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He had not expected Xiǎo Huāyāo to arrive at such an… insidious place.
His instincts bolt to the surface coiled tight, strike ready as he swivels his gaze to and fro in meticulous sweeps. Something is off. Not quite right. Like looking at a picturesque scene, only to move closer and discover its deception the instant its illusion shatters before your eyes.
This place never existed before his containment. Nor ever would have sunk its parasitic claws within the roots of his land, had he succeeded in ridding the world of those useless fairies. He does not know why each inhale here is so acrid, why with just a feathering of his cultivation about him in a well honed reflex he feels repulsed, but the experiences subsist like a tacky, oily film that clings to his perfect form.
The xiǎo huāyāo notices no such thing, scampering along the way an oblivious lamb walks into the den of pertinacious wolves.
He takes in one, deep breath of impure air, lets it out with a shake of his head. Crossing his arms, he treads resignedly behind her.
She does not sense the danger which is no surprise. She fearlessly threatened to cut his throat during their initial meeting. Seeing her bounce about with her bright radiance merely reinforces the indisputable fact of her non-existent self-preservation. As expected, it is up to him to ensure their safety.
The further they sink into this cesspool, the more apparent it is that the people here drift about in listless waves. Everything is subdued in spite of the rich crimson, mauve, and purple shades standing stark against the lifeless, white snow. Upon entering the marketplace, there are a few calling vendors here and there, but otherwise, it’s the whisper crunch of tracks being left within the snow.
There are no squealing children, no laughter, no arguing. It is as if everyone is held within some trance. Everyone aside from Xiǎo Huāyāo, who’s presence they seem unopposed to. Although, she unwittingly blends in with her red mouth and pure shades. He begins to adjust his senses to tracking her shimmering spirit instead; its vibrant, cheery green is distinguishable from their surroundings with ease.
So fixated on her flowing twirls and loops, he spots the instant she compresses inward at the same time he feels a chill feather across his flesh. Shifting focus, he sees Xiǎo Huāyāo lift her empty basket and gaze into it with a frown, watches her turn around and look through him back the way they came, her brows pulled together deeply, her frown prominent. She contemplates the overcast sky for several moments before her shoulders fall. Pivoting back around, she plods ahead with an arm curled across her chest, fingers blanched from her tight grip.
With a flick of his fingers her way, a silvery blue aura settles around her from head to toe before disappearing from view.
She slows to a stop, the tension visibly bleeding out of her as her arm falls to her side and her head tilts back. The chill melts back into his usual fiery temperament, the matter settled. But she turns around once more, and studies the people passing by her.
He can see confusion and her sixth sense which recognizes his heat, prodding at her. Though she does not bridge the two together and make the connection as she returns to the path forward a moment later, sunny smile back in place.
Of course she managed to forget any form of protection towards the elements despite her clear familiarity with this dreadful place. The strength of her cultivation is ninety percent and her aptitude is low. He will not risk her falling sick and backsliding when she is so close to her maximum.
However, as she moves from one stall to another, one of her more unfortunate flaws rears its head.
The xiǎo huāyāo has minimal sense, often paying thrice as much as the items are worth with a bright smile upon her face. If this is what she pays all the time, it’s no wonder she’s in constant debt. No one would dare treat her this way if they knew she belonged to the Moon Supreme.
So naturally, he swindles the difference back from the gluttons who have scented the ripe blood of a gullible target.
Oftentimes, the downside to this is her returning to vendors to purchase more quantities of the items she has already purchased when she discovers she has more spirit stones than expected.
His eye twitches at the tedium, but he follows along, reclaiming what she is owed.
Not long after her basket nears overflowing, she flops down onto an unoccupied bench dusted in snow. He flicks his wrist, swathing her basket in a subtle weight diminishing charm. Her dragging steps and sagging shoulders and wringing grip on the woven handle are dead giveaways to her growing fatigue.
The huāyāo has the delicate constitution of a chubby piglet. Idly, he wonders how she would react if he were to take an apple and stuff it between her rosy lips. No doubt, her plump cheeks would become distended and her eyes would round to indignant saucers.
The image inspires a lungful of satisfaction beneath his sternum which blooms up into a sly smirk across his lips before it drains away like water through the cupped hands of a careless flower spirit.
Fantasy dashed, his attention resurrects itself, drawing his awareness to a male across the pathway watching his xiǎo huāyāo as she rises back to her feet.
The man is fidgety the way a young pup is, casting frequent, conspicuous looks her way. It dredges up the insufferable image of that overblown false god.
The Hellfire that swirls and twists between his ribs, dwells in a constant sear within his veins, surges beneath his skin like a prowling beast, crackling and snapping within his ferocious glare. He attempts to stifle the reaction through the clench of his teeth, but the foolish man dares to take a step in her direction.
