Chapter Text
Snow was falling harder over Cang Qiong, reflecting the northern lights which had never been seen before in those skies, and never would be again. The aurora had begun at nightfall, and only gotten more powerful, more beautiful as the hour turned, eclipsing even the moon.
Eventually, it grew paler, losing its colors. After another few hours, it was almost completely invisible. And finally, it winked out, leaving only the clear night sky.
Liu Qingge put his hand on the door to the manor and pushed. The ice crackled, then gave under his touch.
The door swung slowly open.
It was cold—not lethally so, but enough that his breaths fogged in the air. He stepped into the hall, letting the door close behind him again, and glanced around him. Starlight filtered through the frosted windows. The kudzu that had wound its way through the cracked glass had frozen through and looked like a crystal sculpture of itself, so delicate it tinkled like glass bells. But in the middle of the hall sat a great darkness, not quite touching the walls, as if coiled up on itself.
Liu Qingge hesitated only a moment before he stepped into it.
The silence inside was complete. He could see nothing, not even his own hands.
When the attack came, he couldn’t do anything. He did feel it coming, and even had time to draw Cheng Luan, but the sword’s bright light was extinguished by the darkness, a weight falling onto him like gravity, pinning him down to the marble floor. He bucked up on instinct—he was the Bai Zhan War God, stronger than a thousand men. But he couldn’t make that mass budge an inch, as if he was trapped under a mountain.
Hands tightened around his wrists, to the point of pain. Two blue eyes lit up in the dark, staring down at him.
Mobei-jun leaned in, hair falling around his face. Into his ear, he whispered: “I win.”
And Liu Qingge grinned.
Mobei-jun kissed him, deep and hungry, tearing at his white robes. Liu Qingge let him, welcomed him, encouraged him. He couldn’t feel the cold marble burning his bare back, he couldn’t feel the scratches Mobei-jun’s claws left as they raked over his waist, his thighs, and when Mobei-jun entered him, he couldn’t feel that pain either. Or rather all his pain was just pleasure, pleasure, pleasure.
He clung to Mobei-jun’s shoulders, whispered his name on every exhale, let his king bury himself into him. They hadn’t been with each other in seventeen years; yet their bodies still remembered each other perfectly. Mobei-jun had always been indefatigable, but now he was an avalanche, as if he could keep going for days. He was biting at him, drawing blood, like taking Liu Qingge wasn’t enough, like he needed to devour him whole. He seemed to be looking for every possible way to get closer.
Still, when he kissed him again, going even deeper, Liu Qingge gasped feeling the push of demonic qi.
He and Mobei-jun had never dual cultivated. They had exchanged energy before, of course—so Mobei-jun could heal, so Liu Qingge could resist the cold. Circulating the whole of their qi through each other was different, though. Too much demonic energy was noxious to human bodies, as everyone well knew.
But in practice, it could be compared to electricity: dangerous in high voltages, deadly when it earthed itself, but possible to handle in a flash. Liu Qingge didn’t hesitate for very long before letting Mobei-jun’s qi into him.
It flooded Liu Qingge’s meridians, almost too intense to be borne, current lighting him up from the inside, electrifying him whole, stopping his breath; then it drew back like the tide. And Liu Qingge was drawn with it. And Liu Qingge was briefly pulled into Mobei-jun’s cultivation instead.
“Oh…”
It was like falling into the night sky. Into the depths of the arctic ocean.
Into the Endless Abyss.
Liu Qingge arched as he was returned to his body, and cried out; when he came, it was with that glimpse of infinity in his head, the depth of his king’s power going back to times immemorial. Mobei-jun was not long to follow, biting hard into his shoulder as he did, sharp teeth breaking the skin again.
As pleasure ebbed from them both, he finally released his hold, licking off Liu Qingge’s blood and sweat. Liu Qingge reopened his eyes to smile at him.
“I felt it,” he rasped, still out of breath. “Your power.” His chest was heaving, gleaming with sweat. “I didn’t understand, before. Of course Mobei needed to preserve it. How could he bear to give up something like that…”
Mobei-jun whispered hoarsely, “I could bear it for you.”
