Sometimes I write a story, sometimes I write a small scene. Either the story is too small or was not meant to be big, and the small scenes doesn't really fit anywhere in particular. They don't get posted.
Until I decided to gather them up and make a...
And besides, what can Xie Lian even do? He's just a small defenseless ghost fire. Powerless. He remembered how another ghost fire had struggled and screamed and tried so hard to help a young prince so long ago, but unable to.
Questions will come later.
For now, he's too tired.
He slept.
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Hua Cheng felt like he was breaking apart. Pieces of himself shaking away into the absolute firestorm that wracked his mind and body.
The absolute seething anger screamed and twisted and raged. It burned and howled to rain destruction down on heaven and earth; let them feel the might of his full wrath for what it did to the only true god that ever mattered. Worthless trash that never deserved to step on the same ground that his god trodded upon.
At the same time, he wanted to collapse and shake into oblivion. Wanted to scream and claw at his own skin. Take his ashes and disperse as penance for his failure.
But he can't. As unworthy and dirty and useless as these hands are, they are the only thing in this worthless realm that can and is willing to keep his god safe.
The ghost fire had felt so small in the careful cradle of his hands. Indistinguishable by sight from the countless others that populated Ghost City, but identifiable for the Ghost King through the power hidden inside the unassuming flames, and the familiar voice that brokenly whispered from it.
The safety of this slumbering soul is the only thing that's keeping the last dredges of his sanity intact. Even while its existence outside of its rightful place was the same cause of the cracks in which pieces of himself is ripping away.
Far above, the sky rumbled, dark and heavy in red, but he doesn't let it release its contents. He can't let such filth touch His Highness' body.
His hand shook as it raised.
A spark, a flicker, a blaze.
It took arduous effort to keep the flames within the confines of the coffin. He felt sick down to his stomach, but he can't let himself look away. Xie Lian deserved better than to be looked away by his devoted follower. And Hua Cheng deserved to look upon his failure and repent.
The body of his beloved now seared itself permanently into his heart and mind with the same burning intensity of the flames that is now consuming it. The old rotting blood and filth, the tangled matted hair, the broken wrists, broken hands, the stick-thin fingers ground down to the bone, nails ripped away, the countless bloodied scratches that lined the inside of the prison, the piece of wood stabbed through his thin unmoving chest, the sharp angles of his emaciated face as he stared up with sightless eyes. The rot.
Where was he?
Where was Hua Cheng when his prince suffered?
Hadn't he sworn to protect him?
His very existence forged in fire all for the sake of his one and only god?
But it had come to this.
Why hadn't he listened? The rumors about a screaming restless spirit was about His Highness all along and Hua Cheng- he- if only he had listened back then!
"It hurts," was His Highness Xie Lian's first words to him after centuries of searching, and oh, how Hua Cheng burned.
The ghost shuddered, curling forwards tighter, teeth gritted in despair and anger; at himself, at the world. But his hands remained exceedingly gentle and careful as he cradled what was left of his beloved to his chest.
He was but a statue kneeling in vigil beside a dead god's funeral pyre, unmoving, unbreathing. His one eye at once intensely bright and unseeing as the covered sun inched across the sky.
Once the flames died, its embers sated, an incense stick of time passed before he stirred. He might've stayed frozen longer if he hadn't been roused by a weak squeeze around his wrist.
Hua Cheng's empty gaze dropped down to his god's spiritual weapon, having emerged when he opened the last layer of the coffin. His thoughts carefully skittered away from what exactly the strip of fabric was caked in, but he knew that under the grime was a smooth white silk that served His Highness just as he did. It stayed loyally by its master's side for all these centuries even after Hua Cheng, then Wuming, was torn apart. But even it was powerless to save their god. He lightly pressed fingers to it, feeling as it trembled minutely.
It needs a thorough cleaning.
He took a slow deep breath, shaky and faltering, dead lungs expanding with unnecessary air before escaping in a long exhale.
Hua Cheng needed to collect the ashes. Then, later, His Highness can decide what to forge it as, if he even permits this worthless ghost to handle something so precious.
He went about his task mechanically, distantly, as if controlled by a greater force while he watched from afar. His hands struggled not to shake as he cupped the former god's ashes and stored it all in a pouch, a burst of spiritual energy making sure nothing remained inside the wretched coffin nor clinging to his skin.
The spiritual weapon had wrapped itself around the lantern beside him, guarding staunchly, but willingly let itself be brushed aside as he recollected His Highness. The stiff fabric slowly re-wrapped itself around his wrist and forearm, brushing against the pair of items that Hua Cheng held reverently as he stood.
A pause as he raised his gaze to the sky and closed his eye. A breath.
"Yin Yu, make sure no one can tell that this-" an almost unnoticeable hitch in his thoughts- "grave has been disturbed." He cut off the array before the man can reply. Yin Yu can't refuse his order anyways.
A roll of dice, a step, and he was gone.
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Information: Xie Lian is a banished god. His shackles was supposed to stop him from dying or fading from lack of followers, a blessing from the Heavenly Emperor (though it can act like a curse, particularly during times when he wanted for his suffering to end), but in this AU, he got stuck inside that coffin for more than the hundred years of canon, until even the cursed shackles cant stop him from dying.
Hua Cheng, his devoted believer, had been searching for him for centuries after they got separated, and was too late to save him here. He's also the Ghost King, and his title of Crimson Rain Sought Flower is in honor of his endless search for the Flower Crowned Martial God, Xie Lian.
Edit: im sorry i just wanna add this drawing of mine cause I love him and this novel so much. This is Xie Lian as a god. He wears simple white robes and a bamboo hat after he fell but I havent done a proper full drawing of that yet, just messy uncolored sketches
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