Beautiful in Every Form

Beautiful in Every Form

Chapter eight

I have recently been reminded that Hua Cheng canonically "occasionally takes the form of a beautiful woman" so here's my take on that.

Having only just reunited with his lover after a whole year of estrangement, Xie Lian was practically itching to get back to Hua Cheng.

It was a bit funny. It had been four months, and Xie Lian still considered them to be 'just reunited'. He couldn't help it, though. Four months was pretty deep in the honeymoon phase and considering the living nightmare of having to watch his beloved burst into butterflies and that being his last image of him, Xie Lian doubted he would be taking Hua Cheng's presence for granted any time soon.

Though as much as Xie Lian wished to paste himself to his husband and never let go, he had already blocked out his communication array and didn't do any work for almost the entirety of the first month. As outraged as some of the other gods got, that time had been crucial to take off from his heavenly duties. Living with Hua Cheng was easy but reacquainting himself with how he used to act around him, acclimating to the changes in their relationship status, and trying to curb the irrational fear of losing the one he loved again were all things he needed to do no matter how aggrieved the heavens were over it.

There wasn't much they could do about it anyways. Chastise Xie Lian for his extended break? There were much easier ways for anyone to decide they didn't want to live anymore. That would only lead to a slow and painful death courtesy of Crimson Rain Sought Flower. Or a rather pitiful rest of their life, at the very least.

Besides, anyone who might've suggested hauling Xie Lian back up to heaven had been shot down by Feng Xin and Mu Qing. The two certainly didn't approve of the relationship and, by far, complained the most about Xie Lian's absence, but they had seen what losing Hua Cheng did to their friend, so they were begrudgingly tolerant of the red ghost. As long as their prince didn't look like he did during the first days after losing his beloved, they could bear the burden of some of his work until he returned.

This was certainly a statement when you keep in mind that Xie Lian had no specific territory assigned to him, so he served as the one to take on the miscellaneous tasks that weren't specialized to any other god or important enough to go higher up. Taking over his work was especially difficult considering how involved he had to be in every one of his missions. Many were stealth or infiltration, and sometimes he dealt with murder cases, but he was the one expected to solve them. It required a lot of finesse and less brute force than the other martial gods were accustomed to. Feng Xin was far too blunt to be suited to these assignments, and Mu Qing was too proud to properly conform to a nondescript role. Together they only butted heads and faulted the other for botching the act, all while creating a bigger mess and drawing suspicion.

Xie Lian was extremely grateful to them (no matter how poorly they performed) and even prepared a meal to express his appreciation. Neither of them so much as touched it, but Hua Cheng was happy to take their abandoned offering as an evening snack.

As much as Xie Lian would love to show his appreciation in other ways that wouldn't have the other gods scrambling for an excuse to run away, Hua Cheng occupied his every other thought leaving him aching for his husband's touch. He still worked diligently, of course, but doing any more than the bare minimum would take away the time he wished to spend around his husband, so unless someone specifically requested his help with another task and he was too conscience-stricken to refuse, the crown prince of Xianle vanished as soon as he finished his duties.

This was one of those days.

The Palace of Ling Wen had been dealing with a collapsed shelf that jumbled every scroll, book, and paper on it. These past few days, they've been counting on Xie Lian to help sort the shambolic mess. Had this been a year ago, Xie Lian wouldn't have minded so much, but since all he could think about was how his time could be better spent chiding Hua Cheng about avoiding his calligraphy work, admiring and complimenting the ghost's extensive garden, or anything else involving his husband really, he was distracted and half as efficient than usual.

If anything, with all the mistakes he made in his distracted mind state, he was doing Ling Wen a favor by having her pick someone more focused on the task at hand. That's how Xie Lian convinced himself it was acceptable to leave as soon as he handed over his mission report to the civil goddess.

Ling Wen skimmed her eyes over the scroll, looking up after a cursory review. "By the way, Your—... Your Highness?"

"Seeing as I have completed all my work for the day and there's nothing else you need me for, I'll be on my way." Already having rolled Hua Cheng's dice and standing at a door, Xie Lian backed into a distance shortening array with a wide placating smile.

"Actually, Your Highness, I was hoping—"

Xie Lian only smiled wider, nodded his head as if it would make the civil goddess believe they were in agreement, and projected his voice to drown out the coming request. "Great! I'm glad we've reached an understanding!"

