#it was my turn to make a jin ling's uncle joke | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

twistedappletree · 10 months

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TYPE: One-shot

JURISDICTION: It’s fluffy with a dash of light angst, your honor.

PAIRING: Jin Ling/Lan Sizhui (+ implied SangCheng)

SIDE CHARACTERS: Lan Jingyi, Ouyang Zizhen, Lan Wangji, Lan Xichen, Jiang Cheng, Nie Huaisang, Fairy

ELEMENTS: Hurt/comfort, drunken shenanigans, Lanling setting, canon universe, crush/light romance, gift-giving, tiny homage to wangxian at the end, Jin Ling being a worried little cutie who just wants to see Lan Sizhui smile~

{ Title inspired by ‘Love You (When You’re a Mess)’ by Jadudah }

•

Jin Ling wanted to go to him more than anything but the Lan brothers were too potent of a deterrent, even for his fiery, confrontational nature.

All he could do was watch Lan Sizhui listlessly trail behind his seniors like a ghost among the living. Seeing him this way was jarring compared to his usual bright, warm and present self—the Lan Sizhui with a smile made of light, the Lan Sizhui with every color of the world in his eyes.

•

In which Lan Sizhui is sad, Jin Ling drunkenly climbs a wall to make him feel better and both are left with a sweet reminder of each other’s affection.

{ AO3 }

🍁

The vibrant red maples of Jinlintai set fire to a spacious courtyard lined with modest archery targets, their vermillion bullseyes glowing in the morning light.

A single arrow pierced the quiet air, pinning a fluttering maple leaf at one of the target’s centers. Jin Ling lowered his bow as a blur of grey and white fur excitedly circled around his feet. He stared down at his spiritual dog, Fairy, and rolled his eyes at her enthusiasm.

“Really?” he asked, raising a disapproving brow. “Your standards are way too low. Just wait until I land a triple.”

Before he could ready his bow again, the peace of his morning training was interrupted by the soft voice of a timid servant.

“Young Master Jin,” the servant politely addressed, her head bowed and eyes downcast. “The boats have arrived.”

Jin Ling straightened and quickly secured his bow over his chest. He didn’t bother to recollect his arrows and zipped out of the courtyard like lightning, Fairy happily bounding after him and clearly under the impression that they were playing chase.

The Jin clan was hosting a sect meeting at Jinlintai today. It was the first time in weeks that Jin Ling would be seeing his friends again, and though he often found these meetings to be excruciatingly boring, the presence of his fellow disciples was enough to make them endurable.

He winded through halls and rushed past more servants before finally arriving in the main hall. His uncle, Sect Leader Jiang Cheng, was already seated and conversing with Nie Huaisang of the Nie clan.

They didn’t seem to notice him as he stealthily slipped closer to the entrance and found exactly what he was looking for.

Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen had already discovered each other among the crowd and were laughing playfully at each other’s jokes. Not wanting to appear eager, Jin Ling calmly approached them with a feigned apathetic look. “Already messing around, huh?”

Ouyang Zizhen turned towards him with a wide grin and Lan Jingyi flashed an impish smile. “Young Mistress Jin!” he exclaimed, purposefully loud enough for everyone to hear.

“A-Ling!” Ouyang Zizhen countered, his tone far less teasing.

“Too busy to meet us at the docks or what?” Lan Jingyi chided, sounding mildly offended.

Jin Ling crossed his arms over his chest and nodded towards his bow. “I was training. Unlike some people, I’m always getting a head start.”

Lan Jingyi sneered. “Oh yeah? How about my foot gets a head start up your a—“

Ouyang Zizhen slapped a hand over the Lan disciple’s mouth before he could finish his threat and nervously gestured towards the entrance. Jin Ling and Lan Jingyi turned to see two tall, slender figures entering the main hall side by side.

The Twin Jades of Lan moved gracefully like living statues, their heads held high—one maintaining a gentle smile and the other preserving a tranquil emotionless stare, cold as ice.

Following behind them was Lan Sizhui and Jin Ling’s stomach fluttered so involuntarily that he almost punched himself in the gut. The sensation didn’t last long, however, because the more he observed the handsome Lan boy, the more he could tell that something about him was horribly off.

Lan Sizhui was visibly trembling in what seemed like pain, as though it took every ounce of his strength and focus to maintain his posture. He hadn’t noticed anyone or anything around him because his eyes refused to leave the floor.

Jin Ling’s heart dropped. “What’s wrong with Sizhui?” he asked, turning to Lan Jingyi for answers.

Lan Jingyi frowned, staring solemnly at his best friend across the room. “He’s under some sort of constant surveillance after getting punished for breaking the rules.”

Jin Ling was at a complete loss for words. Punished? Breaking rules? Lan Sizhui? “…What?”

“My reaction exactly,” said Lan Jingyi. “One day, everything was fine. The next, I found Sizhui in the courtyard kneeling in front of the Old Man while getting lashed with the whip. All I know is that he climbed over the wall at night but that’s it. He’s been banned from talking to anyone.”

All the blood seemed to drain from Jin Ling’s body at the thought of Lan Sizhui getting whipped. “Is he okay?”

“Why are you even concerned?” Lan Jingyi questioned. “If it were me who got lashed, you’d be holding a banquet right now.”

Jin Ling smirked approvingly and pointed his chin. “Finally, we agree on something.”

Lan Jingyi blew his bangs out of his face and crossed his arms. “Anyway, the cold springs in the Cloud Recesses can speed up the healing process of injuries,” he revealed, “but Sizhui never went.”

Jin Ling glanced at Lan Sizhui again, smirk fading as the dejected Lan boy stood behind Hanguang-Jun and Zewu-Jun who acted as both his cage and shield from the bustling surroundings. Jin Ling knew how much the Twin Jades of Lan cared for their core disciple and he wondered if his ‘punishment’ to stay under their supervision was actually a means to comfort him.

Lan Sizhui never looked so small before, with his gentle eyes downcast and his right hand bashfully holding his left forearm. Traces of pain from his injuries came in occasional shivers and squints and the way he squeezed his arm to ground himself.

Jin Ling wanted to go to him more than anything but the Lan brothers were too potent of a deterrent, even for his fiery, confrontational nature.

“You might have a chance to talk to him later, A-Ling.”

Jin Ling looked back at Ouyang Zizhen and frowned but appreciated his optimism.

A playful arm slung around his shoulders as Lan Jingyi started tugging him to their seats. “Come on, Young Mistress. Believe it or not, Sizhui’s in good hands and tougher than he looks. Less moping, more sneaking liquor in the meeting!”

Jin Ling rolled his eyes, shrugging off Lan Jingyi’s arm. “Whatever, lightweight.”

“Psh! I’m just not a boring drunk like you.”

“W-wait, are we really gonna drink alcohol?” Ouyang Zizhen asked innocently, genuine worry in his voice.

Lan Jingyi shot him a mischievous grin as they took their seats and waited for the meeting to start. “You’ll live.”

•

The meeting droned on for hours, the only saving grace from boredom being the food, drink and playful jests of the disciples.

Only sect heirs and core disciples were allowed to attend these meetings, and as Jin Ling watched Lan Jingyi slam his fourth cup of ‘<i>water</i>’ with half-lidded eyes and a shameless grin wide as a crescent moon, he genuinely wondered how the seniors of the GusuLan sect decided he belonged among their cream of the crop.

Ouyang Zizhen held his liquor surprisingly well, showing no signs of drunkenness beyond a pleasant buzz. He remained fairly quiet with a content expression and had zero issues expressing himself coherently.

Jin Ling was definitely drunk but his tolerance was far higher than Lan Jingyi’s. He hadn’t listened to a word in the meeting, instead focusing on Lan Sizhui who sat behind the Twin Jades with his head bowed and his hands limply folded in his lap. Though he was obviously awake, his eyes had been closed since the meeting started.

Anger flashed across Jin Ling’s face. He wanted to pluck a plum from the bowl at his table and chuck it at Lan Sizhui’s head, scream at him to snap out of it but his genuine worry for the other stopped him from doing anything rash and ridiculous.

He thought if he stared at the Lan boy long enough, he might feel it and look back. He tried repeating his name in his mind as if they could telepathically communicate. He fidgeted, made weird movements, occasionally cleared his throat a little too loud—nothing worked.

Jin Ling slumped back and sighed, bangs falling like a curtain over his defeated eyes. Are you banned from looking at people too? Jin Ling thought. What happened, Sizhui? Just tell me…

As quickly as Jin Ling lost himself in thought, the meeting finally came to an end and everyone began heading to their rooms for the night. His head shot up and scanned the shuffling hall but Hanguang-Jun, Zewu-Jun and Lan Sizhui had already disappeared.

Even Fairy trotted off sometime during the meeting, cleverly saving herself from the monotony.

Jin Ling spotted his uncle hurrying away somewhere with Nie Huaisang, which he found odd, but he didn’t complain. One less pair of watchful eyes was a blessing in his current state. He could feel gravity fail him as he struggled to his feet, not realizing just how much he’d drank while staring at Lan Sizhui.

Lan Jingyi draped one arm around Jin Ling’s shoulders and the other around Ouyang Zizhen’s. “C’mon, Mistress Jin, the night’s still young. Let’s hang out in Zizhen’s room.”

Not in the mood to fight him, Jin Ling wordlessly allowed himself to be dragged out of the hall with Lan Jingyi happily sandwiched between him and Ouyang Zizhen.

•

“They’ve got him locked in a room now?!”

Jin Ling angrily paced back and forth in front of a soused Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen.

Ouyang Zizhen was on cloud nine, fiddling with an orchid he’d snatched from the sect meeting and Lan Jingyi was impishly egging Jin Ling on by agreeing with his frustrations.

“It’s tyranny,” Lan Jingyi claimed. “They won’t even let us talk to him! I can’t imagine Sizhui of all people doing something so bad that he’s even banned from what… talking?!”

Jin Ling glowered. He still believed there was more to it, that the esteemed Twin Jades of Lan were secluding him for a different reason—possibly even at Lan Sizhui’s own request. He just wanted to know why.

“I’m gonna go talk to him,” he said, courage burning like a wildfire in his amber eyes.

Ouyang Zizhen looked up from his orchid and Lan Jingyi buzzed with inebriated excitement. “Oh, this is gonna be good,” he chimed, leaning forward with growing interest. “What’s the plan, then? Breaking in? Kidnapping?”

Jin Ling glared down at him, unamused by his childish imagination. “I said I’m gonna talk to him, not commit a crime. And why would I have to break into a room in my own sect?”

Ouyang Zizhen shook his head and frowned. “If you go to his room, you might get caught by Hanguang-Jun or Zewu-Jun. I swear they can see through walls.”

Lan Jingyi snorted. “No kidding.”

“Then do you have any better ideas or are you just gonna tell me what not to do?” Jin Ling bit back, the impatience in his voice cutting the air like a knife.

Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen shared a knowing glance before staring back up at him with ominous smiles. Jin Ling could tell whatever scheme they’d conjured was likely the worst plan on earth but he was desperate.

The Lan clan would be heading back to Gusu first thing in the morning and Lan Sizhui hadn’t even acknowledged his existence. Something was terribly wrong and Jin Ling needed to know what it was before he went mad from overthinking.

“I’ve got an idea alright,” Lan Jingyi slurred. He staggered to his feet and confidently placed his hands on his hips. “Follow me.”

•

The three woozy disciples stood in one of Jinlintai’s many courtyards and stared up at a window glowing with lantern light. Though it wasn’t the highest room in the sect, it was elevated enough that one would certainly break bones if they fell from such a distance.

“You can’t be serious,” Jin Ling murmured through gritted teeth as he flatly stared up the wall, exasperation plastered across his face.

“We can always go back to your dumb idea of knocking on his door,” Lan Jingyi retorted. “Now that I think about it, seeing you get humiliated by Hanguang-Jun and ratted out to your uncle might actually be more entertaining than this.”

Ouyang Zizhen tried not to laugh while Jin Ling shot daggers at the annoyingly smug Lan disciple. He turned up his nose and straightened his posture before approaching the wall. He’d always been fairly decent at climbing and the wall seemed to have enough grooves to serve as hand and footholds.

Climbing while drunk was a new experience but if there was anything Jin Ling wasn’t afraid of, it was a challenge. “I’m going up,” he called behind him. “Keep watch.”

Ouyang Zizhen’s eyes sparkled with awe. Even Lan Jingyi seemed impressed by Jin Ling’s fearless initiative.

Jin Ling quickly made decent progress but the higher he got, the more he slowed down. The change in pace didn’t go unnoticed by his small audience.

“This is so romantic,” Ouyang Zizhen swooned as he watched Jin Ling awkwardly climb the wall below Lan Sizhui’s window.

Lan Jingyi snorted. “You have a weird sense of romance.”

Ouyang Zizhen lifted his brows and smiled. “Haven’t you ever heard of tales like this? The brave prince climbing the tower to rescue his beloved from their life of imprisonment!” He clasped his hands together as he spoke, eyes glistening like a lovelorn mistress.

“If Jin Ling is Lan Sizhui’s rescuer, he might want to hold his breath,” Lan Jingyi suggested, nudging Ouyang Zizhen’s arm with his elbow and pointing his chin up at the struggling Jin disciple. “His prince is about to fall on his ass.”

Ouyang Zizhen looked up at Jin Ling and frowned when he saw his feet repeatedly slipping against the wall’s surface. “A-Ling, be careful!”

His voice was way too loud and earned him a disapproving shove from Lan Jingyi. “Shhhh! Don’t you know Hanguang-Jun can hear a pin drop? You’re gonna get us all lashed too!”

“S-sorry,” Ouyang Zizhen pouted, shoulders dropping like a scolded child.

Lan Jingyi rolled his eyes and sighed. “Forget it. Just try to keep it down.”

Ouyang Zizhen nodded and didn’t repeat his mistake.

Jin Ling could hear the two disciples below him whispering but couldn’t make out what they were saying. He ignored them and continued his feat, the image of Lan Sizhui’s pained and deflated spirit at the sect meeting consuming his thoughts and encouraging his endurance.

He tried to picture Lan Sizhui breaking the Lan sect’s rules—perfectly poised, hopelessly respectful, model disciple Lan Sizhui.

You climbed that wall for something important, didn’t you? Jin Ling thought. The alcohol filled his head with light but the warmth in his chest wasn’t from drinking. I’m climbing this wall for something important, too.

Feeling unusually sentimental, Jin Ling smiled triumphantly as his hand finally reached the windowsill. Right when he was about to pull himself up and climb inside, every nerve in his body buzzed. His skin paled brighter than the moon as a familiar voice filled his ears.

“It meant a lot to you,” said Lan Wangji.

A brief pause, then another familiar voice.

“Yes,” Lan Sizhui replied softly. Jin Ling could swear his voice cracked.

“Sometimes things that mean a lot to us,” Lan Wangji began, “must be let go.”

He was obviously speaking from experience.

Lan Sizhui sniffed and a dull ache filled Jin Ling’s chest. Ache because Sizhui was upset. Ache because it sounded like he loved someone. Ache because Jin Ling’s limbs were on fire as he clung to the windowsill with his hands while his feet were braced against the wall. If he didn’t get into Lan Sizhui’s room quick, his muscles would give out and he’d fall.

He forced his eyes shut and focused as he listened to more of the conversation.

“It is almost nine,” Lan Wangji said. “Rest.”

“Yes, Hanguang-Jun. Thank you.”

Jin Ling’s eyes shot open at the sound of Sizhui’s bedroom door opening and closing. Not missing any chances, he barely lifted himself up before his arms started failing him. “Lan… Sizhui…” he called, voice strained.

Almost immediately, Lan Sizhui’s shocked and worried face popped out above him. For a split second, he didn’t care about his burning limbs because Lan Sizhui was finally looking at him. Sizhui, Jin Ling thought.

“Young Master Jin?!” Lan Sizhui exclaimed as quietly as his bewildered voice would allow. “What on earth—!”

Jin Ling frowned. “I’m gonna fall.”

Lan Sizhui’s panicked eyes went wide as saucers. He grabbed Jin Ling under his arms and yanked him over the windowsill with an almost inhuman strength before releasing the other disciple and stumbling back in pain.

The injuries on his back were obviously acting up from the exertion, which sent Jin Ling into a guilty frenzy. He scrambled over to where Lan Sizhui was sitting on the floor. “I-I’m sorry…! I’m sorry, this was stupid and I shouldn’t have come and—“

“Are you drunk?” Lan Sizhui asked, brows knitting at the smell of alcohol on Jin Ling’s breath.

“A little? So what? I can hold my liquor,” Jin Ling defended, his voice laced with offense. “I climbed all the way up here, Sizhui, I—“ He paused before lowering his voice. “I heard Hanguang-Jun.”

Lan Sizhui’s face drained of all color. “You… what did you hear?”

Jin Ling pondered for a moment, his thoughts fuzzy from intoxication. “Something about letting go?” He furrowed his brows and looked at the floor, trying not to think about the possibility of Lan Sizhui going through heartbreak. They were friends, after all. He would’ve told him if he liked someone… right?

“Sizhui,” Jin Ling said, looking the other boy directly in the eyes. “Are you okay?”

Warm light from the lanterns illuminating Lan Sizhui’s guest room cast the two boys in a soft, intimate glow. Gentle shadows danced between them as Lan Sizhui withdrew his hands into his lap and gave a weak smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’ll be fine, Young Master Jin.”

“That’s not what I asked,” Jin Ling retorted. He leaned forward, scrunched his brows and blew air into his cheeks while searching Lan Sizhui’s expression for a different answer.

Lan Sizhui stared back at him with curiosity. He looked like a disgruntled pufferfish and it took everything in the Lan boy’s power not to laugh. Jin Ling, however, didn’t miss the slight upward curve of Lan Sizhui’s lips. His face softened at the sight.

“Young Master Jin, I know you want to ask about my punishment. You don’t need to pretend it’s about me.”

Jin Ling felt the ghost of a knife pierce through his chest and shrank back. The alcohol heightening his emotions really wasn’t helping. “Who says I’m pretending?”

He’d be lying if he said Lan Sizhui’s assumption didn’t hurt but he realized that whatever happened to him must have seriously tanked his confidence. Jin Ling couldn’t let his emotions ruin what he almost drunkenly fell off a wall for.

“Tell me if you’re okay or I won’t breathe.” Jin Ling put on another pufferfish face and actually held his breath, pinching his nose closed so he couldn’t cheat.

The second his face turned a hint of red, Lan Sizhui lunged forward and tore Jin Ling’s hand away from his nose. “Okay! I’ll tell you, but… you’ll laugh at me.”

Now it was getting interesting. Laugh? Why would he laugh? Was it really that funny? Then why did Lan Sizhui look like he was drowning in the pits of despair all evening? Jin Ling inhaled with relief. “I’ll try not to laugh, but if it’s actually funny…”

Lan Sizhui smiled nervously. “It’s just… a little embarrassing, is all.”

“Try me,” Jin Ling challenged.

Lan Sizhui fiddled with the tassel on his belt and nodded. “When I was a child and Senior Wei took care of my family and I in the Burial Mounds, I had a toy—a little tiger toy made by my grandmother.”

Warmth spread in Jin Ling’s chest while picturing a baby Lan Sizhui playing with his toys.

“It was left behind when our home was no longer safe but…” He paused and gave Jin Ling a sympathetic look before continuing. “My uncle, Wen Ning—he found it and gave it back to me.”

A small twitch tugged down the corners of Jin Ling’s mouth at the mention of The Ghost General but he stayed quiet and allowed Lan Sizhui to go on without interruption.

“I’ve kept it with me ever since, taken it everywhere… until a few nights ago when I accidentally dropped it over the wall of the Cloud Recesses during a perimeter check. I panicked and barely thought of the consequences before leaping after it.”

“After breaking one rule, I figured it didn’t matter much. I could probably find it and slip back in before curfew but I’d never been so wrong. I looked everywhere for it. Ripped through bushes, dug in the dirt, scoured the stream—it’s as if it never existed to begin with.”

Lan Sizhui winced in pain as he adjusted his position. His robes were loose enough at the neck that Jin Ling could see bandages. His hand almost reached to touch them but he quickly shook himself out of the sudden compulsion.

“Since it was too late for me to re-enter the Cloud Recesses, I searched and searched until I passed out from exhaustion. Oddly enough, I woke up in my own bed. I thought I might’ve dreamt everything but the toy was still gone and my clothes were stained with grass and dirt.”

“I barely had time to wake up and process anything before I was called to the courtyard and, well…” He gently touched the bandages beneath his clothes. “The rest tells itself.”

Jin Ling frowned at the bandages. “So… when Hanguang-Jun mentioned letting go…”

Lan Sizhui smiled and nodded, cheek’s slightly flushed with embarrassment. “He meant the tiger toy, yes.”

Clarity hit Jin Ling like a wave and he suddenly felt ridiculous for thinking Lan Sizhui and Hanguang-Jun had been talking about romance. He also felt relieved but he couldn’t pinpoint why—or, he just refused to admit the reason.

“They really lashed you for that?! That can’t be the worst thing a disciple’s ever done in the Cloud Recesses.” His thoughts immediately fixated on Wei Wuxian, having heard tales of his unbridled chaos during his studies in Gusu.

“It was only three lashes,” Lan Sizhui assured, acting as though just one lash was perfectly tolerable. The painful punishment of the GusuLan sect was widely known, even by those who’d never endured it. “One lash for venturing out at night, one lash for missing curfew and one lash for rising after five in the morning.”

Jin Ling was ready to rip his own hair out. “Rising after five?! You were exhausted!”

Noticing that Jin Ling seemed far more upset about his punishment than he was, Lan Sizhui passively waved his hands and smiled. “Young Master Jin, it really is no trouble. The embarrassment is far worse than the pain. Some things must be let go, after all.”

An unconvinced pout shadowed Jin Ling’s face but he was grateful Lan Sizhui trusted him enough to open up. Even more, he was smiling again—and this time, it reached his eyes. Jin Ling lost himself in the vision of Lan Sizhui’s soft skin in the lantern’s glow, his raven hair haloed in embers.

“Sizhui,” Jin Ling called quietly. “Jingyi told me the cold springs in Gusu have healing properties but you refused to use them?”

Lan Sizhui nodded and stared down at his hands. “I… felt like I deserved the punishment, so I chose to endure the results. It’s such a silly thing to break so many rules over, after all.”

He tried to laugh it off as a joke but Jin Ling wasn’t having it. “It’s not silly!”

“That’s nice of you to say, but—“

Jin Ling propelled forward and executed another pufferfish face, now fully aware that he could use it as a manipulation tactic to amuse Lan Sizhui.

And again, it worked flawlessly. Lan Sizhui’s face couldn’t help but brighten at the adorable sight of the young Jin disciple’s air-filled cheeks and Jin Ling’s eyes lit up as he basked in the satisfaction of being the Lan boy’s reason to smile. They sat together in comfortable silence for a minute before Lan Sizhui gave him an apologetic look.

“I’m sorry to say this,” he started, “but you should probably leave soon, Young Master Jin. I don’t want you to get in trouble for being here and I’m sure you’re tired.”

Broken out of his trance, Jin Ling suddenly remembered everything he’d done tonight. Got drunk at a sect meeting right under his senior’s noses. Climbed the walls of his own sect to break into Lan Sizhui’s guest room. Almost fell off in the process. Finally talked to Lan Sizhui. He yawned just thinking about it and Lan Sizhui flashed a fond and gentle grin, his suspicion confirmed.

Jin Ling awkwardly scrambled to his feet, the heaviness in his head making the room sway around him. Lan Sizhui took his time standing up to avoid any stress on his injuries. His mouth fell open when he saw Jin Ling walking back towards the window. “Young Master Jin?”

The other disciple turned to look at him with tired eyes. “Huh?”

“What are you doing?”

Jin Ling crossed his arms over his chest and huffed, sending his blunt bangs fluttering outward. “You told me to leave, so I’m leaving. What else would I be doing?”

A worried frown washed away Lan Sizhui’s sunny expression like rain. “You can’t climb back down, you’ll get hurt.” He invitingly held out his hand and curled his slender fingers towards himself. “Come. You can use the door, it’s fine.”

Like a dizzied moth to a flame, Jin Ling gravitated towards the pretty Lan boy in front of him. Lan Sizhui laughed in harmony with the flickering lanterns, melodic and sweet. “You’re much calmer when you’re drunk, Young Master Jin. Normally, you would’ve called me names or pushed me away by now.”

I can’t do that, I won’t do that, Jin Ling thought. He knit his brows and jerked his head to the side, refusing to show Lan Sizhui the unstoppable blush invading his cheeks. “Maybe you just haven’t annoyed me enough yet.”

Lan Sizhui chuckled as they walked to his bedroom door. “Ah, there he is. I was worried for a minute.”

Jin Ling’s cheeks burned even brighter. Lan Sizhui opened the door and peered into the hall. Once he was certain it was empty, he turned back to Jin Ling and frowned when the young disciple stumbled against the doorframe.

“Young Master Jin, I really should walk you back to your room—“

Jin Ling straightened immediately. “NO!”

Lan Sizhui paled at the volume of his voice and Jin Ling slapped his hands over his mouth. They stood in silence for a minute as they listened for any sign of stirring from the surrounding rooms. Luckily, no one seemed to have heard them.

Jin Ling didn’t mean his sudden shout as rejection. He just didn’t want Lan Sizhui to get into more trouble, especially on his behalf.

“Sorry,” Jin Ling whispered, his voice muffled by his hands.

Lan Sizhui sighed. Without warning, he reached up and gingerly plucked Jin Ling’s hands from his mouth causing the other boy to freeze. Jin Ling could hear his own heart pounding in his chest, his head, his stomach. It echoed throughout his body as Lan Sizhui’s gentle hands on his made his flushed face tingle.

“Psssst!”

Lan Sizhui whipped his head around and Jin Ling stood on the tips of his toes to peek over the taller boy’s shoulder. Hiding in a dark corner of the hall was Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen.

“Are you guys done yet?” Lan Jingyi whispered across the hall, somehow managing to make such a quiet voice sound irritated.

“D-done with what?!” Jin Ling stuttered, painfully misunderstanding his question as an accusation.

“Talking, what else?” Lan Jingyi hissed.

Ouyang Zizhen awkwardly waved at Lan Sizhui, giving him a friendly and comforting smile. Lan Sizhui smiled back while Jin Ling glared at the two juniors stuffed in the shadows.

