#LOTUS PIER BURNS AND WEN QING DIES AND JIANG CHENG IS ALONE FOREVER | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rosethornewrites · 3 years

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Fic: a grain of millet drifting, ch. 1

Relationship: Niè Huáisāng & Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn

Characters: Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian, Original Characters, Nie Huaisang

Additional Tags: Assassination Attempt(s), Introspection, Regret, Travel, Post-Canon, POV Third Person, POV Wei WuXian

Summary: Wei Wuxian wanders after parting from Lan Wangji, looking to understand the changes in the world since his death, seeking to understand his place in it. He doesn't realize he's being watched. Frankencanon, so this has a liberal mixture of CQL and MDZS.

Notes: See end.

AO3 link

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Wei Wuxian hadn’t lied to Lan Zhan after their brief confrontation with Nie Huaisang in Cloud Recesses, not exactly.

Knowing why he’d been brought back, whether somehow his old friend had chosen him specifically for his own reasons, or if that had been entirely Mo Xuanyu’s call, wouldn’t change anything.

And part of him didn’t want confirmation of how much Nie Huaisang had meddled with along the way.

So much had been broken, so many people lost, and a part of him wanted to believe the façade that the indolent Nie Huaisang he had known during their days in the Cloud Recesses still existed.

But once he’d left Lan Zhan and set off on his travels with Little Apple, once he started getting used to being alive again, to having even the tiny wisp of a jindan, barely beyond zhuji, that Mo Xuanyu had gifted him, something he could build on, something other than the gaping hole that had ultimately consumed him, he’d had to face some truths.

He had no family, no home. He didn’t know if Jiang Cheng would ever want anything to do with him, and he wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t. As much as he would always love Lotus Pier, he didn’t know that it had ever really been his home.

In some ways, his leaving had been inevitable. Despite being head disciple, he’d never been welcome. And the fall of Lotus Pier would forever be his fault, the ghosts of his own doing. He’d never regret protecting Mianmian and Lan Zhan, but he would always regret the massacre that had followed.

Even if he’d technically been absolved of the death of Jin Zixuan and the bloodbath of Nightless City and shijie’s death, his actions had still led to them.

Wei Wuxian spent long, sleepless nights under the stars and listening to Little Apple snore outrageously coming to the understanding that he’d left the Burial Mounds with his sanity shredded. The war and continued use of resentful energy without a jindan had only worsened it. He’d raised the dead, the ancestors of their enemy, defiling their bodies to win the war, and he’d earned a dark and deviant reputation in doing so.

After the war, he’d taken to drinking to dull it all, and doing so had destabilized his mind further. He was sensitive about his inability to cultivate, but couldn’t explain why. Surrounded by people who wanted him to do what he could not, he had spiraled.

Really, by the time he’d saved the Dafan Wen temporarily from their fate and gone back to attempt to live in the Burial Mounds, he’d been hanging by a thread. Wen Qing had bullied him into taking care of himself, for the most part, but he’d spent more days than he could count in the Demon Slaughtering Cave capable of little more than opening his eyes, what little energy he had dedicated to keeping the Seal under control.

He remembered very little past Jiang Yanli’s death and waking up in the Burial Mounds with the remnants of the Wen who knew death was coming. The seal wanted more, another Nightless City. And he’d known he could absolutely destroy the Jianghu—but that the Seal wanted it gave him enough pause that he knew he needed to destroy it and end it all.

He’d managed to find a way, but the Siege happened just as he was ready. What little sanity he had left went toward an attempt to hide A-Yuan—maybe the one good thing he had managed. And then, as the aunties and uncles and popo were massacred around him, he could only focus on destroying the seal.

Dying in the way that he had, ripped to shreds by corpses, had been agonizing, though the benefit of Jiang Cheng stabbing him had meant he’d died faster. He didn’t know if his shidi had meant it to be a kindness, but ultimately it had lessened his suffering before he died. It was likely a better death than anyone else would have given him.

