#and ouyang feels the same 'like calls to like' so i wonder what he thinks is going on with her gender pff

[buffintruder]

I know I'm not the first person to say it, but the fact that Ouyang cuts off a body part from Zhu Chongba, expecting that it will lead to the same shame and humiliation, both internally and externally, as when one of his body parts was cut off....but then it doesn't

No wonder he hates her. No matter what he does, she'll always be seen and respected as more of a man than he ever could be and she isn't even one

[tangledinmdzs]

Your writing is wonderful and you are amazing! *Muah* everything is chef's kiss.

Could this wonderful person write drunk juniors, who been taken care by reader, confessing to reader?

I love your acc. It's addictive and worthy of getting addicted.

ahh

aw! you're much too kind. thank you for reading~

and yes i wouldn't mind doing this request at all, let's try this out!

i’ve written the opposite of this before, that you can read here

cheers~

*＊✿❀　❀✿＊*

Lan Sizhui

the two of you are sitting in the park lot, under his apartment complex,

you’ve done your good duty of his friend by driving him home, 

but he’s making your life hard

because he isn’t getting out of the car,

“Sizhui, I have work tomorrow,” you tell him, hope to get some logic into him 

Sizhui isn’t a lightweight by any means

but growing up in a family with strict alcohol protocols (? is that what you call it?)

Sizhui hasn’t had that much experience

there are some drinks that he downs fine and others that wipe his ass

the bourbon shot thing that he had at the party a few hours ago, fell into the latter category

“y/nnnnnn, y/nnn, my y/n,” Sizhui sing songs, thrashing around in the passenger seat beside you

he’s so drunk, you think to yourself as you stare at the way his head leans on the seat belt, one he doesn’t want to take off

“Sizhui, let me unbuckle you, i’ll even walk you up,” you persuade and Sizhui actually shouts at you, objects like a five year old even though he’s 25

“no! staying here! with y/n!” Sizhui demands and you sigh at him, 

but you can’t even be mad, because he’s so loud and cute unlike his natural quiet personality

“A-Yuan, be a good boy and let me unbuckle you, okay?” you try to convince and lean over the console to unbuckle him

before you hand can get any close to his seat belt,

his hands are on your face

squishing your cheeks together,

“A-Yuan?” you manage to get out, though it’s probably incoherent with how squished your cheeks are between his hands

Sizhui smiles, hums at you, the red on his cheeks high

“pretty y/n, you’re the prettiest person i’ve ever met in my entire life,” Sizhui tells you and you wanna snort at him but your face is still in the mercy of his hands 

“t-tha-n- chu-” you try to say but stop short when Sizhui literally begins to lean in,

his lips are puckered out

he’s trying to kiss you

and he very well might!

you want to lean back on instinct, but Sizui’s got his hands on your face holding tight and he’s getting in close-

and there’s a small oof, from the man in front of you

the seatbelt that he had so adamantly tried not to take off,

limits him a millimeter from meeting your lips

Lan Jingyi

Jingyi hiccups as you both walk, swaying down the hallway to his apartment

it’s truly a miracle that you managed to even get him home, considering how simply wasted your best friend was 

“y-y/n,” Jingyi hiccups your name, when you lean him against the side of the his door 

you roll your eyes at him, and simply hold your hand out to him, 

“i’m dropping you inside, then i’m going home,” you tell him and Jingyi simply hiccups again, stares at you and then smiles sleepily 

“hmm,” Jingyi hums, almost as if teasing you and you let out a tired sigh (because this dude had been heavy to drag up the five flights to his apartment) 

and you just begin to pat down his jeans and pockets for his keys, because really you didn’t have time for his games

Jingyi giggles here and chuckles there, wherever your hands land on him, moving from his back pockets all the way up his chest 

“Jingyi, don’t tell me you forgot, your keys,” you’re really speaking to yourself at this rate, because Jingyi looks too out of it to even be processing anything that you are saying anyways

“didn’t forget, have them, right here” Jingyi says sleepily and pats the chest pocket on his jean jacket

“god, why didn’t you just tell me earlier-” you grumble 

your reach out to his jacket only for your wrist to be grabbed

suddenly, swiftly you’re turned, your back slamming into the space that JIngyi had been standing in, your hands tugged to a hold against the wall

you widen your eyes at JIngyi,

this close, practically nose to nose, you can really smell the alcohol around him 

“would you leave me after?” Jingyi asks you, solemn, sleepy 

“it’s your apartment, Jingyi” you breathe out because the air between you two had always been friends

flirty, teasing but friendly

friends

“can’t you stay?” Jingyi’ asks, and you stare at him

there’s a pause in between the both of you where you’re trying to read what his hazy eyes on yours might mean

“stay with me,” Jingyi repeats

you stare deeply at him, wondering if you can

if you should

Jin Ling

Jin Ling is not pretty when he is drunk

he is a sad, mopey, angry drunk 

luckily, he’s grown up to have a good hold with liquor

whether that be from experience or genes, you won’t know 

honestly you’d only seen him drunk on a handful of occasions

tonight, sat with him in the his newly moved in apartment, 

city ambiance behind you both in the late night

you’re seeing him again in this weird drunk state that he usually hides from you 

even though you both have been friends for years

“y/n,” Jin Ling starts, solemn, serious, deep drunk voice that he always has whenever he’s reached his limit

you hum at him, 

you’re pretty sober, opting for something fruit and light, not really having much alcohol 

you were really here to keep him company, because the trend tends to be that Jin Ling likes to vent when he’s drunk 

“you know, there’s someone that i like so much. i’ve liked them for...for some time. a long time...but i don’t think they’ll ever know,” Jin Ling admits to you 

and you hum, because it’s the same person that he talks about every time he’s drunk, 

“well, i mean, if you never tell them, they’re never going to know. so you’re really the one holding yourself back,” you say, a bit coldly 

because he always talks about this mystery person

“i’ve told them! more than once, but they still don’t get it, they’re so stupid,” Jin Ling says, takes a nice chug of his beer can and then crushes it

you huff out a funny laugh at his way of showcasing strength, taking a lip sip from your fruity mix 

“A-Ling you’re not the most direct person i’ve ever met. maybe it’s because you’ve been talking in circles with them,” you say, because leave it to Jin Ling to make someone misunderstand 

you’re about to take another sip from your cup when hands grab your shoulders, 

you’re turned roughly to face Jin Ling, scowling quickly after the surprise settles in your chest,

“dude! i could have spilled my drink-”

“i like you!” Jin Ling practically yells at you 

you look at him like he’s grown two heads; because he’s drunk, so drunk and so not sober

“i like you so much more than you’ll ever know. i think i love you y/n,”

his voice is so deep, so solemn and so serious 

he’s so drunk, you think as you stare at his flushed cheeks, tussled hair

you wish that he wasn’t

Ouyang Zizhen

you click your tongue at the sight of Zizhen, 

your friend had never had always been a lightweight 

but he still insisted on coming along to events like this, 

and then sprawling out to sleep at the bar, 

like he was now

softly snoring away as other patrons laughed behind their hands

you roll your eyes and push down the embarrassment as you do your best to get Zizhen awake and out of here,

because this place was really out of both of your depths if you were being completely honest

(you didn’t even drink)

“Zizhen, hey, Zizhen,” you call to him, pushing at his shoulder

you get to watch Zizhen slowly smack his lips before he turns to the other side of his arm to get comfortable 

“oh my goodness, Zizhen, please, get up,” you’re pleading to him, because you’re always responsible for him when it comes to things like this-

you feel a tug on your arm, 

you turn to look at Zizhen, blinking up at you from where he’s lying in his hands,

“you awake yet bud? i’m going to get a water bottle to sober you up a bit and then we better head out” you tell him, moving to do just that when you feel your arm tugged again

you turn to him, give him a looked (one of mild annoyance) and then move to leave 

the third tug on your arm has you sprawling down onto the table beside him,

luckily you don’t hit your head, as you land solidly on Zizhen’s outstretched arm

“can you stay a little longer? like this?” Zizhen sleepily, drunkenly asks you 

you blink at him, never having seen him at such an angle, 

sleepy profile and hazy eyed

“we...we should get going,” you tell him, though your voice is a lot more gentle than you wanted it to be

Zizhen hums at you, closes his eyes again

you watch him, can’t bring yourself to wake him again

his warm palm thrums against your wrist, 

where he still holds it

[featherfur]

I’m going to try and make sense with this so bear with me: I think a lot of untapped angst potential in fic is the reality of Jiang Cheng being the older one now and visibly more mature because Wei Wuxian died at 20? 19? And he wasn’t exactly maturing in the ghost realm during that considering he doesn’t remember it. Now he’s definitely matured via trauma but that’s not the same thing. And now they’re 16x on the wrong wave length.

Under the read more because uh, I go into detail

Now put Jiang Cheng in the same room as Wei Wuxian and they’re both 12, atleast in the beginning. But Jiang Cheng had his previously homicidal insane brother show up right next to his nephew after insulting his mom (who’s death he inadvertently led too) so JC (for me atleast) can be forgiven a bit for not being happy and wanting to kick his ass and thinking he may still be insane because an Okay Wei Wuxian Would Not Insult Shijie or His Nephew. Especially since JC not only didn’t tell the entire world that his brother was back, left him with Jin Ling, only yelled at him a bit and scared him via dog and— (I’m going to shut up here because that isn’t my point but man I could go on). JC had a lot of issues and he yells at Wei Wuxian to the point one wants to offer him a cough drop.

But post Temple JC? Who watched him walk away sadly and knows that Wei Wuxian is no longer unstable and thinks he doesn’t want to be his brother anymore? That’s so much wonderful angst because that means Wei Wuxian will not be greeted by Jiang Cheng his Shidi anymore.

He will be met with Sect Leader Jiang who clawed his way up from nothing but a baby in his right, a stack of spreadsheets on his left and the most feral disciples around that he has to protect. This Sect Leader who doesn’t have time to go around hunting Wei Wuxian down to harass him. Sect Leader Jiang who barely even greets Wei Wuxian when he visits because he has shit to do. He has audits and taxes and those damn merchants are complaining, he has to up the wages of the seamstresses that make the robes of his sect with so many protection talismans and find a way to convince Sect Leader Ouyang to stop fine-ing the caravans that deliver the goods. He has to organize the celebrations and make sure everyone’s safe during flooding season. That’s not even counting how he has to train and monitor his disciples and night hunts and the political hellscape!

But Wei Wuxian!! He doesn’t know that. He doesn’t know everything that Jiang Cheng has been taking care of or that he’s just seriously that busy. He thinks he’s being ignored and pushed away and mocked when Jiang Cheng walks by with a quick “Master Wei” and runs off! Because how could Jiang Cheng treat him like that when Wei Wuxian is clearly trying to reconnect. Every offer of night hunting his declined unless it was planned then already and when they do get together Jiang Cheng ignores him! Why is Wei Wuxian even trying!? What’s the point of Jiang Cheng can’t stand him but why can’t he stop trying either??

Meanwhile during those hunts Jiang Cheng is trying to keep an eye on his brother, his twelve disciples, Jin Ling and his entourage, Wei Wuxian’s Lan ducklings, that random Ouyang kid who apparently imprinted on Jin Ling, figure out what they’re hunting, mentally running the math for the cost of the inns for all of them, going through each of the attending Jiang disciples’ personal likes and deciding on whether to buy their favorite snacks or something else as a ‘thank you for not dying’ as has become accidental custom, trying to figure out if it’s weird to get Jin Ling and his friends something nice (CLEARLY he has to get the Ouyang kid something, he apparently has no other friends considering how often he’s just hanging around Lotus pier whenever Jin Ling swings by), and trying to think of he has any other disciples night hunting within a 50 mile radius he should fly out to check on before he sleeps!

Clearly Wei Wuxian just doesn’t care about the Jiang sect and wants to just be annoying but Jiang Cheng is busy! Cant he see that Jiang Cheng is only available on Mondays and Tuesdays during the odd months and Wednesday through Saturday on the even? It’s very clear when Jiang Cheng has time! Why can’t his brother just respect that not everyone has the free time to do whatever the hell they want? Is he flaunting it?!? How dare he!

It’s a giant mess and it only gets worse because Jiang Cheng is diplomatic, he knows how to bow his head when he’s overpowered (though he rarely is nowadays) or when the outcome isn’t worth it. So he doesn’t want to start a fight with Lan Wangji and from there the entire Lan Sect! He’s been holding his tongue for years he can keep doing it, especially if his brother’s happiness is on the line. He can ignore Lan Wangji being rude, he can ignore the dark looks, hell if he thinks Wei Wuxian’s position is threatened at the LAN’s he’ll even play real fucking nice so that Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen won’t do anything to his brother. He did it for Yanli he’ll do it now. (Also added bonus of now Sizhui has started to warm up to him and so he has to be extra polite so his new nephew doesn’t hate him and his free nephew [Jingyi] doesn’t light a building on fire in revenge for someone looking at Hanguang-Jun wrong). He might have snapped at Hanguang-Jun when shit was going down but now Lan Xichen is in seclusion and Jiang Cheng can’t piss odd Lan Wangji no matter how much he wants to chuck a beehive at his head

But Wei Wuxian doesn’t it take it that way! He just sees his brother suddenly calling him Master Wei and won’t interact with him during meetings or before or after and he’s acting so cold towards Lan Zhan! He’s staring right through his brother in law and keeps acting like he doesn’t exist and the only time in the last month Jiang Cheng sought him out was!! To ask!! If he!! COULD HIRE WEI WUXIAN?!? NOT EVEN TO SAY HI OR CHECK ON HIM OR FINALLY ANSWER HIS LETTERS BUT TO ASK HIM TO CREATE TALISMANS FOR THEIR CLOTHES! (Of course he said yes though because hey money and it’s actually fun chatting with the seamstresses) but that’s all his shidi cares about?? What Wei Wuxian can do for him? He doesn’t care about Wei Wuxian at all! Why does Jiang Cheng keep hating him, he thought they were atleast neutral but he keeps going further and further away!!! Wei Wuxian is hurting and his little brother wants nothing to do with him!

Neither of them are IN the wrong but they’re both wrong.

It takes until someone, probably Lan Xichen or Nie Huiasang, points out that “Wei Wuxian… He’s not your shidi anymore, he’s your Sect Leader well a Sect Leader… he’s a Sect Leader to one of the biggest Sects, he’s busy it’s tax season. I wouldn’t want to interact with anyone either.”

Meanwhile Jin Ling or a random slightly more insane then the rest Jiang disciple interrupts Jiang Cheng’s lunch to go “Okay you’re making this worse on literally everyone, Wei Wuxian is clearly trying to make this work why are you being mean? He’s trying!” (Or much more polite for the disciple)

They have to meet up and actually talk things through and honestly *that* only works because Lan Xichen grabs them both by their metaphorical ears and sits them down because “I would like my brother in law, both of them, to stop crying to me because they can’t talk. So now we’re going to learn to communicate and if either of you makes this weird I WILL just start fluting my way out of it and you’ll feel bad.” (Actually he just sits them down together while and he and Jiang Cheng have to go over payments for the next batch of trades and Wei Wuxian passes out on Jiang Cheng halfway through and when he wakes up he swears to never bother him on a work day because that was the worst moment of his life and they end up repairing enough to start the trek to being brothers again

[the-untamed-obsession]

Hi! Sizhuyu shared me your blog and I loved the contents so if you can can you do the juniors but seperate stories if they inhaled aphrosadraic ( or whatever its called ) insense? But it’s a Husband AU :’) . Imagine them being all romantic haha!

I hope you like it!! I don’t do overly nsfw, only heated stuff + alluding to nsfw so I hope this suffices! It’s a husband AU thingie, so they’re all obvi aged up. But for future reference, all the characters I write for will be aged up regardless of the content.

Incense of Desire

“This is… what?” You asked the woman with black hair. She huffed and rolled her emerald eyes before looking at you.

“For the third time, it’s an incense that’ll make your husband swoon over you. All you need to do is light it thirty minutes before he gets home and it’ll work wonders!” You don’t even remember how you’d gotten here, but this seemed pretty interesting. There wasn’t anything particularly wrong with your relationship, but to see a side like that seemed exciting nonetheless. It wasn’t costly either. You finally made up your mind and looked at the woman.

“Ok, I’ll buy some.”

Lan Sizhui:

You waited rather impatiently for Sizhui to get home. It had been thirty minutes since you’d lit the incense and it smelled great. It reminded you of roses… but also winter. It didn’t take long for you to hear the door open.

“I’m home!” A voice called out. Your nerves spiked, but you ignored them and put a smile on your face, running to the living room.

“Welcome home!” You gave your husband a hug and a kiss, letting him place his sword down. Recently, he and a few of his friends had been hearing of demonic activity not too far from where you lived. He’d usually be gone at least all day, but always returned at night, even though night was the best time to hunt demons.

“Dinner’s ready! I hope you didn’t eat this time.” He smiled and shook his head.

“No, I remembered. I love your cooking so I didn’t want to miss out on it again.” He sniffed around for a second, which made you a little nervous.

“It smells good. Really good!” He walked past you and you sighed in relief. What were you going to tell him anyway?

He quickly changed out of his clothes and into some clean ones, but when he returned he stopped and stared at you as you got the food ready. You looked back at him and smiled.

“Ah! Just in time, food’s ready.” He didn’t move or speak though, just silently watching your figure move throughout the kitchen. You looked back once more and titled your head. “Everything ok?”

He blinked and nodded before moving. However, instead of moving towards the food, he stopped directly in front of you. Before you could say anything, he’d trapped you against the wall.

“I… I’m sorry… I can’t help myself.” His lips quickly captured yours and you both forgot the food rather immediately.

Lan Jinyi:

“I’m home!” About time! You’d been waiting for well over thirty minutes and you were worried the incense would’ve started affecting you. However, the lady at the shop insisted and promised that it would only affect our husband. How she was so sure, you didn’t know. But you didn’t question it too much… until you were waiting for your husband to come home.

How were you so sure it wasn’t poisoned? The incense could’ve easily killed you and your husband would’ve come home to your corpse. Wasn’t that a bit reckless of you?

“Hey, there you are.” You jumped when you saw your husband’s face inches away from your own. “You ok? Normally, you always greet me when I come home.” You pushed a smile onto your face and nodded.

“I’m ok! I promise! Um… maybe we should go out for a walk!” You suggested, nervously giggling as you stood up. If the incense was indeed poisoned, it would be best to get away now. You’d already inhaled quite a bit of it but you were fine, for now. You’d get checked by a doctor later.

“Why? It’s late, besides didn’t you have a long day? Shouldn’t we just rest?” He asked as he tugged your arm, causing you to fall into his lap.

“Yeah, but I feel like going for a walk! Come on! Pleaseeee!” You said, giving him your best puppy dog eyes. Unable to say no to you, Jingyi nodded.

“Alright, sure.” However, when you tried to stand up, you couldn’t. There was something in his eyes, something you didn’t see often. You settled back in feeling that happy-go-lucky atmosphere melting away as a more intimate one set in. Jingyi leaned in, pulling you closer too. Your lips melded together perfectly and any need to leave the house was immediately quelled.

Jin Ling:

You were excited to see a new side to Jin Ling. The woman had promised there would be no negative side effects to the incense, so you had that assurance. Jin Ling was rather… difficult when it came to romance. Sure, he let you know he loved you on many occasions, but he would always be really shy about it. Sometimes he’d roll his eyes when he told you he loved you.

None of these hurt your feelings, he’d never let that happen. But to see him SWOON over you… that was something that excited you. The incense had been burning for about thirty minutes now and you were just waiting for Jin Ling to get home.

You heard the door open and perked up, trying to hide the mischievous smile on your face. You ran out of your bedroom to greet your husband, giving him a welcoming smile.

“Welcome home!” You giggled, jumping in his arms and giving him a kiss on the cheek. He caught you rather easily and moved to the side, placing the sword on it’s holder.

“Thank you, how were you today?”

“Good! I really missed you!” You pouted, making him huff as he set you down gently.

“Yeah well… I am pretty amazing so it makes sense.” You giggled and shook your head as he walked into the house. He smelled the air, stopping for a second as he felt his head spin. It smelled pretty good, but he’d never expected the incense to give him a headache.

“Are you ok?”

“Yeah… yeah, I’m ok.” He responded as you quickly poured him a cup of water. He took slow and steady sips before looking up at you as you took the cup from him.

“Don’t tell me you overworked yourself today. I told you not to.” He shook his head as his eyes trailed down your form.

“No… you just look really beautiful today.” You paused, feeling your cheeks heat up a little.

“O-oh, thank you.” Before you could even suggest anything, he reached out and gently let his finger brush against your cheek.

“Soft too, did you know your cheeks are soft? Sometimes, I just want to hold them. But then when we make eye contact, it makes my heart beat so fast I get dizzy.” Ok this was definitely the incense working, because Jin Ling wouldn’t just say that out of nowhere.

“I- well thank you. That’s very sweet of you.” You smiled, making him smile as well.

“Oh, now they’re warm. Are you blushing? Because it looks good on you.”

“The blush?” He nodded, leaning in before gently kissing your lips. It was almost tantalizing. Without much of a warning, Jin Ling pushed you down onto the sofa.

“I’m sorry-” He captured your lips once more and you’d never been more grateful for that new incense you bought.

Ouyang Zizhen:

Now why did you buy this incense exactly? There wasn’t anything lacking in your relationship. You’d asked the woman even more questions after you bought it and it was obvious she got annoyed. She still answered all of your questions thoroughly, which is why you were sitting here right now.

The incense had been burning for almost 45 minutes now and you kept thinking about why you’d bought it. Zizhen never hid his emotions from you, he was always rather lovey-dovey. He complimented you whenever he could, told you he loved you, and just showed his emotions often in general.

While you were thinking about opening the windows to get the smell out, the door opened and you heard your husband’s voice come through.

“I’m home!” Well… too late now. You fixed your hair and stood up, going to greet him.

“Welcome home! I missed you!” He smiled brightly as he gave you a hug, placing a kiss on your lips.

“It smells really good in here. Did you buy new incense?” You nodded immediately.

“I did! I thought it might’ve been too much so I was thinking about opening the windows up!” Zizhen shook his head at your words.

“No! It smells great! Wow, you look different. Did you… no your hair is the same, you’re just glowing today.” You blushed at his words, shaking your head.

“That’s sweet of you.”

“I mean it! You look really good today and-” His excitable mood stopped abruptly and you looked up at him, tilting your head.

“Yes?” He was silently staring at your lips, making no effort to move at all. “Are you o-” He interrupted your words with a deep, intense kiss. You couldn’t complain as he easily picked you up, letting you wrap your legs around his waist.

“I… sorry… I just can’t stop.”

[lanwangjisnow]

Melting Ice

Lan Wangji x reader ( Part 5)

The night at Mo mansion Wei Wuxian saw Hanguang- Jun arrived just in the moment to defend his disciples. Wei Wuxian had to run away before getting caught, but Hanguang – Jun had already suspected it could be Wei Ying. He saw Lan Wangji was staring at the darkness as he was secretly watching him from far behind. Then there was a person approached Lan Wangji. "Senior Y/N" young disciples chanted. You were glad to see Lan Wangji and all disciples were safe.

"Y/N" Wei Wuxian whispered "you are still at Cloud Recesses. It's good to see you. Hope we can meet again" he smiled to himself.

"Hanguang-Jun" you called Lan Wangji. He turned around and walked away with you.

After Lan Wangi finally brought Wei Wuxian back to Gusu he did not forget to run behind you. When you were petting rabbits he hugged you from back, giving you a heart attack. "Y/N" he purred. "Wei Ying!" you panicked ( note that - you were the only other person who knew he was real Wei Wuxian and not Mo Xuanyu after Lan Wangji and Lan Xichen then) Wei Wuxian laughed but did not release you. "Are you not happy to see me after many years? No. I'm not letting you go"

"Wei Ying, I missed you so much but..." You sighed. It wasn't that you were not happy to see him but you did not want a new rumor to add up to the ongoing list. Then, there heard some noises and Wei Wuxain dropped his hug. Less than a couple of minutes Lan Sizhui and some young disciples came.

"We can't hug because of them? " Wei Wuxian pointed young disciples with a pouty face. You were so embarrassed when young disciples were confused and said, "I'm going to the library" because you wanted to run away from the situation but Wei Wuxian immediately wanted to follow you. "I'm coming too" he said and about to touch your hand but Lan Jingyi interfered.

"Are you crazy? "he yelled at Wei Wuxain" You shouldn't be so close to Senior Y/N"

Wei Wuxian smirked. "Ah! what made you think so?"

"because Hanguang- Jun..." Lan Jingyi stepped front and was about to bluster but Lan Sizhui dragged Lan Jingyi back. "Apologize for our behavior, Senior Mo". He bowed and you tried to melt the tension by saying "Sizhui, do not be late for lunch and take everyone with you", despite you were flushing after hearing about Lan Wangji.

"Senior Y/N, we will go now" Lan Sizhui bowed you and turned to Wei Wuxain "Senior Mo, we are more than happy to escort you"

Lan Jingyi rolled his eyes. He was not delighted to walk with Wei Wuxian anywhere. Wei Wuxian could not reject the kind invitation of Lan Sizhui. He looked at you and you nodded approving the suggestion. "Y/N, will you come too?"

"I'll be there soon" you smiled before leaving the group.

Wei Wuxian was half disappointed that you did not join them, but left with Lan Sizhui. However, you could not meet him at dining hall as Wei Wuxian was then ready go to Qinghe with Lan Wangji and you met them before the exit of the Cloud Recesses instead.

"Hanguang-Jun, I'm coming with you two"

Hanguang-Jun shook his head sightly "stay".

