#you can't cheat death while you're digging your own grave

[radiokathryn-if]

JACKSON LEWIS! The Family Man.

Jackson Lewis──he/him. 33. The night shift receptionist-slash-building coordinator. He usually brings his daughter to sit in on show recordings, seeing as she’s got a bit of a crush on Nate─he’s a no-bullshit kind of man but his soft spot is his daughter’s puppy dog eyes. He just so happens to be the last person to see Nate before he disappeared and YOU CAN’T HELP BUT GET THE FEELING HE’S NOT BEING TRUTHFUL IN HIS STATEMENT ABOUT IT.

Visuals! Jackson is a plus sized man with an average height of 5"9' (175cm). His frame is shaped more oval-like than rectangular and while he doesn't go out of his way to exercise his muscle to fat ratio is almost 1:1. Despite sporting a thick and voluminous afro in his youth, nowadays Jackson's dark brown hair is styled in a crew cut, leaving the growth to his beard──which is full, thick and well-taken-care-of. His black umber-brown skin has cool, jewel undertones that pair well with his dark brown hooded eyes. He has a nubian shaped nose and full lips framed by both his beard and mustache. There is a small scar on the left side of his nose where he previously had a piercing that has since closed up. Half of his right little finger is missing. He doesn't smile often, in all the time you've spent with him (which isn't all that much) but he sports laughter lines at the corners of his eyes and the tips of his mouth letting you believe he's not just the straight-laced man you believe him to be.

Fun Fact! His daughter, Priscilla─Cilly as he calls her─is almost eight years old! Jackson is in the final stages of quite the lengthy divorce but he's excited to finally be Cilly's only parent with legal custody soon.

Modern Day Lyric! "You can't cheat death when you're digging your own grave." PVRIS, Fire. OR "If we had one day left on earth would you call me? In our last few moments left would you want me?" Kenya Grace, Meteor.

[gravitywonagain]

Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave; Part 3

Continued from [1][2]

What if Nie Huaisang and Wei Wuxian were closer? Sworn brothers, even? What if NHS visited WWX in Yiling?

Prompt from the wonderful @shiranai-atsune

[T (for now?), implied Wangxian, 2k, 3/?]

~

Wei Wuxian:

“How much do you know about the Saber Path, Wei-xiong?”

There’s a change in his friend as he asks the question. Nie Huaisang prefers to be seen as someone who is flighty and unaware. He never makes definitive statements, nothing anyone could pin to him as his own opinion; he doesn’t like to appear to know things. 

But now, Wei Wuxian is cut by the sharpness in his friend’s eyes. 

“Uh… I know it’s strong,” he says. “Very yang focused, active.”

“Did you know it kills its practitioners?”

Wei Wuxian blinks. “Early deaths of Nie sect leaders do seem to be a pattern.” 

“I thought,” says Wen Qing, next to him, “that was mostly about… ah, temperament.” 

It’s a delicate way to put it. But Wei Wuxian is pretty sure this isn’t the time for delicate. 

“She means that they always seem to go out in a blaze of idiotic glory on some epic nighthunt.” 

Nie Huaisang does not appear offended on his ancestors’ behalf. He remains sharp, rigid. The blade of a saber he always keeps sheathed. Voice hard as steel. 

He says, “My father died at home when my brother cut him down to protect my mother and me from his final rage. After his saber broke, he deteriorated. It was,” he pauses, clears his throat. It’s a raw kind of sound, wet and red, but he remains calm and cold. “It was difficult to watch. I still don’t understand what happened to him. But our doctors called it a qi deviation.”

“I see.” 

“Nie-er-gongzi, may I ask,” Wen Qing seems to be struggling to phrase her question but finally settles on, “may I see your saber?” 

When Nie Huaisang smiles at her, it’s discordantly soft. Gently amused. “Oh, I doubt my saber will tell you very much, Wen-daifu. I do not cultivate with it.” 

“How much do you know about the Saber Path, Nie-xiong?” Wei Wuxian asks. 

“Not a lot, to be honest.” 

Nie Huaisang flicks his fan open then, retreating back behind a vapid smile as if his candor has reached some limit and he must rest a moment. It’s an oddly placating kind of gesture. Like Wei Wuxian is someone who needs to be coddled or pacified. It irks. Sits wrong, stringing a tension between his shoulders where there wasn’t any before. 

“I believe you,” he says. “But you still haven’t answered my previous question. What is the cost, Huaisang?” 

The fan flickers back and forth as Nie Huaisang seems to consider how exactly to arrange his words. 

Usually he doesn’t take this long. Usually he walks people through a conversation he’s rehearsed in his mind, choreographed and memorized. At least, when he wants something. And maybe the pause itself is strategic, but Wei Wuxian knows his friend well. It seems… careful. Which only twists the band between Wei Wuxian’s shoulders tighter. 

Finally, Nie Huaisang snaps his fan closed. He deliberately meets Wei Wuxian’s eyes and says, “You’ll have to study it.” 

It would be misleading to say that this is what Wei Wuxian had been afraid of. The idea would have had to occur to him first, for him to fear it. But it is tangential to his fear. Connected. 

“Ah…” Wei Wuxian rubs his palms against the rough fabric of his robe. He glances over to Wen Qing, who meets his gaze with the anxiety in her own. “Nie-xiong…” 

“You don’t have to… cultivate it,” Nie Huaisang says, far too knowingly. Wei Wuxian’s eyes jump to his friend’s face, but Nie Huaisang presses on, “Just. Just study it. Fix it.” 

They’re going to have to address that at some point. Probably. Because just how the fuck-- No. Not now.

“Fix it?” Wei Wuxian asks with no small amount of incredulity. No small amount of curiosity either. “I can’t-- I know I helped you pass your exams during the lectures but--” His brain is already beginning to circle around what he knows of the Saber Path. Yang-focused, prone to qi deviation -- or at least something like it. 

Nie Huaisang must see it in his face, because he smiles, a little fiercer this time, and says, “You can. You think about cultivation in ways that other people can’t even imagine. Look at what you built during the war!” 

