Before the masked men could take a single step in their direction, Xue Xiangsi unsheathed Heavenly Frost, and slashed it at the man nearest to him. The sword's edge opened up a wide red gash on his chest, and the blood seeped freely. He fell to the side, instantly unconscious.
Zui Chunlai didn't give their attackers any breathing room either. He held a flaming whip that he swept around the room, setting fire to everything it touched, including the masked men. He leapt in the air and swung the whip, wrapping it around the neck of one of the attackers. Even through the mask, the man's screams were blood-curdling. Zui Chunlai tightened his fist on the whip's grip, and the screams stopped instantly as the man's head separated from his body. The neck stump was completely cauterized. The body collapsed on its knees like a derelict building, and the head fell on the floor with a sickening thump.
Their attackers became even more enraged after that, and Xue Xiangsi was suddenly surrounded by swords. He dropped down to one knee avoiding the swords pointed at this chest, and swept Heavenly Frost at the legs of the men around him, severing muscle and ligaments with a shower of blood.
Zui Chunlai was having trouble with an attacker who managed to dodge the fiery swipes of his whip with the blade of his sword. Xue Xiangsi was growing tired of all this senseless fight. He took an airy leap, and landed behind the man fighting Zui Chunlai. He chanted an incantation and Heavenly Frost froze over; the sharp blade completely covered in ice crystals. Xue Xiangsi thrust the sword into the man's back, piercing him straight through. The blood had barely begun to run before it froze into an ice shard. A wave of ice started crawling through the masked man's body, blooming around the stab wound like a flower of frozen thorns.
Xue Xiangsi removed his sword with a hard pull. The frozen man swiftly disintegrated into hundreds of ice shards.
All the masked men were dead. Xue Xiangsi surveyed the room with unease. In the heat of the moment it was easy to forget that the men attacking them were human as well. He said a silent prayer for them, wishing their journey in the underworld would be smoother than their deaths, and that their next life would be more peaceful than this one.
Zui Chunlai had no such qualms as he wiped blood off his booths with a disgusted sneer. "Xiangsi fought well."
Xue Xiangsi might regret the senseless bloodshed that had just happened, but he wasn't done thrusting swords into unsuspecting backs. "I had the best teacher."
"Bai Yunkai isn't who Xiangsi thinks he is," Zui Chunlai said with a derisive snort.
"I know he is one thousand times the man you'll ever be," Xue Xiangsi said, with total honesty. He didn't need to have romantic feelings for his shizun to admire him unconditionally.
Faster than his own whip, Zui Chunlai pressed Xue Xiangsi against a wall, holding him in place with a forearm against his chest.
"I would love to prove Xiangsi wrong," he said, almost whispering into Xue Xiangsi's ear, who could feel his hot breath against his skin. "He shouldn't tease this hungry dog. He bites."
Xue Xiangsi just about had it with Zui Chunlai's overturns. He had given him the benefit of the doubt in Snowfall Peak, and ended up playing the fool. If Zui Chunlai thought he could intimidate him, he had another thing coming.
He rose up on the tips of his feet to bridge the distance between them, and pressed his lips against Zui Chunlai's. He was blushing furiously, and his heart was almost beating out of his chest, but he was determined to see this through. He took advantage of Zui Chunlai's surprise, and lack of reaction to bite down on his lower lip, hard. Drawing blood.
Zui Chunlai's pupils were blown wide in shock.
Xue Xiangsi took no small satisfaction in seeing the thin rivulet of blood running down his chin. He wiped his bloody mouth with the back of his hand, smearing the blood on his lips and making them shine. He licked his lower lip, maintaining eye contact with Zui Chunlai, as he tasted his blood.
His ears burned with embarrassment, but his voice was steady when he said, "I bet Shizun's blood would taste sweeter." His teeth were red when he smiled.
He looked like a vengeful ghost in his immaculate white robes, with his messy waist-length hair obscuring half his face, and his blood read smile.
"I should have known," Zui Chunlai said, running his thumb through his bloody lip. "Smiling foxes can bite too."
Xue Xiangsi was pinned against the wall again. This time Zui Chunlai wrapped a large hand around his thin waist to keep him in place, and kissed him. His lips were warm, and his tongue teased Xue Xiangsi's bottom lip, seeking entrance.
It would be easy for Xue Xiangsi to bite Zui Chunlai again, but he was a little light-headed from the adrenaline of the fight, and the power trip of reducing the haughty Golden Crane disciple to needful whimpers against his skin.
He opened his mouth and kissed back.
It was his first kiss, and he had no idea what to do, but he didn't want to hand over control to Zui Chunlai. He reached up into his hair, tangling his fingers into the silky strands and pulled. Smiling into the kiss when he heard Zui Chunlai hiss in pain. He tasted of smoke and blood, and grew bolder once Xue Xiangsi started kissing back in earnest. Sliding the hand he had tightly wrapped around his waist down to his hip, and then his ass.
Xue Xiangsi moaned, and this time it was Zui Chunlai who bit him. Albeit softly, sipping his lower lip like fine wine.
