Darkness surrounds him; oppressive, humid, cold.
It clings to him like liquid, just short of suffocating as he lies there, trying to focus on breathing around the lingering sweetness in his mouth.
It isn’t easy though – it isn’t easy at all.
It’s hard, and as time passes, it grows even harder.
It isn’t easy, fighting against the dizziness and the bubbling nausea and the prickling sensation underneath his skin.
He’s sweating too, but cold, oh so cold.
How long has it been since he’d ended up down here? Days? Hours?
He’s lost track of time; he’s lost track of a lot of things.
He doesn’t know where he is, but he knows he’s never been to this place before and he knows that it’s somewhere deep underground.
And as he finds himself now, lying on some stone slab with his wrists bound up in silk, he finds himself distinctly unmotivated to ever return. That is, if he ever even makes it out of here in the first place – if he makes it out without giving in.
“Oh?”
A light illuminates a blurry but red-clad form that seems accompanied by another; double vision perhaps, or perhaps not.
Yue cannot help but think that it’s rather appropriate though, given the two-facedness of the individual before him.
Initially, she’d played the part of a demure damsel, then feigned fear and panic in some bid to get him to lower his guard.
Now however, there’s little hiding the utterly gleeful expression plastered across that face. Even with his blurred and doubling vision, Yue can tell.
“You’re still hanging in there,” she says, bringing the orb of light with her as she sits down beside him. “You’re a lot more stubborn than I thought.”
She brings the light closer to his face – both to blind him, and to get a better look at his face. Because she wants him desperate. She wants him fearful. And Yue, Yue would much rather deprive her of the satisfaction.
“Say,” she says, an undoubtedly sweet smile plastered across her face as her fingers brush against his. “Why must you keep doing this to yourself? Why must you make yourself suffer so? Quit being so stubborn. One word. That’s all I need. Just one word, and this all ends. You should hurry. If you choose to remain stubborn for much longer...”
She trails off, but the message rings perfectly clear.
Say yes, and this all ends.
Agree, and I will set you free.
Agree, or else.
Agree or else the grayanotoxin of the ‘mad honey’ forced down his throat would be left to run its course, its gradual onset of paralysis leaving him to suffocate.
And if this goes on for much longer, then he might very well end up doing that, either on his own vomit or from his lungs refusing to work.
Of course, there’s also the risk of his heart giving out before then; his blood pressure is already low, and his pulse is growing increasingly sluggish.
“One word, Yue, one word,” she persists, the chipper tone of System 707 leaking through. “I promise I won’t treat you harshly... as long as you don’t start acting up again.”
Hah. “Do you really think... you’ll be getting away with this?”
She – no, the System – laughs. “Oh? You think I’d let that half-breed of a Demon Lord get me a second time? I must admit, that sabre of his sure packed a punch, but I won’t be caught off guard next time. And you, look at you. Seducing the antagonist? Who would’ve thought you’d have it in you?”
Yue grits his teeth. “From our point of view... you’re the antagonist.”
“What? Me? An antagonist?” The System releases another peal of laughter. “That’s rich, after all the help I’ve given you.”
Hah. Help? “You⸺”
The System – wearing the body of another – puts a finger to his lips. “Yes, me. Bet you’d thought you’d managed to get rid of me using that Demon Lord half-breed of yours. But you didn't, and you won’t.”
Well, to be perfectly honest, Yue hadn’t dedicated much thought to it all – as far as he could remember, at any rate. He does have some vague recollections though, and they make him smile.
And this is either the wrong thing to do or the right thing, given how the hands move away from his face to reposition themselves at his throat.
“What are you smiling about?” the System hisses, applying pressure, as if Yue isn’t struggling to breathe already. “You will take me back. There is no other way out.”
Perhaps, but the only way out is still one of torment with no end in sight.
Yue isn’t afraid of death; he isn’t afraid of dying. After all, Yue has already⸺
A distant beeping fades in and out.
Then a pulse monitor suddenly goes flat, and no degree of effort can revive him – and what is even the need for it, given that none of it is actually real?
At best it’s just a memory – at worst, a nightmare.
It doesn’t matter though, not really. Nothing does. And yet⸺
He turns the blade on himself and plunges it into his own chest, making sure to aim for the heart.
He dies, and with the screech of System 707, everything ends – everything ends, and then it starts over.
The first time around, Yue had struggled.
He’d been so very young then; young and weak and firmly out of his element.