But Jin Guangyao had been right: even before he’d absconded with the Wen remnants, his actions during the war, his temper and frayed sanity, his rages, his desecration of the dead… All of it had painted a target on him.

No, he’d painted it on himself with blood.

Wei Wuxian had come back in a body not tainted by the resentful energy that had burrowed its way into his bones before his death, despite it being his old one free of scars and birth marks, his sanity somehow restored, and was able to see his own self-destruction and how he had made that the only path he could walk through his own trauma-fueled hubris.

Maybe those years dead had done something to heal whatever damage he had inflicted on his own soul, as well. He remembered nothing of that time, and waking up in a body had been like opening his eyes after a long sleep. He’d known he’d been dead, had known time had passed, though not how much at first. Everything that had occurred leading to his death felt so immediate, particularly shijie’s death and the knowledge he’d left A-Yuan hiding but didn’t know if he’d survived.

The relief he felt that he had at least saved one person couldn’t be quantified.

Part of the journey was trying to find where he fit into the world now, but most of it was reflection and coming to terms with the reality that now existed.

He’d steered away from larger cities, opting to travel smaller roads to villages off the beaten path. Many, it seemed, had problems with restless spirits and the like—the occasional yao, even. He took care of what he could, and drafted letters to Lan Zhan when it was something that required more than he was currently capable of.

Perhaps that was something he’d learned—to rely on others and not try to fix everything himself. He could probably handle it all, but there were costs of using resentful energy too much, and in this life he didn’t particularly want to pay them.

So he communicated with the odd hungry ghost, used talismans to take down roaming fierce corpses, and handled the smaller yao that he could handle with the jindan he had, using these night hunts to help develop it further, hoping one day he could retrieve Suibian from Jiang Cheng and be able to wield the blade again—assuming his once-brother would let him have the sword.

Everything beyond, that would require more spiritual energy than he had or more resentful energy than he was comfortable using, he sent to Lan Zhan so the local cultivation sect could be alerted. He dared not send them a letter himself; people still had strong feelings about the return of the Yiling Patriarch, and it was just as likely he’d be blamed for the problem as anything.

The rural route he took left him able to travel in anonymity as a rogue cultivator, offering essentially any name but his own. Thanks to the ugly Yiling Patriarch talismans, the common folk didn’t know what he looked like. Most often, he went by Wei Yuandao, reminded of Mianmian��s happiness at seeing him when he did, that there were people in the world who didn’t hate or fear him. The villagers didn’t know him, were grateful for his help, whether in setting a spirit to rest or helping with odd jobs in exchange for a meal and a place to sleep by a hearth.

Much of the time, though, he slept beneath a blanket of stars.

One night like that, he heard the sounds of a scuffle and rushed to see what was going on. He expected to need to fight off a bandit, but instead he found a man in Nie colors running through a man dressed head to toe in black, face masked.

As he stood gaping, the Nie disciple bowed to him.

“Wei-gongzi.”

That confirmed a suspicion, and the logic of the situation ran through his mind at the speed of light. The courtesy, the Nie colors, what was clearly a would-be assassin’s body at his feet. Finally, Wei Wuxian sighed.

“How many assassins?”

The young man smiled.

“Five in as many weeks. You are as smart as Nie-zongzhu said.”

Wei Wuxian snorted at that.

“Not if I didn’t realize assassins were being sent after me. I’m guessing Nie-xiong knew they’d be hired and sent you to protect me in secret?”

He’d honestly thought he was being left alone by the cultivation world, especially since he wasn’t causing any trouble. How very naïve.

The man nodded curtly, then bent to rifle through the corpse’s clothing, looking for clues and stripping it of valuables, every bit a Nie.

“He wanted you to be able to travel without worry.”

