#mention of previous Nie Huaisang/Xue Yang

[eleanorfenyxwrites]

Soldier, Poet, King

Part 11

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10]

[AO3] [Masterpost]

Heavily implied SongXueXiao in this one, but it can be read as either romantic or platonic I think - they’re all living together (plus A-Qing of course), but I don’t delve at all really into their dynamic or how it happened since it’s not important to the narrative I’m telling. (SongXiao are married and Xue Yang is just kinda There and Super Healthy™ about it lol)

-/-

Lan Xichen – like most people, he would assume – is perfectly capable of recognizing Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen on sight. That doesn’t change the fact that for the long, breathless moment in which it’s silent enough in the lab to hear a pin drop, he has absolutely no idea what he’s looking at.

The last anyone had heard of the two genuinely legendary Mach 1 pilots, they’d disappeared into retirement following their hardest-won Kaiju battle, and though Shanghai’s press statements had already long dried up into the barest bones of information, this had been shocking enough that the truth had slipped through the shatterdome’s tight security.

They’d been injured – badly so, to the point of being nearly unrecognizable (according to sources that claimed to be inside the ‘dome). It had taken months more for further information to leak, and when it had Lan Xichen had selfishly wished that it hadn’t. Acid, right to both of their faces, people around the world had whispered, hushed and fascinated. Xiao Xingchen’s eyes, Song Lan’s tongue – gone! Just like that!

A rumor like that, no matter how much or how little truth it contained, was naturally bound to lead to…assumptions. Mental images that were painful to imagine, but that were nonetheless inescapable, especially for a fellow pilot – someone who lived with the reality of something similar happening at any moment in the course of their work.

And yet here, now, years after their retreat from the world, stand Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan both smiling gently at Nie Mingjue and (mostly) appearing whole and healthy.

“You-” Nie Mingjue starts and attempts to stand before the nodes attached to his temples prevent him from doing so. He makes an irritated noise in the back of his throat and makes as if to rip them off, which thankfully galvanizes Nie Huaisang and Mo Xuanyu, at least, into scrambling forward to get them unhooked from their contraption. Wei Wuxian is still frozen staring at their guests from behind the computer bank, but Lan Xichen thinks that’s more than fair considering he knows precisely how much this means to him.

“Us,” Xiao Xingchen replies, still smiling. Lan Xichen gets slowly to his feet as well while the man steps around the desk to allow Nie Mingjue to pull him in for a hug that looks nearly violent, but Xiao Xingchen doesn’t complain. Lan Xichen glances at Song Lan to see him studying Jin Guangyao through slightly narrowed eyes, and without thought Lan Xichen steps in front of his partner to block him partially from view. The last these two had seen of Jin Guangyao, after all, had been his expulsion from Bujing Shi and Nie Mingjue’s subsequent depression after he was gone. He can’t imagine they’re thrilled to see him here now as one of Nie Mingjue’s co-pilots.

“It’s alright, Zewu-Jun.” It takes Lan Xichen a long moment to realize that the deep, smooth, vaguely mechanical voice is, in fact, Song Lan’s, though naturally his lips don’t move along with it. “We do not hold needless grudges.”

Jin Guangyao rests a careful hand on the crook of his elbow, but it still takes a reassuring nod from Song Lan before Lan Xichen steps aside again so that Jin Guangyao can offer the man a bow.

“I feel that my intention to offer further apologies for arriving unannounced is no longer necessary,” Xiao Xingchen says with a hint of a strain for being squeezed so tightly. Nie Mingjue’s suspiciously wet laughter breaks some of the awed tension in the room.

“You know you’re always welcome here, anytime,” Nie Mingjue huffs as he withdraws and slaps Xiao Xingchen’s shoulder hard enough that Lan Xichen is sure he sees the man put genuine effort into not stumbling under the impact. “I never expected to see either of you again. But it seems like things went well in the States? Fixed up your faces and everything, ah?”

Lan Xichen is at once relieved and dismayed by his partner’s shocking lack of tact. Mostly relieved – now that he’s over his shock he’s desperate to know how they’ve recovered from such horrific injuries (that he now knows from Nie Mingjue’s memories that they definitely sustained, and that in fact the gossip had actually downplayed their severity).

“Mm they did, eventually. It was difficult to track down what we needed, but we managed. One of Zichen’s eyes for each of us even though I told Zichen I was fine without it. So yes, eyes for each of us, reconstruction surgery and skin grafts to repair more superficial damage to our necks and faces, and Zichen’s throat. Cybernetic replacements for our non-functional eyes to compensate for the loss. And for a special treat, a thought-to-speech implant for Zichen – one of a kind, from Auntie Baoshan herself.”

Wei Wuxian makes a hastily-muffled noise like a dying cat and Lan Xichen has to duck his head to hide his amusement at his friend’s predicament. For as much as Mo Xuanyu is not subtle at all in his hero worship of Wei Wuxian, Lan Xichen knows that Wei Wuxian himself would be hard-pressed to hide his own worship of the Immortal pair even before they’d mentioned Baoshan Sanren (and her work with cybernetics that sound like a mad inventor’s dream).

“Good.” Nie Mingjue’s gruff pronouncement is laced with too many emotions for Lan Xichen to parse through, but he’s sure they’ll have a discussion about it later so he doesn’t mind. “Do you have quarters picked out yet?”

“Not here,” Song Lan says, turning his unreadable look – made more so by the nigh-on unnatural stillness of his face – on Nie Mingjue again. “We do not wish to be any trouble.”

“We already have a place in town, if you don’t mind sparing us in the evenings,” Xiao Xingchen adds smoothly, his smile apologetic even as his tone brooks no argument. “But we will stay and discuss whatever you’d like until curfew, we traveled at a comfortable pace and we are well-rested.”

“I need to go over the experiment we just finished with the research team,” Nie Mingjue says with a gesture towards their ‘peanut gallery’, as Jin Guangyao had called them, who are once again all behind the row of monitors watching this all play out in front of them with wide eyes. “You remember my brother Huaisang?”

“We do,” Xiao Xingchen smiles. Nie Huaisang flutters his fan in a weak little wave.

“The other two are Mo Xuanyu, the youngest Kaiju genius in the world -” Mo Xuanyu flushes crimson at the praise and offers a shaky bow - “And Wei Wuxian, one of the three Heroes of Yunmeng, and Lan Wangji’s new co-pilot in Immortal Mountain.”

“Of course, your career is very impressive, Wei-gongzi. We look forward to meeting with you properly in a little while,” Xiao Xingchen says with a nod for Wei Wuxian, who looks ready to pass out any moment. “Please don’t let us keep you from your duties, we merely wanted to say hello as soon as possible, lest word of our arrival precede us. We were hoping to go see Immortal Mountain next..?”

“I can take you,” Lan Xichen offers before he can think twice about it. “I believe Wangji is observing her maintenance crew this morning, as well, if you’d like to meet him.”

Lan Xichen isn’t quite prepared for the twin bows the two offer him, genteel and graceful.

“Thank you, Zewu-Jun, we’ll follow your lead then.”

Lan Xichen isn’t often at a loss for words. For all that he was raised in relative isolation compared to the vast majority of people, it had been instilled in him since he was a young boy that he should know how to comport himself at all times. And then, following his and Lan Wangji’s descent from their mountain home into training centers and shatterdomes at the start of the war, he’d learned quickly, naturally, how to make up for his brother’s lack of speech that most people found disconcerting at best, if not downright rude.

It’s an extremely unpleasant moment, then, when he realizes that he’s alone with two of his teenage heroes, and he has absolutely no clue what to say to them. Were it not for the fact that he knows Lan Wangji genuinely doesn’t care one bit if the people around him are uncomfortable, he would wonder how his brother can stand it.

“I hope you aren’t upset to see new pilots in Immortal Mountain,” he finally manages when they come to a junction, the perpendicular corridors bustling with enough people that the noise soothes some of the awkward tension – enough for Lan Xichen to find his metaphorical footing again, anyway. People naturally stop to gawk at them as they pass through the jostling and clanging space, but neither Song Lan nor Xiao Xingchen seem to take too much notice of it.

“Not at all,” Xiao Xingchen soothes, lips tipped up at the corners again right on cue. “Surprised, I suppose, that anyone would still wish to pilot a Mach 1 even when poorer shatterdomes than Shanghai can boast much newer tech, but not at all upset.”

“My brother and Wei Wuxian are both enamored with Immortal Mountain for a variety of reasons. Wangji is quite fond of tradition and is pleased to be able to honor the first generation of pilots in this way; Wei Wuxian is an engineering genius who would probably like to take Immortal Mountain apart down to her every last nut and bolt to figure out how she works were he not asked to pilot her instead.”

“Good hands for her, then,” Song Lan says simply, and that’s that. Lan Xichen leads them along another corridor, the walls now cluttered with more and more pipes and steam vents as they approach the Jaeger bays. He’s certain that the others know this shatterdome even better than he does and need no direction through their old stomping grounds, but they allow him to lead them the rest of the way down to the echoing caverns of Bays 1 and 2 without complaint.

Unlike the day they’d arrived from Tokyo, Bay 1, home to Immortal Mountain, is now as brightly lit as Bay 2 next to it. Also unlike that first day, repairs have ceased on Sparks Amidst Snow, the Jaeger silent and gleaming perfect, ready to be sent out on the next Kaiju run. All the cacophony of a working bay is coming from Immortal Mountain, maintenance crew members everywhere he can see swarming like ants as they work on bringing the Jaeger back into working order as quickly as Jin Guangshan has demanded to save face. Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian have already taken her out for the exhibition run, of course, but a quick step out into town for a wave and publicity shots does not at all translate to the old Mach 1 behemoth being ready to get dropped into the ocean and pitted against stronger and faster Kaiju than she had been designed to fight.

Lan Xichen steps away from his companions with the excuse of looking for Lan Wangji to give them a moment of privacy as they’re faced with their Jaeger after years away from it. He spots his brother a few levels up from where they’ve entered on the ground floor, little more than a speck of white at this distance where he’s standing on one of the catwalks near Immortal Mountain’s thighs covered in massive hydraulic pistons and backup weapons the size of typical suburban houses. He snags the closest grease-smudged crew member he recognizes from Tokyo and requests that they please use their comms to get someone to tell Lan Wangji to come down and find him, and only then does he return to Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen.

“Wangji will join us shortly,” he reports, and…runs out of words. Again. He must have a fever or something.

“Zewu-Jun,” Song Lan interrupts his moment of dismay, lips quirked up ever so slightly into a smirk, the most obvious facial expression he’s made yet. “You seem to have something on your mind.”

Lan Xichen smiles politely around the shape of the invasive and utterly inappropriate question that immediately springs to the tip of his tongue.

Xiao Xingchen’s gaze is shrewd over his ever-smiling lips as he says, “You would hardly be the first person to ask what happened to us, Zewu-Jun, if that’s what you’re curious about.”

Despite the flush in his ears, Lan Xichen offers them a bow that’s more than half-apology, his smile twisting towards rueful. “Ah..I have only just seen your injury for the first time in Mingjue’s memories today. I hope you will forgive me, but seeing you hale and hearty immediately after is…surprising. My apologies.”

Xiao Xingchen’s gaze softens. “No apologies necessary, Zewu-Jun. We were quite lucky to have found Auntie Baoshan when we did to help us, and the process of healing has been harder than it may seem now when you’re seeing us as healed as we'll ever be.”

It is perhaps Xiao Xingchen’s gentle understanding and Song Lan’s calm, non-judgmental aura that loosens his tongue enough to blurt, “Do you really have one of Song-daozhang’s eyes?” It’s only his years spent in Lan Qiren’s comportment lessons that keep him from clapping his hand over his mouth like a child catching themselves in a lie.

“Xingchen is an ungrateful husband and wouldn’t accept both of them,” Song Lan says, so deadpan in the flat, mechanical way of early computer speech that Lan Xichen can’t help but be shocked into laughter. It’s probably for the best that his next questions (which ones are Song Lan’s eyes? Do the prosthetic eyes do anything interesting since they were designed by the genius Baoshan Sanren?) are cut off mercifully at the knees by Lan Wangji’s arrival. Lan Xichen feels his face light up in happy recognition the moment he spots his brother over his companions’ shoulders, and so he has the pleasure of watching Lan Wangji jerk to a stop in shock when the Immortal pair turn around in synch to see what he’s looking at for themselves.

“Ah. Hanguang-Jun,” Song Lan greets with a nod that Xiao Xingchen mirrors beside him. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Lan Wangji blinks three times in quick succession before he steps forward again to finish closing the distance between them, and Lan Xichen hides an indulgent smile behind his hand at his brother’s startled awe. He covers it well enough by dipping into a deeply respectful bow, though there’s no hiding how starstruck he is (at least not from Lan Xichen anyway) when Xiao Xingchen reaches out to pull him out of it again with a gentle hand under his forearm.

“It’s alright, we’re all equals here,” Xiao Xingchen is quick to soothe. “You’re a pilot for Immortal Mountain now too, after all, aren’t you?”

“Mn,” Lan Wangji recovers enough to respond, though his eyes are still a bit too wide. “With Wei Ying.”

“Yes, of course. We just met your Wei Wuxian downstairs, and naturally everyone’s heard of his incredible innovations – even those as removed from the news cycle as we are.”

Lan Xichen doesn’t bother hiding his fond smile when praising Wei Wuxian and his work turns out to be precisely the correct way to make Lan Wangji loosen up enough to push past his surprise, his lips and the corners of his eyes softening ever so slightly as he nods (though Lan Xichen is sure he’s the only one present who can see that as a sign of his brother relaxing).

“Wangji, I should go back down to research for the debrief. Would you mind escorting our guests for the day?”

“Mn. An honor,” Lan Wangji says, as cursed with the Lan Sincerity™ (as Wei Wuxian has coined it) as Lan Xichen himself is. “I was observing the repair of a patch of deteriorated armor,” he adds, his attention solely on Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan. “If you would prefer not to do so, we may do something else.”

Song Lan’s smooth, mechanical voice is a visible balm to Lan Wangji’s startled tension, his brother’s shoulders sliding down the inch or so they’d crept up towards his ears when the man says, “No, that sounds good. We’ve already seen one old friend here, it’s time to say hello to the other.”

“Mn.” Lan Wangji says nothing else before he turns on his heel to march back the way he’d come, slowly enough that Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan have enough time to offer Lan Xichen small twin smiles and quiet thanks before they take their leave. Lan Xichen watches them go until they disappear back in the direction of the lifts to the upper levels of the bay. Only once they’re out of sight does he give into the temptation to shake himself all over like a wet dog and pinch himself on the arm for good measure.

If anyone had told him when he’d still been in Tokyo that coming to Shanghai would mean meeting and befriending (and romancing) so many fascinating people – people that he’s looked up to for so many years – he never would have believed it. Still can’t entirely believe it, honestly, though his completed drift with Nie Mingjue and Jin Guangyao is strong evidence that he can’t possibly refute that all of this is really happening.

Teeth and brain thoroughly rattled (yet everything still exactly as it had been moments before), Lan Xichen turns his feet once again towards the corridors that’ll take him back to his partners, and has to put genuine effort into keeping himself from running pell mell down them just to see them sooner. 

 -/-

 “Close your mouth, Wei,” Nie Mingjue gruffs once Lan Xichen has left with Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen in tow. When Wei Wuxian stays frozen staring at the doorway, Nie Mingjue cuffs him (lightly) on the back of the head to get him in gear and the man startles out of his stunned stupor with a little yelp and an overly-theatrical rub at the back of his head that can’t possibly be smarting just from that.

“Holy shit,” he breathes and looks around as if to check that everyone else saw what he did. “Holy fucking shit!!”

“You have a job to do before you’re free to go ask for their autograph,” Nie Mingjue reminds him, though he’s relatively sure he can trust Wei Wuxian not to do something so shameless as that, even if they are his heroes. (He abruptly remembers his and Lan Wangji’s extremely shameless nightly endeavors and adjusts that ‘relatively sure’ to something more like ‘desperately hopes’.)

With a loud snap of his fingers in front of Wei Wuxian’s shining eyes he adds,“Talk to me about the Drift, Wei,” and that, finally, seems to get the man’s hyperactive mind back on the right track. Talking about his work usually does, even if little else is capable of doing so.

“Right! Drift. Uhhhh yep, yeah, here’s your readout, everything is honestly textbook perfect. We’ll probably get you to do it here in the simulator again a few more times under slightly different conditions each time just to make sure everything goes smoothly each time you Drift and make sure it can happen as quickly as it needs to now that you’ve established the connection, but yeah you guys are good. You won’t be able to Drift without the accommodations we made, that’s already well established, but with all three of you in there to distribute the neural load and with the dampers on each of your connections to make sure you don’t burn yourselves out like me, you can Drift just like anyone else out in the field, no problem.”

Nie Mingjue glares down at the long roll of paper covered in incomprehensible figures that Wei Wuxian had handed him and is eternally glad that the only men in the room who can likely tell he’s about to cry are his brother and Jin Guangyao, both of whom are too busy fussing over their precious Drift rig to notice.

He can Drift again. Properly. Without hurting either of his partners – men he would die for in a heartbeat, without an ounce of regret. He doesn’t have to hold Jin Guangyao back anymore. He can be who his partner wants. Who Jin Guangyao needs.

“I mean not that I’d recommend the three of you hopping in a Jaeger to join the rotation – ah..hah not that I’m doubting your judgment, Chifeng-zun! Do whatever you think best, of course. But obviously one of the biggest risks with three-man teams is losing all three pilots in a fight, which is just…numerically a bigger problem than losing two! But of course you already know that, ha..”

“Wei Wuxian, if you don’t get ahold of yourself in the next ten seconds I’m grounding you for the next two weeks,” Nie Mingjue growls to try to cover his own Moment, though Jin Guangyao looks up at him at that precise moment and it’s no use trying to hide how much he’s affected by all of this.

“Mingjue, be nice,” his partner chastises. “You’re just as rattled as he is to see the Immortals, and they’re not even your childhood crushes.”

“Crushes?!” Wei Wuxian yelps. “They’re not..I didn’t…Their work is just very inspiring, okay?! Everyone in Asia is fascinated by them!”

“It’s okay, Wei-laoshi,” Mo Xuanyu says sweetly, his own celebrity crush still apparently going strong even after spending weeks working in close quarters with all of Wei Wuxian’s chaos. If anything it’s probably gotten a bit worse. “I understand perfectly.”

“You still have posters of Wei-xiong wallpapering your bunk, of course you understand,” Nie Huaisang snorts and their stupid back and forth helps settle some of the things that have rattled loose in Nie Mingjue’s chest, at least for now. He’ll probably have to talk about it all with Jin Guangyao and Lan Xichen later, but for now he doesn’t have the luxury of giving into his emotions – nor would he want to, what with their current audience being what it is.

“Da-ge,” Jin Guangyao murmurs at his side as the other three bicker happily back and forth, none of them apparently embarrassed at all by their own behavior. He doesn’t say anything else; he doesn’t have to. Nie Mingjue slings his free arm around his slender waist (a rare show of PDA that he normally wouldn’t allow) then decides to just go for broke and ducks down to press a lingering kiss to the top of his head. Jin Guangyao leans into him easily and reaches over to take the readout from his other hand. Nie Mingjue relinquishes it easily of course – it’s Jin Guangyao who reads the same sorts of data from the computers up in the comms tower anyway, Nie Mingjue can never get his eyes to focus long enough to make heads or tails of them and usually just winds up with migraines for trying.

