Brain Dump: A Collection

Shen Yuan holds the pretty pink envelope in his hands. From the corner of his eye he can see Luo Binghe shaking. He guesses thats normal, he very seldom denies Binghe anything. It must be a shock to his system that Shen Yuan not only held the note away from him but said no when Binghe said he'd get rid of it for him.

Shen Yuan looks away, the tips of his ears red as he brings the sleeve of his hoodie up to block his face.

"Binghe has so many admirers so a little note probably isn't worth looking at- but—" and this is so embarrassing to admit, especially in front of their little friend group— "This is the first one I've ever gotten so-so…"

His little group of friends look at him curiously. Though he doesn't notice they have all gone pretty stiff.

Well not everyone can be as handsome and competent as Binghe!

"I know I'm not very likeable so something like this is—"

Up until now the whole room had been quiet, forcing Shen Yuan to fill the space with his crumbly excuses but with this admission the whole room seems to errupt.

"Yuan-ge can't possibly—"

"There's no way you actually—"

"Literally the prettiest person in the world—"

"I would kill everyone in this room including myself—"

"You can't be that dumb—"

"Not dumb. Just oblivious, you know how Yuan-ge is—"

Everyone is interrupting each other and Shen Yuan's ears are ringing. He can barely understand anything and he feels dizzy with so many people speaking over each other.

It's only until Binghe places his hand over his shoulder and lets him lean against him that the world seems to quiet down.

Everyone in the room is still arguing but it feels as if Luo Binghe has created a silent cocoon just for them. He can feel Luo Binghe breathing against him and he can no longer cover his face.

Binghe, I think you might actually suffocate me! Too warm! Way too much!

Binghe backs off just a little bit and gives him a small placid smile, as if what he's about to reveal is painful.

"Yuan-ge. Everyone loves you."

Shen Yuan is about to fight him back on this, obviously his friend would love him but that doesn't mean everyone—

but before he can the group finally notices their quiet encounter and everyone starts nodding along.

If you were hoping I would ever get to it...well, here it is in all its sad glory: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68439771

Summary: “You….airplane….don't tell me….” Shang Qinghua looks at him curiously, tilts his head to the side innocently as he takes another sip of whatever he’s acquired both for them tonight. The though, revolting, sticks to the side of Shen Yuan's skull until it grows enough to form legs. “Oh my god….Is Luo Binghe your self insert!?”

Shen Yuan was never a particularly lucky person. He was born severely ill, his body frail and often useless at the adversity of life. It was no surprise then, that at the age of twenty-one, he passed away quietly in a hospital room surrounded by his family and a couple of friends.

What was surprising was that after taking his last sad little breath, Shen Yuan opened his eyes once more, his vision fuzzy as he stared up into the black beady eyes of a cat twice his size.

Thus, the unlucky life he lived beforehand was (somewhat) refunded in the next. Shen Yuan was lucky enough to have been reborn as a rather cute kitten and was adopted quickly. His, uh, master, was exceedingly careful and sweet. The man was tall even for a human, so for the tiny - even among cats - Shen Yuan, the man looked like a monolith.

He picked Shen Yuan out of the litter, big green eyes staring back at black-almost maroon eyes- with a mix of emotions that Shen Yuan couldn't comprehend were being sent towards a cat.

A mix of something sweet and hopeful mixed with what he could only describe as sorrow.

Is this how people normally stare at their future cats? Was there something unfortunate about Shen Yuan's new cat body he wasn't aware of?

The man held him up by hooking his hands under Shen Yuan's arms, stretching his lithe body down.

Sir, this is not how you properly hold a cat.

"You're perfect."

Shen Yuan, as a cat, could not blush but he did meow at the man with words that he hoped meant "You can't talk to a cat like that."

After throwing Binghe into the Abyss Shen Yuan needs to get sloppy drunk and who else could he get sloppy drunk with but Shang Qinghua right?

And what if in between that he suddenly realizes that Shang QInghua and Luo Binghe are (Disgusted gasp) kind of alike actually?

Anyways here you go, I will perhaps actually write this one day:

Shen Yuan squints his eyes in an imitation of a glare.

“You….airplane….don't tell me….”

