Work Text:
The Writer and the Wolf
And you are the wolf
And I am the moon
And in the endless sky, we are but one
We are alive
In my dreams wolf and I
Oh Land - Wolf & I
At the sweet age of 27 and being a well-known author (at least on the web novel world), there were some things that Shang Qinghua knew very well. For example, he knew that the road to a successful web novelist career was to please his readers in all possible ways. He also knew that his writing had been more sloppy than usual, which meant the loss of readers and, thus, money. Most importantly, he knew that his stupid idea of trying new things to help with his writing to prevent said losing of readers was going to kill him.
It all started right after he finished his last novel: a story that was longer than the first two and kept him in the top reading spot in Zhongdian Literature, but also was the most difficult thing he had written so far. After the unrivaled success of his first work, creating new stories that provided him with the same amount of readers and money was becoming a bigger challenge each time. Even in the profitable world of heterosexual porn writing, and especially after the third novel. Readers were pickier now, writers were even more shameless after the path he opened to them. And slowly, but surely, new authors with a strong fanbase emerged, which meant more competition for him. Yes, his work was still ranked one on his publishing site, but he knew that it was a matter of time before someone was crowned the most widely read author.
He tried new things to keep up with the money flow. He was becoming more active on social media and had a VIP site where he gave sneak peeks of his work. He also shared deleted scenes and took requests from his readers when his time let him do so. Shang Qinghua had become a content creator that even had a video channel where he talked about being a successful online author and the art of writing 10k words a day (the video about his thought process and “how to craft a novel: from zero ideas to a million words” was one of the most viewed ones).
The thing was that writing about new stuff hadn’t been easy nowadays. He was stuck. Lost in what kind of story he had to write now. After three novels and millions of words, somehow his stories felt the same. Same clichés, same tropes, same plots with OP protagonists, ridiculously beautiful women, and sex scenes left and right. It was getting kind of boring, even to him. And his readers thought so, especially his biggest anti who might be his biggest fan at the same time that he was... his best friend? If anything, he was his greatest critic.
So, he was having trouble writing, right? And somehow he had a great idea: that he needed to take a vacation, go somewhere different, experience new things, and regain his magic with words, go somewhere he couldn’t be distracted by the day-to-day problems. It sounded great. That’s how he rented a cabin in the middle of nowhere, to spend some time with himself and maybe spend some of his savings too because he could afford it now. Kind of. Probably not.
Shen Yuan said it was a terrible idea. Shang Qinghua assured him that it was not.
It was a great place and so far it was a nice way to concentrate and think of future novels, but it was also the reason he was going to die. Because he was Shang Qinghua, master of terrible decisions, and he thought that going for a walk, alone, in the mountains, was a great idea. And it was, yeah, at the very beginning. The scenery was beautiful, the air was pure, and he was beginning to plot a story about a lovely mountain goddess who found humanity interesting enough to take a couple of human lovers and…
And he got lost.
He got lost during his walk, then he fell and now had a broken leg, or maybe he had just a sprain, who knew? It was painful enough to think his leg could be broken. At some point, he must have lost consciousness for a while because the sun was in a different position when he started his walk. So yeah, he was going to die because he was in the middle of nowhere, with no signal, injured, and more importantly, with zero knowledge of how to survive in the wild. Oh, did he mention that he was injured?
He tried to move, but a sharp pain in his leg made him stay still once more. He could feel the panic slowly spreading through his body, like an ink stain in a glass of water. There weren't many options, he was aware of it, but panicking would make things even worse, and yet… And yet. Shang Qinghua closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Okay. Don’t… don’t panic. It’s okay,” he said, trying to reassure himself. “It’s okay, Qinghua. Breathe, just breathe. Try to think. What can you do? What can you possibly do?”
Nothing, the thought, feeling anguished. There was nothing he could do.
The saddest thing was that he was sure that no one would notice his disappearance and eventful death. Yes, Shen Yuan knew his whereabouts, but he knew that he planned to stay in the cabin, writing secluded from the world, not walking around and getting lost. Who else would notice? It had also been years since the last time he talked to any of his parents, and he didn’t have coworkers who would wonder about him. He didn't even have any other friends. He had acquaintances, but friends he had only one, and honestly, there were days when he wondered if he could call the strange relationship he had with Shen Yuan a friendship.
Oh, and now it was starting to snow too.
“Fuck me,” he said to himself as he felt tears running down his cheeks. This was it. The end. His body felt cold and tired, and he had this pressure in his chest that he didn’t know if it was from panic or just the frustration to know that his life would end like this: a pathetic ending for a pathetic person.
Shang Qinghua wasn't sure how long it had been, but he could tell from the color of the sky that it wouldn't be long before sunset. Well, he thought, at least he could just close his eyes and try falling asleep. His body felt lethargic enough to sleep in no time, unlike his usual work-induced insomnia. Even the cold was something that had stopped bothering him, along with the pain in his leg, which he didn’t feel either.
Then, just when he had decided to let himself be carried away by exhaustion, he heard something near him and opened his eyes, but his vision was blurry, and he couldn’t see much around him. He tried to listen. It sounded like footsteps, but he wasn't sure they were. He couldn't be lucky enough to be found by someone else, could he?
“H-Hello?” he tried. “Is someone there?” he added, but there was no answer. Qinghua waited for a while, listening, but there was nothing, just silence, and the dreadful knowledge that he was alone. He sighed. Maybe it was just his mind playing him a very bad prank in the last moments of his life. He wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case. Before he felt his consciousness fade entirely, he thought that at least with him dead, he didn’t have to look at Shen Yuan's smug face and listen to all his “I told you so.”
Consciousness came and went. First, it was the feeling of being carried and a warmness around him before he was unconscious again. Then came the sensation of movement and the blurry vision of the trees, as if he was traveling at high speed. Shang Qinghua felt something soft in his face and heard the wind whistle around him. For a moment, he thought that he had listened to a heartbeat, but he wasn’t entirely sure that it was real and not just his mind playing games with him again. He let blackness take him one more time.
Later, though he couldn’t say exactly how much time later, he opened his eyes. He felt kind of dizzy and had to blink a couple of times to get used to the dim light around him. He was also sweaty and hot in an uncomfortable way. He looked around, confused, still not completely awake, and noticed that he was inside some cave. Shang Qinghua frowned. The last thing he remembered was the cold, the lack of sensation in his injured leg, and the sorrow at the certainty of his imminent death. Was he alive?
He tried to move, but just then he felt a sharp pain in his leg. Yep, definitely alive, he thought. He lay down once more, took a deep breath, and let the idea of not being dead sink. He was alive. He was alive!
Shang Qinghua finally let go of a sob he didn’t know he had inside and felt the tears run free over his face. He cried for a while, still scared of not knowing where he was but relieved that he was alive, and after a couple of minutes, feeling not better but considerably calmer, he noticed some more things. There was a fire next to him and he was covered in furs, which also explained the heat.
