Chapter Text
Luo Binghe breathes in and out, palming the hilt of Zheng Yang as they receive the order that they were participating in the Immortal Alliance Conference. Of all three of Shen Qingqiu’s disciples, he was probably the most underprepared—his foundation unsteady, his sword forms unsatisfactory, and his greatest talent in the kitchen rather than the study rooms; still, he had been chosen and he would deliver.
“...expect to last seven days. That is all,” Shen Qingqiu says blandly. “Do not disappoint me.”
Shen Qingqiu leaves them with a sharp flick of his fan and not a backwards glance, gliding off to order someone to pack his supplies. The man had been of ill humor lately, which led to Luo Binghe getting more and more chores shoved off on him and less time devoted to training. Luckily, with the Conference drawing near, he’d been too busy to give Luo Binghe any punishments for failing to complete his training tasks. Luo Binghe watches his back as he goes back to his house, then shoots Ning Yingying a quick smile and turns to pack his uniform and a few other supplies.
This time he is given a horse. Ning Yingying trots over on her mare and tells him excitedly about all the gossip she had heard of the other sects. He listens without interrupting, tightening the saddle and ignoring Ming Fan’s glare stabbing into the back of his head. The ride is long and bumpy, and even with Ning Yingying filling the silence and his attempts to humor her, it is boring.
Eventually even she decides to leave him to have a good chat with a few Xian Shu disciples. Evidently he couldn’t keep his mask up. He shrugs it off and slows so he’d be able to take in the scenery at the back of the procession. It is more peaceful this way, anyway.
When they get to the grounds, the other sects already fill up the space with their colors: greens, reds, browns, and a sea of yellow that puddles together in the middle, moving and undulating like a giant golden cloud. He waits there, watching the crowd, until Ning Yingying’s high voice alerts him to their dismount and he gets off his horse, handing it off to one of the event’s servants.
He unpacks the back of Shen Qingqiu’s carriage while Ning Yingying helps him down and Ming Fan gives a report. Then they are allowed to disperse, disappear into the crowd and make contact with the others who would be participating.
Without really meaning to, Luo Binghe finds himself surrounded.
“Hello, little gege, welcome!”
“Do you have a place to set up camp yet? There’s space next to my tent!”
He fends off some offers with a polite grimace, making himself look small and harmless. It works to draw in a group whom he is able to survey and ask about the difficulty of past Conferences. It looks like for most, it wouldn’t be too tough—past Conferences tended to not overly stress participants, and for the inexperienced it would be a safer way to gain recognition than night hunts. He records the information carefully.
“Which disciple is this, and why haven’t we heard of such a dashing young man?”
The voice is grating and mocking, and Luo Binghe turns to find a youth in shit-brown robes eyeing him with unwarranted distaste. In response, Luo Binghe gives a gentle smile, glancing back at him demurely.
“This one is Luo Binghe of Qing Jing Peak, disciple of Shen Qingqiu,” he says while subtly twisting his arm out of a young girl’s grasp.
The guy whistles. “The lofty Xiu Ya sword actually has disciples participating? This one thought the competition was much too lowly for one as great as him.”
Luo Binghe bows his head innocently, provoking some soft gasps from a few girls surrounding them. “Senior is too much. Shizun has three talents this year.”
“Talents, hm? We will see, when the competition begins, how talented you really are.” The man sneers, ignoring the hostile gazes he’d elicited from the clump of girls, and swaggers off. Luo Binghe watches him leave, his eyes cold, imprinting his figure in his mind and vowing to at least outlast such trash in the arena.
The girls resume their tittering after he leaves, asking about Luo Binghe: if he’s eaten, if he’s tired, if he’d like to take a rest in one of their tents. Clumsy, too-obvious ploys that he brushes off with a humble and shy smile, pointing to his own pack. Truthfully, he is getting tired of it all and just wants to set up camp, eat dinner, and await the start of the competition.
He finds Ning Yingying within the sea of yellow, already clumsily backtracking on whatever she’d said to make the girl in front of her boiling with anger.
