He saw through the Miaohua glass the strength that could destroy Heaven and Earth. That destructive and mysterious light was his most advantageous magic; creation magic. This was Deizhou, the universe alignment technique. - Pillow Book 2, Chapter 16
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"Zhe Yan!" Came the worried cries from Bai Zhen and Bai Qian. A moment later they were beside him and helped him move from his crouched position to sit on the floor. The baby cradled against his chest was alive, if a bit quiet.
Mo Yuan and Ye Hua had wisely moved straight toward Dong Hua, likely knowing the two little foxes would come to check him first. He supposed it was nice to know his wellbeing was prioritised in this still dangerous world-ending situation.
"I'm fine, stop pestering me." He attempted levity, but he found his lungs were not yet recovered. He sounded far weaker and breathy than he'd have liked as he dragged air through still damaged tissues. It did exactly nothing to reassure Bai Qian or Bai Zhen.
He was too busy focusing on the still form of Dong Hua ahead to pay much attention to the two little foxes. Dong Hua could still wake up and start this entire thing all over again, nothing was certain. But he had neither the physical or magical strength left to move yet.
He saw Mo Yuan kneel and place a hand to Dong Hua's neck to check his pulse. Ye Hua was standing vigilant above, sword not yet sheathed, smart boy. He continued watching as Mo Yuan said something that caused Ye Hua to sheathe his sword. Mo Yuan then lifted Dong Hua into his arms and walked toward him.
It was not a sight he'd ever expected to see, Dong Hua lying in Mo Yuan's arms like a hapless maid. He'd be sure to tease Dong Hua about it in a few hundred thousand years.
"He's alive, just unconscious." Ye Hua explained.
Of course he was alive. The world would not be so silent if the previous Master of the Universe had died. But perhaps not, Dong Hua had emerged silently from Bihai Cangling, perhaps he would leave the world just as quietly one day, he was never one for pomp and ceremony.
Bai Qian and Bai Zhen moved to help him stand, but he waved them off. "Wait." He asked.
He could not allow the others back in to the Fox Den yet, not with Fengjiu lying lifeless in the central chamber while Bai Qian and Ye Hua were still unaware of what happened.
He shared a meaningful look with Mo Yuan and nodded for him to go on ahead back to the Fox Den. Mi Gu followed Mo Yuan back to the Fox Den in a daze, muttering about preparing rooms for the guests.
He motioned for Ye Hua and Bai Qian to sit down, puzzled they did so. Bai Zhenalso stayed; ready to comfort his little sister and brother-in-law. But it was just as likely he was not quite ready to confront the reality awaiting him in the Fox Den himself just yet.
And so Zhe Yan sat on the emerald circle of grass that had been protected inside Dong Hua's barrier and started to speak. With a shaky voice and laboured breath he explained what he had witnessed and what had happened as he understood it.
----------------------------------------------- Zhe Yan —----------------------------------
Bai Qian's every movement since she knew about Fengjiu's passing had been automatic, done without thought. She fed Fengjiu's little daughter, put her to bed in her third brother's room and was now nearly begging for something else to do.
"How can I...what can I do to...help." Bai Qian asked as she reappeared in the central chamber, pointedly not looking at the centre table where Fengjiu was lying.
Bai Qian was clearly desperate to keep moving so she would not have time to think. Zhe Yan pondered for a moment before an idea came to him. It would be a good excuse to get her away from the iron tang of blood that was now pervading the Fox Den.
He was not as unaffected by Fengjiu's death as he was attempting to portray, and a sigh escaped him before he spoke. "Orange river valley, in the central realm, do you know it?"
There was a small negative head shake from Bai Qian.
"I do," Came Bai Zhen's voice, pushed through a throat closed up in grief
"There is a flower there, called 'Immediate Dawn'. It has yellow-orange petals, it's stem and leaves are purple green. If you find that and bring it back, it will help me extract the poison from Fengjiu's bod-"
There was a broken sob from Bai Qian. Though Ye Hua already had his arm around her shoulders in a comforting embrace, Zhe Yan saw her hands were twisted in her dress. Just like she used to do as a child when she was distressed.