"No' you said sternly. Wei Wuxian giggled "feisty huh?" Actually he enjoyed how you rejected Hanguang-Jun's order. Lan Wangji did not say anything but for Wei Wuxian's surprise, Lan Wangji helped you to getting on the back of a pony, and took reins of both his horse and your pony as you were no good at riding on your own.

The journey did not end at Qinghe and it went further. Everywhere Lan Wangji was in constant anxiousness that you might get hurt and made you stay at comfortable inns until he dealt with dangerous places. (exactly, he was spoiling you).

One night when you were at Qiting Tavern, you were suddenly called by Wei Wuxian. When you ran to him there was drunken Lan Wangji besides him trying to stand steady. With an absent mind Lan Wangji looked at you and passing both you and Wei Wuxain made his way to bed. Wei Wuxian looked at you and you looked at him.

"Where's he been? "You asked worriedly.

“Lan Zhan! Lan Zhan! Lan Zhan! He is very stubborn" Wei Wuxian shook his head with hands on his hips. Next, he narrated you the story of from Lan Wangji trying to give him hens to where he called you. You giggled. You knew Lan Wangji could be a baby, sometimes when he was drunk.

After bidding goodnight to Wei Wuxian, you returned to your room, but before you could fall asleep, your eyes widened as Lan Wangji came to your bed staggering. He just plonked on small bed and started cuddling. "Y/N" he cooed and snuggled closer.

"Lan Zhan" you smiled as you found him had fallen asleep while hugging you.

At Yi City Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxain had met the juniors and together they came to Tanzhou at night. Out of all shops Lan Sizhui's eyes caught a toy store where there were paper butterflies. Even though Jin Ling insulted him for fancying toys, he could not resist buying a paper toy just like the one he got in his childhood.

You saw how dearly he was holding the butterfly and could not resist buying another for him. Lan Sizhui overjoyed and for a second he forgot Gasu rules, and threw arms around you. He has grown up taller than you but still hugging you as if he was a child. "Senior Y/N"

"Is Senior Y/N his mother? They don't look related? Anyway, Senior Y/N is spoiling him. May be that's why he is behaving like a kid after all" Jin Ling mocked.

"Yes, Senior Y/N is his mother and Hangunag-Jun is his father, and they do what they want. Do you have more questions?" Lan Jingyi retorted shutting Jin Ling's mouth.

You left the Sizhui with his friends and went to the inn where Lan Wangji told you to wait that day. On the other hand, it took a while for Lan Wangji to talk with Lan Xichen and to deal with bickering juniors at downstairs before reaching you. The juniors saw he was carrying liquor upstairs but there was something else in his other hand too. After he left Jin Jingyi suddenly realized what it was and dropped the pieced of the meat he was eating his for the second time.

"Wasn't that a jade rabbit?"

Lan Sizhui coughed.

When Lan Wangji walked in to the room, you and Wei Wuxain were having a chat. Wei Wuxain through this journey was thinking what kind of a relationship that you and Lan Wangji were having. The rumors were unavoidable, and he heard from random men that Hanguang-Jun and you were a couple, and you must have must have fed him with a love portion on him or he would never be fell for you. Then Wei Wuxian did not hesitated to reply with answers outwitting them and emphasizing how cute you were. Anyway, since he returned he felt that he was having serious feelings for you, even though he was been his usual flirty self earlier . Wei Wuxain wondered, if you felt the same sometimes or if you had mixed feelings and trying to replace his care with Lan Wangji's."Lan Zhan!" Wei Wuxian was glad to see Lan Wangji with liquor and grabbed it quickly from Lan Wangji before pouring it to his mouth. "I missed good times" he said while drinking.

"Y/N, did you have dinner?" Lan Wangji asked.

"No, we were waiting for you"

" Okay, then let's all have dinner" Wei Wuxain cheered up and grabbed Lan Wangji's arm by one hand and yours by the other, dragging you both downstairs. When you all sat, Lan Wangji was next to you and Wei Wuxian was the opposite. The juniors were still having dinner while food was serving for you.

"Y/N, shall we have a walk afterwards?" Wei Wuxain asked after some time. You immediately looked at Lan Wangji. He was listening but poured tea to your cup instead of saying something.

"Ah! Lan Zhan, can come with us too" you said trying to not make Lan Wangji provoke.

"Nah! Hanguang-Jun and I walked so many miles together how about us alone? We have many things to catch up" Wei Wuxian pouted.

Suddenly, you felt someone's arm was touching yours and you had not realized that Lan Wangji was moving closer until his arm was glued to yours. The whole hall was silent watching the scene.

"Senior Mo, isn't it late now?" you mumbled.

"Are you shy for me? Cute" Wei Wuxian laughed warmly.

From behind you felt, Lan Wangj's chest and the juniors gasped as it was new to them to see clinginess of Hanguang-Jun as he had never done that in public. In spite of all, Wei Wuxain was still messing with Lan Wangji.

"It's up to you to decide. I wish you meet me in the garden" He said blowing you a kiss. Lan Wangji thumped the table with his tea cup and stood up. Fuming, he climbed upstairs.

Wei Wuxian smirked. "Y/N, maybe I'm helping you if you are into Hanguang-Jun or may be helping you to decide" He was not even slightly affected by Lan Wangji's reaction while everyone else were terrified and muttered to you.

You did not care what it meant as you were busy chasing Lan Wangji. " Lan Zhan! " You caught Lan Wangji's hand and he shook it off instantly while walking straight to his room. " Lan Zhan! Please don't go" You begged but he was not even looking at you. " Lan Zhan" you hugged Lan Wangji.

"Why are you mad with me?"

“You like him flirting with you?" he said trying to pull you off from him. "No" you cried holding his waist tight burring your face in his robes" No, I LOVE YOU . Hanguang- Jun, Lan Zhan, Lan Wangji... I only need you" you cried.

Lan Wangji pulled you off and lifted you up with in blink and connected his lip with you. He kissed you hungrily even though, Lan Wangji always used to kiss you tenderly until now. You tied your legs around his waist and hands around Lan Wangji's neck. It took only a second for him to close the door and pin you against the wall before peppering kisses on your neck.

You pulled off Lan Wangji's forehead ribbion and accidently knocked off a jug next to you while doing that. Right at the moment Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen were walking to your room passing by Lan Wangji's room as Lan Sizhui was concerned about you after what happened in at dinner.

They heard the noise of the glass and looked at each other. "Is there some trouble?" they thought rushing towards the door but before they enter Wei Wuxian ran into them. "I'll go first. Everyone stay behind" but he did not go in either as he lightly heard your moans, when he was too close to the door. He smirked besides the little disappointment in his heart. It was no longer unclear for Wei Wuxian who you loved the most.

"Let's go Hanguang-Jun is fine. Also don't go to Senior Y/N's room to disturb." He said to impatient juniors.

"but Senior Mo..." Lan Sizhui was still worried.

"Ah not now. Ask Hanguang-Jun about it in the morning perhaps. Tssk didn't I save you all from being poisoned? Listen to me then" Wei Wuxian winked.

Finally, "go go " Wei Wuxian had to chase them away on his own when the young disciples were yet staring at him.

[ibijau]

40. Pride parade. Wangxian go, Jiang Cheng (and juniors?) go to be supportive, and may or may not enjoy themselves. --HLS (resend to sign it)

Oops, this ended up being pretty much 0% about wangxian, and 100% about Jiang Cheng and his litter of adopted nephews!

Jiang Cheng leans against the kitchen counter, arms crossed on his chest.

“I just don’t get why I have to go. Wei Wuxian and his giant ice cube are already going, can’t they keep an eye on the kids?”

Jiang Yanli gives him A Look from over the snacks she’s preparing, and Jiang Cheng can’t help a small grimace.

“Ok. Point taken. But that was ten years ago, I’m sure he’d be more careful these days.”

“Would he, now?” Jiang Yanli retorts as she starts putting the snacks into individual little fabric bags, alongside small water bottles. “He’s going to his first Pride since coming out, with his brand new boyfriend who he’s been in love with for over ten years… an even that is loud and bright, might I add, and you think he’ll stay focused enough to keep an eye on the kids?”

Jiang Cheng grunts, refusing to acknowledge defeat, and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Why do the kids have to go anyway? I’ve seen Pride on tv, it’s hardly child friendly. There’s all those…”

He starts miming for breasts, then remembers who he’s talking to and quickly drops his hands. Jiang Yanli, damn her, bursts out laughing at his embarrassment.

“Jin Ling is fourteen, if he can’t see breasts without thinking they’re sexual, I’ve done a poor job of raising him.” She looks at the table, and nods with satisfaction at the little care bags she’s prepared before turning her entire attention to Jiang Cheng. “Listen, they want to support A-Xian, and I think that’s wonderful of them. I also think they’re all at a questioning age, and it’s good for them to see there’s a whole community out there, should they need it.”

Jiang Cheng sighs, but nods. Jin Ling is… Well, Wei Wuxian is probably not the only bisexual in the family, that’s for sure. And then, there’s Jin Ling friend from school, the one who now asks to be called Zizhen but only where her (his? their?) parents can’t hear it.

That whole little group is frequently crashing at Jiang Cheng’s place, because he is, apparently, the cool uncle. What that mostly means is that he’s got a big tv, several consoles, and too much soda in his fridge, which Jin Ling and his friends love. But he’s also the first adult who was brought into the Zizhen situation, and while he doesn’t get that stuff, he knows Zizhen always had that small smile when someone says that name instead of the old one, and Jiang Cheng has come to hold the odd belief that kids should, in fact, be happy.

“It’s just for a few hours,” Jiang Yanli says, handing him one of her little care bags. “And who knows, maybe you’ll have fun?”

-

For the hundredth time this afternoon, Jiang Cheng does a headcount. Jin Ling, Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi, Ouyang Zizhen… 

They’ve lost Wei Wuxian and his iceberg boyfriend a little while ago, but that’s not Jiang Cheng’s problem. Those two are grown adults, and Jiang Cheng is sure they can take care of themselves. Knowing them, they’re either making out somewhere or fighting with some homophobic assholes trying to ruin everyone’s good time.

Quite possibly they’re making out in front of homophobes, because Wei Wuxian does love to multitask like that.

But that’s not Jiang Cheng’s problem. Jiang Cheng’s problem is to keep an eye on four excited teenagers who look like they want to run off in different directions, and keep chatting with strangers just so they can get a collection of flyers about different identities, like they’re window shopping for a label.

“Can’t you kids stay put for five seconds?” Jiang Cheng growls, grabbing Jin Ling by the collar when he starts darting to the side.

“But that’s the people from Aven!” Jin Ling retorts, pointing at some weirdos in purple, grey and black. “Sizhui, didn’t you say someone from your club mentioned Ace people a while back?”

Lan Sizhui suddenly gets that very intense look on his face and nods firmly while staring at that group in purple. That actually surprises Jiang Cheng. Lan Sizhui is a good two years older than the other kids, though he’s still in the same class as the rest because of health problems when he was little. He’s a quiet kid, who doesn’t make any waves, and in spite of being Lan Wangji’s son, Jiang Cheng likes him and thinks he’s very reasonable. He wouldn’t have expected Lan Sizhui to be shopping like the others for an identity, but if he is…

“Then we’re all going to go there,” Jiang Cheng barks. “As a group, like you guys promised. Nobody runs off on his own!”

Everyone nods, trying to look guilty but ultimately too excited to mind the scolding. Ouyang Zizhen has a particularly wide grin on his face. But then, he’s been like that since someone gave him a little blue, pink and white sticker with a ‘male’ symbol on it which he stuck on his chest. He looks so proud of himself, and Jiang Cheng kind of sees the point of this whole parade now.

So they all head toward the purple people, and Lan Sizhui gets to ask a few questions while Jiang Cheng browses the flyers for this newest of identities he’d never heard about before.

It says “An asexual person does not experience sexual attraction – they are not drawn to people sexually and do not desire to act upon attraction to others in a sexual way. Unlike celibacy, which is a choice to abstain from sexual activity, asexuality is an intrinsic part of who we are, just like other sexual orientations.” and Jiang Cheng forgets how to breathe for a second because that’s…

He didn’t expect there was a word for that.

He’s always figured he’s just picky, or that he’s weird. He’s dated a few people here and there, women mostly but a few men as well, just to see if that was what didn’t feel right, only to always break off when his partners started asking for more. He’d tried that whole sex thing even, only to find that even if it was nice, he’d rather have been cuddling in front of a movie, or playing a video game. He’d thought there was a problem with him, but…

But there’s a word for that.

There’s a word for it and maybe Jiang Cheng isn’t a weirdo after all, no more than Wei Wuxian who used to feel so guilty about looking at other men as well as women, no more than Lan Wangji who only likes men (though Lan Wangji is definitely a weirdo for other reasons).

There’s a word for how Jiang Cheng is, and there are other people like him, and…

“Jiujiu, are you ok?” Jin Ling suddenly asks.

Jiang Cheng startles, the little purple flyer crumbled in his hand, and finds four pairs of eyes staring at him with open concern.

Good kids, all of them, and Jiang Cheng feels so light all of a sudden that he nearly tries to hug them all.

“I’m fine,” he says instead, before waving the flyers he’s holding. “That stuff, that’s… is there anywhere I could read more about that?” he asks the volunteer handing out the papers.

The young man smiles.

“We’ve got a website for information,” he explains, pointing to the back of the flyer. “And it has a forum attached if you want to ask questions or chat with people. Are these your kids?”

“He’s the communal Jiujiu,” Ouyang Zizhen announces proudly. “Jin Ling shares him with all of us.”

They all laugh at that, even Jiang Cheng, though Jin Ling complains he never agreed to this.

They stay a little longer with those Asexuality people, because Lan Sizhui has a few more questions, then eventually move on because there’s more identity window shopping to be done.

For the rest of the day, Jiang Cheng keeps touching that flyer which he shoved in his pocket.

There’s a word for it, and he’s not alone.

[bloody-bee-tea]

JC Love Month 2020 Day 12

Ego and Inflexibility

Day 12 of JC Love Month brings some more Lan Qiren feelings, who is most definitely fed up with JFM's shitty parenting and he is so over it that he forgets all of his manners. It's exactly what Jiang Cheng deserves.

Jiang Cheng isn’t sure what they are waiting for—in front of Lan Qiren’s personal quarters no less—but Jin Ling is inside and so Jiang Cheng waits, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji right by his side.

“Do you know what this is about?” Wei Wuxian asks him suddenly, clearly fed up with waiting already. “A-Yuan is inside, too, but he wouldn’t say what’s going on.”

“Same with Jin Ling,” Jiang Cheng says with a sigh and pinches the bridge of his nose.

He would accuse the juniors of shenanigans, but Lan Qiren is involved, so clearly it cannot be that bad. He would have told them to stop otherwise, Jiang Cheng is sure of that.

Lan Wangji doesn’t actually contribute anything to the conversation but Jiang Cheng gets the distinct impression that he’s not liking this, either, but then the door opens and the juniors and Lan Qiren step out.

“What is going on here?” Jiang Cheng asks and keeps his gaze on Jin Ling, because he’s bound to break first under his glare.

“I told them not to do it,” is the first thing Jin Ling says, and he does seem strangely guilty, but then Lan Sizhui speaks up and Jiang Cheng turns his attention to him.

“So, here’s the thing,” Lan Sizhui starts, clearly nervous and when he can’t seem to find his words, it’s Lan Jingyi who speaks up.

“We brought back your dad for you,” he says and when Ouyang Zizhen elbows him in the side he let’s out a pained noise.

“We brought Jiang Fengmian back for you,” Ouyang Zizhen clarifies and Jiang Cheng’s mood plummets faster than it has in years.

“Why the hell would you do that?” he demands to know and Lan Jingyi waves his hands at him.

“We didn’t actually bring him back,” he tries to reassure them. “We just called his spirit here and gave it a more solid form, so you can talk to him for the day. Uncle Qiren made sure we did all of it correctly.”

“Uncle,” Lan Wangji chastises him, way too mildly if anyone were to ask Jiang Cheng, but Lan Qiren only strokes his beard.

“There’s some catharsis to be found in this, I am certain,” he says and Jiang Cheng takes a deep breath.

He doubts catharsis is the thing they will find here, but it seems like no one cares about his opinion.

“Uncle Fengmian is back?” Wei Wuxian says and he sounds doubtful, but Jiang Cheng knows him well enough to hear the hope in his voice.

“For the day,” Lan Sizhui says. “You always talk so fondly of him, and we thought it would be good for you to talk to him again. And Sect Leader Jiang, he’s your father, we thought you’d like to speak to him, too.”

“I told them they were being stupid,” Jin Ling grumbles and Jiang Cheng has to bite back a small smile.

“We already caught him up on all major events, so you can jump straight in,” Lan Jingyi says excitedly and now Jiang Cheng is glad that Lan Qiren was there all along, because at least like this Jiang Fengmian got the right version of events.

“Fine, let’s do this, it’s not like we’re getting out of this,” Jiang Cheng says with a sigh and starts to walk up to the room, when Wei Wuxian stops him.

“Are you sure you’re alright with this?” he lowly asks, and even though they are still mending their relationship, it’s nice to see that they still understand each other like this.

“No,” Jiang Cheng answers honestly but with a shrug. “But there’s nothing to be done about it now, is there? I’m not actually so unfilial as to leave a ghost hanging,” he says and it startles a laugh out of Wei Wuxian just like he hoped.

“Alright, let’s go,” Wei Wuxian suddenly cheerfully says, and leads the way into the room.

Jiang Cheng is surprised to notice how much he forgot about his father in the past twenty years and it’s like a punch to the gut to see him again, unchanged and untouched by time.

Well, being dead will do that to you, Jiang Cheng guesses.

“Uncle Fengmian,” Wei Wuxian yells once inside the room and Jiang Fengmian looks Wei Wuxian up and down with a smile.

“You really do have a new body,” he says, as if Lan Qiren would lie to him about that. “But you’re still unmistakably my A-Ying,” he then adds and Jiang Cheng chooses that moment to step into his sight as well.

“Jiang Cheng,” his father says, looking him up and down much more critical than he had Wei Wuxian. “The spitting image of your mother I see.”

“Thankfully,” Jiang Cheng bites out and sits down, ready to get this over with as soon as possible.

There’s a very small part of him that hopes that he interpreted his father’s actions and words in his childhood wrong, but with how this started, Jiang Cheng knows it’s a foolish hope.

His father is exactly like he remembered him.

“Why are you not wearing purple, A-Ying?” Jiang Fengmian asks Wei Wuxian who throws a love sick look at Lan Wangji.

“Because I’m no longer a disciple of Yunmeng Jiang,” he answers, and while it still stings, they are making their way back to that.

Wei Wuxian forgot Chengqing in his old room last time he visited Lotus Pier and Jiang Cheng dares to hope that it means something.

“And why is that?” Jiang Fengmian asks, sending a sharp look at Jiang Cheng.

“Because I married Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian cheerfully says—too cheerfully, if you ask Jiang Cheng—and he throws himself at his husband who catches him easily.

“I see,” Jiang Fengmian says with a small smile. “What a wonderful match.”

“It is,” Wei Wuxian agrees and then Jiang Fengmian turns to Jiang Cheng.

“Are you married?” he asks and Jiang Cheng shakes his head, expecting the sour look on his father’s face.

“I never quite found the time for it,” Jiang Cheng easily says because he long stopped being bothered by that fact.

“Ah, yes, I heard about what happened,” Jiang Fengmian gives back and turns his attention back to Wei Wuxian.

“You invented a new cultivation style. I am very proud of you,” he says and Jiang Cheng can’t help the snort he lets out at that.

“Do you have something to say to that, Jiang Cheng?” Jiang Fengmian demands to know and Jiang Cheng clicks his tongue.

“His new cultivation style killed over three thousand people before it eventually claimed his own life. I’m not sure that’s something to be proud of,” Jiang Cheng says, with an apologetic look to Wei Wuxian, who nods along.

“Yeah, it cost too much. It’s not actually something good, you know,” Wei Wuxian agrees but Jiang Fengmian shakes his head.

“But you did it because you gave your core to Jiang Cheng and didn’t have another choice, right? I’d say that’s a sign of true strength.”

“Wow,” Jin Ling mutters behind Jiang Cheng and Jiang Cheng is inclined to agree with him.

“And you lost your core in a reckless move, did you not?” Jiang Fengmian asks Jiang Cheng next and by now everyone in the room seems uncomfortable, even Lan Wangji.

Jiang Cheng has to give it to his father, he has quite the talent.

“Clearly,” Jiang Cheng bitterly says, but he does feel vindicated when he realizes that his father is just as bad as he was in his memory.

“What did you do while A-Ying learned to master his new life and got a family on top of that?” Jiang Fengmian asks and by now everyone in the room is holding their breath.

“You mean what did I do while Wei Wuxian was dead?” Jiang Cheng corrects him and then goes on without actually letting Jiang Fengmian speak. “I was building Lotus Pier back up, that was completely destroyed in the attack,” Jiang Cheng says, and he says it with pride, too, because he managed to do what people thought was impossible. “I raised my nephew and brought my Sect to greatness again.”

“By taking in everyone you could find,” Jiang Fengmian spits out. “Being a Jiang disciple used to mean something, once upon a time. And now look at who you are taking in. I hear your right hand used to be a servant.”

“As your right hand used to be, if I remember correctly,” Jiang Cheng sharply says and Jiang Fengmian’s eyes apologetically dart to Wei Wuxian, who is clenching his hands on his thighs.

“Listen, father, I don’t know what you remember, but when you and mother died, so did the majority of our people. Thousands of disciples were killed that day. They didn’t even spare the kids, did you know that? There wasn’t all that much left, after the Wens were done.”

“Still, you should have kept some priorities.”

“My priority was to rebuild my home,” Jiang Cheng shoots back but he knows that it’s futile.

It doesn’t matter what he says to his father, it won’t make a difference, because he is not Wei Wuxian.

“And yet you couldn’t even protect your family,” Jiang Fengmian bites out. “Yanli died, and for what?”

“For protecting Wei Wuxian, so really, shouldn’t you be proud of her?” Jiang Cheng says and Wei Wuxian makes a wounded sound next to him.

“It was my fault,” Wei Wuxian lowly admits. “I lost control and everyone wanted to kill me, and shijie only died because she tried to protect me.”

“Like family should,” Jiang Fengmian says and Jiang Cheng had enough of this.

“I think we’re done here,” Jiang Cheng says and it’s clear that Jiang Fengmian wants to say more to him, but it’s surprisingly enough not his voice that rings out.

“Sit back down,” Lan Qiren orders him and Jiang Cheng is surprised enough to simply do it.

“Wei Wuxian, do you have something to say?” Lan Qiren asks Wei Wuxian, voice softer than Jiang Cheng remembers ever hearing it, and Wei Wuxian nods so vigorously that his hair flies.

“You are a shitty father,” Wei Wuxian says then and Jiang Cheng sits down more firmly, because that he has to hear.

“Wei Ying!” Jiang Fengmian admonishes him but Wei Wuxian clearly doesn’t care.

“No, you are! Jiang Cheng survived a war! You died in the first wave of attacks and he survived all of them and he led a destroyed Sect to boot. He was thrust into the position as Sect Leader so young, but he did it, and he did it more than well. And he didn’t survive just one war, he survived my armies of undead as well.”

“You would have never hurt him,” Jiang Fengmian defends Wei Wuxian, even now, and Jiang Cheng huffs out a bitter breath.

“I would have,” Wei Wuxian argues and makes a grimace at Jiang Cheng, clearly apologizing for that. “I lost control, much earlier than people think, and there was nothing I wouldn’t have done. And I died for my sins.”

“But you did the impossible and came back,” Jiang Fengmian says and Wei Wuxian glares at him.

“I am back because poor Mo Xuanyu was harassed so much that he thought suicide would be better than living on. I was summoned back as a vicious spirit. There is nothing admirable about that,” Wei Wuxian vehemently says but Jiang Fengmian doesn’t seem like he is very much interested in how  Wei Wuxian is not the amazing guy he still seems to believe he is.

“Still,” Jiang Fengmian says and looks back at Jiang Cheng. “You don’t seem any closer to understanding the Sect motto than you were when I was still alive,” he says, and Wei Wuxian’s eyes flash red.

Jiang Cheng doesn’t actually want him to attack his father, even though it would be quite the sight to behold, but before he can do anything to stop Wei Wuxian, Lan Qiren speaks up.

“You egotistical, inflexible piece of shit,” Lan Qiren says, and it takes Jiang Cheng a moment to realize that those words really came out of Lan Qiren’s mouth.

But when everyone is staring at him, their mouths mostly open because no one heard Lan Qiren talk like that before, Jiang Cheng comes to the conclusion that it must have been really him.

“Qiren,” Jiang Fengmian starts, but Lan Qiren seems absolutely ready to tear Jiang Fengmian a new one.

“Do not speak to me like that,” Lan Qiren says. “You are a disgrace to your Sect. You never even attempted the impossible, because you were too mellow to ever take a challenge at all. And you can’t even recognize great men, because your son is sitting there after he achieved the impossible time and time again and you have nothing but contempt for him.”

“You shouldn’t speak on family matters,” Jiang Fengmian tries but clearly Lan Qiren is not done.

“I have more right to speak on family matters, than you do,” Lan Qiren says. “Especially when it comes to your son, who you so clearly think the worst of. You hold your son in so little regard that you really believe him to be so stupid as to lose his core in a reckless move? Seriously, out of the two, you’d think Wei Wuxian would be the one to do that, and yet you can’t even be bothered to question it.”

“What?” Wei Wuxian asks and Jiang Cheng desperately wonders why he never learned the silencing spell the Lans love so much.

It would come in really handy right now.

“Wait, what?” Wei Wuxian says again and looks back and forth between Lan Qiren and Jiang Cheng. “Say that again.”

