Chapter Text
Prince sang drunkenly as he wandered the palace halls. He was king. He was alive. The spell of whatever monster he had just slain didn’t even have any affects! He just felt like he had a night out with Nan Gong Zui so of course he was having a good time before he had to go back to life as XiaoLan. She was boring and pressured and he wasn’t ready for that. He wasn’t ready to go back to hating mirrors and changing who he was.
The notes died in his throat when he saw Gui. Something unfamiliar bubbled inside his chest as he took in the bastard just lounging there as if he hadn’t spent the entire week fawning over Prince with purple hair fluttering in the breeze and the cool toned bard armor rippling with every motion and emphasizing his fluid movements. The way he lounged now was a beauty he really got to see, more of the cool professor side that made his stomach clench when he said something so profound and so beautiful. The gay bastard. He would never look at XiaoLan like that and he was still XiaoLan. It’s bad enough he hated being a girl but when everyone already thought Prince was better...
Gui’s gem like eyes opened slowly, woken by some scream or another that always carried way too well in these stone walls. When he noticed prince his eyes shone with starlight but all Prince could see was the sadness from their irl date and the hurt and anger the burned her insides at the realization that no matter how he hated XiaoLan, she would never be good enough for anyone.
The anger took over at Gui’s cry of his name.
He didn’t hit the bard too hard! He wasn’t turned into a pillar of light so he was fine. He only hit Gui are hard as the gay fucker deserved! “What’s wrong?” He said immediately as if Prince didn’t just try to melee him to the rebirth point.
He tried to swallow his feelings like XiaoLan did but he wasn’t XiaoLan. XiaoLan wasn’t good enough. XiaoLan didn’t exist in Second life. He wasn’t her and he was too drunk, too angry to care. He hit Gui again.
“Why did you have to be gay?” He meant to just think the question not scream it.
As if screaming a summons instead, Lolidragon ran in, barely acknowledging Doll in shadows of the doorway, with Feng Wu Qing and Nan Gong Zui following shortly behind. The first thing they saw was was Gui, health significantly depleted and Prince’s fist, raised, feet unsteady, ready to attack the bard again. Nan Gong Zui jerked forward to steady his stumbling.
Prince punched him too. “Stay out of this! All I want to know is why this homo keeps pour all him energy into chasing me! I’ve told him no!” He rounded on Gui again. “I’ve told you no!”
Nan Gong Zui looked to Lolidragon and Feng Wu Qing at a loss. They wore matching grim expressions but Feng Wu Qing had a tinge of pity in his eyes. He seemed to know something the rest of them didn’t. He was ready to ask if something came to light through their infamous rivalry but Prince was yelling again, progressing on Gui’s panic frozen form.
“Just admit it! You know who I am don’t you!” Nan Gong Zui considered stepping between them but Feng Wu Qing tapped his fan to his chest.
“He needs to let this out. He needs to see that it’s all in his head.”
“You see me all damn day and you still just ignore me and know. You get off at the power difference don’t you! Hope I’ll come crawling to you like some teachers pet or something! Or are you such an asshole that you only give a shit when I have a dick! Piece of shit! I hate you!”
Lolidragon took a sharp breath but was the only one to do so, the only one to outwardly process the slip. Between the foul language and the reveal, no one moved.
Gui was too busy trying to tame his spinning mind. He promised he wouldn’t wouldn’t look into Prince or his identity. He said that no matter what he wouldn’t care who Prince was in life. But knowing from Prince himself that he saw him everyday, none the wiser brought questions. Would he really be okay with whoever Prince was? Was he really able to go back in his word by sorting through each of his students speech patters and habits? Was he really gay and why would that be such an issue?
Once upon a time a classmate after listen to him grieve about another suitor bothering him the friend ended the night with a suggestion. All he said was research Demisexual but he never did.
Now, looking at Prince’s angry tears, he regrets his negligence.
He had gathered a vague definition from his time in second life and the evidence fit.
He only started bothering Prince to amuse himself but somehow fell in love. He don’t know when or how, but it just happened...
Was that why he was upset? Was Prince odd like him in some way?
He missed the incoming swing to his face. He only watched as his health chipped further away.
“Why the Fuck aren’t you saying anything!” Prince screamed as Nan Gong Zui captured his arms.
