Somebody tells Shang Qinghua that Mobei Jun dresses in his revealing plunging necklines and high-slit side skirts and etc for him, and Shang Qinghua is just like uhhhh no? That's ridiculous? Like come on why on earth would his opinion have any influence on how his king dresses?
But once the idea has entered his head, he can't quite shake it. See the thing is, the Mobei Jun he wrote in PIDW actually did wear whole entire outfits most the time. As the pinnacle of masculine ideals he was more into the high collars and buttoned buttons and cool armor that actually covered his vital points than his SV counterpart.
Shang Qinghua's just never really focused on the discrepancy because, well, most of the time he's around the Moboobs he's not thinking critically about anything at all. But, yeah. Even though ice demons don't have a problem being scantily clad in the cold, it is kind of weird that Mobei Jun dresses like a total harlot?
Not that he's shaming his king! Mobei Jun can dress however he wants and Shang Qinghua will enjoy the view!
He starts to think that perhaps he should figure out how he butterfly effected this particular change, though. Mysteries are dangerous. Obviously it's not actually his gaze that Mobei Jun is trying to draw, but there has to be some reason for it. Maybe he just spends so much more time in the human realms getting overheated that he needs the extra ventilation? Shang Qinghua decides to test a few theories, jokingly telling himself that the first thing to do is eliminate the assertion that the all you can eat beef buffet is being set out for his enjoyment.
It'll probably be easy to debunk. He just finds a way to shoehorn in some compliments on Mobei Jun's looks into their next few interactions, totally bracing himself to get his ass kicked the first couple of times for even mentioning anything at all. At the very least he's expecting his king to maybe take some of his outfits out of rotation, like he is not expecting a positive reception to his observation that "this mantle really emphasizes my king's broad shoulders and powerful chest, he should try wearing it shirtless" to result in... Mobei Jun showing up forty-eight hours later in the mantle and a loin cloth and precious little else?!
Then it keeps happening. Shang Qinghua decides he must have chosen the wrong kind of debunking test. Clearly, his king's a little starved for compliments! It's getting a bit absurd!
He decides damage control is in order before he accidentally praises Mobei Jun into becoming an exhibitionist (if it's not already too late...) and he pivots to... well. Leering, a bit. He spreads his compliments out more, also being sure the compliment Mobei Jun on wearing, like, actual coverage, and looking cool in armor and furs and etc (not hard, because he does). But he lets his king catch his eyes wandering a few times.
He's fully prepared to get his ass kicked for that, and he does. Not as badly as he'd feared, but it does net him some impressive bruises. It doesn't seem to deter his king from dressing how he pleases regardless, and Shang Qinghua despairs. Well of course some wandering eyes wouldn't turn Mobei Jun off of his preferred wardrobe! He's a grown ass demon king, not some uncertain youth who would blush and cover up!
Damn though, refuting this whole "he's doing it for you" theory is more complicated than he thought it'd be. Maybe he should move on to just, figuring out the actual reason, rather than attempting it process-of-elimination style...?
Meanwhile Mobei Jun is getting increasingly impatient. Qinghua has finally started signalling his interest in taking their very respectable slowburn courtship to the next phase, so why is it stalling again...?
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