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[xluna-reclipse]

Jin Guangyao's wellness is synonymous with the interest of the Lan.

Let me preface by saying Lan Xichen owes Jin Guangyao nothing. Xiyao offered everything they could to each other. Their hearts are clean and pure without the chains of debt.

But the Lan owe Jin Guangyao.

Jin Guangyao saved the life of their suzerain, rebuilt the Cloud Recesses, supported the Lan time and again, covered and protected their faults (/cough Lan Wangji).

It is the Sect's obligation to help Jin Guangyao, to repay the favor of coal sent in the dead of winter (雪里送炭).

Between the life of the benefactor and the life of the Sect, of course, the Sect takes precedence. But to ignore the reason you've survived is ungrateful and intolerable.

Wei Wuxian protected the Wen Remnants with his life because of what they did for the Jiang.

Even if we can't seek to be Wei Wuxian and lay our lives down in recompense, nor repay the grace of water droplets with springs (滴水之恩定当涌泉相报), at least we should reach the level of exchanging a peach for a plum (投之以桃，报之以李).

That is to say, should Jin Guangyao seek refuge with the Lan, it is not against morality for him to be received as a guest, lest they forget gratitude and abandon righteousness (忘恩負義).

The Lan owe it to Jin Guangyao to help him however they can. Lan Xichen and the Lan will never be at odds with Jin Guangyao. Should Lan Xichen take offense, it is not from his standing as Sect Leader, but as a man who thought he meant something, then thought he didn't and at the end wondered again if he was really special to Jin Guangyao. But in any case, it is his obligation as Sect Leader of the Lan to, at the minimum, ensure Jin Guangyao a chance to reincarnate.

Yeah, that's right. I'm saying if enough time passes, forget greedy boys who want the power of the Stygian Tiger Amulet (Chapter 113), Lan Xichen will personally open the coffin or die trying.

[xluna-reclipse]

The devotion of a Lan and why Lan Xichen will never marry

(unless that person is Jin Guangyao)

From the likes of Lan An down to Lan Wangji, the Lan, at times tragic, were deeply romantic and always faithful. It’s hard to consider love at first sight to be a genetic trait, but the evidence doesn’t lie. Not a single Lan married a person they did not love. Not a single Lan moved on after the loss of their soulmate.

Lan Forehead Ribbon

The mark of a Lan is their forehead ribbon. At first glance, it is a symbol of self-control. In actuality, it is a blatant declaration of wild passion. The ribbon which represents the obligation to regulate oneself, can only be removed by a destined one? Isn’t this just another way of saying, the three thousands rules are to contain us, for in the name of our soulmate AND ONLY for our soulmate, we observe no laws, no bonds, no morals? The Lan follow the dao, but not even the intentions and punishments of heaven can hold them back from their Destined One. 

The Lan are kind and just to everyone. The woman who crosses the street. The child who begs for alms. The man who nearly drowns. They are all the same, no more, no less deserving of help. The world is a calm and reassuring beige, every tragedy of equal hue and intensity, every joy a drop of water in a deep well. 

Only the Instance of Lan is that great disturbance in their life. A warmth worth suffering for.

It’s fascinating to look at all the joy and pain that love brought the Lan. 

And the singular way they dealt with loss.

Lan concept of love

The common process of the Lan romance is a strong initial first spark. Love at first sight (or first fight for Lan Wangji). 

After that comes devotion. Devotion during life is to seek to be with the other. Lan An and Qingheng-jun married their Destined Ones. Lan Xichen would disappear for months at a time to see Jin Guangyao. Lan Wangji tried his best, appearing at the burial mounds in Wei Wuxian’s first life, but was chased away time and again. In his second life, he drags Wei Wuxian back to the Cloud Recesses and follows him on his adventures. The first part of devotion is to keep your north pointed towards your soulmate.

The second part, is to not hurt others, or involve third parties. The ability to refuse to marry, unless that person is the one you love, is quite admirable. There will never be a Jiang Fengmian in the Lan family, someone who marries a woman he doesn’t love and causes both family and wife to be subject to rumors and mockery, children to self-doubt and insecurity. No Lan marries for convenience. They marry out of love or not at all. It must be reassuring to such a deeply romantic family, to not have to be forced by their elders into loveless matches. (Otherwise, before asking Lan Xichen to marry, Lan Qiren would be served to platter.) Lan Xichen already anticipates this and treats Lan Jingyi as heir. 

Then at the end, after your Fated One passes away, the Lan leave too.

The founder of the Sect set a poignant example for all of his descendent after. Lan An left the monastery for the love of his life and returned to the mountain, leaving not even dust behind after they left. 

Lan Yi, in the Untamed has a hinted romance with Baoshan Sanren. While she did not witness her lover die, she never married another person. She also spent the rest of her days in seclusion.