“You’ll recall,” Wei Wuxian says, raising a pointed eyebrow, “that not many people are very pleased with what I built during the war.” 

Wen Qing, with a bit more wariness adds, “And some are extremely greedy for it.” 

“Also true.” 

“Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang huffs. “False modesty will get us nowhere.” 

Wei Wuxian rolls his eyes. “Yes. I’m smart. But this…” He flaps his hands uselessly. 

“This is new. A challenge,” Nie Huaisang grins, and Wei Wuxian hates that it works on him. “And you’ll be tackling it inside a library. With insulation. And on a full stomach.” 

The Wens, aside from Wen Qing, are all outside the cave somewhere. Tilling corrupted soil, washing clothes with barely cleansed water, gathering any scraps of cloth they can find to sew into blankets and coats as the winter looms near. 

Wei Wuxian looks toward the strained sunlight that brightens the mouth of the cave. He bites a strip of cracked skin from his lip. His leg bounces under the table. 

When he turns back, Nie Huiasang is watching him closely. He’s letting Wei Wuxian see how closely he’s watching, which counts for something here. Between them. He needs this. He’s almost begging them for it. And when has Wei Wuxian ever been able to turn down someone in need of his help? 

“Chifeng-zun has agreed to their safety?” he asks. An insane question in any other circumstance. 

“He has.” A similarly insane answer. 

That Nie Mingjue would willingly shelter Wens is almost as unbelievable as the Wens all surviving this winter in the Burial Mounds. But that’s the thing, isn’t it. Their options are severely limited. And if Wei Wuxian wants to keep them safe, he must consider any that are open to him. 

He nods and asks, “What else?” 

The vapid smile returns. “I don’t know what you mean.” 

“Huaisang.” 

Nie Huaisang shakes his fan at him. “You sound eerily like Da-ge when you do that, did you know?”

He’s avoiding the question. “It’s bad, then.” 

“It’s…” he trails off for a moment, but has the decency to look guilty when he nods and says, “permanent.” 

Wei Wuxian huffs, exasperated. He’s so fucking tired of games. 

Nie Huaisang sets his fan down on the table. Presses his fingers against the surface until his knuckles bulge with it. Then he says, “You’ll have to give up the Yin Tiger Seal.” 

“To whom?” Wen Qing asks, the question quick to her tongue, like she already knew this would be the request. 

She probably did. Wei Wuxian probably should have known, too. But he’d thought, of all people… 

“No,” he says.  

“Wei-xiong--” 

“No, I’ll do it,” he amends. “But I won’t give it to anyone.” 

“Wei Wuxian.” Wen Qing’s voice is sharp with warning. Pointed and precise like her needles. Because she knows what he’s thinking now, too. 

“Qing-jie. It’s the only way we do this.” 

“You don’t know it won’t kill you.” 

It won’t matter if it does, he doesn’t say. Instead, maybe more bullheaded than necessary, he bites out, “Luckily, I’ll have a library at my disposal.” 

Wen Qing’s jaw tightens like she heard him anyway. 

“Ah, Wei-xiong?” Nie Huaisang flutters his fan, blocking the lower half of his face, exactly like he used to during their tutoring session when Wei Wuxian would go off on some borderline esoteric tangent about cultivation theory. 

It’s so familiar that Wei Wuxian almost laughs aloud with the nostalgia in his chest. 

“When?” he asks. 

“When what?” Nie Huaisang returns. 

“When will I need to give it up?”

Nie Huaisang’s eyebrows dip together. “I don’t--”

“If your brother will allow me to hold onto it --” unlikely, but, “fuck, if he’ll lock it away for me -- Tight, safe even from himself. He's more suspicious of Jins than any of the other clan leaders,” he trails off, considering. But Nie Huaisang taps his fan and Wei Wuxian finishes, “I can figure out how to destroy it. Safely.” 

That seems to take Nie Huaisang by actual surprise. His fan pauses, mid sway, then shivers back into motion, faster and far less even. “Destroy it?” 

“Completely,” Wei Wuxian says with a confidence he forces into his throat. 

He needs to be confident in this. He needs to be sure he can destroy it, otherwise… Otherwise none of this will matter anyway. 

Nie Huaisang hums, considering. He folds the fan and taps it against his lips. “We can probably make that work.” 

Something like relief breaks in Wei Wuxian’s chest. A breath he hadn’t been holding. He wants to reach for Wen Qing’s hand, but she probably wouldn’t appreciate the gesture in front of their guest. 

He takes a deep breath. Waits for Wen Qing’s tiny nod. And says, “Okay.”

“Okay?” asks Nie Huaisang, hope shining too bright to be false in his eyes. 

“If you can guarantee the safety of the Wens,” says Wei Wuxian, “we’ll go.” 

Wen Qing inhales, pauses, inhales again, and says, “Nie-er-gongzi…”

“Yes, Wen-daifu?”

She still seems to be gathering her words, but Nie Huaisang waits patiently. His fan is still, his smile gentle again. 

She tilts her head, eyes calculating, and says, “There will be political backlash for this.”

“Ah, yes. I suppose there is one last thing I’ll require of you, Wei-xiong.”

Wei Wuxian waits, annoyed, but also dazed. He’s not entirely sure that any of this is really happening. It’s too good. Even if there is yet another condition. 

Nie Huaisang smiles -- smiles, not a grin full of mischief or a calculating quirk of the lips -- and says to Wei Wuxian, “Become my sworn brother.”

Wei Wuxian’s face reacts before he can tell it not to. His jaw drops open, his brow furrows, his eyes search his friend for the joke, for the punchline, for any hint that he’s not serious about this. When he doesn’t find one, he yells, “Huaisang!” 

“What?” asks Nie Huaisang, fan flapping back and forth over an exaggerated pout. “I didn’t realize it was so detestable a concept.”

“You cannot swear yourself to Yiling Laozu.”

“We’re not getting married.” 

Wei Wuxian scoffs. “We kind of would be, and you know that.”

“So what? You’re a war hero. And an incredibly powerful cultivator.” 

