Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s taken a month to get here. 

A day of indecision, at first - a day spent holed up in his rooms, licking his wounds and pacing restlessly as he tried to make sense of what he’d seen. A day spent gathering information, after, hearing from his wives about what the imposter who had swapped places with him had been like. 

Then a week of working with Xin Mo, trying to get it to replicate the cross-dimensional swap, and a week of scouring his treasure room and hunting down rumors of multiverse theories when that failed, and then finally a miserable, frustrating, useless week where Luo Binghe could only wait as the specialists he’d found worked on an array that was supposed to fix things. A full week where all Luo Binghe could do was babysit them, letting them inspect Xin Mo and prod at it with cautious qi, slowly building an array meant to help guide Xin Mo’s spatial magic towards a given key. 

That week was the worst. Without having an action of his own to take, Luo Binghe seemed incapable of keeping his focus in the present. Over and over, he thought of that mirror world: the soft whisper of the kind Shen Qingqiu’s fingers through his hair, the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest under Luo Binghe’s cheek after they’d tucked into bed together, the warm glow of his memories in their dreams. 

Over and over, Luo Binghe found himself returning to that moment, and over and over, he remembered the look on the mirrored version of himself - 

Luo Binghe breathes out through gritted teeth, slow and controlled. He’s had a week to do nothing but consider these memories. He’s had longer than that to get used to them, and to let them drive his frustration and confusion and outright fury that a world like that existed out there -

Another breath, this time stretched out longer, as if he could use the pace of it to pull at his own memories like a long piece of taffy that was slowly thinning into nothing. 

It was good that he discovered the mirror world. Without having done so, he’d never have known about a Shen Qingqiu that knew how to smile gently and scold without heat and touch without violence. He’d never have known, and then he would have lived the rest of his life missing out on it, so obviously it was a good thing that he fell into the mirror world. Now he just needs to -

He just, with this array that the spatial cultivation specialists had created, he needs to -

Another breath. His heart beats slow and steady in his chest, controlled with the precision of someone who has long since mastered his own blood and its flow. 

He just needs to find that mirror Shen Qingqiu again. So long as he can do that, the restlessness that pinches at his nerves will settle, and the fury that burns his palms will recede, and he’ll be able to -

With that mirror Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe could -

“Lord Luo,” calls one of the spatial array masters. His voice shakes, and his head is bowed so low that it’s a wonder he’s maintaining his balance at all. “Forgive this humble servant, but if we could beg of Lord Luo to keep his energy contained within himself while we finalize the connection of the spirit stones to the array…”

Luo Binghe bares his teeth, a growl half-formed in his throat. He swallows it back with effort, turning to instead face the array and the other masters gathered around it. Now that he’s looking, he can tell that his own energy is wavering like an immense heat in the room around them, and the force of it is preventing the array from being hooked up to the stones that are meant to power it. 

A treasure trove of spirit stones worth the fortune of a city, and yet Luo Binghe’s own energy can still suppress it like this. He’s this powerful, and yet in that mirror world -!

Luo Binghe forcefully draws his energy back inside himself, slamming his meridians shut with a strength that makes his teeth ache.

“Finish it, then,” he snaps, and the array masters startle before quickly resuming their work. 

It’s taken a month, but today, Luo Binghe will finally be able to return.

The braid that the mirror Shen Qingqiu had worked into his hair had fallen out sometime in the second week after Luo Binghe returned to his own dimension; the ribbon that had tied that braid in place, along with a Diamond Dream Stone imbued with the strongest of Luo Binghe’s memories of the mirror Shen Qingqiu, will be the keys to focusing the array. That focus will in turn guide Xin Mo, focusing in on a soul instead of a specific location. 

Luo Binghe’s own Shen Qingqiu is long dead by now, so there should be no confusion of which soul Luo Binghe is looking for. He will be able to return. It will work.

“It’s ready, Lord Luo.”

Luo Binghe breathes out once more. The air feels electric, the result of so much energy stuffed into a single room, like a fuse waiting to be lit.

It will work. He’ll make it back. The churning in his gut and the lack of appetite and the pressure behind his eyes and the anxious need to dig his own claws into his skin - 

It will all work out. 

He steps into the center of the array with purpose, careful not to allow his robes to sweep over the lines of it in any way that could shift the shapes of them. He will not be delayed further for something as foolish as needing to redraw a smudged line.

“Begin,” he demands, and the array masters do.

The spirit stones light up in sequence, one against the next until the whole room is filled with the brilliant glow of pure qi and the air is humming with potential. The array comes to life next, and then, like a desperate call to action, Xin Mo’s own power surges in response.

Finally, Luo Binghe thinks, drawing Xin Mo from its sheathe and preparing to cut through the space in front of him with it. Finally, finally -

It had only been a month since he’d started searching for this soul - a month, too long, a month, hardly any time at all - and yet the rush of delighted confidence that Luo Binghe feels now rivals the heady thrill of success he’s only felt on some of his longest and hardest fought battles. Finally, he thinks, high on both the victory and the excess energy around him and running through him, finally, I’ll have him -

“Ah, I knew it,” hisses one of the array masters, quiet enough he surely only meant it for the ears of his peer, “I told you that this soul felt like it was in this world.”

Luo Binghe whips around to face the array master who had spoken, but even as he moves he knows it’s too late. Xin Mo had already begun transporting him, warping the world around him in a more violent and dramatic shift than its usual method of producing dimensional tears for Luo Binghe to step through. By the time Luo Binghe has finished turning, what greets him is only the rough stone and wet moss of… wherever it is that Luo Binghe has ended up. A cave of some sort, perhaps.

Luo Binghe’s face contorts with the force of his fury. A failure, then; one that at least one of his array masters had anticipated.  

How dare they? Did they think he would not know? Did they think he would forgive a failure, if it was presented as unexpected and unavoidable? Luo Binghe would have killed them for it even if it had been unanticipated, but knowing that it wasn’t, knowing that they’d harbored doubts even as they’d drawn the arrays… Luo Binghe will still kill them, but he will do it much, much slower than an ordinary failure would have merited. He’ll skin them alive first, perhaps, to make them feel the anguish of how illfitting Luo Binghe’s own body has felt in this world since he returned, and then he’ll set them in the sun to roast, and then -

Luo Binghe forces himself to calm down just enough to steady his breathing, allowing the overabundance of energy still inside him to safely circulate through his spiritual pathways and out into the damp underground air around him. 

He breathes slowly, like he’s been doing all day, keeping his heart steady and slow and controlled. He’ll kill the array masters, and he’ll try again, and he’ll succeed then. It’s fine.

The rock beneath Luo Binghe’s feet shakes slightly, the sign of a great beast moving somewhere nearby. With any luck, it’s something powerful enough to at least put up a fight if Luo Binghe were to take out some of its frustrations on it.

Fine, Luo Binghe fumes, stalking through the cave in the direction of the vibrations. A trophy to take back with me, so that I at least don’t return empty handed.

Xin Mo thrums in his hand, delighted at the chance to wet itself with blood so soon after such a powerful spatial manipulation, and Luo Binghe bares his teeth at it. It isn’t especially threatening; Xin Mo can feel the approximate state of Luo Binghe’s mind without needing any sort of communication, and so it knows that Luo Binghe doesn’t mean any sort of real threat to it. 

After all, Luo Binghe still has use for it. Already, he’s pushing aside his anger at the failure to focus on what needs to be done to remedy it, straightening the irritated flow of his qi as if running a soothing hand down prickled scales beneath his skin. 

Luo Binghe has failed before. All his best successes had started as failures.

He’ll slay whatever beat lies in this cave, return to his palace, and try again with the assistance of array masters that are actually worth something - or perhaps Luo Binghe will simply steal whatever knowledge of arrays he needs and do it himself. And then, at the end of the day, Luo Binghe will be able to win. He’ll steal away that odd version of Shen Qingqiu, taking him back to his palace to -

Luo Binghe hesitates, and then reminds himself that he isn’t the sort of person to hesitate. Hesitating gets a lesser man killed, and can still cause a great one like Luo Binghe to temporarily lose a limb or two.

No matter; he’ll figure out what to do with the mirror Shen Qingqiu once he has him. That had always been the plan, and it has always been what Luo Binghe has believed in. For right now, all he has to do is focus on sating Xin Mo’s bloodlust and taking out his anger on whichever monster made its home in this miserable cave.

Fuck, Luo Binghe hopes it’s something worth killing.

The beast comes into view from around a bend in the rock. It’s an ugly, hulking creature, with leathery skin made dirty with moss and blood and such a short neck that its head looks almost as if it had been stuck straight on its shoulders with no consideration for any sort of range of movement. Its eyes are milky with blindness, but it still swings its head to face Luo Binghe as he approaches, sensing the angry qi rolling off him. 

It’s… fine for a beast only meant to sate Luo Binghe’s bloodlust, he decides. It will bleed when Luo Binghe cuts it, and that will have to be enough.

He slides his glare down from the beast’s head, looking for any obvious vulnerabilities. The underbelly doesn’t seem to be covered in the same hard growths as its back, and -

Luo Binghe pauses, his eyes catching on a spot of color a short distance away.

There, crouched so as to keep a large rock fully between himself and the monster, is another person, dressed in earthy green robes and wearing his hair tied back with a simple ribbon. He’s watching the beast warily, his neck craning to see around the rock he’s hiding behind, and his presence is so tightly controlled that Luo Binghe hadn’t known he was there until he’d laid eyes on him directly. A cultivator, then, and one with decent control of his qi.

In front of them both, the monster determines that Luo Binghe’s own energy is indeed representative of a threat, and starts to turn fully to face him - and, due to the positioning of the rock that the unknown cultivator is hiding behind, turning to face him, too.

“Damn it,” hisses the other cultivator, swinging his head to also look in Luo Binghe’s direction, his brows drawn together in frustration. “Idiot, why weren’t you concealing your -”

The cultivator’s eyes go wide, recognition flashing across his face. In the same moment, the beast throws itself up onto its hind legs, massive limbs and claws flailing as it bellows out a warning cry loud enough that it shakes debris from the ceiling of the cave.

In that moment, no other sound can be heard underneath the roar of the beast, but Luo Binghe still catches the way the cultivator’s lips form one startled, questioning word: ‘Binghe?’

From there, everything erupts into chaos. The cultivator is forced to dive out of the way to avoid the beast’s claws as they come down, and the careful stealth he’d been holding before Luo Binghe arrived falls apart. The monster, caught off guard by a sudden second qi signature so close, snaps its head to look in the cultivator’s direction, and the man swears as he desperately tries to reel his energy back inside himself. 

Luo Binghe sneers. Not that good at controlling his qi, then.

Still, he’ll take an opening when one is presented to him. Luo Binghe dashes forward, positioning himself beneath the monster. Xin Mo sings in his hand, a desperate wailing cry that tries to convince him to both slay the beast and allow himself to be slain in the same breath. Luo Binghe allows it: he launches the sword upwards, throwing it in the same instance he takes control of it with his qi, and embeds it in the belly of the beast. Seamlessly, he flicks his hand forwards, and Xin Mo slides down the center of the beast, slitting its gut easily before allowing itself to be recalled to Luo Binghe’s hand. 

Luo Binghe grasps the hilt of the sword - now warm and slick with blood - and quickly extracts himself from his place beneath the beast as it bellows once more, furious in its pain. He cuts a gash into one of the beast’s hind legs, and with the pain and weakness from having its belly split open, the monster is helpless to the sudden weakness, its legs buckling as it goes down heavily enough it shakes the cave once more.

Luo Binghe looks at the ugly thing with disdain, walking slowly up the length of it to stand by its head. It hardly feels worth the kill; it certainly wouldn’t make for the trophy he’d hoped it would. 

The beast is irritatingly loud and trying to snap its teeth at Luo Binghe from where it’s struggling uselessly on the ground, though, so Luo Binghe kills it anyway just to be rid of it. Xin Mo’s energy surges as Luo Binghe deals the final blow to end the monster’s life, and Luo Binghe’s fingers flex around the sword’s hilt in reflexive response as he slowly breathes out into the sudden silence of the cave. 

Then he breathes back in, turns on his heel, and points Xin Mo at the cultivator who had been passively watching Luo Binghe’s attack. 

The man who, if Luo Binghe understands what had happened correctly, had been the unintentional target of the erroneous spatial array that had led Xin Mo to take Luo Binghe to this cave to begin with.

“Name and intentions,” Luo Binghe demands. 

The cultivator blinks at Luo Binghe, uncomprehending. His expression is still caught somewhere close to shock, watching Luo Binghe with wide eyes and a slack jaw, a pair of wide-rimmed glasses slipping down the slope of his nose. There’s a smear of dirt on his cheek that makes him look especially stupid.

“Name,” Luo Binghe repeats slowly, “and intentions, or this Lord will assume your intentions are simply to die by my hand.”

The cultivator blinks again, hurriedly pushing his glasses back up on his face as he recollects himself. His brows furrow and lips thin in a sort of unease, taking a half step away from Luo Binghe and watching him carefully.

“You don’t know?” He asks, and Luo Binghe matches the half step back the cultivator had taken with a full one of his own, drawing up closer to him. The man glances at Xin Mo, then back at Luo Binghe, his expression increasingly irritated. “You really - you really don’t know?”

Luo Binghe narrows his eyes, but studies the cultivator’s face a bit more carefully anyway. Perhaps this is supposed to be the brother of one of Luo Binghe’s wives? Or - Luo Binghe frowns, looking over the cultivator’s round face once more and finding it to be more feminine than he initially thought - the sister of one of them? Luo Binghe found that if one of his wives had a sister, he’d often marry that one too, but perhaps he’d passed on this one due to the androgynous nature of their face? After all, introducing men into a harem of all women would be messy, and Luo Binghe had been nearly certain that this cultivator had been a man when he’d first laid eyes on them.

“This Lord does not,” Luo Binghe confirms, giving up trying to figure out who the person is. “So enlighten me.”

The cultivator draws themselves up, their eyes narrowing. “I’d thought Lord Luo would be above such cruel carelessness as forgetting his wives,” they snap, and Luo Binghe frowns.

A wife? Here? And one that looked like - like - Luo Binghe blinks again. Hadn’t this face been quite androgynous just a moment ago, and the robes of a more masculine cut then they seem to be right now?

“If the young miss could excuse me,” Luo Binghe says tightly, “but just the same, this Lord is quite certain that no wife of his would dare to burrow into the ground and live with a beast.”

“I wasn’t living with it,” the woman says, rolling her eyes with enough gall that Luo Binghe feels the need to press closer with Xin Mo. “I was - no, wait, hold on, look, take another look at me and put your sword away!”

Her voice tilts up at the end, and Luo Binghe realizes with a start that the register of her voice had slowly shifted through the conversation until there was hardly any memory of the more masculine tone she’d surely had earlier. 

Once more, Luo Binghe takes another look. While she does still somewhat resemble the first impression Luo Binghe had gotten of her, she really… Well, right now, she really does look like the sort of sweet thing that Luo Binghe would’ve taken to both his bed and the altar. 

Luo Binghe’s suspicions skyrocket. A cultivator - or some sort of spirit, perhaps, considering the clear shapeshifting abilities - hiding out underground with a beast, disrupting the spatial arrays that were supposed to send Luo Binghe to the mirror world, making herself appear in the image of someone Luo Binghe would find attractive, and declaring herself one of Luo Binghe’s wives?

Luo Binghe has seen beasts with less obvious ill intentions.

“And what, exactly, did this Lord promise you as one of my wives?” Luo Binghe asks, holding his sword steady. “Some rare treasure? A use of my power?”

“I - what? No, wait - do you think I’m trying to use you right now?!”

“This Lord would never take a wife who only planned to use him,” Luo Binghe replies easily, thinking, so naturally, you’d be out of the question.

The cultivator’s eye twitches, as if in strong disagreement, but doesn’t comment. Instead, she takes a deep breath and recites carefully, “Lord Luo met me years ago when he was chasing after a Blue-Tongued Bat Viper, in the forest to the far west of his palace. I was able to use my abilities as the spirit of the flowering fruits that the creatures feed on to lure one in for Lord Luo to capture.”

A flower spirit, then, Luo Binghe concludes, though he doesn’t blindly believe the rest of the story. “This Lord has never needed a bat for anything,” he says, looking down at the spirit.

“A Bat Viper,” the spirit corrects, as if that matters much. “Lord Luo needed its venom to cure Sister Mei Hanxue.”

There’s a beat of silence. The spirit’s expression turns uglier. 

“For clarity,” she grits out, “this one calls Mei Hanxue as ‘sister’ because we are sisters within Lord Luo’s harem.” Another pause, and then she adds, “Sister Mei Hanxue would have wed Lord Luo around 12 years ago, now. The event that left her poisoned was two years past that.”

Luo Binghe nearly bares his teeth, irritated with the mere idea that some unknown spirit would need to pass him cues to remember the women he’d married. A poisoning that happened a decade ago - as if Luo Binghe would remember such a thing, when his harem had enough drama that poisonings happened every other month! 

…Luo Binghe pauses, running his tongue across his teeth irritably. The women that he’d married a decade ago… there was a set of twins, he thinks, and a… snake demon, perhaps? 

Their faces come up blank when he tries to recall them, though, and Luo Binghe feels his gut churn in something close to unease. Every wife he took had been a moment of happiness for him - a success story, the careful extension of a family that had once upon a time contained only himself and no others. Luo Binghe would never dare to forget the people who love him.

…Luo Binghe’s fingers twitch around Xin Mo’s hilt. The blood of the beast has started to cool, leaving the sword feeling tacky and unclean with it. 

Luo Binghe would never dare to forget the people who love him, but his mind hasn’t been right since he’d visited the mirror world - since he’d slept in the mirror Shen Qingqiu’s bed and had his hair combed and braided and cared for. That version of Shen Qingqiu had been odd beyond measure, but in the end, he must have still been a villain for how thoroughly a mess he’d left Luo Binghe’s mind. There can be no other explanation for Luo Binghe’s inability to remember the names and faces of all his wives.

Regardless of the blame, though, Luo Binghe can perhaps admit that his memories of his wives are a bit muddled at the moment, disturbed by images of the mirror Shen Qingqiu instead. If he can’t recall the faces of the twins or snake demon that he’d married a decade ago, then perhaps there had also been a lady Mei Hanxue before that, too. 

With the smallest bit of credence lended to the flower spirit’s story, Luo Binghe turns to a surefire method of testing: he begrudgingly tugs on his connection to the blood parasites outside of his own body, feeling for them in the bodies of all the women he’s drunk bloodied wedding wine with.

At the other end of Xin Mo’s blade, clearly and loudly enough that Luo Binghe can’t claim to have imagined it, the blood responds with a resonant tug back on his demonic senses.

The spirit twitches, feeling the pull of Luo Binghe’s blood as it moves, and scowls.

“Forgive this one’s boldness, but perhaps Lord Luo would benefit from a stroll through his inner palace, if he requires this sort of method to remember who he drank wedding wine with.”

Luo Binghe huffs, lowering Xin Mo before flicking it down to his side to shake off some of the blood. “If a wife wishes to be recognized, perhaps she shouldn’t think so lightly of changing her voice and face on a whim; surely, this Lord could not have been expected to recognize you in the shape you’d been in just some minutes ago.”

The distinctly male shape, that is. If this spirit has truly been married to Luo Binghe for a decade, she would surely know that there are no men in the harem.

The spirit straightens up, her shoulders lifting with tension. “Lord Luo has, in the past, recognized several of my harem sisters in a form unlike the ones Lord Luo first met them in,” she says, voice tight. “As a test Lord Luo had to pass before marrying them, or the evil scheme of one of Lord Luo’s dissenters, or similar situations. How is it any different to expect Lord Luo to recognize me in a slightly different shape than the one he’s most familiar with?”

“Hm,” Luo Binghe says, dredging up old, vague memories of the trials he’d faced in the past for his wives.

Perhaps, he supposes, if he was caught in the whirlwind of finding someone new to love him, in those precious moments where his attraction and obsession burned brightest, he’d be able to do something like that. If he knew the women’s qi signatures well enough, or if he had memorized their mannerisms… 

It isn’t relevant now, though, so Luo Binghe remains silent, still waiting for this wife of his to finally re-introduce herself.

“...Concubine Shen Yuan greets Lord Luo,” the spirit says eventually, her voice especially bitter. She dips into a stiff bow, too, and Lord Luo gets the sense that it’s only to hide the ugly expression on her face, displeased with having to give her name to a man she had bound herself to so long ago.

“This Lord greets Concubine Shen,” Luo Binghe replies, echoing every bit of cynical mocking that had been in Shen Yuan’s tone. 

Wife or not, Luo Binghe has no desire to speak respectfully to those who have no desire to speak respectfully to him in turn. He’s always lived his life by these sorts of rules, and he isn’t about to stop now.

Shen Yuan, sensing the wall she’s met, sighs and straightens up again. “‘Shen Yuan’ is fine, Lord Luo,” she says.

Luo Binghe nods, but says nothing in return. If Shen Yuan had been expecting to be granted leave to call him as familiarly as she had when she’d first seen him in this cave - the unguarded way she’d called for ‘Binghe’ upon seeing him - she would be sorely disappointed.

Sheathing Xin Mo with a huff, Luo Binghe considers the situation. Of course, what he wants to do most is to return to his palace, punish the traitorous array masters that had sent Luo Binghe off to this wretched cave to begin with, and return to his efforts of finding a way back to the mirror dimension. Xin Mo is still tugging restlessly at Luo Binghe’s mind, too, unhappy with only killing such a disappointing creature as the beast that had been in this cave.

There is a wife in front of Luo Binghe now, though, and so he must consider his options with a bit more prudence. Even if he doesn’t remember this little flower spirit right now, the Heavenly Demon blood parasites in her blood are proof that she belongs to him - that Luo Binghe had, at one point, chosen to take her in as part of his family. 

Shen Yuan is someone who is part of the happy ending that Luo Binghe has torn from the clutches of fate to live out himself; he has a duty to her to uphold his own end of the marriage.

Luo Binghe casts his eyes back to the corpse of the beast he’d slain some minutes ago. “Did Shen Yuan require some parts from this monster?”

“Ah, no,” Shen Yuan says, following Luo Binghe’s gaze to stare at the creature. “Although I’m glad for the chance to look at it a bit more carefully. It’s a shame it couldn’t be left alive; the moss that grows on it is host to a truly novel sort of insect colony, and the way that its joints move - well, you saw its neck, right? Its muscles are -”

“If you weren’t here for the beast,” Luo Binghe cuts in, “then what?”

Shen Yuan clears her throat, glancing to the other side of the cave. “That is… there was a certain artifact I wanted to fetch.”

Luo Binghe nods curtly, spotting a darkened passageway in the direction that Shen Yuan had looked towards. At least he knew his wife really did have a purpose in this cave, then, and hadn’t really been aimlessly hanging about in it.

“This Lord will retrieve it for you,” he says, and turns towards the passageway.

“I’m perfectly capable of getting it myself, thank you,” Shen Yuan says, bristling. “Lord Luo need not trouble himself.”

I’m already plenty troubled, Luo Binghe thinks mulishly. Aloud, he simply says, “To make up for pointing my blade at my wife, then.”

From behind Luo Binghe, Shen Yuan makes a sound similar to inhaling a mouthful of rocks. When he glances behind him, she’s watching him with a peculiarly distasteful expression.

“...Lord Luo doesn’t know what I’m looking for,” she tries, moving to catch up to him.

“This Lord is quite certain that there can not be so much of note in this cave that it would be difficult to pinpoint an artifact good enough to fetch in the first place.” Luo Binghe pauses, shooting Shen Yuan a sullen glare from the corner of his eyes. “After all, it’s something good enough that the resources of this Lord’s palace could not replace it.”

Shen Yuan grimaces, and Luo Binghe resists the urge to snort. Indeed, that was not the expression of someone who had left the palace just to retrieve this artifact. Luo Binghe had somewhat expected it from her attitude thus far, but it seems as if Shen Yuan really might have left the palace a long time ago.

Idly, Luo Binghe wonders if perhaps her abandonment is good enough reason to forgo the expectations of their marriage at all, and if it would be fine after all to just leave Shen Yuan alone in this cave while he returns to his search for the mirror Shen Qingqiu.

Forget it, Luo Binghe sighs inwardly. I will help her here, and with this, whatever debts or expectations that lay between us can simply be dissolved. I have no need for a wife who will not stay in the palace to live by my side.

Through the passageway at the far end of the beast’s cavern, the rock of the cave is suddenly smoother, the ground becoming flatter and more uniform with each step they take until it transitions to a walkway leading to a set of stone-hewn stairs. The stairs, in turn, lead to a simple platform that boasts a single pedestal, upon which lays the artifact in question.

It looks to be… a spool of thread?

Beside Luo Binghe, Shen Yuan sighs, exasperated. 

“Lord Luo,” she says, “isn’t it tiring to always find precious artifacts like this?”

Luo Binghe raises an eyebrow. “Is it tiring to receive good things?”

“No, it’s just -” Shen Yuan pinches her brow, sighing again. “I mean, who could believe that this has sat here untouched for centuries? For it to have been set up in such a special way, shouldn’t it be more well known? Shouldn’t this thread at least not be sitting so perfectly on such a thin pedestal, when the Four-Toed Stump Lizard out there was shaking the cave every time it took a step?”

Luo Binghe turns to look back at the thread. In general, the trials of Luo Binghe’s life can be broken into two categories: those before he merged the realms, and those after. Before the merge, Luo Binghe struggled more than any child deserved to. After the merge - signifying the final solidification of Luo Binghe’s authority over the land - he made the world pay all that suffering back tenfold, tearing happiness from it handful by handful.

Finding a precious artifact posed as if it were being presented as a gift to him, or stumbling across maidens with clothes torn in just the right places and a desperate desire to love him, or discovering that his enemy had chosen to drink themselves under the table the night before Luo Binghe was set to attack them - all of these things, Luo Binghe considered to not only be normal but deserved.

After all, they were fate’s way of making reparations to Luo Binghe. To be asked if such a thing was tiring…

“No,” Luo Binghe says simply. 

The ugly Whatever-Stump Lizard in the previous cave was too easy of prey because Luo Binghe had just suffered a loss in the form of the failed spatial technique, and so the world had to be set right by giving him a win in exchange. This thread is easy to find and approach because Luo Binghe doesn’t want to be here, and so the process of getting it and getting out must be quick to achieve. These things are as they should be.

Shen Yuan shakes her head, sighing again, and follows Luo Binghe up the stone steps to stand before the pedestal. She doesn’t hesitate to pick up the spool of thread once she reaches it, though she grumbles as she does. 

“It could at least have been boobytrapped,” she mutters, inspecting the thread with narrowed eyes. 

“Was Shen Yuan looking to lose a limb out of curiosity?” Luo Binghe asks dryly, his hand resting casually on the hilt of his sword, and Shen Yuan snaps her head up to look at him warily.

“I’m your wife,” she reminds him pointedly. “Lord Luo would never dare to harm one of his own wives - you wouldn’t dare cut off my arm even if I begged for it.”

Luo Binghe’s eyes narrow dangerously - who are you, to decide what I would and would not dare to do? - but he isn’t in a good enough mood to indulge in any sort of banter or play right now, so he answers straightforwardly.

“If this Lord were threatening you, you’d know it,” he says simply. “I only asked because Shen Yuan seemed disappointed that this artifact was so defenseless that you could easily pick it up without harm.”

