( Listening to Shen Qingqiu is ah, somewhat familiar to some things. Sometimes you have to push someone away, but not for... not precisely those reasons, in the echo he feels. Hard as it is to judge Shen Qingqiu's true age, what with cultivation being as it is, he's not so sure he's terribly much older or younger than he is.

Then again, he has a sixteen year missing gap, and still counts himself as beyond that, his uninterrupted age, given the strangeness of his circumstances. )

Shifus don't stop being shifus just because a potential's reached. A master for life, ah? One who didn't formally make him leave, and didn't want to in the first place, and pushed him to do what he needed to fulfill his potential. Right?

( He rests a hand on his flute, tossing his other hand up, palm open. )

Are you that eager to cast his ties to you away, just because he's achieved what he has?

( Honestly, he doesn't get it. He, who took no disciples, and doesn't really plan to change that, but who was shixiong to the man in Lotus Pier before and after its fall... well. The ties that bind don't snap without reason. He's failing to see the reason here, unless the salacious nature of the novel is involved? But that, that's rumour, and it doesn't fit what little he's seen. Unless Shen Qingqiu is the lover scorned?

... Nah, still doesn't fit! )