“Thoughts?”

“Wei Wuxian is correct. It’s textbook, right down to our heartbeats once we completed the Drift.”

Nie Mingjue takes a deep breath in and turns slightly, just enough to block Jin Guangyao from the view of the others in the room with his body. His partner blinks up at him, eyes deep and unfathomable.

“You can be a pilot, A-Yao. With me.”

The naked want that crosses Jin Guangyao’s expression nearly hurts to look at, but Nie Mingjue doesn’t look away. They haven’t gotten as far as they have now by flinching in the face of each other’s most vulnerable moments.

“We…We have to talk it over with Huan-ge,” Jin Guangyao says with clear difficulty. “And approach battle cautiously, as Wei Wuxian has suggested. Just because we can Drift properly does not mean we can fight, particularly with the issues you and I have with just seeing a Kaiju on a screen. And we can’t exactly leave the ‘dome in just anyone’s hands if all three of us are out there anyway.”

“I know. But-”

“Not yet,” Jin Guangyao interrupts him, softening the sharp bite in his tone with soft, apologetic hands petting the lapels of his jacket, smoothing over his chest as Jin Guangyao looks up at him again with a tiny smile. “I’ll tell you when, alright? Just trust me.”

“Always do,” Nie Mingjue says, because these days it’s the unquestionable truth. Jin Guangyao smiles a little more widely up at him, dimples in his cheeks, and it’s only the sound of the other three horsing around behind him that keeps him from leaning down to kiss those dimples as he and Lan Xichen both love so much to do.

“Ah…Chifeng-Zun?” Mo Xuanyu hazards a moment later. Nie Mingjue has had more than enough bad news delivered to him in his life to know that he’s not going to like whatever the boy has to say next. Still, he doesn’t even sigh before he turns around to look down at him, one eyebrow raised ever so slightly.

“What is it?”

“I wanted to wait until after your Drift to tell you, but..I’ve finished decoding what I can understand of Xue-laoshi’s notes.”

It takes a supreme act of will not to curl his lip in disgust at the respectful title for that rabid dog of a man, but it’s not an argument he wants to have right now – not with Mo Xuanyu, and not with Jin Guangyao either, despite the fact that he knows that the main reason the man hasn’t been put down yet is because of Jin Guangyao’s protection and assurances to Jin Guangshan that Xue Yang is more useful than he is harmful, at least for their purposes. Nie Mingjue disagrees – heartily and vocally – but he’s not feeling up for a shouting match at the moment so he lets it slide. For now.

“And?”

“Wen-daifu wasn’t lying to Yao-ge before. It’s his fault the Kaiju are coming faster, and that they know who to target and where and how.”

Nie Mingjue takes a deep breath in, holds it, and releases Jin Guangyao’s waist to turn around properly with his arms crossed over his chest as he exhales again to try to find his very shallow reserves of patience. “Tell me. Start from the beginning.”

Mo Xuanyu takes a deep breath in of his own as he turns to his computer to start furiously clicking and typing through screen after screen in quick succession until Nie Mingjue is fairly sure they’re all looking at the unencrypted contents of the hard drive that Wen Qing had said contains Xue Yang’s records. The labels of the files are incomprehensible to Nie Mingjue, but Mo Xuanyu starts navigating them with the ease of the hours he’s spent poring over them in between his study of past battles and Kaiju biology.

(Nie Mingjue thinks a bit ruefully that he works his brother and Mo Xuanyu far too hard, but there’s just no one else he trusts to handle such sensitive material, and the fewer hands it passes through the better anyway. Unfortunately, it seems to be his lot in life to make all sorts of uncomfortable or less-than-savory decisions such as this, even when it’s his family involved. He just has to hope that the time in which it’s necessary is coming to an end soon.)

“Okay. So – Xue Yang. Obsessed with Wei Wuxian’s work in Kaiju research, we all know this, he’s never bothered to hide it. But Wei-laoshi has had a lot of ideas that have never been put to the test – because they shouldn’t be, either because they’re either extremely dangerous, highly unethical, or both. Usually both.”

Wei Wuxian laughs a little sheepishly but pointedly doesn’t correct his newest mentee in these assertions. He doesn’t have to – they all know Mo Xuanyu is telling nothing but the truth.

“The difference between Wei-laoshi and Xue-laoshi though is that Xue-laoshi will do anything if it sounds interesting enough, no matter how much he really shouldn’t, especially when he’s not here for us to keep an eye on.”

“You don’t have to explain that dog or his madness to me,” Nie Mingjue growls. “Just tell me what he did so we can fix it.”

“Sure, boss. He Drifted with a Kaiju.”

The silence that follows that statement is absolute, and for a brief moment Nie Mingjue has the blissful thought that he’s definitely misheard, or at least misunderstood. The momentary illusion is shattered by Wei Wuxian leaning in close enough to grab Mo Xuanyu by the shoulder and turn him around, his ancient leather office chair squeaking in protest at the sudden movement.

“He did what?!” Wei Wuxian yelps, sounding far more terrified than Nie Mingjue would have ever guessed he could.

“Drifted with a Kaiju brain, harvested fresh right after a battle near Tokyo when it was still alive enough to talk to the rest of them wherever they are. So…I don’t think we actually can fix this one, if I’m being honest, if my guesses are correct about what this all means in the long run.”

“That’s…I thought about doing that once! And I immediately followed it up with at least a dozen reasons not to do it right off the top of my head! Even at my worst I wasn’t insane enough to actually try it!!”

“Reasons which I’m sure he saw in your journal and immediately ignored because as we all know, he’s fucking insane,” Mo Xuanyu says with a shrug. Nie Mingjue has to fight the urge to rub at his temple to alleviate a tension headache he can feel looming, completely irrespective of the Drift experiment he’d just finished with his partners.

“Alright, so Xue Yang Drifted with a motherfucking Kaiju. What now? How did this happen, and will it happen again?”

“I’m so glad you asked,” Mo Xuanyu trills and turns back to his computer to begin pulling up a new round of records as he talks. “The short answer is no, it won’t happen again. It really fried up Xue Yang’s brain according to Tokyo’s head doctor’s notes during his assessment of him afterwards, I don’t think even Wei-laoshi could design something to accommodate him in the Drift. I don’t think Baoshan Sanren could design him something, and I’ll bet a month’s worth of snack rations that he tried to ask for it while he was following the Immortals around the States during their miracle healing.

“But to answer how he made it happen –” Mo Xuanyu sits back again and gestures at the rows and rows of figures on his screen, each one attached to a coded name that he’s decoded into a separate document pulled up next to it for their benefit.

“Wen Ruohan’s finances?” Jin Guangyao asks, startled. “Why did he keep — ah, of course. Insurance.”

“Blackmail, Yao-ge, call it what it is,” Mo Xuanyu huffs. “~Blackmail for a black soul doing black deeds for the black market~,” he singsongs in falsetto under his breath next and for a moment it’s eerily like Xue Yang and his love for levity when it’s least appropriate. Nie Mingjue swallows back the urge to tell him to cut it out in favor of asking something much more pressing.

“Are we implicated in this should any of it be found out by the public?”

“Hmmmm yes and no, Chifeng-Zun,” Mo Xuanyu shrugs again and swivels his chair around again to blink up at them. “ ‘We’ as in Shanghai Shatterdome? Oh yeah, no doubt about it, we’d be doing damage control for months probably. ‘We’ as in any of us personally who aren’t Father or Xue-laoshi? Harder to say.”

Jin Guangyao hums, “Mm. Tell me what Father’s involvement is specifically.”

Nie Mingjue knows that tone in his voice too well. Almost unconsciously he begins a countdown in the back of his mind, and he can’t find it in himself to be too upset to realize that Jin Guangshan’s days are very much numbered – likely not beyond double digits.

“Uhhh well…. Okay : If you’re the obscenely wealthy patron of a shatterdome with an already questionable reputation because of nepotism and historically shitty pilots and all, plus a policy of keeping a tight lid on information about your inner workings in a way that makes people a bit suspicious already, what do you do when you want to do highly unethical and dangerous experiments using Kaiju parts?”

“Outsource it,” Jin Guangyao says shortly. It’s curt enough that Nie Mingjue is sure he’s already figured out whatever it is that they’re being led toward. He gestures for Mo Xuanyu to keep talking anyway, since he’s not afraid to admit he’s not quite as quick-witted as Jin Guangyao is, nor as good at thinking along the same lines crooked men do.

“Right — you get someone else to do your dirty work. Someone whose reputation is big and bad enough that nobody messes with them anymore.”

“We already knew he was working with Wen Ruohan,” Nie Mingjue growls. “Tell me what I don’t know.”

“Wen Ruohan is only a small part of it, actually. But okay, so! If you want to run experiments on Kaijus in the tight privacy of a private lab you have a lot of logistical problems to consider – most of them can be solved by working on parts. Tiny bits of corpses. Cutting dead Kaijus up into pieces and dragging the pieces in here. Which we do! Every shatterdome in the world does that, and for the most part it’s on the up and up, we only take the bits we need to study, right? Acid sacs and eyeballs and exoskeleton chunks – and what we’re pretty sure are maybe meant to be their bones even though sometimes they’re like really weirdly squidgy-“

Nie Mingjue’s patience is not improving one bit. “Make a point, Xuanyu!”

“You start a black market! That’s the point. You play the long game and start a black market. Kaiju parts on the cheap to people who will turn around and jack the prices way up when they’re selling it to their contacts and then give you a good cut. When your buyers have driven the prices high enough, you start taking a cut of the physical spoils too – your finances stay consistent, but you siphon off which Kaiju pieces you want for your experiments while selling the rest for more money to cover the gap. You store the Kaiju parts in the warehouse where the corpses are already dismembered anyway, you have your people mark them all as ‘sold to private bidder’ just like the other black market shit that actually makes it out the door. Then you hang onto them yourself until it’s time to go pay a visit to your dear friend in Tokyo, perhaps to begin negotiating a legitimate Pilot Program deal for a totally random example, and you bring along a little gift – plus someone who has some really batshit insane ideas for what to do with them.”

“Xue Yang.”

“Exactly. So you take your Kaiju bits and your certifiably mad scientist over to Tokyo, and you let Wen Ruohan’s reputation keep away any nosy reporters wondering what the hell you’re working on in there. Then, once you’re not being watched anymore because this is all clearly legitimate, you let your mad scientist try Drifting with a Kaiju to see what happens.”

The stunned silence in the room is interrupted only by the sound of severely overworked computer fans trying to keep up with the sheer volume of programs Mo Xuanyu is running and the never-ending background noise of the rest of the ‘dome above their heads.

“All of that all these years just to ultimately have Xue Yang Drift with a Kaiju?” Jin Guangyao finally asks.

“Yep!”

“Why?” Nie Huaisang finally manages to demand – the first thing he’s managed to say during the whole explanation  – sounding as horrified as Nie Mingjue has ever heard him. “Why Drift with the Kaiju at all?! Even Wei-xiong’s notes said it probably would be useless considering they’re literally completely alien to us. How would we even understand what we’re seeing, if you can overcome physiological differences long enough for it to work in the first place? What’s the point?”

“Wars make money if you’re the one selling the dead,” Nie Mingjue grunts, disgusted and more than a little nauseous with it. “If you can find some way to tell your enemy valuable information about your defenses — like who to attack and how and where — then you’re guaranteed fresh meat delivered right to your doorstep, ready to be sold, and terrified people ready to pay you any amount of money to protect them from the monsters you called to their door. And with Xuanyu’s prediction algorithm getting better and better…”

“Always follow the money,” Wei Wuxian pipes up, the same disgust Nie Mingjue feels dripping from each word. “Men like Jin Guangshan and Wen Ruohan? It’s all about the money, and everyone at the bottom dies for it. Is any of this really a surprise in the end?”

“The lengths that they will go to to accomplish these things is somehow still unfortunately a surprise, yes,” Jin Guangyao mutters darkly at his side. Nie Mingjue wonders briefly if he should attempt to comfort him – this is his father’s doing, after all – but thinks better of it when he glances down to catch a glimpse of the look in his partner’s eyes. Hard, cold, and so familiarly deadly it puts a chill up Nie Mingjue’s spine. He doesn’t think that he and Lan Xichen will be able to distract him this time.

Nie Mingjue doesn’t want to distract him.

This is no longer a matter of personal distaste for Jin Guangshan and the way he treats everything under the ‘dome’s roof like it’s a business deal. This is no longer a matter of personal safety, or the safety of only his pilots, or of the population of the Shanghai Shatterdome, or the entire sprawling city of Shanghai itself. Jin Guangshan, in his greed for money and delusions of power, has endangered the entire human race. Of course he knows that Xue Yang is far from innocent in this and he’d love to get rid of that mongrel too, but he knows who the driving force really is behind all of this. If not Xue Yang, then Jin Guangshan would have found another tool to use to the same ends. Perhaps his tool would have even been Jin Guangyao, had Jin Guangshan played his cards right once upon a time.

Nie Mingjue glances down at Jin Guangyao beside him again to find the man already looking up at him, steel and fire in his wide, dark eyes. Between the two of them, no words are needed. He knows Jin Guangyao can read his (begrudging, but unflinching) acceptance of what needs to be done in the set of his mouth, the angle of his brows…or however the fuck it is Jin Guangyao always knows how to read him like a book. He’s never revealed his secrets when Nie Mingjue has asked.

Jin Guangyao slips his hand into Nie Mingjue’s and doesn’t break eye contact as he says, “A-Sang, we’re going out tonight. Time to see how good your informers really are.”

Nie Mingjue raises their joined hands to press a short kiss to Jin Guangyao’s knuckles before his partner withdraws and storms off at a sharp, precise clip without another word until he steps aside just inside the door to allow Lan Xichen to re-enter the lab, looking the tiniest bit flushed, like he’d jogged the whole way down from the Jaeger bays.

“What’s wrong?” Lan Xichen asks, as perceptive to everyone’s moods as ever. “A-Yao?”

“Come here, Xichen,” Nie Mingjue calls, finding himself desperately wanting the softness the man can offer him that Jin Guangyao usually can’t, even under much better circumstances. “There’s something you need to see.”

“Don’t wait up for me tonight, Huan-ge. I’ll see you both in the morning,” Jin Guangyao murmurs, and he gives Lan Xichen the same squeeze of their hands that he’d given Nie Mingjue before he sweeps away properly, footsteps echoing steadily back down the hallway — a death knell, if ever Nie Mingjue has heard one.

 -/-

 Jin Guangyao knows, logically, that of course the way that he lives is not normal. Normal people don’t spend their days holed up in a deteriorating sprawling military facility centering their life around the same twenty-or-so people on any given day and mind-bogglingly massive interdimensional murder aliens. He knows this, and he’s never once claimed to be normal, not even before his life was exactly that.

But stepping out of the gloomy austerity of the ‘dome into the dazzling nightlife of Shanghai still feels like waking out of a vaguely unsettling not-quite-nightmare only to be doused immediately in sticky sweet, neon-colored alcohol and way too much cologne.

“Ooo Yao-ge, this way!” Nie Huaisang shouts excitedly, tugging on his arm. His face is splashed with so many colors off the signs around them it’s difficult to settle on one, but his teeth flash red in the glare of the closest bar’s advertisement, something bold and oversized that he doesn’t bother to read. Jin Guangyao lets himself be towed around, for once, and simply does his best to avoid bumping into the people crowded into the street with them — there’s far more bare skin and cleavage and cocktail-redolent laughter than he would like, and he thinks longingly of his partners probably getting settled in for the evening right this very minute in their quarters without him.

Nie Huaisang tugs him to the left at some signal Jin Guangyao doesn’t bother attempting to identify and he follows. Nie Huaisang pulls him down a short alleyway out into the next block of neon highrises. Here in the heart of the city they tower over everything, level after level after level of pleasure and fun advertised in every shade of neon imaginable, each shade somehow searingly bright enough to make his teeth hurt. Down here, in the pulsing, growling belly of it all, Jin Guangyao feels himself drowning, getting lost in the throngs and looking up into the night sky so far away it’s nearly impossible to see. Criss-crossing wires and sky bridges and the forced perspective of visual noise gradually fading up up up into the blackness of space leave him dizzy with vertigo if he looks for more than a moment.

Jin Guangyao drops his eyes back down to Nie Huaisang’s back just ahead of him in the crush and reminds himself of their agreed-upon task for the evening as a distraction.

“Ahh here we are!” Nie Huaisang finally cries, releasing Jin Guangyao’s wrist for the first time since they left the ‘dome in favor of throwing his arms wide as if to hug the building they’ve stopped in front of. As far as their surroundings go, this place sticks out like a sore thumb. Not a hint of neon on the place, not even a backlit sign board. Instead, a flickering spotlight — dim and yellow, the cheapest bulb money can buy — offers up a dingy epithet with no other context. White background, big black vinyl letters: The Cockpit.

“A-Sang,” Jin Guangyao interrupts, smile fixed where it should be with cutting precision. “I am not here to prevent your being stabbed for the sake of a subpar back alley blowjob -“

“That was one time, Yao-ge, and they only nicked me a little! I’m telling you, if he’s in Shanghai, which we have every reason to believe he is, then he’s here. I’m sure of it.”

Jin Guangyao eyes the bar again, just as dubiously as the first time. The place is a black hole amongst all the glittering allure of the nightlife around it, a shabby brick-and-mortar nothing little hole in the wall. Unfortunately, this all tracks far too well for Jin Guangyao to doubt his friend.

He heaves a world weary sigh, dodges a drunken lurch with an accompanying grope from someone passing behind them, and waves Nie Huaisang forward with an imperious gesture. “Let’s go.” He sighs again; the ‘let’s just get this over with’ is perfectly implicit.

The interior of the club is, somehow, even darker than the outside. Or it at least feels that way, the ceiling low enough that Jin Guangyao has to fight the urge to duck despite the ceiling being nowhere near his head. Much like the exterior, everything inside, even the floor, is painted a deep black that absorbs the low light thrown off by a collection of dark-shaded lamps he can count on both hands for the entire club.

It’s loud enough the moment they step into the space that Jin Guangyao has to watch Nie Huaisang’s gesturing hands to figure out where to go, and he follows the wordless instruction to go find them a table while Nie Huaisang buys them a round of drinks. Even if he could speak and be heard he knows his protests would fall on conveniently deaf ears so he just does as instructed, picking his way slowly through shadows and tables and the blurring outlines of the club’s patrons until he finds an empty table near the back. The music is slightly less deafening with a couple of half-walls in the middle of the space to block it, though of course the pounding bass is inescapable. It reverberates through the thick soles of Jin Guangyao’s standard issue boots and around all the hollow spaces in his chest until he feels less like a man and more like a drum for some unseen fists to pound on.

Nie Huaisang finds him surprisingly quickly under the circumstances, and when he slides into his seat with an overdramatic flounce Jin Guangyao ushers the drinks he’d deposited closer to the center of the table to avoid any of them sloshing free of their glasses.