Airplane took his face in his hands, brought their foreheads together. He wanted to say something, some grand declaration of love, but he had no words. He had never been very good at those.
“Ask me for anything,” he breathed, “anything you want.”
Mobei-jun said nothing for a long moment, breathing with him. He was still weighing over Liu Qingge, power radiating from him, shadows and ice licking at the edges of the room—but after such a burst of his king’s energy through his entire body, Liu Qingge was impervious to the cold.
Eventually, the demon said, quietly: “Will you wait?”
Liu Qingge gave a slight frown, not sure he understood.
“My realm is broken,” Mobei-jun said. “The Ice Palace was destroyed. Now that Junshang was defeated, I can unite the Northern Desert once more. But… that will take time.” He was looking into his eyes. “And Mingyi has been waiting a long time already.”
Liu Qingge grinned, pushing hair away from the demon’s face. “Mobei is asking me to wait even longer?” He rubbed his thumb across his cheekbone, watching his eyes close briefly like a cat’s. In an undertone, he asked: “Wait for what?”
“I will go to your sect leader and offer Cang Qiong an alliance with the Mobei Clan,” the demon murmured.
Liu Qingge almost said, What will your family say? and bit his tongue just in time. Linguang-jun was dead, he knew; he had tried his usual schemes on someone who had no compunction about ending his life this time. He had been just a footnote in this version of the story, relegated there by the Demon Emperor.
“When the alliance is sealed,” Mobei-jun said, speaking even quieter, “then Mingyi can have me. However he wants.”
Liu Qingge swallowed hard. When he pushed back Mobei-jun’s hair again, his hand was trembling. “My king,” he rasped. “I will follow you all my life.”
Mobei-jun kissed him, and kissed him again. Then he bit into Liu Qingge’s shoulder once more, humming when Liu Qingge clawed at his back, and the both of them endeavored to keep making up for these long years apart.
*
Liu Qingge was sleeping so deeply—seven days awake might be nothing to his cultivator body, but it was still a relief to catch up—that he didn’t react when someone loudly knocked. He didn’t react when it happened again. He didn’t react when Mobei-jun shifted against him, then got up. He didn’t react when he heard the demon cross the hall and open the door.
Then he heard Houhua’s strangled “Oh,” and suddenly shot up to his feet before he was even fully awake.
His sworn brother was looking up with wide eyes at the demon looming over him. Mobei-jun was decent—thank fuck—but only just; only one layer of robes, black shimmering with blue embroidery, wide open on his sculpted chest, his hair completely loose with just a few braids studded with sapphires. When he heard Liu Qingge’s frantic approach, Mobei-jun cast him a placid look, as if to say: open your own door, if you don’t want me to do it.
“Sorry about that!” Liu Qingge said much too loudly to the both of them, but he was freaking out for nothing. Mobei-jun didn’t seem particularly interested in Houhua—why would he care about him? And Houhua, though petrified, wasn’t cowering in terror either.
They didn’t know each other. The both of them had never even spoken before.
“I… guess we didn’t do proper introductions the last time, right? Houhua, this—this is… Mobei-jun. The king of the Northern Desert. And—Mobei, this is my sworn brother, Shang Qinghua, the An Ding peak lord.” Liu Qingge grew serious, suddenly. “Mobei. If you care for me, you must care for my family too.” He pointed at Houhua. “Swear right now that you will never raise a hand to him. That you will protect him like you would protect me. That you will defend his life with your own. Swear on your clan’s honor.”
Houhua looked baffled, but to Mobei-jun, this kind of abrupt oath was par for the course in the Demon Realm. Unperturbed, he said, “I swear.”
“Okay,” Airplane said, dizzy, “okay, that’s—great. Thank you. Wow.” He reeled from that a minute, then realized Houhua was probably here for a reason. “Hua-di, what—what is it? What’s wrong?”
“Um. Nothing is wrong.” Between Mobei-jun’s gloriously exposed body and Liu Qingge’s passably disheveled state—his robes were torn up, again, and he hadn’t healed all of his bite marks—Houhua didn’t seem to know where to look. “It’s just… Yue-shixiong and Shen-shixiong have decided to marry?”
“I know that.”
“I mean right now.”
“What?”
