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The fact of it all is that the food chain is not so easy and linear a thing. It's a simple enough principle, of course: the weak are meat, the strong do eat. But there is also far more to it.
For example: all carnivores are predators. A creature that survives by preying on others needs cunning, no less than size, strength or speed. They have evolved with the needed skills, sharper senses and quicker minds. Herbivores, on the other hand, are duller. Simpler. An animal whose livelihood will not run away from it does not need much smarts to survive. Therefore, even the smallest, weakest carnivore, given the right timing, the right circumstance, could find a way to overcome the most powerful herbivore.
Humans, too, have evolved the same way. The predators they tamed are often stronger than them. Fiercer. Often, bigger. But humans have a cunning that surpasses any kind of animal. Humanity has become the lord of the primal, mortal world– by putting their cunning to a skill no animal before it could ever hope to achieve, with a carefulness and subtlety of manipulation no animal could ever comprehend.
Like a small cat, preening, condescending to a large, barking dog. It conveys its superiority to a far stronger creature that could effortlessly tear it apart. Projects an aura of authority, tells the creature in its own animal way, I am your better, and you are beneath me. In a way that seems like arrogance, but in fact, it is to protect itself from becoming meat.
So have humans— for instance— trained horses over thousands of years. Slowly, carefully, they have dominated these mighty, mindless beasts, and taught them submission, imbued it into their nature. Taught them the meaning of superiority and inferiority, taught them they belong in service to their superiors— these creatures that have the power to trample and kill them effortlessly, brought down to slavery. By their own stupidity, by the inferiority of their own lacking brains, so easily susceptible to cunning human manipulation. To becoming slaves by simply being told, trained, conveyed, you are the inferior until it becomes a truth imbued in their bones.
Small predators whose cunning is their defense against the dangers of a violent world, and humans who thrived off their superior intelligence. The difference is in the results. In the end, cats are still prey. Middle of the food chain predators unable to overcome their place in life. But humans have thrived, and taken over. Domesticated wolves until they had changed their natures to be reborn as their docile pets, reduced vicious beasts far larger than them into their slaves. Made the animal kingdom their dominion.
It makes you so fucking sick when you think about it.
* * *
Taxian-jun is a very troublesome slave. He is disobedient; he is disloyal. It is always a battle against his arrogance, his pride, his self importance as an Emperor. But even then, in the end of the day, a dog can only be what it is; a beast tamed into willing slavery. The difference between a wolf and a dog is in domestication, and he's been tamed long before you. So no matter his complaints, his whims, the time you spend arguing with him, no matter the frustration of wrangling him into cooperation— you will find a way, in the end, to make him submit to you and call you Master.
Most of the time, with thick sarcasm. With irritation. But often: with blind, thoughtless obedience. No affection, no adoration, but as a simple truth, an uncomplicated fact in his warped and twisted mind that cannot comprehend the contradiction inherent in the idea. An obedience that he doesn't understand or even enjoy, but never questions. He certainly doesn't like you, not even in the false way the younger Mo Ran thought he did, but your ownership and control over him is so deeply entrenched into the very essence of his mind that he doesn't think to question it. It's just a simple, obvious, indisputable fact. The sky is blue; the grass is green; the sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening; you are Master. You own him. The only authority held over this wild, arrogant creature. The only one who can tell him to do something and survive the experience.
Maybe that's why it's so damn satisfying to hear every time. Maybe that's why it makes you shiver, why sometimes your cock throbs in response to the sound of it. It's pretty disgusting to react like this to such a stupid mutt, but you also well understand what it is that your body enjoys about it. You can't muster any affection for this beast if you had bothered to try, but where else can you get this sense of power? The thrill of having such direct control over another person. The feeling of giving back to another what the world has done to you.
But it's not enough. You want more. You need more. Your blood sings with madness and hatred from every wound inflicted on your pride. Your long suppressed hate and rage and pain that stretching unto eternity, blooming into the painful thirst for hurt and destruction, the unfulfilled desire for your Shizun, all converging on this one, stupid, disobedient dog. You need him beneath you until he is level the dirt on the ground. You need Shizun to see him as you do, worthless, pathetic, lowly— if he won't hate him, then to at least degrade him with pity.
You want Mo Ran, Taxian-jun, to feel the humiliation etched into your very birth and existence. Not the agony of an abandoned child, of the starving and downtrodden poor ignored by the luxury of the rich and self-righteous— both of you had experienced enough of that. But you want him to feel what you did and he was spared: the experience of being an object, a tamed animal. The humiliation he so enjoyed taking from your Shizun; the humiliation you've been enduring the day you ran away from the sight of your mother being consumed.
You've learned your lesson; touching Shizun touches on to his possessiveness all too fiercely. As much as it drove you to madness with rage and bitter jealousy so long ago when you had realized it, the flower has not taken away his obsession with Shizun. You know, also, that he will defend himself if attacked directly; that's simple enough.
Fine, then. All you need to do is find another way. And it's so simple when you spare it some bare minimum of thought.
You don't have Mo Ran's power, strength, or his skill in cultivation. He is a human, you a Butterfly Boned Beauty Feast. In the simplest, plainest terms, the world put you below him on the food chain. But you, too, are a predator, a carnivore. And you have things he doesn't have. You have your looks, you have your body, you have your cunning. You have a real goal, a purpose to strive to, something to aim for beyond satisfying base primal bestial needs. You have your eyes that have been honed over a lifetime of agony to see into people's very hearts and lay them bare. You have your sweet tempting siren voice that lures and calls the blind, tempts them into the dark, wraps around their hearts for you to sink their teeth into their souls and prick with poison.
You have been called beautiful so many times that if you were to count, the number of occasions would likely outnumber the days you have lived. Praised for your beauty: by your shixiongs who warped your name into shimei, by your gentle-voiced elders. By pretty, blushing, shy-faced shidis and shimeis, by strangers several times your age and size who took your youthful delicate flower self to their beds and spilled over and inside you without even bothering to leave a single copper penny that they'd spare for a whore's humanity.
