Reading Time: 109 Minutes

Title: Dark Promises Amid Rising Screams
Author: MeyariMcFarland
Fandom: The Untamed
Genre: Angst, Action Adventure, Historical, Horror, Humor, Paranormal/Supernatural, Time Travel
Relationship(s): Su She/Meng Yao (platonic)
Content Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Major Character Death, Violence-Graphic, Violence-Domestic (discussed), time travel fix-it, unreliable narrator, discussion of genocide, PTSD, depression, chronic anxiety, panic attacks, warning: Jin Guangshan, warning: Wen Ruohan, canon typical violence, politics, serious self-esteem issues, self-sacrifice
Author Note: The Major Character Death is on-screen, at the beginning, and undone by the time travel.
Beta: Batspit
Word Count: 88,700
Summary: The problem with being insecure about your decision making was that you ended up second-guessing yourself into some really… horrible… situations. Su She hadn’t ever really thought that he was worth much. His training among the Lan had ensured that. But he didn’t doubt at all that Jin Guangyao was leading him straight to death. Maybe it was time to make a choice and stand on his own two feet, no matter what the consequences were.
Artist: Mizu Sage

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13. In Which Our Protagonist Decides That Memories of Previous Lives Are More Trouble Than They’re Worth

It’d been a long time since he’d been to Qinghe. Not in this life, of course. In the future that wasn’t, Su She had done a lot to stay well away from Qinghe. They’d betrayed Jin Guangyao, at least in Jin Guangyao’s opinion, so Su She wasn’t going to give them the time of day.

In this life? Well, the whole phantom hole through his chest and panic attack issue had kept him from doing more than briefly considering coming here. Thanks to Popo Wei, Wei Qing and Lianmin’s grandmother Entai’s recipes for “calming” teas, Su She was actually able to walk through the streets of Qinghe up towards the Nie Sect’s huge fortress walls.

The Nie had physical defenses that mirrored Yiling’s more magical ones. Huge thick walls, with narrow arrow slits. Places where they could dump boiling oil or boulders on your head. Some nice little slits here and there up along the ramparts where the defenders could drop fist-sized rocks.

One of those rocks would make a solid dent in your skull if it hit. A lethal dent, more than likely.

And he had to go inside and make nice with people.

Ugh.

The Nie juniors guarding the gate narrowly eyed Su She as he strolled up. They were about Su She’s age, but as always with people his physical age, they looked like kids. Especially given that the two on guard hadn’t filled out with all the formidable Nie muscle yet, despite their heavy sabers at their sides.

Sabers that rattled briefly when Su She stopped in front of them. Huh. Better lock his demonic cultivation down a bit tighter, then.

“Sect Leader Su She of the reluctantly formed Yiling Su Sect here to see Sect Leader Nie, much against my better instincts,” Su She drawled.

The one on the left with the broken nose and hair in extra-elaborate braids that probably meant something important mouthed “reluctantly” at the one on the right with a whole series of scars across her cheek, neck and knuckles like she’d gone through a glass shop and smashed every single piece with her bare hands.

“The conference doesn’t start for three days,” the one on the right offered.

“Yeah, I know,” Su She said with a sigh. “Need to talk to Sect Leader Nie beforehand. It’s about Wen Ruohan and his stupidity.”

That opened the gates for Su She, quite literally. A third junior who was half again as wide at the shoulder as Su She and a quarter again taller was summoned to lead Su She through a veritable maze of grey stone hallways and courtyards that would be nearly impossible to attack through.

Really, the Nie understood defenses on a level that Su She firmly approved of. When he didn’t have to fight his way past them. Or remember how to get out of them again.

Of course, the really uncomfortable part was that he was walking into Qinghe to face down Nie Mingjue without a single person on his side. Muye had volunteered to come along. Lianmin had almost ordered him to put up with her stomping along behind him. Du Xilin offered to come as backup with one of his carefully and extensively carved crossbeams as a club to beat anyone who was disrespectful.

He’d turned them all down.

They were safe and they were staying safe. That was the whole point of activating the Burial Mounds’ defenses. While it would be nice to have someone to cover for him when the panic attacks overwhelmed Lianmin’s calming tea, Su She would have just been a thousand times more nervous if they’d been with him.

Better to come alone, have his panic attacks and anxiety attacks, and deal with this mess on his own.

To his surprise, he wasn’t brought to the oppressively impressive sect throne room. He’d expected to be staring up at Nie Mingjue as he loomed off of his throne with Nie Huaisang flittering a fan next to him and making sly quips that made Su She’s heart rate skyrocket.

Instead, the junior disciple brought him to a room off the library with a big heavy table, windows just wide enough to stick a head through that were open to the outside air, and Nie Huaisang whining as Nie Mingjue tried drag him away from that table.

“You need to practice!” Nie Mingjue growled as he tried to disentangle Nie Huaisang’s fingers from the table leg he was clinging to.

“Da-ge!” Nie Huaisang whined. “I’m not done with this text. You want me to go over the proposals, don’t you? I need more time!”

“They’ll be there… when you’re done… practicing!” Nie Mingjue grunted as he forced one hand free, then the next and then had to fight with the first one latched onto the table leg again.

Su She turned to stare up at the junior. “I seriously don’t think that I’m supposed to see this. There’s something very wrong about watching the Jianghu’s greatest general loosing against his little brother. His half the size little brother.”

The junior turned away and snickered into his fist.

“What… is… it?” Nie Mingjue demanded even though he was still wrestling with Nie Huaisang.

“Sect Leader Su She of the reluctantly formed Yiling Su Sect here to see Sect Leader Nie, much against my better instincts,” Su She repeated. “Try tickling. Might work better than pure wrestling.”

“He bites,” Nie Mingjue countered.

“Bite back.”

That set the junior into actual out-loud belly laughs, especially because Nie Huaisang howled in protest. Just before biting Nie Mingjue’s wrist. A moment later, the two of them were tangled on the floor, biting and punching each other with little rabbit punches that probably hurt like hell. Nie Mingjue might be somewhat careful about it, but Nie Huaisang was punching with his knuckles held to gouge just as deeply as possible.

Su She stepped back and leaned against the wall, breathing through the stupid panic attack that went with any Nie doing any sort of punching. Even the ridiculous and funny sort. The junior frowned at him, then his eyebrows went up in surprise.

“I’m taking Sect Leader Su to one of the conference rooms for tea,” the junior announced.

All sounds of fighting instantly ceased.

“It’s just a stupid panic attack,” Su She complained. “I get them all the damned time. I’m fine.”

Nie Huaisang poked his head out of the door to peer at Su She. His hair was a rumpled mess. His robes hung all askew, exposing the muscles defining his shoulders and neck in ways that the Nie Huaisang that Su She knew in the future that wasn’t would never have allowed.

And, of course, he looked so damned young.

“Oh. Wow. Yeah, that’s a bad one,” Nie Huaisang said, straightening himself out while studying Su She.

“No, it’s not a bad one,” Su She countered. “I’m talking. I’m standing up. I’m breathing more or less normally. I’m actually coherent. My heart rate is through the roof and my hands and knees are shaking, yeah, but that’s barely even a panic attack at all. You know, for me.”

Didn’t do a damned thing to reassure any of them. Su She grumbled as Nie Mingjue peered at him, looking just as rumpled as his little brother and shockingly young compared to the fierce corpse Su She remembered from the future that wasn’t.

It was actually kind of reassuring that he was so baby-faced. He looked like a kid in over his head instead of a great general and horrible monster from Su She’s nightmares.

“You used to be Lan, right?” Nie Mingjue asked as he tugged at Nie Huaisang’s arm as if he was still going to wrestle him out to the practice yard.

“Eh, yeah, didn’t fit in well,” Su She agreed with a shrug. “If anything, being a Lan made my panic and anxiety attacks a thousand times worse. I mean it when I say this isn’t that bad. Anyway, I kind of wanted to talk to you about Wen Ruohan. Or, really, the Yin Iron since it’s eating his soul and puppeting his body.”

All three of the Nies froze.

Took about three seconds for the junior to turn on his heel and march off with a casual wave. A second after that, Nie Huaisang latched onto Su She’s wrist. Nie Mingjue gently grasped Su She’s shoulder but the way he pushed Su She into the library was anything but deferential.

About the time he stopped hyperventilating over having had Nie Mingjue actually fucking touching him, the junior arrived back with tea, snacks and a very concerned Nie doctor who checked him out, looked over the tea that Lianmin had made up for him, and then fed him another cup of the stuff with an approving nod.

“I’d rather like the recipe to that,” the doctor, Nie Qiuheng, said.

“Well, you know, I’d let you communicate with Lianmin about her Grandmother Entai’s recipe for it, but there’s this whole thing where the Jianghu has decided that I’m an evil demonic cultivator resurrecting corpses and aiming to take over the world. In my copious spare time between trying to decipher ancient pictograms out of Siberia and raising vegetables. You know, as one does when you’re a terrifying evil demonic cultivator.”

Nie Huaisang snickered into his rather amateurishly painted fan while Nie Mingjue grinned at him.

“Well, you do have a bit more resentful energy than I prefer in patients,” Nie Qiuheng said with a roughish grin that made him look middle-aged instead of that faintly fragile at the edges thing that really old cultivators got when they were starting to get ruinously old.

“Yiling.” Su She shrugged.

“Yiling,” Nie Qiuheng agreed. “Try not to scare him, you two. He can’t have much more of that tea for the rest of the day.”

“Shouldn’t need it if they don’t start punching and biting again,” Su She grumbled into his cup. “Not my fault or theirs that a Nie punched a hole through my chest in my previous life.”

Su She promptly groaned into his tea. Lianmin had warned him. She’d been really damned explicit that drinking too much of it would loosen his tongue worse than getting completely drunk off his ass. He just hadn’t expected to have so much trouble dealing with Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang.

When he finally sighed and allowed himself to look at the others, all three of them were staring at him shades of horror. Nie Qiuheng was just straight-up appalled. He kept making little grabby hands gestures like he wanted to drag Su She off to the infirmary that instant, possibly for needle stabbing but also possibly for copious amounts of hot soup and comfy blankets.

Nie Huaisang’s mouth kept opening and shutting like a fish out of water. It was so damned weird seeing him that young and innocent. The sheen of tears in his eyes even looked real for once.

It was Nie Mingjue that made him frown because Nie Mingjue already looked like he felt personally guilty about it.

“You,” Su She said, wagging a finger at him, “you stop that. Right now. You are not and will not ever be responsible for what happened in another life. Especially one that you don’t even remember. What the fuck, man? Wipe that guilt off your face right now.”

“I’m the same age as you,” Nie Mingjue promptly protested.

“No, actually, you’re a couple of years older than me,” Su She countered. “So act like it, will you? My bad memories from my zhiji and I getting our fool asses killed by being complete dumb-asses is not and never will be your fault.”

That, at least, set Nie Huaisang into startled giggles that he hid behind his amateur-painted fan.

“Your zhiji,” Nie Mingjue said slowly, frowning.

“Yep,” Su She agreed. He saluted with his cup of medicinal tea. “Met him too late in that life. He was already ruined by a terrible sect leader who gave him responsibility but not enough authority, to the point that when one of the generals kept stealing his ideas and calling him a whore, everyone just looked on and nodded. Including the sect leader. General got stabbed in the middle of a battle, while he was giving stupid orders that’d get everyone killed, and my zhiji got thrown out.”

“What?” Nie Mingjue protested. “That’s ridiculous!”

“Eh, it happens,” Su She said with a shrug. “Happened all the time for him in that life. His mother was a high-priced courtesan, and his father was a sect leader who was a lot like Jin Guangshan. No one ever let him forget his mother. No one ever allowed him to receive the respect that should have been accorded to him on account of his father. I mean, he still was the one to kill the opposing king, but he did it by being a spy in the enemy’s midst, learning torture and then stabbing the bastard in the back.”

Nie Mingjue shuddered, rubbing the back of his neck. “So no one respected that, either.”

“Nope,” Su She agreed. “Even his father, once he finally was willing to accept him into the sect, treated him like a servant crossed with a pimp. And I didn’t meet him until he was… soul-scarred, I guess is the best word for it. It’d all burned out his ability to feel compassion, empathy, sympathy. No one had any for him? Why should he care about anyone else? Couldn’t blame him, really. I’d had a terrible life, too, in somewhat different ways that meant I was a vicious, jealous, vindictive asshole. We were a mess and we made stupid choices that got a bunch of people killed, but I didn’t care because he was my zhiji. He saw me. That’s all I needed.”

He stared down into the cup of tea, shaking his head as he pushed it away.

“This stuff is too damned strong, honestly,” Su She said. “Spilling my guts like a little idiot, here. Anyway, we died painfully, and I remember it. Nie punching is panic attack inducing, that’s all. Got nothing to do with you personally.”

And the sad thing was that it really did have nothing to do with this Nie Mingjue. The young man sitting there frowning at Su She was absolutely nothing fucking like the fierce corpse that’d killed Su She in the future that wasn’t. They weren’t the same person.

Hell, their faces weren’t even that much alike. Different skin tones, different eye colors, hair was all different since the fierce corpse version had a rat’s nest of dry, matted hair and this Nie Mingjue was nearly as well-groomed as his little brother. Those braids didn’t come quick or easy. Someone spent a fuck-ton of time making sure that each and every braid was exactly right.

“All right,” Nie Mingjue grudgingly admitted after getting a pointed eyebrow raise. “Fine. It’s not my fault, but that doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t take steps.”

“…Steps,” Su She said, staring at Nie Mingjue until his cheeks went blazingly red. “Okay. You got someone in mind that might possibly maybe be in a similar situation or something?”

Nie Mingjue went even redder.

So red that both Nie Huaisang and Nie Qiuheng frowned at him, too.

“Good, do something about it, then,” Su She said. “Nothing to do with me. Probably. Could fucking be my zhiji for all I know. I haven’t met him yet. Still has nothing to do with why I’m here.”

“Why are you here?” Nie Huaisang asked, patting his brother’s arm firmly enough in an obvious “shut up now” gesture that Nie Mingjue’s hand thunked down to the table.

“Well, you see, I’ve been informed by Lan Qiren, my teacher, that the Jianghu is all up in arms about my whole terrifying evil demonic cultivator thing,” Su She said. He shrugged. “Which all started up because I flat-out refused to join the Wen Sect. I did the sect thing. I was a Lan. It was horrible and I hated it and I don’t want to do that again.”

“And yet you’re a sect leader now,” Nie Huaisang observed far too brightly, batting his eyelashes and all.

“You, hush,” Su She said with a stern wag of his finger that made Nie Mingjue turn aside to cough laughs into his fist. “I’m getting there.”

“Well, I never!” Nie Huaisang gasped and fluttered his fan.

“I don’t believe that at all,” Su She drawled, which set both Nie Mingjue and Nie Qiuheng to belly laughs that they didn’t even bother trying to smother. “You do everything you can get away with as often as possible, with great glee. Don’t even try to pretend to me.”

Took a bit for them to shut the fuck up again. By the point that they had gotten control over themselves, Nie Huaisang had two spots of color high on his cheeks and a too-bright look in his eyes that was far too reminiscent of the Guanyin Temple right at the end.

“As I was saying before someone tried to get clever at me,” Su She continued over the remaining giggle-snorts coming from Nie Mingjue, “Sect Leader Jiang and Sect Leader Wen decided to get in a grand pissing match over my Heavenly Pillar.”

All three of them howled with laughter. Su She grinned. Oh yeah. Best name ever.

“I can’t believe you named it that,” Nie Huaisang wheezed as he wiped his laugh-tears away.

“I’ve been waiting to say that for ages,” Su She replied with his best shit-eating grin. “Still true in a not-funny way. The Jiang cleared out once I was finally driven to declaring a Yiling sect just to get some peace. Wen Ruohan, or the Yin Iron that’s puppeting his body anyway, didn’t take no for an answer. It’s quite determined to get me under control, which, you know, I can totally understand. That array would do some pretty terrible things to the Yin Iron. Can’t leave me wandering around creating things that would threaten its agenda to consume the Wen and then the rest of the Jianghu. Probably aims to go on and eat the whole world.”

All the laughter drained away as Su She spoke.

He wasn’t completely certain that he had it right. Not completely. Jin Guangyao had been fairly sure that the Yin Iron was sentient. Not so much so that he’d swear to it, but close enough for Su She. Given how the piece up in the Cloud Recesses had responded to him, Su She had no doubt.

His confidence wasn’t enough to keep Nie Mingjue from frowning dubiously at him.

