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1
Xiao Xingchen slit his throat with Shuanghua and woke up in his bed on a sunny morning.
He heard his friend rustling the covers of his own bed on the other side of the room as he woke up. His sensitive ears could also pick up on the slight crackling of the joints in said friend’s healed leg as he stretched. A-Qing was awake, her bamboo cane tapping almost impatiently against the floor as she paced.
“Oh, you’re finally awake,” she said the moment Xiao Xingchen sat up on his bed. “I’m going out for a bit. Didn’t want you to worry, but now you know. See you later.”
There shouldn’t have been anything unusual about that. A-Qing was old enough and familiar enough with the town to go out on her own. She wandered often, especially now that their nameless friend had seemingly decided to stick around long term. This time, however, her words sent a shiver down Xiao Xingchen’s spine. She had said those exact words in his dream—his dream where he had discovered that his nameless friend was Xue Yang, where he had been tricked into killing Song Lan, where he had slit his throat with Shuanghua and finally ended the nightmare.
She must have sensed his hesitation or heard him flinch.
“I won’t be out too long. And I won’t steal from anyone, I promise.”
That was new. She hadn’t said that in the dream, but that was because Xiao Xingchen hadn’t hesitated in the dream.
“Sure, go ahead. I was just momentarily distracted.”
She skipped out the door, her cane tapping a beat that sounded oddly familiar in his ears.
Shortly after she was gone, a pair of arms wrapped lazily around Xiao Xingchen’s shoulders. His friend had gotten bolder throughout his time with them in Yi City. He seized every opportunity to cling to Xiao Xingchen, teasing him with his words and warming him with his touch. He was so gentle, so soft, that Xiao Xingchen couldn’t possibly imagine what his subconscious had been thinking when it decided to replace him with Xue Yang. The weirdest part was that this moment had been in the dream too. Xue Yang’s dream arms had been just as comfortable as his real friend’s.
“Today’s market day,” the man murmured, mouth partially blocked by the fabric of Xiao Xingchen’s robes as he buried his face in his shoulder. His voice was raspy, but Xiao Xingchen couldn’t help but pick up the undercurrent of brightness in the tone. He had never spent much effort attempting to identify his nameless friend’s voice before, but once his subconscious had made the connection, he couldn’t unhear it. It would explain the nightmare, he supposed, if his friend’s voice was just a little too similar to his enemy’s.
“Don’t forget me,” Xue Yang had said, all those years ago.
He had never agreed to those terms, but as it turned out, he didn’t really have a choice. Xue Yang had taken up residence in Xiao Xingchen’s memory like an uninvited houseguest.
“Breakfast first,” Xiao Xingchen said, his tone level and practiced. He’d said those words in the dream too, in the exact same way. The sense of deja vu rang in his ears.
The uncanny feeling reached a boiling point while they were bantering about whose turn it was to go to the market. His friend revealed that he had cheated when drawing sticks, and it was the exact exchange that had happened in the dream, down to the word. Xiao Xingchen told himself that he was being paranoid, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. He had never had a dream that was a premonition. He really hoped that this wasn’t his first.
His friend had already turned to leave, but Xiao Xingchen grabbed his arm before he took his first step. His grip was strong, almost frantic. He could feel his friend’s elevated heart rate against his fingers on his wrist.
“Actually, let’s go together for once,” he offered, smiling in a way that felt forced, but hopefully looked normal.
“Can’t bear the thought of being apart?”
Xiao Xingchen’s grip relaxed slightly. He surprised even himself by smiling despite the wave of emotions still coursing through him.
“Were you going to miss me?” his friend’s voice continued.
That voice… the almost childish lilt at the end of the question, straddling the line between playful and maniacal…
Xiao Xingchen shook his head in response, mostly to clear his own thoughts. He could feel his own blush as he did so. He was sure his friend could see it, too.
“Come on, let’s go together then,” his friend said as he pulled his wrist out of Xiao Xingchen’s grasp, then reached back to properly hold hands.
“Hopefully no one robs us while the house is empty,” he added, as an afterthought. It wasn’t like there was anything in that house worth stealing anyway, and they both knew it.
Their shopping trip was uneventful. The vendors were well trained at this point, thanks to Xiao Xingchen’s mystery friend’s well placed threats throughout the years. They gave the pair their best produce and plenty of thanks for their work protecting the city. Various villagers said hello and the candy salesman deposited two pieces of candy in Xiao Xingchen’s hand without them needing to exchange a single word.
“Give me one too,” the nameless friend had said after Xiao Xingchen had paid. “As a frequent customer bonus.”
The salesman must have only responded with a look, since the next thing Xiao Xingchen heard was his friend’s voice, saccharine and pleading.