“What do you know, your master is always spending his own coin in dirty, base places like that, anyway!” accuses the girl, probably espousing one of those rumors about Shen Qingqiu that always seemed to fly around without solid evidence.
Ning Yingying stiffens and then furrows her brows. “Shizun does not—”
Luo Binghe cuts in before she could make the girl any more hostile. “Shijie, there you are! I found a nice place over there, how about we set up camp now?” He turns to the other girl, who perks up in interest at his appearance. “Apologies, this one thoughtlessly interrupted. Is anything wrong?” He smiles gently, showcasing dimples, his cheeks already becoming a little stiff from maintaining the expression since dismounting.
“Ah- no, it was a misunderstanding,” the girl breathes, starry-eyed. He nods and then quickly takes Ning Yingying’s hand to lead her away.
“A-Luo,” she says helplessly. “I really didn’t mean—”
“It’s okay, Yingying,” he comforts. “I know you’re a little clumsy with your words. Let’s just stay out of their way, they outnumber us twenty to one.”
As he speaks, he catalogs the number of eyes that turn toward them in curiosity. Too many—he isn’t here to make a scene, not yet. Not before he could prove himself. One gaze is particularly burning, making the hair on the back of his neck rise. He glances around, but everyone is dressed in yellow and no one stands out. Still, he can’t help but feel watched.
Once he drags Ning Yingying over to the suitable area he had already picked out when they’d arrived, he sets up camp and gets dinner started. He starts by boiling water and taking out a few rations, dry and crumbly but not unbearable with the right spices. The smell attracts a gaggle of disciples from a few other sects, gathering around like it was a friendly campfire. Really, he knows they were there to check out the competition. He lets Ning Yingying do the talking, then serves her and himself without offering the leftovers to the hungry onlookers. After, he packs up, announces he is tired with a shy glance, and enters his tent without fanfare. With the entrance closed, he can finally close off the prying eyes and get some rest, gathering his energy for the next day. If he wants first place, if he wants to make Shen Qingqiu look at him, then he must be ready for anything.
In the morning he stirs up the leftovers, offering some to Ning Yingying who looks sick with anxiety.
“I heard it won’t be that bad,” Luo Binghe reassures her. “If you don’t want to fight, then just kill a few small monsters and get on the leaderboard. Shizun won’t care as long as you’re not last.”
This is true. Shen Qingqiu probably wouldn’t care even if Ning Yingying never even got that far. It’s himself he needs to worry about.
She bites her lip and gives a wan smile. “I know, A-Luo. Thanks, I—”
The announcer cuts her off, the portal to the arena opening with a spark and a sudden whoosh. They look at it with wide eyes, then jolt into action. As the crowd roils in anticipation, Luo Binghe swiftly packs his camp, gathering his things into the small sect-issued qiankun bag, and helping Ning Yingying put away her tent and count her rations. Then they stand in the crowd, waiting for the signal.
Luo Binghe pats her hand swiftly, then nods to the portal. “We’ll be separated once we go in. I will see you in seven days, Yingying.” It’s a promise as much as it is reassurance.
She nods, staring at the shimmering blue portal. Then she looks back at him determinedly. “Good luck, A-Luo.”
His first few steps into the arena land him in the middle of a forest, dark and damp with the smell of moss and something inhuman. He immediately nets himself a lizard-type beast, lopping off its head cleanly. His studies may not have taught him too much, but he’d learned enough on night hunts to not make a fool of himself right here.
The first two days are full of finding monsters, fighting them, killing the ones he can and tracking the ones that get away until he can find an opportunity to take them out. Nothing here is too much for him to handle, as expected, though he is not very challenged, either. He doesn’t often run into other participants. He takes breaks in out-of-the-way locations, tucking himself into small caves or perching on a vantage point to rest and eat.
The second night he is dozing in a tree when he is awakened by voices. He carefully leans over and watches as a group of yellow-robed teenagers walk below him, talking and laughing and making a ruckus, despite the desperate shushing of its leader.
