Any rumor of such an inappropriate relationship would destroy Sisheng Peak’s reputation if it were

to spread, and Xue Zhengyong would be deeply shamed. Rong Jiu blinked, carefully sizing Chu
Wanning up. He was trying to decide how best to escalate the situation when Chu Wanning finally
spoke up.

“You’re already dead,” he said. “Your shared history is irrelevant.”

pot, kettle

“You asked,” Rong Jiu said. “All I did was answer.”

“Who asked you?” Chu Wanning snapped. “I was talking to him.” The sparks in his tone blatantly
laid claim to his relationship with Mo Ran, and the disciple felt his heart swell with warmth. He
shifted closer to his teacher, but Chu Wanning turned around angrily. “Deal with this,” he said.

Unfortunately for Mo Ran’s peace of mind, he didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t leave Rong Jiu
behind to betray them again, but taking him with would be a terrible risk. He could humiliate Chu
Wanning by saying the wrong thing, and Mo Ran couldn’t figure out which prospect was worse.
Chu Wanning left him to it, stalking off to inspect the barrier.

“What do you want?” Mo Ran grabbed Rong Jiu’s collar.

“I’m just pissed off,” Rong Jiu said. “An asshole like you gets a second chance? It’s bullshit.”

Knowing what kind of person Rong Jiu was, Mo Ran knew that he would never act against his
own self-interest. No matter how resentful he might have been, he wouldn’t do anything to
jeopardize his own situation. He wouldn’t risk death simply to follow them, Mo Ran was sure of it.
He glanced downwards, noticing that Rong Jiu was only wearing one shoe, and that his other
delicate foot was covered in mud. He concluded that his ex-lover had fled in a hurry. “Tell the
truth,” he said.

“I did,” Rong Jiu said.

“If you think you’re going to blackmail me, I will blind you, cut out your tongue, and throw you
down a well. If you’re lucky, someone will pick you up in a couple days. If not, you’ll be stuck
down there for years.” Mo Ran paused. “The truth.”

“I changed my mind,” Rong Jiu said, after a short pause. “I don’t want to stay here. Take me with
you.”

“You don’t want to be a ghost soldier’s whore?” Mo Ran said.

“I want a normal life.” Rong Jiu lifted his chin, determination strong on his sweet face. “I want a
second chance. I want to be reincarnated.”

“And was it you who told the patrol where I was?” Mo Ran glared. “I will torture the answer out of
you if I have to, so help me.” Red light flickered in his hand. “Speak.”

“Yes,” Rong Jiu said, eyes bright with resentment. “But so what? How else was I supposed to
escape?”

“You certainly know how to kick a man when he’s down,” Mo Ran spat, flinging Rong Jiu away
from him.

“Slander is another of my many talents,” Rong Jiu said, picking himself up and carefully
rearranging his clothes. He glanced at Chu Wanning. “You care about him. How do you think he’d
feel about what we used to do together?”

------

Not knowing that Rong Jiu meant sexual exploits in order to elicit jealousy, Mo Ran assumed his
former lover meant all of his past misdeeds. He couldn’t bear the thought that he would be so
shamed. Chu Wanning, Mo Ran thought, would be furious. “You leave him out of this,” he
snapped.

With a beautiful smile, Rong Jiu said softly, “Only if you protect me and take me with you.”

Cursing under his breath, Mo Ran beckoned for him to follow. Rong Jiu followed willingly,
coming up short when Mo Ran spun around threateningly. “If you put even a single toe out of line,
I will scatter your soul.”

“If you don’t mess with me, I won’t mess with you,” Rong Jiu said sweetly, smile effeminately
beautiful despite his being a man. “Honored cultivator Mo, surely you know what kind of person I
am. We have such a long history.”

pinning a shit ton of negative character traits on the one person who is deliberately presented
as androgynous is not a good look

Despite his disgust for Rong Jiu’s softly saccharine tone – as deep as his affection for the prostitute
had once been – Mo Ran could do nothing except watch as Rong Jiu drifted to Chu Wanning’s
side. He couldn’t understand what had drawn him to the man. For that matter, he wasn’t sure why
he had fallen for Song Qiutong, either. He suddenly wanted to grab the Evil Overlord by the neck
and demand he have his head examined.

Fortunately for Mo Ran’s peace of mind, neither of them had said anything that couldn’t be
explained away easily by the seasoned veteran Rong Jiu to the socially awkward Chu Wanning.
His teacher’s brows gradually relaxed, and Chu Wanning came to the conclusion that he had been
inappropriate in his assumption of the meaning of the phrase shared history. He hid his
embarrassment at the social faux pas that no one had noticed.

Blackmail or no blackmail, Mo Ran wasn’t about to let Rong Jiu accompany them without pulling
his metaphorical weight. “So where do we hide?” he asked.

“Not many people come through the street,” Rong Jiu said, looking around. “But this isn’t exactly
hidden. Follow me.”

The cultivators followed Rong Jiu to a storehouse full of thousands of bolts of white burlap cloth.
The back of the warehouse was close enough to the wall for Chu Wanning to feel along the barrier,
but all he managed to do was drain his soul. Mo Ran put his hand over his teacher’s. “Get some
rest,” he said.

Angry and helpless, Chu Wanning seethed. “Why should I be missing my spiritual powers?”

“Would giving you mine help?”

“No. You’re still alive. Yin and yang energy are dissonant.”

After only a short break, Chu Wanning returned to his task. With all of his souls and his abilities
intact, he would have been able to determine the barrier’s weakness immediately. As it stood, he
had very little qi and it was literally impossible for him to reach any conclusions with the minimal
resources he had at hand.

Two hours into the process, Rong Jiu started to get restless. “Is this going to work or not?” he
hissed to Mo Ran.

“Be patient,” Mo Ran hissed back. “Go sit down.”

“I’m very anxious here.”

“We’re all anxious. Be patient.”

“Isn’t your teacher supposed to be this amazingly powerful cultivator?” Rong Jiu poked at Mo
Ran. “Why is this taking so long?”

“Because he’s only got the one soul and it doesn’t have any cultivation. Would you just be quiet?”

Apparently dejected by Mo Ran’s words, Rong Jiu’s eyelashes flickered as he sat down on his pile
of cloth. Another two hours into Chu Wanning’s efforts and he approached the Constellation Saint
instead. “Honored cultivator,” he said. “Is there something I can do to help?”

“No,” Chu Wanning said, eyes closed.

“Is there a way to get your powers back?”

“Do you have qi?” Chu Wanning asked after a moment. “Because I could borrow it if you did.”

“I’m afraid not,” Rong Jiu said. “Wait, can’t you use Mo Ran’s?”

“His is useless,” Chu Wanning snapped without further explanation.

“But why?” Rong Jiu persisted.

Not about to tell him that Mo Ran wasn’t a ghost, Chu Wanning shrugged irritably. “Elemental
incompatibility.”

“Rong Jiu,” Mo Ran interrupted, before Chu Wanning’s inability to lie got them all in trouble. “Go
keep watch outside.”

As he was now depending on the cultivators for survival, Rong Jiu could only do as instructed. He
leaned next to the door, peering outward with his pretty eyes. Mo Ran watched him to make sure
he would stay before sitting next to his teacher. He’d spent a great deal of the past two hours
considering how to come clean about his past, as he had promised himself not to treat his teacher
badly.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said, “I want to apologize for some sins I’ve committed.” Chu Wanning glanced at
him. “So, uh, that one time you had be reprimanded in public.” Mo Ran couldn’t bring himself to
say the word debauchery out loud, too ashamed in front of the paragon of virtue that was his
teacher to be so specific. “When I broke the fourth, ninth, and fifteenth commandments.”

Chu Wanning was aware that Mo Ran meant thievery, debauchery, and deceit, in that order. He
opened his eyes, but didn’t look at Mo Ran. His cool, disciplined expression remained intact as he
said, “Yes.”

“Sir, I’m sorry,” Mo Ran said, even more ashamed.

“You were already punished,” Chu Wanning said coolly, able to keep a level head in even the most
vexing of circumstances. “There were no repeat offenses. No need to bring it up now.”

“Yeah, but Rong Jiu is the one that, I, uh.” Mo Ran couldn’t bring himself to finish.

“I see.” Chu Wanning was also aware that Sisheng Peak’s disciples weren’t forbidden from
practicing dual cultivation, or required to practice asceticism, and that having a lover was ordinary.
But he was a different sort of man, focused on purity of heart and mind, treating carnal urges with
the contempt they deserved. Furthermore, Mo Ran hadn’t even bothered to practice monogamy,
instead behaving like a filthy slut. He knew that Xue Zhengyong paid it no mind, as he felt that
suppressing bodily needs was unhealthy and besides, Mo Ran did not follow the path of purity.

Chu Wanning refused to tolerate such a disgrace; he felt only disgust when faced with them, as Mo
Ran had seen him display during his public humiliation. Mo Ran was sure that knowing that Rong
Jiu had been involved with him would bring those feelings right back to the surface. He knew that
he was about to be on the receiving end of karma, and that his punishment wouldn’t be simple
lashes and broken bones. He feared that Chu Wanning’s earth soul would refuse to get in the
lantern.

Mo Ran felt he would rather die than let his teacher leave him behind. He grew more and more
uneasy the longer Chu Wanning took to reply, going so far as to try to anticipate what route Chu
Wanning might take to get away from him. He would weather the consequences of overpowering
his teacher later, he decided. “Sir,” he said.

“It’s ancient history,” Chu Wanning said abruptly. “You were punished. You got a clean slate.” He
gave Mo Ran a sidelong glance, face coolly indifferent. “I don’t care.”

The words hit Mo Ran like a brick to the head; he heard none of his teacher’s obvious kindness in
dismissing his past sins and only thought that his teacher had given up on him entirely. “No, sir,
please,” he said. “Please, sir, it was my fault, please don’t be angry with me, I won’t do it again,
sir.”

“Why should I be angry?” Chu Wanning snapped angrily. “I knew you two had a past. You can’t
pull the wool over my eyes. Get out.” When Mo Ran hesitated, he raised his voice. “Out! You
shameless dog.”

Mo Ran sat frozen in shock. “I’m not leaving,” he said dumbly.

“I don’t want to see you right now,” Chu Wanning snarled. “Leave.”

“No.” Mo Ran did his best to resemble an immovable rock. “If I leave, you might run off. Please
don’t leave me, sir.”

Having not anticipated that particular concern, Chu Wanning stared. He was revolted by his
student’s sexual history every time it came up, as he was by every other adult who indulged in such
shameless self-gratification. Xue Meng, he felt, was different; having had a sheltered upbringing,
Xue Meng was a good boy who didn’t do such things. Mo Ran, however, was a willful brat with
the unforgivable sin of having grown up in a whorehouse with no father and an exotic dancer for a
mother. He had embraced his lack of guidance to be an unruly pup, screwing around until his uncle
showed him the superior way of life.

Knowing that Mo Ran was, at his core, disgusting in his proclivities wasn’t the same, however, as
being faced with the gorgeous person who had been intimate with him. Chu Wanning shuddered in
revulsion and, unable to get away from either of them, turned back to the wall. He returned to his
work checking the barrier, now distracted by thoughts of Rong Jiu’s pretty little face and his pink
plump lips. Despite his internal strength of will and devotion to purity above all else, Chu Wanning
couldn’t help but think of Mo Ran intimately entangled with the effeminate beauty currently
lurking by the door.

Chu Wanning’s eyes snapped open, fury blazing in his pupils at being forced to fantasize about his
student in such a vile situation. He shoved Mo Ran away from him. “Get out,” he said.

“Sir,” Mo Ran protested.

“Out.”

Mo Ran went to join Rong Jiu, head hanging. His former lover seemed surprised to see him. “Get
into a fight already?” he asked.

Rong Jiu looked like Shi Mei, Mo Ran realized, and that was what had attracted him to the man in
his first life. In his second life, he had fucked the prostitute with the intent of screwing him over.
Both lives left him soiled by his carnal acts, and he didn’t even want to look at Rong Jiu. “I’ll keep
watch,” he said. “Go somewhere else.”

As the door was the most dangerous place, Rong Jiu was happy to comply. But he glanced over his
shoulder at Mo Ran, suddenly curious as to how he had died. He wondered how Mo Ran had
changed so much in only a few short years. Rong Jiu wondered if Mo Ran had undergone some
sort of harrowing trauma, and resolved to find out what. He fluttered his eyelashes becomingly,
looking Mo Ran up and down, when his gaze landed at the shadow at Mo Ran’s feet and he froze
in shock.

------

Of all the possible answers to how Mo Ran had died, Rong Jiu’s last possible guess would have
been that the cultivator was still alive. He stared, frozen, until his mind started down its habitual
response to an unexpected turn of events – did it pose a threat to him, and if not, how he could turn
it to his advantage. Rong Jiu was unaware that his reactions were shaped by trauma, but he
wouldn’t have cared had he known. Understanding that Mo Ran had snuck into the underworld
gave him more leverage than he could possibly have hoped for.

Of course, Rong Jiu thought, if he chose to simply expose Mo Ran, he would surely garner some
sort of official position. He had no need to reincarnate, with the chance of a good life handed to
him on a silver platter. It would erase all of the pain of his past. His eyes narrowed as he
envisioned himself receiving vast rewards, sitting on a sedan chair, carried through the crowds with
ease. The only step left was to figure out how to sneak off without alerting suspicion – a
distraction, Rong Jiu decided, and his gaze fell on Chu Wanning.

“Honored cultivator Chu,” he said, taking a seat. Chu Wanning ignored him coldly. “No?” Rong
Jiu hummed, but as the cultivator didn’t chase him away, he chattered absently about nothing for a
few minutes as if talking to himself. “Honored cultivator Chu,” he said finally. “I wasn’t honest
with you earlier. I thought you might look down on me if you knew, and refuse to take me with
you.”

Anger burned in Chu Wanning’s eyes, but he was practiced in the art of self-control. He kept his
expression smooth. Frost could have formed on his eyelashes, so cold was his expression.

“I wanted to come clean,” he said delicately. “I wanted to apologize.”

Chu Wanning had managed to suppress his disgust until Rong Jiu unfortunately chose the same
words as Mo Ran. He slowly opened his eyes upon hearing the intent to apologize, but did not look
at Rong Jiu as he spoke coldly. “What brothel did you work at?”

“You already knew?” Rong Jiu stammered. He glanced at Mo Ran, suddenly worried that he
wouldn’t be able to sufficiently distract the two of them. “That, we, uh.”

“Which brothel?” Chu Wanning interrupted.

“Immortal Peach Pavilion in Black Bamboo Town,” Rong Jiu answered, biting his lip.

Chu Wanning’s lips tugged wryly as he repeated the name of the brothel and then fell silent. His
face was terrifying. Rong Jiu looked at him several times before working up the nerve to speak.

“Honored cultivator,” he said. “I was sold to the brothel when I was young. Please don’t look down
on me for doing what I had to do to survive. I admire you, and would have loved to have been a
cultivator, but my body was too weak.”

“Reincarnation won’t change your soul,” Chu Wanning said impassively. “Sorry, but we belong to
different walks of life.”

“I know I’m not in your class,” Rong Jiu said, smiling despite being shot down. “It was a wishful
thought only. If we don’t dream, we wouldn’t last the year before thinking about how to end it all.”
He glanced toward Mo Ran, making sure he was out of earshot. “The guests are often cruel or
callous, hardly even seeing us as human. A kind patron like the honored cultivator Mo was
something to be cherished.”

The veins in the back of Chu Wanning’s hand stood out as he pressed it against the wall. He tried
and failed to hold back his rage and disgust, finally speaking in a low voice. “What is there to
cherish.”

The ghost of an affectionate expression, carefully calculated, appeared on Rong Jiu’s gentle, lovely
face. “Because he’s a good person,” he said. “Even though he stole from me, it was probably my
fault. He was such a reasonable, charming person.” He looked through his lashes at Chu
Wanning’s cold, impassive face. “Everyone who ever had him talked about how kind he was. We
always hoped to see him.”

“Did he go often?”

Rong Jiu gave a quiet laugh. “That depends on your definition of often.”

“Tell me how regularly he went,” Chu Wanning said, through thin knife-like lips, each question a
blade. “Who he asked for. When was his last visit.”

Pretending not to notice the frostiness, Rong Jiu pretended to carefully consider. “I didn’t keep
track,” he said. “But we saw him at least ten days out of each month, and he asked for different
people. Honored cultivator, it was in the past. Please don’t look down on him, either.”

“I asked when his last visit was,” Chu Wanning said coldly.

The truth wouldn’t have served his purposes; Rong Jiu feigned uncertainty. “I’m not sure,” he said.
“I thought I saw him now and again until I died, but I could be mistaken.”

Chu Wanning stood abruptly, pulling his hand back from the wall. Sparks blazed in his eyes. Rong
Jiu hid his delight at how easy it was to fool the honored cultivator; the virtuously uptight were, in
his experience, the easiest to gaslight. He rearranged his face into a nervous expression. “Honored
cultivator, please, it’s all from a previous life. He shouldn’t be censured. He’s not a bad person.”

“Like I need you to tell me that,” Chu Wanning snapped, angry enough to shake. “What business is
it of yours if I want to tech my own disciple a lesson?”

“Honored cultivator,” Rong Jiu said.

Ignoring him, Chu Wanning swanned toward Mo Ran. He radiated a furious chill as he strode to
the door to grab Mo Ran by the back of his collar. “Sir?” Mo Ran said, startled.

Chu Wanning yanked his hand away, as if even Mo Ran’s clothing was too filthy to touch. He
glared at his student, too angry to speak. Mo Ran had had the audacity to pretend to have mended
his ways, he thought, and yet had still slunk off to the whorehouse. Growls escaped his lips.

Unaware that he had been slandered, Mo Ran only saw the anger on his teacher’s face. He thought
he caught a glimpse of sadness, but it vanished as Chu Wanning began to speak. His voice was
hoarse and low.

“Mo Weiyu,” he said. “How many lies did you feed me? You really are deficient by nature and
beyond remedy!”

The words triggered Mo Ran, and he jolted violently. He staggered back, shaking his head, unable
to believe his ears. Chu Wanning had only used those words in his past life when he had been truly
beyond the pale, and he had no idea what he might have done to deserve them now. He panicked,
trying to answer, but Chu Wanning cut him off.

“Just how much longer did you think you could get away with it?” he thundered.

For all that he had promised to come clean, Mo Ran still harbored far too many dirty and
unspeakable secrets. It didn’t occur to him that Rong Jiu had slandered him; he assumed Chu
Wanning had discovered another truth. He backed up, not stopping until he hit a wall, and Chu
Wanning paced after him, staring into his eyes.

“Why do you want me to go back to the mortal world with you?” he asked, voice wound tight. “So
you can just keep lying to me? I thought you had changed for the better, that you were worth
teaching, but you’re the same incorrigible brat you always were.”

“Sir,” Mo Ran said.

“Get lost.” Chu Wanning glared, gaze frosty. “What part of that did you not understand? Mo
Weiyu, you disappoint me.”

Heart falling into ash in his chest, Mo Ran ignored his anger and grabbed his teacher’s wrist. “Sir,
please don’t be angry. Please tell me what happened. Whatever I did wrong, I’ll change it. Please
don’t chase me off.”

At hearing the same excuse Mo Ran had given before, Chu Wanning grew even colder. Knowing
that he would have gone on believing the lie if Rong Jiu hadn’t shown up, he was furious. As calm
and collected as he was otherwise, he had a terrible temper and was unable to control himself when
it came to matters of emotional upheaval, and he lifted his free hand to summon his holy weapon to
force his student away. Nothing happened, and his face paled with fury at his inability to whip Mo
Ran into obedience.

Scarlet radiance filled the air and Mo Ran’s holy weapon materialized. He put it in his teacher’s
hand and knelt down, his other hand firmly wrapped around Chu Wanning’s wrist. He was terrified
that Chu Wanning might leave. “Sir, I know I’ve done many things that you find repulsive, but I
haven’t lied to you since I’ve come down here.” Eyes full of tears, he looked up. “I swear I didn’t
lie to you, sir.”

Chu Wanning’s heart burned with rage, hand trembling uncontrollably as he clenched What The
Hell, but Mo Ran’s obvious pain pierced the depths of his soul. His student refused to let go of his
wrist. Chu Wanning pressed his lips together in a thin line, refusing to answer.

“Sir, if you’re upset,” Mo Ran continued, “please just hit me. Yell at me. If you really don’t want
to see me, if you think I’m truly beyond redemption, I’ll leave Sisheng Peak, sir. But, please.
Please, sir, come back with me.” His forehead nearly touched the ground as he groveled in
obeisance, but he didn’t let go of Chu Wanning’s wrist. “Please don’t leave, sir. You promised
you’d come back.”

Chu Wanning closed his eyes against the ache in his heart; only a fragment of a soul and yet he felt
as though he had been stabbed with a thousand knives. He resented Mo Ran for making him feel
such pain. “I promised you?” he snapped. “What about what you promised me? You said you’d
repented of your sins and that you’d never do it again. You lied. Did you really think I wouldn’t
find out?”

Confused, Mo Ran looked up. “What?”

The word had barely left his lips when Chu Wanning lashed him viciously in the face with his own
holy weapon, blood spattering across the ground, flaying his skin open nearly to the bone. He
refused to let go of his teacher’s hand even so. Blood and tears spilled across his cheeks.

it is incredibly disgusting that he goes straight to physical abuse when he’s angry

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir,” he said, wide-eyed.

His denial only infuriated Chu Wanning further, and Mo Ran realized that foul play was afoot. He
looked at the inside of the storehouse, only then realizing that Rong Jiu had disappeared while the
two of them were arguing. His eyes sharpened.

“Sir, we fell for it,” he said. “We have to go. It’s not safe here.”

Surprised, Chu Wanning let Mo Ran pull him toward the door, but they had barely exited the
building before Rong Jiu’s silhouette appeared at the head of a platoon of ghost soldiers. “He’s
over here,” Mo Ran heard him say. “The living one!”

I have way more sympathy for Rong Jiu, who absolutely got massively fucked over through
very little fault of his own, than I do for these two assholes

“I should have killed you!” Mo Ran roared furiously, but there was no time. He held onto Chu
Wanning’s hand as they fled through the streets and alleys inside the palace. More and more
soldiers gathered behind them, the sound of alarms ringing across the grounds. Rong Jiu continued
leading the charge, face alight with anticipation, pushing himself with everything he had.

“Catch them!” he gasped, but he was suddenly grabbed by the captain of the guard. “What are you
doing?” he snapped. “They’re the ones you need to worry about!”

“They might be fugitives, but so are you,” the captain said. “You fled from the Fourth Ghost
King.”
“Under duress!” Rong Jiu protested. “They made me go with them! I’m the one who discovered
that Mo Weiyu isn’t a ghost! Don’t try to steal my credit!”

“You found out?” The captain burst out laughing. “The Fourth Ghost King knew already. Why do
you think the entire palace is sealed off?”

Rong Jiu stumbled in shock, and the soldiers continued to race past him in pursuit. “I’m not the
first?” he whispered. “I’m not going to be rewarded for this?” He stared blankly, the dreams of
wealth and status fading. All he had ever wanted was a decent life, but all he had ever gotten was
hardship, humiliation, and mistreatment. He would have given anything – had given everything –
for a chance to be happy.

“Seize this escapee,” snapped the captain. “Bring him to the Fourth Ghost King for interrogation.”

“No,” Rong Jiu whispered, pale fingers clawing at the ground. He struggled, but the soldiers
dragged him away as he screamed. “No! You wouldn’t have found him if it hadn’t been for me!
No!”

------

With every indication that Rong Jiu had betrayed them, Chu Wanning needed no one to explain
that the prostitute had lied to provoke him in the warehouse. Although he was a calm and rational
person in all matters, he was unable to maintain his cool when it came to Mo Ran. He was
surprised to realize how easily such a sissy had fooled him, but he still had to confirm matters with
Mo Ran.

good lord the toxic masculinity just doesn’t quit

“Did you ever go back to the Immortal Peach Pavilion?” he asked as they ran.

“What?” Mo Ran staggered, but kept running. “Did he tell you I did? Is that why you were so
pissed? Sir, I never went to a brothel again after that and if you don’t believe me now you can
interrogate me with What The Hell when we get back.”

“No need,” Chu Wanning said magnanimously. He glanced at the holy weapon still in his hand,
realizing that he had poured qi into it when he had been intent on whipping Mo Ran into beaten
submission, and it occurred to him that if he could pour energy into the weapon, he could also pull
energy out of it. A tiny bit of effort and he felt a rush of power – with the holy weapon as mediator,
he could use Mo Ran’s qi as his own.

Several steps later, Mo Ran realized that Chu Wanning had stopped running. He slowed to a halt
and turned around. “Sir?” he said anxiously.

The bleeding wound on his face drove a feeling of guilt into Chu Wanning, but although he
thought he might have mistreated his student, he also felt that Mo Ran deserved to be whipped for
his past indiscretions. He wasn’t sure how to resolve his quandary, and settled for a cold,
indifferent expression. “Mo Ran,” he said. “Retreat back to the palace walls.”

“Why?”

“I’m going to show you a trick.” Before the words really sank in, Mo Ran saw the red light of his
holy weapon flowing into his teacher’s remnant soul. The weapon and the soul responded to each
other, a blanket of flames surrounding Chu Wanning. “Give What The Hell an order,” Chu
Wanning said.
“Heed Chu Wanning’s orders as you would mine!” Mo Ran said promptly.

The willow vine erupted in a string of crystal sparks, glowing brilliantly, and Chu Wanning
brushed his fingertips across its entire length. Its radiance heightened in the wake of his touch. The
palace walls were directly behind them, and thousands of ghost soldiers were closing in on them in
front. Chu Wanning wasn’t going to run – he held the willow vine high above his head as a tempest
roared suddenly around them.

What The Hell struck out like a soaring dragon, illuminating the sky, channeling its abundant
energy into Chu Wanning’s soul. His eyes shone with its blinding brilliance as he commanded it
with a deep and steady tone. “What The Hell,” he said. “Ten Thousand Coffins!”

and the narrative rewards Chu Wanning for abusing his power. Seriously. So gross.

Interlaced gold and red willow vines erupted from the earth, lacerating the palace hall into rubble.
A thick and powerful vine fettered the ghost soldiers together, dragging them to its center, locking
them down tightly. Mo Ran watched in shock as his teacher’s robes fluttered magnificently,
blazing and unstoppable.

my mental image with this color combination is The Golden Arches on their red background
jsyk

Chu Wanning resolutely swept to the wall, placing his hand upon it. He immediately discerned the
barrier’s weak point. “Upward nine feet and four inches to the right. Hit it with fire.”

Mo Ran promptly obeyed, slamming the blazing fire spell into the barrier’s weak point before any
of the ghosts caught within the Ten Thousand Coffins technique could stop him. The earth
rumbled and the palace walls fell back to their original height. The barrier crumbled into dust, and
the two cultivators fled the palace. They rapidly disappeared into the boundless night.

Safely hidden in a narrow alley some distance away, Chu Wanning and Mo Ran leaned against a
wall, staring at each other. Mo Ran broke first, laughing. “That old ghost will rage himself to
death,” he said, heedless of how his smile pulled at the open lash on his face.

“Stop laughing,” Chu Wanning said, and Mo Ran promptly obeyed.

“Are you angry with me, sir?” he asked, eyes gentle. Had he pointed out that Chu Wanning had
mistreated him, his teacher might have been angry; the question mollified Chu Wanning instead.

“Cast the spell,” Chu Wanning said, declining to answer. “The Fourth Ghost King might be too
embarrassed to tell the other ghost kings now, but that won’t last. We don’t have much time.”

Mo Ran understood that his teacher had forgiven him by his willingness to accept resurrection, and
he felt a wave of relief. He smiled, but this time the pain tugged at his face and he covered the lash
mark with one hand. Chu Wanning only watched silently, and Mo Ran brought out the soul-calling
lantern. He recited the spell, and a blindingly brilliant light flashed from the lantern. He heard
Master Huaizui’s voice chanting from the world of the living.

“Why are there two earth souls?” Huaizui said, interrupting the chant. Mo Ran explained
everything. “Ah, you met Chu Xun of Tailwind Hall,” he said, an odd note in his voice.

“Is there something wrong with that?” Mo Ran asked.

“No, no. If he says two earth souls aren’t out of the ordinary, he is of course correct,” Huaizui said.
“I’ve just never performed this technique on multiple earth souls before, so it might take a little
longer. Please wait a moment.”

uh, that is not what chu xun said but ok

Mo Ran glanced toward the Fourth Ghost King’s palace. “Uh, how much longer? We’re kind of in
a tricky spot here.”

“Not long,” Huaizui assured him, and started the chant again.

Unable to hear Huaizui’s voice, Chu Wanning frowned. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“Your souls are unique, sir, and it’ll take a little longer,” Mo Ran explained. “Let’s get farther
away from the palace while we wait.”

The skies were beginning to lighten, and Mo Ran saw the stall where he’d bought food the night
before. The old man was packing up, but his eyes widened when he saw Mo Ran. “You found
him,” he said.

“I did!” Mo Ran smiled. “Thanks to you.”

“There’s nothing to thank me for,” the old man said. “But what happened to your face, honored
cultivator?”

“Uh, the ghost soldiers hit me,” Mo Ran said.

classic domestic abuse victim behavior here

“Ah, no wonder,” sighed the old man. “How painful it must be.” He pondered for a moment and
then presented them with two bowls of wontons. “The leftovers I couldn’t sell today. My treat.”

Mo Ran thanked him and then watched as he left. He glanced at the bowl, remembering that his
teacher didn’t like scallions. He picked all of the offending vegetable out of his bowl and
exchanged it with his teacher’s. “Here, eat this one,” he said.

Chu Wanning looked at him coldly but accepted. He tasted the food carefully, and Mo Ran
watched him eat. The bowl remained full of the ice-cold soup and wontons, as was normal for
ghosts in the underworld.

“Is it good?” Mo Ran asked.

“Not bad.”

“Not as good as the wontons you made,” Mo Ran said, and his teacher choked in surprise.

Chu Wanning looked at the grinning man seated before him, cheek propped on his hands, and felt
that all of his secrets had been exposed. “What wontons?” he said, attempting to maintain some
hold over his dignity. It would be shameful if Mo Ran knew he had done something kind.

“No need to hide it, sir,” Mo Ran said, heedless of his teacher’s humiliation. “I know everything
now.” He reached out to caress Chu Wanning’s hair, also heedless of his teacher’s furious dismay.
He took the lantern holding the human soul from his pouch and placed it on the bench. “You were
awkward when you were alive, sir, and even in the underworld only your human soul is honest.”

“I did make them for you,” Chu Wanning admitted. “But only because, uh.”

Mo Ran cocked his head to the side, gazing at him with a faint smile on his injured face. He could
think of so many reasons Chu Wanning might give and knew that his teacher would say none of
them out loud. He understood that Chu Wanning’s strong sense of pride drove him to consider love
and affection to be disgusting and shameful, that he had become a stern and solitary man. Mo Ran
understood that such a great man didn’t stir affection or seduction in the hearts of others, that he
was only steady and dependable and that others would thoughtlessly take him for granted instead
of appreciating all he did.

Mo Ran understood that Chu Wanning had become accustomed to the cruel world’s mistreatment.
He knew also that there were two types of people in the world – those who sought the protection of
the strong with sweet lies and obsequiously slavish devotion, and those like Chu Wanning who
depended on no one and only became stronger. Mo Ran knew that Chu Wanning was used to
seeing the inevitable incompetence bred by allowing vulnerability to take root, and would refuse to
reveal such shameful weakness.

Chu Wanning, Mo Ran knew, was a man who had forgotten that all children were born with
emotions and affection, knowing how to cry and laugh. He understood that his teacher might have
hoped once that others would help him in turn, but that he had been disappointed by no one
noticing the need for help that he deliberately hid. He understood that Chu Wanning knew that
accepting help was a shameful sign of weakness. Regardless of the difficulty, Mo Ran knew his
teacher would accept that there was always a worse outcome, and that he should not struggle.

It was clear to Mo Ran that his teacher had fallen into another type of pitfall – incurably prideful
illness of the spirit, and he looked at him to see how he would respond. Chu Wanning said nothing
in the end, only pressing his lips together. He was clearly unhappy, and finally stood. “Cast the
spell again,” he said. “I wish to enter the lantern.”

“Is it a place you can hide when you’re feeling embarrassed?” Mo Ran laughed.

Expression stern and solemn, Chu Wanning shook out his sleeves. “Why should I be
embarrassed?” he said coolly.

“Well,” Mo Ran started. “Because –“

Chu Wanning had not expected his student to be stupid enough to shame him out loud. “Shut up,”
he interrupted.

“Because you’re kind to me,” Mo Ran said. He stood. The red clouds drifted across the sky, hiding
the dreary moon. “Sir, I know you’re kind to me. I don’t know if you’ll remember this after your
souls have reunited, but I want to tell you anyway. You’re one of the most important people in the
world to me. I regret that I hated you and held a grudge for so long, when you’re the best teacher in
the world, sir.” He sniffed tearfully. “And I am the worst disciple.”

“Oh,” Chu Wanning said, touched by his student’s sincere and clumsy words. He couldn’t help a
faint smile.

“Sir, you’re the best teacher ever,” Mo Ran said. “And I am the worst.”

“As long as you’re aware of the truth of the matter,” Chu Wanning said magnanimously. He gave
and gave to others, asking for very little for himself, and although Mo Ran didn’t love him, he
could be satisfied with the mere accolade of being the best teacher in the world. He was more than
satisfied with the mere crumbs of affection his student had doled out.

Seeing that he had gotten this part of Chu Wanning’s soul to smile, Mo Ran’s heart swelled with
joy. “You’re prettier when you smile,” he said. “You should do it more often.”
Rather than accept the compliment, Chu Wanning frowned. He couldn’t accept that Mo Ran would
give him the kind of compliment he would give someone like Rong Jiu. He wanted no part of such
flattery.

Not understanding the sudden change in atmosphere, Mo Ran pressed on. “When you smile, sir,”
he said, and then paused, trying to think of the right words to describe his teacher’s beauty.

Genuinely angry that Mo Ran hadn’t let it go, Chu Wanning picked up the soul-calling lantern.
“All this blather but you can’t bother to cast the spell? If you spout one more word of nonsense, I
will go right back to the Fourth Ghost King. It would be infinitely preferable than listening to your
gibberish.”

Astonished, Mo Ran could only blink, but he accepted that he had been wrong. He dragged Chu
Wanning silently to a corner, absentmindedly noticing that Huaizui’s chanting in the back of his
mind had gotten louder. “Are you almost ready, sir?” he asked.

Silence rang out on the other side for a moment, and then Mo Ran heard the knocking sound of a
wooden object. “Almost,” Huaizui said.

Chu Wanning’s soul scattered into streaming fireflies as the old master spoke, glowing into the
soul-calling lantern, and Mo Ran heard the voice chanting louder. He hugged the lantern to
himself, feeling his body become lighter and emptier with each repetition of Master Huaizui’s
chant. The wooden object snapped crisply, shattering the recitation, and Mo Ran jolted awake to
find himself lying on a bamboo raft moored next to Naihe Bridge.

The waters lapped ceaselessly beneath the raft, and the sky overhead was crab-shell blue. Mo Ran
saw a strip of red along one horizon. Bamboo leaves danced in the air, whispering against each
other, and Mo Ran blinked. The lantern was gone, and he jolted upright in a horrified rush. “Sir!”
he shouted.

“Don’t yell,” said Huiazui impassively. Pale with fear, Mo Ran turned to see the old master
kneeling on the shore. He held a wooden fish in one hand, knocking it sharply against a rock.
“Even if you shout, he won’t hear it.” The soul-calling lantern was next to the fish, radiating with
the indescribably beautiful light of Chu Wanning’s soul. Huaizui picked it up, nodding to Mo Ran,
and stood smoothly. “You’ve done well,” he added.