“I think that’s enough,” Jiang Cheng says, but now Jin Ling chimes in for the first time.

“No, I think Teacher Qiren should speak,” he says, clearly remembering that moment after the whole temple mess. “I think this needs to be said.”

“And I think I’m going to break your legs,” Jiang Cheng hisses, but Jin Ling only smiles at him.

“Jiang Wanyin!” Jiang Fengmian yells. “How dare you speak like that to your sister’s son.”

Jiang Cheng has a few choice words for that, but before he can articulate them, Jin Ling gives him his best glare.

“He’s my jiu-jiu and he can speak to me however he wants,” Jin Ling tells him with more bite than Jiang Cheng expected and it’s almost enough to derail the previous conversation.

But only almost, because Wei Wuxian is worse than a dog with a bone.

“Wait, let’s go back, what was that about Jiang Cheng losing his core?”

“It was nothing,” Jiang Cheng says, mostly because he doesn’t want to do this in front of his father.

If the truth comes out—and it seems more than unlikely that he can keep it a secret for much longer—then he doesn’t want to hear what his father has to say to that.

It will probably be the only time he will praise Jiang Cheng, because he did it to protect Wei Wuxian, and Jiang Cheng couldn’t give less of a fuck about that.

“I think it’s time for you to go back now,” Jiang Cheng says with a meaningful look to Lan Qiren, who thankfully seems to understand enough to undo the summoning circle without a second thought and Jiang Fengmian vanishes before he can say another word.

“If you think that gets you out of telling the truth, you’re mistaken,” Wei Wuxian says to Jiang Cheng, who only shrugs, because he knows when he’s being beat.

“Fine, whatever,” he says and motions for Lan Qiren to speak.

“You’re not so stupid to try and get your parent’s bodies back, no matter how much you’re grieving. So there must have been another reason you got captured,” Lan Qiren says, and Jiang Cheng didn’t know he thought so highly of him.

“Maybe I am just that stupid,” Jiang Cheng tries, but Lan Qiren sends him such a sharp glare that Jiang Cheng flinches.

“Tell the truth, Jiang Cheng. What did you do?” Wei Wuxian whispers, though Jiang Cheng can already see understanding dawn on him.

“You were buying medicine for A-jie,” Jiang Cheng says after a long moment, and he looks down at his hands, because it feels safer than looking at Wei Wuxian. “Wen soldiers were coming up behind you, and they wouldn’t have passed by.”

“And then they got distracted,” Wei Wuxian mumbles, “by you. Why would you do that?” he wants to know and at that Jiang Cheng lifts his gaze.

“I just lost my entire family, my home. Do you really think I could have survived losing someone else?” he wants to know and it stuns Wei Wuxian into silence.

“You distracted them to safe my life,” Wei Wuxian says and Jiang Cheng clicks his tongue.

“They would have killed you on the spot or tortured you. Wen Chao hated you enough for both, so I had to do something.”

“And then you got tortured,” Wei Wuxian cries, and Jiang Cheng is acutely aware of all eyes on him.

“Not in front of the kids,” Jiang Cheng hisses out, but before he’s even done, Wei Wuxian has thrown himself at Jiang Cheng.

“I love you, too,” he sobs out and Jiang Cheng’s eyes are burning enough that it’s safer to just hide his face in Wei Wuxian’s neck.

“Yeah, yeah,” he awkwardly says around the lump in his throat. “I love you, too.”

There’s a long moment of silence, before Lan Qiren clears his throat.

“Now that this unpleasant situation is over, everyone is free to leave.”

Wei Wuxian only reluctantly parts from Jiang Cheng, but when Jiang Cheng smiles slightly at him, he seems to understand that there will be time later.

“Lan Qiren, I didn’t know you held my shidi in such high regard,” Wei Wuxian says, clearly not done with the unpleasant situation and Jiang Cheng wants to strangle him.

“Sect Leader Jiang is one of the bravest, most capable cultivators and Sect Leaders I ever had the honour to teach and I will not stand for any slander against him,” Lan Qiren says, very deliberately not looking at Jiang Cheng, who is glad about that.

Because his eyes are burning like crazy again and he doesn’t actually want Lan Qiren to see him cry.

“He took his Sect and his Sect’s motto to heights that were never before reached and he should be held in the highest regard by everyone,” Lan Qiren mercilessly goes on, and Jiang Cheng only doesn’t burst into tears, because Jin Ling presses into his side.

“He’s right,” Jin Ling says and all the juniors agree.

“Absolutely,” Wei Wuxian predictably says, but when even Lan Wangji makes an affirmative noise, it all becomes too much for Jiang Cheng.

“Alright, stop that, enough,” he snaps out, his voice only barely shaking and everyone laughs at him.

Even Lan Qiren’s face softens.

“It’s only the truth,” Lan Qiren says and Jiang Cheng gives in to the fact that his dignity is a lost cause today.

He does burst into tears, but it’s not at all bad, because Wei Wuxian is the first one to hug him and he’s crying, too.

Jiang Cheng thinks it’s only fair that they both lose face like this in front of the kids and their teacher.

Link to my ko-fi on the sidebar!

[robininthelabyrinth]

Thank you "Worthwhile Trade". The idea of Baxia turning into an guai is so interesting. I liked imagining the part where she hit NMJ for his idiocy. My brain is projecting "married couple" vibes, omg. I admit despite how weird WWX spoke about the events, the time travel part flew over my head until the tags spelled it out for me. (TBC)

(Cont'd) Also... did NMJ mean it in THAT dual-thing way when talking WRH's prefs? And the last part, where WWX used resentful energy to sub NMJ's qi. I assume he can still cultivate since his core's still there, if emptied? But I wonder what'll happen to his energy once restored Can't help but think his renewed qi will inevitably be affected by the traces of the previous energy that once circulated. He's not going to become a walking stygian tiger or something, is he? Off the wall guess, sorry!

----

sequel to Worthwhile Trade (ao3), also on tumblr

Wei Wuxian didn’t understand Nie Mingjue.

He didn’t understand the way he thought, the way he acted – the way he smiled when he woke up, the way he opened his arms when Nie Huaisang threw himself into them with a wail and said, “It was worth it for you, didi; it always is if it’s for you. Don’t you know that?” the way Wei Wuxian had always shamefully thought of saying, as if something like that could just be said like that, out in the open.

The way Nie Mingjue shrugged when the doctors said his cultivation would likely never recover, that he should have died, that they didn’t understand why he hadn’t; the way he said, seeming even satisfied, that it was a worthwhile trade.

It’s not a trade, Wei Wuxian wanted to scream at him. It’s a sacrifice! It hurts and you’re sad, no, worse, you’re resentful about it and you shouldn’t be because it was your choice, your decision, but you see someone else with everything that you worked so hard for and you’re angry when you shouldn’t be angry and you feel bad and you turn away; it hurts them when you do and you’re glad, you miserable thing, you’re happy that they’re hurt because why should you be the only one whose hurt –

Perhaps the problem wasn’t that he didn’t understand Nie Mingjue.

Perhaps it was only that he saw in Nie Mingjue his own faults, his own deficiencies, the ones he’d tried so hard to hide in the sea of his poor memory.

“You’ll die if you don’t find a way to cultivate,” he said instead, hovering by the door. He’d say that he didn’t mean to ruin the mood, but he kind of did, and Baxia���s eyes on him were cold as if she knew.

As if she knew everything.

How he’d gone back to the past, how he’d changed things, how it was his fault that Nie Mingjue – who’d never done a single thing to hurt him, who’d been upright and righteous and good and whose brother loved him enough to –

Wei Wuxian had made a point of avoiding Baxia.

Not that she was that easy to avoid. She was tall for a woman – not as tall as Nie Mingjue, but proportionate to him in the sense that she was as much taller than the average woman as he was taller than the average man – and she walked as though people should flee before her, a tread that only felt heavy because of the almost visceral rage that surrounded her like a cloud.

Nie Huaisang had found robes for her, somehow, and they were the least feminine robes Wei Wuxian had ever seen a woman wear, though he supposed he still hadn’t seen that given that Baxia wasn’t exactly a woman.  Cut in a martial style, a dark shimmering grey that seemed in some lights to be almost red – she had been born as a human in a mantle of blood and she would not let anyone forget it.

“I should have died already,” Nie Mingjue said, as if the world’s scariest guai didn’t have her hand on his shoulder right next to his vulnerable neck. “You came up with a solution, Wei-gongzi, and for that I thank you. Even if we are not able to solve the next stage, being able to see my loved ones is worthwhile.”

Wei Wuxian could learn to hate that word.

“I have a solution, of a sort,” he said, irritated and not entirely because his reveal had been preempted. He’d hoped to sort of ease into it, somehow. “You lack the capacity for regular cultivation, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use demonic cultivation.”

“What? No, we can’t do that,” Nie Huaisang said, biting his fingers anxiously. “Anyway, doesn’t demonic cultivation harm the temperament?”

“You mean my temperament can get worse?” Nie Mingjue teased, and Nie Huaisang smacked him so lightly that it didn’t even displace his clothing. “I don’t know any means of demonic cultivation, Wei-gongzi –”

“Call me Wei Wuxian,” Wei Wuxian said. “Please.”

“Wei Wuxian, then,” Nie Mingjue said. “All the methods I’ve ever heard of were forbidden for very good reasons – but perhaps those conditions are not the same in the method you know.”

Wei Wuxian tensed. “How do you know that I know one?”

“You saved me, didn’t you?” Nie Mingjue said practically, and well, yes, Wei Wuxian supposed he had a point – “And anyway, Baxia can tell.”

Wei Wuxian shivered. “I don’t use it,” he argued. “How can she tell?”

At Nie Huaisang’s instigation, Baxia had recently started experimenting with smiles. She put one on her face now.

It was terrifying.

“Tell me about it,” Nie Mingjue requested. “The powers and the price, all of it.”

“You’re actually considering this?” Nie Huaisang exclaimed. “But da-ge…!”

“Wei Wuxian was not wrong when he said that I would die if I didn’t find a way to cultivate despite having given up what I have,” Nie Mingjue said. “If I die, what will you do?”

Oh, not much, just become a mastermind capable of puppeting the entire cultivation world to enact revenge for your death. Nothing big.

“But – da-ge has always put such a priority on remaining on the righteous path…”

“That’s why I asked about the costs,” Nie Mingjue said patiently. “I will not abandon righteousness simply because I adopt a new method of cultivating.”

“Everyone will revile you even if you are righteous,” Wei Wuxian warned him.

Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Who is everyone? What do I care for them? You do the right thing because it is right, not for the sake of fame.”

Wei Wuxian had once thought the same.

“If everyone in the cultivation world thinks you are evil, they will paint you as evil no matter what you do,” he insisted. “No matter how righteous your motives –”

“Let them think he’s evil, then!” Nie Huaisang exclaimed. “He could be the most black-hearted cultivator in the land, but he’s still my da-ge; my Nie sect and I will protect him!”

“Huaisang! No! That is not how righteousness works – if I ever truly become evil, you are to cut me off at once, kill me if necessary –”

“No way!”

“Huaisang – Baxia, tell him; evil cannot be endured –”

Baxia was looking at her fingernails. She’d picked that gesture up from Sect Leader Ouyang, when he was trying to be pointed about ignoring someone; it was extremely irritating to absolutely everyone who wanted to know who she was and what she was doing here and Nie Huaisang and Wei Wuxian had teamed up to convince her to keep doing it.

Possibly a mistake, in retrospect.

“Baxia. I know you agree with me on this. Evil is evil, and must be eradicated no matter who it may be.”

She gave him an unimpressed look.

“I know I’m not evil yet,” Nie Mingjue argued, apparently understanding her without any difficulty whatsoever. He’d just woken up from a month-long coma and he could already speak fluent human-saber, it was really unfair. And this man had succumbed to Jin Guangyao’s wiles? Lan Xichen had more to answer for than he knew. “But if I ever become evil – what? No, we will not burn that bridge when we come to it, that’s not even the right idiom, who is teaching you these things –”

Nie Huaisang coughed and hid his face behind a fan.

Wei Wuxian was not going to laugh.

Nie Mingjue growled at them all and turned back to Wei Wuxian. “Explain,” he demanded. “The rest of you, out.”

“But –”

“Out. One of us has to cultivate the righteous path, and if it can’t be me, it has to be you. Baxia?”

She picked Nie Huaisang up by his collar, for all the world like a mother dog picking up her pup by the scruff of its neck, and walked out.

Nie Mingjue picked up demonic cultivation faster than anyone else Wei Wuxian had ever met or even heard of. He wasn’t sure if that demonstrated an unnerving aptitude or if it was simply that Nie Mingjue was surpassingly talented – Wei Wuxian had never met anyone like himself before, someone for whom all things came easy, and it was an unexpected delight to meet a kindred soul somewhere where he’d long ago given up hope. He’d never planned to unveil demonic cultivation in this life unless he truly needed it – he didn’t want to hurt his Lan Zhan the way he had in his first life, and anyway Jiang Cheng and Uncle Jiang and Madame Yu were all alive, with hundreds of Jiang sect members to boot, there was no need for his sacrifice – but the part of him that was more researcher and inventor than cultivator luxuriated in their discussions.

Nie Mingjue was a lot more concerned than Wei Wuxian had ever been with consequences, and how to mitigate them, but he supposed that made sense: losing his cultivation hadn’t impacted that Nie temper one bit, and demonic cultivation was likely to make things worse. Moreover, Nie Mingjue was simply who he was, stiff and unbending, as much steel in his spine as in Baxia’s; he could almost be described as being rigid in his thinking except for the fact that he was in fact seriously considering becoming a demonic cultivator.

“We’re saber cultivators,” Nie Mingjue said when Wei Wuxian tentatively brought it up. “Like a saber, our nature is to be firm and unyielding, not flexible like the sword, but we cannot allow ourselves to become too rigid – a too-rigid saber will break upon encountering an obstacle. It’s a difficult balance to keep, and one made more difficult by our cultivation style.”

“The demonic cultivation aspects, you mean? Using yao to refine your saber spirit?”

“One day, though not today, I’m going to ask you how you know about that,” Nie Mingjue remarked, and although his tone was causal Wei Wuxian’s back went cold. “And I’ll expect you to tell me the truth when I do. But not today. Anyway, yes, that’s what I mean. Do you know what they mean when they say that demonic cultivation harms the temperament?”

Wei Wuxian hesitated. “I assume you’re going to tell me something other than ‘it drives you crazy and makes you kill people’?”

Nie Mingjue snorted. “Sometimes I wonder how someone as smart as you got sent home before you finished your lessons at the Cloud Recesses, but other times it’s fairly obvious.”

Wei Wuxian shrugged, embarrassed.

“Do you really not know?”

“No one taught this to me,” Wei Wuxian said, stung. “I came up with it on my own. How would I know?”

“All demonic cultivation has the same root,” Nie Mingjue said. “Obsession.”

“With killing, yeah, I know, I’ve heard it a million times –”

“Shut up and listen, you impertinent brat. The killing comes later. It starts with obsession. Obsession with righteousness, obsession with love, obsession with the pleasures of this world, with power – a human becomes a demon when they cannot overcome the obsessions within their heart, and the obsession consumes them. In time, a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with power will do whatever it takes to obtain that power, and not mind the blood shed to do it; a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with love will kill everyone who they perceive stands between them and their love, a demonic cultivator who is obsessed with righteousness will turn to murder when in their judgment something that ought to be condemned goes unpunished…”

“What about one who only wants what’s best for his family?” Wei Wuxian said, and he did not know if the challenge in his voice was about Nie Mingjue’s future or his own past.

Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Two roads that I can see: first, their family turns away from them for what they have become and they become vicious with the abandonment, becoming quick to lash out against the world and eventually doing something that causes the world to turn against them.  Second, their family stands by them, and eventually the world causes some harm to them – and the demonic cultivator turns to madness in revenge.”

“Not exactly an optimistic outlook.”

“Not especially, no.”

“You don’t seem as concerned by that as I would have thought.”

Nie Mingjue’s lips twitched. “I have a solution.”

“Would you like to share?”

“Using resentful energy to cultivate our sabers makes them prone to obsession, driving them ceaselessly to fight evil, destroy it, without discrimination. It makes them stronger, but also more dangerous – and that is why they must be carefully controlled.”

Wei Wuxian frowned. “So, what? You’re going to be the saber now? Under whose control?”

“Huaisang’s, of course,” Nie Mingjue said, as if it were obvious. “For better or for worse, he is sect leader now. Who else would it be?”

“But – what if you disagree? What if he wants to do things one way, and you another –”

“Then I argue and probably yell a lot, and if in the end he still insists on doing things his way, I listen,” Nie Mingjue said dryly. “That’s how hierarchy works. Isn’t it the same for you? When your shidi, Jiang Cheng, becomes sect leader, you’ll need to listen to him – or leave the sect. There’s no middle ground.”

Wei Wuxian scowled.

“A sect leader that can’t control his disciples is worse than a demonic cultivator,” Nie Mingjue said. “He’s weak. A target, ripe to be ripped apart and devoured by other sects – resources raided, disciples poached, responsibilities taken away...It’s not a fate I would wish on anyone. If you can’t commit to obeying, commit to leaving so that you don’t end up promising more than you can give.”

Ouch.

Just – ouch.

Great advice, fantastic advice, world-class advice, and totally useless because Jiang Cheng had travelled back in time with him and was therefore convinced that Wei Wuxian was just looking for the first way out of the Jiang sect he could find, no matter what Wei Wuxian said or did about it.

(Even Madame Yu was concerned by the new coldness in their relationship and had tried to talk to him about it, which – Wei Wuxian didn’t know what to do with that. It didn’t match any of what he had thought he’d understood.)

He decided to focus back in on the demonic cultivation lessons, shifting from theoretical discussions to the practical, and that, unfortunately, was when they encountered an issue.

“What do you mean you can’t play an instrument?” Wei Wuxian demanded, appalled. “It’s one of the Six Arts! Everyone can play some sort of instrument – even Nie Huaisang plays an instrument!”

“Everyone agreed it was better that I stop learning,” Nie Mingjue said defensively. “It’s all just plucking on strings or blowing air in pipes, and yet no matter that I did exactly what the teacher said to do, it never worked, that’s all.”

“Didn’t Zewu-jun offer to teach you…?”

“He did. And then he said it would be better if we stopped, too.”

The reason, Wei Wuxian soon learned, was that Nie Mingjue was almost completely tone deaf, and the only reason it was almost was that he was still capable of differentiating speech.

“I agree with the majority,” he said after an extremely frustrating day. “Stop. Never pick up an instrument ever again. And don’t let anyone but Zewu-jun play something especially for you, either, okay? Even if they’re highly recommended.”

“An interesting request,” Nie Mingjue said, eyebrows arched skeptically. “May I ask why?”

“Because you’ll have no idea if they’ve changed the music on you,” Wei Wuxian said bluntly. A great deal about the man’s murder in a different life made sense now, and Jin Guangyao’s brilliance in hiding the score of Turmoil inside of Clarity was a little less impressive when played to a man who thought all music, without exception, was just plucking strings or blowing air. “Musical cultivation is deadly in the right hands, especially if you lower your defenses against it. Just consider it a precaution.”

Nie Mingjue’s eyebrows remained arched, but he hummed in agreement.

“I guess we’ll have to think of a new way for you to cultivate demonic cultivation,” Wei Wuxian said, rubbing his face. He had not been planning on having to invent demonic cultivation at all in this life, and now he needed to not only ‘invent’ the original but actually come up with something new. Why was his life so hard? “How did you previously manipulate external energy?”

“With Baxia.”

“Well, that’s not helpful, is it? You can’t wield a human being. Perhaps another saber…?”

That didn’t work, primarily because it turned out that Baxia had strong feelings about Nie Mingjue even thinking about using another saber and well, as far as Wei Wuxian was concerned, whatever Baxia wanted, Baxia got.

(Nie Huaisang had had to go to Heijan once, with Wei Wuxian and Baxia accompanying him since Nie Mingjue wasn’t ready yet, and some unlucky Wen captain had tried to ambush them. That captain, and his squad, were not granted the courtesy of an intact corpse, and Baxia hadn’t even gotten a speck of blood on her nice new robes – no, Wei Wuxian would not be crossing Baxia any time soon.)

“There’s got to be something,” Wei Wuxian said, and Nie Mingjue agreed, and in the end they found something.

Nie Mingjue had been absent-mindedly playing around with one of Nie Huaisang’s fans when one of the fierce corpses Wei Wuxian had raised as practice targets had gotten loose; instinct had taken over and Nie Mingjue had lashed out with the weapon at hand as if it were a saber, and the resentful energy had surged in response –

Baxia was apparently not threatened by the notion of her master using a fan as a weapon, not even one inlaid with steel and heavy cloth with enough layers to catch a sword in.

(If Wei Wuxian needed to go have some time to himself at the sight of Nie Huaisang, dressed as a sect leader with his saber always at his side, standing next to Nie Mingjue holding a fan – well, that was his problem, and also one he intended to show to Jiang Cheng at the next possible opportunity. Someone else deserved to have their mind wrecked by the incongruity as much as he had.)

Even without the weirdness of Nie Mingjue, it was more than a little odd to see Nie Huaisang in the robes of a sect leader without him acting like the Head-shaker. The shock of having to become sect leader had fallen heavily on him: he had become a little more serious, a little more earnest (though still a bit frivolous); he was more inclined to listen and think things over, less inclined to run away.

“If da-ge is going to become a demonic cultivator, someone needs to stand behind him,” Nie Huaisang said simply when Wei Wuxian had tried probing. “He’s always held the world up for me – it’s the least I can do for him. I may not be able to do much, I might be terrible at it, but I owe it to him to at least try.”

Wei Wuxian wondered, sometimes, if Jiang Cheng would have stood up for him if only he had trusted in him, believed in him, the way Nie Mingjue believed in his notoriously useless little brother.

Maybe he’d ask, when he went back to the Jiang sect.

Maybe he’d –

“What the fuck is wrong with you,” Jiang Cheng said as a greeting, and for once Uncle Jiang didn’t disagree. “All those letters and you never once mentioned the terrors?”

“The what,” Wei Wuxian said, and that was how he learned that while he was on his way back to Yunmeng neither Baxia nor Nie Mingjue had wasted any time utilizing their newfound skills out on the battlefield.

Nie Huaisang was never going to be a particularly respected sect leader, especially by those that had met him beforehand, but evidently that wasn’t really important given that he was constantly flanked by what was being called the two terrors of Qinghe.

Nie Mingjue preferred darker colors now that he was no longer sect leader, the same dark grey shading towards black that Baxia had selected for herself, and the selection somehow made him seem even taller, verging on inhuman, and Baxia standing beside him, her human features patterned roughly after his, made the two of them appear a matched set. Nie Mingjue wielded the fan that Wei Wuxian had helped him design, which he had forged with his own hands out of the metal from the Xuanwu’s cave that Wei Wuxian had foolishly figured someone ought to get some use out of, painted over with a cinnabar array in Nie Huaisang’s careful brushstrokes, and in his hands it was both weapon and conduit for the raising of armies of corpses. Baxia, for her part, held nothing but required nothing, a sweeping gesture of her hand more devastating than a dozen blows with the saber.

They were terrifying, a nightmare writ large and unmistakably dangerous, undeniably demonic cultivators in a way that was entirely different from Wei Wuxian’s own dramatics, and it unnerved the rest of the cultivation world the way Wei Wuxian had feared it would.

“It won’t be a problem,” Jiang Cheng said impatiently. “The Nie sect are ascending in strength, and this only adds to their mystique – who would challenge them?”

“Uh, Jin Guangshan,” Wei Wuxian said. “Like last time?”

Jiang Cheng huffed. “At this rate, I don’t even think Jin Guangyao will bother defecting to the Jin sect,” he said. “Not if he knows how to play his cards right. The Nie sect’s strength in the original version was never about Chifeng-zun’s skill with the blade alone. It was the whole sect’s strength, with Chifeng-zun’s ability to wield them as skillfully as he did his saber; he’s an outstanding general. And now they have him as a general, him as a demonic cultivator, and whatever the fuck is going on with Lady Baxia –”

“I already told you. She’s a guai.”

“Like I already told you, it doesn’t matter how many times you say that, I will immediately expel the knowledge from my mind and you should too. ‘Immortal cultivator cousin that my brother named his saber after’, like what Nie Huaisang has been putting about, is a perfectly acceptable cover story.”

“And the fact that his saber disappeared at the same time?”

“Coincidence,” Jiang Cheng said firmly. “And we’re sticking with that. Anyway, the point is that if you’re an ambitious man, the Nie sect is the place to be right now and probably will continue to be in the future. This is going to be evident to both Jin Guangshan and the future Jin Guangyao, and we’ll need to deal with that.”

“I’ll keep an eye out,” Wei Wuxian promised. “After rescuing Chifeng-zun and helping with the demonic cultivation, I’ve gotten pretty close to them.”

“Mm. And how about your other mission?”

Wei Wuxian scowled at the smirk on Jiang Cheng’s face. “You know perfectly well that I haven’t had any time to seduce Lan Wangji, what with how busy I’ve been. I don’t even know for sure if he likes me yet -!”

“You’re an idiot, he does, and you’re not allowed to keep us all in suspense for two decades this time. Figure it out.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that I’m sticking you with the job of being an information courier and you leave for the Lan sect front line tomorrow.”

“You are the best shidi ever,” Wei Wuxian said, and meant it.

Jiang Cheng huffed. “Yeah, well,” he said as if his cheeks weren’t red. “Remember that in the future. In this life we’re the Twin Heroes, you hear me? No take-backs.”

Nie Mingjue was right: Wei Wuxian would need to either learn to obey or tell Jiang Cheng early on that he was leaving, and walking a path in the middle would only cause heartbreak all over again.

