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Binghe had met the An Ding peak lord, but only twice. Both times the man had been visiting Binghe’s Shizun so, they didn’t really speak more than pleasantries. Still, Binghe got the impression that Shang Qinghua was a nice enough man although he acted more like an older disciple than an immortal peak lord.
That being said, you can imagine his confusion when Luo Binghe landed at the bottom of the endless abyss-heartbreak and terror only exacerbated by the feeling of air being forced out of his lungs-and saw Shang Qinghua falling above him, screaming most of the way down before drawing his sword and flying the rest of the way down.
Once he landed Shang Qinghua fell to his knees, trying to calm his rapid breathing.
“I can’t believe I just did that,” he whispered, wiping his hand on his face. Luo Binghe was almost too confused to be scared anymore.
“Why is Shang Shishu here?” He asked as politely as possible.
“Okay, first-“ Shang Qinghua pointed to him “Are you hurt?” Luo Binghe looked down where a shallow stab wound burned like fire into his heart and Shang Qinghua waved his hand “Wait! Stupid question.” He reached into his robes and pulled out a small box. “I brought a med kit!”
He opened the box and pulled out some disinfectant herbs and a wrap but, before he could start treating Binghe’s wound an icy presence made both parties freeze where they sat.
Standing right behind Shang Qinghua was that ice demon who tried to kill Binghe's shizun, and he looked ready to kill.
Lou Binghe sprung to his feet, reaching for his sword before remembering it was broken and clenching his fists instead.
Shang Qinghua on the other hand, rolled over into a deep bow facing the demon.
“My king! I can explain!”
What the actual hell? Luo Binghe felt the flame of betrayal spike once more. As the Ice demon responded
“I thought you told me you had no emotional attachments here,”
Shang Qinghua was a spy. This was all his fault, Luo Binghe could feel it.
“I don’t! I barely know this kid it’s just-“
“No need to explain. Your actions speak for you,” the ice demon stepped over Shang Qinghua and Luo Binghe stepped back.
The fall didn’t hurt as much as it should have, and adrenaline still pumped through his veins like venom, but his knees and ankles still wobbled as he moved. He wouldn’t last long but he wouldn’t go down without a fight either.
Mobei Jun reached down, ignoring Binghe entirely and taking the med kit in hand. As he rose back to full height, Luo Binghe couldn’t help but notice how large the man was, towering over him like an adult over a toddler. Luo Binghe had to look up to meet his eyes but the demon was focused on the Medkit, clearly not even considering Luo Binghe as a threat.
“Interesting, you mixed demon and human medicine in here. How much of this did you steal?” He asked, amusement sprinkled in his monotone voice.
“None of it my king!” Shang Qinghua cowered from behind, “It’s a mix of treatments given to me by various medics for my own wounds,”
The Ice demon glanced at Binghe, his eyes revealing nothing of his intentions.
“Well, I'd recommend the demon stuff for the wound but, I'm not sure how much can be done for his legs,” he said, closing the box and tossing it back to Shang Qinghua, whose eyes lit up as he scrambled to his feet.
“Yes, my king!”
The ice demon scoffed, turning to face his lackey, leaving his back wide open. He knew Binghe wouldn’t dare initiate. Binghe hated that he was right.
“I’ll look for shelter, it’ll do the boy well to stay here if he plans to continue demonic cultivation,”
“You’re helping me?” This didn’t make sense. None of this made sense.
“Qinghua’s helping you,” the demon corrected. “I’m helping him.”
Lou Binghe took the med kit to disinfect his wounds, before following Shang Qinghua through an alien landscape of giant colorful plants and grass that seemed to hold onto whatever it touched. It felt as if even the bugs wanted blood and even the trees would but if you got too close. He was led to a small abandoned cave dwelling where he found sticks littering the floor that he collected for a fire in silence. He couldn’t stop replaying his shizun's words in his head. Over and over “I don’t want to kill you,” “You are not an ordinary demon,”
Even among those who were hated, among those who believed demons weren’t all bad, his blood alone made him too despicable to be loved.
But he didn’t feel evil. As Binghe used a little qi to start a fire, he felt no rage, no bloodlust, only fear.
He didn’t want to be evil, to lead a hoard of lesser demons into villages to feast upon the innocent, to start a harem of women that he treated as nothing more than objects in a collection, to destroy his sect in an act of manic revenge. He just wanted to be held and told it was gonna be okay and believe it. He just wanted to go home.
Shang Qinghua sat in front of him, pulling out ink, a brush, and some sort of folded scroll. He wrote something small on it before getting up and pulling out four talismans from his sleeve, placing 2 on each side of the cave entrance.
“These will keep demons from going through this entrance but, you’ll have to remove them when you leave. Think of it as a door, except you don’t have a key so you can only lock the door from the inside,” the analogy barely worked but Binghe nodded, getting the point. He was a demon so the demon protection talismans would work on him. This was a fact. That didn’t make it hurt any less against the open wall
The ice demon walked to the entrance, inspecting a talisman with an expression blank as ever.
