After being badly frightened, Xu Min resolutely chose to keep playing dead right in front of the two of them. No matter how Qin Shu called for him afterward, he refused to budge.
In the end, they still had to rely on Ya Ya. Her mother led her downstairs to learn how to recognize people. The little girl was not very strong, but she was certainly brave. She immediately crawled under the table out of curiosity and squeezed in beside Xu Min. The two ghostly heads bumped together as they stared at each other, and only then did they finally manage to coax him out.
And really, although Xu Min instinctively hid behind Ya Ya when he crawled out… the big ghost and the little ghost actually got along quite well. Since both of them were dead souls, a strange sense of closeness naturally arose between them.
Qin Shu had no intention of making things hard for Xu Min. He took Pei Zhao back upstairs to the bedroom first, leaving the terrified fox a little breathing room. Teasing him a couple of times was enough. He could not actually scare the man unconscious.
It was also a good opportunity to tidy up. They had not been home for many days. When Qin Shu brought Pei Zhao back to rest earlier, he had only hurriedly changed the bedding, but now that Pei Zhao was awake, suddenly everything looked wrong to him.
There was dust on the nightstand, dust on the curtains, the windows were not clear enough, and the scent tablets in the wardrobe needed replacing… Of course, all of those problems could actually be solved with a single cleaning spell. But Pei Zhao liked sorting problems into categories and resolving them one by one, nearly turning the entire second floor into a victim of light pollution.
Qin Shu was used to it. He waited until Pei Zhao finished dealing with the wardrobe that “didn’t smell good enough,” then silently entered the scene, picked out some fresh clothes, tossed them all into his storage space, and folded the things they would not need in Jing City before placing them neatly back into the wardrobe.
Because if he folded them crookedly and shoved them around, Pei Zhao would pinch the soft flesh at his waist and let him experience ascending to Heaven on the spot.
In truth, if the wardrobe actually needed organizing, Pei Zhao only had to snap his fingers, because spell cultivators were simply that fashionable. Dragging Qin Shu over to help with the chores was, at the end of the day, because life needed a sense of participation.
And for all kinds of reasons neither of them could quite explain, Pei Zhao had always liked watching him bustle around. Qin Shu had no complaints about that. He had become highly skilled at folding clothes perfectly and could even… divide his attention during the process to discuss something important with Pei Zhao.
“So you really are a Ghost King?”
“More or less.”
“Xu Min said ‘more or less,’ and now you’re saying ‘more or less’ too.” Qin Shu laughed. “See? He answered honestly. He didn’t smear you at all.”
Pei Zhao tilted his head slightly and carefully organized his thoughts. “Maybe because I’ve never strongly identified with that title. It never felt especially real… I don’t have subordinates, I don’t have an army, and I haven’t really managed the ghosts at No. 2 High School.”
“Hey, I disagree. Your management style is extremely direct.” As Qin Shu spoke, he hung up the scarf he had worn before and replaced it with two gray, mist-colored ones, using the movement to demonstrate. “Whoever disturbs your peace, you just go crunch and they’re dead. Simple, brutal, and extremely efficient.”
Pei Zhao slowly lowered his gaze to the cashmere scarf wrapped firmly around his neck and was silent for a moment. “So you don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.”
“You killed other people, not yourself. What could I possibly think is wrong?” Qin Shu looked completely matter-of-fact. Then he quietly tightened one end of the scarf and immediately added, “You’re not allowed to think about killing yourself. If you’re going to die, you can only die by my hand.”
Pei Zhao froze. Dark light surged through his golden-amber eyes, and Qin Shu caught every tiny change.
Hearing Qin Shu’s half-joking threat, there was no resistance in his eyes and no grievance. Instead, an odd sense of recognition surfaced there.
It was as though some memory buried deep in the past had suddenly leapt free and fit perfectly over the scene before his eyes.
He only said softly, “Qin Shu, I can’t breathe.”
Qin Shu stared at him. “Zhao Zhao, do you need to breathe?”
“No.” Pei Zhao closed his eyes. “But I like pretending… pretending you can strangle me to death. If I pretend long enough, it seems to really start working. Little by little, I can feel what it’s like to be alive.”
“Really? Then why are you closing your eyes?”
