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The mission was to slay the beast, and the beast was inside the cave, so that's where Liu Qingge headed.
Shen Jiu refused to enter the cave.
"Stupid brute!" He spat from behind his fan, eyes never leaving the vines trailing over the entrance. "Don't you know what that plant does? It'll reopen every scar on your body, as if the injury was freshly received-"
They were cultivators; No injury could leave a scar. Tired both of Shen Jiu's protests and his shizun's inevitable lecture had he failed to "cooperate", Liu Qingge grabbed him by the wrist, dragging him past the threshold.
He paused there, turning to cock an eyebrow. He hardly even felt a tickle. "See? Was that so-"
Shen Jiu collapsed on the ground.
Liu Qingge blinked, watching as blood slowly began to show on his robes; A spot over his right shoulder, and long lines over his thighs. An impressive feat, considering how many layers Shen Jiu wore.
Cursing, Liu Qingge tossed his shixiong over his shoulder, stepping onto Cheng Luan to hurry back to the nearest village.
As much as he would have liked to just leave Shen Jiu for the few moments it would take to slay the beast, he couldn't risk him bleeding out. His shizun would strangle him.
The beast would have to wait.
***
The healer was looking at Liu Qingge oddly when she left the room.
"How is he?" Liu Qingge asked, hoping the answer was anything but dead.
"What did you say your name was, again?"
He hadn't. "Liu Qingge," he said. "He's my shixiong. Now, how is he?"
The healer visibly relaxed. "He'll recover, given enough time. He has- had extensive scarring, and it'll all need to close up again before he's able to leave-"
"So we're stuck here?" Liu Qingge interrupted. "Then I'm going to sort out the mission on my own."
He felt the healer's eyes on his back as he left.
***
Liu Qingge dealt with the beast, harvested the parts he was supposed to harvest and washed up. When he came back to the healer's house, Shen Jiu was still out.
How inconvenient. If the pervert had put more effort into his cultivation instead of chasing skirts down the mountain, this wouldn't have happened!
Grabbing his wrist, Liu Qingge began to transfer some qi, hoping to speed up the recovery so they could leave faster.
Only to freeze when he felt the state of Shen Jiu's meridians. How... How did one even manage to get them into such a sorry shape?
The wrist was ripped out of his grasp, Shen Jiu shifting his entire body away. "Don't touch me!"
"I'm just trying to help."
"Like you helped back at the cave?"
Liu Qingge shrugged. "If you were a proper cultivator you wouldn't have had any scars, so it shouldn't have affected you-"
"Cultivation can't do shit about old injuries, idiot!"
The doors opened, the healer looking into the room blearily, clearly woken up by the noise.
"If you keep aggravating my patient, I'll have to ask you to leave," she said, glaring at Liu Qingge.
"Apologies for the disturbance," Shen Jiu said in such a soft voice, Liu Qingge hadn't even realized it was him who spoke at first. "We won't be troubling you any longer-"
He then began to shift off the bed, stumbling onto his feet.
"No!" The healer rushed forwards, trying to push him back down. "It's far too soon to move, you're going to reopen your wounds again-!"
There was only one layer protecting Shen Jiu's modesty this time. As such, it was very easy to see when he began bleeding again.
And it was very easy to tell that the blood came from his crotch.
***
Liu Qingge had been tossed out of the room while the healer fixed Shen Jiu's injuries. He paced across the coridor, trying to make sense of what he had seen.
When the healer exited the room, he turned towards her with a singleminded intensity.
"What caused that scaring?"
The healer didn't look impressed with that question. "If you don't already know, I don't believe he would have liked me to tell you."
Pausing, he thought it over. Nodded. Turned on his heel and left to hunt something.
***
He came back mid-morning, catching Shen Jiu as he gloomily stirred his breakfast.
Liu Qingge dropped heavily into the chair. "What caused that scarring?"
"Hello to you too, brute," Shen Jiu didn't even bother to look up at him.
"Tell me."
The other disciple sighed, his eyes devoid of any emotion as he looked at Liu Qingge. "You're stupid, but not that stupid. You've seen enough to draw the right conclusion."
"I don't..." He trailed off. He had an idea, but he dearly hoped he was wrong. Because if not-
"I had been raped," Shen Jiu deadpanned. "Repeatedly, brutally raped. Satisfied now, or shall I describe it in more detail for your entertainment?"
Bile rose in his throat. "Are they dead?" At the baffled look, he elaborated. "The men who did it. Are they dead?"
"Why do you care?" Shen Jiu rolled his eyes. "Yes, they're dead. I killed them with my own hands. Going to condemn me for that, too?"
He shook his head. "Good," he said.
Shen Jiu huffed, turning back to his breakfast. The silence sat heavy between them.
What was Liu Qingge supposed to do now?