact that the species was in decline. Partly due to loss of habitat and prey, of course. But those left had refused to leave their mate even in order to ensure the species’ survival.

Shen Qingqiu had stared at them, wistful, and had said, ‘Binghe, do you think it’s wrong?’

Luo Binghe hadn’t understood what he had been asking back then. He hadn’t understood the need for sadness—didn’t they get to be with their one true love no matter what fate wanted for them? So he’d asked, ‘What’s wrong, Shizun?’

‘This world seems to punish those who only want to live one lifetime with one special person. Don’t you think it unfair?’

Luo Binghe hadn’t known what to say. He’d agreed, of course. As someone who’d known young that he wanted only one man, and knowing that this world’s rich men all have multiple spouses of different ranks, as though love works like that (he supposes that’s the point—what part does love play in these men’s lives?), Luo Binghe’s young teenage years had been filled with the worry that even if he could get himself married off to Shizun… what if a man of his lofty status would want others as well?

His silence had drawn Shen Qingqiu’s gaze towards him then. His shizun had blinked, as if momentarily overcome but coming back to himself. ‘Ah, of course you wouldn’t,’ he’d said. ‘For a moment, I forgot who I was talking to.’

Luo Binghe hadn’t understood that either. Who was Luo Binghe for Shizun to not be able to speak of one love, one lifetime with him? Wasn’t he always just Shizun’s Binghe? The one he could tell anything?

Now, with the revelation of Shizun’s true nature, it makes sense.

Perhaps Shen Qingqiu had already known Luo Binghe was exactly like him. Perhaps he’d known they were the only two of their kind left. Perhaps he was likening their situation to those Willow-Necked Swamp Vultures—to love each other could only mean their species would end with them… but to leave each other was unacceptable. But he’d also known that Luo Binghe was unaware of their shared heritage, and so Shizun had forgotten for a moment that Luo Binghe wouldn’t be able to find it as personally harrowing as he did.

Or, even if Shizun had actually thought himself the last of his kind, and thus looked at Binghe as someone who couldn’t understand the plight of these breathtaking creatures at all—under such circumstances, of course it makes sense that he would have found watching the decline of another species to be particularly heartbreaking. Of course he would have found kinship in their struggle.

What matters is that Shen Qingqiu is a heavenly demon. That Luo Binghe loves him. And that the world is cruel to the last remnants of anything.

Here and now, Luo Binghe watches him go. Watches his shizun, who is a heavenly demon, his zuiyin glowing scarlet along with his beautiful eyes. His ears extended to cute little points. His full bottom lip depressed by two little fangs. He is gorgeous. Peerless in beauty.

Luo Binghe has never looked at his own heavenly demon features and thought of anything but how to hide them. Now, he can’t think of anything but how they make him more like his shizun, how they make Shen Qingqiu the most beautiful that Luo Binghe has ever seen him.

He stands in shock. Not because he doesn’t want to go after Shen Qingqiu. Not because he’s upset, or disappointed, or unhappy (Luo Binghe is a petty man, but the day he is unhappy with Shen Qingqiu is the day he has lost all his memories, and become a different person).

No, the reason he doesn’t go after him as he desperately wants to is because this farce has gone on long enough.

Luo Binghe will never let a grudge go unpunished, and he had been very young indeed when he’d vowed that anyone who stood against Shen Qingqiu would have to stand against him too.

Back then, it hadn’t meant much. What could a scrawny little disciple do in the face of any real harm? But now…

Now—

The Old Palace Master’s face is alit with joy, as though Shen Qingqiu being revealed as a demon before the cultivation world at large is the greatest thing that has ever happened to him in his miserable life. He turns to his disciples, and to the cultivators around them, and barks, “After him!”

“Who dares?!” Luo Binghe says, stepping forward, his voice filled with an easy confidence he had only ever been faking up until the moment Shen Qingqiu’s zuiyin had appeared on his forehead. If before Luo Binghe had seemed an obedient young disciple, letting his elders do all the talking amongst themselves, now it is clear to all that he is a powerful young lord who will brook no argument.

All the Huan Hua disciples freeze, their swords only partly drawn. Everyone else stares at Luo Binghe in shock. Even the Cang Qiong contingent, ready to leap into the sky after their fleeing martial brother, hold back to look his way.

