Chapter Text
“Shen Qingqiu is dead! Shen Qingqiu is dead!”
The news spread like wildfire across the cultivation world, crowds of people pooling together as the local gossipers explained in great detail the judgements that were passed upon the villainous man’s trial. His name wasn’t so illustrious that everyone cared to cheer about his death, but the people who did know him were drinking wine by the barrel in celebration. Everyone else wanted an excuse to join in on the party. It was just one of those things you got swept up by, you know? A party? I’m in!
The celebrations lasted for several days with specific groups of people vanishing entirely to rejoice in private- mostly the man’s previous disciples.
The world seemed to be full of nothing but joy.
That is… until the initial buzz finally died down.
Rumors began to spill between the cracks of the mysteries surrounding the man's death, trying to piece together all the details that enveloped it- many things had been left out during the trial- not that anyone really tried hard to defend him. What was the big deal anyway? Just who was he?
Shen Qingqiu wasn’t anyone large by the standards of the cultivator world. “I heard he was in the middle core formation at his peak.”
Another spit out his booze in hysteria, “WHAT? All this commotion over a small fry? Wasn’t he like… in his mid 20’s or sumthin? I thought he would have been some huge legend!”
“Imagine reaching immortality just to die as a stick!”
The laughter was deafening throughout the tavern, booze spilling carelessly in the process.
“There must have been something wrong with him. His strength was mediocre at best compared to the rest of his sect's superiors, especially considering his age! What could that man even do to cause such an uproar?”
“They were probably just making an example out of someone who had no connections.” The burliest of men leaned forward on the table mischievously, lowering his voice just a bit, “I hear no one even turned up to his funeral.”
The tavern of men broke into a new fit of laughter. Having a person to belittle made themselves feel better about their own shortcomings. Everyone had something nasty to say.
“I mean could you blame them? When the man’s enemy is Luo Binghe, who would dare to show their support!”
“I’m surprised they even gave him one!” The man shook his head. “Seems like a waste of time.”
“It must have been to mock his spirit. Look, look, no one cares! No one showed up!”
A tavern maiden swung by the table to refill the booze seeing as a good chunk of it had been spilling onto the tables and floor. She couldn’t help but chime in to the conversation, “Oh I heard he did have a friend. Yue Qingyuan. But the poor guy died trying to rescue him before the trial concluded.”
With new booze being chugged, the table got even louder, “Karma! Defend a villain and you die a villain too! That man was too forgiving of Shen Qingqiu’s crimes. As a sect leader, he shouldn’t have let personal attachments affect his judgement. I say he’s just as guilty. Good riddance!”
Further down the street, another group of people whispered with hands over their mouths, the maids all huddled together around a half-washed tub of laundry, “Didn’t you know? He was a lecherous creep!”
“Oh I heard!”
“Me too!” The youngest of them squealed, barely able to contain her excitement as everyone shuffled closer, “That scum was always in the red-light district. Brothel after brothel. Night after night! I saw him there many times when I was visiting my sister! Just who knows how many kids are going to show up without a father soon!”
A series of appalled gasps filled the group, the oldest looking over her shoulder twice before speaking up too, “Did you hear about that one girl? Ming Fei? I hear he tried to force himself on her. She still has scars and that was years ago!”
“That’s awful!”
“Well what do you expect from someone without a mother.” The eldest said dryly, shaking her head in disappointment, “I hear he had no family at all in fact.”
“No that’s not true!” The youngest piped up again, reclaiming the attention of everyone there. “He had a loving, supportive adopted family! The Qiu’s took him in and rescued him from slave traders. And what did that get them?” She paused with solemn expression, baiting the older ladies to lean a little closer. Once the suspense was just right she dragged her finger across her neck in an ominous sweeping motion, making everyone shiver, “Murdered. He killed them all. No one was spared! And he did it when he was still just a young boy!”
“What a heartless brute.”
“Yeah and the way he’d dote on that one female disciple of his? Ning Yingying? That creep really just couldn’t keep his hands off women. She was so much younger than him too. Some people truly are just born evil.”
A group of junior cultivators from a small sect in the woods sat down to rest after their daily training routine, each one panting in exhaustion. “You guys hear about that horrible peak master from the Cang Qiong Mountain sect?”
