The Emperor's favorite lotus

I.

The Emperor pushed open the iron gate and released darkness in his wake, the air in the room making him wrinkle his nose behind his black silk scarf. Despite the gesture, the discomfort did not reach his gaze, fixed on a point in that room where the light of another sun would never reach other than those ruby-like eyes.

The basement smelled of decay, of rot, of the depths of the Endless Abyss. It permeated the walls, the chains holding in the air the rectangular shape soaked with the perfume of death. Ancient excrement along with dry patches mixed in the area where once there were long legs, thick thighs, now closed stumps. Man or woman, impossible to know their gender where there was now a raw space, the pus from the infection nest of flies and half-hatched eggs. The Emperor's eyes followed the few untransformed larvae, his head tilting almost comically as he located their preferred food source among the many abrasions and gaping scars on the once-perfect white skin.

The Emperor dropped the handkerchief with a gesture, the cloth fading into the gloom. His mouth parted, the opening revealing a long tongue against perfect white teeth. A pair of small fangs, longer than those of the so called, dominated for a moment the smile that formed in a single word.

"Shizun."

His voice was answered by the breath of a person waking from a nightmare, the tremors of an animal caught in a trap. It smelled of the perfume of destruction and war. And, despite the disorder of the hair and the sunken skin of that still human face, the eyes that looked at him defiantly reflected his own hatred.

"Beast," hissed the one once feared and hated by the strongest men in the cultivation world. His current pathos without taking away the elegance of his aura, his tortures tearing health and calm from him, but leaving him just as empty as in the beginning. Foam formed at the corner of his lips. "Didn't I tell you to leave me alone?".

The Beast, Luo Binghe, received the insult without changing his smile. If he found offend in his words, he hid them behind that mask that he hadn't needed to show the world for a long time. He closed the distance between their two forms, his hand reaching out to touch the chin that still showed marks of saliva, bruises, and specks of tears. He licked his own lips.

The spark of an identical chin of that in front of him, but white and unblemished, was still like a fingerprint under his fingers. He was pleased to identify the barely perceptible tremors, to the point where had to contain the impulse to silence the insolence with his own lips. That Shen Qingqiu's mouth would not have the same taste, nor the same inexperience of that of the sweet one. He had to teach him his tastes, erase his fears and install new ones. If he couldn't have a loving teacher, at least he would have an obedient one.

The Emperor almost purr at the fantasy. His smile grew as he remembered what the mind of that false Shizun had revealed to him, so deep inside himself that it couldn't belong to him. The truth behind those marks on the body of the old leader, the remains unable to be fixed by time.

"Didn't you loved being paid attention to?" It was somewhat disappointing that Shen didn't try to tear off his fingers with his teeth. Not a muscle moved on his features but, and the knowledge spilled its pleasure into Luo Bingghe's soul, for an instant, the terror of a child contracted the pupils of the tortured one as he understood the reason behind the drop in his tone of voice.

"Stop talking nonsense. Finish the job." The syllables came to pieces from the quiver of the master's jaw.

Luo Bingghe relinquished his arm, his smile undisturbed, his eyes unblinking. Without separating his pupils from those of the other, he raised his index and middle fingers, introducing them in one movement into the hole full of worms and pus where an organ had once existed. Blood splashed onto the Demon King's face, the scent of putrefaction now as exhilarating as the taste of Shen Yuan against his tongue.

The shrieks like cries stimulated him to the extreme where his clothes began to tighten in familiar places. Luo Binghe closed the eyes while moving fingers to break the flesh, gasping as he imagined what would have happened to the Shizun from that other world if they hadn't been interrupted by his weeping self.

The Emperor murmured in a soft growl.

"Don't worry, Shizun. There is a bright future awaiting for you".