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“This is actually one of my worst nightmares”, blurted out Shen Qingqiu, and he noticed him clench his fists from the corner of his eyes.
He almost snorted. Of course, for someone like him who couldn’t stop scheming and lying at any moment, this had to be terrible. He couldn’t relate; unlike his martial brother, he was used to being honest and honourable. Maybe that misadventure would teach him a thing or two about speaking the truth, not that he had much hope for him.
“Don’t speak, then.”
“I can’t! This is the whole point of the curse, you idiot, I have to say the truth even if I want to stay silent!”
He shrugged, uncaring. “Then say the truth.”
“Yes, of course! And what do you think will happen once this master starts revealing sect secrets to anyone who asks?”
He frowned, annoyed that his fellow Peak Lord had a good point.
“What’s the cure?”
“As far as I know, you can wait it out, but it will take weeks until the curse's power has weakened enough to be broken through cultivation. Or you can fix it with dual cultivation”, and his voice took a strange twist with these last two words, disgust coating them.
He almost huffed at the hypocrisy. “Aren’t you used to that? Just go to your brothel.”
“As if I would ever betray one of my jiejies like that!”
Shen Qingqiu clearly hadn’t expected to say those words out loud because his eyes widened before his face closed off and he turned away, storming off. Liu Qingge stayed stunned, watching him walk away before deciding to follow him absently. What was that even supposed to mean? Everyone knew Shen Qingqiu had been enjoying going to brothels ever since he joined the sect! He could barely wait a couple of weeks between each of his visits!
“What?”
The Qing Jing Peak Lord fastened his step but he didn’t let himself be left behind. It would take them some more time to go through the forest and reach the village they had been helping, and the trees were too dense to allow them to fly on their swords.
“Shen Qingqiu! What did that mean?”
He stopped and glared at him, rage clear on his face.
“Surely you aren’t so stupid you didn’t understand! This master said he would never force himself upon any of the workers there!”
He couldn’t understand.
“You always go to the brothel!”
“I go to sleep”, groaned Shen Qingqiu through clenched teeth, speaking as if each word was violently torn from his throat.
“Why?” As far as he was aware, the Peak Lord had a perfectly adequate house.
“Because I can’t sleep on my peak! There are people, men everywhere! How could I feel safe there? Now stop asking questions!”
He had never seen him so furious, to the point of his hands shaking from the intensity of his feelings. He had a lot of questions, so many more than he ever expected to get from a single conversation with a martial brother he had known for over a decade now. Or that he had thought he knew, at least. But he could see that pushing any further would probably end badly for either or both of them, and so he was feeling hesitant to dare asking anything else. The Peak Lord seemed to take his silence as agreement and resumed their walk towards the village.
“You never defended yourself, when we accused you of being a lecher”, he ended up saying after a few minutes, making sure to not phrase it as a question.
Shen Qingiu sighed, and he sounded almost tired when he replied. “Why would this one have? You never believe me.”
He opened his mouth, ready to refute the accusation, but closed it without a word as a sudden thought occurred to him.
“The well mission… Did you try to kill me?”
“You really can’t follow a simple request, can you?” The words were harsh but the tone much less so. An almost defeated sort of energy was seeping out of Shen Qingqiu, and for the first time since the curse, he felt genuinely bad about asking all those questions. It wasn’t like the proud and biting Peak Lord to look almost meek, and he felt all the more unsettled the longer it lasted. “No, this master didn’t try to kill you. A ghost was about to attack Liu-shidi in his blind spot, and I killed it before it could reach you.”
This- How could he have gotten things so wrong for so long? How could he have been so blind, so close-minded? He moved faster to get in front of his shixiong, causing him to stop in surprise, and let himself fall to his knees before kowtowing, filled with shame and remorse.
“What are you-”
“I have deeply wronged you, Shen-shixiong. My actions have been a shame to myself and to the Liu family. Not only does this lowly one owe you a debt of life and left it unacknowledged, he has been slandering your name for years. He will be in your service until Shen-shixiong has decided he has repented enough.”
“You-You”, spluttered Shen Qingqiu, and in any other situation he would have been very smug to have left the infamous sharp tongued Peak Lord speechless, “What’s wrong with you? That doesn’t change anything! You still hate me!”
