Chapter Text
Mu Qing’s hands clench in his lap. Only with the barest trace of tension, however; he does not want the whites of his knuckles to show, because then he would notice, and any crack in his calm facade would signal weakness to the other man.
He sits across from him, dressed in the reddest of robes, a single braid falling over his shoulder. It takes Mu Qing a moment to look him in the eye; mirthful, cocky expression, formal body language, and if Mu Qing had been an outsider looking in on the situation he would have thought this was a meeting between business partners and not an interrogation.
Paradise Manor is completely silent, a stark contrast to the loud din of ghosts and mortals alike on the streets. “General Xuan Zhen,” Crimson Rain Sought Flower asks after a moment of silence, a pleasant, empty smile on his face. “Why have I caught you gambling today?”
“The Gambler’s Den is a place for gods and ghosts alike,” Mu Qing says flatly, copying word for word what an attendant had relayed to him. “Does it matter why I’ve come in the first place?”
Mu Qing had not meant for his divinity to slip like that. After four centuries of godhood he had seldom traveled to the world of mortals in disguise; on the rare occasions he did come down it was to provide aid, and even then he did not necessarily have to manifest a corporeal body. Something tells him that even if his disguise did not slip for a fraction of a second Crimson Rain would have known regardless. The way he speaks gives him away: fully and completely confident, knowing that he has the upper hand in this situation.
“If it didn’t matter I wouldn’t have stopped the game in my midst,” Crimson Rain says, still holding the pair of dice in his hands. “Ten years of your lifespan for my help? Did you think I would allow such a meager bet to be placed? That’s comparable to a rich man handing me only a few coins. You should have known better.”
Mu Qing grits his teeth. He stares down at the table between them, the darkened wood contrasting the blood red accents in the room. “What would you like? Fifty years? A hundred?”
Crimson Rain humphs softly, a dark nail catching on the edge of a die. “That’s not necessary. I have no interest in adding decades to my life. I have no intentions to perish anytime soon, and I will not fade away so easily. You said you wanted a favor from me, right? How about three favors in exchange for one?”
Mu Qing nearly stands up in his chair. “You want three favors from me? In exchange for only one? That’s not an equal transaction.”
“The extra two are tax and interest.” Crimson Rain rain sounds disinterested, resting his head on his hand, still staring at the die. “I’m not personally acquainted with you, but I have my sources. You wouldn’t seek my help unless it was something truly serious. Something that must be kept a secret.”
His observations were correct. Mu Qing would rather choke on his own tongue than admit it though.
“I’m being lenient here,” Hua Cheng says, taking his silence as an admission. “Three favors in exchange for one. Word will not get out. While it would be a lie to say I hold no ill will towards you, I certainly don’t want to see you fall from grace.”
He’s silent for a moment before he speaks. “A bet,” Mu Qing says. “It was a bet, not a deal.”
“You would have lost,” Crimson Rain says matter-of-factly. “I’m not being cocky; I’m simply stating the facts. No one has ever lost against me. A deal is better than you losing for nothing in return.”
Mu Qing has been backed into a corner. He hates to admit it, but Crimson Rain is right. All the good luck talismans he had stored on his person would be reduced to nothing.
“I want you to promise one thing to me,” Mu Qing says. “Do not make me murder or kill.” Mu Qing is no stranger to death- he is a martial god, after all- but the idea of killing in the service of such a wretched man makes him feel sick.
Hua Cheng mulls it over for a moment. “Fine,” he says. “You have my word. I won’t make you kill.”
Mu Qing narrows his eyes. He knows he has ulterior motives, but so long as he’s not going to kill in his name he feels he can live with himself.
It was just three favors.
“Deal,” Mu Qing says, offering his hand. Crimson Rain reaches his hand forward but does not take it; he lets his hand linger in the air for a moment, a hair’s breadth from his own.
“I have several conditions as well,” he says. “You will not tell any of my secrets, General Xuan Zhen, especially once your debt has been paid. I’m being generous enough as it is. The moment any kind of news leaks, even the very mention of this transaction, you can expect all your temples to be ash by dawn.”
