#Qi-Ge's wife better

[nyoomerr]

Shen Yuan entered Luo Binghe’s life like any other good thing he’s ever had: with great difficulty, and accompanied by copious amounts of sex.

The difficult parts don’t bear talking about. Luo Binghe still feels his stomach drop at the reminders of those first few mercurial months of knowing Shen Yuan, at the way Shen Yuan had unintentionally dismantled most notions of what Luo Binghe thought a happy ending should be like. He doesn’t think he’ll ever quite enjoy thinking about that time: it had been, in some ways, a more miserable challenge to overcome than his time in the Abyss had been. 

(It had been, in many ways, the only challenge Luo Binghe had ever had to face that was directed inwards. There was no straightforward evil to banish or monster to slay. There was hardly even a wife to seduce, given the fact that Shen Yuan had let himself be seduced by Luo Binghe’s image long before Luo Binghe himself had ever arrived in Shen Yuan’s world to begin with. 

There was only this: in order to grasp the incandescent happiness that Shen Yuan presented - that Luo Binghe deserved - he had to admit that every moment of so-called happiness he had experienced for the last century had been a fool’s imitation of it. In order to be happy with Shen Yuan, he had to admit to being miserable without him. 

It was humiliating, and it was nauseating, and it had even made Luo Binghe cry once, where he thought Shen Yuan wouldn’t be able to see him. 

He’d been so, so glad when it turned out Shen Yuan wouldn’t even look away from that - from Luo Binghe at his least lovable.)

No, the difficult parts of Luo Binghe’s conquest of Shen Yuan are best kept carefully out of mind. The other, better parts of that conquest - the parts involving hot skin against skin, as close as Luo Binghe could get to fitting Shen Yuan within his own flesh where he could never part from him - those parts are far more pleasant to remember, and Luo Binghe works to make new memories of that sort every day. 

Despite its pleasantness, however, the sex is not Luo Binghe’s favorite part of his courtship with Shen Yuan. 

“Bing-ge,” Shen Yuan calls, voice just an octave shy of a proper whine, “surely we can spend summers in my world? You can’t really think this heat is more pleasant than modern AC, ah?”

Luo Binghe hums, leaning in to run his mouth across the plane of Shen Yuan’s neck, savoring the smell of Shen Yuan’s sweat. His skin is tacky from the heat; Luo Binghe briefly fantasizes about being able to stick himself to it permanently. 

“Wasn’t it Yuan-er who begged to see the Fire-Driven Herons’ migration? It only happens once every decade, after all.”

“I know that,” Shen Yuan says, scowling. “I was the one who told you that.”

“Yuan-er is the most knowledgeable about this world,” Luo Binghe agrees. 

Shen Yuan sighs, squirming half-heartedly in Luo Binghe’s lap - a wordless threat to get up. Obediently, Luo Binghe waves the fan in his free hand a bit quicker in Shen Yuan’s direction, threading delicate veins of qi into the generated wind to ensure it’s pleasantly cool. Satisfied, Shen Yuan settles back in, starting up one of his charming lectures about the fauna of Luo Binghe’s world. 

Luo Binghe listens more to the cadence of Shen Yuan’s voice than to the words themselves. He doesn’t often find it necessary to know the ecological features of a beast in order to slay it, or to capture it for Shen Yuan’s zoo, or to cook it into a proper meal. 

Still, this is what Luo Binghe likes best - what he likes even more than sex, which he’d thought to be his favorite activity from the ages of 17 to 132. 

Lounging on the ground, Shen Yuan sat snugly in his lap and held close by Luo Binghe’s free arm, allowing himself to be pet and cuddled as if it were a natural part of a trip to see some ugly birds migrate - 

Pressing his nose into the nape of Shen Yuan’s neck, left bare by Luo Binghe’s own hands that had been responsible for putting Shen Yuan’s hair up in its current complicated hairstyle - 

Idly fanning Shen Yuan to keep him cool even even while Luo Binghe himself is the greatest source of heat when pressed so close in the summer sun like this -

Over a century into his so-called happy ending, Luo Binghe has rediscovered his greatest pleasure to be physical affection of a non-sexual sort, and Shen Yuan gives it as freely as he breathes.

Oh, he fusses and complains and acts as if he must be coaxed into loving Luo Binghe, but it is such a poor act that Luo Binghe can’t help feeling nothing but warm indulgence towards it. 

“Don’t be so bold,” Shen Yuan will scold when Luo Binghe buys lube without hiding his identity, and yet in the next moment he’ll casually thread his fingers between Luo Binghe’s to hold his hand all the way through their walk down the main street of town.

“Who taught you to act like this, ah?!” Shen Yuan will complain when Luo Binghe ensures his subordinates know what an honor it is to be allowed to look at Shen Yuan, but then it will be Shen Yuan himself who will seat himself directly at Luo Binghe’s side instead of any more appropriate location for a Lord’s wife.

“There’s no need to be so sticky,” Shen Yuan will sigh when he catches Luo Binghe practically running back from the kitchens with breakfast, eager to return to his sweetheart’s side, but then Shen Yuan will happily eat from Luo Binghe’s own chopsticks, even during meals taken in the main dining hall.

Despite all his aired grievances, Shen Yuan himself breaks countless social boundaries a day without even blinking. He truly thinks nothing of it, believing these gifts he presses into Luo Binghe’s heart to be nothing but normal for a couple. Normal! As if Luo Binghe has not heard tavern songs about the Demon Emperor’s shameless new male wife, spun by every servant and enemy alike that has visited the palace and been struck to flustered embarrassment at the way Shen Yuan acts!

Luo Binghe wants to roll Shen Yuan up in one hand and eat him. He dared to say as much to Shen Yuan, once; Shen Yuan had merely rolled his eyes and told him that he wasn’t into “vore.”

(Luo Binghe had made a note to research this “vore” when they next returned to Shen Yuan’s world. He’s learned that he can coax Shen Yuan into a great many number of things, if he does it slowly and lovingly enough. The delay will give Luo Binghe time to figure out a way to both take Shen Yuan’s flesh and blood into his own without then being left without a Shen Yuan to hold in his arms.)

Certainly, some part of Luo Binghe knows this quirk in Shen Yuan’s behavior to be a byproduct of the world Luo Binghe had stolen him from. The standards for modesty are warped in that place, and Shen Yuan had been gently raised by the hand of that world to not notice anything odd about it. 

A god is no less sacred for having come from the heavens where more gods reside, though. Nor does a man feel faith to any of those supposed unseen gods when one presently sits in their lap, free to worship with prayer and touch alike. None of the other people of Shen Yuan’s world had offered Luo Binghe something so precious as the free flowing love that Shen Yuan shows him. None of them had been so foolish, and so sweet, and so carelessly thoughtful despite a cute mean streak hidden within, and -

“Bing-ge,” Shen Yuan calls, and Luo Binghe bites at Shen Yuan’s neck to prove he’s listening. Shen Yuan sighs. “Bing-ge, you aren’t listening to a word I say.”

“I am,” Luo Binghe says, “I just bit you to prove it.”

“Wha - how does that prove - oh, you’re hopeless!” Shen Yuan cries, squirming again, this time with a stronger intention.

