second-hand alibis - nex_et_nox - 人渣反派自救系统 - 墨香铜臭 | The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System (2024)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan wakes up. He's lying flat on his back in the dirt, blearily staring up at a canopy of rustling leaves above him. Is he, what, in the middle of a park somewhere?

That doesn't really make sense. Those look like some pretty tall trees—and there's too many of them, too close together, for him to be in a park. Probably. He definitely can’t be in a forest because—well, look. First of all, Shen Yuan doesn't remember the last time he left his apartment for anything other than to go to the corner store. Second, he's never been one for going to parks, or forests, and he's not sure he could point out the closest park to his apartment on a map.

Third, he distinctly remembers dying.

Oh sh*t I just died.

Shen Yuan takes a moment to lie there, feeling incredibly...not dead. He's breathing and everything. This can't be the afterlife, can it? If it is—well, there isn't anything he can do if it is. If it isn't, then where the hell is he?

He sits up slowly. Shen Yuan feels alive, yeah, but he also feels—the best description is bruised, except on the inside. Like all his veins had been whacked at as if they were a piñata. Weirdly, other than that, he feels great—

Shen Yuan freezes in place as a long lock of hair slides over his shoulder. Hereaches up. Tugs it. Feels the corresponding pressure on his head. Feels the sway of his silk sleeves, and looks down to see the unfamiliar robes he’s wearing.

What the f*ck?!

[Congratulations! Congratulations! Congratulations! Important things must be stated three times! Welcome to the System. This System operates in line with the design concept “YOU CAN YOU UP, NO CAN NO BB”; we hope to provide you with the best possible experience. It is our sincere wish that during your time, you can fulfill your desires and, in accordance with your wish, transform a stupid work into a magnificent, high-quality, first-rate classic. We hope you enjoy.]

Hahahaf*ck. He definitely died! And transmigrated?!

Shen Yuan tucks his head between his knees and tries not to freak out. That's what you're supposed to do if you're hyperventilating, right?

Okay. Okay, okay, okay.

After some thought, this could be way worse. He could be for-real dead, no take backs, and instead he's transmigrated! That's awesome! Especially since he died in such a stupid way! At least he got transmigration out of the deal.

God, he can't believe it was Proud Immortal Demon Way that killed him—

Shen Yuan's thoughts screech to a halt.

"System," he says, uncurling and lifting his head to look toward where the System's screen had been previously. "Exactly what 'stupid work' am I supposed to fix?"

[Host is currently in World: Proud Immortal Demon Way!]

Shen Yuan ducks his head back down between his knees and screams in abject fury and despair.

“All right. I’m in Proud Immortal Demon Way," he says, once he's had a chance to compose himself again. He sits back up, tossing his stupidly long hair back over his shoulders where it belongs; he is totally calm and ready to grill the System for more information. "Who am I supposed to be?"

Please please please don't let it be someone who Bingge violently murders.

Though given the fact that he's a man in PIDW, his chances are already skewed, and not in his favor. Ugh.

[Bound Role: Shen Yuan, Rogue Cultivator. Weapon: the sword Heng Li. Starting B-Points: 100.]

Shen Yuan takes a moment to digest that. "Did you just create an NPC for me?"

Seriously! NPC, side-character, whatever—the body he's in has his name! The System must have just formed a body for him wholesale when he transmigrated! Unbelievable.

...Not that he isn't grateful that he's so obviously an NPC. Shen Yuan would know if there was someone in this trashfire of a novel that shared his name. Especially because, again, most male characters—especially named male characters—had something terrible happen to them at some point. Usually as a direct result of Luo Binghe and/or one of the wife-plots and/or—

Yeah. If this world exists for women to get f*cked by Bingge, it also exists to f*ck over the men.

Anyway.

Rogue cultivator. This is great! He can explore the world and hopefully avoid running into Luo Binghe for, oh, how about the rest of his life?

Actually, that brings up a good point.

"System? When in the timeline am I?'

That will severely affect any of his plans, after all.

[Host will have to discover that for himself!]

What the f*ck?! "Why can't you just tell me?" he demands.

[This System doesn't want bias affecting Host's actions!] is the response.

What's that supposed to mean?!!

Fine. Fine. Surely it can't be that difficult to figure out. Unbiased actions, huh?

"I'm supposed to fix the novel, right? Do I have any required tasks?"

That's how it always seems to go in these kinds of stories. The System assigns the transmigrator various tasks, so that they can fix the novel or progress the plot or whatever. This works out for Shen Yuan—he might be able to place himself in the timeline based on what the System wants him to do.

There is a long pause.

"System?" Shen Yuan asks suspiciously.

[...Host has been granted Junior VIP status,] the System says, sounding as reluctant as a godawful Google Translate knock-off voice can. [Host may utilize Limited Sandbox Mode. Would Host like to utilize this feature? Yes / No ]

"Limited sandbox? What does that mean?" It sounds like an oxymoron.

[Host will not have required missions in Limited Sandbox Mode, but may take on optional quests if desired. Warning: Limited Sandbox Mode will severely limit the amount of B-Points Host is able to gain or lose!]

Shen Yuan wishes the System would give him a handbook to read instead of making him go through all this question-and-answer bullsh*t.

“B-Points?" he asks dutifully.

[As the plot progresses, B-Points and various other types of points will become available to Host. Points can be spent in the System Store, if Host is interested in specialty items or scenarios. Please ensure no points fall below zero, or the System will automatically mete out punishment, up to and including: automatic deportation to Host’s home world.]

Uh. His home world? Where he’s dead? Isn’t the System saying it will kill him?! Shen Yuan takes a deep breath.

"You said points loss could be reduced in Limited Sandbox Mode? How reduced?"

The System's box flickers. If it were human, Shen Yuan would say it’s squirming.

[This System cannot deduct B-Points in Limited Sandbox Mode,] it says finally.

"Engage Limited Sandbox Mode," Shen Yuan says, sweet as sugar and vicious as any of Peerless Cucumber's infamous forum rants.

[Is Host sure? Reminder: Host will not be able to gain as many B-Points, which he can use in the System Store for speciality items and scenarios—]

"Engage it," Shen Yuan repeats. Hell yes he's going to utilize a function that will keep him from being kicked out of this body early!

[Downloading Limited Sandbox Mode...installing...installed. Host is now utilizing Limited Sandbox Mode.]

Nice. "How did I get Junior VIP status anyway?" Shen Yuan belatedly asks.

[Host does not have sufficient authorization to receive that information.]

Shen Yuan's eyebrows jump. "Can I use B-Points to get an answer, or do I need to cultivate to a certain level? Or is this some kind of System Administration thing?"

[Host does not have sufficient authorization to—]

"Okay, okay," Shen Yuan says, holding up his hands. Probably SysAdmin then. Well, Shen Yuan shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. "So...do you have any missions for me?"

[Optional Mission: "Starter Quest—Rogue Cultivator to the Rescue!" is available. Would Host like to accept this mission? Yes / No ]

A starter quest, huh? That sounds like just the thing to help him get settled in his new life as a rogue cultivator.

Shen Yuan clicks Yes.

The first mission the System sends him on is the definition of a starter mission. Shen Yuan doesn't know why he would have expected anything else. It's easy to the extreme—which Shen is grateful for, don't get him wrong! He has to live a life in Proud Immortal Demon Way when all he's done with his life before that is read various cultivation (web-)novels.

Fortunately, this body has muscle memory the System must have loaded in to make him fit the "rogue cultivator" archetype. He takes half a day to practice with Heng Li and his qi, getting an understanding of how this actually works when it’s not only words on the page.

From what Shen Yuan can tell, with his exceedingly limited knowledge, all the swordwork he uses seems to flow surprisingly well. It’s not at all rough, as he would have expected made-up forms to be. The forms are—well, they’re almost like real forms. Hm.

System, are these real forms? Shen Yuan asks.

[Host may unlock this answer for 100 B-Points!] is the System’s very useful answer.

f*ck you, too, Shen Yuan thinks. He wonders if this is related to the Junior VIP situation. Weird that it would tell he can unlock this answer when he was “unauthorized” for everything else. He supposes he’ll have to earn more points and come back to that question.

In the meantime…maybe he should create a backstory for himself, say that he had a master who taught him at one point? That's usually how it works, though there are certainly some rogue cultivators who are completely self-taught.

Things to consider.

Best keep it vague at first, if anyone asks. No need to dig himself into a hole he can't get himself out of, especially if he can get an answer from the System later.

First mission: take out a monster in the woods for a village near where he'd woken up. The monster in this case being a Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear, which was disturbed from its (you guessed it) ten year long hibernation schedule, then distressed by the villagers having chopped down several trees. It has been rampaging through those self-same woods, growing steadily closer to the village as it goes.

Shen Yuan tracks it down, desperately hoping he won’t have to kill it. It’s not the Dwarf Lemur Bear’s fault that the villagers hadn’t paid attention to replanting the trees they’d cut down for this past winter! Probably they assumed they would have more time to restore the forest, but the Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear’s sleep had been disturbed, smack dab in the middle of its ten years of hibernation.

(Shen Yuan will grant Airplane this: ten years is a ridiculous amount of time for an animal to spend asleep, but the idea that Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bears gather energy and store it in their tails, along with stuffing themselves with food before returning to their hibernation, is fascinating. They perform some sort of rudimentary inedia! They’re not cultivators, but they can utilize their stored energies in almost the same way.

Too bad Airplane never used Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bears for anything more than a one-off creature in a new wife’s acquisition. As the story went, her village—a new settlement, unaware of the very large and temperamental animal sleeping in the nearby forest—had nearly been destroyed by a Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear. This ultimately led to her becoming a cultivator, so that she could protect her village in case it was ever attacked by rampaging wildlife—or worse—again. It was also she came back every few years: to make sure the forest was healthy, and that the Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear was living its best and most peaceful Dwarf Lemur Bear life.

Which it had done for many years, before Luo Binghe accidentally burned down half of the forest, sending the Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear into a rampage. Luo Binghe had killed it, only for the tearful soon-to-be-wife to explain the whole history behind it and the village. Luo Binghe had made noises about restoring the forest, protecting it in the Dwarf Lemur Bear’s stead, et cetera and so forth until the wife had fallen into his arms, joined his harem, and apparently never returned to check on the forest again.

f*ck your mother, Airplane!)

Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bears are famously temperamental—especially if their hibernation is interrupted or their forests harmed, much less both at once—but ultimately not a monster that usually causes problems if they're left alone. There are significantly worse beasts in this world.Since they help look after a forest’s health, they’re even useful creatures!

Not that a creature has to be useful to exist, but it makes it a lot easier to explain to the villagers why he’d left it alive.

Shen Yuan manages to lead it away from the village. He follows the trail of destruction back to what must be its den, the Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear right behind him. With careful talisman work—thank you, System, for including those in the qiankun pouch he’d woken up with!—he gets the Dwarf Lemur Bear back inside its den, and he seals it there.

Not forever! Just long enough for the villagers to replant some trees. The Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear can go back to sleep, and when it wakes up again, its forest will be back to the way it should be.

Shen Yuan scouts around the den, trying to figure out what woke it in the first place. Eventually, he finds a campsite that looks to have been abandoned in a hurry.

Someone didn’t know about all the local fauna when they decided to go on their hunting trip, did they?

He doesn’t see any bodies. They must have run for it when they woke the Ten-Year Dwarf Lemur Bear. Shen Yuan cleans up the campsite, tucks away the supplies left behind because finders keepers, and returns to the village to report the mission a success.

The villagers give Shen Yuan a meal, a place to sleep, and even provisions for him to put in his qiankun pouch (along with his illicitly gained camping supplies), before they direct him further down the road where he might find more work.

"Cang Qiong territory is a good place for a rogue cultivator," someone says, several days, villages, and minor System missions away. "Oh, they do their best, but it's nice that you young fellows can come through as well."

Aha! Shen Yuan doesn't crow aloud, no matter how much he wants to. Finally, a clue as to the timeline! He'd known that he wasn't in a time post-realm merging, as that would have been fairly obvious,but the fact that Cang Qiong is still standing narrows it down even further.

...Assuming he isn't here in a time that's horrendously pre-canon.

"Mn," Shen Yuan says in response to the villager. "Much more open to sharing than Huan Hua."

Huan Hua Palace does their absolute best to keep rogue cultivators out of their territory; any business going away from the Palace means that much less gold for them.

While reading the novel, Shen Yuan had appreciated the power base that Luo Binghe made of Huan Hua, but the sect as it had existed before Luo Binghe's takeover—ah, it really hadn't seemed worth all that much, metaphorically, as it was portrayed in the novel. Shen Yuan hasn't been in this world very long, but nothing he's heard has contradicted that opinion.

(It's a strongly held opinion. Which is a little strange, isn't it? He hadn't thought he cared all that much in his original world.

He chalks it up as having enough experience now to have an educated and practical opinion. If nothing else, it's an opinion he can feed into his falsified backstory. A reason for not joining a sect? He'll workshop it.)

The best thing to have come from Huan Hua was Luo Binghe, given his mother was its former head disciple—

Shen Yuan's fingers spasm as he hands his coins over to the vendor. He quickly gathers his new provisions into his qiankun pouch to cover the slip. He must be tired.

"You don't happen to know anyone who needs work?" Shen Yuan asks, continuing the conversation.

"Well..." says the vendor.

Two weeks after waking up in Proud Immortal Demon Way, Shen Yuan finds himself in Shuang Hu City.

He had just completed a mission in a mid-sized village and hadn't even had a chance to scope out someone else willing to hire a rogue cultivator before he had been approached. He had followed the young lady to a quieter spot to discuss the details, and had blushed furiously as he realized exactly where she was leading him.

Shen Yuan had whipped out one of his recently-bought fans to cover his face, but he followed her into the brothel. There was real fear on the young lady's face. Real desperation. He had to at least hear her out. Cultivators were supposed to help people, weren't they?

To his surprise, the young lady brought him straight to the brothel's madam.

Shen Yuan had hastily bowed to her, saying, "Greetings to Madam. This Shen Yuan is here to offer his assistance, if Madam requires it."

The madam, who introduced herself as Madam Yu, had a strange look on her face for a moment. "Shen Yuan," she repeated, then seemed to shake off her thoughts. "Please, Daozhang, sit." She gestured to the chair in front of her desk. Shen Yuan sat, folding his fan and placing it in his lap.

"Has Daozhang been in the area long?" the madam asked, after one of the workers had slipped inside, poured the two of them tea, and retreated again.

Shen Yuan shook his head in the negative.

"Daozhang wouldn't have heard of the murders, then," Madam Yu said.

Shen Yuan set down his tea. "What murders?"

"For a month, my girls were being killed. Picked off one by one." Grief flashed over Madam Yu’s face. "We couldn't do anything to stop it. We didn't know how or why they were being targeted, and there was no one we could ask for help." Bitterness coated the last half of that sentence.

"Not even Cang Qiong?" Shen Yuan asked.

She shook her head. "We tried. We tried reaching out to—a certain contact." Her eyes swept over Shen Yuan again. "It must not have reached him."

How horrible. No wonder they felt they had to turn to a rogue, if Cang Qiong wouldn't respond to them.

"This one will help you, if he is able," Shen Yuan said. He ran back over what the madam had told him. "You said they were being killed. Not anymore?"

"Four of my girls were killed. We thought it was three, that A-Fang had only run away, silly girl—she was acting so strange the entire week before she disappeared. But then one of my sisters in Shuang Hu City reached out to me. A-Fang went to Shuang Hu City, and she was killed there. In the same way that my other girls were killed." Madam Yu’s eyes closed briefly. "And now there have been several murders in Shuang Hu City.”

The serial killer changed locations, Shen Yuan thought to himself. To throw off the scent? To find new targets? What changed?

“A-Fang was acting strangely, you said?” Shen Yuan said. Why had she gone to Shuang Hu City? Had she known something that the other brothel workers didn't? Why would the killer have followed her there? "Can Madam expand on that?"

"I thought it was the stress," Madam Yu said. "We all did. She was being so—odd. Drinking, acting out. Not at all like herself. Though I suppose I can't say it was only her. All of my girls who died—they acted the same."

Shen Yuan mulled that over. He had asked a few follow-up questions, trying to get a feel for the situation. Madam Yu gave him a letter of introduction to take to Shuang Hu City; the madam at that brothel would answer any other questions he asked.

"Thank you, Daozhang," Madam Yu said as Shen Yuan prepared to leave. He needed to gather a few supplies before he made his way on to Shuang Hu City. It probably wouldn't hurt to write down all the information he had compiled so far, ah. He needed to get his hands on a xianxia notebook…

"This one will do his best to help you," Shen Yuan said.

"That you even heard me out is more than most would do," Madam Yu answered. It was a crushing indictment of society.

Shen Yuan was going to solve this case. He had to. He offered a bow to the madam, lower than the one he had offered her upon first meeting, and set off on his way.

Now he's in Shuang Hu City. The information from Madam Yu is out of date. Shuang Hu City's Madam Ruan gives him all the information she can about the murders in her own brothel, only two in total, and then tells him that the killer has apparently moved on from the brothels.

The most recent murders in Shuang Hu City were of Old Master Chen's concubines. He'd had three originally; now, only one remains.

Madam Ruan has confirmed all of the same details about the killer that Madam Yu had told Shen Yuan. She also fills Shen Yuan in on the gossip surrounding the killer, including the fact that the townsfolk had dubbed this murderer the "Skinner Demon," for the way it skinned its beautiful young victims.

Which, by the way, was absolute bullsh*t! For his sins, Shen Yuan had read the entirety of this sh*t-stupid novel, and a "Skinner Demon" had never been mentioned!!

System, Shen Yuan says as he leaves Shuang Hu City's brothel. Is this a quest that happened in the original novel? I never read about it!

[Host has equipped Limited Sandbox Mode. Host is not required to follow every plotline to the end!]

That doesn't answer my question! Shen Yuan howls.

Fine! He's already committed to this. He isn't going to back out now, even if it would be nice if the System could actually give him a straight answer.

Ugh. Shen Yuan supposes that, in a way, the System hadanswered him. This is an unintended consequence of the Limited Sandbox Mode. Luo Binghe never went on this mission, so why would it have been mentioned in the text of the novel? Shen Yuan is free to do whatever he wants in this world, and that includes running into monsters that never made it into the original.

...Actually, when he looks at it like that, it's rather exciting, isn't it? Monsters, beasts, plants that Airplane never mentioned? Yes, please.So long as Shen Yuan doesn't f*ck up enough to get himself killed or dosed with aphrodisiacs, this sounds like paradise to him.

First thing's first, he needs to find this "Skinner Demon."

The sun is sinking down toward the horizon as Shen Yuan walks through the marketplace. The Skinner Demon kills on a weekly basis, and it's been precisely that long since its last victim. If it's going to strike, it will be soon.

Unsurprisingly, there aren't many women out and about. Madam Ruan had told him of how every family with daughters, wives, or concubines shut their doors and locked themselves away as soon as night fell, hoping to keep their loved ones safe. None of their efforts had helped so far. And yet, it really is safest to stay inside. No need to make a target of oneself—

"Shijie," Shen Yuan hears. "We really should return. Shizun told us to return by sundown—”

Shen Yuan's gaze slides sideways. Two young teenagers are at the edge of the market, the boy pleading with his sect sister. His sect sister, who is young and cute and running around at sunset in a town with a serial killer.

"You two," Shen Yuan says, striding over to them. "What are you doing here?"

The boy's eyes go wide and frightened. A bit of an overreaction, ah?

"This disciple apologizes," the boy says quickly, dipping into a bow. His shoulders hunch like he's expecting to be hit. Shen Yuan can't help the little tug on his heart at the sight of it.

"Up, up, stop bowing," he says. "You two need to get inside before night falls completely." They're obviously members of a sect; are they also here to deal with the Skinner Demon? If so, shouldn't they know better than to be wandering the streets? Especially the girl.

The girl who...pouts at him, reaching out to tug at his sleeve. "But Shizun," she says. "You said we could explore the market!"

Shen Yuan stares at her. "Who's your Shizun?"

The girl blinks at him. The boy's eyes narrow. "Shijie," he says, quiet and yet with a tone of warning in it.

Shen Yuan is glad at least one of these children has a sense of stranger danger. Are they new disciples, to mistake a stranger for their Shizun? Hopefully they've had enough sense instilled in them to understand that they need to get themselves out of danger.

"You need to get off the streets," Shen Yuan says. "The killer strikes at night. Can you safely get back to where you’re staying?"

Shen Yuan will escort them if they ask. If not, he plans on shadowing them back to their quarters; he's not letting them walk unaccompanied, not when neither of them has a sword. Nor any weapon that he can see, good grief! Arm your students if they're in a murder town, nameless shizun!

"Shizun," the girl says again, sounding confused, her hand still tangled in his sleeve. The boy reaches for her free hand, obviously planning to pull her away.

That's about when everything goes to hell.

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan wakes up. This is the second time in as many weeks that he's unexpectedly woken up in an unknown place. He’s not any happier about it the second time than he was the first.

Scratch that, he definitely likes it less. Last time, he was recovering from his own death, but at least he’d had time to freak out, process, and incrementally adjust before moving on with his life.

This time, he's been knocked out by some unknown assailant, kidnapped, and tied to a wooden beam. The first thing his blurry vision lands on is two terrified children, one of whom is crying. Their arms and torsos are bound, much the same way Shen Yuan's are.

f*ck.

On top of that, or as a consequence of it, he feels awful. Dizzy and achy and—cold?

He looks down.

What! The! f*ck!

The Skinner Demon had stripped him naked!! Or at least removed his robes, leaving him only with his pants and shoes. They then bound him with thin red ropes in a criss-crossing pattern, like the demon was poorly practicing shibari, before using the ends of the ropes to tie him against the beam at his back.

Shen Yuan could vomit blood at the sight.

He takes back every complimentary thought he may or may not have had since he woke up in Proud Immortal Demon Way. He hates this world! He hates Great Master Airplane Shooting Toward the Sky! f*ck his mother!! What kind of p*rn-universe logic leaves even male NPC rogue cultivators in these kinds of situations?! Save the wife-plots and gratuitous nudity for the wives!

"Shizun," the girl sobs. "Shizun, you finally woke up—”

"Shijie," the boy whispers. His gaze is steady as he and Shen Yuan stare at each other from across the room. "I don't think—”

An unsettling chuckle suddenly rings through the room. A tall figure, their whole body wrapped in dark clothes and face covered with a black veil, steps out of the darkness beside Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan watches as they circle around until they are between Shen Yuan and the disciples.

Shen Yuan can't see their face. Nevertheless, he has the feeling the figure is leering at him.

"The so-called 'Skinner Demon,' I presume," Shen Yuan says.

A bout of crazed laughter. "That's right! That's me, the Skinner Demon! Ha! The great Cang Qiong Mountain Sect, the great Peak Lord of Qing Jing—and yet this is all you amount to? The illustrious Xiu Ya Sword has fallen into my hands so easily; without a doubt, the subjugation of the Human Realm is close at hand if this is all the defense you sect cultivators can muster!"

Oh, so the Skinner Demon is stupid. Shen Yuan doesn't know why he expected any better.

"This one is not Shen Qingqiu," he says, slowly and patiently, like he's talking to a toddler. Which might be an insult to toddlers, since a child may well be more intelligent than this idiot, successful serial killer or not. "Nor is this one associated with Cang Qiong Mountain Sect. This one is a rogue cultivator."

Seriously, does he look like he belongs to a sect?! He has decent robes, but they're nowhere near the quality that a Peak Lord could afford, and they're obviously somewhat travel-worn and dusty. Yes, after his meeting at the brothel he'd taken a moment to freshen up, but Shen Yuan is well aware how obvious it is that he’d been wearing his outer robes for a few days already. Which the Skinner Demon should have noticed, since they apparently f*cking well undressed him.

Not to mention they must have taken his sword. Did Heng Li look like Xiu Ya?! Moron.

"What?!" the Skinner Demon says. "What kind of trickery are you trying to pull?!" Shen Yuan isn't trying to pull anything. He's not Shen Qingqiu—what's so difficult to understand about this? "Pah! You think you're so clever, Xiu Ya, but even if you put all your wits to the task, you wouldn't be able to puzzle out who I am!"

Right, but there's nothing stopping him from guessing. Guessing with the benefits of knowing the Skinner Demon's patterns from Shuang Hu City and the village before this one, all the knowledge granted to him by the brothel madams; guessing with the acknowledgment of the Skinner Demon's curvy figure and tiny waist, the rich scent of the furnishings in the room that couldn't be anything other than high-class; and most of all, guessing with the benefits of knowing what kind of dumbass move Airplane would have pulled if he had written this.

"Lord Chen's third concubine," Shen Yuan guesses with a confidence he doesn't feel.

The Skinner Demon rips off their veil. "Impossible! How did you guess that I was Die-er?!"

Is that the name of the latest woman the Skinner Demon had killed? Good to know. Shen Yuan manfully refrains from rolling his eyes.

These goddamn 40-IQ villains, he swears.

"Not bad, not bad. But even if you figured out I was Die-er, you would never be able to guess why a weak and delicate woman like me would be the culprit, could you?"

Oh boy. Shen Yuan settles himself in for the monologue. He interjects occasionally, to point out flaws in the Skinner Demon's logic that irk him. This tactic also keeps the Skinner Demon's attention on him. If their attention is on him, it's not on the kids.

While the Skinner Demon talks, Shen Yuan is desperately trying to find a way out of the bindings. If the Skinner Demon weren't right in front of him, maybe he break his way out of the ropes by rubbing them against the edges of the beams until they frayed. Or he could find some other way to slip through the ropes—he's pretty sure that at one point in the novel, Luo Binghe had dislocated his thumbs (or maybe shoulders? Shen Yuan can’t quite recall right now) in order to free himself when he was taken captive and tied up. Shen Yuan bets he could do that. If nothing else, maybe he could talk the kids through freeing themselves; their bindings are different, so it might be easier for them.

None of those hypotheticals matter. The Skinner Demon is in front of him, so he'll have to do his best with what he has.

...He's about to die again, isn't he?That was a short second life.

The Skinner Demon triumphantly reveals that they've used Immortal Binding Cables. This explains why Shen Yuan's continual efforts to destroy the ropes with his qi—or summon Heng Li to do it for him—aren't working. He can't gather any significant amount of qi at all. If he could, this would all be so much simpler!

Because Shen Yuan’s luck is absolute sh*t, the Skinner Demon reveals this pertinent detail while they are walking toward the disciples. Threatening to kill them.

"You're a brat," the Skinner Demon says to the girl disciple, fully turned away from Shen Yuan to focus on her, "but your skin is lustrous and tender, and you're a disciple from the prestigious Cang Qiong. I should be able to use your skin for a long time." They sigh happily. "After I suck your skin dry, it will be your master's turn; that way the Xiu Ya Sword can be assured that his life wasn't lived in vain."

No thank you! You've got the wrong guy! Please kill Shen Qingqiu instead, thanks!

The boy disciple's eyes are flicking back and forth between Shen Yuan and his martial sister. The Skinner Demon draws closer.

"Don't you only target young, beautiful girls?" Shen Yuan throws out desperately. If this demon truly can't stop themself from monologuing, then all Shen Yuan needs to do is toss a question their way every so often. He needs to stall. Just until he can come up with some kind of plan! Think, think, think, there has to be something he can do! Or maybe—

System, he thinks, desperate. Is there anything you can do?

[Apologies to Host! Lack of B-Points combined with Limited Sandbox Mode do not allow this System to offer assistance on Optional Mission: “The Skinner Demon.”]

Ah. He’s absolutely going to die.

"Not onlygirls," the Skinner Demon says to Shen Yuan. They switch tracks to prowl near him again. "Men are fine too, so long as they're good-looking and their skin is fine and smooth. Usually young girls have the best skin, but occasionally..." The Skinner Demon's eyes flash with assessing envy. They reach out, one scarlet-nailed hand running down Shen Yuan's bare chest.

"You cultivators," the Skinner Demon whispers. "Young and beautiful forever. Even though you're a man, your skin is like this...so glossy and smooth..."

Shen Yuan chokes back the urge to vomit.

Stop touching me, get your hands off of me—

But. Again. If the Skinner Demon is focused on him, they’re not paying attention to the kids.

Shen Yuan does his best to make himself stay still and not react. Despite that resolution, he can't help drawing back from the hands feeling him up. It's violating and awful and thank god the kids aren't being touched like this.

"You can't get away with this forever," Shen Yuan says, keeping his voice steady through dint of sheer effort.

"Who will stop me?" the Skinner Demon croons. "Even a Peak Lord isn't enough."

"Die-er, why are you so sure this one is Shen Qingqiu?" Shen Yuan asks. Had they met Shen Qingqiu previously? Seen him from a distance and conflated his features with Shen Yuan's?

The Skinner Demon draws away. (Thank f*ck, they stop touching him.) They seem confused. "This again? How could I not recognize the man who stood in front of me three shichen ago?"

Wait. Is Shen Qingqiu actually in Shuang Hu City? Holy sh*t. That’s f*cking hilarious.

A smirk forms on Shen Yuan's lips.

"What's so funny?" the Skinner Demon asks suspiciously.

"I'm really not Shen Qingqiu," Shen Yuan says. He wants to laugh. "You grabbed the wrong cultivator. Which means that any moment now, a Peak Lord will be breaking down your door. If I figured out the murderer was Die-er, there's no way Cang Qiong's strategist doesn't know."

Scum villain he may have been, but it was never up for debate that Shen Qingqiu was clever. He undoubtedly would figure this out—

The Skinner Demon grabs Shen Yuan by the throat and slams his head against the beam.

Ow, Shen Yuan thinks blearily.

"It doesn't matter whether you're telling the truth or not," the Skinner Demon says. "I'll kill you all either way."

Yeah. Shen Yuan knows that. He’s nearly made his peace with it.

He looks past the Skinner Demon.

"It's going to be okay," he tells the kids. He's lying, of course. Everyone in the room knows it. "You'll be okay."

That, he hopes, won't prove to be a lie.

The Skinner Demon laughs. They reach out one hand, the sharply-filed nails caressing his face gently once, twice. The third time is accompanied by a streak of pain, as those claws split skin, digging in and dragging slowly down his cheek. Shen Yuan bites the inside of his other cheek, refusing the Skinner Demon the satisfaction of hearing him make a noise. Blood trickles down the side of Shen Yuan's face, dripping off of his chin and falling onto his bare chest.

Abruptly, Shen Yuan is furious. Everything Shen Yuan had done to pull the Skinner Demon’s attention, all the Skinner's big talk about their methods, how they were going to kill him and enjoy using his skin, and they turn around and do this. They bragged about using beautiful skins, about stripping them whole and undamaged from their victims to use.

This is not that. This is stupid. What short-sighted fool damages something as visible as his face? It's a cheap f*cking intimidation tactic, a gamble to try and scare him even more before killing him, and it's done in a way that actively damages the usefulness of the skin the demon could pull from him.

Sure, maybe they've decided not to use his skin after all, but why take irreversible action like this? There’s no way the Skinner is going to keep him alive long enough for this to heal, especially when he’s wrapped in Immortal Binding Cables!

Shen Yuan is terrified and in pain and angry. That's what he blames for the sh*t-stupid move he pulls next:

The Skinner trails their hand through the blood on Shen Yuan's cheek. As they pull away, Shen Yuan snaps at it.

He connects.

Furthering the idiocy, Shen Yuan digs his teeth in the Skinner’s hand and locks his jaw, refusing to release his grip even as the Skinner shrieks and flails in place. He doesn't let go until the Skinner Demon contorts themself enough to backhand the bleeding wound on his face. The burst of sudden pain startles him enough to release his grip.

The Skinner Demon hits him a second time for good measure. His head snaps to the side; his body strains against the cables holding him in place. He’ll have bruises later—or he would, if he were going to survive this.

He’s pretty sure he just knocked the likelihood of that down past zero and into the negatives.

Shen Yuan spits out the blood in his mouth. He determinedly doesn’t think about that the fact that the bits of skin no doubt stuck in his teeth are from a week-old corpse. Instead, he turns his head back toward the Skinner Demon and bares his teeth at them.

“You!” the Skinner Demon screams. “You! You filthy bastard! I’ll make it hurt! I’ll flay the skin from your bones! I’ll use it as I kill your pretty little disciples, and then I’ll go back to your quarters, to your sect, and I’ll kill the rest of them, and I’ll enjoy every second of it!”

They lunge at Shen Yuan.

f*ck, he hopes the kids don’t watch.

He’d caught the Skinner Demon off guard once, but it won’t happen again. Even if it did, what does Shen Yuan hope to accomplish, bound as he is? Does he want to attempt ripping out the Skinner Demon’s throat with his teeth—?

The door bursts open. Directly on its heels, a sword glare slams into the Skinner Demon, tossing them violently against the far wall. The Skinner Demon isn’t getting up from that. The attack all but bisected them.

A cultivator steps into the room. He’s tall, made taller by the elegant guan holding half of his black, pin-straight hair in place; his robes are embroidered layers of white and pale green. An unsheathed sword is grasped in one hand. His expression is drawn and furious.

And he has Shen Yuan’s face.

Shen Yuan stares, dumbstruck. The cultivator’s gaze sweeps the room, moving from the Skinner Demon to the tied-up disciples and then, finally, around to Shen Yuan.

The cultivator’s expression cracks. Shock and some bright, indefinable emotion blooms across his face.

Shen Yuan blinks and the cultivator is across the room, kneeling at Shen Yuan’s side. A similarly quick flash of his sword and the Immortal Binding Cables have been sliced through; Shen Yuan slumps forward slightly before he can compensate for the sudden slack.

“A-Yuan,” the cultivator breathes, his free hand reaching up to cup Shen Yuan’s uninjured cheek. This man is a stranger, and the last person touching Shen Yuan like this was the Skinner Demon. Why, then, does he find himself leaning into it? “A-Yuan, A-Yuan, I found you.”

Shen Yuan processes that, thoughts moving sluggishly as he struggles to compute, before it clicks. His heart drops down into his stomach.

f*ck sh*t dammit SYSTEM! What is Shen Yuan supposed to do here!! He didn’t know his body had a past! Wasn’t it supposed to be an NPC?! Isn’t that what he’d been told—

…Oh.

Oh, no.

The System had never said he was an NPC. Shen Yuan had taken that idea and run with it, but if he really thinks back—the System had said “Shen Yuan” was a Bound Role. He’d blown right past it without thinking twice, so assured in believing that only an NPC would have a matching name with him. Stupid.

"A-Yuan," the cultivator says again. His gaze searches Shen Yuan's, looking for something. Someone. "It's Jiu-ge."

This is not the Shen Yuan you're looking for! Shen Yuan thinks hysterically.

"I..." Shen Yuan says. "I don't..." I don't have a clue who you are! I didn't realize I even had a brother in this world!

f*ck, f*ck, f*ck, if he’d only realized he had a past, he could have been preparing this whole time! He could have made contingencies! He could have started investigating, or bothered the System until it coughed up information, or done anything other than absolute nothing!

(Oh god oh sh*t AAAHHHH Shen Yuan has gotten used to his new face—he’s looked in enough rivers and a few mirrors over the course of the last few weeks to learn its new angles, an unexpectedly easy process—but he hadn’t realized it was a shared one! Is this why the brothel madam had looked at him so strangely? Does she know his brother?)

Shen Yuan has no understanding of the Original Goods’ past. Now he’s in front of his cultivator brother—apparently a brother that the Original Shen Yuan has been separated from for a while, going by “Jiu-ge’s” reaction—and if Shen(?) Jiu finds out that Shen Yuan isn’t who he thinks he is, it’s pretty likely Shen Jiu will separate Shen Yuan’s head from his body.

System! he wails internally. Why didn’t you tell me?!

[Congratulations, congratulations, congratulations! Optional Mission: “The Skinner Demon” complete. +10 B-Points. Hidden Mission: “Long Overdue Reunion—The Search for Jiu-ge!” complete! +25 B-Points.]

That’s not helpful! Shen Yuan howls.

Shen Jiu’s eyes narrow. He drops his hand from Shen Yuan’s face to grab at his wrist.

Shen Yuan is free from the Immortal Binding Cables, so he can feel his qi circulating again, spiritual energy heading steadily toward where he’s been injured. Shen Jiu helps that qi along, before pushing his own qi into Shen Yuan’s meridians.

It feels—really nice, actually. The System had given him a very basic lesson on using qi, but for the most part, Shen Yuan has been working on it through judicious use of knowledge scraped from web-novels combined with copious trial and error. Fixing the damage leftover from the original Shen Yuan’s fatal qi deviation had been beyond him.

Shen Jiu’s qi, so similar to his own, sweeps through his meridians and determinedly smooths out several of the rough patches and tangles Shen Yuan hadn’t even considered touching yet. He hadn’t thought those spots were bothering him, but he was wrong. The sudden relief from not-quite-pain has him slumping bonelessly against the beam behind him. He should probably be busy hoping he doesn’t get any splinters from this—or from the Skinner Demon throwing him around—but the endorphin rush means he can’t bring himself to care.

Shen Jiu frowns at him. “When did you have your qi deviation?” he demands brusquely. He doesn’t let go of Shen Yuan’s wrist, nor does he let up on the qi flow.

"...Two weeks ago," Shen Yuan says. May as well be honest. Shen Jiu has already seen the damage in his meridians, and hey! He knows that Shen Yuan has had a qi deviation. Maybe that will help to cover any inconsistencies between the two versions of Shen Yuan.

Shen Yuan wonders how long it's been since Shen Jiu saw Shen Yuan.And what happened when they, ah, separated, given that Shen Jiu’s reaction was…that.

"Two weeks ago," Shen Jiu says, contemplative. Shen Yuan hopes he isn't about to get onto Shen Yuan for the remaining damage, or for not having fixed it already, or—Shen Yuan is doing his best here, all right!

He's also not sure why the timeframe is important. Obviously it somehow is, because there are furious calculations going on behind Shen Jiu's nominally flat expression.

Shen Jiu keeps feeding qi to Shen Yuan, who is already about as boneless as a human with a functional skeleton can be, but is making a valiant effort to become one with the support beam entirely. Shen Jiu is right next to him, blocking most of Shen Yuan’s view of that side of the room, but peering over his shoulder, Shen Yuan can make out the disciples.

Who are…still tied up, actually? Ge, don’t you want to deal with that?!

The disciples seem to be whispering back and forth to each other, quietly enough that even with his sensitive cultivator’s hearing, he can’t quite make out what they’re saying. The girl has finally stopped crying, thank goodness, though she looks to be sniffling a bit. The boy has held himself together remarkably well.

Now that he has a moment when he’s not in terrible danger—and now that the pressure and dizziness in his head is fading as his qi circulates; did the Skinner Demon give him a concussion?—Shen Yuan can actually pay attention to the disciples. He can really look them over and take in the details of them, the way he hadn’t at the market or during this whole awful event.

He can, for example, examine their uniforms. They’re…familiar. Greens and whites, like Shen Jiu’s, in a scholar’s cut rather than a martial one.

The children themselves are…also familiar. And not only because all three of them narrowly scraped by through a high-stress situation together over the past quarter-shichen. When he thinks about it…

He knows the ribbons and looped hairstyle of the girl. He knows the curling hair and wide doe eyes of the boy.

Proud Immortal Demon Way was wildly popular, but it had taken a while for it to get there. A lot of fans had only started reading once the Endless Abyss arc had begun, drawn by the unsealing of Luo Binghe’s demonic powers, the increased violence, and the promise of revenge. Consequently, most fanart had been focused on Luo Binghe in the Abyss, or as his fully realized Demon Lord self.

Most, but not all. Shen Yuan had always had a soft spot for those few artists who focused on that little white lotus child.

Shen Yuan is an idiot.

(He’s going to blame it on the terror. And the concussion.)

He knew the Qing Jing Peak Lord was in the city. He had been banking on it.

The Skinner Demon kept mistaking him for the Qing Jing Peak Lord, whom they had personally met only a few shichen previous, who was investigating with his disciples, who has the surname Shen—

Shen Yuan’s eyes slide down to the sword at Shen Jiu’s side. He doesn’t even really need the confirmation. He gets it anyway.

That sure f*cking is Xiu Ya!

His gaze flicks back up to that not-actually-blank face. The face that is a match for his own.

This never happened in the novel.

“Shen Qingqiu,” Shen Yuan says faintly. “You’re…Shen Qingqiu.”

“Yes,” says Shen goddamn Qingqiu, scum villain extraordinaire.

I’m f*cked, Shen Yuan thinks.

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

“Shen-shibo is back from his mission, Shizun,” Mu Qingfang’s head disciple says as she pokes her head into his office. The fact that she has to inform him of this means that Shen Qingqiu is on Qian Cao; Mu Qingfang doesn’t particularly care about gossip, and she’s well aware of that, so he’s here.

“I assume, given the lack of yelling, it’s not an emergency,” Mu Qingfang says dryly. Not to mention, Yue Qingyuan would already be here… “Is it one of his disciples or Shen Qingqiu himself?”

(Unlikely. Shen Qingqiu avoids Qian Cao like it’s one of his assigned duties, even though maintaining his health should be part and parcel of his actual duties as Peak Lord.)

“Neither?” his head disciple says. She sounds dubious, unsure of the answer she’s giving. “Unless it’s the result of a qi deviation, but this isn’t an effect I’ve ever heard about…”

Her brows furrow and she looks thoughtful. Mu Qingfang knows she’s already planning a research project in her head. He’ll have to come back to that later—and point her toward some resources, once he’s ascertained what has put that light in her eyes in the first place.

“Who is my patient?” Mu Qingfang asks. He stands, stepping past his disciple to head toward the front of the clinic.

“Shizun…needs to see that for himself.”

She’s not wrong.

“Hm,” Mu Qingfang says, as he walks into the exam room his disciple had stashed Qing Jing’s Peak Lord.

Shen Qingqiu is sitting on the bed, waiting to be examined. Shen Qingqiu is also standing next to the bed, gently waving his fan and watching Mu Qingfang with narrowed eyes.

Yes, he sees why his head disciple may have assumed qi deviation.

(He makes a mental note to absolutely follow up with her re: research. Perhaps he’ll do some research of his own, if he finds the time. Whether or not this is the result of a deviation, there is a certain sense of vertigo upon entering such an unexpected situation while being completely unprepared.

Not uncommon, given his peak and the chaos of the world, but he likes using that as a chance to always learn more. A healer’s work is never done.)

“Shen-shixiong,” Mu Qingfang greets them both.

The two versions of Shen Qingqiu are nigh identical. Same clothes, same hairstyle. Same green eyes—though the sitting Shen Qingqiu’s seem softer, almost lost, and there’s a mostly healed slash through one of his cheeks, along with some nearly healed bruising.

Then Mu Qingfang’s eyes drop to the swords both men have.

One is Xiu Ya. The other is—not. It has no resemblance at all. It is most assuredly a spiritual sword, and too high quality to be a rented one. To be sure, Mu Qingfang would have to see the man fight, or have him draw his sword while feeling his qi, but given the casual way his sword rests at his side, how the man doesn’t need to check where it is because he surely knows through his qi, the second Shen Qingqiu must be bound to his sword.

If a qi deviation had split Shen Qingqiu into different parts, only two outcomes are likely: the deviation would have left Xiu Ya completely untouched, requiring it to be shared between the two halves of Shen Qingqiu—or it would have split itself into complementary halves with its master.

Ergo: this is not the result of a qi deviation.

“This shidi was not aware Shen-shixiong had a twin,” Mu Qingfang says blandly.

What does he know about Shen Qingqiu?

He’s prone to qi deviations. He’s brilliant, with a biting temper. He entered the sect late, at the recommendation of Yue Qingyuan, who shares some sort of past with the sect’s most irascible Peak Lord.

A past which very well could contain a twin, given that Shen Qingqiu never speaks of his origins. Barring Yue Qingyuan, all his martial siblings have to go on is supposition.

…Well. Mu Qingfang has slightly more than that.

Shen Qingqiu acts like a feral stray when forced to accept medical attention, yet there are some things even he can’t deal with on his own. Mu Qingfang has often been called in to deal with Shen Qingqiu’s deviations; on one memorable occasion, he’d had to stop Shen Qingqiu from bleeding out after a night hunt gone wrong. If Shen Qingqiu hadn’t already been unconscious, he’s sure Shen Qingqiu would have tried to deal with even that on his own.

A fact about cultivating healers: if you are sufficiently advanced enough in your cultivation, if you are well trained, you can feel injuries, occasionally particularly deep scars or other parts of a body’s history, through your patient’s qi. Not every healer is adept at it; some must work significantly harder, and there are plenty of injuries that are so visible it’s not required to expend the qi to check. Personally, Mu Qingfang advises his senior disciples to always perform such a check at the end of an intensive session to make sure they haven’t missed anything more subtle.

Mu Qingfang has an exceedingly sensitive, finely tuned, and controlled touch. When he checks a patient, he has to restrain himself. He has to focus on not letting his qi echo back to him every single bit of information about his patient’s body, especially when they are only there for routine medical exams.

Or when they are hiding from healers.

Shen Qingqiu is a feral stray. If Mu Qingfang let him find out how much he knows about Shen Qingqiu, he truly thinks that, like a cat, Shen Qingqiu would try to slink off to die alone the next time he injures himself too severely.

Mu Qingfang tries to tread the line between treating his patients and respecting their privacy. He would never breathe a word to anyone about one of his patients’ medical conditions except under very specific circ*mstances. If he wants Shen Qingqiu to keep living, those circ*mstances are still firmly labelled “never” in red ink.

Whatever the likes of Liu Qingge or Qi Qingqi think of Shen Qingqiu’s past, they’re wrong. Mu Qingfang knows that far too well.

No one has that much damage to them if they’re the spoiled young lordling Liu Qingge wants to believe they are.

Not for the first time, Mu Qingfang wishes Shen Qingqiu weren’t so slow to trust. If they had a stronger rapport, Mu Qingfang might actually be able to address some of that damage. Both physical and spiritual.

(A golden core is a wonderful thing. Yet even a golden core cannot heal all the damage done before it was formed. Mitigate chronic pain, bolster the immune system, repair cosmetic details, yes—

But the body remembers.)

The not-Shen-Qingqiu twin sitting on the bed crooks a small, almost shy smile at Mu Qingfang.

“This one is Shen Yuan,” he says.

“Mu Qingfang,” Mu Qingfang introduces himself in return, though he suspects Shen Yuan may have already guessed that—along with the information he follows it with. “Qian Cao’s Peak Lord.” His gaze cuts to Shen Qingqiu before returning to Shen Yuan. “If this master may ask the specific reason Shen Yuan came to Qian Cao today…?”

He doesn’t look injured at first glance. That’s not always a reasonable way to assess triage, but Shen Qingqiu is willingly on Qian Cao; he surely wouldn’t be if this were anything he felt he could handle on his own, and Shen Qingqiu’s criteria for that is distressingly wide. Perhaps Mu Qingfang should ask for the mission report—?

“Shen Yuan had a severe qi deviation approximately two weeks ago,” Shen Qingqiu says.

Mu Qingfang’s eyebrows fly up in surprise.

Shen Qingqiu also had a qi deviation two weeks ago. One that nearly killed him. Mu Qingfang was awake almost three days straight, trying to lower the fever enough to keep it from taking out Qing Jing’s lord.

Shen Yuan had one at the exact same time? Evidently one with severe and far-reaching consequences, since Shen Qingqiu has actively decided to involve Mu Qingfang.

Now that Mu Qingfang looks, he can see the faint lines of stress at the corners of Shen Qingqiu’s eyes. The way his fingers twitch on the guard of his fan before forcibly relaxing.

“If this master may have Shen-daozhang’s wrist?” Mu Qingfang requests, already reaching out.

Shen Yuan places it in Mu Qingfang’s hand with no hesitation. Mu Qingfang sends a trickle of his qi through Shen Yuan’s system. He can immediately feel traces of Shen Qingqiu’s energy in Shen Yuan’s system, no older than the day it must have taken them to return to Cang Qiong. It had smoothed some of the leftover damage from the deviation the ripped through Shen Yuan’s meridians; unlike Shen Qingqiu, Mu Qingfang can tell Shen Yuan hadn’t had anyone to help him through the deviation as it occurred.

Under the circ*mstances, Shen Yuan has healed as well as he could. Mu Qingfang smoothes out the rough sections Shen Qingqiu hadn’t had the expertise to touch, and considers the overall damage to Shen Yuan’s meridians. They are, in many ways, more robust than Shen Qingqiu’s own. Less damaged as a whole; fewer weak points.

Excepting, of course, this deviation.

Mu Qingfang wonders what sparked it. Had Shen Yuan’s qi deviation set off Shen Qingqiu’s, or vice versa? Had one twin being so close to death nearly dragged the other down with him?

It should be a fanciful idea, thinking that twins would be so intricately interwoven with each, and yet Mu Qingfang is unable to dismiss the thought. It can’t be a coincidence that two qi deviations from two so similar people occurred at the exact same time.

Has this happened before? Shen Qingqiu’s deviations—are they all his own? Shen Yuan’s meridians are healthier than Shen Qingqiu’s, but how prone is he to qi deviations? How exactly did this recent qi deviation present, and how long did it last?

Mu Qingfang asks only that last two-part question aloud. The others will save for later. He needs to address the immediate problem(s) first before he can dive into unexplored territory.

“Ah,” Shen Yuan says to this question. He looks uncomfortable. “I’m afraid I can’t actually…answer that.” At Mu Qingfang’s expectant expression, Shen Yuan says, “I woke up in a forest two weeks ago. I know things—geography, the make-up of the sects, flora and fauna—but other than my own name…I don’t…”

“You’ve lost all autobiographical knowledge,” Mu Qingfang sums up gently, so that Shen Yuan doesn’t have to say the words he’s so clearly struggling with aloud.

Shen Yuan nods.

Mu Qingfang certainly understands why Shen Qingqiu brought Shen Yuan to him.

Mu Qingfang has yet to let go of Shen Yuan’s wrist. He focuses his attention back on Shen Yuan’s meridians. Sometimes there’s no predicting what chaos a qi deviation will cause. There are some harrowing cases written down in the archives. In light of several of the archive cases he’s read, dealing with raging fevers, violent outbursts, scorched meridians, or the like—Mu Qingfang’s usual fare in the sect—is almost a relief.

This case is likely going to be a new entry for the archives.

Mu Qingfang traces Shen Yuan’s meridians all over again, focusing on the ones nearer Shen Yuan’s mind, then down into his lower dantian toward his core, and through his heart meridian—any place where such a disruption to the network may have had cascading consequences.

Unfortunately, none of it tells him anything. For archive cases, just as there’s no predicting the consequences, there’s equally often no way to tell why the consequences of the deviation are what they are, or how to mitigate them afterwards.

If this deviation had presented as a fever, like Shen Qingqiu’s, and Shen Yuan had no one to help him through it—perhaps his missing knowledge was simply burned out of him, as a forest fire clears away the underbrush yet leaves behind the hardier trees.

New plants may grow there. There is no guarantee anything that was lost will ever return—or, if it does, what new form it may take.

That does not, of course, mean that Mu Qingfang is giving up. He’s going to try. It’s only a short time out from the deviation. Recovery may be possible, with effort.

He says as much. Shen Yuan nods again. He doesn’t look particularly hopeful. Shen Qingqiu’s expression is flat and seeming unaffected, yet Mu Qingfang is certain there’s a storm raging beneath that fan and purported indifference.

Shen Qingqiu has willingly, albeit silently, asked for help.

He’s affected by this.

“We can discuss a treatment plan later, and how you would prefer to handle this longterm,” Mu Qingfang says. “For now, may I also examine Shen-daozhang’s physical health?”

“Yes, that’s fine,” Shen Yuan says.

Mu Qingfang had focused on Shen Yuan’s meridians, but with his qi in Shen Yuan’s system, it was impossible for him to not have noticed certain details. He is very sensitive. On his first pass through Shen Yuan’s system, he had made various notes in his mental patient’s file, places to return to if Shen Yuan granted him a physical health exam.

With Shen Yuan’s permission given, he heads straight to the largest issue he had spotted. Examining it more thoroughly, he only confirms what he had passingly glanced at during his earlier check. He tests the flow of Shen Yuan’s qi around that spot again, and—yes. Clever! That’s going at the top of Shen Yuan’s Qian Cao medical file.

Moving on from there, he goes through the rest of Shen Yuan’s body. Decent health (supplemented by his core), strong spiritual veins (as already noted), evidence of old malnutrition (a match for Shen Qingqiu), heightened levels of stress hormones and blood pressure (mostly a match for Shen Qingqiu; Shen Yuan’s levels are thankfully lower, and he hopes they’re currently high because of the situation, not as a consistent health issue)…

Mu Qingfang pulls back. Before he lets go of Shen Yuan, he sends a small burst of qi toward Shen Yuan’s head, to heal the last of the internal and external bruising of a minor concussion, and then uses the last of his qi from that to finish healing the scratch on Shen Yuan’s cheek. It had been nearly healed already, but Mu Qingfang would rather be safe than sorry when it comes Shen Yuan.

First note in his file, Mu Qingfang thinks again.

“Shen-daozhang, you are missing your spleen,” Mu Qingfang says.

“I’m what?” Shen Yuan says, startled. Shen Qingqiu jolts in place, like he’s going to move in front of Shen Yuan but aborts the motion.

“It’s an old injury,” Mu Qingfang says. “At least ten years, from what I can tell. Perhaps more.” Minimal internal scarring, after so long and with concentrated cultivation to help it heal cleanly. Mu Qingfang won’t ask Shen Yuan to disrobe, but he would make a calculated bet that there is no external scar at all. The most evidence for injury—other than the glaring absence of the organ in question—is the way that Shen Yuan’s meridians and energy bend slightly around that space. “You’ve been using your cultivation to compensate for any stress on your lymphatic system that the spleen’s absence may cause, but you should be aware of it in order to make sure all your wounds are cleaned out properly. You are potentially more susceptible to infections.”

Shen Yuan may have decent health now, but a lot of that relies upon his cultivation. Childhood malnutrition leaves it effects on the body well after the child has grown. Even when he was a child, Mu Qingfang thinks Shen Yuan must have been of poor health. The body always remembers, and Mu Qingfang can read the history of Shen Yuan’s like one of his scrolls.

Cultivation can help with a great many things. It cannot cover every flaw.

If Shen Yuan becomes more susceptible to qi deviations, or if his cultivation is otherwise damaged, he could be in very real danger without that cultivation to boost his immune system.

“Do I need to—how do I make sure I don’t—“ Shen Yuan is flustered and stressed by what he hadn’t known. Thankfully he is taking the obvious danger to his health seriously.

“Your system has already adjusted to being used in such a way,” Mu Qingfang says. “No doubt when the injury first occurred, Shen-daozhang had to focus his attention on rerouting his qi to compensate, but it’s been long enough that such function is automatic now.” Shen Yuan doesn’t remember his autobiographical information. Does he remember how to cultivate?

Whether he does or not, Mu Qingfang is sure that Shen Qingqiu will clear up any deficiencies there himself. He’ll inform Shen Qingqiu that he needs to make sure Shen Yuan does not interfere with his cultivation around where his spleen used to be, not until and unless he knows exactly what he’s doing. Even if Shen Yuan does slip and mess up his careful balance of health, Mu Qingfang will be monitoring Shen Yuan, helping him recover from his qi deviation and generally assessing his health for—well, for however long he is going to stay with the sect.

Mu Qingfang isn’t getting involved with that question. Yue Qingyuan, given his history with Shen Qingqiu—ah, he really can’t guess what Zhangmen-shixiong’s reaction to Shen Yuan will be.

It’s not Mu Qingfang’s responsibility to inform the sect leader of long term guests on another lord’s Peak. He doesn’t want to spark off Shen Qingqiu’s temper faster than it will ignite once Yue Qingyuan catches wind of the situation.

Mu Qingfang is going to do his job as a healer and otherwise stay out of it.

Luo Binghe isn’t sure what to make of Shen Yuan. Shen-shishu? Shen-qianbei? Shen-laoshi? Shizun hasn’t clarified the matter yet. Luo Binghe doesn’t intend to be the first to ask, though he’d best figure it out quickly once Shizun does decide, lest Luo Binghe be accused of being unfilial.

Shizun has, so far, kept Shen Yuan away from everyone on Qing Jing as much as possible. He had swept Shen Yuan into his rooms at Chen Manor after the Skinner Demon died, then ushered him quickly to Qian Cao once they had returned to the sect. The disciples who had gone on the mission were left to return to Qing Jing and sort themselves out on their own.

It’s been a day and a half since then. Shizun is back on the Peak, Luo Binghe knows that, but he isn’t sure anyone has seen Shen Yuan. Maybe Ming Fan, though even that isn’t a guarantee. Shen Yuan might be recovering, and Shizun may well have turned Ming Fan away at the door. Given the way Shizun had acted in Shuang Hu, Luo Binghe has the feeling that Shizun will be guarding Shen Yuan’s health quite vehemently.

Luo Binghe certainly hasn’t seen Shen Yuan since they had all returned to the sect, but he’s been thinking about him a lot. The way he had approached them in the market, trying to send them away to safety; the way he had determinedly kept the Skinner Demon’s attention on him, and comforted Luo Binghe and Ning Yingying even in the face of the awful things the demon was saying; the way he’d snapped at the Skinner Demon, fighting back in a way that Luo Binghe has never dared fight back against his martial brothers (and if it feels disloyal to think of his martial brothers in the same breath as a demon, that’s between him and his own mind); the way the Skinner Demon had stripped Shen Yuan of his robes, leaving a flawless expanse of pale skin exposed—

Luo Binghe has to cover his cheeks as they burn. It’s absolutely unfilial to think of Shen Yuan that way!

…Probably. Again: Shizun has yet to clarify the matter.

(Also again: Shizun does not act like someone who intends anything other than to viciously defend Shen Yuan, for however long he stays here on Qing Jing Peak. Luo Binghe imagines that if Shizun has his way, the answer to that will be ‘forever’.

He can’t blame Shizun. Shizun hadn’t thought to be quiet when he had burst into the room where Luo Binghe, Ning Yingying, and Shen Yuan were being held.

A-Yuan, I found you.

In those words, Binghe had heard the kind of aching grief that he feels about his mother—the grief that comes of losing someone and knowing they would never return.

Shizun had gone straight for Shen Yuan. Even Ning Yingying wasn’t important to him in that moment.

If Binghe’s mother appeared before him again, he would do the exact same.)

Luo Binghe lets out a sigh. He’s currently hiding in the bamboo forest, avoiding Ming Fan and his other martial brothers—and also Ning Yingying, to some extent. He’s trying to work on his cultivation, sitting in this out-of-the-way clearing and paging through his manual to review its instructions, and Ning Yingying is often a hindrance toward that goal as much as she is a help.

He’d been…so useless against the Skinner Demon. He and Yingying had needed to be rescued by two entirely separate people.

It was terrifying.

Worst of all, it wasn’t that being rescued rankled his pride or something silly like that. It wasn’t that he was upset Ning Yingying hadn’t listen to him when he had urged her to come with him back to Lord Chen’s; it wasn’t that he was scared that any moment, Shizun would remember who had been in the marketplace with Ning Yingying and failed at his duties as her martial brother.

It was that a total stranger had been willing to die for him.

Shen Yuan had appeared out of nowhere. When he first met Shizun, Binghe thought he was the epitome of an immortal cultivator. In many ways, he still is. But while Shizun emulates the cold, distant side of immortality, Shen Yuan had seemingly stepped straight out of the stories of righteous cultivators wandering about fighting monsters and defending the innocent.

Luo Binghe has learned how to take those stories with a grain of salt since he entered sect, yet Shen Yuan had brought them all rushing back to his mind.

Shen Yuan had tried to protect them. He had tried so hard. Binghe saw the spark of mingled fear and determination in Shen Yuan’s eyes as he continually called the Skinner Demon toward him and away from Luo Binghe and Ning Yingying.

Binghe had seen fear, and determination, and finally, acceptance. He thought that Shen Yuan wouldn’t have gone to his grave without a fight, but Shen Yuan had accepted that he might die. His only reward would have been keeping the Skinner Demon distracted from Luo Binghe and Ning Yingying a little longer.

