Luo Binghe, panting from exertion, moves through the sword form from the beginning. As he extends one leg behind him and raises his arms, he feels a sharp slap from Shen Qingqiu’s fan.
“Shoulder’s down,” Shen Qingqiu snaps.
Luo Binghe drops his shoulders.
The next whap comes to the back of his knee. He yelps and stumbles to the dirt.
“Your feet should be closer together, your knees bent more deeply. Again.”
A quarter shichen later, and Luo Binghe is barely keeping his feet. He moves swiftly through the form, and this time he knows it’s done perfectly.
Shen Qingqiu’s narrow gaze watches him intently. When Luo Binghe completes the progression of movements, he taps his fan against his palm.
“Hm,” he says. “You’re slower on the uptake than Shang-shizhi, but it will do.”
As he walks away to correct the other junior disciple’s forms, Luo Binghe does his best to strangle the hilt of his practice sword, imagining someone else’s neck in its place.
Unfortunately, that other neck looks exactly like his own.
——
“You’ve gotten taller,” Ming Fan observes, grabbing Luo Binghe’s arm and pulling at his sleeve. “We’ll need to get you fitted with new robes soon.” The older boy clicks his tongue, frowning as though this was a personal inconvenience, like he would be the one sewing those robes himself.
Luo Binghe huffs, but he can’t help a small, proud smile. He has been growing, absolutely shooting up since coming to Cang Qiong and getting access to a steady supply of food.
“I’ll take your new measurements later and send them to An Ding,” Ming Fan says, dropping his hand and crossing his arms.
“Yay!” Ning Yingying says, throwing an arm around his shoulders. “Xiao Binghe is getting bigger! Soon you might even be as tall as Binghe!”
Luo Binghe’s eye twitches.
——
Shang Binghe is the bane of Luo Binghe’s existence.
Everywhere he goes in Cang Qiong it’s “Shang-shidi” this and "Shang-shizhi” that. “Oh, you look so much like Shang Binghe! Only not as stoic and handsome!” “Have you met Shang Binghe yet? You two look so alike! Last week he rescued three puppies from trees and produced a miracle cure from thin air for a plague in some far-off place! Isn’t that great?” And, especially, “Binghe? Don’t we have one of those already? And I thought he was… taller.”
It is driving Luo Binghe insane.
Shang Binghe, the head disciple on Bai Zhan Peak, is the same age as him. They have the same name. They have, Luo Binghe was dismayed to discover upon their formal introduction, the same face. Except that Shang Binghe is tall, strong, and popular. He has two living parents who love him—one of them is a Peak Lord, and rumour says the other is some important foreign trade contact. Everyone in the sect loves him. Even other sects call him a once-in-a-generation talent.
“It’s just not fair,” Luo Binghe whines.
“Cheer up, buddy,” Peak Lord Shang says. He pours Luo Binghe a cup of oolong and slides the tray of snacks towards him. Sulkily, Luo Binghe takes a few melon seeds and begins to pick at their shells. “Listen, you don’t want all that spotlight stuff! When everyone’s eyes are on you, that means you have to deal with all their expectations and worry if you’re living up to them and all that. Isn’t it better to be the unknown entity? Then you can do whatever you want! Enjoy your youth!”
“I don’t want to enjoy my youth,” Luo Binghe mutters. “I want to be a great cultivator and grow four inches.”
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In the dead of winter, the wife of a goat farmer gives birth to two daughters, lying in the straw of their barn. They are her first children. It has been four months since her wedding. Unlucky, unlucky.
“I really am cursed,” she whispers, looking over the faces of the sleeping girls. Identical, right down to the tiny, pin-prick freckles on their cheeks and chins.
One of the goats approaches to snuffle at her ear, and then at the babies. The one on the left scrunches up her nose at the sensation. She supposes she will have to find a way to tell the girls apart, but… well. It’s not so important.
Her husband won’t even look at the girls. Unfortunately, neither look very much like him.
—
“I’m not doing this again,” A-Hua says, gripping the makeshift scrap-cloth bag that holds all of her belongings in this world tight, like it’s full of gold and treasure and not two stale mantou, a strip of goat jerky, and a bent iron nail. She’s dressed herself in their little brother’s clothes, tied her hair up like father does. Their brother is tall enough already, and the two of them short enough, that it’s only a little small on A-Hua. Only shows a few inches of A-Hua’s ankles and wrists beyond the hems.
