WPCID 49: A Complete Mess

Shen Zhou slammed the door shut with a “bang” and returned to the table to continue reading the medical book.

The sentences in the book were convoluted and awkward, the small, fly-head characters jumbled and chaotic. After staring at it for a long time, he hadn’t even finished a single page, when he heard a thud from behind.

Shen Zhou turned his head and saw a quilt being stuffed through the half-open window.

A moment later, a person fell in after it.

Lu Buzhuo hadn’t expected the window to be so difficult to climb. He lost his grip and fell, his vision went black, and he couldn’t get up for a long while.

So he simply lay there on the ground to rest.

The expected sounds came from the direction of the table. Following a few thumps on the floor, a pair of bare feet with rounded toes appeared before him.

They were very white, a bit thin, with slender ankles. Two crisscrossing old scars were faintly visible under the hem of the black robe, reminding one of the rough sensation when held tightly in hand.

“I didn’t let you in to sleep,” Shen Zhou said, crouching down, his robe hem falling to cover his feet. 

“What are you looking at?”

“You didn’t say I couldn’t come in to sleep, either.” Lu Buzhuo regretfully withdrew his gaze, coughed a couple of times, and said weakly, “Can you give me a hand? Shen Zhou.”

Shen Zhou: “…”

Here we go again, Shen Zhou thought. It was the same at the Bamboo Retreat. He would make himself look very weak, then say “Shen Zhou” in a soft voice, and Shen Zhou would go over.

If that didn’t work, he would curve his eyes slightly, and Shen Zhou would definitely appear.

But not this time.

Shen Zhou stood up and glanced down coldly.

“No.”

Lu Buzhuo said, “Oh,” not too surprised. After a moment, he got up by himself and, as if nothing had happened, sauntered over to the table and picked up the medical book to flip through it.

“You like reading this?”

Shen Zhou remained unmoved. 

“None of your damn business.”

He then gave him a couple of shoves. 

“Get out.”

“Don’t, don’t… don’t push me…” Lu Buzhuo was as soft as if he had no bones, toppling wherever he was pushed, like a piece of sticky candy that couldn’t be kicked away.

Shen Zhou was at his wit’s end.

Xie Xianqing said Lu Buzhuo didn’t have many years left to live and not to torment him. But this man surnamed Lu had delivered himself to the door, and even brought his quilt.

After some thought, he gave up. 

“You can have this place.”

Lu Buzhuo immediately got up from the table and, with an agility unlike that of a patient, blocked the doorway.

“I’ll go, I’ll go.”

Shen Zhou stopped, but kept one hand on the door, looking at him threateningly. Lu Buzhuo went to pick up the quilt, folded it slowly, and on his way past the table, he also swiped the book.

Shen Zhou immediately said, “My book.”

Lu Buzhuo paused, then said, “But you were holding it upside down when you were reading it.”

He added, “This book is very difficult to read.”

“None of your damn business,” Shen Zhou’s curses were always the same few phrases. He stepped forward and snatched the book back, his wolf ears flicking impatiently. 

“Xie Xianqing will read it to me.”

“Then I can read it to you too,” Lu Buzhuo said, continuing his own train of thought as he put the quilt down, finally showing his true colors. 

“When you’re asleep, I’ll go back on my own. Is that okay?”

The wolf ears stopped flicking.

This wasn’t an unreasonable request, Shen Zhou thought. Besides, Lu Buzhuo’s face was a bit pale, and Xie Xianqing had said not to torment him. It was probably better for him to sit and rest for a while before going back.

So he looked up. 

“You’ll really leave on your own?”

“Yes,” Lu Buzhuo wasn’t greedy. He opened the book. 

“Which part do you want to hear?”

Shen Zhou took the bait as expected. He leaned closer and flipped to the page he had been reading earlier. 

“Here.” The moment the words left his mouth, he felt something brush against his wolf ear.

“Sorry, that was an accident,” the other man said preemptively, then curved his eyes, a star-like arc of light held within them, making it impossible to refuse his gaze. 

“Your wolf ears have gotten even more beautiful.”

Shen Zhou: “…?”

Shen Zhou showed a look of bewilderment, feeling that something was off but unable to put his finger on it. Yet, it would be a lie to say he was unhappy.

His wolf ears swiveled around in confusion.

Lu Buzhuo pretended not to know what trouble he had caused and continued, “Take off your outer robe and go lie down on the bed. You can fall right asleep when you get drowsy.”

The wolf ears became even more confused, spinning like a pinwheel.

Shen Zhou ignored the pinwheel on his head. After some thought, he decided it made some sense. He obediently took off his outer robe and got into the quilt, leaving only his head exposed to look at him, his expression clearly saying, “Hurry up and read.”

His black hair fell softly onto the quilt, his inner robe slightly open, revealing a patch of delicate white skin at the collar. The candlelight reflected in his eyes, making them clear and bright, filled with an unguarded anticipation.