And with that, he was out the door and gone.

"Ho ho ho." Ling Wen sighed, looking from where one unimpressive martial god had just left to where another had appeared beside her. "There's only so many things that can get a man that excited to go home."

"So you're still here." Ling Wen dropped Xie Lian's scroll on a table, picked up a sizable sheaf of papers, and handed them to Pei Ming. "Make yourself useful and help me file all of these."

Pei Ming frowned at the shuffled conglomerate of utterly unrelated papers in his arms. He seems to have found another reason for a man to get excited over leaving early.

"Surely, no man can be expected to finish all of this in one evening?"

"That's half of what I was going to assign to His Highness the Crown Prince, and over there is what I have set aside to sort out myself." Ling Wen gestured to a lopsided tower nearly ready to come crashing down on the middle court officials tiptoeing around it.

Ling Wen was shorter, but she somehow managed to look down on him from all the way down at her height. That was one of the many qualities that Ling Wen possessed and used to its fullest extent on her taller friend. (Maybe the Rain Master was capable of doing the same thing to him from an even shorter height, but that was less condescending and more of her projecting her nonchalance toward him.) This coupled with the faint gleam of humor in Ling Wen's eyes was enough for Pei Ming to realize the impending challenge she would impose on him, but he wouldn't fall for it. He had somewhere to be, anyway.

"I actually have an arrangement with Queen Yushi this afternoon," Pei Ming said, looking for anyone nearby to heap his cluster onto. However, everyone was too busy with their own work to even spare the baffled martial god a glance.

"Then I suppose it cannot be helped," Ling Wen sighed again, turning away with the slightest smile gracing her face. "The Rain Master will be so disappointed to see you show. I'll have to apologize to her later."

Pei Ming's eyebrow twitched.

"Is it that you're too prideful to deign yourself to help an old friend?" Ling Wen mused aloud. "Or perhaps it's the opposite. I should have known that this task would be above you."

Pei Ming huffed and yielded, "fine. I'll just finish fast enough to visit Queen Yushi by the end of the day."

(He failed.)

Meanwhile, in Paradise Manor, Xie Lian opened the front door and called out to his beloved to announce his presence. It used to be that his dice only brought him to Hua Cheng anytime he wanted, but Xie Lian has since learned to better manipulate the spiritual tool to bring him to other places. Falling on top of his husband every day was fun for a little while, but as much as Hua Cheng insisted it wasn't a problem, Xie Lian hated encroaching on his partner's privacy. That, and he liked to see his lover hurriedly round a corner to greet him with a wide smile on his face.

It was only a second later that a pair of arms encircled his waist and pulled him against the figure behind him. "Welcome home, gege. Did you miss me?"

There are certain moments in every person's life when their thoughts move far faster than anything else around them. When Hua Cheng first wrapped thin arms around him, Xie Lian merely assumed that his husband was using a smaller form than usual. By the time he was pressed to the chest behind him, though, he was thinking that his husband was no longer his husband. Crooning words reached his ears, but they hardly registered with all the buzzing from the rush of blood to his face.

"Gege?" Having not received a response, Hua Cheng curiously propped her head on Xie Lian's shoulder.

The god turned stiffly in his partner's arms and almost slapped himself when his gaze immediately flitted down. Any woman could tell what he was looking at, never mind Hua Cheng, who was hyper-tuned into his every reaction! Xie Lian had never had such a problem averting his eyes from that area before, but, as per usual, Hua Cheng was the spur for every bit of his corruption.

Xie Lian wasn't averse to admitting when he was in the wrong, but contrite as he was, he didn't believe that it was his fault entirely. Was it not natural for the eyes to lock onto and observe what was new? Hua Cheng's dudou¹ was doing a poor job suppressing much of anything, really. Even if her voice hadn't changed, it was difficult not to spot the apparent difference, and there was no way it wasn't deliberate. One of the perks of being an incredible shapeshifter is, well, shape-shifting and getting to decide exactly how you look. Every part of her appearance was intentional, including chest size. Hua Cheng was many things, but pure wasn't one of them. At least that was true to type.