Zui Chunlai was the first to break the kiss, panting heavily against Xue Xiangsi's neck. "Let me have you. I'll fuck you so good you'll forget your own name."
Those vulgar words sent a shiver down Xue Xiangsi's spine. He almost whimpered but held himself back. He wasn't about to lose all the ground he had gained by acting like the flustered innocent Zui Chunlai expected him to be.
He pushed Zui Chunlai back with a hand against his chest. "You wouldn't know what to do with me if you had me. I've never heard of a dog outsmarting a fox."
Zui Chunlai pushed back against the hand on his chest, trying to get closer. "Maybe I'm not a dog, but a wolf."
"That remains to be seen." Using a small amount of spiritual power, Xue Xiangsi pushed him back again, this time making him stumble a few steps and almost fall.
"We're done here, we should go find Shizun at the Lei mansion. I'm afraid he's walking straight into a trap." Xue Xiangsi straightened his robes, and retied the top half of his hair, smoothing over the strands that had come undone.
He almost looked like he hadn't been exchanging heated kisses with Zui Chunlai, just minutes before. Almost.
"One day Bai Yunkai will disappoint Xiangsi greatly," Zui Chunlai ran his thumb over Xue Xiangsi's red bottom lip. "I look forward to picking up the pieces."
Xue Xiangsi chuckled humourlessly. "I'm sorry you'll never understand the bond between a shizun and his disciple. I'd follow Shizun into the underworld and back."
A deep frown creased Zui Chunlai's sword-straight eyebrows, erasing all signs of lust from his expression. "You don't know what you say. There's nothing I wouldn't do for my Shizun. You would follow Bai Yunkai into the underworld? I'd set fire to the nine heavens for my Shizun."
Xue Xiangsi was stunned to hear Zui Chunlai speak so vehemently. He hadn't mentioned a teacher before, and didn't seem particularly attached to the Golden Crane sect, especially considering he was the sect heir. Who was this teacher who commanded such loyalty?
Zui Chunlai seemed to have realized he had spoken too much, because the fire went out of his eyes, and his indolent smirk returned. Xue Xiangsi filed the information for later. Whatever Zui Chunlai was hiding, it was related to his teacher.
He would hide his suspicions for the moment. "I'm going to find my Shizun whether you're coming or not. He might be in danger."
He jumped into the windowsill; a two floor drop below him. "Maybe if I save him, he'll give me that kiss."
Zui Chunlai's expression clouded over again. He looked even more handsome when he was angry. Xue Xiangsi laughed, and jumped.
---
Xue Xiangsi light-stepped from roof to roof, without looking back to see if Zui Chunlai was following him. He dropped down into the street when he saw the city gates. Just as Tan Fei said, it was impossible to miss the Lei estate and its imposing gates.
He jumped over the high walls, and landed in an empty courtyard. The whole house seemed deserted, and despite the immaculate state of the garden there was an eerie stillness to the trees and the pond water, that sat at odds with the breeze rustling his robes. It was as if the entire estate had been frozen in time. Not even a single leaf stirred.
Some powerful technique had clearly been used here. He couldn't see an array but he could still smell the foul scent of demonic energy.
Someone landed beside him. "Demonic cultivation," Zui Chunlai said, scenting the air as Xue Xiangsi had done moments before.
Xue Xiangsi nodded, and crossed the courtyard in the direction of the main pavilion, where the door was half-open. He unsheathed Heavenly Frost, and stood at the ready for any imminent attack.
Zui Chunlai unfurled his whip from his wrist, leaving a trail of scorched grass as he walked behind Xue Xiangsi.
"What's your whip called?" Xue Xiangsi asked, to dispel some of the oppressive anxiety tightening his chest. He was trying to avoid thinking about what might have happened to Bai Yunkai.
"Firewalker," Zui Chunlai replied, as he used the whip's grip to pry the door further open and peer inside. "It was a gift from my shizun. It's part of pair. Shizun has its twin."
Usually divine weapons were won or earned in some way, but a divine weapon would create a spiritual bond with anyone who was strong enough to wield it. Regardless of how it came into their possession. It was odd that someone as powerful as Zui Chunlai hadn't received his divine weapon in a competition.
They crossed a barely lit, and deserted hallway, until they happened upon a flickering light, coming in through the paper panes of a closed door.
Xue Xiangsi took the initiative to open it, and came face to face with a gruesome scene. Dozens of bodies piled up in the middle of the room, in the centre of an array he couldn't recognize. The array was drawn in what looked like blood, most likely from the caster. Xue Xiangsi had never seen this type of array before, but he could recognize several energy harnessing seals. They seemed to have been corrupted or distorted somehow. Whatever energy they had gathered wasn't freely given.
He walked gingerly towards the dead bodies, piled haphazardly on top of each other. All the corpses had their eyes open in a frozen expression of pure terror. Xue Xiangsi felt the pulse of the body lying closest to him. It was obviously long dead, but it wasn't signs of life he was looking for, when he pressed his two fingers down harder into the stiff wrist.
His eyes widened in shock, their red tails brimming with dread. "Their qi has been completely dissipated," he told Zui Chunlai. "Their souls have been disintegrated. They'll never enter the cycle of reincarnation again."