Chapter 34 - My Costar Gives Me A Refreshing Sip Of Blood

Yao Shen is pulled along by Xin Hulei, his eyes still not adjusted to the gloom. Clearly the 'Night Vision' upgrade is a complete misnomer.

He can feel himself being pushed down into a chair, and the next moment the room they're in is flooded with light as several candles and a neon sign saying "Hellish Delights" light up.

The only way he can describe the room they're in is as a "boudoir". There are meters of fine silk hanging from the ceiling and the walls, in various shades of red and green. All the furniture is lacquered, gleaming under the warm light. Several chaise lounges upholstered with brocade silk make Yao Shen feel as if someone should be smoking opium from a pipe while luxuriating on them.

Xin Hulei takes a seat in front of him, across from a round table covered in yet more silk. The waiter comes into the room minutes later carrying a tiered wooden box that he deposits on top of the table.

"My saliva doesn't harm him, so don't bother testing if he's a fiend," Xin Hulei says, as the waiter pulls several vials and metal instruments out of the box.

The waiter's hands waver for a moment on the vials, and Yao Shen thinks he sees his throat bob anxiously. 

"What the hell is going on?" Yao Shen asks, looking from one to the other in utter confusion.

Xin Hulei leans forward across the table, resting his elbows on the tabletop and his chin on his linked fingers. "You grow more interesting each day, I just want to learn more about you, that's all."

Yao Shen lets out a snort and crosses his arms in front of his chest. "I'm a human, you're wasting your time."

"And yet you could see both Jincan, and Heimao," Xin Hulei says, his eyes narrowing as he looks at Yao Shen. "That shouldn't be possible for a human to do."

"Wait, did you name them 'golden silkworm' and 'black cat'?" Yao Shen asks, his mind stuck on those details for some reason.

A fleeting look of amusement crosses Xin Hulei's eyes. "You're welcome to find better names for them," he pauses. "As long as you tell me what you are."

"I'm a human," Yao Shen insists. 

"Then I guess they'll keep their names," Xin Hulei says, nodding towards the waiter.

The man puts on a pair of frameless glasses, just two circular lenses held together by a curved piece of gold and balanced on the thin bridge of his nose.

Yao Shen watches in confusion as the man takes a long acupuncture needle and dips it in one of the vials. 

He yelps as he then pulls Yao Shen's hand forward and pricks the needle imbued in the substance on his pinky, the outermost acupoint of the Heart Meridian on the upper body. 

Nothing happens. 

"His skin ins't blackening or peeling away, so we can rule out jiangshi," the waiter says, while Xin Hulei nods.

What the fuck, that's something that could have happened?

Also, "aren't jiangshi gross looking corpses, just like, barely reanimated?" Yao Shen asks, slightly offended that they would even consider that a possibility for him.

Xin Hulei's lips curl with a barely there smile. "Sometimes yes, sometimes no...depends."

Great, one of his terrible non-answers as usual, but what else can Yao Shen expect from a guy who picks names like "Jincan" and "Heimao"?

Xin Hulei might just be the most interesting boring person he has ever met -- which is a really confusing thing to think, and it's giving Yao Shen a mild headache.

The waiter continues to test Yao Shen for several other creatures he could be, without much success. 

Yao Shen allows this to go on, because he's 100% sure he's a human, besides, this might help him gain Xin Hulei's trust -- a necessary step if he wants to find his spirit stone and capture him.

"He's not an animal spirit either," the waiter announces after mixing a drop of Xin Hulei's blood with several different coloured liquids. "We can test for plant spirit next."

Yao Shen lets out a groan and lets himself slump in the chair. "This is so boring, didn't you say I might even enjoy myself? Right now I'm just bored out of my mind," he says, fixing Xin Hulei with an accusing stare.

Without a word, Xin Hulei gets up and walks around towards Yao Shen, nodding at the waiter to step away. "We can go straight to the main event, if you want," he says.

He takes a long copper knife and draws the blade across the thin skin of his inner wrist. A thin stream of vivid red blood drips from the wound, momentarily mesmerizing.

Xin Hulei brings his wrist towards Yao Shen's lips. "Drink," he says.

Yao Shen recoils, looking wide-eyed up at Xin Hulei. "I'm not going to drink your blood."

The waiter looks frantically between the two of them, his thin lips drawn in consternation. "Perhaps I can do it? His Majesty shouldn't spill his own precious blood so carelessly."

Why does he have to drink someone's blood? What is this?

Are all Supernatural beings this weird, or is it a special talent Xin Hulei and everyone associated with him has?

With sigh, Yao Shen pulls Xin Hulei's wrist towards his lips and licks gently around the seam of the open wound, lapping up a few drops of blood. It tastes coppery on his tongue, pretty much like normal human blood would.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, staining it with a streak of red, and gives Xin Hulei an unimpressed look. "See? No extra eyes, horns, or feathers."

Xin Hulei smirks, like an invisible hook attaches to the corner of his upper lip and pulls it up, completely disassociated from the rest of his stony features. "Demon blood is an aphrodisiac for ghosts."

Yao Shen goes completely still.

Before he can panic further, Xin Hulei adds, "It's completely harmless to humans, so if what you say is true, then you have nothing to fear." He drums the fingers of one hand on the table top, his chin balanced on the open palm of the other. "If you're lying, things might just get interesting enough for you to stop complaining."