[1] From my understanding, a dudou is a type of ancient Chinese bra that was meant to flatten women's chests to support their philosophy at the time which favored flat-chested women over busty women because they were viewed as tempting and flamboyant.

"Oh," Hua Cheng said, stunned for a few seconds before she reacted with more intensity. "My apologies, Your Highness. I forgot I looked like this." She turned her back to him and made a move to take several steps away, only halting when Xie Lian caught her wrist.

The forms Hua Cheng usually took while lounging around Paradise Manor varied greatly and sometimes had small hands, better for painting and intricate sculpting, he'd said. Similarly, Hua Cheng tended to have a smaller waist, though that was more consistent, and even he admitted that was more of a preference than practicality. As a man married to someone of many faces, the finer details of his partner's appearance were negligible at best. Who cared if Hua Cheng had dainty wrists for a few days? At most, Xie Lian might try to fit it between his fingers out of curiosity and tease at how cute he was. How was he meant to realize that there might've been a deeper meaning behind all of that?

Context clues, probably.

About once every month for varying periods, Hua Cheng would be more lethargic, and recently, too much so to leave the bed without a considerable amount of coaxing, plenty of kisses, and an inordinate dose of cuddling. Even then, he might lie there until Xie Lian offered him a self-made lunch and a prolonged look of concern before he finally rose for a late start on the day.

The only break in that pattern was the day before when Yin Yu had come in with tea and snacks for the perturbed ghost king and his husband. That alone hadn't brightened Hua Cheng's mood, but he did sit up after Yin Yu offered to sort out his dress for the day and came back with an actual dress. Xie Lian hadn't put much thought into it before, just as he'd never thought deeply about the women's cut clothing when he noticed them in the closet or how Hua Cheng had preened when he had used the word pretty² to compliment him over any other term.

[2] Some Mandarin words are specifically orientated to a single gender, and while pretty can and has been used to define more men in recent years, this is the most effective way to convey that Xie Lian called Hua Cheng beautiful in the way someone would compliment a woman because of the clothing.

It wasn't like Hua Cheng didn't spend half of his time around Xie Lian fawning no matter what word choice he believed his god would praise him with; this wasn't so different in comparison. Xie Lian was no stranger to cross-dressing and had no reason to care if his beloved enjoyed wearing women's clothing. They were two men in a relationship, and people would stare regardless of whatever clothing they wore, so what did it matter? It would still be Hua Cheng under the clothes, and that was all Xie Lian cared about. It was that simple to him.

What happened the previous day was certainly odd, but without much other evidence to draw from, there were no means to reach a concrete conclusion. Especially one so unorthodox, not that Xie Lian minded in the slightest.

"Wait. I'm sorry," Xie Lian said. "San Lang, I want you to look at me."

The wrist in his hand had filled out by now. No doubt Hua Cheng had switched back to a male form and a more masculine one at that, likely as some sort of compensation.

Slowly, Hua Cheng turned only his head to the side and let his eye settle on the floor. "His Highness shouldn't apologize for anything."

"Then neither should you." Xie Lian slid his hand down from Hua Cheng's wrist to take the other's hand in his and stroked it tenderly with his thumb. "If my beloved has something to tell me, I would be glad to listen."

Hua Cheng turned away again to put his head down, clearly dithering on how to respond. "There isn't much to say... I just prefer my female forms sometimes."

Xie Lian hummed. "But I don't understand why you kept this from me. Qingxuan did something similar when they were a god, so you know I never had a problem with this."

Hua Cheng seemed almost reluctant to argue his point. "This is a bit different. You weren't married to them."

That was...true. There was a fundamental difference between how Xie Lian interacted with Hua Cheng and how he interacted with Shi Qingxuan, the most glaring being relationship stuff. Xie Lian has never kissed or done other things with his best friend, and he intended to keep it that way. However, that could never be enough to hamper his feelings for his lover. Xie Lian doubted anything could.

"And who am I married to, San Lang?" Xie Lian questioned.

"...Me."

"En. You are my beloved and my everything." Xie Lian took a couple of steps forward to hug Hua Cheng from behind. "What matters is you, not the state of you. Remember when I told you that? I meant it."

"Gege..."

