art reblogger

—• It was another day, another adventure. MK and the others had gone out to take down another villain of the day. Well, others, referring to Mei, Pigsy and Sandy I mean. Tang? Tang was once again left out on another adventure. Even after attempting to prove himself by taking the third ring of samadhi by himself, he would still get left behind time and time again. So once again, he sat by himself in the empty, quiet noodle shop, with his thoughts. Tang sighed and started daydreaming, a daydream where others relied on him. On his intelligence. But it seems like intelligence isn't good enough for them to say he's cool.

Tang: "Why do they keep doing this.. ain't I cool? I mean, I do have powers now... what's so wrong about me then?"

Tang looked down at his hands and groaned

Just then, a black and purple shadow appears right from under Tang’s seat, and out comes Macaque, who had been watching him for a while now.

“Well, aren’t you being so very included”

Macaque said, with a smirk. “I thought you said that the others were so…heavily reliant on you and that they needed you?”

Tang squeaked and blinked twice, but his face got a little calmer when he saw Macaque, he quickly fixed his glasses and glared at him offended.

"Excuse me, they ARE reliant on me! They just...want me to be safe. Yeah. That's what it is."

Tang crossed his arms and looked away. But let's be real, he didn't believe his own words. He just hoped Macaque couldn't see right through him.

“Oh, is that right? Remind me the last time they invited you to go on a mission, or even something that’s enjoyable..?” He sneered.

“I’ve seen how they’re treated you, Tang. I know un appreciation when I see it, especially after..y’know. Do you really want to keep standing behind in the shadows, letting your FRIENDS get all the attention..?”

He went back into Tang’s shadow, and then appeared right back in front of him, leaning in and pushing his glasses on him slightly.

“Or are you going to finally do something about it..?”

Tang shivered as he felt Macaque behind him, he quickly turned to him. His arms and defiant expression dropped slowly as he looked at Macaque

"..What do you mean? I won't hurt my friends. I love them!" Tang looked down and put his hands on his knees

"İt's just...hard to be there when all you can do is talk you know? But I won't hurt them, you can't make me. And why do you even suggest me that? Aren't you like one of us?"

Macaque sighed and rolled his eyes. “One of the group’s? You can’t be serious..No, they never invite me! It’s all about Wukong this and Wukong that. They never stop and think what I may feel..”

He shook it off and then lifted up Tang’s chin. “Look at me. You can’t either keep following behind them and have them never acknowledge you, or you can finally break free and forge your own path..it’s your choice.”

Macaque then dropped his chin and disappeared back into the shadows, leaving Tang alone again.

"Wait-!!! UGH, YOU CAN'T JUST SAY THAT AND LEAVEEE?! HELLOOO!!"

Tang groaned and sat back in his chair. He reconsidered Macaques words over and over again. "it's all about Wukong", "You can break free".. Tang put his hands down on his book and slowly closed it.

"..Maybe I should listen to Macaque. Okay. But how...."

Just then, the door opened.

MK and the gang finally come back from their mission, and while most of them were exhausted, MK was quite lively.

“GUYS!!! That was the adventure of a lifetime!! Did you see how cool my staff throw was!? IT WAS LIKE- *explosion noises*”

He then realizes Tang is still in the same spot he was when he left. “Oh, hey Mr. Tang!” MK acknowledges.

“We just didn’t think you could’ve handled that, that’s why we didn’t invite you.”

Before Tang could answer, Mei jumped in and poked Tang's cheek

"Yeah Tangy! İt'd just be so intense for a scholar like you!!! But anyway, we handled it perfectly, right?! So nothings wrong!!"

Mei giggled and pratically jumped over to MK, again, not giving Tang a chance to respond, she grabbed MK's arm "Anyway, wanna play a video game? I just found this!"

She started to show and explain the game to MK, Tang just..stared at them. Unable to speak. Why did they not even... Apologise? A simple sorry wasn't so hard, was it?

But MK laughed, agreeing with Mei.