Displeased, Luo Binghe casts aside the fan he’d been using to cool Shen Yuan, moving instead to curl both arms around Shen Yuan’s middle. When Shen Yuan keeps squirming, he trails one hand down to rub at Shen Yuan’s thigh, listening for Shen Yuan’s indignant protests. Luo Binghe may have grown drunk on the simple act of holding Shen Yuan without the need for it to be sexually pleasurable, but he isn’t above using sex to keep Shen Yuan close if he must. He refuses to give up even a millimeter of contact with this precious person unless there is no other option. 

“You’re insufferable,” Shen Yuan complains, slapping at Luo Binghe’s creeping hand several times. “We’ll miss the migration we came all this way to see if you keep this up!”

“I’ll miss Yuan-er’s closeness the most,” Luo Binghe says gravely, and Shen Yuan snorts.

“Insufferable,” he repeats, and then gives his most put-upon sigh. “Can’t you just settle for holding my hand for at least until the birds leave?”

Happily, Luo Binghe stops feeling Shen Yuan up and intertwines their hands instead. Shen Yuan praises him for his patience, as if the simple feeling of their palms pressed together isn’t more pleasurable than the greatest heights of ecstasy found in any bed. 

One day, Luo Binghe will confess this to Shen Yuan: that he’s truly deviated far too much from the erotic character Shen Yuan had read all about in that other world. That somehow, when it’s Shen Yuan, Luo Binghe feels so overwhelmed with simple affection that his greatest desires are as chaste as a young boy’s. Oh, he still enjoys the sex, but -

But ah, what he really loves most is this.

#i was rotating binggeyuan in my mind too much and accidentally wrote this. surprise! #might clean this up / extend it a bit and post it on ao3 after i finish my fth fic #svsss #binggeyuan #bingyuan #fic drabble

[jaimebluesq]

For the Nie Mingjue prompt: He's not everyone's Da-ge, he's everyone's didi!

And if you're not feeling the age swap situation, then maybe canonverse NMJ loses his memory somehow (curse? qi deviation unusual effects?) and needs everyone's help to remember who he is (but specially Huaisang’s 🥺)

Damn, how did this prompt go over 2k?! *Ahem*.

Thank you so much for this prompt! I very much enjoy reverse Nie bros! I got to write then once before and decided to turn this prompt into a sequel (but you don't need to have read Maybe if the stars align, maybe if our worlds collide to follow the worldbuilding!)

So, on to the prompt fill - I hope you enjoy :D

~ ~ ~

Nie Huaisang bit his lip in thought, and a little frustration. He’d been to the rooms assigned to the Lan sect, and hadn’t found his brother anywhere – normally Lan Qiren would have absconded Nie Mingjue somewhere to discuss night hunts, or Lan Xichen would have dragged him away somewhere for tea, but neither had seen him since the banquet that evening. Nor was Nie Mingjue among the Jin – they were in Koi Tower, after all, and the sects had been invited for a grand celebration on Jin Zixuan’s birthday, and though the boy was vain and snobbish at times, he often came out of his shell to take Nie Mingjue under his wing and show him around the grounds or take him to spar on the training field. Nie Mingjue had certainly not been among the Wen – even after Wen Ruohan’s ‘mysterious’ death two years ago, the Nie and the Wen were far from friendly, even if Wen Xu’s reign was nowhere near as contentious as his father’s (Nie Huaisang was quite thankful that he, rather than Wen Chao, had come out on top when the two brothers fought for dominion over their sect).

He was finishing looking around the smaller sects’ delegations, intending to head for the Jiangs’ quarters next, when he was stopped by a feminine voice nearby. “Oh, Nie-zongzhu? It’s quite fortunate that I found you!”

He lifted his fan to cover his frown and sighed. It was Sect Leader Yao’s sister, of course it was. She was nowhere as unpleasant as her brother, thankfully, but she did have a habit of making a nuisance of herself. Particularly to him.

“Ah, Yao-guniang, I hope you’ve been enjoying the birthday celebrations. How may I assist you?”

She fluttered her eyelashes coquettishly and waved her round fan over her chest – her neckline showing far more cleavage than was proper. Normally he would not mind – he did have a reputation for enjoying the company of women (and men), after all – but he knew she’d had particular designs on him for two years now.

“I heard that the matchmakers have been a great bother to Nie-zongzhu of late,” she offered with an attractive pout. “So disrespectful to hound such a great man, no doubt still grieving the late Madame Nie. I would be more than happy to have a word or two with them, if it would help.”

Yes, the matchmakers had been on his case of late to petition for various women wishing to be the next Madame Nie. He knew he would have to accept one eventually, but he had yet to decide upon what alliance would be most advantageous. Most believed he was still mourning the ‘accidental’ death of his wife during a night hunt – the better that they did not think further upon the timing of her death with that of Wen Ruohan. While they had not been a love match, Yu Jinzhu and he had developed an affection for one another, and he knew she would not want her sacrifice in pursuit of assassinating Wen Ruohan to put his sect in danger.

He also knew that Yao YuFeng’s offer was far from altruistic – she’d had designs on becoming the next Madame Nie since the day of the funeral.

“That is very kind of Yao-guniang,” he said with a charming smile that prompted her fan to move a little faster, “but this one is not afraid of the matchmakers. When I am ready to marry again, only then will I have need of them. But until that time, I have a sect to run, and a brother to find.”

“Is your Didi lost again?” Her smile and chuckle were now far more genuine. “He’s grown to be such a handsome boy, and a great cultivator even at his age! And I have yet to meet a girl who can resist the temptation to pinch his cheeks when his dimples show.”

“Yes, that’s the very reason why I lose him so often. He’s far too happy to help anyone who asks, and is often led astray.” He gave a long-suffering sigh. “If I allowed him, he would go weeks without seeing his Da-ge and spend all of his time helping people in need. My Didi forgets me so!”

“Such a thing is impossible,” she replied. “Everyone knows Nie Mingjue adores his brother and threatens anyone who even thinks of questioning the way you run your sect. He is a credit to Qinghe Nie, and to his Da-ge.”

He tilted his head in thanks at her kind words. “Your kindness does your sect credit, Yao-guniang. Now if you’ll forgive me, a process of elimination is leading me to the Jiang sect’s quarters – hopefully I’ll find my misplaced Didi there.”

“I wish you the best of luck, Nie-zongzhu,” she offered with a short bow, that he echoed.

Thankfully, she had the grace to leave his side, allowing him to continue on his way.

He took a path through the gardens outside on his way to the Jiang delegation’s rooms, enjoying the cool night air, and he spotted a pair of figures sitting outside in the lantern-light. The two boys seemed to be pouting – well, one looked positively grumpy, while the other one pouted only a little as he bumped his shoulder into the other’s. But the moment Nie Huaisang came close enough to be lit by the lanterns, both boys jumped up onto their feet and made proper bows.

“Nie-zongzhu!” they chorused.

“You’ve been enjoying the celebrations, I hope!” Wei Wuxian crowed with a charming grin.

“Are you here to get Nie-xiong?” Jiang Cheng added, a little too much hope in his voice.

Nie Huaisang did his best not to let a smirk creep upon his face.

“I have been searching for him,” he replied, “and this was my next stop. I do hope my Didi hasn’t been too much of a nuisance.”

“Nie-xiong is never a bother,” Jiang Cheng replied – unsurprising, since he and Nie Mingjue had been close since they were young, and Jiang Cheng had yet to refuse an invitation to come to Qinghe and visit with Jasmine, Princess, and Love.

“Not a bother – but he is a thief,” Wei Wuxian countered unapologetically.