Qingheng-jun fell in love at first sight and stood against sect and world to marry and protect her. He paid for her ‘sins’ as if they were his. And after she died, he did not leave seclusion until his death during the war.

The current Sect Leader, Lan Xichen also went into retreat after the love of his life died. And he will never leave unless Jin Guangyao returns, or in pursuit of Jin Guangyao’s return.

Not even Lan Wangji was an exception. Sometimes people will say that he moved on with his life after Wei Wuxian’s life, citing his night hunts as an example. But actually, Lan Wangji ‘appeared wherever there was chaos.�� Why? Because he was looking for Wei Wuxian. Because he wanted to be there if Wei Wuxian found himself in trouble (which Lan Wangji was right, Wei Wuxian nearly gets dragged back to Lotus Pier immediately). Lan Wangji never ‘moved on.’ He was waiting. He was searching. Why was it so easy for him to accept Wei Wuxian had returned from the dead? Because he was hoping it would happen. Wei Wuxian had already ‘died’ in the eyes of the world once before, when he was kicked into the Yiling Burial Mounds by the Wen. But! Wei Wuxian returned stronger than ever, albeit with literal ghosts, but he was back all the same.

He was different than his father and ancestors. He was lucky to love the Yiling Laozu. Wei Wuxian was exceptional. He proved the dead could return--sentient! Why did Lan Wangji have to live as dead when his heart had not died?

Lan Xichen will never remarry. Because he’s already married. The moment he looked into the eyes of his savior amidst the flames of war, his ribbon found an owner. Why would he marry when his clan will not ask it of him? Why did he raise Lan Jingyi like his heir, a child whose entitlement and sass can only be rivaled by Jin Ling? A child who is capable of being rude to Sect Leaders with out repercussion? A child who oozes the confidence of someone loved, respected, and of high rank, when he is a supposed orphan? Because he is the heir Lan Xichen prepared when he realized he had already found the love of his life. 

And the love of his life had married a woman. But that is irrelevant in the face of the Love of a Lan. It does not matter if the other party does not love me (Qingheng-jun, I’m squinting at you; Lan Wangji who asks what is to be done when the person he wants to protect refuses to return with him), what matters is that I love them. And that they do not want my ribbon, does not make it any less theirs (when Lan Xichen cancels the permission of the jade order, but tells Jin Guangyao that it still belongs to him). 

Why did he, after the death of Jin Guangyao, retreat as Lan An did for his Fated One, as Qingheng-jun did for his wife, as a Lan does for his soulmate?

And why, do we find it tragic?  

Lan Xichen before Jin Guangyao was untouched by worldly emotions. Because of Jin Guangyao, he descended from the dais and was made human. 

Lan An cultivated in the monastery, because of his Destined One, he went down the mountain. When that person left, he left too. 

All he did was return from whence he came.

While I believe Lan Xichen will open the coffin because even if he does not want to, the Lan owe Jin Guangyao, a life in seclusion is not to be pitied.

A gift for Meng Haoran

I love a Master Meng, exalted across the world. The beauty abandoned his post, to rest white-haired in seclusion. Often drinking under the moon, preferring flowers to the king. To the mountain I long to reach, this disciple can only bow here.

Li Bai Translated by Luna_reclipse

赠孟浩然 (Zèng mènghàorán)

吾爱孟夫子， 风流天下闻 wú ài mèng fūzǐ, fēngliú tiānxià wén 红颜���轩冕， 白首卧松云 hóngyán qì xuān miǎn, bái shǒu wò sōng yún 醉月频中圣， 迷花不事君 zuì yuè pín zhōng shèng, mí huā bu shì jūn 高山安可仰,  徒此挹清芬 gāoshān ān kě yǎng, tú cǐ yì qīng fēn

李白 (lǐ bái)

Lan Xichen’s soulmate is Jin Guangyao and he will never trade him out.

Liu Haikuan, the actor who portrayed Lan Xichen in the Untamed, said in an interview, that Lan Xichen will never leave seclusion without Jin Guangyao.

Zhu Zanjin, the actor who portrayed Jin Guangyao in the Untamed, said that the relationship between Lan Xichen and JIn Guangyao is the same as that between Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. 

The Lan through their now 4000 precepts, have bound themselves with rule after rule with only one release. And because of this Destined One, descend to become mortal, and without them, return to the mountain.

Lan Xichen has proven through layers and layers of Lan patterns that his soulmate is Jin Guangyao and this soulmate was worth it.

I leave you with Liu Haikuan’s words, “Both of their lives were tragic, but the relationship they had was not a tragedy. A-Yao, through the end, was very good to Lan Xichen.”  (他们两个的人生各自都是悲剧，但这段友情不是悲剧，阿瑶直到最后还是对曦臣很好.)

