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Having lived in the big city for the majority of his life, Shen Yuan had learned not to spare a second glance at the variety of characters he’d encounter on the train. Tourists, fashionistas, the downtrodden, broke college kids attempting to transport large items of furniture with no car, had all blended into the background of his commute.
Of course, that didn’t mean he was incapable of being surprised. Hence, why he’d spent the last four minutes unsubtly glancing at a girl on the other end of the train car who’s bag is completely covered in charms of the Northern Demon Lord and An Ding Peak Lord from Proud Immortal Demon Way. Now, Shen Yuan was no stranger to the vast world of shipping. He even held a certain level of respect to the fujoshis who flooded forums with their art of the Demon King and his right hand man. Their fervor had helped bring a wave of new merch in, and Shen Yuan himself admired the devotion the Northern Demon Lord showed the protagonist. It made a certain cosmic sense for him to inevitable fall in love with the Demon King. After all, the premise of PIDW was that the Demon King was irresistible, unstoppable. But who in their right mind would ship the frigid Ice Lord, who never so much as smiled at the Demon King, with the two-bit cowardly, cannon fodder An Ding Lord?!?!? Never mind that the traitor died about 100 chapters into a 1000 chapter story, what even is the point of spending your time thinking about PIDW if you weren’t thinking about the Demon King?!? Dear sister, why have you spent your hard-earned money on what amounts to narrative trash when the real gem was only a breadths away?
Perhaps his thoughts were too imperious, the girl in question swivels her head directly to meet Shen Yuan’s gaze. He thinks he sees a trace of seriousness in her eyes, but she’s too far for him to tell. She gives him a quick glance before swiftly making her way over to him, weaving through other passengers milling between them. He looks out the window and notices they’re still far from the next stop. There’s no escaping this confrontation. How is he going to explain that he isn’t a pervert ogling her, he just really doesn’t like her ship?
As the girl approaches closer, he notices the staggering amount of accessories she has beyond her ita bag. Each step makes a hefty clink as plastic charms, beaded necklaces, belt chains, and ostentatious earrings move with her. She stands before him, her hair in two braids that makes Shen Yuan think of his meimei. They stare at each other for a moment. From the edge of his field of vision, Shen Yuan sees the people around them try to eavesdrop on them.
The girl raises a polished finger to point directly at him. “Are you are a Proud Immortal Demon Way fan too?” Her voice comes out in a frantic rush, more giddy than accusatory.
Belatedly, he realizes that her finger is actually pointed at his phone, the phone that currently has a Demon King rubber key chain attached to the corner. Despite having put it on nearly a year prior, this is the first time someone’s approached him about it.
He glances back at her bag. It looks significantly weighed down from the multitude of charms hooked onto each zipper. He tries to think about how to downplay exactly how much of a “fan” he is, but his mouth falls open without thinking. He answers with the one thing he’s been preoccupied with since he’s seen her, “Why in the world do you ship those two?”
She smiles widely at him. If such a smile were on anyone but this girl, he’d even call it manic. “I’m so glad you asked.”
Sha Hualing, he learns, is actually quite well-aligned with him on Proud Immortal Demon Way. Wholly uninterested in the late-stage harem antics of the novel, she focuses her energy on analyzing the dynamics between all the characters the protagonist meets before he returns from the Abyss. Somewhere in that endless searching, she began hallucinating a chemistry between “icemouse,” as she’s lovingly named her crack ship. Of course, she explains it with much more seriousness, but whenever she teeters too far he pulls her back in by talking about the disciple days of the protagonist.
He doesn’t quite remember when they got off the train. Just that at some point he stopped looking for his stop. When Sha Hualing moves towards the door in the middle of power scaling each of the twelve Cang Qiong Peak Lords with no intention of stopping, it only feels natural to follow her off the train and into the streets of the city. He spares only a moment to look at their surroundings, enough to recognize that they’re in the financial district. Being a weekend, the area is much quieter than usual, but it’s still public enough that Shen Yuan doesn’t fear for either of their safety. Miss Hualing, how brave you are to entertain a random stranger for so long on just one shared interest!
He’s certain that they’ll stop in a coffee shop to sit down, or even find a lull in the conversation to finally part ways soon enough. Except, they keep wandering the streets, and each attempt that Shen Yuan makes to get them to stop somewhere is quickly rebuffed by Sha Hualing.
A suggestion to dip into a pastry shop is met with: “Oh I’m not too hungry. Hey, do you think it’s possible for the Demon King to completely conquer Xin Mo’s energy?”
When Shen Yuan tries to go into a bookstore, she sheepishly pulls him back to the street and says: “Yuan-ge, this is so embarrassing but I haven’t got paid yet! If I go in there, I’ll completely ruin my budget for the month.”
Even a library is passed up with a quick: “We’re having such a nice conversation! Do you really want to be stuck somewhere so quiet? We’d definitely get kicked out, Yuan-ge.”
Is he being too pushy? Sha Hualing addresses him very familiarly, but maybe it’s to hide the awkwardness she feels when Shen Yuan tries to take her somewhere else. Maybe he really should just go. After all, he still has a few errands to run that he put off when he started hanging out with Sha Hualing.
He moves to pat her back, then thinks better of it. “Hualing,” he calls out, “It’s getting a bit late. I wouldn’t want to make you stay out in the dark just to keep talking with me. I’ll head home and we can hang out another time.”