Guilt devoured him. It was true that despite these unexpected confessions, this was still his short-tempered, bitter and cruel shixiong, who he had hated for many years. But was it truly fair of him to judge him for being as such, when everyone around him had judged and condemned him for actions he had never committed, when he was surrounded by people he knew he couldn’t trust? When was the last time that someone had even thought about giving him the benefit of the doubt? Even he himself had never given him a chance; by the time they first met, he already had heard too many rumors about the scummy disciple of Qing Jing Peak, and had formed in his mind an image of him that he never bothered to try pushing past.
“I have judged you without knowing, and that was unfair to you. This one would like to be given a chance to fix his mistakes and learn to know Shen-shixiong properly.”
Even from his position, he could feel the glare of Shen Qingqiu on his neck. In the past he would have bristled, but he refused to even tense. Hadn’t his shixiong proved he could be trusted to protect him even when no one expected him to? Why would he be wary of such a man?
“You’re not going to change your mind, are you? Fine! Do whatever you want then, since I can’t stop you!”
The Peak Lord stomped past him, sounding furious, but when Liu Qingge straightened up from his kowtow and looked at him, he could see bright red ears peeking from between strands of hair. It was a surprisingly endearing tell, more delicate than he expected from him, and he wondered how hard it would be to make him blush again. Was his shixiong easily embarrassed? Or was he just unused to people showing their appreciation to him?
He got up and hurried to follow the other man before he could be left behind. He could see that he was still tense, probably expecting more questions, but he stayed silent. He had been told to not ask anything else after all, and it was time he listened to his shixiong’s orders. He had spent too much time refusing to acknowledge any of his words on the sole basis that they were coming from his martial brother, despite hierarchy putting him above any other Peak Lord.
That being said, he still wished to talk with him. He was aware he was a terrible conversation partner, to the point that even Mingyan had given up on trying to teach him small talk. He hadn’t seen the point, and could admit that he still didn’t, but he was now paying the price. What had his sister said? Find a subject that could interest both of them, and start from there? Without being blunt, she had added. He didn’t understand how going straight to the point was an issue, wasn’t it more convenient to not waste time speaking in riddles? But Shen Qingqiu did like that, though, and had made it his trademark. Should he try, even if it would end up with him making a fool of himself?
He was so lost in his thoughts that he hadn’t noticed how long they had been walking, and only suddenly realized they had almost reached the village. He panicked.
“Would Shen-shixiong like to cultivate with me?” he blurted out without thinking.
Said man turned to him, revealing a face filled with disgust. He blinked, taken aback by his reaction.
“This master sure hopes he didn’t just hear Liu Qingge proposition him”, he hissed.
It took him a second to understand, and he felt his own face burn hot with embarrassment in response.
“That’s not- No! I meant normal cultivation, together! Not- Not that!”
“Hmm”, a careful glance was thrown in his direction, but Shen-shixiong seemed to believe him. “And why would either of us want to cultivate with each other?”
He might not be the best at conversations, but he could sense the trap from there. Everyone knew that any mention of Shen Qingqiu’s faulty cultivation was enough to throw him into a dark mood.
“We could both benefit from doing a different type of cultivation. And I-” He didn’t like to admit his weaknesses, but he had forced so many secrets out of his shixiong, wouldn’t it be fair to show some of his soft belly in return? “My cultivation, it’s good, but this one has a small blockage and sometimes I have qi deviations. Mu Qingfang said that if I wasn’t careful, I could enter a deadly one one day.”
It wasn’t easy to reveal something so shameful that he hadn’t told anyone, but he owed him as much after everything he had put him through these past few hours.
Shen Qingqiu hummed, taping his closed fan against his lips. “But why waste time doing that with someone who, in Liu-shidi’s own words, has such a terrible cultivation basis he must have tricked the previous Peak Lord into making him her succeeding disciple?”
He cringed back at that. He couldn’t deny he had said that in the past, and multiple times at that.
“I’m sorry, Shen-shixiong. But you could work on your cultivation too, we could both progress.”
“If fixing up the consequences of being a cauldron for a demonic cultivator was as easy as doing some cultivation with a partner, Liu-shidi, I would have done it a long time ago”, snorted the Qing Jing Peak Lord.
