Not passing along the title because it's actually pretty garbage series in execution, but I saw a fun premise that would make a very nicely twisted RuoSang plot, sooooo....
Nie Huaisang, whose older brother has been hit with a slow-acting poison by the Jin sect. They're keeping him alive but infirm as incentive and will only give him the full antidote if Huaisang marries and kills Wen Ruohan so they can claim the power vacuum.
The wedding is quick and goes off without a hitch because Wen Ruohan is taken with his new bride on sight, and Huaisang manages to carry out the assassination that night.
Only... the next morning, Wen Ruohan affectionately greets him at breakfast.
Attempt after attempt, Huaisang succeeds, only to fail again and again because no matter what method he uses, no matter how thoroughly he disposes of the corpse, Wen Ruohan revives and returns. Worse, he seems to find the murders *cute*, like a game.
Then, he reveals he's known all along that the Jin were trying to usurp him, and was allowing *that* too, just because it amused him. If he so wishes (and he has done before), he can simply wipe the plans from the memories of Jin Guangshan and his co-conspirators. Purge the poison from Nie Mingjue's body, even, so it's like nothing ever happened. Wait to see what sort of entertaining ideas they come up with next.
He'll even allow the murder "game" to continue for as long as Huaisang keeps convincing himself he can escape. It's cute, after all.
past ruosang, nhs mourning secretly alone (or with my/jgy if you need another character in there) for wrh? thanks!!!
"I think something's wrong with me."
Meng Yao looks up from the report he's been drafting at the small, rough sound of his former young master's voice.
When his father arrives -there will be a victory banquet, he's already been informed, paid for by the Jin coffers that were barely dented by the war effort while other sects are struggling to rebuild- he will deliver it and the head that has been sequestered away in one of the qiankun bags on his hip.
"You've been through quite the ordeal, gongzi," he says, keeping his voice neutral despite the fact that he has been concerned about Nie Huaisang's state of mind since the Undying Sun fell from the sky.
Since well before that, in fact.
He hasn't even asked for a bath to get rid of the blood yet, when Meng Yao had expected that to be the first thing requested.
"It would be more unusual if you weren't affected."
Nie Huaisang shifts, hunching in on himself more, and Meng Yao bites down on an involuntary shudder when he sees copper and jade and malachite peeking out from the edges of borrowed robes and blankets.
He's still wearing the collar.
Meng Yao hadn't thought to remove it, figuring Nie Huaisang would have found a way to do it himself as soon as possible, but he's still wearing-
Mouth pressed into a thin line, Meng Yao opens one of the drawers of his desk to take out some small metalworking tools, since it's unlikely the key will be found quickly. "Gongzi... let me take that off of you."
His fingertips haven't even made contact with the metal when Nie Huaisang flinches away from his hands with the smallest shake of his head, eyes wide, yet glazed over in a way that makes his emotions unreadable.
Ah... That's what he means by 'something wrong'.
He lets out a breath, then lays down the tiny cutters and reaches out instead to touch the almost completely dried blood spatter across Nie Huaisang's face that makes his eyes stand out even more. "Alright. Not yet," he murmurs, soft and soothing. "Let's at least clean you up, then, before you wind up having to get your hair cut to remove all that blood."
There is a moment of hesitation, then Nie Huaisang nods.
A full bath would still be best, but he doubts Nie Huaisang's mental and emotional state is good enough to let himself be that vulnerable yet. So he settles for heating up a basin of water and the mix of cleansers and oils he'd designed for getting blood out of his own hair during his time working in the Fire Palace, then coaxes Huaisang to lie down on one of the benches for an easier angle.
Wiping the blood from Huaisang's hands and face are easy enough, but his hair takes even more effort than Meng Yao had predicted, and Meng Yao painstakingly goes in small sections, first kneading in the oil blend, then making short, slow comb passes.
He doesn't look at the mess they're making on the stone floor, the melted blood and other things pooling there.
It won't matter.
As he works, he thinks again about the contents of the bag he will be presenting to his father.
Surely, his father will not care, or even notice, if there is something missing.
Pausing in his task, he wipes his hands and gets up. "Just stay put," he says in response to Huaisang's questioning noise, then turns to walk over to one of his other workstations.
When he opens the bag, the head inside looks almost unnervingly serene, staring sightlessly at nothing.
Much like Huaisang has been the entire time he's been washing his hair.