“Okay,” he said, deciding to ask Lan Wangji for advice on obedience. Surely that was something that could be learned? “Deal. You do know that that means Lan Wangji’s going to have to marry in, right?”

“Oh no,” Jiang Cheng said, voice entirely flat. “How terrible. I’ll find a way to manage dealing with that ice block somehow…listen, I don’t care if you end up calling him Wei Sizhui in this life, but don’t ruin his character. He was perfectly nice.”

“I don’t know if he’s even been born yet,” Wei Wuxian said glumly. “I’ve been looking, but…”

“I’ve asked some of Mother’s spies to keep track of Wen Ning and Wen Qing,” Jiang Cheng said. “Collecting evidence we’ll need for their inevitable post-war trial, assuming we want them to live better lives than just refugees. Give it time, we’ll find him.”

“Now I just need to see if Lan Wangji will want to raise children with me…”

“Wei Wuxian. I don’t care. Go.”

[pennyofthewild]

when all is done and settled

could there be something left for us after all?

***

when all is done and settled //could there be something left for us after all? Characters: Nie Huaisang, Jin Ling I Jin Rulan, Jiang Cheng I Jiang Wanyin Word Count: 1,170 Ratings/Warnings: General Audiences, this is really self-indulgent, please don't judge me? (plot, what plot! can't a fic just be a long conversation?) Notes: written for sangcheng week 2021 day 3: grief//revenge but i am horrible at angst so have this mildly hopeful post-canon thing instead? Alternative Reading Link: [AO3]

***

Cultivation conferences have been particularly tedious lately. Truthfully, Huaisang never really enjoyed cultivation conferences – his idea of enjoyable social events does not encompass sitting in on a bunch of stuffy old men arguing pointlessly for hours on end – but lately –

Lately the meetings have been more grating than ever. It is probably because – well. Huaisang used to be able to catch his eye over his fan when Sect Leader Yao was being particularly odious – exchange half-hearted shrugs with a dimpled smile –

He’d won, Huaisang reminds himself. He’d come out the victor. He’d outwitted the cleverest person he’s ever known, so why –

It must be that cultivation conferences were never Huaisang’s favorite places to be, and now he has to endure being lonely on top of everything else.

Why didn’t anyone tell him victory would feel so hollow? How long will it be before he stops waking in cold sweat, the crack san-ge’s neck had made when he’d been dragged into the coffin resonating in his ears?

I never thought you would be the death of me, Nie Huaisang.

Across the room, Lan Wangji is rising stiffly from the chief cultivator’s position, announcing we will now adjourn for the noon meal sounding practically relieved, for Lan Wangji.

Ironic, Huaisang thinks, how he’d brought about Lan Wangji’s eternal earthly happiness and his elevation in the eyes of the cultivation world through his machinations (though he’d also driven his brother into seclusion, to be fair), and had been unable to secure any such joys for himself.

Perhaps if Wei Wuxian were the sort of person to attend cultivation conferences Huaisang might have at least a conversation partner, but Wei Wuxian, like Huaisang, has a particular distaste for this sort of gathering, and unlike Huaisang, is not at all obligated to actually be present.

And then, Huaisang thinks with a slight pang, trailing in the wake of his fellow sect leaders, there is the matter of another erstwhile old friend. The one who is currently several paces ahead of Huaisang, (tall and unattainable), walking with his hands behind his back, head tipped to the side to listen intently to whatever his nephew is whispering into his ear.

See – Huaisang used to have a long-standing agreement with Jiang Wanyin, at cultivation conferences – to meet up after the day’s agenda had been wrung dry – and poke fun at the general state of the cultivation world’s leadership over greasy street-stall food and a several drinks. Late at night and slightly inebriated is when Jiang Wanyin’s dry, sarcastic wit is at its most razor-sharp; their conversations have always been Huaisang’s favorite part of being at a cultivation conference.

Unfortunately, in the months since Huaisang’s decade-long plot had finally run its course, this agreement has quietly fallen through. The worst of it is, Huaisang cannot be sure why.

As far as he is aware, he hasn’t quarrelled with Jiang Wanyin – unless he is mistaken, the Jiang sect leader had been pretty pre-occupied, that night in Guanyin Temple, and can’t possibly have realized the extent of Huaisang’s role in the night’s events. It is understandable, then, that to Huaisang, this new distance that has cropped up between them is especially frustrating. Could it be, he wonders, that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji had revealed his plot to Sect Leader Jiang? But as far as Huaisang is aware, Jiang Wanyin is still not on speaking terms with the Chief Cultivator or his one-time martial brother.

Lost in his musings, Huaisang runs headlong into Jin Rulan, who has, in the meanwhile, unhooked himself from his uncle’s apron strings in favor of catching up with the Lan sect’s head disciple. As he stumbles backward, Huaisang finds himself on the receiving end of an appraising look from Jin Rulan (he looks down his nose just like his uncle!). He turns away from Lan Sizhui with a murmured give me a moment, A-yuan, and gives Huaisang an appropriately deferential bow, sect-leader-to-sect-leader.

“Sect Leader Nie,” he says, grave, polite (he used to call Huaisang Nie-shushu, once upon a time, Huaisang thinks with a twinge of pain).

Huaisang nods back, crinkles his eyes over his fan. “Sect Leader Jin,” he says, cheerfully. “You look well.”

Jin Rulan takes a step closer, casting a cursory glance around the room. Lan Sizhui is pointedly looking elsewhere.

“I feel I should tell you,” Jin Rulan says, expression frank, straightforward, “I am aware of an obligation I have to return a favor you have done my late uncle.”

Huaisang’s breath catches in his throat. To think he would actually come out and say it, and in such a place! Or perhaps it is because of the place – but if this is a warning, he is doing a horrible job – . The part of Huaisang’s mind that is not absorbed in self-preservation thinks, dimly, that perhaps certain things are in fact passed down, from father to son, like naivety, and a sense of justice.

“I am afraid I must be misunderstanding you, Sect Leader Jin,” Huaisang says, easily, giving Jin Rulan his most innocuous expression, from above his fan.

Jin Rulan smiles. “Rest assured,” he says, a sardonic tone in his voice that, once again, is all Jiang Wanyin, “you are not. But –,” here, he pauses, takes a breath, “ my objective in telling you is to let you know I have in fact decided to let the matter rest.”

Now Huaisang is sure he must be misunderstanding, because none of this conversation is making any sense. “You have,” he says, faintly.

Jin Rulan nods, decisive. “Yes,” he says, “I am not quite sure I will be able to properly forgive you, Sect Leader Nie, but the truth is I have precious few family members left to me. Besides, my jiujiu has assured me that revenge is not a road lightly taken, and that I probably do not have the temperament for it.”

A laugh – rather like a sob – climbs its way out of Huaisang’s throat. “Your jiujiu doesn’t mince words,” he finds himself saying.

Jin Rulan gives him a considering look. “My jiujiu is lonely, too,” he declares, a non-sequitur if there ever was one, “I’d rather he not lose anyone else precious to him, if it is all the same to you, Sect Leader Nie.”

From across the pavilion, Jiang Wanyin – who is caught in what looks like an excruciating three-way conversation with Sect Leaders Yao and Ouyang – turns, as if by some protective maternal paternal instinct. He looks from Huaisang to Jin Rulan, and back. Catches Huaisang’s eye, holds. Gives Huaisang a brief nod. Something bright and painful flares in Huaisang’s chest.

“Thank you, for your magnanimity,” Huaisang tells Jin Rulan – to himself, silently, he adds: perhaps, one day, I will be worthy of it, and then, “and to your point; I think I will go rescue your jiujiu before he embroils us in another diplomatic situation.”

Jin Rulan’s answering smile is blinding.

The feeling in Huaisang’s chest grows brighter.

Ah, Huaisang thinks, this is what it feels like to hope.

[silenteyes]

你的答案 | Your Answer

By 阿冗

Warnings: Spoilers, Angst, Canon-typical Violence (Also it doesn’t follow word-to-word, I put in my own twist because I cannot for the life of me remember all of the scenes and their specific words. I need to remind you all as well, this is an AU! It mostly follows canon but as I said, I put my own twists to it.) ; Other than that, I suppose it’s a happy ending

也许世界就这样 我也���在路上 

Maybe the world is just like this | But I am still following my path

Wei Ying sighed as he looked back at the Burial Mounds. He continued walking - although he was convinced he might as well be limping, with traces of resentful energy following him. 

Sentient he thinks, perhaps a tad bit maniacally. 

没有人能诉说

With no one to confide in

“Demonic cultivation harms the mind and body.”

“The Yiling Patriarch is so arrogant, he uses his power to take advantage of everybody!”

“I will not spare Wei Wuxian any mercy.”

Wei Ying laughed hysterically. Sure, no one had the same views as him, and sure, he may be alone. But he could live on without the whole cultivation world watching his every step, waiting for him to break. 

“To be honest, Wei-xiong’s words were quite interesting. Spiritual energy can only be obtained through cultivation and taking great pains to form a golden core. It would take I-don’t-know-how-many years to do, especially for someone like me, whose talent seems as if it was gnawed by a dog when I was in my mother’s womb. But, resentful energy are from the fierce ghosts. If they can easily be taken and used, it would be beyond wonderful.”

也许我只能沉默 眼泪湿润眼眶 

Perhaps I can only remain quiet | Tears glistening my eyes

“Qing-jie...”

Wei Ying had tears threatening to spill as he struggled to move. Wen Qing stared at him with tears in her eyes as well, smoothing out his hair. Wen Ning was watching both of them, and if he wasn’t a fierce corpse at the moment he would’ve burst into tears.

“A-Ying, thank you. And I’m sorry.”

He could only stay silent as the two walked out of the cave, heading towards Lanling.

可又不甘懦弱

Yet not willing to show weakness

He could not, not yet. He will not die before avenging his second family, who all actually cared about him. 

To Nie Huaisang, my second brother,

I am sorry. You have helped us a lot, but it seems as though our efforts were in vain. You are not at fault, please do not blame yourself for not being able to help me. We will meet again in another life, as brothers.

With a smile I sign this letter,

Wei Ying, Wei Wuxian.

低着头 期待白昼 

With my head down | I await for the dawn

He sighed with his head tilted down as he waits for the cultivation world. All those who are greedy, who seek power and fame, and those who seek vengeance are sure to come. He could almost chuckle at the fact his martial brother - no he’s lost right to call him that months ago, Sect Leader Jiang was the on leading the siege. 

He hopes A-Yuan won’t be too heartbroken, but maybe A-Yuan might be dead. He actually tears up at the thought. 

接受所有的嘲讽

Accepting all of their taunts

“It’s the Yiling Patriarch!”

“Kill him!”

“Monster!”

“You killed Jin Zixuan, spare him no mercy!”

Wei Ying just accepted them with what one may call an exasperated sigh, but if you listen closely it sounded breathy as well. Why should he refute them if they won’t believe him anyways?

向着风 拥抱彩虹

Facing the wind | Embrace the rainbow

Nie Huaisang stared in horror at the letter. The Wen remnants... dead? They were clearly just elderly people if you don’t count Lady Wen and Wen Qionglin, but even then they were just doctors!

He begged an begged for his brother to not participate in the siege but to no avail did he succeed. 

“Wei-xiong, I’m glad even at the edge of death you still remember me. I’ll be looking forward to seeing you in our next life, maybe it would be better than this.”

勇敢的向前走

Bravely walk forward

Wei Ying smiled as he walked towards the edge of the cliff. He took another step and fell.

Oh, the part where they say Sandu Shengshou killed him? He couldn’t really remember much, but he knew it was a lie.

If anyone was going to kill him, he’d rather it be himself. 

黎明的那道光会越过黑暗

The light of dawn will always cross the darkness

He closed his eyes as he awaits for death to embrace him. They say death is another adventure, but he hopes it leads to peace. 

He’s tired. 

打破一切恐惧 我能找到答案  

Defeat all my fears, I will find the answers

He opened his eyes as he remembered A-Yuan and the others. Qing-jie would’ve used her needles on him, he’d also like to think she may be crying over him. But he wouldn’t want to push his imagination.

QIng-jie crying is one of the last things he wants.

哪怕要逆着光 就驱散黑暗   

Even if I need to go against the light and disperse the darkness

To defeat the monster, he had to become one himself. He had no other resources to help them defeat Wen Ruohan after all.

Why is it that when they turned their backs on me, I’m not allowed to do the same? Am I supposed to stay defenseless when they choose offense?

丢弃所有的负担 不再孤单 

Throw away the burdens, no longer alone

He laughs, and he cries. And at last he smiles once more. He feels like his death would be a peaceful one. He’d be able to join Granny, Uncle Four, Qing-jie, A-Ning and all the others soon. 

Maybe shijie would also forgive him. He hopes Madam Yu will stay ten feet away from him though.

不再孤单   

No longer alone

His eyes widened as fierce corpses surround him. And he screams.

He never wanted to be truly alone after all.

---

黎明的那道光 会越过黑暗

The light of dawn will always cross the darkness

“Senior Wei!” Jingyi gawked. 

A burst of laughter came from said senior and the juniors’ reactions ranged from eye rolls to small chuckles.

“We almost died!” Zizhen cheered.

“Why the fuck are you so happy?” Jin Ling snapped, panting for air.

“We almost died! We have a cool story to tell to other people now!” A kid from the Ouyang Sect exclaimed. Wei Ying ruffled their hair and it took the juniors a lot to not drink vinegar.

打破一切恐惧我能 找到答案

Defeat all my fears, I will find the answers

“Get that beast away from me!” he screamed.

“Da-jiu! Fairy is not a beast! And you have to get over your phobia of dogs!” Jin Ling said in exasperation.

Fairy sat still, ears drooping as she looks at Wei Ying with sad eyes. She might as well be pouting while she’s at it. Even he couldn’t stand the dog looking like that.

“...Fine. Just ONE pat! If it bites me I will not have it be in the same room as me EVER!”

Fairy wagged her tail and looked at Wei Ying. He trembled as his hand got close to her and he closed his eyes. Fairy stared at the hand which hadn’t touched her and she slowly bumped her head into his hand. He jumped and stared at her and she stared back, clearly happy to at least initiate some kind of physical contact with him. He gave her a clearly scared, but small smile.

“There, see. She isn’t that bad.”

She may not be, but as if HE’D ever admit it.

哪怕要逆着光 就驱散黑暗

Even if I need to go against the light and disperse the darkness

“Senior Wei!” The juniors all screamed in fear. The Lans may have broken a few rules just by doing that, but desperate times call for desperate measures. 

“Fuck,” Wei Ying swore under his breath. This spirit was not a simple one, and they had fucking minions with them. He would’ve compared them to a mother duck and their ducklings if not for the fact they looked absolutely horrible. He looked back at the juniors and heaved a sigh.

Whistles could be heard as the juniors watched in both fear and awe how Senior Wei was actually communicating with the spirit using resentful energy. They never really saw it in action since he has tried to stop using demonic cultivation, he didn’t want the sects to think he was teaching them things like that.

A few more whistles which sounded eerie and the spirit let out a loud wail and collapsed, before fading.

The juniors all stood still for a few moments - Wei Ying thought they were finally afraid of him, before they all crowded him with stars in their eyes as they admired him.

有一万种的力量 淹没孤单

There are ten thousand kinds of power to drown the loneliness

“Wei-xiong!” Nie Huaisang’s voice rang out. Wei Ying froze before he slowly turned to face Nie Huaisang, who looked desperate, as if he couldn’t believe that Wei Wuxian himself was alive again.

“Nie-xiong,” was all he said before the Nie Sect Leader pounced on him, seemingly throwing away his last ounce of dignity. It’s fine, it’s worth it for this.

“Do not EVER die on me again,” Huaisang said in between sobs. Wei Ying chuckled before wrapping his arms around Huaisang tightly, warmly. 

“I’ll try, brother,” he murmured, patting the sect leader’s back. “I’ll try.”

不再孤单

No longer alone

“Wei Ying.”

“Lan Zhan.”

In the darkness, two broken lovers could only hold onto each other, ignoring reality. 

Right now, in each other’s embrace, the world finally felt whole.

---

Heya~ terribly sorry for being dead. I had no motivation. Hopefully this is good and HOPEFULLY it shows up in the tags.

[foularcadebanana]

The Guide to being a fun-er and cooler uncle by Jiang Cheng (or how to become more like Wei Wuxian)

Finally I have finished writing the fic for the last prompt of the Untamed Fall Fest 2020. Day 31-Wei Wuxian. I know I’m late, but this fic was huge and the idea was a big one. I still haven’t done one for the Day 1 prompt and the idea I have is similar but at the same time very different for that one. 

Thank you so much @fytheuntamed for arranging this amazing fest. I had so much fun participating in this and writing so many different fics. I feel like writing a fic every day for a month had really helped me grow as a writer. So here is the fic. I hope you all enjoy it!

Summary: Where after having an argument with Jin Ling, Jiang Cheng decides to become a much cooler and more fun uncle. Or the one where Jiang Cheng decides to become a better Wei Wuxian than even Wei Wuxian could ever hope to be.

READ ON AO3 (This is a really big one guys)

It began during an argument with Jin Ling of all things. It wasn’t even an argument. Jin Ling was being a particularly insolent brat on that day of all days. Ever since he had become a Sect Leader, he had started to talk back to Jiang Cheng and disagree with him more and more.

Jiang Cheng wondered how people could think they were alike since Jiang Cheng had never dared to speak up against his parents when he had been a teenager. But then again, he had never really had the best relationship with them, and he liked to think that his relationship with Jin Ling was better and that they were a bit close, if nothing else.

All of that changed during that one argument. “Why not?” Jin Ling asked, and Jiang Cheng could tell he was resisting the urge to stomp his foot. “Lan Sizhui’s going and so is Lan Jingyi, even Ouyang Zizhen’s dad is letting him go.”

“You’re not like them though, are you, A-Ling? You’re a sect leader now, you have more responsibilities,” Jiang Cheng tried to explain through the headache he was getting.

“I know that, Jiujiu, but can’t I go just this once?” A-Ling asked, and Jiang Cheng sighed. “I’ll be back as soon as—”

“That’s what you said the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that. You can’t keep making excuses to get out of Koi Tower and avoid your responsibilities and duties to the sect. If you tell your friends, I’m sure they’ll understand and change their plans.” Jiang Cheng replied, keeping his tone firm.

He couldn’t let Jin Ling wander off wherever he wanted and let him have his way every time. He needed to understand that things changed when you became a sect leader, and you had a duty to protect your sect and its people. He wished that things could have gone differently for Jin Ling, and Jiang Cheng was trying his best to not let too much burden fall on Jin Ling’s shoulders, but Jin Ling had to try too.

Jin Ling crossed his arms and pouted like a child. “I’m sure if I’d asked Wei Wuxian, he would have allowed me to go. He lets Sizhui go anywhere he wishes whenever he wants. I’m sure if he had been my guardian he would have wanted me to go have fun.”

Before Jiang Cheng could get the chance to respond, Jin Ling stomped away from Jiang Cheng’s office, closing the door behind him a bit too harshly. Jiang Cheng couldn’t muster up the energy to shout at him for it.

He wanted to go behind Jin Ling. He wanted to pull him back and order him, ask him to please take back his words. If I’d asked Wei Wuxian, he would have allowed me to go. If he had been my guardian, he would have wanted me to go have fun.

A knot formed in Jiang Cheng’s stomach and he tried to swallow the lump in his throat. But he wasn’t there for you, A-Ling. He was dead for sixteen years while I— I suffered. I tried my best for you, but I guess it still wasn’t good enough.

It had never been like this with Jin Guangyao, it had been different with him. With him, Jiang Cheng had never felt the pressure to compete, to be the best uncle he could be because he had known that he already was.

Jin Guangyao may have had the emotional sensitivity that Jiang Cheng lacked, and a way with words. He may have had his advantages, but Jiang Cheng had known that the way Jin Ling had called out to his ‘jiujiu’ was never the same as when he had talked about his ‘xiao-shushu’.

Jiang Cheng had seen the way Jin Ling had brightened up every time he had been in Jiang Cheng’s presence. He had never mouthed off to Jin Guangyao the way he had to Jiang Cheng, and still did. 

People had always said that Jin Ling behaved like Jiang Cheng, his personality, and the way that he acted being remarkably similar to Sect Leader Jiang’s. Jin Guangyao had never stood a chance.

Wei Wuxian, on the other hand… Jiang Cheng had once loved him dearly (still did, even if he denied it profusely) and had always been competing with him for his entire life. For the affection of his father, for the satisfaction of his mother, he had competed against Wei Wuxian with everything he’d had, he had worked so hard and practiced and practiced until he had been a bleeding mess on the floor, but it had never been enough.

And then Wei Wuxian had taken everything from him, including his free will. Now here he was, promising to take another important part of his life. One that Jiang Cheng had been growing and cherishing for sixteen years. Wei Wuxian hadn’t even done anything really, and yet, here Jiang Cheng was, already losing this battle of acquiring nephew’s affections. How long had Wei Wuxian been back and alive for?

Didn’t Jin Ling hate him? Or at least mildly dislike him? Jiang Cheng couldn’t lose to Wei Wuxian already. Sixteen years, dammit. He was going to win this competition against Wei Wuxian. He was going to come out on the top and be a better uncle than Wei Wuxian. The cooler uncle. The best uncle he could possibly be!

He needed to be a better Wei Wuxian than even Wei Wuxian could ever hope be.

Jiang Cheng stared into the mirror, looking at himself properly. He wasn’t going to start dressing like Wei Wuxian, obviously. He wasn’t obnoxious enough to wear all black, and he quite liked his purples and navy blues. What he was going to try though, was to smile like Wei Wuxian. So, he looked into the mirror, staring at his mouth.

But no matter how much he stared at it, he could not turn his frown upside down. He sighed and pressed his lips together, glaring at the mirror. How did a person smile, again? He tried turning the edges of his lips up…UP. But they just wouldn’t move. He groaned. What was he supposed to do? He couldn’t even smile like Wei Wuxian could. How could he hope to become a better uncle than Wei Wuxian if he couldn’t even smile for his kid?

This was a great start.

It was just a week later that he found himself in the Cloud Recesses. Jin Ling was going on a night hunt with the rest of his friends and Jiang Cheng was going to spend the night in the Cloud Recesses after a meeting with Hanguang-Jun.

So, he stood outside the entrance of the Cloud Recesses with Jin Ling, who was about to leave for the hunt. Jiang Cheng knew what he had to do. Project WWWWD (What Would Wei Wuxian Do) was about to begin.

“A-Ling,” Jiang Cheng said, his hands twitching at his sides. He was sweating and red in the face, wasn’t he? He was sure Jin Ling was giving him a weird look. Jiang Cheng could do this. All he had to do was lift his hands and give Jin Ling a hug, just like he’d seen Wei Wuxian give all of the juniors. Jin Ling had avoided his. But he wouldn’t avoid Jiang Cheng’s hug would he?

Jiang Cheng lifted one hand. Jin Ling looked at it. Jiang Cheng swallowed and cleared his throat, putting the hand on Jin Ling’s shoulder and patting him. “Have fun,” he said, just like Wei Wuxian had said earlier. He tried to smile like he had practiced in the mirror.

“Jiujiu, are you okay?” Jin Ling was staring at him worriedly. Jiang Cheng nodded his head, letting his hand drop and a frown settle on his face. He expected Jin Ling to say ‘goodbye’ and ‘see you soon’ before sprinting off to join his friends, but instead he waited, as if expecting Jiang Cheng to say something more.

Jiang Cheng gritted his teeth, resisting the urge to ask to check Jin Ling’s pouch and ask him if he had carried all of the necessities with him, his clarity bell, and the flares and…

Taking a deep breath, Jiang Cheng asked, “Is there a problem, A-Ling?”

Jin Ling seemed to search Jiang Cheng’s features before he shook his head. “No. I guess I should get going.” The kid had his lips pursued as he turned around and walked slowly over to his friends.

Jiang Cheng watched him take a few steps forward before he swore under his breath and gave up. “A-Ling!” Jin Ling turned back with a hopeful expression on his face. “Take care and stay safe.”

Jin Ling’s face brightened, and to Jiang Cheng’s surprise, he walked back to Jiang Cheng, pulling his pouch out of his robes. “I will, Jiujiu.” He opened his pouch in front of Jiang Cheng with a serious expression on his face. “Here, look. I’ve packed everything……”

After Jin Ling had finished showing Jiang Cheng all of the items in his pouch, had pointed to his clarity bell, attached to his waist, and had shown Jiang Cheng his supply of flares, he was gone with his friends waving and enthusiastically saying goodbye to Jiang Cheng.

Jiang Cheng watched Jin Ling disappear and sighed. He had failed in the first step of his project. He hadn’t even been able to chill out like Wei Wuxian and let Jin Ling have fun. He’d had to check up on him. Well, he would not anymore. He turned to look at Wei Wuxian, who was sat on a rock, looking up at the moon.

As Jiang Cheng passed by him, Wei Wuxian’s head whipped around to look at him. “Do you think we should go behind them? I think we should trail behind them for this hunt, just in case.” Wei Wuxian said, and on the surface, the words seemed innocent and harmless enough. But Jiang Cheng knew better.

He narrowed his eyes at Wei Wuxian. Subtly trying to steal his nephews love and earn the spot as his most favourite uncle was one thing, but this. This was too much.

“Oh, haha, Wei Wuxian. Very funny. Let’s make fun of Jiang Cheng for being concerned about his nephew and being cautious. They’re teenagers, you know, and even if they don’t think so, they still need someone to look after them. That includes Jin Ling, even though he’s a sect leader now. So, I don’t appreciate you making fun of me for that,” Jiang Cheng answered and stomped off after he had finished his rant, ignoring Wei Wuxian’s calls to him.