“Yeah, no need! We ended up defeating the bad guy very easily!! ESPECIALLY me and Mei!!” He then nodded, turning away from Tang and running off with Mei.

“Heck yeah!! Let’s go beat up more bad guys!! This time- digitally!”

Tang slowly looked down at his book again. His eyes dropped slightly.

"Must be nice.."

He said as supportive as he could. His voice was barely a whisper, after a millisecond of quiet, his glasses catched an intense golden light. It was Wukong. The one who had everything maded for him, everybody loved him, so did Tang. Tang loved Wukong so much that he spend all his life studying on him. But Wukong didn't think the same. The love didn't really matter to him, because the Great Sage didn't like having a normal mortal around him

"Helloooo bud, ya reading again? Gonna be honest, you missed a lot."

Mk, not realizing that Wukong is in a conversation with Tang, runs in. “Monkey King!! Monkey King!! Guess what!? Mei found an extremely limited edition of your video game!! And- and I want you to watch me play!! You gotta come!!”

He says, before Pigsy tells down from the same hall.

"MK!! HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU NOT TO GRAB ONTO SOMEONE WHEN YOU NEED SOMETHING!?”

Wukong just laughed and got up

"Alright, alright, champ! Calm down! I mean, if you insist~."

Wukong chuckled again and let MK drag him, not even minding to look at Pigsy. Tang slowly raised his head and looked at Pigsy. His eyes beamed a little, he genuinely loved Pigsy and he believed Pigsy valued him, even if..the others didn't. Or he didn't understand.

"Hi Pigsy, how was it?"

Tang tried his best to not add a "How was it without me?" to that sentence. He didn't wanna rub it in their faces, he wanted them to see.

“It wasn’t too bad, Mk and Mei were the main two to take care of things, and we helped a bit here and there. I’m proud of em though.”

Pigsy then looked at Tang, realizing something was wrong in his tone, while preparing a bowl of noodles and sliding it over to Tang.

“Tang..? Were you alright the whole time we’ere gone or did something happen?”

Tang looked at his hands and sighed slowly, he didn't want to look Pigsy straight in the eye. He rubbed his arms together and spoke

"Can I be honest with you, Pigsy? Like, incredibly honest?"

Pigsy gave a look of sympathy and looked up at Tang, after handing him the noodles.

“Of course Tangy, you can always tell me anything.”

Tang took the noodles but didn't eat them yet, his soft eyes finally looked at Pigsy

"Well...today Macaque came in...while you all are gone and he told me...I shouldn't be sitting here all day while you all do the hero thing. He said I should be ...doing something about this. And I ... don't know. I feel like such a mess....But, it's okay, I know I'm not the one for the hero business. It's all good! Just...wanted to talk about it to somebody. Get it off of my chest you know?"

Tang let out a nervous chuckle and quickly started to eat the noodles to keep his mouth shut. He was visibly sweating from how nervous he felt. Then he turned his back on the counter and started..staring at his book. He wasn't reading it. He was just trying to look busy. He didn't wanna make others feel guilty but...the feeling of betrayal was just itching in somewhere inside his brain.

Pigsy tried to reach out and talk to Tang right as he turned his back on the kitchen counter. He didn’t know what exactly to do, so he tried to reassure Tang.

“Well, I’m sure your powers are pretty cool Tang. I’m sure if you tried to talk to the kid, he’d let you come along.”

Tang slowed down and smiled slightly "Yeah, you're right Pigsy. I'll try asking..one day. Eventually." He finished his noodles, "Anyways, these we're DELICIOUS, thank you Pigsy, bye!" Tang quickly got up, picked his book up and went outside.

Pigsy was about to speak up more when Tang had suddenly rushed out the noodle shop, which was unusual considering the fact that Tang would try his hardest to stay there for hours.

“Oh! Uh- bye, I guess-“

Pigsy said, going back to cleaning the counters.

When Tang finally got out of the noodle shop, he took a deep breath and walked slowly.