“I’m embarrassed.” Pei Zhao leaned into his arms, burying both his cold face and the fluffy scarf in the hollow of Qin Shu’s neck. He even explained with great seriousness, “My kink is strange. Of course I get embarrassed saying it aloud. Unlike you. You never get embarrassed no matter what you do.”
Qin Shu: …
That was a little unreasonable. Qin Shu could not stop himself from sucking in a breath. His head nearly exploded from hearing that, and he wanted nothing more than to swallow the person in his arms whole. The fierce attitude he had worn a moment ago softened instantly.
Truthfully, he thought he embarrassed rather easily too. But under circumstances like these… Qin Shu simply could not stay tough. He did not want to argue indignantly against Pei Zhao’s accusation, and there was no need to debate it anyway.
So he could only hold Pei Zhao and agree mindlessly. “Fine, fine, I don’t get embarrassed. Clearly there’s something wrong with my brain. I’ll work hard to fix it. But I’m begging you, ancestor, don’t say things like that outside the bedroom. Sometimes you suddenly drop one sentence out of nowhere… and you can scare people to death.”
“Mm.” Pei Zhao was obedient now. He stayed against Qin Shu and thought for a moment. “Right. We can talk about everything else slowly, but there’s one thing you need to know beforehand.”
“…What? I suddenly have a bad feeling.”
“It isn’t bad, but it might be a little strange… I’ve been reading the ancient books Zuo Zhe left behind. Ancient qi refiners lived for far too long and got bored, so they participated in a great many discussions and studies involving Dao companions of different species.”
“…Mm. So, put simply, research into every possible yao-human-ghost-deity combination?” Qin Shu hesitated. “The kind of material they can’t show on television?”
Pei Zhao nodded lightly. His face was still buried against Qin Shu’s shoulder, leaving his voice muffled. “Mm. So I deliberately read all of it in advance to learn. We count as cross-species too… and now we cross several species at once.”
“That makes so much sense. So for a situation like ours, is there an explanation?” Qin Shu had barely asked before hesitating again. “Does it still matter if both people are men?”
“…Mm. It does. As long as they’re Dao companions recognized by Heaven and Earth and properly joined, but they aren’t of the same species, there will be some degree of effect.”
“…Mm. What kind of effect?”
“The first time, if the results are too good…” Pei Zhao was quiet for several seconds before saying faintly, “I won’t have any secrets left from you. And neither will you from me. The problem is on my side. Ghosts all have a similar issue, and the higher their cultivation, the easier it is for them to… expose their weakness and leak soul power when they let down their guard.”
It was actually a very abstract way of putting things, but Qin Shu had the vague sense that he had just heard something quite extraordinary.
He fell silent again and struggled to digest the enormous amount of information. Only after a long while did he lower his voice and carefully confirm, “If the results are too good, then while our bodies and minds are connected and there’s no distinction between you and me… our memories might accidentally connect too?”
“Mm. If I had never known about this, perhaps the accident wouldn’t happen.” Pei Zhao sighed. “But I already know. I’ve read every relevant ancient text so thoroughly I can recite them backward. Even if you don’t believe in fate, I’ll still be influenced by all this knowledge I can’t forget. Under that kind of psychological suggestion… there’s probably no avoiding it.”
“Then… then what can we do? I can’t deliberately make the results bad.”
The moment Qin Shu said it, both of them fell silent at the same time. Pei Zhao even abruptly straightened and stared directly into Qin Shu’s eyes.
They looked at each other for a moment. Everything that needed saying was already understood.
“The results have to be good,” Qin Shu said first, his gaze quietly turning resolute.
Pei Zhao slowly nodded too and threatened him coolly, “If you deliberately make the results bad, I’ll strangle you.”
“That’s right. That’s the spirit.” Qin Shu grew even more determined. “It’s New Year. Nobody’s leaving disappointed.”
“You aren’t afraid I’ll see your memories?” Pei Zhao raised an eyebrow.
Qin Shu was not intimidated in the slightest. “I’ve done plenty of things I feel guilty about, but not one of them has anything to do with you. If I had to pick the thing I felt guiltiest about, it’d be realizing at the beginning that I kind of lusted after your body. That doesn’t count as something to feel guilty about anymore. Knowing you, if I didn’t lust after you at all, that’s when you’d want to kill me.”