He tried to get up, careful on his injured leg, and while doing that, he looked around once more. It was obvious that whoever had saved him hadn’t chosen this place merely for its convenience. It looked like someone lived here. There were other furs beside the ones he had on him, and he also saw a couple of wooden boxes. It was also difficult not to notice the big black wolf that was a few steps from him.
He yelled and tried to move away, but a new wave of pain emerged from his leg. “Oh, ow, fuck, fuck.”
He could feel his heart pounding and even though his leg hurt horribly, he leaned back, trying to put as much distance as possible between himself and the wolf, who was just there, sitting and watching him intently. Shang Qinghua closed his eyes and waited for an attack, thinking that this was, indeed, his luck: surviving death by hypothermia just to be eaten by a wolf. Were there even wolves in that part of the world? He couldn’t remember.
A few seconds passed and when he noticed that there was no movement (and more importantly, that he was still alive), he slowly opened his eyes. And yes, the wolf was still there, watching him, but it didn't seem like it had any intention of attacking him.
“Eh. Hi?”
There was no answer, obviously, but it didn't look like the wolf was going to move either, so he tried to relax as much as someone could do so in the presence of a wild animal. He looked around the cave again, searching for the person responsible for his rescue, but there was no one else, just him and the wolf. Shang Qinghua didn't have any kind of experience with wolves (petting his neighbors' husky when he was a kid, wasn’t “experience”, exactly), so he didn't know what he should or shouldn't do. That didn't prevent him from appreciating how magnificent and imposing it looked, though. It was huge, and its black fur reflected the firelight near them. Its gaze, Shang Qinghua thought, was unusually human. Uncomfortable and still afraid, he looked away.
After a while, he sighed and settled back on the furs. He still felt exhausted from everything that had happened in the last hours (or days or whatever time that had passed since he got lost), and he couldn't even think clearly at that moment. Perhaps the best thing he could do was to try to sleep again and wait to see what happened because there weren't many options. He would be eaten by a wolf, or he would find out who had rescued him, whichever happened first.
He had barely closed his eyes when he heard movement near him and opened them once more. He turned to where the sound came from and discovered that the wolf was no longer there. In its place, there was a man. A very naked man, staring at him.
“What the hell?!”
As he tried to move, he felt pain in his leg again, which distracted him for a moment. However, almost immediately, the man turned his back on him and walked over to one of the boxes that Shang Qinghua had previously noticed. He opened it and from it took out some kind of clothes that he began to put on, completely ignoring the injured man. Shang Qinghua continued to watch him, not quite knowing how to react or what to think of what was happening at that moment.
On the one hand, there was the fact that the wolf and the man seemed… they seemed to be the same, as incredible as it was. The fact that he wasn't freaking out over that revelation told volumes about how tired and confused he still was. And on the other hand, where on earth had a man so wonderfully sculpted by nature come from? There was no way this was real and that he was still alive. He was definitely dead.
“You are not dead,” said the man, still without turning to see him. And yeah, there was Shang Qinghua’s ability to speak without thinking. He gulped.
“Ah. Well. That’s good to know, I think.”
The man stopped for a moment and looked up to see him. He didn't say anything, but Shang Qinghua could feel that he was judging him, and uncomfortable, he looked away. Embarrassing himself in front of strangers was his greatest skill, and now it seemed that it had extended to embarrassing himself in front of strangers that came straight out of a fairy tale.
They both fell silent and after a few seconds, Shang Qinghua felt encouraged to look up once more to observe the stranger. He watched him close the wooden box and stoke the fire, acting like he wasn't there. Beyond his enviable appearance, there was something about the man that forced Shang Qinghua to stare at him, even when he knew he shouldn't (somewhere in his mind he still remembered some rules of social interaction, after all).
He was unlike any other person Shang Qinghua had seen before; he seemed distant, unreachable, not like famous people you could see in the media, but like something far more important. Like royalty, perhaps. Not that he had seen royalty before, but he figured they must look like that man. He was also the hottest person he had seen in his whole life and considering his not so little experience with porn, he had seen a lot of them, at least through the screen.
“You are staring,” said the man, still concentrating on whatever he was doing. Shang Qinghua averted his gaze and scratched the back of his neck, feeling the heat in his face.
“Sorry,” he muttered. After a couple of seconds, he added. “Thank you for saving me.”
The man just nodded.
“I’m Shang Qinghua. What… What's your name?”
There was no immediate answer and for a moment Shang Qinghua thought that the other man wouldn’t answer his question, but after a while, he heard him speak.
“Mobei Jun.”
And that was all. Mobei Jun said nothing, and Shang Qinghua didn’t ask more. There were a lot of questions he should be asking, but he still felt tired and didn't feel like thinking, so he lay back on the furs, as he did before the man arrived. He kept his gaze fixed on the ceiling of the cave, listening to the man move from one side to the other. His wounded leg was throbbing, and he was starting to feel hungry, but eventually, he fell asleep again.
The second time Shang Qinghua woke up after being rescued, he did so with a little more lucidity. Careful not to hurt (again) his injured leg, he sat, looking around once more. The fire was practically out, but the glow it gave off, though faint, was enough to make out the contours of what was inside the cave. Shang Qinghua was not surprised when he saw Mobei Jun just sitting on the other side of the cave. He was asleep, leaning against the wall; his breaths even and arms crossed at his chest.
Shang Qinghua took the moment to look at him once more. He looked calm, relaxed. His black hair fell over his shoulders and framed his face, which was one of the most beautiful he had ever seen in his life. Even if he hadn't put the dots together regarding the wolf and the man, Shang Qinghua would still have concluded that he was not an ordinary person. He was too perfect to be human. Yet beneath that picture of perfection, he seemed lonely. Qinghua might not know many things, but he could recognize loneliness when he saw it.
“You are staring. Again.”
The man, Mobei Jun, opened his eyes and looked at him. It was somewhat dark, but Shang Qinghua could make out his eyes, fixed on him. He shuddered, but still held his gaze. “Sorry,” he said.
“You are still hurt,” added Mobei Jun after a couple of seconds in which neither of them say anything else. “Sleep.”
“I’ve slept for a while, I’m not tired right now. Sir.”
Mobei Jun sighed and stood up. He put some more wood on the fire, causing the flame to grow a little higher, and walked over to Shang Qinghua. Without saying a word, he lifted the furs that covered him (ignoring Qinghua's protests) and examined his leg. At that moment Qinghua realized that his pants had been cut off, he also noticed that his leg had a rather large bruise. Despite this, he felt less pain than when woke up the first time. He was startled when Mobei Jun put his hand over his leg but managed to suppress the little cry that came from his lips. Kind of. The man’s hand was cold, unusually cold, thought Shang Qinghua. It made him shudder again.
“It is no longer broken,” he said. Shang Qinghua blinked a few times, confused, before understanding what Mobei Jun meant. His leg had been broken and, somehow, now it wasn't. This was getting weirder and weirder, and despite this, it seemed as if Qinghua had lost the ability to be surprised. Funny, what being on the verge of death could do to some people. “You should be able to walk in a week or so.”
