Chapter Text
Yue Qingyuan summons him at dawn, requesting his presence at the newest disciple selection. Shen Qingqiu is almost tempted to say no, the major source of amusement in his life being trying to needle the sect leader into finally cracking and banishing him off the mountains, but the combined persuasion of his Qi-ge and Yingying ends up wearing him down, and so he stands with the rest of his martial siblings, cooly looking down at the young faces scruffed with dirt and mud with quiet judgement and a smidge of long forgotten sympathy.
Liu Qingge, that brute, looks at him with his usual hostility, but seemed to know better than to air out Cang Qiong’s dirty laundry in front of the various immortal hopefuls and their families gathered around them. Shen Qingqiu considers deliberately goading him for a second, but abandons the thought when he spots the son-in-law of the minister of agriculture in the crowd. Shen Qingqiu had been quietly working on having one of his graduated disciples elevated to the position of the man’s deputy, and couldn’t risk him returning home and talking about the Qing Jing Peak Lord’s lack of decorum.
Ning Yingying spots a child in the crowd and turns his attention to him, and Shen Qingqiu allows his qi to seep into his eyes in order to observe him more closely. Having a bad egg on his peak just to keep his littlest disciple happy is not worth it, after all.
Shen Qingqiu’s hands clench around the guard of his fan when he finally gets a good look at the boy’s meridians. There’s a faint layer of foreign qi clogging them up, suppressing their potency and aura. A seal.
There’s only one reason why someone would have their meridians sealed in such a way. The child is not of the righteous path.
Liu Qingge comments about the child’s innate talent, and Shen Qingqiu resists the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration. Spirit Vision was a technique taught to all of them by their teachers for this particular scenario, but it looked like Liu Qingge had either forgotten all about it or couldn’t be bothered to use it, because there was no way a narrow-minded buffon like him would think highly of someone who doesn’t walk the same path as him.
Shen Qingqiu picks the child for his peak, Yue Qingyuan folding over like a wet piece of tissue paper because of him. He basks in the glares his martial siblings send his way for a moment, and then asks Ning Yingying to guide her newest shidi to Qing Jing. He retires to his cottage in order to prepare for the tea ceremony.
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The child kneels before him, hopeful and dewy-eyed, his face wiped clean, and Shen Qingqiu ends up discarding the idea that he was a spy sent to the sect by an enemy. No, because he knows whose child this is. Su Xiyan’s face stares up at him guilelessly, and Shen Qingqiu has to forcefully suppress the rage in his heart.
His mother? What does this child know of the sacrifices she had gone through for him? Of the one who abandoned her life for his? How dare he talk of someone else-
The gall of this child.
“A-Jiu!” she had laughed at him. “A-Jiu, you’re too distrustful, ah! Even if he’s a demon, he’s my demon, so this jiejie won’t let you bad-mouth him.”
“Su-dajie is the one who is too naive,” Shen Qingqiu had huffed out, lifting his tea cup to his lips with a wry smile. “Even as children, when unscrupulous men tried to lure you out with sticks of tanghulu, you used to follow without hesitation. Now you give your heart to the first charmer that turned his eyes on you. How can I possibly call that sound judgement?”
“Didn’t A-Jiu always protect me against those so called unscrupulous men on the streets? If he does something, I will come to you and you can beat him up for me, ok?”
“... fine, you ridiculous menace.”
She trusted him, she trusted Tianlang-jun, she trusted the Old Palace Master, and that had only gotten her killed.
Because Tianlang-jun wasn’t alert enough, because Shen Qingqiu wasn’t smart enough-
Because of him.
In the end, slaves such as themselves will always die a dog’s death, no matter how far they run away from their pasts.
Shen Qingqiu watches muddily as his hand raises itself, feeling like he was a stranger to his own body as he tips the cup of tea down on the boy’s face. Tears well up in his eyes, and Shen Qingqiu hates him for showing weakness, for acting so disgracefully when he is of her flesh and blood.
Shen Qingqiu seals the child’s fate then and there. He will turn this child into the greatest menace the jianghu has ever seen, use him to bring that wretched old bastard onto his knees, use him to raze those hypocritical assholes to the ground, and then-
He cannot survive. Not when he’s a heavenly demon.
Not when he's the reason Su-dajie died.
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He asks Ming Fan to give the boy a cultivation manual he personally fished out of the library. Ordinary cultivation techniques had a high chance of breaking through the flimsy barrier Su Xiyan had placed on the boy’s meridians, and Shen Qingqiu had no desire to tack on the words demon sympathiser on his list of alleged crimes. Although the manual had been depreciated over the years in favour of the new ones due to its high comprehension level and the unnecessary qi pathways it used, it would probably work better than the standard Qing Jing Peak technique for a physical cultivator such as the child, and if he was unable to comprehend it, then he didn’t deserve a seat on the scholarly peak.