He walked over and untwisted her hands and raised them to his face. Bai Qian's eyes followed them until her tear filled eyes met his.
"It will help." He said, his voice as full of conviction as he could manage.
The tears escaped Bai Qian's eyes as she nodded.
While the flower did have some poison neutralising properties, it was magically useless. Zhe Yan did not need it, he could extract the poison easily enough now that it was not...active. Zhenzhen knew of the plant, but thankfully he remained silent. The flower was not the point, giving them time to grieve and something else to focus on was. It went unspoken that Ye Hua would go with them.
"We'll go now." Bai Zhen spoke, tone half suggestion and half command.
There was a nod from Bai Qian, and a faintly heard 'Mmmh' of affirmation before the three High Gods disappeared from the Fox Den.
There was only he and Mi Gu left to watch over Fengjiu now. As Mo Yuan was standing sentinel over an unconscious Dong Hua in another room. Mi Gu was standing to the side, crying silently, still in shock.
Zhe Yan sighed again and moved over to Fengjiu. She was covered by a sheet, but the black-green veins of the poison that had claimed her life were still prominent. Fengjiu's skin was already porcelain pale, and in death she was paler still, it made the poison look all the more ghastly.
Zhe Yan decided he could not wait for Bai Qian to return, seeing the poison in Fengjiu...it was not right. He picked up a bowl sitting nearby and swiftly transferred the poison out of Fengjiu's body, it came out of her mouth in mucous-like strands. He coughed as the tiny amount of magic he was using was almost too much for his injured spirit to spare.
He knew this poison, it was not common, but nor was it particularly rare. Fengjiu had been a High Immortal, the poison should have had little effect. Even weakened with pregnancy her powers should have quickly nullified the poison, unless her power was suppressed at the time.
Seconds later the grim task was done, and he placed the bowl in one of the high alcoves nearby, he would look into it later.
Mi Gu spotted the bowl. "A bowl! I can cook now, did you know? I was making the evening meal for Little Highness earlier when...", Mi Gu paused and Zhe Yan watched as the spirit shied from the truth, "I can cook now." Mi Gu finished as his hand moved to grasp a pendant that was no longer there.
Shock and denial were often the default reactions to death, and he was well versed in dealing with the aftermath of that. He walked to Mi Gu, and carefully guided the tree spirit over to his 'little highness'.
"That is good, Fengjiu is sleeping right now, could you stay here and make sure she rests well?" He asked. The lie would allow the tree spirit to remain in denial a little while longer, which was perhaps cruel, but it would give him time to make a remedy for the shock.
"Of course, that's the little highness; I would be a poor retainer of the Fox Den if I did not say with her, right?" Mi Gu asked him, with a glazed look.
"That's right, just sit here, I'll be back." He promised, after a moment he moved to the kitchen to prepare a medicinal tea for Mi Gu.
Zhe Yan cleared a space on the kitchen table and gathered all the items he would need to make the tea. Always prepared, he summoned the herbs he needed and got to work. Ginseng, skullcap, thorowax, mint and a red date. His thoughts turned to the next steps to take as he chopped, sliced, ground and mixed the ingredients.
------Mo Yuan--------------------------
Mo Yuan was standing vigil near Dong Hua's bedside. The Xuanyuan sword resting in his right hand was ready to use at a moment's notice. If Dong Hua woke up ready to fight there would be no time to summon it.
Zhe Yan had come by a few minutes earlier with a cup of tea and updated him on the general goings on in the Fox Den. His younger twin brother Ye Hua, Bai Zhen and Bai Qian had returned a little while ago from the errand Zhe Yan had sent them on. Ye Hua and Bai Zhen had quickly left on other grim errands. The only living occupants of the Fox Den currently were himself, Dong Hua, Zhe Yan and Bai Qian. Bai Fengjiu's body had now been cleaned and was lying in her chamber.
