Reading Time: 97 Minutes

Title: Lord of the Yiling Peak
Author: MeyariMcFarland
Fandom: MDZS/The Untamed
Genre: Crossover, Drama, Fantasy, Hurt/Comfort, Paranormal/Supernatural, Romance, Suspense
Relationship(s): Lan Zhan / Wei Ying
Content Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Rape/Non-con/Dub-con, Torture, Violence-Graphic, child sexual abuse (discussion of), canon war and aftermath, human sacrifice, murder
Author Note: While this story is a crossover between MDZS and SVSS, the body of the story is focused on MDZS. Four key characters show up in end notes on each chapter, sort of like the chorus in Greek plays. I changed Wei Wuxian / Wei Ying quite a bit too, which will become clear in the story as he comes into his heritage. Other than that, most of the really horrible things happen off-screen and in the past, though some truly terrible things are discussed. Mind the warnings, please, and take care of yourself.
Word Count: 103,065
Summary: It could have started as the rain poured down on them all, washing away blood and stirring up mud as Lan Zhan stood their sad and noble in the darkness of the night. It didn’t. It started when Wei Ying was a kid on the streets of Yiling. It started when Madame Yu beat him with Zidian and left him bleeding through his torn clothes. It started when Wen Chao threw him off his sword and down into the swirling wails of torment that was the Burial Mounds. Qiongqi Path was just the point where Wei Ying finally followed the path he’d been offered years before.
Artist: Spennig Aisling

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22. Private Meeting

The best thing about Nie Huaisang “courting” A-Jie was that Jiang Cheng didn’t have to worry about A-Jie suddenly leaving the Jiang for some asshole who wouldn’t honor the connection to the Jiang. After all, neither Jin Guangshan nor fucking Sect Leader Yao thought the Jiang were worth spending time on. And Sect Leader Yao’s sons were worse than Jin Zixun, which was horrifying to realize after the fact.

The next best thing about it was that Nie Mingjue was making the biggest of big fusses over the courtship, to the point that Jiang Cheng was kind of worried about when A-Jie and Nie Huaisang called it off. He’d gotten letters and visits from virtually everyone, other than Jin Guangshan, the asshole, congratulating him on A-Jie attracting such an important suitor.

Yeah, the peacock had sent his great-uncle, Jin Ruotian, over for a day-long visit that amounted to Jin Ruotian being all dismissive about the peacock’s ability to rule anything and his total inability to be a real boy, but that was it from the Jin.

Jiang Cheng had been so glad to see the back of Jin Ruotian. The guy had always given him the creeps. There was just something wrong with that man, above and beyond the normal casual corruption of the Jin Sect.

The problem with it all was that Jiang Cheng hadn’t had a chance to just sit down and scream into his hands about Wei Wuxian still being missing since it all started up.

Where the fuck had Wei Wuxian gone? None of Jiang Cheng’s spies had heard a peep. No one out on the rivers had seen hide nor hair of him. While the entire Jianghu was talking about Wei Wuxian and the still utterly missing Wen remnants, all they had to say was that they were still missing.

Utterly useless.

Also completely frustrating and Jiang Cheng couldn’t get enough time alone to have a private little fit about it.

At least Lan Xichen agreed with Jiang Cheng that some private pity party and screaming into the void time was needed. He was a bigger mess than Jiang Cheng was.

At least Lan Xichen’s sect let him be a worthless mess. Lan Xichen got to be pale and obviously not sleeping well. His hands could shake visibly.

If Jiang Cheng showed a single sign of how fucking worried he was, the entire damned Jianghu lost their minds, starting with Yeung Kun, his new First Disciple, and spreading outwards from there. Thus Lan Xichen had sat his elegant ass opposite Jiang Cheng in his office for their little pity party.

The window shutters were closed. The door was shut. They had a pot of excessively sweet tea, for Lan Xichen, and a pot of really good wine, for Jiang Cheng. Both of them were chugging their drinks without tasting them.

“I am so…!” Jiang Cheng made a strangling gesture with his free hand.

“Oh, yes,” Lan Xichen sighed. He threw back his too-sweet tea and poured another cup with a mournful look. “No news. None. I’m so…!”

“That,” Jiang Cheng agreed, waggling a finger at Lan Xichen. “That exactly!”

Next to them, Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang watched with puzzlement and delighted amusement, respectively. Jiang Cheng glared at Nie Huaisang.

He promptly hid behind his fussy little fan.

“You be quiet,” Jiang Cheng snarled at Nie Huaisang. “Aren’t you supposed to be out there courting?”

“Jiang Yanli asked that I spend some time with you, actually,” Nie Huaisang said from behind his fan. It didn’t hide the grin-wrinkles around his eyes. “She’s making a special meal and didn’t want me to see it before it was done.”

Jiang Cheng stared at Nie Huaisang for a long moment. When he turned to Nie Mingjue, to his surprise Nie Mingjue flinched.

“If that asshole actually successfully courts my sister, he’s marrying into the Jiang,” Jiang Cheng said.

“It’s not serious!” Nie Huaisang protested, apparently seriously.

Jiang Cheng turned to Lan Xichen who sighed and shook his head in disappointment at both Nie Huaisang and Nie Mingjue. They both blushed and looked guilty over it. Amazing.

“She’s cooking for you,” Jiang Cheng explained in his talking to idiots and Sect Leader Yao voice. “You, in particular. That’s the very definition of serious. A-jie only cooks for the people she cares about. To make a whole meal is the same as, as…”

“As you designing, having embroidered and then delivering personally a dress made specifically for her,” Lan Xichen said entirely too mildly. “With all the jewelry and ornaments. From silk you had set aside to be dyed to your personal specifications.”

“That dress was…?” Jiang Cheng wheezed before pouring himself another cup of wine that he poured straight down his throat. “Fuck. I mean it. He’s marrying in to the Jiang. I’m not giving up another sibling. The only reason I entertained it before was Mom setting the betrothal up before A-Jie was even born. It will not happen this time.”

Nie Mingjue didn’t respond to Jiang Cheng, probably because he was too busy staring at Nie Huaisang in shock. “You used your betrothal silk? And didn’t tell me? Huaisang!”

Huaisang ducked entirely behind his fan this time. “I can get new betrothal silk! Nothing else was good enough for Yanli’s design.”

“When did you two move to a personal name basis?” Nie Mingjue spluttered, voice going up two octaves.

Jiang Cheng leaned back and watched, somewhat mollified by Nie Mingjue’s horror. Good. Someone else had stupid drama going on. He felt better now. Slightly drunk, but better. Lan Xichen smiled as he watched Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang. He’d put down his tea and picked up the little bowl of sweet snacks that A-Jie had provided, munching away at them with a brighter expression than normal.

Huh. Not a bad idea, that. Jiang Cheng set to work on his little bowl of salty snacks though he didn’t stop drinking. Slowed down, set his core to working on the alcohol already in his system, but he didn’t stop.

“Sect Leader!” Yeung Kun bellowed loudly enough to shut Nie Huaisang’s wailing about how nice and sweet and kind and gentle and utterly ruthless A-Jie was.

She slammed the door open, eyes wide. For one moment he thought that she was wide-eyed because of the four of them.

Then he heard the screaming.

“What did Wei Wuxian do now?” Jiang Cheng snarled as he left the pity party and surged to his feet.

A solid swirl of his core canceled the vast majority of the alcohol, thank fuck. Lan Xichen was on his feet, too, though it took a moment longer for the Nie brothers to get up.

“How did you know?” Yeung Kun spluttered at him.

“You’ve barely met him,” Jiang Cheng said as he shoved his way past her. “There’s a certain sound to the chaos he causes and that is it.”

It really was, too. Screaming, sure, but there were excited shouts and people shouting bets and the inevitable splashes of people getting shoved into the river, followed by spluttering and laughter. A Wei Wuxian disaster never, ever sounded like any other kind of disaster.

“Where?” Jiang Cheng demanded as he headed towards the chaos with Lan Xichen on one side and Yeung Kun on the other.

“The longest pier,” Yeung Kun said, trotting to keep up with their longer legs. “He’s got Lan Wangji with him in weird green robes and the biggest twisted-fang bi-viper I’ve ever seen. It’s enormous.”

While Lan Xichen made a surprised noise at the news that his ice-block of a brother was there, Jiang Cheng braced himself for a really big bi-viper. That his brother had apparently, given that no one was gurgling screams as they died in agony, tamed.

“Oh,” Jiang Cheng breathed, stumbling over his feet as he turned the corner and saw the bi-viper. “You meant legendary monster size, not unusually large.”

“Uh, yeah,” Yeung Kun said. She sensibly didn’t edge past Jiang Cheng. That would mess with his aim if he had to pull Zidian. “Sorry. We’re all a bit rattled. They appeared out of thin air.”

Jiang Cheng drew in a breath and then let it out slowly.

Yeah, his brother was back. And so was his chaos.

“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng bellowed as if they were on a battlefield and Wei Wuxian was about to be eaten by his own undead troops.

Every single veteran reacted by getting the fuck out of the way, even though a few had to leap right into the river to do it.

“Jiang Cheng!” Wei Wuxian called back with a bright grin and a cheery wave. “Sorry for not sending a warning that we were coming. It’s all kind of complicated.”

He had on his normal black and red robes. His hair was up in his normal ponytail. But that was about the only thing normal about the scene.

Wei Wuxian looked… healthy. Well-rested. The hollows of his cheeks, something that Jiang Cheng had thought was a permanent fixture since the war, had filled out. His bird’s nest hair had been properly oiled and combed, making it look somewhat respectable for once.

And those robes!

Cut in an ancient style with sleeves designed for combat, they were gorgeous heavy silk brocade that would pay for rebuilding the southern pier if they were sold at the open market. Instead of the Jiang lotus, these robes had three bamboo stalks embroidered in bright red on the shoulders and the belt. Six layers, too, in varying shades of red, grey and black.

Lan Wangji had even more elaborate robes in white and very pale green. He looked like an especially cold-faced bamboo spirit in them. The gauzy over-robes, three layers edged in silk so fine that Jiang Cheng’s fingers twitched to get to examine them, had such delicate embroidery on it that it had to have been done by someone with at least fifty years of mastery in the art.

Which completely ignored the fucking monstrous bi-viper watching Jiang Cheng with narrowed eyes. Because it had eyelids on all four of its eyes. What the fuck?

That was not a bi-viper. Whatever it was, it was big and dangerous and clearly smart as hell, but it was not a bi-viper.

“What. The. Fuck?” Jiang Cheng asked as he slowly, cautiously, approached his idiot-genius of a brother.

Wei Wuxian grinned. “Long story. I always meant to tell you and A-Jie about it, but it was never safe with Uncle Fengmian and Madame Yu around.”

Jiang Cheng sucked a breath between his clenched teeth. Then he reached out and pulled Wei Wuxian into a bone-creakingly tight hug that Wei Wuxian gave back with all his strength. Which was wow, a lot better than it had been before he ran off with the Wen remnants.

“Tell me you’re safe,” Jiang Cheng muttered into Wei Wuxian’s shoulder as the Lans had their own fiercely hugged reunion.

“I am totally safe, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said in the real, honest, true voice. He blushed a little when Jiang Cheng pulled back to frown at him. “I mean it. My hideout is so secure that no one can get to it. And we’ve got plenty of shelter, food and clothes. I mean, it’s old clothing, but the stasis spells were really well set so it’s all still good.”

“Right,” Jiang Cheng said, relieved. “Good. I’m glad. I mean, I’m going to get punched when I demote Yeung Kun back to Second Disciple, but at least you’re back.”

Wei Wuxian took half a step back as his eyes flared red and his expression went sad and apologetic. Before he even said it, Jiang Cheng knew what was coming. From the way Lan Wangji stepped away from Lan Xichen and back to Wei Wuxian’s side, both of them had already made their choice no matter what anyone had to say about it.

“I’m so sorry, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said as he wrung his hands, and the red faded out of his eyes. “But I can’t come back. I have a responsibility to my new sect. I can’t abandon it.”

The bi-viper’s narrowed eyes and threatening loom were about the only thing that kept Jiang Cheng from exploding at Wei Wuxian. Lan Xichen looked like he was about to burst into tears, because he got to do that, the asshole.

He wasn’t coming back. Wei Wuxian was never, ever coming back to the Jiang.

“Was that new sect as in you joined a different sect, or is that new sect as in you’re forming a new sect?” Nie Huaisang asked from behind Nie Mingjue who had his saber out and at the ready just in case the legendary monster of a bi-viper turned out to be a threat instead of Wei Wuxian’s bodyguard.

“Ah, well, that is…” Wei Wuxian said so hesitantly that Jiang Cheng stared at him, aghast.

“His own,” Lan Wangji replied for Wei Wuxian. “I will be Furen. Will not leave Wei Ying’s side.”

For one too-long moment, silence hung in the air.

Then everyone in the water and on the pier other than Jiang Cheng and the giant bi-viper shouted “What?”

Yeah, there was just a particular flavor to a Wei Wuxian disaster.

Jiang Cheng sighed. At least the asshole was alive. That was probably all he could ask for.

#

In the Demon Realm:

SQQ, poring over stacks of books: All right, yes, he could possibly have his demonic blood waking up. According to the notes your father left behind, the more the blood worms spread to other cherished people, the more likely it is that the Heavenly Demon blood will stir within the originator.

LBH stares at the mirror: …he’s got himself. A-Yuan. Wei Qing and Wei Ning. Popo. Lan Wangji. Jiang Cheng. Jiang Yanli. Maybe half the Wen remnants have touches of his blood worms.

SQQ: Don’t forget that he’ll have interacted with and maybe bled on a bunch of people during the war. They may only have the tiniest touches right now, but the more he interacts with them and the stronger his blood gets, the more it will strengthen inside of him.

LBH: *laughs in disbelief* He’s going to accomplish all my father’s goals without even trying.

SQQ: As if. He’s not interested in ruling anything, and he doesn’t have the slightest clue about the various spheres. No, he’ll do something much less predictable once his power fully wakes.

LBH brightens and beams at the mirror, utterly delighted by the chaos going on around WWX and LWJ.

23. New Sect

Wei Ying winced as everyone started shouting at him. It wasn’t just the Jiang disciples listening in being aghast at losing their First Disciple. No, the Nie disciples shouted like they got to have an opinion. Nie Mingjue did this bellow that was far too much like an angry bull while Nie Huaisang clung to his arm and shouted something about “how could you?”, as if he was one to talk.

Nie Huaisang was courting Shijie. He had no room for scolding anyone for choosing to follow a new sect.

Even the dock workers and various servants looking around corners and staring at the confrontation from their ships started shouting. So much noise, all of it directed at Wei Ying and him with no way to really explain things without giving away the entire deal.

Yeah, that was just about what he expected. Shouting and recriminations and Lan Zhan getting all defensive as Snake-gege moved to put his tail between Wei Wuxian and everyone else.

Jiang Cheng didn’t yell at all.

He just stared at Wei Ying with his “so very done with your bullshit” face that always came out when things went sideways on Wei Ying.

Fair. Everything truly had gone sideways on him lately. Spectacularly.

Snake-gege put his tail firmly between Wei Ying and everyone else, looming high overhead in that pose that promised venom spit in people’s faces followed by a surge at them to swallow bodies whole. Not that Snake-gege would eat people.

Here. Right now. Eating a big meal would make Snake-gege sleepy and he was very much on duty so yeah, no eating currently.

Later was a different story.

“Enough!” Jiang Cheng bellowed overtop everyone else’s shouting.