A glance to Wen Qing offers no help. Her lips are softly curled and her eyes are unfocused, like she’s imagining Jin Guangshan’s face when Wei Wuxian is pulled out of his reach for good. Or maybe just the spectacle of Yiling Laozu swearing himself to Nie Huiasang, the most unassuming figure of the highly ranked gentry. 

“I don’t have a core,” Wei Wuxian blurts out, “which you seem to have figured out somehow.” 

Nie Huaisang looks very smug and says, “Nothing in the ceremony requires a golden core.” 

“I’m a servant’s son.”

“Meng Yao is a prostitute’s son. Wei-xiong, I really don’t understand what the problem is here?”

“He has self-esteem issues,” says Wen Qing. Which is just-- 

“I--? What? I’m incredibly full of myself, ask anyone.” 

Wen Qing catches his eyes and glares. But he isn’t lying. 

It’s not self-esteem he has issues with. It’s other people risking themselves for him. Reputation means everything in this world, all three of them know that. And Nie Huaisang’s reputation is far from spotless. He does not need it raked over the coals by being associated with Wei Wuxian. 

But then. It’s not for him. Or not just for him. It’s for Nie Mingjue. It’s for the Wens. 

It-- Damnit, it could work, too. 

This time when he looks at her, Wen Qing looks back. It’s in her eyes: his acquiescence. He can see it there, taunting him. She knows him too well. She knows him better than anyone, it seems, even himself. 

“In front of everybody?” he asks, a whine more than anything. 

Nie Huaisang’s smile gets wider. Victorious. “That is generally how it’s done, yes. I’m planning it for your nephew’s 100 days ceremony.”

“That’s quick,” says Wen Qing. 

“It’s necessary.”

“I’m impressed.”

Nie Huaisang winks, “Don’t tell anyone.” 

“And Nie-zongzhu is just-- fine with that?” Wei Wuxian asks, some last token protest before he has nothing left. 

“He understands the complexity of the situation. And the… Jin Guangshan of the situation.” 

“Ah.” 

“Yeah.” 

Wei Wuxian blows out all the air in his lungs. It’s not a lot, but it gives him several seconds to collect himself. Then, finally, he says, “Alright, let’s do it.” 

He’s not sure who looks more satisfied, Nie Huaisang or Wen Qing. He ignores the strange ease that settles into his own gut at the idea of it. At a path forward that isn’t a single-log bridge in the night. It’s… nice, he thinks. To have somebody else to help him across the river, to help him help the rest of them cross safely to the other side. 

It’s a new feeling. A new lightness. 

He’s sad, suddenly, that it didn’t come from someone else. Someone who has been his candle in the dark since they were teenagers. 

And then he is abruptly guilty for that feeling, and he shakes it off, letting his mouth run instead. 

“How does this sworn brotherhood thing work, anyway? Am I siblings with my sworn sibling’s siblings? What about their sworn siblings and those sworn siblings’... siblings?”

He ran out of steam at the end a little bit, and “siblings” now more resembles a jumble of sounds than it does a real word. But then Nie Huaisang sighs and says, “You will still be allowed to marry Wangji-xiong,” and Wei Wuxian feels all of the blood in his body rush into his cheeks. 

“Good,” he nods, with every ounce of dignity he has left. It’s not a lot. “That’s all I need to know.”

[audaciiaearchive]

26 - dealers choice hehe

Spotify wrapped || Accepting

Fire--PVRIS

The anger Kit feels is nothing like they've ever felt in their entire life. There's been plenty of people who've fucked them over, betrayed them, tried to stab them in the back and came out worse for it. But this? This is a whole new low. Kit loved Alex, but he isn't Alex. He is Casper Daniel Reid, aka The Ghost, aka the motherfucker that's been screwing them out of millions for months.

While they're angry, they're also heartbroken. It's not a great combination, especially for someone like Kit who has never had to deal with this before. That's how they find themself here now, gun pointed at Casper, their hands shaking (why are they shaking? This is fucking bullshit. Just pull the god damn trigger, Harris). "You can't cheat death when you're digging your own grave, darling," they practically spit out, taking a step closer to him. "What did you think would happen? That you'd get to pull the wool over my eyes and that would be that? You didn't think I'd figure you out? You're a god damn fool."

[mirclealignr]

Hello friend! Sorry I have been MIA for a while but omg congratulations!!! 2 year celebration is so fREakIN EXCITING HEHE!!!

I need to catch up on reading I’ve been so busy!

Anyways,,, here you go:

[A ROOM WITH A VIEW] — send me your favourite song lyric and i’ll tell you what character you remind me of.

“So go ahead, yeah just drop dead. And while you're trying to fool the whole world don't forget that you'll decay. And you'll waste away. You can't cheat death when you're digging your own grave.” — Fire by PVRIS

~ @entishramblings

no worries, i understand. and THANK U SM! please don’t rush to catch up, take ur time :)

you remind me of bucky barnes!

two year celebration !

[gravitywonagain]

Hey, thank you so much for sharing Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave! It came up on my timeline and I think it's fantastic!! Do you have any plans to put it on AO3? I don't want to miss out on any future updates so I was hoping you would so I can bookmark it. :D

hi!! i'm so glad you like it!!

there are plans to put it on ao3 eventually, but i tend not to post anything there until it's been through a round or eight of edits by my wife and/or myself. i post a lot of first drafts here, particularly those i use as warmups, that need a lot of work before i'm actually happy with them and i've come to think of ao3 as where things get 'published' if that makes sense? i had also been planning on not putting up unfinished works there again due to my very slow and sporadic update rate for... well pretty much everything, among other reasons.

it does seem kind of silly, though. now that i write that out. as the only thing that is different about tumblr vs ao3 is the audience and the ability to follow the progress of a fic in a more straightforward manner.....

but, with that particular fic as an example, there are three chapters now and i have no idea what the fourth will even be about, let alone when it will be posted. this means that i might want to change things in prev chapters to suit a better overall story line (which is something i'm learning how to do and struggling to reconcile with my current big long fic). but, then again, maybe not. maybe i reserve that for fics that i haven't posted here? maybe something like this fic becomes more of a 'yes, and...' type exercise, and we all just see where it goes together? i could get behind that, i think. maybe.

it would still have to go through edits. (like, that entire third ch should be in past tense based on how i set up the timeline in the first one.) and wife Does Not have time for following along with all of my wips. but maybe that would still be doable. i've posted non-wife-edited fics there before. i could do it again. add her edits when they're made, if they're made.

