Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Ning Yingying was a young girl, all she had wanted was to love someone and be loved in return. 

Part of this, she easily knew, was because she grew up loved. She wasn’t like her Shizun who shied away from affection like it was a curse, or her Da-Shixiong who feared comfort like it was personally out to hurt him. She wasn’t like her many Shixiongs and Shijies who didn’t know what it felt like to be held or hugged. 

She was different, She grew up loved. She grew up everyday knowing this through actions and words alike. For her and her alone affection was freely given and comfort was a necessity. She grew up being hugged and held when she wished to be. 

Ning Yingying grew up softly. Pampered by people who had never been pampered. Loved by people who had never received it in return. 

However, somedays Ning Yingying really wished they had never loved her, she wished she hadn’t grown up the way she had.

 She wondered late at night what it would be like if Shizun had hit her like he hit Luo Bingge, or toyed with her like he did Da-Shixiong. She wondered if she would have been able to hate Shixiong like Luo Bingge if Da-Shixiong ignored her until he could ignore her no longer and finally snapped. 

She wondered if she would have hated Qing Jing the way Luo Bingge did if they resented her as they did him. If she could have stood by silently under the heat of their ire the way Luo Bingge did back then. 

She wondered if she could resent Luo Bingge the way her Qing Jing siblings had if she hadn't grown up loved. She wondered if she could have died the same as them if only she had shied away from the boy everyone seemed to resent for one reason or another.

It might have been better if she had been more like her martial siblings. If she had given up on being loved like they had all those years ago. If she had listened to Da-Shixiong when he told her to be careful with Luo Bingge because something wasn’t right.

(And maybe it had been the boy’s jealousy speaking back then, but when it came to her Ming Fan really tried to take her feelings into account, he wouldn’t have pushed if she told him he was wrong.) 

And maybe she was overreacting. Maybe all of what happened was for the better, maybe it was her fault. Maybe nothing that happened had anything to do with her. Maybe she should just forget like everyone else seemed to, or hate the way Luo Bingge seemed to do so easily.

But Ning Yingying couldn’t do that. Not when she still knew that even after everything that she and Luo Bingge went through, neither one of them could be happy. When neither one of them could really have peace. 

Becasue here they were, thousands of years into a marriage that neither really wanted anymore, trapped with the ghosts of their past, and a Shizun that no longer exists.

This wasn’t the love Ning Yingying had wished for all those years ago, nor was it the love she had been promised.

Maybe it was just her being selfish again. Maybe she was just longing for something her own lack of action gave up, but Ning Yingying missed her home.

Not her Shizun, not the sect that let them all rot, but her home.

She missed her obnoxious Shixiongs who used to spar her just for an excuse to fight, but snuck her out to get sweets when no one was looking. She Missed her Shijies doing her hair in the early morning and late nights, missed the days she used to spend with them painting in the shade or arguing over the latest novels.  She missed Da-Shixiong lecturing her on personal safety and assignments, missed the way he would fuss over her when he felt safe enough to.

She missed her brothers and sisters. She missed Chu Wanyin and Bai Hehua. She missed Lin Wanyu and He Banyu. She missed all her JieJies and GeGes even if they were horrible to Luo Bingge.

It wasn’t right, and it especially wasn’t fair to her husband, or to them, but she missed them all. 

She missed them all even tho they probably hated her. She missed them all even tho her husband definitely hated them. She misses them all because they loved her even when she had done nothing to be loved. She missed them because she’s lonely and alone and if they were here she wouldn’t be.

She hated this.

She hated feeling this way about people who were dead. About people who had caused this even if it wasn’t intended. She hated this because when she married Luo Bingge, it was supposed to be fine. He and his stupid harem were supposed to be her family, the people who held her late at night and the people who comforted her.

But they weren’t, and she hated it because it meant her Shizun was right again.

“You’ll regret it.” Well, she did. She regretted it and she missed them, so why can’t this all be over now? Why can’t she have her Da-Shixiong back? Why can’t her Shixiong’s and ShiJie’s come back to her? 

Why is Ning Yingying alone when she was promised it would never happen?

Why did they leave her alone? Why did they break their promise? Why did they leave her?