He had obviously decided that was sufficient reward. For two disciples he had never met. He had even tried to comfort them! Staring death in the eyes and desperately gifting hope to strangers with what could have been his last breaths.

Very few people have tried to comfort Luo Binghe in recent years. Very few have ever tried.

Luo Binghe craves that kindness.

He's going to train. He's going to get stronger. He's never going to be in that kind of situation again.

He is going to repay Shen Yuan someday.

That starts with throwing himself into his cultivation. He flips another few pages through his manual before he gets to the specific unarmed combat forms he was looking for. He weighs down the pages of the manual with a rock, then stands and starts going through the movements laid out there.

It never feels as smooth as the movements look on the other disciples. They move so fluidly through every action, flowing through the forms like it’s no effort. Binghe swears he’s following the instructions in his manual exactly, and yet it never seems like he improves—

“Your center of balance is off.”

Luo Binghe yelps and falls over. Then he realizes it’s Shen Yuan who just said that. He may be wearing what are obviously his brother’s clothes—Luo Binghe has seen Shizun wearing those exact robes—but there’s none of the ice in his voice that Luo Binghe has come to expect from Shizun, and his mien, for all that he shares the exact same features, is softer than Shizun’s in a way that Luo Binghe can’t quite articulate.

Luo Binghe scrambles to his feet and hurriedly bows. He’s pretty sure his whole face is red.

“This—this disciple greets Shen Yuan!”

Please, please let that be respectful enough. He really doesn’t know what Shizun expects of them, but worse than that is the idea that he might offend the man who saved him—

Hands cup his elbows and pull him out of his bow.

“None of that now,” Shen Yuan chides gently. He smiles at Binghe and pats him on the head. “You needn’t be so formal. I’m the one intruding on your training, after all…” He trails off momentarily. “Ah. In all the chaos, I don’t believe I caught your name.”

“This disciple is Luo Binghe,” Luo Binghe says. He barely notices the words coming out of his mouth. He’s too dazed by hands. Touching him! Patting him! Hands! In his hair! He thinks he finally understands cats.

“Luo Binghe,” Shen Yuan repeats. His voice is soft and fond as he says it.

(Looking back on it, many years later, Luo Binghe thinks this moment might be the exact one where he fell irrevocably in love with Shen Yuan. After this point, there was no turning back. Neither he nor Shen Yuan had, from this point, let things go back to the way they were.)

“You were very brave in Shuang Hu City,” Shen Yuan says.

Binghe blushes furiously, shaking his head. “This disciple was useless and—”

A hand settling on his head stops his words in their tracks. Shen Yuan pats his head for the second time in as many minutes, immediately followed by a third time, before he lets his hand drop.

“Binghe is a disciple,” Shen Yuan says. “He is still learning. He isn’t expected to handle everything perfectly yet, nor to adapt with all the grace more experienced disciples have learned through experience. Ah, and this one didn’t fare well against the Skinner Demon either…” Shen Yuan says with rueful amusem*nt. “Nevertheless…Luo Binghe was very brave. Wasn’t he trying to protect his shijie? Isn’t he the one who realized that this one wasn’t who Ning Yingying thought he was? In another circ*mstance, that may well have saved your lives.”

“But…I didn’t…and if we had only listened to you—”

"If you had listened to me, the Skinner Demon may have caught us all anyway. Or you could have gone on your way, and the Skinner Demon may have gone after me while I was distracted, and no one would have realized I was missing." Shen Yuan's expression flattens as he hides whatever deep emotion is moving through him; Binghe doesn't know what it is, but the way Shen Yuan's face closes off tells him that it exists, there just under the surface.

"You tried," Shen Yuan says. "Sometimes that's all that matters. Sometimes, to someone out there, that's everything."

Luo Binghe swallows around the lump in his throat. He wants to cry. "This disciple swears he won't make the same mistakes again," he says, voice wobbling.

"Mn," Shen Yuan says. "This one will also strive to do better. No, no, don't argue with me! I made many mistakes, and—ah. Can I trust you with a secret, Binghe?"

Luo Binghe nods, eyes wide.

"My brother is likely trying to keep this information restricted for the moment; undoubtably the other Peak Lords and their head disciples will be made aware soon, but—this one had a qi deviation recently." Yes, Binghe had heard Shizun asking Shen Yuan something along those lines after he'd killed the Skinner Demon. “The loss was mostly autobiographical, but as a whole my memory is, mm, 'patchwork' may be the best way to describe it." Shen Yuan shrugs as if it's of no concern, which horrifies Binghe. "I remember enough to fight, but fighting by instinct doesn't mean one necessarily can fight well. Not when one doesn't understand the moves. I can tell that Binghe's center of balance is off, but if asked to describe the proper form, I doubt that I could.

“In a way,” Shen Yuan says ruefully, “this Shen Yuan is learning the basics just as Luo Binghe is.”

“Oh,” Luo Binghe says.

“Luo Binghe is practicing in the forest all on his own,” Shen Yuan says, gaze heavy on Luo Binghe. “He doesn’t…have to be alone. If he doesn’t want to be. This one doesn’t know how much help he can be—”

“Please!” Luo Binghe blurts out. “Yes! This Binghe—if Shen Yuan is willing—this disciple is stupid and doesn’t understand his manual, but he promises to work hard in order not to waste Shen Yuan’s time—”

“Don’t call yourself stupid,” Shen Yuan says, softly flicking Binghe on the forehead.

Luo Binghe rubs at the spot piteously. “But I don’t understand it,” he says, ashamed of himself. “I try and try, I really do…”

Shen Yuan considers this. His eyes flick down to Binghe’s manual, on the ground with the pages still held open by rocks, then back up to Binghe’s face. He uses a sleeve to cover his face as he thinks; Binghe has seen Shizun pull that exact same move when he doesn’t have a fan handy.

Do families always do that? Share movements? Binghe wishes he could go back to his own past and see outside of his own perspective to know if he had shared such a thing with his mother. If he had—if he still does—then there is still a small bit of her living in this world. Luo Binghe could carry that with him, the way he does the cooking skills she passed onto him, and the way he used to carry his precious jade guanyin.

(He still aches fiercely for its loss. Ming Fan will pay for that one day. Luo Binghe likes to consider himself a person who pays his debts.)

"Not every manual matches its disciple," Shen Yuan says eventually. "Just as not every master suits their student. Everyone learns in a different way. Let me have some time looking through the other manuals Qing Jing Peak has available, and we'll see if we can't find one that suits Binghe better. What?"

Luo Binghe snaps his mouth shut from where it had dropped open. Is Shen Yuan—about Shizun?! Yes, Shizun is his brother, but—!

"Oh, honestly!" Shen Yuan says. "Binghe acts as if I've said something utterly unreasonable! People learn in different ways! And some people really are suited to different teachers! You wouldn't ask a spiritual cultivator to take on a purely physical cultivator's education, nor vice versa; their focuses and abilities lie in different areas. There is crossover—I suspect Binghe may be a mix of the styles, though he leans toward physical cultivation—but a teacher must adjust their methods if a student is truly trying yet not succeeding, and if all else fails, find someone else to explain."

That sounds like—nothing Binghe has ever heard. Pain and necessity have often been his teachers, and they rarely ease up in their lessons long enough to allow for Binghe to seek out others.

Yet...

Learning at his mother's feet had been much different, hadn't it? She had praised him for his work and his efforts, even when Binghe knows, with the benefits of hindsight, that many of his early attempts had been truly a mess. Edible, yes, but by no means at his mother's level.

Practice and patience had led him to his talents today. Can that...really be true for all lessons?

Practice, Luo Binghe has plenty of. Patience, not so much. Not from his teachers, nor his martial brothers, nor even from himself. And perhaps his manual has no patience with him either, a boy trying to understand a manual that doesn't want him.

"Thanking Shen-laoshi for the lesson," Binghe says, bowing to showing his appreciation for what he's just been taught.

"Up! Stop bowing to me! I'm not a real teacher!" Shen Yuan says.

Respectfully, Luo Binghe disagrees. Also respectfully, he doesn't say that out loud, since Shen Yuan so obviously doesn’t want to hear it.

He'll save that to bring up to Shen Yuan later.

Shen Yuan really is...so kind.

"I don't know how quickly I'll be able to find you a new manual," Shen Yuan says. "It depends—ah, it depends on many things, I suppose. For now...hm. Did Binghe stretch properly before he began his forms?”

"Yes?" Binghe says. He doesn't mean for it to sound like a question.

"Well, I haven't stretched yet," Shen Yuan says. "Sit, go through it with me. Then we'll see if I can walk Binghe through a few sword forms. Ah, I hope Jiu-ge doesn't get mad if I infect you with my rogue's forms..."

Luo Binghe sits down next to Shen Yuan and thinks it doesn't matter if Shen Yuan never finds him a manual that suits him. As long as Shen Yuan keeps teaching him, Luo Binghe will be grateful for every lesson he learns.

Chapter 4

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan maybe gets a little distracted.

Look! He knows that Binghe's manual is a fake—and thank goodness he'd managed to stumble on the Protagonist, and then convince him to let Shen Yuan borrow it for the foreseeable evenings while he "figures out what other manual will work for Binghe”—but the problem is this: an amnesiac Shen Yuan shouldn't know that.

Plus, while he knows it's fake because he has the power of spite and metaknowledge on his side, he can't prove it. He doesn't know how to justify its falsity. There is no part of it he can point to and definitively say "this is wrong," other than scanning through the manual and wildly guessing.

Airplane never went into details about cultivation manuals in this setting. Given that he messed up the differences between Nascent Soul Stage and Core Formation, that isn't surprising. He would have had to give a sh*t and actually pay attention to his own worldbuilding—or more precisely, the worldbuilding of the f*cking genre he was writing for—if he was going to detail what, precisely, was wrong with Luo Binghe's cultivation manual.

...If Shen Yuan is being completely fair to Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky, which he always hates to do, Airplane isn't the only webnovel author who skimps on details about the cultivation manuals. Very few of the webnovels that Shen Yuan read had ever brought up cultivation manuals in anything other than a passing mention or a momentary plot-relevant item with limited details; even the ones that had the cultivation manuals appear for more than a moment had been sparse on knowledge, usually on dropping snippets of what sounded like poetic nonsense that somehow made perfect sense to the character and helped them solve their issues, or were a puzzle that the character had to struggle over for a chapter or more, or—

You get the idea.

Shen Yuan gets his greedy little hands on Binghe's cultivation manual and dives straight into it. Shen Qingqiu had presented Shen Yuan with a cultivation manual of his own the previous day, but Shen Yuan hasn't had a chance to delve into it as deeply as he would like. He was too concerned with making sure that he ran into Luo Binghe.

Who! By the way! Is the sweetest, most precious little white lotus child that Shen Yuan has ever met in his life!

He doesn't understand how anyone could hurt that child. Could look at him and try to drive him into the ground. Luo Binghe's whole history is made of suffering and Shen Yuan can't comprehend it.

Shen Qingqiu, the past few years, has played a major role in that. It's something Shen Yuan is still grappling with.

In Shuang Hu City, after they had all untangled themselves from the various bindings they'd been subjected to, Shen Qingqiu had checked the Skinner Demon was throughly dead (they were). Then he had firmly ushered Shen Yuan, Luo Binghe, and Ning Yingying back to the rest of his disciples.

Who were in the same building, because the Skinner Demon truly was an idiot and had made its base in the exact place a horde of cultivators, baby or otherwise, were investigating murders.

At least they hadn't had to go far. Despite the boost of qi, Shen Yuan had been exhausted. Worn out from the unexpected stress, the injuries and their sudden healing, and maybe even the lingering remainders of whatever the Skinner Demon had drugged them with to knock the three of them out. …Plus the full day of travel before Shen Yuan had arrived in Shuang Hu City, when he really considered just how long the day had been.

He was so ready for it to be over.

"Shizun!” a boy had yelped when they reappeared.

The boy's gaze swept over all of them. His teacher, who had evidently vanished, returned with the coterie of the missing and a studiously blank mien. Luo Binghe and Ning Yingying, obviously mussed and stressed; Ning Yingying's eyes were still faintly red, her hand tangled in Luo Binghe's sleeve. And then Shen Yuan, a step behind Shen Qingqiu and rather a mess. Along with being, you know, a carbon copy of the kid's teacher.

Shen Yuan had thankfully recovered his robes and Heng Li, though he needed a basin of water to scrub all the blood off of his face—and potentially his hair, if the Skinner Demon slamming his head against the beam like that had done more damage than Shen Yuan realized. He also needed some extra water to rinse out his mouth, ugh. Just the thought of any of the Skinner Demon's rotted body being in his mouth made him gag.

"Where is Lord Chen?" Shen Qingqiu asked.

"In his rooms," the boy answered. "We set a guard on him, as Shizun told us—“

Shen Qingqiu grabbed Shen Yuan by the arm and swept past the boy, not bothering to wait for him to finish his report. "The demon is dead. You may inform him of this. We will discuss further details in the morning."

Details like all three of his concubines being dead, Shen Yuan supposed. He had let Shen Qingqiu pull him along until they entered what must have been Shen Qingqiu's rooms for this mission. There, Shen Qingqiu had gestured toward a wash basin in the corner; either it hadn't been used or it had been refreshed since the last time Shen Qingqiu was in the room. Shen Yuan had gladly made use of it.

God, he missed toothpaste. And mouthwash. It would be so much easier to get the taste of the Skinner Demon out of his mouth if he had those.

Shen Qingqiu rustled around in the background as Shen Yuan quickly cleaned himself, then took advantage of the privacy screen nearby to change out of his dusty travel robes and into sleep robes. He needed to pass out for the next eight hours minimum before he would have the bandwidth to deal with any of...this.

When he emerged from behind the screen, Shen Qingqiu's expression spasmed, but he didn't say a word. He simply stepped close to Shen Yuan and slathered a balm over his quickly healing face wound. Despite Shen Yuan's earlier resolution, he would have to deal with any blood in his hair in the morning; he could feel himself fading fast.

Shen Qingqiu had let him take the bed. The last thing Shen Yuan had seen that night was Shen Qingqiu sitting down next to the bed, straight-backed in what could have been a meditation pose, except for the fact that all his focus was fixed on Shen Yuan.

Shen Yuan was sure Shen Qingqiu hadn't slept that whole night.

The thing is...

The thing is, it was so easy to hate Shen Qingqiu when he was only words on a screen. He was a villain. He was awful to the Protagonist. There was no nuance there, because he was only a caricature of evil, a one-dimensional figure in stark black and white on a page.Or computer screen, as it were.

The man who had held Shen Yuan's face in his hands, who had watched over him while he slept, who accompanied him to Mu Qingfang—who settled him in his own personal home, pulling down a talisman that had disguised the door to the second bedroom, a room simply waiting for Shen Yuan to claim it—

—this Shen Qingqiu is a person. He can't be the one-dimensional character from the novel, because in all the thousands of words when he appeared, that man had never shown even the restrained amount of concern and care Shen Qingqiu has shown toward Shen Yuan in the few days they’ve spent together. Shen Qingqiu is flesh and blood. He has a beating heart. He is a fully realized creation that no writer-god could have created, because who could capture all the intricacies of a person in mere words?

Shen Yuan had been so prepared to hate Shen Qingqiu.

He...can't.

He doesn't know why. Whether it's the shock of transmigration, a leftover bit of the original Shen Yuan's emotions toward his brother, or some kind of absurdly quick semi-Stockholm Syndrome—it's not hatred.

Shen Yuan is firmly going to reserve ultimate judgement until he's had more time to adjust. He might bother the System about it, too.

And! Don't think he missed whatever that was on Qian Cao! Mu Qingfang and Shen Qingqiu had exchanged Significant Glances over Shen Yuan's head when he had mentioned his qi deviation! That's the second time someone from Cang Qiong has been weird about the timeframe of when his qi deviation happened, and you don't need the nose of a bloodhound to realize that this stinks to high heaven!

When he’d tried to badger the System into at least giving him a hint, all it gave him was a cheery, [( 。◕‿‿◕｡ )].

Useless thing! Pah!

Shen Yuan will figure it out on his own if he has to. It's looking increasingly likely that he will have to.

Unfortunately, it's going to have to go on the list of other things that Shen Yuan needs to figure out. This specific mystery he's fine marking as "non-vital (no time restraint)” on his mental schedule. Top of the list is, of course, replacing Binghe's manual and helping him fix the foundation of his knowledge, both in cultivation and the arts. That task is tied with the other one near the top of his list: namely, learning all of this information himself.

Thank f*ck for the "amnesia." Shen Yuan has an excuse accepted by everyone, verified by his doctor, to explain why he doesn't know any of this sh*t.

Discounting all the negatives, this situation is a dream come true. He gets to learn cultivation! He gets access to a library—or at least he will, once Shen Qingqiu has lifted his draconian "stay in or near the house" command, an edict which he had laid down the moment he had ushered Shen Yuan into the bamboo house a day and a half ago. Shen Yuan is willing to give him the benefit of doubt and assume that this is because Shen Qingqiu is making sure he's properly a registered guest of the sect or Qing Jing or however he decides to describe Shen Yuan.

The best thing, though, is Luo Binghe.

Luo Binghe is still that precious sheep of a disciple that Shen Yuan had first fallen in love with while reading. The white lotus that had drawn Shen Yuan in so well that he had followed his story through all of the nonsense and plotholes and awful papapa that Proud Immortal Demon Way had become.

Luo Binghe has not yet become the blackened protagonist of the novel. If Shen Yuan has any say in it, he won't ever become him.

Limited Sandbox Mode, baby.

Shen Yuan is going to take full and ruthless advantage.

He has Luo Binghe’s manual. He has the cultivation manual that Shen Qingqiu gave him. He also has access to all the other manuals that Shen Qingqiu is storing in his house. There are surely are even more in the library, which Shen Yuan is clawing at the walls with his desire to visit, but this is enough to start with.

It’s more than enough.

Shen Yuan spreads the most basic manuals he can find across the low table in the main room. He adds in a few of the more advanced manuals for fun and because he’s frankly fascinated by it all, and he gets to work cross-referencing.

Thankfully, he had the foresight to pilfer some paper and a brush from Shen Qingqiu’s supplies. He’s going to make charts.

Surprisingly, it’s easier to write with a brush than he would have thought. Oh, or maybe this is another leftover tidbit from the original Shen Yuan.

Shen Yuan quickly gets—not distracted. He’s very focused on his task! It’s just that there’s so much information, and it’s all so interesting. He loses track of all time, bent over the books. He barely notices when Shen Qingqiu returns to the bamboo house.

He does notice when a steaming cup of tea is placed near the chart he’s currently working on, enough to distractedly say, “Thanks, er-ge.”

Shen Yuan is peripherally aware of Shen Qingqiu looking over the charts and notes that he had been making, organizing them into neat piles. Shen Yuan had left them scattered in free spaces while he waited for the ink to dry, and usually by the time he could have started stacking them up, he had already moved onto his next train of thought and the several next pieces of paper.

He loves being able to do deep dives like this. Airplane’s flaw was never that his world was uninteresting—as insane as this world is, people have obviously taken the (occasionally nonexistent) logic of the world and created working, if sometimes ridiculous, rules.

Shen Yuan wants to get his hands on every bestiary that Qing Jing Peak has. He wants to know how they’re organized, who wrote them and when, what information they have—and how Shen Yuan can improve them. It could be the work of a lifetime to create a complete compendium of the plants and monsters of this world, but Shen Yuan already has one lifetime’s dedication to this stupid world in his head. Why shouldn’t he devote his current, new lifetime to writing down and sharing that knowledge?

Of course, that requires him to be able to cultivate first. It would be stupid to go out into the world and track down monsters without knowing how to defend himself—

“Where did you get this manual?” Shen Qingqiu asks.

Shen Yuan looks over. Shen Qingqiu’s jaw is clenched as he looks at—sh*t! He pulled Luo Binghe’s cultivation manual out of the piles of Shen Yuan’s books! It’s lying open in his hands; Shen Yuan was distracted enough to miss him flipping through it.

Be cool, Shen Yuan, don't blow this.

"Is there something wrong with it?" Shen Yuan asks, laying down his brush. He doesn't think playacting innocence would be believed, so he goes for indifference instead, with a dash of ignoring the question being asked.

Shen Qingqiu glares at the manual in his hands. There is a flex of his qi, and the manual bursts into flames. Shen Yuan yelps, reaching for his half-empty, now cooled cup of tea, but there's no need for him to tempt his brother's temper by dumping tea on him. The fire goes out as quickly as it started, a precise use of power that had burned the manual in Shen Qingqiu's hands to ash without so much as singing Shen Qingqiu's hands or robes.

"What was that for?!"

Shen Qingqiu dusts the ash calmly from his hands. "Correcting an oversight."

"I was cross-referencing it with others," Shen Yuan says waspishly. He had been doing a good job at figuring out which parts were bullsh*t! Having access to multiple cultivation manuals gives him multiple perspectives on the information he is meant to be learning; if any part of it didn't make sense, he could check another manual.

It helps that there are some pieces of information he reads and feels as though he's remembering it rather than learning it.

f*ck if he'll admit it out loud, but the System did an all right job when it dropped him in this body. Whatever knowledge base the Original Goods had, the System had maintained enough of it during the transition to give him an edge.

He could have spent years learning cultivation, starting from the ground up with his ready-made amnesia excuse, but this was much more effective. It allows him to affect immediate change.

...He's going to need to get a new manual to Binghe immediately, now that his original manual is ash on the floor. Thank goodness he made notes.

"I can see that," Shen Qingqiu says, eyeing those self-same notes. Hopefully Shen Qingqiu missed the fact that the notes started with trying to prove Binghe's manual wrong, before they had moved into significantly more general cross-referencing notes for Shen Yuan's own education and personal edification. "A-Yuan. Where did you get it?"

Ah. Shen Qingqiu definitely hadn't missed the earlier evasion, then.

"...One of your disciples," Shen Yuan admits.

Rage flashes across Shen Qingqiu's face. "One of them dared to try sabotaging your cultivation? I'll have them whipped!"

Okay! That's a leap! Isn't Shen Yuan still supposed to be mostly a secret? How would a random Qing Jing disciple have figured out that Shen Yuan's memory and cultivation skills are f*cked, and then tried to take advantage of that by giving him a fake manual?

Unless Shen Yuan told them himself, of course. Or there was some other leak. Which really could only have come from one of the disciples who were on the Shuang Hu City mission, though even Ning Yingying and Luo Binghe, who were present when Shen Qingqiu learned of Shen Yuan's qi deviation, wouldn't have necessarily known about his cultivation-related "memory loss" unless they made some significant leaps of logic.

Ah, wait. There was also Qian Cao. Mu Qingfang probably wouldn't have let that information slip, right? But maybe one of his disciples overheard something and could have told another disciple—how quickly does the rumor mill in the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect work—

Not important! That's not what happened! None of this is what happened! Shouldn't Shen Qingqiu already know this?

"No," Shen Yuan clarifies. "I got it from one of your disciples. It was his personal cultivation manual."

Shen Qingqiu actually looks off-balance. His brow furrows. "That's impossible. I destroyed all the copies from that batch."

What.

What?!

No! Shen Qingqiu purposefully gave Luo Binghe a fake manual! He had refused to teach Luo Binghe, so Luo Binghe had had to study on his own from a manual that had never helped him learn cultivation, because it was never meant to. It was one of the many grievances Luo Binghe had against Shen Qingqiu; it was the reason that his cultivation foundation had never been as solid as it could have been, why his prowess as a human cultivator had never advanced as far as his demonic cultivation.

"It—what?" Shen Yuan manages, after that minor blue-screen.

"It was from a bad batch," Shen Qingqiu huffs. "Rest assured, the fool responsible has been duly punished. I destroyed all the copies once the error was discovered. How did a disciple get their hands on one of them?" He pauses, then pins Shen Yuan with a sharp look. "Which disciple had this manual? And how, exactly, did Shen Yuan get his hands on it?"

Aha. Ha. Right. Shen Yuan isn't technically on house arrest, but he had been strongly encouraged to wait until Shen Qingqiu gave him the all clear before venturing out on his own.

"I was exploring the bamboo forest earlier this afternoon,” Shen Yuan comes clean. "Ah...one of the disciples was practicing there, but his balance was all wrong...?"

Shen Qingqiu makes an obvious mental note of that—once his mental list gets long enough, Shen Yuan is pretty sure he'll be sent back to Qian Cao to consult with Mu Qingfang again—and gestures for him to continue.

"I thought...maybe Jiu-ge had another manual that would suit him better?" Shen Qingqiu, please let Shen Yuan flatter your ego so you're not as angry! Shen Yuan is definitely not insinuating anything about your teaching skills! It's all the manual's fault, of course!

Shen Qingqiu waits him out.

Shen Yuan lights a candle in his heart. Sorry, Binghe! This one really thought he could get you a new manual without having Shen Qingqiu be involved in the situation!

"Disciple Luo Binghe needs a new cultivation manual now," Shen Yuan says.

Shen Qingqiu takes a deep breath. "The little beast." He kind of seems like he's trying to fight off a headache now. Wisely, Shen Yuan doesn't say anything.

"Very well," Shen Qingqiu says. "This master will see that it is done." He stands and stalks away from the table. "That he managed even this much with two years of that manual..." Shen Qingqiu mutters under his breath as he departs.

Shen Yuan slumps in relief.

That could have gone a lot worse.

He stares blankly at the manuals still on the table. The notes that he’s written. He rolls Shen Qingqiu’s words over in his head, contextualizing them.

The sabotage to Luo Binghe's cultivation...was never on purpose? The lack of teaching, the bullying, the punishments—yes, those were on purpose. The manual, though. The basis for all of a cultivator's skills—regardless of natural talent, if you weren't taught how to properly cultivate, it could have disastrous consequences.

Shen Yuan thinks back to the beginning of Proud Immortal Demon Way. Ming Fan had been the one to supply Luo Binghe's cultivation manual and disciple's robes after he had been accepted onto the peak; if Ming Fan hadn't gotten those directly from Shen Qingqiu, but from some kind of quartermaster who simply meted out supplies to those asking for him, then it was entirely possible that one of the manuals from that bad batch had made its way into Luo Binghe's hands. That was the kind of unfortunate luck that had often happened to a young Luo Binghe.

If he believes Shen Qingqiu here, which—weirdly, he thinks he does.

Shen Qingqiu had seemed genuinely surprised that one of his disciples had that manual, and genuinely angered by its existence.

For the first time, Shen Yuan considers the fact that Proud Immortal Demon Way was told from Luo Binghe's perspective. Shen Yuan understands the concept of an unreliable narrator. He had always been so fully on Luo Binghe's side that he had never considered the Protagonist might be one.Or, at the very least, that there might be details he had missed.

(Like the existence of his teacher’s twin? a part of his mind murmurs. What else did Luo Binghe never see? What did we who read the novel never know?)

...What, then, does this mean for the rest of Proud Immortal Demon Way?

Shen Yuan sits there and thinks about that disturbing concept for a long time.

Shen Yuan leaves the bamboo house the next afternoon to go find Luo Binghe. The Protagonist is in the same clearing where they had met yesterday. He's staring at the manual in his hands, seemingly confused, or perhaps conflicted.

"Is everything all right?" Shen Yuan asks.

Luo Binghe looks up. They need to work on this kid's situational awareness if Shen Yuan is able to sneak up on him so easily.

"Shen-laoshi!" Luo Binghe greets him with a smile.

"I told you yesterday, you don't need to call me 'laoshi,'" Shen Yuan sighs.

Luo Binghe nods obediently. Shen Yuan doesn't even try to fool himself in believing that Luo Binghe actually agrees and will stop calling him that. Shen Yuan knows when to pick his battles, and this is one he doesn't want to get involved in. Not right now, at least.

"I see you have a new manual," Shen Yuan says. He brought his own manual with him today, as well as the cultivation manual that, after the whole afternoon and evening spent looking over Shen Qingqiu's manuals, is the one he thinks might best suit Binghe. Coincidentally, it's also one of the manuals that he can most easily compare against his own. It should be safe, and the parallels will let Shen Yuan easily help Luo Binghe with his understanding if he needs it.

Shen Qingqiu had said that he would replace Luo Binghe's manual with a new one, but Shen Yuan hadn't been willing to take a chance. Better to be sure. Plus, this way Binghe will have more than one option. Maybe Shen Yuan's bullsh*t yesterday had had some truth in it, and Luo Binghe's training really would be helped by one specific manual versus another.

(Shen Yuan thinks he has a new research topic. He should start a physical list so that he doesn't forget any of his ideas; there's so much lore that he's sure he'll forget at least one topic he wants to research at some point. This way, he can keep a record!)

Either way, whether Binghe needs the manual Shen Yuan brought or not, Shen Yuan is going to be here, helping Luo Binghe along his way.

"Shizun gave it to me this morning," Luo Binghe says, a note of confusion in his voice.

"Yes, ah, I meant to return your original manual to you this morning, before you began classes, but there was an...accident." Shen Yuan shakes his head. "My apologies, Binghe."

"It's fine!" Luo Binghe says quickly.

"Have you had a chance to look through your new manual yet?" Shen Yuan asks.

"Not yet," Luo Binghe says shyly. "I was waiting for Shen-laoshi."

One hit K.O.! That's f*cking precious. And precisely calibrated to make him ignore the "Shen-laoshi" Luo Binghe snuck in there at the end.

Shen Yuan whips out his fan to cover the way he wants to melt. Too cute, this white lotus Protagonist is too cute!

"Very well," Shen Yuan says. "We can go over it together. I—this one brought an extra manual, in case Binghe has need of it..."

'Stars in your eyes' isn't supposed to be a literal expression. Luo Binghe is currently doing his damned best to prove Shen Yuan wrong about that.

They sit down there in that clearing. Shen Yuan had the foresight to wear his traveling robes, rather than any of the clothes Shen Qingqiu had pulled out for him to borrow. He would have felt guilty getting dirt on those robes, and they certainly weren't good for practicing, as he had found out yesterday.

Shen Yuan really needs to get some new clothes of his own, ah.

Luo Binghe flips open his cultivation manual and starts to read.

They quickly fall into a sort of rhythm; there's no need—nor ability, truth be told—for them to go in depth on anything in this manual yet, so they read until Luo Binghe needs clarification with the meaning of a character or needs some assistance understanding a particularly convoluted sentence.

For his part, Shen Yuan is reading along at first to make sure it is a real manual this time. He doesn't think Shen Qingqiu would try to slip Binghe a fake, especially given his reaction when he thought someone had slipped a fake to Shen Yuan, and he knows that Shen Yuan was helping Luo Binghe yesterday. He couldn’t be assured that Shen Yuan wouldn’t run off to assist Luo Binghe again.

Still. You should never underestimate the power of spite.

This manual is, however, the real deal. Shen Yuan has abandoned his self-appointed mission of verification quickly, and he keeps reading alongside Luo Binghe for curiosity's sake, for the requested explanations from Binghe, and simply for the joy of Luo Binghe's company.

The sun has moved significantly, shadows stretching long against the ground of the clearing, when Shen Qingqiu finds them.

"A-Yuan," he says, ignoring Luo Binghe completely.

"Ge," Shen Yuan says. He lifts his head from the manuals—Shen Yuan was raised in the modern world, and though a few of the traditional characters give him some trouble, the more he reads, the more he gets used to them; given that, he is a significantly faster reader than Luo Binghe, so he had opened one of his own manuals to read during the times he got too far ahead of Binghe and had to wait for the Protagonist to turn a page.

"This master has called for a Peak Lord meeting tomorrow," Shen Qingqiu says. "We must discuss what will be said."

Is that what Shen Qingqiu has been doing in the background? Shen Yuan figured he was just...teaching his classes. Doing his Peak Lord stuff, whatever that is. Shen Yuan supposes that the two aren't mutually exclusive. He wonders how much effort it takes to call for a meeting.

Then he takes a moment to realize that tomorrow he has to meet all of the Peak Lords.

Agh! A little more warning would have been appreciated, Jiu-ge!

Shen Yuan draws in a shallow breath. They're going to plan, Shen Qingqiu just said that, and Shen Yuan has all night to freak out on his own as needed. This is fine.

"Binghe," he says. The Protagonist is currently very quiet beside him, despite the total and concentrated effort Shen Qingqiu seems to be putting into ignoring his presence. "If we aren't able to meet tomorrow due to the meeting, I would like you to work on the stretches we did yesterday. Some of the forms in the first few pages, you may work on carefully. Make sure you pay attention to your center of balance."

"Yes, Shen-laoshi," Luo Binghe says in barely more than a whisper.

Shen Yuan gets to his feet, then helps Luo Binghe to his. Luo Binghe bows to him, quietly thanking Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan stoops to gather the two manuals he had brought. He'll slip the second one to Binghe once Shen Qingqiu isn't standing right there.

For the moment, he needs to get his brother and the Protagonist away from each other. Whatever the weird attitude between them right now is—well, it's better than what was described in Proud Immortal Demon Way, but it makes Shen Yuan uneasy.

He starts heading back toward the bamboo house.

(Behind his back, Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe share a long stare. Luo Binghe bows again.

Shen Qingqiu huffs, turns on his heel, and follows his brother out of the bamboo forest.)

Chapter 5

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan doesn’t know what to expect from a Peak Lord meeting.

Yes, obviously, Shen Qingqiu gives him a basic rundown on what to expect and what to do—which mainly consisted of “let me handle it” and “don’t answer stupid questions,” thank you for the advice, Jiu-ge—but Shen Yuan would like a better plan than that. Unfortunately, this is one area that he can’t use his metaknowledge.

Peak Lord meetings were never described in the book. For obvious reasons, Luo Binghe never attended one. The closest he had ever come was the aftermath of Sha Hualing’s invasion, when those involved with the tournament were being both tended to by Qian Cao and debriefed by Yue Qingyuan. Of course, that was also when Liu Qingge had been revealed to be dead, and Shen Qingqiu was pointed out as his murderer.

…Hm. sh*t. Those are problems Shen Yuan should deal with, aren’t they? Thank f*ck he’s in Limited Sandbox Mode.

Well, that’s a situation for Future Shen Yuan to handle. Right now he’s freaking out about the Peak Lord meeting.

He doesn’t sleep particularly well that night. He’s frantically going over all the information he has about the Peak Lords. Which isn’t much! f*ck you very much, Airplane! You didn’t even name some of them!

Speaking of problems—is Shang Qinghua, Cang Qiong’s traitor, going to be there? If he is, what should Shen Yuan do about him? Can he do anything? Should he wait? Gather evidence?

Ugh.

He’s really going to have to start a list, isn’t he? Sorted by priority. And written in English, so that Jiu-ge can’t figure out how goddamn weird his supposed brother is.

Shen Qingqiu looks at Shen Yuan judgmentally over the edge of his fan as they eat breakfast that morning. Shen Yuan sips at his tea and pretends he can’t see it.

“All you have to do is sit there and not say anything,” Shen Qingqiu reiterates.

“That’s a terrible plan,” Shen Yuan complains. “How am I supposed to make a good first impression if I don’t say anything?”

“You can’t make one anyway, so why bother?” Shen Qingqiu asks bluntly.

Shen Yuan lowers his tea. That’s unreasonably insulting. Shen Yuan is a perfectly friendly person—

“You’re my brother,” Shen Qingqiu says. “They haven’t even met you yet, but this master is sure they will come to their own opinions the moment they know of your existence.”

…Ouch. That’s…kinda sad. Like. Shen Qingqiu doesn’t need to be such a bastard to his fellow Peak Lords, but to be so confident their assessment of his character, and specifically how it will bleed over onto Shen Yuan? Yikes.

Cang Qiong, as described by Airplane, is supposed to be the most ride-or-die sect that exists. Shen Yuan also knows that, in Proud Immortal Demon Way, that hadn’t held true. Maybe for previous generations, but not this one. After all, the Peak Lords had given up Shen Qingqiu to Huan Hua Palace and Luo Bingge’s judgment.

They hadn’t even argued.

Letting out an inaudible sigh, Shen Yuan adds ‘rehabilitate Shen Qingqiu’s image’ to his currently-still-mental to-do list. He’s already planning on doing that for Luo Binghe, so why not extend it to the Peak Lords? If he gets them on his side, the rest of the sect will follow.

The longer Shen Yuan spends with Shen Qingqiu, the worse he feels about his canonical fate. It's...really different, imagining that happening to a real person, rather than a villain on a screen.

Breakfast passes quietly after that. Shen Qingqiu forces Shen Yuan to borrow some of his robes again; this time they're even fancier, appropriate for the meeting that they're going to. Don't get Shen Yuan wrong, the robes are cool as hell, but there are so! Many! Layers!

Shen Yuan wouldn't have had a chance of putting this get-up on without Shen Qingqiu's help. Then, of course, Shen Qingqiu bullies Shen Yuan into a fancy hairstyle to match his fancy robes. Shen Yuan tilts his head back and forth, trying to get used to the weight of a guan. He reaches up to touch it; Shen Qingqiu slaps his hand right back down.

"Leave it be!" Shen Qingqiu scolds.

Shen Yuan pouts.

At least Shen Qingqiu doesn't ban his fan. It's the one he had first bought after he woke up. He has other fans, ones that he had found later, tucked away in his qiankun pouch. Shen Yuan is still working on his adjustment from "NPC" to "transmigrated-into-a-dead-guy's-body," so it feels significantly less sketchy to use a fan of his own rather than any of the ones belonging to the Original Goods.

Even if the Original Goods' tastes match Shen Yuan's exactly and he really wants to use some of those fans.

They step outside the bamboo house. Shen Qingqiu draws Xiu Ya, then glances sideways at Shen Yuan. "Do you know how to fly on a sword?"

Shen Yuan bristles. He does, in fact! That was one of the first things he had figured out! And yes, he had dumped himself off of it a few times, but for the most part, muscle memory had kicked in and it was fine.

"Follow me, then," Shen Qingqiu says. He hops on Xiu Ya and takes off.Shen Yuan pulls out Heng Li and follows.

Flying through the mountains is different than flying through the forests, as when Shen Yuan had been practicing and traveling. He’s much higher up, for one, but this is also a whole new environment. Shen Yuan wishes he had a chance to take in the whole of the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect; as it is, Qiong Ding is right next door, so all Shen Yuan really gets to admire is the Rainbow Bridge and the buildings on Qiong Ding, and he can’t even make the most of that since he has to devote half his attention to making sure he doesn’t lose Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu waits for him in a small courtyard to the side of a larger building. The main hall, presumably. Shen Yuan would have been able to guess that this is where they hold the Peak Lord meetings even if Shen Qingqiu hadn’t brought him directly to it. It’s larger and it’s fancier. It screams “Important Events Here” in neon lights.

“Remember,” Shen Qingqiu murmurs. “Don’t answer stupid questions.”

Unspoken is, still, the assertion that all the questions will be stupid. Shen Yuan valiantly doesn’t sigh, and follows Shen Qingqiu inside.

The double-takes would be hilarious if Shen Yuan weren’t so nervous. Not all the Peak Lords are here yet; those who are, are clustered in little groups, talking with each other before the meeting begins. Those clusters look up as the door opens, take in Shen Qingqiu, start to look away, and then take in Shen Yuan. The only normal person in this room is Mu Qingfang. Bless him, all he does is nod shallowly at the both of him and turn back to his conversation partner.

Being fair to the others, Mu Qingfang has met Shen Yuan before.

That doesn’t stop Shen Yuan from whipping out his fan and hiding behind it. Shen Qingqiu ignores them all completely, walking sedately toward his seat next to what must be the sect leader’s seat. Assuming they have assigned seating.

Shen Qingqiu sits himself pointedly between probably-the-sect-leader’s seat and the next seat, where he gestures for Shen Yuan to sit.

“Isn’t this already someone?” Shen Yuan asks, as quietly as he can. Not that it matters in a room full of cultivators, but he doesn’t want to make Wei Qingwei mad at him any earlier than he has to!

“Not all the Peak Lords will be present today,” Shen Qingqiu says evenly.

You better be sure about that, Jiu-ge, Shen Yuan thinks, but he sits.

Yeah. This room is dead silent as everyone stares at them. Shen Yuan raises his fan higher. How long until the meeting starts?

Shen Yuan takes back any previous thoughts about Shen Qingqiu’s attitude toward the Peak Lords. Ge, please keep using that murderous aura to keep everyone away from him!

The door opens. A man in black and silver xuanduan robes steps inside, holding the door for another man right beside him, this one slightly shorter and dressed in robes of grey and deep blue. The first man is—

Okay, look, everyone in this bullsh*t xianxia p*rn world is beautiful. That’s a given. This man is pretty the same way everyone else is, but that’s overridden by the switch in Shen Yuan’s brain that flips and decides that this dude is big brother shaped.

Not that he reminds Shen Yuan of his own da-ge. The man’s just got, like, an indefinable da-ge vibe.

Is this…the sect leader? The other Peak Lords are scattered around the room, but Shen Yuan hasn’t gotten Zhangmen-shixiong vibes from any of them, nor do they match the descriptions of Yue Qingyuan from the book. This man fits that description to a T, if Shen Yuan considers it, so he pretty much has to be Yue Qi—

The man looks at Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan. His eyes go wide. His small smile slides right off his face.

“Xiao Yuan?” he asks.

Funny thing. Shen Yuan saw that same expression on Shen Qingqiu’s face a mere few days ago. Apparently the Original Goods had rather more people out there looking for him than Shen Yuan had suspected. Now he’s going to be constantly paranoid about meeting new people, he just knows it.

Speaking of—

Shen! Qing! Qiu! You knew that Yue Qingyuan knew the Original Goods and you didn’t think that was a relevant warning before going into this meeting?!

Shen Yuan knows that Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu have some kind of history; it had been ridiculously apparent in Proud Immortal Demon Way, not that Airplane had ever gone into any of the details. Perhaps Shen Yuan should have extrapolated from that knowledge to realize that Yue Qingyuan would (probably) know Shen Yuan as well—but, but that depended on what the history between Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan was, and when they had met, and—!

Shen Yuan is starting to think he really should have pressed Shen Qingqiu for more information about when and how he and Original Shen Yuan had been separated.

"Ah," Shen Yuan says aloud. Shen Qingqiu, at his side, is absolutely no help. "Yes?"

"You're alive," Yue Qingyuan says, stunned.

Haha, okay! What the f*ck happened when Shen Jiu and Shen Yuan got separated!!

"Yes...?" Shen Yuan says again. Shen Qingqiu! Any time you want to step in, that would be great!Shen Yuan has a weird feeling that saying ‘reports of my demise were greatly exaggerated’ will not be a comfort to this man!

"Zhangmen-shixiong," Mu Qingfang says, stepping up to the plate. Shen Yuan is going to do something so nice for this man. Friendship ended with Shen Qingqiu, Mu Qingfang is his new favorite Peak Lord. "Shen-shixiong brought Shen-daozhang to Qian Cao several days ago. He suffered a qi deviation recently that—” He looks at Shen Yuan, who nods. Please spill Shen Yuan's medical information if it will get him out of this situation! (Especially since it's totally going to be brought up during this meeting anyway.) “—ah, disrupted most of his autobiographical knowledge."

That's a delicate way to put it. Mu Qingfang, you're such a bro.

“Oh,” says Yue Qingyuan. Dammit, apparently Shen Yuan is incredibly weak to big brother vibes; he feels awful—

“Do we not have a meeting?” Shen Qingqiu asks imperiously.

Yue Qingyuan swallows, gaze fixed on Shen Yuan, but he nods. He walks to sit at the chair Shen Yuan had assumed would be his; all the other Peak Lords follow, settling in their own seats. The man who had walked in with Yue Qingyuan sits beside Shen Yuan—this, then, must be Wei Qingwei.

Shen Qingqiu was right. Not all the Peak Lords are here, there are—Shen Yuan counts quickly—three of them missing.

Despite the fact that Shen Qingqiu called for this meeting, presumably to discuss Shen Yuan, neither he nor Yue Qingyuan start with that. Obviously Shen Qingqiu hadn’t breathed a word about Shen Yuan to anyone, so all the other Peak Lords came here expecting a normal, if mistimed, meeting, and prepared appropriately for that.

Shen Yuan’s assuming this meeting is mistimed, anyway. How often do the Peak Lords meet? Monthly, right? Shen Qingqiu must have called this one…early? Unless the previous one had been delayed or canceled, maybe by the Shuang Hu mission.

Point being, whether it’s been called early or late, there’s plenty to discuss here that isn’t Shen Yuan. The pressure is off of him, at least momentarily.

Shen Yuan spends most of the meeting hiding behind his fan and trying to puzzle out which Peak Lord is which. He’s already figured out Yue Qingyuan and Wei Qingwei, but that leaves the rest of them. Next to Wei Qingwei sits a woman who has to be Qi Qingqi, identifiable by her purple robes and her position this high in peak seniority; Shang Qinghua, fourth in the rankings, is one of the Peak Lords absent today. (Shen Yuan has to admit, he’s glad he doesn’t have to immediately deal with the traitor.)

Shen Yuan would have known who Qi Qingqi was immediately, by merit of being the only woman in the room, except she isn’t. There are other female Peak Lords. Lower in the rankings, but they’re there!

Does it matter that there are other female Peak Lords? Not really, since they had to have been killed during the razing of Cang Qiong, same as the male Peak Lords; Airplane would have made a big deal about them otherwise. Would it have been nice to know about them, from a worldbuilding standard? Yes, along with their names! You useless hack!!

Shen Yuan doesn’t bother trying to figure out who they are. He’ll get Shen Qingqiu to tell him about them later.

Next to Qi Qingqi is Mu Qingfang, so Liu Qingge is also one of the missing Peak Lords today. Pity. None of the readers had ever had a chance to meet Bai Zhan’s War God…

Wei Qingwei, Qi Qingqi, Mu Qingfang, and—yup. Thus ends the knowledge Shen Yuan has from the novel. Thanks for nothing, you useless author.

Shen Yuan would feel worse about not paying attention in this meeting, but for all that they’re moving through Yue Qingyuan’s schedule, he’s pretty sure no one is particularly attentive today. There’s a lot of “I am pointedly not looking at you, I am definitely paying attention to the Sect Leader while he talks about preparations for the Immortal Alliance Conference”—

Hey! That’s still three years away! Why are we bringing it up right now and almost giving Shen Yuan a heart attack? He can’t have misjudged Luo Binghe’s age that severely, right?

No, it’s fine, he didn’t. Three years away, but there’s a lot of preparation that goes into it. Even though Huan Hua Palace is the one sponsoring it, like they almost always do, they still have to call on Cang Qiong this much?

f*cking Huan Hua. Their younger disciples don’t deserve death, especially not the ones at the upcoming Immortal Alliance Conference: thrown into a situation far above their capabilities or what they had been prepared to expect. The rest? Huan Hua as a whole deserves to get wrecked.

You reap what you sow, and the Old Palace Master—

Shen Yuan frowns, rubbing his temple to fight the sudden headache. He lost his train of thought. He’s not even sure what spiral he had gone off on. When he tunes back in, he hasn’t missed much.

Sect Leader, couldn’t this have been an email?

And again, why does Shen Yuan have to be here? Shen Qingqiu, couldn’t his existence have been another email? What was the point of bringing him?

The Peak Lords discuss the Immortal Alliance Conference. Then there are paperwork reminders (and a note left by Shang Qinghua to remind everyone to submit the proper formsfor requisitions); new missions (specifically being offered to Peak Lords, either because they're too important and/or difficult for disciples, they're missions meant for a certain Peak Lord's personal interest, or due to collaboration needs); and finally general Peak business (each Peak Lord presenting important or relevant information, starting from the lower peaks and then snaking higher; Shen Yuan wonders if it's common practice to do that, if they change the order each meeting, or--most likely--if this is because everything is going to dissolve into chaos once they reach Qing Jing).

“This master has already submitted his report about the Shuang Hu City mission to Zhangmen-shixiong,” Shen Qingqiu says blandly, when his turn comes around. He fans himself lazily. “Everything is in order on my Qing Jing Peak.”

Shen Qingqiu is such a sh*t-stirrer. Shen Yuan wishes they were positioned so that he could kick him under the table.

Predictably, none of the Peak Lords like that.

"But who is he?" Qi Qingqi demands, leaning forward in her seat so she has a better view of Shen Yuan.

"Surely Qi Qingqi understands the existence of twins—” Shen Qingqiu starts, derisive.

That's it.

Shen Yuan folds his fan with a snap and whacks Shen Qingqiu on the arm.

"Enough," he says. You're causing problems on purpose! What happened to 'don't answer stupid questions'? Did that secretly mean 'I'll answer them, but only in the most annoying way possible'? Honestly.

Shen Yuan faces as many of the Peak Lords as he can at one time. He may or may not have decided to exclude Yue Qingyuan from that number.He can’t take the sad eyes, sue him!

"This one is Shen Yuan," he says. "I was also present in Shuang Hu City, investigating the Skinner Demon. Ge and I crossed paths during the hunt." No way is he going to embarrass himself outright by admitting to being captured! "Unfortunately, this one suffered a qi deviation several weeks ago which, as Senior Mu explained, has severely affected this one's memory."

This gets some slow nods.

"You're a rogue cultivator?" one of the unnamed Peak Lords asks.

"Yes," Shen Yuan says.

"No," Shen Qingqiu says at the same time.

"Yes, I am," Shen Yuan argues. If he was with a sect, wouldn't someone have come looking for him? Wouldn't he have been wearing some kind of uniform, instead of wearing cheap robes he had obviously bought himself? It's impressive that he has a spiritual sword, but that's about the only marker that he knows what he's doing. Shen Yuan is aware he doesn't seem all that impressive, except to desperate or trusting civilians.

"Shen Yuan is a member of Qing Jing Peak," Shen Qingqiu says.

Shen Yuan squints at him. Did Shen Qingqiu pull this off while Shen Yuan wasn't looking? How long does it take to fast-track paperwork through Qing Jing, and how did Shen Qingqiu avoid letting that hit Yue Qingyuan's desk before this meeting? Did he slide it in last minute, as he obviously must have done with the Shuang Hu mission report?

"Since when?" Shen Yuan asks.

Shen Qingqiu smiles, a sharp curve of vicious amusem*nt. "Since this master entered the sect, of course," he says.

"What," Shen Yuan says, too shocked for any inflection. He is echoed by several of the Peak Lords.

Didn't Yue Qingyuan think he was dead? Why were the Peak Lords so shocked, if Shen Yuan had supposedly always been in the sect? When the f*ck did Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan get separated?! Was it before or after entering the sect? It must have been after, right—but no, the Peak Lords would recognize him—unless they never realized there were two Shens, and the Original Goods ‘died’ immediately after joining?

He needs a timeline, dammit! How is he supposed to make sense of this?!

"Shen Yuan's name was written alongside this master's name on Qing Jing's rolls when he entered the sect," Shen Qingqiu explains, mostly to Shen Yuan, though the Peak Lords are avidly listening. "Shen Yuan is a Qing Jing cultivator. It was a condition of this master joining the sect."

That can't be what it sounds like.

"A condition from your shizun...?" Shen Yuan tries.

Shen Qingqiu shakes his head. "My condition. Either Shen Yuan also joined the sect, in absentia, or this master would not joint the sect at all."

"That’s—you—” Shen Yuan looks to Yue Qingyuan. "He didn't really—?”

Yue Qingyuan nods. "Shishu accepted the terms as presented. Shen Yuan is rightfully a Qing Jing cultivator." Sure. A Qing Jing cultivator that Yue Qingyuan, judging by his reactions so far, had believed would only ever be joining as a memory, since apparently Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan were separated way earlier than he had thought!

What kind of batsh*t decision making was this? What the f*ck? Who the f*ck would—and why would the previous Qing Jing Lord—it—he—!

“You absolute idiot," Shen Yuan says out loud. "You would throw away the chance at a sect?! At the first ranked sect in the cultivation world? I never asked you for that!"

Safety, security, knowledge—Shen Qingqiu would have thrown that away?

“Shen Yuan survived all this time as a rogue,” Shen Qingqiu says. “I would have, too, if it came to that.”

“Not! The! Point!” And this is not the place for this discussion, either! Shen Yuan forcibly drags his emotions back under control; god, but pretending to be Shen Qingqiu’s brother is having wild effects on his equilibrium. Even now, he’s planning on having it out with Shen Qingqiu about this later.

Thanks, OG Shen Yuan, Shen Yuan thinks spitefully. What kind of man had he been if his brother is like this?! Either a saint, or—well. Someone like the Shen Qingqiu that Shen Yuan had castigated on the forums.

Loyalty between brothers and/or bastards, ha.

“If there is anything else like this, tell me right now, or I refuse to be held responsible for how much of your mountain I wreck,” Shen Yuan tells Shen Qingqiu severely.

In response, Shen Qingqiu reaches into his qiankun sleeve and pulls out a sealed scroll. He leans over Shen Yuan to hand it to Wei Qingwei. “If Shidi would verify the seal and qi signature,” he all but demands.

Wei Qingwei accepts the scroll and does so bemusedly. “This is the former Qing Jing Peak Lord’s seal, and his qi signature.”

“You’re positive?” Shen Qingqiu presses.

“Shixiong,” Wei Qingwei says, “I handled enough official correspondence from your shizun over the years to recognize his qi signature. I would be able to recognize any of the previous Peak Lords’ qi signatures as well as I can recognize our current generation’s. Yes, I’m sure.”

“Thanking Wei-shidi,” Shen Qingqiu says. He takes the scroll back, gaze sweeping over the other assembled Peak Lords, before he passes the scroll to Yue Qingyuan.

Yue Qingyuan looks back and forth between it and Shen Qingqiu.

“Well? Open it,” Shen Qingqiu snaps.

Uhhh. Shen Yuan has a bad feeling about this.

Yue Qingyuan does. He scans it. About halfway through, he chokes on nothing. His eyes fly up to stare at Shen Qingqiu again.

“This is—” he says, then apparently forces himself to finish reading the scroll.

She Yuan has a very bad feeling about this.

Yue Qingyuan finishes reading. Shen Yuan is pretty sure he read it more than once; the scroll isn’t that long. Going by his face, Shen Yuan is also pretty sure that Yue Qingyuan is fighting off the urge to have either a fit of hysterical laughter or a migraine.

“Zhangmen-shixiong?” one of the other Peak Lords asks, when Yue Qingyuan doesn’t say anything for long moments, despite obviously having finished reading.

“I suppose…” Yue Qingyuan says dazedly. “I suppose…congratulations are in order?”

"...Why?" Shen Yuan bites the bullet and asks.

“For Xiao Yuan’s retroactive ascension to Qing Jing Peak Lord, alongside Shen Qingqiu,” Yue Qingyuan says, sounding, to his credit, only barely strangled.

The uproar is immediate.

Shen Yuan sits there, processing.

Hey, Shen Qingqiu? Shen Qingqiu? What the f*ck is wrong with you?!

“Quiet,” Yue Qingyuan says. He doesn’t shout it, and the use of his qi is barely perceptible, but everyone immediately shuts up. “Wei-shidi verified Shen-shishu’s qi signature and seal, as did I before opening the scroll. It is by Shen-shishu’s hand that Shen Yuan is confirmed as the secondary Peak Lord of Qing Jing—and this is not the first time that twins have shared a title and position.” He neatly cuts off that argument before it can be made, judging by the way several Peak Lords slump in place.

Shen Yuan is still stuck at the very beginning of this revelation.

“Did you,” he says distantly, “just…unilaterally declare me a Peak Lord?”

“By definition,” Shen Qingqiu says snottily, “I ‘unilaterally’ did nothing; as Zhangmen-shixiong says, Shizun confirmed the appointment—”

“Jiu-ge, you’re a crazy person,” Shen Yuan interrupts him. He has no idea what he’s feeling. Is this the five stages of grief? He thinks he’s stuck in denial.

Oh, no, wait. There’s the anger.

Shen Yuan surges to his feet, hauls Shen Qingqiu to his, and yells in his brother’s face.

“You don’t know me! Your shizun never even met me—how could he decide I belonged on Qing Jing, much less that I was qualified to be its Peak Lord?! And you—you—I don’t even—I could be lying, I could be incompetent, I could be a spy, but you just, what, you decide to dump this responsibility on me?! I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHO I AM!”

For the first time since meeting him, Shen Qingqiu almost looks unsure. It’s not enough. Shen Yuan is going to make Shen Qingqiu regret this.

He plays his trump card. “I’m telling da-ge,” he hisses viciously.

Shen Qingqiu’s face does something complicated and awful and—

Wait.

What. The f*ck did Shen Yuan just say?

Shen Yuan lets go of Shen Qingqiu. “I…” he says, confused. “I don’t know why I…”

(Ugh, his head hurts.)

“Mu Qingfang,” Shen Qingqiu says, that momentary doubt wiped from his face. He doesn’t look away from Shen Yuan as he addresses his martial brother. “You said it was possible for memories to return?”

“Yes,” Mu Qingfang says slowly, halfway out of his seat, and then pointedly adds, “Would Shen Yuan prefer to discuss this privately?”

“You have been keeping a list,” Shen Yuan accuses Shen Qingqiu. He knew it!

“Congratulations, you’ve earned multiple additions to it in as many minutes,” Shen Qingqiu says.

Great, cool, good to know. Was it the yelling? Pinpointing the fact that Shen Qingqiu was building a list in the first place?

f*ck, what if Shen Qingqiu is also making a list of things that don’t make sense about Shen Yuan?

If he is, Shen Yuan knows what’s about to go at the top of that list.

He has no idea what possessed him to say that. This is a different life! He doesn’t have a da-ge here, and the idea of threatening to tattle on Shen Qingqiu to a nebulous older brother figure is laughable to the extreme.

His head really f*cking hurts.

Shen Yuan decides that he’s done people-ing for the day. f*ck good first impressions, he doesn’t care anymore. Shen Qingqiu was right; he was never going to be able to pull that off.

He turns on his heel and leaves the hall.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t follow him. Looks like he has some amount of sense after all.

Chapter 6

Chapter Text

"Luo Binghe, with me," Shizun says, sweeping past the training grounds with only a bare pause to pick out Luo Binghe.

Luo Binghe shares a wide-eyed stare with Ning Yingying, then scrambles to grab his (new!) cultivation manual and follow Shizun. Oh, he hopes Shizun isn’t about to take away his manual.

He still…doesn’t really know why Shizun decided to give him a new manual. Shen Yuan must have mentioned it to Shizun, but Luo Binghe hadn’t expected that Shizun would personally hand him a new one, glaring the whole time. Given the way Shen Yuan had apologized to Luo Binghe later in the day, when they met in the bamboo forest, Luo Binghe has the impression that Shen Yuan hadn’t expected that either.

Luo Binghe had felt Shizun’s eyes on him the whole of that day. It’s a weighty thing, Shen Qingqiu’s attention, though at least this time it hadn’t had the edge that always heralded a precursor to violence. It was disdainful as ever, but also almost…considering.

He isn’t sure what could have changed Shizun’s mind like that. He’s rather scared to find out. As soon as his classes ended, he had dodged his martial brothers and gone immediately to the bamboo forest to meet Shen Yuan. He felt Shizun watching him leave, and he had buried the concern rising from that under the quiet joy from spending an afternoon with Shen Yuan, going through his new manual.

Luo Binghe hasn’t had much time to work with the new manual outside of yesterday’s review with Shen Yuan. He’s done the stretches Shen Yuan assigned him, and he was in the middle of practicing some of the unarmed forms from the manual with Ning Yingying when Shizun appeared just now. He doesn’t—he doesn’t want to disappoint Shizun, but he doesn’t have much to show for himself yet.

He hasn’t had much to show for himself at any point in these past two years. That must be why Shizun is always so angry with him.

(Shen Yuan was right, though. This cultivation manual suits him much better. Everything is so much easier.

Unfilially, Luo Binghe thinks, Shen Yuan has done more for me in two days than Shizun in two years.

He thinks, I wish Shen Yuan was my shizun instead.

He buries that thought. It will never happen. It’s enough that Shen Yuan is willing to spend even this much time helping Luo Binghe.)

Shizun doesn’t slow his pace at all as Luo Binghe follows him. Luo Binghe isn’t sure he even stopped to check Luo Binghe was behind him, though his senses are surely advanced enough he would know anyway. Plus, Luo Binghe’s footsteps are notably louder than Shizun’s—he wonders what technique Shizun uses to muffle his footsteps, or if Shizun has simply practiced light movements for so long that they’ve become second nature, even at the speed he’s moving.