Silence echoed until one of the swallows under the eaves chirped hesitantly.

“A new sect,” Jiang Cheng said, staring at Wei Ying over Snake-gege’s tail. “With the Wen. And Lan Wangji. And the snake, I assume?”

“Well, of course Snake-gege is included,” Wei Ying huffed. “He saved my life and kept me company after my parents died. Snake-gege’s a very good person for that he’s, you know, a snake.”

“That is not a bi-viper,” Jiang Cheng said. “Not with eyelids.”

“No, of course not,” Wei Ying agreed even though Snake-gege started and then quivered like he wanted to hide somewhere. “But he’s still a snake, even if he’s not a bi-viper. He’s just more than a snake. He’s a very good boy despite how scary he looks to everyone else.”

Jiang Cheng sighed and rubbed his forehead. “…Right. Well, that’s lovely and all, but how are you going to support this new sect of yours? Feed and clothe them and teach them?”

“That’s…” Wei Ying paused and considered saying “not a problem”, but that would just get him a glare and scolding. “A secret. I mean, I’m absolutely going to tell you, Jiang Cheng. Just not publicly. On the other hand, I do have some samples I wanted you to look at. Because there are trade possibilities.”

While the Nie looked appalled, all the Jiang perked up. All the sword-waving, horrified-face-making shifted into intense curiosity. One couldn’t be Jiang and not react to trade possibilities. It was trained into them all from the earliest days. Pretty much everyone in town responded the same way.

Wei Ying flung himself on top of Snake-gege’s tail like he used to when he was little, holding out the little samples of silk that he’d brought from Cang Qiong. Popo had found the stores on An Ding. There was more than enough fabric so they could trade some of it. Plus there were looms and spun silk and instruction manuals on how to make more that some of the women had been delighted by.

None of them were master weavers. All of them were determined to become masters of these particular silks, no matter how hard they had to work at it. Add that to the manuals on how to make the dyes and how to process eighteen different sorts of plants and spiritual animals to produce silk and they were going to have a thriving trade in high quality fabric very, very soon.

Or just some really lovely robes.

Either worked.

“See, this one is amazing,” Wei Ying said as he lay half-over Snake-gege’s tail despite the way Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes, and the rest of the Jiang stared at him with horror. The Nie, on the other hand, looked like their souls had just left their bodies. Even Nie Huaisang gaped at Wei Ying, pale-faced and shaking.

“Gimme those,” Jiang Cheng grumbled as he snatched them out of Wei Ying’s hand. “Wait. Wow. Okay, you’re not kidding. These are stunning. How…? Brocade this fine? Who the fuck is spinning this thread? And the dyes on this green are unreal.”

“Three different shades of green” Wei Ying agreed, pointing to the way it shifted color as Jiang Cheng moved the sample in his hands. “Two-toned dye in a… probably random pattern on the warp? Not sure yet. And a very deliberate pattern of two tones on the weft. I found one that I thought about bringing where they used that kind of two-tone dye in an ikat so fine that it’s pictures are the size of mosquitoes.”

Jiang Cheng stared at Wei Ying, mouth hanging open.

“Are you serious right now?” Nie Huaisang asked, startling the sparrows over his head into flight.

“About the fabric or what?” Wei Ying asked.

“You’re lying on top of a titanic bi-viper that’s definitely not a bi-viper because no, they do not have eyelids,” Nie Huaisang said in his snippy about to start hitting people with full Nie strength tone. “While Lan Wangji stands there in the wrong color robes and doesn’t haul you away from the snake. Who clearly understands every single word we’re all saying.”

“Well, yeah,” Wei Ying agreed, shrugging a little as he wiggled to get more comfortable. “I told you. Snake-gege is a good boy. He’s very sweet and kind. Quite shy, too. But he’s also incredibly deadly, venomous and fought in a long-ago war, defeating whole armies. He can be both. I mean, you can both be a useless bit of fluff and a strategic genius.”

Nie Huaisang squeaked and went beet red. “I am not! You take that back!”

Wei Ying laughed at him.

“Look, no matter what else is going on, I had to come make sure that Jiang Cheng and Shijie were okay,” Wei Ying said reasonably. He could be reasonable. “And Lan Zhan had to make sure that his brother knew that he was okay. There’s a bunch of other stuff to discuss, including trade possibilities that I’m not divulging in public, but the core of it is that our families were worried, Shijie is apparently serious about you, and well, neither of us could stay away forever. Snake-gege came along to make sure that we were safe.”

Wei Ying patted Snake-gege’s tail fondly, laughing at the way Snake-gege quivered like he wanted to curl up into a small mountain of embarrassed snake with just the tip of his snout poking out from under his coils.

He didn’t, of course. No room.

The really weird part was the none of the Nie had commented about how little of Snake-gege was over the surface of the water. The vast majority of his body was safely under in the river, hiding the actual length of him. He’d expected at least a comment or two about that.

“Right,” Jiang Cheng said, still studying the fabric samples. “Moon pavilion. Your Snake-gege can curl up around it and keep watch while we talk.”

“Good,” Wei Ying said, beaming. “Thanks, Jiang Cheng.”

Of course, it wasn’t as simple as just walking down the pier, across several walkways and then out along the moon pavilion’s pier. No, the Nie had to be made to stand down. Then they had to be sent back to what they were doing, which apparently was training with the Jiang seniors while the juniors cheered them on.

That couldn’t happen because all the juniors had to come and cluster around Wei Ying to make sure that he was feeling better and not drunk and really, truly was not going to come back to the Jiang. Then the Seniors needed to awkwardly congratulate him on getting engaged to “his” Lan Zhan. Quite a few of them cackled as they ran away from his shaken fist in their general direction.

After which the servants had to come fuss over him and get distracted by the new robes. So many questions about the robes. A few shouted from merchants and sailors on the neighboring ships.

All while Snake-gege made the water vibrate with how much he Did Not Like these people getting close to Wei Ying. But Lan Zhan was right there next to Wei Ying to make sure that no one stabbed him, punched him, glared too hard at him, or even teased him too much. Lan Zhan had a glare that could cut through armor when he really meant it. The old glares back in the Cloud Recesses had nothing on these.

Eventually, though, they made it to the Moon pavilion where Shijie tackled Wei Ying at the door for a hug and crying and all kinds of whispered apologies from both of them. Not that Shijie had anything to apologize for. Ever. She was perfect and always would be, even if she did decide to settle down with Nie Huaisang.

Still better than the peacock. Probably.

Either way, they all settled down inside the moon pavilion with Lan Zhan guarding Wei Ying and Snake-gege curled protectively around the pavilion just under the surface of the water. His nostrils and top set of eyes peeked over the water, but that was it. The rest of Snake-gege’s bulk was a dark, threatening shadow just out of sight.

Nie Mingjue being Nie Mingjue, he hadn’t been happy to be excluded from the pavilion. Or pleased that there were secrets that Wei Ying wasn’t willing to tell him. Yet. Maybe ever? Probably eventually, just not quite yet.

Nie Huaisang being Nie Huaisang, no one else knew about the mirror communication.

And Lan Xichen just stood at the end of the pier, shaking with the need to wrap himself around Lan Zhan and keep him safe.

So yeah, definitely needed to keep this portion of the discussion short.

“All right, what the hell?” Jiang Cheng demanded once Lan Zhan put up a privacy talisman so that Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang couldn’t hear them.

“Okay, so, you know how Uncle Fengmian couldn’t find me when I was little?” Wei Ying said.

“Yeah, we heard about it every damned day,” Jiang Cheng agreed with his frustrated, impatient scowl that preceded lots of yelling if he didn’t get answers in very short order.

“A-Cheng,” Shijie said as she put a quelling hand on his wrist. “We remember, A-Xian.”

“That’s because I found a safe place accidentally,” Wei Ying said. “I’d been attacked by wild dogs and was kind of dying at the time but there was an old stone marker that I drew on with my blood as I waited for the dogs to come back. The marker opened a gate into a safe place and that’s where I met Snake-gege.”

Neither of them got it. Their confusion showed in their eyes, in the side glances to each other.

Wei Ying leaned forward. “It’s Cang Qiong. The long-lost, hidden twelve peak sect, Cang Qiong. I didn’t know it when I was little. We figured it out when I brought the Wen there. It was all put in stasis and locked away until someone, me obviously, met the requirements to get back in. Cang Qiong requires a sect leader. It chose me. Lan Zhan insists on staying at my side. But, Shijie, Jiang Cheng, there are so many things there. Books and fabric and just… so many things out of legend. Heart’s Ease grows there. Wild. And a bunch of other herbs and medicines.”

“Holy fuck,” Jiang Cheng whispered. “Seriously?”

“Yeah,” Wei Ying confirmed. “We can’t tell the Nie yet. And the Lan elders are a problem. I needed to tell you two, though, because we’ll need money and eventually we’ll need to interact with the outside world. I trust you. I trust the Jiang. Lan Zhan trusts his brother.”

“I do not trust the Elders,” Lan Zhan interrupted.

“Fair,” Shijie agreed, granting Lan Zhan a wry smile that he regally nodded back to. “All right. What do you need right now?”

“Let’s get the others in first,” Wei Ying said. “Because there’s a way we can communicate. It just takes mirrors. We used it to talk to Nie Huaisang because he’s got mirrors around. No one else does.”

“That little rat,” Jiang Cheng complained. “He swore that he knew nothing.”

“Yeah, no, there’s…” Wei Ying shuddered. “Let’s get the others in here and reset the privacy talismans. There’s too much that they need to know and too much danger looming over all of you.”

#

In the Demon Realm:

Luo Binghe sits on a cushion, eyes half-shut and glowing bright red. His mind is linked to Zhuzhi-Lang’s as they speak telepathically.

LBH: *He’s really just going to tell them?*

ZZL: *…yes? Obviously? That’s why they came?*

LBH: *…Can you please focus on something other than being called a good boy? Please?*

ZZL: *ducks further under the water even though his snake shape does not have the ability to blush*

LBH: *deep sigh*

They return to listening in on the conversation, both of them carefully not paying attention to how they’re listening through WWX’s blood and power, not through ZZL’s.

24. Surprise Visit

It would be delightful if the Jin attracted competent people. A joy, really.

To be able to pass a task on to a trusted and trustworthy subordinate was a dream that Jin Guangyao had given up the day he walked away from the Nie. None of the sect members that Jin Guangyao could call upon were even vaguely trustworthy. Most of them were a threat to themselves as much as they were to others.

The Wen under Wen Ruohan had been worse as they had been murderous as well as untrustworthy and overly complacent about their abilities. And intellect.

Sometimes Jin Guangyao regretted that he hadn’t gone with Lan Xichen when he offered a place among the Lan. He’d been worried that the rules would hem him in, keep him from earning the respect of his father. He’d been such a fool.

There was no way to win his father’s respect. Everything he did now was to clear a place for his own future, no matter how he pitched things to Father. Jin Ruotian had kindly, patronizingly, gently explained the facts to Jin Guangyao the day after he arrived in Koi Tower.

“I know that you thought you were be brought in properly,” Jin Ruotian had said with a sadly sympathetic smile that was so insulting. “I’m sure my nephew told all kinds of lies.”

Jin Guangyao hadn’t allowed the shattering of all his mother’s and his dreams show as he studied Jin Ruotian. “He is quite good at that. Tell the lies, that is. Unfortunately, he’s quite bad at making them believable.”

Jin Ruotian had barked a laugh, waggling a finger in Jin Guangyao’s direction. “Oh, you’re do well. You’ll be at the bottom of the hierarchy, of course, but… well. Things change all the time. My nephew won’t live forever.”

The way he’d said it implied so much about how Jin Guangyao could move up if and when his father died.

He’d been such a fool.

Three days was all it had taken for Jin Guangyao to learn that his father would never die by murder. No knife, no poison, no physical or other attack would ever kill him. Things were not going to change, but it was too late for Jin Guangyao to go anywhere else by then.

It would be so much easier if he hadn’t had to rely on idiots like Jin Zixun. Su She was barely competent at anything, but he did follow orders beautifully. After this little visit, he would make a side trip to make sure that Su She was progressing in his efforts to master demonic cultivation. At least he could trust Su She to work himself into an early grave if given the least little scraps of affection and approval.

The Jiang sect seemed a bit overwrought when Jin Guangyao landed at the gate. Yes, the Nie were visiting, which was very interesting indeed. Yes, they’d clearly had some sort of minor flooding event given that the streets and walkways were awash with water. But there seemed to be more excitement than he would have expected.

“San-ge!” Nie Huaisang exclaimed as he hurried up with Nie Mingjue on his heels like his personal thunderstorm. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

Jin Guangyao waved his guards to relax, not that any single one of them made the slightest effort to pretend that they would defend him against an attack.

“I’m doing a favor for my brother,” Jin Guangyao said with the wry little smile that always made Nie Huaisang most curious. It was like dangling string in front of a kitten.

“Huh, well, that’s interesting,” Nie Huaisang said as he flipped open his fan and promptly turned away. “Good luck with that, San-ge.”

Jin Guangyao allowed his jaw to drop open. When he turned to stare up at Nie Mingjue, that ridiculous mustache of his twitched as he fought off a grin. Worse, the Jiang in the area glared at Jin Guangyao as if they wanted to stab him through the heart.

That, at least, had his so-called honor guard stiffening. Not surrounding him or moving to defensive positions, just looking a bit peeved as they glared back.

“What…?” Jin Guangyao asked Nie Mingjue.

Nie Mingjue sighed and shrugged. “He’s… annoying the hell out of me courting Jiang Yanli. I could’ve sworn that it was a ruse. Sect Leader Yao’s sons were here, you see. But now she’s making him a special meal, and he used his betrothal silk to make her an outfit.”

Jin Guangyao rocked back on his heels in actual shock.

That.

That was not good for his plans. Any of his plans. The Jiang needed to be isolated, not drawing in alliances to the Nie. If Nie Mingjue died now, with Nie Huaisang already halfway into the Jiang, the sect leader’s position would go to their cousin Nie Zonghui, and he was even worse than Nie Mingjue.

“I can’t say that I blame them,” Jin Guangyao said instead of the million other thoughts in his head. “Really? Sect leader Yao’s sons?”

Nie Mingjue’s mustache twitched again. “Sadly, yes. You know how Huaisang gets. He found out about it and decided to “help”. And then Jiang Yanli decided that she needed to properly thank him for the help. And now it looks like I’m going to have to choose someone else as my heir because Jiang Yanli refuses to marry out.”

Jin Guangyao sighed obviously enough as he followed Nie Mingjue’s slow stroll along after Nie Huaisang’s path. “Well, that gives me the answer I was looking for, I suppose. My brother requested that I come and talk to Jiang Yanli for him. I don’t believe that he expected success but…”

His delicate shrug prompted Nie Mingjue to snort a laugh. Not an honest one, not one of those suppressed laughs where he seemed to believe that sect leaders should never show a sense of humor.

No, this was the derisive snort-laugh full of commentary on how stupid people could be and the sheer hopelessness of expecting them to learn from their mistakes.

Fair.

They emerged out onto the piers. Once again, there was a sort of frenetic urgency to the dock workers’ movements. The sect members on this side of Lotus Pier studied Jin Guangyao with blatant suspicion while the sailors on the various docks appeared to be thoroughly distracted by something in the water near the Jiang’s famed moon pavilion.

Actually, what was that in the water?

A slow-moving mass lurked under the surface of the river. Jin Guangyao peered at it, trying to see if it was some kind of debris, a sunken ship perhaps? Except no, even with the patchwork covering of lotus and lily pads blocking his line of sight, he could see that the whatever-it-was was mottled like a snake.

