Reborn To Be The Imperial Consort [BL]-Chapter 73: Zopyra — XIII

How did Hu Lijing end up finding himself in this predicament? Until the end of his days, he would be wondering just that.

His entire body was hurting yet simultaneously felt so hollow and numb. He didn’t understand himself at that moment as he was lying curled up to himself amidst the cadavers of his people.

The harrowing guilt of not being enough, not being strong enough to protect his clan, it ate him alive, like a flesh eating parasite that crawled in his heart, eating its way deeper and deeper while carrying the heavy seed of self-blame and derision with itself.

Hu Lijing let out a weak sound, a shuddering breath in his lungs as he hugged his knees, curling tighter as though he wanted nothing more than to disappear into nothingness.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t afford to disappear nor die. Not so soon, not without getting even just a sliver of revenge. Not without meeting the ten-tailed fox and facing the consequences of making a deal with that devil.

As he lay, lost in the dark, gloomy and wicked void of his mind that was wasting away, Hu Lijing’s hands left his knees as they subconsciously travelled to his belly.

His trembling fingers rested on it, gently tracing the barely present bump as he took a sharp breath and pursed his lips together. The bloodied claws ghosted over the layers of soiled robes, barely caressing the protrusion of his body.

Hu Lijing closed his eyes, leaned his head back and clenched his teeth as he let out an aggrieved, guttural sound at the back of his tight throat. Slowly, he swallowed the lump.

Unfamiliar grief and distress for the inevitably impending doom of his child dawned upon him like a lighting striking without preamble.

Hu Lijing shivered, feeling cold. He didn’t know if he did the right thing by accepting the bargain or not, but he felt too sad.

For a child he never wanted, for a child he carried for years, for a child he hated even.

At that moment, before the dark shadow of the ten-tailed fox could fall over him and it, Hu Lijing mourned.

For as long as it lived in his body, for as long as his heart beat in tandem with the nine-tailed divine fox spirit, it was never loved.

More often than not, Hu Lijing entertained the idea of ending the child’s life himself but never went through with it. Back then, it had always been an idle thought filled with dread, never one he had any intentions of fulfilling.

But now that it was going to die for Hu Lijing to be able to avenge his people all alone with nothing but the fallen and disgraced fox deity, the nine-tailed fox felt strangely forlorn.

He had never loved it. He had abhorred it even. He hated having to carry it, he hated that it was a cursed star sired from his beloved seeds and conceived in his own cursed womb.

He hated it. To him, to Hu Lijing who never told Long ZhenHai of its existence, this child was always it.

Never he, never she or they. Always it. Always an object, never a child.

However, now that it was going to die soon, Hu Lijing could feel his — what he had presumed to be dead — parental instincts kick in. It was not a pleasant feeling in midst of the cold concoction of war, but it was also not something Hu Lijing particularly wanted.

After a long time of finally feeling close, feeling the grief of this child, Hu Lijing dropped his hands and just...

Laid there. Waiting for the ten-tailed fox to break past his confines using the power of bargain they made and come for Hu Lijing.

He dreads having to face the sight of that fallen deity, behind the guard of chains, of distance, he might have been able to behave insolently towards the ten-tailed fox, but when they came face-to-face, would he be able to do that same?

Truthfully, Hu Lijing didn’t know.

He let out a long suffering sigh, feeling the wet squelch of flesh and blood rubbing against his sides as he moved slowly. He wanted to disappear.

He hadn’t even told Long ZhenHai about their child and now he had made a deal with the ten-tailed fox in exchange for its life.

Just how much of a bad parent could he become?

A sob left his lips, an unnamed grief swirling in his heart. Hu Lijing didn’t know where this grief came from, or what its roots were. All he knew was that despite the hollowness in his heart, he could feel the pain of losing the child he never loved.

He was losing a part of himself and along with it a part of Long ZhenHai.

It hurt to even think of it.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" A familiar and unpleasant voice sounded from right above him. "Is that the mighty nine-tailed fox curled up to himself like a pathetic kit?" It jeered and laughed.

He laughed.

This time, however, instead of a disembodied sound that echoed all around, his voice sounded much more grounded.