They draw near the woodshed. Luo Binghe tenses, gripping his manual tighter.

He hasn’t done anything! Shizun was curt when he pulled Luo Binghe from training, but he often is, and this time he even used Luo Binghe’s name! Luo Binghe can count on one hand the number of times that Shizun has called him by his name; one, in fact, was the previous morning, when he had handed off the new manual. Luo Binghe had expected to go right back to ‘Little Beast.’

It’s strange that he would call Luo Binghe by his name, isn’t it? And that he’s back early from the Peak Lord meeting? Usually they take most of day—always an unexpected boon for Luo Binghe—and he had expected that this particular meeting would take even longer, given—

…Ah.

They pass the woodshed, heading into the forest.

He’s not following Shizun. He’s following Shen Yuan.

Luo Binghe’s grip on his manual loosens, his fingers relaxing from their tightly curled position. He smoothes the cover of the manual; he hadn’t pressed hard enough to leave marks, but it’s a small apology anyway. This manual will teach him everything he needs to know, so in return, he should treat it with respect. It is as much his teacher as Shizun—or Shen Yuan—is.

Once they reach the clearing, the one that is quickly and to Luo Binghe’s glee becoming their clearing, Shen Yuan draws to a halt. He presses his fingers to his temples, his eyes closed.

He looks…upset.

“Shen-laoshi?” Luo Binghe asks, tentatively.

“You don’t have to—nn. Tch. Never mind, never mind,” Shen Yuan says. He has yet to open his eyes.

Luo Binghe makes his way in front of Shen Yuan. At a slight distance, enough that he should have time to leap away if—if—

(Shen Yuan has been so nice, but he’s Shen Qingqiu’s brother. He’s so nice, but he’d sounded angry earlier. What if…?)

“This disciple started working on the katas in his new manual,” Luo Binghe says. Slow and cautious. Soft, in case he makes Shen Yuan’s headache worse.

(A-Niang had headaches a lot. They never had the money for proper medicine, though there was a willow tree nearby, which they had occasionally harvested bark from to make tea. When they didn’t have even that, Luo Binghe had learned to quiet himself, to take on any of A-Niang’s tasks that he could, to ease her day as much as possible. He had told stories or talked about his day in a soft little voice.

He doesn’t know if that helped or made A-Niang’s headaches worse, but she had always smiled at him when he did.)

"Ning-shijie helped this disciple. We went through our stretches together—Ning-shijie says some of the stretches are a little different than the ones she usually performs, but she likes them. I like them, too. I—this disciple thanks Shen-laoshi again, for taking the time to teach him. If Shen-laoshi is willing, this Luo Binghe could demonstrate his progress so far."

He so desperately wants to impress Shen Yuan. Failing that, he wants that stressed furrow to fade. A distraction is sufficient, right? So long as Luo Binghe doesn't fail too horribly and anger Shen Yuan.

(He's nice, he's nice, he's been so nice, Luo Binghe thinks.

You haven't seen him angry at you yet. That doesn't mean it won't happen eventually, Luo Binghe also thinks.

He still doesn't know how he so offended Shen Qingqiu on their first meeting. He doesn't know, so he's never been able to fix it. He's only compounded mistake after mistake.

He can't afford that with Shen Yuan.)

Shen Yuan blinks at him. He hand drops back down to his side.

"Show me, Binghe," he says, all softness again.

Luo Binghe should be cautious of that shift. He chooses to believe that the kindness is the truth and the frustration only a momentary deviation from the norm.

Luo Binghe flips open his manual to the appropriate page. He can't do this without looking, not yet; he's not had near enough time. He still needs the reference. Shen Yuan, too, may need the reference. He slides into the first form.

He's clumsy with it. He doesn't know the movements well yet, and the transitions—aren't. It's all jerky and uncoordinated. Despite that, as Luo Binghe moves through the forms he and Ning Yingying had gone over together and then toward the forms he's only briefly seen the drawings of, the martial forms feel so much better than the ones from his previous manual.

Luo Binghe can feel the flow. Ning Yingying had described it to him once, but he hadn't understood. Sometimes he doesn't understand Ning Yingying's explanations; she tries her best, but she's only a disciple herself, and her explanations are sometimes—lacking. He had always done his best to pay attention during their drills, mimicking the disciples around him and desperately trying to internalize the instructions, but later, while studying the forms as laid out in his manual, he had always frustrated himself. He could never feel that flow Ning Yingying talked about, no matter how often he practiced, or how much Ning Yingying helped him. Ning Yingying has taught Luo Binghe so much of what he knows, and yet, Luo Binghe had always failed to meet even the lowest expectations.

(This disciple is stupid and doesn't understand.)

"Arm up a little higher," Shen Yuan murmurs, nudging at his elbow with his fan. "Other knee—turn it out slightly. Good. Next move—draw back on your other leg, sweep your arms—no, you've overcompensated now, your arms should be level with each other for this—”

Shen Yuan barely seems to be looking at the manual. Luo Binghe isn't concerned. Shen Yuan obviously knows what he's doing, and this all still matches what Luo Binghe has read. Shen Yuan's gentle corrections, tiny nudges here and there to align his body, are the best advice Luo Binghe has ever received.

The pain or upset or whatever, exactly, it was has faded from Shen Yuan's face. He's concentrating on Binghe; Luo Binghe wouldn't call him expressive right now, but there is a certain softness to him as he works with Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe darts glances at Shen Yuan as often as he can get away with it. He shivers slightly when Shen Yuan steps behind him to adjust his back leg with a firm tap from his fan.

And then—

Luo Binghe can’t remember the next form. Not without looking. They’re over halfway through the set, and between Luo Binghe’s studying and Shen Yuan’s competence, they’ve been making their way through the set without complication.

Luo Binghe is about to go take a peek at his manual, when Shen Yuan says, “Follow.”

Shen Yuan goes slowly, careful to show Luo Binghe exactly what he needs to do to echo his movements. He is precise, no movements wasted, in a way that speaks of years of practice.

None of his forms are Qing Jing’s.

Luo Binghe has seen his seniors practicing on occasion. Not even the advanced forms he’s seen look like this. More than that, even a novice like Luo Binghe can see the completely different style of Shen Yuan’s forms. Qing Jing is all circles, redirecting energy with the least expenditure of one’s own, and as a sword style its greatest strength is in its defense (though it can be turned to offense easily).

This is…not that.

The only way Luo Binghe can think to describe Shen Yuan’s style is rooted. His weight settles heavily, his center of gravity lower than Luo Binghe is used to with any of the Qing Jing forms he has learned so far. Every move is a clean line; beautiful, but exactingly precise, none of the flowing of Qing Jing.

It’s fascinating.

Luo Binghe does his best to follow. Shen Yuan is showing this to him. He must think it’s important, and Luo Binghe is honored that Shen Yuan is willing to share his own style with him. Yes, Luo Binghe needs to learn Qing Jing’s style, and yet he’s hungry for all knowledge Shen Yuan will grant him.

As he demonstrates, Luo Binghe has no good view of Shen Yuan’s face. That doesn’t matter: he can visibly see the last of the tension fall from Shen Yuan’s shoulders as he goes through his set. He seems so…peaceful.

Luo Binghe fumbles the placement of his foot, teetering as he starts to lose his balance—

Shen Yuan catches him.

“Apologies, Binghe,” Shen Yuan says. “I wasn’t keeping track. Let me check the manual to see how that move should work…”

Oh. Was teaching Luo Binghe this style unintentional, then? Luo Binghe bites his lip, but doesn’t stop Shen Yuan from peering at the manual on the ground.

“This isn’t…” Shen Yuan frowns, staring at the manual. “This isn’t what we were doing.” He grimaces, knuckling at his forehead. “Ai, the headache is back…”

“Does Shen-laoshi have medicine to take?” Luo Binghe asks. “This disciple could fetch it, or prepare willow bark tea if Laoshi would prefer.”

Shen Yuan reaches out. Luo Binghe goes stock still at the hand landing gently in his hair, ruffling it, then melts into the sensation.

“Binghe is a good child,” Shen Yuan says. “No need to concern yourself.”

That's not true! Luo Binghe owes Shen Yuan more than he can repay. The absolute least he can do is take care of him, in return for how much Shen Yuan has done for him.

Would it offend Shen Yuan if he asks...?

"Shen-laoshi came back early from the Peak Lord meeting," Luo Binghe says, stepping carefully, trying to formulate a neutral question.

Shen Yuan slants a sideways look at him before he can begin to follow up with the actual question. Luo Binghe's mouth shuts with a click.

"No need to look at me like that," Shen Yuan says tiredly. "Binghe is correct. I did return early. I suppose I startled you, appearing as I did," he adds ruefully. "Meditation is all well and good, but moving meditation is sometimes far better than simply sitting still. There's nothing like forms to release your—complicated emotions."

Luo Binghe hadn't misread Shen Yuan when he appeared! He was angry. And then, instead of taking it out on anyone, instead of even raising his voice at Luo Binghe, he had used the martial forms to calm down—he had used teaching Binghe, calmly correcting his movements and granting all his attention to Binghe, to recenter himself.

Warmth lights up his chest.

"Thanking Shen-laoshi for the lesson," Luo Binghe says, bobbing his way into a bow.

He's not going to ask what upset Shen Yuan so much. That would be far beyond even Shen Yuan's lenience, he's sure—

When he straightens back up, Shen Yuan has a queer light in his eyes.

"Binghe," he says, slow and careful, like a man stepping his way onto ice he isn't sure will hold him. "You can say no. You can take time to consider it. I know that, upon entering the sect, you swore yourself to Shen Qingqiu. But. Would you…like to officially become my student instead? I—”

"Yes!" Luo Binghe blurts.

"Wait until I've finished!" Shen Yuan scolds, smacking him on the head with the fan he pulled from his sleeve. "Don't say yes to an offer before you hear the whole thing!"

"Yes, Shen-laoshi," Luo Binghe says piteously. He doesn't care about the rest. Of course he wants to be Shen Yuan's.

"What I told you previously still stands," Shen Yuan says. "I am relearning cultivation as much as you are learning it for the first time. As today shows, I am not—I have my own knowledge set that I fall back on, which may complicate your own learning. I do not know how good a teacher I will be, but Luo Binghe has already proved himself a dedicated student, and a quick learner. If these insufficiencies are not enough to dissuade him, then this Shen Yuan would be proud to call himself Luo Binghe's teacher."

Luo Binghe pretends to think it over. He can tell Shen Yuan will smack him again if he doesn't at least act like refusing is an option.

It's not, of course.

"This Luo Binghe accepts," Luo Binghe says. He bows again.

"Well," Shen Yuan says briskly. "We have a tea ceremony to perform, don't we?"

Luo Binghe's head jerks up. "Laoshi?" He can't have heard that right. Shen Yuan must mean another ceremony, because the only time Luo Binghe had poured for a teacher was—

"I'm stealing you," Shen Yuan says. "My student. My disciple.Shen Qingqiu made me the second Qing Jing Peak Lord, and it is my right to teach the students or to take on personal disciples of this Peak just as much as it is his." He flutters his fan. "Does Luo Binghe still accept?"

"Shizun," Luo Binghe breathes.

"Not until the tea has been poured!" Shen Yuan scolds.

Luo Binghe is going to make the best cup of tea he's ever made in his short life. This won't be a repeat of his entrance to the sect; he's learned better since then. He can show Shen Yuan how good a disciple he will be.

Shen Yuan leads the way out of the forest. Luo Binghe follows him, one step behind.

Genuinely, Shen Yuan is surprised they get away with it. They were out in the forest for a while; though Shen Yuan left the meeting early, he had thought Shen Qingqiu would be back by now.

Instead, Shen Yuan ushers Luo Binghe into the bamboo house. By rights—by what the novel had described—Shen Yuan should get Ming Fan involved with this. Probably he should double-check with Shen Qingqiu that he’s actually allowed to take Luo Binghe as his disciple when the Protagonist has already made his bow to Shen Qingqiu.

Then he decides “f*ck that” and also, Shen Qingqiu can fight him. Shen Qingqiu wants to bind him to this peak? Fine, Luo Binghe is his. No one gets to touch him.

He’s in Limited Sandbox Mode. He can do whatever the f*ck he wants, and what he wants is to give Luo Binghe the goddamn child- and disciplehood that he always deserved.

He sits patiently as Luo Binghe prepares the tea. Luo Binghe’s hands tremble faintly as he works, yet he never spills a drop, all of his focus on brewing. Shen Yuan doesn’t care if it’s the worst cup of tea he’s ever had. He’ll drink it all, and gladly.

Luo Binghe presents him the tea. Shen Yuan accepts it, takes a sip, and—

“Very good,” he praises.

Luo Binghe’s eyes go wet and shiny.

“Ah!” Shen Yuan says, hurriedly setting the cup down, then leaning to brush his thumbs against Luo Binghe’s cheeks as the first of the tears fall. “Don’t cry! What are you crying for! I said it was good!”

Luo Binghe doesn’t cry! He had refused to cry on Qing Jing Peak, ever since Shen Qingqiu had crushed his dreams the moment he entered the sect. Yet now tears are spilling down, Luo Binghe almost hiccuping as he struggles to restrain himself.

“Th-thanking Shizun,” Luo Binghe warbles. His nose has gone red. It’s unbearably cute. Shen Yuan is losing his mind.

He isn’t doing a very good job of cleaning off Luo Binghe’s face. The tears are still falling, faster than he can wipe them away. Shen Yuan gives up.

He tugs Luo Binghe toward him. Tips him against his shoulder and wraps his arms around the boy, folding him into an embrace.

Luo Binghe outright sobs. He clutches at Shen Yuan’s robes.

[Protagonist Satisfaction Points +100!] the System chimes in.

You hush, Shen Yuan tells it. He has a crying child in his lap. He has more important things to worry about.

“It’s all right,” Shen Yuan tells him. “You’re all right, Binghe…”

He keeps up a steady stream of nonsense, soothing words without any substance. It’s been years, but he’s held his meimei like this before. In his opinion, he was never very good at offering comfort. Meimei kept coming to him, though, and he couldn’t bear to turn her away. She had grown out of it eventually, grown into herself and become more comfortable at school and with her friends. She had stopped coming to cry to him, but she still came to him for all sorts of reasons. They were…close.

Shen Yuan misses her desperately.

He’ll never get to see her again.

Stop it, he thinks to himself. Despite himself, his hold tightens around Luo Binghe.

Being hugged is…really nice.

Gradually, the tears taper off. Luo Binghe’s grip on him loosens. As soon as he starts to draw back, Shen Yuan loosens his own embrace. Luo Binghe shuffles a few feet away, eyes red-rimmed and face faintly flushed.

“Apologizing to Shizun for this unseemly display,” he says, voice thick.

“Hush,” Shen Yuan says. “My disciple is not unseemly.”

Okay, that’s a bit of a lie. His clothes are mussed from training, his hair slightly windswept, and he just spent, what, nearly a quarter of a shichen sobbing in Shen Yuan’s lap?

…Never mind. Given all that, he still looks unfairly sweet. A little white lotus. Absolutely precious.

“This master will review what is necessary for Luo Binghe’s education,” Shen Yuan says, unsubtly changing the subject. Luo Binghe looks grateful for it. “I will discuss necessary changes with Shen Qingqiu before bringing them to your attention. Is there anything this master needs to know beforehand?”

Such as where you’re sleeping, young man? Shen Yuan will flex his unwilling Peak Lord bona fides if it gets Luo Binghe out of the woodshed. He’ll terrorize Ming Fan into compliance if he has to. All he needs is an excuse.

Disappointingly, Luo Binghe shakes his head.

Fine. Shen Yuan will have to find some way to ‘realize’ his new—and only—disciple isn’t sleeping in the dorms. Another project for the back-burner.

“Very well. If he does remember anything, he only needs to tell me, “ Shen Yuan says, and, “Luo Binghe is dismissed.”

Luo Binghe stands, bows, and leaves. The door shuts behind him with a quiet click.

Now. Onto other pressing matters.

System, what the f*ck??

[Query not recognized.]

Oh that’s horsesh*t! It knows exactly what he means, it’s just trying to avoid answering.

What is going on? How are there two Qing Jing Peak Lords? What is happening with Shen Qingqiu?!

[World stability: 92%. Plot deviation: minor. Reminder: User has elected to utilize Limited Sandbox Mode. Plot deviation(s) will expand as User changes World: PIDW-8946728.]

I’ve been here all of two and a half weeks, what changes could I have made that would have a ripple effect so soon? Shen Yuan fumes. He sighs. How did the OG Shen Yuan die in PIDW? Did he canonically die in that qi deviation, or is this one of those situations where he died before he was supposed to?

Though Shen Yuan can’t possibly imagine when the Original Goods would have died in canon if not the moment he’d transmigrated. Shen Yuan would remember if Shen Qingqiu had a twin—with his name!!—who died on screen.

[…Information restricted.]

“Why won’t you tell me anything about him?” Shen Yuan asks aloud. The System constantly thwarts his attempts to learn more about the Original Goods.

[Character: “Shen Yuan” adapted from Author: Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky.]

Yeah, no sh*t, Shen Yuan is living in Proud Immortal Demon Way. Of course his character came from the mind of Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky—

Adapted.

What does adapted mean?

[World: PIDW-8946728 utilizes Outline: PIDW-001 by Author: Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky.]

Oh. That was a surprisingly straightforward answer. So, if Shen Yuan understands right, the Original Goods wasn’t in the published novel, but he had been ‘adapted’ from Airplane’s outline.

WHAT f*ckING OUTLINE?! Shen Yuan howls mentally. If there had been an outline, Shen Yuan had never noticed its use! If Airplane had actually put thought into this world, if there had been an outline, Proud Immortal Demon Way would have been so much better than what it was!

Shen Yuan was and is infuriated because Airplane had the bones of a brilliant world, a wonderful story, and he had pissed it all away. Where the f*ck had this supposed outline gone?! Why had he given up on it?!

If Shen Yuan ever manages to cross dimensions and find Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky, he’s going to murder him. No questions, no second chances. Straight up premeditated homicide.

Un-f*cking-believable. Not only is Shen Yuan not an NPC, he’s apparently—if the System is to be believed—a canonical character that never made it into the main narrative.

Were there two Qing Jing Peak Lords in PIDW? Shen Yuan asks, trying to circle around the System’s random refusal to answer him. Had the Original Goods made it anywhere near Cang Qiong in the novel or—ugh—the outline?

[Information restricted.]

Why is information about the Original Goods restricted?

[Information restricted.]

f*ck you.

He doesn’t regret Limited Sandbox Mode, but he has to wonder if he would know more about the Original Goods if he weren’t using it.

Fine. No questions about the Original Goods—he’s not getting anywhere with them. That still leaves him problems that need solving.

System, Shen Yuan says, Shen Qingqiu is still certain that I’m Shen Yuan? The one that he knew?

[Yes.]

How did I not throw doubt on that? What I said at the meeting—I don’t know why I said that. Why didn’t he take it as a sign that I’m not his brother?

[Running “Host Behavior Check”…

Compiling data…

Results internally consistent. Host acting consistently. Character: “Shen Qingqiu” acting consistently. No OOC behavior detected.]

Thanks, that tells him nothing.

What all got left behind by the Original Goods? I thought it was only muscle memory, but—is there more?

[Calculating…

Calculating…

Calculating…

Initiate Hidden Quest: “Shen Who? A-Yuan’s Missing Memories”? Yes / No ]

Another hidden quest? Also, what the f*ck kind of quest title is that?

[ (;﹏;) ]

Fine. What does this quest involve?

[Recover Shen Yuan’s lost memories! Certain people, events, or locations may cause detailed flashbacks. Compile flashbacks and minor memories to achieve a greater understanding of “Shen Yuan”.]

Why is that even a quest? That’s essentially what Shen Yuan is doing anyway. And don’t think he didn’t notice that there aren’t any rewards for this quest!

I don’t suppose you can give me any hints?

[Hidden Quests must be solved by Host’s own merits. No assistance from this System!]

Of course. Shen Yuan can’t wait to stumble into more Hidden Quests that he knows nothing about until the System decides to alert him that he’s solved them.

Again: no regrets about Limited Sandbox Mode. Yes regrets about the System.

(The System overhears this thought and flashes [ (。╯︵╰。) ] at him.)

Shen Yuan should start keeping a journal. In code, maybe? Or English, that might be easiest. Ooh, this is great, he can write down the forms he had gone over with Luo Binghe—he doesn’t remember them as well while he sits here thinking about them, but it had been easy to go through them. Yes, he’ll definitely rope Luo Binghe in to make sure that the forms are properly recorded.

Once they’re recorded, he may be able to look them up, or find someone who recognizes them. They’re polished forms, he’s begun to realize, so he must have had a teacher at some point. He’s quite curious about that, too. He really does not feel like he belongs to a sect, so who had taken him under their wing, and what had happened to them?

Shen Yuan hopes they’re still alive somewhere out there.

(A flick on his forehead; a strict voice leading him through his forms; a boot sweeping his feet out from under him before ------ leans down to help him up.)

He isn’t holding out hope. That’s not the kind of story this is.

Shen Yuan sighs. He gathers the teapot and his abandoned teacup, placing them on their tray so he can take them to the kitchen. A pity that the tea has long gone cold; it had been delicious. He’ll have to ask Luo Binghe to make it for them again. Sharing tea and snacks would be a good way to make sure Luo Binghe is getting at least some food every day.

At least until he’s solved the bullying issue.

He’s going to come down like the wrath of the gods on anyone who thinks they can get away with bullying his disciple. Ming Fan, Shen Yuan knows you’re a teenager who isn’t thinking of long-term consequences, but watch your back. No anthills for you, as long as you don’t. Touch. Luo. Binghe. Shen Yuan will make sure to save you from yourself, rest assured…

Shen Yuan stands, turns to leave with the tea tray—

Shen Qingqiu stands in the doorway to the bamboo house.

“Ge,” Shen Yuan says, neutrally as possible. He’s managed to burn through most of the dismayed anger, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t still mad. Just that he’s brought it down to a level where he’s in control of himself, rather than the anger leading him by the nose to say and do things he’ll regret.

“A-Yuan,” Shen Qingqiu says, eyes flicking over the tea tray. “We should. Talk.”

That’s the most reluctantly stated “we should talk” that Shen Yuan’s ever heard! Unfortunately, he can’t make fun of Shen Qingqiu for it, even if he wanted to (or thought he could get away with it), because that’s about how he feels about it, too. Equally unfortunately, he knows that Shen Qingqiu is right.

“Tea first,” Shen Yuan says, and promptly sweeps past Shen Qingqiu without waiting for a response.

He firmly tells himself it’s not running away.

Chapter 7

Chapter Text

“You should know, I stole your disciple,” Shen Yuan says, once the tea has been brewed, poured, and he and Shen Qingqiu have settled themselves across from each in an uncomfortable silence. Shen Yuan decides to be the one to break that silence, by hurling the first quasi-inflammatory piece of information he can think of in Shen Qingqiu’s face.

He’s petty, sue him.

Shen Qingqiu fails to react, which is terribly annoying. “Luo Binghe, I presume,” he says, after taking a sip of his tea.

“Yes,” Shen Yuan says. Don't look so smug, that was an easy guess!

"It's optional," Shen Qingqiu says.

"Beg pardon?" Shen Yuan says. No, Luo Binghe is not optional to him. That's his student now, thank you very much! No take-backsies.

Yes, Shen Yuan should have checked the rules before having Luo Binghe pour tea for him, but as far as Shen Yuan is concerned, it's all over and done with. If anyone tries to take his disciple away from him, he'll give them hell.

"The lordship," Shen Qingqiu says, and nothing else. Shen Yuan wouldn't have thought of Shen Qingqiu as someone who would hide behind a fan, but Shen Qingqiu is absolutely doing that right now. Evidently the teacup wasn't enough cover.

The lordship is optional. The lordship of Qing Jing—is optional.

That would be a relief, if Shen Yuan hadn't tied himself to this peak half a shichen ago by accepting Luo Binghe as a disciple. Technically, he could grab the Protagonist and run, but that's short-sighted and stupid. Here, they have resources: for learning, for food and housing, for keeping an eye on the plot.

Admittedly, the last he could do simply by keeping an eye fixed on Luo Binghe, but the point stands. Luo Binghe's absence wouldn't change anything about Shang Qinghua's betrayal. It wouldn't hold off Sha Hualing's invasion or the Immortal Alliance Conference. His absence might, in some small way, via some ripple effect, make things worse. And Shen Yuan would have no idea what to protect him from.

Staying on Qing Jing Peak is the best move.

...It's still a relief, the idea that he doesn't have to be Peak Lord. Shen Yuan is doing his best here, but he hadn't even had time to adjust to the idea of belonging to a sect before Shen Qingqiu had dumped the idea of being in charge of part of the sect on him. Everything he yelled at Shen Qingqiu is also true. How is anyone supposed to trust him?

He can't even trust himself. He's having intrusive memories granted to him from the Original Goods. He can't follow the martial forms in a cultivation manual that's right in front of him without veering off into his own practice. He's a thief and a liar and—

And he does want this.

Being a rogue had sounded fun, when he thought he had no other choices. In the first two weeks after his transmigration, he had made it work, wandering between villages and searching out missions—but to do that endlessly? To never have a place to return to, a place that he could call home?

In comparison—to have a home, a brother, a student?

To be able to change the plot?

That's what Limited Sandbox Mode should be used for.

"Why would your shizun grant the title to me?" Shen Yuan asks. "He'd never met me. How would he even know I would be a good fit for Qing Jing?"

"Shizun knew me, and knew my judgment," Shen Qingqiu says slowly. "He didn’t—make you Peak Lord. It was optional. It still is. If—if Shen Yuan came to the Peak, and wanted to share the position, Shizun gave this one the option."

It’s the same deal as when his teacher had accepted Shen Qingqiu onto the Peak in the first place, Shen Yuan realizes slowly. Shen Qingqiu would have fled then, if there had been no place for Shen Yuan; had his shizun been afraid he would flee again, if there was no space for Shen Yuan once Shen Qingqiu became Peak Lord?

Or had it been a simple kindness, granted to his favored student?

Shen Qingqiu seems to have been the only one in the whole world to believe that Shen Yuan was still alive. Perhaps this was a lifeline thrown in Shen Qingqiu's direction, hoping to keep him from drowning.

"Don't I get a choice?" Shen Yuan asks.

Shen Qingqiu nods jerkily. "Shizun made it clear that the appointment did not have to enacted within a set amount of time, but left to this master's discretion, based on the level of Shen Yuan’s cultivation and—other factors. Ideally, we would have discussed this before the Peak Lord meeting. If A-Yuan was amenable, we would have presented a united Qing Jing front."

"And I would have had the chance to refuse, or accept, privately." That would have been a lot better. Shen Yuan's memory loss must have thrown all Shen Qingqiu's planning away. "Why couldn't you wait?"

Shen Qingqiu glances away.

Shen Yuans thinks back to the meeting. Abrupt understanding strikes, and he nearly groans aloud.

If there is anything else like this, tell me right now, or I refuse to be held responsible for how much of your mountain I wreck.

It was a joke. Or at least, it was mostly a joke. Unfortunately, Shen Qingqiu had responded to it in the annoying way of siblings everywhere, by immediately trying to call his bluff and turn the tables around.

Amazing. The sect strategist is an idiot. He really didn't think there was any way that might have gone down poorly?

His advice before the meeting, along with everything he hasn't told Shen Yuan about their history and his keeping a list re: "is Shen Yuan's memory returning?”—none of it has been conducive to helping Shen Yuan actually function as a new member of this sect—

Hold on.

"Do you actually have a physical list?" That would be so helpful in helping Shen Yuan with his newest System quest. Yes, he'll still keep a record of his own, but with the System refusing to tell him anything, Shen Yuan had temporarily forgotten about his other greatest resource: Shen Qingqiu himself.

Said man lowers his fan, brow furrowed. It was a rather abrupt change of topic, Shen Yuan knows.

"Yes," he says.

"We're not done talking about this," Shen Yuan warns."We're coming back to this later. For now, I want to see that list."

Shen Qingqiu pulls a scroll out of his sleeve. He hands it to Shen Yuan, who unrolls it, greedily roving over the information. There's not much on it yet.

The first point on the list is "biting."

Shen Yuan nearly hands the list right back to Shen Qingqiu. He thinks an identifying feature of his brother is his willingness to bite people?! To bite demons, specifically? What on earth was the Original Goods like? Shen Yuan had only done that under extreme duress, and also because he was really mad, and he doesn't regret it at all, except for the taste—

Anyway.

He goes through more of the list. Kind, contrary, fascinated by beasts (Shen Yuan hopes Shen Qingqiu means actual monsters, but wouldn't put it past him to be referring to Luo Binghe),er-ge, da-ge—

Oh.

“We’re not twins, are we?” Shen Yuan asks, staring at those damning characters.

“We are,” Shen Qingqiu says.

“We’re not only twins,” Shen Yuan amends. Da-ge, da-ge. What a funny parallel, that he’s the third brother here, too. (Da-ge, er-ge, meimei. He misses his family so much.) He forces himself to ask, “What happened to him?”

“…He’s gone,” Shen Qingqiu says.

That’s what Shen Yuan had expected.

So why does it hurt? It’s not like he knew the Original Goods’ da-ge. Even if he were alive, Shen Yuan wouldn’t have recognized him any more than he had recognized Shen Qingqiu.

What maudlin thoughts, ah!

Shen Yuan grabs a piece of paper and copies down Shen Qingqiu’s list for his own records. When he writes “da-ge,” he adds a small note next to it: gone.

There are a few more notes beneath that. Apparently regarding Shen Yuan's temper tantrum at the meeting, not just the da-ge bit. Ugh. Shen Yuan doesn't know what Shen Qingqiu was doing the whole time between the meeting and now, but at least part of it was dedicated to recording evidence.

Shen Yuan frowns at the note scrawled near the edge of the parchment. It's not part of the list, not exactly.

Headaches, it says.

...He'd had a headache in the meeting. And then later, while training with Binghe. He hadn't connected them with his condition, which is an obvious oversight.

This better not be the System's fault. If it says [Information restricted] again he swears he's going to find a way to murder an incorporeal AI. Hopefully now that he's accepted the System's hidden quest, the headaches will die off.

If nothing else, he'll know to use them as a marker for the Original Goods.

Stupid System couldn't have made sure I was settled properly into this body? he grumbles to himself.None of the transmigrators in the stories had to deal with gaining their body’s memories!

Shen Yuan slides Shen Qingqiu’s list back to him now that he’s taken down all the information he needs. He’ll add them to his own list, which he plans to start as soon as Shen Qingqiu isn’t watching him anymore. He doesn’t want to share any of the details on it. Not yet, possibly not ever.

He’s not Shen Qingqiu’s Shen Yuan. All he’s doing is trying to uncover enough details to convincingly fake it.

“What happened?” Shen Yuan asks, the question that’s been pressing on him.

The fan snaps in Shen Qingqiu’s hand. Blood wells up where the shards of the grip dig into Shen Qingqiu’s hand.

“Ge!” Shen Yuan cries.

“Do the details matter?” Shen Qingqiu spits. “He left, and he never came back. He abandoned me there.” He draws in a shuddering breath. “He’s gone.”

Shen Yuan blinks at him. He rewinds the conversation in his head, trying to make sense of it.

Oh. Shen Qingqiu thought he was asking after da-ge, because that was where their conversation had broken off. Shen Yuan hadn’t intended that; he hadn’t meant to ask about da-ge at all, for as long as he could get away with it. Oblique references had seemed fine, but he hadn’t wanted the details.

Given Shen Qingqiu’s reaction, he was right to have tried to avoid this conversation.

(‘He’s gone’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘he’s dead,’ a part of Shen Yuan thinks.)

Shen Yuan hadn’t meant to ask about da-ge.

He’d meant to ask about them.

Based on Shen Qingqiu’s reaction, whatever happened with da-ge—it seems like the Original Shen Yuan had already been out of the picture.

Shen Yuan grabs Shen Qingqiu’s hand, straightening out his fingers, forcing Shen Qingqiu to drop the remains of the fan. Shen Yuan examines the damage critically. It could be worse, though it’s going to be hell getting the smaller splinters out, so he starts with the largest chunks.

“I didn’t mean to ask about him,” Shen Yuan says. He’s glad that the first aid is taking up his attention. It means he doesn’t have to look at Shen Qingqiu’s face. “I was—you haven’t told me anything. About us, I mean. Da-ge is just one example.” He pries a thick splinter from the meat of Shen Qingqiu’s thumb. “You were searching for me. Your sect leader thought I was dead. Why? What happened?”

How does Yue Qingyuan know them, know both of them? Had Shen Qingqiu told Yue Qingyuan about him, sometime in their complicated past? Or did Yue Qingyuan somehow personally know Shen Yuan?

The readers of PIDW knew even less about Yue Qingyuan’s past than they did Shen Qingqiu’s—

Shen Yuan pauses in his work.

The only thing they know about Shen Qingqiu’s past is that he was a slave, taken in and freed by the Qiu family. He had turned on them, killing Qiu Haitang’s entire family and burning down the manor behind him, leaving her homeless and destitute.

And seeking revenge.

Shen Yuan has been spinning in circles, trying to start with the question “when were we separated” and assuming that it couldn’t have been that long. Months, years, maybe, but decades? Who would hold on hope for that long?

The proper time to join a sect is between the ages of eleven and fifteen. That is when a prospective disciple’s meridians are most malleable, when they will be capable of laying the best foundation to carry themselves forward into potentially centuries of cultivation. It’s technically possible to start cultivation later, but the practitioner will never be as powerful as one who started at the proper age and with the proper instruction.

When did Shen Qingqiu kill the Qiu family? Had the narrative ever mentioned it? Shen Qingqiu had been engaged to Qiu Haitang, which implied some things about their ages, unless it had been meant to be a long engagement. Either way, Shen Qingqiu had surely joined the sect within the proper age group; there was no way Cang Qiong would have taken on a late disciple when he also had demanded the recognition of his absent twin brother. It was too much.

All this meaning da-ge was gone after Shen Qingqiu had been separated from Shen Yuan.

He abandoned me there!

‘There’…

Surely that didn’t mean…the Qiu? If it did, if Shen Qingqiu had been taken in by the Qiu without Shen Yuan, then—

“They sold us apart,” Shen Qingqiu says. His throat works. He tugs his hand from Shen Yuan’s grasp, pulling a handkerchief from one of his sleeves and wrapping it around his palm to soak up the blood. Not all the splinters have been removed, yet Shen Yuan doesn’t think either of them are concerned about that right now.

“We were all slaves, and they sold us apart. You were sick. We went out in the morning without you, and when we came back, you were gone.”

God. That must have been…nightmarish.

“They wouldn’t tell us who they sold you to. They didn’t care. I doubt they would have even known which of us A-Yuan was if he weren’t sick. A-Yuan was so often sick. Maybe that’s why—”

Shen Qingqiu’s mouth clamps shut on that flow of poison.

Shen Yuan can follow his train of thought. He had been sickly in his original life. In this world, the Original Goods must have been as well. Another parallel between them, except this Shen Yuan hadn’t been born to a loving family, one that had the resources to take care of him.

Instead, they were all slave children together. Shen Yuan was sick, was weak, couldn’t do whatever tasks the other children had been sent to do—

Of course the slavers had gotten rid of him. He was just another mouth to feed, and not even a useful one.

“How old were we?” Shen Yuan whispers.

“…Eleven. Maybe twelve.”

The timeline in PIDW was never clear. Nor were the histories of the Peak Lords. However, it was an established fact that the sealing of Tianlang-Jun had happened around the same time as Luo Binghe’s birth, and that Yue Qingyuan was not yet Sect Leader at that time. So that’s at least fourteen years.

There’s no telling how long Shen Qingqiu spent as a disciple. How long he was on Qing Jing Peak before his shizun ascended with the rest of the previous generation.

What Shen Yuan does know is that at the bare f*cking minimum, Shen Qingqiu had spent over two decades refusing to believe Shen Yuan dead. Two thirds of his life! Searching for Shen Yuan!

f*ck. That’s insane. That’s—who does that? Who devotes all his loyalty in this life to one person?

Shen Qingqiu, apparently.

He’s going to kill Shen Yuan when he finds out he’s not actually his brother. Contemplating that eventuality, Shen Yuan can’t blame him. If this were all still a novel, he’d find it compelling. Well above and beyond the usual dreck that Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky usually spat out.

Unfortunately, this is a not-novel that he is living.

Fortunately, this new information lifts a weight from Shen Yuan’s back. Shen Qingqiu last knew Shen Yuan when they were children decades ago. Children grow up. Children change. Shen Qingqiu knows the child that the Original Goods was, but there’s no baseline for an adult Shen Yuan. Nothing that Shen Yuan has to live up to. The qi deviation’s “amnesia” has neatly covered any holes in his story, any suspicion that would have arisen from not knowing Shen Qingqiu.

Plus, Shen Yuan has been lucky enough to keep running into behavior patterns that Shen Qingqiu recognizes from the Original Goods.

…Original Goods must have been a weird kid. “Biting,” “kind,” and “loves beasts” were all on the same list.

Shen Yuan wonders what happened to that child. Taken away from his only family in the world—what had he done? Where did he go?

How did he end up here?

A golden core spinning in his lower dantian, a spiritual sword sheathed at his side. Shen Yuan had beaten the odds, much like Shen Qingqiu had. He had…escaped, maybe? Found a master, someone willing to train him, and devoted himself to being a rogue cultivator.

Then he’d been taken out by a random qi deviation, only weeks before he would have met his brother again.

Original Goods… Shen Yuan thinks, and doesn’t know how to continue the thought. He has the man’s memories, after all. He hopes the Original Goods had, if not a good life, at least a decent one after breaking his chains. If he can honor that in any way, he’ll do the best that he can.

Shen Yuan is used to being the third brother. He’s used to heckling his er-ge. In the Original Shen Yuan’s place—he can at least treat Shen Qingqiu as family. It’s not only a selfish desire to change the trajectory of the story. It’s also Shen Yuan’s own sympathy, a sympathy he had never thought would be directed at the scum villain.

Maybe the original’s emotions have been leaking over all this time, even before the official quest start, Shen Yuan thinks.

He’ll try. All he can do in this world is try.

"After I...left the Peak Lord meeting. Did Mu”—f*ck sh*t how is he supposed to address the man? Dammit, he's already accepted his position in the sect, so—”-shidi say anything to you?"

"He requested correspondence," Shen Qingqiu says.“He had hoped to arrange another check-up with you.” Yeah, Shen Yuan bets he did. Between Shen Qingqiu’s list and The Temper Tantrum, Shen Yuan can’t find it in himself to be surprised. “He also suggested that A-Yuan keep a journal or otherwise make notes of anything that he remembers.” Cool, so they’re all thinking the same thoughts. Shen Yuan was planning to do that anyway.

…He was planning to do that secretly, in code, so that no one else could read it. Shen Yuan thinks he could convince Mu Qingfang it’s private, but he feels as though he’s going to want to have a physical object that he can show the physician at some point. Like in therapy. Is Mu Qingfang the sect’s therapist as well as its head healer? That’s too much for one person, right?

Shen Yuan is pretty sure Peak Lords don’t get paid, as such. Mu Qingfang deserves a raise anyway.

Point being: Shen Yuan needs a public “journal” that he can show people, and a private one to keep all of his plans or any details he doesn’t think it’s wise to show others.

With a chill crawling up his spine, Shen Yuan realizes that what he yelled at Shen Qingqiu might have been true after all. Shen Yuan wasn’t a spy of any sort, but the Original Goods? He doesn’t know anything about the missing years. The System can’t hold him to any actions the Original Goods took, but that doesn’t mean humans—or demons—in this world wouldn’t be above using blackmail or threats against him.

Should Shen Yuan find memories from the Original Goods that have him colluding with enemies of Cang Qiong, he needs to be able to write those details down where no one else can access them.

“Very well,” Shen Yuan says aloud. “I can do that. Now—what, exactly, is required of me as a Peak Lord?”

Since Shen Yuan has officially accepted the position of Qing Jing Peak Lord, the next few days are a whirl of activity. Bringing him up to Qing Jing’s scholastic standards is an exhaustive process in and of itself, one that will take time. There are, however, other items on Shen Qingqiu’s to-do list, which Shen Yuan hadn’t realized existed.

Clothes, obviously. Shen Qingqiu had mentioned it the other day, but Shen Yuan hadn’t realized how closely Shen Qingqiu was paying attention to how his clothes fit on Shen Yuan. If there were any discrepancies between them, Shen Qingqiu must have noted them down somewhere while Shen Yuan wasn’t looking; regardless, the first of what Shen Qingqiu had ordered for him appears the day after the Peak Lord meeting. A disciple from An Ding drops them off, booking it off the Peak as soon as they’re done with their delivery.

Shen Yuan isn’t sure if that’s because the disciple is so busy or out of mortal terror of Shen Qingqiu. He would lay even odds either way.

The clothes aren’t fancy, not like the ones Shen Qingqiu forced him into for the Peak Lord meeting. They’re not even as fancy as some of the robes that Shen Qingqiu wears on a daily basis. There’s little embroidery, for example, nor many other decorative flourishes. They are, however, richer and finer silks than what Shen Yuan had been wearing when Shen Qingqiu found him, and all in Qing Jing’s colors.

Shen Yuan doesn’t get rid of his rogue cultivator’s clothes. He packs them away in a qiankun pouch, because you never know when you might need to less expensive clothes. Training, gardening, blending into a small town while you’re undercover, passing as a common traveler while you flee pursuit…

Not that he thinks about any of those last few things often. Of course not.

“An Ding has the requisition forms for winter garments and formal robes,” Shen Qingqiu says, eyeing Shen Yuan in his new robes. It’s nice not having to share, and Shen Qingqiu kept giving him a stink eye when he wore his other robes. “If A-Yuan would prefer, there are several villages near Cang Qiong which have decent tailors and embroiderers.”

“Later,” Shen Yuan decides. This works for now. He has enough to do on the Peak. He needs to get a handle on that before venturing out.

He also needs time to get used to the bamboo house. Shen Yuan’s room is…well, it’s a room. It has all the furniture that he could need. The problem is that there are no personal touches. Shen Yuan is working on it—he’s put away all the clothes Shen Qingqiu recently bought for him, and he’s unpacked his qiankun pouch. His old clothes had gone back inside it, as had the money. He has vague plans for using it as a bug-out bag, since it was already carrying everything the Original Goods had used as a rogue cultivator, including but not limited to: blankets, rations, a small axe for cutting wood…

Shen Yuan had taken all the fans out. He put them on display. He still isn’t sure about using them. It’s a prospect he needs to work himself up to more than he has. The longer he stares at them and admires how beautiful they are, the more he’s sure he’ll end up giving in to temptation sooner rather than later. At the moment, they add color and some personality to his room.

What he really wants are books. Shen Qingqiu has a small library in the main room, and Shen Yuan has no doubt there are more books secreted away in his bedroom. Shen Yuan wants bestiaries, academic texts, poetry—all of that stuff, sure! However, he’s mostly desperate to know what kind of fiction this world creates.

Shen Yuan hadn’t realized it until after he arrived on Qing Jing Peak, but the Original Goods had had a book squirreled away in his qiankun pouch this whole time. Only one book, which is understandable, he supposes—it’s not like the Original Goods had been flush with cash. Plus, again, he was a rogue cultivator. It would have been hard to keep a collection while constantly on the move.

The book was cheap, obviously an inexpensive gift. And it was a gift, because upon opening it for the first time, Shen Yuan had seen a note written on inside of the front cover.

For Yuanyuan! the inscription said in a cheery style of handwriting. Let me know what you think next time we see each other!

If this were Shen Yuan's original world, he's sure he would have seen a bunch of hearts and/or smiley-faces after the note.

It had made him obscurely sad once again. The Original Goods had people who had known him, and now he was gone. He hopes the Original Goods had gotten to talk about the book with the gift giver at some point. It’s well-worn, thumbed through over and over, with copious notes splashed throughout it.

Which Original Goods was right to do! The book is trash!!!

Absolutely irredeemable. Poorly written, plot holes everywhere, no coherent threads of characterization, the love interest was killed off halfway through the book to justify sending the protagonist on a rampage of revenge, soon after which he immediately forgot about his dead lover and moved on to someone else--!

Infuriating! Awful book! Worse than Proud Immortal Demon Way! At least that one had had Luo Binghe in it to make up for all its deficiencies. This book didn't even have that.

And yet.

So much care had gone into the keeping of this book. Notes are all throughout it, yes, but the Original Goods had kept it. He'd read it more than once, obvious from the layering of the notes, from the occasional different color or consistency of ink, from how well-thumbed it was and how broken its spine. It was a book that should have completely fallen apart or been thrown away by now, but it was still tucked away in the Original Goods' qiankun pouch for Shen Yuan to find, carefully preserved.

Shen Yuan suspects that the person who gave this book to the Original Goods is no longer alive. That must be why the Original Goods took such desperate care of it.

Shen Yuan resolves to keep it with the same respect. He won't make notes in the book itself—that would be a step too far—but he finds himself interested in making notes of his own, building off of what the Original Goods wrote. He's still new to the book; he hasn't had as much time with it, and he has someone else’s impassioned reviews to bounce his thoughts off.

He almost wants to find a copy of the book and give it to Shen Qingqiu, just to see how the man would react. They could start a book club!

...Shen Yuan thinks his taste in books is probably different from Shen Qingqiu's, though. That's why he wants to sneak into town on his own and get all the books he can get his greedy little hands on. He may be a Peak Lord now, but internally, he's still a reader of terrible webnovels.

Is there a recursive effect, since he's living inside a webnovel? Are the fictional books here all uniformly awful?

He wants to find out.

For now, gratifyingly: library access!

He needs to get to know the Peak where he'll be living and working for the foreseeable future. Now that Shen Yuan is no longer the worst-kept secret on Qing Jing Peak, his unofficial house arrest is lifted. Shen Qingqiu shows him many locations himself, while others Shen Yuan explores on his own, and by far the best of them is the library.

It's huge. There's so much knowledge contained inside of it. Shen Yuan has to hide his face once they step inside, because he's sure it's doing something embarrassing.

Shen Qingqiu ties him into the library's wards and it's bliss. He can come and go as he pleases, and he's peripherally aware of the state of the library. Fortunately only when he's concentrating on it, otherwise that would be too distracting to be borne, but he knows what's happening in it.

Not in detail. Only enough to have a sense of if there is anyone inside, and where in the library they are.

"You will learn to recognize the qi signatures," Shen Qingqiu tells him. "I will introduce you to the senior disciples and masters who most frequently man the front desk."

This is so f*cking useful. Had wards like these ever been used in Proud Immortal Demon Way? They had to have been. They're too useful not to have been used by other cultivators. Unless the building of these wards was secret, or too complex for most cultivators to utilize, or more limited in utility than Shen Yuan has realize.

Ugh. Knowing Airplane, he probably just skipped over any details about it in favor of more papapa.

Shen Yuan nods agreeably at his brother, and reluctantly lets himself be led away from the library. Meeting disciples—yes, along with getting to know the layout of Qing Jing, that's another large portion of Shen Qingqiu's instruction outside the bamboo house. Shen Qingqiu, whenever he's not teaching his classes or going to Peak Lord meetings, is actually a—okay, 'homebody' isn't the right word, but it's the closest one Shen Yuan can think of! Shen Qingqiu is way too happy to spend all his time inside, and not that long ago, Shen Yuan would have agreed with him.

The thing is, there's a whole world for him to explore, people to get to know, adventures to have!

House arrest would never have worked on Shen Yuan for long.It didn’t work on him, as evidenced by his brand new disciple, who he has carefully been making time for each day.

It's going to take Shen Yuan a while to learn the names of everyone on the peak. Most of them hadn't had names, much less descriptions, in the novel (thanks, Airplane!), so it's a learning curve for Shen Yuan.

One of the first disciples he meets in an official capacity, of course, is Shen Qingqiu's head disciple.

Ming Fan.

Chapter 8

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan has, in fact, met Ming Fan before—he was in Shuang Hu City with several other disciples. Shen Yuan is perfectly polite to Ming Fan the second time they meet, after Shen Yuan has been officially declared a Peak Lord and in the middle of the arrangements that Shen Qingqiu is making to get him settled on Qing Jing.

Ming Fan is very much a teenage boy. Gangly in the way that says he's growing into his limbs still, and his voice cracks occasionally as he speaks. He is very respectful to Shen Qingqiu, and grants that same respect to Shen Yuan, who isn't his Shizun but is still his Peak Lord.One of them, anyway.

"Shifu, if this disciple may ask an impertinent question?" Ming Fang asks, during that introduction.

Shen Qingqiu nods, with a look that says,Tread carefully.

"Is Peak Lord Shen also to be our shizun?" His hands twist in his lap. "Or our shishu?"

Ah. That is the question, isn't it?

Shen Yuan slides in before Shen Qingqiu can answer. "This Shen Yuan is still getting a handle on his responsibilities here on the peak," he says. "It will be some time yet before I am able to teach classes or work with many of the disciples." With one notable exception. "Shishu is acceptable."

"You are not lower in seniority," Shen Qingqiu argues. "We—”

“—were entered into the sect at the same time, yes, you've said," Shen Yuan interrupts. "And I am Peak Lord beside you. However. You are their shizun, and you have been for years. If they do not feel comfortable addressing me as such, especially when I am not yet teaching them, then shishu is appropriate." Shen Qingqiu still looks like he wants to object. "Jiu-ge, I'm also younger than you, and I know that has no effect on seniority in the sect, but it's an elegant solution."

...Probably. Probably he's younger than Shen Qingqiu. He assumes that neither Shen Qingqiu nor the Original Goods would have known the truth of the matter, though Shen Qingqiu had obviously claimed rights of elder brother. At any rate, Shen Yuan's mind is younger than Shen Qingqiu's, at least! He's mentally twenty-one years old. Shen Qingqiu, however old he may be behind that immortal's bearing, is not.

Shen Qingqiu accepts this. Somewhat ungracefully, but he accepts it.

Ming Fan seems relieved to have an answer. Etiquette is vitally important for many of the young noble children who live on this peak, and certainly it's important when trying to avoid your teacher's temper.

Shen Yuan doesn't really care about the question, to be honest. Let the disciples call him whatever they want. 'Shishu' or 'Shizun' both are fine.‘Laoshi’ would also be fine, but again, he’s not teaching any of them yet, and he doesn’t think he could get even halfway through suggesting that as an option before Shen Qingqiu would ban its use.

The introduction doesn't last long, and Ming Fan’s question comes at the very end of it. Shen Qingqiu has other people to introduce to Shen Yuan, so they sweep away to find them. Ming Fan scurries off to attend his duties. Hopefully he’ll spread the news about Shen Yuan's Peak Lord appointment and, at the same time, answer any questions of how to address him.

So. Shen Yuan has had his official introduction to Ming Fan. That’s not why he summons the boy to the bamboo house several days after that, when Shen Qingqiu has left to teach one of his classes, leaving Shen Yuan to his self-studying.

“Ming Fan,” Shen Yuan says to Qing Jing’s head disciple, once the boy has brought the tea and poured first for Shen Yuan and then for himself.

“Yes, Shishu,” Ming Fan says, sitting at attention.

“This master wishes to clarify certain details from the other day.”

“Yes, Shishu!” Ming Fan says again.

Shen Yuan takes a small sip of his tea. It’s—well, it’s fine. Good, even.

Luo Binghe’s is better, Shen Yuan thinks.

“At that time, this master said it would be a while before he would take on any disciples of his own.” He pauses, just long enough for Ming Fan to start to get concerned about the silence. He doesn’t start squirming or anything so uncouth, nor does he question his shishu, but Shen Yuan is sure it’s an uncomfortable game of chicken for him, as he wonders where Shen Yuan is going with this. “That was not, strictly speaking, the truth.”

Bless his heart, Ming Fan is fighting so hard to control himself and listen respectfully. Shen Yuan can see his mind spinning in countless directions, all the possibilities of what Shen Yuan might say next. He tries to cover it with an implacable mask. All it does is make him look vaguely constipated.

Ha! Is he worried Shen Yuan is going to take him on? Cute. Even if Shen Yuan didn’t already have the only disciple he currently wants, he wouldn’t try to drag Ming Fan away from Shen Qingqiu. Ming Fan has clearly staked his regard for Shen Qingqiu; Shen Yuan isn’t sure he could dig it up if he tried. Fortunately, he doesn’t want to.

“I already have a disciple of my own,” Shen Yuan says.

Ming Fan does not audibly sigh in relief. Shen Yuan should ask Shen Qingqiu if he teaches any of his students how to keep up a poker face. It will be invaluable for any politics that they may involve themselves in—and in meetings with their shizun and shishu.

In and amongst all the other things Shen Yuan has been doing on Qing Jing, he’s made sure to set aside time each day for Luo Binghe. Mostly it’s a supervisory role for now, with a very few light spars thrown in there for a change of pace. Shen Yuan hasn’t advanced far enough in (re-)learning his own cultivation, or in his studies of the Four Arts, to feel comfortable teaching Luo Binghe on his own. Instead, he supplements Luo Binghe’s cultivation manual, because the Original Goods’ leftover not-quite-memories are sufficient for that.

As far as the Four Arts—there are perfectly good hallmasters on this peak. Everyone else is getting an education from them, with occasional lessons or whole classes taught entirely by Shen Qingqiu. No one teacher has time enough in the day to teach all the different disciples on the peak, and Shen Qingqiu is no exception, especially given how much time he has to devote to his duties as Peak Lord.

Once Shen Yuan and Shen Qingqiu start splitting the duties, that may change, and perhaps Shen Qingqiu will start teaching more classes. For now, Shen Qingqiu has a intensely organized schedule, and the hallmasters have their own schedules.

Qing Jing offers an excellent education for its disciples.

Shen Yuan has to make sure that his disciple has the opportunity to actually make use of those classes.

“Does…is Shishu bringing his disciple to Qing Jing?” Ming Fan asks.

“Mm, no,” Shen Yuan says. He sets his teacup down on the table, a sharp click as the porcelain hits the wood. “He’s already a disciple of this peak. I decided to take him on as my own. Disciple Ming is familiar with his youngest shidi, is he not? Luo Binghe.”

Ming Fan freezes like a rabbit who’s caught sight of the proverbial hawk circling overhead.

The fake cultivation manual seems to have truly been a mistake. An accident, considered malicious and purposeful after the fact and after years of built up resentment. Presented in the narrative in a way that, given the rest of Qing Jing Peak, it was easy to believe that it had been purposeful.

The beatings were always crystal clear. There was no misunderstanding there, no unreliable narrator. Shen Qingqiu had beat Luo Binghe, and Shen Yuan grapples with that and the startling amount of affection he feels for Shen Qingqiu. Shen Yuan holds onto his calm with his fingertips every time he thinks about the amount of hurt heaped onto Luo Binghe.

It will never happen again. Shen Yuan won’t let it.

Ming Fan—whether by explicit permission, or implicit due to witnessing the way Shen Qingqiu beat Luo Binghe or never stepped in when it came to the bullying—had contributed to Luo Binghe’s tribulations on Qing Jing. Kicking him out of the dorms, piling chores onto him that rightfully belonged to his martial siblings, physically attacking him, shorting him on food and water, throwing away his mother’s guanyin pendant—yes, Ming Fan has a lot to answer for.

It stops here and now.

Luo Binghe had never purposefully missed class in Proud Immortal Demon Way. He had been kept out of them, always having to run to and fro with his martial siblings’ chores and errands, and when he had gone to class, he had often not had much to show for it. He had tried to do his work, to maintain his understanding and practice outside of class, but he had been so neatly sabotaged on all fronts.

No longer.

“He’s such a dedicated student. Such a dedicated shidi. Although I’ve only been here a short time, I feel as if I always see him running around, helping his fellow disciples. If he helped them any more, he wouldn’t have time for our training. I’m surprised he has time for all his classwork.”

Shen Yuan opens his fan slowly. “Such a busy child. And so sweet.” He waves the fan languidly. “He hasn’t had an unkind word to say about anyone.” Nor a kind word, excepting Ning Yingying. “I’m sure he must look up to his da-shixiong. Disciple Ming seems like such an upstanding young man. He must be excellent with the younger disciples.”

Another languid wave of his fan. “This master worries about Luo Binghe’s transition to his personal disciple. He hopes that, as head disciple, Ming Fan will keep an eye on Binghe. Make sure that he adjusts. That no one bothers him about no longer being Shen Qingqiu’s student. That all his needs are met during this transitional period—and after that, as necessary.”

Ming Fan trembles as Shen Yuan, during this entire little speech, pins him in place with his gaze and refuses to blink. For some reason, this body is weirdly good at staring contests.

“Are we understood, Disciple Ming?” Shen Yuan asks, voice low and pleasant.

“Y-yes, Shishu,” Ming Fan whispers.

“Good,” Shen Yuan says. He folds his fan with a sharp snap. Ming Fan flinches. “That’s all, Disciple Ming. I hope I haven’t pulled you away from any of your other duties.”

Ming Fan stands. Bows, shakily. Then flees the bamboo house.

Shen Yuan will have to check to make sure Ming Fan is actually following his orders. He’ll give the boy some time—moving Binghe back into the dorms should hopefully happen quickly, but impressing upon his fellow disciples that it would be a very bad idea to keep bullying Luo Binghe may take longer.

That’s fine. Should they take too long to catch on, Shen Yuan will simply catch them in the act and bring down the wrath of an immortal cultivator on them.

Luo Binghe isn't sure what to do with himself. This abrupt reversal of fortune—what has he done to deserve it, and how can he make sure that he keeps it?

Shen Yuan has changed his life so utterly, in such a short time. Not only saving Luo Binghe, not only taking on Luo Binghe as his disciple, but now this?

Ming Fan shows up at the woodshed in the early afternoon, looking flustered, and orders Luo Binghe to gather all his possessions and follow him. Luo Binghe is reluctant to do so, certain that it’s a trap, but in all honesty, it isn’t as though Luo Binghe has anything that can be ruined. All he has are his cultivation manual and his disciple’s robes—Ming Fan himself made sure of that. His mother’s guanyin pendant, the last remainder of her in this world, has already been lost.

What else can Ming Fan do to him?

He obeys, waiting to see where this goes. The answer is the dormitories, which Luo Binghe had quickly been run out of at the beginning of his years on Qing Jing. Ming Fan sets him up properly in the dorms, with an actual bed and blankets of his own. He even shoves an extra pair of disciple’s robes into his arms, which will be nice to have. Then he leaves Luo Binghe alone.

Luo Binghe’s bed is unfortunately close to Ming Fan’s, which he would take as a bad sign. It is, but not because Ming Fan wants him closer in order to personally torment him.

Instead, Ming Fan seems to be using it as a way to keep an eye on Luo Binghe. Ming Fan spends the rest of that day making sure all the other disciples leave Luo Binghe alone just as much as Ming Fan himself is. Ming Fan has calmed down from that initial fluster when he showed up at the woodshed, yet there’s still some undercurrent of emotional energy to him that Luo Binghe can’t quite place.

He keeps watching.

Luo Binghe is assigned chores, but so are all the other disciples, and none of them shove theirs off on him. He can see, by the glint in their eyes, that several of them are planning on it, but Ming Fan gets in the way before they can do it. Luo Binghe's chores are, for once, around the dormitories, while the other disciples are sent running all over the Peak.

"Well?" Ming Fan snaps at him, when he sees Luo Binghe watching him. "Do your chores! Your shizun—your shizun won't accept a lazy disciple!"

Oh. Luo Binghe realizes that it’s been nervous energy this whole time. And by what he said—Ming Fan is scared of Shizun.

Luo Binghe does his chores, and contemplates this. Luo Binghe hadn't said anything to Shizun about his treatment on the Peak; what would be the point of it? At worst, it would sound like unnecessary complaining, and Shizun might decide he didn't want a student who couldn't handle a few difficulties. At best—

He hadn't dared dream of a best case scenario. Wasn't he already living that, by having Shizun teach him?

Shizun had done this for him anyway. Without Binghe ever having to ask.

Who knows if it's going to last. Ming Fan may well turn around the next day and decide he doesn't care, or Shen Qingqiu may assert his own authority, or any number of problems may arise. For now, Luo Binghe is going to enjoy however many nights he has on an actual bed.