No snake had ever been that big. The barrel of whatever-it-was was wider in diameter than Jin Guangyao was tall. Nie Mingjue could have looked over the top of it, but he would have had to crane his neck a bit to do it.

Actually…

What was that?

A long, slender section slid past them, moving exactly like a snake did with that distinct side-to-side motion. That was… That couldn’t be… Why weren’t the Jiang reacting…?

“Am I… seeing things?” Jin Guangyao asked only to jerk to a stop as the biggest bi-viper that Jin Guangyao had ever seen raised its head out of the water.

“Shit.”

Nie Mingjue sighed as if he was deeply frustrated by the bi-viper’s appearance. He didn’t reach for Baxia. None of the Jiang moved to intercept, nor did the sailors do much more than point at the bi-viper.

Which flicked its forked tongue out at Jin Guangyao. The forked tip of its tongue fluttered around Jin Guangyao’s face while his blood froze solid in his veins and his heart lurched as though it had skipped a beat. The old, old instincts of staying perfectly still so that the bigger, more powerful threat would not find him locked Jin Guangyao’s joints down.

The tongue retracted.

The bi-viper surged straight at him.

Now people screamed. Now Baxia leaped into Nie Mingjue’s hand. Now there were shouted warnings, all of which echoed along with Jin Guangyao’s sour irony that of course it attacked him and only him.

For all of a second or so.

Then the weight of massive coils wrapped around Jin Guangyao, squeezing him so firmly that he could barely breathe.

“Shit!” Nie Mingjue shouted. “Let him go! Let him go, damn it!”

“Snake-gege!” Wei Wuxian shouted from the moon pavilion.

Jin Guangyao gasped as he tried to wrench an arm free so that he could send a butterfly back to Father. If Wei Wuxian was free…!

The bi-viper squeezed Jin Guangyao hard, harder, so hard that he wheezed a groan as he stared up into its four very intent eyes. Which blinked, startling Jin Guangyao into a strangled shout. The bi-viper’s tongue flicked out as it nodded slowly.

Just like a man. Like a human. Like it understood…!

“Snake-gege, we need him alive!” Wei Wuxian said as he flung himself onto the bi-viper’s coils. “A little more air. Jin Guangyao, if you try to send a message or call for help, I’ll let him bite you. And you will not survive if he does.”

Father would… Jin Guangyao wheezed and gasped for air as the topmost coil loosened just barely enough for him to breathe. He thought for one crystalline moment of sending that butterfly anyway, but the bi-viper narrowed its eyes at him and the idea died.

He owed filial duty to his father.

He wanted to live to kill his father himself.

Thus, he had to live.

No matter what.

“I won’t,” Jin Guangyao promised, barely able to get the words out what with how hard the bi-viper squeezed.

“Good,” Wei Wuxian said so grimly that Jin Guangyao actually looked at him. “Because no one will mourn if you die. Might be parties, actually. Loud ones.”

Jin Guangyao tucked the hurt of that slight away deep inside his heart where he kept all the other hurts that he could not afford to react to. Yet.

The bi-viper hissed every so quietly, as quietly as a grass snake the size of Jin Guangyao’s little finger. Such a tiny sound should not come from such a large creature.

Nor should it be that threatening.

“Whatever you just did,” Wei Wuxian said as he sat cross-legged on the bi-viper’s coils, “I recommend that you don’t do that again. Snake-gege is very protective of me. He’s quite dangerous for all that he’s shy and gentle and very good boy.”

“…What?” Jin Guangyao wheezed.

While noticing for the first time the incredibly fine clothes that Wei Wuxian wore. His mother would’ve done a full orgy complete with bondage and floggings to get fabric that finely made. The depth of the black and red dyes was unbelievable, as was the fine patterns in the weave of the fabric itself. Bamboo? It looked like some madman had woven bamboo into the fabric.

Wei Wuxian’s hair was well-kept, if still up in his customary ponytail. The ribbon decorating it was finer silk than Father’s robes. His boots were the same level of quality.

A sect leader. He looked like a sect leader.

“Hm.” Lan Wangji’s judgmental hum made Jin Guangyao jerk against the too-tight coils. “The timing.”

“Yeah, I know, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian agreed.

He didn’t look over his shoulder at Lan Wangji. His eyes stayed firmly on Jin Guangyao with the same sort of consideration as the massive bi-viper holding Jin Guangyao captive. There was… He should… Father would need to know…

But no, there wasn’t a single thing that he could do right now.

Jin Guangyao tucked the burning fury at being trapped and contained away, deep inside where it would not escape. He’d been trapped before. He’d been beaten, threatened with worse, given worse and then laughed at by… far too many more powerful men.

He was still here.

They were not.

He had to keep his wits about him well enough to survive. That was all. Just survival and then he would… figure something out. If this was the sort of power Wei Wuxian commanded then clearly Father was not going to win.

Switching sides made sense. Except that Jin Guangyao may have burned too many bridges in his desperation to get Father’s approval. Nie Mingjue, destroying Lan Xichen’s peace of mind, hunting Wei Wuxian; all of it would make switching sides far more difficult.

Well, he’d just have to survive as best he could.

If he could.

#

In the Demon Realm:

Luo Binghe paces and curses viciously as he listens into Zhuzhi-Lang’s thoughts.

Shen Qingqiu frowns as he comes in and stares at LBH.

SQQ: …What?

LBH: That obsequious little rat is plotting to, to, to ingratiate himself to our great-grandson! He’s, he’s, he’s… *descends into more cursing, this time blackly furious and bloody-minded about all the things he’s going to do to JGY*

SQQ: *raises an eyebrow and studies the situation through the mirror* Ah. I see.

LBH: … Shizun?

SQQ: *smiles sadly as he cups LBH’s cheeks and then kisses the tip of his nose* Binghe, he is nothing at all like you. They all know he’s dangerous and a liar. They won’t trust him. They’ll make sure that he can’t betray them.

LBH: *jaw dropping open* Shizun? You… I don’t think he’s anything like me!

SQQ: No, but he is much like… that other you. Less violent, of course, or at least a bit more circumspect about his violence. Truly, Binghe. They’ll be fine.

LBH: *pales as he considers it* …oh…

SQQ: *nods* Now, come on. MBJ and SQH are here with information on how Yiling is doing.

SQQ leads LBH away from the mirror. LBH looks over his shoulder at the mirror and then narrows his eyes as he tells Zhuzhi-Lang to make sure that there is no possibility of JGY hurting WWX or LWJ, no matter who he has to bite or crush to do it.

He’s gone before Zhuzhi-Lang nods ever so slightly that yes, absolutely. No one is hurting his sweet little didi. Not now. Not ever.

25. Careful Truths

The timing of some people. Wei Ying had barely gotten Nie Mingjue calmed down enough to sit when the juniors had come running with the news that Jin Guangyao had shown up out of the blue. It was like the man had spells on Wei Ying and Lan Zhan to track their movements, though that was ridiculous.

There was no way he could’ve used a teleportation talisman to come to Lotus Pier in time to intercept them because the talisman would’ve flattened him. Given how much work he had to do in Koi Tower, Wei Ying couldn’t imagine that he’d been allowed to lurk, somehow unseen, around Lotus Cove waiting for things to look odd inside Lotus Pier.

Jin Guangyao showing up right then was just pure dumb luck.

Wei Ying’s luck was always just the worst possible or the very best, nothing between.

Either way, he hadn’t gotten to explain anything. He hadn’t been able to tell Nie Mingjue and Jiang Cheng and Lan Xichen about the mirror communication thing. He’d barely even gotten to the point that Nie Huaisang’s voice had stopped threatening to crack glass as he scolded Wei Ying for disappearing and scaring them all.

All his progress in explaining, poof, gone.

So annoying.

And worse, Wei Ying honestly didn’t thing there was a single chance that they would be able to get the truth out of Jin Guangyao. The stories he’d heard from Nie Huaisang and from Jin Zixun were very clear on how smart and how slippery Jin Guangyao was. He’d survived and thrived in Wen Ruohan’s court, after all.

Nothing that Jin Guangyao said could be taken at face value which kind of made Jiang Cheng’s interrogation pointless.

“Sect Leader Jiang,” Jin Guangyao said in that smooth, calm, overly controlled voice, “I’ve already told you that I had no idea anything was going on here. I came specifically because my brother wanted me to speak to Jiang Yanli. Though even he believed it to be a hopeless mission. That was why I brought so few Jin cultivators with me.”

“Like I fucking believe that,” Jiang Cheng huffed. “The first time my brother shows his face, here you are.”

“Actually, I do believe him,” Wei Ying commented from the other side of the “dungeon” room that Jin Guangyao had been shoved into.

It wasn’t a dungeon. It wasn’t even that hard to escape from the room if you could swim. It was just a smaller pavilion set out at the edge of Lotus Pier with especially deep water and some really nasty steelhead fish that lived underneath it.

Go swimming and you’d get badly bitten. Potentially you’d get rammed. Steelheads were notorious for ramming threats to their territory, full speed and full power. Given that their heads were armored, and that their bodies tended to be about as long as Wei Ying was tall, getting rammed could be very Life Ending if you weren’t an excellent swimmer.

Snake-gege lurking under the pavilion waiting to strike definitely made it more secure than normal of course.

Still, there was a barred cell on one side with no window, reasonably solid walls and floor, and a too narrow gap between the top of the wall and the heavy slate roof. Wei Ying’s side had a table and two stools for the guards who usually would sit and play games while they watched over whoever it was until Jiang Cheng was free to pronounce judgment.

“You could help,” Jiang Cheng complained.

“Agreed,” Nie Mingjue rumbled from his spot at the door. He scowled when Lan Zhan narrowed his eyes at him.

“I am helping,” Wei Ying said as he added the last stroke to his new talisman. “This should help more than asking questions that you know he’s going to lie about.”

“I am not lying,” Jin Guangyao said in just snappish enough of a tone for it to be plausible that he was upset.

But he wasn’t trembling or frozen in fear or shouting or even doing that too servile smile of his. It was like there was nothing in particular going on. And given that Nie Mingjue was still trembling ever so slightly from having to actually touch Snake-gege when he took Jin Guangyao hostage, that wasn’t believable.

“Maybe not,” Wei Ying replied as he passed the talisman to Lan Zhan to power up. “But you’re also very carefully sculpting the answers you give us. And we just don’t have the time for that nonsense. I’d like to believe that you’re a good guy. I honestly would. It would make my life so much easier if you were a good, honest, true person. But you’re not. I’ve got too much evidence from the Wen, from Jin Zixun, from Nie Mingjue and Shijie and so many others that says you’re sneaky and smart and very, very dangerous.”

Jin Guangyao rounded his eyes at first. Then he tried frowning. By the end, Jin Guangyao’s face was a perfect blank mask showing no emotion at all.

Yeah. Not someone who could be interrogated easily.

“I was handling this,” Jiang Cheng complained without any real heat as Lan Zhan charged and then stuck the talisman to Jin Guangyao’s chest. “What’s it going to do anyway? And why didn’t you charge it yourself?”

“That is a discussion for privacy,” Wei Ying said, stomach lurching at the thought of explaining it at all. “Besides, Lan Zhan is way fiercer about truth and justice than I am. He’s the best choice to charge it.”

By the time Lan Zhan stepped back, Jin Guangyao had slowly slumped on his blanket covered bench masquerading as a bed. He sucked in a breath as if to say something, then let it sigh out as his pupils dilated.

“There we go,” Wei Ying said, nodding. “How does it feel? Any pain?”

“No,” Jin Guangyao said, one hand drifting up towards the talisman as if he wanted to tear it off. His hand dropped before he got more than a couple fingers’ width off his lap. “I truly do not like this. Wen Ruohan would have loved it. It would have made being his torturer so much easier.”

“Probably,” Wei Ying agreed, jerking his chin at Jiang Cheng to pull back a little. “People forget what you did for Wen Ruohan.”

“I work very hard to make sure that they do,” Jin Guangyao replied with a dreamy, discontent sort of pout. “I don’t want you to remind anyone.”

“I won’t after this,” Wei Ying reassured him. “Did you tell the truth that the peacock just wanted to see if Shijie might rethink dumping him?”

Jin Guangyao sighed and rolled his eyes, though it was more like his eyelids quivered a touch than a proper eyeroll. “Yes. I did. It’s so stupid. Even he thought it was a pointless mission, but Father was irate about Jin Zixun disappearing so getting me out of Koi Tower was expedient. I don’t know how you got him out of the dungeon. It should have been impossible. Jin Ruotian suggested this whole… trip. It’s so pointless.”

Wei Ying nodded that the talisman was working correctly. That was far more than Jin Guangyao would have said normally. Though, honestly, he suspected that Jin Guangyao was still in enough control of himself that he hadn’t said anything significant.

“What did your father do when Jin Zixun was found missing?” Wei Ying asked.

“Ah,” Jin Guangyao winced and shifted uncomfortably on the hard bench. “The guards were killed and converted to fierce corpses by Xue Yang. I was beaten. He threatened to let his friends use me as they used Jin Zixun, but I managed to convince him that it would make doing my job impossible. Which it would have. One cannot work when one has been raped to that degree.”

Both Jiang Cheng and Nie Mingjue’s jaws dropped open.

“Oh,” Jin Guangyao murmured, hand drifting up towards the talisman and then flopping down once more as the talisman forced him to leave it alone. “I don’t like this at all.”

“That’s fair,” Wei Ying said. He waved at Jiang Cheng to keep him from yelling. “It’s an unpleasant thing to have to tell the absolute truth.”

“I’m not sure I would be forced to tell the absolute truth,” Jin Guangyao said thoughtfully. “I’m not sure such a thing exists.”

Wei Ying laughed. “Well, there is that. But your truth as you see it. What does Jin Guangshan want with Shijie?”

Jin Guangyao huffed. “To fuck her, of course. And for her to bear heirs for Jin Zixuan so that his wife will stop badgering him for grandchildren. But mostly to fuck her. He thinks that he can get away with it. It’s like he forgets who Jiang Yanli’s mother was.”

Jiang Cheng hissed as his hands curled into fists. Zidian sparked all along his arm, scorching the wood of the wall behind him.

“And the Wen remnants?” Wei Ying asked as Nie Mingjue tried to calm Jiang Cheng down.

“They’re unimportant, really,” Jin Guangyao said with a flip of his fingers that would probably been a wave had he been in full control of his body. “Father intended to use them to test the techniques we’re studying for demonic cultivation. It’s difficult. Your notes are so very fragmented.”

“You have his notes?” Jiang Cheng demanded.

“Of course,” Jin Guangyao replied with a tiny frown that should have been a scowl. “Not all of them. Father was quite upset that you took portions of them. It’s far more difficult working out the techniques without all the information.”

“All the information was never in my notes,” Wei Ying said, waving at Jiang Cheng to be quiet. “Most of it wasn’t. I never wrote down the key portions of it. I never will. You’re working with Xue Yang. Who else is involved?”

Jin Guangyao shifted again like he wanted to go for the talisman. Or maybe like he wanted to get up and bolt. It did him no good. The talisman subdued his will and left him humming as he leaned back against the wall of the cell.

“Su She, of course,” Jin Guangyao said, distant and dreamy and faintly disgusted. “He fancies himself as in love with me. It makes him easy to control. Father has talked about bringing in another of his bastards, a boy from the Mo family, but so far he hasn’t done it. I hope not. It would make my position much more precarious, especially since I haven’t finalized the plan to kill my brother yet.”