“Oh come on, is that how you treat the saviors of your city?”
Xiao Xingchen ended up buying a third piece of candy. He walked back with an empty wallet and a giddily happy friend. It seemed a fair and equivalent exchange.
When he arrived home, his friend stopped suddenly, his hand going slack against Xiao Xingchen’s. He made a halfhearted attempt to pull away, but Xiao Xingchen held on tighter.
“What is it?” he asked, giving his friend’s hand a tug.
It wasn’t his friend who replied.
“Nothing to say now, Xue Yang?”
Song Lan’s voice.
Xue Yang.
All of the blood drained from Xiao Xingchen’s face. His body moved before his mind could catch up. By the time he could form words, he could feel his friend’s—Xue Yang’s—blood running down the hilt of Shuanghua onto his fingers.
He could have asked the same question he had asked in his dream: “Was it fun?” but he instinctively knew that he would have gotten the same answer as he had in his dream.
Instead, he asked if the walking corpses he had killed had been living people.
There were a few seconds of pause.
“So you’ve finally figured it out.”
Xue Yang made no attempt to disguise his voice. Xiao Xingchen wondered if he would proceed to explain his plan for making him kill Song Lan. He didn’t. The speech he gave was more or less the same one as in his dream. An explanation, then gloating. No mention of Song Lan besides where it was relevant to the plot of the story.
Not that it mattered, anyway. If he had been given the chance, Xue Yang would have made Xiao Xingchen kill Song Lan. His dream had been a premonition, after all.
If there was one thing Xue Yang was good at, it was surviving. He survived being stabbed with Shuanghua, and he survived listening to Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan discussing how exactly they were planning to bring him to the authorities the next day. From his designated corner, through the wall of talismans preventing him from moving, he watched Xiao Xingchen ask Song Lan to keep him company through the night, voice trembling and hands shaking. The wound in his chest twinged. He closed his eyes tightly.
Xiao Xingchen laid down next to Song Lan, their arms just barely not touching. He wished he could reach over and hold him for some solid comfort, but he knew it would upset Song Lan. He fell asleep nonetheless, comforted by the presence of his friend—his real friend, the one he had known for most of his life.
—
2
Xiao Xingchen woke up feeling surprisingly well rested. He supposed Song Lan’s presence had helped him get a good night’s sleep despite the circumstances.
He heard the rustling of sheets, the tapping of a cane, the popping of joints. The spot next to him on the bed was empty. Song Lan had already made a huge effort to comfort him as he was falling asleep; he couldn’t blame him for seeking his own personal space after Xiao Xingchen was fully settled.
A-Qing’s voice cut through Xiao Xingchen’s thoughts.
“Oh, you’re finally awake. I’m going out for a bit. Didn’t want you to worry, but now you know. See you later.”
It was the same wording as—
No.
No no no no no.
This could not be happening.
“Do you remember what happened yesterday?” Xiao Xingchen asked, trying to keep the panic from creeping into his voice.
“Um, you did the laundry I think? And that piece of shit accused me of stealing his candy again.”
A-Qing grabbed his hand and pointed it in the direction of where his nameless friend—Xue Yang—used to sleep. Still slept. He was still there. Because today was yesterday, and yesterday hadn’t happened yet.
He didn’t want to do this again, but he had to. In order to get to tomorrow, reunite with Song Lan, bring Xue Yang to justice, and move on with his life, he had to get through today again.
What he had tried previously had worked, it had just gotten reset. All he needed to do was repeat the patterns of the previous loop as exactly as he could, then find a way to break the loop.
When Xue Yang was successfully confined to his makeshift corner prison cell and it was time to debrief with Song Lan, he explained what had happened the previous day.
“My apologies,” Song Lan said. “I’ll make sure to stay with you the entire night and not let you disappear into the past.”
Xiao Xingchen accidentally let his hand brush against Song Lan’s as he laid on the bed to sleep. Song Lan flinched slightly.
“Sorry,” Xiao Xingchen said, curling his fingers around his blanket instead.
“It’s all right. I will stay tonight, no matter what. I won’t let you spend another day with that man.”
—
3
Xiao Xingchen woke up. The spot on the bed beside him was empty. A-Qing asked to go out again. Xiao Xingchen wanted to scream.
Maybe he was approaching this the wrong way. Maybe this wasn’t about Song Lan staying and helping him get through to tomorrow. Maybe it was about stopping Xue Yang from trapping him in today.
He approached Xue Yang’s bed and shook him roughly.
“What sort of demonic cultivation is this? What did you do to me?”
“What? Daozhang, what’s gotten into you?”
“Xue Yang, I know who you are and I know what you’re doing to me. Is this what you call revenge? Do you think this is fair to me? To any of us? You disgust me!”