"I married my beloved because I love him. Whatever form he takes is irrelevant to me," Xie Lian said simply, tucking his head down to place one of his heated cheeks between his towering partner's shoulder blades. He barely had the face to say all of that so plainly, but it was something he needed to convey for Hua Cheng's sake.

"Now, may I see my wife? She was beautiful, and I would like to see more of her."

Hua Cheng switched back in silent acquiescence. Even after she shrunk, Hua Cheng was taller by a couple of centimeters but much closer to Xie Lian's eye level than most of her other forms. When she turned around, Xie Lian couldn't help but notice how flustered she was. Hua Cheng hasn't been this bashful since they kowtowed together³. Shy was cute on her, Xie Lian decided. It wasn't the kind of unconscious fumbling that would allow her to forget to redirect the rush of blood from her face, but it was enough to get a rather adorable awkward smile.

[3] In traditional Chinese marriage ceremonies, the husband bows with his forehead to the floor to pay his respects to the heavens, the parents, and his spouse.

Ignoring his blush, Xie Lian tucked a piece of hair behind his wife's ear. "See? Gorgeous."

Hua Cheng surged forward to wrap her lover in a tight embrace and breathed out a sigh. "I love you."

"I love you too," Xie Lian said, stroking her back and trying very hard not to think about the impediment keeping their bodies separated by a couple of centimeters more than he was used to.

"So, you don't mind?" Hua Cheng asked, pulling away enough to look her husband in the eyes.

"Not at all." Xie Lian pulled Hua Cheng into a kiss. It was odd kissing a woman, but no less strange than hugging one, something Xie Lian hadn't done in eight hundred years before a few seconds prior (if his mother and a rebel army assassin even count, that is). His previous claim still stands, however. Changing bodies doesn't do much to hinder muscle memory, so the lips on his still moved like Hua Cheng's. If not for the obvious breasts pressed against his chest, Xie Lian might not have been able to tell the difference.

"Are you sure?" Hua Cheng asked when they broke apart.

"Of course. As long as San Lang is comfortable, I'm okay."

"It's just that you seem a bit distracted by...something." That was Hua Cheng being nice in her saying that Xie Lian hasn't been able to keep himself from looking down for more than five seconds.

The god turned away, somehow more flustered than before, and coughed into his fist. "Sorry."

Hua Cheng wasted no time placing her head on her husband's shoulder and embracing him once more. "Or...was I mistaking gege's curiosity for concern?"

"San Lang!" Xie Lian covered his burning face with his hands.

"I'll let gege look if he's interested." Hua Cheng moved to Xie Lian's side, making sure he felt the cleft of her cleavage and danced her fingers around his waist. "But I'll let you know now, I'll be expecting some compensation from you."

Female or not, this was still the same shameless, spoiled Hua Cheng...

Xie Lian wouldn't lie and say he wasn't interested (Hua Cheng would always be enticing no matter what body she was in), but he was understandably reluctant to admit it. So, he directed the conversation elsewhere. "Maybe, if San Lang has already finished the calligraphy sheets I made for her."

The teasing smile on Hua Cheng's face froze, and she slothed off her husband. "My...my calligraphy sheets, you say? Aha, umm...funny you mention that..."

After finally gaining higher ground, Xie Lian turned his body towards his wife. "You didn't do it, am I right?"

Hua Cheng looked down, then away, anywhere but Xie Lian. "I got distracted... But! Gege knows how off course I get without him. I still need him to guide me." By the end, Hua Cheng was looking over at Xie Lian, just barely meeting his eyes.

She knew him inside and out and knew exactly what to do to nudge Xie Lian in the direction she wanted, but he knew her just as well. There was always an underlying plea she worked towards and curried favor for to get what she wanted. Maybe it always worked on him, but Xie Lian was never opposed to granting his wife these small pleasures in the first place.

"If San Lang wants to hold my hand, she only needs to ask," Xie Lian assured, holding out his hand.

Hua Cheng immediately grabbed his hand, and Xie Lian took her down a hall, but it only took a couple of seconds for her to realize that she was being led on. "Wait, where are we going...?"

"Come on, don't worry about that."

Hua Cheng stopped walking and began mock resisting. "But gege, you know my brushwork is going to look bad no matter what. Gege's time is precious, he shouldn't waste it on trivial things."

"I'll hold your hand while you write," Xie Lian tried, grabbing her other hand to better pull her towards the study.