...

all of which is to say, YES, it will go up on ao3, but i don't know when. possibly sooner rather than later as a direct result of your question ;)

in the meantime, idk, follow the tag (#ccdwydyog), maybe? not sure how well that works. or maybe i can make a note to send you a thing whenever the next ch happens? it'll have to be a very good note, and placed particularly well, so i currently make no promises to do more that try on that one :)

sorry that got a bit more complicated and ramble-y than you were probably hoping for, but you gave me a lot to think about!

thanks for the ask, and thanks for reading my silly little fic! <3

[gravitywonagain]

My Writing Masterpost

Here's a working list of all of the MDZS (mostly WangXian) fics I'm writing and am currently posting and have completed. Anything that makes it to this list has actual words in a google doc somewhere, I promise. (But there are also many google docs that haven't yet made it to this list. See here for all of that.)

~Series~

Starts with a Spark, Then it's a Wildfire (Modern Triad AU Series)

Words are Gonna Bleed from Me: [ao3] [excerpts]

My Friends are Degenerates (The Juniors): [ao3]

The Devil's Worst Nightmare (QingMian): [ao3] [excerpts]

The Killing Kind (A Prequel): [ao3] [excerpts]

[Spotify Playlist]

[Series ao3]

Sign Your Name Across My Body (Unrelated Porn Snapshots)

[Series ao3]

Hands: [ao3]

A Mess: [ao3]

Hit Me: [ao3]

*

~Chapter Fics~

Blackouts (Modern AU + Roofies): [ao3]

Breathing You In (I Don't Wanna Stop) (Cultivation Gym AU): [ao3] [1][2][3] [excerpts] [inspiration]

Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave (NHS comes to the Burial Mounds prompt): [ao3] [1][2][3]

The Water's Right, It's Sinking In (Summer in Yunmeng AU): [ao3] [1][2][3][4][5][6]

Beating Like a Hammer (WLW Enemies to Lovers AU): [ao3] [1][2][3]

I Am Not a Vessel for Your Good Intent (Immortal WWX AU): [ao3] [1]

Fresh Powder in the Pine Trees (Ski Resort AU): [ao3] [masterlist] [excerpts]

Sympathy for the Devil (The Blacklist AU): [ao3] [1][2] [excerpts]

Hand in Hand with a Brother (Demonic Shuangjie AU): [ao3] [1] [inspiration]

Boy Meets Sword (MXY does Empathy on Suibian): [ao3] [1][ask]

*

~One Shots~

Hold You Like a Hand Grenade (a canon-divergent pain-relief fantasy): [ao3]

Power Over Me | 欢迎 (the repository for the purplest of my prose, also vampire/faerie au): [ao3] [excerpts]

Your Shadows in My Room (a qingxian moment in the burial mounds; aka Tombmates): [ao3]

Echoes, Feelings, Yet to Disappear (an exploration of wwx's thoughts about lwj's discipline whip scars): [ao3]

Thick Blood Warms Cold Strings (the first time lwj plays inquiry while still healing from his punishment): [ao3]

What You Hear is not Silence (there is a ghost in the burial mounds who hears music: [ao3]

Younger than the Sun (immortal lwj and undead wn sharing a moment centuries after their loved ones are dead): [ao3]

Inquiring Minds (core reveal because wwx gets compelled by inquiry during sunshot): [ao3]

Dreams Unwind (wei changze/cangse sanren meet cute ugly): [ao3]

*

~Shorts and Drabbles and Other Stuff~

Gui Daifu | 鬼大夫

A Necessary Evil, WWX's POV, LWJ's POV | [ao3]

Frog!xian (double drabble) .🐸. [ao3]

Lan Yuan curses in front of his dad (4x drabble) .🤬. [ao3]

NHS and LWJ walk in on their brothers (4x drabble) .👀. [ao3]

[gilmore girls au nonsense]

[various musical inspiration]

#my-writing | #my-nonsense

[gravitywonagain]

Rules: Post the names of all the files in your wip folder regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it.

hehehe... hahahahaha... oh this is gonna be... embarrassing, mostly, but also very fun!! thank you for tagging me @amethyst-noir <3<3<3

A Necessary Evil [wangxian]

All the Monsters Come Out at Night [wlw wangxian]

Alone on Lunar New Year? Mad at your dad? [wangxian fam]

Assassin's Creed AU [wangxian]

Beating Like a Hammer [wlw wangxian]

Boy Meets Sword [mxy&suibian]

Breathing You In (I Don't Wanna Stop) [wangxian]

Bury the Sunlight [burial mounds fam]

Caiyi Town (Gilmore Girls AU) [wangxian fam]

Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave [nhs&wwx]

Control [beefleaf]

Do you like apples? [wangxian]

Dreaming in Red [wangxian]

Dresden AU [wangxian fam]

Edges that Scratch (and notes on the Expanded Monterey Genderverse) [wlw wangxian]

Fierce Corpse JYL [yunmeng siblings]

Fire in the Back of My Throat (Sunshot Band AU) [wangningxian]

Fresh Powder in the Pine Trees [wangxian]

Gui Daifu | 鬼大夫 [burial mounds siblings]

Gun Oil [sunny bees]

Hand in Hand with a Brother (Demonic Shuangjie AU) [yunmeng sibs]

High Fidelity [wangningxian]

Homeless AU (and a treatise on the US treatment of felons by librarian LWJ) [wangxian fam]

Hot for Teacher [wangxian]

I am Not a Vessel for Your Good Intent [wangxian]

I Got Dumped in Tokyo [wlw wangxian]

Immortals [lan wangji/&wen ning]