Shang Qinghua looks at him curiously, tilts his head to the side innocently as he takes another sip of whatever he’s acquired both for them tonight.

The though, revolting, sticks to the side of Shen Yuan's skull until it grows enough to form legs.

“Oh my god….Is Luo Binghe your self insert!?”

Shang Qinghua spits out his drink in a way that would be comical if it wasn’t confirmation.

“Ha…why would you think….uh…” Shang Qinghua drags his eyes to he side slowly as he rubs his face clean with the side of his robes. There’s a red blotchy blush on his cheeks that isnt from the alcohol.

Shen Yuan on the other hand, feeling entirely too sober for this, because fuck him if he can’t see it and so much more stuff suddenly makes sense.

He stares at the pathetic alcohol and shame infused tears that are beginning to form at the edges of Shang Qinghua’s eyes and there’s a red blush peeking out of his robes, a lovely rosy color that causes a pang of melancholy to run through him because damn it he misses Binghe so much.

And fuck it Shang Qinghua isnt actually just a tiny bit like Luo Binghe.

Shen Yuan grabs the nearest bottle of alcohol and downs the rest of it in one quick swig because he is not attracted to Shang Qinghua okay? He just really misses Luo Binghe okay? Wait that’s not right either!

He’s just pre-mourning his limbs and the white lotus he had to drop down into the abyss.

Yes, that makes sense.

“You know…” and Shang Qinghua’s tone is entirely too playful.

“It really isn’t gay if we keep our socks on.”

Shen Yuan does not slap him but he does turn his haziest glare at him.

“Like, let’s be real I probably wrote it on the margins somewhere……it’s gotta be canon right?”

Shen Yuan feels his mind become pleasantly hazy and does his best not to think about the warm and apparently willing body next to him.

He is going to kill Shang Qinghua.

Shen Yuan did not, on principle, enjoy otome games - Excluding, of course- anything that included the addition of monster dateables- this was the only exception.

So when his meimei forced him to play through “Proud Immortal Love Way” he refused profusely. It wasn’t until his meimei stared at him with doeful eyes that he reluctantly picked up the game.

PILW was a slugfest to get through, a catch em all’ type dating game with a plot line as thin as his patience for the hack dev. Airplane better count his days, because Shen Yuan had half a mind to find the dev himself and end his days.

There were two things that kept Shen Yuan interested in the game. Number one, The game allowed the player to keep track of flora and fauna in a notebook type system. Shen Yuan wasn’t just a completionist, he was also deeply impressed by the art and creature compendium within the game. Truly its one saving grace was the amount of monsters the hack dev had managed to stuff into the game.

And number 2: Depending on the specific route you took, the main character, Luo Binghe, would either display more human or demonic traits. Shen Yuan was a big fan of the demon related traits that the character gained as he became demon emperor.

Thus, Shen Yuan, was not, could not, be obsessed with PILW. No, no, he simply enjoyed the monster compendium. Nevermind that he spent hundreds of hours going through every romance route or that he spent even more time playing the useless and completely unnecessary mini games the dev added, that was purely to unlock extra content.

Obviously Shen Yuan would not spend as much time in the game world if he weren’t a completionist and if he had to buy merch of the protagonist it was purely because it came with DLC content codes and if he already bought it well, there wasn’t a reason not to display it, I mean he already bought it. Might as well.

Anyways, it was these disparaging thoughts of resolute disdain that were spiraling in his brain when, one rainy day, he absentmindedly pushed a fluffy puff of a puppy out of the way of a delivery truck. It wasn’t the delivery truck that did him in mind you, Shen Yuan won’t let himself be isekai’d like that sorry Mr. Truck-kun! In fact, it was the electric shock he received from the metal pole that he leaned on to to grab his psp as a new notification for PILW popped on his screen that did him in.

One shock and that was that.

Shen Yuan closed his eyes as the electricity went through him, the cute little puppy he had pushed out out of the way earlier whimpering next to him, and the next he was staring at a bamboo ceiling, gauzy light green curtains filtering the bright sun.

As two worried sickeningly familiar faces stared down at him, only one thought became clear in Shen Yuan’s mind.