“Disciple Luo is confused,” the Old Palace Master says.

It really is rather funny how little the Old Palace Master or the disciples of Huan Hua know him. Of all the moments in his life, the one where he can be said to be least confused is this one.

All their secrets are out. He and Shizun are both cutsleeves and heavenly demons and love each other as much as they always have. All the paths forward have converged into one singular, beautiful direction.

“Is it that I’m confused,” Luo Binghe asks. “Or is it that you are?”

One by one, he reveals his own heavenly demon traits. First, he lets his eyes turn brilliant red, staring into the Old Palace Master’s very soul. Then, his claws extend as he places his hand on the hilt of Xin Mo. The tips of his ears peek through his curls. With a smile that is really more threat than reassurance, his fangs protrude down over his bottom lip.

Finally, his zuiyin appears, emblazoned on his forehead for all to see.

It’s strange.

Luo Binghe had thought that the only time in his life where his heritage would be revealed was at the edge of the abyss in a moment of both terror and overwhelming regret.

He’d never imagined he would choose to reveal himself before all, intending as he had been to stay a human cultivator for the rest of his life. But as with all things in Luo Binghe’s life, where Shizun leads, Luo Binghe can only dare to follow.

Anything Shizun is, Luo Binghe is proud to be. He stands before these cultivators and mortals alike, proud of who he is. Proud, for the first time in his life, to be a heavenly demon.

To be the only person in this world who knows Shen Qingqiu’s true heart.

“Tell me, Old Palace Master,” he says, the smile on his face never dropping. “Has there been some kind of misunderstanding?”

For the first time, Luo Binghe sees the Old Palace Master appearing unsure, as though aware for once that he has overstepped. That all of his overbearing, insincere praise has only ever grated on Luo Binghe’s nerves. That Luo Binghe had only ever bowed and smiled because it was the only path he had seen back to his shizun.

There is another path now—the right one—and so the Old Palace Master is an unlucky man.

Luo Binghe draws Xin Mo. “Mobei!” he calls, and beside him, a rift opens.

Before this moment, Jinlan City could neither be described as cold, nor hot. But as soon as the rift opens, it would not be wrong to say that all the warmth of the area is leeched out entirely. The cultivators and mortals as one shiver.

“Junshang,” Mobei-Jun acknowledges frostily, stepping through, the rift disappearing out of existence. And somewhere behind the Cang Qiong delegation, a small squeak almost sounds like, ‘my king!’

“‘Junshang?’” Qin Wanyue questions, her voice shrill, her hand clutched to her bosom. Whether out of actual fright, or just to draw attention to it, Luo Binghe cannot say. Either way, he’s tired of her carrying on. Even declaring himself a cutsleeve and a heavenly demon in front of all has seemed little enough deterrent.

“Oh,” Luo Binghe says, tapping a claw-tipped finger against Xin Mo’s hilt. “Did I fail to mention? This lord is the emperor of the Demon Realm. There is no ‘Luo-shixiong’ to you.”

Everyone around gasps, apart from, for the most part, his martial aunt and uncles. Since Shen Qingqiu’s revelation, Yue Qingyuan’s face has only gotten increasingly grimmer. And if Liu Qingge’s hand tightens any more on Cheng Luan, one or the other of them will break.

“I knew he was weird,” Liu Qingge announces with no effort whatsoever to reduce the volume of his voice. “What kind of disciple goes missing for three years after that Immortal Alliance Conference, and shows up again perfectly fine, living with Huan Hua?”

“Liu-shishu is too serious,” Luo Binghe says. “My prolonged absence from home was merely a misunderstanding. My shizun’s magnanimous heart compelled him to send me away for my own good until I could become strong enough to truly stand beside him, but this disciple was stupid, and failed to understand.”

“Who’s your shishu?!” Liu Qingge roars. “I have no shizhi like you!”

Luo Binghe can’t help but laugh, happier than he has been in years, his world finally, finally falling into place all around him. “Before I am anything,” he says, “I am my shizun’s disciple. Everyone here heard it themselves. I was raised personally by Cang Qiong Mountain Sect’s Peak Lord Shen Qingqiu, who still acknowledges me as his own. Liu-shishu isn’t suggesting he has no relation to his own shixiong, is he?”

“You—!”