She brightens, and Shen Yuan knows he’s made the right move. “Yuan-ge is right, it’s getting pretty late, but we’ve been having such a lovely time! I don’t want it to end just yet. Come to my place, it’s nearby. I’ll call a DiDi.” She hooks her arm with his before he can answer, and begins typing away at her phone. Hualing, usually when a girl wishes to take a guy home she’s not this forward!
Quite frankly, he’s never been in this situation before. His few flings in grade school had all been relatively short lived. Since college, he hasn’t dipped his toes back into the dating world. Meaning, he’s never been invited back to a girl’s place before. While Sha Hualing is great person to talk, he really isn’t interested in doing much more than talking!
Before he can think of the best way to tell the girl this without hurting her feelings, she asks, “Yuan-ge, in your opinion, which wife in the harem is the best?”
This isn’t a simple question that could be answered with just a name. Surely it wouldn’t hurt to answer her, and then go home? This is a topic he’s trekked and defended himself on many times in forums. Despite his reservations, he stays.
Though Sha Hualing claimed that her place was close by, they’ve only just arrived at the curb of her building when Shen Yuan finishes his hour long wife rant. Sha Hualing’s eyes are wide in awe as they walk up to the front door. There’s a few posted doormen when they enter and Sha Hualing blinks her disorientation away and has a hushed conversation with them. Shen Yuan’s lived in fancy buildings before, but the robust security detail manages to impress him still. She turns back to Shen Yuan and smiles sheepishly when she sees his face of surprise but makes no further comment.
A little out of his element, he follows her as she makes her way to the elevator. The doors open, and he notices that the elevator is first-class and well-kept. He figures that’s to be expected with a place that can afford so much on-site staff. Is Sha Hualing a trust fund kid like him? Or does she have a lucrative day job that lets her go all out for her hobbies? He wants to ask, but suddenly finds it rather awkward that he doesn’t know. For the first time the whole day, a wave of silence falls between them as the elevator dings with each passing floor.
Sha Hualing breaks it, “Before I forget, I have a roommate who’d like to meet you.” She smiles easily, not disappointed in having another person around in the slightest.
Shen Yuan relaxes. With a roommate, there’s definitely no way Sha Hualing would try to initiate something more intimate. The elevator opens with a ding, and she again leads the way through a winding hallway.
She flings open a door. “Hey boss!” Her voice rings out as she steps inside. The place is sparsely furnished, but the few pieces of furniture look high quality.
“Sha Hualing? What do you want?” The voice from beyond the corner is irritated and a little deeper than expected, but despite that it’s achingly familiar.
Shen Yuan speaks without thinking. “Binghe? What are you doing here?”
He hears a thud and then the squeak of hurried footsteps. Luo Binghe appears before him, taller than when they last met, hair a little longer, clothes filled out with more muscle. Gone is the eager underclassman that used to spend each weekend sprawled on Shen Yuan’s dorm floor as they talked deep into the night. They stare at each other in mute shock.
Sha Hualing giggles, “Luo Binghe always spoke highly of Yuan-ge to this Hualing. How nice is it for two friends to meet again like this!”
Her voice sparks Luo Binghe back into action. His expression morphs quickly, and his eyes shine with the wetness of held back tears. Shen Yuan feels his chest tighten instinctively at the sight. “A-Yuan, I’m so sorry this happened, please believe me that I didn’t put Sha Hualing up to this.”
Poor Binghe! He was always a bit of anxious kid. He must be scared that Shen Yuan would jump to conclusions. He rushes to comfort him, “Binghe, it’s alright, Hualing invited me here. I didn’t know you’d be here.”
Luo Binghe’s eyes dry quickly. His mouth twists in confusion. “You mean you came here… willingly?”
Sha Hualing places a hand on his shoulder with purpose. He buckles slightly under her force. Was he really that out of shape? “Yuan-ge, you are exceptionally easy to kidnap. You really should be more careful,” she says brightly.
His head whips over to her. “What? Were you trying to kidnap me this whole time?” Sure, not everything from point A to point B had been perfectly normal, but he’d be able to tell if he was being kidnapped… Right?
Sha Hualing and Luo Binghe merely stared at him with twin expressions of incredulity. Shen Yuan takes a moment to glance at the two again, doing his best to not get distracted by how kind the years have been in maturing his appearance. Sha Hualing is dressed as any eccentric college girl would be, except her clothes looked fairly new, as if worn especially for this occasion. Binghe is dressed in much nicer clothing than he used to own. Though casual, the quality of the material is apparent at a second glance. The Luo Binghe he remembers was so broke he couldn’t even bear to look at designer clothes from a shop’s window. How difficult would it be for someone to so drastically turn their life around in a matter of three years? He thinks back on the black-tinted SUV that had taken them here. The driver that seemed to already know Sha Hualing despite her claiming to have ordered a DiDi. How he thought he saw a gun tucked in one of the doormen's waistband before they walked away but convinced himself otherwise.
“Binghe… what have you got yourself into?” His voice is small, but it somehow manages to not shake.
“Well, the good thing is that I finally found my dad. The bad thing is, he also happens to be a mafia boss.”
“Surprise!” Sha Hualing chirps next to him.
He faints.