Wei Ying started at the exact same moment that Jin Guangyao’s eyes went wide. This time when his hand headed upwards towards the talisman, it didn’t stop. Before Jiang Cheng could do more than gape and Nie Mingjue suck in a breath to bellow, Wei Ying stood and pulled out Chenqing.

“None of that,” Wei Ying said as he began to play.

Ashy shadows in the cell deepened, stretching out to coil loops around Jin Guangyao’s wrists and ankles. Wei Ying prodded the resentful energy to slide into Jin Guangyao’s channels and meridians. It wasn’t hard. He’d thoroughly stained himself with resentful energy and never done a single thing to mitigate the damage of it.

”Tell us about your plans,” Wei Ying played at Jin Guangyao who gritted his teeth and wheezed through his nose as he tried desperately hard to break free of the talisman and of the resentful energy.

Like that was going to do him a single bit of good. Jin Guangyao obviously was familiar with some little bits of the ghostly path, but he just as obviously hadn’t figured out how it worked as a whole.

No one, especially not Jin Guangyao, was going to turn Wei Wuxian’s own invention against him.

#

In Lotus Cove, just outside the gates to Lotus Pier:

Shang Qinghua shakes his head sadly as he chats up the Jin disciples that Jin Guangyao left behind at the gate: Yeah, no, that’s just the way the upper levels are. You wouldn’t believe some of the nonsense I’ve had to put up with.

SQH: *pauses as MBJ, in his human disguise, sweeps up to fix the Jin disciples with a disapproving glare* Ah. Sorry, I think I have to go now.

Random Jin Disciple #1: Um, of course, of course. Thanks for chatting anyway. The Jiang aren’t exactly being… chatty… today.

SQH as he peers past the Jin towards the Jiang who’re all scurrying about: Mm. Yeah. Noticed that, too. Right, well, gotta go. Good luck!

He waves. Random Jin Disciple #2 waves while #3 and #4 look down their noses at SQH who looks and acts too much like a servant for them.

Random Jin Disciple #1: You, too. Really. Lots of luck to you, too.

SQH hurries off on MBJ’s heels, waiting until they’re out of sight to huff: Why’d you come interrupt? I was getting them to talk.

MBJ: *frowns back towards the river*

SQH: But Zhuzhi’s with them. There shouldn’t be any threats coming… Oh, wait. He wouldn’t just randomly bite, would he?

MBJ: *raises one eyebrow*

SQH: Okay, fine, yes, it wouldn’t be random. It would be very targeted. I’m just surprised it’s coming to… *pauses as WWX’s dizi playing sounds over the town* that. Oh. Right. Let’s head back to see what they want us to do. If anything.

MBJ teleports them back to the Demon Realm between steps, fortunately not when anyone is looking their way.

26. Studied Lies

Ash clouds full of red sparks surrounded Jin Guangyao, blotting out the sun, the night pearl over Wei Wuxian’s table, every bit of light in the cell. He descended into total darkness, jerking against Wei Wuxian’s power and the horrible, terrifying, violation of the talisman on his chest.

The resentful energy pushed inwards on his skin, his qi, his teeth, eyes, nose, ears. Every desperate panting breath let more slip into his body to stain his soul. Screams filled his ears, distant, close, battering against his teeth as they attempted to get into him by any means possible.

It felt oily. Like being drenched in overly warm oil, not boiling but just a hair too warm so that it slid across his skin like a film laid down by a continuous stream poured over his head. Head and cheeks and throat and inside his throat, choking off any sort of scream he wanted to make.

Loud, hot, vile…

Xue Yang was nothing like this. Nothing. Jin Guangyao jerked his qi the way that always let him break free from Wen Ruohan and Xue Yang’s control.

Wei Wuxian’s grip tightened.

Coils of looping resentful energy slithered up his arms and legs to wrap around his torso as tightly as the bi-viper had. Air. He needed air. He couldn’t breathe.

It wasn’t safe! The more he breathed, the more resentful energy Wei Wuxian would slip into him. The more he would control Jin Guangyao.

“There we go,” Wei Wuxian said.

His voice was the only thing that reminded Jin Guangyao that there had been a dizi playing. High and sweet, seductive and implacable at the same time. Now that it was gone, Jin Guangyao realized that he couldn’t even feel his body.

No fingers. No toes. Not even his tongue.

Paralyzed.

Utterly helpless.

Jin Guangyao jerked desperately at his qi, trying to break free from whatever this hell-on-earth was.

“Ah, ah, none of that,” Wei Wuxian said.

Other sounds rumbled in the background, unimportant even if they were vaguely familiar in a way that suggested that Jin Guangyao should be paying attention to them, even though he couldn’t. Three sounds? Or three sets of sounds. Like voices heard drifting on the wind from just a bit too far away to be overheard.

“No, he tried using a qi trick to break free of my control,” Wei Wuxian said. “Won’t work. If I had less of a grip, maybe, but not like this. He can’t escape.”

More sounds that Jin Guangyao wanted to understand and couldn’t. Loud and angry, sharp-toned. Another that rumbled like a mountain about to drop on your head. And then a cool, clear burst of maybe one or two words at most.

“He’s basically experiencing exactly what I did when Wen Chao threw me into the Burial Mounds,” Wei Wuxian said. “Well, partially. He doesn’t have a bunch of broken bones and he… well. There are other injuries that I had that he doesn’t. We can talk about it later. It was part of why I was there in the first place.”

As the angry sharp tone exploded into… shouting? Maybe. Jin Guangyao tried to find his lungs so that he could breathe. Meditation sometimes helped against Wen Ruohan. It might help against Wei Wuxian, too.

Though…

…this was what Wei Wuxian had experienced? Crushing pressure, utter darkness, complete helplessness; Three months of being crushed and shaped by resentful energy. Jin Guangyao heard something like a sob.

This couldn’t go on that long. It couldn’t. He could barely handle this little amount of it. How could anyone survive this?

“Hey, take it easy,” Wei Wuxian said, soft and gentle and so close to Jin Guangyao that he flailed with his qi to try and escape again. “No, that’s not going to work. You’ll only hurt your core if you fight like that. Come on. Calm down. I won’t let you be hurt. I just can’t risk you doing something silly like contacting your father.”

There was no option to remain upset. Jin Guangyao found his spirit relaxing so dramatically that he assumed his body did as well. Not that he could feel his body.

“There we go,” Wei Wuxian said. “I’m letting you see again. Just a little bit. The darkness is scary.”

It was.

It was intensely terrifying, actually, not just “scary”. To be helpless and unable to see what might come at him was one of his worst nightmares. So many nights at the brothel had involved men coming at him in the dark of night while he tried to hide or sleep or just stay out of sight of the worst of them.

“Ah, sorry,” Wei Wuxian said. His face came into view just in front of Jin Guangyao. “Should’ve considered that.”

Behind him, Nie Mingjue stood tall and impassive, though his jaw worked as if he was holding off a powerful emotion that he wasn’t sure he could indulge. Jiang Wanyin stood next to him, grey-faced and deeply uncomfortable. And just to the left of Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji stood in fine white and soft green robes finer than anything Jin Guangyao had ever seen.

“He does look good, doesn’t he?” Wei Wuxian said with a bright grin over his shoulder at Lan Wangji. “Green suits him better than blue. At least I think so.”

Jin Guangyao wrenched at his qi as he realized that he was talking out loud, spilling his thoughts into the open without a single care.

“Sorry, you still can’t do that,” Wei Wuxian said much more seriously. “Why kill your brother?”

Why? What a ridiculous question. As long as Jin Zixuan lived, Jin Guangyao was nothing more than a whore-son, an unfortunate side-effect of their father’s legendary depravity and appetites. Even after Jin Guangyao killed him, the two of them would be judged by each other. Both of them would be found lacking; Jin Guangyao for his breeding and Jin Zixuan for his lack of intelligence.

“He is an idiot,” Wei Wuxian agreed with a dramatic sigh and a roll of his eyes. “I just don’t understand why you stay. Any other sect would be delighted to have you.”

Oh, of course. Delighted to steal the genius away but none of them, not even the Lan would let him be an inner member. Even the Jin resented that he’d been given the name. Besides, a person who left their sect for anything other than marriage would always be looked at with suspicion. And the only people that he’d ever wanted to have hated him on one side and couldn’t afford to be associated with a whore’s offspring on the other.

Jin Guangyao flinched as Nie Mingjue’s jaw dropped open.

Whatever Nie Mingjue said, it was indecipherable. Loud and angry, full of wide eyes and flying spittle as Nie Mingjue bellowed his normal threats at Jin Guangyao.

“You,” Wei Wuxian said with one finger leveled threateningly in Nie Mingjue’s direction. “Be quiet. He can’t understand a single word of what you just said and I’m glad. Whoever it was that he murdered, I’m sure that there was a reason for it.”

Laughter, full of shock and misery, bubbled up. Jin Guangyao couldn’t tell if it actually came out. He couldn’t tell if he babbled about the beatings, the threats, the attempted and actual rapes that the ever-so-honorable Captain had inflicted on him. And on others.

What did it matter, anyway? Nie Mingjue would never believe what Jin Guangyao said. His mind was made up and there was no changing it.

“His might not be,” Wei Wuxian said. He put a hand on Jin Guangyao’s cheek and stopped even the flinch from happening. “But mine isn’t. Not really surprised, honestly. I met him on more than one occasion, and he was… awful… whenever people with authority over him weren’t around.”

Wei Wuxian waved away whatever Jiang Wanyin spluttered, then turned back to Jin Guangyao.

“You’re trapped, then,” Wei Wuxian said but Jin Guangyao could see just how little belief he had in that. “I know, I know. No one will trust you. Except that the Nie trusted you until you betrayed them. The Wen, including Wen Ruohan himself, trusted you until you betrayed them. And now the Jin trust you, though they’re rightly wary of your apparently inevitable betrayal.”

…Rage flared inside Jin Guangyao.

“How dare you?” Jin Guangyao snarled, aware of his own words for the first time since he descended into this hell. “I told Nie Mingjue what was happening! I told him that I and others were being attacked and abused. He said that I lied about it!”

“He was a good captain,” Nie Mingjue complained, distant but now audible.

That might mean that Jin Guangyao was wresting some control back. More likely, Wei Wuxian allowed him more autonomy so that there could be a proper conversation.

“Fucking hell,” Jiang Wanyin groaned. “Seriously? What? You asked the asshole, and he denied it all with wide eyes and a hurt look? You never fucking believe the person accused of abuse. You believe the people being abused. What the fuck?”

Maybe he should have come to the Jiang instead of the Nie after being thrown down Koi Tower’s stairs. Except then he would’ve had to deal with Yu Ziyuan and no.

Just no.

“Fair,” Wei Wuxian said. His smile was painfully wry.

“I went to the Nightless City,” Jin Guangyao said, enunciating his words carefully so that he said just what he wanted and not every wild dream he’d permitted himself at the time, “specifically to spy on him. Of course I betrayed Wen Ruohan. That was the point.”

Wei Wuxian nodded that he had a point. “No one in the Jin cares about that. All they care is that you betrayed two sects. We would’ve gladly taken you. The Lan would’ve, too.”

Jin Guangyao breathed, just breathed. No thoughts. No rage. No laughter or fear. Most especially, no saying every single thing that went through his head. He wouldn’t.

“Ah, you’re really smart,” Wei Wuxian said, eyes bright as his smile went razor-sharp. “You’re figuring out the trick of it already. Too bad that I can’t let you get away with it. You really are wasted among the Jin.”

The oily, disgusting resentful energy flowed into Jin Guangyao’s throat, wresting what little control he had away again. At the same time, the world drifted away until there was only Wei Wuxian staring at him with a smile that felt almost friendly. Almost trustworthy.

He… could trust Wei Wuxian… right? There was… no reason to be afraid of him. Wei Wuxian was helping Jin Guangyao.

Deep inside, in the place where every insult, every rude gesture, every snub lived in his memory, the word “no” echoed.

“Oh, that’s not good,” Wei Wuxian murmured. “You literally can’t forget anything. Not a single thing, ever. Exact opposite of me. My memory is a sieve. According to certain healers, I’m sure you know which ones, it’s the result of the abuse and deprivation of my childhood.”

Forgetting sounded like a lovely thing. Jin Guangyao didn’t know who he would be if he had the capacity to forget things. To forgive them. Every single day of his life, he’d depended on his ability to remember all the little things that offended or insulted or amused the powerful people around him. Survival meant sculpting his responses to match what worked in the moment for those men.

Wei Wuxian nodded. “And when you’re Jin Sect Leader, what then? A sect leader can’t keep grudges.”

Grudges. How ridiculous. Every single sect leader in the Jianghu kept grudges. They remembered down to the tiniest look and smallest slight every single time they’d lost. Keeping grudges was all that sect leaders did.

He would be no different in that. At least Jin Guangyao had the capacity to make those grudges something useful instead of wasting time and energy yelling and striking out for no good reason at all.

Ah, well. It’s not like it would matter. Er-ge was safe. Jin Guangyao would never allow him to be harmed, though keeping him distracted was always a terrible challenge. Soon enough, Nie Mingjue would die in a qi deviation, leaving Huaisang in charge. Jiang Wanyin would be simple to control through the debts between the Jin and the Jiang, though it would be so much simpler if Jiang Yanli just married his idiot brother. A quick assassination of the two of them, preferably after she bore a child, and Jiang Wanyin would be too busy trying to preserve that precious link to his lost sister. With the Wen gone and the other great sects under control, Jin Guangyao would finally be safe.

“Huh,” Wei Wuxian said as a vaguely horrified expression settled into the wrinkles around his eyes. “And why would Nie Mingjue die of a qi deviation?”

Oh, seriously, as if the entire Jianghu didn’t know about the Nie leaders’ tendency to die early. Their sabers killed them. It was how Wen Ruohan killed Nie Mingjue’s father. It was how Jin Guangyao would kill Nie Mingjue, though he would have to find a different method of delivery, likely.

Er-ge’s Songs of Turmoil should do nicely.

The distant abstraction of Wei Wuxian’s control shattered as something hot and sharp slid into Jin Guangyao’s chest. Ashy clouds billowed up off him as he looked down to find Baxia buried hilt-deep against his breastbone.

“Fuck!” Wei Wuxian cursed as he slapped a hand against Jin Guangyao’s chest.

This time the resentful energy made everything go away in one horrifying swoop.

#

In the Demon Realm:

LBH, delighted: That’s my technique. Shizun, how did he figure out my technique?

SQQ: …I don’t know. But I don’t like that man. Is there anything we can do to stop him?

SQH: Yeah, like about a billion different things. He’s walking on thin ice all the time. Sneaky, though. Reminds me of me when I was younger, honestly, though without the ability to kick back and say fuck it all.

MBJ: *gasps as NMJ stabs JGY*

All four of them stare and then explode into action, calling allies among the demons, shouting mentally to Zhuzhi-lang and running for the door.

27. Sudden Death

The sound of a sword sliding into human flesh was one that Wei Ying had never wanted to hear again after the end of the Sunshot Campaign. Having that sword, saber, slip right past his cheek to bury into Jin Guangyao’s chest when he was completely and utterly helpless was enough to make Wei Ying bellow.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Jiang Cheng screeched at Nie Mingjue who glared into Jin Guangyao’s unseeing eyes.

“Killing him,” Nie Mingjue said as his wrist twisted as if he was about to cut right through Jin Guangyao’s ribcage to get Baxia out.