“For the last time, if you aren’t quiet then we will get found, and then we will get eaten, and I will have lived a very sad life,” the boy complains, huffing a breath of air that flutters the veil covering his lower face.
“But, shixiong,” a girl whines, “You were the one who said the stone circle would be safe!”
“I said safer, I said it would be safer, comparatively,” the boy hisses, massaging his temples. Luo Binghe looks down on him from above, pitying him for being stuck with an incompetent group of hangers-on. “We were in the forest, of course a defensible location would be safer than being surrounded and attacked on all sides! This is a monster-filled arena, or have you forgotten?”
Another girl steps up, wrapping a calming hand around the first girl’s upper arm. “Shixiong, don’t be too mad, A-Rong was just nervous.”
“We’re all nervous, I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in—”
The branch Luo Binghe’s hand is gripping snaps under his weight and he finds himself plummeting through layers of foliage to land directly in the center of their little camp. They shriek and jump away from him as he groans and rolls over. When he opens his eyes he freezes as he takes in the sharp tip of the blade not two inches from his face.
“Oh, it’s a person!” says the sword’s owner in relief, and promptly sheathes the blade. “Let us know you’re here next time instead of falling from the heavens like— holy shit.” He sounds like he’s choked on his words, and Luo Binghe meets his wide eyes over the veil for a split second before he gets his knees under him, disliking the vulnerable position. The boy’s eyebrows screw up in a show of worry. “Um, sorry.”
Luo Binghe gets to his feet, facing the two girls who grip each other in fear. “Apologies,” he says hoarsely, and coughs just to feel his ribs jump painfully. “Didn’t mean to scare you all.”
The veiled boy mutters something behind him. A touch on his shoulder startles him and he whirls around to face him defensively, wincing when his ribs protest the jerky movement. The veiled boy raises his hands to show that they’re empty before gesturing to his side. “You hurt? That was a nasty fall.”
Luo Binghe eyes him warily and puts his hand on his side, not liking how the group has him surrounded. The veiled boy gestures for him to wait and then pulls over a small boulder, evidently for him to rest on. He digs through his pack before pausing and glancing up, past Luo Binghe’s hesitant form to land on his party.
“Qin Wanrong, Xiao Cui, Jian Anran, you three can take a break. Qin Wanyue and the rest, take the watch. It’s not safe to stop here so keep a lookout.” Then he pulls out what looks like a roll of gauze and an ointment, gesturing Luo Binghe over. “Sit, and uh- look, I know this is uncomfortable, but if you can lift your shirt so I can take a look…”
Luo Binghe looks at him strangely but does as he’s told, taking a seat on the rock and angling himself so only the veiled boy can see his skin when he half-shrugs out of his robe and lifts his shirt. The boy hisses in sympathy and warns him that the ointment will be cold before smearing it on and taking the ball of gauze to wrap around his torso. He ties it securely in practiced motions, the band of gauze not too tight nor too loose. Luo Binghe watches his bowed head, the boy’s eyes turned gentle and focused from the angle. When he finishes he pets over the gauze once before Luo Binghe lets his shirt fall back into place, pushing down a shiver.
“Are you cold?” He doesn’t wait for an answer before draping an outer robe around Luo Binghe’s back, the mellow scent that suddenly engulfs him overwhelming him for a moment. It’s very warm from the residual body heat. He realizes that the boy gave him his own robe and stares at him with wide eyes.
The boy fails to notice his disbelief and gets to his feet, calling out to his companions. “No problems? Good, let’s get going. You, L- uh, Cang Qiong disciple, are you good to stay here? We didn’t mean to trample on your hiding place, you can continue…”
For one maddening second, the fragrance and warmth worms its way into his heart. Luo Binghe’s subconscious takes over and he… shakes his head.
“Good, you’re… no? You…” The boy’s straight brows furrow in concern. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”
Luo Binghe shakes his head again, setting his eyes on the boy’s hidden face and just… staring. He can’t help himself.