As for Dong Hua, only his purple outer robe had been stained with Bai Fengjiu's blood. The black liquid had been too viscous to soak further into Dong Hua's actual robes. Without the purple outer robe Dong Hua was resting only in his three robe layers. The outermost of these was a pale purple. It was more of a pinkish-orchid colour, than the more blue toned lavender purple Dong Hua had often worn before.
Mo Yuan could not have been the only one to notice Dong Hua's inner robe colour choices had been steadily verging more on the pinker side of purple since he married Fengjiu. Pink was her favourite colour and she wore it often, and so he had subtly changed the hue of his own garments to match her. It was a clear symbol of how much the previous master of the universe had loved Bai Fengjiu. And a clear reminder of how cruel it was that she was gone.
Combined with the fact he was completely unconscious, in his repose Dong Hua looked strangely fragile. Mo Yuan knew Dong Hua was anything but weak. It was an illusion brought on by the fact Mo Yuan had never seen the man so unguarded.
If anyone would have told him in the future he would carry an unconscious Dong Hua in his arms, he would have smiled and suggested they meditate more on the truths of the universe. A polite and subtle way of saying they were crazy.
It was strange now to think he had not even liked the man at first; in fact he'd actively disliked him. As a young child all he'd understood was that when the white haired man appeared his father would leave soon afterwards to war, sometimes for many long years. It had been Zhe Yan, his adopted elder brother who had later explained the necessity of his father's frequent absences.
With his mother often ill due to the effort she had expended to repair the Pillars of Heaven, he was often by her bedside. In those long hours he began to tinker, finding great joy and challenge in creating bizarre devices and weapons. When he had ascended to High Immortal rank at 25,000 years old, he gained a mysterious mentor.
Some years he would find another device or weapon sitting beside his half finished creations. When he analysed the new artefact he always found something new he had not seen or realised before. A mechanism, a certain twisting of the breaths of magic in such a way that brought a whole host of other possibilities.
Other times there would be a piece of paper with information, a suggestion or question on it. If it had not been for Zhe Yan and his then mysterious mentor-rival artificer his childhood would have been a far more cold and lonely affair.
Over time his knowledge and understandings of magic techniques and energies increased to an extremely high level. Eventually he had set himself the goal of creating the most powerful item he could manage, in hope it could be used to help pacify the chaos of the world. He succeeded in his goal just before he would have been considered an adult, and had created what was later named the Donghuang Bell.
He'd only found out his mentor had been Dong Hua after he'd heard his mother yelling at the man, shortly after Mo Yuan had created the bell.
His mother, father and Dong Hua each held mastery over the energies of the universe. His mother held sovereignty over the Yin aspect, and Dong Hua, Yang. It was for this reason Dong Huas most ancient title meant 'Lesser Yang Sovereign'. Dong Hua had been mentoring him in understanding the primordial energies of the universe. Mo Yuan had used his rudimentary knowledge to create the Donghuang Bell. While the bell had been extremely powerful, it was an object anyone with enough power could activate. Mo Yuans ability to control it was also not perfect.
As a result the Donghuang bell had not been used in the prehistoric era. It had eventually been gifted to the first Ghost Lord as a symbol of trust and alliance between the Ghost Tribe and the Heavenly Tribe.
He never shared the fact that it had been Dong Hua's silent mentorship that had allowed him to bind the energies of the universe in such a fashion to create the Donghuang Bell in the first place. Though honestly Dong Hua should not have been giving hints to any child about such powerful energy without at least supervising. But that was Dong Hua, and rarely did such common understandings as 'don't teach a child how to blow up the world' apply to him.
He and Dong Hua had never asked each other for help, or suggested others help in any situation unless they requested it. Because they each had the utmost faith that the other would be able to overcome any trial that came before them. To offer help would come across as suggesting the other could not handle whatever the trial was. They both respected each other too much to potentially insult the other by doing so.