Why is she alone?

They said she wouldn’t be alone. 

Chapter Text

Ning Yingying tried to be content with what she had, she really did. 

She talked to Consort Liu, she stopped provoking Consort Qiu and Consort Sha. She tried to converse with her husband, to speak with the servants. She conversed with the other wives, and with the other children.

She did her best to fulfill her duties as the favored wife. 

She really tried. 

“This husband has noticed, that this wife has been agitated recently.”  her husband mentioned offhandedly. “May this husband ask why?” 

The brush in her hand felt heavy, she wondered how hard it would hurt.

“It’s just been tiring lately,” she offered. “Husband has noticed the sister wives fighting yes?” 

“No, this husband hasn’t,” his tone as usual was unconcerned, from the mirror she could see his eyes gaze into hers. 

Like a lazy beast.

‘Does this venerable one’s wife need assistance?” She pretended to consider it.

“Thanking this husband, but no, this wife has been handling it.”

Ning Yingying figured the hairbrush wouldn’t hurt enough to matter. 

“Mmm.” His eyes closed, a clear sign of vulnerability. “Should this one's wife change her mind, let this venerable one know.” Or, well, it would have been a sign of vulnerability had he been vulnerable.

She chose not to eye the Dark sword, Xin Mo, still at his side. 

“This wife will remember her husband's words.” She won’t.

He chuckled, and she had the feeling he had already moved on from the subject. Ignoring the feeling bubbling in her chest, she took the hairbrush away from his hair, frowning just a little at the way she had to tug just a bit to remove it from his hair. 

He didn’t notice still, or if he did, he pretended not to.

Either way, it didn’t matter she supposed.

“Wife,” her husband started, and Ning Yingying wished to respond ‘which one?’,  “This husband loves you, you know?” he leaned back into her chest turning his head to look at her directly. 

Ning Yingying wanted to cry.

—

Ning Yingying may not have always admitted it, but somedays she wondered if she could ever see her family again.

Her real family.

The one she betrayed all those years ago. She thought about what she would do if she could wake up back in time, back in the days of her childhood. Or maybe in the days when her husband was supposed to be dead. 

She imagined waking up with a chance to fix things. Imagined waking up and breathing in the Qing Jing air. 

She imagined the way her siblings would hug her.

She imagined it was real.

She thought of how she could go to that vision for real. She imagined how she could fix things if she could go back. 

She imagined how she could bring that dream to reality.

She wondered in her lonesome, when her bedsheets were cold, and her mind was quiet, what she could do to bring that vision to life. 

Shen Jiu taught all his original disciples demonic cultivation. That meant that Ning Yingying, Ming Fan, Chu Wanyin, and a select few others all knew the correct, and complete way to travel the demonic pathways. 

(To this day, it was something that her husband still didn’t know.)

Chapter Text

Late at night, when Ning Yingying thought a little too far, she thought about all she knew. 

She remembered her days of living and learning as a child and a girl.

She hadn’t known it then, but where she had thought her education had been little, it was deep with lessons others would never have learned, no matter how rich they may be. 

Her Shizun had taught them lessons that even most righteous cultivators wouldn’t know, things that would either make them glow with curiosity or hide with fear. 

Looking back, her Shizun really had been prepared to die and leave them defenseless. Her Shizun, in all his glory and power, had been a weak, afraid man. One who knew his time was coming long before anyone else did, and sought to make weapons out of the few he thought he could trust. 

It hadn’t worked in the end, especially considering the threat he was prepared for wasn’t Luo Binghe, however, it had still left Ning Yingying with more than anyone would ever expect. 

Just not enough to be useful.

“It’s stronger and faster than using a golden core because the cultivator would be actively exchanging something. Most of Demonic cultivation works in exchanges like that, which is why Ning-Shimei must be careful. Want to do something important, and you have to give something important in return.”

Despite all her riches, Ning Yingying didn’t have anything to give in exchange. 

However…Ning Yingying sat up, however her husband had taken everything with nothing.

Why couldn’t she do the same? 

She slipped off her bed, grateful for once that her husband had long since left her. 

