Chapter Text
Luo Binghe never thought that it was possible for Shen Qingqiu to ever look soft. When they parted for what Binghe thought would be the last time, Shen Qingqiu had looked completely wretched – clothes torn and hair tangled from his less than charitable stay in the Water Prison, eyes red and furious from Luo Binghe’s poking around in his dreams. Binghe hadn’t cared all that much about Shen Qingqiu’s feelings, then. He was much too confused about his own feelings, the realisation of Shen Qingqiu’s past dredging up fresh hurt about his cruelty to a child whom he had killed five long years ago. Luo Binghe had thought that that would be where their story ended: the cruel teacher turned tortured soul, and his pathetic student turned emperor of the demonic realm. But of course things wouldn’t be that simple.
Even if Luo Binghe had forgiven him, in a sense, that didn’t mean his martial siblings liked him any more than they had before his capture. He had still killed Liu Qingge, as far as they were concerned (and Luo Binghe had not been particularly interested in correcting them at the time). His sharp edges were just as cutting as they always had been, and, if the rumours were true, only tempered by the fact that Shen Qingqiu dropped his level of interactions with other people from a three to a one. Shen Qingqiu resumed his duties as Peak Lord, but only just, and when his tenure was up he disappeared from the public eye without a trace. There was probably not a single person who missed him. But with the way he acted, who would be stupid enough to try and care about him?
In the meantime, Luo Binghe found that he did not particularly enjoy being an emperor.
After he’d been pushed into the Endless Abyss, Meng Mo had managed to convince Luo Binghe that becoming the emperor of the demonic realm was the best thing he could do for himself, that the hungry beast inside of his chest would be satiated if only Luo Binghe were the emperor. Luo Binghe had let himself be convinced. He had believed Meng Mo’s nonsense. If he were the emperor, he would be the most powerful being in the human and demonic realms. No one would be able to look down on him for being a half-breed, or be able to simply cast the emperor aside, or leave his court without his express permission. As emperor, there was also no shortage of people vying for his attention and his favour. Thousands clamoured to get the chance to even be in the same room as him, and every day brought a new shipment of rare and priceless gifts, all intended to please Luo Binghe.
It should’ve been everything that Luo Binghe could have ever wanted. Wouldn’t that little child enjoy having so many people want him, and be in a position where he could never be cast aside? Wouldn’t he enjoy having all the riches in the world, soft fabrics and good food whenever he pleased? Or would he be able to tell, with the memory of having been loved still fresh in his mind, that none of the sycophants actually wanted him?
Anyway, it dawned on Luo Binghe soon enough. A century or two of playing emperor later, and he packed up his things and took off. He didn’t bother appointing a successor; unlike the human realm, the demon realm did just fine in times of chaos. The demons would enjoy tearing each other apart for the throne. And if Luo Binghe’s was the last dynasty to be successful, well. That worked out quite well for him, didn’t it?
Luo Binghe had had a plan for his retirement. First he was going to pay his respects to his mother, renovate her grave so that it was worthy of someone as good as her. Perhaps he’d travel a little, seek out a few adventures just for the fun of it. Then, before anyone could try and claim the glory of killing the former emperor of the demon realm, Binghe would dig himself a grave right next to his mother’s, and enter the reincarnation cycle.
And then he found Shen Qingqiu stuck in a tree.
No, the story didn’t go where Luo Binghe might have hoped.
For starters, he was stuck staring at the man’s face, instead of more appealing body parts. Secondly, though Shen Qingqiu had been lying obediently in that hole for at least a little while up until that point, judging by the age of the attack marks on the tree that imprisoned him, as soon as he saw Luo Binghe, he began thrashing about like a kitten stuck in a rucksack.
“Hello, Shizun,” Luo Binghe drawled. He was content to stand a little ways in front of Shen Qingqiu (and a healthy distance away from any trees) and watch his former shizun struggle. It was a little bit gratifying, actually. Luo Binghe could feel his stress melt away.
“You!” Shen Qingqiu snarled. He momentarily gave up on his wiggling and braced his arms against the bark of the tree. The hole he was stuck in was just far enough off the ground that he couldn’t quite reach the ground, and Shen Qingqiu glared furiously up at Luo Binghe like that was his fault. “What are you planning?”
“Me?” Luo Binghe asked, astonished. “I just got here!”