Ah, Nie-xiong…

Perhaps Nie Huaisang was used to working from the shadows and had an agenda, or perhaps he truly just wanted Wei Wuxian to be undisturbed. Whatever his reasons for the secrecy, with this that ship had sailed.

But Wei Wuxian had no idea why Nie Huaisang would bother, not after he threatened him at the Cloud Recesses. Implied threat, but still—he’d expected that would burn a bridge. Not… this.

“I suppose I’m overdue for a visit to the Unclean Realm,” he said after thinking it over. “You may as well travel with me openly, unless Nie-xiong would prefer you watch over me in secret?”

Despite the protection he’d sent, Wei Wuxian didn’t know if he wanted the Nie clan officially associated with the Yiling Patriarch.

“Sect Leader was not specific about this eventuality. Traveling together openly may deter assassins, though it is easier to catch them off guard if they believe you unprotected.”

Ah, so Nie Huaisang didn’t care. Wei Wuxian waved off the concern. Now that he knew the threat, it was easily dealt with.

“I can set talisman traps around the campsite. Probably should have done that to begin with.”

But he’d been trying to have faith in the cultivation world, he didn’t say. Once again, misplaced faith and he should’ve known better.

“At least that way you can get real sleep as we travel to meet with Nie-zongzhu.”

They were a week of travel from the Unclean Realm, and he supposed he’d get answers to questions he hadn’t known he had then.

He headed back to his campsite, happy to see his Nie protector was following, and set a gourd of water near the fire to heat and pulled out some tea.

“In the meantime, we can talk about these assassins, eh? We’ll bury the body in the morning.”

It’d been over a decade since he’d last dug a grave, and it wasn’t to bury a body, but he was sure he could manage with the Nie’s help.

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Zhuji is the foundation building stage of cultivation, the stage before forming the jindan/golden core. Basically, Wei Wuxian is saying Mo Xuanyu was barely into the stage of forming a golden core, so it’s barely a wisp, but is still something that has the foundations built for him.

This fic was… unexpected. I wanted to write something for Nie Huaisang’s birthday, kind of a reconciliation between him and Wei Wuxian, and this happened. It will likely be no more than three chapters.

The title is a reference to a translation of a Su Shi poem, “First Ode on the Red Cliffs,” which was written after his first exile (he was exiled twice, both times for his poetry), while he wandered. There are several translations floating around, but I liked the wording of this one.

#the untamed #mo dao zu shi #chen qing ling #cql #mdzs #wei wuxian #wei ying #nie huaisang #untamed fanfiction #untamed fanfic #untamed fic #cql fanfic #cql fanfiction #cql fic #mdzs fanfic #mdzs fanfiction #mdzs fic #my fanfiction

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cinnamonandpancakes · 4 years

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Thinkin about the Yi City Crew (as you do) and idk, I think the tragedy (in CQL) for LWJ in particular is seeing these cultivators who he took notice of (he knew their names! when they met! he doesn’t like people this is very unusual!) reduced to this terrible fate where one’s soul is shattered and the other is a living corpse doomed to walk the earth forever and how that mirrors him so completely.

WWX’s soul was presumed lost! He was left to uphold their promise together and raise their son alone! Song Zichen doesn’t even have a son! He just has a bag holding the shattered remnants of the man he was going to spend his life with, who he cruelly pushed away and spent the rest of his life trying to find and make amends and then had to watch kill himself as he realised he’d killed his dearest friend (soulmate). Idk it’s Tragic in a different way to the MDZS Yi City.

There IS something incredibly tragic about WWX missing meeting his shishu and being the reason for his demise due to his demonic cultivation but the tragedy there is of Missed Connection. The CQL tragedy is of connection brutally ripped away and that just gets me more, especially in relation to LWJ whose whole life is filled with these connections that are brutally severed, beginning with his parents and then continuing through almost everyone he’s ever cared about or admired.