A-Yan stares at her, and wonders what, when they look so similar, makes her sister so different from her.
“You can stay here and try to take care of them for mom and dad if you want to,” A-Hua goes on, not pausing for A-Yan to speak, “It’s good. It’s good! You’re a nice sister. But if you do, you’ll probably starve with them, and killing yourself for our family won’t make anyone love you more.”
“Someone needs to take care of them,” A-Yan says, her voice dull. The fire that burns hot through A-Hua has always been absent in her. Silent where her sister is loud, apathetic where her sister is emotional. Grounded where her sister is flighty. It’s ironic that it is the colder of the two of them who seems to care so much more.
“Sure, sure,” A-Hua agrees. “Like their parents, maybe?”
“You used to think so, too,” A-Yan says.
“I woke up,” A-Hua says. “… you could, too.”
It’s the first time that A-Hua has made the offer since she decided to leave. For months, A-Yan has watched her sister toss and turn and cry out in her sleep. Her childish enthusiasm condenses and hardens into an alien sort of desperation that A-Yan doesn’t understand. She thinks that she knew A-Hua would leave them before her sister did. But never had A-Hua said: “Come with me. Let’s go together.”
She isn’t sure if it’s because A-Hua had known she would say no, or because her sister doesn’t want to stay together.
Either way—
“No,” she says. “Take care of yourself.”
A-Hua nods, ties her makeshift bag around her neck, and slips away into the night.
—
She never sees her sister again.
One year later, demons invade the countryside and slaughter her entire family, down to the last chicken and goat. She comes home from hunting in the late-fall forest a li away from the farm and finds the first of the bodies lying in the dust of the road. She follows the blood trail home.
At Huan Hua Palace, Palace Master Su tells her she’s the most extraordinary student he has ever taught. He holds her hand to correct her grip on her sword and walks her through the swing. She’s the youngest disciple of her age group to receive a spiritual sword. Its name is Gu Feng: a solitary peak. The Palace Master says it’s a sign that she will be great one day—singular, above the common person. She finds it a lonely name.
Does SQH ever put together that Binghe is his sisters son? Also, was the widening of eyes during the sealing of TLJ because he thought he was looking at a disguised SXY? Does he ever get freed and what does he think about this situation?
in my mind there is another installment of the series set between What I Need Right Now and I May Be Young that takes place when Bingge is a toddler and that resolves some of the stuff between SQH and Huan Hua Palace (what is IMBYAH about if not that you may be asking?? dont worry about it...)
ifff that fic happens, this is what ive been thinking for it:
=== MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW ===
At first, when the Old Palace Master saw Shang Qinghua outside one of the entrances to the Water Prison, dressed in An Ding yellow, he thought that Su Xiyan was making an escape attempt. That she had somehow freed herself, gotten a Cang Qiong uniform from the visiting disciples, and was trying to stealth her way out.
When he felt Shang Qinghua's spiritual energy, he could tell that it felt different from Su Xiyan's. However, he did also feel the demonic energy from her baby.
Then, the Cang Qiong head disciple and head disciple of the second ranked peak show up, calling 'Su Xiyan' by a different name. Old Palace Master is both intrigued and confused! After they leave, he goes and checks the Water Prison and finds Su Xiyan still inside. She either doesn't respond or claims not to know what he's talking when he questions her, but he sees something in her expression when he says that he saw someone else who looks exactly like her. He files this information away and resolves to keep an eye on Shang Qinghua.
When the Old Palace Master goes to attend the ascension ceremony for the next generation of Peak Lords, he finds Shang Qinghua and watches him. Here is someone with Su Xiyan's face, and everyone on the mountain is acting like this is someone else entirely, someone they all know. He's even about to be Peak Lord of An Ding! After the ceremony, he sees him leaving in distress and sends some cultivators to follow him. He also sends a talisman to Huan Hua Palace to have the guards check on Su Xiyan in the Water Prison.
Su Xiyan has taken the chance of the Palace Master and most of the highest ranking disciples being out of the sect to escape.
