Chapter Text
Luo Binghe’s Shizun was a stern, cold, and harsh one. The peak lord of Qing Jing was famous for his cold countenance and look of disdain to almost everyone, making him seem like a lonely flower atop of a mountain peak with only cliffs and abyss surrounding it. Unattainable.
He gave punishments so easily if you displeased him. Luo Binghe personally witnessed and experienced this first-hand.
Copying books, running laps, holding your deliberate horse stance for a whole night that you couldn’t feel your back for a whole day afterward. All the male disciples had experienced all of these more frequent than they liked to admit.
Luo Binghe suffered more in his first few months of discipleship.
Luo Binghe slept in the woodshed for a few months, working the hardest, trying to be the first to wake up and always been the last one to sleep.
Eventually, much to Luo Binghe’s relief, his Shizun was finally kind enough to end the torment, or as several mean martial brothers told him ‘screening test for newbie’, and Luo Binghe was granted a room. It was pretty small and he didn’t have any roommate. But it was way better than the woodshed so Luo Binghe loved it like no other.
Luo Binghe’s life got better after that, not by much but certainly many things improved.
As like other boys, Luo Binghe was not safe from Shizun’s displeasure. Only girls could be safe, the hardest punishment they ever needed to do was to copy several books and if Shizun was annoyed enough, they would need to pull an all-nighter.
Meanwhile, other teachers would be pleased if you showed that you learned something through punishment, never show that you learned more than you supposed to learn from punishment to the lord of Qing Jing peak. Because he would assume that would be the best method to teach you and increase the amount.
Pretend to be dumb and learn one thing. That would be sufficient. One martial brother made a mistake by blurting out that copying the art of war helped him to memorize the book and Shizun was more than happy to make him do it more often.
Stupid. Everyone thought when they saw that martial brother looked faint.
Putting Qing Jing peak lord’s punishments and method of teaching aside, every boy got the same treatment from him except for one.
Luo Binghe again.
Luo Binghe was an odd case, aside for him being the only one having to sleep in the woodshed for months before Shizun granted him a room, their Shizun also liked to do something else...
“Eat this,” Shen Qingqiu pushed a bowl of... Inky black soup??? Was that supposed to be a soup or a new concoction from Qian Cao peak??
Luo Binghe glanced outside and saw it was lunchtime, he licked his dry lips slightly, “Pardon, Shizun. What is this?” Luo Binghe asked reluctantly.
“Just eat it.”
Luo Binghe picked up the bowl and he almost had a heart attack when he smelled the thing. His eyes teared up, it smelled worse than the spoiled food he forced himself to eat when he wandered around the street after his mother’s death. He had to eat this?
An impatient tap on the wooden desk surface brought Luo Binghe’s attention back to his elegant and dainty Shizun, “It’s hard for this master to get his hands that.” A pause, “Do you want to eat it or be punished?” Shen Qingqiu narrowed his eyes harshly and Luo Binghe nodded hastily, showing a flattering smile all the while.
“Y-yes,” Luo Binghe closed his eyes. Here goes nothing. He picked up the spoon and carefully fed himself the black thing in the bowl, the smell was horrid but the taste...
The taste was awfully delicious. It was like a perfect mix of sweetness and sourness, Luo Binghe would enjoy this if only his sense of smell was not killing him. With his sense of taste and sense of smell disagreeing with each other, Luo Binghe looked up to see his Shizun was looking out of the window, hiding a secretive smile behind his paper fan.
Luo Binghe’s expression must’ve been really entertaining, then.
It wasn’t just Luo Binghe who wondered, everyone also wondered what stupid mistake that Luo Binghe accidentally slipped out in front of their Shizun to get him that special treatment. Initially, Luo Binghe was flattered with his Shizun’s kindness to share and others were jealous of him. But slowly, that feeling was changed to confusion and others began to pity him.
It started with normal confectionaries, almost like Shizun was treating him like a child he was and Luo Binghe was honestly both flattered and shy at first. But it slowly evolved to something more and more bizarre that no matter how foolish Luo Binghe was, he had to pause and raise his eyebrows.
Like that time when Qian Cao peak’s peak lord, Mu Qingfang, came to visit to give a little lecture about outside world’s herbs and how to process it. It was a good lecture aiming to teach the future scholars about the outside world and what changed now they were cultivators.