“How?”
Mobei Jun looked at him. “Using both of your legs,” he deadpanned.
“No. I mean, yes, I know that!” The audacity of this man! Wolf. Werewolf? “Are you a werewolf?” he asked. But before Mobei Jun answered, he added, “No, that’s not what I wanted to know. Okay, no, that's not entirely true, I do want to know. But what I meant before is, how is it possible that my leg was broken a couple of hours ago, and now it’s not? Was it magic?”
“I am not a werewolf,” frowned the man, ignoring the other question.
“Then what are you?”
“Mobei Jun. Now, shut up.”
And Shang Qinghua did so. Or, at least, he tried. He wasn’t good with silence. When he was alone, it wasn’t that important because he didn’t pay attention to it. The frantic sound of his fingers on the keyboard and a random tune just to get into the mood were his only company for the longest part of the day, when he spent hours and hours writing, too absorbed in his work to pay attention to what was going on around him. Things were different when he was with someone else, though. Shang Qinghua was not good with social interactions and most of the time, not knowing what to say, he ended up saying too many things. It was like he needed to fill in the silences and say the first thing that came to his mind, without thinking, to avoid the awkward moments that came when he had to talk to others.
After a while, he started to hum some made-up song and also started to play with the furs in the bed-like surface he'd been occupying all that time. He also continued to glance at Mobei Jun as discreetly as he could, and other questions passed through his mind. Who was him? What was he doing on this mountain and since when? Why did he help him? And again, what was he? All this situation was so weird and yet, it kind of made sense that the only one who was able to find him just before the worst happened, was this mysterious and gorgeous man who wasn’t even human.
Mobei Jun sighed and looked back at him.
“You never shut up?” he asked.
“Huh? Oh! Sorry.”
Before Shang Qinghua could say anything else, Mobei Jun stood up, ignored him again, and walked away, possibly towards the cave exit. And just like that, he was all alone again.
Shang Qinghua stood still for roughly three minutes before moving once more, changing the position he was sitting in. He hissed when the movement caused pain in his injured leg, although it was more bearable than hours ago. Once he was in a comfortable position, he reached into his pockets. He had come out of the cabin with his cell phone, a set of keys, and a portable battery, and by some miracle, he had managed to conserve the cell phone and the battery. Keys were his least problem at the time.
The cell phone was dead and although he could use the emergency battery, his rational side (which had decided to appear at that moment and not before, when he thought that walking alone in the mountains was a good idea), told him that the best thing would be to wait a little more to use it. Especially since he knew himself well enough and knew that if he could use his phone, his stupid side, which used to win most of the time, would end up using the device for something silly. Like trying to take a picture of Mobei Jun. Or writing porn.
It would be better to wait until he was on his way to the cabin one more time before trying to use his phone to call for help. He had no idea how long it had been since he left the cabin, and he also didn't know how he would get back to it, but he hoped it wouldn’t take too much time. No one cared for his well-being, and surely no one would find out about his accident or his disappearance before the time he rented the cabin ended. Maybe if he asked nicely, Mobei Jun would accompany him there.
It wasn’t a crime to dream, right?
After some time, though he wasn’t sure exactly how much exactly, and after four attempts to find a more comfortable position, he finally stood up. He hissed at the pain on his leg, which was sharper and stronger than when he was sitting or lying on the furs, and waited for it to pass little by little. He tried to walk after a couple of seconds, but the first step almost brought him down, so he sat again. Maybe this wasn’t a good idea, he thought, and he preferred to avoid embarrassment, especially if Mobei Jun returned just to witness his poor attempt at walking.
He wondered, once again, how long he had really been in this place and how long it had been since his accident. A part of him wondered if, just by chance, someone had already noticed his absence, but he soon dismissed the idea. He wasn't important enough to anyone, so most likely no one would know about his disappearance unless he said so himself at some point. Which was not going to happen. His life was pathetic enough as it was, it wasn’t necessary to add "about to die for his stupidity" to the list.
Silence and loneliness added to the experience of having been about to die were not a good combination. His mind was beginning to wander to those dark places that he avoided as much as he could. Unfortunately, at this moment, he couldn’t keep himself busy writing ridiculous and implausible stories that, at least, left him some money to survive on his own.
He wasn't sure how long it had been since his attempt to walk a bit, but when Shang Qinghua realized it, Mobei Jun returned to the cave in his wolf form again. Without much ceremony, he left something on the floor near where Shang Qinghua was and turned his back once more to return to his human form. Shang Qinghua had to try twice as hard not to turn to see him as he dressed once more, and looking for something else to stare at, Shang Qinghua glanced at the ground and discovered a pair of dead hares. He swallowed hard.
"Do you know how to skin them?" asked Mobei Jun. Qinghua paled at the thought.
"N-No."
"Cook them?”
"No, I don’t think so."
Mobei Jun stared at him for way longer than was necessary, judging him without a doubt, but didn't say anything else. He approached the place where the hares were and prepared dinner that night.
Although he had no way of knowing the exact time, Shang Qinghua began to use Mobei Jun's routine to get a rough idea of how much time passed since he was rescued. He calculated that he had been there for about three days, counting the time he spent lost in the mountains. Although he had tried to ask Mobei Jun a bit more about what happened that day, the other man didn't talk much. Actually, he would just ask a few questions related to Shang Qinghua's abilities to survive in the wild (which were none) and would usually revert to his muteness, which was accompanied by occasional grunts, growls, and lots of intense stares. Qinghua probably shouldn't consider any of that to be sexy, but there he was.
In the morning Mobei Jun would wake up, eat something (leftovers from the previous night’s dinner), and, without saying much, turn into a wolf before leaving the cave. He spent hours outside and returned in the afternoon, always with something for dinner, which he shared with Shang Qinghua even though he spent the whole day doing nothing. He was starting to go crazy, having nothing to do. The silence of the cave and the solitude weren't something he enjoyed, so on the fourth day, he summoned all the courage he had and decided that he would lose nothing by trying to talk to Mobei Jun again.
"So," he said. Mobei Jun looked up, across the cave. "How long have you been in this place?"
Several seconds passed and there was no answer. He felt his face flushed. Yes, that was not a very good idea. Shang Qinghua sighed, resigned to going crazy with the silence.
"I’ve lost track of time."
Shang Qinghua jumped when he heard his voice and for a moment he didn't know what else to say. It was the first time the other man said anything other than monosyllables or questions about his survival skills. "Well, it makes sense,” Qinghua acknowledged at last, “there are no clocks or calendars here. And what are you doing alone, on this mountain?"
“I protect it.” He paused and then added. “Or, at least, I used to protect it”.
Was he some kind of ranger? Because Shang Qinghua could swear that he had seen a porn movie that started something like this, including the hot and mysterious forest ranger and the nerdy twink that... This wasn’t the time to think about it. He coughed a little.