“No,” Wei Ying snapped.

The shadows latched onto Nie Mingjue and Baxia, holding them utterly still no matter how hard either of them jerked. It was both of them. Baxia vibrated against Wei Ying’s grip as she violently battled to get free.

He should have thought of that. He should have planned better! The Nie were notorious for never tolerating evil, no matter where it came from.

“Snake-gege!” Wei Ying yelled as he planted a hand in the center of Jin Guangyao’s chest.

The shadows surged into the open wound when Wei Ying flung Nie Mingjue and Baxia back and away from the two of them. Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan caught Nie Mingjue. Lan Zhan promptly gripped Nie Mingjue’s fist, keeping him from flinging Baxia at Jin Guangyao.

Wood cracked and splintered as Snake-gege ripped the back of the cell off the building. He loomed, huge and dangerous. Tongue flickering nervously as all four of his eyes studied Wei Ying.

“Get him back and get A-Qing to fix him!” Wei Ying ordered.

He reached with his other hand to push the shadows onto Snake-gege’s, Zhuzhi-Lang’s nose, sticking them there and then smiling brightly when Zhuzhi-Lang held them with elegant skill.

Wei Ying reached for the rainbow bridge and wasn’t at all surprised that it was already forming just outside of the prison, an easy jump from the open hole of the back wall. Zhuzhi-Lang hesitated for a moment, but when Wei Ying pushed the want for him to take Jin Guangyao to Wei Qing and then come right back please Zhuzhi-Lang darted up onto the rainbow bridge.

Up and away so fast that Nie Mingjue’s furious bellow choked off in shock.

Wei Ying counted to six before Zhuzhi-Lang darted back down the bridge which retreated back into the sky.

“Thanks, Snake-gege,” Wei Ying said, patting Zhuzhi-Lang’s snout fondly and then laughing as his tongue flickered out to tickle Wei Ying’s cheek. “Aww. I’m fine. Seriously. I just have a bunch more questions I want to ask him about what that jerk of a father of his is up to. He can’t die. Yet.”

Start to finish, getting Jin Guangyao out of the prison and to Wei Qing couldn’t have taken a count of twenty, so it wasn’t too surprising that Nie Mingjue was still in a rage when Wei Ying turned around to glare at him.

Nie Mingjue snarled as he glared at Wei Ying as if Wei Ying was his enemy. Except no, that wasn’t accurate, was it? It wasn’t Nie Mingjue who’d decided that Jin Guangyao had to die.

It was Baxia.

Her screams of fury at being denied her prey reminded Wei Ying of the ghosts in the Burial Mounds. So much anger and resentment, so much bitterness piled upon bitterness until she was practically a yao bound to a steel form.

Actually…

…that was pretty accurate, wasn’t it?

“Huh,” Wei Ying said as he walked over to gently touch Baxia’s hilt. “That’s not good. You’re carrying too much, you know. If you don’t purge it, you’ll break him.”

“He deserves to die!” Nie Mingjue shouted at Wei Ying.

Wei Ying turned to stare into Nie Mingjue’s eyes. “I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to her.”

Both Baxia and Nie Mingjue jerked into a sort of wary silence.

Huh. So yeah, they both realized that something was wrong. They just didn’t… fix it. Which, yeah, Wei Ying could totally understand that. He’d been doing the same thing about his lack of a core and the drinking and all the problems he had with the Jiang for ages.

Sometimes it was just easier to let things ride than it was to make yourself dig into the tough problems.

This wasn’t a tough problem, though.

It was easy.

For Wei Ying anyway.

“I can take the weight of it away,” Wei Ying said to Baxia. “Not all of it, of course. You are what you are. But the excess, the part that’s breaking him. I can drain that off so that he doesn’t qi deviate and die on you.”

”…Do it.” Baxia growled.

Almost exactly like a particularly large and dangerous tiger yao. Yikes.

But…

…there was a sort of resonance there. In the same way that Wei Ying had learned to feel and control the resentful energy that filled the Burial Mounds, he recognized the energies filling Baxia. There was a part of his soul that chimed like a bell that was the same size and tone as Baxia.

Or, more accurately, Baxia’s resentful energy swiftly hummed into a match for Wei Ying’s. He smiled as Nie Mingjue’s eyes went wide, and his legs gave way underneath him. Baxia’s rage sagged as she relaxed into Wei Ying’s hold.

It wasn’t like he was taking her away or breaking her link to Nie Mingjue. He’d never do that. They were literally made for each other.

What he did was soothe the raging waters of her resentful energy and then slowly, gently, pour it all off into himself. It felt good, honestly. Not like the Burial Mounds’ protective zone of razor-filled resentment or the Yin Iron’s clawing at him for control.

Baxia wanted to give the resentful energy over. She wanted to lighten the load that Nie Mingjue carried. Because she didn’t want to hurt him.

And carrying so much hurt him badly.

Wei Ying could feel the echo of the resentful energy inside of Nie Mingjue. Not as much as what Baxia had, but it was too much for his system. It lurked in his meridians, clogged up his channels. Worse, it filmed over his golden core, making it so much harder for Nie Mingjue to properly cultivate.

You know, swirling qi through your system, out from the core along all your channels with a good strong flow so that it scoured your meridians clear?

Yeah, Nie Mingjue absolutely could not do that. At all. His core was hugely powerful. That was probably the only reason that he hadn’t succumbed to a devastating qi deviation already.

The resentful energy clogging his system definitely was driving paranoia. Add that to the feedback from Baxia who very definitely was not seeing the world clearly at all what with the too-heavy load of resentful energy she carried, and they were both balanced on the razor’s edge.

Destruction would just take the wrong word, the wrong breath, the wrong thought at the wrong time.

Fortunately, it wasn’t hard to fix.

Because the resentful energy that was so damaging to Baxia and Nie Mingjue flowed into Wei Ying’s body and qi like it belonged there. Maybe because it did? The more he worked with resentful energy, you know, away from the mess that was the defenses around Cang Qiong, the better it felt in his body.

It was like his body had been born to use this energy in the same way that Lan Zhan used spiritual energy.

Zhuzhi-Lang quivered behind Wei Ying, sloshing water over the broken floor of the prison.

Okay, yeah, something to consider later.

After this was done.

Baxia was not going to wait for him to woolgather.

“There we go,” Wei Ying crooned as the excess drained off Baxia. “That’s it. Good. That’s perfect. Well done, Baxia. We’ll have to sit down and find a way so that you can do that when I’m not around. You know, later. Because there’s stuff to be taken care of.”

“What the hell?” Jiang Cheng asked, voice all squeaky and high-pitched in ways that Wei Ying fully intended to tease him about later. “Wei Wuxian! What did you do?”

He was as wide-eyed as Nie Mingjue, though a lot more stable. Nie Mingjue looked like his limbs had turned into overcooked noodles as he blinked at Wei Ying and made startled sounding noises that made no sense whatsoever.

“Helped,” Wei Ying said, shrugging. “Baxia was carrying a huge amount of resentful energy. It was hurting him. So, I drained it all off her. Now he’s a bit loopy from reaction, I think.”

“Healers,” Lan Zhan said with a sigh and one of his heart-stabbing “sadly disappointed in you” frowns.

“But I helped, Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying complained with his best sad pout and devastated eyes.

“Healers,” Lan Zhan repeated, lips twitching at Wei Ying’s dramatics. “We do not wish to risk a qi deviation.”

“Okay, that’s fair,” Wei Ying agreed.

Not that it was easy to accomplish. Zhuzhi-Lang had destroyed a big chunk of the walkway out to the prison, much too much for them to get Nie Mingjue over the gap. The debris in the water made bringing a boat over difficult. None of them, Nie Mingjue included, wanted to put him on his saber to fly back.

He’d crash straight into the water.

In the end, it took flopping Nie Mingjue onto Zhuzhi-Lang’s head for them to get him out of the prison and back to the healer’s pavilion. Undignified, but effective, which was all that Wei Ying cared about.

The Jiang Healers, especially Fan An who was as ancient as the hills and unimpressed by everything Wei Ying had ever done since she’d had to patch him up after each stupid stunt, were more than a little bit annoyed with Wei Ying. The Nie Healers, both of the ones that Nie Mingjue had brought with him to Lotus Pier, had sighed at Nie Mingjue as if they were disappointed in him, but they still spared some head-shaking for Wei Ying, at least until they realized just what he’d done.

“There’s practically nothing left,” Nie Qiulian said as he poked Nie Mingjue’s forehead while pinching his wrist. “What is there is draining into his saber as I sit here. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“I’ve never met a Nie at his level who has so little resentful energy,” Fan An agreed, doing her own poking at Nie Mingjue’s chest while pinching his other wrist. “What did you do, you ridiculous boy?”

“Drained the resentful energy off,” Wei Ying replied with a shrug. “I mean, it’s kind of a proprietary thing? Or at least it’s kind of a me thing. I don’t know if anyone else could do it, though I do plan on figuring out how to make a sink so that the Nie can drain their sabers of the excess resentful energy on a regular basis. I think that would be way more healthy for them all.”

No one believed him that it wasn’t a technique. An array or a talisman or some ancient device he’d found somewhere. Even Lan Zhan seemed puzzled, but then Lan Zhan’s Cleansing wasn’t that effective that quickly. He would’ve had to do months of playing, spent a good half the day for weeks on end, to do what Wei Ying had done in moments.

Wei Ying couldn’t exactly tell them how he did it.

Well.

He knew how he did it. He pulled the energy into his body and soul were it settled down comfortably. His lack of a golden core, which the Nie healers had figured out pretty much instantly, was what everyone else decided made it work.

That wasn’t it.

Wei Ying knew it wasn’t. Right down to his bones, he knew that wasn’t it. Zhuzhi-Lang’s uncomfortable twitching whenever someone said that wasn’t necessary for Wei Ying to know.

It ran deeper. Not bone deep. Blood-deep.

And it connected him to… huh.

To Zhuzhi-Lang. To Wei Qing and Wei Ning. Popo and A-Yuan and Uncle Fourth and Lan Zhan. Jiang Cheng and Shijie. When he concentrated, he could feel dozens of cultivators from all the other sects and some peasants. Nie Huaisang. Lan Qiren. Lan Xichen.

So many people.

And… oddly… other people who felt much, much further away, too.

Which was a thing he would figure out later.

After he dealt with the stricken look on Shijie’s face and the growing anger on Jiang Cheng’s face which wasn’t really anger. That was his “I’m angry so I won’t cry in public” face. Both of which had started when Nie Qiulian had blurted out Wei Ying’s lack of a core.

“Feeling better?” Wei Ying asked Nie Mingjue about a shichen after Jin Guangyao’s stabbing and kidnapping.

“Yeah,” Nie Mingjue said, rubbing his hand over Baxia like he was petting a cat.

“Good,” Wei Ying said. “Because I still have things that I wanted to tell you guys. We gotta go over this stuff. No more interruptions! Come on. Moon pavilion again, this time to actually talk about it all.”

Wei Ying marched off, ignoring everyone’s splutters and shouts. This was not a conversation for public places. It wasn’t one he wanted to have at all but since when had Wei Ying ever gotten what he wanted?

Never, that’s when.

Lan Zhan’s fingers laced into Wei Ying’s hand, startling him out of his spiraling black thoughts.

“Aw, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying murmured, happy again. “Thank you for taking care of me.”

“Always,” Lan Zhan replied with his tiniest, happiest smile.

#

Outside Lotus Pier:

Shang Qinghua frets as he watches the Jin disciples laze about as they waited for Jin Guangyao to return, hidden under a Don’t Look Here and a muffling talisman so that no one will notice him spying on them.

Mobei-Jun, under his own spells to be unnoticed, tilts his head to the side, studying them through narrowed eyes and pursed lips.

SQH: Yeah, no, you’re not wrong. They really are kind of terrible cultivators. I mean, shouldn’t they have noticed the chaos going on behind them.

MBJ: …

SQH: But it’s obvious! The screaming was really loud. I mean, really loud. And they just stayed here.

MBJ: …

SQH: Oh, wait. Oh, wow. Seriously? You really think he was sent here to get killed?

MBJ: …

SQH: Okay, fine, available evidence does tend to indicate you’re right. Just way scummier than even I thought his dad was. What’s Zhuzhi say?

MBJ: …

SQH: *sighs and rolls his eyes* Of course he’s smitten. A-Ning’s adorable and he pets Zhuzhi. But what’s that got to do…?

MBJ: *stares flatly at SQH*

SQH: *groans* He’s so distracted that he’s not giving good information. Fine. Fine! Let’s head back and see what the mirror tells us. I’m sure the kiddo is going to be fine.

MBJ: *stares consideringly across Lotus Pier towards the pavilion where Wei Ying is gathering the others* Mm.

They disappear in a swirl of blue light and quickly melting ice crystals that no one notices before they’re gone.

28. Hidden Healer

Wei Qing stabbed a needle into Jin Guangyao, glaring at the man because she couldn’t actually stab it straight into his brain. If there was anyone that she’d commit murder against, other than her uncle and Jin Guangshan, this was the man.

And she had to keep him alive.

“I hate this,” Wei Qing grumbled as she set to work washing her hands while A-Ning got Jin Guangyao ready for his heart surgery. “I hate him. I hate Wei Wuxian. I hate the whole world.”

“Understandable,” A-Ning said with a little sigh, and if that didn’t say just how wrong the whole situation was, nothing else would.

A-Ning, agreeing that Wei Qing had a reason for being angry at everything. She’d always known that A-Ning had a core of fury inside of him, but it was held back by his generally gentle nature and the fact that being fierce among the Wen was a sure method to ensure that either Wen Xu or Wen Chao killed you for challenging their “superiority”.

Still, Wei Wuxian clearly wanted the horrible little man alive long enough for him to be properly and fully questioned. That meant that Wei Qing needed to save his life before she pumped him full of drugs, stabbed him with needles and then asked him all the questions she’d been saving up for ages.

Like just how he thought he could get away with torturing people.

In the Wen, for Wen Ruohan. In the Nie, according to Xue Yang and several spies Wen Ruohan had inserted into the sect. After the war in the stupid camps. So many people there.

And he just… coasted along, smiling as though it was perfectly acceptable for him to torture, manipulate and kill people left, right and center.

Wei Qing blew out a breath and forced herself to dismiss all her rage, all her frustration, every emotion other than the determination not to let a patient die on her surgery table. She didn’t always succeed in saving people’s lives. Sometimes she hated that she’d saved that particular person. This was one of those occasions.

But she was a great surgeon specifically because she could turn her emotions off and do what needed to be done, no matter how long it took or how frustrating it was.

Frankly, Jin Guangyao’s surgery wasn’t complicated at all. Yes, Baxia had gone straight through his ribs to bisect his heart. Yes, there was a nasty gash to his lung. For anyone else, it would’ve been an instant death sentence.

Wei Wuxian changed things.

Resentful energy seethed inside of Jin Guangyao. It had sealed the wound as tightly as if it had been sutured, more tightly as not even the slightest hint of blood seeped through the edges of the cut. More importantly, it had shut Jin Guangyao’s heart, lungs and brain down as if he had been placed under a stasis spell.

She could… feel… that the stasis effect wouldn’t last terribly long. A few days at most. But that didn’t matter when all she had to do was sew the areas up and then carefully prod them with qi to force the flesh to seal back shut.

It was as easy of a surgery as she’d ever had. Less than a quarter shichen after Snake-gege had dumped Jin Guangyao at their feet, Wei Qing prodded the last cut and healed the last wound.