When Xiao Xingchen finished his outburst, the entire house was silent for a few moments. Then, laughter. Xue Yang’s uncontrolled, high pitched, maniacal laughter.
“How did you find out?” he asked. “Did you feel my hand in my sleep?”
“I remember from last time.” Xiao Xingchen replied. “I don’t think you intended for me to remember, but I do. This isn’t the first time I’ve lived through today.”
“What?”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“No, I’m not lying, I’m just—”
Xue Yang’s vocal chords were destroyed before he could finish.
Xiao Xingchen did not like the idea of killing living people, but if Xue Yang had to die to end the loop, then so be it. He couldn’t handle another round. He couldn’t listen to Xue Yang trying to defend himself. He had to get out. He made the death as quick and painless as he could, slicing cleanly through his housemate’s neck. He felt the blood splatter across his skin and robes. He’d have a lot of explaining to do when A-Qing got back, but Song Lan would be there to help.
He didn’t ask Song Lan to stay with him that night. He didn’t want to wake up in an empty bed and immediately know that he had failed.
—
4
Xiao Xingchen woke up in an empty bed and immediately knew that he had failed. He recognized the exact smells and sounds of that morning by now. He could feel it in the air.
He took a walk to clear his thoughts. His thoughts didn’t clear. Maybe that first loop was a premonition after all. Maybe this wasn’t about Song Lan or Xue Yang. Maybe this was about him. He drew Shuanghua and slit his throat, like he had in the first loop—the one he had thought was a dream.
—
5
A small part of Xiao Xingchen’s mind, probably a part that Xue Yang had managed to corrupt using some newfound demonic cultivation technique, wondered if the reasonable next course of action was to kill Song Lan to see if that would fix things. It was obvious that it would not.
He decided to end his own life early just for entertaining the thought. He didn’t want to live through today again anyway, so he might as well end it early.
—
6
It had to be Xue Yang’s fault. There was no other explanation. Xiao Xinchen decided on a plan. He would let A-Qing go off on her own, kill Xue Yang, and hope that it would work this time around.
Almost immediately after dismissing A-Qing, Xiao Xingchen felt Xue Yang’s arms wrap around his shoulders. He had forgotten this part. It would be really difficult to kill him in this position without him putting up a fight, so he decided to wait it out.
Finally, when it was time for breakfast, he saw an opportunity. Xue Yang was distracted by cooking breakfast and Xiao Xingchen had Shuanghua at the ready. He wasn’t as good of a cook as Xue Yang though, and with the element of surprise on his side, he could afford to wait for the food to be done.
When the food was done, he realized that it would go to waste if no one was there to eat the second portion. What was a few more minutes of waiting anyway? It wasn’t like Xue Yang ever killed anyone or caused any harm during this part of the day. They ate together in silence. It felt torturously tense to Xiao Xingchen, but Xue Yang basked in it like a snake in the sun.
Xiao Xingchen killed Xue Yang after he admitted to cheating while drawing sticks.
Xue Yang’s last words before he died were: “All I did was cheat at drawing sticks. That’s a bit of an excessive response, don’t you think?”
It wasn’t just about the sticks. Given everything else that had happened—the entire lives they had lived—it was fair, wasn’t it?
—
14
Killing Xue Yang clearly didn’t work. He'd tried it many times with no success, so Xiao Xingchen had taken to ending his life as soon as possible, every time he woke up. Dying to end the day early worked well enough to prevent reliving the day’s events, but it was painful and boring and he didn’t want to make Shuanghua go through the motions of killing him for the rest of eternity. It seemed cruel to the sword, which had been forged to do good and fight evil, not whatever this was.
He supposed it would be slightly less depressing to at least go out and interact with the community he had lived in for three years. The townspeople were his friends, after all. He could enjoy a nice day out with friends before the inevitable tragic end.
When A-Qing asked to leave, Xiao Xingchen offered to go with her.
“Don’t you have house chores or something?” she asked, confused. He never asked to go with her. She suspected it was out of respect for her privacy and independence, but he had always said it was because he had other things to do.
“Not today. I just want to spend some time with you, if that’s ok.”
She nodded, and they headed out together.
They somehow ended up at the market. Xiao Xingchen’s legs remembered the path by habit, so as they wandered aimlessly, his instincts led him there.
“Well we’re here now, might as well do the shopping,” A-Qing said. She sounded like she was trying to seem disappointed.
“It’s Xue Yang’s day; let him do it. It’s the least he could do.”
“He told you his name?”
Xiao Xingchen paused, realizing what he had said.
“Yes.”
“I didn’t think he would. He always seemed so shady. I always thought he had something to hide. Guess he was just shy.”
“He did have something to hide.”
“What was it?”
