Chapter Text
Tianlang-jun carefully eyes the man levering himself to his feet.
‘Liu Qingge,’ the people they’d passed had called him. A pretty name, for such a tenacious man.
“Where are we?” Tianlang-jun asks, glancing around the region once more. What meets his eyes is exactly the same: dust, dust, rocks, dust. A half-hearted breeze blows across the barren plain, barely stirring up the greyish brown dirt. The sky above is a pale, cloudless color, indistinct and hazy.
“Somewhere you can do no harm,” Liu Qingge bites out, glaring. Tianlang-jun’s new sense of smell can make out the scent of blood in the air; it’s thick and cloying, even from so far away. Tianlang-jun doesn’t like the taste of it; it makes his nose wrinkle.
“I intend no harm,” he remarks casually, turning to scan the horizon behind him for anything more interesting. It is similarly bare; a single rock formation adds almost nothing to the view. “How will taking me here help?”
“I took you nowhere,” Liu Qingge snaps out in indignation, stance straightening as best he can. Tianlang-jun glances at him out of the corner of his eye; the man is favoring one leg. Barely noticeable, but it’s there. “Why did you follow me, if you intend no harm?!”
“You attacked me,” Tianlang-jun says patiently, glancing down at the sword in his hand. There’s no sheath for it, except for the one at Liu Qingge’s belt; he’d never removed any of Liu Qingge’s accessories when he tied him up. His eyes linger on the scabbard briefly. “Was I supposed to just let you go?”
Liu Qingge makes a noise of irritation, and his eyes flick down to the sword in Tianlang-jun’s hand in a mirror of his. “Give me that.”
“The sword?” Tianlang-jun says incredulously, lifting it in demonstration. Liu Qingge steps back, eyes narrowing. “Why, do you plan to attack me again?”
“What if I do?” Liu Qingge snaps back, unhelpfully. Tianlang-jun stares at him disbelievingly.
“...I’ll hold onto it, until we’re out of here,” Tianlang-jun says. Liu Qingge makes a noise of outrage, which he graciously ignores. “Get us out of here safely, and the sword is yours.”
“I have no plans for you to leave safely,” Liu Qingge says menacingly- as if he poses any sort of threat, disarmed and half a step from hobbling. Tianlang-jun ignores his words, and gives the man’s body a once-over. It’s a nice body, but it’s not looking particularly functional at the moment.
“You’ll need to rest before we start moving,” Tianlang-jun says, simply tossing Liu Qingge’s blade into the dust behind himself. The dirt puffs up in a reddish cloud around it. He steps toward Liu Qingge, whose eyes widen, then narrow. His feet shift on the barren earth into a subtle fighting stance.
“Don’t start that,” Tianlang-jun chides, stepping closer. “I’m going to help.”
Liu Qingge scoffs, and as soon as Tianlang-jun is in range, a blow snakes out towards his face- lightning-quick, just as deadly. It collides with Tianlang-jun’s arm as he blocks it instinctively, blunt and with bruising force. Tianlang-jun can feel his body going calm, his mind empty; with a single step, he’s in Liu Qingge’s space, watching his eyes go wide as he lays his fingers on his neck.
“You-!” Liu Qingge gets out, trying to thrash away- but that’s all he manages before his eyes go hazy, his proud form slumping into Tianlang-jun’s arms. A quiet settles over his limp, unconscious body.
This is the third time that Tianlang-jun has knocked Liu Qingge out; his skin against Tianlang-jun’s feels just as enthralling, just as enticing this time as the first. Liu Qingge’s color looks worse, though; though it could be related to that leg that he was favoring. Tianlang-jun props Liu Qingge’s heavy head against his collarbone, his silky, long hair drapes across his chest as he considers. His fingers pet the exposed skin of Liu Qingge’s neck; it’s hot beneath his touch, in contrast to the harsh, cool wind of this isolated plain.
Tianlang-jun has experienced many things in his life, but nothing has felt quite so alien and yet familiar as watching Liu Qingge do… whatever he did, when he transferred between worlds. Without more than a thought, Tianlang-jun had felt himself following the flow of the energy, drawing it in the same pattern, replicating it…
Looking down at his hand now, where it disappears under the fall of long black hair, he can feel the same power under his skin. It’s flowing in a thin, shaky stream from Liu Qingge’s body to his; and yet seconds ago, when he made him collapse, it had roared into him in a rush. It’s as though there’s a limit to what Liu Qingge can give; and his color looks a little worse.
With a frown of concentration, Tianlang-jun firms up his grip on Liu Qingge’s neck and plays with the flow of energy as best he can, until he finds a balance with it; the stream between them slows gradually, then stops. Tianlang-jun’s brow furrows; he immediately misses the high of it. The wrinkle on Liu Qingge’s forehead, though, smoothes out slowly; the light coat of sweat under Tianlang-jun’s palm makes his hand slide as he adjusts his grip and lowers Liu Qingge to the ground, sliding his hand along the leg that Liu Qingge was favoring. He immediately finds the swelling around the ankle, prominent enough that his fingers can feel the heat of it through the fabric of his pants.