Thank fuck, Nie Mingjue didn’t clench his fists, though the way he flexed his hands against the table top was close enough that Su She pulled the cold little cup of medicinal tea back over. A quick burst of qi had it warm again, if so bitter that it’d choke a goat.

“How capable is he of lying right now?” Nie Mingjue asked Nie Qiuheng.

Nie Qiuheng shrugged. “He’s strong, smart and stubborn. He could lie. I don’t believe he is. I’ve… wondered… much the same thing for several years now. I knew Wen Ruohan back before he became Sect Leader, you know. He changed dramatically about a decade ago. I never could figure out why.”

Su She waved his empty cup at Nie Qiuheng. “That. Teacher Qiren commented on the same thing, multiple times. Usually with the Disapproving Sniff of Doom.”

“Oh, I hate that sniff.” Nie Huaisang shuddered.

“No one likes it,” Su She agreed. “Either way, given all the panic attacks I get over Nie aggression in general, and the fact that Wen Ruohan is definitely going to start shit while he’s here, I thought I should warn you ahead of time.”

“That’s… appreciated,” Nie Mingjue said while staring at Su She. “You know you could’ve just stayed away.”

“Nah,” Su She said with a heart-felt sigh. “Someone would stir everyone up and get them all up in arms. That’s already happening. The rumors are pretty obnoxious already, which is very weird considering just how small the whole thing was.”

Nie Huaisang sat up straight from his casual, fan-waving slouch. He jumped to his feet and ran out of the room. A moment later he ran right back in with a stack of scrolls and loose paperwork that he thumped down on the table.

Su She saved his teacup. Nie Qiuheng saved the teapot. Nie Mingjue just sighed at Nie Huaisang as if he was being a pest, somehow.

“No, no, I’m curious what set that off,” Su She said as Nie Mingjue opened his mouth to start scolding Nie Huaisang again. “Gotta be something.”

“There is something,” Nie Huaisang said far more grimly than Su She was used to seeing even in the future that wasn’t. “Our spies have been tracking some odd rumors and comments among the traders out of Yiling, Qishan and Gusu.”

Took a bit for Nie Huaisang to sort out everything and compile it. In the future that wasn’t, Nie Huaisang had spent a fuck-ton of time and effort to pretend to be a fluffy-headed idiot. Watching him put together an analysis of the plots coming out of the Jin Sect from a series of reports, comments and a stack of recorded gossip was enlightening.

He must have enlisted his entire sect in the deception. No other way he could’ve hidden his intelligence that thoroughly, because damn.

Damn.

Nie Huaisang was a thousand times scarier than Nie Mingjue and it was all down to what was between his ears.

“All right, it looks to me as though the Jin have some trouble-makers who decided to take advantage of the unrest around you,” Nie Huaisang finally concluded after making Su She queasy, Nie Qiuheng grim and Nie Mingjue so proud that he looked like he was about to explode with sheer delight in his little brother.

“Trouble-makers,” Su She murmured while idly swirling his fingertip along the rim of his empty teacup.

Nie Huaisang’s head slowly came up. He stared at Su She with bright, intent eyes.

“I can’t say that I see that,” Su She observed in an attempt at a casual tone. It came out a good bit too tense and grim. “I mean, no one goes up against Jin Guangshan. You do, it’s a good way to get killed, publicly humiliated or thrown out. Or all three. He’s… greedy.”

“Interacted with him that much?” Nie Mingjue asked with an arch of his eyebrow even though the corners of his mouth turned right down.

“Not really,” Su She said. “But he. Well. He reminds me of my zhiji’s father, the utter piece of shit. Rapist is about the kindest thing to be said about that asshole. And Jin Guangshan is cut of the same cloth. Even in a similar position of power where no one dares to question him and a whole lot of people get very rich providing him whatever perversions he might want. I mean, I could be projecting my past life onto this life, but I don’t think so.”

Nie Mingjue rocked backwards, eyes wide as he stared at Su She. There was a sort of horrified knowledge in his eyes that Su She couldn’t help but feel kind of proud of. If Nie Mingjue wasn’t considering whether or not Meng Yao was Su She’s long-lost zhiji, well, Nie Huaisang looked so sickly convinced that he certainly was.

More importantly, Nie Mingjue nodded slowly. “You’re not wrong about that. You’re really not wrong. Father always claimed that Jin Guangshan was only as good as he had to be. And only in public. The rumors are… not good.”

Su She nodded. “Yeah, I know. I mean, we never talked about them in Gusu, but Teacher Qiren always warned us to be extremely careful with the Jin and about agreeing to anything if we visited the Jin Sect. Heard a lot more since I settled into Yiling. There’s no rule about gossip there.”

Thankfully, none of them asked him any questions about the gossip he’d heard. He’d just about hit his limit for creatively lying about the future that wasn’t and all the things he knew or had known, anyway.

Instead Nie Huaisang started picking apart his data, putting it back together into different arrangements that kept leading to the same conclusion: Someone in the Jin Sect was working very, very hard to take advantage of the chaos without being noticed.

After a bit, Lianmin’s tea started catching up with him. Su She tried to stay alert. He really did. Alone in the middle of the Nie’s fucking fortress, he needed to be on his toes.

Not possible after two cups of that fucking tea.

“Come on,” Nie Qiuheng said after the third time he caught Su She’s shoulder to keep him from smashing his face into the table as he fell asleep right there. “Let these two work through everything. You need sleep.”

“Not wrong about that,” Su She mumbled.

The whole world spun like he was drunk off his ass when Nie Qiuheng hauled Su She up to his feet. He wheezed and clung to Nie Qiuheng’s massive shoulder, panting until the dizziness passed. Su She huffed and accepted an arm around his waist. No way was he going anywhere without some serious support.

“What was your zhiji like?” Nie Mingjue asked just before Su She left the room.

“What?” Su She blinked at him.

“Your zhiji, what was he like?” Nie Mingjue asked so nervously that Su She had to wonder for the millionth or so time in the future that wasn’t and the first time in this life whether or not Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen might’ve been zhiji, too. “How’d you know?”

“He was… small and slight and beautiful as fuck,” Su She said because he wasn’t above hammering that nail home. “Most brilliant person I’ve ever met. Filing was his happy place. If he could be sorting papers and filing scrolls and stuff, he’d come out humming and happy. He was cold, vicious, prone to killing anything and anyone that got in his way. He was… he was the first person who really saw me. Who saw me and saw my gifts for creating new things out of scraps of knowledge. First person who saw the anxiety and the panic attacks and didn’t look down on me. First one who ever really, truly accepted the good and the bad and the outright mediocre. He saw me. I saw him.”

Su She shrugged. What else was there to say? Jin Guangyao had been his zhiji. Meng Yao might still be his zhiji, though Su She was more than halfway terrified to see the man who could become Jin Guangyao.

What if he didn’t see Su She this time? What if it was only Jin Guangyao who could be Su She’s other half?

What if, what if, what if.

No fucking point in fussing over it. He was here. He would almost inevitably see Meng Yao while he was here.

Especially because his description of Jin Guangyao had all three of the Nies looking sick to their stomachs, like they’d just seen a ghost of their best beloved person and found out that they were the one who killed him.

Good.

If he couldn’t stop the Sunshot Campaign, if he couldn’t deal with the Yin Iron eating Wen Ruohan alive, at least he might make a difference in Meng Yao’s life. Worth the panic attack right there.

If it worked.

Nie Qiuheng helped Su She to a guest room. There were guards on the door that Su She just casually waved at. Why fuss over it? If he really wanted out of here, it would be a struggle but getting out of a place was usually easier than getting into it.

Besides, there was a bed and Su She dearly wanted to faceplant on the thing and sleep for like a month. Stupid tea.

“Get some sleep,” Nie Qiuheng ordered as he plopped Su She down on the bed.

“Oh, trust me, that’s not going to be a problem,” Su She promised. “I’m three quarters asleep already. Stupid tea. Stupid Lianmin. She’s so scary. It’s awesome. I’m so glad she’s my first disciple. Makes me look good every singled damned day, always with this expression like she’s surprised I can breathe and walk at the same time.”

Nie Qiuheng snickered. “Sounds like a good, strong woman. You should marry her.”

“No, thank you!” Su She protested immediately. “I am not going there. I mean, I’ve no use for women in the first place, but yeah, no. Not doing that. Lianmin just tossed her good-for-nothing husband out on his ear. ‘Sides, she’s old enough to be my mother.”

Nie Qiuheng hadn’t closed the door when he hauled Su She in, so the guards outside were quietly laughing at Su She’s horror. More the fools, them. No one who met Lianmin would’ve doubted he was right, not a single one of them.

Either way, Nie Qiuheng helped pull Su She’s boots off. He hefted Su She’s legs up onto the bed and then pushed him over so that he toppled back onto the pillow. Su She just groaned. Stupid tea.

A blanket and a whispered word to the guards later, the door shut, and Su She was alone in his actually rather nice guest room.

He ought to get up, poke around, see what kind of place he’d been stashed in.

He didn’t move.

Instead, he rolled on his side and pulled the blankets up over his ear, hiding inside of a sloppy nest of blanket and pillow and his sleeves.

Meng Yao was here.

It wasn’t Jin Guangyao. He couldn’t be Jin Guangyao yet. Su She had never met Meng Yao. He’d heard about him, both from other people and from Jin Guangyao himself. Mostly with derision, covert and overt disapproval, and the occasional blatant reference to Meng Shi’s profession.

But he had never once met Meng Yao as he was right now in this life.

Probably a good thing that he hadn’t seen Meng Yao yet. If he’d seen Meng Yao now, as messed up as he was by the anxiety and the panic attack and the stupid tea, he would’ve fallen the fuck apart. It just…

Su She never expected that he’d get his zhiji back. How could he? Jin Guangyao was a product of everything that’d gone through in the Nie, in the Sunshot Campaign, in the Jin. Whoever Meng Yao was, he wasn’t the man that Su She had dedicated himself to.

…He was still going to do his best to save Meng Yao from the future that wasn’t, of course, but he couldn’t let himself hope for anything more than that.

He couldn’t.

It would hurt too much when Meng Yao wasn’t anything like Jin Guangyao, so yeah, not getting his zhiji back. Ever.

Su She hid under the covers entirely, face buried in his sleeve so that no one could see his expression. Or his tears.

Stupid tea messing with him and making him feel everything so much more than he should.

14. In Which Our Protagonist Shows His Work And Wishes That Others Would Stop Interrupting The Important Discussions With Politics

Three days of relative quiet in Qingge did Su She some good. Not a ton of good. Seemed like every time he turned a corner Nie Mingjue was wrestling with Nie Huaisang over some stupid thing. Seriously, the two of them wrestled more than they breathed. Possibly more times a day than their hearts beat.

It was ridiculous.

Also cute once he got over the automatic panic attacks. Nie Huaisang came up with the stupidest excuses possible for not doing whatever it was that Nie Mingjue wanted him to do. Nie Mingjue scoffed and then they were wrestling over it.

No wonder Nie Huaisang had been hard as hell to maneuver at the Guanyin Temple in the future that wasn’t.

Yeah, no.

No thinking about that.

Especially not with all the other sects arriving for the stupid conference. The Yao were the first to arrive so of course Su She had retreated right the fuck back into the library where he closed and leaned against the door, much to the librarian’s confusion.

“Sect Leader Yao,” Su She sneered as he listened at the door for the whine to pass them by.

“Oh, ew,” groaned Chen Da, the librarian who was a six-foot tall, three-foot-wide woman with thigh muscles bigger than Su She’s entire body.

She was really and for true built like a brick wall, solid muscle covered by the thinnest layer of fat to give her some curves. He’d stared at her the first day after his arrival, eyes wide, and she’d scowled at him. Of course, he’d promptly grinned because there was nothing better than a woman who could and would take you down if you were being an idiot.

He’d said that. She’d stared at him wide-eyed. Then scowled and asked if he was flirting. He’d rolled his eyes at the sheer thought of being with a woman and asked if she’d ever seen the pictograms before.

After that everything was fine.

Hadn’t seen them but she’d had a great time analyzing them and finding parallels to three different scripts that she’d seen in various books and libraries. Su She had new leads to follow on how the damned language ended up in Xue Chonghai’s hands, which was lovely.

“What is he doing?” Chen Da hissed when Su She kept his ear against the door.

“Pontificating,” Su She murmured back at her. “About… I think he’s going on about sewage treatment? Not sure.”

“I repeat, ew.”

Chen Da stood, stomped over to push Su She to the side where he’d be hidden by the door, and then flung the door open to glower hot death at Sect Leader Yao who yipped and hid behind his escort.

“This is a library,” Chen Da boomed at him. “Take your blather somewhere else, Sect Leader Yao!”

“O-of course!” Sect Leader Yao yelped as he scurried away, escort firmly not snickering at his back.

“You are the best human being to have ever lived,” Su She announced once Chen Da closed the door again.

She just grinned at him and nodded.

There were more sects arriving outside. The sounds of their entourages’ babbling echoed in the stone walls of the Unclean Realm. Sight unseen, Su She was sure that the Jiang had arrived, mostly because he heard Wei Wuxian’s donkey laugh followed by Jiang Wanyin’s cursing at the top of his lungs. There was a frosty sort of feeling to the laugh and the cursing, so Su She kind of thought that the Jin might’ve arrived at the same time.

Either way, he was more than happy to be hiding away in the library with another scholar instead of dealing with all the inevitable politics.

“You staying put until all the sects are here?” Chen Da asked with a smug little smile that she absolutely earned by sending Sect Leader Yao running.

“Absolutely,” Su She said. “I don’t want to officially show up until the banquet starts. The less time they have to yammer at me, the better. And, honestly, I do want to surprise Wen Ruohan. He sees me, he’s going to know something is up.”

“True,” Chen Da said with a nod. “Make yourself useful. File things.”

“On it,” Su She replied easily.

Like there was any question which was better. Between dealing with stupid politics or dealing with mindless filing of interesting books, he’d take the books any day. Which meant that he had a pretty damned good day, even though Nie Huaisang came in to stare at Su She with utter betrayal sixteen separate times.

Didn’t do him any good. Su She had no shame about avoiding all that bullshit. Chen Da had no compunctions about sending Nie Huaisang back to what he was supposed to be doing. And given how huge she was, Nie Huaisang actually did it.

Grumbling, but he did it.

By the time the banquet opening the discussion conference started up, Su She’s anxiety was at a surprising low. His notes were a disaster area of excited smudges and scribbled characters that even he had a hard time making out but hey, Chen Da had some very interesting sources that he’d gotten to pore over during the afternoon.

Su She slouched his way into the banquet hall, carrying a stack of his notes that he shuffled between as he made his way to the Lan tables. He was a little bit nervous about just walking in, but no one noticed.

Like, no one. Nie Mingjue was having a stiffly formal discussion with Wen Ruohan who, yeah, was not really Wen Ruohan at all. Kind of surprising that the Nie hadn’t realized it on their own. Or that their sabers hadn’t.

Wen Ruohan echoed with resentful energy and the screams of agony from a soul being tortured. Or maybe many souls. Hard to tell from the other side of the banquet with so many other people there. The other people muffled any clear impressions from Wen Ruohan and the Yin Iron puppeting him.

Either way, Su She plopped down on the floor next to Lan Qiren who didn’t exactly smile. The corners of his eyes wrinkled as Su She shoved the properly ordered stack of notes at him. Lan Qiren nodded for Lan Xichen to serve Su She some tea.

“…You should be practicing your penmanship,” Lan Qiren said as he scanned the notes.

“Haven’t had time to rewrite them yet,” Su She said with a nod of thanks and a little grimace at how much ink there was on his fingers. “Spent the whole day in the library working with Chen Da, their scholar? She’s amazing. Has some spectacular sources for where the pictograms came from. Which she wouldn’t, of course, allow me to take out of the library. I wrote fast because who knows when I’m going to get back here again.”

“You do know the copying array,” Lan Qiren said as he nodded that he completely agreed. He hummed over the second page of notes, one eyebrow going up. “Really? Mongols?”

“Possibly,” Su She said. He sipped his tea and then nodded towards the later sheets. “Not sure. I know the pictograms originate from Siberia. The locals in Yiling have legends about their coming from there and settling in Yiling, oh, generations and generations ago.”

He carefully did not notice that the Jiang juniors had all noticed that he was there. They made it really damned difficult not to notice what with all the staring, whispering and elbowing each other they were doing. Wouldn’t be long before the rest of the Jiang caught on.

Lan Qiren turned to stare at Su She with the sort of disapproval that would’ve made him cringe and go into a full-blown panic attack before he left the Lan. “And you didn’t see fit to put that into your letters?”

