Chapter Text
So…He died. Croaked. Expired like a cup of moldy yogurt (or maybe a moldy pork bun? lol). His system was no longer reaching out to him about his life’s extended warranty. That is to say, Shang Qinghua was no longer a transmigrator in the shitshow that was his novel Proud Immortal Demon Way, but was in fact shifting around in squeaky toddler shoes as he gained consciousness in his third life. What the fuck?
“Izuku, honey, stick close to me or you’ll get lost again.” His mom (his mom????) lightly scolded him, and Shang Qinghua could only stare dumbly at her as he reflexively held tight to her hand. She adjusted her hold on a grocery basket in her other hand before they set off down another aisle of pre-packaged food.
Um…Okay??? Third life’s the charm???
Oh, fuck that. Shang Qinghua, the author known in his first life as Airplane Shooting Toward the Sky, would like a refund please. Or actually, no, he absolutely did not want a refund. It didn’t look like his transmigration system was still around (THANK FUCK), but Airplane was 100% sure that if that piece of shit malware was still around, it would hear the words “I want a refund”, metaphorically spit in his face, and reset the entire plot of PIDW out of pure pettiness. Sorry, but he would sooner swan dive into the Eternal Abyss than live as the scum traitor of his Xianxia erotica a whole-ass second time. Once is more than enough.
His new mother picked up a box of something Shang Qinghua was too short to make out. She hummed consideringly. “Do you want cereal for breakfast this week?” She turned the box around for him to see a muscular man with a bright grin printed next to a bowl of cornflakes, and what the hell, Shang Qinghua nodded with enthusiasm. He wasn’t a cornflakes kind of guy, but marketing was marketing, and the dude on the box was at least a 9. Call him scum, but Shang Qinghua knew what he wanted.
And actually, he didn’t necessarily mind the scum traitor part of his old life. How else would he get to serve the literal man of his dreams if not by throwing himself at the feet of his king? And ah, maybe he should care more about the erotica part, but honestly the occasional incidents involving aphrodisiacs and sex pollen were more an annoyance than anything. He wasn’t the protagonist or even that good looking by cultivator standards, so it wasn’t like anyone was tripping over themselves to seduce him or anything.
See? Not a problem at all. Opposite of a problem, actually, because goddamn, the system took his descriptions of demon culture and their lack of propriety, and abso-fucking-lutely went to town on his king’s wardrobe. Mobey-Jun’s chest could not be restrained, and the cut of his robes were tight as fuck whenever he even minutely flexed his biceps. Airplane was ecstatic living as Shang Qinghua if that was the view everyday.
What he did have a problem with was the thankless, never-ending work of the An Ding Peak Lord. When he was writing PIDW as Airplane, he had the bad habit of explaining around the tedious details by hand-waving it away to An Ding. So yeah, he definitely paid for that when he was cursed to live it out.
His fellow transmigrator, Cucumber-bro, let him know he had no one but himself to blame in one of their bitching seshes, which, harsh! In his first life, he was constantly writing on a deadline, a singular thread of sanity, and his literal rent hanging over his head. He didn’t have the time or money to fact check. He’s allowed to whine a little about how unfair his schedule was.
Vacation days when? Uninterrupted lunch breaks who? Nope, sorry, he was trying not to drown in the mountain of paperwork his lovely Shidi’s pushed onto his desk. What? He has to deal with the very urgent shipment of bird seed that accidentally got pushed off the rainbow bridge, like, right fucking now or the tarantula-fanged-finches on the Beast Keeping Peak are definitely going to start burrowing into the mountain and ambushing hapless disciples?
…That one scared the shit out of him, actually. Get dragged into an ambush predator den one time, and you get nightmare material for life. And, clearly, it was all his fault because the shipment fell off the bridge in the first place. Nope, he did NOT want to do that again.
Which was a moot point, seeing as he was a kid again in what looked like a modern, non-Xianxia setting. God, maybe he’d have an easy life this time around? As soon as the thought crossed his mind, Shang Qinghua bit his tongue. Oh fuck, he better not have jinxed himself right there.
…Who was he kidding? His ancestors for sure were chanting “may you live in interesting times” as they drop-kicked him out of the afterlife for round three.
Surely he deserved some compensation, right? After all the shit he had to deal with, when the plot was finished and things were starting to look up, he just fucking dies getting struck by lightning? Seriously?? What the fuck kind of freak accident is that?? It was maybe better than his first time around, when his laptop decided to reinact a wife plot double suicide and zap him like a unsuspecting bug. But really?
And he died young too! A measly 45 years when most cultivators live to hundreds or thousands before considering ascension. Like, okay, being a cultivator in his past life doesn’t guarantee immortality, but damn, he was hoping to live at least a few centuries as Shang Qinghua.
More importantly, he never even got to third-base with Mobey-Jun! Ugh, he was so unlucky!
— — —
It’s been a few weeks, but Izuku’s finally come around to his new situation. It was a little weird getting used to his new name, but it’s started to grow on him.
Izuku whined as his mom dragged a comb through his rats nest of hair. And his hair was now naturally green? Like, down to his arm hair green, which was just as freaky as it was cool.
He always wanted to dye his hair as Airplane, but the one time he tried, it was a murder scene. As in, his roommate walked in on him and almost called the police. That was a fun thirty minutes.
In any case, Izuku was so glad his new life was back in the modern world. Air-conditioning! Indoor plumbing! He missed you so much!
…Maybe it was a bit too modern in the blink and you miss it, humanity developed fucking superpowers kind of way, but hey, he wasn’t complaining.
The superpowers were actually pretty damn cool, and his author brain was spinning with all the different ways someone could use a quirk.
He was already running out of space in his little notebook, which was not too surprising? He didn’t have time to write in his past life (and was honestly a little afraid of dooming himself to transmigration again if he did), but when he did write, he was used to cranking out 10,000 words a day, you know? But his mom just got that notebook for him last week.
And that was another thing. He finally has a mom that doesn’t neglect or beat him? He’s pretty sure his dad left for milk in another prefecture or something, but his mom still genuinely looks at him like she loves him? He could cry. He has cried. And then his mom cried with him because she’s perfect like that, and they really are related, huh?
So all things considered, his third life was actually pretty good. He was so glad he would never have to deal with that stupid transmigration system again.
...haha.