In the book I liked the Yi City arc, don’t get me wrong, I love Xue Yang as a villain and it’s a great lil section but I think having that point of connection beforehand where the reader already knows the people involved makes it that more emotionally impactful. After all, let’s be real, Yi City is mainly a plot vessel to explain how Empathy works so it doesn’t need to be explained later with Nie Mingjue’s head with a lil bit of angst sprinkled on top.

Also! WRT WWX, Xiao Xingchen isn’t just a name! He opens that coffin and it’s someone he knew! Someone he respected and whose opinion he cared about! Someone to whom he’d expressed a wish to emulate! There’s a particularly angsty blend of CQL and MDZS where WWX is still the First Demonic Cultivator but he knew Xiao Xingchen before his death and he’s slapped in the face with the knowledge that if he hadn’t messed with this cultivation then his shishu whom he greatly admired would probably still be alive, another on the list of people he cares about whose deaths he indirectly caused.

I think there’s a blend of canons that I think I’d like best where the Yin Iron arc doesn’t happen, but Wen Qing and Jiang Yanli and Wen Ning still go to the lectures and WWX and LWJ still go nighthunting together after the lectures and they still meet XXC and SZC out doing their thing, baby faced and wide eyed and they all express their wish to leave politics behind to just help people. (The don’t fight Xue Yang because I think it’s funny when he’s Baby)

Then they get called back to go to the Wen Cultivation Conference and they thrash everyone at archery because power couple (ribbon shenanigans are more along the lines of WWX trips and pulls it off and LWJ goes bright red and freezes, it’s v awkward) [[JC sees WQ at the competition and does the best he’s ever done]].

Then the Wens do their ‘we’re banning nighthunting’ and CR burns and Indoctrination happens. Xuanwu cave, LWJ bites WWX as in MDZS because that’s hilarious. Lotus Pier as in CQL except Yanli is sent to Meishan because fuck Lanling. WWX becomes CorpseMan a la MDZS because all the giggling female corpses is Gross but also like such a Look, WWX accepts help a la CQL because I like the vibe of LWJ trying and failing to bring his crush back from the clutches of Evil.

Idk if I’d keep the Shooting at Wens thing from the pheonix mountain hunt? on one hand it demonstrates how everyone is scared of the Jins now (and that scene where wwx shoots 5 arrows is hot) but on the other I don’t that no one would speak up?? and I don’t think the Jins would want to be Conspicuously Evil so soon??? Blindfold yes, no kiss tho because I found the ‘LWJ punches trees when angry’ aspect of it annoying and I’d rather have a heartfelt talk about being soulmates (could have a sexy scene of LWJ walking up and taking off the blindfold and declaring WWX doesn’t need to prove himself to Jin Zixun)[[maybe an almost kiss before yanli appears]]

Qiongqi path: Wen Rescue as in CQL because that shit hurted but Wen Ning would Definitely Be Dead a la MDZS. Burial Mounds Life happens. [[JC refuses the comb from Wen Qing ‘what use would I have for it?’ he says]] There is no second flute, WWX lost control and Jin Zixuan is dead at his hand and his hand alone. Wen Qing and Wen Ning go to turn themselves in alone. [[Wen Qing leaves the comb in a tree stump where later a small boy will shelter as his home is destroyed around him]] WWX loses control at Nightless City, JYL dies, WWX jumps off a cliff. LWJ, wounded and heartbroken, takes his stand at the Burial Mounds, trying to protect WWX’s people after hiding A-Yuan in Cloud Recesses [[A-Yuan has the comb, years later Jiang Cheng will find him reminiscing and will have to leave the room to cry angry tears]] LWJ is incapacitated and punished. The Wen Remnants are killed and thrown into the Blood Pool.

16 years pass. 16 long years.