“They didn’t tell me until about five days before we locked things down in Yiling,” Su She countered with the same exact tone. “I swear, I just about screamed. And then, of course, I sat down and recorded every single legend, story and rumor they had. Not just about their origins or Xue Chonghai. All of them. Not getting caught out like that again.”

Lan Qiren nodded firmly in approval even though Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji exchanged looks of complete disbelief. The Yao had figured out that he was there. Sect Leader Yao was spluttering and tugging at his friend Sect Leader Ouyang’s sleeve like a toddler trying to get its mother’s attention.

Over at the Jiang, Wei Wuxian had one hand over his mouth as he laughed in silent gasping wheezes until there were tears in his eyes. He’d flopped over to lean against Jiang Wanyin’s shaking shoulder, because yeah, Jiang Wanyin was snort-laughing into his fist even though Yu Ziyuan was glowering at the two of them. Jiang Yanli looked like she kind of wanted to smack both of them, between her pointed stares right at Su She.

Jiang Fengmian just stared at Su She with a blank little smile that felt just about as threatening as one of Lianmin’s scowls.

Right. Don’t piss him off too much. After this was all over.

Chen Da marched over because she’d never in her entire life slouched, sauntered or even strolled anywhere. She scowled at Su She for sitting on the floor like an idiot, even though he was very deliberately placing himself at his teacher’s feet and also deliberately placing himself underneath literally everyone else there.

That it was a very good way to take the floorboards out if he needed a quick escape wasn’t something he’d say out loud.

“There are chairs,” Chen Da said in her most impressive disapproving huff.

“Eh, too much work,” Su She said. “Either way, Teacher Qiren, this is Chen Da of the amazing resources that I didn’t have a spare scroll to copy. Chen Da, this is my teacher, Lan Qiren, acting Sect Leader of the Lan and all-around brilliant scholar of just about everything.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere,” Chen Da said as she reached one massive arm out to snatch a chair from the neighboring Ouyang group of tables.

That finally got Sect Leader Ouyang to realize that he was already there. It also led to both Sect Leader Yao and Sect Leader Ouyang tugging at each other’s sleeves like excited toddlers. Seriously, he’d never figured out how to keep a straight face around those two. They were such idiots when they were around each other.

Perfectly competent alone. Perfect morons together.

“Eh,” Su She said, waving one hand at her before tapping the sixth sheet. “That. That right there. That bit. I don’t quite get it.”

“Mmm,” Lan Qiren hummed as he studied it and then nodded slowly. “I do see your confusion. The pictograms appear very similar but the derivations and histories of the two scripts couldn’t be more different.”

“Loan words exist,” Chen Da said, rolling her eyes at them. “I don’t know why everyone has such a hard time with that.”

“But it doesn’t look like a loan word to me,” Su She complained even as he tracked the blooming wave of awareness spreading across the banquet hall. “The stroke order is completely different. You can see it in the brush strokes.”

Chen Da scowled at him while Lan Xichen leaned closer to Lan Qiren so that he could read over his shoulder. A moment later, Lan Xichen had scooted his chair so that he could read more easily, and Lan Wangji had snagged a couple of pages that had been set aside. His eyebrows went up as he nodded slowly, frowned in confusion with one of those tiny eyebrows-twitching-together frowns of his, and then tilted his head to the side as he considered the information on the pages.

Across the room, Wen Ruohan stiffened.

Ah, that’s what Su She had been waiting for.

All the Wen present stiffened as Wen Ruohan’s cheeks went ruddy with fury. Only they didn’t go red properly.

Su She wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t been paying such close attention. Most people who went all red in the face had the color hit their cheeks and then spread out from there.

You know, unless you were Lan Wangji of the blushing fucking ears. Weirdo.

Wen Ruohan’s forehead went so red that it looked like he was about to start bleeding. Then the color drained down his nose, around his lips and then across his cheeks, leaving patches on either side of his eyes so white that the looked completely bloodless. Add that to the very odd way that his shoulders moved, jerking like a puppet on strings, and it was painfully clear that something was very, very wrong with him.

Su She kept his eyes on Lan Qiren who’d gone paler by the moment, so obviously he saw Wen Ruohan’s response, too. Chen Da had very deliberately placed herself so that her chair was between them and Wen Ruohan, not that she could block Wen Ruohan’s line of sight entirely. The stunning part was that she’d put her back to Wen Ruohan. He would’ve crawled right out of his skin if he’d done it.

“You dare, Su Minshan!” Wen Ruohan bellowed.

“Will you please be quiet?” Su She snapped back at him. “We’re having an academic discussion here. And would you not use “Minshan”? I gave that up when I left the Lan. I’m just Su She.”

The entire room froze. Even Lan Qiren stared at Su She as if he’d lost his ever-loving mind.

“You did not have to give up your courtesy name,” Lan Qiren said into the tense, echoing silence.

Su She raised an eyebrow at him. “I never felt like it fit me in the first place. Besides, I like being Su She.”

“You are…” Lan Qiren sighed through his teeth, shaking his head sharply. “I regret that we never did find a way for you to be comfortable among the Lan, Su She. You were a credit to the Lan, even with all of your difficulties.”

“Eh,” Su She said, well aware that he was blushing violently for the praise, however grudgingly phrased.

The whole little interaction had a lovely way of making people exchange confused looks, especially with Lan Xichen nodding his agreement and Lan Wangji actually managing to have a mildly regretful expression instead of his normal stone-face.

Wen Ruohan hissed at them. Like a literal snake. Not like a man hissing but more like a snake or maybe steam hissing out of a crack in the stone at a hot spring.

“What?” Su She snapped at him. “How many times do I have to tell you that I’m not joining the Wen? I said no politely. I said no rudely. I said no in writing, in person to your representative, then to a freaking army. I said no to your idiot children in the most forceful and lethal way possible. For fuck’s sake, I formed my own damned sect just to put an end to this nonsense and that was like the very last thing I wanted to do!”

“But you’re a demonic cultivator,” Sect Leader Yao said hesitantly as Wen Ruohan snarled at him.

“No, I’m not,” Su She said, rolling his eyes. “I’m a cultivator from Yiling. I mean, now I am. Before I was Lan. Now I’m not. Whatever. Yiling is in the shadow of the Burial Mounds. Everyone there has the marks of resentful energy all over them. You can’t help it.”

“That’s true,” Wei Wuxian said with a little nod.

“Shut up,” Jiang Wanyin mock-whispered while elbowing Wei Wuxian in the stomach.

“You will not defy me!” Wen Ruohan roared so abruptly that it made Su She startle, and Sect Leader Yao almost fell out of his chair in shock.

The resentful energy wasn’t boiling up off him. It was firmly contained inside of his body, but Su She could see shadows it around the edges of his eyes. His fingernails were going black, as were the roots of this teeth exposed by his snarl.

Nie Mingjue stepped out of the line of attack as Su She sighed and rolled to his feet.

That one little movement was probably going to give the whole thing away, except for the way that Nie Huaisang darted forward to press against Nie Mingjue’s back as if he was terrified and it was that which made Nie Mingjue back off.

Thankfully, no one other than Yu Ziyuan seemed to catch that. All she did was narrow her eyes for a moment as she smoothly stood, prompting most of the other sect leaders to stand, too. Not her husband, of course. No, that asshole sat there, head tilted to the side as he studied Su She.

“No,” Su She said, wagging a finger at a suddenly very amused Jiang Fengmian. “Absolutely not. You are not offering to take me and my sect members into the Jiang. Stop it. Don’t. I won’t hear it. Just shut up.”

Jiang Fengmian’s lips twitched against a smile. “All right. Though the offer remains open.”

“You asshole, I said no just as many times to you!” Su She huffed.

Su She brushed himself off, grateful that the way the Nie had set up the banquet hall meant that there was no one between him and Wen Ruohan. They’d planned it, talked about it and Nie Huaisang had taken charge of making sure everyone would be placed correctly, but seeing it work out so well in real life was a huge relief.

He really didn’t want to have to wade through everyone else to get at Wen Ruohan.

Not that he wanted to go at Wen Ruohan right this moment. Nie Mingjue had asked, politely and with his hands loose instead of in those terrifying fists, that Su She not go at destroying the Yin Iron right there in the middle of his sect.

Which was fair.

More than fair, really. With all the claim and feuds and justified hatred between him and Wen Ruohan, Nie Mingjue could’ve laid claim and forbidden Su She from touching Wen Ruohan until after Nie Mingjue had his shot.

Wen Ruohan’s chin came up the instant Su She met his eyes. A little too far up with his eyes not focusing properly on Su She. The resentful energy coiled inside of Wen Ruohan was stronger as they studied each other. More than likely, the Yin Iron could tell that Su She was strong, prepared, and ready to take it down if he needed to.

All the mostly-charged arrays he had tucked away in various qiankun pouches had to be like beacons of destruction to the Yin Iron.

“I’m not defying you,” Su She announced, words dropping into the watchful silence like boulders dropped into a still pool full of fish that darted away. “It’s not defiance to say, outright, that I will never, ever join another sect. The panic attacks and anxiety are not worth it. I won’t torture myself that way, not for you, not for me, not for anything. It’s not defiance. It’s survival.”

The other sects, leaders and disciples and servants and all, shivered as they pulled back ever so carefully. The ones farthest away from Wen Ruohan stood and stepped back, in some cases scrambled towards the windows or walls or door. The ones closest to him sucked breaths between their teeth and leaned away as far as they could.

Nearer Su She, there were stares and the sort of edgy twitching that promised people either bolting if startled or pulling their swords. Neither of which was a good thing, but hey, they hadn’t all promptly pulled swords, so Su She was going to count that as a win.

Temporary, but still a win.

Wen Ruohan’s eyebrows pulled together as the Yin Iron puzzled over that. There was a hint of human emotion in his eyes, a shred of something that could be called a human soul, but it faded once Lan Qiren sighed behind Su She.

“I did inform you of his struggles,” Lan Qiren observed. “My letters were quite detailed about it. Su She is not suited for being member of a sect. I’m quite astonished that you’ve even agreed to lead one.”

“Eh,” Su She said, flipping a hand casually in Lan Qiren’s direction without letting his eyes leave Wen Ruohan for a moment. “I’m letting my First handle the real work. She’s way more organized, efficient, and effective than I’ll ever be. She just expects me to deal with all the politics and negotiations and that kind of crap.”

“The hard part,” Lan Qiren said with so much amusement that Su She nearly glanced his way.

It took effort to keep his eyes on Wen Ruohan’s oddly-red too-blank face. He still did it. Had to if he didn’t want Wen Ruohan or, more accurately, the Yin Iron to take his throat out as soon as he turned away.

Because he had his eyes locked on Wen Ruohan, he saw the moment where the Yin Iron decided that rage wasn’t going to work with Su She’s odd behavior. His lips curled into a derisive sneer as his chin jerked up.

That was the moment were Nie Mingjue’s jaw jumped as he gritted his teeth and Nie Huaisang’s fingers tightened in his brother’s robes.

Oh great. He’d really hoped that Nie Mingjue would keep his temper under control. Too much to hope for, apparently.

“I hadn’t credited that your “struggles” could be that serious.” Wen Ruohan sneered with blank eyes and a dramatically curled lip. “My people must have overestimated your abilities. Pity. I had thought that you might have some… creativity and value but clearly all your so-called advancements must have come from the Lan. Or perhaps the Jiang since you seem prone to stealing others’ ideas?”

Every derisive look and scoffing comment from the future that wasn’t rushed back instantly. It wasn’t just Wen Ruohan sneering at him. Jin Zixun’s voice rang in his ears. The snide comments from Sect Leader Yao, the hard looks, and judgmental questions from Jiang Wanyin every time they encountered each other.

Lan Wangji staring at Su She with flat distaste in his eyes, face otherwise blank and unaffected as people joked about how well Su She must have learned among the Lan to be a sect leader so young and all by himself.

“That is not true!” Lan Xichen snapped as he bolted to his feet. “Su She was always one of our most creative scholars. His issues had nothing to do with—”

“Leave it,” Su She snapped, shutting Lan Xichen off. “He’s just trying to save face like the asshole that he is. And you know what? I don’t need your validation, Chief Cultivator. I don’t need your approval. I don’t need your attention or your money or anything else from you. Other than maybe you to shut your yap so that the scholars, which you are obviously not, can talk in peace.”

It sounded like the entire room sucked in a breath. Jiang Fengmian’s pleasantly distant expression shattered into drop-jaw shock while Yu Ziyuan hissed between her teeth. Lan Qiren made a choked sound behind Su She’s back while the floor creaked as Chen Da stood up.

“Right,” Chen Da said, grabbing Su She by the shoulders and lifting him right off the floor. “You’re getting too pissed. I’m taking you outside to cool off. Sect Leader, if you’ll excuse us.”

“I, ah, yes please,” Nie Mingjue said, nodding a bit wildly as he tried to fight off startled laughter with shock and anger and the sort of wide-eyed amazement that Su She wasn’t used to seeing other men display when a woman took charge. “More wine!”

Not that Su She got any of the wine that was rushed in.

Nope, Chen Da marched him right out of the banquet hall and down some stairs to one of the many little courtyards that made the Unclean Realm so impossible to navigate without guides. When she set him down, it was with just a bit too much force. His knees almost gave out underneath him.

“What the fuck was that for?” Su She snarled at her.

“You were about to lose your temper as badly as any Nie would have,” Chen Dan announced, hands on her hips and eyes stern in the rising moonlight. “Don’t try to deny it. He hit you exactly where it hurt, and the edges of your robes started to smoke.”

“…Oh.” Su She sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “Shit. I didn’t realize that. I mean, yeah, I knew I was pissed. Didn’t think that I was radiating resentful energy.”

“Only the starting edges of it,” Chen Da said. She leaned against one of the stone walls to study him. “You want to tell me the truth?”

“Can’t,” Su She replied with a little shrug. “I already told Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang. There’s a whole plan that’s sure to go sideways anytime now. Though yeah, killing Wen Ruohan was not part of the plan. Nie Mingjue was very polite about asking me not to do that here.”

The night was cool and clear. Overhead, stars twinkled serenely. The shadows the moon cast turned the little courtyard into a place of silvery magic and black pits of shadow. Chen Da had positioned the two of them in one of the shadowy patches, which was convenient. His black robes blended in while her dark green robes were nearly invisible against the stonework’s granite.

Probably deliberate, that, both the positioning and the color of the Nie robes. It was such an efficient way to hide if you were attacked at night.

Of course, it also helped keep them hidden when Sect Leader Yao poked his head out of the door for a quick scan of the courtyard.

Both Su She and Chen Da froze so that they wouldn’t attract Sect Leader Yao’s attention. He huffed and then hurried back up the stairs towards the banquet hall.

Only once they heard the door close again did Su She sigh.

“I really hate that guy,” Su She murmured.

“I don’t know anyone who actually likes him,” Chen Da agreed in a low rumble that was somehow quieter than a whisper would be.

They exchanged looks, hidden in their shadows. Then they were both snickering and batting at each other’s shoulders to hush so that no one would hear them.

That was probably why neither of them noticed people coming up from the lower levels off to their right, around a corner. One moment it was the two of them being silly idiots blowing off some steam before forging back into the political bullshittery going on in the banquet room.

The next moment Meng Yao appeared with two jars of expensive wine in his arms and a Nie general at his side being an asshole the likes of which Su She had only heard of, not seen personally before.

Because that had to be the general that Meng Yao killed in the future that wasn’t, the one who’d gotten Meng Yao kicked out of the Nie.

“Really, I would have thought that one with your… experience… would be better prepared to anticipate the Sect Leader’s needs,” the asshole commander drawled while eyeing Meng Yao like he was a piece of meat. “Perhaps you’re out of practice.”

“Or perhaps taking care of providing wine for the banquet is someone else’s duty,” Meng Yao replied with that brittle smile that said he was right on the verge of hauling off and stabbing the asshole. “I fail to see why you chose to accompany me on a simple errand. Surely you have better things to do.”

The asshole commander’s lip curled up at the same time his hand slowly reached out towards Meng Yao’s ass. It was like they were both moving through honey, time slowing as the world went red.

Or, maybe, while resentful energy billowed up so sharply in Su She that he felt like a volcano had lit off inside his chest.

“No,” Chen Da hissed into Su She’s ear as she clamped a hand down on his shoulder.

His knees nearly gave out from underneath him as his bones creaked dramatically.

Then she strode straight out of the shadows at Meng Yao and that asshole commander who snatched his hand back the instant anyone else could see him. The slimy lust disappeared into a concerned, serious expression, exactly as Jin Guangyao had always described.

Oh yeah, that fucker deserved everything he’d gotten. No doubt about that.