“What are you even doing up here?” Jin Ling snapped.

“We thought you might’ve gotten caught by Hanguang-Jun or Zewu-Jun, so we came to check on you,” Ouyang Zizhen explained.

“Jingyi, Zizhen,” Lan Sizhui spoke. “Can you two make sure Young Master Jin gets to his room safely?”

Mortification shadowed Jin Ling’s face as he shrank back against the doorframe.

Before Ouyang Zizhen could politely reply, Lan Jingyi snorted wildly into his palm. “The Young Mistress needs an escort?”

“Jingyi,” Lan Sizhui repeated, his eyes narrowed and his voice unnervingly stern.

Jin Ling blinked up at him, not used to seeing Lan Sizhui’s assertive and protective side. The authority in his tone caused Lan Jingyi’s amusement to fade.

“Alright, alright,” Lan Jingyi mumbled. “We’ll take him back.”

“Thank you,” Lan Sizhui replied with genuine gratitude, his smile returning as though the unusual dominance that possessed him before had been exorcised from his body.

Jin Ling started walking towards the other two disciplines when Lan Sizhui stopped him. “Wait—before you go…” He pulled out a small perfume sachet from his sleeves and handed it to him. The sachet was white and embroidered with sky-blue clouds, just like the Lan sect’s forehead ribbon.

Jin Ling looked visibly confused. He took the sachet and studied it as though it were a curious artifact.

“It’ll help with any side effects of the liquor. Just keep it near you when you sleep or else it won’t work.”

Jin Ling’s lips parted to speak but his arm was unceremoniously grabbed by Lan Jingyi. “Young Mistress Jin, it’s almost nine and I’m not getting in trouble for you. Let’s go already.”

He ripped his arm out of Lan Jingyi’s grasp as he was forcefully pulled away from Lan Sizhui. He gave the other Lan boy one last glance before he, Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen clumsily stumbled down the hall, bantering as they went.

Lan Sizhui watched them leave and smiled. “Thank you, A-Ling.”

•

Despite Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen pestering him with questions about his time with Lan Sizhui, Jin Ling remained defiantly quiet on the trek back to his room.

Eventually, the two gave up and chatted amongst themselves while Jin Ling was lost in thought.

He mulled over every detail of Lan Sizhui’s story. He frowned at the reminder of the other boy’s lashings. He blushed at the realization that he wanted nothing more than to stay in Lan Sizhui’s room for the night. He marveled at the fact that thoughts like this would otherwise leave him irrationally flustered but the alcohol in his system sedated his temper.

Right now, his strongest feeling was perseverance as an idea sprung to life in his slowly sobering mind.

Once he was deposited safely into his room and said his goodbyes to Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen, he lit several lanterns and candles and hurried over to a trunk in the corner by his bed.

Fairy perked up from her own bed and wagged her tail after a night of patiently waiting for her master. She stuck her tongue out and observed him curiously as he rummaged through the trunk.

Jin Ling pulled out a generous stack of paper along with several ink pots and brushes and spread them out onto the floor. He worked tirelessly in the soft lantern light and flickering flames until every wick met its end and the room dimmed enough to surrender to the moonlight.

Satisfied with his work, Jin Ling sighed with exhaustion and clamored into his bed. He thought of Lan Sizhui and clutched the small perfume sachet against his chest.

Orange blossom and cedar wood permeated his dreams as he drifted off to sleep.

•

The docks of Jinlintai were bathed in the hazy glow of the rising sun where several guests of the Jin clan readied their boats to depart.

The Lan clan followed suit, Lan Sizhui still confined to the role of being Hanguang-Jun and Zewu-Jun’s shadow. Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen offered minimal help, too busy chatting with other sect disciples they’d somehow managed to befriend overnight.

Lan Sizhui placed his travel bag of belongings on their boat and turned to survey the gradually dispersing crowd as everyone said their goodbyes and boarded to set sail.

Jin Ling was nowhere to be seen.

Lan Sizhui’s eyes fell with his frown but he tried not to overthink. The young Jin disciple surely slept in after the bizarre and hectic night he’d endured before. Lan Sizhui took comfort in the fact that he was able to see and speak with him at least once before his journey back to the Cloud Recesses and did his best to push any insecurities to the back of his mind.

After seeing off Ouyang Zizhen, Lan Jingyi carelessly flopped into the boat after the contrasting grace of the Twin Jades’ perfectly postured strides. Lan Sizhui took one last look at Jinlintai before stepping onboard himself.

Right when he was about to push the boat away from the docks, he heard a familiar voice call his name. His head whipped up to see Jin Ling tearing down the steps of the docks in a wild hurricane of yellow robes and wind-swept hair.

He skidded to a stop in front of the Lan sect’s boat and panted, making his best effort to speak between heavy breaths. “Si… zhui… wait—“

Lan Jingyi stared at them with suspicion while Zewu-Jun’s brows raised in interest. Hanguang-Jun stood at Zewu-Jun’s side and simply observed the scene with his usual stoic demeanor.

Jin Ling finally caught his breath enough to look up at Lan Sizhui, who was even taller standing on the boat. The sunrise made his gentle eyes sparkle like amethyst geodes and his fair, glowing skin resembled warm starlight.

Feeling out of breath again at the angelic vision before him, Jin Ling inhaled and brought his hands up, shoving something towards Lan Sizhui.

Lan Sizhui’s eyes reluctantly left Jin Ling’s as they followed his movements and settled on the young Jin disciple’s outstretched hands.

The moment he saw what was cradled in his palms, his lips parted in pleasant surprise and his eyes glistened with emotion.

A carefully folded paper tiger stood proudly in Jin Ling’s hands. Its unevenly painted stripes and lopsided beady eyes made it obvious Jin Ling wasn’t much of a painter but the paper-folding was near perfect. Its shape was exactly like the tiger toy he’d lost. Even the design of its stripes were similar and Lan Sizhui wondered if Jin Ling had somehow seen the toy himself.

“I know it’s not the same, but…” Jin Ling didn’t know what else to say, his cheeks burning red as he furrowed his brow and looked off to the side.

Lan Sizhui carefully took the paper tiger into his own hands, handling it as though it were a baby bird. It was clear he didn’t know what to say either, both astonished and touched by the gift, but he tried to speak anyway. “Young Master Jin, I—“

Jin Ling shook his head. “Y-you don’t have to say anything. I know it’s awkward, just…” He mumbled something under his breath after a brief pause.

Lan Sizhui frowned, looking confused. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear—“

“Stay safe,” Jin Ling blurted, looking up at Lan Sizhui with a serious face that made his words seem more like a command.

Lan Sizhui raised his brows, the heat creeping into his cheeks turning them a pretty shade of rose. He gently hugged the paper tiger to his chest and nodded, his shining smile illuminating the world around him. “I’ll see you soon, A-Ling.”

Lan Sizhui immediately spun around and took a seat next to Lan Jingyi, blushing coyly from his own boldness and leaving Jin Ling stunned at the edge of the docks. On autopilot from shock, Jin Ling pushed the boat and reluctantly watched Lan Sizhui drift away from him.

Lan Jingyi peeked at the paper tiger in Lan Sizhui’s hands and scrunched his nose. “The hell is that supposed to b—“

He abruptly fell silent as the grave and turned to see Hanguang-Jun’s cold stare boring into him like a glacial spear. Lan Jingyi shrank back in his seat and dropped the subject.

Lan Sizhui was too engrossed with Jin Ling’s gift to notice the exchange beside him. He pet the paper tiger’s sides, its tail, its head, admiring how every fold and paint stroke was made for him.

At the edge of the docks, Jin Ling watched the Lan clan’s boat wade towards the horizon. Lan Sizhui’s perfume sachet hung at his waist and a gentle breeze whispered through the strands of his long, dark hair filling the air around him with orange blossom and cedar wood—the scent of his favorite person.

His features softened with a wave of bliss when he noticed Lan Sizhui looking back at him. He closed his amber eyes and smiled.

“See you soon, A-Yuan.”

{ 🖤 }

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fannish-karmiya · 3 years

Text

Wei Wuxian’s Position in the Jiang Household

Fandom tends to mischaracterise Wei Wuxian’s position in the Jiang family greatly. A lot of people project more modern ideas about adoption onto his relationship with the Jiang siblings, and write as if he really is their sibling and only Yu Ziyuan’s abusive nature gets in the way of their bond.

This strikes me as a bit misguided. While adoption was practised in ancient China, it was mainly for the purpose of obtaining a male heir in the absence of one, or obtaining more daughters to marry off for alliances. Jiang Fengmian had no reason to adopt Wei Wuxian into the main family, and he didn’t. Wei Wuxian’s position in the household is far more nebulous than that, and honestly it’s hard to find an exact corollary, in Chinese history or in any culture, precisely because it was so messy and ill-defined.

A Companion to Upper Class Children

Wei Wuxian is the son of a servant of Yunmeng Jiang; it’s notable that Wei Changze is always referred to this way, rather than as a disciple. Wei Changze wound up leaving the sect in order to marry Cangse Sanren, and Jiang Fengmian considered them dear enough friends that when he heard they passed away, he spent years searching for their orphaned son. He wound up finding Wei Wuxian on the streets of Yiling and brought him home as his ward.

Wei WuXian was taken home by Jiang FengMian when he was nine.

Most memories from back then were already blurred. Yet, Jin Ling’s mother, Jiang YanLi, remembered all of them, and even told him quite a few.

She said that, after his father heard of the news that his parents both died in battle, he had always dedicated himself to finding the child that these past friends had left behind. After searching for a while, he finally found the child in Yiling.

(Chapter 24, Exiled Rebels translation)

It’s clear from the start that beyond this sense of obligation to his old friends, Jiang Fengmian also had a role set out for Wei Wuxian: he wanted him to be a companion to his children, and Jiang Cheng in particular.

He encourages a friendship between them, insisting on a sleepover between the two a week into Wei Wuxian’s stay.

On the second day, Jiang Cheng’s puppies were given to someone else.

This angered Jiang Cheng so much that he threw a big tantrum. No matter how much Jiang FengMian comforted him gently, telling him that they should ‘be good friends’, he refused to talk to Wei WuXian. Quite a few days later, Jiang Cheng’s attitude softened. Jiang FengMian wanted to strike while the iron was still hot, so he told Wei WuXian to sleep in the same room as him, hoping that they’d grow fonder of each other.

[...]

That night, Jiang Cheng locked Wei WuXian outside his room, refusing to let him in.

[...]

Wei WuXian waited outside for a long time. When the door opened, before the joy could spread onto his face, he was bombarded with a pile of things being thrown out. The door banged shut again.

Jiang Cheng told him from inside, “Go sleep somewhere else! This is my room! You’re even gonna steal my room?!”

[...]

Standing outside, as Wei WuXian heard that dogs would come bite him, fear immediately bubbled within him. Twisting his fingers, he hurried, “I’ll go, I’ll go. Don’t call the dogs!”

Dragging behind him the sheets and blanket that were thrown outside, he ran out the hall. Having only arrived at Lotus Pier for a short period of time, he didn’t dare jump around yet. Every day, he obediently holed up in the places that Jiang FengMian told him to stay at. He didn’t even know where his room was, much less have the courage to knock on other people’s doors, scared that it’d disturb someone’s dreams.

(Chapter 71, Exiled Rebels translation)

After Jiang Cheng is worried about getting in trouble, he goes to Jiang Yanli for help, and she searches for Wei Wuxian.

But this was the first pair of shoes that Jiang FengMian bought him. Wei WuXian was too embarrassed to make him go out of his way to buy another pair, and so he said that they weren’t too big. Jiang YanLi helped him into his shoe and pressed the hollow tip, “It is a bit big. I’ll fix it for you when we get back.”

Hearing this, Wei WuXian felt somewhat uneasy, as if he did something wrong again.

Living in other people’s homes, the worst that could happen was to make trouble for the hosts.

Jiang YanLi put him onto her back and began to walk back, wobbling in her steps as she spoke, “A-Ying, no matter what A-Cheng said to you, don’t bother about him. He doesn’t have a good temper, so he’s always home playing with himself. Those puppies were his favorites. Dad sent them away, and so he’s feeling upset. He’s actually really happy that somebody’s here to be with him.”

(Chapter 71, Exiled Rebels translation)

Later, Wei Wuxian offers to cover for him, saying simply that he ran outside by himself because he was scared. In this one case it feels like a genuine instance of children showing solidarity and covering for each other’s little misbehaviours. But it also follows a pattern of Wei Wuxian doing this and making excuses, time and time again, for Jiang Cheng. I wonder if on some level, he already knew that his role in the household was in part to be a companion-servant to Jiang Cheng.

Wei Wuxian normally never puts up with people treating him poorly or being arrogant; he constantly bites his tongue when Jiang Cheng does so around him. While they study at Cloud Recesses, Jiang Cheng frequently insults Wei Wuxian, who always just smiles and laughs it off.

Jiang Cheng humphed, “Him? He wakes at nine in the morning and sleeps at one during the night. When he wakes up, he doesn’t practice his sword or meditate; he goes boating, swims around, picks lotus seedpods, and hunts for pheasants.”

Wei WuXian replied, “No matter how much pheasants I hunt, I’m still number one.”

(Chapter 13, Exiled Rebels translation)

Jiang Cheng scolded with a darkened expression, “What are you proud of?! What is there to be proud of with this?! Do you think that it’s a glorious thing to be told by someone to get lost? You bring so much shame upon our sect!”

(Chapter 16, Exiled Rebels translation)

We never see Wei Wuxian excusing this sort of behaviour from any other character; he has no problem scolding Jin Ling for his arrogant attitude and telling him that he shouldn’t be imitating his uncle, after all! It’s only where Jiang Cheng is concerned that he does this, and honestly, even then he seems to be quite aware that Jiang Cheng’s behaviour is wrong; he simply accepts on some level that it’s his role in the household to put up with it.

He actually does, very gently, try to guide Jiang Cheng at times. In Lotus Seed Pods, for example, he tries to give Jiang Cheng advice on how to flirt with some of the maidens in Yunmeng and make friends:

Wei WuXian threw the seed pods toward the shore. It was a far distance, but they landed lightly in the women’s hands. He grabbed a few more and stuffed them into Jiang Cheng’s arms, shoving, “What are you doing, just standing there? Hurry up.”

After a few shoves, Jiang Cheng could only accept them, “Hurry up and do what?”

Wei WuXian, “You ate the watermelon too, so you also have to return the gift, don’t you? Here, here, don’t be embarrassed. Start throwing, start throwing.”

Jiang Cheng snorted again, “You must be joking. What’s there to be embarrassed about?” Whatever he said, however, even after all of the shidi began to throw seed pods, he still didn’t start to move. Wei WuXian urged, “Then throw some! If you throw some this time, next time you can ask them if the seed pods tasted good, and you’ll be able to make conversation again!”

[...]

Jiang Cheng was just about to throw one when he realized how shameless it was the moment he heard it. He peeled a seed pod and ate it by himself.

[...]

After a while of laughter, he turned around and looked at Jiang Cheng, who was sitting at the front of the boat eating seed pods with a long face. His smile gradually disappeared as he sighed, “Well, what an unteachable child.”

Jiang Cheng fumed, “So what if I want to eat alone?”

Wei WuXian, “Look at you, Jiang Cheng. Nevermind. You’re hopeless. Just wait to eat alone your whole life!”

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

He even sighs rather disappointedly when Jiang Cheng refuses to take the hint; he knows that Jiang Cheng’s sullen behaviour is going to make him miserable down the line, but all of his gentle efforts to nudge him in a better direction have failed.

He also speaks with great awareness of Jiang Cheng’s flaws after the fight in the ancestral hall:

Wei WuXian reached out with one hand and massaged his chest, as if trying to break up the pent-up feeling inside his heart. A moment later, he blurted, “I knew Jiang Cheng wouldn’t have let us go so easily. That brat… How could this be?!”

[...]

Wei WuXian’s eyelids throbbed, “Every one of them. The brat’s been like this ever since he was young.He’ll say anything when he’s angry, no matter how bad it is. He gives up on all grace and discipline whatsoever. As long as it’d annoy whomever he’s against, he’d say it no matter what terrible insults he uses. After all these years, he hasn’t gotten better at all. Please don’t take it to heart.”

(Chapter 90, Exiled Rebels translation)

This is so interesting to me, because it really makes it clear that Wei Wuxian has always been aware of these flaws of Jiang Cheng’s. He hasn’t been viewing him through rose-coloured lenses or making excuses for him because he’s ‘family’. He puts up with Jiang Cheng’s behaviour because being his companion is one of his duties in the Jiang household. It may never have been directly stated, but there seems to be some unspoken understanding to this effect.

I honestly don’t know if there is any official role in history (in any culture, not just China) which perfectly correlates to this. In China a lady’s maid was expected to also be a close friend and companion to her mistress (in canon, see Bicao to Qin-furen and Yinzhu and Jinzhu to Yu-furen). In Europe an upper class woman would hire a lady’s companion, a woman from the lower fringes of the gentry who would serve as her companion in exchange for financial support.

I don’t know of any version of this role which involves two men. In general, this sort of role existed because upper class women were confined to the household by and large, and had very limited social spheres. Men, meanwhile, had much greater ability to meet with their peers and make friends. I almost feel like Wei Wuxian wound up being shoved into this role simply because even as a child Jiang Cheng was so unsociable that Jiang Fengmian didn’t know what else to do!

Wei Wuxian also at least once steps in and starts a fight in place of Jiang Cheng (essentially taking the fall for him). He does this when Jin Zixuan speaks disparagingly of Jiang Yanli at Cloud Recesses:

Jin ZiXuan asked in reply, “Why don’t you ask me how on Earth can I be satisfied with her?”

Jiang Cheng instantly stood up.

Pushing him to the side, Wei WuXian walked in front of him and sneered, “You sure think that you’re pretty satisfying, don’t you? Where did you get the guts to be all choosy here?”

[...]

Wei WuXian sighed, “… It’d be nice if shijie came. It’s fortunate that you didn’t hit him.”

Jiang Cheng, “I was going to. If you didn’t push me, the other side of Jin ZiXuan’s face would also be ruined.”

(Chapter 18, Exiled Rebels translation)

It’s also very notable that Wei Wuxian is never shown having friends outside of Jiang Cheng’s social circle, despite what an outgoing and friendly person he is. Any time he expresses interest in someone for himself, as with Lan Wangji, Jiang Cheng tries to nip it in the bud. Being unable to deter Wei Wuxian from Lan Wangji directly, Jiang Cheng instead tries to drive a wedge between them, constantly telling Wei Wuxian that Lan Wangji hates him.

“Yeah,” Nie HuaiSang spoke, “It looks like he really hates you, Wei-xiong. Lan WangJi usually… No, he never does something so impolite.”

Wei WuXian, “He hates me already? I wanted to apologize to him.”

Jiang Cheng sneered, “Apologizing now? Too late! Like his uncle, he surely thinks that you are evil and unruly to the core, and didn’t bother to pay you any attention.”

(Chapter 14, Exiled Rebels translation)

Jiang Cheng pulled him even closer, “It’s not as if you’re familiar with him! Don’t you see how much he hates you? You’re going to carry him? He probably doesn’t even want you a step closer to him.”

(Chapter 52, Exiled Rebels translation)

He even directly orders Wei Wuxian not to invite Lan Wangji to come visit him at Lotus Pier during the Lotus Seed Pod extra.

Wei WuXian, “Why are you so upset? My watermelon almost flew away! I was just being polite. Of course he wouldn’t come. Have you ever heard of him go anywhere by himself to have fun?”

Jiang Cheng had on a stern expression, “Let’s make this clear. I don’t want him to come, anyhow. Don’t invite him.”

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

It’s not only Lan Wangji he tries to steer Wei Wuxian away from; he also interrupts his conversation with Wen Ning at the archery competition:

Wen QiongLin was probably one of Wen Clan’s disciples furthest in bloodline. His status was neither high nor low, yet his personality was timid. He didn’t dare do anything and even his speech stuttered. Through much practice, he had finally conjured up the courage to enter the competition, but he blew it because he was too nervous. If he didn’t receive the right guidance, perhaps the boy would hide his true self more and more from now on and never dare to perform in front of other people again. Wei WuXian encouraged him a couple of times and touched on a few areas of growth, correcting some miniscule problems that he had when he was shooting in the garden. Wen QiongLin listened so attentively that he didn’t even turn his eyes away, nodding uncontrollably.

Jiang Cheng, “Where did you find so much nonsense? The competition is starting soon. Get into the arena right now!”

Wei WuXian spoke to Wen QiongLin in a serious tone, “I’ll be off to the competition now. Later, you can see how I shoot when I’m in the arena…”

Jiang Cheng dragged him away, short of patience. He spat as he dragged, “See how you shoot? Do you think that you’re a model or something?!”

(Chapter 59, Exiled Rebels translation)

Even when it comes to Wei Wuxian’s friendly flirtation with Mianmian, Jiang Cheng has something to say and tries to deter him from her:

Jiang Cheng, “The one that MianMian gave you? I didn’t.”

Wei WuXian exclaimed his regret, “I’ll find her for another one later.”

Jiang Cheng frowned, “You’re at it again. You don’t really like her, do you? The girl does look fine, but it’s obvious that she doesn’t have much background. Maybe she isn’t even a disciple. She seems like the daughter of a servant.”

Wei WuXian, “What’s wrong with servants? I’m also the son of a servant, aren’t I?”

Jiang Cheng, “How can you compare to her? Whose servant is like you, having your master peel lotus seeds for you and boil you soup. I didn’t even get to have some!”

(Chapter 56, Exiled Rebels translation)

Jiang Cheng really does seem to view Wei Wuxian in a very proprietary light; he’s not allowed to have any friendships which don’t exist under Jiang Cheng’s direct control.

The idea that Wei Wuxian was meant to be Jiang Cheng’s servant-friend is reinforced at its darkest when Lotus Pier falls: both Yu Ziyuan and Jiang Fengmian’s last words to Wei Wuxian are an instruction to protect Jiang Cheng.

One hand holding him, Madam Yu grabbed Wei WuXian’s lapels with her other hand as though to strangle him to death. She spoke through clenched teeth, “… You damn little brat! I hate you! I hate you more than anything else! Look at what our sect has gone through for your sake!”

[...]

Madam Yu, “Don’t make such a fuss. It’ll loosen up when you’re somewhere safe. If anyone attacks you on the journey, it’ll protect you as well. Don’t come back. Go to Meishan straight away and find your sister!”

After she finished, she turned to Wei WuXian and pointed at him, “Wei Ying! Listen to me! Protect Jiang Cheng, protect him even if you die, do you understand?!”

[...]

Jiang FengMian stared into his eyes. Suddenly, he reached out. Only after pausing in the air did he finally touch Jiang Cheng’s head, slowly, “A-Cheng, be well.”

Wei WuXian, “Uncle Jiang, if anything happens to you, he won’t be well.”

Jiang FengMian turned his eyes to him, “A-Ying, A-Cheng… you must look after him.”

(Chapter 58, Exiled Rebels translation)

Even Jiang Fengmian, who supposedly favoured Wei Wuxian, only gives him instructions as pertains to his own son; he doesn’t spare a single last word for Wei Wuxian himself.

A Lower Status Family Member

It wasn’t uncommon throughout human history, across many cultures, for wealthy families to take in relatives who were orphaned or had otherwise fallen on hard times. They tended to have a lower status than the main family; they lived with them and were still a part of their social sphere, but were not quite equal, either. The English term for this is ‘poor relation’.

Obviously, Wei Wuxian isn’t actually a blood relative at all. But his position in the Jiang household definitely has some similarities. He lives in the main house, eats meals with the family, attends school with the son... He is even on some conditional levels accepted into the gentry of cultivation society. But he isn’t a full equal member of the family, either.

The fact that he’s Jiang Fengmian’s ward, not a blood relative or adopted into the main family, puts him at even more of a disadvantage. It seems that Jiang Fengmian paid for all of Wei Wuxian’s expenses:

Wei WuXian took a bite, “Back then, I didn’t even have to pay when I ate at the dock. I grabbed whatever I wanted, ate whatever I wanted; ran after I grabbed, walked as I ate. A month later, the vendor would get the reimbursement from Uncle Jiang.”

(Chapter 86, Exiled Rebels translation)

While this is a bit of conjecture, I gather that he was given access to family money as if he was part of the clan, and could just charge Yunmeng Jiang whenever he shopped in Lotus Pier. Which is great so long as Wei Wuxian is accepted in Yunmeng Jiang...but as we see during the Burial Mounds settlement period, the moment that acceptance fades, Wei Wuxian is left out in the cold without a single coin. And because he isn’t a member of the family, it’s a far easier matter for him to be thrown aside, as he was when Jiang Cheng grew angry with him over his decision to protect the Wens.

Of course, Chinese families traditionally did share their wealth, and still do nowadays. Ideally, in a loving family, this is a positive and means they all support each other; but when that isn’t the case, it leaves the victims of abuse vulnerable.

In Wei Wuxian’s case, he has some of the benefits of being a member of the Jiang clan, without ever actually being a member. He can be cast aside at any time, and he is never afforded the same respect by wider cultivation society which an inner clan member would have.

I don’t believe the novel ever directly addresses Wei Wuxian’s acceptance into the guest lectures at Cloud Recesses in this light, but the donghua actually has a very interesting little exchange about it which takes place between Nie Huaisang and a relative of his:

“Wei-xiong is just a disciple from Yunmeng. Why could he come to Gusu to study?”

“Wei-xiong is the son of Jiang-zongzhu’s old friend. He has been treated as their own son.”

“Oh, I see. That explains why they don’t look like master and servant, they seem like brothers.”

(MDZS Donghua, Episode 3, Guodong Subs)

Wei Wuxian was only allowed to attend these lectures, which seem to mainly be for sect heirs and inner clan members, on the grace of being Jiang Fengmian’s ward (and probably to accompany Jiang Cheng). While this exchange is not from the book, we never do see or hear about any of the other students being outer disciples rather than members of the main clan. Here’s what the novel had to say about it:

In that year, aside from the YunmengJiang Sect, there were also the young masters from other clans, sent to study here from parents who heard of the reputation. The young masters were all around fifteen or sixteen. Because the sects all knew the others, although they weren’t close, they had seen others’ faces before. It was widely known that, although Wei WuXian’s surname was not Jiang, he was the leading disciple of the sect leader of the YunmengJiang Sect—Jiang FengMian, and also the son of his friend who had passed away. In fact, the sect leader regarded him as his own child. This, along with how youths were not as concerned with status and ancestry as elders, they were soon friends. Only a few sentences passed, and everyone started to call others older brothers or younger brothers.