Phase two of the plan to win Jin Ling back and be the cooler uncle involved going to Koi Tower. Jiang Cheng took the day off and went there late into the morning. As soon as he opened the door to Jin Ling’s office, he was greeted with a surprised “Jiujiu!”

Jin Ling stood up and rushed over to Jiang Cheng, who tried not to eye the messy pile of letters Jin Ling had left on the table. “A-Ling,” he said, greeting Jin Ling with a nod of his head, and a slight curve of his lips. He was trying, okay? At least Jin Ling seemed like he was glad to see him. That was a start, right?

“Jiujiu, what are you doing here?” Jin Ling asked. Jiang Cheng understood why. He didn’t really come visit Jin Ling at Koi Tower unless there was a meeting, a conference, some type of a celebration, or if Jiang Cheng believed that Jin Ling needed his help with something, or Jin Ling called him over for an emergency.

One of these things happened at least once a month and Jin Ling visited Lotus Pier often enough, so it wasn’t as if Jiang Cheng needed to casually go over to check up on the kid. But he was there now, for an extremely specific reason, and Jin Ling was curious.

“Well, I was hoping we could go out and do something fun,” Jiang Cheng said. Take that Wei Wuxian. Who’s the fun uncle now?

Jin Ling’s entire demeanor changed as he straightened up and gave Jiang Cheng a serious look. “Is this some kind of a test, Jiujiu?” A test? Jiang Cheng frowned. “Because I’ve been working very hard on the upcoming night hunt I have to arrange for all of the elites in the Jin sect. The elders have been on my back for weeks, and if you’re wondering why I haven’t responded to the letters, it’s not because I’ve been wandering around with my friends. I’ve just been so busy—”

“I know,” Jiang Cheng interrupted, feeling guilt gnawing at his insides. Was this the kind of uncle he was? One that put Jin Ling into such an anxious and frustrated state even when he suggested doing something fun? He swallowed the lump in his throat. “I know how hard you’ve been working, A-Ling. I’ve never doubted you. That’s why I was thinking that maybe we could get away from here and do something fun. It’s up to you, we can do whatever you want.”

Jin Ling stared at Jiang Cheng. He seemed to be searching Jiang Cheng’s eyes again, or maybe searching for the right words. Jiang Cheng didn’t know what he had said to make Jin Ling turn speechless. Did Wei Wuxian not speak like this to Sizhui? Or Jin Ling? He didn’t know. He was betting it was something much, much more sentimental.

Jiang Cheng scowled at the thought that Wei Wuxian had one-upped him in this too. “Jiujiu?” Jin Ling was biting his lower lip, deep in thought. “Could we maybe do that later?” Jiang Cheng blinked. What? “First, could we— well, now that you’re here, I was hoping that you could help me with arranging the Jin hunt. Please, Jiujiu? I’ve been working so hard and—”

“Alright, let’s take a look at it,” Jiang Cheng agreed. Jin Ling’s whole face lit up as he practically dragged Jiang Cheng to his worktable to take a look at what he had come up with so far.

Jiang Cheng blinked and listened as Jin Ling spoke rapidly, ranting to Jiang Cheng about everything all at once. Everything Jiang Cheng had missed so far, everything the elders had told him, everything Jin Ling had incorporated into his arrangement of the hunt so far, and all of the things he planned to do.

To Jiang Cheng, Jin Ling looked not like the capable Sect Leader that Jiang Cheng knew he had become, but like the tiny child who used to pull Jiang Cheng through the entire Lotus Pier to look at a flower he had seen or a bird or a butterfly, anything that had caught his attention, really. He reminded Jiang Cheng of the Jin Ling who, every time he had come to Lotus Pier from Koi Tower, would hold Jiang Cheng’s hand in his pudgy, little one and go off on a rant, rapidly recalling everything that had happened at Koi Tower.

And maybe, phase two of his plan had failed too, maybe it hadn’t. Jin Ling had said that they could go have fun after they had arranged the night hunt, but Jiang Cheng was sure that A-Ling really couldn’t care less about it.

Maybe that was Jiang Cheng’s problem. He was too hard on the kid. Maybe he should ease up, loosen his leash, and show a little more trust and belief in Jin Ling. Like Wei Wuxian tended to do.

“Jiujiu, you should come with us.” Jiang Cheng blinked as Jin Ling looked at him. Go with them where, again? He had almost dozed off while Jin Ling had been having a conversation with Jiang Cheng and his friends, and of course, Wei Wuxian.

Jiang Cheng felt like he somehow got less sleep as he became older, and surely enough there would come a time in the future where no one would let him get any sleep at all.

“Hmmm?” Jiang Cheng casually asked.

“To the lake nearby!” Jin Ling said, clapping his hands excitedly. “We could go for a swim.”

Jiang Cheng just wanted to get some rest, but he turned to look at Wei Wuxian. WWWWD—What would Wei Wuxian do? Wei Wuxian was nodding at the plan approvingly which meant that Jiang Cheng would have to do the same.

He tried to hold in his sigh. “Sure. That sounds like a great idea.” Jin Ling blinked and narrowed his eyes at Jiang Cheng, as if he had said the wrong thing. But Wei Wuxian seemed pleasantly surprised.

“Are you sure, Jiujiu? You look tired, and I saw you kind of dozing off in the meeting earlier.” Jin Ling said. Damn that kid and his observation skills. Maybe he could blame that one on Jin Guangyao?

Jiang Cheng searched for a response. What would Wei Wuxian say? “Ah, A-Ling, it’s fine. I’m fine. I can sleep after we come back, but I wouldn’t want to miss this.” A smile. Jiang Cheng should go for a smile right about now. He felt his lips twitching upwards, but he couldn’t see himself, there was no mirror around. Was he smiling?

Jin Ling’s eyes widened, and he looked stricken. Was that the kind of response people got when they smiled? Was he doing this right?

“We…should go,” Jin Ling said.

As they reached the spot near the lake, Jiang Cheng noticed the shade under the trees. Maybe coming here had been a good idea after all. Jiang Cheng could get some rest while the boys had some fun. Wei Wuxian was there to keep an eye on them, or not. But Jiang Cheng most certainly wasn’t going to pay them any attention. Just like he had promised himself.

He could also get to spend some time with A-Ling like this, and he wouldn’t keep bugging Jiang Cheng to try to meet up with Wei Wuxian. He was in his presence now, and that would have to be enough.

Spreading out a blanket for himself on the grass, Jiang Cheng lay down under the shade of the trees and closed his eyes. He had kept the picnic basket which contained warm food a bit of a distance away from him, but still on top of the blanket.

Jiang Cheng let himself relax. He felt the breeze gently caressing his face and his hair, and he allowed himself to finally fall asleep….

“Jiujiu!” Jiang Cheng startled awake.

“Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng!” Wei Wuxian called out, and Jiang Cheng heard the urgency in his voice.

“What is it? Who’s hurting you? Where’s the dog? What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng immediately stood up, alert.

“It’s Jingyi and Sizhui. We were just playing in the lake and they both got hurt and almost drowned, but Wei Wuxian and I saved them.” Jin Ling told Jiang Cheng. While Jin Ling’s tone remained calm, Jiang Cheng could see the worry and concern on his face. “They need your help, Jiujiu.”

Wei Wuxian, on the other hand, could not seem to stand still, hopping from one foot to the other and hovering around the two boys. As Jiang Cheng walked towards them, he noticed that the boys were both sitting upright and coughing. Ouyang Zizhen seemed to be rubbing their backs, the smart kid.

“Do something, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said in a panicked voice. “Look at them. I almost lost Sizhui a second time! I think they might have a concussion. Jingyi’s looking a bit pale—”

“They’re going to be fine, Wei Wuxian. Stopping jumping around and help me.” Jiang Cheng snapped, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. This was great. Wei Wuxian was acting like a child. He felt like the only adult around. At least he could still count on Jin Ling to help.

Jiang Cheng saw that Sizhui’s knees were scratched up and immediately pulled out a few creams and lotions along with a bandage from his pouch. The lotions would help Sizhui’s sea sickness and help clear both the boys’ lungs of water. Lan Jingyi did not have a concussion, but he had a bruise on his forehead. Jiang Cheng pulled out a pack of ice for him before closing his pouch.

After tending to both the boys and giving them instructions, with Jin Ling sitting right next to him and adding a few pieces of advice of his own, and Wei Wuxian still hovering around them, Jiang Cheng thought it would be best to go back to his blanket. He had done what he had been asked to do. That was enough, right?

Jiang Cheng felt almost proud of himself, as he pulled warm food out of his picnic basket for everyone. He hadn’t even given the boys a single lecture. He was getting the hang of this cool, fun uncle thing.

“Jiujiu,” Jin Ling said. He standing next to Jiang Cheng and conveniently blocking out the sun. Jiang Cheng watched him as he looked down and fidgeted with his fingers. What was wrong now? “I’m sorry.” Jiang Cheng stared questioningly at Jin Ling. “You were right. You’re always right. We should have been more careful. I didn’t know Sizhui couldn’t swim, and the tides were very strong. It was stupid, Jiujiu, and I know that I was being irresponsible. It won’t happen again.”

Jiang Cheng blinked up at Jin Ling. He hadn’t even lectured Jin Ling this time, but he had somehow still received an explanation and an apology. He hadn’t even said anything and yet, here A-Ling was doing the talking for him, saying words in response to everything that Jiang Cheng wanted to say to him.

Sighing exasperatedly, Jiang Cheng tugged on Jin Ling’s arm, making him sit down beside him. “It’s alright, A-Ling. I’m glad you’ve understood your mistake, and I’m sure you’ll be more careful from now on.” There. His response had been short and sweet. Wei Wuxian could get wrecked!

What was Wei Wuxian doing anyway? Jiang Cheng looked over at him. Wei Wuxian seemed to have gone mad, making wild hand gestures as he spoke loudly. Sizhui seemed to be trying to placate him, as if the idiot were angry at the kid and not concerned for him. Jiang Cheng scoffed. Who was the cooler uncle now?

Looking back at his own nephew, Jiang Cheng was puzzled by the hidden disappointment he found in Jin Ling’s eyes. “Jiujiu, why aren’t you getting angry at me?” Jin Ling softly asked.

Jiang Cheng was even more confused now. Hadn’t Jin Ling wanted this? Hadn’t he wanted Jiang Cheng to be just like Wei Wuxian?

What would Wei Wuxian say? “A-Ling, you are a grown-up now. You’re managing to look after an entire sect all by yourself, aren’t you? Then it wouldn’t do for me to treat you like you’re still a child, to shout at you or get angry with you. You’re a responsible and mature individual now, and I’m sure you can take care of yourself. You don’t—” Jiang Cheng cut off and cleared his throat, immediately looking away.

He swallowed the emotions threatening to spill over. You don’t need me to take care of you anymore. You have Wei Wuxian here with you if you need a fun, cool uncle to spend some time with.

“A-Ling. Why don’t you call your friends and your idiotic uncle over to have some food before it goes cold?”

Jiang Cheng found himself going on a night hunt with the juniors and Wei Wuxian soon after that. He knew that this would be difficult. It would be hard for him to keep his cool and stay calm if a monster came at the kids, especially at Jin Ling, but Jiang Cheng would try. For A-Ling.

He was even keeping his distance, walking right next to Wei Wuxian, who was at least a few steps behind the juniors. Jiang Cheng sighed, tightening, and loosening his grip on Sandu. He wanted to ask Wei Wuxian how he did it, how he made everyone like him so much. How he inspired the loyalty and devotion of the people around him instantly.

Maybe he got it from his parents, or maybe he got it from Jiang Cheng’s parents. Either way, Jiang Cheng hadn’t acquired that particular personality trait. Maybe it was the smile that did it. That bright, blinding smile that made people instantly melt, no matter what had just happened. Then it made sense, because Jiang Cheng had never learned how to smile like that, had he?

A sudden gurgling sound tore through the silence of the night and Jiang Cheng instinctually looked over at Wei Wuxian. Wei Wuxian was looking back at him. He gave Jiang Cheng a quick nod, and Jiang Cheng could feel Zidian slowly beginning to flare up, could feel the itch in his hands to unsheathe Sandu. But he straightened up, took a deep breath, and decided to watch as the juniors handled the monster by themselves.

It was after all just one monster. They would be able to handle it wouldn’t they?

“Jiujiu!” Jin Ling called, his eyes flashing over to Jiang Cheng. Be supportive. Trust him. Tell him that you believe in him.

Jiang Cheng  gestured with his hands and gave a small smile. “It’s alright, A-Ling! I believe in you.”

Disbelief flashed in Jin Ling’s eyes before he joined the rest of the juniors in fighting the monster. There, it seemed like Jiang Cheng had done a good job. Now all he had to do was stay away from the fight and let Jin Ling and the rest of his friends handle it. Easier said than done.

“Jiang Cheng, what are you doing?” Wei Wuxian hissed. Jiang Cheng blinked and turned to him. Wei Wuxian had a desperation in his tone and this look in his eyes that Jiang Cheng hadn’t seen since he had been resurrected. “Why aren’t you helping them?”

Jiang Cheng scoffed. Was Wei Wuxian serious? Was this some kind of a trap to knock Jiang Cheng down a few pegs so he could never achieve the title of a cool, fun uncle? Well, Jiang Cheng was not falling for that. “Why don’t you go help them?”

Wei Wuxian gave Jiang Cheng the same look of disbelief that Jin Ling had.

“You’re the one who has Sandu and Zidian. Why would I use Chenqing on a single monster?” Wei Wuxian asked. Jiang Cheng could not understand what was wrong with him. Why was he acting like Jiang Cheng had to be the one to handle this hunt? The juniors were handling it just fine, weren’t they?

“There are four of them, Wei Wuxian. I’m sure they can handle a single monster,” Jiang Cheng replied, pointing at the monster, who was apparently already dead. “See, I told you.” Jiang Cheng felt like the coolest, fun-est uncle ever in that moment.

But before Wei Wuxian could respond, a second monster ran into the clearing, and Jiang Cheng held his breath as he realised that it was going straight for Jin Ling. Jiang Cheng was ready with his sword and Zidian, he was ready if he felt like Jin Ling was in even the slightest bit of danger. But the kid looked at the monster running towards him, unsheathed his sword smoothly, and in one clear move, pierced the monster straight in his heart. Jiang Cheng couldn’t have felt prouder.

As Jin Ling pulled the sword out from the monster’s chest, blood spurted all over his face and body. He groaned. “This is just fucking great!” He exclaimed, lifting his hands up in the air.

“Nice aim, Young Mistress.” Lan Jingyi said. As the rest of his friends gathered around Jin Ling, Jiang Cheng suddenly remembered how to breathe again.

“That was close,” Wei Wuxian muttered, with another expression Jiang Cheng didn’t remember seeing on his face since the resurrection, or maybe since Guanyin Temple.

Too close, Jiang Cheng thought as he rushed over to Jin Ling.

“A-Ling—” Jiang Cheng said, and something throbbed in his chest as Jin Ling’s expressions turned grim and more serious.

“It’s all right, Jiujiu. I’m okay. You don’t need to— You were right. I can handle these things myself,” Jin Ling said, his voice a little harsh as he walked past Jiang Cheng.

Jiang Cheng stayed frozen in place. Jin Ling had never spoken to him like this before. What had gotten into him? A small voice in Jiang Cheng’s mind said that this was the way Jin Ling spoke to Wei Wuxian. So, was it really a good idea to try and be more like him?

But it’s what A-Ling wants. A-Ling likes him. Jiang Cheng sighed. He didn’t understand what was wrong. What had he done wrong?

‘A-Ling, what’s wrong?’

Something was wrong with Jin Ling. Jiang Cheng knew that. Ever since they had gone on the night hunt, Jin Ling had been acting different. More distant. And Jiang Cheng didn’t know what he had done wrong.

It had been a month, and Jin Ling hadn’t come to visit him in Lotus Pier. He hadn’t met him or found a reason to call him to Koi Tower, and Jiang Cheng just wanted to know what had happened. What had Jiang Cheng done wrong? He had tried to be like Wei Wuxian. He had tried to be fun and laid back and cool. Was that still not enough? Was Wei Wuxian still a better choice than him? Better company than him?

Of course, he was. Jiang Cheng didn’t know what he had been thinking. Trying to be like Wei Wuxian had only confirmed one thing for him, that he could never be him. No matter how hard he tried, he could never evoke the same sense of loyalty and devotion as him. Jiang Cheng had never been and could never be likeable or fun or cool or anything good.

He just had to surrender the title and spend the rest of his life knowing that he would be Jin Ling’s angry, temperamental, strict uncle. That Jin Ling would only come to him because he had to. When he had no choice.

‘If I’d asked Wei Wuxian, he would have allowed me to go. If he had been my guardian, he would have wanted me to go have fun.’

And now that Jin Ling was a Sect Leader, he didn’t have to come to Jiang Cheng anymore. He had a choice, and it was even better now because he had Wei Wuxian. Another uncle. A better uncle.

Jiang Cheng sighed, putting his head in his hands. Fuck all of this, he missed his kid.

He missed having Jin Ling around, walking into his office to interrupt his work every once in a while. He missed Jin Ling pulling pranks on him, and Jiang Cheng getting so angry that he would threaten Jin Ling by pulling out Zidian. Jin Ling would retort by mouthing off to him.

He missed having the kid insist that they sit together for lunch and dinner and all of their meals, and having him insist that they go to the training grounds to train together or because he wanted Jiang Cheng to teach him a particular technique or to show him something he had recently learned.

He just missed his A-Ling. Jiang Cheng rubbed at his eyes, roughly wiping away his tears.

“Jiang Cheng!” A sudden voice called out, making Jiang Cheng look up as his office door banged open. It was Wei Wuxian. What was he doing—

“You need to come with me to Koi Tower. It’s Jin Ling.” Wei Wuxian was a mess, and Jiang Cheng’s heart was in his throat.

“A-Ling, what—” He’s alive. He has to be alive.

“He’s got a fever, and he’s calling for you. Please. I don’t know what to do,” Wei Wuxian pleaded, looking helpless in a way that he had never seemed before.

Jiang Cheng relaxed slightly as Wei Wuxian’s words sunk in. He already had Sandu unsheathed and was marching outside with Wei Wuxian. “How long has he had the fever? Why didn’t anyone tell me? How did you get here?”

“He just got it this morning, but he didn’t tell anyone because he thought it was nothing. We only noticed when it spiked this afternoon. It’s a good thing I was there at Koi Tower with the rest of the juniors. I came here on Suibian as fast as I could.”

Jiang Cheng looked at the sky as he stepped outside the entrance. It was evening now. He swallowed and hopped onto his sword, pulling Wei Wuxian onto it before he could protest.

As they flew into the sky, headed towards Lanling full speed, Jiang Cheng swallowed. “What were you doing there?”

“Oh,” Wei Wuxian seemed hesitant to speak. “Jin Ling needed some help with some things, so he called me.” Of course, he did. Why would he call me when he has you? “It was no big deal, Jiang Cheng. He knows that you’ve been busy and he just didn’t want to cause you more stress.”

Jiang Cheng snorted. That was easy for Wei Wuxian to say. Everyone actually wanted him around. He was everyone’s first choice. So where did that leave Jiang Cheng?

They flew in silence for a few moments before Jiang Cheng remembered what Wei Wuxian had said as soon as he had burst into his office.

“You said that A-Ling was calling for me,” Jiang Cheng spoke. A knot tightened in his stomach at the thought. He imagined a feverish Jin Ling calling out for him, and for a moment, he couldn’t breathe. They had to go faster.

“Yeah, he— he had a high fever and he kept murmuring your name in his sleep. Kept saying he needed his jiujiu, even after he woke up. We found him fainted in his office in the afternoon, y’know.” Wei Wuxian said.

Jiang Cheng gritted his teeth, clenching his fists. This was all his fault. He should have been there for A-Ling. He should have visited him. He should have—

Koi Tower appeared in Jiang Cheng’s vision and he almost leapt off his sword.

“A-Ling!” Jiang Cheng pushed open the door to Jin Ling’s room. “A-Li—”

“Jiujiu,” Jin Ling spoke. He was sitting up, leaning against a soft pillow. He seemed fine. Jiang Cheng’s posture slumped slightly. “What are you doing here?”

Jin Ling looked surprised. As if there was no need for Jiang Cheng to be there. Well, fuck that.

“What do you mean what am I doing here?” Jiang Cheng asked as he strode over to stand to Jin Ling’s side. “Am I not allowed to enter my nephew’s room? Who are you to demand answers from me when you cannot even take care of yourself?”

Jin Ling blinked at Jiang Cheng, and a tenseness that Jiang Cheng hadn’t even known Jin Ling had been holding in his shoulders, disappeared. “I—”

“I don’t show up for a few weeks and you forget you have another uncle!” Jiang Cheng knew that he was getting worked up over nothing. It was just a fever; it was supposed to be nothing. But he’d had enough. Jin Ling not taking care of himself was the last straw and all bets were off.

If being Jin Ling’s temperamental and strict uncle would mean that Jin Ling wouldn’t get hurt and that Jiang Cheng could protect him, then Jiang Cheng would happily take that title back. “You forget you have another home and just decide to not come visit Lotus Pier. Not only that but you don’t even write me letters! You think you can get rid of me that easily, you brat?! Huh?

You think you can just keep things from me and not have me find out about them? Well that’s too bad because I’m going to find out anyway! And I’m going to come nag you about them. I made a promise to your mother and father to take care of you, and I’m going to keep that promise!”

“Jiujiu,” Jin Ling looked at Jiang Cheng with a soft look in his eyes, and as he coughed, Jiang Cheng was reminded that the kid was sick. He had a high fever.

Jiang Cheng sat down with a frown on his face, taking the wet cloth lying beside A-Ling and dipping it in the cold water kept in a bowl. Gently squeezing the cloth, Jiang Cheng kept it on A-Ling’s forehead. He touched the back of his hand carefully to Jin Ling’s neck and his cheeks. The kid was burning up.

“Jiujiu,” A-Ling said a little more meaningfully. He grasped Jiang Cheng’s hand in both of his own and held on.

“A-Ling,” Jiang Cheng whispered softly. He swallowed the bile rising up his throat. “What were you thinking? Why didn’t you call me here?”

“I thought—” Jin Ling looked away from him.

Jiang Cheng used his sleeves to wipe the sweat off of Jin Ling’s cheeks and neck before keeping another wet cloth on the neck. “You though what?”

“That you didn’t care anymore,” Jin Ling muttered. What?!

“What?” Jiang Cheng gaped at Jin Ling. What had given him that idea? “What made you think that?”

“You— you started acting really weird, Jiujiu. You didn’t ask me to stay safe and take care during night hunts anymore and you didn’t tag along on this recent one until I asked you to, and told you that Wei Wuxian was coming too. You didn’t demand to see what I’d kept in my pouch or check if I’d packed the flares and tied my clarity bell around my waist. You came over to Koi Tower to visit me but you didn’t ask about the elders or how my sect leader duties were going. I had to ask you to help me instead.

When we went out to the lake to take a break, instead of keeping an eye on us or joining us, you just fell asleep. When you found out that Sizhui and Lan Jingyi were hurt, you just tended to them and walked away. You didn’t even ask if I was okay, you weren’t even mad or angry at me, and you didn’t even shout at me or tell me to be more careful. You just— You just didn’t care!”

“A-Ling—” Jiang Cheng’s heart hurt to see his kid in so much pain. There were tears in Jin Ling’s eyes and he had gone red the more he had spoken. But he wasn’t done yet.

“And then during this recent night hunt, you didn’t even come to help us. You just stood there and watched! Even when that second monster was about to kill me.” Tears fell from Jin Ling’s eyes and he turned to look away from Jiang Cheng, but Jiang Cheng firmly held Jin Ling’s face in his hands. He wiped away Jin Ling’s tears with his thumbs.

“It’s like you don’t even care about me anymore.” Jin Ling brokenly whispered, and Jiang Cheng wondered how they had gotten here. How had they reached this point of almost no return?

It was because Jiang Cheng was a fool. “A-Ling, that’s not true. You know that. You know how much I care about you. You’re the most important person in the world to me.” Jiang Cheng said softly.

“Then why were you acting like that?” Jin Ling demanded. “Why were you acting like— like Wei Wuxian?!”

“Hey!” Wei Wuxian protested, but neither of them paid him any attention.

“I thought you wanted me to act that way,” Jiang Cheng said, and Jin Ling blinked at him confusedly. Jin Ling looked so tired that Jiang Cheng just wanted to pull him into his arms and sing to him until he fell fast asleep. “You told me to, remember, when we fought a while ago. I didn’t let you go out with your friends so you said that Wei Wuxian would have allowed you to go. You said that he lets Sizhui go anywhere he wants and that you wished he were your guardian. So, I— I tried to be…more like him.”

“What?!” Wei Wuxian exclaimed. “Jin Ling you wanted me—”

“No!” Jin Ling almost shouted. “That wasn’t what I meant. Jiujiu, I was angry and frustrated. You never usually take me that seriously. What happened this time?”

Jiang Cheng tried to hold back the tears that sprung into his own eyes. “I just…I just wanted to be the fun and cool uncle that you wanted me to be, A-Ling. For once. I wanted you to— I didn’t want you to—” choose Wei Wuxian over me “—hate me because I couldn’t be as amazing as Wei Wuxian.” Jiang Cheng let out a sharp breath, feeling like a shard of broken glass was stuck in his chest. Breathing hurt.

“Jiang Cheng…” Wei Wuxian spoke, but Jiang Cheng didn’t want to hear it. He didn’t want to hear the pity in his brother’s voice.