Mu Qingfang presented a stalk of berries called Crescent Moon Berry because of its crescent-like shape. He then explained that while it was harmless to adult mortal, it could harmful to cultivators, something that rarely happened. Usually, while it could be harmful to mortals, it wouldn’t always be harmful to cultivators.
Whilst explaining that Crescent Moon Berry was a bit harmful to cultivators because it disturbed the flow of qi and the more qi you have, the more disturbance it was, but it wasn’t deadly. Shen Qingqiu plucked one from the branch and told Luo Binghe to eat it since he was the one with the weakest cultivation and pretty safe to eat it.
Still, who would offer something to his student when another already said it could be harmful?
Or that one time when Luo Binghe felt his stomach was on the verge of bursting out because he ate too many and then his Shizun told him to run a lap around the peak to digest it. That didn’t help. No matter what, if you ate too much, you should sit for a while and think about what happened wrong in your life. Not run.
As Luo Binghe grew up, he became convinced that this was just another of his Shizun’s creative ways to torture him.
Eating many things, most of them were delicious but Luo Binghe rather be an ascetic and only ate bland congee forever than to eat those delicious dishes in one day.
Luo Binghe tried to think where he did something wrong which made his Shizun apply this kind of torture to him. Did he look way too pleased when he was first given a food? But Ning Yingying reacted the same way whenever she received anything from Shizun, food or not, and Shizun never stuffed her with three trays worth of food.
Did his Shizun take the saying of fattening up the lamb for a slaughter too literally? Was Luo Binghe the lamb?
However, Luo Binghe could only accept his situation, he had a shelter, he had a teacher, he wasn’t starved, he was grateful to his Shizun nonetheless... He just really hoped his Shizun could stop his torment in any form.
“Today, this master feels generous, you all would get Body Enhancing Pills and Spirit Enhancing Pills. If you don’t improve after this, this master will have to cross your name from the list and kick you out of my peak,” Shen Qingqiu announced and the disciples all looked at each other in delight.
Pills! They did get their own assigned resources including pills, but the pills Shen Qingqiu just mentioned were not something they could easily get their hands on unless their Shizun was kind enough or thought highly of them.
Shen Qingqiu distributed two small jade bottles to each of his disciples, when it was Luo Binghe’s turn, Shen Qingqiu paused and looked at Luo Binghe’s face seriously. “No... Not you,” he said as he retracted his hand back.
Of course, Luo Binghe’s heart was crushed after he was denied but he held himself back and kneeled down, “Shizun, did this disciple have any fault?” he asked.
Shen Qingqiu looked at him coldly, “No. I just don’t want to give it to you,” he flicked his sleeve. “You’re not getting any, that’s all. Next,” Shen Qingqiu said.
Luo Binghe sadly looked at his Shizun and slowly stood up, bowing down, he walked away, aware of his martial brothers’ sneers. Luo Binghe sat down under a banyan tree and sighed. Why did he think he would be treated fairly? He should really just be satisfied with what he had...
“A’Luo...” Ning Yingying came and sat close to him, she had two small jade bottles in her hands. She looked sad for him, “I’m sorry you didn’t get any, Shizun might have some other plans for you...?” she offered her assumption.
“It’s fine, Ning-shijie,” Luo Binghe smiled.
Ning Yingying bit her lips, “You know, we got two pills each,” she showed the two jade bottles with two pills in each. “Maybe-“
“What you got is yours, no one should take others’ or give it to others. This master will know,” Shen Qingqiu announced one last time and everyone murmured their response.
“I’m sorry, A’Luo...” Ning Yingying instantly gave up. She didn’t want to get in trouble, but mostly, she also didn’t want Luo Binghe to get in trouble.
“It’s okay, thank you, Ning-shijie,” Luo Binghe smiled bitterly.
“Luo Binghe, come. This master has something for you,” Shen Qingqiu called out and Luo Binghe stood up, quickly running up to Shen Qingqiu to receive whatever Shen Qingqiu wanted to give.
He really should have known it would be another strange exotic food that he needed to finish in one sit.
When their Shizun went for a retreat, Luo Binghe was free of the mental torture of having to eat anything that his Shizun found remotely interesting. He studied harder, he cultivated diligently to improve his cultivation.
Although Luo Binghe ate way less because Ming Fan didn’t let him get more than a bowl of congee every day, Luo Binghe didn’t care. Ming Fan could be petty for all he wanted. A bowl of congee was good, sometimes, Luo Binghe would even add some herbs he found in the bamboo forest to flavor his congee.