Lu Buzhuo: “…”

Lu Buzhuo’s throat tightened.

The words on the page started to jumble, becoming incomprehensible. A thought suddenly occurred to him out of nowhere: When Xie Xianqing lulled Shen Zhou to sleep, did Shen Zhou look like this too?

But he didn’t ask.

Shen Zhou waited for a moment, then frowned. 

“Are you going to read or not?”

“…I’ll read.” Lu Buzhuo dimmed the candlelight, sat by the head of the bed, but still couldn’t focus on the book. He made up a passage on the spot.

Fortunately, Shen Zhou didn’t notice the fabrication at all and simply grew sleepy from listening.

His wolf ears drooped, the silver ornament flashing in the candlelight. Lu Buzhuo was momentarily dazzled by the light. He stopped, gently touched the wolf ear with his forefinger, and looked at Shen Zhou again, discovering he had already fallen asleep.

The pillow was crooked, and Shen Zhou was sleeping crookedly along with it.

Lu Buzhuo watched him intently for a long time, then reached a hand under the nape of his neck, carefully supporting it to help straighten the pillow.

A small white piece of paper was revealed, stained with ink and a little wrinkled.

Lu Buzhuo picked up the little paper figurine, held it in his hand for a long time, then smiled. He tucked it into the medical book, closed it, and gently placed it by the pillow.

The next day.

Breakfast was already on the table, consisting of purple sweet potato glutinous rice cakes and pumpkin balls, along with an introductory version of “Shuowen Jiezi”.

Without even opening his eyes, Shen Zhou first felt around the other side of the bed. Finding no sign of anyone having slept there, he contentedly rolled over and tumbled around on the bed for a while before getting up.

The book that had suddenly appeared on the table didn’t arouse Shen Zhou’s interest. After breakfast, he went to find Xie Xianqing to see if there were any chores he could do.

Xie Xianqing was still busy.

A large bathing tub was placed in the room, with a fire burning underneath. The water was milky white, with a pile of unidentifiable things floating on the surface, emitting the smell of winter melon soup.

Lu Buzhuo was soaking in it, his hair plastered wetly to his cheeks, complaining to Xie Xianqing, “So hot, so hot, are you trying to scald a pig?” while trying to stand up.

Then he was pushed back down, earning a string of curses: “It’s you I’m scalding! Where were you fooling around last night for your soul to be so scattered?”

Shen Zhou knew at a glance that there would be nothing for him to do today either.

Just as he was about to leave, he turned and saw Chu Xuan.

It seemed he had also come looking for someone and found no one, though it was unclear which of the two in the room he was looking for.

A sense of shared misfortune instantly arose.

Coincidentally, Chu Xuan’s gaze swept over and paused on his wolf ears. For the first time ever, he said, “Shall we go sit in your room?”

Shen Zhou: “?”

Shen Zhou opened his mouth, and after a long moment, said, “Oh.”

The two completely unrelated people walked away side by side.

The furnishings in Shen Zhou’s room were very simple. There wasn’t even a tea set, only a single cup for drinking water and a copy of “Shuowen Jiezi” on the table. Naturally, there was nothing to offer a guest.

Chu Xuan didn’t mind, because his room was also bare.

The two of them sat facing each other, looking at one another for a moment. Chu Xuan took out a chessboard from his storage bag and, somewhat clumsily trying to start a conversation, said, “Do you know how to play Go?”

Shen Zhou shook his head.

Another dead silence.

“I’ll teach you,” Chu Xuan said.

As it turned out, Sect Master Chu was not a good teacher. By the time Shen Zhou had spent half an hour figuring out where to place his fifth stone, he somewhat despairingly put the game record away and sought a new topic: “Did Senior Brother spend the night here with you?”

Shen Zhou, who was just getting into the game, looked up at his words. 

“Who said that?”

“Senior Brother,” Chu Xuan said. 

“He also said you two have already made up and slept affectionately in the same bed last night, just that it wasn’t very comfortable… What, you didn’t know?”

Shen Zhou: “?”

Lu Buzhuo was completely unaware that his own junior brother had already sold him out.

After finishing his medicinal bath, while Xie Xianqing wasn’t looking, he straightened his clothes, took out a box of specially made bamboo-scented balm, dabbed some on his wrists and behind his ears, and after careful preparation, snuck to the front of Shen Zhou’s room.

The door was ajar, and faint voices could be heard from inside, though not clearly.

He had a guest.

Lu Buzhuo frowned and peered inside.

He saw Shen Zhou sitting on the couch with his back to the door, and Chu Xuan sitting expressionlessly opposite him, saying, “This is already the simplest introductory Go formation.”

A hint of despair was faintly discernible in his words.

The wolf ears wagged innocently.

“…”

“You’ve read the game record three times and thought for a quarter of an hour, yet you still haven’t figured out whether to play black or white.”