He’d been stuck in a new significantly younger body in a new strange environment – in a world of ghosts, spirit beasts, demons, cultivators, and whatnot.
Before, Yue had only ever had a passing familiarity with such things, having had little time for reading about such.
As a result, there had been a whole lot to learn and get used to when he had first arrived.
It had been the struggle, yes, and Yue used to think that having the System there was a good thing.
But then Master Bai had come along and brought him up to become his successor – and Yue had failed miserably at it, proving himself an unbelievable disappointment.
The second time around, Yue had opted for a different approach.
He’d become a rogue cultivator and sworn to never set foot on the Green Jade Peaks, a place connected to far too many memories – some happy and others sad, but all of them painful in hindsight.
And then there’d been Master Bai, who’d let him down yet also given him everything, who Yue had not only disappointed but also failed.
Of course, there’d been no guarantee of the other remembering – and while the realisation of such had come as a relief, it had also made his heart ache.
Because while he’d feared Bai Mingyue remembering him, the thought of not being remembered had proved nigh unbearable – and unwilling to face either prospect, he’d hidden himself away and rebuilt his foundation.
He’d rebuilt his foundation because he’d needed to become stronger in order to live and repay his debt.
Because whether or not Bai Mingyue remembered him, Yue still owed the other – he still owed him his life, but⸺
Yue couldn’t go back to the Green Jade Peaks. He couldn’t.
He’d sooner just stab himself all over again, and then⸺
[Host,] System 707 had assured him. [This System will find you a new body once we’ve moved over to the next World. Just give this System a sec to save our progress and⸺]
And Yue, still reeling from the shock of all his efforts having been in vain, had turned the blade on himself; Hánlěng – compact, light, and frigid, like its name implied; like its creator, someone had once said.
The System had no body to call its own, but it was tied to Yue’s. As such⸺
The bloodied blade was flipped over, and then⸺
With the screeching of System 707, everything ended.
Everything ends, and then it starts over, and Yue wakes up.
He’s a child again, and contextual clues put him right in-between him running away from those slavers and him running into Master Bai, as per the System’s instructions.
This time around though, there’s no System there to guide him; no disembodied entity occupying his headspace, giving instructions and options, and giving and deducting points.
Because that had been the deal, hadn’t it – for Yue to work hard to assemble enough points to buy himself a new lease on life back in his original world? To awaken from the coma that he’d been in ever since the accident?
But now, the point is moot.
Yue has already died twice now, and if he has to die a third death, then he’d rather have it be one of his own choosing.
He’d already lived out one life at the Green Jade Peaks; a relatively short one, yes, but a life nonetheless.
Now he has the option to live out another in peace somewhere else.
This is certainly his plan, but then, then⸺
“Shixiong?!”
⸺Yue makes a fateful mistake.
Much like some dreams were never really meant to come to fruition, some plans were always destined to go awry, and this time around, Yue really has no one to blame but himself.
Because he could’ve remained complacent. He could’ve stuck to eating mostly plants and nuts and such, and maybe even hunted a bit.
But no, that morning, he’d been in the mood for fish, and as such, he’d foolishly left his camp and ventured down to the nearby river. But what he had ended up pulling from the water on that day hadn’t fish but a mistake.
Recognising the drenched from of Youming Jun, Yue has half a mind to toss him back in again.
Unfortunately, that goes against his principles, and besides, the effort has already been exerted.
Screwing his eyes shut, Yue pinches the bridge of his nose.
Then finally, he opens his eyes, having come to a decision.
“Okay,” he says, voicing his thoughts out loud. “I guess I might as well take a look...”
Whether it’s one lifetime or the next, Yue harbours plenty of regrets. And this, this is just the latest out of the bunch.
Past, present, or future – real or imagined – it all seems to blend together, to merge.
He crouches down beside the demon bastard – beside the prone and wet mess that is Youming Jun. And as he does, he cannot help but consider the inherent irony of it all.
Once, he’d saved this bastard’s life – and indeed, Youming Jun was a bastard, because he hadn’t even seen it fit to return the favour; hadn’t even bothered to find out who’d found him and stopped when the others would’ve left him there without batting an eye.
They would’ve probably killed him though, had they actually bothered to stop and get a better look – but they hadn’t, and Yue had said nothing about the underlying current of demonic qi that he’d sensed – but Master Bai undoubtedly had, and he too had said nothing about it.