Mo Ran struggled to his feet and then onto the shore, scrambling over to the old master. He tugged
on his sleeve. “Let’s go find his mortal body,” he said. “It should be in Frostsky hall. If we’re late,
the souls will disperse again.”

“They won’t disperse so easily,” Huaizui said, chuckling. “Don’t worry, I’ve already sent Xue
Meng to speak with your sect leader. Chu Wanning’s mortal body is being taken to the Red Lotus
Pavilion, and I will go into seclusion there to transfer his souls back into the body.”

“Then we should get going!” Mo Ran urged, dancing with impatience. At Huaizui’s faint smile, he
blushed, chagrined. “I mean, there’s no rush,” he muttered.

“There’s no point in being impatient,” Huaizui said, eyes twinkling.

“No, no, no rush at all,” Mo Ran agreed, feet shuffling as if he wanted to break into a run.

“Steadiness is important,” Huaizui continued. “Souls cannot immediately return to the body, or it
would violate the laws of heaven and they would dissipate. I will have to reintegrate them slowly.”

but wait! There’s more! ISTG there are just more cheap roadblocks that weren’t established
at any point every time anyone tries to do something

“Yes, slowly,” Mo Ran agreed, not really listening. “Of course it has to go slowly.” He paused, the
words apparently sinking in. “Wait, how long will it take, then?”

“Oh, about five years,” Huaizui told him.

“I see, five – five years?” The color drained out of Mo Ran’s face. “Five? Years? Five years?”

“At least,” Huaizui confirmed.

Book 2, Part 2: Same Destination - Five Years, An Awakening, and a Rice
Farm

The clouds shone red on the horizon as disciples dressed in white for mourning gathered outside
Red Lotus Pavilion. The morning bell ran from the Heaven-Piercing Tower, and a procession
carrying a coffin made its slow way through Sisheng Peak. Xue Zhengyong and Elder Tanlang
walked at its head, followed by Chu Wanning’s disciples and a monk in worn robes that no one
recognized. The morning fog did nothing to dim the dazzling brilliance of the monk’s lantern.

The gathered disciples bowed their heads solemnly, correctly assuming the monk was the Master
Huaizui of Wubei Temple of the rumors flying across Sisheng Peak. They were far more reverent
than curious, and no one dared to stare. The great master therefore passed by the crowd in
anonymity.

The coffin was steady throughout the journey, arriving at Red Lotus Pavilion with the lack of tears
appropriate for a resurrection. Huaizui looked around. “Place him next to the lotus pond,” he said.
“An abundance of qi suitable for spells is there.”

Xue Zhengyong nodded briskly, leading the pallbearers. The black ice coffin settled gently into
place. “Let me know what else you need,” he said. “His life means as much to me as my own.”

“Prelate Xue is too kind,” Huaizui said. “I have no further needs at this time.”

“Feel free to let me know if you do,” Xue Zhengyong said kindly.

With a respectful bow toward the sect leader, Huaizui turned to address the gathered disciples. “As
I am severely lacking in skill, I will need five years to return the great Constellation Saint’s soul.
To prevent disturbances, this pavilion will be closed until the task is complete. If you wish to pay
your respects, please do so now. It will be close to two thousand days before you may meet him
again.”

The elders filed forward to stand solemnly before the coffin and pay their respects, some longer
and some shorter, and then it came time for Chu Wanning’s disciples. Xue Meng stepped up, tears
falling from his eyes despite his attempts to control his emotions. “Sir, I will work hard to train
myself so that I don’t embarrass you when I see you again. I’ll make you proud at the Spiritual
Mountain Competition.”

His father clapped him on the shoulder as he turned away, and Xue Meng straightened his spine.
He didn’t want to cling to his father like a spoiled child in front of his teacher. Eyes still red, he
stepped aside to make room for Shi Mei. Tears falling from his eyes as well, Shi Mei stood
silently. He retreated to the side after a long moment, placing a crabapple blossom into the coffin
with a gracefully adult hand.

Mo Ran stepped forward, the lotus-scented breeze fluttering his hair. He reached forward to brush
his teacher’s face, pressing his lips together. “I’ll wait for you,” he said softly. Emotion Mo Ran
couldn’t express stuffed his chest full to bursting, words insufficient to convey the scalding lava of
his feelings. He felt as though it would burn him to ash, but he wasn’t sure what the feeling was.

The Pavilion was closed off, an enormous barrier set around it. It would be five years before
anyone smelled the lotus blossoms in summer. Bamboo leaves rustled in the wind about it,
blowing crabapple blossoms to and fro, and disciples knelt along the ground in a vast throng with
Chu Wanning’s disciples front and center.
a man who doesn’t ask for much, is he

“Wishing Constellation Saint well in his seclusion,” Xue Zhengyong announced in a booming
voice, and the massed disciples repeated the sentence. Mo Ran repeated it once more in a soft
voice, bowing low for a long moment as he contemplated five years of waiting.

The three disciples all chose to continue training on their own, unwilling to betray Chu Wanning’s
memory by even temporarily learning from another elder. Shi Mei and Xue Meng remained at
Sisheng Peak, as it suited their aptitude and path of cultivation, but Mo Ran chose to travel to pass
the time. His reasoning that he learned better from experience was the truth, but it was only part of
his whole truth; so much had changed from his first life that he was concerned.

No one in his first life had been able to use Zhenlong Chess Formation as well as the Evil
Overlord, but the puppet master had been better than he was. Mo Ran wanted to see if he could
catch him in making a mistake, although he was aware that he wasn’t particularly bright and that
his strengths lay in his abundant qi. He had concluded that returning his cultivation levels to where
they had been before he died was his best chance at defeating the puppet master.

Instead of a destroyer, Mo Ran wanted to be a protector. He stood before the main gate, about to
set off on his journey, with only a few people to see him off. Xue Zhengyong, Madam Wang, and
Shi Mei clustered around him. “Mengmeng won’t be here,” Xue Zhengyong said.

“He says he’s too busy training, right?” Mo Ran chuckled.

Xue Zhengyong coughed awkwardly. “He’s very thoughtless,” he said.

“He’s going to try for first place at the competition,” Mo Ran said. “Of course he’s going to train
diligently. I’ll let him earn glory to elevate our teacher’s name.”

“Ran,” Xue Zhengyong said hesitantly. “The competition is the foremost tournament for orthodox
cultivation, but I’m not sure they’d permit the kind of mixed discipline you’re likely to learn. I’d
hate to see you miss it.”

“My cousin will do well enough for both of us,” Mo Ran said.

“But what about you?” Xue Zhengyong said.

Mo Ran laughed out loud. He remembered missing the competition in his first life, as he had been
confined due to some kind of misbehavior, and he had resented it for so long. Now, however, it
seemed so petty. He had been through far too much to be emotionally invested in a competition. He
didn’t need beautiful people or fine wine, worship of the masses or revenge. He had already been
emperor of the human world, and the competition was a non-issue. “I’d rather do other things,” he
said simply. “Xue Meng is well-bred and should compete, but I’m just a street rat with his own
way of doing things.”

“Silly child,” Madam Wang said, pity in her voice. “You’re not a street rat. We love you as much
as we love Meng.”

Mo Ran forced a laugh, but he knew that there were differences between the two of them. Xue
Meng had grown up in the lap of luxury, whereas Mo Ran had been much less fortunate. He
couldn’t say such hurtful things to Madam Wang, who was only concerned with his wellbeing and
loved him, so he smiled. “Thank you, aunt,” he said.

“You’ll have to look out for yourself as you travel,” Madam Wang said, and pressed a small pouch
in his hands. It was embroidered with flowers, and full of something. “This is full of treatment for
injuries,” she continued. “I made them myself, so they should be better than what you could buy in
a store. Don’t lose it.”

“Thank you so much,” Mo Ran said, grateful and truly touched by her thoughtfulness.

“I have nothing to give you except this pendant,” Shi Mei said. ”It will keep your spiritual core
warm.”

Mo Ran took it, noting that it was smooth and warm to the touch and an exceedingly rare item. “I
can’t accept this,” he said. “It’s far too valuable. And since I’m affiliated with fire, if my core gets
warmed any further, I might have a qi deviation.”

Shi Mei laughed, fending off Mo Ran’s attempts to return the pendant. “What do you mean, qi
deviation?”

“You should keep it,” Mo Ran said again. “It’ll do you more good than me.”

“I had someone get it from the Xuanyuan Pavilion auction just for you,” Shi Mei protested, biting
his lip.

“Oh, Shi Mei.” Mo Ran was warmed by his words alone, his heart aching for his former beloved.
“It must have been so expensive. Please keep it, it will do so much more for you. I’ll be able to rest
easier knowing that it’s nourishing your qi.”

The thin cord was uncoiled and the pendant around Shi Mei’s neck before he could protest further,
and Mo Ran smiled at him. “It looks good on you,” he said, lifting a hand to pat Shi Mei on the
shoulder. “So much better on you.”

“Ran is right,” Madam Wang said. “It’s much more suited for a water core.”

With even Madam Wang chiming in, Shi Mei capitulated. He nodded. “Please take care of
yourself,” he said seriously to Mo Ran.

“I’ll write often,” Mo Ran promised.

“You say that, but only our teacher can read your terrible handwriting,” Shi Mei laughed, hiding
his sadness.

Mo Ran felt something in him stir at the mention of Chu Wanning; it wasn’t the familiar hatred,
but the dull itchy ache of remorse. He gave a lopsided smile and set off down the mountain,
counting the steps in his head as he went. At the foot of the mountain, he looked back up to see the
peak shrouded in clouds. “Three thousand, seven hundred, and ninety-nine,” he said.

The number of steps up to the main gate was the number of steps Chu Wanning had carried him
home, and Mo Ran would never forget his ice-cold hands chafed raw and bloody from crawling up
the stone steps. He thought that perhaps good and evil weren’t part of a person’s inherent nature
after all, but due to the circumstances that surrounded them. Mo Ran reflected that some were
planted with goodness, like fields of wheat bearing an abundance of harvest, while others were
unlucky enough to be planted with the poppy flowers of dissipation and decadence.

In the end, the righteous and upstanding would burn the poppy fields to the ground, claiming it as a
breeding ground of sin and a demonic fiend who was ruthless and without conscience and deserved
every punishment. Mo Ran had convulsed in that metaphorical blaze, crying out in pain, although
all he had wanted was the water and sunlight of goodness. He didn’t know who had planted the
first seeds of darkness in his heart, but he knew that the person who had saved the unwanted
abandoned plot of land that was his hart was Chu Wanning.

There would be five years before Mo Ran could see his teacher again, and this was the first day.
He missed his teacher’s stern, gentle, angry face. He closed his eyes, thinking back on both his
lives and the memories that scattered like snow in wind. The heavenly rift had been the biggest
crossroad of his life, he suddenly realized, in which the person he loved had died. The first time,
Mo Ran had descended into hell. This time, Mo Ran remained in the world of the living.

------

The first letter arrived eight days after Mo Ran left, messy scrawls trying and failing to confine
itself to the lines of its stationary. Mo Ran wrote that he had arrived at Blossom Crossing,
vanquished an evil water spirit without, and been paid for his efforts. He enclosed his fee with the
letter, asking Xue Zhengyong to convey his regards to Madam Wang and Chu Wanning. Others
followed, gifts and money arriving along with the letters on a semi-regular basis. One letter held a
high-quality spiritual stone for Xue Meng's Longcheng blade, and another included rare Frost
Lotus blossoms. Mo Ran had had to train hard to get past the thousand-year-old monster guarding
the blossoms, he wrote. Sometimes the letters contained entertaining trinkets or medicinal herbs,
and each one ended with a request to convey greetings to his teacher.

Letters also arrived regularly for Shi Mei, rambling about places Mo Ran had seen and reminding
his beloved to dress warmly. Over time, Mo Ran's handwriting improved along with his literacy.
By the time a year had passed, he made almost no errors in his neat letters. The first letter to arrive
for Xue Zhengyong after Mo Ran had been gone for a full year caught the sect leader's eye as he
savored his spring tea. He passed it to his wife. "Sweetheart, look at this."

"His handwriting has gotten better," she said.

"Looks like Constellation Saint's," Xue Zhengyong pointed out, blowing on his tea. He retrieved a
copy of one of Chu Wanning's books from his desk. "See? Seven parts alike."

"It really does," Madam Wang agreed, surprised. "He did take Constellation Saint as his teacher
when he first came here, and that's who taught him to write. It makes sense."

"He never took it seriously at first, though," Xue Zhengyong said. "It took days for him just to
learn his name. But look at him now."

"I' glad to see the wide world is teaching him maturity," Madam Wang said.

"What will he be like after five years of traveling?" Xue Zhengyong mused. "He'll be what, twenty-
two?" He sighed. "I thought Constellation Saint would be able to watch his students mature into
their twenties, but the heavens had other plans."

Mo Ran also felt that the heavens had their own plans as he traveled from the misty rains of
Jiangnan in the south to the Sanguan Pass of Saibei to the north. He sat by the Toulao River
drinking rice wine in summer, and huddled by campfires in the winter. He had owned all the lands
under the skies when he had been emperor but never bothered to travel through them, to see the
fishing boats of the east or the underground aqueducts of the west. He hadn't noticed the common
people, either, the tough skin on the soles of bare feet or the beautiful voices of young opera
trainees. He wasn't the Evil Overlord, but only a wandering cultivator.

Requests for his services came from people of all walks of life - a small child asking the wandering
brother to save a bird or an old man asking the honored cultivator to banish an evil spirit, or even
an old beggar woman asking the kind-looking man to spare some food, Mo Ran heard it all. He let
it wash over him like water, until the day a suntanned resident of the village he'd stayed near for
several days addressed him as Grandmaster Mo.

"Oh, no," Mo Ran said. "No, that title is for my teacher."

"I'm sorry, sir," the man said. "It's just that everyone in the village calls you that."

The village had been troubled by snow ghosts, due to its proximity to a high mountain where the
snow never melted. It was near the border of the lower cultivation realm, too far to have heard of
Chu Wanning's Holy Night Guardians. Knowing that a cultivator couldn't stay in the area even for
the unrelenting tide of low-level monsters, Mo Ran had tried to copy the armor himself. It had
taken him many tries before he'd figured out the mechanisms to create a serviceable construct,
spending enough time near the village that they had taken it upon themselves to give him the
undeserved title of Grandmaster.

The remote village wasn't the only place to drown Mo Ran in awkwardness. Another evening, as
the setting sun dyed the sky red, he was walking past an apricot grove on his way back from
lectures at an academy on Mount Taishan. He heard someone call for Grandmaster Chu, and his
head whipped around reflexively. He laughed at himself as the rest of his brain caught up,
reminding himself that there were plenty of cultivators with the surname Chu, and it was far too
soon for his teacher to have returned. He shifted his pile of books and went to continue on his way,
but the call came a second time.

Mo Ran squinted into the crowd, trying to see who had called, and saw someone waving at him.
The person was too far away for him to make out a face, and all he could tell at a distance was that
it was a young man wearing blue cultivators' robes. The cultivator started toward him, and Mo Ran
could see a bow on his back and a wolf padding after him. When the cultivator got close enough
that Mo Ran could make out his face, he stopped in surprise.

"It's Mo Ran." Nodding politely, as his hands were full, Mo Ran spoke first. "Young master
Nangong," he added, maintaining courtesy to the heir of Rufent Sect, Nangong Si. Mo Ran
remembered that Nangong Si had died too early in his first life for Mo Ran to have met him, but
that Chu Wanning had known him while he had been a guest instructor at Rufeng Sect. The quiver
in the other cultivator's hand caught his eyes, made of cloth and old enough that the embroidered
flowers had faded. It was incongruous with his otherwise neat clothing, clearly an object precious
to him.

"Mo Ran," Nangong Si repeated. "I remember you now. You're Grandmaster Chu's disciple." He
softened. "I'm sorry, you looked like the grandmaster from a distance, so I thought maybe he came
out of seclusion early."

Looking tactfully away from the quiver, Mo Ran nodded. "Hearing you shout, I also thought he'd
come out of seclusion early," he laughed.

Nangong Si joined him in laughter, somehow still managing to retain a measure of arrogance in the
midst of his mirth. It wasn't quite the same as Xue Meng's pride, which was born of skill and
talent, but something more belligerent and headstrong. Mo Ran thought that he resembled a
spirited stallion, and that his wealth and status made him seem audacious rather than frightening. "I
was devastated to hear he'd lost his life," Nangong Si said, sobering. "I'm thankful he will be
revived under the great master's guidance, and I plan to visit him when he returns."

"We look forward to it," Mo Ran said, still tactful.

Nangong Si waved acknowledgement and then looked at Mo Ran's stack of books. "What are you
doing?" he asked curiously.

"Studying," Mo Ran said.

As if searching for complicated or esoteric scrolls, Nangong Si peered more closely at Mo Ran's
books, but his eyes widened in surprise; Mo Ran was carrying simple classics. He composed
himself quickly, but apparently couldn't help saying, "These are all fundamental reading texts.
Why do you have them?"

"I got a late start," Mo Ran said evenly, without a trace of shame. "I only learned to write my name
after going to Sisheng Peak."

"So you're studying at an academy?" Nangong Si asked, somewhat awkwardly.

"Yeah, I was collecting spiritual stones on Mount Taishan a while back and happened to see
Apricot Grove Academy had classes starting. I've been going to their lectures."

"I see, I see." Nangong Si nodded. "Hey, since I bet you haven't eaten yet, you should let me be a
proper host. You're in Rufeng Sect's province, you're Grandmaster Chu's disciple, and I'm on my
way to a restaurant to meet a companion for dinner. Come with."

"I'd be honored," Mo Ran said, not having plans.

"Wuyu Pavilion is one of Linyi's most famous restaurants," Nangong Si said, falling into step
beside him. "They make the best braised pork intestine there is. You know them?"

"Of course," Mo Ran said, grinning. "Top restaurant in the upper cultivation realm. You have good
taste, young master Nangong."

"Oh, I didn't pick it," Nangong Si said.

"Who did?"

"My companion," Nangong Si replied.

Knowing more than he wanted about the complicated relations in Rufeng Sect, Mo Ran was
somewhat surprised and wondered if Ye Wangxi was the companion in question. He followed
Nangong Si to the stairs and through the pearl curtain to the private booth. He nearly choked at the
sight of the person waiting - Song Qiutong was inside, dressed in light silk and standing by the
window. She turned as they entered, the golden hair ornaments swaying gently in the light, and Mo
Ran froze with one foot already in the room. He wondered if it was too late to escape the dinner
invitation by telling Nangong Si that he wasn't particularly fond of braised pork intestine after all.

------

“Let me introduce you, Brother Mo,” Nangong Si said. “This is Song Qiutong, a sister from my
sect.”

Mo Ran reluctantly went along with Nangong Si’s enthusiastic round of introductions, pretending
he had no idea how many moles were on Song Qiutong’s back or where the birthmarks were on her
thighs. He nodded with restraint. “Miss Song,” he said.

“Grandmaster Chu’s disciple,” Nangong Si said, “Mo Weiyu of Sisheng Peak. You might have
seen him at Butterfly Town.”
Song Qiutong smiled and bowed respectfully. “I am pleased to meet the honored cultivator Mo.”

Without rising, Mo Ran gave her a level look for several moments. “Likewise,” he said, finally. He
hated his former wife with an intensity that had begun in his past life. She disgusted him, a fragile
and delicate woman, like an unripe fruit upon the branch in early autumn. She looked as though
she held endless gentleness and tender young love, and only after one had fallen for her charms did
one discover the pungent and festering worm rotting at the core.

Compared to the Emperor Evil Overlord, Song Qiutong had done very little that could be
considered abhorrent; she had only betrayed Rufeng Sect, after it had saved her life, offering up Ye
Wangxi in order to survive. All she had done was to make herself pretty while Linyi was piled high
with mountains of corpses and oceans of blood, garnering Mo Ran’s favor, and eagerly serve her
new master. She had only vilified Ye Wangxi after the massacre in order to demonstrate her
devotion to the new emperor, weeping pitifully about how cruelly he had treated her and thanking
Mo Ran for saving her.

author clearly hates people that try to survive in any way other than confrontation, which is a
trait she assigns to women and feminine men, and again there is a distinct lack of subtlety –
most of what Rong Jiu and Song Qiutong do so that they can survive really is not
objectionable, but she then goes on to add cartoon-villain levels of fuckery and conflate all of
it. There is no empathy here for people who choose to live, rather than die standing against a
fucked up situation.

Mo Ran was granted the chance to speak to her alone after Nangong Si left to harass the kitchen
into producing their meals more quickly. “A toast,” Song Qiutong said, filling his cup with a smile.
She let him glimpse her forearm, a vibrant dot of cinnabar on her wrist. Mo Ran grabbed her arm
roughly, and she shrank back with fear in her delicate eyes. “Young master Mo?” she said.

“You have nice hands,” Mo Ran said after a long pause, expression cool. “Do you know how to
play chess?”

“A little bit,” she said.

“Hands this beautiful must be adept at chess,” Mo Ran continued coldly, but he was interrupted by
the sound of Nangong Si’s footsteps approaching. “Excuse me,” he said, and let go of her wrist. He
wiped her touch from his skin with a handkerchief.

The rays of the setting sun outside splashed brilliant color upon the dusky sky, while inside a
sumptuous feast fit for a pleasant spring eve was spread. Mo Ran smiled brightly, as if nothing had
happened, while Song Qiutong completely ignored his bizarre behavior. She continued to play the
gracious hostess, even refilling his cup. He did not wish to drink the wine she poured, and did not
drink again for the remainder of the meal.

“Brother Mo,” Nangong Si said eventually, “please be sure not to embarrass your teacher at the
upcoming Spiritual Mountain Competition.”

“I’m not going,” Mo Ran said.

“Surely you jest.”

“I’m quite serious,” Mo Ran laughed. “My cousin’s going to represent Sisheng Peak. I don’t feel
the need to join the crowd.”

Nangong Si stared at him in apparent disbelief, piercing eyes narrowed. Mo Ran looked back at
him with an open expression, and Nangong Si sat back and broke eye contact. He twirled his
chopsticks, grinning, and looked back up. “So I won’t be seeing you there at all?”

“Nope,” Mo Ran said.

“Well,” Nangong Si said, laughing again. “Grandmaster Chu’s disciple is really something special,
snubbing a prestigious competition.”

There really wasn’t a reasonable explanation Mo Ran felt he could make; he couldn’t explain that
he was thirty-four and not eighteen and had no desire to play with a bunch of little novice brats
while the elders that he had thoroughly trounced sat in a circle around him to grade his
performance with little scorecards. He cleared his throat. “I don’t think it’s beneath me, it’s just
that I’m not great at orthodox cultivation methods. I’d rather not risk embarrassing my teacher.
You’ll do much better, so please don’t tease me about it.”

If Mo Ran had been speaking to Xue Meng, his cousin would have all but writhed in pleasure at
the compliment. Nangong Si, hailing from Rufeng Sect with its complicated internal politics,
simply smiled at Mo Ran’s praise and declined to take it at face value. He drank some wine, and
wiped his mouth before replying. “Since you won’t be participating, who do you think will win
this round? In your unbiased opinion.”

that is 180 degrees from the previous characterization of Nangong Si but okay

Of all the people Nangong Si could have asked, Mo Ran thought, he’d picked one of two possible
people who could answer the question with absolute certainty. Along with the false Gouchen, Mo
Ran knew exactly how the competition would play out. “Nangong Si,” he answered.

why would you expect the competition to go the same way it did before when nothing else has

The conversation was interrupted by the pearl curtain abruptly swinging to the side to reveal a face
half-hidden in the shadows. Before either of the men could react, Song Qiutong leapt to her feet in
a panic. “Lord Ye,” she said, head lowered.

In black robes trimmed with muted gold, Ye Wangxi stood tall and straight. His lithe figure
stepped into the room without so much as glancing at Song Qiutong. “I wasn’t talking to you,” he
said, eyes fixed on Nangong Si. “I was talking to you. Look up if you can hear me.”

Instead of answering, Nangong Si glanced at Song Qiutong. “What are you standing up for? Sit
down.”

“My lord, I am of such low status that I should remain standing,” she said shakily.

“Sit down!” Nangong Si snarled, suddenly angry.

Song Qiutong flinched, hesitating as she held the edge of the table. Ye Wangxi stepped in. “Listen
to him,” he said coldly.

“Thank you, Lord Ye,” she whispered.

“Nangong Si,” Ye Wangxi said, ignoring her again. “How long, exactly, do you plan on dragging
out this farce? The sect leader is furious enough to lose his wits. Come home.”

“I will do no such thing,” Nangong Si retorted. “He can pretend I’m dead for all I care. If he
doesn’t withdraw the order, I’m not going back.” He spoke clearly, enunciating every syllable.
“Please see yourself out, Lord Ye.”
“You!” Ye Wangxi’s hands tightened into fists, entire body shaking.

Mo Ran watched with interest from the side, wondering if Ye Wangxi might kick over the table
and bodily drag Rufeng Sect’s heir with him, kicking and screaming. He was disappointed to see
that Ye Wangxi was a gentleman after all, suppressing his rage after a long moment. He stood tall
and straight again.

“Nangong Si,” he said finally, voice hoarse. “Do you really have to go this far?”

“Why do you care?”

Ye Wangxi closed his eyes and sighed. He finally turned toward Mo Ran, opening his eyes
apologetically. As Mo Ran was aware that a sect’s internal matters were not to be discussed in
public, he chose to graciously withdraw. “I have an appointment,” he said. “Mustn’t be late. I’ll be
heading off.”

“Many thanks, young master Mo,” Ye Wangxi said.

“Oh, not at all,” Mo Ran said. “Please don’t stop on my account.” He stepped toward the door,
catching an unexpected glimpse of redness in Ye Wangxi’s eyes as he walked past. He thought
perhaps that Ye Wangxi had a similar habit of denying emotion, and he was moved by sudden
impulse to intervene on his behalf. He turned to Nangong Si. “Sir, I might not know what’s
happening here, but I do know he’s always been genuinely good to you. If you’re willing, an open
conversation might be beneficial for the both of you.”

Nangong Si had little appreciation for Mo Ran’s unsolicited advice. “Mind your own business,” he
said coldly.

Mo Ran left, rather insulted. He heard Nangong Si’s furious bellowing from the room as he went
down the stairs, demanding to know what sorcery Ye Wangxi had used to usurp Nangong Si’s
rightful place in his father’s heart and shouting that he had never been given a choice in anything.
Mo Ran heard chairs and tables topple over, and other guests and staff peeked into the hallway to
see what the commotion was all about. Mo Ran glanced over his shoulder as he reached the end of
the corridor.

“If it’s my presence that upsets you,” he heard Ye Wangxi say, voice dull and resigned, “Then I’ll
leave and you won’t have to ever see me again. Please go back. I beg of you.”

If he hadn’t heard it with his own ears, Mo Ran would never have believed that a morally upright
person such as Ye Wangxi would resort to the weakness of begging. He had thought the man to
have integrity, an invincible force on the battlefield, a man who would bleed rather than cry. But
here and now, he knew him to lacking at his core. Mo Ran wondered about what else Ye Wangxi
might be hiding, or what anyone hid from others.

People, Mo Ran thought, hid their bodies under clothes and their feelings behind words; layers
upon layers hid the truth of every person, the only thing presented to the world a painted face
playing a role. Each persona was carefully defined, and no one could switch their character type to
something else. But, Mo Ran thought, in the dark of night, colorful costumes and makeup could be
washed away to reveal unexpected surprises.

The small room he had rented welcomed a Mo Ran deep in thought. He had lived two lifetimes,
and yet he did not truly understand people. He was barely able to understand himself – Chu
Wanning alone twisted his thoughts around themselves in knots. He was reminded that Nangong Si
had mistaken him for his teacher, and that he had thought it funny, but then he caught sight of his
reflection.

The person in the copper mirror wore a simple white cultivator’s robe, hair up in a high ponytail;
the hair had been a whim, the robe something that had caught his eye as he had again outgrown his
previous robes and needed a new set. Only now did he realize that the white garb had caught his
attention for its similarity to his teacher’s usual fare. The dull yellow of the mirror distorted the
image so that it felt as though Mo Ran were looking at a fragment of his teacher rather than
himself.

The Holy Night Guardian Mo Ran had made was a clumsy imitation of his teacher’s better
creation, just as Mo Ran found himself to be a clumsy imitation of his teacher’s better self. Looking
for his teacher’s shadow in the world, he had chosen to become him instead – each day he had
considered what he could to do make his teacher proud had allowed his teacher to take root in his
heart and permeate his entire being.

------

The Spiritual Mountain Competition’s unexpected results sparked a multitude of excited

conversations, a particularly enthusiastic one in the Pearl Teahouse. A pair of wandering cultivators
drank hot tea and gossiped about the even hotter news that the winner of the competition had been
the young phoenix from Sisheng Peak. A tall man in a cape sitting within earshot by the fireplace
perked up as the name Xue Meng – courtesy name Ziming, nickname Son of the Phoenix – was
mentioned.

Unaware they were being overheard, the two wandering cultivators kept chatting. The tall figure
turned slightly as they agreed that honored cultivator Xue was indeed a phoenix – every other
competitor had shown up with a holy weapon, but the heir to Sisheng Peak had defeated them all
with an ordinary curved blade. They attributed his incredible skill to his master, as the
Constellation of the Night Sky would of course train a stunning warrior.

The eavesdropping man set down his tea as they discussed how close the doubles had been, as Xue
Ziming and Nangong Si had been evenly matched. One of them attributed Nangong Si’s loss to the
girl on his team dragging him down, and the eavesdropper turned to look at the pair with clear eyes
in a strikingly handsome face. He smiled at them and inserted himself into their conversation.

“Excuse me, I’ve been out of touch for the last couple of days and missed the competition. I
happened to overhear that Xue Meng won first place, and I was wondering if you could give me
some details?” he asked with a charming smile.

Only too eager to have an audience, the two cultivators beckoned for Mo Ran to join them. Having
undergone a great deal of character development during the time skip, Mo Ran was more mature
than he had been upon leaving on his travels and was well aware of the proper courtesy. He
ordered snacks and tea for his new companions. “Xue Ziming is the darling of the heavens,” he
said, as they arrived. “I’m not surprised to hear of his victory, even without a holy weapon, but
what of the rumors of Nangong Si’s lady fighter?”

The wandering cultivators were more than happy to talk about women. “Truly a case of ambition
gone awry in the bosom of a beautiful woman,” one of them said. “Or Xue Ziming might not have
been able to prevail.”

“I see,” Mo Ran said. He remembered that Ye Wangxi and Nangong Si had been partners during
the competition in his first life. When he’d first heard that Xue Meng had won, he’d thought that
perhaps the little phoenix had been motivated by their teacher’s death to work incredibly hard; his
sectmate’s efforts, it seemed, weren’t the only variable. “Do you know who she is?”
“Song something,” said one of the cultivators. “I’m not sure. She’s a pretty little thing, got Rufeng
Sect’s heir wrapped around her little finger, though.”

“Pretty?” the other cultivator laughed. “Astoundingly beautiful. I’d give up first place, too, to make
her happy.”

“I see, I see,” Mo Ran said. He knew that the competition had three events – singles, doubles, and
the battle royale – and scores were averaged across each to determine the victor. Xue Meng had
been partnered with Shi Mei in Mo Ran’s first life, facing off against Nangong Si and Ye Wangxi
in the doubles event. The inclusion of Ye Wangxi, the second strongest person in the world after
Chu Wanning, made the outcome of that match inevitable.

Setting down his cup of tea, Mo Ran wondered what had gone wrong for Nangong Si to partner
with the useless Song Qiutong instead of the very capable Ye Wangxi. He rubbed his temple in
irritation, as one of his new companions remarked that she had managed to tame even the wild
stallion Nangong Si, much to the amusement of his partner. A few more cultivators had joined
them by then, and they broke out into laughter.

“What about Ye Wangxi?” Mo Ran asked.

“Who?” said the cultivator who had spoken.

“Ye Wangxi,” Mo Ran repeated, but he was met with blank faces. Consternation wormed its way
into his stomach; the man had been a war god who had given the Emperor Evil Overlord no end of
trouble, and he certainly should have been making a name for himself now. He tried to explain.
“The other young master from Rufeng Sect? Long legs? Tall, good temper, quiet?” None of the
blank faces showed the slightest hint of recognition. “And a bow,” Mo Ran sighed.

The gathered cultivators collectively shook their heads; answering over the top of each other to
assure Mo Ran that of the sixteen cultivators sent by Rufeng Sect, none of them had been named
Ye. Mo ran fell silent, remembering that Ye Wangxi had promised to leave the sect if Nangong Si
returned. A pang shot through him as he wondered if he had followed through. In his past life, Mo
Ran remembered Ye Wangxi telling the executioner that he wanted to be buried next to Nangong
Si, and he sighed. How did it go so wrong this time?

All the slight changes had built up, ripples growing into waves as the world had spun sideways.
What should have been an ocean had become land. The turn of fates could be a recantation of past
hatred bought with hot blood and bitter tears, or a breathless silence. Had Nangong Si grown thirsty
that day at the inn, Mo Ran wondered, and run into Song Qiutong while searching for a cup of tea,
and perhaps he had spilled and she had offered him a handkerchief. Neither of them would have
been aware that the courses of their lives had changed.

In his past life, Mo Ran had known himself to be all-powerful and omniscient. He knew he’d
fundamentally understood life itself, and yet now he realized that all souls were merely dust in the
wind, subject to the whims of fate and happenstance. Mo Ran felt chills as he realized how lucky
he had been to return to Chu Wanning’s side. He was fortunate to have been able to have another
chance to perform his filial duty, and apologize for letting his teacher down in his first life.

Finishing his tea, Mo Ran bid the other cultivators farewell and left the warm firelight. The wind
had picked up outside, heavy with the scent of rain. Mo Ran walked into the depths of the forest,
silhouette fading in the distance until it could no longer be seen from inside the teahouse. Lightning
flashed, followed by the rumble of thunder, and water poured from the skies.

The downpour was suffocating. Mo Ran walked between the raindrops, then ran and then fled,
trying to hide from the nonsensical years of his past life. The water couldn’t wash away his sins,
and even if Chu Wanning had forgiven him, he could not forgive himself. His heart was heavy,
strangling his breath, and he doubted that even spending the rest of his life doing good deeds would
be enough to make amends for the evils he had perpetrated.

No amount of rain could wash away the filth in his blood, Mo Ran knew, and yet he wished for it
to continue falling until his teacher awakened. He wished for it to cleanse him so that he could
stand before his teacher with clear eyes and a clean soul. If he could wash away even a little of the
stain, and then a little more, then perhaps the worst disciple in the world could stand before the
best teacher without shame.

Exposure to the freezing wet brought fever down on Mo Ran that night, despite his usual good
health. He lay in his bed, bundled beneath a thick quilt, unable to tell the difference between
dreams and reality. He dreamt of how he had tormented Chu Wanning, waking with a start to the
howling wind, trying and failing to light a candle. He threw the flint and steel aside, burying his
face in his hands and pulling at his own hair in frustration. He howled like a pained beast with the
pain of his guilty conscience.

Escaping death and blame, escaping the consequences of his actions, none of this allowed him to
run from the pricking of his heart. His soul felt as though it had split into two, past and present,
each tearing at the other. Mo Weiyu blamed the Evil Overlord for being a ruthless bloody-handed
lunatic, while the Evil Overlord snarled that Mo Weiyu had unmitigated gall to simply parade
around as if he were just another innocent.

“How am I supposed to start over, when you haunt me and drag me down?” Mo Weiyu cursed his
previous self, pleading and castigating in equal measure. “You jump out when I least expect it,
retribution and vicious laughter and taunting me that this is all a dream! I’m not you anymore! I can
start over!”