Having experienced the lowest and highest point of eating, Luo Binghe was pretty detached in this topic.
Everything had to come to an end though, the day Luo Binghe and several other disciples were crossing to Qiong Ding peak, wanting to go to another peak to do some assignments, Qiong Ding peak was under attack. The rainbow bridges were severed with no way to request for help.
At the same moment, fate decided that the two peak lords within the Spirit Cave got out of their retreats, both were equally pissed. When they saw the chance to vent was present in front of them, they gladly accepted it by jumping straight to the invading demons’ way and started their slaughter.
But the demons managed to talk them down on it before it was too late and Shen Qingqiu accepted their attempt at ‘peace’ much to Liu Qingge’s annoyance. Luo Binghe was then shoved to a fight he was not supposedly fought after Liu Mingyan failed to attain victory and the two peak lords began to argue on ‘who is better?’
Since Liu Qingge’s little sister had failed, Shen Qingqiu pushed Luo Binghe unhesitantly to fight a demon elder with a poisoned hammer as a weapon.
Luo Binghe won. Somehow.
He almost died when the beaten demon elder tried to maim him again but the two peak lords reacted quickly with that action which broke the ‘peace vow’ and led the few disciples to kill and push the demons out of the Sect.
When all was done, Shen Qingqiu looked at Luo Binghe. “Good job.”
Luo Binghe’s heart almost skipped a beat before blooming into something so full and satisfying hearing his Shizun’s praise but then as it always went. Good thing never lasted for him.
“Ten laps around the peak and re-stock the woodshed,” Shen Qingqiu said, instantly crushing Luo Binghe’s pride and joy.
“But, Shizun...” What did he do?
However, one cold look from Shen Qingqiu made Luo Binghe cower back.
“Yes, Shizun...” Luo Binghe resigned.
That night, when Luo Binghe dragged his tired body to his beloved small and comfy room, he dreamed of a demon and found Ning Yingying beside him in the dream.
He witnessed back everything that happened in his life, including the one that recently made a very big impact in it. His Shizun...
That was the point of a drastic change of Luo Binghe’s life.
Luo Binghe’s forehead felt itchy, the demonic energy overflowing from him was out of his control, Luo Binghe was almost terrified at it. He then raised his eyes, meeting eyes with the man who stood not far away from him, his heart once again trembled when Shen Qingqiu glared at him.
Unforgivable...
Luo Binghe glared back.
“A half-demon?” Shen Qingqiu said disbelievingly before hissing, “Demonic cultivation?!” Under his watch?! “How dare you!”
Luo Binghe gritted his teeth, glaring furiously at Shen Qingqiu, “This disciple has no choice,” he said darkly.
“No choice? Would you say you have no choice when your demonic cultivation exceeded your years of human cultivation!?” Shen Qingqiu growled. He wasn’t a fool! No choice? Who would believe that?!
“What are you going to do now?” Luo Binghe growled in distrust. Ever since he agreed to cultivate demonic cultivation secretly with the Dream Demon, he had only grown stronger, he prepared himself well in everything, he took every punishment given by his Shizun and learned to not care when his Shizun didn’t give him his resource.
Dream Demon had tried to plant the seed of hatred but Luo Binghe could never truly hate his Shizun at all. However, Dream Demon had managed to plant many seeds of doubt in Luo Binghe’s heart. It had a feeling in this place, he would reap many things.
Shen Qingqiu glared sternly at him as he stalked closer, Luo Binghe backed off slightly instinctively. He was close to snarling like a feral animal when Shen Qingqiu stopped in front of him.
Shen Qingqiu raised his hand and Luo Binghe instinctively squeezed his eyes, bracing for an impact from Xiu Ya or a blast of spiritual qi that would instantly kill him.
In this situation, if Shen Qingqiu chose to kill him, Luo Binghe wouldn’t even be able to resist.
However, in the next moment, he felt a thick and warm coat wrapped around him. Luo Binghe’s eyes opened and widened as he looked at the person before him who had given his defensive outer robe for Luo Binghe.
Luo Binghe gazed at him with wide eyes, disbelieving. “Shizun,” he started, voice soft, like an innocent child calling out for the person he trusted the most.
However, as always, like every good thing in Luo Binghe’s life, it ended. In the next moment, Shen Qingqiu harshly pushed Luo Binghe off and into the abyss.