But he didn’t have to, because Jin Ling spoke up in response. “Well, I was lying you know. Wei Wuxian lets Sizhui go wherever he wants but only because he goes with him. Just like he follows us on night hunts and brings out his flute any time anyone so much as breathes. He says it’s because he wants to teach us things, but he just makes us do things on our own and plays pranks on us. And he’s a shitty teacher, Jiujiu. He’s nowhere near as good as you are.

And every time anything happens to any one of us, even if it’s a scratch, he just freaks out. Especially if it’s Sizhui, cause Sizhui always gets hurt. He tries to reassure Wei Wuxian, but it just ends up with the both of them hugging each other and saying they love each other.” Jin Ling made a disgusted face.

“And if, unluckily, any one of us gets hurt so badly that we start crying, then he begins to cry too, and then so does everyone else. I’m the only one who just sits there wishing that you were there too. Because I know if you’d have been there with us then you wouldn’t have cried, you would have actually done something to help us.” Jin Ling scowled as he looked at Jiang Cheng.

Jiang Cheng had never loved the kid more than he did in that moment. Without even thinking about it, Jiang Cheng hugged Jin Ling tightly. “I missed you so much, A-Ling,” he admitted.

He heard Jin Ling swallowing heavily. “I missed you too, Jiujiu.”

“I’m sorry I made you feel like I didn’t care. That promise I told you I made, to take care of you and always protect you. To never let any harm come to you. That wasn’t just a promise that I made to your parents, A-Ling. That was a promise that I made to myself first. And I intend to always keep it.”

Jin Ling brushed away more tears as they appeared and leaned in to hug Jiang Cheng again. “I’m sorry too, Jiujiu. I never should have said those things about Wei Wuxian. You are a fun and cool uncle. At least for me, you are. And I don’t care what anyone else thinks about you, they can fight me if they want. I don’t want you to change, Jiujiu. I don’t want you to stop caring about me. You’re the best uncle. Wei Wuxian is the lame one.”

“Hey!”

“I will never stop caring about you, A-Ling.” Jiang Cheng promised. He pulled the kid into his arms and softly caressed his hair. He was hot with fever, and they were surrounded by Jin Ling’s friends, and Wei Wuxian, but Jiang Cheng could care less. “Sleep, A-Ling. I’m here. I’ve got you and I’m going to take care of you, okay?”

Jin Ling melted into Jiang Cheng’s embrace, closing his eyes and sighing softly. “Okay, Jiujiu. Goodnight.”

“Night, A-Ling.” Jiang Cheng murmured.

“You know,” Lan Jingyi spoke up. “I think Sect Leader Jiang is a really cool uncle, too. Remember when he patched us up at the lake, Sizhui? Wei Wuxian just stood by and did nothing.” This Lan kid was really starting to grow on Jiang Cheng, he wouldn’t lie.

“I remember,” Sizhui spoke up with a smile.

“And I’ve heard tales of Jin Ling having fun at Lotus Pier, so I think he might be a really fun uncle too.” Ouyang Zizhen added. Had Jiang Cheng mentioned what a smart kid he thought the Ouyang heir he was before?

“Hmm, he might be,” Sizhui agreed, making Jiang Cheng narrow his eyes. He could spot the slight smirk on the kid’s lips. “We’ll just have to see proof of that then, won’t we?”

Jiang Cheng blinked at that. Had Lan Sizhui just invited himself to Lotus Pier that easily? Wei Wuxian really had been the worst influence on the kid.

“What is happening here? Are you forgetting that I’m the fun, cool uncle here?” Wei Wuxian dramatically said

Jiang Cheng shook his head and smiled to himself.

“Oh my god, look at that. Sect Leader Jiang is smiling.”

“He is. How nice.”

“He looks so handsome when he smiles.”

Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes, his cheeks flushing at the comments made by Jin Ling’s friends. As he looked down at his nephew, who was fast asleep in his arms, he realised that the last part of his project was complete. He could smile like Wei Wuxian after all, and charm those around him.

He had already inspired the loyalty of an entire sect, the Yunmeng Jiang sect, and the utter, complete devotion of his nephew somehow. Jiang Cheng supposed he had just been too blind to notice it until now.

[needtherapy]

open always petal by petal (ch 1)

Song Lan knows his only passenger, Cao Huan, is more secrets than truths, but he's still the best passenger Song Lan has ever had: paid up front, self-sufficient, and silent.

It shouldn't matter that Cao Huan plays the guqin like his heart is broken.

It shouldn't matter that his smiles light up the darkest corners of Fuxue's passageways.

It shouldn't matter that he makes Song Lan curious, curious in a way he hasn't felt in years.

It's just an ordinary transport, a regular fare, a mostly-honest way to make a living. All they have to do is get from Sichuan Station to Caiyi Port. The galaxy may be a dangerous place, but Song Lan is very good at his job, and this should be an easy two-week trip.

The rest doesn't matter. It doesn't.

READ ON AO3

Notes: Rated E for Explicit. Title from e.e. cummings' poem "somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond". Thanks to @cirilien​, @coslyons​, @treemaidengeek​ and tucuxi (AO3) for the beta reads!

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

⋆ Day 0 ⋆

The papers are fakes, Song Lan thinks, but damn good ones. It’s really only the feel of the paper—a bit too clean, a bit too smooth—that tips him off. The ID badge is probably fake too.

He examines the man standing in front of him. He’s handsome in a patrician sort of way, if a bit too thin, and nearly as tall as Song Lan himself, dressed in graceful Eastern Sector robes that rustle the way only real silk does. They’re a far cry from Song Lan’s utilitarian jacket and comfortable shirts and pants in shades of constant black, only a small step up from the uniform he used to wear.

Song Lan wonders why this obviously wealthy man would need forged travel docs. He doesn’t really care, of course. Everyone has their secrets. But he doesn’t need trouble with the Goldlighters. It’s already tricky enough to be unaffiliated without drawing the attention of the galaxy’s most powerful economic cultivation guild.

With a sigh, Song Lan fishes the comm out of a pocket and holds it to the tiny neural node on the side of his head.

[Why the fake name?] the comm speaker asks in a cheerful, melodic voice that still twinges painfully in his chest. It’s been five years. He should really get the damn thing re-coded.

Instead of being offended, the man—supposedly named Cao Huan—tilts a wry, weary smile at him.

“I had hoped to be anonymous a little longer,” he says, his elegant accent denoting excessive amounts of privilege and education. “If you require my real credentials, I can produce them.”

Song Lan shrugs and shakes his head. As long as the man is legit, he can call himself whatever he wants, but now Song Lan has another question. Frowning, he lifts the comm again.

[Why not just travel on a Goldlighter transport? You’re headed for Caiyi. It’s a major port. You know it’ll take two weeks to travel through all four sectors in my ship? The trip might be more dangerous than on a sanctioned vessel,] Xingchen’s voice asks.

Song Lan is under no illusions about his typical fares. There’s usually a good reason they want to travel without questions, and usually a good reason they choose Fuxue. He might be unaffiliated, but he’s not cheap. The galaxy is a dangerous place, and he’s very good at his job. In ten years, he’s only lost one person. It was, however, the only one who mattered.

“I am returning to my family after...some time away. I am in no hurry,” Cao Huan answers, with an edge that Song Lan takes to mean the topic is closed.

Well, he’s happy to take the man’s money; he paid extra to be the only passenger. Song Lan shrugs again and motions for Cao Huan to follow him on a very short tour: kitchen, guest bedrooms, sonic lavs, the foolishly indulgent bath, infirmary, bridge, engineering, cargo bay, plus half a dozen corridors that serve as storage, computer terminals, short-term passenger seating, and whatever else Song Lan needs them to be. He’s even strung up hammocks in emergencies.

[Make yourself at home,] he says with a nod and quick, slanted smile.

“Thank you Captain Song,” the man says with a wide, genuine smile that starts in the corner of his mouth and spreads, opening like a flower across his face. It surprises Song Lan in a way he can’t quite articulate, as though neither of them expected today to hold any need for smiles. “I have been told you are the best pilot, and I look forward to the journey.”

Song Lan finishes prepping Fuxue with supplies for the two-week flight, plus extras, because it’s always better to plan for the worst. He checks to make sure his one luxury—six skeins of outrageously expensive qiviut yarn—is carefully stowed in waterproof cases. Having warm socks and something to do with his hands in the long dark expanse of space is worth any price. Cao Huan busies himself with loading his own gear, waving Song Lan away when he offers to help.

“Commander Song! Commander Song Lan!”

Song Lan turns at the familiar voice calling a half-forgotten title, but it takes him a minute to recall the person: Ouyang Ju. They had served together some ten years ago in the war that brought down the Wen High Chancellor. Fat lot of good that had done.

“Man, it is you! Haven’t seen you in ages,” Ouyang grins, slapping Song Lan on the back. “How’s it going?”

Song Lan tries not to flinch. He has never understood the need people have to touch each other when they’re talking. It’s annoying. He smiles and tips his head, the universal motion for a polite and disengaged fine, and hopes he won’t have to elaborate. It’s not that he doesn’t like using the comm. He would just rather not use it.

Alright, maybe it’s that he doesn’t like using it.

The man’s face twists with sudden, embarrassed recollection, and Song Lan knows what’s coming next.

“Sorry to hear about your partner and...everything,” the older man says with an apologetic grimace. “He was a great guy.”

[He was,] Song Lan acknowledges, giving in to the blasted voice box. [Thanks.]

“Hey, I’m XO on the Goldlight Ren,” Ouyang nods at the huge transport vessel resting in the nearby docking bay, just visible through wide banks of windows designed, Song Lan assumes, to show off the might and power of the ships that travel here. Nothing like Fuxue, who might be ninety meters if he squints just right, can be flown by a single person, and only requires a landing pad.

“Anything you ever need, you tell me, okay? I owe you.” Without waiting for a response, Ouyang strides away, whistling a fairly dirty bar song.

Song Lan watches him go, wishing it was that easy, wishing he could reduce the war to favors performed, a series of tit-for-tat exchanges that balance to zero instead of a perpetually-red loss column.

Wishes are pointless. Only the road ahead matters.

Song Lan sees his new passenger idly poking through a bag, head dipped away, back turned, and something about his posture rings a distant alarm bell in Song Lan’s mind. He has flown the route from Sichuan Base to Caiyi Port hundreds of times in his life. It should feel exactly the same as every other trip. And yet this time, he senses trouble brewing, and he does not like it.

⋆ Day 3 ⋆

Other than the unexpected music, it’s almost like flying alone. Cao Huan seems to have a sixth sense for knowing where Song Lan will be and avoiding him. He only occasionally catches glimpses of the tall man, white robes swirling behind him as he disappears through doorways or around corners.

It suits Song Lan just fine, and he laughs to himself about his initial concern. Cao Huan is the best passenger Song Lan has ever had: paid up front, self-sufficient, and silent. Song Lan finishes his first sock less than two days out of port, a record.

The only place he consistently runs into his passenger is in the kitchen. After the third day, it occurs to Song Lan that, as strange as it seems, it must be on purpose. Song Lan gets the definite impression that Cao Huan waits for him to arrive before he eats, as though it’s some ceremony he wishes to observe.

There’s no good reason for it, but Song Lan starts to eat his meals at the narrow kitchen table too. After all, there’s no reason not to, either. He just doesn’t usually eat in the kitchen. He’s grateful to discover that conversation is not the reason Cao Huan prefers company; meals continue to be quiet, peaceful affairs.

“Captain Song?”

Cao Huan’s voice startles Song Lan into dropping the knife he’s using to stir his...whatever this goop is.

“My apologies, but...will you join me for tea tomorrow morning? It is not as enjoyable to drink tea by myself.”

Without meaning to, Song Lan looks at the cabinet that contains the “tea” and “coffee,” thinking, it’s never enjoyable to drink that swill, and Cao Huan laughs.

It’s only a laugh on the barest technicality, a soft huff of air, but it changes things so profoundly, Song Lan has trouble staying on his feet. Suddenly, Cao Huan is a person, not a passenger, not a potential problem. The word no forms in his head even as he feels himself nodding.

Cao Huan smiles and inclines his chin, pleased, and Song Lan finds himself smiling back. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him. He’s not usually so soft-hearted. Xingchen was the nice one, he reminds himself, and look how that turned out. The cruelty is the only way he can snap himself out of the whispering camaraderie, a pointless train of thought, and back into his role as captain of a ship, nothing more.

[Captain, your attention is required.]

As if to punctuate the computer’s notification, an alarm sounds—unexpected, as this part of space should be smooth and easy sailing. Song Lan grimaces, shrugging apologetically.

“I’m coming,” he signs to the computer’s security camera, before running back to the bridge.

It turns out to be nothing major, only a debris field. Either a small ship had a catastrophe here or a large ship dumped trash. Neither option is particularly heartening. Bad enough if ships are carelessly leaving obstructions on a primary transit route, worse if a ship has been attacked and destroyed here where it should be safe. He knows the Joint Senate is doing its best, and Hanguang-jun, the new chairman, is by far the best leader the four sectors have had in decades, but it’s hard to protect everyone.

There’s no signs of life anywhere after three scans, and Song Lan steers them out of the mess before he resumes course and autopilot.

He doesn’t go back to the kitchen, though.

It isn’t wise, he tells himself, to think of passengers as anything but temporary. Even if they seem nice, even if they’re friendly, they always reach their destination and move on. That’s what he likes about flying transport.

Like clockwork, at 8 pm the music starts. The first night on the ship, Song Lan had thought he was going crazy, hearing the eerie twang of an instrument he didn’t think still existed outside of private art collections.

But no, his passenger had been seated in the mostly-empty cargo bay, eyes closed, playing the guqin. An actual wooden guqin. The music had echoed through the hold, wrapping its notes around Song Lan and reverberating in his chest. He had listened with a mix of disbelief and reverence to the beautiful melody flowing from the fingers of the obviously skilled musician. He listened, in fact, until Cao Huan lifted his hands off the strings and sighed, a long, plaintive sound of grief that piqued Song Lan’s curiosity more than was healthy, and he’d hurried away before Cao Huan noticed him.

The next night had been the same, the music winding into access shafts, around the bridge, even through engineering.

Which Song Lan knows, because he tried all of those places to escape it.

Tonight, though, he gives up. If he is going to be treated to an impromptu concert by a master musician every night, he may as well enjoy it. He knits on the catwalk over the cargo hold and listens, wondering if the song has words, wondering what it means to Cao Huan, wondering how long you had to practice to make the guqin sound like an ocean of sorrow.

⋆ Day 4 ⋆

Evidently, Cao Huan had not been referring to Fuxue’s stores of tea.

He had his own.

Song Lan tells himself to stop being surprised that a man who carries a guqin and can afford a private transport would have a jar of aged white tea that smells like honey and the summer sun. He sits at the table across from Cao Huan and watches him gracefully pour tea, holding back his draping sleeve with one hand.

Cao Huan notices Song Lan’s raised eyebrows.

“You must think me overly indulgent,” he says, pouring his own cup. “I am not particular about many things, but I do enjoy good tea. I am fortunate that it is something my...my family can provide.”

Oh, Song Lan thinks, his family must be tea merchants, which does explain quite a bit, and he feels a little guilty for judging the man on appearances. He wonders if it’s flash-cloned or actually soil-grown, and he peers into the cup, considering the color and shape of the leaves he can see, as though they will give him an answer.

“It is soil-grown,” Cao Huan answers Song Lan’s curious thought, and smiles when Song Lan looks startled. “It is the obvious question. Unless you were seeking your fate in the leaves?”

Song Lan snorts, and Cao Huan laughs again, again that soft exhale that feels more intimate than raucous laughter. It highlights faint lines around his eyes and softens his usually-tranquil angular features with a hint of playful teasing.

“Perhaps you do not believe in fate? Or perhaps you do not believe tea can tell the future. It is considered a noble art, Captain Song. Could so many fortune-telling market grannies be wrong?”

Song Lan laughs, a sadly rusty sound, he thinks with an internal wince, and shakes his head. The man looks pleased.

“Captain Song, may I ask a nosy question?”

Sometimes when people say things like that, they mean I am going to ask a nosy question whether you like it or not, but Cao Huan sounds sincere. Song Lan considers. With a sigh, he finds the comm.

[You may ask. I can’t guarantee that I can answer.]

The man’s mouth twitches in an almost smile. “That is fair. It is only...I noticed you signed to the camera yesterday. Do you…” he pauses, seeming to reevaluate his question, which is good, because Song Lan has frozen.

He forces himself to relax. Hand sign languages are no longer illegal, but he still can’t stop the fluttering fear from pooling in his gut.

“Does the computer understand your hand signs?” Cao Huan finishes, and Song Lan practices breathing normally.

[Yes. It’s easier to sign than find the comm sometimes, especially if I’m in a hurry,] he says through the little speaker, only a little defiantly. He won’t let this man shame him.

“Would you prefer to speak this way?” Cao Huan asks, lifting his hands and signing as he speaks.

Song Lan just stares at him.

And stares.

And stares until Cao Huan’s eyebrows raise. “If you would rather not…”

“No, I do prefer it,” Song Lan signs hurriedly, not wanting him to withdraw the offer. “It’s just...unusual to find someone who knows hand signs these days.”

The High Chancellor had been a paranoid and suspicious man, and he had outlawed the use of hand signs decades ago, fearing them to be the language of bandits and assassins. He wasn’t entirely wrong; hunters and thieves did use the signs, but so did countless others. His replacement, who preferred to be called Xiandu, wasn’t much better. All in all, almost thirty years passed before the current Joint Senate legalized them again after Xiandu’s death three years ago. In so many places around the four sectors, the sign languages that correlated to the spoken languages have been lost entirely.

Song Lan had learned the sign language after Xingchen died five years ago, after he was left for dead, after he decided he was done with the future. His teacher was a wizened old woman on an unaffiliated space station, Rogue Sky, and she was most likely one of the High Chancellor’s feared bandits. Song Lan hadn’t cared then and he didn’t care now. All he knew was that she’d refused to let him wallow in misery, no matter how much he felt he’d earned it.

Song Lan still takes her snowflake cakes whenever he’s near Qinghe space. It’s the least he can do.

Cao Huan nods in acknowledgement, still signing as he talks. Even though it’s unnecessary, Song Lan finds he likes watching, the words and motions blending together to make something wholly different.

“I have always loved languages. This one is particularly beautiful and unique.” He grins suddenly, eyes twinkling with mischief, and the expression turns his face brilliantly luminous. “Plus, it was an appealing novelty to learn something forbidden.”

Song Lan’s first reaction to the man’s captivating smile is an unwelcome surprise. Instinctively, he covers his embarrassment—which he hopes has gone unnoticed—with something he’s more familiar with.

“I did not have the luxury of enjoying the novelty,” his fingers cut angrily through the air. “I was taught illegally on an unaffiliated station by a former bandit, but it was better than never speaking again.”

Swiftly he stands and goes back to his room to berate himself. He isn’t sure which is worse, yelling at his passenger or feeling a knee-buckling surge of desire for him. He has no business doing either.

Song Lan flops on his bed and stares at the ceiling, at the sword that hangs above his head. Shuanghua, Xingchen’s pride and joy, the sword he brought with him when he joined Song Lan’s crew, the sword that couldn’t save him in the end. Couldn’t save either of them. The guilt throbs in his gut, as familiar as the vibrations of Fuxue’s heart, and he sinks into it. This is an emotion he understands.

[Captain, do you need assistance?] his computer asks, and Song Lan wants to laugh. It seems that even Fuxue thinks he’s being a moody child.

He shakes his head and signs to the camera. “What would you do if I did? I’m the captain and the crew.”

The computer is silent, the question apparently having stumped the AI.

[Zichen, do you want to talk about it?]

“No,” his hands say emphatically. He’s not an expert, but he’s pretty sure it’s not going to help to get a psych eval from a computer that’s using his dead partner’s voice.

“Captain Song?”

And now Cao Huan is on the other side of the door. Why can’t everyone just let him sulk in peace?

“Captain Song, I profoundly apologize. It was a terrible, insensitive thing I said, and I am so sorry. It is not an excuse but...I have not been around...people much lately. Evidently I am still quite bad at it. I will not disturb you…”

Song Lan yanks open the door.

“It’s nothing,” he signs slowly, calmly. “I overreacted.” Song Lan smiles ruefully. “I’m not around people much either. Thank you for the tea.”

Cao Huan blinks in surprise, and his face shifts through a series of expressions Song Lan doesn’t recognize before landing on careful neutrality.

“You’re welcome. I...I would be happy to share tea with you every day. If you wish.”

He looks like he’s considering saying something else, but he doesn’t, just nods his head once and goes. Song Lan doesn’t exactly watch him walk down the passageway, one fist resting on the small of his back, but he doesn’t not watch him either.

⋆ Day 5 ⋆

Song Lan is amused to discover that Cao Huan is insatiably curious about everything on Fuxue. It’s not hard to believe he’s been isolated for a while. He is unfailingly polite, and still mostly avoids Song Lan, but occasionally, Song Lan finds him in the oddest places: staring at the engines, examining at the computer core, meditating on the catwalk, sorting through supplies in the infirmary. Song Lan wonders if he’s bored.

He finds Cao Huan on the bridge one day, running his lithe musician’s fingers over the flight panel, murmuring something to himself. Song Lan knows as soon as Cao Huan is aware of his presence. He doesn’t startle, exactly, but he stiffens and steps back slightly. His face, when he turns to Song Lan, though, is tranquil and uncomplicated.

“My pardon, Captain,” he nods, and steps to the side as though he intends to move past Song Lan, but for once, Song Lan is curious.

“Were you talking to Fuxue?” he asks before Cao Huan looks away.

Cao Huan’s neck flushes, and he shrugs. “I have heard these Jian-class AIs have distinctive personalities, as it were. I prefer to err on the side of caution.”

Song Lan doesn’t understand what he means, but Cao Huan is still blushing, the tips of his ears turning a distracting shade of pink, and it makes him want to know.

“I don’t understand,” he says, and Cao Huan sighs.

“I was introducing myself,” he explains. “It seemed courteous.”

Song Lan can’t help his smile. He wonders if Cao Huan introduced himself to Fuxue with his real name.

“Yes, Fuxue is somewhat unique,” he agrees. “My...my partner was a gifted tech, and he gave her more autonomy than is customary since we flew alone so often.”

Cao Huan nods. “So I gathered. She tells me about him sometimes. Is her voice…” he pauses, noticing the look of surprise on Song Lan’s face. “Is that strange?”

Fuxue talks to Song Lan, and of course, she used to talk to Xingchen—one of the reasons, Song Lan suspects, that his ship is so unusual. Talking to Xingchen for extended periods of time would make anyone a bit odd. But as far as he knows, the ship has never spoken to any other passenger, much less talked to them about Xingchen. He can’t decide why Fuxue would start now, whether it’s a bug in the programming or something about Cao Huan specifically.

“Yes,” Song Lan acknowledges. “She still manages to surprise me sometimes.” He smiles up at the camera in the corner of the room and adds, “Don’t make trouble, my love.”

“I believe she likes the music,” Cao Huan says, stepping around Song Lan and moving into the passageway. “I apologize again for intruding on your bridge.” He smiles, a minute flicker, and Song Lan catches his sleeve impulsively, probably foolishly.

“You are welcome on the bridge any time,” he signs swiftly, before Cao Huan can leave. “Whether I am here or not.”

Cao Huan considers for a moment and nods, his smile a little wider, a little more genuine, and Song Lan doesn’t regret his words at all.

⋆ Day 7 ⋆

“How did you learn this?” Cao Huan asks one day, touching the toe of the sock Song Lan is knitting.

They are sitting in the two bridge seats, and Song Lan is working through a heel turn, shaping the rows to reinforce the curve. He finishes the section before he sets down the sock to answer.

“I learned when I was a boy. I grew up with scrappers, and there was a lot of downtime.”

Cao Huan is silent, rubbing the soft wool between his fingers, and Song Lan wonders why he bothered to ask.

“Would you like to learn?” Song Lan asks, and Cao Huan shakes his head slowly.

“Yes, but I am not certain I will ever...I do not know what my future holds. There may be no point in learning.”

He sounds so bleak and disappointed, dozens of questions pop in and out of Song Lan’s head, and he firmly shuts them behind a door. He isn’t going to intrude on this man’s private life.

“There is always value in learning something new,” he signs instead, and Cao Huan smiles ruefully.

“You sound like my brother,” he says, then snaps his mouth closed and hides the expressiveness of his face behind the neutral mask Song Lan is beginning to recognize, even if he’s still not certain what it means.

“Mm,” he agrees, one of the few sounds he can still make. To his surprise, Cao Huan laughs.

“Now you truly do sound like him. He is not a man of many words, but he is very eloquent with noncommittal sounds,” Cao Huan explains when Song Lan looks puzzled.

“You’re close?” Song Lan asks, and the shuttered expression returns.

Still, the man answers after a pause. “Yes, we were, but...he is gone now, living his own life. I am proud of him, but...it makes going home seem...different.”

Every word is reluctantly spoken, as though giving shape to them makes them dangerous. Song Lan vows not to ask any other questions, but Cao Huan keeps talking, and he can’t very well tell him to stop, either.

“Home used to mean people, but...they are grown or changed or…” his eyes close in obvious pain, and Song Lan wants to tell him to stop or distract him with a starboard nebula, but there’s nothing, just this palpable misery.

“Or gone,” he finishes. “Home is only a place now. It should be enough but…”

Song Lan understands this much at least.

“It’s too quiet.” He finishes Cao Huan’s sentence, and he means that home has always been Fuxue, but it no longer hums with love and laughter and Xingchen. It is the same place it was five years ago, but...it isn’t.