“You were feeling guilty,” shrieked the other half of his soul, teeth elongated into fangs in a
twisted face. “You fucked it up again, and why shouldn’t you die alone? Why don’t you make
amends to everyone you hurt before? You false beast, you’re no different than I am. You have the
memories of the past and all of our sins, and what gives you the right to think you can just forget?
You’re deceiving everyone who loves you, because if they knew what kind of person you were,
they’d hate you. Chu Wanning would despise you, if he knew what you had done to him.”

I assume that this passage foreshadows learning that Chu Wanning was in fact resurrected
and has forgiven Mo Ran because he is Just That Awesome and it will be the most ridiculous
fucking asspull

Mo Ran felt around for his flint and steel, trying to light the candle and drive out the darkness.
Even the flame had rejected him, leaving him alone to suffer, and he collapsed on the bed. He
sobbed, apologizing over and over to the crowd of shadowy figures he saw around him, cursing and
accusing him, howling that he had been evil and would never be redeemed. His face burned and his
heart was on fire, and finally he heard a soft sigh.

Chu Wanning stood among the phantom shadows, white robes draped loosely to the floor. He
walked slowly over to the bedside. His elegant, refined features were smooth as he looked down at
Mo Ran.

“I have no right to see you, sir,” Mo Ran whispered, but Chu Wanning didn’t answer. He only
picked up the flint and steel Mo Ran had repeatedly dropped and smoothly lit the candle. He
seemed to merge with it, giving off light as he smiled at his student.
“Go to sleep, Mo Ran,” Chu Wanning said. “The candle is lit. Don’t be afraid.”

The words sounded familiar, but Mo Ran didn’t know when he’d heard them before. The pain in
his head and heart crushed his mind into a slow, sticky syrup. Chu Wanning sat by his bedside, and
Mo Ran felt the warmth of his presence drive out the cold of the rain outside.

“I’ll stay with you,” Chu Wanning said, and Mo Ran’s heart ached with sweetness.

“Don’t leave me, sir,” he said, clutching at his teacher’s hand.

“I won’t,” Chu Wanning promised.

“It’ll be dark if you leave.” His eyes burned until the tears spilled over his cheeks, and Mo Ran
covered his face with his other hand. “Please don’t leave me behind. Please. I’m begging you, sir, I
don’t want to be the emperor any more. Please, sir, don’t throw me away.”

The fever dazed his wits and drained his strength, muffling the part of him that knew his teacher
would be gone when he woke. The icy rain pelted the window as if thousands of vengeful ghosts
were knocking, trying to get inside to claim Mo Ran’s life in retribution for his sins. Inside his
dream, the light his teacher had lit kept them out and drove away the ceaseless chill.

“Don’t leave me behind,” Mo Ran muttered over and over again, and his teacher assured him every
time that he would stay. Finally, nothing came out of his mouth but a pitiful whimper, that it didn’t
matter how many times others had promised not to leave him. “Everyone abandons me in the end,”
Mo Ran whined, like a stray dog. “I’m so tired. I’m so tired, sir, no one ever wants me.” He sobbed
again, feeling as though he could expect nothing more than to be pelted with rocks like the stray
dog he was. “Sir, please don’t throw me away. If you reject me, just kill me. It hurts too much to
be abandoned again and again.”

The fever spiked, driving his thoughts into incoherence and taking away his awareness of where he
was and who he thought was sitting next to him, until finally all he knew was the desire to go
home.

------

The barrier around Red Lotus Pavilion shimmered as the seasons passed, separating inside from
out, until five years had gone by since its erection. Each year had its history. The first year of Chu
Wanning's seclusion, his disciple Mo Ran went down the mountain to travel while his other two
disciples trained alone at Sisheng Peak. Mo Ran's handwriting improved, Xue Meng broke through
to the ninth level of Quiescence Blade, and Shi Mei left to study with Lonemoon Sect at the end of
the year. Mo Ran paid a visit to the Chang family, the salt merchants in Yizhou, chasing the lead
of their son's involvement with the false Gouchen. It didn't pan out; the son had died and the body
cremated.

The second year of Chu Wanning's seclusion encompassed the Spiritual Mountain Competition, in
which Xue Meng won first place. Mei Hanxue placed second, and Nangong Si third. Shi Mei spent
the year tending to the sick and injured across the lower cultivation realm while Mo Ran traveled
and did good deeds. Eventually, Mo Ran vanished into the mountains to cultivate, leaving only a
horde of slain fiends behind.

The third year of Chu Wanning's seclusion was a ghost year, teeming with Yin energy, and the
barriers to the ghost realm weakened. A breach occurred at Butterfly Town, and Xue Meng led the
disciples of Sisheng Peak to suppress the encroaching monsters. It was a disastrous year of misery
and destitution for the lower cultivation realm while the upper cultivation realm opted to protect
itself. Each of the nine sects dispatched disciples to guard the border between upper and lower
cultivation realms, building an evil-repelling wall to keep out both fiends and refugees. Peace and
calm reigned behind the walls, just past the mounds of corpses outside of them, and no amount of
negotiation from Xue Zhengyong could sway their hearts. At the end of the year, Mo Ran received
a letter from his uncle and re-emerged into the world.

The fourth year of Chu Wanning's seclusion saw Mo Ran and Xue Meng fighting side by side in
the lower cultivation realm to drive the demonic fiends from the land. During the final battle, again
at Butterfly Town, Xue Ziming annihilated enemies by the hundreds and thousands as Mo Weiyu
repaired the Heavenly Rift. After the fighting was over, the upper cultivation realm once again
opened its borders. Xue Meng and Mo Ran became renowned the world over - the son of the
phoenix and Grandmaster Mo.

Despite his victories at the competition and the war that followed, Xue Meng neither rested on his
laurels nor let the accolades go to his head. He trained diligently in the bamboo forest,
remembering his teacher's words - the darling of the heavens doesn't need a holy weapon to prove
his skill or worth. He had to work harder to make up the lack. Sometimes, when he had completed
a particularly difficult session, he would glimpse a small figure out of the corner of his eye
whistling with a leaf and remember his teacher as a small boy. He could almost hear the melody.

this is 100% more compelling than hundreds of thousands of words about Chu Wanning's
Amazeballsness and manpain and we skate over it in a few paragraphs, this is bullshit

At the end of the fifth year, Xue Meng had just finished training and was cleaning the frosty edge
of his blade when he was interrupted. A disciple rushed in, shouting for him frantically. "Compose
yourself," Xue Meng said. "What happened?"

"The Red Lotus Pavilion!" the disciple gasped, red in the face and out of breath. "Master Huaizui
left! Constellation Saint is awake!"

The sword slipped out of Xue Meng's nerveless fingers, the blood draining from his handsome face
and then rushing back to dye it red. He gaped for a moment before dashing off to the southern peak
at a breakneck speed. The sword remained behind, forgotten on the ground, and he nearly tripped
several times. He reached the former edge of the barrier just as his father strode out with a broad
grin.

Without missing a beat, Xue Zhengyong caught his son by the collar and halted his headlong rush.
"Dad!" Xue Meng said.

"He's recovering," Xue Zhengyong said. "He was only awake for a few minutes. You wouldn't
want to disturb your teacher's rest, would you?"

"I mean, no, but," Xue Meng said, all but dancing with impatience. The five years had been so long
that even a moment more seemed torturous, and he wanted nothing more than to tell his teacher all
that had happened.

"Be sensible now," Xue Zhengyong said, the only phrase guaranteed to make his son pay
attention.

With a long sigh, Xue Meng stopped trying to sidle past his father. He tried to peer around his
father's bulk to see through the slightly ajar door, pressing his lips together. "What if I just went to
take a quick look and didn't say anything?"

"You will make so much noise," Xue Zhengyong said, glaring. "Don't deny it."
"Fine," Xue Meng muttered. "You're right."

"Of course I am."

Xue Meng made a face. "So, uh, how is he? Really?"

"He's doing well. Master Huaizui even got rid of the rest of the poison from Heartpluck Willow, so
he won't turn back into a child."

A little disappointed that he wouldn't get to see Terri Fying any more, Xue Meng scratched his
head. "So what about everything else? Is he feeling okay?"

"He's fine. He was just annoyed to find out he'd been asleep for five years." Xue Zhengyong
chuckled. "Good thing he's still tired, or he'd be interrogating me." He paused. "That reminds me,
Meng, do me a favor and ask your mom for some money to buy some books from Wuchang Town
at the bottom of the mountains. You know, the ones that chronicle current events. Give him a few
from the past five years."

Perfectly aware that his father was trying to get rid of him so he couldn't sneak inside the pavilion,
Xue Meng let himself be manipulated. He was doing something for his teacher, after all, and Xue
Meng was only too aware of his own tendency to let his emotions override his good sense. "Fine,
fine, I'll go," he muttered.

"Upper and lower cultivation realms," his father said. "He likes reading."

"Okay, okay." Xue Meng dejectedly went down the mountain alone, but when he reached the
vendor, he wasn't sure which books would be the right ones. "Sir, do you have books about the
recent events in the cultivation world?" he asked the stall owner.

The vendor, excited to see someone from Sisheng Peak even if he didn't know it was the heir
himself, answered with enthusiasm. "Of course, of course, historical chronicles and fictional
adaptations both, biographies, demon suppression records, and even manuscripts from famous
storytellers. What suits your interest?"

Analysis paralysis struck. "All of it," Xue Meng said. "Money is not an issue."

The vendor grinned ear to ear and started collecting manuscripts. As he put together Xue Meng's
order, Xue Meng found a booklet ranking wealth within the cultivation world. He flipped through
it, interested to see where he might have come in, but his name wasn't listed. He saw the end of the
list, rounding out at a hundred, and a disclaimer that those ranked under a hundred would not be
listed. His good mood soured, and he slammed the book to the ground.

"What am I, broke?" he said, and the vendor jumped in surprise.

"Ease your anger, honored cultivator, these books are nonsense. Each region has a different
version, promoting its own cultivators at the top of each list. Don't let it bother you." His words
seemed reasonable, but Xue Meng took the book from his hands and opened it again.

An even more peculiar phrase caught his attention - Young Master Ego Ranking.

------

The writing boldly declared Nangong Si of Rufeng Sect to be in first place, with Xue Meng as
second. He glared at the booklet, slamming it shut. "I see how it is," he spat, expression dark.
"Wrap this book separately." He shoved it in his sleeve without waiting, carrying the huge stack
chosen by the vendor back up the mountain.

He was furious to be ranked second for the Young Masters Ego Ranking, and decided that if he
found the dimwit who had written such nonsense that he would thoroughly vent his rage. It
tampered down his good mood to something approaching neutral by the time he reached the Red
Lotus Pavilion, clearing his head of both excitement and fury. A pair of high-level disciples stood
guard, but they let him pass without question.

Honey-soft light glowed through the half-open windows, illuminating the dark of night. Not
knowing whether or not Chu Wanning was awake, Xue Meng stepped lightly as he pushed the door
open. He took the stack of books toward the bedroom, the residence so quiet that he could hear his
own heart beating. He glanced at the bed as he looked for a place to put down the books, but it was
empty.

"Huh?" he said out loud, and then an ice-cold hand descended upon his shoulder.

"What intentions do you have trespassing at the Red Lotus Pavilion?" asked an eerie, chilly voice.

Xue Meng turned slowly to see a creepy pale face hovering behind him, and he screamed. Before
he thought, he struck at the perceived threat, but the person behind him was quicker. He landed a
strike on Xue Meng's neck and another kick to his guts before forcing him to his knees and holding
him there. More than the iron grip, Xue Meng's shock immobilized him; he had been diligently
training for five years and yet he had still been so easily dispatched. He couldn't fathom who could
have defeated him so quickly.

His ears rang as the person restraining him spoke again. "I went into seclusion for five years and
now everyone thinks they can just waltz in here without an invitation. Whose disciple are you and
where is your master? Didn't he teach you common courtesy?"

The sound of the familiar voice broke Xue Meng's paralysis, and he flipped over to fling himself at
his teacher in the tightest hug he could manage. "Sir! Sir!" He lifted his head, tears coursing down
his cheeks despite his best efforts. "It's me, sir," he choked out.

Chu Wanning, still damp from the bath, looked at the person hugging him in the dim light. He saw
a young man, not much more than twenty, with fair skin and low, thick eyebrows. His full lips
made him look spoiled, his eyebrows compassionate, and his eyes were spicy and unfettered. The
twin pools were unmistakable, and Chu Wanning finally recognized his student. Although Xue
Meng had been sixteen when Chu Wanning had died, he was twenty-one now; the passage of time
had changed him enough that he had looked like a stranger.

"Xue Meng," he said slowly, although he wasn't sure if he was telling himself who this unfamiliar
person was or speaking to him directly. Chu Wanning pulled him to his feet. "Stop kneeling. Get
up."

Xue Meng was nearly as tall as Chu Wanning himself, the passage of time having carved maturity
onto the half-grown youth of Chu Wanning's memories. Xue Zhengyong hadn't changed nearly so
much over the course of five years, but the changes in his son drove home just how much Chu
Wanning had missed. "Sir," Xue Meng was saying. "The Spiritual Mountain Competition." He was
beginning to calm down now. "I got first place," he said.

"Of course you did," Chu Wanning said with a small smile.

"I fought Nangong Si," Xue Meng said, blushing. "He had a holy weapon and I didn't, but, I, uh."
He looked down and bashfully rubbed at the hem of his robes. "I didn't, but I didn't embarrass
you."

"It must have been terribly difficult," Chu Wanning said gravely.

"Not terrible," Xue Meng deflected. "It was pretty great."

Chu Wanning lifted a hand to pat his student's head as he had before, but hesitated. Xue Meng was
an adult, he thought suddenly, and might not appreciate being treated like a child. He patted his
shoulder instead, and gestured to the mess on the floor. Xue Meng started collecting the stack of
books he'd dropped, and Chu Wanning helped after a moment.

"You bought so many books I'll never be able to read them all," he said.

"You read so fast it'll only take you a day to get through all of them," Xue Meng said cheerfully,
and Chu Wanning was at a loss for words. He wasn't sure how to handle his student's undiluted
enthusiasm.

"Jiangdong Hall has a new sect leader?" he said, having opened a random book to give himself
time to think.

"She's a woman, too," Xue Meng said. "Rumor has it she has quite the temper."

Chu Wanning kept looking at the history of Jiangdong Hall as if reading with rapt attention, but he
wasn't taking in the words. After a moment, he made himself speak casually. "How's Mo Ran
been?"

"Oh, fine," Xue Meng said.

Chu Wanning looked up at the careless answer, entirely appropriate to the tone of his carefully
nonchalant question. "What do you mean by that?" he asked.

"He's more or less a decent guy now," Xue Meng said.

"And he wasn't before?" Chu Wanning bristled, and then paused. "I supposed he wasn't. Continue."

"Uh," Xue Meng said. He was quite prepared to discuss his own deeds and accomplishments in
detail, but he wasn't skilled at summarizing the merits of others. That the subject was Mo Ran
made it even more difficult. "He's been traveling," he said finally. "Grew up some. That's about it."

"He wasn't at the competition?"

"No, he was cultivating at Snow Valley at the time."

The conversation meandered through other subjects until Xue Meng, worried that he might overtax
his teacher, swallowed down the rest of what he wanted to say and excused himself thoughtfully.
Chu Wanning lay on the bed, still dressed, and thought about how Mo Ran had been in the
underworld. He remembered all of it clearly, and he wasn't surprised at how his student had
changed. He was suddenly despondent at how much he had missed, how even Xue Meng had
changed almost beyond recognizing, and his thoughts turned to the welcome banquet Xue
Zhengyong had wanted to throw for him.

"I've even sent a letter to Ran," his friend had said, trying to wheedle agreement out of him. "Surely
you want him to have a proper meal and good wine when he gets here."

Despite hating crowds and not wanting to be made so much of, Chu Wanning hadn't refused. Mo
Ran was his weak spot, which Xue Zhengyong well knew. The sect leader had also told him of the
difficult years, during which many of the villages at the foot of Mount Baitou had been destroyed.
He'd told Chu Wanning that Mo Ran was helping the rebuilding efforts, as the destruction had
been so severe that many villages were still in ruins.

Resolutely, Chu Wanning turned his attention to his pile of books, but he found himself continually
distracted. Finally he got up and summoned a messenger blossom. "Sect Leader," he said after a
moment's thought. "Please send Mo Ran another letter and tell him not to rush. If he doesn't make
it in time for the celebration, he will be forgiven. Mount Baitou is cold and harsh this time of year,
and he must not neglect his duties to the villagers."

Urge satisfied, Chu Wanning returned to his reading. He couldn't finish the entire pile in a single
night, but he was more than capable of familiarizing himself with all of the important events in the
cultivation world that he had missed over the last five years. Though the first years of records were
uneventful, Mo Ran's name appeared more and more often after the second Heavenly Rift opened
above Butterfly Town. When Chu Wanning reached the record of the upper cultivation world
closing its borders, he sat up straight and looked more closely.

Murder and cannibalism had followed after a seventeen-day halt to the food supply routes, he read,
and it only got worse. The horror and carnage that had abounded was reduced to a few lines on
paper, but Chu Wanning was more than capable of imagining the suffering. A sour taste filled his
mouth as he continued to read. His students had led the defense against the fiends, he learned, with
Xue Meng doing most of the fighting and Mo Ran sealing the rift. The history even mentioned that
Mo Ran's barrier techniques were similar to that of his teacher, Chu Wanning, the undisputed
master of barriers.

"He can repair a rift on his own?" he murmured.

Further passages were dedicated to Mo Ran's good deeds, how he vanquished evil as he traveled
the land. A monster in the Hedong Region, which Bitan Sect had declined to face, had fallen to Mo
Ran - he had been gravely injured, the scroll said, and lucky to come across Jiang Xi, sect leader of
Lonemoon. Chu Wanning's heart chilled as he thought of Mo Ran injured while he wasn't there to
protect him. A three-day battle, the scroll had described, and Chu Wanning could almost see the
scene before him as his student stood before the enormous waves of the Yellow River battling the
Drought Demon with his scarlet willow vine in hand.

The aftermath of the battle painted itself vividly in his mind's eye as well, as the demon's head was
separated from its body and it crashed to the ground. So too did Mo Ran collapse, blood pooling
around his dark robes. Chu Wanning closed his eyes against the tears that threatened to fall,
opening them again to see that the scrolls had started referring to his student as Grandmaster Mo.
The words were nearly incomprehensible, with no link in Chu Wanning's mind to the brightly-
smiling lazy adolescent of his memories.

"I've missed too much," he murmured, and wondered whether or not he'd even be able to recognize
his disciple when he returned. A man who carried more scars and accolades, a man who now bore
the title Grandmaster. Uneasiness fluttered in Chu Wanning's belly, apprehension at the thought of
facing his student. He finally dozed off near dawn, head resting on a pile of books.

With the guards keeping watch over the pavilion, no one was allowed to enter; Chu Wanning didn't
wake until the following evening. He opened his eyes to the setting sun, and stared at it in quiet
confusion. The lake reflected the dusk-red clouds as a crane flew leisurely across the horizon, and
he flushed with shame at his weakness. His physical body was still recovering, but that was no
excuse to sleep so long. The blood drained from his face as he realized he was about to be late to
his own welcome banquet.

Clothing in disarray and hair undone, eyes still cloudy with sleep, Chu Wanning stared out the
window at the evening sky in a panic. He had no idea what to do. It was at that moment that Xue
Zhengyong burst through the door to collect him.

"Are you still not up yet?" his friend said, eyeing him still sitting on the bed.

"I'm up," Chu Wanning snapped reflexively and untruthfully. His expression was nearly dignified
enough to make up for the disarray of his hair and clothing, but not quite. "Did you need
something, Sect Leader, that you've come personally all this way?"

"No, no, I was just looking for you. Since I didn't see you. All day." Xue Zhengyong rubbed his
hands together. "Since you're up, go get cleaned up and dressed. It's dinner time." He glanced at
the door. "Mengpo Hall has all of your favorite dishes. I'll wait and walk with you."

Chu Wanning was suddenly starving, anticipating osmanthus lotus root and crab meatballs, and
had no interest in fixing his appearance. He stood up and searched out his shoes without changing
his clothes. Xue Zhengyong watched him with interest and appeared to remember something as
Chu Wanning failed to put his shoes on the proper feet on the first try and had to do it over.

"Oh, right," he said. "I got a letter from Ran this morning. He'll definitely be here. And he got you
a gift. He's getting quite thoughtful as he grows up." He paused. "Constellation, why are you taking
your socks off again?"

"They're from yesterday," Chu Wanning mumbled. "I want a fresh pair."

"Why didn't you start with a fresh pair?" Xue Zhengyong asked.

"I just now noticed," Chu Wanning said.

Xue Zhengyong chose to believe him, looking around the room. It had been neat and tidy when
Master Huaizui had left, but within a day it had devolved into a disaster. "You should look into
getting a cultivation partner," he said. "Keep this place clean."

"Sect Leader, kindly see yourself out," Chu Wanning said. "I'm changing."

"Sure, sure," Xue Zhengyong said affably. "But the partner thing. What kind of qualities should I
look for? I'll keep my eyes open for any likely prospects."

Chu Wanning glared at him coldly, and Xue Zhengyong finally caught on. "Okay, okay, I was just
wondering," he said. "You wouldn't settle for just anyone. I was trying to be helpful." The glare
didn't abate. "What, am I wrong? You're picky," Xue Zhengyong added.

"I just have better things to do," Chu Wanning muttered. "That doesn't mean I'm picky."

"Okay, then, if you're not picky, then tell me what kind of partner you want. No pressure. Just so I
can keep an eye out."

Annoyed, Chu Wanning huffed a reply. "A living woman," he said. "Sect Leader, please feel free
to find someone who matches those criteria. Kindly see yourself out."

He pushed Xue Zhengyong toward the door, but his friend had apparently decided during his
hibernation that his new purpose in life was to get Chu Wanning settled down in happy matrimony.
Chu Wanning didn't know that one of Xue Zhengyong's regrets was that Chu Wanning had left
behind no children, no one to carry on his line or remember him by, or that Xue Zhengyong had
been disconsolately guilty. He didn't know that his friend had realized how lonely Chu Wanning
was and was trying, clumsily, to fix it.

"That doesn't help me," Xue Zhengyong was saying. "Constellation, I'm being serious here."

Chu Wanning, wanting nothing to do with his friend's meddling, shoved him out and put up a
barrier to keep him there.

------

Naturally, the end of Constellation Saint's seclusion was a cause for celebration for the entire sect,
and Xue Zhengyong had already planned around Chu Wanning's distaste for social gatherings and
public spectacles. He had a speech and itinerary prepared ahead of time, and Chu Wanning
followed his instructions smoothly. Xue Zhengyong, rough as he might have been in some areas,
was socially gifted and able to accurately read the atmosphere of the room. He spoke to the
gathered masses with honest emotion, moving the entire audience.

Only Elder Lucun failed to sense the mood, and called for Chu Wanning to give a speech himself;
Xue Zhengyong tried to save face for all involved, declining on Chu Wanning's behalf, but the
elder wasn't about to be put off. "He's got to put in at least a few words," Elder Lucun complained.
"Our younger disciples don't even know what he looks like!"

"It's fine," Chu Wanning interrupted, and stood. He scanned the hall, looking out at the thousands
of people looking back at him, but didn't see Mo Ran's face. He paused, thinking, and then spoke.
"The Red Lotus Pavilion has many defensive mechanisms as well as mechanical guardians," he
said. "New disciples are discouraged from visiting without prior invitation."

The crowd fell silent at his words. Elder Lucun found his voice first. "What, that's it?" he asked.

"Yes," Chu Wanning said, and sat down.

The silence stretched farther, the more awkward the longer it got. The disciples were dying of
curiosity with regard to death and resurrection, hoping to hear heartfelt emotion, and the gathered
crowd felt that the words spoken were almost an insult to their expectations. The older disciples,
not having expected anything else, found some humor in how true to character their elder remained
despite his wild experiences, and commiserated that Constellation Saint's only good feature was in
fact his handsome face.

With no further hiccups, the banquet began. Spicy and savory dishes abounded, along with finely
made desserts and an abundance of mild and sweet Jiangnan dishes. Xue Zhengyong had provided
over a hundred jars of top quality pear-blossom wine co share the tables. Chu Wanning went
straight for the stewed crab meatballs, returning to them multiple times, until he was finally
interrupted by a large bowl descending in front of his plate. "Constellation! Have a cup!"

"That's a bowl," Chu Wanning retorted.

"Just drink it," Xue Zhengyong said, bold features glowing in the cheerful atmosphere. "I know
how much you can drink! This wouldn't even make a dent! Chug!"

Bowing to the inevitable, Chu Wanning picked up the bowl and touched it to his sect leader's cup.
"I must follow my lord's instructions," he said, and drank off the entire bowl. He placed it upside
down on the table.

"That's my man!" Xue Zhengyong said, overjoyed. A bittersweet expression washed over his face
in the next moment, his eyes reddening slightly. "You asked me for a jar of this years ago and I
wouldn't give it to you," he reminisced. "I regretted it so much. I never thought I'd get to - well."
He sighed. "Never mind!" He added loudly. "You can have the whole cellar if you want it! No
point in dwelling! I'll make sure you never lack for good wine for the rest of your life."

"Deal," Chu Wanning said, smiling.

In another corner, Xue Meng was whispering with a cloaked and hooded figure. They spoke for
several moments before Xue Meng dragged his companion over to Chu Wanning's table and they
bowed simultaneously. "Sir," Xue Meng said, looking up to show off his handsome, commanding
face.

"Sir," said his companion, also straightening. His face was as beautiful as a freshly bloomed lotus.
"I was held up seeing patients at the free clinic in Wuchang Today," Shi Mei apologized. "I've only
now been able to arrive. Please forgive my shameful tardiness."

"It is not of import." Chu Wanning looked his disciple over carefully, expression remaining
neutral. His heart dropped again at how much he had missed; Shi Mei had gone from a beautiful
boy to a gorgeous man, a flower in full bloom. His sweet eyes were clear, the curve of his nose
perfect, his lips red and full.

"Sir," Shi Mei said, even his voice soft and sweet, "I missed you so much."

In the face of his disciple's uncharacteristic vulnerability, Chu Wanning didn't know what to say.
He hesitated, feeling ashamed at his jealousy of his student's good looks. He was older than both of
his disciples and their superior, and he had no reason to feel envy. He nodded magnanimously.
"You can get up," he said mildly.

what a fucking dick

Both of his disciples stood obediently, and Chu Wanning froze again. Shi Mei was taller than Xue
Meng, as tall as Chu Wanning himself, with broad shoulders and a slim waist. His long legs gave
him an air of subtly assertive elegant grace, far beyond the fragile adolescent he had been. Chu
Wanning's heart fell yet again as he saw the beauty of Mo Ran's beloved, and he reminded himself
that he had kept his own feelings for Mo Ran a secret until he'd died. He reminded himself that Mo
Ran had chased him all the way to hell without admitting feelings for Chu Wanning. The two of
them were not to be, he knew; they were destined to be master and disciple and nothing else.

his narcissistic dickishness apparently knows no bounds oh my fucking god

Blushing, Xue Meng nudged Shi Mei and gave him a meaningful look. "You really want me to?"
Shi Mei said, hesitantly.

"Yeah," Xue Meng said.

"But you're the one who got these things."

"And that's why it would be awkward," Xue Meng retorted. "You do it. Besides, you brought stuff
today, didn't you?"

"Oh, all right." Shi Mei sighed and took a large rosewood box from behind Xue Meng's back. He
held it in both hands and approached his teacher. "Sir, we prepared some gifts for you. Just some
small things, but please accept them."

Having already returned to his meatballs, Chu Wanning looked up to see Xue Meng's blushing
face, growing redder as he approached his teacher. He put the box down and stalked off to look at
one of the decoratively carved pillars in feigned nonchalance. Although Chu Wanning knew it was
impolite to open a gift in front of its giver, but his pride wouldn't let him accept anything
expensive. He debated with himself for a moment. "What is it?" he asked, finally.

"Just some little things we picked up here and there," Xue Meng said.

More perceptive than his fellow disciple, Shi Mei smiled gently. "Nothing expensive," he said.

"Then I'll just take a look at it," Chu Wanning said.

"No!" Xue Meng yelped, rushing over in a panic and trying to grab the box before his teacher
could commit a social faux pas. "Don't open it!"

It was too late; Chu Wanning had already opened the box, giving him an impassive look. "Don't
run," he said. "You'll trip."

The box was full of varied trinkets, from delicately embroidered hair ribbons to finely crafted hair
clasps and intricate belt buckles made of jade. A bottle of sedatives with the seal of Hanlin the
Sage was inside, and Chu Wanning could tell immediately that everything in the box was precious.
He glared at his students. Xue Meng blushed even redder, and Xue Zhengyong laughed at his son's
discomfiture.

"Constellation," Xue Zhengyong said, "just accept Meng's thoughtfulness. The elders got you
pricey gifts, what's one more?"

"He's my disciple," Chu Wanning protested, not wanting to accept so many gifts from his own
student.

"It's just a few things I happened to pick up!" Xue Meng burst out, panicking. "I only used money I
earned. Sir, if you don't take it, I'll - I'll - I don't know."

"He won't be able to sleep," Xue Zhengyong said. "He'll be cranky. Might go on a hunger strike."

Chu Wanning found himself overwhelmed by the joint assault perpetrated by father and son, and
looked at the box to garner himself some time. He saw a smaller wooden box inside the pile, and
lifted it out. "What's this?" he asked, opening the box to reveal four clay figurines. He glanced at
Xue Meng, only to find his disciple with a face the color of a ripe tomato. His disciple glued his
eyes to the floor, resembling a bashful child. "What is it?" Chu Wanning repeated.

"Let's take them out," Xue Zhengyong suggested, over his son's protests, and cheerfully snatched
the box. He removed the dolls and arranged them in a row; they were crudely made and unpleasant
to look at, with the only difference among them that one was slightly taller than the rest. Chu
Wanning was sure it was Xue Meng's work, as the little phoenix had originally wanted to learn the
mechanical arts. He had shown so little aptitude that Chu Wanning had set him to learning the
blade instead by the end of his first day.

The effort Xue Meng must have put into the clay figurines was astounding, and Xue Zhengyong
grabbed one to examine it closely. "What is it?" he asked his son.

"Nothing," Xue Meng said. "I was just messing around."

"It's hideous," Xue Zhengyong said, poking the doll's head. "The tall white one is much better
made."
"Don't touch it!" Xue Meng yelled, but it was too late.

"Hands off, uncle," the doll snapped.

Xue Meng buried his face in his hands, and Xue Zhengyong finally figured out that the doll was
meant to be Mo Ran. He started laughing, and Xue Meng shrieked in protest. Xue Zhengyong
reached for the tall, white doll, which grunted coldly and said, "Don't be impudent." Xue
Zhengyong laughed so hard he nearly cried, cackling that it was a perfect impression.

"You put a voice charm in them!" he said, finally getting himself under control. "Pretty good."

"Ridiculous," Chu Wanning said, but he carefully packed the dolls back into their box and placed it
close by. His face was expressionless as he glanced back at his disciple. "I'll take this one," he said.
"You can keep the rest."

"But," Xue Meng protested.

"Do as he says," Shi Mei said, smiling. "That's what you really wanted him to have, right?" he
added in an undertone.

Xue Meng shot his fellow disciple a furious glare, bit his lip, and kept silent. He had always been
flattered while growing up, never censoring himself for the sake of others. Chu Wanning had
always been a little jealous of his candor, a luxury he had never been able to afford himself, and he
had resolved to try to be at least a little more open after his resurrection. But not too much, he
silently reassured his anxious heart, for if he changed too much he wouldn't feel like himself.

As the banquet wound down, Chu Wanning still hadn't caught sight of Mo Ran. His chest felt
heavy with sorrow, but he said nothing despite his earlier resolution to be more open about his
feelings. He eyed Xue Zhengyong, reluctant to expose himself by asking what had been in the
letter or if his sect leader knew where Mo Ran was. Instead, he held his wine cup in a white-
knuckled grip, downing one drink after another. The alcohol burned on the way to his stomach, but
not enough to warm his heart or give him the courage to turn around and ask what he really wanted
to know.

------

As the night wore on and Chu Wanning didn’t ask what he really wanted to know, Xue Zhengyong
got tipsier and Chu Wanning got gloomier. Eventually, Xue Zhengyong noticed his friend was
upset and leaned over. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Chu Wanning said.

“Who upset you?” Xue Zhengyong pressed.

Chu Wanning was torn; he thought he might feel better if he just asked about Mo Ran’s letter, if
perhaps Xue Zhengyong had misinterpreted that his final disciple would be back that night. He
glanced at the door, where darkness had fully fallen. The banquet was drawing to a close. Chu
Wanning was incredibly disappointed that it was his first full day out of seclusion and Mo Ran
hadn’t made it back to see him.

Every other disciple of Sisheng Peak had attended, even those he’d never met or whose names he
didn’t know. Without Mo Ran, the banquet was incomplete. All the stewed crab meatballs, sweet
osmanthus lotus root, or pear blossom wine wouldn’t fix the absence of Chu Wanning’s favorite
disciple. He closed his eyes in frustration, only to open them a second later at a ruckus near the
entrance. He leaned over curiously.
The crowd was shouting that something was in the sky, and Chu Wanning started to hear lively
crackling and thundering booms. He followed the crowd outside to the verdant lawn, looking up at
a sky lit by fireworks. Millions of glittering specks scattered across the backdrops of the stars, and
the disciples chattered in awe at their beauty. Chu Wanning tilted his head back, grateful at the
glorious display Xue Zhengyong had prepared, but it couldn’t dislodge the heaviness in his heart.

A sharp whistling sound pierced the sky, coming from a red-gold streak of light flying upwards
before exploding into shimmering sparkles. The scattered lights were almost like crabapple
blossoms, splendid and lively. Chu Wanning closed his eyes again.

“Disciple Mo Ran welcomes his teacher back from seclusion,” said a clear voice behind him.

Chu Wanning began to tremble, heart beating out of rhythm and pressing the breath out of his
chest. He turned slowly, seeing a pair of disciples looking up at the sky. One of them had spoken,
pointing upwards. Another repeated the words, and then more, until all of Sisheng Peak was staring
up at the glittering words in the sky and reading them aloud.

The whispers of the crowd were full and rich, carrying a tenderness gentle like the tide. Chu
Wanning looked skyward, following their gaze to see the proclamation for himself. The fireworks
had flowed into a mighty river, held in the sky by qi, and he could feel his disciple’s heart
converging upon him in joy and sorrow, longing and regret. He was a piece of driftwood lost in the
ocean of Mo Ran’s eyes as they had looked when he had been embraced in the underworld.

There was no escape from the tenderness, passion, and determination of Mo Ran’s display of
affection, but Chu Wanning refused to analyze the type of affection. He couldn’t try to parse
whether it was the love of disciple for teacher, or something more; only knowing that his student
thought well of him was enough.

Later, Chu Wanning would learn that Mo Ran had carried the signal fireworks with him
everywhere – made by Elder Xuanji, the fireworks were costly and difficult to make, but Mo Ran
had gladly paid the price. The message written on paper with qi would be boldly written across the
sky in letters so large they would be visible from Sisheng Peak no matter where they were set off,
and Mo Ran had wanted his teacher to feel loved even if he couldn’t make it back in time.

The banquet sound down several hours after the fireworks display, and Chu Wanning made his
way back to the Red Lotus Pavilion. The odor of wine permeated his clothing and hair, but the
lotus pond was too cold to bathe in at night. Chu Wanning considered his options, then collected a
change of clothes and made his way toward the communal bath in Miaoyin Springs.