“Oh,” Shen Yuan says, coughing once. “Right. Well, that’s - it’s about the narrative weight, I suppose. It just feels silly to have that one beast to have been the only defense for an artifact that’s meant to be so great.”

“Is it?” Luo Binghe asks, not quite believing it. “It doesn’t appear to be all that great. If Shen Yuan wanted an embroidery thread in this sort of vivid red, this Lord is certain that the palace could have -”

Luo Binghe doesn’t have a real interest in the artifact, but he does try to make it a habit to make sure none of his wives are bringing anything especially dangerous into his palace, and so as he’d been speaking he’d also reached out a hand to try and grasp the thread from where its end fell loosely from its spool. His only intention had been to catch it between two fingers and send a small bit of probing qi through it.

He hadn’t anticipated for the way Shen Yuan would try to jerk the thread out of his reach once she realized he was moving to touch it, and he certainly hadn’t anticipated for the thread itself to suddenly move as if it had come to life, unwinding around its spool with a speed that has Luo Binghe taking a wary step back.

“Shit!” Shen Yuan swears, also stumbling backwards and nearly tripping down the stairs behind her. “Don’t - fuck, don’t let it touch you, or - no, I’ll just drop it, and then it can touch you, or -”

Shen Yuan, Luo Binghe muses, is the sort of person who is quick to say a lot but actually do very little. 

After all, the thread had already managed to loop itself around Luo Binghe’s wrist before Shen Yuan had finished giving her messy instructions. 

The thread burns where it touches him, searing itself into his skin like a wire that had been made red hot by sitting in the coals of a fire. Luo Binghe spares the briefest of moments to try and feel for the thread’s intention, probing the wound with his qi and catching a rush of inevitability, of spatial manipulation, of life viewed through a timeless lens -

- and by the time Luo Binghe has realized the magic is the sort of nasty thing that disguises itself as a blessing while hanging on to someone with the stubborn relentlessness of a curse, it’s too late. Even as he attempts to forcefully isolate the magic, unsheathing Xin Mo with his off hand and spinning it to lop off the arm that had been burned by the thread in one fluid motion, the thread’s magic is already burrowing deep into him. 

‘Arm - that’s - Binghe’s arm -!’ Shen Yuan cries, alarmed as she watches Luo Binghe’s arm fall to the ground with a dull thump. 

Luo Binghe, still burdened with all the irritations he’d had when he’d first mistakenly shown up in this cave but now down an arm and saddled with some unknown curse, is in no mood to comfort his currently least-favorite wife.

“Don’t call me that,” he snaps, turning to glare at her. The stump where his arm used to be is pouring blood down the side of his robes, and Luo Binghe grits his teeth in irritation as he resheathes Xin Mo. “Shen Yuan will continue to address me as her lord.”

“I didn’t call you anything??” Shen Yuan splutters, her voice thin and reedy and her eyes locked onto where Luo Binghe’s dismembered arm lies awkwardly on the ground between them. At the same time that she speaks, though, Luo Binghe hears her voice saying something else, layered on top of her spoken words in a way that feels grating and out of tune:

‘Fuck, shit - his arm! He just - cut it off! I mean, obviously Binghe can regrow or attach it easily, and it was a smart thing to do considering he didn’t know what Life’s Binding Thread can actually do, but -’

“Be quiet,” Luo Binghe hisses, bringing his remaining hand up to rub at his temple. Mid motion, he pauses, looking at Shen Yuan again cautiously.

…She hadn’t seemed to actually be speaking, just then? 

Shen Yuan blinks back at Luo Binghe, her already panicked expression morphing into genuine horror.

‘Shit, did he not cut it off in time? Did I not drop my end of the thread in time??’

Shen Yuan’s mouth doesn’t move once. 

Luo Binghe scowls. That damn thread had really burned into him well enough that cutting off the wound didn’t work, then, and now he was stuck with - whatever the fuck this is. A curse of some sort, obviously, but -

“Life’s Binding Thread doesn’t really count as a curse, per say, it’s more like a strong but temporary mental array,” Shen Yuan says, talking over the discordant and ever-flowing stream of swearing and panic that seems to be coming directly from her own mind. 

“Hm,” Luo Binghe says, and - at the realization that Shen Yuan can hear his thoughts just as clearly as he can hear hers - reflexively tries to slam the mental connection shut.

It doesn’t shut.

‘Oh, neat, is that how Binghe keeps Xin Mo out of his mind? Actually, that’s an interesting paradox - if Xin Mo is so strong, how come mental effects of lesser skill or strength can’t be blocked in the same way? Or is Life’s Binding Thread actually stronger than Xin Mo, and Binghe just let himself fall under the effects of that wine from the wife plot back in - ah, shit, he’s looking at me like he wants to kill me again, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut -’

“Be quiet,” Luo Binghe repeats, even as he tries to adjust his expression to not so obviously give away his current desire to make Shen Yuan shut up by more violent methods. 

“I’m still your wife!” Shen Yuan yelps, backing away. ‘Violent methods?? What violent methods?! Aren’t I still - I still look like - I’m still his wife! Your wife! I’m still your wife, I know you’re listening! Fuck!’

Luo Binghe once more attempts, without much success, to forcefully block off the mental connection between them. Once more, there is no effect. 

Luo Binghe’s lips pull back into a wordless snarl, frustration making his skin itch with the desire to quickly and violently fix things so he can just return to his palace and continue searching for -

Luo Binghe cuts a sharp glance over to Shen Yuan. ‘No,’ he thinks viciously. ‘That goal is not something an outsider gets to know about.’

‘Searching for…?’ Shen Yuan’s mind echoes back. ‘Searching for… oh, was he looking for a particular wife or something? That would explain the way Life’s Binding Thread reacted, but I mean, I’ve already had my turn, so why…?’

Under Luo Binghe’s steadily intensifying glare, Shen Yuan waves her hands in front of herself nervously. “I’m not trying to listen! Or reply! If I could turn it off, I would!”

“Shen Yuan seems to know what the cursed thread did to us,” Luo Binghe says, instantly cutting down to the only important thing to come out of the incessant panicked thoughts coming from her.

Honestly - Luo Binghe is really quite used to odd things happening when he’s already in a bad mood, and he’s even more used to those things happening when he’s around women, but having such a constant and agitated stream of thoughts being blasted directly into his head is making it significantly more difficult to concentrate. 

‘You seem to be concentrating just fine, getting right to interrogating me!’ Shen Yuan thinks, clearly flustered. Still, she clears her throat and nods a bit stiffly. “I’m not so hopeless that I would have been searching for an artifact I didn’t know the effects of -”

Luo Binghe’s fingers - those still attached to his body - twitch in the direction of Xin Mo.

“- not that I wanted these particular effects to activate! There’s a different set of effects for if it’s one person or multiple that activate the artifact! I only wanted it for myself, I swear!”

‘Why is he so damn violent today, ah?!’ Luo Binghe hears under Shen Yuan’s spoken words. ‘Binghe never punishes his wives with anything but more papapa and a slap on the wrist, but he’s been ready to kill me several times in the last hour alone!’

“If it’s too hard for Shen Yuan to be completely quiet,” Luo Binghe grits out, “Perhaps she could at least refrain from thinking of an entirely different set of dialogue than what she says aloud?”

Outwardly, Shen Yuan finally obediently goes quiet. 

Inwardly, the space in Luo Binghe’s mind where Shen Yuan’s consciousness sits against his seems to do a full-bodied shudder of disgust the moment Luo Binghe refers to Shen Yuan as ‘she.’ 

‘FUCKing hate that ugh gross ew ew,’ Shen Yuan thinks, and then in rapid succession: ‘Wife, you’re a wife, think Binghe’s-Wife-thoughts.’

Ah. So Luo Binghe hadn’t been mistaken; Shen Yuan really had been a man when Luo Binghe had first seen him today. 

Luo Binghe casts his eyes skyward. Sometimes he truly believes demonic culture is superior; why do so many other species insist on refusing to be straightforward about simple things like this?

“Fine, so Shen Yuan hadn’t intended to activate the artifact in this particular manner,” Luo Binghe says, trying to force the conversation along. “But he did still intend to use it.”

“...Maybe,” Shen Yuan says, his eyes casting downwards in an unexpectedly bitter expression. ‘ If I could use it to find a way home…’

“Then explain the artifact’s effects,” Luo Binghe insists. Is he talking to a child? How hard is it to understand that the most important part of crisis management is giving the most competent person in the room all the relevant information?

Shen Yuan shoots Luo Binghe a resentful glare, but like earlier, it seems he can’t constrain his own thoughts about the artifact and its potential uses.

“It’s as it says on the tin -” ‘because this book has the shittiest author I’ve ever fucking had the displeasure of encountering’ “- Life’s Binding Thread really is just a way to bind someone to some important part of their life. If it’s used on a single person, it can be used to reconnect them to, uh, something they lost, for example.”

Hm. Luo Binghe supposes that Shen Yuan and himself are important parts of each other’s lives - they are married, after all. 

‘This bastard is daring to think something that stupid when he didn’t even recognize me earlier??’ Shen Yuan thinks especially loudly in Luo Binghe’s direction. ‘Really, did his EQ go down ten points with every marriage or -’

Shen Yuan coughs loudly, his thoughts wrenching away from the dangerously treasonous path they’d been on. 

“If Life’s Binding Thread is used on two people,” he says, continuing his explanation, “the effects are a bit different. Rather than connecting them to something that’s already important to them, it connects the two individuals until they become important to one another.”

Luo Binghe looks at Shen Yuan with renewed suspicion. An artifact that is supposed to make Shen Yuan more important to him… If Luo Binghe has been pulled away from his search for a path to the mirror world by what amounts to just another exhausting plot to climb the ranks of his harem, he’ll be very irritated.

“I’ll remind Lord Luo that I did not ask for him to show up here,” Shen Yuan seethes. ‘Nor do I want to waste time trying to fulfill this bullshit wife plot, either.’

Luo Binghe drops his suspicion, but not the tension in his shoulders. The more time he spends just standing around uselessly in this cave, the stronger the itch under his skin gets - the stronger his desire to return to his palace and the failed spatial manipulation arrays. He doesn’t want to be here, and Shen Yuan doesn’t want him here; they’re in agreement. They’ll deal with this cursed affliction quickly, then.

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe says, and then, after a moment, corrects himself: “Concubine Shen. You are important to this Lord. Let’s renew our wedding vows.”

Shen Yuan gapes at him. ‘I’ve heard kids more enthusiastic to go to the dentist’s than that bullshit confession, what the fuck!!’

Luo Binghe sighs - the curse clearly hadn’t broken with a simple declaration of love, then. He’ll just -

‘That was not a declaration of love,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts interrupt, startlingly firm.

“Shen Yuan is welcome to demonstrate to this Lord the proper technique, then,” Luo Binghe snaps. “This Lord would be honored to learn from the sort of man that thinks a wife’s duty is to run away under his lord’s nose and make trouble in monster-infested caves.”

Once more, Luo Binghe receives a wave of emotion from Shen Yuan, too tangled in itself to be conveyed in words. It’s - startlingly warm, and nostalgic, and a bit wistful, tied up around the idea of loving Luo Binghe - 

And then, of course, Luo Binghe finally picks apart a coherent thought in the mess, and it’s an especially bitter ‘tough fucking talk from an asshole who thinks a husband’s duty is to speedrun the infatuation-to-boredom pipeline for each of his million gazillion stupid wives.’

Luo Binghe scowls, gearing up to complain about being subjected to such a sentiment from his runaway wife, but Shen Yuan gets there first.

“Stop listening to my thoughts if they bother you so much,” Shen Yuan snaps. ‘Or don’t, and die under the weight of the deserved guilt, if you’re even capable of feeling it. Bastard.’

“I’m trying to,” Luo Binghe grits out. “It’s only Shen Yuan’s talent for thinking all sorts of uncharitable things about his husband that are preventing us from breaking this curse.”

“If you’d let me finish my explanation,” Shen Yuan says, “I’d have already explained to you by now that you can’t just trick the Life’s Binding Thread into thinking we’re important to each other. It’s got its own measure of how to judge such a thing - the artifact’s effect will naturally dissipate once we both learn the thing that fate has determined to be the most important thing for us to know about the other.” 

Luo Binghe watches Shen Yuan silently. He may not know this wife of his particularly well, but it’s become very clear to him very quickly that he’ll learn more if he just stays quiet and lets Shen Yuan’s constant stream of thoughts play out uninterrupted. 

And, as if on cue -

‘Generally I’d think that Binghe is supposed to realise, ‘oh wow, oh gee! this wife is great and loves me and my stupid heavenly pillar and -’ ah, fuck, he’s still listening, Lord Luo I didn’t mean to think anything treasonous about your papapa stick -’

“The artifact, Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe grits out. “What are we supposed to be realizing right now?”

“If I knew that, do you think we’d still be stuck like this?!” Shen Yuan snaps, then quickly tacks on: “Lord Luo. Respectfully. Sir.”

Luo Binghe holds back the urge to sigh, turning away from Shen Yuan to pick up his dismembered arm. He shakes it off once, twice - then holds it up to the stump where it had once attached to him and focuses on letting his healing abilities get to work on mending muscle and bone and skin to put it back into place. 

As he does so, he keeps his mind carefully focused on the task and free of any other potentially distracting thoughts, and as he expected, it only takes a few long beats of quiet before Shen Yuan’s internal monologue about the artifact picks back up again.

‘If this particular wifeplot is meant to make the couple of the week realize how much they both care about each other… then, is it because I ran away? Ah, shit, of course that’s what this is about. Well, fine - I just have to realize that it was a mistake to run away from the sweet embrace of Binghe’s cool protagonist-level muscled arms, and everything will be all better! I just - I just have to think about how much I like Binghe…’

Luo Binghe looks up from his still-healing arm to meet Shen Yuan’s awkward, deer-in-the-headlights expression. 

Shen Yuan is not currently thinking many charitable things about Luo Binghe.

“Are you my wife?” Luo Binghe asks waspishly.

“I am!” Shen Yuan cries. ‘ Am I??’ he thinks, clearly enough that Luo Binghe can hear the thought, and Luo Binghe’s expression darkens.

“Then think about how much you like me,” Luo Binghe demands. “Since that’s how this curse must be broken, then you must do it at some point or another - don’t be shy.”

“It isn’t a matter of being thin faced!” Shen Yuan says, the emotions of the underlying thoughts beneath his words feeling borderline hysterical. ‘I used to be perfectly capable of praising you without hesitation, you know! I was the best at it, even! I know, because sometimes pieces of my comments would get lifted and used in the next new wife’s dialogue, which was weird and stupid and definitely didn’t fit what I was trying to say but it does prove I was really good at praising you, so -’

“Then praise me,” Luo Binghe snaps, and Shen Yuan’s shoulders hike up to his ears, his expression squishing up as if he’s bit into something sour. 

“Then give me something to praise, asshole!” Shen Yuan returns. There’s a beat of silence, then: “Ah - ahem. That was supposed to be a thought I didn’t speak aloud. If Lord Luo would kindly forget I said anything.”

“I don’t think I will,” Luo Binghe replies. “In fact, I think Shen Yuan has perhaps been taking a bit too much enjoyment from using this curse as an opportunity to make sure I hear so many unpleasant thoughts from you, all under the guise that you can’t control it.”

‘Ha-ha, I’m in trouble,’ Shen Yuan thinks. Aloud, he says, “I couldn’t possibly know what Lord Luo is talking about. After all, isn’t Lord Luo famous for being so desired by all the merged realms? How could it be that any wife of yours is left unsatisfied to the point that they have so many complaints, and that their resentment has piled up to the point of even being delighted at the chance of getting to voice them? Wouldn’t that be unreasonable, if Lord Luo is such a magnificent husband?”

“If Shen Yuan wants to complain, then you should do so freely,” Luo Binghe says, baring his teeth in a sharp smile. “After all, didn’t you claim so confidently earlier that I would never hurt one of my wives, even if they were getting into all sorts of trouble?”

“I wouldn’t dare to test my Lord’s patience,” Shen Yuan says, his face contorting with the tight edge of his own strained smile. “However, if Lord Luo feels especially impatient to hear praise from me, perhaps he could start by offering some of his own?”

‘After all, it’s your own fault that you’ve been such a shitty husband that I can’t even muster a single compliment for your efforts!’

Luo Binghe scoffs - as if a wife like Shen Yuan had any authority to judge what sort of husband Luo Binghe has been. 

Still, the itch under Luo Binghe’s skin has only gotten worse - he wants to be done here as quickly as possible, so that he can return to more important business. If a few sweet words are what are needed to finish this fast, then so be it.

“Shen Yuan is an unparalleled beauty,” he intones. “Your eyes are like -”

‘This asshole isn’t even looking at my eyes!’

“Does Shen Yuan want to be complimented or not?” Luo Binghe scowls. “Don’t interrupt me.”

‘Why, so you don’t lose concentration as you recite the same seven lines you’ve memorized to impress every woman you meet?’

“And if you insist on interrupting me anyway,” Luo Binghe says darkly, “then at least have the courtesy to do it aloud; the cowardice that has you hiding behind the ‘unintentional’ thoughts this curse transmits to me is certainly not an attractive thing I could compliment.”

“On the other hand, I think Lord Luo could stand to make use of this bond between us a bit more,” Shen Yuan scowls. “Rather than reciting compliments aloud, wouldn’t I be more inspired if I could feel the heartfelt goodwill of your thoughts directly?”

Through their mental connection, Luo Binghe hears Shen Yuan’s motivation more clearly: ‘If the reason I can’t think proper wife-y thoughts at you is because you’ve neglected me, then you better start un- neglecting me! After all, if it weren’t for this stupid resentment I have about how I’ve been treated from the second I was dumped into the inner palace and forgotten about, we’d be done with this in a flash!’

Luo Binghe narrows his eyes at Shen Yuan. That… he can feel that Shen Yuan genuinely believes those thoughts, but he really hasn’t heard a single good sentiment from Shen Yuan about him this entire time - it’s difficult to imagine Shen Yuan conveying his love for Luo Binghe so well they could be done with this quickly.

“I’m not sure Shen Yuan could find the words to praise me even if they were written down and all you needed to do was recite them,” Luo Binghe spits.

“Better than reciting them, I could write them myself!” Shen Yuan scoffs. “If I only needed to say them as - as an advisor, maybe, or something like that - I could praise you better than the nobles that lick your boots! It’s just - it’s when I have to say them as a wife -!”

Once more, Luo Binghe is met with the overwhelming tide of emotions that seems to spill from Shen Yuan every time he thinks something too complex to be conveyed in simple words. 

There’s - admiration, of a sort. A genuine, awe-struck amazement of what Luo Binghe is, what he survived to get to his current state, and a fierce protectiveness and outrage that Luo Binghe had to survive it at all. The ‘Binghe’ that Shen Yuan sees in his mind glows with a bright intensity that startles even Luo Binghe himself, but there’s - a film, of some sort - a barrier that separates the messy care for ‘Binghe’ from the cold resentment Shen Yuan has for ‘Lord Luo.’ 

‘I really did love your story, ah,’ Shen Yuan is thinking, his thoughts finally filtering down into something more comprehensible again, as if he hadn’t just nearly drowned Luo Binghe in a set of emotions more strong and sure than those expressed by the last… many, many women that Luo Binghe had married into his family. ‘It’s only, now that I’m here…’

“Lord Luo will have to excuse me,” Shen Yuan says tightly, shuffling about to put a bit more distance between them. “As you’ve probably gathered, my experience as your wife has been… rather lackluster. I cannot currently express the feelings needed to break the bond linking us. So, as I said before, if Lord Luo could only prepare some encouragement…”

Luo Binghe stares at Shen Yuan without saying a word. His grip on his own arm has gone slack; it’s only due to the luck of how quickly it’s healing that it doesn’t fall back to the ground and instead manages to hang from the ropes of sinew that have begun to reconnect the dismembered arm to his body. 

Not - not currently able to express the feelings needed to break the bond?? After the wave of - of that sort of emotion that Luo Binghe had felt over the bond, all directed at Luo Binghe??

“Not at you,” Shen Yuan snaps, before once more falling silent and taking another half step away. For the first time since the bond snapped into place between them, he looks genuinely uncomfortable, the babbly panic that had occupied him before now replaced with a quiet sort of unease. 

In other words: for the first time since this curse connected them, Luo Binghe managed to hear something in Shen Yuan’s thoughts that Shen Yuan was not actually willing to share.

Good, snarls a part of Luo Binghe’s mind. Finally, Shen Yuan is experiencing some degree of the discomfort Luo Binghe has been feeling this entire time, even if Shen Yuan isn’t burdened with the same urgency to get out of the situation and return to his other goals as quickly as possible. 

The other part of Luo Binghe’s mind snags on the idea that something in what Shen Yuan had just communicated over their bond must have been important, and he doesn’t think it was the rush of admiration itself. If it was only that, even if Shen Yuan wasn’t comfortable with expressing it, it could still be swept away with the excuse that it was for the sake of fulfilling the requirements of the curse. And if it wasn’t the admiration itself…

Then, naturally, it must have been about who it was for.

Luo Binghe narrows his eyes, advancing on Shen Yuan, who has only managed to take a handful of meagre steps back in the time that Luo Binghe had been mulling things over. As he moves, Shen Yuan’s retreat grows more panicked, and his thoughts pick up again until Luo Binghe is once more listening to a steady stream of ‘fuck oh no oh shit he knows he heard he’s going to figure it out, Binghe’s always been too clever by half and he’s going to figure it out, fuck -’

Luo Binghe catches Shen Yuan by the collar of his robes, yanking him closer. Shen Yuan stumbles over his own feet as Luo Binghe moves him, and one of his hands comes up to steady himself on Luo Binghe’s shoulder for a brief moment before yanking itself away - ‘DON’T TOUCH HIM oh shit that was the arm Binghe hurt, too, he was still healing that!’ - leaving Luo Binghe to steady Shen Yuan by the grip on his lapels alone. 

“What,” Luo Binghe says slowly, “is the difference between ‘Binghe’ and ‘Lord Luo?’”

Is there some sort of imposter running around, stealing Luo Binghe’s wives out from under him? A thieving son of his that he doesn’t know about? 

‘As if Binghe would ever sire a kid by accident,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts answer with a surprising amount of disdain. 

Not a child, then. Who else could ‘Binghe’ be, though, if it is not Luo Binghe himself? And in the first place, hasn’t Shen Yuan referred to Luo Binghe as ‘Binghe’ several times now? Indeed, what is the difference between ‘Binghe’ and ‘Lord Luo’ that Shen Yuan can’t assign the affection he has for one to the other?

Luo Binghe’s grip on Shen Yuan’s robes tightens, and Shen Yuan’s balance wavers just slightly, still just a bit too dependent on Luo Binghe’s hold on him to stand correctly. 

“That -” Shen Yuan starts, breaks off, and wets his lips nervously before trying again. “There is a difference, certainly, but - Lord Luo, aren’t there some things that are better not shared? Sometimes a secret is a secret for a reason, ignorance is bliss and all that -”

“The difference, Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe hisses, and then for good measure uses the hand from his injured arm - still clumsy from not having all its nerves reconnected yet, and still wet with blood - to cover Shen Yuan’s mouth so that he cannot attempt to answer aloud. 

As expected, when Shen Yuan isn’t capable of running his mouth, his thoughts only spiral faster and louder.

‘Shit, what will happen if he figures it out? Will he even be able to? Wouldn’t the Ṡ̵̨̜y̶̧͍̳̞͊͘s̷͉̙̐̉̆̈́t̶̨̹̜͍͂é̴̮̲͋́m̴͈̘̹̜̿ prevent him from learning about something like that?’

The - what? Luo Binghe frowns, his brows coming together as he tries to parse out the word he’d missed there. It had sounded like - maybe he knew it? Maybe he… 

Luo Binghe drops Shen Yuan unceremoniously, bringing both hands up to clutch at his head as a wave of nausea passes over him. He… can’t remember the sounds of that missing word at all, now. Clearly it was important, though - clearly it was powerful, to be able to circumvent the rules currently baring Shen Yuan’s mind to Luo Binghe when even Luo Binghe’s own mental and dream abilities had not been able to do anything similar to stop his own thoughts from reaching Shen Yuan.

From where he’d fallen to the ground in an uncoordinated heap, Shen Yuan looks up at Luo Binghe warily, wiping at the smeared blood on his mouth with the back of his hand. 

‘He… couldn’t hear it? Wait, isn’t this actually perfect?!’

“Speak - think properly,” Luo Binghe demands. “What is preventing your thoughts from being clearly communicated?”

“I don’t think I can answer that,” Shen Yuan says, his eyes darting around nervously, as if expecting something to suddenly come out and attack him. ‘Fuck, what shitty half-assed censorship is this? It can prevent snippets from being conveyed, but not the whole thought? Obviously that would only make someone more curious!!’

“Try,” Luo Binghe says dangerously. “As Shen Yuan has so astutely put together, I’ve become quite curious. Is this… disconnect similar to the difference between ‘Binghe’ and myself?”

‘Of course, it’s this shitty Ṡ̵̨̜y̶̧͍̳̞͊͘s̷͉̙̐̉̆̈́t̶̨̹̜͍͂é̴̮̲͋́m̴͈̘̹̜̿’s fault that I t̸̪̓̕̚͝r̸̯̝̆͑ä̶̢̭́͋̋͐ń̷͈̪̣ş̵̝̗̠̽̅͂m̷͚͌̂͆͠ì̸͓̰̂g̵̖̲͇̈͝r̵͍̘̳̅a̷̭͗̌t̷̛̙͙͂e̸̺͇͙͂d̷̼͐̇ into this world, of course it’s the reason I see you s̷͉̎ȩ̸̫̓̽̋p̸͉̬̰̾͘a̵͚̬̩̔̈̂̇r̷̛̫̭̊̀̊a̷͇̦̹͊t̷͇̂̆ê̸̥̲̈́ͅ ̷̱͇̞̌̀̊̑f̴͔̱͈̓ͅṙ̷̳̲̈́ͅo̸̬̺͒m̴̺͈͓͛͂ ̶͇̓̋̕͠t̴̩̱͌͗̽h̴̹͙̋ê̸̮̻̮͌̈́̓ ̸̰̔́͆ć̷̝͖̺́̇ŭ̸̗̩͙̲͝t̸̨̂͘ḙ̷̊͐̄͝ ̸̨͕̥̅̽̄ͅb̷̡͕͔͍̔̂̆̇l̶̳̬͕̗͆̿͊̾a̴̞̤̼̍̕c̸̖̞̫͇͊k̵̡͚͇͖̂̊-̸͋͌̿͜ḅ̵͎͍͆̋͝ė̶͍́ļ̸̨͉̈́͒̇͜l̴̯̳̃͘i̴̎̓͆̇͜ͅė̵̛̘͓͜d̶̳̼̪̽̚ ̷̞̱̈́̾ć̵̰͎̥̚̚h̷͇͈̆̕̕a̷͙̍̊͑̓ŗ̵͇̙̐̐̈̅ą̵̠̰͎̀̚c̷̻̐t̷̹̲̝̂̈́̀e̶̜̓̈́̿̃r̵͙̺͌̀͋͜ ̵̯̜̯͝Ǐ̶̢̻̀ ̶͖̘̹̳̉̅͝ọ̵̐̍̓n̶͓̮̯̉̋͝ļ̴̥̝̪͛̌̕̚y̴͉̏͋ͅ ̵̜̬̼̱̈͊e̸̢̪͗̀͝v̷̢̖̎̆ȅ̶̮̰͈̱͒̒r̵͔̝̂͗ ̵̰̮̆͂r̶̛̻̓̀͘ë̸̪̟́a̵̡̦̖͋̒̊͝d̵̡̈́̽̽̋ ̴̬͐â̷̜̄b̷̛̖o̶͍̭̜͗͑̿u̴̖̐͑̆̓t̵͚̉͂̂͋ ̶͙͋͊̅b̵̫̙̈́̿̊͝e̷̹̯͐͐f̴̢̞̄̽o̶͕͊̇́ř̴̪́̃͘ě̷̢̡̼̓͆̕!̴͚̀̾͝’

Shen Yuan’s thoughts seem to blend into an incomprehensible static, as mundane as the white noise of rain, and it takes conscious effort for Luo Binghe’s attention to not slip off them. Under scrutiny, it seems…

Luo Binghe lowers himself closer to Shen Yuan’s level, searching his face with sudden, aching intensity. 