Abruptly, Cao Huan leans forward and squeezes Song Lan’s knee, his face softening in sympathy. It’s only a brief touch, but Song Lan’s body reacts like the brush of fingers is a line of electricity, both sharp and crushing, nothing like he expected, not that he could ever have expected this particular cataclysm. Has it been so long, he wonders, since someone touched him with kindness?

He stands, covering his sudden need to escape by hunting through one of the storage bins for a bigger set of knitting needles and a chunkier-gauge yarn. He sets them on Cao Huan’s lap.

“You may as well learn,” he signs with an easy smile. “We still have a week of travel left.”

Cao Huan laughs in disbelief when Song Lan shows him how to cast the yarn onto the needle, but he turns out to be a quick study, which Song Lan should have expected, given his dexterity with the guqin. Song Lan admits to himself that he likes the way the man’s face lights with the satisfaction of meeting a challenge, even more the way he brandishes a square of fairly smooth rows with such pride.

The quiet stretches out like a lazy cat, broken by the sound of clicking needles, and it settles serenely over Song Lan. Usually on transports, he is busy every waking moment, herding children, answering questions, sometimes even preventing bloodshed. He could get used to this uneventful kind of trip.

As if the gods have heard his thoughts, a piercing blue alarm sounds. Not an environmental emergency. Blue is an enemy attack.

Song Lan jams his needles into the yarn and tosses the whole bundle into the corner before turning to the screens, grabbing the yoke with one hand and snapping the comm headset onto his neural node with the other.

Where? he asks Fuxue through their mental link, and Xingchen’s voice relays the coordinates through the overhead speakers: 403 225 687.

He enlarges the image. Junk pirates. A mini-fleet of five. It could be worse, it could be Red Robe mercs or Goldlighters or soldiers of any major faction, but he isn’t looking forward to a run and gun. He scours the sector for a nearby...anything. There’s an asteroid field and two tiny stations, one in either direction, all so much further than is particularly helpful. He makes a decision and changes course, doubling back on the pirates and surging past them.

[Cao Huan, we have pirates,] he says via the comm. [We’re going to try to outrun them first.] He doesn’t bother explaining what the other option is.

“Give me tactical control,” Cao Huan says, calm and insistent, and even though he has no reason to think this man has ever even flown a ship before, Song Lan flips on the secondary pilot display and unlocks the manual gun controls.

[Fuxue is adapted for neural node. You’ll have to shoot manually, but it might at least scare them off,] he explains.

Cao Huan grins. “Or I might surprise you, Captain Song.”

He does, of course. Song Lan is busy avoiding the pirates’ attacks, so he can’t watch as carefully as he suspects he'd like to, but his new co-pilot seems to be racing through calculating targeting coordinates like he’s half computer. Interestingly, he isn’t aiming to destroy, only damage, and he knocks out the first two ships’ navigational cores with single, identical, virtually impossible shots.

Fuxue is easily faster than one of the ships, and Cao Huan clips its starboard wing, only dislodging the thruster, before they pull away. It’s enough to send the forty-meter ship spinning out of control in the opposite direction.

The last two though...they’re a problem. The smaller of the two has an expert pilot and gunner, and Fuxue takes several hits. One explodes against the side of the lifeboat bay, others destroy sensor arrays and scatter pieces of shielding into space. They’re going to have to do something drastic or they aren’t going to survive this.

[Rolleram?] he asks Cao Huan, not entirely sure if he’ll understand, but he nods once and waits for Song Lan to turn.

Song Lan rolls Fuxue in an arc and flies directly at the larger ship, avoiding a few shots before dodging around the ship on its right side, swooping down, using the ship as a blind. With a hard bank, he brings Fuxue up on the other side of the big pirate ship. The smaller ship is right in front of them, a perfect shot.

[Now!] he yells, but Cao Huan has already fired the phaser cannons, and without even looking, Song Lan knows he’s calculated Fuxue’s path and the pirate’s trajectory perfectly.

[Target disabled,] Fuxue confirms. [Nice shot, XO.]

Cao Huan’s mouth tips in the corner. “Thank you, Fuxue,” he says.

Song Lan shakes his head at them both. Since when did the passenger become his executive officer, and who thanks a ship’s AI?

But there’s no time to celebrate. The last ship, the largest ship, is less agile than Fuxue, but more heavily armed and is throwing everything at them in a last ditch effort. With a jarring lurch, Fuxue shudders, and Song Lan grimaces.

[Port wing…]

[Yes I know,] he snaps. He only barely has enough rudder to pivot Fuxue, pure luck more than anything. They won’t survive one more impact like that.

“Wei Drop?” Cao Huan suggests, and Song Lan snorts.

[Play dead?] No one who has ever seen the Wei Drop is fooled by it twice. But even as he derides the idea, he realizes it might work. It’s going to have to. Cao Huan is a good enough shot, and they don’t have a lot of choices left.

[Fine, but if this doesn’t work, you owe me a ship,] he says, killing Fuxue’s engine, shutting down all the systems, and letting his ship slowly start to drift oh-so-subtly in a circle.

It works. He can’t believe it works, but the pirates stop shooting, probably reluctant to break their new salvage any more than necessary, and coast toward Fuxue.

When Fuxue has made a full rotation, when Song Lan can almost see the attacking crew through the shielded fore windows, he looks at Cao Huan, who nods.

It happens so fast, the two of them working in unison to flip on all the power, stabilize Fuxue, take aim, and fire twice. At the last second, the pirate ship banks, trying to escape the shot, but they’re too close, far too close, and instead of disabling the wing or navigation, or whatever Cao Huan was aiming for, the ship explodes in a blinding blast of nuclear white light.

The last thing Song Lan thinks, the last thing he has time to think before the shockwave hits them, is Xingchen is going to be so mad about his ship.

[tangledinmdzs]

hihi! could you do a scenario where the juniors and the reader make up after an argument? whether it's a serious argument or over something petty is up to you!

heyo~

yes yes, i’ve just written a light ver. of this request that you can read at the link embedded! here’s my attempt at angsty vibes lol

i hope you enjoy~!

[ver. dark]

[b/f/n = best friend’s name]

»»————-　♡　————-««

Lan Sizhui

it was all one big misunderstanding 

it had to be

because that was the only reason that you both were fighting and shouting and yelling like you were right now

right?

fights and Sizhui don’t seem like words that would be in the same sentence

especially not with you

but in any relationships it was normal to have those kinds of bumps

but was it normal for years and years of practically smooth roads to suddenly be smashed and buried with one big explosive...argument?

it had started out as an argument first

then more words that he been understood the wrong way

and it only went downhill from there

if Sizhui really tries, maybe he can rewind to the exact moment that led to the present angry aftermath of him being demoted to sleeping on the couch

because there was no way

that you were going to let him back into the room

you didn’t even open the door for him to get his pajamas

so he’s forced to sleep in what he wore to work

it’s midnight now as he’s lying in the quiet apartment, listening to the emptiness of the space now that he’s not sleeping beside you

it’s not simply quiet

it’s painful because he misses you, even after the words that you both exchanged to one another

it’s nearly 2 in the morning when Sizhui resolves to find you, to apology, because he realizes that he really can’t spend an entire night without you

he’s too in love

sorry 

and he’ll take it

Sizhui quietly sneaks back to the bedroom door and pushes it open,

surprised to hear sniffling as he walks in

his heart had always been heavy whenever you cried

and now it was much the same

“y/n” he calls to you, quietly in the middle of your sniffles

he notices the way that the blankets stop shaking immediately,

the abrupt stillness as you try to trick him into thinking that you were just asleep

Sizhui pulls the covers away as he enters, edges towards your side of the bed, 

you lay still 

and he wonders for a moment, if you would push him away

he lays his arm around you, closing in around the blanket that covers between you both

“i’m sorry,” Sizhui whispers to you, earnestly, truthfully

he closes his eyes

a moment later you turn in his embrace, move to press your teary eyes into the column his chest,

he hears your whispered apology in his skin

as he’s drifting off to sleep

Lan Jingyi

you pace around your apartment, slowly 

back and forth and back and forth

the curtains are drawn

and everything around you looks the same when you’re left alone

it’s been a few days since you’ve last seen Jingyi,

probably a week since your fight now

everything feels monotonous without him

and honestly you don’t even remember what you two were even yelling about

after the hours that you had spent with your words at each other’s throats,

all the tears and screaming come to a halt when Jingyi slams the front door closed 

it’s all...nothing now

the first hour he’s gone, you’re sitting in the lingering anger of each other’s words, fresh and bruised on your heart

the first few days after, you walk around the quiet apartment dully, 

now, a week later, all that’s left from that burst of yelling is the residual sadness 

there’s no light in your apartment despite the late night, just the yellow-y grainy streetlight that shines in through the window when it’s late

you’re still sitting on the couch, knees drawn to your chest 

Jingyi hadn’t said goodbye when he left

so maybe 

he’d be coming back

you drawn into your arms, trying to hide away from your own feels

but your shoulders still shake with the thoughts impend on you

he’s not coming back

you don’t know if you’re more scared of that or the fact that this might go even longer that it already was without being resolved

you’re hiding in your face in your hands, so you don’t really hear the door opening or notice that the lights are turned on from a person entering

it’s when you hear a sigh close to you, like right beside you do you pull your head out of your dark sheltered arms

at first your vision is bombarded by light

then you turn to side and see him

Jingyi’s eyes flicker to your tear stained cheeks and red eyes, then all around your face

“i’m sorry,” you hear him tell you

you stare at him, feeling another warm tear fall down your cheek

“i’m sorry too,” you tell him, because you’re more sorry of the days you spent in angry and sadness about him than you were about whatever you two had been so mad about

at your tears Jingyi moves closer to you, close enough to take you into his arms and guide your head to his chest

you cry there in his arms because you miss him (because he’s actually here, he came back)

with your face hidden in his chest Jingyi is sure that he can hide his tears from you too

Jin Ling

your phone buzzes on vibrate against your bed,

but these days you’ve gotten good at ignoring him

after your fight with Jin Ling, you told him that you needed to take a breather somewhere else, far away 

because seeing his face was going to set you off again

and also maybe taking a break from seeing each other would clear both of your heads

he’d watch you with the same stormy eyes that he had when he had been yelling at you just hours early

and you left your shared apartment in the same angry gloom that had been days coming

if you were honest to yourself, you were both expecting this fight

between the work that you both had to do

the never having time for one another

the promises that you somehow always seem to break with each other

you’re staying at your best friend’s house for the time being, because you can’t go back home

and you don’t feel like you can go back to Jin Ling

not when your first feeling at the thought of him is sadness, 

“i never liked him anyways,” you best friend comments to you when she brings you a mug of tea 

you know she means well, but it’s not the words you’re looking to hear

“thanks,” you say not clarifying if it was for the comment of the drink she got you

she smiles, a small sad little thing, leaves you alone in the room again

you think you’re going to need a bit of extra time to find that peace of mind again, that clear head to be able to sit down and talk it out with-

that quiet, calm ambiance is shattered quickly when you suddenly hear raised voices from outside your closed door

you put the mug down and stand up just as the loud voices gets closer and your door suddenly pulls open, 

“y/n,” Jin Ling says immediately when the door open and you widen your eyes staring at him 

“you weren’t invited here! who do you think you are, barging into my house,” your best friend shouts as she comes running in behind him, 

“her boyfriend, “ Jin Ling snaps and you immediately intervene before Jin Ling manages to sever even more of the bridges that you had to people,

“i’m so sorry, b/f/n, i’ll get him out of here just give us a minute” you promise your best friend

she sighs at you glares at the back of Jin Ling’s head before letting the door close behind you 

“what are you doing here?” you ask him, tiredly

“looking for you,” 

“you didn’t have to,”

“you weren’t answering your phone,” Jin Ling replies, always a second after your words and never enough time to just think

you already feel the ebbs of annoyance build up in the back of your skull again

“did you ever think that maybe i didn’t want to talk to you? just go home,” you tell him, anger already running in your veins at the simple way that he was

“...” you both stare at each other for a long, silent moment before you watch Jin Ling take in a deep breath, look up to the ceiling than back down at you,

“we can’t run from our problems, y/n” Jin Ling says, and you huff out a laugh,

“wow, is that what you’re pining on me now? who’s the one that didn’t want to talk about it in the first place?” you tell him, voice raising 

“no, it’s not-” 

“it’s always about what i’m doing wrong, isn’t it? what about you?” you shout, your tears prickling up at the corner of your eyes,

because you know Jin Ling 

and he won’t ever apologize

“i’m sorry,” 

when you hear those words, you think that maybe you’re angry and delusional and despondent enough to imagine it

the apology lingers in the air for a moment

then you look at him, full on the face, just to see if he’d actually said something

when you’re staring at him now you see the remorse on his face, the way that he himself looks like he might cry too

at least, now you know that you’re not the only one feeling some kind of regret

“come home with me, y/n”

JIn Ling surprises you again because he doesn’t ask

it sounds a lot more like a plea

Ouyang Zizhen

real, big fights with Zizhen are rare

but when they happen 

it’s usually with a lot of tears

you’re always much better than him at keeping your eyes dry, 

and it had always been something that Zizhen had been embarrassed by

after being with him for so long you realize it’s not that he was weak for crying so easily, or so much

he just felt a lot more, a lot deeper than you when it came to things

which was why...

which was why you two were where you were now

sat together on the same couch

the air tense, silent

save for the small shaking breath from the man beside you

you swallow gently, pushing down the poison laced words you could say, shut out the angry thoughts that jump around in your head

you give yourself a breather, level your head and your mind before you turn to him

Zizhen had always been a quiet crier, so you don’t hear him,

but when you turn to him, you see the way that he hides his eyes with one of his hands, a futile way of holding the tears back

the other hand wraps around his stomach, a gesture as if to comfort himself

because he wasn’t expecting you to

even though you’re mad and the two of you still have a lot to say

right now

you gently reach for the hand by his side, unwrapping it from its tight clutch at the side of his shirt

Zizhen continues to hiccup and cry, because he is still angry with you and still hurt by the words you said to him

you know that he is

your smallest effort of comfort to him is intertwining your small hand with his, warm ones

and though this was a heavy, gloomy, painful fight

you know that forgiveness is on the horizon when you feel a gentle squeeze back

[featherfur]

I would love a Fix-it Au where Nie Huaisang fails to kill Jin Guangyao (maybe he slips through his fingers, maybe he just slits Lan Wangji’s throat the second he has the chance and Su She never has a moment to go get Huaisang because he has to hold back Lan Xichen and Wei Wuxian so Huaisang can’t maneuver the playing field). So he goes back in time and just stabs Jin Guangyao and blames Xue Yang.

(More below the cut)

Huaisang’s not an idiot, he knows he’s not the smartest person in the room he’s just the best at adapting. Jin Guangyao can set up all the pieces but if something doesn’t go right he flounders, but Nie Huaisang has grown up as a Nie and no one in the Nie make sense or follow predictable patterns so he adapts easily. He had a back up plan, of course, if things went south but he wasn’t expecting things to go so south. So he approaches Wei Wuxian, grieving at Lotus Pier where Jiang Cheng brought him when he found him and Jin Ling frozen at the temple. Wei Wuxian hadn’t said a word since, clutching Bichen and Lan Wangji’s headband so tightly even Lan Qiren didn’t have the heart to pull it away.

Huaisang sits beside him, wondering how Jiang Cheng is handling his newly mute brother but he doesn’t worry too long, if things go right this time he won’t ever have to feel that. If things go wrong… well, he’ll be dead anyways so why not try?

He quietly passes him the spell he found in the Lan Forbidden Library (Jin Guangyao isn’t the only one who had Lan Xichen wrapped around his finger all these years, Huaisang was always his didi the moment they met even before he and Mingjue were sworn brothers) and says “let me fix this, please.”

Wei Wuxian doesn’t know why Huaisang thinks he needs to fix it, he doesn’t know that Huaisang is the reason the feared Yiling Patriarch is back instead of an actual demon, doesn’t know he sent the sword arm to Mo Village, doesn’t know he set up the meeting in Yi City, doesn’t know anything. But he takes the papers and stares at them and he knows and part of him, a fierce bold part of him filled with empathy and love and hope, wants to fight Huiasang on it. If this spell failed Huiasang would be torn apart, his soul reduced to nothingness. But he’s tired, he’s so very tired. It has been 16 years for everyone else but for him, he’s lost his family with the Wen’s, his sister, and the love of his life all within the span of six months. He doesn’t have the strength to argue, not when the only reason he eats is because Jiang Cheng comes over three times a day and feeds him, the only reason he sleeps is because the Head Disciple (Liu Xiolan, his sisters best friend and that hurts too) brings him to his room and waits for him to sleep, the only reason he moves is because Sizhui needs him to stay alive.

So he takes the papers and he writes the rest, focusing all his energy on something that will distract him. He writes and writes until he can wake up on his own again, until he shovels food in his mouth at a pace that actually has Jiang Cheng trying to stop him after a month of forcibly pushing chicken in his face. Because this could save Lan Zhan, his Lan Zhan.

He finishes it finally, three months later with Jiang Cheng passed out beside him at three am, Jin Ling and his posse only a few feet further all curled up like a bundle of kittens from the night hunt they’d just completed to get the blood of a ghoul for the spell. When he passes it to Huiasang he isn’t expecting the hesitation when he reads it over.

“You… do understand you can’t go back right?” Huiasang says quietly, “this needs a golden core on both sides and you won’t be able to go back far enough with your current core.”

Wuxian doesn’t even bother to think about how in the hell Huiansang knows he gave up his core, since Jin Guangyao’s disappearance he’s been different and Wei Wuxian has come to realize he’s smarter than he was ever given credit for.

“Your core isn’t much stronger,” Wei Wuxian snaps but there’s no fire as he nods tiredly. “I know, I can send you back to before I died though, if your past self is willing to give in and let you merge with him. If you can save all of this from happening, I’d do anything.”

Huiasang eyes him and tucks the papers away. He doesn’t say “you know this will create an alternate timeline and you will continue to live in world without him.” Wei Wuxian knows, and he’s tired but he won’t strip Sizhui of another father.

“I’ll take care of everything, Da-Ge will stab anyone who tries to stop me.” Huiasang says as jovially as he can even though he knows it comes out flat but Wei Wuxian gives him an appreciative smile.

“Good luck,” is all he says before he’s turning around and walking wordlessly towards the Head Disciple who waits patiently for him. Huiasang makes a note of her, wondering if he can find her in the past and wiggle her into the Jiang Sect, he never met her before and he isn’t sure where exactly to find her but if he can it’ll make it much easier to have someone hold Jiang Cheng back if he starts barking and biting. (Though, he remembers with a gentle feeling of fondness, Jiang Yanli had been good at that too so if he does this right she could help him get those two idiots to being brothers again)

It takes almost two weeks to prepare the spell but he doesn’t mind taking the time to get his affairs in order. The Nie Sect never truly loved him, not after Da-Ge’s death (they used to adore him, he thinks bitterly before tossing the useless emotion away). But he had the most trustworthy members by his side throughout the whole plan against Jin Guangyao, so he assigns his heir and orders them to say they found his body dead on a night hunt. He thinks Lan Xichen will be the only one who will grieve for him, there’s only a flicker of guilt for that after all Xichen led to his brother’s death because he was too kind to listen.

He does the spell and the world goes dark and he thinks it failed, until he opens his eyes and realizes he can see. Then he feels the other consciousness rouse beside him, confused at first then absolutely pissed. He almost laughs at the indignant emotions in his past self at the idea that a ghost would be so brazen as to attempt to posses him.

It doesn’t take long to convince his past self to merge with him, he wouldn’t be dying only becoming one with his future self. Really it would just be like growing up really fast since they are the same person. It does take longer to convince him that they are the same person, nearly half a day before he gives in.

The merge is, easy honestly. Huiasang faints in the middle of walking through the fields, and wakes up a day and a half later after living through all of his memories on fast forward to a pissed (worried) Da-Ge.

He doesn’t even speak at first, he just sobs, he sobs and sobs and sobs as he holds onto him, until Da-Ge gently soothes him and the awkward strokes become gentle caresses through his hair like Huiasang is five again.

“What the hell has gotten into you?” Da-Ge asks when Huiasang can breathe again and Huiasang cries softly again and burrows into his chest and Da-Ge doesn’t ask again. He just pets his head and cradles him close until Huiasang is nearly asleep again.

Xichen visits once and Huaisang has to force himself not to bare his teeth and scream, but 20 year old Huaisang wouldn’t do that. Xichen looks so young too, his touches on Mingjue’s shoulder are full of affection and Huiasang hates him, hates him so much that he wishes Xichen died at the temple instead of Lan Wangji. He did this, because he didn’t listen to Mingjue because he fell in love with someone even though he already loved Mingjue. How could he-

Then Xichen lays a hand on his head, and 28 years of affection from his Er-ge wells in him and he throws himself forward into his arms. He wants to hate him, but this is his Er-ge. Who held him through nightmares when he visited, who went through night hunts protecting him when Da-ge couldn’t, who snuck him treats and paintings and gave Huaisang his first painted fan, who loved it when Huaisang called him Ge-ge and called him didi and spoiled him almost as much as Da-ge did.

And Da-ge loves him, loves him only less then Huaisang himself. So Huaisang can’t hate him, even if he loathes his choices and won’t ever be able to fully trust his decisions again, he can’t hate him.

Xichen takes his crying better than Mingjue did and murmurs to him quietly until he does actually pass out. Nie Zhongui almost makes him cry too but Huaisang manages not to, instead he gives him the prettiest fan he can buy because that’s how 20 year old Huaisang would say “you’re my favorite” even if 36 year old Huaisang would have just said it.

It’s two weeks until the ambush at Qiongqi Path and that’s all Huisang needs. He convinces Mingjue to take him to the celebration (much easier now with his fainting spells, and the almost full day of sobbing that Huiasang won’t explain). Thankfully Xiao Xingchen hasn’t captured Xue Yang since his escape and it provides the perfect excuse.

He quietly asks Jin Zixuan if he could go and meet Wei Wuxian at the base of the Burial Mound with Jiang Cheng before Jin Zixun even has a chance to leave, Huaisang didn’t think it would be so easy but when he mentioned being worried because of Sect Leader Yao and Ouyang, staunch haters known for screaming for Wei Wuxian’s blood, they’d both agreed immediately and Huaisang has to trust them not to be morons because he has something else that needs to be taken care of. Su She would be too late with Jin Zixun failing to arrive in time to ambush and Nie Huisang could discredit him (and possibly have him executed) immediately by showing the hundred holes curse on him. But Jin Guangyao? That was going to be personal.

A few crudely written demonic cultivation talismans (curtesy of Wei Wuxian’s Sunshot rampage where he left them fucking everywhere) and a knife shaped like Xue Yang’s familiar sword, where all Huaisang needed. That and alone time with Jin Guangyao.

That was probably the easiest bit, convincing Jin Guangyao to walk with him so Huiasang could show him his new fans. He was eager to walk with him, and Huaisang wonders as he plunges the knife through his back and into his heart between the ribs if Jin Guangyao still held affection for him in the end or if he simply wanted another pawn to use to keep Lan Xichen close.

Huiasang wished he took pleasure in the betrayal on Jin Guangyao’s face, but really? He’s just tired. It’s been 16 years of this, 16 years of loss and pain over and over again and it’s finally over.

Well nearly.

He slices his own face too and slips the knife into a qiankun pouch where he knows no one will look, after all Nie Huaisang was no good at being a cultivator much less a killer, and shoves a few talismans into Jing Guangyao’s clothes to be found later (maybe they will be, maybe they won’t but that’s not what he’s worried about).

Then he screams, he howls, he cries for Da-ge as he runs toward the gates and he’s almost surprised at how fast he gets there (he shouldn’t be, he was Da-ge’s most precious thing in the world but it’s been 14 years without him and some things he’s forgotten like the feeling of safety that comes with his brother’s rampaging steps storming to protect him from anything and everything). He throws himself into his brother’s arms and sobs, swiping through the air at the dead Jin Guangyao.

“Da-ge! He’s dead! He’s dead! San-ge!” He wails as Mingjue presses him against his chest with all the force in the world, Baxia ready to destroy anyone. “I was just showing him my fans and I only turned around to look at a bird and- and- Da-ge he…”

He sobs and dramatically yanks at Da-ge’s robes like he’s beside himself with agony and grief, and maybe he is, not for Jin Guangyao but for everyone else who lost everything because of his need to get his father’s approval.

“What? Huaisang stop crying and just spit it out.” Da-he’s harsh in such a familiar way that the tears spill out more. He’s not angry, he’s worried and he wants to hunt down his sworn brother’s killer but he won’t leave his didi behind.

“He tried to protect me, San-ge! San-ge!” There was no point in tarnishing his reputation, he hadn’t done anything yet beyond be a disgusting snake who killed the Captain and freed Xue Yang but that would be so much harder to prove when Mingjue had let the bastard go. “But he got stabbed instead! Da-ge please.”

“Who was it? Did you recognize them?” Theres louder shouts behind them, Xichen’s voice is worried but still soft as he moves to comfort him as well.

Huaisang nods frantically, reaching out to tug on Xichen’s robes like he’s terrified.

“It was Xue Yang! He said he was going to kill me then Da-ge and the rest of the Nie for imprisoning him. But San-ge pushed me out of the way and- and- and he-“ Huaisang cut himself off with another wail and his brother’s hands are firm as they tilt his head up to look at the deep cut on his face. “I screamed and he ran after taking something from San-ge.”

Mingjue tries to step forward and Huaisang sobs louder.

“Da-ge no! Please! Don’t leave, what if he comes back? He killed everyone at the Chang clan!” He howls and he’s shoved into Xichen’s arms that fold around him immediately. Huaisang ignores the tears on Xichen’s face, the tears on his brothers because their grief is nothing now compared to the future. The future of Mingjue’s death and Xichen’s loss of every brother he had.

