daozhangs | ic inbox, ryslig.

Are you still spending the fog hiding away?

As a responsible good friend, I'm not going to let you hide forever, that would be terribly sad.

Edited 2020-09-18 16:27 (UTC)

( a responsible good friend.

something isn't right. with luck, it's the benign sort of 'not right' as opposed to the side which might endanger jiang wanyin or others. xingchen has seen the network - whatever it is that's occurring, some seem to be growing less dangerous while others grow more so. )

Not forever, my friend. Simply until the fog clears.

How are you feeling?

[ How cruel and unusual! He is a very friendly person, you should know. A friendly person with many friends. Which he sometimes stabs. Or eats. But that's all part of friendship, right? ]

See, that's what makes it sad! The fog is the best time to leave your home. Thrive! Enjoy! There is so much pleasure to be found in Bavan during the fog.

Edited 2020-09-18 23:34 (UTC)

( he is a friendly person, xingchen would agree - perhaps not to everyone, but he has always been friendly enough to xingchen. and he certainly does have many friends, whether or not he's willing to admit it. )

I suppose that answers my question. :) It warms me that you're in such good spirits.

Forgive me, but you'll have to enjoy the pleasures of the fog without my company this time.

No! :(

You can't leave me alone!

What kind of friend does that?!

Come on, it will be fun! Don't you like me anymore, Xingchen?

( o h. there's a distinct pause before this response, not that jiang wanyin will probably recognize as much in this state. )

Please don't misunderstand, I do not decline your offer for lack of wanting, or for lack of care for you.

Even if I were to leave my quarters, I would not be able to thrive or enjoy my time as you might hope. Perhaps one day, I will.

Perhaps I am indeed a poor friend. I'm sorry to disappoint.

okay okay

I will have to keep making my own fun then. But you don’t know what you are missing out on! The city is great!

I'm glad that you're enjoying yourself. You deserve to do so more often.

I'm having a lot of fun! Hard to believe I wasted months here doing nothing but whining. Being brought here is the best thing that ever happened to me!

What sorts of adventures have you gotten yourself into in my absence?

( ideally sparing him the details, if anything came of obi-wan's network declarations. )

I enjoyed the nightlife. It's so much livelier than going to the night markets or drinking in an inn! The bars here are huge and they have dancing! And there are people who are attracted the danger of us monsters but it's not as fun when they want to be hunted.

But that's a good thing, isn't it? If some humans socialize with us without fear, it gives us the opportunity to show people that we aren't going to hurt them.

I guess. It would be inconvenient if they were all too scared to make themselves useful. But it's still not as fun to play with them when they want you to.

( and it's approximately now that something clicks into place. the reply is just slightly longer in coming this time. )

Have you been hunting, Jiang-xiong?

Don’t sound so disapproving!

It's only been a little. There is nothing to do here. No proper game to hunt. And I'm always hungry.

It was simply a question.

I meant to bathe, before you got in touch. I should probably do so. You'll be in touch?

Bathe before you come join me?

Where?

HAH!

You're coming!

I knew I could convince you!

Let me look up the address of the bar I'm going to and I'll send it to you.

Wear something pretty!

( there's no reply. presumably, he's off to bathe.

in actuality, he makes his way with a heavy sigh to the neatly-folded pile of clothes he acquired for an instance in which he'd need to emerge from his residence in this form. a long-sleeved undershirt and a pair of overlong trousers with a stretchy bit in the back to accommodate his tails, all covered by an equally overlong hooded cloak with sleeves long enough that if he closes his hands, none can see that they're clawed instead. it barely hides anything really - the cloak still billows unnaturally in the back, and his figure is still nearly a hand and a half too tall, but it will have to suffice.

drawing the hood up over his head, he turns and heads decisively for the door.

there are plenty of people out and about, but at this hour, not even an overly tall hooded figure in white gets too lingering a glance. perhaps if his monster bits were more visible he would, or perhaps they've grown used to such things by now. regardless, not fifteen minutes later he's nearly made it to the bar in question. he's rounding the corner onto the proper street when the smell of charred flesh reaches him, stopping him short. it's no new scent to xingchen, they burned the bodies of nearly everyone he slaughtered, but here and now it simply means that he has discovered jiang wanyin's kills. or, he supposes, he would find them if he followed the scent - but based on the lack of alarm it seems that no one else is able to smell it, not at this distance. and so he continues on to the bar, able (he realizes a couple of steps later) to follow a note of that very scent to find it.