“These are powerful, how did you get them?” He asked almost accusatively.
“These are supplied to all the peak lords before missions,” Binghe could see Shang Qinghua sweating from where he sat. “I’ve been studying them and learning to make my own,”
“Why?” Mobei jun asked, tilting his head a little though his cool expression remained unchanged
“I’ve been trying to make ones that would benefit your kingdom and conquests, my king. Like ones that conceal auras for spy work, passively collect and identify demonic qi, or even explode when an intruder passes by it,” Binghe tried to conceal his interest as he listened, a pit growing deep in his gut.
He’d heard vaguely of talismans doing those sorts of things but, talismans were a human invention that demons didn’t use. Humanity had a hard enough time fighting demons as it was! If demons started using talismans…
So that was why Qinghua was planted in Cang Qiong. To bring human techniques into the demon realm.
But what could Binghe do about it? Even if he found a way to warn the cultivators they’d never believe him. One look at his forehead and all his words would be deemed instantly false.
Luo Binghe had many questions that he didn’t have half the confidence to ask at first, but then they got into a comfortable routine. Mobei Jun would leave at night to do his noble duties and Shang Qinghua would wake Binghe up at the break of dawn to put out the fire and start gathering in between when the night creatures were going to bed and the day creatures were waking up. Shang Qinghua had apparently done quite a bit of research on the plants of the abyss and took it upon himself to teach Binghe how to identify the edible ones and the plants that did unspeakable things to your mind and body.
Then Mobei Jun would return and he would teach Binghe how to hunt. Mobei Jun thought the best way to teach was by giving Binghe a knife and throwing him at the first “edible” creature he saw. Luckily Binghe was pretty good at fighting, he just needing help identifying which creatures were “edible”. It turned out only like- a fourth of the creatures they brought back were edible for humans, meaning Shang Qinghua mostly ate the plants while Mobei Jun told him how each animal had to be prepared. Although apparently being a heavenly demon meant Binghe wouldn’t have any negative effects even if he chugged poison.
After that Binghe would practice demonic cultivation, a journey he could only trudge alone. It was surprisingly simple. He had already started in the human realm and down in the abyss it was 10X easier due to just how much demonic qi was around him. It was like before he was begging for coins on the streets and now he was dropped into a rich man’s bank.
By the time he finished night was usually falling, Shang Qinghua had made a fire, and Mobei Jun had left. So the cycle repeated day after day.
The first few weeks were stiff. Of course, they were. Luo Binghe barely knew these two men and what he did know was that they were morally questionable and hard to read, but the more time they spent together the more confident Binghe got that neither of them wanted to hurt him.
So at the beginning of the third week, Binghe waited until they gathered for lunch, sat around the fire in comfortable silence, and asked Shang Qinghua.
“Why are you helping me?” The man just tilted his head in the same way Mobei Jun always did (Who got it from who?)
“Why do you ask?” He spoke as if it was a silly question, like why there were rocks on the ground or clouds in the sky.
“You didn’t have to,” Binghe said. “You could have just sat there and left me to rot alone. Why did you follow me?”
Shang Qinghua’s smile faltered and he gave an almost wistful look before turning to Mobei Jun.
“I guess I should probably explain that to both of you huh?” So Mobei Jun didn’t know either? Those two had such a confusing dynamic. On one hand, Shang Qinghua was a servant who was clearly scared of his master, on the other hand, Mobei Jun would follow Shang Qinghua to the ends of the earth no questions asked. It was almost unsettling.
“It all started right before I became peak lord, only about a year after I met you actually,” Shang Qinghua started. Looking at Mobei Jun. Binghe took in the lore that Shang Qinghua met Mobei Jim when he was a disciple passively.
“I had known the head disciple of the Huan Hua palace sect, Su Xiyan, for a while, since I was often sent over to other sects to deliver packages and letters. One day when staying the day in Huan Hua for a meeting that night, I saw her in a restaurant with a man. They were talking about some play- a love story, and the man asked if humans were really that romantic. She said no but, confirmed a few customs before asking him about some of his own. I decided then not to tell anyone, not only because I was working for a demon myself, but because they just seemed so- happy,” he looked almost distraught, his face contrasting with the description of the happy couple.
“I don’t know why but I decided to join them at the table and ask who he was. He confirmed that he was a demon but he only wanted to learn about humans, not destroy them. He found us interesting,” Shang Qinghua smiled sadly before continuing.
“Only a few months later word got around that Su Xiyan had been seduced by a heavenly demon and that demon had been ambushed and sealed away under a mountain,”. At the words, “heavenly demon” Binghe’s eyes went wide. He’d heard this story before, but much differently than how it was being told now.
“I didn’t know him but I looked into it and- he didn’t do anything. The Huan Hua palace master claimed to have heard him scheming something but he had no proof and claimed Su Xianyu had left in shame. I could never believe that, especially now that-“ Shang Qinghua looked Binghe in the eye, face consumed by grief.