Chu Wanning hadn’t used the communal springs since his first few months in Sisheng Peak, but he
was fairly sure it was late enough that it would be fairly empty and therefore acceptable for his use
now. He lifted the curtain to enter, looking over the familiar tall black-tiled walls and the sheer
veils drifting along the winding corridor leading from the gate to the steps down to the springs
themselves. He felt a rush of warmth that this place had not been renovated like so many others.

what does he normally do in cold weather??? Just not bathe????

Chu Wanning approached the steps, looking to see how many pairs of shoes had been left at the
top. A single pair of large boots, a little dirty, were neatly placed in the corner – only one person
was inside. Chu Wanning wondered who else was there so late before he walked down the stairs in
his bare feet. The courtyard was hazy with steam from the massive pond with its broad waterfall,
always so thick that it obscured anything more than a few inches away.

Chu Wanning walked down the footpath constructed of smooth, colorful pebbles, brushing aside
the heavy peach blossoms to arrive at the nearest entrance to the bath. He put his clothes on the
shelf and walked into the pond’s warm water. He sighed in contentment, wishing that he could
bathe in the luxurious waters daily, but neither crowds nor waiting until the middle of the night
appealed to him.

Miaoyin Springs embodied the fastidious side of Xue Zhengyong’s nature; he had personally
overseen its construction, with flowers blooming year round and the waterfall for rinsing at the end
of the pond. The pavilion to the side, containing heated stones to be placed along meridians, was
available for resting after one had soaked – it was a far more indulgent experience than the rushed
baths Chu Wanning generally made do with.

Delighted that he had the pond all to himself, Chu Wanning spread himself out and swam to the
waterfall. He stood up, wiping the water off of his face with a faint smile, and only then did he
notice the man showering in the surging waters very close to him. The pounding waters were so
loud that Chu Wanning hadn’t heard the sounds the other man had made, and if he had gone just a
little farther he would have touched the man unexpectedly.

Relief that he had stopped in time spread through him, and the unexpected emotion led Chu
Wanning to observe the man more closely than he would have otherwise. He was very tall, with
sun-kissed skin the color of honey covering broad shoulders. His muscles were sculpted and toned,
flowing down to his narrow waist, and Chu Wanning watched the water trickling down his spine.
It suddenly struck him that he was staring in a paroxysm of carnal desire and he flushed bright red
in embarrassment at falling prey to lust.

Even seeing the sight of a naked man in a non-sexual situation was far too impure for an ascetic
like Chu Wanning, who despite his devotion to mental and spiritual purity could not look at
innocently bare skin without immediately thinking of sex. He tried to withdraw gracefully but
stumbled instead, creating a huge splash. He coughed, blushing even redder than before, inhaling
water.

Water used as bathwater entering his mouth disgusted Chu Wanning so much that he lost all sense
of composure. He scrambled and flailed as he tried to stand. As the Constellation Saint, it was
unseemly of him to indulge in such behavior. As the last of his dignity drained away, a strong hand
pulled him upright, the man clearly startled by the sudden commotion.

“Are you all right?” he asked, in a deep, calming voice. “It’s slippery here,” he added, so tall that
his mouth was on a level with Chu Wanning’s ear.

Chu Wanning’s ears burned even hotter, able to feel the firm chest mere inches from his back and
almost brushing against him. Indignant and mortified in equal measure, he shook the man’s hand
off of him and avoided eye contact. “I’m fine,” he said.

Despite the deafening sound of the waterfall nearly drowning out his quiet voice, the man jolted as
if stung. He lifted his hand as if to entreat Chu Wanning to stay, but Chu Wanning had already
retreated to hide inside the roaring curtain of water.

------

Chu Wanning's heart started to race with fury, his face flushed with rage. He saw the man standing
frozen in the same spot out of the corner of his eye, and he could feel the man's stare marking his
skin. He felt absolutely scandalized that the other man would dare stare at him so openly with
obvious lecherous thoughts. He stepped deeper into the waterfall to shield himself from view, but
the man staring at him was clearly too much of an idiot to take the hint. The other man moved
forward as well.
Skin prickling in fury, Chu Wanning moved deeper into the waterfall; Sisheng Peak had its share
of perverts, like every other sect, and Chu Wanning hated them. He inadvertently swallowed more
than a few drops of the filthy water, until the other man finally moved away to continue rinsing.
Chu Wanning saw him look over his shoulder more than once, and it was difficult to control his
rising temper at the man's sheer audacity.

In no mood to soak, he reached for his supplies with the intent of bathing as quickly as he could
and leaving. He discovered that he had dropped his towel and soap into the water, and it had been
long enough that the latter had most likely dissolved. He couldn't decide whether he should collect
more, particularly since he was naked and he would have to walk past the other man to exit the
pool. He went pale in embarrassment and remained standing with his back pressed to the wall.

"Hey, do you need some soap?" came the other man's voice over the roar of the waterfall. When
Chu Wanning didn't answer, the man pressed further. "You're not going to wash just with water,
are you?"

"Toss it over," Chu Wanning said coldly, closing his eyes and remaining where he was. After a
moment, an enchanted peach leaf floated over to him, holding two different types of soap - one
scented with plum blossom and the other with crabapple. The stranger had chosen his favorite
scents, and Chu Wanning glanced at him despite himself.

"Are those okay?" the man asked.

"Fine.”

The two of them continued to wash in silence, and Chu Wanning began to feel a little more at ease.
He cautiously stepped out from the back of the waterfall into a gentler stream, but the man started
looking at him again as soon as he moved. His expression was strange, and Chu Wanning once
again felt exposed. He decided to leave, bracing himself for the ordeal of walking past the stranger
and his obviously inappropriate thoughts. Face sullen, he gritted his teeth and made for the exit.

Unexpectedly, the other man also twisted his hair up and started to follow Chu Wanning out of the
bath. No amount of walking more quickly drove home the hint that Chu Wanning was trying to
gracefully escape, and the vein at his temple started to throb. The tips of his fingers began to glow
as he prepared to summon his holy weapon in self-defense as soon as he was properly dressed, and
he began to walk even more rapidly. The man behind him came to an abrupt halt, and Chu
Wanning sighed in relief.

"There's soap in your hair still," the man called. "Don't you want to rinse it out?" Failing to read
Chu Wanning's furious mood, the man had the audacity to walk up to him, not stopping until he
was within arm's reach.

Had he not been so angry, Chu Wanning might have recognized the familiar voice. Instead, he lost
his temper and spun around, golden light flashing in his hand as he lashed out toward the other
man. He barely decided against a lethal blow as retaliation for the other man's outrageous
behavior, Heavenly Questions striking toward the other man's bare chest. "What the hell is wrong
with you?" he snapped.

The man's face was lit for an instant in the light of the holy weapon, clear and gentle eyes of
tranquil depth belonging to none other than Mo Ran. Chu Wanning tried to pull back, but it was
too late. Heavenly Questions struck at his disciple's smooth, firm chest. Mo Ran grunted in pain,
but he met Chu Wanning's eyes without the slightest trace of anger or resentment. Chu Wanning
hastily recalled Heavenly Questions and then froze, unable to act. He finally managed to loosen his
tongue enough to ask, "Why didn't you dodge?"
"Sir," Mo Ran said.

Stunned, Chu Wanning started to babble. "When did you get back?" He had fantasized many times
about how he might meet his favorite disciple again, but this scenario had been part of none of
them.

"Just now," Mo Ran said. "I was filthy and unfit to be seen in public, so I came to take a bath
before going to see you." He trailed off, clearly not having expected to run into his teacher. Both of
them had wanted a proper and dignified reunion, but they had gotten a farce instead. "Sir, I can't
believe it's really you," Mo Ran said finally. What had been nothing more than the span of a dream
to Chu Wanning had been nearly two thousand torturous days for Mo Ran, and his complicated
emotions threatened to overwhelm him. He forced them down. "It's just that it's been so long that I
didn't think it was really you," he said.

Head spinning, Chu Wanning was at a loss for words for a long moment. "Why didn't you just ask
me?" he said finally. "Instead of creeping after me silently."

"I did want to ask," Mo Ran said. "But it's been so long that I thought I must have been fooling
myself." He had gotten more and more nervous as he had gotten closer to home, afraid that he
would wake up only to find that the news of his teacher's revival had been a dream.

Despite his calm exterior, Chu Wanning's insides were a roiling mess. He had to expend the utmost
effort to keep his tone dry and even without betraying his inner chaos. "Don't be absurd," he said.

Pausing for a beat as if remembering something, Mo Ran pressed his lips together. He hesitated a
little more, finally deciding that if he didn't say it before Chu Wanning had the chance to build up
his walls, he wouldn't get another chance. "Do you remember?" he asked.

"Remember what?"

"What you said to me," Mo Ran said. "About wonderful dreams not being real."

Chu Wanning caught himself before he could answer, realizing that he had said those words at
Jincheng Lake because he had been so miserable at that time. He wasn't sure when or how Mo Ran
had realized that it had been him, and not Shi Mei. He lifted his eyes, seeing Mo Ran looking back
at him, and then knew that Mo Ran hadn't known the truth. He had been fishing for a reaction.

"Ah, so it was you after all, sir," Mo Ran said. He lifted a hand to the seeping wound on his chest,
and smiled wryly. "I did a lot of thinking over the past couple of years," he said. "I wanted to know
what you had done for me, sir, and when I thought about Jincheng Lake, I realized that Shi Mei
doesn't call me by name." He paused. "There are a lot of things I wanted to ask you about when
you woke up, sir, but that was the most important. You were the one who saved me at the bottom
of the lake, weren't you, sir?" He walked closer as he spoke.

Chu Wanning wanted to back away, suddenly reminded of how much taller Mo Ran was, powerful
strength written in every line of his body. The brightness of Mo Ran's eyes struck him, like twin
pools of sunrise, and he was flustered for no reason. "It wasn't me," he said.

Mo Ran didn't believe him, clearly. Chu Wanning scrambled for a subject change, but he was so
nervous that he completely forgot what he had and hadn't said. He lost track of what questions he
had asked or had answered in his panic.

"Why didn't you dodge?" he asked again.

Mo Ran stilled, dropping his eyes with a smile. "Well," he said, "when you said that dreams that
were too good to be true were, I wanted to see if it would hurt. Then I would know I wasn't
dreaming." He was within reach of Chu Wanning, his heart full of nothing but joy and fondness.
He forgot even to keep a proper distance between them, the right amount of space between master
and disciple, and the name that whispered across his mind wasn't his teacher's proper title but his
given name. His eyes filled with tears, and he lifted an arm with a grin. "I must have gotten water
in my eyes," he deflected, wiping them.

Chu Wanning stared up at him in a daze; having been waiting, he was a little more clear-headed
than his student, but it only now occurred to him that the two of them were standing buck naked in
the middle of the hall to have their conversation. He also noticed that Mo Ran was so close that
Chu Wanning could have embraced him with just a tiny shift. Not wanting to continue looking up
at his student's unfairly handsome face, he dropped his gaze and then saw broad shoulders and a
firm chest instead. The bloody lash mark still wept, mingling with droplets of water dripping from
Mo Ran's hair.

It was hard to tell what was hotter - Mo Ran's chest or the hot spring behind them. He only knew he
was surrounded by Mo Ran's chest and it would steal his soul. He trembled.

"Sir," Mo Ran said. "I -"

Before he heard another syllable, Chu Wanning turned away and took off running. Mo Ran stared
after him, stunned at the sight of his teacher fleeing in such a hurry. He had never seen the man
move so fast.

"I've missed you so much," Mo Ran finished lamely, and felt wronged. He followed more slowly,
coming upon his teacher scrambling to get dressed. "Sir," he said, and was ignored. "Sir," he said
again, but Chu Wanning continued to ignore him. "Sir," Mo Ran said a third time.

"What?" Chu Wanning snapped, finally dressed and with his dignity returned to him. His brows
canted downward in anger, phoenix eyes glaring fiercely at his disciple who dared to grow taller
than he was. "What's so important that it can't wait until we're outside? Talking to me naked? Have
you no shame?"

Chagrined, Mo Ran coughed into his fist. "It's not like I wanted to have this conversation naked,"
he muttered.

"Then why aren't you getting dressed?" Chu Wanning pointed out triumphantly.

Mo Ran looked away, toward a peach tree. "It's like this," he said helplessly, and then visibly
steeled himself. "Sir, you're wearing my clothes." He stared fixedly at the peach blossoms as a faint
blush spread across his cheeks.

chu wanning is a hypocritical asshole

------

Chaos spilled into Chu Wanning's mind as he was paralyzed between his two choices - to remove
Mo Ran's clothing and stand naked before his student or to keep inappropriate clothing on when he
knew that it wasn't his. Both choices involved too much humiliation for Chu Wanning to handle.
He froze in awkward silence, until Mo Ran finally broke it. "They're, uh, very clean clothes," he
ventured. "If you don't mind, sir, you could wear them."

"Ah," Chu Wanning said.

Mo Ran let out a breath of relief, having realized too late that he had asked his teacher to strip in
front of him. He burned with shame at the mental image, but his face had tanned enough that it was
less visible than it would have been before he had started his travels. He could hear his heartbeat
roaring in his ears, loud enough that he was sure Chu Wanning could hear it as well, and he pulled
on his teacher's robes without another word.

Another awkward silence fell, as both of them saw that Chu Wanning's clothing was too small for
Mo Ran. A wide expanse of honey-colored chest was left exposed along with half of his legs. Chu
Wanning was in no better shape, Mo Ran's robes pooling on the ground and dragging behind him.
He was insulted anew at the reminder that he was now so much shorter than his student, and he
grunted with a sullen face. "I'm leaving," he said.

Mo Ran optimistically assumed he had been invited to join his teacher, and he took the initiative to
collect Chu Wanning's belongings. He followed him to the entrance of the bath and through the
curtains, noticing how Chu Wanning shivered as he was hit by the autumn chill. "Are you cold?"
Mo Ran asked solicitously.

"No," Chu Wanning said.

Mo Ran, however, was on to his teacher's prideful nonsense. "I'm a little cold," he said, and
gestured with a flourish. A scarlet glow sprang outward to form a warming barrier around the two
of them. It was expertly done and decorated with flower motifs along the top. Chu Wanning
glanced up at it with an unreadable expression.

"You've improved," he said. "Not bad."

"I'm nowhere near as good as you are," Mo Ran demurred.

"You're not far off," Chu Wanning allowed. "My own cold-warding barriers are probably
comparable." He gazed at the barrier for a few moments. "The peach blossoms are a nice touch,"
he added grudgingly.

"They're crabapple blossoms," Mo Ran corrected him, and Chu Wanning's heart skipped a beat.
"Five petals," Mo Ran added.

Chu Wanning couldn't help the slight laugh as he tried to suppress his reactions. "Copying me, are
we?" he said lightly.

To his surprise, Mo Ran simply nodded honestly. "It's a poor imitation, I'm afraid," he said.

No answer came to mind; the two cultivators walked side by side until Chu Wanning became too
uncomfortable to be so close to his student. He sped up, leaving Mo Ran behind. After a moment,
Mo Ran spoke.

"Sir," Mo Ran said suddenly. "Are you upset that I wasn't back in time for the banquet?"

"No," Chu Wanning gunted.

"Really?"

"Why would I lie?"

"Then why are you walking so fast?"

The honest answer that Mo Ran was too tall for Chu Wanning to feel comfortable beside was
unacceptable; he looked up instead and said, "It's going to rain soon."
As if the heavens themselves would act to spare Constellation Saint's ego and dignity, rain chose
that moment to start pattering down. Mo Ran smiled, his expression every bit as lovely as it had
been five years before. His newfound sincerity made it even more beautiful, and Chu Wanning
glared at him.

"What's that stupid grin for?" he snapped.

"Nothing," Mo Ran said, still smiling. His demeanor was docile and obedient, free of overbearance,
and even a little bashful. "I'm just really happy to see you again, sir."

His dimples caught Chu Wanning's gaze. Once, he had thought the twin pools of sweetness were
reserved for Shi Mei, but he had proven that his assumptions had been wrong. Chu Wanning had
only had to give up his life to gain access, he thought sourly, and he scolded his student. "Idiot," he
said.

Mo Ran grinning even more widely like the idiot that he was, and then accidentally stepped on the
hem of Chu Wanning's robe. His teacher looked at the offending foot and back at Mo Ran. "Those
clothes are very big on you, sir," he said, and Chu Wanning reflected that his student was a master
of making exactly the wrong statement.

The two cultivators made their way back toward Red Lotus Pavilion, a rather strange experience
for Chu Wanning. He had always walked alone, rarely sharing an umbrella with anyone. He
stopped suddenly and said, "I can maintain the barrier."

A little taken aback, Mo Ran stopped. "It's fine," he said.

"What kind of teacher makes the student hold the umbrella," Chu Wanning grated.

"You've done so much for me, sir," Mo Ran said after a moment of silence. "I've spent the last five
years trying so hard to improve myself, so I could be more like you, sir. I wanted to be of use to
you. I wanted to repay you, sir, but I'm afraid I'll never be able to." He lowered his head, hands
clenching into fists. The rainwater splashed around him. "So, please, sir, from now on let me take
care of at least the little things." He paused, but Chu Wanning only watched him quietly. "I want to
hold an umbrella over you for as long as I live, sir."

Burning pain spread through Chu Wanning's chest upon hearing his disciple's heart-warming
words. He wanted to cry, having gone through so much suffering, as a traveler who had found
shelter after far too long. He felt shaken down to his bones as Mo Ran spoke of wanting to step out
of his own life to provide shelter for his teacher. No one had ever shown Chu Wanning such
kindness, and the tenderness that overcame him was painful in its intensity. He stared at his
disciple, standing there with his head lowered, and said, "Mo Ran, look at me." His disciple
obeyed. "Say that again," Chu Wanning ordered.

oh my fucking god he is such a self-pitying overdramatic - call the wambulance, seriously,

why is he being rewarded for his asshole behavior

Mo Ran simply gazed at him, face still not quite familiar. It wasn't the face in Chu Wanning's
memories and it wasn't the face of his erotic dreams. He was gentle and steadfast, warm as fire and
firm as iron. He met Chu Wanning's gaze without hesitation, and Chu Wanning saw that he had
grown into a handsome, confident man. Without warning, Mo Ran dropped to one knee and looked
up at him. "Sir," he said. "I want to hold an umbrella over you for the rest of my life."

Mo Ran's dark eyebrows and shapely jawline were paired with bright eyes and a straight nose, the
form of an impressive pine tree grown tall. The tree that was Chu Wanning - pathetically alone in
the wind and the rain for so long - suddenly found another tree grown beside him, taller and
steadier than he. He knew that he would never be alone again, and he was struck with the
realization that Mo Ran was no longer the boy he had been.

Standing in the rain under the dancing crabapple blossom motif, Chu Wanning carefully looked at
his own disciple for the first time. He looked at the man promising him a lifetime, and his heart
began to race. He saw how alluring Mo Ran looked, and knew that he had only felt love before. He
had been able to hide his love. Now, however, Mo Ran was a fire that could easily set him ablaze.
The heat called up an answering fire in his own core, flames that had been lying dormant for so
long that they now threatened to burn his reservations, dignity, and self-control to the ground.

------

Breathing heavily through his dry throat, Chu Wanning refused to surrender. He opted to be
difficult, tamp down the fire raging in his chest, and answered mildly instead. "As long as you live,
you say."

"As long as I live," Mo Ran promised earnestly.

"I might walk real fast," Chu Wanning said. "And pay no attention to you."

"I'll still follow you," Mo Ran said.

"I might just stand still instead of walking," Chu Wanning warned.

"Then I'll stand with you, sir."

Agitated by Mo Ran's lack of hesitation, Chu Wanning swept his sleeves. "What if I grow unable
to walk?"

"Then I'll carry you." Mo Ran realized he might have been rather disrespectful. "On my back," he
amended, lest Chu Wanning assume he meant bridal style.

Heart beating faster and faster, Chu Wanning found himself almost unable to hold back the urge to
touch Mo Ran. He frowned instead. "Who wants to be carried by you," he grunted.

Mo Ran had no snappy comeback for that assault; he knew his teacher was difficult, but he had no
idea what to do to make him happy. His face fell, and he simply said, "Then I'll stop walking, too.
If you want to get rained on, I'll stay.”

At his wit's end, Chu Wanning spoke without thinking. "I don't want your company," he said, so
used to doing things on his own that he was unable to visualize anything else.

Mo Ran froze, his eyelashes quivering. "Sir," he whined, misunderstanding Chu Wanning's very
clear rejection. "Are you upset with me, sir?"

Drowning helplessly in the pounding of his own heart, Chu Wanning didn't hear the full question.
"What?" he said.

"I said I was sorry," Mo Ran said hoarsely. "Back in the underworld. I know I said I'm sorry so
many times, and I know it's not enough. I've spent the last five years trying to make it up to you. I
want to be worthy of you, sir, I want to be able to look you in the eye. But I worry that I'll wake up
to find out that you're not here after all. I'm afraid, sir, that this beautiful reality will turn out to be a
wonderful dream, and that I'll lose it. It makes me so sad, sir."
Mo Ran snapped his mouth shut, wanting to say more. He knew he had no right to speak of his
insignificant shame in front of a man as great as Chu Wanning, and he didn't have the heart to let
his teacher know what he had done for five years. Alone in Snow Valley, he had sometimes
pricked himself with a needle just to know that he was awake and not hallucinating. He had been
terrified that he would wake up in a Sisheng Peak stripped of all familiarity and that Xue Meng
would look at him with eyes full of hate, that he would see Rufeng Sect burned to the ground and
Chu Wanning wouldn't be in Red Lotus Pavilion as though he were still alive.

The most painful words Mo Ran could think of were as if he were still alive - when Mo Ran had
learned that his teacher had really died for him, his heart had ached. It had been as nothing to the
pain he felt in the five years afterwards, as the time for Chu Wanning's awakening came closer. Mo
Ran had felt as though a knife had been cutting into his heart.

Perhaps because he had had too much time to think in the days he had spent alone or because he
had tried so desperately to fill the Chu-Wanning-shaped hole in his life by becoming as similar to
his teacher as possible, Mo Ran had gradually forgotten many things. They began to resurface in
his mind, visions of the bygone past that only now became clear. He thought about his past life,
surrounded by war on all sides, and the last night he had seen Xue Meng.

His cousin had come to Sisheng Peak demanding to know how he could have perpetrated such
wrongs against their teacher. He had tried to force him to turn back before death, reminding Mo
Ran of all that Chu Wanning had done for him. Mo Ran had refused to listen then, but now that he
could see his past more clearly he could tell that there was a lost heart wedged beneath his boots.
That heart had been so good to him, so genuinely good it had nearly driven him to death.

Set in his ways, Mo Ran had understood none of it. He had trod Chu Wanning’s heart into the
ground, and thinking of it now drove a chill through his heart. He couldn’t countenance what he
had done, couldn’t live with the fact that he had failed to repay Chu Wanning’s kindness across
two lifetimes. He had never put his teacher first in his heart, not for a single day.

Mo Ran thought his heart must have been made of stone, before, and he had dreamt of his teacher’s
return for five long years. He had woken to a pillow soaked in tears, weeping as he apologized to
his teacher, and none of it assuaged his guilt. He had thought of his teacher when he had seen the
blossoms of spring and under the falling snows of winter. Daybreak had been golden like his
teacher’s soul and night dark like his teacher’s eyes.

Later still, every beam of white moonlight called to mind the snow on Chu Wanning’s sleeves, and
Mo Ran had seen his silhouette in every graceful shadow. The anguish and yearning he had felt had
diminished his resentment for the station of his birth and reduced his fanatical devotion to Shi Mei.
Outside Snow Valley one day, he had seen winter jasmine growing out of a crack in the wall and
quietly thought that Chu Wanning would have appreciated its beauty.

Between one breath and the next, all the sorrows had rushed into his mind at once. Mo Ran had
broken down and sobbed miserably by the flower in the wall, his ugly cries a disgrace to the
golden blossom under the snow. He had never, in those five years, managed to come close to
forgiving himself.

Kneeling in front of Chu Wanning now, his forced composure finally faded. “Sir, I’m so sorry,” he
choked. “I tried so hard to make it on time today with your present.” Mo Ran could only fully be at
ease in front of his teacher, only show his true emotions to Chu Wanning. “Sir, I’m an idiot. I
couldn’t keep any of my promises. I’m bad, sir.”

Having always adored Mo Ran, Chu Wanning could hardly bear to see his student so miserable.
Hearing his words, he couldn’t help asking the question at the front of his mind. “Why were you
late?” he asked.

“There was enough time,” Mo Ran said. “But I ran into some demons around Butterfly Town.”

“Got held up clearing them out?” Chu Wanning prompted.

“Sorry, sir,” Mo Ran said, head down. “Not only did I get held up, but they destroyed the gift I had
prepared. And I was covered in blood, so I had to rush here to wash it off. And then.” He
hiccupped.

Chu Wanning’s heart melted; Grandmaster Mo was indeed nothing like the teenage Mo Ran. His
teenage disciple had been a selfish brat, but now he understood the weight and proper order of
things, knew what was truly important. Mo Ran understood that the demons were to take priority
over festivities, and Chu Wanning couldn’t help but find him adorably idiotic. He stepped forward
slowly, warmth in his heart, and reached out to help him up.

“Sir, please don’t kick me out of the sect,” Mo Ran said, and Chu Wanning was stunned.

Not having understood the depth of Mo Ran’s guilt and remorse, he froze. “What?” he asked
cautiously.

“Even if you don’t want me by your side,” Mo Ran sobbed. “Please don’t kick me out.” He lifted
his tear-stained face, and Chu Wanning’s heart trembled.

this is a goopy narmy wangsting bullshit circlejerk of attempted pathos, and it’s just so
overblown that it’s gone past anything resembling humor into just mind-numbingly stupid

Usually firm and decisive, Chu Wanning found himself at a loss. “You’re twenty-two,” he said
numbly. “Why are you still like this?” He sighed. “Get up.”

at a loss for the fourth or fifth time in three chapters, yes, so decisive

“I’m not getting up if you don’t want me, sir,” Mo Ran said stubbornly.

Chu Wanning’s head began to ache. He pressed his lips into a thin line and hauled his student up
by the wrist, feeling the strength of his muscle and bone. His firm body was far more mature than
it had been, and the simple touch threatened to send Chu Wanning’s heart bounding straight out of
his chest. He let go abruptly, but Mo Ran was too absorbed in his own angst to notice his teacher’s
strange behavior.

Distracted from his student’s drama, Chu Wanning stared at his own hand in disbelief. Five years
of slumber and he had lost all of his ascetic self-control. He glanced up at Mo Ran; perhaps it was
because the person in front of him was too enticing, making it impossible for him to control his
own actions in the face of such temptation.

Mo Ran bit his lip, then apparently decided to be obstinate. “Please, sir, don’t kick me out.” He
tried to kneel again, and Chu Wanning panicked at the thought of having to drag him to his feet
again.

“If you kneel, I really will kick you out of the sect,” Chu Wanning warned him.

Mo Ran blinked and then figured it out. “You’re not blaming me, sir?” His eyes lit up. “You’re not
angry that I was late?”

“Have I ever been so petty?” Chu Wanning snapped. Mo Ran launched himself toward Chu
Wanning, but his teacher stepped back hastily to avoid the embrace. “What do you think you’re
doing?”

“Uh,” Mo Ran said. “I’m sorry, sir, I forgot myself.”

Chu Wanning blushed to the ears. “Already in your twenties and still without manners,” he
muttered.

“Sorry, sir,” Mo Ran muttered back, also blushing to the ears, and wondered if he had discovered a
new catchphrase.

The sound of the words sorry, sir sent a wave of emotion through Chu Wanning; anger, pity,
warmth, and amusement. He secretly stole another glance at Mo Ran through his downcast lashes,
seeing a vibrantly beautiful youth. His heart thudded against his ribcage and his throat dried out.
He dared not look at Mo Ran again as he muttered, “Idiot.”

The barrier above him didn’t shift as Mo Ran fulfilled his promise to chase after his teacher. Chu
Wanning huffed and kept going, aware that he could no longer hide the love and desire in his gaze.
Mo Ran had ruined him completely, taken his heart and drowned him in an ocean of unseemly lust.
Mo Ran had made him into a mere mortal, with a body of flesh and a soul defenseless against
desire.

let me find the world’s smallest violin and play it for you

------

In the Red Lotus Pavilion, Chu Wanning was unable to sleep. He tossed and turned, thinking of
how Mo Ran had matured. All he saw when he closed his eyes was the handsome face of
Grandmaster Mo, and his tenderly determined eyes. Chu Wanning cursed and kicked the quilt off
the bed, spreading his arms and legs wide and staring at the ceiling. He was tormented with desire
and unable to escape.

“Mo Weiyu, you are a bastard,” he mumbled, feeling as though the hot, firm body was right in
front of him. He could all but see it, and he jolted upright before his thoughts could grow even
more impure. Chu Wanning grabbed the first book within reach, lamenting that his respectable life
had been reduced to resorting to books to quell his inner demons.

The densely packed rows of tiny writing made his eyes glaze over at first, and he stared at them for
several moments until he registered the words Size Ranking of the Cultivation World’s Young
Heroes. He blinked, further confused by the disclaimer that the list wasn’t comprehensive as some
of the young heroes declined to bathe outside or visit pleasure districts – Nangong Si and Xu
Shuanglin of Rufeng Sect, Jiang Xi of Lonemoon, as well as Xue Meng, Xie Fengya, and Chu
Wanning of Sisheng Peak were said to be missing from the rankings.

Still confused as to why the pleasure districts were involved, Chu Wanning blinked at the first
name on the list and thought that Mo Weiyu surely hadn’t grown tall enough to be ranked number
one. The entry went on to note that Mo Ran had been seen bathing at Deyu Hall and was truly awe-
inspiring. The second name on the list was an unfamiliar name, apparently observed bathing in a
forest and described as mighty. Chu Wanning frowned, wondering why peeking at people bathing
was important, even if shoes and hairpieces did add inches to height.

The third name on the list was Mei Hanxue, disciple of Kunlun Taxue Palace’s sect leader, and his
descriptive text noted that the young master Mei had been measured and corroborated, and that his
endowment was glorious enough to leave a lady utterly pliant. Finally realizing what he was
reading, Chu Wanning flung the book across the room. The gesture did nothing to assuage his
humiliation, and he stomped across the room to shred the book with a pulse of qi.

Although the book no longer existed, the words awe-inspiring were seared into Chu Wanning’s
brain, and he suddenly regretted that he had been so proper as to keep his gaze above Mo Ran’s
waist during their reunion. And yet, his vivid imagination suddenly detailed exactly what his
disciple’s endowment must look like, painting it onto the memory of Mo Ran naked in the bath. He
buried his face in his hands, lamenting his misfortune. The modern world was unfit for a decent
man, Chu Wanning decided, and had gone to hell while he’d been dead.

Despite getting no sleep, Chu Wanning got up at the proper time. He dressed and washed, drifting
gracefully down from his residence with restraint and dignity that betrayed none of his internal
turmoil. He did not intend to miss the sect’s monthly assessment, carried out at the Platform of Sin
and Virtue. Flickering light reflected off the light armor worn by thousands of disciples performing
drills as Chu Wanning walked up the steps to his seat on Xue Zhengyong’s left.

Robes dragging on the ground and expression sullen, Chu Wanning poured himself a cup of tea
and sat down. Assuming his friend was sulking over Mo Ran missing the banquet, Xue Zhengyong
leaned over. “Constellation,” he said, “Ran’s back.”

Rather than being cheered by the news, Chu Wanning scowled. “I saw him,” he said.

“Oh, you did?” Xue Zhengyong nodded. “He’s changed quite a lot, hasn’t he? What do you
think?”

“Eh.” Chu Wanning didn’t want to discuss his hot disciple, particularly since all he could think
about was his apparently awe-inspiring dick. He did not plan to look for the man in the sea of
people below, either, diverting his gaze to the table instead. “Quite a lot of pastries,” he remarked.

“You missed breakfast, right?” Xue Zhengyong grinned at him. “Eat up.”

Without missing a beat, Chu Wanning chose a lotus crisp, nicely pink and full of red bean paste.
“This tastes of Lin’an’s Breeze Bakery,” he said, surprised. “They weren’t made by Mengpo
Hall?”

“Ran brought them just for you,” Xue Zhengyong said. “See? No one else got any.”

Only then did Chu Wanning realize that the lavish spread in front of him was confined to his table
alone; the fruits and snacks, pastries, and sugared desserts nearly overflowed the surface. Three
sweet dumplings were in a covered porcelain bowl, their translucence indicating they had been
made with lotus root powder rather than rice. They were a Lin’an specialty.

“Ran borrowed the kitchen,” Xue Zhengyong said. “Made them this morning. The red one is rose
and red bean, the yellow is peanut sesame, and the green one is some fancy tea blend. They’re real
fancy, he spent all morning on them but only made the three.” He paused. “Is that enough for
you?”

Chu Wanning stared quietly; he only ever ate three sweet dumplings at a time. It was a lucky
coincidence that Mo Ran had happened upon the perfect number. He scooped up the first adorably
round dumpling, the perfect size to eat in a single bite, and his heart fluttered for a moment. A
wave of humiliation swept over him and he buried it in cool composure. “He’s pretty good,” he
said.

“Too bad he only made them for you,” Xue Zhengyong said, sighing ruefully.
Chu Wanning said nothing, eating the dumplings slowly. He stirred his soup, feeling the sweetness
spread through his heart. He paid no mind to the drills, focused on the gifts in front of him. Once
done eating, Chu Wanning picked up a nearby book detailing Sisheng Peak’s recent history.
Thoughtfully provided and also written by Xue Zhengyong, they were direct and concise; Chu
Wanning absorbed the contents with ease. He saw a second book underneath the history, very
thick, and looked inquiringly at his breakfast companion.

“Another gift from Ran,” Xue Zhengyong said. “He was too embarrassed to give it to you directly,
since it got a little damaged during a fight with some demons.”

Inside the cover was a neat line of script reading Dear teacher. Chu Wanning’s eyes widened and
he realized that the book was a collection of letters. There were 1825, one for each day of his five-
year seclusion, detailing Mo Ran’s life during that time. It included small moments like Mo Ran’s
distaste for a sticky rice cake, and profound ruminations on the nature of cultivation. The words
squeezed onto the pages, as if the ample space was insufficient to share the depths of Mo Ran’s
heart.

No excess sentimentality or maudlin sorrows tainted the pages, which contained only the happy
moments of the past five years. Chu Wanning’s eyes filled with tears as he saw Mo Ran’s
handwriting slowly improve to an adult elegance. The most recent letter still had wet ink, while the
earliest page had already yellowed with age. The words Dear Teacher on every page were
different, meandering from light and brisk to sure and steadfast until they were a work of confident
art in and of themselves.

On the last page, Chu Wanning touched the words, imagining Mo Ran lifting his writing brush
from the paper, imagining his student growing from seventeen to twenty-two as every day without
fail he sat and addressed a letter. His ruminations were interrupted by a voice calling for him, as
the drills had ended without his noticing.

“Sir!” Xue Meng waved excitedly from the front, standing next to a tall, broad-shouldered man
with a narrow waist and long legs. Their faces were flushed with sweat. Mo Ran broke into a smile,
bright and warm as the golden light of morning, gentle and spirited, bashful and vibrant, fiery
enough to steal Chu Wanning’s breath.

Chu Wanning crossed his arms with an air of studied nonchalance, looking loftily down at his
disciples. His mien betrayed none of the chaos of his thoughts. He grew even more flustered when
Mo Ran tugged at his own clothes and then pointed at him. Chu Wanning glared at him, eyes
narrowed, and Mo Ran laughed. He mouthed something, but Chu Wanning couldn’t make it out.

Mo Ran tugged at his own robes again, and Chu Wanning finally understood. He looked down,
realizing that he had put Mo Ran’s clothes on that morning. He turned away in a huff, annoyed that
Mo Ran had the gall and lack of tact to point out the humiliation of his robes dragging on the
ground for all to see.