“It’s complicated. I’ll explain tomorrow.”
If there was a tomorrow.
“Well, whatever it was, you didn’t kick him out over it, so it’s probably fine, right?”
Xiao Xingchen held back a bitter laugh, but couldn’t hold back his equally bitter smile. He could not see it, but A-Qing gave him a quizzical look.
He bought three pieces of candy at the candy merchant again, but A-Qing got the extra piece this time. He told her a story about a blind man who had been tricked into sharing a house with his worst enemy.
“How does it end?” she asked after he trailed off, stopping the story at somewhat of a cliffhanger.
“I don’t know.”
When they got back to the house, A-Qing screamed. Xue Yang and Song Lan lay dead at their doorstep, swords in hand. Xiao Xingchen apologized to A-Qing and told her to leave before drawing Shuanghua and joining them in the land of the dead.
—
15
It was only upon waking up the next day that Xiao Xingchen realized A-Qing wasn’t blind. How else could she have noticed the bodies before he could?
How many lies were being told in his house? Did he dare try to count them?
—
23
Xiao Xingchen spent a few more loops going out for walks with A-Qing. They explored various parts of the village, swapped stories, and ate meals they could not afford. They learned about the lives of many of the villagers—how they ended up in Yi City, why they stayed. When it was time to head back, Xiao Xingchen always made sure to open the door on the side that would block A-Qing’s view, then slit his throat before she could fully comprehend what was happening. He rationalized it as sparing her from the pain, but he still felt worse every time he did it.
He wondered why, in the first loop, Xue Yang and Song Lan had been outside of the house near the market. He had wandered out and followed Shuanghua’s signal to find them. However, every loop after that, the confrontation happened at the house; he never met Song Lan at the market. He didn’t run into him during the two times he went with Xue Yang, nor during the many times he went with A-Qing. It didn’t make sense.
Repeating the first ever version of the loop was painful, but he had to try to solve the mystery. It was something he hadn’t tried before, and at this point he was desperate for ideas.
He let Xue Yang embrace him, cook for him, and tease him. When Xue Yang offered to go to the market as he would every time, Xiao Xingchen gave him a head start before following his trail.
Once he reached the market, Xiao Xingchen found himself awkwardly backing into an alleyway as Xue Yang stopped to talk to a vegetable merchant. At that moment, two things surprised him at the same time.
The first thing was A-Qing whispering, “Daozhang, what are you doing here?” and grabbing his robes to pull him down into a crouch next to her. He didn’t know she would be there. Given the fact that she was obviously hiding from something, she must have been spying on Xue Yang as well.
The second thing was Song Lan yelling Xue Yang’s name.
Song Lan had chased Xue Yang down, not the other way around. It had taken 23 whole loops for Xiao Xingchen to figure this out. If he hadn’t decided to investigate, he could never have guessed.
At first, the confrontation went as expected. Xue Yang revealed his plot with the walking corpses, Song Lan got exactly as angry as he deserved to be, and then they clashed swords. Suddenly, Xue Yang spoke.
“Do you really still have the nerve to call yourself Xiao Xingchen’s friend? Who was the one who said there was ‘no need to ever meet again’?”
Song Lan wondered how he could possibly have known about what he had said. It was not public information.
Xiao Xingchen remembered when he had told his nameless friend about Song Lan. He had slowly, over the course of many nights, shared the full story of his own past, opening up to his friend who had sat and listened and combed his hands through Xiao Xingchen’s hair as he spoke. He had, while telling that story, quoted everything his then ex-friend had said to him after the eye transplant. It had felt good to get it all off of his chest.
“He shouldn’t have done that to you. If I ever find that so-called friend of yours—” Xue Yang had cut himself off then, knowing better than to speak his murderous urges aloud. Instead, he buried his face into Xiao Xingchen’s neck and held him.
“If I ever leave, you can always come and find me again,” he had said, after a long while. “I’ll always be happy to see you. Doesn’t matter who’s eyes I’m seeing you with.”
Xiao Xingchen had laughed at that, but he had also believed it.
Song Lan faltered at Xue Yang’s words, and Xue Yang took the opening. Xiao Xingchen immediately felt the corpse powder’s effects on Song Lan’s energy readings from Shuanghua. He was hit with the oppressive, dark feeling of a walking corpse’s aura. His sword hand instinctively gravitated toward the hilt of his sword. It had been so long since he had last felt this type of energy. The first loop, he had found it odd to see a walking corpse after so many years without seeing them. This time around, armed with the information about exactly what was going on, it confused him even more. If he hadn’t seen a walking corpse in years, that meant that Xue Yang hadn’t made him kill anyone in years. But Xue Yang had explained that his sole reason for sticking around was to make Xiao Xingchen kill people. There was no way to turn a living human into something that felt and acted like a ghost or an animal. Villagers also hadn’t gone missing in a long time. Xue Yang had made Xiao Xingchen kill people, and then he had stopped.