the bar isn't nearly so empty as the last they attended, not at this hour, and xingchen finds himself growing more tense with each step that he takes. there are far too many people. he's not entirely sure how he ever dealt with people, they're loud and they're touchy and he finds that he wants no part of them, collecting himself to full height so that as he steps into the crowd with purpose, bodies shift from his path with a hushed murmur of mild bewilderment. they leave the reek of sweat and alcohol in their wake, but xingchen can nonetheless follow the burnt-flesh smell to a group not far from where everyone seems to be dancing, where a very familiar (and yet fundamentally unfamiliar) voice is asking after a fog priest.

a fiery lick of something like indignation flares in xingchen's chest, and he closes the remaining distance between them to reach out and wrap a clawed hand just above jiang wanyin's elbow, not tight or rough but certainly not gentle either. the rest of the group may as well not even exist. he has no spare ounce of courtesy to offer them as, from beneath the lip of his hood, his attention burns into jiang wanyin's face in a way that not even eyes with which to properly stare could have managed to intensify.

it might be best for jiang wanyin to take the hint and excuse himself from the conversation at hand. at this point, he's parting ways with it one way or another. )

[ Just as he had expected, Jiang Cheng has no trouble finding entertainment or company at the bar. Where before he would be clumsy and sullen, he is now quick to smile and to laugh, and he finds it very easy to be charming, witty, to make people like him and want to be in his company. And this, even though he isn't hiding his true nature anymore. He is still wearing the purple robes of Yunmeng Jiang but now these robes are open to reveal the gleaming white porcelain of his chest, now sneaking ever higher up his chest. His right sleeve is tucked up too to bare his porcelain arm. What he doesn't carry anymore is the sword, why should he bother with a common man's weapon when he is so much more now?

It doesn't matter much to him if people are attracted to him for being a monster or if they are revolted - both kinds can be exploited for a maximum of pleasure.

He is at the bar now after having finished a run-in with a group who hadn't been too happy about his presence here, the cling of burnt human hair and flesh still clinging to him from when he had kept shooting electricity through the men until all that remained was something ugly and charred that no meat eater would even want to touch.

Jiang Cheng, meanwhile, Jiang Cheng feels like he is drunk on proverbial and literal power as he drifts through the crowd, flirting and bantering and following his actual goal tonight, which is to find another monster which knows more about the Fog God and how to get the boons she is said to give her followers. It's not going well, though, and he is ready to call it a loss for tonight and pout - maybe find himself a toy and snack to take home and chase away the pout.

That is when he suddenly finds himself grabbed by the elbow. He snarls, cultivator's fighting skills kicking in as he readies himself to ward off the attacker, the feeding cables bursting out of his fingertips to fry him right on the spot... ]

Xingchen! You came! I was half-convinced you'd stand me up and then I'd have to hunt you down!

[ The cables disappear and he gives his companions a sunny smile, saying quick goodbyes and turning his attention fully to Xiao Xingchen. The gleam to his eyes is slightly feverish, the smile a little too bright and giddy for his face. But he looks happy and genuinely excited to have him here.

There is also a pair of brown-furred, floppy-tipped puppy ears peeking out of his hair, which look just as perky as everything about Jiang Cheng. ]

And you made yourself pretty for me! [ He leans in close, voice pitched to a conspiratorial whisper. ] Are you here to seduce me? If you can't keep your hands off me I'd understand!

( though the jovial way in which jiang wanyin spoke to the group with which xingchen found him was mildly unnerving by itself the response his grip on the man's arm earns - the instantaneous flip from delighted to snarling and tensing to fight, and then right back to jovial - has something catching strangely in xingchen's chest. it's not familiar. he refuses to allow it to be familiar. but then comes a joke about 'hunting him down', such an unnecessarily threatening phrase tucked right in with the man's genuine delight to see him, and that too strikes a discordant note in the core of him before he stubbornly swallows down that insidious thrum of familiarity too.

xingchen may not be able to see jiang wanyin's smile, but he can hear it curled around each word the man says. he has always liked making jiang-xiong smile, but not this time. this time it doesn't feel like one, regardless of how it sounds - and somehow, at least in this moment, he aches for that loss far more than he does for the corpses outside. he aches, and all of this nonsense - this calling him 'pretty' and asking if he's here to seduce him - it ends right this moment. )

You wanted me to come, and so I came. ( it's not the entire truth, but in another time it could've been - a time when jiang wanyin was himself, not murdering in the alleyways and searching for a connection to pledge his life to the fog god.

his grip loosens some, but in exchange it tugs a little. ) This way. ( he's attempting to lead him back toward the door, if jiang wanyin will allow it. )

[ Well, he guesses that is a no on the seduction. So much for that. Jiang Cheng pouts a little but there is always time for that later, even if it had been a flattering thought that Xiao Xingchen had dressed up for him.