“Then do you want to come with us?” the boy checks, glancing between Luo Binghe and the rest of his group. Luo Binghe feels his face warm and he shyly nods, looking up at him through his lashes.
One of the girls behind him, the whiny one, pipes up in his favor. “It’s just one extra person, shixiong.”
Another voice, “Yes, and we probably startled him in the first place.”
And another, “We should take responsibility!”
The boy glares at whoever said the last phrase and then sheepishly scratches the back of his head. “Well. Alright. If you want to come, then come. Hopefully we won’t slow you down, um…”
“This one’s name is Luo Binghe,” he says, taking the hand offered to him. He tries to keep his mind from latching onto the way it feels, all broad warmth and calluses. “Thank you very much for your help, Senior…”
“I just did what I should,” the boy brushes off without returning the introduction. He looks like he wants to say more but hesitates, looking at his group again with a conflicted knot between his brows. “Let’s get going. This is the habitat of the False King Salamander, we don’t want to run into it when it’s just waking up. Nasty beasts.”
Despite his injury, Luo Binghe rushes to keep up with him, walking close behind and staring at the boy’s back to avoid having to interact with the other Huan Hua Palace disciples that eye him like a piece of meat.
“Do you know a lot about monsters, senior?” he asks curiously, earning a surprised look back at him.
“...Just a few tidbits, here and there.”
“Don’t be shy, Shen-shixiong,” a girl sidles over next to Luo Binghe. “He’s publishing a bestiary soon.”
“Shimei, that’s not public information!” The veiled boy—Shen-shixiong—whispers fiercely, and then glances at Luo Binghe. “Rival authors, and all that,” he explains vaguely. The tips of his ears are pink.
Luo Binghe opens his mouth to ask more, but the girl next to him beats him to it. “I’m Qin Wanyue,” she says lightly, pulling his attention onto her. She preens with it, blushing under his regard. “I’m a disciple of Huan Hua Palace.”
Obviously.
He nods at her and turns his attention back to Shen-shixiong, but the boy has already somehow pulled away with a swift gait and is up ahead, forging a path and switching directions occasionally. The group of disciples follow his lead without hesitation, completely trusting in their shixiong’s ability to bring them to a safe haven.
The girl keeps trying to engage him in conversation, but he’s quiet, caught up in his own head. The robe around his shoulders keeps the chill in the air out. The material is thick and padded; clearly the sect cared enough to bundle its disciples up against the cool air, or… He traces the inseam, the rough uneven stitches of an unpracticed hand. Perhaps Shen-shixiong did it himself.
Shen-shixiong leads them to a grassy space encircled with stone statues, one of which seems to be a goddess. Her feet are lifted in the midst of a dance, her hands angled elegantly and her face serene. Shen-shixiong looks at her for a while before sighing and declaring that they’ve reached the place and can take a rest.
While the rest of his camp flop around gracelessly, or try to entice Luo Binghe to sit with them, Shen-shixiong crosses the space and bounds up to the top of a boulder, sitting facing-outward in lotus position. Luo Binghe watches him and then quietly addresses one of the younger disciples, Xiao Cui he thinks, to ask about him.
Xiao Cui looks overwhelmed by his favor and frankly gushes about his shixiong. “Oh, he always does that. He’s keeping watch since he says he can’t sleep anyway and the rest of us need the rest. Shen-shixiong is the best!”
Luo Binghe looks at Shen-shixiong’s back. It looks tired, bowed with stress. He doesn’t shiver in the cold night breeze but his breaths puff out in clouds of white, crystalizing in the air.
When he turns to reassure his younger sect-mates, however, his eyes are crinkled with a smile. He even glances over at Luo Binghe and nods at him, as if asking about his condition. Luo Binghe sends a tentative smile back at him, and he nods again, a silent acknowledgement, then face outward again. He’s acting like the guardian of the group and he can’t be older than twenty.
There is an odd little swell in Luo Binghe’s chest. It feels like grief.