Swallowing back the bile that rises up threateningly in his throat, Meng Yao focuses his attention on the guan the head still wears, on the layers and layers of golden flames around its central ruby-studded sun, on the droplet chain that had always dangled down over its owner's forehead.
It's this that he carefully snips free, hiding evidence of the alteration by folding the connecting links back under the sun.
And it's this that he carefully presses into Huaisang's hand in a gesture of understanding as he sits back down. "If you will let me remove the collar when I'm done with this, I can have it fashioned into something... smaller. A bracelet, perhaps?"
A bracelet, like the droplet chain, will be easy to hide.
It will be a little secret, just between the two of them.
Nie Huaisang folds his hands in against his chest, then closes his eyes and nods. "Thank you."
Posting more old stuff. Finally gathered together enough of my brain to clean up the Petshop of Horror AU shorts and put them in a vaguely proper timeline order.
---
Nie Zonghui is fifteen the first time he enters the aviary and sees a boy watching his movements instead of a bird.
It's thrilling.
It's terrifying.
He's been told all his life what an honor it is to even be considered a potential partner by Sang-er, but for it to actually happen-
"Remember," his mother warns him gently. "You have to wait for him to pick you. Very bad things happen to those who try to jump ahead with him."
He nods nervously, remembering how a man from one of the other great sects had "vanished" a year previously after attempting to force the issue, and even the man's own sect leader had written it off as a careless (stupid) mistake and informed the Nie sect there would not need to be any recompense.
For a time, nothing else seems to change, other than the knowledge he is now in a different -unspoken- class of disciple.
Three months later, he is taking a break from his studies when a graceful hand snitches a slice of peach from his plate.
That in itself is nothing new, as Sang-er has always been playful whether bird or boy, but the heat in a bright green stare when Nie Zonghui looks up makes his mouth go dry with a mix of nerves and anticipation.
Sang-er smiles and offers him a hand up and he goes more than willingly, hoping he won't embarrass himself.
---
He's not sure how to feel the day that his perception of Sang-er changes.
He's heard others talk about nervous anticipation, or hope, or even fear, but...
"Talk to me, Jue-er," Sang-er murmurs, running long nails that feel like talons through his hair.
It's a really pleasant feeling, though it doesn't disperse the discomfort in his stomach.
"It feels like an obligation," Nie Mingjue mutters.
The look that crosses Sang-er's face makes him feel like an asshole, but now that the words are coming out, he can't make them stop. "Bond a saber, lead the sect, fuck the resident good luck charm. All the requirements to be Nie-zongzhu laid out nice and neat."
The petting stops.
"You know, I only accepted three of the men who were Nie-zongzhu before you," Sang-er says, then quietly gets up and walks back to the aviary.
Oh.
Wow.
Now he feels like an even bigger asshole.
Sang-er doesn't change back into a bird, but that doesn't lessen the feeling that he has ruined things between them.
He knows it's on him to apologize, but he doesn't know how.
In the end, it turns out not to matter much. Sang-er meets him in his new rooms two weeks after his father's funeral.
"Remember. I chose you," Sang-er says as he sinks into Nie Mingjue's lap and nuzzles up under his chin.
He won't forget.
---
One of the girls who worked with his mother loved telling outlandish stories of how cultivators would tame magical creatures to protect their sects.
He had only ever listened with half an ear, dismissing most of them as pure fantasy.
And then his new sect leader introduces him to the prettiest boy he's ever seen and tells him that is actually a bird.
"Hm. Not to you, apparently," Nie Mingjue says, looking more amused than anything.
"I- is that bad?" Meng Yao asks, suddenly fearful that he's failed some kind of secret test.
One explanation later, he's still reeling a little bit.
He has been warned that Sang-er might take a while to choose him, or won't choose him at all. But to even be considered an option is overwhelming.
The stories all said that one had to be an exceptional cultivator to draw the interest of such a being, and he is... very much not that, especially not after being trapped in a bottleneck for the better part of a year.
So when he returns to his room one evening and finds Sang-er waiting for him, all curled up with his chin resting on his knees, he can't help blurting out the question that has haunted him for weeks.
"Why me?"
Sang-er tilts his head, then unfolds himself gracefully and slips off the bed. "I don't see why it matters, but we can help each other. All power has to be refined before it can be used."
It's an offer to crack open the bottleneck for him, Meng Yao realizes, and his chest and throat close up with painful knots of emotion. "Please. I'll give you anything you want," he begs involuntarily, the words escaping despite being sticky in his mouth.