You know the truth. Shizun is beautiful. Mo Ran is handsome, Xue Meng is radiant, Ye Wangxi is gallant. These are the praises humans get to receive. You don't get to be anything but fuckable. You never get to be anything but a body to be used, a mindless, heartless vessel for ugly human carnality on which they project their own idea of sex and desire as a sinful, forbidden lure.
So, fine. If that's how it is to be, then you'll make use of it. You'll play the temptress. You'll play the siren. If that's what it takes, so you can spare the rest of your people from this fate, if you can get them all away. You'll be the vixen, the witch, sneak, the manipulator, the two faced man-eater, the liar, the evil seducer luring away the good and moral man away from the path to immortality.
If this is what it takes, if this is what the world demands of you, then so be it. You'll become the embodiment of temptation and sin.
No matter what it takes. No matter how much your body is violated on your own path, no matter how many times you are taken and used by brutes and wolves. You must be quite good at it, if you still have all your limbs.
No matter how much sometimes you look at all your body in all your tempting delicate feminine fuckable frail naked beauty and want to tear off your skin and burn your flesh and sink blades into your vile and lurid vessel, longing for just a fraction of a second to be anything, anything, anything else. No matter the urge to pull out your soul from this dirty, obscene fuck-toy of a container.
* * *
For one who has made use of such a simple tactic many times, who has been a paranoid mess with overly-keen senses when reborn into his younger body, it is surprisingly easy to slip a little something into Taxian-jun's cup. You only need to make the barest effort of a spell to divert his focus and make him forget that he doesn't know what's inside his cup, and with no sense of smell or taste he has no way to tell that something is off. Even if he notices something strange about his own senses, that he's a little hazy, a little suggestible, by then it will be too late; you're going to make sure of that.
Instead, he sneers as if doing you a favor by allowing your presence, drinking as if he had poured the wine himself: "What do you want, Master?" He leans back across the mess of a chair, spreading his legs, sitting on it like a throne. "This Venerable One has no time to waste on pleasantries."
He's got enough sense to understand you're only ever here for a reason. Usually, that reason is instructions. With the barest hint of a smile, you croon in your sweetest, softest, gentlest voice: "I only have a small thing to ask of you, this time."
This part, you know how to do: how to be the gentle, modest beauty such a tyrannical brute wants. The workers at the brothels Mo Ran would frequent would go too far, give themselves away, by batting their eyelashes just a little too much, by their saccharine manner, but you know that not a single one of them was one of you. They didn't learn their trade under the same circumstances.
"Out with it, then." He takes another sip of the wine as soon as the words leave his lips in a clear indication of what he thinks of your words. But really, this time, you're not lying at all. What you need him to do is extraordinarily simple. And what you say next is also the truth. Independently and unrelated to what you really need, but a truth.
"Once we recover your spiritual core from this world's Mo Ran, the next step will of course be the transition procedure." You say patiently. Taxian-jun stills, always so utterly transparent. "But such an operation always comes with complications. Even for a core that belongs to your other self— your Majesty has seen for himself just how much the other Mo Ran has diverged from his path, hasn't he?"
Taxian-jun's eyes watch you like a hawk, but he looks without seeing, his mind far away in his own concerns. Exactly where you need it to be. "Go on."
"It would be for the best if we prepare beforehand, and smooth over the process for you."
"You waste this Venerable One's time." Of course you are. His precious, precious, valuable time that he clearly could be spending on so many other, more important things, of which he has plenty to do, like he isn't just sitting here waiting around wasting your time messing with Shizun and just driving the point home that— "Get to the point."
"For this purpose, I would like to perform a simple exercise." Slowly, slowly, you approach him. With every word, a step closer. "All it would require of you is your cooperation." Closer, closer, closer— "Your Majesty may simply lay back, and let me take care of everything. Allow this one to serve you."
Ah. He really likes the sound of that. His eyes, just a little hazy, just a little lidded, twinkle with a clear pleasure. Somewhere deep within, beneath your sweet, placid face, you hide a victorious smile. This is the part you so enjoy— the thrill of seeing your words seep into his skin, into his mind. Persuading him gently into compliance, watching him walk into your trap without even knowing, all while thinking he's ever so clever.
The feeling of control over another. The simple feeling of having agency in this world.
"Very well. This Venerable one will allow it." he says, you're quite pleased to note, with an imitation of his usual tone of grand, majestic declaration, as if it were just out of reach, unable to quite grasp it and scrambling at some barebones resemblance of it. "Proceed."
So you slide right up to him, press your body to his, hold up your hand before his eyes, conjure a simple, innocuous illusion of a small, gently moving light.
"Then if it please your Majesty," You breathe into his ear, coat your words in the sweetest honey, purr in your most coquettish tone. "I would ask you to look at this light, and focus."
It's so extraordinarily simple. Such a technique is not at all different from what can be done with mortal hands. The only difference, of course, the only thing making this a spell, rather than a technique, is the strength and intensity of it; this is powerful enough that it can be used on the unwilling, and does not require his cooperation. It certainly makes it easier, but you could force him into the state you're aiming for, if that's what you so wanted. It would simply mean using an external spell to do the work that the human mind usually does on its own, rather than using this spell as reinforcement.
But then, what's the point of that? It's so much more satisfying to watch him sway, his posture soften. To watch his eyes move from side to side to the light as he falls in slowly, deeper and deeper. To watch his body relax slowly as the drug seeps into his consciousness, robs him of his facilities, makes him more and more pliant until he hangs on to your every word. The sense of power that comes in persuading one to give himself over to you, rather than forcing them into it. Of watching what he was able to scrounge up of his free will slip away.
Yes. All of his free will. All of his agency. All of his choice. You're going to take it all.
"Ssh... relax, your Majesty." Your breath tickles his ear. From your other hand, you summon a low, humming, soothing noise, press your hand to the chilly, stiff back of his neck. Your voice soothing, low, gentle, resonates with the low hum. You remember the way Mother would soothe you to sleep, and channel the best of her comforting tone.
