protagonisthalo | [open post

[open post - dream big]

Luo Binghe does not need to sleep every night, and at home he is too busy to do so. But there is less to do here, and he grows bored in the nighttime when there is no chance of seeing any of the few people he likes. And Nina must not have any nightmares on his watch.

He curls up on his bed now, enduring the ache he always feels to be in it alone. Sleeping alone is one of the things he most despises. The only saving grace is that his powers let him make himself sleep instantly. In his youth, he often ended up fighting his thoughts for hours in place of sleep, even when physically exhausted. He wishes Shen Yuan were here, or if not, perhaps Sagramore—not to do anything that would disrespect Shen Yuan, but just to warm Luo Binghe's bed with his presence. But he would prefer almost anyone in the mansion over no one.

He ignores this customary melancholy and forces himself to sleep. He will first check on Nina, to guide her mind towards its best dreams without intruding, as he promised. After that, all dream paths are open to him.

[If you'd like a Luo Binghe dream visitation, please comment with how and where your character is sleeping, and perhaps what might be on their mind. If Luo Binghe does not know the character well, the dream will be more generic. However, he can read thoughts and memories, so feel free to DM the typist if there's anything you'd like Binghe to pick up on. Sweet dreams!]

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"I didn't mean to call to you," Magnus says. "I wasn't even dreaming about you!" He tilts his head. "That's a pretty cool power, though. There have been some gods who know I'm watching them when I end up dreaming about whatever they're doing, but I don't think anyone's gotten pulled in, before."

"I am not a god." This, too, is an acknowledgement of how he's deceived Magnus.¹ "And I was not pulled in, exactly—I was simply curious. Are they prophetic visions? They show what is truly happening?"

¹An acknowledgement is kind of like an apology.

"Oh, I know you're not a god," Magnus says. Now he does, at least. "But you have a lot of power, right? Similar premise." He crosses his arms, scrutinizing Luo Binghe. "They show what's truly happening, or truly has just happened, but I don't think they're prophetic? It's never the future, anyway."

Luo Binghe nods, a bit uncomfortable. He wanted to settle things with Magnus so their relationship did not cloud Shen Yuan's heart. But instead of asking for something from Luo Binghe, Magnus asked him to appear, yet he's not taking him to task like Luo Binghe thought he would. If he's expecting Luo Binghe to apologize, well, that's what the note was for. He's not going to demean himself more than that.

Luo Binghe crosses his arms as well, unconsciously mirroring Magnus. "Magnus. I don't like unfinished business. I didn't intend to harm you, but I would not have been so duplicitous if I'd known you were close to Shen Yuan. If there's anything you wish to say to me, then say it." There's no explanation of his behavior that can give that won't reflect poorly on him if said plain: that he's accustomed to doing whatever he pleases; that most people in his own world are tools to him. These things are true, and Luo Binghe is not ashamed of them, but they will not improve Magnus' opinion of him. He settles for, "Shen Yuan's happiness is very important to me."

Magnus tilts his head, regarding Luo Binghe. "I'm glad you asked, man. There is one thing I've been wondering." He pauses. Then, delicately, he says, "Shen Yuan is a good friend of mine." He debates mentioning all of the wives he knows Luo Binghe has had, and decides against it, at least for the time being. Something also tells him that asking what Luo Binghe's intentions are might ping as too confrontational. "...Do you love him?"

He's about to snap Of course I do—who could possibly not love Shen Yuan?—but he wants Magnus to take his answer seriously. At the same time, he hates being put on the defensive, as though he has to prove his love for Shen Yuan, when it is the truest thing he's ever felt. It is too true and too raw to open to Magnus' eyes for judgment. Especially when Magnus is already judging him.

In Luo Binghe's own world, marrying him is seen as the ultimate good fortune. He is the emperor—the most handsome and powerful being alive—and even though he may not attend to all his wives personally, all their needs are met. Yet here, his status has been stripped and his powers are close to useless. It must be so clear to everyone how little he deserves Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan has the kindest, most loving heart of anyone Luo Binghe has ever known, and Luo Binghe is the man Claudius described so accurately: a pathetic tyrant.

The night he slept with Shen Yuan was the best of his life, but it also destroyed him. It taught him how little everything else had meant, all his marriages built on nothing. Luo Binghe thought he had loved. But he was just the overgrown version of that lost child from last month, going through the motions a hundred times over in a desperate attempt to feel something he didn't even know how to recognize.

He loves Shen Yuan. But saying it—at least to someone he doesn't trust—is difficult, more difficult than it has ever been to proclaim love for any of his wives. Luo Binghe wanted all those women, but none of them, ultimately, had the power to hurt him. If one rejected him, there were ten others ready to take her place. If Shen Yuan ever leaves Luo Binghe, he will not survive. Loving him is Luo Binghe's greatest vulnerability, and he is not yet secure enough in their relationship to expose it.

But it would be intolerable for Shen Yuan's friends to see him as a danger, or to try and turn Shen Yuan against him. He cannot risk that. Luo Binghe has so many flaws, and Shen Yuan is so trusting of his friends.

"I don't like to discuss my private matters. But for him..." Luo Binghe looks away. "Before Shen Yuan, I did not know love. I did not think I was capable of it. He has revealed it to me."

"Good," Magnus says, satisfied. "And I trust you don't plan on hurting him?"

This time, Luo Binghe is insulted. "I'd rather die. I'd rather die than let anyone hurt him. Do you plan on hurting him?"

"I'm just checking, dude," Magnus says. It's what you do when your friends get new boyfriends!! Galahad may be his best friend, but Shen Yuan still gets to benefit from Magnus's commitment to best friend code. "No, I don't plan on hurting my good friend Shen Yuan. I'm just glad we're agreed on that front, that's all."