“Enough,” Yue Qingyuan says. “Now is not the time, and Jinlan City is not the place.” He doesn’t do anything as uncouth as hold Liu Qingge back, but his commanding voice, and his grip on Xuan Su have the same effect.

“Zhangmen-shibo is right,” Luo Binghe agrees. “Sect business should be conducted within the sect. Huan Hua Palace need play no part in it.”

Never satisfied with being dismissed, the Old Palace Master pushes forward. “Clearly, the matter of Cang Qiong raising a heavenly demon to their second highest station is important to all the righteous cultivators in this world. As the foremost authority on heavenly demons, how can Huan Hua merely step aside?”

Luo Binghe laughs again. “Not one, but two heavenly demons have stood before you today. Old Palace Master, let alone the world, how can you claim to be the foremost authority on heavenly demons even in this small group? To say nothing of the fact that you were trying to claim my shizun’s accomplishments in teaching me as your own not even a shichen ago.”

“Whatever was said and done before Shen Qingqiu was revealed to be a heavenly demon is irrelevant.” The Old Palace Master turns to look at the rest of the people in Jinlan. “Cang Qiong needs to be held accountable for harbouring and raising up the most dangerous of demons to a position second only to their sect leader. Shen Qingqiu has been the Peak Lord of Qing Jing for decades. Can his martial siblings really claim not to have known?”

Just yesterday, Cang Qiong had raced to help Jinlan City survive the plague despite knowing that no other cultivators who had been sent had ever returned. Shen Qingqiu had identified the source, Mu Qingfang had developed the cure, and Liu Qingge had caught (some of) the sowers. The fact that Luo Binghe had also identified the source, and caught (most of) the sowers is irrelevant. Luo Binghe would never have come if Shizun hadn’t.

If the plague had turned out to be something even they could not handle, Cang Qiong would have lost a quarter of its peak lords in a single day.

He watches the people of Jinlan, the Huan Hua disciples, and the other assorted cultivators rising up in anger, baying for blood, and he frowns.

This is the gratitude of humans.

‘Don’t you know what you are?’ Shen Qingqiu had asked him on the edge of the abyss, Xiu Ya held aloft, his voice tight with emotion. ‘An abomination. A creature so sinful, even heaven can’t accept you. Don’t you understand?’

Blinded by tears, and the destruction of his perfect life, Luo Binghe hadn’t known what to say. He hadn’t understood.

Now he does.

He and Shen Qingqiu, by their very nature, are unacceptable to the rest of the world.

At seventeen years old, having never stepped foot beyond home without the cloak of Shen Qingqiu’s reputation to protect him, Luo Binghe hadn’t yet learned how to stand on his own outside of his shizun’s shadow. To say nothing of standing for both of them.

He hadn’t yet learned how to hide—or how to be strong enough not to have to. Asking Shen Qingqiu to carry his burden for him, when he was already carrying his own… hadn’t it been too much? Hadn’t he effectively been asking Shizun to give up everything he’d spent a lifetime building for himself? To give up his life as the beloved master to a peak of cultivators when such a thing had suited his disposition more surely than any other role ever could?

Always his teacher, it stands to reason Shen Qingqiu had been the one to teach Luo Binghe his greatest lesson—how to love, and how to be loved…

And how to do it as demons do.

Shizun, a heavenly demon who had forged this path alone before him, had known all of it—everything Luo Binghe hadn’t understood then, nor even half a shichen ago—and had issued a challenge.

Prove yourself to me before I face the world with you.

Isn’t that what he’d meant by the abyss, when he’d pushed Luo Binghe, whom he’d loved so tenderly up until that very moment?

Shen Qingqiu had been born a demon—whether he’d been initially unaware just the same as Luo Binghe or not, his demonic nature will always be inescapable. Of course he would want Luo Binghe to be able to shoulder his own burdens, to prove that he could shoulder Shen Qingqiu’s too, should the need arise. Shen Qingqiu had already long proven himself capable of doing the same.

And Luo Binghe, always the most eager student, had utterly failed to understand his master’s good intentions!

He’d thought the lesson he’d had to learn was how to make himself the most human—the least objectionable he could be. But that hadn’t been it at all! The lesson Shen Qingqiu had wanted him to learn was how to be a heavenly demon who could stand on his own, and who could therefore stand with him against the rest of the world.