Nie Huaisang lifted his fan to cover his silent chuckle. “Well, would you be so kind as to escort me to my thieving Didi?”

“Of course! Right this way, Nie-zongzhu,” Wei Wuxian offered in a way that was almost flirtatious – ah, to be fifteen again.

As the three of them walked, Nie Huaisang was reminded of how fast these young cultivators grew up. When he’d first taken over as sect leader, he’d been their age, and they had been but children playing at being cultivators. And now they were all grown, and already taller than he was. At times he felt like an ant wandering among trees.

Jiang Cheng knocked on a door and opened it, calling out: “Jiejie! We have a visitor!”

Inside the luxuriously appointed guest rooms, Jiang Yanli had set up a table with tea and many kinds of food – and across from her, shyly accepting an affectionate pat on the head, was Nie Huaisang’s missing Didi. The two looked up at their entrance and Nie Mingjue’s face lit up.

“Da-ge!”

“So this is where you’ve been hiding, A-Jue,” he teased. He knew his brother and that his absences were rarely purposeful – he had simply been ‘adopted’ by so many older disciples that constantly sought him out, wanting to spoil him or teach him or drag him out on night hunts. “I’ve been looking for you for nearly an hour.”

Nie Mingjue looked sheepish; he stood up and bowed to his brother. “This one apologizes to Nie-zongzhu.”

“No apologies necessary, something simply came up at the last minute.” Nie Huaisang turned to Jiang Yanli. “I hope Jiang-guniang does not mind me stealing back my brother.”

“Of course, Nie-zongzhu,” she replied kindly with an elegant bow. “Had I known he was missing, I would have sent him back to your delegation’s rooms.”

“No harm is done – and there are few I trust with my brother’s welfare as much as you and your family.” She tilted her head in thanks, her cheeks flushing brightly. Not for the first time did he think she would make an excellent wife – but not only was she betrothed to Jin Zixuan, but Yu Ziyuan had told him in no uncertain terms that her daughter (and son, for that matter) were off-limits to his wandering eyes.

But a man could still look and appreciate.

Everyone wished each other farewell for the night, and Nie Huaisang and his brother were finally en route to their rooms.

“Is something the matter, Da-ge?” Nie Mingjue asked quietly when they were finally alone.

“Nothing is wrong,” he replied, keeping his eyes ahead of him. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to look at his brother, but with how he had to crane his head up to look at him since his last growth spurt, it hurt his neck a lot less to keep his eyes on the path ahead. “But there is someone I want you to meet. Someone I believe has some potential in our sect, but who will require some time to adjust to our ways.” He paused as they passed a servant, and only continued once they were long past them. “Furthermore, I want to get your impression of them.”

“Of course,” Nie Mingjue replied. “Whatever I can do to help.”

He smiled to himself – this was why everyone wished Nie Mingjue were their little brother.

When they reached the Nie delegation’s quarters, one of their disciples held the door open for them as they entered. The healer within stood up and bowed in greeting.

“How is he?” Nie Huaisang asked her, glancing over to where a young man sat by the window. When he saw Nie Huaisang had returned, he stood up and lowered into a gracious bow of his own.

“Nothing that cannot be healed,” she replied reassuringly. “I’m more concerned at his malnourishment than I am the few scrapes and bruises he acquired today.”

He nodded and dismissed her with a wave of his fan. He stepped further into the room once the door clicked shut behind him. “Didi, I would like to introduce you to a young man I met earlier today. This is Meng Yao, and I have invited him to come back to Qinghe with us. He wishes to become a cultivator, and I believe we may have a place for him in the Unclean Realm.”

“It is an honour to meet you,” Meng Yao said in a practised tone of voice, the same one that had impressed Nie Huaisang upon their first meeting outside when the young man had stood up from the bottom of Koi Tower’s steps. He’d seen something in him immediately that he recognized – someone who did not have the same strength and skill with weapons that were the basis of many cultivators’ training, but instead he saw someone adept at the more subtle arts that Nie Huaisang called his own, that his father had brought in teachers from Meishan Yu to teach him many years ago.

In Meng Yao, he had seen himself.

“What happened to you?” Nie Mingjue asked bluntly, as was his way.

Meng Yao lifted a hand to self-sonsciously touch the darkened bruise on his cheek, and when he smiled, his lower lip showed red from where it had been split. “It is nothing, Nie-gongzi.”

“Was it a night hunt?” Nie Mingjue asked – Nie Huaisang said nothing, merely standing back and watching his brother. “Or bandits?”

The response was a wince, and Meng Yao shook his head. “It is nothing-”

Nie Mingjue's eyes narrowed. “Who hurt you? Only a coward hurts someone who can’t or won’t fight back.” He reached for his saber, strapped securely to his back, but he stopped when Meng Yao reached out a hand to stop him. “Point me their way and I’ll-”

“It’s all right, young master. I will be fine.” Meng Yao’s eyes softened noticeably the way so many others did when they thought Nie Mingjue’s righteousness adorable, and Nie Huaisang found nothing to indicate it was an act. “You need not worry about this one. I merely wish to do what I can to thank Nie-zongzhu for his kindness.”

“It’s almost time for bed,” Nie Huaisang announced. “Meng Yao, why don’t you escort my brother to his room and help him take his hair down for the night? It will give you a chance to better see some of his braids – they’re typical for our sect, and you may wish to wear some of your own one day.”

“It would be an honour, Nie-zongzhu,” Meng Yao replied.

Nie Mingjue snorted. “Right this way,” he mumbled, “and you can tell me how you got hurt.”

“As I told your brother, Nie-gongzi, it was but a simple tumble down the stairs...”

Nie Huaisang watched his brother and Meng Yao walk away. It was going to be interesting having one of Jin Guangshan’s bastards around – not that he’d revealed to the young man that he’d overheard that part of the encounter on the stairs – particularly one that, like everyone else, fell under the sway of Nie Huaisang’s Didi’s charm.

That night, when Nie Huaisang slipped into his empty bed, he allowed himself a moment of true weakness. Wen Ruohan was dead, but there would always be sect politics, and people needing his attention, and yao and ghosts to fight. At times he was overwhelmed by it all, truly overwhelmed in a way the Headshaker never was. But he had a duty to fulfill, a sect to lead, and a brother to protect – and if he could do what he could to make certain Nie Mingjue never had to worry about anything in life, then it would all be worth it – just like what it had secretly cost them all to take down Wen Ruohan.

He sent a silent prayer to Jinzhu – he really did miss her at times, political though their marriage had been – and one to his and Nie Mingjue’s parents as well. Then, pushing his anxiety aside, he rolled over and allowed sleep to claim him.

The End

#nie mingjue #nie huaisang #nie bros #reverse nie bros #prompt fill

[katamaricule]

Since we had fun with the last one and didn't start too many blood feuds with it, I'm bringing it back!

This round's a little different: Slots are for your favorite portrayal of your favorite character with that family name. Again, not best at acting, most book-appropriate, most morally correct, sexiest, whateve -- and it still neither means that all other versions are bad nor means other people are bad for liking them. Just your favorite.

...This is going to be the thing that tells you real quick whether or not someone is familiar with the Mystic Nine and/or Sand Sea, isn't it?

Anyway, I'll go first! WIth explanations behind the cut.

Zhang Rishan: I love Xiao Ge, I want to shove him down the front of my shirt like the little black cat he is, but ... if I have to pick a Zhang, it's going to be that chipmunk-cheeked gremlin angel turned cranky bitch who texts like a grandpa.