Sang-er smothers a laugh with a gauzy sleeve, the sound making him shiver. "There's no need for that kind of dramatic proclamation, Yao-er. Just relax," he says, and then leans in to kiss him.
---
He is working the festival crowds, picking pockets and snitching snacks, when a rumble of excited awe goes up in the town's center square.
"I can't believe they've allowed him out of the fortress," one woman murmurs to her companion.
"How much do you think old man Chang paid to get them to have him bless the area?" he hears another man say.
"If it means the crops survive this year, they can have the whole sect treasury as far as I'm concerned," his friend replies.
Curious despite himself, Xue Yang slips through the very, very few gaps in the mass of people towards the center of all the attention.
He's almost made it to the front of the crowd when he finds himself on his face in the dirt.
He raises his head, intent on cursing out whoever tripped him-
-and finds himself locking gazes with a pale-eyed boy sitting amongst the green and grey robes of a sect that isn't the Changs.
The boy smiles and gives him a little wave.
Xue Yang feels dizzy.
Unfortunately, the crowd shifts again, and he doesn't get the chance to see the stranger again before they leave.
---
The first time the pretty boy in green and gold silks that are far too revealing for Qinghe's weather smiles at him, all sweetness and sharp teeth, Lan Xichen feels dizzy.
Having heard about Sang-er from Mingjue-xiong, he knows what it means that he is seeing a boy at all, but he never thought... he never considered...
He was the heir, meant to marry and have children.
Nie Mingjue outright laughs at him when he brings it up. "As if bedding Sang-er has ever stopped anyone else, even a Lan, from doing that."
He's not sure what to think of that. It should be... indecent that anyone of his sect would have slept with someone, especially a yao, that they had no intention of wedding.
He starts to wonder if maybe he's a little naive.
There's a prickly little itch in the back of his brain that says maybe he should ask Sang-er more about it.
That's... all he'll do...
Surely.
—
It's… not.
When, much later, Lan Xichen lies dazed with a pretty boy still curled up against his chest, he has a whole new perspective on things.
---
While Jiang Cheng has heard of Qinghe's strange pet almost all his life, most of the gossip being either jealousy from the Jin sect or denigration from the adults of his own, he doesn't actually meet Sang-er until almost a month after Wei Wuxian has returned from the Burial Mounds.
"Aren't you supposed to be lucky?" he asks, too bitter to remember at that moment that he should be seeing a bird and not a boy.
Sang-er tilts his head in an unnervingly birdlike manner and levels him with an unreadable stare. "Would you like to know how this would be going if I wasn't here?" he asks mildly.
Jiang Cheng quickly shuts up and retreats to meet with the weaponsmiths.
It's another five days before Sang-er approaches him, alighting in front of him just before he can enter the tent where he sleeps. "My blessing is starting to wane. And you're going to need it for the next push your martial brother is planning."
Jiang Cheng swallows hard. "Shouldn't you be going to him, then?" he asks, trying not to sound envious.
Sang-er leans up on his toes and wraps slender arms around his neck, then kisses him lightly. "No."
Oh.
Okay.
He is… very okay with this.
---
Wen Ruohan had only been the third son of the sect, no one important really, when he found himself among Sang-er's potentials.
The first one from outside of Qinghe Nie. The only one among his brothers and sisters.
His father had been smug; his siblings jealous.
Wen Ruohan himself had only been smitten.
Be it the possibility that a little of the pretty boy's luck had, quite literally, rubbed off on him, or a newfound desire to prove himself worthy, he had quickly surpassed his older brothers to steal away the position of sect heir.
But as his strength and standing grew, so too did his jealousy. The fact that Sang-er belonged to Qinghe Nie, that he had other mates, including the sect leaders…
It was hardly fair, was it? When Wen Ruohan could best them all?
And, for three generations, that jealousy quietly simmered. Even as he found himself eventually drawn in by Nie Haoran's irreverent, jovial attitude, found himself becoming friends with the fourth Nie-zongzhu he'd known in his lifetime, it remained under the surface.
Until it escaped.
It is only after Nie Haoran's death that he learns that his old friend and supposed rival was never one of Sang-er's chosen. That for all the clear fondness, they had only been a sect leader and a sect pet.
It's too late to fix things. Sang-er never requests to meet him again.