Luo Binghe lost his footing and his heart dropped. Luo Binghe reached out to no avail, his eyes were still wide in disbelief and bewilderment, “Shen Qingqiu!!!” He shouted out at the top of his lungs, with a tone full of grievance and fury.
Luo Binghe smiled lightly when he glimpsed Shen Qingqiu’s expressionless face that slowly morphed into a disbelieving expression once their eyes met. Luo Binghe smirked when he saw a surge of fury in Shen Qingqiu’s eyes.
It had been three years since he was pushed into the Abyss to suffer. Three years of suffering and three years of grievance. The protective outer robe protected his fall but he still suffered a broken arm and a few internal bleeding even then.
He almost died.
Luo Binghe was enraged, deeply furious of Shen Qingqiu’s action that almost cost Luo Binghe his life. But he also had his own dilemma in the form of the protective outer robe. But why did he push Luo Binghe off?
Dream Demon had said that giving Luo Binghe that outer robe had been a distraction so that Luo Binghe lowered his guard and could be pushed into the abyss, but Luo Binghe knew his Shizun was more than capable to resort to such petty and cheap tricks.
Why?
His Shizun had always been a cruel and rather indifferent, he gave out punishment as easy as drinking water. He always punished Luo Binghe strangely, telling Luo Binghe to eat borderline poisonous plants, giving strange repugnant food instead of a normal one for Luo Binghe to eat- he seemed to treat Luo Binghe as nothing than a mere lab rat.
And perhaps that was why Luo Binghe was called Little Beast too.
But he gave him the defensive outer robe...
But he was the one who pushed him off anyway...
Three years were spent to get stronger as well as thinking and mulling about Shen Qingqiu’s intention, however, Luo Binghe still couldn’t understand it.
No matter, now he was here, Luo Binghe would find out.
And Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be able to run.
Shen Qingqiu wouldn’t be able to avoid him.
Luo Binghe would imprison him. Trap him.
He’d make sure to press him for a reason, oppress him if he had to.
Anything to make this burning fire in his heart to feel satisfied.
Luo Binghe frowned at Shen Qingqiu and Shen Qingqiu moved. Was he going to run?
No, no, no. Luo Binghe couldn’t let him run. Shen Qingqiu had be to be in his hands. In his mercy. He prepared himself to chase and catch his Shizun if he were to run.
However, Luo Binghe didn’t need to chase at all. Because Shen Qingqiu had decided to dart forward and jumped at Luo Binghe.
Luo Binghe’s eyes widened slightly before he snorted and stepped back, smoothly dodging Shen Jiu’s strike. Luo Binghe spun and ducked to avoid Shen Qingqiu’s spinning kick. However, when Shen Qingqiu threw himself into Luo Binghe, the younger man was caught off guard and fell to the ground with Shen Qingqiu pinning him.
“Peak lord Shen!” The Palace Master hollered, not only him, even others felt the sight was too crude and surprisingly inelegant for the peak lord of Qing Jing peak.
“Qingqiu-shidi-“ Yue Qingyuan called out in worry, also not believing that Shen Qingqiu could be that reckless.
“What are you doing, attacking my Huan Hua’s people so openly like this!?” The Palace Master hollered his lungs out once again with an underlining threat in his tone.
Shen Qingqiu ignored the old coot and raised his hand.
Slap!
Everyone’s eyes widened by a fraction as their jaws slowly dropped in disbelief.
Luo Binghe blinked, his cheek stung after the slap. He snapped his head back to growl furiously at Shen Qingqiu.
But Shen Qingqiu was having none of that, “You, damn idiotic soulmate! What kind of monstrosity did you eat down there?!” Shen Qingqiu demanded as he grabbed Luo Binghe by his collar and shook him furiously. “I almost die choking, you bastard!!!”
“...”
“...”
“WHAAAATTT!?!?!?!” Everyone exclaimed incredulously. Luo Binghe included.
“It’s not just once every few days, it’s once a day. I had to wash it down with sugar or honey water,” Which was honestly more sugar and honey than water, it should be called watery sugar or watery honey instead, “I had half a mind to just cut off my tongue to dim the taste and let you taste my blood of suffering- do you want to be killed so badly?!” Shen Qingqiu shook Luo Binghe almost hysterically as he threw a satisfying punch.
The punch woke Luo Binghe up from his daze and he hastily caught another punch thrown at him with ease, he pulled Shen Qingqiu to the side and rotate their position so Shen Qingqiu who was on his back now. His eyes were wide in disbelief as he pinned Shen Qingqiu’s wrists to the ground, watching as his Shizun glared furiously at him.