In the Parking Lot Between a Dairy Queen and a PL$ Check Cashers [junior quartet, zhuiyi]

Inquiring Minds [wangxian, wwx&jc]

Let Your Brain Run Wild (Everybody's Nephew Band AU) [junior quartet, zhuiyi]

Let Yourself be Loved (Definitely Not a Queer Eye fic) [wwx&fab5]

My Heart's Like Yours [wangxian fam]

Paint My Body Gold [wangxian]

Parker [leverage ot3]

Ramen House [wangxian]

Rope Burns [clexa]

Roses Don't Know When They're Dead [xuanli]

Sign Your Name Across My Body [wangxian]

Teal Eyes [fair game]

The Bar [thunderblink]

The Korrasami Sexcapades Playlist [korrasami]

The Too Personal AU [wangxian]

The Trashbag AU [korrasami]

The Water's Right, It's Sinking In [wangxian]

Turnt Up at the Club [sunny bees]

Under Streetlights [wangxian]

Undergrad Groupchat [wangxian]

Urban Fantasy AU (What Does the Huli Jing Say?) [wlw foxxian/dragonji]

WAGBFM: Can You Hear That (Whistle) -- A Nighthunt [junior quartet]

WAGBFM: Devil's Worst Nightmare -- A Rendezvous [mianqing]

WAGBFM: Nails in My Coffin -- A Marriage [songxiao]

WAGBFM: The Killing Kind -- A Prequel [wangxian]

Weird West AU [wangxian]

Words are Gonna Bleed from Me [wangxian]

WQ Soul Sacrifice Ritual AU [burial mounds siblings]

You Got Me Bloodshot [wangxian]

水 | Paradoxes [xue yang, yiling wei sect]

wow. okay. sure. at least 50 is a nice round number?

(i put the main focus in brackets when i start writing a thing, but sometimes that changes and i forget to update so... idk if all of those are super accurate or not? i guess we'll find out!)

Tagging: anyone who wants to do this! it's very fun! and also painful. but mostly fun! and i'm super excited for questions!

ask away! i'll answer whatever, whenever :)

ETA: still open. open forever. maybe i'll even try to keep it updated if people want that?

[gravitywonagain]

writing patterns tag game

Rules: list the first line of your last 10 (posted) fics and see if there's a pattern!

ahhh sorry @loosingmoreletters you tagged me in this days ago and i'm only getting to it now <3<3<3

i'm gonna include unedited stuff posted on tumblr because it's more fun for me that way :shrug: but i assume this isn't for like... subsequent chapters?

The Water's Right, It's Sinking In

Accepting Wei Wuxian's invitation was a mistake.

Inquiring Minds

It was, in retrospect, the stupidest possible way to be found out.

Boy Meets Sword

Mo Xuanyu closed his eyes as he worked to steady his breath.

Sympathy for the Devil

Wei Wuxian finds himself surprisingly calm as he pushes open the plate-glass door beneath the massive Cultivation Bureau of China insignia.

Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave

This is not how this was supposed to go. This is not how any of this was supposed to go.

.👀.

He knew. He’d known.

.🤬.

Lan Yuan freezes.

.🐸.

Wei Wuxian didn’t mean to turn himself into a frog.

Beating Like a Hammer

The first time they meet, well… It sets a tone. 

Words Are Gonna Bleed From Me

"I hear you can make the dead rise."

(yikes. yeah i've rewritten/heavily edited the first several chapters of wagbfm, but idk if i want to update them or not? ongoing discussion in which i tell my wife about the reworking of old chapters and she says "finish the new chapter already!" and she's right)

so mostly it seems that i use the first sentence to set tone rather than the scene, or often even the characters. not dialog very often, though i did notice that i do that more in later chapters as i was looking through (both sympathy and own grave have updates that start with quotes). i only use character names about half the time? i definitely thought i did that more. they're also mostly pretty short sentences, with sympathy as the obvious outlier. with the drabbles that mostly makes sense, but it's interesting in the longer fics. even when there's paired sentences, they're pretty short.

super fun! thanks letters! i might just go do this with the rest of them to see if anything else pops out at me!

Tagging: @epistemologys @amethyst-noir @dottie-wan-kenobi @greywake @dragons-of-ara and anyone else who wants to play!!

[gravitywonagain]

(via https://open.spotify.com/track/7BBkQ6VRl860bWchY1yXZe?si=1OF_EskgQVmxr30F_xB0wg)

Fire - PVRIS

[gravitywonagain]

Can't Cheat Death While You're Digging Your Own Grave; Part 2

[Part 1] I didn't abandon it, look! Now with [Part 3]

What if Nie Huaisang and Wei Wuxian were closer? Sworn brothers, even? What if NHS visited WWX in Yiling?

Prompt from the wonderful @shiranai-atsune

[T (for now?), implied Wangxian, 3.5k, 2/?]

~

Nie Huaisang:

The solution was obvious. So obvious that Nie Huaisang was a little annoyed that he seemed to be the only one who saw it. 

In fairness to everybody else, there was a lot going on and not everybody even knew there was a problem that required a solution. But Nie Huaisang didn’t feel like being fair to anyone when his brother was dying. And not only was he dying, but he wouldn’t admit he was dying. He wouldn’t change a single thing even though they both knew that his saber was slowly killing him. 

To make matters worse, the entire cultivation world had somehow conspired against the only hope for his survival and stranded the two of them on a mountain of corpses in the middle of fucking nowhere. Okay, technically it was in the outskirts of Yunmeng, but the point remained. 

Nie Huaisang, however, was nothing if not proactive. Don’t ask anyone to corroborate that, but he was. Da-ge knew of his competence, and that was what mattered. 

There were, after all, multiple reasons he was left in charge of the Unclean Realm’s resources during the Sunshot Campaign. Reasons that had little to do with his refusal to pick up his saber. Reasons that resulted in a very effective hospital, if he did say so himself. 

His brother was very aware of his covert brand of brilliance. Which was good. Because he really needed his brother to hear him out. And he would definitely not want to hear him out about this. 