------

As the birds returned to roost in the evening, so did the disciples of Sisheng Peak return to Mengpo
Hall at the end of the day. Only Mo Ran remained by the practice dummies, as if waiting. Xue
Meng turned back to him on his way out, their relationship having improved considerably since Mo
Ran had sent him a spiritual stone to set into his Longcheng blade. “You coming?” he asked.

“Not yet,” Mo Ran said.

Shi Mei, too, hesitated. He was devastatingly beautiful in the twilight as he asked, “Are you
waiting for our teacher, Ran?”

“Yeah.” The sight of Shi Mei standing in front of Xue Meng was odd; he was on track to be taller,
the which Mo Ran had noticed earlier, but it wasn’t the familiar sight of Shi Mei eclipsed by the
heir to Sisheng Peak. Mo Ran smiled at him anyway. “I missed the banquet,” he said by way of
explanation. I wanted to invite him to a meal as an apology. You two are also welcome to join us.”

Unused to sharing meals with their teacher, Xue Meng and Shi Mei opted to leave. Mo Ran simply
waited in the light of the setting sun and the crescent moon, its curve only just beginning to peek
out when Chu Wanning’s slow-walking silhouette appeared. He had changed into light robes and
carried a cloth bundle, and he frowned when he saw Mo Ran.

“I was just looking for you,” he said. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting for you, sir,” Mo Ran said. “So we can have dinner.” He jumped off the rock, smiling
brightly. “There’s a new restaurant in Wuchang, and they snagged a famous pastry chef from the
upper cultivation realm.”

“Not bad,” Chu Wanning said, looking him up and down. “You’ve got the cash to spare, I see.”

Mo Ran simply grinned in answer, and Chu Wanning tossed the bundle at him with a grunt. Mo
Ran caught it easily. “What’s this?”

“Your clothes,” Chu Wanning replied.

“It’s great fabric, sir,” Mo Ran said. “Light but warm. If you want, I can have it altered to fit you.”

“I don’t wear second-hand clothes,” Chu Wanning said.

Mo Ran stumbled in embarrassment. “That’s not what I meant, sir. I just saw you wearing it this
morning and I thought you liked it. I can have a new one made instead, sir.”

“Do you even know what size I am?” Chu Wanning said coldly.

Convinced that he could have built an accurate replica of Chu Wanning through memory alone, Mo
Ran started to answer in the affirmative. Then it occurred to him that every memory he had
detailing the dimensions of Chu Wanning’s body involved sex, and he couldn’t admit it out loud.
Chu Wanning pounced on his hesitation.

“How exactly are you going to have something tailored if you don’t know my size?” Chu Wanning
asked loftily, sweeping his sleeves smugly.

Mo Ran couldn’t answer and still maintain his dignity, particularly not after making the dumplings
the day before had taken so long because he had kept losing himself in fantasies of Chu Wanning
sucking him off. He’d intended to not entertain inappropriate thoughts, but it had been difficult to
suppress them. The dumpling-making process had suffered as a result.

The finished dumplings had been exactly the right size to fit comfortably in Chu Wanning’s mouth,
the dimensions of which Mo Ran was intimately familiar. He had known he was accurate, too,
after Chu Wanning had eaten each dumpling in a single bite. However, as he had promised not to
have impure thoughts, he couldn’t very well admit to how he knew Chu Wanning’s size and
dissembled instead. “Of course I’d ask first, sir,” he said.

“Your voice is hoarse,” Chu Wanning said suspiciously.

“It’s inflammation,” Mo Ran said hastily.

Chu Wanning, unaccountably, blushed and turned away with a sullen face. The blush persisted all
the way down the mountain and into the restaurant in Wuchang Town. It being the first time Mo
Ran had invited his teacher for a meal for pleasure, he felt the atmosphere was completely
different.

A pot of exquisite tea was placed on the table along with melon seeds and nuts before the waiter
presented them with menus Mo Ran smiled and thanked the waiter, which Chu Wanning had never
seen him do before. He glanced up at Mo Ran.

“Sir, order whatever you like, but I recommend the fish.”

Chu Wanning nodded. “We’ll go with that, then. Pick the rest, too.”

“I’ll get food you like, then, sir,” Mo Ran said, grinning.

“You know what kind of food I like?” Chu Wanning said mildly.

“Of course,” Mo Ran said. He’d always noticed but now he took pains to remember. He was
looking at the menu still when footsteps approached, and he heard the waiter tell someone that
their party hadn’t ordered wine yet. The footsteps stopped right outside Mo Ran’s beaded curtain.

The agate beads slid smoothly aside to reveal Shi Mei’s beautiful face. He was carrying a jug of
wine. The smile in his eyes could have chased clouds from the sky. “Ran.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I ran into the sect leader and he heard where you were going,” Shi Mei said. “He thought the
restaurant might not have the right kind of aged wine, since they just opened. So here it is.” The
sweet fragrance from inside the stocky pot was just noticeable through the sealing clay.

“Have you eaten?” Chu Wanning asked.

“Oh, Mengpo Hall is still open,” Shi Mei said guilelessly. “I’ll eat when I get back.”

“You’re already here,” Chu Wanning said, as courteous as ever. “Just stay.”

“I couldn’t possibly impose on Ran,” Shi Mei said.

“What nonsense,” Mo Ran said. “Pull up a chair.”

Another set of bowls and chopsticks appeared at Mo Ran’s request, inlaid with gold and silver and
sparkling in the candlelight. Shi Mei poured wine into beautiful cups for each of them, the rich
aroma of the wine permeating the air. It was a familiar scent, the wine Mo Ran had drunk after Shi
Mei had died and after Chu Wanning had died, both in his previous life.

The feeling that his past no longer mattered in the face of the two most important people of his life
being alive and with him came over Mo Ran; he could treat his loved ones to good food and good
wine, and it was worth more than all the lands of the human world. He called the waiter over to
order the fish for each of them, along with a number of side dishes Chu Wanning favored. He
added a spicy dish he knew Shi Mei liked, and then one of the entire menu for dessert.

“We can’t finish all of that,” Chu Wanning said.

“We’ll take the leftovers with us,” Mo Ran said.

“It’ll get cold.”

“Mengpo Hall can heat it up,” Mo Ran insisted, and Chu Wanning gave up arguing. He opened the
menu and added some sweet dumplings to the order, along with sticky rice cakes.

The food arrived quickly, with Mo Ran arranging the spicy dishes on one side and the mild on the
other. Light and refreshing dishes were opposite red and scrumptious, colors complementing each
other. The signature dish – fish spiced with pine nuts in a sweet and sour sauce – arrived last,
vibrantly colored with thick stew, deep fried and plated on a gorgeous blue dish. It was cut into
flower-like slices, topped with peas and shrimp.

Sweet and sour foods were Chu Wanning’s favorite, and he couldn’t help the light of anticipation
in his eyes as the dish was brought out. The waiter saw empty space in front of Shi Me, moving to
place the dish there, but Mo Ran rearranged the table quickly to leave space in front of Chu
Wanning instead. “Here,” he said. “Put it here.”

“Thank you, sir,” the waiter said, always appreciative of customers who made his workload lighter.

Shi Mei, however, had noticed that Mo Ran was favoring their teacher in the ordering and
distribution of dishes, and his eyes flickered with an unreadable expression. The special attention
Mo Ran had once paid him now went to someone else. Furthermore, he thought, Mo Ran should
have remembered that not only did Shi Mei also love sweet and sour fish but that he had ordered it
for all three of them.

Well aware of his own worth, Shi Mei understood that he was more beautiful and better-tempered
than their teacher. He was struck with sudden apprehension despite his self-confidence, knowing
that Mo Ran – despite his outward playboy act – cared the most about genuine emotion. Shi Mei
knew that Mo Ran repaid love and hatred both a thousandfold, and also that Chu Wanning had
given Mo Ran more kindness than anyone else ever had.

The dissonance in that last sentence is staggering, given chu wanning beats the shit out of
people on a regular basis for no good reason but ok

Shi Mei felt his heart drop, and he looked at his two companions with new eyes. Chu Wanning’s
expression was mild but his eyes were as molten as water. Mo Ran smiled with cheek in hand as he
watched their teacher. He fluttered his eyelashes like ripples across a lake, the glittering stars of his
feelings unknown even to him. Shi Mei, watching the scene, accidentally knocked his chopsticks
to the ground.

With an apology, Shi Mei bent to pick them up. He paused, seeing that the utensils had landed next
to Mo Ran’s boot. He could have asked for another pair, he reflected, but he didn’t like to bother
others unnecessarily. Another thought occurred to him, and he deliberately brushed against Mo
Ran’s leg with the back of his hand as he reached for his fallen chopsticks to see how he would
react.

------

A light touch brushed past Mo Ran’s leg as he was sipping the pear blossom white and he
instinctively moved away from it. The contact deepened, and for a moment Mo Ran couldn’t
process what had happened. Shi Mei sat up, blushing slightly, and Mo Ran knew that his beloved
had been playing modified footsie. Shi Mei’s lips pressed together and he frowned as he
straightened, and Mo Ran suppressed a cough.

Shi Mei had been untouchable in Mo Ran’s mind, like a fresh snowfall or a new moon atop a
branch; to be admired from a distance. Although devoted to him – Mo Ran would die for him – he
had never had so much as an impure thought about his beloved, and yet he had just been groped by
someone he regarded as a paragon of purity. Mo Ran found himself shaken to the core.

“What’s wrong with you?” Chu Wanning asked.

“Nothing!” Mo Ran choked out, as he realized that Shi Mei had not only groped him but done so in
front of their teacher. Rather than flattered, he was horrified.

“Excuse me, waiter,” Shi Mei called. “Could I trouble you for another pair of chopsticks? I
dropped these.” Mo Ran looked over as the waiter appeared, seeing Shi Mei’s calm, composed face
with no trace of a flush. Shi Mei smiled back at him. “What is it?”

“Uh, nothing.”

“They landed next to your foot,” Shi Mei elaborated.

“Oh,” Mo Ran said, relief coursing through him. He had made inappropriate assumptions after all.
He opened his mouth to keep the light conversation going, but Shi Mei turned away abruptly and
reached for the soup.

“Here,” Mo Ran said, guilty about his assumption. “Let me help.”

“I’ve got it,” Shi Mei said calmly, ladling three bowls of soup. It had been placed near Chu
Wanning, all the way across the table from Shi Mei, who had to hold his sleeve out of the way and
stand up to reach it. Mo Ran hadn’t meant to put food out of Shi Mei’s reach, and watched
uneasily. Shi Mei met his gaze after a moment and smiled lightly before continuing to serve them.

Feeling awkward, Mo Ran waited for him to finish, Mo Ran asked if Chu Wanning wanted soup.
When his teacher said no, Mo Ran carefully moved the soup to the middle of the table. He wanted
his precious teacher and his favorite person to feel equally loved.

“You’ve really grown up, Ran,” Shi Mei said suddenly. “Since we’re all here, I have something I
want to say to you, and I have to apologize to our teacher.”

His beloved’s sincerity deserved full attention. “What is it?” Mo Ran said.

“Do you remember,” Shi Mei said, “The first time I brought you wontons? I didn’t make them. I’m
really bad at making wontons.”

“Oh, that.” Mo Ran smiled. “I thought it was something serious. I already knew.”

“You did?” Shi Mei’s pretty eyes widened in surprise.

“I saw it before I went to the underworld,” Mo Ran said, and he was about to explain further when
Chu Wanning cleared his throat and put down his wine cup. He shot Mo Ran a cold glance, and
Mo Ran correctly understood that he was not to expose their teacher’s vulnerability, not even to
another of his students. “Anyway. I already knew,” he said. “That’s all.”

“I see,” Shi Mei said, and then he turned to Chu Wanning. “Sir, when you didn’t want to take the
wontons to Ran and had me do it instead, I didn’t think much of it. But over time, as your
relationship got worse, I kept thinking I should have cleared up that first misunderstanding. But I
couldn’t. I was selfish, and I didn’t want to lose my only close friend at Sisheng Peak. I’m sorry.”

“I did tell you not to tell him,” Chu Wanning said mildly.
“I still feel guilty for taking credit for your kindness, sir,” Shi Mei said. “Sir, I really am sorry.” He
paused. “Ran, I’m sorry to you, too.”

Although Mo Ran had initially become fond of Shi Mei for a kindness he hadn’t initiated, Shi Mei
had truly been good to him over the years. He felt no rancor, particularly as Shi Mei had only been
doing as instructed and hadn’t deliberately been deceptive. “No, don’t worry about it,” he said.
“It’s in the past.” He looked at Shi Mei in the candlelight, drinking in the sight of a face he had
never seen.

In Mo Ran’s first life, Shi Mei had died young. He had never gotten the chance to see what his
beloved would look like as an adult, tall and slender with peach blossom eyes and skin as fair as
jade. He looked like the very embodiment of a gentle spirit. Mo Ran’s tightly wound heart relaxed
and he smiled with a sense of relief, feeling warmth and reassurance.

The sense that the adult Shi Mei was a little like a stranger niggled at him, the vague feeling that
his beloved was no longer quite as familiar as he had once been. Mo Ran was sure they would
become close again, and he still declined to force romantic sentiments on his paragon of purity. He
had wandered for five years, nearly dying more than once, without managing to come any close to
the secrets of the false Gouchen, and what Mo Ran had learned was that he was determined to keep
his two most precious people safe.

Mo Ran was unaware that inner demons never rest; as he pushed the claws of his out of his own
soul, another’s inner tranquility was coming under assault. He basked in the peace of the moment
and in the journey back up the mountain afterwards. The three cultivators bid each other good
night, and separated.

Chu Wanning had planned to work through the night, finishing the blueprint for a new mechanism,
but he soon found himself overcome by exhaustion. He resisted briefly, before giving in to the
inevitable, laying down without even changing his clothes. He slept poorly, dreams coming thick
and fast. He dreamt of Mo Ran’s firm toned body and, even in his sleep, tried to maneuver away
from his shameless vision.

Instead, Chu Wanning sank into a different and yet still familiar dream. The Sisheng Peak he had
dreamed of before, with different buildings and an adult Mo Weiyu who stared at him with
venomous, mocking eyes. The man before him was too pale and the light in his eyes was crazed as
he demanded obscene things from Chu Wanning in return for concessions unnamed. Chu Wanning
felt as if he were on the cusp of flying apart as Mo Ran approached him and ripped his clothes off.

A curtain of darkness fell, and Chu Wanning sank into it gratefully with the expectation that he
would finally be able to sleep peacefully. Instead, the darkness slowly lightened into a hazy mist.
He couldn’t see, but he could smell sweat and sex. He could feel a thundering wave of arousal. He
saw a toned body moving above him, and tried to struggle, but his body refused to obey him.

The man above him was vicious, assaulting him as if he wanted to tear Chu Wanning apart, and yet
Chu Wanning heard encouraging groans from his own throat. He felt himself move to meet the
other man, as if he wanted this, until he went entirely numb. He didn’t wake until noon, drained of
energy, almost able to smell the musky scent of the previous night until it faded into the
sandalwood of his own bed.

Heart gradually slowing, Chu Wanning looked around the perfectly ordinary room. Nothing was
out of place, except that he – who had spent years practicing asceticism and was in complete
control of his own physical responses – inexplicably had morning wood. He flushed in furious
humiliation, horrified that one trashy book and the brief sight of his student’s naked body had
destroyed years of self-control.
Worse, the erection refused to go away. Chu Wanning pressed his lips together, determined to
shrivel it in the cold water of the lotus pond, when the barrier around the Red Lotus Pavilion
rippled to announce a visitor. He paled, yanking the quilt to cover his crotch, just as the visitor
knocked at the door.

“Sir, are you up yet?” Mo Ran called.

Thinking that his student had been moving way too fast, and also that his newly mature voice
sounded just like the Mo Ran of his dreams, Chu Wanning leaned against the bed. No, he thought,
this Mo Ran was gentle and respectful and didn’t sound deep and throaty and lustful, but he still
felt a tingling rush straight to his dick. He decided to solve the problem by pretending to still be
asleep, until Mo Ran threw a wrench in his plans.

“Sir, are you there?” Mo Ran called. “I’m coming in, sir.”

Chu Wanning immediately associated the phrase with its filthiest possible interpretation. He
blushed bright red, his clothes disheveled, and eyes furious. The naked lust in his face made him
appear much less formidable than he would have thought he looked if he had any room in his brain
aside from the throbbing in his rock-hard dick.

Mo Ran, unaware of the situation that awaited him, pushed the door open. He saw his teacher
sitting in the bed, hair loose and face furiously stern. He glared at Mo Ran with a hint of red
indicative of indignant chagrin in the corners of his eyes. Mo Ran came to an abrupt halt, staring at
his teacher, feeling as though a heavy rock had just been dropped onto his chest.

------

Mo Ran stared at the disheveled form of his teacher, drowning in a torrent of desire, frantically
repeating to himself that he was to respect and cherish his teacher instead of dreaming of fucking
his brains out. He would absolutely not humiliate the man as he had in his previous life, he told
himself, and finally gathered enough of his wits to pretend he hadn’t just been standing frozen in
the door. He smiled. “Sir, you’re awake,” he said. “Why didn’t you answer?”

“Just woke up,” Chu Wanning said, sounding as though his throat was dry.

A five-layered bamboo meal box was in Mo Ran’s hands, and he glanced at the table. There was
no space for the box, what with the mess of files, tools, and parts scattered across its entire surface.
With no other possible option available in the entire house, Mo Ran had no choice but to carry the
box straight to the bed.

Chu Wanning appeared even more agitated than usual, glaring irritably at Mo Ran. “What do you
want?” he snapped.

“You woke up pretty late, sir,” Mo Ran said. “Mengpo Hall didn’t have much food left. So I made
some breakfast to share with you, sir.”

He opened the box, taking out the dishes one by one. He had made mushrooms, stirfry, silk thread
rolls with sweet lotus root, bamboo shoots, and soup. Finally he produced two bowls of rice. Chu
Wanning was speechless at the sight of both bowls; the rest of the food had been bad enough, but
apparently Mo Ran thought he was a glutton.

“The table is pretty messy, sir,” Mo Ran said. “Would you prefer to eat in bed?” He paused. “Or I
could clean the table, sir.”

As the quilt was the only thing hiding his stiff dick, Chu Wanning had a difficult choice to make.
He wavered between two undignified options before choosing the lesser evil. “The table is too
messy,” he said. “Here is fine.”

“Okay.” Mo Ran smiled.

A good cook before Chu Wanning’s seclusion, Mo Ran had improved into true mastery of the
culinary arts. In addition, he also knew Chu Wanning’s tastes well – that he preferred straw
mushrooms, that he liked rolls stuffed with sweet potato and not red bean paste, that he didn’t like
congee in the morning. Mo Ran even used only the most tender bamboo shoots and had picked
fatty ham for the soup. Chu Wanning didn’t remember ever telling Mo Ran his preferences, and
yet the food was tailored to them perfectly.

Without losing an iota of composure, Chu Wanning nevertheless ate eagerly. He finally put his
chopsticks down with a contented sigh to see Mo Ran watching him with a slight smile, and felt
suddenly self-conscious. “Is there something on my face?” he demanded, searching for a
handkerchief.

“No, no,” Mo Ran said. “I’m just glad you liked the food.”

“It was good, but a single bowl of rice will be sufficient next time,” Chu Wanning said mildly,
trying to hide his unease.

“Got it,” Mo Ran said, after an unsettling hesitation. He sighed internally; Chu Wanning was
perceptive to a fault when it came to important matters, and yet completely failed to notice that
there had been enough food for two people along with two sets of chopsticks in the bottom of the
box. He even had the audacity to then tell Mo Ran that there was too much food for one person and
to bring less next time, and Mo Ran had to fight to hide a laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Chu Wanning demanded.

“Nothing,” Mo Ran said, not wanting his teacher to feel embarrassed at his faux pas. “Sir, I
remembered something I wanted to talk to you about yesterday.”

“Yes?”

“I heard Master Huaizui left the day before you came out of seclusion,” Mo Ran said.

“He did.”

“So you didn’t see him at all?”

“I did not.”

“Ah,” Mo Ran said. “I’d heard a rumor that you rudely refused to thank him for five years’ worth
of effort. But if he left before you woke, it’s not like anyone would have expected you to run over
to Wubei Temple to cry tears of gratitude. I’ll ask my uncle to address it at the next morning
assembly, because honestly, those bitchy people are really annoying.”

“No need,” Chu Wanning said.

“Uh, why not?”

“I wouldn’t have thanked him if I had seen him,” Chu Wanning said.

“Wait, what?” Mo Ran was taken aback. “I know you two already severed the master-disciple
relationship, but he still came to help you in your time of need.”

“I do not wish to explain the nature of our current relationship,” Chu Wanning said coldly. “It is of
no import if I am called cold-blooded and ungrateful. It’s the truth.”

“But,” Mo Ran fretted. “You’re not that kind of person!”

Chu Wanning’s head snapped up and he glared icily at Mo Ran. “What do you think you know
about me?” he snapped.

Immediately sensing that he was about to damage Chu Wanning’s ego, Mo Ran nonetheless
wanted to tell him that he knew. He knew Chu Wanning never let his guard down and kept his
distance, and he wanted nothing more than to tell his teacher that it was okay, that it was hard and
exhausting to keep people at a distance, and that he could let go of his pride. He held his tongue,
remembering that as the disciple it was his job to obey.

Chu Wanning’s tense frame relaxed bit by bit in the silence, until he sighed. “People aren’t saints,”
he said. “Fate cannot be fought. Some things cannot be changed. Don’t talk to me about Master
Huaizui again, and leave so I can change.”

“Yes, sir,” Mo Ran said, quietly collecting the detritus from the meal. He paused at the door, hands
full. “Sir, are you upset with me?”

“Why would I be upset with you?” Chu Wanning snarled, glaring at him.

“Great,” Mo Ran said, smiling brightly. “I’ll see you again tomorrow, then.”

“Suit yourself,” Chu Wanning told him. “There’s no need to announce yourself with that ridiculous
phrase,” he added.

“What?” Mo Ran blinked.

“You’re going to come in anyway, you don’t have to tell me beforehand,” Chu Wanning said. He
didn’t know if he was more worked up over Mo Ran staring at him or his own uncontrollable
blush, but he didn’t get up until well after Mo Ran had left.

Walking barefoot to the bookcase, Chu Wanning chose a bamboo scroll. He unrolled it, staring at
it for a long moment with an unreadable expression. Huaizui had left it on his pillow, sealing it
with a spell preventing anyone other than Chu Wanning from opening it. The writing, neat and
straight, read, Confidential. For the young master only.”

That his former teacher would call him young master was ridiculous. The initial contents of the
letter were dry, containing instructions for maintaining his health after awakening. The rest of it
was a slog, a plea for Chu Wanning to journey to Mount Longxue near Wubei temple so that they
could make amends before Huaizui died. He had written that one of his great regrets was their
falling out.

Huaizui had continued that he had heard that the adverse effects of the old injury Chu Wanning
had suffered caused him to go into seclusion for ten days every seven years, and that he felt guilty
and remorseful. He would be able to heal the injury at Mount Longxue, he had written, but as the
healing spell was risky it would require a disciple with a dual affinity for wood and fire to stabilize
the array. Chu Wanning dug his fingers into his palms, reading the letter over and over.

Something destroyed and lost couldn’t be recovered, Chu Wanning felt, and he wouldn’t get those
hundred and sixty-four days back. Huaizui couldn’t heal a scar so deep, he thought, and his eyes
snapped open. The letter shattered into powder under the assault of his qi, and he resolved never to
set foot near Wubei Temple again as long as he lived.

The fourth day after Chu Wanning had come out of seclusion, Xue Zhengyong called him into
Loyalty Hall to give him a letter of commission. Chu Wanning shook it open, read it, and looked at
his sect leader. “You gave me the wrong one,” he said.

Xue Zhengyong snatched it out of his hands and read it. “Nope, nope, this one’s for you.”

“It says to help with farming,” Chu Wanning protested. “At Cool Jade Village.”

“What, don’t you know how?” Xue Zhengyong said, and then his eyes widened at Chu Wanning’s
embarrassed silence. “You really don’t know how?” he repeated.

Backed into a corner of shame by the incessant questioning, Chu Wanning seethed. “Isn’t there
something like dispatching demons that I could do?”

“Things are pretty peaceful,” Xue Zhengyong said, stroking his chin. “No demons around lately.
Just take Ran with you and let him do all the hard work.”

“Since when does Sisheng Peak take on odd jobs like this, anyway?” Chu Wanning sulked.

“Uh, we always did,” Xue Zhengyong told him. “Shi Mei has gotten Granny Wang’s cat out of the
tree in Wuchang more times than I can count. I just never gave these jobs to you when we had
more serious shit to deal with. I was going to give this to someone else, but then I thought maybe
you’d get bored.”

“I don’t want to just sit around, but I don’t actually want to harvest rice.” Chu Wanning narrowly
managed not to admit to not knowing how, but Xue Zhengyong’s expression told him that he knew
anyway.

“Ran will be there,” the sect leader said. “He’ll do the hard work. Just think of it like a vacation.”

“Can’t I just act like I’m on vacation up here without taking an assignment?”

“I guess,” Xue Zhengyong said, scratching his head. “But since Cool Jade Village is so close to
Butterfly Town, and it was Mo Ran that patched up the rift and not you, I thought you might like to
check it out while you were there. See if it looks okay.”

With a problem he felt worth of his attention, Chu Wanning accepted the assignment and turned to
leave Loyalty Hall.

------

Cool Jade Village was tiny and its population skewed older; with very few young enough to
harvest, the village hired cultivators to help every year. Although such a request would have gone
ignored at every other sect, Xue Zhengyong had built the sect from scratch after going through
hardships in his youth. Rumor had it that he and his brother had depended on charity as children,
and he took requests for assistance very seriously.

Horses had been prepared for Chu Wanning and Mo Ran. The maple leaves were bright red as they
reached the gate, Mo Ran leading a black horse for himself and white for Chu Wanning that
matched his robes. Sunlight filtered through the luxuriant fall foliage to fall on the moss-covered
stone steps of the temple.
Mo Ran wore a black outfit with wrapped wristguards, simple enough to work in, but Chu
Wanning noticed that it accentuated his figure. It was innocently sultry – attractive without looking
as though Mo Ran were trying to show off. He looked his student up and down for a moment,
before snarking that it would be cold with so much skin showing.

“No, sir,” Mo Ran said. “I’ve been getting the horses ready and I’m actually pretty hot. See?” He
guilelessly took Chu Wanning’s hand and pressed it against his bare chest.

“How indecent,” Chu Wanning snarled, ripping his hand away before he could do more than
barely feel Mo Ran’s strong heartbeat.

“I’m sorry, sir, am I sweating?” Mo Ran blinked at him innocently, completely unaware that his
teacher was attracted to men despite their years-long relationship in his past life. He concluded that
Chu Wanning was distressed by his untidy condition and the fact that Mo Ran had touched him
without permission. “That was thoughtless of me, sir.”

A closer look would have shown Mo Ran the blush at the base of Chu Wanning’s neck, but he
missed it. Chu Wanning mounted the black horse in a single motion, and glanced loftily at his
disciple from his greater height. “I’m leaving,” he said coolly. “Keep up.”

Mo Ran watched him spur his horse into a gallop, then scooped up the basket still full of hay that
he had been using to feed the horses before Chu Wanning arrived. He tied it to the white horse’s
saddle and mounted, following Chu Wanning. The quick pace got them to Cool Jade Village within
the hour, rice paddies full of golden grain lining the borders.

Perhaps thirty farmers were harvesting as the cultivators approached, young and old, sweating with
exertion. Mo Ran wasted no time finding the village chief to show him the letter of commission
and then changed into hemp shoes to join the villagers in the fields. With his strength and stamina,
along with his cultivation skills, he put away two whole rows of rice in less than half a day. The
farmers continued at their own pace, one of the younger women singing as they worked.

The lyrics were sweet and coy, setting a rhythm for the villagers’ scythes as the sweet scent of
grain wafted through the air. Chu Wanning listened as he drank hot water under a tree instead,
watching Mo Ran working in the distance. The water seemed to lodge in his heart rather than his
stomach, and he frowned at the song’s subject matter. “A song about lovers is obscene,” he
muttered.

When he returned the jar, the village chief watched him with apprehension. A straightforward man,
he nonetheless hesitated before asking his question. “Honored cultivator,” he said. “Are you not
also going to work in the fields?”

Having never felt more put on the spot in his life, Chu Wanning froze. Xue Zhengyong had
assured him he wouldn’t have to do actual work, and yet the village chief was accusing him of
sloth. He knew he would have done the work if he had known how, but he couldn’t be blamed for
not knowing how to harvest rice. A nearby child looked him up and down.

“Grandpa,” said the child, “how can he work in the fields wearing that?”

“His shoes are all clean,” piped up another child. “They’d get all dirty.”

Even the children were accusing him of dereliction of duty, and Chu Wanning was too ashamed to
continue to stand idly by. He grabbed a sickle and waded into the muddy field without even
removing his shoes. He swung the sickle as he had seen Mo Ran do, but his attempt was fumbling
at best. The children started laughing at him.
Face darkening, Chu Wanning kept his face smooth with the greatest of effort and stalked off
toward Mo Ran’s figure in the distance. He planned to observe Mo Ran’s movements more closely
and copy whatever he did, as his disciple appeared to know what he was doing. His long strides
took him across the field in a matter of moments.

Bent over in the blazing sun, Mo Ran swung his sickle with skill. The golden rice fell softly into
his waiting hand with each stroke until his arm was full, at which point he turned to deposit the
grain in the basket behind him. He didn’t appear to notice Chu Wanning’s approach, working
diligently. Chu Wanning didn’t stop until he was close enough to smell the sweat trickling down
Mo Ran’s cheek, wild and scorching.

Under the sun, Mo Ran’s skin glistened like steel just out of the casting pool, and Chu Wanning
ogled him shamelessly before he realized exactly what he was doing. He blushed, muttering to
himself that he was observing his student’s technique and it was utterly innocent. He needed to
watch closely, he told himself, to see at what angle Mo Ran swung the sickle and how he
maneuvered the grain so well.

So focused on staring, he didn’t notice the frog by his foot until he edged closer and startled it. The
frog croaked loudly and hopped away. Startled, Chu Wanning jerked his foot back, only to slip and
fall in the slimy mud. Reflexively, he reached out to the only object close enough to break his fall –
the hardworking man in front of him. The singing maiden had just reached the part of the song
about grabbing her lover’s belt as Chu Wanning’s hands flailed onto Mo Ran’s belt and he found
himself with a face-full of broad, naked chest.

------

Mo Ran went from minding his own business reaping rice to feeling a hand pull his belt down. He
turned to see Chu Wanning overbalancing and hastily dropped the sickle to catch him. Chu
Wanning stumbled into his chest with the faint odor of crabapple blossoms and Mo Ran held him
upright with both arms. The rice he had held scattered all over the ground.

“What are you doing here, sir?” he asked. Chu Wanning declined to answer. “The mud is slippery,
sir,” Mo Ran added.

Not only did Chu Wanning not answer, he refused to look Mo Ran in the face. From a distance, Mo
Ran faintly heard the girl singing about tugging at her lover’s belt, and suddenly Chu Wanning
shoved him away. His face was frozen rather than calm, eyes wildly darting back and forth despite
his obvious attempts to maintain his composure. Even his earlobes were a brilliant red, the color of
ripe peaches.

Immediately reminded that Chu Wanning had appeared to enjoy having his earlobes sucked on,
Mo Ran’s eyes darkened with lust. “What the fuck are you looking at?” Chu Wanning snarled,
absolutely livid at the attention paid to his embarrassing fumble.

Mo Ran jolted back to the present, feeling as though he had been caught with his hand in the cookie
jar, and ashamed of his carnal thoughts toward the bastion of purity in front of him. Further shame
pooled in his gut at how he had broken Chu Wanning’s pride in his past life, when the man didn’t
have an iota of sexual desire to begin with. He shook his head repeatedly.

“Why are you shaking your head?” Chu Wanning snapped. “Is this funny?”

Mo Ran froze, peeking at his teacher and seeing the embarrassment Chu Wanning was clearly
trying to hide with a mask of rage. Mo Ran found it cute that the great Constellation Saint had
tripped over a frog in front of his own disciple, and couldn’t help chuckling. Unfortunately, the
laughter only made Chu Wanning angrier.

“Now why are you laughing?” he demanded furiously. “Does it amuse you that I don’t know how
to harvest rice?”

“Nothing funny about that, no, sir,” Mo Ran said, getting his laughter under control.

The frog, again demonstrating terrible timing, appeared on the ridge between fields and croaked
again. It sounded self-righteous, as if claiming its rightful position, and Mo Ran let out another
huff of laughter before stuffing a fist in his mouth to control himself. Chu Wanning stalked toward
the ridge in a rage, and then heard Mo Ran call out for him.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said, not wanting to sully his teacher with his inappropriate touch when he could
still feel Chu Wanning’s warmth against his chest and smell the crabapple in his scent.

“Are you not done laughing?” Chu Wanning spit out.

Mo Ran smiled gently. “I can teach you how to harvest the rice, sir.” He held up the scythe.
“You’re clever enough to pick it up quickly.”

Plans entirely derailed, Chu Wanning obediently followed his student’s instructions. He had
intended to covertly observe, and instead he had landed an official apprenticeship; it was absurd.
Mo Ran, however, was serious and attentive, teaching him patiently. “It’s all in the wrist,” he was
saying. “Like this.”

The sharply defined features that would make anyone else arrogant in their good looks were
tempered with his gentle strength. Tenderness radiated from him as he demonstrated the
movements. Chu Wanning tried to follow his motions, but he couldn’t effectively cut the pliable
stalks of grain. Mo Ran watched him for a moment and then reached out to adjust his grip.

The barest moment of skin to skin contact was all that either of them could allow; Mo Ran’s
torrential stream had nowhere to go, while Chu Wanning’s pond was utterly dried up. They were a
match made in heaven, except that both of them had concluded that the other was uninterested. It
was a ludicrous farce, a comedy of errors with no end in sight.

“A little lower,” Mo Ran said. “Watch out for the sharp edges.”

“I know.”

“Relax, you’re too tense.” As Mo Ran spoke, he hovered even closer to Chu Wanning. Far from it
being relaxing, his proximity injected tension into Chu Wanning’s spine and grip.

Without warning, Chu Wanning was suddenly reminded of his shamefully erotic dream. The two
of them had been in roughly the same position, Mo Ran telling him to relax and unclench. Chu
Wanning blushed at the memory, trying to distract himself, and yet all he could think of was that
Mo Ran’s dick had been first ranked in the cultivation world.

None the wiser, Mo Ran looked at him earnestly. “Why are you getting tenser? I told you to
relax!”

“I am relaxed!” Chu Wanning snapped, glaring at his disciple. He froze, staring into Mo Ran’s
eyes from so close he could have touched him, unable to hear anything but the beating of his heart.

Awkwardly, Mo Ran withdrew and straightened up. He smiled sheepishly. “Would you like to try
again, sir?” he said. With another reassuring smile, Mo Ran took his sickle and started down his
row of grain. He hadn’t gotten far before he straightened again. “Sir,” he added.

“What?”

“Take off your boots, sir. They have smooth soles, and you might slip again.”

Chu Wanning mulled it over for a moment before capitulating; following Mo Ran’s suggestion was
less humiliating than slipping a second time. He walked barefoot back into the rice field to assist.
The boots and socks went next to a haystack on dry land for collection later.

By the time the sun was high overhead, Chu Wanning had more or less mastered the art of rice
harvesting. His motions were fluid and between the two of them, he and Mo Ran had harvested
quite a mountain of grain. He finally felt a bit of fatigue and straightened to take a deeper breath as
a light breeze swept past with the autumn chill. Mo Ran turned to him immediately.