He finds himself closing the distance between them in a matter of moments, his aura seeping out like a noxious haze.
The man jerks to a halt, wide eyes glancing around the way a hapless deer would, ending in a lingering gaze her way that causes the tendons in his throat to strain. His conclusion that the residents of this place don’t hold a resentment towards the fairies the way the heart of the Cangyan Sea does is solidified.
This does nothing to assuage the rapid acceleration of his temper.
“If I could just work up the nerve, I can still talk to her… find out if we—”
The man squeals as his leg is wrenched up into the air, his body flailing as gravity yanks him down flat onto his back where he moans and writhes in a disgraceful heap.
Heads turn, wondering in hushed tones about the man who slipped on ice. Upon checking, Xiǎo Huāyāo is not one of them, too far away to have noticed.
Mouth crooked up to one side, he walks across the feckless man curled on the ground where he belongs.
He finds Xiǎo Huāyāo at another stall, though this one does not hold necessities.
She “oohs” and “awws” like a graceless commoner, standing upon the tips of her toes to get a good look at all the dangling, ornamental trinkets.
Crossing his arms, he studies them himself, attempting to grasp what she sees. There are finer jewels within the numerous treasure houses of the Silent Moon Palace. If she would simply ask, he would bring her something worthy of her visage.
“See something you like, miss?” The vendor grins with an astute gaze, shuffling up to the counter of the stall.
The edge of her spirit feels brittle, matching her shaky frame and white hair. Though it still eclipses his xiǎo huāyāo’s effortlessly.
The huāyāo bobs her head and eyes the wares more intently.
He heaves a great sigh.
“You have a good eye,” the vendor casts the complimentary lie. Gliding her withered hand before the hanging pendants, he feels a touch of her cultivation spread across them, causing a slight shimmer to emerge from within their jewels. “After all, these will grant the wearer protection from harm.”
Xiǎo Huāyāo goes still, her eyes peering with more intensity than before. “Really?”
He lowers his face into his hand, pressing fingers into the throb within his temples for a long moment. She must really have believed he was serious about eating her raw.
The vendor chortles. “Certainly. These talismans have all been enchanted in one way or another.”
Not one of them gives off a wisp of magic. He idly wonders what the old woman’s story is for each of the buyers that wanders her way.
Xiǎo Huāyāo considers each of the costume pieces with narrowed eyes and patience, and much to his surprise, doesn’t need his assistance to resist the compulsion charms placed on certain necklaces. When she eventually points out which talisman she desires, the vendor offers ample flattery and mystical tales of the object’s creation.
All the while he pictures encasing the old woman within hellfire and turning her into dust. After all, she is nearing the age for reincarnation, and he has killed for far less.
“Fifty spirit stones?” Xiǎo Huāyāo quires, her brows drawing together beneath snow dusted bangs. She sets her basket onto the ground and empties her pouch onto the counter. Carefully begins counting them out.
He can see at a glance, she is just short of the abysmal asking price, and feels his body physically quake from fighting the urge to lift the stall and send it careening into the nearest mountain.
This is asinine.
The xiǎo huāyāo does not need this. She has him. But he knows she will be sad. She will carry it silently like a black, soggy cloud for days and days. Will work extra hours around Shuiyuntian to earn what she needs in order to return here, only for the vendor to have found a reason to inflate the price.
“I…”
There’s a hitch in her tone that feels like a salty slice across his ribs.
She recounts the spirit stones, but her quivering hand curls with palpable defeat in the end. “I only have thirty-eight…”
The woman smiles with faux sympathy. “I’m sorry, miss. There is nothing I can do.”
Xiǎo Huāyāo nods jerkily, her nose and the rims of her eyes growing flushed in spite of the warmth he has swathed her in.
He roughly scrubs a hand across his stinging eyes, jaw twinging beneath the clench of his teeth. Heat blazes and snaps and roars underneath his skin as he glares down the vendor he makes certain to remember.
Why is this so damn important?!
Xiǎo Huāyāo gathers a handful of her spirit stones and opens her pouch to place them inside, though she hesitates. Sniffing, she sets the spirit stones back onto the counter and lifts the pouch. Her eyebrows shoot up as she gasps. “Wait a moment!”
She tips the pouch over onto the counter, causing a rattle as more spirits stones join the others. She counts them just as meticulously, though there’s a visible shake in her hand. “Fifty!” she cheers with a breathless laugh. “I must have missed them. Here! Please, I would like that talisman!”
He lowers his hand, only marginally pacified that the amount he summoned from his own stores salvaged the situation.
Xiǎo Huāyāo receives her purchase, and the flutters and swoops and sheer light that dances through his stomach and tickles his blood, softens him a smidge more. But when she floats away, he turns to the vendor. Walks with a casual gait until he is standing beside her while she greedily counts her earnings.