This whole time - through the battle with the monster, and the reveal of Shen Yuan’s status as his wife, and the curse of the stupid red thread, and lopping off his arm and still having to be subjected to another person’s thoughts - through all of it, Luo Binghe has had to force his mind from wandering, has had to constantly refocus from the way his skin seemed too tight and his breath felt too sharp and the way he just wanted to go back to searching for a way back into the mirror world.

Luo Binghe has been piloting himself through this encounter with half his brain elsewhere. Now, for the first time, he feels fully present in these caves, all of his attention narrowed down to the exact shape of Shen Yuan’s face. His cheeks and nose are too round, and the large lenses of his glasses hide eyes that are too soft, but - 

But the feeling of the foreign mental barrier within Shen Yuan’s mind is exact. 

Luo Binghe had only felt it briefly, when he was digging through the memories of the mirror Shen Qingqiu; past a certain date, back before the mirror Shen Qingqiu started acting differently from the vile Shen Qingqiu that Luo Binghe himself had grown up under, all the memories had a hazy feel to them. They felt almost too normal, too mundane - like it would be all too easy for Luo Binghe’s mind to slip away from them and not pay them any attention, just the same way that it had felt to try and focus on the garbled thoughts coming from Shen Yuan now.

And - what exactly was it that Shen Yuan had said, between pieces that couldn’t be understood? That he ‘came to this world… to see Luo Binghe?’ And that mirror Shen Qingqiu had called him as just ‘Binghe’ too…

Luo Binghe shudders, a full-bodied feeling that leaves the nerves along his back feeling like they’ve been lit up by foreign energy. 

‘The spatial array worked after all,’ Luo Binghe thinks. ‘This little spirit is who I was looking for.’

In the same moment, Shen Yuan’s own thoughts come across just as clearly.

‘What the fuck was that feelin - oh, shit, he already figured out his part of the bond?? That - that jumbled mess about me being who he was looking for - that is what the Life’s Binding Thread wanted him to realize about me?!’

Yes, that… Indeed, Luo Binghe could think of nothing more important he could realize about anyone than this. It’s important, and Luo Binghe should be nothing but pleased that once more the world has twisted in his favor to drop what he was looking for directly in his lap, but -

Luo Binghe’s hands flex at his sides, staring at Shen Yuan.

“How long,” he says, voice carefully measured, “Have you been in this world?”

Shen Yuan’s brow furrows. ‘So he really was searching specifically for someone not of this world, then? That’s…’ Shen Yuan swallows, his eyes darting away. “Over a decade,” he says aloud.

“And we’ve been married for -”

Shen Yuan’s eyes flick back to him, wary. “Also over a decade. I - uh, arrived shortly before meeting you for the first time.”

Luo Binghe leans back slightly, breathing in slowly through his nose. Shen Yuan didn’t arrive recently, then. He’s always been here - has always been the one Luo Binghe married. 

For the last decade, Luo Binghe has simply… overlooked him.

‘Try being a bit meaner about it,’ Shen Yuan’s mind snaps at him, sarcastic and bitter even as Shen Yuan himself turns his face away. ‘Ugh, fuck, this is - this is fine. It’s still just a wifeplot, I only have to get through it for now. Even if - even if he was looking for me - looking for me -me, the me that came from t̶̟̓̾̒̐ḩ̷̦̳̳̋̏e̸̘͔̼̹̎̐ ̶̮̺͇̭̩́͘m̴̙̖̎̍̐͜͝͝ő̵̹̬̫̀̒̎̕d̵̢͎̘͌̆͜ē̵̢͕̳̩̈́̾̏͜r̵̮̆̈́̈́̈n̶͈̭̺̅͂ ̷͍̺̼̊͒w̵̡̝̘̗̔ö̷̜̻̎͜r̴̡̜̖̬̠̾͛̾̕͝l̴̺̀d̵͔̿̅ - it’s still only… fuck, I’m going to throw up.’

Luo Binghe frowns, reaching out a hand to send a calming pulse of qi through Shen Yuan. “If Shen Yuan feels sick, we should return to the palace quickly,” he says, somewhat subdued. 

He found who he was looking for before getting the chance to realize what it was exactly he wanted from this person, but he knows enough to not want Shen Yuan to feel ill. That much is natural; Shen Yuan is his wife, after all. He’d been - a bit confused earlier, perhaps - a bit too distracted to pay proper attention - but Shen Yuan is his wife, and so naturally Luo Binghe will care for him.

Across from him, Shen Yuan grimaces. “You… how did you even find out about me? It - from your thoughts - you seemed to have… visited another world, before?”

And though Luo Binghe doesn’t really wish to speak about that mirror world - not even to this soul that he had been searching for, not when that mirror world was wrapped so strongly in feelings of failure and loss - he’d still rather answer those questions than what Shen Yuan really wants to ask.

After all, even as Shen Yuan is speaking, his thoughts give way to a different question: ‘What do you want from me?’

Luo Binghe’s lips thin, remaining silent. He lets his hand fall from Shen Yuan’s shoulder - he’d used his dominant hand without thinking, the hand that had only recently been reattached, and now there’s a smear of dark blood on Shen Yuan’s robes, just as ugly as the blood still lingering by Shen Yuan’s mouth. 

Then, Luo Binghe’s eyes fall to his own hand, and by extension, his wrist. The place where the Life’s Binding Thread had burned him has healed, but it left a faint mark - not quite a scar, but a lingering curse mark, showing that their ordeal had not yet fully been overcome even if Luo Binghe had already had his own side of the needed realizations. 

That’s right, Luo Binghe thinks, something within him settling, this world is still working to provide me with reparations; fate is still repaying its dues to me. There’s no need for me to trouble myself with figuring it out on my own.

“Isn’t that for Shen Yuan to figure out?” Luo Binghe asks lightly, his lips curling up in a smug grin. “The ‘most important thing you can realize about me’ - naturally, it should be a realization about the role you should play in my life.”

“Didn’t you want this to be over with quickly?” Shen Yuan asks. “Just tell me - or think it, if you’re set on being stubborn - and then I can ‘realize’ and we can break this bond.”

“No need,” Luo Binghe says sharply, standing up and turning away in one quick motion. “This Lord figured out my side on my own, and so Shen Yuan must figure out his side on his own, too.”

Shen Yuan’s incredulous stare burns into the back of Luo Binghe’s head. ‘This asshole… he really doesn’t know what he wants from me?? What the fuck was he looking for me for, then?! Amusement? Fascination with the unknown? Did he learn about the possibility someone like me could ṯ̷̬̞͕̈́͗̉̏r̷͈̎̄̎́a̵̺͍̮͔͊̏̄ͅņ̴̙̂͌̒̿š̴̨́̿͝m̵͔̫͕̎̅͜͝i̵̟͖̅̓̇͘g̴̞̦̳̀r̸͕̞̞̒a̵̛͍ṭ̴͔͐̏́̏̕è̸̲̻̇̈͝ and decide he wanted to try and merge a few more realms together??’

“Shouldn’t you call me more affectionately?” Luo Binghe says, glancing back over his shoulder at Shen Yuan. “Hasn’t Shen Yuan been my wife for long enough to come up with something sweet to call me?”

Shen Yuan stares back at him with his jaw slack. ‘What the fuck,’ he thinks, nearly frantic. ‘What the fuck is this new personality I’m meeting?? Well, not new, fuck, he was all honeyed words like this when we first met all those years ago too, wasn’t he? It - fuck, shit, it really is a wifeplot, I hate this I hate this I hate -’

“Lord Luo was the one to insist that I refer to him respectfully, not even a shichen ago,” Shen Yuan says, finally pulling himself up off the ground. “How could I dare to disobey?”

“My mistake,” Luo Binghe says dryly, “I was unaware that referring to me as ‘this asshole’ could be understood as a respectful address.”

Shen Yuan winces, then busies himself in searching through his sleeves until he pulls out a handkerchief he can properly clean his face off with. He pointedly does not look at or reply to Luo Binghe throughout this, but Luo Binghe would be able to understand his intentions even without the bond connecting their thoughts. Luo Binghe himself had thought it earlier: they’d been married a decade, and all that time, Shen Yuan had been overlooked by him.

Now, steeped in the bitterness that came from being ignored, Shen Yuan can’t think of a single good thing to say about the man that was ostensibly his entire reason to exist in this world.

Luo Binghe turns his gaze away once more, his expression contorting in an uncomfortable way. Fine. It isn’t especially hard to earn the affection of someone he sets his sights on; by the time Shen Yuan has figured out his side of the bond, Luo Binghe will have him clinging to his role as Luo Binghe’s wife once more. By then, everything will be fixed.

What Luo Binghe wants from Shen Yuan - what Shen Yuan is meant to fix, the ugly thing that the mirror world turned Luo Binghe into - all of it will be fixed if Luo Binghe can just convince Shen Yuan to like him again.

Shen Yuan sighs, tucking away the newly bloodied handkerchief he’d been using to wipe his face off with. “Yes, alright - let’s get on with the plot, I suppose. We have to, uh, rekindle our flame and stuff, so, uh -”

“Try sounding a bit more stiff, this Lord will try to find it romantic this time,” Luo Binghe says, voice sounding unexpectedly bitter even to himself.

‘Try helping then!’ Shen Yuan thinks, glaring at him, and - 

Well. Luo Binghe had been intending to woo Shen Yuan back into his arms, hadn’t he?

“Though time may have stretched thin our memories of each other,” Luo Binghe says, “we were close before, and time again can remind us of why we found ourselves to be close in body and heart. Shen Yuan, you -”

‘Not like that!!’ interrupts Shen Yuan’s mental dialogue, accompanied by a background symphony of retching noises. Luo Binghe’s eye twitches. 

“- you must have suffered without me by your side,” Luo Binghe continues, determined to see it through even as the mental soundtrack of protests grows louder, “but I am here now, and together we can -”

“Enough, enough!” Shen Yuan cries. “Lord Luo, let me ask you something: how many times have you had a marital spat with one of your wives?”

Luo Binghe thinks for a moment, then waves away the question. “Occasionally,” he says.

“Occasionally,” Shen Yuan repeats, voice dry. “And how many times does ‘occasionally’ mean, when stretched over the period of several decades and over a hundred women?”

Does this little spirit think it’s romantic to pick over details of the other women I’ve lain with? Luo Binghe thinks, a bit baffled, and the space where Shen Yuan’s mind sits next to his lights up with indignation.

“I find it about as romantic as you reusing the same lines you always do when you’re faced with a wife giving you the cold shoulder!” He exclaims, throwing his arms up helplessly. “‘Occasionally’, you say, as if even once or twice wouldn’t be enough to spread the news throughout your palace - do you really think we don’t all know these lines by now?”

Truthfully, Luo Binghe doesn’t remember the exact words he’s said in similar situations, even if he knows there’s a certain formula that usually works to lure a woman back into bed with him. But if he doesn’t remember the specifics, and Shen Yuan does…

“And I’m not jealous!” Shen Yuan yells. “I’m - I’m fed up!”

‘And extremely let down, even though I already knew that all the hopes I’d had for you to be some sort of fairytale dream were indeed only dreams, and that you only know romance when it has big tits and is presently sitting in your bed - aren’t you supposed to be good at this, ah?! If I was going to get a second turn at the wifeplots, couldn’t it at least be enjoyable?!’

The odd emotion Luo Binghe had felt earlier - the uncomfortable pull inside of him, dissatisfied with the knowledge that the person he’d been looking for had been under his nose this whole time and so deeply unhappy with Luo Binghe that he’d run away from him - comes back full force. 

“Then instruct me,” Luo Binghe says, carefully measured, “on how you’d prefer to be comforted.”

“I don’t want to be comforted,” Shen Yuan snaps. “I just - listen, forget it, let’s just - a date? We could go on a date?”

‘A date would narratively put us into an enclosed arc, too, so the bond should naturally find a way to dissolve by the end of the night, and then - well. One thing at a time,’ Shen Yuan thinks.

“A date,” Luo Binghe repeats, and Shen Yuan nods along.

“We could, uh, watch the White River Spirit Berries bloom from a spot on the riverbank -”

Ah, Luo Binghe thinks, remembering a time when he’d done just that with the sweet martial sister he’d rescued from the cult that had been planning to use her as a cauldron, the sex there was especially nice - humidity always makes the skin-on-skin experience feel so much more -

“Or!” Shen Yuan says loudly, “we could learn a new dance together -”

Maybe a dance like the one I learned with Hualing’s cousin some years back, moving in such a way that -

“Nevermind dancing,” Shen Yuan says, “let’s try - right, okay, let’s try going to a bookstore and, uh, competing to find a book the other person would enjoy -”

Trying to keep quiet between the shelves was very fun, Luo Binghe thinks, remembering such an event with a pair of rabbit demon twins.

“Forget it!” Shen Yuan snaps. “You - Lord Luo, I humbly request that you remember I can hear your thoughts right now. If listening to you reminisce about your other women is supposed to warm me up to you, it isn’t working!”

Luo Binghe blinks. How was he supposed to make this date good, if he doesn’t reference his past ones?

“Well - that - figure it out!” Shen Yuan huffs. Inwardly, he bemoans, ‘what sort of date could I possibly think of that a guy with a hundred wives won’t have already done in the past?! Should I choose a subpar date he had with someone else and try to improve on it instead? No way, fuck that, I’m not a loser, I could make Binghe happy if I tried - shit, forget it, who wants to make that asshole happy!’

“If Shen Yuan is struggling, he can always rely on this Lord -”

“I’ll pick the date,” Shen Yuan snaps. “Just - give me a second.”

‘A date he’s never done… Well, what could he do with me that he couldn’t with others? He has other spirit wives, so it can’t be something related to that, and - uh, I think there was even a demonic flower-power wife, right? So no flower spirit specific stuff, either. Then -’

Shen Yuan glances up from his concentration, meeting Luo Binghe’s eyes and blinking placidly. 

‘Ah. Right. Naturally, for the mind reading wife plot, it should be a mind reading date!’

“Shen Yuan chose something, then?”

“Of course. I told you I would, didn’t I?” Shen Yuan replies, clearly a bit smug. “I think we're actually going to have quite a bit of fun together, Lord Luo.”

Chapter Text

Only a few years after Luo Binghe had united the realms, he’d stumbled across an odd sort of pocket space. It didn’t seem to occasionally go missing like many secret realms do, nor did it have any sort of requirements limiting who could enter it. Instead, it presented a set of trials to those that entered, with each trial allowing passage to a deeper part of the realm. In theory, this meant that the innermost part of the space would contain a treasure.

‘In theory,’ because Luo Binghe himself had never managed to make it that far.

The problem lay in the nature of the trials: rather than things that could be overcome with Luo Binghe’s own strength and wit, they were challenges that could not be solved without partnership with another person. In particular, they were challenges that could not be solved without a strong partnership with another person; they seemed to exclusively test for a sort of understanding between two parties.

‘The unsolved trials to determine which wife stands at the top of the harem,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts agree smugly. 

Luo Binghe casts him a sharp look. He may not have made up his mind about just what this person was supposed to be to him yet, but he highly doubts it’s supposed to be… that. If anything, Shen Yuan should be…

Well, if Shen Yuan would…

Luo Binghe wets his lips. It’s no matter. The curse connecting the two of them would ensure that Shen Yuan would figure it out for him. For now, it’s best to just focus his energy on thoroughly wooing Shen Yuan back into his role as ‘happy wife’ through this little outing. And to that matter:

“I’ve entered this particular pocket realm several times in the past,” Luo Binghe says. “Hadn’t you wanted to do something with me I hadn’t done before?”

“You’ve entered the realm before,” Shen Yuan agrees, “but you’ve never made it to the center, right?”

“Why bother asking a question you know the answer to?” Luo Binghe scoffs, turning away from the flower spirit to instead face the entrance of the pocket realm once more. 

When Luo Binghe had first failed the trials, he’d been with his most recently-married concubine, having stumbled across the pocket realm on his journey to escort her back to his palace. Failing at that point had been unsurprising; while he may have been high on the joy of finding someone new to join his family, he had already come to understand that he would not be equally close to all his wives. Not sharing a deep enough understanding with that woman to conquer the trials of the pocket realm had not been cause for concern.

Coming back with Sha Hualing, and then again with Ning Yingying, and failing both times then too had been mildly more… unsettling.

Even then, though, the irritation had come more from the understanding that Luo Binghe would never get to see the prize of this pocket realm for himself rather than the failure of the trials themselves. Luo Binghe was the husband to two dozen women at the time, and had no particular desire to stop growing his family there. In such a situation, of course there could not be a single person who understood Luo Binghe best - rather, it was natural that each of Luo Binghe’s wives would understand a part of Luo Binghe, and the sum of them would be enough. 

‘Yeah, it was a bit of a cop-out,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts muse, ‘but naturally a ṕ̸̦̠̠r̸̻̥̄ổ̶̳̙̘̈͝ͅt̸̻͐͜ä̶̧̤̤̼́̅ḡ̵̗͚̌ǫ̸͓̉̂͋n̶̪͕̂̿͒i̵̖̭̻̖̾͝s̴͚̮͎̎͗͊͠t̶̰̓͐͗̓ as great as Binghe couldn’t be paired with only a single person - the whole point of the arc with this weird pocket realm had been to show that.’

Luo Binghe’s brows pull together. Although put more simply, that was more or less the same conclusion that Luo Binghe had come to, but hearing it put into words by another person…

“Anyway,” Shen Yuan says aloud, clearing his throat. “You’ve entered, but you’ve never gone to the center, so that’s what we’ll be doing - with the Life’s Binding Thread working its magic, we should be able to clear the challenges no problem!”

“You want to cheat the trials?”

“Of course not,” Shen Yuan says, even though his thoughts very clearly say, ‘oh yeah we’re going to scam this pocket realm so bad.’

“Shen Yuan is quite bold for a spirit that doesn’t even know the full extent of the trials,” Luo Binghe says cooly. “Even if Hualing is a gossip, the most she could have shared with you and the other harem sisters are the details of the first two trials.”

“I know the details of all three,” Shen Yuan says, waving a hand dismissively and stepping forward towards the opening to the pocket realm. “They’re definitely things we could do with the telepathy thing we have going on right now.”

Luo Binghe watches him with newfound doubt. Ning Yingying had made it to the last trial with him before failing, so it isn’t impossible for a member of his harem to know the details of all three trials, but Ning Yingying has been… significantly less likely to gossip, since she’s grown up some. It doesn’t strike him as particularly likely that she’d have shared the details of something like this with someone like Shen Yuan. In fact, Shen Yuan wouldn’t have even been a part of the harem at the time, so…

Shen Yuan casts a complicated look back at Luo Binghe. ‘Ah, why does he have to be clever about things like this!’ He thinks, sighing heavily. ‘Can I even tell him about P̵̼̘̏͗̓̊ȑ̶͓̠̩̑͑ǫ̷̘̪͆̓̈͂ų̴̠̣͚͊̀̿d̷͕̒̑ ̴̛̜̜͚̾Ỉ̷̤̯͘m̸̖͋͗̌̀ḿ̶̜̥͓̺o̴̢̻̿̾͜r̶̨̈́t̴̢͖̊ͅǎ̶̠̏͐ḽ̵̤͙̲́̾̾͊ ̵̪͗D̴̬̖̒͐̍ë̷̮̻̑m̴̻̾̀̀͆o̸̎̓ͅn̴̩̊͝ͅ ̶̡̯̳̫͂̈́W̸͉͊̓̀a̸̘͚̮̭͆̔y̴̧̢̧̯͘͝ without being censored?’

“Evidently not,” Luo Binghe answers aloud, suddenly quite irritated, and Shen Yuan startles and launches into a slew of mental swears. 

This little spirit… did he really manage to forget that Luo Binghe could hear his thoughts in the same moment that he was thinking about what Luo Binghe could hear from him??

“Listen, this is - well, Lord Luo already realized I came to this world for him specifically,” Shen Yuan says, words carefully measured even as his mind is a jumbled mess of static and unclear thoughts. “How could I do such a thing without knowing about you first? It isn’t unusual that I’d know about your life from before I came to this world, so don't overthink it too much.”

“Down to these small details?” Luo Binghe asks, gesturing to the entrance of the pocket realm.

“They aren’t so small,” Shen Yuan protests, sounding a bit defensive. ‘This arc was the definitive answer to whether you’d continue building a larger harem or decide to focus on one or two chosen wives!’

Luo Binghe allows his eyes to slide off Shen Yuan, thinking. He’d already started to suspect that Shen Yuan had been sent to this world by some sort of god - after all, there isn’t much else to explain the power of a censorship that overcomes the fact that their minds are so directly linked right now - but it seems like he’d underestimated this god’s powers even still. Moving a soul across dimensions, censoring information about their own existence, and even providing visions or prophecies of Luo Binghe’s life to Shen Yuan before Shen Yuan had even had his soul moved by the god to begin with… that seemed to go beyond the skillset usually attributed to a single god.

Shen Yuan’s own thoughts seem to react to the word ‘god’ with a fair bit of disdain and an increased amount of censored words, though, so Luo Binghe lets the topic drop for now. He can always help his wife with an exorcism later if needed.

“An exorcism, he says,” Shen Yuan mutters with dry amusement, but he doesn’t let the opportunity for conversational escape pass him by, quickly turning to make his way to the pocket realm’s entrance. “Well, come on, then - a very narratively fulfilling date awaits us, I’m sure.”

The entrance to the pocket realm spills into a large stone hall lit by white flame lanterns and split down the center by tall arching pillars that create two distinct walkways, with each center pillar holding scrolls that jut into the walkways on either side. At the end of the hallway, where the two walkways once more merge into one, a massive iron door looms, shut and locked tight. 

Luo Binghe bites back a sigh. Even if he hadn’t grown immune to this sort of grand sight from years of living in and conquering palaces, he would have still grown tired of this particular sight, having walked this hallway several times in the past only to be met with frustration. 

Next to him, Shen Yuan seems to be going through a similar train of thought: ‘Hm,’ he thinks, ‘it isn’t as cool as I thought it would be. Isn’t it a bit too obvious looking, splitting the hall in two like this as if it’s a game?’

Too obvious indeed. The first ‘trial’ that the pocket realm presents is a rather convoluted sort of interrogation about the couple who takes on the trial: each person is meant to walk down one side of the hallway, stopping to answer the questions written on the scrolls as they go past each column. With each correct answer, the large door at the end of the hallway would open a bit further, eventually allowing passage into the next deepest part of the realm. 

Really, how childish. 

Still, if this is how Shen Yuan wishes to spend their date, it’s fine. Luo Binghe isn’t opposed to learning more about this particular soul anyway, even if the method is a bit immature. 

Shen Yuan cuts him a sharp look - ‘and I imagine you think the only mature way of learning about someone is getting into bed with them, then?’ - and resolutely steps forward to take one side of the hallway. Luo Binghe follows his lead and steps onto the other side, and thus their trial begins. 

The questions on the scrolls aren’t anything special, really. ‘Speak aloud the name of the place where your partner grew up in,’ and ‘Name the meal your partner prefers over all else,’ and other such trivialities. There was something interesting in seeing flashes of emotion and memories when Shen Yuan mentally provided him with answers like ‘Shanghai’ and ‘Kay-Eff-Cee,’ but they weren’t the sort of things Luo Binghe truly cared to learn about Shen Yuan. 

That is, until halfway down the hall, when they reach a set of scrolls instructing them to answer with what their partner’s primary goal is. 

Luo Binghe finds himself straightening up, peering past the column separating them to glance at Shen Yuan’s expression. Until it had been put into words, he hadn’t realized how much he wanted to know this particular thing about Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan came to this world for Luo Binghe, and presumably so did the version of him that existed in that odd mirror world - but why? Based on what he saw in the mirror world, was it to teach him something? To chase off less-worthy admirers? 

In the time Shen Yuan has been in this world, all he’s done for Luo Binghe is marry him, so… is his divine goal here just to love -

‘I want to go home,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts say firmly. 

Luo Binghe startles, catching Shen Yuan’s eye from across the pillars separating them. That - well, that might be a current goal Shen Yuan holds, sure, but it certainly can’t be his main one. Regardless of how Luo Binghe may have overlooked this soul’s presence for the last decade, it exists in this world to begin with by the will of a god. That isn’t the sort of thing that can be overwritten easily. 

‘The answer to this question is that I want to go home, to my original world,’ Shen Yuan thinks again, meeting Luo Binghe’s gaze steadily.

‘If I answer incorrectly, there won’t be a chance to redo it,’ Luo Binghe replies silently.  

Although they aren’t required to correctly answer every question in the chamber in order to move on, enough incorrect answers would prevent the door from opening wide enough to allow them to pass through. Their mental connection has allowed them to cheat their way through so far, but there isn’t any need to waste an incorrect answer now in case their strategy is somehow defeated later. 

‘What a convoluted way of saying that you don’t like the answer and want a different one,’ Shen Yuan thinks, and Luo Binghe can feel the way his mind is sparking with irritation. ‘Don’t you think I’d give you an answer you’d like better if I had one? The whole point of this is to wifeplot it up so we can move on. Answer as I said: I want to go home.’

Luo Binghe feels his mouth pull down in dissatisfaction. With clear reluctance, he touches his fingers to the scroll in front of him and dutifully recites that Shen Yuan’s main goal is to return ‘home.’

The flame bursts into white flame, and the door at the end of the hallway opens a fraction wider, the sign of a correct answer. 

Luo Binghe’s complaints, half formed and ready to blame Shen Yuan for their loss, die on his tongue. Sure, Shen Yuan had mentioned that he’d gone after the Life’s Binding Thread in order to find a way back home, but until now, Luo Binghe had dismissed that as unimportant. Now…

Luo Binghe forcefully puts the thought aside. There’s no need to worry just yet; there’s nothing wrong, yet. Luo Binghe has already resolved to woo Shen Yuan back to his side. Everything else - what Shen Yuan is meant to do here, and whether Shen Yuan wants to do it at all - will figure itself out from there.

Shen Yuan’s mind, where Luo Binghe can feel it sitting beside his own, cringes away a bit. Shen Yuan himself clears his throat, clearly trying to focus his thoughts elsewhere, and reaches out to the scroll on his side of the pillar.

‘Your turn, then - what’s your ‘primary goal’ right now? Is it still a genuine cohabitation of human and demonkind?’

Luo Binghe feels his brows pull together, dissatisfied with both Shen Yuan’s quick return to task and the task itself.  