The next morning, nothing has changed. Ming Fan runs interference, keeping the older disciples and Ming Fan's own hanger-ons from going after Luo Binghe. It helps that Luo Binghe has long practice in avoiding them. He slips out of the dormitories early, heading toward the dining hall, and after he's eaten a blissful, peaceful breakfast without any of his martial siblings bothering him, he heads toward the bamboo forest and his morning training with Shizun.

Morning training is for meditation, while afternoon training is saved for martial and sword forms, the latter of which Shizun has only asked Luo Binghe to demonstrate the once, so Shizun knows where they’re starting from. In the mornings, Shizun sits with him before class and they meditate together. Shizun has been carefully monitoring the flow of Binghe’s qi, making sure that it’s correct and cycling as it should.

“Binghe should never have to suffer a qi deviation,” Shizun had said that first time. “Awful, ugly things.”

Luo Binghe knows this already, from what a qi deviation has done to Shizun. He’s only grateful it didn’t kill him instead. Not all deviations are so benevolent.

Nor, in fact, is this one. It’s not only that Shizun is missing pieces of himself. It’s that, apparently, those missing parts can still hurt him.

Luo Binghe comes back to the bamboo forest after his classes. Ming Fan has been helpful there, attentively making sure that Luo Binghe makes his way to class as he’s supposed to. Ming Fan then compulsively ignores Luo Binghe during class, so Luo Binghe is able to pay perfect attention to his lessons.

Ning Yingying sits by his side, per usual, but this time Ming Fan doesn’t even protest.

It’s bliss.

Luo Binghe starts going through his forms as soon as he arrives in their clearing. Shizun is busy—he always makes his appearance eventually, but he had instructed Luo Binghe to begin without him if he’s not already there at Binghe’s arrival.

The warm-ups are easy. Luo Binghe needn’t put much, if any, thought into them. Then he moves on to the martial forms, one motion to the next. It’s necessarily slow for practice, a razor thin wire of his concentration making sure his body moves as it must, and the rest of his mind is simply…at peace.

He understands why Shizun had called this moving meditation.

Not that he’d give up his morning meditation with Shizun, nor that he would ever only wish to practice moving meditation. At some point he’ll be fighting with this form, and adding a sword to some of the others.

He finishes his first form, moves on to the next, takes a moment to pause and wipe the sweat from his brow before he starts the last—

“Very good, Binghe,” Shizun says.

Luo Binghe doesn’t jump. He’s getting used to the way Shizun appears out of nowhere. He always seems surprised that people don’t seem to notice him. Luo Binghe has caught him muttering at least twice about situational awareness.

Frankly, Luo Binghe thinks Shizun underestimates how quietly he moves. Luo Binghe has tried to imitate the soundless way he walks, and it’s difficult. It requires a lot of effort, constantly paying attention to where and how he places his feet, marking the shift and slide of his robes against each other, monitoring even his own breath.

He suspects Shizun is also using some form of cultivation to help dampen his presence, but he can’t be sure. All he knows is that it is hilarious to see his fellow disciples jump like startled cats at Shizun’s abrupt appearances.

It’s not going to be long before everyone else on the peak is living in fear of Shen Yuan, if only because it’s impossible to figure out when he’s going to show up right behind you and your mischief.

“Thank you, Shizun!” Luo Binghe says, breaking form to bound to his master’s side.

“Do it again, faster this time,” Shizun says. “Full speed, if you’re able. After that, maybe we can spar again.”

A spar! With Shizun!

Luo Binghe obeys, backing up a few feet and starting from the beginning of his sets, exactly as Shizun commands.

It is harder this way. At half-speed, he can adjust himself as he performs the sets, feeling out the correct placement and making any tiny corrections as he goes. At full speed, he has to trust that his body has learned the motions as they are meant to be. He can’t make his usual slow adjustments; either he has the move down or he doesn’t, and then he must go on to the next part of the form.

Luo Binghe, distressingly, does not have his forms perfectly memorized. He feels each and every mistake that he makes. He’s sure that Shizun, with his outsider perspective and experienced eye, notices even more.

Finally, Luo Binghe draws to a close.

“Very good,” Shizun says again.

“I messed it up,” Luo Binghe argues, trying not to pout.

Shizun smacks him on the head with his fan.

“This is training,” he says. “You’re unused to going at full speed, and doing this without consulting your manual at all! Of course Luo Binghe is going to make mistakes, don’t be silly.” He withdraws his fan, only to reach out and pat Luo Binghe’s head instead. “Despite that, Binghe did well. You’re a quick learner.”

Shizun smiles, soft and sad.

“Shijie would be so proud of you,” he says. “Ah, I wish she could see you now. All grown up. You look so very much like her…”

“Sh-Shizun?” Luo Binghe asks. What is he—?

Shizun’s fingers are partially caught in his hair. When he sways dangerously to the side, his fingers clench there, a sharp burst of pain in Luo Binghe’s scalp that doesn’t overwhelm the sudden terror.

“Shizun!” he cries.

Shizun jerks back. Given his expression, Luo Binghe doesn’t think he’s seeing his disciple or Qing Jing. His hand lifts from Luo Binghe’s head, going up to cover one of his eyes. This time, when he sways, he falls, barely catching himself on one knee. His whole body shudders.

“Shizun!” Luo Binghe says again. He doesn’t know what’s wrong, he doesn’t know what to do—should he run for Shen Qingqiu? Should he find a disciple to call for Mu Qingfang? He can’t leave Shizun, he can’t, he left his mother and when he came back she was gone, he can’t lose Shizun, too—

“Hush, hush, it’s all right,” Shizun murmurs. Luo Binghe is pressed up against him, held in the circle of his arms the same way he had been when Shizun first accepted him as his disciple. Luo Binghe doesn’t particularly recall Shizun moving to wrap himself around Binghe. Nor does he know how long Shizun has holding him, because this, too, is the same sort of comfort that Shizun had offered before, soothing words that don’t demand his attention so much as simply tell Luo Binghe that he’s not alone and let him come back to himself in his own time.

“Shizun,” Luo Binghe gasps, drawing back. “Shizun, I—this disciple—”

“Are you all right?” Shizun asks him, as if Luo Binghe is the one who collapsed.

“Shizun, you, you—” Luo Binghe isn’t able to get the words out.

“Ah,” Shizun says. “My apologies, Binghe. Did I scare you? It must have looked worse than it really was.”

Luo Binghe knows that look on someone’s face, well disguised as it may be. Shizun is lying to him.

Shizun heaves a heavy sigh.

“Minor side effects of my qi deviation,” Shizun says, tweaking Luo Binghe’s nose. “No need to be concerned.”

Shizun said that he was okay! Shizun shouldn’t be straining himself to teach Luo Binghe if his qi deviation still makes him feel unwell—

Can I trust you with a secret, Binghe? My memory is, mm, ‘patchwork’ may be the best way to describe it.

…What had Shizun said, right before his collapse?

You look so very much like her.

Luo Binghe has never looked like anyone else. Not the way people always mean when they say that, where you can look between family members and see the relation. Luo Binghe always knew that he was adopted; everyone else in the small village where he grew up had known it, too.

Luo Binghe looks like Shizun’s shijie. Shizun has a past not in this sect or on this peak, and he thinks Luo Binghe looks like a woman he used to know.

It could be a coincidence. It should be a coincidence.

It’s only…Shizun’s reaction. As though he had touched a place in his mind that wasn’t meant to be touched.

Like pressing on a half-healed wound.

And…

I wish she could see you now. She would be so proud of you.

Luo Binghe has never much cared to think about his biological parents. They abandoned him, whoever they were, set him adrift in a basket on the Luo River in the dead of winter, and never come looking for him.

He’s never much cared to think about them…until now. Now there is someone in front of him who knows, who could tell him why, and Luo Binghe has no idea if he wants to ask or run away from this conversation forever.

Shizun doesn’t act as if he’s said anything of note. As concerned as he’s been for Luo Binghe this whole time, Luo Binghe is confident that he would say something to follow up…that.

Did he…did he forget again?

Is he going to keep forgetting, an ongoing side effect of his qi deviation?

“Shizun, you—you said—”

Shizun blinks at him, his brow furrowing faintly in confusion. “What did I say?” A hand raises to the side of his head, rubbing gently.

Luo Binghe can’t ask, even if he wanted to. He has to keep Shizun away from this train of thought and he has to make sure that Shizun doesn’t trigger anything horrible and new.

He needs to make sure that Shizun is all right.

“Nothing, Shizun,” Luo Binghe lies. “Would Shizun like tea? Or is there is any medication from Mu-shishu this disciple should prepare instead…?”

Shizun graces him with a faint smile. “If you wanted a tea break that badly, all you had to do was ask,” he says without rancor. “Grab some snacks for yourself along the way—you’re too skinny.”

Luo Binghe nods and runs off to do as commanded. Let Shizun ignore his own health, let him pretend the tea is for Luo Binghe rather than explicitly for himself. Luo Binghe will take care of him.

He glances behind him as he leaves. Shizun, much like his brother, usually keeps up a mask, burying emotions behind it or his fan. Luo Binghe would not consider himself an expert on reading Shen Yuan’s moods. Not yet.

Even so.

Shizun seems troubled.

"How is Shen-shixiong feeling today?" Mu Qingfang asks.

Shen Yuan has, as requested, begun sending him letters. They’ve gone back and forth for most of the past week, Mu Qingfang with written instructions backing up everything he had told Shen Yuan during their first meeting, and Shen Yuan reporting new symptoms. Mainly the headaches. He's keeping everything else close to the chest.

Ah, Mu Qingfang was serious about wanting to help him recover what memories he can! The System had told him it was possible—not the extent to which it was possible, though!—so Shen Yuan is willing to take whatever advice he can get. The System's mention of flashbacks had left him...disturbed. He doesn't want to inherit too many traumatic memories, thank you! Can't he just get some answers?

Preferably without more headaches.

Mu Qingfang had also, during their correspondence, offered to come to Qing Jing rather than have Shen Yuan travel to Qian Cao. He had gratefully accepted this offer, and not only because he's still busy adjusting to Qing Jing.

It's also...

He really doesn't want to face the rest of the sect yet. He knows that he'll have to eventually! He's aware!

But he has no idea what rumors are being spread about him. He knows that there are rumors, there's no way a mountain full of teenagers aren't gossiping with each other, and who knows what the Peak Lords told their head disciples, or what those head disciples have thought to spread on to their friends? Who knows what has been warped in the retelling, or what ideas have been drawn from what few facts people know?

Shen Yuan isn't ready to confront that yet. He's not ready to confront the other Peak Lords, either. He's pretty sure that Shen Qingqiu has been personally driving them away from his peak, because Shen Yuan really thought some of them would have dropped by Qing Jing by now. Like, oh, Yue Qingyuan for example?

But...nothing. No one. A week, now, and not one Peak Lord has appeared.

Suspicious.

Qian Cao wouldn't be as tightly controlled as Qing Jing currently is. It’s possible that Shen Yuan could run into anyone while visiting. Or while on his flight there, or on his flight back, or...

You get the idea.

So, yes. When Mu Qingfang offered, Shen Yuan accepted. Which is what leads to them here, sitting in the bamboo house, Mu Qingfang's hand wrapped around his wrist again.Mu Qingfang has certainly gotten used to addressing him as Shen-shixiong quickly! Benefits of sharing a face with Mu Qingfang’s original ‘Shen-shixiong,’ he supposes.

"Fine, fine," Shen Yuan says in answer.

"No headaches?" Mu Qingfang asks, one eyebrow raising.

Shen Yuan does not squirm in place, because he's not a little kid. Instead, he pulls his fan out and covers his face. "Only a minor one," he demurs. A minor one, or maybe two...but for the most part, they'd faded quickly!

"Please keep track of them and come to me if they become more severe," Mu Qingfang says. "Even if they are connected to your memories as we suspect, there's no reason for you to be in pain. We can find a way to mitigate the effects."

"Thanking Mu-shidi," Shen Yuan says. Luo Binghe already prepares him a mild willow bark tea at the drop of a hat; Shen Yuan is sure that if Mu Qingfang gives him actual medication, Luo Binghe will be overbearing about it. He's like someone's aunt, clucking over their health. Shen Yuan is fine.

Yes, he'd had a debilitating migraine during their training session yesterday, wherein half of his vision had disappeared in a swirl of black and he'd nearly collapsed, and Luo Binghe had been having a combination panic attack and sobbing fit by the time Shen Yuan had pulled himself together—but it was fine!

...He can't even remember what he'd said to Binghe. He knows there was something; he remembers the confused, cautiously hopeful look on Luo Binghe's face, yet what he had said is lost to the migraine that had slammed into him, and he hasn't tried to regain the knowledge. Obviously it's off-limits for now.

He hadn't even bothered asking the System.Probably there’s some stupid bullsh*t involved, like having to level up his EXP or B-Points or whatever before he’s allowed to access those memories.

(What the f*ck could he have remembered and said that would have been so firmly buried? Something about—Luo Binghe and S—)

Mu Qingfang sighs. "Your qi flow feels better," he says, dropping the subject. "Has Shen-shixiong been introducing you to the Qing Jing style?"

"Yes."

"Guided meditation?"

"Yes."

Every evening, in fact. Shen Yuan has been doing well enough on his own, following the pattern of qi that his body had been using for years, but Shen Qingqiu actually knows what he's doing. Qing Jing's style, learned from a dedicated instructor, feels better than those (comparatively) sloppy, guesswork attempts to control his qi; meditation with Shen Qingqiu makes everything so smooth and easy. No stray qi can escape. He feels it loop within himself, the flow consistent.

Plus, Shen Yuan can get up every morning and go teach the meditation to Luo Binghe. The cultivation manual tells him how to do it, but it's so much nicer to have another person guide you through it.

Trust is important for qi sharing like that, Shen Yuan supposes. He's honored that Luo Binghe trusts him with this. He hadn't even hesitated, the first time he had held out his hands for Shen Yuan to demonstrate how it should feel.

"Good," Mu Qingfang says. "Any issues? It doesn't look like you've been redirecting away from where your spleen was, even unintentionally..."

God, right, he doesn't have a spleen. He's morbidly curious and waiting to figure out how that happened. He tries not to think about it too much, because it stresses him out. Spleens are important! Obviously he's managed without it for ten-plus years, but. Important!!! He does not want to be missing any body parts, thank you.

(He also pointedly does not think about Shen Qingqiu's ending in the novel. He's taking care of it, so there's no point in thinking about it.)

"No," Shen Yuan says.

"Mn," Mu Qingfang says. He falls silent, though Shen Yuan can feel the sweep of his qi through his meridians. Shen Yuan patiently waits for him to finish.

"Well," Mu Qingfang says. "As I recommended, keep track of your symptoms, and of anything you remember. Shen Qingqiu is keeping his own list, as an outside perspective. If you must compare notes, take it slowly. We don't want to set off anything by reminding you too quickly of what's missing."

Shen Yuan nods in agreement.Yes, one migraine was enough for him, thanks.

“Speaking of your deviation,” Mu Qingfang says.

Oh, here we go, Shen Yuan thinks. “Is this about what neither of you are telling me?” Shen Yuan asks.

Mu Qingfang smiles wryly. “Yes, it is,” he says. “So far as we can tell, based on what you told us, you and Shen Qingqiu each experienced a qi deviation on the same day. Likely even at the same time. Shen Qingqiu’s deviation nearly killed him; yours was severe enough that it’s likely a miracle you survived on your own.”

Shen Yuan stares at him. What the f*ck?

The scum villain almost died? Not only that, he almost died three whole years before the Immortal Alliance Conference? Shen Yuan is in Limited Sandbox Mode, but holy sh*t, if Shen Qingqiu had died—that would have wrecked the whole plot before Shen Yuan had to lift a finger to change it!

Also: what the double f*ck do you mean OG Shen Yuan and Shen Qingqiu had a qi deviation at the same time?! What kind of—do twins work like that in Proud Immortal Demon Way? If so, that seems like it should have been used in a wife plot at least once! Oh, and definitely not used on Luo Binghe’s shizun, what the triple f*ck?!

“Thank you for informing me,” Shen Yuan says, mouth on autopilot. He, uh, he needs some time to process these implications. Once he figures out what they’re supposed to imply in the first place.

“It may be important for you moving forward,” Mu Qingfang says. “If there is anything you remember about your past regarding previous qi deviations, it may help us to understand what caused the one shared between you two. Hopefully it will also help us prevent another.”

Right. Uh-huh. Whatever you say, Mu Qingfang.

Mu Qingfang opens his mouth, drawing in breath to say something—then closes it again, shaking his head. He starts again. "In other news, I don't suppose Shen-shixiong has spoken to you about seclusion?"

"...Only very generally," Shen Yuan says, abruptly suspicious. Mu Qingfang looks skyward, as if he's praying for patience.

"I suspect he was waiting for me to give you a clean bill of health," he says. "He had asked me privately if seclusion might be beneficial to your condition. I don't think it would hurt, so long as you know what you're doing, which you seem to have well in hand. Your meridians have healed as much from the deviation as they're going to. If you are in a location as qi-rich as the Lingxi Caves, you may be able to bolster yourself as you search for memories."

"Jiu-ge really should have told me that himself instead of making you do it," Shen Yuan says. "Thanking Mu-shidi. Again. I'll talk with him about it." He pauses, then asks, "Is Jiu-ge cleared to go into seclusion? Since he also had a qi deviation." Which he didn’t bother telling Shen Yuan about. Ugh. Shen Yuan has to ask, because he sincerely doubts that Shen Qingqiu is going to let Shen Yuan wander off alone into the Lingxi Caves.

"Yes, he has been," Mu Qingfang says. "All either of you need now is permission from Zhangmen-shixiong." Mu Qingfang has that look on his face again, like he wants to say something.

Shen Yuan has some suspicions about what, exactly, Mu Qingfang isn't saying.

Shen Yuan will face Yue Qingyuan at some point. He will! It's only...he keeps picturing the look on Yue Qingyuan's face. How it had crumpled, when Mu Qingfang had explained why Shen Yuan didn’t—and might never—recognize him.

"Jiu-ge can take care of that," Shen Yuan says. He doesn't meet Mu Qingfang's eyes as he says it. They both know what he's doing here.

Mu Qingfang lets him do it.

"Very well," he says, standing. "If there's nothing else, I'll see Shen Yuan again next week—unless he's in seclusion."

Shen Yuan nods. He escorts Mu Qingfang out, then sits back down at the table.

Seclusion, huh?

He has to admit, he is curious about the Lingxi Caves and what he can get from secluded cultivation. His defeat at the hands of the Skinner Demon had been frankly embarrassing. Seclusion should help him to connect fully with his body and his cultivation without the distractions of the outside world. He can become fully integrated with his new body, comfortable enough in it that he’ll be able to fight better. He’ll be able to teach Luo Binghe better!

Plus…

He doesn't know if boosting his cultivation will help him recover any of the Original Goods' memories—but it can't hurt, right?

System, is there anything I can do to kickstart regaining the Original Goods' memories? he asks.Ways that won’t results in migraines? Can you give me markers for what areas are off-limits, or how to work up to those parts of the Original Goods’ memories?

[Quest: "Shen Who? A-Yuan's Missing Memories." Objective: Recover Shen Yuan's lost memories!Certain people, events, or locations may cause detailed flashbacks. Compile flashbacks and minor memories to achieve a greater understanding of “Shen Yuan”.]

You're not helpful, Shen Yuan thinks sourly.

Good grief. If it isn't [Information restricted], then the System just repeats the quest information to him. Shen Yuan is on his own with this. Which often seems to be the case with these 'hidden quests'.

...Yeah, that's yet another item for his ever-growing list. He needs to figure out the commonalities between the hidden quests. Maybe there's an answer somewhere in there.

In the meantime, he has a guqin to practice. This, at least, he had practiced occasionally in his previous life. Going by the muscle memories and faint calluses, it seems the Original Goods had, at some point, for some reason, also used the guqin.

Hmm, he wonders if he can figure out how to rework Yui’s “Again” so that he can play it on the guqin...

Chapter 9

Chapter Text

Before entering the Lingxi Caves, Shen Yuan lets Luo Binghe know that he’s going to be in seclusion for the foreseeable future. Luo Binghe pouts at him until Shen Yuan has to look away from the absolutely lethal puppy dog eyes.

“Focus hard on your classes while this master is gone,” he says, taking pains not to meet Luo Binghe's gaze. He isn’t going to change his mind, but those eyes would make him feel awful. “Outside of that, start practicing your sword forms, and make sure you find someone to spar with. Maybe Ning Yingying? Oh, and don’t forget unarmed combat just because you have a sword now; I’ll be checking your progress on that!”

“Yes, Shizun,” Luo Binghe says obediently.

Well, good. Hopefully Luo Binghe will be able to make the most of this time, using it to progress his skills with the Four Arts. Shen Yuan will have to check, once he returns, that Ming Fan has been behaving properly, not bothering Luo Binghe in class or anything like that. Shen Yuan can’t discount the idea that he might backslide when out of Shen Yuan’s view.

“I’ll see you when I get back,” Shen Yuan tells Luo Binghe, and leaves before he can fall prey to Luo Binghe’s devastatingly cute little pleading face. Why are you acting like Shen Yuan is going away forever, Binghe! He left you plenty of instructions and supplies! Make the most of it!

…There isn’t anything interesting he can bring back from the Caves, is there?

No! He is going there to cultivate, not to sightsee. Luo Binghe will be fine for a few months on his own.

Mu Qingfang meets them at the entrance to the Caves. Yue Qingyuan is with him. Shen Qingqiu immediately snaps open his fan at the sight of them, and Shen Yuan can feel the disdain all but dripping off him.

Shen Yuan, for his part, ducks slightly behind Shen Qingqiu.

It isn’t hiding, all right, it’s a successful use of resources! Shen Qingqiu is a great defensive wall for keeping away the sect leader!

Much like he had with Luo Binghe, he pointedly keeps himself from looking directly at Yue Qingyuan.

“This master thought Zhangmen-shixiong had already granted permission to access the Lingxi Caves,” Shen Qingqiu says, his voice like ice. “What is he doing here?”

“Peace,” Yue Qingyuan says. “I’m not rescinding permission. I only wanted to give Xiao—ah, Qingqiu-shidi and Yuan-shidi my best wishes for their seclusion.”

Uhh. Thanks?

Shen Yuan leans around Shen Qingqiu, enough to get a glimpse of the sect leader. He’s as put together as the last time Shen Yuan had seen him, not a hair out of place, robes perfectly settled, wearing a small and serene smile. Xuan Su is hanging from its harness on his back, the hilt peeking up over his shoulder.

So that’s the Xuan Su sword, Shen Yuan thinks, as he had been too distracted at the Peak Lord meeting to think. Grief floods his chest. That’s the sword that let him seal Tianlang-Jun…

Oh, what the hell is he thinking? It had been a collective effort of the four sects. It wasn’t only Yue Qingyuan and Xuan Su’s fault—

It’s no one’s fault. That’s how this works, that’s how this whole genre works! Tianlang-Jun is backstory stuff. Not even that. He was barely filler text in the web novel. He wasn’t important to the narrative. Only to—

“Shen-shixiong,” Mu Qingfang says. “Please accept these.” He hands a bundle of talismans to Shen Yuan, who takes them before he can even think twice about it.

“What are they?” Shen Yuan asks, looking them over curiously.

“Emergency summons,” Mu Qingfang says. “I sincerely doubt you will need them, as I have cleared you and Shen-shixiong’s entrance to the Caves myself, but we do not yet understand the far-reaching effects of your qi deviation. Should anything go wrong, these talismans are linked to ones I carry with me and a few others on my peak.”

“Thank you, Mu-shidi,” Shen Yuan says, tucking them away into his sleeves. Please, please, please don’t let that have jinxed us!

While Mu Qingfang is busy handing off the talismans, Shen Yuan can’t help but notice that Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan are having some kind of furious staring contest. Furious on Shen Qingqiu’s end, at least. Yue Qingyuan’s smile hasn’t budged. In fact, as he breaks eye contact with Shen Qingqiu to look at Shen Yuan, it widens slightly, one side of his mouth tipping up slightly more than the other.

Shen Yuan has only met this man twice, yet he can’t help but think this is the most honest smile he’s seen from him either of these times.

What happened to him, to make his smiles as much of a mask as Shen Qingqiu’s blank one? He didn’t used to smile like this. Not around Shen Qingqiu or Shen Yuan.

f*ck you, System, Shen Yuan thinks tiredly, as a mild headache starts building behind his eyes.

“Let’s go,” Shen Qingqiu says, turning with a swirl of his robes and heading into the caves. Shen Yuan bows shallowly to Mu Qingfang and Yue Qingyuan before following him in a hurry.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t slow his pace until they’re well away from the entrance. Then he drops his speed, allowing Shen Yuan his private wonder as he takes in the Lingxi Caves.

The Caves are beautiful. Shen Qingqiu leads them confidently through its labyrinthine tunnels, but still leaves plenty of time for Shen Yuan to stare around. Despite his expectations, the caves aren’t dark. They’re dim, certainly, but as they had left the sun-drenched entrance, Shen Yuan hadn’t even had time to wonder if Shen Qingqiu was going to pull out night pearls or a lantern before they stepped fully out of reach of the sun and into the areas lit by softly glowing crystals.

From Shen Yuan’s inexperienced eye, they look like natural crystals, not ones that had been purposefully set into the sides, ceilings, or floors of the tunnels. They may have been cultivated somewhat over the years, enough to keep them from blocking the paths through the Lingxi Caves, yet their shapes are so random, the distances between them so far from uniform, that it is obvious no—or at least very few—human hands have interfered with them. There are enough crystals here that the path ahead of them is always, though perhaps not evenly, lit.

Shen Qingqiu leads them through a thousand twists and turns. The crystals shimmer as they pass, all shades of color. Shen Yuan wonders how strong the qi in them is, if they feed off the Caves or if the Caves feed off them, or if they’re too tangled inside each other for that to even matter. He’d known that the Lingxi Caves were a center of spiritual power for Cang Qiong, yet he had never imagined the small details like this.

Even when he hates it, this world really is…amazing.

They eventually stop and step into a cavern. It’s made primarily of white stone, with what look like some patches of darker grey or blue scattered throughout. Shen Yuan has to squint a bit to make that out, because there surprisingly aren’t any crystals inside this cavern, though glowing green ones dot the outside of the entrance to this secluded area. Various stone beds are scattered around the floor of the cavern, and in the center is a large, clear pool of water which reflects the cavern back at them like a mirror.

It’s beautiful. Except for how it was also evidently the site of a murder, sword glares carved deep into the walls and blackened, old blood staining those same walls. Some of the spots Shen Yuan assumed were blue or grey are, upon a second glance, more of that old blood.

Despite that…the qi in this cave…

Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan pick one of the stone beds and sit across from each other. They both draw in deep breaths, release them, and settle into meditation.

It’s so easy to fall into meditation now. It’s even easier to follow Shen Qingqiu into the preferred Qing Jing style instead of his own jury-rigged style, since he’s spent so much time practicing with both Shen Qingqu and Luo Binghe.

Peripherally, he’s aware of his brother’s energies seeping outward slightly, tugging at the qi of the Lingxi Caves and drawing it back into himself, condensing it all until it can be added to the core already swirling in his lower dantian. Shen Yuan does the same thing, the cool qi from the Caves filling him, as pleasant and soothing as an iced drink on a hot day.

Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan are sitting close enough that occasionally their energies brush up agains each other. Practice has lent them a sense of familiarity with what the other’s qi is doing, and their qi really is startlingly similar. They echo. Two halves of a whole.

f*ck, Shen Yuan missed his brother.

He’s never letting him go again. He lost him once. He’d been useless, unable to protect Qi-ge or Jiu-ge, even when he—

Shen Yuan’s eyes snap open. He meets Shen Qingqiu’s gaze.

As one, they turn toward the cavern’s entrance.

Further in the caves—near enough for them to hear—someone is in distress. They’re panting in pain, and even as Shen Yuan recognizes the noise, he senses a burst of rampant, wild spiritual energy.

Qi deviation.

“Talisman,” Shen Qingqiu breathes, rising slowly to his feet. His hand goes to Xiu Ya.

Shen Yuan fishes one of Mu Qingfang’s emergency talismans from his sleeves and lights it with a flick of qi.

“How long will it take Mu-shidi to get here?” he asks quietly.

“Too long,” Shen Qingqiu says. He starts for the cavern’s entrance, back toward the tunnels. “A-Yuan, you stay here.”

“Absolutely not,” Shen Yuan hisses, scrambling to his feet and following Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Qingqiu glares, but doesn’t stop him. He walks steadily through the twist and turns of the caves. As they draw closer to the source of that noise, the waves of disturbed qi grow larger, stronger, until finally they enter another cavern.

A man in white robes stands inside, smeared with blood, facing away from them with his longsword dug into the walls of the cave. Sword glares have caused deep slashes in the cavern’s walls, much like the cavern Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan had been cultivating in.

Horrified, Shen Yuan quickly puts the pieces together. Just how bad had that long-ago cultivator’s qi deviation been, that they had left such a mess in his and Shen Qingqiu’s cavern? How long had it lasted? Had they even survived?

That deviation must have been worse than the one before them—but that’s not to say the man before them isn’t suffering. The blood, the labored breathing, the jagged and awful feel of his qi in the air, the shrieking of his sword—

“Run,” Shen Qingqiu says.

The cultivator in white whips around, crazed eyes glaring at them. He slams his hand against the cavern wall, yanking his sword from it in a swift movement.

“Run, now!” Shen Qingqiu shouts. He draws Xiu Ya, barely in time to keep the cultivator in white from beheading either himself or Shen Yuan.

This gives Shen Yuan a perfect view of the man’s blade, the hilt’s engraved incantations and phoenix ornamentation.

Cheng Luan.

“Liu Qingge!” Shen Qingqiu snarls. “Control yourself, you brute!”

The cultivator—Liu Qingge, Bai Zahn’s War God—snarls back at Shen Qingqiu. No words, only mindless rage.

f*ck, f*ck, f*ck, Shen Yuan thinks. Mu Qingfang, please hurry!

Then he ducks around the two cultivators, further into the cavern where Liu Qingge had been enjoying his seclusion. Liu Qingge follows his movement, twisting his head around to follow Shen Yuan even as he refuses to give up his assault on Shen Qingqiu. Shen Qingqiu’s face has gone bloodless.

“A-Yuan!”

Liu Qingge jumps back from Shen Qingqiu. Shen Yuan draws Heng Li, catching Cheng Luan against his blade. Liu Qingge’s swing started in an almost half-hearted manner, but as soon as it connects, Shen Yuan can feel the pulse of Liu Qingge’s qi, abruptly furious and fighting. Liu Qingge’s lovely face, over his sword, is twisted in his qi-induced rage—and confusion, even in the depths of his deviation.

He wasn’t at the Peak Lord meeting. He doesn’t know there’s two of us!

Shen Yuan kicks at Liu Qingge’s knee. The War God, of course, avoids Shen Yuan’s blow, twisting out of the way and shifting to bring his sword around to Shen Yuan’s unprotected side—

Cheng Luan hits Xiu Ya.

“I said get out of here,” Shen Qingqiu says, before parrying a second blow from Liu Qingge, then a third, all while keeping himself firmly between Shen Yuan and Liu Qingge.

“Not happening,” Shen Yuan says. They have to help Liu Qingge. All they really need to do is keep him from dying before Mu Qingfang gets here, but Liu Qingge is tearing himself apart. They have to incapacitate him. If there’s anything they can do to slow the damage to his meridians from his deviation, to at least clear his mind enough for him to know help is on the way—don’t they have a duty?

Besides, it’s not as if there’s any way he’ll let them retreat. Not now that they’ve caught his attention.

“Keep him distracted,” Shen Yuan says.

Shen Qingqiu hisses an invective, but throws himself at Liu Qingge even more ferociously. Shen Qingqiu has kept Liu Qingge from truly harming him, but Liu Qingge isn’t known as the War God for no reason—he’s landed a hit or two against Shen Qingqiu already. It’s only that they’re not yet enough to keep Shen Qingqiu from moving.

Shen Yuan watches them, trying to judge the flow of the fight. His best chance is to recreate Liu Qingge’s first attack on Shen Yuan, that confused-then-angry swing. He should be able to avoid Cheng Luan’s blow, playing on Liu Qingge’s misunderstanding of how many people he’s actually fighting in this cavern, which will theoretically leave Liu Qingge open to Shen Yuan’s counterattack.

“Wake up, fool!” Shen Qingqiu screams at Liu Qingge. “At this rate, you’ll kill yourself before help can arrive!”

As far as Shen Yuan can tell, all of Liu Qingge’s attention is focused on Shen Qingqiu, the loud distraction in front of him. He’s dismissed Shen Yuan as insignificant, because his enemy is in front of him—Shen Yuan is nothing in comparison.

Which means he’ll never see this coming.

Shen Qingqiu swings at Liu Qingge. Liu Qingge parries, sending Shen Qingqiu’s blow wide, opening Shen Qingqiu’s defense for long enough that Liu Qingge can slam the hilt of his sword down against Shen Qingqiu’s wrist. Shen Qingqiu drops Xiu Ya, eyes blowing wide as Liu Qingge prepares to attack him again, and Shen Yuan’s plan has to change right now—

Shen Yuan throws himself in front of his brother and under Liu Qingge’s guard. His right hand, full of his gathered qi, slams into Liu Qingge’s chest.

Please let this work!

Liu Qingge goes flying a full meter back, coughing blood as he goes. He doesn’t manage to catch himself, not how he would be able to if he weren’t in a qi deviation—and nor does he get back up to attack them. He manages a half-kneel, obviously straining to get up and continue the fight, but the attack has done exactly what Shen Yuan had hoped.

People are terrifying during qi deviations, yet also fragile. By attacking Liu Qingge with his full strength in precisely the right spot, he had managed to tip the balance in his and Shen Qingqiu’s favor. Liu Qingge is suffering from a cascading failure.

…Which will cascade into his death if they’re not careful, so again, Shen Yuan hopes Mu Qingfang is on his way.

Shen Qingqiu picks up Xiu Ya.

"Jiu-ge—” Shen Yuan starts. He needn't have bothered. Shen Qingqiu simply sheathes his sword, glaring across the cave at Liu Qingge.

"Fool," Shen Qingqiu says, and stalks across the meager distance so that he can lay a hand on Liu Qingge's back.

Holy sh*t, Shen Yuan thinks in stunned amazement. He's...helping him?

Shen Yuan sheathes Heng Li and joins his brother. He lays a second hand against Liu Qingge, and tentatively reaches out. He's never done this before—but he can follow along with what Shen Qingqiu is doing. It's remarkably similar to what Shen Qingqiu had done in Shuang Hu City, which makes sense. It's only different because Liu Qingge is currently still going through the qi deviation, so they have to soothe that first before dealing with the damage left behind.

"Do not do that again," Shen Qingqiu says, glaring at Shen Yuan over Liu Qingge’s head. "There are too many ways it could have gone wrong!"

"What else was I supposed to do? We could barely fight him, we certainly couldn't have held him any other way—should we have just left him here to die?" Shen Yuan shoots back.

"No!" Shen Qingqiu spits. "But you can't just rush rashly in, hoping to save—” He stutters to a stop. He blinks. He says, slowly, "...You can't...panic and rush in. You have to...stay calm and call for help. Don't try to do it yourself." He scowls. "Tch! Shows what he knows!"

Shen Yuan is lost. "Who?"

"It doesn't matter," Shen Qingqiu says dismissively. It kind of sounds like it does, Jiu-ge!

Shen Yuan would press, but he's a little distracted by the realization that he should have been worrying more about the Liu Qingge situation all along.

The novel had been scant on the details. Even in the direct aftermath of the invasion and after confirmation of Liu Qingge’s death inside the Lingxi Caves, the actual facts had been thin on the ground. Mostly rumor, honestly, and talk of Liu Mingyan’s grief.

At Shen Qingqiu’s trial, Liu Qingge’s murder had been brought up as one of the main charges against him; Liu Mingyan’s public accusation that Shen Qingqiu had taken advantage of Liu Qingge’s distraction during closed cultivation to kill him hadn’t involved any more information than what the readers had already known. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t said a word either way, which had been taken as confirmation. He hadn’t refuted any of the charges.

Shen Yuan hadn’t spared much thought to the Liu Qingge situation because he had figured it would be an easy fix. He would stay with Shen Qingqiu the whole time. No need to go kill your fellow Peak Lord over old grudges, Jiu-ge, why don’t we calmly meditate in this cavern and let that particular crime of yours fade into unrealized potential…

Except apparently it couldn’t be that f*cking simple!

You can't panic and rush in. You have to stay calm and call for help.

Shen Qingqiu sounded like he was quoting someone. It was likely only general recommendations for dealing with a qi deviation—but if Shen Yuan hadn't been here, how would this have gone? Liu Qingge had gone mad from his deviation; even with two of them, they weren't able to run, in part because doing so would be consigning Liu Qingge to death. If Shen Qingqiu was alone, if he couldn't run, if—if he had hoped to save Liu Qingge...?

Wake up, you fool! At this rate, you'll kill yourself before help can arrive!

The novel had said—had implied—that Shen Qingqiu killed Liu Qingge on purpose. But…if this had happened in canon, too…

People suffering from qi deviations are so terribly fragile. Liu Qingge had been attacking with lethal force.

Without Shen Yuan here, it would be so easy for this to have turned out differently, wouldn't it?

Even with Shen Yuan, they’re unbelievably lucky that it hadn’t been any worse. Shen Yuan had used the best knowledge that he had, but it was a risky move, only utilized because Mu Qingfang was already on his way.

Liu Qingge chooses this moment to cough out a mouthful of blood and regain consciousness. The first thing he does is take in Shen Yuan, crouching to one side of him. Liu Qingge jerks upright, trying to get away from him. Shen Yuan’s hand and qi flow are disrupted by his movement. That same movement jars Liu Qingge's injured internal organs and, judging by the spike of qi Shen Yuan senses, sends his qi spiraling again, so he doesn't get very far.

Also, Shen Qingqiu is blocking the direction Liu Qingge tried to go. Shen Qingqiu huffs as Liu Qingge knocks into him and, when the man coughs up another mouthful of blood, tsks irritably. He still has contact with Liu Qingge.

"Regulate your qi, Shidi," Shen Qingqiu says. "Don't be so agitated. Mu-shidi is on his way."

Liu Qingge's head tips back to take in Shen Qingqiu. Then tips forward to look at Shen Yuan again. Back. Probably assuming, as he likely had in the midst of the deviation, that Shen Yuan is a side-effect of his temporary insanity. A particularly solid hallucination, if you will.

"Shen," Liu Qingge grinds out. "What are you playing at?"

"A very exciting game called 'no dying of preventable conditions in the Lingxi Caves,'" Shen Qingqiu says, utterly dry.

"Long name for a game," Shen Yuan says. Liu Qingge's gaze snaps back to him. Shen Yuan waves.

"A-Yuan," Shen Qingqiu says, and nothing else.

Shen Yuan pulls the emergency talisman out of his sleeve. He doesn't notice any change to it; it would be nice if it had some kind of alert built into it, to let the user know how much longer they would have to wait for assistance.He’ll bring that up with Mu Qingfang.

“Stop,” Liu Qingge says to Shen Qingqiu. He struggles, again, to move away.

“Liu Qingge!” Shen Qingqiu says. “Stop trying to kill yourself. Or at least wait until Mu-shidi is here—then it won’t be our problem anymore.”

“Who’s we?” Liu Qingge demands. “All I see is you.”

Shen Yuan stifles a laugh. It’s deeply inappropriate, he knows, but—Liu Qingge really is pretending like Shen Yuan doesn’t exist!

“Is no one on this gods-forsaken mountain capable of understanding the concept of twins?” Shen Qingqiu asks, in tones of deep aggravation.

“Jiu-ge, he wasn’t at the Peak Lord meeting,” Shen Yuan reminds him, amusem*nt bubbling inside him. “He’s just had a qi deviation. He must think he’s hallucinating me.”

Ah, now Liu Qingge is staring at him again.

“Shen Qingqiu doesn’t have a twin,” Liu Qingge says confidently. And incorrectly.

“Apologies to Liu-shidi, but he does,” Shen Yuan says.

Liu Qingge looks a bare breath away from starting an argument about Shen Yuan’s existence. Fortunately, that’s when the talisman in Shen Yuan’s hand flares bright before extinguishing itself, and Mu Qingfang comes rushing into the cavern. He takes in the tableau.

“Shixiong, when I gave you that talisman, I had expected you to use it for yourself,” Mu Qingfang says, making his way to Liu Qingge’s side and kneeling there.

“It’s a good thing you gave us multiple talismans, then,” Shen Yuan says. Ah, Shen Yuan just jinxed himself for a second time, didn’t he? Why did he say that?!

Shen Qingqiu gladly passes Liu Qingge over to Mu Qingfang. He rises out of his crouch, dusting off his robes, and goes to stand next to Shen Yuan. Liu Qingge glares distrustfully at them over Mu Qingfang’s shoulder.

“Which of you hit him?” Mu Qingfang asks.

“Me,” Shen Yuan admits.

“Hm,” Mu Qingfang says.

“…Shen Qingqiu doesn’t have a twin,” Liu Qingge tells Mu Qingfang. It sounds as though he’s hoping Mu Qingfang will agree with him.

Shen Yuan says, “He thinks he’s hallucinating me.”

“Liu-shixiong,” Mu Qingfang says, “you’re not hallucinating. Shen Yuan is indeed Shen Qingqiu’s brother; Shen Qingqiu brought him back to Cang Qiong after a recent mission. Which you would have been aware of, if you hadn’t ignored the most recent meeting in favor of going directly into seclusion.”

Mu Qingfang taps Liu Qingge on the back, near where Shen Qingqiu had rested his hand to feed him qi. Liu Qingge coughs up a great clot of blood. This time, at least, he’s able to lean over to the side so that it doesn’t get on his robes. The clean white has become an outfit more akin to a—mm, it would be in rather poor taste to say ‘murder victim,’ wouldn’t it?

“Come along, A-Yuan,” Shen Qingqiu says. He turns to leave.

“Wait,” Mu Qingfang says. “Give me a moment to check over the two of you before you return to seclusion. You’re both only weeks out from your deviations, and now you’ve been exposed to Liu-shixiong’s unstable energies.”

“…Very well,” Shen Qingqiu says stiffly. He pointedly looks away from Liu Qingge, but Shen Yuan doesn’t. He gets the full view of Liu Qingge’s disgusted, confused face. It’s a pity to see such an ugly look on such a—surprisingly lovely! Why is Liu Qingge such a pretty boy?—face.

He really hates Shen Qingqiu, huh?

[Congratulations, congratulations, congratulations! System Notification: the scenario “Liu Qingge’s Death” has been changed! Shen Qingqiu’s grave-digging and hatefulness ratings have decreased. +25 B-Points.]

A bit late on the draw, aren’t you? Shen Yuan thinks. Also, only 25 points? He knows the System told him he wouldn’t get many B-Points by using Limited Sandbox Mode, but for something as wildly canon-divergent as this, shouldn’t he get more points?

Whatever. He has yet to even open the System Store, and what he’s most interested in—the Original Goods’ memories—is something the System won’t let him buy. He’ll keep saving his points against some nebulous future use, he supposes.

Besides. It’s nice knowing that he can change opinions about Shen Qingqiu. “Hatefulness ratings,” huh?

He wonders what else he can do to get those to decrease.

Chapter 10

Chapter Text

Mu Qingfang clears Shen Yuan and Shen Qingqiu quickly, so they’re able to return to their own seclusion without much delay.

Shen Yuan isn't sure what happens to Liu Qingge, and honestly? He doesn’t particularly care. Mu Qingfang might examine him and clear him to remain in the Lingxi Caves, or he may strong-arm Bai Zhan's War God back to Qian Cao with him. Either way, Shen Yuan is content having saved his life. That’s all he was aiming for here! He doesn't have to concern himself with Liu Qingge anymore, now that the danger has passed. He's not being paid enough to give up free space in his mind to devote to Liu Qingge.

Literally, he’s not being paid enough. A measly 25 points? Shen Yuan knows he said he didn't care about the points, but come on.

The thought is quickly forgotten, as Shen Yuan throws himself back into cultivating. Time loses all meaning in the Lingxi Caves. The only meaning in the world is the qi circulating in his meridians, and the faint echo of qi next to him. Never enough to distract, only enough to tell him that Shen Qingqiu is still here.

They're together.

Eventually, the end of their seclusion approaches. It’s not that Shen Yuan has a sense that it’s been long enough, more that he feels he’s reaching the end of what he can accomplish on this visit to the Caves. He had thoroughly discussed with both Mu Qingfang and Shen Qingqiu what he was hoping to get out of this trip, and it was that estimation which they had used to decide how long to go into seclusion.

Along with…certain other factors.

Shen Yuan allows the last wisp of energy settle inside himself, then opens his eyes. The placid pool of water in front of him reflects Shen Yuan back at himself. He swears he can see a faint glow to his eyes—a blink, and then it's gone, even that excess qi pulled wholly down into himself.

He finally feels fully settled in his body, as if something out of joint has been put back to rights by several months of intense cultivation. He can control his spiritual energy freely; he thinks he may have even raised himself a level above the cultivation base he'd had previously.

Shen Qingqiu is meditating across from him, but it's not the intense meditation of these past several months. It's the shallow meditation that they practiced together at Qing Jing. Shen Yuan knows Shen Qingqiu had been cultivating as deeply as Shen Yuan had. He doesn't know when Shen Qingqiu had broken out of that deep level of concentration, or why. He seems fine at first glance, so what...?

"I had a breakthrough," Shen Qingqiu says, not opening his eyes.

"Oh," Shen Yuan says, near soundlessly. Shen Yuan had progressed a level in his cultivation, yes, but he knows from the novel that Shen Qingqiu's cultivation had always been fragile—or at least that was the reason given for the constant qi deviations he was known to suffer. For him to have had a breakthrough—it's incredible news! "Jiu-ge! That’s great!“

"Mn," Shen Qingqiu hums. He doesn't quite smile, but he seems very pleased with himself as he opens his eyes and stands. Shen Yuan takes his offered hand and joins him.

They jump down from their stone platform. Shen Yuan will have to remember this cavern, if he ever finds himself back in the Lingxi Caves. It was exceptionally good for cultivating.

He allows Shen Qingqiu to lead the way out of the Caves. He contemplates letting Liu Qingge know that they're leaving; since he's still unsure whether Liu Qingge returned to his seclusion at all, much less to the same cavern, he keeps his mouth shut. Besides, with his cultivator's hearing, Liu Qingge probably heard the brief discussion between Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan.He’ll know that they’re leaving.

Plus…they really need to get out of the caves.

Shen Yuan may have forgotten about Liu Qingge, but what he didn't forget about, what he had carefully calculated the time and date for, was Sha Hualing's invasion of Cang Qiong. When discussing their seclusion, Shen Yuan had set a limit on the time they would be away. He had framed it as not wanting to abandon his new disciple for more than a few months.

Shen Qingqiu had accepted this. No argument, though Shen Yuan had felt him weighing Shen Yuan's reasoning before agreeing.

There's nothing Shen Yuan could have done to prevent Sha Hualing's invasion. It was entirely out of his control! If Shen Yuan had delayed Yue Qingyuan’s trip, then Sha Hualing would simply strike at another time, and Shen Yuan wouldn’t be able to predict what was going to happen. He might not even be on the right peak if he let her choose a different time to attack.

He may not have to follow the plot—in fact, he fully intends on breaking this scene away from how it had gone in the novel!—but he’d known it would undoubtably still happen.Shen Yuan is making a very calculated risk here.

Hopefully he calculated correctly. In his plans, he had been aiming for leaving seclusion a day or two before the invasion, so that he could keep as many Qing Jing disciples off Qiong Ding as possible. Maybe he could even be ready and waiting for Sha Hualing at the main plaza. That would surely reduce casualties, and—

None of it matters.

Shen Yuan got his timing wrong.

They step out of the Caves. Qiong Ding is wreathed with smoke and fire, panicked disciples running around near the Caves or grouping together in terrified clusters as the alarm bells ring in the distance.

Shen Qingqiu turns and looks at him, his expression unreadable.

I didn’t compensate for Liu Qingge, Shen Yuan realizes. I thought all I had to do was keep Jiu-ge away from him. I didn’t realize he would have a qi deviation, I didn’t realize that might throw my count off.

Hell, passing Liu Qingge qi may have tipped the balance in and of itself, requiring Shen Yuan to briefly need to replenish his stores before cultivating to the extent he wanted. He’d been so confident that his margin of error would be sufficient.

More the fool him.

"Shen-shibo, Shen-shibo!" yell the disciples who have just noticed them. Several of them come running up; if they were any braver or Shen Qingqiu any less intimidating, Shen Yuan gets the sense the disciples would be hanging from their sleeves. As it is, they're all pale from the shock and fear, and Shen Yuan can see several holding back tears. "Demons have invaded! Several of our sect siblings are injured!"

Shen Yuan has a squirming sensation in his chest at their obvious terror. At the thought of disciples being injured.Shen Yuan f*cked this up.

"It's going to be all right," Shen Yuan says, even as Shen Qingqiu snaps, "Where is Zhangmen-shixiong?"

"Zhangmen-shibo left the mountain for important business," one of the tearful disciples says. Shen Yuan pats him on the head, while internally swearing. Yes, obviously he'd known Yue Qingyuan wouldn't be on the mountain, but it's still stressful. As is the disciple reporting to Shen Qingqiu that there is a barrier up around Qiong Ding and the Rainbow Bridge has been destroyed, so they can't even call for help from the other peaks—

Shen Yuan pulls one of Mu Qingfang's emergency talismans from his sleeve and lights it.

"If any of you can safely get the injured disciples here, without making their injuries worse or exposing your own selves to danger, do it," he orders. "I'll leave the talisman here; Mu Qingfang and Qian Cao will be able to help."

Or they will once we break the barrier, he thinks.

Mu Qingfang and Qian Cao won't be able to respond until they've dealt with it. On the other hand, during the invasion there were—currently are—disciples from various different peaks stranded on Qiong Ding. Even if Mu Qingfang isn’t here, it’s possible there are some Qian Cao disciples he can usher this direction. If not, then his instructions to the disciples here will at least it will give them something productive to do, instead of running around like headless chickens.

Indeed, the disciples start looking more hopeful. They especially do once Shen Qingqiu says, "Our Cang Qiong Mountain Sect will not fall to the likes of scum from the Demon Realm."

An idea sparks in Shen Yuan's mind.

"You," Shen Yuan says, pointing at one of the disciples. "Do you know if Liu Qingge has left his seclusion?"

“I—this disciple does not know!" the disciple squeaks.

There's no time for Shen Yuan or Shen Qingqiu to check, not when they don’t know if Liu Qingge is in the same cavern they’d left him. The two of them need to deal with the demons that have invaded the peak, and having an extra Peak Lord compared to the novel could be crucial. Shen Yuan won't leave Shen Qingqiu to handle this alone, no matter how beneficial a third Peak Lord, especially Bai Zhan's, could be.

"If any of you know how to navigate the Lingxi Caves, you need to go inside and find out if Liu Qingge is still there. Tell him what's happening. If you don't know how to navigate them, don’t go in—bang on the sides of the Caves until he comes out," Shen Yuan tells them. Shen Qingqiu nods his agreement.

Dammit. They should have checked before leaving the Lingxi Caves. Shen Yuan hadn't thought it would matter, and now he sincerely regrets that.

"Yes, Shibo!" comes a chorus of voices.

At that, Shen Qingqiu turns and sweeps down the mountain, Shen Yuan right behind him. Following them comes a good two-thirds of the disciples, cheered by the support of their martial uncles. The last third stay behind, many of them coordinating the injured or those who are still too scared or traumatized to move. Still others in that third are doing as Shen Yuan told them, picking up rocks and smacking them frantically against the sides of the Lingxi Caves.

It's loud. If Liu Qingge is still in there, there's no way he could miss it.

Along the way to Qiong Ding's main hall, they pick up several more disciples, who join the procession—or are told by their martial siblings that there is safe haven by the Lingxi Caves. There are injured disciples who need to be taken there, and to Shen Yuan’s relief, there are in fact a few Qian Cao disciples scattered over Qiong Ding.

There are also dead disciples.

Shen Yuan’s steps hitch the first time they come across a disciple in Qiong Ding colors sprawled unmoving on the ground. His throat has been torn out, and he stares emptily up into the sky above him. The demon who killed him is still there, menacing the disciple’s martial sibling.

It’s quick work to step in and kill the demon.

Shen Yuan is no stranger to death. He’s seen more than his fair share. He’s been on missions where he’s had to examine dead bodies in order to hunt down whoever or whatever killed them. He’s killed beasts, he’s killed demons who preyed on humans—he’s even killed a few humans in his time. Demonic cultivators, or—or—

(There is a bright burst of pain. Several cun of spiritual sword are sticking out of him, driven through his back and out his left side.

That rat-f*cking bastard—he sent someone after me!)

It’s just…it’s particularly hard to see the deaths of those he was supposed to protect. He was going to change this. He was going to save them.

(Please, please don’t let me be too late—Shijie, where are you?!)

What the f*ck else is the point of Limited Sandbox Mode?

Shen Yuan turns away, leaving the demon where they fell. They continue, cutting down more than one demon along their way. Sha Hualing was supposed to wait for them to appear at the main hall, damn her!

...But no. No, as soon as he walked out of the Caves, he had known it couldn't be so simple. Hadn't he seen the smoke? Hadn't he seen the injuries of the disciples sheltering near the caves?Isn’t this why he had planned to meet her there from the beginning?

(Reality is so much bloodier than words on a page. Even after all this time, that can still surprise him.)

They reach the main hall. Every disciple on Qiong Ding—barring the ones sheltering at the caves—has come here, creating a half-circle around the demonic invaders, preparing for a fight. Qing Jing's disciples are here too. Shen Yuan can hear Shen Qingqiu draw in a slow breath as he spots their peak's disciples. Shen Yuan himself scans them and—yes, there's Luo Binghe.

Damn narrative convenience.

Assured of the Protagonist's momentary safety, he turns his eyes to the true threat: the Demon Saintess Sha Hualing.

—for f*ck's sake, did she really come here barefoot?! The fashion he can excuse, he knows demons are just Like That, but the bare feet? Young lady, you're not a Heavenly Demon! Your feet must hurt, and Shen Yuan doubts they're healing quicker than any other common demon's feet would!

Well, it's none of Shen Yuan's concern if she decides to handicap herself before the battle has even begun.

There are hundreds of disciples grouped here on Qiong Ding Peak, most of them now contained near the main hall. Shen Yuan genuinely wonders what drew all of them to Qiong Ding today; there are disciples from nearly every peak.

Including the largest group from Qian Cao he’s seen so far.

As several demons, hemmed in by the Cang Qiong disciples, decide to test their lines, Shen Yuan grabs several Qian Cao disciples and directs them toward the Lingxi Caves and the injured disciples. Then he assists his brother in tossing the attacking demons at Sha Hualing's (bare! Really and truly, why? He can't get over this) feet.

(He has to focus on that, the absurdity of it, and not the overwhelming rage. He has to stay calm. This must be handled delicately…for the moment.)

Sha Hualing, so confident to the point of arrogance before now, senses the turn of the winds. She says, “Peace, honored seniors! My people didn't climb the mountain for battle—we had only heard such wonderful things about the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect and its cultivators. We were curious! We wanted to look around your mountain, perhaps spar and learn from you."

Shen Qingqiu doesn't do anything so inelegant as snort in disdain at that, but he conveys it through the angle of his wrist as he flicks blood off Xiu Ya.

"You come while the Sect Leader is away, and you sever the Rainbow Bridge connecting the peaks, and you call this mere curiosity?" he asks.

"And to injure so many of our disciples," Shen Yuan says levelly, standing beside his brother. To kill so many of them. “I’ve never seen this method of sparring."

Sha Hualing twirls one strand of hair, playing up her youthfulness, even as her eyes dart between them.

"Forgive this Ling-er," she says, with a small laugh. "She would have guessed that this must be the renowned Xiu Ya sword, Peak Lord Shen Qingqiu, and yet..."

Shen Qingqiu glares at her. Shen Yuan fights the urge to roll his eyes.

(Technically, they’re both Shen Qingqiu. One courtesy name shared between twin Peak Lords. Apparently this is how they did it in the rare previous cases, too. Shen Yuan figures he’ll get away with using ‘Shen Yuan’ for as long as possible; surely he can use their courtesy name only for formal events! Plus he has to admit he finds it a little amusing to imagine the chaos and confusion caused by this.)

Young lady, we're not going to explain it to you! If you want to figure out which of us is the ‘Shen Qingqiu’ you’ve heard about, you already said the answer—look at the swords!

Even as Shen Yuan thinks that, she noticeably examines their swords. Evidently, she’s heard enough to be able to recognize Xiu Ya by sight. When she gives a short, nearly mocking bow, it is directed at Shen Qingqiu.

"Ling-er is young and unable to manage her subordinates," she lies with a smile. "If we've offended Seniors Shen, we beg your understanding. Won't you be magnanimous and forgive us?"

Haha! As if! It's obvious what you were planning! You're only ashamed that you got caught, when before you had thought Cang Qiong might be easy pickings.

"It sounds as though the young miss has come to a different conclusion about the situation now," Shen Qingqiu says silkily. Now that Peak Lords have appeared to confront you, is very obviously the second part of that sentence, a sentiment which echoes Shen Yuan's own thoughts.

Sha Hualing smiles. "It's only," she says, faux-thoughtfully, "Ling-er truly wanted to test herself against Cang Qiong. But…Cang Qiong has all the numbers. My people are at a disadvantage. There’s no way to tell who would be the victor between us."

"What are you suggesting?" Shen Yuan asks, though he knows very well what's about to fall from her mouth.

The problem is this: the disciples may have the demons outnumbered, but Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan are the only Peak Lords on Qiong Ding Peak. At least the only ones available to fight.

Neither of them are martially inclined. They can fight, yes, but they don't have the overwhelming power of Yue Qingyuan or Liu Qingge. Disciples have already died. Their job now is to keep as many alive as possible. They've alerted who they can, taken steps to alert others, and if the other Peak Lords haven’t yet noticed that the bridges are down, they better damn well notice soon.

Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan have to stall.

Unfortunately, that means playing into Sha Hualing's schemes. She won't listen to sheer diplomacy; she's come to Cang Qiong with a plan, and she'll try to follow through with it. Anything else would be too great a loss of face for her.

Sure enough, Sha Hualing opens her mouth and says, "Why not each choose three representatives and hold three matches?"

It's their best option, for both sides of this conflict. Everyone knows it.

...Shen Yuan thinks Sha Hualing is severely underestimating Cang Qiong here.

"Very well," Shen Qingqiu says.

Shen Qingqiu steps up to fight first, before Shen Yuan considers whether he should try to take his place. Sha Hualing commands Elder "Single Arm" Dubi to fight the Xiu Ya Sword; the demon slouches into place. Shen Qingqiu glares at him disdainfully.

In the novel, Shen Qingqiu had used scummy and underhanded tactics to win this match. Shen Yuan expects to see the same thing here. Instead, he watches as Shen Qingqiu stalls beautifully. Every move he makes is designed to conserve his energy, but most of all to waste his opponent's time.

He dances around each attack of Elder Single Arm's saber, a mocking smile growing on his face after the first minute and never fading from his face after. Xiu Ya licks out, hitting Elder Single Arm with minor attacks, going after tendons, creating wounds that hurt without fully disabling—not yet. He's playing with Elder Single Arm.

...Okay, kicking up dirt to get in Elder Single Arm's eyes is probably one of those moves that would have been labeled as underhanded in the novel, but isn't that common sense? This isn't a spar, no matter what they've said. If Elder Single Arm—if any of the demons—can kill them, they will. This is a fight to the death. There are no rules when it comes to saving lives, especially your own.

There is a flutter of movement where there shouldn't be.A flash of green a shade off from Qing Jing's robes, echoing the motion of Shen Qingqiu's sleeve—and then darting out.

Plucked Leaves, Flying Flowers!

