Chapter Text
Fortunately since Shen Yuan doesn’t know the first thing about tracking and doesn’t want to bother Liu Qingge for such a little matter, Ming Fan didn’t go very far. His footsteps lead towards yet another bamboo grove – jeez, they are really fond of that plant on Qing Jing Peak, aren’t they – hiding a small garden made of pristine white sand, on which a few dark grey rocks have been scattered in a hazaphard pattern.
Ming Fan is sitting upon one of these rocks, his head between his knees. It doesn’t look very comfortable, Shen Yuan is pretty sure the teen’s butt is already hurting and he cannot have been sitting for more than a minute.
Well, at least he’s not doing something as pointlessly nasty as bullying his poor shidi who’s currently too meek to properly defend himself and won’t stay this shy little lamb forever, so! That’s progress, Ming Fan! Now, if only you keep following this path, you just might die swiftly when your scapegoat and favorite stress release punching ball will be back to raze the mountain range to the ground!
The godling gently puts Lingling down, and she immediately leans against his leg. Really, this bunny – since they have landed in the Middle Kingdom, it seems she never stopped hugging, climbing on him, or touching him, as if she is afeared of her Young Master vanishing as morning dew when the sun grows too hot and intense.
Shen Yuan doesn’t blame her, because there’s comfort to be found in her tiny furred body, a presence to anchor him in the present unless he lets his mind unravel from sheer panic or distraction.
«Disciple Ming appears quite distraught» he decides to utter, folding his hands over his stomach in order to look like he has an idea of what he’s doing instead of wildly improvising. «Might this humble one inquire about the reason why?»
The teenage boy barks a laugh. It’s bitter and a smidge wet, reminiscent of this medicinal tea for soothing headaches, the one containing crushed willow leaves.
«He wonders why» Ming Fan mutters in a wavering tone, «when he’s precisely the reason.»
Shen Yuan raises an eyebrow, rather confused by the accusation.
«Was I meant to hear that?» he ponders – because cultivation bullsh*t helps to enhance the senses, you would think people would remember that but the IQ loss is frightfully omnipresent, especially when a plot point is invoking it.
Another laugh, much wetter. Ming Fan still refuses to turn his face towards the godling, a very rude behaviour indeed, but what if he’s trying to hide tears? Now Shen Yuan is genuinely worrying.
The sand whispers under his feet as he comes closer, kneeling besides the rock to put himself more or less at the same eye level as his young target for discussion, if said target wasn’t busy keeping his head bowed low.
«Disciple Ming, you are in pain, and I would help you if I could. But I know not what ails you.»
«… Please don’t come nearer» the teenage begs in a tiny voice. «I don’t – this is – I am too gross for you to stand too close.»
Gross? Shen Yuan discreetly sniffs the air, but there’s no hint of stench in the air, and his quicksilver eyes roam all over the bent teenager without stumbling upon a smudge of dirt or an oily lock of hair. Ming Fan is quite the rare treasure indeed, an hormonal boy who’s aware of a bathroom’s existence and using it.
So why does he claim being gross? Some poetic imagery, maybe?
Ah well, does the boy actually believe this will be enough to make the reincarnated soul run for the hills? He used to be stuck in the hospital for weeks in his previous life, he has been desensitized to gross long ago, and that’s not the kind of mindset you can shed so easily.
He snorts. It’s far from the elegant image he seeks to uphold but it expresses his opinion too well for him to not do that noise.
«One who seeks to ascend to the silver bridge shouldn’t be repulsed by something as mild» he answers. «I certainly am not.»
Ming Fan softly hiccups.
«Yeah, the Young Master Shen is perfect, isn’t he? Perfect in body, perfect in mind, perfect in behaviour, everything about him pristine and blessed.»
What is he saying? Shen Yuan certainly is nothing of that. He’s lazy, he enjoys nothing more than trashing bad novels until their authors are weeping in abject trauma, he would stuff himself with nothing but sweets if the cooks weren’t insistent on forcing him to diet, truly he’s the picture of a hopeless spoiled brat whose lone quality is to not bother the world with his presence!
Yet Ming Fan keeps speaking, barely able to articulate his words.
«So perfect and I could try for a thousand years but I never will be you.»
Ah, so that’s it.
Shen Yuan never truly understood people who got angry when they were envious of something. Because the only feeling swelling in his scarred chest when he saw his siblings running on the beach or on the path without coughing a lung, when he watched them command any food they wanted without having to wonder if they would have an allergic reaction – it was the quietly despairing resignation that blearily whispered, I will never have that.
He was wrong, but to be fair, he wasn’t expecting to be reincarnated as a Heavenly Official. It doesn’t erase the previous feelings, the existence lived before his current one.
The godling breathes out.
«And never shall I be my esteemed mother’s equal. Do you know, she taught me how to dance? If you could see and compare her performance to mine, you would deride me as a clumsy jester.»
This time Ming Fan lifts his head and stares at Shen Yuan. The teenager’s nose is running, his eyes red-rimmed, and the godling just wants to clean this blotchy face with his sleeve – wait, does he have a handkerchief somewhere?
«You’re kidding me, right?» the boy blurts before reddening as he realizes he just was unbearably rude to his Peak’s own guest.
The godling smiles, a bit crooked and very hapless.
«My esteemed mother is a goddess in full bloom, she who embodies the perfect beauty of the heart, the body and the mind, and is prayed by maidens everywhere for a measly crumb of her loveliness to reach them. Besides her, all the Three Realms are plain at the best, and this humble one certainly isn’t the exception.»
He’s not biased, that’s an objective fact – Chang’e is a goddess of inhumanly polished charm, and that’s just not Shen Yuan’s domain.
He’s fully at peace with that. That’s not like he’s unused to being ugly.