He ought to take each and every one of these necklaces, wrap them around her wrinkled neck and squeeze until the light leaves her eyes for daring to dampen the spirit of his xiǎo huāyāo.
Instead, as he has before, he removes the excess his xiǎo huāyāo is owed, intending on slipping them back into her stores when she next picks up her stipend from the hypocrites that grow bloated from their place upon the backs of others. If he also happens to cause the container holding the vendor’s holdings to spontaneously rupture across the pathway and places a compulsion charm on that, well…
Who will be any wiser?
He trails a few steps behind Xiǎo Huāyāo, feeling the thready tension within his shoulders release when he realizes she is finally heading for the departure boat. He watches her board, grits his teeth to keep himself stationary when she stumbles into her seat, thankfully not overboard. Only after the boat is drifting across Memory Loss River does he jump upon the rear of the boat wrapped within a weightless charm.
Gazing over his shoulder at the city shrouded in shadow in spite of the evening sun's rays, he makes it a point to investigate it in the future. Any place that bears the stench of ill intentions that potent carries an infestation that requires a swift, clean elimination at the root. And cut at the ankles, everything else will topple.
Once the boat rocks into the shore of Shuiyuntian, he makes certain that Xiǎo Huāyāo exits with minimal mishaps, then steps into the dark, smoky wreath of his cultivation. The world dissolves and reshapes into Arbiter Hall in a mere blink.
He has just settled onto the floor seat within the cooking pavilion when he hears her tapping footsteps rushing down the hall.
“Da Qiang!” she chirps by way of a breathless greeting.
He hums in return.
“I had a really good day! I found so many deals on all the things we need…”
He listens to her radically different take on the trip she took, following her around with his eyes as she places the contents of her basket into their designated places.
“Can you believe I forgot my coat? I was cold at first, but then it sort of went away… Do you really think I’m getting stronger?”
He hums his affirmation with a nod. Having the most supreme being at her disposal does lend to a form of strength after all.
She beams, unwittingly dragging him into the ebullient radiance of her glow. She places her basket off to the side, then casts her gaze around with a growing frown.
“Did you finish the dusting?”
He gives her a withering look.
The absurdity this little grass has within her. To ask him, the Moon Supreme Lord of the three realms, to partake in such menial tasks. Daily. On top of bringing her morning dew flavored with seven kinds of honey, taking her to bask within dawn’s rays, making sure she does not get herself hurt, enduring the ever revolving changes in her moods, and listening to her prattle on about her precious Changheng, she wants him to do more.
The itch to stick her to the roof and hold her there until she is positively begging to be given the opportunity to repent her offenses to her Lord simmers enticingly beneath his fingertips.
The xiǎo huāyāo’s eyes dare to become shaky as they lower, her lower lip protruding as her shoulders sink.
He seethes, feeling the genuine, soggy, heavy descent in her mood layer atop of his sharp ire. She had been so light and fluffy when her eyes had landed on him. Now—
She mopes towards the basin, stooping down to collect a bucket and cloth from a cabinet, then pumps water into the wooden vessel without a word.
He is storming towards her, driven by a compulsion quite similar to the One Heart Curse, though its origins are unknown. Taking the supplies from her, he cinches the sleeves of his robes up to his elbows with bands of magic, and starts the infuriating task, the same way he has done the day before, and the day before that, and the day before that.
The shine of her smile is near physical. He turns from it the way shadows do the sun.
“I’ll help you, Da Qiang!” she pipes up, racing to procure another cloth and bucket of her own.
He wants to hiss at her, to tell her to go soak in the bath, that he feels her muscles twinging, her lower back and feet aching. Such minor things that his cultivation shakes them off with ease, but for pitiful grass such as herself, she needs to heed her body’s weaknesses. But she is as stubborn as root sickness he has learned.
There is the possibility of turning his magic upon her, frightening her into obedience. It would be quite easy, in fact.
He scrubs the counter instead, listening to water sloshing somewhere behind him as she tackles the opposite side of the room.
This place is too big for one little flower spirit. Yet she takes care of it without batting an eye, even though her little body throbs from head to toe after each laborious chore. And those pretentious little ingrates, whenever they do deign to stop by, see fit to turn their noses up as if the place, and the tireless Arbiter of Fate’s apprentice, are beneath them.
Worthless losers, the lot of them.
He spends the time shining the wood, imagining eviscerate every single one of those hypocrites, eliminating all of the filth the way he removes all of the dust in his path within the kitchen. Afterward, he would place Arbiter Hall atop of the Water Pavilion so the xiǎo huāyāo would never have to worry about being able to bask in the sun again.