“He’s here,” Nie Huaisang leans in to shout in his ear. “Just have a drink and wait.”

Jin Guangyao nods to show he’s heard and reaches for the less offensive-looking option of the drinks Nie Huaisang has brought. Almost all of them are some shade of sickly sweet artificiality and he suspects the presence of far too much flavored vodka in them, but there’s a dark purple something glittering in the dim lighting that seems safe enough so he takes it, sipping at it carefully in tiny little mouthfuls until he’s sure it won’t make his teeth feel like they’re going to vibrate out of his skull.

He’s made it most of the way through the purple thing – enough of it swirling through his head that he thinks it’s actually pretty good now – and grown numb to the thundering music when a dark shadow seems to oooooze its way out of the press of too many bodies in the cramped spaces between tables to slip into the only unoccupied seat at their table on Nie Huaisang’s other side.

“Hey babes,” Xue Yang greets, too quietly to be heard over the din, but Jin Guangyao can manage to read his lips. The predatory grin stretching across his manically expressive face needs no interpretation to know he’s up to no good, but Jin Guangyao just sips at his drink and watches Nie Huaisang tip his neck enough to let Xue Yang lean in and nibble at him in greeting. (There is a Reason, capital R, that Nie Huaisang comes out to places like this, and once upon a time Xue Yang had been one of his regular hookups until they’d gotten bored of each other’s neuroses and settled into a weirdly combative and flirtatious truce. Jin Guangyao doesn’t like being reminded of that period of their lives too often, since they’d both been completely insufferable throughout it.)

Nie Huaisang allows the necking for roughly half a minute before he catches Jin Guangyao’s raised eyebrow and swats Xue Yang away with his closed fan, eyes a little unfocused from the trio of cocktails he’s already downed with impressive disregard for how they must taste.

“You’ve really done it this time, Xue-xiong,” Nie Huaisang pouts, somehow loud enough that Jin Guangyao can just hear him over the music. “Messing around with Kaiju brains? Naughty naughty.”

Xue Yang throws his head back to cackle, his long, sharp canines teeth glinting strangely in the lamplight. “Finally figured it out?! Took you long enough, I heard you got hold of my notes weeks ago! ~Someone’s out of practice~!” Jin Guangyao grinds his teeth around the urge to smile at Xue Yang’s sing-songy needling, his ability to pick up on and prod at sore spots as unerring as ever. Right on cue, Nie Huaisang pouts and hits him with the fan again, hard enough this time that Jin Guangyao knows it must’ve actually stung at least a little (though naturally pain is not exactly a deterrent for Xue Yang).

“I have better things to do than read through all your batshit ramblings, Xue-xiong! A-Yu is doing it, I’m still mad at you for destroying all my trackers.”

“Shoulda hid one in my ass if you wanted me to keep any of them,” Xue Yang snorts and makes a grab for the last drink on the table, something blood-red and glittering like Jin Guangyao’s had been. “At least then I could’ve had some fun with it before I took it out back and shot it.”

“Perhaps this is a conversation we could continue somewhere that won’t permanently destroy our hearing,” Jin Guangyao offers, grimacing at the sight of Xue Yang licking his cocktail-red lips with an overly theatrical eyebrow waggle, the glass already drained in three massive gulps.

“Sure, Yao-ge, whatever you say! Let me show you to my ~office~.”

Said ‘office’ is a room (to be very very loose with the word) made out of moldering crates in the suspiciously damp back alley behind the bar. Jin Guangyao doesn’t bother resisting the urge to rub at his temples as the fire door swings shut behind them with a loud clang that reverberates off the brick walls tight around them.

“Your existence both terrifies and disgusts me.”

“Aww, I missed you too, Yao-ge.”

Jin Guangyao sighs and crosses his arms over his chest, leveling an unimpressed Look at Xue Yang sprawling out over the staggered stack of the crates like they’re the most comfortable throne in the world. It’s just as dim back here as it had been inside, perhaps moreso, but at least the music is now nothing more than a thumping he can feel only in the soles of his boots, so it’s…debatably an upgrade.

“So – you finally came to find me. Took you long enough! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“You know you’re supposed to come back to the ‘dome if you’re in Shanghai,” Nie Huaisang pouts as he sits down on Xue Yang’s shins hard enough to make the crates creak ominously and Xue Yang winces around the lollipop stick between his teeth, though whether that’s from the damage to his shins or from the thought of coming back to the shatterdome is unclear.

“No can do, Sangsang. Got too many projects out here, you know how it is.”

“Projects like trying to figure out how to get the Kaijus to work for the worst men imaginable?”

Xue Yang’s creeping grin grows so wide Jin Guangyao personally believes it shouldn’t be allowed to exist on a human face, predatory and sharp at the edges, his lollipop stick trapped in the gap between his abnormally sharp canine and its counterpoint in his lower jaw.

“How’s Daddy Mustache liking that one?” Xue Yang asks him, not even bothering to pretend to deny it. “He figured it out? Pissed? Gonna come after me lecturing me about righteousness and seducing me with threats to chop my head off just like old times?”

“Mingjue has more on his mind than the actions of one unhinged man,” Jin Guangyao says smoothly despite the fact that everyone present knows precisely what he really means. It’s hard to just turn off a lifetime of self-preserving lies, even now, even with the two men – besides his partners – who know him more thoroughly than anyone else.

“So you haven’t told him the full extent yet because it will ruin so many of your elaborate schemes if you tattle on little old me and get me tied up nice and tight again so I can’t work my magic,” Xue Yang translates in that obnoxious way he has of yes, getting to the point, but doing it in such a way that’s so irritating Jin Guangyao’s first instinct is still to double down on his lies. But Nie Huaisang’s gaze is just as sharp on him over the edge of his fan, a silent warning away from old habits that got him in hot water before, so he takes a deep breath and sweetens his smile, unnervingly saccharine and perfect. A counterpoint to Xue Yang’s feral grin.

“Yes. I have a vested interest in making sure you continue to walk free for a little longer, dangerous as that might be for the general populace and every piece of candy within a ten mile radius.”

Xue Yang throws his head back to cackle again and when he sits forward again he slings his arms around Nie Huaisang’s waist to tug him up onto his knees instead of his shins, resting his head on his shoulder to pout up at Jin Guangyao through his eyelashes.

“You got me candy, Yao-gege? Just for me?”

Jin Guangyao raises his eyebrows at the man as Nie Huaisang wards him off with a few more good whacks from his fan, though he still doesn’t stand up from his perch on Xue Yang’s lap. Jin Guangyao already knows better than to so much as think about Nie Huaisang acting like this with Xue Yang while around Jiang Wanyin, who’s apparently taken it upon himself to bully Nie Huaisang into actually taking care of himself and becoming a slightly more functional human being in a slightly aggressive courting ritual that makes sense only to him (and, he supposes, Nie Huaisang). Xue Yang is still – probably more than ever – very much a massive flight risk at every moment, and sitting on him (i.e. giving him the sort of semi-violent affection he sorely needs but can only barely tolerate at the best of times) is pretty much the only surefire way to keep him around long enough to actually talk to him.

“I might have,” Jin Guangyao shrugs. “It’s difficult for me to remember when I’m so busy attempting to clean up one of your extremely dangerous messes. Again.”

Xue Yang huffs at that and slumps back, pouting and crunching on his lollipop a few times loudly before he spits out the bare paper stick and holds his hand out imperiously.

“You’re no fun anymore, Yao-gege, what happened to you?” he asks, his jutting lower lip and upturned brows quickly morphing into another manic grin when Jin Guangyao sighs as if put upon and slaps a fresh lollipop into his waiting palm. The plastic wrapper crinkles too loudly as he rips it off with his teeth and pops the sucker between his lips so fast Jin Guangyao hears the candy clack sharply against his front teeth. “Okay fine, you can spend another day off the list of people I’m gonna kill. But seriously, where’s your edge these days?! I found a way to talk to the giant aliens attacking all the stupid little humans!! No one else is doing that, not even Wei Wuxian! Call me a good boy at least, Yao-gege!”

“It is a lot like the kinds of things you and A-Yu used to get up to before Da-ge caught on and shut it down,” Nie Huaisang says with a shrewd little glint in his eye that Jin Guangyao doesn’t want to admit gets his hackles up, spine tingling with the need to defend himself and his past desperate measures. “Looking to start up the demon squad again, Yaoyao?”

Jin Guangyao pinches at the bridge of his nose again as he begs the unforgiving cosmos for some sort of extra ration of patience. “There was never such a thing as a ‘demon squad’, and if I were to ever start a group dedicated to ethically reprehensible, underground, black market research I would not allow my angsty teenage brother to give it a name at all, but especially not the ‘demon squad’!”

“Don’t even give him credit, Sangsang, I got it all from Wei Wuxian’s notes anyway, not his,” Xue Yang sighs, breezy and carefree. “And don’t help him avoid my question, either! What the fuck’s happening under Daddy Warbucks and the stupid Mustache these days, hm? They beating you up in there? Tying you down? Kink should loosen you up, Yao-gege, not wind you tighter. What are you riding my dick for all the sudden?”

“A-Sang,” Jin Guangyao says pleasantly, refusing to rise to Xue Yang’s clumsy baiting. He’s getting rusty, and Jin Guangyao has at least one solid theory as to why, though he’s not going to debase himself enough to ask. He doesn’t have to. “I’d like to talk to Xue-xiong alone for a moment if you don’t mind.”

“Aiyah,” Nie Huaisang pouts up at him from his perch. “I go to all this work to track him down and bring you out here to see him just like you asked, and now you’re brushing me off?? Rude, Yao-ge!”

Jin Guangyao sighs and withdraws his rarely-used cell phone from his pocket, clicking through a few screens quickly as Xue Yang crunches on his sucker and eyes Nie Huaisang’s exposed jugular like he’d very much like to chew through that instead.

“I just sent you money for drinks, go get whatever ridiculous concoctions you want and I promise I’ll drink one if you wait for me inside.”

“A man who knows the way to my heart! Thanks Yao-ge!!”

“Hey — nothing with tequila!” Jin Guangyao calls after his friend’s rapidly-retreating back, but considering all he gets in return is a maniacal cackle he’s pretty sure he’s in for a bitch of a hangover tomorrow either way, tequila or not. He looks down at Xue Yang again where he’s still lounging as the door slams shut behind Nie Huaisang again. Xue Yang — always better than anyone at scenting blood in the water — immediately grins his wickedly wide smile, all sharpened canines and eyes glittering with the sort of mischief that leads to world-shattering catastrophes…like Kaiju suddenly targeting specific Pilots with personally tailored attacks, because Xue Yang told them to.

“I don’t work for free,” Xue Yang says. “You know how steep my real prices are for the good shit.”

“I know. I’m offering you protection.”

“Mm you’re already doing that for me, gege, don’t try to play coy. You’ve got to up the ante now.”

“Not for you; for your family.”

The grin flickers off Xue Yang’s face quick as a burnt light fizzling out, expression as cold and furious as Jin Guangyao had expected.

“I don’t have a family.”

“Alright.” Jin Guangyao shrugs. “But that’s my offer. Anything you need to keep them safe you’ll have — money, papers, medical care, a house somewhere the Kaiju will never reach. Whatever it takes.”

In the blink of an eye, Xue Yang is no longer lounging on his stack of musty crates, but is instead snarling right in Jin Guangyao’s face, the cold bite of a knife at his throat as his back collides with the slimy bricks on the opposite side of the alley.

“Shut up!! I don’t have a family!” Xue Yang bites out, his breath redolent with sugar; underneath it, the thick tang of blood. Jin Guangyao quietly flicks his own knife out of his sleeve, though he doesn’t threaten Xue Yang with it just yet.

“Fine, so they’re not your family. Sugar daddies, then, though from what I understand they donate as much of their royalties and pensions as they can to orphanages and relief shelters, so I’m not sure if they can really qualify as anything other than your ‘handlers’ at best.”

Xue Yang withdraws as suddenly as he’d pounced, affecting an utterly flawless (and therefore obviously fabricated) aura of cold indifference. “I’m not doing anyone favors, Yao-gege. I don’t work for free, I told you, and I don’t need your fucking protection so just leave me alone.”

“You don’t need it – or they don’t, because they’ve already got such a good guard dog?”

“You have no goddamn idea what you’re talking about!” Xue Yang’s hackles are up again, knife flashing anxiously between his fingers as he spins it too fast to be seen clearly in the dim alley light. “What do they even have to do with anything?! You think you have a right to meddle in their lives just because they decided to walk back into your stupid Shatterdome for a day? They’re my toys to play with, not yours!”

“Mature, xiao-Yang,” Jin Guangyao drawls. “If you’d rather torture them than help them, that’s your business. I don’t want to force you to help me, but I will if I must. This is your mess, and you will help me clean it up, and you underestimate the lengths I’m willing to go to to ensure you get it done. You’re alive because I won’t allow you to die, and you’ll do as I say until I decide you’re no longer useful.”

“Hey!!” Jin Guangyao doesn’t take his eyes off Xue Yang as a young, high voice suddenly shouts above them, punctuated with the clang of something knocking hard against a metal grate. “Get your ass back in here, Yang-ge, the daozhangs are back! Stop playing tough and come eat dinner!!”

“Get back inside the house before I chop your stupid head off!!” Xue Yang shouts up at whoever it is, an ugly snarl on his face that Jin Guangyao can only assume is masking embarrassment more than genuine anger. His knife is still flickering between his fingers, after all, and if he were truly angry it would likely be sailing through the air to lodge itself somewhere in this person’s face by now.

“My offer stands,” Jin Guangyao says in the ringing silence of the window slamming shut again. “You can say you don’t want it, but you can’t hide from me forever, A-Yang. The Immortals aren’t fit to return to active duty, and you’ve doomed yourself to an early grave with your little Drift experiment – if the Kaijus don’t kill us all first, your nerve damage will come for you almost as quick without proper care. Do this last task for me, and I’ll send you so far away everything you’ve seen and done here will be nothing but a fever dream. You’ll never want for anything again, and neither will they.”

Xue Yang is glaring at him again and breathing hard like he’d just run a mile, his teeth bared, hands clenched white-knuckled at his sides. He takes a deep breath in and visibly centers himself before he closes his eyes and forces his grimacing lips into his signature grin.

“Anything to get you to leave me the fuck alone again,” he chirps. “What’s the goal? I’m assuming I can have as much fun with him as I want?”

It’s Jin Guangyao’s turn to take a deep breath in. He’s been wanting this for so long – thinking of it in abstract even when it still made him sick with guilt. Daydreaming of it when it was no longer an ‘if’ but a ‘when’. Making quiet, hidden moves to line things up just right in recent months, just in case.

Just in case.

“Make it hurt,” he tells Xue Yang, even though he knows that’s a given, “and before it’s over, make sure he has no doubts as to who is standing behind you telling you to pull the trigger.”

Xue Yang nods and turns to go without another word, knife still flashing and spinning rapidly between his clever fingers. Jin Guangyao allows himself five deep breaths before he returns to the noisy, black interior of the bar, and when he finds Nie Huaisang back at their table he downs three shots of something in quick succession without so much as a grimace. Nie Huaisang just hands him a pint glass of water before he lines up the next shot with silent, grave understanding.

[ibijau]

I have written a thing! It's a three part xisang timeloop with a lot of people repeatedly dying, because that's what's good and fun about time loops. All three parts are already on AO3 because this was for an exchange, but I'll post it one chapter at a time on tumblr warning from some mentions of violence (mostly offscreen) and an offscreen suicide (it doesn't stick)

1. Even without the Song of Clarity to both calm and irritate him, Nie Mingjue still died on the same day. In his final moment of rage, he did not recognise his own brother until Baxia had already decapitated him. Lan Xichen, who had come running to his friend’s aid, stopped in his tracks as Nie Huaisang’s head rolled to his feet, blood and tears staining it. A pang of twisted satisfaction coursed through Lan Xichen at the sight of that little snake being punished for crimes he would now never commit. A short-lived glee; Nie Mingjue roared as he realised what he had done, and collapsed over his brother’s corpse.

2. “Enough excuses!” Nie Mingjue snarled, still shockingly angry for a man to whom Lan Xichen had played the Song of Clarity daily. “I warned you that you’d pay if Xue Yang wasn’t punished for his crimes!”

Jin Guangyao was shaking with fear, pleading for more time, trying to explain his side of things, begging their Da-ge to understand his position, but Nie Mingjue refused to listen. Baxia was unsheathed. Realising the situation was getting out of control, Lan Xichen tried to step between his two sworn brothers, only for a terrified Nie Huaisang to grab him by the sleeve, restraining him with surprising strength. Lan Xichen glared at him, letting his hatred shine through. Nie Huaisang, startled, released him, but it was already too late.

Jin Guangyao laid in a puddle of his own blood, unmoving.

3. Warning Nie Mingjue of Jin Guangshan’s plot only made things worse. Lan Xichen had taken such pains to explain that Jin Guangyao had been pressured into it, that he was truly innocent, another victim of his father. Nie Mingjue refused to see things his way.

The attack on the Jins, however justified, started a new war which decimated what was left of the cultivation world, including Jin Guangyao.

4. Warning Jin Guangyao that Lan Xichen knew of his plot did not work either. Jin Guangyao apologised, yes, and he begged for forgiveness, explained in detail how awful his life was in Jinlin Tai, how he was not given a choice. But he refused to take Lan Xichen’s offer to stay with him in Gusu where he would be safer. He was after all the heir apparent of the Jin sect, as he pointed out once he realised that Lan Xichen had no intention of revealing his plot to Nie Mingjue. And he was likely to remain so, since none of his father's other bastards had any real skill for cultivation, and Madam Jin was past the age to bear children. He couldn't give up on that.

The two of them argued for the first time that Lan Xichen could recall, certain tragic events of his first life aside. No matter how good Lan Xichen’s arguments, Jin Guangyao found ways to turn them around to suit his opinion. Meanwhile, over the course of the day, Jin Guangyao grew increasingly frustrated with Lan Xichen’s refusal to bend to his side, the way he’d always done before. Unable to reach a decision, they agreed to continue talking in the morning.

Left alone for the night, in the silence of the Hanshi, Lan Xichen found his resolve wavering. After all, Jin Guangyao had done such good for the world as chief cultivator before. Maybe they really could ensure that he would be again, and without killing Nie Mingjue this time. There had to be a way, if Lan Xichen helped him.

And he would have helped, truly, but he died in his sleep that same night. 

5. Lan Xichen couldn't make sense of his death in the previous loop. He knew his health to be excellent at this point of his life.

A lesser man might have suspected Jin Guangyao, but he refused to consider the thought. Even in murdering Nie Mingjue, Jin Guangyao had been a victim of circumstances. He'd had no choice. If he had really killed Lan Xichen… But no, that was impossible. Jin Guangyao would never hurt him. He'd said so, once. Jin Guangyao would never have hurt him, not on purpose. 

All the pain he'd caused had been accidental. 

Lan Xichen clung to that conviction.

He tried, again, to warn Nie Mingjue, and he was more careful in his words, trying harder to hide Jin Guangyao’s part in the plot, so both his sworn brothers might survive.

He failed. There was a war again, but this time it was Nie Mingjue who failed to survive it.

6. Another attempt to make Nie Mingjue understand.

Another failure.