“Are you cold, sir?”

“No. I’m fine.”

Before Mo Ran could say anything else, the singing maiden called out from inside the village. Her
clear, bell-like voice announced lunchtime for the laborers. Chu Wanning brought his last basket of
rice to their growing pile and then headed for the village. He left his shoes where they were, as his
feet were dirty, and Mo Ran collected them on his way into the village proper.

Those who hadn’t been harvesting had made food for the entire village in large pots –steaming
rice, braised pork with cabbage, and vegetable tofu soup. The meat was a luxury in the lower
cultivation world, but the village would be unable to bear the shame if they fed Sisheng Peak’s
cultivators nothing but vegetables. The entire village breathed in the scent as the lid came off the
pork dish.

“Please make do, honored cultivator,” said the chief’s wife. A stocky woman with a loud voice and
a bright smile, she gestured toward the pot. “We cured the meat and grew the vegetables
ourselves.”

“It looks delicious,” Mo Ran said, scooping two bowls of rice. He handed them to Chu Wanning
before taking a third for himself.

The chief’s wife waved Chu Wanning over with enthusiasm, and he approached the pork dish to
see it buried in a layer of chili peppers. She filled his bowl before he could object, and he froze in
uncertainty. There was no way he could eat it, but he also couldn’t refuse the village’s hospitality.

“Swap with me,” Mo Ran said, holding out a bowl of soup.

“Eat your own,” Chu Wanning said, ignoring the bowl.

“Oh, dear,” said the chief’s wife. “Honored cultivator, are you unable to eat spicy foods?”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Chu Wanning assured her, and took a bite of the broth-soaked rice.

By this point, the entire village had caught onto the exchange and was waiting with bated breath to
see what would happen. Chu Wanning held it together masterfully for several moments until he
could no longer bear the pain and started coughing. He had not only woefully overestimated his
own ability to tolerate spice, but sorely underestimated the chili peppers. His entire face was beet-
red and he couldn’t speak at all.
Horrified, the villagers stared, absentmindedly swatting the children who laughed. Mo Ran
hurriedly scooped a bowl of soup for Chu Wanning, who drank it immediately. It took away some
of the fire of the chili peppers, but burned his tongue in an entirely different way. Chu Wanning
looked at Mo Ran with watering eyes. “More,” he grated out hoarsely.

Mo Ran shivered at the sight of those teary eyes and blushing face, brain conjuring up an image
from his first life. A memory of Chu Wanning, overcome with lust and begging for more, overlaid
the face of the man in front of him. Mo Ran couldn’t move, transfixed by the very thought.

------

With Chu Wanning standing in front of him and asking for more, Mo Ran felt the blood rush
straight between his legs. He adjusted himself to hide the erection, leaning over to ladle another
bowl of soup for his teacher. He reached over to hand him the bowl, their fingers brushing and
sending a jolt right down to his groin. Mo Ran twitched, spilling the soup.

With a frown, Chu Wanning took the bowl. He was more concerned about his painful tongue than
whatever inanity his disciple was perpetrating. Mo Ran watched him swallow, lips vividly red from
the spice, and imagined kissing them. Abruptly, he slapped himself in the face.

“There was a mosquito,” he said to the collectively staring visitors.

“Ah,” said a clear female voice. “Autumn mosquitos are the worst. Did you bring medicinal salve,
honored cultivator?” It belonged to a young woman, shapely figure dressed in a blue coat and
gleaming hair braided. She looked at him boldly, and Mo Ran recognized the voice as the singer.
He did not recognize the open invitation in her face.

“Ling,” said the older woman sitting next to her, who knew very well what was going on. “Of
course he didn’t. They’re only here for the day. Bring him some later.”

“I’ll bring it tonight,” Ling said, smiling.

Mo Ran felt steamrolled, and turned to his teacher for help. Chu Wanning was ignoring both of
them, fastidiously wiping the spilled soup from his hand with a look of distaste. “Sir,” Mo Ran said
in a small voice, trying to avoid the women. “Can I borrow your handkerchief? I spilled on my
hand, too.”

The same crabapple-embroidered handkerchief that Terri Fying had carried at Peach Blossom
Springs landed in his hand, and Mo Ran thought about how his teacher was quite sentimental
despite his ongoing efforts to appear cold and distant. He had noted it in his past life, that Chu
Wanning’s clothes and furnishings stayed the same throughout the years, but he hadn’t expected
him to hold onto something as small as a handkerchief. It was so old that the colors had faded, and
yet he still kept it.

Upon closer inspection, Mo Ran noticed that the flower was carefully embroidered but that the
needlework was poor. It looked like the work of a beginner, and Mo Ran wondered if Chu
Wanning had been the one to do it. He couldn’t help imagining his teacher stitching the flower
with a look of concentration, and stifled a laugh. Chu Wanning snatched the handkerchief back as
soon as Mo Ran’s lips so much as twitched.

“What was that for?” Mo Ran asked. “I was going to wash it.”

“I can wash it,” Chu Wanning said, picking up his bowl of spicy stew.

Not wanting a repeat of previous events, Mo Ran swapped their bowls. Chu Wanning frowned, but
the chief’s wife smiled placatingly. “Honored cultivator,” she said, “we don’t mind if you can’t eat
spicy foods.”

“My apologies for my discourtesy,” Chu Wanning said after a moment, and accepted Mo Ran’s
bowl.

With Chu Wanning’s bowl in hand, it suddenly struck Mo Ran that his teacher had eaten from it,
and the thought made him feel all warm and fuzzy inside. He picked up a piece of meat and ate it,
transfixed by the intimacy of the act. There was a part of him that couldn’t countenance that
despite all the filthy acts he had perpetrated upon Chu Wanning’s person in his past life, he was
utterly undone now by such a simple gesture. He couldn’t stop the indecent thoughts no matter
how hard he tried, how much he told himself that he had vowed not to be inappropriate.

Peeling away the hatred should have left him with nothing more than respect, Mo Ran thought, and
yet he felt tender affection and scalding desire. He clung to the driftwood of rationality in the ocean
of need, and yet one word or glance from Chu Wanning was enough to start him drowning all over
again. Mo Ran felt as though he had taken leave of his senses, so desperately obsessed was he with
someone who had never been and would never be attracted to another man.

Without being sated, the desire in him only increased. It swelled into a blazing inferno and a vast
ocean, with no care but that its object stood in front of him, taunting him with his unreachability.
The autumn breeze picked up, bringing the fragrance of harvest and a chorus of frogs, and Mo Ran
thought that this wouldn’t be a bad life.

The harvest season lasted half a month, and the two cultivators stayed in Cool Jade Village until it
was over. Although not well-off, the village had enough space to put the two of them up. The
chief’s wife presented them with two thick mattresses, clean but clearly belonging to someone else,
and Chu Wanning politely demurred. “The straw is warm enough, ma’am,” he told her.

Mo Ran smiled in agreement. “We’re cultivators,” he said. “We can’t just take your beds.”

The chief was grateful and guilty in equal measure, apologizing over and over and explaining that
the village had been beset by an evil spirit the year before and they had lost many supplies in a fire.
Chu Wanning had assured him that they were perfectly fine, and finally the two left. Mo Ran
adjusted the makeshift straw mattress, much like a dog arranging his nest, until Chu Wanning told
him to stop.

“Sorry, sir,” Mo Ran said. “I’ll get you a proper mattress at the market tomorrow.”

“And leave me to do all the work?” Chu Wanning said coolly. “It’s fine.” He approached the
haystack masquerading as a bed. “It smells nice. Like grain.”

“You’ll catch your death of cold,” Mo Ran protested.

“It’s not even winter yet.” Chu Wanning frowned. “Go back to your own room. It’s been a long
day and I want to sleep.”

Obediently, Mo Ran decamped. Chu Wanning rinsed his feet haphazardly and moved toward the
straw bed, but a knock sounded at the door. “Sir, I’m coming in,” Mo Ran called.

Furiously, Chu Wanning spat back, “Didn’t I tell you to stop saying that?”

With a grin, Mo Ran shouldered the door open. His hands were full of a bucket of steaming hot
water, eyes sparkling, and Chu Wanning’s heart raced under his gaze. Mo Ran set the heavy bucket
next to the bed, face glowing. “You worked hard today, sir,” he said. “Soak your feet and then let
me give you a footrub before you go to sleep.” He held up a hand to forestall Chu Wanning’s
protest. “I know you’re going to tell me there’s no need, sir, but this is your first time doing
farmwork. If you don’t let me do this, you’re not going to sleep well with your feet aching, and
they’ll hurt even more in the morning. Do you want the kids to make fun of you again, sir?”

Chu Wanning graciously lowered his feet into the bucket. His skin was fair, toes delicate, and Mo
Ran thought that he had nicer feet than many women. He certainly had more pleasant feet than
Song Qiutong had, Mo Ran mused, and then fled to the other side of the room with a book to wait.
It was quiet enough under the light of the single candle that both of them slowed their breathing so
as not to disturb the silence, and it wasn’t long before Chu Wanning looked up.

“They don’t hurt anymore,” he said. “You can go now.”

Knowing Chu Wanning as well as he did, Mo Ran wasn’t about to take him at his word. He put
down his book and crossed the room to kneel beside the bed, taking Chu Wanning’s foot in his
hands. “Footrub first,” he said. “Then I’ll leave.”

Chu Wanning’s first impulse was to kick him and force him to leave, but the hand gripping his foot
was strong. Mo Ran’s skin was a little rough, the calluses rubbing against skin sensitized by hot
water so that it tickled. Chu Wanning was so busy trying not to laugh that he missed his
opportunity to tell Mo Ran to stop, and Mo Ran began to gently and carefully massage his feet.

“Was it cold out there, sir?” Mo Ran asked.

“No.”

“There’s a lot of debris in the water,” Mo Ran said. “Look, your foot was scratched, sir.”

“I can’t even feel it,” Chu Wanning said, although it stung now that Mo Ran had pointed it out.

“Nonsense, sir, I packed some herbal ointment just for something like this,” Mo Ran said. “Aunt
Wang made it, so it’ll heal by morning. I’ll go get it if you’ll just wait here, sir.” He returned
quickly with a small jar, the courtyard separating their rooms no more than a dozen steps wide.

“You’re overreacting,” Chu Waning grunted.

“What if it gets infected, sir?” Mo Ran countered, and made a grab for the foot again.

As his feet had always been as private as the rest of his body, Chu Wanning was uncomfortable
having them exposed, much less touched. He hadn’t known that Mo Ran’s footrub would give him
a tender, aching sensation, and he was now reluctant to experience such longing again. Mo Ran
eyed him as he held his feet out of reach, then looked at the feet in question.

Gentle and respectful, Mo Ran reached for Chu Wanning’s delicate foot again. He felt his teacher
trembling under his grasp and wanted to press a reassuring kiss to the limb in question. “Sir,” he
said instead.

“What is it?” Chu Wanning’s voice was raw with what Mo Ran would have labeled desire in
anyone attracted to men. The candle crackled, breaking the tension. “My feet are ticklish,” Chu
Wanning said mildly. “Get on with it.”

“Yes, sir,” Mo Ran said, flushing under his tan. The words get on with it rang in his ears, also
reminiscent of his past life, when Chu Wanning had been pale against his scarlet sheets. He’d told
Mo Ran then to stop screwing around and get on with whatever he was going to do.
Mo Ran squeezed his eyes shut against the memory, and realized that he had two choices. He
could stay near his teacher and properly take care of him like a good disciple, which would only
stoke the flame of desire, or he could keep his distance and his dignity and neglect his teacher. Mo
Ran was not confident in his ability to control his desire – he was afraid he might assault Chu
Wanning, who wouldn’t be able to resist. He wanted so badly to fuck him, regardless of how Chu
Wanning felt about the matter.

this isn’t slow-burn-delicious-pining, this is clumsy poorly-written TeeHeeHee If They Only

Knew bullshit that thinks it’s a thousand percent cleverer than it actually is

“All done, sir!” Mo Ran yelped, startling his teacher. He was wracked with guilt over the emotions
that kept swamping him; Chu Wanning was such a paragon of purity that he would no doubt feel
nothing but contempt for Mo Ran’s filthy desires. Apparently oblivious, Chu Wanning put his
shoes back on. Mo Ran remained kneeling with his head lowered like an obedient dog for a long
moment before he thought he had regained his self-control. “Rest well, sir,” he said. “If you feel
unwell tomorrow, then I’ll do all of the work.”

Before Chu Wanning could reply, a delicate voice rang out from outside the door. “Honored
cultivator Mo, are you there?”

------

“Someone’s looking for you,” Chu Wanning said mildly.

“It’s too late in the day for someone to be looking for me,” Mo Ran said, head full of Chu Wanning
and nothing else.

“The singer from earlier,” Chu Wanning said pointedly. “The prettiest girl in the village.”

“Huh?” Mo Ran blinked. “They all looked the same to me.”

“Did you go blind in the five years I was gone?” Chu Wanning asked acerbically, but a hint of a
smile was visible when Mo Ran looked at him.

Warmth at the good-natured banter lifted Mo Ran’s mood. He peeked out the door to see Ling
holding a bundle wrapped in blue cloth, still calling for him. “I’m over here,” he said, and she
turned to see him smiling. “It’s so late,” he added. “How can I help you?”

Initially startled, Ling smiled back. “I’m glad you’re still awake, honored cultivator. This is for
you, from my aunt. Please use it.” She handed him the bag, which contained three small clay jars.

“What’s this?” Mo Ran asked.

“For your mosquito bite,” Ling clarified.

“Oh, right.” Mo Ran felt embarrassed that she had taken his off-hand excuse so seriously, making
the effort to bring him the salve, and felt that the villagers were actually quite gullible.

“I don’t think you got bitten too badly,” Ling said, smiling. “I don’t see a welt.”

“I am a cultivator,” Mo Ran said, clearing his throat.

Ling clapped her hands together, laughing. “You’re so funny,” she said. “I wish I had the talent for
cultivation.”
After a short exchange of pleasantries, Mo Ran bid her goodbye and returned inside. Chu Wanning
was flipping through his book – a dry medicinal text – and looked up with an inquiring expression.
Mo Ran held up the salve in explanation.

“Did you really get bitten?” Chu Wanning asked. “Let me see it.” Mo Ran’s skin was the color of
honey in the candlelight, unmarred by any sort of insect bite. “And the welt?”

“Uh, already gone,” Mo Ran said. “I have thick skin.” He put all three jars of salve on Chu
Wanning’s table. “You should keep them, sir, you’re more likely to suffer bug bites.”

“First the ointment and now the salve, I’ll have to open an apothecary.” Chu Wanning poked Mo
Ran’s forehead as his disciple only grinned like an idiot. “Go back to your room and go to sleep.
It’s late.”

“Sleep well, sir,” Mo Ran said, moving toward the door.

Neither of them slept well, tossing and turning. Chu Wanning could feel Mo Ran’s touch against
his feet, but Mo Ran had more complicated feelings. He reminded himself not to do anything
stupid to the bastion of purity that was his teacher. He couldn’t sully him, and besides, Mo Ran
knew he was in love with Shi Mei. The thought of his beloved sent a frisson of unease through
him.

Since returning to Sisheng Peak and seeing his beloved for the first time in years, Mo Ran found
that his initial ardor had cooled. He had settled into the habit of liking and protecting Shi Mei, but
it felt like nothing more than inertia. He was fond of the teenager Shi Mei had been, but the
beautiful man he was now seemed like a stranger. Mo Ran didn’t know how to fix it, or himself.

Early the next day, Chu Wanning woke and stepped outside to come face to face with Mo Ran.
“Good morning, sir,” his student called.

“Morning.” Chu Wanning looked him over. “Did you not sleep well?”

“I’m not used to the bed,” Mo Ran said. “I might nap later.”

The early morning breeze brought the refreshing fragrance of grass and trees and the only noise
was the song of cicadas and frogs. Chu Wanning yawned, and then noticed a piece of straw in Mo
Ran’s hair. He smiled and brushed it out. “Mo Ran,” he said. “Were you rolling around in bed?”

“You were too, sir,” Mo Ran said, pulling straw out of Chu Wanning’s hair.

The sun rose in the east, the two of them gazing at each other as they had in the past. Now,
however, their heights were reversed and Mo Ran looked down at his teacher. On impulse, he
jumped into the field and opened his arms. “Sir, if you jump, I’ll catch you.”

“What is wrong with you?” Chu Wanning asked. He removed his shoes and hopped gracefully into
the field. The cool mud chilled his feet as he swept one broad sleeve across a large stretch of the
field. “This is my side,” he told his student. “I wasn’t as fast as you yesterday, but I’ll harvest more
than you today.”

“If I lose, I’ll cook lotus crisps and crab meatballs for you,” Mo Ran said.

“And honey-glazed lotus root,” Chu Wanning said.

“Sure,” Mo Ra agreed, eyes sparkling. “But what if you lose, sir?”

“What do you want?” Chu Wanning asked coldly.

“If you lose, sir, you have to eat all the lotus crisps and meatballs that I’ve made,” Mo Ran said.

After a beat, Chu Wanning added, “Don’t forget the honey-glazed lotus root.”

Proud and talented, Chu Wanning had applied himself to learning how to harvest rice and had
learned well. He refused to be made fun of two days in a row, and he worked with singular
diligence to far outperform Mo Ran by midday. He glanced at the pile of grain, proudly, out of the
corner of his eye, and was distracted by one of the women directing Ling to bring Mo Ran another
bowl of rice.

“Oh, no, I’m done,” Mo Ran said, his bowl already empty. “I have something to take care of,” he
added. “I have to run for a bit. Please keep eating without me.”

Ling’s pretty face was uneasy. “Honored cultivator, is the food not to your taste? I can make
something else for you.”

“No, no,” Mo Ran said, waving her off with a grin. “The food was delicious.” He was utterly
oblivious to her flirting and headed toward the stable with large strides.

“Where are you going?” Chu Wanning called after him.

“I have to buy some things,” Mo Ran said over his shoulder. “I’ll be back soon.”

“Honored cultivator,” Ling persisted.

“Let him be,” Chu Wanning told her, picking up a piece of fried tofu. He was clearly the higher
ranked of the two, and looked cold and severe to boot. The villagers couldn’t very well press the
matter.

After lunch, the villagers split off into small groups. The women knitted winter clothes while the
children played and the men napped in the sun. A thin cat sniffed hopefully at the ground looking
for leftovers, and Chu Wanning tried to wave it over to feed it. Wary of strangers, the cat bolted
instead. Chu Wanning sulked, feeling that he was intimidating even to small animals.

In the midst of his self-pity, Ling approached with the sound of copper pieces jingling and joined
him in leaning against a haystack with a cup of hot tea. He looked at her expressionlessly; she was
fair of face and full-figured, a rarity in such remote places. She had decorated her clothing with
scraps of copper and iron, which glittered pleasingly to the eye. “Honored cultivator,” she said.

“Yes?” Chu Wanning answered coolly.

Slightly taken aback at his standoffishness, Ling nonetheless smiled. “I wanted to keep you
company,” she said. “You seemed lonely.”

Unlike cats, Chu Wanning thought, people often had ulterior motives. He let her chatter empty
pleasantries and trifling nonsense. She didn’t seem put off by his cold expression, but he thought
she would reveal why she was there soon enough.

“Honored cultivator,” Ling said after a while. “What does it take to be a disciple at Sisheng Peak?”

“Give me your hand,” Chu Wanning said, and she eagerly thrust it toward him. He placed his
fingertips lightly against the inside of her wrist. “You don’t have it,” he told her.
“I don’t have aptitude?” Ling asked, blushing red.

“You knew I was going to check your core,” Chu Wanning said. “Someone has already told you
that you do not have the aptitude. It would only be a waste of time if you went. It would be best to
forget about it altogether.”

“Thank you for your consideration,” Ling said, face falling. She bit her lip in disappointment,
staring at the ground.

“You’re welcome,” Chu Wanning told her, feeling mixed emotions as she gathered her composure
and fled. He knew the commoners of the lower cultivation realm hoped even more fervently than
those of the upper realm; for the latter, it was a means of bringing honor to one’s ancestors and
making a living. For those of the lower cultivation realm, it was often a matter of survival.

Leaning against the pile of grain, Chu Wanning took another sip of tea; it had gone cold, while he
hadn’t been paying attention to it. He drank the rest quickly, and closed his eyes to take a short
rest. Between the late night and the physical labor of the morning, it was sunset by the time he
woke again. The crows were cawing and the sky was dark red, only stems of rice neatly arranged
left in the paddy fields.

To his chagrin, the farmers had not only not woken him, but they had covered him with a piece of
clothing so he wouldn’t catch cold. He glanced down at the coarse fabric, smelling a familiar scent
and realizing that it was Mo Ran’s clothing. He sat back down, burying his face in its folds and
looking across the field for his student.

Mo Ran was tall enough to stand out, helping the villagers load the cut grains onto an ox cart with
his back to Chu Wanning. He had stripped his outer robe and shirt like the rest of the villagers,
leaving his broad back in full view. Chu Wanning could see the drops of sweat even from a
distance, trickling down to his dimples and snaking beneath the line of his waist. Every tender
sentiment Chu Wanning had ever felt turned into burning carnal desire.

The rest of the village faded out of Chu Wanning’s awareness as he focused entirely on Mo Ran’s
gorgeous body with its sleek muscles flexing as he worked. His kind face, visible now and again as
he turned to smile at the villagers, sent the blood racing through Chu Wanning’s veins. Mo Ran
turned to look over his shoulder, and Chu Wanning hastily closed his eyes in feigned sleep. He
waited a long moment before sneakily cracking open an eyelid to see that Mo Ran was once again
working.

Ling was approaching, holding out a handkerchief with a smile. “For your sweat, honored
cultivator,” she said.

Mo Ran, carrying an armful of rice straws to the cart, smiled at her. “Later,” he said. “My hands
are full.” Apparently happy to watch from the side, Ling retreated. She steadied a pile of straws
ready to slip out of Mo Ran’s grasp, and he gave her a surprised smile. “Thank you,” he said.

Ling returned his smile brightly, blushing, and seemed to forget all sense of propriety. “Honored
cultivator, it’ll get into your eyes,” she said.

“My hands are full,” Mo Ran repeated.

“I’ll do it for you,” she offered. A chill brushed against her back before the words fully fell off her
tongue, and she turned to see Chu Wanning standing behind her.

Wearing Mo Ran’s thick outer robe, he had approached silently. He seemed listless and irritable, as
if still half-asleep. “Mo Ran,” he said.

“Yeah?” Mo Ran put down the grain immediately, beaming at his teacher. “You’re awake, sir.”

“Aren’t you cold?” Chu Wanning asked, looking him up and down.

“Actually, it’s kind of hot,” Mo Ran said, and a droplet of sweat chose that moment to splash into
his eye. He yelped, squeezing his eye shut. “Sir, my eye, my eye.”

“My handkerchief is hanging up to dry,” Chu Wanning said coolly.

“You can use mine,” Ling offered, but Chu Wanning ignored her. Walking up to Mo Ran with an
impassive expression, Chu Wanning used his sleeve to wipe the sweat from his eye.

------

The familiar scent of crabapple and the gentle touch of his teacher’s sleeve froze Mo Ran in his
tracks. Chu Wanning was so close that Mo Ran could see the texture of his lips, close enough that
he would only have to dip his head down to kiss them. “You won,” Chu Wanning said, “but since
you didn’t wake me up it’s not a fair match.”

Mo Ran blinked and then smiled. “I didn’t win,” he said. “You did, sir.”

“You didn’t harvest the crops this afternoon?”

“No, I bought some things for winter at the market,” Mo Ran said. “It took long enough that you
reaped more than I did, sir.”

Chu Wanning grunted coldly, apparently satisfied. “What did you buy? Mattresses?”

“The honored cultivator bought so much that I felt bad for the poor horse,” Ling interrupted with a
smile.

“It wasn’t that much,” Mo Ran protested. “Coal, meat, sweets. That’s all.”

“No,” Ling said. “He bought a mattress for every family, too. The seller just brought them all back
on a cart.”

“How did you pay for that?” Chu Wanning asked, astonished.

“I had some savings,” Mo Ran said. “Besides, sir, the mattresses were pretty reasonably priced.”

“And the meat?”

“I thought we could roast it tomorrow and share it with everyone.”

“The sweets?” Chu Wanning asked, face neutral.

“All the kids,” Ling said, clapping her hands delightedly. “That was the first thing he did, pass out
the candy. The children were thrilled.” She paused. “And I got one, too.”

Although Chu Wanning hadn’t minded her interruptions before, this time he gave her a cold glare.
“Was it good?” he asked.

Missing the social cue, Ling answered happily, “It was so good.”
Chu Wanning lifted his chin haughtily. “Help yourself to as much as you like,” he said, and stalked
off.

Trying to follow him, Mo Ran found himself with a face full of his own jacket. He pulled it down,
looking at his teacher stalking off. “Sir,” he said.

“Put your clothes on,” Chu Wanning snapped. “I’m cold just looking at you.”

Without protesting and despite being overheated, Mo Ran pulled on the robe. It was quickly soaked
with sweat, sticking to his skin uncomfortably, and he looked uncertainly at Chu Wanning. He
wasn’t sure what he had done to upset his teacher this time. Still apparently not satisfied, Chu
Wanning frowned at him again.

“Close your collar,” he snapped. “Showing so much skin is indecent.”

Mo Ran obediently pulled his clothes closed, but it did nothing to diminish his sexiness. Chu
Wanning cursed under his breath and stalked away with a flick of his sleeves. Mo Ran stared, at a
loss, joined in confusion by the village chief, his wife, and Ling.

“He’s, uh, scary,” Ling said quietly. “You’re really patient, to be able to put up with his temper,”
she added, looking sympathetically at Mo Ran. To her surprise, he didn’t respond with gratitude.
He was glaring at her with a dark expression, and she closed her mouth abruptly. Mo Ran turned
away, and with his face no longer so visible, Ling wondered if she had imagined his displeasure.
He had been so easygoing, so cheerful, that such savagery seemed impossible.

“You guys go ahead,” he said. “I’ll go check on him.”

Chu Wanning was by the bank of the river, reeds dancing along the shore. Mo Ran stopped behind
him, a little out of breath from running. “Sir,” he said. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No.”

“Then why are you so upset, sir?”

“I’m not upset,” Chu Wanning said, and when Mo Ran just looked at him, he added, “I’ll be upset
if I want to.”

Mo Ran stared at him for a long moment and then smiled. “I know what’s wrong, sir.”

Chu Wanning clenched his hands into fists, hidden in his sleeves, and his shoulders tightened. “I
already told you,” he started. Mo Ran walked up to him, grinning with a hand behind him, and
stepped up on top of a nearby tree’s protruding roots. He was even taller than usual, and Chu
Wanning frowned at him. “Get down from there,” he said.

Mo Ran hopped lightly down, but the tree was so massive and so old that there was very little
ground not occupied by its roots, and he was forced to stand almost on top of his teacher. Chu
Wanning could feel his breath on his eyes, and it was disconcerting. He glared at his student.

“Go back up there,” he said.

Mo Ran grinned at him. “Up, down, up, down. Make up your mind, sir.” Chu Wanning was
displeased to have his unreasonable attitude exposed and remained silent. Mo Ran took his hand
from behind his back and held out a handful of colorful candy. “I did save you some, sir,” he
added.
“Mo Weiyu!” Chu Wanning bellowed furiously, angry that he had been so exposed, and even more
furious that Mo Ran was treating him like a spoiled child. “Who wants your stupid candy?” Before
he could keep ranting, sweetness spread across his tongue and Chu Wanning realized that a piece
of candy had been stuffed in his mouth. His face flushed bright red in a mixture of shock and fury.

“Milk-flavored,” Mo Ran added helpfully. “Your favorite, sir.”

Speechless and powerless, non-threatening despite his bluster, Chu Wanning sulkily savored the
candy. A strand of hair had come loose, and Mo Ran reached out to tuck it back behind his ear
with a smile. Chu Wanning stared, affronted.

“I saved the best ones for you, sir,” Mo Ran said. “The candy’s in my sleeve and the pastries are in
your room. Don’t show anyone else, sir.”

Some of the tension drained out of Chu Wanning’s shoulders as he sucked on the candy. He
glanced at Mo Ran. “Honey glazed lotus root,” he said abruptly.

“Got it.”

“Stewed crab meatballs.”

“Yep.”

Feeling as though he had lost the entirety of his dignity, Chu Wanning straightened his posture and
lifted his chin, imagining that he looked stern and imposing. “Pity there isn’t any pear blossom
white.”

Mo Ran, however, only saw his jawline and exposed throat. Rather than intimidating, Chu
Wanning had exposed his most vulnerable spot before the predator that was his student, who
wanted nothing more than to pounce on it. Mo Ran managed to move his gaze away from the
temptation with a great deal of effort, but he forced himself to smile. “I got that too,” he said, voice
husky, but he had been silent for so long that Chu Wanning frowned at him.

“What?”

“The pear blossom white,” Mo Ran said, keeping his face and voice steady. “I got that, too, sir. I
thought on the way back you might want some.”

With his disciple making a concerted effort to get on his good side, Chu Wanning was at a loss for
words. Holding onto his veneer of coldness seemed like too much effort for no reason, and he
relaxed enough to lean on the tree. “Mo Ran,” he said finally. “You’ve changed.”

A hint of unease flashed in Mo Ran’s eyes, but then he smiled. “Do you like it, sir?”

“I don’t dislike it,” Chu Wanning hedged. He held up a hand, reaching for Mo Ran after a
moment’s hesitation, and touching his side. “I read about the battle with the drought demon,” he
said softly. “Is this where you were injured?” At Mo Ran’s nod, Chu Wanning sighed. “You did
well. The title grandmaster is well deserved.”

“I wouldn’t presume,” Mo Ran said modestly.

“On the other hand,” Chu Wanning said, poking Mo Ran’s forehead with a small smile. “Running
around half-naked is hardly dignified enough for a grandmaster. It’s getting late. We should go
back.”
“Yes, sir,” Mo Ran said. “Tomorrow we’re cooking rice,” he added.

“By the way.” Chu Wanning paused. “Don’t randomly strip. Just take a break if you’re hot.”

“Yes, sir,” Mo Ran said, blushing.

“Bring your own handkerchief,” Chu Wanning continued. “And stop hanging around unmarried
girls. Do you even have your own handkerchief?”

“Uh, no.” Mo Ran looked down self-consciously.

“What do you use, then?”

“My sleeves.”

Shocked into momentary speechlessness, Chu Wanning stared long enough that Mo Ran felt even
more self-conscious. “I’ll make you one,” he said finally.

“You will?” Suddenly Mo Ran felt ecstatic. “I can’t wait! When?”

“Not until we’re done here,” Chu Wanning said repressively.

“Can you make me one with crabapple flowers?”

“We’ll see.”

Mo Ran was so ecstatic about the promise of a handkerchief in exchange for a handful of candy
that he rolled on his new mattress all night, too happy to sleep. In direct contrast to the last five
years of misery, it was the first time he had been unable to sleep out of joy. He gave up after a
while and sat at his window, opening it to take in the refreshing scent of night.

In Chu Wanning’s room across the courtyard, a single candle was still burning. Mo Ran tilted his
head, frowning, wondering what his teacher was doing. Eating lotus crisps, he thought, or perhaps
mulling over the handkerchief. He watched from afar until the light was extinguished and then
murmured, “Sweet dreams, sir.”

Tucked away deep inside, Mo Ran whispered his teacher’s given name instead of an honorific.
Sweet dreams, Wanning.

------

A dream visited Chu Wanning that night in accordance with Mo Ran’s wishes, but it wasn’t the
pleasant sort; he dreamed of being at Butterfly Town during the opening of the rift, except that Shi
Mei was with him instead of Mo Ran. Heavy snow was falling from an ashen sky and Shi Mei was
stabbed through the heart. He fell to the ground and Mo Ran gathered him into his arms, begging
Chu Wanning to save him.

this is 100% more interesting than the poorly written pining

Under the effects of the twinned barriers, Chu Wanning had also been stabbed through the heart.
He closed his lips against the blood filling his mouth lest the ghosts smell it and tear him to pieces.
Mo Ran was begging on his knees, but Chu Wanning could only flee as his disciple died. He
dreamed that Mo Ran never forgave him, and that he was standing on Naihe Bridge during a cold
spell in late spring as the rain fell. He held an umbrella, and saw another person dressed in black
and walking toward him. The other person had no umbrella, only a stack of books wrapped in oil
paper. Chu Wanning slowed his steps, but Mo Ran only walked faster after giving him a single
cold glance.

As his student passed him, as far away as he could be without tumbling off the bridge altogether,
Chu Wanning came to a halt. He felt as if the damp cold had permeated his bones, exhaustion
crushing him so that he couldn’t take another step. Mo Ran glanced at him once with his soaking
wet eyelashes, and the dream faded to blackness. It was cold and heavy, like the rain.

In his sleep, Chu Wanning turned on his side, curling into a ball. Tears slid from his eyes to soak
his pillow. He felt Mo Ran’s hatred and disappointment so clearly. Chu Wanning felt he couldn’t
accept the dream’s ending, but it wasn’t over. He saw Mo Ran change, growing gloomier and
quieter by the day, but he didn’t explain why he hadn’t saved Shi Mei. He didn’t think it would
help, not when Mo Ran’s hatred had grown so much.

In the dream, time continued to pass. During a lesson, Mo Ran plummeted from the top of a pine
tree. Chu Wanning dove to catch him, but couldn’t break their fall in time. Out of sheer luck, the
only injury was a deep slash to Chu Wanning’s wrist. Mo Ran glanced at the wound and then
looked Chu Wanning in the face for the first time in months. “You’re bleeding, sir,” he said. “I
have salve and bandages. Best to take care of it now.”

Mo Ran wordlessly wrapped the bandage around his teacher’s wrist, and Chu Wanning didn’t
break the silence. He could see Mo Ran’s eyelashes quiver, although with his student’s face
lowered he couldn’t make out his expression. He wanted to ask if Mo Ran really hated him so
much, but it was too peaceful. The gentle breeze and the warm sunlight almost let him believe that
nothing was wrong, and he didn’t want to ruin it.

The question and its answer weren’t important, Chu Wanning felt suddenly. In the dream he knew
that what was important was that his injury could buy him a little of his student’s attention. He
woke up dazed, almost feeling the ache where he had been injured in the dream. He rubbed his face
tiredly and wondered if he had been so jealous of Shi Mei’s stunning beauty that he had conjured
up the dream to vent his feelings.

Putting the thought aside as absurd, Chu Wanning dressed and got ready for the day. The dream
faded from his mind, its last remnants vanishing like smoke in the face of the village’s preparation
to make rice cakes for New Year’s Eve. Both glutinous and nonglutinous rice were ground into
flour and then steamed over hot stoves. It was a laborious process that nonetheless could be
performed by the women and the elderly, so Chu Wanning felt no guilt over sleeping in.

As he arrived, Chu Wanning saw a large wok propped up in an open field under a waist-high
wooden barrel. The chief’s wife stood on a footstool, adding flour to the barrel periodically as
children ran around the stove trying to pull roasted peanuts and corn from the fire with metal tongs.
Mo Ran was helping watch the stove and the children, having risen early as usual. He helped a
child up who had tripped, washing her hand and smiling until her tears dried and she started
chattering away again.

Watching quietly from the corner, Chu Wanning saw him coax her back toward the firepit and give
her a roasted sweet potato. He thought it must have been something like the last five years of Mo
Ran’s life as he traveled, and then Mo Ran looked up and saw him. He broke into a smile.

“Sir, you’re here?”

Still, Chu Wanning hesitated before walking over to sit by Mo Ran. He watched the flames
beneath the wok for a long moment. “What’s roasting down there?” he asked.
“Oh, peanuts, potatoes, corn.” Mo Ran smiled. “Candy for you,” he added.