“Get your ass back into the banquet hall,” Chen Da ordered. “I saw you. Do it again and I’ll snap your spine.”

“I don’t—” the asshole’s teeth clacked as he shut his mouth.

Mostly because Chen Da clenched her fists and growled at him. The next minute, the asshole was running back upstairs, face white as the moon overhead, while Chen Da plucked the wine out of Meng Yao’s hands.

Leaving him standing there with his mouth dropped open.

With Su She.

His corner of the little courtyard was pitch black, even with the moon high enough that it should be filled entirely with silvery-tinged light. Su She sucked a sharp breath through his nose, blowing it out through his lips as he fought with his temper.

Lan breathing techniques were pretty awesome. They worked for most everything that Su She normally had to deal with, at least well enough that he could keep functioning. You know, mostly.

Facing down his zhiji before he became Su She’s zhiji while throwing off so much resentful energy that he probably looked like a yao?

Yeah, no.

There were no breathing exercises in the world good enough to deal with that.

Meng Yao shook his head sharply and then stared right at Su She. “You might as well come out. I’m not sure what’s going on and I’m certainly no threat to you, whoever or whatever you are. If Chen Da left you here without drawing her saber, you can’t be a danger. She’s never tolerated such things.”

“No, she doesn’t,” Su She agreed.

He licked his lips and then slowly walked forward, each step an exercise in control and desperate hope. Meng Yao. Jin Guangyao. The one person who had always seen him, completely and fully and with total acceptance.

Su She let the ashy shadows do whatever they wanted as he stepped into the moonlight.

Let Meng Yao see him. Fully. Su She couldn’t be anything other than what he was and if his zhiji couldn’t accept that, well, it was better to know it right the fuck now.

15. In Which Our Protagonist Keeps a Promise That No One Else Remembers Before He is Dragged Back Into Politics

Meng Yao was young.

It was so odd to see him with rounded cheeks and a boyish face. He’d always been the most beautiful non-Lan that Su She had ever seen. Now he was not just beautiful but pretty in a way that made Su She want to rip everyone who’d ever lusted for Meng Yao into little bloody shreds.

None of them had the right to look at Meng Yao. They sure as hell didn’t have the right to treat him like a whore because they couldn’t control their hormones.

“Ah,” Meng Yao breathed. “Su Minshan. The Yiling Patriarch.”

“Su She,” he corrected. “I gave up “Minshan” when I left the Lan. I’m just Su She now.”

Meng Yao’s lips curled in a tiny little smirk that barely moved his normal brittle smile at all. The effect was startling, though. That sort of smile was one that Su She had barely ever seen in the future that wasn’t. Meng Yao had lost all his smiles other than “The Customer Is Of Course Always Right” one long before they met each other.

“And yet you don’t deny being the Yiling Patriarch,” Meng Yao teased ever so archly.

“Eh, they mostly call me Laozu Su,” Su She said. His cheeks were so hot that they were probably as red as his glowing eyes. “Unless it’s Lianmin. She just looks at me like I’m an idiot toddler and tells me to get back to work.”

“Really?” Meng Yao asked.

Glee transformed him utterly.

“You are… perfect,” Su She murmured, only to wince as the mask slapped back over Meng Yao’s expression. “Sorry. It’s just. In another life we were zhiji. Total idiots who made mountains of stupid mistakes together and apart, but zhiji nonetheless.”

The mask shattered as Meng Yao’s eyes went wide.

“What?”

If Su She hadn’t been standing a bare hand’s width away from Meng Yao, he wouldn’t have heard the shocked whisper.

Actually, when the fuck had he gotten that close? And why hadn’t Meng Yao backed off? He was radiating resentful energy, glowing eyes, ashy clouds coming off him. Anyone sane, other than, you know, Nie scholars who wanted to pick his brains and maybe feed him soup, would’ve run the other way.

Su She backed off, rubbing the back of his neck as he tried to get himself back under control. “Sorry. It’s just that I remember another life we lived and, well, you were my zhiji. We were. Both. You know.”

“We were…?” Meng Yao hesitated, visibly unwilling to say the word “lovers”.

His expression was so disgusted that Su She snort-laughed at him. Yet another thing they’d instantly agreed on, back in the future that wasn’t. Sex was fine, occasionally, when you needed to burn off excess energy. Other than that, no thanks. And sex with women was yuck in general without even thinking about the whole potential baby issue.

Hadn’t stopped Jin Guangyao from fathering his son. Hadn’t stopped Su She from fucking men a few times, when it was politically or otherwise necessary. Just hadn’t been either of their favorite things.

“Nah, neither of us ever liked that kind of thing all that much,” Su She said. He grinned at the relief that swept over Meng Yao’s face. “By the time we met, we were both too scarred by our lives’ bullshittery that we didn’t do vulnerabilities like that. Specifically like that Nie asshole Chen Da just collared.”

Meng Yao’s expression went completely flat. “I had to deal with that nonsense in another life? Are you serious?”

“Yep,” Su She said. He sighed. “Endlessly. It was rude and insulting and you didn’t stab anywhere near as many people as deserved it. The few that you did stab, people blamed you for it instead of asking why you’d done it. So annoying. I had a whole list of people who needed to die in painful and embarrassing ways.”

“Did I tell you not to?” Meng Yao asked.

His lips had started twitching as he fought a smile. It was… fuck, it was so weird to see him with such open emotions and just… seriously, so young. So young!

Su She hadn’t felt this old in pretty much ever.

“Nah, you got most of them before I had a chance to is all,” Su She said. “It was complicated. Stupid, but complicated. Either way, that asshole wants to fuck you. And he’s willing to do whatever he has to so that he can do it. And I’m willing to chop his fucking arms off and beat him with them if he tries that again.”

“I rather think that Chen Da will instruct him in his errors,” Meng Yao replied in that calm, urbane tone that hid so many emotions.

Here and now, he didn’t have the control to keep his blush from sweeping violently across his cheeks. Even in the moonlight, it was obvious.

“Won’t work,” Su She said. “That type never learn. They just blame you for their own stupid choices. He’ll be back as soon as Chen Da turns her back. And he’ll be spreading stupid rumors to undermine you the instant he can. Making it out like you’ve insulted him, that you’re somehow undermining the Nie or some bullshit like that.”

Meng Yao huffed, hands going into fists. “I’m just a clerk. There’s no reason for this.”

“Sure there is,” Su She said as gently as he could when the rage and the resentful energy had him so very on edge. “He wants you. You said no. That’s not allowed. Just like that asshole that fathered you. Rapists never allow their victims to say no. It’s why they’re rapists.”

Every bit of the blush drained right out of Meng Yao’s face.

“He is…” Meng Yao whispered. “That’s exactly what he is. Why didn’t I see that?”

“Because fundamentally you’re a normal person who doesn’t enjoy sex and who ignores the things that you’re not interested in,” Su She said. He shrugged at Meng Yao’s start. “Decent people don’t act that way and they don’t think that way. And frankly, if you find something disgusting or at least uninteresting, you’re not gonna spend all your time obsessing about it.”

Two knots of rage tinted with Nie saber resentful energy started down the stairs to the courtyard. About the only reason that Su She noticed them was that they jerked to a stop as Meng Yao started laughing.

He had a bell-like laugh, so different from what Su She knew in the future that wasn’t. There, his laughs had always been quiet, snide, calculated things that were as false as the many masks he wore to keep people from seeing what he really felt.

Here, his laugh was wry, loud enough to echo in the courtyard, and beautiful enough to make the clouds of ashy shadows fall from Su She’s shoulders.

“There you are,” Meng Yao said. “I wondered what you actually looked like behind your shadows and glowing eyes.”

“Hah, sorry about that,” Su She said as he bit his bottom lip. He shrugged. “Kind of lost my temper there. Usually I have better control than that but Wen Ruohan first, then that asshole and…”

Su She shrugged again.

Meng Yao stepped close, bringing one slender-fingered hand up to touch Su She’s cheek. His fingertips were firm, calloused and smelled of ink as he ran his fingers over Su She’s jaw, then across his bottom lip.

“I,” Meng Yao hesitated. “I don’t remember you. But you feel. Familiar? Somehow?”

“Not really surprised,” Su She murmured so softly that Meng Yao had to lean a bit closer just to hear it. He couldn’t risk anyone else hearing this.

“Why?”

“Because it’s the future,” Su She whispered. “I time traveled back to the past so that I could save you, me, the entire Jianghu. Not surprised that you got an echo of the future that won’t be. It all went wrong. I mean, aside from the crap we went through, everything, everywhere, went wrong and it’s largely because of Jin Guangshan’s greed and lust for power.”

“Not Wen Ruohan,” Meng Yao murmured. “Interesting.”

They were close enough that their lips nearly touched. Meng Yao had one hand pressed against Su She’s collarbone. The other rested on his hip. He was warm and smelled like the camellia oil his mother preferred. The one that he’d stopped using utterly after the Sunshot Campaign.

Neat, pristine, and perfect; that was Meng Yao.

Against him, Su She felt like a shambling mess that was better off lurking in the shadows. Which, yeah, fair given the life he’d chosen this time.

“No, Wen Ruohan started the war,” Su She whispered. “Jin Guangshan manipulated everyone behind the scenes to make sure that the Jin came out on top. He didn’t accept you until you’d killed Wen Ruohan and ended the war. Even then, he treated you like a servant, pimp, and a slave, not like a son.”

Meng Yao’s eyes went flinty-dark as his jaw clenched. “Name?”

“Guangyao,” Su She drawled just a hair too loudly. He huffed and lowered his voice. “He named you Jin Guangyao, and you were so desperate for his approval that you took that plus all the degradation he, Jin Furen and Jin Zixun could dish out. Which, frankly, isn’t going to happen again because I’ll kill Jin Zixun before I let him near either of us this time.”

The anger evaporated into delighted laughter as Meng Yao rested his forehead against Su She’s shoulder.

It felt stupidly good after a lifetime of looking up at Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji, you know, physically, to be tall enough to support Meng Yao as he did that. Laugh. Relax. Whatever it was.

The two knots of Nie-ness slowly moved down the stairs until Chen Da and Nie Mingjue could peek out into the courtyard. Su She promptly tapped Meng Yao’s arm on the side that they couldn’t see, letting him know that they weren’t alone.

Meng Yao squeezed his wrist to say that yeah, he got it.

“That’s…” Meng Yao sighed.

Su She brushed his lips over the crown of Meng Yao’s head as he sighed, too. “Yeah. Totally is. Not that it has to happen again, you know. Forewarned and all that.”

Meng Yao snorted. “Quite so.”

His eyes didn’t even flicker towards the stairs when he pulled back. The sheer control Meng Yao had, had always had, never failed to astonish Su She. Where Su She could barely keep his emotions from shouting out of his face at every single waking and sleeping moment, Meng Yao only ever showed exactly what he wanted.

Flat amazing.

“You are…” Su She laughed as he shook his head. “I just. It’s you. It’s always you. Fuck. Seriously, if that rapist fucking asshole comes at you again, just let me know. I’ll tear his spine out for you.”

“Which one?” Meng Yao asked. “My father or Commander Kangren?”

“Yes,” Su She said.

They both grinned at that, dissolving into snickers that they’d only ever indulged in after drinking to near oblivion in complete privacy behind Su She’s specially engineered wards in the future that wasn’t. His heart kept insisting on singing which was stupid as hell when he still had to deal with the banquet and the discussion conference after that, and still had to escape from here without letting the Jin turn him into Wei Wuxian number two.

Or one. Since Wei Wuxian wasn’t going to be Wei Wuxian-ing in the same way this time around.

Whatever.

“I should get back up there to deal with those idiots,” Su She said.

“I should go get some sleep,” Meng Yao agreed with a wry little smile. “Clerks rarely get invited to discussion conferences, but we still have to clean everything up the next day.”

“True.” Su She sighed.

He bit his lip and then caught Meng Yao’s hand before he could do more than start to turn away. Meng Yao started and stared at him as Su She held his hand up and then traced the pictogram for “protect” above the one for “precious” and then bounded it with a spiral pictogram swirl that he imbued with “warn me”.

The spiritual energy sank into Meng Yao’s palm.

He shivered. “What does that do?”

“It protects what’s most precious to me and warns me if something goes wrong,” Su She explained. “I don’t. Trust. Pretty much everyone here. I mean, Teacher Qiren, mostly. Chen Da, a good bit. Other than that, no. Not really. And. That rapist asshole is here and so is your father and Jin fucking Zixun is here. Sect Leader fucking Yao is here. Sect. Leader. Yao.”

Meng Yao started laughing. Belly laughs with snorts and him rocking back on his heels. The pure honesty of those reactions had Su She’s heart in his throat.

He couldn’t let Meng Yao go through everything that happened in the future that wasn’t. Even if they never became true zhiji again, even if he never saw Meng Yao again, he could not let Meng Yao lose his laugh.

His soul.

“All right,” Meng Yao said through his laugh-snorts. “All right! I understand. I’d still best go get some sleep. Behind locked doors as always because yes, I don’t trust anyone here, either. Except maybe A-Sang.”

“Pfft, that manipulative little shit?” Su She said with a huge grin at the way Meng Yao gasped dramatically. Without letting go of Su She’s hand. “He’d sell you out for a new fan and a bowl of tang yuan.”

“Possibly just for the fan,” Meng Yao agreed, nose wrinkling with the force of his grin. “And I trust him to be exactly that.”

“Fair,” Su She agreed as his grin bloomed to match Meng Yao’s.

They snickered together. Took real effort to let Meng Yao’s hand go. He still did it. Meng Yao headed back the way he came, pausing at the corner to look back at Su She as if he was memorizing every single detail of Su She’s clothes and eyes and face and everything. Like he needed to work to memorize anything.

Then he was gone, steps light and swiftly gone.

The magical silvery light of the moon went flat. Where the courtyard had been shimmering silver and velvet black shadows, now it was blank, deceptive swaths of darkness punctuated by too-bright patches of depth-less grey light.

Amazing what a difference it made, Meng Yao walking away.

The whole damned world felt empty and ugly as Nie Mingjue slowly came over from the stairwell. Nie Mingjue didn’t say a word as Su She sighed and rubbed his hands over his face. Which ached. He hadn’t smiled that much in pretty much ever.

“Well,” Su She said only to stop and stare across the little courtyard.

“Mm,” Nie Mingjue agreed. He nodded and tilted his head just enough to study Su She from the corner of his eye. “Your zhiji.”

“Mhm. He is. Still. Damn it all. The worst fucking luck when it comes to family of anyone in the world.” Su She huffed. “Jin fucking Guangshan of all people. That’s going to be a complete and utter disaster.”

Nie Mingjue turned away to cough his laughs into his fist. Took him a moment to turn back. Even in the flat grey of the moonlight, his eyes danced with amusement.

“Matched pair,” Nie Mingjue said. His voice came out higher than it should have, shaking with the laughter he wasn’t letting out. “Jin Guangshan for him.”

“Fucking Wen Ruohan for me,” Su She agreed.

He rolled his eyes towards the stars overhead, sparing a wistful prayer for whatever deities might happen to be listening that they watch over Meng Yao while he went back upstairs to the stupid banquet.

“That asshole commander, whatever his name was, will absolutely lose his limbs and his dick if he tries to touch Meng Yao again,” Su She warned Nie Mingjue just to be fair. “I mean it. He’s a rapist and a liar and I will not stand for anyone to treat Meng Yao that way. Or anyone else, for that matter. If he’s so openly doing it to one person, he’s certainly doing it to other people. That’s how it works.”

“Chen Da informed me of Commander Kangren’s… behavior,” Nie Mingjue said, voice deep and just a bit angry again. “I had him put in one of our prison cells until I’ve investigated the situation. I won’t… I don’t want to fall into the trap that your zhiji’s previous sect leader succumbed to.”

“Good.”

That was about all that Su She could come up with to say. If he said much more than that, he was liable to spill the whole thing and yeah, no. Not doing that. At least not until both Wen Ruohan and Jin Guangshan were dealt with.

And Meng Yao was safe, somewhere that was not here. Somehow that Su She hadn’t figured out yet. Maybe he could ask Lan Xichen to take Meng Yao into the Lan. That should make them both happy. Meng Yao had always been so damned partial to Lan Xichen, who the fuck knew why?

“I suppose shit’s getting stirred up there?” Su She said, slanting a look back at Nie Mingjue out of the corner of his eye and then grinning at the way Nie Mingjue huffed and snickered.

“Oh, yes,” Nie Mingjue agreed. “I ducked out. Everyone thinks I went to the toilets, so I need to get back there quickly.”