Dong Hua had trusted Mo Yuan with the more martial side of peacekeeping in the Four Seas and Eight Wildernesses when he had sat upon the throne of the universe. And for two hundred thousand years until the Donghuang Bell incident that faith had been rewarded. It was strange now to see Dong Hua battling his own trial, one that he might not be able to overcome.
He had just finished completing the thought when Dong Hua went from unconscious to fully awake, moving to sit up in the space of an eye blink. Surprised, Mo Yuan erected a barrier around Dong Hua in an unthinking reflex reaction.
And was then treated to the rare sight of Dong Hua looking at him with a mild look of bemusement. "Playing pranks Mo Yuan?" Dong Hua asked as he raised a finger to the barrier and it instantly collapsed.
Mo Yuan moved to create another but he could not move. He realised that the barrier had not been broken, but reshaped and redirected at him. Too late he remembered that the base formation for that barrier had been something he learned from watching Dong Hua, of course he would know how to break it. That had been hundreds of thousands of years ago. He thought he could be forgiven for his poor memory, if that mistake had not possibly cost the world its right to exist.
He immediately got to work analysing the barrier for weak points. The base formation was one he understood, but the connecting points and layer system was complex, not something he favoured. It would take him fiv-no four minutes to break it. Hopefully he could do so before Dong Hua decided to destroy the world again.
"I estimate you will break through that barrier in three minutes." Dong Hua stated, his voice unhurried and relaxed as always.
It had been a long time since anyone had overestimated his abilities; Mo Yuan supposed he should be happy that Dong Hua had such faith in him.
"Though I am interested to see which method you will use to break it, I imagine you're quite worried."
Mo Yuan watched as Dong Hua rose from the bed and moved toward the low table, sat down and started writing.
"I am in my right mind," Dong Hua reassured him. "And I'd thank you not to try and skewer me if I drop the barrier." Dong Hua stated with a pointed look at the Xuanyuan sword he was holding.
Dong Hua's calm and composed demeanour would not worry Mo Yuan in any other situation; he'd seen the man far more relaxed with situations others would consider far more horrifying and disastrous. Mo Yuan had heard that not five seconds after learning of his seeming death with the Donghuang Bell Dong Hua had already mourned and processed it. The deity had swiftly moved to solidify peace within the world by ensuring the Second Prince of the Ghost Tribe became the Ghost Lord.
But this? He was far too calm, especially when compared to the world ending grief Mo Yuan had witnessed from the man not an hour past. Something was wrong, but Dong Hua did not appear to be ready to end the world again for its lack of Bai Fengjiu. It was best to gather as much information as he could, and fighting would not be terribly productive.
Mo Yuan realised he could move now, and speak. "I will not." He replied as he sheathed his sword.
"Good." Came the reply from Dong Hua, a simple affirmation without inflection, the barrier fell.
Mo Yuan walked over to Dong Hua and sat opposite the table Dong Hua was writing on.
"You remember everything?"
"I do." Came the disinterested reply.
Something was very wrong.
"What was that spell you cast?"
Mo Yuan watched as Dong Hua lightly traced a finger across his right wrist. Tiny silver shimmering symbols appeared and dimmed into nothingness just as quickly.
"It was an impromptu creation, and flawed as a result." Dong Hua mused, voice ponderous. "It was my intention to completely sever all current, past and future feelings of love, in all its forms."
Mo Yuan watched as Dong Hua's eyes rose to gaze at a beautiful tapestry, depicting Nine-tailed foxes dancing through the heavens. The red furred fox stood out clearly as Fengjiu, but so too did the silver thread used for another fox, little Gungun. He started to look for Dong Hua in the tapestry when the man himself spoke and Mo Yuan brought his gaze back to the living deity.
"However it appears I only managed to mute such feelings. Likely due to the imperfect design and application. I am tempted to tinker and see if I can perfect it."