“Protect it from whom?” he asked.
“Demons and other creatures. My family was in charge of this place, but that was a long time ago. I do not remember how much anymore.”
“Why do you protect it?”
“For when the true demon-lord returns.”
Shang Qinghua nodded, though it was more out of inertia than anything else. After that, his mind decided to react to what Mobei Jun had just said. Demons and other creatures. Did he mean...?
“I am a demon too,” added Mobei Jun, as if reading his mind. After that, he opened his mouth a little, showing his fangs. Shang Qinghua gulped.
Somehow that made sense too. The lonely man living in the middle of the mountain, his ability to turn into a wolf, the air of majesty and mystery around him, everything made sense to him. He wasn't a werewolf like Shang Qinghua had originally thought, and that, instead of scaring him, gave him a certain reassurance that he couldn't explain himself. Having been on the verge of death had changed his perspective on life. Or it was just a dream and this was his imagination making things up while he was in a coma, but he preferred to think of the other option.
And well, more fantastic things would have happened somewhere else, right? Shang Qinghua believed that what we saw around us was not the only thing that could exist. The world, the universe, was so vast that it was laughable to imagine that only humans and what was created by man were the only thing that existed. It was maybe his writer and reader mind talking for him, he was a sucker for fantasy, but it wouldn’t be so bad to think this was real.
Shang Qinghua settled into the furs, without taking his gaze off Mobei Jun. He didn't quite know how to act now that Mobei Jun had just said that he was a demon. Qinghua didn't believe in demons, at least not until that moment, when he had one in front of him. What did it mean for Mobei Jun to be one? He swallowed hard as he contemplated the idea that Mobei Jun had rescued him only to assassinate him later. But that wouldn't make much sense, would it? If his goal was to kill him, would he have no reason to rescue him in the first place, or to heal him and let him rest in his… den? Home? Whatever. Or maybe he wanted to eat him and it was all a plan to make him fatter.
Mobei Jun frowned. “Your heart is beating faster. You are scared.”
“How...? I mean. No?” he said, and it sounded like a question. “I'm fine.”
“I know you are lying.”
“I… I’m just wondering why you saved me? Eh. Sir?” How was he supposed to talk to a demon? “It’s not that I’m not grateful!” he added quickly, “but I’m trying to make sense of everything. A few days ago I was just a guy trying to get inspired in the middle of the mountain, and today I can say that I’ve met a demon. It seems like a fantasy or a dream. I'm just trying to understand more of all this.”
“I do not need reasons for the things I do,” stated Mobei Jun. “I was a king, once. I do as I want, and I wanted to save you.”
“And I will be grateful all my life, my king!” exclaimed Shang Qinghua. Mobei Jun looked at him silently. “Ah, shouldn’t I call you…?”
“Do what you want,” added the demon before he headed towards the entrance of the cave. “Tonight there will be a storm. I will get us some food and find some wood for the fire before it starts.” And just like that, he was gone.
Just as Mobei Jun said it, a storm fell that night. Although the inside of the cave was kept warm by the fire, the temperature had dropped considerably compared to the rest of the days that Shang Qinghua had spent with the demon. It was probably not as cold as it seemed, but Shang Qinghua couldn’t stop shaking. Perhaps it was because he hadn’t done much in the past days, or maybe it was just the fact that he was a weak millennial not made for the wildlife. Either way, that night the cold didn't let him sleep.
He tried to warm himself by sinking as low as he could into the furs around him, but the cave floor felt colder and harder than normal and he just couldn't find a comfortable position to be in. Also, his leg had started to hurt again. He wanted to be at home, where he, despite everything, could shelter himself from the cold and not have to worry about the contractures that would come the next day because of sleeping on a rocky surface. The only investment he'd made in his adult life had been a good mattress and he didn’t regret it.
"Stupid author and your stupid ideas," he muttered to himself as his teeth chattered. "'I'll go somewhere different, experience new things, this is a great idea, Shen Yuan, you just see'. Yeah, right."
Thinking about his friend he wondered, again, if by now he would’ve noticed his absence. He snorted at the thought. The only thing Shen Yuan would’ve noticed would be the plot holes in his last updates, which he programmed to be published sometime during the day he got lost and some more on the following days. Now that he thought about it, this was the first time in quite a few years that he didn’t spend hours reading comments and answering trolls. It felt nice, not worrying about haters or dubious fans. If only the weather was better.
A sound coming from the other side of the cave made him jump. He turned a bit, barely sticking his nose above the furs, and swallowed when he saw that Mobei Jun was standing right in front of him.
"M-My king?"
"Move," said the demon. Shang Qinghua looked at him in silence for a few seconds, not quite understanding what the other was trying to say. Move to where? He wouldn't be kicking him out of the cave, right? In this weather, it would be impossible for him to survive. Not that he was going to survive on his own even under normal circumstances, but if he stayed in the cave at least he wouldn't freeze in three seconds.
Not receiving an answer, Mobei Jun frowned and, without saying anything else, began to take off his clothes. Shang Qinghua squealed something incomprehensible and sank into the furs once more, covering his face with them. “My king, what are you doing?!” he asked. His only response was the muffled sound of someone lying next to him, followed by a warm sensation. Shang Qinghua ventured to look out and found another layer of fur, different from those that had sheltered him in the past days, moving slowly.
He wasn't a genius, but he wasn't that stupid either, even if his actions say otherwise, and he knew that Mobei Jun was lying next to him. He could feel the heat radiating from his body and, although the floor was still uncomfortable, it didn't take long to feel his body begin to warm up again. It was nice, yes, but he was confused and kind of afraid of having a demon wolf so near to him. Qinghua had seen his fangs and claws and was not so sure he wanted them this close to his body.
The wolf huffed after a while and Shang Qinghua tried his best to stay still once more. He was suddenly aware of every breath he took and every move he made. He shifted, uncomfortable, and tried to find a better position to be when Mobei Jun growled, obviously annoyed. He froze and tried to relax once more. It was difficult at first, but once he concentrated on following Mobei Jun's breathing, his body did so. In the end, between the pleasant warmth he felt having the wolf next to him and the calm that came after following his breaths, he finally fell asleep.
Shang Qinghua woke up a few hours later. He was more asleep than he was awake, so it took him a few seconds to recognize the cave that had been his shelter for the last few days. He no longer felt the cold from the night before, in fact, he was quite warm. Little by little he remembered what had happened before he fell asleep and stayed still. He could hear Mobei Jun's even breathing behind him, so it was clear that the demon was there, sleeping.
He decided that the best thing to do now was to stay still. Knowing that Mobei Jun was a demon and that he was also in wolf form made him feel somewhat uneasy, after all, Shang Qinghua knew how to recognize when someone was stronger than he. And Mobei Jun was not only stronger than him, physically speaking, but he was a powerful and ancient being who, if he wanted, could kill him just by moving one of his fingers.