Instead of learning to do that, and then coming home, Luo Binghe had dallied at Huan Hua, causing his shizun to suffer, and to misunderstand him!

This disciple was wrong! Please, Shizun, forgive your unruly disciple!

In his darkest moments, after finding Xin Mo, but not yet being strong enough to keep it in line, Luo Binghe had often turned his thoughts to using force. To confine his shizun to life in the harshness of the Demon Realm he hated so much if Luo Binghe could not have him there willingly. He’d wondered at how it might change the man, his lofty immortal master, so far above Luo Binghe’s reach. How the acid of that place might wear down his finer edges, dirty the pristine nature of his soul… leave marks on him of which Luo Binghe was the direct cause.

The thought had both saddened and thrilled him. To have his shizun changed by something that Luo Binghe was… that thought had made liquid fire boil in his lower dantian. But in the deepest heart of himself, where only the truth survives, Luo Binghe has only ever desired for Shen Qingqiu to be exactly as he had been in the years they’d shared in the bamboo house.

Looking at it now… wasn’t it Luo Binghe who was changed in his image instead? Shizun, who was already fully himself at that Immortal Alliance Conference, even if Luo Binghe hadn’t known the extent of it—what need had he to change?

At seventeen, having been raised a human, the abyss had felt like a betrayal. But Shen Qingqiu is not human, and never was, not even then.

Whether the world accepts them or not, whether the humans are grateful for their help or not, Luo Binghe has finally learned the lesson his shizun had been trying to teach him.

Narrowing his eyes at the crowd, Luo Binghe says, “No one will touch Cang Qiong. And no one, absolutely no one, will touch Shen Qingqiu. If you think the plague was a bad thing that happened to you, you don’t want to know what I’ll do to you.”

In front of him, Liu Qingge grits his teeth. “Who needs an unfilial brat like you to stand up for us? Do you speak for Cang Qiong?”

“This disciple wouldn’t dare. It’s just that in this,” Luo Binghe says, “as in all things, Shizun and I are of one heart.” 

The sound of the Huan Hua disciples’ outrage is a sweetness Luo Binghe hasn’t experienced since he last heard the notes of his shizun’s guqin carrying on the wind. Luo Binghe is a petty man, it’s true. It’s been six long years since he’s wanted to rub everyone’s faces in the fact that Shen Qingqiu likes him best of all. He’s not above doing it now.

He turns back to the people of Jinlan. “I will remind you that today the emperor of the Demon Realm came to help you, purely because my shizun desired that you be helped. He is kindhearted and benevolent, and unwilling to let pathetic creatures suffer, quite unlike myself. But if you should choose to repay his kindness with suspicion and slander against his character, the emperor of the Demon Realm may also choose to hurt you.” 

He lets loose the desperation-tight hold he’s had on his demonic qi since the moment he stepped foot in the Human Realm again. Whilst the mortals around them quiver, the cultivators all glare, shouts of ‘demon’ filling the air. Luo Binghe simply lets his vast stores of demonic qi shake the world around him, everyone below a certain level of cultivation bending down, and clutching their heads, or falling down entirely.

“But Luo-shixiong,” Qin Wanyue wails, plaintive and trying. “How can you—”

“As I said, there is no ‘Luo-shixiong’ to you. This lord only acknowledges the disciples of Qing Jing as his martial siblings, only knows one master, and… belongs to only one man.”

The Old Palace Master’s face, already sour, becomes a grizzled thing at Luo Binghe’s declaration. Luo Binghe can’t help but feel a thrill at that. Freedom like he has never known bubbles up in his chest.

“Be warned,” he says, unable to be moved on this subject. “I will find out who instigated the sowers to harm Jinlan, and to defame my shizun. And that person will be dealt with alongside any of you who choose not to heed my words.”

He turns to Mobei-Jun, and points in the direction Shen Qingqiu had gone. “If any of them try to go after Shizun, tear them to pieces.”

“Yes, Junshang.”

Then, Luo Binghe cuts a rift in the air with Xin Mo, letting his demonic qi dissipate.

“Wait a minute,” Qi Qingqi calls, valiantly stepping forward, as unafraid of him now as she was when he was a child.

Luo Binghe turns to her, and she looks at him like he’s a question without an answer. The same look that Shizun used to give him whenever Luo Binghe would reject a girl out of hand. The same look he’d give him when Luo Binghe would fake being sick so that Shen Qingqiu would be forced to take him home instead of stay around women that kept ogling his shizun.