“The trial is over. Our guests have left. Ah, including… Luo-shizhi and his… soulmate. Shen-shixiong said the wedding is happening now, and no time to gather all the Peak Lords because they’d just ask for a huge ceremony anyway, and this is none of their business. Yue-shixiong said fine, but he would like for you and me to be there, at least. So Shen-shixiong agreed to wait a few minutes. No more.” He hesitated. “Ah, I don’t think… L-Lord Mobei… is invited.”
Liu Qingge cast a glance at Mobei-jun. “Would you like to come anyway?”
“No,” Mobei-jun said, deadpan. Then he touched Liu Qingge’s back, lightly. “But this king will return here in a few nights, to rest. If he can.”
Liu Qingge had to kiss him instead of answering. It was a fairly chaste kiss by their standards, but Houhua still squeaked faintly and averted his eyes.
“Go,” Liu Qingge said under his breath. “I will see Mobei again very soon.”
“Mn.” Mobei-jun stole one last glance, then opened a rift and disappeared into it.
Liu Qingge stared longingly at the place he had been for a few seconds, then refocused and cleared his throat. “Sorry, Hua-di.”
Houhua was staring at him like he had a lot to say about all that.
“Sorry,” Liu Qingge repeated. “Let me just… change?”
He turned back to the inside of his manor, only realizing now that it was completely wrecked. It had never been in good shape—decades of neglect after centuries of abandonment had been bad enough—but Mobei-jun’s ascension had left it almost in ruins again. Ice was rapidly melting from the walls and ceiling, flooding the main hall. Pockets of Abyssal void had eaten chunks of random masonry everywhere. The defrosting kudzu was blackened and rotting. Deep furrows had been carved into the marble floor, and that… was just from last night. If Liu Qingge still had intact clothing in that mess, he wasn’t sure where.
“I’ll borrow seagull robes on the way down,” he decided.
And maybe it was time to move, anyway. Well, he could stay here, on top of Bai Zhan Peak. He liked the gardens. But the old manor was too big, from another time. When the An Ding carpenters were done rebuilding Houhua’s Leisure House, perhaps Liu Qingge could commission them. A more reasonably-sized house would be nice. With chairs, this time. And a bookshelf. And a big bed.
*
Shen Qingqiu wrinkled his nose seeing Liu Qingge show up to his wedding barefoot and in plain white robes. But when he opened his fan to flutter it disdainfully around his face, Liu Qingge noticed it was the crane fan. Yue Qingyuan smiled at them both. He had never looked so happy.
“Okay, ah, we’re here,” Houhua said, a bit breathless.
The wedding was not rich, and it was not complex. Shen Jiu and Yue Qi were former slaves, who had never been able to afford such dreams. Just cutting a lock from each other and braiding it in the other’s hair seemed almost too much—Shen Qingqiu blushed fiercely, looking like he would kill whoever dared to comment, and Yue Qingyuan’s hands were trembling so much he almost couldn’t plait his hair into Shen Qingqiu’s. Houhua had them sign a plain marriage contract to make their union official in the eyes of the sect. And just like that, it was done.
Liu Qingge pulled out the two bottles of Zui Xian wine he had brought. “Drinks?”
It was not much of a ceremony at all, really! But it was the four of them together, sniping and laughing with each other, the way they hadn’t since they were seventeen, when Shen Qingqiu and Liu Qingge’s relationship had begun to sour. And miraculously, no one came to request the sect leader’s time—or any of the other peak lords’ attention. And that was the best wedding present one could hope for.
By the time Houhua, red-faced from the wine, excused himself and said he should turn in, it was very late, the sky entirely dark. Hearing him lament the much longer walk to Xian Shu and his inability to fly in this state, Shen Qingqiu—more than a little drunk himself, though he adamantly refused to admit it—declared it would be the work of a moment to bring him there through the roots network. It was probably meant as a brag, but Houhua looked so overwhelmed by such generosity that Shen Qingqiu couldn’t refuse to actually do it. Those two really were strange friends now.
“I will be back very soon,” Shen Qingqiu told Yue Qingyuan like a threat, “for our wedding night,” then they both disappeared in the shadows.