The wolf ears folded forward, the meaning obvious.

“I won’t touch them,” Chu Xuan rubbed his temples, looking on the verge of a breakdown. 

“…Find someone else to teach you. Just consider what I said earlier a mistake.”

“What mistake did you say?” a lazy voice sounded from the doorway.

Chu Xuan’s eyelid immediately twitched, and he looked towards the door. Upon seeing who it was, he felt that things were about to go very wrong and repeatedly winked at the person.

Lu Buzhuo, thinking his junior brother was just happy to see him, walked into the room completely oblivious. 

“What’s wrong, are your eyes bothering you?”

As he reached the couch, he heard a sinister voice: “Lu Buzhuo… mmph.”

“Hey, hey, I’m here,” Lu Buzhuo casually stuffed a piece of crispy pastry into his mouth.

Shen Zhou: “???”

The other man even looked quite smug and, courting death, patted the wolf ear. 

“I heard you like to eat this, so I specifically brought a portion over from Xie Xianqing’s.”

Chu Xuan: “…”

Chu Xuan averted his gaze and stared at the floor.

Shen Zhou’s brow furrowed, but he didn’t refuse the pastry. He quickly finished it in a few bites, wiped his mouth, and then grabbed Lu Buzhuo by the collar, saying coldly, “What did you promise me last night?!”

A spray of angry pastry crumbs hit Lu Buzhuo in the face.

“…What?” Lu Buzhuo was stunned, looking helplessly at his evasive junior brother for help. 

“What?”

“You said you would go back on your own after I fell asleep.” The wolf ears stood up menacingly. 

“You lied to me again.”

Lu Buzhuo finally understood and felt deeply wronged. 

“I didn’t.”

“Chu Xuan said so,” Shen Zhou was certain. 

“Chu Xuan doesn’t lie.”

That was true. Lu Buzhuo nodded, and after nodding, he realized, “No, wait… Shen, Shen Zhou, I was just sleeping in…”

Shen Zhou’s face was frosty. He forcefully dragged him by the collar to the door, threw him out, and added a kick for good measure. 

“Get lost!”

Just as he threw him out, he saw that Chu Xuan was already standing outside and had caught Lu Buzhuo. 

“Senior Brother.”

So he added another word: “Both of you, get lost!”

He slammed the door shut with force. The door shook violently, sending dust flying, and startling the two brothers outside into looking at each other with sorrowful expressions.

After closing the door, Shen Zhou went to close the window, but Lu Buzhuo was faster. In the blink of an eye, one of his feet was already on the windowsill.

“I slept in the little paper figurine last night,” he explained quickly.

“The one under your pillow. I was afraid of crushing it, so I tucked it into the medical book and slept with it by your pillow. I didn’t lie to you, and I didn’t lie to Chu Xuan… Hiss, Shen Zhou, the window, open the window… my leg is going to break.”

Shen Zhou: “…”

Chu Xuan: “…”

Meanwhile.

Doctor Xie discovered that his patient had run off yet again. Without even thinking, he knew where he had gone and hurried over with a rope to catch him.

Before he even got close, he heard his patient from afar saying something about “sleeping in a little paper figurine,” and was instantly enraged.

“A little paper figurine? Didn’t you tell me you forgot to take your medicine last night!? With your soul so tattered, you still dare to leave your body so casually, treating my words like farts? You’re really getting more and more capable, aren’t you? Do I have to tie you up to make you behave??”

Lu Buzhuo looked back, and his face turned green.

To make matters worse, his leg was still stuck in the window, unable to move forward or back. He could only look at Chu Xuan for help. 

“Junior Brother…”

Chu Xuan was always responsive to his senior brother’s requests. He took out a small paper figurine, unfolded it into a sword, and after chanting a few incantations, the paper sword expanded in the wind and hovered steadily in mid-air.

He got on it first, then reached out a hand to pull his senior brother up.

Shen Zhou had already been planning to drag Lu Buzhuo back into the room to settle scores behind closed doors. Seeing Chu Xuan intervene, he became anxious, his wolf ears flickered, and he blurted out, “You’re no good either, eavesdropping on Xie Xianqing’s sleep-talking every night, and still saying you won’t be Dao companions with him!”

The paper sword tilted, and Chu Xuan fell off.

Xie Xianqing tripped over the rope in his hand, stumbled forward a few steps, and as fate would have it, ended up in a heap with Chu Xuan.

Lu Buzhuo was dumbfounded. He had heard every word clearly, but when they came together in his ears, they made no sense. What sleep-talking, what Dao companions? He stared blankly at the sudden chaos that had erupted on Shuyu Peak.

Suddenly, he felt that his own secret of sleeping in the little paper figurine last night wasn’t such a big deal after all.

In a momentary daze, he and the paper sword were dragged back into the room by Shen Zhou.