Crown Prince and Ghost King

Chapter 68

In his mind, He Xuan went through each and every curse word and sentence he ever learned in his life and death. He had been careless and distracted, and the result of that was now staring at him in the form of a small ceramic cup filled with transparent alcohol.

He had no idea what could happen after he drank that wine.

The way the stage worked could fuck him over, no sugar-coating the words. What the stage did was choose a play concocted by mortal minds being executed during that Mid-Autumn Festival, but it didn't discern between gods and ghosts. It merely focused on the person that lost the drinking game, and chose a play about them.

It wouldn't be a problem if mortal people were all a single mind and only put on stage plays about heavenly officials worshipped in their lands, but that wasn't the case. Some places, whether the heavens wanted it or not, also worshipped a very specific Ghost King.

A Ghost King who, unfortunately for the current situation, had close ties with He Xuan.

Those who worshipped Hua Cheng were somewhat aware of his relationship with He Xuan, in a way, and some plays had him participating as well, mostly with a background role or a surprise character thrown in to entertain people.

The majority didn't necessarily know his name, but some did. Those who dared enter Ghost City not to gamble, but to visit the place ruled by their precious ghost, knew just that little bit more. It could even happen that mortals sometimes knew more than gods, because the general disinterest of the heavens towards certain topics was renowned.

He Xuan stared at the wine, tuning out the sound of dozens of voices wanting him to drink; the Mid-Autumn Festival was a special occasion for everyone, and there was a huge number of plays. Mortals were entertaining each other everywhere in the human realm.

It was highly possible that the stage would choose a play about the Earth Master, rather than anything else. At most, it could also choose to focus on a play about Shi QingXuan, where he starred too.

But what if it chose a play about Hua Cheng? What if those foolish mortals had put together exactly the play that would out He Xuan once and for all?

He could refuse to drink, obviously, but he had no reason to. His refusal would stir up some chaos, for sure, and officials would start hounding him after the banquet, prying for information. Heavenly officials were a gossiping, curious bunch, and taking away their main form of entertainment wasn't going to work in the short and in the long run.

Unless...

«I can't drink this», he announced, putting down the cup. «The stage could show us the Water Master, and I won't give this grief to his brother».

There.

It wasn't so far-fetched of an excuse. Many times, before Shi Wudu died at his hands, plays shown about him and Shi QingXuan also had He Xuan in the background, still posing as Ming Yi. Given how close he was to Shi QingXuan, and how many stories ultimately filtered out for mortals to hear, plays with all three of them weren't an exception to the norm. They weren't all that common, but not rare either.

In all honesty, He Xuan was genuinely scared that his cover might be blown. There were too many people involved with his fake identity, at that point. The sudden discovery that Ming Yi had been dead since his ascension would cause a terrible outrage in the heavens, and that was without adding Shi Wudu's death and the fact that many influential gods were aware of everything.

He could fake it all he wanted, but the ghost cared about his friends and wouldn't put them in danger just like that.

Shi QingXuan on top of everyone, also taking into consideration how and why he ascended. Since he shouldn't have been a god to begin with, and was instead placed in the heavens thanks to the exchange of fates brought upon them by Shi Wudu, He Xuan was sure that the Emperor wouldn't have that hard of a time kicking him out of the heavens.