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The first time Shen Yuan had peered at his new face in a bronze mirror, he'd mainly just thought about how he looked now. Shen Qingqiu was much prettier than he imagined while he'd been reading Proud Immortal Demon Way, and let's be honest- suddenly transmigrating into a new world with a new body and a new face was a bit shocking, okay?! Of course he'd be curious about what he looked like! And for that moment, everything was still so overwhelming and confusing that he shoved most of his thoughts away in favor of trying to figure out how to cling to the protagonist's legs without acting too OOC. So his first look at himself was a simple observation before he'd needed to move on with the plot and figure out what the fuck he was supposed to do to prevent being turned into a human stick.

Eventually, though, things started settling down as he got used to being in this new world and used to his role within the story. He'd actually started patting himself on the back for doing such a great job with accepting the fact that he'd died and transmigrated into the shitty novel he'd just finished. He guessed that most people would have panicked much more than he did. Even if he was still a bit prone to panicking in his mind, nobody else could tell, so it was fine!

The thing that was less fine was that the slight release of pressure brought on by becoming familiar with the world is that it gave his brain energy to latch onto other things that he had so far been able to successfully ignore.

Things like the fact that he was literally inhabiting someone else's body.

It was kinda fucked up to think about, but at least he could say that he didn't feel too bad about taking over considering this body had belonged to the scum villain. He most definitely deserved it, and it's not like Shen Yuan chose to take over his body, so there was no point in feeling too guilty about it.

Regardless, the next time he spent longer than a moment looking into a bronze mirror, he couldn't help staring at himself. Not in an admiring way, but rather, he couldn't help feeling confused. He knew this was supposed to be his face now, the face of the scum villain Shen Qingqiu, the face that he'd been using long enough now that he should be used to it, and he was used to it.

Except it just didn't feel right.

He tried to wrinkle his eyebrows, and his face hardly twitched. But he opened his mouth, and that worked just fine. He blinked slowly, green eyes staring back at him when he reopened them.

The mirror seemed to shrink away from his intense gaze, while everything else blurred in his periphery. A hollow feeling overtook his chest, and suddenly, he was hyper-aware of his heartbeat, a heart that wasn't really his (but now it was?).

He felt cold, and it took far too much effort for him to raise a hand to his face, idly poking one of his cheeks. He hardly felt it, both his face and hands feeling numb.

His ears began to ring, and now, he felt like he couldn't move at all, like he was a puppet whose strings had been cut. And maybe he was, with his smooth porcelain face that barely even twitched with emotion.

He didn't know how long he sat there staring at himself, but eventually, he started to register noises from outside the bamboo house and his surroundings became more clear. Shortly after, he found himself able to break his staring contest with the mirror. It took him a bit longer to get his limbs moving again, but by the time Luo Binghe entered to bring him a new pot of tea, he appeared normal, even if he still felt a bit detached from it all. With Shen Qingqui's aloof nature, no one else would know the difference.

It was fine.

Surely, this was an expected side effect of transmigration. Of course he'd find it strange to have someone else's face after having his own for his entire life. Maybe he just needed more time to get used to it than he thought, but it was fine.

After all, he had more important things to worry about, like not being brutally tortured and killed by his white sheep of a disciple.

XXX

The detachment that had slowly faded to rarity came back with its full force after he'd shoved Luo Binghe into the Abyss, worse than it had even been at the start. He'd found that he couldn't stand remaining on Qing Jing peak anymore, so he only returned to it when he was forced to, either because his meridians needed to be cleared or because Yue Qingyuan requested for him to return.

He knew he was neglecting his other disciples, but most of him actually didn't care. He knew Luo Binghe wasn't really dead, despite everyone else believing that he was mourning. Luo Binghe wasn't dead- he was going to come back and be fine and take over the world and torture him and kill whoever he wanted and marry his hundreds of wives, and that was just how the story went. He wasn't sure how he was ever supposed to change that when the damn System outright forced him to shove Luo Binghe down there, as if that one event wouldn't be enough for the same plot to come to pass.

And so, Shen Qingqiu spent his days wandering the cultivation world, fighting whatever beasts and demons showed up to bother humanity to keep his mind from thinking about it.

Even still, it was impossible to distract himself all the time. There were always moments, especially during his travels from place to place, when he had nothing to distract himself and was forced to think.

