Chapter Text
All things considered, Li Lianhua really was quite irritated to be alive. He supposed he should be grateful, considering how many times he’d come so close to death, but this time he really had attempted to leave with some kind of grace. He’d slunk off like a cat, meaning to disappear; to die somewhere peaceful and quiet on his own, with the final word in the form of a letter to the two people he cared for the most.
And then some local medicine man in the far off corner of the land he’d ended up in found him in his last moments and took him home and cured him, the bastard.
It wasn’t without its drawbacks - the man had saved his life in exchange for his ability to ever do any serious martial arts again, so he would finally be the person he’d been pretending to be all those years travelling around in Lotus Tower. A - mostly - ordinary man. He could live out the rest of his life, however long it was, doing what he wished. So he became a wanderer. He couldn’t be recognised so he drastically altered his appearance, tried to look like a vagrant so people wouldn’t spare him a second glance, and he walked.
He’d never really had the opportunity to travel without burden, but with just a satchel and his wits, he felt more relaxed than he had in a very long time. He walked, and fished, and ate. He slept without having to worry about wasting precious time before the impending grave. He stretched and climbed trees and swam in lakes. He learned to stitch his own clothes from a kind old lady in one of the small villages in the mountains, and started doing it every night by habit. He was starting to feel the aches of age and it filled him with relief, because his youth had been marred with the pain of Bicha poison and this was so much easier.
He was still irked by his continued existence, however. He had been perfectly content with leaving and had been brought back from the brink decidedly against his will, but he couldn’t fault the man for saving him. He probably would have done the same in his position.
He was getting used to it, though.
Or at least, he thought he was, until Fang Duobing found him, or rather Hulijing did - sniffed him out despite his efforts to spread his old things out to throw them off the scent. He’d disguised himself somewhat, but you can’t trick a dog’s nose, or Fang Duobing’s doggedness. And then everything came crashing down around him again. Because now he had to be Li Xiangyi again. He had to be Li Lianhua. He had to be a version of himself twice removed from the man he was now, to make sure he didn’t upset the protege who loved him so very much.
“You lied to me, again,” Fang Duobing whined, half-petulance, half in genuine distress.
Lianhua sighed heavily, a habit he’d picked up almost exclusively from his friendship with the man. “I actually didn’t, this time-”
“Why are you always trying to leave?” He looked so earnestly at him that it was almost impossible not to answer.
He patted his old dog’s fur as he thought it over. “Xiaobao-”
“Don’t you dare xiaobao me, I am so furious with you,” Fang Duobing’s hands were shaking at his sides and any idiot could have seen how much anger he was holding back, but only Lianhua knew him well enough to see the relief and joy and love in it too.
He reached over and patted his shoulder. “I was dying. I didn’t want you to see me like that.”
The honestly seemed to take Duobing by surprise, whatever remark he’d been planning on firing back at him with dying in his throat, instead replaced with a sniffle and a quiet, “I really thought you were dead this time.”
“So did I,” Lianhua admitted tiredly.
Fang Duobing had rented a room in one of the small towns nearby so while they walked he regaled Lianhua with tales of the rebuilding of the Sigu Sect and the martial world at large, and Lianhua listened in polite silence, nodding and interjecting with questions whenever Duobing got too carried away on a tangent.
When they reached the room, Hulijing jumped up onto one of the beds, curled up, and promptly fell asleep. Li Lianhua wished he could do the same. Instead he remained attentive because it was the least he could do for the disciple he kept abandoning. Unfortunately it seemed his attention wasn’t all that Fang Duobing wanted - he also wanted answers. He poured them both tea as he turned the questions back onto him, asking about what he’d been doing since he “died.”
He was honest - “I’ve been walking.”
“And?”
“Fishing.”
“And?”
“Sleeping.”
Fang Duobing made a noise that was some combination of a tut and huff because even when he was trying to scold somebody, he couldn’t help being fussy himself. “What else?”
Lianhua smiled over at him as he clinked his teacup to his protege’s. “What else is there?”
The protege himself could clearly see things were different with Lianhua now, but he was being his usual optimistic, puppy-eyed self, and it was hard to ignore that, even for an old curmudgeon like the twice-dead Xiangyi. He powered through every obstacle Lianhua put up, and made him promise to stay the night and not run away while he was sleeping. Even after he promised, he knew the kid wouldn’t believe him - his track record spoke for itself. This time however, he really did intend to stay put, at least for the night.
Fang Duobing shoved a towel at him and used the momentum of it to propel him to the bathroom where a warm bath was ready. “Wash up, you look terrible.”