“That’s more like it.”
＊
A short while later, when the two of them strode downstairs with heroic determination, their inexplicable air of marching onto a battlefield nearly scared Xu Min straight out of his body again.
After taking the pills and regulating his qi, he could already return to human form. But if he suddenly went stiff and dropped dead while looking human… the visual effect would be on an entirely different level.
Besides, there was a child watching now, along with the child’s parent. Newly appointed Teacher Xu cared at least a little about maintaining face and wanted to preserve his image as a heroic teacher.
So he did not dare move. He could only sit stiffly on the sofa, force his facial muscles tight, and speak through the tension. “You two students… w-what happened this time?”
“Hm? Nothing happened. We’re tidying up so we can go to Jing City for dinner.” Qin Shu was in a good mood. Smiling, he picked up the little girl and bounced her lightly in his arms. “Ya Ya, have you ever ridden a dragon? Want to ride White Dragon Brother and fly through the sky?”
Ya Ya tilted her head. “I want to ride Brother Yuanbao!”
The moment she finished speaking, the little centipede crawled out of her sleeve and climbed around her neck, coiling into a circle. It looked just like a ruby necklace made specifically for her and even went surprisingly well with her princess dress.
Ya Ya was not afraid of bugs at all. When its legs tickled her neck, she instead burst into giggles. She had even started calling Yuanbao “Brother Yuanbao,” making it obvious that the two of them got along very well.
Thinking of Yuanbao’s ordinarily suffocating level of psychological maturity, Qin Shu suddenly found it completely unsurprising. Xu Qian treated Yuanbao like a child. When Ya Ya played with it, meanwhile, it was simply two lonely children finally finding a friend they could play with.
Qin Shu smiled. “All right, then let Brother Yuanbao carry you and Mommy, and we’ll head out together for a big meal. The wind is strong up there and it’ll be cold. Remember to take care of Mommy later. Don’t let her catch a chill.”
“Cold? Mommy needs a thick blanket!”
At Ya Ya’s words, the deathly pale Xu Min’s eyes suddenly lit up. Seizing the opportunity, he hurriedly transformed back into a fox, swished his thick fluffy tails, and bounced around on the sofa. “Ya Ya, I’m warm! How about you use me as Mommy’s blanket?”
His movements were exceptionally fawning, and if one listened closely, there was a faintly ingratiating note in his voice too.
Qin Shu looked at the excited Ya Ya reaching for the fox, then shot Xu Min a speechless glance. “All right, all right. I know you don’t want to travel with the two of us. Yuanbao has never traveled such a long distance on its own, so I was already planning to have you stay with Ya Ya. That’s part of a bodyguard’s job.”
“Ahem… Thank you for your understanding, Student Qin.”
Xu Min also realized he had overdone the fawning and looked a little embarrassed.
But when Qin Shu put Ya Ya down and she hugged Xu Min tightly and started petting him with all her strength… the fluffy-creature instinct that left him helpless beneath human fingers soon became impossible to suppress. Xu Min melted into a puddle at once, going soft in her arms like a fox-fur scarf.
Liang Ming Yue did not interfere with her daughter’s fondness for fluffy creatures. If anything, she looked deeply happy. She even came up with a small trick of her own, taking the neatly folded napkin from her pocket and forcibly rubbing the dried blood across her phone camera lens before going wild taking pictures of her child from every angle.
Even Qin Shu had not thought of that. Cameras could usually capture ghostly figures, but manifestations were not guaranteed every time, nor were the images always clear… Yet adding a little special “ingredient” to the lens unexpectedly produced excellent results.
After letting the child laugh and play for a while, the white dragon, who had barely managed to stabilize the situation in the Dragon Palace, finally arrived late. Its eyes carried an exhaustion no one had ever seen there before.
It was the exhausted expression of a dragon who had never held a job, knew nothing about personnel management, and had suddenly inherited an enormous mess.
It sprawled down on the front lawn and urged them gloomily, “Let’s go, let’s go. Hurry up, eat, and hurry back. Your daddy here is busy…”
Qin Shu wanted to laugh but did not expose it. He casually climbed onto the dragon’s back with Pei Zhao and patted the white dragon’s slightly stiff neck. “Ao Wang, there’s a child here. Watch your language. If I ever hear Ya Ya copying you and going around calling herself ‘your daddy’… I’ll come to the Dragon Palace the very next day and make iron-pot stewed dragon.”