How happy she would be to no longer squander at the feet of others, how grateful she would be to her Moon Supreme Lord. So grateful in fact, that she would fall to her knees before him, her lips touching the edge of his robes like a good xiǎo huāyāo should.
And if he is really feeling generous, he will allow her to sit upon his lap on top of his throne, will let all of the Cangyan Sea witness the beauty of the most precious being in all the three realms who belongs solely to him.
“What is that grin for?”
He blinks, the pleasant fantasy dissolving away as she pokes his cheek.
She is titled so that her face is angled up to his horizontally, her hair spilling towards the ground, ending in gentle waves. She is cream and strawberries, soft, sweet, and frustratingly fragile.
Xiǎo Huāyāo takes the bucket and cloth from his hands. “I’m happy to be done with this too!”
After disposing of the gray water, she brings a fresh cloth his way, and humming, begins to dry his hands as if he is some sort of infantile sprite.
His Hellfire flashes underneath the skin of his neck, making the covered area uncomfortable to his annoyance.
Snatching the cloth from her and ignoring her petulant whine, he snags her chin between his fingers and begins to dab along her forehead where her hair clings to her skin from overexertion.
“You work too hard on such trivial things,” he chides, squeezing her chin a little in retaliation towards the defiant glare she gives him.
She whines, appearing as threatening as a yapping Yingzhao.
He smirks, leans down so their noses nearly brush. “Since you have so much energy in you now, why don’t you fix that Destiny Book?”
Her eyes round before she pulls out of his grasp, exaggerating coughs as she hems and haws. “I’m actually… feeling a bit—”
He snaps the towel down onto the floor mat, not interested in hearing any more of her excuses. “Go soak in warm water, not hot.”
She shakes her head, and moves to begin rummaging through the cabinets, pulling out ingredients, utensils, and clay pots.
This irrational creature!
His jaw twinges. His temples pulsate. He stalks up behind her and reaches for her waist. She is a slight woman, hardly equivalent to a feather in spite of her piggish ways. What could she do to stop him from marching her down to care for herself? Nothing, so long as that infernal curse doesn’t come into play.
But his hands end up filled with things that aren’t soft, curved, and squirmy.
“Da Qiang, take this to the cooking pot,” she tells him while ensuring his hands are secure around the flat noodles bundled within the white cloth by cupping her dainty hands around his. “Boil the water, then place these inside. When they become translucent, ladle them into our bowls. Okay?”
Once again she behaves as if he is an invalid – his previous attempt at cooking being pointedly ignored – while peering up at him with such globular eyes framed by inky black lashes.
He says nothing, though his glare feels more disgruntled than the murderous sneer he is going for. Drawing in a long breath through his nose, she halts his intended assault on her character, this time through a hand curved gently over his shoulder.
“Thank you, Da Qiang!” Her toothy smile crinkles her eyes as she makes a sound like tinkling bells.
She is blinding– infuriating to look at. He sweeps from the room without another word, out to the cooking pot where the cool breeze is direct and his chest is less tight.
The pot rests innocuous within the center of the nook. Yet his foot nearly drives into it, certain the accursed thing bears pride in its previous triumph over the Moon Supreme. He lowers himself down, posture erect and chin raised as if he has already achieved irrefutable victory.
“You will not succeed this time,” he declares through a mean twist of his lips.
The pot remains cool, unperturbed.
He works by early evening light doing as she instructed. He puts the noodles within the water and jutting out a dash of his Hellfire through his fingertips, coaxes the water into a boil. And then, all there is left is mindless stirring.
He can see her frame at the counter if he leans to the side just a touch. She is kneading dough, rocking into the motion with the full weight of her little body.
Cheek dropping to his fist propped up on his thigh while the other continues to agitate the noodles within the pot, he reaches within his chest seeking out her thread. Thin but resilient and deceptive in scope. It spans out across the breadth of his heart in an intricate weave not unlike that of a spider’s webbing, impossible to recreate.
It feels threaded into each of his fibers, filling in gaps he was not aware of prior to its existence, making the organ feel fuller when he once could not feel it at all. Now it feels as if he has always felt the comforting sensation of her lungs expanding, has always been able to find her soul within a room of thousands, as if she has always been there, an immemorial part of his spirit.
Dropping his eyes from the xiǎo huāyāo, he scoffs at his puerile musings. He has been reading too many flowery poems. Threads can be cut and discarded. But for now, this one has a purpose. He can feel a jittery energy trickling down from her. Its thrum is bundled with energy. Anticipation. She is planning something.
Jolting he looks down at the pot, and notices Hellfire curling up the sides. He stares unmoving for a smattering of seconds. The drive within his veins had intensified at some point without his notice as if in reaction to something.
He draws them inward, corralling them back into their fleshy containment with intrinsic ease. But his focus remains fixed upon his palm. His Hellfire prowls beneath his skin, a constant, devastating presence. Such a careless slip… He cannot remember a similar occurrence having happened before.