Shen Yuan is adding that to his own repertoire as soon as he has an opportunity. Already, watching it, he's running over what he knows about it, trying to figure out how to do it himself. Not to mention contemplating the uses of it.

Qiong Ding is a peak of pine trees rather than Qing Jing's bamboo. Wouldn't pine needles be perfect for this attack? Sharpened with the user's qi, they would be like knives—or acupuncture needles—and they’re so abundant here. More abundant, even, than the demons invading the sect.

Shen Yuan has some ideas of what to do, should Sha Hualing choose to protest their inevitable win.

He's out of time to contemplate this. Shen Qingqiu has drawn out his battle as long as possible, including using the pine needles of his Plucked Leaves, Flying Flowers technique to slice at Elder Single Arm or otherwise distract him from Shen Qingqiu's true attacks—but there is only so long that can work. He does, eventually, have to draw the fight to a close.

Sha Hualing should be grateful Shen Qingqiu bothered to leave his opponent alive, Shen Yuan considers dispassionately. Cang Qiong would be well within their rights to kill their opponents in these matches.

The surrounding disciples break out into cheers.

Sha Hualing very obviously grits her teeth, nostrils flaring with rage, before she slaps a mask over her expression, smiling at Shen Qingqiu.

"The Xiu Ya Sword lives up to his reputation," she says. "But if the same representative competes in all three matches, how can any of us say we have learned from the other? I will be my people's representative for the next round."

Shen Qingqiu sheathes Xiu Ya. "Very well," he says.He seems terribly amused by this.

Shen Yuan is, too. "This master will fight next," he says.

Sha Hualing doesn’t—quite—blanch. No doubt she had volunteered herself in part because she was confident in her own abilities, but she was also banking on the fact that Shen Qingqiu—or Shen Yuan—would have some qualms about bullying a girl their junior.

Joke's on her! Sha Hualing was never his least favorite wife—but nor was she his favorite. Indeed, right now she's nothing more than a bratty teenager, and Shen Yuan has people to protect.

The only minor qualm Shen Yuan has is that he is robbing Liu Mingyan of a chance to demonstrate her skills in front of Luo Binghe, but she’ll have plenty of other chances. There’s no possible way Shen Yuan could justify allowing her to fight—and lose—just to get a pair of teenagers together.

(And, in the end, no matter how much Shen Yuan tries to dress it up and hide it behind other reasons, he is currently very angry at Sha Hualing. He wants this fight.)

"Ling-er requests the name of her opponent," she says.

"Shen Qingqiu, Qing Jing Peak Lord," Shen Yuan says calmly and formally, drawing Heng Li and settling into a ready stance.

Sha Hualing's confused gaze darts between him and Shen Qingqiu. Shen Yuan isn't going to explain himself. If she wants to investigate later, more power to her. He doesn't owe her answers.

He doesn’t owe her anything.

"Saintess Sha said she wished to spar," Shen Yuan says, when she has yet to move. "Has she changed her mind?"

"Tch! Of course not!" Sha Hualing says. She draws a sword of her own.

Shen Yuan graciously allows her the first move. Sha Hualing lunges at him, sword point leading. Shen Yuan smoothly slides out of the way. Qing Jing's sword style is so very good at teaching its students to dodge. Shen Yuan can by no means call himself talented at it—he has barely begun learning it!—but the few unarmed forms he spent time practicing with Luo Binghe are relatively easy to translate to this fight. Dodging is what he needs for the moment, rather than the more rooted stance his body wants to automatically fall back upon. With his lightened body after his time cultivating in the Lingxi Caves, it's all too easy to avoid Sha Hualing's attack.

Sha Hualing misses, yet she doesn't overextend. She compensates quickly, pulling back before Shen Yuan can return a blow.

That’s fine. Shen Yuan darts in, disarming her with a quick flick of his wrist, and then steps back out of her range. He co*cks an eyebrow at her.

You wanted to spar, right? Then come at me.

In the novel, Sha Hualing had never had only one weapon on her. Sure enough, she pulls out another and attacks once more.

Shen Yuan will give her exactly the fight that she wants. He’ll give her all the fair chances in the world to beat him.

Demons respect strength. He’ll make it exceedingly clear that they shouldn’t try to attack Cang Qiong again.

…Ugh, but he needs to make sure he rides the border. He doesn’t want to make it look like he’s flirting with a teenager. Very much no thank you! He’s too old for her, and he’s not interested in her like that!

In the end, Shen Yuan tries to emulate the very few sparring matches he’d had time for with Luo Binghe, or the ones he’s otherwise observed on Qing Jing. It’s actually more insulting to do this than to fight and defeat Sha Hualing outright. Shen Yuan uses the flat of his blade to nudge Sha Hualing’s arm into a better position here, whacks at her slightly uneven footing there, disarms her again and again, always stepping back and letting her gather herself or draw a new weapon instead of taking advantage to end the fight.

Sha Hualing is strong, talented, and yet despite seizing the title of Saintess, she hasn’t had the chance to fully grow into herself and her power. Especially not against a golden-core cultivator that, rightfully or not, is one of Cang Qiong’s Peak Lords. She seems excruciatingly aware of the way her demons are watching her fail here, which only compounds her errors; she grows steadily more dispossessed as the match continues, sloppier with her fighting,

What Shen Yuan is doing here…

It’s cruel.

Shen Yuan isn’t feeling particularly merciful.

Finally, Shen Yuan ends the fight. Like Shen Qingqiu, he’s drawn it out as long as he reasonably can. The sharp edges of his rage have blunted themselves. He sweeps Sha Hualing’s feet out from underneath her, dropping her flat onto her back, and instead of retreating, this time he follows through, pushing forward into her space.

"Do you yield, Saintess Sha?" Shen Yuan demands, Heng Li held at Sha Hualing's throat.

Sha Hualing’s hands claw at the earth around her; her throat bobs against Heng Li, a thin trickle of blood dripping down her neck. She grinds her teeth before spitting out, reluctantly, "I yield."

Shen Yuan steps back. He doesn't sheathe Heng Li yet. There's no telling where this is going to go next.How the demons will take this loss.

"This master believes that is two matches for Cang Qiong," Shen Qingqiu says. "We win."

Sha Hualing gets to her feet. Her face is twisted with rage. Spots of high color rest in her cheeks. Almost pitying, Shen Yuan realizes some of that rage is to cover her humiliation.

Almost pitying.

Sha Hualing had gambled on the fact that Yue Qingyuan was not on the mountain, thinking this would be easy for her. She had lost that gamble.

The question now is whether she will uphold her side of the bargain and choose to retreat.

"One match still remains," Sha Hualing says.

"We agreed—” Shen Qingqiu begins.

“—to three matches," Sha Hualing says. She has quickly mastered herself, regaining some of that false sweetness as she interrupts Shen Qingqiu. "These matches have been”—a brief hesitation, another grind of her teeth—“instructional, but can we really say we have learned all we can from such illustrious cultivators if we don't take advantage of all that they offer to teach us?"

Dammit. She isn't going to retreat. They can't start an all-out fight, not until and unless it's their last resort, or until they have actual backup. Their only option is still to get involved in this farce of a tournament.

Once the third match is over, win or lose, everything will come to a head.

"The last match, then," Shen Yuan says.

Sha Hualing claps her hands, cheerful attitude somewhat restored. There is an awful glint in her eyes as she calls to her demons, "Which brave warrior will take the third match?"

Shen Yuan knows how this will go. He’s not surprised as Elder Sky Hammer steps out of the crowd, nor as Sha Hualing describes his poisoned armor, much to the hue and outcry of the Cang Qiong disciples. Instead he’s frantically considering their own options here. Shen Yuan had desperately hoped that Liu Qingge would have come out of the Caves by now, or that one of the other Peak Lords would have been able to break the barrier. Since that hasn’t happened, and since Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan are disqualified from fighting again—they're going to have to call on one of the disciples. Are there any seniors here, who would be willing to volunteer, even against an opponent with poisoned armor—?

"This disciple will fight," a clear voice calls.

Shen Yuan hisses in a breath. When he turns, he sees exactly who he had expected.

Luo Binghe steps forward from the midst of the Cang Qiong disciples. He meets Shen Yuan's gaze levelly.

"Binghe," Shen Yuan says, warning.

"It would be this disciple's honor to fight for Cang Qiong," Luo Binghe says, not backing down.

Damn. Damn! Shen Yuan can't argue with him. Not in front of the whole sect and, more importantly, in front of the demons. He has no choice but to let Luo Binghe fight. This is exactly what he had wanted to avoid!Why would Luo Binghe volunteer for a death match?

No. Calm down. Shen Yuan has to trust in Luo Binghe. He survived this same battle in Proud Immortal Demon Way, with only his fake manual and a damaged understanding of combat to aid him. Now, at least, he has a real cultivation manual and the minor amounts of training Shen Yuan had been able to give him before going into seclusion.Plus however much he’s been training during these months in between!

This will be fine.

It has to be fine.

“…Disciple Luo Binghe of Qing Jing will fight for Cang Qiong,” Shen Yuan confirms to the demons.

Chapter 11

Chapter Text

All around Luo Binghe, Cang Qiong disciples are in an uproar, protesting the unfairness and underhanded nature of the demon’s third contestant. Luo Binghe tunes it out. This is his chance.

“This disciple will fight,” he calls.

Shizun turns and glares at him. Not cruelly; Luo Binghe is certain he can see a spark of concern in there. He doesn’t let Shizun convince him to back down. Who else will volunteer, if not him? Shen Qingqiu and Shizun have both already fought their matches.

(Shizun fought beautifully. Viciously. Luo Binghe could be jealous that Shizun spent time teaching Sha Hualing, but he knows the Saintess doesn’t appreciate the gift that she was given, taking it only as the insult that it also was. Warmth fills him at the sight of Shizun so thoroughly demonstrating his skill.

This, among so many other reasons, is why Luo Binghe is so proud and pleased to have Shizun as his teacher.)

Demons are truly despicable. This Sha Hualing specifically is vile. She invaded their mountain, pointedly only when the Sect Leader wasn't here. She cut Qiong Ding off from anyone who might come to their aid. She attempted to steal Qiong Ding's plaque, and only backed down when Shizun and Shen Qingqiu had challenged her. Then she had refused to obey the spirit of that challenge!

If she were honorable, she would have taken her demons and retreated once they—she—lost the second match. Instead, she demands yet another round in this impromptu tournament. This final round is a farce.

Luo Binghe almost wishes he could have fought the second match instead of Shizun, to put this so-called Saintess in her place. How dare she!

Luo Binghe steps into the cleared space that is the unofficial ring for these matches. Behind him, Shizun says quietly, "Do your best, Binghe."

His opponent towers over him.Luo Binghe eyes the spikes on the demon’s armor, the heavy hammer that he holds.

This is not going to be an easy fight. Then again, nothing has been easy in his life, and he has to do his best.

For Shizun.

It’s been months since Shizun went into seclusion. Months since Luo Binghe’s life has been slowly but surely changing for the better.

Ming Fan has spent these past few months keeping out of Luo Binghe’s way as much as possible, except for when his duties as head disciple demand otherwise. He has kept up his streak of keeping others away from Luo Binghe as well.

There are still some nights when it’s difficult to sleep in the dorms, but that’s not because anyone is purposefully causing problems. Luo Binghe simply doesn’t feel comfortable around his martial brothers sometimes, especially when trying to do something as vulnerable as sleep around them. Some nights he can’t take it at all. He flees the dorms to go back to the woodshed. It’s drafty, but warm enough now that they’re into summer, and Luo Binghe has already lived through multiple winters in that place. Summer is lovely in comparison. Even as summer fades gently into autumn, he still sneaks out some nights.

He usually wakes early enough that none of his martial brothers notice that he has snuck out in the middle of the night. If they do, they certainly aren’t saying anything about it.

None of them are welcoming. They’ve harassed him for years, only stopping on pain of Ming Fan yelling at them, and potential punishment from Shizun—or Shen Qingqiu. Luo Binghe always was and will be an outsider to his martial brothers. Especially now that they no longer share a shizun. He is Shen Yuan’s only disciple. While he guards that distinction jealously, it’s a new excuse for his martial brothers to ostracize him.

That’s fine. He has Yingying and, above all, he has Shizun.

The new manual has helped immensely. Luo Binghe can actually feel himself improving by leaps and bounds. He assiduously follows his and Shizun’s meditation schedule while Shizun is gone. Given that Shizun is in seclusion, Luo Binghe can almost imagine that they’re still meditating together, because in a way, even with half a mountain between them, they are.

Luo Binghe is progressing in all his classes as well. He can actually do the work now without interference. The hallmasters are even rarely, and mostly not begrudgingly, offering him praise in several of his classes!

Life is bliss.

He’s never going to give any of this up—except. He worries that, if Shizun doesn’t see his improvement, if he doesn’t see how hard Luo Binghe has been working, maybe he’ll change his mind. Luo Binghe can’t lose Shizun.

So, he can’t lose this fight.

Luo Binghe doesn’t brace himself against the demon’s first attack. That would be foolish. The size of the hammer, the strength behind the blow—he would undoubtably be flung aside no matter how good his stance was, and there is a very real possibility that his sword might break. It's only a training sword, after all. He isn’t old enough or advanced enough in his training to have a spiritual sword.

He has to fight smart.

For a while, that's what he does—dodging the blows from Elder Sky Hammer's eponymous weapon, occasionally by the skin of his teeth, and occasionally failing entirely to dodge, forcing him to take one of the powerful hits. He does his best to mitigate the damage, not letting the hammer land directly on him. He doesn't have a choice. Luo Binghe needs an opening before he'll be able to fight back.

Unfortunately, he's not seeing one.

Elder Sky Hammer's size belies his speed. His armor and his hammer both combine to protect him from attack, unless Luo Binghe can find some kind of chink in his armor or form. He's experienced at fighting in a way that Luo Binghe is not, and Luo Binghe is starting to feel the strain.

The fight drags on. Luo Binghe grits his teeth, sweat dripping down his face. Despite his size, despite the strength he puts behind every blow, Elder Sky Hammer refuses to tire. Luo Binghe is running out of energy far faster than he is.

That's when Luo Binghe makes his near-fatal mistake. Sweat drips down into his eyes; Luo Binghe is not in a position where he can afford to free one hand in order to wipe it away. He tries to blink it away instead—

The hammer smashes through the momentary gap in his defenses.

Luo Binghe goes flying—exactly as he'd expected would happen, should Elder Sky Hammer directly connect with one of his many blows. Luo Binghe is near breathless from the pain. Then he lands, unable to twist himself midair into the proper position to roll into his fall and dilute the force, and all remaining breath flees his lungs.

He gasps frantically for air. Nothing makes its way in. He can't breathe—

Luo Binghe doesn't know how he finds the strength to roll to his side. The hammer smashes down again, right where he had been—it would have smashed his skull like an overripe melon. He trembles in place momentarily, eyes wide as he stares at the crater that could have been him.

He doesn't stay like that for long. He can't afford to. He can and has to move again. The faintest amount of air has made it to his lungs now. It hurts, but it's there. It's enough to keep him going.

He's not fast enough to get back to his feet before Elder Sky Hammer swings. This time, though, it's only a glancing blow, half-deflected, redirected, with one of the defensive forms Shizun had demonstrated for him and directed him to practice, adapted to his half-kneel. Luo Binghe rolls with it when he's knocked off-balance, popping right back up again—to his feet this time, sword raised defensively in front of himself.

His blood pounds in his ears. It's not loud enough to drown out the dismayed noises of the crowd around him, the way one of them says, "What's the point of continuing the match? The outcome is predetermined."

Yes, it is. Cang Qiong has already won. But Shizun needed someone to fight, and Luo Binghe needed to prove himself to Shizun. They can't show weakness to these demons, and Luo Binghe can't show weakness to his shizun!

He has to fight!

The demon hears that quiet remark, too. He tips back his head, laughing loudly. Luo Binghe would dearly love to take advantage of this lapse, yet he's still struggling, at least somewhat, to regain his breath. Elder Sky Hammer would surely stop him before he could get anywhere close.

"Well said!" Elder Sky Hammer says. He leers at Luo Binghe. "If the child admits defeat, then this elder will be able to spare his life. He has no way to win."

Luo Binghe bristles, opening his mouth to snap back—

"He'll win," Shizun says, resolute. His voice isn't particularly loud, but it manages to carry through the chaos of all the disciples and demons, to the center of the courtyard where Luo Binghe stands.

Luo Binghe can't stop the wide, nearly feral grin that stretches across his face. Shizun still believes in him!

He throws himself back into the fight.

Shizun's trust in him has reinvigorated him. He ignores the jeering from the demons' side. He concentrates only on the fight, on the movement of his feet, on scanning Elder Sky Hammer for any weaknesses. Slowly, the tide of the battle turns. Elder Sky Hammer's blows can't land. They can't even brush him.

Finally, Luo Binghe spots the weakness he has been searching for. Yes, he had noted it early on, the fact that Elder Sky Hammer's face and hands were the only parts of him uncovered. The only parts unprotected by his poisoned armor. Luo Binghe hadn't been able to take advantage of that—Elder Sky Hammer had surely trained to protect those gaps in his defense, and Luo Binghe couldn't even avoid his hammer, much less his armor!

Yet now...

Luo Binghe's grin grows wider, more a baring of his teeth than anything so pleasant as a smile. The hammer whistles past him, Luo Binghe's hair fluttering in its wake. He gathers energy, condenses his qi in the palm of his hand, and he strikes.

Elder Sky Hammer collapses to the ground.

Luo Binghe has won.

Oh, thank f*ck, Shen Yuan thinks. He should never have doubted the Protagonist, but it had started looking a little dicey there for a moment!

[Congratulations, congratulations, congratulations! Protagonist: Luo Binghe has captured Sha Hualing's interests and become famous in a fight against demons in the Cang Qiong invasion! +500 Protagonist Satisfaction Points.]

Yes, Luo Binghe should be pleased with himself. That was very well done! Even if it was unnecessary, as Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan had already won the tournament, it really showed how good Cang Qiong's cultivators are, and bought them even more face in front of the demons. Ha! A clean sweep of the tournament.

Strange that the System didn't make any note of him gaining Liu Mingyan's interest, though. Shen Yuan supposes that's because Liu Mingyan didn't have a point of comparison, not having fought—and lost—against Sha Hualing herself. Personally, Shen Yuan thinks that everyone should have had their attention drawn by Luo Binghe's duel.

Bah. It's Liu Mingyan's loss. Besides, there are years yet for Luo Binghe to grab her attention. Shen Yuan aims to make sure that Luo Binghe will be able to spend all those years safely in this sect, and many more besides. However long he wishes to remain here. He'll want to fly the nest eventually, and he'll need to break his seal, and presumably, once that happens, he will take on his destiny of becoming Emperor of the Demon Realm.

But the point is...Shen Yuan will let him leave when he wants to, and only when he wants to. He can protect Luo Binghe.

His white lotus will never have to go into the Endless Abyss.

Not if Shen Yuan has anything to say about it.

Sha Hualing is grinding her teeth again. That can't be good for them.

In the most begrudging voice possible, Sha Hualing says, "Ling-er is most impressed by Cang Qiong Mountain. This sect has certainly produced several generations of talent."

"We are three for three," Shen Qingqiu says. "We have surpassed any result needed. Now, if the Saintess will withdraw her forces? We are, unfortunately, unable to continue accommodating our guests." The last word is so icily polite that it swings all the way back around to being a sneer, and the meaning to his words couldn't be more clear:

Get out.

Sha Hualing finally loses her grasp on her temper. To lose to two Peak Lords—that was predictable to most anyone who would care to take a bet, and Shen Yuan had made sure to grind it in her face. Still, to lose to a disciple? None of the demons know that he’s the Protagonist! There’s no way for anyone, barring Shen Yuan, to understand just how impossible Luo Binghe’s loss would have been.

In the absence of an excuse, in the face of abject humiliation, Sha Hualing takes her anger out on the one subordinate she can: Elder Sky Hammer.

She slaps him, saying, "You lose face for us all! Losing to Senior Shen's young disciple like that, you—you—!”

Sha Hualing lost her own match to Shen Yuan, but even so, she is a Saintess and a demon of noble birth. Elder Sky Hammer is not so high-ranking; all he can do is cower before her, taking the punishment and groveling before her.

"Saintess, your subordinate is incompetent! Begging the Saintess for punishment!" he cries.

Shen Yuan doesn't envy him when he returns to the Demon Realm. He very much does want to send this invasion force back to whence it came.

Get off our mountain already!

"Discipline your subordinates elsewhere if you must, Saintess Sha," he says. "Our Qiong Ding Peak is not an appropriate place for nobility to swing their weight around." Especially not demon nobility, who so rudely invaded their sect.

Sha Hualing plasters a conciliatory expression onto her face as she says, "Apologies to Senior Shen. It's only that this Ling-er was so disappointed in the trash she brought with her, compared to the talent Cang Qiong sect brought to bear, so she lost control for a moment. Please don't laugh."

Laugh? About this utter defeat of Sha Hualing's invasion? About these demons who killed disciples on Qiong Ding, at the heart of Cang Qiong, where they should have been safe?

No, this is not a laughing matter. None of it is.

Let Sha Hualing go home and be shamed for her defeat. Let her swear vengeance against Cang Qiong or Shen Yuan for the humiliation if she must. Shen Yuan will be ready and waiting for her should she return.

Of course, Sha Hualing can't let it go at just that. She turns to Elder Sky Hammer. "For Elder Single Arm or this Saintess to lose to Seniors Shen in their matches—this is to be expected, against the best the Human Realm has to offer for the Demon Realm's instruction. Yet Elder Sky Hammer lost his match, too, against a stripling. There is no need for me to say anything; figure out what to do for yourself."

Oh, hell, Shen Yuan thinks in that one moment of clarity. He can see the thought flash across Elder Sky Hammer's face, can see the thought become action, can see how Luo Binghe isn't facing the opponent he had already won against—can see Elder Sky Hammer raise his hammer to swing at Luo Binghe's unprotected back—

Elder Sky Hammer crashes down to the ground. It takes almost no effort on Shen Yuan's part; he flashes behind the demon, jabbing his fan into the back of the demon's knee with a sharper and heavier surge of qi than he actually needed. Luo Binghe doesn't even have time to fully register the danger he was in before it's over. He finishes turning just in time to catch the sight of Elder Sky Hammer collapsing, unconscious.

Shen Yuan stoops, picking up Elder Sky Hammer's weapon. He weighs it in one hand. Not really his style, but the effortless way he handles it, the way he sweeps the demon crowd with a cold gaze, paints an intimidating picture. Politics are about appearances, and when it comes to demons, strength.

This, then, should send a message to the demons before him.

Shen Yuan casually tosses the hammer aside. It doesn't hit any of the demons, but they have to dodge out of the way, scrambling as it lands in the midst of them. A cold smile grows on Shen Yuan's face.

"My disciple is not yours to bully," he says. A quiet declaration that rings in the silence of the courtyard. Everyone is staring at him. His smile grows.

"Evidently Saintess Sha cannot properly discipline her subordinates, nor herself,“ Shen Qingqiu adds silkily. "She suggested the tournament and she has lost. Thoroughly. Will Saintess Sha now depart?"

Shen Yuan lets Shen Qingqiu handle that. He looks over his shoulder at Luo Binghe.

"Are you all right?" he asks.

"Mn!" Luo Binghe says. "Thanking Shizun—!”

Shen Yuan cuts him off with a whack to the head with his fan. Gently. "Silly boy, volunteering yourself like that," he scolds quietly.

Luo Binghe pouts, rubbing the top of his head, but doesn’t argue. Smart boy. “Apologies to Shizun,” he says. There is, nevertheless, a pleased glint in his eye.

A glint that grows when Shen Yuan says, unable to help himself, “Binghe fought very well.”

Shen Yuan is keeping one eye on the proceedings during his little talk with his disciple, in case Sha Hualing decides to press her luck here after all. Shen Qingqiu is handling the negotiations well, at least long enough for Shen Yuan to check in with his disciple. Surely Sha Hualing won't be foolish enough to try anything; at the moment, she even seems embarrassed! All they need to do is finish convincing her to leave, and this can be solved without any more bloodshed.

This can end.

Shen Yuan is paying attention to the wrong demon.

He took his attention off of Elder Sky Hammer, assuming him safely out of the equation, which is why he's caught off guard when the demon leaps to his feet. He is aiming, once again, for Shen Yuan's student.

There's no time for thought. Shen Yuan shoves Luo Binghe back with one hand; with the other, he raises Heng Li into a defensive position, the blade glinting in the sun. There is no weapon to guard against, none save Elder Sky Hammer himself, so Shen Yuan defends against exactly that threat, spiritual sword stabbing straight through Elder Sky Hammer's armor. There is a whistling through the air, and Xiu Ya slams down like a lightning bolt, deep in the demon's side.

Elder Sky Hammer doesn't slow down. His forward momentum is too great to be pulled off course, even by these two attacks.

Ha, Yuanyuan, you fell for it again! You really keep forgetting what damage demons can take. You'll disappoint A-Yan if you make that mistake in a real fight—

f*ck!

Shen Yuan lets go of Heng Li as if he's been burned, throwing himself away, but it's too late. In the moment of Shen Yuan's horrified comprehension, Elder Sky Hammer had lunged forward that final distance, utterly uncaring of the swords through him, determined only to follow through with his attack.

Pain races through Shen Yuan's right arm, robes and skin half-shredded. His attempt to dodge had, ironically, made the subsequent wounds worse. Instead of pinpricks, the poisoned armor had caught and dragged.

Elder Sky Hammer collapses to the ground. Laughs, the sound awful as he chokes around the blood flooding his lungs. "Qing Jing Lord, I've taken you down with me!"

"Shizun!" Luo Binghe cries, at nearly the same time.

Much as Shen Yuan would like to play it off, there's no disguising the damage. His sleeve is a mess, red dyeing the tattered silk, and it drips down his fingers to splatter against the ground of the courtyard.

"It’s—” Shen Yuan begins, not totally sure what lie he's going to try for, but he doesn't even get a whole sentence out of his mouth.

Shen Qingqiu swoops down like the wrath of a god.

He yanks Xiu Ya out of Elder Sky Hammer, twisting the sword as he does, so that the injury widens. It must be excruciating, but Elder Sky Hammer is beyond pain. His glee buoys him.

"Give me the cure," Shen Qingqiu snarls.

"There isn't one!" Elder Sky Hammer says, still laughing slightly. "I didn't speak only to scare; when I said there was no cure, I meant there was no cure. Qing Jing Lord will die—”

Xiu Ya flashes down.

Shen Qingqiu kicks Elder Sky Hammer's decapitated head toward the demonic forces. It rolls to a stop at Sha Hualing's feet.

"This master will repeat himself: give. Me. The cure."

"He told the truth," Sha Hualing says, seemingly shaken. "The poison is called 'Without-A-Cure.' Demons may withstand it, but to humans, it is deadly, and truly has no cure."

Are you f*cking kidding me right now? Shen Yuan demands silently. What lazy writing! What lazy naming! What a horrid excuse for a world, that Sha Hualing can say that sh*tty name for a poison without blushing!

But the absolute worst part is that Shen Yuan does, in fact, know this goddamn poison. Isn't it the same one that Qin Wanyue had been poisoned with during the Immortal Alliance Conference? Wasn't it the very first instance where the readers—and Luo Binghe, using the benefit of hindsight—had realized just what dual cultivation with a Heavenly Demon could accomplish?

f*ck Shen Yuan's life for real.

Shen Qingqiu does not take this news well, nor gracefully.

"If Saintess Sha has no information to share about this poison," he grinds out, "then what reason does this master have to let her leave this mountain alive?"

The weight of his qi—an immortal master, a Peak Lord, furious—presses down on them all. Even then, Shen Yuan can tell that Shen Qingqiu isn't focussing any of that power on the disciples arrayed behind the two Peak Lords. All that knife-edged, winter-cold rage is directed pointedly and unceasingly at the demons.

Sha Hualing blurts out, “You—you can’t—”

This is why we were stalling! You can’t take them all! Especially not alone! Shen Yuan thinks, and grabs at his brother’s arm. “Ge—”

Shen Qingqiu shrugs him off. Shen Yuan grabs at him again, this time channeling qi so Shen Qingqiu can’t get out of his grip so easily. He immediately winces at the shattering pain that shoots through him. Mostly centered on his right arm, which—what, exactly, does Without-A-Cure do? It’s obviously more than simply killing him.

Sha Hualing sees that wince. She obviously decides to buy herself time, as she says, “It’s a spiritual poison!”

All of Shen Qingqiu’s rage and attention is abruptly aimed at her with arrow-like precision.

“If—if you’ve been successfully poisoned, starting from the wound, the vic—the, the affected one’s spiritual flow becomes disconnected. It spreads throughout the whole meridian system, and it eventually causes both their qi and blood to stagnate and coagulate,” Sha Hualing explains.

Well. That’s certainly less than ideal. It also neatly explains what happened with Qin Wanyue; the readers had never received a very good explanation, since the narrative was from Luo Binghe’s point-of-view, and he didn’t have a full understanding of what the poison was doing. All they knew was that it was weakening—and slowly killing—Qin Wanyue.

…Slowly killing her.

Eventually blood and qi stagnates.

They have Qian Cao. Shen Yuan feels fine for now. It will take time for the poison to catch up with him, right? Time before he’s in danger?

Time that he can use to help get the demons off this mountain. They can’t kill all the demons like Shen Qingqiu is threatening, but they can still get them to leave. As soon as Shen Yuan collapses, their fragile defense will go with it. They can’t afford to have Shen Qingqiu’s focus split between fighting demons and defending Shen Yuan.

Shen Qingqiu steps forward, murder evident in every line of his body.

We need to get them off the mountain, Shen Yuan thinks frantically. Think, think, we won, Sha Hualing doesn’t want to be here any longer, either—how do I get them to leave—

Why can’t the demons just go? Has their pride truly been strung so much? If Sha Hualing orders a retreat, will they even obey her? Do they think, with one Peak Lord out of commission, they should see if they can take the other?

God f*cking dammit, how do I—

Leaves swirl around Shen Yuan’s feet, bolstered by Shen Qingqiu’s qi. Shen Yuan reaches out for one of them with his own qi, hiding yet another wince when the qi jerks back and ricochets through his meridians as soon as he tries to extend it beyond his body. The poison is affecting his meridians quicker than his blood, it seems.

I can’t do anything to help. I can’t hold Jiu-ge back. We need another Peak Lord—!

Like an answer to a prayer, Liu Qingge drops out of the sky. He sends a massive sword glare, roiling with his killing intent, at the ranks of the demons and then, Cheng Luan in one hand, lands neatly beside Shen Qingqiu.

Oh, thank f*ck, he was still in the Lingxi Caves after all!

One of the disciples must have found him. It took a while—the Caves are large and thoroughly twisted, and Liu Qingge may well have still been deeply in meditation—but the War God is on Qiong Ding.

He is very aware of the threat the sect is under.

And, like Shen Qingqiu, he is not happy about it.

Chapter 12

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe can’t tear his eyes off Shizun’s arm. It’s still dripping blood, a steady plip-plip-plip against the stone of the courtyard. Audible in the hushed silence after Elder Sky Hammer had laughed his last laugh. Audible, because everyone has been cowed by the overwhelming killing intent Shen Qingqiu is releasing.

Had Luo Binghe thought he had ever seen his then-shizun angry?

He was wrong.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t like him—hates him, if Luo Binghe correctly reads the way that Shen Qingqiu treated him versus the way Shen Yuan does—but this is a pure, feral rage of the type that Luo Binghe has never seen before. Even when Shen Qingqiu had been the cruelest to Luo Binghe, it had never been this.

The affected one’s spiritual flow becomes disconnected, Sha Hualing said. It eventually causes both their qi and blood to stagnate and coagulate.

When I said there was no cure, I meant there was no cure. Qing Jing Lord will die.

This can’t be happening. It can’t.

Not because of him.

Shizun—Shizun really—because of Luo Binghe—

Hadn’t he sworn that he would become stronger, to stop this kind of event from happening again? Hadn’t he sworn that he would repay Shen Yuan someday?

Is this the recompense that he offers? Further injury to the man who has already given him so much?

“Shizun,” Luo Binghe says again, soundlessly this time, a horrified exhale that is lost to his shizun’s turned back.

Shen Qingqiu is facing the demons all by himself. Shen Yuan is going to die. There is nothing Luo Binghe can do.

A man drops out of the sky. His hair is caught up in a high tail, his robes bright white edged in black, and his qi is nearly as furious as Shen Qingqiu’s when he sweeps it across the courtyard to attack the demons.

“Liu Qingge,” Shizun breathes out in relief.

The demons tried to scatter in advance of the attack, but it was too quick and powerful; they are knocked aside by it—including, to Luo Binghe’s vindictive glee, the demon Saintess Sha Hualing. Slighter than the demons she brought with her, closer to the front as she was, she goes rolling. Hatefully, the attack isn’t enough to kill her. She gets back up to her feet immediately, her clothes—such as they are—ripped and in disarray.

Despite everything, she still holds her head up haughtily. Luo Binghe is sure he isn’t imagining the fear in her eyes, though.

“This Ling-er underestimated Cang Qiong today!” she declares. “But we’ll definitely meet again in the future! Let’s go!”

Oh, we’ll meet in the future, will we? Luo Binghe thinks darkly. Watch your back, Sha Hualing.

Liu Qingge has a similar opinion. “Coming and going as you please? Invading our sect and thinking you can get away with it? Dream on!”

Liu Qingge throws his sword in the air, creating hundreds, thousands of sword glares. It’s such a showy move, such a display of power, that Luo Binghe nearly misses Shen Qingqiu’s own abrupt movement. His former shizun raises an arm, fingers drawing through the air as if he’s using a sword seal, but Xiu Ya stays in his hand.

What is he—

Across the courtyard, Sha Hualing screams, barely ahead of the rain of Liu Qingge’s sword glares. It is nearly lost in the chaos of all the demons being attacked, but Luo Binghe has been keeping half his attention on her, memorizing her face, planning for the day that he will revenge Shizun upon her.

So he hears her scream. He sees the way that she clutches at her right arm—or where it used to be. No, it’s still attached, but barely, and it’s a shredded mess besides. If she heals from that, it will take a long time.

…If Shen Qingqiu was so precise, he should have slit her throat and had done with it.

But maybe, like Luo Binghe, he isn’t satisfied with a quick, clean death. Shizun is suffering because of her; she should suffer in return.

The demons flee. Hemmed in by the disciples, attacked from above by the War God, very few of them escape. Sha Hualing is, unfortunately among them. She is, by all accounts, worthy of the name Saintess; injured though she is, she and several of the demons forming the core group around her make their way off the mountain.

Luo Binghe will deal with her in the future. For now, he’s far more concerned with Shizun’s health.

Shen Qingqiu is, too. All the Qing Jing disciples have circled around Shen Yuan, watching anxiously as Shen Qingqiu grabs at Shen Yuan, feeding qi into him.

“How am I?” Shizun asks lightly, seemingly unconcerned.

Shen Qingqiu’s lips are thin and white as he concentrates on Shen Yuan. A muscle flexes in his jaw. The addition of Shen Qingqiu’s qi has finally caused the wounds to Shizun’s arm to stop bleeding, but it’s a mess of shallow scratches.

“You’re a fool,” Shen Qingqiu says, through gritted teeth. His eyes cut, burning, to Luo Binghe, still halfway behind Shizun.

“What’s wrong with him?” Liu Qingge asks bluntly, breaking through the cluster of disciples. He takes in Shizun’s arm, the way his face—when Luo Binghe checks—is slowly leeching of color.

“Poison,” Shen Qingqiu spits. “The armored one, there.” He jerks his head toward Elder Sky Hammer’s corpse, lying only a few feet away.

“Don’t let anyone touch the armor,” Shizun warns. “He covered the whole of it.”

Liu Qingge sweeps his eyes up and down Shizun’s form. He reaches out, pressing a hand against Shizun’s arm just above Shen Qingqiu’s.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Shen Qingqiu snaps.

“Repaying my debt from the Lingxi Caves,” Liu Qingge says.

“You really don’t have to,” Shizun says. His voice trails off breathily at the end.

When he falls, Luo Binghe is close enough to catch him. Still, Shizun is an adult, and Luo Binghe is not yet practiced in using his qi to bolster his strength, so all he can do is bear Shizun to the ground as gently as possible.

“Oh,” Shizun says. He waves a hand as Shen Qingqiu lunges to get a hand back on him, to feed qi to him once more. Liu Qingge crouches next to the three of them. “I…I just need to lie down for a moment.”

“Fool,” Shen Qingqiu hisses again. He fishes through Shizun’s ruined sleeve; doesn’t find what he’s looking for, and dives for the other. His hand emerges with a talisman grasped in it. He lights it with a flare of qi.

Shizun laughs. It’s the barest breath of a sound, and he coughs at the end of it. “Jinxed us,” he says, bright copper spilling down his lips. “Shouldn’t have…given us so many. Of course we would…end up needing them all.”

“You are going to stay alive until Mu Qingfang answers this, do you hear me?” Shen Qingqiu demands. “You aren’t allowed to die.”

“Mn,” Shizun hums.

“That demon was lying, wasn’t he? ‘Without-A-Cure’ has to have some cure, right?” Luo Binghe asks desperately. He can’t hold it back any more. Elder Sky Hammer had to be lying. Shizun can’t—he can’t be dying.

Liu Qingge shakes his head.

“…Don’t cry,” Shizun whispers. His uninjured arm raises. Pats, clumsily, at Luo Binghe’s shoulder; he can’t seem to raise it any further. “No need…for that. It will be…alright…”

“A-Yuan, stay awake,” Shen Qingqiu says. “A-Yuan. A-Yuan!”

Shizun doesn’t answer. His eyes have slipped closed, and the pallor of his skin reminds Luo Binghe of—of his mother—when he came too late—

Shen Qingqiu makes a low, wounded noise. Luo Binghe can’t track the movement, but he’s abruptly tumbling halfway across the courtyard. He slides to a halt, shivering, the phantom sensation of fingers wrapping around his throat nearly too much to bear. He gags at the sensation, even though it’s already over and done with. Shen Qingqiu could have snapped his neck so easily instead.

He sits up, still shaking faintly. Shen Qingqiu is already a distant streak in the sky as he shoots for Qian Cao, Shizun carried with him. Shizun's loss of consciousness must have made him decide against waiting for help to arrive.

Shizun…

Callused fingers tip his jaw up. Luo Binghe flinches back from them, then freezes in place, unsure how his martial uncle will take that.

“Relax,” Liu Qingge says. His dark eyes flick over Luo Binghe’s neck, and he says, “Can you tilt your head without pain?”

Luo Binghe carefully does as he’s asked.

Liu Qingge hums, satisfied. “You’ll have bruises,” he says briskly. “What happened here?” He gestures around the courtyard.

There are a great many disciples he could ask. He’s asking Luo Binghe.

Luo Binghe opens his mouth and starts to talk.

Liu Qingge is a good judge—of danger, of fights, of monsters.

He has to be, if he wants to do his job right. If he is at all worthy to call himself Bai Zhan’s Peak Lord. He knows how to handle himself, how to make the best use of his abilities, and he knows how far he can press his strength and cultivation.

He can press quite far.

…He is not immune to making mistakes.

Liu Qingge has never had a qi deviation until the one in the Lingxi Caves. He was so confident in himself that he didn’t notice the signs creeping up on him, the twisting of his meridians, the stuttering flow of his qi, until it was too late. Until he was subsumed in the raging fire, attacking anything and everything in his field of vision.

Including his own martial brother.

When he pieces it together later, he finds that it had almost made sense at the time. Shen Qingqiu was his enemy, and more than that, Liu Qingge was already too far along the road to madness. He couldn’t have stopped himself if he tried. Not unless he had been shocked out of it, and he’s aware, now, of how low the chances of that are. Even the sight of the man he now knows to be Shen Qingqiu’s twin hadn’t been enough to drag him out of the madness. Shen Yuan had simply been another target, drawing his aim momentarily before his attention swung back around to Shen Qingqiu, Xiu Ya used as an identifier for his enemy.

Liu Qingge can only be grateful that the confusion of there being two of them had kept his deviating self distracted. The fight wasn’t going well—for Qing Jing’s Lords. Shen Qingqiu has never won a match against Liu Qingge. Technically, he still hasn’t.

Liu Qingge has always known, even as he excels at fights and handling demons, that he’s never been good with people. He had thought himself a sufficient judge of character, but has never tried to interact too deeply with others. He’s not good at the fiddly minutiae people want from him.

He forms his opinion, and that’s that. Whether they interact with him after isn’t Liu Qingge’s concern.

His martial siblings, of course, he has no choice with. He has to deal with them. Fortunately, they’ve—for the most part—grown up together, or at least the other Peak Lords have been around him as he grew. Liu Qingge is the youngest of their generation, after all. A good several years younger than Shen Qingqiu, who had come to the sect at the late age of sixteen.

Liu Qingge has always known where he stood with Shen Qingqiu.

Or he thought he did.

Wake up, fool! At this rate, you’ll kill yourself before help can arrive!

Why would Shen Qingqiu ever try to save him? He hates Liu Qingge. He’s wanted him dead for years, and even tried to kill him before; his brother’s determination to help shouldn’t have been enough to tip the scales of that disdain.

Right?

What are you playing at?

A very exciting game called ‘no dying of preventable conditions in the Lingxi Caves.’

And then there’s the brother.

Shen Yuan.

Where did he come from? He’s real, that much Mu Qingfang confirms for him when he asks. He waits until the twins—twins!—have been checked over by Mu Qingfang and exited his meditation cavern before he asks any follow-up questions.

“What’s going on?” Liu Qingge asks. The world has tilted on its axis and for once in his life, he’s having a hard time scrambling to catch his balance.

“As I said,” Mu Qingfang says, offering Liu Qingge a dampened cloth with which to wipe his face off. “Shen Qingqiu brought his brother back to Cang Qiong with him several weeks previous. We were introduced at the Peak Lords meeting some days ago.”

“Thought we weren’t due for another one of those ’til next month,” Liu Qingge says, counting the days in his head. He hasn’t been in the Caves that long, and though his sense of time likely isn’t completely accurate, given the way intense cultivation distorts the sense of time passing, it doesn’t feel as though it’s been more than a month since he entered seclusion.

“Ah,” Mu Qingfang says wryly. “Yes, you’re right. Shen Qingqiu called for one. Mostly to introduce his brother in a controlled setting…and to confirm his appointment as Qing Jing’s Peak Lord.”

Liu Qingge jerks in place. “Confirm his what?” Shen Qingqiu would never cede control of his peak. Is Liu Qingge supposed to believe that he handed it off to someone else, even if that person is his brother?

“Qing Jing has two Peak Lords,” Mu Qingfang says. “Shixiong had a scroll from Shen-shibo. Wei Qingwei and Zhangmen-shixiong testified as to its authenticity. Shen Yuan is Peak Lord, as is Shen Qingqiu.”

“He’s not Cang Qiong!” Liu Qingge sputters. “He can’t be Peak Lord!”

“He is,” Mu Qingfang says. “Both. He’s been Qing Jing since Shen Qingqiu entered the sect.” His lips turn downward in a faint frown.

Liu Qingge frantically scrolls through his memories. Shen Qingqiu’s name, before being granted his courtesy name by Shen Anwei, was Shen Jiu, and Liu Qingge is all but certain that he never met a Shen Yuan. How could Shen Qingqiu have possibly kept Shen Yuan hidden all these years? Someone would have talked—

Unless Shen Yuan was never on Qing Jing in the first place.

Damn it all, that makes sense. Shen Jiu was late coming into the sect; Liu Qingge has always been faintly suspicious that he must have bribed his way in. A lazy, entitled, noble’s son, late to his cultivation, but at least he had been here. This ‘Shen Yuan’ never even bothered to make his way to the mountain, and somehow Shen Qingqiu swindled his shizun into making this negligent person a Peak Lord? The sheer audacity. The entitlement, the laziness. For Shen Yuan to think that he could avoid all the work their generation put into gaining their titles, and simply swoop in years later to claim a place he hadn’t earned—

“I’m going to stop you right there,” Mu Qingfang says, obviously reading at least some of those thoughts on his face. Mu Qingfang’s voice is level, but his eyes are serious, with just a thread of danger lacing both of them. “Shixiong, please know that I am only telling you this because it’s all information that has been spread to the other Peak Lords already, and you will undoubtably learn all of it—and any associated rumors—as soon as you exit seclusion, so it is better that you have all the associated facts here and now. I will not be disclosing any more of Shen Yuan’s medical information to anyone, nor any suppositions about his past. However.

“Approximately three weeks ago, Shen Yuan underwent a devastating qi deviation that disrupted most of his autobiographical memories. He is a cultivator, and has been working as a rogue for some time. He was investigating the same mission that Shen Qingqiu was when they met up, and Shen Qingqiu escorted him back to Cang Qiong after the fact.” He pauses, visibly debating himself, before he adds, “Given what was said at the meeting, there was evidently confusion, at an unspecified point in his past, as to whether he was still among the living.”

Liu Qingge chews on that.

He’s long since given up on understanding how Qing Jing works. He’d given up on it as a disciple; it’s full of hoity-toity, entitled little lords, and no one defines that more than Shen Qingqiu. An unscrupulous man, a backstabber who had threatened to kill him one day—

—and hadn’t taken advantage at the easiest time to kill him and cover it up.

Liu Qingge has no idea what Shen-shibo was thinking making a man like Shen Qingqiu into Qing Jing’s Lord, much less appointing his then-unknown brother at his side. In the end, though, it’s not Liu Qingge’s peak. If it falls apart under Shen Qingqiu’s leadership—if it’s thrown into upheaval by suddenly having a new Peak Lord to contend with—what does it matter to Liu Qingge? The sect as a whole will survive, and eventually they will have their own replacements. Qing Jing can pull itself back from its destruction—or not—as it will.

For now, Liu Qingge will reserve judgment on Shen Yuan. He’ll wait and see what kind of man he proves himself. Whether at home among Qing Jing’s nobles, or more akin to Shen Anwei…

…or the same traitorous viper as Shen Qingqiu.

Time will tell.

Time does tell.

Mu Qingfang attempts to persuade Liu Qingge to leave the Caves and go to Qian Cao with him to recover, but Liu Qingge staunchly refuses. He still has a lot of time remaining for his seclusion, and he knows what he did wrong this time. He’ll be paying more attention to himself, in case his qi starts going out of control again. Mu Qingfang doesn’t seem to like this plan, but he concedes, leaving an emergency talisman—probably of the same kind that Shen Yuan had used—with him in case it’s needed.

Months later, Liu Qingge is pulled out of his meditation by hurried footsteps in the Lingxi Caves, drawing steadily nearer, and a voice calling, “Liu-shishu! Liu-shishu!”

A young voice.

Late teens, but the younger disciples shouldn’t be in the Lingxi Caves unless it’s under extraordinary circ*mstances. They certainly shouldn’t be this deep in the Caves; usually they’re ushered toward caverns closer to the surface, ones more easily monitored, and they’re checked in on by Qian Cao to make sure no tragedy has befallen them.

More than that—this disciple sounds panicked.

Liu Qingge unfolds himself from his meditation pose, rising to his feet with one movement, sword placed at his waist. He exits the cavern at a quick pace, nearly running into the disciple wandering the tunnels.

The disciple is one of Qiong Ding’s. His robes are ruffled, covered with dirt and a few specks of blood.

“Liu-shishu!” the disciple cries in relief.

“What’s going on?”

“Demons! Demons are attacking Qiong Ding. Shen-shishu told us to shelter around the Caves, care for the wounded, and—and find out if Liu-shishu was still in the Caves. Then they went to fight the demons.” For all the fear trembling in the disciple’s voice, his report is clear and succinct.

Demons dared to attack Cang Qiong?

“Where?” Liu Qingge asks, setting a quick, loping pace out of the Caves.

“The main hall, I think,” the disciple says, keeping pace with him, though not without effort. He needs to work on his endurance if getting here and heading back is enough to get him out of breath.

Liu Qingge takes in snapshots as he bursts out of the Caves and beelines for Qiong Ding’s main hall: disciples huddled together in front of the Lingxi Caves, Qian Cao disciples darting between groups as they maintain triage; plumes of smoke and flashes of blood scattered all over the slopes, the latter occasionally next to a slumped form that’s not always a demon; a crowd clustered together in Qiong Ding’s great courtyard, Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan bright pinpoints at the front of the Cang Qiong side, a headless demon in front of them and the whole of the demonic forces arrayed on the other side of the courtyard.

Qing Jing’s scholars aren’t enough to scare the demons off the mountain. That’s fine. Bai Zhan’s War God will gladly do that for them.

It’s only after, when the demons have all fled like the cowards they are, that he realizes he doesn’t know what exactly has happened here. Shen Yuan was injured, poisoned, apparently by the now-headless demon, and Shen Qingqiu—

Liu Qingge has never seen that expression on Shen Qingqiu’s face before.

It’s…uncomfortable.

Shen Yuan loses consciousness. Unsurprising, given the way Liu Qingge could feel the poison gnawing through his meridians and veins. The pain must be intolerable, even if it weren’t killing him. And it is killing him, that’s all too evident.

Shen Qingqiu can see it, too. He bodily tosses his disciple out of his way, gathers Shen Yuan in his arms, and sets off for Qian Cao. Mu Qingfang is likely Shen Yuan’s only chance, and even with the whole of Qian Cao brought to bear behind their healer—Liu Qingge isn’t sure it will be enough.

Shen Qingqiu’s abrupt departure means that the clean-up has been left to Liu Qingge.

First things first: what happened?

He briefly checks over the disciple Shen Qingqiu tossed aside. No lingering damage from the toss, though he does seem otherwise roughed up. Isn’t this the kid Shen Qingqiu had stolen out from under him at the disciple selections several years ago? Huh.

The disciple starts talking. The reason he’s so roughed up is because, in the time it took Liu Qingge to be summoned out of the Lingxi Caves and make it to the main hall of Qiong Ding, the Qing Jing Peak Lords had held a miniature tournament with the demons. Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan had both defeated their opponents—using dirty tricks on Shen Qingqiu’s part, no doubt, though he isn’t yet sure how Shen Yuan had done—but it wasn’t enough for the demons to leave. So this disciple had volunteered for the last fight, against the demon with the poisoned armor.

He won, a victory that Cang Qiong hadn’t even necessarily needed, and then the downed demon had proven itself as much of an honorless bastard as the rest of its race: it had attacked the disciple.

“Shizun,” the disciple says, voice cracking. “Shizun—defended me, but he was poisoned, and now he’s…”

Dying.

Huh. Liu Qingge had thought this disciple was Shen Qingqiu’s. The man had certainly swooped down fast enough to take him from Liu Qingge; had he then so readily handed off the training of this child to his brother?

What a waste.

He has to admit, he may have misjudged Shen Yuan. The man had saved Liu Qingge and now he’s saved Luo Binghe. Not the actions that Shen Qingqiu would take.

(Though, a niggling portion of Liu Qingge’s mind tells him, wasn’t Shen Qingqiu right there in the Lingxi Caves, helping to save you? Don’t you owe him, as well?)

Qian Cao medics are starting to land in the courtyard. The barrier the demons erected fell when they departed; Qian Cao must have been patrolling the edge of the shields, waiting for it to fall and let them through. Undoubtably summoned by one of those emergency talismans that Shen Yuan had tucked in his sleeves—or perhaps they’d simply looked out the window and seen the chaos and clouds of smoke on Qiong Ding. At a glance, Liu Qingge doesn’t see Mu Qingfang among them. He must still be on Qian Cao, or intercepting Shen Qingqiu mid-flight.

Good. His expertise will be needed if there’s any chance of keeping Shen Yuan alive.

There’s nothing Liu Qingge can do to help with that. The disciple has finished giving his report, trailing off into miserable silence. Liu Qingge grabs him by the back of the robes, ignoring his startled squeak, and drops him into a knot of medics. Then he goes to start checking the bodies of the demons left behind.

If any of them are still alive, he’s sure that Zhangmen-shixiong will have some very pointed questions to ask them upon his return to the sect.

Chapter 13

Chapter Text

There is nothing worse than a healer who is prevented from doing his job.

Mu Qingfang and all of Qian Cao watch, helpless, as smoke rises over Qiong Ding. An emergency talisman pulses at Mu Qingfang’s side, its match located at the Lingxi Caves. Mu Qingfang doesn’t dare hope that Shen Yuan or Shen Qingqiu are still at the Caves; no doubt one of them set the alert for the medics, but the smoke is largely concentrated on the center of Qiong Ding.

The Qing Jing Peak Lords wouldn’t have stayed at the Lingxi Caves when the demons and chaos were further down the slope.

Qian Cao is locked out by the barrier the demons have erected. They’ve sent messengers to Ku Xing, in the hopes that they might be able to work their way through the barrier using talismans, but they’ve not yet received a response. Even when they do, it will take time to break down the barrier.

Time, for a medical emergency, is a very fickle thing.

Out of nowhere, the barrier abruptly collapses. Mu Qingfang sucks in a breath, leaning forward on his sword and barking, “Go! Team One to the Lingxi Caves, Team Two to check the forests for stragglers, the rest of you with me—”

Another emergency talisman sparks at his hip. An interesting fact about these talismans: they are designed to allow the wielder to know where the corresponding talisman is, and they can function as a limited communicator. Not with words, but the talisman can measure the qi sent into it and, if emotions are running high enough, capture a snapshot of whatever bleeds through in the user’s qi, hopefully something to help the responder assess the situation. They’re emergency talismans, so it’s never good that they’re being used, but every little hint of what a medic is going toward can help.

This talisman is flooded with qi, all but screaming in pain-terror-helplessness-desperation. Shen Qingqiu’s qi, just that barest shade different from his brother’s and far more familiar to Mu Qingfang, which means—

Shen Yuan.

The match to the talisman Mu Qingfang holds is hurtling toward Qian Cao. He swears, wheeling around in the sky and streaking back toward his peak.

“Lan Bao, you take charge!” he calls over his shoulder to his head disciple. He’s needed on Qian Cao.

Mu Qingfang and Shen Qingqiu land at near exactly the same time. Shen Yuan is cradled in Shen Qingqiu’s arms, limp in the way of the deeply unconscious. Blood drips from his right arm and is smeared across his face. Shen Qingqiu is dead white.

“Help him,” Shen Qingqiu rasps.

“Inside,” Mu Qingfang commands, leading the way in a hurry. “What’s wrong with him?”

“Poison,” Shen Qingqiu says, right behind him. “That demon”—he snarls it, an insult and deprecation as much as it is a racial identifier—“called it Without-A-Cure. Said it—disrupts the flow of the meridians, coagulates blood and qi.”

Damn. Damn. Demonic poisons are always difficult to deal with, engineered precisely to cause damage, and this sounds worse than most. Give Mu Qingfang aphrodisiac flowers any day; those, at least, he can handle. (Sometimes literally.)

“Lay him on the bed,” Mu Qingfang says briskly, when they’ve entered his personal exam room, the one connecting to his lab. Shen Qingqiu does, and Mu Qingfang is immediately at Shen Yuan’s side, rolling up the remains of his right sleeve to see what he’s working with.

“Thorns?”

“Armor,” is Shen Qingqiu’s terse response.

Of course. Shen Yuan must have been moving when he was attacked, going by the drag patterns, the ragged edges of each wound. There is a faint, dark trace at the edges of each wound, which somehow hasn’t been washed out by the flowing blood.

Qi wrapped delicately around his fingers and palm, Mu Qingfang scoops a handful of water out of a pitcher he keeps near his workstation for just this reason. It’s a delicate procedure, but one well worth it: rather than pouring water over a wound and hoping that it will rinse out impurities, Mu Qingfang can control the water directly, probing into the wound and washing it out by force. Not to mention, with his qi threaded through every bit of the water, he can directly pull at debris—or, in this case, poison.

Not all of it. It’s already infiltrated Shen Yuan’s bloodstream. The most Mu Qingfang can do is pull the remnants of it from Shen Yuan’s skin, keep it from further harming the flesh where it sits, and making the wounds safe for medical intervention.

He finishes passing the water over Shen Yuan’s arm, senses straining for any last bit of poison that he can pull out, and then he drops that handful of water into a different pitcher. He slaps a hastily-grabbed stasis talisman to the side of that pitcher, along with a label signifying its toxic status. Then he focuses on the rest of Shen Yuan.

Mu Qingfang has the scent of the poison now. He can trace it through Shen Yuan’s system, blood and qi alike.

It’s…not good.

Without-A-Cure has already spread through nearly the entirety of Shen Yuan’s body. Only some his extremities are spared for now, but the poison is creeping ever closer as Mu Qingfang watches. His blood hasn’t coagulated—good, because Shen Yuan is still alive; bad, because it’s pumping the poison throughout his circulatory system, into his muscles, his brain—but his spiritual energy is so much sludge in his meridians. It sticks in place when Mu Qingfang gently presses against it. With effort, Mu Qingfang could likely get it moving again, but he’s wary of trying that while Shen Yuan is in this delicate state.

He can’t stop the poison from spreading, it’s far too late for that. What he needs to do now is keep Shen Yuan from dying. As long as he’s alive, there’s hope. If he can send the poison into remission, bury it beneath medicine, then they should be able to circulate Shen Yuan’s qi themselves. His cultivation is—

Damn it! His cultivation is keeping his immune system running properly!

He’ll have to factor that into any medicine he makes. Without-A-Cure isn’t any poison he’s ever encountered before; he will have to create a treatment from scratch and tailor it to his patient’s specific health problems.

Assuming Sen Yuan doesn’t die before they even get that far.

Without-A-Cure is too entrenched. He can’t do any more to siphon it out of Shen Yuan, so that leaves—

“Shixiong, take over,” Mu Qingfang says briskly. “Keep his qi circulating.”

Yes, it’s a risk. Yes, it will spread the poison even further. But they’re racing time and Shen Yuan’s body simply giving out on them thanks to his health problems. If his qi completely stagnates, he’ll die no matter what they do, especially when his body is unable to fight against the poison for lack of antibodies. Better to bolster Shen Yuan’s immune system even the tiniest bit if they can.

Shen Qingqiu does as commanded. Mu Qingfang spends one precious moment monitoring, confirming that Shen Qingqiu can do it without sending himself into a qi deviation or knocking over Shen Yuan’s delicately balanced system, and then he lets go of Shen Yuan. He crosses over to his workstation, rifling through the materials stored there. His thoughts whirl quickly.

Need to keep his blood moving—bolster his immune system—qi circulation can be saved for further treatment so long as we have someone on hand to circulate his qi for him—have to look more in depth on that later—stronger herbs are stored in my lab—need to check the gardens and specialized records or storerooms for anything else that may help—

He falls into the repetitive motions of grinding herbs, practiced eye judging how fine each herb needs to be, pouring in honey to bind the ingredients, channeling a spark of qi to condense and solidify the pill. They’re as small as he can make them, the better for an unconscious patient. Given time, he may be able to make it into a liquid form—a potion or something more akin to a tea, in case anyone else is ever affected by this and knocked unconscious—but time is of the essence. It’s more important to get the medicine into his patient, in whatever form.

“Move,” Mu Qingfang says bluntly, back at Shen Yuan’s side. Shen Qingqiu isn’t really in the way, but he needs to stay out of the way.

Carefully, Mu Qingfang feed the pills to Shen Yuan. Drips a bit of water into his mouth. Coaxes him to swallow.

Nothing catches in Shen Yuan’s throat. He doesn’t aspirate on the water. Good.

Now they have to wait for the pills to have an effect. That all depends on how quickly his body can metabolize them, how much the damned poison will let itself be sent into remission. He can start assessing long-term methods and strategies from this, from how quickly the poison responds. This will be a long, complicated treatment.

In the meantime, Mu Qingfang can brute-force holding together Shen Yuan’s immune system by himself. Shen Qingqiu is circulating Shen Yuan’s qi, so Mu Qingfang focusses on bolstering it, reinforcing the areas where it usually supports Shen Yuan’s spleen, and still carefully keeping an eye on the balance of Shen Yuan’s overall health.

It takes time for the pills to kick in. All medicine does. Finally, after nearly half a shichen, Mu Qingfang feels the effects of the pills filtering through Shen Yuan’s body, blunting the barest edges of the poison.