A ‘genuine cohabitation of human and demonkind’ - what a simple way of putting it. How can a simple descriptor like ‘genuine’ convey the desired peace and happiness of such a thing? Is it even meant to, or is Shen Yuan thinking only of villages with both races and no bloodshed, even if such a thing is preserved with hard lines in the sand and frosty attitudes? 

Still, the last time that Luo Binghe had gone through the trials of this pocket realm, that had been the answer his wives had given - and that had been recognized as correct. Now, over a decade later…

‘Has Shen Yuan heard many tales of my attempts towards such a thing, while on your journey running away from my palace?’

‘Well - no,’ Shen Yuan thinks, his mind clearly tripping over the realization. ‘It was just what you wanted for so long…’

It had been, certainly. After Luo Binghe had taken his revenge, and after he’d torn power and riches and influence from the world that dared to withhold them from him, he’d set his sights on a grander, albeit more vague sort of retribution: even if most of the world was uninvolved with Luo Binghe’s direct suffering, they were all still a part of the prejudice and violence that separates humans and demons, from which Luo Binghe had then suffered indirectly. 

However, if the assumptions that humans had about demons were torn out from their roots, and humans were forced to live alongside demons, then surely even that prejudice could be corrected. All of humankind would feel sorry for having contributed to a culture that shunned what Luo Binghe was, and - if ever there were another child like Luo Binghe again in the future - perhaps that child would not suffer so much. A world where a child like that wouldn’t have to be in charge in order to be treated with respect…

Well, it didn’t work out in the end. Despite merging the realms, and despite spending years of his life settling disputes and trying to enforce peace amongst the common people by using his own violence, humans and demons still by and large avoided one another. Some handful of years ago, Luo Binghe had stared at the pile of requests that had come in begging him to fix this or that in towns where demons and humans lingered closer together than usual, and he’d wondered if there was much of a point in fighting much longer for a goal so out of reach.

Humans and demons hate each other. It isn’t the sort of thing that Luo Binghe can beat out of an entire population, no matter how hard he tries.

He’d stopped trying so hard after that.

‘I’m not the sort of fool who can’t recognize when my time is better spent elsewhere,’ Luo Binghe eventually thinks in Shen Yuan’s direction. 

He isn’t naive enough to believe that Shen Yuan heard none of his other, less organized thoughts leading up to that one direct one, but he’d rather still hold on to some semblance of structured conversation. Otherwise, Luo Binghe gets the sense that Shen Yuan would start picking out all the wrong things in Luo Binghe’s thoughts to respond to - it’s much better to be clear about what Luo Binghe means to ‘say’ to Shen Yuan and what he doesn’t, even if the curse between them still conveys both.

Shen Yuan, for his part, seems to be watching Luo Binghe with an uncharacteristically quiet mind.

‘...it’s a bit sad if Binghe gives up on that goal,’ he eventually thinks, ‘but I suppose it was about time. It wouldn’t have fixed anything, anyway.’

‘Don’t make assumptions about things you know nothing about,’ Luo Binghe silently snaps back, once more turning to meet Shen Yuan’s eyes with a harsh glare. Luo Binghe may be on a mission to woo Shen Yuan back into his arms, but not even Luo Binghe’s most favored wives have any right to make judgements about Luo Binghe’s goals like that.

Shen Yuan simply tilts his chin upwards, unintimidated. ‘Good thing I don’t want to be your wife, then.’

‘You had better, or else we’ll be stuck like this forever, you -’

‘And anyway, I’m right. It isn’t because you have demonic heritage that you suffered so much as a child, so even if you succeeded in bringing that sort of dual-world peace, it wouldn’t have been a satisfying ending.’

Luo Binghe stiffens as if Shen Yuan had dared to reach out and slap him across the face. 

Shen Yuan, who came to this world with divine intervention, and who knew about Luo Binghe’s life in seemingly unnecessary detail, and who had been present in that mirror world and all its odd dreamlike peacefulness…

Luo Binghe’s thought about it, of course: the possibility that Shen Yuan’s soul may know the exact reason for Luo Binghe’s suffering, since the mirror world had been spared so much of it. It had been one of the reasons he’d been searching for Shen Yuan to begin with. If it wasn’t just because Luo Binghe was half-demon, then -

“Luo Binghe’s current goal is to find out why he was mistreated when he was younger,” Shen Yuan says aloud, and the scroll under his fingers burns to ash as the door at the end of the hallway opens a bit wider. 

Luo Binghe rounds on Shen Yuan in an instant, stepping forward a bit so that the column is not directly between them.

“That,” Luo Binghe hisses, “was cheating. Did you purposefully lead my thoughts in that direction, just so I would be thinking so strongly about that question that it would register as a correct response?”

‘We’ve been cheating this whole time, though?!’ Shen Yuan thinks loudly, taking a few steps away from Luo Binghe so that Luo Binghe wouldn’t be able to reach him without crossing onto his ‘side’ of the hallway. “No need for that scary expression! It was the right answer in anycase, right?”

“It wasn’t,” Luo Binghe snarls, his hands curling into fists. He wants to know, yes, but - 

“Then I shouldn’t tell you?”

Luo Binghe bares his teeth, frustrated in a way that makes him feel like his skin is too tight to contain it. He has to contain it, though, because Shen Yuan is still looking at him, and nothing will get better if Shen Yuan doesn’t like him -

“I have been living in luxury and success for over a century now - I’m not so pathetic that I’d keep wondering about a misery from that long ago. It wasn’t only my childhood that I faced hardships in, besides.”

‘Then why does the name ‘Shen Qingqiu’ keep coming up in his thoughts, ah?? He may be trying to drown them out, but he clearly keeps thinking about it??’

“Those thoughts,” Luo Binghe says lowly, “are not yours to listen to, no matter what curse may bind us.”

“Calm down, calm down, I haven’t really understood most of what I’ve heard!” Shen Yuan says, both his hands raised placatingly. ‘You’re really only proving my point, though - you clearly really want to know!’

“Then tell me, if you really know!” The words feel like they’ve ripped from Luo Binghe’s chest against his will. He - he does want to know, but it’s - it’s less about why Luo Binghe suffered and more about why - in that other world -

“Shen Qingqiu was just an irredeemable asshole,” Shen Yuan says simply. “It didn’t have anything to do with him secretly sensing your demonic heritage or anything like that. He just sucked balls and shouldn’t have been in any sort of position to influence kids.”

Luo Binghe’s mouth shuts with a small click. It’s…

It’s about what he expected, in the end. He’d suspected that Shen Yuan’s soul might know, but he’d also suspected that perhaps that mirror world had only been so…. like that because of where exactly Shen Yuan’s soul had ended up, not that it was there to begin with. 

Luo Binghe releases a slow breath, the air hissing out between his teeth as he tries to ground himself. He really… he’d wanted to know the answer to this, but he’d also known with a bone-deep certainty that the answer wouldn’t bring him any satisfaction. It really hadn’t been his ‘primary goal’ to find the answer to it. Rather, if there’s something he wants to know more than anything…

It would be better to find out how Shen Yuan is supposed to make things right. He needs to keep calm, and he needs to fix things between himself and this runaway wife, and he needs to figure out what exactly that runaway wife needs to be doing in order to make things better.

Once more, the space where Luo Binghe can feel Shen Yuan’s mind sitting against his own seems to flinch away, trying to draw distance between them even when such a thing is impossible right now.

‘There he goes again, ah… being the wife of the week is really too much pressure!’ Shen Yuan thinks, exasperation clear. ‘Just gotta get through this, just gotta -’

“Let’s just keep going, alright?” Shen Yuan asks, moving towards the next pillar and reaching out to the scroll hanging from it. “Look, next up is, uh - ‘what is your partner’s biggest regret’ - jeez, these really take a hard turn from trivial to serious, don’t they?”

Luo Binghe huffs, stepping up to the other side of the pillar Shen Yuan is standing by to confirm the question from his own scroll. Indeed, the latter half of this hall is why Luo Binghe is familiar with the idea that they don’t need a perfect score to pass - the more serious questions weren’t always answered correctly the last few times Luo Binghe attempted these trials, even with the wives most familiar with him.

For this one… Sha Hualing had tried naming a battle that Luo Binghe had taken quite a bit of damage in, and Ning Yingying had spoken about a cultivation technique that could have made part of Luo Binghe’s life easier if it hadn’t been lost in the fires Luo Binghe himself set in his attempts to burn out the major cultivation sects. Neither had worked out. 

‘So, what’s the real answer, then?’ Shen Yuan asks silently.

‘I don’t hold regrets.’

‘Why the hell does your face look so sour all the time then, ah? Come on, don’t hold back, I probably know about it through, uh, divine revelations and A̶̜̾͗͝ǐ̵͓̅̉r̶̠͙̊̔p̶͇̀̉͠l̷͕̔̈́á̴̮̞̘͋͐ǹ̵̖͖̖͋e̷̱̔̇̏'̸̯̌̑̃s̵̫̼̀ ̴͎̰̈́s̵̢͉̗̓͒͝h̵͔̋͛́ḭ̸̔̈́͜t̷̛̝̙̱ṭ̵̚͠ý̵̢͎́ ̵̝͉̑w̷̱̒̔ŗ̸͊̇́i̸̹̪̗̽͝t̸͔̰̚͝i̷̞̘̝̽̿̇n̸̢̥̬͆̑̚g̴͎̱̐ anyway. Do you wish you hadn’t been a disciple of Cang Qiong? Or that you hadn’t merged the realms? Ah, personally I wish you’d been a bit more discerning in who you married - ah shut up shut up he doesn’t want to hear you think shit like that…’

Luo Binghe’s lips pull downwards before he realizes, a bit belatedly, that his expression likely did look sour. An expression like that won’t pull Shen Yuan back into his reach, even if Luo Binghe is currently feeling a bit irritated with this foolish flower spirit. 

‘Hey, what the fuck, what’s with that mental image of plucking petals off me until I shut up and learn my lesson??’ Shen Yuan silently cries.

‘I don’t hold regrets that I’ve already gotten my dues for,’ Luo Binghe revises. ‘Right now, I’m regretting letting you get away with so much, little spirit.’

Luo Binghe then spends the next several moments thinking, in great detail, about this particular regret and how he would like to take his dues for it once things have settled between them. This method of just pulling a particular thought to the front of his mind had worked with the last question, after all, so it should work here too.

“...Luo Binghe regrets showing this humble Shen Yuan normal, everyday leniency between acquaintances," Shen Yuan tries. 

The scroll in front of him bursts into flame and the door… does not open any wider. An incorrect answer, then.

Luo Binghe clicks his tongue, irritated. “You should have answered more seriously,” he scolds. “How can you talk about acquaintances, when it’s an issue between husband and wife? What is ‘everyday leniency,’ when you act this bold and expect to get away with it?”

“Apologies to Lord Luo,” Shen Yuan says behind a strained grin, “could you please clarify? Since you’ve married such free spirits as Sister Sha Hualing, I thought you liked such boldness?”

“Hualing pays her dues,” Luo Binghe says, cheerfully putting on his most charmingly seductive expression, “If you want to pay yours the same way -”

‘WOAH woah woah hold on slow down what the fuck -!’ Shen Yuan’s mind pitches up in a panic, and Luo Binghe lets his leer fall, clicking his tongue again.

He doesn’t dislike the coy sort of chase-and-retreat act that he often plays out with his more shy wives, but since Shen Yuan had proved his main goal right now is to return to his divine origin realm, there’s a flicker of urgency fueling Luo Binghe’s goal to remind Shen Yuan of his place in this world as part of Luo Binghe’s family. A shy wife is not easy to woo quickly. 

‘He didn’t even MEAN it?? He’s just saying shit to try and make me stay?! This bastard, I really outta -’

‘Your turn to tell me your greatest regret, little spirit,’ Luo Binghe interrupts, raising his fingers to his own scroll. 

‘- outta just get through this quickly, right, yes, okay fine whatever. Regrets, right, let me just - uh, think about it.’ And then, quieter, clearly not a thought meant for Luo Binghe to hear: ‘Was it really just that I answered that question sarcastically, or does Binghe have a genuine regret that couldn’t be so easily hidden by trivial ones?’

Luo Binghe grits his teeth. ‘Binghe,’ again, rather than the ‘Lord Luo’ that Shen Yuan calls for when he’s talking to the Luo Binghe right in front of him.

‘Your own regrets, Shen Yuan. We’ve already covered mine,’ Luo Binghe reminds him sharply.

Shen Yuan’s gaze flicks to Luo Binghe’s from around the pillar, and he clears his throat awkwardly. ‘Right. Uh, try ‘eating that pork bun.’’

‘...Pork bun?’

Shen Yuan’s ears turn a fascinating shade of pink. ‘Well, you know, souls can’t cross dimensions so easily when they’re bound to a body… something like that probably sounds like a decent ‘divine’ interpretation of dying and t̴͍̎̿ȑ̸̢͝ǎ̶̠͘n̴͈̠̑͘̕ŝ̴̢̠̘̈̊m̷̥͍͉̈͒͝î̶̜̟̲̎g̶̬͙̓r̷̰̞̟̀a̷̹͈̘̎t̶͖͛̑̓i̷͉͋͒n̵͈̂͆̅g̷̢̽̏, right?’

‘You… died from a pork bun before a god moved your soul to this world?’ Luo Binghe clarifies. 

Just how much had Shen Yuan hated living in Luo Binghe’s palace, for him to run away despite clearly knowing from his past life the struggles of staunching hunger with rotten food when there’s no home or money to provide something better?

‘That’s - what? Does he think - ohhh he must think it was food poisoning from lack of better options, right! Ah, how embarrassing, I don’t want to correct him… it’s a bit more honorable to be seen as someone who died struggling to live than someone who just got angry and choked on a pork bun by accident, right??’

The small sympathy that Luo Binghe had found for Shen Yuan’s runaway act dies in an instant. 

“Shen Yuan regrets being so foolish that a bit of anger made him forget the proper way to chew and swallow food,” Luo Binghe recites dryly, watching the scroll under his fingers catch aflame. 

“Hey -! That isn’t -!” 

At the far side of the hallway, the door opens a bit wider, allowing the answer as the truthful one. Luo Binghe moves on to the next question scroll without glancing back at the undoubtedly stupid expression on Shen Yuan’s face. 

‘This asshole…!’ Shen Yuan silently cries, rushing to catch up to Luo Binghe. “Hey, just so you know, I normally eat very well! I mean, I - it was just a moment’s lapse, it - well, I was really very justified in how angry I was -!”

“Once we return to the palace,” Luo Binghe says blandly, “I’ll inform the cooks to preemptively cut your portions into small bites.”

‘THIS ASSHOLE -!’ comes the thought again. ‘See if I ever get angry on your behalf again, ah! Fuck you too!!’

Luo Binghe’s hand, half raised to unfurl the next scroll to read its question, pauses. On his behalf? Then, it was something in the divine revelations Shen Yuan had received - some misfortune that Luo Binghe had faced - that had made him so angry? That… hm. The thought of these divine revelations still leaves a bitter taste in his mouth, but it’s… not as bad to know that someone had so passionately responded to them. 

Still, choking and dying on a pork bun out of misplaced anger… is still pathetic, Luo Binghe decides.

“Next question,” Luo Binghe says, finally unfurling the scroll. “Name the person your partner cares for most.”

This question was another that had not been answered correctly for Luo Binghe in any of the times he’d tried to make it through this pocket realm. Luckily, it had been enough to know who his wives had cared for most - and to see an outside force confidently validate that that person was indeed Luo Binghe himself - for Sha Hualing and Ning Yingying to make it through this trial.

Still, Luo Binghe had best at least try to organize his thoughts to provide an attempted answer for Shen Yuan to try. Otherwise, Luo Binghe is sure that the fit Shen Yuan would throw would be grating.

Except Shen Yuan, for once, takes one look at Luo Binghe and seems to decide that he’d be better off answering on his own.

“The person Luo Binghe cares for most is his late mother, who would definitely scold him for making fun of the way I died in my last life,” he says, confident enough it baffles Luo Binghe.

The scroll on Shen Yuan’s side of the hallway bursts into flames. The door opens a bit wider. 

‘I don’t know why A̶̜̾͗͝ǐ̵͓̅̉r̶̠͙̊̔p̶͇̀̉͠l̷͕̔̈́á̴̮̞̘͋͐ǹ̵̖͖̖͋e̷̱̔̇̏ treated this question like it was some big mystery,’ Shen Yuan thinks, oblivious to Luo Binghe’s wide-eyed stare. ‘Even if a wife made it all the way through the trials and claimed her spot at the top of the harem, it still wouldn’t have been her name that was answered here. Obviously this was the answer.’

‘Obviously.’ Luo Binghe himself hadn’t even thought - after all these years, and after everyone he’s brought into his family since then, it’s still -

Luo Binghe’s mouth thins, his eyes dropping down to the ground. It is still her, after all, after all these years. Of course it is. The sort of warmth that Luo Binghe felt in that simple, rundown house, his hands rubbed raw from helping his mother wash some ungrateful noble’s clothes… He still hasn’t felt anything like that since then, even if he’s experienced greater luxuries and excitements and victories over the years.

‘No, that isn’t quite true,’ Luo Binghe thinks, drawing himself back up, curious of what expression would be on Shen Yuan’s face at this moment. ‘In that mirror world -’

Luo Binghe’s thoughts come to a halt. Shen Yuan is not on the other side of the pillar, where he’d expected him to be. 

“Over here,” Shen Yuan calls, and Luo Binghe’s head snaps forward to look at the end of the hall, where Shen Yuan is standing by the partially open door. “Look, it’s already open wide enough, right? We can go through now!”

“...There are still questions left,” Luo Binghe says.

“So?”

“We didn’t even finish this turn,” Luo Binghe insists. “The person you care most about -”

“Doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter,” Shen Yuan says, waving a hand dismissively. “The whole point of this date is to make sure that my answer would be ‘the great Lord Luo’ by the end of it so we can break the Life’s Binding Thread’s influence on us, right? So don’t worry about the answer now at the start.”

“Then hadn’t we best get to know each other a bit better?”

“Sure - that’s what the next two trials are for, right?” Shen Yuan’s gaze flicks over the scrolls between him and Luo Binghe. ‘A game of twenty questions would be way too lame for any major emotional beats, even for a wifeplot - no need to linger here longer than absolutely necessary.’

Luo Binghe’s brow furrows. He’d thought it before, but Shen Yuan’s impressions about romance… seem quite skewed. Inconsistent, too; hadn’t it been Shen Yuan who had defended this trial at the start, when Luo Binghe had thought it was immature?

“For someone who claims not to hold onto regrets, you sure do bring up the past any chance you think it will make for a good argument,” Shen Yuan grumbles, turning away from Luo Binghe to slip through the door. “Come on, let’s go do the second trial now.”

“I don’t hold regrets for things I’ve already been repaid for,” Luo Binghe stresses, but finally moves to follow Shen Yuan. 

Leaving so many questions in this room unanswered makes Luo Binghe feel faintly like his bones are itching, unsatisfied and curious, but it isn’t worth arguing. If there are things that are important for Luo Binghe to know about Shen Yuan, he will surely learn them in time. For now, progressing onto the next trial will be fine.

The second room of the pocket realm is completely soundless. From the first step Luo Binghe takes into it, it feels as if a thick wool blanket has been pulled over his head; even his sense of touch feels somewhat muted from being unable to hear the expected sound of his boots hitting the ground with each step or the slight rustling of his robes as he moves. 

Shen Yuan, having arrived in the room before Luo Binghe, is curiously testing the room. Luo Binghe watches him silently open and close his mouth several times before nodding in satisfaction.

‘This one’s a bit cooler than the last room,’ he thinks. Then he turns to look at Luo Binghe, a somewhat smug expression coming over his face. ‘Easy for a couple of mind readers, right?’

Indeed, if what they had done in the last room could be called cheating, then using their mental link in this room could only be called outright fraud. 

The floor of the silent room is tiled with pieces of porcelain, with each piece either engraved with a rune or painted in a bright color or both. The walls of the room are engraved with qi dampening arrays that prevent the use of flying swords or other such tools; to get across to the other side of the room where the door to the next deepest part of the realm awaits, they would have to walk across the tiles.

To Luo Binghe’s side, Shen Yuan steps forward to place both his feet onto a tile with a set of hashed lines carved boldly onto it. Then, hesitantly, he stretches out one foot to lightly tap the tile in front of that one -

Luo Binghe reaches out and snatches Shen Yuan by his collar, yanking him backwards just in time to avoid a set of spikes from impaling his wandering foot.

‘Do you know the rules of the trials in this realm or not?’ Luo Binghe asks as he releases Shen Yuan, watching him stumble a bit as he regains his balance.

‘I was just testing, just testing!’ Shen Yuan thinks rather defensively. ‘What if the rules had changed since the last time you’d been here, and we blindly assumed we knew what we were doing only to end up skewered like pigs!’

‘Hm,’ Luo Binghe replies, trying to avoid thinking something uncharitable like, ‘you don’t strike me as the sort of person who knows how to cook a pig, let alone skewer one.’

‘Too late, you thought it anyway, asshole.’

‘Hm,’ Luo Binghe thinks again, and then, very deliberately, ‘Shen Yuan’s hands are so delicate, kept pure of the hard work of a kitchen, truly beautiful -’

‘Very charming,’ Shen Yuan interrupts, waving a hand that suddenly looks scarred and wrinkled and burned all over in Luo Binghe’s direction. ‘Come on, we won’t beat this trial with you standing around doing nothing.’

Luo Binghe is, he decides, not a fan of trying to court little flower spirits that change their appearances at will. It makes it very difficult to compliment them.

Still, he obediently steps onto a porcelain plate of his own, careful to choose one that matches the symbols on Shen Yuan’s own tile. As soon as he does, both his chosen tile and Shen Yuan’s depress slightly, and the energy in the room grows thicker, like the static electricity that lingers after a thunderstorm.

Shen Yuan nods once, and then instantly starts to move with the clear intention of ‘just testing’ another porcelain tile.

‘Do not,’ Luo Binghe warns. ‘We must move together from this point on, unless you wish to experience the feeling of spikes through your legs.’

‘Then move with me,’ Shen Yuan replies, rolling his eyes. ‘I’m going to get on the tile with the picture of the weird tiny dick in three, two -’

‘What tiny dick - SHEN YUAN -!’

In unison, both of them move to nearby tiles, each with a small engraving of large ‘U’ with two circles on either end of the central arch carving. Luo Binghe looks down at it for a long moment, then up at Shen Yuan.

‘Weird tiny dick,’ Shen Yuan confirms, giving him an awkward thumbs up. ‘Okay, next… The umbrella with feet in three -’

‘Stop,’ Luo Binghe commands, ‘I don’t see an umbrella with feet. I can’t move there.’

‘What? Look, to your left, no your other left -’

‘That was left, do you not know your -’

‘I know my right and left thank you very much, you’re just facing the opposite direction from me -’

‘Then you meant your left, not mine,’ Luo Binghe concludes. Shen Yuan stares at him for a long moment, his mind full of uncharitable thoughts, before silently pointing at a particular tile to Luo Binghe’s right.

‘Umbrella with feet,’ Shen Yuan thinks, and then: ‘hey, isn’t this supposed to be easier when we can talk to each other? Didn’t Binghe breeze through this trial with Ning Yingying just by pointing and nodding and moving on cool badass instinct and sexual tension alone?’

‘That looks nothing like an umbrella with legs,’ Luo Binghe thinks, and then quickly after: ‘Yingying and I would have been halfway across the room by now, yes. Just focus on me, stop trying to come up with silly names for all the runes here.’

‘Of course it doesn’t look like an umbrella with legs, that’s why I said it looked like an umbrella with feet,’ Shen Yuan clarifies. ‘And anyway, they aren’t silly, I bet you’d describe them the same way. Or worse, actually.’

‘This one is just the northern demonic character for ‘rain’ combined with the southern demonic character for ‘walk,’ with an extra dash connecting them,’ Luo Binghe explains, gesturing at the tile Shen Yuan had indicated.

‘...What the fuck?’ Shen Yuan thinks, staring at Luo Binghe in complete bafflement. ‘Isn’t that an umbrella with feet after all?? No, before that, why are you thinking about two demonic alphabets smushed together, wouldn’t anyone else try to at least stick to a single alphabet when describing something?? And - and I’m not a demon, why would I know those alphabets to begin with!!’

‘Classes on most demonic and human regional languages were offered in the palace,’ Luo Binghe says, turning his nose up at this runaway that clearly had no appreciation for the effort Luo Binghe went to keep his wives happy. 

Shen Yuan blinks. ‘Hm. That’s actually… very interesting. I wonder why that was never mentioned in the lore… although, wouldn’t that be a bit backwards, incidentally encouraging bored wives to go out exploring a new land they’ve learned the local language for? Or it could be used to form cliques within the harem! Something like, ah, sister, I know that language too, let’s use it to tell secrets and gossip -’

‘The opposite,’ Luo Binghe interrupts. ‘There’s less of a tendency to gossip in front of others if no one’s sure which languages are or aren’t understood by the people around them.’

‘...Ah. Yeah, that works too, I guess. Anyway, umbrella with feet, three, two -’

They both move to their next tiles, and then successfully coordinate movement to a few more tiles after that, too. It goes more slowly than Luo Binghe had experienced when he’d cleared this challenge with Ning Yingying, but their mental link does make it doable without the need for an implicit trust between them both, so it seems to be alright.

And then it gets less and less alright the more time they spend in the silent room and the more Shen Yuan sinks into his own mind, as if not being able to speak aloud means that he has an extra thread to run his thoughts on. 

Thoughts that would have been only a hum in the back of Shen Yuan’s mind are given enough focus that they end up projected clearly to Luo Binghe alongside the thoughts that Shen Yuan does want to convey, and at one point Luo Binghe feels like his head is stuffed full of more of Shen Yuan’s thoughts than his own. For Luo Binghe, who has felt like Shen Yuan’s thoughts were already too chaotic and noisy from the moment their minds were first connected, this makes it extremely difficult to concentrate.

‘Maybe the moldy bread colored tile - ah, no, Binghe would have to jump too far to reach one of those, it would be difficult to time us landing at the same time - hey, isn’t it hot in here? Well, I  guess we’re in an enclosed space - actually, do pocket realms count as enclosed spaces? Many of them appear to be outdoors, but maybe they technically - oh, look we both have that tile with the lopsided smiley - did the person carving these do so while drunk?’

‘Shen Yuan.’

‘Right, right! I should think of a better way to explain the rune - smiley faces are still a thing in this world, surely? People still have faces and those faces smile, so -’

‘Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe thinks again, more forcefully this time. ‘Which tile - describe it carefully this time.’

‘The lopsided smiley - look, it’s got a tilted curved line, and then above that are two little squiggly - hey, don’t you think we should be able to convey images to each other? Sometimes I get bursts of unclear emotion from you, that’s kind of similar -’

‘Is the tilted curved line carved in deeply or shallowly?’

‘Shallow. Interesting that’s a variable though, what if you wanted to try the trials with a wife with poor depth perception? Binghe definitely married a woman with one eye at one point -’

‘I’m going to move now, Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe warns, and Shen Yuan scrambles to move to the tile with the lopsided smile on it alongside Luo Binghe.

‘Shit, don’t skip the countdown before you move! What if I didn’t move in time! I could’ve been filled with more spikes than your blood could heal me from, just because you were ready to leave me behind! Is that any way to treat your wife of the week!!’

Luo Binghe resolutely ignores Shen Yuan’s complaints, the same way he’s been trying to ignore all the extra chatter that’s been spilling from Shen Yuan’s mind. 