(Chapter 13, Exiled Rebels translation)

And Wei Wuxian isn’t treated as an equal at school, either; when he and his friends get up to mischief, he’s frequently the only one punished. Nie Huaisang even notes that Lan Qiren seems to be far harder on him than the other students:

Nie HuaiSang spoke, “Why does it seem like old man Lan is especially strict towards you? He always directs his scoldings at you.”

(Chapter 14, Exiled Rebels translation)

And we see Wei Wuxian being the sole one punished out of a group taken for granted by his friends multiple times:

As a result of cheating notes flying everywhere in the air, Lan WangJi suddenly attacked during the test, and caught a few initiators of the commotion. Lan QiRen exploded with anger, writing letters to the prominent clans to tell on them. He loathed Wei WuXian—in the beginning, although these disciples could hardly sit still, at least nobody started anything, and their buttocks were able to stick to their legs. However, now that Wei Ying came, the originally spineless brats were influenced by his encouragement, venturing out at night and drinking alcohol however they pleased. The unhealthy practices grew greater and greater. As he had expected, Wei Ying was one of the biggest threats to humanity!

Jiang FengMian replied, “Ying has always been like this. Please take care to discipline him, Mr. Lan.”

And so, Wei WuXian was punished again.

(Chapter 14, Exiled Rebels translation)

The boys were all cheating, but Wei Wuxian is the one punished most severely. This happens when he's caught sneaking alcohol, too (though to be fair to Lan Wangji, he probably was only punishing him, and himself alongside him, for being outside after curfew when he threw them off the wall).

Of course, Jiang Cheng didn’t dare to say that Wei WuXian was at fault. Thinking back, it was them who urged Wei WuXian to buy liquor. Each and every one of them should have been punished. He could only speak in a vague way, “It’s fine, it’s fine; it’s not that serious! He can walk. Wei WuXian, why are you still up there?!”

(Chapter 18, Exiled Rebels translation)

It’s not entirely unreasonable for the one who gets caught to take the punishment (what’s he going to do, rat his friends out?) but their ready acceptance of this does fit into a pattern.

Jiang Cheng’s top was tied at his waist. Hearing his mother’s chastise, he hastily put it over his head. Madam Yu scolded again, “And you boys! Can’t you see that A-Li’s here? Who taught you brats to dress like this in front of a girl!?”

Of course, it was needless to think who led the group. Thus, Madam Yu’s next sentence, as usual, was “Wei Ying! Do you want to die!?”

[...]

He could still feel some pain in his back, so he tossed the paddles to someone else, sat down, and felt the stinging piece of flesh, “How unfair. Nobody else was wearing anything, but why was I the only one who got scolded and beaten up?”

Jiang Cheng, “Because you hurt the eye the most with no clothes on, for sure.”

[...]

Everyone nodded. Wei WuXian, “Thanks for the praise, you guys. I’m even starting to feel some goose bumps.”

The shidi, “You’re welcome, Da-Shixiong. You protect us every single time. You deserve even more!”

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

While we know that Yu Ziyuan is an abusive person in general, she abuses Wei Wuxian far more harshly than anyone else, even the outer disciples. It’s made clear to us in Lotus Seed Pods that she whips him regularly over minor infractions:

Madam Yu was even angrier, “How dare you run! Come back right now and kneel!” As she spoke, she let loose her whip with a flip of her wrist. Wei WuXian felt a searing pain slash across his back. He loudly exclaimed, “Ow!” And almost tripped on the ground.

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

And that his back is heavily scarred from it:

He felt his back, covered in scars both old and new, and still couldn’t hold back the question he’d be thinking about, “How awfully unfair. Why is it that I’m the only one who gets beaten up, whenever something happens?”

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

Rumours about this even made it outside of Lotus Pier; during their visit to the ancestral hall years later, Lan Wangji even states that he heard about some of it:

Lan WangJi had on an expression of understanding, “Kneeling as punishment?”

Wei WuXian mused, “How did you know? That’s right. Madam Yu punished me almost every day.”

Lan WangJi nodded, “I have heard of a few things.”

Wei WuXian, “It’s so famous that even people outside Yunmeng, even you Gusu people know—how could it be ‘a few things’? But, to be honest, in all these years, I’ve never seen a second woman whose temper was as bad as Madam Yu’s. She told me to go to the ancestral hall and kneel no matter how small the matter was. Hahaha…”

(Chapter 87, Exiled Rebels translation)

Wei Wuxian’s lower social standing is definitely a part of why Yu Ziyuan is able to abuse him so terribly and receive little to no censure for it. Everyone at Lotus Pier simply takes it for granted, with the exception of Jiang Yanli who at least does try to deflect her mother when she is angry with Wei Wuxian:

Yet, all of a sudden, someone’s quiet voice drifted by Madam Yu’s ear, “Mom, do you want to eat some watermelon…”

[...]

Jiang YanLi almost cried from her mother’s pinching, mumbling, “Mom, A-Xian and the others were hiding here to relieve the heat and I came here on my own. Don’t blame them… Do… Do you want some watermelon… I don’t know who gave them to us, but it’s really sweet. Eating watermelon in the summer is great for cooling down and quenching thirst. I’ll cut them for you…”

(Chapter 125, Lotus Seed Pod, Exiled Rebels translation)

She both tries to deflect her mother from her anger, and also outright states that Wei Wuxian and the other boys weren’t at fault. Jiang Yanli seems to be the only one at Lotus Pier who ever does this.

After the war, Wei Wuxian attends social events at Jiang Cheng’s side but is never quite treated as an equal, either. See how at the Flower Banquet, Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue greet Jiang Cheng but not him:

Suddenly, a voice spoke, “Sect Leader Nie, Sect Leader Lan.”

Hearing the familiar voice, Wei WuXian’s heart jumped. Nie MingJue turned around again. Jiang Cheng came over, dressed in purple, hand on his sword.

And the person standing beside Jiang Cheng was none other than Wei WuXian himself.

He saw himself walk with hands behind his back, wearing all black. A flute in the shade of ink stuck to his waist, hanging down with crimson colored tassels. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Jiang Cheng, he nodded in this direction to show respect. Attitude slightly arrogant, he took on a profound, disdainful appearance. As Wei WuXian saw the stance of his younger self, the root of his teeth even cringed in soreness. He felt that he really was pretentious, and itched to just beat the hell out of himself.

Lan WangJi also saw Wei WuXian, who stood beside Jiang Cheng. The tip of his brows twitched ever so slightly. Soon afterward, his light-colored eyes returned to where they were, still looking forward in that composed way. Jiang Cheng and Nie MingJue nodded at each other with grave faces. Neither had anything unnecessary to say. After a hasty greeting, the two walked their separate ways. Wei WuXian saw his black-clothed self glance around as he finally saw Lan WangJi. He looked as if he was about to speak before Jiang Cheng came over and stood to his side.

(Chapter 49, Exiled Rebels translation)

They then proceed to talk about him and his lack of a sword behind his back, never having said a word to Wei Wuxian himself:

Nie MingJue’s gaze turned over again, “Why does Wei Ying not carry his sword?”

Carrying one’s sword was like wearing formal attire. In such gatherings, it was a non-negligible indication of etiquette. Those from prominent sects saw it as especially important. Lan WangJi responded in a lukewarm tone, “He had probably forgotten.”

Ning MingJue raised a brow, “He can even forget something like this?”

(Chapter 49, Exiled Rebels translation)

At Phoenix Mountain it also seems that Wei Wuxian is conditionally a member of the gentry, but not treated like an equal. Sometimes there are these more cheerful interactions:

Holding the flower, Lan WangJi seemed to be quite cold. His tone seemed cold as well, “Was it you?”

Wei WuXian immediately denied it, “No, it wasn’t.”

The maidens beside him spoke at once, “Don’t believe him. It was him!”

Wei WuXian, “How could you treat a good person like this? I’m getting angry!”

Giggling, the maidens pulled their reins and went to the formations of their own sects. Lan WangJi lowered the hand that he held the flower with and shook his head. Jiang Cheng spoke, “ZeWu-Jun, HanGuang-Jun, apologies. Don’t pay attention to him.”

Lan XiChen smiled, “That is fine. I will thank Young Master Wei’s kindness behind the flower in place of WangJi.”

(Chapter 69, Exiled Rebels translation)

But then he will be publicly disparaged and it is readily accepted by others. Jin Zixun first starts an argument with him by criticising Wei Wuxian for fighting Jin Zixuan, then turns the topic to Wei Wuxian’s having taken a third of the prey in the hunt.

Jin ZiXun, “Wei, just what what do you mean by going against ZiXuan so many times?”

[...]

Jin ZiXun sneered, “How is it presumptuous? How is any part of you not presumptuous? Today, in such an important hunt involving all of the sects, you really showed off your abilities, didn’t you? One third of the prey have been taken by you. You sure feel pleased, don’t you?”

[...]

He mocked, “But it’s only natural that you don’t think you’re in the wrong. It’s not the first time that Young Master Wei has disregarded the rules. You didn’t wear your sword in both last time’s flower banquet and this time’s hunt. It’s such a grand event, and you care nothing for courtesy. In what regard to you hold us, the people who are present with you?”

[...]

No disciple had ever dared say such lofty words in front of so many people. A moment later, as Jin ZiXun finally regained his composure, he yelled, “Wei WuXian! You’re only the son of a servant—how dare you be so bold!!!”

(Chapters 69-70, Exiled Rebels translation)

Naturally, Jin Zixun is able to weasel out of giving an apology, even though Jiang Yanli demands one. And guess who also takes a third of the prey, but this time without any censure?

Jin GuangYao, “In reality, not only did Young Master Wei keep a third of the prey to himself, our eldest brother has eliminated over half of the fays and the monsters as well.”

Hearing this, Lan XiChen laughed, “That is how Brother is like, after all.”

(Chapter 70, Exiled Rebels translation)

Never a Brother

As I’ve already mentioned, Wei Wuxian was never adopted by Jiang Fengmian, or adopted into the clan in general in even a distant way. And this nebulous ‘we’re letting you live with the main family as a charity, but you aren’t really one of us’ attitude also reflects in his relationship with Jiang Yanli.

I’ve already discussed how Wei Wuxian was more like a companion servant to Jiang Cheng than a brother. It’s also worth noting quickly that neither of them ever refers to the other as a brother. Wei Wuxian refers to Jiang Cheng as his shidi a few times, and Jiang Cheng never even refers to him as his shixiong (because Jiang Cheng views him as his servant, not as even a martial brother, I’d argue).

Only one member of the Jiang family ever does use familial terms to refer to Wei Wuxian: his shijie, Jiang Yanli. At Phoenix Mountain, when Wei Wuxian is being insulted by Jin Zixun, Jiang Yanli stands up and defends him, and states clearly that she considers Wei Wuxian a little brother:

The people who gathered around Jin ZiXun had on the same dark faces as he did. Yet, taking into consideration Jiang YanLi’s background, they didn’t dare talk back to her directly.

Jiang YanLi added, “Besides, hunting is hunting, so why bring the matter of discipline to the table? A-Xian is a disciple of the YunmengJiang Sect. He grew up with my brother and I, and so he’s as close as a brother is to me. Calling him the ‘son of a servant’—I’m sorry, but I won’t accept this. And thus…”

She straightened her back and raised her voice, “I hope that Young Master Jin ZiXun would apologize to Wei WuXian of the YunmengJiang Sect!”

(Chapter 70, Exiled Rebels translation)

It doesn’t come through in the Exiled Rebels translation, but she actually refers to Wei Wuxian as her didi in this scene, not her shidi. She’s trying to draw a line and state that Wei Wuxian is a part of the family. However, no one takes her seriously, and shortly afterwards we see Jin-furen insisting that Jiang Yanli and Wei Wuxian shouldn’t be walking alone together because it would be inappropriate.

Jiang YanLi whispered, “That’s not necessary. I’d like to have a few words with A-Xian. He can walk me back.”

Madam Jin raised her brows, looking Wei WuXian up and down. Her gaze was somewhat cautious, as if she was feeling displeased, “A young man and a young woman—you two can’t stick together all the time if nobody else is present.”

Jiang YanLi, “A-Xian is my younger brother.”

[...]

Wei WuXian lowered his head, “Excuse my absence, Madam Jin.”

He and Jiang YanLi bowed at the same time. As they turned around to leave, Madam Jin grabbed Jiang YanLi’s hand and refused to let her leave.

(Chapter 70, Exiled Rebels translation)

Jin Zixuan also never treats Wei Wuxian the way one might a brother who is still angered with him over his past dismissive treatment of his sister. For example, see their argument at the Flower Banquet:

Before he could see how Lan WangJi reacted, a series of clamor suddenly came from the other end of the base. Wei WuXian heard his own raging shout, “Jin ZiXuan! Don’t you forget about what things you said and what things you did? What do you mean by this, now?!”

Wei WuXian remembered. So it was this time!

On the other side, Jin ZiXuan also fumed, “I was asking Sect Leader Jiang, not you! The one I was asking about was also Maiden Jiang. How is that related to you?!”

[...]

Jin ZiXuan, “Sect Leader Jiang—this is our sect’s flower banquet, and this is your sect’s person! Are you going to look after him or not?!”

[...]

...Jiang Cheng’s voice came, “Wei WuXian, you can just shut your mouth. Young Master Jin, I’m sorry. My sister is doing quite well. Thank you for your concern. We can talk about this next time.”

Wei WuXian laughed coldly, “Next time? There is no next time! Whether or not she’s doing well isn’t any of his business, either! Who does he think he is?”

He turned around and started to leave. Jiang Cheng shouted, “Get back here! Where are you going?”

Wei WuXian waved his hands, “Anywhere is fine! Just don’t let me see that face of his. I never wanted to come, anyway. You can deal with whatever’s here yourself.”

Having been abandoned by Wei WuXian, Jiang Cheng’s face immediately clouded over.

[...]

Jiang Cheng stowed away the clouds on his face, “Don’t mind him. Look at how impolite he is. He’s used to such rude behavior at home.”

He then began to converse with Jin ZiXuan.

(Chapter 49, Exiled Rebels translation)

Jiang Cheng also quietly dismisses the notion of Wei Wuxian as a brother in relation to Jiang Yanli; when they visit to show him her wedding dress and she asks for a courtesy name, Jiang Cheng specifically says:

Jiang Cheng, “The courtesy name of my unborn nephew.”

(Chapter 75, Exiled Rebels translation)

Not our nephew, mine.

Even the disastrous invitation to Jin Ling’s one month celebration is framed as a favour to an old shidi, not a family member:

Jin ZiXun, “Since you’ve heard it from him already, you should know that I can’t wait. Don’t tell me that you’ll disregard your brother’s life for the sake of Sister-in-Law’s shidi?!”

Jin ZiXuan, “You clearly know that I’m not that kind of person! He might not necessarily be the one who cursed you with Hundred Holes either. Why are you so rash? I was the one who invited Wei WuXian to A-Ling’s full-month celebration anyways. If this is the way you do things, where does that leave me? Where does it leave my wife?”

Jin ZiXun raised his voice, “It’s best if he doesn’t attend! What does Wei WuXian think he is—does he deserve to attend our sect’s banquet? Whoever touches him gets nothing but a splash of black! ZiXuan, when you invited him, weren’t you worried that you, Sister-in-Law and A-Ling would receive an irremovable stain for the rest of your lives?!”

(Chapter 76, Exiled Rebels translation)

It’s clear that not only does wider society not consider Wei Wuxian and the Jiangs siblings...they themselves don’t, either. Wei Wuxian, after all, readily accepts that his relationship with them is over after he leaves the sect:

Before they parted, Jiang Cheng spoke, “We won’t see you off. It wouldn’t be good if someone saw us.”

Wei WuXian nodded. He understood that it wasn’t easy for the Jiang siblings to have come out here. If someone else saw them, all those things they did for the public to believe would be wasted. He spoke, “We’ll go first.”

[...]

He turned around, knowing that it’d be a long time before he’d get to see the people he was familiar with again.

But… right now, wasn’t he on his way to seeing people he was familiar with as well?

(Chapter 75, Exiled Rebels translation)

Cast Aside

The way cultivation society treats Wei Wuxian when he is not with the Jiangs is also very revealing. Any level of respect he is given is contingent on his position in the Jiang household, and when they aren’t around that minimal respect fades away. Look at how disrespectfully he is treated when he approaches Jin Zixun to ask for Wen Ning’s location.

Wei WuXian didn’t make small talk either, getting straight to the point, “No thanks. I don’t.” He nodded slightly at Jin ZiXun, “Young Master Jin, could I please have a word with you?”

Jin ZiXun, “If you have anything to say, come after our banquet is over.”

In reality, he didn’t want to talk to Wei WuXian at all. Wei WuXian could see this as well, “How long do I have to wait?”

Jin ZiXun, “Probably around six to eight hours. Or maybe ten to twelve. Or until tomorrow.”

Wei WuXian, “I’m afraid I can’t wait for that long.”

Jin ZiXun’s voice was arrogant, “You’ll have to wait even if you can’t.”

Jin GuangYao, “Young Master Wei, what do you need ZiXun for? Is it a pressing matter?”

Wei WuXian, “Pressing indeed. It allows for no delay.”

[...]

Jin ZiXun, “Wei WuXian, what do you mean? You came for him? You aren’t standing up for a Wen-dog, are you?”

Wei WuXian wore a broad grin, “Since when is it your business whether I’d like to stand up for him or cut his head off? Just give him to me!”

At the last sentence, the grin on his face vanished. His tone turned cold as well. It was clear that he had lost his patience. Many of the people within Glamor Hal shivered in fear. Jin ZiXun felt his scalp tingle as well. Yet, his anger soon soared. He shouted, “Wei WuXian, you are too bold! Did the LanlingJin Sect invite you today? And you dare run wild here. Do you really think that you’re invincible, that nobody has the courage to confront you? Do you want to overturn the Heavens?”

Wei WuXian smiled, “You’re comparing yourself to the Heavens? Excuse my language, but your face is a little too thick, isn’t it?”

[...]

Just as he was about to rebut, sitting on the foremost seat, Jin GuangShan spoke up.

His voice seemed kind, “It’s not anything too important anyways. You youngsters, why lose your tempers over such a thing? However, Young Master Wei, let me be fair here. Barging in when the LanlingJin Sect is holding a private banquet is indeed inappropriate.”

To say that Jin GuangShan didn’t mind what happened at Phoenix Mountain would be impossible. This was also why he only smiled when Jin ZiXun bickered with Wei WuXian but didn’t stop them, and only spoke up when Jin ZiXun was at the disadvantage.

Wei WuXian nodded, “Sect Leader Jin, it was never my intention to disturb your private banquet. My apologies. However, the whereabouts of the people whom Young Master Jin took are still unclear. Just a moment of delay, and it might be too late. One of the group had once saved me before. I will definitely not sit back and watch. Please do not feel pressured. I will make amends for this at a later date.”

[...]

After a few laughs, he continued, “Sect Leader Jin, let me ask you something else. Do you think that, because the QishanWen Sect is gone, the LanlingJin Sect has all right to replace it?”

All was silent within Glamor Hall.

Wei WuXian added, “Everything has to be given to you? Everyone has to listen to you? Looking at how the LanlingJin Sect does things, I almost thought that it was the QishanWen Sect’s empire all over again.”

[...]

A guest cultivator on his right shouted, “Wei WuXian! Watch your words!”

Wei WuXian, “Did I say something wrong? Forcing living people to be bait and beating them up whenever they refused to obey—is this any different from what the QishanWen Sect does?”

Another guest cultivator stood up, “Of course it’s different. The Wen-dogs did all kinds of evil. To arrive at such an end is only karma for them. We only avenged a tooth for a tooth, letting them taste the fruit that they themselves had sown. What’s wrong with this?”

Wei WuXian, “Take revenge on the ones who bite you. Wen Ning’s branch doesn’t have much blood on their hands. Don’t tell me that you find them guilty by association?”

Another person spoke, “Young Master Wei, is it that they don’t have much blood on their hands just because you say so? These are only your one-sided words. Where’s the evidence?”

[...]

Jin GuangShan stood up as well, his face a mixture of shock, anger, fear, and hatred, “Wei WuXian! Just because… Sect Leader Jiang isn’t here doesn’t mean you can be so reckless!”

Wei WuXian’s voice was harsh, “Do you think that I wouldn’t be reckless if he were here? If I wanted to kill someone, who could stop me, and who would dare stop me?!”

[...]

“Young Master Wei really is too impulsive. How could he speak in such a way in front of so many sects?”

Lan WangJi spoke coldly, “Was he wrong?”

Jin GuangYao paused almost unnoticeably. He immediately laughed, “Haha. Yes, he’s right. But it’s because he’s right that he can’t say it in front of them, correct?”

Lan XiChen seemed as if he was deep in thought, “Young Master Wei’s heart really has changed.”

(Chapter 72, Exiled Rebels translation)

The only person at this banquet who speaks to Wei Wuxian respectfully is Jin Guangyao, a consummate manipulator who is also of a lower social status. Everyone else speaks to him dismissively, refusing to respect his request for Wen Ning’s location even though he states that Wen Ning helped him during the war. Wei Wuxian is extremely polite at the beginning of this conversation, and only slowly begins to lose his temper when Jin Zixun speaks rudely and Jin Guangshan decides to bring up the matter of the Yinhufu (Wei Wuxian is right in suspecting him of wanting to replace Qishan Wen, of course, and that it’s very bold of them to think they have the right to a spiritual tool of his just because...they’re rich?).

When the sects meet at Koi Tower to discuss the breakout at Qiongqi Path, no one considers Wei Wuxian as an independent agent who they might actually want to meet and negotiate with themselves. He is a wayward servant of Yunmeng Jiang who the sect leader has failed to keep in hand.

Jiang Cheng only spoke after a few moments, “What he did was indeed a bit too much. Sect Leader Jin, I apologize to you in place of him. If there’s any way at all to help the situation, please let me know. I’ll definitely compensate for things however I can.”

[...]

Jin GuangShan, “Sect Leader Jiang, Wei Ying is your right-hand man. You value him a lot. All of us know this. However, on the other hand, it’s hard to tell whether or not he actually respects you. In any case, I’ve been a sect leader for so many years and I’ve never seen the servant of any sect dare be so arrogant, so proud. Have you heard what they say outside? Things like how during the Sunshot Campaign the victories of the YunmengJiang Sect were all because of Wei WuXian alone—what nonsense!”

[...]

Lan WangJi sat with his back straight, speaking in a tone of absolute tranquility, “I did not hear Wei Ying say this. I did not hear him express the slightest disrespect towards Sect Leader Jiang either.”

[...]

The good thing was that, not long after he felt awkward, Jin GuangYao came to save the day, exclaiming, “Really? That day, Young Master Wei busted into Koi Tower with such force. He said too many things, one more shocking than the next. Perhaps he said a few things that were along those lines. I can’t remember them either.”

[...]

Jin GuangShan followed the transition, “That’s right. Anyhow, his attitude has always been arrogant.”

One of the sect leaders added, “To be honest, I’ve wanted to say this since a long time ago. Although Wei WuXian did a few things during the Sunshot Campaign, there are many guest cultivators who did more than him. I’ve never seen anyone as full of themselves as him. Excuse my bluntness, but he’s the son of a servant. How could the son of a servant be so arrogant?”

[...]

“In the beginning, Sect Leader Jin asked Wei Ying for the Tiger Seal with nothing but good intentions, worried that he wouldn’t be able to control it and lead to a disaster. He, however, used his own yardstick to measure another’s intents. Did he think that everyone is after his treasure? What a joke. In terms of treasures, is there any sect that doesn’t hold a few treasures?”

“I knew that something would eventually happen if he continued on the ghostly path—look! His killing intents are being revealed already. Killing indiscriminately those from our side just because of a few Wen-dogs…”

[...]

Jin GuangShan continued, “Sect Leader Jiang, you’re not like your father. It’s just been a couple of years since the reestablishment of the YunmengJiang Sect, precisely when you should be displaying your power. And he doesn’t even know to avoid suspicions. What would the Jiang Sect’s new disciples think if they saw him? Don’t tell me you’d let them see him as their role model and look down on you?”

He spoke one sentence after another, striking the iron while it was still hot. Jiang Cheng spoke slowly, “Sect Leader Jin, that’s enough. I’ll go to Burial Mound and deal with this.”

Jin GuangShan felt satisfied, speaking in a sincere tone, “That’s the spirit. Sect Leader Jiang, there are some things, some people that you shouldn’t put up with.”

(Chapter 73, Exiled Rebels translation)

This is very reminiscent of the way that Jin Zixuan would often turn around and say, ‘Why aren’t you controlling your servant?’ to Jiang Cheng whenever he had a dispute with Wei Wuxian over his treatment of Jiang Yanli.

When Jiang Cheng goes to the Burial Mounds and Wei Wuxian defects from Yunmeng Jiang in order to help the sect save face, Jiang Cheng treats this as a personal betrayal. He not only challenges Wei Wuxian to a duel but then announces that Wei Wuxian has betrayed Yunmeng Jiang and declared himself the enemy of cultivation society:

After the fight, Jiang Cheng told the outside that Wei WuXian defected from the sect and was an enemy to the entire cultivation world. The YunmengJiang Sect had already cast him out. From then on, no ties remained between them—a clear line was drawn. Henceforth, no matter what he did, they’d have nothing to do with the YunmengJiang Sect!

(Chapter 73, Exiled Rebels translation)

“Wei Wuxian has betrayed the sect, and publicly regards all cultivation sects as enemy! Yunmeng Jiang Sect hereby expels him, breaking all ties with him and drawing a clear line between us. Henceforth, no matter what this person does, it will have nothing to do with Yunmeng Jiang Sect!”

(Modao Zushi Radio Drama, Season 3 Episode 5, Suibian Subs)

Naturally, no one ever questions this or wants to hear Wei Wuxian’s side of the story. Jiang Cheng is a sect leader and Wei Wuxian his servant, and that is all cultivation society needs to know.

In Conclusion

Wei Wuxian was never really part of the Jiang family. The wider social view was that he was a servant who was lucky to be taken in by the family and allowed to live in the main house alongside the sect leader’s children. He’s accepted into cultivation society conditionally, but only as someone who remains a rank below everyone else.