There was a silence while they both took in what he had just revealed. He could feel himself gaping like an idiot, but couldn’t stop. Was that- Was that why Shen Qingqiu had joined the sect so late? And why he was so prone to qi deviations? He had known the rumors about him being too lazy to fix his cultivation were just that, unbased rumors; if there was one thing he couldn’t ever deny, it was that his shixiong was incredibly hard-working. But that- He couldn’t have ever imagined something that horrible, but it made a lot of sense.
“ENOUGH!” yelled Shen Qingqiu, and this time he noticed the fear barely hidden behind his anger. “If you speak another word before we reach the sect, I will make sure no one ever discovers what happened to you!”
He didn’t even reply, dazed by that new revelation. A cauldron… He knew it was very complicated for a cauldron to ever get over the horrors that happened to them. Not only their spiritual veins would be incredibly twisted, to the point where cultivation could be next to impossible, but often the resulting heart demons would mean they would be suffering from intense qi deviations that could be deadly. Rare were the cases where victims would survive cultivating, and most didn’t even want to try in the first place, preferring to never feel strong qi in their body ever again. The fact that Shen Qingqiu still tried, on top of being older than recommended for forming a golden core, and not only survived but managed to reach such a high level… It was nothing less than awe-inspiring. Liu Qingge had never felt less ashamed of his previous behaviour, and he promised himself that from now on, the Qing Jing Peak Lord would be able to count on his support for anything he wanted. Loyalty was the least he owed the man.
By the time they arrived at the village, it was almost mid-day and all the inhabitants were awake and working. He realized, a bit too late, that they were going to have to speak with the head of the village to assure him that they had accomplished their mission. Liu Qingge always stayed back in these situations, letting whoever was his traveling companion take care of the talking, but it wasn’t wise in this case. Shen Qingqiu could end up saying far more than would be safe, and a quick glance in his direction showed that based on his tight grip on his fan, he was aware of the issue.
When the old man came to them, his face filled with hope, the War God forced his face into a blank expression (it was better than his usual frown, wasn’t it?) and took control of the conversation, doing his best to emulate the way his shixiong usually reassured the mortals after a mission. He was sure he fumbled several times, despite his best efforts, but at the end the head of the village seemed simply relieved and grateful, and they left without any feathers being ruffled.
“So Liu-shidi can be taught new tricks”, mused the Qing Jing Peak Lord while they were getting on their swords, ready to leave for the sect.
A warning look made sure he didn’t try to reply, not that he would know what to say. Still, despite the demeaning words, that was the closest to a compliment he had ever received from him. A back-handed one, but a compliment nonetheless. Some part of him quietly hoped that one day, he would manage to earn more.
Thankfully, the trip back on sword didn’t take long. After a couple of hours, they could see the peaks getting closer and closer. While usually he would already be moving towards his own peak, this time he kept following Shen Qingqiu, causing the man to look at him with a raised eyebrow. He waited until they had both gotten off their respective swords to speak.
“Mu Qingfang is a curse breaker. He might be able to break your curse.”
“So I finally have to answer all the invasive questions he has been pestering me with for years?”, spat the man. “I would rather not speak to anyone until the curse breaks by itself.”
“If Shixiong is amenable…” he started, prudent in a way he usually wasn’t. But this was important. “I could come with him, and make sure no one bothers him with unnecessary questions. This one is aware he isn’t gifted with words, not the way Shen-shixiong is, but I could speak for him. I will chase away anyone you want me to.”
He sneered. “So what, you’ll become my guard dog, waiting on my orders to bite anyone who comes too close?”
He nodded eagerly, trying to show his sincerity. “If this is what Shixiong wishes.”
“Y-You!” This time, the blush on his ears was even more obvious, and he drank in the sight. “Fine! Give up your dignity, for all I care! Come with me to see Mu Qingfang tomorrow if you want it so badly!”
“Thanking Shixiong for the opportunity”, he simply replied, ignoring the harsh words. He didn’t think of it as anything similar to abandoning dignity, considering he was finally acting in an honourable way for the first time in almost a decade and starting to pay off the enormous debt he owed.
With a final nod, he turned around to go back on his own peak. He felt almost lighter, warmth and tentative hope blooming in his chest as he thought of Shen Qingqiu. Maybe it wasn’t too late yet to fix his mistakes, and establish a real relationship with his fellow Peak Lord.
He left, unaware of the thoughtful gaze on his back, or the way something within the feelings of Shen Qingqiu had shifted.