When the other sects foolishly decide to follow the Nie in standing against the inevitable, he immediately orders the capture of Qinghe's most valuable pet. But Sang-er proves to be surprisingly elusive for a creature of such fame and recognition, and every agent he sends inevitably winds up sentenced to the Fire Palace for failure… until they stop coming back at all, either due to cowardice or because Sang-er has taken note that he is being hunted.
And then, one night, he wakes from his bed in the Palace of the Scorching Sun to find Sang-er watching him from the sill of the open window.
As a bird, not a boy.
Incensed by the very clear rejection, he attacks the bird, not caring whether to capture or kill, and the bird retaliates with talons and wing edges as sharp as honed steel.
Badly injured and mind in a storm, he does not react fast enough when the spy within his ranks (and one of Sang-er's current chosen), steps out of the shadows of the servants' entrance with a sword in hand.
---
He only ends up in Qinghe at all because their father sends him along with Yao-ge as "extra hands", which they both know just means getting rid of him for a while.
At least Yao-ge is nice about it, sharing lunch with him on the way.
"Should I go... somewhere?" he asks his brother nervously as they enter the gates.
"Hm..." Yao-ge flags down a servant who seems to recognize him. "Would A-Yu be permitted to see the aviary?"
"As long as Sang-er allows it, it's fine. Let's stop by the kitchens to get some fruit for the little ones."
"Little ones?" Mo Xuanyu asks.
"Some finches and nightjars found their way in over the last winter. Sang-er likes them well enough, so we never chased them out."
—
There are not a bunch of little birds and one large bird in the aviary.
There are a bunch of little birds and a boy his age whose pale-eyed gaze makes him feel like he's going to faint from his heart beating too fast.
"U- um-"
The servant who escorted him in makes a noise like trying to turn a laugh into a cough. "I'll let Zongzhu know a new candidate has arrived."
Wait, what?
He quickly turns around, but the door has already closed.
i would love to hear more about this part! (this is from your ideas on wrh's soul catching a ride with mxy)
"The thing that makes him most nervous is the spike of Interest the first time he meets with Nie Huaisang after gaining his unwanted companion. He's been interested in Nie-xiong since they first met, but this is different. Predatory. Like a cat eyeing up a bird. He's getting ideas in his head he never would have considered before and he doesn't know how to feel about it."
The last... hours?... days?... have been a fog.
He's had problems with headaches for as long as he can remember; times where he could barely open his eyes without feeling like someone was trying to shove their thumb in his eye, or the miserable squeezing pressure that always let him know when a storm was approaching... nevermind the throbbing of bruises or possible concussions and the unconscious clenching of his jaw compounding the underlying aches.
This is different, though. This pain pushes and pulls behind his eyes, leaking out and then swelling back up as if something is trying to decide whether it wants to invade his head or escape it.
He's sure it has to do with his unnerving passenger, but with no way to get an answer, or even ask the question, that remains a guess.
At least Yao-ge has been somewhat sympathetic; they can't take the risk of him showing up at the infirmary for anything more than basic injury treatment and he can't stop assisting with the demonic cultivation studies entirely without both of them incurring the demanding rage of their father, but Yao-ge has been quietly passing him pain medication and keeps his workload to a minimum.
But the fog is getting thicker. His thoughts are struggling harder to form. He genuinely can't remember the last time he's slept, and he's so tired-
Contact against his forehead makes him jump and recoil with a startled hiss, only for his defensiveness to turn to guilt when his swimming vision clears and he finds it's Nie-xiong leaning down in front of him, eyes wide and hand raised in a clear fever-checking gesture.
"There you are," Nie-xiong says, concerned tone unmistakable. "I called your name a few times, but you just kept staring at the floor."
"'m sorry," Mo Xuanyu mumbles automatically, then shivers when the back of the other man's hand rests on his forehead again, gentle and warm.
Something ripples through his brain from that point of contact, and it doesn't feel like a fever-checking. Doesn't feel like it's coming from Nie-xiong at all, actually, like it's something already...
Something already...
It takes him too long to realize Nie-xiong is speaking to him again, and when he blinks slowly at the other man, Nie-xiong's expression is even more worried.
For him.
Worried for him.
Pretty, sweet Nie-xiong worries for him.
Slowly, almost as if the air has turned to honey and he is trying to swim through it, he reaches up and takes hold of that graceful hand, staring at it.
There is a gold bracelet around Nie-xiong's wrist.
