Iwasyoungonce

He’s looking for the kind soul that made him eat so he wouldn’t die. He’s looking for the older soldier he protected during a hard fight, who told him he wanted this kid to train under him. He’s looking for the man who got drunk and spilt his sorrows to a ghost fire and talked to him like he was a person. He’s looking for his fellow war orphan, who was self-destructive and suicidal when he last saw him. He’s looking for his general, whom he followed into a ghost rage. Xie Lian is all of these things to Hua Cheng, and more importantly, Hua Cheng is all these things to Xie Lian.

He never forgot that kid he wanted to protect, that young soldier he wanted to train. He remembers the devoted ghost fire fondly, and Wu Ming is the wound on Xie Lian’s soul that never healed. They were always thinking about each other. They always cared for each other to some capacity. They like each other. They are friends. Like, yes, greatest love story ever told, he looked for him forever, but Xie Lian had no idea!! Like, if Xie Lian had known Wu Ming lived, he would have looked for him, too.

Me if that had happened:

This is mean lol. I'm joking. it's not true, I would miss their clownery.

And again, HC didn't even kill the guys, just asked them to give away their goodhood as an ironic punishment for how they treated a banished Xie Lian and mocked his struggles. If surviving banishment and ascending again is so easy, then surely they can do it. It's even stated banished gods age slower than a regular person and we know from MNQ that a strong enough cultivation can make you functionally immortal even if you're not a god, so they could have stayed alive for an indeterminate amount of time. The only thing HC did was forcibly take their goodhood by driving away their followers when they refused to keep their word.

Some feared he would challenge them and burn their temples if they were to incur his displeasure, some were blackmailed into silence and inaction because he had them by the balls, and some even oddly respected him because of how wide his reach was in the Mortal Realm. Sometimes, they even had to ask him for help paving the way for them while they carried out their duties. This went on for a long time, and many heavenly officials developed a peculiar sort of admiration for him.

-Chapt 5

After the snake and scorpion died, their souls didn’t disperse and, dragging their destroyed bodies, they went to seek an audience with a ghost king in a faraway land. For some unknown price, the ghost king pieced their bodies together and added in an extremely toxic venom, causing them to change into a demonic creature. The newborn scorpion-tailed snake killed the king in the end and, furthermore, remained to eternally haunt this place.

-Chapt 21 (revised)

At that time when the ghost pleasure boat toured the Jianjun River, Xie Lian had taken note of a few of the rare normal prayers, all children’s wishes, with the intention of helping Hua Cheng fulfill them in the future when he had the time. He hadn’t expected that Hua Cheng would remember them, too. Hua Cheng winked at him and said, “Sometimes I care." Xie Lian said, “The prayers of high-ranking officials and nobles, you don’t care about, but you care about these little children?” Hua Cheng replied, “There’s nothing to be done about it. Since they’re beseeching me, whether or not I respond, Emperor Laozi also depends on my mood, right?”

(revised)-Chapt 47

Hua Cheng scooted over to him; they were now sitting much closer than before. Hua Cheng pointed at a few names. “These are wrong.” Xie Lian looked at the names closely; all of them were known to be lawless, malevolently evil tyrants. “How do you know?” “Because I killed them,”

-Chapt 51

Twenty years ago, there was a pig spirit who went crazy and uprooted the village master’s household. The building collapsed and the whole family was killed, and the pig fled to Ghost City. I’d only just entered the trade at the time. I chased after the creature, but I was beaten to a pulp by a bunch of ghosts. What humiliation! He also sent one of his lackeys to tell me that if you eat a whole family of pigs, it’s only fair for a pig to slaughter your whole family in revenge. It’s your lucky day if the pig doesn’t seek revenge; if it does, then you deserved it. Now tell me, what is that rotten logic?!” “What a coincidence! Our sect experienced something similar, but it was in regards to a rooster spirit" “Hear, hear. You all know of my shixiong, right? He was talented and had an infinite future! He only had one tiny vice: he loved to dally with women. Decades ago, a prostitute ghost seduced my shixiong and sucked him dry—turned him into human jerky. That Hua…Hua…that ghost king dared shelter her.” (...) “I think I’ve heard of your shixiong before,” Heaven’s Eye said. “Wasn’t he the guy who would force himself on married women under the pretense of conducting rituals and ceremonies? The one who got locked up for three months?” “Ahem, ahem, ahem!”

-Chapt 74

Yin Yu didn’t have enough confidence to deny it. He said weakly, “Chengzhu has shown me grace. He saved me—” “I know,” Jun Wu said. “He even helped you pacify and send off Jian Yu’s vengeful spirit after he died during your banishment, am I correct?"

-Chapt 128

Even if the great master had lost control of his hands, it would still be a master level masterpiece, but that thousand-year-old jade spirit simply didn’t think so. It only felt that the heavens had fallen and the earth had split apart, a thousand years of cultivated importance already wholly lost! The jade was on the verge of breaking itself into pieces and disappearing on the spot. Unexpectedly, it was its close friend, the Kunlun spring sage that stopped it and gave it an idea, explaining that, Since it was like this, it would be better to simply go search for the supreme Ghost King Xueyu Tanhua of legend, ourselves. It’s said that Ghost City is a place where nothing cannot be bought and nobody cannot be found. He even dares to beat up heavenly officials, so maybe he has a way to find someone who’ll save you. Xie Lian laughed, unconvinced, and said, “So, they came to find you? And you touched it up with your blade?” Hua Cheng tossed those white jade chopsticks in his hand and said, “I took two casual swipes. To remedy a bit.”