“That’s my cue to leave, I think,” Liu Qingge snickered. “I’ll leave you to it, Qingyuan.”
He was groping for a dirty joke to make about wedding nights and mushrooms—come on, there had to be at least one—when Yue Qingyuan put a hand on his arm. “Wait. While I have you here…”
“Oh, I’m going to marry Mobei,” Liu Qingge told him bluntly. “But he’s gotta unite the Northern Desert first. So that won’t be before… I don’t know, probably at least a year? No more than two. He’s very efficient, and I’ll be helping him out.”
“That is wonderful news,” Yue Qingyuan said patiently, as if his chief tactician had not just admitted to be planning on fighting for a demon lord and then marrying him. “But it isn’t what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Oh,” Liu Qingge repeated, then frowned. “Well, I don’t think Shen Qingqiu will need to cultivate with me anymore, with his new body and all, so you don’t have to worry about that…”
Yue Qingyuan coughed, the way he did when he was hiding a laugh. “It’s not what I wanted to talk to you about either. Though I genuinely would not mind, you know—but that is for the both of you to discuss later.”
He carefully took a wooden box from a shelf, and opened it. Inside was a sealed envelope.
“This is your personal divination from Zhi Ji Peak. It will activate only with your qi.”
Liu Qingge stared at him.
“And you’re giving me this now? When I’m drunk?”
“I may be lightly inebriated as well,” Yue Qingyuan said.
“You just want me to open it in front of you! You politician!” He hesitated. But he remembered Mobei-jun smiling at him just hours ago, and thought: well, what do I care if it’s not him? He’s my favorite. I’m his favorite. That’s better than any red string crap. “Fine, give it here, let’s get it over with… I said I didn’t want one, you know…”
He broke the seal, then put his hand in the middle of the paper. Yue Qingyuan explained it to him, but this Author God already knew how it worked, of course. If a red string of fate linked him to somebody, his qi would leave a crimson imprint into the paper, in the shape of a character associated with that person, most of the time just the first character of their name. How unsubtle!
He closed his eyes and pushed his qi into the paper.
After waiting a few seconds, he reopened one eye, then the other. He and Yue Qingyuan both stared.
The paper had gone entirely red.
“Ahh,” Liu Qingge said. “I think… there’s been a mistake?”
“Yes,” Yue Qingyuan promptly agreed. “The paper must be faulty. I’ll talk to the Ji Zhi peak lord. Forget about the whole thing, Mingyi—it was wrong of me, you’re right. You never asked for this.”
“That’s right, I never asked for any of this,” Airplane Shooting Towards The Sky said happily, “but I’m glad anyway. I’m so very glad!”
*
*
*
After Liu Qingge had left, Yue Qi sat on his porch, with a single night pearl for light, and waited. It wasn’t long before the bamboos shivered and Xiao Jiu extracted himself from the ground. His skin looked nacreous like this, his eyes and hair darker than before. He had a pleasant smell of deep forest. Yue Qi tried not to burst with happiness.
“Husband,” he said.
Xiao Jiu ignored him, but his faint blush was clear. “So? Did he do it?”
“Yes. He even left the paper here. Do you want to see?”
This was his wedding present to Xiao Jiu, who worried about Liu Qingge’s attachments, all the more so since they had learned of his mysterious nature. For whose love had he reincarnated? Xiao Jiu came close, sitting on the porch and letting Yue Qi pull him almost into his lap, like they always did when they were alone together. While Xiao Jiu opened the divination box, Yue Qi ran his fingers through his fine black hair and idly wondered how it would feel to sleep with him in that new body. He would soon find out.
“What is this?” Xiao Jiu wrinkled his nose. “Red paper.”
“Look closer,” Yue Qi advised. He was not drunk at all. “Look around the edges.”
Xiao Jiu looked closer, and saw what Yue Qi had seen right away, what Liu Qingge would have surely realized too if he hadn’t been so tipsy and giddy. On the edges of the paper could be distinguished the thin strokes of a billion overlapping characters, like red snowflakes piling up together to form a thick, uniform layer of snow.
“What is this?” Xiao Jiu repeated, with a rare unsettled edge to his beloved voice.
“I think,” Yue Qi said quietly, “that it is everyone in the world.”