The plan of staying still worked for a few minutes, but soon the position he was lying in became uncomfortable. His bad leg started to cramp and, besides, he needed to go to the bathroom urgently. He carefully turned on his shoulder to see if Mobei Jun was still asleep and instead of meeting the black wolf that he expected to see, Shang Qinghua found himself a few inches from the demon's perfect face.
He watched him carefully. It was the second time he’d dared to stare at him, and he could feel the thrill of it. Mobei Jun was an imposing person and Shang Qinghua tried not to look at him too much for fear of disturbing him. Now that he could do it, he observed his face. He was perfect indeed. If Mobei Jun hadn't said that he was a demon, Shang Qinghua would still have noticed that there was something supernatural about him. So much perfection was out of this world.
The demon looked relaxed and that, for some reason, made Shang Qinghua smile. Then his gaze dropped a little, down the demon's chin and a little lower, to his collarbones and his chest. Qinghua returned his gaze to Mobei Jun's face, feeling his cheeks grew hot. At first, he was uncomfortably warm, with all the furs piled up over him and Mobei Jun being so close. But now that he knew that the demon was not only next to him, but that he went back to his human form during the night, and that he was naked, Shang Qinghua started to feel uncomfortably hot.
He averted his gaze and tried not to think too much about the naked man behind him, which didn’t work at all. He took a deep breath and waited a few seconds before he gathered enough courage to peek again, and he nearly choked with his tongue when he discovered that Mobei Jun had his eyes open and was staring at him.
"Ah, my king!" he exclaimed as he put as much distance as possible between him and the demon. A nervous smile appeared on his face. "G-Good morning! How did you sleep? Today is a splendid morning, isn’t it? It’s not cold anymore and it looks like the storm is over, so it also looks like a good day to go hunting, right?"
"Good. Bring some hares. If you can," Mobei Jun replied. To tell the truth, Shang Qinghua did not expect the demon to say anything at all. That reaction was, after all, one of his verbal vomiting, so common when he was nervous, stressed, anxious, horny, or all of the above together. The demon’s response took him by surprise, and he didn’t know what to answer. It wasn’t until he saw that Mobei Jun was smiling that he realized that the other was mocking him. There was still enough food for that day, so Mobei Jun wouldn’t have to go hunting.
Before he could say something else, Mobei Jun stood up, paying no attention to his nakedness by completely ignoring Shang Qinghua’s stunned look. The king walked to where he had left his clothes the night before, crouching to pick them up. Then, with an indifferent attitude, he looked up at the human, who opened his eyes with surprise and hurried to look away. Shang Qinghua could feel his face burning. From his place in bed, he heard the sound of the cloth as Mobei Jun dressed and then heard him walk back and forth in the cave.
After a while, Shang Qinghua stood up too. His bad leg, still somewhat sore and still numb from the position taken in the last few minutes, felt weak and Qinghua wobbled a little before regaining balance. Despite that, he felt much better than in the previous days, so he expected to be fully recovered in a short time. The magic that had happened or whatever Mobei Jun did to treat his fracture was something he didn’t understand and probably would never understand, but he was glad it had happened. He was alive and that was the important thing.
When he saw the demon again, he was already fully clothed. Shang Qinghua tried to make his disappointment less apparent and distracted himself by accommodating the furs. He tried not to think that that would be the first time that Mobei Jun would spend the whole day inside the cave, next to him. "What do you usually do to pass the time?" he asked. There was not much to do in the cave, he knew because he had been there for several days, but perhaps the demon would have some secret so as not to die from boredom and monotony after all those years. Mobei Jun shrugged.
"Nothing, really," he replied. "I do not spend much time here."
"Oh, you go hunting?"
"And I walk up the mountain."
"To protect this place, right?," Shang Qinghua nodded as if understanding. Then he frowned slightly, thinking. "Protect this place from what, exactly? I know you said other demons, but what kind of demons? Why do you need to protect this mountain?"
"Demons like me,” said Mobei Jun. “Sometimes there are different kinds of demons. Although I have not met any for a long time.” It did not go unnoticed by Shang Qinghua that the demon ignored the other question.
“Oh, I see.” Qinghua made a pause in which none of them said anything else. “So, what are you going to do today?”
“I don’t have anything in mind.”
“Okay. Cool.” Mobei Jun said nothing, just stared at him, until Shang Qinghua laughed nervously. “This might sound weird, but do you want to hear a story?”
“What kind of story?”
“I don’t know. A story. Just to pass some time. I do that for a living, you know? I’m a storyteller. A writer, to be more specific.”
“Why would you like to tell me a story?” asked the demon. Shang Qinghua shrugged.
“I don’t know, I’m tired of doing nothing all day. And it must be kind of boring to do the same every day for the last few years. How many years have you been here, again? You don’t have to answer that. So. A story?”
After a couple of seconds, Mobei Jun sighed and nodded, and that was enough.
Shang Qinghua didn’t consider himself the best writer in the world. He knew that his writing skills were passable most of the time. Yes, his novels were more of the type of stories that were written to fulfill his readers' wishes and whims, but that didn't mean that he didn't know how to write a decent story. He had once done so, long before his literary aspirations took a complete turn, you know when survival became a priority over art. So Shang Qinghua told Mobei Jun a story. It was not a complicated story, just a shortened version of one of the many short stories he wrote for one of the literary contests in which he was never selected.
Although it was not a great story and perhaps it wasn't that interesting either, Mobei Jun listened carefully. When he finished speaking, Mobei Jun was silent for several seconds, thoughtful, and just when Qinghua thought that the demon might stand up to leave the cave, he asked him to tell him another story.
"What? Are you sure?!" the human asked, surprised.
"Are you denying this king?"
"No, no! I will immediately tell you another story, my king."
And so he did. The day passed like this, amid stories that Shang Qinghua drew from his memories and the constant request to continue telling more. Sometimes Mobei Jun would comment or ask questions that Qinghua could not always answer immediately, but that served to exercise his imagination. Even as the hours passed, the demon listened to him attentively, until Shang Qinghua began to lose his voice from so much talking and Mobei Jun ordered him to stop to rest and eat something.
Perhaps it was a sad thought, but that day, inside that cave, accompanied only by a supernatural creature who was listening to him tell his stories, Shang Qinghua felt happier than at any other time in his whole life.
After two more days, Shang Qinghua was finally able to move properly. Although he still did not feel safe enough to walk for a long time (his fracture had taken just over a week to heal when under normal conditions it would have taken much longer), he now ventured around the cave, always in the company of Mobei Jun. The demon remained silent most of the time but always listened to what Qinghua had to say. From his complaints about his daily life and Shen Yuan’s attitude to all the stories, he asked him to tell.
Especially the stories he asked him to tell.
To his surprise, Mobei seemed to enjoy his stories. Qinghua had soon finished telling him the ones that were at some point intended for literary contests and other editorial aspirations in "real literature," so he eventually began telling him the true versions of his novels published online. Even Shen Yuan didn’t know most of those details, so being able to tell that to someone who listened to him without criticizing him every second made him feel wonderful. The reality was that Mobei Jun didn't seem to care if the stories were complex or weird or contradictory, and he was just content to listen, but it didn’t matter to Shang Qinghua.