Dong Hua was casually musing about perfecting a spell that would completely remove his capacity to love forever. It was extremely worrying and Mo Yuan did not realise he had risen from his seat and taken a half step forward in a pre-emptive attempt to stop Dong Hua from further mutilating himself until Dong Hua spoke again.
"You are right, it would be dangerous. And perhaps I should not risk the world's existence to sate my own curiosity." Dong Hua stated, as if the destruction of the world or not was a mere afterthought.
Dong Hua Dijun had always been known as cold and austere, occasionally playful but rarely merciful. Even after marrying Fengjiu and having Gungun this had held true. Now with his sense of love muted he resembled even more the Ruler of Heaven and Earth he used to be, and it made Mo Yuan wary.
His silence must have given away the gravity of his thoughts, because Dong Hua spoke again.
"It was this or the world's destruction; I did not think you so nihilistic to accept the latter." Dong Hua sent him a pointed look, re-inked his brush and continued writing.
Mo Yuan was also selfishly grateful he would not need to fight his old mentor and friend.
"You mentioned it was imperfectly applied, does that mean this spell will end?" He asked.
"End?" Dong Hua mused, "Possible, but unlikely."
"You don't know?" He could not quite keep the incredulity out of his tone. It was extremely rare that the man before him did not know something, no matter what the subject.
He realised his error slightly too late as Dong Hua's eyes lifted from the scroll he was writing on and the brush stilled. There was a glimmer in the man's eyes, he had seen that look often, but rarely had it been directed at him.
He was already internally grimacing as Dong Hua asked in a languid manner "Did you know the exact day the grief of losing your beloved Seventeen to your little brother would cease to draw fresh wounds each day you woke?"
He'd appreciate the skill it took to always be able to verbally wound another on command more if he were not just on the receiving end of it.
He dipped his head in acquiescence; Dong Hua's point was well made, if a bit cruelly delivered. It was obvious his questions were not welcome, but he risked one more.
"What happened to Bai Fengjiu?"
The answer came immediately and without inflection, "It was a correction of destiny; it seems we were ill-fated after all." Dong Hua stated with supreme indifference.
Mo Yuan found himself unable to reply, what could he say? Deny it was destiny, offer a platitude? As for details, Dong Hua either did not have any, or was not willing to share them.
The man sitting before him now was unchanged from the one he had known for nine hundred thousand years. Dong Hua had not understood love or experienced it in truth before Bai Fengjiu thirty thousand years ago. So short a time, but Mo Yuan did not realise how much that love had changed Dong Hua until now, the difference was jarring.
Mo Yuan was brought out of his musings by Dong Hua sliding the still drying scroll across the table. "Here, this will be of use to someone. I have more pressing matters to attend to." Dong Hua stated as he took a blank scroll and began writing once more.
Mo Yuan picked up the scroll and scanned its contents and found it was a detailed plan for a funeral, Bai Fengjiu's funeral.
"You may go."
Mo Yuan spared a moment to smile ruefully as he rose. He had not been dismissed like that in over three hundred thousand years. Not since he was only one of seventy two generals under Dong Hua's command as he conquered the world.
How was he supposed to explain this development? He would tell Zhe Yan first, at least the phoenix would know what he was talking about in regards to Dong Hua's current state.
------------------------Zhe Yan ---------------------------------------
Fengjiu's kind soul had touched thousands of hearts, and Zhe Yan did not even know who to inform first. Her family of course, her father and mother, and her son. It would have been Dong Hua's role as her husband to do so, but the Dong Hua walking around now was not a version any but the eldest of gods had seen.
He'd have help from Mo Yuan to help explain to everyone else why Dong Hua Dijun was seemingly utterly unaffected by his wife's death. And also warn anyone that was likely to interact with him to tread with more respect and caution. This was not the laid-back retired Emperor of Heaven and Earth, loving father, doting husband or any variation thereof. This was Dong Hua, the Shaoyang Sovereign of the Purple Palace that danced through the chaos and blood filled battlefields of prehistory, and he did not suffer fools.