7. One more attempt.

Nie Huaisang was there when Lan Xichen spoke to Nie Mingjue, for some reason.

He’d refused to leave his brother alone for the entirety of Lan Xichen’s visit. His presence was irritating, as always, but Lan Xichen ignored him. Nie Huaisang wasn’t worthy of notice at this point in his life.

He would never be worthy of notice.

He was just a coward, a liar, a little snake manipulating better men to spill blood for him.

Lan Xichen focused only on Nie Mingjue, on making him realise that his life was in danger while still protecting Jin Guangyao, so he could become the man he should have been.

One more attempt.

One more failure.

8. One more.

9. One more.

10. One more.

16. Sometimes, almost Lan Xichen wondered how he had become friends with Nie Mingjue in the first place. This unbending man, always so sure that he alone knew what was true and what wasn't. Stubborn, irritating Nie Mingjue, without any mercy in his heart.

This time either, Jin Guangyao couldn’t be protected once Nie Mingjue guessed the parts of the story Lan Xichen was trying to hide from him.

27. It wasn’t that Lan Xichen wanted to see Nie Mingjue die again. But he was growing frustrated with his inability to fix things, when it should have been so easy. He knew that Nie Mingjue and Jin Guangyao used to be friends, so why couldn’t they be again? Why must one always kill the other?

Why couldn’t anyone ever make things easy for Lan Xichen?

He was so tired.

He was also running out of ideas.

That was why he didn’t try to change anything in this new loop. He allowed events to follow their natural course, hoping to gain new insight. Jin Guangyao changing the song after one last humiliation. Nie Mingjue losing his mind after another perceived betrayal. The Qi deviation. The slaughter.

Lan Xichen didn’t try to change anything.

Something still changed.

There must have been a mistake somewhere, something he didn’t notice he’d done differently.

For whatever reason, Nie Huaisang didn’t run to his crazed brother in this loop, and Nie Mingjue continued his slaughter until he found Jin Guangyao.

They both died this time.

That had never happened yet.

Lan Xichen fell on his knees next to the corpses of his sworn brothers, choking on tears he couldn’t spill. For the first time, he wondered if trying to fix things hadn’t been a mistake. If he had accepted their deaths, if he had accepted his own mistakes… But as he thought this, his eyes fell on Nie Huaisang, watching the three of them from a few feet away. 

Nie Huaisang, with his face red and shining with tears, but his eyes as hard as the day he’d re-buried his brother.

Nie Huaisang, who watched with cold curiosity, seemingly more interested in Lan Xichen than in the dead men.

Nie Huaisang, whose absence at a critical moment had caused this tragedy.

Nie Huaisang, whose irritating personality had made things so much harder for Nie Mingjue even before the loops.

Nie Huaisang, who had hated Lan Xichen enough to use him as a weapon.

Nie Huaisang, without whom Lan Xichen wouldn’t have had to see his two only friends die again and again.

Nie Huaisang, whose cold curiosity turned to pure terror when Lan Xichen launched himself at him to choke him.

Nie Huaisang, whose neck snapped with such a terrible noise, just as surviving Nie disciples pierced Lan Xichen’s chest in an pointless effort to rescue their late sect leader’s brother.

28. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

The irony was not lost on him.

But he couldn’t bear to see either of his sworn brothers die again, and he knew he was powerless to save them. Perhaps if he hadn’t been so blind, if he’d accepted that only one of them could live, if he’d been a better friend…

But things were what they were.

It was better to stay out of this, until the loops drained away what was left of his life.

29. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

He now realised what he hadn’t in the previous loop, that he would always know when one of his sworn brothers had died because he would be sent back to the first day. But as long as he didn’t see it happen, as long as he wasn’t there to smell blood, knowing hurt less.

At least, that was what he tried to convince himself of.

30. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

36. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

42. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

He closed the door of his house behind him, turned around, and startled when he noticed someone standing inside his home, waiting for him. Lan Xichen nearly ran back outside, but he refused to be scared, refused to lose again.

“How did you get in here, Huaisang?” He calmly asked.

The young man shrugged, hiding an embarrassed smile behind a fan.

“Oh, you know, I managed,” Nie Huaisang said in the light, somewhat whiny tone he used often. 

The tone he had used at that temple, when Wei Wuxian had confronted him.

“I can’t imagine anyone let you in,” Lan Xichen insisted.

“I didn’t need it. You gave Da-ge one of those jade tokens that lets him freely come and go, so I borrowed it,” Nie Huaisang admitted with an awkward giggle. “I wasn’t sure it’d work since I’m not Da-ge, but it’s about the token, not the person. I came in last night and this morning, when you went to talk to your uncle about your seclusion, I slipped inside the house. It was really easy, Er-ge,” he added with a pouty frown. “You really should put some protections around your home. What if I had been an assassin?”

An assassin would have been a less unpleasant surprise, Lan Xichen thought, glaring at the little snake that dared to disturb him again. But quickly, another more important detail struck him.

“How do you know I’m entering seclusion?” Lan Xichen asked, frowning. “I haven’t told anyone except my uncle.”

Courtesy would have demanded that he inform his sworn brothers, especially in such troubled times. But courtesy mattered little, and in three weeks, none of this would have happened in the first place. Lan Xichen could afford to be rude.

Nie Huaisang shrugged again. “You’ve done it like that the last few times,” he said, his voice trembling, just as his hand did, barely keeping his fan in place. “So I thought you probably would again, and I thought… I thought I should finally try to find out for real.”

Lan Xichen stared at the young man. Nie Huaisang was smiling, but his lips were spasming from the effort it took, and whatever good humour he was trying to convey failed to reach his eyes, already shining with the threat of tears.

How many times had Lan Xichen seen him like that? Poor little Nie Huaisang, incompetent sect leader if there had ever been one, so awkward as he asked Jin Guangyao for help. And it was always Jin Guangyao he’d bothered with his problems. Lan Xichen had only ever been involved as an afterthought. He used to be bothered by that, he vaguely recalled, because there had been a time when he had sincerely liked and pitied Nie Huaisang, when he had wanted the younger man to rely on him more. Lan Xichen used to wish they could have been friends. He knew better now. He knew that all of Nie Huaisang’s tears had been false, more like rouge on a courtesan’s face than a genuine display of emotion.

“You’re not making any sense, Huaisang,” Lan Xichen scolded. “If you want something, say it clearly. Otherwise, go home. I don’t care if you’ve had another argument with your brother…”

“But I haven’t!” Nie Huaisang cried out, lowering his fan and taking one step toward Lan Xichen.

He froze, his eyes glancing in terror at Lan Xichen’s face, then took two steps back.

“Er-ge, I have been so good the last few times,” Nie Huaisang whispered, lowering his eyes. Shedding a tear, even. Pathetic. “After what happened the last time you came, I realised it had to be my fault. That’s why you’ve been like that toward me since this started, right? It must have been my fault. So I behaved. I did everything Da-ge told me. I trained as hard as I could, until there were blisters all over my hands. I meditated when he told me to. I helped with the sect’s daily affairs even when it gave me headaches. I… I tried so hard, Er-ge!” He sobbed, heavy tears falling on Lan Xichen’s floor. “But he still… every time, he still… I don’t know what to do…”

Lan Xichen took a sharp breath, finally starting to understand what Nie Huaisang was trying to say. But it was impossible. Lan Xichen had started those loops. He should have been the only one aware of them. 

“Please Er-ge, you have to tell me what to do!” Nie Huaisang begged, as whiny and demanding as he had been during the years after his brother’s death. 

Lan Xichen had trusted him then, his heart aching every time. He now watched Nie Huaisang’s despair without emotion. None of it was real, so why should it touch him?

“Er-ge, I just want to save Da-ge!” Nie Huaisang insisted. “It’s fine if you hate me, but if we work together, won’t we have a better chance to save him, and San-ge too?”

“You want to save A-Yao?” Lan Xichen scoffed, something in his voice startling Nie Huaisang out of his tears.

The young man stared at him with the terror of a mouse cornered by a snake. Then, slowly, almost carefully, he nodded.

“Even though Da-ge hates him?” Lan Xichen insisted.

Nie Huaisang blinked a few times, some last few tears falling on his cheeks. Then, another nod.

“It’s like you’ve said,” Nie Huaisang whispered. “It’s not really San-ge’s fault. I… I don’t understand all of it. And I… I don’t like that San-ge could even think of obeying his father about this. It’s… it’s wicked of him. But I don’t think… I don’t think San-ge would actually do that, anyway. He wouldn’t go through with it. He’s so nice, he wouldn’t. I’m sure he would have stopped in time, but I… because I always make Da-ge angry… San-ge couldn’t guess that I’d make Da-ge so upset, and… I hate that Da-ge blames him for everything. I just want everything to be good again, and for all of us to be friends.”

Lan Xichen pinched his lips. During the early loops, Nie Huaisang hadn’t been there when Lan Xichen would tell Nie Mingjue in detail about the plot against his life. By the time Nie Huaisang made himself unavoidable, a few loops later, Lan Xichen had figured out it was wiser not to let Nie Mingjue know that Jin Guangyao had already started poisoning him, so he only spoke about the murder scheme in a vague manner, as something that had been ordered but not yet put into action. Omissions were not really lies, were they?

Lan Xichen had despaired that his efforts to protect Jin Guangyao would convince anyone.

He despaired all the more, knowing they had only convinced the wrong brother.

“I’m not sure this can really be solved,” Lan Xichen bitterly said. “Short perhaps of you killing yourself to see if it solves something…”

“No, I’ve already tried that,” Nie Huaisang cut him, hiding again behind his fan. “It wasn’t enough. There’s got to be something more we can do, Er-ge.”

It had to be a lie. Lan Xichen almost shouted at the young man, who even at this age thought he could be easily fooled. But he realised, suddenly, that the previous loop had felt… oddly short. It was hard to tell the time when he was in deep meditation, so he hadn’t thought much of it.

He didn’t want to think about it. 

“I find it hard to believe you’d be brave enough to try that,” Lan Xichen replied, clinging to his understanding of Nie Huaisang as a selfish coward, a man without honour who never saw fit to avenge his brother until it became easy for him. But if it was true, if Nie Huaisang had killed himself… of course that would have precipitated Nie Mingjue’s death, in his unstable state, ending the loop early.

“I had to see him die so many times, after you stopped coming,” Nie Huaisang said, averting his eyes. “I couldn’t… it wasn’t being brave. I just couldn’t see it happen again. And if it could save Da-ge… But it didn’t really work. I still woke up at midnight again, like the other times. And I… you’re right, I’m not brave. I didn’t mean to come see you at first. I just ran away as soon as I woke up. I just couldn’t stay home to watch him die again. Why did you stop trying, Er-ge?”

“Nothing I did was working,” Lan Xichen replied, more honestly than he intended. His heart clenched at the despair in Nie Huaisang’s voice, the accusation in his words. Nie Huaisang was the last person who had any right to judge him.

Nie Huaisang was, perhaps, the only person with a right to judge him.

“How long have you been aware of what was going on?” Lan Xichen asked.

“I don’t know,” Nie Huaisang sniffed, and Lan Xichen winced at the too familiar answer. But unlike his time as a sect leader, Nie Huaisang didn’t leave it at that. “A while? Maybe from the start. The very first time Da-ge died, I tried to stop him and he wounded me with Baxia. But then I woke up in my bed, without so much as a scar, so I figured it was just a bad dream. Only, you told San-ge to stop playing that song for Da-ge, and a little while after Da-ge still had a Qi deviation, and this time he killed me.” Nie Huaisang paused and brought one hand to his throat. He started crying again. When he spoke again, his voice was weak. “After that, it was San-ge who started dying many times. But I could tell… I could tell even whenever he won against the Jin, Da-ge was about to have another Qi deviation. I always woke up at the start of the cycle before it happened, but I knew. I could see it.”

Lan Xichen shivered. He’d been so focused on his horror over Jin Guangyao’s death every time that came to pass, he’d forgotten to worry about the effect of another war on Nie Mingjue’s health.

Or had he simply not cared?

He’d become so frustrated with Nie Mingjue’s stubbornness. Had Lan Xichen really cared anymore what happened to Nie Mingjue once Jin Guangyao couldn’t be saved anymore?

Had he cared even when he started those loops? Had he cared before, when Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian had offered proof that Jin Guangyao was a murderer? Or had everything he’d done been an elaborate way to protect his last friend from the consequences of his actions? Lan Xichen had so desperately wanted to believe Jin Guangyao could have been a good man, had he not murdered their sworn brother. He’d found so many excuses for him, so his complicity would weigh less heavy.

As if Nie Mingjue hadn’t been a good man as well.

Infuriating and stubborn and unbending, yes, but good as well, and a steady friend for as long as he’d lived.

And Lan Xichen had helped kill him.

Lan Xichen fell to his knees, bile burning the back of his throat, tears drenching his face. He distantly heard Nie Huaisang’s cries of concern, and then felt the young man’s presence at his side, hand hovering near his shoulders, never daring to touch him. 

Nie Huaisang who didn’t know yet that Lan Xichen was a murderer.

Or didn’t he? Lan Xichen had killed him once with his bare hands, had watched him die another time with cruel glee, had wished horrors upon him countless times. All that for the crime of doing what Lan Xichen couldn’t have done, for avenging Nie Mingjue with what weapons he had at his disposal: tears, and the sympathy of others.

It was no wonder that Nie Huaisang had used him as his weapon, that night. It was all Lan Xichen was good for. That, and making excuses for murderers. Like his father, he was so much like his father. Too much like his mother, too. Ruining lives and hiding dirty secrets. 

“Er-ge, should I get someone?” Nie Huaisang asked, his voice appearing to come from so far away. He had gotten over his terror of Lan Xichen and was holding his shoulders now, trying to comfort him perhaps. “Er-ge, please, I don’t want to watch someone die again. Please calm down, please. I’m sorry I came here, I won’t do it again! I’m sorry for whatever I did to make you angry. Please calm down, please don’t die.”

The request startled Lan Xichen. He opened his mouth, wanting to reassure the young man, only for blood to pour out of his lips. A hand brought to his eyes, his nose, made it clear he was bleeding there too.

Lan Xichen would have laughed, had he had the breath for it.

What a fitting punishment for his failings, to die the way he’d allowed Nie Mingjue to die.

He wondered, briefly, if perhaps this would finally break the unending cycle he’d created, if they would all be free once he died.

He could only hope.

43. Lan Xichen went into seclusion.

Nobody came to visit him.

Days and weeks alone, waiting for the moment everything would start over again. He did not meditate this time, wanting to ensure that days flowed normally, that Nie Huaisang had not tried anything radical again to protect his brother.

It gave him time to think about things, really think about them, for the first time since he’d seen Nie Mingjue’s headless corpse blindly attacking juniors, and Wei Wuxian hinted at a possible murderer.

Lan Xichen had made mistakes. Believing Jin Guangyao had been one. Being kind to him… he could not regret being kind, even to a man who had abused his trust. Even a murderer deserved to have his pain soothed, and Lan Xichen refused to think he’d been wrong to show mercy to Jin Guangyao that terrible night. But he could see better why it would have enraged Nie Huaisang, pushing him to reveal himself by pushing Lan Xichen to murder.

Looking back on it, Lan Xichen disapproved of the methods, but he pitied the desperation.

Poor Nie Huaisang, whose only remaining friends had been his nemesis and an accessory to murder. Could Lan Xichen really blame him for lashing out and hurting so many others, when he had done the same during those hellish loops?

It was odd, to have anything in common with Nie Huaisang. Lan Xichen remembered, distantly, that Nie Mingjue used to encourage him to befriend his little brother, saying they were more alike than they seemed. He couldn’t have known that their greatest common trait was a tendency to be vicious for the sake of affection, but Lan Xichen didn’t think Nie Mingjue would entirely disapprove either. Not when he’d gone to such length to avenge his father.

Maybe that was why Jin Guangyao had failed to truly fit in with them. If he had killed for love instead of ambition, like the rest of them, Nie Mingjue might have liked him better.

44. Lan Xichen did not go into seclusion.

Instead he stepped on his sword and flew North, toward Qinghe.

Alone, he had failed to save his sworn brothers. But he did not have to be alone.

First, he would apologise to Nie Huaisang, for his mistakes in their first life, in all of the horrifying loops he’d inflicted to the poor boy. He would tell him the truth, as much of it as could be shared without hurting him more.

And then, if Nie Huaisang was still willing, they would work together to break the loops.

[korpikorppi]

Unnamed swords: Nie Huaisang's sabre and the other Nie blades

While making the posts of the swords mentioned by name in the MDZS and the Untamed, I found myself frequently thinking about all the beautiful unnamed blades and thinking "I need to look at those, too!". So, here is the first post in a series of those, expanded into a general overview of the blades used by specific sects/clans, starting with Nie Huaisang's sabre and the Nie blades.

Nie Huisang is, of course, far more often carrying one of his fans than his saber, so we are only given few glimpses of his blade, unfortunately. The first time we see it is in the Cloud Recesses:

Then we see it again in Qishan, during the indoctrination, where we get the best view of it as Nie Huaisang surrenders it to Wen custody:

And oh, it is a thing of beauty!

This got long, so let's do a cut here.

It is hard to be sure of the colour, but both the scabbard and the handle are very dark, possibly matte black or dark brown. The fittings seem to be of a rather dark grey metal, perhaps oxidised silver or (fitting the Nie?) steel. The ornamentation is quite sparse, and the handle looks, perhaps surprisingly, utilitarian and comfortable to wield.

The blade looks straight, so - a piece of trivia - this seems to be a zhibeidao (直背刀) or simply zhidao (直刀), a "straight backed dao" or "straight dao" (I think this applies to all Nie sabres, which are all straight-backed, only much wider... please correct me if I'm wrong). The blade is quite narrow for a dao (a straight or curved, single-edged blade), no wider (or even slightly narrower) than an average jian (a straight, two-edged blade), which gives the sabre a rather elegant and refined look. A beautiful weapon <3.

I did not see this saber among the swords Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji reclaim from the Wen during the Sunshot Campaign, but Nie Huaisang clearly gets it back, because he is carrying it during the Second Siege of the Burial Mounds:

And not just carrying it, but wielding it (ok, at least he's drawn it? Dage would be weeping for pride!):

The narrow, straight blade is nicely visible in the images above, as well as the fact that with it's single cutting edge, it really is a dao. I also have to mention here that I just love how the Nie disciples crowd around their Sect Leader; Nie Huaisang might not be Nie Mingjue, but he clearly has their loyalty 🤎.

A little side tour here: the screencap above with Lan Jingyi and Nie Huaisang? The blade on the right side of it? A sabre, with a very similar blade to Nie Huaisang's! I had to go and watch that scene to find out who it belongs to, and it turned out to be this guy:

Don't know his name, but he's a disciple of the Su Sect! Well well, Su She.... Qin from the Lan, sabers from the Nie, eh? Nie Mingjue's spirit disapproves. Strongly.

Hmm. Yes. Where was I.... Oh yes. The Nie sabres. It seems that the Nie disciples favour blades that are like lesser versions of the mighty Baxia:

Some can also be seen in the previous Burial Mounds caps. A close-up of a blade, courtesy of Meng Yao:

And a close-up of the handles, courtesy of Xue Yang:

Nicely decorated, solid pieces; standard issue for the Nie disciples from the Qinghe forges?

