#mingjue is openly bi so the idea of male!yao sleeping his way to the top doesn't come out of nowhere

[larothoughts]

fem!jiggy thoughts (part 1: qinghe nie)

this is part of a larger mdzs au i definitely do NOT have time to write completely. but i've been turning it over in my head for days at this point and it needs to be written down else i forget everything.

basically, how drastically things would have changed with a genderbent meng yao.

(the following timeline is a mix between canons; basically it's the drama timeline without the yin-iron/puppets. but i'm even less familiar with the mdzs timeline as i am with svsss so forgive me for any errors;;;)

the brothel

now i fully believe meng shi, smart as she was and living in a brothel, would've done all she could to hide meng yao's true gender from the madam and her coworkers. this was her son, only meng shi is allowed to bathe him, his father will come back to retrieve him one day. secretly, she still taught meng yao that her father was a great man; that one day she wouldn't need to hide as he will surely take her in.

sisi, the only other person aware of meng yao's true gender, would've seen a young and already-pretty meng yao and been emboldened to pull her aside: 'do not go to lanling jin once your mother dies. not even being his daughter will protect you from jin guangshan.'

because jgs has a reputation amongst brothel workers, the working women of lanling, everyone except for the women he bedded and charmed. if meng yao had been a boy, then maybe sisi would've been assured that the worst jgs could do was throw him down koi tower. but as a girl, when meng yao was as pretty as her mother? no. absolutely not.

so when meng shi dies, sisi sneaks out a still cross-dressing meng yao and urges her to run as far away from the madam's reach as she could. she was still passably androgynous in her youth, but the minute the madam realized she was a girl, she'd force her to take on her mother's debt in her place. so meng yao runs.

qinghe nie

now sisi may have stressed the importance of not going to lanling jin as a no-name girl with a pretty face, but meng yao is tenacious. if she could build a reputation as a cultivator, then surely her father would at least be willing to hear her story out. to acknowledge her as a member of his family. (because meng shi was right too; if meng yao was legitimized as a jin, being a woman would no longer be as dangerous as it was for her now. she would have the power to finally dress and act the way she wants.) the yunmeng jiang sect is a bit too close to home for her comfort, so she goes to the next best sect accepting civilian members: qinghe nie.

one would think NOT being known as a bastard son of a whore would make her experience here much better. it doesn't. sure, the og!qinghe nie bullies liked to use his status to torment meng yao, but in the meritocratic no-bullshit environment chifeng-zun has established, it's strength that ultimately matters. and in both the og universe and in this one, meng yao just isn't as strong as the other recruits. being weak, effeminate and too-differential are all frowned upon traits for a man to be in qinghe nie; but in this au, meng yao would rather be bullied for weakness than be forced to give up cultivating altogether. it's not like female cultivators aren't allowed, just that female cultivators in qinghe nie are held at a higher physical standard. if anyone found out she was actually a girl, they'd take one look at her soft and petite frame and remove her from the ranks entirely. so meng yao grits her teeth and tries to make herself useful no matter how humiliating it is when her fellow disciples treat her more like a servant than a comrade.

then, nie mingjue comes across her half-dressed. she's mortified. the one person who should never know her real gender just walks up behind her, all because the other disciples had set her camp up across the pond as more bullying and she figured she'd use the privacy to her advantage. rather than demand answers or react with violence, however, chifeng-zun just frowns.

"I wasn't aware there were women in this squadron." "There... aren't," Meng Yao answers. She flushes slightly when Nie Mingjue's gaze flickers down to the still-visible swell of her breast, barely hidden beneath the robe she'd yanked over herself in panic. There is an awkward silence, one that fills her with skin-crawling dread. She has half a mind to throw her dignity away entirely and beg for mercy on her knees, but the man surprises her by turning his gaze away from her body out of... out of respect? The idea of a man not ogling her the way all men ogled women is strangely endearing. "Your name?" the sect leader finally says. It briefly crosses her mind to lie. It'll be a difficult but not impossible task to slip away from this squad and pretend to be recruited into another under a different alias. She's an expert disguise-artist when given enough time and determination; her work helping the brothel sisters prepare for the night beforehand was testament to that. Meng Yao wants to lie, because that's always been her first instinct in the face of danger. But from the way everyone spoke about Chifeng-zun, the righteous Nie Mingjue, Meng Yao suspects lying of any kind here may be her actual undoing. "Meng Yao," she answers him, decisive. "My name is Meng Yao."

the inner circle

no one is more shocked than meng yao when, only a few days later, chifeng-zun reassigns her to his personal squadron. he sees her contributions, recognizes her worth, and promotes her into the ranks as an inner disciple. and the cost of this promotion--and therefore unrestricted access to the nie library, where meng yao could finally, finally get her hands on a cultivation manual better suited to her than the dumb one handed out to new recruits--is the added job all members of chifeng-zun's squad must partake in sooner or later: babysitting nie huaisang.

in fact, this is her main job. meng yao is briefly offended that chifeng-zun assumes her gender makes her the perfect babysitter. she's only mollified at the promise of (1) aforementioned access to the nie library as an inner disciple, (2) the sect leader's promise to keep her true gender a secret from everyone but huaisang and (3) her job is less babysitter and more last-line-of-defense, the same as all his other squad members. the difference is, nie huaisang hates having to put up with the usual burly, no-nonsense nie cultivators silently judging his foppish pursuits. they ruin his aesthetic!

