Chapter Text
Yin Yu sat at the low table, his legs neatly folded under him and hands resting on top of his thighs. On the table in front of him was a collection of brushes, inkstone ready to be grinded to ink, and a selection of scrolls both written and yet unused. He was dressed simply in cultivator robes and a wooden hairpin holding up his hair, a stark contrast to the beauty and riches around him. The palace he was staying in was only recently built but the decorations and focus on details clearly announced how favored the owner of this palace was. Yin Yu had not dared to roam and had yet only seen this one room and the entrance hall, but even that small glimpse was enough to tell him that the heavenly emperor, for reasons unsaid, wanted to secretly pamper the newly re-ascended crown prince of Xianle. If the other heavenly officials could see the interiors of this palace, maybe they too would pay more attention to Xie Lian and be kinder toward him, Yin Yu thought but dared to not say anything out loud. He believed he was alone, but he couldn’t be really sure about that.
The palace was quiet. Very quiet. There should have been a lot of sounds of life in a palace of this size. Deputy officials carrying out their tasks, visiting gods paying their respect to their host, the crown prince himself busying himself in many duties he needed to attend…
But no.
Only Yin Yu sat there, staying still like he was fearing that just a smallest movement would somehow alert the whole heavenly realm of his presence and they would all come in to demand for his head. Like just a smallest mistake, no matter how innocent, would be his end.
The silence was very deep.
Not even a bird flew by to sing a song.
Yin Yu slowly let out the breath he had been holding. It came out as a sigh, deep and filled with emotions he did not bother to think about. He moved his fingers, stretching them out before allowing his arms to fall down and relax after hours of almost painful tension. Slowly but surely his posture lost its rigidness as he managed to coax himself to think that he should be safe here. Nobody would barge in to chop off his head because nobody knew he was there and had no reason to even think that he was there. Even if somebody suspected something being wrong, they wouldn’t just march in without a lengthy process of asking permission and demanding answers from the owner of this palace. In that case, Yin Yu would notice the danger and have plenty of time to act.
And why was he in the heavenly realm, sitting alone and quite terrified in the newly rebuilt palace of Xie Lian? A place where he really did not belong to and neither wanted to be in?
Well.
It was a long story.
It all had started with a very normal announcement. So normal that Yin Yu did not suspect anything or sensed the looming doom befalling him when he placed down the basket filled with the latest tribulations from the ghost realm’s merchants, and readied himself to receive the orders. Usually the day’s duties and orders were given much earlier in the morning, but a delayed, surprise briefing was not too uncommon either. Especially now that the beloved crown prince had ascended once again and the ghost king was too busy with getting in his good graces to focus on the ghost realm. Yin Yu had spent the morning inspecting various functions of the crimson calamity’s realm and completing his daily routines in peace, but he had been expecting to see Hua Cheng at any moment. Therefore he had not been too surprised to have the ghost appear out of nowhere and demand his attention.
“Dianxia will borrow you for a moment”, Hua Cheng told his loyal subordinate without wasting time for any courtesy greetings before diving right in the main topic. Yin Yu nodded and accepted the mission, because what else could he do? He owed his life to the ghost king and refusing would have been a waste of time anyway because Hua Cheng always got what he wanted. Still, Yin Yu took a moment to quietly stare at his employer when Hua Cheng started to explain the details and said, “you will need to do a heavenly mission for him.”
Hua Cheng knew what Yin Yu was thinking so he stared back. For a moment they engaged in a sudden and quite unexpected staring competition. One that Yin Yu soon lost. Not because ghosts did not need to blink, but because he did not really dare to show too much resistance and disobedience. He would probably end up dead in just a few months if Hua Cheng decided to kick him out.
“Respectfully, chengzhu…”, the fallen god banned from the heavenly realm said in a very polite tone that clearly did not hide his thoughts well enough, “is that really a good idea?”
“Just a small mission with few low-grade deputy officials”, Hua Cheng replied, sounding like he had already judged the situation and found every single heavenly official included lacking in both skills and strength, “you will be fine.”
“...Define fine…”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing, chengzhu”, Yin Yu replied, wisely not admitting anything. Hua Cheng looked at him sharply, almost like challenging the subordinate that was now pretending that he had no thoughts at all and could therefore not be judged for any rebellious ideas. The ghost king snorted and turned around, telling Yin Yu to prepare himself. The more detailed instructions would be delivered later and Yin Yu shouldn't bother with worrying because some pretentious deputy officials wouldn’t be a threat anyway. In fact, he should only worry if he somehow still managed to fail the mission, because Hua Cheng wouldn’t tolerate a subordinate too weak to deal with some crappy second-hand almost-gods. Yin Yu nodded along and didn’t bother asking where the ghost king was hurrying to. He had already figured out that his boss’ new favourite way to pass time was to play home with the newly ascended crown prince of Xianle. No doubt he was going to run back to that barely standing shrine and look for praise for solving his beloved’s troubles by sacrificing his loyal subordinate.
