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Shen Qingqiu already knows it’s going to be a bad day from the minute Liu Qingge kicks down his door and stumbles in, covered in pollen.
“Something’s wrong with me,” he says, blowing his bangs out of his eyes and releasing a small cloud of the stuff. Shen Qingqiu leaps as far away as he can get without actually climbing out the window.
“Shidi, perhaps you might like to go somewhere else to take care of that? Alone?” Honestly, it’s like he’s never been sex pollened before!! He literally has! I was there!
“Take care of it how? I don’t even know what it is!”
Shen Qingqiu resists the urge to bang his head against the wall. Does he seriously still not know how to… take care of things… himself?!
“Well, when we were at Madam Meiyin’s, you–”
“What’s she got to do with anything?” Liu Qingge glares at him. “I’m not turned on. At least, no more than I usually am around y–” He proceeds to cough so hard that Shen Qingqiu is worried he’s going to start coughing up blood.
“O…kay,” says Shen Qingqiu. “So it’s not an aphrodisiac, that’s good!” He’s beyond curious about what his shidi had been about to say, but it’s probably none of his business, anyway. Does he get really horny when he’s fighting monsters or something?
“I just can’t stop talking,” Liu Qingge says.
Interesting.
“What did the flower look like? Wait, wait, no, it’s still all over you–let me take a sample and then please go take a bath.”
“It was a flower? It was big? I wasn’t paying that much attention because I was trying to kill a Five-Horned Crowbeast for you because you mentioned off-hand that you thought their feathers were pretty two weeks and three days ago oh my gods please make it stop.”
Carefully, Shen Qingqiu nudges a bit of pollen off the end of Liu Qingge’s ponytail into the nearest empty jar, covering his face with the fabric of his sleeve.
“All right, Shixiong will take this to Mu-shidi while you bathe and we’ll figure this out, okay?”
“I can’t go back to Bai Zhan. What if a disciple tries to talk to me?”
“Liu-shidi, why would you go back to Bai Zhan? There’s a perfectly good bathtub right here!”
“You want me to–in your–where you–” Liu Qingge’s face turns almost purple. “With your bath products? So I smell like you?”
You don’t have to sound so offended about that, Shidi!!
“Yes,” Shen Qingqiu tells him patiently. “It’s most important to make sure you’re not infecting anyone else with this pollen while we figure out a cure. I won’t even be here, so there’s no need to be embarrassed!”
“Great, yes, I would love to be naked in your house,” Liu Qingge says. It’s kind of muffled by the hand he’s currently trying to shove into his own mouth.
“That’s… nice, Liu-shidi. And, you know, this master will walk and take the Rainbow Bridge, just in case there were any… other effects Shidi would like to take care of. Privately.”
Liu Qingge makes an incomprehensible noise into his fist and practically flings himself behind the privacy screen. Shaking his head, Shen Qingqiu leaves, making a mental note to stop by An Ding on the way back for a new door.
There are no suspicious noises coming from the bamboo house when Shen Qingqiu gets back. Criminally, some part of him is almost disappointed by that. It would be interesting to know if Liu Qingge whimpers. There was no information about this in PIDW and Shen Qingqiu simply thinks it’s interesting, from a purely objective point of view.
“Shidi?” he says cautiously, knocking on the door frame and trying not to look past the broken pieces of the door. “Are you, ah, decent?”
“I have all my clothes on if that’s what you mean,” Liu Qingge calls from inside.
“Oh, good.” He is certainly not disappointed that he doesn’t get to see how sculpted those muscles really are under his shidi’s robes. At all.
“I missed you the whole time you were gone,” Liu Qingge says, immediately followed by a muffled thump and more words he can’t make out.
“So, you may have already realized this, but it’s a truth pollen,” Shen Qingqiu says.
“YEAH, I NOTICED,” says Liu Qingge, emerging from behind the privacy screen with his face in his hands. “I physically cannot shut up. Please say there’s a cure.”