A chill runs down Mu Qing’s spine. He does not doubt his words for a moment. “I understand.”
“A deal it is,” Hua Cheng says cheerfuly, sounding pleased with himself. He shakes his hand. Hua Cheng’s hand is cool against his.
When their hands part Hua Cheng leans back in his chair, his braid moving with him. Something glitters in the dim light, catching Mu Qing’s eye. A small coral pearl at the end of his braid. A bolt of dreadful familiarity strikes him, eyes going wide.
Hua Cheng gives him a knowing look. “Familiar?”
Mu Qing stands on shaky legs, disoriented. One eye. He glances down to the cursed blade that sits on Hua Cheng’s hip, the single red eye glaring at him in the hilt. Red eye. He would recognize that eye anywhere.
Mu Qing lets out a harsh breath. “You-”
“We can reminisce later,” Hua Cheng says airily, waving his hand in a dismissive motion. “I’ll have my attendants escort you out. And lastly, let me reiterate- if word gets out you can say goodbye to your godhood. Don’t forget to choose a better disguise next time.”
He’s gone so numb with shock he doesn’t even say farewell. A ghost assistant escorts him out of Paradise Manor and onto the crowded streets. He melts into the crowd, the strange sights and smells barely even phasing him.
Of course he remembers. How could he forget?
It had been centuries since he’d caught the child falling from the wall. Yet, clear as day he could still remember what had been going through his head- an instantaneous reaction, causing him to abandon his role in the parade and leap upwards. Little did he know that the Crown Prince had leapt as well- Mu Qing, being marginally closer to the area had managed to catch the child first, his body knocking into Xie Lian’s, the force of their mutual impact knocking the breath out of their lungs.
The child was frightened and bewildered to begin with, falling from such a fatal height, and the ghost mask upon his face was definitely not helping. In that brief moment’s time he had taken up his saber once more and began to duel Xie Lian, the clashing of their weapons ringing out above even the cries of the crowd. It all happened in the blink of an eye. He doubted that more than a few people in the crowd had noticed that the ghost was now cradling a child in his left arm as he struck out with his right.
The child was crying and whimpering, and as Mu Qing glanced down between the strikes of his own weapon he noticed how small and raggedy the child was, the bandages wrapped around his head covered with filth. Probably a street child who’d leaned too far forward in the excitement of the parade. He was looking up at him with fear now, and Mu Qing could not blame him; his own ghost mask was grotesque, the kind of thing that would have given him nightmares if he were a child himself. Yet the child did not try to scramble away, clinging to him like he was a lifeline.
“Don’t be scared,” Mu Qing hushed quietly, but he doubted the child could hear him over the violent clashing of their weapons.
Moving his focus from the child to Xie Lian, Mu Qing realized with growing horror that the prince’s mask had slipped off.
He would be blamed for this.
And after they collected themselves and acted like nothing had happened, the parade coming to an unfortunate end after only three rounds, Xie Lian slew Mu Qing in front of the crowd. He let himself fall to the ground as though he were really pierced, the child in his arm shivering and trembling.
Xie Lian scooped the child out of Mu Qing’s arms as the crowd cheered on his defeat. The child clung to him as he had clung to Mu Qing, but the look he gave him was that of one who had been saved, stunned in childish awe.
Then the Grand Procession proceeded forward, towards the palace, and Mu Qing could not stave off the dread and panic washing over him, drowning out even the cheers of hundreds of thousands.
✦
Xie Lian hands the child back to him briefly, ignoring the kid’s protests and whimpers of fear. He’s pleading Xie Lian for help, begging him to save him from the ghost, his little arms stretching outwards and away from Mu Qing.
“It’s okay,” Xie Lian shushed, taking the child from Mu Qing’s arms once again. “It’s all just an act. See?”