Absently reaching for the ladle, he notices at once how different stirring feels.
A familiar pressure starts within his chest building and churning and boiling its way up.
Gathering a scoop and lifting it beyond the lip of the infernal pot, he stares at the former noodles. Now, a sticky, clumpy, beige mass.
His eye twitches as his skull pounds and pounds.
A glob drips back into the victorious pot.
He surges to his feet, hurdling the ladle back into the pot, fuming. His hands curl upward into claws at his side. Vengeance manifests in a burst of ice blue flames.
The scurrying taps of graceless feet impede his rightful reprisal.
“Da Qiang!” His wrists are ensnared by hands as sturdy as bird’s bones.
The Hellfire flutters beneath her face, casting shards of azure across her features. Brief flashes contained within her round eyes are as intriguing as that of moonstones. She doesn’t flinch from the fire as others do, as if she’s impervious to it. The most reasonable explanation being her tie to his heart.
“While your flames are pretty… could you maybe put them away?” She bats her eyes up at him.
He gives the pot a long, scathing glare.
The flames are doused with a sigh like hiss.
A satisfied hum accompanies her smile before she turns to dish odious servings into two bowls. She twists one and peers at it as if it is something worthy of being examined rather than disposed of at first sight. Her heart tells him that her spirit is not bogged down by disappointment. She feels rather like the soft hand she had placed upon his shoulder earlier.
“It’s okay, Da Qiang. It took me a while to get cooking right after my Master went on her trip too,” she sets the bowl back down and reaches for another she must have brought with her in her hurry. She takes his hand and guides it underneath the zitan. “Can you heat this one up?”
He should not take lightly to being treated as a convenient flame. But not being used as a tool to crush, maim, or destroy, something about this is… novel.
The stasis charm he had placed upon it the other day breaks in a shimmering wave. And within moments, the nook is filled with an inviting aroma.
Xiǎo Huāyāo distributes the last of the contents across the two bowls, then urges him to sit by way of her hands on his arms.
The sauce she brewed before makes the disaster palatable. Though the noodles are too frail to withstand the force of their chopsticks. They give up their use halfway through and scoop up the rest like it is simply mushy soup. Her side at some point becomes a constant warm graze against his own. There is enough room to slide over and end the needless contact.
He remains stationary in his position.
Xiǎo Huāyāo slurps up her remaining portion, head tossed back with an exaggerated moan.
He wants to pinch her cherubic cheeks and demand she not pretend like her contributions weren’t the only thing that salvaged the meal. But the xiǎo huāyāo has somehow been suffused with an unremitting elixir as she is always up, always moving.
She is so perky, disproportionately effervescent. Her spirit is the pearly white of a newborn star despite how much the world has attempted to siphon her dry, to extinguish her. How is this possible? It is frankly confounding.
Bowls stacked in one hand, she grasps his in the other. With no resistance or thought, he fits his hand around her silken warmth securely and follows after her into the kitchen where she exchanges the bowls for a tied cloth with a little orchid woven into the tan fabric.
He eyes the basin filled with soiled dishes before he’s pulled down the familiar path to her greenhouse.
The scent always hits him first. A sensory delight, the rich, blend of sweet, aromatic fragrances. Honey and peach layer across balmy earth and a subtle hint of something tangy, something sharp. It blankets across him like a fragrant oasis. A place that is calming and uplifting with her happiness or withered and desolate with her woe. It smells familiar. It smells of joy, sunshine, and laughter.
It smells of her.
She takes him all the way to the back where they can see purple, blue, and onyx spreading across the sky in ever deepening strokes. It has become somewhat of a routine to end up here at night, depending upon what misfortune the xiǎo huāyāo finds herself in that day.
The flower cakes she unfolds on the wooden bench between them, however, is a new addition. He makes certain not to bring one to his mouth too swiftly.
The velvety sweetness swirls through his nose first, teasing pure decadence his mouth waters for. He takes a bite, eyes shutting as it melts across his senses. He has tasted many delicacies within the Cangyan Sea. The flavors there are striking and savory with sharp kicks and lasting bites.
But this is cloudy soft with subtle layers that roll across his tongue in blossoming waves. A multitude of smooth honeys, drops of silky petals, and a kaleidoscopic nectar that envelopes it all, yet he has been unable to identify its variety. It’s so different from what he knows. Neither a source for survival or a delicate thing meant solely to display one’s status.
It’s purely meant for enjoyment, for comfort, to make one… happy.
He pauses at this odd deduction, having never considered it before. He has experienced Xiǎo Huāyāo’s pleasure, concern, and contentment, and these are indeed what he associates with her flower cakes. She always offers them with meaning.