Shen Qingqiu huffed, and turned his face away. Like this, Luo Binghe could see the flush on his cheeks, and the freckles that had bloomed over his pale skin. Those certainly hadn’t been around when Luo Binghe had last seen him. There were some callous marks on Shen Qingqiu’s hands, and the man was at least two shades darker than the white jade appearance he had so favoured back then. Though Luo Binghe couldn’t see his entire outfit, Shen Qingqiu’s hair was now bound with a simple hair stick instead of his ostentatious hair crowns, and the part of his robes that Luo Binghe could see were of a plain and mostly average quality. If he had even a slightly different face, Luo Binghe might have thought he were an entirely different person.
“Qingqiu looks quite different, now,” Luo Binghe observed. Shen Qingqiu recoiled – or tried to, at least.
“Impudent!” He spat. He shot a weak blast of qi at Luo Binghe, and it fizzled out before it even came close to him. Luo Binghe raised an eyebrow. That was abnormally weak, even for Shen Qingqiu.
“How did you get yourself into this mess?” Luo Binghe asked. He took a few steps back and tilted his head up, letting out a low whistle when he couldn’t even see the top of the tree like that. Shen Qingqiu eyed him warily but didn’t bother trying to move.
The tree that Shen Qingqiu was stuck in was one of the biggest that Luo Binghe had ever seen. In fact, he had seen it from a half dozen villages away; had seen its leaves start to glow a bright green and so set out to investigate. He hadn’t even seen Shen Qingqiu at first, the man so completely dwarfed by the enormity of the tree, and his spiritual energy traces completely drowned out by the energy flooding from it.
“Are you here just to make fun of me?” Shen Qingqiu said. He struck his palm against the bark of the tree again. Predictably, nothing happened.
“I was just passing through when I happened to see my shizun. It would have been rude if I hadn’t stopped to say hello, right, shizun?”
Shen Qingqiu glared up at him. From where he was stuck, his head only came up to Luo Binghe’s waist. What a shame that Luo Binghe‘s feral shizun most definitely bit.
“Get me out of here,” Shen Qingqiu said through gritted teeth. Luo Binghe cocked his head.
“Sorry, what was that?”
“You heard me!” Shen Qingqiu looked like he would enjoy nothing more than tossing Luo Binghe off of a few high places, but was trying to keep it from showing on his face. “Get me out of here, and I will…I will…”
Luo Binghe grinned. “Shizun will?”
Shen Qingqiu’s mouth opened and closed a few times, before his pride finally got the best of him and he refused to speak. Luo Binghe sighed, a little disappointed, and sauntered forward. Shen Qingqiu’s snapped to him once again.
“Well,” Luo Binghe said, pulling Xin Mo from its sheathe. “I suppose I could – ”
Xin Mo was the peerless demonic sword, never once defeated in battle. It should have been enough to at least put a dent in the tree. Instead, as Luo Binghe swung the sword down in one smooth strike, the very tip of Xin Mo’s blade made contact with the bark, and a wave of spiritual energy surged forward and exploded in Luo Binghe’s face. Then everything went dark.
When Luo Binghe came to, Shen Qingqiu was trying to lift himself off of Luo Binghe’s chest.
“Hello,” Binghe said, because old habits died hard. Shen Qingqiu elbowed him very hard in his diaphragm.
“Quiet,” Shen Qingqiu said. He managed to push himself into a standing position, wobbling on his feet, and then took off towards the tree again. Luo Binghe pushed himself up on his elbows; he didn’t necessarily care if Shen Qingqiu wanted to get himself stuck forever in some oversized tree, but shouldn’t he at least wait until Luo Binghe was gone before he started wasting his efforts?
“Shen Qingqiu!” Luo Binghe shouted. Shen Qingqiu didn’t even pause. He stumbled his way through the grass and straight into the tree again before Luo Binghe could stop him.
Nothing happened.
“Are you out of your mind, Shen Qingqiu?” Luo Binghe called. “Do you enjoy being restrained so much that you can’t even go a moment without?”
Shen Qingqiu ran his hands over the tree like a man possessed, attempting to stumble his way across its entire circumference. Luo Binghe pushed himself to his feet and followed.
“What on earth are you looking for?” He asked, annoyed at being ignored. Shen Qingqiu didn’t respond, and Luo Binghe reached out and grabbed his wrist. “What are you looking for, Shen Qingqiu?”
His ex-shizun tried and failed to pull himself free, and finally had to resign himself to glaring up at Luo Binghe.
“…there was a baby,” he said finally, sounding as if he’d rather get all his teeth pulled at once than talk to Luo Binghe.
“I didn’t see any babies when I came here.”
