pluviosa | [Open] I'm On A Boat

[Open] I'm On A Boat

Who: Casper and ???
What: Boat shenanigans! Digging! Trees!
Where: Several locations
When: Day 3-4ish
Warnings: One prompt has a dead body, one thread is getting into some serious/dark subjects.

Jungle Cruise

[Casper does not have many weapons - certainly not the kinds of powerful magical options other people on the ship have. But he's not out of all options. He heads down towards the bottom of the ship - or at least what he can reach. Deck 9 is about it, so he starts there.]

[The water is a problem. The water might be too much of a problem for him to handle - so he freezes it. At least a good chunk around him is frozen, so anyone coming down there might need to be careful not to slip. That done, he starts digging. He doesn't have a shovel or any tools so it's just him pushing at dirt trying to find some kind of bottom.]

[This is probably not going to work. Come either mock him or help him?] (See next prompt.)

Kill it with Fire

[Casper has been digging and he absolutely does not like what he's found. He's read enough horror books and seen enough horror movies to know that letting this thing spread is an incredibly bad idea. He keeps looking around for anyone, covered in dirt and mud and probably other things with his hair all wild.]

Do you have fire magic? Or the ability to make a fire that's really hot?

[He needs a hand, because a campfire is not going to do it. He needs extremely high temperatures in an extremely controlled environment.]

On the Treetops

[He likes to be up high. Some of these trees are gigantic so he's having fun climbing them. It's very much an easy thing for him - he's just scrambling up them and jumping from tree to tree. He's making a lot of noise though so he might be being too disruptive. Either way he's having fun and it's not like there's a whole crowd to bother.]

[Occasionally he rests, and stares out at the barren wasteland around them. What could be out there? He wants to know, but he also doesn't want to die again.]

Night Sky

[Casper is enjoying himself just chilling out on the deck at night. There are no constellations that he's familiar with, so he starts making up new ones.]

That one's the Cat. That one's the Rabbit. ... Maybe that spot on the moon is the Monkey? It's definitely not the Bunny.

[He's mostly talking to himself - Bob is asleep in his hoodie pocket - but he'd welcome company, if you'd like.]

[Wildcard]

[Got another idea? Either grab me on Discord (artematthew) or Plurk (

atrypical).]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"To be fair, food is good..." He chuckles and rubs the other's back gently. Eventually he does pull his head away and leans against Shang Qinghua. "... You should... um. Know. That I have a problem with... um. Sea life? Especially crabs. A - and I'm bad around guns. So if that happens... please help me? I don't..."

How to even explain this? "It feels like I go... far away where everything is muffled. So I'll need... you or someone else to snap me out of it." Usually he gets snapped out of it by being hit, but he'd like to avoid that.

Shang Qinghua absently rubs his thumb over the back of Casper's neck after he pulls away. "So like... trauma? I... do you know what helps? Should I touch you, or not touch you, or... Say your name or something?"

"I'm not... sure." He thinks it over for a minute before sighing. "Though touching me is probably... bad. I might hurt you. My reflexes... they're tuned for battle, so if I see 'sudden' movement it might not... yeah."

He doesn't want to talk about it, but he knows he needs to for Shang Qinghua's safety as well as... everyone else's.

"Sorry... I just... I don't want you to get hurt. I just... I don't know what the 'right' thing to do is? Because no one's really... tried... I guess..."

“I’ll… try and figure it out, then. And I’ll be careful, but… I’m pretty durable, it’s not that big a deal if you end up hitting me. And it’s not like you’d be doing it on purpose.” Unlike like, anyone else who has ever hit him.

He kisses Casper’s cheek. “We’ll figure it out. I’m… not exactly trained for anything, but… I have trial and error, and I care about you? So that’s? Maybe something? And I can—I can make sure other people know to hang back and not startle you until you’re back. Unless you want me to offer you a plant that’s supposed to help cure heart demons, I guess, I think I have that in my cures bag, but your shit is so different it probably wouldn’t do anything.”

He blushes slightly at the kiss. "It's something. But I don't know that it'd help. It's more of a mental health thing? Not like a... 'being possessed' thing. ... Which I known too much about since I'm basically possessing myself from afar."

He trusts Shang Qinghua. It's... scary to expose himself to this level of hurt, but...

“Oh, heart demons are basically just like, xianxia mental health problems. They can fuck up your cultivation and you get qi deviations if you’re too anxious or traumatized or self-loathing or angry or despairing or whatever. Multiple of my martial siblings have issues with heart demons, it’s a whole thing, Liu Qingge nearly died of a qi deviation from pushing himself too hard, Shen Qingqiu did die of a qi deviation and was replaced by Cucumber-bro which is honestly sort of creepy like at least I replaced Shang Qinghua at birth no one has ever known a different one but like Yue Qingyuan has to deal with this guy wearing his childhood beloved’s face with none of his memories and I’m shocked he hasn’t had a qi deviation from his Xiao Jiu not knowing him, I mean the rest of the sect doesn’t know their whole traumatic child slave backstory and even Cucumber-bro doesn’t because it didn’t make it into the novel but. Yeah. Um. My point is xianxia treatments for trauma are sort of stupid, I guess, it’s mostly magic plants and meditation. I have no idea if I count as possessing this body?” Whoops it’s rambling time!