"Focus on the light. Focus on its movement. Let that be all you see." Oh, you see it on his face so clearly, how your words seep into him, how he falls. It's so much more effective than even you expected it to be, and the realization makes you unbearably giddy with delight, so much so that the warm honey of your words comes out almost sincere. "Very good, your Majesty."
And at that. Taxian-jun shivers. Oh, oh, of course. An unloved child would be hungry for praise, weak to kindness, just as he was from the very start, just as susceptible to the smallest kind words as that boy who looked at you with dreamy eyes for a plate of food and some basic decency. That foolish boy is still there, beneath the grand, almighty Emperor. Since his revival you've run out of the patience to play Shi Mei with him, but you could call back something of that sweet faced shige to yourself for now. "Let go, your Majesty. Rest your weary head. It's alright. "
His head lolls. Eyes shudder close.
"Lay back. Rest. Focus." Every inch of your body presses to his. Your hair falls and brushes across his chest. You lower your voice to the sweetest whispering purr, blend it into the low sound humming into his ears, just shy of pressing your lips to his cold, lifeless skin. You think of how the men in your bed would call you a vixen, a whore, a slut, every time you'd act like this, every time you'd use this tone on them, but they fell for it anyway. "And forget everything else."
Slowly, slowly. You ease him in, deep into the depths, your siren song lulling him into the ocean. And he steps in, deeper and deeper heedless of the creatures swimming beneath his feet, waiting for the chance to jump at their prey. Watching the seawater rise higher and higher as he walks in further and deeper, pooling at his feet until it goes up to his legs, stomach, throat, face.
Deeper, deeper.
And then—
Click.
With a snap of your fingers, Taxian-jun disappears. Sinks, down, down, deep into the depths of the ocean. His body lolls and sinks into the chair, unsupported, unfocused. Mind floating aimlessly, sweetly, helpless in the depths of the ocean you led him to.
Experimentally, you grab him by the chin, force his head upwards harshly. Watch his unseeing eyes, his lolling mouth, his uncomprehending look.
"Your Majesty." You say sweetly. He doesn't even twitch, as if he had returned to being the mindless corpse he used to be. "Open your eyes."
And he does. From beneath his lashes, he doesn't quite peer back at you, his eyes dull, lifeless, unfocused, the hints of purple muted. A sort of sleepy calm, as if something of his mind just shut off and disappeared, as if his thoughts fell asleep with him.
He looks so stupid that you want to laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh. It bubbles in your throat, but never quite makes it through beyond the littlest huff.
"Look at me. Who am I?"
And he answers, without a drop of sneering sarcasm, without a hint of hesitation.
"Master."
What words can possibly describe what you feel at that? It's not just that the sound of it sends several shivering thrills from the top of your nape to the bottom of your spine, not just that it goes straight to your cock until it twitches with an interest only Shizun could otherwise inspire in you. It's both these things, but so much more than the sum of its parts, a bone-deep satisfaction, a relentless sense of power and control.
Master, master, master. You want to hear him say it another hundred times.
"That's right." You tilt his head from side to side by the chin, relishing the stupid mindless fucking look on his face, cruel giggling bubbling in your throat and itching at the sides of your mouth, awed at the complete absence of any resistance at all, the fact that you can just move him as you wish. "I am your master." Pause before saying the next set of words, voice calm, more so than you feel knowing you're gambling on completely losing him with just one set of words. "And you are my dog."
Your heart beats in your chest, once, twice. Taxian-jun doesn't move, doesn't rage, doesn't wake up.
"I am your dog."
He parrots you, monotone, hollow, lifeless, a perfect imitation of his own chess pieces.
What kind of expression are you making right now? Your face, that you've never lost control of, that never emotes or moves or twitches without your own precise puppeteering, stings from the strain in your cheeks and jaw. Your face, so unfamiliar with the effort of a real smile that stretches your lips so wide. You must be smiling like a snake, like a beast showing off its teeth to its prey.
A giggle escapes you that sounds demonic even to your own ears, sweet, delicate, coquettish Shi Mei reflected through a mirror thousandfold.
With this man at your mercy this way, how are you to stop here? With such a rare chance for your revenge.
* * *
If Shizun had been in any state to fight you or defend his disciple, you would not have attempted this part. As it is, an even bigger gamble is bringing Taxian-jun to where he can see him at all. What remains of a soul you were unable to wipe clean clings to him like a lifeline, the last barrier of resistance, of adoration, obsession. The thought makes you want to spit out onto his face the acidic sourness it leaves on your tongue.
But even if you don't manage to have your way with him and do all you wanted to do, this would have all been worth it— just for the sweet savory memory of hearing him say I am your dog in his own voice, and for the sight he makes as you lead him into the room where Shizun lies bound and helpless in bed.
"Oh, Shizu—n—," You don't quite call out so much as sing as you enter, cheerfully drawling out the word into song. Taxian-jun's chain and collar crinkle melodiously beneath your steps. "I have something wonderful to show you. I think you'd find it quite interesting."
Shizun looks more divine than any god could ever hope to be. His hair is mussed around his face, his eyes are tired, that combination of softness and sharpness on the shapes of his face that always leaves your heart beating. He doesn't call you Shi Mingjing anymore, doesn't look at you the way he used to. His eyes always meet your own with a righteous rage, silent and dignified.
Your other self would hurt to be at the receiving end of such hate. But you've given up on having his heart long ago; you've given up on having his body so long as Taxian-jun is around. But there are at least things you can still have. If you can't have him, then you can at least have the disciple he did choose, to pry them apart if only for a moment.
Taxian-jun crawls on all fours beneath your feet. A muzzle strapped around his jaw, covering his face— it looks quite fetching if you must say so yourself. You considered one that fully covers his mouth until he couldn't speak, because he'd look so much better with his mouth covered, but you want him to be able to talk to humiliate himself. A collar around his neck— to match the type of thing you well know he had Shizun wear. A leash, for you to lead him by. You tap your foot gently before you, and he sits on his haunches, down on his knees below you.
"Look at your dear disciple, Shizun. Doesn't this suit him so much better?"