“First thing you do when you see me is threaten me with death. Very civilized.” The white dragon rolled its eyes. Its attitude was terrible, but it still changed how it referred to itself. “I can’t be bothered arguing with you.”
“Yes, yes, I’m the uncivilized one. Hurry up. Yuanbao’s shadow has already disappeared. It flies even faster than you.”
“Oh, really? That little shrimp’s gotten capable, huh? Watch Big Brother pass it in an instant!”
The instant it finished speaking, the snow-white dragon shot forward like lightning and rose into the air at terrifying speed, slicing the surrounding air into a piercing shriek.
Qin Shu narrowed his eyes against the fierce wind and looked. Even that faint aura of workplace exhaustion clinging to the white dragon had suddenly vanished. Its eyes now held nothing but a burning desire to win.
When it finally caught up with Yuanbao, the white dragon even deliberately swished its enormous tail in passing, its intent to provoke unmistakable.
A little stimulation was all it took. This fellow’s psychological age… was probably not much better than Yuanbao’s.
But Qin Shu certainly was not going to complain. He liked fast rides. It saved time.
Both the white dragon and Yuanbao, thoroughly provoked, completed an extremely brief aerial race and reached the Jing University cave with unprecedented efficiency.
The fox had turned into an exploded ball of fur, while the little girl’s braids had been blown into a postmodern bird’s nest. The visual effect was spectacular.
Liang Ming Yue had been protected by Ya Ya and Xu Min and had not caught much wind, but she had clearly still been badly frightened. She silently took motion-sickness medicine from her little bag, which had lost its hanging charm during the flight, and dry-swallowed three tablets.
The two creatures who had carried passengers were not even satisfied yet. While Qin Shu could not be bothered paying attention to them, they exchanged a remarkably tacit glance, sneaked away together, and flew back into the sky to hold another round.
Yuxu hurried out of the spherical space and stared at the chaos before her in astonishment. “What happened this time?”
“The Dragon King’s son and the Cave God’s son are competing over flying speed.” Qin Shu shook his head helplessly. “My fault. I stirred up their competitive streaks. If they don’t settle who wins, I’m afraid this won’t end.”
Yuxu froze, then laughed. “Interesting. I wonder which of them will win…”
Before she finished, an unfamiliar voice, majestic and resonant, cut her off.
“Does that even need asking? My son, of course!”
Qin Shu’s eyelid twitched. He quickly grabbed Ya Ya by the back of her collar and tugged her behind him, shielding her from the surging dragon qi rolling directly toward them.
Even though Qin Shu had never heard the voice before, he instantly knew who this fellow with his own built-in golden special effects had to be.
The chief culprit responsible for spoiling the white dragon rotten, Ao Run, Dragon King of the West Sea. His voice arrived before he did.
Everyone fell silent at the same time. Xu Min could not even breathe. He immediately curled into Ya Ya’s arms and started playing dead. When Ao Run slowly walked out of the spherical cave and stood in the open with his hands clasped behind his back, imposing and dignified, Xu Min still did not dare open his eyes.
Qin Shu, of course, dared to look. And he looked very carefully.
Heroic brows and bright eyes, hair as white as snow, a firm square face, nearly three meters tall, and an extraordinarily powerful bearing, with just a slight outward turn to his gait… Add in the dragon race’s hereditary huge golden eyes, and even in human form Ao Run remained absurdly distinctive.
Once he had looked his fill and broadened his horizons, Qin Shu immediately smiled and broke the silence. “Hello, Uncle. Could you please rein in your dragon qi a little? We have quite a lot of evil spirits over here. Soaking in dragon qi that dense makes them feel awful.”
“Hahaha! My oversight. Then I’ll do as Young Friend Qin says…” Ao Run laughed three times and was just about to cast a spell when he suddenly paused and turned toward Yuxu, who stood with her arms folded. “Yu’er, help me rein it in? I’m not very good at it.”
Qin Shu’s eyelid twitched again. Because the second half of what Ao Run said to Yuxu… was so deliberately softened that it almost had no edges left.