‘The tile with the red color and the symbol like a Four Toed Hog’s Breath, next.’

‘Again with your assumption I’ll know what that looks - oh wow that really does look like a Four Toed Hog’s Breath! How come this one is so much more detailed than the other symbols? Is it -’

‘Three,’ Luo Binghe counts menacingly, ‘two -’

‘Shit, shit, fine - okay I made it, what was I thinking about? Right -’

‘The next tile, Shen Yuan.’

‘...Hey, tell me honestly, are you trying to keep me on task because you want to beat the trial, or because you’re irritated listening to my thoughts?’

‘Ah,’ Luo Binghe thinks, ‘I was caught too quickly.’

‘You asshole,’ Shen Yuan thinks, ‘that’s kind of really funny, actually.’

‘I can assure you that it is much less amusing for me,’ Luo Binghe replies, but he can’t help but feel a bit relieved - the more that Shen Yuan actively converses with him, the more it seems to quiet the irrelevant chatter coming from Shen Yuan’s mind. 

If Shen Yuan only needs something to focus on to keep his thoughts from being too noisy, then Luo Binghe doesn’t mind if that ‘something’ is Shen Yuan laughing at Luo Binghe’s expense!

…Well, he mostly doesn’t mind. Shen Yuan will compliment him enough to make up for it once he’s been wooed more thoroughly, he’s sure.

‘Then I guess you better keep me well entertained, hm!’ Shen Yuan grins at him. ‘Anyway, let’s do the takoyaki looking tile next - hey, can you make takoyaki? Do you have takoyaki here?’

‘Describe it to me.’

‘Uh, well, it’s battered and fried - is it fried? It’s cooked, at least - octopus bits, and it comes in little balls -’

‘Describe the tile , Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe interrupts, and then, after a beat, ‘I’ve made something that might be similar using the Squid-Headed Angel Fish before, I believe.’

‘Ohhh,’ Shen Yuan thinks, ‘I want to eat that…’

‘I’ll make it for you, then.’

Shen Yuan whips his head up from where he’s examining the tiles in front of him to blink soundlessly up at Luo Binghe. ‘Really?!’

‘Why not?’ Luo Binghe thinks. ‘Once we return to the palace -’

‘Ahhhh,’ Shen Yuan groans, ‘this again… Come on, weren’t we starting to have a bit of fun, what with you trying to keep me entertained and chatting so my thoughts don’t blow your brain up? Let’s focus on that instead of your dumb stupid palace - forget about the tako-tile, let’s do a different one. Why don’t you choose?’

Luo Binghe frowns, but lets his attention be dragged away anyway. If Shen Yuan was enjoying himself… Luo Binghe glances down at the tiles. 

‘The tile that looks like… someone plated a handful of eyeballs to eat,’ he tries.

Shen Yuan’s mind lights up with something that feels - really and truly - like ‘having fun.’

‘Ah, look at that, he can play along!’ He thinks. ‘This trial really is only any good if we come up with stupid ways to talk about the symbols, after all. A plate of eyeballs… wait, that’s just the takoyaki tile again! Binghe!!’

Luo Binghe’s lips quirk up, somewhat pleased to be called ‘Binghe’ directly, and from there they fall into a pattern of pestering each other with foolish descriptions of the tile runes as they slowly progress across the room. 

Shen Yuan seems to default to dick jokes the second the opportunity presents itself, and then very quickly tries to cover it up with more mature ideas as soon as he realizes that Luo Binghe has taken note of that. For Luo Binghe’s part, he accidentally stumbles into the realization that Shen Yuan seems to know what quite a few rare beasts look like, and finds himself coming up with increasingly convoluted ways of testing that knowledge. 

‘The tile that looks like the ear of a Bat-Finned Purple Beetle,’ he’ll try, or ‘The one that resembles a scale of the Hook-Nosed Rat,’ and then he’ll watch in fascination as Shen Yuan correctly identifies what Luo Binghe had been referring to, even as he scolds Luo Binghe all the while for using obscure references. 

‘I’m really going to end up stepping on the wrong tile one of these times!’ Shen Yuan silently cries, shooting Luo Binghe a glare with very little heat behind it.

‘Apologies to Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe demures, ‘this Lord will endeavor to reference less beasts and more genitalia, instead, the way Shen Yuan prefers.’

‘Don’t make fun of me, ah!’ Shen Yuan scowls. ‘Look at this cheeky demon lord, making fun of me! I’m not the one that has fourteen different publicly known euphemisms for my own dick, why am I the one being bullied here?!’

‘Fourteen?’ Luo Binghe echoes, a bit taken aback. He’d been aware there were several bar songs that made references to Luo Binghe’s skill in bed, but that still seemed like quite a lot.

‘The heavenly pillar, the miracle member, the legendary love muscle, the - hey, don’t make me list them all!!’

‘I haven’t made you do anything,’ Luo Binghe thinks, and then, quieter and a bit horrified, ‘I’m not sure I wanted to hear that at all, actually.’

‘Obviously not. Why come up with so many, anyway, doesn’t ‘the heavenly pillar’ communicate all it needs to?? Stupidly big, stupidly - no wait, don't think that, don't think that, don't think that where Binghe can hear it, ah!’

Luo Binghe blinks several times rapidly. His lips suddenly feel a bit strained from trying to keep a straight face, and when he glances at Shen Yuan - 

Shen Yuan’s ears are a bright, bright red, to the point where it was nearly comical. Did he… notice his own embarrassment, and in the process of naturally flushing pink with it accidentally mix in some of his own shapeshifting abilities, resulting in that overly dramatic color? What sort of spirit with powers over their own appearance does that? That’s so -

Without realizing it, Luo Binghe lets his head tip backwards, his shoulders hitching in a silent laugh. No sound comes out, swallowed up by the muted energy of the room, but his chest still stutters as his breath comes out in short hitching bursts, and his lips still curl up in amusement. 

He’s having fun too, he realizes, and that makes him laugh just a bit more.

‘He’s laughing,’ Shen Yuan thinks. ‘He’s - Binghe’s laughing. I - fuck, and I don’t even get to hear it?! That’s so unfair!! Shouldn’t I get to hear it?!’

Luo Binghe lets his silent laughter peter out, turning to look at Shen Yuan with eyes still curved up in amusement. Shen Yuan looks away quickly.

‘Ah, shit,’ Shen Yuan thinks, still very clearly not talking to Luo Binghe. ‘I’m letting myself get swept up in it all. I told myself I wouldn’t, but -’ Shen Yuan glances back up. Luo Binghe is still looking at him, and their eyes meet easily. ‘Fuck. Fuck!! It’s so hard to remember it’s just a wifeplot!! Think of the cold, weird palace!! Think of how bored you were, and how no one wanted to be friends, and how Binghe wasn’t ever even home, and how he never even hung out with anyone when he was!! Think of how much that sucked!!!’

‘Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe calls, some of his mirth slipping away.

‘What!! Can’t you tell I’m panicking over here, ah!!’

‘Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe calls again. ‘When someone is unhappy with living in the palace, it can be fixed. There’s - a complaint system, I think.’

‘You… think. You listened to it so little you don’t even fully remember it?!’

Truthfully, Luo Binghe doesn’t remember it at all. He’d only thought such a thing because he figured it probably exists, likely created by Ning Yingying or Liu Mingyan or some other wife with a high sense of responsibility to the harem. That it exists after all is just luck.

Foolishly, Luo Binghe finds himself wetting his lips, even though he knows he can’t physically speak right now. At the start, back when their minds were first connected and Shen Yuan was trying to think nice things about him… Shen Yuan had thought something about how he wouldn’t mind being Luo Binghe’s advisor, right? Advisors handle complaints - advisors make complaints, generally, and Shen Yuan seems to like complaining quite a bit. 

The thought lingers for a moment, but Luo Binghe ends up shrugging it away. It doesn’t fit quite right when Luo Binghe hangs it up against the image he has of Shen Yuan in his mind, the same way ‘the head of the harem’ didn’t fit quite right either when he tried that earlier. 

‘Ah, what is this, what is this,’ Shen Yuan thinks, and it feels a bit like being tutted at, like a disappointed mother. ‘You still don’t know what you want from me? Aren’t we over halfway through this date, now?’

‘If you dislike life in the palace, it can be adjusted,’ Luo Binghe thinks resolutely, instead of acknowledging Shen Yuan’s recognition of his uncertainty. 

It’s enough to thoroughly woo Shen Yuan back into his arms. He’s already decided that. He decided that at the very start, so it isn’t a new decision. Shen Yuan has to be alright with living in the palace if he’s to be wooed, and so if he dislikes living there, then he can complain about it, and it can be fixed. 

‘Ah, Binghe…’ Shen Yuan sighs, his chest silently rising and falling with the breath of it. ‘What am I even thinking, shit… Let’s just keep going, the answer is to just keep going every time we hit this awkward feeling, okay!!’

Shen Yuan turns back to the tiles around him, but Luo Binghe finds that the idea of coming up with absurd descriptions for the runes has turned sour in his mouth. It had been fun, just a moment ago, the way that Luo Binghe usually only has fun when hunting a particularly skilled beast or mastering a particularly interesting new dish, but now…

He finds he doesn’t want to linger here any longer. 

‘This method is too slow,’ Luo Binghe thinks loudly in Shen Yuan’s direction. Shen Yuan’s mind, still frantic in its attempts to cover up his own uncertainty, slows down a moment to hum in consideration.

‘There isn’t really a way to go faster,’ he thinks. ‘I know you tried to with Sha Hualing, but didn’t the whole pocket realm collapse around you when you tried to piggyback her across the tiles?’

The pocket realm had, in fact, done such a thing, which had been why he’d failed that particular run of the realm’s trials. Luo Binghe truly hasn’t ever experienced a realm so strict in its own asinine rules.

Still, Shen Yuan isn’t Sha Hualing. Different methods might exist, this time.

‘How extreme can your shape shifting get?’ Luo Binghe asks after a moment of consideration.

Shen Yuan blinks at him. ‘Extreme? Well, I can do anything I can imagine clearly, but that doesn’t mean I can hold it very well. This body seems to resist being anything that I don’t think it should be.’

‘As in, human-looking?’

‘More strict than that,’ Shen Yuan clarifies, waving one hand a bit ambiguously. ‘Like, I’m not sure I could ever take on a form that doesn’t need glasses, because I can’t imagine a world where I don’t need them.’

Interesting. Luo Binghe had never heard of a spirit with such paradoxical shape shifting abilities. Generally, spirits were either unbounded in their abilities or limited only to their original inanimate form and the single humanoid one they’d cultivated to. Shen Yuan talked about his abilities with enough flippancy that implied he really could achieve just about any shape, but then he was also bound by such stifling rules like ‘has to have poor vision.’

Still, this seemed good enough.

‘How long could you hold an improbable form?’

‘How improbable?’ Shen Yuan asks, clearly doubtful.

‘With your arms long enough that you could grab onto my shoulders from across the room. Ideally, adjusting your weight to be hardly anything would help, too.’

‘Yeesh, what sort of ugly form are you imagining?! Arms as long as a room - I’d look like some sort of cryptid! Is that sort of thing even acceptable for a wifeplot??’

Luo Binghe, who has heard this term ‘wifeplot’ enough times now to understand it means something akin to ‘things that Luo Binghe likes and that usually end with a fun romp in bed,’ graciously nods his head. ‘I’ll allow it,’ he thinks. ‘Then it’s acceptable for a ‘wifeplot,’ correct?’

Shen Yuan stares at him as if he’s grown a second head. ‘What the fuck,’ he thinks loudly. ‘I mean - I guess? What are you, some sort of monster fucker?? Hey, don’t respond to that, I didn’t mean to think that so loudly…’

‘So is it doable?’

‘Well, it would be interesting to try it out, at least,’ Shen Yuan allows. ‘I’m not sure how weightless I can make myself, though - that’s more difficult to picture than having creepy spider limbs.’

Indeed, weight is a feeling that isn’t easy to imagine without having felt it in the past. In that case…

Luo Binghe shuts his eyes and, for the first time since they had been cursed, tries to open their connection a bit wider instead of keeping it tightly shut. The shape of their connection is malleable when approached like this, and Luo Binghe is able to make it - fit, sort of, into the shape of what he’s used to when it comes to slipping into people’s dreams.

Obviously, neither of them are asleep right now, but the curse binding them steps in to fill the gaps. Carefully, Luo Binghe feeds Shen Yuan a memory.

When Luo Binghe had been young and still working on fixing the damage done to his spiritual pathways during his time on Cang Qiong, he’d chased any number of legends about miracle cures and such. One such myth had claimed that a meal made of Heaven’s Pink Pheasant would improve his sword flying abilities tenfold.

In reality, it had temporarily seemed to release Luo Binghe from the ground entirely, and he’d had to wedge Xin Mo into a crack in a canyon’s wall to prevent himself from floating away.

It had not been especially pleasant. But Shen Yuan’s mind, when carefully shown that exact feeling, lights up like a child given a gift.

‘Ohhhh that is so cool what the fuck, where was this arc hidden?? If I’d known this existed, I would have hunted down one of these birds myself!’

‘I’d advise against it,’ Luo Binghe thinks dryly, extracting himself from the memory and carefully sealing up the connection between them to be as closed off as it can be. Thankfully, it seems willing to bend to this will - that brief moment in which Shen Yuan’s joy at the weightless memory had come through the curse’s widened connection had been nearly overwhelming.

Shen Yuan… is really the sort of person to feel joy as strongly as he does irritation, it seems. Luo Binghe isn’t sure how to feel about that; it’s rare to meet someone who feels so freely in both directions. 

‘Well? Can you make yourself weightless, if you think about yourself having eaten that terrible meal?’ Luo Binghe prods, and Shen Yuan nods eagerly.

‘Whether I can or not, I’m damn well going to try!! Aiya, why had I never thought of trying something fun like this before, anyway?! Obviously I’ve tried giving myself wings before, but I couldn’t get the proportions right to lift off, and my body was too heavy to stay in the air anyway, and -’

‘Shen Yuan,’ Luo Binghe interrupts, but it isn’t particularly harsh. Imagining Shen Yuan making a fool of himself in his attempts to figure out the limits of his own shape shifting spiritual abilities… yes, Luo Binghe can imagine it quite well.

‘Well, un- imagine it, please!’ Shen Yuan sniffs, and then carefully adjusts his stance to be a bit more stable. ‘Alright, here we go, c’mon don’t fuck it up -!’

Like all of Shen Yuan’s transformations thus far, it seems to happen in the spaces between Luo Binghe’s blinks, just outside his own awareness. It’s nothing less than jarring; in one moment, Shen Yuan stands simply on a porcelain tile some strides away from Luo Binghe, and in the next his arms have grown spindly and long enough that they seem to take up half the room’s width. 

‘If you dare call me ugly now after it was you who wanted me to do this, I’ll shapeshift my hand into a spiked bat to beat you upside the head with, just you wait,’ Shen Yuan fumes. Then, in a rush of panic: ‘Wait - shit, I’m going to float off this tile, Binghe you need to move - but where will you move to, we both need to move to the next tile at once -!’

‘Quiet,’ Luo Binghe admonishes. ‘Grab onto my shoulders.’

Obediently, Shen Yuan does so. Luo Binghe spares a glance at Shen Yuan’s hands on his robes - for some reason, Shen Yuan had shifted his hands to be long and spindly too, instead of just altering his arms - before quickly grasping at Shen Yuan’s wrists to keep him anchored.

‘Don’t fight me,’ Luo Binghe warns.

‘I’ll fight you all I please - I mean, I won’t, I’ll definitely lose, but it’s the principle of the matter - wait, what would I fight you about?’

‘Fool,’ Luo Binghe thinks with great amusement, and then he jumps. 

So far, the steps they’ve made across the room have been limited by Shen Yuan’s own abilities. He isn’t an especially strong cultivator, and even if he could jump further than a mortal, the timing of it would be tricky. Sticking to short distances that could be traversed in a single step made it simpler to ensure that they both left their current tiles and moved to their new ones in unison, obeying the rules of the chamber. 

With Shen Yuan a weightless extra tied to Luo Binghe’s shoulders, though, Luo Binghe could ensure they both left the ground in the same moment just by jumping and pushing Shen Yuan up with him. As for landing…

‘WHAAAATT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING - WE’RE GOING TO DIE WE’RE - well okay we won’t die but it’s going to be very painful to be skewered by this room’s stupid spikes - BINGHE PLEASE DON’T LET ME GET SKEWERED LIKE A PIG - oh wait - oh it’s fine!’

…as for landing, the whole point of using such an odd method was that they could move as far as Luo Binghe could take them, and Luo Binghe’s own qigong was nothing to sneeze at. In one jump, they directly leapt from their tiles about halfway across the room to the far end of it, where the tiles gave way to a platform they could stand on without worry about coordination.

Shen Yuan nearly collapses on landing, his form shuddering for a brief moment before returning to its original shape. 

He looks up at Luo Binghe with an incredulous expression. ‘That,’ he thinks, ‘was very, very stupid. And clever, obviously, but I didn’t like it, so it’s minus points anyway! What sort of date scene was that!! That belonged in the horror genre, not romance!!!’

‘How do you think with so much punctuation?’ Luo Binghe wonders idly.

Still, he’d accomplished his goal: they were done with this room, and all the messy emotions that had gotten brought up here could be safely left behind so long as they moved on to the next one. 

Luo Binghe leans down to pick Shen Yuan up by the collar of his robes, pulling him up to stand beside him. 

‘Not even pulling me up by the hand,’ Shen Yuan thinks with mild disgust. ‘This really is an awful date scene, what the fuck.’

Luo Binghe releases Shen Yuan’s collar and takes him by the hand instead. Shen Yuan, who is already standing at this point, merely rolls his eyes and shakes Luo Binghe’s hand off. 

‘Shouldn’t you have learned to ignore most of my thoughts by now, ah? Come on, you wanted to move on - let’s move on, then.’

Luo Binghe once more reaches out to grab Shen Yuan, catching him by the shoulder, and Shen Yuan again goes to shake Luo Binghe off before catching sight of the expression on Luo Binghe’s face and stopping.

‘...What? It’s weird to see that sort of look on your face, quickly go back to glaring or looking charming or something.’

‘I’ve been quite reassured that I always look charming,’ Luo Binghe thinks with some indignation. 

‘Well, obviously - hey, stop trying to cheat your way into compliments, it isn’t endearing at all!!’ Shen Yuan does remove Luo Binghe’s hand from his shoulder this time, but he doesn’t turn to walk through the door into the next room, so Luo Binghe doesn’t fight it. ‘So? What is it?’

He glances towards the door in front of them both. The third trial…

Truthfully, he isn’t sure how Shen Yuan is planning to use their mental connection to cheat it. The first and second trials were nothing more than silly games in the end, and being able to secretly communicate with one another naturally allowed them to beat them.

The third trial wasn’t a game at all, and it wasn’t something that could be solved with words. 

Once they both stepped into the next room, Shen Yuan and Luo Binghe would find themselves… displaced. It seemed to work like a temporary possession; for the time it took them to walk through the third room, their souls would swap bodies. 

‘It’s such a dumb, way-too-literal interpretation of the whole ‘walk a mile in someone’s shoes to understand them’ thing,’ Shen Yuan silently sighs. ‘But it isn’t so bad, really.’

‘It is,’ Luo Binghe thinks, remembering how Ning Yingying had failed the trial. 

The whole pocket realm was odd in the way it enforced its rules, but the third trial was truly the strangest. Although the trial only consisted of walking the length of a hallway while in control of your partner’s body, it also provided any challengers with ‘bail out’ talismans they could activate to quit early if being in their partner’s body made them... uncomfortable. 

Ning Yingying hadn’t made it four steps into the hall before she’d burned her talisman up in a panic, unable to handle the stress of piloting the body that Xin Mo had sunk its teeth into. 

If Luo Binghe had known the nature of the third trial in advance, perhaps he could have done something about it - he could have coached Ning Yingying on how to handle Xin Mo ahead of time, or perhaps even have found a way to temporarily unbind Xin Mo from himself so that it wouldn’t bother her at all for the duration of the trial. After all, although Xin Mo is an ugly, violent thing, it wouldn’t have been allowed to exist in Luo Binghe’s life of success if it couldn’t be handled at all. It was just like an unwanted child: quick to fuss and always greedy for more, but ultimately easy to keep obedient if one knew how to threaten it properly. 

Luo Binghe had not known what the third trial would be, though, and so no preparations had been made. For Ning Yingying, it must have felt like the same sort of suffering as Luo Binghe had felt when he’d first found the damned sword in the Abyss and hadn’t known how to handle it, allowing Xin Mo’s energy to burn right through him and leave him empty of almost everything but pain and bloodlust. 

Luo Binghe didn’t resent Ning Yingying’s failure, but he hadn’t bothered to put time into figuring out how he might teach someone else to handle Xin Mo since then. If Shen Yuan truly wanted to step into the third room with Luo Binghe, then they had to resolve it now. 

‘Aiya,’ Shen Yuan thinks. ‘Ning Yingying was just unlucky - anyone would scream if they suddenly found a leech unexpectedly latched onto them. It won’t be so bad for me, knowing what to expect.’

‘Xin Mo is not a simple parasite,’ Luo Binghe warns. ‘And regardless of the fact that Xin Mo’s greatest effects are upon the mind, it’s bound to my qi and therefore my body - it will fully be your burden to bear once the third trial starts. I’m not sure how our mental connection could help outside of allowing me to coach you in how to block Xin Mo out, but we won’t have the time for that once we leave this room.’

Shen Yuan shrugs with the sort of carefree attitude that makes Luo Binghe want to grind his teeth.

‘Look,’ Shen Yuan thinks, and then - there’s an odd sensation, like someone trying to slam a lid over the connection between their minds. 

It doesn’t work, of course, but it’s… frighteningly similar to the way that Luo Binghe shuts Xin Mo’s influence out.

Luo Binghe stares at Shen Yuan with wide eyes. ‘You… Is your god the same way?’

‘What? No, I don’t bother trying to shut the Ṡ̵̨̜y̶̧͍̳̞͊͘s̷͉̙̐̉̆̈́t̶̨̹̜͍͂é̴̮̲͋́m̴͈̘̹̜̿ out, it doesn’t bug me so much these days anyway. I’m just mimicking what you did when you were trying to shut the connection caused by Life’s Binding Thread - I figured you were using the same technique you use on Xin Mo.’

Luo Binghe thinks back to the start of their adventure. The memories of the bond clicking into place aren’t exactly clear, clouded with his confusion and the pain of missing an arm at the time, but he does remember attempting to close the bond after realizing it was conveying his thoughts to Shen Yuan.

‘You were able to mimic that after experiencing it once?’

‘Only once?’ Shen Yuan thinks, and his mouth twists like someone trying desperately to hold back laughter and still nearly failing. ‘Binghe, you reflexively try to shut the connection any time you start thinking of whatever world it was that you first met a version of my soul in! I haven’t decided if I’m glad to be spared hearing your direct comparisons to other-me or if I’m desperately curious, honestly.’

Luo Binghe carefully smooths his face into the most neutral expression he can manage. That would… explain why Shen Yuan has expressed nothing but confusion over that topic, he supposes. 

‘You just did it again,’ Shen Yuan snickers. ‘Anyway, I’ve had plenty of examples. I know Xin Mo will be a bitch, but just following your lead on how to shut it out should be enough to bear it for a bit.’

For a bit, sure, but Xin Mo would surely start fighting back once it realized that the one in charge of its seal was suddenly a less experienced soul. 

‘So we’ll run like hell to the other side of the hall,’ Shen Yuan thinks simply. ‘We’ll step in, body swap, grab the talismans in case we need to bail out after all, and then sprint through the trial while I keep Xin Mo shut down. GGEZ, and then we’re in the prize room!’

Luo Binghe watches Shen Yuan’s expression carefully for a moment, but there doesn’t seem to be any doubt in it. To be able to so easily plan for something like this, but to treat it so flippantly at the same time… Luo Binghe can’t decide if he thinks Shen Yuan is clever or a fool. A bit of both, perhaps.

‘Asshole,’ Shen Yuan grumbles. ‘Come on, let’s give it a shot, at least.’

Luo Binghe nods, and finally allows Shen Yuan to lead him into the final room of trials within the pocket realm. If things go wrong and they end up failing the trial, Shen Yuan will simply have to take Luo Binghe on a different date to make up for it. It isn’t a bad deal. 

As he steps into the next room, Luo Binghe’s ears pop, and then there’s a sudden flood of sound that nearly overwhelms him: the hushed whisper of air flowing through the passage way, the impact of their boots on the stone ground, the almost imperceptible hum of the pocket realm’s rich qi. Even the blood flowing through Luo Binghe’s ears suddenly seems catastrophically loud after having been immersed in such total silence in the previous room, and Luo Binghe nearly raises a hand to his head in pained instinct before remembering quite suddenly his concerns from right before he stepped into the third trial’s room.

He whips around to face Shen Yuan - er, to face Shen Yuan in Luo Binghe’s body. It really is quite disconcerting to see. 

‘How is it?’ he asks, before remembering that they can speak aloud once more. “How is it?”

“Just peachy,” Shen Yuan replies with Luo Binghe’s voice. Inwardly, his thoughts are a bit more honest: ‘FUCK what a WORKOUT I didn’t even know my mind had muscles that could flex like this! It’s like trying to hold down a body builder! And Binghe deals with this all the damn time?!’

Luo Binghe sets his lips in a thin grimace. Still better than he’d been expecting Shen Yuan to fare, then. He grabs a set of talismans from a post by the door they’d come in at, each inscribed with a loose sort of anti-possession spell meant to break the magic of the trial. As he hands one to Shen Yuan, Shen Yuan takes it with a grimace. 

‘This whole pocket realm feels game-y, but this is ridiculous - why are the talismans put up like a free brochure at a theme park?? It’s - oh, woah, look at Binghe! I didn’t think about it, but I guess it would make sense that he’d do something like this…’

Luo Binghe frowns. “What?”

“Oh, uh,” Shen Yuan says with a startle. “It’s nothing bad! I just forgot that my body - that is, the body you’re in right now - is a bit malleable, is all.”

Luo Binghe blinks at him. It occurs to him, rather belatedly, that if he were really in Shen Yuan’s body, he should be looking up at his own body, rather than standing at eye level with it. He looks down at his hands. The fingernails look identical to the claws he’s been used to for all of his adult life. 

Ah. He’d subconsciously shifted Shen Yuan’s body to resemble his own, then. They must look rather foolish, two of the same body standing next to each other having a conversation.

‘Almost,’ Shen Yuan agrees. ‘ Except Binghe made himself look… younger. Is it because he was immersed in that memory with the Heaven’s Pink Pheasant earlier, when he was helping me figure out how to be weightless?’

“If you have time to judge my shape-shifting abilities, Xin Mo must not be a problem after all,” Luo Binghe says lightly, and all at once Shen Yuan’s mind lights up in panic.

‘Ah, fuck, I forgot to be worried about that! Down Xin Mo, bad evil sword!!’ he thinks. Aloud, he says rather sheepishly, “No, I’d still like to make a run for it, I think,” and takes off down the hall without a glance back. 

Luo Binghe lets out a quiet rush of air - not quite a laugh, but not quite not a laugh, either - and follows. 

It turns out that when someone has a bit of an idea of how to shut Xin Mo out, it isn’t actually all that hard to simply run down the length of a single hallway while doing so. In the end, they clear the third trial in a fraction of the time that they spent on either of the previous two. 