He lets himself collapse into Xichen’s embrace as Mingjue kneels beside his sworn brother and slides his hands through the messy robes and finds the notes, written in what Huaisang would consider pretty good renditions of Jin Guangyao and Jin Guanshan’s hand writing. He hadn’t though he could actually get them to look but he was nothing if not adaptable.

Mingjue’s face is unreadable as he passes the talisman’s to Lan Xichen and Xichen’s eyes darken. Huaisang knows he won’t be there to track down Xue Yang, he doesn’t want to be at 20 years old and he doesn’t want to be there at 36 years. He wants to sleep.

He sobs until Nie Zhongui is called and then latches onto him instead, listening to him promise to protect him no matter what. He wrings out promise after promise until Nie Zhongui owes him atleast another century of personal protection and two hours a week for the next month of painting together and finally allows himself to be quieted.

He’s taken back to his quarters and only an hour later, Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng are bursting through the doors like they’re fifteen again. Both are yelling questions and he wails as he hugs them, this time it’s not fake. They’re alive and they’re not grieving messes and he has his best friends with him for the first time in sixteen years and he cries and almost laughs as they panic trying to comfort him.

He has a lot more to do, he knows. He has to protect Wei Wuxian, has to save the Wens (though he’s certain a small baby A-Yuan will make that simple, Da-ge was weak for babies), he has to make sure Jin Guangshan is either dead or discredited so Wei Wuxian can’t be hunted down, has to shove Wei Wuxian back into the Jiang Sect and let Jiang Cheng’s insane protection streak go wild, and he has so so many fans to make to give his brother after he chews him out for not telling him about the Sabers and getting him to let Wei Wuxian help. He has so much to do and he is so tired.

But he’s lighter than he’s been in ages, his brother is safe, everyone he cares about is safe and he is happy.

(This is just a very rough draft of an idea lmao)

[yichens]

thank you once again @yibobibo​ for tagging me ♥ even if, like I said, this is pure torture. I have so many sons that I’ve given up on counting them sigh but here goes.

favourite male fictional characters.

I took it that this meant ten so am going with that (tho am not gonna try and put them into order). am also sticking to all the characters I loved this year. and gonna ramble and add gifs so cutting it here. 

1. Liu Sang

The Lost Tomb Reboot/Reunion: The Sound of The Providence

I have so much love for this boy it’s not even healthy. it’s a bit funny tho bc once I started tltr, I didn’t really like him and almost forgot about him as the first season ended. he just felt so annoying and bitter in what I saw him, even if I did get that he had a Tragic BackstoryTM (I felt for him but well. tltr really made him hard to like at first). but then they brought him back in the second season with his sad puppy eyes and inability to handle his thoughts on wu xie and being all touch-starved and pitiful and whatnot and baam, I had the adoption papers ready. he’s wonderful and so strong and so smart and amazing. and liu chang as his actor has been wonderful (and he’s so pretty my god, have you seen him??)

2. Shen Wei

Guardian

never did I expect to just. fall into this hole after a year? I remember what a mess I was when I first watched guardian over a year ago, right after finishing the untamed. I was in shambles even as I knew how it would end. and now I’ve done this all again while also reading the novel and. my love for shen wei, especially bc it’s zhu yilong acting as shen wei? astronomical. I want to write poetry about him and his stupid responsibilities that he chooses to carry silently and his devotion to zhao yunlan and his love for his ppl and his didi and. I hope that one day I manage to write weilan bc I have this one idea and you can come pry it from my cold, dead fingers if it doesn’t get out there (am also super happy about the edit I made bc my god does he deserve at least that)

3. Cloud Strife

Final Fantasy VII

ok so stepping into the video games territory now. I was waiting for the remake like crazy and it was everything to me once the quarantine hit during spring. the game is so beautiful and I felt like I looked at this gorgeous boy once and was ready to give him my heart (tbh am quite sure he owned my heart before I even learned to know him). he is tragic in so many ways (I’ve only scratched the surface of all of his pain I know) and I wish I could just. hug him a lot. he is kind and cares very deeply even if he hates to show it and I love it how remake showed him also just being a human disaster (some of his scenes are just. peak comedy). I would kill for his smile (I have already cried for it a dozen)

4. Geralt of Rivia

The Witcher (The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt)

if there’s one grumpy, brickwall of a man I love, it’s geralt. I affectionately call him “papa wolf” while playing witcher 3 and his voice in it does things to me (I am just so fond of him ok, begone you dirty fuckers). I got introduced to him through the books and adored him in them bc he is so prickly and sarcastic and still so full of love even if he will never admit to it. he is the father figure I wish I could have in real life. (and yes, I’ve seen the tv series (or at least a couple of the first episodes) and it looks stunning but. this is my version of geralt and that’s the hill I will die on)

5. Xiaoge

Zhang Qiling, Daomu Biji (The Lost Tomb 2)

(wow finding a gif for him was a pain, apparently I gotta learn how to gif or?) ah, my dear boy who I’ve ended up just calling xiaoge bc he seems to prefer it over his real name/title/whatever zhang qiling really is. I got introduced to him through tltr where we really didn’t get to know that much about him bc he was just... there. huang junjie was absolutely stunning tho and his soft smiles made me super fond, but only in the lost tomb 2 did I really fall in love with xiaoge as a character. I was surprised tbh bc I didn’t expect it to be this drama? I had so many doubts about the cast in tlt2 but they all delivered! and I think cheng yi’s xiaoge is now my favorite bc he somehow captured that softness and the pain of him? (and we do not talk about that buxun storyline tyvm) tho now that ultimate note is on the way, I gotta say that xiao yuliang does a wonderful job as xiaoge too!

6. Wu Xie

Daomu Biji (Ultimate Note)

(sorry we have to go with a pingxie gif now but maybe it’s only fitting) tbh it’s hard to choose my favorite version of wu xie. I think all of the actors for him have done amazing job showing wu xie in different parts of his life (all of them are very distinct but still feel like the same person) but currently zheng shunxi takes the lead. I really wanted to put the reboot version of him here (bc I love that mature, relaxed and somehow very soft version of him and the angst is phenomenal and the thoughts he has about death... yeah) but I already have zhu yilong’s face here once so :’D wu xie is just one of those characters you cannot not like. he is so strong, so kind, so stubborn, so wonderfully stupid sometimes and in need of careful protection. I also adore it how smart he is and I could listen to him spew history facts for 10 hours straight (even if it was in a tomb full of blood zombies) ♥

7. Jiang Cheng

Jiang Wanyin, The Untamed

my darling boy! my beautiful angry grape! I love him beyond words. I love him in all of his raging, misunderstood, stupid, sassy, constipated, abused, tragic, bitter, big hearted glory. I could write novels about him (and I did and am still writing oh boy) and his love for ppl and his inability to show that love and his loneliness and his issues. I could also write another novel for all of his outfits etc. bc damn, what a fashion king. he is just so great. he owns my soul. he deserves happiness and in this essay I will

8. Isana Yashiro

Adolf K. Weismann, K Project

I rewatched k project this spring bc a) it’s one of my favorite animes ever (it just looks stunning with all the colors) and b) I love yashiro to bits. I remember falling in love with him when I first watched k project many years ago bc he was just so kind and bright. this time though, I ended up seeing another side of him and my god did I cry. he is... so sweet. he cares for others so deeply and is ready to sacrifice so much for them and his love for his two clansmen... yeah. I think I finally saw the tragedy of him too, all the pain and loneliness and insecurity he decides to hide behind his smile and obnoxious personality. he reminded me a lot of myself and watching him made my heart bleed in a good way

9. Qi Tiezui

Ba Ye, The Mystic Nine

(wow am going to riot for the lack of all the gifs hhh) yes, we’re continuing with the dmbj universe that sucked me in big time this year. the drama of the mystic nine wasn’t probably that earth shattering for me as it somehow got boring more than once but I did love ba ye to bits. he was just... so nice? I got it that he was somehow this “comedic relief” in the drama with all of his funny scenes and ridiculous mannerisms but I could see the brilliance of him. he is warm and smart and kind of a romantic too and he cares for all of his friends so deeply? it was also sweet how protective of him his two zhangs were (does that run in the family? the tendency to imprint into one smart but disastrous man and keep him safe? maybe) and I really hope I knew more about him bc he seemed to have a lot of knowledge and a lot of impact to ppl’s lives (I yelled when they mentioned him in ultimate note, I miss him ;;)

10. Dorian Pavus

Dragon Age Inquisition

(yes I’ve been replaying DA:I this year, this counts!) another darling boy! my lovely sass master son! I have so much love for him and his story in DA:I. he is my favorite companion (and his romance is my favorite too, probably obvious in the way am currently romancing him for the third time) and he has given me a lot of strength. the way he stands up against his father, how he’s ready to reform his homeland instead of walking away, how he’s so caring for those he sees struggling... it’s very warming and I feel like I’m safe with him. it feels a bit silly to say that but he really is that comfort character I will seek out when I just want to know am doing fine :’) (and I am so excited to see him again in DA4! probably?)

+ 11. Li Cu

Tomb of the Sea

yes I cheated a bit (with my own rules lol) to fit li cu here. I didn’t really expect to like him or tomb of the sea as much as I did once I started it? I’ve seen leo wu elsewhere before this (battle through the heavens, nirvana in fire) and his face always makes me think about a sad puppy so maybe I just grew fond over li cu instantly bc he was... so hurt? the first episode really slaps you in the face with all of it, showing him being abused, wounded, kidnapped, tortured, used and then just very, very scared and broken. he continues being that throughout the whole drama and I feel like tomb of the sea (or sand sea or sha hai idk) is the darkest and angstiest story in the dmbj universe. I know it deserves to be bc this is a dark time for wu xie but... my darling li cu. I wish him only happiness ;; he was so strong and smart and wonderful in this and it was just so amazing to watch him grow and find his own place in the world just bc he did something himself (even when he got dragged into all of this bc of wu xie) also I support the wu xie adopts li cu -agenda

Honorary mentions: 

Zhang Rishan, Xie Yuchen and Hei Xiazi from DMBJ universe. The Twin Jades of Gusu and Ouyang Zizhen from The Untamed. The Iron Bull and Fenris from Dragon Age games. Thane Krios, Kaidan Alenko and Jaal from Mass Effect games. The whole lot of Assassin’s Creed protagonists (especially Ezio Auditore and Shay Cormac). Adam Parrish and Ronan Lynch from The Raven Cycle. Neil Josten from All For The Game. Eduon and March from The Smoke Thieves. Qiling from L.O.R.D. Critical World. Luo Fei from Detective L (played by Bai Yu). 

well, with this I can really see that I have a thing for those who are tragic :’D I have a thing for grumpy, prickly and antisocial guys or those who hide their pain behind a smile. maybe it’s bc I am somehow both, even if I can’t show my anger or be mean to others and even if I feel like my smile never sticks either. I just find kinship in all of the characters who are on this list. and I feel like I aspire to be as strong and as kind and as loving despite all the pain I’ve been put through.  

thank you, this was so much fun! and sorry I made this so long and so complicated ^^’ but well, there are just way too many male characters I love haha

at the end I want to tag @i-am-just-a-kiddo​ @ashenwren​ @kholran​ @tiesanjiao​ @lan-xichens​ @aheartfullofjolllly​ @manhasetardis​ and @lzswy​​ ♥ feel free to do this in your own way or not at all! and thank you if you managed to read through my rambling :’D

[imaginaryelle]

Would you do anything with Wei Ying and the 4 main Juniors like either a fic or just how they interact in the show compared to the older generations

(Many thanks to @miyuki4s for the awesome beta work!)

*

It’s a banquet. A banquet Wei Wuxian was not, technically, invited to, but which he is attending nevertheless because no one in charge figured out he wasn’t supposed to be there until he’d already been offered food.

Such kind servants the Yao Sect has. Such a contrast to their sour Sect Leader, who keeps staring into his wine as if it’s turned to vinegar on his lips.

Wei Wuxian decides not to test his welcome too long—yes, he had been rather useful on the night hunt this afternoon, and yes, his role in Jin Guangyao’s downfall and the known fact of the Chief Cultivator’s favor do buy him a certain amount of social standing with the major Sects, but he’s not going to sit in a man’s hall all night mocking him with his very presence.

Well, he might.

Okay, he definitely would, except the wine is merely decent and the conversation is stilted and, frankly, boring. It would be bearable if he was getting to watch Lan Wangji endure it as well, but alas, the Chief Cultivator has pressing business in Yunmeng, apparently, which must be quite pressing indeed for Jiang Cheng to ask for him and which Wei Wuxian is certain would only be made more difficult by his own presence, even if he does still worry about Jiang Cheng, somewhere in a not-so-secret corner of his heart. So instead of making small talk or setting off into the night he takes his wine and bows out of the hall to Sect Leader Yao’s disgruntled nod of acknowledgment and goes in search of better entertainment.

He finds it just around the side of the disciples’ dormitories, behind a stand of magnolia trees.

Lan Jingyi, Ouyang Zizhen and several other vaguely familiar young members of various clans are sitting in what looks to be a small garden, huddled around what is quite probably either illicitly procured food or, more probably, wine. There’s a flash of gold near the center, and Wei Wuxian is able to answer the slightly-nagging question of where his nephew disappeared to halfway through the feast. Fairy, thankfully, is nowhere in sight. He wonders, for just a moment, whether they purposefully left Lan Sizhui’s reasonable voice out of this clearly ill-advised venture before he catches sight of him half-hidden behind Lan Jingyi’s shoulder, a look of fond exasperation on his face.

Wei Wuxian takes a drink of his own wine and prepares to keep walking—there’s probably a rooftop somewhere with a good view of both the garden and the waning moon to keep him entertained without disturbing anyone else’s fun.

“Ah! Wei-qianbei!” It’s one of the ones Wei Wuxian doesn’t quite remember who greets him, which is a little embarrassing, but the boy’s wearing Yao sect robes and looks like he lost a fight with a thorn bush—ah. Young master Liang Fai, who got a little too up close and personal with a malevolent spirit this afternoon. He beckons Wei Wuxian closer, either ignoring or not noticing those of his companions who freeze in place—Lan Jingyi and two other Lans try valiantly to look as if they have not touched alcohol and Lan Sizhui offers up a slightly chagrined smile—or those who are making only mildly obvious efforts to stop him. Jin Ling looks for a moment as if he might bolt through a nearby bush. “Wei-qianbei, can you teach us that talisman you used today? The one that banished the mist.”

A few of the others actually do look interested in that, even Jin Ling, at least until Wei Wuxian shakes his head.

“You can achieve the same effect with a basic spirit-repelling talisman,” he informs them. Blood is stronger than ink, of course, but he remembers their eagerness in Yi City. Best not to mention that. “It’s nothing special.”

“What about your ward-breaker then?” Lan Jingyi asks. Wei Wuxian arches an eyebrow at him.

“Hanguang-jun did a lecture on it,” Lan Sizhui puts in, soft-spoken and reasonable as ever. “On your inventions, like spirit-attraction flags. He said you had a ward-breaker talisman.”

“I might,” Wei Wuxian allows, though it was never really a secret. “How good’s your brushwork?”

The next half hour is a delightful rush of fresh ink, waving paper and bright enthusiasm. Enthusiasm, of course, is key in the creation of this particular talisman. Enthusiasm, focus, and delicate control of a brush. A few of them can produce a handful of sparks in their first tries. Jin Ling and Lan Sizhui each manage one butterfly, to their evident glee and Wei Wuxian’s lavish praise. Ouyang Zizhen manages a quietly smug three, to general acclaim. They finish the wine, and someone steals more, and an hour goes by and the moon rises higher and then Jin Ling, a little flushed but entirely determined, asks:

“Can you tell us about the Sunshot Campaign?”

Everyone goes quiet. Wei Wuxian laughs, too loud in the long shadows. He is burningly aware that Lan Sizhui—Wen Yuan—is sitting somewhere on his left.

“Surely you’ve learned all about that already,” he says. His smile feels stretched too-thin across his face.

“Not really.” Jin Ling frowns. Wei Wuxian can’t decide if the expression makes him look more like Jin Zixuan or Jiang Cheng, but it’s familiar frustration either way. “Jiujiu won’t tell me anything and—” he stops, lips pressing tight together.

“There are a few stories,” Ouyang Zizhen says in a sort of hushed whisper that makes everyone lean in closer. “but it’s strange, they’re always—”

“It’s always the same stories,” Liang Fai says. “No matter who you ask. It’s always about how awful Wen Ruohan and his sons were, and then the Yin Iron, and the razing of Cloud Recesses and Lotus Pier. Then the Sects rise and Lian—and Meng Yao goes undercover, and Chifeng-zun lays siege to Nightless City.”

“My father always says the Wens reached too far,” Ouyang Zizhen adds. “That they were arrogant and thought they held the authority of the Heavens themselves. But when I ask what happened before the war, or why they attacked Cloud Recesses, he just talks in circles. Sometimes I’m not even sure he knows the answer at all.”

“There’s not much detail,” says Lan Jingyi. “Honestly, I’ve gotten more out of merchants and kids playing in the street than most cultivators. There are more stories about you, really. After. When you were at the Burial Mounds.”

Wei Wuxian sighs. Of course there are. Just as now, when there are so many stories of Jin Guangyao, once more Meng Yao to the vindictive and impressionable, and how people always knew he was up to something. Even at the time, when the events were fresh in everyone’s mind, no one had wanted to remember who the Wens were before the war. If they had, Wei Wuxian might not have been the only one standing by the survivors.

He finds Lan Sizhui’s eyes in the dim moonlight, but Lan Sizhui only stares back at him, as calm and composed as if he’s waiting for a lecture in Cloud Recesses. All the young faces around him are intent and watchful. Waiting. Waiting for him to prove, as he has so many times before, that he’s different from their parents. Because he is, just—maybe not as different as they think.

“It was a war,” he says. “There are better things to talk about. Like—oh, the clouds, the clouds are very nice tonight.”

The clouds are nice. For the record. Worthy of poetry even. But of course these are determined young cultivators. They aren’t just going to let this go.

“It’s when most of them earned their titles,” Jin Ling says. Insists. “And they weren’t—you weren’t—that much older than we are. Not really. What’s so bad that we can’t know it?”

Wei Wuxian remembers a sudden flash of sky, of grass scraping at his scalp and cheek as his brother’s hands closed around his neck. He remembers his sister’s hands, raw and swollen from scrubbing and boiling cloth for bandages. The way Lan Wangji had turned away when he’d asked, and your brother? Your uncle? in the Xuanwu cave. The taste of corpse-dirt in the back of his throat.

There are many, many things that no one should ever have to know. And yet … Jin Ling asks so little of him, in the usual way of things. And not every memory is a weakness their elders will resent.

“What do you know about the Yin Iron?” he asks. It’s a safe enough subject—for one thing, he’s something of an expert, and that’s something he made his peace with long ago. For another, it doesn’t reach too deep into the scars lurking under his skin, and he knows that it has to be part of what Jiang Cheng doesn’t talk about: watching his new recruits, cultivators who trusted and believed in him, become mindless foes with the same face. These young cultivators have seen corpse puppets, but they’ve never seen someone turn before their eyes. Someone they knew and fought alongside. Someone they called brother or sister. He can’t imagine Lan Wangji or anyone else from that time talking about it either.

“It can be used to control corpses,” Lan Jingyi says promptly. “To make them stronger. And used too long, the Yin energy can be damaging to the spirit.”

Wei Wuxian snorts. Of course the Lans would teach that second part. He wonders if they also teach of Lan Yi’s sacrifice, these days. He picks up his brush again and sketches an incomplete array—unbalanced and open ended. Energy ever re-directed against its source.

“Have you thought about what control of corpses means, on a battlefield without Yin Iron of your own? Where every fallen ally can become an enemy?”

The sudden stillness around him would indicate that no, they haven’t. More than one looks like his wine is not agreeing with him.

Wei Wuxian picks up another piece of paper and starts a new talisman—fire, to burn away impurities. “There’s a lot I really don’t remember.” He laughs a little and lights the paper with a twist of his fingers. “My memory has always been bad.”

There is quiet as the paper burns to ash and the night breeze sweeps even that away. Wei Wuxian reaches for the wine and pours himself another drink, and that seems to break the moment at least a little. Jin Ling looks particularly disappointed, and Wei Wuxian is debating telling the one or two actually decent stories he has of Jin Zixuan when someone else speaks first.

“But, Wei-qianbei …” Ouyang Zizhen looks around at his friends and Sect brothers, and then back to Wei Wuxian, determination hardening his features. “If we don’t know how it happened, how will we know how to stop it happening again?”

There are nods around the circle, and Wei Wuxian takes another drink to swallow back the tightness rising in his throat. “I’m really not the right person to ask,” he says.  It’s a very noble sentiment they’re nurturing of course, but the world had turned on him much the same way it had on the Wens, and —ahah. He gestures at Lan Jingyi and Lan Sizhui, triumphant.

“Hanguang-jun,” he says. They stare at him.

“Hanguang-jun doesn’t talk about the war either.” Lan Sizhui’s gaze doesn’t waver, trained on Wei Wuxian.

“There are innumerable things our esteemed Chief Cultivator never puts into words,” Wei Wuxian agrees with a languid wave of his hand, “but does that really mean you don’t know what he thinks?”

Lan Sizhui blinks, then smiles at him.

“The seminars,” says Jin Ling. “He’s setting up—I don’t know, really, lectures and trainings and things, in Gusu and Caiyi, inviting people to speak or visit from all over. Jiujiu says he’ll probably be pushing the rest of us to do that too, soon.”

Ouyang Zizhen nods. “The watchtowers were Jin Guangyao’s project after the war, right? My father says Hanguang-jun wants something better than watchtowers. That he’s working on a new talisman, like the Jin Clan’s butterfly messengers.”

Jin Ling frowns, his hands tightening around his sword. “He hasn’t mentioned the butterfly messengers to me.”

“It’s Hanguang-jun. I don’t think he said anything about it to anyone, Father just saw him writing talismans that turn into pigeons after that conference focused on the towers.”

“Sect Leader Yao doesn’t like how he’s treating the smaller sects.” Liang Fai turns his helmet between his hands, his expression thoughtful. “He says the Chief Cultivator will recognize even just two people as a new sect, if they own so much as a single house to train out of. It’s making the bigger sects nervous.”

“I’m not nervous,” says Jin Ling, scowling at him. “And neither is the Jiang Sect.”

“Ah, ah!” Wei Wuxian interrupts before tensions can draw any higher and waves his hands in the space between Jin Ling and Liang Fai. “Let’s talk about something else. Right?”

Jin Ling looks away, but the conversation doesn’t change. 

“He’s worried about communication and response time,” says Lan Jingyi. “He’s always said it’s a cultivator’s job to go where the need is.”

“If more people can identify a problem, or know the right techniques, it won’t get out of hand,” Ouyang Zizhen agrees. “And with more sects, there are more cultivators in more places. It makes sense.”

“He travels.” All eyes shift to Lan Sizhui, who looks only at Wei Wuxian. “That’s part of what you mean, isn’t it? When Lianfang-zun was Chief Cultivator, everyone went to Lanling to speak with him. To the home of the Jin Sect. But Hanguang-jun doesn’t accept as many visiting parties. Most of the time, he goes to them.”

Lan Jingyi’s face scrunches up, doubtful. “I thought that was because he didn’t want to host so many banquets.”

“He still has to attend just as many,” Lan Sizhui points out. “Maybe more, even.”

“He’s staying neutral,” Jin Ling says, sudden and with an expression like he’s even surprising himself. “He can’t speak for Gusu Lan. That’s why Grandmaster Qiren is still at every conference. Because he’s Chief Cultivator, but not Sect Leader.”

That seems to be some sort of breaking point—several people start talking at once, and Wei Wuxian slowly eases himself out of the circle; he’s not needed anymore, and he should probably see himself out before Sect Leader Yao feels forced to offer him a place to sleep. Also, he’s out of wine.

Lan Sizhui meets him at the gates.

“Tell him we’re happy to help, with anything.”

Wei Wuxian frowns at him, confused. “Tell who?”

“Hanguang-jun. When you see him.” Lan Sizhui smiles and pets Little Apple’s nose. “Tell him we want to help. Even Jin Ling, though he might grumble about it.”

Wei Wuxian feels a sudden pang of homesickness—for the familiar walls of Lotus Pier, and for Lan Wangji’s steady presence at his side. But traveling to Yunmeng is no better an idea now that it was this afternoon.

“Ah, A-Yuan,” he says, “you can tell him yourself. You’ll probably see him before I do.” 

Lan Sizhui looks doubtful, but he doesn’t argue. He seems to hesitate a moment, and then he sort of lunges into Wei Wuxian’s side and hugs him. 

“What—”

“Thank you,” Lan Sizhui says as Wei Wuxian tries to figure out what to do with his hands. They’ve only done this a few times, still, and he’s not entirely sure what’s allowed when, and he’s desperately anxious to not mess it up.

“For what?” he asks, settling his free hand on Lan Sizhui’s back. 

“For helping us,” Lan Sizhui says, almost at a whisper, and Wei Wuxian is sure they’re not talking about the gaggle of young cultivators in the garden anymore. He tightens the curl of his arm.

“You don’t need to thank me, A-Yuan. I—”

“Ning-shushu told me a little,” Lan Sizhui interrupts him, the words half-muffled in his collar. “And I’ve heard—I know all the same stories as the rest of them. I mean it. Thank you.”

Wei Wuxian shakes his head, but he doesn’t protest aloud again. Instead he wraps his other arm around Lan Sizhui as well, and tucks his chin over Lan Sizhui’s white-clad shoulder. He watches the gauzy clouds drift slowly across the brightness of the moon and makes a silent promise: 

This time, they’ll do better.