Chapter Text
It could be ostensibly said that Shen Jiǔ was a distrusting and guarded young teen that was far likelier to bare his teeth than to entertain the thought that someone was genuinely being kind only for the purpose of being kind.
The truth of the matter was not so. Shen Jiǔ was a guarded person who loved immensely though he did not show it openly. He went to brothels for gossip and soothing music, and to visit with the jiejies who had been his only safe haven once before. Just because they were no longer his only safe place didn’t mean he was going to abandon them simply because his other safe place was considered to be much more ‘respectable’ to his sect mates.
That wasn’t to say that he was suddenly the nicest person around compared to his first life. No, he would never change who he was as a person so intrinsically; he was prickly and defensive and tart. He was angry and guarded and distrusting of every single person around him. Qí QīngQī was the first person since Yuè QīngYuán had- she was the first person that had truly proven herself to be someone he was safe with in this life. It didn’t matter that in Shěn Jiǔ’s first life other people had proven they were safe for him to let his guard down near. That wasn’t this life, wasn’t his third life where he was doing his best to get close to and form new connections with the people he’d been safe with the first time around.
Liǔ QīngGē wasn’t as close to him in this third life as his a-Péng in his first life had been yet. He wasn’t Mù QīngFāng’s Jiǔ-er the way he remembered being as clearly as if he had been called that yesterday. He couldn’t hide away with Mǎ QīngFèng when people were just a bit too much and be called a-Jiǔ so gently like he was something precious to be protected. Qí-shimei had earned being his Zǐzǐ the same way she had in his first life, but everyone else he’d formed bonds with and felt safe around weren’t yet at the same level of closeness they had been at in his first life. They hadn’t formed bonds yet, despite how much he wanted and craved to once again have that level of security.
… He didn’t have his daughter. His darling little Lìhuā; he couldn’t even go searching to adopt his dawn blossom even earlier in her life than he had the first time. His sweet demonic foundling didn’t exist yet. It wasn’t like he had lost his child, this constant ache and pain in his middle dantian was only in his head. It wasn’t real because if it was, then that meant he was grieving over a loss that never happened. His baby wasn’t dead because for her to be dead she would have to have been born first and she hadn’t yet been born.
His scent (hide it hide it hide hide they can’t know what you are they’ll use it against you-) must have soured slightly, as Qí QīngQī pressed her side lightly against his with her own comforting scent of fire and cinnamon and iron reaching him. Others would say the scent was too strong, too dominant, too violent for a zhōngyōng, but her scent was one that Shěn Jiǔ found helped him relax. It was one of the few scents that hadn’t changed at all from his first life, other than the scents of the ones he had called his. Everyone else had an almost entirely unnoticeable change in their scents that rubbed against him the wrong way.
“What’s wrong, Jiǔ-dì?”
He took a moment to think over what to say. How was he supposed to even begin to explain that he missed someone who didn’t exist yet, someone that existed in memories that didn’t quite fit into this new life he was living? He’d already tried to escape ending up at Cāng Qióng, managing to avoid his fate as that man’s punching bag and unwilling accomplice… except he’d somehow still ended up at the Immortal Alliance Conference that he’d first met Yuè QīngYuán in and learned that his Qī-gē had broken that promise to come back for him.
It had thankfully not been Yuè QīngYuán that he’d encountered out of the Cāng Qióng disciples this time, instead it was Qí QīngQī who had looked at him fighting with only a fan he’d carved himself and imbued with his soul essence so it would react to his qi and the qi of those he completely trusts only, at his robes that weren’t for anyone of status, at the feral way he moved and the way he struck at the creatures with the same intent he’d used in life-or-death fights during his first life. She’d immediately adopted him as her new little brother, and had practically given the Peak Lord of Xiān Shū before her the ultimatum of convincing the Sect Leader to allow him into Cāng Qióng or she would leave the Sect to be a rogue cultivator with Shěn Jiǔ instead of succeeding her shīzūn. Considering how Qí QīngQī had been the only disciple of Xiān Shū with the capability to become its next Peak Lord, with the rest of her Peak’s disciples having not even a single one of the requirements, it had been quite the ultimatum that could have pushed back the succession of Head Disciples and ascension of the former Peak Lords back by years if not decades.
“… it’s nothing that can be changed, Huī-zǐ,” he murmured softly, as unwilling as ever to lie to her but unable to make himself admit that he grieved someone who wasn’t even born yet.
He only let his scent show when he was entirely alone, or with someone he knew he could trust completely. It was after he’d joined Cāng Qióng that the ones who had been his in his first life and weren’t yet his in this third life had immediately clocked that he was uncomfortable near Yuè QīngYuán, and assumed correctly that it was from something before the Sect but Qīn- Liǔ QīngGē had gone ahead further and assumed that something had occurred between Yuè QīngYuán and him and that one of them hadn’t been in their right minds when it happened. Liǔ QīngGē was technically on the right track, as that sort of thing happening before one presented could indeed set back their presenting by at least a year if not decades. And because he was hiding his scent so thoroughly, the people around him thought he was unpresented; it led to several of his martial siblings treating him like he was likely to break if they tried to ‘rush’ him presenting ‘so that he wasn’t left out’ when they formed the pack that every batch of Succeeding Head Disciples were encouraged to.
