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Macaque wasn't known for his kind heart and charming personality, at least not among Monkie Kid's friends. However, the kid seemed to like him for some reason, and the monkey demon quickly began to appreciate his company even before he tried to take his powers, unfortunately at the time he still considered it a necessary evil. Revenge against Wukong was his driving force and sole purpose in life after his resurrection, but without any weapons or additional power he had no chance against him. The appearance of a young boy irritated by the lack of control over his powers was like a sign from the heavens and the black-haired man immediately decided to use it for his plan. However, there were two things the demon couldn’t predict. Firstly, that he will like the boy quite a bit, and secondly, that he will not be able to take all the power at once, thus losing the chance to defeat Monkie King.
Later, with nothing much to do, he discovered that Wukong had gone on 'vacation' and was not around to train the young one, so Macaque decided to take care of it. However, he wouldn't be himself if he did it without the wow effect. In the process, he repaired his budget before he managed to lure Monkie Kid and his friends to a show. What happened next was predictable, they fought a bit, the young hero figured out his act and Macaque let his friends go and gave Mk a little lecture. Satisfied, he wanted to disappear and hide in the shadows again for some time, knowing what was currently lurking in the city, but before he managed to do so, Lady Bone Demon's dog caught him, taking him to her like a toy.
Then he had to chase the entire gang halfway around the world on the orders of the demoness and deal with all the pesky issues to almost turn into an ice puppet, which would have happened anyway if it weren't for the Samadhi fire. Fortunately, he narrowly managed to avoid it, additionally losing his connection to the LBD. Then, wanting to help Mk when his mentor was possessed, he brought them a demon's dog, hoping that it would be enough for them, but the young man, of course, created a plan in which he had to include it.
“Look, I brought you the Lady Bone Demon's lapdog, but I'm not up for being a hero, kid.” Macaque said, wanting to just teleport somewhere far away, but first he wanted to be sure that the gang in front of him would be able to handle it and stop the coming destruction. Although the fact that they had tied him up with a rope thinking that it would be able to restrain him in any way forced him to consider returning to service for the LBD.
“We don't need you to beat him. We just got to keep him busy. As long as he's under her control, the mech's vulnerable. We can do this. You can do this.” Mk said optimistically, and Six-Eared didn't even know how to explain to the hero that in this scenario, the risk of something going wrong was too high. The very idea that Macaque would be able to defeat the possessed Wukong was laughable.
“Nice speech, kid. But it's not gonna…” the demon began to explain patiently when his former student interrupted him.
“Ugh! Stop. You keep playing at being this bad guy, acting like you're just in it for you. But I know, deep, deep down, you're not that guy. Help us. Make it right.” Mk began to speak irritably, touching the demon's strings that no one had even been able to find for a long time.
“I'm not a hero, bud.” Macaque sighed, wishing he could be who he needed for the teenager.
“Then be a warrior.” Mk replied with a bright smile, and at that moment Macaque realized that there was no turning back.
This kid, full of hope and faith, despite the odds, reached out to him with a smile that reminded him of Wukong from their youth. From the times when the monkey king was the greatest hero in the world for the demon and a source of faith that no matter what happens, everything will work out somehow. He saw something in Mk that both Wukong and himself lacked. Mk was supposed to become the greatest hero, it was his destiny. He was a star that shone with blinding light, still not fully formed and still growing. This all hit the demon monkey with the force of a freight train and helped him make a decision.
“Hehe. Okay, kid. You win...” replied a smiling Macaque, quickly removing the rope he was tied with, ignoring the noise this caused from the rest.
Even much later, when he had to face the cold puppet that was Wukong, the shadow master had no intention of giving up. He couldn't let down the rising star who still had a lot of work to do as the sun of their world was setting. Macaque promised to protect the kid and that's what he was going to do, no matter if he had to fight or cooperate with Wukong because of it. He didn't want Mk's light to ever dim, because at that moment the boy became his hope, that there was a chance that everything would work out one day.
For this reason, he helped get Wukong out of the memory scroll, listened to their plan and helped fight his former brothers, although he did the latter with pleasure, knowing that it was up to him to fight Peng, whom he had wanted to deal with since very long time ago.
He was currently watching as Mk tried to glamur his simian attributes so that he could get through the rest of his slowly ending day at work without any problems. The teenager was slowly getting used to the idea that he was not a human, but a monkey demon, like his mentor and Macaque, but he was still terrified at times because of it.
“Ugh!” the boy groaned helplessly as he once again failed to hide his tail.
“Kid leave it, it's nothing.” he called Pigsy from behind the counter while cooking noodles, but he kept checking how his son was doing.
"NO. I have to learn to do it, but this is the part that is the hardest.” the boy replied, trying again.
“In my opinion, you're failing because you're trying too hard.” admitted the monkey demon, eating the noodles.
“Oh great idea! I have to try less and I will succeed.” Mk said sarcastically, and Macaque hid his smile behind a bowl of noodles.
Mk acted like a little monkey, trying to prove that he was completely independent and an adult, but after translating his age into demon years, he was still very young.
“Even though it hurts me a lot, Macaque is right.” Tang admitted from the other end of the counter, reading some old book and eating noodles. “You're trying too hard.”
“Agh!” the boy just screamed when he failed again, sitting between the demon and the human.
“You will still learn, you have to give yourself time.” Tang comforted him when Macaque muttered something and started playing with the boy's hair, which, to the adults' amusement, after a while simply fell asleep.
“This is amazing, I wish I had known about this way of calming him down when he was about five.” Pigsy muttered.
“Considering he was covered in his own glamor at the time and had no idea of his own heritage, we don't know if his instincts would have worked.” replied Macaque with tenderness grooming the young monkey.
