QT: Don't fall in love with the Male Lead

Xi Zirui drops his guard, inching closer to Li Siqi despite himself.

It would make sense that another person, bound by the constraints of Fate would also be dissatisfied. It stands to reason that Xi Zirui wouldn't be the only one.

He's momentarily worried about all the times he pushed the two of them together in the other worlds, and of what that might mean.

Li Siqi leans against a nearby table, sighing despondently. Xi Zirui takes a seat on the table, balancing his feet on the chair below.

Li Siqi shoots him a reproachful look, but he only asks, "Why don't you want to go home?"

He expects to hear a tale o star crossed love where Li Siqi tearfully admits nurturing feelings for someone else.

Instead, she says, "because I'm not wanted there," while fiddling with the hem of her billowing sleeves.

Xi Zirui bites his tongue to refrain from calling her an idiot.

He should have known that it was naive to expect that Li Siqi and Liao Min wouldn't be as obnoxiously clueless in the heavenly realm as they were in the alternate realms.

"What gives you that impression?" he asks, through gritted teeth.

Li Siqi shrugs in a poor attempt to look nonchalant when in fact she's deeply upset about it. "I heard Liao Min say as much."

Xi Zirui sincerely doubts that. The most likely explanation is that she overheard Liao Min commenting with someone that she was nervous to start a life with Li Siqi and she took that to mean that she hated her or something.

"What did she say, exactly?" Xi Zirui asks, already imagining this will be an easy misunderstanding to clear up.

"I wanted to surprise her at the martial hall, and overheard her talking with another martial god, about how much of a nuisance I was, and how she didn't want to talk with me."

Xi Zirui grows silent.

That does sound bad.

But he's not ready to give up yet. "Did she say your name? Is it possible she could have been talking about someone else?"

Li Siqi throws him a dirty look. "I know what I heard." 

She doesn't look interested in talking with him anymore and steps away from the table. "Organize the scrolls if you still want to make yourself useful," she says, over his shoulder.

Xi Zirui glares at the shelves in front of him, wondering if he bit more than he can chew.

---

Li Siqi fumes all the way down to the lower floor, still clutching the ream of scrolls protectively against his chest.

She can't stand the idea of that Xi Zirui, who barely knows her, questioning her with such a judgmental tone.

As if Li Siqi is an idiot who hears things wrong and gets her feelings hurt over nothing.

In all fairness, he's likely not the only person to have that impression about her.

She has always been regarded as a mousy, neurotic, stickler for rules. A higher goddess who behaves like a minor one, with how much she keeps her nose buried in the work all other gods would rather hand off to minor god underlings.

Because caring too much about the work that needs to be done should be below a higher god's attention. A higher god should live in a constant state of meditation and communion with the cosmos, unperturbed by trivial affairs. 

Li Siqi happens to like the trivialities of her post as civil goddess. 

Some mortals in the present pray to pass their civil servant examination (even though some feel guilty about this useless superstitious belief) while others, hundreds of years in the past, pray to pass the imperial civil service examinations -- is it so wrong for Li Siqi to see a beautiful symmetry in it? 

To take pride in her role as goddess? To see herself as civil servant of humanity, in a way, and take that role seriously?

In Li Siqi's opinion, many gods have forgotten it's not only the mortals who need them, but they who need the mortals as well.

She knows her views earn her the scorn of a few and the ridicule of many.

Which is why it came as a surprise to everyone when the Book of Fates, which had previously only detailed a brief summary of her administrative duties, suddenly revealed a new entry, detailing her marriage to the martial goddess, Liao Min.

Li Siqi has always been shy, and was fine with the idea of remaining unmarried. It's not as if the Book of Fates goes around pairing everyone like a human matchmaking service.

So, it came as a great shock to her that she was to be married, and to such a formidable goddess no less. 

Liao Min is one of the most respected martial gods. Humans often pray to her, requesting help in battles big and small in the past, fortitude in the present to go ahead with a business venture or ask for a promotion, and again for aid in far flung battles in the future.

Often, Liao Min will go in person to assist her worshipers and lend them her strength. Although she only shows herself to the most virtuous.

Li Siqi admires her dedication, she thinks that in their ways, they have a lot of common in this regard.

Which is why she warmed up to the idea of the marriage fairly quick, growing bashful about it even.

At first, she was under the impression that if Liao Min wasn't excited about the idea, she wasn't upset about it either. She treated Li Siqi cordially and didn't delay in making their living arrangements.

Everything was progressing at the expected pace -- Li Siqi really felt like the two of them were growing closer and establishing a connection -- until the day she decided to pay Liao Min a visit at the hall of martial strength.

Maybe it was karma, for entertaining such romantic notions, that made her overhear Liao Min complaining about her to a colleague just as she was about to announce her presence and tell Liao Min she had brought lunch for the two of them to share.

Try as she might, Li Siqi can't forget Liao Min's words:

"She isn't easy, very quiet and introspective. Sometimes, I'm afraid of talking to her, so I just stay silent."

Her careless words cut Li Siqi to the quick.

In such few words Liao Min had managed to lay bare all of Li Siqi's insecurities.

She's aware that she's awkward, that others find it hard to talk with her. She knows that she too dull and unpleasant for anyone to look forward to her company.

But as much as she knows the other gods think those things about her, she has never heard any of them voice it.

It's unbearable that her wife would be the first.

After that day she avoided Liao Min whenever possible, burying herself even more deeply in her work, staying out of the house whenever she knew Liao Min would be there.

It's better that way.

The Book of Fates might have bound them together, but it never said they should love each other, or even appreciate each other's company.

Li Siqi lowers the scrolls in her arms onto a table in a quiet corner and prepares to devote herself to her work again.

Work, at least, doesn't judge her.

---

It takes Xi Zirui hours to organize the scrolls according to Li Siqi's specifications, and he still isn't sure he did it right by the time he considers the task somewhat done.

He thinks he has probably convincingly sold the idea that he was sent to the civil bureau as punishment. Well enough perhaps, to try his luck with Li Siqi again.

If he can't use the Liao Min angle, maybe he can ferret information out of her using other means.

He's searching for her in the lower level when the clink of armor draws his attention.

Liao Min is making her way towards him with hurried steps and an anxious expression.

"So?" she asks, her  voice lowered. "I've been waiting at home, but she still hasn't arrived. Did you talk with her?"

Xi Zirui looks around at the other gods working silently around them and pulls Liao Min into a quiet cranny between two perpendicular shelves.

"Why is Li Siqi under the impression that you don't like her?" he asks, his tone more accusing than he originally intended.

Liao Min blinks at him twice in quick succession. "I have no idea? I've always been cordial to her."

Xi Zirui sighs. He has his own problems, he can't be here wasting time playing marriage counselor.

Li Siqi and Liao Min are always trouble. Even retroactively.

"She mentioned something about overhearing a conversation between you and another martial god about how she was a nuisance and you didn't want to talk with her."

At first, Liao Min looks utterly confused, as if this is the first time she's hearing anything about it, but then her confusion clears and she looks horrified instead.

"I think this might be an awful misunderstanding," she says, paler than bone china.

Xi Zirui groans, muttering under his breath. "It usually is with the two of you."

"What am I going to do?" Liao Min asks, her tone verging on despair.

Xi Zirui considers the techniques he has used to win over Han Yu in all the worlds he was playing hard to get.

With a grave expression, he clasps Liao Min by the shoulder and looks her in the eye. "I think I have an idea."