“I don’t know what made you stay away for so long,” Qi Qingqi says, “but you should know… because of you, your shizun acted like a grieving widow for three years straight.”

A… a widow?

Shizun missed him like a widow missing her husband?

“You should have returned,” she says, as though Cang Qiong would have accepted a heavenly demon back just to make Shen Qingqiu happy.

Though, judging by the grim faces of both Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge, perhaps that is not so far from the case. Luo Binghe has no doubt that they would do anything to have Shen Qingqiu return.

Still… for Shen Qingqiu to act like a widow in his absence—doesn’t that mean he considers Luo Binghe his husband?

Luo Binghe bows to Qi Qingqi, a smile lighting up his face. “This shizhi was negligent, and worried Shizun,” he says. “But, Shishu, rest assured, I will not allow Shizun to be a widow any longer.”

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Luo Binghe’s life hasn’t made sense for years now.

Because he hasn’t been looking at it the right way.

Shen Qingqiu is the personification of cognitive dissonance because he is both human and demon, his two natures warring with themselves inside him.

Luo Binghe knows the meaning of that. Knows the shape of those feelings. The part of him that wants to be good, but only if it makes Shizun look at him.

Luo Binghe’s life hasn’t made sense for years now… because he’d been attributing only human motivations to his shizun’s actions.

But Shizun is not just human.

He is still half-human, of course. His many years of passing himself off as a powerful cultivator with extensive spiritual qi, and the ability to pass all of Mu Qingfang’s many medical tests over the years says as much. To say nothing of the fact that Shen Qingqiu had joined Cang Qiong as a child who would have been little able to control his own demonic features without aid of a cradle seal.

Luo Binghe wonders when he had found out. He wonders how old his shizun was when his demonic side had forced itself to the top. And part of him aches to know that Shen Qingqiu had been alone, and had to cope with it all by himself amidst a sect of cultivators.

How did he hide it? Was he even Qing Jing’s head disciple back then?

Luo Binghe wishes he’d confessed his own heritage to Shen Qingqiu himself. Under more agreeable circumstances. He wishes his shizun had had the chance to teach him how to be a proper half-heavenly demon.

With Shizun guiding him through it, it would have felt like the most natural thing in the world.

He wonders who guided Shen Qingqiu. Was it Tianlang-Jun, that degenerate playboy? Or was there some other way that Shizun had acquired such ability?

His master has always loved knowledge. It’s possible he knows all the mating rituals of every class of demon in existence.

With that in mind, couldn’t—with what Luo Binghe has learned from Mobei-Jun’s affair with Shang Qinghua—couldn’t Shizun have been testing Luo Binghe when he threw him into the abyss? Couldnt it have been more than just a demonic master asking for proof that his student was worth teaching? Couldn’t it have been his romantic challenge too?

Be good enough for me or fuck off.

Wouldn’t that be the only reason Shen Qingqiu would ‘act like a widow’ while Luo Binghe was gone?

He shudders.

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

When Luo Binghe had been fresh from the abyss, but not fresh from the open wound in his heart that only Shen Qingqiu could ever heal, he had met a seer.

It was not the first time he had met her, having come across her in the abyss itself on no less than three occasions.

‘Why doesn’t Shizun love me anymore?’ he’d wailed, tired of never getting any answers.

‘Oh, my dear,’ she had said, motherly, and moved by his pain. ‘You always ask the wrong questions.’

Here and now, as the uncontested (actually oft-contested, but never bested) emperor of the Demon Realm, it is easy to summon her, and have her brought before him.

He doesn’t make her kneel, or exert his dominance in exchange for truths. Indeed, he holds up his hand to ask for patience while he composes himself.

This time, he will not wail. He will not offer threats, or bargain.

This time, he is unafraid of what the future holds for him.

“I always ask the wrong questions,” Luo Binghe says. “Please, tell me the right answers.”

The seer sighs. After a time, she nods. Just once.

“I have seen the being you know as Shen Qingqiu live a thousand lifetimes,” she says. “He only ever looks at you.”

☁️ 🫳🏻

🫴🏻 🌧️

Like Shang Qinghua, Luo Binghe hadn’t understood.

And like Shang Qinghua, he could be made to understand.