Yin Yu sighed softly and started to prepare for a few day’s travel. He wasn’t sure how long this mission would take, but at least he hoped he wouldn’t be away for longer than that because the Ghost City shouldn’t be left without supervision for too long. Just a single day without Waning Moon Officer taking care of things would be too much, but there wasn’t much Yin Yu could do when the city lord himself wanted to risk a possible chaos in order to help out his beloved.
Just like Hua Cheng had said, Yin Yu did receive the detailed instruction later. He read it carefully and prepared accordingly. The mission really did not sound too complicated on paper and it seemed like the procedure had not been changed since Yin Yu had been a heavenly official. It was a simple event, barely important enough to deserve any attention which probably was the reason why it had been pushed on the deputy officials. That also explained why Hua Cheng had decided to let Xie Lian borrow a subordinate. The crown prince himself had no deputy officials in his palace and neither was he eager to find one, but if he attended a mission like this himself he would be ridiculed behind his back. An ascended god forced to attend unimportant missions himself because he had no subordinate to spare? How horrible! Clearly there was something wrong with him!
Of course Xie Lian himself wouldn’t have cared. He knew he was already laughed at, because he did know what the title “laughing stock of the three realms” really meant. Hua Cheng, however, was not going to allow Xie Lian to endure any ridiculing. Especially not because the whole mission clearly was a trap somebody had set in order to insult Xie Lian. Why else would he have been asked to join when his third ascension had happened so recently and he clearly had not yet had time to organise his palace? Not even mentioning that the lack of subordinates clearly was a difficult topic for the crown prince whose previous subordinates had ascended themselves while he was banished to the mortal realm. There was no doubt of it, somebody had planned this all just to ridicule Xie Lian.
Hua Cheng would later find out who was behind this vile plot, but for now the best he could do was to hand over Yin Yu who could act as Xie Lian’s deputy official. Xie Lian had been hesitant at first, but Hua Cheng had made some very clever points and the crown prince actually already had a lot on his plate. A lot of important things like seeing if he could do something to fix that leaning wall at his new shrine and how much he could sell those scraps for. Things that surely were more important than a heavenly mission. Just after a brief discussion he had accepted the generous offer and allowed Hua Cheng to take care of everything.
But how had Yin Yu ended up sitting alone in a heavenly palace when he had only been sent out for a simple mission in the mortal realm?
He should have returned to the Ghost City long ago. He wished he was already back in the safety of his own courtyard where everything related to the heavenly realm were just distant rumours he did not need to care much about. But the fate was cruel and apparently Yin Yu had not yet suffered enough. The mission itself had been just as easy as Hua Cheng had claimed and without effort Yin Yu had played a role of newly assigned deputy official of the crown prince of Xianle. He had avoided contact with the other mission takers as much as possible, deciding to act like a crumpy but effective subordinate who didn’t waste time with socialising. His tactic had been effective and just after a brief meeting the other deputy officials had stopped caring about the fake one among them.
Once the mission was done, Yin Yu had made an attempt to slip away from the group of heavenly deputy officials who were ready to return to the heavenly realm and report the day’s success. They were all very lively, clearly thinking high of themselves although there had been good reasons why none of the actual gods had bothered to attend this mission personally and why Xie Lian had been targeted with this barely veiled insult. Yin Yu wisely kept his thoughts to himself and ignored the few sharp looks thrown in his direction. It was clear that few of the deputy officials had been instructed to keep Xie Lian on eye and they openly blamed Yin Yu for ruining the fun.
It could also be because Yin Yu, in his effectiveness and strong will to get back home as soon as possible, had dealt with the troubles almost single handedly and therefore robbed these poor underachievers from the pitiful glory they believed they would gain by finishing irrelevant missions. Yin Yu really did not care. He only bothered to acknowledge the looks so he could describe them later to Hua Cheng who for sure would be interested to hear more.
Unfortunately, Yin Yu’s plans for escaping the heavenly officials and returning to his normal life as Waning Moon Officer were ruined by one and only lord Wind Master, who just happened to show up at the worst possible moment and decided to offer them all a faster and funnier way to get back to Heaven. Shi Qingxuan was popular among heavenly officials, if not the most popular even, and so his arrival was greatly celebrated and caused something that could easily be described as a chaos. Everybody, Yin Yu forcefully included, gathered around Wind Master, looking for attention and a chance to bask in his glory. Shi Qingxuan was familiar with the behaviour like this and he gladly encouraged it, but Yin Yu did not care to join in such a thing. Unfortunately, it was not his choice. Before he had time to escape or even to either politely decline the offer or strongly refuse any help, he found himself whisked up all the way to Heaven with all the deputy officials.