“You have her face, but his eyes and hair. I told myself it was a coincidence but when I saw that mark…”
“You think they were my parents?” Binghe said, voice just above a whisper
He had dreamed of his birth parents when he was a kid. Imagining that maybe one day they would find him and love him. He had given up on that a long time ago. He never thought he’d have closure but now that he had it, he…
He didn’t even notice he was crying until he was being pulled into a soft hug. Binghe held on tight, letting his tears soak Shang Qinghua’s shoulder.
He missed his Shizun, he missed his mom, and now, he mourned for the parents he never had.
“They were good people,” Shang Qinghua’s voice shook as he spoke. Was he crying too? “And you are good too I know you are,”
After that, it was like a dam broke most of the tension dispersed. It was a lot easier to trust someone when you knew why they were helping you and what their intentions were.
More than that it gave Binghe something he didn’t have before, direction. Demons could be both powerful and good. Binghe was going to be the one to prove it.
He started training with Meng Mo again, meaning he was training day and night. His progress skyrocketed. He started sparring with Mobei Jun and though he never won, he did learn a lot. Shang Qinghua started taking Binghe on little adventures to find artifacts and plants for Binghe to use instead of a sword. It was on one of these adventures, raiding an old demon tomb, that Binghe met Xin Mo.
Xin Mo was a beautifully twisted sword that had a powerful aura of demonic qi. Binghe could hear it calling to his soul, and as he approached he knew that while Xin Mo wasn’t the only weapon he could wield, Binghe was the only one who could wield Xin Mo.
He didn’t remember how it ended up in his hands but once it was he felt as if he was whole. As if this was what he was missing all his life. He slashed at the wall and the blade left a deep, clean cut a few feet deep.
He admired the black blade with awe and he could tell the blade was looking back at him with a similar feeling.
Once he left the tomb Shang Qinghua gave him a pat on his shoulder.
“Nice sword,” he said with a smile. “We’ll need to find you a good sheath for that,” Binghe nodded.
Xin Mo deserved only the best of sheaths.
It didn’t take long after that before Shang Qinghua left for the human realm.
“Two months is enough time for it to be reasonably assumed another rift opened on its own but not enough time that the sect has recovered from my loss,” Shang Qinghua explained “Plus, Binghe is more than equipped to live here alone by now,”
He was right. He had learned how to identify food as well as Qinghua could and Xin Mo made him a formidable opponent for even Mobei Jun himself. It wasn’t that he had nothing more to learn, just that Shang Qinghua had nothing more to teach when it came to survival and Mobei Jun was barely teaching in the first place, just pushing him in the water and hoping he'd swim.
“I wish I could go with you,” he knew he couldn’t, that as fierce as demons were, humans could be much worse when fueled by fear, but that didn’t mean he didn’t yearn for home.
“Hey, just a few more years. Then you can show them all just what they could’ve had,” Shang Qinghua comforted. Luo Binghe gave a low bow.
“Thank you, Shang Shishu. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you,” Shang Qinghua waved him off.
“You would’ve been fine, you're a strong young man,” Binghe ignored that
“I still don’t like that you're betraying Cang Qiong Mountain but, I wish you luck up there,”
“Do you want something?” Shang Qinghua asked suspiciously.
“Just- Can you check on my Shizun for me?” Binghe finally asked “I can't imagine he’s taken my loss well,” part of him hoped he was still grieving, hoped he regretted it with all his heart, but he knew that part of him was an evil, wicked thing so he forced himself to wish his Shizun well.
Shang Qinghua’s smile faltered a little
“Yeah, I will,”
And with that, he was off. The two demons watched the human go and didn’t look away utill he was out of sight. Mobei Jun Lifted up a small, very expensive looking pouch which Binghe stared at for a moment before the ice demon pushed it into his hands.
“Here. Inside is a bracelet. If there is ever an emergency just break it and help will arrive shortly.” Binghe frowned
“Are you leaving too?” It should have made him happy. Binghe wasn’t supposed to enjoy the company of anyone who hurt his shizun. Still it was hard not to when Mobei Jun always seemed to be looking out for him in the smallest ways like scaring away large predators when he thought Binghe wasn’t looking or geting spices from the human realm and using them even in meals he knew Shang Qinghua couldn’t eat.
“Not for long. I have some things I need to deal with in the north. Can’t bring you with me. That would be a detriment to your cultivation,” Mobei Jun explained
“I understand,” he opening the pouch, withdrawing a small crystal blue bracelet. Mobei Jun probably didn’t realize but, it all probably cost a fortune. Just the bag could feed a family for a week. Binghe put on the bracelet, feeling the demonic qi emanating from it rest gently against his skin.
“Ill be back monthly to make sure your alive,” Mobei said. “Don’t die,” and with that Luo Binghe was technically alone once more but, he didn’t feel alone.
Instead he felt even more motivated than before. He would get better and one day, he wouldn;t need to be protected, because he would be the one doing the protecting. He swore it.