“Good,” Wei Qing said as she placed needles for paralysis, needles for crippling a man’s awareness of his sense of self, and needles that should encourage Jin Guangyao to answer every question utterly honestly.

Then she added another one to befuddle his too quick mind so that he would be slow to catch on to the situation. Every advantage was a good one with this horrible, violent man.

“H-how will we get rid of the resentful energy, Jiejie?” A-Ning asked. He frowned at Jin Guangyao, as disapproving as Wei Qing had ever seen.

Wei Qing opened her mouth to say that they would just dispel it, then slowly closed her mouth because what?

She didn’t know how to do that. Neither of them was Wei Wuxian. He was the master of this, not her or A-Ning.

Except…

Wei Qing hesitated for a moment before stepping to Jin Guangyao’s bedside. If she thought about it, she’d already ordered the resentful energy around. All through the surgery, she’d pushed it this way and that to clear space for her work and then to heal the damage was quickly as possible.

“Just like during the surgery,” Wei Qing murmured as she lifted a hand and… flipped her fingers at the resentful energy to dismiss it as if it was a lazy medical student who had to be reminded to do the most basic of things like washing up or mopping the floor.

The resentful energy quivered for a moment.

Then it flowed out of Jin Guangyao, off the table and onto the floor where it sank into the ground, leaving no traces behind.

Wei Qing sucked a breath in and then let it go slowly. This was another thing like knowing that Wei Wuxian needed her help, like the rainbow bridge going red and traveling to all new places. Just…

“Wei Wuxian,” Wei Qing said, shaking her head at A-Ning’s goggling awe. “He must have set it up to respond to me. Nothing else makes sense.”

“…Maybe?” A-Ning squeaked before licking his lips. “Well, I suppose. What else could it be?”

Neither of them answered that.

That wasn’t something either of them would touch, not after growing up under Wen Ruohan. There were things you did not notice no matter how obvious they were as they glared at you.

None of which mattered with Jin Guangyao alive and going to stay that way, at least until Wei Qing was allowed to end him.

Well. Actually, it was far more likely that Lan Wangji would end Jin Guangyao’s miserable, lying life, but she could dream about it once in a while. It would be so very satisfying to do it, even though doing it would then haunt her for the rest of her life.

“He’s… actually alive?” Jin Zixun said from the doorway.

He peered around the doorjamb as if afraid that Jin Guangyao would leap off the table and attack him at any moment. Wei Qing nodded and waved that he was safe to come in. As much as she loathed Jin Zixun, a large portion of his awfulness was down to Jin Guangshan’s abuse and Jin Guangyao undermining him at every turn.

As annoying as that was.

“Alive and deeply asleep for a bit longer,” Wei Qing said. “I need to get the truth out of him. Wei Wuxian tried, but Nie Mingjue interrupted.”

“Baxia interrupted,” A-Ning corrected with a little grin at the way Wei Qing glared at him. “She did. She interrupted right through his heart.”

“You, hush,” Wei Qing huffed at A-Ning. “Do you think you can sound like your uncle? You know that oily voice he does when he wants something from you?”

Jin Zixun grimaced. “Maybe? I mean, I think it might be better to pretend to be Lan Xichen or something. He’s always trying to impress Lan Xichen.”

“I want truth, not carefully manipulated fragments of truth disguising massive lies,” Wei Qing said.

Her tone was flat and threatening enough for Jin Zixun to pale and flinch away from her. Wei Qing sighed at herself, purely internally. She never had learned how to behave in a comforting manner to patients.

No matter how terrible Jin Zixun had been to all of the Wen, he was a patient. A terribly traumatized, utterly broken patient.

“I think…” A-Ning said slowly as he stared at Jin Guangyao, “that it needs to be you, Jiejie. If we put makeup on you, maybe you could pretend to be his mother? Everyone says that he does what he does to honor his mother’s memory. We should use it to find out what he’s up to.”

Horrifyingly, Wei Qing couldn’t come up with a better idea, so in very short order she had a face full of makeup that would make a courtesan proud. Plus some of the gauzier silks in reds and pinks instead of the white and green she’d gotten used to.

Wei Qing stared down at Jin Guangyao’s face which had begun to twitch as he came out of the anesthetic and into the needles and drugs which would prevent any of his nonsense like during Wei Wuxian’s interrogation.

“Just like A-Ning,” Wei Qing murmured as she steeled herself to do what needed to be done.

A gentle brush of her fingertips over Jin Guangyao’s forehead made him sigh and blink up at her blurrily. Wei Qing didn’t try to smile. She simply wasn’t that good of an actor.

“A-Yao, lay still,” Wei Qing ordered. “You’ve been ill. Let me take care of you.”

“…Mama?” A-Yao whispered, blinking repeatedly and then peering at her as if he desperately wanted his eyes to clear.

Too bad for him. The drugs weren’t going to let him do it.

“Shh, A-Yao,” Wei Qing said as she brushed her fingers over his forehead again. “You were dreaming. It didn’t sound good. Tell me about it?”

“Mama…” Jin Guangyao sighed as he relaxed again. “I. I dreamed you died. You died. It isn’t… isn’t true?”

“Would I be here if I died?” Wei Qing asked, guilt squirming inside of her despite her efforts to shove the emotion down. “Was that it?”

“No,” Jin Guangyao murmured. “Father refused me. I… he threw me down the stairs, so I had to find a way to destroy him. I was almost done. Almost done. I’m close to killing all of them. Wen Ruohan died. He taught me so much, but he wouldn’t let me rule. He had to go. And then Nie Mingjue. I’ll kill him yet. Self-righteous prick.”

Wei Qing didn’t allow herself to curse. Or flinch. Or even respond to Jin Guangyao’s plans to destroy everyone of importance in the Jianghu. She’d known intuitively that he was heading that way. Hearing it was a different matter.

“That sounds like a terrible dream, A-Yao,” Wei Qing said softly. “Surely there was something good in all of that.”

Jin Guangyao sighed as he pressed his cheek against Wei Qing’s hand. “No. I thought Lan Xichen would, could, love me, but his brother is so much more important to him. I knew. I knew that he wasn’t truly on my side, but I thought I could pull him free from that self-righteous pest. Now I have to destroy Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji both. Only then can Lan Xichen be mine.”

Which would tear the heart right out of Lan Xichen, but clearly Jin Guangyao cared about others in the same way that Wen Ruohan had: they were belongings, not people, and any sign of independence was to be crushed.

“My poor boy,” Wei Qing said instead of cursing. “How terrible for you. We must give you a better dream.”

“This is better,” Jin Guangyao whispered as he turned to stare blurrily at her. “I missed you, Mother. I missed you so much. You were so brilliant and so, so stupid. I wish you hadn’t been so stupid. I never would have gone to Father if it weren’t for you. Why did you believe in him?”

Her blood went to ice in her veins, but Wei Qing didn’t respond to his awareness or the threat that he represented. Jin Guangyao was helpless, drugged and paralyzed. She had power. He did not.

“I think you’ve let the dream pull you too deep, A-Yao,” Wei Qing said as she put just a thread of qi into the needle that kept him from reaching full awareness. “It was all a dream. I’m here. You’re here. Nothing bad has happened. Someday you’ll be the most powerful cultivator in the world. Everyone will look up to you and bow to you, my clever son.”

If she’d heard that litany once, mostly directed at Wen Chao but also at Wen Xu before they died, she’d heard it a million times. And, just like her idiot cousins, Jin Guangyao relaxed into the inherent promise of ultimate power and total respect.

“Really?” Jin Guangyao whispered, blinking slow and hazy at her.

“Of course!” Wei Qing exclaimed, keeping her voice soft and soothing despite the way her skin crawled. “Nothing else is possible, not for my A-Yao.”

“I like this dream,” Jin Guangyao whispered as a single tear crept down his cheek towards the pillow. “I don’t want this dream to end. It’s so much better.”

“Well, tell me all about that nasty nightmare so that it can’t ever come back,” Wei Qing said. “That’s how one banishes a nightmare. Spill it out for me and I’ll carry the weight of it for you, clever boy.”

And, in part because he was drugged out of his mind, in part because he was so very desperate for Wei Qing to actually be his mother, Jin Guangyao did exactly that.

Plots and plans to decimate sects that had insulted his parentage. Funds embezzled from those weaker than him. A half sister that he was actively seducing and planned to marry, even if it meant that their children were somehow deformed or “defective”.

Jin Guangshan was not the one driving the destruction of the Wen remnants. Jin Guangyao had planned it as a method to incriminate the other sect leaders after a random laughing comment from Jin Ruotian. It would give him things to hold over their heads, especially Lan Xichen who had willingly send his disciples off to torture and kill people without verifying what they would be required to do.

He was the one crafting the rumors against Wei Wuxian. He was the one who’d set Su She up to learn demonic cultivation. He was the one to wanted Wei Wuxian’s Tiger Tally.

There was plenty of blame to go around as all of his pawns had willingly done the things that Jin Guangyao suggested oh so deferentially, but Jin Guangyao had pulled the strings on most everyone in the Jianghu, making them dance to his tune.

Eventually, he started repeating his complaints of being looked down on, hated and scorned, so Wei Qing knocked him out.

“You know,” Jin Zixun said from the doorway, “I would’ve outright killed him a long while ago. You’re stronger than I would’ve thought.”

“I treated Wen Ruohan for years,” Wei Qing said, glaring at him. “Trust me, this ass is a spoiled brat compared to my uncle. A-Ning, did you get all that transcribed?”

“Mhm,” A-Ning said, poking his head around the corner and nodding. “Do we have to keep him alive?”

“We’ll ask Wei Wuxian and find out,” Wei Qing said, going to scrub her face and her hands until she stopped feeling like she’d been dipped in sewage. “He’s sect leader. He gets to decide.”

#

Back in the Demon Realm:

SQH: Look, just use the mirror to see what’s going on with that little jerk, will you?

SQQ: We are trying to keep an eye on WY, not that little jerk. He’s under control and out of everyone’s hair at the moment. WY is more important.

SQH: Yeah, sure, except for the fact that MBJ thinks he was sent to Lotus Pier to get murdered.

SQQ: …

SQH: …

SQQ: …!

SQH: *spreads hands in a well, are you going to do it or not? gesture*

SQQ: Fine! But only for a moment. WY is more…

Both of them stare at the mirror as Wei Qing milks JGY for every secret he’s got. Behind them, MBJ looks reluctantly impressed while LBH beams with pride at his great-grandson’s chosen sister.

SQH: Oh-kay… Was not expecting all that. Huh. But… if someone is trying to kill him by sending him to Lotus Pier right now, who would it be? Who’s not under his thumb at this point, you know, other than your boy?

All four of them frown as they try and figure that one out.

29. Flooded Words

Sometimes, Wei Ying really wished that he’d never come out of the Burial Mounds all those years ago. So many things had happened, terrible things and awful things and wonderful things, too, but they’d all happened because he got lonely and left the one safe place he had.

And now that he had his safe place back, he’d done it again by leaving Cang Qiong to make sure that his first family didn’t worry too much about him.

Should’ve just stayed home and convinced Nie Huaisang to talk Shijie and Jiang Cheng into setting up a mirror. It would’ve been so much easier. Less dangerous.

Though Lan Xichen would’ve still be worrying himself to pieces, so no, that wouldn’t have worked.

He really, really, really hadn’t wanted to tell the Nie and Lan about Cang Qiong. Really. But now that they’d had so much happen, Meng Yao and the rainbow bridge and purifying Baxia, it didn’t look like Wei Ying was going to be able to get Jiang Cheng and Shijie alone again.

Oh well.

Just have to tell them all and swear them to secrecy afterwards. None of that mattered now that he’d gotten Jiang Cheng and Shijie into the Moon pavilion with Nie Mingjue, Lan Xichen and Nie Huaisang who perched next to Shijie so protectively that he absolutely earned the narrow look that Wei Ying leveled on him.

“Be nice,” Shijie told Wei Ying.

“He’d better be nice to you,” Wei Ying huffed. “I’m still not sure about this whole courtship thing you two have going.”

Both Shijie and Nie Huaisang promptly looked away from each other like a pair of cats that had been about to fight but realized that neither could win so obviously the other cat was not there. Wei Ying made an outraged noise at Jiang Cheng who just sighed and nodded that yes, they’d been doing that for a while.

“I can’t tell if that means they’re really serious about this or if they’re playing a game of romance chicken and neither of them is willing to lose,” Wei Ying complained.

“Both,” Nie Mingjue said. He didn’t even flinch for the twin glares from Shijie and Nie Huaisang. “Definitely both. Which doesn’t matter when you’ve apparently got some secret to tell us.”

“True,” Wei Ying said.

He passed the Strongest Privacy Talismans over to Lan Zhan who properly set them on the four walls, floor and ceiling of the Moon pavilion. All sound from outside stopped, leaving the only sounds left the quiet shush-shush of Nie Huaisang’s fan and the creak of Nie Mingjue’s chair as he shifted position.

“All right,” Wei Ying said once Lan Zhan sat back down. “When my parents died, I was in Yiling. I was attacked by feral dogs and almost killed, except I found one of the really ancient markers around the Burial Mounds and traced the markings on it with my blood. That opened up a gate into a safe place where I recuperated, learned a bit, and then left when I got too lonely.”

Jiang Cheng frowned at him. “How did no one else find it?”

“I’m getting to that,” Wei Ying said. He rolled his eyes at the glares he got from everyone but Shijie. Even Lan Xichen glared. “Really, I am. So, Uncle Fengmian found me, brought me back here and made me part of the Jiang. I never told anyone about my safe place because it felt… not private so much as not the right time yet. When I disappeared just before the Sunshot Campaign, I was thrown into the Burial Mounds by Wen Chao. From his sword. At height. I was… pretty badly injured so it took quite a while to heal up.”

Shijie paled, one hand going to her throat and the other to grip Nie Huaisang’s wrist. They really had to be courting because Nie Huaisang put down his fan so that he could pat Shijie’s hand to comfort her.

“Now, all the stuff I did with demonic cultivation, which is not accurate as it’s not properly demonic, thank you,” Wei Ying huffed at Lan Xichen who covered a sudden smile with his sleeve, “is stuff I learned in my safe place. You see, there’s a library there. Actually, there are multiple libraries there, twelve of them, all full of cultivation techniques and interesting artifacts, including the mirror that I used to communicate with Nie Huaisang earlier.”

The fan sprang right back in front of Nie Huaisang’s face as all eyes turned his way.

“I wasn’t going to tell anyone until I’d confirmed that I wasn’t going crazy,” Nie Huaisang exclaimed when Nie Mingjue smacked his palm into his forehead. “Really, Da-ge. You wouldn’t have believed me without proof.”

“Fine, no, I wouldn’t have,” Nie Mingjue admitted. “Get on with the story.”

Jiang Cheng leaned forward to stare at Wei Ying. “Twelve libraries. In a hidden place that only the chosen person can get into. Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Wei Ying sighed.

He nodded at the shocked look blooming on Lan Xichen’s face, followed by Nie Huaisang hissing curses and Shijie going very pale indeed. It took a moment longer for Nie Mingjue to get it. Nie Mingjue sucked a sharp breath through his teeth as he stared at Lan Zhan’s green and white robes with their delicately embroidered bamboo designs.

“You fucking found Cang Qiong?” Jiang Cheng spluttered. “When you were a little street kid? What the hell, Wei Wuxian?”