He did not really remember much of what had happened between that sudden change of location and this quiet moment in the palace of Xie Lian, but Yin Yu assumed that he had managed to somehow keep himself calm enough and made his way to this palace that now served as his one and only safe haven. The fear and panic had taken over right away when he realised where he had ended up and that only the voice altering talisman and the skillfully crafted fake skin he was wearing kept him from being discovered and executed on the spot. He was not sure if anybody had said anything to him or shown concern over why he was taking shaky steps and looking like he was heading to his doom as he made his way to the palace of Xie Lian, but at least nobody had tried to follow him.
Yin Yu had still been in shock when he sat down in the study, sitting down at the table meant for subordinate working by their master’s side, but the tranquil silence and lack of angry gods coming to him eventually calmed him down and allowed him to think. He stared at the table, paying only little attention to the expensive writing tools the palace was stocked with, and focused on figuring out what he should do next.
Starting with the facts, he was now stuck in the heavenly realm and he would not be able to leave on his own. His now mortal body wouldn’t survive the jump down and he did not have any spiritual power for drawing an array. Not that using an array would have been a smart decision even if he could do that. The heavenly realm was well guarded and his attempt would have been noticed right away before he even had time to activate the array. Because of those same defensive measures, Yin Yu wouldn’t even be able to alert Hua Cheng of his unexpected absence from his duties. All the communication in the heavenly realm was controlled by Ling Wen and Yin Yu knew she would notice even the smallest anomaly. Asking help from the ghost king would also ruin several on-going plans and so Yin Yu wouldn’t dare to make any attempts even if he had a chance. No matter how much he was valued as a subordinate, if he did anything that could endanger Hua Cheng’s plans or place Xie Lian in a difficult situation, he would be abandoned without regrets or hesitation. Similarly he would not be able to rely on He Xuan. The black calamity wouldn’t care about him at all. Actually, Yin Yu was sure that He Xuan would just murder him and feed his remains to the fish the moment he realised what had happened and how Yin Yu’s presence could compromise his situation.
So he wouldn’t be able to leave and neither could he ask for help. The skin he was wearing was of high quality and could fool even a heavenly official so long they had no reason to doubt that there was anything strange going on. The voice talisman should last for a good while too although it was fragile and could be broken accidentally. That, however, did not worry Yin Yu too much. He would just have to stay quiet and avoid idle conversations, which was something he would have done even without the risk of being found out. It also helped that Xie Lian was not a popular god and he had no subordinates of his own, which was also exactly the reason for why Yin Yu had ended up in this trouble. Yin Yu could probably hide in this palace without any worry about having to host surprise visitors or curious intruders.
With his worried mind calmed for a moment, Yin Yu focused on thinking how he could escape. It did not take him long to realise that the best, and probably only, option for him was to wait for Xie Lian to return to Heaven and hope that the crown prince was benevolent enough to help a fallen god to escape back to the ghost realm. Yin Yu had only met Xie Lian briefly and he knew there was no connection between them to grant him any favor from the crown prince. However, if Hua Cheng was to be believed, Xie Lian was kind to strangers who deserved to be met with kindness. Yin Yu was not sure if he, with all his mistakes and crimes committed, could deserve kindness but he decided to stay positive.
He could still do some work to make sure the crown prince at least would have a positive opinion on him at their first proper meeting, Yin Yu thought and looked around in the empty, newly re-build palace that had yet barely seen its’ master. At least he would have plenty of time to gain some favor because it probably was going to take a while before Xie Lian came to visit the heavenly realm again. Yin Yu knew well that the crown prince preferred to stay down in the mortal realm and personally tend his one and only shrine. So unless Hua Cheng asked, Xie Lian wouldn’t come to Yin Yu’s rescue any time soon. And Yin Yu knew Hua Cheng wouldn’t ask, because he was carefully wooing the crown prince and wouldn’t risk the process for the sake of his misplaced subordinate. If he even noticed that Yin Yu had not returned to the Ghost City. Considering the ghost king’s unwillingness to give any attention to anything that was not related to his beloved now that he had finally been found, Yin Yu was quite sure that the whole Ghost City could just go and vanish without its’ lord noticing at all.
Yin Yu looked around a moment longer, making some observations about his surroundings and a few mental notes about things he could do. No doubt the other deputy officials had already reported back and delivered the word of the newly ascended crown prince’s subordinate. News like that would no doubt cause some talking, but Yin Yu thought that wouldn’t be an issue. After all, assigning deputy officials soon after ascension was the normal way to proceed when one became a god. Yin Yu’s presence in the palace of Xie Lian was hardly something unexpected. However, it also meant that he unfortunately wouldn’t be able to just hide here freely. He would have to act like a proper deputy official in order to not gain the wrong kind of attention. Just do a good enough job and look like you know what you are doing while appearing in public just long enough to keep curious minds from wondering what was going on in the palace of Xie Lian, Yin Yu told himself and nodded. That sounded like a good plan. It should work.
It really should work.
If it did not work, Yin Yu wouldn’t survive.