He assigns the child a room in the junior dorms but isn't very surprised when Ming Fan throws him into the woodshed anyways- after all, the child always did have the makings of a bully within him.
Shen Qingqiu himself had stayed in the woodshed for seven months before his shizun deemed him worthy enough to interfere. It was practically a tradition for the newest shidi on Qing Jing to be housed within the woodshed under the tacit approval of the peak head till they proved themselves.
He assigns the child some chores, and then forces himself to ignore him for a while- dwelling upon his existence too much would merely exacerbate his heart demons.
He very pointedly does not think of how Su Xiyan would loathe him if she were to see what he was doing to her child.
It’s alright, he’s used to being hated.
_________
He uses his rare time off to go visit another jiejie of his, this one at least having the good sense of staying far away from the filthy mud that is the jianghu’s great sects.
“A-Jiu,” Madam Meiyin smiles at him, her lips hidden by the rim of her teacup. “It truly has been too long.”
“My apologies,” he replies smoothly, “I was caught up in work.”
“Oh?” she raises an eyebrow in interest, “Anything in particular?”
He weighs the advantages and disadvantages of hiding his newly gained information from someone who is quite possibly this world's greatest seer- not that outsiders were aware of the fact, of course- and decides to abandon all pretence.
“I want to know if the newest disciple on Qing Jing is Su-dajie’s child.” Shen Qingqiu already knew that he was, but it never hurt to be too careful- “I also wish to know if his father is Tianlang-jun.”
Madam Meiyin’s eyes widen in shock, and Shen Qingqiu knows that he has her attention.
“Do you have anything of that child that I could use?”
Shen Qingqiu nods, and then carefully fishes out a jade pendant from within his sleeves. “I would have brought blood, but if he truly is a heavenly demon, I wouldn’t want to risk it.”
“This will do,” she smiles warmly at him, and gestures to put the pendant down onto the little array she secretly carves into all her teacups.
Shen Qingqiu rests his chin against a curled fist, watching curiously as she gets to work, knowing from experience that she didn’t enjoy being disturbed when in such a state. Her girls, too, leave the room, giving them some privacy.
Minutes pass before she finally turns her attention back to him, a wane smile coming up to thin her lips. “He is.” she confirms, and Shen Qingqiu feels a newly-formed resolve settle within his cultivation.
“Oh, A-Jiu,” she sighs. “Is this truly what you wish to do? I know that you’ve always hated them, just as much as you loathe yourself, but are you truly willing to grind your bones into dust for this? Do you think that will make you happy? Do you think that will make her happy?”
Shen Qingqiu flinches, before drawing his spine up straighter. “This is the only way.”
And then, he leans forward, surreptitiously whispering, “After all, you’re not the only seer in this room.”
He grins.
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He takes a detour by Bailu Forest before returning to the sect, casually picking up some Sun and Moon Dew Flower seeds that he knew were planted in the grotto by the Old Palace Master quite some time ago- a failed attempt at his obsession with creating the perfect vessel for himself to reside in.
He carefully places the seeds in containers designed to preserve their efficacy, turns around, and then stumbles into what is possibly the most hideous snake he has ever laid his eyes on- and that, in and of itself, is quite the feat considering Shen Qingqiu’s obsession with the grotesque. The pathetic little thing peers up at him from underneath its matted hair, and one look at its face has a virtual deluge of visions slamming into his mind.
Zhuzhi-lang towers over the assembled cultivators, desperately protecting his liege from harm, Zhuzhi-lang is falling, falling, falling-
Tianlang-jun is looking at him, eyes dead, soul hollow, and Shen Qingqiu towers over him, furious and remonstrating-
Shen Qingqiu clutches his stomach and laughs and laughs.
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Another year passes, and Shen Qingqiu has mostly adapted to having the little beast on his peak. He’s also almost done planning out his grand sabotage of the four great sects, and managed to promote several of his students working within the secular world.
Sensing that his mood is stable enough, he goes to the Lingxi caves to meditate, knowing that he would need a calm heart in order to not qi deviate out of anger when he looks at the Old Palace Master’s pathetic and devious face at the Immortal Alliance Conference.
This is when everything quickly goes to shit.
...
Tsk. That stupid shidi of his.
He’s lucky that Shen Qingqiu has extra seeds!
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