The Dragon sees a nipple slip [+16]

tw: (very) mild sexual content and (slight) dubious consent

The forest doesn't get any less dreary as they walk through it, but at least Wu Yun is no longer hearing voices. He's still on edge, afraid they'll start up again at any moment

Lan Tian is a comforting presence by his side. He sticks close to him, their shoulders bumping together with each step.

"I have no idea how we're going to get out of here," Wu Yun admits with a defeated sigh. "We can't even be sure if whoever created this secret dimension is still here."

"Maybe Wan Mi will have some idea about how we can get out, when we find her." Lan Tian keeps his voice even and steady, but Wu Yun can tell by the tight line of his lips that he's apprehensive.

They keep walking. Wu Yun feels as if he has done nothing else for the past years. It's as if he's been stuck inside this secret dimension since the beginning of time.

"Why do you think this was even created?" Wu Yun asks, motioning to yet another tree.

"I think it's purpose is to torture whoever wanders inside it," Lan Tian says, kicking at a rock in his path with particular strength.

He's about to expand further on his thoughts when he feels a soft touch along his neck. He flinches in surprise, but when he turns to Wu Yun he's motionless at his side.

"What?" From the distress in Lan Tian's eyes, he fears that he might be hearing things too. "Did you hear any voices?"

"No, it must have been a bug." Lan Tian blinks, trying to get the odd sensation out of his mind.

When he opens them again, Wu Yun isn't at his side anymore, but lying on the ground, over a white blanket with his robes half undone, and breaking open the spindly shell of a soft white fruit.

He examines the white fruit, before popping it into his mouth. He licks the translucent juice from his fingers, as if he's never had anything so delicious in his life.

He turns to Lan Tian with a sly smile and offers him an already peeled fruit. "Do you want a lychee?"

Lan Tian is still trying to process how Wu Yun could be standing next to him one second and then lying on a blanket the next, but his mind is stuck replaying the scene of him wrapping his plush lips around his own fingers.

"How did you get there? Where did the fruits come from? You shouldn't eat that," he says, trying hard to focus on what matters in this entire, bizarre, scenario.

"You were in a daze for a while, and I was thinking how hungry I was, and these fruits appeared." He gives Lan Tian a dazzling smile, showing both his sharp canines. "Why waste it? Come here."

Lan Tian wants to protest but his feet move beyond his command. They carry him to the blanket, and his knees buckle once he's next to Wu Yun. He tries to get back up again, but his legs won't move.

Wu Yun splays himself over his body, until Lan Tian is sitting down on the blanket. His robe is slipping off one shoulder, and the shadow of his collarbone is stark against his soft skin. Lan Tian can't take his eyes away from that bare sliver of skin. The sight makes his heart pump faster, and his mouth run dry. He's seen Wu Yun completely naked, bathed with him often, he doesn't understand why that tiny bit of skin is having such an effect on him.

The worst part is that he doesn't think it has anything to do with the compulsion, but the result of his own treacherous body.

He tears his eyes away from Wu Yun, looks instead at an unremarkable patch of grass.

It isn't long until he feels slim fingers touching his jaw and making him turn around.

"Why aren't you looking at me? Don't you like what you see?" Wu Yun's lips are turned down in a moue of consternation.

He's on all fours, holding himself over the lower half of Lan Tian's body with one hand in the blanket and the other on his face. The robe has slipped completely off his shoulder. Lan Tian's eyes are drawn to his small pink nipple. His mouth is so dry that his throat clicks when he swallows.

Wu Yun notices him looking. He leans back on his knees, and pulls up his robes over his thighs, exposing them. He takes another peeled lychee from the pile, and bites into it with the tip of his canine. The white fruit explodes on his lips, and the juices trickle down his chin, trailing a clear path down his chest, and over the peak of his nipple.

"If you don't want the fruit, maybe you'd rather drink the juice?" Wu Yun asks, throwing back his sleek ponytail. His tone is leading, and leaves no room for misinterpretation.

Lan Tian shakes his head, trying to clear it. Wu Yun would never do this. He has shown no interest in Lan Tian in this way, why would he suddenly be acting in such a suggestive manner.

"This is not real, you're not Wu Yun," he says, closing his eyes.

Wu Yun's hand wraps around his fingers, and Lan Tian is powerless to free himself from his grip. His eyes remain closed, but he feels it when his fingers touch Wu Yun's smooth chest, and when he drags them lower, over the raised peak of his nipple.

"Doesn't this feel real to you?" Wu Yun asks, voice sweet as honey.

The worst part is that it does feel real, but Lan Tian can't allow himself to be pulled into whatever cruel illusion this is. His urge to give in, and indulge in what is clearly being offered fights with his knowledge that this isn't the person he wants it from, it's just borrowing his face. Worse yet, if this is really Wu Yun, he isn't acting of his own volition and Lan Tian would never forgive himself for doing something Wu Yun didn't welcome.

It takes all of his strength, but he manages to pull his hand away. His body still doesn't obey him fully, but at least his mind is still his own.