“Well,” says Shen Qingqiu.
“If it’s dual cultivation can you do it, please–I didn’t mean to say that–I meant it though–UGH,” says Liu Qingge, face growing increasingly, concerningly red with every word.
Ah, so sweet of him to trust his shixiong with something like that! “It’s not,” Shen Qingqiu says.
Liu Qingge breathes an audible sigh of relief. “Okay, good, because I think that would actually kill me–not because I don’t want to–I don’t not want to–can you please gag me or something not in a sexual way but that might actually be fine too–”
“It’s true love’s kiss,” says Shen Qingqiu.
“IT’S WHAT,” says Liu Qingge.
“Maybe it can be platonic love or something? Or maybe any kiss will do? The, er, literature wasn’t exactly clear.”
“The literature” being PIDW, of course. Some random girl had wandered into a field of Giant Chrysanthemum Asters (Airplane, you hack, that is literally just two flowers mashed together), gotten a dose of truth pollen to the face, and of course started going on and on about Bing-ge’s sexiness and how she wanted to see him be vulnerable or whatever when she had been pretending to hate him two pages earlier. It hadn’t taken much convincing for him to kiss her, and the chapter had been very clear that the truth pollen wore off immediately after the kiss, but clear as mud on every other detail of the situation. He’s sent a messenger to Shang Qinghua, but the bastard wasn’t in when he stopped by to request a new door, so he’s on his own for now.
“I really fucking hope it doesn’t have to be true love,” Liu Qingge grits out. “Or at least that it doesn’t have to be requited–ugh, I was very serious about the gag, Shen Qingqiu.”
Poor Liu-shidi, he’s spent too much time training and not enough pursuing beauties… wait a second, what’s this about requited? Is he harboring a secret passion for someone? What women does he even talk to???
He hazards a guess. “I’m sure Qingqi would be willing to at least try!”
“Why would I want to kiss Qi Qingqi?”
Okay, that’s exhausted the one woman he is 100% confident that Liu Qingge knows.
“Could it be familial love? What about your sister?”
“Please do not call Mingyan and tell her she needs to try kissing me to get rid of a truth curse. In fact, never speak a single word of any of this to her, or within earshot of her. I do not want to know what she would do with this information.”
Okay, so what are we supposed to do here, Shidi?! Shall I grab the first random woman I see in hopes that she’ll be your fated soulmate??
“Maybe… if you’d be okay with it being a man–”
“Very okay with that. Would prefer it actually. Please pretend you didn’t hear that, but actually don’t–”
“–since it’s a medical treatment, maybe Mu-shidi would try–”
“Please don’t make me kiss Mu Qingfang.”
What a time for Binghe to be in the abyss!! Maybe it wasn’t true love, it was just the Binghe Effect–if only I could just have him do it, since Liu-shidi doesn’t mind it being a man! Poor thing, he’s probably scared of women. How did I not see it before, with the way he was acting around Madam Meiyin and the succubi? He must feel safer with a man, knowing it has to be platonic!
“All right, then, Shidi,” Shen Qingqiu says, exasperated. “What are you thinking?”
“Oh no, don’t ask me that,” Liu Qingge says, a look of pure horror crossing his face before words start to pour out of his mouth. “I smell like your hair oil now and it’s driving me insane. While you were gone I stared at your bed for five minutes wishing I could sleep in it with you. I ask the other Peak Lords to tell me if you ever mention a particular monster so I can get it for you. I–no, no, please stop me–I would go on my knees for you right now if you would let me, I–no no no–I want–ugh –I w-want to be touching you all the time–I don’t mind giving you rides because I get to hold you–sometimesIkissyourfansbeforeIgivethemback can you please just kiss me and make it stop.” Liu Qingge finally manages to stop the flood, gasping for breath.