Da-ge was sweaty and smiling when Nie Huaisang found him, Baxia laid gently across his lap as he tended to her edge with all of his attention. He was relaxed in the way he only was after losing all his breath and working himself into near exhaustion. Training always made Da-ge feel powerful and centered. It was the cleanest exercise he got -- at least outside of visits from Er-ge and San-ge. 

Which was why Nie Huaisang waited to search him out until the early afternoon. He wanted Da-ge to be calm and happily exerted, which could be a detriment to one of Nie Huaisang’s arguments, but would leave him in the best state of mind to hear out Nie Huaisang’s plan. 

“Da-ge!”

“Sang’er.”

There’s a warmth to Da-ge’s voice when he’s happy. It’s a good sound. A sound like fresh soil for planting flowers. 

Nie Huaisang skipped his way over to his brother and sat himself down on the stone stair next to him. 

He smiled and said, “You look relaxed.”

Da-ge raised an eyebrow and replied, “You look calculating.”

Nie Huaisang huffed at that. This was the danger of being known, of course. This is the reason Nie Huaisang pretends to be an idiot in front of other people. When people don’t know that you’re clever enough to be calculating, they never accuse you of it! 

He pouted at Da-ge, but it was no use. 

Hands still moving in long, confident strokes, Da-ge looked up and dismissed the rest of the disciples in the training yard. 

The disciples moved at once, not wanting to get involved in an argument between the brothers. Nie Zonghui set a hand on Nie Huaisang’s shoulder as he passed by, leaving swiftly after a comforting squeeze. 

“What do you want, Sang’er?” 

Da-ge’s eyes returned to Baxia, but Nie Huaisang had no doubt he had his brother’s attention. 

“I have a solution to our problems,” he said, a simple kind of delight affecting his tone. 

“What problems?”

“See,” Nie Huaisang flapped his fan lightly, “I knew you would say that, because you always say that whenever I try to bring this up.”

“Huaisang.” It was almost a groan. Nie Huaisang hated when his name was a groan. 

He deflected, “But your cultivation is only one of the problems I’m about to solve for us.”

“And the other?”

He couldn’t help himself, quirking his head to the side like a magpie, “So you admit it’s a problem?”

“Sang’er.” Another groan. This time edged with chastisement, which was even worse. 

Nie Huaisang rolled his eyes, but pressed on. “The other is Wei Wuxian.”

At this, Da-ge froze. His hands stilled, whetstone hovering a paper’s width over Baxia’s blade. Then, slow as a mountain, Da-ge turned to face Nie Huaisang with narrowed eyes and furrowed brow. 

“You have a way to kill him?” he asked. 

“Da-ge! No!” Honestly, Nie Huaisang shouldn’t have been surprised. And he wasn’t, not really. But he had forgotten -- briefly -- in all of his scheming that Wei Wuxian was on that stupid mountain of corpses because people wanted to kill him. Apparently those people included Da-ge, which was something Nie Huaisang, again, knew, but had, momentarily, forgotten. 

He brightened his smile and said, “I have a way to save him.”

Confusion spilled over Da-ge’s features. “Save him?” he asked. “From what?”

Nie Huaisang sighed, “Himself, mostly,” and got a chuckle out of Da-ge. 

“You’re a bit late for that.”

“Maybe, but maybe not,” he shrugged. “I want to bring him here.”

Anger came next. This Nie Huaisang was expecting. This he was quite prepared for. So when Da-ge began to shout, “You want to--” Nie Huaisang was quick to cut him off before he could work himself into a frenzy. 

“Him and the refugees he’s protecting,” he said, channeling as much certainty into the words as he could and backing them with his own brand of Nie stubbornness. 

“The Wens he’s protecting,” Da-ge shot back. 

But Nie Huaisang didn’t budge. “Yes.” 

“Why?” 

Good. Good; leave it to his brother to know that there was a reason. That this wasn’t just some frivolous idea. This, Nie Huaisang would acknowledge, is why you do show some people how clever and capable you are. 

“Wei Wuxian,” he starts, leaving behind all pretense of flightiness in his voice and in his body language, “is the world’s foremost expert on resentful energy and Wen Qing is a medical genius who treated Wen Ruohan for years.” He did not stop as his brother’s eyes narrowed further at the mention of Wen Qing and her uncle. He continued, “They are wasted living in the Burial Mounds, farming radishes in soil fertilized by human corpses.” 

“Wasted?” Da-ge’s voice quivered with suppressed rage. “They should both be dead!” Barely suppressed. 

“He’s the hero of the Sunshot Campaign!” Nie Huaisang really didn’t understand why people kept forgetting that. 

Sure, he knew that some forgot it conveniently as they used his friend’s villainization toward their own grasps for power, but Da-ge was there. Da-ge saw Wei Wuxian in the aftermath of that final battle, drained and pale after having wrested control of Wen Ruohan’s puppets and turned them against their former master. 

“Meng Yao--”

“Do you really want to bring up San-ge right now, Da-ge?”

Da-ge flinched and deflated a little. Paused, looking down at the massive saber in his hands. “No,” he said after a moment. “But that doesn’t explain why you want to bring an army of demonic cultivators--”

“They’re not an army,” Nie Huaisang said, waving his fan as if he could dismiss the thought from the collective consciousness like fanning smoke from the air. “They’re too old and weak. Common people caught in the conflict.” 

To his credit, Da-ge doesn’t ask how Nie Huaisang knows that. He says instead, “They are Wens.” 

“They are villagers. Not even in the tenth degree of kinship to Wen Ruohan.” 

“The doctor and her brother are his cousins.” 

“They did not take part--”

“And you think that absolves them?” Da-ge stands, Baxia in his grip but flung out wide as he spreads his arms with frustration. “Did you not just say she treated our father’s murderer for years? Why does she deserve our protection?” 

“She helped the Jiang siblings--” 

Anger begins building up in Da-ge’s body. Nie Huaisang can see it like a physical thing. 