This attitude isn’t just the wider social view which the family themselves disregard; they all play into it. Yu Ziyuan and Jiang Cheng both actively enforce it, Jiang Fengmian passively enforces it, and Jiang Yanli tries but fails to break through the social barriers between them.

#mdzs #mdzs meta #modao zushi

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drwcn · 3 years

Text

follow up to [post] exploring the crack au if lwj was a girl

〒▽〒 ps im not trying to erase canon lwj representation, not at all, wangxian is mm in all my other fics, this is just stupid fun

in a ceteris paribus situation aka all other things staying equal:

1) Lan Wangji 100% still has a resting bitch face, which probably would get her a couple of “Lan-er-guniang 美若天仙 (beautiful as an immortal/goddess) but would benefit from smiling more” comments but nobody is that desperate to die yet so, she’s spared. But damn... imagine the sheer number of thirsty boys who’d try to secure a marriage with LWJ. None of them is good enough for Wangji as far as Lan Xichen is concerned. Okay - maybe in Lan Xichen’s opinion, Nie Mingjue is good enough, but he couldn’t be less interested. I see her as I see Huaisang, Xichen please.

2) Everything interaction between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian in Wei Wuxian’s first life is now 500% more scandalous.

Exhibit A) Their first meeting at the gates; Jiang Cheng immediately felt his spidey senses tingling. —“You’d sooner have immortals flying out of your ass than get with someone like her. The second jade of Gusu? The pearl in old man Lan’s eyes? C’mon.” —“Shut up, A-Cheng.” —“Uh-huh.” —“Also, she’s not that pretty. Her brother Zewu-jun is much better. There’s a reason he’s ranked first.” WWX is still a disaster bi. — “LMAO, you? Zewu-jun? Please.”

Exhibit B) Just because LWJ is a girl does not mean WWX grew more brain cells.

WWX, straight up to Lan Qiren’s face, “Lan-meimei and I - we’re zhiji.” (he means it like we’re kindred spirits, peas of a pod, etc) LWJ: *does not deny* Lan Xichen: ⚆_⚆ Lan Qiren: ಠ╭��ಠ

Exhibit C) Lan Wangji getting drunk the first time. Wei Wuxian knew he crossed a line the minute he invited Lan-er-guniang for a drink. Really, WWX, even for you, this is inappropriate. When Lan Wangji fell face first onto the table, Wei Wuxian knew, he fucked up. “Hey....hey...Lan....Lan...-er-guniang,” He poked her. “Don’t...don’t sleep here! You can’t sleep here! If your Uncle finds out or if Jiang-shushu finds out...they’ll skin me alive and then...and then they’ll make me marry you! I don’t want to marry you; you don’t talk and I’m too young!”

WWX, being a dipshit, “Hey Lan Zhan, call me Wei-gege.” LWJ, drunk as fuck, “Wei..gege.” WWX *((( heart )))* ???

Exhibit D) The Cold Pond. Okay, so I don’t think Zewu-jun would sabotage his sister’s virtue by sending a stupid teenage boy her way while she’s bathing, but doesn’t mean Su She is above all that. Wei “I didn’t see anything I swear!” Wuxian. Lan “I will gouge out your eyes.” Wangji. Somehow they still end up in the cave. Maybe WWX got in the water after LWJ got out and got sucked into the vortex and LWJ heard the commotion, turned around, saw WWX had disappeared. “Wei Ying?!” A panicked LWJ jumps back into the pond, “Stop fooling around, come out!”

Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing 👀👀 when LWJ and WWX fall out of the cave together. Also the fact that Lan-er-guniang and Wei-gongzi went missing, together, for two days. Who knows what could’ve happened. I mean anything really. I mean... that’s gotta stir the pot a little were it not for the Yin Iron stealing everyone’s attention away from this bit of juicy scandal.

Oh the whole story... so much to work with, so little time.

3) Because Lan Wangji is a girl, now suddenly there’s a high ranking member of the Lan Clan who can host the girls at Cloud Recesses. I mean, Mianmian, Jiang Yanli, Wen Qing, Lan Wangji - SISTERLY FRIENDSHIP. Other than Mianmian, none of the girls are really talkers which suits Lan Wangji perfectly. Even Mianmian’s chatter is endearing.

4) Lan Wangji is absolutely still a powerhouse during the Sunshot Campaign. The inherent aesthetics of fem!lwj telling the Wen goons to “kneel” - no one will deprive me of this. Also she will still cut off your arm if you cross her - Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao ya better watch out still.

I am TORN between two options: Lan Wangji tol and kickass or Lan Wangji smol and kickass. On one hand, the aesthetics of willowy elf-like LWJ, on the other hand, 5′2′’ of whoop ass who can and will throw an unconscious wwx over her shoulder firewoman-style and toll him to safety.

And amongst other things:

A) Lan Wangji still becomes Chief Cultivator, because excuse me who else is left to clean up this mess? Jiang “Short-fuse” Wanyin? Nie “I won’t do what I’m not intended to do” Huaisang? Jin “13 year-old” Ling? Or Sect Leader Yao? Technically, being a woman means that she was never Lan Xichen’s heir, but at the end of it, it’s not like Gusu Lan is left with a lot of choices. Just the poetic justice of Gusu Lan pleading for Lan Wangji to come back when she fully intends to 隐居山野 (retreat into the mountains) with the resurrected WWX.

Lan Wangji being Chief Cultivator would echo Lan Yi’s tenure and rectify the fact that Gusu Lan’s only female head of family “failed”. Lan Yi had to face a mountain of prejudice because she was woman; someone has to say “up yours” to that. A woman as not only the sect master of Gusu Lan but the Chief Cultivator? Love that for Gusu Lans. (⌐■_■) ☞ ☞

B) Because of ~ sexism ~ I wonder if Lan Wangji would get titled “Hanguang” at all even after the Sunshot Campaign. Even Lan Yi, the SL Lan of her time didn’t have a title. Chances are LWJ won’t either. (Note: Violet Spider is not a title, it’s a moniker). So — say after the way Lan Wangji is still just “Lan-er-guniang”, and she does not obtain the title “Han Guang” until after she leaves Cloud Recesses and become rogue. (srsly how did they come up with these titles in canon, did gusu lan just look at 21 year old lwj and be like yah he’s lord light bearer *cue trevor noah stand up joke* why do you call yourself “great” britain? isn’t that a bit presumptuous? shouldn’t you go around doing good things and then let other people come to the conclusion: oh britain look how great you are? same logic with lwj.)

Lan Wangji, a Jade of Gusu or a nameless rogue, still goes where trouble is, helping those who need it. After laying low for a year or two to heal, Lan Wangji began night hunting. Donned neck to ankle in white silk and tulle, and a weimao (wide brimmed veil hat) obscuring her face, she became known to the people as Hanguang Sanren, the lightbearing wanderer. Gusu’s highest power probably has some idea who she is - or at least they can guess - but the vast majority of people don’t.

C) Lan Sizhui raised by rogue Lan Wangji as his mum would be different. Still cultured, respectful, but definitely with an air of keeping others at arm’s length.

For instance, grown-up Sizhui running interference and saving a cohort of gentry disciples on joint hunts.

Jingyi: 这人谁呀？Who is this guy? Zizhen: 多谢兄台搭救之恩，小可看您眼生，敢问兄台尊姓大名，何门何派，改日当登门拜访. Many thanks for saving us. I don’t believe we’ve met, pray tell what is your name and sect, so we may visit at a later time to thank you for tonight. Sizhui: 在下无门无姓，单名思追。举手之劳不足挂齿，怎敢劳烦各位名门子弟答谢。My name is Sizhui, belonging to no family and to no sect. As for tonight - I only did what anyone would; it bears no mentioning and requires no thanks. Jin Ling: 你这人，看你工力不凡，想和你交个朋友，可你怎么遮遮掩掩的。Hey you, we see you’re a talented cultivator and want to make your acquaintance. Why are you so dodge-y? Zizhen：金陵 — Jing Ling - Sizhui: 若是有缘，还会相见。告辞。If it’s fated, we will meet again. Farewell.

Later: Jingyi: 思。追。思追谁？Si. Zhui. To recollect and long for whom? Sizhui: 母亲的一位故人. Someone from Mother’s past. Jingyi: 你父亲？...Your father? Sizhui: 我不知。I don’t know.

I thought about how cute it would be if sizhui and jin ling knew each other but guys...Jiang Cheng literally thinks he killed Sizhui’s biological father. Like he literally thinks he orphaned Sizhui before Sizhui is even born. And Lan Wangji would never accept anything from Jiang Wanyin, not that it would stop Jiang Wanyin from trying.

A package of books here, a new robe for Sizhui there. Lan Wangji doesn’t know how Jiang Cheng keeps finding her. She and Sizhui are nomadic.

D) The inevitable conversation after wwx is revived.

You know what would be funnier than Jiang Cheng thinking Sizhui is a wangxian baby is if Lan Qiren thinks Sizhui is a wangxian baby.

#cql #the untamed #wangxian #lan wangji #wei wuxian #lmao what is this #cql ficlet #corie fics #lwj fic #f!lwj

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jiangwanyinscatmom · 3 years

Text

Jin Guangyao isn't cruel because he is nice sometimes! No... no... just no. He pretends to be a nice, sweet person to get what he wants, it is exactly why he got away with the killings and plannings for the Yin Hu Fu, YEARS AFTER JIN GUANGSHAN IS OUT OF THE PICTURE. He's the only legitimate Jin left old enough to take over the Sect, who the hell was gonna argue that when all relevant Jins were dead and Nie Mingjue was killed by the happy smiling pretty boy?

First example, he was actively friends with Xue Yang, there is no saying he was coerced into that one since he recommended him as a guest disciple and made creepy little jokes with him.

Jin GuangYao sighed, “I only turned around for a second and you stirred up so much trouble for me. I only had to pay for a bowl of dumplings in the beginning, and now I have to pay for his table, chairs, pots and pans, and even bowls.”

Xue Yang, “You’ll miss the couple of coins?”

Jin GuangYao, “No.”

Xue Yang, “Then why are you sighing?”

Jin GuangYao, “I don’t think you’ll miss the couple of coins either. Why can’t you try being a normal customer once in a while?”

Xue Yang, “Back in Kuizhou I never paid for anything I wanted. Just like this.” As he spoke, he casually plucked off a stick of sugared haws off a vendor’s pole. It might be the first time the vendor saw such a shameless person. As he stared open-mouthed, Xue Yang took a bite, “Besides, you can deal with the trouble of me wrecking a tiny stall, can’t you?”

Jin GuangYao smiled, “You little delinquent. Wreck stalls however you want. I wouldn’t even care if you burned down the entire street. Just one thing—don’t wear the Stars Amidst Snow robes and cover up your face. Don’t let anyone know who did it, or it’d be trouble for me.”

He tossed the money to the vendor

A.K.A: haha you're funny and I don't care who you fuck over but be sly and

Next example:

And so, Jin GuangShan sought after all those who imitated Wei WuXian in cultivating the ghostly path and gathered them under his rule. He spent a great amount of money and resources on these people, ordering them to study and analyze the structure of the Tiger Seal in secrecy so that they could replicate and restore it. Among them, not many achieved anything, while the one who walked the furthest was the youngest Xue Yang, recommended by Jin GuangYao alone.

Jin GuangYao was overjoyed. He accepted him as a guest cultivator and gave him high rights and freedom. The corpse training ground was an area of land Jin GuangYao specially requested for Xue Yang for him to research in secrecy, which meant for him to fool around however he wanted to.

He gave a whole torture playground for Xue Yang to use, he specifically asked for this from his own mouth, for Xue Yang to use and he would check in on progress. As for his morals:

Jin GuangYao’s tone was somewhat reproachful, “He Su gongzi is a respected cultivator, after all. How could you refer to him in such a disrespectful way?”

The cultivator laughed coldly, “I’ve already fallen in your hands. What are you keeping up the pretense for?”

Jin GuangYao responded with a kind expression, “You don’t have to look at me like that. I also had no choice. To elect a chief cultivator is an irresistible trend. What was the use of stirring up trouble and seeking arguments everywhere? I’ve already warned you again and again, yet you were determined not to listen to me. Under these circumstances, things are already beyond redemption. From the bottom of my heart, I, too, feel utmost pain and regret.”

He Su, “What was the irresistible trend? What was stirring up trouble? Jin GuangShan wanted to establish the position of chief cultivator only to imitate the QishanWen Sect in being the only one at the top. Do you think all the world is ignorant? You frame me like this only because I spoke the truth!”

Jin GuangYao smiled, saying nothing. He Su continued, “When you really succeed, all of the world of cultivation would see the true face of the LanlingJin Sect. Do you think killing me alone would put you eternally at ease? How wrong you are! We, the TingshanHe Sect, teem with talent. From now on, we’ll unite and never surrender to you Wen-dogs of another skin!”

Hearing this, Jin GuangYao squinted slightly, the corners of his lips curving up. It was the usual kind, gentle expression. Seeing this, He Su felt his heart skip a beat. At the same time, commotion sounded outside the corpse training ground, among it the cries of women and children.

He Su spun around, only to see a group of LanlingJin Sect cultivators drag inside sixty or seventy people all wearing the same uniform. There were men and women, old and young. Every one of them was a cross between shock and fear, while some were already crying. Both tied up, a girl and a boy kneeled on the ground as they wailed at He Su, “Ge!”

He Su was shocked speechless, his face instantly as white as paper, “Jin GuangYao! What are you doing?! It’s enough if you kill me—why drag my entire sect along?!”

Jin GuangYao looked down and fixed his sleeves, still grinning, “Weren’t you yourself the one who reminded me just now? Even if I killed you, I wouldn’t be put eternally at ease. The TingshanHe Sect teems with talent, and from now on, you’d unite and never surrender—I was quite frightened. After much thought, this was the only thing I could come up with.”

Among the group are children. That he did see and stare at gleefully as he lets Xue Yang decide to use all of them for corpse experiments. What does that mean??? Maybe that Jin Guangyao is also not in fact best uncle as he similarly was willing to kill Jin Ling who he "loved" as bait to try running away and is more than willing to use his "friends" for his own rise to power or to run away.

Examples of him enjoying emotionally torturing others as much as Xue Yang as a tactic:

Example 1:

“That’s not the way to go about things, is it? The TingshanHe Sect rebelled and schemed to assassinate Sect Leader Jin with all its forces before it was caught red-handed. How could that be called without a reason?”

The ones overhead cried, “Ge! He’s lying! We didn’t, we didn’t!”

He Su, “Utter nonsense! Open your eyes and fucking look! There are nine-year-old children here! Old men who can’t even walk! How could they rebel against anything?! Why would they assassinate your dad out of nowhere?!”

Jin GuangYao, “Because you made a mistake and committed murder, Young Master He Su, while they refused to accept Koi Tower’s conviction of you, of course.”

He Su finally remembered the accusation for which he was transferred to such a creepy place, “It’s all made up! I never killed a cultivator of the LanlingJin Sect! I’ve never even seen the person who died! I don’t even know if he was really a cultivator from your sect! I… I…”

He stammered for a while before eventually caving in, “I… I don’t even know what happened, I don’t even know!”

Yet, at such a place, nobody would listen to his protests.

Example 2:

Just as he was about to move, Jin GuangYao smiled, “HanGuang-Jun, it’s best if you take five steps back.”

Wei WuXian suddenly felt a small, sharp sting come from his neck. Lan XiChen lowered his voice, “Be careful. Do not move!”

Lan WangJi’s gaze landed on Wei WuXian’s neck. His face paled slightly.

An almost invisible guqin string, light and golden, was tied around Wei WuXian’s neck.

The guqin string was extremely thin. It was covered in special paint as well, making it almost invisible to the eye. Along with how disoriented Wei WuXian was, unable to pay attention to anything else, he didn’t notice it when it wrapped around his throat.

“Lan Zhan, don’t! Don’t back away!”

But Lan WangJi immediately walked five steps back without any hesitation.

Jin GuangYao, “Wonderful. Now, please sheathe Bichen.”

With a clank, Lan WangJi obeyed again. Wei WuXian raged, “Don’t ask for too much!”

Jin GuangYao quipped, “This is already asking for too much? Next, I’m even going to ask HanGuang-Jun to seal away his spiritual powers. What would that be called?”

Wei WuXian seethed, “You…”

Before he could finish, the sharp pain of flesh being lacerated came from his throat. Something dripped down his neck. Lan WangJi’s face was pale. Jin GuangYao said, “How could he not listen to me? Just think about it, Wei gongzi, his life is in my hands.”

Lan WangJi spoke one word at a time, “Do. Not. Touch. Him.”

“Then you know what to do, HanGuang-Jun.”

A moment later, Lan WangJi responded, “Yes.”

Lan XiChen sighed. Lan WangJi raised his hands. With two strong taps, he locked his own spiritual powers.

Jin GuangYao smiled, his voice soft, “This really is…”

Lan WangJi’s eyes were locked on them, “Let him go.”

Example 3:

Wei WuXian wouldn’t have had to be responsible for a life as heavy as Jin ZiXuan’s, and the things that happened later wouldn’t have had to happen.

Yet now, he finally realized even the reason behind culprit’s curse wasn’t to frame him. Even the cause didn’t have anything to do with him!

Such a fact was truly difficult to accept.

As he laughed, Wei WuXian’s eyes reddened. He mocked, whether at himself or otherwise, “I can’t believe it’s because of someone like you… because of such a ridiculous reason!”

But Jin GuangYao seemed like he knew what he thought, “Wei gongzi, you really shouldn’t think like this.”

Wei WuXian, “Oh? You know what I think?”

Jin GuangYao, “Of course. It’s quite easy. You’re definitely thinking about how unfortunate you are. In reality, you’re not. Even if Su She didn’t curse Jin ZiXun, Mr. Wei, you’d receive a siege sooner or later, because of some other reason.” He smiled, “Because that’s what kind of a person you are. At best, you’re the untamed hero; at worst, you offend people wherever you go. Unless all those whom you’ve offended lived their lives safely, as soon as something happened to them or someone did something to them, the first person they suspect would be you and the first person they seek revenge on would also you. And this is something you have no control over.”

Somehow, Wei WuXian smiled, “What should I do? For some reason, I think you make a lot of sense.”

Jin GuangYao, “And even if you didn’t lose control at the Qiongqi Path, could you guarantee you didn’t lose control sometime in the rest of your life? Thus, someone like you is destined to have a short life. You see? Doesn’t it feel a lot better if you think about it this way?”

He takes little time in using others hurt or their protective instincts against them, and is just as gleeful to see others in powerless situations in comparison to him as it still gives him a form of control to worm his way out of everything that has caught up to him.

Jin GuangYao, “Ge, every word of what I say is true.”

His tone was more than earnest. Ever since he captured Lan XiChen, he’d indeed been treating him with respect. At this point, Lan XiChen wasn’t able to turn against him yet. He could only sigh, “Sect Leader Jin, I have already said, when you went your own way to scheme such havoc at Burial Mound, that there was no longer any need to call me ‘Brother.’”

Jin GuangYao, “What happened at Burial Mound was an accident, a mistake. But, I can’t go back anymore.”

Lan XiChen, “What do you mean you cannot go back?”

Lan WangJi frowned slightly, his voice cold, “Xiongzhang, do not engage in excessive conversation with him.”

Wei WuXian reminded him as well, “Sect Leader Lan, do you remember what you said to Sect Leader Jiang? Don’t spend too long talking to him.”

Jin GuangYao, “Ge, listen to me. I don’t deny that I did those things…”

Lan XiChen, “How could you deny them? There are both witnesses and proof!”

Jin GuangYao, “And so I said I don’t deny them! But to have killed my father, my wife, my son, ge—if not because I had no other choice, why would I have done those things? Could it be that I’m really so out of my mind in your eyes?!”

"Your… wife…” As though he couldn’t say it, he immediately changed his phrasing, "Your sister, Qin Su, did you really marry her while knowing what blood relationship you had with her?”

Jin GuangYao stared blankly at him. Suddenly, tears rolled down his eyes. He answered with pain, “… Yes.” Lan XiChen took in a deep breath. His face was almost ashen. Jin GuangYao whispered, "But I really had no choice.”

With a sigh, Lan XiChen continued, “Third, do not try to avoid it and answer me—did you plan the death of Jin ZiXuan on purpose?!”

Hearing his father’s name, Jin Ling, who’d been holding Jiang Cheng, widened his eyes.

Lan WangJi raised his voice somewhat, “Xiongzhang, you believe him?”

Lan XiChen’s expression was complicated, “Of course I do not believe that Jin ZiXuan ran into the attack at Qiongqi Path by accident, but… let him speak first.”

Jin GuangYao knew he wouldn’t be believed if he denied it no matter what. He clenched his teeth, “… I indeed didn’t run into Jin ZiXuan by accident.”

Jin Ling immediately clenched his fists.

Jin GuangYao continued, “But I’ve never thought of planning everything that happened afterward either. You don’t have to think of me as so clever and faultless. Many things can’t be controlled at all. How could I have known that he’d definitely die by Wei WuXian’s hands together with Jin ZiXun? How could I have predicted that Wei WuXian would definitely lose control and the Ghost General would definitely run a riot?”

Wei WuXian’s voice was harsh, “And you said you didn’t run into him by accident? Isn’t that self-contradiction?!”

Jin GuangYao, “I don’t deny that I told him about the attack at Qiongqi Path on purpose, but I only thought that he’d encounter some difficulties if he ran into you when you were being troubled by his cousin since he’d never been on good terms with you. How could I have known that you would simply kill everyone present, Wei gongzi?”

“Why was a sect leader who spent money like water unwilling to do the smallest favor and buy my mother’s freedom? Simple—it was too much trouble. My mother waited for so many years, weaving together so many difficult circumstances when she talked to me, imagining for his sake so many hardships. And the real reason was only a single word: trouble.

“This is what he said, ‘It’s especially women who’ve read some books who think they’re a level higher than other women. They’re the most troublesome, with so many demands and unrealistic thoughts. If I bought her freedom and took her back to Lanling, who knows how much fuss she’d make. It was best that I let her stay where she was just like that. With her conditions, she’d probably be popular for a few more years. She wouldn’t have to worry about her spendings for the rest of her life.’

“‘Son? Oh, forget it.’”

Jin GuangYao’s memory was extraordinary. With such a word-by-word repetition, one could even imagine that drunk expression of Jin GuangShan’s when he said these words, “Ge, look, those three words were all that I was worth to my father, ‘Oh, forget it.’ Hahahaha…”

Pain flashed before Lan XiChen’s face, “Even if your father… you…” He still couldn’t find an appropriate comment and gave up, sighing instead, “What is the use of saying all this now?”

Jin GuangYao shrugged as he smiled, “I can’t help it. To seek pity even after doing all these terrible things—that’s the kind of person I am.”

At the word ‘pity’, he suddenly flipped his wrist. A red guqin string wrapped around Jin Ling’s neck.

Tears still hung at the corners of Jin GuangYao’s eyes as he spoke, voice low, “Don’t move!”

"I had no choice", "I couldn't predict anyone would be killed" "He mocked and forgot my mother and I". He uses all of this as a try to convince a kind Lan Xichen to let him go. However,he contradicts his own defenses as he had said Wei Wuxian was always fated to die for his actions and lack of being to keep things under control. This empathy is faked on his end while he makes excuses all while he never extended the same courtesy to those he killed, innocent or not, and underhandedly still tries to get those sympathetic under his manipulations. When they are not working he resorts again to threatening lives. He uses his mother also as a reason for revenge, however his grab for power alone after Jin Guangshan and Nie Mingjue are killed was solely based on his own obsession of status at that point. His mother was no longer a goal to accomplish anything and his continued lies dragged in more than one innocent party to get what he wanted.

He never saw Jin Ling, Lan Xichen, Lan Wangji, or Wei Wuxian as anything but pawns despite his soft words to them that are really just a mockery within Guanyin Temple at that point. He has placed none of them before himself in terms of what he cares for and never had.

TL:DR: Jin Guangyao's "kindness" was always a mask and Nie Mingjue was right that he was irredeemable, genuinely unkind and cruel as a person.

(Edit: Jin Guangyao stans don't even try, I will block you if you dare to reply to this)

#mdzs #mdzs mo dao zu shi #Jin Guangyao #I'm a little tired of him being painted as something he is not too #he would never have been kind to Wei Wuxian in turn as he used his infamy for his own benefit #he said he was fated to die anyways #that's not friend material #nor would Wei Wuxian ever willingly work with him #lol good friend and shushu Jin Guangyao #please this take is just as annoying as any of Jiang Cheng's excuses

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bloody-bee-tea · 3 years

Text

Parents

Jiang Cheng is still panting heavily when he goes to check if they really did kill the yao, but when he turns slightly to make a joke at Nie Mingjue, his husband is nowhere to be seen.

“Mingjue?” Jiang Cheng yells out and he doesn’t want to admit it, but fear grips his heart.

The last moments of the fight were pretty hectic and rough; what if something happened to Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng didn’t notice it?

“Mingjue?” Jiang Cheng yells again, louder this time, when no answer comes and he goes back to where he thinks he saw Nie Mingjue last.

“Shush, Wanyin,” Nie Mingjue scolds him out of the blue and Jiang Cheng follows his voice into one of the many destroyed houses around the place.

The did not lose the whole village to the yao; these are long abandoned houses they simply found the yao at and so Jiang Cheng frowns.

“What’s going on?” he asks, carefully stepping into one of the destroyed houses but he comes to an abrupt stop when he sees what Nie Mingjue is holding.

“Is that a baby?” Jiang Cheng breathes out and is at Nie Mingjue’s side a moment later.

“Yes,” Nie Mingjue says, even though it’s pretty obvious that the squirming and clearly upset bundle in his arms is a human baby.

“What happened?” Jiang Cheng demands to know and steps closer to check the baby over.

“I don’t know. She made a sound and when I came in here, I found her all naked on the ground, not even crying. I hope she’s okay.”

Now that Nie Mingjue said it Jiang Cheng realizes that he cut his own robes to dress her, and the act just makes him love Nie Mingjue more.

“Let me see her,” Jiang Cheng says, holding his hands out expectantly and when Nie Mingjue drops her into his arms he checks her over more thoroughly.

There are no visible wounds on her and even though she seems a little bit too cold, she’s quickly warming up, now that she can leech off Jiang Cheng’s and Nie Mingjue’s body heat.