This moment as he looks at her through eyes reluctant to draw open, he observes her attentive gaze and warm smile as she chews her own delight; he knows his conclusion is true. She is somehow gratified to share in this indulgence with him.
He swallows his next cake, tasting only the sweetness of this peculiar discovery.
“So… what did you do today?”
Her question stirs him from his mild trance. Her curious expression is innocent enough, but the echoed flutter in his stomach is telling. What is she up to?
Smoothing out his features, he plucks up a cake and nibbles on it, giving her a shrewd stare. “I prevented an unsuitable supplicant from potentially gaining what does not belong to him.” He snaps up the rest of the cake, gaze unwavering, all while he feels the recollection of the scorch of outrage towards that uncultivated underling battering against his ribs.
It is no wonder he reacted instinctively before. The would-be hopeful was no better than that sanctimonious mediocre war god. Wanting something neither are worthy of.
Xiǎo Huāyāo’s expression appears to twitch through confusion, wonder, before landing on pleased. “That’s good that you stopped thievery. See, I told you you’re not all bad!” She pats his hand dangling over the railing.
He laughs a dismissive note through his nose. The rivers of blood he would create for her…
She draws back, eyes scoping around in feigned consideration while her stomach tightens up enough to start affecting his own. “That’s why you didn’t dust before—”
“Cut it out,” he interjects in a stern tone, head dropping just a little ways to the side as he sizes her up, trying to pick apart what it is she has done now, somehow without his notice. “Just say what you intend to. Don’t hesitate on matters with me.”
Her eyes round before narrowing into that glare that’s all round edges and blunted heat as if he has insulted her. It makes him want to needle her further, get her to draw her kittenish claws out, puff out her cheeks and look down her nose as she treats him like he has flesh and blood. Like he is no better than her equal.
She snatches his hand up and jerks it between them, breaking him free of that compelling line of thought. He watches instead as she removes something from within the storage charm within her billowing sleeves, and with tremendous care, she places an object within the curl of his palm.
The useless talisman from before.
His eyes lift towards her, his eyebrows drawing together deeply. For a moment, all he knows is the drumming of his heart and the tightness of his lungs, her body’s reactions creating replicas within his own.
She is looking down at his hand she cradles, ducked into herself a touch. Yet she speaks in a smooth glide the way her flower cakes melt down his tongue. “This is a talisman that has been blessed by the nine seas and enchanted beneath the rays of a thousand full moons. It is meant to grant the wearer protection from harm.”
Strangely, he feels the wispy sweetness of her cultivation trickle outward through her palms and settle around the talisman as if willing her statement to be true.
He gazes at the round wood, sanded and smoothed, carved with immaculate, flowy detailings around the perimeter which encircles the prominent raised moon of a honey gold shade. Red and green dabs of color accentuate the finer etching embedded within the moon itself and sprouting out from its swooping shape. Circular cerulean gems perhaps represent the nine seas’ infusion while the runes woven into the moon’s border should be for protection.
It’s a marvelous fake. But spurious nonetheless.
“I wield more power than anyone within the three realms. What would I need protection for?” he queries, baffled by the suggestion.
His hand lacks warmth with her hands sudden departure.
It is an odd thing to notice. He even goes so far as to study his hand for a moment, pondering the impossibility of her having taken the heat of his Hellfire with her.
His stomach gains a tense, disruptive pressure, his body feeling as if it bears an endless, dragging weight he has learned to associate with her sadness.
“Well, it was just… a silly gift,” she says with such false levity that even without her heart bound to his, he would be able to identify the false, dissonant notes. “You don’t have to keep it. Here, let me just—”
He pulls his hand back from her reaching grasp, eyes still fixated on the factitious amulet. It’s done without thought.
She has given voice to its worthlessness, has even implied the act of discarding it. So he doesn’t understand why he takes the black cord and hangs it around his neck, clutches the tiny spark of her cultivation close to his chest.
The honeyed fragrance perfuming the air swells immensely, becoming a heady drug as it thickens with the widening of blossomed petals. Her heartbeat thrums wildly, driving the erratic pace of his own.
“Oh! That…”
He looks up at the odd, almost strained quality to her voice to find her features are florid. His eyes trace the manner in which the color brings light to the softness of her cheeks, the wide innocence of her eyes, the gentle curve of her nose, and the full shape of her mouth of their own accord.
“That looks very fitting,” she concludes in a breathy tone that brushes against his skin strangely.
Pleasantly.
She scrambles to her feet, eyes dashing from his. “I need to…” she flutters away to the other side of the greenhouse in a rush of swishing white skirts.
