Work Text:
There is nothing that An Ding can't get for you.
Of course, it wasn't always like this; the past Peak Lord wasn't so efficient, though he could be meticulous to the extreme; he was a terribly tired man who was ready to throw his sect brothers and sisters off his peak any day of the week if they asked something impossible of him. This man thought that his successor would outgrow his desire to fulfill every ridiculous request he could get on his desk, just like he himself had in his time, because most of it was physically unfeasible. What this man didn't know or understand was that his successor, Shang Qinghua — was a man of a completely different mentality; he always seemed strange to the others, maybe even a bit of a tosser who desperately wanted the position of chief disciple and then lord of the peak as if his life depended on it (it did), and was tried to be scared off by many impossible requests or requests... the problem was that Shang Qinghua fulfilled all of it.
You see, Shang Qinghua, aka Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky, aka the author of this bizarre world full of injustice, cruelty, and sex— is a man of the twenty-first century. He is a man from a world and a time where performance becomes paramount, where the customer is always right, where you can't say no and you have to die but do, from a country full of ruthless competition and skills that must surpass limits, every — damn — time.
Shang Qinghua will not refuse if he is told to go and find a mythical flower that may be either fictional or extinct — he finds it.
Shang Qinghua will not refuse if he is told to rebuild an almost completely destroyed peak from scratch — he only asks for resources.
Shang Qinghua will not refuse if he is told to pluck a star from the sky, he will only ask: which one and in what quantity?
If it does not exist?
He will create.
A gift that should not be thrown around, if you ask any outsider. However, such an ability only breeds greed, or worse, the notion that it must always be this way. If he did it last time, why can't he always do it?
This is a spawn of the stupidity of the human mind that too many people are susceptible to.
(Although Yue Qingyuan tries not to abuse it, this talent of his shidi is too valuable to waste; however, a sect leader cannot know about everything his sect brothers and sisters do, and Shang Qinghua does not refuse.)
Liu Qingge was certainly no exception: neither in abusing on behalf of Bai Zhang, nor in not hearing these rumors.
Cang Qiong is really just one big rumor mill, where one is more ridiculous than the other (e.g. does anyone seriously think Shen Qingqiu had an affair with Shang Qinghua? Just because the two of them laughed together? nonsense! Shen-shixiong never did that to him).
It's been over two years since Shen Qingqiu's death, and this monster, this demon, still won't let him be buried. To bury him and give him a chance at a new life, with all the rituals as their life of cultivators believes. For Shen Qingqiu's disciple which he still dares to call himself — demon is too disrespectful.
Liu Qingge is too weak to win, to be worthy of a shidi, at least in the here and now, and—
Mu-shidi and Zhang-shidi often say that Shang Qinghua can get anything.
Liu Qingge grins, bitterly and unkindly.
Well, if that's true, then let him get the corpse of their common shixiong, Liu Qingge decides to himself and, for the first time in his position as lord, writes a formal petition to An Ding.
It's ridiculous.
It's so easy that it doesn't even make sense.
One day, Liu Qingge sends his first and last request to An Ding by the hands of his head disciple, healing his wounds until Mu Qingfang comes to his soul, grumbling and stern as he has been every night before.
Shang Qinghua meets him in the morning, disheveled and dusty beyond belief, shaking off his clothes as he walks, throwing him for the first time the look his meimei usually gives him: like a man who puts up with his foolishness for some unimaginable reason, but for Liu Mingyan it was love for him — in this case, he doesn't know what to think.
"Just so you know, Liu-shidi", and his voice is full of displeasure, instead of the usual stammer, "I have no right to reject the first requests of the lords of the peaks. Gods, and I thought An-shimei was demanding when she asked me to get her the lost tomb in the Bermuda Desert for her!" he exclaims, stepping aside, behind him, Shen Qingqiu is leaning gently against one of the trees, with no presence for the living, as one might have dreamed.
Shang Qinghua follows his gaze and sighs.
"Come on, shidi, help me", he's clapped on the shoulder as if it's the order of the day for them, "we should go to zhangmen-shixiong and Mu-shidi, it's the least we can do for him".
Shang Qinghua is frighteningly efficient, but equally frighteningly indifferent to the death of someone who is supposed to be his friend.