“I put a lot of work in to look this terrible,” Lianhua grumbled, but he acquiesced, shedding his clothes and climbing into the tub with no fuss. He hated to admit it, but it was nice, being taken care of again. He could hear Xiaobao bustling about through the thin wall and it set him at ease more than anything else had done in the entire three months he’d been alive. It occurred to him that this was exactly what he’d been looking for while he wandered, without even knowing it. Fang Duobing had really made Lotus Tower feel like a home with his domesticity and petulance and genuine care for him, and somehow Li Lianhua had let that compassion infect him until he missed it when it was gone. He sighed, sinking down below the surface of the water, and meditated on it.
He could escape, keep running, hiding, staying in the shadows. He was good at it. But Duobing would never stop looking for him, and Lianhua had done enough running. He told himself he just wanted to live a quiet life out of the spotlight, without the pressure of being the world’s greatest martial artist or the leader of Sigu Sect, and it was true, but that didn’t mean it was all he wanted. He wanted… what did he want?
That was the hardest part of not dying - he’d spent so long training himself never to expect or want anything that now that he had the time for it, he had no idea what he desired. He’d been figuring it out on his travels - he still liked nature, he enjoyed learning to stitch patterns he never would have tried before, he liked swimming more than he remembered - but he’d never let himself imagine the bigger picture. The future.
When he emerged from the bath, bed robes wrapped tightly around himself, Fang Duobing glanced over and visibly relaxed.
“It’s really you,” he sighed, relief coating every syllable.
Li Lianhua had to admit he liked the feeling of being clean and looking himself again, if only for the ease it put his closest friend at. He refused to let that show on his face, however. He couldn't let Fang Duobing know; he’d never hear the end of it.
Hulijang ran up to his shins and made excited noises - she too had recognised him earlier but preferred him looking like himself. He bent down to scratch her ears and she snuffled at his palm. He had missed this.
Fang Duobing was still clothed, drinking tea, probably not planning to sleep until after he was sure Lianhua was, so he decided it was time to at least lie down, put the poor boy's mind at ease.
He lay down in the spare bed - the bed he had pointedly not asked about because he knew the answer was that Fang Duobing always booked double rooms just in case he found his shifu on his travels - and it didn’t take long for sleep to claim him. He slept more soundly now than he used to. When his nightmares did come, they were worse than before, but they were so much rarer now that he felt it was an even trade.
This night there were none to be found and he woke feeling well-rested and ready to start the day. He sat up, stretching and yawning, and Fang Duobing startled from the doorway where he’d clearly dozed off.
“You actually stayed,” he said, eyes wide like a baby deer.
“I gave you my word.”
“Why?”
Lianhua raised an eyebrow. “Because I might not be dying anymore, but I’m also not Li Xiangyi anymore and now that you’ve found me I know that there’s nowhere I could go that you wouldn’t catch me. That sounds tiresome. I’d rather get a good night’s rest.”
Something flickered across Fang Duobing’s face, but it was too quick for him to read it. The smile that followed after it was huge and excited like those early days when all he wanted was to be a detective. “What do you want to do today?”
Li Lianhua leaned back on his hands and breathed in deeply. The air was faintly salty from their proximity to the ocean and it had been a long while since he’d made his way down onto the sand. He tended to stick to springs and lakes nowadays. “Let’s take a walk.”
Fang Duobing looked crestfallen. “Is that all?”
“I hope you’re not expecting me to announce myself to others just because I let you catch me,” he wagged a finger at him the way he would have his dog. In the corner, she tilted her head at him, confused, but continued wagging her tail.
“You didn’t let me do anything-”
“I mean it, Fang Duobing.” For once, there wasn’t an iota of amusement in his voice. “I’m dead. I plan to stay that way. If that disappoints you then I’m afraid I will continue to be a disappointment.”
He felt a little guilty about the sad look on his face, but his resolve was strong. He’d weathered worse behaviour from the miscreant detective.
And then it got worse.
“I sent word to Di Feisheng,” Fang Duobing blurted out.
His heart sank a little. It wasn’t like he hadn’t expected for his old rival to find out (it was only a matter of time, once Fang Duobing had tracked him down) but he hadn’t expected to have to deal with him so soon. He was still reeling from being recognised by Duobing - having to be a person in front of the one man who knew him better than anyone was going to be physically painful. He didn’t let that show though, just tilted his head in acknowledgement. “Thought you might.”
“He’s on his way down here, he’ll arrive in the afternoon,” he said.
“Naturally.” He glanced around but there was no food to be seen. “Let’s go down to the village and get something to eat. I need to buy new clothes too.”
“You’re not going to ask me what I told him?” Fang Duobing asked after they got dressed, looking sheepishly over at him while they put their shoes on.
“The truth, I assume.”