A week after his accident and fully recovered from his leg, Mobei Jun accompanied Shang Qinghua to his rented cabin. The human spoke all the way, telling the demon about what had taken him to the mountain in the first place, and about the stories he now had in mind after what he had experienced in the last few days. Mobei Jun, for his part, was much quieter than on other occasions. Once they arrived and Shang Qinghua looked at the path they had traveled, he was shocked at the distance from Mobei Jun's cave to the cabin. No wonder why he got lost in the first place.
As they reached the cabin door, Shang Qinghua stopped. Mobei Jun looked down, watching him curiously. "I forgot that I lost the key," Qinghua explained. What would be the best way to get in? Picking locks wasn’t something he knew how to do, and he wasn't sure trying it at the moment was the best idea. "Maybe I could walk around to get some signal and call the owner. I just need to use my battery to..."
He was still thinking about how to solve his problem when Mobei Jun simply pushed the door and opened it easily, taking the lock in the process.
"Or you could do that," added Qinghua to himself. He rubbed his temples, thinking of the extra money he should pay for property damage, but in the end, he sighed. That would be a problem for Shang Qinghua of the future.
He entered the cabin and shivered a little at the cold inside. He didn't expect it to be this cold, but it wasn't surprising, considering the storm that had struck days ago. Even though it was not in the deepest part of the mountain, it was obvious that the weather affected this place as well. He looked around. Even though it hadn't been that many days since he'd been here, the cabin seemed like a different place. It felt less real than Mobei Jun's cave, if that made any sense. He shook his head from side to side, trying to concentrate, and then he headed for the window, which he opened. Although he was cold inside, he also needed to air out the interior. Then he plugged in his phone. As soon as he turned on the device and managed to connect to the network, he started to get notifications.
FROM: Cucumber Bro
I read your last three updates.
They’re crap, as always.
You said you had another four updates scheduled?
FROM: Cucumber Bro
People are arguing in the comments section and for the first time, it wasn’t me who initiated everything. I don’t know if I’m amused or offended.
FROM: Cucumber Bro
You’re not going to read this, are you? You’re in the middle of nowhere. Didn’t I tell you that it was a very bad idea?
FROM: Cucumber Bro
I hope you are writing something better than all this, for once. I guess we’ll see once you’re back.
FROM: Cucumber Bro
Sooooo… I saw there was a storm in that area.
FROM: Cucumber Bro
Are you dead?
FROM: Cucumber Bro
Airplane?
FROM: Cucumber Bro
I’m assuming you were unable to communicate. Say something as soon as you can.
FROM: Cucumber Bro
Shit. I hope you’re not dead.
A smile appeared on his face. So Shen Yuan had worried about him, he thought. Oh, this was wonderful. He could bother him so much with this for the next few days, no, weeks. Cucumber Bro would deny everything and look for ways to avoid this particular conversation, but that would not prevent Shang Qinghua from saying a couple of things about it. He stopped before answering the messages. Jokes aside, a pleasant warmth ran through him. After thinking that no one would care about him, there was a person who did. In his own way, yes, but it was clear that Shen Yuan had cared for him. He couldn't remember when was the last time someone had shown the slightest bit of concern for him. His face was getting warm from thinking about this.
He was thinking about what would be the best response to Shen Yuan's messages (should he be sarcastic? Start annoying him from that moment on? Be a little more, ugh, sincere?), when he felt a presence behind him. Turning around, he found Mobei Jun was much closer than he expected. He jumped in surprise.
"My king!" Mobei Jun didn't say anything, though Shang Qinghua noticed that he had a slight frown. "Is everything okay?"
"You're happy," Mobei Jun said. It was not a question, but a statement. Shang Qinghua noticed that his face was even warmer and laughed a bit, scratching the back of his neck.
"A little," he replied. "I just discovered something I didn’t expect." Mobei Jun said nothing, although his gaze was fixed on the phone that Shang Qinghua was still holding in one of his hands. "Oh, yeah, this is a phone. A smartphone, more specifically. We use it to call and message people, and even to pay for..."
“I know,” cut Mobei Jun. “I know humans and their creations, I walk among them, when I feel like doing it. And I know what a smartphone is, I’m not stupid.”
“I would never say…!”
“Enough!” he growled.
Qinghua didn’t say anything else. The silence that followed was different from the one they used to share in the cave during the days when Shang Qinghua accompanied Mobei Jun. Now he felt heavy, suffocating. Qinghua chose not to say anything and after a while, when he felt that enough time had passed, he closed the window again. Then he turned on the heat, hoping it would help warm him up as soon as possible. However, as he turned into the cabin once again, he realized that Mobei Jun was walking towards the door.
“My king?” he asked. Mobei Jun stopped and turned around. “Are you leaving?”
“Yes.”
“Oh.”
He tried not to make his disappointment so obvious, but he was sure that Mobei Jun noticed anyway. “Thank you,” he said. “For saving me and, you know, everything. I wouldn’t have survived the past few days without your help.”
“It was nothing.”
Shang Qinghua tried not to feel hurt after hearing that and forced himself to smile.
“Even so, thank you so much. I’m glad that it was you who found me in the mountains! Even if we never meet again, I’ll be eternally grateful, my king!”
For a moment it seemed as if Mobei Jun wanted to say something, but in the end, the demon just nodded and turned his back on him once more, exiting through the door. Shang Qinghua observed, without moving, feeling that there were things he still had to say, but not daring to say them. So he opted for silence and remained in the doorframe, watching until Mobei Jun was just a silhouette in the distance and a memory of something no one would ever believe.
The first thing Shang Qinghua did once he was left alone, was to take a long shower. In the past few days, his personal grooming had been the last thing on his mind, and it wasn’t until the hot water touched his body that he noticed how much he needed this. For a moment, he felt bad thinking that Mobei Jun had to put up with him like this for days, though he soon dismissed the thought. The demon hadn’t said anything about it, so maybe he didn’t care so much. Or maybe he did so, but he’d been too polite to mention it. Anyway, it wasn’t like that mattered now, was it?
When he was done, he tried to occupy himself with other things. He made himself some instant noodles and opened his messaging app to write to Shen Yuan.
TO: Cucumber Bro
Heeeeeeey. I'm still alive.
Shit just got really crazy hahaha.
I'll tell you later.
But I'm okay!!!!
And after thinking about it for a few seconds, he added:
TO: Cucumber Bro
Thank you for your concern.
He turned off his phone after typing that, suddenly feeling embarrassed. Then he turned on his computer, which had remained forgotten on the table for the past few days. His internet connection was not the best, but it was enough to see what Shen Yuan had mentioned, about the comments in the last scheduled updates of his novel. He read some of them for a while, but unlike other times, whatever other people had to say about his work did not provoke any reaction. The discussions that arose around his last two chapters didn't seem as amusing as they used to. He wasn't even interested in the fact that the discussion wasn't Cucumber Bro's fault.