"I don't understand.. I'm Tang.. I'm Tang Sanzang, and they're acting like I'm nobody. I'm not nobody! ..am I? No. Of course I'm not. I'm smart. I'm... I'm powerful! And I talk a lot which is basically a superpower."

When Tang had ran outside, isolating himself, Macaque had returned from his shadow.

“Oh- realizing the fact that they don’t value you compared to the others huh now?”

He said, smirking and lurking around Tang as he sat down upset.

"..At least do something for me instead of skipping around the shadows. You told me to do something about it, what? What can I do about it?" Tang said to Macaque. Pointing at him aggressively. "And stop listening to my vents."

Macaque rolled his eyes when Tang tried telling him what to do, he sunk into the shadows again, then appearing in front of Tang.

“Aren’t you the golden cicada? You know, get in touch with all your powers, you’ve barely scratched the surface...” He paused and then shrugs.

“Plus, you’re super smart, so obviously you should know about that. You always say pearls of wisdom drip from your lips..” He says, brushing his finger against Tang’s lips to prove his point, then let’s go.

Tang paused, when Macaque let go, he stuttered a little. The closeness made him awkward. "I... I-Its not the same thing. I'm...good at telling stories. I don't know how to get...in touch with my powers."

Suddenly, a small, golden cicada appeared on Tang's shoulder. Tang didn't see it of course, he was busy looking at Macaque.

"And it's a metaphor for my knowledge! But the others don't seem to be minding knowledge..." He kept ranting, not noticing the little bug.

“But you know everything about the Journey to the West, don’t you? The Golden Cicada lore…”

Macaque said, still wandering around Tang, and his tail brushes across his shoulder, the same shoulder that the cicada had appeared.

"But I don't know how to activate it...to HELP them! To help them. Yes. Help..." Tang grabbed Macaques tail from his shoulder, and then he saw it..Golden Cicada. "...What? I didn't- I didn't even try! What happened?"

Tang quickly let go of Macaques tail and gently picked up the bug, watching it fly away "is..is this a sign or..?"

“Are you sure it’s to help them, Tang? I mean clearly you can use your magic, as there’s a glowing cicada on your shoulder.”

Macaque knew what he was doing. He knew he was agging Tang on, as he asked in a questioning tone.

“I think it’s more based on your emotions, rather than wanting to help them….”

“Maybe it’s a sign, maybe it’s not, but it’s your choice…”

Macaque whispered to Tang in his ear, than disappearing into the shadows again.

Tang gulped and shook his head "...Stupid monkey... disappears everytime....Oh god, what do I do...?"

The Golden Cicada flew away from Tang's hands. Tang felt a golden light peeking through his veins. He stared at his glowing palms as the light pulse rhythmically beneath his skin. The warmth felt suffocating rather than comforting.

"I am trying to help," Tang whispered to the empty alley, his voice trembling as he tried to convince himself. "..Or am I?"

Tang then heard MK yelling for Tang

“TANG!!! MR. TANG!! WHERE ARE YOU?? “IT’S DINNER TIME!! YOU NEED TO COME EAT!!”

He continued yelling, looking around for Tang.

Tang didn't make out the words, he couldn't. He felt an intense pain on his back and face, and a headache. He couldn't see because of a blinding light coming at him. His knees buckled and he fell down on the ground, then heard a crack from his back. When he finally a could see and hear, he.....he was different. He saw the world different. He saw golden. He saw...wider. Wider than usual. He felt a soft fluttering. Wings..? What? And his hearing had increased too. He found a mirror at a corner and looked at himself.

He was ...the Golden Cicada. •—

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AGAIN, I MADE THIS WITH BESTIE @nerdylittlebutterfly !!!! (PICTURE BELOW IS ALSO EDITED BY HER!!)

I HOPE EVERYBODY LIKES IT BECAUSE WE'RE MAKING CHAPTER 2 SOON!!!!!!! YAYYYYY

I found this in lofter and this makes me sad for Liu er