“She seems fine to me,” Jiang Cheng decides. “Maybe a little bit hungry, but she doesn’t seem injured.”

“Thank the gods,” Nie Mingjue breathes out and gently strakes his finger over her cheek. “I was worried because she wouldn’t cry. I still remember how Jin Ling was, it seemed strange for her not to make a sound.”

Jiang Cheng decides not to take offense on Jin Ling’s behalf, because he was one loud baby and instead says “Babies are much more sensitive than we give them credit for. If her parents were hiding from the yao, it’s likely she somehow picked up on the fact that she needs to be quiet.”

“She’s barely older than six month,” Nie Mingjue says with a frown and Jiang Cheng presses her protectively to his chest.

“And maybe she’s just especially bright,” he snaps back and then walks out of the house. “Come on, we still have to let the healers check her over, maybe we missed something,” he calls over his shoulder when Nie Mingjue doesn’t follow him immediately.

“Alright, alright. But Wanyin—no getting attached. We’re not keeping her,” he says and Jiang Cheng rolls his eyes.

“Of course we’re not keeping her. I don’t want any more kids, Jin Ling totally was enough for me,” he cheekily says, though immediately the doubt cuts deep again.

Jin Ling is only six, but the kid already has an attitude and he has his nose high up in the sky and Jiang Cheng is afraid that he fucked him over for good. He is not fit to raise any kid, least of all his sister’s child, and absolutely not the sweet baby in his arms.

“As long as you remember,” Nie Mingjue says and then keeps a hand under the babies bum the whole time they walk.

As if Jiang Cheng would ever let anything this precious drop.

~*~*~

“How is our baobei doing?” Nie Mingjue asks with a huge smile as he walks into the infirmary.

They are keeping her there for a lack of better accommodations, though Jiang Cheng is getting out all of Jin Ling’s old stuff again. Soon enough she’ll be able to sleep with them in their bedroom.

“She is perfectly alright,” Jiang Cheng gives back and looks up from where he’s sitting on the floor, tickling her tummy and watching her squirming around and squealing with laughter.

“And how is my most amazing husband doing?” Nie Mingjue asks as he drops a kiss to Jiang Cheng’s head and then blows raspberries onto the babies tummy.

“I am doing very well, too, thank you for asking,” Jiang Cheng seriously gives back and then erupts into laughter when Nie Mingjue gives him a disgruntled look at that.

It makes the baby clap her hands together and kick her tiny, tiny feet in the air and Jiang Cheng simply melts at the sight.

“And news of her parents?” he asks, mostly to distract himself from the urge of squeezing her to death and Nie Mingjue shakes his head as he sits down next to Jiang Cheng and picks her up.

“No. There were reports of a family running from the yao, but no one knew them and no one seems to know where the parents ran off to. I left a message in the house we found her in, in case they come back, but I don’t think it’s looking promising. It’s been a week already.”

“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng thoughtfully says and offers up one of his fingers for her to hold on to. “What a shame.”

“Yeah,” Nie Mingjue agrees and then they fall silent.

Well, at least until their little baobei starts to scream bloody murder because she’s hungry.

~*~*~

They are laying in bed, Jiang Cheng tracing senseless shapes into Nie Mingjue’s chest when he speaks up.

“We’re not keeping her, right?” Jiang Cheng asks and Nie Mingjue tenses.

“Wanyin, I thought we were agreeing on this,” he cautiously says and Jiang Cheng props himself up to look at him.

“We are. I am not fit to be a father; I was barely able to be an uncle to Jin Ling and raising him—I did so much wrong. I’m too much of my mother and not enough of my father and I’m just—”

“Well, from what you told me about your parents and from what I have seen with Jin Ling you are exactly the right mix of them. Just from the top of my head I can come up with at least seven instances where you held or carried Jin Ling, so I’d say you are perfectly good.”

“I messed up so much with him,” Jiang Cheng mutters. “The real damage will only show when he’s older, just you wait.”

“Well, pardon me, but your parents were shit and you turned out alright if I dare say so,” Nie Mingjue tells him and pulls him into a kiss. “And I am not actually keen on being a dad, either. I was pouring so much into raising Huaisang when our father died and I don’t know if I can raise anyone without the explicit expectation of them having to be a Sect Heir.”

Nie Mingjue sighs and Jiang Cheng snuggles closer to him.

“Look at how I messed up with him. I put so much pressure onto him all the time because I feared I would die young and now he avoids any kind of responsibility as if his life depends on it. I already fucked up once. I’m not going to do it again.”

“You didn’t fuck up,” Jiang Cheng protests. “If anything you spoilt him too much. You were too lenient. It’s not like he ever cowers when you yell at him, right? He’s clearly not afraid of you or the consequences you keep threatening him with, because he damn well knows you’d never follow through.”

“Is that right?” Nie Mingjue asks, raising one eyebrow at Jiang Cheng. “Just like Jin Ling laughs at you whenever you threaten to break his legs?”

“That’s different,” Jiang Cheng huffs.

“I don’t think it is,” Nie Mingjue argues and then rolls them over onto the side so they can sleep.

“No more kids,” he mutters, burying his face in Jiang Cheng’s hair and Jiang Cheng agrees.

No more kids for them.

~*~*~

It’s been two months by now since they found little Baobei in the abandoned house and they have formed a routine around her.

The healers complained after two weeks of her being in the infirmary that she can’t stay there anymore so Jiang Cheng and Nie Mingjue took her to their own bedroom, letting her sleep right next to their bed, so they could keep an eye on her.

“Good morning, little baobei,” Jiang Cheng says when she grumbles herself awake and Nie Mingjue laughs at the sight.

“She’s just like you,” he jokes and Jiang Cheng can’t even manage a proper frown over her head.

“Shut up, she is not,” he denies and Nie Mingjue has not even the decency to argue with him about this.

“Let’s go find Jiang Zedong and hear how the search for parents for her is going,” Jiang Cheng mutters, a little bit miffed that Nie Mingjue wouldn’t indulge him in a little argument, but when Nie Mingjue comes over to pepper first Baobei with kisses and then Jiang Cheng, he decides it’s forgotten.

When they ask Jiang Zedong about the issue he stares at them like they lost their minds.

“What do you mean, possible parents for her?”

“What do you mean, what do we mean?” Jiang Cheng bites back, though he’s aware that the look is a little bit ruined with Baobei in his arms. “You’re supposed to look for possible parents for her, what’s going on?”

“You mean for other people to take her in?”

“Other people? Who else would take her in?” Nie Mingjue asks as well, and when Baobei starts to sniffle, he takes her right out of Jiang Cheng’s arms.

It turns out that Baobei is a very sensitive baby, and she picks up on moods incredibly well. They haven’t found much that can sooth her, but resting against Nie Mingjue’s chest always seems to do the trick.

Jiang Cheng can relate. It’s a very good chest to lean on.

“You?” Jiang Zedong shoots back and Jiang Cheng quickly reaches out when Nie Mingjue’s arms go slack.

He manages to secure Baobei until Nie Mingjue remembers himself and hugs her close again.

“We’re not looking to adopt,” Nie Mingjue tells him, and Jiang Zedong frowns in confusion.

“But didn’t you already? I mean, she sleeps with you and you modelled your whole day around her. You come running when she cries or makes any kind of sound and no offense, but you don’t even allow the healers to hold her for her check-ups. I am actually afraid of what you’ll do if I tell you that we did find someone to adopt. Honestly, I just thought you would keep her.”

Jiang Cheng blinks at Nie Mingjue who in turn blinks at him.

“We didn’t want to adopt,” Jiang Cheng eventually says and Nie Mingjue nods.

“Well, to me—and everyone else—it looks like you already did. Now if you excuse me, I have real problems to solve here,” he then tells them and simply marches off.

Jiang Cheng wonders what demon was possessing him when he appointed Jiang Zedong his second in command, but when Baobei gurgles he forgets that thought.

“We weren’t looking to adopt,” Nie Mingjue says and bounces Baobei in a soothing manner.

“No, we weren’t.”

“Maybe—maybe she adopted us?” Nie Mingjue tries and Jiang Cheng sighs, before he leans into Nie Mingjue’s side.

“My soul, maybe it’s time we face the truth,” he gravely says, and surprisingly enough he’s not terrified out of his mind. “We’re done for. We are her parents.”

There’s a moment of silence from Nie Mingjue before he shrugs.

“Could be worse, I guess,” he says and lifts Baobei up high in the air.

Jiang Cheng fights the urge to snag her out of his hands, because what if he lets her fall, but by then Nie Mingjue already has her safely against his chest again.

“Just promise me, Wanyin: if I put too much pressure on her, if I demand too much of her, you’ll have to smack me over the head.”

“I’ll smack you over the head whenever I please,” Jiang Cheng cheerfully tells him but then he nods. “Of course I promise. And—the same goes for you: if I snap at her like my mother did or if I don’t give her the affection she deserves, you’ll have to smack some sense into me.”

“I promise, my heart, but you already did a good job with Jin Ling.”

Jiang Cheng doesn’t comment on that, because the fear that he fucked his nephew up sits deep, but when Baobei babbles happily at him, he pushes those thoughts away.

“Oh shit,” Jiang Cheng suddenly says, and looks with big eyes at Nie Mingjue. “We have to come up with a real name for her!”

“Oh fuck,” Nie Mingjue wholeheartedly agrees and then they dissolve into laughter because if that is their biggest worry right now, then maybe they’ll be alright.

Link to my ko-fi on the sidebar!

#bt writes #the untamed #mdzs #mingcheng #mdzsbingo #established relationship #canon divergence #adoption #found family #quite literally #fluff

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robininthelabyrinth · 3 years

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Unfettered (aka NHS goes feral) - part 4 - previous parts: on ao3 or tumblr pt 1, pt 2, pt 3

Wei Wuxian wasn’t going to lie: it was weird seeing Nie Huaisang smiling again.

It wasn’t that he didn’t remember how Nie Huaisang used to behave when they were all back at the Cloud Recesses, and even before, but that seemed so long ago these days that it might as well have occurred in a past life. The expression just didn’t fit him anymore, like a grown man trying to return to the clothing of his childhood, and yet at the same time it was wretchedly familiar, even welcome – it was as if time had reversed course all at once, plucking them all out of the stream of their lives and returning them to how it used to be long before. Back to simpler, happier times.

It was kind of funny, actually.

Those that had not known Nie Huaisang as anything other than the Pallbearer seemed to be in a state of utter shock, gossiping madly – Did you see? He was smiling! He laughed at someone’s joke! He told a joke! He patted that child on the head and said ‘good job’ and the child didn’t cry even once!

Those that had known him from before only by reputation were, if anything, even more aghast – Do you think he’s going to start pouting and crying at things again? Surely not, I can’t even imagine! The last time he pouted was when one of his fans got stained, remember, after he stuck it straight through that man’s throat –

Those that had known him from before in person…

Well, the reaction was mixed. There was some relief, some distress, and a great deal of pain as they remembered once again how much their friend had changed in the wake of his brother’s near-death – the reminder of his former self was both nostalgic and bittersweet.

Personally, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji were working through their feelings on the subject with the help of a lot of roleplaying involving their time at the Cloud Recesses. It was very healthy of them, emotionally, although maybe not so healthy for the state of Wei Wuxian’s waist. Or throat. Or hands…

(No, they weren’t officially married yet, since they were still hoping that they could have a proper ceremony when the war ended, but they were both of age and engaged. And that meant they could go to bed together, no matter what some of the more conservative Lan sect members thought – with Lan Qiren backing them up, which he did with no small amount of eye-rolling and deep sighs and long-suffering resignation, they were free to do as they pleased.)

That, too, was something they owed to Nie Huaisang.

Without Nie Huaisang’s timely intervention, both Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng would’ve fallen for the Jin sect’s instigation and turned against each other in an act of mutual destruction that harmed both of them, and everyone else besides. Jiang Cheng would have cut off his own right arm, voluntarily weakening his sect just at the moment when they needed strength the most, and rendered himself without any other choice but to be dependent on Lanling Jin, while Wei Wuxian would have remained trapped in the Burial Mounds in Yiling, getting called the Yiling Patriarch as some people still today did, growing ever more resentful at his isolation and poverty.

(That one uncomfortable month he’d spent arguing with Wen Qing and Wen Ning about whether they should try to grow radishes or potatoes had been very educational, especially since they were both not-so-secretly convinced that the argument was futile and that nothing would ever grow on the Burial Mounds, such that they were just whiling away time until they all starved to death.)

They would be scattered, weakened, unhappy and vulnerable. Wei Wuxian would be sitting there like a giant target until the Jin sect decided, in their leisure, to deal with him the way, in hindsight, they had so obviously always intended to.

Wei Wuxian would have missed his sister’s wedding, probably. He might even have missed Jiang Yanli’s widowing, and the consequences of that were unthinkable.

If Wei Wuxian hadn’t brought the Wen sect back with him to the Lotus Pier as a result of Jiang Cheng’s defiance of the cultivation world’s criticism, Wen Qing and Jiang Yanli would never had the chance to hit it off the way they had, becoming fast friends. If they hadn’t been friends, Wen Qing wouldn’t have been visiting Jinlin Tower to check up on her good friend when the news of Jin Zixuan’s death had first spread.

His murder, rather – Wei Wuxian wasn’t terribly clear on the details, but it wasn’t really necessary. Jin Guangshan had pressed his legitimate son’s filial piety to the breaking point in his pursuit of power, and finally he must have done something to go too far, to cause there to be a real break between them. Jin Zixuan must have made clear that he would not play along, no matter what, and by that point Jin Guangshan already knew there was Jin Guangyao waiting in the sidelines to step up and take his place. There was no other way it could have gone, simply because there was no other reason for both Jin Zixuan and his mother to so conveniently die on the very same day.

If it hadn’t been for Nie Huaisang convincing Jiang Cheng, Wen Qing wouldn’t have been there. Wen Qing wouldn’t have been available to be bold and decisive, the way she was with her medicine; she wouldn’t have been able to persuade Jiang Yanli of the possibility of danger and then to smuggler out of Jinlin Tower and take her on the run in disguise, long before it occurred to anyone else that there might be some threat to her – that the Jin sect might decide to hold her hostage, or worse.

Definitely worse. If Jin Guangyao had had the chance to figure out what only Wen Qing had known back then – that Jiang Yanli, barely more than a newlywed, already carried the next heir to Lanling Jin within her belly…

Jin Guangyao’s ambitions would never have let Jin Zixuan live, a fact they’d all only realized in horrible helpless hindsight, but if Wen Qing had been trapped in Yiling with Wei Wuxian at the time, instead of visiting Lanling, then Jiang Yanli…

Wei Wuxian didn’t even want to think of it.

So, really, it was only fair that Nie Huaisang, who had whether intentionally or incidentally saved so many of them these past few years, finally, finally get what he’d been dreaming of all these years: his brother’s return.

It was only fair that he be allowed to return to being happy.

And yet, at the same time –

“You need to go talk to him,” Jiang Cheng said. His arms would be crossed in front of his chest if he wasn’t currently holding a sleeping Jin Ling, who’d had something of a fright upon meeting the new and improved Nie Huaisang. The poor kid had been convinced that his habitually bitter and vicious Second Uncle Nie was possessed by some sort of fierce but bizarrely friendly ghost. “There’s a war on, for fuck’s sake. He can’t spend all his time haunting the Unclean Realm trying to pretend that he’s something he’s not in order to keep his brother from finding out that he’s changed!”

“It’s not as bad as all that,” Wei Wuxian objected. “I mean, Nie Huaisang’s always run most of the war through correspondence, anyway, and it’s not like we’re totally helpless without him to boss us around.”

“His absence hasn’t been noted by our enemies just yet,” Wen Ning murmured. His arms were similarly full with Wen Yuan – a little older than his friends, steadier and more mature, but a sympathetic crier, and spending a month of his childhood in the Burial Mounds made him more susceptible to fears of possession, not less, so he’d been set off by Jin Ling. And seeing them both in tears had, of course, made poor level-headed Jin Rusong, who didn’t cry easily at all, panic and try to help in a way that only made it worse; Xiao Xingchen had swept him away to the kitchen, and the two of them were currently making snacks for the other two when they woke up. “But it will be, soon. They are already puzzled by the change in tactics.”

Wen Ning’s voice was as soft as ever, his stutter subdued only by the fact that he was with company he liked, but his tone brooked no argument – he’d changed a lot since their youth, too, and knew more intimately than most how some things could not be undone.

The Jin sect, not content with merely killing him, had dubbed his resurrected self ‘the Ghost General’ in an attempt to incite the cultivation world into hating and fearing him. It had been a lie back then, when he’d been doing nothing more than planting radish seeds and babysitting, but now Wen Ning was a general in truth, the leader of their archers and one of Nie Huaisang’s right hands. He was still shy, still didn’t speak fluently and probably never would, but Nie Huaisang had assigned him several capable deputies who understood him even when he had to resort to the type of hand-signs used by the deaf or in covert situations. He was surprisingly popular with the cultivators on their side of the war, although Wei Wuxian acknowledged that perhaps his popularity shouldn’t be that much of a surprise: there was a certain morale-boosting effect in seeing your general continuing to fight even after being struck with enough arrows to create a porcupine.

“Being puzzled by a change in tactics is fairly run of the mill for any enemy facing Nie Huaisang,” Wei Wuxian pointed out.

“Which is why they haven’t noticed it yet, Wei-gongzi. But eventually…”

Wei Wuxian grimaced. “Is it really that dire?”

“Not yet,” Lan Wangji said ominously, and – fine. If even Lan Wangji thought that someone should talk to Nie Huaisang, Wei Wuxian would go and talk to him.

After all, they were old friends of long acquaintance.

Very long, even.

“I come bearing terms of peace,” Wei Wuxian announced, walking into Nie Huaisang’s study and waving a few jars of wine at him. “Come negotiate with me, Nie-xiong!”

“I don’t recall giving you permission to barge into my room,” Nie Huaisang said without looking up from his correspondence, a little flash of the vicious Pallbearer they’d all grown painfully accustomed to – he had his family’s temper but a cooler head, with rage that burned low and long rather than flaring up hot and burning out.

Wei Wuxian reflected once more on how apt Nie Huaisang’s personal title was. The foolish thought that it referred to the filial piety he showed in mourning the brother that raised him since childhood, the somewhat wiser to the way the attack on Nie Mingjue had forced Nie Huaisang to find the virtue he had previously lacked, but the really smart ones knew that the most accurate interpretation was that those that Nie Huaisang chose to accompany to their end would ultimately find themselves without any path forward but death.

Nie Huaisang’s cultivation was still nothing special, his ability to fight virtually non-existent beyond the most basic of saber forms – a saber he now carried with him often enough, but still almost never used – and he’d rejected Wei Wuxian’s very innovative idea (if he did say so himself) that he try to train with a war fan, both on the basis of it being both too much effort and furthermore thoroughly lacking in aesthetic. As a result, he had no particularly notable talents, and none that could allow him to triumph in a night-hunt or a duel.

It didn’t make him any less terrifying.

“You’ll forgive me,” Wei Wuxian said flippantly, and sat down next to him, looking at the words that filled the page with Nie Huaisang’s lovely, artistic calligraphy. “More spy stuff?”

Nie Huaisang’s lips curled up into a small smirk. “Naturally. The network never sleeps, as you well know. I assume you’ve been sent to scold me about the war?”

“Amazing,” Wei Wuxian said, and nudged him in the side with his elbow. “It’s almost like you have a brain in your head or something. Since you’ve guessed it, I don’t even know what more I need to say…how’s Chifeng-zun doing?”

That got Nie Huaisang’s face to soften, as he’d hoped it would. “Much better. He’s been sleeping and waking consistently, and the mobility exercises are working well, though of course he’s insisting on trying more than he can manage. He only just managed to walk across the room without stumbling yesterday, had to sit down right away after, and he’s already asking about saber training.”

That was very in character for Nie Mingjue.

“I’m glad,” Wei Wuxian said, meaning it with all his heart. “I missed da-ge.”

He owed him so much, after all.

So much more than most people knew.

It had been Nie Mingjue who had found him all those years ago, in the dark days when his parents had died in a night-hunt gone wrong and the money they’d left with the innkeeper turning out to be insufficient to keep him housed or fed for more than a fortnight. Wei Wuxian had been a spoiled, beloved child – even if his parents were rogue cultivators, his father originally a servant, they were famous; there wasn’t a town that didn’t welcome them with open arms. They had never lacked for money, for warmth and comfort.

Wei Wuxian might have had a chance if they’d died in the spring or summer. He might have been able to learn to sleep on the streets during warm nights and used those rich fat months to learn from all the other beggars how to eat refuse, but his parents had died in the winter. Even the beggars chased him away, unwilling to spare the smallest scrap of food or lose any bit of warmth by sharing the spots they had found to shelter from the cold; and when he went to the richer districts that had once greeted his parents with such enthusiasm, wild dogs were sent to chase him away, vicious and merciless…within a week, he had been very nearly dead.

Luckily, when hiring rogue cultivators turned out to be insufficient to deal with the problem, the miserly local landlord that had sent out the notice in the first place had finally given in and written to a Great Sect, begging for aid – as a rich man, he was obligated to contribute to the costs of a requested night-hunt, and the Great Sects, while generally more successful, were typically far more mercenary in that regard than rogue cultivators – and Nie Mingjue had come with his Nie sect, the most willing by far to do the work of defeating evil without charging too much for the privilege.

He’d found the bodies of Wei Wuxian’s parents.

Soon after, he’d found Wei Wuxian himself.

Wei Wuxian had been about seven, then. It had been a full two years before Jiang Fengmian had found him on the very same streets, hiding in the trash with a dirty face and a sad and miserable expression, ready to be picked up and taken home by his father’s old friend, the Sect Leader of Yunmeng Jiang.

Just as anyone might’ve predicted.

After all, Nie Mingjue had never stinted on sending out spies, even if he never used them.

(He’d released Wei Wuxian of all those old obligations long ago – but Nie Huaisang never had.)

“Da-ge passes along his thanks, by the way,” Nie Huaisang said. “He thinks the array you created to help preserve his life is brilliant.”

“It is brilliant,” Wei Wuxian said, shameless as always. Getting a truly vicious scolding from his little master Nie Huaisang about exactly how close to the line his arrogance had brought him and the Wen sect had humbled him a bit, and the disaster of the Stygian Tiger Seal nearly going out of his control at the Nightless City not long thereafter had humbled him still more, but in the end he was still Wei Wuxian. He was awesome. “Could anyone else have done what I did?”

Nie Huaisang rolled his eyes.

“He’s not angry at me for misusing Baxia?” Wei Wuxian asked, fishing for confirmation. If there was one thing that his two years in the Nie sect had taught him, it was a near-pathological revulsion at the thought of touching another person’s spiritual weapon – he’d been very nearly more excited to be allowed to put his hand on an unsheathed Bichen than Lan Wangji’s dick, although not quite – and Nie Mingjue was quite justifiably more paranoid than most on the subject.

Even that treacherous dog Jin Guangyao hadn’t dared touch Baxia. The spiritual poison he’d used on Nie Mingjue had been limited to the man himself, and that had been what gave Wei Wuxian the idea for the array he’d invented. Nie Mingjue cultivated with Baxia as his primary, if not only, spiritual weapon, and the disciples of the Nie sect were closer to their sabers than most – and by the end of the Sunshot Campaign, Baxia was a fearsome entity in her own right, possessed of her own spiritual energy.

And as he’d always said, energy was meant to be used.

There was something about the Nie sect’s cultivation style that reminded Wei Wuxian of his innovations in demonic cultivation, although it wasn’t quite the same. They didn’t manipulate resentful energy directly the way he did, but they still made use of it, refining their blades with it until the sabers were very nearly guai, cultivating saber spirits filled with a lust for blood – although the strict disciplines of the Nie sect cultivation path meant that every saber spirit that Wei Wuxian had ever had the fortune (or misfortune) to personally encounter just as absolutist in their disdain for evil as their masters.

Even Nie Huaisang’s saber Aituan was like that, and maybe that should have been Wei Wuxian’s first hint that Nie Huaisang wasn’t as simple as he appeared on the surface.

“It’s fine,” Nie Huaisang assured him. “Really. Da-ge said it was – how’d he put it – a charming contradiction, that his saber get used to cultivating energy for him rather than him for the saber. Though maybe he was just relieved that she was intact, given everything.”

Wei Wuxian grinned and toasted Nie Huaisang, drinking a little of the wine while Nie Huaisang continued with his correspondence.

They sat in comfortable silence for a little while.

“I’m not pretending,” Nie Huaisang said abruptly, and Wei Wuxian, who’d drifted off into daydreams involving him, Lan Wangji, and a very sturdy bathtub, turned to look at him. “I know what Jiang Cheng thinks –”

“Of course you do. I tell you what Jiang Cheng thinks.”

“Shut up, you – you calamity. I don’t need you to tell me what Jiang Cheng thinks, he tells me himself more often than not. He thinks that I’m pretending to be useless because I don’t want da-ge to know about everything I’ve done, but that’s not the case at all. He knows. I wouldn’t keep it from him.”

“I know,” Wei Wuxian said, because he did. Even at his most lazy and self-indulgent, Nie Huaisang abhorred the thought of lying to his brother. “But you are spending too much of your time in the Unclean Realm. We need you back in the field.”

Nie Huaisang scowled. “The cream of the cultivation world,” he said disdainfully. “Can’t they do anything by themselves, just for a few short months? You’d think my brother fought the entirety of the Sunshot Campaign by himself with how little they seem to contribute.”

“Personally, I think that everyone has just taken the Nie sect as lucky cats, and are afraid to do without you,” Wei Wuxian said, batting his eyelashes at him in his most provoking show of earnestness. “Nie-xiong, if I rub your head, does that mean I’ll win my next battle…?”

“Don’t you dare,” Nie Huaisang said, but the scowl receded and he looked amused again. “I can’t wait to send da-ge out on the battlefield again.”

“The Jin sect will trample each other in their eagerness to get off the battlefield rather than face Chifeng-zun,” Wei Wuxian agreed, and couldn’t help his own smile at the thought. “The rumors that he’s returned have already started spreading like wildfire, but you’ve done well to hide him away so thoroughly. It means no one knows if the rumors are right or if you’re just pulling some kind of trick on the world.”