Er Yue Hong: There's just not a lot of Hongs in the visual media, so this is probably going to come down for most people to, did you like better the one in the movie or the one in the drama? For me, I'm going to be like 90% of the ladies in the show and go for the cross-dressing wife guy.

Chen Wenjin: Auntie Wenjin wins this, partly because she's pretty baller in Ultimate Note, but also because the other Chens kinda suck. Big shoutout to Chen Pi Ah Si for being so fun to hate, though.

Wu Xie: The most babygirl, the one in my heart.

Huo Xiuxiu: This one surprised me by being the hardest decision on this grid! There's just so dang many Huos, and so many of them are absolute gems. Ultimate Note's jiejie-coded gymnast edges them all out, though, and wins her place in this spot by a nose.

Xie Yuchen: I did wind up curiously fond of his drug addict grandpappy with a stolen puppy and a huge abacus, but I didn't write an unnecessarily long and pornographic hurt/comfort fic for that executive homosexual; I did it for Xiao Hua.

Wang Pangzi. Practically perfect in every way.

Qi Tiezui: I wanted so badly to put a Qi space on this layout, but there's only one, played by only one person, so it's not much of a choice, and a completely unmakeable one if you're not familiar with the Mystic Nine series (unless you think Glasses counts, and that's debatable, since we don't really know what his name is). So I'm going to take my free space opportunity and give it to Ba Ye, the needy, batty religious studies major I way overidentify with. I want to kiss his fooby little face.

#dmbj #lost tomb memes #silly tomb boys meta

[levia-san]

Puppet AU where SJ died (how isn't that important), so YQY build a puppet in his likeness to cope.

BUT THEN SJ'S SOUL FROM SV GETS YEETED INTO SAID PUPPET JSUT WHEN YQY WAS ABOUT TO SNEAK A KISS

Bonus:

After many one on one sessions with his hand he managed to finish the hip

#qijiu #shen jiu #yue qingyuan #svsss #mxtx #im crying this is so dumb #anyway SJ is now housewife because #and i quote #'I'm officially dead so I don't know who this QJPL is' #fdjksldwas #QJPL nice #Qi-Ge's wife better

[bloody-bee-tea]

Raise

Ever since he and Nie Mingjue broke up, Jiang Cheng has only been going through the motions. He’s still fulfilling his duties as a Sect Leader—his pride in his Sect won’t allow him to do anything else—but that’s about it.

There’s nothing in life to take enjoyment from anymore and Jiang Cheng feels a lot like he did right after the war, except with less existential dread. But he’s lost and unmoored and he doesn’t know what to do.

He hates it a little bit that Nie Mingjue still has this kind of power over him, but mostly he’s just fucking devastated.

Now he understands his sister and her tears and her sad smiles a bit better.

Getting your heart broken really is the worse and Jiang Cheng guesses it doesn’t help that at least he knows that Nie Mingjue felt the same for him.

Jin Zixuan was a complete asshole to his sister, which must have made it a little bit easier Jiang Cheng hopes, because he wishes this for no one.

When he realizes that he lost himself yet again in his own head, he scoffs. It’s been happening a lot lately, and usually all of his thoughts turn to Nie Mingjue but he can’t afford to slack off.

No matter what his second in command keeps telling him on a daily basis.

If Jiang Cheng would take a day for himself, he wouldn’t do anything but wallow in his misery anyway, and he prefers working over doing that.

So he goes on, and on, one letter after the other, until he made a considerable dent into the stack that built itself up during his last weeks with Nie Mingjue.

Jiang Cheng grinds his teeth together when he realizes that he’s yet again thinking about the other man and he slams his hand on the table in his rage.

He really wonders just how long this will go on; how long he will be haunted by the thought of Nie Mingjue. Right now, he hears Nie Mingjue’s laugh echo in the hallways they frequently walked together, he feels Nie Mingjue’s phantom touch on his shoulder whenever he sits hunched over some work for too long, and he still feels all the love Nie Mingjue had for him.

But duty comes first, Jiang Cheng understands that. He doesn’t have to like it, but he understands.

“You can’t just—no, wait,” Jiang Cheng suddenly hears from outside and he lifts his head a second before someone barges into his study.

“You fucking asshole,” is what Nie Huaisang greets him with and Jiang Cheng knew that the break-up would throw a little bit of a wrench into their friendship, but he didn’t expect this.

“Huaisang,” he still greets his old friend, but he figures he shouldn’t have when Nie Huaisang glares at him, clearly too agitated to even get his fan out.

“Do not even dare,” Nie Huaisang hisses. “You absolute fucking asshole. You said you would love him!”

“I do,” Jiang Cheng says with a sigh, getting up to close the door behind Nie Huaisang, hoping that not all of Lotus Pier heard him yet.

“Yeah, I can tell,” Nie Huaisang sarcastically gives back. “It’s so very evident in the way you broke up with him.”

“Don’t be unfair,” Jiang Cheng whispers, but he can’t meet Nie Huaisang’s eyes.

It still hurts too much.

“Unfair. Unfair! The only one being unfair here is you!”

“Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng snaps, now slowly getting angry himself.

He can understand the protective instinct of a sibling, but this is really going to far. It’s not Jiang Cheng’s fault, and he didn’t actually want to break up with Nie Mingjue, but since it was what Nie Mingjue had wanted, he had done it.

And it seemed unfair to be attacked over this now.

“No. I’m going to ruin you,” Nie Huaisang lowly says and while usually Jiang Cheng wouldn’t give much thought to a threat like this, he knows that if Nie Huaisang really wants to, he will.

Going by the glare Jiang Cheng gets, Nie Huaisang really wants to.

“Why? It’s not my fault,” Jiang Cheng snaps at him and Nie Huaisang laughs right in his face.

“Right, not your fault. Of course not. How could it be? You’re just the guy who broke up with my brother.”

“Because he wanted to!” Jiang Cheng shouts at him, his heart still hurting so damn much and that at least is enough to shut Nie Huaisang up for a few seconds.

“He wanted to,” Nie Huaisang lowly repeats. “That’s what you’re going with? Really?”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Jiang Cheng asks, suddenly drained of all energy and he goes to sit back down at the table.

He doesn’t want to fight with Nie Huaisang and he doesn’t want to do it while standing up, and all he really wants to do is go crawl into bed with Nie Mingjue and curl up against his chest, but it’s not like he’ll ever be able to do that again.

“My brother finally opens up to you about the qi deviations and your first instinct is to run away and break up with him? And now you’re trying to twist it like it was actually his idea? You’re really something else, Jiang-zongzhu. I thought better of you.”

“That’s not what happened, Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng says with a small frown, because Jiang Cheng remembers that conversation a lot differently, and he was actually present.

“Then enlighten me,” Nie Huaisang hisses. “What did happen?”

Jiang Cheng desperately doesn’t want to speak about it—the pain still too near and fresh—but Nie Huaisang is levelling him with a look that promises pain and absolute ruin if Jiang Cheng doesn’t start speaking like five seconds ago and so he sighs.

“He told me about the qi deviations,” Jiang Cheng says, because so far they are on the same page. “That he’ll die soon and young and violently.”

“And you left him for it,” Nie Huaisang says with a nod, as if there could be no doubt about it.

“I love him. Do you really think that low of me?” Jiang Cheng asks, a new kind of hurt finding its place in his chest.

Jiang Cheng thought he was long over being hurt by people being disappointed in him, but it seems like he was wrong.

