Chapter 28:
Return to Childhood
WHEN HE WOKE UP, Shen Qingqiu slowly turned over in bed, but he didn’t find an arm locked around his waist as he usually did.
The light of dawn spilled in from beyond the window. He covered his eyes with the sleeve of his inner robe, but this single movement made his waist and back begin to ache and his arm feel weak. A faint, tearing pain came from a certain part of his lower half, accompanied by the strange sensation of some dried sticky liquid.
After last night’s whole stretch of nonsense, waking up had come with a wave of consequences. Wondering why Luo Binghe hadn’t woken at the crack of dawn to clean him up and make breakfast on the way, Shen Qingqiu rasped, “Binghe?”
No one responded. Even more confused, Shen Qingqiu forced his eyes open and looked down, only to find a small head with a curtain of soft black hair.
Shen Qingqiu was speechless.
The owner of this small head had a cute and pretty face with a natural flush on his pale and tender cheeks; a long, thick curtain of lush black eyelashes; tightly shut eyes; and pale pink lips. This person was also curled up in a ball like a little kitten by Shen Qingqiu’s side, his head pillowed on his own arm.
Even though this person wasn’t the same size, and even though he looked to be about five or six years old at the most, and even though…
There were no more “even thoughs.” Even if he’d shrunk to another size, Shen Qingqiu could absolutely still recognize him at first glance—this was the face of the great male protagonist!
With a shudder, his voice jumped up an octave. “Luo Binghe!”
He was going to try pinching his own arm to see if he could pinch himself awake, but as soon as he sprang up, that ache in his lower half sent him collapsing stiffly back down. Still curled up in a little ball, Luo Binghe’s lashes trembled, and he slowly drifted awake.
With a red mark across one half of his face from his own arm, he squinted at Shen Qingqiu’s half-dressed form across the bed and reached for him in a give me a hug gesture. “Shizun…”
This voice was soft and squishy, so tender and sweet that it practically dripped. Accordingly, Luo Binghe froze as soon as he opened his mouth.
They gave each other a blank stare.
After a period of chaotic fumbling, they finally managed to sort out what exactly had happened.
Luo Binghe had been at a critical juncture in his cultivation lately. The common wisdom was that he should have been clearing his mind and keeping himself pure of base desires in order to prevent any mishaps from occurring. Yet the evening prior, he had lost control and rolled around with Shen Qingqiu all night, and finally—he’d suffered a qi deviation.
Shen Qingqiu didn’t find this at all difficult to accept because this plotline had occurred in the original text of Proud Immortal Demon Way. Of course, Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky hadn’t written that arc for cute fluff, but rather because the de-aged Luo Binghe had been able to openly strut into all sorts of locations an adult man couldn’t enter. (Exactly what those locations were, one can imagine for oneself.) And such a little kid was way better at lowering young women’s guards, so they could proceed to have intimate contact, and then, right when they least expected it—he’d win them over in a single blow!
This plotline had taken so long to show up that Shen Qingqiu had thought it had been skipped. He’d never expected that it had just been unable to occur on time.
Shen Qingqiu pressed a hand to his forehead. “How much of your martial aspect remains?”
“Not even a tenth.” Luo Binghe had a stern expression written all over his youthful face. Not only did it fail to convey the severity of the situation, it was instead…extremely funny.
So, Shen Qingqiu, very uncharitably, began to laugh. After he was done laughing, he rearranged his face into a serious expression and said with a cough, “Just one-tenth? All right. Then we can’t stay in the Demon Realm.”
Luo Binghe had offended more than a few humans and demons both. At this sort of time, the obvious next move was to flee as far away as possible and hide as well as they could. Shen Qingqiu’s first thought was, therefore, to grab chibi Luo Binghe and make a run for it ASAP.
Having made up his mind, he went to get up and get dressed—only for his face to twitch in pain again as soon as he straightened his back.
Every time before, after they finished, Luo Binghe had carried him into the hot springs while he was still deep asleep and helped him clean up. But now, Luo Binghe could at most cling to one of Shen Qingqiu’s legs, much less haul him anywhere. Luo Binghe crouched down next to him, eyes huge and on the verge of tears.
Shen Qingqiu was silent for a moment, then comforted him, “Forget it, it’s fine. I can do it myself.”
In the deepest part in the middle of the natural hot springs Luo Binghe had dug in the underground palace, the water rose past Shen Qingqiu’s chest. If he tossed chibi Luo Binghe into it, he’d immediately be submerged up to his head. So, Shen Qingqiu had to carefully sit down on the round stones along the edge while holding him, and even instructed him to sit tight so as not to slip.
He was about to start giving himself a cursory cleaning when he saw Luo Binghe straining to reach a nearby chunk of limestone to try to hand him the box of soap sitting there, but no matter how far he stretched, he fell short.
This scene reminded him of Luo Binghe crouched in a valley when he had first arrived at Cang Qiong Mountain to seek tutelage, a patched-up cloth bundle on his back as he assiduously dug holes. Shen Qingqiu looked at him for a while and couldn’t resist pulling him into his arms. Expressionless, he began to squish and tug at Luo Binghe’s face.
While subjected to this aggressive harassment, Luo Binghe inhaled a few gulps of water. His skin already had a faint flush from the warm steam, and with his struggles, his entire body practically turned pink. In a surge of emotion, Luo Binghe instinctively grabbed Shen Qingqiu’s wrist and tried to shove him down against the limestone.
Though Shen Qingqiu considerately cooperated and let Luo Binghe “shove” him down, Luo Binghe’s pretty little face went instantly dark.
With this body…even if he shoved Shen Qingqiu down a thousand—ten thousand—times, there would be no point! He couldn’t do anything about it!
At the sight of Luo Binghe’s face going from red to white to dark, Shen Qingqiu practically gave himself an internal injury from trying not to laugh. “You were so impetuous when tormenting this master last night; suffering the consequences today, are you?”
“Wasn’t it Shizun who seduced this disciple first?” Luo Binghe cried out, betrayed.
This made Shen Qingqiu’s face flare red as he internally gasped in shame. He righted his expression and quickly let go.
Caught off guard, Luo Binghe slipped into the water, disappearing in a stream of bubbles.