“…Yeah.” Wei Ying sighed. “I did. It is. It’s amazing. I can bring things out to trade but only people I allow can come in. And right now I can’t let anyone come in. It’s… the wards chose me. It’s not something I did personally, especially not when I was a little kid. I didn’t magically open the gate that no one else could have. The wards actively evaluated me and chose me as the new Sect Leader.”

“…And that’s why you can’t stay,” Shijie whispered, eyes sad though the color did slowly come back to her cheeks as she stared at him. “You have other responsibilities now.”

“Yeah,” Wei Ying said with a sad sigh of his own. “I’m sorry, Jiang Cheng. But I mean, I was chosen before Uncle Fengmian found me. I just wasn’t old enough to do anything about it then. Now I am and I chose the Wen to join me. Lan Zhan decided that he’s staying with me.”

“I am,” Lan Zhan declared with his fiercest glare at Lan Xichen who sighed as he slumped back in his chair.

For a very Lan version of slumping that meant that his chin drooped at little, and his shoulders fell a hair from their normal very straight posture. Gah, now Wei Ying needed to fix it, but he had no real idea how to.

Lan Zhan was the best, most perfect, most amazing person in the world, but he was also more stubborn than a whole pack train full of donkeys being led away from their favorite treats. There was no way Lan Zhan would submit to leaving Wei Ying’s side.

“So!” Wei Ying said in his brightest tone and that smile that made people side-eye him as if he was about to do something stupid, which was fair because he normally was. “That means that we gotta get the Jin shut down as quickly as possible so that Lan Zhan can visit Gusu whenever he wants.”

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan said with utmost disappointment.

Because obviously Lan Zhan didn’t actually want to go to Gusu, not even for his brother. Wei Ying had never really understood just how little Lan Zhan liked his own sect until they started planning to visit Lotus Pier. Wei Ying had, oh, maybe three people? Two of them already dead since Wen Ruohan and Madame Yu, so one person that he actively disliked since Jin Guangyao should, hopefully was still alive.

Lan Zhan seemed to loathe the entire world. Everyone. There were maybe three or four people that he tolerated, A-Yuan being one of them, and then Wei Ying himself was the one person that Lan Zhan actually wanted to spend time with.

Which did nothing whatsoever for defusing that heartbroken look on Lan Xichen’s face.

“No, now, none of that,” Wei Ying said, waggling his finger at Lan Zhan. “You might not want to visit your uncle, and the Elders absolutely don’t deserve your attention, but there’s all the cute little juniors and you know you’ll miss your bunnies. And your brother. And the library, too, even though it’s not even half as amazing as our library.”

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan sighed, but now he was amused instead of disappointed.

Better, Lan Xichen no longer looked like he wanted to cry. Nie Mingjue’s mustache kept twitching like he was trying not to laugh out loud, and Jiang Cheng had a normally annoyed face instead of the freaked out annoyed face.

“The library cannot be that good,” Jiang Cheng scoffed.

Scoff number three where he was deeply curious but unwilling to admit it.

“You…” Wei Ying stopped and flailed his hands over his head and wide enough to almost smack Lan Zhan in the face. “You have… It’s… and there’s… Levels! Multiple! Categorized! Whole wings for each categorization!”

Nie Huaisang sat up very straight. So did Lan Xichen, while Jiang Cheng turned to Lan Zhan who nodded solemnly as he hummed his agreement.

“Seriously?” Jiang Cheng asked. “There’s that many books? Are we talking about a few shelves per category? A room?”

“Wing,” Wei Ying corrected with reverence. “Entire wings for each category. Whatever you’re imagining, make it bigger than the entirety of Lotus Pier, with qiankun spells that hide things you don’t have access to, and just… wings of books on every subject you can think of.”

Lan Xichen whined high in his throat. It looked like he was about to vibrate right out of his robes in pure excitement. Next to Shijie, Nie Huaisang’s fan had stopped moving even though he was pale as a ghost, making shocked goose noises and clinging to Shijie’s hand.

“Okay, then,” Jiang Cheng said to Nie Mingjue. “Just lost the three of them.”

Nie Mingjue cackled. “Have to admit, I’m curious, too. Not that curious, but still.”

That was everyone but Shijie caught and firmly on their side. Wei Ying grinned and nodded at them, clapping his hands like A-Yuan did when he was happiest. Finally, Shijie relaxed a little bit. Not as much as Wei Ying expected but it was an improvement.

“You could stay here and then visit there for the library,” Shijie suggested in that vaguely supportive but still heartbreakingly sad tone she reserved for things that she really, really wanted but didn’t feel that she could ask for directly.

Both Nie Huaisang and Jiang Cheng turned stern looks on Wei Ying. He rounded his eyes right back at Shijie while patting Lan Zhan’s knee so that he wouldn’t bristle too hard.

“But Shijie, we only just got A-Yuan to feel like he’s home,” Wei Ying protested. “He’s got his own little room and his own toys and his own bed. Honestly, he could with spending more nights sleeping in his own bed but he’s just barely three so we’re not pushing it yet. His nightmares are pretty bad.”

And that got both Shijie and Lan Xichen perking up nicely. They exchanged delighted looks while Jiang Cheng frowned at Wei Ying in that “I know you’re up to something” way and Nie Mingjue straightened up like he was suspicious.

“What is a toddler doing in there?” Nie Mingjue demanded. “Did you take him from his family?”

“…He…” Wei Ying had to stop and force the resentful energy down so that his eyes didn’t start glowing red. “He was in the camp at the pass. Popo was carrying him on her back as the Jin made her march back and forth with spirit attraction flags. He’s one of the handful of kids who actually survived.”

“His family is dead,” Lan Zhan said as he took Wei Ying’s hand to gently squeeze it. “Only distant cousins remain. He was starved, beaten, tortured briefly. They were all tortured.”

And… there went every bit of joy and relief that Wei Ying had built up so far.

Well, it had to happen eventually. Given everything that had happened to the formerly-Wen remnants, this was never going to be an easy discussion. Wei Ying sighed and leaned forward to put his elbows on his knees so that he could stare into Nie Mingjue’s shocked and disbelieving eyes.

“You already killed every Wen who had anything to do with your father’s death,” Wei Ying said softly, implacably. “The Wen who are left were kidnapped by the Jin, tortured and raped. They’re not Wen anymore. They’re Wei. They’re the heart of the new Cang Qiong sect and I will not be bringing any of them out to answer questions.”

Nie Mingjue strangled whatever swearing he wanted to do into a growl that sounded like a yao about to attack, but pretty obviously he held back solely because of Shijie’s saddest of sad eyes staring at him with tears welling up.

“And how am I supposed to believe that?” Nie Mingjue demanded. “I need evidence, Wei Wuxian. The rest of the Nie are not going to accept it.”

“Well, you can still do interviews,” Wei Ying said with a smile as he turned and looked right at Nie Huaisang whose fan immediately covered his entire face. “You just need a mirror. Your brother can explain. We contacted him because he had mirrors around and there weren’t any with the Lan, the Nie or the Jiang.”

For a long moment, silence echoed. Then four varieties of “What?” bellowed out as Nie Huaisang tried to hide his entire body behind his fan. Wei Ying grinned and let them all shout. Once they calmed down, he’d call Wei Qing and demonstrate.

Shouting at Nie Huaisang was a good way to let them blow some steam off and it made him grin, too. Well worth the inevitable interrogation after this.

#

In the Demon Realm:

SQQ: …His father definitely wants him dead.

SQH: Yeah, no doubt about that. That creep’s on the kill list.

MBJ: *nods firmly as his glare intensifies from it’s normal levels*

LBH: But that uncle is the one who really pushed for him to make the trip.

SQQ: That rat? Obviously he wants JGY out of the way. He’s just too stupid to realize that he’d have to cover for all of JGY’s work once he died.

SQH: And then there’s Madame Jin.

All four of them roll their eyes because she’s clearly been trying to murder JGY every single day, morning, noon, and night.

LBH: I just don’t see this as one of her attempts. She’s behind the stabbings and the poison, not this. It’s too subtle.

SQQ: Much too subtle. I mean, the entirety of the sect elders surely have a role in it.

MBJ: …

SQH: Yeah, no, you’re totally right, my King. None of them had any part of sending JGY off this time. I mean, last week? Sure. Just not this time.

SQQ and LBH exchange looks because neither of them had a single clue what MBJ meant with that silent, flat-faced look.

LBH: *grimaces* The only person who really pushed JGY to make this trip is…

SQQ: *rolls his eyes* JZX is not that subtle. He’s not that smart. There is no way that he’s behind this. The man can barely manage to string six words together without putting his foot in his mouth.

SQH: Totally. But… who else is there?

All four stare at the mirror as they try to find another candidate and utterly fail.

Off curled up around the moon pavilion, ZZL privately thinks that they’re overthinking it, but that’s fine as long as it ensures that JGY isn’t a threat to WY and LZ and their cute family. And WN who’s the cutest of them all.

30. Painful Realization

Finding out that you were nothing but a tool to the people around you kind of sucked. Zixun’s entire fucking life had been spent dancing to other people’s tunes, all the while dreaming of somehow getting to be the one on top.

Literally.

Uncle was so much worse than the rest of the sect knew. The other sects had no clue about the shit that man got up to in private. Even Zixun’s idiot cousin Zixuan had no idea. If he’d known about the touching and the sex and the other abuse, Uncle would’ve been dead within a shichen.

Zixuan had zero calm once he realized that something was wrong. Especially dishonorably wrong. How many times a week did Zixun fantasize about telling Zixuan? Hundreds, usually while something horrible and degrading happened to him.

He couldn’t tell.

Uncle would torture Zixun to death.

Uncle had tortured Zixun.

Over and over and over again, healing him up between rounds, listening to all of Jin Guangyao’s every so helpful suggestions about how to make the torture worse. More effective. More emotionally and mentally damaging.

It’d be… nice… to claim that Jin Guangyao was the reason that Uncle had been the way he was. Oh, of course it was just the whore-son who drove him to it! Uncle wasn’t really a rapist and a pedophile and a thorough creep.

Not true. It’d never been true, no matter what Jin Guangyao claimed as he was interrogated.

“We should report this back to Wei Wuxian,” Wei Qing said as she read over the notes that Wei Ning had taken. “It’s pretty obvious who’s to blame in all of this.”

“Lies,” Zixun scoffed.

Wei Qing glared like she wanted to cut his throat and kick his carcass down the side of the mountain. “He couldn’t.”

Zixun laughed and didn’t try to cut himself off when the laugh came out broken, horrible and terrifying. “Yeah, sure, he couldn’t lie. But Uncle started raping me when I was nine. He started molesting me when I was seven. And that was way before Jin Guangyao ever showed up. Hell, he would’ve been the same age. For all we know, Uncle was going to the brothel where he grew up specifically to molest him, too. Not like anyone asked that and frankly, it doesn’t fucking matter. What matters is that Uncle is… he’s a pedophile, a rapist, and he’ll never stop until he has everything and everyone under his control.”

Saying out loud was…

…Zixun was actually a little lightheaded. Wow. He’d never once admitted any of it before. The horror on Wei Ning’s face wasn’t enough to make Zixun shut up. Even Wei Qing’s little headshake of disbelief wasn’t.

Uncle couldn’t touch Zixun anymore. He was safe. Ish. Safe from Uncle, if not from the death that was coming for both Zixun and his whore-son of a cousin.

Actually, Zixun should probably stop calling Jin Guangyao “whore-son”, shouldn’t he? If he kept saying it in his head, it’d come out his mouth eventually and no one here was going to take kindly to that kind of term.

Even if it was desperately accurate.

Just, Jin Guangyao might have studied proper manners. He definitely was smarter than anyone else in the Jianghu, possibly excepting Wei Wuxian. He was dangerous and skilled, despite the smaller size of his core.

He was still blatantly raised in a brothel. The way he smiled and submitted branded his origins on him, no matter what Jin Guangyao wore or how careful his words were. It was like Jin Guangyao believed that if he just ingratiated himself enough that it would make a difference in how he was treated, never realizing that if you had power, you never ingratiated yourself to anyone.

They served you. You did not serve them.

Wei Qing sighed as she rubbed her hands over her now clean cheeks. “He couldn’t lie.”

“He didn’t fucking need to lie,” Jin Zixun insisted. “You didn’t ask anything about what Uncle implied. What he suggested with little sneers. The jokes. You never asked about the fucking jokes. He’s never once said Jin Guangyao’s name. He consistently starts to say “Meng”, then stops, laughs, and gestures as if “oops, minor mistake”. But only when Jin Guangyao is looking especially competent or Zixuan is looking exceptionally brainless. He sculpts people with his fucking jokes and the comments and the rumors. I don’t care if you want to blame Jin Guangyao! Go right ahead—he’s creepy and violent and awful. But it’s not the only thing wrong in the Jin Sect. Ignore that and the torment will only get worse.”

Wei Qing shook her head again, turning away to check on Jin Guangyao. What? What the fuck? How could she just ignore….?

Wei Ning, on the other hand, gently pushed Zixun out of the treatment room. He passed all the notes over to Zixun, making sure to push them firmly into Zixun’s hands.

While looking a little bit scary on his own, there. Zixun had never seen that kind of rage in Wei Ning’s eyes before. Not even during the torture that Zixun had been ordered to inflict on the Wen remnants. And, you know, been more than happy to do.

Nice to have someone else be the one trembling, pissing themselves and suffering for once. Didn’t stop Zixun’s personal hell, but it had sort of made things a little more bearable for a while there.

“This needs to be reported to our sect leader,” Wei Ning murmured low enough that there was no way for Wei Qing to hear. “Right now. Please.”

“Yessir,” Zixun squeaked as he clutched the notes. “When did you get scary?”

Wei Ning dimpled as he suddenly smiled, all the anger disappearing in an instant. “Oh, I always was. I just hid it so that my cousins wouldn’t kill me or my sister. You know.”

Zixun thought about that for a moment and then nodded. “Yeah. I know. Right. I’ll go. Report, I guess.”

“Tell them everything,” Wei Ning said, gently emphasizing “everything” in exactly the right way to make it clear that Zixun had better fill Wei Wuxian in on just when, how and how often he’d been abused.

“Got it,” Zixun confirmed.

It wasn’t as easy as marching up to the mirror and calling Wei Wuxian over. Of course it wasn’t. Popo Wei stopped him and made him explain what he thought he was doing. So did about six other Wei who looked at Zixun with varying levels of “my knife needs to be buried in your kidneys”.

In the end, though, he got to the mirror. He got to call. And then he got to groan as four different Jiang disciples questioned him about just what he thought he was doing, getting himself stuck in a mirror that way.

“Just go get Wei Wuxian,” Zixun finally snapped at the latest one, a woman with a vicious cut on her cheek and a belly swelling in pregnancy. “I got a report he’s going to need as soon as possible.”

“Fine,” the woman grumbled. “But then you’re getting exorcised.”

“I am not possessing this stupid mirror!” Zixun shouted, half because of the way the Wei were giggling behind his back.

Had to be the real reason why Wei Ning sent Zixun, damn it all. Couldn’t be embarrassed himself, oh no, had to send Zixun to be humiliated. Except if Wei Ning had done this, the Jiang would’ve taken one look at him and been all sweetness as they ran to get Wei Wuxian immediately.

Assholes. Everyone, everywhere, were assholes specifically to Zixun.

“…Why are you giving me the report?” Wei Wuxian asked once he finally showed up after way too long of a wait.

“Because Wei Qing is taking care of my murderous cousin, Wei Ning is helping and Wei Ning told me to do it,” Zixun explained.