The Old Palace Master receives the report back that Su Xiyan is gone. He orders his cultivators to capture 'Shang Qinghua,' assuming this was all part of some trick after all. Mobei-jun and the other peak lords kill all of the cultivators he sends.
The next that the Old Palace Master is aware, Shang Qinghua is back at the sect, everyone continues to act like this is totally normal, and word reaches him that the An Ding Peak Lord has adopted a child.
--
Some time shortly after all of this, Mobei-jun begins making big moves. He's always been quietly setting up his play for the throne, building support and power and taking out his rivals with Shang Qinghua's help. Suddenly, he is like a man possessed—he begins doing absolutely everything possible to take out his siblings and secure himself the place as the one and only option for the next king of the north.
This makes Linguang-jun, who would very much like to be the next king and who is growing less sure by the day that his soft, easily manipulable nephew won't kill him for the throne, very nervous. He starts looking into why Mobei-jun is making out-of-character power plays, and discovers that his nephew's human servant has had a child. Not only that, but they're courting.
Now Linguang-jun knows that Mobei-jun is trying to take the throne early because he wants to protect his human lover and child. Easy peasy, Linguang-jun just needs to use them to distract Mobei-jun from his power-grab and quickly take the throne out from under him. Killing them outright isn't the best option—it could get back to Mobei-jun and then Linguang-jun will have to deal with the full might of his fury. No, he needs something subtler. More digging reveals a perfect option—apparently, the Old Palace Master has some sort of long standing obsession with Peak Lord Shang and his child. He's sent kidnappers to try to take the child before.
So all Linguang-jun has to do is help the Old Palace Master steal away Shang Binghe, and Mobei-jun will be so distracted trying to save him that he won't notice it when Linguang-jun eats his brother's heart (˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶) ‹𝟹
--
What exactly TLJ thought was happening when he saw SQH at the battle and if he will be freed are questions that should be answered by IMBYAH, so i'll leave those a mystery for now haha
I will say, TLJ did know that SQH was not SXY when they had their fuck-or-die sex pollen adventure. TLJ initially approached pollened!SQH because he thought that he was a demon wearing the face of TLJ's lover to try to seduce him and lured SQH off intending to kill him for it. however, talking to SQH quickly made him realize that something else was going on, so instead he 'cured' him and resolved to tell his lover this funny story. SXY did not find this story as funny as he expected her to. however, neither of them had much time to linger on it, since soon after that SXY disappeared and when next TLJ heard from her, it was to draw him into the trap that sealed him away for the next fifteen years
TYSM for this ask!! it was fun to write all this out haha, its just been plot threads that ive been mulling over a lot up till this point, and writing them out did make me want to pursue writing this part of the story... probably after IMBYAH tho!
tfw two of your cringefail ocs (one of which you almost died giving birth to, 600M AMA) finally come to some idea of peace and unity amongst one another (they have no choice) but isn’t it crazy this would probably the first time lbh got picked up by a parental figure in a hot minute like 😭😭
THIS IS SO CUUUTE AAAAHHHHHH
im dead also at the description hlkjhgjgjh. truly get along dad hug binghes WILL be nice to each other or SQH will drop them
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i have work tmr and it’s my birthday week so this is truly a barebones sketch buuuut this is a lil idea lol. in every timeline sqh finds a way to make lbh suffer, and this time it is with first hand experience being tormented by someone who gives the most potent youngest sibling energy and behavior 😔 what is the xianxia equivalent of get along shirts?? forced sword sharing???? ty for answering my asks i cant wait to rave about them during my lunch!!
BABIEEEES
i love them so much .·°՞(≧□≦)՞°·. .·°՞(≧□≦)՞°·. .·°՞(≧□≦)՞°·. pouty bingmei and smug bingge hehehehehe
I just finished What I Need Right Now Is Some Good Advice and 😭❤️❤️❤️
Thank you❤️ I'm really really looking forward for the next part of the series 🫂❤️❤️❤️❤️(lmao i love bingbing's attitude in the sneakpeaks)
-B
thank you so much!!! that means a lot to me ૮꒰ྀི∩´ ᵕ `∩꒱ྀིა !! im really excited to share more with you in the near future, and im so glad you enjoyed reading! 𐔌՞ ܸ.ˬ.ܸ՞𐦯