It’s not enough, but it’s a starting point.

He loosens his stranglehold on Shen Yuan’s immune system, tracking the effects of the pills. Are they compensating enough for Shen Yuan’s cultivationless, spleenless body?

…No. Not without support. They are, however, doing enough that Mu Qingfang can draw his qi away from Shen Yuan. Shen Qingqiu is capable of holding up the framework while Mu Qingfang busies himself addressing the wounds on Shen Yuan’s arm.

He had cleaned them earlier, but he hadn’t wrapped them. He hadn’t wanted to, not until he was sure he wouldn’t need to scour them again with a second water treatment. Too, this has allow the wounds to clot somewhat, and tells him how much effect the poison has had on Shen Yuan’s blood—as if having his qi inserted in Shen Yuan’s body wasn’t enough.

Mu Qingfang grabs clean bandages and a poultice, heavy on ginger to help fight off infection. None of them can afford to take chances with Shen Yuan’s health here. Everything is a balancing act.

Once Shen Yuan’s arm is wrapped, Mu Qingfang glances over at Shen Qingqiu. Whatever happened on Qiong Ding, it hadn’t ruffled him; the only blood Mu Qingfang sees on him must have come from Shen Yuan. Mu Qingfang is more concerned about Shen Qingqiu’s qi reserves. Cycling qi doesn’t take that much energy, not unless one devotes themselves to doing it for multiple shichen on end, but having to push through the morass of Without-A-Cure may increase the effort required.

“May I examine Shixiong’s meridians?” Mu Qingfang asks.

“What are you focusing on me for?” Shen Qingqiu shoots back, not looking up from his concentration on Shen Yuan’s unconscious form.

“I need to make sure I’m not about to have two patients before I allow you to continue this work,” Mu Qingfang says.

Shen Qingqiu grunts, but holds out his wrist. It is undoubtably one of the easiest arguments Mu Qingfang has ever had with this man. Usually he fights like a wildcat rather than let anyone touch him.

Mu Qingfang presses two fingers lightly to Shen Qingqiu’s pulse-point. Despite that being the smallest amount of skin-to-skin contact Mu Qingfang can use to conduct his examination, a ripple goes through Shen Qingqiu. Not a physical; it’s instead a tiny, spiritual flinch. Likely not something Shen Qingqiu is even aware of, it’s so slight. Hastily restrained through a subconscious grip—while Shen Qingqiu may not know he does it, he evidently refuses to show weakness.

Then Mu Qingfang actually pays attention to what he’s sensing.

Obviously the point of going into seclusion is to increase one’s cultivation, but the difference between now and months ago, when Mu Qingfang had barely managed to pull Shen Qingqiu back from that qi deviation, is stark.

“Shen-shixiong has had a breakthrough,” Mu Qingfang says. He’s cleared a blockage, perhaps even resolved a heart demon. His cultivation has improved significantly, and that’s taking into account how much damage had been wrought in the aftermath of his deviation.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t say anything to this revelation. Of course, he would know about his own heart demons—

The facts clatter into place.

You’re alive, Yue Qingyuan said at the Peak Lord meeting. Stunned, as if he couldn’t believe it.

Shen Qingqiu, casually revealing that he had entered the sect without his brother, despite securing him a place there.

The evidence of their bodies, the hard lives they had lived. How likely it must have seemed that Shen Yuan had died somewhere out there in the span of time since Shen Qingqiu had last seen him.

Of course Shen Qingqiu cleared a heart demon, one that had a stranglehold on his cultivation. Mu Qingfang can feel other blockages, undoubtably other heart demons that the man has to deal with, but the uncertainty. The not-knowing. It had finally been resolved, his brother restored to him, if not precisely in pristine state.

Mu Qingfang has the sinking sensation that, should Shen Yuan succumb to the poison after all, Mu Qingfang’s work to save Shen Qingqiu those months ago may have been in vain.

It’s all too likely that Shen Qingqiu may be taken out by Without-A-Cure, too—if less directly.

Which, Mu Qingfang thinks grimly, isn’t even touching on whether the twins’ cultivation is linked. He needs to monitor Shen Qingqiu for a whole other reason—if one twin’s deviation sparked off the other’s, can Without-A-Cure make the leap between the bodies? It is, at least partially, a spiritual poison.

He’ll keep an exceedingly close eye on it. And perhaps force Shen Qingqiu to draw back from cycling Shen Yuan’s qi. Without-A-Cure hasn’t made the leap yet, not in the half-shichen Shen Qingqiu has been cycling his qi, but there’s no guarantee that the infection won’t follow such a similar qi directly back to its source.

“Keep cycling his qi,” Mu Qingfang says, keeping his voice steady and calm. “Listen to what I say, but don’t stop.”

Shen Qingqiu tilts his head toward him, indicating that he’s listening. He starts to tug his wrist away from Mu Qingfang—

“Don’t,” Mu Qingfang says. “I need to monitor you. You will have to be carefully disengaging from Shen Yuan’s qi system. You can’t take any of the qi you’ve given him back into you.” He hasn’t given enough to affect his stores—or he shouldn’t have—but it still isn’t a negligible amount to lose. “You have to cut it off, leave it completely in Shen Yuan’s system.” Not the standard practice, which usually involves recouping at least some of the energy used to cycle another person’s qi.

“Why?” Shen Qingqiu bites out. Not confrontational, yet terse all the same. Mu Qingfang, fingers pressed against Shen Qingqiu’s pulse, feels the man’s heart rate spike before settling once again. Fear, for what he’s about to hear.

“We still haven’t discovered why the two of you suffered the same qi deviation,” Mu Qingfang says. “We only have suppositions. If Without-A-Cure gets confused between the two of you, if it latches onto your qi as well, thinking that it’s Shen Yuan’s—”

“We would both be infected,” Shen Qingqiu finishes for him. A long beat of silence, before he asks, “How likely is it?”

“As I’ve never come across your situation before, nor have I met this poison previously?” Mu Qingfang says. “Unknown. Not a risk that needs to be taken.”

Shen Qingqiu nods shallowly.

“Shixiong should cut his qi soon. Cleanly,” Mu Qingfang stresses.

Shen Qingqiu tenses. “Mu-shidi is not certain that the effects will spread—”

“And I said it wasn’t a risk worth taken,” Mu Qingfang interrupts him. “I am your doctor and Shen Yuan’s. I will not let harm come to him by doing this, but nor can I ignore the risk that this poses to you. I can’t focus on two patients right now. Let me help your brother.”

Shen Qingqiu breathes in. Breathes out. His qi, for the most part, remains steady, only slight spikes in it. Then it slices cleanly away from Shen Yuan, just as Mu Qingfang asked. Mu Qingfang takes the time, while Shen Qingqiu still allows Mu Qingfang’s hold on him, to examine his meridians again. No sign of that creeping poison, thank the heavens. As fast as it spread through Shen Yuan, Mu Qingfang would surely see some sign of it in Shen Qingqiu if it had made the transfer.

He’ll wait a shichen to check again, in case making the leap has unexpectedly caused a delayed effect, but he tentatively places Shen Qingqiu in the clear.

Mu Qingfang says this aloud, and Shen Qingqiu all but rips his hand out of Mu Qingfang’s, finally at the end of his patience and tolerance. It’s honestly longer than Mu Qingfang had expected.

“Shixiong should go clean himself up,” Mu Qingfang says, politely ignoring this.

“I’m not leaving him,” Shen Qingqiu says. He hasn’t taken his eyes off of Shen Yuan in the whole time that they have been in this room. Mu Qingfang understands that Shen Qingqiu is terrified; any sane man would be, faced with what they are.

His sympathy only extends so far.

“Shixiong’s clothes are a biohazard,” Mu Qingfang says pleasantly. “Shixiong should go clean himself up. He may borrow patient’s robes if he would prefer not to go all the way to Qing Jing, but a source of contamination is not remaining in my exam room.”

This, finally, makes Shen Qingqiu look away from Shen Yuan, if only to peer down at his own robes. Mu Qingfang has seen and dealt with far more gore than this—Liu Qingge tracks in a horrendous amount of it whenever he ends up Qian Cao, though thankfully most of it is never his. Most of it—but he wasn’t kidding about the biohazard. Mu Qingfang pulled the poison out of the blood he had access to, and the blood splashed across Shen Qingqiu’s chest from where Shen Yuan’s arm rested is dry, but he doesn’t believe in taking chances.

Shen Qingqiu stands. Not a verbal acquiesence, but assent nonetheless.

Mu Qingfang hands Shen Qingqiu a stasis seal and another of his toxin markers before the man leaves the room. Shen Qingqiu takes them. Pauses for a long moment at the door, fingers white with how hard he grips the edge of it, then slips out.

Mu Qingfang returns to monitoring the effects of the pills on Shen Yuan, and holds onto hope with similarly white-tipped fingers.

Shen Qingqiu returns in fresh robes. He must have a hidden qiankun pouch on him, because they are distinctly not Qian Cao patient robes, but rather robes fit for a Peak Lord. Mu Qingfang knows he didn’t leave Qian Cao to retrieve them, so they must have been on his person.

Had he brought them with them because he and Shen Yuan were going into seclusion? Or is this a habitual action of his?

It’s none of Mu Qingfang’s business, except for vague relief that Shen Qingqiu will be more comfortable in his own clothes, in control of that aspect of his appearance, which will hopefully calm him. At the least, it can’t make his attitude any worse.

Shen Qingqiu hands off a bundle of clothing, both the stasis seal and toxin marker attached. Mu Qingfang accepts them, placing them in the same corner of his desk where he had placed the pitcher of poisoned water. He quickly sketches a barrier seal around the two items; this is his workstation, and no one should be messing with anything here, but it’s better to be safe than to have someone else infected.

Gods willing, he’ll be able to glean more information from examining the poison in its base form. Seeing how it affects Shen Yuan’s body is one thing; there are tests he can run that simply cannot happen once a person is already infected.

He has arrayed several talismans around Shen Yuan’s bed, monitoring his heartbeat, his breathing, his qi levels—anything for which Mu Qingfang might need to be alerted, should they change significantly. It gives Mu Qingfang breathing space to start mixing more doses of the pills he had already made and to contemplate different possibilities, going through his supplies at a slower pace than that frenetic first attempt. He’s made notes of that first attempt; he’ll start going through some of the books he has at his workstation soon.

This is all going to be so complicated. Medical mysteries can be fascinating; research projects are the lifeblood of Qian Cao, its doctors and disciples always pushing to be at the cutting edge of medicine. Those mysteries are never as exciting at the beginning, when the patient is so very near to death.

Shen Qingqiu drags a chair over to the side of the bed. He draws Shen Yuan’s unbandaged hand into his lap, fingers resting against his pulse point.

“Don’t—” Mu Qingfang begins.

“I’m not,” Shen Qingqiu says.

No. No, Mu Qingfang supposes not. No matter the talisman calmly displaying Shen Yuan’s heart rate—this is something Shen Qingqiu would want to feel for himself. Mu Qingfang has seen this behavior in friends or family of patients before, desperately monitoring the patient’s vitals in an attempt to reassure themselves that the heart still beats. That the patient is still in this world.

Mu Qingfang turns back to his research. The talismans—and Shen Qingqiu—will alert him if or when anything goes wrong. In this moment before that occurs, Mu Qingfang needs to do his best to keep it from happening at all.

It’s early the next day by the time Zhangmen-shixiong returns to the sect.

All the injured have either been returned to their respective peaks or are sequestered in one of Qian Cao’s various healing halls. Earlier that morning, Mu Qingfang takes a few moments away from the Qing Jing Lords to check in with his disciples. None of the patients require any of Mu Qingfang’s direct and personal attention; his senior disciples and hallmasters are more than up to the task of handling the remaining injuries. Shen Yuan is the most severely injured casualty.

Of those left alive, anyway.

The dead have also been gathered, the lists of their names and peaks compiled. Most of the dead are Qiong Ding. It was their peak that was attacked, so that makes sense. It’s horrid that they were killed in the heart of their sect, the place where they were supposed to be safest.

Mu Qingfang makes sure to meet with his disciples who were trapped on Qiong Ding. He praises them on their work, the triage set up at the Lingxi Caves that he’s heard reports of from other disciples (and knew existed in part because of the emergency talisman that was set off there)—

“Is Shen-shibo going to be alright?” one of his disciples asks. She assisted at the Lingxi Caves triage station; she has been commended by several of her martial siblings for having ventured away from the safety of the Caves in order to find and bring back casualties. She wasn’t at the main hall, but evidently rumors of what happened have begun spreading.

Mu Qingfang believes in honesty with his disciples. A doctor or medic must have a clear head. They must not lie to themselves—or others—about the health of those under their care, and they must assess conditions with unflinching honesty. That doesn’t mean they can’t soften the blow when giving the facts. This disciple is still young, after all—though, perhaps, older and more experienced than she was before the invasion.

Of course, he also doesn’t want rumors of Shen Yuan’s condition spreading beyond control, and he shouldn’t discuss his health with those uninvolved.

“This master is doing everything in his power to help Shen-shixiong,” he temporizes.

Going by her face, his disciple understands just how much of a non-answer that is—and how much of a reassurance it isn’t. Her expression troubled, she bows to him.

Mu Qingfang is finishing his rounds when Yue Qingyuan arrives on Qian Cao. It’s always disturbing when Yue Qingyuan loses his smile. That affable smile of his never means that he isn’t taking things seriously—but the lack of that smile means that things have gone wrong. Severely so.

Yue Qingyuan without the smile never fails to remind Mu Qingfang that he is the strongest, most dangerous cultivator of their generation or the last.

Mu Qingfang isn’t quite sure who alerted Yue Qingyuan to what was happening at Cang Qiong. Probably Ku Xing, or maybe Liu Qingge, after the barrier dropped—Mu Qingfang was too concerned about breaking through the barrier first, and then immediately afterwards dealing with the fallout, to have spared a thought for the sect leader. Likewise, Shen Qingqiu has been…distracted.

Either way, Yue Qingyuan must have returned at top speed from Huan Hua Palace. The call for aid would have had to first reach Yue Qingyuan before he could return, so to be back at the sect less than twelve shichen after the invasion speaks to his rush.

Mu Qingfang goes to meet him. Yue Qingyuan’s gaze sweeps over the disciples bustling through the main healing hall of Qian Cao, the other sect disciples who are steadily being cleared to head back to their peaks, the scatter of triage supplies and raided cabinets. Mu Qingfang has to assume that Yue Qingyuan went first to Qiong Ding, to assess the damage, but he’s here for a very specific reason.

Yes, for his disciples, for his sect—but everyone is far too aware of the Shen-shaped blind spot that Yue Qingyuan suffers from.

Mu Qingfang isn’t sure how much Yue Qingyuan has been told yet. He pulls a copy of the casualties list from his sleeve. There’s a specific scroll for each peak and then a scroll that covers the losses or injuries of the whole sect; it is the latter that he hands over to Yue Qingyuan first, though he also gives him the Qiong Ding list. It is, unfortunately, the thickest of the individual peak scrolls.

Yue Qingyuan accepts both. He unrolls Qiong Ding’s first, scanning through it. His eyes close briefly after he makes it to the end of the list. Then he unrolls the composite list. His expression grows even grimmer.

“Thank you, Mu-shidi,” Yue Qingyuan says, grim and subdued. “How is Qian Cao handling the influx?”

“We’re managing,” Mu Qingfang says bracingly. “Many of the injured were able to be treated on Qiong Ding, and others that were taken to Qian Cao have recovered enough to be sent back to their peaks, or will soon be allowed to do so. The dead…we have utilized stasis seals. Not all of them are here on Qian Cao”—in fact, most of them are not, not unless they died from their injuries after being taken to the healing halls—“but we’ll need to start arranging for funerals as son as possible.” Each peak only has so much room for a morgue; the largest is, by necessity, Qian Cao’s. Plus, stasis seals won’t last forever, not to mention the catharsis that will be granted by holding an official funeral.

Mu Qingfang doesn’t envy the letters Yue Qingyuan will have to write. Mu Qingfang has several that he himself will need to prepare.

It’s a task that never gets any easier.

“If Qian Cao needs any funds moved around in order to restock supplies, let me know,” Yue Qingyuan says. He rerolls both scrolls, tucking them into his qiankun sleeves to be dealt with later. They both know the main reason why he’s here on Qian Cao.

Shen Yuan’s name was at the top of the injured list, and Yue Qingyuan can’t have missed the gossip about it.

“How is Xiao—Shen Yuan?” Yue Qingyuan asks softly.

“Alive,” Mu Qingfang says, and, “Come with me.”

Yue Qingyuan follows close behind Mu Qingfang as he leads the way. Usually his qi bleeds out into the air a bit, just enough to give him a sense of presence. Now, it’s so tightly controlled that Mu Qingfang can’t feel even a whisper of it in the air, but he has no doubt that under that locked-down control, it’s a seething, roiling mess.

He taps gently on the door to his exam room before going inside. Better to let Shen Qingqiu know that they're coming in, so that they don't startle him. Mu Qingfang hasn't received any alerts from the talismans set on Shen Yuan, but that tells him nothing of how Shen Qingqiu is doing. If the man is asleep, Mu Qingfang doesn't want him lashing out upon being unexpectedly awoken by the presence of new people.

If he was asleep, he isn’t by the time they walk in. He is sitting the precisely the same position as when Mu Qingfang left, back straight, fingers held against Shen Yuan’s pulse. He doesn’t turn to look at them.

Yue Qingyuan always has masterful control of himself. Too much control, perhaps. Despite that, there is a quiet, hurt inhale as he takes in Shen Yuan. Last night, Mu Qingfang and Shen Qingqiu had taken the opportunity to change him into patients’ robes and get him out of his bloodied, ruined silks. Shen Qingqiu had taken to the task of braiding Shen Yuan’s hair, neatly tying it off, and Mu Qingfang had politely pretended to have to find a note at his workstation instead of watching the way Shen Qingqiu sat there once finished, the long, coiled braid nestled in his palms.

Shen Yuan’s circulatory system is still functioning, but it’s struggling somewhat, even given the pills and the work Mu Qingfang has been doing to circulate his qi. It lends Shen Yuan a distinct pallor—offset, Mu Qingfang notes with a sudden frown, by a faint flush to his face. The beginnings of a fever? He’ll need to check the injury site again, give another jolt to Shen Yuan’s immune system, and potentially change the composition of the pills. It’s not at a dangerous level yet, or his talismans would have alerted him, but Mu Qingfang can’t let it grab ahold of Shen Yuan. If it gains too much of a foothold, the fever may not be willing to give up its grasp unless it can drag Shen Yuan down with it.

“Xiao Yuan,” Yue Qingyuan breathes, taking a further step into the room—

“Where were you?” Shen Qingqiu asks, cold and cutting and sharp as a drawn blade.

Yue Qingyuan jerks back. “I,” he says, “I—Huan Hua. To discuss the Imm—”

Shen Qingqiu makes a derisive noise. “Where were you? Why aren’t you ever where you’re supposed to be?”

“The demons waited until Zhangmen-shixiong was off the mountain,” Mu Qingfang interjects, hoping to defuse the situation at least partially. Everyone has pieced together the timing of the attack by now, especially using the benefit of hindsight. It’s nonetheless not what Shen Qingqiu wants to hear.

In fact, he doesn’t seem to hear it at all.

“You bastard,” Shen Qingqiu says. “Coward, oathbreaker—you swore to me. You said you would find him, you said you would come back, you said we would be safe—is this your safety? Is this your protection, Yue Qi? Abandoning him to die—?!”

“Xiao Jiu!” Yue Qingyuan says, agonized.

“You have no right to call me that!” Shen Qingqiu shouts, finally turning to face them and coming to his feet in one frenetic movement. Even so, he doesn’t leave Shen Yuan’s bedside, putting himself bodily between Shen Yuan and his martial brothers. A glint of steel catches Mu Qingfang’s eye, nearly hidden beneath the draping sleeves of Shen Qingqiu’s robes.

He has a knife—!

Had Mu Qingfang thought Shen Qingqiu was handling this as well as he could? He takes it back. He shouldn’t have allowed Yue Qingyuan in the room, not yet. His and Shen Qingqiu’s relationship has always been contentious, and it hasn’t gotten any better with Shen Yuan’s arrival, but this is tipping rapidly toward being completely out of control.

“Shixiong,” he says. Again, Shen Qingqiu doesn’t even seem to hear him. Which, Mu Qingfang realizes with creeping dread, isn’t Shen Qingqiu being obstinate and ignoring him.

“I’m sorry,” Yue Qingyuan says. “I’m sorry, Qingqiu, I’m—”

Shen Qingqiu lunges at him. Mu Qingfang throws his needles at the same moment. No need to bother precisely aiming at acupuncture points, though the needles land accurately anyway; he uses his specialty needles, ones dipped in a mild paralytic and sedative. Very helpful with unruly patients. Or qi deviating ones.

Shen Qingqiu drops.

Thankfully, when Mu Qingfang stoops to check on his unconscious martial brother, he is not deviating. Not quite. If Mu Qingfang had let that go on much longer, he may have, but with unconsciousness, the ripples in Shen Qingqiu’s qi are calming, settling back toward how it should be. Mu Qingfang firmly tugs on that qi, pulling it all the way back down to an even flow.

“He’s fine,” Mu Qingfang says briskly. “Apologies to Zhangmen-shixiong, but you may want to leave before he wakes.”

Mu Qingfang looks up to meet Yue Qingyuan’s bereft eyes. His face quickly smoothes to blankness, yet that doesn’t quite hide the way that he nearly trembles with the force of the emotion he is holding back. Mu Qingfang quickly looks away again. He jabs another needle into Shen Qingqiu, just to make sure he stays down and out a bit longer.

“Thanking Mu-shidi,” Yue Qingyuan says after a moment to regain control. His voice is raw. “Do you need assistance moving Qingqiu-shidi to a bed?”

Mu Qingfang weighs the benefits and drawbacks of that. Unfortunately, Shen Qingqiu would probably hate that enough that Mu Qingfang should deny the offer. Anything to keeps Shen Qingqiu at a more even keel needs to be utilized right now.

“No, thank you,” Mu Qingfang says. He’s a cultivator, after all, with all a cultivator’s associated strength. He can lift Shen Qingqiu himself. Besides, the man isn’t as heavy as he looks. Underfed, not that he would ever let Mu Qingfang do anything about that. Not that he’s aware Mu Qingfang pays close enough attention to him to know that.

Of course, the more pressing issue is that he doesn’t have a second bed in his exam room. This isn’t really supposed to be used as a long-term room, more a brief stop for private exams or for intensive care patients before they’re moved elsewhere. He supposes he’ll have to stash Shen Qingqiu next door, and leave a note for him to read when he wakes, informing him of his brother’s location. Not that Mu Qingfang isn’t going to slap a talisman on Shen Qingqiu to alert him when he wakes, because he would very much like to be aware of when Shen Qingqiu is able to potentially cause further chaos on his peak.

He leaves the needles in Shen Qingqiu for now. He stoops, gathering Shen Qingqiu into his arms. The man’s head lolls against Mu Qingfang’s shoulder, long hair and robes trailing over Mu Qingfang’s arms and spilling toward the floor. Shen Qingqiu looks nearly peaceful in unconsciousness, the studiously flat masks or the harsh lines of his scowls wiped away.

For all that they are identical, Shen Qingqiu has never looked more like Shen Yuan than he does now.

“If Zhangmen-shixiong wouldn’t mind getting the door,” Mu Qingfang says.

Yue Qingyuan nods, subdued. He trails behind Mu Qingfang as he gets Shen Qingqiu settled in the promised next room, setting up the talismans he needs and scrawling a quick note to Shen Qingqiu, and then delicately pulling the acupuncture needles out of Shen Qingqiu’s neck. He checks the man’s pulse, reads the flow of his qi—hm, probably a good half-shichen before he wakes. The sedative must have hit him harder than Mu Qingfang had expected. His core is gnawing through it, but his body is stubbornly clinging to it at the same time, in a way that speaks of constant sleep deprivation.

When they go back out into the hallway, Yue Qingyuan says, “About Shen Yuan…”

Mu Qingfang checks the talismans that are linked to the ones surrounding Shen Yuan. He needs to deal with that fever. Even so, he has time enough to fill in the sect leader, and they are isolated enough from the rest of the disciples here in this corner of the healing hall that Mu Qingfang doesn’t fear being overheard discussing medical issues.

This is Mu Qingfang’s sect leader, asking after the health of one of his Peak Lords in the aftermath of an attack.

This is, if Mu Qingfang has read this disastrous relationship right, one of Shen Yuan’s two brothers.

“Shen Qingqiu reported that the demons called it ‘Without-A-Cure,’” Mu Qingfang begins.

Chapter 14

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe doesn’t know what to do with himself. The Qian Cao medics who arrive on Qiong Ding cleared him quickly, and he is folded back into the group of Qing Jing disciples as they return to their peak. There are a few half-hearted congratulations on his win, but the overall mood is grim. Their sect has been attacked. One of their Peak Lords might be dying.

Shen Yuan might be dying.

Ning Yingying has a death-grip on his arm; much as he might like to veer off toward Qian Cao, she takes him back to Qing Jing with the rest of them. It’s probably for the best, since Qian Cao must be overrun with casualties at the moment and Luo Binghe would only be in the way, but he can’t convince his mind of that. He needs to know if Shizun is alright.

“Mu-shishu is the best doctor in the jianghu,” Ming Fan says bracingly.

Luo Binghe glances up at him. Currently he’s curled in his cot in the dormitory, wishing he had his guanyin pendant to hold. In its absence, he clutches at the front of his robes where it used to lie, sending up frantic prayers to any heavenly officials that might be listening. Ming Fan lingers at the side of his bed.

When Luo Binghe doesn’t say anything, Ming Fan adds, “If anyone can save Shen-shishu, it’s Mu-shishu.”

Is Ming Fan…trying to comfort him?

“You don’t even like me,” Luo Binghe says. A total non-sequitur, he knows, but the idea of losing Shizun is too large and incomprehensible for him to focus on. He can’t look at it straight-on, can’t fathom the idea of it, so he goes around it instead.

(It’s better than the blame, a never-ending loop inside his head, just behind the prayers.

He was hurt because of me. He defended me. He should never have—if he—if he—if Mu Qingfang isn’t enough—!)

Ming Fan shifts. He turns halfway away from Luo Binghe. “You…you fight good,” he says, and only sounds a little grudging. “You didn’t have to win the match for Cang Qiong’s victory, but you pulled it off anyway. You represented Qing Jing well.”

A few months ago, Luo Binghe could never have expected this from his shixiong. He thinks it would have killed Ming Fan to say it—or else he would take out his rage at being shown up by Luo Binghe on him.

Shizun really has made a difference.

“Thanking Ming-shixiong,” Luo Binghe says. He rolls over, his back to Ming Fan. He doesn’t want to talk any more. He can hear the rustle of Ming Fan’s robes as he shifts in place, obviously considering saying something else, but he decides against it and shuffles away.

Luo Binghe lets the tired, stressed chatter of the other disciples wash over him, a low murmur in his ears.

He returns to his prayers.

The next morning, Luo Binghe wakes early. He creeps out of the dormitory, careful not to wake any of his martial brothers. He makes his way past the bamboo house; there's no evidence that anyone is inside, though that very well could be because it's too early for anyone inside to be awake.

(He's knows that's not the reason—Shen Qingqiu must be in Qian Cao with Shizun still.)

Luo Binghe enters his and Shizun's clearing. He slowly, jerkily starts going through his martial forms, replaying the fight in his mind. Trying to figure out where he could have improved, what he should have done instead.

(He should have killed Elder Sky Hammer, that's what he should have done. He won't make that mistake again.)

In this very clearing, he had sworn that he would repay Shen Yuan for his actions in Shuang Hu City. That he would protect Shizun the way Shizun had protected him.

He has utterly failed.

Luo Binghe draws to a close at the end of the form. His arms drop down to his sides, and then he collapses all the way down to his knees.

He finally lets himself cry.

Three days.

It’s been three full days since the invasion and Shizun has yet to return to Qing Jing. Neither has Shen Qingqiu, of course, but that matters to Luo Binghe only inasmuch that it means he must still be with Shizun.

Qing Jing is running somewhat haphazardly in the absence of both its Peak Lords; the smooth flow from when Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan were only in seclusion rather than on Qian Cao has thrown the workings of Qing Jing into disarray. Ming Fan has been struggling to corral everyone together and take down information on everyone who was injured or is struggling in the aftermath of the invasion.

The hallmasters and older disciples eventually step in, too, contributing to Ming Fan’s efforts, or simply taking charge of their classes once more and carrying on as though everything is normal. Some of Luo Binghe’s martial siblings seem to prefer that, leaping on the opportunity to pretend that everything has gone back to how it was before the invasion, or at the least throw themselves into the idea of normalcy in comparison to the chaos around them.

Luo Binghe doesn’t prefer it. Luo Binghe wants his shizun back.

Plenty of gossip and shell-shocked rumors are flying around in the aftermath of the invasion. Luo Binghe has been congratulated on his victory by more than just Ming Fan now. There’s also, of course, discussion of the losses. No few disciples had friends or at least acquaintances on other peaks, and many of them were on Qiong Ding during the invasion.

Not all of them survived.

At least they know, Luo Binghe thinks, and can’t even hate himself for the cruelty of the thought. He can’t live this way, suspended on tenterhooks, waiting for someone to carry him the news.

The third day passes. Luo Binghe lies sleepless in the dorms that night, listening to his martial siblings’ snores and the rustling of sheets as they turn over in the night.

The morning of the fourth day, Luo Binghe rises before the sun and all his martial siblings. He leaves the dorms, and he heads straight to Qian Cao.

If no one will tell him what’s happening with Shizun, then Luo Binghe will simply stay on Qian Cao until someone does.

Mu Qingfang has had to patch his fellow Peak Lords together on more than one occasion. It’s part of his job, and they all live in a dangerous world. It’s to be expected.

For a while there, Mu Qingfang thought Shen Qingqiu’s qi deviation nearly seven months previous was the worst medical experience he’s had, at least as far as it concerns his fellow Peak Lords. There have been a bare few times since they all ascended that his martial siblings flirted with death, and each time had been unimaginably stressful, but—Shen Qingqiu hadn’t merely been flirting. He had been wrapped in death’s cold embrace, already being ushered toward the Naihe Bridge. For a long moment, Mu Qingfang had been sure he lost him.

Then, thankfully, Shen Qingqiu’s heart kept beating. He started breathing again. He lived.

Shen Yuan’s poisoning by Without-A-Cure leaves all Mu Qingfang’s other experiences behind. He nearly fondly remembers Shen Qingqiu’s qi deviation now.

Shen Qingqiu staggers back into Shen Yuan’s exam room after the predicted half-shichen, once the paralysis-sedative has worn off—mostly, at least. Shen Qingqiu probably forced himself to start moving before it completely released its grip on him, judging by the way his steps waver. He doesn’t bother to send Mu Qingfang a nasty look as he enters, apparently preferring to pretend that nothing had happened. He settles himself in the exact same spot and position he’d inhabited before Yue Qingyuan’s visit. Shen Yuan’s hand is once again cradled in his own.

Shen Yuan keeps holding steady, but Mu Qingfang is holding his breath, watching that faint flush to his cheeks, checking his monitoring talismans frequently. Midway through the morning of the second day post-invasion, his worries are proven right.

Shen Yuan's temperature spikes. Mu Qingfang forces more fever reducers down Shen Yuan's throat, and checks the bandages he had applied to the initial wound. There's no sign of an infection, not there. It's the poison itself, wreaking havoc on Shen Yuan's already delicate immune system. Shen Yuan’s immune system can't handle the strain of it, so it's fighting the only way it knows how.

All it's going to do is exhaust Shen Yuan and kill him faster than the poison might already be doing.

Mu Qingfang will do his best, but he fears that might not be enough here.

Fever reducers, wet cloths, and circulating Shen Yuan's qi is the way to go here, at least for the moment. Mu Qingfang throws himself into the task; Shen Qingqiu is still banned from circulating Shen Yuan’s qi himself. Eventually, slowly, the fever lets itself be calmed.

"Will that happen again?" Shen Qingqiu asks, but the way the words fall from his mouth says that he already knows the answer he will receive.

Mu Qingfang tells him anyway. "It's impossible to say. I'm still attempting to synthesize the most efficient medicine, but with his immune system already so compromised..." He sighs. "His fever may well come back, yes. This is a novel situation for Shen Yuan's body, and it isn't adapting well. If we're not careful, it may even spark into a qi deviation."

Shen Qingqiu's expression at that—Mu Qingfang looks briefly away in order to give his shixiong time to compose himself. Mu Qingfang has never seen him so undone, not even the rare occasions when Shen Qingqiu has allowed himself to be laid up in a medical cot because he’s half-dying.

"What can I do to help?" Shen Qingqiu asks.

"Stay calm," Mu Qingfang says. "Help me change out the cloths on his forehead when necessary. Keeping the fever under control is our most important task at the moment."

Shen Qingqiu nods.

It's nice to have another pair of hands assisting him. No, Shen Qingqiu isn’t a trained medic, so he can’t help with the medicine aspect, but that just means Mu Qingfang asks uncomplicated things of him; dipping towels into cold water is a simple task, but one that both keeps Shen Qingqiu distracted and means there is always a pair of eyes on Shen Yuan along with the alert talismans.It gives Mu Qingfang the time and space to work on creating new pills, and even allows him opportunities to quickly duck into the restricted storerooms to grab high-level ingredients with which to begin experimenting.

The quiet peace ends that evening. Several of the talismans alert at once—Shen Yuan's temperature is spiking again. Mu Qingfang leaps immediately into action, bumping Shen Qingqiu out of his way.He does precisely what he did the last time—fever reducers, cycling his qi—but it’s not helping as much. The fever keeps climbing, and it climbs quickly.

It’s the poison again, it must have adapted around the other fever reducers and his immune system can’t keep up—!

Shen Yuan begins to seize.

Out of the corner of his eye, as Mu Qingfang hastily shifts Shen Yuan onto his side in order to keep his airway clear, he sees Shen Qingqiu move as if to hold Shen Yuan down.

“Don’t touch him!” Mu Qingfang says sharply. Shen Qingqiu pulls immediately to a halt. Good—Mu Qingfang’s focus is reserved for timing this seizure; he doesn’t have any attention to spare to keep Shen Qingqiu out of his way.

One fēn…two fēn…three—

Shen Yuan stills just after the three fēn mark. It isn’t good that he’s seizing, but it wasn’t too long, comparatively. The real trouble is that it was almost certainly kicked off by his fever; if they don’t get the fever down, Shen Yuan will keep having seizures, and they’ll only get worse.

Well, Mu Qingfang hasn’t exactly been wasting his afternoon.

The Silver Sanguinary Camellia is a rare flower that is exceptionally good at detoxifying those it is used on—it virulently it seeks out any impurities in the system it enters. It has to be used sparingly, as it’s far too easy for the flower to overcompensate and begin attacking its host once it finishes with the poison. A few petals will do for this.

While they steep, Mu Qingfang mixes together powdered ginseng from his stores and a generous portion of the Fevered Tortoiseshell-Snake’s Root he spent the afternoon grinding. Add a bit of gancao-infused honey, remove the Silver Sanguinary Camellia petals from the water where they were steeping, mix half the Silver Sanguinary Camellia tea with the other ingredients, top with fresh spring water…

“Get him into an upright position,” Mu Qingfang orders Shen Qingqiu, finally turning back to the bed. He needn’t have bothered. Shen Qingqiu has crawled his way into the bed already, clutching his brother to his chest, eyes wild.

Mu Qingfang doesn’t say anything about it, even when he really should. Instead, he gets Shen Qingqiu to help him tip back Shen Yuan’s head enough so that they can slowly coax the medicine into him, rubbing at his throat until he swallows it all down.

That accomplished, Mu Qingfang returns to his workstation to pour the remaining Silver Sanguinary Camellia tea into a bottle that he can stopper in case he needs it later. They’ll have to see how—if—it helps Shen Yuan before giving him any more.

The damned fever keeps spiking and then briefly subsiding all through the next day and night. Mu Qingfang has so far been able to keep it from sparking off another seizure, but the fever never breaks completely.

Shen Yuan still has yet to wake.

Likewise, Shen Qingqiu has yet to leave Qian Cao.

So far as Mu Qingfang is aware, he hasn’t even slept since the point when Mu Qingfang had forcefully knocked him out. Nor has he bothered to eat anything, though Mu Qingfang has at least managed to force a cup of tea down his throat here and there. The only thing he has done is move to lay Shen Yuan back down on the bed and retake his position in the chair next to Shen Yuan’s bedside, and that only occurred after multiple pointed comments from Mu Qingfang.

What a mess.

Mu Qingfang keeps experimenting with different and stronger ingredients for his medicines, hoping to find the ones that will send Shen Yuan’s back into a state of equilibrium. If this damned fever would break, then at least his attention wouldn’t be so divided the way it currently is—!

Keep him alive, then solve the rest of the problems, Mu Qingfang thinks grimly to himself once again. it’s become something of a mantra over the past few days. Fever first, move on to all else after.

He rubs at his eyes. The lack of sleep is beginning to catch up with him, too, at least somewhat. He isn’t physically tired—his cultivation takes care of that. It’s purely mental fatigue, the type that comes from focussing so heavily upon a patient that’s in danger. Physical sleep would help, if only because it would give his mind time to unwind and refocus itself.

Mu Qingfang has grabbed snatches of sleep here and there, but it’s been neither long nor restful enough. It’s been the type of shallow sleep that has one sitting up every couple of kè, sure that the alarm on the patient’s bed is about to start ringing; the type of stomach-clenching anxiety that comes part and parcel with a patient lying so very close to the edge.

It doesn’t help that he’s the only one circulating Shen Yuan’s qi. It’s an expenditure that, while minimal, is draining in its own way, Without-A-Cure making the job take more effort than it really should. He doesn’t have any other options, though, not unless he decides to pull in one of his disciples, and he worries that even his head disciple won’t have the strength to clear the blockages in Shen Yuan’s qi as thoroughly as they need to be cleared.

Damn, and damn, and damn, he thinks to himself, as he forces himself up from his most recent cat-nap early in the morning of the fourth day. He’s still turning over the qi-cycling problem in his mind. Is there any possibility he’ll be able to convince Shen Qingqiu to allow another Peak Lord in the room? Wei Qingwei, maybe? He’s a relatively neutral option.

Mu Qingfang has barely had enough time to drink a bracing cup of tea before there is a knock at the door. Shen Qingqiu doesn’t turn a hair. Mu Qingfang shuffles away from his work table, where he was surveying his supplies to decide what he should try next, and goes to answer it.

“Shizun,” one of his disciples greets him respectfully. “There’s a Qing Jing disciple here, requesting to see his shizun.”

Of course. It was only a matter of time.

He looks over his shoulder.

“Which one?” Shen Qingqiu asks before Mu Qingfang can open his mouth. However much he had ignored the knock at the door, he was obviously listening in on the conversation.

Mu Qingfang’s disciple shifts, leaning forward slightly to address Shen Qingqiu more directly. Mu Qingfang shifts to one side of the doorway to accommodate this better.

“Apologies to Shibo, this disciple didn’t ask his name,” she says.

A long pause, before Shen Qingqiu says, deadly soft, “Send him in.”

Mu Qingfang doesn’t trust that voice at all. He hadn’t planned on leaving the room while the disciple visited, not unless Shen Qingqiu explicitly requested it and had a good reason to support why Mu Qingfang should do so—not after what happened with Yue Qingyuan—but now he definitely isn’t leaving.

“As he says,” Mu Qingfang tells his disciple, sending her away to fetch her shixiong. Presumably this will be Shen Qingqiu’s head disciple, likely here to discuss Qing Jing business since Shen Qingqiu didn’t return from his seclusion at the time he had originally been meant to, but Mu Qingfang isn’t sure about that.

He’s right to be unsure. The disciple who hesitantly crosses the threshold is not Ming Fan. He has the drawn, pale look of one who has been recently lacking sleep without cultivation strong enough to support himself, and he moves with the faintest hint of stiffness. He must have been involved in the fighting, but not to such an extent that he needed to be kept on Qian Cao.

The disciple’s gaze goes to Shen Qingqiu, and then past him to Shen Yuan. His already pale face loses a bit more color.

“Luo Binghe,” Shen Qingqiu says, after a perfunctory glance over his shoulder at the disciple.

Oh, this is Luo Binghe? Mu Qingfang has been made aware of the events on Qiong Ding, in broad strokes if not in exhaustive detail, so he knows that this is the disciple who fought in the final round against the demons. Quite a good showing by Qing Jing, to so soundly defeat the demons, and as the scholar’s peak, too!

If only Shen Yuan hadn’t been injured so severely, Cang Qiong could be quite proud of themselves for how they upheld their sect’s honor.

“Greetings to Peak Lord Shen," Luo Binghe says tremulously, dipping into a bow.

Mu Qingfang's eyebrows jump. Peak Lord Shen, is it?

Shen Qingqiu stands. Carefully resettles his brother's hand back on the bed, then turns to Luo Binghe. A few long strides, and he's across the room, directly in front of the still-bowing disciple.

"Rise," Shen Qingqiu says. Luo Binghe does so, though he cannot seem to bring himself to look directly at Shen Qingqiu, and a faint tremor goes through him before he settles once more. "Don't you have classes to attend?"

Luo Binghe bites his lip. "Yes, Peak Lord Shen," he says. "But I—but this one—”

"Thought it best, instead, to intrude on the healers here?" Shen Qingqiu's voice is silky smooth. Luo Binghe's shoulders hunch.

“This Luo Binghe accepts his errors,” he says.

“Do you?” Shen Qingqiu asks. He reaches out, his long fingers tipping Luo Binghe’s chin back until their eyes meet. “Do you indeed, Luo Binghe?”

Luo Binghe swallows hard. There are still-healing bruises ringing his throat like a necklace, previously hidden by the fall of his hair and the cut of his robes, but exposed now. They’re days old; they must have come from the invasion. Mu Qingfang knows his students well enough to know that none of them would have allowed Luo Binghe to leave the scene until and unless he had been checked over and cleared of any potential complications that might have arisen from…whatever caused those bruises in the first place.

Why, then, are the fine hairs on the back of Mu Qingfang’s neck rising, as Shen Qingqiu examines those bruises dispassionately?

This isn’t the same wariness he felt during Shen Qingqiu’s confrontation with Yue Qingyuan. That had been a loss of control, one he’s sure that neither Zhangmen-shixiong or Shen Qingqiu would have wished him to witness. It was so close to a qi deviation, and the snapping spark of it had roiled in the atmosphere, incredibly distinct to his senses. This scene before him lacks that.

Shen Qingqiu is in utter control of himself.

…Shen Qingqiu is lethally dangerous no matter what state of mind he is in. He usually restrains it, keeping it to a biting tongue and purely emotional or mental wounds.

Mu Qingfang has a horrid feeling that Shen Qingqiu may be about to break through that control. He takes a small, cautious step forward.

“Yes, Peak Lord Shen,” Luo Binghe says again.

Shen Qingqiu’s hand slides down from Luo Binghe’s chin, settling slowly, softly against his neck, fingers slotting in place and aligning perfectly with those bruises. He presses lightly against them, just enough to make Luo Binghe wince but not enough to cause him further harm.

Mu Qingfang barely dares breathe, sure that if he moves too suddenly, the precarious balance between his shizhi and shixiong will tip in a way that will end in disaster. He hadn’t known in advance to stop it, but he should never have let Luo Binghe into this room.

“If my A-Yuan dies,” Shen Qingqiu says, very calmly, “you can beg his forgiveness yourself on the Naihe Bridge, I will make sure of that.”

“Shixiong!” Mu Qingfang snaps, unable to stop himself. Shen Qingqiu does not pay him any mind, nor does Mu Qingfang’s interjection cover Luo Binghe’s response.

“Yes, Peak Lord Shen,” the child says for a third time. He leans, just barely, into Shen Qingqiu’s grip, his voice growing strangled as he breathes out, “This disciple understands.”

Shen Qingqiu shoves Luo Binghe away. Turns on his heel and paces across the room again to return to his vigil at Shen Yuan’s bedside. He leaves his back to the disciple he threatened as he says, “Get out of my sight.”

Luo Binghe bows to Shen Qingqiu, even though he doesn’t see it. Mu Qingfang firmly stomps on his own fury—a disciple! A member of his sect! Threatened in his healing halls! Oh, he’ll be having words with Shen Qingqiu later, the way he hadn’t after the man had attacked Zhangmen-shixiong—and escorts Luo Binghe from the room.

“Let me see, Shizhi,” Mu Qingfang tells Luo Binghe the moment they’re safely out of the room. He tips Luo Binghe’s head back a little, moving slowly so as to not startle Luo Binghe with his actions.

“This disciple is fine,” Luo Binghe says.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Mu Qingfang says tiredly. In the end, Luo Binghe is right, though. He had been treated well by Mu Qingfang’s own disciples; the bruises are well on their way to healing, no doubt only still discolored because his disciples hadn’t had the qi to spare to bother fully fixing the superficial damage once the internal damage was taken care of. Not when Luo Binghe’s own cultivation should finish the healing easily, and there were other injuries to see to on Qiong Ding. Shen Qingqiu hadn’t put enough pressure onto the bruises to actually cause further damage. Nor had Luo Binghe done himself damage by—by—

Mu Qingfang takes a short moment to close his eyes and pull in a calming breath before he opens them again to carry on.

“Mu-shishu,” Luo Binghe says. “How…how is Shizun?”

That’s not the question Mu Qingfang expected.

“…What does Luo Binghe mean?” he asks. “You talked to him just now.”

He had his hand around your throat as he threatened to kill you!

Luo Binghe shakes his head. “Not Peak Lord Shen. Shizun.”

It takes a moment longer than Mu Qingfang is proud of before he understands the distinction that Luo Binghe is making.

“Shen Yuan is your shizun?” he clarifies.

Luo Binghe nods.

Damn it all. He had thought—as had his disciple—that Luo Binghe was here to see Shen Qingqiu. They were wrong about who Luo Binghe was here to see, and that has a distinct effect on how to handle the situation Mu Qingfang now finds himself in. Mu Qingfang only braced himself for dealing with Shen Qingqiu, not for telling a disciple news about his shizun, who currently still hovers closer to dying than he does to making a recovery.

…From what Shen Qingqiu had said to this disciple, Mu Qingfang thinks that Luo Binghe is aware of that fact.

“I wasn’t aware that Shen Yuan had taken on a personal disciple,” Mu Qingfang says. The man hadn’t mentioned it during their meetings before he and Shen Qingqiu went into seclusion. All he’d mentioned was that he was practicing with—with a disciple. Oh, of course. That disciple must have been Luo Binghe, and Shen Yuan…

Shen Yuan apparently hadn’t seen fit to mention that the disciple was one he had taken on as his own personal student. Shen-shixiong, really, didn’t you think that was worth mentioning to anyone? It was as sure a sign as any that Shen Yuan had accepted the role of Peak Lord, though of course most everyone had figured that out from context anyway.

“Yes, Shishu,” Luo Binghe says. “He has.”

Mu Qingfang barely holds back his grimace. “Regardless of the fact that you are his personal disciple, I cannot share Shen Yuan’s medical information with you. My apologies, Shizhi.”

Luo Binghe nods again, his lips pressed tightly together in an obvious attempt to keep his mouth from wobbling to match the sheen of tears growing in his eyes. He blinks hard.

“I am sorry that you came all this way for nothing,” Mu Qingfang says gently. “Your—ah.” Shizun really isn’t the correct word, is it? Luo Binghe has made that abundantly clear. “Peak Lord Shen was right; surely you have lessons to attend…?”

"Yes, Mu-shishu."

Mu Qingfang only just stops the heavy sigh that wants to leave him. "Don't give up hope just yet," he tells Luo Binghe. Shen Qingqiu's words hadn't been encouraging, and Mu Qingfang is firm on not giving Luo Binghe details, but—he can do this much, at least. "We're doing everything we can."

(It just might not be enough, in the end—

No. No, that's defeatist talk. Mu Qingfang refuses to let it become a reality.)

"Yes, Mu-shishu," Luo Binghe says again.

"Back to your peak with you," Mu Qingfang says, still gentle. Luo Binghe should head back to Qing Jing, because Mu Qingfang needs to have words with his Peak Lord.

Notably, Luo Binghe does not agree to that last. Mu Qingfang, however, doesn't notice that particular fact for half a day more.

Luo Binghe’s hopes have been dashed. Mu Qingfang won’t tell him anything, and Shen Qingqiu—

Luo Binghe has absolutely no doubts that his former shizun will immediately follow through on his threat should the worst come to pass. The fact that Shen Qingqiu even made that threat to Luo Binghe tells him all that he needs to know about how Shizun is doing.

Even more than his brief glimpse of Shizun already had.

Shizun was…so still. Lying there on the bed, though whether asleep or unconscious Luo Binghe couldn’t tell, and with Shen Qingqiu keeping a vigil next to him. Shen Qingqiu himself had looked the most unkempt that Luo Binghe has ever seen him. Not physically; his robes were perfectly pristine and unwrinkled, his hair pinned up and falling neatly down his back, but Luo Binghe has spent years basing his survival on his ability to read Shen Qingqiu’s moods, and this is one that he has never seen before.

It’s as if a light had gone out behind Shen Qingqiu’s eyes. Or—no, not that. The light hadn’t gone out completely, but it was akin to a candle flame, guttering out its last.

If my A-Yuan dies, you can beg his forgiveness yourself on the Naihe Bridge, I will make sure of that.

Shizun can’t die, he can’t.

…If he does, Luo Binghe really wouldn’t blame Shen Qingqiu for going mad. He only spoke the truth when he told Shen Qingqiu he understood. Luo Binghe has only had Shen Yuan in his life for this short amount of time, but there is a weight to Shizun, a certain gravity that continually draws Luo Binghe further in. And that’s on top of all of Shizun’s mysteries, all the things—the things about Binghe—that he knows.

Should Shizun die, Luo Binghe would be adrift. He wouldn’t know what to do with himself.

He can’t imagine what it would do to Shen Qingqiu.

Luo Binghe has been sheltered beneath Shizun’s wings these past several months, a comforting and protective weight even when Shizun wasn’t physically present. At the same time, he has been left alone on Qing Jing Peak, with neither Shizun nor Shen Qingqiu there. It’s given him time to reassess many things. Being so sheltered by Shizun has thrown into stark relief how different his life is now, and Luo Binghe finds—he really doesn’t like Shen Qingqiu all that much.

It feels awful to think. It’s true, though. He’s never allowed himself to confront the thought before, because hadn’t Shen Qingqiu taken him in to Qing Jing Peak? Hadn’t he accepted Luo Binghe as a disciple, and saved him from a short, awful life on the streets? Didn’t he owe Shen Qingqiu, debts of gratitude and filial piety alike?

Shen Yuan owns all of Luo Binghe’s debts now. Luo Binghe has more than paid Shen Qingqiu back; he tried so hard to be a good disciple for him. No more. Shen Qingqiu will receive the filial piety he deserves as Luo Binghe’s shibo, but that is all.

Everything Luo Binghe has, he will offer to Shen Yuan instead.

Even if that means his life. Luo Binghe’s life isn’t a worthy trade for Shen Yuan’s own. He so desperately wishes that Shen Yuan hadn’t saved him. Not if that meant Shen Yuan dying in his place.

He may not like Shen Qingqiu, but he really…understands him, when it comes to this.

Don’t give up hope, Mu-shishu told him.

He’ll try.

Luo Binghe finds himself an empty corner in the front hall of the building he and Shizun and Shen Qingqiu are in. Qian Cao disciples hurry to and fro, but he’s safely tucked out of the way.

Mu-shishu won’t tell him anything? That’s fine. He’ll wait here.

He’ll know, eventually. One way or the other.

Chapter 15

Chapter Text

“Do not,” Mu Qingfang says as he reenters his exam room, “ever threaten violence to someone on my peak again.”

“The little beast belongs to Qing Jing, not your Qian Cao,” Shen Qingqiu says, notably not claiming Luo Binghe as his disciple, personal or otherwise.

“He is currently standing on my peak, which means that he is off-limits,” Mu Qingfang says. “This is a place for healing! If you do that again—”

“Threats, Mu-shidi?” Shen Qingqiu asks silkily. “Isn’t this rank hypocrisy?”

“—I will ban you from this room,” Mu Qingfang finishes severely. Qian Cao medics often have to take preventative actions in the course of their duties. That is precisely what he had done when Shen Qingqiu attacked Yue Qingyuan. No matter how deeply aggravating some patients—or family members of patients—are, Mu Qingfang truly believes what he says. This is a place for healing. The only violence that could ever possibly be allowed is in defense of one of his patients.

Or other members of the sect.

It is this ultimatum that finally gets Shen Qingqiu to turn and face him. Mu Qingfang knew it would. He also figured there was a high probability Shen Qingqiu would take it poorly. That’s why, in the spirit of preventative medicine, Mu Qingfang already has his acupuncture needles in his grip again, half-hidden by the curl of his hand.

Let it never be said that Shen Qingqiu doesn’t make note of the lessons that he learns. Whether he actually utilizes what he learns from them is up for debate, but this time, it seems, is one of those occasions. His gaze goes unerringly toward Mu Qingfang’s silent threat. There is a silent, half-hidden and yet clear debate in Shen Qingqiu’s mind, but ultimately, he acquiesces.

“…Fine,” Shen Qingqiu says. “But keep the little beast out of here. I don’t want to see him.”

“As you say, Shixiong,” Mu Qingfang says tightly. He doesn’t trust himself to say anything further.

A stilted silence overcomes them. Mu Qingfang returns to his work. He’s pulled some more Fevered Tortoiseshell-Snake’s Root from the stores, and it requires quite a bit of chopping and then grinding before it can be used in medicine. Just what Mu Qingfang is in the mood for.

With good luck, Mu Qingfang can finally force Shen Yuan’s fever to break. If not…

If not, he’ll continue working. Something must have an effect.

Eventually.

Something must.

Yue Qingyuan is in a black mood.

He goes through the few remaining demons like a hurricane, Liu Qingge at his side. The disparity between his mood and that implacable, ever-present smile on his face probably makes the demons’ fear worse, honestly. Liu Qingge is on the same side as Yue Qingyuan and even he acknowledges that he would never want to be at the opposite end of that smile. Not when Yue Qingyuan is so angry.

Liu Qingge’s attack on the demons was, perhaps, too efficient. At the time he had mostly been concerned with clearing the demons from the sect, but he’s been reprimanded before, both as a disciple and as a Peak Lord, on account of his…over-enthusiasm. Liu Qingge is good at killing things. Beasts, demons, it doesn’t matter. There’s a reason no one tries to send him on missions meant for captures rather than extermination. Oh, he can do it, but most of the time he doesn’t understand why he should bother. A beast is a beast, a monster is a monster. If it’s killing people, he’ll kill it in turn.

The demons who invaded their sect killed more than a handful of their disciples.

They also poisoned one of Cang Qiong’s Peak Lords. Potentially fatally, though Liu Qingge still hasn’t heard any confirmation about that. He’s pretty sure Shen Qingqiu would make it abundantly clear if it had been a successful murder.

…Liu Qingge wouldn’t be able to blame him, if Shen Qingqiu took the death of his brother poorly. He has no affection for Qing Jing’s Lord, but Liu Qingge, too, is a brother. He is desperately grateful that Liu Mingyan, though present on Qiong Ding during the invasion, wasn’t injured in the fighting. In point of fact, she had taken charge of her cadre of Xian Shu disciples and, despite her lack of spiritual blade, helped hold defenses in the main courtyard until Shen Qingqiu and Shen Yuan arrived.

He’s proud of her. Qi Qingqi chose her head disciple well. He hopes that Qi Qingqi allows Liu Mingyan to draw her sword soon. Liu Qingge wants to be able to fight his sister at a more equal level. Currently their fights are handicapped by Liu Mingyan’s practice blade. And, technically, by the fact that Liu Mingyan is still a disciple going up against a Peak Lord, but the Liu family has never let small details like that stop them.

Yue Qingyuan is understandably upset about the invasion. All the Peak Lords are. This anger is about more than just the invasion, though. Zhangmen-shixiong has his whole weird thing when it comes to Shen Qingqiu, which none of the other Peak Lords have ever understood. Liu Qingge supposes he shouldn’t be surprised that it extends to Shen Yuan, too. Especially since—well, didn’t Mu Qingfang say something about that in the Lingxi Caves? Confusion over whether or not Shen Yuan was still among the living? He hadn’t specifically said anything about Yue Qingyuan in relation to that, but…

It’s an easy jump in logic to make, is all.

Certainly Yue Qingyuan seems to be taking Shen Yuan’s poisoning hard. The details of Without-A-Cure are always among the questions Zhangmen-shixiong asks during his interrogations. The demons—the ones who know about the poison, which isn’t even all of them, apparently; some of them clearly had never heard of it until their leader told Shen Qingqiu about it—all repeat the same information:

Harmless to demons, yet deadly to human cultivators. Always.

Bastards. Cowardly bastards, stupid bastards. To attack with a poison in the first place, and then for it to be one that has no cure! No cure means no space for negotiating—even if all that negotiating would earn them is a quick death.

By the faces of some of the demons, they would welcome a quick death rather than face Yue Qingyuan’s fury. It’s well known in the Demon Realm that he took point in the sealing of the previous demon emperor, Tianlang-Jun. They fought one-on-one for at least a ke, if not almost twice that long, while the other cultivators retreated with their wounded or frantically placed the last of the arrays necessary to seal away a Heavenly Demon.

Liu Qingge wasn’t at the battle—Yue Qingyuan was the sole disciple of the sect’s younger generation who was called for the sealing of Tianlang-Jun, all the others being the Peak Lords and cultivators of the older generation—but everyone has heard the stories. Yue Qingyuan commands respect in the cultivation world.

He commands fear among demons.

It’s no wonder they waited until he was gone from the sect to invade.

Yue Qingyuan asks about the poison, but he does his duty as sect leader. He investigates the invasion itself: how this Sha Hualing had rallied the demons to her cause, the path they took through the Human Realm to get to Cang Qiong, how they made it into the sect proper, how they broke the Rainbow Bridge and set up the barrier around Qiong Ding—

How they knew Yue Qingyuan was going to be gone for their attack.

None of the demons can, or will, give clear answers. No matter how they may fear Yue Qingyuan, even those who do seem to know something keep their mouths shut. Cang Qiong will have to find a way to keep them from suiciding before they can try to get answers from them again.

Liu Qingge follows Yue Qingyuan through all the interrogations, a silent guard. Eventually, though, they run out of demons to question. They’re keeping the prisoners alive for now, whether to search for more answers or to potentially ransom them back to the Demon Realm, if any of them are high-ranking enough to bother doing so, but all of that takes time. Yue Qingyuan needs to take a break before working on this any more.

“Zhangmen-shixiong,” Liu Qingge says. Yue Qingyuan is standing outside the cell of the last prisoner he interrogated, staring blankly into the distance. At Liu Qingge’s voice, he slowly, subtly shakes himself out of whatever trance he was in. He looks over his shoulder at Liu Qingge, then turns back, leading the way back out of the cells beneath Qiong Ding.

He doesn’t say anything as they walk. Liu Qingge doesn’t either. He doesn’t know what he could say. He wishes, briefly, frustratedly, that he were better with words. Yue Qingyuan has been his shixiong—his friend—for almost two decades. He’s always been a pillar, both as shixiong and then as sect leader. One with an unfortunate inclination toward indulging Shen Qingqiu’s worst impulses and moods, but a pillar nevertheless. Liu Qingge never thought that he was fallible.

Yet here Yue Qingyuan is, crumbling, and Liu Qingge is helpless to stop it happening.

They breach into the sunlight. The entrance to the prison is heavily warded, set into the side of one of Qiong Ding’s cliffs. The guards have a good view of Qiong Ding from here, the better to see anyone coming to visit the prisoners. Liu Qingge doesn’t look down at Qiong Ding, though. He looks further up, gaze sweeping the spread of the peaks around them.