“You can roast candy?”

“You can’t,” Mo Ran teased. “You’d burn it. But I can.” He removed the paper wrapping from a
milk-flavored candy and held it in the fire for a few moments. He removed it, testing the
temperature. “Hot,” he said, and blew on it to cool it down before he offered it to Chu Wanning.
“Try it.”

The candy was warm and soft from the roasting, bringing out its sweet milky flavor. “Not bad,”
Chu Wanning said. “Do another one.” After the second, he looked at his student. “Another.”

By the time Mo Ran had roasted nine candies, the children were getting restless. A small child
begged for a sweet potato, and – hands full of candy – Mo Ran gestured for Chu Wanning to do it.
Chu Wanning went for one of the larger sweet potatoes, perplexed when Mo Ran told him to put it
back and get a smaller one instead.

“The bigger ones taste better,” he objected.

“They’re not cooked through yet,” Mo Ran said. “I used to roast sweet potatoes all the time while I
was traveling,” he explained at Chu Wanning’s dubious expression. “Give him the little one.”

The kid, having no idea what an august personage he was addressing, tugged on his robes. “I
wanna big one,” he said.

“Tell him that,” Chu Wanning said. “He’s the one that said no.”

Somehow, Mo Ran convinced the kid to take the smaller sweet potato, but it was Chu Wanning
that ended up peeling it for him. He hadn’t quite finished when Mo Ran pulled the candy out of the
fire. “It’s done,” Mo Ran said, but Chu Wanning’s hands were full of sweet potato. Chu Wanning
opened his mouth to tell him to wait, but Mo Ran stuffed the candy between his lips instead. His
thumb brushed lightly against Chu Wanning’s lips, and Chu Wanning realized he’d eaten out of his
disciple’s hand.

Ears growing red, Chu Wanning cleared his throat. “That’s enough,” he said around the candy.

“There’s only one left in any case,” Mo Ran said. “I guess I bought just enough to feed you.”

As relaxed as he was, he spoke carelessly – the words he used weren’t those appropriate for a
disciple speaking to his master but that of an owner speaking to a beloved pet or an emperor and
his concubine. Chu Wanning stared at him, dazed, for a solid minute. The crude words were
absolutely shocking, and yet he wasn’t angry.

The rice finished steaming, and the young men arrived to pound the rice cakes. Mo Ran accepted a
mallet from the village chief, but stopped him before he could hand a mallet to Chu Wanning. “My
teacher has never done this before,” he said. “He wouldn’t be good at it.”

Speechless with indignation, Chu Wanning could only stare. No one had ever accused him of not
being good at something from the day he left the temple. He was used to hearing things like
Honored cultivator, please help me. The indignation melted into an irritated urge to bellow that he
was perfectly capable, thank you very much, but he abstained because Mo Ran was technically
right.

The village chief led them to a stone mortar with a ball of steamy, cooked flour and left them to it.
Mo Ran looked at him. “Sir, turn the rice cake over every three strikes. Be careful not to burn your
hands, and watch out for my hammer.”

“If you can hit me pounding rice cakes, I will give up cultivating right now to be a farmer,” Chu
Wanning grumbled.

“I’m just saying, sir,” Mo Ran said, grinning.

Not wanting to be outdone, Chu Wanning flung back his sleeves. “Get on with it,” he said.

All three of Mo Ran’s strikes landed solidly in the center of the flour mass. He paused, looking at
Chu Wanning with bright eyes. “Go ahead, sir.”

Chu Wanning flipped the ball over and Mo Ran raised the hammer again. It didn’t take long for
them to establish a rhythm. The process was deceptively simple, but required careful timing and
careful control. The person doing the pounding required strength and stamina as well, to ensure the
flour was sticky and stretchy enough. The villagers began to tire much more quickly than the
cultivators, and they started to count in a rhythm.

Intrigued, the cultivators also fell into the shouted rhythm. By the time the flour balls were halfway
to being sticky enough, the villagers had been exhausted. Mo Ran was still perfectly fine, grinning
at Chu Wanning. His skin sparkled with sweat in the sunlight, and he paused to wipe his face. “Is
there flour on my face, sir?” he asked.

“Nope.” Chu Wanning could see that he was hot, though, with his collars folded closed, and
suddenly felt sorry. “Are you hot?” he asked, not looking at his student.

“I’m okay,” Mo Ran said, giving him a confused look.

“Take it off if you’re hot,” Chu Wanning grunted.

“You don’t like it, sir, so I’ll keep it on.”

“I like it even less if you’re sweating,” Chu Wanning said.

Figuring that he might as well be comfortable if he was going to be confused, Mo Ran stripped.
Chu Wanning watched him with an icy gaze, in direct contrast to the heat in his heart. A breath of
warm air washed over him as Mo Ran took off his inner shirt, soaked with sweat. He turned to
smile at Chu Wanning, dizzyingly handsome in the sun.

“Tea?” asked the chief’s wife, shattering the moment.

“No, thank you,” Mo Ran said, picking up the mallet again.

Chu Wanning reached out, taking a cup of tea from the tray and chugging it. He handed back the
empty cup. “One more, please.”

“Sir, are you that thirsty?” Mo Ran asked.

Pricked by the question, Chu Wanning glared at him. “No,” he said. “I’m not thirsty.” He drained
another full cup in contrast to his words.

Mo Ran felt his confusion deepen, wondering exactly when his teacher had gotten so prideful that
he couldn’t admit to simple thirst.

------
After finishing the tea, the two cultivators returned to work. Chu Wanning couldn’t help but be
hyperaware of Mo Ran’s body, taut muscles glistening in the sun. He swung the mallet with
inexhaustible strength, its head slamming deep into the moist softness of the rice cake with every
strike. Sweat clung to his brow, and Chu Wanning couldn’t help but think of the dream he’d had.
His body had been invaded like the rice cake, kneaded and humiliated until he went soft.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said, calling him back to the present. “Sir. Sir?”

Heart racing madly in his chest, Chu Wanning returned to the present. “Yes?” he said, hoarsely.

“Turn it over, sir,” Mo Ran said, eyes even more fiery than usual.

Dream still in his mind, Chu Wanning heard Mo Ran telling him to turn over instead and static
roared in his ears. He saw the two of them tangled with each other in red sheets embroidered with
dragon and phoenix. Let me look at your face while I fuck you, Mo Ran whispered in his memory.
Chu Wanning squeezed his eyes shut against the vision.

“Are you okay, sir?” Mo Ran asked, putting down the mallet and approaching him. “Is something
wrong?”

“No,” Chu Wanning said, not sure which question he was answering. Even the sound of Mo Ran’s
voice made him quiver inside, and he shoved his student away forcefully. Humiliation turned to
rage, and he looked up in a fury. “The sun is too hot,” he said, hating how perturbed he was.
“Don’t stand so close. You’re all sweaty.”

Dismayed, Mo Ran looked down at himself. He knew how fastidious his teacher was, and here he
had the audacity to sweat in front of him. He moved away immediately, but his concerns had not
been allayed. He watched Chu Wanning silently until the rice cakes had been pounded and
steamed, but his teacher vanished the moment Mo Ran turned his gaze away.

“Oh, the other honored cultivator?” said the village chief when Mo Ran asked. “He said he had a
headache and went to lie down.” He glanced at Mo Ran nervously. “His cheeks were flushed. I
hope he isn’t ill.”

Full of anxiety, Mo Ran abandoned his commissioned job to rush to his teacher’s side. He pushed
the door open, seeing no one on the bed, but there were sloshing noises coming from the kitchen.
Mo Ran dashed forward, skidding to a halt when he saw his teacher, naked, pouring a bucket of
water over himself. Mo Ran stared, dumbfounded, the back of his mind helpfully reminding him
that it was the end of October and the wrong weather to bathe in cold water.

The rest of Mo Ran’s mind was more concerned with his first sight of Chu Wanning’s naked body
since he had been resurrected. It was more familiar to him than his own, and it ignited the raging
fires of lust that he had been trying so hard to tamp down. Mo Ran couldn’t breathe as his eyes
traced the curves of Chu Wanning’s strong shoulders cloaked by his delicate skin. Chu Wanning’s
delicately slender waist, dimples on his back giving way to the sturdy buttocks as round as the
sweet fruit of autumn.

“Honored cultivator Mo!” called someone from behind him. “Honored cultivator, are you in here?”
Before Mo Ran could react, the curtain was again pulled aside. Ling poked her head in, only seeing
Mo Ran at first and smiling. “You left in such a hurry – oh!” Her voice died in her throat as she
saw Chu Wanning behind him. She covered her eyes and screamed in a panic.

Expression dark, Chu Wanning made a grab for his clothes. Unfortunately for the last remaining
shreds of his dignity, he had had no reason to expect multiple uninvited guests as he bathed in the
kitchen and had left his clothes near the door. He froze as he realized he couldn’t traipse across the
kitchen naked in front of a woman. Mo Ran came to his rescue, covering his nakedness with his
own body and glaring over his shoulder.

“Get out,” Mo Ran said.

Ling fled after another stunned moment, and Chu Wanning let out a sigh of relief. Mo Ran watched
the curtain fall shut and cocked his head to the side to listen to her retreating footsteps. He looked
back, tension draining out of his face, only to be met with Chu Wanning’s cold and indifferent
expression. It occurred to him that he had jumped in front of his teacher like a dog guarding its
food.

Still pressed very close, Mo Ran could smell Chu Wanning’s crabapple scent. He shifted
unconsciously, dizzy and heavy with the aroma of desire. The walls of determination he had
painstakingly erected to keep his monstrous urges at bay were crumbling at the smell of his teacher
so close and without a stitch to cover him. Mo Ran wanted to seize Chu Wanning’s wet wrists and
push him against the wall before ripping off his own clothes, brutally forcing him just as he had
done in his previous life.

There have been more instance than I can count of Oh No Mo Ran Lost His Painstakingly
Created Defenses Against Chu Wanning’s Sexiness and it loses impact when it happens not
only every chapter but multiple times per chapter, it is incredibly fucking tedious

The litany of I may not touch him repeated in Mo Ran’s mind over and over again, sweat beading
on his forehead. Mo Ran closed his eyes, shutting out the sight of his teacher’s scalding gaze, but
he thought Chu Wanning looked lost and confused. He had no way of knowing Chu Wanning was
no better off than he was.

As Chu Wanning expended all his energy on appearing cold and indifferent, he was hyperfocused
on Mo Ran’s wild male scent and his strong, thick arms. Chu Wanning hadn’t sparred with Mo
Ran since he had been resurrected, but he knew that the arms around him could crush him if they
so chose. He dropped his eyes, but his gaze landed on Mo Ran’s chest. It was not an improvement.
The tension radiating out from Mo Ran’s hot chest was palpable, as if he could melt the coldest ice
into an overflowing spring.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said suddenly, and Chu Wanning thought his voice sounded hoarse and full of lust.
It wasn’t the first time he had heard Mo Ran call him sir, but this wasn’t like any of the others. It
sounded filthy and alluring, and Chu Wanning trembled.

Unconsciously, Chu Wanning backed away until his bare back hit the cold wall. He shuddered
involuntarily, gasping, and Mo Ran looked at him like a predator. Eyes darkening, Mo Ran was
lost in a vision of kissing Chu Wanning, clutching his waist and leaving red marks on the skin. No
matter how much he suppressed himself, his nature was cruel and tyrannical, desiring to rip apart
and devour his conquests. He would never be tame.

Closing his eyes, Mo Ran pushed the lava down in his chest. He knew how close to a beast’s
nature a man’s desire was, and he had to remove the oblivious prey in front of him before he did
something he had promised himself he would not do. “I’ll get your clothes, sir,” he said hoarsely.

The amount of Male Desire Cannot Be Controlled is frankly gross, and it’s more of the toxic
bullshit that has permeated the entire narrative

With long strides, Mo Ran walked to the door and picked up the pile of clothing. Leaning against
the wall, Chu Wanning felt as though he had just run a marathon. He was utterly drained, and he
looked at Mo Ran standing with his back to the kitchen. He realized suddenly that his dick was
erect; Mo Ran had been pressed up against him without looking down and so had not noticed
earlier, but he would certainly see it now.

The Constellation Saint couldn’t have his haughty and pristine reputation sullied with a hard-on; it
would ruin his aloof, ascetic image. He panicked, seeing only two possible options. He could
crouch down, pretending his legs hurt, or he could jab his eyes out. Before he could pick an option,
Mo Ran turned around and saw him.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said, and froze with his mouth open. Whatever he had intended to say fled from his
mind as he plunged deep into the mire, never to resurface.

------

Inspiration struck Chu Wanning in the split second before Mo Ran looked over. He turned at the
last second, propping himself against the wall with his arms crossed to leave Mo Ran with the view
of his back. He concluded that he was brilliant, in that he was hiding what he most did not want Mo
Ran to see; it did not occur to him that he was displaying himself to perfect advantage to the
predator standing behind him.

Mo Ran's throat dried at the view presented, and it took him a moment to be able to speak. "What
are you doing, sir?" he asked.

Chu Wanning wasn't sure quite how to answer the question so as not to arouse suspicion of his
indecent state. He glanced over his shoulder, expression cold and solemn, to see Mo Ran having
already put down his clothes and approaching him. His student seemed frightening, almost hungry
in the way he was staring, and Chu Wanning finally noticed something was wrong. "Scrub my
back," was how he chose to defuse the situation.

"What?" Mo Ran froze, voice gravelly and sensual.

With no way to withdraw the request, Chu Wanning doubled down. "Since you're here," he said in
his best frigid tone, "scrub my back before you go. I'm covered in sweat and it's uncomfortable."
He tried his best to sound nonchalant. "It would be good to be scrubbed clean."

It was hard to tell from his angle if Mo Ran bought his lies, but Mo Ran obediently approached
with a towel and warm water. Chu Wanning felt the rough cloth scrub his back, finally realizing
that he had just perpetrated the single dumbest act of his entire life as the person he was
desperately attracted to stood behind him with only a thin cloth separating their skin. Never having
had his skin touched by others, every nerve ending felt as though it were on fire. He had to
maintain rigid stiffness to keep himself upright.

Chu Wanning pressed his forehead against the wall, biting his lips, desperately trying to maintain
his haughty image. Behind him, Mo Ran was similarly tortured, having no choice but to put his
hands all over the person he desperately wanted to touch but not allowed to do whatever he wanted.
Despite the almost overwhelming urge to throw away the towel and mark Chu Wanning's skin with
his bare hands, Mo Ran forced himself to be a gentleman.

Both cultivators were strained nearly to the breaking point, but it was Chu Wanning who broke
first. "You can go," he grated out. "I can reach the rest." His voice cracked and he snapped his
mouth shut.

A sigh of relief slipped out before Mo Ran could stop it. "Yes, sir," he said.
Chu Wanning felt a breeze as the curtain opened and closed around Mo Ran, but he remained
frozen with his forehead pressed to the wall for several moments. His ears were still flushed, and
he wondered dimly if Mo Ran had noticed. He bit his bottom lip in humiliation, reaching
downward. He had intended to shower to suppress the sordid feeling but reached to relieve himself
of his desire instead. Like a white swallowtail butterfly sunken in a spider's web, Chu Wanning
was powerless. He knew he had been sullied, never to be purified again. Before his traitorous hand
could move, he smashed it into the wall. Blood oozed out from between his split knuckles, and in
that moment he wasn't sure if it was Mo Ran he hated or himself.

More than half a month had passed since they had come to Cool Jade Village. The busy farming
season was coming to an end, and the two cultivators had assiduously avoided each other the entire
time. Chu Wanning couldn’t accept the change in himself, the rapid shift from austerity and
refinement. Constellation Saint had truly found the practice of dual cultivation distasteful, and
finding himself performing base acts was distressing.

The day after he had gotten himself off in a confused flurry, Chu Wanning had sobered up and
stared at the stickiness on his hand. He couldn’t accept that a kid barely 20 years old had destroyed
his self-control so thoroughly that he had performed such a disgusting act. He made sure to stay as
far away from Mo Ran as possible, lest he accidentally ignite his desire again and do something he
would regret.

No braver was Mo Ran, who had discovered that he yearned for Chu Wanning more strongly than
he had thought. He was keenly aware that he was but a moment of weakness away from devolving
into animalistic loss of control. He had no wish to harm Chu Wanning in a moment of weakness,
and stayed away from him to keep him safe.

The distance between the two of them had the further advantage of creating an illusion of a
respectful disciple and a kind master, allowing the days to pace peacefully. On the last day before
they were to leave, the village killed and butchered a plump deer. A bonfire party was proposed,
with every family contributing food and the village chief bringing liquor.

The joy of watching the bonfire as a community permeated the air, scented with the aroma of roast
venison. The cultivators sat apart from each other, stealing glimpses at each other through the fire.
When their gazes met, both would look away as if it had been a chance encounter and the orange
fire crackled between them. Laughter and cheer intermingled with conversation, and yet the two of
them sat isolated from the village and each other.

The moon hanging in the sky illuminated two hearts, and two hearts alone as the level of liquor in
the pots dropped and finally bottomed out. The crowd called for more, and Mo Ran remembered
having a stash of pear blossom white in his cabin. He made it halfway there before he was stopped
by a noise behind him.

“Who’s there?” The footsteps paused, and then a pair of shoes embroidered with yellow flowers
shuffled into view. Mo Ran peered at the face above them. “Oh, it’s you, Miss Ling.”

Having drunk a little too much, Ling’s cheeks were flushed pink and her lips rich and bright. She
stared at him in the moonlight, full bosom heaving with her quickened breath. “Honored cultivator
Mo,” she said. “Wait. I have something I’d like to say to you.”

------

Slow as he was, Mo Ran understood exactly what Ling wanted to say. “You’ve had a bit too much
to drink,” he said, trying to head her off. “We can talk tomorrow.”
“It has to be now!” she said, ferocious and determined.

Seeing that she couldn’t be reasoned with, Mo Ran attempted to vault away with the skill of
lightness kung fu, but she grabbed his sleeve and held him in place. “Hey, let go.”

“No,” she said. She had had confidence while sober, and was even more determined drunk. “I like
you,” she said. “Do you like me?”

Mo Ran just stared, and she began to feel anxious. She had had a crush on him from the moment he
arrived, her feelings only fanned by finding out who he was. She had no aptitude for cultivation,
her only assets her pretty face and voluptuous figure. The farming season was about to end, and if
she didn’t speak, she would forever lose her chance.

Surprised at her boldness, Mo Ran stared at her flushed face. She looked back, hoping to get not
only a handsome lover but a way out of the tiny village. She wanted to live a life bigger than her
town could afford her, and this felt like her only way out.

“I’m sorry, Miss Ling,” Mo Ran said. “Please let me go.”

The simple refusal shattered all of Ling’s precious dreams, and she paled. After a moment, she
rallied her courage. “Am I not good-looking enough?” she asked.

“You’re very beautiful,” Mo Ran said gently. “But you’re not my type.”

The last shreds of her dignity crumpled, and Ling’s eyes filled with tears. More than Mo Ran
himself, she mourned the loss of her dreams of a different life. “What is your type?” she asked.

Mo Ran opened his mouth to tell her that his type was Shi Mei, but he froze. It didn’t seem like the
right answer, and he wasn’t sure what to say. Ling took his silence as a refusal to tell her, and some
of her shame turned into anger.

“Why won’t you tell me?” she asked, staring at him intently. She was remembering her older sister,
who had married a fabric merchant from the upper cultivation world. Her sister had moved in with
her husband’s family in Leizhou Prefecture; the only time Ling and her mother had gone to visit her
sister, her brother-in-law had been ashamed of his wife’s provincial family and sent them home
again quickly.

Ling’s heart had never recovered from the sting of this rejection, and she had sworn she would live
a better life than her sister. She had been seeking an outstanding husband in the years since then,
thinking it the only way to change her fate. Her infatuation with Mo Weiyu was fueled by her
desperation, and she leaned toward him.

Ling’s soft and sensual figure was enough to turn the heads of all of the local men, and she thought
it would surely be enough to tempt the cultivator. “Why am I not good enough?” she asked, trying
to press herself against him.

Mo Ran shuddered and avoided her embrace. “Miss Ling, I haven’t known you long enough to
decide that I like you,” he said.

“You didn’t even try!” she said.

Mo Ran backed up again, before she could approach. “Stay away,” he said.

“You really hate me,” Ling said. “You don’t like me even a little.”
“Not even a little,” Mo Ran confirmed, trying for a clean break. He thought it would help her move
on. “I’m not interested.”

Ling was speechless at the sight of a man who would reject someone as beautiful as she knew she
was. “How,” she said breathlessly. “Why don’t you feel anything at all for me?”

“Forgive me,” Mo Ran said softly, and slipped into the night. The breeze brushed past his cheeks
and he thought that perhaps he had always been wrong about love. He hadn’t known how to
answer the question of what he liked in a romantic partner, and he realized that he had never asked
himself that question. He had only devoted himself to anyone willing to treat him kindly, with no
thought as to what kind of person they were.

Not only people but food or entertainment – Mo Ran had never thought of his preferences for
those, either. He had only been able to afford the simplest fare when he had been a child, and the
taste hadn’t mattered. He had developed the habit of being grateful for whatever he could get – he
didn’t have the right to express his own likes and dislikes.

Even when he’d been the emperor of everything, surrounded by rich perfumes, money, and
treasure, he had been unable to escape the poverty engraved in his bones. He had been taught that
his feelings were worthless, and he had never been able to shake the lesson. That no one had dared
ask after he had become emperor only made it worse.

Love, Mo Ran had always thought, was bound up in respect and care and the refusal to sully the
object of his affection with wishful thinking. He had adored Shi Mei from afar, and he had known
that it was love, but now he thought perhaps he had spent both lifetimes being wrong. There were
possibilities, he was beginning to understand – gentle or stubborn, sweet-tempered or unyielding,
even eyes as affectionate as peach blossoms or the sharp piercing frost of the phoenix?

Mo Ran even thought it was possible that he wasn’t in love with Shi Mei, but with – his brain
stalled out before it could complete the sentence. His heart still raced, blood boiling, and the
precipice of his own love and desire startled even him. He started to think that love and desire
should never have been separated, and that he had been wrong to think that desiring the object of
his affection was a defilement.

I see we are now demonizing the act of casual sex between consenting adults by presenting
Sex With True Feelings as the only appropriate choice, that’s just fucking great

Mo Ran had yet to understand that of all the types of love in the world, only romantic love had
nothing to do with purity. It was destined to be stained with sticky sweat and the mingling of hairs.
It was saturated with the moans of passion, the plump stamen that could only breed from the wet
mire of a warmed bed. Mo Ran fled his revelations and Ling’s questions, finally coming to a halt.

look we’re still on Sex Is Impure and that’s a gross idea

The raging waves he had suppressed were drowning him, and he stood rooted in horror. Lust,
desire, love, and Chu Wanning – all of those words were meant to go together. He had cleared the
mental detritus away from two lifetimes of self-deception to understand that he had been wrong
about the person he was in love with the entire time. He retrieved the pear blossom white and
walked back to the party in a daze.

When Mo Ran arrived, Ling was gone. No one had noticed her disappear, still drinking merrily and
ready to play games. The first game involved a game of truth and chance – the randomly chosen
target had to answer whatever question they were asked. Even someone like Chu Wanning –
allergic to fun – could easily understand the rules and participate.
“Lao-Bai!” someone called, “draw your lot!”

The miserable Lao-Bai grabbed a sheet of paper from the bowl and read it out loud. “Which looks
better, big tits or a fat ass?” He glared at the crowd. “Which of you numbwits threw this in there?
I’ll fuck your ancestors!”

The village laughed at his predicament, with Lao-Bai’s wife glaring him and daring him to answer
the wrong way. He hemmed and hawed and tried to escape the question, only to be shouted down
in good-natured derision. Finally someone spilled the beans – he had said that he preferred wide
hips so as to make bearing children easier, and as he had not answered, he was given a penalty shot
to drink.

Hidden in the crowd, Chu Wanning watched curiously. He felt awkward at the vulgarity of the
questions, and knew that he would be utterly unable to answer should he be called on. He found an
escape from the potential humility when the village chief called for a replacement drummer, and
he volunteered.

The thick leather drum and drumsticks awaited him, and the chief blindfolded him effectively,
making sure he was unable to see. Chu Wanning picked up the drumsticks and took a couple of
practice beats before he found a rhythm. His drumming was urgent, varied and intricate, and he
didn’t notice Mo Ran staring at him from the other side of the bonfire with a face full of longing.

With new understanding of his emotions, Mo Ran stared at every inch of Chu Wanning. He took in
his features one by one, feeling the love of romantic desire and not the love of a disciple for his
master. He was stunned that it had taken him so long to realize his own emotions, that he had been
so blind and stupid. As if one revelation triggered another, his new understanding reshaped his
worldview, and he began to feel on the cusp of fresh enlightenment.

The drum came to a halt, and the grass ring of chance landed on Mo Ran’s knee. He picked it up,
just in time to see Chu Wanning remove the blindfold and look to see where the wreath had landed.
Their gazes met, and neither of them looked away.

Chu Wanning started to dodge Mo Ran’s eyes, but he suddenly saw the confused and complicated
tender affection on Mo Ran’s face. He widened his eyes. “Well played,” he said.

The village chief laughed and pulled Mo Ran to his feet. Mo Ran put the woven ring in his hair as
the rules demanded, and glanced at Chu Wanning from underneath the grassy crown. He flushed
red in the firelight, and Chu Wanning’s eyes widened still further. Mo Ran lowered his eyes,
putting on a mask of shy obedience.

As clumsy as an adolescent with his first crush, Mo Ran was pitiful and adorable, Chu Wanning
suddenly thought. Or perhaps his disciple had lost his wits entirely, and that was why he was
suddenly so melodramatic. He could think of no other rational explanation.

------

Mo Ran pulled a piece of folded paper from the bowl and laid it flat, at first relieved at the
question and then nervous. He showed the village chief the paper at an inquiring look, and the
chief huffed a laugh. “Good thing you didn’t come with any of your fellow disciples,” he said, “or
you’d offend someone for sure.”

Now even more curious, Chu Wanning’s ears perked up. He stared at the slip of paper as if he
could read it by staring hard enough, and Mo Ran didn’t help matters by joining in the laughter.
“It’s against the rules, chief,” he said. “It’s asking me three questions, and everyone else only had
to answer one.”

“Honored cultivator,” said the chief. “Your precise and unerring hand chose this question, and we
cannot change the rules.”

Mo Ran opened his mouth to argue, then considered answering a question such as whether he
preferred women with slender waists or long legs and thought better of it. “I’ll answer the
questions,” he said, and handed the paper back.

“I am to name my three favorite people,” he announced, arms flung wide.

Unnoticed by Mo Ran, Ling returned to the crowd. Her eyes were red, and she stuck to the edges of
the crowd lest others notice she had been crying. Even had she jostled to the front, Mo Ran would
have missed her – he felt that he wouldn’t be able to answer such a personal question if he actually
had to look anyone in the face. Instead, he stared at the bonfire.

The flickering light of the fire cast shadows over his handsome face as Mo Ran gazed at the
bonfire for a long moment, lost in thought. The village waited patiently for his answer, in direct
contrast to their mood for the entirety of the preceding evening, and finally he spoke.

“My mom,” Mo Ran said. “She passed early on, and I only remember feeling safe when she was
around. So if I have to name three people, she’s the first.”

“Filial piety,” said the village chief. “It is good that you have the profound love of a child for his
mother, honored cultivator.”

“The second person is the first disciple of my master,” Mo Ran continued. “He is very kind to me,
and although we share no blood bond, he treats me better than a brother.”

Chu Wanning had expected this answer, and it gave him no pain. Mo Ran had loved Shi Mingjing
with his whole chest for the entire time he had been at Sisheng Peak, and had made no secret of his
devotion. Chu Wanning gazed at the object of his affection, both loving how stubborn Mo Ran was
and mourning that his disciple would never be as fixated on him as he was on Shi Mei. He poured a
cup of hot tea to ward off the chilly breeze, sipping it slowly.

The tea was even enough to melt the chill in Chu Wanning’s heart as Mo Ran waxed poetic about
Shi Mei’s many virtues. He went on so long that Chu Wanning had time to pour himself a second
cup of tea. He had just raised it to his lips and felt the bitter liquid flood his tongue when Mo Ran
took a deep breath.

“The last person is my teacher,” he said.

Chu Wanning choked, spraying tea in front of him. He coughed to clear his throat, and when he
could finally mop up his streaming eyes to take a ragged breath, the cooling tea on the front of his
robes caught his attention. He tried desperately to mop them up before they stained his robes,
never once looking at Mo Ran. He was so used to being insignificant in the regard of others that
even when singled out for affection he longed only to hide in anonymity.

excuse me while I die laughing at the idea that someone who was insulted at being handed a
non-demon-slaying role, someone who accepted as a matter of course that the entire fucking
world would celebrate his resurrection, someone who knows that his very name is Renowned,
is now described as being poor-me-nobody-cares-about-me-i-am-too-wounded-to-be-loved,
ok, it was funny for the first 80,000 words but we are way past that shit being entertaining
now
Too private of a person to show any vulnerability, Chu Wanning preferred to only show the outside
world his fiery fierceness. Mo Ran, however, was intimately aware now that the frightening mask
concealed a soft pitiful human soul. He had seen how gentle Chu Wanning truly was, and didn’t
want to let his teacher abuse himself into misery. He didn’t want his teacher to have to wear a
savage and terrifying mask ever again, pridefulness or no.

oh yes the man who physically beats the shit out of anyone who pisses him off is ~so gentle~

Still trying to retreat into his invisible cocoon, it took Chu Wanning several moments to notice that
the crowd around him had gone silent. He heard the faint sound of a child laughing, and the words,
“The honored cultivator Chu is so silly” spoken in a very young voice. It was immediately hushed,
but the phrase pierced him to the core.

Finally, Chu Wanning looked up. The Constellation of the Night Sky was not to be associated with
silliness; he was sharp, fierce, and cold. Mechanically, he kept scrubbing at the nonexistent tea
stains, trying to see where the voice had come from so he could intimidate it into submission.

“Sir,” said Mo Ran. “If you scrub any harder, you’ll wear a hole in the table.”

Black boots had arrived while Chu Wanning had been searching the crowd, standing close enough
to invade his personal space. A black shadow bore down on him, its very presence pressing the air
out of him. He was humiliated by his sudden breathlessness, and angry that he felt so ashamed.
Fury washed over him, at his shame and weakness, and he slapped the cloth down. Chu Wanning
lifted his head to glare at his student, full of rage and ready to unleash an assault upon him.

Almost at the same time, Mo Ran smiled. “Sir, pay attention to me,” he said, gently and
respectfully.

It was too late to ignore his student, too late to take back the gesture, and Chu Wanning was even
more humiliated that it appeared that he promptly responded when Mo Ran had begged for his
attention. There could be no greater humiliation than promptly doing as he was told. He felt the last
of his dignity slip away at the thought that he had leapt to obey like a dog, and his expression
chilled into ice.

Mo Ran’s gentle, warm gaze took in his rage and quenched it as if with spring water. “Sir,” he said.
“My third answer is you.”

With nowhere to vent his indignant fury, Chu Wanning’s face became even colder. He seemed
utterly indifferent, callously disregarding his disciple’s affection, magnanimously accepting it as no
more than his due. He cheered himself on internally at having maintained his impersonal mask,
utterly unaware that Mo Ran was secretly laughing at him.

Knowing exactly what his teacher was doing, Grandmaster Mo was busy switching Grandmaster
Chu’s title in his thoughts to little idiot. All unaware of how his performance was being received,
Chu Wanning became even more cold and haughty as he answered. “So what?” he said. “You
don’t need to be over here to say it.”

Even as a broken clock is right twice a day, so did Chu Wanning’s wild shot hit its mark. Mo Ran
stiffened, reminded that it didn’t matter if he was in love with Chu Wanning. He had discovered it
too late, and he had already firmly established that it was Shi Mei he was in love with. He thought
that if he had understood his own heart when he’d first been reborn, it would have been easier to
change the object of his affection, but now he had locked himself into a single chaste and distant
love.
again, dumbest shit ever, you do not need an excuse to end a relationship, particularly not a
one-sided relationship

Discovering that he was in love with Chu Wanning only increased his misery. He had used sex as a
weapon in his previous life, and associated love with chastity and purity in both lives. It was
incredibly difficult for him to think of Chu Wanning as anything but an unreachable divine being
unsullied by the mortal world. He couldn’t figure out how to be properly intimate with him, rather
than humiliate him.

not this shit again, it is really getting tiresome and repetitive

Mo Ran couldn’t let his teacher notice that his love was not that of a disciple for his master. He
couldn’t figure out how to be intimate as a lover should, only worship from afar, and so he needed
to use his filial piety as a mask. “I just wanted you to know, sir,” he said. “That’s all.” He hesitated,
and when Chu Wanning didn’t answer, he continued. “I wanted everyone to know.”

“Know what?” Chu Wanning said.

Mo Ran laughed, eyes bright. “How lucky I am,” he said with a grin. “That I have the absolute best
teacher in the world.”

The only reply was an unfathomable look and some quivering eyelashes. Mo Ran inhaled deeply,
not sure why he was suddenly so bold but sure that if he missed his chance he would never get
another. He half-knelt, dropping to Chu Wanning’s eye level, feeling his heart race.

“Sir,” Mo Ran said. Chu Wanning sensed danger in the burning eyes of the man before him. He
leaned back unconsciously, but the sharp arrow pierced his heart. “I like you,” Mo Ran said.

With nowhere to run, Chu Wanning stared at Mo Ran blankly. Static buzzed in his ears,
overwhelmed his vision, as he tried to figure out what Mo Ran meant by like without actually
being so crude as to ask him directly. Mo Ran’s intent had been not to scare his teacher off with
unwanted passion. Chu Wanning interpreted the word as given to him out of pity, despairing of
earning any other sort of love from his student. The validation of a student’s love for his teacher
would be enough, Chu Wanning decided.

1. fucking. Tiresome. How many times are we going to repeat this bullshit? Literally half
of this could have been cut out and it would have been a more readable book

The conversation ended there, the crowd praising the deep affectionate bond of master and
disciple. Only Ling, watching from a distance with her raw heart, felt that something was off. She
could see the suppressed desire in Mo Ran’s face, but it did not occur to her that a man could love
another man sexually. She didn’t know why their relationship was odd, but only knew that it was.

In Mo Weiyu’s previous life, he had been the Evil Overlord. In his current life, he was
Grandmaster Mo. Notoriously brilliant, the most evil of devils had become the most compassionate
of angels. The stench of anxiety overlaying his body was something that Mo Ran could not escape,
the permeating foul odor of distress generated by guessing and hiding his honest emotions. Chu
Wanning, for his part, would forever be the fish in the net; any sign of turbulence would disturb his
delicate balance, and he would only pretend harder to be unaffected. Both of them were fucking
themselves over.

------

The busy farming season ended with the vivid colors on the trees, and the residents of Cool Jade
Village prepared a number of packages for the cultivators. Although Sisheng Peak did not lack for
sustenance or supplies, the gifts bore the hearts of the villagers. The cultivators could not in good
conscience refuse.

Ling arrived with a bamboo basket covered in blue cloth, holding freshly steamed meat buns and
green-shelled eggs. She hesitated before approaching Mo Ran, blushing faintly and clearly
embarrassed at her impassioned confession of the night before, but finally stood determinedly in
front of him. “Honored cultivator Mo,” she said, “please take this food I made this morning for
your journey.”

Unable to decipher her intentions, Mo Ran hesitated. Ling, understanding his concern, looked up to
meet his eyes. She had regained her dignity, and would not pursue someone who didn’t want her;
she smiled reassuringly. “Honored cultivator,” she said, “I just wanted to thank you for taking care
of the village for nearly a month.”