“Then let Yunmeng Jiang take her in!” Baxia flares red. “Let them deal with their supposed saviors and their heretic defector!” He swings her back and forth in a small arc as she splutters with their combined power. 

Nie Huaisang needs to calm him down. He needs to separate him from Baxia, but first, he needs to bring his brother back. 

He leans back on one hand, fan fluttering gracefully. He keeps his own voice light, perfectly non-combative, and says, “Jiang Cheng doesn’t have the resources.” Flippant, “Or the balls.” 

The joke lands. Da-ge doesn’t laugh or even smile, but his shoulders relax. He loosens his hold on Baxia’s hilt. Seems to notice her in his hand for the first time. Before there might have been something like worry in his eyes as he looks at her, or an apology on his lips as he looks back to Nie Huaisang. But they are past that now. It is not good, but it is known and they do not waste breath on performative promises that mean nothing. 

Instead, Da-ge sets Baxia down gently and steps away from her; sits on the other side of Nie Huaisang, resting his elbows on his knees. 

“And his lack of balls is my problem somehow?”

Nie Huaisang snaps his fan closed, the closest thing to an acknowledgement either of them will make. 

“Not your problem, no, but it could be our gain.”

His pulse settles out and slips back down into his chest from where he’d felt it lodged in his throat. 

“Gain?” Da-ge asks, incredulous. “What do we stand to gain?” 

Nie Huaisang simply nods, “Wei Wuxian.”

“The demonic cultivator.” 

Now he wants to groan. Is that all his friend is to anyone anymore? “The former first disciple of Yunmeng Jiang,” he says, insistent. “The champion archer. The talismanic genius. Remember all his potential? He was the fourth ranked young master of my generation.” 

“I’d wager that ranking has changed. And it’s not like we can put him back on the Sword Path, Sang’er.” 

“He can’t return to the Sword Path, anyway.” The words leave his mouth almost flippantly and it’s less than a second before he notices but the regret is instantaneous. 

Of course, Da-ge picks up on it immediately. “What do you mean ‘he can’t?’” 

The thing is, he’s not actually sure of this bit. It’s just-- Well, he notices things. But because this isn’t a fact that he knows, it wasn’t one he was going to bring up in this conversation. 

He likes to have confidence in the things he tells Da-ge. It helps maintain his credibility, or whatever. And also doesn’t give Da-ge false information that may put him in a sticky situation if he bases a decision off of it. 

Because of that, he also knows that if he were to tell his brother to let it go, that the information is not reliable yet, that Da-ge would. He would leave it. He would wait. 

But, the other thing is, Nie Huaisang is almost sure of this bit. He would give it ninety percent odds of being true. Higher if his source in Yunmeng isn’t blowing smoke; which she never has yet. 

It’s enough, he decides. 

“Da-ge, he doesn’t have a core.”

“He-- what?!” Da-ge’s eyes go wide as archery targets. His full body turns to face Nie Huaisang, legs shifting, as he fixes Nie Huaisang with the narrowest of narrow-eyed stares he’s ever seen and asks, “How could you possibly know that?”

“I don’t!” Nie Huaisang says, and this time he means it, “I don’t. But the rumors during the war-- You remember, I told you. Rumors of Jiang Wanyin falling to Wen Zhuliu during the massacre of Lotus Pier. Rumors of Wen Chao dropping Wei Wuxian into the Burial Mounds. If Wen Qing, the accomplished doctor that she is, sheltered them…” he remembers the haunted look in his friend’s eyes after he returned, the way he flinched away from touch, the way he avoided Lan Wangji of all people. “The pieces fit and think about it, Da-ge. Why else would he give up his sword?”

Da-ge doesn’t look convinced, yet. His voice is calm as he says, “Men do all kinds of things for great power.” 

Nie Huaisang can’t help himself; he shouts, “He had great power! You’ve seen him! He was Yunmeng Jiang’s head disciple. He went strike for strike with Wangji-xiong. He and Wangji-xiong, alone and injured, defeated the beast under Muxi Mountain!”

Da-ge only shakes his head, “All of that pales in comparison to what he did at Nightless City, Sang’er.” 

“Which he did for us! And we all let him! We encouraged him. We used him!”

“You’re right.” Still so calm. He reaches out an places a hand on Nie Huaisang’s shoulder, just like he used to when they were young and one of Nie Huaisang’s birds had died. “We should never have allowed him to live,” his eyes are dissonantly kind, “but war is a desperate time.”

“And he’s desperate now!” Nie Huaisang feels strangely like the conversation is slipping from his grasp. It sits heavy and awkward in his chest, his emotion welling up and distracting him from the task at hand. So he calms it. He closes his eyes, forces it into a ball, and shoves it down, burning it off inside his golden core, or imagining that he does. 

When he looks back into his brother’s eyes, he is steady. “He helped us then,” he says, voice strong and clear, “and we can help him now.” 

Da-ge looks back, just as steady. “By bringing a demonic cultivator and a bunch of Wens onto our land, Sang’er? No. Absolutely not.”

“They’re farmers, Da-ge. Farmers.”

“Farmers and whatever Wen Qionglin is.”

That is so not the point! “Aiyo, Da-ge! He could save you!”

“Save me? Huaisang, I’m not dying.”

And back into the same old argument they go. Nie Huaisang is beyond tired of it. He refuses to allow his brother to lie to him about this any more. Every time the subject comes up, Nie Mingjue avoids or distracts or prevaricates. They’ve never talked about how Nie Huaisang figured it out; they’ve never talked about what is actually going on; and Nie Huaisang will not let pride or stubbornness kill his brother. Not when he’s finally figured out how to save him. 

“Yes you are.” He allows no room in his words for uncertainty. 

“I’m--”

“You’re going to qi deviate. Like your mother. Like Father.”

“Wen Ruohan--”

“Took a shortcut. We both know Father would have died soon enough anyway.”

Da-ge looks at him with his jaw set. He doesn’t deny it. He can’t deny it, not honestly, and Nie Huaisang will always know if he’s lying -- mostly because he’s exceedingly bad at it. But it’s not like he looks ready to give up, either. 