Mu Qing removed his mask, tossing it haphazardly away onto the ground. “Your highness, the parade-”
“It will be fine,” Xie Lian soothed, and for a moment Mu Qing did not know if his voice was directed at the child or at himself. “It wasn’t your fault, it was mine.”
Mu Qing knew this. Still he knew that the blame would fall on him somehow; either he would be accused of messing up the festival by shoving Xie Lian aside and causing his mask to fall, or he would be called foolish for trying to save a child from falling in the first place, despite Xie Lian trying to do the same as he.
He’s proven correct in only a minutes time, accusations from the Guoshi assailing him. Not only was he faulted for not telling them of Xie Lian’s little stunt near the beginning, but the accusations of messing up the parade, trying to sabotage the parade on purpose because of some hidden hatred for XianLe- all these make him shrink and go silent under the stares and accusatory words, anxiety rising from him, the world spinning-
“It was my fault,” Xie Lian defends, stepping in front of him, hiding him from their anger. “I jumped for the child as well. Mu Qing did not shove me out of the way. If anything, all the blame is to be put on me.”
Xie Lian and the Guoshi bicker back and forth for several minutes. Mu Qing barely hears any of it, with the exception of Xie Lian’s affronted cry; “And let a child die in the path of the Heavenly Procession?” Mu Qing tries to settle with his fate. It’s over. By this time tomorrow he’d be kicked out, back to living with his aging mother, her pride and faith in him shattered-
Hands cling to his black robes. He looks down and sees that the child is clinging to his leg, looking up at him with his huge eye. He says nothing, but Mu Qing recognizes the look on his face- he’s scared of all the yelling adults and probably recognized Mu Qing’s fear as his own. Mu Qing reaches a tentative hand down to pat the child on the head- dry, brittle and filthy hair, he notes.
He does not speak. Soon the child is looking at Xie Lian again despite clinging to Mu Qing. He clings silently as Mu Qing explains himself to the Guoshi, that he had in fact told him that Xie Lian was planning to make a grand entrance to the parade, that he did not try to sabotage the parade, that Xie Lian would have done the very same as he. He is softspoken throughout the whole explanation, but an inner rage is starting to burn in him- no matter what good things he’s done, they have always been unfairly misconstrued in some horrible way, and today was no different.
A stalemate is reached. He is exhausted, his muscles creaking and groaning from the sparring. He hardly notices as Feng Xin wrenches the child from Mu Qing’s robes, crying out in protest as he’s handed off to some attendants, and Mu Qing can recognize the street child in him, fighting like a dog to get away.
✦
That child manages to shove his way into their lives time and time again. The next time Mu Qing comes across him he is bloody and battered on the street, beaten bloody and nearly dead from being beaten by Qi Rong’s men. If Feng Xin hadn’t broken Qi Rong’s arm then Mu Qing fears he would have it in his stead. He watches silently from the sidelines as the Guoshi tells the child of his terrible fate, as Mount Taicang nearly burns down, and searches for the child after he disappears. There are no leads. He is gone without a trace.
Mu Qing does not personally meet with this child again until his next visit with his mother. Xie Lian had just gone away and struck out on his own several days ago, and nobody knew when he would return. A gut instinct told Mu Qing it wouldn’t be long before they met again.
“Gege, gege!”
Mu Qing doesn’t even reach his own house before the street children swarm him, begging for food and little trinkets. This time none of the other disciples had been around to see him stuff his pockets with cherries and loquats.
“Don’t shove,” Mu Qing scolds as he hands out the treats. “There’s plenty to go around.”
However, his eye catches on one child sitting a little ways away from the crowd; a familiar, messy head of hair, half his face covered with bandages. His gaze meets Mu Qing’s and the child looks embarrassed, turning his head away.
“Here,” Mu Qing says, moving the other children out of the way. He kneels down in front of the child, offering him a cherry. “Take it.”
The child tentatively reaches his small hand forward, taking it from him. He looks at Mu Qing with suspicion, his eye laced with little remnants of the same fear from the day he caught him. Mistrust.