Hua Cheng turned her head away melodramatically. "Not good enough."

They had reached a point where they had deadlocked with two arms span between them, but they still held each other's hands, unwilling to let go. It truly was an odd scene to any third-person party, but to them, it made perfect sense. Hua Cheng was pouting and reluctant to do her calligraphy practice and grasping at straws over a way to get out of it without outright running away, while Xie Lian had a deceitfully innocent smile on his face, ready to drag his wife into the other room if she continued to desist. He was a guoshi in his past life, after all, and deftly equipped for dragging spoiled children to do the work they tried so desperately to get out of. And Lang Qianqiu ascended, so it wasn't hard to tell that Xie Lian got his way.

Xie Lian took a half-step closer and interlaced his fingers with Hua Cheng's. She eyed him with suspicion but was too satisfied with the new status quo to back up again.

The next few seconds of silence trudged slowly, and then, they both moved at the same time.

Hua Cheng jumped back as Xie Lian sprang forward. "Gege, gege—! No gege, mercy gege, please gege! Gege!"

Xie Lian grinned while chasing her. "San Lang! Come here, it's just gege, why are you running?"

Hua Cheng only made it to the end of the hall before getting caught.

Neither of them had been trying very hard, and if she truly wanted to get away, this was Hua Cheng's territory, and the halls of Paradise Manor essentially bent to her will. Xie Lian wasn't running as fast as he could either. It was almost like a game between them except there was only ever one winner. Hua Cheng wasn't nearly as opposed to doing her calligraphy practice as she acted, and if he wanted, Xie Lian could easily haul her back by force. To tell the truth, this was nothing but a show for their entertainment.

Hua Cheng was half bent over, tittering, and trying to disentangle Xie Lian's arms from her waist. "No...! I don't wanna, and you can't make me!"

Xie Lian found this amusing. "Oh? I can't, can I?" He picked her up, laid her over his shoulder like a sack of rice, and patted her hip before starting off down another hall. "Come on. I'll let you sit on my lap, how does that sound?"

This wouldn't be the first time he'd done this to Hua Cheng, and she certainly never minded. Not with that exceptional view she got anyways. Being a woman very clearly did nothing to curb her perversion.

After Hua Cheng's giggling dissolved, she responded, "alright."

Then she poked him.

Caught off guard, Xie Lian stuttered in his step and yelped. "Ai! San Lang, not now, I could have dropped you."

"But you didn't," Hua Cheng said. "Besides, I trust that you won't."

"But I would feel guilty if I dropped you."

"Maybe, but I've fallen from worse heights."

"San Lang!" Xie Lian turned his head before remembering that it was impossible to look at Hua Cheng with her over his shoulder the way she was. He would've addressed her insensitive humor, but he's starting to run out of different ways to tell his wife to be kinder to herself. Instead, he sighed and made a note to revisit that later.

"What? You caught me then too, didn't you?" Xie Lian didn't need to see Hua Cheng's face to know that she was smiling the way she always did when she said something ridiculously sentimental that never failed to bring a blush to her husband's cheeks.

"Yes, I suppose I did. Does San Lang remember the way I carried her?" Without waiting for an answer, Xie Lian heaved his wife to his front, holding her with one arm under her legs and the other supporting her back. "It was something like this, no?"

"Mhm." Hua Cheng put her face into her husband's neck, leaving a small kiss there. "Careful, gege. If you keep me here for too long, I might never let go to do my work."

This time it was Xie Lian who gave a brief hum. Having his wife contently curled into the heat of his chest while leaving the occasional light peck against his skin was almost enough to make him abandon their calligraphy practice in favor of the idea of cuddling with his beloved. All of this was especially effective because of the body Hua Cheng had taken on. Other than the fat allocated to her obvious breasts, Hua Cheng had cushioned many of the sharper edges of her jarring skeleton. With more meat on her bones, she would probably retain more of Xie Lian's body heat and be a bit warmer to cuddle, not to mention she's softer too.

But almost enough wasn't enough. At most, Xie Lian might let her get off early so they would have extra time later to simply hold and appreciate each other. However, he's afraid he'll have to be a bit mean until then. He just hoped that his wife wouldn't be too disappointed to separate from his chest to copy calligraphy worksheets.

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