Lolidragon snapped, her patience and resolve crumbling as one. “Get him out of here! I’ll deal with Gui!”
“They need to resolve this themselves,” Feng Wu Qing snapped back. “It’s Gui’s fault for not responding!”
“Prince-gege is cursed.” Dolls soft voice from the shadows made them jump. “It’s probably from a ghoul type monster he fought but nothing will be resolved. He will just get angrier... that’s why the more he yells they more his health drops.”
With little more than a glance and a curse, Feng Wu Qing moved to save his stupid older brother.
“Hey Dage,” he took one of Princes hands and brushed a hand through his hair. It was a familiar motion to both of them from those few times their parents were around for sick days. Something warm and comforting, just enough to get his feverish eyes to focus. “See, you’re okay.”
“You called me...”
“I know,” he gave her a smile and nodded to Nan Gong Zui to set him down. He had to move quickly to grab him from his away to the floor but when he did, Prince clung to him.
Prince’s fist curled into his baby brother’s robes. “I hate him,” he whispered pathetically into his shoulder.
Rubbing his big brothers shoulder, Feng Wu Qing sighed, “I know.” Of course he knew XiaoLan was carrying some kind of burden. He had heard her rage and curse Guiliastes before for his indirect insults and ignorance. He could remember the rare moments he walked in on moments she tried to hide. Her wrapping bandages around her chest, a pair of scissors in hand as she held her ponytail, the way she was slowly carving all femininity out of her closet.
He didn’t understand why but he knew she was in pain. It didn’t matter that they didn’t look like twins anymore. It didn’t even matter that they tried to keep their distance despite living in the same house and going to the same school, or that they found each other annoying and insufferable. She was his twin and weather she was his brother or sister they were his family and they needed help. If nothing else they always had each other.
“Let’s go find Wolf-gege,” he said softly. “Wolf always knows how to make you feel better, right?”
Prince nodded, slowly pulling away but still clung to his brother’s arms. “Yeah okay... but I’m not lying about cramps this time.”
“I know,” he said through a laugh. Every time he thought he was starting to think of his twin as a brother they would say shit like that! He took his time guiding them both down the hall and pulling up the messenger. “It would be weird if you did.”
Prince nodded along with his baby brother when suddenly another sob ripped through him. “God, I feel like I drank a bar! I’m sorry I don’t think I’ll be able to make you breakfast. Please don’t hate me!”
Feng Wu Qing frowned at the words realizing yet another topic they would have to address. Just as he was pondering a therapist he smiled when he heard Loli snap all the way from down the hall.
“What did you do?”
Gui fumbled. “I didn’t- I don’t- Prince just started yelling me!”
Nan Gong Zui joined the accusation. “You had to do something. Prince would not just turn on one of his teammates without reason!”
“I don’t know! He was singing then just started yelling at me! I though he was going to kill me this time.”
Doll huffed shoving the large warriors it of her way as she placed herself between all of them. “I told you he was cursed! It was a Ghoul Type Soul Burn. He was forced to bare all the negativity in his soul until he burns his health away. Prince-gege is upset with Gui-gege and the spell just made him actually say it! Remember that controversy about the gear affecting the users brain?”
Lolidragon went quiet but Gui’s stricken look was enough.
“So he really hates me?”
Doll shrugged. “If he was what would you do about it. He said pretty clearly why even if you’re too shocked to notice.”
Slowly he traced back over every insult and stab at his heart. Every word and connotation until finally it hit him. “Only if I have a dick for you to suck,” implying that irl he didn’t have one. He all but said-
“Prince is a girl.” He breathed.
He froze at Lolidragon’s sharp breath.
“You knew!” He growled. “Don’t you think the members of this team would have deserved to know?”
“Girls are treated differently in games! He didn’t want anyone to know! He wanted people to figure it out!”
Nan Gong Zui rubbed his temple, face pale from all the signs missed, plots that Prince hatched or went along with. “Who else knows?”
“Wicked,” Doll sang. “They were childhood friends.”
Gui’s eyes widened Wicked, Feng Wu Qing, they both knew Prince irl. They were close. So where the two from the Eastern continent who where students in his class and swiftly joined Prince’s inner circle. They all interacted like family and their only common factor was...
Gods, FengLan.
Gui hissed a breath through his teeth. “I need to think.”