Mu Qing stands back up and hands out little fruits till the street children stop pestering him, running off to harass the street vendors next. The child remains sitting, watching him with that single-eyed stare that’s unnerving and sad at the same time. He looks like he’s already been through a lifetime of pain at the age of ten. He’s still clutching the cherry in his hand.
“Hong Hong-er,” Mu Qing says awkwardly, remembering his name, “how have you been?”
Mu Qing can’t help but feel offput in the presence of this child. It had not been long since the frightful scene at the Royal Holy Pavilion, weeping and screaming at his own horrible misfortune and fate, a horrible sight to behold. His greeting sounded pathetic in light of this.
“I want to see him,” the child whispers hoarsely, so quiet Mu Qing can barely hear. “Where is he?”
“He’s gone away,” Mu Qing says. “For now. I doubt he will be gone long.”
Hong Hong-er looks down at the fruit in his hand. His fist clenches, dirty and ragged nails biting into the flesh of the fruit, red juice running down his arm like dark old blood.
Mu Qing wants to invite him inside, give him a bit of hospitality, but he thinks back to this child’s horrid luck, the ills he had wrought upon himself and those around him just by virtue of being born. He cannot risk the wellbeing of his mother, even though his heart aches for the child.
“What do you need?” Mu Qing asks softly.
Hong Hong-er is silent. Mu Qing has no words of comfort to give.
Mu Qing reaches into his pockets once more and holds out a handful of cherries. They were supposed to be for his mother. Hong Hong-er’s fist unclenches from its hard grip slowly, the pitiful corpse of a cherry falling onto the ground with a splat. He cups his hands outward, letting Mu Qing hand them to him.
Mu Qing walks away without any words or farewells- there is no need, they are not welcome. He feels that stare burning into the back of his head.
After his visit with his mother he passes through that alleyway once more, pausing in the area where Hong Hong-er had been sitting. There are cherry pits strewn across the ground.
✦
“You are discharged,” Mu Qing says in a flat voice. He tries not to look at the little soldier’s face, but he feels his eyes drawn to him regardless.
There is shock in his eye, something akin to heartbreak.
“No,” he whispers hoarsely.
“I’m doing you a favor,” Mu Qing insists, his sounding too loud to his own ears in the middle of the night. He’d been on a lone patrol when he’d found the little soldier out here in this dewy field training with his new saber, testing out this new type of weapon.
The little soldier’s form seems to tremble all over, shaking hard with barely contained rage. “No,” he says as loud of he can without waking anyone else up. “I am going to serve my god.”
Mu Qing raises an eyebrow at this. “Serve him in some other way then,” he responds. “Go tend the temples and leave your offerings. It would not please your god to know children are fighting and dying on his behalf. Have some honor.”
“Don’t cite honor as your reason for this,” the little solider all but snarls. “It’s because of this, isn’t it?” He raises his saber, the steel edge glinting in the moonlight.
Mu Qing’s hackles raise. Did this brat really just insinuate that he was jealous of him? “Far from the truth,” he says, rolling his eyes.
The little soldier is quick on his feet, but Mu Qing has years of fighting experience on him. The moment the little soldier leaps at him Mu Qing is already ducking, unsheathing his own saber and kicking his leg out from under him. The little soldier is held to the ground by the heel of Mu Qing’s boot, saber pointed at his back. He finds himself impressed with his skill; if Mu Qing had been anyone else, he would be on the ground right now.
“Do not attack your superiors,” Mu Qing says in a grave tone of voice. The back beneath his foot is frail and thin, so he lightens his the pressure. The little solider inhales deeply, shakily. “This is the sort of thing that could get you killed if it were anyone else, little soldier.”
The little soldier turns his head to the side, the bandages on his head coming lose. “You wouldn’t,” he says with complete surety. He is right, of course, but anger sparks in him at the gall of this kid.
