Yue grinned and hugged Viktor’s arm as they got out of their carriage when they arrived at the Palace in Belarus. It was partially for looks since lots of nobles and reporters were outside the palace. According to Elena, they had been out there every day since the announcement of the engagement party.

Yue wore a sheer lace veil over his head as he walked with Viktor. Elena wanted to be the one to introduce him fully to the public so she didn’t want his portrait to be spread around Belarus early. Viktor played along and worked to get through to the palace as quickly as possible.

Yue quickly removed his veil as he got into the palace and giggled, “They weren’t expecting that.” 

“Not at all.” Viktor chuckled.

“Her majesty is on her way to Belarus, she wants you to be ready for the rehearsal.” A maid explained and started leading them to the room where they would wait for Elena.

--

Elena arrived and called for everything to start immediately. She went over to Yue and Viktor as the servants started to play out what would happen on the day of the party like a simulation.

“Andrei and I will introduce you. Your official title will be the saintess of the Azure Dragon temple, just like how Aylin and I are saintesses of our temples. I told Huy that he should use saint as his title as well. It’ll help you not be bullied by nobles who wish their daughter married Vitenka instead.” Elena said and patted Yue’s shoulder with a smile.

“Will that work? The four beasts don’t seem to be very well known here…” Yue murmured.

“In Belarus and Russia they’re pretty well known because of me,” Elena explained.

“Just go with the flow, I’ll prepare you for everything that could happen,” Elena added And the rehearsal got fully started.

—

“Is Huy coming later?” Yue asked Mai after he greeted her at the entrance of the palace. He had his veil on once again since there were still many reporters outside.

“Yes, he’s coming the day of the party,” Mai said and smiled. She didn’t wear a veil, she was going to but she worried that people would mistake her for Yue if she did.

“Have you had any issues so far? I heard nobles have been coming to the palace trying to speak to you.” Mai asked as they went on their way to the room that was prepared for Mai.

“No, everyone has been working to keep them away from me,” Yue said and removed his veil.

“We’ll see what happens at the party though. A certain someone and his family were invited so who knows.” Yue added with a slight smirk.

Mai just giggled in response.

—

“It’s great, isn’t it? I designed it myself.” Mai said to Mai and Natasha as they watched Yue try on his dress. Andrei and Alexei were also watching but they were mostly waiting for Viktor. And Nikolai wasn’t really paying attention but he was also there.

The outfit has two parts, one part was similar to the dresses that Elena usually wore. It was a loose A-line dress with short puff sleeves that rested off Yue’s shoulders. The dress was covered in gold flowers and lace. The other part was a sheer robe clearly inspired by a hanfu. It was covered in gold designs and lace as well.

“Does Viktor’s outfit look similar?” Yue asked as the maids showed him different hairstyles and makeup looks to choose from.

“It's a little different,” Elena said and stood up from her seat.

Viktor finished changing and walked into the room. He wore a white suit with subtle gold details on the lapels of his blazer and a light turquoise tie. He wore a Belarusian military-style jacket over his shoulders as well with a pin that symbolized the black tortoise temple.

“Ah, you both look so good!” Elena squealed and smiled as she motioned for Viktor to turn around a little.

Viktor turned and smiled at Yue as he watched him get his makeup done.

“I’m glad everything fit, I was worried something would go wrong,” Natasha said and let out a sigh of relief.

“Even if something went wrong it’d be fine. I went through every possible outcome and prepared them for it.” Elena chuckled and took a comb from a maid and started messing with Viktor’s hair.

“We rehearsed for 9 hours, I don’t think anything could catch us by surprise at this point,” Yue murmured.

They all talked for a while, they were going to have a portrait of Yue and Viktor made so they had to wait around a bit.

“Is the dress heavy? Will you be fine walking and dancing in it?” Andrei suddenly asked Yue while Elena changed Viktor’s hairstyle again, trying to decide what she liked better. Yue was a little surprised that Andrei was speaking to him and even more surprised that he seemed worried.

“I think I’ll be fine, there’s no corset and It’s pretty light,” Yue said and smiled a little.

Andrei coughed a little, changing the subject from Yue’s dress to something else, “Does everyone else have their clothes ready for the party?”

“Yes, there’s nothing to worry about,” Alexei said and smiled. He was pretty sure that question had already been asked today but no one mentioned it after seeing how Andrei was a little flustered.