The expression that flashes across Shizun's tired face is so damn delectable you can just taste it. The widening of his eyes, the twitch of his eyebrows. The flashes of horror and despair. Your sweet, sweet, kind, bleeding heart Shizun, so sensitive, so honest in his heart, his perfect pretty face that shows every drop of blood that drops down from it. Not for the first time, you think— how could anyone have ever thought for a moment he's cold blooded and heartless? Even Mo Ran had an excuse that you made sure he'll see him that way. Everyone else around you must be so fucking stupid and blind.
"Hua Binan." His voice is weak, a raspy croak. When he looks back to meet your gaze, his eyes flash and burn ever so brightly from a weary, pale face. "Is all you've already done to him not enough? Will you not be satisfied until..." He shudders, draws in a breath. His voice almost seems to break around the next set of words. "You had crushed his soul and driven him to suicide. His corpse is under your command. What is the point of debasing him further? What do you get out of humiliating him?"
Your hands twitch with the desire to strangle something between them. How is it that boundless compassion pours out from him still, for the dog who violated him every day for years on end, who crushed his core, humiliated and destroyed him? How is he more deserving of compassion than you? It's not like you need his compassion, or kindness, or pity, or even want it. But how come he gets to be forgiven and loved in his eyes, more than you? As if his pain matters more. (As if your pain matters less.)
"Shizun is so kind, to extend such compassion to him even now."
Even on his knees, Taxian-jun is tall enough that you exert no effort to place your palm on top of his head, to stroke his scalp and ruffle his hair in a mockery of affection.
"This humble disciple only wishes to convey a point to his Shizun, so as to be properly understood."
The way Shizun narrows his eyes is all the answer you need. Which is all well and fine. You are not interested in talking to him. Some things are better shown than said.
Pulling at the leash, you force Taxian-jun's lifeless eyes to look up to you, and hold up your hand for him, and order with a sweet smile: "Bark for me, dog."
And he does.
"Woof," is his first, very distinctly human sounding attempt, and then a second and a third— raw and animalistic, and in fact so accurate that you're almost impressed. He holds his hands up, curls them up into paws, puts one into your outstretched hand, and barks, and again, and again.
The combination of thrill, of delighted disbelief and bone deep satisfaction, pure contentment and cruel joy— all of it pushes the laugh that you've been holding in for so long to finally burst out of you. It pours in through a breaking dam and out of your throat. In your heart it feels cruel and ugly, tearing itself from you with the taste of blood in your mouth, but on exit, the sound turns delicate, sweet and melodious, as if you don't know how to laugh in any way that isn't docile and pretty.
But oh, Shizun! Shizun looks just wonderfully, charmingly, earnestly horrified! Not even angry, no, just pure, compassionate, bleeding heart horror and despair, and you want to laugh even further. It's just oh, so, so sweet and honest that you can't help yourself. How innocent his heart is still capable of being, and after all this time! These are the reasons you just adore him so. You return the lovely sight with your own warm smile, and another few pets on Taxian-jun's head, a deserved award to your slave for his rare obedience.
"Not bad, mutt." For the first time in a while, you don't have to fake your cheer, or the warmth in your voice. He looks up at you in such a way that you can just see a tail wagging behind him, even with his expressionless, distant face. Crouching down to meet his eyes, you coo and whistle and pat the carpet beneath. "Here, boy. Roll on your back and I'll rub your belly too."
With his stupid looking face and unfocused eyes staring nowhere, Taxian-jun lies obediently on his back right where you direct him to. Pale, dead limbs creak with the effort when he raises them up and bends them like a dog's legs, hands still curled into paws.
"Very good!" You coo mockingly, and press your hand to his stomach to rub. It's as stone cold and lifeless as the rest of him, unnatural in its unbreathing stillness. Perhaps that's why it's not as repulsive to the touch as you'd normally find it to be. "Is this what you see in him, Shizun? Blind obedience?" You want to sneer, mock, but the voice that comes out instead is still cloyingly, venomously sweet, coating your sarcasm. "Mm, he's quite endearing like this. I can almost be fond of him when all he can do is bark."
"Hua Binan—" When you look back up to Shizun, he's just trembling with rage. It's a lovely look on him. You're terribly, terribly fond of him like this, when he is weak, helpless you fight you or get in your way, but still ever so noble, and good, and kind. "You are... you are such a—"
"A bastard? A monster? An evil sinner?" The first time he insulted you, you were upset. But that passed away remarkably quickly, when you realized he can only hate Hua Binan, not Shi Mingjing; that he had separated the two of you so cleanly, unable to turn on his sweet, poor disciple so easily. Oh, Shizun, Shizun, Shizun. How so very tender-hearted he always is. You need to be a separate person for him to hate you for all he suffered on your behalf. "I've been called worse things long before we met, Shizun. But I appreciate that you insult my actions, rather than my nature. "
How he still treats your actions as your own, in how he takes it for granted that you have the capacity to act on your own, as a person does. You'd rather be a monster than a bitch.
"Even when you hate me, you treat me as a real person— for that, I truly am grateful. "
You say it in the fake-sweet voice that seems to be stuck in your throat, but the sincerity of the words surprises even yourself. It's as if in spite of everything, not only can you allow yourself honesty with Shizun, but your adoration of him draws out that honesty on its own. In fact, it's just a bit too much, enough to feel as if you've slipped, that makes a brief panic spark at the back of your mind at the loss of control, your instinct itching to regain some footing.
Looking down at the Taxian-jun gives you the urge to play a little further. Pretend for a bit this really is a pet you're so fond of. He's just so much more likable this way.
"Dogs are very pitiful creatures, don't you think, Shizun?" You switch the subject as you scratch under his chin. "Their ancestors are ferocious hunters, and yet, having been taken advantage of and manipulated by humans, they've been reduced to humanity's slaves. But they're too stupid to understand what's been done to them, and are happy in their servitude."
Taxian-jun barks. Shizun's face twitches as if he has been stung, and you don't have to look at his face to feel the agony radiating off him, as if he's the one lying on the floor, humiliating himself.