The bandages on his head have become completely undone now, falling onto the ground. Mu Qing vaguely recalls that the child had mentioned something about ugliness three years prior, that he struggled tooth and claw on the brink of death to make sure the medical aide did not remove those bandages.
There was no trace of ugliness. A single red eye, crimson even to the sclera, stared straight into Mu Qing. In that gaze he could already see the suffering and rage of a vengeful ghost. In all his life, even as one who lived in the slums, as someone who’s had to beg for food on multiple occasions, as someone accused again and again throughout his life of harboring ill intentions where there were none, he had never felt the force of such strong hatred directed towards him.
Mu Qing relents, letting his foot off his back. The boy scrambles up, immediately reaching for his practice saber, but Mu Qing snatches it away before he even has a chance.
“Go,” he says. “Leave. His Highness would not be able to live with himself if he knew such a devout believer had died so young. Tell me, little soldier, how would it feel to see your own god weep over your grave?”
Finally, finally this seems to reach him. His posture droops for a moment. (To this day, Mu Qing had never seen one of his own believers look even a fraction as sorry as this child in this moment. The image is seared into his mind.)
Mu Qing turns around, preparing to depart quickly. Too much time had passed on this small matter. “Quickly grab your belongings and leave. Your superiors are notified.”
He does not look back. He knows what he will see: a little soldier brought to his knees in the grass, his fervent belief in his god having no outlet.
(Mu Qing thinks back some years later after his ascension to this curious scene- a little soldier accusing him, the right hand of a god, of being jealous- jealous of him, no less.
It was not jealousy but recognition of himself in the child that made him do it. In the little solider he saw fragments of himself, age twelve, forced to work as an errand boy and seek out scraps of food from kind strangers just to survive. He hadn’t had the chance to be young. War robbed the young of their youth. If he could spare this child and any other of that fate he would consider it one of the few goods he’d done in his life.)
Two weeks pass after Mu Qing makes the deal. There is no physical contract of their agreement; no papers signed, no mark placed upon him, yet he can feel the weight of it on his shoulders. (There is a small, small part of him that regrets it, by a margin- it would be embarrassing if the matter could have been taken care of without the aide of Crimson Rain Sought Flower, but he supposes the chances of that are next to none.) He gives Hua Cheng the password to his communication array, but he does not receive Hua Cheng’s own- this is a business relationship, not at all cordial. This alone hammers in the fact that he is practically just a servant at the whims of Hua Cheng.
General Xuan Zhen.
The voice nearly knocks Mu Qing from where he stands, overlooking the training of new junior officials he had recently inducted into his palace. He regains some of his composure, standing a bit straighter than before.
Crimson Rain, what is it?
Meet with me to discuss what favor you need from me. I would prefer to get it taken care of as soon as possible.
I understand.
Mu Qing turns to one of his subordinates. “There is something I have to attend to. Take care of them for me.”
“Yes, General Xuan Zhen.”
In a short matter of time, Mu Qing finds himself face to face with Hua Cheng once again in Paradise Manor. Before, they had been sitting together at the table as equals; they now sat at a round table, Mu Qing seated directly across from Hua Cheng. Hua Cheng’s chair was nearly a throne, a tall and arched seat with vibrant red padding, while Mu Qing’s was a standard dining chair. Mu Qing was not one to ignore aesthetics, and he knew Hua Cheng was not either; the implications of this arrangement were clear as day.
He’s staring at him with his single eye. “A new form?” he asks.
“Yes,” Mu Qing answers. This form has several features that are different from his original form, such as brown hair and golden eyes, but the constitution was mostly the same. Mu Qing did care for aesthetics, after all.
“It’s okay,” Hua Cheng begrudges, crossing his arms, “but if you’re to do any undercover work then you’ll need to choose something different. Maybe even something ugly. No would suspect the vain General Xuan Zhen to take an ugly form upon himself.”
“Did I say this was for undercover work?” he says, arching an eyebrow.
“You would do well to watch that tone of yours.”
Mu Qing fumes in silence. He will not let himself forget his place. A small mistake like that could be deadly.