For a moment, a chain attached to it flickers into view.
Wait... what?
Mo Xuanyu blinks several times, but the chain never reappears. Why... had he...?
"I think we should get you back to your room, Yu-er. You clearly need rest at the very least."
"I... I haven't been sleeping well," he admits, the words feeling strange and goopy in his mouth, like whenever he had a cold and had to cough up stuff.
"Did you like the magnolia tea last time?" Nie-xiong asks, then continues when he manages to nod. "I'll get you more today, then. The maker opened a second shop here just last month, so it won't take long at all."
Gentle hands help him to his feet, and the world swims again for a moment. When his vision settles, he finds himself staring down at Nie-xiong's throat.
Nie-xiong isn't even wearing a necklace, but again, a chain flickers in his mind, this time with a collar to match.
That sensation from before, like a small stone dropped in a pond, returns, but this time he recognizes...
He...
No, it's not just him.
Is it?
He has always... he is a filthy creature, he knows this. From the first moment they met, he has been soaking up as much of Nie-xiong's kindness and attention as he can, the knowledge that he was unworthy of it only making him more greedy for it. Hungry, even.
But this...
He shudders, and Nie-xiong has to catch him when his legs buckle.
The shackles around the other man's wrists return.
It really isn't him, Mo Xuanyu realizes. His worst possessive thoughts had never gone this dark... This... It's like whenever he caught glimpses of the remaining pieces of Nie Mingjue, except even more...
It really isn't him. The presence... the ghost, it's-
"Yu-er."
He sucks in a sharp, icy gasp, and finds he's kneeling on the floor, Nie-xiong crouched in front of him.
He -not he- wants to wrap his hands around that elegant neck and squeeze.
Once Nie-xiong is unconscious, he'd have time to make sure this pretty bird can't fly away again.
His own throat feels tight all of a sudden, like he wants to cry.
"It's only a little bit further," Nie-xiong tries to encourage him, and that makes him aware that yes, they did reach the hall where his room is located while he was stuck in his thoughts. "And then you can lie down while I get your tea and some food."
It's a struggle to get back to his feet because- because-
Those gentle hands help clean his makeup off and get his outer clothes off and weave his hair into a simple braid, and he has never felt so spoiled in his life, yet the hunger doesn't ease even a little but.
Instead, it even grows worse, gnaws at him like a starving dog with a bone.
"I'll be back soon," Nie-xiong promises.
'You'll never leave again,' a smooth deep voice Mo Xuanyu has never heard before in his life replies in the back of his head, and he can almost feel teeth being bared and claws being flexed with it.
As soon as his bedroom door closes, he grabs the small washbasin from his bedside table and throws up.
Finally managed to wrestle my brain into letting me hammer out the last of the ruosang request, so here we go.
---------------
"I want to talk to your father, or uncle, or master, or whoever he is to you."
The quiet one blinked at him. For a moment, Huaisang wondered if the other boy hadn't heard or didn't understand, then he got a nod.
"V- very well," came a mumble so soft he almost didn't hear, then the quiet one reached out and tugged the shade he'd been escorting by the arm, grasping it firmly as if it were solid though it looked like red smoke.
After they left, all he could do was wait more. Too nervous to sleep, he sat against the headboard of the bed with his knees drawn up to his chest and looked anywhere but at the door as he tried to keep his breathing from locking up in fear.
If this gambit failed... No, no, no, he wasn't going to think about that.
He wasn't going to think about anything until his host arrived.
And Wen Ruohan did open the door a surprisingly short amount of time later, that familiar indulgent smile already painted across his face.
"My nephew tells me you have something you wish to discuss," he said pleasantly.
Huaisang swallowed hard and un-balled himself to sit crosslegged on the bed, folding his hands in his lap in an attempt to hide the fact that they were shaking. "I-" he said, then had to swallow again from the way the word stuck in his overly-dry mouth. "I want to make a deal," he managed on the second try. "You... you want me alive and here. I don't know why, but you do. And I want to be alive and go home. So... so could we c- compromise?"
The smile didn't waver, but something in the Lord of the Afterlife Realm's eyes sharpened, making him feel like prey being observed by a predator deciding whether or not he would be good to eat. And there was something else he couldn't quite understand, like... approval? Why-
No, focus.
"And how do you propose we do that?"
"Splitting time?" No, no, that sounded too unsure. He tried again. "I could go home part of the year and stay here the rest."