"Cats are also pitiful. " You continue as if ignorant of any occurrence, reaching behind his stiff, solid ears to scratch at their shells. "Because they chose to be domesticated. They are smart enough to know better, but they joined dogs in their slavery. They decided that is better to be safe as human slaves, than free in the dangers of the wild."
You raise your head and meet his eye. There is a shaking to his lip and his brow, a desolation to his soft eyes. You adore his vulnerability, his weakness. You want to gorge yourself on it, as if to consume it from another will allow it in yourself.
"Which of the two is more unfortunate, do you think? The slave that's too stupid to understand it, or the slave that chooses to be?"
Shizun answers only after a long silence.
"Do you consider animals more deserving of your pity than humans?"
"Hm?" Oh, now there's a thought. You've never really thought of it that way, but.. "I suppose I do. Animals are the victims of humans and their thirst for domination. I certainly relate more to that than to humankind. Do you think the way they conquered the world is proper, or deserved, Shizun? The violence humanity has been waging on the world for thousands of years, the way they had decided to rule it. Is it really justified in your eyes?"
"I don't have the arrogance to make such definitive judgements."
You recognize the intended sting in the comment, but really. Who better qualified to make such a judgment, than the singularly gentlest and kindest human to have lived? Perhaps one of the few worthwhile ones. A human who has had his kindness and gentleness paid back by the world with violence. Who better understands than him?
"It's hardly arrogance coming from someone so well qualified."
"... Are these meant to be words of praise? Do you expect me to be glad to hear that from you?"
You mean to say what you intended. To clarify. That you've seen his misery. That you've seen struggle to be good and just in a world that doesn't appreciate his efforts. You mean to convey all these thoughts. And yet. Instead:
"All I have to say of you is praise, Shizun."
The sentiment was true. The words were true. But what you wanted to say was that you've seen his heart, that you've seen his pain, that you trust him to at least understand yours no matter how much he despises you. That wasn't what you said. Why couldn't you have just said it? You haven't had to flirt or seduce someone for your own goals in years, you managed to persuade Xu Shuangling smoothly over to your side without debasing yourself that way, so why is that still your first instinct? Why does your rare venture to try sincerity have to be filtered through something so ugly and syrupy?
So when Shizun makes a face of revulsion, of disgust— in spite of everything, in spite of how you have bigger priorities, in site of how it's expected, in spite of how he couldn't possibly see your intent and in spite of how it shouldn't fucking matter— well. That makes your heart stir in a way you rather don't like. And immediately, all the fleeting, condescending affection you have mustered for the dog Taxian-jun withers up and dies.
So in one swift moment, you stand up, and without thinking, kick him.
Not with all your force, not even really to hurt, but it grates when Taxian-jun doesn't react. Of course he can't. What can you do to hurt a corpse? In his current state he wouldn't have reacted if it did hurt. He would have barely moved through pain.
So instead you press your foot to his face, and push and push and push until it rolls to the side and squishes between your foot and the floor. Taxian-jun's leg twitches, and it's the pure reflex of a dead body, but just doing it feels damn good. He looks so pathetic and it's all you've longed to see for years and you press and press until you hear a creak. Your dig your heel into his jaw and your vision swims, a sharp spark of flame lighting up in you, and you release your foot, raise it, and then it goes down and smashes into his face, up, down, up and down, your shoe leaving marks on his face, and you kick and kick and kick and each hit makes something sparking rush in your veins, makes you feel a pure cleansing release, a purging of something ugly and painful from within you, and that thought makes another helpless giggle break out from within your heavy throat and—
"... Stop."
Then you hear Shizun's voice through the mists of your burning vindication, and your heart quivers. A single droplet of water cools down your raging flame. The noise in your ears disappears, quiets down, to your own heavy breaths.
It's just one word. But, oh— so much, within that single word, that single sound! Such a small voice, so pitiful, so precious! As if he's trying to call on the stern and powerful Shizun he wore as his mask and defense. It's unbearably sweet, unbearably pitiful, unbearably vulnerable.
You turn to look at him, meet his sweet, pitiful, sad face, and know you did that. You made him feel that way. You drove him to this desperation. You made him look that way! Chu Wanning, a man who does not beg. A man who is dignified, elegant, powerful, beautiful. And yet. And yet!
"Please stop."
It comes out of him in one breath, as if he's afraid of his own words. Terrified by this briefest exposure of vulnerability. You want to kiss his quivering mouth. You want to devour the tremor in his sad dark eyes.
That very second, you decide it was all worth it just to have heard him beg you.
"Well," You say, eyes boring into him as if you could devour it all through sight alone. "Since Shizun asked so nicely."
Obviously, you have no intention of really stopping here. Not when you've yet to see just how far you can push all of this. Not when just trampling and stomping all over him felt so damn good. But you remove your foot and let him off just for a moment. Fulfill Shizun's innocent plea if at least temporarily. Of course, there's still so much you can do, so many ways to play, that you hum to yourself, thinking, thinking, eyes raking him over, top to bottom, until— well, well, well!— your eyes catch of something really truly very interesting.
"Oh," you fake-gasp. "It seems you didn't have to get quite so upset on his behalf, Shizun. Look," You breathe as you eye up what's a very distinguishable, very unmistakable telltale bulge of an erection— by some absurd miracle, rising in a bloodless, lifeless body. "Even I didn't expect this. Seems like the dog likes being put in his place."
Shizun's lovely face looks like it's warring between deathly pale and icy terrified blue and pretty flushed pink somehow all at once. It's really so endearing, in its plan transparently, in the flood of emotion so plain to see.
"Such an expression suits you, Shizun." You look down to the emperor at your feet. "I think, just for that, you deserve to have your demands met to the spirit, and not just to the letter."
Click.
Another snap of your fingers, and Taxian-jun wakes up. His eyes open and clear, blink once, twice, pulled out from beneath the water onto the surface and the open air, unnoticing that the rest of his body remains submerged and helpless. You see the struggle in his expression to adjust to reality, the warring emotions on his face, the confusion and struggle to comprehend, all of it delightfully, satisfyingly stupid looking.
