Svsss mamajiu ^o^
Shen Qingqiu hated demons. It was a core characteristic of his, the teachings of a righteous cultivator.
He’d never get attached to one.
So… Why is it that when faced with the child that’s been thrust upon him—a child he hadn’t even wanted—he seems to hesitate.
Shen Yuan wasn’t a monster. He wasn’t cruel. He was a child. A child that took after Shen Qingqiu appearance-wise but retained none of that spiteful personality. A child that always had a little attitude with the man who’d raised him.
A child who was now dead. Struck down by the blade of none other than Yue Qingyuan. A man who was usually merciful as he was aggravating. The man that had abandoned him.
Shen Qingqiu's heart lurched, his chest filled with a tightness he had never felt before. Why was it that when they were disciples Yue Qingyuan hadn't been willing to draw his blade to save him yet now, in the face of no true danger, he was willing to draw it to strike a child down.
A child who had done no harm.
...
Yue Qingyuan could only watch as Shen Qingqiu crumbled, grabbing the thing and pulling it close. He didn't say anything to Yue Qingyuan. He just pressed his face against the demon's chest as if searching for a heartbeat.
Shen Qingqiu was confused. Truly. What he held in his arms was a heart demon that'd been fed enough to take on a physical appearance. A heart demon nurtured by the blood and qi of Shen Qingqiu.
If there was another way--any other way to let Shen Qingqiu keep it in a way that wouldn't harm him, Yue Qingyuan would've taken that path without a second thought.
But there wasn't.
There was no way to remove the negative affects of the demon Shen Qingqiu called 'A-Yuan'. No way to prevent this 'A-Yuan' from leeching off of Shen Qingqiu's life force. No way to change 'A-Yuan' from what he was at his core, a parasite.
...
LEHHH I revised this so much and toned down the angst SOOO much I am kinda sad about it
Basically Shen Qingqiu's had a really bad heart demon (NAMED Shen Yuan) for like the past two years. It genuinely is a parasite that appeals to Shen Qingqiu through a mixture of emotional, mental, and hormonal manipulation.
Normally Shen Qingqiu wouldn't have gotten attached but it'd spent years unresolved, breaking down his defenses bit by bit until it could manifest physically and begin leeching off of his life force.
Yue Qingyuan and his curse of not explaining probably genuinely didn't see the need to explain why he was killing a heart demon.
MQF staged an intervention after SQQ was found Qi deviating once more. He noticed how strange the energy in SQQ's body was, how nearly all of it seemed to be depleted. After a bit of questioning it wasn't that hard to figure out what was wrong. Figuring someone had a major heart demon wasn't an issue of reading into what they would answer, but rather what they wouldn't.
Shen Qingqiu refused to entertain the idea of a heart demon, going silent whenever MQF poked around the topic.
ANYWAYS UHHH THE HEART DEMON ISN'T ACTUALLY SY, IT'S JUST NAMED SY
That way when actual SY comes and becomes a disciple SQQ can project on him and yayyy issues!! Like it's not the heart demon that he'd been forced to cherish, that he'd been manipulated into loving... But maybe he's projecting those lingering feelings of maternal-ness onto SY and idk
OUM I'LL WRITE SOMETHING FLUFFY FOR Y'ALL BECAUSE THIS IS A HOT MESS LMAO