“Mk! Kid, I have an interesting proposition for you!” screamed Monkie King, who flew into the restaurant, waking the sleeping young man.
“Monkie King!” the boy greeted enthusiastically, despite the yawn that escaped him.
“Monkie King, welcome.” Tang greeted politely as Pigsy glared at him, muttering something under his breath and returning to the kitchen, while the black monkey demon just watched Wukong with cold indifference.
“Hey! I came to offer you a little training in your monkey form and I thought the best idea would be to spend the night at my place! You could stay at my place tomorrow after training and get some rest while you're at it.” the king announced very smugly.
“And that's all you came all the way for?” Tang asked in surprise.
“Oh, by the way, I wanted to eat some noodles.” Wukong replied, showing the order on his phone that Mk had convinced him to buy.
“How great! Spending the night on the flower fruit mountain, combined with training! Of course I want!" the happy boy replied, and Macaque barely held back from snapping at the monkey king for trying taking his cub out of his reach.
“Great, if you want some snacks, tell me while I'm in town, because otherwise the only thing left is what you can find in the cupboards.” Wukong announced cheerfully, wrapping his tail around the student's waist.
"No problem." Monkie Kid replied, then began to think about something, turning to the black monkey. “Will you come too, since it's going to be a sleepover for mystical monkeys?”
Everyone in the restaurant froze and was aware of the awkward atmosphere in the room, except for Mk, who stared at the shadow master hopefully. The boy didn't even hide the fact that he was counting on a positive answer, even forgetting of the fact that he has a tail, that was wagging from side to side like a happy dog.
"I'm sorry, Kid, but this probably isn't the best idea..." the demon began hesitantly, because as soon as the words left his mouth, the young man's smile faded into a sad and disappointed grimace, and his tail drooped.
"All right." Mk muttered sadly, trying to pretend that nothing had happened, breaking the hearts of the adults present, especially Macaque, who wanted to hurt himself for causing such a state to the cub.
“I think it would be good for you to come to the mountain.” Wukong choked out, seeing the student's condition, towards the other demon.
“See, even Monkie King thinks this is a good idea!” smiled the kid with growing hope.
“You'll need a break from the city. Plus I prefer the young one to be cared for by someone who will hear him, and transport him to a safe place immediately.” Pigsy muttered and Tang nodded and Macaque agreed.
“Considering that you have already become parental figures number three and number four, you must start getting used to each other without our company as arbiters in the event of any dispute.” Tang added thoughtfully as Mk was out of earshot. Monkie King quickly nodded in agreement and went to talk to the teenager some more before taking the noodles and running away to his place.
“Monkie King, he said we should come together so you can see us practice! Would you like to join?” Mk asked happily, almost jumping on the spot.
“We'll see, kid.” laughed Macaque and the happy boy called Mei to meet up, forgetting about his tail problem.
“You know Tang is right, you two need to learn to function together.” Pigsy said and his husband lit up when he heard this.
"It's not that easy." the demon replied, rubbing his temple, already thinking about what the next evening would be like.
"Why?" the restaurant owner asked, and Tang immediately began to carefully admire the stain on the ceiling.
“How well do you know JTTW?” Macaque asked tiredly.
“As far as I'm concerned, I was never interested in legends, I only listened a little because of Tang.” Pigsy confessed.
“That's not really a story I ever told Mk. And the books I gave him don’t have it due to mistakes in various translations.” Tang added, turning from the ceiling towards the other two.
“I'm not sure how it was described, but the most important things seem to have been preserved. To make a long story short, I impersonated Wukong by playing the role of his evil twin, causing some unpleasant events, causing some trouble on Flower Fruit Mountain, and leading to a fight between us that ended with my death." concluded the demon, covering his injured eye.
“Death?” Pigsy repeated.
"Yes. Wukong killed me and Lady Bone Demon resurrected me. I'm not saying I'm innocent, but well... He's several times immortal and almost indestructible, and I was immortal twice, maybe three times, but I wasn't even half as immune as he was, so the end result of our fight at the moment Wukong stopped holding back, he was predictable.” replied Macaque.
“This may not be a very discreet question, but before all this, were you…?” Tang asked, making a vague movement with his hand.
"Together? In a sort of, yes.” the shadow master replied honestly.
“What do you mean, sort of?” asked the cook.
“We were not a couple in the normal sense of the word. As you already know, I literally called him my sun, while in this logic I remained the moon. We were close, very close, but neither of us ever said out loud what we were, but yes, our relationship was most like that of lovers." Macaque admitted with a slight melancholy in his voice.
“Your relationship is like a soap opera.” snorted the restaurateur.
“Pigsy!” Tang was outraged, and Macaque, to their surprise, laughed.
“You're right, considering we have a child now. This sounds like the script of some cheap tearjerker." said the monkey demon.
“Mk doesn't know anything?” Pigsy asked worriedly, after a while.
“I'm not going to tell him. I know Wukong loves this kid, and I have no intention of changing the way Mk looks at either of us. And I'm willing to bet my other eye that Wukong won't tell him that either." replied Macaque.
“He'll find out someday.” Tang replied.
“Then it will be beyond our control.” commented the shadow master.
“Like everything in life.” Pigsy said, after closing the restaurant, taking out a small bottle of sake and three cups on the table, then filling them and giving one to the monkey demon. “I feel like you might need this before tomorrow.”
“What are we drinking to? In a toast to next night with my ex?” Macaque joked, taking the cup, careful not to spill it.
“In a toast for Mk, the best thing that happened in our lives.” Pigsy replied and the other two nodded in complete agreement.
“For Mk!” accompanied by a scream, the men gently clinked their cups, letting the conversation turn to less serious topics, allowing the heavy truth to drown in sake.