“Seeing as he is back home, absolutely devastated and you’re going on like nothing happened, I think the only possible answer can be yes,” Nie Huaisang sneers at him and Jiang Cheng sees red.

“I have to do this,” Jiang Cheng yells and shoots up. “I have to because if I don’t keep busy, if I don’t distract myself, I’ll be a fucking shell. I want to do nothing more than to crawl into bed and cry for a good week but what good is that going to do me? It’s not going to get me Mingjue back and my Sect actually still needs me. I was miserable all through the war and for a good while after and I don’t want to feel like that again. And besides; he made his choice. What use is there for me to cry after him.”

“He made his choice? The audacity you have! And don’t raise your voice at me like that,” Nie Huaisang gives back, clearly unfazed by Jiang Cheng’s explosion and it cuts all of Jiang Cheng’s strings.

It doesn’t matter what he tells Nie Huaisang, he realizes. He has his mind already made up.

“He told me about the qi deviations and that his Sect must come first,” Jiang Cheng still mutters. “He needs an heir.”

Jiang Cheng barely gets the words out, and he hates himself a little for how his eyes well up almost immediately. It’s been almost a week by now and the words still hurt as much as they did when they left Nie Mingjue’s mouth.

In front of him, Nie Huaisang freezes.

“What?”

“He said he needs to prepare, that he needs someone to take over eventually. It’s not that hard to understand his meaning,” Jiang Cheng whispers.

Nie Mingjue needs an heir. And for that he needs a wife. It’s as easy as that.

“Did he say it like that?” Nie Huaisang asks and Jiang Cheng nods miserably.

“That fucking idiot,” Nie Huaisang mutters and finally sits down himself, slamming his fan on the table. “Listen here, Wanyin,” he says and Jiang Cheng wonders when he switched back to being Wanyin again.

“I’m listening,” Jiang Cheng says because clearly Nie Huaisang is waiting for a response from him.

Though he’s not quite sure he can take any more accusations today.

“My brother is an idiot,” Nie Huaisang solemnly says and Jiang Cheng fights the immediate urge to defend Nie Mingjue.

He’s not sure he still has that right.

“Why?” he asks instead, because it seems like the safer option.

“I am his heir,” Nie Huaisang tells him and Jiang Cheng goes very still. “When father died and da-ge decided to not take a wife, they wrote that down somewhere. I’m to inherit the Sect should anything happen to my brother.”

“He—it didn’t sound like that when we talked,” Jiang Cheng carefully says.

It makes no sense. Nie Mingjue had looked sad as he had said that he needs to prepare. Why would he look sad if he already has an heir.

“There was sadness on his face when he said it,” Jiang Cheng weakly goes on, because he still remembers that look and it cuts him just as much as it did then.

“It was probably regret. Da-ge wanted to give me an intensive few months of Sect Leader training, so that he could hand off the reigns sooner, before his qi deviations get really bad. He resolved himself to not see you during those months, because he said you distract him too much.”

“No, he—” Jiang Cheng starts, putting his head in his hands. “That’s not how that conversation went.”

“Clearly, it’s not,” Nie Huaisang says drily. “But we both know da-ge and we know you. Both of you tend to draw your own conclusions. Da-ge thought he made himself perfectly clear—asking for a few months with nothing but letters for contact—and you thought he was breaking up with you. I can see where you would get that idea from, don’t take me wrong—da-ge is horribly bad at wording things—but it’s not what he wanted. He’s moping and heartbroken at home. I didn’t even get any training yet.”

“You hate training,” Jiang Cheng mutters, his head spinning.

“I like logistics and getting people to do what I want,” Nie Huaisang corrects. “And I would like my brother to be happy again,” he tacks on, with a raised eyebrow.

Jiang Cheng swallows.

“He doesn’t want to take a wife?” he asks, just to make sure. “He doesn’t want to sire an heir?”

“He does want to adopt a kid with the guy he had been courting for a while,” Nie Huaisang says, absolutely nonchalant as if it’s not blowing Jiang Cheng’s mind to hear that Nie Mingjue thought about a little family of their own.

“Really?” Jiang Cheng asks, his voice full of hope and his heart hammering away in his chest.

“Really,” Nie Huaisang assures him, finally picking up his fan and flicking it open with the by now so familiar gesture.

“I think I have to cut your visit here short, then,” Jiang Cheng says, already scrambling to his feet.

“You go on ahead,” Nie Huaisang waves him off, draping himself over the table. “The flight here was way too exhausting for me.”

“Sure,” Jiang Cheng says, rolling his eyes, but not actually bothering to convince Nie Huaisang.

If he flies alone he can push himself as much as he wants, and then he gets to see Nie Mingjue sooner.

~*~*~

Jiang Cheng doesn’t bother to announce his arrival and Nie Mingjue’s disciples clearly don’t deem it necessary to do it, either, it seems, because Jiang Cheng simply barges into Nie Mingjue’s quarters without anyone telling him.

“What are you doing here?” Nie Mingjue asks him, his voice rough and Jiang Cheng sees the dark circles under his eyes and how pale he is.

It seems they both didn’t deal well with the temporary break-up.

“Huaisang invaded Lotus Pier,” Jiang Cheng tells him and Nie Mingjue immediately draws himself up.

“Whatever he said, don’t listen to him. I respect your choice,” Nie Mingjue reassures him and Jiang Cheng wants to go to him and hug him and kiss him, but for now he simply rolls his eyes.

“He said there was a misunderstanding.”

“A what?”

“You said you need someone to take over the Sect. You never mentioned Huaisang. I thought you meant you want to take a wife,” Jiang Cheng explains in as little words as possible, because he is dying with the urge to finally get his hands on Nie Mingjue again.

“A wife,” Nie Mingjue repeats and blinks. “If anything she would be the second wife, because I intent to marry you.”

Jiang Cheng flushes bright red at that, but his heart is dancing in his chest. With happiness, for a change.

“Yeah, I should hope so,” Jiang Cheng says and dares to step closer. “But I understand duty to your Sect and so when you said it like that—”

“You thought I would ask you to step back so I can focus on my Sect. You would have allowed me to take a wife?” Nie Mingjue asks and Jiang Cheng shrugs.

“Duty comes first,” he says because if he learned anything in his youth then it’s that. “I understand that. I didn’t like it, but it sounded sensible to me.”

“Nothing about that is sensible, I love you, what the hell would I ever do without you?”

Find someone else to love, Jiang Cheng wants to say, but Nie Mingjue doesn’t let him, because with two big steps he’s right in front of him and he doesn’t hesitate to crush Jiang Cheng to his chest.

“What would I even do without my heart?” he whispers again and Jiang Cheng’s resolve is broken.

He slings his arms around Nie Mingjue and presses himself as close as he can get, his breath leaving him in shuddering bursts.

“I didn’t like it,” Jiang Cheng chokes out. “I missed you so much. I love you.”

“Never think something like this again,” Nie Mingjue begs him. “I would never do that to you, not for any duty in the world.”

“Okay,” Jiang Cheng weakly says and Nie Mingjue presses a kiss to his head.

“Not for any duty,” he repeats and Jiang Cheng nods.

“Okay, alright,” he gets out, his voice choked up with tears.

For once they are tears of happiness because he’s finally back where he belongs.