It still wasn't a great deal. His brother was going to be angry about it, though whether he'd be angrier about Huaisang getting to stay some months or having to leave some months, he wasn't sure.
A quiet chuckle broke into his thoughts, but Wen Ruohan had turned away to signal one of the servants out in the hall -human or shade or...something else, he couldn't tell- with a hand gesture he didn't recognize.
Before he even got the chance to ask, the servant -now revealed as a shade- had returned, bearing an elaborate glass vial on a tray made of the same carved red stone as most other things in the realm.
"There are very few mortals who would attempt to bargain with a god. Particularly with me," Wen Ruohan said as he picked up the vial. "Therefore, I must test the honesty and commitment of your proposal."
Huaisang stared at the vial, a sense of dread beginning to knot in his stomach. "Meaning..."
"For every minute you can withstand the effects of this, you will earn a day in the mortal realm."
For all his cousins and his brother's friends thought otherwise, Nie Huaisang was not an idiot.
This was another trap.
This was absolutely another trap.
But he was completely out of other options this time. If he refused this 'test', he would never get another chance.
Wen Ruohan was holding out the vial like bait in a snare.
Nie Huaisang took it.
There was no hiding the shaking of his hands anymore as he fumbled the stopper out, then took several deep breaths before tossing it back like the time he'd snuck some of his brother's wine when he was too young to handle it.
It was worse.
It was so much worse.
He couldn't even manage a scream as it boiled down into his stomach like liquid fire and made every muscle in his body go tense at once, dropping him to his knees to curl up with his forehead on the cold stone floor.
He couldn't count the seconds, couldn't open his eyes, couldn't breathe, there was only the horrible flames radiating out from his stomach, searing organ and bone and muscle until-
He finally, blessedly, lost consciousness.
---
As he slowly began to come to, he registered that he was moving.
Not by his own power, it was something like- was he on a boat?
No... no, he was being carried. Why-?
He cracked his eyes open and was very proud of himself for not automatically yelping and trying to escape when he realized he was being carried by none other than Wen Ruohan himself.
"Welcome back, little bird," the god said, amusement once again crossing his face at Huaisang's reaction.
"What- what happened?" Huaisang asked weakly, his voice a rasp stuck in his throat.
The last thing he remembered-
"You continue to impress me," the god replied. "That tincture was one of my very own creations, made to fell heroes arrogant enough to breach my realm."
"How long did I earn?" he asked again, dreading the answer.
The god's smile grew, though what emotion drove it, he couldn't tell this time. "Three months of the lunar year."
That- that much? Had he really-
Wen Ruohan stopped, and Huaisang finally looked at their surroundings, finding they were at the edge of a long tunnel, and outside-
Trees.
Grass.
Flowers.
Sunshine.
The god set him on his feet almost delicately, and Huaisang stumbled forward, hesitantly putting his hand out into the light as if it would prove to be an illusion.
It was warm.
A hand rested on the back of his neck just like the first time he'd woken up, and he stiffened in fear that he was going to be dragged back. But instead, he felt a strange sensation wind around his throat, and when he pressed his fingers to it, he found a thin band of... something. He couldn't see if it was stone or metal, but he knew what it was.
A collar.
"Remember, little bird," the Lord of the Afterlife Realms murmured close to his ear. "You will return at the end of three months. Or be returned."
Huaisang let out a shaky breath. "U- understood."
"Good. Fly home then, little bird."
And then he was alone.
Slowly, gingerly, he stepped out into the sunlight, hissing and covering his eyes at how bright it was even though he had missed it dearly.
Then he took another step.
And a third.
At that point, he was suddenly hit with a raging hunger as time caught up to his body, his stomach snarling loudly.
Okay... okay. Food, then home. Or food on the way home, if he could figure out where he was relative to where he lived.
As he stumbled forward, the collar around his neck shifted slightly, and he shuddered.
He wasn't looking forward to having to explain this to his brother at all.
Hiii!! For the writing jam! Can we have ruosang as something greek mythology related? Preferably the Hades and Persephone myth with some spookiness to it ٩( ᐛ )و
Thank you for your work, Biscuit. I am deeply on love with ur writing <3
Aww, thank you! I apologize that this is still incomplete, but I wanted to go ahead and post this part so that you wouldn't be left hanging. Hopefully I'll have the rest done within this weekend or so!