If he had been really awake and fully lucid, he would have attacked you on the spot, fought against every movement, struggled with all his might. But his body remains down in place, as if strapped to the floor, completely dependent on your orders. The only lucidity is his eyes, flaring with defiance and rage.
"Master." He says, ice-cold, commanding, powerful, arrogant. Completely useless in his current situation. "What exactly is the meaning of this?"
"A reminder." You meet his cold defiance with a sweet smile, and bring up the leash for him to see. "Of who you belong to."
"Impudent!" He bellows, rage flaring in his eyes. His body twitches, and he seems to struggle to move, as if against some invisible binding. He manages to control his hands just enough to attempt to claw at his muzzle, but his fingers don't cooperate the way his arms do. "Who do you think you are? You will remove this— this— contraption and release This Venerable One's body at once!"
"Hmmm." You lean down, caress his muzzle in a parody of gentleness. "Why would I do that, puppy? With the way you keep biting, it's a necessity for your training." Relishing in his body's helplessness, the way it seems all but glued to the floor, you circle him. "Unless, of course... we can find a way to put your mouth to better use than talking."
"As if you could make one ever stoop so low!" He sneers. "Does Master really think This Venerable One would so much as humour your tiny fucking—"
"Really, now, your Majesty. Is this the best insult you can come up with? Is that all you consider to be of any value? Do you think that just because this grotesque thing you call a cock—" You raise your foot above his crotch, let it hang in the air, and press down. "—Is what makes all your decisions for you, then the rest of us are the same?"
And he stills, as perfectly cold as the corpse he is. Taxian-jun's eyes twitch down to the tent in his own robes, as if uncomprehending what he's seeing.
"Particularly when his Majesty seems to be rather enjoying his current situation."
He opens his mouth as if to protest, but a firm rub of your shoe into his cock startles a gasp out of him. It's as if he's all but run out of any words, so startled and struggling to understand the situation, unable to reconcile the reality with his own self perception, He twitches, sucks in a breath into a body that does not need it, and with every motion of your foot, every way you find to play with the vulgar thing, it throbs, and with such an intensity, as if begging you to be trampled further.
You note, not without satisfaction, that this monster of a thing, even in its full size, is still outclassed by the size of your foot. Being praised by slobbering men for your pretty delicate dainty feet, they're nicer than most girls, feels so good and soft all over my dick, had made it feel all the more vindicating when you grew up to be this tall.
"I suppose it's only natural. His Majesty should be honored, if anything. Hundreds of men like yourself would kill for this opportunity, you know?"
Taxian-jun wheezes out a defiant sneering laugh. "There are no men like myself." Then your slow, playful pressing crescendos into a harsh kick, just hard enough to risk injury, and it rips out a moan of him that makes his dark eyes fly open wide.
"Vulgar beasts, dogs and wolves in human form who think with their libido? Who think all the world belongs to them? Who trample upon everything they come across and think they're entitled to take everything in sight?" You spit out every word with bitterness, every syllable snapping. "You really are unbelievably naive, Mo Ran, if you think you're the only one."
When you pull away, there is a dark, wet spot where your foot had been. It's at once disgusting and delightful, and you click your tongue in a cold reprimand. "You see? No different from any other man. This is the only part of your body that ever thinks. All the more reason you'll need to be trained."
Kneeling down to sit on your haunches, you reach behind his ears and release him from his muzzle, then place it on top of the nearest table, sending Shizun a sweet smile along your way. Then, placing each one of your legs at Taxian-juns sides, standing in a straddle, you pull at the dark silk pooling at your feet, gather it up until it's bunch upped above your waist
Taxian-jun takes one look at your exposed lower half, and laughs throatily. "Master, you really think I'll suck you off when you do all this to me and you're not even hard? You're really—"
You smother any comment he might have made by turning around, and sitting down right on top of his face.
The sensation isn't unpleasant— the friction, the press of his protruding profile to your exposed core, the way his nose rubs up to your tailbone, and you suppress a shiver. A brief wiggle of your hips presses your hole directly to his pale mouth, your thighs squeezing around his face. It's not the first time you've been in this position, but the first time you've done it without bigger hands grabbing you, without being forced into it; the first time it really feels like an act of domination, of forcing another to pleasure you. You have been begged to do this by pathetic, slobbering men, men who were still powerful, who still forced you to play along in the end. You let the silence hang as if you hadn't heard him, relish the rarity and the sense of power, of effectively shutting him up by forcing him to serve you.
"Of course not." You finally say, smooth and even, as if there had been no delay at all. "Do you really think a useless dog like you could arouse me?" Taxian-jun makes a muffled sound against your entrance in his attempt to speak, his throat and mouth vibrating against your sensitive spots. That also feels kind of nice, but not enough. "Now, eat me out."
The muffled noises of protest only increase. You watch his legs tremble and snap upwards only to drop back down as if pushed back by a massive weight; his body, too, thrashes beneath you, but just barely, still bound by your spell and the invisible ropes keeping him from acting as he wishes. Frankly, you expected this kind of disobedience, so it only gives you an excuse to put him down under. When you look back to Shizun, he's keeping his eyes turned away, teeth gritted, which is rather a shame as it means there's no one for you to send exasperated looks at. But you know he's not going to be able to look away forever.
"Now, what's up with that reaction as if you're being suffocated? Did you forget you don't have any breath to lose?" You say in the chiding voice of one speaking to a disobedient child. "Countless men had begged me to sit on their faces and suffocate them with my thighs even though it put them at real risk. Don't you even understand how lucky you are to not have to worry about that? The privilege of having me do this for you, by choice?"
From the corner of your eye, Shizun's head snaps up. At least there's someone here lucid enough to appreciate your sarcasm.
"Ah, well. At least I did try to give you a chance." You sigh, long-suffering, and, with another snap of your fingers: "Focus."