They spill out into the next room dizzy with disorientation as the temporary possession is lifted and they both regain control of their own bodies, and Shen Yuan nearly trips over his own feet as his body rapidly shifts into the smaller form he’s used to. On Luo Binghe’s side, Xin Mo flinches back at the sudden control of the more experienced handler it’s used to, and Luo Binghe does the mental equivalent of spitting in its general direction to remind it not to get too cocky. 

…Luo Binghe feels almost foolish for how worried he’d been, just for the third trial to be over that simply. 

“Hey,” Shen Yuan pants, collapsing down onto the ground beside Luo Binghe and clutching at his head. “Didn’t you offer me an exorcism before we started these trials? If you’ve got something strong enough you think it could exorcise something divine, you should really take a look at using it on that damn sword of yours! I know it isn't nearly as bad for you as it was for me, but - still!!”

Luo Binghe hums, carefully circling his spiritual qi and then his demonic energy in slow, investigative turns. He doesn’t find anything amiss; for as much as Shen Yuan disliked the mental burden of holding Xin Mo back, he seemed to have done a fine job of it. 

“Compliment me aloud, then, why don’t you,” Shen Yuan grumbles, and Luo Binghe returns his attention to him, a bit amused.

“You’ve gotten bold,” Luo Binghe muses, “unless you’ve simply mixed up which words you’re saying aloud and which ones you’re thinking.”

Shen Yuan waves one hand dismissively, leaning back on the other to more comfortably sprawl across the ground. “We’ve been chatting using the mental link the whole time we’ve been in this pocket realm - saying it aloud or saying it in my mind, aren’t you already used to how I want to be talking to you either way?”

He isn’t wrong. After the second trial and being so immersed in Shen Yuan’s thoughts, Luo Binghe thinks it might actually be more weird for Shen Yuan to go back to trying to keep his spoken words respectful regardless of what his thoughts are doing. 

“Don’t call me ‘asshole’ aloud, at least,” Luo Binghe grumbles. 

Honestly, isn’t Shen Yuan’s grudge against him a bit too big, for that name to have stuck this long into his attempts to warm Shen Yuan back up to him? 

‘Asshole,’ Shen Yuan thinks a bit gleefully.

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe warns, but he still extends a hand in an offer to help Shen Yuan off the ground. 

Shen Yuan takes it gratefully - ‘Ah, there we go, he knows how to politely help someone up after all! I wasn’t sure, after the second trial,’ - and hoists himself up off the ground before quickly brushing any dirt off his robes.

Robes that look a bit like Luo Binghe’s now, Luo Binghe notes with some amusement. Shen Yuan had shifted his body back into his own shape nearly the moment he’d gained back possession of it, but there seem to be a handful of distinct changes to it now. His once earthen colored robes are now accented with a dark black, and the simple ribbon that had once held Shen Yuan’s hair back has been replaced with an ornamental pin reminiscent of the one Luo Binghe is currently wearing.

What had Shen Yuan said before - that his shape tended to stick to what he thought it ‘should’ be? Perhaps some influence from having briefly piloted Luo Binghe’s body had stuck around, then. 

That explanation of how Shen Yuan’s shape-shifting works explains several other things, too, now that Luo Binghe’s thinking about it. He’d clearly chosen his masculine form to shift back into now, and -

‘Ah?’ Shen Yuan startles, blinking down at himself. ‘Right, right - still in the wifeplot, need to look the part…’

Luo Binghe’s brows furrow, watching the shape of Shen Yuan’s jaw melt into something softer and his robes adjust themselves to be in a more feminine cut once more. 

“...You said you shape yourself based on how you feel you ‘should’ appear, did you not?” Luo Binghe asks, feeling somewhat displeased.

Shen Yuan blinks up at him. ‘Did I forget something? Soft jaw, longer lashes, red lips, feminine robes and weird flesh lumps on my chest -’

“Do you think you should be a man or a woman?” Luo Binghe cuts in. He feels oddly restless - he feels like he probably should have asked this at the start, back when he’d first deduced that Shen Yuan thought of himself as a man even if he presented himself as a woman.

“Well,” Shen Yuan says slowly, “I am your wife, aren’t I?”

Luo Binghe’s lips tug down, unsatisfied. Shen Yuan has made it… pretty clear by now that he doesn’t like being Luo Binghe’s wife, and it occurs to Luo Binghe for the first time that that opinion may be shaped by things outside of just how much Shen Yuan disliked living in the palace, or how neglected Shen Yuan had felt by Luo Binghe. 

‘Those things are still the main issue, to be clear,’ Shen Yuan thinks rather bitterly at him, but his expression has turned distinctly wary, like Luo Binghe is getting close to pressing on a bruise. 

Luo Binghe watches him for a moment more, his gaze tracing over the shapes of his face. Finally, he lands on what it is that he thinks is most important to say, here.

“I would have married a man too, if I met a man I liked enough.”

Shen Yuan startles again, like Luo Binghe had poured cold water down his back. “Really? I - no, I mean -” ‘- shit, what do I mean, this is so awkward -’

“You think too much,” Luo Binghe says, confident that he’s become an expert on the matter after having listened to Shen Yuan’s thoughts all day. 

“Hm,” Shen Yuan says, clearly disgruntled. “Maybe you think too little, if only this small number of thoughts overwhelms you.”

Luo Binghe doesn’t bother to protest. He only narrows his eyes, watching Shen Yuan, and listens to his thoughts.

As expected, the thoughts are always what give Shen Yuan away: ‘Shit, what am I saying, isn’t it pathetic to use that kind of insult on someone this clever? It’s Binghe, of course he’d pick up on things like this…’

Luo Binghe nods, pleased with himself. He’d been right, then. 

“If you spend too much energy focusing on fabricating small details like the cut of your robes or the length of your eyelashes, then you really won’t have the energy to learn how to grow working wings,” Luo Binghe says, recalling some of Shen Yuan’s ramblings from the second trial. 

“What would you know about what it’s like being a shape-shifting flower spirit,” Shen Yuan grumbles, but then - slowly, still watching Luo Binghe warily - finally lets his body melt back into the more masculine form he clearly prefers. 

‘Don’t you dare regret this,’ Shen Yuan thinks while glaring at Luo Binghe, and Luo Binghe nods, satisfied. 

Then, he turns to finally examine their current surroundings, the innermost part of this pocket realm. 

Like the rooms before it, it’s made of dark stone that glimmers with small flakes of minerals, but that’s about where the similarities end. The manmade feeling of the previous three rooms gives way to a natural cavern, and the torches that had lit the rest of the pocket realm are gone. In their place are crystals that jut out from the walls and floor and glow gently with the light of high purity qi, gathered and condensed inside the gems until it sparked into visible energy. Deeper into the cave, a shallow pool of water is lit with enough of those gems that the water in it is startlingly clear, and a gentle steam rises from it that makes it seem warm and inviting.

It’s… not as impressive as Luo Binghe had been expecting, admittedly. It’s undeniably beautiful, but Luo Binghe has seen countless beautiful things over his adventures, and he’d been of the impression that any sort of pocket realm that offered ‘challenges’ would also offer ‘rewards.’ 

“I think this is the reward,” Shen Yuan mutters, looking around. “Like - congrats on proving your understanding of each other, here’s a hot date spot for your troubles.”

Luo Binghe looks towards the glowing pool, then back to Shen Yuan, considering. 

“Don’t even think about it,” Shen Yuan warns, holding up a hand before Luo Binghe can say anything. “I also wanted to see a cool treasure at the end of all that, you know - let’s poke around a bit and see if we’re missing anything.”

‘Although,’ Shen Yuan’s thoughts continue in that same, sardonic tone, ‘this would make narrative sense. Start in a cave, end in a cave, nothing else to it.’

“You could probably eat some of these crystals if you want something ‘cool,’” Luo Binghe offers, moving closer to one wall to inspect the crystals themselves.

‘????’ Shen Yuan thinks rather loudly.

Luo Binghe looks back at him, unimpressed. “Aren’t you a spirit? Even if your body was originally cultivated from a flower, you should be able to consume qi from other natural formations. I’m not sure about the rooms we came through to get here, but the amount of pure qi in these crystals suggests that they, at least, are natural.”

“Literal rock candy, then?” Shen Yuan mutters to himself, coming up next to Luo Binghe to examine the crystals with him. “I don’t think I could imagine myself with teeth strong enough to cut through rock in order to transform that way, so how would I eat them?”

…What?

‘What?’ Shen Yuan’s mind echoes back at him.

“Did you cultivate this form yourself?” Luo Binghe asks, suddenly suspicious. “Or was it just how you arrived in this world?”

“The latter,” Shen Yuan answers slowly. “Why?”

“I see,” Luo Binghe says, instead of how the hell have you survived this long.

Shen Yuan clicks his tongue at him. “Still heard it anyway, thanks. What is it?”

“No one digests qi like that, not even spirits.” 

Luo Binghe reaches out to place his hand on one of the crystals, feeling the power in it thrum beneath his skin and slowly reaching out with his own qi to make proper contact with it. He can’t completely absorb the energy into him the way a spirit like Shen Yuan could, but he can at least demonstrate pulling it into his body to clean his own energy with, holding on to as much of the residual qi from the process as he can and tucking it carefully into his core.

“Like this, instead.”

Shen Yuan turns an embarrassed shade of pink. “I know that! It’s just - you said eat not circulate or absorb - damn it, stop laughing at me, I can hear the laughter in your mind even if you hold it in!!”

Luo Binghe only grins lazily at him, pulling in his energy and dropping his hand from the crystal. 

Shen Yuan’s own thoughts, after all, did not seem too displeased to hear Luo Binghe’s laughter. 

“Ahem, well, anyway,” Shen Yuan says, turning his face away, “I’m not especially quick with that sort of energy absorption. We’d be here all day if I wanted to ‘eat’ enough of it to gain a significant power-up.”

“Take your time,” Luo Binghe says lightly. “If you start feeling grimy from cultivating, the pool -”

Shen Yuan reaches up and cuffs Luo Binghe over the head before he can finish. “Try a third time and I’ll shapeshift into a rock and make you lug me out of here on your back.”

“You couldn’t hold a form that far from humanoid,” Luo Binghe says, mostly confident in it.

‘Damn it, why did I spill all the secrets of how my one super power works, ah!’ Shen Yuan thinks with a huff. “Who knows until I try - maybe I could shapeshift into a rock statue of a human, how’s that?”

Luo Binghe snorts. He’s now very confident that Shen Yuan isn’t able to do such a thing. 

They pick their way through the cavern leisurely, Luo Binghe occasionally nudging Shen Yuan towards an especially powerful feeling crystal but otherwise content to just let Shen Yuan guide them. For someone who had seemed quite unimpressed with the cavern when they’d first entered, Shen Yuan seems plenty fascinated by the tiny ecosystem in it, eagerly investigating every unique looking mushroom or particularly interesting rock formation.

“Oh shit, look there!” Shen Yuan calls, voice hushed. He knocks his hand into Luo Binghe’s shoulder to catch his attention before gesturing upwards. 

Tucked between two glowing crystals is a small reptile, its dark scales glinting in the light around it. The light of the crystals around it is pulsing slightly in tune with the creature’s breathing.

“Even lizards know how to absorb qi like this,” Luo Binghe muses, easily ducking out of the way when Shen Yuan moves to swat at him again. 

“Can you tell if it’s cultivating?” Shen Yuan squints up at it, trying to make out the details past the light of the crystals around it. “There isn’t that much food in here, could it just be absorbing the qi as base nutrients without the desire to cultivate further?”

“Regardless of desire, absorbing qi as base nutrients is cultivation,” Luo Binghe says. 

“Aiya, what a boring answer…”

Luo Binghe sighs. He looks back up at the lizard. It does not look especially intelligent. 

“No, it’s not cultivating with purpose,” he amends. 

“Just because you think it looks dumb?!” Shen Yuan cries. “I was a flower, you know - no brain in sight! And look at me now!!”

Luo Binghe cuts Shen Yuan a half-hearted glare. This little spirit had just minutes ago told him that he’d arrived in this world after his body had done all the cultivation work for him, and now he’s already changing the narrative? When was Shen Yuan himself ever a flower?

‘Tsk, I was caught so quickly,’ Shen Yuan thinks. “Whatever, whatever - I’m going to get a closer look at it.”

Luo Binghe sets his hand on the hilt of his sword, ready to fly Shen Yuan up with it, but Shen Yuan seems to have his own plans.

‘Floating away, floating away, floating away - ah shit, what was it -’  

The thought spills into a flash of feeling, ripped from the memory Luo Binghe had shared with him in the second trial of the uncontrolled weightlessness he’d felt after eating a Heaven’s Pink Pheasant. In the next moment, Shen Yuan starts floating gently upwards, his arms shooting outwards as if to help him balance and stay upright in the air.

“You can control it?” Luo Binghe asks, mildly impressed. 

“Not at all,” Shen Yuan says through gritted teeth. “So hold on to me, quickly, quickly!”

Luo Binghe snorts, but grabs onto the hem of Shen Yuan’s robes as he starts to float past his head. This… is not nearly as romantic as if Luo Binghe had just carried Shen Yuan up on his sword.

‘The guy who helps me figure out how to fly without a sword is the same one complaining that I actually make use of that skill?’

‘If you’re going to complain about me, at least do it out loud,’ Luo Binghe thinks back, followed by several especially vivid rushes of emotion encompassing how much easier this would be if Shen Yuan had just gotten onto Xin Mo with him.

Shen Yuan squirms in his grip for his troubles.

“Hold me steady,” Shen Yuan complains, as if he wasn’t the one who had knocked himself off balance. “I can’t quite tell… it doesn’t look like a Shining Silver-Clawed Lizard, and its scales are too iridescent to be the Black-Tongued Jackal Salamander…”

Shen Yuan’s voice trails off as he mutters to himself, cataloguing the details of the lizard-salamander-whatever. 

“...Then, this must be something new?” Shen Yuan reaches out as if to touch the creature, and Luo Binghe instinctively jerks him backwards to prevent him from making contact.

“Careful,” he warns. Even if the scales weren’t directly harmful to touch, interacting with a weak-willed creature in the middle of cultivation could easily get someone wrapped up in the creature’s backlash. 

“I wasn’t going to touch it!” Shen Yuan lies. 

“Then you also won’t touch it if I move you closer again?”

“...I won’t,” Shen Yuan agrees sullenly. Luo Binghe carefully tugs at Shen Yuan’s robes until he drifts closer to the rock wall the lizard is on once more. 

‘Something new… it makes sense, since Binghe never got to this inner chamber before, but - ah, shit, this is too exciting, I’ve never seen anything new before! Do I get to name it? Can I name it something normal sounding?!’

Shen Yuan’s mental monologue picks up speed, whirring with the excitement of a child given a new toy they can’t quite figure out yet.

‘Its toes are quite wide, and I don’t see eyelids, so wouldn’t this actually be a gecko, rather than a lizard? Does A̶̜̾͗͝ǐ̵͓̅̉r̶̠͙̊̔p̶͇̀̉͠l̷͕̔̈́á̴̮̞̘͋͐ǹ̵̖͖̖͋e̷̱̔̇̏ even know the difference between a lizard and a gecko? No fucking way he does, that lazy hack - shit, maybe the Shining Silver-Clawed Lizard was a gecko, who knows - the spines on its back look like they’re made of the same stuff as the glowing power-up crystals all over the place, is that from absorbing them? Was it born with it? Is there something about this cave that makes the qi condense into crystals?’

Trying to keep up with Shen Yuan’s thoughts when he’s like this is enough to make Luo Binghe feel vaguely dizzy, so Luo Binghe lets himself tune it out until it’s just a background mutter in the back of his mind. The chatter makes his head feel a bit too full, but it isn’t as uncomfortable as it’s been in the past when Shen Yuan gets too lost in his thoughts.

Luo Binghe takes the time to observe Shen Yuan, instead; after all, he hasn’t had a good chance to fully assess Shen Yuan’s preferred form. When they first met, Shen Yuan slipped into a female form too quickly for Luo Binghe to see much, and at the time Luo Binghe wasn’t interested enough to care much anyway. After Shen Yuan finally let himself melt back into this male one, Luo Binghe had gotten the sense that if he looked too closely then the little spirit would freeze up and start overthinking things again.

It’s a bit of an odd perspective, holding Shen Yuan by the hems of his robes and looking up at him. It makes him seem much taller than he really is, and the angle isn’t any good for looking at much of his face since the light of the gems around him casts a harsh glare onto the lenses of his glasses.

Vaguely, Luo Binghe can feel Shen Yuan’s thoughts slowing, his attention likely caught by the fact that Luo Binghe’s own thoughts are focused fully on him. 

Still, Luo Binghe doesn’t halt his observation. He finds that he almost wants Shen Yuan to know - wants Shen Yuan to feel the slight warmth that Luo Binghe feels. Somewhere between their entry into this pocket realm and now, the tension between them had slipped into something more playful, and even being scolded and swatted at by Shen Yuan in this final cavern has felt… fine. Felt a bit like someone reaching into Luo Binghe’s chest and gently untangling a knot that he hadn’t even known was there, even. 

So now, looking at the way that the gentle light of the crystal’s qi falls on Shen Yuan, and feeling the thrill from Shen Yuan’s mind as he observes the simple creature in front of him, one or both of those things makes Luo Binghe think that Shen Yuan might really be glowing just the same way as the crystals themselves.

Shen Yuan’s thoughts seem to finally peter off, fully paying attention to Luo Binghe’s own thoughts now even as Shen Yuan keeps his eyes carefully on the creature in front of him. The excited flush to his cheeks doesn’t fade, though, and his feet are still subtly kicking the air, the reflex of someone excited to have their feet off the ground, and so still Luo Binghe doesn’t bother to look away.

Instead, his eyes linger on the slight curve to Shen Yuan’s mouth.

Right now, Luo Binghe thinks, he really looks -

Shen Yuan’s whole body jolts in the air above him.

“Oi, haven’t we already learned the lesson about complimenting the physical form of a shapeshifter?” he snaps, whipping his head around to glare down at Luo Binghe. 

‘- happy,’ Luo Binghe’s thought finishes quietly, and he finds himself staring up at Shen Yuan a bit helplessly. 

“...Oh,” Shen Yuan says eventually, swallowing thickly. ‘Fuck, now I sound lame as hell, what the fuck.’

Slowly, Luo Binghe pulls Shen Yuan back down, feeling the weight return to Shen Yuan’s body as he does so. He doesn’t quite let Shen Yuan land fully back on the ground, though, catching him by the waist and pulling him close so that Shen Yuan is dragged up onto his toes. Shen Yuan’s breath hitches, his chest pushing against Luo Binghe’s, and Luo Binghe catches a frantic mental dialogue of panicked question marks as Luo Binghe leans in closer.

“I think,” Luo Binghe says, “that I could compliment your physical form just fine, actually, now that I’ve seen a few versions of it.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Shen Yuan scoffs, even as his mind screams something like, ‘please don’t try what the fuck why are you so close what the fuck -’

Luo Binghe’s lips curl up, and he brings his free hand up thumb at the corner of Shen Yuan’s eye.

“Here,” he says, “if you’re smiling because you’re actually enjoying yourself, your skin will wrinkle here.” As opposed to if Shen Yuan is smiling because he’s trying to wear that polite-but-mean mask, or if he’s smiling because he’s flustered.

“That’s - hardly a compliment,” Shen Yuan says, pushing at Luo Binghe’s chest to try and create distance between them. ‘Stop thinking of all my smiles so clearly!! It’s just a smile, I don’t want to be dragged in like this, ah!’

Luo Binghe presses his thumb into Shen Yuan’s skin, a feeling in the core of his being burning hot with something akin to irritation - something like being rejected, except it doesn’t feel like the way it normally does, nor does it feel quite the same as the other times Shen Yuan has pushed him away in this same day. 

Luo Binghe lets Shen Yuan go all at once and turns to look back up at the lizards again.

“Gekkos, not lizards,” Shen Yuan corrects absent-mindedly, and Luo Binghe can feel his gaze on him as strongly as he can hear Shen Yuan’s thoughts.

‘Why did he let me go?’ Shen Yuan’s thinking, the emotion of it tangled and messy. ‘That - it was the perfect setup for a kiss. Narratively, we’re already at the climax of the date arc, so this wifeplot needs to reach its conclusion, doesn’t it? So why…’

‘Who decides when the ‘wifeplot’ ends?’ Luo Binghe thinks, a bit bitter. ‘What ‘conclusion’ is needed here?’

Shen Yuan likes him - Luo Binghe is sure of it, far more sure than he’d been only earlier today when he’d felt the warm wash of Shen Yuan’s emotions of respect and awe for ‘Binghe.’ The things that Shen Yuan doesn’t like about Luo Binghe are solvable, now, too - Shen Yuan can be a man and a wife at once, and Luo Binghe can pay attention to whatever complaint system his wives have been using and fix whatever it is that Shen Yuan doesn’t like about living in the palace, and - 

And what? The rest of Shen Yuan’s resentment isn’t pointed at an outside factor; it’s pointed at the way Luo Binghe himself has treated Shen Yuan over the last decade that they’ve spent married, distant from one another after their first week or so of marriage.

Shen Yuan keeps referring to this date as a ‘wifeplot,’ and he assumes that it should end with them renewing their vows - or something along those lines. Even Luo Binghe has kept reassuring himself that things would work out so long as he wooed Shen Yuan back into the role of a happy wife, but what then? Wouldn’t they just return to the status quo? 

When Luo Binghe imagines treating Shen Yuan the way he treats any other wife, a slimy beast churns in his gut, catching his nerves and tugging at them unpleasantly. 

‘He still doesn’t know what he wants from me,’ Shen Yuan thinks quietly, ‘but he doesn’t want me to be his wife. How are we supposed to finish this, then? What else could the Life’s Binding Thread possibly want from us?’

‘What else would you be willing to be, for me?’ Luo Binghe silently asks, turning to look back at Shen Yuan. He doesn’t think he could speak the words aloud even if it didn’t feel inappropriate to break the silence between them. 

‘I don’t know - shit, I don’t even know why this is happening!’ Shen Yuan thinks, running an anxious hand through his hair. “Why are you -” he starts to say before breaking off, swallowing thickly, and trying again. “Why are you so weird, today? You weren’t anything like this when we got married a decade ago!”

Luo Binghe thinks just for a moment of the mirror world and the way it made him feel, and this time he is very much aware when he tries to slam shut the mental connection between them to prevent Shen Yuan from receiving any of those thoughts at all. 

“Right, right, the other-me you met, but - You’d met me before, and it didn’t make you weird like this! And you’ve been to other dimensions before, so it can’t be the simple fact that it was a different world, either, so -”

The grip that Luo Binghe has on their mental connection, squeezing it as close to shut as he can manage, slips for just a moment. It’s a mistake he hasn’t made since he was a child first learning dream control. 

“- holy shit,” Shen Yuan breathes, his previous dialogue stuttering to a stop. “You didn’t just meet another me, you met -” ‘- another you.’

“So what?” Luo Binghe snaps, frustrated with himself for daring to let that information leak. It feels unbelievably private, but he doesn’t even know why. “If there’s another version of you, shouldn’t there also be another version of everyone else? How is it unexpected?”

‘It isn’t unexpected at all,’ Shen Yuan thinks, his mind running a mile a minute, ‘except that the ‘Luo Binghe’ you saw in that world looked much younger, if that memory I got a glimpse of was accurate.’

“Stop,” Luo Binghe warns, backing up half a step.

Shen Yuan looks at him helplessly. ‘That ‘Luo Binghe’ looked the same way that this Binghe made himself look when he was in charge of my body in the third trial.’

“Stop, Shen Yuan!” Luo Binghe hisses. “You have no right to this.”

“I - I’m just thinking you know I can’t stop thinking, you’ve been irritated with me all day because I can’t stop thinking! But that -” Shen Yuan’s voice cracks. ‘What made Binghe think that he should look more like the other world’s ‘Luo Binghe’ than himself? Because that has to be what he thinks, for my body to have shifted like that under his control -’

“The other ‘Luo Binghe’ was pathetic,” Luo Binghe spits. “I was ashamed to share the same name as him, let alone the same identity. I want nothing to do with him!”

Except - doesn’t he? Hadn’t he been nearly desperate with the desire to find Shen Yuan’s soul, all because of what that soul had done to the mirror world’s Luo Binghe?

‘That’s right,’ Shen Yuan thinks, ‘he keeps thinking that I can ‘fix’ something for him. But what the hell could I fix? Binghe’s the emperor of the combined realms, and he’s got more wives than he can even remember, and he’s earned everything he’s ever wanted.’

“Don’t talk about what you don’t understand,” Luo Binghe grits, and Shen Yuan’s mind falls blissfully silent for a moment.

And then, slowly as if the thought itself is creeping its way through Shen Yuan’s mind -

‘Binghe doesn’t like it, does he? He wants me to fix something but he doesn’t want me to be a wife, and he’s clearly enjoyed today but today hasn’t been anything at all like one of his normal adventures because I can’t help but be a pest about everything, and he refused to kiss me earlier because of - of what, some sort of fear of returning to the status quo? But then, wouldn’t that mean -’

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe tries, his voice rough. 

‘- Binghe’s unhappy with his current life?’

There’s a feeling like static electricity running up Luo Binghe’s spine, and then there’s only silence. For one, hopeful moment, Luo Binghe thinks that Shen Yuan’s mind has once more fallen blank.

Then Shen Yuan looks at him as if he’s expecting an answer to something he’d thought, and Luo Binghe realizes what’s actually happened: the bond has closed. 

Luo Binghe rears back, horrified and furious. This - he isn’t unhappy. Everything Shen Yuan had thought had been true: Luo Binghe has everything he’s ever wanted, and then some on top of that. Anyone would kill to be him, and he doesn’t even have to worry about it because he’s so powerful that even the fiercest assassin couldn’t make him suffer these days. 

He isn’t unhappy, and he certainly isn’t so unhappy that some ugly curse should decide that Luo Binghe’s non-existent unhappiness is the most important thing that Shen Yuan should know about him. 

“...Binghe?” Shen Yuan calls, reaching out with one hand towards Luo Binghe. He looks shaken, as if the bond closing to that thought had been as much a surprise to him as it had been to Luo Binghe. “Are you… okay?”

Luo Binghe slaps his hand away, distraught and defensive and perfectly fine.

“Of course I’m okay,” he hisses. “Don’t tell me that you actually believe that something as small as some cursed thread could come to such wild conclusions about me and be right? Of course I’m - I’m fine.”

Shen Yuan’s expression contorts, like he doesn’t quite know how to react. 

“It’s just - listen, I didn’t exactly like the way we uh, were over the last decade, but it also seems like you don’t want to return to that either, and - and you are fun to be with when we’re not like that, and I do - shit, this was so much easier when you could hear my thoughts!”

“The bond closed by mistake!” Luo Binghe insists, his unease spiking at the mere reminder of the curse. 

“Right, yeah, but -” Shen Yuan swallows thickly. “I… I do like you, Binghe. I wouldn’t have married you the first time if I didn’t, no matter what the uh, the divine thing in my head said. So, if you think that I can help you -”

“There’s nothing to help!” Luo Binghe snarls, and Shen Yuan flinches backwards, watching Luo Binghe warily. “Whatever you heard in my mind - whatever the hell you think the cursed bond told you - there’s nothing there.”

Shen Yuan looks at Luo Binghe as if Luo Binghe is something to pity - something that Luo Binghe will tear his fucking face off for, there’s nothing wrong with him! - and then all at once his expression closes off entirely. 