---------------
For all his cousins and his brother's friends thought otherwise -for all he wanted them to think otherwise- Nie Huaisang was not an idiot. He was deeply, frustratingly aware of how many of the divine protections his brother had that he lacked, and how easily injured he was without them, and thus never let himself get so engrossed in the subjects of his tracking that he forgot his surroundings.
So, naturally, when he had noticed the oddly unnatural way the stream in his path shimmered, he had gone looking for a tree or some other sort of bridge to cross rather than attempting to ford the shallow water himself, as anyone with sense would do.
It should have been fine.
It would have been fine, had the water not suddenly turned a deep flaming red and apparently acted with a mind of its own, slashing the tree to splintered pieces before he could make it all the way across.
It slithered over the chunks of wood collapsing beneath him and up his body, sticky and heavy as honey, and muffled his scream as it dragged him down far deeper than the stream should have been. Struggling only made it cling more, forcibly squeezing the air out of him through his nose and making him unable to get any back.
The last thing he remembered before he lost consciousness was the feeling of something like claws sinking into the wrist of his desperately outstretched hand.
---
Awareness came back to him slowly, with the cold being the first thing that registered. Shuddering, he tried to curl himself into a ball to salvage some warmth, but found his limbs didn't want to respond.
Before he could start to work up a panic, a large hand rested on the back of his neck and the numbness in his arms and legs vanished.
"Apologies," said a smooth, rich, unfamiliar voice. "But precautions had to be taken. You were quite delirious when you arrived."
Arrived… where?
The hand moved away and he slowly tried to sit up, even that little bit of motion making him dizzy at first. When his vision settled back into focus, he found that he was in what would have resembled a sickroom, had it not been for the carved red stone tables in place of cots.
One of which he'd been lying on, which both explained the cold and brought up so many new questions.
The hand returned to sweep his hair out of his face and he reflexively turned his head to follow it, his breath catching in his throat when he saw his host.
The man was… pleasant to look at, to put it mildly, but what had made Huaisang freeze was the sight of the crown that held his hair back.
The first set of magical items any child learned about was the Rising Moon and Setting Sun, crowns belonging to two of the most powerful deities in the pantheon.
"A second apology must be made as well," said Wen Ruohan, Bearer of the Setting Sun and Lord of the Afterlife Realms said with a smile that somehow came off as both kind and extremely unsettling at the same time… the latter possibly because of the fact that Huaisang was now nervously aware of just how much power was radiating from him.
"A… A second apology?" he asked, managing to keep his voice from squeaking.
"For an unfortunate mistake, you see. The creature that accosted you was an experiment being conducted by one of my sons and my niece. One that was not permitted to reach the world of the living."
Huaisang swallowed hard, unsure which sounded worse; the idea of a thing like that having managed to escape the underworld, or the tone of Wen Ruohan's voice on that last sentence. Even if their creation had almost killed him, he found himself feeling a little sorry for the son and the niece for whatever their punishment might have been. "But… I'm not dead… am I?"
Amusement flickered across the god's expression. "You are not," he agreed. "However, you are not ready to be returned to the middle realm yet. There is still some way to go before you have fully recovered."
"How long has it been already?"
"Three days."
Three days… three days wasn't bad. He'd only left home one day before that, and his brother was aware -didn't approve, but was aware- that his bird-tracking trips could take as long as two weeks. So he still had some time to finish getting better before his not coming home would be noticed.
Another mostly vibes post but RuoSang where Wen Ruohan suddenly got killed generations before he would have befriended Papa Nie. (Maybe he wasn't even sect leader yet, and it was due to someone else in the competition for the role?) Anyway, however he died, it caused him to be sealed into an artifact (book, amulet, whatever) and decades (centuries?) of plotting revenge and slowly going mad later, he suddenly finds himself in his own sect's library, all ready to rain bloody vengeance on the disloyal dogs of his sect (he has no idea just how long it's been)-
And then there's a noise behind him and when he turns, he finds a boy who is very much *not* of his sect (were the Nie even a sect yet when he was trapped?) holding the artifact with a wide-eyed mix of confusion and fear.
(Nie Huaisang obviously wasn't expecting this at all, he was just curious when he found the thing while being allowed to look around the library.)
Anyway, something something Wen Ruohan forcibly enlisting Huaisang's assistance in catching up on how much he's missed and getting his revenge and finding he is very entertained by this clever little bird. Perhaps when he has completed his original goals, his next one will be finding a way to keep his new pet.
