Zhuoyu snapped, “Senior Brother He, Lu Qi’s body is weak—he can’t withstand strength like yours.”
He Xing gave an “oh” and, easygoing as ever, thought nothing more of it. “Fine, fine. Go on, hurry. Shibo hasn’t been able to eat or drink a thing these past days from pining—Shizun has brought him Spiritual Medicine seven or eight times already.”
At that, Zhuoyu’s tears nearly spilled anew. He turned to Lu Qi. “Wait for me at my quarters. I’ll be right back.”
Qingshan Qi nodded, ever so understanding.
Yan Su had stood to one side the entire time without a word, watching that eyesore’s performance with cold eyes. Seeing Zhuoyu finally apart from the man’s side, he gave a soundless sneer and fell into step behind.
Deer Jade Terrace stood utterly empty; even the young Dao Attendants who swept it had been sent away by Wei Qingxiao, lest Daoist Lord Tongxu cut them down in a single stroke of temper.
Zhuoyu ran to the Life Lamp Hall on well-worn feet. The moment he entered, he saw Daoist Lord Tongxu standing before a row of dimmed Life Lamps, eyes lowered upon the three sticks of incense.
Each dim yet ornate Life Lamp was like a cold memorial tablet. Candles burned low—and with Tongxu the only living soul standing at the center of it all, the hall felt haunted.
At the familiar footsteps, Tongxu turned, gaze coming around cold.
Zhuoyu jogged in—and stalled at the sight of Tongxu’s face, colder than he had ever seen it, the faint red bleeding into his eyes.
Watching Shizun reach out, expressionless, as if to thrash the child within arm’s reach, Zhuoyu made an instant decision and sprinted forward, ramming headfirst into his chest at speeds unprecedented—momentum enough to rock even the foremost cultivator of the Three Realms half a step.
“Shizun!”
In the same breath, Zhuoyu’s hands clamped in a death grip around Tongxu’s arms, arresting the beating before it could begin.
The baleful aura wreathing Tongxu froze mid-flare.
Zhuoyu wailed on, grasping at anything that might stir his Shizun’s mercy, his parental tenderness, his protective love—anything, really, so long as it didn’t curdle into the urge to thrash him.
“Shizun! A single day apart feels like three autumns—and it’s been eight hundred years since I last saw you! I’ve missed you so terribly that your disciple thinks of you day and night; even my dreams are filled with nothing but you!”
Daoist Lord Tongxu: “…”
Yan Su pressed a hand to his forehead.
Zhuoyu showed no sign of stopping. The pretty words spent, he pivoted seamlessly into practiced penitence. “I was wrong, so very wrong, on this journey, and I know full well how wise and mighty you’ve been these fifteen years, Shizun. Punishing me is a small matter—only please don’t work yourself ill over it.”
Tongxu looked down at him, the red in his eyes seeming to recede a little. “And where did you go wrong?”
“I shouldn’t have gambled with my own life.” Zhuoyu had his confession down pat. “Truly, these past days I’ve reflected on nothing else—if I really had died just like that, how heartbroken Shizun would have been, I…”
Zhuoyu had set out only to coax Tongxu out of punishing him—but somewhere in the telling, some words or other struck home, and he abruptly broke into heaving sobs.
Tongxu had meant to freeze him out a few days, just to frighten him—but the instant he sensed hot tears soaking through his robes, his heart went soft in a flash.
“Enough.” Tongxu pushed him back a little and bent down to wipe his tears. “You’re of age now. What’s with this way of crying? Aren’t you afraid people will laugh at you?”
Out in the world, through his whole journey of trials, Zhuoyu had stood steady before Qingshan Qi and the common folk alike, shouldering whatever came. Here, before the Shizun who was father and mother both, he seemed to shrink back into a child.
Head bowed, wiping tears that would not stop, he ached as though his heart would break. “Your… your hair. Why has it gone whiter?”
Before, though Tongxu’s head had been a full crown of snow, a few strands of gray had still shown through; now it was white through and through.
Tongxu said flatly, “It was whitened by a little bastard.”
Zhuoyu couldn’t hold back fresh tears, choking out, “Shizun, I—I—I swear I’ll live long and well—a thousand years, ten thousand, a lifespan to rival the heavens!”
The red drained fully from Tongxu’s eyes, and he laughed despite himself. “Hm. At least you’ve got spirit.”
In the end, far from being punished, Zhuoyu was coaxed into eating several thousand-year Snow Lotus Fruits, fresh from the Northern Domain. He wiped his tears and squirreled away the last two, meaning to save them for Lu Qi.
Tongxu was speaking with Yan Su. “…What came of the investigation into that Lu Qi’s identity?”
Yan Su handed over a Jade Slip, a rare thread of impatience showing between his brows. “The identity holds. A Half Core Realm cultivator. Parents and kin all dead.”
“The face matches?”
“It does.”
Zhuoyu hastened to speak. “Shizun, he staked his life to save me and took grave wounds for it. Might he stay on Floating Jade Mountain to recover? I’d like to ask Shishu Qingxiao to examine him.”
Yan Su said evenly, “A debt of gratitude so great must naturally be repaid. Better to send him to Autumn-Embracing Peak—spare Shishu the trip back and forth.”
Tongxu nodded. “Very good.”
Zhuoyu’s “Peach Blossom Calamity” remained a lurking threat all the same. If this person proved to be one of the “Peach Blossoms”…
That body was frail and feeble, the temperament soft and spineless—good for nothing, and unworthy of Lin Zhuoyu.
Zhuoyu had meant to refuse—but having finally coaxed Shizun back into good humor, he was loath to invite fresh complications, and nodded obediently instead. With the matter thus settled, Zhuoyu tucked the two fruits away and took his leave. Yan Su followed hard on his heels.