“Anyways. General. Would you like to tell me what it is you need help with?”
Mu Qing looks to the side for a moment, then meets Hua Cheng’s gaze straight-on. “There is a fetus spirit I’ve been searching for.”
“Your own?”
“No,” Mu Qing blurts faster than he can think. “No, Crimson Rain. It is not my child. My cultivational vows are unbroken.”
Hua Cheng nods. “I see. Then you want me to find this fetus spirit? And do what to it?”
“Bind it somehow,” Mu Qing answers. “Maybe even disperse it. I haven’t decided yet.”
Hua Cheng is silent for a moment. “And that’s all? Nothing else?”
“I have been searching for this fetus spirit on and off for centuries,” Mu Qing admits. It’s no use hiding the partial truth from him. “There is no doubt in my mind that it is still lurking around somewhere. Occasionally, in the rare times I do wander the mortal realm, I hear rumors of a ghost child. It’s a fearsome and malignant thing that sucks the life out of pregnancies. This is not necessarily an unusual occurrence, of course, but sometimes there is a string of incidents and the trail will disappear. I lose it every time.”
Hua Cheng nods. “This fetus. Does it happen to be of Xianle?”
Mu Qing is taken aback for a moment. “…Yes.”
“Then it must be quite powerful by now, to have feasted for four centuries without anything to interrupt it. And, may I ask- why do you care for it so much?”
Mu Qing doesn’t want to reveal too much to him, but he supposes he has no choice. “I feel…partially responsible for the state of things,” he admits. My reputation risks ruin as well, a vain little voice in his head whispers.
“I see.”
The room is quiet once more. It is a silence of consideration.
“That is easy enough to handle. I will have this taken care of within the next year.”
A thin memory of pain blossoms on his wrist, right over the scar. “Thank you.”
There is silence for a moment as Mu Qing thinks. “Crimson Rain,” he says. “When will you begin asking me for favors?”
Hua Cheng looks at him odd. “What, you want to begin so soon? Impatient?”
“No,” Mu Qing says. “But lately something has been on my mind.”
He leans back against the plush red chair. “Go on.”
“I don’t quite understand why you would want favors from me,” Mu Qing admits, “I can’t figure out how I specifically could be of much use to you; if it’s information you’re looking for, I am only cordial with the other gods, not close to them. So, if I may ask you this: why?” Are you motivated by hatred, little soldier?
“It’s foolish to reject something handed out to you,” Hua Cheng says breezily. “I have the upper hand in every sense possible in this transaction. You pose no threat to me. You assume that no other gods have ever done favors for me, either.”
Mu Qing hadn’t considered that. Perhaps he is right; Ghost City was a place even gods could visit. Knowing the intricate politics of both Upper Lower Heaven, it would be no surprise that Hua Cheng may others running around to do his errands, maybe even spies among them. And there was the larger, more nefarious question at hand here: just what great thing was Hua Cheng planning? What kept him going as a ghost, that he would haunt and terrorize heaven?
If Hua Cheng was seeking some type of revenge against someone it was none of his business.
Maybe it was revenge against Mu Qing he sought.
“Be honest when I ask you this,” Mu Qing says, eyes cast downwards towards the table. “Do you hate me, little soldier?”
Mu Qing’s breathing stills after he speaks. Not a sound can be heard even beyond the walls of the room.
“Yes,” Hua Cheng admits. “When I first recognized you in the Gambler’s Den, I won’t deny that my first reaction was anger and fury. But… I am also confused.”
Mu Qing looks up. For a moment he cannot believe it took him all these years to recognize him; it was right here in front of him, clear as day. “What confuses you?”
“The dichotomy in you,” he answers. “Back then, and even today, I still find you hard to read. I see a great insecurity beneath your pride. For many years I believed that you had kicked me out of the army out of jealousy; revisiting those events, I’m not so sure anymore.”
Mu Qing is silent. “I was not jealous, if you’ll trust the words from my own mouth.”