None of this made sense.
Xiao Xingchen stepped out of the shadows and addressed his nameless friend.
“Xue Yang. Return Song Zichen’s tongue to his body immediately.”
“And then what, you’ll kill me?”
Xiao Xingchen wanted to say yes, but he wouldn’t get any answers if he did.
“No. I will let you explain why you did all of this, and then I will take you to the authorities to be put on trial for your crimes.”
“No thanks,” Xue Yang spat, and then he ran. Or flew, or otherwise escaped. Xiao Xingchen couldn’t see where he had gone and was thus unable to chase after him.
Instead, Xiao Xingchen helped the injured Song Lan back to his house and treated his wounds and poisoning as best as he could. He asked why Song Lan had gone after Xue Yang instead of just talking to him first. Using a stick to write characters on the palm of Xiao Xingchen’s hand, Song Lan explained that he had actually seen him and Xue Yang talking before going to confront Xue Yang on his own. He had meant to kill him without Xiao Xingchen ever finding out the truth.
“You would have still had to tell me,” Xiao Xingchen explained. “He was my friend. I would have missed him.”
Song Lan pressed the stick hard into Xiao Xingchen’s palm in indignation as he wrote, “I can’t imagine he was a very good friend.”
If Xue Yang were here, he would have said something along the lines of: “Well neither were you, Song Lan. Maybe he just has low standards.”
Xiao Xingchen bit back a smile at the thought. It shouldn’t have been funny to him, but it was like his brain was programmed to smile or laugh whenever he thought of how Xue Yang had talked to him. Between when he stopped making Xiao Xingchen kill and when he started making him kill again, Xue Yang had been a very good friend.
“I would have missed him regardless. That’s just how I am.”
—
30
No matter what he tried, how kind and seemingly empathetic he was to Xue Yang after the initial confrontation with Song Lan, Xiao Xingchen could not get him to say his confession and tell his story like he had in the first loop.
He always ran, or attacked, or insisted that none of it mattered, that no one there deserved to know.
Finally, Xiao Xingchen gave up on that approach and tried something new.
That morning, when Xue Yang wrapped his arms around Xiao Xingchen, he asked him a question.
“Why do you think there haven’t been many walking corpses in a while?”
He felt the arms around him stiffen almost imperceptibly.
“We got rid of them all, I guess. Is this secretly a cultivation lesson and you’ve got some wise words about the true origins of walking corpses and how to stop them before they’re even made or something like that?”
Well, Xiao Xingchen supposed, he did know how these particular ones were made. He didn’t really know how he had stopped them from being made, but somehow he’d managed to do it anyway.
“Sometimes,” he explained, choosing his words carefully, “walking corpses are made by a cultivator, usually a demonic cultivator, for nefarious purposes. Maybe someone was raising them but then got caught, or died.”
“Mmm, maybe,” Xue Yang said against Xiao Xingchen’s shoulder. “Or maybe they just got bored.”
“What do you think a demonic cultivator would do if they got bored of raising walking corpses?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t think that far ahead.”
They made and ate breakfast. When it was time to go to the market, Xue Yang admitted to cheating at drawing sticks.
“Is there anything else you’d like to admit?” Xiao Xingchen asked.
Xue Yang paused. Xiao Xingchen didn’t know what he would do if he actually confessed. It was so out of character for Xue Yang to confess, and it was equally out of character for the nameless friend that he had shared a home with to have done anything that needed confessing.
“I guess I’ve always wondered what you tasted like.”
“Wha—”
Xiao Xingchen’s mind went completely blank when Xue Yang kissed him.
“Why?” was the only thing Xiao Xingchen could think to say in response.
“You know half the town thinks we’re a couple, right? Well if they’re going to mock us for it then it might as well be true.”
Xiao Xingchen didn’t have time to process that information before he heard rapid footsteps and the sound of a blade cutting through flesh.
“Xue Yang. How dare you touch Xiao Xingchen? How dare you deceive and defile him in such a way?” Song Lan sounded angrier than he had ever sounded in his life.
“Because it was fun,” Xue Yang answered, blood spewing from his stab wound onto Xiao Xingchen’s white robes.
Xiao Xingchen had nothing to say. He just stood there silently and let Song Lan defend his honor. He couldn’t summon the anger and sadness that had consumed him in the first loop. He couldn’t yell and scream and hurl insults. It wasn’t fresh enough anymore. Besides, everything would reset in a few hours and none of this would matter.