With Gungun, it was likely better for Bai Qian and Ye Hua to deliver the news that his mother was dead, and his father was...not the father he'd grown up knowing, and might never be again. Zhe Yan doubted that informing his son of his mother's death had even crossed the man's mind. Functionally, Gungun had lost both of his parents in a single evening.
Poor child.
Zhe Yan sighed and took mental stock of the situation and wondered if there were anything more he could do.
Ye Hua had just returned to the Nine Heavens to sort out the inevitable panic that had resulted from the past hour's events, people tended to worry when the sky started falling. He would only be sharing the fact that the calamity was now over, that Dijun had stopped it. Family and friends still needed time to learn of Fengjiu's death. They had decided to let the children sleep and tell them in the morning, it was likely to be their last night of untroubled dreams for a while. And they thought it was fair to give everyone a day to grieve before the whole world found out.
Bai Zhen was the oldest member of the Bai family present, and so it had fallen to him to inform Fengjiu's father, their second brother Bai Yi of her death. He was currently in the Central Realm doing so.
Mi Gu was currently fast asleep courtesy of a sleeping pill Zhe Yan had tricked him into taking. The anti-shock tea had not worked and so the best solution was to let the tree spirit try and sleep off the shock instead.
That left just Dong Hua, Mo Yuan, Bai Qian and himself in the Fox Den. Mo Yuan was explaining to Bai Qian that the Dong Hua she knew was gone, and that she needed to tread far more carefully with this 'new' version of him. Mo Yuan had not yet shared the scroll containing the funeral arrangements for Fengjiu with Bai Qian; that could wait a few days.
Dong Hua was in another room, busy writing something else. That just left him, and he was feeling a bit at loose ends. He'd just decided he would go to the Central Realm to support Zhenzhen when Dong Hua strode in from the other room.
He went straight to their bedroom where Fengjiu's body was, others moved to follow but he swiftly re emerged before they could enter wearing a non-bloodstained purple outer robe.
---------Zhe Yan ---------------------------
Her approach was wary and her tone cautious but not timid, Mo Yuan was the only other person with the ability to turn Bai Qian in to a shy maid.
"Do you want to hold her?"
"No."
"She's your daughter." There was an undercurrent of outrage in Bai Qians tone, and anger.
It was no surprise to him that Bai Qian had moved to the anger stage of grief quicker than most. But she was not directing it at the one person in the room, and perhaps the world that would not let her do so unscathed. The previous master of the universe had become known for his legendary thick-skin and general uncaring aura, but that was not the man standing in the room now.
"What of it?", was the cold response came from Dong Hua.
He saw the anger flare in Bai Qian's eyes and realised it was not going to end well. He noted that Mo Yuan had moved from Dong Hua's side to occupy the still sizable space between Dong Hua and Bai Qian.
"Bai Qian, don't." He warned, but he only received a short head shake in denial.
"You're going to leave her, just like that?" Bai Qian demanded as she took a step forward toward Dong Hua. She looked quite menacing for someone holding a child in both arms.
There was no movement from Dong Hua, he looked every inch the statue Zhe Yan had joked about as a child. The delivery was unhurried and seemingly without inflection, but there was a warning hidden in it. "You are in no position to lecture me, child."
To him the warning was as clear as a trumpet call. He realised too late that it was because both he and Mo Yuan had known Dong Hua since they were children and had fought under his command in unnumbered battles and wars. They knew almost instinctively when the man was not in the mood for foolishness or petty displays of emotion, the younger generations did not.
"And why not? Someone shoul-."
"Be silent." Came the warning from Mo Yuan but it arrived too late, Dong Hua's venomous tongue was unleashed.
"Three hundred and three years," Dong Hua began, "after this time has passed, you may attempt to lecture me." Dong Hua stated with the air of someone granting a great favour.