Tianlang-jun slides the leg of the pants up, fingers skimming along the inflamed skin; now, he notices the way that his body automatically holds back from drawing Liu Qingge’s energy. Control.
Thoughtfully, he strokes along the smooth skin; after a moment, he slowly pushes a thin stream of energy back out of his body. Liu Qingge’s body resists it; tilting his head, Tianlang-jun adjusts the energy, making it thinner, finer, more subtle, until it aligns itself with the flow of Liu Qingge’s. It sinks in, quiet and unassuming. Liu Qingge’s brow relaxes further.
After a bit of experimentation, Tianlang-jun figures out the best way to send a steady, slow stream of energy into Liu Qingge’s leg; he sits for a while and watches the swelling on his ankle gradually go down, fascinated. Sending the power through his fingers makes him itch to draw more from Liu Qingge; but he refrains. He needs the man to wake up- perhaps answer some questions- but more importantly, to use more of his spiritual powers in front of Tianlang-jun. Something in the back of Tianlang-jun’s mind tells him that there’s more he can do, more he should know; if he can just watch this man, steal his techniques, as he did before…
Tianlang-jun looks at the serious expression on Liu Qingge’s handsome face as he sleeps, and slowly feeds his power into him. He doesn’t allow himself to grow restless.
---
When Liu Qingge wakes up, he is furious. He scoffs at Tianlang-jun; dismisses his attempts at conversation to idle away the long hours of nothingness. Liu Qingge’s leg is healed, but he doesn’t seem inclined to leave; just glares daggers at Tianlang-jun and occasionally attempts to regain his sword, lying silently in the dust.
Nothing much changes, in the barren desert; it remains resolutely uninteresting. Strangely, even as the day passes into night, then back into dawn, afternoon, night again, Tianlang-jun finds that he needs no food; no water. Something about the energy that’s awakened within him sustains him. Liu Qingge makes no mention of the lack of sustenance, so Tianlang-jun assumes that he’s also fine.
Tianlang-jun is a patient man; he waits for Liu Qingge to break, to complain, to attack, to lead them out of the wasteland to something more interesting. To talk; to use more of the strange techniques that Tianlang-jun has been waiting to see. Liu Qingge doesn’t.
Tianlang-jun is not impatient; but the stubbornness grows tiresome. After a while, he begins to consider other avenues.
“Here,” Tianlang-jun says, stooping down to retrieve Liu Qingge’s sword from the flat, uninteresting earth. Liu Qingge’s eyes narrow; he’s been watching Tianlang-jun since the moment he moved toward the sword. “You can have this back.”
Liu Qingge doesn’t say anything as Tianlang-jun tosses the sword in his direction; but he does step forward, snatching the blade out of the air by the handle in a perfectly controlled motion. His fingers fall naturally into place, holding the sword like an extension of his body. Tianlang-jun takes merely a moment to appreciate the elegance, even as he begins gathering the energy within himself.
Having seen it once, he can replicate the spell that took them to the place they almost arrived at; Liu Qingge may have changed the spell partway through to take them here, but Tianlang-jun remembers the original design. He reconstructs the first version of the spell, feeling the way the energy slides into place, natural and solid. It feels good; right. Workable.
Liu Qingge is watching him suspiciously; Tianlang-jun can see the moment he realizes what’s happening. Liu Qingge’s eyes widen, knuckles tightening on Cheng Luan, as the spell begins to take hold; the surrounding plain begins to blur before Tianlang-jun’s sight.
Faster than Tianlang-jun can move while maintaining the spell, Liu Qingge’s body slams into him, arms grabbing onto him like bars of iron. Tianlang-jun can feel the way that the spell flexes and surges, drawing more power from him- enough that the blurring of the scenery doesn’t slow at all. It simply continues fading, as Liu Qingge’s attempted tackle throws them both to the insubstantial ground, which moments later resolves into well-tread grass, the dreary grayness of their smudged surroundings becoming a clear, cool silver, the fresh smell of mountain mist all around them.
Liu Qingge is here as well, in this place where the other cultivators once stood; it’s empty, now. Liu Qingge’s arms rip themselves free from Tianlang-jun’s waist, Cheng Luan still grasped in one fist. Caught in the fascination of the unfamiliar environment- the smooth peaks and trailing ledges, topped by gently swaying pines, the slow travel of distant eagles overhead- Tianlang-jun barely sees the strike coming in time. With a smooth roll, he lightly leaps to his feet.
“There’s no need for that,” he scolds mildly, as Liu Qingge glares death down the blade of Cheng Luan. “I just gave you back your sword, can’t you be nice?”
“I won’t let you feed on them!” Liu Qingge snaps, stance shifting aggressively. Tianlang-jun’s mouth forms in a moue.
“Who said anything about that?” he asks with a sigh. “Aren’t I just here because you attacked me?”
“You-” Liu Qingge bites out, when a small gasp interrupts them.