His body goes limp beneath you again as if dying for the second time. The muffled mumble beneath you sounds a bit more like master, and you thrust your hips into his face in lieu of a command. This time, he doesn't need to be told. All it takes is a tug at his leash for his tongue slips inside you without hesitation, his hands raising only for the use of two fingers, spreading your hole to allow himself deeper access, and you finally allow yourself to sigh and shiver.
Yes, certainly this isn't the first time someone has put their tongue inside you. But it's the first time having this done to you doesn't feel so repulsive that it makes you want to throw up. That your soul doesn't want to crawl out of your body and doesn't scream to get out, that your mind doesn't blur with a mix of dizziness and nausea, a caged animal screaming, trying to run off so it can be anywhere except here and now.
There's no real comparing Taxian-jun's technique with others. You assume he's probably better than the other men, but your memory of what it felt like is buried somewhere deep underneath where you made sure it will never resurface. What a miracle it is, to feel this way, to be able to close your eyes and focus on the sensation, on the present rather than try to numb your mind and get it away. To focus on the way he reaches so deep within you, a long, slick appendage hitting every sensitive spot. To have it press down to your prostate and make your mind go momentarily blank, and then again, and again, and have that lightning current running through you feel good.
Encouraging, you roll your hips into his face, arch your back. "Mm... he's not good for much beyond his mouth and his cock, but he's decent enough at this, at least." You assume he is. You don't know if he's any good, because anything would be good compared to what you experienced before. It's not your first sexual encounter since those days of survival before you've made your way to Sisheng, and not the first one to be consensual. But you can't help but feel your mind wandering thinking about what it would be like to have done this with a loved one. What would it be like not to have to force him? What would it like for someone to give to you, willingly?
Why does it always have to be an act of violence and hate for you? Even now, when you're in control, when you do it by choice, you do it for hate, for revenge, for vindication, for a feeling of power. Why can't this be an act of love? Why isn't it possible for someone to desire you, want you, as a person, and not as an object?
What could that possibly even be like?
You don't even realize your hands are pulling at Taxian-jun's hair until it's almost ripping it out of his scalp until you register the unfamiliar texture against your palm. You release it, and your mind clears from its haze, but your body still feels hot with anger, your rage and your hate suffocated in your robes, heat burning in your limbs.
What stupid thoughts. What are you asking why for? You know exactly why. Mother didn't love the man she married either. She probably hated him and everything he was and stood for, and couldn't show it even for a moment. She married because it was a bond that gave her a chance to survive, a chance to have agency in this world, a chance to have power, and therefore, a chance to save your people. You are here to continue her work. Who are you to disrespect her by complaining, when being not just a Butterfly Boned Beauty Feast but a woman, she's probably gone through much worse? With how much she sacrificed to give you and your jiejie a much better childhood and life than either of you could have had?
The sucking sensation around the ring of your entrance timed perfectly with a precise thrust of tongue inside you pulls you out of the ocean of thought you've sunk into, sudden and sharp and good. You swear and hiss under your breath, your hips thrusting back to meet him, ass pressing onto his face, and hell if it doesn't affect you. You don't understand why that annoys you, the pleasure steadily rising with each movement of his tongue, why you're annoyed you couldn't insult him for not knowing how to please you more than you're enjoying him serving you. But you push it away the way you've pushed away so many other unwanted feelings, and force yourself to focus on what matters. This is what you've wanted, wasn't it?
When the smallest shuddering gasp breaks out of you, when your thighs tremble at the pleasure, when you feel your iron self control slip, you decide— no, this isn't what you wanted. With another low hissed swear, your cock full and heavy throbbing between your legs, with the peak of your pleasure approaching closer, you lift your hips and pry yourself off him smoothly, your legs off the floor and feet finding purchase onto his body instead.
A single person makes for a very uneven ground, even a dead one. It's far from practical to walk on, but it's worth it to feel him beneath both your feet as you gather up his robes and slip off everything underneath to expose the thing that has been making that grotesque tent in it. The throbbing organ is dark and discolored, exposing its own bizarre unnatural state, and to your eyes extremely ugly looking. It's a relief to look without being forced to put your hands on it, without having it forced down your throat, not to be then insulted and beaten by a man who forces it in far too deep inside and blames you for your body forcing him out with your vomit.
You turn to face him, looking down from above, meeting his expression that's back to blank and dull, with his hazy eyes, all helpless and foolish, defiance and willpower drained out. "Look, Shizun. Look at him. Don't tear your eyes away from us even for a second." You don't turn away to check if he's looking, or even make any effort to force him. You don't care. What you care about is his fully erect cock throbbing and just seconds away from bursting beneath your foot, the look on his face, the helplessness of his submission. "Isn't this dumb, mindless expression is so much more charming on him? So much truer to his nature. It's only fair, right? A stupid dog should always look like a stupid dog."
You stroke both of you off in tandem; him, with the bottom of your shoe, yourself with your hand as you watch him. You focus on the feeling of your hand, on your sense of control, on the throbbing and pumping sensation of blood rushing through your veins. Try to ignore the ever intrusive thought that the stupid immature fixations of Taxian-jun do matter, that you are as soft and delicate as you are because you are inferior, because your body is designed to be used and fucked. That your beauty is what marks you as inhuman, that you weren't meant to, never has the right to receive, to take, only to be taken. That Mother's fate is just punishment for the crime of seeking autonomy, for making her own choices on who to lead in her bed rather than submitting helplessly to her just violation.
It's the thoughts that still plague you in spite of yourself, always, at the sight of your body, any time you feel any arousal at all. It haunts you alongside the memory of Mother's last moments, born in the memories of ugly sweet cooing words, leering gazes, heavy breathes, spoken in the peak of your violation. Humans get to take; you exist to be taken. Humans get to find pleasure; you exist to be fucked. You don't get to take. You don't get to have anything on your own, for yourself. Yours is a body designed to be fuckable, for others' pleasure, not your own, so who cares how you feel about it, if you want it or not? Of course any pleasure of your own that you can find is like this: dark, dirty, corrupt, wrong. It's proof that all the things you were told are right, that the things humans believe about you were always true.