To describe it more precisely, he had instantly transformed from a mighty brawny man into a delicate gentleman from an ancient romance, and the transition was impossibly smooth. Clearly this was not the first time he had switched faces like that.
And Yuxu herself did not even seem to notice anything wrong. Lazily forming a hand seal, she cast a spell and covered Ao Run in an invisible layer of magical power.
Whether it was a special property of the Evergreen Art or Ao Run doing it deliberately, the dragon qi that had been baring its fangs and claws instantly calmed. It was as though it had returned home, obediently curling back inside.
No matter how one looked at it, the two of them were clearly very close. Being forced to watch the romance of parents who were not even your own parents was a strangely subtle experience… especially when Qin Shu and Ao Run could barely count as relatives while their generational ranks remained a complete mess.
The white dragon insisted it was Qin Shu’s big brother. Qin Shu sometimes called Yuxu “Sister.” Now that he had met Ao Run, somehow only “Uncle” felt right. Yet Pei Zhao and Ao Run were dragons of the same generation, while Pei Zhao was Qin Shu’s boyfriend…
The question of seniority was too complicated. No matter how he tried to untangle it, it remained a hopeless knot.
Then again, Qin Shu had no right to comment on anyone else’s parental romance. He and Pei Zhao were far worse about kissing wherever they happened to be. At least these two could maintain a proper social distance in front of others.
So Qin Shu coughed lightly, forcibly looked away, and turned toward the Five God-of-Wealth brothers peeking curiously from behind the cave. He put on a concerned expression. “King Xiancong, has Uncle already been cured?”
“Ah, how could it possibly be that fast? There’s still a long way to go! Half of His Majesty the Dragon King’s body is nothing but bones. Growing all that flesh back won’t be easy. And even when the flesh grows back, His Majesty still needs to recuperate slowly and regrow the outer skin and membranes. Those are important, and they’re not easy to grow.”
King Xiancong clicked his tongue in amazement. “Even after the skin is restored, he still can’t move around freely. We have to closely observe the regeneration of his scales and adjust things in time… As my fifth brother put it, if the result isn’t beautiful, wouldn’t that damage the dignity of royalty? I agree! Dragons must be handsome. A Dragon King can’t lose face!”
“Xiancong, you’ve put so much thought into this! There’s no need to trouble yourselves so much. Being alive is enough!”
Ao Run’s mighty, rough laughter returned. He pulled King Xiancong over and threw an arm around his shoulders, sighed deeply, then launched straight into a speech. “I suffered this calamity as a death tribulation. I had already prepared myself to die and distributed my property down to the last detail, never imagining there could be such an outcome today. The fact that I can take human form today, stand here with hands and feet, has nothing to do with royal dignity, and I no longer dare speak of something so empty as face… It is because all of you knew it was impossible yet still did it, defied Heaven, and fought out a sliver of life for me with your own hands!
“After walking once through the Void, it feels no different from being reborn. In this second life as a dragon, all of you are my sworn companions through life and death, my guiding stars! I have reflected deeply and now understand the weight of family. Forget dignity… if I did not still have responsibilities to bear, I wouldn’t even want to sit on the Dragon King’s throne anymore. I only hope that one day, when the world is peaceful, I can quietly become an ugly old man, travel the mountains and rivers with my Yu’er, and throw Dragon Palace affairs to the children so they can get headaches over them instead!”
“Wahhh, Big Brother Ao Run, beautifully said!”
Ao Run truly was someone who had spent years leading others beneath the sea. When he gave a speech, his cadence rose and fell with tremendous force, every word powerful and resonant. Qin Shu realized that Ao Run did not seem to be the type who liked elaborate etiquette either. Everything he said was simple and direct enough that even a jellyfish with no brain could understand it, yet somehow his words carried extraordinary infectious power.
The Five God-of-Wealth brothers came from humble roots themselves and especially loved Ao Run’s style of speech. King Xiancong turned out to be surprisingly easy to move to tears. The more he listened, the more moved he became. He started wiping his eyes with his arm right there and, holding back sobs, thumped the Dragon King hard on the back. “Family is the most important thing! Sworn companions through life and death should support each other, rely on each other, risk their lives for each other! Come, come, come, let’s become sworn brothers!”