Not to mention closer.

Hu Lijing’s eyes snapped open as waves of panic set in. He turned over, lying on his back as he faced the sky, stained in red. His eyes widened.

Those beautiful amber eyes rounded in indescribable horror as he sat up, as though whipped. His spine curved as he clawed backwards, his body instinctively trying to put more distance between himself and it— it—

—Whatever it was.

He crawled back, claws slashing and trampling on the bodies under him as blood and mud sullied his barely clean clothes.

His mouth fell open, lips quivering as his pupils shrunk while he looked up, glaring at the sight in front of himself.

"You— you—" he stuttered, voice thick and throat too tight for him to truly form any words.

Not that any words would be enough to express the sight he was seeing.

At his reaction, the ten-tailed fox laughed, satisfaction oozing with every little sound, every nuance of his voice as his looked down at the nine-tailed fox crawling backwards in veritable horror.

Hu Lijing gulped. "Ten-tailed bastard?" He asked, those words entirely instinctual as he gritted his teeth, shaking pupils staring up.

Abruptly, the laugh ceased as the ten-tailed fox let out an offended noise. "Watch your tongue, pathetic fox!" He hissed, his tone betraying the fury he withheld.

Hu Lijing snapped his mouth shut, fist clenching hard as he stared at those crimson eyes before his sight darted around, trying to see if there was a way out of the all encompassing darkness that had surrounded him.

He couldn’t even stand up, forcing him to stay on the ground, mixed with the piles of bodies.

Everywhere around him was dark, he could see nothing. It was darker than any and every night he had been through, no matter where he looked he could see nothing.

But dark.

Was it the fallen deity’s true form?

He swallowed thickly as he looked around, it was nothing. Nothingness, he could see nothing.

It filled him with terror. True terror.

Nothingness, absence of anything.

Hu Lijing looked around desperately. He saw nothing. It was dark. It was pitch black.

The ground under him was dark. But it was not black. The ground under him was dark from the blood and organs of his comrades. His clansmen. He shifted uncomfortably as he brought his hand to sniff, trying to see if it was reality or an illusion of the mind, perhaps a petty trick of the fox.

It wasn’t. He smelled blood.

Hu Lijing immediately dropped his hand. He felt like throwing up, the guilt, the nausea, all of it swirling in the coldest pit of his stomach. He retracted his claws, head bowed as he started mourning.

It was not an illusion nor a trick of his mind. Then it must be the ten-tailed fox’s power.

In the darkness, he couldn’t see the ten-tailed fox either. He turned and turned, lips pursed as he took a shallow inhale and called out, voice cracking as he spoke, tremors wrecking his body.

"Where are you? And where is this?"

No response.

Hu Lijing bit his lower lip and waited. Still, he found no answer. Sitting in the darkness, just existing alongside the corpses of his kinsmen.

It was slowly driving him mad. Frustration bubbled in his heart.

"Ten-tailed fox!" He yelled, this time louder, fisis shaking as he asked. "Is this a joke?!"

Once again, cruel, deafening silence met his desperate inquiry. The darkness seemed to swallow everything, the sound of his voice, the sight of his eyes.

Everything.

For a moment, Hu Lijing didn’t know if he was imagining things or if he was starting to lose his sensation, his ability to feel touch.

He growled, body shaking as his heart thumped. Fear and something else rushed in his veins as he hyperventilated, panicking as fell apart, his breaths coming in short pants.

His body grew increasingly numb. One moment, his skin was crawling, one moment he could feel the disgusting wetness of blood and organs.

The next...

Nothing.

Hu Lijing stopped breathing. His skin... He could not feel his own flesh any more.

Madness set in, in a fit of rage, the nine-tailed fox clawed at his own arms, growling animalistically as he drew blood, sent his skin in tatters as he clawed and clawed, wanting to feel something.

Anything.

He felt none.

Then suddenly, a loud, cold laughter booked around him, in the darkness it rattled as from the shadows—

—Hundreds of thousands of crimson red eyes blinked rapidly, staring down at him as they rotated in the shadows accompanied by the lighter.

Blink, blink, blink.

Blink... Blink... Blink...

Blink, blink, blink.