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Luo Binghe furiously stomped through Qing Jing Peak. He didn’t have a destination, he just needed to… clear his head. Get a grip again. Something. Anything. Anything to get away from the other version of his actual Shizun and the kind Shizun.
It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair. Why did the crybaby have it so much better than him? He got to have a loving husband. He got to have the original Shen Qingqiu who’d managed to develop some resemblance of a conscience. Somehow. What the fucking hell had happened for the monster who’d haunted Luo Binghe’s childhood to change into… that?
It just wasn’t fair.
Luo Binghe realized he’d walked back to the now slightly wrecked Bamboo House. The place the crybaby got to call home. Luo Binghe gathered qi in his hands to attack, but at the last minute he sent the blast to the side. The earth exploded and a giant crater was left behind. Something snapped. Luo Binghe lashed out again and again. In the end, he just stood there panting and staring at the Bamboo House. It hadn’t been hit once.
He gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. Well, whatever. Just add this to the cosmic injustices of Luo Binghe’s life. It didn’t matter. He would still have the kind Shizun. The crybaby could keep the other one. As long as Luo Binghe got to have the kind Shizun… Shen Yuan… That was all that mattered.
“Shen Yuan will never be yours,” a voice suddenly said.
Luo Binghe turned around and nearly blasted the newcomer into pieces. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t. “And you are?” he hissed instead.
The newcomer gave a charming smile. “As I’m in this world on vacation, you can call me Pei Ming.”
Luo Binghe sneered. “If you’re not even from this world, what the hell do you know about Shizun?”
Pei Ming seemed completely unbothered by his hostility. “You know, in my world I’m the unofficial god of love, so I’d say I’m rather knowledgeable when it comes to matters of the heart.”
“…you’re a god.”
“Yes.”
Luo Binghe narrowed his eyes. “I’ve killed gods.”
Pei Ming just grinned. “So has Crimson Rain. Hell, Black Water literally ripped my best friend’s head off. I still tease them about their marriages. If that was supposed to be a threat, you’ll have to do better.”
…that god was definitely insane.
“Aright, god of love, then enlighten me with your wisdom,” Luo Binghe said sarcastically.
Maybe he was insane for entertaining this, too.
Pei Ming turned a bit more serious. “You’re right when you say I don’t know Shen Yuan that well. However, I don’t have to to recognize the way he and your counterpart look at each other. It’s the same way our Heavenly Emperor and Crimson Rain look at each other. The same way their son and his husband do. The way Black Water and Shi Qingxuan do. And a couple of others as well. I know all too well what it looks like if someone is your whole world. If there’s never going to be anyone else. If this one person is the only one it could ever be.”
“I’ve heard that one before,” Luo Binghe replied with a scoff. “More times than I can count. In the end, those women still always ended up choosing and marrying me.”
Pei Ming shook his head. “Even if they might’ve said the same, there is no winning someone over who looks at their partner this way. Getting Shen Yuan’s love is a lost cause. He’ll only ever have eyes for Luo Binghe.”
“I’m a Luo Binghe, too. And I’m better than that crybaby.”
“You’re not his, though. And when it comes to this kind of love, the difference matters.”
...no. No! Luo Binghe wouldn’t accept this. He couldn’t.
“He just met the crybaby first,” Luo Binghe hissed. “I’ll make him love me! I’ll make him see I’m better!”
Pei Ming’s eyes held pity. “You can’t make someone love you.”
“Some god of love you are! Maybe I just need to kill the crybaby and take Shen Yuan to my world. He’ll love me eventually!”
Pei Ming sighed. “Heaven, you remind me of a former girlfriend of mine. It just doesn’t work this way. Maybe you would manage to kill your counterpart. Maybe you would manage to take Shen Yuan. Let’s ignore the how and the massive group of people who’d come after you in that case. You know what would happen if you did it? Shen Yuan still wouldn’t love you. On the contrary, he would loathe you for killing his husband. He would fight you until his last breath even if it’s not physically. Maybe out there is a different version of Shen Yuan as well who could be yours the way you want to, but this one? No matter how hard and long you’ll try, he’ll never be yours. He belongs to someone else.”
Luo Binghe wanted to protest. He always got what he wanted in the end. Every woman he’d ever set his sights on had become his eventually. This pathetic excuse of a god of love obviously didn’t know him! However, not a single word left his mouth.
“Besides, are you really sure you want Shen Yuan? The way you talk about him makes it seem like you want what he can give you. You want what the other you has. You want the idea of him.”
Luo Binghe wanted to scream at Pei Ming to just shut the fuck up. He stayed silent, though. Maybe because a tiny part of him knew the other was right. Maybe because that tiny part of him had always known. It had been years at this point. Luo Binghe wasn’t stupid. He knew how to read others.
“Also, what the other you has is a willing partner. An equal. You can never get that if you don’t respect the other’s choices and wishes. Shen Yuan doesn’t want you. If you loved him the way you want to be loved by him, you would respect it.”
Luo Binghe stared at the Bamboo House again. A home. Just never his home. “But why does he get to have something like that?” he whispered. “Why does he get to be happy and I don’t?”
Pei Ming sighed again and walked forward until he was standing directly next to Luo Binghe. “You know, not everyone needs a partner like that to be happy. I for one am perfectly fine to spend a certain amount of time with someone and then move on. Some people don’t need a partner at all. However, if you think this kind of relationship is what you want and need, then go looking for it. You’re apparently married to multiple women, but as far as I can tell it’s not the kind of love you want. So go looking for the one who’s going to be your whole world. And whose whole world you’ll be in return.”
“…who’s to say they even exist?”
“I can’t tell you that. But you’ll never know if you won’t start looking and instead spend your time chasing after someone who’ll never be yours.”
…Luo Binghe promptly decided he didn’t want to hear another word. “Wise words from someone who apparently dated a crazy lunatic.”
“Hey, she wasn’t that crazy when I dated her!” Pei Ming replied. “She just got a little murdery afterwards.”
Luo Binghe raised a mocking eyebrow. “Meaning?”
Pei Ming sighed. “She murdered brides for centuries and burnt quite a few of my temples down. Among other things.”
“My wives regularly try to kill each other,” Luo Binghe heard himself saying for some reason.
“And that would be why I never involved myself with more than one woman at the same time.” Pei Ming grinned. “Except for, you know, if they wanted to be involved at the same time.”
“I have six hundred wives. Trust me, I know.”
Pei Ming grinned even wider. “Six hundred, how cute. Want to know my track record?”
Luo Binghe scoffed. “As if you could do better than me!”
“Want to bet on it?”
Pei Xiu sighed deeply and reported, “The situation with the other Luo Binghe seems under control for now. Apparently, General Pei took him to town for a contest on charming someone.”
The present cultivators, gods and ghosts who’d been waiting for news had expressions somewhere between flabbergasted, amused or outright horrified.
“What does that mean?” Liu Qingge asked.
“I really don’t want to know, so I didn’t ask for details! You don’t ask General Pei what he’s doing in his free time!”
Fuck, Shen Yuan was never going to get rid of the mental image suddenly running rampant in his head. Because he was a little bit too aware of what Luo Bingge got up to in his free time…