meng yao is still annoyed that mingjue assumes her being female means nie huaisang will better allow himself to be guarded (because feminine pursuits means he would prefer a female guard??) but... the man is trying. and having unrestrained access to both the young master and the sect leader is an advantage she'd be insane not to secure. even if her sudden promotion makes her relationship with the lower-ranked nie disciples even worse.

almost perfect

these years are, in hindsight, some of the best of meng yao's life. she dotes on huaisang as if he's her own little brother, finally manages to cultivate her golden core, and finds pride in clearing away qinghe nie's hidden enemies. she has mingjue's admiration and trust, and holds enough sway with the non-disciples to see her plans put into action. things are almost perfect, but for a few things: the lower-ranked disciples still view meng yao as a snake that slept 'his' way to the top of the hierarchy; and nie mingjue refuses to take her as his wife.

well, refuse is a strong word. more like 'will not offer,' a predicament huaisang laments alongside meng yao because just look at her! she'd be a perfect nie-furen! also i know you're sleeping together da-ge, yao-jie is discreet but you certainly aren't! no one even entertains the idea of meng yao being taken in as a concubine; the moment one of the mostly powerless nie elders tries to bring it up (a civilian, mingjue? a man??) the nie brothers shut it down.

the lack of proposal is not out of disrespect. it's because nie mingjue knows he's going to die young. marrying meng yao would require her to reveal her true gender to calm down the nie elders, and once known that information can't be taken back. leaving behind a widow and a non-combatant brother is a far more dangerous situation than leaving behind a non-combatant brother and his trusted attendant. leaving behind a widow related to jin guangshan is even worse. that power-hungry bastard would use any opportunity to gain ground, and his grieving daughter in qinghe nie would put the entire sect in jeopardy.

(mingjue would like to think meng yao would have more loyalty to qinghe than that, but even through rose-tinted glasses he knows meng yao is a practical woman. if it ensured her own safety and possibly huaisang's, she'd open the gates of qinghe nie herself. that was the entire point of meng yao telling him her background, a warning disguised as her detailing how useful she could be. it makes mingjue uneasy, the idea of what meng yao would do if backed into a corner. so he spends as much energy as possible to keep that from happening.)

the fall

meng yao takes nie huaisang to the gusu lan lectures again and again. tensions with the wen sect keep rising. xue yang is captured and taken into the qinghe nie dungeons, only to be broken out by wen cultivators less than a day later. in the ensuing battle, mingjue catches meng yao murdering the same former squad mate that used to steal credit for her victories. he sees her smile, her purposeful use of a wen-style attack, and how easy it is for her to switch from confident to 'terrified' once she realizes he sees her. the shift shakes something fundamental in him, the realization that this woman he loves is so capable of putting on a mask. that she put a mask on in front of him, when she'd once vowed never to do so unless it was for the good of the sect.

murdering the captain of her former squadron was not for the good of the sect.

before he can confront her, xue yang cuts his way through the last of the nie defenses and leaves one last parting gift via declaration: that wen rouhan was quite interested in the beautiful woman who'd stolen nie minjue's heart. that she could do so much better in nightless city, if she ever found herself wanting.

the aftermath of the escape is devastating. meng yao eschews dignity and does what she thought of doing the first time her gender was revealed: she gets down on her knees and begs for mingjue to let her stay as a nie disciple. already word has spread throughout qinghe nie and the wider gentry that meng yao is not just a woman, but a devious and power-grabbing one. that she hid her gender to get close to the sect leader, then engineered a perfect reveal to catch his attention. that she could have easily seized control of the entire sect before anyone had any idea of the threat she was.

mingjue, meanwhile, doesn't know what is and isn't true. he's questioning everything about meng yao, even their first meeting as insinuated by the rumors. it hurts him deeply that he can no longer trust her word; and it hurts her to lose his regard so absolutely.

in a world that favors men, mingjue wouldn't hesitate to kick male!meng yao out within the day. in this one, fem!meng yao is instead locked in her rooms until mingjue can come up with a solution that won't end in her certain death. because despite huaisang's begging, he is firm in the fact that meng yao cannot stay. not even taking into account mingjue and huaisang's feelings, the outrage amongst the nie disciples is enough they'd likely rebel if she remained. mingjue does not want to see meng yao slain by a disciple of his own sect. he doesn't, against his better judgment, want to see meng yao slain at all.

lanling jin

in a great twist of fate, huaisang points out the best solution is the plan meng yao gave up on so many years ago. for better or for worse, meng yao's name is now known across the gentry. she'd been a high-ranking member of qinghe nie for many years, is valued by both brothers and is still respected for her intelligence. mingjue keeps silent on the matter of their broken trust, their long-lasting affair, and any rumors other than the fact that meng yao is a woman. instead, he sends meng yao to lanling jin with a retinue of disciples from his personal squadron, as well as an apology gift for besmirching the honor of jin guangshan's daughter.

he sends her to koi tower with a glowing letter of recommendation and an earnest request for jin guangshan to take care of someone both nie brothers care about greatly. jin guangshan reads the two letters through gritted teeth, sat in front of the stoic nie retainers bracketing meng yao on either side. with meng yao's name and accomplishments on everyone's minds, with the thinly-veiled threat of nie retribution in those damn letters-- jin guangshan cannot hide her away as he would his other bastards.

he has no choice but to accept meng yao into lanling jin as his daughter, even with his wife glaring daggers at him all the while.

it is the last gift mingjue is willing to give meng yao. if not his hand, fulfilling her dream is the next best thing he can offer. unfortunately, as with most things in meng yao's life, it is simply not enough.

a few weeks later, the cloud recesses burn.