He stares after her for a moment, attempting to analyze her mood. The flighty, warm, tangly feeling within his stomach and chest that’s reminiscent to that moment when they arose from the Memory Loss River, after she had arched her body into his, pressed her mouth to his and met the tentative motions of his lips beat for beat in a way that had felt like the fathomless lightness of clouds, the weightless rush of falling, becoming untethered from gravity through a transcending, breathless force that exuded from the thread that stretched taut between them, the breath of life that had touched both his lips and her own.
Only when she begins to calm is he given his first full breath, allowed to close his eyes and dismiss the musings of her emotional influence.
He looks down again at the talisman, unsure as to why she would give this to him. It is ridiculous. Foolish. She is the one in need of such a thing. He has shown her time and time again that his cultivation far surpasses her own.
He shifts the fragile wood within his hand, brushes his thumb over the raised moon with furrowed brows.
Does she believe him to be weak?
He looks up at her, watching the way she flits from one side of the greenhouse to the other, yammering inane encouragement to her ‘pets’.
It is a reasonable conclusion, but that is not what he sensed from her.
She had been like the morning glories within Shuyu Forest he sees each day that unceasingly reach towards the sun, the breath of anticipation she always takes before golden, pink, and lilac breaks through multifaceted prisms in pearly streaks across the sky at dawn.
His heart builds up in speed once more, causing him to wonder what has crossed his Xiǎo Huāyāo’s mind this time.
But in the end, he fails to unlock the reasoning behind her gift, too busy looking at the useless trinket as often as he does his Xiǎo Huāyāo.
By the time the waning moon is approaching its peak, she drifts back towards him.
He feels a faint weight on his bones, a pressure against his chest.
He catches sight of her heavy gaze, before she flops onto the ground beside his legs. In seconds, he feels her body topple into his legs. She has reached her inevitable limit.
“Glad you liked your gift, Da Qiang,” she slurs, words running so deeply into each other that he merely assumes her meaning.
He exhales through his nose. “Up,” he commands, expression pinched at her pitiful display.
He warned her after all. He ought to toss her in the bath and make her have to either wrestle with her clinging clothes in the water or trudge around soggy and miserable all the way back up to her room.
She pushes to her feet with a grumble and promptly falls into his lap.
She does not move.
An emotion flashes within him too briefly for him to analyze, flitting across his features as his arms move beneath her knees and around her shoulders.
She breathes deeply against his neck, trapping the skin in vapors of her warmth. “Can I sleep in tomorrow?” His ears pick up the minuscule whisper.
“And what’s so exhausting that you have done today, Xiǎo Huāyāo, that you deserve a break?” he inquires on his way up the stairs.
Her little fist drops against his chest in an attempt at a strike.
Even so, her aura is as teasing as his own.
Releasing a sigh, he hums, conceding to her request.
“Thank you, Da Qiang…” Her feather-light weight evens out across her body as the pulse within her meridians becomes a languid flow of slumbering waves.
He reaches her room with no issue, settling her beneath her covers after removing her boots.
The gifted talisman swings between them like a pointed jab to his lack of foresight. Even though she has gotten herself into trouble more than once practically the instant she had stepped out of his sight, it never occurred to him to do what she has, because he assumed he would always be there. Which unfortunately is impossible.
He will move Heaven, trample earth, and obliterate Hell in order to save her, but for the seconds before he arrives, she should have a way to protect herself.
So it seems only fitting that he returns the favor.
It’s hardly guesswork feeding his cultivation into his heart to collect blood just as the muscle squeezes a fresh drop into existence. It burns hot beneath his skin due to its potency, which is a sign of success.
Straightening out his left arm, he leads the blood down in a smooth flow, joint to joint where it emerges from within his unfurling fist, hovering above the cup of his palm in a crimson so dark it absorbs light more than reflects it. Waving his hand around the small orb, he supplements it with the smokey blaze of his cultivation, and infuses a direct thread to the volatile flames inhabiting his being along with a touch of influence from his primordial spirit to give it guidance.
Before his eyes the drop of heart blood transforms within in a shimmer of fire speckled smoke into an ivory white bone shard in the shape of a crescent moon. Though what causes his breath to cease for several moments is what winds around the piece of his spirit.
A gold, winding stem which blooms into the delicate petals of an orchid.
How… How is it possible for a piece of my being to have also borne a piece of her so blatantly?
He stares at the bone fragment uncomprehendingly.
It must… be a result of her influence… her physical tie to my heart, his mind haltingly provides him with a reasoning with sound evidence that makes the unsettling quiver in his blood recede.
He expands his lungs as far as they will go then releases the breath, slowly feeling stable once more. His bone shard is propped atop her left wrist, and with a snap of his fingers and a flare of his will, it morphs into a bracelet of bone white ivory and a climbing orchid.
“With this you’ll be protected, always. Even when I’m not around,” he assures her sleeping figure, studying her face lax with peace, and sweet dreams a being such as herself is no doubt blessed with.