He looks at Wu Yun, at his inviting smile and bared skin and steels his resolve. "You might look like him, but you're not my Wu Yun."

The sly smile remains on Wu Yun's lips but for just a second he seems to flicker, become less substantial. "It's me. Can't you see?"

He slips the robes off his other shoulder, and they pool around his waist, but that second of flickering allowed Lan Tian to see through the illusion. He can now see all the ways in which this isn't really Wu Yun. His hair is too slick and neatly combed, his skin shines with an unnatural glow, and his eyes are lit up with a manic glint.

His next words are full of conviction. "You're not my Wu Yun."

The false Wu Yun flickers once again, like a reflection in a foggy mirror, coming in and out of existence, but he doesn't seem to notice, just continues smiling, as if any minute now Lan Tian will give in.

He hears a voice then, calling to him. "Wake up, please wake up."

Lan Tian feels the phantom touch of fingers against his cheek, and knows the real Wu Yun is waiting for him somewhere else.

He focuses on the sound of that voice, and concentrates on waking up from whatever illusion he fell into.

The entire scene around him flickers in and out of existence, one minute the false Wu Yun is there, the next he's gone. He closes his eyes and concentrates of the thread of Wu Yun's voice, on the gentle phantom touches against his skin.

He feels a swooping sensation in the pit of his stomach, as if he's falling from a very high altitude.

When he opens his eyes again he meets Wu Yun's worried gaze, looking down at him.

He lifts his head with a groan and realizes he was lying on Wu Yun's lap.

"I thought you were never going to wake up," Wu Yun says, sighing in relief. "One minute you were fine, the next you fell to the ground in a dead faint."

"I'm awake now."

Lan Tian looks at Wu Yun's face, taking in every detail that makes him real, every little imperfection that only adds to his beauty.

"What happened? Your eyelids were moving, and you made noises sometimes."

"Something I wanted, but in the worst way possible."

Wu Yun gives him an indignant look. "That doesn't explain anything! Come on, tell me."

"I think it means whoever created this dimension wanted the two of you idiots to walk right into it."

Both Wu Yun and Lan Tian look up from their positions on the grass only to meet Bai Xiaoli's long-suffering glare, and Wan Mi's smug smirk.

Wu Yun gets up from the grass and pats down the creases in his robes. "Thanks for, uh, saving me, back in Liucun."

He's disappointed to find that, thanking someone hasn't become any less awkward in the time he spent in the secret dimension.

"To be fair, I almost killed you while doing it," she says with a shrug.

She has a point. Oddly, it makes Wu Yun feel much better about his paltry expression of gratitude.

"How did you find us?" Lan Tian asks.

Bai Xiaoli pats Wan Mi's head, and says, in her best inappropriate scholar from Liucun voice: "The young heroes' little daughter is really smart! If it wasn't for her I think they would both die here."

Wan Mi slaps her hand away from her head and shoots her a glare. "I should have prayed to another god."

Bai Xiaoli snorts. "Would another god have come?"

Wan Mi grumbles some more, and then finally tells Wu Yun and Lan Tian that she could see them the whole time.

She saw them both start acting as if they couldn't see each other, and her, then she followed Wu Yun to the lake, saw him struggle with the skeleton, and when Lan Tian showed up followed the two of them.

"I tried screaming, throwing stuff at you, punching you, but nothing worked, you just couldn't see me." She kicks at the ground with a forlorn expression, Wu Yun reckons she must have hated being ignored.

"That's when I remembered Bai Xiaoli said we could pray to her when we needed her help, so I carved her name on a trunk, made an offering, and she came."

"An offering of exactly three walnuts and a chestnut. I don't get many prayers, but even so, that was one of the worst in recent memory."

"Can you get us out of here?" In any other circumstance, he would love nothing more than to join Bai Xiaoli in making fun of Wan Mi, but he really can't wait to get out this horrible forest. If he sees another tree in the near future, he'll be tempted to set it on fire.

"Wan Mi was kind enough to mention your predicament, so I came prepared," she says, taking out a stack of talismans with weird characters and symbols drawn on them out of her loose sleeve. "Teleportation arrays, it will be faster and safer than me using my powers to teleport you out of here one at a time."

Now that Wu Yun looks at her, he notices that Bai Xiaoli looks different than she did in Liucun. Her clothes are much finer and delicate than the rough scholar grab she used to wear. Her hair falls in a smooth curtain around her face, and she's wearing a silver hair ornament that runs down from the pin crown securing the top-half of her hair, all the way down to her forehead. She looks much more like a goddess, but unlike Xie Xiu's air of ethereal grace, Bai Xiaoli seems almost encumbered by the trappings of godhood.

"Do you know who wanted to trap us here?" Lan Tian asks.

"From what Wan Mi described, and what I can sense from being here, a god created this realm and purposefully drew you here, and they were targeting only the two of you," she says pointing with her thumb at Lan Tian and nodding at Wu Yun.