So, the Nie seem to prefer (or ever use exclusively) straight-backed, broad-bladed and rather heavy sabres taking after Baxia in the overall design. This makes me all the more appreciative of the fact that Nie Huaisang has a very different, lighter and more elegant, sabre. Did Nie Mingjue, realising Nie Huaisang was not made for a more traditional Nie blade, have it made for his didi? I like to think so, because years later, Nie Huaisang still carries that blade, at least occasionally. And it gives me Feelings.

[paradife-loft]

Things we learn about JGY in MDZS, in chronological order

I mentioned at one point a while back, that when the official English volumes of MDZS came out and I started doing a reread, I wanted to make a chronological catalogue of information we learn about Jin Guangyao.

I wanted to do this both for reference purposes, but also for bringing a quality of deliberation to the experience, trying to look more cleanly at how MXTX’s presentation of him unfolds throughout the novel if you aren’t coming into it already knowing a majority of his story. In particular, I think it’s very relevant to look at that presentation when coming, as I do, from a background of having watched CQL first, because the difference in story ordering (present day with integrated flashbacks, versus mostly linear and chronological) makes a big difference in what and how we learn things about him in, in what order, and therefore how his entire character comes across. (I mean, it does that for probably everybody to greater or lesser degrees, but it’s me, so my main concern is Jin Guangyao.)

So this here is the first part of that reference catalogue! It covers material found in volume 1 of the official published English translation by Seven Seas, which is also what the page numbers refer to.

---

He is the only one of Jin Guangshan’s many illegitimate children to be “outstanding enough” to be recognized and taken back into the family. He is the current head of the Lanling Jin clan in the present day. (page 72)

He is close personal friends with Zewu-jun, Lan Xichen, and as a result of that friendship, the Lan and Jin clans are politically close. (page 82)

His title is Lianfang-zun. He hosts Lan Xichen at Jinlintai regularly. He was the (younger) half-brother of Jin Ling’s father, and the elder half-brother of Mo Xuanyu. He sits on the “highest seat of the cultivation world” and is very politically and personally powerful - entirely unlike Mo Xuanyu. He and Lan Xichen are not simply good friends, but also sworn brothers. (page 124)

He’s the one who gave Fairy to Jin Ling as a gift. (page 222)

He and Lan Xichen had also been sworn brothers with the previous leader of the Nie clan, Nie Mingjue. The two of them now often help his younger brother, Nie Huaisang, with the many difficulties he has running his clan. (pages 225-226)

He is considered “smooth and resourceful, sharp-witted and intelligent.” His oath of brotherhood with LXC and NMJ took place during the Sunshot Campaign, when they each did praiseworthy deeds that later got them the moniker of the Venerated Triad*. (page 270) (*yes, I’m cleaning up/swapping that translation for a different one, because the official one on-page is ridiculous.)

Nie Mingjue “viciously berated” him and ordered him to leave when he stepped in to try and smooth over a diplomatic solution between him and Jin Guangshan over the matter of Xue Yang killing the Chang Clan. He ended up too terrified to say anything more, and hid behind Lan Xichen. (page 308)

Jin Guangyao inherited control of the Lanling Jin clan after his father’s death (a few years after the siege of the Burial Mounds), as well as his position of Cultivation Chief. He ushered in a new regime compared to that of his father, offering many restorative measures to their reputation, including “getting rid” of Xue Yang and any talk of remaking the Yin Tiger Seal. (page 314)

He’s the most popular character for kids to play in “Sunshot Campaign” games! (adorable <3) His background - which we don’t know yet beyond simply his being an illegitimate child - is considered “too embarrassing to speak of”, but that only helps endear him to the common people in the context of his admirable rise to power. During the Sunshot Campaign, he worked as an incredibly effective spy within the Qishan Wen clan; afterwards, he “curried favor by every means possible,” using intelligence and quick wits in all sorts of ways eventually reach his current position as Cultivation Chief. On the other hand, it seems widely-enough known as a part of his reputation that he was regularly scared of Nie Mingjue, that even the kids playing Sunshot games were well aware of it. (page 344-345)

---

And that’s it! A few additional observations of these, taken as a whole:

The strong focus here, presumably in his reputation as narrator!Wei Wuxian is relating it to us, on extraordinary merit as the reason for everything about his ascension.

A strong five out of nine of these passages mentioning him either include, emphasise, or are directly about, his relationship with Lan Xichen. (And one of those remaining four is literally just “he gave Jin Ling a dog”.) - And not only is it a consistent through-line: it’s the literal second thing we learn about him.

Up through the point where Wangxian have retrieved their dismembered corpse friend’s torso from the Chang clan cemetery, we still haven’t heard any mention of Meng Shi’s occupation. The closest we get is the last section, where his background is mentioned as being very embarrassing - but it still doesn’t specify. Even in the very first mention of him, where we learn he’s an illegitimate child, and that Jin Guangshan was an infamous womanizer, nobody here and now is commenting about “son of a prostitute”. Reputation may certainly be fickle - but it’s also very clearly not worth nothing.

(For comparison, in his first couple appearances in CQL, we get, roughly in order: retainer of the Nie clan who Huaisang relies on; son of a prostitute (gossiped about); mutual heart-eyes with Lan Xichen; extremely competent and politically shrewd. Possibly also murders people and lies about it (??), but also jumps in front of a sword for Nie Mingjue.)

[hishoukoku]

Nie Huaisang's Master Plan

I've seen a few misunderstandings regarding Nie Huaisang's role in uncovering the murder of his brother, Nie Mingjue.

I wanted to go through a brief summary his entire master plan, that he carefully thought out, chronologically, since he deserves a LOT more credit than he's given.

~~The events follow the novel story-line solely!~~

Under the cut of course, because it's quite long~!

We know and love how Nie Huaisang is first presented in his comical, innocent even scaredy facade. He is not known to put that much effort into cultivation and his studies results (especially at Cloud Recesses) are exceedingly poor.

He’s also always gladly participating in Wei Wuxian's shenanigans, indulging in drinking nights and pranks + that small fact abt him owning an entire library of pornography.

Worth mentioning, that Nie Huaisang has always shown interest in demonic cultivation when Wei Wuxian first mentioned it. Especially since he wasn't adept at cultivating himself, which proves he was already ready to use all the means/short-cuts necessary to achieve his goals.

(This is presented solely from his POV but a bit of background of each situation is needed, yet I will try not to go into too many details and keep it NHS centric as parts of his plan are unfolded, which is why other main story elements are naturally skipped)!

His plans begins after his brother Nie Mingjue's death through qi deviation.

Nie Huaisang naturally becomes the new Qinghe Nie sect leader. He is still unwilling to cultivate the saber, lest the same fate befalls him, as previous Nie sect leaders have also lost their lives through qi deviation.

When Nie Huaisang notices that his brother's corpse has gone missing, he begins his search. He is only able to track down his left arm that he can neither suppress nor control.

Thus, his first goal is to find the remaining pieces.

His plan unravels chronologically as follows. step by step:

step 1. MO XUANYU

Nie Huaisang seeks out the traumatized Mo Xuanyu and goads him to perform the sacrificial summon with the incentive of revenge against his abusive family to summon Wei Wuxian back from the dead.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

step 2. MO VILLAGE

Nie Huaisang lets Nie Mingjue's left arm loose in Mo village when the Lan juniors (Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi) arrive to help solve the issue of increased number of fierce corpses recently. Nie Mingjue's left arm ends up claiming the lives of all of Mo Xuanyu's aggressors; Mo Ziyuan, Madam Mo, her husband and A-tong, hence freeing Wei Wuxian from the debt of the sacrificial summon by fulfilling Mo Xuanyu's wish for revenge.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

step 3. THE BODY PARTS SEARCH.

Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji’s search for the other body parts begins:

The left arm is taken to the Gusu Lan sect and it directs them north-west, to Qinghe. Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji encounter Nie Huaisang who tells them about the "Man-eating castle" which is revealed to be the Nie Sect’s Ancestral Hall.

Backstory: The sabers cultivated by the Qinghe Nie Clan became strong enough to have a desire to kill evil spirits on their own even of their owners' died. As this created even more bloodshed, the sixth head of the Nie Clan came up with a plan to appease them. He built a tomb for the sabres with a number of corpses that were going to turn into fierce corpses. This way, the sabres could continue to fight with evil spirits even after their owners' deaths.

-> Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji discover the legs of the corpse in the wall of this Nie Sect’s Ancestral Hall

->The left arm then points to Yueyang next, where they witness the torso of the corpse being dug up by an unknown Gravedigger (who turns out to be Su She)

->Lan Wangji finds the corpse's right arm in Yi City after splitting up with Wei Wuxian.

-> The corpse reassembles itself in a headless body in a garden in Tanzhou. After fighting the corpse and playing 'Rest' to appease it, Lan Xichen recognizes its movements as that of his sworn brother. Nie Mingjue.

4. GETTING THE JUNIORS TO YI CITY

Nie Huaisang goes to great lengths to lure the junior disciples into Yi City.

It is presumed that technically he would go that far as to put the blame on Jin Guangyao quicker, if the juniors were to die at the hands of Xue Yang, which shows how strong his resolve is.

Nie Huaisang first targets Jin Ling, in an inn located in Qinghe, by nailing a dead black cat to the door of his room and a pool of blood outside as he wakes up. This happens night after night, despite him going from inn to inn, which eventually prompts him to investigate.

At the same time, Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi, Ouyang Zizhen and a few other juniors had been night-hunting in Langya. They first find the head of a cat in their soup, and then the corpse of a cat in their beds. This prompts them as well to investigate, ultimately meeting up with Jin Ling.

Ultimately as they met, Nie Huaisang disguises himself as a hunter from a nearby village to point them accurately, directly towards Yi City, which was his goal for this part of the plan.

5. SISI & BICAO

Nie Huaisang frees Sisi and asks Bicao to inform Qin Su about her true relationship with her husband Jin Guangyao. Qin Su receives the letter the night before the Discussion Conference, which makes her take her own life.

6. MENG SHI’S GRAVE

(Jin Guangyao buries Nie Mingjue's head in an iron box with Meng Shi's body in Guanyin Temple.)

Thus, it's Nie Huaisang who retrieves the head and removes Meng Shi's body, placing a poisonous trap in its place.

7. THE LETTER -> second Burial Mounds siege

Nie Huiasang sends Jin Guangyao a letter warning him that he will expose all his secrets in seven days.

!This triggers the Second Siege of the Burial Mounds. Jin Guangyao uses the Stygian Tiger seal to control the corpses there and Su She seals the cultivators' spiritual power. After Wei Wuxian’s thorough analysis in front of the hundreds of cultivators present, Su She reveals himself as Jin Guangyao's accomplice.

8. LOTUS PIER

As the cultivators recover after the second siege and go to Yunmeng, at Lotus Pier, Bicao and Sisi (instructed previously by Nie Huaisang) arrive to tell their stories:

> Sisi tells how Jin Guangyao murdered his father Jin Guangshan

> and Bicao tells how Jin Guangyao's wife Qin Su was his own sister.

Hearing this, the clans begin to plot his downfall furthermore.

9. GUANYIN TEMPLE

Despite popular belief Nie Huaisang isn't captured against his will or helpless at Guanyin Temple. Everything he planned for Guanyin temple was extremely deliberate and well thought out as it's the final piece of the puzzle.

His plans were as follows:

He released Nie Mingjue's fierce corpse onto Yunping to hunt down Jin Guangyao

He was willingly "captured" by Su She to play on Jin Guangyao’s pity through seeing him defenseless and scared

He deliberately allowed Su She to cut his leg because Nie Mingjue’s fierce corpse can still sense that his brother is hurt

He also uses his leg wound at the very end, by overreacting to the pain, distracting Lan Xichen from a very wounded Jin Guangyao, so that he makes him think he attacked him from behind. This results in Lan Xinchen stabbing his dear sworn brother, ultimately leading to Jin Guangyao’s death.

Wei Wuxian pieces it all together at the end, deducting the lengths Nie Huaisang went to and the magnitude of his plan.

[mdzsartreblogs]

17,000 Post Round Up

Still busy, still a little behind on...everything...but the queue is full of Halloween and Wei Wuxian birthday art, and I'm only like three days behind on posting this, so progress, or something. The overhaul I did of my spreadsheet (did I mention that here or only on my personal blog? I took a day and like...completely changed how I track artist reblogs) has been saving me a LOT of time, so absolutely worth it. Remember, you can always take a peek "behind the scenes" at my data, and see every single tag I use (or, at least, every one as of the last 1k+ round up, since that's when I add new tags to the master list) by going to my spreadsheet, here.

Other things...

I think we're finally evening out on followers, like, hitting critical limit or something? The blog is at 1,342, which is up only 21 since my previous round up (granted, that was posted only 19 days ago, so it's still one new follower a day...)

I added 248 new tags since the last round up, bringing the total number of tags to 6,700-or-so. My reorganization found some mistakes in my old artist tag list; some got removed, some added. Based on current count, 3,665 artists have at least one work reblogged here; that's up 122 since last time!

If you know where any of the works tagged unknown location are, please let me know. Likewise, if you know any of the artists tagged unknown artist (it’s pretty much all official art), I’d appreciate your help a lot!

If you make fanart, feel free to DM it to this blog, or @ me @unforth (don’t tag @mdzsartreblogs, tumblr rarely shows me those tags). I don’t track any unique source blog tags but I do check #mdzs, #mo dao zu shi, and #the untamed daily and reblog all artwork posted there provided it doesn’t break any of my few rules (also provided that the creator hasn’t blocked me, or I haven’t blocked the creator - I’ve been blocked a handful of times and I block people who post hate in the main tag, including artists if they're antis).

Support artists by liking and reblogging their work! Yes, even if you see them on a source blog! DO THE THING! Artists need and deserve our support!

-unforth

And, finally, since I do a full audit to fix any mistakes I've made, I might as well use the data to share some stats... (read more)

The 15 Characters Tagged Most Often:

wei wuxian (8,235 works) (no change)

lan wangji (6,670 works) (no change)

jiang cheng (2,468 works (no change))

lan xichen (1,666 works) (no change)

nie huaisang (1,337 works (no change))

a yuan (1,265 works) (no change)

jin guangyao (1,167 works (no change))

jin ling (1,022 works) (no change)

nie mingjue (879 works) (no change)

wen ning (759 works) (no change)

xue yang (735 works) (no change)

xiao xingchen (725 works (no change))

jiang yanli (638 works) (no change)

lan jingyi (544 works) (no change)

wen qing (498 works) (no change)

The 15 Ships Tagged Most Often:

wangxian (4,724 works) (no change)

xicheng (338 works) (no change)

xiyao (284 works) (no change)

sangcheng (248 works) (no change)

songxiao (242 works) (no change)

xuexiao (168 works) (no change)

3zun (123 works) (no change)

xisang (117 works) (+1 from 16k post)

zhuiling (115 works) (-1 from 16k post)

xuanli (100 works) (no change)

nielan (97 works) (no change)

nieyao (80 works) (no change)

yanqing (74 works) (no change)

ningxian (49 works) (no change)

songxuexiao (36 works) (no change)

The 15 Platonic Relationships Tagged Most Often:

twin prides of yunmeng (559 works) (no change)

grape uncle (381 works) (+2 from 16k post)

twin jades of gusu (283 works) (-1 from 16k post)

wangxian are dads (276 works) (-1 from 16k post)

yunmeng siblings (269 works) (no change)

nie brothers (228 works) (no change)

wei wuxian is a dad (190 works) (no change)

junior trio (133 works) (no change)

yi city family (124 works) (+2 from 16k post)

lan wangji is a dad (119 works) (no change)

junior quartet (119 works) (-2 from 16k post)

wen siblings (117 works) (no change)

wei wuxian is an uncle (110 works) (no change)

burial mounds family (108 works) (no change)

one brain cell trio (107 works) (no change)

The 15 (+1) Artists with the Most Works Reblogged Here: (+1 is "official art")

official art (243 works) (no change)

modao18 (178 works) (no change)

littlesmartart (164 works) (+1 from 16k post)

sketchyscribbles (160 works) (-1 from 16k post)

ibijau (149 works) (no change)

joshua-beeking (124 works) (no change)

hilluhri (104 works) (no change)

elogval (98 works) (no change)

pikazchu (94 works) (no change)

candicewright (87 works) (no change)

bbeiex (86 works) (no change)

wrecklwj (83 works) (no change)

wifiwuxians (81 works) (+2 from 16k post)

valdrift (79 works) (-1 from 16k post)

xiejie-liubo (76 works) (-1 from 16k post)

soursoppi (74 works) (no change)

245bst (74 works) (new!)

Most Prolific Artists Who Posted for the First Time Since Last Tag Audit: since it's Inktober, there's definitely some new people who came in with a bang!

chemical-abcess (19 works)

uwibbit (13 works)

everdreamwithchocolate (11 works)

abadname (9 works)

sorceringing (8 works)

starbiology (7 works)

meimeimmii (5 works)

bearsbloom (5 works)

goldfishpudding (4 works)

elwelcs (4 works)

The 20 most Used Other Tags:

portrait (14,959 works) (no change)

digital art (13,939 works) (no change)

comic (2,829 works) (no change)

laughs (2,487 works) (+1 from 16k post)

flowers (2,386 works) (-1 from 16k post)

modern au (2,094 works) (no change)

chibi (1,898 works) (+1 from 16k post)

sketch (1,882 works) (-1 from 16k post)

lan wangji has golden eyes (1,597 works) (no change)

wangxian hug (1,468 works) (no change)

fantasy au (1,338 works) (no change)

yiling laozu (1,199 works) (no change)

food (1,170 works) (no change)

chenqing (1,133 works) (no change)

blood tw (1,067 works) (no change)

hearts (1,012 works) (no change)

lemon (993 works) (no change)

bunnies (987 works) (+1 from 16k post)

stars (984 works) (-1 from 16k post)

pencil drawing (980 works) (no change)

Top 5 Actors: The "cast" tag has been used 344 times.

xiao zhan (185 works) (no change)

wang yibo (135 works) (no change)

zhu zanjin (10 works) (no change)

wang zhuocheng (10 works) (+1 from 16k post)

song jiyang (10 works) (no change - tie)

Top 5 Animals:

bunnies (987 works) (no change)

birds (419 works) (no change)

butterflies (246 works) (no change)

cats (143 works) (no change)

dogs (106 works) (no change)

The 15 Character Attributes Tagged Most Often:

lan wangji has golden eyes (1,597 works) (no change)

yiling laozu (1,199 works) (no change)

lan sizhui (882 works) (no change)

wei wuxian has red eyes (745 works) (no change)

jiang cheng with braids (550 works) (no change)

fierce corpse wen ning (476 works) (no change)

child a yuan (434 works) (no change)

blind xiao xingchen (432 works) (no change)

jiang cheng has purple eyes (343 works) (no change)

nie mingjue has a mustache (308 works) (no change)

nie mingjue with braids (283 works) (no change)

wei wuxian in lan white (252 works) (no change)

wen yuan (243 works) (no change)

wei wuxian has piercings (219 works) (no change)

child wei wuxian (165 works) (no change)

The 15 Ship Attributes Tagged Most Often:

wangxian hug (1,468 works) (no change)

wangxian kiss (631 works) (no change)

wangxian holding hands (538 works) (no change)

lan wangji carrying wei wuxian (152 works) (no change)

wangxian sharing a bed (123 works) (no change)

wei wuxian wearing lan wangji's ribbon (116 works) (+1 from 16k post)

xiyao hug (112 works) (-1 from 16k post)

xicheng hug (107 works) (no change)

wangxian duet (83 works) (+1 from 16k post)

sangcheng hug (81 works) (-1 from 16k post)

wangxian wedding (70 works) (new!)

songxiao hug (70 works) (-1 from 16k post)

xuexiao hug (69 works) (no change)

shuangjie hug (69 works) (-2 from 16k post)

lan wangji wearing wei wuxian's ribbon (67 works) (-1 from 16k post)

The 15 AU Tags Used Most Often:

modern au (2,094 works) (no change)

fantasy au (1,338 works) (no change)

canon divergent au (718 works) (no change)

creature wei wuxian (621 works) (no change)

creature lan wangji (533 works) (no change)

technological anachronism (288 works) (no change)

bunxian (234 works) (+1 from 16k post)

bunji (227 works) (-1 from 16k post)

dragon (201 works) (no change)

creature jiang cheng (196 works) (no change)

cat person (154 works) (no change)

merperson (142 works) (no change)

historical au (138 works) (no change)

creature lan xichen (134 works) (no change)

bunny person (123 works) (new!)

