Chapter Text
"Where the fuck were your eyes!" roared Shui Cheng with a broken sword hilt pointing at the other boy. "Do you realize you literally froze like a jerk waiting to be ripped apart!"
The fierce corpse lay dismembered between him and the boy in purple, the rest of the broken blade lodged in his back, and the other boys in the same uniform -who seemed not to know whether to be intimidated or outraged- stared at him with barred eyes. If Shui Cheng had to make guesses, just by looking at the red of the collar, belt and ribbon in his hair and on his wrists that somehow didn't clash with the ornate purple of the boy's robes, he would have said he was a Young Master of some sort.
Great, another pompous Young Master who can't do his job, they seemed to be popping up like mushrooms recently.
The aforementioned Young Master stared at him, blinking and the trembling chin .
Shui Cheng froze in the middle of his scolding. Oh shit, he thought, he hadn't run into one of those overly sensitive types, had he?
He was somewhere between trying to apologize and not scolding him for being so pathetic, when the boy threw his head back in the loudest belly laugh Shui Cheng had ever heard.
It was somewhere between trying to apologize and not scolding him for being so pathetic, when the boy threw his head back in the loudest laugh Shui Cheng had ever heard.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" was the first thing he asked when the laughter died away in broken sobs and arms stopped holding their bellies
"Wei da-shixiong,"one of the boys took a hesitant step forward. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine guys, I'm fine," he replied waving his hand and a smile still on his lips. "My savior here was very quick."
And before Shui Cheng could scold him for being so heedless, the boy bowed down with his fist in his palm.
"This one's name is Wei Ying, by courtesy Wei WuXian. This one would like to know the name of his savior," he asks with a mischievous glint in his eyes as if a corpse didn't almost take his head off a second ago.
Shui Cheng snorts, his arms crossed and one eyebrow raised. But since his mother had taught him good manners he bows appropriately and replies. "This is Shui Cheng and Young Master Wei owes me a new sword."
"How dare you!" one of the boys interjected. "You can only blame yourself for not taking better care of your sword!"
Shui Cheng leveled him with a so sharp look that the little boy squeaked, hiding behind the back of his shixiong but Wei WuXian threw an arm around Shui Cheng shoulders as if they've known each other forever before he could say anything else.
"Come on, don't be so scary Shui-di, you scared Zhu shidi to death. Anyway, you're right, I owe you a sword and since we're almost done here, dinner too."
Shui Cheng, for some reason unknown even to him, did not detach himself and merely sneered.
"This better be damn spicy."
Wei WuXian laughed delightedly right next to his ear. "Of course!"
He hears the younger boys groan loudly behind them.
§
He looked like Madam Yu.
That had been the first thought that crossed Wei WuXian's mind when Shui Cheng had turned to him with burning eyes and an avalanche of scolding that seemed to have been copied directly from the Lady of Lotus Pier's repertoire.
He observed the other boy from the edge of a sip of wine. High cheekbones, almond-shaped eyes, and a frown as his default expression. Shui Cheng was eating with a straight back and table manners that were definitely better than Wei WuXian, slouched in his chair as usual. The other ducklings at their table, unusually quiet, watched their host with some curiosity if not awe as they ate while maintaining their best posture.
Wei WuXian couldn't help but smile at the sight, surely his boys didn't want to look any less disciplined than a rogue cultivator they met by chance.
A rogue cultivator who was strong enough to defeat a dozen high level ferocious corpses by himself and at the same time rushing to kill the one who had caught Wei WuXian from behind, breaking a standard cultivator sword that was definitely not cheap. If he hadn't known for sure, he would have ignored the worn blue cotton robes he was wearing and thought he was up against some undercover cultivator from the great sects. But he knew all the notable cultivators of the Five Great Sects -Madam Yu had made sure he studied- and if he belonged to some minor sect certainly with a talent like that he wouldn't go unnoticed.
"So," Shui Cheng began after sending down a sip of wine. "How come the Young Master of Lotus Pier deigned to come all the way to the borders of Yunmeng to hunt?"
Straight to the point, the other guy certainly wasn't one to waste time.
Wei WuXian smiled, he was still not capable to smiled in that placating, diplomatic and illegible way of Uncle Jiang but was a close tingh.
"This humble me is just Lotus Pier's Head Disciple. As for the question, I think you've already noticed, but recently there are huge amounts of monsters and fierce corpses."
Shui Cheng nodded between bites. "Fierce corpses and monsters walking around even though the cemeteries are intact and there's no accident or catastrophe to justify their presence."
Silence, a moment of understanding passed between them without speaking.
Wei WuXian smiled jovially. "Childrens!" he caught the attention of the youthers. "If you have finished eating, you should go to sleep. We're leaving early tomorrow to go home."
"Yes Wei da-shixiong!" they said in chorus, and like good children they stand up whispering and casting glances at them.
"What do you want to know?" he asked ordering another jar of wine.
"Why did you come all the way to the borders to hunt feral corpses that are obviously of a higher level than the kids you bring along?"
Wei WuXian whistled impressed. "No one half measures whit you right? We weren't set up, our scoutsthey had only detected traces of low-level corpses and unless they reached that level in the two days it took us to arrive, which is unlikely, they clearly arrived later."
"And why are you giving all this information to an outsider ?" sneered Shui Cheng, looked so much like Yu ZiYuan when she managed to point out a misstep by her Head Disciple, that Wei WuXian has a shudder.
But instead, he snorted out a laugh and replied, "I simply think it's a must to warn a fellow cultivator. You didn't really seem prepared for big hunting either."
He knowed he had hit the nail on the head when Shui Cheng's expression crumpled up as if he's tasted something bitter.
"Don't think I'll settle with this paltry piece of information, you still owe me a sword," said, as if Wei WuXian really intends to run without paying him back. And maybe it's already happened, Wei WuXian thinks, knowing the unwillingness of some noble cultivators to pay their debts, let alone let it be known that a rogue cultivator saved their life.
"Of course," he poured more wine for both of them and the conversation migrates to more pleasant topics, like tales of the places Shui Cheng has already been and the ones he's going to or all the political nonsense and jokes Wei WuXian has been a part of.
Wei WuXian listened to those tales with nostalgia, that vague feeling of something he can never quite remember that pressed between his ribs, those rare details dancing behind his eyelids; his mother's smile, the swaying of the donkey on the beaten road, his father's quiet nodding and the evenings they spent in front of the fire under the stars.
He could hear Madam Yu's voice scolding him for being so confident with a complete stranger, even Uncle Jiang would have gently pointed out to him that he wasn't very careful.
But somehow was comfortable.