One of the boys dabbed the sweat off his brow with the palm of his hand, still panting, “Y-yeah. Didn’t he… die or something?”
The first boy nodded, leaning against a tree with crossed arms, “Mhm. It's what you call divine justice. One of my friends had been his disciple for a while. But that bastard absolutely ruined his cultivation due to giving him the incorrect training manual. He eventually had to leave the sect.”
A few of the boys' eyes widened in shock, one of them yelling in horrified wonder, “Can’t that potentially cause qi to backfire and lead to death?”
“Mhm.”
“How does one make such a heinous mistake??”
The boy leaning against the tree shrugged his shoulders once, gaze becoming an icy black, “Likely wasn’t an accident. It isn’t exactly a secret that he sabotaged the people with the highest potential using cheap tricks like that. Shen Qingqiu hated people who cultivated at a young age. If you had a loving family too? It got even worse.” He scanned his surroundings briefly before continuing in a low voice, “Like what he did to Luo Binghe… constantly trying to suppress his strength. He had even shoved Luo Binghe into the Endless Abyss- right after the man saved him and a bunch of others from a wild beast.”
One of the boys who had initially been too winded to speak finally sat up, “Oh I did hear about that! He also made Luo Binghe fight a super strong demonic cultivator when he was way underdeveloped as a disciple. I still hear tales of how gruesome the fight was to watch.”
“Sheesh… What a horrible master.”
Deep within a jail of a local town, a few aged men of greying hair couldn’t help but laugh, “That brat soared so high just to come crashing down harder than any of us despite making such a big ruckus!”
One of the prisoners waved his hand erratically, crooked jaw barely able to keep his expression stable, “Oh look at me look at me, I'm the leader of a peak now, oooooh- just kidding I’m dead!”
“He gets what he deserves!” A man with a single golden tooth chimed in from a cell deeper in the jail, “He murdered his buyers in cold blood then went on to become an assassin with that horrible Wu Yanzi as his master… That man was a demonic cultivator didn’t you know?”
The crooked jaw prisoner grunted in response, “Like master, the disciple also became corrupted. Well… then again maybe he was evil from the start. What kind of kid murders people at that age? How does one even get that as an idea?”
Someone from an adjacent cell intruded on the conversation, “Yeah that bastard Wu Yanzi truly drew the short end of the stick. I heard it was Shen Qingqiu himself who killed the poor bastard! Imagine biting the hand that feeds you.”
The crooked jaw prisoner merely sighed, “Yeah and despite aaalllll of that he’s pardoned and joins a sect. Becomes all high and mighty as peak master too. He had the chance to live the perfect life from that point on… but no. He abused his disciples and went on to become an even bigger criminal. Killed his only rival Liu Qingge at some point and tried to kill Luo Binghe.” He rubbed his dry, aged hands together, “We may have dirty hands but at least our souls aren’t black.”
A chorus of agreement filled the cells.
“Shen Qingqiu oh Shen Qingqiu. I hope you’re turning in your grave! May you suffer an eternity like the people who suffered under you.”
The endless echo chamber rattled through the homes, workplaces and bars of every region. Sect after sect, town after town. Tidal waves of information and misinformation smeared the lines between truth and fiction, painting Shen Qingqiu’s life a muddy dull shade of red.
The general consensus?
It was good that he was dead now.
But every tale has its time and as the years passed on, less and less people cared about the man. Shen Qingqiu? Never heard of him. The three realms merging under Luo Binghe’s command swallowed up everyone's attention as they needed to focus on adapting to their new circumstances. Nobody had time to care about a madman anymore.
The infamous Shen Qingqiu name became a ghost story told to new disciples when they slacked off during training. Something about them being sent to Shen Qingqiu’s grave to be disciplined if they didn’t study hard enough. It usually did the trick.
Meanwhile the one quietest about the death was none other than Luo Binghe. Not a word from his lips involved Shen Qingqiu ever again. No one could tell if the man was happy or indifferent to his former teacher's death. No one dared to ask.
The one time someone was caught talking about Shen Qingqiu around him vanished and never appeared again. From that point on, it became an unwritten rule to make topics surrounding the man’s former teacher taboo.
‘He who shall not be named’.
Thus the man named Shen Qingqiu slowly faded from existence in a flash. Fading out as quickly as it seemed to fade in.