He opened a new document and tried to write, but everything he wrote seemed more terrible than usual. Usually, that didn’t stop him from writing, even if the beginning of a story was dull or cliché, he used to keep going until he found a good rhythm and kept going for hours. Now, however, he had initiated the same paragraph at least fifteen times without finding a good starting point. He was distracted, his mind wandering to another place on that same mountain. In the end, he just wrote down some loose ideas that he could pick up later when he felt more in the mood and turned off the computer.
Qinghua sighed. Barely a couple of hours had passed since Mobei Jun left, and he hadn't stopped thinking about him. He imagined him back in the cave or walking around the mountain, doing whatever the demon did in his spare time. Thinking that Mobei Jun would be alone on that mountain again, even if it was something he was used to, made Shang Qinghua feel a tightness in his chest. He knew loneliness and it wasn't nice. Mobei Jun could be used to it after the years he had been the guardian of the mountain, but that didn’t necessarily mean he enjoyed being alone in that place, did it?
"Enough, Qinghua," he said to himself. Maybe Mobei Jun did enjoy the solitude and was happy in that cave in the middle of nowhere, without anyone to talk to for who knows how many years. It didn't seem like that was something most people enjoyed, but maybe it was different for demons.
The more he thought about it, the more he convinced himself that it wasn’t possible.
His overthinking mind was bothering again. What did he gain by worrying so much? The next day, he would return to the city, which also meant thinking about how he would explain the broken lock to the cabin owner. Coming to this site was barely within his budget, and while he could pay for the damages, that meant that for the next few days, or even weeks, he would have to limit his expenses a little more if he didn't want to start using the money he had reserved for emergencies. Just thinking about it gave him a headache.
In the end, he just packed everything and then tried to sleep.
The next day he got up almost at dawn. He checked that everything he needed to get home was ready and dressed up in the right clothes. Then, after checking that he had all the battery on his phone, you know, just in case, he left the cabin. He looked around for a few seconds, trying to memorize the landscape as much as he could, and started walking, taking all the care he didn’t have the day he got lost.
He wasn't sure how long it was, but after a while, he stopped to take a much-needed break. It was obvious, he was aware of that, but climbing the mountain was harder than going down it. When he turned to see the entire stretch that he had covered, the cabin was only a point in the distance. He returned his attention to the path he was heading down and decided to continue with his heart beating rapidly. He barely took a few more steps when a familiar figure cut him off.
In front of him, in his human form, was Mobei Jun.
He took a few steps towards the demon, and all the care he had taken up to that moment was of no use, as he tripped over a stone. Shang Qinghua closed his eyes, waiting for the impact with the ground, but instead, he felt when Mobei Jun grabbed his arm. Looking up, he saw that Mobei Jun seemed to have the same indifferent expression from the previous days, although a small smile, barely perceptible, appeared on his face. Shang Qinghua smiled too, a little nervously.
“You got lost again?” asked the king.
"No. I didn’t get lost. Or so I think." Mobei Jun only raised one eyebrow in confusion. "I wasn’t sure exactly where to go, but I tried to follow a path from which I could still see the cabin, so I could return if I had to."
Mobei Jun nodded but didn’t say anything.
“I thought I wouldn't find you,” added Qinghua.
After that, they both fell silent again. Shang Qinghua shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Now that he was in front of Mobei Jun he wasn’t so sure of what he had done, after all this was something he decided after a night of very little sleep and the spur of the moment. The demon remained silent, watching him. Qinghua could feel his heart beating even faster than when he was walking up the mountain.
Maybe this was a bad decision, but he was finally here, so he took a deep breath.
“I know this is sudden,” he began, “but I can't stop thinking about the time I spent in the cave with you. I mean, it was nice? You listened to my stories, the silly ones, and the real ones, and not everyone does that. I know that I'm annoying and that you probably have better things to do than worry about a useless human, but... I’d like to stay here a little longer.”
“You want to stay here?”
“Yes.”
“On this mountain?”
“For a while? I didn’t make a long-term plan, but, yes, I’d like to stay here, if that’s okay with you?”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It just feels right.” He couldn’t explain why, but he felt more at ease in this place, next to this virtually unknown creature than in his apartment, surrounded by empty cups and instant food containers. It didn’t mean he would stay here forever, he knew that he eventually had to go back to his life, but he was willing to stay with Mobei Jun for as much time as the demon let him.
"You were happy," said the demon. Shang Qinghua looked at him, confused. "Yesterday, when you came back and read what was on your phone. You seemed happy."
Shang Qinghua remembered that it was when he received Shen Yuan's messages and realized that perhaps he was not as alone as he thought. "Oh, that! Shen Yuan found out about the storm and got worried," he explained. "It's the first time that he cares about me, or at least the first time that he shows his concern and yeah, it made me happy I guess."
"Was he not the one you were complaining about all these days?"
Qinghua blushed. "Well, yeah."
"I thought he annoyed you."
"Yes, he annoys me sometimes, but in his defense, I also annoy him. This is how our friendship is."
Mobei Jun shook his head. "Humans," he muttered but didn't say anything else.
“So, can I stay?”
“You don’t have to ask for my permission,” spoke Mobei Jun, frowning a little. “Humans come and go in this place. I protect this mountain, but I don’t own it. You could stay in your cabin and there is nothing I can do about it."
“Yeah, about that.”
“What?”
“I just rented the cabin for some days and I can’t keep paying for that. So I don’t have a place to go if I stay here. Can I come with you?” he asked.
“To the cave?”
“Yes.”
Mobei Jun did not reply immediately. He looked up the mountain, and then he looked down the path that led to the cabin. For a moment Shang Qinghua thought that the demon would send him back, and he was bracing himself for a negative answer when Mobei Jun nodded to himself.
"I have a better idea."
"And that's what happened."
Shen Yuan stared at him for a long time without saying anything. Shang Qinghua took his drink and sipped from it without looking directly at his friend when the silence became awkward enough.
As he played with the tapioca balls in his tea, he thought that choosing a public place to talk to him was a good idea. Shen Yuan would hold back a bit in his reactions, as he did every time he was in front of other people. Qinghua knew it was risky to talk to him about everything that had happened during the days that he rented the cabin and the almost three months after that, but considering the current circumstances, he would eventually have to explain a few things. Whether it was a good decision or not, he could only know after seeing Shen Yuan's reaction, but Shang Qinghua believed that it was better to come clean now and not later.
"Ok, let me see if I understand all of this," Shen Yuan said at last while massaging his temples. "Are you telling me that you got lost in the mountains and a..." he made a pause and sneered, “a demon found you and took care of you after you broke your leg, which magically healed?”
“That’s correct.”
“And then you decided to stay in those said mountains for the past three months just because you, and I quote, ‘liked the scenery and the company so much?”
"Yep."
"And that now, that wolf demon you found somehow turned out to have a great fortune ..."