—

Viktor stroked Yue’s hair as they laid in bed together. He felt exhausted. Trying on clothes wasn’t the most exhausting part of his day though. The truly exhausting part was the mild headache that had been building up for the past few days and the ringing in his ears that came with it.  

It wasn’t really a ringing sound. It was more like a quiet murmur. It only happened when he was around people though. When he was alone in his office he heard nothing but when even just Anya was around he heard the murmurs and he felt like he was going crazy.

“Maybe I am going crazy…” 

He didn’t hear it right now though. He couldn’t hear it when Yue was close to him. He also couldn’t hear it when he was with his mother. He was starting to think that either he was going crazy and his auditory hallucinations had preferences or that it had something to do with them being non-human.

“Can’t sleep?” Yue whispered, he was barely awake.

“Yeah...I’m too excited.” Viktor murmured, looking at Yue’s sleepy smile.

“Me too…” Yue chuckled. He stared at Viktor for a while before wrapping his arms around Viktor’s neck and pulling him so that his head was nestled into his chest. Viktor was a little taken aback by this but he calmed down and just closed his eyes, staying like that for a few moments as Yue stroked his hair. He wrapped his arms around Yue’s waist and hugged him tightly.

“When we get back to the academy, visit me more often,” Viktor murmured.

Yue looked a little confused, he had started visiting Viktor more often before they went to Belarus so he was a bit confused but he nodded anyway. 

--

[D-1]

It was the day before the engagement party and part of the Ivanov family had arrived. Only the closest branches had come to the palace today, specifically, the people who were a part of the pact of kin, the rest of the family was invited to come the day of the party instead. Today they had a more private ceremony. The only outlier in this was Mai, who had deemed herself as the representative of the Xia family.

They all gathered in a secret room in the palace, This was the actual engagement party. All of the official things, like adding Yue to the pact of kin and Elena and Andrei giving their blessings happened today, in secret. Just in case something happens on the day of the party that stops the ceremonies from happening.

Mai sat with Natasha, Alexei, and Nikolai while Elena and Andrei stood near a glowing grimoire up in the front of the room. Yue and Viktor were nowhere to be seen as the ceremony started.

“I hope that this union brings happiness. To all of us.” Elena said and smiled.

“Though perhaps I should save such a sentiment for their wedding.” She chuckled.

Natasha was quietly translating for Mai as Andrei started to speak, “Come in.”

Yue and Viktor walked in together. Viktor wore an all-white suit and Yue wore a light blue dress. Viktor’s outfit was passed down through the Ivanov family, The founder of the family wore it when announcing his engagement to Avelina Ivanov. Yue’s dress was a replica of Avelina’s dress, it had also been passed down through generations but it wasn’t the actual dress she wore. The actual dress was destroyed at some point near her death.

Yue felt nervous as he walked with Viktor up to the grimoire. He glanced over to Mai and Natasha who were smiling at him brightly and he felt a little less nervous.

The pact of kin needed a catalyst. The grimoire in the center of the room was the catalyst for the Ivanov family but for other families, it was a gem or a goblet. For families that were more in touch with their Royal side, it was a crown. 

Yue knew that Andrei and Elena would give them their blessings but he did still tense up a little when Andrei took a second to say his blessings.

“I’m sure you’ll be a good fit for our family,” Andrei spoke in English and Yue’s expression faltered for a second but he smiled after a second.

After some more extended blessings, Yue was handed a knife by Elena. He braced himself before even unsheathing it. He needed his body to not heal the injury he was about to cause himself so it took a little concentration. He also was a bit hesitant to injure himself, but he got over it quickly.

He sliced into his hand, making sure the cut was deep enough to cause blood to fall. He held his hand over the grimoire in front of him and let the blood fall onto the pages. When the blood fell onto the grimoire the catalyst glowed but when the catalyst was a grimoire it created a record. It listed the true name of the person being added to the pact. Yue wasn’t even sure what that meant. Would ‘Yue’ appear? Would ‘Azure Dragon’ or QingLong Appear? Would a name he didn’t even recognize appear?

What even was the meaning of a ‘true name’? The name your parents gave you? The name you gave yourself? The name you respond to? The name of your soul?

Yue’s question was sort of answered. Written on the grimoire were Two characters. Both were oh so familiar.

Elena looked at the name and then at Yue. She didn’t know what the Chinese Characters said but she had a hunch, just based on Yue’s trembling lip.

