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Knowledge is painful.
The Six Eared Macaque knew it well.
His six ears brought him knowledge from all over, whether it came from a different time or a different place, the simian’s head was filled with it.
Many times he didn’t want to listen, many times he ignored the warnings that came to his ears, many times he pretended to be deaf.
Eventually, he was able to silence the voices that the wind brought, only to listen once in a while, hearing what he needed and ignoring everything else.
His favourite subject to ignore?
His death.
He already heard the winds blow in his direction, the storm around him, the rage of his murderer, the strike that would end him, his blood being spilled as his killer kept crushing his skull as if he were still alive after the first hit.
He didn’t want to know anything else about his death, since once he heard something, that was bound to happen. He was okay with dying, he knew that everything dies, eventually.
Knowing how he’d die way before it actually happened was too much for him to handle.
Another subject he’d ignore frequently?
Sun Wukong.
He loved Wukong, he couldn’t stop him from getting into trouble, so what was the point of hearing his future?
Maybe that would’ve saved him some pain.
Their fight is painful, both physically and emotionally.
Then he stops, mid conflict, he stands, confused as he hears what he should be hearing before his death.
It’s ridiculous, isn’t it?
Sure, they’re fighting, but Wukong- Wukong wouldn’t kill him, right?
He looks up, Wukong is launching himself on him, what is he doing?
He barely blinks as a claw scars his eye, then he falters, falling to the ground.
Another blink and Wukong’s staff meets his already injured eye.
His body jolts from the hit.
-Stop- he thinks, not being able to open his mouth and actually talk.
The last thing he sees is Wukong growling at him as his blood stains his face.
His good eye becomes dull as his hero keeps crushing his skull with his staff. His body keeps jolting at the force of every hit, giving the impression that he is still alive.
Wukong only notices his lack of breath after a good while.
He too, stops, confused, panting, the glowing in his eyes dissolves. Why is Macaque not trying to fight back?
Why is he just lying there?
Why is there so much blood around them?
Why is the injury so deep?
“Macaque?” he calls, taking out the staff of his skull.
No response.
“Macaque? Hey? You- you know we might’ve overdo this, we- we can talk, right? Let’s just talk.”
He puts down his staff, to make him understand he really wants to talk.
The body before him stays still.
“Bud, I know you can’t go down like this, come on, stop playing with me.”
Hot blood keeps spilling from the shadow demon’s skull and that’s the only movement that it’s coming from him.
“Look, okay, I’m sorry- I-” a groan leaves the king’s lips. “You can’t just pull this stunt, come on-”
He’s trembling, on his knees before the one he always tried to be stronger for. Waiting for a single motion that could convince him that Macaque is in fact alive.
Maybe he was just unconscious, surely that was why he wasn’t responding.
Touching him and shaking him a bit would be the solution, of course, he knows it. But, touching him would also mean that, if he were dead, Wukong couldn’t keep thinking he was fine.
Slowly, a trembling hand reaches a still shoulder.
Macaque doesn’t flinch.
Is he okay with Wukong touching him? Or is he dead?
“Mihou? Peach, come on, let’s just- talk, okay?”
Wukong crawls near him and stops, observing what he did.
Everything is soaked in blood, the puddle under his peach getting bigger every second more. The remaining purple eye is open ajar and dull; no anger in it, not one emotion if not sad acceptance.
“Liu Er Mihou, I swear to the gods if this is a prank-” Wukong can’t even finish his sentence, his eyes watering, his lips trembling. “I deserve it, you’re right, I’m the greatest asshole ever, just please, stop this.” He pleads and trembles again as he waits for an answer that will not arrive.
Minutes - that seem centuries - passes and Wukong now lifts Macaque’s head with a care that nobody knew he was capable of; and he holds him dearly to his heart, waiting for him to move.
Only movement “he does” is when his head falls backwards, limp, as Wukong is adjusting him in his arms.
And Wukong waits. Five hundred years under a mountain strangely seem a slower period of time, comparing it to this.
Drip, drip, drip. Blood keeps leaving Macaque’s skull, the injury is such a mess Wukong barely sees the brain under the blood and the dirt in it.
Wukong finally cracks, bursts out crying, screaming so hard both Heaven, Hell and Earth hear his desperation. His brothers and master are thrown miles away from the winds that his screams lift.
But the universe isn’t done with him: Mihou’s body starts dissolving into shadows.
“No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no-” he chants, tightening his grip so hard he hears Mihou’s bones breaking, his body becoming even more of a ragged doll. “You can’t take him away from me.” He sobs, rocking the corpse and holding him so tight one might think the monkey king wants to fuse with it.
“YOU CAN’T TAKE HIM AWAY FROM ME!” he screams, and their surroundings get even more wrecked down, mountains collapse, the soil is shaken, the clouds in the sky are blown away; the sage’s voice is enough to start a catastrophe, as if the fight between the two of them didn’t shake the universe enough.
The butchered side of his warrior’s face starts to dissolve slowly, looking as if a black fire is consuming his beaten body.
And Wukong cries all his tears, trying to stop that process, infusing his own magic in the corpse in his arms.
Nothing works, and soon enough – it’s hilarious how the time is so fast now – Wukong is holding nothing more than thin air.
His head hits the ground once, twice, thrice… he keeps doing it, sobbing, screaming, wrecking everything around him, glowing red eyes crying and firing beams around the place.
Soon there’s little to destroy, what once was a mountain range is now a desert.
No one dares to approach him for days, as he mourns, and cries and destroys.
In the end, he falls on his knees, takes deep breaths, no tears left to shed, no energy left in him, a desert that expands for miles and miles.
He’s alone now.
He will be alone from now on, even in a crowd full of people.
Alone and broken, cause he felt clearly that when Mihou died, a part of him followed the moon in Diyu.
He has no home to return to-
Mihou was his home.
Half of his soul is gone now.
He considers it, going down to Diyu and dragging him out, only to keep him dearly at his side for the rest of the eternity.
But, a part of him whispers, Mihou deserves a new life, one away from him.
No matter how enlighten he might be, in the end the only thing he is, it's a fraud, a trickster, a vessel of chaos.
And Mihou? Surely, he wasn’t a saint but- everything he did was for Wukong, he knows it.
So, without Wukong in his next life, he would have a good one, right?
That delusion is the last thing to keep Wukong away from madness.