—
31
At first, Xiao Xingchen had wondered if it was a fluke, some cosmic change that altered that one particular loop that had caused Xue Yang to be weird for a day. He had always been touchy and flirty, but he had never explicitly made a move. Xue Yang hated Xiao Xingchen. He was in it for revenge. Why would he want to kiss him?
He tried repeating all of the same actions the next day, just to see if it would go differently. It went exactly the same.
Because he expected it, he actually felt the kiss instead of just the shock. He noticed Xue Yang’s sharp little canines as they brushed against his lower lip and he remembered how they had looked when Xue Yang had smiled at him after being acquitted. He wondered if it was the same smile as this Xue Yang was wearing now, whether he was just as sadistically victorious or simply happy and content. He didn’t know why it mattered, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
—
32
For all of the loops, Xiao Xingchen had never left Yi City. He didn’t want to leave Xue Yang alone here, but he decided that maybe it would be ok if he did. Xue Yang wasn’t actively killing anyone, and he didn’t seem to want to leave and do anything notable, so he probably wasn’t a threat. Perhaps the key to breaking the loop lay in the location. Maybe if he traveled far enough, he’d be able to leave the circumference of the looping area.
As soon as he woke up, Xiao Xingchen set out early with A-Qing in tow. As planned, they ran into Song Lan on the outskirts of town. Song Lan apologized, Xiao Xingchen told a Xue Yang free version of his own experiences in Yi City, and A-Qing had enough sense to not correct any of it. Xiao Xingchen let Song Lan “convince” him to leave Yi City and continue traveling together to help other towns. A-Qing was deeply confused by Xiao Xingchen’s sudden willingness to leave his nameless friend behind, but didn’t complain.
They were walking on foot toward the nearest town when an old woman approached them.
“You’re cultivators, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Please help us.”
The old woman led the group to her small farmhouse. They left A-Qing in the house itself with the old woman’s family and followed the old woman out the back to her pasture. The sun was beginning to dip below the horizon, but neither Xiao Xingchen nor Song Lan were planning to turn their backs on a civilian in need.
“Something’s been eating all of my livestock,” she explained. “I don’t know what it is, or how to get rid of it, but we will starve if it kills any more of our goats.”
Shuanghua could sense something immediately. It was big, likely a monster.
Swords drawn, the two cultivators waited.
The ground trembled, and a large plant-like structure slowly dug itself out from the center of the field.
“I will handle this,” Song Lan said. “You can’t see it, and it’s vibrating the ground too much for you to pinpoint it using feel and sound alone. In the meantime, ask the lady why there might be a vengeful plant monster in her yard.”
Xiao Xingchen nodded.
“Fine, but if you need help or if it’s too much to handle, don’t hesitate to call for help. I won’t lose you a second time.”
As it turned out, the land the old woman had bought was cheap because it had previously been a mass grave. The bodies were old, old enough that no living person remembered them anymore, and a great tree had grown on top of the center of the burial site. When her husband had decided to convert the plot to a farm, he had chopped down the tree to make room for more crops. The vengeful spirits of the long dead and forgotten, combined with the sudden destruction of a tree that had provided stability and structure to their burial site for centuries, had unleashed a wave of resentful energy that burrowed into the remaining root structure of the tree, forming a malevolent tree monster.
Each individual root that Song Lan slashed was weak and easy to destroy, but they never stopped coming. Xiao Xingchen, feeling that this had gone on for far too long, decided to return to the field to help. The moment he set foot on the grass, he realized his mistake. Song Lan could see and avoid the network of roots the monster had left spiraling across the grass. Xiao Xingchen, using Shuanghua, could only narrow in on the core of the monster, the central node of the root network. The rest was noise against the loudness of the main energy source. The trap he had stepped on sprung, and he slashed at it as soon as he could feel it, but it had already left a deep cut on the side of his leg. He tried to fight, heal, and avoid any other traps at the same time, but it proved just as frustratingly endless as Song Lan’s battle. He couldn’t make his way to the core of the monster, and Song Lan didn’t have Shuanghua’s ability to tell where the core even was. The ground vibrating and the roots moving made the environment too loud for them to talk and plan effectively. This wasn’t good.
Leaving now would mean unleashing a fully activated monster on the defenseless family living on the land. Not leaving would mean a battle of attrition. Xiao Xingchen had never stayed up to see when the time loop reset, but he suspected it would be resetting soon, if it did at all. The sun had fully disappeared and the moon shined brightly in the pitch black sky.
Xiao Xingchen chose to stay. Song Lan did too. They never had to discuss it. It was their duty.
Xiao Xingchen endured another cut, his focus faltering as time wore on. If he could just make an opening to attack the core, he could—
Suddenly, Shuanghua started screaming. Something was wrong with its senses because the amount of resentful energy it detected went from a lot to completely off the charts. The core of the tree monster, which had been a beacon of energy clear as day, was obscured by the noise of everything else. The ground’s vibrations intensified.