“Who, me? A trick?” Nie Huaisang said, and smiled thinly. “I only wish I could’ve seen the look on that treacherous dog’s face when his spies reported on my unusual behavior. I hope he’s afraid.”

Wei Wuxian agreed.

He had tried many times to imagine doing what Jin Guangyao had done. To turn your hand against the man to whom you had sworn to love as a brother –

He couldn’t even imagine hurting Jiang Cheng like that, and Jiang Yanli even less.

Wei Wuxian owed Nie Mingjue his life. He had sworn fealty to him with all the passion and singlemindedness of childhood, and had never once regretted it. Nie Mingjue had taken him off the streets and brought him back to his sect, he’d taken back his parents’ bodies and buried them with full (if private) honors, he’d given Wei Wuxian training to make him strong and smart and capable. He’d sent him to do work in a place where he would prosper and thrive and be happy, and all the while promised that he would never be trapped – that he would have a way out if the Jiang sect became too suffocating or he was treated too viciously, on one hand, and on the other told him that he could one day petition to be released from his obligations to the Nie sect if he ever found them too demanding.

Wei Wuxian had asked to be released from those obligations after the fall of the Lotus Pier, unable to stomach the idea of reporting on Jiang Cheng now that he was all alone in the world in the way that he had so effortlessly reported on Jiang Fengmian and Madame Yu. Nie Mingjue had granted the reprieve without a second’s hesitation, even though it meant wasting the years and years of investment they’d put into him, even though it would have been a critical moment to have an ear within the Jiang sect’s camp.

Wei Wuxian owed Nie Mingjue everything.

And yet – if the man had asked him to kill Jiang Cheng, he would have said no.

Twin heroes, he’d promised Jiang Cheng, and if for a while he’d thought he would have to give up that promise because of the secret of the golden core that he still kept hidden away, he refused to think it any longer. Jiang Cheng was his brother in all but blood, in all the ways that mattered. Wei Wuxian would stand aside from him if he thought he had to, as he had with the Wen sect remnants; he would keep secrets from him, he would even deceive him, but he would never willingly seek to hurt him.

Jin Guangyao, though? He had attacked Nie Mingjue without even being asked.

He was like some rabid beast, a white-eyed wolf, Wei Wuxian thought. Utterly beyond his understanding.

He deserved to be afraid.

“Speaking of which,” he said, suddenly remembering. “I think I’ve figured out why Jin Guangyao was willing to kill his own heir to further his and his father’s ambitions.”

“About time,” Nie Huaisang said, and while his tone was stern Wei Wuxian was mostly sure that he was teasing. “I put you on that job months ago. What do you think I keep you around for? Your brilliant inventions? Your armies of corpses? Your amazing ability to stun irritating sect leaders into silence with your overwhelming shamelessness regarding Lan Wangji –”

“Let’s not talk about that,” Wei Wuxian said hastily, although the giant grin he couldn’t keep off his face said everything about his shame – or lack thereof – relating to that last one. You get caught doing one little roleplay about the fearsome demonic cultivator Yiling Patriarch being arrested by the righteous cultivator Hanguang-jun and suddenly no one wanted to look you in the eye anymore… “Anyway, according to all the rumors, you keep me around because you want me to raise your brother the way I raised Wen Ning.”

Nie Huaisang rolled his eyes. “I’ve heard that one, and I still can’t believe anyone believes it. Da-ge’s a sect leader! Even if you wanted to bring him back, think about the amount of resentment he would have had to feel at his death to rise up again despite all the soul-calming rituals he’s gone through! If he ever became that resentful, he wouldn’t rise up as a ghost general, he’d be a ghost king, and then we’d all be screwed.”

Nie Huaisang wasn’t wrong. Nie Mingjue was one of the most powerful cultivators living – if he rose as a fierce corpse, he’d be able to slaughter an entire village of common people overnight with just the energy in one hand. And if he were then allowed access to Baxia, her power added to his…he’d become a scourge on the world, a true calamity, and they’d need to find a way to appease his anger and somehow lock him away forever just to survive.

Assuming Nie Huaisang allowed something like that, anyway. Wei Wuxian was very happy they had never been forced to face the question of whether Nie Huaisang preferred his brother or his morality, as he suspected no one would like the answer to that. Not even Nie Huaisang.

“Enough speculation,” Nie Huaisang said, and Wei Wuxian twitched guiltily even though he knew Nie Huaisang was not, in fact, a mind-reader. “What’s the story with A-Song?”

“You want the long version with all the proof I found to support it or the conclusion?”

“Start with the conclusion.”

“Jin Guangyao couldn’t risk A-Song growing up into a half-wit on account of being a child of incest.”

That actually surprised Nie Huaisang, Wei Wuxian was pleased to see.

“Incest?” Nie Huaisang said wonderingly. “But how – oh, of course. Jin Guangshan and Madame Qin? An affair or rape?”

“Rape while he was drunk, supposedly, though of course we only have the relevant people’s words for that, and they’re not exactly impartial sources. Could’ve been an affair that had unexpected results, not that anyone would ever admit it.”

Nie Huaisang started laughing.

Wei Wuxian really wished he wouldn’t. It wasn’t the sort of happy giggle that he sometimes let out nowadays when he was thinking of Nie Mingjue’s recovery – it was the jagged vicious bitterness of the Pallbearer, through and through.

“Oh, Qin Su, Qin Su,” Nie Huaisang said, wiping tears from his eyes. “I gave you all the chances in the world, you stupid woman. I hope you’re happy with what you chose.”

“Can I ask?” Wei Wuxian said cautiously. “You never said – you just showed up with A-Song, no Qin Su and no explanation…”

“Says the person who adopted A-Yuan all but sight unseen?”

“I lived with him for a month, it’s different,” Wei Wuxian said. “What happened with Qin Su?”

Nie Huaisang shrugged. “Nothing dramatic. She wouldn’t believe me when I told her that her husband was planning on killing her son to frame his enemies, which is reasonable enough given that everyone knows I’m at odds with him. Even when I offered her proof, she said it was just a forgery – that he wasn’t like that, that she knew him, the real him, that she was the only one who really understood him, even though I’d say the whole cultivation world knows the ‘real’ him by now.”

“Irritating, but understandable, I think – he is her husband, the dashing hero that rescued her so valiantly in the Sunshot Campaign and which she defied custom and her parents to marry. So why all the disdain?”

Nie Huaisang’s lips pressed together tightly with disapproval. “I asked her if she was willing to risk losing A-Song just to show her husband that she trusted him, and she said that she was, because it wasn’t a risk at all. Because she knew he loved her too much to do such a terrible thing without a good reason.”

“Without a good reason?” Wei Wuxian demanded. “That’s her son!”

“Don’t you know that they can always have others?” Nie Huaisang said with a sneer, clearly paraphrasing words he’d heard. “They’re young, in love – it’s all my fault that he stopped touching her, apparently. I took Lan Xichen away from him and he’s so upset about it that he can’t come to her bed, but once the world is rid of me, it’ll all go back to the way it should be…”

“I’ll give her that much: she really loves him,” Wei Wuxian said, shaking his head. The delusions of a person in love, he supposed. He hoped that he and Lan Wangji weren’t quite that bad. “She’ll be in for a disappointment. Given what I found out…he’ll never return to her bed or give her children, not in this lifetime.”

“No, he won’t.” Nie Huaisang reached for his fan. “Thank you for this. I’ll think about how to use it.”

“And?” Wei Wuxian prodded.

“And I’ll come back to the battlefield,” Nie Huaisang conceded, looking discontented, and Wei Wuxian smiled smugly. “You can supervise the Unclean Realm in my place.”

“What? No!” Wei Wuxian protested, his smile disappearing at once. “You have Xiao Xingchen –”

“He’s newly blinded, and out of all the cultivators we have available, you’re the most effective at fighting on a stand-alone basis. Think of it as having some time to bond with your mother’s shidi.”

Wei Wuxian didn’t want time to bond with his martial uncle – or, well, he did, he’d been dying for an opportunity to talk with Xiao Xingchen more or less since the man first made his name known in the cultivation world, but Nie Huaisang’s rules were such that no one outside the most trusted inner circles of the Nie sect was allowed in the familial quarters of the Unclean Realm, or even in the Unclean Realm at all. And that meant…

“But – Lan Wangji –”

“Will not die if he’s forced to be abstinent for a little while,” Nie Huaisang said, and oh, it was on.

“Did Qin Su specify the method by which you took Lan Xichen from her husband?” Wei Wuxian asked, crossing his arms. “I was under the impression that you still referred to him as Zewu-jun –”

Nie Huaisang glared.

Too bad – if the Pallbearer didn’t want to get mocked over his crush on the First Jade of Lan, he shouldn’t have let Wei Wuxian find out about the fact that the torch he held for him was still burning hot as ever.

“Perhaps my information is out of date. Tell me, little master, what means of seduction did you employ to convince Zewu-jun to betray his poor sad little A-Yao? Did you work your wicked wiles on him?”

“Wei Wuxian –”

“Did you play his xiao?”

Nie Huaisang let out an ungentlemanly snort and had to cover his face. “Oh no,” he said. “Oh no. Why did you have to give me that mental image? Fuck you, Wei Wuxian.”

“Yeah, well, fuck you too. Abstinent my ass.”

“I think you’ll find that the problem with abstinence is that it’s not your ass,” Nie Huaisang said, shoulders shaking. “That’s kind of the point. Now go tell everyone that I’ll be rejoining them tomorrow.”

“I will relish their groans of despair,” Wei Wuxian said, standing up. He was clearly going to have to take as much advantage that he could of the little time he had with Lan Wangji before being cruelly locked away. “Oh, is there any news on Song Lan?”

“None,” Nie Huaisang said. “He may as well have ascended into the heavens. Don’t tell Xiao Xingchen, he’ll only worry.”

“I won’t, I won’t. As for you – could you try to lighten up on Zewu-jun? Now that da-ge’s awake again?”

Nie Huaisang frowned.

“I’m not saying forgive him,” Wei Wuxian clarified. “Just – you know that da-ge wouldn’t want you to be so mad at him, especially since you still like him and all.”

“I’ll let da-ge decide that, I think,” Nie Huaisang said, and the humor had fled his face entirely. “It was his assassin that Zewu-jun decided to trust and protect, after all.”

Wei Wuxian nodded, accepting the verdict – he disagreed, but he understood – and turning to leave.

He paused at the door.

“Just so you know,” he said, not looking at Nie Huaisang. “Having trusted Meng Yao doesn’t mean you have to be so mad at yourself, either.”

He left before Nie Huaisnag could respond, but he heard something shatter in the room behind him.

#mdzs #wei wuxian #lan wangji #nie huaisang #jiang cheng #wen ning #my fic #my fics #unfettered

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nillegible · 3 years

Text

Jin Zixun accidentally saves canon, Part2

(Read part one of the fic, here!)

“Did you hear? The Yiling Patriarch killed Jin-er-gongzi, and dragged away his corpse.”

Jiang Cheng might not have been the intended listener, but he has no qualms in stalking toward the cultivator who was speaking. Pale green robes with white accents, he must be from Laoling Qin. Jiang Cheng doesn’t take him by the collar, but his fingers twitch. He definitely wishes to.

“What did you say?” he asks.

From the expression of abject terror that crosses the other man’s face, Jiang Cheng didn’t do a particularly good job at appearing non-threatening.

“Jian-Jiang-zongzhu. I. Jiang-zongzhu, it was. They’re all saying.”

“That Wei Wuxian killed Jin Zixun and took away his corpse? When did he even get here? Where did he drag him away from?”

“Ah, no. It wasn’t. Jiang-gongzi must know I don’t speak for Jin sect, but it wasn’t here.”

Jiang Cheng considers shaking a more coherent answer out of this coward, but decides against it. Gods knew what nonsense he would actually spout. No, he needs a better source, he needs Shijie.

Protocol forgotten, he storms into Koi Tower.

Oooh, Jiang-xiong looks furious. Jiang Wanyin had stormed into Carp tower like a small purple thundercloud. He’s taller than Yu-furen was and less delicate looking, but one could absolutely see that Jiang-xiong was his mother’s son. The air even smelled electric when he strode by, purple sleeves billowing elegantly.

Where is Jiang-xiong going, making quite so much of a display? Huaisang directs his casual wandering in his wake, stretching his cultivation senses to keep track of him when he storms out of view. He wonders if this is about the rumours that have been slowly spreading from the anxious and guilty looking Jin cultivators. And there are so many, oddly many, low-level cultivators who can’t have all been invited at this time for the naming-day ceremony, it was gauche. So much yellow, they interfere with the decorations.

“Whatever did Jin-gongzi do this time to anger Jiang-zhongzu so much? Ah, I’d hoped a nephew would mellow him,” Nie Huaisang complains, or something along those lines to the most disgruntled people he crosses, with a laugh and conspiratorial smile. The reminder of Jiang-xiong’s rather Extra tendencies seems to put people at ease, and Nie Huaisang sails through, keeping an eye out for anyone who might actually matter.

He sees Lan Wangji, who, in spite of the way he stands separate from the crowd like a drop of water on a lotus leaf, definitely matters. Nie Huaisang makes his way towards him.

“What nonsense is everyone spouting about Wei Wuxian and Jin Zixun?” Jiang Cheng demands, bursting into Jin Zixuan’s office, where the wary Jin disciples had directed him.

“Jiang-gongzi!” says Jin Guangyao, the first to stand, just as Jin Zixuan says, “Jiang Wanyin, you’re here!”

Jin Zixuan says, after a beat, “Wei Wuxian and the Ghost General were seen taking my cousin away.”

“Surely even he couldn’t attack and cart someone off from Koi Tower. What would he even want from Jin Zixun?”

“It wasn’t from Koi Tower, he didn’t reach here,” says Jin Zixuan. “It was on the way.”

“Explain,” says Jiang Cheng.

“A-Yao will explain,” says Jin Zixuan. His voice is colder than Jiang Cheng has become accustomed to hearing it.

“Jin Zixun was cursed. It was the hundred holes curse. He got it into his head that Wei-gongzi had to be the one who did it. I only found out this morning, but he – he went to waylay Wei-gongzi and demand that he remove the curse.”

“Leaving aside the absolute idiocy of Wei Wuxian being the one to curse him, why would Wei Wuxian then kidnap him? Maybe he actually knows a way to remove that curse, and Jin Zixun’s gone back with him.”

“Ah, it wasn’t quite so amicable as that–” Jin Guangyao looks towards Jin Zixuan, but when he doesn’t take over the explanation he continues, “Jin Zixun took three hundred archers with him –”

“THREE HUNDRED archers? Why would the Jin sect send a full battalion to ask Wei Wuxian to remove a curse?”

Jin Guangyao’s voice, which was already quiet, lowers further, “I believe that the show of strength was only meant to make Wei-gongzi give Jin-er-gongzi his due consideration. Wei-gongzi doesn’t always listen.”

“That is not what you told me,” Jin Zixuan says.

“He may… he may have planned to end the curse in a different way if Wei Wuxian didn’t comply,” says Jin Guangyao, finally.

Jiang Cheng tries to choke back his rage. How dare they! “If it turns out that Wei Wuxian has been harmed, Jin sect will not be forgiven,” Jiang Cheng threatens. “He may not be of my sect anymore, but to ambush him and try to kill him on such a stupid pretence, after you invited him to my own nephew’s ceremony! As if Wei Wuxian would not kill Jin Zixun himself if he had wanted him dead, and reanimate his corpse!” Jiang Cheng knows what happens to those his brother punishes. Jiang Cheng had joined him, in exacting their vengeance against Wen Chao, Wang Lingjiao, and Wen Zhuliu.

“Jiang-zonghzhu, seems to be planning to do that, now. They say he carried Jin-er-gongzi’s body away,” says Jin Guangyao. Implicit in that is what foul things Wei Wuxian is known to do with corpses.

Jiang Cheng just can’t believe it. In a rage at the people who had murdered Wen Ning? Perhaps. But to kill Jin Ling’s uncle on his special day? Wei Wuxian would know better! And there’s more that doesn’t make sense. “How did Wei Wuxian kill Jin Zixun? You said he took a whole battalion!” Even if Wei Wuxian had killed half of them, it’s unlikely he could get away, especially if they were archers.

“Ah. Uh. Wei-gongzi did not kill him. The Jin archers shot him.”

It takes Jiang Cheng a moment. “The Jin archers shot Jin Zixun?” he turns to Jin Zixuan for confirmation. His brother-in-law looks miserable and angry, but nods. “How the hell did.” Jiang Cheng is out of words. “Do you not train your disciples to aim?”

“Faced with the Yiling Patriarch, one of the younger disciples may have been afraid? As far as I gathered they were actually aiming for Wei-gongzi,” – Jin Guangyao winces as Zidian sparks – “but he ducked, and so Jin Zixun was shot.”

“He ducked,” repeats Jiang Cheng, looking between Jin Guangyao and Jin Zixuan, who don’t disagree with that frankly ridiculous assessment. They have to be joking. Or worse, they have to be lying. And if they’re lying to his face, then who knows what really happened? Jiang Cheng bows lightly to his brother-in-law. “Jin-gongzi, I take my leave of you. My apologies for missing Jin Ling’s celebration, but if I’m lucky, I can fetch Wei Wuxian and be back in time to meet my nephew and my sister before they retire from the feast. I know how much A-jie was looking forward to seeing our brother.” Jin Zixuan winces at that, no doubt imagining explaining to Jiang Yanli that his stupid cousin had tried to murder her brother.

That’s Jin Zixuan’s problem though. Jiang Cheng is going to fly to the Burial Mounds and his brother’s awful little encampment, and shake him until he gets some answers.

He ducked.

Which meant, at the least, that Wei Wuxian was being shot at. Stupid, I told you I couldn’t protect you, and this is what you get up to? Jiang Cheng had thought his brother would keep his head down until people forgot about him! Some sort of self-imposed imprisonment that kept him out of everyone’s way. That was why he wasn’t even invited to the wedding. Stupid, stupid Wei Wuxian.

As Jiang Cheng sweeps out the doors of the main hall, he sees Lan Wangji, looking stiff, and if Jiang Cheng isn’t just projecting, angry. He meets Jiang Cheng’s eyes and weaves his way closer.

“Jiang-zongzhu.”

“Hanguang Jun,” returns Jiang Cheng. On any other day he’d wait and glare until the second jade spoke his mind, not making it any easier for him. Today, he hasn’t the patience. “If you’ll olease make my excuses to Lan-zongzhu, but I will be unable to greet him. I need to go to Yiling and find my–” he realizes with a jolt that he’d called Wei Wuxian brother too many times today in conversation already. “-Wei Wuxian. There’s all sorts of rumours flying about, I don’t like it.”

“I will come with you,” says Lan Wangji.

Jiang Cheng eyes him. “If Hanguang Jun believes me incapable of judging Wei Wuxian if he is at fault today–” he snarls, but is cut off by a sharp gesture from Lan Wangji. And what might even be a real emotion on his face.

“Wei Ying would not have,” he says, with a certainty that even Jiang Cheng could not feel. Jiang Cheng hates how much he appreciates the words. “Let me come.”

Jiang Cheng should say no, should say that Wei Wuxian was his responsibility.

‘Just Let me go. Tell the world that I defected. From now on, whatever Wei Wuxian does, it would have nothing to do with Yunmeng Jiang sect.’

“Fine,” says Jiang Cheng. “Just keep up.”

He knows from experience, as he takes off into the sky, that Lan Wangji can keep up.

#Shitty!JZX #Jiang Cheng #jzx #jgy #canon divergence #fix it au

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buffintruder · 4 years

Text

can you imagine what the untamed would have been like from Lan Sizhui’s pov because that would have been so funny

like first of all, you’re just going about your regular business, hunting evil spirits with your squad, and you meet this guy who used to be part of the Jin sect but got kicked out and apparently is crazy and always wears a mask? but he’s also clearly being mistreated by his family, and you know that whatever got him kicked out, he does not deserve this humiliation and abuse

you feel sorry for him, even when he stomps a spirit-summoning flag into the ground and runs unprotected into the middle of a fight and generally causes mild distress and irritation to your fellow juniors.

except then it turns out he actually seems quite competent and he even figures out a lot of what’s going on with the goddess statue, and sure he has weird habits, but he is nothing like how Jin Ling describes his bastard uncle. also maybe he summoned and sent away the Ghost General with his flute? but that’s impossible because the Ghost General should be ash, and anyway, the only one who could control the Ghost General was—

And that’s not even the weirdest part, because then Hanguang Jun arrives. You are certain the two of them have not been close in the past, because surely he would have mentioned it, and besides, when would their paths even have crossed?

But Hanguang Jun is your adopted father/mentor figure, and even though he has shown you nothing but kindness, you know how stoic and reserved he is to the rest of the world. Yet he treats Mo Xuanyu with a care you have never seen him offer to anyone besides yourself and his brother. He is never like this around strangers, and you don’t understand what is going on.

(edit: now on ao3)

You part ways, then meet back up again not too long afterwards, and any pretense Hanguang Jun might have had at not being incredibly close to Mo Xuanyu dissolves. When they fight together at Yi City, there is a familiarity in the ease of their movements, the way they never have to look to make sure the other has his back. Sometimes when Hanguang Jun looks at Mo Xuanyu, you see more open emotion than you possibly have ever seen before. Hanguang Jun never flinches away from Mo Xuanyu’s touch.

Any pretense Mo Xuanyu might have had at being anything less than an expert cultivator also vanishes. He slips into the role of mentor and protector with ease, joking to keep all of you calm while he teaches you how to save your lives, always putting your safety above his. You wonder if it would be weird to consider a near-stranger fatherly.

He feeds your poisoned fellow Juniors ridiculously spicy congee, and it does cure them, despite all their complaining about how it murdered their mouths. You had tasted some when helping him make it, but even with how strongly it burned your tongue, there was a strange part of you liked it. For some reason it taste familiar, like home somehow, even though you have lived in the Lan sect for as long as you can remember and they only have bland, spiceless food.

That’s when the memories begin coming back, slow and weak, like a faint flute melody in the wind, too quiet to fully make out.

You do not remember your early childhood. This is hardly an unusual phenomenon, but you still feel its loss. You were not always a Lan. That development came when you were around four or five, according to what others have told you. Four seems an old enough age that you always thought that you should have at least some idea of what happened before, but you never have.

But now you have the faint impression of a different vendor in a different city selling a similar grass butterfly to the one you bought on impulse despite being far too old for toys. You think of the familiarity of congee, of the reedy melody you heard the night you met Mo Xuanyu and then again as the Ghost General stopped attacking the juniors and ran off into the trees. You have a handful of clues, but they paint no coherent picture.

These thoughts haunt you for three months, but since Mo Xuanyu returns to Cloud Recesses as you continue on your night hunts, there is nothing but the occasional sparks of familiarity around random items or phrases to fill in the missing parts.

And then the word comes out that Mo Xuanyu is actually Wei Wuxian, the Yiling Patriarch, the founder of demonic cultivation. This is the man who killed thousands, who betrayed the clans, who murdered his own family, including the parents of your—your friend? the boy you’ve run into a few times and survived life-or-death situations with?

Except when everybody else reacts with anger and fear, you... don’t. You can’t explain why, but the name Wei Wuxian brings an echo of comfort, half buried under all the horrible stories you’ve heard about him.

Part of you wonders if it has anything to do with the whispers of memories, that faint deja vu that has started haunting you. Or maybe it’s the way that Hanguang Jun has always turned sad at the mention of Wei Wuxian, how he never speaks a bad word about him despite their alleged rivalry. All your fellow juniors are terrified and furious and hurt at having been deceived, at having grown to like this eccentric man who teased them and saved their lives then turned out to be the monster from all their childhood bedtime stories, and even though you understand them, you feel none of that.

He saves all of you not too long afterwards, and you can’t say you are surprised. Even when all evidence pointed to him being the one to trap you and your friends in a cave for days, it never seemed quite right to you.

It was a set up you learn, as he and Hanguang Jun and the Ghost General save you from an army of corpses and reveal the true traitor. All those terrible deeds you’ve spent your whole life hearing about are not explained away, but this one is, and you have faith that Wei Wuxian is not the villain everyone has made him out to be.

His Ghost General, Wen Ning, certainly isn’t. A living corpse who has slaughtered armies sounds terrifying, but in reality he’s rather sweet. There is something so soft and hopeful in his eyes as he approaches you and asks you for his name. Your friends keep their hands on their swords, but you offer him a smile and an answer. There’s something familiar about him too.

Maybe that’s why you talk to him, despite the intense look in his eyes. Or maybe because he seemed so sad, alone, separated from everyone else, and the intensity seems anything but dangerous. “You—look like my cousin,” he says, and you start to wonder, everything so close to sliding into place.

You don’t know who your parents are or where you came from, but there is something about the clan name Wen that feels so close to something right, despite all the tales you’ve heard about the destruction they wrought.

Then he gives you a grass butterfly, so similar to the one you bought at the market, so similar to something you know was important to you long ago. And like one last pebble taken out from the base of a wall, this small token brings everything above it crumbling down, and suddenly the memories start spilling in. You look at him properly now, because this was your relative, and you once lived with and played with him. He sees the recognition in your eyes, you know, because he steps forward, trembling.

Of course, Jin Ling has to ruin the moment, but now that you know, there is nothing in the world that could keep you from talking to him and finding out more. You were a Wen, you think. You must have been raised in the Burial Grounds by Wei Wuxian, the Yiling Patriarch. You were one of the people he betrayed all the clans to protect. No wonder you never feared the stories of the monstrous Wens and Yiling Patriarch. How could you when they were your family, when you were one of them?

You never could have lived among the Lan Sect if people knew, so you understand why it had to remain a secret.

Still. You have to know more.

“Did Master Wei really put a five year old child in the soil like a turnip?” you ask Wen Ning, at the nearest opportunity. That child was you, and both of you know it, even if you can’t say it out loud, not this close to all these people who would be willing to turn on Wei Wuxian on any excuse, who would be willing to turn on you if they knew the truth.

Wen Ning smiles and nods, and there is more life in the glow of his eyes than any corpse has the right to have. “Just like this!” he says, gesturing, as sparks of memory come back even stronger than before.

And then of course everything goes wrong. Wen Ning throws you into the temple where all the leaders of the four main clans plus Wei Wuxian and Hanguang Jun and a few others are. Jin Guangyao is holding a thread around your friend’s (you think you can call him your friend by now) throat and there is blood, and so many secrets spilled, confessions made.