But, but, but— you're taking now, aren't you? The all powerful Taxian-jun is the one crawling on the floor beneath you. He's the one barking at your command. He's the inhuman one, not you. He's the one being used, the one serving you, pleasuring you, and he can't do anything about it. He has to watch you please yourself because he's unworthy of it, he's the one getting off just from eating you out and from the cold impersonal touch of your foot, he's the one helpless and mindless and—
And he's the one coming in pale discolored spurts, brought to the peak by your cruel heartless rubbing, alone, spraying everywhere, on himself, onto the floor, onto your leg.
"Look what a mess you've made." You present your stained leg to him. "Clean it up, dog."
You don’t really want the dog slobbering all over you, but you decide it’s worth it, just this one time. And you don’t feel repulsed enough at the feeling of his tongue on your shoes and bare skin when the sight of him using that arrogant, boastful tongue like a wet rag, any dignity or pride completely lost to him, sears itself into your memory.
It’s just for this singular moment in time. A temporary, fleeting moment. You’re going to wipe it away from his memory, but Shizun will remember, you will remember, and you will know. This moment when he cleans you up, a well trained hound– no. No longer a hound.
Because at this moment, he is the prey, you are the predator. A fierce wolf reduced to a stupid herbivore, the stronger, bigger beast at the mercy of a smaller, cunning carnivore.
It all comes to a head, all these precious moments you had stolen from his humiliation tonight. You treasure each and every one as you watch him clean, watch him apply his tongue to the floor, to clean himself off like a street animal, relish every memory that you will carry with you as the wood of your pyre.
And you feel vindicated. You feel satisfied.
Most importantly, you feel powerful.
And that is what finally brings you over the edge, has you coming with your teeth gritted and your come splashing all over his face, dripping down the front of his robes and his Emperor's crown. A precious moment of pure relief, of clear-minded freedom, of disconnecting from all the world’s ugly realities, a moment where nothing matters but this sense of power, where things feel good and right. You ride out your orgasm with another few tugs of your hand that leave you panting, your breaths soft but heavy and slow.
You come back to the sound of Shizun’s voice, to the sight of Taxian-jun still boneless on the floor before you, covered with your come.
The afterglow never lasts long enough for your liking. The few times you get this type of release, the rush of it, the relief, the moment of bliss, always fades away a little too quickly. Your ever-active mind can’t allow itself to stop working for long enough to lay back and treasure any respite you might give it. True relaxation is never going to come for you; there is always work for you to do, for as long as you’re alive, for as long as your goal is in sight.
It occurs to you that Shizun was saying something while you were too absorbed in orgasm to listen. You imagine he has nothing good to say, and you’re not really in the mood for conversation when your mind is already busying itself with the logistics of cleaning up, of undoing the spell, of wiping his memory, of how you want something of this encounter to remain but he’s already so disobedient it will just bring more trouble. Still, you’re best off at least listening now that he’s decided he does have something to say.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Shizun. Were you saying something?”
“... Are you satisfied now, Hua Binan?”
“Mmm.” A good question, really. No, you don’t know if you’re ever going to be satisfied. Not until your goal is met. You don’t even have any sense of what you’ll feel like or what your life will be after now, if you survive past that accomplishment. “Does Shizun mean sexually, or something else?”
There is a strange, unfamiliar expression on his face when you turn to look at him, and he speaks in an equally strange tone of voice.
“Do you feel better, having brought him down to this level?” He talks in a voice that should be full of hate and contempt. Instead, it’s distant. Almost clinical. He closes his eyes, and then makes a face you recognize again; that expression when his mind is full of thoughts he won’t voice. “... Do you feel that, having taken his humanity from him, you have reinforced your own?”
Oh, fuck no.
You’re not going to have anyone talk to you like that. You’re the one who reads others and sees clearly through their masks, digs into their secrets and exposes their true feelings. No one but jiejie gets to do that to you. Not even Shizun. He’s lost his chance to that long ago.
So with an icy sweet smile, you say. “My apologies, but I really don’t care to have this kind of conversation with you, Shizun. You just concentrate on your recovery.”
You pull at Taxian-jun’s leash, lead him out of the room, set to get back to business from this brief momentary digression.
And then, just before you leave:
“... I had never thought of Shi Mingjing as anything less than human.”
Shizun’s voice rings from across the room. Surer and firmer and odder than any time he’s spoken this evening.
“There is nothing that would have changed that, no matter what your true origins might be.”
Hah. So this is the closest to compassion you’re ever going to get from him, is it? You hear what’s unsaid in these words loud and clear. Even that barebones compassion is not really directed at you. Well, fine. So that’s how it is. It’s the other you that he knows much better, who hasn’t become a monster in his eyes, but even if it’s not the current you, even if he uses the name of the fake self you hate, it’s still some version of you.
Whatever. Hearing that isn’t really going to make you feel better. None of that is news to you. It’s not even your problem.
“I know.“
Of course you know. Both of you know. Of course he wouldn’t deny you if he knew the truth. Of course he’d accept you.
You want to say: But Shizun is just one man. But Shizun is just one human who’s not like any others, who’s kinder, better, full of compassion and determination to do right even when it goes against the rest of the cruel, heartless, violent herd. But it’s not enough for you. But none of this has ever been about you, Hua Binan, as an individual. If you had a miracle of a happy life, where everyone had been kind to you, if you had never experienced the things your brethren did and everyone around you had been like Shizun, none of it would ever be enough.
It’s a moot point, anyway. You have been angry for so long. You had been angry, constantly, for most of your life, nearly every day. Shizun couldn’t calm down that anger if he had tried, if he had poured out all his efforts and compassion for you the way he did it for so many others.
The other you might disagree about the pointlessness. The topic of Shizun is where most of your arguments lie. You’re sure he’s hiding somewhere around here, probably had been listening to all of this. Probably thought you’re wasting your time messing with Taxian-jun. He’ll have plenty of words to say to you when he does show himself, but it’s a discussion you can manage. It wouldn’t be your worst argument.
All you can wonder, as you leave the room, is if he was imagining doing all of this to his world’s own Mo Ran.