7. Escaping Troubles Only To Prepare For More
The aftermath of this dream was a bit weird. Luo Binghe did try to ask questions about his past, but all Shen Qingqiu could do was play dumb and hope the Demon Lord wouldn't notice.
He also noticed the large jump their relationship had, the alpha much more friendly with him for some reason, even helping him a bit when he could. This was probably not something the Demon Lord should be doing, helping a mere servant around.
It even got the attention of the other disciple, some asking more boldly what happened and what he had done to make Luo Binghe suddenly so... friendly. At least towards him. "I don't know?!" he could only reply, seriously unsure why Luo Binghe had suddenly become this nice to him when he had done nothing to really earn this.
But he supposed he shouldn't complain if it meant the session of taking his energy was less stressful and much more comfortable. Even his next heat, which this time he had the time to go to a more far away room, was affected by this. The surprise he had when Luo Binghe himself came to leave him one of his robes and some food. Why did it look like he was taking care of his mate?!
"Maybe he just got found of you" tried to reassure Shang Qinghua when he was done talking, "Maybe seeing you struggle on your own made him want to help you, maybe because you remind him of Shen Qingqiu".
He wasn't sure if the other omega was trying to reassure him, but it sure as hell didn't really help him feel better. Of course, it wouldn't be for him, but rather for the older version of him. He should really not get his hopes up when he knew it was easily not the case.
"Anyway, what was it that you were going to tell me the other time? About something that was about me?" he decided to ask to change the subject. Only then did the author seems to tense, looking to the side as if wondering if he really should talk about it.
"I think you would rather not know about it" Shang Qinghua finally said. "Look, at this point, I don't think much could surprise me anymore, what is it? Does Binghe have some of my old stuff?" he asked, before letting a laugh escape him, "Even better, maybe he has my older body".
This didn't make Shang Qinghua laugh and when he looked back up at him his smile faltered a bit. The man looked a bit surprised, but also sorry in a way. "You are joking me" he finally managed to get out, "He doesn't really... Why would he need it?!".
This made the other omega force a smile on his face, shrugging a bit "I really cannot tell, all I know is that Luo Binghe was absolutely obsessed with you in the past five years and wouldn't give up your body, even after having Liu Qingge regularly come to battle him, he wouldn't give up".
This made Shen Qingqiu feel a bit uneasy, what had he done for Luo Binghe to be this obsessed with him? Why wouldn't he give up his body? He tried not to imagine the worst about this situation, trying to believe there was some non-creepy reason for him to be doing so. Right?
"This is why I didn't want to let you know" admitted Shang Qinghua, "I... don't know what he's doing with it, but I know he still has it... I don't know what you did when he was younger, but he truly won't give you up". But that was the thing, he never did anything?! At least, not that he knew of.
Seeing how it had affected him, Shang Qinghua seemed to try and change the subject instead, seemingly to make him feel a bit less uneasy. It did work, yet when Shang Qinghua had to go away with Mobei-jun again, Shen Qingqiu was left alone to wonder what he should be doing. This was not something he wanted to learn and he was slightly troubled by what the Demon Lord could be doing with his body. Had he kept it all this time in the hope that his Shizun would come back? Or was it because it was the last thing he could keep from him?
That night he had great difficulties going to sleep and when he finally managed to get to sleep in hope of mindless dreams, he only woke up in a hallway. It took him a little while until he realised, he was inside a version of Huan Hua Palace, only everything was desaturated, nearly black and white.
Was he inside Luo Binghe dream again? Why wasn't it the nice scenery of Qing Jing Peak mountain, instead of this rather sad looking Palace? Or maybe was he the one having a weird dream because of his rather troubling discovery of the day. He sighed as he passed a hand on his face, trying to figure out what he should do.
He could just sit there until he woke up, or find a way to wake up.
But this sounded really boring and he was a bit curious to know what this place had to offer him. So he ended up walking around a bit, trying to push away the weird feeling of being watch by time. Luo Binghe was probably just having some good fun with his dream Shen Qingqiu, so he doubted it was him, maybe it was just his nerve playing with him.