“I’m not sure if I do yet.” Anger hardens Hua Cheng’s eye suddenly, like he’s just remembered something. “Some things cannot be forgiven.”
For some reason Mu Qing feels like he isn’t talking about being kicked out of the army anymore.
“This is about him, isn’t it?” Mu Qing asks, cursing the hesitation in his voice. “You’ve taken what he said to heart.”
Hua Cheng smiles, but no warmth reaches his eyes. “I have,” he says. “And I’ve seen how you’ve failed him.”
A brief moment of panic overtakes him, and the room seems to fade in his vision- one of the moments in his life that had brought the most shame to him, that scene up on the mountain with thirty-three other officials- no, there’s no way Hua Cheng could know about that, is there?
Thirty-three officials-
A distant memory of a little ghost fire flying into the eyes of others, trying it’s hardest to defend His Highness-
It all clicks into place.
Mu Qing breaks out in a cold sweat.
Hua Cheng smiles cheerfully, crossing his arms on the table. “Have you realized it yet? I was there on the mountain.”
Mu Qing stands up, nearly knocking his chair over with the force of it. “You-” he bites his tongue, hard, to keep himself from saying something he will regret. Does he not realize what a difficult position he was put in that night? Does he not realize that he tried to diffuse the situation as fast as possible to make sure no one got hurt? Does he not realize that he endured seeing the one he’d once respected fling mud and stones at him like a madman?
“Don’t run,” Hua Cheng says in a low voice, coming around the table towards him. He feels like a rabbit trapped by a wolf. “I have a proposition.”
Mu Qing lets the panic of unpleasant memories drain just a bit, but he’s still on edge and tense, realizing the possible danger he’s stepped into. “What proposition is that?”
“You never took me up on my offer for a duel all those years ago,” he said. “I’ve been itching to fight you, specifically you, since then. Even if I don’t get to burn your temples afterward. So, how about it?”
Mu Qing is breathing heavily now. He tries to settle himself, rabbit’s heart beating fast, his panic turning to anger. He glances at the scimitar at Hua Cheng’s hip, the red eye glaring at him. “No weapons,” Mu Qing says. He can’t trust himself to win against E’Ming. “We’ll fight with our fists.”
He’s barely even spoken those words before Hua Cheng’s coming at him, fist colliding heavily with his face. It knocks Mu Qing backwards till his back collides with the wall, air knocked from his lungs.
He doesn’t want to think back to his regrets. Fighting for him is like a form of release; he doesn’t have to think about anything but overcoming his opponent. He had never lost a fight against anyone but Feng Xin or Xie Lian.
The next fifteen minutes are a blur. He manages to land a few punches against Hua Cheng. The sound of their fight is incredibly loud; antiques and ornate paintings are knocked the ground, glass shatters, both of them grunt with pain and effort. Mu Qing soon finds himself subdued beneath Hua Cheng, his hands twisted behind his back, held down by a boot whose silver chains jostle whenever Mu Qing tries to writhe out from beneath him, ribs creaking under the pressure.
“Admit defeat,” Hua Cheng says, hissing the words out. “Say you’re defeated.”
Mu Qing grits his teeth, shame overcoming him. “I’m defeated,” he relents.
The boot lifts off his back. Mu Qing gets on his knees and starts coughing violently, a mouthful of blood splattering onto the floor.
He looks back at Hua Cheng. Besides a few scrapes on his face he seems mostly unaffected, walking away without even a limp, whereas Mu Qing is fairly sure he’s fractured a bone somewhere.
“Get out,” Hua Cheng says flatly. “I’ll call you back in two weeks time. Don’t keep me waiting.”
Mu Qing rolls his eyes. “Fine,” he hisses under his breath, loud enough that he knows Hua Cheng can hear him.
He gets one last glance at Hua Cheng before he leaves, lingering for a moment by the doorway. Hua Cheng looks proud of himself.
Mu Qing clenches his fist, stumbling onto the street. He hates the shame he feels.