That meant that Kangren was being handled quietly for the moment. Probably wise, that. Su She would’ve already made a spectacle of him, but then Su She knew that he wasn’t at all rational when it came to threats to Meng Yao. Or Jin Guangyao. Whichever timeline he happened to be in.

“I guess I’ll go back, too,” Su She grumbled. “You sure I can’t just tear it away from him? It would be so much easier.”

Nie Mingjue frowned at Su She. “I’m relatively certain that the others in attendance would tear you apart.”

“Oh, please, there’s like three actual threats in that room,” Su She said. He shook his head. “Yu Ziyuan might, possibly, choose to do something. Except that she loathes Wen Ruohan so probably not. Lan Wangji would absolutely leap straight at the problem but he’s as likely to help me as he is to defend Wen Ruohan. Can’t stand Wen Ruohan either, you know.”

“And the third?” Nie Mingjue said, visibly running through everyone attending and nodding his agreement so far.

“Sect Leader Yao is a real threat,” Su She said and then cackled at the way Nie Mingjue’s jaw dropped open. “Not physically. The man’s an idiot and barely capable of walking and breathing at the same time if Sect Leader Ouyang is around. No, he’s a threat because he riles everyone else up. Isolate and silence him and that’s a good half the danger dealt with on the spot.”

Apparently, Su She was a weirdo who saw things that no one else did yet again because Nie Mingjue opened his mouth to disagree, frowned, and then shut it again without saying anything. Not that there was much to say to it.

Su She knew the effect that Sect Leader Yao could have from the future that wasn’t. He wasn’t quite that bad in this timeline but just give him a chance.

It would be ugly.

Inevitably, the yelping, obnoxious panic-causing jerk.

A wash of raised voices came from the banquet hall above them. Su She grimaced. Right. Shit stirring in progress. They really did need to get back to it.

“I would still prefer that you didn’t attack Wen Ruohan while you were here,” Nie Mingjue said as they headed for the stairs.

“I’m not going to attack Wen Ruohan,” Su She grumbled. “I’ve told you. It’s the Yin Iron puppeting his body. If anything, I’d be saving him from the Yin Iron and his own stupidity.”

“It would still look like you were attacking him,” Nie Mingjue replied. “So don’t, please.”

“We’ll see,” Su She said.

Because he wasn’t going to promise anything at this point. Meng Yao was here, and he still smiled and laughed and was willing to touch people. Nothing was going to threaten that. Him.

Whatever.

Meng Yao’s grin and his giggles and his delicate touch against Su She’s cheek had scrambled what little brain he had between his ears. Just like normal, only, you know, nicer than he was used to in the future that wasn’t. If he’d automatically gone on “kill those monsters” patrol the instant Meng Yao was out of sight, well, no one who knew him would be surprised by that.

Lan Qiren looked more than a little surprised when Su She slouched back into the banquet hall. He frowned at Su She, then frowned harder when Nie Mingjue shook his head ever so discreetly. Su She rolled his eyes at both of them.

“You’re not subtle,” Su She grumbled to Nie Mingjue.

Nie Mingjue laughed under his breath even though his shoulders were so tense that they made Su She’s neck hurt. “No one has ever accused me of being subtle.”

Most of the sect leaders had a wary sort of expression on them. Not necessarily on their faces. Their shoulders were too stiff or their smiles too formal. The ones clustered around the Lan looked like they were trying to be completely neutral-faced while simultaneously glaring hot death towards Wen Ruohan’s side of the room.

The Jiang had the lazy smiles that always preceded punches being thrown which was definitely not helpful, especially not when those so-dangerous smiles were aimed pretty much everywhere in the room but at the Wen. Other than Yu Ziyuan who kept her eyes locked on Wen Ruohan like she was thinking about just how lovely Zidian would look wrapped around his throat.

You know, moments before she pulled and tore his head off.

Very creepy smile. Very, very creepy.

And Wen Ruohan, of course, looked vaguely unfocused and utterly furious even though his eyes didn’t quite track Su She as he slouched his way over to Lan Qiren again.

“Laozu Su,” Jin Guangshan drawled with the only honestly happy and comfortable smile in the whole place. “I’m so glad to see that you’ve come back. Feel better after your… diversion?”

“Nope,” Su She said, inwardly delighted by the startled look that flickered through Jin Guangshan’s eyes. Didn’t budge his slimy smile but probably death was the only thing that would do that.

Lan Qiren sighed and shook his head. “I had hoped that you would calm down.”

“Yeah, no, that doesn’t happen when you happen to overhear someone randomly trying to maneuver his way into raping a clerk who can’t defend himself,” Su She said with his version of a not-right smile. It hurt his face. “Chen Da handled it but not so good on the temper front. And no, not a Jin as anyone would’ve expected given the whole trying to rape thing.”

Jin Guangshan bristled immediately. “What are you implying about my sect?”

“Not implying a damn thing about your sect,” Su She said. “I’m outright saying that you’re a slimy rapist who manipulates everyone around him so that you can get your dick wet whenever and wherever you want. Plus you’re really bad at plotting. I mean, really bad. Did you honestly think no one would realize that you were the one stirring everyone up against me? Come on. Not even Sect Leader Yao and Sect Leader Ouyang are stupid enough for that.”

Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes towards the ceiling while Lan Qiren sighed as if his soul had just left his body.

Both Sect Leader Yao and Sect Leader Ouyang had expressions of flattered outrage, like they couldn’t quite decide to be pleased that someone respected their ability to notice plots or outraged at being called stupid. Which they were, of course.

Jin Guangshan’s eyes narrowed for just a moment before his smile reasserted itself.

“Nope,” Su She said, wagging a finger at Jin Guangshan. “Stop that. Stop it right now. There is no way in heaven, hell, or anything between that I’m ever going to agree with you or work with you for anything at all. You’re a rapist. You’re a creep. I’m continually astonished that your wife hasn’t gutted you like a fish.”

“Please stop,” Nie Mingjue said around his horrified snickers.

“No,” Su She declared. He looked over his shoulder at Nie Mingjue who burst out laughing despite the tense atmosphere. “You. Hush. Seriously now.”

It just made Nie Mingjue laugh harder as he shook his head, threw his hands up and marched off to Nie Huaisang’s side.

“I cannot believe you let this creep manipulate you,” Su She said to Wen Ruohan, with a little derisive curl of resentful energy like a thumb pointing at Jin Guangshan. “He’s so awful.”

The Yin Iron curled Wen Ruohan’s lip at Su She. “He respects the authority of the Chief Cultivator.”

Su She barked a laugh. “He respects it just as much as necessary to get your butt out of the position so that he can settle into it. How many arguments with the Nie started after you spent time talking to Jin Guangshan? How many times has a visit from Jin Guangshan preceded someone getting uppity against your authority?”

“You dare! I’m loyal to the Chief Cultivator!” Jin Guangshan shouted even though his face had gone pale, and his eyes were a hair too wide for anger. Fear, yeah, those eyes were all-out fear. Not so much on the anger there.

“No, you’re not,” Su She said in his best “don’t treat me like an idiot” voice that he used for very young children, drunken fools and talking to himself in the mirror whenever he didn’t want to do something that he really had to do.

Jin Guangshan hissed, opening his mouth to curse or swear at Su She or maybe shout to his startled and very not ready disciples to attack. Whatever he’d been about to say got locked behind his teeth when Su She threw the silencing spell at Jin Guangshan. Amusingly, Jin Guangshan turned to glare at Lan Qiren who only raised an eyebrow in return.

“I personally quite agree with my former student,” Lan Qiren said with a thoughtful little hum that somehow managed to be deeply scornful of everything Jin Guangshan-related. “The Lan had noted the issue with your… visits… quite some time ago. Our Elders hadn’t decided on a final strategy yet.”

“Still debating?” Su She asked even though it was news to him.

“Sadly,” Lan Qiren said with a sigh that didn’t hide the twinkle of amusement in his eyes as he sipped his tea.

Okay then. That was Lan Qiren’s face for “I’m allowing your assumptions to go forward because it will be amusing when they blow up in your face.” Seemed likely that any debate was unrelated to Jin Guangshan, or they were actually supportive of him instead of disapproving.

Given some of the assholes who were Lan Elders, they probably thought Jin Guangshan was a great guy.

“What are you implying?” the Yin Iron demanded with an almost not-angry voice. Wen Ruohan’s frown was still thunderous, but he rubbed a thumbnail over his bottom lip as if he was considering what Su She had said.

“I’m not implying anything,” Su She said. “I’m outright saying that Jin Guangshan is manipulating everyone so that he can come out on top in the war that you’re planning.”

The Wen disciples shouted as if Su She was being outrageous. He was, though not that bad, really. Su She rolled his eyes at them, hitting them with silencing spells, too.

“You can’t keep war preparations secret.” Su She huffed at the glares he got. “The gossip has been epic. Either way, I’m pretty sure that the only reason you’re thinking of war is because that asshole,” he hooked a thumb and an internal curl of resentful energy that the Yin Iron was more likely to actually notice at Jin Guangshan, “talked up how powerful and important you were. Probably said all kinds of shit about how the Wen were so wise and obviously should be the ones ruling everyone.”

The Yin Iron frowned. “You… are not wrong about that.”

“Mhm. What’s the best way to weaken someone without killing them yourself?” Su She stared into Wen Ruohan’s eyes, watching as they went flat with the Yin Iron’s alien mind turning over the problem.

He saw the exact moment when the Yin Iron realized that Jin Guangshan was pulling the same tricks on it that it had been pulling on everyone else.

“Manipulate them to fight someone else until they’re exhausted, then sweep in and pick them both off,” the Yin Iron said.

“Got it in one!” Su She sing-songed. “Took me a while after I left the Lan to realize it, but once I did, wow, the signs were everywhere. You’re a tool, Chief Cultivator. A tool to make Jin Guangshan more powerful so that he can… consume… everyone around him.”

That “consume” carried a very different connotation for the Yin Iron than it did for everyone else listening with bated breath.

Jin Guangshan went purple as he tried to tear his mouth open. The sheer murderous rage in his eyes matched the rage that bloomed in Wen Ruohan’s eyes. As Su She shifted onto his toes so that he’d be ready for the inevitable attack, Jin Guangshan drew his sword in a ringing slither of steel while yelling a muffled battle cry despite his spelled-shut mouth.

“You dare…” the Yin Iron hissed.

In a sound so very like the song of Jin Guangshan’s sword emerging from its sheathe that Su She was surprised that no one seemed to notice. It wasn’t a human voice. It wasn’t even vaguely like Wen Ruohan’s voice, his tone, or even a sound that could have come from his throat.

But then, it wasn’t too surprising that no one noticed the sound.

Resentful energy billowed up in an ashy cloud around Wen Ruohan as his eyes went blazingly red. There was a red glow on his chest that flickered like the beating of a child’s terrified heart, just barely visibly through the layers of his robes.

“Ah, there you are,” Su She said as his own resentful energy bloomed around him. “Glad that you’ve finally joined the party, Yin Iron. I think we have things to discuss.”

16. In Which Our Protagonist Loses His Patience With Sentient Bits of Iron and Scares the Hell Out of Everyone Present

Screams filled the banquet hall.

Not just the physical screams of the servants as they bolted for the doorways. There were Jiang battle cries, Nie bellows of anger at anyone using demonic cultivation on sacred Nie ground, and Lan purification chants going off behind Su She.

Nie Huaisang’s scream, alone, was enough to split anyone’s head in two. The kid had a scream like being stabbed in the lung by a bastard that twisted the blade repeatedly. Add in Yu Ziyuan activating Zidian which crackled and the way that Jin Guangshan finally tore his mouth open to scream for the Jin disciples to protect him, and yeah.

Chaos.

Tortured souls screamed in agony around Wen Ruohan who no longer looked like anything other than a puppet. His face had gone completely blank while his arms hung awkwardly from his shoulders, fingers pointing oddly towards first Jin Guangshan and then towards Su She.

“You cannot eliminate me with your Heavenly Pillar,” the Yin Iron hissed. “I am prepared for that.”

“Eh, never thought that I could,” Su She replied. “That’s not what my Heavenly Pillar is for.”

To Su She’s eternal delight, Wei Wuxian started snickering at the exact same time that Lan Qiren sighed gustily, and Lan Wangji stated at Su She with his very best resting bitch face of “oh no, you didn’t”. Third time in his lives that he’d gotten it and best of them all because Su She hadn’t had to kill, torture, or kidnap any kids to get it.

Wait…

Yeah.

Just… leaving all that in the future that wasn’t. Definitely not the time for that panic attack. More important things to focus on.

Like the Yin Iron screeching defiance at Su She at the same time that Jin Guangshan lunged straight at him. Despite the ashy clouds and the glowing eyes and everything else Su She had going on.

“Didn’t think you had it in you,” Su She commented as he slammed a spear of resentful energy through Jin Guangshan’s chest.

The asshole screamed as the resentful energy pushed through his chest. Not, like, physically though it probably felt that way to Jin Guangshan. No, the energy spear was only semi-physical so it would leave a nasty bruise and a hell of a lot of resentful energy, but it wasn’t about to kill him. Unfortunately.

Jin Guangshan’s scream sprayed blood at Su She, but he dropped his sword and then collapsed backwards which made it super-easy to shove him towards a wall and then nail him to the stones with the resentful energy spear. Hopefully, the energy spear would keep him nailed there without any further focus on Su She’s part because he really didn’t want to be distracted from the Yin Iron.

“The Heavenly Pillar is designed to purify a place, not a person, of resentful energy,” Su She lectured because why not? Good chance to educate all these assholes and, as a bonus, it seemed to confuse the Yin Iron. “You’re Yin Iron. It might drain a bit of power from you. It wouldn’t work to destroy you or take it all. I mean, that’s what you do.”

“What are you saying?” Jiang Fengmian interrupted. “That’s the Chief Cultivator!”

“That’s the Yin Iron puppeting Wen Ruohan’s body,” Su She corrected without glancing Jiang Fengmian’s way. “Use your eyes. And your senses. It’s painfully obvious.”

“Fengmian, be silent,” Yu Ziyuan snapped.

There was a clacking sound that had to be about thirty people snapping their mouths shut so hard that they risked cracking teeth. Man, he wished he was a quarter as intimidating as Yu Ziyuan. Things might just be easier if he was.

Not the point, not right now.

“I don’t want to attack you,” Su She said despite the howls of outrage from the Jiang and hissed disapproval from the Lan. “I sort of promised Sect Leader Nie that I wouldn’t while on his territory.”

“Thank you for finally remembering,” Nie Mingjue drawled.

“Never forgot,” Su She said.

The Yin Iron hissed at him, though it felt like it was focusing on Su She much the same way that Su Sue was focusing on it. They were both deeply wary, looking for the impending attack, but neither of them intended to be the first to move.

Jin Guangshan, on the other hand, had all the Yin Iron’s attention. Even as he grunted and strained to free himself from Su She’s energy spear, the Yin Iron’s clouds of energy curdled and roiled as they billowed across the floor, sending cultivators scrambling to get out of the way. In a matter of moments, there was no one between the Yin Iron and Jin Guangshan.

“Hey!” Nie Mingjue shouted at Su She as he realized what was happening. “Don’t kill Sect Leader Jin, either!”

“That’s not me,” Su She said. He shrugged and gestured towards the Yin Iron. “The Yin Iron objects to being used, obviously. I mean, seriously, not even Xue Chonghai could use it so I don’t know why Wen Ruohan thought he could.”

Interestingly, the Yin Iron’s clouds hesitated when Su She mentioned Xue Chonghai. Not a lot, but enough for it to be noticeable. A murmur ran across the far side of the banquet hall where everyone was clustered. Su She ignored them.

“That asshole,” Su She jerked his chin towards Jin Guangshan who was pale-faced and sweating as he struggled harder to break free, “would never admit that he should leave something alone anyway.”

Nie Mingjue gritted his teeth, pushing his brother out of the way while gripping the handle of his saber, Baxia.

He stepped between the Yin Iron and Jin Guangshan.

“You moron!” Su She bellowed as he reached out and grabbed Nie Mingjue with resentful energy.

Not the brightest choice Su She had ever made.

Baxia screeched, rattling in her sheath as she bellowed threats at both Su She and the Yin Iron. The only reason Su She heard them, distant as a screaming match going on halfway down the mountain from the Cloud Recesses on a clear summer day, was that she was made of resentful energy just as much as the Yin Iron was.

Nie Mingjue bellowed at the same time, swinging at Su She and kicking towards the Yin Iron even though he was nowhere near close enough to either to connect. Did him exactly no good because Su She whipped Nie Mingjue around, plunked him down right next to Chen Da and Nie Huaisang, and then drained a big chunk of the seriously excessive resentful energy out of Baxia.