“Alright,” Shen Yuan says. “Alright, then.”

Luo Binghe waits for something else - for Shen Yuan to apologize, maybe, or to just go back to talking about the beasts in this pocket realm, or to finally offer some sort of explanation for what Shen Yuan is meant to be to him, if it isn’t a wife.

Shen Yuan takes a small step backwards instead. The black in his robes and the silver hair pin he’d been wearing since they’d swapped bodies are gone, replaced with the simple outfit that Luo Binghe had first met him in.

“The bond is broken,” Shen Yuan says simply. “So it seems we’ve finished up here. Lord Luo, I’ll trouble you to escort me out of this realm, and then I’ll be out of your hair again.”

Luo Binghe opens his mouth, ready to argue, but - what could he possibly say? Shen Yuan is right. Luo Binghe may claim to still have business with Shen Yuan’s soul - after all, they’d gotten into this mess in the first place because Luo Binghe had been searching for him - but what would that business even be? He hasn’t known the answer to that this whole time, only blindly assuming that the curse that bound them would figure things out for him. 

Instead, it had spit in the face of Luo Binghe’s accomplishments and convinced Shen Yuan that he was unhappy.

Luo Binghe closes his mouth with a quiet click . He watches Shen Yuan for just another moment, half convinced that he’ll change his mind and start asking to stay by Luo Binghe’s side instead. 

He doesn’t.

Fine, then. 

The past few times that Luo Binghe had challenged this pocket realm, he’d been expelled from it forcefully when he’d failed a trial. Now, Luo Binghe simply unsheathes Xin Mo and demands that it create a pathway out for them. 

They both exit through Xin Mo's spatial tear without a word. Shen Yuan glances back at him once more - and once more, Luo Binghe thinks that Shen Yuan will change his mind and fix things - but he only nods once before turning and walking off.

Luo Binghe watches him leave for only a moment before he whirls around to head off in the opposite direction. 

Fuck.

Chapter Text

The palace is quiet when Luo Binghe returns. 

He’d nearly forgotten about the array masters that had been responsible for sending him to Shen Yuan in the first place, but they clearly haven’t forgotten about Luo Binghe, waiting for his return with expressions like men sent to war. They seem convinced of their own guilt for not having successfully sent Luo Binghe off to another dimension, and their own surety of failure puts the palace guards on edge. The inner palace is divided between women quietly keeping their heads down and women on the edge of their seats waiting for the expected action.

Luo Binghe takes one, long look at the array masters before dismissing them with a wave of his hand.

“This Lord recognizes your service,” he says with no joy, and the array masters exchange furtive glances and hushed whispers before one of them steps forward. 

“My Lord,” the master demures, “please allow us another chance. We’ve identified a variable that can be tweaked for power output -”

“This Lord didn’t give you permission to speak,” Luo Binghe cuts in sharply. “There is no need for another attempt.”

The array master stares at him dumbly. “My Lord means to say that the previous one… worked?”

“This Lord means,” Luo Binghe hisses, “get out.”

The group of them scramble to obey, their feet sliding inelegantly against the floor in their hurry. Several of the demons lining the walls glance at Luo Binghe with some expectation, clearly expecting him to start his slaughter the second the array masters’ backs are turned, but Luo Binghe only looks away and slouches down in his throne. 

The array had worked, after all. It was probably even still assembled in the hall Luo Binghe had lent to the array masters, even if its power had been used up. Luo Binghe could go back and use it again - would it take him back to Shen Yuan? Or would it take him to another version of his soul entirely, if Luo Binghe gave it more power than it had last time? 

Luo Binghe feels the sudden urge to chase down those array masters and tear them to pieces after all.

He calls over a servant instead. “The hall that this Lord lent to those old fools - get rid of it.”

“... My Lord? We can have it cleaned by -”

“Get rid of it,” Luo Binghe repeats, baring his teeth. “I want it destroyed. Put something else there instead - I don’t care what.”

“Of course, My Lord,” the servant demures, and slips away to obey. 

The palace remains quiet. An unease settles over everyone who had been waiting for blood to be spilt, and Luo Binghe is reminded of the way everyone had acted those first few days after he’d returned from the mirror world, wary and uncertain of how to act in response to Luo Binghe’s own odd behavior. That time, Luo Binghe had spurred the palace out of its moodiness by launching into action, hunting down array masters and information on parallel worlds and the theory of dimensional travel and soul tracking. 

This time, Luo Binghe doesn’t do anything at all, and so the unease of the palace staff and women of the harem persists.

A couple days in, Luo Binghe asks to be given the list of complaints from his harem. 

“...Complaints, My Lord?” An advisor echoes, clueless. 

Luo Binghe turns his gaze to the women gathered to the side of the hall, where several divans are permanently installed for interested wives to watch their husband preside over court. 

“There’s a complaint system, is there not?” He asks.

One of the women hesitates before bowing her head down. “There’s a method my sisters and I have to voice requests for change, Lord Husband.”

“Yes,” Luo Binghe nods. “I want to see the existing complaints.”

“...This wife will send someone to inform First Wife Ning Yingying; the requests are kept with her.”

Luo Binghe nods; he’d figured as much. 

The complaints are brought to Luo Binghe in a small ornamental box, with each complaint neatly transcribed onto strips of paper that have been folded and organized together with other related issues. Luo Binghe thumbs through a few of them mindlessly as Ning Yingying - who had arrived alongside the box - watches him with a keen eye. 

“...Is A-Luo looking for a particular sort of request?” She asks at length, and Luo Binghe spares her a quick glance before returning his attention to the complaints.

“No,” he says simply. 

He picks up an especially lengthy complaint, skimming over it briefly. It goes on for quite a bit about which perfumes are in fashion before finally making a vague, almost innocent sounding accusation that someone had added pepper to the author’s favored perfume in an attempt to sabotage their reputation.

“Are they all like this?” He asks, lazily waving the roll of paper in Ning Yingying’s direction.

“Like what?” 

“Petty. Four out of six of the ones I’ve read have been about perceived slights that don’t even have a suspected instigator. The other two were requests for prettier looking handmaidens.”

“Well,” Ning Yingying starts, looking a bit uncomfortable. “Generally, if there is a suspected instigator, the issue is handled more directly.”

Luo Binghe tips his head up in acknowledgement; he’s always encouraged his wives to fight things out as they see fit. Naturally, someone getting genuinely hurt would be grounds for punishment, but scuffling about in the sorts of petty cat fights that harems are so inclined towards had always felt like a more controlled option than if the women were forced to move more discretely. 

There were enough poisoning incidents as it was, after all. 

Luo Binghe replaces the complaint and closes the small wooden box with a snap. “There aren’t any others?”

“Is A-Luo concerned that we might be lacking something in particular?”

“The palace might be too boring,” Luo Binghe says, aware of how the other women in the hall have begun to shift uncomfortably. “Some of you might… feel inclined to leave, perhaps, to pursue other forms of entertainment or adventure.”

The gathered wives titter nervously. One of them gets up and excuses themselves out of the throne room entirely. 

“A-Luo provides for everyone well,” Ning Yingying says, but even she sounds a bit uneasy. 

“If there are some who have already left,” Luo Binghe says, watching the way Ning Yingying tenses up, “this Lord releases them of any obligation to return.”

“...A-Luo, banishment is a bit…”

“It isn’t a banishment,” Luo Binghe corrects, leaning his head back to rest against the back of his throne. He feels… a bit tired, he thinks. “They can come back if they want. They can still use the title of my wife, too. This Lord is only clarifying that there isn’t to be any sort of punishment for those that left without telling me.”

Ning Yingying releases a long breath. “Thank you.”

Luo Binghe nods, returns the box of complaints to her, and lets himself sink into his own thoughts once more. 

If he had felt out of sorts because his encounter with Shen Yuan had left some loose ends behind, then that should settle them. He can return to his daily life without concern, now, indulging in all the treasures that he’s earned in this world. It’s only…

It’s only that Luo Binghe hasn’t had a good fight in awhile, he decides. The slow, hulking beast he’d slaughtered when he’d first found Shen Yuan was hardly worth bloodying Xin Mo for, and before that he’d been too wrapped up in his search for Shen Yuan’s soul to keep up with his regular spars or monster subjugations. Even the pocket realm he’d conquered with Sheen Yuan - something that usually includes some sort of athletic challenge - was overall quite gamey and tame. Naturally he’d feel a bit restless if he hasn’t worked up a sweat in awhile.

Such trivial challenges, Luo Binghe muses, restlessly rubbing at the skin of his palm as if there was a knot there he could unravel, and yet Shen Yuan had still been hiding from that massive lizard beast when I first encountered him instead of facing it head on. He’s too weak. He didn’t even take advantage of all the pure qi in those crystals at the center of the pocket realm we went through. How has he been wandering around on his own all these years? Mediocre qi control for a spirit and limits to his shapeshifting on top of that, he’s really -

Luo Binghe stops. His fingers are pressing so harshly into his hand that the skin has gone white with pressure, and little pin pricks of blood have risen up around Luo Binghe’s claws. He breathes out harshly through his nose, roughly wiping the blood away to reveal already-healed skin.

There’s no need to think of Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan is… not what Luo Binghe was looking for, in the end. 

And what were you looking for? Luo Binghe thinks, and the lilt of the question sounds like how Shen Yuan would think ‘Binghe’ and ‘asshole’ and ‘ahh, don’t think that, what the fuck!!’

Luo Binghe stands from his throne abruptly. There’s no need to think of Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan is a foolish, audacious, ungrateful runaway wife, and his assumptions about Luo Binghe and Luo Binghe’s happy ending are naive and borderline treasonous. 

So Luo Binghe had a bit of fun with him - so what? If it was that he had enjoyed the novelty of someone willing to insult and question and play with him, that could be replicated; the respect and distance that Luo Binghe’s staff and women treat him with now is learned, and different behavior could naturally be taught to replace it. If it was that he liked how much Shen Yuan had known about him, then Luo Binghe could offer his own ‘divine revelations’ to someone else of his choosing, or find another cursed object to replicate the mental connection that he’d shared with Shen Yuan and gift it to someone else. 

Anything good can be broken down into a list of criteria to form a goal, and any clear goal can be achieved. There’s no need to think of Shen Yuan, except for only as much as it takes to break down exactly what made spending time with him interesting and figure out how to replicate it in someone else. 

“Mobei-Jun,” Luo Binghe calls, tugging on his connection to the blood parasites he’d shoved down the ice demon’s throat the first time he’d beaten him. “Come here.”

Silently, Mobei-Jun melts out of the shadows in the corner of the throne room. His expression is as unbothered as ever, but there’s a smear of ink on the inside of his wrist; Luo Binghe had managed to catch him in one of the rare instances where the man would bother with the clerical side of ruling, it seems. 

Good. They could both appreciate a spar right now, then. 

“Outside,” Luo Binghe says, jerking his chin in the direction of a hallway that would eventually spill out into a large courtyard. It isn’t a courtyard that is primarily used for training, but it would be easier to replace a garden than a throne room, and Luo Binghe doesn’t especially feel like holding back right now. 

Mobei-Jun follows without a word. When they make it outside and Luo Binghe rounds on him instantly, Xin Mo already in hand, Mobei-Jun has a summoned sword made of glittering black ice ready and waiting to meet him. 

The sound their swords make when they clash is ear piercing, the result of two opposing types of energy slamming up against each other behind metal and ice. The ground beneath them is quickly torn up by sword glares and rough footwork alike, and Luo Binghe’s arm aches with every harsh clash of their blades, the force of them enough to make his bones shake. 

Xin Mo’s energy pushes at Luo Binghe’s control, thrilled to be thrown up against a strong opponent, but Luo Binghe clamps down on it with ruthless authority. He doesn’t want this fight to be too easy, or to end too soon. Luo Binghe wants to fight this one out until his muscles are shaking and his mind can’t think of anything but the physical struggle of living. He wants to fight until the callouses on his palms tear open, healing abilities be damned, and he wants to fight until the palace stops feeling so quiet and his wives too reserved and his retainers too obedient and his challengers too fucking easy, he wants to fight until he stops feeling like his mind has been too empty without another voice taking up all the room -

Mobei-Jun grunts, jumping backwards to take a moment to pop his shoulder back into place. He’s bleeding sluggishly from one leg, frost creeping over the wound to prevent too much blood loss. Luo Binghe doesn’t give him a moment’s rest, pushing in closer, and Mobei-Jun drives him back with spears of ice that materialize between them with a sharp crack of cold energy.

“No magic,” Luo Binghe barks, swiping at the ice spears with his free hand and burning them away with a burst of his own qi. “Yield if you can’t keep up without it.”

Mobei-Jun’s gaze flicks to Xin Mo, then to Luo Binghe’s face, as if quietly assessing if Luo Binghe is in control enough to actually stop if Mobei-Jun requested him to. The hesitation makes Luo Binghe’s lips pull up in a sneer. The implication that Luo Binghe is acting unstable enough to warrant this sort of doubt is insulting, and Luo Binghe finds himself flinging Xin Mo away with enough force it embeds solidly into the far wall of the courtyard.

“I’ll use a different sword, if you’re so afraid,” Luo Binghe hisses, drawing out a spare blade from his qiankun sleeve. This one gleams with the pure energy of spiritual cultivation - a blade Luo Binghe had commissioned for moments when the demonic energy from Xin Mo would only put him at a disadvantage - and the feeling of it must be grating for Mobei-Jun.

Still, Mobei-Jun looks somewhat appeased, and after a moment he nods curtly and draws his energy back inside himself to focus on his swordplay, allowing the lingering ice magic in the air to melt fully away.

How foolish. Luo Binghe lunges forward once more, fueled by his irritation and frustration at having been doubted, and even more so at his own pathetic way of ‘proving’ himself to Mobei-Jun. 

He’d so clearly doubted Luo Binghe’s clarity and control, and instead of proving that he had a clear mind, all he had done was distance himself from Xin Mo to prove that it wasn’t the sword’s doing. He hadn’t even thought to make an attempt to show that he was actually in complete control over his own mind. 

Of course he hadn’t - even if Xin Mo wasn’t what was tugging at the loose threads in his mind, his mind was unraveling anyway. A fight was supposed to give direction to his restless energy, was supposed to ground him and pull him out of his ugly mood, but the more they clash the more Luo Binghe only feels his desire to scream grow.

It feels as if his guts are twisted and pulled taught, his own body trying to cannibalize itself in a desperate attempt to just get rid of the parts of him that have felt so ill-fitting ever since he returned to his palace, ever since he let Shen Yuan leave -

It feels as if Xin Mo is eating away at his mind even when he isn’t even holding the damn sword, feels as if he’s back in that foolish pocket realm imagining what the strain on Shen Yuan must have been like when he had to handle Xin Mo’s attachment -

It feels like he’s in a race against himself to get rid of the energy that buzzes under his skin like an electric whip, like a qi deviation waiting to happen - 

Luo Binghe spins, catching Mobei-Jun’s sword in one hand and drawing his own blade back with the other to prevent it from finishing its arc towards Mobei-Jun’s head. Fuck. Fuck.

He’d really been about to qi deviate, all because he couldn’t keep his energy straight while in a battle - all because he’d been distracted. What is he, a child? 

Mobei-Jun’s blade dissolves between Luo Binghe’s fingers, and the man takes a shaky step back, favoring his injured leg. The wound on it has not managed to heal yet; Luo Binghe had reached out to dig his fingers into it during one of their clashes, and now it only looks messier than before.

“Anything else, Lord Luo?” Mobei-Jun asks. 

Luo Binghe grits his teeth, turning his head away. He doesn’t feel any better than he had when he’d summoned Mobei-Jun. He only feels worse, and he’s certain Mobei-Jun can see it. Mobei-Jun probably assumes that Xin Mo had its claws sunk into Luo Binghe’s mind after all, even if it was still across the courtyard from them, all because Luo Binghe had been so out of it that he couldn’t keep his own damn energy in check.

Luo Binghe almost wishes that was what happened, just so he had something to blame that wasn’t himself.

“No,” Luo Binghe finally says. His mouth tastes like metal, and the tongue he runs absently over his teeth is too wet. Did he bite it, or did he cough up blood from one of Mobei-Jun’s attacks? “Dismissed. Don’t bother me until I call again.”

Mobei-Jun acknowledges him with a silent tilt of his head and vanishes, probably off to go bully a subordinate of his own to nurse the bruises that Luo Binghe had beaten into his pride. 

Luo Binghe, left alone in the ruined courtyard, lets himself fall backwards onto the ground with a soft grunt. Mobei-Jun had managed to leave him with several wounds of his own, but they heal sluggishly with so much of Luo Binghe’s energy in disarray. He closes his eyes tight enough to see stars, circulating his qi with a careful guiding hand - breathe in - and gently nudging it towards where his blood parasites were trying to work - breathe out. 

His forehead feels tacky with blood. A piece of rubble from a torn-up garden path digs uncomfortably into Luo Binghe’s back. 

Luo Binghe opens his eyes again, staring up at the sky with tired eyes. Fighting didn’t help - nothing that he’s tried since he returned to his palace has. He feels just as restless, just as out of step with his own self as he’d been from the moment the Life’s Binding Thread’s connection had snapped. He’s just… 

He’s unhappy after all, he supposes. 

The moment feels almost anticlimactic. The palace doesn’t suddenly start crumbling apart. Luo Binghe’s wives don’t suddenly materialize to cause a fuss or comfort him. The world doesn’t suddenly shift to emphasize how miserable Luo Binghe is or to magically fix the problem - it just keeps going exactly as it had been the moment before, as if Luo Binghe’s unhappiness is a simple fact of it, something to be expected. 

It doesn’t even feel appropriately dramatic in Luo Binghe’s own mind. He doesn’t want to cry or hurt anything. Not any more than he usually does. ‘Oh, my life’s efforts were for nothing,’ he thinks, and he thinks it in just the same way he thinks about what might be for dinner. 

After all, even if he recognizes it, what can he do about it? He’s spent decades building up a life made up of every good thing anyone could ever want; if something exists in a ‘happy ending,’ then Luo Binghe has already gotten it. There’s nothing left to win, nothing left to fix. 

Luo Binghe swallows thickly, bringing a hand up to cover his eyes. 

You got everything that should be part of a happy ending, he thinks, but you didn’t keep it all. Shen Yuan walked out on you years ago, and you didn’t even notice.

Shit. Shit again, just for the realization that Luo Binghe’s been swearing more since he had Shen Yuan’s mind babbling directly into his and probably influencing him in all sorts of horrible ways. What the hell does he need Shen Yuan for? He really didn’t notice when Shen Yuan left, so why would he be some sort of critical piece of a happy ending? Shouldn’t he have noticed if something that important left him suddenly?

…Luo Binghe rolls onto his side. The rubble digging into his back was really uncomfortable. 

Fine, so his time with Shen Yuan was - nice. It was good, even. So what?

Luo Binghe remembers the feeling of tipping his head back in silent laughter during the second trial, feeling playful and pleased as Shen Yuan watched on in awe and indignation at not having been able to hear the sound of Luo Binghe’s laugh, and the memory feels like sandpaper pressed against the inside of his ribs. 

---

The women and staff of the palace keep living normally, and so Luo Binghe must also. He presides over court as needed, settles skirmishes and disputes, and accepts tributes from visiting diplomats hoping to curry favor. It’s almost alarming how mundane it all is. 

Luo Binghe doesn’t visit the harem or call on any of his wives, but he hadn’t really been doing that before, either - not since he’d returned from the mirror world. Before, it had been because he’d been too consumed by his own outrage and his furious search for a way to locate Shen Yuan’s soul. Now, Luo Binghe is simply tired enough that he’d rather sleep through the night than call upon anyone to entertain himself. 

He’s been feeling exhaustion wear on him more and more as the days have passed since his spar with Mobei-Jun. It isn’t like the ache of a worn body after a fight or the foggy feeling Luo Binghe has gotten when he’s overused his qi or dream abilities - this is a weariness that tugs at the hems of his robes no matter how well he sleeps, making every movement feel like he’s wading through water. 

He calls on a curse specialist to banish the feeling, but even as they look him over, Luo Binghe knows they won’t find anything. Even the mark that the Life’s Binding Thread had left on him has long since faded away, and Luo Binghe hasn’t become negligent enough to allow a new curse to bind itself to him. 

Luo Binghe has always been the sort of person to only become more wary the unhappier he is, after all. Whatever affliction he has, it isn’t one he’s gotten from an outside source.

So normal life continues. Luo Binghe listens to petitioners, plays weiqi with Liu Mingyan, and makes a show of beheading a couple of fools that attempt to steal from his treasury. 

He makes a list of the things that had made Shen Yuan someone he wanted, but only ends up tossing it half-heartedly in the fireplace of his study. When everything gets listed out, it seems so simple - so easily reproducible, so easy to find someone just like that or train someone to take on that role - that it feels foolish. If a list that childish could fix Luo Binghe’s unhappiness, then that ‘unhappiness’ wouldn’t be such a serious thing to begin with. 

Outside, a group of Luo Binghe’s wives are having a tea party, and their soft laughter filters in through the window behind his desk with a muted sort of joy. A servant knocks on the door to the study before silently letting themselves in with fresh tea. The list in the fire burns to ashes, and Luo Binghe watches. 

…Is his unhappiness a serious thing? Can it be, if he’s been living this same way for so many years that he couldn’t even pinpoint when this feeling had crept up on him? Everything is so normal - so mundane in how it speaks of hard earned peace and luxury. 

The servant leaves. The women outside keep chatting and drinking tea. Normal life continues.

And then, during dinner one night, someone catches his eye. 

It isn’t uncommon for a servant or lady-in-waiting to try and sneak glances at Luo Binghe while performing their duties. It’s also not uncommon for them to quickly look away when Luo Binghe catches them, though Luo Binghe hasn’t bothered punishing anyone for those sorts of wandering looks since he was very new to the throne. After all, these days people want to catch a glimpse of Luo Binghe out of awe, not out of a disrespectful refusal to bow their heads.

Still, when this particular servant quickly averts their eyes after having been caught, Luo Binghe’s gaze lingers on them. 

They aren’t doing anything particularly noteworthy. They’re only dutifully refilling cups and clearing plates as needed, hovering in the shadows at the edges of the room along with the other servants when idle. They haven’t looked back at Luo Binghe since their eyes met. 

Luo Binghe should feel pathetic, letting himself watch this single servant with such intensity, just because the light had glinted off the man’s glasses in a way that had felt a bit familiar. Glasses aren’t that uncommon. In this room alone, there are at least two of Luo Binghe’s wives that are wearing delicate frames. The light glints off those too, and yet Luo Binghe’s gaze remains firmly locked onto the servant. 

Tugging at his connection to his blood parasites wouldn’t do him any good here; even if the servant did have some in him, Luo Binghe wouldn’t be able to tell from the massive amount of feedback he’d get from every other wife of his in the room. That’s exactly the sort of thing Shen Yuan would have thought of if he were to try and sneak around while still holding Luo Binghe’s blood in himself, but it’s also the sort of plan that an assassin or spy or even a particularly clever thief might think of if they were trying to come up with a situation in which some of Luo Binghe’s senses might be dulled from a sheer amount of information. There’s no reason to assume that Luo Binghe’s instincts had pinged in that servant’s direction because it’s Shen Yuan - it could just be another mundane antagonist to Luo Binghe’s life. 

Luo Binghe should feel pathetic, really, and yet…

Luo Binghe gestures for one of the servants closest to him to come forward. 

“The one in glasses attending to the mid rank concubines,” Luo Binghe murmurs, “Swap places with him.”

The servant bows her head in acknowledgement, though Luo Binghe catches the sullen look on her face; swapping places from serving Luo Binghe himself to serving a handful of mid rank concubines isn’t exactly a promotion. Still, she obeys without complaint, slipping over to the servant that Luo Binghe had indicated and delivering a hushed set of instructions.

Finally, the servant that had caught Luo Binghe’s eye looks back at him, expression unreadable. Luo Binghe holds eye contact, searching for… something. 

Pathetic, Luo Binghe inwardly scolds himself once more.

“Lord Luo,” the servant demures after approaching. “Can this humble one assist…?”

Luo Binghe taps a finger idly against the table. The tone of voice… was not dissimilar.

He watches the servant carefully. His face looks nothing like Shen Yuan’s, and he’s too tall, and his voice is too deep, and Luo Binghe had never seen Shen Yuan take on a form that had facial hair like this servant has. 

For a shapeshifter, though, those things don’t necessarily mean anything, so - couldn’t it be possible - 

Pathetic, Luo Binghe thinks again, more forcefully this time, as if he could startle himself out of this foolishness. Looking for Shen Yuan in every strange face, how hopeless can you be?

…Luo Binghe still doesn’t look away. It’s pathetic and it’s foolish and he should stop right now, but…

Luo Binghe traces his eyes over the servant’s face and neck. His skin is free of any small blemishes, no moles or freckles or old faded scars. Is it because he’s taken care of his skin or purchased a remedy, like so many of those who come to work in the palace and feel the need to elevate their own appearances to do so? Or is it the result of a shapeshifter’s intention to hold a disguise without thinking of the small details like this? Would Shen Yuan have thought to add those details? Would he have purposefully smoothed over his skin, in order to avoid having an identifying blemish from his ‘real’ form be recognized?

Luo Binghe jerks himself out of his thoughts, frustrated. 

“No,” he finally answers curtly, after realizing that the servant is still waiting for an answer. “Go back to your place.”

There’s the slightest tick of irritation to the servant’s brow, carefully masked behind an expression of neutrality and obedience. “Of course, Lord Luo,” he says, and -

Luo Binghe shoots a hand out to grab the servant by the wrist, standing so suddenly that his chair screeches as it’s pushed back from the table. The servant’s pulse jumps under his fingers as the sounds of casual dinner conversation fade and people’s eyes turn to them out of curiosity, and his whole body freezes up, looking at Luo Binghe with unease.

“...Lord Luo?”

“Servants don’t respond after being dismissed,” Luo Binghe says in a rush. His lungs feel almost too big for his chest, buoyed by a startled sort of hope. 

If it were a clever spy or an assassin trying to slip in, hiding their hostility under so many friendly faces that it might be more difficult for Luo Binghe to single them out, then they would have learned the rules for the role they had to play. If it were a similarly villainous person who was just mindless enough to not think about that part of their plan, then they likely wouldn’t have made it this far into the palace to begin with. 

Still, it isn’t certain yet. The whole dining hall has quieted down to listen in on them by now, making the silence that hangs between them feel deafening. If Luo Binghe pushes any further than this, he’ll most certainly have it confirmed one way or the other by how the servant responds, but if he’s wrong…

After a long moment, the servant dares to speak up again.

“I can only beg for forgiveness for my mistake, Lord Luo -”

“You -!” Luo Binghe says again, his throat tight. He can feel his expression twisting in a way that he doesn’t especially want the whole room to see, and he tips his head forward to hide it, nearly resting his forehead on the servant’s shoulder. 

That was not the pleading of someone who was genuinely afraid that they had made a mistake.

Luo Binghe had been right. It hadn’t been foolish after all, it wasn’t just a hopeless, pathetic longing - he’d been right.

“You really… didn’t spend much time in the palace at all before you left, did you? You don’t know how to act the part.”

“...I’m newly employed, Lord Luo, but I will surely double down on my training after this.”

Luo Binghe’s lips pull up in a grin, amusement and relief alike making him feel almost light headed. This fool… what sort of servant keeps talking back like this? What kind of servant dares to refer to themselves with such a casual pronoun?