Granted, it wasn’t as though Yue had saved the other purely out of the goodness of his own heart – it had been a mission, plain and simple.
It had been a mission, and only one amongst many, and given his undeniably strained relationship with the other disciples, Yue hadn’t really paid much attention beyond that.
He’d been busy but helpful when able, and besides, the other hadn’t exactly treated him with any greater degree of sincerity either.
But what did it matter, honestly? It just made him the same as all the others.
Still, in hindsight, it could hardly be denied that Yue had underestimated the others – their boldness, at any rate. Then again, calling it boldness was perhaps a bit much, given that they hadn’t had the guts to challenge him to a fair fight.
And now, this time around, Yue wouldn’t give them the opportunity – and even if he had, then things would’ve hardly ended the same. Still⸺
Yue crouches down, gingerly taking hold of the demon bastard’s limp wrist.
Then, with a bit of focus, he sends a tentative thread of qi into the other’s body; a diagnostic technique used by most medicinal cultivators in order to quickly determine the cause and severity of another’s condition.
That said however, it is by no means an exact science; Yue is able to pick up certain things, but he knows better than to assume that he’d be able to catch and interpret everything correctly, because such things are still beyond his current level.
Master Bai would’ve been able to teach him, but... Yue doesn’t want to. He isn’t ready yet, and he rather doubts a time will ever arrive when he’ll be ready to face his old master – as a stranger or as something else.
As for the demon bastard, well⸺
With a sigh, Yue sacrifices one of his sleeves and wraps it around one of the gashes to stem the bleeding. Because even now, even with much of it having been washed away by the river, the scent of blood is still strong – strong enough to potentially lure all sorts of things out of the woodwork.
The demon bastard rather seems to have encountered one of them already though, because many of his wounds look like they’ve been inflicted by claws. And there are plenty to both dress and address – wounds, blood loss, exposure, possibly even poison – and Yue quickly tears off his other sleeve, using it to wrap a head wound.
It probably isn’t all that serious, because head injuries tend to bleed a lot. Still⸺
“You’re seriously more trouble than you’re worth, bastard.”
One more time – one more good deed and then Yue would wash his hands of this bastard forever. And then⸺
He needs more supplies, but they’re back at the camp, which is still some distance away. Sure, he could just leave the bastard here – leave the bastard here with the full knowledge of what might happen to him in the meantime.
And sure, Yue could also attempt to drag the bastard back to camp, but if so, then the other would undoubtedly start to bleed even more and get blood on Yue’s clothes as well, making them both great beacons for any opportunistic predator.
“Dammit.”
If only he’d have access to a spatial ring. Because then, Yue could’ve just carried around all his supplies without having to worry.
However, having access to spatial rings is a luxury awarded to a few, mainly to richer or more favoured members of righteous cultivation sects, and right now, Yue is neither of those things.
Given the opportunity, he could probably steal one – and that would probably take less time than obtaining the funds to buy one for himself. Still⸺
Yue looks at the demon bastard, taking a proper look not just his wounds but also at his attire. Because while those clothes are drenched and torn, the quality of them is certainly nothing to scoff at.
As such, it’s not unreasonable to assume that the bastard might be carrying some valuables, potentially even a spatial ring of some sort.
Yue considers it. He considers it and nearly discards the thought before returning to it once more. Because on one hand, Yue wants as little to do with the demon bastard as humanly – or inhumanly – possible, and stealing from him would largely contradict that. Still, Yue is technically trying to save the bastard’s life and all, so⸺
He reaches down, but then⸺
Sensing danger, he attempts to pull back. But by that point, it’s already too late.
Cold fingers close around his wrist, clamping down on it hard while slit pupils in a sea of burning crimson lock with his. There’s something undeniably feral about them, and Yue knows immediately that no words would be getting him out of this one.
A well-applied burst of qi loosens the grip just enough for Yue to tear himself loose, but then⸺ “Ugh!”
His head is spinning; he must’ve hit it on one of the rocks as the feral bastard knocked him to the ground. And Yue now uses another rock to attempt to smash the other’s head in after his attempt at stabbing the bastard had ended with his knife getting seized and tossed aside.
The blow hits, and the beast snarls in pain, giving Yue just enough time to roll over and attempt to get up – to get the knife, to get away, to get anywhere really.
Retaliation comes swiftly though, and in the shape of fangs sinking into the back of his neck.
Oh, Yue thinks, feeling faint. I guess this is it then.
And with a gasp and a pained whimper, everything ends.