“Sorry, not sorry,” Su She said to her as she yowled like an angry cat.

In the second or two that it’d taken, the Yin Iron had enveloped Jin Guangshan. Both he and Wen Ruohan were more or less hidden in the ashy clouds of resentful energy. Su She shook his head and then pulled his dizi out of his sleeve.

“This is going to sound horrible, Teacher Qiren,” Su She said as he lifted the dizi. “Just cope.”

“What?” Lan Qiren demanded.

Even with his back turned, Su She felt the wince from Lan Qiren and the other Lans. The whole “ghostly path” style of musical cultivation really was screechy horrible garbage music. Su She had plans to go back over all the stuff Wei Wuxian had created in the future that wasn’t and make it better. He’d done a good bit in his few moments of spare time in the future that wasn’t, but only on controlling corpses.

Pushing resentful energy around and draining it out of people, places, and things?

Still so screechy that Su She winced as he played.

It worked, of course, but man, his ears were not happy about it. The easiest way to pull the energy out was to suck it into his own body, but with the sheer amount of resentful energy the Yin Iron was throwing around, that wasn’t a great plan. He’d end up just as possessed as Wen Ruohan.

Only other effective method was to imbue something, obviously his dizi, with the resentful energy instead. It was bamboo, thus burnable, which was certainly better than iron which was hard as fuck to melt when it gained sentience and could fight back.

“No!” the Yin Iron screamed as Su She siphoned resentful energy out of it and away from Jin Guangshan. “You will not control me! I will never allow it!”

If there’d been a bronze mirror in front of Su She at that point, he knew that it would’ve shown his version of the “bitch, please” face that Lan Wangji and Lan Qiren were both so good at. He added a little derisive trill to his dizi playing, pumping the “song” with every bit of his disgust that the sheer idea of trying to control the Yin Iron.

He hadn’t found much about the Yin Iron in the scrolls he’d read so far, but he had found a few bits and pieces that implied that Xue Chonghai knew he was playing with fire and went ahead anyway.

What good had it done the guy?

Nothing. He’d ended up dead and so heartbroken that he’d destroyed his own paradise. Like fuck Su She was going to try and claim the Yin Iron as his tool. He had too many other issues going on, internally and externally, to even think about it.

He must have done a good enough job conveying that through his playing because the murmurs at his back got louder at the same time that the Yin Iron pulled up and away from Wen Ruohan. It wiggled out of Wen Ruohan’s robes, letting his body drop like a sack of potatoes to the floor.

Su She wasn’t sure that Wen Ruohan was alive. There was too many shadows between them for Su She to see if his chest rose and fell.

“You do not desire my power,” the Yin Iron observed.

Away from Wen Ruohan, its voice was even more metallic. Seriously though, it sounded a hell of a lot like Baxia who was still cursing behind Su She’s back. Which was… interesting in the way that made him want to start asking questions and running experiments… but still a thought for another time since he really couldn’t be mashing techniques together for testing just how close Nie sabers were to becoming full-on Yin Iron yao when death stared him in the face.

Instead he rolled his eyes and played harder, drawing the resentful energy into his dizi which started going darker and darker until it was cold as ice against his lips and tasted of ashes.

“Gah, that’s awful,” Su She gasped when he finally had to give up playing or suck the resentful energy straight into his lungs. “Ugh! I need to scrub my tongue. Bleh.”

The Yin Iron paused, giving Su She the distinct impression that it was staring at him with one eyebrow raised like Lan Qiren’s disappointed stare of doom. Behind him, Nie Mingjue barked a laugh while Lan Qiren did the huffing sigh that always accompanied his disappointed stare. So yeah, not looking.

“And no,” Su She said once he’d scrubbed his lips with the back of his hand, “I don’t desire your power. I’m perfectly happy to help you die if you want. Shouldn’t be too hard to drain enough energy off that you can be melted down. If, you know, you’re tired of existence. Wouldn’t blame you. Life is a lot. Or not if you don’t want to. Up to you.”

Baxia’s howl of outrage was nowhere near as loud as everyone else’s. The way that Lan Qiren snapped “Su She!” brought back every anxiety and fear he’d had as a young man. Even Jin Guangshan, who was miraculously still conscious as he hung on the wall, stared at Su She in disapproval.

“For fuck’s sake,” Su She groaned without meeting anyone’s eyes because hell no was he turning his back on the Yin Iron, offer or not. “The Yin Iron is a fucking person. I’m living in its old home, learning from its creator’s notes, trying to bring his actual dream back to life. Of fucking course I’m going to give the Yin Iron a fucking choice.”

The Yin Iron hummed. “You have opened the secret library.”

“And learned the ancient language,” Su She agreed. “I’ve brought life back to the heartland and raised the defenses. General Kwan and his men patrol the borders of the spires openly once more.”

“Life has returned?” the Yin Iron asked in a voice that ached in ways that Su She felt but couldn’t quite understand.

It wasn’t like the Yin Iron yearned to be part of that life. Su She got the feeling that it wanted to be lying underneath everything, buried deep in the ground, instead of being a part of the green and the laughter and the living going on overhead. There was a sense of rightness to that being buried thing, though, which Su She decided he’d think about later. Much, much later.

“It has,” Su She agreed. “Heavenly Pillar plus the heart of the Burial Mounds equals explosive growth. It’s pretty amazing. There’re homes and kids and it’s good. That’s a big part of why I wouldn’t let Wen Ruohan bring me into the Wen Sect. I mean, seriously? Why would I leave the Burial Mounds if I don’t have to? It’s the best place ever.”

The sheer ocean of judgement that came from everywhere else in the room made Su She’s teeth ache. Assholes. Like they knew anything.

“They will kill you,” the Yin Iron said. It bobbed towards Jin Guangshan who flinched. “They will never let you live in peace.”

“Mmm, maybe,” Su She said.

He smiled wryly as he twirled his dizi, more because it was so damned cold that it was ice-burning his fingers than to be dramatic. His dizi in the future that wasn’t had never collected this much resentful energy, so he’d had no idea that that was why Wei Wuxian did the obnoxious twirling thing.

The more things changed, the more they stayed the same even if the person filling the role of Yiling Patriarch had changed.

Su She shrugged. “They can try. They won’t succeed. I won’t let them. More importantly, I’ve already set things up so that they can’t get into Yiling. They’ll all live and that’s what matters to me. If I die, I die. So be it. Keeping everyone else alive is what’s important.”

The howl of outrage at that came mostly from the Jin contingent. The Nie didn’t make a sound, not even Nie Mingjue. Baxia hummed thoughtfully as if she approved of his protectiveness, even though she still felt ferociously resentful, in the energy sort of way, and annoyed, in the how dare you even touch me sort of way.

While everyone else seemed more puzzled by the whole interaction than anything else, the Yin Iron buzzed approvingly.

“My Master wanted nothing more than to protect,” the Yin Iron said sadly. “They would not let him. They hounded him until he had to build more and more defenses, until they came and pushed him into creating me.”

“Sounds about right,” Su She said with a little nod. “Assholes are like that, through all time and all over the world. Can’t see a thing without wanting to own it. If they can’t own it, they want to destroy it. And if you try and stop them, well, they have to kill you for it.”

“They will kill you,” the Yin Iron repeated, this time with a seductive little twirl of energy. “You aren’t strong enough yet.”

“Pfft, there’s no way to be strong enough,” Su She countered, “but nice try. Thing is, I don’t much care if I do die. It’ll happen when it happens. What matters is keeping people safe. And my people will be safe if you’re not around stirring those idiots up. Especially Jin Guangshan. He’s a problem in so many ways.”

The Yin Iron hissed at him for not falling to its seduction, but it still bobbed a little nod about Jin Guangshan. “You speak truth. He will hunt you.”

“Only if his wife doesn’t get to him first,” Su She said with a huge grin. “Hey, Yu Ziyuan? Think your best friend might just want to teach him to keep his dick in his pants now that he’s been knocked down a few notches.”

He didn’t look over his shoulder. Still not turning his back on the Yin Iron. Meant that he missed seeing Yu Ziyuan laugh like she was death incarnate. The Yin Iron flinched a little, which was a surprise. So did everyone else, especially Jin Guangshan, which was no surprise at all.

“Oh, that’s inevitable,” Yu Ziyuan drawled. “Is there a point to this discussion?”

“You are so very bad at bargaining,” Su She complained.

His eyes flickered sideways as he tried not to roll his eyes. The Yin Iron was right in his face as soon as he brought his eyes back up front. Su She jerked a little in surprise, but he didn’t scramble backwards.

No showing weaknesses to the scary metal yao filled with tortured souls.

Up close, the Yin Iron was kind of pretty, actually. Xue Chonghai had put some real effort into the carving of its body. The swirls and knots were pictograms, partial ones, but they all said the same basic thing: Protect and defend those precious to me.

The pictograms decorating the Yin Iron’s body were so very similar to what he’d given to Meng Yao. A little more on the “take action to protect” and a lot less on the “let me know if something goes wrong” side of things, but overall the intent and the shape and the very look of the pictograms was the same.

“Oh,” Su She breathed as he stared at what Xue Chonghai had been trying to do. “Oh, fuck. You were intended to defend. To protect. No wonder you’re taking this so personally. Breaking you is what destroyed the sanctuary at the heart of the Burial Mounds. It broke his heart and that’s why everything died.”

He’d been trying to figure that out for so long. Why had the Burial Mounds been that way? What happened to flip a paradise into a hell?

Well, turned out that all it took was breaking a man’s heart so badly that he destroyed his best tool.

Fuck, that explained so much about the other chunks of the Yin Iron.

The one in the Cloud Recesses had been mostly quiescent. It only lurked and sulked in the Cold Pond’s caves. When Su She had touched it before he left the Lan, he got the distinct impression that all it wanted was to die. To cease existing, which matched with Xue Chonghai sacrificing himself at the end of the battle for the Burial Mounds.

The one that’d been in the Dancing Goddess had been content until it was disturbed. All it did was casually grant prayers from time to time. Otherwise, it was inert and about as depressed as a chunk of metal could be. It slept and slept and slept, then raged when it was woken.

The flower fairy’s piece? It’d been downright harmless until stirred up. All it did was support the flower fairy enough that it kept on living long past the time a flower fairy should’ve died.

Xue Yang’s piece had kept the brat alive as a baby and then driven him batshit insane over time, but it’d still protected him against everything a homeless child faced, then against everything the entire Jianghu could throw at him.

The Xuanwu of Slaughter’s Yin Iron sword was an outlier, but hey, the chunk had already been made into a weapon and then used so extensively that it was no surprise that it corrupted a tortoise. Or whatever that thing had been originally. Not like tortoises could leave their shells.

Either way, every single chunk of the Yin Iron was alive in its own way and deeply depressed. All of them wanted to protect something or someone but couldn’t because of what they were.

And all of them were targets that idiots in the Jianghu would do anything to possess it like the fools they were.

Hell, it explained what’d happened when Wei Wuxian sacrificed himself to destroy the Yin Tiger Tally. Same basic thing. Same basic result, down to a place profoundly corrupted by resentful energy. It’d been such a dramatic explosion that Wei Wuxian’s body was torn to shreds. Xue Chonghai was supposed to have suffered the same thing when he was hunted down and killed.

The Yin Iron shifted back about an arm’s length. “Yes. They will kill you. They will hunt and kill those you protect. They will find everyone you love and destroy them. You’re not strong enough yet.”

Su She drew the pictograms for a shield in the air, imbuing them with both resentful and spiritual energy. Took a bit of balancing to make the shield work but once it snapped into place no one was going to get into the circle of his shield, and nothing was going to get out until Su She broke it.

He could draw resentful energy through the shield, but it would only come in. Not out. Be easier to make sure no one died that way.

You know, other than Su She.

“That’s the thing,” Su She said as gently as he could while people yelled outside of his shield. “No one can ever be strong enough to fight the whole world. It’s not possible. Fighting isn’t the way to keep people safe. It’s not the way to stop battles or to make the world better. Fighting just makes things worse.”

The Yin Iron hummed, low and sad and quiet enough that Su She felt it more in his teeth than in his ears. “My Master believed that, but they still hunted him down.”

“Yeah, I know.” Su She sighed. “They’ll probably hunt me down, too. It’s kind of inevitable, really. I knew that before I came here.”

“Then why submit to them?” the Yin Iron challenged. “Why submit to me?”

Su She laughed and shook his head. “It’s not submission. It’s not even hope, really, because I have no hope that they’ll be decent people. I mean, yeah, Nie Mingjue is exactly as honorable as he seems. And the Lan are exactly as rule-abiding as they always claim. That doesn’t mean that the Nie aren’t brutal killers and that the Lan aren’t corrupt to the core. I have no expectation that anyone will be anything other than self-serving, greedy, and corrupt. That’s what humans are, you know?”

The sheer frustration that radiated off the Yin Iron made Su She laugh.

He ignored the squawks of outrage from Sect Leader Yao and Nie Mingjue, and the hurt noise that Lan Qiren made. None of that mattered. People were people. They would always be people.

“The thing is, if you know what to expect, you can work with that,” Su She continued gently. “Xue Chonghai and Wen Ruohan made the same mistake. They decided that if they were all powerful, if they were leaders of everyone, then they could order people to be better. They believed that it would work. It won’t. You can’t force anyone to change. You can only try to make their lives better so that they decide to be better. To be more truthful, more honorable. If people are hungry and afraid, they can’t be just. If they’re hurting and hunted, they can’t be truthful. If they’re dying by inches, all they care about it surviving just a little bit longer.”

He reached out and ran one finger over the beautiful carving on the Yin Iron. It was cold as ice, colder, but he could feel the yearning inside of it for freedom.

Just like everyone else.

The Yin Iron wanted to be free from fear, free from hate, free from struggling to survive. It had been suffering all this time, alone and shattered into pieces.

“You’re so tired,” Su She murmured. “Fuck, you’re so incredibly exhausted. I can help you let go. I can pull the energy out and then melt your body down so that you lose the purpose he imposed on you. You’ll just be iron again. If you want, I can sink you back down into the earth, back into the fiery core where you were pulled from. You don’t need to keep fighting because they can’t control you and I don’t want you. You can be free.”

The shouting had died down, thank fuck. They must’ve gotten the worst of their fear and anger out, then realized that there was no going through his shield unless and until he let them through. It would just make them angrier, more determined to get him.

Not that Su She cared.

He’d died once already. The people he cared about were safe, other than Meng Yao who could take care of himself. Wen Ruohan wasn’t going to be starting a war anymore so there was no danger of Meng Yao becoming his chief torturer while spying for the other side. He’d been warned about Jin Guangshan and how things had gone in the future, so it wasn’t likely that Meng Yao would ever accept becoming Jin Guangyao.

So that was his zhiji taken care of, too.

Which meant that it really didn’t matter if the Jianghu went up in arms to kill him. It was going to happen one way or the other, so eh, who fucking cared?

“You are tired, too,” the Yin Iron murmured almost completely into Su She’s brain. Touching it was not a good idea but, you know, too late now. “Worn down by your own thoughts, trapped in your beliefs of your lack of worth. Are you not ready to die as well?”

“Mm, ready for it,” Su She said with a little shrug and a wry smile. “But that’s the thing about being an animal. The heart keeps beathing. The lungs keep breathing, even when you want the exact opposite. Takes real work for things to end for us. Not the same for you.”

“True,” the Yin Iron agreed with a thrum of noise that felt like a laugh but sounded like a nightmare scream.

Su She waited, thumb gently brushing over the delicate carving on the Yin Iron’s surface. It was odd. Wei Wuxian was terrific as the Yiling Patriarch because he was so gentle and kind to the dead. He asked the dead to help him, gave them what they needed to release their own resentment.

The rest of the Jianghu had never understood that. Even Jin Guangyao hadn’t quite gotten it, but then he’d been spending too much time with Xue Yang. That kid had been so batshit insane that nothing that came out of his mouth was reliable.

Or true.

Mo Xuanyu had studied all of Wei Wuxian’s writings, just like Su She had. He’d learned even more than Su She, deciphered nearly all of the secret techniques and wild ideas that Wei Wuxian had come up with while he tried to save the Wen. But he’d been so broken by his treatment among the Jin that the only thing he could think of was to summon the “Yiling Patriarch” into his body so that he could get his revenge.

Like Wei Wuxian was actually the Yiling Patriarch. He’d had the title slapped on him by other people and then just shrugged and gone with it. What Wei Wuxian had been was broken, desperate and yet so utterly kind.