He puts a hand on top of the other's head. "... No, I mean. Um. My soul's in Bob. I don't really tell people, but..."

It's a very scary thing to admit to someone! But he has to trust someone he's in love with. Right?

Bob squawks down at Casper - stop talking about this! You've known him less than a week! But Casper turns to look at him and glares. "Okay, but I trust him. And don't - I know you're going to call me an idiot but I always am, so what else is new?"

Shang Qinghua turns to look at Bob. "I hope you're taking good care of that. I know I'm not... much of anything... but I wouldn't-- I won't do anything to hurt Casper."

Turning back to Casper, he... he doesn't know what to do with apparently unprecedented trust. "I, um. Thank you? For trusting me? I'll try to be... worth it?" He doesn't know how he possibly can be, with what he is, but Casper likes him this much, so... he guesses they'll both find out what his best looks like. "Um. For what it's worth, you're... the first person I told I was a transmigrator, and the only one I've told that I'm... the author. And-- and I don't think you're an idiot."

Edited (smol addition) 2024-03-03 04:40 (UTC)

Bob just glares at Shang Qinghua. Of course he is!

Casper smiles and ruffles the other's hair gently. "I appreciate you telling me. ... And not thinking I'm an idiot." He gives the other another peck on his forehead before staring up at the trees. "Normally I like abandoned buildings - in pictures, at least - but this place just feels... sad. There's no life but us and the plant growth." And the Ship, he supposes.

He has been rewarded with a forehead kiss. Shang Qinghua tries not to blush about it and maybe succeeds.

“There are so many things that are cooler in pictures or in books than that are in real life.” An extremely rueful admission on his part. “The lack of animals is definitely weird and unsettling, but I’m also glad for the lack of fucked up monsters, at least so far? I wrote about… a lot of monsters, and they’re everywhere. And half of them are plot devices.” He flushes. A large number of plot devices exist solely to facilitate papapa, whether that’s aphrodisiacs or poisons that can be cured by papapa or poisons that can only be cured by going on a quest for some rare thousand-year snow lotus or whatever and then the poisoned girl has grateful papapa with Bing-ge and joins his harem.

“But, um. Yeah. It’s… I really want to know what happened to the people. Especially if it might happen to us. It’s all sort of… ominous.”

"The legends are always better than living it, yeah." He's also glad for the lack of monsters, but he's used to it. "And I... well." He looks a little uncomfortable for a moment. "I... did see... what happened to one of the people."

He doesn't want to kill the mood, but... he's got to be honest.

Oh, that's not a great look on Casper's face. "That sounds... not great. Are they... do you think whatever it is will happen to us? Do you... want to talk about it?"

"I saw someone running away from something in the halls. There were plants but not as bad as it is now. The person put up their arm to defend themselves and there were buds on their skin. I'm not sure what actually killed them because I had to stop the vision - it felt like I had a ton of sand shoved straight into my eyes." His eyes water a little just thinking about it, and he wipes his face.

"The body I found was pretty decayed but still recognizable - like those bog bodies they find sometimes? I think someone dumped the body - I felt like I was falling after the death happened. And whatever was on that body? It still was growing once it got exposed to some light. Maybe five or so inches - uh. That's like tw... elve centimeters?" He's trying to do the math. He is not great at math. "And so I got someone to uh. Set it on fire. Not hot enough to cremate but hot enough to kill off whatever plant growth was there."

He pauses, then realizes he didn't explain something vital. "If I look into a corpse's eyes I can see a few minutes before and after they die."

Shang Qinghua actually just kind of stands there blinking until he finishes that recitation, because. Well. Okay. Wow. How did he see, okay, that's how, and. Arm plants. "That. Uh. I am automatically wary of plants in general, but now I am... extra wary of these ones! I would really rather not be colonized by plants. Burning that sounds like a great plan, let's not... spread person-invading plants." He gives a wary look to a nearby fern. "I want to go to sleep near this shit even less than I already did when I was only afraid of-- uh. You know what, you might as well know. I was a sellout porn author and Proud Immortal Demon Way was full of stupid excuses for sex scenes, which means the world is full of just so many goddamn aphrodisiacs, a lot of which are plants, and sometimes there are plants that try to breed you, and. Um. Anyway, I don't want to know exactly how the plants here colonize people, is my point. Because I was already afraid of them wanting to be... inside me. In some way. Uh." His face is bright red. It was different before, Cucumber-bro knew what he was like, he'd read the damn webnovel, paid for it and everything, but Casper... does not know what an embarrassment he is, and he probably should.