To distract himself, he turns to where the girls are practically begging him to come over with their eyes and sets up a pot, then asks if anyone has rations to spare. He cooks them dinner, some of them gobbling like they hadn’t eaten for days.
“Shen-shixiong may be a great shixiong, but he’s no chef,” Jian Anran jokes as he slurps at his stew, and Luo Binghe takes that crumb of information and stores it away like a little woodworking mouse.
“I, your great shixiong, heard that,” Shen-shixiong calls from his rock.
“This humble shidi only speak truths~!”
They all laugh. Luo Binghe looks around and finds them relaxed, protected, safe. They feel safe here, in this arena crawling with monsters that wouldn’t hesitate to kill if they had the chance. These children—and they are children, the youngest here looks to be around thirteen—they trust their shixiong so much. And Shen-shixiong takes that responsibility so seriously that he would even extend it to an outsider like himself.
Luo Binghe volunteers to take food up to Shen-shixiong, since he doesn’t seem inclined to come down. He accepts it thankfully, and the noise he makes when he takes the first bite is—hm. It’s a noise, for sure. One of the noises, ever, easily.
Luo Binghe stares resolutely out at the dark environment while Shen-shixiong finishes the meal happily. He doesn’t remove his veil for it, either, just scoops the spoon under the barrier as if he’s used to it.
“Senior Shen,” he says when the bowl is emptied, “forgive me if this is a personal question, but… why the veil?”
Shen-shixiong pauses in the corner of his vision. He sees his hand reach up to check that it’s still in place. Then he laughs uneasily, the first sign of falsity since they’d met. “My face… is an unpleasant reminder to some. Better to keep it hidden.”
Luo Binghe takes the bowl he offers up and stands there awkwardly, unable to resist looking at Shen-shixiong like this. His eyes refract what little light they have, shining like small diamonds. He thinks the rest of his face is probably just as beautiful. He doesn’t say that out loud, though, just nods contemplatively and fiddles with the bowl.
“H-hey, Luo Binghe, what are you doing up here with me?” Shen-shixiong nudges his leg playfully. “There are some sisters down there who would very much like to get to know you.”
“I wonder if they really would want that?” he counters quietly, unable to help himself. It sounds bitter, though he doesn’t really mean it to.
Shen-shixiong seems shocked by his answer, which Luo Binghe belatedly realizes is because he was only teasing. He forces a grin, then drops it because it feels too fake for the moment. It’s not like Shen-shixiong is able to see his face clearly in the dark anyway—he’s different from Luo Binghe’s own sharp senses that can see the faint curve of Shen-shixiong’s cheek through his veil.
“This one prefers it here. It’s quiet,” Luo Binghe murmurs to soften his answer, and hesitantly settles down next to Shen-shixiong.
“Yeah,” Shen-shixiong agrees after a beat, setting his eyes on the outside. He lets Luo Binghe stay and Luo Binghe manages to get him talking about his research, just to watch his eyes light up and crinkle with a smile. The camp noise behind them dies down and it feels like it’s just them two alone here, chatting softly and watching the outside. It’s nice.
Until Shen-shixiong spots something in the darkness and stands up slowly, keeping his hand down low as he checks behind him and curses.
“They forgot to put out the fire. It’s attracting beasts when usually they’d pass by, of course I’d forgotten something… Luo Binghe, would you go down and put out the fire? I’ll divert that thing. If I’m not back by dawn… Qin Wanyue is in charge, got it?”
“Senior Shen means he is going out there alone?” Luo Binghe grabs his arm.
“It should be quick. It’s better to do stealth attacks with less people making noise, y’know? Plus, I don’t want to risk it with your injury.” Shen-shixiong grins at him, the veil distorting around his expression. It doesn’t reach his eyes. He places a hand on Luo Binghe’s shoulder.
“Protect them,” he says quietly. “I know Luo Binghe can do it.”