“Shidi, if you wanted to be held, you could have just asked,” Shen Qingqiu says helplessly. “There’s no shame in being touch starved! Honestly, those Bai Zhan brutes don’t teach you how to handle your emotions… Wait, wait, you want me to try kissing you?”
Liu Qingge draws his hand away from his mouth for long enough to clutch onto Shen Qingqiu’s sleeve. Oh, good idea, Shidi! Maybe a kiss on the hand would work! He tries it, pressing his lips gently to Liu Qingge’s knuckles, then turning his hand over and kissing his (very sweaty) palm for good measure.
“Did it work?” he asks, peering up at Liu Qingge in concern.
“Your lips are so soft,” Liu Qingge says. “Uh. No.”
They had better be, with all the effort he expends on keeping them moisturized!! It’s nice of someone to notice!!
…well, he could try a cheek kiss, or a forehead kiss, but since the hand kiss didn’t work he’s kind of guessing it has to be on the lips. Trying not to think about how it will be his first kiss in this body (it doesn’t have to count!), he takes a deep breath and leans in. Unfortunately, Liu Qingge tries to lean in at the same time, and their foreheads crash together.
Okay, that’s fine, he’ll just!! Try again!!
This time he puts a hand on Liu Qingge’s cheek, hoping it will hold him still or something. Liu Qingge is practically vibrating with the effort of holding back another rush of word vomit, so Shen Qingqiu takes pity on him and presses their lips together.
…Bing-ge had kissed that girl with tongue, so for good measure…
…huh, this is actually… pretty nice? Liu Qingge really has a nice mouth, and that thing he’s doing with his tongue on Shen Qingqiu’s teeth is kind of driving him wild a little bit. Hadn’t Bing-ge grabbed the girl’s ass? For accuracy purposes, Shen Qingqiu gets a handful of Liu Qingge’s incredibly firm ass and is rewarded with a definite whimper (he knew it!!!). He pulls back slightly to breathe and dives back in, nibbling lightly on Liu Qingge’s bottom lip because he suddenly feels like he might die if he doesn’t. Liu Qingge has a hand in his hair and one at his waist and he’s doing this thing with his thumbs that’s making Shen Qingqiu feel all warm and tingly–who has he been practicing with?!
Reluctantly, he pulls away once he well and truly can’t breathe and Liu Qingge is panting into his mouth. He moves his hand upward, for propriety’s sake, but, well–Liu Qingge has just said he likes being held, so he should obviously be holding the poor man whenever possible!
“It worked,” Liu Qingge says, and wow, has his voice always been that deep and sexy?
“Are you sure? We should test it,” Shen Qingqiu says, scientifically. “What are you thinking?”
Liu Qingge stays perfectly silent and still, but there are blotches of red spreading over his porcelain-pale skin.
“We could try once more, you know, just to be totally sure it won’t come back–” Shen Qingqiu says, and Liu Qingge takes that as an invitation and kisses him again.
Really, Shidi, shameless!! This master didn’t actually say he wanted to be kissed again!! It probably can’t hurt, though.
“I see you didn’t need my help,” says the most annoying voice in the world from behind them.
“YOU,” Shen Qingqiu growls, immediately detaching himself and spinning around with a violent flutter of robes. “You have a lot to answer for!”
“Bro, why? Oh nooo, a flower forced you to realize your feelings–”
“What feelings?” Shen Qingqiu says, genuinely confused. “The love between shixiong and shidi–”
“If I don’t kill you I think he’s going to,” says Shang Qinghua. “The pollen would have worn off within a day, but a kiss between two people in requited, romantic love will cure it sooner. I brought your new door, by the way.”
There’s an audible crash from behind him at the word “requited.” Shen Qingqiu mentally mourns his eighth nicest vase.
“Wait,” says Shen Qingqiu. “Wait, Airplane. I’m in love with him???”
“Oh, you’ll need a new couch, too,” says Shang Qinghua. “Your boyfriend just pulverized the one you had. Okay, have fun!”
“SHANG QINGHUA–”