“It was in the tree,” Shen Qingqiu said, like that made any sense whatsoever.
“You’ve been poisoned,” Luo Binghe decided. He dropped Shen Qingqiu’s wrist and started to walk away. “Have a good evening, shizun.”
Then Luo Binghe promptly tripped over the largest cabbage he had ever seen. The cabbage, still firmly planted in the ground, began to wail.
All of that led to right now: Luo Binghe looming in the doorway of the little cottage with a tray of food, watching Shen Qingqiu soothe a baby in the low light of the afternoon. For the first time that Luo Binghe had ever seen, Shen Qingqiu’s face was completely relaxed. It seemed that the presence of the baby and the shedding of Shen Qingqiu’s layers and layers of stiff robes had changed the man in some way. Luo Binghe could not help but to think that all of that wandering had clearly done Shen Qingqiu many favours.
“If you’re not going to come in, then you might as well just leave us,” Shen Qingqiu said.
Well, not that many favours. Interesting that Shen Qingqiu would say that when he was the one who forced Luo Binghe to rent them a house and “take responsibility” for making a mess out of the situation. Luo Binghe would argue that the mess was already made, he just had the misfortune of stepping in it. But it wasn’t like he had anything better to do.
“How could I just leave?” Luo Binghe said, pouting. “Shizun has my child, after all.”
Shen Qingqiu did not look impressed.
“Ah, to think that I have lain with so many women, and yet Shizun is the one to give me my first child,” Luo Binghe said lasciviously. This time, Shen Qingqiu whirled around, the highest points of his cheeks flushed with a fetchingly deep red.
“Be quiet!” He snapped. “Come inside, before anyone hears you spew your nonsense!”
Luo Binghe happily let himself into the cottage and began arranging his dishes on the table. Shen Qingqiu turned back to the baby. Luo Binghe was not particularly knowledgeable about babies, but the one in Shen Qingqiu’s arms looked tiny. Mercifully, besides the incident where Luo Binghe had kicked it, it was fairly quiet. He simply stared up at Shen Qingqiu with huge, unblinking eyes that looked like the mirror image of Shen Qingqiu’s. He hadn’t even pooped once. Luo Binghe thought that was all babies were supposed to do.
“An emperor so excited about cooking dinner,” Shen Qingqiu snarked. “Was it too far beneath the emperor of the demonic realm to ever even step foot in the kitchens?”
“This emperor could do anything he pleased,” Luo Binghe said, grinning. Shen Qingqiu scoffed and turned his face aside. For some unknown reason, Binghe didn’t want him to look away. “As emperor, giving anything to anyone was a sign of favour. I couldn’t simply make a plate of food for someone out of goodwill. Everything was political. The emperor had to be careful of every breath lest it blow in the wrong direction.”
Shen Qingqiu shifted the baby in his arms. “I wouldn’t have thought that you would have thought about such things.”
Luo Binghe set the wooden tray down with a clatter. “Oh?” He said, smiling poisonously. “I believe I was also a disciple of Qing Jing Peak, once. Does your Qing Jing Peak not teach its students well, or were you perhaps remiss in your duties as a teacher?”
“Can a teacher be blamed for a student who cannot learn? When the land is not tilled, do you blame the rake or the farmer?” Shen Qingqiu fired back.
“Shizun seems to forget that this farmer was never given a rake to begin with,” Luo Binghe snapped.
Shen Qingqiu didn’t bother deigning him with a response. He shifted the baby in his arms, stubbornly turning his face away from Luo Binghe and the food he’d cooked for him.
The tray snapped in Luo Binghe’s hands.
Luo Binghe laughed.
“You never change, do you, Shen Qingqiu?” He said, smiling. “You don’t regret a single thing you’ve done. You don’t care about anyone but yourself. I saved your life. Won’t you look at me, Shizun?”
Shen Qingqiu’s gaze flicked upwards for barely a moment before he was looking away again. Still, for a brief moment his expression was completely confused. It was as if he didn’t understand why Luo Binghe was upset at all.
“Fine, then,” Luo Binghe snapped. He slammed the pieces of the wooden tray down on the table, sending the dishes rattling. The baby startled and began to cry.
In its distress, it curled itself towards Shen Qingqiu, who then held it to his chest. He looked like a protective mother protecting his baby from the big evil demon.
Luo Binghe’s lip curled. It figured that even when he hadn’t done anything wrong, Shen Qingqiu still managed to make Luo Binghe feel like shit.
“Enjoy your meal, shizun,” Luo Binghe said, and slammed the door on his way out.