openmisc | Pagan/Huaisang

He thinks he understands the tone of the bird’s calls, and attempts a soft whistle to mimic it. He waits a beat, then attempts again when the bird doesn’t immediately flee. It responds with a quiet whistle and Nie Huaisang grins.

Pagan can hear birdsong among the forest and he sighs, indulgent, slowing down as he smiles. He lets him be, lets him do what he wants, enjoying the sound of it.

But something stops him short. A whisper of cold, of death, the stink of decay and despair and resentment.

Pagan draws his sword and runs.

Nie Huaisang goes back and forth with the little songbird, whistling and chirping along with it until things grow oddly silent and still. The slow roll of yang energy, dark and twisted, hits him like a breeze. He can feel it in the air, but his golden core isn't strong and his senses are slow. He realizes it too late that something evil is near.

Pagan, on the other hand, is honed and strong and fierce. He rushes past Huaisang in a blur of red and black, his sword going through the corpse heading for him and pinning the creature to the tree. He leaves the sword there and lands a kick on another, landing gracefully on the grass as he surveys their ambush.

"Back to the camp, A-Sang," he says firmly, his fingers drawing in the air to repel the monsters with magic.

Nie Huaisang opens his eyes wide in surprise, not at the fierce corpse but the mix of strength and grace shown by the Min sect leader. He’s violent and quick, impressive in his martial arts skills. Nie Huaisang turns to look over his shoulder as yet more fierce corpses stumble through the trees, his jaw dropping slightly before he absolutely books it back to the safety of the arrays.

“Gan-ge! Gan-ge, run!”

"Mins don't run!" he laughs, pulling his sword from the tree as he focuses his strength and speed on the corpses coming at him. He takes them down one at a time, alternating repelling and binding until the threat is gone and he's exhausted.

But he has enough strength to run back to the arrays to ensure Huaisang made it.

Maybe a Min should run! Did he ever think about that?

While he waits back at the campsite he strengthens the array, knowing there isn't too much he can do otherwise. It's frustrating, being so weak in this way, not able to apply himself in any helpful manner. He stands just at the edge of the arrays and paces slightly, finally able to feel a little relief when Pagan comes through the brush.

"Come back in here! Right now!" He tuts worriedly and rushes to his side.

Pagan laughs to himself and steps inside the safety of the arrays, sensing the strength that he had placed it it. "You had no need to worry, foolish Xiao Nie," he says, though he's grateful to everything and everyone that Huaisang is there, safe and sound. Pagan reaches out to put a hand on his shoulder.

Nie Huaisang in turn grabs Min Pagan by the robes about his shoulders, holding on tightly as he inspects him for injuries. "Yes, yes, you're very brave and fierce," he grumbles, looking him up and down. There are some cuts and tears in his clothes, and he looks at them with a furrowed brow that makes him almost look his age.

Pagan frowns, turning serious, and places a hand on Huaisang's cheek. "Look at me. I cannot be felled by a handful of fierce corpses with no power over me."

Huaisang looks back at him, brow still furrowed, before he puts both hands onto his chest and pushes him. He's too much like his brother, powerful and strong in martial arts, but not willing to admit his own weaknesses.

"You better not lie about being hurt," he huffs.

He stumbles back and holds out his hands. "Shall I strip for you so you can see for yourself?" he wonders with a waggling eyebrow, though he's struggling with the knowledge that he's been fussed over. Genuinely so.

"We don't have to go that far," he says, tsking softly, "but you'd better not be lying to me." He can't handle those kinds of lies anymore, and despite the teasing tone there's something in his eyes that looks like genuine fear.

He can see that look and he shakes his head. "Minor bruises. Nothing worse," he eventually mutters. "That isn't keeping it from you. That isn't hiding it. I can take care of myself and you."

That’s what Da-ge said too, almost word-for-word. I can take care of myself and you. And he could, until the day came he actually couldn’t and didn’t have the heart to admit it to his brother. Or maybe he didn’t realize, it’s hard to tell when it comes to the mind of Nie Mingjue.

He gives Pagan a very small nod, accepting that there’s only a few bumps and bruises. “You have a strong golden core, you’ll heal fast,” he mutters, turning away from him to check on the horses. “I thought the fierce corpses were all driven away from this area.”

"As did I."

He starts to clean up their camp. "I wouldn't have stopped here otherwise. But - we are safe now and we can keep going."

He glances over his shoulder once, worried.

Nie Huaisang spends a little time with the horses, petting their noses and fixing their manes, trying to keep himself distracted and not thinking about the terror he experienced when Min Pagan came running out through the trees with sword in hand. Eventually he’s ready to go again, and after packing up his things he gets onto the back of his horse and waits for Pagan to join him on the path.

“The Jiang will be angry to learn there are fierce corpses down here,” he says after a while, surprisingly political and aware. “They’ve been capturing and torturing demonic cultivators.”

"Yes, well, they certainly haven't done a good enough job of it. Perhaps I'll pay them a visit one day."

And angry fucking visit.

He mounts the horse and continues on, but there is less boisterous talk and stories. He won't rest until they're up in his own mountains.

Likewise Nie Huaisang is also quiet as they ride, annoyed with himself for his own reaction and angry that he has to even worry about something like that again. It seems wrong, after all he's been through, to care again.

When they finally see the mountains in the distance, higher and far rockier than those of the Impure Realm's lower and sort of meandering mountains, Nie Huaisang actually feels a little bit of relief.

"The storms will come in periodically," Pagan says when they get closer.

"But it doesn't reach the peak as often as it does the valley." He reaches back and takes hold of Huaisang's reins.

"Now, we are going to walk into a wall, but it is simply an illusion. My horse can see through it, you and yours can't. So just keep walking. Trust me."

Nie Huaisang is impressed by the bit of illusion magic on display here. He’s seen this kind of magic before, but on a far smaller scale, nothing so impressive as an entire gate. He nods his head and relaxes himself, letting his horse feel how calm he is and thus hoping to help him through the wall without hurting itself or panicking.

Pagan keeps a hand on the horse's reigns and walks through the barrier with his own, nudging the reluctant horse along until it bolts inside. On the other side of the illusion, the woods stretch on, but a road continues. A road that they follow.

"I put that barrier up - a few years ago." When his daughter died.

A few years ago. He’d been young then, but he remembers that the Min Sect Leader had pulled away from the world. Isolated himself, put up walls.

“Because of the war?” he prods gently. “I didn’t think the Wen made it down this far.”

Or that Wen Rouhan would have the guts to challenge the Min.

"No."

He clears his throat, urging the horse on. He walks ahead of Huaisang, not looking at him.

"I had a family once. My wife, Ishwari. Our children, Lakshmana and Ajay."

He stares ahead, jaw set.

"I kept them secret from the world. Your father knew, but no one else. I would reveal them when I was good and ready. But someone found out. Crossed the border and killed Lakshmana, still in her swaddling clothes. He was chased out before he could get to my son, but we never found who did it."

Nie Huaisang is stunned. He knows so much about the dirty little secrets of the cultivation world, but this is the first he’s hearing of this. It was so secretive that Nie Mingjue hadn’t even known - and he’d been one of the Min’s strongest allies.

He looks at Pagan for a long while, shocked and angry on his behalf, but mostly just terribly sad. It all makes so much sense now though, the Min isolation from the cultivation world, the reputation of the Min Clan of being harsh and brutal.

He speaks after a while, measuring his words very carefully. “Do you have theories on who could have done such a thing?”

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