Viktor grabbed Yue’s hand and quickly healed it with a smile. He noticed Yue’s expression and raised an eyebrow.

“Yue?” Viktor whispered and Yue looked over to him after a second

“Sorry I was thinking about something,” Yue murmured a smiled a little.

The ceremony continued and soon ended.

‘Is everything okay?’ Viktor asked Yue through telepathy.

‘Yeah...That just wasn’t the name I was expecting to see.’ 

Viktor was going to ask more but the two of them were overwhelmed by people giving them their blessings.

“Let’s all talk over dinner in a few hours,” Elena said and took Yue and Viktor away

“Was it Fei?” Elena asked as she entered a lounge room with them.

“Y-yes..” Yue murmured. Viktor looked surprised, ‘Like as in Fei Xiang?’

“Do you wanna know why it’s Fei?” Elena asked with a smile.

“You know why?” Yue asked he looked surprised. He genuinely hoped Elena wasn’t going to tell him that Fei Xiang was his biological father, if she did he might feel some resentment toward him. Even though he took him in later on, he still would’ve been the person who abandoned him at the inn. The time he spent at the inn was somehow even worse than the time he spent on the streets so he hoped that his beloved master wasn’t the cause of such torture.

“Fei Xiang has Azure Dragon’s blood running through him. He’s the only other person in the world with it so in a sense you are biologically related. Even more than your actual parents.” Elena explained, “My name in the grimoire is actually just Elena, even though my parents are very much alive.”

“Huh? How does he have Azure Dragon’s blood?!” Yue exclaimed.

“His father was one of your past incarnations.” 

 “Then he was the one who gave me my fan…?” Yue murmured. He sat in silence for a while, just thinking.

‘Was he your son…?’ 

“Wait why did my previous incarnation have a last name then?” Yue asked after thinking for a while.

“He didn’t. The name Fei was just a name he picked, but it was passed on to his son and since his son is much older than you, that is the name the world has accepted for your human form.” Elena explained, “This happened with Vermillion Bird once.”

“...Are you sad that he didn’t tell you?” Elena asked, watching Yue’s expression.

“No...Master is like that…I’m just a bit surprised… Back when I first met him he always seemed quite sad...I guess that’s because I reminded him of his father...” Yue murmured.

“Why are new incarnations born?” Yue suddenly asked after sighing a little. Viktor squirmed a little, this conversation was stuffy, especially for him since he wasn’t like Yue and his mother.

“...Because...Our power is trying to find ‘the real one’,” Elena murmured, she had a saddened look.

“So we’re fakes?” Yue asked, that didn’t seem like the truth to him.

“No. Each incarnation is a piece of us. A piece of Azure Dragon or a piece of Black tortoise. But only one piece is meant to be the core, and our power is trying to find that core, that’s why incarnations live and die. It’s not a sudden death or anything though, the incarnations know they’re not the ‘right one’ so they choose to...die…” 

Elena couldn’t quite tell how Yue felt about what she was telling him but when she looked at her son she was almost shocked by his expression. Viktor looked like he was on the verge of tears.

“Vitenka...You don’t have to worry about us. I’m ‘the right one’, I wouldn’t have lived for so long if I wasn’t and Yue...He is probably also the ‘right one’.” Elena said and stroked Viktor’s hair. 

Yue turned to look at Viktor, He was shocked that Viktor seemed like he was going to cry. He didn’t really expect that.

“Yeah...” Yue murmured and held Viktor’s hand. He felt awkward about it, it felt like people had died for his sake. But he had never doubted who he was and he couldn’t imagine willingly letting himself die, especially not when he knew that Viktor was going to reach immortality and live for a long time with him.

“...Embarrassing,” Viktor murmured, quickly wiping his eyes. He couldn’t believe he had such an emotional reaction.

“No, it’s only natural. I’m sure that’s how Fei Xiang felt when he found out about this…” Elena murmured.

“But you both have to cheer up now! It’s a special day today and tomorrow is a special day as well!” Elena exclaimed.

Yue tried to cheer up and Viktor just stayed quiet, his ears were bright red because he was so embarrassed to have been on the verge of crying.

“And here I was thinking that my crybaby son had disappeared.” Elena teased.

“Please just forget about it.” Viktor groaned and hid his face in Yue’s shoulder. 

Yue giggled, He was now a bit curious about what Viktor looked like when he cried. Viktor seemed to get a sense of what Yue was thinking about and gulped.

‘I think I’m in trouble now…’