He listens to the other admit that and... shrugs. "Look, I don't care whatever wacky sex stuff people get into as long as no one gets hurt. And it's not like you knew anyone would get hurt when you wrote that." He's been on the internet, he's seen some Things. Probably not as much as Shang Qinghua, but still.

"You... I'm glad you don't seem to find me freaky or something for all of that..."

"Freaky? For... oh, for being able to see the death? Eh, people do stuff. It's not that weird. Just, like--I'm used to everybody being weird magic? So you're weird magic too and it's fine? And we're both immortal and we've both died and it's. Normal? You like, see moments of death or whatever, which is more useful than my lore knowledge of a setting I'm not in anymore. I'm not like, special for a cultivator, other than being the author. But you're special. Um." Yeah he lost track of his point again. "You're fine. And you don't... think I'm... think less of me for... writing what I did? Um. I know I'm not... Cucumber-bro has called me sleazy at least once, and you're all clean-cut heroics and... yeah. And you're--I don't even know how old you are, actually? Am I a creepy old man? Am I just completely skewed by the cultural norms of xianxia stallion novel, I don't know..."

"You're special to me..." He smiles a little shyly at the other, to the point where he almost misses the other. "And... uh." He has to think for a moment. "It's the beginning of spring now at home - Marchish? So I'm nineteen."

... "I guess that... that really is a lot older than me..." Is it creepy? Maybe? He's not sure. "But you look and act like you're near my age, so..."

He colours at the admittedly corny but incredibly sweet line.

"I was like, 23 I think when I died? So if you don't like, count my fictional second life... I don't know. I mean, I do still look twenty. No one like... cares about age differences in the book... But I've been living as Shang Qinghua--well, and, like, the kid who would become Shang Qinghua--for like, sixty years or something I dunno I stopped keeping track because no one cares once you're immortal. I don't want to be taking advantage of you?" He's visibly guilty, thinking about it. "You just... you're so nice and I like you so much and... I don't want to... be weird? I don't know. I just want you to be happy."

Part of him wants to say 'it's fine, I'm used to being taken advantage of'. But that's not - that's not what's happening here, he's pretty sure. "I just... I want you to be happy, too. And maybe it's weird but... I mean, I don't mind? It's not like you're running around like an old man spouting off your age."

He holds the other's hand gently. "You're important to me, even though we... haven't known each other long. I just... you're special. And not in like, the condescending way or even the superpowers way. You're just... special."

Airplane stares down at their joined hands, his with its ridiculous smooth cultivator skin and Casper's with more ordinary human callouses. He really... he's not a good enough person to try and rest on some kind of principle he only even vaguely grasps here, when Casper is saying things like that.

"You're important to me too. And special for non-powers reasons. You're... I'm not a poet, you're just fucking great." He tilts his head back up to look at Casper, cheeks pink. "Um. Do you want... would you... kiss me?"

"You're a writer, close enough." He chuckles at the question and leans in to press a soft kiss to the other's lips. It's brief and gentle and he pulls back, wrapping an arm around the other's shoulders. "You're amazing."

It's weird. He should be terrified of all of this... but he's not. He's just glad that he's here with Shang Qinghua. It's hard to even believe that someone would care about him like this, but... it's nice.

He leans against Casper. "I'm certainly lucky you think I am. Sort of... unbelievably lucky, honestly, after the kind of bad luck it was to end up having to be Shang Qinghua. I didn't think I could have good luck. But meeting you here was... very lucky."

"... Given my life I wasn't sure I could be lucky either. But you make me feel lucky and happy." He kisses the other man's jaw, letting out a slow breath. "Man, you wrote yourself being gorgeous. Though it'd be nice to know... the you from before, too." Not that he's not happy! He just... really wants to know the other.

He is absolutely melting from the affection. "I-- wasn't much to write home about. Weedy little NEET, like I said. I'm not even that much to write home about as far as cultivators go, it's just that everyone in the webnovel is so beautiful that average looks like this. I--" He bites his lip. "Shang Beida. Was my name, before." He's never told anyone that, not even Cucumber-bro knows. It's... he tries not to think, usually, about the dissonance between who he is and who he's been forced to be, but being able to be so honest with Casper is making the seams show more than he's used to.

"I mean I... was kind of the same. Still am. Skinny nerd... weird hair, and at school I'd always smell like the funeral home." But he listens and nods, stroking the other's hair. "... Which would you prefer I call you?"

Look, he understands people change their names sometimes. He's not fully sure why at times but it'd be rude to not call them what they want to be called.

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