Then he’s gone, vanished into the darkness where low growls and odd high-pitched whines can be heard. Luo Binghe’s face drops into a frosty frown and he’s stuck in place for a second before he drops into the camp, swiftly putting out the fire and alerting Qin Wanyue of Shen-shixiong’s plans. She squints in the darkness, wary of the dark shape hovering over her. Luo Binghe frowns harder at Shen-shixiong’s second-in-command who’d apparently forgotten she was in the Conference and let her guard down this much.
They don’t wake the young disciples, choosing to set up posts with them and a few older ones around the camp to alert them of any nearing monsters. With the fire put out, nothing approaches. Neither does Shen-shixiong come back.
It crosses Luo Binghe’s mind that Shen-shixiong had taken the opportunity to run and get points while dumping his group on Luo Binghe and his incompetent second, but the thought perishes when he remembers the sincerity in Shen-shixiong’s voice. He clutches his robe around him harder and waits for daylight.
Dawn breaks on the third day of the Conference and Shen-shixiong doesn’t come back. Luo Binghe curses, worried, as the younger disciples wake up, shocked without their shixiong there to coddle them. They attach themselves to him, unfortunately, to the point where when he suggests he goes out alone to search for clues, Qin Wanyue doesn’t stop them from latching on and following him.
He surveys the group. “Senior Shen led you here for a reason. It’s safer here, all you need to do is take out the few monsters that wander by. Let me go out and search for him, it’s better than all of us…”
Jian Anran looks at him with wide, watery eyes. “We… we can just come with, though? We won’t be a burden, promise?”
Qin Wanrong crosses her arms stubbornly. “Shen-shixiong isn’t here, we don’t know if it will be safe this whole time!”
Xiao Cui is silent, but he clearly wants to come along too.
Qin Wanyue, the girl with absolutely no backbone against small children and her sister, caves quickly. “We won’t get in the way, if you find monsters you can take the points yourself!”
Luo Binghe turns his face away, unwilling to bother masking the scowl that takes over his features. “Whatever.”
He ventures out from the safe haven with a gaggle of inexperienced Huan Hua children trailing him like ducklings after their mother. He just knows Shen Qingqiu is laughing at him, wherever he sits watching the chaos.
He strikes down a few minor beasts as he goes, keeping a lookout for signs that Shen-shixiong came this way. A few broken branches mark a path, a piece of torn fabric is found tied to a stick, like a white flag. A beacon. There are signs of a fight, and eventually they find the corpse of two large monsters. There’s blood on the ground, and Luo Binghe’s nose twitches as is dawns on him that some of it is human.
The disciples behind him don’t like that at all. Xiao Cui even starts to cry, fat droplets falling from his eyes and down cheeks still round with adolescence. Luo Binghe says nothing, merely patting his head gently. He doesn’t pull his hand away when it is grabbed.
“Let’s go back,” he tells Qin Wanyue. “Safer the place we know than the one we don’t.”
She nods grimly, her face pale. She doesn’t try to talk to Luo Binghe again, merely comforting the others as they walk back to the place Shen-shixiong found.
Luo Binghe clutches the robe tight with one hand and Xiao Cui with the other. It’s not like he is very sad. Rationally, he knew him for less than twelve hours. He just… feels it’s a loss.
Jian Anran is starting to grumble again, while Qin Wanrong tromps around sullenly. They’re making too much noise, again. Luo Binghe barks at them to stay quiet, wondering how Huan Hua let such inexperienced disciples join the Conference—they would just let their sect down and disappoint their master. Or die. Either way, it was largely a waste for such resources.
Qin Wanyue approaches him when they’re back in the stone circle, trying to gain his cooperation and stay with the group a little longer. He knows she’d be helpless without him—even injured, he’s probably the strongest fighter here.
Once again, she makes a play on the points. “We’ll just guard the encampment, you can take the credit for the kills…”
“I’m already taking credit for my kills,” Luo Binghe notes apathetically.
“But— but with a group like this, you’re more likely to attract attention. You’ll get monsters coming up to us instead of wasting energy trying to find a target.” She touches his arm and he shrugs her off.