In the midst of it all, you see Wei Wuxian for the first time since you started to remember, and now there are more memories, sharper, clearer. You remember his spicy congee, the toy butterfly so similar to the ones you hold now that Hanguang Jun bought for you that day Wei Wuxian took you out into the city. Back then, you hadn’t really understood the significance of all those things, why you lived on a mountain full of buried bones, why Wei Wuxian hadn’t bought that toy himself, but now you are older and you know some of the history behind it. Not all of it, you are sure, since so many assumptions of the past have just been proven wrong tonight, and the history you were told had never mentioned the existence of a small child among the supposedly evil remnants of the Wen clan.

You do not know the full truth, but you want to.

Even once everything is over, with the enemies dead and gone, there are a million things going on, relationships being broken or repaired for the first time in over a decade, injuries to be treated, people to reassure that you are okay, that you made it out alive. It takes a bit for you to peel away from everything, to speak to Wei Wuxian, but you find Wen Ning, and the two of you manage to catch up before Wei Wuxian and Hanguang Jun can go far.

Your thoughts and memories are still chaotic and scattered, little bursts of images and sensations that only barely form a coherent picture. But you summon all your determination, sixteen years of questions that are now clamoring for answers in your brain. You take a deep breath. “I have something important that I must ask you.”

Your heart is pounding, and in the past few days, you have faced an army of fierce corpses and fought against the Ghost General (for which he has apologized a thousand times) and helped confront a master manipulator, and somehow this is the most terrifying thing you have done. You are so sure of the truth, but some part of you doubts. How can you truly be sure when you were so young? And even if the man in front of you helped raise so long ago, how can you know if he still has any affection for you, that he is willing to recognize you? These are irrational fears, you know, but they weigh heavily.

Still, you meet his gaze with eyes that are already starting to water and begin to speak of your long-buried memories, the words spilling out with more and more ease as you continue to talk, as his expression changes from confusion to something full of grief and slow realization.

“Wen was my surname,” you say, now confident of this fact, your previous doubts melted away in the face of Wei Wuxian’s teary eyes.

He looks away, blinking as if he can’t believe it and mutters, “Wen was your surname? Isn’t Lan your surname? Lan Sizhui... Lan Yuan... Lan Yuan.” Then he looks up at you with so much hope, full of a scared longing that you know is the same as what fills your own heart. “A-Yuan.”

It has been a lifetime since you last heard your name called out in that voice, and you wonder how you could have gone so long without even knowing you were missing it. You nod. Tears threaten to spill out of your eyes, but you can’t be bothered to fight them.

You can tell it doesn’t seem quite real to him, the way he looks so afraid to believe it. He thought you were dead this whole time, you realize when he turns to Hanguang Jun for confirmation. And that breaks your heart a little more. He had lost so much, and you had lost so much even if you weren’t fully aware of it, but now you have found each other all over again, and the miraculousness of that is almost too much to bear.

You rush forward to hug him, sixteen years of Lan propriety forgotten. You are a child again, clinging onto a man you have always loved, except you are also an adult with so many years of separation only hitting you now that you are finally reunited. You are both and neither, and as his arms come up to wrap around you, you know that all that matters is that you are home.

#the untamed #lan sizhui #lan yuan #wei wuxian #lan zhan #lan wangji #wen ning #wen yuan #my post #my writing #mo dao zu shi #mdzs

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ibijau · 3 years

Note

“I’ve got a sick sense of justice, but you knew that.” 3zun fic? Where things work out between them, somehow, and yet JGY still kills JGS the same way and defends that choice to LXC and NMJ (Or JZX, if he's alive)? Can go full on JGS was stealing his women's energy, hence their sickness/deaths!

warning for mentions of death, rape and murder. Yay, it’s a happy one :D

Nie Mingjue storms into the cell, only for Jin Guangyao to look up and smile at him, as if he were welcoming him into his quarters, rather than locked up and in chains. He smiles just as peacefully to Lan Xichen when he follows their lover inside, pretending not to notice the other man's obvious distress.

"I hope Da-ge and Er-ge will forgive me if I do not stand and bow to them," Jin Guangyao calmly says, rattling his chains.

Nie Mingjue stares at him, taken aback.

Even though they have reached a tentative peace between them, and Jin Guangyao often makes efforts to be more open with them than he is with anyone else, he still is the same person he always was. When he gets in trouble, he makes himself pathetic before them, almost on instinct. Sometimes it annoys Nie Mingjue, but other times it feels almost like a joke between them, as long as Jin Guangyao has that twinkle in his eye to show he knows he won't be taken seriously.

To see him this calm and detached is unsettling. Nie Mingjue can only wonder if it has something to do with that large bruise on the side of his head. Going by the colour it is at least a day old. No cultivator of Jin Guangyao's level should have let this last this long.

"Ah, this," Jin Guangyao notes, feeling their gaze. "Zixun was not very happy and let it be known. I am sorry to present myself before you in such a state, but my powers have been sealed, and I could not do anything about it. Please, just avoid looking at it."

That makes Nie Mingjue frown. If Jin Zixun is behind one bruise, he's ready to bet there are more, hidden under Jin Guangyao’s clothes. He forces his mind to drift away from the worry he feels, because the real problem today is…

"Did you do it?" Lan Xichen asks, something wavering in his usually calm voice.

Jin Guangyao placidly looks up at him.

"What do you think, Er-ge?"

Lan Xichen trades a glance with Nie Mingjue.

What they think is that Jin Zixun, who uncovered the plot against his late uncle, is not the most reliable man in the world, and holds a grudge against Jin Guangyao since that near fiasco with Wei Wuxian at Jin Ling's hundredth day party.

They think also that he did bring convincing evidence. The most critical one is the testimony of a woman who took part in the murder of Jin Guangshan. She says she did not see the man who paid for her services, but she would recognise his voice. She also did see Xue Yang, and they all know the little creep respects no one except Jin Guangyao.

They think that Jin Zixuan is desperately trying to prove his half brother's innocence, but finding it difficult.

They think that Jin Guangyao has killed his superiors before.

They think he promised he wouldn't again, and they both made the choice to trust him.

And Nie Mingjue thinks, also, that although they've disagreed on means and motives, Jin Guangyao never strikes unprovoked, which he says out loud.

The tenderness in Jin Guangyao’s eyes as he hears this is nearly unbearable.

“Da-ge, are you really asking for my side of the story?” he asks in disbelief.

It might be sincere. It might be feigned. Nie Mingjue never knows with him, just as he suspects Jin Guangyao never knows what to expect from him.

“We know your father was not… the kindest of men,” Lan Xichen says gently, kneeling down next to Jin Guangyao to send some spiritual energy into him and help him heal. Jin Guangyao sighs in relief, but keeps his eyes on Nie Mingjue even as Lan Xichen continues speaking. “You have let us know about some of the things he’s done, A-Yao, and I’ve long suspected there’s more you never told us. If he did anything to deserve such an end…”

“Of course he deserved it,” Jin Guangyao cuts him, still looking at Nie Mingjue. “You both know it as well as I do. He deserved it whether I had a hand in it or not. He was a selfish man. He only joined the Sunshot Campaign because he hoped to become what Wen Ruohan had been. He only took me in because his true son, forcefully kept from the heat of the action, failed to garner glory for Lanling Jin. And I won't get into the details of everything that happened with Wei Wuxian."

"But none of these things are why you killed him," Nie Mingjue retorts, suddenly convinced that Jik Guangyao really did it.

Once, it would have filled him with rage to realise this. Back when he first understood what sort of a person his efficient and soft spoken friend was, when he saw Jin Guangyao murder his own captain… But since then, Nie Mingjue has learned to forgive, at least somewhat. Because when Jin Guangyao killed Nie Mingjue’s men in Nightless City, he took care to only murder those who once derided him for his background, to lightly wound the ones who never mocked him.

It was still wrong, those were still good men, but Nie Mingjue, who had been burning for years with his hatred of the Wens, understood that better than he ought to have done.

So there is no anger as Nie Mingjue too kneels down next to their lover. Only disappointment. In himself, for wanting to excuse this most awful crime. In Jin Guangyao, for not coming to them this time, when he thought something was wrong. They had listened about Wei Wuxian, they would have listened about this too.

"Some brothels offer specialised services," Jin Guangyao says, the smile on his face shifting from loving to cold and polite, the way it used to be around his father. "I suppose this doesn't surprise you. Someone with money can always get what they want in this world."

Both Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen nod uncomfortably.

"Some of those services offered are of a rather different nature," Jin Guangyao goes on, his eyes growing distant. "They are difficult to perform, cannot be repeated, and cost an obscene amount of money… not to speak of the moral cost. It takes a certain kind of man to purchase such services. Believe it or not, even Xue Yang found it distasteful. For all the wrong reasons, but still, I think Da-ge and Er-ge will agree that it takes a lot to shock someone like Xue Yang."

Lan Xichen takes their lover's hand, trying to comfort him, but Nie Mingjue freezes. He is suddenly reminded of certain rumours, gossip so foul that it had to be exaggerated. He's always refused to pay it any mind, knowing well there were horror stories about him as well, as there always are against powerful men.

He can't escape it now.

“It’s not hard to find human cauldrons, if you know how to look for them,” Jin Guangyao states in a voice devoid of any emotion, staring somewhere in the distance. “And some men will always look for an easy way to improve their cultivation, even if it means raping and killing a girl for it. There are addresses, and certain euphemisms. These days, you would ask to see a Wen girl. I’ve learned that a few years ago, people called them educated women.”

Nie Mingjue only frowns at that comment, but next to him Lan Xichen gasps in horror, squeezing Jin Guangayo’s hand.

“Your mother…”

Jin Guangyao blinks a few times, and forces himself to look at Lan Xichen. It appears to take him great effort. Nie Mingjue wonders if it is the topic that causes this, or if the blow to his head caused more damage than is visible.

“No, don’t worry. She was just actually educated. It didn’t mean the same thing in Yunping as it did in Lanling, but my father found her attractive enough for his other purposes, I suppose.” Jin Guangyao looks away again, his face growing harder. “Others were not as lucky. It is all too easy to get what you want, with enough money.”

“You should have told us,” Nie Mingjue says. “If you had come to us with proof…”

“My father is not so stupid that he would have left proof,” Jin Guangyao hisses between clenched teeth, still staring at the wall. “Even he would have had trouble justifying doing such a thing to augment his power. I only found out because I went to fetch him with Xue Yang at a brothel one day, and heard him discussing in detail his next… purchase. Xue Yang happened to be knowledgeable about certain euphemisms we were hearing, and thought it entertaining to explain to me. After this I started looking. It’s funny what you find, when you look for it. It wasn’t proof enough to openly attack him, not with my background. But it was enough to be sure. And then…”

Jin Guangyao chuckles darkly, his eyes finally meeting Nie Mingjue’s.

“I’ve got a sick sense of justice, but you knew that,” he says with unnerving calm. “Xue Yang was on board because he thinks that sort of thing is cheating. Torturing the dead and cutting them from their reincarnation doesn’t phase him, but he knows it could have been him, if he’d been born a girl. And so we did what had to be done. My father died the way he lived.”

He pauses a moment, taking in the expression on his lovers’ faces, from Lan Xichen’s horror at that confession to Nie Mingjue’s anger that once again, this took clever man made all the wrong choices.

“Nobody else would have dared to stand against him,” Jin Guangyao adds, smiling feverishly, his gaze on Nie Mingjue. “But I’ve always been one to do what others wouldn’t. Someone has to get their hands dirty, Da-ge. I’ve never minded doing it when my turn came. I wonder if you will, now that you know the truth? You’ve always been such a champion of justice, always telling others to be righteous. Let’s see what choice you make, now that justice isn’t such an easy thing to decide.”

#jin guangyao #nie mingjue #lan xichen #3zun #mdzs #not super happy with this one #I think jgy is probably pretty ooc here oops?#jau writes #today sucks I just needed to get something done #Anonymous

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unpeumacabre · 3 years

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soaring dragon dancing phoenix - 龙飞凤舞: prologue

Yunmeng is no longer home for Wei Wuxian, for he is no longer welcome. And so when he visits he can always count on Jiang Cheng descending upon his head with the full strength of heaven's fury, to chase him out. But one day when he sneaks into Yunmeng again, days go by without Jiang Cheng making an appearance. Something has happened to Wei Wuxian's prickly shi-di, something that - once they reunite - they will find is far greater than they could ever have anticipated. Accompanied also by Wei Wuxian's dear friend (?) Lan Zhan and a Lan Xichen who has only just reluctantly left isolation, the four of them set out on a journey that will bring them across the greater part of China to the mystical Kunlun mountains of mythology - and more importantly, may bring them love, healing, and reconciliation.

If only Wei Wuxian could take his head out of his oblivious arse and start putting himself in other people's shoes for once...

Rating: Mature

Relationships: Wangxian, Xicheng, Wei Wuxian & Jiang Cheng

Read on AO3 (bc tumblr might mess up the formatting + more extensive author’s notes on the story)

Count: 1.5k

next ->

One year after the events of the Guanyin Temple, and the death of former Chief Cultivator Lianfang-zun.

Lan Zhan!

I agree with what you said about Sect Leader Yao, that old fart. He wouldn’t know a good idea if it bit him on the arse. If I were you I’d have snuck into his room at night and shaved off his eyebrows – but then again, you’re Chief Cultivator, and you have to follow boring things like rules and protocol. Don’t worry, the next time I’m in Pingyang I’ll … It’s a secret! Look forward to the next time you have a discussion conference with that pig-headed old fool.

I’ve finally reached Yunmeng. Little Apple took such a long time to get started from the inn in Jiangling. I think he had a crush on one of the serving girls, to be honest. Even apples didn’t work to drag him away from her. I had to conjure a mirage of her all the way from Jiangling to Yunmeng to get him going – can you imagine that? One of these days I’ll have to find a nice little female ass to keep his little Little Apple happy … Hahaha! I can practically see you rolling your eyes at me now, Lan Zhan. You still can’t take a dirty joke after all.

Anyway, I digress. It’s nice to be back in Yunmeng and be able to pick all the lotus pods I want and to flirt with all the pretty Yunmeng girls, although none of them are as pretty as you are, of course. You’d make a big stir if you came to Yunmeng – you should visit with me one of these days when you’re free! Although I know of course you have responsibilities as Chief Cultivator etc etc but I promise you it’ll be fun! One of these days I’ll come kidnap you. Then Lan Qiren, that old man, would really have an aneurysm, ha! I’d kidnap you just to see his reaction.

Don’t worry about me, I’m talking nonsense as usual. I wouldn’t really kidnap you, unless I was really bored. And Jiang Cheng would probably beat my ass for trying. Honestly, it surprises me that I haven’t had the honour of Jiang Cheng’s company yet. Somehow, he always knows the moment I step into Yunmeng – it’s like he has a spell set up to go off whenever I’m in the vicinity??? And he never fails to turns up for an hour or two just to shout at me, thrash Zidian around a bit and tell me to go back to Gusu. Then he storms off somewhere to drink tea or something. I swear he’s going to die of high blood pressure one of these days.

Well, I expect I’ll see him around. He’s bound to turn up sometime or other. Looking forward to your reply, and counting every one of your twenty words,

Wei Wuxian

***

Lan Zhan!

Thank you for expressing your concern for Little Apple’s wellbeing. He’s eating well (as usual) and living happily in the city stables where I left him. He has a new crush on the stable boy though, but I’m not worried about that – it seems like his affections are as transient as floating smoke and passing clouds. He seems to be like his former master in the sense of being indiscriminate with regards to his choice of partner, which makes me wonder why he’s taken such an intense aversion to me. I guess it’s just the same old story with me and animals all over again.

It’s my third day in Yunmeng, and still no sign of Jiang Cheng anywhere. Perhaps he’s simply busy with some night hunt or other and can’t be bothered to whip my ass into shape. I’ve been visiting his favourite haunts the past few days but no luck – it seems like he’s really busy this time. I’m starting to worry, and although I never thought I’d ever say this, I miss his grumpy ass. It’s been the longest I’ve gone without hearing him call me a fucking idiot, haha!

Anyway I have a funny story to tell! Yesterday I went to investigate rumours of walking corpses at the base of Yunmeng Mountain. Apparently some farmers came across them and ran away but one of them was caught and eaten.

But guess what, Lan Zhan? Actually, it was nothing more than a group of hermits who’d come down from Yunmeng Mountain five days ago after meditating in seclusion for three years, and they were doing their Bagua ritual circle walk around one of the dove trees at the base of the mountain. They hadn’t bathed once in those three years, and so when the farmers came upon them and saw them chanting and moaning and pacing around the tree they were mistaken for walking corpses! Hahahaha how ridiculous is that??? Anyway I cleared up the misunderstanding. The farmer who was apparently eaten fell down a cliff when he was trying to escape from the “corpses” and broke his leg, so the hermits rescued him and patched him up. He was perfectly fine. I talked to them and they seemed like a pretty normal bunch to me – they were quite a big group when they came down the mountain at first apparently but then most of them decided to go down south and back home instead of lingering in Yunmeng. That’s about all the excitement I’ve had so far, I think.

Well, anyway, thank you for the twenty-one words you used in your reply. You have gotten quite adept at teasing me, haven’t you? Looking forward to how else you may surprise me next,

Wei Wuxian

***

Lan Zhan,

No, I don’t think Jiang Cheng fell off a cliff too. As much as you might wish for it to happen, he’s still my brother an important sect leader, you know! Anyway I already checked all the cliffs around the mountain before I received your letter so it couldn’t possibly be so.

Besides, I went to Lotus Pier earlier today – just to check on how things are going, you know, in case they need my help or something, nothing to do with Jiang Cheng. I just stayed outside the gates because I thought Jiang Cheng would probably descend from the heavens on a cloud and break my legs the moment I stepped foot into Lotus Pier, but some of the disciples spotted me and asked me what I was doing there. They said there have been people disappearing just outside Yunmeng, to the southwest and twenty li outside the main city, and when some of the Yunmeng Jiang cultivators went to investigate a few days ago some of them disappeared. So Jiang Cheng decided to take a few more of the Yunmeng Jiang disciples and investigate himself.

Since I have some free time, I’ve decided to help them out. They’ve been gone for four days already – the beast must truly be a handful indeed. It might be fun to go and help, although I think Jiang Cheng might spontaneously explode when he sees my face. Well, maybe the explosion will end up killing the monster, who knows.

It’s quite odd, though; some of the disciples who escaped even said they saw the spectre of Jin Guangyao, that wily old fox, hanging around the cave where they were attacked. Although of course that is impossible, for he is probably still trapped in Nie Mingjue’s coffin, fighting a battle till the end of time. Well, I guess I’ll see for myself if what they saw was true or not.

I had not known that you were capable of silk embroidery. Your skill is indeed fine – as expected of the esteemed Second Master Lan! I shall treasure your gift until the end of time. The cherry blossoms flowered today, and they made me think of you. I wonder if you still remember visiting Tanzhou with me when we were looking for the remaining pieces of the Yin metal? Was it your first time attending such a festival? You looked so surprised by the petals raining down on you then! I miss those times.

I will write to you again tomorrow when I have rescued Jiang Cheng from the human-eating monster. I will make sure to give you a good account of his face when he sees me there to interfere with his night hunt, ha!

***

Dear Lan Wangji Hanguang-jun Mr Chief Cultivator Sir,

I am writing this letter to you because I know you to be a good friend of Wei Wuxian. Just today, I visited Lotus Pier and found that my uncle has been missing for a week, and Wei Wuxian with him for two of those days. They have apparently gone in pursuit of a human-eating monster twenty li southwest of the main city limits of Yunmeng. It must have been a fierce creature indeed to have ensnared both my uncle and Wei Wuxian

Unfortunately, as I am currently extremely and regrettably tied up in Lanling Jin sect matters, this humble person would like to humbly request for your help in locating and possibly rescuing them. Thank you.

Best regards, yours sincerely and most humbly,

Sect Leader Jin Ling, Lanling Jin sect

#wangxian #xicheng #upm works #upm #cql #wwx #lwj #jiang cheng #lxc #jc #mdzs #mdzs fanfiction #cql fanfiction #wei wuxian x lan wangji #jiang cheng x lan xichen #wei wuxian #the untamed #lan wangji #lan xichen

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aurora077 · 3 years

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Intervention

Summary: Lan Xichen’s seclusion had gone on long enough, in Jiang Cheng’s opinion. It was time for an intervention. Fem!JC

Author's Note: This work is set in jiucengta ‘s haunting legacies au (https://archiveofourown.org/series/1716682)which I suggest you check out. Jiang Cheng is female and was married to Wei Wuxian before shit hit the fan. The relationships are not explicitly stated here, it's very background. I just had this idea and wanted to get it out there. I may or may not do another fic very similar to this one but not set in an AU, just post-canon instead.

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Two years had gone by since the fateful Guanyin Temple incident that rocked the cultivation world. Two years (a little more really) since Jiang Cheng’s erstwhile husband had returned from the dead. Two years (a little less actually but who’s counting) since she lost her widowed status and gained an extra love to boot somewhere in the middle. And two years since Sect Leader Lan had gone into seclusion, punishing himself for his blindness and mourning the loss of both his sworn brothers.

Normally Jiang Cheng would not stick her nose in other sects’ business. But Gusu Lan had become more than just another sect to her; it was important to those she loved and so, it was also important to her. And even if things hadn’t turned out the way they did in her personal life, Lan Xichen is someone she would have wanted to help anyway. During the thirteen years her husband had been dead he had been one of the few to show any open support for her.

She would never forget that fateful discussion conference-- the one where she’d been dubbed Wife of the Yiling Demon after she rebuffed Jin Guangshan’s attempt to pressure her into marriage (brokered by him no less-- undoubtedly trying to get her to wed one of his own relatives...control over the Jiang could only work in his favour). Loudmouthed Sect Leader Yao would have turned things even uglier for her had it not been for Lan Xichen’s timely intervention on her behalf. His steady support had helped her in more ways than one over the years despite the fact that they were not ever particularly close. With Gusu Lan seemingly in her corner, the voices that would (and initially, did) loudly decry a young female Sect Leader were forced to whisper instead.

That was why she found herself sitting opposite the man, sipping on a cup of tea as he gazed inquisitively at her.

“Sect Leader Jiang,” he greeted, sounding weary, voice containing only a trace of his former warmth, “What brings you here? As you know I am still in seclusion, technically, I should not be having visitors. Is there something urgent that you need my help with?”

“Yes,” she said, and continued bluntly as was her way, “I’m here to convince you to leave it.”

His eyes widened slightly. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me.”

It spoke to the measure of self control the Lan’s had that he didn’t simply kick her out of the hanshi.

“I beg your pardon but I don’t see how that’s any of your business.”

She cleared her throat and tried to measure her words more carefully; she didn’t want to be asked to leave before she had made her arguments and she tried to remember that this Lan Xichen had been hurt too deeply to retain his former magnanimity.

“You may not know it Lan Xichen, but outside these walls you are sorely missed.”

His lips twitched, as if he wanted to smile but couldn’t quite make it.

“I’m aware my family may miss me, Sect Leader Jiang, but I had no idea that you harbored such strong feelings towards me that you now miss my presence.”

She sputtered slightly, not expecting him to joke about it when he looked like he could keel over if she spoke too loudly. “I…” her face turned red, “That wasn’t what…”

Taking pity on her he waved her protests away, voice becoming more solemn, “Why don’t you tell me why you think I should leave my seclusion. You of all people should understand why I need to do this. It was your family hurt the most by my ignorance.”

She drew in a breath to steady herself, “Did you hold me responsible when Wei Wuxian did all the crap that he did?”

“That’s different, he was manipulated,” he frowned.

“Nobody knew that until recently Zewu-Jun. And manipulation or not he still made choices that led to a lot of harm. So I ask you again, was I to blame? Should I not have been able to stop my husband? Is it not, therefore also my fault? Maybe I should join you in seclusion since his demonic cultivation was partly because he gave me his core and had no options left.”

He looked pained, “I have never blamed you for his choices. You couldn’t help what you didn’t know. None of us knew he didn’t have a core.”

“And none of us knew Jin Guangyao was a megalomaniac either. So how can you be blamed for his choices? If you are to shoulder the blame then so should all the rest of us.”

“The rest of you weren’t his sworn brothers!” he almost shouted.

“Mingjue knew. He warned me not to trust him so many times. I dismissed him. I thought he was paranoid and misjudging A-Yao like so many others. If he could see it, why didn’t I? I wronged Da-ge in the worst way because I thought I knew better than him,” His breathing was coming out ragged, “I thought A-Yao was the one who knew me best. Who I knew best.”

It spoke to his state of mind that he even let all of that out in front of her.

“Sect Leader Jiang, the man I considered my closest companion is the man most hated by the cultivation world and reviled as a monster. How do you think I must look in comparison? I am sure there are those out there wondering if I had known and if I even helped him with all of his plans. There are people who will speculate as to the bounds of our relationship. If I did not go into seclusion they would say I had no shame, look what his sworn brother did and he’s out and about like normal. Then there are those who look at my decision to seclude myself as an indicator of guilt and may accuse me of complicity. Or they will look at my mourning and see someone who mourns a monster and who does that? Why mourn a monster? Sect Leader Yao even openly criticised your young nephew for crying at the coffin of his uncle who also helped raise him. A parentless child who saw one of his only remaining close family members die brutally after being exposed as a serious criminal, who even threatened him with bodily harm, could not grieve him without censure. What of a grown man, and a Sect Leader at that!”

“With all due respect, so what?”

“E..excuse me?” Lan Xichen was torn between being confused and insulted.

“You heard me. So. What?” she started, “So what if they think these things? Does that make it true? If Sect Leader Yao thinks that you’re an incestuous troll would that make it true? If Sect Leader Ouyang says ‘hey did you know that Sect Leader Lan likes to visit brothels in secret’ would that make it true? Just because people think something does not make it a reality. Your sect certainly does not believe you are responsible for the actions of Jin Guangyao and would stand by you if anyone insinuates otherwise. You have your brother and your uncle who love you and are worried about you. Your sect has thrived under your leadership and undoubtedly they all miss you too.”

