To Dream Of Blackbirds

Yue Qi, dragging blood covered seething feral teen Shen Jiu to the Peak Lords: "this is Xiao Jiu, he is my friend and he saved my life and killed a demonic cultivator. Can we keep him? Pretty please"

Qing Jing Peak Lord, deciding adopting a malnourished teenager he literally watched on magical cultivator television kill several disciples and then his own master, like that's not going to stab him in the back: "dibs, lmao, this'll be hilarious."

Writes the name Xiao Jiu (not Shen Jiu, it's important for the hilarity) in the book where the disciples names are recorded ...but not the characters for Little Nine. Because of homonyms. Instead the book reads his name as 晓咎 (Xiǎo Jiù).

This character for Xiao means the dawn/daybreak or to understand. The character for Jiu means to fault/blame, or Misfortune/Disaster. Poetically his new legal name can be translated to "Dawn of Disaster" or "To Understand Misfortune". Very in character. But why is this funny? Its funny my friends because of this.

Disciple, waving cheerfully: "Yo, Xiao Jiu! Are you heading to the library?"

(Intent, respectful: "Greetings, Ominous Harbinger of Doom! Shall we study?")

Shen Jiu, stops dead in his tracks, fan snaps shut and his eyes narrow into slits: "Kill yourself."

(What he heard, insulting: "Yo, Little Trainwreck! Off to read some books?")

And, because of this ...For the rest of his life he is referred to as Xiao-shixiong or Xiao-fengzhu. He has to keep a straight face as he's basically called a hot mess to his face all the time and because he's never certain if his sect mates are calling him little senior brother/or our little peak lord or not.

And it's all Yue Qi's fault. Forever. It does not matter if the qijiu misunderstanding gets cleared up because Shen Jiu is going to kill him for telling everyone his name is Xiao Jiu.