Link to my ko-fi

#bt writes #mingcheng #the untamed #mdzs #angst #misunderstandings #temporary break-up #getting back together #hurt/comfort #nmj is alive #nhs is the best friend #and brother #and he will not let either of them forget it

[robininthelabyrinth]

Spilled Pearls

- Chapter 23 - ao3 -

Lan Qiren woke with a start at the sound of something slamming to the point of cracking – a door thrown too hard, perhaps, or the shattering of a piece of furniture under the strength of a powerful cultivator.

Dazed at having been woken so abruptly at such a late hour, he at first thought that the sound was an aberration of some sort, someone making too much noise by mistake, even some cultivation maniac doing exercises in the middle of the night that had briefly lost control, but then the sounds continued, crashing and slamming and even indistinct shouting.

Indistinct, and unfamiliar, but still recognizable – that was Wen Ruohan’s voice.

Lan Qiren had never heard him shout before.

He stood up, instinctively checking over his clothing and fixing his forehead ribbon, and padded out towards the door to the hallway. The array used to create enough silence to let him sleep was glowing faintly, doing its work against overwhelming odds, but Lan Qiren didn’t hesitate to dismiss it and pull open the door, poking his head out to see what was going on.

“ – what use are you?” Wen Ruohan was shouting, some distance down the hall. “Good-for-nothing bitch! What do you think I got you for in the first place?”

He was standing outside his wife’s door.

Lan Qiren had not seen Madame Wen on this visit, other than in passing. He’d been relieved to discover that he had heard accurately and that she had not suffered on account of what she had done, except perhaps as a result of her husband making clear that he would give her exactly what he had promised her out of their marriage and nothing more. Despite that, every time she saw him, she generally had an expression that resembled smelling something bad, and he didn’t especially want to deal with her irrational jealousy. 

(Lan Qiren could understand and even appreciate the truth that she had shown him, but it didn’t mean he appreciated the reasoning behind her actions - just as Wen Ruohan might appreciate the cunning and ambition demonstrated by her actions, and begrudgingly acknowledge that the real fault for their divide was his own actions, but not feel any more inclined to her as a result.)

Lan Qiren thought he might have to deal with her more, particularly on the few times he had visited little Wen Xu, who was already a size or two larger than he’d started out – it was simply shocking in terms of how much time had passed since he’d had his argument with Wen Ruohan – but he found that the child was largely being watched by servants, not the Madame, who was busy ruling the social scene of the Nightless City. Whether that was true or merely an excuse, by now it was clear that they were in mutual agreement that they did not want to spend any time in each other’s presence.

She was also, very clearly, refusing to let Wen Ruohan into her bedroom.

Lan Qiren couldn’t blame her: he’d never seen Wen Ruohan in a state like this. His clothing was mussed up, his hands clenched, his face red, his aura frighteningly strong and overwhelming, his monstrously powerful qi roiling the air in the hallway into an incipient storm – and even from the distance he was standing, Lan Qiren could smell the distinct odor of strong liquor, suggesting that Wen Ruohan had overindulged in alcohol at some point after Lan Qiren had gone to sleep. Based on casual mentions in prior conversation, Lan Qiren knew that Wen Ruohan’s cultivation level was so high as to render him largely unaffected even by significant drinking, but the fact that he had bothered to try to seek solace in the wine jar suggested that there was something incredibly wrong with his mental state. 

It wasn’t a qi deviation - the violent emanations were unsettled, but not distorted - but it wasn’t good, either.

Wisdom would counsel that Lan Qiren keep back and not get in Wen Ruohan’s way.

Righteousness, on the other hand…

Anyway, Wen Ruohan was his sworn brother. What sort of brother would Lan Qiren be if he took only the good and not the bad?

“Da-ge?” he called, stepping out into the hallway. “Da-ge, come away from there.”

Wen Ruohan turned to him, and his expression was frightening. “Fine. You’ll do,” he growled, and it was only because Lan Qiren had grown wiser and stronger that he realized what was about to happen and dodged before Wen Ruohan could grab him, darting back into his room.

Wen Ruohan followed him in.

“What happened?” Lan Qiren asked, still backing away. “You were fine at dinner – what happened since then?”

For some reason, that set Wen Ruohan off again, turning his attention away from Lan Qiren, and he grabbed the table and threw it into the wall, smashing it all to pieces. 

“That fucker,” he snarled, his eyes blank and distant. He wasn’t angry at Lan Qiren, that much was clear, but he was filled with ceaseless rage, and he was taking it out on everything around him. “That fucker got married! He’s got a son!”

Lan Qiren blinked. “…what?”

Smash went the cabinet, and all the various things on it. At least Wen Ruohan hadn’t started in on the paintings, which were the only aspect of the room Lan Qiren actually cared or worried about.

“Who got married and had a son?” Lan Qiren asked, even though he knew it would only inflame Wen Ruohan further. At this point, it was clear that Wen Ruohan’s had gotten stuck in his chest, like black blood that needed to be coughed; he needed to vent his anger or else it would curdle within him and he would suffer. “Normally that’s a good thing, a cause for celebration. Why is it bad here?”

“Because it’s Lao Nie!” Wen Ruohan burst out, and Lan Qiren rocked back on his heels in shock.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t known that Lao Nie had been unusually distracted these past few months, even most of a year – the way he’d ignored or disregarded Lan Qiren’s letters about the situation with He Kexin, the breezy and almost manic tone of his replies to Lan Qiren’s brother, which Lan Qiren had seen, it all spoke of distraction and carelessness, all typical of Lao Nie, albeit of far greater severity than usual.

Nor was it truly a surprise that none of them had been informed: the Qinghe Nie had always been idiosyncratic about their personal details, unusually secretive and fiercely proud of it. They did not share their birth date or even year, other than for arranging a marriage. If Lan Qiren had thought about it, he wouldn’t have been at all surprised to find out that Lao Nie would have married and had a child all without having shared any information on the subject until afterwards.

Only…

“But aren’t you – with him?” he asked, and knew immediately that he had asked the wrong question.

Wen Ruohan roared and smashed yet another thing, sending a palm strike through a dresser and denting the stone wall with the power of it. “He’s mine,” he spat. His eyes were even redder than usual, the sclera becoming red alongside the iris; it made him look almost possessed, almost as if he really were having some sort of qi deviation. “He’s mine, damn it! Who is he to give himself to another? And he didn’t even tell me…!”

They were definitely in a relationship, Lan Qiren confirmed to himself. His guess had been right. There could be no doubt about it. And yet, despite it all, Lao Nie had –

No, he couldn’t even express surprise. Lan Qiren knew Lao Nie, knew what he valued and how he valued it: Lao Nie had always been passionate and powerful, strong and superior, friendly and often kind, and yet at his core he was ruthless, careless, and selfish, just like Wen Ruohan was so often selfish. He did not concern himself overmuch with questions of righteousness, other than to the degree necessary to win glory to his sect as one on the righteous path. After his sect, which he valued most of all, he was an indolent pleasure-seeker, with terrible taste in partners, the more dangerous the better; Lan Qiren had seen him flirting with people left and right long after he’d concluded that he’d entered into a relationship with Wen Ruohan.

In the past, Wen Ruohan hadn’t seemed to mind. If anything, he’d even encouraged him, looking smug and amused by the flirtations, taking the other man’s victories as his own; during one incident that Lan Qiren could recall, he’d all but applauded when Lao Nie had successfully wooed some rogue cultivator and taken her back to his bed, turning instead to his own separate amusements after.

Then again, that wasn’t a marriage.