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe breathes. The servant - Shen Yuan, it has to be Shen Yuan - goes stiff. “Shen Yuan, it’s you.”

Finally, Shen Yuan stays silent. Luo Binghe wants to lean in further, to tuck his nose into the crook of Shen Yuan’s neck, to let his tired weight fall on Shen Yuan’s shoulders - but the thought of so many others seeing Luo Binghe do such a thing makes him uneasy. He stands up straight instead, keeping his hand wrapped tight around Shen Yuan’s wrist, and turns to address the room.

“This Lord will be retiring early,” he says, ignoring the curious looks some of his closer wives shoot him. “Please enjoy the rest of your dinner.”

It isn’t unprecedented for Luo Binghe to abscond with someone before a meal has finished, but it hasn’t happened in awhile, and it certainly has never looked like - well. Luo Binghe spares a moment to look Shen Yuan up and down, considering. 

“A beard doesn’t suit you,” he mutters at length, amused at the way Shen Yuan bristles in response. He looks like he’s about to strain something in his attempts to keep silent and finish out his act as a ‘servant.’

“If Lord Luo wishes to retire for the evening, then I’ll -”

“Come with me,” Luo Binghe finishes for him, finally turning from the table and moving to exit the room, pulling Shen Yuan along behind him. 

Behind him, he can already hear the hushed whispers of gossip begin to break out, but he doesn’t bother to turn back and scold them. If he pauses even for a moment, he’s nearly certain that Shen Yuan will try to squirm out of this, and Luo Binghe really can’t bear to even think about that happening.

He’s spent the past fortnight trying to convince himself that he wasn’t unhappy, that he had no need for Shen Yuan. 

Now that he has Shen Yuan within his grasp again, he’s going to damn well try to keep him there, so that he doesn’t have to bother with such futile arguments with himself in the future.

“Lord Luo,” Shen Yuan calls as Luo Binghe pulls him down the hallway, “I think you’ve gotten me mistaken for someone else.”

“I haven’t,” Luo Binghe says simply. His rooms have never felt so far away from the main dining hall before. 

“I really think you have,” Shen Yuan says, starting to test Luo Binghe’s grip on him, tentatively trying to pull his arm back as he stumbles along after him. 

Luo Binghe glances back once, his gaze dipping to the way Shen Yuan’s feet hit the ground too hard, his pace just a bit too awkward. 

“You’re not used to moving around with this much of a longer gait,” Luo Binghe says, amused. “You made yourself too tall, or at least didn’t practice enough at this height for it to look natural.”

“I didn’t - Lord Luo,” Shen Yuan tries again, hissing at him like an offended cat.

Sensing the end of Shen Yuan’s patience, Luo Binghe finally comes to a stop, pulling them both into an alcove, out of sight of anyone happening to look down this particular hallway. They barely fit when standing face to face like this, squeezed between an ornamental vase and a pillar with carefully carved symbols on it marking it as part of the large defense array that spans the entire palace.

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe says, embarrassed at his own eagerness but unable to stop himself. “Shen Yuan.”

Shen Yuan lets out a short, frustrated breath through his nose, but there’s something just slightly off about his form now - he’s just a bit shorter, the ugly facial hair he’d chosen just a bit less scraggly. If Shen Yuan has trouble holding a shape that he doesn’t think he ‘should’ appear in, then Luo Binghe calling out to Shen Yuan by his name would surely destabilize his ability to think that he ‘should’ appear in a disguise.

He still refuses to drop the disguise entirely, though, so Luo Binghe pushes a bit further.

“If you wanted to sneak in,” Luo Binghe says, his lips curling up in amusement, “you should have chosen a role you were more familiar with - a lady in waiting, at the very least, if you didn’t want to arrive as my wife directly.”

Finally, Shen Yuan seems to give up on completely schooling his expression.

“Can you really say that kind of thing with such a straight face, when you’re looking at someone who looks like -” Shen Yuan breaks off, gesturing vaguely to his beard. It really, truly does not look very good on him. 

Luo Binghe tips his head forwards, leaning a bit closer into Shen Yuan’s space. 

“I told you,” he says softly. “I would’ve taken a man as a wife too, if I liked him enough. Even one with an ugly beard.”

Shen Yuan’s breath hitches. Parts of his disguise have melted away entirely, now, and Luo Binghe has to bend down further to keep the distance between them small as Shen Yuan grows shorter. 

“You need better taste,” Shen Yuan mutters, as if trying to cover up his own embarrassment with irritation. After a belated moment, he adds: “Respectfully. Lord Luo.”

Luo Binghe huffs softly, amused, and finally lets go of Shen Yuan’s wrist in order to reach up and cradle Shen Yuan’s face instead.

“You protest,” he says quietly, tracing his thumb over the faint wrinkle at the corner of Shen Yuan’s eye, “but you’re actually quite happy that I recognized you like this.”

Shen Yuan shudders under his touch, then closes his eyes, looking a bit defeated. When he opens them again, he looks entirely like the version of himself that Luo Binghe had grown familiar with, fully discarding his disguise. 

Luo Binghe drinks up the sight greedily, memorizing the details. There are some small skin blemishes after all, in this form: a small, barely there scar on his chin and a couple dark freckles on his neck. Were they things Shen Yuan felt he had ‘earned’ at some point, and had therefore purposefully worked into his usual form? Or were they mindless holdovers from whatever world he had come from, before a god had lifted his soul up and deposited it into this more malleable flower spirit’s body? 

Luo Binghe wants to know. He wants to know so badly it aches, the same way that the weariness of the past couple weeks had made Luo Binghe ache, desperate to just give in and let it wash over him. 

Just the other day, he’d asked himself if his unhappiness was such a big deal. Now, warmed by the mere sight of the freckles on Shen Yuan’s neck, he feels foolish for having wondered. 

“Well,” Shen Yuan says, pulling Luo Binghe from his thoughts, “I suppose I should have expected to be caught, given how much I scolded you for not recognizing me last time.”

“I told you that I’d listen to your complaints,” Luo Binghe agrees, satisfied. 

“Still,” Shen Yuan protests, “dragging me off in the middle of dinner like that! Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of master of subtlety and manipulation?”

“I see,” Luo Binghe says, slipping his hand down Shen Yuan’s face to tug lightly at his cheek instead. “I should have pretended to have caught an intruder and dragged you off for punishment instead, then?”

“You should’ve - well, I don’t know! Not that, certainly,” Shen Yuan huffs, reaching up to swat Luo Binghe’s hand away. 

Luo Binghe watches him for another moment, basking in the light feeling in his chest, before letting his smile fall. The mood sombers, and the easy way that Luo Binghe had been teasing Shen Yuan just a moment ago suddenly feels stifled in the nervous energy between them both.

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe calls quietly. “Why are you here? I thought you didn’t like the palace.”

“I didn’t - I don’t,” Shen Yuan agrees, “but… I don’t think you like it very much, either.”

Luo Binghe presses his mouth in a thin line, unwilling to respond. Even after having recognized his own unhappiness, it’s difficult to interpolate that forwards in this particular direction. Why wouldn’t he like the palace? It’s well protected and full of more luxuries than he ever could have dreamt of as a child. It’s massive, too - large enough to convey his power and wealth and to also hold the large number of women that he had taken in over the years, pleased to expand the number of people that he had considered his family. 

Shen Yuan seems to see some of that on his face, his brows furrowing. 

“Binghe… I was quite literally in your head, you know.”

“I never thought anything bad about the palace,” Luo Binghe says, quite sure of that.

If he can’t even find fault in the ‘good’ things in his life now, after having admitted to his unhappiness, he certainly couldn’t have beforehand. 

“You didn’t,” Shen Yuan says. “And yet, I never once heard you refer to this place as ‘home.’”

“It would be like referring to a city as a home,” Luo Binghe argues. “It’s too big for that sort of thinking.”

There’s an uneasy silence as Shen Yuan holds his gaze with a look that could only be described as challenging. Luo Binghe’s heart beats a restless rhythm against the inside of his ribs. 

“Alright,” Shen Yuan allows after a moment. “Then, if you’re happy and home here, I can just -”

Luo Binghe’s hands shoot out without his own conscious thought, grabbing at Shen Yuan’s waist, anchoring him in place. Shen Yuan raises one brow at him, but Luo Binghe stubbornly holds on.

“You’d believe me if you lived here long enough,” Luo Binghe insists. “If you aren’t convinced, then stay.”

“Hm,” Shen Yuan says, and though their minds are no longer connected, Luo Binghe swears he can still hear the shape of what he’s thinking. It isn’t especially kind.

“You’re calling me an asshole again in your mind, aren’t you?” Luo Binghe asks sullenly.

“You’re being an asshole again, aren’t you?” Shen Yuan snaps. “Hands off, Binghe.”

Reluctantly, Luo Binghe lets his hands fall back to his own sides. He’d known, vaguely, that this would be the outcome from the moment that he reached out to touch Shen Yuan, and yet he’d tried to insist that Shen Yuan stay by his side anyway. 

Fuck. Just how pathetic can he get?

“What sort of face is that, ah…” Shen Yuan sighs, watching Luo Binghe with a complicated expression. 

“Don’t look if you don’t want to see it,” Luo Binghe says a bit waspishly. He feels like he’s falling back into the pit of uncomfortable emotions that he’s been stewing in for the last couple weeks, tired and uncertain and like his skin is too tight to hold everything inside him.

Shen Yuan doesn’t stop looking.

“Why are you here?” Luo Binghe asks again, more insistent this time. “If you don’t like it here and won’t stay long enough to try and change that, then why come here at all?”

“Why do you think, ah? Binghe, really, you should have done a better job convincing me that the Life’s Binding Thread was wrong - that I was wrong,” Shen Yuan says, frustration clear in his voice. “Of course I came back here, how was I supposed to just - go on with life, knowing that you were -!”

Shen Yuan breaks off, looking warily at Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe looks back helplessly, the fight draining out of him.

“Unhappy,” Luo Binghe finishes for Shen Yuan. 

“Unhappy,” Shen Yuan echoes, voice soft. “I just - I couldn’t do it. You’re Binghe.”

Luo Binghe lets his eyes fall shut, playing the sounds of those words over and over again inside his own mind. ‘You’re Binghe,’ Shen Yuan had said, ‘you’re Binghe.’  

Shen Yuan had called Luo Binghe by that name before, but it feels different hearing it put like this. ‘You’re Binghe,’ Shen Yuan said, and he really meant it - meant to call Luo Binghe as the same ‘Binghe’ that Shen Yuan had held such extreme fondness and awe for, the ‘Binghe’ that was so separate from ‘Lord Luo’ in his mind. 

“I am unhappy,” Luo Binghe admits, his voice scraped raw. “And I’m - I’m so tired, Shen Yuan. I don’t know what else I’m missing that would make me happy.”

“Fuck,” Shen Yuan swears under his breath, and Luo Binghe opens his eyes to look at him again. He looks - devastated, almost, to hear Luo Binghe admit to it. 

“But,” Luo Binghe says, his breath shallow, “I enjoyed the date we spent together.”

“Fuck,” Shen Yuan swears again. “Binghe, you - you can’t just say it like usual, you have to know that by now!”

“I know,” Luo Binghe says. “I know, but I still want to say it anyway.”

That day that they’d spent together, he’d been so unsure about what Shen Yuan was supposed to be to him - how Shen Yuan’s soul might fix the ambiguous discomfort he’d felt since visiting the mirror world, or how Shen Yuan might live in a role like ‘head of the harem’ or ‘trusted advisor’ or some completely new position that Shen Yuan might come up with himself. 

Now, it feels almost trivially easy to answer: he just wants Shen Yuan close. He enjoyed the time they spent together. What else is he supposed to say?

He means it the way he normally does, of course. Stay close to me, I’ll take care of you, let’s get married. He doesn’t know another way to mean it. 

It feels different this time, though. ‘Stay close to me,’ he thinks, and it feels like a desperate drumming of his heart, like the way his hands are itching to reach out and touch and grab and make Shen Yuan stay close. ‘I’ll take care of you,’ he thinks, and it feels less like a promise to provide a safe home and food security and more like reaching out to take Shen Yuan’s hand in his so the little spirit can drag Luo Binghe all over the combined realms, helping him cheat his way through pocket realms and get close to whatever beast catches his eye and teasing him through all of it.

‘Let’s get married,’ he thinks, but they already are married, it's just… Luo Binghe isn’t sure. He thinks it anyway. He hopes desperately that he’s thinking it in a different way than he had a decade ago, because he doesn’t know what he’d do if Shen Yuan decided to leave him again.

He enjoyed his time with Shen Yuan, and he’s been nothing but weary and unhappy after coming back to the palace by himself, and so he thinks all these things while Shen Yuan watches him like he’s a horrible disaster he can’t tear his eyes from. 

Luo Binghe doesn’t look away. He’d been in Shen Yuan’s head, too; Shen Yuan didn’t like being Luo Binghe’s wife, but he’d enjoyed their date just as much as Luo Binghe had.

Maybe Luo Binghe means ‘let’s get married’ as a way to just ask for another date like that, then. Is that possible? Luo Binghe hasn’t ever had a second date with someone before marrying them; suddenly, that feels like a mistake.

Shen Yuan breathes out harshly, running an anxious hand through his hair. 

“Okay,” he says softly, and then again, picking up steam, “okay. This - this is fine. Honestly, it would basically be treasonous for me to just leave you like this anyway, and besides that it would be stupid, so okay.”

“Okay?” Luo Binghe asks, hope once more rising in his throat like a sickness. 

“Okay,” Shen Yuan agrees, nodding. “But! We can’t do it your way because - frankly, Binghe, you have no idea how to treat a wife! If it weren’t for your good looks and martial power and - ahem, well - if it weren’t for your other qualities, there’s no way you’d have ended up with this many women!”

It doesn’t sound like Shen Yuan’s truly upset with him right now, but the criticism makes Luo Binghe feel anxious anyway. He wants to reach out and grab Shen Yuan again, to keep him physically close until Luo Binghe can convince him that he can do things right this time, until the uncertainty that’s clawing at Luo Binghe’s own chest settles.

Luo Binghe makes himself stay still, instead. If Shen Yuan really meant to criticize him, he’d be far more brutal than this.

“If it weren’t for my ‘heavenly pillar?’” Luo Binghe tries, more testing Shen Yuan than teasing him, feeling for how stable the emotions between them are.

“As if!” Shen Yuan hisses. “If anything, you should count that on your list of cons - it’s too big, too unreasonable!”

Luo Binghe grins, just a bit. That - that wasn’t a bad response. If Shen Yuan is willing to engage with Luo Binghe’s teasing, then…

“Don’t look so pleased,” Shen Yuan says. “I’m serious, you hear me? You - you shouldn’t be let near another wife until someone’s taught you how to treat a wife right!”

“And you’ll teach me?”

“Well,” Shen Yuan says, his ears turning pink, “I have some experience, after all.”

Luo Binghe straightens up at once, alarmed and possessive about something he hadn’t even thought was a possibility until now. Did Shen Yuan leave a lover behind in the world his soul had come from? Did he meet one in the years since he’d left Luo Binghe’s palace??

Shen Yuan, unbothered, swats at his arm like an irritated auntie might scold a child.

“Calm down, you idiot, I only meant that I’ve been married to the great Lord Luo, it was a joke,” Shen Yuan says. Luo Binghe only winds himself up tighter.

“Been married? Past tense?”

Shen Yuan sends him an odd look.

“Past tense,” he confirms. “You’re the one that sent out the royal decree with your very magnanimous decision that those who had secretly left your inner palace should face no punishment for it.”

“Shen Yuan -”

“Or didn’t you mean it?” Shen Yuan cuts in, narrowing his eyes at Luo Binghe.

“...I meant it.”

“Then,” Shen Yuan nods, “let’s start over.”

Luo Binghe hesitates. Frankly, he isn’t sure if he can convince Shen Yuan to marry him a second time. It already feels like Shen Yuan is allowing him a lot just by being here, just by coming back out of concern for Luo Binghe’s happiness. Shen Yuan had called him ‘Binghe,’ but…

“Why don’t you at least hear me out all the way before you start panicking, ah?” Shen Yuan sighs. “You don’t even like having all these wives - no, don’t argue, remember I was in your head! A big family is cool, sure, but aren’t you exhausted trying to please so many women? When you first met me, before you realized I was the ‘soul’ you were looking for, all you could think about was getting me taken care of and shoved back in the palace as quickly as you could manage!”

Luo Binghe, damningly, remains silent. He’s exhausted by a lot of things these days, and that’s when he isn’t even bothering with the women beyond the bare-bones responsibilities to keep the inner palace safe and to help settle their disputes.

“See? So: I don’t like being your wife, and you’re tired of tending to wives, and you’re shit at it on top of that,” Shen Yuan says. “In this situation, isn’t the best thing to do just - well. I mean, if I’m going to teach you how to treat a wife better, the easiest way…”

“You want me to marry you, instead of you marrying me,” Luo Binghe breathes, feeling winded at the realization. He really, really wants to reach out and touch Shen Yuan again.

“Not so fast!” Shen Yuan protests. “Who said anything about marriage this quickly? Binghe, listen carefully, your first lesson is that it’s stupid as hell to marry anyone you like after knowing them for just a handful of days!”

“Then, eventually -”

“Eventually,” Shen Yuan says, looking rather embarrassed. “If you - if we both think it’s working out. If you’re… not unhappy.” 

Luo Binghe’s never felt so far from unhappy in his life. He feels like if he bled now, it might glow with the sheer strength of his feelings, incandescent and pleasantly surprised. When he breathes in, it seems to fill his lungs and his head alike, leaving him lightheaded and dizzy. 

“Shen Yuan,” Luo Binghe calls, “Shen Yuan, Shen Yuan.”

“Yes, yes,” Shen Yuan replies, doing a very bad job of acting irritated about it. “What is it?”

“Let’s go on another date,” Luo Binghe says, his lips and eyes curled up in a dazed sort of satisfaction.

Shen Yuan clicks his tongue. “Ah, right, I nearly forgot - Binghe, forget the date,” he says seriously.

“I’d rather not,” Luo Binghe says. 

“No, I mean - forget about going out on a single date, what you need is to run away properly!”

…Luo Binghe is a bit skeptical.

“Really,” Shen Yuan insists. “Because - well, I have some thoughts about just how many women you married - but generally, what you have here is good. You’re well respected, it’s impossible to want for anything material while within the palace walls, and you have powerful underlings to go do your bidding when something sounds like too much of a chore.”

“Do you always suggest running away from the things you think are good, or only when you’re talking to me?” Luo Binghe mutters, somehow even less convinced than he’d been a moment ago.

“Only when I’m out of other ideas!” Shen Yuan huffs. “This was supposed to be your happily ever after, but you’re…”

Luo Binghe keeps his mouth stubbornly shut. He’s already said it before, Shen Yuan doesn’t have to hear him say it again. Besides that, he’s still running off the high of the idea of marrying Shen Yuan; he doesn’t want to ruin that by acknowledging the way his weariness is still lingering in the back of his mind, waiting for him to sink back into it.

“...Right,” Shen Yuan says. “Well, anyway, the point is that what you have now is good, and if you’re unhappy anyway, I don’t know how to fix that.”

“I’ve generally found running away to be counterproductive to fixing anything,” Luo Binghe says mulishly.

“We won’t be trying to fix anything,” Shen Yuan says. “Binghe, we’re changing genres! If this happily ever after doesn’t work for you, we’ll go get a different one!”

Luo Binghe blinks at Shen Yuan. A different type of happy ending, rather than a ‘better’ one…

There’s a phantom tug in his chest, like someone’s reached in and started unraveling him. He thinks, for just a moment, of the quiet bamboo house that he’d visited in the mirror world, and then of the much more humble home he’d shared with his mother for a handful of his youngest years.

It isn’t the sort of happy ending that belongs to an emperor. It’s the sort of thing that any stranger off the street might dream of. 

Luo Binghe swallows thickly. That sort of life feels outlandishly out of reach for him, a man whose face is known by so many, beloved and hated in equal measure. More than that, he isn’t sure if he’d even be content in it, even if the thought of it feels like a honey-sweetened dream in his mind. He’s too restless, too used to movement and challenge for a life like that to stick to him for too long.

“What type of happy ending?” Luo Binghe asks, a bit hesitantly. 

“The type where you stop asking me to figure your life out for you,” Shen Yuan scolds, reaching up to flick Luo Binghe’s forehead scoldingly. “I don’t know! I figured we’d work it out as we went, I guess. Just - trying stuff and seeing what sticks.”

That sounds like a lot of dates with Shen Yuan, to Luo Binghe. He doesn’t mind that.

“So we have to run away,” Luo Binghe concludes. “I’ll need a few days to inform everyone -”

“Ah? Sorry, what was that? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of you grossly misunderstanding what it means to run away!” Shen Yuan says, exasperated. “You’re not retiring - running away means running away!”

Luo Binghe narrows his eyes at Shen Yuan. “Apologies, I forgot that Shen Yuan was an expert on running away, given his vast experience in it. How should we run away, then?”

“Without telling anyone, obviously! Drop it all and leave! If you go on a formal vacation, you’ll be expected to come back quickly. If you retire, you won’t be able to come back. If you run away, then - well, whatever happens, happens!”

Shen Yuan pauses, reaching out to run a soothing thumb over where he’d flicked at Luo Binghe’s forehead a few moments ago. It’s unlikely that it turned red from such a small attack, but Luo Binghe won’t protest a good thing.

“You worked a bit too hard to get here to give it all up in an instant,” Shen Yuan says, voice soft. “So let’s just run away. If you find a better happy ending, you can handle this as a formal retirement then.”

Luo Binghe lets out a long breath, leaning into Shen Yuan’s touch. He really did work hard to get here. It’s one of the things he feels the worst about - how many years of his life he devoted to achieve what he has, and how that all feels a bit wasted now that he’s admitted to his own unhappiness.

“I see,” Luo Binghe says, speaking quietly to match Shen Yuan’s tone. “You’re an expert on running away after all.”

Shen Yuan grins mischievously, dropping his hand from Luo Binghe’s head.

“Of course I am - I even figured out how to avoid having all the blame for such a thing put on you. It would be truly tragic if you actually became known as an emperor who ran away, after all.”

“How thoughtful of you,” Luo Binghe says, amused. “And how will we do that?”

“Naturally, you can’t be blamed for running away if it wasn’t your own feet that did the running!” Shen Yuan says, looking pleased with himself.

Then he steps back as far as he can while remaining hidden in the alcove with Luo Binghe, creating some space between them. Between one blink and the next, Shen Yuan has once more shifted his shape, resuming the appearance of the bearded servant from earlier. 

“...This appearance again?”

“Ah, you’re right - this one’s been compromised, thanks to someone’s very subtle way of turning the whole palace’s attention on me earlier,” Shen Yuan says, glaring half-heartedly at Luo Binghe. “How about this one?”

Another blink, and his form has changed again, his hair growing longer and his skin turning an ashen grey as two horns split out from his forehead. 

…Luo Binghe reaches out and tugs at Shen Yuan’s beard, which has not disappeared. “This…”

“Isn’t this sort of thing the best for a disguise?”

“Definitely not,” Luo Binghe says with absolute certainty.

Shen Yuan narrows his eyes at him. “You just don’t like it, is what this is. What if I want to grow a beard for real one day? Are you going to cause a fuss then, too?”

“I will,” Luo Binghe agrees, keeping a straight face. “I’ll complain about beardburn every day.”

Shen Yuan whips his head away, as if the idea of Luo Binghe kissing him enough in order to be able to complain every day is too much for him. He does get rid of the beard, though, so Luo Binghe lets it be. 

“Ahem,” Shen Yuan says, still looking a bit flustered. “Well, anyway - I’m a mysterious intruder now, so - rather than you running away -”

“You’ll kidnap me?” Luo Binghe asks, delighted.

“I’ll bridenap you,” Shen Yuan clarifies, and then immediately grows two shades more red in the face. 

“That’s even better,” Luo Binghe grins. 

Shen Yuan’s face does an interesting thing, like he’d been expecting Luo Binghe to protest even after the whole conversation they just had and found it rather overwhelming when Luo Binghe only went along with the plan happily. 

“Yes, well,” Shen Yuan stammers. “Well. Ahem.”

“It seems like Shen Yuan could use a bit of training himself, in what to say in times like these,” Luo Binghe says, amused. 

“I know what to say, it’s just embarrassing,” Shen Yuan hisses.

“I won’t laugh, so why don’t you say it?”

Shen Yuan glances away, then back at Luo Binghe. His shoulders pull up, defensive and flustered, before relaxing all at once, like Shen Yuan had realized what he was doing and forced his body to unwind. 

Finally, his expression firms up in determination, and he looks up to meet Luo Binghe’s eyes. Even now, in this minor demon’s form, Shen Yuan’s eyes are so, so bright. 

“I’ll make you happy,” Shen Yuan says, “so come with me.”

Luo Binghe laughs. 

“Hey!” Shen Yuan squawks. “You said you wouldn’t -”

Luo Binghe leans in close, reaching a hand up to hook a finger around one of Shen Yuan’s false horns and tugging gently at it. 

“I’m happy,” he says, “just because you came back to try and find me a better ending. I’ll go with you.”

Shen Yuan swallows thickly, the wet, muted sound of it loud between them. 

“Right,” Shen Yuan says. “That’s - good. That you’ll let yourself be run off with, I mean. Of course.”

“Will you carry me out under one arm?” Luo Binghe asks, his eyes curved in amusement. “That’s how it usually happens, I think.”

Shen Yuan’s brow furrows. “Doesn’t it usually happen with some sort of magical tool teleporting one of your wives away? I don’t think -”

Luo Binghe reaches out and pinches at Shen Yuan’s side. 

“It happens this way too,” he insists.

“...Ah,” Shen Yuan says, understanding. “Well, if you say so, it must be true - I suppose I must indeed carry you out under one arm.”

Luo Binghe grins again, sharp and pleased, and watches Shen Yuan’s form suddenly grow three sizes in both height and muscle mass. He has to step out into the main hallway to allow the transformation, no longer fitting in alcove that Luo Binghe had hidden them in.

“Here we go,” Shen Yuan says to himself, and then reaches out to scoop Luo Binghe up, wrapping a massive arm around Luo Binghe’s center and hoisting him up to rest him against his side. “Is that a proper kidnapping, Lord Luo?”

“A proper bridenapping,” Luo Binghe corrects, testing the give of Shen Yuan’s arm around him for a moment before letting himself fall limp. “I also think it’s rather common for the bridenappers to call their victims a bit more fondly than by their proper titles.”

“Asshole,” Shen Yuan calls teasingly. 

“More fondly than that too,” Luo Binghe protests, wiggling in Shen Yuan’s grip. Shen Yuan snorts, tugging Luo Binghe to him tighter, and starts on down the hall towards the exit.

“Then,” Shen Yuan says, picking up speed, “congratulations on your first proper bridenapping, Binghe.”

Luo Binghe laughs, having far too much fun with this for any of the palace guards to do anything but watch on in confusion, and Shen Yuan runs all the way out of the palace like that, his ‘evil bridenapper’ form wavering the more Luo Binghe seems to be enjoying himself.

It isn’t quite time for the sun to go down by the time they make it out of the palace, but it’s close enough: Shen Yuan carries Luo Binghe off into the sunset, and they live happily ever after. 

…Well. Luo Binghe will give it a shot, at least.