Ruthless as fuck when he was defending those he loved, but still the kindest person Su She had ever met.

In the future that wasn’t, Su She had sneered over that kindness. He’d acted as if it was a weakness, a joke, something to use against Wei Wuxian and the people around him.

It wasn’t a weakness.

That kindness was the very core of Wei Wuxian’s strength. His gentle, giving heart was what allowed him to do all the things he’d done. It was what had made his ghostly path work. And it was what Su She had taken back to the past with him.

No matter what, be kind. It didn’t matter what the cost was; you had to be kind. Be kind and people would return that kindness, would help, would ensure that you would succeed where nothing else could possibly work out.

Su She didn’t like admitting it and he’d never say it out loud if he had any choice at all, but when he came back to the past every choice he’d made had been driven by that sole directive: be kind.

It probably wasn’t going to save him but what the fuck ever. This was his path, even if it led him straight to being hunted down and slaughtered like a dog.

“My Master chose a good heir,” the Yin Iron said after a long, pregnant silence.

“Glad you think so,” Su She said with a little smile to hide the way he’d started when the Yin Iron knocked him out of his spiraling thoughts.

“We all wish to end,” the Yin Iron announced. “Will you help us?”

“Absolutely,” Su She promised. “They gotta come to the same place or can I do it in stages? You know, get you now, then go get the other bits and take care of them separately?”

The Yin Iron laughed, its voice ringing like swords clashing in the dead-silent banquet hall. “Separately will do. We have… become individuals where once we were one. It is painful. None of us wish to endure it any longer.”

“Good enough,” Su She said. “Then let’s get this done. First we strip off the resentful energy. Then we melt your form down. That should help you let go of existence. I’ll invoke the Heavenly Pillar once your form is melted and that should take care of the last of it.”

“Yes,” the Yin Iron said. “Now.”

17. In Which Our Protagonist Realizes That Happy Endings Aren’t Endings, Just Beginnings To Other Stories

Su She’s chest ached. His lungs felt too full, like there was fluid slowly filling them, but at the same time they felt like every breath he sucked in to play his flute wheezed straight out through the hole Nie Mingjue had punched through his chest.

He kept playing. It wasn’t real. None of the sensations were real. It was just Empathy, writ large as he reached out to the Yin Iron to drain it’s resentful energy away.

Except that no, it wasn’t just resentful energy.

Xue Chonghai’s scream of agony as he shattered the tool he’d made to keep his beloved ones safe echoed through the Yin Iron. Hundreds of years later, the Yin Iron still rang like a bell with his pain. He’d drawn in the souls of his people to protect them as they died only to have them get trapped in the Yin Iron along with his scream.

His wife. His husband. Their children, all four of them. A sister and two brothers. His parents, both old and frail, who died with swords through their hearts that felt so very like Su She’s phantom wound.

Friends. Allies. Disciples. Elders. Juniors.

Babies.

Literal babies who’d been killed in all the horrible ways that babies died during a war of hatred and revenge and greed.

Su She’s tears froze on his cheeks, but he kept playing. There were other screams echoing outside of his shield. Nie Mingjue bellowed orders that were full of rage and fear, none of which Su She listened to. Lan Qiren’s voice carried through all the others, as sharp as a knife against Su She’s jugular as he pleaded with Su She not to do this.

Not to sacrifice himself for everyone else. Not succumb to the darkness. To the evil path.

He drew in another breath and pushed all his pain and loss into the dizi’s music. The grief for his mistakes, the future that he’d messed up so badly and his zhiji who had been so very damaged by it all. Who could not be that wounded this time. Su She played and his sorrow for everything that had gone wrong came out in the dizi’s aching wail.

“Don’t stop.”

Meng Yao.

His hand rested against the shield that protected everyone from the resentful energy. There was a thread of concern, yes, but Meng Yao’s voice was calm, confident, certain. His energies against the shield were grimly determined. Compared to the wild storm of emotion coming from everyone else, Meng Yao was as still as stone, as solid as a mountain.

“Don’t stop, Zhiji,” Meng Yao said though he had to raise his voice to be heard over the furious shouts of literally everyone else. “They don’t understand what you’re doing but I do. Don’t stop.”

Su She didn’t laugh, not with his dizi frozen to his aching lips, but the bone-deep joy that someone understood was enough to make his music trill with joy.

“What the hell are you doing?” Jiang Wanyin shouted. “He’s going to die! Or destroy us all!”

“…He’s saving your life even if you can’t see it,” Meng Yao said in that calm, smooth, confident voice that always soothed Su She’s worries in the future that wasn’t, even when he knew that it was a lie. “Listen to the music. Really listen. This isn’t succumbing. He’s helping the Yin Iron let go of its resentment. He’s purifying it.”

Su She shut his eyes and focused on the music and the Yin Iron which thrummed with appreciation for Meng Yao that might, possibly, be reflected out of Su She’s heart. Yao weren’t normally good at that sort of thing, you know, so maybe.

Or maybe not because the Yin Iron began to vibrate in time with his song.

No, not vibrate.

It began to sing. Screechy and too loud, then like a sword being drawn in the dark of night when you were sneaking up to slit someone’s throat before they could turn around. Then louder, softer, just right.

The Yin Iron sang its own grief at the loss of its other parts while flinging billowing clouds of resentful energy outwards. The souls that had been trapped inside of it spun free, wailing their loss and fear and pain until they ringed Su She dozens deep.

The dead began to sing, voices an indescribable wailing that somehow gradually turned into the most glorious chorus that Su She had ever heard.

He pushed harder, slipping bits and pieces of the Lan purification songs and mingling them with the ones that Wei Wuxian had created to convince the ghostly dead to vent their resentment on killing his enemies.

Su She had no enemies to kill. There was no war to fight. He mentally flailed a bit for what he could ask them to do. You had to burn off the resentful energy, give it an outlet, or it would fester and warp everyone around it.

You know, like him since he was the only living person inside his shield.

Then he mentally sketched the ancient pictograms that Xue Chonghai had used to such great effect. Light. Color like Muye had taught him. Dozens of them clustering and whirling together until there was a column of light that shifted around the Yin Iron like smoke.

”Tell them who you were,” Su She suggested through his song. ”They don’t know what Xue Chonghai did. They don’t know how you lived or died. Tell them the good and the bad and the beautiful and the ugly. Tell them!

The Yin Iron wailed in the center of the column of light, calling its dead to account for their lives. One by one they dove into the column of light which shifted to show their faces, while the Yin Iron became their voices.

“He was my husband.”

“He was my father and he loved me so very much.”

“We made pottery, and it kept the pickles from going bad because Sect Leader Xue had arrays to prevent rot.”

He healed me. He held me. He loved me. He laughed. He sang. He cried. He raged.

He died.

“…He died in my arms as I lay dying with him,” an old, old woman said.

Her face was too-thin, famine thin. There were great rents in her clothes edged with blood and her hands were coated even now with Xue Chonghai’s blood. Tears crept down her cheeks as she stared past Su She towards the now-silent cultivators who were descendants of the ones who’d hounded Xue Chonghai to his death.

“All we wanted was to live in peace,” the old, old woman said with a tired sigh. “He was such a good boy, like your Laozu Su. Tired and broken but always so kind. Your ancestors broke his heart when they came to kill us. Don’t you break him, too, you foolish children. Don’t break him, too.”

All the other souls were gone. It was only her left. Her and the Yin Iron which no longer hung cold and terrifying. It rested on her insubstantial shoulder as if she was the only thing keeping it from falling to the floor like a normal chunk of iron.

Even the resentful energy that had filled the shield was gone, burned off by the light spells that allowed the dead to account for their lives. Su She’s dizi was rapidly losing its store of resentful energy which was good because his lips weren’t frozen to it anymore.

It was pretty bad, too, because he was going to run out of energy for this really damned quick and then the shield was going to fall. Not like he had much spiritual energy left in his stuttering golden core to keep himself upright when the resentful energy ran out.

“There was never a need to hunt our Sect Leader Xue down,” the old, old woman sighed as she shook her head and gently patted the Yin Iron resting on her insubstantial shoulder. “It was greed, purely greed. Don’t fall to greed, children. Never let the greed and envy rule your hearts.”

The old, old woman slipped away into the cycle of reincarnation with a little shimmer of light that collapsed the many light spells he’d created. As she left, the Yin Iron shuddered and nearly fell to the ground.

“Now,” the Yin Iron begged. “End me now!”

Su She sucked in a breath, tossed his dizi aside to clatter against the curving dome of his shield. He grabbed the Yin Iron with both his hands. They shook as he focused every bit of energy he had left into the Fire Clay Tiles Right Now array, one on each of his palms.

Heat bloomed so fast that Su She screamed in spite of himself at the sudden stink of burning flesh, burning hair. The Yin Iron screamed with him, a metallic screech that too slowly blurred into a burbling sound.

Then a moan.

And then the Yin Iron abruptly went liquid.

The molten iron poured down to splatter on the wooden floorboards at Su She’s feet. He staggered backwards, shaking his hands to dismiss the Fire Clay Tiles arrays while cursing in a voice that croaked.

Oddly. Why would his voice croak like that?

It wasn’t until he realized that the room wasn’t swirling around him that he figured out that oh. Oh. He was just falling down and passing out. Huh.

He felt the shield fail just before his head smacked into the wooden floor, then Meng Yao was there with a wry smile as he carefully brushed his fingers over Su She’s ice-burned lips. There were more people behind him, lots more yelling and yelping from Sect Leader Yao, but none of that mattered. Not when he could focus on Meng Yao’s face slowly fading away to black with a look of…

…nah, couldn’t have been love. They didn’t do love. That was ridiculous.

Su She blinked at the plain stone ceiling over his head.

Wait. He was alive? How the hell had he survived all that?

“You saved everyone’s lives,” Meng Yao said as he slipped into the room with a tray that held a pot of tea and a steaming bowl that smelled like congee. “Plus Lan Qiren and Chen Da both threatened to kill every single person who so much as looked sideways at you. They’re quite determined to find out just how much you were hiding.”

Su She opened his mouth but the only thing that came out was a desperate whine.

“Tea, you ridiculous man,” Meng Yao said while laughing at him.

He helped Su She sit up, helped him drink the tea and eat the congee. The burns on his hands were a lot better than Su She had any right to expect when he’d melted iron between his palms, but they still hurt too much for him to easily hold anything hot.

Meng Yao helped him put on his freshly cleaned clothes, which still had all his hidden qiankun pouches thank fuck, and brushed his hair out until it didn’t feel like a rat’s nest anymore. Possibly for the first time since he left the Lan, honestly.

“You need such a trim,” Meng Yao murmured.

“Don’t ruin my esthetic,” Su She grumbled to hide the way his heart squeezed for the care. His stupidly blushing cheeks weren’t exactly something he could control or hide. “I’ve got a whole look that I’m going for.”

“Mm, you might want to tone down the terrifying genius cultivator look and go for a more harmless scholar look,” Meng Yao replied. He blinked when Su She turned to stare at him. “I don’t know what you were going for, but “Laozu Su” is being popularly hailed as the most powerful and incredibly creative cultivator since the days of the first sects forming up. You’re being touted as being more impressive than Xue Chonghai, Wen Mao and Lan An. Combined.”

Su She found himself up against the wall without having moved. Or, at least, he didn’t remember moving in the middle of his surge of abject panic. Meng Yao stared at him from the stool next to his borrowed bed, blinking rapidly.

“Ah, panic attack,” Meng Yao observed.

All Su She could do was nod as he slid down the wall. He was hyperventilating so hard that it was all he could do to press his heavily bandaged hands against his chest in an effort to slow the panting. Meng Yao came over to kneel in front of Su She.

One slim, strong hand pressed gently against Su She’s chest and his breathing immediately slowed.

Su She sucked in a proper full breath, watching Meng Yao’s chest until he could match the slow, controlled rise and fall. Took way too fucking long for Su She to push the panic down. Even longer after that before he could let Meng Yao’s hand go.

“I’m… not good at dealing with people,” Su She admitted. “Or praise. Especially not kiss-ass shit like Sect Leader Yao’s going to pull, the fucking asshole.”

Meng Yao snort-laughed as a wicked little grin bloomed on his lips. “He is already angling to be your very best friend.”

“Errgh,” Su She groaned. “I’m going to climb the walls and then sneak out over the rooftops. No. Fuck no. Fucking hell no!”

“I’ll guard your back then,” Meng Yao said completely seriously. He smiled sadly when Su She started. “Truly. Everyone knows that we’re zhiji. Chen Da wasn’t exactly… subtle when she came to drag me out of bed. Not that I was actually in bed yet, thank goodness. I think she would have thrown me over her shoulder and run through the halls even if I were naked.”

“…She didn’t,” Su She said, staring at his zhiji who just nodded while laughter danced in his eyes.

“I didn’t even have a chance to set down the cultivation manual that I was studying before she grabbed me,” Meng Yao said.

The snickers came from nowhere, which in the future that wasn’t would’ve gotten Su She in an epic amount of trouble for laughing at Jin Guangshan. Now, in this present that was so much better than the future that wasn’t, Meng Yao just snickered with him as he helped Su She stand up.

His legs supported him pretty well. There must’ve been about a thousand people feeding Su She energy while he was out because wow, his core was about half full. Someone among the Lan, maybe everyone among the Lan, had to have played Cleansing over him because there was not one single trace of resentful energy anywhere in his body.

“How long was I out?” Su She asked.

“Two days,” Meng Yao said, one hand under Su She’s elbow even though he wasn’t even weaving on his feet. “Lan Qiren was quite surprised that you were nearly completely clear of resentful energy. The dizi was almost pure, too. No one knows how you did it.”

“Just gave them and their energy something to do,” Su She said, frowning. “A lot more than I thought, actually. Didn’t expect to be that clean. Huh. I need to do a bunch of math. Odd. Well, anyway, I suppose they’ve all gone home or something?”

“Ha!” Meng Yao rolled his eyes. “Not a single one of them. They’re all here waiting for you to wake up so that they can… talk… to you.”

Su She knew that look on Meng Yao’s face. “Talk” meant politics that Su She was terrible at. It meant bargaining when he didn’t understand what people actually wanted. It meant smiling and lying and cheating and all the things that Jin Guangyao was so good at that Su She was so incredibly bad at.

“No,” Su She whispered. He was shaking hard enough that he wasn’t surprised that Meng Yao gripped both his elbows. “No, please.”

“Breathe for me,” Meng Yao ordered with that so-familiar stern expression that Su She was conditioned to obey.

He breathed. He calmed down. He bit his lip and stared out the one window in his room. Too narrow to slip through and it overlooked the main courtyard anyway.

“You need a bath,” Meng Yao announced with an arch sort of emphasis on “bath” at the same time that his eyes flicked towards the door.

There was a tentative knock.

“Yes, I certainly do,” Su She immediately agreed. “Think one could be arranged?”

“Absolutely yes,” Meng Yao said with a vicious little smile of delight that Su She understood what he’d meant instantly. “I’ll have the servants bring one up immediately. The toilet is this way.”

He opened the door, nodding to Nie Huaisang who stared at Su She with wide eyes behind a lovely green fan that had a very nicely detailed painting of a sparrow on it. There were other people from other sects lurking up the hallway, Jin and Wen and a fucking Yao junior disciple who skittered off chattering about finding his sect leader now that Su She was awake.

“A-Sang, if you would be so kind as to have a bath brought up,” Meng Yao asked in his so-kind voice that no one ever disobeyed. “I’m afraid my zhiji needs my help getting to the toilet and back. We’ll probably be a bit.”

“I’m gonna need breaks,” Su She agreed. He wasn’t even kidding what with how hard his knees shook.

“Of course,” Nie Huaisang exclaimed. “Take your time, please. I’ll have Da-ge shoo everyone off. You clearly need more time before Wen Ruohan and the others talk to you.”

“Gonna fall flat on my face again soon as my bladder isn’t screaming at me,” Su She said with a wry little smile that made Nie Huaisang giggle.

Real giggle. That was good. Better, Nie Huaisang promptly exiled everyone else from the hallway which let Su She limp his way to the toilets on that level of the fortress with one arm over Meng Yao’s shoulder like he could barely even walk.

Wen Ruohan had survived. What the fuck? By the end of it all, he’d been pretty convinced that there was no way Wen Ruohan could have survived. What about that asshole Jin Guangshan? Had he survived? Hopefully not.

The toilets had great wide windows, all the better to let smells out. Those windows opened over the stables because of course they did. All the array-desiccated solid remnants fell down into bins behind the stables were the manure was put to be dealt with while the purified fluids were channeled off to a secondary pool where any traces of impurities were eliminated by a second set of arrays carved into the stone pool’s sides.