“Why is Disciple Qin here if not for the competition,” Luo Binghe asks tiredly, unwilling to play into her little manipulations.
She looks across the camp to where her sister is goofing off with an older disciple. “I… I came to compete. But my sister came too, and I cannot leave her alone. The other little ones… it happens every time, Shen-shixiong and I couldn’t leave them like that.”
She doesn’t finish but Luo Binghe gets it. Sect politics, show of force, whatever they wanted to call it. And she and Shen-shixiong had soft hearts.
He sighs, resigned. “Okay. I will stay for a few more nights, but if I’m not getting the points I need then I will have to leave while there’s still time. Don’t you have your head disciple around here somewhere?”
She brightens, then pauses. “Gongyi Xiao. I’m not sure he’d be willing to help us for long.”
Luo Binghe raises an eyebrow. So he’s fair game, a disciple from an entirely different sect? Their own head disciple, rumored to be friendly and righteous, isn’t willing to take on this group of drag and compromise his own points. The cohesion of the sect really needed some work—probably a weakness of all large organizations, since he can’t say Cang Qiong is better. Well, regardless, he already said he’d stay. Who knows, maybe Shen-shixiong will come back before then.
Qin Wanyue sees his expressions since he doesn’t bother to hide them. She bows her head submissively and thanks him, grateful that he’s willing to stay even longer than he’d planned.
They stay the morning in the area of the stone circle, Luo Binghe growing antsy at the lack of action. He’d gotten a head start on his points but with this lull he’s probably falling in the rankings. Finally he suggests they go find a water source, venture out to see if there is a river nearby. The others look around uneasily but decide to follow, unwilling to leave the shelter his sword provides.
Since he’s decided on leaving the stone circle, he instructs the disciples to stay on high alert in case he’s unable to catch every monster that comes his way. He’s even able to send a small, furry thing to Xiao Cui’s waiting sword to give him a few scant points, the weapon looking almost too heavy for his skinny arms. Luo Binghe tsks in disapproval; without a support like him, sending this kid into the arena was like sending a sacrificial lamb to slaughter.
They tire fast, and Qin Wanrong breaks a little after the sun begins its descent from its throne at the top of the sky. He ignores her, since Xiao Cui and Jian Anran only look a little tired, and she’s better-fed than they are. Qin Wanyue doesn’t say a word to him, either, merely tugs her sister along behind her and placates her a few times.
When they reach the water source, Luo Binghe has gained points and suffered no huge setbacks, despite the large group that follows him. Honestly, it looks like someone’s been through the area already, cleaning up for them. Qin Wanyue pleads with him and he stands back and slightly on higher ground to let the disciples drink their fill, staring outwardly to stop any sneak attacks.
He hears a shriek and spins around, sword ready, only to find Qin Wanrong with her boots and socks off, playing in the water. She’d just splashed Jian Anran, who’d also shucked his footwear to go after her for childish revenge. Qin Wanyue watches over them fondly. Xiao Cui has filled a waterskin and is bringing it to him, likely to give him a drink, the filial child.
He thanks the boy with a smile and takes a mouthful, washing away the dust that had unknowingly gathered in his mouth. First he spits, then takes a long drag, letting the water fill his belly. It tastes a little odd—sort of brackish, but also somehow smoky, if water could have that taste. A tiny fritz of adrenaline sparks down his spine, and he looks around vigilantly, trying to spy what could have caught his attention like that. Nothing’s really the matter on the surface. Underneath the sounds of the kids playing, the trees are silent and the water is calm.
He pauses, staring at the water. The ripples from the Huan Hua disciples spread outward and then just… calm suddenly, as if being absorbed without a trace. Eaten by something behemoth beneath the surface.
His eyes widen and he throws the waterskin into Xiao Cui’s arms, already beginning to sprint toward the water’s edge.