(Of course, Wen Ruohan himself had also gotten married…)

“How dare he,” Wen Ruohan said, panting a little from his own exertion, clearly more moved by the feelings raging within him than any type of physical exhaustion. “How dare he – does he think I’m desperate? Pathetic? Does he think I’d run after him, begging and humiliating myself..? I don’t need him at all!”

He turned once more, and this time his gaze focused on Lan Qiren.

“I have something of my own already,” he murmured, and this time Lan Qiren wasn’t fast enough to stop him as he caught him up in his arms, slamming his back against the wall.

Lan Qiren tensed, suddenly for a moment back in his rooms in the Cloud Recesses, looking up at a different brother who wanted to hurt him – but no, Wen Ruohan wasn’t the same, Wen Ruohan liked him. He was acting out of fury, not malice; there was no He Kexin here to goad him on, nothing like that.

Even the force of being pushed against the wall hadn’t actually hurt – Wen Ruohan had been careful even in his mindless rage, making sure that any impact was cushioned by his own arms rather than Lan Qiren’s back; Lan Qiren hadn’t even had the breath knocked out of him.

“Da-ge…!”

Wen Ruohan didn’t want to hear him. He put his hand on Lan Qiren’s mouth and pressed down, cutting off speech at once. They were pressed together so closely that the movement inadvertently dragged his sleeve onto Lan Qiren’s throat, almost making him gag, and he instinctively tried futilely to kick his way out – it didn’t work, of course.

Wen Ruohan pressed up against him, the front of his body burning like flame against Lan Qiren.

“You’re mine,” he said, reaching in to nuzzle the side of Lan Qiren’s head with his cheek. “My blood brother, bound by oath and blood; my shining pearl, untouched by the world. All good things should belong to me.”

Lan Qiren reached up to try to push away the hand at this mouth, wanting to speak even though he did not know what he would say, and at first he thought he’d done it. But then suddenly he was in motion, his back landing hard on the bed he’d been given, the impact softened by the blanket Wen Ruohan had wrapped around him when he’d brought him back to the Nightless City from the Cloud Recesses. Shocked by the unexpectedness of the abrupt movement, he gasped, a wordless inhale rather than any coherent words.

Less than a heartbeat, and Wen Ruohan was on top of him, pressing him down. His body seemed even hotter than usual, as if his whole spirit were aflame, his qi boiling in the air around them until Lan Qiren had the impression as though he ought to be able to see steam; his hands were hot where they pressed down on Lan Qiren’s shoulders, his lips burning as they pressed against his collarbone, and between his legs there was something hot pressing against him, too.

And still, Lan Qiren – was not afraid.

He wasn’t sure why. He’d been terrified when it had been his brother who had stood against him, disgusted when it had been He Kexin pawing at him in ways he did not and had never wanted, but Wen Ruohan, who was bound to him through nothing but a tricked oath…

“Da-ge,” he whispered. “Please stop.”

Wen Ruohan stilled. He didn’t get up or pull away, but he didn’t make any further movements.

“Please let me go.”

Wen Ruohan’s breathing was harsh in his ear. “You, too, little Lan?” he asked. “Just like him, making me think – don’t you like me?”

“I do,” Lan Qiren admitted. He might be stupid when it came to social interactions, might be slow and miss things that were obvious, but even he could figure out what Wen Ruohan meant, with his confession of how Lan Qiren lingered in his thoughts and in pressing him down on the bed like this while mourning the loss of Lao Nie, his lover. And maybe sometimes he needed Cangse Sanren to point things out to him, but most of the time he knew himself. This past week had made clear enough that he enjoyed Wen Ruohan’s endless indulgences in a spirit that was more than just pure brotherhood. “I do like you. But I don’t like – this.”

Wen Ruohan was silent for a long moment.

“Not this, with me,” he finally said. “Or not – at all?”

“At all,” Lan Qiren said. He had thought when he was younger that he might change, but he was increasingly sure that he wouldn’t, that this was just what he was like. “I was never like the others my age. Even Yueheng-xiong, who I would’ve thought loved nothing but mathematics and explosions, has found himself distracted by the shape of the one he likes. But not me. I don’t yearn the way they do. I can love a person’s spirit, but I never much cared for the flesh.”

“Love,” Wen Ruohan echoed, his voice oddly uneven. “You speak of - love?”

“…isn’t that what we’re talking about?”

Wen Ruohan laughed, a jagged and choked up thing, and then he pulled away, letting Lan Qiren go, sitting up on the bed and burying his face in his hands. The qi around him was still too-hot, overwhelming, pulsing with his feelings, even as his shoulders shook and he stared blankly at the wall; any other man, and Lan Qiren might think he was crying, but he could see Wen Ruohan’s face through his fingers, and there were no tears there.

Perhaps he’d forgotten how.

Lan Qiren slowly sat up himself.

He could still feel the mild stiffness of old healing injuries, but he ignored them and got up off the bed, going to the one side table that had yet to be destroyed – the one where he’d laid his guqin to rest. It turned out that Wen Ruohan had only destroyed the things he himself had put into the room; he hadn’t touched anything of Lan Qiren’s.

Lan Qiren settled in front of his guqin and began to play.

Out of all the compositions he had created, his favorite was the one he had first created at the Nightless City, that strange hypnotic melody that brought to mind spilled pearls, but unlike some of the others he’d worked on, it had never felt fully completed. The music wrapped itself around the listener, at first intimate and then oppressive, a heavy stone in their chest and pressure on their skull, growing darker and darker, just as he’d written it – but now he played onwards, elaborating on the theme in ways he hadn’t planned or expected, letting the solemn notes brighten, the overwhelming pressure turning from suffocating into safe as it became clear that it would cause no harm, the storm passing by overhead and leaving things clean and clear and better, the lingering euphoria of finding oneself supported, rather than alone.

When his fingers finally stilled, Lan Qiren looked up and saw Wen Ruohan sitting there with his back straight again, hands resting gently in his lap, eyes closed as if in meditation and face calm once more. His qi no longer coiled around him, lashing out; it had settled once more.

“You will,” Wen Ruohan said without opening his eyes, “be an excellent traveling musician, little Lan. People will fight for the right to hear you, and you will never go without an audience.”

Lan Qiren hesitated, not sure what to make of such a compliment, or what Wen Ruohan meant by it. He’d only intended to play something to help him settle his qi and soothe his rage, which he’d clearly accomplished. He hadn’t even meant to play that particular song, other than in the way that he tended to default to it when he had nothing else specific in mind. It had always been unsatisfying, like an itch, but now it finally felt complete.

“Da-ge –” he started to say, not knowing what he would say next, but at any rate he never had the chance to continue.

“When you do finally go to fulfill your dreams, leaving the dust of the world behind you, I hope that you visit the Nightless City often,” Wen Ruohan said. His tone was still calm, settled, but not, Lan Qiren observed, peaceful: there were all sorts of seething emotions underneath it. “But for the moment, I think it is better if you return to the Cloud Recesses.”

Lan Qiren hesitated once again, this time feeling a little hurt. “You don’t want me here?”

“I do,” Wen Ruohan said, and his lips curved into something that was not a smile; it seemed almost painful a shape to contort into, and his eyes reflected no humor at all when he opened them. “Very much. Ah, little Lan, if only you knew…despite that, I would still have you go. Having made my views on you clear to your brother, it should be safe, and I do not want you to see what beast I make of myself when I am denied.”