His nest was well hidden, in a secret area of the bamboo house that Shīzūn had given him. It was in a slightly different part of the Peak than the one he’d had in his first life was, and that eased something that Shen Jiǔ hadn’t realised was tense until it relaxed. A sign of further confirmation that this wouldn’t be a repeat of his first life, a sign to go with his zǐzǐ being the one to find him first during the Immortal Alliance Conference in this life rather than that person who had broken his promise to come back and save him.
That unruly little beast wouldn’t- he wouldn’t have to lose his precious daughter to that beast’s ever-growing collection of women, his darling little Lìhuā wouldn’t have her first introduction to demonic society being forcibly brought into that beast’s harem even while she screamed at him and wailed and begged him to stop and not to hurt her mother just please we didn’t even-
Shen Jiǔ shook himself out of the memory of his sweet little girl’s cries before his scent could betray how he felt about that particular unpleasant memory. He’d found her in his first life while he was presenting and her presence had quite possibly saved his life by giving his budding kūnzé instincts something to latch onto, and it wasn’t until after he and the head disciples became Peak Lords that any of them found out about his demonic foundling child. By the time they did, she had bonded with him enough that taking him from her would almost certainly spell out her death because of the toll severing that bond would have on her. Doing so would have destroyed him, and so his fellow Peak Lords had had no choice but to allow him to keep his child. His mates in his first life had slowly warmed up to her, and Lìhuā had easily dubbed them bàba, diēdie and zhǎng after the three had gained her trust. That decision had utterly melted the three and they had immediately started doting on her even more than after they’d warmed up to Shen Jiǔ’s child.
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Shen Jiǔ curled up in his nest after it was time for everyone to remain on their own Peaks for the night and tried to pretend for a moment that it wasn’t achingly lonely. That it wasn’t empty and void of his mates’ scents and he wanted his a-Péng’s comforting smell and his a-Jìng’s reassuring scent and his- he wanted their scents to be alongside his Huī-zǐ’s in his nest but they weren’t. His nest had only his own scent and his zǐzǐ’s scent in it, it was too empty-bare-blank and it was making his own scent turn a bit sour at how he didn’t have so much as even a hint of his first life’s kūnzé mate’s scent to help him. He wanted the scents of his mates from his first life please he was alone he was alone he was alone and abandoned and Qī-gē left him and his brothers from his second life left him and Mama left him and Baba left him and they all abandoned him and he was all alone he was alone he didn’t wanna be alone again he needed-
Unbidden, a soft keen escaped his mouth as he pressed himself against the part of the nest that held his zǐzǐ’s scent the most so he could try and remind himself that at least one person in his pack from his first life was here and that he wasn’t all by himself like he had been for so long. His zǐzǐ was pack, she cared, she was his pack, he wasn’t packless like he had been in his second life, no one was going to abandon him in this third life please don’t leave him he needed the bonds he needed to feel safe please don’t leave him don’t leave stay don’t go-
“Jiǔ-dì? Jiǔ-dì, what’s wrong? Zhǎng-shīgū said you needed me and- oh, Jiǔ-dì,” a voice said from just beyond where he kept his nest hidden, one that turned softer towards the end as the only member of his pack he’d regained entered his home, “Jiǔ-dì, dìdì, your zǐzǐ’s here now. Huī-zǐ’s here, Jiǔ-dì. Is it okay if I enter your nest?”
Fire, cinnamon, iron. Comforting heat, reassuring warmth, gentle sharpness. His zǐzǐ was near, his pack was close, please don’t leave him don’t leave stay stay don’t leave stay don’t go-
Gentle arms circled around him, his zǐzǐ’s scent coming nearer and soothing his own scent by calming him with the reassurance that she wasn’t going to abandon him. His zǐzǐ wasn’t like that, she wouldn’t leave him all alone without her. He had his zǐzǐ, and that was going to have to be enough at least until he was able to try and form packbonds with the other members of his pack from his first life like he wanted to desperately.
“I’ve got you, dìdì,” she murmured, and gentle hands turned his head so that he was curled against her with his nose close to one of her stronger scent glands, “it’s alright, I’m here. You just focus on my scent, alright?”
He breathed in that comforting smell and curled further into his packmate’s side, his own scent calming some. It took a while, but slowly his scent went back to its usual state when he wasn’t doing his best to hide it. Rotting books to freshly made ones, bitterly acidic tea to warm and pleasant apple tea, wilting jasmine and lotus to freshly bloomed, and spoiled bamboo becoming fresh shoots once again. He was nearly asleep against her when his scent was finally back to normal, and it had certainly helped his scent bloom properly and send him closer to sleep when his zǐzǐ began running her fingers through his hair gently after taking it out of the guan he’d accidentally left in.
It took only a shaky and barely-conscious murmur of “stay?” for his packmate to cave and curl around him protectively in his nest so she’d be able to protect him if any threats approached while they rested. There were some disadvantages to hiding his scent, one being that unless he was familiar with someone’s scent he had difficulty smelling them. But the advantages to hiding his scent and presentation far outweighed the inconveniences.
Shen Jiǔ fell asleep with the scent of his packmate reminding him that as long as his zǐzǐ was near she would watch his back. He could lower his guard with her. He was safe with her, she wouldn’t let anything hurt him. It didn’t even bother him all that much that his scent didn’t stay on his packmate when hers always left traces on his things and him and gave him reminders that he had at least one packmate. He had at least one packbond.