Shang Qinghua sighs. “I would like to escape fucking dick-measuring contests someday.” You know what both cultivators and demons love to do? Assess your capabilities, mostly through combat! “Have you considered being normal and like, saying ‘stop groveling it’s annoying’? No?” He does stow Kao Ci back in its sheath, though, less as a measure of trust and more as an attempt to maintain deescalation. After all, he can always get it back out, or hit the asshole with a blast of spiritual energy from his hands to buy time, if he really needed to.