“Soulmate?” Luo Binghe voiced up incredulously.
“Flattery won’t get you-“ Shen Qingqiu started but Luo Binghe released him so suddenly. Luo Binghe slashed a wound open on his palm and shoved his palm over Shen Qingqiu’s mouth. A thing that he been obsessed to do. He had many scenarios in his mind on how this would happen.
By force as he conquered his Shizun.
Putting it into his drink when he wasn’t looking just to have the element of surprise.
Putting his Shizun in a cage and fed him this as he stripped away the freedom off of this aloof Immortal.
Never like this... To prove whether the man was his soulmate or not.
The taste of blood trickled in Luo Binghe’s mouth, the taste of his own blood. His soulmate was consuming his blood... The confirmation brought another wave of shock in Luo Binghe that he lowered his guard and Shen Qingqiu actually bit his hand off, spitting out his blood.
“Luo Binghe, you dare-!” Shen Qingqiu shrilled.
“Uh... Do you need some privacy?” Yue Qingyuan nicely asked as everyone simply stood there, too speechless to react accordingly.
Luo Binghe got off of Shen Qingqiu who proceeded to hack out in disgust, trying to cough out the blood and get rid of the disgusting metallic taste in his mouth. None of them answered the Sect Leader.
“You’re my soulmate!?” Luo Binghe finally demanded, flushing and losing his composure. That would explain the taste of tea but never any food! Wait- Since when?!
“Impossible!!!” Xiao Gongzhu shrieked out.
Shen Qingqiu was about to spout out something offensive when Yue Qingyuan’s voice sounded again.
“Uh, we really should leave you two on it,” the Sect Leader said as he cast glances to everyone to be kind enough and scram out with him.
“Wait, we’re in the middle of something here,” Old Palace Master said, his voice was filled with restrained fury and considerable amount of resentment as he gazed at Shen Qingqiu.
“You overfed me till the point of edging towards throwing everything up for taste-testing?!” Luo Binghe finally connected all of those ‘forms of torture’ when he was in Qing Jing peak and glowered in indignance.
Finally, aside for fury and absolute resentment, Shen Qingqiu’s face showed a trace of embarrassment but he quickly scoffed out, “You’re speaking nonsense. Do you not feel grateful that this master fed you?” he said haughtily.
No. Not at all. Luo Binghe felt flattered at first when his Shizun gave him different kinds of dishes, but it quickly turned into dread because he needed to eat everything up as his Shizun watched him indifferently, sometimes, with a slight amusement! He thought it was a creative form of torture! Fattening up your lamb before slaughtering it!
However, Shen Qingqiu’s answer confirmed everything to Luo Binghe. So, it was truly taste-testing!!!
Luo Binghe growled in frustration. All of those childhood traumas happened just because his soulmate was too lazy to open his mouth and eat it himself!!!
Luo Binghe yanked Shen Qingqiu towards him by the collar, furrowing his brows rather murderously as he killed the remaining wailing Sowers. “You’re really...” he said darkly.
“What?” Shen Qingqiu was not afraid and challenged, making Luo Binghe even more frustrated.
He really wanted to push this man down. Preferably on a bed.
Luo Binghe hissed, “We need to talk, now.”
Cang Qiong Mountain Sect was usually very protective of their own. But yikes, it seemed, and sounded, nasty. They appropriately smiled in all grace they could muster before taking a step back, nodding to Shen Qingqiu.
“We’re going to leave you two on it,” Yue Qingyuan said.
“Please talk calmly,” Mu Qingfang reminded.
“Tsk,” Liu Qingge rolled his eyes.
Shang Qinghua simply smiled a light and secretive smile as he gave a thumb up to Shen Qingqiu. “Comrade!” He said meaningfully, filled with a delightful feeling of camaraderie.
“Scream if you need us,” Qi Qingqi smiled graciously.
“We don’t need to talk, and shut up you!” Shen Qingqiu glared at his brothers and sister who had betrayed him. “Luo Binghe, you beast!” Shen Qingqiu screamed furiously when Luo Binghe practically hauled him up and threw him over his shoulder like a potato sack and brought him away in a flash under everyone’s incredulous eyes.
“He won’t be back tonight,” Shang Qinghua told his martial siblings like he was completely familiar with this. Everyone agreed.