Zhe Yan grimaced as Bai Qian opened her mouth to query Dong Hua, but he spoke first. "That was how long you abandoned your firstborn for, was it not?"
Zhe Yan was closer to Bai Qian and he saw her move before Mo Yuan did, but the God of War was faster. Mo Yuan wrapped a hand around her arm in restraint, when a second had passed and she had not stopped trying to get to Dong Hua, Mo Yuan spoke "Seventeen, the child." He reminded her sternly.
And Zhe Yen saw her calm down, physically at least.
If Dong Hua had a look on his face at all it was only the faintest hint of amused disdain, but perhaps Zhe Yan was just imagining it.
"High God Mo Yuan, I suggest you teach your disciple better manners. I will not be so amicable a second time."
Zhe Yan saw the surprise in Bai Qian's eyes as Mo Yuan bowed low to Dong Hua and apologised. Seeing her beloved Masterapologise for her behaviour seemed to drain the last of her anger away, leaving only sorrow.
Dong Hua started to walk back into the room he had woken in.
"She doesn't even have a name." Bai Qian whispered mournfully.
Dong Hua paused, but did not turn around. "She preferred Xue Yu, if the child's hair was like mine. The characters for 'Snow' and 'Virtue', Bai Xueyu, call her that." And saying so, he left the room.
Zhe Yan had heard from Fengjiu that she had let Dong Hua name their incoming daughter. He had decided on Xue Yu as a name and Fengjiu had loved the general sound of it. But the characters he had chosen were for 'Study' and 'Jade', and Fengjiu had preferred softer and more whimsical meanings. The fact Dong Hua had chosen the characters that Fengjiu had preferred gave Zhe Yan hope. What reason was there for him to do so if not for sentimentality, if not for love? And the memory of love?
Dong Hua still had the capacity for love, but as Mo Yuan had reported it was muted and dim, sealed. Or perhaps Dong Hua was acting from pure obligation.
-------Bai Qian---------
"Do you understand now?" Her master asked her, his voice full of sympathy.
The man she had only just gotten used to treating more like a respected elder brother than the venerable Dijun was gone. She did not know this Dong Hua. The memory and terror she'd felt as the world ended and she could do nothing was still fresh. She focused on that fear and used it to will herself to not chase after Dong Hua and slap him to try and snap him out the spell he'd cast.
Instead she sat down and cradled the newly named baby Xueyu. She was still sleeping blissfully in her arms, despite all the previous commotion. It seemed this little one would be like her elder brother, all composed and unruffled.
Not a minute had passed before Dong Hua swept back into the room and moved toward the entrance of the Fox Den. There was a scroll in his hand, but he had not closed it, the ink was likely still drying. Seeing him so casually ignore of all them to go and do whatever he had deemed more important than his baby daughter or his dead wife angered her.
"You won't even say Fengjiu's name, or see her." She attempted to not be angry, but her tone betrayed her feelings.
She felt her master's hand on her shoulder, at once comforting and restraining, warning her to stop.
"You have the arrangements. What use do I have for a corpse?" Came the cold and disinterested response from Dong Hua as he swept past her to the entrance without missing a step.
She could not help it, she had never been meek, and her grief at the fact Fengjiu was dead was overwhelming, she shouted at him. "Where are you going? Why are you going? Why is she dead!" Little Xueyu had been woken by her shouting and started to cry, tiny, weak cries.
At the last question Dong Hua paused, but did not even turn to look at her when he spoke.
"There are precious few people I allow to question me, you are not worthy to do so. ", Dong Hua spoke cooly. He reached the entryway and teleported away.
"Have the children lost their father too?" She wondered aloud. No one answered her, why would they? She could see as clearly as they did, saw the answer mirrored in the blank faces around her.
—---------------------------------------------------------------------
Mini Glossary
Master - 师父 Shīfu. 师 - Master, Teacher 父- Father. connotes lineage in a teacher–student relationship. Bai Qian called Mo Yuan 'Master/Shīfu'.