(Don't read this one. It's a complete disaster. I tried something new for the first time, it didn't work, and I cried because it was so bad.)
Shen Sijin had lived for hundreds of thousands of years, always thinking he understood life pretty well.
Until one day, a five-year-old child made his way through the crowd at a first-birthday ceremony, crawled up to him, and looked up with a smile.
The child was taken in as Shen Sijin's junior disciple under the moon, and from then on, he grew up quietly at Shen Sijin's side.
Shen Sijin thought the child was quite well-behaved.
What he didn't know was this:
The child's older brother fled after one glance at him because he had loved him for hundreds of thousands of years.
The younger brother stood by his bed and merely watched because he couldn't bring himself to confess his love.
And the child himself had understood what it meant to say “mine” when he was only five.
So he waited quietly as he grew up, waiting to keep everyone else at a distance.
“You don't know anything.”
“Then I'll tell you now.”
Only later did Shen Sijin learn that being loved could also be the result of a scheme long in the making.