The 10 Meme, Fandom Event, Holiday, and Character Birthdays Tagged Most Often:

october art challenge (352 works) (no change)

wangxian week (107 works) (no change)

color palette challenge (104 works) (no change)

valentine's day (100 works) (no change)

wei wuxian's birthday (94 works) (no change)

lan wangji's birthday (93 works) (no change)

draw this your style (74 works) (no change)

mermay (72 works) (no change)

mdzs reverse big bang (59 works) (no change)

lunar new year (57 works) (no change)

The 10 Instruments and Weapons Tagged Most Often:

chenqing (1,133 works) (no change)

bichen (561 works) (no change)

wangji (494 works) (no change)

zidian (449 works) (no change)

suibian (187 works) (no change)

baxia (161 works) (no change)

sandu (155 works) (no change)

shuanghua (148 works) (no change)

fuxue (117 works) (no change)

liebing (102 works) (no change)

The 15 Most Common Motifs and Objects:

flowers (2,386 works) (no change)

food (1,170 works) (no change)

hearts (1,012 works) (no change)

stars (984 works) (no change)

fan (796 works) (no change)

lotuses (720 works) (no change)

fierce corpse (599 works) (no change)

fire (544 works) (no change)

the moon (504 works) (no change)

alcohol (487 works) (no change)

jiang clan clarity bell (465 works) (no change)

the sun (456 works) (no change)

art of art (402 works) (no change)

lanterns (363 works) (no change)

scars (248 works) (no change)

The 15 Media-Related Tags Used Most Often:

portrait (14,949 works) (no change)

digital art (13,939 works) (no change)

comic (2,829 works) (no change)

laughs (2,487 works) (no change)

chibi (1,898 works) (+1 from 16k post)

sketch (1,882 works) (-1 from 16k post)

pencil drawing (980 works) (no change)

lineart (932 works) (no change)

ink work (927 works) (no change)

screen cap redraw (549 works) (no change)

watercolor (506 works) (no change)

work in progress (457 works) (no change)

meme redraw (409 works) (no change)

markers (345 works) (no change)

landscape (279 works) (no change)

The 5 Trigger Warnings Used Most Often:

blood tw (1,067 works) (no change)

lemon (993 works) (no change)

mcd/implied mcd (563 works) (no change)

body horror tw (306 works) (no change)

suicide tw (101 works) (no change)

The 5 Location and Era Tags Used Most Often:

cloud recesses (745 works) (no change)

lotus pier (391 works) (no change)

burial mounds (242 works) (+1 from 16k post)

lecture era (233 works) (-1 from 16k post)

post canon (205 works) (no change)

The 5 Lemon Tags Used Most Often:

bondage (105 works) (no change)

bondage using the lan clan ribbon (50 works) (no change)

hickies (46 works) (no change)

blindfolds (35 works) (no change)

bottom wei wuxian (33 works) (no change)

The 10 Other Fandoms Most Often Portrayed in MDZS Art Pieces:

tian guan ci fu (200 works) (no change)

ren zha fanpai zijiu xitong (168 works) (no change)

word of honor (21 works) (no change)

douluo continent (18 works) (no change)

the husky and his white cat shizun (16 works) (no change)

star wars (12 works) (no change)

legend of fei (11 works) (no change)

lang dianxia (11 works) (no change)

marvel verse (6 works) (no change)

fire emblem (5 works) (broke the tie!)

[thewickling]

Age of Jiang Yanli, Lan Xichen, and Nie Mingjue during Key Events

After a long time, I did the next one. I also updated the previous ones to make the timeline bullet points clear/easier to read. Crossposted on ao3 for those who prefer that format.

Jiang Yanli

Jiang Yanli is "two or three" years older than Wei Wuxian and was "twelve or thirteen" during the childhood memory scene (Departure, Part Three). So take Wei Wuxian's age and add 2 to 3 years.

Gusu Exchange: 17 or 18

Discussion Conference at Qishan: 18 or 19

Indoctrination at Qishan: 19 or 20

Start of Sunshot Campaign: 19 or 21

Night-hunt at Phoenix Mt.: 22-24

Ambush at Qiongqi Path: 23-25

Massacre at the Nightless City: 23-25 (Death)

If alive for the Second Seige: 37-39

Lan Xichen

Lan Xichen is at most three years older than Lan Wangji as he appeared during the archery competition at the Discussion Conference at Qishan that was limited to disciples under twenty (Allure, Part Three). Therefore, he is one to three years older than Lan Wangji. If Lan Wangji is his highest possible age, there cannot be a 3 year age difference as 18 + 3 that would squarely place L Xichen at 20-21 the year of the Discussion Conference at Qishan. If LWJ were in his highest potential age, the maximum difference can be 2 years as if could happen in the year Lan Xichen turns 20 but before his birthday. I'm taking Lan Wangji's possible age ranges and adding 1 for the low end and 2 for the high end.

Gusu Exchange: 16-18

discussion conference at Qishan: 17 to 20 (year he turns 20 but before his birthday if you use LWJ's higher possible ranger)

start of Sunshot Campaign: 16-21

Night-hunt at Phoenix Mt.: 20-25

Ambush at Qiongqi Path: 21-26

First Siege on the Burial Mounds: 21-27

Second Siege on the Burial Mounds: 35-39

Nie Mingjue

Nie Mingjue's age is difficult to place. He inherits the sect leader role before 20 so likely 19 (Contentment, Part Three). Nie Mingjue and Huaisang’s father died half a year after his saber shatters during a night-hunt (Guile, Part Four). The Night-hunt Prohibition occurs the year prior to the Indoctrination Camp at Qishan so the night-hunt that shatters the saber must occur before then (Courage, Part One).

Additionally, Nie Mingjue was not mentioned to be a sect leader in the conversation during the Disciple Exchange at Gusu, while that detail could have been omitted considering how gossipy all the disciples are and how important it would be to mention that position, it is likely at that point he wasn’t yet the sect leader (Refinement, Part One). Thus it is likely the summonings and night-hunt happened between these two events.

Furthermore, we do not see any Nie sect members mentioned during the Discussion Conference at Qishan so unlike Lan Xichen, we cannot use that to say if he under or over twenty.

So the earliest Nie baba can die is after the disciple exchange at Gusu, so the year when the discussion conference at occurs. Taking the Nie Huaisang possible age ranges and compare the lowest bracket (16) to 19. That maximum age difference is 3.

Since Nie Mingjue is already sect leader when the Sunshot campaign begins, the youngest he can be then is 19 the year he turns 20 (Contentment, Part Three) which would be 1 year older than Nie Huaisang on the low end.

As for placing his death, it must occurs year after the First Siege on the Burial mound as he raced to yell at Jin Guangshan for his attempt to shelther Xue Yang (Dew, Part Three). An unknown amount of time after that, Jin Guangyao visits Nie Mingjue and the two come into conflict over Jin Guangshan's imprisonment rather than execution of Xue Yang after which two months Nie Mingjue dies (Guile Four and Five). This is likely then the year Xue Yang gets captured, the year after First Siege on the Burial Mounds.

In summary, Nie Mingjue is between 1 to 3 years older than Nie Huaisang depending on when you place when Nie baba's death. So he has the same age ranges as Lan Xichen without the limitation LXC has for the Qishan Indoctrination.

Gusu Exchange: 16-19

discussion conference at Qishan: 17 to 21

start of Sunshot Campaign: 16-22

Night-hunt at Phoenix Mt.: 20-26

Ambush at Qiongqi Path: 21-27

First Siege on the Burial Mounds: 21-28

Death: 22-28

If alive: Second Siege on the Burial Mounds: 35-40

comments

AO3 | dreamwidth | ko-fi me |Tumblr

[butterflydm]

The Untamed Rewatch (ep 10)

Previous Episode | Index | Next Episode

There's a lot of plot movement in this episode! Plus not one, not two, but THREE of WWX's antagonist parallels feature in it, in addition to the partnership parallel of SongXiao. Very exciting for me. ❤️

Xue Yang is revealed on a roof. There are… there are a lot of important roof moments in CQL. I also just straight-up love the composition of this shot, it has a lot of depth. There's Xue Yang on the roof, the hanging bodies in bright red under him, then Lan Zhan and Wei Ying in the foreground.

So… Xue Yang is a terrible person but a really great character. Here, though… ah. The man in black waits on a roof, standing elevated over the bodies of his victims and ready to challenge the people who are here to call him to task for his crimes, then a hero dressed all in white flies in to challenge him. From the point of view of the cultivation world, that's the story that started to (was supposed to) happen during the fight in eps 31-32.

Xue Yang and Wei Wuxian are only superficially alike. Their hearts are very different. But that's one of the themes that I enjoy — how differently things look when you only see them from the outside. Visually and on the surface, WWX & LWJ match up to either Xue Yang and Xiao Xingchen or Song Zichen and Xiao Xingchen. But once you scratch the surface, it becomes more clear that WWX's heart is nothing like Xue Yang's.

I love that WWX wants to stand back and observe before acting, here. Contrary to what might be assumed about his impulsive nature, he's very perceptive and strategic, and it's enjoyable to watch that here. He acts to level the playing field, then stays out of the fight to assess the fighters and when he does act, it's very calculated. This is one of the things that makes him a good teacher way later on, I think.

I also like that we see Xue Yang appreciates WWX's skills and more whimsical approach to things. So, one of the things that separates WWX from Xue Yang is that WWX has a sense of perspective and proportion (...actually, now that I think about it, this is also one of the things that separates WWX from MY/JGY, though in a different way). Like, one of the reasons XY is fun to watch is that he's generally always having a good time even in situations when it's extremely inappropriate. Whereas that may be what LWJ thought about WWX when he first met him, but he realized there are things (moral and ethical things) that WWX is quite serious about and doesn't joke over.

I also love the mutual admiration society that goes on after Xue Yang is captured, and Xiao Xingchen says nice things about our kiddos and then Lan Wangji turns it around and says nice things about him back. It's polite but it's also very sweet.

Xue Yang laughing over the hypocrisy of the honored cultivators — another WWX/Yiling Patriarch parallel moment there.

We also get another early moment of Lan Zhan currently refusing to do a thing that he will do with all his heart in the future, which is hold Suibian for WWX.

And then we get more detective work from WWX & LWJ — searching Xue Yang, realizing that the evidence no longer points to Xue Yang still having the Yin Metal, WWX working through his thoughts about it out loud. I really do love the partnership vibe.

I also have feelings about Jiang Cheng on one side of WWX, LWJ on the other side. They're in pale blue outer robes of slightly different shades, but the color underneath is very different and matches their clan. The color choices for the clothes on this show feel very deliberate, so while I might read the wrong things into it, I don't think I'm wrong for reading into it at all.

Xue Yang and WWX's outfits are so similar. Really, the main differences are WWX having red accents and Xue Yang having gold ones. But the main colors and silhouettes just… yes. The conversation here, about personal vs the wider picture, is a reoccuring theme as well. Because those things are hard to separate — the personal grudges affect the world as a whole when people with power are the ones with the grudges (again, a theme that will come up with JGY). Xue Yang doesn't have political power, but he has a skill and knowledge set that are useful to people in power, so he has more freedom to do terrible things and get away with it than something without those skills and knowledge would.

Meng Yao and Nie Huaisang are here! 

I do love this for Nie Huaisang's characterization — he was hesitant to come when it was just him and just a few young cultivators his own age, but once he has some serious backup, he immediately came to help. He does want to be helpful but he knows his own strengths.

We get the second mention here of Nie Mingjue being known for being forthright and honest with his judgements (Lan Xichen had mentioned it previously). It's something he's widely known for, it seems.

...I hadn't remembered that Wei Wuxian had said his bit about himself and Lan Zhan working together out of like-mindedness in front of Nie Huaisang and Meng Yao. I remembered Jiang Cheng, of course, but I hadn't remembered the other plot-important people who heard that said. The show really does set up this specific dynamic where the people who are involved in the main plot are all very aware that there's a special bond between WWX and LWJ. And Jiang Cheng's reaction is also in front of Meng Yao — I'm sure that he remembered this moment in the future, when he was poking at Jiang Cheng's ego-related issues about WWX. Because just like he did in front of Nie Huaisang in the earlier episode, here WWX separates himself out with Lan Wangji specifically, excluding everyone else from their partnership.

I love this lovely moment of validation that WWX gets from XXC, where XXC says that Baoshan would be happy to know him if she had the chance to meet him. And, again, I love that the person connected to WWX is the LWJ parallel. This is one of the moments when CQL just feels like a show that… even though many sad or terrible things happen in the story… the show wants to give these characters moments of kindness and absolution. It just feels very… affectionate. The show feels like it was made with real, genuine love and sympathy for the characters. That's one of the things that I like best about it, honestly. It feels tender, even in the hard parts. It wants to be kind.

Nie Huaisang really does admire regal gentleman. He was all admiring over LWJ, and now he's the same over XXC and Song Zichen. And I also absolutely love how much this meeting affects both WWX and LWJ. WWX is the talker, so he gets the lines about how he wants to have that kind of life, but we can tell LWJ is just as deeply affected by how he watches them leave. And I assume the show already knew it couldn't actually show WWX and LWJ as full-on cultivation partners in the end, so they used this as a way of showing us that this is the path (being partners together) that they're both starting to desire, and they trust us to do the math at the end of episode 50.

Meng Yao is the one who passes along the information about the Wen Clan demanding every great clan to send at least one 'direct disciple' (important? full-fledged? family? I'm not certain of what it means exactly, though Nie Huaisang says he's the only one for the Nie clan, so family seems likely) for training. I love how WWX immediately takes this opportunity to say nice things about the Lans. He whined when he was there, but now that he's not in Gusu anymore, he's already nostalgic over it. Oh, honey. 

So, Meng Yao must already be formulating his plan to… hmm, go undercover? Play both sides? He's always looking for opportunities to advance himself. I feel like we can safely assume that. He's already been rejected by his father and is probably trying to think of ways to prove himself in order to get the public recognition that he wants. Those are the assumptions I'm currently making.

WWX is so thrilled to addressed directly by NMJ, wow! Look at that smile. Then NMJ says nice things about him and Jiang Cheng, and WWX is just over the moon. Cute, cute, cute! Meanwhile, NMJ addresses LWJ just as 'Wangji' like LXC does, so they know each other a lot better. Yeah, unless I get contradictory info, I am on the 'NMJ went to the Cloud Recesses and he and LXC became good friends and this is part of why LXC thought to suggest a similar idea to his brother' train of thought.

Then we have the sentencing of Xue Yang. It's interesting that we see both WWX and Meng Yao react similarly to Nie Mingjue wanting to immediately kill Xue Yang, though I'm not sure if Meng Yao would have spoken up if WWX hadn't — he might not consider his position secure enough to do that. Once WWX makes the initial argument, Meng Yao backs him up, but, yeah. I'm not sure if he would have made the initial argument himself.

Ah, it makes me quite sad, honestly, to see Nie Huaisang, Wie Wuxian, and Jiang Cheng being so admiring of Meng Yao's arguments. Because Meng Yao really did screw himself over. He was talented and smart and capable of winning admiration from others, but he was so focused on what he didn't have that he couldn't see what he'd already achieved. He threw away a good position with a good family in hopes of winning recognition from someone who didn't even deserve an ounce of admiration.

But I do… understand why he felt like it wasn't enough? Because even though he had won admiration from strong cultivators, many people still looked down on him for being a "prostitute's son" and he didn't have enough power to make that stop (as we see in the next scene). And I do think that's… I mean, that's what it was about for him (I mean, that and his incredible ability to hold onto a grudge no matter what. that's also a factor). Just trying to get enough power and enough reputation to make the whispers stop. And there's never enough power for that. No matter how much power he amassed, it would never be enough. Becoming the actual leader of the entire cultivation world still didn't give him the power to make people not judge him for his parentage, and he wasn't, for whatever reason, capable of being like LWJ or WWX and saying 'screw reputation, I want to do what's right'. And so he trapped himself into a doomed cycle that elevated him up higher and higher but then inevitably led to his own destruction. A tragedy, yes, but one built by his own hands.

Still, you know, I watch that scene with Meng Yao and the guard captain and I'm like. okay, yeah. I get why he killed the guy and tried to frame him for Xue Yang's escape. It was awful and he shouldn't have, but I understand the motivations. Just having to be polite and give out a customer-service smile, over and over, to people who are disrespecting you (and your mom)… it's exhausting and soul-killing.

Hmm, when WWX first crosses over to stand next to LWJ, the timing felt a little random, but then I realized it's connected to the whole thing he's been stressing since the Yin Metal trip started.

He sees himself and LWJ as the partners on this, and everyone else is a little bit on the outside.

I like Nie Mingjue's facial hair — it does a good job, I think, of displacing him forward in time compared to the rest of the cast, and making them all seem like agemates compared to the slightly older NMJ. I like his whole character design, tbh.

Oh my god! WWX suggests here turning a piece of Yin Metal into a weapon. Which is. Exactly what he does later on. He literally suggests right here the thing that he does later on that wins the war. Huh.

Another important rooftop scene — WWX goes to sleep on the roof over LWJ's quarters, instead of sleeping in an actual bed. These ridiculous boys with their ridiculous crushes, I swear. And LWJ is already falling hopelessly in love with him. My heart overflows. They are so incredibly, ridiculously romantic and I will never recover emotionally.

I like the confrontation between Wen Chao and Nie Mingjue. There's a lot of tension in the scene. In terms of the antagonist characters, Wen Chao isn't my favorite but he is very sharply defined and I feel like I get a good sense of who he is as a person. And we get the introduction of Wen Zhuliu here, as someone who can go toe-to-toe with this Sect Leader that our protagonist characters are all impressed by and respectful towards. So that setup works for me really well. And it's very telling of Wen Chao again as someone who talks big but likes to send in other people to fight his battles for him.