Mostly, he'd dread the fate he knew was to eventually befall him, terrified of the pain he was going to have to go through, all to just eventually lead to his agonizing death after agonizing torture. He'd think about how, if the injuries he'd sustained so far in this world hurt X amount, how badly would it hurt when his limbs were torn off? Sometimes, he'd wonder if it was worth it to try to cling to any hope of changing things. Wasn't it really too late now? Maybe he'd be better off if he just managed to die before Luo Binghe returned. It would be less painful that way, and after all, he'd gotten a few extra years, right? He could have just died back in his original world without ever having been sent here, so he was already living on borrowed time. And if it was to avoid being tortured, maybe it really was for the better. Even though he really didn't want to die, every day closer to Luo Binghe's return was a continuing gamble- one more day with a risk that he'd face his original fate.

But still, he continued to take that gamble because he wasn't quite ready to die yet. He hadn't wanted to die in his original world, either, but he had, and this was his second chance. He didn't want to waste it. And besides, Luo Binghe was going to be in the Abyss for 5 years, right? That meant he should still have some time left.

However, there was also the guilt following after him, no matter where he went. Of course, he knew that Luo Binghe would ultimately be fine. He'd leave the Abyss with his OP skills and begin his war path to destroy everyone who had ever wronged him and pick up chicks along the way. Having read the original story let him know that Luo Binghe wasn't really dead. On the other hand, his knowledge of the original plot also told him that his disciple was, in fact, suffering pretty badly right about now. Luo Binghe's time in the Abyss wasn't exactly pleasant, and even if he would be alive by the end of it, he was going to suffer and sacrifice to get there.

And that was Shen Qingqiu's fault. Most of the time, he was content to blame the System for forcing his hand. He had to shove him. If he hadn't, he would have been sent back to his original world, and he'd be dead. If he'd been given any real choice in the matter, he would have chosen not to. He would have told Luo Binghe that it was okay that he was a demon, that it didn't change who he was. He would have brought him back to Qing Jing Peak, brought him home, and things would have been able to go back to the way they were for the past couple of years. Luo Binghe would never have to blacken, and Shen Qingqiu could avoid becoming a human stick. It would have been a win-win scenario! But no the system decided that Shen Qingqiu shoving Luo Binghe into the Abyss was a canon event and he couldn't interfere.

Blaming the System didn't always work, though. Sometimes, he couldn't help but blame himself. Sure, his hand had been forced, but he had been the one to make the choice, been the one to stab him and toss him away to face the horrors of the next couple of years. He'd been forced, but he did have another option. He just didn't want to take it.

He could have chosen to refuse the System. He could have not shoved Luo Binghe down and just accepted the consequences. He could have died.

It felt a bit unfair, though. He had never asked for this role, never wanted to treat Luo Binghe like the original flavor treated him, never wanted to betray him. He hadn't even decided to come here; it had just happened. And while he could have just died then, it was hard to feel grateful for a second chance when that second chance dictated to him what he could/could not do at such important moments. Why should he have to die because he didn't want to hurt someone that the System said he had to hurt? And since he knew Luo Binghe would live, was his own life really an equivalent exchange?

It wasn't fair to him, but he supposed that it wasn't quite fair to Luo Binghe, either. He didn't know anything about any of this. As far as he knew, he had been tossed into the Abyss to die and all his suffering there could have been avoided if only his master wasn't such a terrible person. He didn't know why Shen Qingqiu shoved him down there, or that he had been forced to. He just knew that he'd been betrayed. Luo Binghe's suffering was Shen Qingqiu's fault.

The guilt and fear weren't helping anything. He frequently found himself overwhelmed by them, sometimes making it so he couldn't even actually do any of the monster-fighting he had set out to do. Sometimes he ended up curling up at an inn or inside a cave or even standing in the middle of the road and just staying there for days on end until he ended up snapping out of it. Other times, he'd keep walking without really remembering where he was going or what he was doing or how long he'd been doing so. Sometimes he'd catch his reflection in a pond or a reflective object and just stare and stare and stare and wonder how things had turned out like this. How did he go from being some random loser who did nothing but read all day to a scum villain in a cultivation novel? Was any of this actually happening? Was any of this real? Or was he just imagining all this in the moments before he kicked the bucket? Or, hell, he could even be dreaming. Maybe he never died at all, just dreamed he did. Maybe Proud Immortal Demon Way hadn't even ended yet, and that shitty ending was just something his brain cooked up while he was asleep.