[xluna-reclipse]

If you wouldn't ask Lan Wangji to move on from Wei Wuxian, you shouldn't expect Lan Xichen to do so either. Lan Xichen, by the end of the novel, decides to enter seclusion for Jin Guangyao just as Lan An did for his wife. Whether or not you subscribe to the Lan only love once theory, Lan Xichen has made his choice. In the novel, you see, even months after, through the eyes of Wei Wuxian, that Lan Xichen behaves as if his soul has left him. In The Untamed behind the scenes, Lan Xichen's actor even stated that without Jin Guangyao, Lan Xichen will not return to the world. Enter the world for one person and leave when they go, leaving only dust in the wake (Wei Wuxian's observation upon seeing the Lan murals).

Lan Xichen was a gentle, compassionate being before Jin Guangyao, equal in his love and care for all living beings, heart the surface of deep calm waters. He was the ideal of Taoist goals, a person without waves and attachment. Lan Xichen, after Jin Guangyao entered his life, was a person brought alive, finally bound by the red threads of emotion and living, a statue become human.

Lan Xichen looks at no one the way he looks at Jin Guangyao, treats no one the way he treats Jin Guangyao. Just as Jin Guangyao considered Lan Xichen the impeccable, flawless moon in the sky. To Lan Xichen, Jin Guangyao was the scorching, life bringing fire of the sun. Here existed a man who was born in the mud, but rose above to stand above all men. Not only did he command the world, only in his hands was power a force for good. Jin Guangyao alone, saved the most lives in Mo Dao Zu Shi. He built a temple to Guanyin for his mother, and through it, offered food and medicine for those the cultivational world were only willing to offer their pity and unwilling to lift a finger to help. He built the watchtowers when all of the cultivational opposed it, fought day and night, endured his father's abuse so that places considered beneath other cultivators would receive timely aid. When others took power, they just wanted to elevate their own family and oppress others. Jin Guangyao took power and saved the world.

Lan Xichen loved exactly this man. The man who was covered in scars and bruises from the circumstances of his birth, who was smeared with the biased opinions of others and the crappy luck that plagued him wherever he went, who was oppressed and abused by those with power, and yet never broke, never stopped lifting his head to the heavens and standing up again to climb. The man who saved him from the moment they first met and repeatedly after. Jin Guangyao rebuilt the Cloud Recesses for Lan Xichen. Lan Xichen decided to build ties with the world for Jin Guangyao. The man who acquiesced to pressure in the treatment of the Wen, bore the scorn of the cultivational world beside Jin Guangyao to build the towers, to elect Jin Guangyao Chief Cultivator.

Lan Xichen loved him and only him. With the long life of a cultivator, and the reliable promise of human greed, that coffin will open while Lan Xichen lives, and he will be ready. Just as Lan Wangji regretted not standing beside Wei Wuxian in his first life, Lan Xichen will finally be able to stand beside Jin Guangyao in his next.

The knife in the dark is effective because you cannot see it. Lan Xichen won't repeat his mistakes this time. He will be prepared to support A-Yao.

[xluna-reclipse]

If I had to say, is Nie Huaisang responsible for that stab, or is Lan Xichen, I still can't bear to blame Nie Huaisang. Because if the root of doubt was not there, Lan Xichen would never have drawn his sword in the first place.

Reversing the situation, if Nie Huaisang had played that card with Jin Guangyao, would Jin Guangyao have stabbed without looking? I doubt it.

But you can't say it's Lan Xichen's fault either.

My mother used to say, no matter how hard you work, how much effort you put in, how much you sacrifice, if you're ill on the day of the exam, it all comes to naught.

No matter how much Lan Xichen trusted Jin Guangyao on the weekdays, in one moment of doubt, he ended his own life. What's the use of all that Lan restraint when you yourself are the cause of your seclusion?

Even if you think of it this way, picture Lan Xichen as the man who stumbled one step before reaching the top, the man who turned back to look with one foot out of Hades and one moment left until his beloved returned, it's still too cruel to say it's his fault.

What a terrible accident that was, what an awful blunder, what an agonizing mistake.

The roll of the dice comes for all of us. Who in the world, after having lived a life, has never tripped? How can we be blamed for the sun rising?

How can you judge him through one lurch of impulse?

It's so cruel to Jin Guangyao that the one person he protected and cherished with all his being was the one who killed him, but when I think about the Lan Xichen who wished he'd died in that temple, who looks at his hand now and wishes it severed from him, I can't blame him at all.

And I can't blame Nie Huaisang either. What's one lie when he was already willing to kill the juniors? What's wrong with using any tool at his disposal? In the end, it still wasn't his hand that stabbed that blade, even if he still got blood on his fingers. How can you blame him when he's also doing what he can to live? Without purpose, a tool has no meaning. All Nie Huaisang wants, is his own meaning.

In the end, I don't blame anyone. It was just a tragedy.