However, he has something far more interesting to offer right now anyway. The pout vanishes again, an intrigued glint sparkling in his eyes. ]

Where are we going? [ he asks, though there is no suspicion in his voice. It's Xingchen, he's boring but hardly dangerous. And if he does cause trouble... Well, that's what Jiang Cheng has his feeding cables for. They are such an useful weapon, almost as good as having Zidian back. ] Are you taking me somewhere fun? Because I'm not done partying yet, you know, you haven't even tried that fantastic alcohol I discovered!

( he did, in a sense, dress up for jiang wanyin. he'd be wearing something quite a bit different were he still in his residence, and he dressed to leave his residence on jiang wanyin's behalf.

he also purchased the clothes in the first place with jiang-xiong in mind. more broadly, he purchased them in case he dire enough cause to go out at night, but the night that his friend spent somewhere cold and smelling of burnt flesh is what comes to mind at the thought of 'dire enough'. perhaps one day, he'll have others he might venture into the dark in changed form for.

regardless, that's not the sort of 'dressed up for him' jiang wanyin means. in fact, this is actually xingchen's first time receiving that sort of attention from someone he cares about rather than some lecherous stranger - the last of a long string of things jiang wanyin would never actually do. murder, joining the fog god, showing interest in one like xiao xingchen. he almost certainly wouldn't have even accepted if it were genuine, but to have such a thing be lumped in with some of the worst choices jiang wanyin could've made still jabs sharply at a place that would usually ache hollowly within him. right now, it mostly just frustrates him. which is quite honestly fine with xingchen. he's sick of aching. he's sick of being a person who allows himself to do so.

'where are we going?' he offers no answer, simply leading him through the crowd until they've found the door, but it's soon followed up by, 'are you taking me somewhere fun?' the rest of the words are irrelevant, his answer already formed and ready to reach the air as soon as jiang wanyin's done speaking. ) We're hunting, ( he says, ) In the woods, where a fox is meant to hunt. ( if jiang wanyin is embracing his animal side, it doesn't hurt xingchen any to give the impression of doing so as well. it's not as if he's lying, even if he only plans to hunt wild game.

a beat, and then - ) If you still want to revel once we're done, I'll come back here and do so alongside you. ( he's fairly certain that the man won't. that once they're out of the city, whatever this is will fade. it didn't even hit him until he left his apartment - he's self-aware enough to recognize that he's been affected as well, even if he can't quite pick out which parts are or aren't him. it's the reason he doesn't dare vary from his original plan (getting them both far from the city), should the urge arise. he made that plan in a place of sound mind, and he isn't confident that he remains in such a place. )

While Xiao Xingchen is going through a whole slew of inner conflicts over the person Jiang Cheng has become and what bundle of behaviors this person shows, the man in question himself remains blissfully unconcerned with such thoughts. Not that he would let himself be burdened with them, even if he knew of these thoughts. That's hardly entertaining and he has chosen to have fun tonight.

As such, he pouts some more with Xiao Xingchen's continued insistence that he must leave the club behind and now also... You want me to go back to the forest! [ There is a petulant undertone to his complaint. He scoffs and rolls his eyes, maybe the most normal gesture tonight, though even in this he sounds quite spoilt. ] I have been there with Obi-Wan and Gosalyn and hunting in the forest was fun once but I don't want to do it again! This time it's just going to be dark and boring and there isn't even enough prey to choose from.

[ However, for all his protests, he isn't actively fighting being herded outside, either. He could fight and he thinks tearing into Xingchen would be entertaining as well. But it would also ruin his plans for the night, which involve Xingchen well and convinced to join him. Dead people make for terrible company, it's sad and tragic and all kinds of things which all boil down to annoying. ]

I'm not a fox, I'm a Simulacrum. How about this? We find you a snack and then you won't be as grouchy anymore!

ic inbox, ryslig.

September 17th

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retconning this happening mid-19th instead

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