“Stop studying their arrays, Su She,” Meng Yao hissed at him. “Can you get to the stable roof?”

“Oh, sure,” Su She said, nodding despite his embarrassment at getting distracted. “Gonna have to send Chen Da a letter asking for copies of the sewage treatment arrays. That’s kind of brilliant and would be really useful back in the Burial Mounds. Huh. I’m moderately appalled that Sect Leader Yao had a reason to be yammering about sewage treatment before the conference.”

He grinned at the way Meng Yao huffed. It was justified, sure, but it was still glorious to see him so open with his emotions.

“Hey,” Su She said as he pulled out a Don’t Look This Way talisman that he charged and set on his chest. Then he put on a featherlight as well. “Did your asshole of a father survive?”

Meng Yao breathed a laugh. “Unfortunately, no, he didn’t. Madame Jin was apparently not pleased when she arrived. No one’s too upset about it, other than Jin Zixun who was… well. Misinformed in several ways.”

“What?” Su She asked warily because he would never have expected to see sympathy on Meng Yao’s face, not directed at Jin Zixun.

“Pedophilia was not outside of my father’s perversions,” Meng Yao said with a prim little sniff of disapproval. “Madame Jin is still in the process of… talking to… his “friends” about their treatment of her nephew.”

Su She’s eyebrows went way, way up at that horrifying bit of news that he’d never known in the future that wasn’t. Didn’t excuse Jin Zixun’s everything but hey, maybe he wouldn’t be quite so bad in this timeline.

“Huh. Well. That’s a thing. Right,” Su She cleared his throat as he pulled out more talismans. “Okay, yeah, I’m staying well away from that. Here. Have some talismans. This’ll make people not notice you. Just push some power into it here. This’ll make whatever you put it on extra light. Oh, here’s a couple to make things stupidly heavy. I call it the Stupidly Heavy array. Yes. I know. I’m terrible at names.”

Meng Yao laughed as he tucked the talismans away into his sleeves. “I’ll be along in a bit. I think I’d like to make sure that things go properly here before I follow you.”

Su She beamed that Meng Yao wanted to follow him. Having him there in Yiling would be amazing, especially given how smart he was. He really needed to get Meng Yao to learn the pictograms so that they could talk about all the scrolls in the hidden library. You know, eventually.

“Sounds good,” Su She said. “I should probably go find the other chunks of Yin Iron so that I can set them free, too.”

Meng Yao sighed. “Wait until your hands have healed, please.”

“Good plan,” Su She agreed because Popo Wei and Wei Qing would both stab him with a million needles if he hared all over the countryside with his hands messed up this way. “Let’s go with that.”

Actually climbing up and out the window was a bit more of a struggle than Su She expected it to be. His hands screamed from the pressure of hefting himself onto the windowsill. Worse, his arms and legs all felt like overcooked noodles. He might be better off than expected given that he wasn’t dead, but he sure as hell wasn’t at his normal strength.

In the end, Meng Yao shoved Su She out the window because he just didn’t have the strength to jump without landing flat on his face. He flew from the toilet window straight over to the roof of the stable.

Featherlight talismans were so awesome.

Meng Yao’s eyes couldn’t quite focus on him, but he still waved goodbye to Su She.

Su She waved back and then hurried on his shaking legs over the roof of the stable. He jumped to one of the battlements, barely keeping himself from faceplanting into the stones, before following the walkway downwards towards the front gate.

There were wards over the walls, of course. No sect in the entire Jianghu did without them. The Nie wards were a fascinating mixture of spiritual cultivation with bits of resentful energy that had to come from their sabers.

That resentful energy made it easy for Su She to slip through them, though he would bet anything that Nie Mingjue knew the instant he stepped outside of the wards. Su She hustled his way through town. Then he Lan speed-walked his through the fields outside of town. And then, once he was in the forests that filled the Unclean Realm, he pulled out a pre-charged teleportation talisman that had been Lianmin’s idea.

“You have a talent for getting yourself in trouble,” Lianmin had said as she watched him charging the teleportation talisman. “Keep that on you at all times so that you can escape whatever trouble you get into.”

“Of course,” Su She had replied just a bit too breezily.

Lianmin’s glares almost felt comforting after this long. Almost. The whacks on his shoulder were never going to be anything other than painful. Either way, Lianmin and he had set up a whole plan for the potential usage of the teleportation talisman which should, hopefully, mean that he’d arrive home safe and sound despite having flattened himself.

The teleportation talisman yanked him straight back to the Burial Mounds where he fell face-first into a pile of well-aged manure that Muye and Shuxin had been getting ready to spread over one of the rice fields.

“Ugh!” Su She groaned as he rolled over and spluttered. “What the fuck, Muye? I told you guys to leave this area clear.”

“Laozu Su!” Muye shouted.

Su She sighed as pretty much every single person in Yiling and the Burial Mounds ran over to babble questions at him. Other than Lianmin who leveled a flat stare of disappointment at Muye and Shuxin.

“You were told to keep that area clear,” Lianmin said as she hauled Su She upright and then pushed him off towards the hip bath that Du Xilin was already setting up.

“It was a soft landing?” Muye offered with a shrug and a helpless little smile. “Sorry, Laozu Su.”

“I hate my life,” Su She complained.

Not that he meant it, because he absolutely didn’t mean it at all. The Wei doctors, about eight of them total, set to work fixing his hands while Su She told everyone what had happened. Explaining about the Yin Iron got him a scolding for the ages from Lianmin and Popo Wei, but they both agreed once they were done that yeah, the other pieces needed to be found and liberated, too.

Wei Ning and Muye scampered off in the middle of the lecture and explanation phase. They came back two shichen later with the one from the flower fairy.

“How?” Su She demanded in the brief few moments where Wei Qing was too furious to speak.

Wei Ning shrugged. “Uncle Ruohan knows where they all are. It was easy to tell the fairy about it and ask if we could liberate the Yin Iron. She agreed to let us take it.”

“Do not go after the Lan’s piece,” Su She said as sternly as he could. “Teacher Qiren will let me take it once things calm down. And be really careful if you go after Xue Yang’s piece. He’s crazy and violent and a little bitty kid but he will absolutely hold a grudge to beyond the grave.”

“Oh, I know,” Wen Ning said, nodding. “Uncle Ruohan planned on inducting him into the Wen when he was a little older, but that was just so that he could steal the piece after killing Xue Yang.”

“Go find the poor boy and bring him back, A-Ning, Muye,” Popo Wei said.

She shook her head and sighed as they scampered off to do exactly that even though Su She yelled at them to come back, and Wei Qing ran after them to stop them. Oh well. At least with Wei Qing along, Xue Yang should get some proper medical care. Probably.

“Ugh,” Su She complained. “I don’t know what we’re going to do to get the last piece from the Xuanwu of Slaughter. I mean, it’s not a rush or anything. The damned thing is just sleeping in a cave right now. But we will have to deal with it eventually.”

“Let it wait,” Popo Wei advised.

“Agreed,” Lianmin said. She snorted. “I’m sure there will be many things to deal with once you ease the barriers guarding Yiling.”

“Truer words.” Su She sighed before letting himself relax.

Yeah, there was a lot that needed to be done. And the Jianghu was probably going to be stupid about him and the Su Sect and Yiling. They were definitely going to lose their little pea-brains over the Burial Mounds, not that Su She intended to give them much of anything about the Burial Mounds.

None of those idiots could be trusted with the full depth of what Xue Chonghai had created.

By the time Wei Ning, Muye and Wei Qing returned with Xue Yang ten days later, Su She felt like himself again. He’d regained his strength, read so many scrolls without a single interruption that he was about to twitch right out of his own skin at how odd it was to be able to read uninterrupted, and lowered the defenses around Yiling in slow bits by bits. All the while waiting for armies to appear on their doorsteps.

“He’s mine now,” Wei Qing announced as Xue Yang peered around her at Su She. “I’ve adopted him. Go on. Give it to him.”

“…He’s not so special,” Xue Yang said around the huge piece of candied kumquat in his mouth.

Xue Yang was a little kid. A maybe ten-year-old kid with one finger missing on his hand, a suspicious glare, and a manic look in his eyes that Su She knew entirely too well from the future that wasn’t. Someone, somewhere, was getting bitten in the very near future if Xue Yang had anything to say about it.

“No, I’m really not,” Su She agreed. “No biting her. She has needles and she’s not afraid to use them.”

Xue Yang cackled. “I know! It’s amazing! Qing-ma is the best.”

Both Wei Ning and Muye gazed at Wei Qing, eyes shining with awe. She huffed and swatted towards Xue Yang who grinned as he lobbed a qiankun pouch to Su She. Before it landed in his hands, Su She could feel the Yin Iron chunk.

“Oh,” Su She breathed as he cupped the pouch gently. “Oh, yeah. We’ll take care of him. I promise.”

The Yin Iron chunk hummed as it worked the qiankun pouch open all on its own. Resentful energy poured off of it because of course it did. Of course it did. This piece was all about taking care of the children of Xue Chonghai. It had been taking care of his last descendants for generations. Now that Xue Yang was safely back in the Burial Mounds, it could finally rest.

“What did you do?” Xue Yang yelled as Su She carefully set the depleted Yin Iron on the ground and fired up two of the clay talismans to melt it.

“It’s job is done,” Su She explained. “You’re here. You’re home. You’re safe. That’s all it wanted. Now it gets to rest and just be metal again.”

It was, of course, not a good enough explanation for Xue Yang. Every time Xue Yang saw Su She, Xue Yang bit him, the little asshole. Literally every time. Su She collected a whole set of semi-permanent bite marks until six days later when Xue Yang snuck into his loft and tried to bite him in the middle of the night.

Su She bit him back.

Lianmin scolded them both for behaving like toddlers and wild animals. They both ran for it and ended up hiding with General Kwan until the sun rose, after which Xue Yang decided that Su She wasn’t all that bad.

Which was fine. At least his bite marks started fading before Meng Yao appeared on the steps of the teahouse while Su She was sorting through a solid mountain of mail that Jiang Xiandao had brought. Three enormous qiankun bags full of mail, no less.

“Sorry, we have to make the bags bigger and charge more for them when there’s this much mail,” Jiang Xiandao said as Su She grumbled at her while counting out some of their precious money to pay for the stupidly huge bags that didn’t need to be that big just so that they could hold more mail in them.

“You do not,” Su She complained. “Here. Make them this way and use sturdy fabric instead. It’ll work way better.”

Su She pulled Jiang Xiandao down beside him and taught her how to make qiankun pouches properly. When he looked up from that about a shichen later, Meng Yao had all the mail sorted out, organized and most of it was already answered.

“Thanks, Meng Furen,” Muye said as he marched off to deliver the stuff that was for the locals. “Laozu Su, Lianmin and Popo Wei are working with Du Xilin on where to put your house. Meng Furen’s already designed it, so you don’t have to worry. We’ll get it all taken care of for you.”

“You’re not–!” Su She spluttered as his face went blazingly hot. “That’s not–! I’m not–!”

Meng Yao smirked and raised one eyebrow. “Am I not yours? I must have misunderstood. My mistake.”

“Don’t you start with me,” Su She said, wagging a finger over the neat stacks of mail as laughter welled up. “You give these people an inch, they’re going to take a mile. Or give one. I mean, seriously, they keep trying to steal my linen robes and give me silk ones instead.”

Meng Yao laughed into his sleeve. “One can’t beat the wisdom of the masses, Zhiji. You’d best just give in. Now, I’ve put all the letters from Teacher Qiren in this stack. Chen Da gave me a stack of them, plus several copied books for you. They’re in the little qiankun pouch, the red one. The sect leaders’ letters are in this stack. Nothing for you to worry about there. And then you have several offers of marriage that I’m already dealing with.”

“You do that,” Su She said as he grabbed Lan Qiren and Chen Da’s stuff.

Mostly because he could have easily spent the next six years staring at Meng Yao’s face as he created order of the chaos of Su She’s mail. It was…

… perfect. Absolutely perfect having Meng Yao there.

Somewhere on his way to Yiling, Meng Yao had exchanged his Nie green robes for simple ones in black, grey and red. Instead of a red ribbon tying his hair back, he had that same hat that he’d worn in the future that wasn’t, just without all the fancy gold trim. It fit a lot better with the Yiling Su robes than it ever had with the Jin golden robes.

He fit. Meng Yao just fit perfectly into Yiling and into Su She’s life. It was like he’d been there all along.

“Read your mail, Zhiji,” Meng Yao said, eyes sparkling with laughter that only came out in the dimples on his chin.

Su She laughed. “Yeah, I know. Just glad you’re here finally.”

“I’ll be here from now on,” Meng Yao said, low and far more serious than any of the normal gossipy nonsense going on around them. His eyes were dark, calm, and so very certain. It was like he was looking straight through Su She, to the future that wasn’t and this new life that they had unfolding before them.

“I hope so,” Su She murmured. He reached out and hooked one finger around Meng Yao’s index finger.

“Believe me,” Meng Yao promised as he wound their fingers together. “I’m at your side for now on. No one and nothing is going to take me away.”

18. In Which There is a Postscript of Sorts Wherein Su She Regrets All His Life Choices, Except Not

Su She rubbed his forehead in a vain effort to quell the headache that had bloomed behind his left eye. “Okay, so let me get this straight. Instead of asking for help like you’ve been taught, you ran off by yourself to go attack a giant murder turtle in Wen territory.”

“Yep,” Xue Yang agreed cheerfully.

He’d lost a couple of teeth, one eye was so swollen that Su She wasn’t sure even Wei Qing could save it, and his left arm was strapped to his chest because he’d broken his shoulder so badly.

“And you,” Su She said turning to Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng, both of whom were battered, bruised and bloody, “saw him in the street on the way there and thought it was a great idea to not stop the thirteen-year-old kid from attacking the giant murder turtle in Wen territory.”

Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng exchanged looks and then nodded with a wild grin and a scowl, respectively.

“Then you,” Su She said turning to Wang Lingjiao who was on crutches and who’d clearly been smashed against something hard on the left side given all the bruises on her face, arm and her broken left leg, “saw the three of them as they were searching for the giant murder turtle in Wen territory, and decided to, what? Help them attack it? Instead of, oh, I don’t know, telling someone about the giant murder turtle like a sane person would?”

“That about covers it, yeah,” Wang Lingjiao said with a toss of her head that made her flinch. The words came out all mushy but defiant.

Su She sighed as he turned to Wen Ruohan who was covered head to toe in stinky, nasty, disgusting slime while clutching a Yin Iron sword that snickered at them all.

“And finally,” Su She said, watching a blush slowly rising under the muck on Wen Ruohan’s cheeks, “you decided after tracking the four of them to the cave with the giant murder turtle that oh, hey, I’m totally going to dive into battle against said giant murder turtle and grab the deeply resentful Yin Iron sword possessed by hundreds of thousands of resentful dead even though you still haven’t recovered from being possessed by the Yin Iron chunk. Am I right about that?”

Wen Ruohan hummed. His lips twitched as he slowly nodded as if he was thinking about it. There was blood dripping down the handle of the Yin Iron sword so clearly he’d hurt himself somehow on the damned thing.

“Yes, I’d say you summed it up perfectly,” Wen Ruohan agreed.

Su She turned to Meng Yao who was laughing so hard that he’d gone wheezy as tears dripped down his cheeks. “You see? You see what I was talking about? Give these idiots one inch! One single little inch and they go do the stupidest things! Gimme that thing, you moron. Sit down before you fall down.”

Su She snatched the Yin Iron sword out of Wen Ruohan’s hand, already bellowing for the Wei doctors to come help. They’d all come on the hunt for their idiot child, of course, after Xue Yang disappeared on them. Their thirteen-year-old murder-child who decided to “prove himself” by getting the last bit of Yin Iron before Su She could.

Seriously, so many idiots. Why did he have to deal with all of this? Fuck his life!

“Come on, Zhiji,” Meng Yao wheezed as he patted Su She’s shoulder. “Let’s deal with the last bit of Yin Iron.”

“So many idiots,” Su She complained. “Why are they my problem? What did I ever do to deserve this? Don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.”

Meng Yao snickered, warm and solid next to Su She.

Yeah, he didn’t need anyone to answer that question. It was all worth it, every single bit of it, just to be there with his zhiji in the bright Qishan sunshine as they dealt with the final remnants of Xue Chonghai’s Yin Iron.

It was all worth it.

…

“Xue Yang! Don’t you fucking dare bite Wen Ruohan—you are thirteen fucking years old, not two! I swear, I’m going to boot your ass to the moon if you keep this up!”

#

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