Most of the Wen sect wear black and red in equal amounts, while Wen Zhuliu is mostly black with just a hint of red accents… like WWX does in this episode. I've talked about this character comparison briefly, I think, and it'll come back later but — Wen Zhuliu plays the second fiddle to the direct son of the sect leader, despite being clearly far more powerful a cultivator, but he believes he owes a debt to the family for taking him in so he suppresses his own potential ambition or choices for the sake of the sect. Now, this is not what WWX does, but it's the situation that WWX is in, or very similar. But WWX chooses to act against the interests or orders of his sect when it conflicts with his ethics.

And I note —  in this time of crisis, WWX instinctively gives Jiang Cheng an order and it's followed. And WWX is his head discipline, it makes sense! But that's also a habit that can be hard to transition out of once Jiang Cheng becomes Sect Leader in the future. Like, even if everything with the Wens hadn't shaken out this way, they still might have come into conflict due to WWX being a natural leader.

The mess of Meng Yao getting caught killing the guards and trying to lie his way out of it, then throwing himself in front of Wen Zhuliu's sword, then WWX challenging Wen Chao and everyone hearing that his brother, Wen Xu, is off to destroy the Cloud Recesses… it is a lot, though the pacing of the scene works for me. It's just that a lot of things are piling over and over on the characters (oh, and we get Meng Yao noticing and being concerned about Lan Xichen after he hears about Gusu).

Hmm, so the final scene with Meng Yao and Nie Mingjue. It does… ah, echo for me with how Meng Yao ultimately dies, with regards to how he acts with Lan Xichen in their final scene. Here, he tells Nie Mingjue that meeting him means he has no regrets. At the end, he will tell Lan Xichen that LXC being willing to die for him is 'enough'. In both cases, there's a sense of… Meng Yao knows there's a good chance he might actually die here, so I feel like he's doing his best make to try to make it so that at least this person will carry him with them the rest of their life, that he will impact them by his death. Which ties into his deep, deep desire to matter. Nie Mingjue dismisses it as — the viki translation says 'this little vanity' — but. I mean, it's easy for a sect leader to dismiss someone else's desire to be seen as important? Nie Mingjue has never been unimportant a day in his life. This doesn't excuse Meng Yao's actions, of course, but, I do think dismissing something that is clearly the cornerstone of someone's life doesn't lead to understanding. And Nie Mingjue does want to understand why, but I think his and Meng Yao's lives are just so different that the gap was just too wide to bridge with the tools that he had at his disposal.

I do think that both Nie Mingjue and Meng Yao are clearly emotionally marked by this confrontation/breakdown of their previous relationship. I didn't know either of the characters very well in my first viewing, so I'm just… I'm a lot more emotional about this scene now than I was the first time.

Next time: Lotus Pier! Excited to be seeing it again for the first time in the rewatch. And all the painful/fascinating family dynamics.

Previous Episode | Index | Next Episode

[trishmilburn]

An Exploration of The Untamed’s Romance & Mystery, Episode 7

Disclaimer: This post and others in this series will be filled with loads of spoilers if you haven’t seen The Untamed, the Chinese drama based on Mo Xiang Tong Xiu’s novel, Mo Dao Zu Shi (The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation). My chief interest in doing this series as I re-watch the drama is to chronicle the development of the romance between Wei Ying and Lan Zhan, but I also highlight the progression of the mystery that helps bring them together. Keep in mind that I’m writing these posts with the knowledge of what’s going to happen throughout the series and having read the novel. If you’d like to read my examinations of previous episodes, links are provided at the end of this post.

On to Episode 7…

We pick up where we left off at the end of Episode 6, in the cave beneath the cold pool with Wei Ying and Lan Zhan talking with elder Lan Yi. Wei Ying asks her what happened to his grandmaster, then explains that he’s the son of rogue cultivator Cangse and that rogue cultivator Baoshan was his grandmaster. Lan Yi says that the mess she made with the Yin Metal years ago caused Baoshan to have to live in seclusion.

Lan Zhan asks Lan Yi if she beckoned him and Wei Ying into the cave, but she replies that she didn’t. Instead, in recent years the Yin Metal has been showing signs of movement and her spiritual consciousness has gotten weaker and weaker, making this possible. She says she’s afraid the resentment of the Yin Metal has polluted the water of the cold pool and thus that’s why the two of them were pulled under into the cave. Wei Ying asks her why the Yin Metal has been making movements, and she speculates it’s because the other pieces have resurfaced. At this news, Wei Ying looks at Lan Zhan and says that the cultivator they saw suffering from spirit absorption was turned into a ghost puppet by someone following the methods of Xue Chonghai.

Wei Ying asks Lan Yi if there’s another way to keep the Yin Metal from hurting humanity, but she says it’s a natural object with an earthly spirit, thus it’s impossible to completely eliminate. The only solution is to find all the pieces and eternally freeze them in the cold pool.

Lan Yi starts to fade away, and Lan Zhan bows and says he’ll undertake the task of finding the Yin Metal pieces and freezing them. Wei Ying follows suit, but Lan Zhan decides to be stubbornly standoffish again and tells him it’s a Lan Clan matter and has nothing to do with Wei Ying.  But Wei Ying says that Lan Zhan can’t stop him because he has never taken the principles of humanity and justice lightly, and because the Yin Metal issue forced his grandmaster to live as a recluse for a hundred years. He can’t sit aside and do nothing.

Lan Yi says she hopes they won’t repeat her mistakes, and when she disappears completely the Yin Metal piece falls from where it’s been slowly spinning in mid-air. In that moment the protective barrier falls as well, and an invisible wave flows out of the cave across the surrounding area. Wen Qing feels it as she’s searching the back side of the mountain, and Wen Ning feels it, his eyes going wide, as he helps search for the missing Wei Ying and Lan Zhan.

Then comes one of the more humorous parts of the entire series. Wei Ying and Lan Zhan tumble out of the side of the mountain, their wrists still tied together with Lan Zhan’s “only parents, child and wife can touch it” forehead ribbon, and Wei Ying lands on top of Lan Zhan. So this is how you get a bit of a BL moment in a show that can’t be explicitly BL because of government censorship. When Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing see them in this position, Wei Ying’s all smiley and “Hey, guys!” while Lan Zhan clenches his jaws and tells Wei Ying in no uncertain terms to get off him.

Wei Ying and Lan Zhan are surprised that outside of the cave, they’ve been missing for an entire day and night, and everyone’s been worried about them. Wen Qing mentions that their foreheads are emitting cold energy and asks what is in the mountain. (Let me pause for a moment to marvel at how fast Lan Zhan got that forehead ribbon off their wrists and once again tied properly around his head before anyone else saw the inappropriate connection between him and Wei Ying.) Smoothly covering the truth, and perhaps surprising Lan Zhan in the process, Wei Ying tells Wen Qing that the cave was filled with cold water and ice and he thought he might freeze to death. Then the little devil turns and gives Lan Zhan a grin as if to say, “See how smooth I was. You should be impressed and be my friend.”

We next see Lan Xichen playing his magical flute to calm the piece of Yin Metal that Wei Ying and Lan Zhan brought with them from the cave as they and Lan Qiren watch. Then Lan Qiren puts it in of those magical spirit-trapping bags we’ll see throughout the series. While discussing the Yin Metal and what they should do going forward, they hear and then see one of those wraith-like birds of the Wen Clan. Lan Zhan observes that the Wens attended the lecture series just for the Yin Metal. Lan Xichen says they were right to deduce that Wen Ruohan has a piece of the metal already and knew one was at the Cloud Recesses. Lan Qiren adds that this means Wen Ruohan must have had help from someone to locate the first piece.

Wei Ying tells the others that Lan Yi said the pieces of metal can sense each other, so they should use theirs to find the others. Lan Qiren disagrees and says they should seal their piece once more and put it back in the cold pool, then recreate the barrier. Lan Zhan says he fears that will be to no avail. It’s the first time we see Lan Zhan disagree with his uncle in any way, but it definitely won’t be the last or the most vehement disagreement. When Lan Zhan finally falls in love in the future, there is literally no one he won’t go up against to protect Wei Ying. But we’re not there yet.

When we see Wei Ying outside after the conversation, Nie Huaisang runs up to him and asks where he was. Wei Ying responds that the Cloud Recesses is so big that even Lan Zhan almost lost his way. After Huaisang walks away, Jiang Cheng says that Wei Ying is getting mighty close to Lan Zhan (remember, he saw them with their wrists tied together with that forehead ribbon), so much so that he might as well become a Lan disciple and not go back to Lotus Pier. Part of this is his normal poking at his “brother,” but there is likely a part of Jiang Cheng that wouldn’t mind if Wei Ying stayed behind. Then he wouldn’t have to compete with him and constantly come in second place.

Next we see Wen Chao and Xue Yang standing outside Wen Ruohan’s throne room. It’s obvious the chief cultivator doesn’t like colors other than black and red. How very on brand. They have to talk to Wen Ruohan through a big black door, and Wen Chao congratulates him because the Yin Metal has resurfaced in the Cloud Recesses. But Daddy Dearest asks why he’s congratulating him. Does Wen Chao have the piece in hand? Yeah, this guy isn’t winning any Dad of the Year awards. Wen Ruohan tells Xue Yang to go to Yueyang, a command that excites Xue Yang in that wide-eyed, “I’m going to murder some people” sort of way. Yueyang is the seat of the Chang Clan, and we’ll later see that Xue Yang has a beef with them. He reassures Wen Ruohan that he has no interest in the Yin Metal.

Then we go to another of my favorite scenes in the series, where the Lan Clan and the various visiting disciples are making paper lanterns that they’ll send up into the sky along with their prayers. While Lan Zhan is very stoically making his, Wei Ying watches him, a little smile tugging at the edge of his lips. Why does this boy not know he’s smitten? He says to Lan Zhan, “Since we’ve been through life and death experiences together, let’s release a sky lantern together to pray for blessings.” Predictably, Lan Zhan responds that he’s used to doing it by himself, which strikes me as very sad. Despite having family, Lan Zhan has been very much alone and shut off emotionally since the loss of his mother when he was very young, which we’ll find out more about later in the story. Wei Ying says that habits can change and that he made his lantern specifically for Lan Zhan. And then the most beautiful moment occurs, a small but not insignificant turning point in their relationship. Lan Zhan looks at the lantern, on which Wei Ying has drawn a bunny, and smiles. It’s not a huge smile, but it’s big considering it’s Lan Zhan. He looks genuinely stunned and happy, and it makes you think that perhaps no one has ever done anything that thoughtful for him.

Of course, Wei Ying can’t help laughing and pointing out that Lan Zhan smiled, which totally ruins the moment. Lan Zhan’s smile disappears in favor of his more usual disapproving glare as he grabs his sword. Wei Ying jumps to his feet and backs away, inadvertently setting Nie Huisang’s expensive lantern ablaze and destroying it.

When everyone else lets their lanterns float up and start making their prayers and wishes, Wei Ying says, “I wish that I can eliminate evil and protect the weak.” This is significant because not only does it foreshadow the complicated and often sad path he’s going to travel, but the unguarded look Lan Zhan gives him when Wei Ying isn’t looking shows that despite how he might act he’s developing feelings for Wei Ying. It’s more than just curiosity or a crush now; I think this is the moment he starts to fall in love. He probably doesn’t really realize it yet, is maybe even confused and fighting the truth, but it’s going to be a losing battle. These two were drawn to each other from the first moment they met, no matter how much they might fight it or think that it’s something other than what it is.

During the whole lantern scene, Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan were making eyes at each other in that shy little way they have, but when their engagement is brought up by Mian Mian and some of the other Jin disciples, Jin Zixuan’s attitude changes and he says it’s time to leave. As Mian Mian questions him about the engagement as they walk down the road, he tells her not to bring it up again because the engagement was not of his free will. Wei Ying overhears this and hates anything that might hurt his beloved sister. Next thing you know, the two are in a fight. Lan Zhan arrives and goes straight to Wei Ying, telling him to stop, and a random disciple explains why Wei Ying was defending his sister’s honor, because Zixuan was seemingly looking down on her. It takes Yanli’s arrival to get Wei Ying to back down even though she’s obviously hurt by the things that were said.

Because fighting is prohibited in the Cloud Recesses (really, what isn’t?), we next see Wei Ying kneeling in the courtyard while Zixuan is supposedly receiving the same punishment elsewhere. Lan Zhan catches him playing with ants, saying they’re cute, instead of reflecting on his wrongdoing. Next Wei Ying sees that Jiang Fengmian has arrived because he and Jin Guangshan have been summoned by Lan Qiren because the fight was over their children’s engagement. At the end of this meeting, Fengmian asks that they end the engagement since he doesn’t believe in forcing the two into a marriage that won’t make them happy. Guangshan reluctantly agrees.

After Jin Guangshan leaves, Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen tell Jiang Fengmian that the fight wasn’t the only reason they asked him to come to the Cloud Recesses. They tell him about the Yin Metal situation, and he vows to help however he can.

When Jiang Cheng tells Wei Ying that his father ended Yanli’s engagement, Wei Ying races off to see his sister because he knows she’ll be upset. Plus, he feels guilty that it’s his fault that things have come to this. When he sees how sad she looks, he floats a paper man talisman toward her to make her smile. When she comes outside and catches him, he apologizes and tells her she’ll marry a man a thousand times better than Jin Zixuan. Wrong. She loves him, and Zixuan likes her, too. He just doesn’t like being forced into things with no say, and I can understand that. Yanli then tells Wei Ying, “You will also marry a beautiful and talented female cultivator.” Wrong again, but she’d only have to change one word in that sentence for it to be right. After all, Lan Zhan is beautiful and talented.

She then tells him that since the lectures are over, they’ll be going back home to the Lotus Pier. Wei Ying looks disappointed when he says, “It has ended already?” You get the feeling that he’s talking about more than the lecture series. He must be wondering if his budding friendship with Lan Zhan is ending, too, or how long it might be before he sees him again.

Jiang Fengmian tells Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen that while on the way to the Cloud Recesses, he heard disturbing news that in the Yueyang region, some cultivation disciples were murdered with no survivors and that the killer is a young retainer of the Wen Clan with the last name Xue. Yep, looks like Xue Yang went on that killing spree he seemed so excited about.

As Jiang Fengmian, his children and Wei Ying bid the Lans farewell, he and Lan Zhan seem to be extra aware of each other and their imminent parting despite not saying anything to each other or making eye contact. When Wei Ying tries to say something to him, Jiang Cheng drags him out as Wei Ying overhears that Lan Zhan is going on a trip. Once outside, Jiang Cheng asks why with so many other disciples around, why did Wei Ying only want to say goodbye to Lan Zhan? Wei Ying replies that he looks up to Lan Zhan and then teases that he was unbeatable until he “finally met his match.” Oh, sweetie, he’s your match in more ways than fighting.

As Lan Zhan watches the Jiangs and Wei Ying depart, perhaps reluctantly and very privately wondering if he’ll ever see Wei Ying again, and quite possibly why he’d want to, Lan Xichen asks him if they should tell Wei Ying about his trip to look for the pieces of the Yin Metal. Lan Zhan says there is no need.

In the final scene, we see Wei Ying saying goodbye to the white bunnies he brought out of the cave and left to roam over a hillside at the back of the Cloud Recesses. He wonders aloud if he should take them to Lotus Pier with him, but then decides to leave them for Lan Zhan in case he gets bored. He wonders where Lan Zhan is going by himself and then seems to remember the promise Lan Zhan made to Lan Yi about finding the other pieces of the Yin Metal and can’t believe he’s going by himself. After all, Wei Ying had promised to help despite Lan Zhan telling him it was a Lan Clan matter.

So this episode had more revelations about the Yin Metal and Wen Ruohan’s devious plans, but on the bright side it also had some beautiful moments in the early development of the romance between Wei Ying and Lan Zhan. We see some softening on Lan Zhan’s part. Wei Ying’s infectious personality and caring nature are making inroads in Lan Zhan’s closed-off heart. And I don’t think he quite knows what to make of Wei Ying, how he surprises him, and his own changing feelings toward this man who is so totally opposite in personality to himself. But that’s what makes you the perfect pairing, dear Lan Zhan, as you will grow to realize.

Previous posts in this series:

Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

Episode 5

Episode 6

[ibijau]

Futures Past pt16  /  on AO3

 Nie Huaisang learns more about his future self, and gets burdened with yet another annoying mission

Winter was never Nie Huaisang’s favourite season to begin with. It was cold, and wet, and grey, and generally unpleasant in every possible way. To make it worse, that year he wasn’t even allowed to head out of the Unclean Realm for a bit of bird watching, nor indeed to go alone in Qinghe to check the food, or just wander around and have fun. Nie Mingjue might not have been too upset about his brother failing his classes but he was still generally angry. He had apparently been worried sick about him disappearing, fearing the Wens had decided to take his brother from him, after having murdered his father.

After Nie Mingjue had confessed that fear to him one evening, Nie Huaisang stopped complaining against being grounded. Once, merely a year earlier, he would have called his brother paranoiac for jumping to that conclusion, and continued whining until he got his punishment lifted. Now though, with his older self’s promise of a war to come… It made him wish he could have found another way to rescue Xue Yang from his fate without worrying his brother. It also pushed him to make more of an effort to be a nice and obedient brother, though all that got him was Nie Mingjue thinking he’d gotten sick and asking the sect's doctor to check on him several times.

So Nie Huaisang was stuck in the Unclean Realm, bored beyond belief, constantly aching from all the training his monster of a brother forced him to do, wishing he could just go for a walk and do a bit of bird watching or find a nice landscape to paint. It was truly hell. Though at least, being constantly home gave him a chance to practice the guqin (he’d bought one of his own on the one and only outing to Qinghe he’d been allowed, after which Nie Mingjue complained at length about him spending too much money as always) and to keep a close eye on Xue Yang. That was nearly a full time job.

It was almost a relief when one night, his future self appeared in his room as he was preparing for bed. Unpleasant as their encounters tended to be, at least Nie Huaisang would know if his great plan had worked. So he sat cross-legged on his bed, and waited for the scolding that was sure to come.

“I should have come earlier,” his future self said with some annoyance, looking no angrier than he always did. “But my last visit drained me more than planned. When are you returning to the Cloud Recesses?”

“In a week,” Nie Huaisang mumbled, pointing at a pile of trinkets he’d just gotten around to unpacking from his previous stay. “Da-ge said to wait until after the new years celebration to start preparing, because I always bother the servants otherwise, and they’re busy enough already, and…”

“How is da-ge?” his future self interrupted. “Didn’t he hurt himself during a Night Hunt around this time?”

Nie Huaisang nodded. It had worried everyone when Nie Mingjue had returned from a Night Hunt with long gashes on his chest due to a particularly nasty fierce corpse, and they’d all made a big fuss of it. But in the end it hadn’t been anything threatening, and Nie Mingjue had healed quickly. In fact, he was currently absent on another Night Hunt, this time with Lan Xichen. That didn’t seem like a detail worth mentioning.

“Hey, can I ask you a question?” Nie Huaisang said, increasingly puzzled that his older self wasn’t scolding him yet. “It’s just, I’ve been wondering, you know and… well, is he alive now?”