He nodded and then paused, pulling a face. “I didn’t tell him about…”
“My lack of abilities?” Li Lianhua waved his hand dismissively. “He’ll figure it out pretty quickly.”
“He’s gonna be mad,” he winced.
“He’ll get over it.” Probably. Lianhua pressed his lips together and shook the thought away.
They walked together down to the seaside village and sat down at a stall for breakfast. He started chatting to the kindly middle-aged woman who ran it about the village and she told them everything she could about all the best places to walk and the best stalls to get good deals in. When they left he thanked her and gave her an embroidered handkerchief with their payment which she gushed about, saying it made her feel young again and that it was far too kind a gesture. He promised her they’d be back later to grab some more food and she beamed at him as they left. It wasn’t until they’d been walking in silence for a few minutes that he realised that Fang Duobing was staring at him.
“Problem?”
“That was very nice of you,” he said, eyes narrowed.
Li Lianhua nodded. “Mm. I’m very nice.”
“No you’re not.” He blurted out, and then seemed to realise what he had said. The backpedalling was swift and loud. “I mean, of course you are, you’re kindhearted, you’re a very honourable man, you’ve saved countless lives, you’re a catch, but… I don’t know… that was different.”
“Well,” he clapped him on the shoulder, “I’m not lying about who I am anymore. Nor am I dying. Nor am I the leader of a sect on the verge of war. It’s easier to be nice in small ways when I’m not dealing with those things. Kindness is the obligation of every human; niceness is a privilege reserved for those with the energy for it.”
Fang Duobing was wearing a familiar expression - one of a student filing away wisdom from their shifu - when he spotted a large clothing store at the bottom of the hill. Teaching moment all but forgotten, he grabbed Li Lianhua’s elbow excitedly and dragged him down there. He made him try on practically everything in the store, in every conceivable colour. It was a fight to stop him from buying the place out and Lianhua still left with far more than he needed. He had a feeling that Fang Duobing was trying to cover all his guilt over his “death” by buying him things and humouring him, which was cute but wholly unnecessary. He didn’t want to tell the kid that though - it was clearly making him feel better and he would never want to take that away from him. Especially when he was the reason Fang Duobing was so upset to begin with.
He changed into one of the outfits and they decided to walk down to the beach and sit by the waves a while. It wasn’t an insurmountable trek, but it was a longer walk than either of them expected, and the sun had moved further down in the sky by the time they got close. Their toes were practically touching the sand when Fang Duobing halted abruptly. Li Lianhua would have barrelled into him if his reflexes weren’t still sharp.
“Di Feisheng is supposed to arrive soon,” he turned around, eyes wide. “I’ll head back to the village and meet him so he doesn’t think we left without him - you stay here.”
Li Lianhua nodded and made to keep walking towards the waves, but his elbow was grabbed again, sharper than before. He looked back at his friend.
“I won’t be long.”
He smiled reassuringly. “I won’t run away.”
“You-”
“You would find me. I told you; it’s not worth the energy.” He shooed him away gently. “I’ll get some sea air, you go make sure Di Mengzhu doesn’t cause a ruckus in the village.”
Fang Duobing reluctantly jogged back up the trail and Li Lianhua kept his pace down to the water’s edge, watching as the tide brought the waves closer and closer to his feet. He breathed in, letting the oxygen get all the way to the bottom of his lungs, and exhaled slowly. He wanted to enjoy this last moment of solitude before all hell broke loose.
He had truly enjoyed wandering alone these past months. This was the last modicum of isolation he’d be allowed, until one or both of them was following him everywhere he went. He couldn’t decide if he was dreading it or looking forward to it, so he put the thought aside and just enjoyed the sounds of the waves, watching them roll in as the sun slowly sank lower in the sky. If he was honest with himself, at least a small part of him was looking forward to the chaos that those two ridiculous men being back in his life would bring.
Half an hour passed and he could hear horses.
He knew before he turned that it was going to hurt, but he couldn’t help himself. Not where Di Feisheng was concerned.
Slowly, carefully, he looked back over his shoulder. Fang Duobing was standing there with his own horse, and Hulijang had come with them, which means that - as he’d suspected - Fang Duobing’s letter to Di Feisheng had contained more than just the status of his life. They planned to drag him back with them and give him no choice. He could understand that. He hadn’t exactly given them a reason to trust him, recently.
He turned more fully until he could finally catch the eye of the man he was so terrified of seeing because he knew the moment he did that his solitude would be a lost cause. There was a split second where he wondered if all that chemistry they’d had was an invention he’d been leaning on to sustain himself, and then Di Feisheng’s eyes narrowed. An expression that sent a dagger through his heart, because it meant one thing.
Di Feisheng was never going to forgive him for dying.