He waited and waited, but Zhuoyu never said a word to him. At last Yan Su called him to a stop. “Zhuoyu.”
Anxious to get back to Lu Qi, Zhuoyu turned. “Hm? What is it?”
Seeing that blank, guileless face, Yan Su held his silence a long moment before finally speaking first. “Your Senior Brother has done you so great a service this time—and you mean to simply walk away?”
Zhuoyu stared at him, taken aback. It didn’t sound like anything Yan Su would say—more like an awkward pleasantry grasped at to fill the silence.
“Then… thank you, Senior Brother?”
Yan Su: “Only thanks?”
Zhuoyu no longer knew how to be around Yan Su. Before, a few honeyed words were enough to send his Senior Brother blooming; that trick was off the table now. After a moment’s thought, he drew a Snow Lotus Fruit from his robes. “Then take this, as a token of thanks.”
Yan Su said, “Good things come in pairs.”
Zhuoyu couldn’t help glaring. “One is plenty. The other one is for Lu Qi.”
Yan Su said nothing, gaze still pinned to his sleeve. Zhuoyu was drawing breath to snap at him when a voice came from nearby.
“What’s all this?”
Zhuoyu turned—and his eyes flew wide in astonishment.
“Shishu?”
Li Buwei came ambling over in black robes, a gentle smile playing about his eyes. At the sight of him, Yan Su’s brow knotted hard.
Li Buwei had not been home in five or six years. On this rare return to Floating Jade Mountain, he had meant to go to Deer Jade Terrace—only to be driven out by his elder brother. His eyes narrowed, sizing Zhuoyu up. “And who might this be?”
Zhuoyu was overjoyed beyond words, scampering over to circle him. “Shishu, Shishu! It’s me, Shishu!”
Li Buwei’s brow creased. “Who? I’m afraid I don’t recognize you.”
Zhuoyu had clung to him since he was small; now his eyes curved into delighted crescents. “It’s me—Zhuoyu!”
Li Buwei: “Oh? Is it, now?”
Zhuoyu grew a touch frantic. “Shishu!”
Li Buwei narrowed his eyes at him. “Impossible. You’re so young and already in the Spirit Solidification Realm—and with a face like a descended celestial. Talent like this is vanishingly rare; the likes of it has never been heard of. You must be some little heaven-god come down to walk the mortal world. How could you possibly be Little Zhuoyu?”
Coaxed into peals of laughter, Zhuoyu said, “Shishu, you’re teasing me.”
“Not teasing. Floating Jade Mountain has produced a little prodigy—your Shishu couldn’t be happier.” Li Buwei ruffled his hair, smiling. “But why did you two sound so off just now? Quarreling?”
Zhuoyu wasn’t about to drag their squabble before an elder. He said in a small voice, “I would never quarrel with him.”
Yan Su’s face stayed cold. He said nothing.
“What brings you back, Shishu? Did Shizun call you home?”
Li Buwei’s smile faded a shade. “No. A good friend from Eastern Province has lately taken a Dao Companion and asked me to come drink at the Grand Union Ceremony. Care to come along, Zhuoyu?”
As a small child, Zhuoyu had rarely left the mountain; his only outings had been the banquets Li Buwei took him to across the land. He nearly bobbed his head in eager delight—then thought that, for now, his place was at Shizun’s side, and shook his head. “Perhaps… not this time.”
Lest Li Buwei feel let down, Zhuoyu asked with keen interest, “Is it Shishu Chongzhi of Azure Brow Peak?”
“The very same.”
“He has a Dao Companion now? What sort of person?”
Li Buwei smiled. “A mortal.”
Zhuoyu blinked in astonishment. “A mortal?”
“Mm. A mortal’s span is barely a hundred years—but once bound as Dao Companions, they may share spiritual power and fortune through the Dao Companion Pact.” Li Buwei sighed. “Yet the path of cultivation is doomed to solitude. To defy Heaven and stretch a mortal’s life so—who can say whether it will prove blessing or bane.”
Zhuoyu went quiet, thoughtful.
“Well, enough of that.” Li Buwei’s laugh warmed again, his gaze drifting between the two of them, meaningfully. “You two grew up together—your bond runs deep. Don’t let some trifling thing sour it.”
Zhuoyu pursed his lips. “I know, I know.”
Seeing that the boy seemed to have business waiting, Li Buwei said gently, “Off you go, Zhuoyu. Next time I come home, I’ll bring you wine.”
Zhuoyu nodded, and with a wince of heartache handed both Snow Lotus Fruits over to Yan Su, bowed, and scampered off.
Yan Su released a breath, soundless.
Li Buwei glanced at Yan Su and chuckled. “Would you look at my memory—came all this way and brought Zhuoyu no gift at all.”
With that, he drew from his robes an exquisite Jade Pillow steeped in dense spiritual power, set it in a case, and held it out to Yan Su. “Linyuan, make a trip for me. See it delivered to Zhuoyu.”
Yan Su knew precisely what he intended. His face darkened. “Shishu…”
“Your Heart-Purifying Dao is on the verge of breaking.” Li Buwei’s eyes narrowed faintly, his voice soft. “Zhuoyu would never bear to watch you spiral into madness and die. Say the word—even merely hint at it—and he will surely consent.”
Yan Su ground the words out through his teeth. “Then what would he be?”
Lin Zhuoyu was a living, breathing person—not a tool to be used at will.
Yan Su refused to scheme against him.
Li Buwei: “If there is true feeling, why quibble over schemes?”
Yan Su stared after the direction Zhuoyu had gone, dazed half a moment before answering low.
“It is precisely because there is feeling.”
…That is exactly why it cannot bear the slightest scheming.
