we're just bound by fate.

Went a bit beyond my capabilities here for this @natsumeweek prompt so it’s a bit half-baked, but Reiko was the only one in my heart for this.

⬩ Xian Rong is an incorrigible flirt, and she flirts just because she finds Ao Bing cute. Ao Bing unexpectedly falls in love. Xian Rong is confused – she didn’t plan for it to go this far.

⬩ Don't get her wrong, she genuinely likes and admires Ao Bing as a person, her praise was never fake. But she's. not sure if she feels the same kind of affection for him as he does for her... (It's going to be a slow burn on her part.)

⬩ While not immediately, Ao Bings falls in love way faster than Xian Rong. For him she was a fascinating person he likes spending time with first, but then this kind of attention from her made him consider the possibility of Xian Rong being interested him as a potential partner, and suddenly he couldn't get this "what if" thought out of his head. He actually liked it...

⬩ Even when he figured out that he's not the only one she flirts with – unfortunately, it only made him further realize that he's really in too deep already, because you don't get jealous and upset like that when your "just friend" is being flirty with someone else.

⬩ While he fell first, Ao Bing was always very subtle about it. He’s not nearly as assertive as Xian Rong can be, and instead of directly expressing his feelings he just tries to help and support her in any way he can, always take her opinions into account and follow her instructions. So when he gave Xian Rong the jade hair pin she was taken off guard since she didn't pick up on the earlier clues (meanwhile Ao Bing, confident in her intelligence, though that she must have noticed by now anyways... But this woman got the emotional intelligence of a brick. Which is now flying into their faces.)

⬩ Xian Rong had to awkwardly explain to him, that while she is deeply honored to recieve such a sign of affection from him (it's 100% truth, she's not saying it to be polite!), she can't truly reciprocate his feelings. Which, of course, kinda hurt, but Ao Bing is willing to accept that. He still would have liked her to keep the hair pin, though. She doesn't have to wear it if she doesn't want to.

⬩ He doesn't require her to reciprocate his feelings, he will love her regardless. All he asks for is to be allowed to stay by her side as a friend.

⬩ And that's how Xian Rong got further convinced that she could never deserve him anyways. Regardless of how he or she may feel, she thinks that Ao Bing is objectively too good for her, and needs to find someone more worthy of his affections.

⬩ The hair pin remained safely hidden in her bedroom for the next few years, but it gave her a whole lot of headache at first. On one hand, gifting a hairpin by is an indirect way of conveying one's feeling if given by a man to a woman. But then this hair pin itself is really not subtle. First of all, it is made of pure jade, making it obnoxiously expensive, and the color is so bright it demand your attention. According to sumptuary laws, being a peasant, Xian Rong is not supposed to wear something like this.

progress pics bc like hell if im not gonna complain about how much layering and blending and blurring i had to do for this HDDJGSGH

they ended up becoming invisible red splotches in the bg, but he's the blood cells in the capillaries of the universe :) each version of him contained in every timeline. though maybe it's fitting that they're splotches now. kind of like internal bleeding. fitting since they're dying off one by one to cause the apocalypse

i tried to emulate the style of some of my older arifive art where i go ham on saturation and filters and editing. did it work? maybe? idk i kinda like it :') despite receiving this idea like some kind of crack vision when i woke up this morning (so it's a bit rushed i admit) i think it turned out good