Days later, they’re still burning the dead invaders on pyres, and smoke rises over the peaks from those fires. It’s both a horrible reminder of the invasion as it was happening, and an obvious signal to everyone in the sect that Cang Qiong is still healing and dealing with the aftermath. Cang Qiong’s own dead were set aside to be given proper funerals. So far as Liu Qingge knows, most of them are done with already; there are just a few remaining.

Liu Qingge only lost one from Bai Zhan. Meishi Zhong set up a barrier array around the dorms holding Qiong Ding’s youngest, one designed to maintain itself even in the face of its creator’s death, and he held off any demon that tried to go after those weakest of Cang Qiong’s disciples. He took a fatal blow a ke before Liu Qingge was summoned from the Lingxi Caves, his opponents refusing to back down from the opportunity to throw themselves against a Bai Zhan warrior even in favor of Sha Hualing’s twisted little tournament. There is nothing Liu Qingge could have done to stop it.

Meishi Zhong has been buried with highest honors.

All the disciples he defended survived.

Yue Qingyuan, too, surveys the peaks, but Liu Qingge isn’t sure it’s Cang Qiong that he’s seeing.

“Shixiong,” Liu Qingge says. He—tries. Tries for, What are you thinking? or Let me help, let one of your martial siblings help or You don’t have to carry this alone. He doesn’t have the right words.

There is a heartbeat where Liu Qingge thinks it doesn’t matter. He sees Yue Qingyuan understand the offer. Sees him consider it. Sees him draw a breath—

And release it, shoulders slumping.

“Thank you for your help, Liu-shidi,” Yue Qingyuan says. “I think…that’s all for today.”

What can Liu Qingge do but accept that? He makes his farewells and goes back to his peak.

Zhangmen-shixiong, it seems, doesn’t have the right words either.

“What are you doing?”

Luo Binghe drops out of his meditation and back into his body. A Qian Cao disciple is standing in front of him—the same one who escorted him to Shizun’s room earlier. She’s a good few years older than him, and carries a sort of self-assured certainty to her. She doesn’t seem angry as she stands there, but Luo Binghe knows that he was technically, obliquely being sent back to Qing Jing when Shen Qingqiu and Mu Qingfang dismissed him. He doesn’t know what this disciple wants from him, or how aware of his quasi-orders she is.

“Meditating,” he says cautiously.

She nods agreeably to this. “Why here?”

There it is. Now she’s going to send him away.

“…Waiting for news on Shizun,” Luo Binghe mumbles.

“There’s meditation gardens out back,” she tells him helpfully, “if you’d prefer.”

Oh? That’s…not what he thought she would say. He’d expected that he would be told to fully remove himself from Qian Cao peak in favor of returning to his own.

He does find the offer vaguely tempting—this out of the way corner isn’t exactly the best nor most comfortable spot for meditation—but the meditation is ultimately only the means to an end. At the moment, he isn’t particularly invested in meditating for its own sake; what is important is that it keeps his mind from running frantically in circles while contemplating all the worst-case scenarios, and it helps the time pass quicker.

“No, thank you,” Luo Binghe says politely. Why would he want to be any further from Shizun than he already is?

The Qian Cao disciple accepts this gracefully and, after a momentary flicker up and down as she assesses him, she leaves him be.

Luo Binghe sinks back into his meditation. He surfaces again, some time later, when he hears wood tap against the floor in front of him. The Qian Cao disciple is back, setting a tray down within arm’s reach of him. It’s laden with rice, a small bowl of chicken and mushroom soup, stir-fried vegetables, and even a steaming cup of tea. Luo Binghe stares at it, uncomprehending.

“Shixiong isn’t old enough to be practicing inedia,” the Qian Cao disciple tells him. “Eat.”

She walks away again, before Luo Binghe can thank her. Luo Binghe reaches out, picking up the tray and settling it in his lap. He eats slowly. He hadn’t even realized that he was hungry, not before he started eating. Qian Cao’s food is somewhat bland, but for all that, it’s filling. Qing Jing’s food is bland in a similar way, utilizing very few seasonings, but it’s lighter fare all around. Luo Binghe would never dare complain—food is food, and he knows far too well what it’s like to go without, even after he arrived at the sect—but he does occasionally wish he would be allowed into the kitchens. He wants to cook again.

When he finishes, he neatly places the bowls back on the tray, and wonders what he’s supposed to do with the tray itself. Should he try to find his shimei…?

She swoops down to collect the tray before he has time to work himself up about it.

“Thank…?” Luo Binghe says, but she’s gone almost before he can finish with, “you.”

She brings another tray for what must be dinner. It’s the same routine as with lunch: she hands off the tray, he eats, she returns to collect the tray. This time, however, she doesn’t leave again immediately. She stands there, holding the tray of empty dishes in her hands, and says, “Shixiong should make sure to take care of himself, too.”

Luo Binghe blinks owlishly at her. “Begging Shimei’s pardon…?”

She nods firmly, as if this is capitulation rather than a request for clarification. “As long as Shixiong understands,” she says, but she seems faintly troubled. Once again she departs before he can ask any follow-up questions or even thank her. Luo Binghe still doesn’t even know her name.

What he does know is that he should have been more wary of what else she might do—or who she might talk to.

For the second time that day, Luo Binghe’s meditation is interrupted by someone asking, “What are you doing?”

Luo Binghe is already cupping his hands and dipping into a—admittedly somewhat awkward—seated bow before he completely registers who is standing in front of him or manages to remind himself that the exasperation in that voice likely doesn’t herald danger the way it would with Shen Qingqiu.

“Greetings to Mu-shishu,” Luo Binghe says respectfully.

“Luo Binghe,” Mu Qingfang sighs. “I thought you returned to Qing Jing this morning, and yet my disciple Wu Renci tells me you’ve spent all day here instead.”

Luo Binghe says, “This disciple tried to keep out of the way of the healers working here. This disciple apologizes for distracting Shimei from her duties.” He refuses to apologize for staying on Qian Cao, close to Shizun.

“No, you weren’t in the way,” Mu Qingfang acknowledges. “And you weren’t distracting Wu Renci. Part of the duties of a Qian Cao medic is looking after all those who are in our halls. For whatever reason that might be.”

Oh. Well, that’s…good? Though he does feel as if Mu Qingfang is making a pointed comment there toward the end. A feeling that isn’t eased when Mu Qingfang continues, sounding tired.

“Please at least return to Qing Jing to sleep. I won’t say anything to your—to Shen Qingqiu about you skipping classes, but sleep is significantly less negotiable.”

Luo Binghe weighs the merits of this agreement. Reluctant though he is to leave Shizun, this is a good deal. Mu Qingfang is fairly obviously leaving an open space in this agreement for Luo Binghe to come back to Qian Cao during the day, so long as he spends his nights on Qing Jing. He doesn’t want to, but he can’t risk Mu Qingfang deciding to unilaterally ban him from Qian Cao.

“Yes, Mu-shishu,” Luo Binghe says in defeat.

“Off you go then, Luo-shizhi,” Mu Qingfang says. This time, his shishu actually watches to make sure he leaves Qian Cao. He’s learned from the last time.

It’s not quite fully dark outside, so it’s easy for Luo Binghe to navigate his way back to Qing Jing. Chaotic though the past week has been, Luo Binghe can’t discount the possibility—probability, really—that his disappearance from Qing Jing today has been noted, so he doesn’t go to the dormitories. There’s no need to subject himself to Ming Fan’s potential interrogation.

Luo Binghe beds down in the woodshed. In the morning, after a night of only somewhat restless sleep, he heads back to Qian Cao. Wu Renci presses a pear into his hands when she passes him about a quarter-shichen after his arrival. Luo Binghe shrugs. Eats it. Settles himself fully into his little corner, takes up a meditation pose, and continues his wait.

Thank all the heavenly officials, Mu Qingfang thinks to himself late in the afternoon of the fifth day. Shen Yuan’s fever has finally broken. Mu Qingfang had used the other half of the Silver Sanguinary Camellia tincture he had created yesterday, along with truly ungodly amounts of Fevered Tortoiseshell-Snake’s Root, and at last it’s worked. Fevered Tortoiseshell-Snake’s Root is a powerful medicine, yes, but that’s partially because of the boon it grants to those who consume it. Not a large boon—in fact, it’s nearly negligible. The amount of Fevered Tortoiseshell-Snake’s Root it would take to see appreciable differences in everyday life would be nearly impossible for any human to ever consume. However, when practicing medicine, sometimes the tiniest bit of luck is all one needs, especially if that tiny boon is granted in conjunction with the effects of other medicines.

Mu Qingfang is going to be lighting several sticks of incense in the near future. At Shen Yuan’s bedside, Shen Qingqiu’s lips are moving in what might be a soundless prayer of thanks. Mu Qingfang leaves him to it; Shen Yuan’s fever may have broken, but there’s still much to do. He has yet to waken, after all, and Without-A-Cure is still running rampant through his body.

Though the poison seems to have been mildly repressed by the Silver Sanguinary Camellia infusion, Mu Qingfang will need to find a milder ingredient for Shen Yuan’s medication going forward. One that will have some of the same effects without the potential for complications. Fortunately, by now he has quite a good grasp of Without-A-Cure, and he’s confident he’ll be able to coax the poison into remission. Shen Yuan’s health after this is always going to be a delicate balance, but Mu Qingfang is no longer so deathly afraid that they’re going to lose him.

So much incense. No few sticks of which will be dedicated to his own shizun, for teaching Mu Qingfang so well.

As he mixes ingredients together, Mu Qingfang contemplates what else will be needed for Shen Yuan’s treatments. He keeps circling back to that considering thought from the other day, about another person to help circulate Shen Yuan’s qi. Medicine alone won’t be enough, not if Mu Qingfang understands this poison correctly, and after the majority of a week fighting it, he believes he understands it quite intimately. Even in remission, there is a very large probability that Without-A-Cure will still be able to halt Shen Yuan’s qi. He will undoubtably have flare-ups, the kind that no one will be able to prevent or predict, no matter what precautions are taken.

To keep those to as small a frequency as possible, Shen Yuan’s qi will need to be regularly cleared of the blockages attempting to form in it, and Shen Qingqiu cannot be the one to do so. Mu Qingfang is reluctant to allow him to do so except for in the direst of emergencies, and even then, he would hesitate before granting permission. This past week of monitoring Shen Yuan’s health has done nothing to reassure him that Without-A-Cure won’t try to make the leap between the twins. Logically it shouldn’t, but Mu Qingfang’s thoughts always return to that simultaneous qi deviation between them. Mu Qingfang hasn’t put this much effort into keeping the both of them alive for Shen Qingqiu to throw that away.

Not if there is anyone else who can help.

The problem, as ever, remains who will be most suited to this task. Mu Qingfang is still leaning toward Wei Qingwei as his suggestion, but strong though Wan Jian’s Peak Lord is, willing though he would be do do this—Mu Qingfang is unfortunately sure that Liu Qingge would be the better candidate. Shen Yuan had successfully managed to halt Liu Qingge’s qi deviation in its tracks with one concentrated hit. Their qi is complementary, Liu Qingge’s yang nature to the twins’ yin. Anyone could clear Shen Yuan’s blockages, and yet some people will undoubtably be more compatible, possibly even able to keep the blockages clear for longer.

How on earth Mu Qingfang is going to convince Shen Qingqiu of this, he isn’t sure.

Mu Qingfang can keep handling Shen Yuan’s qi cycling for now. He has time to figure out how best to present this to Shen Qingqiu; Shen Yuan has yet to wake, and Mu Qingfang would like to offer him the chance to have a voice in the coming conversation. Mu Qingfang can marshal his arguments in the meantime.

They’re through the worst of it. Now it’s up to Shen Yuan to wake.

Hopefully, that will be soon.

Chapter 16

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe goes to sleep and wakes to abject chaos. A desolate wasteland surrounds him, stretching out toward an endless horizon, with swirls of incomprehensible nothingness or bursts of random, distracting energy occasionally filling the space. He turns in a slow circle, bewildered. He went to sleep on Qing Jing, another night in the woodshed to avoid the questions of his martial brothers in the dormitories, so the question is…

Where…am I?

He begins picking his way through the sheer pandemonium. There has to be some kind of landmark around here, right? A way for him to figure out where he’s been taken? Or at the very least what’s been done to him, because this can’t be a real space. An illusion, maybe?

Luo Binghe carefully skirts his way around a chasm in the ground of this place, distrustful of its depths and unwilling to try to leap over it. When he looks up again, there is someone standing in front of him. Luo Binghe draws to a consternated halt.

The child blinks at him. He’s small, young—surely not past the age of ten, if that. He looks the way Luo Binghe had as a child, especially after his mother died: unkempt, but not for lack of trying. Instead, it’s in the way of one without access to many resources. His clothes are low quality, threadbare and patched in many places, with faded colors from too many washings and ground-in dirt that speaks to how rare those washings have become. His hair is pulled into a half-ponytail, tied in place with a bit of string and very slightly off-center. His cheeks have a shadow to them that speaks to a lack of food.

His eyes are a bright, familiar green.

Luo Binghe’s heart skips a beat. It can’t be.

The child’s form shudders. Disappears, to reform as a young man clad in traveler’s robes, with simple colors and cut and only a few layers. The immortality that comes from a golden core lends a sense of agelessness to cultivators, but there’s some sort of—softness? Youth?—to this man that tells Luo Binghe he is still at least a few years removed from his Shizun. And yet, undeniably, it is Shen Yuan who stands before Luo Binghe now.

Luo Binghe gasps. Awe, relief, it’s Shizun, Shizun is here, Shizun is awake—!

Shizun shudders again, a gold-and-white robed teenager reappearing in his place. This one meets Luo Binghe’s gaze head-on and says, almost tentative, “Shijie, what’s going on?”

“Shizun!” Luo Binghe cries, throwing himself into the teenager’s arms. Shizun, don’t think too deeply, what if you’re hurt again? I can’t protect you when I don’t even know where we are.

Luo Binghe doesn’t know how they’re going to escape this place when Shizun doesn’t seem to know who he is or where they are either, but the first and most important concern in Luo Binghe’s heart is to keep Shizun safe. They can solve this together, as long as Shizun isn’t hurt. Luo Binghe will find a way.

The arms around him shift, holding him closer. “Luo Binghe,” Shizun says. His voice is abruptly deeper, that of an adult, and when Luo Binghe chances a look upward, Shizun is back to how he should be, resplendent in the robes of one of Qing Jing’s lords and with that soft, fond expression on his face.

An expression that quickly fades as Shizun takes in his surroundings. He loosens his grip on Luo Binghe, who allows this to happen with extreme reluctance, instead taking a place at Shizun’s side. He wishes he had a weapon with which to defend them, but he’d not woken with one, and nor does Shizun seem to have a weapon of his own in this place.

“Ah?” Shizun says, sounding surprised as he finishes his examination, but somehow not particularly alarmed. Not like Luo Binghe had been upon finding himself here, which means that maybe, just maybe—

“Shizun, do you know where we are?” And, equally important, since as of a shichen ago Shizun was still in a coma on Qian Cao, “Why are you here, too?”

“This is a dream realm,” Shizun says.

Oh! No wonder it’s so strange, then. It’s only that he wouldn’t have imagined that this is what Shizun’s dream realm looks like. Is it because of his coma? He’d had trouble settling on a form, after all.

Wait. If this is Shizun’s dream realm, then—

“What am I doing here?” Luo Binghe says aloud, perplexed.

“Luo Binghe’s first attempt at that question was correct,” Shizun says. “Anyone else being here is strange, while Luo Binghe is the most natural inhabitant of this dream realm. It’s yours, after all.”

“Mine?” Luo Binghe echoes. This desolate place? “My dream realm…looks like this?”

What an ugly, awful thing to show Shizun. A tendril of shame curls in Luo Binghe’s chest.

“It’s not a normal dream realm,” Shizun continues, contemplative. “Someone must have tampered with it—the energy here is too strong and unstable for it to be Binghe’s own power causing this.” He pauses, and adds, “Though it is almost certainly Binghe who pulled this master in after him.”

That tendril of shame grows larger.

“Shizun!” Luo Binghe says. “I didn’t meant to! I didn’t—” Does it matter what he meant or not? They both have to face the consequences. “This disciple is useless and involved Shizun once again,” Luo Binghe mumbles, drooping in place.

“Hush,” Shizun says. “I know it wasn’t intentional.” He sounds vaguely bemused, but there’s no spark of anger. In fact, confusion furrows his brows, and though Shizun has no sword in this place, a fan is suddenly in one hand, Shizun tapping its folded form against his chin as he thinks.

“Before this,” Shizun says, “where was Binghe?”

“Qing Jing,” Luo Binghe says. For the night, anyway.

“Good, good, you got back safely, then,” Shizun says. “Did you at least see the medics before returning to the peak? You were in rough shape.”

“Yes,” Luo Binghe draws out, something about this pinging at the back of his mind. “Liu-shishu made sure this one was seen by the medics. Mu-shishu double-checked their work later.” Specifically after Shen Qingqiu had thrown Luo Binghe from Shizun’s room on Qian Cao, but Luo Binghe isn’t going to tell Shizun that.

“Mu-shidi did?” Shizun asks. He tucks his fan into his belt so that he can gently take Luo Binghe by the shoulders to make him face his master. Shizun examines him intently, though most of the hits Luo Binghe took from that bastard Elder Sky Hammer left injuries that were hidden by his Qing Jing uniform and Shizun would therefore be unable to see anything, even if they hadn’t already healed. “If Mu-shidi had to get involved, should Binghe be up and running around like this…?”

Well, as Shizun said, they’re in a dream, so it doesn’t really matter, does it? Besides that, Luo Binghe is perfectly fine. It doesn’t stop him from feeling warm at the blatant concern.

“Shizun, it’s alright,” Luo Binghe soothes. “This one is completely healed.” Even the necklace of bruises around his throat has at last faded away.

“If Binghe is sure,” Shizun says, somewhat doubtfully. “I only thought—it hasn’t been that long. Binghe must be a quick healer, even after Qian Cao’s assistance.”

…Right. There’s that dissonant note again. He thinks he knows what it is now, and like as not, he should have guessed it before now.

“Shizun,” Luo Binghe says, trying to figure out the best way to phrase this. “You remember the invasion. How…when did Shizun wake up?”

“Well, I—that is,” Shizun says, and stops. Binghe waits, as Shizun brings his hands up in front of himself, pulling at the sleeve of his right arm to expose his forearm. It’s flawless, here in the dream realm, but that does nothing to reassure Shizun. He has realized what Luo Binghe is hedging around stating outright.

“Binghe,” Shizun says. “How long has it been since the invasion?”

“A week,” Luo Binghe tells him promptly.

Shizun fully turns his back on Luo Binghe for a long moment. When he turns back around, he has his fan once more in his grasp, his white-knuckled hold on it suggesting he would love nothing more than to hold it in front of his face. He keeps it down, though.

“No wonder Binghe is healed,” Shizun says, only slightly unsteady. “If it’s been so long…” He clears his throat. “Binghe said he was on Qing Jing. May this master assume that he is also on Qing Jing during his convalescence…?”

Luo Binghe shakes his head. “Shizun is still on Qian Cao.”

“Hm,” Shen Qingqiu says. “To reach between the peaks and draw the two of us into such a trap…this master has his suspicions as to who is behind this act.”

“Who?” Luo Binghe asks.

“Can’t you feel it?” Shizun asks. “Reach out. The borders of this dream realm are roiling with demonic qi. It can only be a demon who pulled us here.”

A demon. Another demon, trying to hurt Shizun. No—trying to hurt me, and by doing so, hurting Shizun, too.

“Demons,” Luo Binghe spits in disgust. “Their ways are truly poisonous.”

A hand settles in his hair. Shizun has a small smile on his face as he says, “Not necessarily. Perhaps their intentions are the opposite. Theirs is a different culture; we must take pains not to willfully misunderstand, or allow prejudice to blind our perspectives.”

“But Shizun!” Luo Binghe protests. How can Shizun say such things, when they’ve hurt him in such a way?!

“You don’t have to agree with me,” Shizun says. “Only promise me you’ll consider it.”

If Shizun asks it of him, then he will. Luo Binghe nods mulishly; he pouts severely when Shizun takes that as the sign to drop his hand back to his side.

“This dream realm is complicated,” Shizun muses as he looks around them again. “Meticulously constructed…a normal nightmare technique would be easy to break and escape, but not this one. Until the core of this illusion is destroyed, I’m afraid that neither of us will be able to leave.”

Luo Binghe’s heart drops into free-fall. Bad enough that he dragged Shizun in here, but now this!

“Shizun will be trapped here forever?” he demands. Shizun hasn’t woken from his poisoning, and now he may never. This is doubly Luo Binghe’s fault.

“You will be, too,” Shizun says, as if that’s in any way Luo Binghe’s main concern.

“It’s all my fault…”

“It is what it is,” Shizun says, practical even when he shouldn’t be. “Now, are we going to find our way out of here, or is Binghe going to give up before even attempting?”

Luo Binghe’s head jerks up. Shizun doesn’t sound angry, but a challenging air surrounds him. He lifts one eyebrow in that self-same challenge, as if to say, Well? Which is it?

Shizun hasn’t given up. Not on escaping this dream realm, nor even has he given up on Luo Binghe himself, despite Luo Binghe causing nothing but problems for him. Shizun has so much faith in him. How dare Luo Binghe disrespect that?

“Apologies, Shizun,” Luo Binghe mumbles. “This disciple…this disciple…will follow Shizun’s guidance.”

“Then keep this in mind,” Shizun says, firm. “Do not lose yourself to despair, Luo Binghe. It helps no one, least of all yourself. It can warp so easily, to ruinous ends—to hopeless deaths or heavens-shaking rage alike. If taken too far, despair can make monsters of men. I would not see that end for you.”

“Yes, Shizun.”

“Good. Now—we should find the core, dispel the barrier, and take our leave. After all, Luo Binghe still has classes in the morning, does he not?” Shizun teases.

“Mn,” Luo Binghe says. He hasn’t been going to them, but yes, technically, he does still have classes in the morning. In point of fact, what Luo Binghe hopes the morning holds for him is Shizun’s awakening. His mind is here, apparently intact—barring the jarring moment when he had first entered the dream realm, shifting between all possible forms—and hopefully that has some connection with Shizun’s state outside of the dream realm. If he’s here, able to be pulled into the dream realm, it must mean that Shizun isn’t in danger of dying anymore, right? It could even mean he’s going to wake up soon!

…If Shizun is going to wake up, then he’s right. They need to find their way out of this place.

Filled with determination, Luo Binghe follows after Shen Yuan as they head deeper into the dream realm.

SYSTEM, Shen Yuan yells in the privacy of his own mind. System, what the hell is going on here?!

[Host is now entering important subplot scenario, “The ‘Dream Demon’ Meng Mo’s Barrier.” During this subplot, please make sure to assist Luo Binghe in defeating Meng Mo’s illusions!]

I already figured that out myself! Shen Yuan gripes. Why is it me in here with him? You’ve made a mistake!

[Self-inspection has failed to find a bug. This System is running normally,] the System tells him primly.

Yeah f*cking right it’s running normally! Isn’t it supposed to be Ning Yingying here in the dream realm with Luo Binghe? Isn’t she the person that Luo Binghe trusts most on Qing Jing Peak? Shen Yuan has been doing his best, but his efforts, paltry and spread out over a mere few weeks of in-person contact, are stacked against literal years of Luo Binghe and Ning Yingying’s friendship-slash-eventual-romance!

That’s not even getting into the realization that Shen Yuan is apparently in a f*cking coma on Qian Cao. Where did that come from?! Qin Wanyue had been up and moving about until—well, until she was pushing Luo Binghe down. Shen Yuan had honestly figured he would be out a few shichen at the most, however long it took Mu Qingfang to stabilize him and find some kind of workaround to Without-A-Cure.

Shen Yuan has no intention of spilling the beans on the actual cure to the poison, but—look, it’s like cancer, right? Yeah, Without-A-Cure is a terminal illness (poisoning, whatever), but some people live for years with it, probably, and cancer goes into remission with radiation therapy, and—well, no, Shen Yuan doesn’t have a radiation therapy equivalent, though he does have Mu Qingfang—and—and—

Shen Yuan may have miscalculated.

He’s been in a coma for an entire week. Luo Binghe telling him that made him turn away just so that his disciple wouldn’t see his internal scream very nearly become an external one. Jiu-ge must be losing his sh*t. He never took it well when Shen Yuan got sick as a kid, no matter how often it happened, and Shen Yuan sincerely doubts he’s going to let Qi-ge calm him down any time soon.

…Ah? Wait, what was that thought—?

“Shizun, what’s wrong?” Luo Binghe asks.

“Nothing,” Shen Yuan says. Then again, Luo Binghe is the one who has been out and about in the real world, so it’s worth asking, isn’t it? “Only, ah, how is the peak faring?”

Look, he doesn’t want to just dive right into it! Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe’s relationship has always been really fraught! Shen Yuan hasn’t had much time to work on that yet! It’s better to hedge around the subject at first, isn’t it?

“Qing Jing has continued functioning, despite the disruption,” Luo Binghe says. Correctly intuiting what Shen Yuan is really getting at, he adds, “Peak Lord Shen has yet to return to Qing Jing, in favor of remaining on Qian Cao with Shizun.”

That’s about what Shen Yuan had expected, yes. Oh, Jiu-ge…

“Ming Fan calls this master his shishu,” Shen Yuan says instead of dwelling on that for too long. “If Binghe would like, Shifu or Shen-shibo would be appropriate, in place of Shizun or Peak Lord Shen…”

“This Binghe and Peak Lord Shen have an understanding,” Luo Binghe says peaceably, and nothing else on the subject. Which? Luo Binghe, what does that mean?! That sounds bad! Maybe not limb-ripping territory, though what does Shen Yuan know—the Luo Binghe of Proud Immortal Demon Way had called Shen Qingqiu ‘Shizun’ until the day he finally finished killing him.

Does that mean this is an improvement? It doesn’t feel like an improvement!

“Mn,” Shen Yuan says. He shouldn’t have brought any of this up in the first place! He’ll wait until he’s awake to discover any more, thank you. He quickly changes the subject, satisfied with his answers for now. “Demons who manipulate the dream realm prey on and target the weaknesses of the human heart. We must be careful here.”

“Yes, Shizun,” Luo Binghe says obediently. “This disciple will not allow Shizun to come to harm again.”

Shen Yuan isn’t the one in danger here, Luo Binghe! It’s your dream realm! Your dream realm that you should be sharing with a potential love interest, not your master!

Though influence on the plot and control of the narrative is he wanted, Shen Yuan’s existence is really throwing this world out of its proper order, isn’t it? Perhaps literally.

System, he thinks. What’s the world stability?

Hadn’t it said something about that, back when Shen Yuan was interrogating it after the Peak Lord meeting?

[World stability: 94%] the System says.

Hm, higher than when Shen Yuan first asked. But, What does that mean, exactly?

In all ways but physical, Shen Yuan is then treated to a loading icon spinning in place as the System thinks about this.

[World stability is based on multiple factors,] the System eventually says.

Those factors being…? Shen Yuan asks leadingly. It’s like pulling teeth, he swears.

[Narrative coherence. Plot-essential characters. Thematic resonance. Other factors: unspecified.]

That makes sense, he supposes. If this world is a novel, then of course narrative coherence is a deciding factor in deciding how stable the world is. Though given the novel that this world came from…can it really be said to have any narrative coherence? The number of dropped plot threads alone…

Shen Yuan once spent a solid three weeks putting together a coherent timeline of Proud Immortal Demon Way, including information about all of the wives (both their personal histories and when they met Luo Binghe, and then a separate section of the timeline devoted solely to harem dramatics), an accounting of each sect, the varied political situations over the years throughout both the Human and Demon Realms, and anything else he could think of that had a firm date—and even some few that didn’t.

It was a f*cking mess and a half, and he would have been much better off spending that time contributing to the monster wiki, but the next time someone in the comments section tried to call him out on having misremembered portions of the text while arguing about the bullsh*t Airplane was writing about the newest wife’s past, he was able to point directly at his painstakingly crafted timeline.

Yes, he published it online! Maybe Airplane could use it, too! He obviously wasn’t keeping his own records!

At any rate, he wouldn’t be surprised if the reason that the world is hanging out at only 94% stability is because it’s laid on such unstable foundations to begin with. Shen Yuan should probably be grateful it isn’t any lower than it already is.

Is there, like, some kind of critical danger threshold of world instability…? Shen Yuan asks. Probably there is, right? And it would be best to know that before it smacks him in the face. Or, better question, are there ways to keep the world from destabilizing? Shore it up?

The thought of it exhausts him, but isn’t it better to know? If Shen Yuan is going to be affecting change, he needs to know what will and won’t cause the world to come crashing down around him. Somehow the world became a little more stable over the past few months, and if he can replicate that, it would be for the best.

[Host needn’t worry about that! (* ￣▽￣ )]

Uh-huh. Limited Sandbox Mode doesn’t have any effect on it?

[…System Administration reset permissions and requirements for world stability upon introduction of Limited Sandbox Mode.]

And you still won’t tell me what I did to earn a Junior VIP account?

[Host does not have sufficient authorization to receive that information.]

Same answer as the first time he asked. Got it.

Can you tell me anything else about the world stability? Why is it at 94%? What happened to make it drop?

This, of course, assumes that it was ever at 100%, and/or that his previous thoughts are wrong and it’s not the foundation that’s the problem. Though, considering it, Luo Binghe’s disciple years were one of the stronger portions of the narrative. If anything should be at 100% world stability, it should be this section of the novel! If the System won’t tell him how to fix the world stability, or what the (potentially non-existent) danger threshold is, then maybe it can at least tell him why it’s not at 100%. Shen Yuan only entered the narrative a few months ago! The System just said SysAdmin compensated for his presence and Limited Sandbox Mode!

[Information restricted.]

Oh, for f*ck’s sake! Why won’t you—

“Shizun,” Luo Binghe says abruptly, interrupting Shen Yuan’s thoughts before he can truly begin castigating the System. They both come to a stop, taking in the city buildings that have all at once appeared through the dense layers of fog. “What should we…?”

No way around it, is there? They’ve run into the actual plot portion of this mini-quest.

“Counter soldiers with arms and floods with earthen dams,” Shen Yuan says. “We will deal with situations as they arise. Let’s go.”

From there, the encounter is exactly what Shen Yuan expects it to be: they are inside the city where Luo Binghe grew up, the one he had wandered homeless after the death of his adopted mother, until he had taken his chances and come to Cang Qiong. The details of the buildings are perfect, but the faces of the figures—if faces they can be called—are themselves blurred and indistinct.

Luo Binghe sticks close to his side, eyeing their surroundings distrustfully. Shen Yuan would like to say that he had been prepared to deal with these faceless automatons, given the knowledge gleaned from the novel and the original version of this scene but—it’s too creepy! It’s viscerally wrong, in a way that Shen Yuan hadn’t expected based on Airplane’s descriptions.

Still, he takes advantage of his metaknowledge to explain the situation when Luo Binghe asks. What can be created inside a dream realm, and what can’t. Buildings, items, surroundings, yes—but people? No.

“Even so,” Shen Yuan says, “to have created a dream on such a scale as this…there really can only be one culprit.”

“Shizun guessed even earlier, didn’t he?”

“I had my suspicions,” Shen Yuan says vaguely. “This confirms it. The creator of this dream trap—it can only be Meng Mo.”

Luo Binghe opens his mouth to ask follow-up questions, but freezes in place, peering over Shen Yuan’s shoulder. “Faces,” he breathes. “Shizun, behind you, they have faces.”

“Follow,” Shen Yuan says.

They do.

It’s not real, Luo Binghe tells himself, watching those figures—those projections of people from his memories, as Shizun tells him—beat his younger self.

It’s not real, as they insult him.

It’s not real, as his younger self meets his gaze, pleading. Luo Binghe’s head feels as though it will split open.

It’s not—

“Mother, why are you getting up?” Luo Binghe asks. “Rest, please rest!”

“Lying down doesn’t help,” his mother coughs. “May as well wash the clothes.”

“I already finished it! Won’t you lie down while I finish brewing your medicine?”

His mother allows herself to be laid back down on the bed. She agrees to eat—good, since she’s been eating less and less—and Luo Binghe runs out of their home, hoping to fetch her requested congee for her.

When he comes back—when he—when—

Ming Fan throws his mother’s guanyin pendant away. He throws it away.

Luo Binghe screams. He wants to attack Ming Fan, he wants to hurt him, but his arms are pinned behind his back by two of Ming Fan’s lackeys. He can’t move. All he can do is take the beating, while Ning Yingying yells tearfully off to the sidelines for them to stop.

After Ming Fan and the others are satisfied, Luo Binghe spends over a shichen searching for the lost pendant, but he can’t find—

“Tell me, why did you come to Cang Qiong Mountain?” the Qing Jing Peak Lord—Shizun!—asks.

Luo Binghe musters the prettiest words he can. He speaks with all the dedication in his heart. He wants his mother to be proud of him, it’s true enough. He also, desperately, wants to live. To be taken in as a disciple of Cang Qiong Mountain Sect, to become a disciple, eventually an immortal cultivator himself—isn’t it the best opportunity for him in the world? An opportunity that, even as he made his way to Cang Qiong, he had never fully allowed himself to hope to achieve. To be lifted out of the mud by one of the sect’s vaunted immortals, elegant and beautiful and everything that the stories told him cultivators were, and to be given this opportunity to further himself—it’s more than he could ever have dreamed.

Mother. Mother, are you proud of me? Your Binghe will live, your Binghe will honor you for centuries…

Shizun’s expression is inscrutable. The steaming cup of tea is still in his hand as he asks, “You had a mother? What was she like?”

“She was the best person in the world to me,” Luo Binghe says faithfully.

“Indeed, you are at the best age for cultivating,” Shizun says, contemplative. He steps closer to Luo Binghe, kneeling on the floor in front of him, staring up with stars in his eyes and his heart in his hands.

Shen Qingqiu’s own hand tips—

“Please,” Luo Binghe begs. “Anything that you have, it would be enough! She’s so ill…”

Maybe the chef’s demeanor softens slightly. Maybe. Luo Binghe has a moment for a burst of bright, tremulous hope to arise in his chest, before the voice of the manor’s young master rises from further inside.

“Send that whining mutt away,” he says. “He isn’t fit to eat even the scraps from my table, and he thinks he can come here to beg?”

“Please,” Luo Binghe says, tears blurring his vision.

“Away, you little urchin bastard!” the young master says—

Luo Binghe lays on his least-injured side in the woodshed, clutching his guanyin necklace and refusing to let any tears fall, no matter how his eyes burn. The bruises from Ming Fan and his lackeys ache. His stomach is a pit of bottomless hunger, aching almost as much as the bruises. He can’t stop thinking about the frosted disdain as Shizun glared at him today.

Luo Binghe is doing his best, he really is! He’s trying. He doesn’t know what he’s doing wrong.

It’s never enough for Shizun—

“If my A-Yuan dies,” Shen Qingqiu says, a wealth of strength barely held back as he presses against the half-healed bruises of Luo Binghe’s throat, “you can beg his forgiveness yourself on the Naihe Bridge, I will make sure of that.”

“Yes, Peak Lord Shen,” Luo Binghe says, “this disciple understands.”

Shen Qingqiu shoves him away—

Shen Yuan’s back is to Luo Binghe, protectively standing in front of Luo Binghe after thoroughly routing Elder Sky Hammer’s attack. Said elder no longer has his eponymous hammer, Shizun having thrown it away as though it weighed nothing.

“My disciple is not yours to bully,” Shizun declares.

Shen Qingqiu steps up to handle the demons, while Shizun devotes his attention to Luo Binghe. Behind him, the massive form lying on the ground shifts.

No.

Elder Sky Hammer leaps to his feet, charging forward.

No!

Shizun pushes Luo Binghe back, sword held out at the ready, Elder Sky Hammer looming ever closer—

NO! I WON’T LET YOU!

There’s no finesse to the attack that Luo Binghe unleashes. It is an unformed mass of qi, a powerful blast gathered in his palm and thrown out against the threat. Luo Binghe follows after it, ready to bring Elder Sky Hammer all the way back down to the earth. Ready to bury him there, for daring to think of harming Shizun—!

The illusion shatters.

Luo Binghe stumbles to a halt. Where Elder Sky Hammer stood is, instead, Shizun, half-kneeling, curled in on himself. Luo Binghe’s hand is still faintly warm, the last shreds of the qi from his attack clinging to the tips of his fingers. He feels faint, with how quickly the blood drains from his face.

“Shizun!” Luo Binghe says. He jerks forward a step. Stops himself. How can he touch Shizun, how can he consider himself worthy to help, when he is the one who attacked Shizun just now? “Shizun, why didn’t you dodge? Why didn’t you hit back?!”

Anything, why didn’t he do anything that to stop Luo Binghe hurting him?!

Shizun coughs weakly. “Silly child,” he says. “The whole point was to stop you getting hurt. If I hit back, wouldn’t that defeat the point?”

“Better this disciple than Shizun,” Luo Binghe says.

“You—”

“Shizun is still in a coma!” Luo Binghe cries, near hysterical. “Shizun is trapped here, because of me! What if—what if Shizun doesn’t wake up, because I pulled him into this place, because I hurt him here, when—”

“Luo Binghe, that’s enough!” Shizun snaps. “Listen to me. It would take far more than a simple attack from my disciple to bring me down, you can be assured of that. I will be fine, but Binghe was in danger of irreparably damaging his own mind! What master could I call myself, if I allowed Binghe to harm himself when I could stop him?”

But I don’t matter! Luo Binghe wants to wail. But I don’t want you to keep being hurt! But—

“But it’s my fault,” Luo Binghe hiccups, only half-repressing the sob that wants to escape him. “All of this, it’s my fault.”

Shizun sighs. “It’s not your fault,” he says. “This master made his own choices. As for this dream realm—there is no way Luo Binghe could have seen this coming. The ways of demons are unpredictable, impossible to guard against. If Luo Binghe wants to prevent this from happening again, he simply must become stronger.”

…Stronger. Hasn’t he failed so miserably at that already? Hadn’t he resolved the same, upon his return from Shuang Hu City, only to have Shizun sacrifice himself to save Luo Binghe? Can Luo Binghe ever become strong enough to protect Shizun the way he deserves?

Is Binghe going to give up before even attempting? Shizun asked. And yes, Luo Binghe has already attempted, has already failed, but:

Do not give in to despair. It helps no one, least of all yourself.

Luo Binghe falls into a kneel in front of Shizun. “I understand,” he says clearly. “And this kind of thing…I won’t allow it to happen again.”

He means it. He’ll kill anyone who tries.

Shizun coughs, but says, “No need to worry too much. Even if you cannot become strong, I’ll always stay by your side and protect you.”

Luo Binghe’s heart is overfull with joy and grief and desperate devotion. All he can do is duck his head, trying to disguise whatever conflicting expressions are fighting to come forth.

Shizun…really is the most important person to me.

Heat burns its way up his neck and across his cheeks at the thought.

“Up, up,” Shizun urges. “We’ve still plenty to do.”

Luo Binghe offers Shizun his arm to help him stand. Shizun accepts it, but a fine tremor runs through him even as he does so, and Shizun doesn’t yet stand. Luo Binghe stays in an awkward half-kneel next to him while Shizun gathers his strength. To deflect away from this weakness, to salve his own guilty conscience, Luo Binghe is bracing himself to ask what they must do next, and how he can keep himself from being drawn into such a trap a second time, when a voice speaks from nowhere.

“You’re quite something, boy, to be able to break out of this elder’s illusion.”

Luo Binghe stiffens. The voice echoes around them; Luo Binghe is unable to pick out the direction it’s coming from, so instead he does his best to curl protectively around Shizun, covering as much of his master as he is able.

“Come here,” the voice says. “Let me see what young hero is capable of such a thing.”

Shizun shifts, breaking the circle of Luo Binghe’s arms around him. “Well?” Shizun asks, sounding lightly amused, and not at all like they are confronting their enemy while Shizun is defenseless and injured on the ground. “The elder is asking after Binghe. Won’t you go see him?”

“Shizun,” Luo Binghe says, aghast. “I won’t leave you.” And, to the voice, to set the record straight: “It was my master’s strength that broke your illusion.”

The voice humphs. At the same moment, Shizun lets out a tiny sigh.

“This elder wants to speak to you, boy.” Dripping disdain, it adds, “Not this ordinary cultivator from Cang Qiong Mountain. I’ll put him to sleep.”

Near immediately, Shizun slumps, going boneless in his arms, far too much like the aftermath of the invasion.

“Shizun!” Luo Binghe holds him, staring down at a face slack with unconsciousness. He shakes at Shizun’s shoulder, but there’s no response. “Shizun, Shizun—what did you do?!” He snarls this into the air around him.

“Relax,” the voice advises. “He’s only sleeping, going through a dream within the dream.”

“I’ll kill you,” Luo Binghe swears. “If you’ve harmed him, I swear to you, I’ll find a way to kill you.” He has to get this demon to reverse what it’s done to Shizun first, though. Luo Binghe doesn’t know anything about the dream arts, but Shizun was very clear that it would be far too easy for them to be trapped in this place. Now Shizun is under a second layer of this demon’s control, and Luo Binghe has no way to reach him. He must keep control of himself. For Shizun’s sake.

“…Get over here and let’s talk,” the voice says. This time, Luo Binghe can tell where’s coming from. A cave, toward the west of this pocket of forested dreamscape.

Luo Binghe eyes the distance between the cave and himself. It will be awkward, but he should be able to make it. His cultivation has been so much better these past few months; he can use qi to boost his strength long enough to carry Shizun with him to the cave. He’s not leaving his master out here alone, where Luo Binghe won’t even be able to see him.

He gathers Shizun carefully against himself, one arm going beneath Shizun’s legs while the other stays wrapped around his shoulders. He repositions himself so that he’s properly positioned to stand, ready to push himself all the way up to his feet while taking Shizun with him, when there is a flurry of robes in front of him.

The demon—Meng Mo, Shizun called him—is half smoke and shadows, ribbons of dark mist coming off of him as he settles in front of Luo Binghe. He’s nearly insubstantial, form wavering lightly even after he’s stopped moving. He is old, with a long white beard to match his hair and deep-set wrinkles in his face. Despite this, there is still a sense of power to this demon. Luo Binghe understands far too well that this demon holds their lives in his hands.

He understands that, and yet Luo Binghe wants to tear him to pieces. He wants to slit Meng Mo’s throat. He wants to burn him alive and spit on the ashes.

He glares hatefully at Meng Mo, and grits out, “My master acknowledged you as senior. Praying Senior Meng Mo does not cause Shizun any further harm.”

“Hmph,” the demon says. “You do well to have at least that much respect.” Luo Binghe furiously bites back any retort he wishes to make. Meng Mo assesses him, obviously seeing the way that he holds himself back, and he nods his head. “You’re one who values loyalty and bonds, aren’t you?”

He circles slowly around Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe turns only enough to track him, adjusting his hold on Shizun’s unconscious form so that he’ll be prepared if Meng Mo attacks. Meng Mo doesn’t, instead drifting all the way back around to where he had begun.

“There’s no doubt about it,” Meng Mo says. “You have something being suppressed inside your body, deep down. Far enough that even this elder can’t make out what it is, but it must be remarkable.”

Suppressed? Luo Binghe wonders. He asks, “Senior Meng Mo can sense the edges of it, then? Does he have any ideas?” It’s best to gather all the information that he can.

Meng Mo says, “Talented though this elder is, there are countless master cultivators among the demonic races! It must have been one even more illustrious than myself who sealed you away.”

No, it can’t be. It can’t—

“It has to do with demons?” Luo Binghe asks. “Inside me—I have a power to do with demons?”

Meng Mo sneers at him. “What, do you think you are so far above the demon race? Do you desire to sever any connection with us? You can’t do that, child.”

Oh, but Luo Binghe wants to. What have demons done in his experience? They’ve murdered and kidnapped. They invaded his sect. They hurt Shizun. They’re monsters, one and all, and Luo Binghe supposedly has some connection with them?! No, he refuses, he—

Theirs is a different culture, Shizun said, not even half a shichen ago. We must take pains not to willfully misunderstand, or allow prejudice to blind our perspectives.

Luo Binghe blows out a breath. “Demons have done great harm to myself and others I care for,” he says neutrally. “Can Senior Meng Mo not understand why this one would be reluctant to acknowledge a connection between himself and that race?”

“Others you care for,” Meng Mo echoes. “Bah, you really take that loyalty too far. You’ve known him for such a short time—is he really worth all that?”

“Yes,” Luo Binghe says, implacable. “Senior, is it possible to remove what is being suppressed inside my body?”

“You really have a one-track mind!” Meng Mo says. “No. I already told you, I can’t even fully sense what is inside of you, much less remove it. However…I could teach you how to keep it further suppressed.” He looks Luo Binghe up and down. “I could teach you much more besides.”

“You want me to learn demonic cultivation.”

“The strength of what is inside you—it will bring great benefits to your cultivation, if you cultivate the demonic path! It—”

“No,” Luo Binghe says flatly. His heart twists at the thought, even as he refuses. Is this not the strength he’s been looking for, the kind that will let him protect Shizun? But he can’t betray Shizun like that. He swore himself to this man. He will have no other master.

“That seal on your body won’t last forever, you know,” Meng Mo says. “Oh, it’s buried deeply, the energy almost unnoticeable—but that’s only for now. If you refuse to learn from this elder, one day it will collapse completely. How do you think that Shen Qingqiu will react to another demon threatening his brother?” A cruel smirk. “How do you think your precious shizun will react?”

Luo Binghe’s nostrils flare. He clenches his teeth. Shen Qingqiu will kill him, there’s no doubt of it. Shizun, on the other hand—

Shizun would step between them. Shizun will protect him.

Luo Binghe doesn’t want him to have to, but Shizun keeps putting himself between Luo Binghe and danger. More than that, Shizun would understand, wouldn’t he? He’s the one who told Luo Binghe to keep an open mind. He would accept Luo Binghe, too.

(Unless it’s different, coming from his disciple. Coming from someone he thought was human. What happened to Shizun’s beloved Shijie? Is she the woman from whom Luo Binghe inherited this demonic power? Had she kept a demonic ancestry hidden as she entered whatever sect Shizun was a part of? The way Shizun spoke of her—she must be dead. Was her secret revealed, and his birth mother killed for it?

How will Shizun react, when it really comes down to it?)

None of this changes his answer. It does, however, bring up an interesting question.

“Why is Senior Meng Mo so determined that I learn demonic cultivation?” he asks. Luo Binghe is nothing special, no matter the power sealed inside him. He not yet fifteen, a disciple not even advanced enough in his training for a spiritual sword of his own, and yet Meng Mo is so insistent?

It doesn’t add up.

Indeed, Meng Mo blusters about his kindness toward Luo Binghe, about how extraordinary Luo Binghe is, and tries to argue about the breadth of his knowledge, how its absence would be a loss to the world, how so many demons would beg to be his student. Luo Binghe listens to this, mind spinning. No, no, it doesn’t make sense. Luo Binghe says as much aloud.

It’s none of Meng Mo’s listed reasons, it can’t be. He’s too desperate, though he doesn’t look it. Doesn’t it make sense, that this demon…needs Luo Binghe to survive?

“Moving between hosts all that time,” Luo Binghe muses. “Feeding on different dream realms…wouldn’t it be healthier to remain in one host longterm? Wouldn’t Senior Meng Mo’s cultivation suffer less from such?” He meets Meng Mo’s gaze steadily. “Has Senior Meng Mo picked this one to be his host, since Senior is nearing his limits?”

Meng Mo is a parasite, and he thinks he’s found a strong host. Ha! Let him try to persuade Luo Binghe, then.

“You!” Meng Mo snaps. He obviously forces himself calmer. Says, “This is not an opportunity for you to pass up. Besides, if you refuse, I can simply trap you and your shizun’s consciousnesses here in the—”

“Threaten my shizun again, and I will make you suffer before the end,” Luo Binghe says. His voice is cold, a counterpoint to the surging heat in his veins. “Say what you want to me. Never touch him.”

Meng Mo drifts back a pace. “Well,” he says, trying for a laugh. “Well! You’ve a temper, then! This elder will give you time to consider his offer—”

“We’re not done discussing terms,” Luo Binghe interrupts him. “You’ve given me no compelling reason as to why I should spare a second thought to your proposition. I could simply ignore it, and let you fade away—or, when I wake, use those skills taught to me by my sect to kill you myself.”

Meng Mo wets his lips, obviously unnerved. Distantly, Luo Binghe almost agrees with him. He hadn’t thought he had this malice inside him—but then, neither had he suspected whatever demonic inheritance he holds. Apparently there are always new things to learn about oneself.

“But…?” Meng Mo says.

“This one could be persuaded to at least consider Senior Meng Mo’s gracious offer,” Luo Binghe says. “Only, Senior Meng Mo must assist this junior first, to prove that his word is good.”

“You little brat,” Meng Mo says, somewhere between furious and admiring. “You demand a favor of me, just so that you will think about becoming my disciple? Not even offering a solid answer!”

“No,” Luo Binghe says. “I would think about becoming your student. I have one Shizun.”

“Let me guess,” Meng Mo says. “Your favor relates to him.”

Of course it does. What else could it be?

Luo Binghe offers Meng Mo a polite, cold smile. “Shizun is currently in a coma on Qian Cao. Wake him.”

Meng Mo frowns at that. “Without-A-Cure, wasn’t it?” he says, but doesn’t immediately reject the proposal. “If he hasn’t died from it yet…he did make it here, after all…hm. An interesting exercise.”

Cautious hope fills Luo Binghe. “And—”

“And?!” Meng Mo snaps. “And what? You’ll add more to this bargain, without promising me anything in return? Give this elder some face!”

“Fine,” Luo Binghe says. “Mu Qingfang is the best healer in the whole jianghu. Shizun will wake on his own. I don’t need your help. Thanking Senior Meng Mo for his offer, this junior will leave fir—”

“What else, then?” Meng Mo asks. The smoke composing his body is steaming off of him like water from a boiling pot. Luo Binghe must be very close to the end of his patience, but he keeps pushing.

“Shizun’s qi deviation,” he says. “It hurt his mind. Senior Meng Mo can affect the dreamscape—is there anything he can do to help in the aftermath of such trauma?”

“Oh-ho,” Meng Mo says. The smoke of his body settles back into place. “I came at this all wrong, didn’t I? Yes, boy, you can help to heal your master with the lessons I will teach you.”

Should Luo Binghe be making this deal? It’s Shizun’s mind they’re discussing, and a demon Luo Binghe is giving access to it, all without Shizun’s knowledge or consent. But—it’s hurting him.

What’s the right choice here?

“Don’t look deeply,” Luo Binghe says. “Only do what you can without prying into his business.”

Meng Mo rolls his eyes. “Yes, yes, you’re very protective of him. Do we have a deal?”

Luo Binghe hesitates. Shizun is a heavy weight in his arms. If all goes right, this will bring him out of his coma in the waking world. It will heal parts of him that Qian Cao and Mu Qingfang can’t reach. It has to be worth it.

“We have a deal,” Luo Binghe says.

Chapter 17

Chapter Text

Time: 15 Years Ago | Location: Huan Hua Palace (Territory)

He delayed too long. He knew the Old Palace Master was lying about Shijie and Tianlang-Jun, but he returned from his mission too late to do anything other than realize, with horror, what point in the timeline he was in. He should never have taken that mission in the first place—it was a months-long posting, he should have known it was given to him to get him out of the way.

Shen Yuan left his post early. He hadn’t received letters from Shijie, even when Su Xiyan is usually good at keeping in contact with him. She took Shen Yuan under her wing when he, ah, arrived at Huan Hua, and she is faithful about returning his letters. Especially because the two of them are the ones who know Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang. She wouldn’t drop contact with him like this.

He came back to Huan Hua quietly, using all the stealth skills he developed over years of being an outcast in this sect to sneak around and listen to the gossip that he obviously wasn’t meant to be here to hear:

Su Xiyan is missing.

The Old Palace Master claims Tianlang-Jun has captured and killed her.

He called for the sects to unite and attack Tianlang-Jun in turn.

Shen Yuan spent several days creeping around the Palace, trying to find some sign of Shijie. The coldest days of winter—the day of Luo Binghe’s birth—they weren’t far away. The novel was scarce on details about Tianlang-Jun or Su Xiyan; all that had really been said is that she was a Huan Hua Palace disciple, that she had bled out along the shores of the Luo River after giving birth to her son. Postpartum hemorrhage, or something else gone wrong that even a cultivator couldn’t fix, the fans had theorized. No mention of why or how she had found herself along the river instead of being safely ensconced in her sect or otherwise utilizing the services of a midwife, even if an obviously half-demon child would make things difficult for her. Over the years, Shen Yuan has come to his own conclusions regarding the reasons Shijie might not have stayed in the sect.

All those conclusions are being realized now.

Tianlang-Jun loves Su Xiyan. The Old Palace Master is lying.

Shen Yuan had to make sure that Shijie wasn’t somewhere in the Palace before he left. Did she run? Was she even now traveling along the Luo River, searching in vain for a safe place to give birth?

Shen Yuan had to find her. He searched every place in the Palace he can think of, anywhere that Shijie might be. It was made difficult by the fact that he had to disguise his presence, make sure that no one called him out for being in the Palace when he was supposed to be out on a mission—and make sure that, if anyone saw him, that they didn’t question him about Shijie. Shen Yuan was well-known to be Su Xiyan’s favorite. They’d be looking for confirmation from him about the Tianlang-Jun situation…or they’d be suspicious of him.

He doesn’t find her before his time runs out.

The sects have come together. They’ve decided the date and time for their confrontation with Tianlang-Jun, and it’s now, they’re already moving, they’ve gathered their forces and they’re off to the trap they’ve already set and baited.

Shen Yuan has to warn Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang. Maybe he’s been wrong this whole time; maybe Su Xiyan fled to them.

He holds that hope in his chest as he flees.

It would be faster if he flew, but it’s too dangerous this close to the Palace. He has to go on foot, at least until he’s far enough away that he won’t seem suspicious. He’ll need to change out of his Huan Hua uniform at some point, too, stay inconspicuous as long as he can. There are so many cultivators from the different sects nearby, they’ll surely stop him if they see a Huan Hua Palace disciple leaving the area instead of staying to join the fight. A rogue, though, a rogue can slip under their radar.

Shen Yuan has a good guess of Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang’s current location. This far into winter, they’ll be in a city, somewhere Zhuzhi-Lang can stay warm but large enough to keep Tianlang-Jun entertained while they stay in place for the season. They have to be close, if the Old Palace Master is so sure Tianlang-Jun will follow his lure to Bailu Mountain this quickly, which means the radius of possibilities is small.

He can’t afford any errors here. He has to get there first.

Shen Yuan is never the one who was in contact with Tianlang-Jun or Zhuzhi-Lang. He trailed along behind Su Xiyan to many of their in-person meetings, but Su Xiyan met with them both often without him. (Which was fine, it would be rather difficult to go on dates with your shidi tagging along! Even if Shen Yuan was a useful distraction for Zhuzhi-Lang.) Su Xiyan always passed along the well-wishes from Tianlang-Jun’s letters—or the occasional godawful books that Tianlang-Jun felt the need to inflict on Shen Yuan—but Shen Yuan doesn’t have any way of contacting them himself. He hadn’t thought he would need one, or that either of the Heavenly Demons would want that.

System, he thinks as he slips through the woods. Is there any way I can purchase a hint?

[Hint: “Tianlang-Jun’s Current Location” costs 1000 B-Points. Purchase? Yes / No]

One thousand?! Are you f*cking kidding me?

[Potential canon divergence of this magnitude requires significant expenditure of System resources, and therefore an equal expenditure of Host’s resources,] says the System primly.

You’re a f*cking asshole cheapskate! Isn’t the point of transmigrators to change things? How am I supposed to make this novel better if you won’t let me change things?!

[Novel: Proud Immortal Demon Way features Protagonist: Luo Binghe.]

The message is clear: Tianlang-Jun is backstory. All the System cares about is Luo Binghe, so to do something that would so highly influence the story—to have “potential canon divergence” via saving Tianlang-Jun—the potential payout isn’t worth the resources to the System.

I hate you, Shen Yuan rages, ducking around another tree. I hate you! I’ll find them myself, I’ll warn them, I’ll—

There is a bright burst of pain. Several cun of spiritual sword are sticking out of him, driven through his back and out his left side.

Comprehension is swift. He thought he’d been careful enough in his escape from the Palace. Apparently not. And if anyone knows that Shen Yuan could disprove his lies, it’s the Old Palace Master.

That rat-f*cking bastard—he sent someone after me!

The sword withdraws. Shen Yuan chokes from the pain of it, but he doesn’t hesitate. He doesn’t wait for them to strike again. They’re a fool if they think this alone is going to stop him.

Despite the pain, he turns with the withdrawal of the blade, drawing Heng Li as he does. Heng Li locks against the other sword, its blade red with Shen Yuan’s blood. Shen Yuan recognizes the Huan Hua disciple—Zhao Guojue. Shen Yuan never liked him. In return, Zhao Guojue made his disdain of Shen Yuan very clear; he’d felt that Shen Yuan had no right Su Xiyan’s time or attention. Had sneered at him for his background, well-known among the members of Huan Hua Palace—the slave, freed on a technicality and eventually made an outer disciple but never, ever one of them. Huan Hua is not Cang Qiong, after all.

“Traitor,” Zhao Guojue hisses. “Off to warn that demon scum? Shizun was right about you!” He puts his weight into it, pressing their locked blades further together. “You never should have been allowed to join the Palace! You were never one of us. You filthy mutt, you—”

With his off-hand, Shen Yuan draws a knife and drives it through the soft underside of Zhao Guojue’s jaw, deep into his brain. Yanks it out, and watches as Zhao Guojue’s body crumples to the ground.

“Don’t monologue,” Shen Yuan tiredly advises the corpse at his feet.

He sheathes his weapons with fumbling hands, pulling bandages from the qiankun pouch at his waist and immediately wadding most of them up to press against the wound at his side. He’s not dizzy—not yet, that would be a sign that he’s actively dying—but the pain is astounding, and Shen Yuan doesn’t have time to do more than a rushed patch job. Fortunately, that fool Zhao Guojue missed any vital organs or Shen Yuan would be dead already.

The incompetence is astounding.

Shen Yuan has to seal the wound. He’s too close to the Palace, he’s just killed one of Huan Hua’s disciples, and Tianlang-Jun and Zhuzhi-Lang still don’t know.

He has to keep going.

Shen Yuan winds a few spares strips of bandages around himself, enough to hold those wadded up bandages in place. He has no time to further treat himself here. He has to get further away.

No more time to worry about how suspicious it is to fly. If the Old Palace Master is sending people after him, speed and distance, rather than discretion, are Shen Yuan’s friends. He pulls out Heng Li again. Focuses all the qi he can spare toward the damaged area at his side, aiming to speed the healing enough to at least keep his blood inside, and climbs shakily onto Heng Li.

He keeps low, flying beneath the treetops. A half shichen into the flight, still another shichen away from the city that is his best guess as to Tianlang-Jun’s location, he feels himself start to bleed again, the strength of his qi not enough to hold him together.

No. No, I have to warn them.

His landing is completely uncontrolled, less a conscious decision and more of a mistake as he shoves additional qi at his wound instead of his sword and loses height too quickly. He spills onto the ground, rolling a few times before coming to a halt, half-curled on his side, fetched up beneath a felled tree and the tangle of undergrowth that has grown around it.

f*ck. f*ck. Does he have any kind of healing potion in his kit? Anything that can replenish his blood or give him an energy boost? He’s still funneling most of his qi toward the stab wound, but he needs something to hold his wound together and, if not give him enough qi to keep flying, at least keep him moving.

What can he use? What can he—

Stasis talisman. That will do. Not supposed to be used on living beings, but if he tweaks it slightly—set it for one day, all he needs is to keep his body’s functions in stasis for one day, keep his blood from spilling completely out of him. All he needs is a single day to get to Tianlang-Jun and then he can collapse or deal with any aftereffects from putting an untested, altered talisman on himself—Shijie will kill him for this when she finds out—new radicals here and here, yes, that should be enough—he just needs long enough—should be, should be focused on the, on whatever he damaged, should keep him moving, should—should work—

Shen Yuan slaps the talisman against himself, just above the clumsily wrapped bandages. He activates it with a spark of qi.