Shizun… likes him.

Doesn’t this answer his every prayer since he was fourteen years old? For his shizun to have feelings for him. For his heart to belong to Luo Binghe.

Doesn’t this mean that even on the edge of the abyss, Shen Qingqiu had been interested in him? Even back then?

Perhaps seeing him as a heavenly demon had made Shen Qingqiu realise for the first time that Luo Binghe was strong enough to accept his love.

But Luo Binghe, not understanding his shizun’s intentions, had delayed his return, causing Shizun to suffer without him.

What Luo Binghe had seen as being thrown away was really the only thing he could ever want—his shizun giving him a chance to become his partner. But only if Luo Binghe proved he was up to the challenge first.

Wasn’t it proof of his shizun’s belief in him that the Endless Abyss was the challenge he had set for him?

Heavenly demons are the pinnacle of all demons, of all beings in this world. And Shizun is far older than him—of course any challenge laid out to be worthy of him would have to be an enormous task!

And although Luo Binghe had come back, his first stop hadn’t been Qing Jing Peak—wouldn’t that be seen as a rejection on his part? A snub of the highest order. To complete the challenge laid out for him but to never return.

Of course Shen Qingqiu had been upset with him at the brothel!

He regrets ever wasting time at Huan Hua Palace.

Outing himself as a heavenly demon, and emperor of the Demon Realm at that, has put a nice end to that problem though. And it has freed up his time considerably.

No more toadying in Huan Hua Palace. No more listening to the inanities of the Huan Hua disciples’ lives, and having to pretend he wasn’t daydreaming about Shen Qingqiu instead of listening to them. No more being pestered for unwanted romantic entanglements by all those women who’d thought if they just simpered a little harder, they could be Luo Binghe’s sweet young wife.

What a joke!

If only they knew Luo Binghe always goes to his bed at night dreaming of the day Shen Qingqiu will finally let them be one! The same way he has since he was fourteen years old, and new to the feelings of love. The same way he will when he is an ancient, grizzled thing, still needy, and desperate for Shen Qingqiu’s touch.

Luo Binghe will never stop wanting him and Shen Qingqiu to be one.

And to that end, he has Mobei-Jun drag Shang Qinghua before him. “You,” he says, pointing at him. “Tell me where Shizun would go.”

Shang Qinghua shrinks down, trying to become a speck of dust on the floor. “I really don’t know, Junshang.”

“Aren’t you his best friend?”

“Cucumber-bro said that?” Shang Qinghua mutters in shock, his head rising.

Luo Binghe raises an eyebrow. “What did you call Shizun?”

What follows is hardly human language at all—a simpering mess of trembling, shocked utterances that have no structure, nor substance, culminating in Mobei-Jun kicking him to make him stop.

“My blood didn’t work on him,” Luo Binghe says. “At the time, I thought…” He scowls fiercely at Shang Qinghua, unable to get the ridiculous words out of his mouth. “I believed what you said about Tianlang-Jun!”

At this point, Shang Qinghua quakes even harder under his glare. As he should! If Luo Binghe weren’t on the precipice of having everything he has ever wanted in life and more, he would be trying to figure out what that utterly stupid lie had been all about.

It has no reason to exist! Why would Shang Qinghua want Luo Binghe to think that Tianlang-Jun had touched his person? Did he want the man to die? Does Shang Qinghua have some unspeakable grudge against Tianlang-Jun?

It’s possible.

“Forget it. I don’t care what you were trying to accomplish there. My blood didn’t work on Shizun because his own heavenly demon blood counteracted mine. I can’t track him that way.”

“Shen-shixiong didn’t tell me where he was going, Junshang.”

It sounds like the truth. More than Shang Qinghua’s incredibly stupid lie had, even if Luo Binghe had been too upset and jealous at the time to realise how ridiculous it was. His unworldly immortal shizun, master of the Four Arts, who cannot even tell that Liu Qingge has designs on him, sleeping with Tianlang-Jun merely to get rid of Without-a-Cure?

Absurd!

Shen Qingqiu would never lower himself.

That was a lie Luo Binghe had been too desperate to see for what it was. Luo Binghe is no longer desperate, sure in the knowledge that his shizun loves and cares for him like he does no other.

This, though, whilst it may not be a lie, he can’t help but feel like there’s more to it.