"We are." This could be going worse, but it's not going as well as Luo Binghe might like, either. Some part of him wants to protest that he doesn't know how friendships are; his only friend is Nina. It baffles him why people dislike him so much here—and then he realizes that it's not only because he has no status or military prowess with which to impress them. He could have approached this all differently. He could have turned on the sleek, charming persona he uses when he plans to kill someone and doesn't want them to know it yet. He could have tried harder to be nice. But he didn't, because he loves Shen Yuan, and he wants to be himself around him, and Luo Binghe's self is not very likable. He huffs in frustration. How did he befriend Nina and Janet? He humiliated himself in front of both of them, letting them see him in moments of deep distress. But that's easier with women, and more appealing to women anyway, in Luo Binghe's experience. Women like vulnerability.¹ How does one appeal to a young man?

"I love Shen Yuan," he says again, just to confirm. "Things are very different here from what I'm used to, and I've had to learn to act differently." He thinks of Nina saying he has room to grow—something that would be unforgivably condescending from anyone else, but a genuine compliment from her. "Shen Yuan is from my world and knows me very well, so it is easier for him to understand that. It's not easy for me to explain myself. That's why I left the note."

¹Broad generalizations not endorsed by typist.

Magnus is pretty sure Shen Yuan is actually from his world, but it's not worth arguing about. He squints at Luo Binghe for a long moment. "If you don't wanna hang out, that's fine," he says, finally. "I'm not, like, Forcing Dudes to Hang Out in My Dreams Guy. I just thought --" He shakes his head. "You're my friend's boyfriend! I like Claudius and Amir and Halfborn. And Hearth and Blitz." The last two count less, because they're each other's boyfriends. "So I wanted to get to know you. But it's cool. If you're still willing to give me a dream, I guess I'll take one about hanging out in a park with all my friends. Or maybe a nice day you had, if you want to share."

"No, I—" What he said was meant as an explanation of his behavior, not a rejection of Magnus. The mention of Claudius pierces through him in a flare of hot shame. How is he losing out to Claudius? "I want to hang out," he says hesitantly—Magnus must have picked up some of the ancient demonic dialect from Shen Yuan. "I'm just saying that I'm not used to it."

"Oh," Magnus says. Okay, actually, that explains a lot. "Yeah, that's cool." He's putting a few things together, between this conversation and what he remembers of their first one. He doesn't want to assume, though; he doesn't want Luo Binghe to freak out at him if he's wrong. "So what's demonic cultivation?"

"It's cultivation from a demonic source," Luo Binghe says with some relief—Magnus seems a little warmer toward him than before. "Human spiritual qi and demonic qi are different types of energy. Demonic qi is stronger, but more destructive, harder to control. And most magical artifacts work better with one kind or another. I'm half-demon and half-human"—he remembers that he hasn't explained this before, since he was pretending to be a god—"so I can use both kinds." It's a bit meaningless to demonstrate in a dream, since Luo Binghe can do whatever he wants anyway, but he holds out his palm and ignites a flame in it. The flame fades from the warm yellow-red of spiritual qi to the flickering black of demonic qi and back again. He's not actually switching between his human and demon qi pathways, since his physical body is not present—he's just using dream cultivation. But this is what it would look like if he were.

"Oh, that's cool," Magnus says, leaning forward to inspect the flame. He's uncrossed his arms at some point without realizing it. "I don't think we have demons where I come from. I think the closest thing we have is jotuns."

Luo Binghe is intrigued. "I haven't met anyone else here who comes from a world with demons—except Crowley, of course.¹ It startled me at first to be talked about as though I am mythical, and not in flattering terms either. What is a jotun?" He keeps the flame still so Magnus can look closely. Since it is a dream flame, it won't burn.

¹Because they're from the same world and Crowley is his ancestor.

"Oh, they're giants," Magnus says. "Sometimes literally, sometimes not. Some of them have, like, claws? Or fangs? There are fire jotnar, ice jotnar, and mountain jotnar. A lot of them are masters of illusion magic. Some of them are gods, some of them are just regular giants." He shrugs. "About half the jotunns I've met have tried to kill me, and about half have tried to work with me, and those two halves do overlap. A lot. So they're just like anyone else, I guess."

"That does sound like demons." Luo Binghe's voice carries a touch of approving warmth—no one else has known anything about what he is. "Not all look as human as I—claws and fangs are common, as are tails. Some are associated with certain animals, such as snake demons or wolf demons. And we have fire and ice clans as well. But my line is the Heavenly Demons—those descended from heavenly beings, who were banished and became demons instead. I am the last remaining." Except Crowley.

"I've met snake and wolf jotunns," Magnus says, with a shiver. The wolves -- he's not a fan of the wolves. "I guess there's a lot of what you might call heavenly jotnar in my world? My dad married one. My girlfriend's mom is a different one. I guess technically that would make my girlfriend half-jotunn? Demi-jotunn." He'd never thought of it like that, before. "But the half-mortal kids of jotunns we usually just call demigods, too."

Luo Binghe laughs. "Doesn't that make me something like a god after all?"

"Demigods are nothing like gods," Magnus says, immediately and stoutly. Luo Binghe might not recognize it, but this is, in truth, a compliment.

"What are they, then? I have told you about my kind. Although we do not have a term for half-demons—I call myself a demon because I know it is what people think of me. I am as human as I am demonic, but humans would not tolerate one such as I counting myself among them."

"Well, most gods suck, so," Magnus shrugs. "I guess us demigods are less powerful but a lot more useful. Um, they tend to live apart in my world, too. But that's mostly because most regular, um, mortals can't see the truth, so it gets dangerous to spend all your time around them."

"What truth can they not see?"

"That gods and giants and monsters exist," Magnus shrugs. "Anything that would break their brains. They bounce right off of it instead."

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