But he always seemed to come back eventually, reattaching himself enough to be certain that all this was actually happening.

He was back on Qing Jing Peak for one of his rare visits, only returning because an enraged Liu Qingge had tracked him down and growled at him about how it had been far too long since anyone had last cleared his meridians and 'did he want to fucking die like an idiot because he was too stubborn to return back to his own damn sect' and so on and so on (hypocrite). Shen Qingqiu honestly didn't even know how long it had been since he'd last returned. If he had to guess, he would have said it had only been a week or two, but based on Liu Qingge's angry ranting, it must have been much longer.

Perhaps, part of why he wasn't quite sure of the time was because he was a bit detached from himself even when Liu Qingge showed up. He hadn't even recognized him at first, just started walking by him unseeingly until the other man reached out and grabbed his arm, glaring as he assumed Shen Qingqiu was just ignoring him. The contact brought painfully sharp awareness to him for just a moment, but even still, it took him a moment to figure out who the man grabbing him was. It took him even longer to greet him, his monotonous voice being mistaken for his usual aloof manner yet again.

He didn't remember the journey back or if he'd greeted any of his disciples. He did know that Mu Qingfang was holding his hands to clear his meridians, though. He also vaguely remembered drinking a bitter medicine. He didn't notice when the man frowned.

"Shen-shixiong, is something wrong?" Mu Qingfang questioned him.

The question had to be repeated before he answered it.

"No, I'm fine."

Mu Qingfang put a hand to his forehead to check for a fever but found none.

"You aren't feeling ill?" he pressed. "Your qi seems unsettled."

"I'm sure it's nothing significant."

"Even still, I think you should probably stay on Cang Qiong Mountain for a while," Mu Qingfang suggested. "Perhaps you've been putting your body through too much stress with all your traveling. You do need to remember that Without a Cure still takes its toll, even with us managing it, especially if you don't return so we can manage it."

"Alright, I'll stay for a bit."

"Good."

Shen Qingqiu left Cang Qiong Mountain the next day.

XXX

Eventually, as the rest of the plot unfolded around him, Shen Qingqiu's periods of detachment decreased in frequency again. There were too many experiences and sensations keeping him bound to the body he was inhabiting for him to drift away quite so often. But again, as things settled down, the frequency gradually started to climb back up again.

He tried to hide it as best he could when it happened, which only worked so well because of Shen Qingqiu's original personality, but even still, he wasn't particularly successful. Luo Binghe often picked up on something being wrong, even if he didn't seem to quite understand what it was. Sometimes, he assumed that he'd done something wrong and started crying and apologizing, and Shen Qingqui just didn't have it in him to open his mouth and correct him. He knew Luo Binghe got upset when it seemed like he was being ignored, but Shen Qingqiu just really couldn't help it. He usually had some level of awareness of his husband trying to get his attention, but he could only very rarely force himself to address him when he was in these states. More often, he'd just continue staring, maybe getting one of his fingers to twitch.

It didn't happen all the time, and he was pretty sure Luo Binghe was getting used to it, even if it clearly still upset him. Sometimes, he would ask Shen Qingqiu about it, but he never knew how to answer. He didn't entirely understand what was happening himself, and the parts he did understand were things that he couldn't possibly explain. He couldn't explain how being in someone else's body made him feel because then he would have to explain the someone else's body part.

Luo Binghe was unhappy with the lack of an explanation, but he accepted it anyway and tried to find ways to help. Through trial and error, he'd found that it often helped to light strong incense or to hold him in a tight hug. Granted, he would have preferred if he could hug his Shizun like this when he was in a more normal state, but he didn't begrudge doing it in this sort of situation, either. Sometimes, Luo Binghe would just keep talking about things until Shen Qingqiu found himself able to reply.

He didn't know why it worked, but at least there was something that helped at all. It was better than wandering the countryside without any awareness of what was happening or curling up in a bed unmoving for hours or days on end.

He couldn't help appreciating his husband, despite what it took for them to get to this point.

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