Dozens of fresh fierce corpses woke beneath the ground.
Xiao Xingchen braced for an attack that never came. The roots that had been relentlessly poking and prodding at him retracted, redirected against a more immediate threat. The fierce corpses that he thought would be attacking him were gnawing on the roots of the tree monster, tearing it to shreds. When the tree monster killed one corpse, another took its place. It would’ve been a bloodbath if any of the things in the fight had any blood left in them.
“Daozhang! I looked everywhere for you!”
It was Xue Yang’s voice, not the nameless man’s disguised one. Xiao Xingchen had not interacted with him at all that day. He had no reason to believe that Xiao Xingchen already knew. He was baring his identity to the world and he didn’t even seem to notice.
“Daozhang, you’re hurt. Stay still and let me fix you.”
Xiao Xingchen felt strong arms picking him up. It was a bit awkward due to Xue Yang being noticeably shorter, but he still managed to carry Xiao Xingchen off the field.
“What were you doing? Don’t you always take me with you on your night hunts? You could’ve gotten yourself killed.”
Behind them, a very tired and dumbfounded Song Lan gasped, “Xue Yang?!”
Xue Yang stopped walking and clutched Xiao Xingchen tighter against his chest. He opened his mouth to speak but did not have time to get the words out.
—
33
Xiao Xingchen now knew that the loop did reset in the middle of the night, and that it would do so even if he was outside of Yi City, even if he was awake during the reset point. He also knew that there was a family in need that he had the ability to save. Finally, he knew that Xue Yang’s demonic cultivation was potentially their best bet for killing it.
With that in mind, he told A-Qing that he might be out late that night and to stay with the neighbors for a night. A-Qing looked at Xiao Xingchen, then at Xue Yang, then back at Xiao Xingchen, and just said, “Have fun,” in her best judgemental deadpan before leaving.
“I think there’s a monster nearby, but it’s far enough away that we’ll need to set off now if we want to catch it tonight,” he said, before Xue Yang could snake his arms around his neck.
“How do you know?” Xue Yang asked. “You don’t usually sense things that far away.”
“I just have a feeling about it. If we go and there’s nothing there, we’ll just meet some new people, you’ll get to see some new scenery, and we’ll come back, ok?”
Xue Yang could never say no to novelty. Or to demonic cultivation.
They set off, and ran into Song Lan. Xiao Xingchen knew this was coming, but he hadn’t yet figured out what he was going to do to explain why he was dragging his worst enemy along with him on a night hunt during the day.
Xue Yang immediately tried to bolt, but Xiao Xingchen grabbed his hand and pulled him back. He considered breaking away and running anyway, but Song Lan had already seen him. There was no way he could keep his secret now. He held on tight to Xiao Xingchen’s hand.
“Xue Yang, how dare you take advantage of his blindness?”
Xue Yang opened his mouth to say something but was cut off by Xiao Xingchen.
“His demonic cultivation skills will be helpful to us. There is a dangerous tree monster in one of the farmhouses along the way to the next village. He can help us exorcize it, and then we can figure out what to do with him.”
Xiao Xingchen gave his hand a little squeeze and started walking onwards.
Xue Yang just looked confused. Song Lan looked equal parts confused and disgusted.
“This is ridiculous! Are you just going to forgive him for what he’s done?”
“No,” Xiao Xingchen replied. “What would you propose we do with him instead?”
“He’ll try to kill us.”
“I’m right here,” Xue Yang said, waving his hands. “I can hear you.”
“I didn’t hear a denial,” Song Lan huffed.
“I won’t kill you, pinky promise.” Xue Yang stuck out his nonexistent left pinky.
Xiao Xingchen shook his head to hide his smile.
“We’ll handle this monster first, and then we can discuss this later.”
Somehow, they made it to the house without killing each other. Somehow, they exorcized the tree monster without dying. Somehow, Xue Yang was nothing but helpful.
When the battle was over, Xue Yang returned the corpses to the earth.
“I could have made you kill them, for old times sake,” he had joked.
Xiao Xingchen could not find it in himself to laugh at that one.
Noticing the response, Xue Yang tentatively draped an arm over Xiao Xingchen’s shoulders and reassured him, “I wouldn’t have done it anyway.”
Song Lan sneered in disgust. In return, Xue Yang shot him his deadliest glare, then settled his chin on Xiao Xingchen’s shoulder as if to say, “You can’t touch me while he’s here. He’s negotiated a ceasefire. Whoever strikes first would be at fault.”