“He didn’t tell you,” Luo Binghe repeats, “but do you know anyway?” 

Shang Qinghua looks conflicted, which is not unusual. The man often looks conflicted. Often looks like he is about one simpered apology away from splitting in two.

Luo Binghe pauses for a moment, a thought coming to mind.

What Mobei-Jun had thought was obvious, Shang Qinghua had not understood. What Shen Qingqiu had thought was obvious, Luo Binghe had not understood. Perhaps now, even though his intentions feel obvious, it wouldn’t hurt to be direct.

He clears his throat, and says, “I will never hurt him.” Shang Qinghua seems to settle down a little at that, so Luo Binghe goes on. “Your loyalty towards Shizun pleases me,” he says. “So long as you remain loyal to him, you will never be harmed.”

Breathing out a sigh, Shang Qinghua looks up at him, for once with a glimmer of calculation in his eyes that Luo Binghe has never seen before.

He can work with that.

“Shizun is on the run right now, believing himself alone in this world,” Luo Binghe says. “Don’t you want to help him?”

“I… I don’t know where he’s gone,” Shang Qinghua says. “But I may be able to find out.”

Luo Binghe smiles, leaning forward. “Tell me how.”

“Shen-shixiong and I set up a series of dead drops so we could keep in contact if either of us ever… got into difficulty.”

Luo Binghe narrows his eyes at the man. “Why are you so close?”

“Shen-shixiong and I have known each other for a long time, Junshang,” Shang Qinghua says, squirming, his voice getting quieter. “We’re brothers from the same hometown.”

So long as that’s how it stays, Luo Binghe will not have a problem with him.

“Find out,” he commands, and waves his martial uncle away, the little man scurrying off to who-knows-where. If there is one thing about him that Luo Binghe can appreciate to some degree, he is a reliable little weasel. Luo Binghe will have to count on him then.

“Mobei,” Luo Binghe says. “Pass down my edict.”

“Yes, Junshang.”

“Safe harbour,” he says, “for all heavenly demons within my lands.”

NOTES: (because I'm a clown and the actual notes section isn't actually long enough ◔̯◔)

Winner = Luo Binghe, the Male Lead ᕙ( •̀ ᗜ •́ )ᕗ

SQQ: 5 | SQH: 0 | LBH: 1 | demonic courting rituals: 1 | SQQ’s heavenly demon blood: 1 | SQQ’s aggrieved martial siblings: 0 | Huan Hua Palace delinquents: -10 | the communication barrier between LBH + SQQ: 100 | SQQ’s ult to make himself misunderstood: 1000 | the weight of public opinion: 10,000 | the bitches LBH doesn’t have to pretend to like anymore: -1,000,000

SQQ, his heavenly demon status freshly revealed to the world at large, shaking his head: Ah, shit… what must Luo Binghe be thinking of me? That I’m the world’s biggest hypocrite, and a coward, and—
LBH, lip quivering, giddy tears streaming down his cheeks: Daddy?
TLJ: 👀 Am I seriously being cucked right now? Posthumously? The only one banging SXY back then was me! I’m being written out of history. The sowers were my doing too btw.
LBH: Shut the fuck up! Daddy is talking!
TLJ: :o

SQQ, looking wistfully into the distance: Isn’t it sad that this world doesn’t seem to favour people who just want to be with the one person they love?
SQQ: Oh, right. Why am I asking Luo ‘I was already out because I needed milk so I picked up six wives too, whom I banged in various combinations on the way back’ Binghe?
LBH, eyes wide and filling with tears: Shizun and I are like a star-crossed mated pair of Willow-Necked Swamp Vultures—staying together means dying out but not being together is a fate worse than extinction!

LBH: Shizun and I are the only two heavenly demons left in this world.
TLJ: What am I?! You wouldn’t even be a heavenly demon if not for me!
LBH: the. only. two. left. in. this. world.
ZZL: -_-

LBH, misty-eyed and smiling, full of the nostalgia of home: When I was a young disciple in his care, Shizun loved me so tenderly.
Assembled cultivators, Jinlan citizens, sowers, nodding: Oh, so it’s like that.
SQQ, shaking his head: Luo Binghe knows Yingying would kick his ass if he declared that I abused her so he’s going to say that I abused him instead! Well played, protagonist! Well played!