His future self glared at him.

“What?”

“Da-ge,” Nie Huaisang clarified. “I’ve changed things, right? He’s got to be alive in the future now, right? You’re not on your own anymore, are you?”

His older self went still and stared at him with wide, shining eyes. He opened his mouth to say something but nothing came out. After a moment the older man regained control of himself and turned away, opening his fan with a sharp gesture.

“That’s not how it works,” he hissed. “I thought it would be, but… but it’s not. I cannot change what has happened for me. My da-ge is dead, and nothing can change what happened to him. It’s… I don’t care. I’ve made my peace with that. He wouldn’t like what I’ve become anyway, and I couldn’t bear to lose him again, not like that. But I need to know…” 

He paused, and Nie Huaisang thought he heard a soft sob. 

“I have to know there’s a place out there where da-ge is alive. Not just alive, but he’s safe, he’s happy. No matter the cost to others and to myself, as long as da-ge is well… that’s what matters to me.”

For all the dislike Nie Huaisang had accumulated toward his older self, his heart ached to know that the man would never even get a chance to see Nie Mingjue again. It made him want to take his older self to have a chat with their brother, to see Nie Mingjue smile at him. Maybe he’d be a little less of a prick like that.

But since his older self was a prick, and unlikely to accept such an offer, Nie Huaisang instead jumped off his bed and went to take his hand to comfort him.

“I’m really sorry,” he said. “Thanks for… thanks for saving my da-ge. I’m so sorry for yours, it must be…”

His older self turned around, tearing his hand free with such rage that Nie Huaisang stumbled a few steps backwards.

“I won’t be pitied by anyone!” the man hissed. “I’m not sorry for myself, and I forbid you to pity me, you stupid little brat! If I’d been smarter at your age I wouldn’t have let him die, so how dare you pity me?”

Nie Huaisang lowered his head and hunched his shoulders. His older self should have been happy: any pity he’d felt vanished instantly.

“Now tell me what I came here for,” his older self ordered. “Is Xue Yang dead?”

“He is,” Nie Huaisang lied, and he found it easier than he’d have expected, now that he knew the truth couldn't be discovered.

A certain tension left his older self’s shoulders at that answer. In fact, he seemed relieved enough that it worried Nie Huaisang a little, and almost made him confess the truth. If Xue Yang was really fated to become such a horrible person…

But he wasn’t horrible. Not yet, anyway. No more than a lot of other people were.

Xue Yang was a brat, sure. And he struggled with a lot of common decency, doing things like stealing from other kids, or stashing food away, or trying to fight teachers that disciplined him. But in those few weeks, Xue Yang had also made a lot of progress already. He’d started understanding that nobody would let him starve, so he didn’t need to hide food that would rot somewhere, and should instead eat everything that was presented to him right away if he was hungry. He was also slowly learning to accept that, a lot of the time, if he needed something he could ask for it instead of stealing it from someone. He still had a problem with authority, and that might never change, but he sometimes seemed to understand that the teachers were not his enemies, that they only wanted to help him learn.

But the turning point had happened just three days earlier. Xue Yang, with great reluctance, had finally explained how he’d lost his finger. From the defensive manner he told that story to Nie Huaisang and Nie Mingjue, it was likely that those he’d shared it with before might have mocked him for being naive enough to think he'd ever have gotten the sweet he'd been pormised. But Nie Mingjue, instead, asked if he remembered any names or precise locations, if he could recall when it had all happened, any details at all that might help if they decided to confront Chang Ci’an for what he’d done. In the end, Xue Yang’s memory had been too fuzzy to think of building up a case, something for which Nie Mingjue had expressed great regret, before saying he'd still keep an eye open in case he might discover who was the man whom Chang Ci'an had insulted.

The expression on Xue Yang’s face was one that Nie Huaisang wouldn’t ever forget. He’d looked… young. Like he really was an ordinary ten years old kid, instead of the tough criminal he tried to be. Like he might cry, just because someone was showing just and deserved horror over what had been done to him.

There was no saying whether Xue Yang would turn out good or not, whether the efforts of Qinghe Nie would be enough to bring him onto a more righteous path than would have been his, but they were going to try.

“This is wonderful,” Nie Huaisang’s older self said, fanning himself a little too fast, as if unable to contain his excitement. “I’ve always hated that little creep, even before he started slaughtering entire sects. Now the world is safe from that at least, and that’s one worry less for da-ge. Now, on to your next mission…”

“Are you ever going to stop giving me orders?” Nie Huaisang complained. “Every time I do something you say, you tell me there’s more to do!”

“Welcome to adulthood. Now shut up.”

But I’m not an adult, Nie Huaisang thought. He was just going to turn sixteen, there was an entire four years before he’d be considered fully grown. Even Nie Mingjue, who always complained about him being an immature brat, never actually demanded from him the things he’d have expected from an adult. After all, Nie Mingjue knew too well what it was to be forced to leave one’s youth behind too early, and he’d said multiple times he didn’t want that for his brother.

Too bad Nie Huaisang couldn’t extend the same courtesy to himself.

“I’ve had to give a lot of thought to the problem that is Wei Wuxian,” his older self said, starting to pace the room. “I still haven’t come up with a satisfying answer. On the one hand, it was so convenient to all of us when he left the established path during the Sunshot Campaign and became a horrifying master of death. But I can’t decide if it’s worth all the trouble it created after the war, when his new skills were no longer required. And it’s not like I could ask you to simply kill him after he’s stopped being useful because…”

“I appreciate that, actually.”

“I can’t ask you to kill him because you’d never be able to,” his older self dryly finished, pausing his pacing just long enough for a glare before he resumed walking. “Wei Wuxian is only the most brilliant cultivator of our generation, skilled in every martial art, a genius who has invented talismans and tools beyond your imagination. He’s already so talented you could never harm him now. By the time the war ends, the only way he could die is through self-destruction, as we’ve all come to learn.”

That sounded scary and, quite frankly, Nie Huaisang wasn’t sure he wanted to get anywhere near such a person. Geniuses tended to be difficult to deal with. Like his own brother, who was always so intense about everything, and didn’t have any hobbies except cultivation and leading their sect. Or Lan Wangji who was very intense as well, and had even less conversation than Nie Mingjue. Or Lan Xichen who…

Well. Actually, Lan Xichen wasn’t so bad these days. In fact, Nie Huaisang missed their music lessons, and he missed chatting together immensely, because Lan Xichen was one of the most interesting people he knew, along with Su She. Nie Huaisang couldn't wait to see him again. But it had taken a while to get there, and before they’d found common ground, Lan Xichen too had been boring and difficult to get along with.

The problem with geniuses, Nie Huaisang figured, was that they didn’t know how to have fun.

“Here is what we are going to do,” his older self announced, stopping his pacing and closing his fan to point it at Nie Huaisang. “You are going to befriend Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng, as you were always meant to do. But you must also get closer to Lan Wangi…”

“What? But he’s awful!”

“...and make sure he befriends Wei Wuxian as well. None of that pining for a lifetime nonsense! If they become close earlier and realise their love as youths, then Wei Wuxian will probably not go dark quite as easily as he’s done from where I stand. And Jin Guangshan will hesitate a little more to antagonise Wei Wuxian if he thinks Gusu Lan too has close ties to him. Yunmeng Jiang was easy to pick on, but Gusu Lan is of a different class. Its sect leader might have been spineless, but anybody would think twice before crossing Lan Wangji. I think that’s our best course of action.”

Even more than before, Nie Huaisang became convinced that this Wei Wuxian had to be the least fun person in the world. After all, if someone like Lan Wangji could fall in love with a person, then that person had to be absolutely awful and boring. Wei Wuxian was probably a stickler for rules too. 

“Can’t I just help them without being their friend?” Nie Huaisang begged.

“Why wouldn’t you want to be Wei Wuxian’s friend?” his future self retorted, sounding puzzled by the request. “Whatever else he becomes later, I remember he was one of my favourite people when we studied together. I’ve always felt it was a shame he got kicked out so early. If he had stayed longer…”

The older man trailed off, his hand clenching on his fan, then promptly shook his head

“Nevermind,” he muttered. “Jiang Cheng was there the whole year, and that didn’t change anything to how shallow our friendship turned out to be. Just… just make sure to get them to like you, and help Wei Wuxian befriend Lan Wangji. But don’t get attached. No matter what promises you exchange with others, remember you don’t actually matter to anyone, so don’t let them matter to you either.”

“I won’t,” Nie Huaisang easily promised.

He didn’t think he was at any risk of ever liking someone who had Lan Wangji’s approval. And as for Jiang Cheng, Nie Huaisang had thought him to be a pretty interesting person when they’d met in Yunping City, but he was fairly sure the feeling was not mutual in the least.

“Excellent. I’ll cut this visit short then,” his older self announced. “Hopefully I will have recuperated enough for a brief visit in a month to hear about your progress. At worst, I’ll check on you for Qingming. Do not disappoint me.”

“I’ll try,” Nie Huaisang promised, but the older man had already disappeared.

It sounded like he had a very boring year ahead of himself.

And to make it worse, Su She was going to be so annoyed if he started hanging out with Lan Wangji.

[mdzsartreblogs]

9,000 Post Tag Round Up!

I’m a few days late on putting this post up, but I did get all the stats ready a few days ago so it could be worse. I’ve had less time to put into this blog the last month or so, and I’m really sorry about that - I’ll keep trying to keep at least some content flowing, promise!

Other stuff...

Our current follower count is 819, which is up exactly 100 from the last time...which was itself up exactly 100 from the time before, what were the chances?!

As always, I’m expanding tagging and adding tags as needed to help people find the art they might want to see from the collection.  If you have a trigger or squick that I am not currently tagging, and you’d like me to tag it, please let me know - anon asks are fine - what you’d like tag, and if you have a preferred tag that you already blacklist. As always, you can see everything this blog tags by referring to the pinned post. 

As always if you know where any of the works tagged unknown location are, please let me know. Likewise, if you know any of the artists tagged unknown artist (it’s pretty much all official art), I’d appreciate your help a lot!

If you make fanart, feel free to @ me (@ unforth - Tumblr isn’t giving me any notifications on @ for this blog) or DM me (unforth or mdzsartreblogs are both fine) so I can add your new work to the queue! 

Thanks for the follows, everyone, and as always make sure you’re reblogging art from creators whose work you enjoy - they deserve the support!

-unforth

(and, my favorite part - tag stat update!)

(read more)

Characters Tagged Most Often: once again there were no new characters added between 8k and 9k. We’ve got nearly every character who was named in canon, with the exception of Mo Xuanyu’s family, so it’s not really a surprise that we’re not getting more...

Wei Wuxian (4526 works) (no change from the 8k post)

Lan Wangji (3607 works) (no change)

Jiang Cheng (1294 works) (no change)

Lan Xichen (749 works) (+2 from 8k post)

Nie Huaisang (711 works) (-1 from 8k post)

A Yuan (678 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Jin Ling (553 works) (no change)

Jin Guangyao (509 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Wen Ning (442 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Nie Mingjue (413 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Xiao Xingchen (406 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Jiang Yanli (377 works) (no change)

Xue Yang (315 works) (no change)

Lan Jingyi (290 works) (no change)

Wen Qing (274 works) (no change)

Ships Tagged Most Often: there was a spate of more crack ships in the last 1000, which means we added some rare pairs! This is a thrill to me, I’m a multishipper and I love seeing the variety. New additions include Wangsang (LWJ/NHS), Xianxuan (WWX/JZX), Wen Ruohan/Lan Qiren, and others!

Wangxian (2773 works) (no change)

Songxiao (260 works) (no change)

Sangcheng (161 works) (no change)

Xicheng (150 works) (no change)

Xiyao (103 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Xuexiao (92 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Xuanli (70 works) (new!)

3zun (56 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Xisang (53 works) (-2 from 8k post)

Yanqing (52 works) (no change)

Platonic Relationships Tagged Most Often: not many new tags here, just rarely mentioned familial ones. And not much movement in the top 15 either...(the reason this one is 15, by the way, whereas the previous is 10, is that I expand the number of slots if there’s no movement for a while...the ships list keeps changing, so it doesn’t get expanded!)

Twin Prides of Yunmeng (285 works) (no change)

Wangxian are Dads (148 works) (no change)

Yunmeng Siblings (140 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Grape Uncle (135 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Twin Jades of Gusu (134 works) (no change)

Nie Brothers (106 works) (no change)

Wei Wuxian is a Dad (86 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Junior Trio (82 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Lan Wangji is a Dad (64 works) (no change)

Yi City Family (60 works) (no change)

Burial Mounds Family (57 works) (no change)

Wen Siblings (56 works) (no change)

One Brain Cell Trio (52 works) (no change)

Junior Quartet (50 works) (no change)

Wei Wuxian is an Uncle (50 works) (no change)

Artists Tagged Most Often: At the 8k check in, there were 2,235 artists with at least one work reblogged here. Now there are 2,406 artists. That’s an increase of 171 artists, which is a little less than last time, but still means nearly 1 in 5 works posted over the last 1k were by artists who had previously had 0 works on MDZS Art Reblogs. I continue to be in awe of the massive amount of effort and skill in this fandom. Please remember the below list is not a ranking, it’s simply which artists are most prolific and which I’ve encountered most frequently, thus leading me to reblog the most from them.

Official Art (by various artists) (128 works) (no change)

ibijau (83 works) (no change)

hilluhri (formerly known as honeyiling) (80 works) (+2 from 8k post)

modao18 (77 works) (no change)

bees0are0awesome (67 works) (-2 from 8k post)

sketchyscribbles (63 works) (no change)

littlesmartart (61 works) (no change)

v0006 (55 works) (+1 from 8k post)

bbeix (51 works) (-1 from 8k post)

joshua-beeking (49 works) (no change)

valdrift (45 works) (no change)

TOP OTHER TAGS:

The 20 Most Used Other Tags:

Portrait (7135 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Digital Art (6928 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Sketch (1361 works) (no change)

Comic (1283 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Flowers (1270 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Laughs (1170 works) (no change)

Modern AU (941 works) (no change)

Chibi (846 works) (no change)

Lan Wangji has Golden eyes (809 works) (no change)

Ink Work (686 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Wangxian Hug (675 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Chenqing (648 works) (-2 from 8k post)

Yiling Laozu (585 works) (no change)

Food (562 works) (+2 from 8k post)

Pencil Drawing (542 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Fantasy AU (531 works) (+2 from 8k post)

Lan Sizhui (518 works) (-2 from 8k post)

Blood TW (502 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Bunnies (496 works) (no change)

Lemon (448 works) (new!)

And, in some specific categories...

Actors:

Xiao Zhan (122 works) (no change)

Wang Yibo (87 works) (no change)

Song Jiyang (9 works) (no change)

Zhu Zanjin (5 works) (no change)

Wang Zhuocheng (4 works) (no change)

Liu Haikuan (4 works) (no change)

Jianguo (4 works) (new!)

Ji Li (4 works) (no change)

Animals:

Bunnies (496 works) (no change)

Birds (204 works) (no change)

Butterflies (118 works) (no change)

Cats (75 works) (no change)

Fish (49 works) (new!)

Character Attributes:

Lan Wangji has Golden Eyes (809 works) (no change)

Yiling Laozu (585 works) (no change)

Lan Sizhui (518 works) (no change)

Wei Wuxian has Red Eyes (445 works) (no change)

Jiang Cheng with Braids (281 works) (+2 from 8k post)

Fierce Corpse Wen Ning (277 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Blind Xiao Xingchen (247 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Child A Yuan (222 works) (no change)

Jiang Cheng has Purple Eyes (171 works) (no change)

Wei Wuxian has Piercings (129 works) (new!)

Ship Attributes:

Wangxian Hug (675 works) (no change)

Wangxian Kiss (353 works) (no change)

Wangxian Holding Hands (288 works) (no change)

Lan Wangji carrying Wei Wuxian (76 works) (no change)

Xicheng Hug (55 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Songxiao Hug (42 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Sangcheng Hug (40 works) (+1 from 8k post)

Wangxian Sharing a Bed (38 works) (new!)

Wangxian Wedding (36 works) (-2 from 8k post)

Wangxian Duet (36 works) (-1 from 8k post)

AU Tags: (10)

Modern AU (941 works) (no change)

Fantasy AU (531 works) (no change)

Fierce Corpse (341 works) (new!)

Canon Divergent AU (332 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Creature Wei Wuxian (236 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Creature Lan Wangji (214 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Technological Anachronism (167 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Bunji (85 works) (no change)

Dragon (82 works) (-2 from 8k post)

Bunxian (75 works) (no change)

Fandom Events, Holidays and Character Birthdays:

October Art Challenge (314 works) (no change)

Wangxian Week (106 works) (no change)

Wei Wuxian’s Birthday (89 works) (no change)

Lan Wangji’s Birthday (84 works) (no change)

Valentine’s Day (81 works) (new!)

Instruments and Weapons:

Chenqing (648 works) (no change)

Wangji (320 works) (no change)

Bichen (295 works) (no change)

Zidian (245 works) (no change)

Suibian (102 works) (no change)

Sandu (102 works) (no change)

Baxia (85 works) (no change)

Shuanghua (76 works) (no change)

Fuxue (71 works) (no change)

Suihua (64 works) (no change)

Liebing (64 works) (new!)

Common Motifs and Objects:

flowers (1270 works) (no change)

food (562 works) (no change)

fan (443 works) (no change)

hearts (402 works) (+3 from 8k post)

stars (379 works) (no change)

lotuses (375 works) (-2 from 8k post)

alcohol (276 works) (-1 from 8k post)

the moon (258 works) (no change)

fire (253 works) (no change)

jiang clan clarity bell (252 works) (no change) 

Media-Related Tags:

portrait (7135 works) (no change)

digital art (6928 works) (no change)

sketch (1361 works) (no change)

comic (1283 works) (no change)

laughs (1170 works) (no change)

chibi (846 works) (no change)

ink work (686 works) (no change)

pencil drawing (542 works) (no change)

lineart (393 works) (no change)

screen cap redraw (324 works) (no change)

watercolor (290 works) (no change)

work in progress (223 works) (no change)

meme redraw (205 works) (no change)

markers (150 works) (no change)

landscape (147 works) (no change)

Trigger Warnings:

blood tw (502 works) (no change)

lemon (448 works) (no change)

mcd and implied mcd (255 works) (no change)

body horror tw (89 works) (no change)

suicide tw (50 works) (no change)

Locations and Eras:

cloud recesses (363 works) (no change)

lotus pier (239 works) (no change)

lecture era (118 works) (no change)

burial mounds (87 works) (new!)

post canon (73 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Lemons:

bondage (53 works) (no change)

bondage using the lan clan ribbon (29 works) (no change)

blindfolds (18 works) (+2 from 8k post)

hickies (17 works) (-1 from 8k post)

bottom wei wuxian (16 works) (-1 from 8k post)

Other Fandoms:

Tian Guan Ci Fu (91 works) (no change)

Ren Zha Fanpai Zijiu Xitong (82 works) (no change)

Lang Dianxia (9 works) (no change)

Legend of Fei (8 works) (no change)

Douluo Continent (5 works) (new!)