Mo Xuanyu summons back a Wei Wuxian who wanted to die but one who hoped against hope the Wen Remnants hadn’t been murdered after his death. A Wei Wuxian who regretted letting himself die without making sure they were safe. (A Wei Wuxian who had to find out he had failed when he arrived in the Burial Mounds to rescue the juniors). [[A Wei Wuxian that looks like Wei Wuxian and Mo Xuanyu combined]] In this canon they find body parts, a la MDZS. They share inn rooms with the knowledge of what they had meant to each other and how in the end it hadn’t meant a thing. They go to Yi City and find a boy, barely older than the juniors, playing house with the bodies of their friends, the ones they wanted to be like. WWX is reminded of all he put LWJ through when he jumped off that cliff. It is no wonder LWJ drinks that night.

Koi Tower happens, right? Idk it’s got to happen at some point. Probably CQL canon if only because I know that one better? I don’t think there’s much difference between the two for this bit.

At the second siege of the Burial Mounds the bodies in the blood pool come to their rescue. Wei Wuxian is horrified. ‘How could you let them do that!’ LWJ stays silent. (‘What else could warrant 33 lashes of the discipline whip’ he will whisper later, drunk off a single cup of wine.) ‘The honourable Hanguang-Jun was in seclusion after you died.’ Jiang Wanyin will say in his best sneer. Lan Qiren says nothing. (’I tried, I tried but it wasn’t enough’)

After the Burial Mounds they return to Lotus Pier. The revelations happen. [[Jiang Wanyin is horrified for more reasons than Wei Wuxian realises. No wonder Wen Qing could not accept his help after what she had done to him]]

Guanyin Temple bores me for the most part, JGY is allowed to monologue for far too long. I like the idea of them confessing at the most awkward time but at the same time it drags out JGY’s monologue even longer and that shit took like 4 episodes in CQL and it Dragged. I skimmed most of those chapters in the novel. JGY and NMJ’s body end up in a coffin trapped under a statue in the image of JGY’s dead mother. Probably have the iconic novel line where JGY is like ‘I hold LWJ’s life in my hands’ or w/e because that’s kinda hot. [[WWX comments to LWJ about how in the ancestral hall they’ve already done most of their bows, LWJ short circuits, JC asks if WWX would like his wedding planning books from when they were kids, WWX short circuits because ‘you KEPT THEM???’ ‘yeah dumbass, you’re still my brother even if I hate you!’]]

There’s that cute scene in CQL where WWX touches LSZ’s ribbon and they hug and cry, keeping that. LWJ and WWX kiss because I Said So and then also have sex because the UST is killing me (but not in front of LSZ, after he’s gone off to travel with Uncle Ning) They handfast but LWJ has to go be interim sect leader while convincing his brother to come out of seclusion and wwx decides to go try and set his demons to rest. LXC demands to be allowed to plan Wangji’s wedding as a stipulation of starting to return from seclusion. Wangji wisely does not mention they already consider themselves married.

[[Wen Qing is found in the cells of Jinlintai. JC tells her that he forgives her. She tells him she still can’t marry him, she has broken her oath as a healer. He lets her go.]]

[[2 years later she turns up in Yunmeng with her brother and her nephew in tow and suggests he join them on their latest night hunt. It’s not love, but he’s beginning to realise he can move on from her. Jin Rulan is disconcerted to find his uncle smiling the next time he visits.]]

[[For some reason, Sect Leader Yao is appointed Chief Cultivator. Everyone is appalled but a surprising amount gets done in order to avoid letting him talk too long.]]

#the untamed #long post #this got long and very off topic #and also kinda cracky #but lbr is it a me post if it's not crack of some kind #forreal tho there were 100% bits I think I could have made flow better with a little bit of work #I think the Yin Iron is kinda clunky as a plot device and honestly did not realise there was a second flute in CQL until people complained #I think the Yin Iron COULD have been done better #but I think it wasn't really fleshed out enough in planning and was just used as like #a macguffin #which sure that's cool #but I think Yin Iron would have worked better if they'd changed the tiger seal plot a lil #and the way they shuffled Xue Yang about was kinda dumb

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