That Lan Jingyi kid couldn’t shut up about how much he missed Zewu-Jun. And she knew Lan Zhan missed his brother and lamented that he could not do more for him. He and Lan Qiren were working themselves ragged trying to pick up the pieces. He’d hardly had time to come back to Lotus Pier and she and Wei Ying missed him dearly. They’d had to make up so many ‘official’ reasons to find themselves in the Cloud Recesses so that they could spend some time together. So yes on the one hand it would be good for them if Zewu-Jun were to leave seclusion but she wasn’t simply doing it for that reason. It was because if anyone could understand what Zewu-Jun was going through, it would be her. And she didn’t think that seclusion was going to help anything. All it would do is make him ruminate on his mistakes over and over again until he likely went mad himself.

“You said that the man you considered your closest companion turned out to be a monster. Gee, I wonder what that feels like? You said that people will wonder if you helped him with his plans, oh gee, I wonder what that feels like?” Zewu-Jun had the grace to look abashed at that.

She continued, softer, “You said people will talk about what kind of person mourns a monster. But you’re not mourning a monster, are you? When A-Ling cried over his coffin, did you blame him for it? Did you think ‘why is this child mourning when he should celebrate the end of the one who fractured his family?’ like Sect Leader Yao did?” Zewu-Jun shook his head but didn’t say anything, letting her continue.

“A-Ling was mourning the loss of the uncle he knew. And you are mourning the loss of the companion he had been to you. The world will only ever view him as a monster because the world never knew him. But you did. Maybe you didn’t know everything about him, but not everything about him was fake. I hate Jin Guangyao, I will not pretend otherwise. But I was there, Zewu-Jun. I was there, and I could see that he truly did care for you and value you. Not everything he showed you would have been fake. You of all people probably got more sincerity out of him than anyone else. And so you, of all people, have a right to mourn the man he was, the same way A-Ling still mourns the loss of the man who gifted a lonely child a dog. Not everything had an ulterior motive. Even monsters can love can’t they? Even monsters had people who loved them. I would know. So if you need to mourn him… then just mourn him.

Who gives a damn what people will say about it? People will always talk, Zewu-Jun. It doesn’t matter what you do or don’t do, people will believe what they want to believe. So why let their opinions force you into repenting for something you didn’t even do? Let them think what they want to think. It is not a crime to be deceived. We all were. Why take the world on your shoulders when you don’t actually have to? And again, with all due respect Sect Leader Lan, if I, a family-less, alliance-less woman whose husband was the most reviled personage in the jianghu, who suffered the scorn of the cultivation world for over a decade, could raise my nephew on my own and build my sect back from literal ashes into one of the strongest and most respected once again, then you, who have a strong sect and people who love you, who believe in you and will support you no matter what… you can manage to live too.”

“Sect Leader Jiang…” Zewu-Jun was at a loss for words. What could he say? It only sounded selfish and petty to claim that he suffered more than she did, because he truly didn’t. She was right after all. Sect Leader Jiang was a remarkable woman. Life had not been kind to her. And...her words struck something within him. He felt ashamed. He hadn’t even thought about what it was like for her before this. He’d never offered her any support, but here she was trying to get him to live his life again without guilt. She, whose family most assuredly suffered because of his inaction, was here telling him to let it go, to not take responsibility. But how could he do that so easily?

“How did you do it? Sect Leader Jiang...” his voice cracked, “Can you ever forgive me, for the harm that my inaction caused you and your family?” Maybe if he heard it from her, maybe he could begin to forgive himself.

She sighed. “On my part, there is nothing to forgive Zewu-Jun. And so I can’t grant you forgiveness because you haven’t done me any wrong. But there are a few people who do deserve an apology from you. And your seclusion is a self-imposed punishment that you feel you deserve but at the end of the day, it does not actually do anything tangible when it comes to making amends to those who have been hurt.”

He was silent for a moment, stunned by her words. He hadn’t considered that his seclusion might have been causing others even more harm than he’d already done to them. Sect Leader Jiang was wise (she would disagree...she’d just learned from bitter experience in her opinion). He felt like he’d done her a great disservice all of these years, by not making an effort to reach out to her.

“Please, tell me. I.. I confess I no longer trust my judgement. I thought I knew A-Yao. I thought I was a good judge of character. I no longer know how to tell what is up from down. All I know is that I was so, so wrong about A-Yao. If you say that I have not harmed you then I am glad. I would hate to be the cause of more pain. You said that I am not responsible for A-Yao’s actions, and though it isn’t easy to believe that just yet, if there are those who I have truly wronged then please...please tell me. I still don’t know if I am ready to leave seclusion, if I even know how to, but I need to atone for my actions.”

Jiang Cheng nodded, “That’s the right attitude at least. So to start with I’d say you need to have a chat with Huaisang.”

His eyes widened, “I… I don’t know if that’s such a good idea, Sect Leader Jiang.” His face darkened slightly. He wasn’t pleased with Huaisang at the moment. It felt like he never even knew him.

“And why not? Out of everyone, it’s Huaisang that you unintentionally hurt. And I don’t mean because of not listening to Nie Mingjue. His death was not your fault.” He was about to protest but she cut him off. “It wasn’t. I told you, stop taking responsibility for what isn’t your fault and own up to what is.”

He sighed heavily, “If it’s not about Da-ge then how did I wrong Huaisang?”

“Well for one, you’re still his Er-ge. Yet you seem to have forgotten that in lieu of what happened in the temple. Huaisang… has lost everyone. He may have been acting like a shady shit for the past however many years but… do you know what it’s like to be the last one of your family, Zewu-Jun? To have nobody beside you except subordinates?” He inhaled sharply. “I.. I hadn’t thought of that,” he said mournfully. How much did he just not consider? What kind of a person was he that he resented Huaisang for his deceit but yet did not consider for one moment that Huaisang may have done those things because he thought he was all alone and could not come to him for help? What kind of brother was he that his little brother could not confide in him? He should have been there for Huaisang, instead he had thought so highly of Jin Guangyao, even dismissing da-ge’s claims, that Huaisang had not dared to approach him with his suspicions.

Sect Leader Jiang was being very understanding however, “Zewu-Jun, I know you’re not pleased with Huaisang. I know there are many things that he’s done that are not right. I know there’s a possibility that he lied and forced your hand at the end. Believe me, I know the feeling...more than anyone, I know what it feels like to be deceived by someone you love...to kill someone you love. I know what it feels like when everyone praises you for it. Like you did such a great thing and you should be happy and celebrating with everyone else, except you can’t because your heart has shattered…has been ripped to shreds.

As someone who once loved a so-called monster...as someone who as good as killed that person with their own hands, I understand better than anyone what you’re going through. What Huaisang did was cruel, even though I’m glad Jin Guangyao is dead. It was cruel to have you be the one to end him. Huaisang likely knew that Jin Guangyao valued you. He knew it would be the worst end for him to be killed by your hand. I can’t speak for Huaisang, but I don’t believe he did it to hurt you, even though that’s inevitably what happened anyway. He did it to hurt Jin Guangyao. But even though it was not kind of him to have you be the arbiter of justice, he still deserves to have his Er-ge in his life.

She paused remembering the pain of losing her husband and sister all in one night.

She didn't have to imagine how Huaisang would have felt at losing the last member of his family at the hands of someone he cared about.“You and I aren’t the only ones who were deceived by someone we loved. Huaisang loved Jin Guangyao too, didn’t he? He loved and trusted him. When Nie Mingjue was getting worse, didn’t Huaisang trust and rely on both you and Jin Guangyao? It wasn’t a front. You were both dear to him. He loved him. He loved him and was betrayed by him in the worst way. And then yes, he orchestrated a whole convoluted plan to have him exposed and killed.

But you and I can both attest that justice, and even revenge, doesn’t stop the pain does it? Huaisang avenged his brother, but he lost another in the process, the same way you did. Don’t let him lose you too. You said you wronged Nie Mingjue by not listening to him. I think you’d wrong him even more if you left his little brother alone, without anyone to call family. You don’t have to forgive Huaisang right away, or at all if you don’t want to, but eventually you should at least try and reconcile with him. You’re his big brother... the only one left. And you know, Huaisang would have had the realisation that he was fooled by Jin Guangyao all on his own. But you don’t have to be alone.

Huaisang and you share the experience of being blinded by him. It would be much easier to talk to someone who has gone through the same things, no? Huaisang is there. And I am here. You don’t have to endure this on your own. We may not be very close Zewu-Jun, but we can understand each other, not so? So I’m here if you need someone to confide in. And Huaisang...Huaisang must be waiting too. For his Er-ge. You both owe each other apologies.”

By the time she was done speaking there were tears rolling down his face. She didn’t think it was quite appropriate given their positions, (though she was sort of his secret sister-in-law so really, he counted as family) but she moved over to his side and embraced him. If he was surprised he didn’t show it, only moving to cling to her more tightly and sob with a ferocity that had her a bit surprised. She wondered if this was the first time since the temple that he’d allowed himself to fully grieve what he had lost, without the guilt of letting his sworn brother die, killing the other one, and feeling bad for mourning for someone who he should hate.

Everyone praised him for killing Jin Guangyao however, it was something he didn’t want to be praised for. But what could he say? That he hated the fact that he killed him? He was right about one thing, if he ever said something like that people would most assuredly say he was complicit and probably want to implicate him. Jiang Cheng of all people knew how hard it was to listen to people praising you for a deed you were not proud of. And so she was the only person who would understand. The only person who would, who could, acknowledge the hurt it would have caused him to do what he did, especially if he was tricked into it.

His feelings about Huaisang would be complicated, but it wasn’t too late to reconcile as long as they were both alive.

She rubbed his back consolingly and just let him cry. It must have been no more than 15 minutes, but it felt much longer, before his tears slowed. When his sobs petered out he tried to compose himself. She let go of him and he embarrassedly turned away, sipping his tea. He cleared his throat, “I’m sorry Sect Leader Jiang, that was unbecoming of me.”

“Don’t mention it,” she waved off. She was there to help after all.

“I will give your words due consideration. It was remiss of me to forget that I was not the only one affected by A-Yao’s schemes. I truly regret not thinking of how Huaisang would have felt when he first found out. You are right. I have done my little brother a disservice,” he said, voice croaky from his bout of sobbing.

“You said that there were people I needed to apologise to. Who else have I wronged?” he continued. His respect and admiration for Sect Leader Jiang had grown exponentially since the start of this visit. He would take her words under advisement if he could.

“Oh Zewu-Jun,” she sighed, “What you’re doing with this seclusion, doesn’t it remind you of someone? Because it sure reminds your uncle.”

Zewu-Jun looked as if she had slapped him.

“Nobody would begrudge you needing time to grieve and to come to terms with what happened, it is human nature. It’s understandable. We were all blindsided. And I understand the wish to seclude yourself because I wish I could have as well, though I didn’t have the luxury,” she said, not unkindly but it made him wince anyway, “But it’s been too long. A few months would be okay, though grief will last longer than that, but more than that is just being unfair to others. You are the Sect Leader. Your uncle has already had to watch his brother shirk his duties and seclude himself from the world for the rest of his life.

Your uncle has had to pick up the slack. He raised you and your brother like a father would, while taking care of sect matters. None of those things were his responsibility yet he did it. And now… now he has to go through it all over again. Master Lan is elderly though and he cannot keep up with all of the duties required of an elder, teacher and now Sect Leader once more. And so that leads me to the last person that you have wronged.

Lan Zhan is Chief Cultivator now, did you know? His duties are myriad and yet he has to come back here and help Master Lan run the sect. It pains Master Lan to see history repeating itself. A younger brother once again has to take the reins from his older brother and he does it without complaint, because he loves you. But it is unfair to A-Zhan. He can’t live his own life because he’s too busy living yours. He’s barely managing to keep up with both sets of duties, but he’s doing it for you. It has been two years, Zewu-Jun. He worries so much about you, as does your uncle. It pains them to see you this way. And so Sect Leader Lan,” she pointedly used his rank, “I beg of you to consider leaving your seclusion. You have people who love you waiting for you. Your family needs you.”

His eyes were glittering once more, but no tears were shed this time. He swallowed thickly. The past few months it had seemed as if he was living in a fog. He’d barely managed to keep his routine up, it was only through decades of strict routine that he’d gotten himself off the bed and eaten his food and meditated everyday on his shortcomings. But it seemed that while he was doing that he’d missed quite a few. Because she was right wasn’t she? He hid himself away like a coward and didn’t even think about how it would affect Wangji and Uncle. He hadn’t even considered how hurt his uncle would feel to see him go down the same route as his father.

Her words were like a splash of cold water. It seemed to wake him up; it got him out of the daze he was in. If this woman before him could raise a child and a sect from the ashes all alone after going through more tragedy than a hundred people in one lifetime would...he could get himself in gear and do what he had to do. He felt ashamed in front of her. She was right that she didn’t have the luxury to seclude herself. But he did. He did, and he took advantage of the support system that he had to take time for himself. More time than he should have.

She said it was understandable, and maybe it was, but she was also right that it should not have been going on for this long. He had no desire to be Qingheng-Jun the second. But if she hadn’t come here today… if she hadn’t said all that she had said… He would not have even thought of those things. He was too busy thinking of himself. It was likely that he would have stayed for years in his seclusion, just ruminating on what went wrong and what he could have changed. It was all too easy to get caught up in could-have-beens.

“Sect Leader Jiang,” he said, devastated at the thought of his uncle, the man who raised him when he didn’t have to, who did his best to prevent them from turning out like their father, thinking that he had failed when it was Lan Xichen who failed, “I’ve heard you loud and clear. But…”

“But?”

“But I don’t know if I even know how to go about being Sect Leader anymore. I feel like the decisions I make would be questionable now. How can I trust that I will do what’s best for the sect? I have already failed in so many ways. Now I have failed Wangji and Uncle too.”

“What did I tell you? You’re not alone Zewu-Jun. You don’t have to leave seclusion immediately. You don’t even have to start doing everything right away. Ease back into it. Your family will be there to help you. I’m offering to help you. If you need to talk about things that you can’t with them, you can write to me. Master Qiren should not have to be taking on these responsibilities any longer and A-Zhan needs to have time to breathe...his own position is challenging enough. Besides you haven’t failed, you’ve just had some setbacks is all. Failure would be wallowing in self-pity forever and leaving everyone else to do your duties indefinitely,” she looked at him pointedly. He got the hint.

“Okay Sect Leader Jiang. I shall take you up on that then. But I do have a question if you’ll indulge me,” he said.

“Shoot.”

“I mean no offense at all, in fact I’m actually extremely grateful for your concern, but I am curious….why do you even care? You didn’t have to do any of this. I’m well aware that you have your own duties and worries. Why bother about mine?”

She smiled for the first time since she walked into the Hanshi. He was struck by it. It had been a long time since he’d seen her smile... truly smile. In fact, the last time he’d seen a smile as bright as that on her face was probably right here in the Cloud Recesses when she was a student.

“You may not remember it, Zewu-Jun, but there was a time Jin Guangshan sought to marry me off. It was your words of support for me, against that awful Sect Leader Yao, that saved my skin, though they still called me Wife of the Yiling Demon after that. But at least I was only his wife. I will be eternally grateful to you for that. It was thanks to your words that nobody else tried to make me marry. I was able to focus on my sect in relative peace. It was a kindness that I have never been able to repay until now, though you shouldn’t think that it is only because of repayment.”

She got up and dusted off her clothes perfunctorily.

“I shall take my leave now, Zewu-Jun.”

“Please, call me Xichen,” he said, thinking that after all of the things that were said that day, she might as well.

“Well then, Xichen you may call me Wanyin. Thank you for hearing me out and please forgive me for barging in unexpectedly. I have intruded upon your hospitality long enough.”

“It is no matter,” he said, and for the first time in a long while he was able to manage a weak smile, “I was honored by your company. If you did not give me so much to think about, I would offer you some more tea.”

She laughed, “Thank you Xichen, but I will be missed soon anyway. I do not need to cause an uproar in Cloud Recesses if they can’t find a Sect Leader. Plus the scandal that would happen if someone other than A-Zhan or A-Yuan finds me in here will not be pleasant.”

“A-Zhan?” he raised an eyebrow, “Is there something I should know about, Wanyin?”

She snorted and threw him a cheeky smirk, “If you want to find out you’ll have to come to Lotus Pier.” And with that she saw herself out, leaving nothing but the scent of lotuses behind her.

Huh. Well then. How curious. He’d thought that Wangji had gone off with Wei Wuxian, who he’d been in love with since he met him. How did Sect Leader Jiang factor into this? As far as he knew they didn’t even particularly like each other. It seemed like he missed quite a lot while he was in seclusion. Was his little brother in a love triangle? It would explain why Wanyin said that he shouldn’t only think of her visit as repayment to him. It wasn’t the purest motivation but huh maybe he would leave seclusion after all. His brother might need support in more ways than one. Sect Leader Lan leaving seclusion because he was too invested in his brother’s love life was a hilarious thought, and for the first time in two years, he chuckled mirthfully to himself. Maybe he would be okay after all.

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alice-in-wonderart · 4 years

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I have found your blog and I love it!! Good look with it! Can you do headcanons for pregnancy and post-delivery for the juniors? (I see you write about them, and I don't know which other characters you are comfortable to write for). Thnkx~

I write for right about all characters! The Nies, the Jiangs, the Wens, the Lans, even all of the Jins (except Jin Zixun he can go be mean somewhere else) + Yi City power characters are all characters I write for ✌️ (I may have missed a few names) That aside, thank you so much for reading my stuff! I'm glad you enjoy them ❤️❤️ Aside from having 0 time management skills, running such a blog is so much fun! Here is your request about the Juniors being...well- themselves.

Ouyang Zizhen

You're what now?

OYZZ.exe stopped working.

Then he realised three fundamental truths at the exact same time. (if u get the reference, bless ✌️ )

Once the realization of the situation hit, his eyes watered and a loud, yet emotional whail escaped his lips, before engulfing you in a big hug. He was going to be a dad! You two were going to have a baby. And then realization hit him again.

Shit. He was going to be a father. A father to a baby - his baby. That was a lot of responsibility he was about to take. A lot of work, a lot of sleepless nights, a lot of time and energy. Babies are hard.

And then realization hit him a third time. He was going to have an actual family with you. And you were the mother to his child. YOUR child. He almost couldn't believe it.

Cue OYZZ becoming 70 times more affectionate and careful. You want to go outside? By all means, but let your gentle lover accompany you. Just in case, y'know. You want something sweet? By all means, what kind of sweets does the queen desire? You need new clothes because of the baby bump? By all means, what kind of silk do you want? Colour? Pattern? Style? You want to sleep? 3, 5 or 50 pillows?

OYZZ is a walking panic bomb when it comes to your pregnancy. Conveniently, he also knows how to mostly hide said panic. But you being in pain, having morning sickness and and in general feeling off is not something he signed up for. So, he will dote over you as much as humanly possible.

But then judgement day arrived. And he was out of it. He somehow never considered the fact, that you were going to one day have to give birth to that baby.

You have never seen a more distressed looking man than OYZZ when he finally got the permission to see you. His eyes were puffy, his lips were quivering and he was so pale, he could easily pass for a corpse. It seemed as if he was the one giving birth, not you.

And he immediately dropped to his knees next to your bed, gently taking your hand in his. You were alive. You were alive and argueably healthy and that was what he needed to hear.

But then! In comes the medic, holding your child in pure white blankets, gently letting you take it. And the moment his eyes landed on that baby he knew, that his heart was stolen once more.

"Congratualtions! It's a girl."

Guess who is about to become "Daddy's little princess".

Jin Ling

"Hahahahahhahha. Funny. Oh wait, you're serious?!"

PaniK

What do you mean you're pregnant? When did that happen? When did you learn? How were you sure? Wait, you were how many months in?!

Give him time. It's not, that he isn't happy. He's just panicking like crazy. Of course, once the initial mental breakdown™️ wears off, he'd come up to you and give you the most emotional hug you've ever experienced. He'd hide his face in your hair, as he mumbled into you how incredibly grateful he actually is.

Now, as the Lanling Jin Sect's leader, of course it was expected of him to have an heir, so such news travelled quickly. Immediately this became the gossip of every household and ultimately led to you receiving a metric ton of gifts from all over the place. Jin Ling would also make sure you were living the most lavish, yet healthy lifestyle possible.

The truth is, he was utterly terrified. After all, he grew up without parents, lived only with his uncle and as a result was quite hot-tempered. More than anything, he wanted to be the best dad possible. He wanted his children to grow up in a loving family, with their parents next to them, with a mother to care for them and a father to teach them. And he was afraid whether he was capable of even being a good father. But of course, you knew he was going to be the best father in the world.

Now, speaking of hot-tempered, Jin Ling honestly would throw more hissy fits than you. In fact, he'd get more mood swings than you too. In fact, even when pregnant, you're the calm one. Because if you think he's snappy and over-protective of you usually, wait 'till you see him once he learns you're pregnant. Hoo boy.

He was at work, dealing with the pressures of leading a sect when one of Lanling's servants hurriedly burst into the room, giving him the news that made his tough guy act crumble in seconds - his wife was giving birth.

At the time, he was surrounded by now Sect Leader Lan Sizhui, (idk it's a hc), Nie Huaisang and of course - his uncle, who all ushered him to go see you. Thus, he stormed out, running towards the nursery like his life depended on it.

"What do you mean I can't enter yet, my WIFE is in there." You haven't seen scary until you've seen Jin Ling, amidst an utter mental breakdown, being held down by a few nurses, trying desperately to stop him from going in.

Once they DID let him in, he'd be by your side in 0.001 seconds, only to see you holding not one, but two babies.

"A-Ling, look. They're twins. Say hello to papa, little ones." For once, Jin Ling didn't mind the tears that began falling from his eyes, as he gently held one of his two sons in his embrace. Perhaps, being a father wouldn't be that bad after all. Not with you by his side.

Lan Jingyi

*dramatic gasp*

For once the loud, wild Jingyi was left speechless, unmoving, utterly starstruck by the news. He'd never admit it, but for a while he'd been dreaming of having a family with you. So, when you told him the news, his heart skipped a beat. His dream was coming true.

And then, with the biggest smile on his face, he'd lift you up, carrying you to your now shared room, stating how you shouldn't strain yourself and how he'd take care of everything you need.

"Er-gege, I'm only 3 months in, it's barely noticeable yet, I can take care of myself."

Denial.

Lan Jingyi will be there for you at the cost of right about everything, even if it meant breaking Lan's rules, much to yours and everybody's dismay. Macho man™️ will protect his darling flower. What he wasn't ready for was how complicated pregnancy actually is.

Whenever you're more moody, he'd be quick to anger as well, so small and pointless arguments wouldn't be uncommon. But for every little argument, there is also a sleepless night where he'd cuddle you, whenever your stomach would hurt, or you'd feel uncomfortable.

Now Lan Jingyi is a cool dad. He is a cool dad before he is officially a dad. Whenever you two are alone, lying in bed, he'd lean in to rest a hand on your stomach. And he'd always give a happy yelp whenever he felt his little one move. And gosh, how much he'd talk to the baby. He'd tell your stomach stories of his great adventures, he'd joke around and believe me, he's planned every family outing for next 10 years.

Absolutely everybody thought it was going to be a boy. Ouyang Zizhen and Jin Ling even bet on it, OYZZ being ABSOLUTELY sure it would be a boy.

Giving birth was a whole new adventure. He'd wake up much too early for his liking with you frantically shaking him awake.

"The baby is coming." "Who's coming?" "The baby." "THE BABY?!"

Cue, Lan Jingyi losing his damn mind. He'd be up and running in a blink of an eye, casually scaring the medics and waking up the entire Cloud Recess in his hurry. Don't run in Cloud Recess? He's not running. He's SPRINTING. Do not shout in Cloud Recess? He's not shouting, he's SCREECHING. Do not speak out of turn? FOR GOD'S SAKE MY BABY IS COMING. And he'd be like that the entire time, until he's allowed to see you. He'll write the rules a thousand times if he has to later. He won't, Lan aren't heartless.

Seeing his healthy little baby, he was right about ready to pass out. He almost didn't hear you joking how your little girl was a loud crier and was about to be just as wild as her dad.

" Wait. It's a girl? We have a little girl!" Cue Ouyang Zizhen screaming in misery, as Jin Ling victoriously smirks his way.

Lan Jingyi on the other hand couldn't have been happier.

Lan Sizhui

QWQ

"This is the best day of my life, I can't believe we're going to have our own family!"

With a bright smile, he'd pull you in for a sweet kiss, shaking with excitement. Honestly, he'd have the best reaction out of all the Juniors. He's a family guy, who gets to witness true love everyday around his fathers, so having a child of his own with you was one of his long-term goals. He was old enough and wise enough to be absolutely ready to embark on an adventure through fatherhood.

Lan Sizhui would be so loving and gentle with you. You'd have him wrapped around your finger, he'd respond to your every beg and call. He'd minimize any work-related travelling to make sure he could be as close to you as possible.

When he wasn't there, he'd assign his cultivation partner and trusty bestie Lan Jingyi to take care of you and look after you. Did you necessarily need it? No. But you understood his worry, so you let him be.

He'd be there for you when you were feeling down, through your mood swings, morning sickness. He never complained, never fought with you, never gave you anything short of his unconditional love.

In fact, he was so SO compassionate, that he'd get pregnancy cravings WITH you. Nothing like the two of you, sitting awake at 2 am, (uncommon for him) eating chocolate-covered cucumbers and apricots.

Similarly to Lan Jingyi, everybody were already 100% sure the two of you would have a little girl. With Sizhui's sweet soft-spoken behavior and big warm heart, having a little gentle flower to spoil rotten seemed like the obvious outcome.

Lan Sizhui, on the other hand, refused to give into all of those "what ifs". Only time could tell. Besides, he'd be just as happy and proud no matter what gender the baby would be.

With his careful planning and skillful avoidance of any travelling, thankfully he was there when the due date was up. On the outside, he remained as calm as physically possible, but oh, on the inside it was a storm. Few could see through his façade, but by the trembling of his fingers, discreet chewing on the inside of his lip and eyes darting all around him, his true feelings came to light.

And when he finally got to see you, you've never seen him more unlike himself. With a worried expression and hasty movements he'd make his way to you, trembling hand reaching out to cup your face. He'd leave a gentle kiss on your forehead, before turning to the newborn in your hands.

"Sizhui. Say hi to your son."

A single tear rolled down his face, carrying the weight of all of his love in it. One look at his child and his heart was pierced by a million arrows. At that very moment he vowed, that he'd protect this child with all he's got, teach him all he knows and love him with all of his heart.

Thank you for reading~

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