Moving to her nightstand, she searched through her drawers, reaching until she at last felt what she was looking for. 

Smiling, she shone a light. 

–

Shen Qingqiu had never learned nor taught necromancy. 

The excuse at the time he gave for this was his own inability to teach something he never learned himself. 

At the time she had been told this, Ning Yingying hadn’t considered this an issue. Regretfully, unlike her Da-Shixiong, she never understood why knowing how to raise the dead would be needed. 

Now in her adult years, she regrets her naivety and wishes she could have been more distressed such as her Da-Shixiong was at this revelation. 

Perhaps then, she wouldn’t have had to distress like this. 

Regardless, no limitations had stopped her before, so why should this limitation stop her now? 

Why would a silly thing like knowledge stop Ning Yingying from trying to revive someone? 

She could figure it out, she knew enough to figure it out. 

Out of all the disciples, she had been the best at Demonic cultivation, her husband notwithstanding, so with enough effort put forth, she should be able to achieve the impossible

“It’s stronger and faster than using a golden core because the cultivator would be actively exchanging something. Most of Demonic cultivation works in exchanges like that, which is why Ning-Shimei must be careful. Want to do something important, and you have to give something important in return.”

So theoretically, using that principle, reviving someone shouldn’t be too difficult. She just needed to find something of equal value to give in return.

“Consort Ning?”

Ning Yingying didn’t startle; instead, just like the cultivator she was trained to be, she turned slowly and gave the least glare-like glare she could muster. Watching happily as the servant began to sweat. 

“The wives are fighting again,” the servant pushed out, a squeak to their voice that was all too aggravating. 

Fuck she hated this. 

“This one assumes she is needed to resolve the conflict?” she confirmed, voice placid and cold. When the servant nodded, she was not surprised. 

“Of course.” She hated it here. 

Even so, she moved quickly to follow the servant demon; she had duties to attend to.

Chapter Text

It takes her far too long to break up the fight this time around. 

Far too long wasted on senile old women far past their days of glory and grandeur. 

Ning Yingying was really far too tired to play their stupid games, but here she was anyway, doing so. 

Disappointing was all it was. 

Yet she was the one forced to do it.

Not because her husband particularly thought she was good at the job, but because she was apparently the only wife even capable of playing nice. 

Really…she had to wonder if it would not be more beneficial to kill them? Rather than sit and watch as they tear each other apart for one singular man. 

Eugh. 

Ever so. It didn’t matter. Really it didn’t matter. 

Those foolish wives weren’t important in the end. Just another annoying trial for Ning Yingying to get through on her path to happiness. 

She would get there after all. She had a plan now.

After so many long and tortuous eons. Ning Yingying had a plan. 

Necromancy.

As he had known before. It wasn’t something considerable for a while, and so she didn’t dare think about it. Far too busy over the time spent as the head consort to her husband. 

Truthfully, she had pushed even the idea of revival aside after what happened and, for a long, long time, continued to happen to her ex-Shizun. 

She didn’t want to even consider the thought of bringing back anyone, not at the risk of her husband using it for more torture on her-... well. 

It probably wouldn’t have bothered her all that much if it were her Shizun he used it on…Ning Yingying hated it, but she hadn’t felt all that much affection for the old man in some time. 

For many reasons. 

He wasn’t the only one, either. Admittedly, while she wouldn’t have wanted Shizun levels of torture inflicted on her Shixiongs, and Shijie’s. She probably wouldn’t have minded if he spent a little longer hurting her, either. Her husband, or Shizun. 

Ning Yingying laughed. Startling a stray servant walking through the halls. That was fucked wasn’t it?

She’s so, so, so desperate for them to be back, and yet she barely flinched at their torture. 

What was wrong with her…

It didn’t matter, she supposed. In the end, she had realized the error in her ways and now sought to rectify her past mistakes by any means necessary. 

“Is it not better to ask for forgiveness rather than permission in certain situations, Shimei? When you know you are correct, is it not better to do it so?” Chu-Shixiong asked, a happy little lilt to his voice. “Ming-shidi won’t mind all that much, he’s very forgiving if he cares for you.”

She'll do Da-Shixiong first.