Only then did Mo Ran accept, lowering his gaze from his seat on horseback. “Many thanks.”

“You’re most welcome, honored cultivator.”

Feeling touched at her resilience, Mo Ran felt he couldn’t just leave. “Miss, what plans do you
have for the future?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I don’t think you want to live in this village forever.”

“I want to live in the upper cultivation world,” Ling said, the fight returning to her eyes. “I’ve heard
that Rufeng Sect will assist people from all over the world. My needlework is pretty good, and I
know how to cook, so I think I might be able to find work there.” She didn’t say that, with seventy-
two cities, Rufeng Sect had more disciples than any other sect and that Lingyi was the metropolis
of all immortal sects – she would be able to find herself a good husband.

Unaware of her ulterior motives, Chu Wanning frowned. “Miss, Rufeng Sect is perhaps more of a
challenge than it might appear. Linling Island in Yangzhou Prefecture might be a better choice.”

“The cost of living there is too high,” Ling said. “I thank you for your kindness, but I have my
priorities.”

Understanding that she wouldn’t be swayed, Chu Wanning let it go. The two cultivators, bearing
their gifts, returned to Sisheng Peak. They detoured past Butterfly Town, and Chu Wanning
assessed the state of the barrier. It was stable, supported by a plentiful spiritual current, and they
continued on home. They reached Sisheng Peak by noon, with Chu Wanning leaving to brief Xue
Zhengyong.

With unexpected leisure time, Mo Ran strolled through the sect. He reached Naihe Bridge,
absentmindedly coming across someone scrubbing the stone lions on the bridge columns. As the
disciple being punished was usually embarrassed to be performing public penance, Mo Ran turned
to leave before he made it worse, but the disciple called out to him. “Ran!”

Moving closer, Mo Ran discovered that the penitent disciple was none other than Shi Mei. Taken
aback for a moment, he felt a wave of disorientation. It was unbelievable that Shi Mei, as fond of
the rules as he was, had done something to merit punishment. Shi Mei’s adult face and figure only
added to the sense of surreality, and he felt some kind of way that had failed to recognize his
beloved at first. “What happened?” he asked, trying to cover his lapse.
“Me, and, uh, the young master,” Shi Mei said.

“Mengmeng?” Mo Ran said, and then started to laugh. Xue Meng made mistakes all the time, and
it was nothing new for him to be in trouble. It was just that he had gotten Shi Mei involved. “What
did he get you into?”

“He wanted to catch ghosts from the forbidden grounds for training purposes,” Shi Mei said. “And,
uh, he nearly broke the barrier.”

Mo Ran wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. “Ghosts aren’t cats or dogs,” he said. “You can’t just
catch them. Don’t let him talk you into this nonsense.”

Shi Mei sighed in resigned helplessness. “Of course I tried to talk him out of it,” he said. “But he
was going to go, and I thought I could maybe keep him out of some trouble, at least.” He shook his
head. “Thankfully it didn’t go totally wrong. But Ran, I’d rather talk about you. You were at Cool
Jade Village for a few weeks, how was it?”

“It went pretty well,” Mo Ran said, and settled in to tell Shi Mei stories about the villagers and the
harvest.

Eventually, the conversation petered out, and Mo Ran bid Shi Mei farewell. He walked down a
small tree-lined path, mulling over his feelings for Shi Mei. He could see now that he didn’t feel
love; he had clung to the obsession out of habit. His appreciation for Shi Mei’s admittedly stunning
beauty wasn’t desire, it was the simple human attraction to that which was aesthetically pleasing.

No longing for impudent intimacy accompanied Mo Ran’s enjoyment of Shi Mei’s looks – he felt
the same way about a mountain view of brilliant leaves in autumn or a pond full of lotus blossoms
in summer. He cherished Shi Mei with tender affection, but it was platonic and soft. Mo Ran
needed conquest in his sex life – hot and wet, accompanied by hot blood coursing and thick fluids
gushing. Mo Ran was like a wolf that knew how to sniff roses but needed to eat flesh and blood.

ok that is a hilariously stupid line and I am laughing my ass off at it

In the second classics section of the library, Xue Meng finished organizing books just in time for
dinner. He sighed in exhaustion, and dragged himself to Mengpo Hall. He spread himself over the
table, mood still dark despite his favorite spicy diced chicken being on the menu for the night. He
poked at his dish in boredom, and the sight of Chu Wanning entering the dining hall caught his
eye. “Sir!” he shouted above the noise of the crowd.

A brief nod was all Xue Meng got for his trouble. Mo Ran, sitting next to him as was their long-
standing habit, took it a step farther. He shuffled their dishes around to create space and beckoned
to Chu Wanning.

“What are you doing?” Xue Meng hissed, but Mo Ran ignored him.

“Come sit with us, sir,” Mo Ran called.

Both Xue Meng and Shi Mei, neither of whom had consented to this, gave him appalled looks.
Respect their teacher as much as they might, they still had no desire to eat with the man. Mealtimes
were supposed to be enjoyed, Xue Meng felt, and not bound up in Chu Wanning’s prim and proper
manners. Besides, Xue Meng reasoned, Chu Wanning wouldn’t be any happier with their
inevitable slips in etiquette.

Perfectly aware of his students’ feelings, Chu Wanning raised an eyebrow and shook his head at
Mo Ran before going to his usual spot. He hadn’t eaten in Mengpo Hall in the last five years, and it
was comforting to see that nothing had changed. Except, he saw as he sat down, a small ornamental
copper plate nailed to the corner of his table with the inscription Constellation Saint’s Special
Table.

Uncomfortable at having his habits laid bare for all to see, Chu Wanning set his tray down heavily.
A pall had been cast over his first meal back home. He sat, preparing to eat quickly and leave, but
the chair opposite him was yanked outwards before he could so much as raise his chopsticks.
“What do you want?” he asked, looking up to see Mo Ran.

“It’s too crowded over there,” Mo Ran said, gesturing. “Thought I’d join you instead, sir.”

Peering over at Mo Ran’s previous table, Chu Wanning determined that it was not, in fact,
crowded. He frowned, confused. It made him feel no better that his disciples looked as nonplussed
as he felt, and were watching the two of them out of the corners of their eyes.

“Is he off his ass?” Xue Meng muttered, barely loud enough for Shi Mei to hear. His fellow
disciple shrugged gracefully.

For his part, Mo Ran had determined that Chu Wanning was too picky when it came to his eating
habits. The slightest inconsistency would put him off of his food, generating disgust and even
nausea, and Mo Ran decided that it was unhealthy. He figured it would cause trouble for Chu
Wanning if he didn’t get over his little hangups, regardless of how Chu Wanning felt about the
matter. He knew if he tried to force a head-on confrontation, however, that he would lose. Sneaky,
Mo Ran knew, was the way to go about it.

oh yeah that’s not creepy at ALL, they are both horrible people who deserve each other

“Try this,” Mo Ran said, picking a piece of braised pork and placing it in Chu Wanning’s bowl. It
looked out of place on the tray full of nothing but vegetables and rice. As he expected, Chu
Wanning frowned.

“I don’t like pork.”

Mo Ran had an answer ready. “It’s sweet, like in Jiangnan.”

“This isn’t how Jiangnan cooks meat,” Chu Wanning informed him.

“You don’t know if you don’t try,” Mo Ran said.

“I know how Jiangnan meat looks.”

“Cook says it’s Jiangnan,” Mo Ran said, playing his trump card. “He’s very experienced. Of
course he knows what he’s doing. Perhaps you’ve been away from home too long, sir, and have
forgotten the specifics of your home’s food.”

“Don’t be an idiot.” Chu Wanning glared at him.

Mo Ran ate a piece of the pork. “Sir, I think you’re the one who’s mistaken. It’s really sweet. Try
it.” Unaware of Mo Ran’s ulterior motives, Chu Wanning ate the pork. Mo Ran held back his
laugh at how well his teacher had fallen for his tactics. “Well?” he said.

“No,” Chu Wanning said. “Too much star anise and fennel. I’m going to tell the cook this is not
Jiangnan-style pork.”

“No, wait.” Mo Ran pulled him to a stop before Chu Wanning could figure out he’d flat-out lied.
He hadn’t thought his teacher would take the little game so seriously. “Don’t rush off, sir. Surely
the cook is busy right now. I’ll let him know later. We should finish eating, sir.”

Mollified by his student’s promise, Chu Wanning sat back down. Choosing another target, Mo Ran
picked up a piece of fish. Chu Wanning eyed him suspiciously. “IS that shad fish?”

“Yeah.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“I don’t like it.”

Laughing, Mo Ran didn’t comply. “Is it because it’s full of bones?”

“No,” Chu Wanning said after a telltale pause.

“I’ve been paying attention to you, sir, and you only eat fish without bones.” Mo Ran’s eyes
twinkled. “Or the ones with big bones easy to pick out. Sir, surely you wouldn’t avoid a small-
boned fish.”

“How ridiculous,” Chu Wanning said, baited into falling for Mo Ran’s second trap. He picked up
the piece of fish to prove Mo Ran wrong.

With a combination of flattery and taunting Chu Wanning’s ego, Mo Ran convinced his teacher to
sample far more than his usual spread of vegetable dishes. It took him nearly two hours, but Chu
Wanning ate at least a little of every dish offered in the hall. By the time they left, Chu Wanning’s
other disciples – and indeed most of the crowd – were long gone.

that was not a loving act, that was the behavior of a controlling abuser and it was creepy AF

Strolling down the small tree-lined path back to Red Lotus Pavilion, Mo Ran crossed his arms
behind his head. The sun was dipping toward the horizon and the night breeze sprang up around
them. Mo Ran smiled. “Sir,” he said.

“What?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to call you.”

“I think you ate too much tonight,” Chu Wanning told him.

Mo Ran’s smile grew softer. “Can I eat with you again?”

Even knowing Mo Ran meant nothing more than filial piety for his teacher, Chu Wanning’s heart
skipped a beat. “Are you arguing with Xue Meng again?”

“No, no.” Mo Ran waved his hand dismissively. “I haven’t eaten with them in five years and it’s
all weird. If you don’t want my company, I’ll find somewhere else. Don’t worry about it.” He
couldn’t very well reveal his ploy to broaden Chu Wanning’s palate or tell him that he thought it
was sad that he ate alone; appealing to Chu Wanning’s protective instinct with a display of
weakness was his best chance at success. He saw Chu Wanning waver, and added, “I don’t want to
eat alone, though, sir.”

“Why not?” Chu Wanning asked.

Mo Ran lowered his gaze. “Sir, someone eating alone is just satisfying hunger.” He paused,
brushing hair out of his eyes, and smiled to show off his dimples. “But if two people eat together,
the food tastes better and you feel warmer. Isn’t that what meals are supposed to be about, sir?”

Chu Wanning simply looked at him expressionlessly.

“So can I join you tomorrow, sir?” Sensing that he hadn’t quite closed the deal, Mo Ran kept
angling. “I spent five years out there alone. I’d like to spend time with you now that you’re back. I
wouldn’t be comfortable without you, sir.”

“I’m not eating duck necks,” Chu Wanning warned him, demonstrating that he wasn’t quite as
clueless as Mo Ran had thought. “Or rabbit heads.”

Mo Ran laughed, tugging shamelessly on Chu Wanning’s sleeves. “Okay, fine, sir, I’ll eat your
scallion tofu and sweet osmanthus lotus roots.”

Suddenly reminded of past grievances and beginning to suspect what Mo Ran was really doing,
Chu Wanning narrowed his eyes. “You may join me for meals if you eat exactly what I do in the
morning.”

“Sure, sure,” Mo Ran agreed, nodding. “Wait, what do you eat for breakfast, sir?”

“Salted tofu pudding,” Chu Wanning replied spitefully. “With seaweed.” Mo Ran began to think he
had made a mistake, remembering of the hotpot they had eaten while Chu Wanning was
pretending to be Terri Fying. “And,” Chu Wanning said, enunciating every syllable, “dried
shrimp.”

------

From that day forward, Mengpo Hall boasted the unusual sight of Mo Weiyu frequenting the
Constellation Saint's special table. The two ate facing each other, with Mo Ran placing morsel after
morsel into his teacher's bowl. The disciples around them would gossip, laying quiet bets as to
whether or not Chu Wanning would eat whatever he had received and chattering with reserved
excitement over every detail of the interactions. Sometimes Chu Wanning accepted what he was
given, and sometimes he returned it; a lively culture of gambling had arisen revolving around what
he would and would not eat.

Once in a while, Mo Ran would attempt to feed his teacher directly, much to the shock and awe of
the surrounding disciples. Chu Wanning would knock his chopsticks aside every time, and Mo Ran
would smile as he deposited the food into his teacher's bowl instead of his own. With a sigh, Chu
Wanning would capitulate and eat his student's offering. No matter how often they saw it, the
gambling disciples - and those who just watched out of morbid fascination - were dumbfounded.

Neither Mo Ran nor Chu Wanning noticed the increased scrutiny or the whispers that came along
with it. One on particular day, it was warm enough inside the hall that Mo Ran had rolled up his
sleeves to the elbow to expose a slender and muscular arm. He served a bowl of soup, adding extra
ribs while Chu Wanning wasn't paying attention. "This is good for warding off the cold, sir," he
said, handing over the dish.

"Plain soup?" Chu Wanning asked.

Blinking innocently, Mo Ran glanced at the bowl. "I wasn't paying attention when I got it, sir. I
think so."

Accepting the soup, Chu Wanning took a bite. "It's not bad," he said in response to Mo Ran's
inquiring look.

"Please make sure to finish it, sir," Mo Ran said with a smile.

"You have the audacity to talk to me about finishing food when every day you get so much that
you need me to hep you finish it," Chu Wanning said sharply.

"Next time I'll take less," Mo Ran lied. Watching his teacher savor the delicious soup, he let out a
soft sigh. Life, he felt, was like a bowl of soup; one never knew what one was going to get, but it
was a feeling of fulfillment no matter what. Mo Ran felt he had worked hard, paid in blood and
pain for this moment of peace represented by the bowl of soup, and he didn't want to think about it.
He'd had too little good in his life, and it was hard for him to savor his moments instead of
hoarding them.

Sometimes, Mo Ran thought, he envied Xue Meng's carefree attitude toward his pleasures; he had
learned since he was young that if he wasn't safe in what he gained until he had consumed it
entirely. Only then could no one take it away again. He had had to fight for sustenance and shelter
when young, and he hadn't really shaken those habits even upon entering the cultivation world or in
the years since. He had only learned to fear his comforts would be taken away by a different
method.

Having done many evil deeds in his past life, Mo Ran feared a weighing of the scales and a
balancing of his fate. He felt that he had to seize every small piece of happiness he could and
devour it before fleeing whatever punishment fate had in store for him. Despite his surface
happiness, he was never truly at ease underneath, convinced that the peace he enjoyed was a lie.
He had to grab as much joy as he could before fate rewarded his evil deeds with punishment.

"What's on your mind?" Chu Wanning asked, breaking his concentration.

"Nothing," Mo Ran said, smiling. "I always space out when I'm full."

Eying his empty bowl, Chu Wanning's mouth flattened. "You seemed like you enjoyed the soup
today," he offered.

"I did."

"I'll get you some more." Without waiting for an answer, Chu Wanning disappeared, only to return
with a large bowl overfull of meat soup. He looked at Mo Ran. "Take your time, but be sure to
finish it. There's more if you need it, you know. No one will take it away."

Mo Ran was moved nearly to tears by how well Chu Wanning had understood him, and he cradled
the bowl. "Okay," he said, desperately trying not to actually cry in front of his teacher. He had been
tormented with self-blame for five years, but his teacher was offering him absolution. Sweet agony
pierced his heart, worse the closer he got to his teacher as he now realized how warm and
affectionate Chu Wanning had always been. He felt incredible remorse for having destroyed such
an amazing person in his past life, and felt he didn't deserve to be so near him in this one.

The feeling that he should stay far away from Chu Wanning for his own protection, that he
shouldn't be able to bear the shame of having the audacity to associate with the man, warred with
the desire to be near him. He would have a long life yet, Mo Ran thought, and surely he had
enough time to atone for all of his past sins. He vowed to kneel for the rest of his life, if only he
could be worthy of the smallest scrap of Chu Wanning's regard.

"Sir." Without either of them noticing, Xue Meng had appeared to interrupt Mo Ran's self-pitying
reverie. As the habit of self-recrimination had settled deep into his bones, Mo Ran was unable to
shake it at a moment's notice and his expression when he looked up at his fellow disciple was so
distraught that it startled the little phoenix. "What the hell is wrong with you?" Xue Meng asked.

"Uh, I just ate too much," Mo Ran lied, unable to regain full control of his shameful display of
emotion on such short notice. "I'll just go walk it off. You two go ahead and talk."

"Wait," Xue Meng said. "This is about you, too."

"What about me?" Mo Ran asked, sitting back down.

"Okay, but I don't want you to be too upset when I tell you," Xue Meng said.

"Out with it," Chu Wanning snapped.

"It's like this," Xue Meng said. "I got an invitation. Song Qiutong is getting married."

The blood drained from Mo Ran's face; he was less disturbed by the knowledge that Song Qiutong
was marrying someone else - although he pitied the poor bastard, whoever it was - and more that
Xue Meng somehow thought the news was going to depress him. Then it occurred to him that the
puppet master might be involved in the changing events, and that he might have arranged the
wedding as an elaborate trap for Mo Ran. He forced a calm expression, far too late for anything
resembling a natural reaction. "What does that have to do with me?" he asked.

"Uh, the letter," Xue Meng said. "Didn't you know? Rufeng Sect delivered the invitation and a
letter from Miss Song specifically for you. When did you get mixed up with her?"

Given his strong negative feelings for Song Qiutong, it took Mo Ran a moment to calm down
enough to reply. "A letter?" he said. "For me? Is it a mistake?"

"Nope." Xue Meng pulled out an envelope and slapped it down on the table. "Written with your
name and hers. There is no mistake."

Heart pounding like a drum, Mo Ran glared at the offending envelope. He had no idea why she
would write to him before her grand wedding in this life, when they had only met briefly by
chance. Xue Meng crossed his arms, staring at him as if Mo Ran was the one who had done
something wrong.

"Are you going to open it or what?" he demanded. "I want to see, too." A glance to the side
revealed Chu Wanning also staring at Mo Ran, brows furrowed. Mo Ran still hesitated, which
apparently agitated his cousin even more, and Mo Ran remembered what a dim view Xue Meng
took of extramarital relations. "Well?" he demanded.

Unsteady, Mo Ran reached for the letter. If his suspicions were correct, he would be unable to
avoid what was coming no matter what he did. Resigned to his fate, he silently opened it.
 Book 2, Part 3: Same Destination - Red Wedding

The envelope contained only a thin sheet of paper with a few short lines, and reading them settled
Mo Ran’s anxious heart. He almost sighed in relief. Xue Meng pushed closer, reading over his
shoulder.

“What the heck?” he said. “Why would she send you this?”

“I told you I didn’t know her that well,” Mo Ran said, letting out a real laugh. He put the letter
down. “You made it sound so fishy, I almost thought there was something to it.”

The letter was a request regarding a demon Mo Ran had slain while he was wandering; a carp spirit
at Lake Yunmeng had swallowed an invigoration crystal and become particularly murderous. Mo
Ran had battled it for many rounds before it succumbed, and he had found the crystal. It had been
formed by the brilliant essence of the moon, and was a spiritual stone of the highest grade. “It’s the
best choice to forge weapons or cultivate the core,” Mo Ran told Xue Meng.

“What does a throwback like her want it for?” Chu Wanning asked.

“She wants me to collect it for her husband,” Mo Ran said. “His spiritual core is aligned with fire,
and he’s been so impatient with his training that she thinks he’s in danger of qi deviation. She
thinks having the crystal as part of her dowry would help him suppress the essence of evil.”

“Spending a thousand gold for her husband’s peace of mind,” Xue Meng said. “That’s one in a
million.”

“Where do you think she’d get the money?” Mo Ran asked. “She’d still have to ask Rufeng Sect
for it. But she’s so beautiful that she could get any number of disciples to do whatever she wanted
with just a few words.” He grinned at his fellow disciple. “You would, too.”

“I’m not some kind of pervert,” Xue Meng hissed.

“I was just saying,” Mo Ran said, handing the letter back over. “File it,” he added.

“File it?” Xue Meng blinked, surprised that Mo Ran wanted to put the letter into the sealed chests
meant for missives that wouldn’t garner a response.

“You could burn it if you wanted,” Mo Ran said.

“No, it’s just,” Xue Meng said, confused. “It’s her wedding, she wants a spiritual stone, and she’s
willing to pay you for it. Why wouldn’t you sell it?”

“It’s not that I don’t want to sell it,” Mo Ran said. “It’s not like I can use it, but I already gave it to
you.”

“Me?” Xue Meng gaped.

“Yes, you.” Mo Ran pointed at the sword hanging from Xue Meng’s waist. “Didn’t I give you a
crystal a few years back to forge into Longcheng? Didn’t it improve the sword? You’ve got that
carp spirit to thank for it.”

Mouth hanging open, Xue Meng was unable to answer for several long moments. He had known
Mo Ran had gotten a spiritual stone while on his travels, but where the stone had come from hadn’t
concerned him. He had never quite been able to get rid of the edge of resentment he felt for Mo
Ran, his greatest rival. When Xue Zhengyong had told him that he could upgrade his sword with
the gem, Xue Meng had been both grateful and aggrieved, as if he had received something good
for no apparent reason.

He hadn’t expected that it was even worse than he had known; Mo Ran had not only upgraded his
sword but had given him a priceless invigoration crystal. He wasn’t sure how to respond, or even
exactly what he was feeling, and it was a few minutes before he could squeeze out a mumble of
thanks. Mo Ran clapped him on the shoulder.

“It’s fine,” he said. “You’re welcome. I just happened to have it and it fits your spiritual
alignment.”

“I was thanking the carp spirit,” Xue Meng said, glowering.

“Then you should avoid eating carp,” Mo Ran said, laughing. “Accumulate some good karma for
your savior.” He laughed harder, and after a moment Xue Meng joined in. “Oh,” Mo Ran added. “I
almost forgot to ask. Who’s she even marrying? She’s such a low-ranked disciple, but Rufeng Sect
is sending out all sorts of invitations. Are they allying with Bitan Sect or something?”

“Nope,” Xue Meng said. “Guess again.”

“Man, I was sure the pervy old sect master had asked for her,” Mo Ran said. “What clan is it?” He
thought. “Is it Taxue Palace?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Xue Meng said. “It’s not a marriage alliance.”

“Wait,” Mo Ran said, laughter drying up. “Then who’s she marrying?”

“Nangong Si,” Xue Meng said. “Who else? He’s the heir to the sect. He’s of marriageable age.
She’s gorgeous, it’s not like it’s a bad match for him.”

“Nangong Si?” Mo Ran repeated numbly, nearly falling off his chair in shock.

“What?” Xue Meng looked at him, eyes narrowed.

“Why is she marrying him?” Mo Ran couldn’t fathom how such a union could take place.
“Nangong Si,” he muttered. Part of his shock was that he kept forgetting Nangong Si was still
alive, and hadn’t died of a grave illness as he had in Mo Ran’s first life. Partly it was that he hadn’t
paid attention to the prominent sects as he had traveled the land and been focused on war and
refugees.

yeah the author keeps forgetting about the two, three years of actual story she just skipped
over so she could get back to stupidly repetitive pining, I can’t blame Mo Ran for forgetting
about it too

The wedding announcement crystallized a nebulous sense of something being wrong – the path of
history had changed, and it wasn’t only limited to Mo Ran. Unrelated events were changing, a
funeral becoming a wedding with a former empress as the bride. Mo Ran wondered if perhaps
Nangong Si were blind, to marry such a scheming harpy, but he still had to offer congratulations
and present a gift. He had no valid excuse not to attend.

All the sect affairs had been set in order to allow its highest officials to attend the wedding
scheduled for the fifteenth of the month. Elder Tanlang and Elder Xuanji had been put in charge,
and Xue Zhengyong was ready to travel. Accompanying him were Madam Wang, Xue Meng, and
Mo Ran. Chu Wanning had also been invited, specifically by name, as Nangong Si had trained
under him as a young disciple.

“Every reputable figure in the world will probably be there,” Xue Zhengyong said. “Since Rufeng
Sect is the foremost sect, and it’s their heir’s grand wedding.” He looked at all of them in turn. “I
know we don’t sweat the small courtesies and finer points of etiquette at Sisheng Peak, but we’ll
have to behave properly here so as not to become a laughingstock.”

“What do you mean by proper behavior?” Xue Meng said suspiciously.

“Your hair, for one,” said his father. “You’re wearing a golden crown.”

“And?”

“Ah, Meng, this is your first wedding. Of course you don’t know.” Madam Wang chuckled. “In the
upper cultivation realm, only the groom may wear gold hair accessories. It would look like you
were there to steal the bride.”

“No, no, no,” Xue Meng said, flushing. “I absolutely do not want to do that.”

“Oh, so you’d panic if we tossed the two of you into a small cabin?” Mo Ran teased.

“I’ll throw you into a small cabin!” Xue Meng shot back, embarrassed and furious. “Fine, I won’t
wear it!”

“I don’t think either of you understand proper wedding guest attire,” Xue Zhengyong said, shaking
his head. “We’ll have your clothes prepared for you. Just wear what we tell you.” He looked at
Chu Wanning. “Constellation, would that be acceptable to you?”

Disciples inadvertently wearing the wrong color was one thing, but Xue Zhengyong was
legitimately nervous that Chu Wanning would commit the far worse faux pas of showing up to a
wedding dressed head to toe in white. He wouldn’t be able to blame Nangong Si for starting a war
with Sisheng Peak based on that insult alone. He was relieved when Chu Wanning simply nodded.

The night of their departure, Xue Zhengyong’s chosen outfits had arrived. They were exactly and
properly made, beautiful enough that even Xue Meng nodded in satisfaction. Mo Ran took it upon
himself to deliver Chu Wanning’s outfit, calling from outside the barrier. “Uncle Xue asked me to
deliver your clothes, sir.”

Pressing through the barrier, Mo Ran found Chu Wanning practicing the sword by the lotus pond.
He remembered that his teacher’s second holy weapon was a sword with a dense killing aura, and
that it was rarely used. However, he also knew that skills left unpracticed would wither. Chu
Wanning would therefore train with his weapon enough to keep himself sharp.

Despite the biting cold of the night, Chu Wanning had warmed up enough from practice to remove
his outer robe. His hair had been tied into a stern knot, rather than loose in its customary ponytail,
leaving his face to appear lean and dangerous without its softness. As he moved through the dance
of the blade, he exhibited gentle grace along with his strength, flicking up white flakes of frost.

Mo Ran could see no flaw in his movements, and finally Chu Wanning’s brows tilted down as he
pointed the sword toward the center of the pond. The waters split in two under the assault of his qi
combined with the sword’s aura, rushing aside so furiously that it took long moments for the
surface of the pond to become unbroken once again.

Chu Wanning followed his stunning feat with a leap to the gazebo on the opposite shore, feet
lightly dotting the waters as he sprung. Mo Ran panicked, afraid that Chu Wanning would cavort
off somewhere out of sight, and he ran toward the gazebo. “Sir!”

Stepping onto the gazebo roof in the moonlight, flapping sleeves as white as the petals fluttering
down from the giant crabapple tree that hadn’t been established until right at that moment, Chu
Wanning looked down. “What?” he said.

“Your clothes,” Mo Ran said, holding them up. “See if they fit.”

Chu Wanning grunted, and then suddenly remembered that the world had bestowed the title of
Grandmaster upon his student while he had been dead and unable to pay attention. He leapt lightly
down from the gazebo, full of glee at his brilliant idea. “Why don’t you see if you can parry my
attack first?”

------

Taken aback at the unprovoked assault, Mo Ran barely managed to dodge. “If you wanted to spar,
sir,” he said, “try the clothes on first. Uncle Xue is waiting.”

“Sparring first,” Chu Wanning said, striking again.

“Uncle Xue is in a hurry, sir,” Mo Ran objected with yet another dodge. “The tailor is still there.”

“Then you’d better get started,” Chu Wanning said, fixated on his desire to spar with his student
and unable to let it go in the face of Mo Ran’s very reasonable request. Almost as an afterthought,
his longsword flickered out again, seeking Mo Ran’s vital points. Frustrated, Mo Ran dodged all
but the last blow. Chu Wanning pulled it, the blade barely touching Mo Ran. “That all you got,
Grandmaster?” he jeered.

Unable to put down the clothes in his hands, Mo Ran smiled miserably. “Sir, you don’t plan on
going easy on me, I see.”

“You thought I’d coddle you forever?” Chu Wanning taunted.

“Fair enough,” Mo Ran said, still dodging.

“So are we doing this or not?”

“Okay, okay,” Mo Ran said, calling his holy weapon. He didn’t inject any spiritual powers into
What The Hell, as his teacher was holding an ordinary blade, but Chu Wanning barely waited for it
to materialize before he struck yet again. Mo Ran jerked a few steps back, then wrapped the vine
around the hilt of Chu Wanning’s sword.

It didn’t take long for Chu Wanning to pin Mo Ran with his sword, up against his student’s neck.
“Weren’t concentrating,” he grunted. His breath brushed against Mo Ran’s ear, soft and warm,
sending a wave of heat into his chest.

With a dark chuckle, Mo Ran glanced up. “Don’t be so sure, sir,” he said. “Look again.”

The willow vine was wrapped around Chu Wanning’s wrist, restraining him firmly on the spot. He
stared at his own arm for a moment. “I take it back,” he said.

“You can’t do that,” Mo Ran told him, grinning.

“And what do you suggest I do instead?”

“Go change,” Mo Ran said triumphantly.

Chu Wanning grunted. “After we determine a winner.” He drove back What The Hell with his own
qi, and vaulted away from Mo Ran.

Left with no other choice, Mo Ran was forced to go on the offensive. Neither weapon was suffused
with spiritual power and it was less of a show than it might have been otherwise, but both
cultivators moved smoothly enough to almost make up for it. Mo Ran still held the bundle of
clothing in one arm, and Chu Wanning limited himself to his right arm only as well.

Neither of them were able to gain the upper hand. The Holy Grace Immortal’s combative nature
had been thoroughly roused by his own disciple. He only appeared so cold and aloof because it
was hard to come by a worthy rival, but the torch of Mo Ran set him ablaze. By the end of the
fight, his ordinary longsword had shattered into a thousand pieces.

oh is that why he’s been Coldly Indifferent this whole time I’m sorry I thought it was because
he was emotionally constipated

“Even the sword is broken,” Mo Ran said, exasperated. “Are we going to keep going?”

Chu Wanning tossed the hilt aside. “Yes.”

Before Mo Ran could put What The Hell away, Chu Wanning had come lunging straight for him.
He was like an arrow, but also like a preying leopard and a hawk. Mo Ran blocked hastily, and the
two of them engaged in an entirely new method of hand to hand combat. Given his height and
weight, Mo Ran had the clear advantage. “Sir, stop,” he said. “If you don’t use your spiritual
powers, you’ll never win.”

“You arrogant, unruly disciple,” Chu Wanning snarled furiously.

“No, sir,” Mo Ran said. “If you want, sir, I can yield ten moves to you.”

“Mo Weiyu!” Chu Wanning howled in rage, and he became even more furious in his humiliation.

It took dozens of rounds before Chu Wanning felt his strength begin to wane. He had spent the
hour before Mo Ran arrived practicing the sword, putting him at a disadvantage, but he refused to
yield. Finally, Chu Wanning shifted and struck at Mo Ran with an elbow to the ribs. The strike was
caught, and the two cultivators pressed against each other.

Chu Wanning felt as though he would be crushed by Mo Ran’s rough grip. Mo Ran’s beastly
nature started to rear its ugly head, and he suppressed Chu Wanning’s spiritual powers. Chu
Wanning jerked back in shock, only to realize that he had been firmly held in Mo Ran’s sweaty
embrace.

“You want to keep going, sir?” Mo Ran asked, smile evident even in his voice. Chu Wanning felt
Mo Ran’s broad chest behind him, and Mo Ran’s soft lips pressed against his hear, Mo Ran’s
heated breath against his neck. “Well, sir?” he added, when Chu Wanning didn’t answer.

Chu Wanning bit his lip, his eyes reddening with strain as he refused to give in. Mo Ran’s lips
rubbed against his ear and Chu Wanning shuddered. “Let go of me!”

Despite his aggressive words, Chu Wanning was shaking. Mo Ran, exhausted himself and
distracted by keeping himself in check, couldn’t tell why. “Are you going to try on the clothes
when I do, sir?” he asked.
“Let go!” Chu Wanning hissed, overstimulated by Mo Ran’s lips still brushing against his ear. His
flinching only made Mo Ran clamp down harder, nearly dislocating Chu Wanning’s arm. He went
pliant and limp, accidentally letting out a hoarse moan.

Mo Ran froze violently, erection immediately springing to life. He shoved Chu Wanning away
before his teacher could notice his stiff cock. Chu Wanning stood in a rage before whipping around
and kicking Mo Ran to the ground. Completely stunned, Mo Ran frowned in pain. “Sir,” he said,
but stopped himself before he could accuse Chu Wanning of cheating.

Squinting through watery eyes, Mo Ran looked up at his teacher. Chu Wanning’s robes were in
disarray, collar pulled open to reveal his firm chest. As soon as he saw Mo Ran’s gaze, Chu
Wanning yanked his collar closed and glared down at his wayward student. “You’ve lost,” he said,
chin tilted upwards. “It doesn’t matter if you’re tall.”

“Yeah, I lost, sir,” Mo Ran said spitefully. “You’d break my bones just to win.”

Guilt pricked at Chu Wanning; he had been so fully engaged in the fight that he hadn’t
remembered to hold back. He bent down, prodding at Mo Ran’s ribs. “Does it hurt here?”

Not about to cry like a teenager, Mo Ran held his tongue. He couldn’t stop his face from paling in
pain, and Chu Wanning saw. He took the bundle of clothing with one hand, reaching for Mo Ran
with the other. His intent was to help his student to his feet, but he hadn’t reckoned with Mo Ran’s
weight or his own exhaustion. He slipped and fell on top of Mo Ran instead.

A loud, pained grunt sounded from under Chu Wanning and he scrambled upright. Without
thinking, he tried to express his concern. “Are you all right?”

Mo Ran put a hand over his eyes. “Get off me,” he grated out.

He’s all right, Chu Wanning thought distantly, and then realized that he should stop crushing his
student to death. Although he tried to get up, Chu Wanning’s legs had finally thrown in the towel
and he was unable to stand. He fell backwards, his thinly clothed rear end landing on something
big and hard.

------

The object pressing into his ass gave Chu Wanning a jolt of strength and he scrambled to his feet.
He flushed and paled in turns, shaken and frightened. Mo Ran was disconcerted at the naked fear
on Constellation Saint’s face, and he sat up. “Sir,” he said tentatively, and Chu Wanning’s eyes
widened still further until they were nearly round. “Sorry, sir,” Mo Ran said. “I’m, not, uh.” His
voice trailed off.

Chu Wanning’s mind whirled in confusion, unable to understand why Mo Ran had had such a
reaction. He thought perhaps that he was mistaken, but the only other alternative was that Mo
Ran’s dick was that large and hard normally. His mind went straight to the trashy list and its
description of his disciple, and he flushed bright red. He saw Mo Ran open his mouth and held up a
hand. “Say nothing. Go back.”

Enduring the pain of his bruised ribs, Mo Ran dragged himself to his feet. He had upset his
teacher, and he wasn’t going to stay where he wasn’t wanted. “Sir,” he said, “I’m sorry, it was an
accident.”

Chu Wanning stared at him with a face that implied a multitude of thoughts, and Mo Ran left with
his tail between his legs. Rather than overwhelmed with more ideas than he could process, Chu