Then, hovering his hand over the Bone Orchid, he sweeps it across the bracelet, erasing it from view.
Xiǎo Huāyāo inhales deeply, shifting a little as she mumbles. It sounds a little like “…careful, Da Qiang… don’t want… they’ll hurt you…”
He huffs, utterly amused. This little flower spirit continuously insults him.
He watches her pouty mouth, wondering what more she’ll reveal, long enough that it takes him a moment to realize his fingers are her meshed in her hair, sweeping through her bangs. It’s her softness and warmth seeping across his awareness that alerts him.
He jerks back, glaring down at his hand as if it isn’t his own. Another spontaneous impulse.
“Shangque.”
His lieutenant appears beside him in a blink, aura rippling with the fiery rumble of an alert dragon. “My Lord.” His attendant offers his devoted salute, right arm swinging to cross his left.
“Make sure nothing befalls her in my absence. Her life is more tenuous than my own,” he reiterates the established order with a warning edge, his stare becoming sharp, frigid.
Shangque’s eyes widen, though he is swift to nod, his head lowering in deference. “Of course, Moon Supreme Lord.”
Holding his glare for seconds longer to be certain the unspoken threat saturates the air until it is stifling, is felt like a pointed blade wedged beneath his precious scales.
Shangque remains solemn and unwavering to his satisfaction.
Only then does he turn to depart from her room.
“S-sir?”
He halts, faces his lieutenant. His flinty look urges the black dragon to get on with it.
Shangque’s mouth moves for a moment before he seems to find his tongue. “It’s just that… Little Fairy Orchid’s cultivation has reached one hundred percent.” Shangque looks at him with open curiosity housed within an affable expression. “May I ask what you did to achieve this?”
He looks down, brows furrowing in confusion. One hundred percent… but she’s worn out? And then he recalls that her cultivation is mostly governed by her emotions. Thinking back through the day, he can only really recall her pure elation at having procured that talisman and then later when he accepted it from her. The way the flowers perfumed the air with her unbridled joy is more than telling.
It can’t be that she…
“She was worried about me,” he voices the only answer while facing her sleeping form, the reasoning behind her gift slotting into place.
You silly huāyāo… you’d let yourself be hindered by worry for the worst person in existence?
His skin grows inexplicably hot which in turn increases the tempo of his heart. He runs a keen gaze over her figure, searching for the source of her sudden ailment.
She is relaxed. Breathing deeply. Her skin a healthy cream. Nonetheless, something must be amiss.
Striding closer, he pushes her bangs up and flattens his palm against her forehead. Her chest expands fully, then squeezes out a sigh. Her skin is cool against his, a sign she is not burning up from within.
“And it’s still one hundred percent?” He pins Shangque with a thin look from the side of his eyes.
The bewildered, wide-eyed stare Shangque adorns vanishes as he jolts to attention. “Y-yes! It has not wavered.”
Gaze drifting down to where he touches her, he comes to a realization.
That means the abnormality stems from within.
Retracting his hand, he sweeps past Shangque on his way out. “My order still stands.”
“Yes, My Lord!”
The further he is from her, the more he questions his previous behavior and tries to put his body’s reactions into perspective. He has two goals:
One, to keep his xiǎo huāyāo alive and blissful so that she is strong enough to fix the Destiny Book of the first Goddess of War.
And two, to avenge and protect the people of the Cangyan Sea.
Everything revolves around Xiǎo Huāyāo. How can he go to war if he’s no longer living because something snuffed out her little life? Or how could he free the hundred thousand soldiers if she’s not well enough to fix the damaged Destiny Book in the first place? Therefore, she needs to be safeguarded and cared for as if– No, not as if.
She is one of his own.
Others will not see this, though their opinions aren’t worth a grain of his consideration. Shangque, although loyal for the time being, still appears perplexed by his continued efforts to keep his xiǎo huāyāo happy. So as usual, it will remain solely in his hands to assure her continued survival and contentment.
And he is more than qualified for the task. He can achieve any request she could ask of him with ease. And on the other hand…
Even if by chance his five senses were to be suppressed, the only sense he would need is the one thrumming under his skin, breathing within his heart, and woven into his being. The shape of her soul, the color of her spirit, the luminance of her thread are more absolute than the North Star. There is no place that she could be kept from him that he could not find. And when he does find whoever tried…
He shudders at the sheer bloodthirsty rush that fills him to the seams, a sensation so palpable, he can almost taste the liquid glory of it.
God help the unfortunate soul endure the time they have left before they draw their last.
This is why the threat to Shangque was necessary, as well as an apt reminder to not lose his edge. He is an unswerving weapon created for one mission. Which is why tonight he leaves with plans to maintain the honed acuity of his cultivation.
But beforehand, he cleans every last dish left within the basin.