“And what exactly do you think Wei Wuxian can do about it?” He asks it like a question, but it’s difficult to tell whether or not he actually cares to hear the answer. 

Nie Huaisang gives him one anyway. “It’s inside him, Da-ge, like it’s inside you.”

“The Saber Path is not the Ghost Path, Sang’er.” 

“Ghosts, beasts, what’s the difference?” 

“Do I need to send you back to Lan Qiren a fourth time?” 

He flaps his fan dismissively. “It’s resentment. It’s harmful. It’s not spiritual energy. It might as well be the same thing. And if he can contain it, if Wen Qing-daifu can help him, maybe they can help us.”

The clench of Da-ge’s jaw tightens. He huffs through his nose. “That’s a lot to risk on a maybe.” 

“What risk?” Nie Huaisang asks honestly. “Your life, the lives of every Saber Path cultivator, could be saved!” 

“By an unstable man with wicked cultivation?” 

“He’s unstable because he’s desperate. They’re barely surviving on that mountain.” Nie Huaisang laughs, “He scraped together a cultivation method that defeated Wen Ruohan and ended the war with a few months and no golden core. Imagine what he could do if we gave him time. Shelter. A library. Food.”

“Sang’er--” Da-ge starts, but there’s a weakness in it. Not quite conciliatory, but close. Close enough to press. 

“I will bring him here,” says Nie Huaisang, forcing all of his conviction into each syllable. “I’d marry him into the sect if he wasn’t so in love with Wangji-xiong.”

Da-ge sighs, “You don’t need to--” 

“You’re right! Because there’s another option!”

Da-ge’s eyes widen as he realizes, “Huaisang, no.” 

Nie Huaisang grins, “He just has to agree to it.”

“Huaisang.”

“It’ll be perfect!”

“Huaisang!”

Nie Huaisang stands tall, raising his fan high, and cries out, “We’ll bow before Heaven and Earth and the entire cultivation world as sworn brothers!”

Da-ge stands to match him, “You will not.” 

He’s tall, so much taller than Nie Huaisang, so Nie Huaisang goes two steps up the stairs, saying, “We will. In Lanling. At his nephew’s Full Moon celebration.” 

Da-ge doesn’t chase him. He looks up, now, to his younger brother. A mixture of defeat and something else -- maybe hope? -- in his steely, grey eyes. 

“You think you can arrange that?” he asks, but it’s not a question. It’s a yielding. An acquiescence. Permission. 

Nie Huaisang smiles down at his older brother and nods. “Jin Guangshan will be so pleased to have Wei-xiong close enough to touch.”

“Close enough to trap.”

“Yes, we’ll have to be careful.” He taps his folded fan against his chin, “But if Qinghe Nie offers him protection, I bet Wei-xiong will be willing to give up that stupid seal that has everyone frothing at the mouth like rabid dogs.” 

Da-ge’s eyebrows climb his forehead. “He’d give up his power? Just like that?”

Nie Huaisang steps back down the stairs, putting him on equal footing with his brother, his sect leader, again. Now that he’s won, now that they’re talking strategy, he sits back down on the stone stairs, pleased when Da-ge does the same. He picks up the whetstone that Da-ge had discarded in his earlier rage and hands it to him. 

“Wei-xiong doesn’t want power for power, Da-ge. He wants it for purpose. He needs it to keep people safe and if we take on that burden for him, he won’t need that power anymore.”

Da-ge hums and nods, turning the stone over in his hands, thumbs gliding over the smooth edges of it. 

“If we take in a few dozen farmers --” he continues, but Da-ge cuts in. 

“And the Wen siblings.”

“Yes,” Nie Huaisang rolls his eyes, “and the Wen siblings, who will be very grateful to not have to scrounge out a living on a mountain of death anymore,” he reminds his stubborn brother, “then Wei Wuxian will give up the Seal. He’ll come here. We will protect him and those he has claimed. And he will fix--” Da-ge cuts a glare at him from the side, and Nie Huaisang amends, “adjust our cultivation so that it stops killing our most powerful practitioners.” 

“It is not bad to have a defined upper limit on power,” says the man who is always pushing up against that limit with his own two shoulders. 

But Nie Huaisang doesn’t need to bring that up. “So you’ve said,” he nods. “It is also not bad for our sect leaders to have an expected lifespan longer than forty years.” Really, it doesn’t seem like he’s asking too much here. 

Da-ge grins. “You just don’t want to be a sect leader.” 

“This is true,” says Nie Huaisang, because it very much is. “And you will need all the time I can give you to find a wife who can stand you--” he dodges Da-ge’s hand as it flashes out to catch his arm, giggling when the fingertips connect with his sleeve anyway “--long enough to make you a tiny little heir!” Da-ge lunges again. 

For a moment, they’re just brothers again. Before titles and wars and death molded them into what they are now, they were just two brothers. Two brothers who loved each other and who protected each other. 

Nie Huaisang supposes they haven’t changed too much, in the grand scheme of things. They love each other. And they will protect each other. 

“This will work?” Da-ge asks, and Nie Huaisang swallows past the fear in his throat. 

“Da-ge, it is the only chance we have.” 

Da-ge hums again, passing the whetstone from hand to hand until handing it to Nie Huaisang. “You will pick up a saber?”

Nie Huaisang hesitates, fingers barely grazing the now-warm stone. “That was not part of this deal.” 

“What if it was?”

He can’t tell, he honestly can’t tell if Da-ge would back out over this or not. It’s an amazing bluff if it is one, but if it’s not -- Nie Huaisang can’t afford to give up now. Besides, he’s only ever had one truly major complaint against the Saber Path. 

“If he fixes it-- Don’t give me that look. If he fixes it,” he takes a deep breath and accepts the whetstone from his brother, “I’ll pick up my saber.” 

“Deal.” Da-ge stands, smiling, and Nie Huaisang just can’t help himself. 

He snaps open his fan and says, “But I’ll put it back down as soon as I start sweating.” 

“Sang’er!” Da-ge starts to stomp after him. 

He runs. “It’s so gross, Da-ge!”