Yesterday—well, the yesterday that felt like forever ago—Xiao Xingchen would have never imagined sitting in comfortable, companionable silence with Xue Yang. Today, Xue Yang was practically wrapped around him, but he felt safe. Protected, even. Xue Yang had slaughtered the Chang clan, massacred Baixue Temple, and poisoned Song Lan’s eyes. He had also fixed Xiao Xingchen’s roof, cooked him food, bartered at the market for him, and made him laugh. Yesterday, these concepts would have been diametrically opposed and mutually exclusive. Now, they weren’t. At some point across the many todays, the separate concepts of Xue Yang and Xiao Xingchen’s nameless friend had merged.
The old woman let them stay at her house that night, since it was late by the time they had finished. There was only one guest bedroom, and Song Lan took the bed since he refused to let Xue Yang have it and Xiao Xingchen refused to take it for himself. After Song Lan fell asleep, Xue Yang crawled over and tugged lightly on Xiao Xingchen’s arm.
“What?” whispered Xiao Xingchen.
“Why didn’t you tell me? You knew who I was?” asked Xue Yang.
Xiao Xingchen didn’t respond. What kind of question was that?
“You lied to me,” Xue Yang pressed, indignant.
“What? You’re the one who’s been deceiving me. You’re the one who made me kill innocent people. You’re the one who took Zichen’s eyes!” Xiao Xingchen was whispering as loud as he could without actually speaking, occasionally pausing to make sure Song Lan was still asleep.
Xue Yang looked down at the floor.
“You’re no better than me. You don’t want me to have a fair trial. You just want me to die.”
“I do want a fair trial. You of all people should know that.”
“Why now? Why didn’t you turn me in earlier?”
“I only found out today.”
“How?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Tell me.”
Xiao Xingchen hesitated. He could explain that he had been reliving the worst day of his life for just over a month. He could tell him about all of the times he’d killed Xue Yang or killed himself. He could tell him how wished that this would all end. He could tell him that when he thought about what he wanted his life to look like once the loop was over, he couldn’t help but imagine waking up in his house in Yi City with A-Qing and his nameless friend.
“I’ll tell you tomorrow.”
It technically wasn’t a lie. They rarely, if ever, lied to each other. The really insidious deceptions were hidden between the words, in the empty spaces where information should have been but wasn’t.
“Right now,” Xiao Xingchen said, his voice serious and somber, “I need you to explain to me why you don’t think you would receive a fair trial.”
“You know everything, don’t you? Then you must know Jin Guangyao will do everything in his power to make sure I die.”
This was new. Of all of the Xue Yang confessions he had heard, all of the slightly differently worded versions of the truth, not one of them had featured Jin Guangyao.
“I did not know that.”
“You don’t know everything, Xiao Xingchen Daozhang. But I’ll tell you everything. Listen carefully, since I’m only saying this once.”
Xiao Xingchen listened. He always did, in every loop. Xue Yang’s hand, still on his arm, pushed under the fabric of his robes to rub gently at his bare skin. He didn’t know if it was intentional or subconscious on Xue Yang’s part, but Xiao Xingchen was keenly aware of it.
Xue Yang told the story of his childhood encounter with Chang Cian. Xiao Xingchen had heard that one before. But he also told the stories of his first foray into demonic cultivation and his work on the Yin Tiger Talley with Jin Guangyao. He told the story of how he ended up in a ditch to be saved by Xiao Xingchen. As he spoke, Xue Yang watched the red blood permeate through Xiao Xingchen’s blindfold. Even after the blindfold was thoroughly soaked, Xiao Xingchen kept listening. It took Xue Yang hours to finish, with Xiao Xingchen asking clarifying questions the whole way through. When he was finally done, Xiao Xingchen waited a few moments before speaking.
“I don’t think any of that excuses any of the crimes you committed, but you are right when you say that you have never been treated fairly by the cultivation world.”
“I won’t ever be. When all is said and done, you and I both know I won’t get a fair trial.”
“I know. But I won’t let you get an unfair one, either.”
“Not if Song Lan has anything to say about it.”
“I’ll handle it.”
“Does that mean you’ll judge me on your own terms?”
Instead of answering directly, Xiao Xingchen changed the subject.
“Why did you stop making me kill walking corpses?”
“I got bored.”
“The truth, please.”
Xue Yang pulled his hand away from Xiao Xingchen’s arm and said nothing.
“Fine fine, have your secrets,” Xiao Xingchen sighed.
He knew the answer. They both did. Neither of them were ready to say it.
After a long pause, Xiao Xingchen answered the original question.
“I won’t judge you on my own terms, Xue Yang.”
“Why not?”
Xiao Xingchen reached out and took Xue Yang’s hand, interlacing their fingers. The first rays of the morning sun peaked above the mountains in the distance.
“I don’t think I could give you a fair trial either.”