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Gongyi Xiao was going to die.
He knew it. He could feel it. From the way Shen Qingqiu looked at him with pity as they walked out of the prison, as if he wasn't the one being tortured every day.
He saw it in Binghe's eyes as they crossed paths, as he refused to look down right until the point his gaze became too oppressive to endure.
Gongyi Xiao was going to die, soon.
He didn't think about running away, he knew it would be useless. He thought about what would be more honored though, fighting for his life even though he knew it would be useless or accepting his own death with dignity. Would it be shameful or inspiring?
A scream was dying in his throat, clawing to get out. He could taste blood and bile in his tongue.
He was going to die and all he could think about was what other people would think of his death. It was, sadly, too much like he was in life.
The best disciple. The most desired. Always surrounded by people that wanted something from him, surrounding himself by people he should use later on in life, when he took over the Huan Hua Palace as the new headmaster.
What good was it now? None of them would fight for him.
He had, like a whore, sold away all of his virtues for nothing more than another day, to live amongst people that he despised.
He was lonely, he could admit it now that he was dying. The only person he thought of was the dying man in the water prison, the only one who seemed to show him something honest, be it loathing, pity or sympathy. What about Elder Shen? What horrors would he go through alone? More than what he had gone through?
Gongyi Xiao was going to die and he was thinking about someone else.
How odd. That a man so hated by others would prove himself to be more honored than all the disciples and elders surrounding him.
How odd that none of them would bat an eye when told to torture him, how strange that Shen Qingqiu would be so human in that situation. He saw the fear in Shen Qingqiu's eyes and he couldn't be anything other than human at that moment.
And that's what got him killed in the end.
Would there be a burial? Who would go there? Would there even be a body to bury? If what he heard about Luo Binghe's foes was true, probably not. He was okay with not having a body, he always felt weirdly out of place with the one he was given anyways.
Would it hurt? He wondered. He was scared, he wanted to runaway, he wanted to be a coward, but he wouldn't. What would others think? The coward that tried to run from death and failed. He worried about it, he was going to die, what would the others think.
As he walked along the long empty halls of the Huan Hua Palace, he felt his body heavy, he had the impression that he weighed nothing when his feet touched the floor. He smiled at the other disciples as they greeted him, they smiled back, his body kept walking.
He stopped somewhere in the garden.
The sun was shining, the sky was bright and beautiful, flowers in full blown, the scent filling his lungs.
He was going to die today. The weather would not mourn his parting.
Gongyi wanted to curl up and cry. He wanted to scream, he wanted to run, to disappear. He took one step, then another and sat down under the lovely shade of a ginkgo biloba. The disciple had always liked that tree, the way its leaves were shaped like little fans.
It reminded him of Elder Shen's fan, the green one he always held in his hand. He wished he could've given him more than some robes when they parted ways.
Ah... Yes, he was the reason why Xiao was going to die. And it was okay, and Gongyi wanted to regret it but he couldn't bring himself to. It was worth it, he thought, Shen Qingqiu was worth dying for.
That did not soothe the growing pain inside his chest, nor did it make it easier for him to breathe. His ribs seemed to crush his own lungs, like a snake wrapping around a prey, strangling it to death. Would his body give up before he did?
It was unfair, he thought. It was a childish thought, something a child would say because they knew nothing about the world. Gongyi Xiao wasn't a kid anymore, he couldn't think that way, the world was unfair, he saved an innocent person and he would die for it.
He wanted to cry, he tried to. He tried, he tried, he tried. He begged the sky for rain so that he could cry, so that something, anything, would mourn him. Just so he wouldn't need to go through the grief alone.
Alone. He was tired of being alone, he was tired of being surrounded by people. He was exhausted and he was in pain but he didn't want to die like that.
He cursed at his body for not moving, cursed at his face for not showing, he felt heavy, he felt imprisoned in that unmoving body, like he was made of stone. And he kept telling it to move, to move, to take him away from that place, to take him somewhere safe.
He begged to be saved by the body that seemed to have abandoned him. And still, it did not move.
Gongyi Xiao was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it.