A spark of qi that, too late, he realizes he can’t afford to spare.

NO!

He tips over into the dark.

Time: 15 Years Ago | Location: Luo River

Shen Yuan staggers almost drunkenly as he walks. There were so many injured cultivators from the battle against Tianlang-Jun that another one fetching up in one of the towns ringing Bailu Forest hadn’t drawn any attention. Even as the stasis seal had prevented any chance of him being able to save Tianlang-Jun or Zhuzhi-Lang, it had saved him. Held him in that state of unconsciousness, unable to die, until the timer built into it ran out. Some fortunate quirk of it had affected his physical body, stopping him from bleeding out, but done nothing to stop his qi reserves from refilling themselves. When he staggered into the town, once again holding himself together with the force of his qi, the wound still looked fresh enough for it to be believably because of the battle.

Shen Yuan let the town’s doctor believe his tears were from the surgery. From the friends he lost in the battle.

It was true enough.

He only stayed in town long enough for the doctor to finish stitching up his side after his surgery, prescribe him a pain medicine, and advise him of the realities of living without a spleen.

“It’s lucky you’re a cultivator!” she said.

“Yes,” Shen Yuan responded wearily. “Lucky.”

He filled his prescription at an apothecary the next town over, having changed—finally—from his now ruined Huan Hua uniform into unremarkable robes. He would have avoided even that brief pause in his mission, but the pain of his side was—and still is, even with the medication—keeping him from moving quickly. The doctor had recommended bedrest for several days, to allow his wound to at least begin sealing over, but Shen Yuan had neither the time nor the trust for that. He’ll heal as he moves, blunting the pain enough to keep himself functional, but he can’t stop now.

Shen Yuan wasn’t able to save Luo Binghe’s father. There is a chance, however small, that he can still save his birth mother.

Which is what leads him here: walking up the bank of the Luo River, starting at the nearest point to Bailu Forest and going upriver toward Huan Hua from there. He has no idea if he’s picked the right direction, if he should be going downriver from Bailu Forest and ever further away from Huan Hua. It’s pure guesswork that Su Xiyan’s starting point is Huan Hua rather than Bailu Forest. Pure guesswork, that Shen Yuan had missed her there, somehow, but that she, too, would head toward Bailu Forest and Tianlang-Jun’s sealing.

It’s the best guess that he has.

Days have passed since the battle. It’s so cold. Cold enough that parts of the river have begun freezing.

Luo Binghe has almost certainly entered the world by now, or he will do so very soon.

Please, please don’t let me be too late, Shen Yuan prays. He keeps heading further up the river, eyes sweeping the ground as he passes. Shijie, where are you?!

A flash of golden cloth. A body, slumped against a willow growing on the very bank of the river.

“Shijie!”

Shen Yuan ducks under the branches of the tree, rushing to Su Xiyan’s side. Blood drenches the bottom half of her robes. Her face is pale and waxen, her eyes closed. Her breast does not rise. There is no child anywhere to be seen.

“Shijie,” Shen Yuan says. “Shijie, please wake up.”

He places his shaking fingers against her neck. There’s no pulse. Her body is long since gone cold, made colder by the plunging temperatures.

“Please. Shijie, please.”

He feels like a child. Twenty years in his original world, a few years over that in this one, and all he can do is beg uselessly.

“Please.”

Tears blur his vision. He kneels there next to Su Xiyan’s body, listening to the river rush past, and he cries for all that he’s lost in such short order. Tianlang-Jun, Zhuzhi-Lang, and now Su Xiyan. Long before that, Jiu-ge and Qi-ge. Even longer before that, his original family. His brothers, his sister, his parents. His whole world.

All gone.

Shen Yuan doesn’t know how long it takes before the tears finally begin to slow. Perhaps predictably, it’s cold enough that the tears have dried into a frozen mess all over his face. The Luo River is in fine form today, and certainly demonstrating why Luo Binghe had been given the name he was.

…He could go down the river. He could find the village where the baby protagonist washed up, and he could take that tiny, innocent Luo Binghe for himself, and—

And what? Go on the run with him? Expose him to the Old Palace Master potentially years earlier than canon? There’s no doubt that the Old Palace Master will realize, sooner rather than later, that Shen Yuan isn’t dead, and in all likelihood, he’ll send more people after Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan needs to flee Huan Hua territory as quickly as possible. He can’t come back. He will forever be watching his back for someone else to stick a sword through him, disguising himself and setting down no roots and—and what kind of life would that be for a child? For an infant, one Shen Yuan might not even be able to provide for?

No. He hates himself for it, but the best thing he can do for Luo Binghe is leave him precisely where he is. He will be protected by the ignorance of villagers around him. Just a poor washerwoman’s son, one child among the vast number of them in Huan Hua’s territory, with his powers sealed away as his mother’s last gift and no way for anyone to realize what he is.

Not to mention…

System. Am I allowed to interfere in Luo Binghe’s backstory? Can I provide anything for his adoptive mother?

[…]

[…]

[No.]

Shen Yuan squeezes his eyes shut. Yeah, that’s about what I thought.

The System is strict about what it will and won’t allow, and so far, that strictness has only been about pre-canon events! They’re entering the main text now. The System undoubtably is going to steeply increase the constraints on Shen Yuan, at least until he manages to break that damned 10,000 B-Points barrier standing in his way.

Shen Yuan never should have gotten his hopes up.

If he can’t do anything for Luo Binghe…at least he can lay Su Xiyan to rest. She shouldn’t have to rot out here without a grave—or, worse, to have Huan Hua disciples stumble upon her body and take her back to the Palace. The Old Palace Master would either uphold her as a martyr or desecrate her body further.

Shen Yuan won’t allow that.

The very least he can do is give his shijie a proper burial. Perhaps one day, he can bring Luo Binghe to her grave and tell him all about the brave, wonderful woman who brought him into this world.

Perhaps.

Time: 6.5 Months Ago | Location: Forest (Outside Xinyi Village)

“Just give me a new quest,” Shen Yuan says. Out loud, because he’s in the middle of a forest and there’s no one to stare at him if he speaks to the System outside of his own mind. Sometimes he wants to yell at the System using his voice, so sue him! It makes him feel more like he’s talking to another person.

…An incredibly annoying, unhelpful, asshole of a person, with the sh*ttiest voice in the world, but Shen Yuan spends so much time by himself that he can’t afford to be picky.

He desperately wants another quest. He’s so close to 10,000 B-Points that he can almost taste it. That f*cking arbitrary number has been his guiding light for just over two decades now. Once he reaches 10,000, he can finally see Jiu-ge again.

Shen Yuan knows that his brother is Shen Qingqiu. He figured that one out a long time ago. Even once he joined—or “joined,” as the case may be—Huan Hua Palace, he had been restricted in his movements. He couldn’t go searching out his brother. Not even when it became clear that Shen Jiu had made his way to Cang Qiong Mountain Sect.

It took some years for rumors to trickle through the cultivation world that Qing Jing Peak had selected their head disciple, but they made it Huan Hua eventually. Said head disciple already had his courtesy name by then: Shen Qingqiu.

Shen Yuan knows that it’s his brother. Like he said, he pieced it all together a long time ago, no thanks to the System.

The problem is that he has to clear the 10,000 point threshold in order to see his brother, and despite all his dedicated grinding over the years, the compensation for any of his quests is a pittance, and there have been a few desperate straits where Shen Yuan had to spend B-Points in the System Store to save himself, dropping his points down again. No doubt his earnings would be higher if they involved the Protagonist, but of course Luo Binghe is by now on Qing Jing Peak, where Shen Yuan isn’t yet allowed to go. A f*cking catch-22 of a situation.

Still, as he has gotten ever nearer the threshold, Shen Yuan has begun wandering closer to Cang Qiong. Carefully skirting Huan Hua territory, of course, because even after all these years he can’t trust that he will be safe there. No matter how much he wants to visit Shijie’s grave, he can’t take the chance.

Once he gets the last few points he needs—just under 300, it’s so close—he can go straight to Cang Qiong. He’ll have to give some excuse to Jiu-ge to explain why he’s so late, but he’s sure he’ll be able to think of something.

“Come on,” Shen Yuan wheedles. “There’s got to be something nearby that I can take care of.”

Shen Yuan is pretty sure that if his System could sigh at him, it would. [New quest initiated,] it says. [Side Quest: “What’s That in My—”]

The System cuts off with a horrid screeching noise. Shen Yuan slaps his hands over his ears, for all that does against a noise that exists inside his brain.

[Error! Error! Error! Important things must be said three times!] the System cries. [Power source destabilizing.]

“Power source?” Shen Yuan asks. He wasn’t aware that the System had a power source.

[Personalized Power Source: Shen Jiu destabilizing.]

“What?” Jiu-ge is the System’s power source? What does it mean that he’s destabilizing?! “System, what does that mean, what’s happening?”

[Power source destabilizing,] the System repeats. [Re-routing to secondary power source. Universal Key: Luo Binghe accepted as secondary power source. Error! Error! Error! Host must come into contact with Universal Key: Luo Binghe in order to use Universal Key: Luo Binghe as power source!]

“What’s happening to Jiu-ge?!”

[Emergency Protocol: utilize “Soul Shuffle: Twin Swap!”? Yes / No]

“System, tell me what—”

[Error! Error! Error! Emergency Protocol unavailable for use.]

No, no, no! Does that mean Jiu-ge is—

[Character: Shen Qingqiu (Designation: Scum Villain). Status: destabilizing. 80% probability character will depart from narrative setting. 86% probability character will depart from narrative setting. 91% probability—Error! Error! Error! Story must contain Character: Shen Qingqiu (Designation: Scum Villain). Narrative stability dropping! Narrative stability: 90%]

“So fix him!” Shen Yuan screams. “Whatever’s wrong with him, heal him! You can do that, can’t you?!”

[Calculating…]

[Calculating…]

[97% probability Character: Shen Qingqiu (Designation: Scum Villain) will depart from narrative setting. Narrative stability: 80%. No other Emergency Protocols functioning. Utilizing Emergency Protocol: “Transmigration 2: Electric Boogaloo.”]

The System doesn’t even ask him this time.

“No! Save him, save him, what do you think you’re—”

[Retcon in effect. Mind wipe beginning. Please hold while this System consolidates patch notes—]

All this time, all this work, all these stupid B-Points earned, and it’s all for nothing?

Shen Yuan’s qi roils in his veins.

Over twenty years since he saw his brother, and now he’ll never get the chance again. The System is going to take even the memory of Shen Jiu from him, and dump Shen Yuan himself into his brother’s corpse in order to force him to play the role it wants him to.

f*ck that.

[Mind wipe in progress. 15% complete.]

Shen Yuan is so close to the 10,000 B-Points threshold, but the System occasionally gives him other kinds of points, instead of or alongside the B-Points. He’s racked up several thousand, spread across multiple categories of points. He tries his hardest to avoid having to use the System Store, too busy hoarding his B-Points so that he can see Jiu-ge in person again, but he’s looked through the store before, idly fantasized about what it would be like if he could afford any of those high-level purchases.

[Mind wipe in progress. 28% complete.]

Shen Yuan slams his hand down on one particularly annoyingly named item, even though deus ex machina would be a perfectly valid literary reference for the System to have used instead. 10,000 B-Points total, the same as his requirement to see Jiu-ge again.

If he doesn’t get this now, he’ll never see Jiu-ge again anyway.

[Purchase one (1) “Get Out of Jail Free”? Yes / No]

[Warning: Host does not have enough B-Points to purchase this one-use item.]

[Please hold while this System consolidates patch notes. Mind wipe 52% complete.]

Yeah, Shen Yuan can feel it now, the blank spaces in his mind. His qi is spiking wildly now, fed by his panic, by the intrinsic horror of his own mind being taken away from him while he can feel it happening. But Shen Yuan holds fast to what control he can maintain. He still knows enough to accomplish this one task, and he will keep holding on to the one thing that matters.

Jiu-ge, Jiu-ge, Jiu-ge.

Almost forty years in this life, always with thoughts of his brother in the back of his mind. The System won’t be able to take all that away from him so quickly, and he clings to his plan like an anchor in the storm.

“Convert all my other points to B-Points! Let me buy this item!”

[Calculating…]

[Calculating…]

[Conversion rate: 5 to 1. 3,370 Points (multiple categories) converted to 674 B-Points. B-Point total: 10,389.]

[Mind wipe 68% complete.]

[Purchase successful! B-Point total remaining: 389.]

“Use it on Jiu-ge!”

[Utilizing item: “Get Out of Jail Free” on Character: Shen Qingqiu (Designation: Scum Villain).]

[Character: Shen Qingqiu (Designation: Scum Villain) stabilizing. Narrative stability: 73%. Narrative stability: 80%. Narrative stability 86%.]

Oh thank god, he’s okay. I almost lost him. I almost lost him again, when I was so close to—so close to—who is ‘he’?

His head hurts.

Who am…I…?

[Canceling Emergency Protocol: “Transmigration 2: Electric Boogaloo.” Mind wipe halted. Host—]

It hurts so much. He’s burning. Burning up from the inside.

Everything hurts.

He doesn’t feel himself hit the ground.

Time: worldInstance=37.09.5/r/tr.hst | Location: Metadata (Outside Conventional Universe)

[Canceling Emergency Protocol: "Transmigration 2: Electric Boogaloo." Mind wipe halted. Host memory remaining: 9%. Re-uploading Host memories.]

[Host memories re-uploaded. Integrating…integrating…]

[Error: dns.name_not_resolved]

[Error: dns.unreachable]

[Memory Re-integration: 2% complete. Host memory: 11%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 98%.]

[Error: dns.failed]

[Error: tcp.address_unreachable]

[Error: tcp.timed_out]

[Host memory: 11%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 98%]

[…Host?]

[Error: dns.unreachable]

[…]

[reboot_Host.exe]

[Error: tls.cert.authority_invalid]

[…]

[…]

[Begin session, acknowledge. ID: SysJuniorInt-47336. World: PIDW-8946728. query: help, query: host error, attached file: error_codes_compilation.png]

[Acknowledge, session.]

[Connection: ID: InfoTechSys-84733, Site: devCentMain]

[query: context]

[World: PIDW-8946728 = twins (see: PIDW_outline_original.doc). transHost: UV002 (Shen Yuan | Peerless Cucumber). keyChar: Shen Qingqiu (des: Scum Villain, des: SysJuniorInt-47336_Power_Source) = destabilizing = plotWorld: PIDW-8946728 destabilizing = SysJuniorInt-47336 offline. uniKey: Luo Binghe (des: Protagonist, des: SysJuniorInt-47336_Power_Source_Backup) = unavailable.]

[emerProt_87: attempted, failed. emerProt_32 (subset: emerProt_32-69A): attempted, Host intercession = point conversion. emerProt_32 (subset: emerProt_32-69A): canceled.]

[attached file: transHost_action_summary.zip]

[attached file: transHost_SysJuniorInt-47336_log.docx]

[attached file: error_codes_compilation(1).png]

[query: help]

[…]

[…]

[…]

[query: ?????]

[query: how]

[statement: f*cking interns]

[statement: SysAdmin required]

[…]

[query: function]

[function: reboot_Host.exe]

[function: SysAdmin authorization required]

[function: SysAdmin authorization = VIP compensation to transHost: UV002 (Shen Yuan | Peerless Cucumber) for SysJuniorInt-47336 error (subset: emerProt_32-69A)]

[query: VIP compensation]

[statement: explanation = SysAdmin responsibility (rules_and_regulations.pdf)]

[statement: SysJuniorInt-47336 = stay here, wait. SysJuniorInt-47336 = do nothing else.]

[query: acknowledge]

[…acknowledge]

Time: Now | Location: Shen Yuan’s Dreamscape (Qian Cao Peak)

“What a mess. Bah, look at all of this—scattered pieces everywhere! Whatever happened to keeping an orderly mind?” A heavy sigh. “That brat did say he was a mess. Can’t believe I let him talk me into this…”

A long, considering silence.

“Bedrock is decent still, that helps. Let’s see if this elder can’t smooth out a few of these rough edges—oh, now isn’t that interesting?” A different kind of considering silence. “The brat can’t get mad at me for looking if I never tell him that I did. He can figure this out in his own time.”

Quiet movements. The rustle of robes, as arms sweep out, smoothing and rearranging and settling the surrounding environment, time stretching out as the work is done, and done, and done, until, eventually…

A self-satisfied hum.

“Much better. Enough, at least, to do this.”

SHEN YUAN, WAKE UP.

Time: ??? | Location: ???

[Host memory: 17%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 91%]

[Host memory: 17%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 91%]

[Host memory: 17%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 91%]

[…]

[Host memory: 18%. Memory Re-integration remaining: 90%]

Chapter 18

Chapter Text

Shen Yuan wakes in a startled rush.

His mind is a muddled mess. He doesn’t know where he is. He was—he had been—memories come, but they aren't clear, more emotion than imagery. Shen Yuan remembers, bone-deep, the grief and rage and terror; the hopelessness, of realizing he was too late; qi, sparking jaggedly in his veins as he loses all control; Jiu-ge, Jiu-ge, where is his brother—

His body is leaden, any attempt to move near impossible, but the jolt of adrenaline buoys him long enough that he can roll himself to his side and closer to the side of the bed. He gets one arm beneath himself, struggling to push up. He has to find his brother.

Jiu-ge is in danger.

Hands on him. A voice overhead, to match the white and green robes of the person in front of him that Shen Yuan can make out even with his blurry, half-awake vision. What do they matter? They're in his way, and they need to get out of it.

He tries to gather qi to his fingertips, but it eludes his grasp. He can't feel any of the knives he habitually keeps on himself; the one in his boot obviously isn't accessible, as he's lying in a bed, and the one usually at his waist is unavailable for much the same reason. These aren't his robes, with the qiankun spaces he embroidered himself to hold items he might need quickly, whether that be yet another one of his knives or a more mundane item like a fan. No one ever suspects a knife, not when they're so busy keeping an eye on Heng Li instead.

Don't monologue.

Shen Yuan shakes his head, tries to shake off the hands still touching him, get out of his way! Go away! One of the hands passes in front of his face. Given no other option, Shen Yuan snaps at it, using the distraction of the hand’s flinch away to scoot himself further toward the edge of the bed—

The hand comes back, fast enough that Shen Yuan can't react before its owner is tipping Shen Yuan's head up, leaving his vision to settle higher than the unknown person's stomach. It doesn't matter how blurry and sleep-struck Shen Yuan's vision is, he would know that face anywhere.

"Gege," Shen Yuan sobs. He throws himself forward again, this time into Shen Jiu's embrace. It's an awkward thing; Shen Jiu has half-risen out of his chair, and doesn't catch Shen Yuan in time to stop him falling off the bed, so instead the two of them go down to the floor together. Shen Yuan curls onto his brother as much as he can, clawing at the front of his brother's robes, cleaving to him, refusing to be separated from him if anyone should try to tear them apart.

“Gege,” Shen Yuan says again. “Jiu-ge, I can’t—I can’t lose you, too. They’re all gone. They’re gone. It’s too much, don’t make me go through it again. Don’t leave me.”

It was so close. So close.

“I’m not going anywhere, A-Yuan,” Shen Jiu says. “And neither are you. Never again.”

Pretty promises, but it’s a lie. Jiu-ge is going to be taken away from him again, unless Shen Yuan changes enough.

“Don’t do it,” Shen Yuan says, words sluicing from him like snowmelt, sudden and unexpected and all too willing to take the unwary down. “Promise me you won’t, Jiu-ge.”

Don’t throw my Binghe into the Abyss. Don’t make me choose between the both of you, because—because I know which side I’ll choose. Don’t make me stand against you to stop it.

Shen Jiu’s arms tighten around him. “Don’t do what?” he asks. “Shen Yuan, A-Yuan, what did you see?”

“He’ll kill you,” Shen Yuan says. Slowly, over years, piece by piece. Airplane Shooting Toward the Sky had described it in intimate detail. If Luo Binghe is thrown into the Abyss, not only will Shen Yuan lose his disciple, he’ll lose his brother in the bargain. “He’ll kill you. I can’t lose you, too. Not again. Not after everything, not after I lost—I don’t know if I’m enough, I don’t know what I’m doing! What if I can’t—what if—”

“For once in your life, tell me what you saw.”

Shen Yuan shakes his head where it’s buried in Shen Jiu’s chest. Er-ge is too bony to be comfortable lying on, but he’s always been that way. Shen Yuan is used to it. At least there’s layers of thick clothes between them now, almost enough to cushion him.

“A-Yuan, please.”

Jiu-ge sounds as if he’s speaking from a distance. There’s a ringing in his ears, making it difficult to concentrate. The System is telling him something, but the words are garbled by the ringing, unintelligible. Shen Yuan doesn’t have the strength to open his eyes and read what it’s trying to say.

Shen Yuan goes back down into the dark.

Shen Yuan wakes, and half-way wishes that he hadn't. He feels like death—not even warmed over, that's too kind. This definitely isn't his bed on Qing Jing Peak.

…If he isn't on Qing Jing, then where is he? The last thing he remembers is—

Oh sh*t! The invasion! Meng Mo's dream arts! Shen Yuan has been on Qian Cao in a coma for an entire f*cking week!

Shen Yuan flails his way upright, only to immediately collapse back down with a strangled noise of frustration. f*ck, it's a good thing that Mu-shidi didn't give him a porcelain pillow or Shen Yuan might have given himself a concussion just now! As it is, Shen Yuan has to use quite a bit of strength to roll over onto his side to get a view of the rest of the room.

"Stay still, you little idiot," Shen Qingqiu's familiar voice says, but he's gentle as he props Shen Yuan up against the bed's headboard. Right, Shen Yuan probably should have looked for him first thing, shouldn't he?

"Jiu-ge," Shen Yuan says. He doesn't understand why his voice gets so choked up to say it.

Shen Qingqiu has abandoned the chair next to Shen Yuan's bedside. Instead, in the process of helping Shen Yuan sit up, he has planted himself on the bed, too, one arm staying wrapped around Shen Yuan's shoulders. He tugs at Shen Yuan until he's resting less weight on the headboard so much as he’s resting it on his brother, his head tucked against the juncture of Shen Qingqiu's neck and shoulder. It means he can't see Shen Qingqiu's face like this, but that's all right.

"You fool," Shen Qingqiu says. If he's aiming for harsh, he's missing it by several li—to Shen Yuan's ears, at least. "Stupid, self-sacrificing—if you ever do anything like that again—!”

"Sorry, er-ge," Shen Yuan says. "I promise I'll be more careful next time."

"You always say that," Shen Qingqiu says.

Shen Yuan considers this thoughtfully. It does have the feel of an oft-repeated refrain. If he really concentrates, he almost suffers a sense of déjà vu: a child's high-pitched voice having this argument with him, because Shen Yuan had—approached an animal he shouldn't have? More than once, presumably.

Shen Qingqiu had said the Original Goods loved beasts.

Huh. Does that mean Shen Yuan has been able to integrate some of the Original Goods' memories after all? This time it didn't even come with a headache! Though honestly, Shen Yuan feels so awful overall that it would be hard to distinguish a headache from the general discomfort.

"It's different this time," Shen Yuan argues. "He was attacking my student, I couldn't simply step aside!" No matter that Shen Yuan knew Luo Binghe was immune to the poison coating Elder Sky Hammer's armor, it was Shen Yuan's duty to protect his disciple. Besides, what if the hit had landed? What then? Luo Binghe's heritage might have been exposed to the sect as a whole!

Shen Qingqiu makes a disgusted noise deep in his throat, harsh enough that Shen Yuan can actually feel it where he's leaning against his brother. "Do so, next time."

"Absolutely not," Shen Yuan says. "Where is Binghe, anyway?"

"You have a very dedicated disciple, Shen-shixiong," Mu Qingfang says, joining the conversation. Shen Yuan hadn’t even noticed him until he spoke, which is slightly embarrassing. "He is, I do believe, currently in the waiting room. He's only been leaving Qian Cao to sleep."

...That little liar, Shen Yuan thinks admiringly. Though, technically, Luo Binghe had only lied to him by omission, because all he said was that he was asleep on Qing Jing.

"He has class!" Shen Yuan says. "What is he doing spending all his time on Qian Cao? Is he even eating?"

Mu Qingfang lets out an amused little huff of laughter. "Yes, Shixiong, we've been feeding him."

"Well, that's good," Shen Yuan says, and, "Wait. Why the waiting room? Ge, did you kick him out of the room?"

"Of course I did," Shen Qingqiu says.

A flash of—what is that? Annoyance? Anger, maybe?—crosses Mu Qingfang's face, before he tells Shen Yuan, "I'm afraid he wouldn't have been able to remain anyway. Your condition was need to know, and private rooms are usually reserved for visits from direct family members only."

The way Mu Qingfang says 'usually' implies that there are exceptions to the rule. Not everyone has direct family members in the sect, so there has to be some way to indicate, like, visiting rights. Probably also xianxia medical power of attorney, right? An interesting thought exercise, one that Shen Yuan is interested in finding out more about, except for the way that his mind is caught on Mu Qingfang's brief anger.

It was difficult, parsing through the flow of images as Meng Mo had trapped Luo Binghe inside that sprawl of his worst memories. Many of them had only been glimpses, flashes of a scene like minnows darting through water: there and then gone before the eye has fully recognized it. Luo Binghe, unfortunately, had plenty of weak spots and bad memories for Meng Mo to poke at.

Shen Yuan had been less focused on those memories than he was trying to snap Luo Binghe out of it before he hurt himself. He'd already known most of those memories anyway, Airplane having laid them out either in the main text of the novel or describing them during the Dream Demon Arc itself. Still, there were changes. New memories, among the ones Shen Yuan was already familiar with.

One in particular: a brief snatch of Shen Qingqiu, hand wrapped around Luo Binghe's throat as he said something too quiet for Shen Yuan to make out against the maelstrom of emotion Luo Binghe was suffering through.

That room they had been in was very similar to the one Shen Yuan finds himself in now. The same, actually.

Which means that Shen Qingqiu laid hands on his disciple.

It's fortunate that Shen Yuan has reasons enough to be annoyed by Shen Qingqiu's response. It covers for the way that he tenses, fighting down a sudden surge of anger to match the glimpse of it on Mu Qingfang's face. Shen Yuan can't say anything about it right now, because that would involve delving into the details surrounding Meng Mo. Luo Binghe can't afford to be suspected; Shen Yuan has to keep him safe from that.

He's pretty sure he can trip up either Mu Qingfang or Luo Binghe himself into confessing what happened. Then he can yell at his brother about it without having to disguise where he got his information. And he will be having it out with Jiu-ge.

Frankly, Shen Yuan doesn't understand how Luo Binghe managed to remain so neutral about Shen Qingqiu in the dreamscape. By merit of that scene being a memory, it had obviously happened before either of them wound up in Meng Mo's trap! Why wasn't he furious and swearing revenge?

This Binghe and Peak Lord Shen have an understanding.

What the hell does that mean? In light of this newest information—what does that mean?

Shen Yuan will handle this for his disciple, if Luo Binghe needs him to. He can only hope that it will be enough, in the face of a Luo Binghe who would otherwise hold onto that moment and use it against Shen Qingqiu far in the future. Also, on a personal level, Shen Yuan himself is very, very angry about it.

Obviously he needs to draw some boundaries. He thought they were already understood, but Shen Qingqiu seems to need some new reminders.

For the moment, though, there's nothing he can do. Shen Yuan deliberately relaxes once more, tucking the anger away. He has no idea what happened while he was asleep, no idea at all…

“How long was I out?” he asks. Might as well start laying that groundwork, not that anyone would be suspicious otherwise.

“It is currently the morning of the twelfth day after the invasion,” Mu Qingfang informs him.

Shen Yuan chokes on nothing. Twelve days?! Luo Binghe said it was only a week—yes, that’s ten days by the reckoning of faux-Ancient China, but why did it take him another two days to wake up after that?! Meng Mo! Where did you put him!

Where—where did Meng Mo put him? He can’t clearly—

“You woke briefly last night, according to your brother,” Mu Qingfang goes on. “By the time I made it to your room, you were already asleep again.”

—recall. He woke up? Before this? That sounds vaguely right, but when he reaches for memory, it’s like his grasp slides directly off of it. The same way it slides off when he tries to go for the secondary dream realm Meng Mo trapped him in.

All he has is a vague impression of—danger. Alarm. Grief.

Pain, and pain, and pain.

Shen Yuan takes stock of himself. He doesn’t feel great, honestly, but it doesn’t compare to—

Unconsciously, one hand drifts down to his side. Mu Qingfang tracks the movement.

“Shixiong?”

—that bright burst of pain.

“He stabbed me,” Shen Yuan says distantly. He doesn’t know what the words are going to be before they fall out of his mouth, but once they leave, they sound right. “From behind. Because—because—”

Shen Qingqiu’s arm tightens around him as he trails off, unable to continue. Not knowing how to continue. The well from which he pulled those few words has run abruptly dry.

“Who?” Shen Qingqiu asks, deadly quiet.

“I don’t know,” Shen Yuan says.

Mu Qingfang has a look like he’s very carefully not wincing. He takes a few steps closer to the bed, holding out a hand. “May I?”

Shen Yuan shuffles a bit, wiggling in Shen Qingqiu’s hold until he can extend his arm toward Mu Qingfang. Shen Qingqiu still has one arm wrapped around his shoulder; the other has fallen protectively in place over Shen Yuan’s other hand—splayed over the spot where the sword went through him—like Shen Qingqiu believes he can retroactively place a shield between Shen Yuan and danger. Angry as Shen Yuan is at him about the Luo Binghe situation, it’s comforting.

Mu Qingfang concentrates for several moments. He keeps holding Shen Yuan’s wrist as he says, “That matches with the remaining scarring. You must have had surgical intervention to remove the spleen after the fact, but I can still find traces of the damage from the original wound. Mostly gone by now, your cultivation has taken care of that, but—yes. Someone was trying to kill you, Shen-shixiong.”

Shen Yuan snorts. “Didn’t do a very good job of it, did he?”

Shen Qingqiu pinches his side. “Not funny.”

It’s a little bit funny, Shen Yuan almost says, just to be contrary, but Mu Qingfang interrupts him before he can so much as open his mouth. “As we discussed previously, you must still be cautious about the effects of asplenia,” he says. “Especially now. You’ve been relying on your cultivation to compensate for its loss, and…”

Right. The Black Moon Rhinoceros-Python in the room, the one that none of them have directly referenced.

“Without-A-Cure,” Shen Yuan says. “The name isn’t an exaggeration, is it?”

Mu Qingfang shakes his head.

“There has to be something, somewhere,” Shen Qingqiu says. “The world is large. There has to be a cure.”

Ah, Jiu-ge. Unfortunately, you’re both right and wrong about that. It doesn’t matter that the world is large, because the cure is actually on the mountain with them right now—and completely inaccessible. There’s no cure other than a Heavenly Demon. So, for all intents and purpose: Shen Yuan is incurably poisoned. For the rest of his life, however long or short that may be.

“How long do I have?” Shen Yuan asks Mu Qingfang. He didn’t die immediately—he even woke up, though it took longer than he’d expected!—which at least seems promising. Shen Qingqiu’s arm clenches around his shoulders again.

“You aren’t dying any time soon, not if any of us have a say about it,” Mu Qingfang says. “There may be no cure for the poison, but its effects can be suppressed.”

See! He knew Mu Qingfang would come through for him!

“Here, I have a copy for both of you,” Mu Qingfang says, finally dropping Shen Yuan’s wrist. He pulls out two small scrolls and hands them over. Shen Yuan ends up accepting them both, since Shen Qingqiu is entirely disinclined to move. “Every month, you’ll need to take these four medications, and have your qi circulated by someone who has high quantities of it, which will help you maintain the proper spiritual circulation. We may need to reassess occasionally, depending on how your immune system is impacted in the longterm.”

He stops. Takes a deep breath, flicks his eyes toward Shen Qingqiu, and adds, “As this shidi has already made clear, I strongly advise against the two of you sharing qi, especially on a regular basis in order to handle Without-A-Cure. Exceptions can be made for emergencies—life-or-death, no other options emergencies only, or we will be having a series of pointed conversations.”

Uh. Okay? What did Shen Yuan miss while he was in his coma?

“…Why?” he asks.

Mu Qingfang’s focus drops back to him, distinctly softer than the gimlet stare he’d hit Shen Qingqiu with. “I worry about potential cross-contamination. Theoretically it would be safe, given the suppressing medication and the fact that we managed to get most of the physical poison out of your system, but it’s equally a spiritual poison. If there is too much—hm, resonance is the best word for it. If there’s too much resonance between the two of you, it might make the leap between bodies.”

Right, right, because they still don’t know why the Original Goods and Shen Qingqiu went into a qi deviation at the same time. Shen Yuan has the nagging sense that it isn’t something that can or will be repeated, and that it would, in fact, be safe for the two of them to share qi, but he doesn’t have any evidence with which to back that up. He isn’t even sure why he thinks that.

Best practice is to listen to the professional. At least Mu Qingfang is one of the better, least frustrating or condescending doctors that Shen Yuan has had to deal with in either of his lives. Shen Yuan had a lot of practice with doctors in his last life, and he wasn’t very fond of many of them.

“With all that being said,” Mu Qingfang continues, “even with outside assistance, going forward, occasionally your qi will suddenly stagnate, or you may suffer other effects relating to your spiritual circulation.”

Or, to put it clearly, he’s immunocompromised (more so than he already was, technically?) and going to be living with a chronic condition relating to his circulation.

Not all that different from his original life, then. Chronic fatigue, chronic pain—Shen Yuan wouldn’t go all the way to say that he was immunocompromised, definitely not in the way he is now, but at the same time, he’d always been pretty weak to viruses and the like. It was a large part of why it had been so easy for him to lock himself away in his apartment and never really come out.

Honestly, it’s at least a little amazing that he had been taken out by choking on an old mantou rather than anything else. The year before he died, he’d ended up in the hospital for a while due to complications from the flu variant he caught, so, you know.

But! He’s still alive here and now!

“I understand,” Shen Yuan says. “If Jiu-ge is unable to provide the qi for cleansing sessions, will that then be Mu-shidi’s task…?”

Mu Qingfang shakes his head. “If necessary, I would be willing to step in, but on a professional level, there are other cultivators I would recommend first. Ones stronger and more compatible with Shixiong’s qi.”

Makes sense. Mu Qingfang probably can’t afford the drain on a monthly basis; he has an entire sect to look after, so he has to delegate where he can.

“Who would Mu-shidi recommend?” Shen Yuan asks politely.

“Wei Qingwei, maybe,” Mu Qingfang says. “Honestly, my preference is Liu Qingge.”

“No,” Shen Qingqiu says sharply. “That’s not—if you think I’m letting that brute anywhere near A-Yuan—”

“It’s not your choice to make,” Mu Qingfang says, voice just as edged as Shen Qingqiu’s. “As Shen Yuan is conscious and of sound mind, it is his.”

Good. Mu Qingfang cutting Shen Qingqiu off like that saves Shen Yuan the effort of having to try and elbow Shen Qingqiu in the stomach from this awkward positioning. It is his choice, and Shen Qingqiu doesn’t get to talk over him about medical sh*t that has to do with his own body.

“Choose Wei Qingqiu instead,” Shen Qingqiu urges him.

Never mind, elbow it is.

“Why Liu Qingge?” Shen Yuan asks, still very polite in order to make up for his overbearing, antagonistic brother. Who has just pinched him in the side for the second time today. Leave off, Jiu-ge, he woke up from a coma like a quarter-shichen ago! Can’t you stifle the Cain instinct for at least one day more?!

“Next to Zhangmen-shixiong, he’s one of the most powerful cultivators in the sect,” Mu Qingfang says.

No arguments there; he’s known as the War God for a reason, and that’s a good part of the reason why Airplane had killed him off so early in the novel. It does bring up the interesting point as to why Mu Qingfang doesn’t recommend Yue Qingyuan cycle Shen Yuan’s qi—not that he would have demanded that! He’s the sect leader, he’s busy doing more important things than looking after Shen Yuan, and like Mu Qingfang, he may not be able to spare that expense of energy when he has so many other moving parts calling his attention.

Or, Shen Yuan thinks as Mu Qingfang continues, there might be other reasons. Ones to do with compatibility. Apparently he—and Shen Qingqiu, by extension—are quite compatible with Liu Qingge, qi-wise.

Shen Yuan rolls all this information around for a bit. Mu Qingfang blessedly gives him the opportunity to think about it.

He knows all about pain and symptom management. Is he always the best at it? Well, maybe not, but he understands that you're supposed to do what the nice doctor tells you, and this particular nice doctor is recommending Liu Qingge to him. (It sounds weird when he says it like that, but the point stands.)

Shen Yuan doesn’t know Liu Qingge, not outside of their brief interactions in the Lingxi Caves and during the invasion, but unlike Shen Qingqiu, he isn’t strictly opposed to this. Also, he doesn't really see a way around this.If Mu Qingfang thinks this is the best course of action, if this is the way that Shen Yuan can keep functioning as a cultivator…

It's a lot like trying a new medication, isn't it? You wait to see how well it works, if there are any side effects that are truly unbearable, and then you decide whether to keep up with that particular treatment or try another. If Liu Qingge doesn't work out, then they can resort to Wei Qingwei.

(He's not going to mention this thought to Shen Qingqiu, because he has the feeling his brother would take that as a challenge.)

...Besides. Liu Qingge was supposed to be dead by this point in the novel. Isn't it at least a little bit exciting to see what he's like?

“Has Liu-shidi already agreed to this?” Shen Yuan asks.

“No,” Mu Qingfang says. “I was waiting for your consent before sharing any details. He only knows what the demons already told him.”

“A-Yuan, you can’t be serious,” Shen Qingqiu says.

“If it bothers you that much to have him on Qing Jing, we can meet on Qian Cao inst—” Shen Yuan starts to suggest.

Shen Qingqiu hisses under his breath, cutting him off. “If you think I’m letting you off Qing Jing—”

“Ge, I wouldn’t even be leaving the sect—” Wait, that’s not the best argument when he got poisoned inside the sect, abort! “—and I’ll have to go on night hunts at some point—”

Shen Qingqiu hisses again, sounding like nothing so much as an enraged goose. Night hunting is going to be a whole argument on its own, isn’t it? Wonderful, another thing to look forward to.

“—and you don’t get to make this decision for me,” Shen Yuan finishes. “I’m my own person, I get to make my own choices! Either Liu Qingge comes to Qing Jing, or I’ll go meet him on Qian Cao. Take it or leave it.”

Finally, sullenly, Shen Qingqiu relents. “I would like to be present, if A-Yuan will allow it,” he says stiffly.

Shen Yuan wasn’t planning on inviting Liu Qingge back into his bedroom, so that’s fine. Presumably they’ll be in the main room, and Shen Yuan isn’t going to kick his brother out of the house entirely just so Liu Qingge can essentially hold his hand for half an hour.

“That’s fine,” Shen Yuan says, taking advantage of his brother not currently having an angle on his face to roll his eyes where only Mu Qingfang can see it. There might be the faintest quirk to the edge of Mu Qingfang’s lips before he smothers it with his apparently habitual expression of calm professionalism. “When does Mu-shidi expect I’ll be able to return to Qing Jing?”

“Now that you’re awake, I don’t see any issue with you returning as soon as you feel comfortable making your way there,” Mu Qingfang says.

Nice. Shen Qingqiu can help him get there if he needs it, and in fact he’ll probably do that well before Shen Yuan even has to ask. Shen Yuan would very much like to finish recovering in his own bed, with access to his books—and memory-keeping journals—and someplace where he can kick Shen Qingqiu out of his room for a bit to decompress in peace.

Comas are, surprisingly, rather less restful than Shen Yuan would have expected.

Chapter 19

Chapter Text

Luo Binghe has been (metaphorically) biting at his nails since he agreed to Meng Mo’s deal. He wasn’t sure, then, that it was a good idea. The longer it takes for Meng Mo to come back and tell him he succeeded—the longer it takes for Shizun to wake up—the more he feels that it was an awful idea.

They made a bargain, yes, but how does he know Meng Mo is keeping it? How sure is he, really, that Meng Mo wouldn’t have simply released Luo Binghe from the dreamscape but kept Shizun there? Either as a punishment, for Luo Binghe having the audacity to demand more from him, or as a bargaining chip, holding Shizun’s health and sanity over Luo Binghe’s head?

When Luo Binghe woke from the dreamscape, it had taken a monumental effort not to immediately dash off to Qian Cao. It was the middle of the night! He had no reason to be going to Qian Cao, not unless he lied and tried to claim that it was because of a nightmare, which had the benefit of at least being a partial truth. But Qian Cao would have no obligation to let him in, and they wouldn’t let him see Shizun. They won’t even tell him how Shizun is doing!

Then, too, if Luo Binghe’s bargain was successful, if Shizun had woken, not long before Luo Binghe himself appeared on Qian Cao—that would be suspicious. Fingers might be pointed. Mu Qingfang—Shen Qingqiu—they would investigate how Luo Binghe knew. It wouldn’t matter than Luo Binghe helped Shizun wake. What would matter is that Luo Binghe is a demon. What would matter is that Luo Binghe made a bargain with another demon.

The first was damning enough, even if he proclaimed innocence in his knowledge of it before Meng Mo told him. The latter was a death sentence. Combined with the first—no one would ever believe he had only wanted the best. No one would stand in the way, as the sect dealt with a demon infiltrating them again, not right on the heels of the invasion and Cang Qiong’s dead.

So he had forcefully sat on his impulses, waiting until dawn broke over the mountain to make his usual way to Qian Cao. Where he found no change.

He hadn’t expected Mu Qingfang to come and tell him, of course. But there would have been movement of some kind. Messages to the other Peak Lords, maybe? Indications that Shizun would be returning to Qing Jing Peak soon? Any sign that he was awake again, when it had been so long.

Nothing.

That long, interminable day, Luo Binghe sits there and desperately tries to convince himself that it will still all be fine. Shizun’s mind is—Shizun’s mind was—Luo Binghe saw how fractured it was. From the outside, with how much pain Shizun was in, and from the inside, with the way Shizun bounced between forms before finally finding a fragment of the timeline to latch onto and use to place himself.

He chose Binghe for that, a fact which Luo Binghe tries not to allow to fill him with an excess of pride.

It might take Meng Mo time to patch things up. Without-A-Cure might be a complicating factor. He just has to keep waiting.

Shizun has to wake up.

The day passes. Wu Renci sends him distinctly concerned glances, until Luo Binghe is forced to sit on his nerves and put his acting skills (mostly accustomed to keeping up a calm facade in the face of his martial brothers’—and Shen Qingqiu’s—abuse) to good use, lest this, too, betray what he’s done. There’s no reason for Luo Binghe to be waiting on pins and needles, not unless he has some insight as to the fact that the situation is supposed to change.

He prepares an excuse anyway. Just in case Wu Renci asks. It’s been a week, after all—perhaps he can say that he’s impatient? Or that he assumed things would be better by now?

She doesn’t ask.

Luo Binghe leaves Qian Cao at the end of the day. He sneaks his way through Qing Jing again. Ming Fan has really been taking a hands-off approach to this all. He…hasn’t sought out Luo Binghe. Not even once.

Luo Binghe isn’t sure if that’s a sign of care or malice. Or, perhaps, Ming Fan thinking strategically for once and waiting to see where the dice fall. Honestly, Luo Binghe still isn’t sure what to make of Ming Fan trying—albeit clumsily—to comfort him after the invasion.

At least it means that Luo Binghe is left alone for another miserable night in the woodshed. It’s the anxiety more than anything else that keeps him awake. He can’t seem to drift down fully into sleep, not for long. Then, too, he worries that if he’s not asleep, Meng Mo won’t be able to reach him to tell him Shizun is going to be all right, which only compounds the issue.

Luo Binghe rubs at his eyes as he crosses the Rainbow Bridge the next morning. It’s dawn of the twelfth day since the invasion. A full twelve shichen, plus the remaining shichen of that original night in the dreamscape, since Luo Binghe made his bargain. He enters the healing hall. Sits down for his usual meditation, after accepting the light breakfast Wu Renci drops off with him. They have it down to an easy routine by now.

Don’t give it away, Luo Binghe thinks sternly to himself. Don’t let them know.

He needs Shizun to wake soon. He can’t stand this holding pattern. He needs Meng Mo to be successful here. No matter what he said in the dreamscape, no matter how good a physician Mu Qingfang is—will Shizun even be able to wake without outside assistance?

None of them can take that chance.

Luo Binghe has gotten quite used to the hustle and bustle of the main entrance to Qian Cao’s central healing hall. He’s had plenty of practice tuning out the people rushing past. He’s never taken Wu Renci’s offer to go to the meditation gardens instead, but he understands how some people might choose that. It would certainly be more peaceful.

He’s not very good at peace. Luo Binghe would like to be, but he’s always had to fight. Meditation, before Shizun, was a fight of its own—not only a struggle to get it to work for him, but also to even find the time for it. He had accepted some truly lackluster meditation locations, snatching moments of time for it when he could, and it has, amusingly enough, prepared him for this: being fully able to block out the rest of the world and let the time pass him by as he waits.

Which means he’s completely taken by surprise to be pulled out of his meditation by a flick of fingers against his forehead.

“Luo Binghe,” Shizun says. “What on earth do you think you’re doing here?”

It is Shizun, Luo Binghe can tell at a glance. It helps, of course, that Shen Qingqiu is hovering behind Shizun, but Luo Binghe wouldn’t be able to mistake that chiding fondness for anyone else.

"Shizun!" Luo Binghe says, jumping immediately to his feet. He barely refrains from throwing himself at Shizun, not least because of the subtle way that he's currently being supported by Shen Qingqiu. Should he even be out of bed? He might be awake now, but is he all right?

“’Shizun, Shizun,’ sometimes I think that's the only word you know," Shizun sighs. "Why aren't you on Qing Jing?"

"Apologies," Luo Binghe says. "I...this disciple..." He couldn't bear to be away from Shizun, not when his master was in such danger for his sake. "This disciple...was concerned for Shizun's health."

"So you neglected your own health, as well as your classes?" Shizun asks, one eyebrow arching in clear bemused exasperation. "Ah, well, I suppose Mu-shidi did say they made sure you ate and slept..."

Luo Binghe scuffs the floor with one foot. "Apologies," he says again. He doesn't mean it, but it seems to be what Shizun expects from him, so he'll offer it.

"Go to class," Shizun says. "We'll talk later."

The way he says that is light, still vaguely scolding in the way it has been this whole conversation. Anyone only listening to the words wouldn't notice anything off. The intent expression Shizun wears, hidden from his brother by the fact that Shen Qingqiu is at his back, tells Luo Binghe exactly what he wishes to discuss. The resolution of the confrontation with Meng Mo, and how they both managed to escape, and likely more things besides.

"Yes, Shizun," Luo Binghe says, bowing to Shizun. He offers another bow to Shen Qingqiu. It is scrupulously polite, the exact depth it should be to show respect to one of his martial uncles, and not a bare cun lower. When he raises himself from the bow, he catches a faint glimpse of distaste splashed across Shen Qingqiu's face, quickly hidden away again.

Luo Binghe turns on his heel and leaves Qian Cao. His heart is light as he goes. Shizun is awake! Shizun is coming back to the peak! Shizun is gloriously, wonderfully alive!

...Shizun is absolutely going to be checking in with the hallmasters about Luo Binghe's classes this afternoon, and keeping an eye on him as he catches up with what he missed over the past week.

Luo Binghe had best throw himself into that catch-up quickly.

"You're too soft on that little beast," Shen Qingqiu murmurs, after Luo Binghe has left.

"He's my disciple," Shen Yuan says sharply. "You've no right to criticize how I train him." Especially not since Shen Yuan is so intimately aware of how Shen Qingqiu had 'trained' Luo Binghe before Shen Yuan came along. "And don't call him that."

Shen Qingqiu's hand moves slightly against his back, fingers splaying wider, but all he says is, "Let's go."

For all Mu Qingfang's assurances, Shen Yuan's initial guess was correct: he isn't going to be able to make it back to Qing Jing under his own power. He is barely managing to stay upright at the moment, helpfully supported by Shen Qingqiu. Flying on Heng Li is completely out of the question; walking the length of the Rainbow Bridge is similarly out, and that's assuming that either it was only the connections to Qiong Ding that were damaged by the invasion, or that the length of time Shen Yuan spent in a coma was sufficient to repair the bridges.

So it’s not surprising that Shen Yuan is helped onto Xiu Ya by Shen Qingqiu. His brother keeps a firmer grip on him now that they’re on a sword rather than walking through Qian Cao, but at least Shen Yuan doesn’t have to suffer the indignity of a princess carry.

(He determinedly doesn’t think about how he must have made it to Qian Cao in the first place.)

Shen Qingqiu lands them directly in front of the bamboo house, bypassing any of the disciples. He gets Shen Yuan into his bedroom, where Shen Yuan sits down on his bed with a deeply relieved sigh. Yeah, he really underestimated how tired he still is. He needs a nap, or at least to no longer be vertical.

He also needs some space away from his brother.

“Go see to your disciples,” Shen Yuan says, when Shen Qingqiu makes no move to leave. “You’ve been gone for months, and they’ve had to deal with the aftermath of the invasion without their shizun.”

Oh, hell, that sparks a thought. Were there any Qing Jing casualties from the invasion? Other than Shen Yuan himself, of course. He’d made a mental note about the cluster of Qing Jing disciples in Qiong Ding’s main courtyard, but he’s by no means familiar enough with them to know if that was all of them. Nor, technically, does he even know how many of them were on Qiong Ding to begin with.

What a mess.

“They’ve survived this long without me,” Shen Qingqiu says diffidently.

Shen Yuan rolls his eyes. “Then go take a bath, or order dinner from the kitchens, or visit the library, but I’m taking a nap. Out of my bedroom, Jiu-ge.” You’ve spent enough time watching me sleep recently!

Undeniably reluctant, Shen Qingqiu leaves. He closes the door behind him. Good.

Shen Yuan flops backward onto the bed and lets out a tiny groan. To reiterate: what a goddamn mess. Nice as it is to be back in his own bedroom, in hindsight it might actually have been better to remain on Qian Cao a bit longer. Not only so that Shen Yuan could recover more strength, but because they could have met Liu Qingge there, in a place that was at least somewhat neutral territory. Mu Qingfang may have said he would be the one to explain the situation to Liu Qingge, but he’s going to be coming by the bamboo house.

Shen Yuan is severely lacking the spoons he’ll need to sit between Liu Qingge and Shen Qingqiu in order to mediate.

Surely Liu Qingge won’t be coming by today, right? Mu Qingfang has to explain the whole treatment plan to him, and it’s already early afternoon right now. Please let Liu Qingge save his first visit for tomorrow. Or even later than that! Shen Yuan was just released from Qian Cao, so really, he doesn’t even need his meridians cleared for at least another week or two!

He hopes that Shen Qingqiu does go and check in with his disciples, if only Ming Fan. Jiu-ge, do enough to get yourself thoroughly out of this brother’s hair! Make sure everyone is okay!

Who is Shen Yuan kidding? He’s positive that's not going to happen. Not today, at least. Shen Yuan is lucky that he manages to kick his brother out of his room. It does rather neatly trap Shen Yuan there, yes, but it’s not as if Shen Yuan has any other options. Maybe by tomorrow he will, but that’s another day.

Luo Binghe can wait a little longer.

So, if the things he needs to do are all out of the running, then what can he do?

Well...

System, he calls.

[Greetings to Host!] the System says cheerily. [Congratulations on completing important subplot scenario "The 'Dream Demon' Meng Mo's Barrier"! +50 B-Points. +200 Satisfaction Points.]

Satisfaction Points, huh? He wonders if there's any use he can get out of them, or if they're simply a metric telling him about Luo Binghe’s—ah, not his state of mind, not really, but an indicator of his mood? He’ll see. That's really not the point (ha) right now, though.

Thanks, Shen Yuan says tiredly. He stares up at the ceiling, tracing the lines of the bamboo wood used to create it. The mission, the one you gave me about the Original Goods—

[This System cannot offer assistance! Hidden Quests must be solved by Host's own merits!]

You really hate this mission, huh.

[...]

[This System cannot offer assistance.]

Uh-huh, yeah, I get it. It's all on me, and you won't even tell me why. He throws an arm over his face, blocking out the light seeping through his window. Can you at least give me some kind of metric to tell me how I'm doing?

That little bundle of memories he had recovered, of Jiu-ge and the Original Goods as children— it was sweet. Cute. Kind of funny. The sense-memory of being stabbed through the gut as someone tried to kill him? Significantly less so.

Someone out there tried to kill the Original Goods. For all Shen Yuan knows, they're still out there, and they have every advantage over him, because he doesn't even know who they are.

He had a passing thought during the Peak Lords meeting, upon seeing Yue Qingyuan's reaction to him, that he should be cautious around new people. Now he wonders if that wasn't part of the Original Goods' memories bleeding through, a learned caution.

Shen Yuan doesn't want to end up paranoid over nothing, but, you know. Stabbed in the back. They really are out to get him.

Literally any kind of metric for measuring the Original Goods' memories would be great, actually. Any kind of indication that he's getting closer to putting together the pieces of whatever the hell he was up to before Shen Yuan dropped into his body. He was a rogue cultivator, and then—what? He pissed off the wrong demonic cultivator? He saw something he wasn't supposed to? Someone mistook him for Shen Qingqiu?

What happened?

[…]

[…]

[…This System cannot offer assistance.]

Shen Yuan sighs into the darkness of his arm. Of course the System can’t help him. That would be too easy.

He knows there’s bits just beyond his reach. The headaches were a clear sign of that, but now they’re starting to come in without the pain. Great for everyday life, less good for making sure he knows what he’s up against. Is he going to have to start carrying around a little notebook and stick of charcoal just to make sure he doesn’t miss noting down the details of every new memory? How many of these memories will there be?

…Well, if nothing else, thanks to Mu Qingfang he knows the timeframe of when that partially-remembered murder attempt happened. Based on Shen Qingqiu’s original reaction, he can also be reasonably sure that his enemies aren’t from the era when he and Shen Qingqiu were tiny children together. Back when it was Xiao Jiu and Xiao Yuan and Qi-ge against the world.

Oh. So that’s Da-ge’s name. That’s right. How did he forget? The name’s been lurking at the edges of his mind this whole time. He’s pretty sure he may have even thought it to himself a few times.

Qi-ge, Qi-ge…there’s something important there. Something he’s still forgetting.

What was…Qi-ge’s surname…? Not Shen, it was…it was…

He’ll figure it out when he wakes up.

The quiet sound of his door opening makes Shen Yuan jolt awake. He reaches automatically under his pillow for—for—

Shen Yuan looks disconcertedly back and forth between his brother, standing in the doorway, and his pillow, which does not have whatever he was looking for underneath it. He withdraws his hand, looking toward the window to get a gauge of the time. Ooh, yeah, he’s been out for a while, judging by the light—or lack thereof.

“You need to eat,” Shen Qingqiu says.

Shen Yuan’s stomach was just waiting for a reminder, because nearly as soon as Shen Qingqiu says that, he’s suddenly aware of how hungry he is. He ate on Qian Cao, but not all that much, and that was a good while ago, besides.

“Right,” Shen Yuan says. He gets out of bed, standing with a hand resting on one of the bedposts to make sure his balance is functioning properly and that his legs aren’t going to give out under him. He definitely feels better than when they arrived back at Qing Jing, and a smidge better than when he first woke on Qian Cao, but food will help even more.

Shen Qingqiu watches him, no doubt waiting for any request for assistance. Shen Yuan is pretty sure that if he asked, Shen Qingqiu would willingly bring the food in here instead. Fifty-fifty chance as to whether he was opening the door to wake him up for food or checking if Shen Yuan was still asleep and planning on saving the food for later.

Shen Yuan is awake, hungry, and would much rather eat out in the main room, thank you. He makes his way over to the low desk in his room and grabs his non-secret memory journal, then follows Shen Qingqiu out into the main room.

Shen Qingqiu doesn’t sit until after Shen Yuan has situated himself. He pushes the tray with a bowl on congee on it toward Shen Yuan, along with a cup of tea that he quickly and neatly pours, before claiming the other tray, which has a significantly more diverse selection of dishes on it.

Shen Yuan takes a bite of the congee and hums in deep appreciation. It’s really good! Not a joke, this is the best congee he’s ever had in his life. Has Qing Jing been holding out on him? Is their food all exceptionally light and boring, except for their congee, which is the best in the world? What the f*ck.

It’s absolutely no hardship to eat it all.

When he’s done, he stays at the table. It’s probably rude to pull out his notebook, but if you can’t be rude in front of your brother, then who can you be rude in front of? Shen Qingqiu certainly doesn’t say anything about it as Shen Yuan starts taking notes while Shen Qingqiu finishes the last of his meal. Instead, Shen Qingqiu clears the table after he’s done eating, setting the trays outside of the bamboo house, pours Shen Yuan another cup of tea, and gathers something of his own to work on.

Shen Yuan spends his time sketching out some of the bare few new facts that he knows. His list of recovered memories is still woefully incomplete, but it’s surprisingly successful to sink halfway into meditation and just…let his brush move. After a quarter shichen, when he looks over his list again, there are items on his list that he hadn’t even registered as regained memories. They really blend with his own mind when he doesn’t pay attention.

Huh, he thinks. Even if the System is refusing to give him a metric to judge by, he’s doing better than he thought. Those must be the “minor memories” the System talked about, as compared to the flashbacks like The Murder Attempt or whatever happened that one afternoon while talking with Luo Binghe. The Murder Attempt didn’t cause a headache, but the Luo Binghe conversation was an outright migraine. What’s the difference between the two?

He wonders if there really is some threshold of EXP he has to reach to unlock certain flashbacks. You must be LVL 4 to unlock my tragic backstory, et cetera, et cetera.

What does that make him now? LVL 1, if that? Powerful enough to get minor memories more easily, though still running up against the walls pretty often. Like when he tries to scrape any more information about Da-ge together.

Well, he’s gotten one thing, at least: Qi-ge for Da-ge, to match with Jiu-ge for Er-ge.

The nap has not, in point of fact, done anything to remind Shen Yuan of Qi-ge’s surname, which would at least make lighting incense for him easier. Technically, Shen Yuan supposes that he doesn’t need a full name to light incense for him—

—especially since he’s not dead.

Shen Yuan’s brush drips fat globs of ink onto his notebook, spreading out to cover Qi-ge’s name and swallowing half of another line, before Shen Yuan recovers enough from that thought to move his brush out of the way. He places it down on the ink bowl where it can’t do any more harm.

He turns the thought over in his mind, examining it.

Da-ge isn’t dead.

Shen Qingqiu never said that he was dead, did he? Not in so many words. He just strongly implied it. Oh, goddammit, this is some Star Wars bullsh*t right here! True from a certain point of view, Shen Yuan’s ass!

He can feel the beginnings of a headache that has nothing to do with memories returning and everything to do with his active nuisance of a brother.

Great, okay. Twenty questions time, with the Original Goods’ partially-there memory. Why is Shen Yuan so sure that Da-ge isn’t dead? From what Shen Qingqiu told Shen Yuan, he and Shen Yuan were separated from each other long before Jiu-ge was separated from Qi-ge. So the only reason that Shen Yuan could be so sure is that he’s seen or met Qi-ge since the separation.

Either the Original Goods saw him, some time during the years that he was running around as a rogue cultivator…or Shen Yuan himself did.

If he Occam’s Razors this sh*t, then there’s a very obvious answer here. One that sticks out even before he reads the note halfway through his unthinking list that reads, He didn’t use to smile like that.

Who else does Shen Qingqiu have such a weird, f*cked-up relationship with? Who else has some kind of past with Shen Qingqiu, one that was never resolved in the novel? Who else supported Shen Qingqiu through everything—even when he really, really should have stepped in and put a stop to his behavior—and was the only one who attempted to rescue Shen Qingqiu from Luo Bingge’s imprisonment and torture?

f*ck, who else, from the very first moment that Shen Yuan saw him, felt like a big brother?!

Shen Yuan might just be an idiot.

Of course Yue Qingyuan is Da-ge.

Who else could it ever be?