Everything was empty, room barely furnished with anything. It was deserted, not even any faceless people just to give the idea that this dream place had people in it normally. He had thought he could find something to make this dream a bit more exciting, but now he was getting just as bored by the emptiness of the place. Only when he reached the main hall did he stop, looking to a side where he knew a door was. He had noticed it before, yet had never dared to ask about it. What was there? He had never seen anyone going in or out of there.
He looked around as if to make sure no one would see him, despite being all alone in this dream, before taking careful steps towards the room. He peaked in first, yet even this room seemed void of anything but a bed surrounded by curtains. This made him feel uneasy again, his discovery of the day coming back to him.
This was probably not one of his dreams, was he thrown into a deeper part of the alpha's mind without him knowing?! He thought about retreating, that this was all a bad idea, yet he couldn't bring himself to actually back down. He needed to know if it was all true.
So, he got closer to the bed, trying to peek in through the slightly parted curtains. What he saw made him freeze, something in his chest tightening. Laying there was his old body being held close to Luo Binghe as the man seemed to be sleeping. He slowly back away, trying to chase away the weird feeling of envy he had for his own damn body, but also shaking off the cold shiver that had come to him at the sight, only for his back to hit something hard.
"You shouldn't be here, Huang Hua" he heard whispered near his ear, making him shiver again in fright.
He spun on his heels quickly, looking behind him to see nothing was here, yet it didn't make him feel better about it. He then felt a hand placed itself on his shoulder and he froze, before feeling the hand push him forwards.
He felt himself falling for a while, only to wake up in a sudden jolt, sitting up, still trying to catch his breath, cold sweat on his skin making his clothes stick to him.
He had been caught by Luo Binghe.
He had been caught by him while he was snooping around something he should not have been looking at.
He had been caught by him while apparently still looking like Huang Hua, although the weird way of saying it made him feel uneasy as if sarcastically using that name.
He took a shaky breath, standing up to grab some clean clothes, not feeling good enough to go back to sleep. He simply washed, trying to calm himself down from what he had seen and what had happened.
All the time before he had managed to hide who he was by playing as best as he could his older role of Qing Jing Peak lord. Since Luo Binghe had never said anything, he believed it had worked well. Yet now there was no way he could hide it if it had been this body inside of the dream. What will he do when he'll see the Demon Lord later on? What was he supposed to say? 'Sorry Lord Luo, I thought this was a weird dream so I decided to just walk around the dream palace? I totally did not see what was happening' ?!
Yet his worries were changed for something else rather easily, as disciples were running around talking about an intruder. Upon hearing a growled "him again" from a passing alpha Shen Qingqiu managed to understand quickly who was the intruder, running back to the main hall to see how things were doing over there.
The two alphas were already fighting when he finally entered the room, he had been not even ten minutes ago in the dreamscape. Liu Qingge was the only talking, mainly throwing accusation at Luo Binghe. The Demon Lord wasn't responding mush, simply paring the attacks with his sheathed swords while keeping the body close to him, which was probably enough to anger Liu Qingge more.
Shen Qingqiu really wanted to do something, but what could he do? In one way he was still a bit unsure how to take that Luo Binghe had held onto his body for five years, while on the other he didn't want for Liu Qingge to battle like this against the Demon Lord, he had no chances.
Yet, surprisingly, Liu Qingge seemed to find an opening and out of not wanting to get the body damaged, he saw Luo Binghe let go of it. Without thinking his body moved alone and Shen Qingqiu Caught his own old body, unsure what to do with it now.
"Shizun" he heard.
Of course, Luo Binghe would call for his Shizun when the body had suddenly been snatched away from him. He looked up, but rather than looking at the Demon Lord, his glance passed over the Peak Lord. The man was giving him an odd look, his eyes flipping from him to the body in his arms.