“Get out!” he orders, his voice clear and demanding. “Get out of the water there’s something—”
He’s too late. One moment Jian Anran is looking at him in confusion, the next the boy is gone, yanked under the water by something grasping his foot. Qin Wanrong screams in confusion and fear and tries to make her way back to shore, her sister already helping get the other disciples to safety. They stumble away, some of them falling and scrambling on all fours.
“A-Rong!” Qin Wanyue shouts, rushing forward to help her sister over the edge of an outcropping. “Grab my hand!”
Luo Binghe reaches the water and is able to spot dark lines, what looks like cables or black roots, snaking quickly through the water and making a beeline for the ripples from Qin Wanrong’s splashes. He sprints over but suddenly staggers, his vision twisting and making his legs go sideways under him.
At the same time, through his blurry vision, he sees a tendril of black rope breach the surface of the water without so much as a breaking of wave, striking as fast as a viper, and wrapping around Qin Wanrong’s ankle. Qin Wanyue lays belly-down on the outcropping, one hand pressed against her temple and the other weakly grasping her sister’s wrist. The girl caught in the middle looks limp, as if without bones, her head slumped and her body helpless to resist the rope. The thing around her ankle pulses as if alive, more threads of fibers reinforcing the original strand and growing in strength.
Luo Binghe forces his eyes to focus, bringing his sword down to help him up as his head goes fuzzy and soft, seeing double. When did he— the water! The thing in the water, it poisoned them!
He growls and slaps himself, using the sharp bite of pain to bring himself back around. Qin Wanyue screams in desperate anger as her sister’s wrist is slowly but surely pulled out of her hand. “No, no, don’t let go! A-Rong, wake up!!”
Luo Binghe steadies his breathing, calming his spiked heart rate in an effort to slow the circulation. Then he quickly and carefully circulates a thin strand of spiritual qi through his veins, pumping the poison out and purifying it. He coughs out a few droplets of thick black goo, the sight of it enough to recoil.
Then he shakes it off, tightening his hand around Zheng Yang and using his entire body to propel himself forward, aiming for the rope of fibers dragging Qin Wanrong into the water. He hits it, slicing clean through, and the thing in the water shrieks in anger. He uses his momentum to leap off the outcropping, bringing his sword down to combat more ropes of the thing shooting from the water—hair. It looks more and more like twisted, distorted black hair.
He doesn’t recognize it immediately, but the hair rings a bell. Somewhere in the back of his mind he remembers reading about the Nu Yuan Chan, a high-level monster thought to live in certain swamps in the demonic realm. What the hell is a monster like that doing in the Conference?
Unable to spare a backwards glance, he forces the Nu Yuan Chan away with his sword to give Qin Wanyue time to gather herself and her sister and get out of the area.
“It’s drugged the water!” he yells into the air, hoping his words reach her. “Clear it with qi!”
The thing has a long reach, even able to scoop up bystanders on the shore, though with the late afternoon sun beating down on it it seems unwilling as of yet to emerge from its home. He deflects it again and again, buying time for the disciples to get away.
He casts around and manages to spy a distortion in the sky, probably one of the monitoring devices that Shen Qingqiu explained to them would be watching their every move. Their—every—move!
But… if he asked for assistance now, it would be tantamount to dropping out of the Conference. It would mean abandoning his dreams, giving up on a chance of recognition from Shen Qingqiu. From his sect. His stomach aches with the thought of giving up when he’s so close.
As he hacks at the thick strands of hair, the sky quickly becomes overcast and the whimpers of the Huan Hua disciples ring in his ears. He has no choice.
He quickly takes out a talisman, the characters on it a little misshapen, and activates the array painted on the top. The single talisman multiplies into a thick stack, and he throws them out to seal the Nu Yuan Chan so he can reach the flare in his pocket, dodging a long tendril aimed at his tender ribs. The talismans buy him enough time that he can hold the Nu Yuan Chan in place, writhing in fury against the cultivator magic, and fire a flare in the air.
The moment it bursts, a flare of crimson lighting up the ground and the trees and pale, terrified faces, everything goes to hell.