Wei Wuxian blinked at Zixun about a thousand times, really fast, before getting that scarily serious face on. “Wei Ning ordered you to come report to me.”

“Yeah,” Zixun agreed. “Tell the others to send the kids away. What I’ve got to report isn’t for little ears.”

The Wei scowled at him until Wei Wuxian did exactly that. With more smiles and fond looks, but it was still an order, and it still got the kids to leave the area. Which was a really good thing because Zixun didn’t pull a single punch as he detailed what Wei Qing had gotten out of Jin Guangyao.

“Which is all awful, of course,” Zixun concluded as Wei Wuxian’s eyes glowed red and Lan Wangji loomed like a thundercloud behind him, “but it’s not the full picture. Sure, I mean, it’s nice to assume that it’s all Jin Guangyao’s fault. All him, the murderous whore-son who was Wen Ruohan’s torturer.”

“It does make sense,” Wei Wuxian said over the sound of people in the background on his side cursing up a storm. “You don’t agree?”

“No,” Zixun said before blowing out a breath and squaring his shoulders. “Because Meng Yao was still living in his mom’s brothel when my uncle decided that I was… old enough… for him to start molesting and raping me. I mean, it was a good six years or so before Meng Yao even set foot on the stairs of Koi Tower. Got thrown right back down them, but still.”

Silence echoed on both sides of the mirror.

“How old?” Wei Wuxian asked as ashy smoke boiled up off him.

“I was seven when the molestation started,” Zixun said. He tried really hard not to shake, not to curse, not to cry. Just… cold. He had to be cold as ice or he’d break and that wasn’t going to fucking happen. “I was nine when the rape started. When I turned fourteen, he started “loaning” me out to his cronies. I wasn’t the first, either. I wasn’t the last. It’s been going on for ages, probably since Uncle was my age. Yeah, blame Jin Guangyao for what he did. Absolutely. He’s a dangerous, violent asshole who hides behind his servant smiles. But don’t forget that he wouldn’t even exist if Jin Guangshan wasn’t a worse asshole. His mother was maybe fourteen when she got pregnant, after all.”

“Right,” Wei Wuxian said.

He shut his glowing eyes, which didn’t do a hell of a lot to stop the glow. Then, like a candle being snuffed out, he was suddenly just normal. No glow, no resentful energy, no darkness or smoke or anything.

Like that wasn’t creepy as hell.

“You and Wei Ning were right to make sure I knew as soon as possible,” Wei Wuxian said. “Thank you. Tell them to keep him unconscious, in stasis if possible. There’s a device that we found that might work well for that.”

“I’ll tell them,” Zixun promised. “I don’t… have to go there, back to Koi Tower, right?”

Wei Wuxian’s smile was one of the scariest things that Zixun had ever seen. “No. You absolutely do not. We’ll sort something out because one way or the other, you’re not going back ever again.”

#

In the Demon Realm:

Luo Binghe and Mobei-Jun stare into the mirror, watching Jin Zixun’s report on the horrors that had been inflicted on him far, far, far too young. In the background, Shen Qingqiu and Shang Qinghua pace and curse, respectively, then switch so that SQQ can exercise his considerable vocabulary and volume.

SQQ: *whirls to stab a finger at LBH* That man is not going to survive! No matter what it does to us, no matter what it does to the realms, he is dead man walking!

SQH: Oh, so dead. So very dead. That, that, that… *breaks off into spluttered cursing in multiple different languages, including some that don’t exist in that time or that world*

LBH looks to MBJ.

MBJ nods once, very seriously.

LBH turns back to SQQ and SQH. He nods once, very seriously, as well.

MBJ disappears in a swirl of ice crystals, leaving SQH behind because he’s too angry to be effective at this kind of mission.

In Lotus Pier, under the Moon Pavilion, Zhuzhi-Lang offers up his snakes to help ensure that JGS is dead in very short order. Not even an immortal can survive some of his snakes’ bites. Better to be certain than risk him getting away and doing… those things… again.

31. Strident Call

It’s not like Wei Ying hadn’t known that Jin Zixun had to have gone through some truly horrific stuff to be the sort of person he was. Seriously, no teenager was that horrible that persistently. Occasionally? Sure. Every teenager was a cauldron of hormones, confusion and absolute certainty that they were the best and brightest ever. Unless they were busy being convinced that they’d fooled everyone for the last time and any second they would be denounced as a fraud in front of everyone they cared about.

That was just being a teenager.

Jin Zixun, on the other hand, had been calculated about his cruelty. Vicious, cutting, no mercy ever, no matter who he was cutting to shreds. Wei Ying had wondered, in that carefully not admitting anything way that kept him from getting in trouble with Madame Yu, whether there was more behind Jin Zixun’s behavior.

He probably should have taken the whipping for speaking up and getting someone to look into Jin Zixun’s real circumstances. Too late now.

“Seven,” Lan Xichen breathed, grey-faced and shaking as he leaned against Lan Zhan’s side. “Seven! I cannot…”

“Mm,” Lan Zhan hummed comforting even though his face had gone blackly furious just about the time Wei Ying lost control over the resentful energy inside of him.

Wei Ying had gotten control back. Lan Zhan didn’t look like he was going to try. Which was fine. Lan Zhan had almost died. He got to be emotional about terrible things if he wanted to.

“We have to stop that man,” Lan Xichen said, breathing getting more steady as his horror gave way to the sort of implacable rage that made Lans so terrifying to fight. “This. This cannot be allowed to continue.”

“Agreed,” Nie Mingjue said from the doorway to the room where Nie Huaisang was comforting Shijie.

Or maybe Shijie was comforting Nie Huaisang? They were both deeply upset by Jin Zixun’s report, to the point of tears and rage and more tears and then collapsing into each other’s arms. Probably better to have them tucked away where they could calm down in private.

Whatever Shijie and Nie Huaisang came up with for vengeance against Jin Guangshan was going to be horrific. Let them do their plotting alone so that it wouldn’t be overheard.

“Totally agreed here,” Wei Ying said. “I’ve wanted to stop him for ages. I mean, at least since I punched the peacock.”

Lan Xichen shook his head. “No. We have to deal with this in the next couple of days. I will not be parted from A-Zhan any longer than I have to. I will not put up with any more Jin nonsense. We must act. Quickly.”

Wei Ying grimaced as he rubbed the back of his neck.

“I… agree… that we need to act,” Wei Ying said slowly. “I really do. I’m not sure that we’re organized enough to act in days. That’s very short notice. Even with the mirrors, there’s a lot to coordinate. And, well, we’re being actively hunted. There are Jin here at Lotus Pier right now. If any of them saw me or Lan Zhan it would be a problem.”

“Nope,” Jiang Cheng said as he marched back up the pier to Wei Ying’s side. “I told them to go get rooms in town because we have no space for them with the Nie here. And then threatened to let them fight the Nie for the rooms. They all left right after that.”

Wei Ying had to fight a very inappropriate cackle over that. Not that he could blame the Jin for running with their tails between their legs. No one wanted to go up against the Nie. Not when the Nie would be gleeful about wiping the floor with you.

“All right then,” Wei Ying said. “What are we going to do? I mean, the Peacock wouldn’t appreciate us razing Jinlintai to the ground.”

“Don’t be too sure about that,” Jiang Cheng said with an amused snort. “The Peacock doesn’t exactly like anyone in his sect other than Luo Qingyang. Still, you’re not wrong. Total destruction isn’t going to work. The Jin have way more disciples who didn’t just fight a war. None of the other sects have the capacity to go up against the Jin in a head-on battle.”

“Then we cannot go head-on,” Lan Xichen said as he straightened up fully once more. “We must be more subtle.”

“There any tools or tricks that you can bring out to support us?” Nie Mingjue asked as he kept right on pacing furiously back and forth across the room. “Weapons?”

Wei Ying laughed. Tried to stop because it came out half-hysterical. Maybe more than half. The laughter went down to giggle snorts when Lan Zhan came over to wrap Wei Ying up in his arms.

“Many things,” Lan Zhan said. “All locked to sect members only.”

“Great,” Nie Mingjue grumbled. “That’s no help, then.”

“Don’t be too sure,” Wei Ying said as he snuggled into Lan Zhan’s side. “I mean, Snake-gege by himself is a huge threat. Add in me and my new ghostly cultivation method, Lan Zhan with a legendary guqin, and some of the talismans and arrays I found? Really, there’s not much that we can’t overpower.”

Jiang Cheng looked out the window to where Zhuzhi-Lang had risen up so that he could nod firmly at them all.

“…Can he, like, control bi-vipers?” Jiang Cheng asked, cheeks a little pale at the thought.

“Yeah, of course,” Wei Ying said. “Snake-gege is something like their king. Ruler. Grandpa? I don’t know. Pretty much every snake ever listens when Snake-gege needs something. It’s fine, though. Snake-gege is just super-nice and sweet, despite being all, you know, big. And venomous.”

There was something wrong with getting the same flatly unamused look from Zhuzhi-Lang that he got from Lan Zhan, Lan Xichen, and Nie Mingjue. At least Jiang Cheng nodded thoughtfully as if he was using his brain instead of getting caught up in nonsense.

“Good,” Jiang Cheng said. “Then we need snake spies in Jinlintai so that we know what’s going on.”

“Already there,” Wei Ying said, waving off Jiang Cheng’s scowl. “No, really. Snake-gege insisted on getting all the snakes to spy on everyone before we ever left home. They’re all over. Just, you know, lurking. Being all… snakey. As snakes do.”

Zhuzhi-Lang submerged himself under the water with a splash that just shrieked of “I cannot believe that I’m supposed to pretend that I respect you” while the strange bond between them hummed with “you’re so embarrassing but I still love you, you disaster person you”.

Fortunately, Wei Ying was very familiar with that because Jiang Cheng’s facepalm and disgusted groan was the exact same thing, in a slightly less tidal wave causing form.

Either way, knowing that they had a source of information on what everyone else was doing helped get the others into actually making plans.

Wei Ying wasn’t exactly sure that they were great plans since the focus was “get in, kill him, get back out” and the problem was so much wider than just Jin Guangshan. After all, Jin Zixun had said outright that he’d been passed off to other pedophiles in the Jin sect. And to cronies who were rapists and pedophiles. There were many, many, many victims.

Far too many perpetrators.

Just stabbing a handful of people wasn’t going to fix the issue. Stopping the pedophiles and warmongers who wanted to rule the Jianghu while grinding everyone under their heels was going to take something…

…bigger.

Something unprecedented.

“Right,” Wei Ying said once the others had their very neat little plan to deal with Jin Guangshan and just Jin Guangshan. “That’s the first step. How are we dealing with the rest of the pedophiles?”

Nie Mingjue stared at him, his frown slowly increasing to maybe a quarter of what it was before Wei Ying drained the resentment out of Baxia. The rattle of Baxia’s sheath carried a silent suggestion of “more stabbing?”, all bright and cheerfully delighted.

“No, not more stabbing,” Nie Mingjue groaned while caressing Baxia’s handle.

“Mmm, I can get behind stabbing,” Wei Ying said with a huge grin. “Some people just need to be killed, you know? But the fact is that I don’t know which of them need to die and which just… got roped into it and were too afraid to stop. I could summon ghosts and have them scare people. Report back on what happened when they died. But even under Lan questioning, you have to be incredibly careful about the questions or you don’t get a full picture. That’s not a good way to investigate murder, rape, corruption, all of that stuff.”

Lan Xichen sighed, staring at his notes as if they disappointed him now when just a moment before he’d been quietly smug about how detailed they were. “This… Can we fix this?”

“I don’t know,” Wei Ying said. “I’ve never had the freedom to just… study what Cang Qiong has to offer. There may be the exact tool or talisman that we need to separate the guilty from the innocent, but.”

Wei Ying sighed as he leaned into Lan Zhan’s side.

The problem wasn’t determining truth. If they were determined enough, thorough enough, and used multiple methods to ensure truthfulness, they could get to the truth on pretty much anyone.

The problem was point of view.

Nothing excused the rape. Or the pedophilia. That Wei Ying was solid on. If of them was a child rapist, dead. Dead on the spot with no guilt on his side, thank you very much.

But Nie Mingjue had been perfectly happy to see Wen farmers and healers tortured and killed in death camps just because they had the Wen name. To him, his actions were completely honorable. The Wen were his enemy. Everyone in the camps was a Wen or aligned with the Wen. They deserved to die. Simple, straightforward, easy.

Not so true looked at from the Wen point of view.

“Cang Qiong sealed itself away in part because the rest of the world wanted to tear them apart,” Wei Ying said slowly. “They wanted to take all that knowledge, all those tools, and use them to become rulers of the Jianghu. Of the world. Jin Guangshan wants the same thing. Completely aside from all the rest of his horribleness, Jin Guangshan, Sect Leader Yao and Sect Leader Ouyang, half the smaller sect leaders; they would the exact same thing if they had a chance. The entire Jianghu decided that the Wen remnants needed to die even though they had nothing at all, no power, no qi, no tools, nothing to make them a threat. They had to die because it made the other sect leaders feel strong and righteous and powerful, not because they were bad people or anything.”

Wei Ying didn’t meet Nie Mingjue’s eyes. The painfully loud swallow and fidgety sigh wasn’t something he wanted to address. Same for Lan Xichen who now looked stricken because he’d sent Lan disciples in without verifying what they would be doing. Presumably, he’d brushed off any reports the Lan had sent back to him about the camps with a “it hardly matters because they’re just Wen”.

“The real problem is that everyone in the Jianghu thinks that being a cultivator means that they’re better than everyone else,” Wei Ying said even more slowly. He frowned at Lan Xichen’s plans, picking them up. “That’s the real root cause of all of this. They’re better and special and thus they don’t have to follow laws. They don’t have to treat others well. If they’re higher rank, well, everyone needs to get out of their way and kowtow to them.”

“I don’t disagree with you,” Jiang Cheng said, thinking face firmly engaged even though he’d crossed his arms over his chest defensively. “But that’s not exactly something we can fix, Wei Wuxian. It’s just the way the world works.”

“Is it?” Wei Ying asked as he stared into Jiang Cheng’s eyes. “Cang Qiong was twelve separate sects that chose to band together as allies, friends. During the Sunshot Campaign, we all worked together. Why does that have to collapse into the same stupid infighting now that the war is over? Why can’t we lift each other up? Help each other? Step in when someone needs support dealing with jerks like Jin Guangshan instead of stepping back and making noises like “oh, so sorry, but oops, can’t do anything after all”?”

Lan Xichen sighed, shaking his head. “That is a lovely idea, truly. But we are not Cang Qiong.”

“Do you want to be?” Wei Ying asked. All of them, even Lan Zhan, stiffened. “Because there’s exactly one person who gets to say who qualifies as Cang Qiong and who doesn’t: me.”

#

In the Demon Realm:

SQQ throws his hands up and groans: Who does he think he is? We tried that!

SQH: Now, no, we didn’t. We didn’t invite whole sects in. We just invited individuals in and they went all, you know, power crazy we gotta get all this for ourselves at us.

SQQ: Exactly! How can he trust them? Even if LXC wants his little brother to be able to visit, the entire sect isn’t as reliable. LQR would gladly cut Wei Ying’s throat! With no guilt!

They both look for their husbands and realize that no, neither LBH nor MBJ are there. And that they don’t know when their husbands left. Or what they’re up to, for that matter.

Both start cursing as they use the mirror to try and track their wayward spouses down before they do something that shatters the realms yet again, because all the heavens know that it would be entirely too easy to do so after what happened back when Cang Qiong hid from the world.

 

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