When he seemed to take a step towards him Shen Qingqiu couldn't control himself from taking one back, cradling the slightly bigger body in his arm safely. He wasn't exactly sure what he should be doing now, but having to alphas look at him so intently was not helping him figure it out. Didn't help that he wasn't sure what he should be doing.
So he decided to slowly try and make his way towards the door, taking away with him the body. This seemed like a good idea, he could figure out what he would do afterwards since he had no clue what both of these alphas were trying to do and it was starting to make him feel a bit weird that his dead body was so demanded.
"Come back here" he heard growled to him, making his whole body shake at the sound of it, his breath catching in his throat. Yet he didn't stop, even making his step quicker. It was too late to back down, he needed to get out of here and figure something out. His pace was even more hurried when the sound of clashing swords was heard close behind him, not wanting to be stuck between that mess.
He was caught by surprise when an arm looped around his middle, pulling him onto a sword that had quickly zoom next to him. He would have been reassured if the scent he had caught was the one of spice and warm spring day, yet it wasn't it. It was an unfamiliar scent; his memory having maybe smelled it somewhere before.
He looked up, only to see Liu Qingge trying to escape with him. Wasn't he aiming for the body?! Why had he caught him too?! When he looked back, he saw Luo Binghe looking at them, yet he was surprisingly not running after them, despite something in his eyes telling him he wouldn't stay still for a long time.
So he tried getting out of the steel grip around his waist, making it harder to keep the sword stable in its flying. Liu Qingge did try to make him stop, only for Shen Qingqiu to feel a hand grab the back of his neck, as if to make him submit a bit.
He couldn't control the growl that came to him, startling the alpha behind him, looking down at him with a weird expression. Yeah, how do you like that? Having an omega not bow down to your request? He was sure he had managed to teach Liu Qingge to treat omegas better than this in the past. Maybe he should retry again later on, to show him it didn't always work.
He needed to get out of this. Sure, he felt like he would soon need to go to Cang Qiong Mountain, surely Luo Binghe would go retrieve his body, but he didn't want to be stuck there. Clearly, he resembled Shen Qingqiu too much and he didn't want to be locked somewhere else, the Huan Hua Palace had already been enough.
Then he thought about the fact that Liu Qingge was mainly aiming for the body, so he decided to use it to do his escape. He could most likely sacrifice something that wasn't useful to him anymore. "This is what you want?" he asked, only to receive a confused look, "Then you should go get it".
With this he threw his old body into the air, looking at it falling dangerously fast to the ground from where they were in the sky. This made the grip around him loosen enough for him to slide out of it, using his sword to fly away. Like he thought Liu Qingge went after the body first, leaving him enough time to escape.
He did need to run away for some more until the Peak Lord got tired to chase him, at least he assumed. Maybe he thought he wasn't important enough, which did annoy him a bit, but he decided it was good enough. If he thought for now that he was just a cultivator who surprisingly bears many resemblances with Shen Qingqiu, then that was enough for now. With how obsessed Luo Binghe seemed to be with his older self, it would probably not be surprising that he was stuck in the Huan Hua Palace.
He did have to settle down a little bit when he was finally sure to be alone, thinking over what he should be doing. Luo Binghe would surely go to Cang Qiong Mountain, there was nearly no doubt in his mind, he wouldn't just give up this body when he had... taken care of it in the past five years.
And this meant it could end rather badly because he doubted any of the Peak Lords would give him up after Liu Qingge had finally managed to get him back. It was truly meant to have everyone fight and he wasn't interested in hearing the Cang Qiong Mountain got burned down by Luo Binghe because he decided not to do anything. He should probably be going right now, the travel time from here wouldn't be nothing after all.
How strange would it be, to finally go back to Cang Qiong Mountain after all this time.
Sorry if anyone wanted me to actually write about all those events in detail, but I would most likely not have really found a way to makes these events play that much more different than they did in the novel, other than add little differences here and there. This part still ended up being nearly 3k words, longer than I thought it would be.