"Family heritage."
"... and he gave you a cabin in the mountains?”
“Yeah, isn’t that crazy? It turns out that when he said that he sometimes walks among humans, he meant that he lives in the city most of the year and that he is the owner of all the cabins in that mountain. The dude I rented it from is just the manager. Anyways. Can you believe that all the time it took me to recover he could have taken me back to the cabin, but instead he made me stay in a cave? I'm not complaining, it could have been worse, but my back still remembers the floor. I’m not that young anymore.”
“You are 27,” deadpanned Shen Yuan.
“Just wait until you reach my age,” replied the writer. His friend rolled his eyes.
“You sound like a senior citizen.”
“I feel like one.”
After a pause, Shen Yuan added, with all seriousness in his voice, “Dude, are you high?”
“What?”
"I won't judge, I know you've been having some troubles with the inspiration thing, and as far as I know, some people try weird stuff to get into the creative mood. Just tell me the truth.”
"I'm telling you the truth!"
Shen Yuan sighed. “You know what?” he added. “This is it. I’m not going to read this excuse of a story, I refuse. It’s too bad, even for you.”
Shang Qinghua frowned in confusion. “Which story?”
“This one you are obviously projecting into. Really, self-insert? This seems very low, even to you. I know you’re not getting the readings you used to, and I’m fully aware that you have not a bit of dignity, but you should put a limit on yourself.”
“This is not a story!”
Shen Yuan snorted before leaning back in his seat. He crossed her arms and looked at Shang Qinghua with a smile on his face. “Yeah, right,” he said. “You don’t expect me to believe all this, do you? You are saying that you got lost in the mountains and that, instead of dying, you managed to find a boyfriend.”
"I don't think 'boyfriend' is the best word..."
"You were very graphic about the kissing part and about sex," Shen Yuan interrupted him, looking disgusted.
"Are you jealous?"
"Fuck you."
"Whatever. Yeah, that's what happened.
“If believing that makes you feel better, go ahead.”
Shang Qinghua opened his mouth to reply, but his expression relaxed as he looked behind Shen Yuan. “Oh, hey!”
“Qinghua.”
Shen Yuan jumped when he listened to the voice behind him and turned around. When they looked at each other, Mobei Jun smiled a little, just enough that he could see his fangs. Shen Yuan’s eyes opened comically as he scanned Mobei Jun from head to toe before he looked at Shang Qinghua in disbelief.
“What…? Is he…?”
Shang Qinghua grinned.
“Shen Yuan, this is Mobei Jun,” he said, “my… well, my Mobei Jun.” Shen Yuan’s jaw dropped, and Qinghua had to use every bit of self-control to not laugh at that moment.” Mobei Jun, this is Shen Yuan, my best friend.”
Mobei Jun looked at Shen Yuan for a couple of seconds. “A pleasure,” he finally said, but his expression of indifference didn't match his words. “Are you ready?,” he asked Shang Qinghua.
“Oh, yeah! I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”
Mobei Jun nodded, then he turned to Shen Yuan, who still looked surprised. “See you around.”
“Y-Yeah. See you.”
Once Mobei Jun walked away, Shen Yuan turned to Shang Qinghua, who had his attention on his drink. Although the writer feigned indifference, his red ears gave him away. "You didn't get yourself a boyfriend," Shen Yuan said, causing Shang Qinghua to look at him. "You got yourself a sugar daddy."
After hearing that, Shang Qinghua almost choked on his tea. It took a few seconds for him to stop coughing, and when he did, he looked at Shen Yuan with a frown, ready to complain about his bad timing. However, before he could speak, his friend sighed. "Now what? What's your plan?"
"I'll be staying with him for a while and then see what happens.”
“In the cabin?”
“Yes.”
“What about your novels?”
“Bro, I'm not going to stop writing,” laughed Shang Qinghua. “I just won't have to depend on it to live a decent life anymore. Maybe I won't upload so much content, either, and I’m not so sure about those videos I was recording, but we'll see.”
“So, no more crappy stories?”
Shang Qinghua smiled.
“I won’t promise anything.”
Shen Yuan finished his cup of tea. It was clear that he was thinking about everything that had happened, so Shang Qinghua waited silently. “Are you sure this is a good idea? You barely know him.”
“Honestly? I’m not sure if this is a good or a bad idea. I just know that I feel more like myself when I'm with him. Maybe this is not going to work.” He shrugged. “Or maybe it will, and then I'll be the one to tell you ‘I told you so’, but that's something that only time will tell.”
“I still find it hard to believe that what you said is not fiction,” Shen Yuan insisted. “Assuming what you say is true, doesn't it scare you? I mean, he's a demon. An old one, from what you said. Exactly why is he protecting that mountain? From whom? And who is that demon lord he mentioned to you?”
Shang Qinghua shrugged.
“I don’t know. It does scare me a little, but I think if he wanted to hurt me, he would have done it from the moment he found me. And about your questions, I don’t know the answer to either of them, but I hope one day he will tell me his story.”
For a moment it seemed that Shen Yuan wanted to continue protesting, but in the end, he just sighed. “You have already made a decision,” he said, “and I think there are no words that will make you change your mind. Just…”
“Just?”
He coughed a little and looked away. “Take care,” he muttered. Shang Qinghua smiled.
“Aww, bro, I knew you cared!”
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do. You just said it yourself.”
“I didn't say shit. Now get out before your sugar daddy decides to come back.”
“He’s not my sugar daddy.” Shen Yuan gave him a look, which made him sigh. “Whatever. I’ll text you, and I’ll send you my drafts, as always.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“See you later?”
Shen Yuan just nodded and said goodbye with a wave of his hand, suddenly interested in his empty cup. Qinghua smiled again, then he got up and left the tea shop. Mobei Jun was waiting for him outside. Shang Qinghua stared at him for a moment. No matter how many times he observed him, in his wolf form or this more human appearance, he kept marveling at him. Mobei Jun passed for a human, and although he attracted attention (as did all beautiful people), those who looked at him did not imagine that this man was a demon, the protector of a sacred place. A powerful creature who, for some reason, had accepted Shang Qinghua as a companion. For how long? He didn't know, but he didn't care.
"My king!” he said once that he was next to him. “Sorry for the wait.”
“No problem. Shall we go?”
“Yeah.”
Mobei Jun nodded and started walking.
Shang Qinghua knew that all of this seemed incredible, and a part of him dreaded the moment when he would wake up from his dream just to find that he was still lost in the middle of the mountain, broken leg and all. But even if that was the case, he was determined to enjoy his time with Mobei Jun. As he had told Shen Yuan, all he had to do was wait and see what happened next. He glanced back at the demon, and his heart skipped a beat when he realized that there was a smile on his face. He was sure that Mobei Jun had noticed the change in his heartbeat, with those supernatural senses he had, but he didn’t say anything.
Feeling that his cheeks were flushed, Shang Qinghua smiled too and just walked next to Mobei Jun.