Capturing My Demon King Costar

MY COSTAR PUTS A SWORD TO MY NECK

Yao Shen watches the moment the smile disappears form the Crown Prince's face. Xin Hulei is sitting down on the same sofa he was when they first met. Except this time he's injured, covered in bandages everywhere. There's one wrapped around his eye, circling his head.

It's a heartbreaking sight, but Xin Hulei still has both horns -- like he told Yao Shen, that will come later.

"What happened to you?" the Crown Prince asks, rushing to his side. "Did you manage to use the relic?"

Xin Hulei glares at him with his visible eye and pushes him away, making him stumble into the other sofa.

"Did it amuse you?" he asks, his voice heavy and grating. "Did you enjoy lying to me, sleeping with me, knowing what would happen after?"

The Crown Prince's eyes widen. "I don't- I have no idea what you're talking about."

Xin Hulei gets up from his sofa like a big cat stretching his muscles, unfolding himself from his seat and advancing towards the Crown Prince with long strides.

The Crown Prince scoots up backwards on his sofa. He doesn't know what is happening, but he's scared -- and hurt.

"The two people I loved most in the world are dead, I only survived by a miracle," Xin Hulei says, his remaining crimson eye flashing. "I'm sorry to disappoint."

"I didn't betray you! The relic I gave you was only supposed to deactivate wards."

Xin Hulei grins, but there's no humour in it, only a devastating sadness and a corroding hatred. "It did, if you count the explosion that brought everything down on top of us too."

The Crown Prince's eyes widen even more, he doesn't know how any of this happened. What any of it could mean.

His hands shake, and his usually red lips are rendered bloodless.

"There has to be an explanation...I," his head shoots up at once, "My brother!"

Xin Hulei frowns. "Your brother?"

"I'm...I'm one of the ghost kings, the Tenth King, my brother is the Fourth King."

Xin Hulei is already enraged by what happened before, but now his hatred has reached a boiling point. "What?" He grits his teeth. "I assumed someone had put you to this, and you agreed, but now, you admit that you've been lying to me from the start, apparently of your own volition, and expect me to believe this is someone else's doing?"

Yao Shen has been in a painfully similar situation with Xin Hulei, over the exact same thing.

He wonders if he looked as heartbroken and hurt as the Crown Prince does now.

"Let me try to explain," the Crown Prince begs, and then launches into a hurried account of all the events leading him to become a ghost king, his feud with Si Wang, the other ghost king's plans to destroy Modu...but he omits the tale of how he first came to meet Xin Hulei. That little detail he keeps to himself.

Yao Shen has the odd sensation of seeing footage of himself, while having no recollection of being recorded, when looking at the Crown Prince. For all their differences, a lot of their behaviours are similar. Especially when they are too sad to think clearly.

"I've heard enough," Xin Hulei says, stepping away from the Crown Prince. The hatred in his eyes hasn't receded from hearing the Crown Prince's jumbled tale.

Instead, he closes his fist and in it appears a sword hilt, attached to a long, engraved blade.

"I'm not a cultivator, not even a human, but my shizun gave me this sword when I became his disciple, and I intend to avenge him with it."