Chapter Text
Chengzhu was late for dinner.
Just tell him I’m busy and start feeding him, he said in the private communication array. Black Water won’t really care about anything else anyway.
Yes, Chengzhu. And that was what Yin Yu did, accompanied by the usual staff in their diaphonous dresses, carrying tray after tray to set in front of Black Water Sinks Ships as Yin Yu delivered the message.
Rather than stare at the Supreme Ghost King relentlessly putting food into a dark, sharktoothed maw, the women then retreated in their two straight lines. Dead-fish eyes watched them go even as the chopsticks never paused.
Until eventually, they did. “Many of those women are from Crimson Rain’s private dance troupe,” he said to the rhythm of empty bowls clattering on empty platters as he moved them around for convenience.
Yin Yu nodded. Having decided to become an intel expert, Black Water had honed a keen observational sense.
“Which he never really watches much,” He Xuan continued. “And he doesn’t treat them in a way that’d make me want to murder him.”
Yin Yu nodded again, not commenting on the fact that ‘want’ was the operative term. No one was under the delusion that He Xuan would stand much chance even if Chengzhu did tread enragingly on emotional baggage about abusive harassment of women. Which Chengzhu would not, for so many reasons.
“And I very much doubt that Crimson Rain keeps so many on staff just to get me my food more quickly at these meetings. He himself barely eats. Though granted, it might amuse him to add their wages to my debt.” He Xuan looked intently at Yin Yu, presumably in expectation of an answer. If the Waning Moon Officer — his face was on — still let things bother him, that look would have been disconcerting.
“Chengzhu is a patron of the arts,” Yin Yu said as flatly as proper grammar allowed.
“Oh, indeed.” The ghost’s voice was waterlogged with exhausted death. “I’ve seen his art. Give me the culinary — or even performing — arts over More Sculpture anyday.”
Yin Yu continued to stand there. “Chengzhu’s aesthetic sense is well cultivated.”
“Oh yes. He got to technical skill eventually. I doubt he ever got to the point of truly varying his subject matter.” And then, as if a pendulum had been released to swing back, the chopsticks resumed their labor, and no more was said for some time.
Yin Yu did not have the familiarity the two Ghost Kings had with Chengzhu’s foremost sculpture gallery, but he suspected Black Water was correct on the issue. Crimson Rain Seeks Flower could be very single-minded.
Obsession was, after all, a major attribute of being a Ghost King. Black Water had destroying Shi Wudu. Chengzhu had finding His Highness. Yin Yu had no idea what the obsessions of the other two Calamities were — well, he had no idea what Bai Wuxiang’s obsession had been, rather. Green Lantern Tours Night, who wasn’t a proper Ghost King, was apparently obsessed with mimicking all the others and general self-aggrandizement. No wonder he still wasn’t a Devastation despite his age. Yi Yu knew well that if someone was simply better, there was no way to force oneself to their level. He knew it quite well.
Finally, he heard, over the sound of eating, the clinking of Chengzhu’s boot-chains.
The door swung open. “Black Water. How’s the compulsion to stuff your face?”
Behind his own professional face, Yin Yu managed to smile at Chengzhu’s particular flair and sigh in sympathy with his victim at the same time.