Lan Qiren bowed his head a little. “About Lao Nie…”

“I know what he’s like,” Wen Ruohan said. “I’ve always known, from the start. If you had asked me a few days ago, I would have said that I did not have any illusions…”

He smiled bitterly.

“It seems that I misjudged myself.”

“I’ll go,” Lan Qiren said. He didn’t especially want to, but Wen Ruohan wasn’t in a rage, nor lashing out unthinkingly. To refuse him would be to deny him, to treat him as if he could not make his own decisions, and that, he thought, would be worse. “If you want me to, I’ll go, and later, I’ll return.”

Wen Ruohan said nothing, but he watched as Lan Qiren pulled on some more clothing, not caring which one it was, and did his hair back up in the simplest style, favoring speed over substance; he packed away his guqin and his sword and one of the paintings that he had liked best, but took nothing else – after all, it wasn’t as if he were going away for good.

He made it to the door before hesitating, then turned back to look at Wen Ruohan, who was still watching him.

“Is there anything…?” he asked haltingly. “Something I can get you…?”

“Send one of the maids to me,” Wen Ruohan said. “Any of them, it doesn’t matter which. If they’re still hanging around in the family quarters after an eruption like that, it can be seen that their ambition has overcome their good sense, making them a perfect match for me. It would be a shame to deny them the fruits of their victory.”

Lan Qiren didn’t quite understand, but he knew enough to get the gist; he felt his cheeks and ears go hot. Still, he had offered, and it wasn’t something he was willing to do himself, so there was really no basis for refusing to pass along the request. He nodded and slipped out – as Wen Ruohan predicted, there was one of the maids lingering at the far corner, looking around in blatant curiosity. She was pretty enough, Lan Qiren supposed, with an upturned nose and a slightly arrogant air, her clothing carefully arranged to be just a little mussed in a way that Lan Qiren understood most men to find attractive.

“Your sect leader is in my room,” he told her, and she blinked at him. “If you go to him now, he’d probably accept. Up to you, though.”

She stared at him for a moment, then nodded. He left, his head held high; when he glanced back anyway, he saw her going into his room, hair patted down and clothing even more carefully arranged – Wen Ruohan hadn’t been wrong when he speculated as to her ambitions. The life of a powerful sect leader, Lan Qiren supposed: desired but never known, as distant from those around him as Lan Qiren but as a consequence of his position rather than his inclination.  

He would definitely return, Lan Qiren decided. Perhaps he would even make the Nightless City the first destination on his travels. After all, why should he not? Was Wen Ruohan not his sworn brother, too?

Yes, Lan Qiren thought. That was right.

Wen Ruohan deserved to have someone possess him as he longed to possess others.

#mdzs #lan qiren #wen ruohan #my fic #my fics #spilled pearls

[djinmer4]

Matchmaking for the Greater Evil (3/4)

Nie Huaisang is a busy man.  He’s running a major sect, trying to find a way to stave off qi deviation, plotting a murder, researching demonic cultivation, and acting like a useless idiot for the sake of covering for the murder plot all at the same time.  He has no time for a relationship.

Too bad no one told Sect Leader Jiang that.

Huaisang would have to be just as foolish as he pretends to not notice that Jiang Wanyin is courting him.  Between the gifts (fans and brushes, yes, but also books, lotus-scented incense, and bolts of cloth dyed the same deep purple of Wanyin’s own clothes), getting dragged on night-hunts where Huaisang’s only role is captive audience as Sandu Shenghou shows off, and the fact the man actively seeks him out at Cultivator Conferences; it’s only the fact that Wanyin remains as bad-tempered and foul-mouthed as ever that his actions have gone unnoticed by most of the other sect leaders.  Huaisang reciprocates, as is polite, calling out to him at conferences, visiting Lotus Pier, and sending gifts of pornography and the fruits of research on qi deviation (Wanyin’s temper might even be worse than his Da-ge’s was).  Once, he even sent half of a strange rock that had been found in the Qinghe mines, a round thing that had proven to be filled with purple crystals when broken open.  He even gave him a fur-lined coat because the other kept complaining about the cold whenever he visited the Unclean Realm.

That was the one thing that had made Huaisang hesitate.  Every other item and action could be chalked up to being old friends, but clothing was a very traditional courting gift.  (And why was he the wife in this case?)  The cloak came dangerously close to publicly accepting Sect Leader Jiang’s suit and Huaisang can’t let anyone that close.  Damn that man!  If only he came right out and said something, then he could reject him and they could all get on with their lives.  But no matter how obvious Jiang Wanyin is to those who know him, he’s never once crossed that line, never once openly declared his intent.  And Huaisang couldn’t afford to let his own mask slip by showing that he knew why he’s the only person Sandu Shengshou ever smiles at during those interminable meetings they have every three moons.  So here they are, stuck in limbo where the Head-Shaker never says either yes or no, and the angry grape neither pushes for a confrontation nor gives up and abandons his pursuit.

He probably could have tolerated the situation better if he didn’t know that Jin Guangyao was actively encouraging it.  He found that out by pretending to be dead drunk and asleep, listening to San-ge and Er-ge talking over his head.  Guangyao had openly admitted to the other that he was encouraging Huaisang’s and Wanyin’s friendship as a means of “building better connections between the Yunmeng Jiang and the other Great Cultivator Sects”.  And Xichen had just laughed and complimented the Chief Cultivator on “being exceptionally resourceful, able to turn something even as carefree as A-Sang into an asset.”  And that comment had burned worse than San-ge’s, had hurt more than realizing he wasn’t even considered a pawn, just bait.

(Huaisang had already decided not to kill Er-Ge at that point, but that comment made him decide he didn’t care if Xichen got hurt in the process.  As if any Sect Leader could truly live unburdened by worries for their sect!  Zewu-jun should have known better, both from his own experience as de facto Lan Sect Leader and from observing Mingjue and Huaisang throughout his entire life.)

That conversation had also given birth to a wish-fulfilling fantasy of his, of telling Jiang Wanyin the truth about everything Jin Guangyao had done.  Huaisang set his brush aside so that it wouldn’t drip on his letter and allowed himself a few moments to indulge in his favorite daydream.  It didn’t start with telling Sect Leader Jiang, no, instead it started with telling Lan Wangji about everything, offering him the few bits of proof he had.  And then pointing him, not towards Lanling Jin, but instead towards his own brother.  Again, not to kill but to distract.  Then flying to Lotus Pier (as if his core was ever that strong) to speak to Jiang Cheng.  Or maybe he’d time it to coincide with Jin Ling’s half-year stay at Lotus Pier; delivering his nephew safe and under Jiang Cheng’s care like a gift.  He’d ask for privacy, then break down, explaining what he had found about the Song of Clarity that Jin Guangyao had taught him, about how he had tested it on himself and found the malicious script mixed into the melody.  Playing up his hurt to appeal to the younger man’s protective instincts, maybe even making a few promises of how he could reward him after the deed was done.  Jiang-xiong had always had a weakness for wuxia romances and stories of heroes rescuing damsels in distress back in Gusu, and his tastes in literature hadn’t changed in the intervening decades.  And if worse came to worst, he could always throw Wei Wuxian in there too.

Done correctly and the man would storm Koi Tower all by himself.  And Sandu Shengshou had made a name by tearing through Wen troops like a natural disaster, the cultivators of Lanling Jin were far lesser threats in terms of combat.  As for Lianfeng-zun, he was nearly as weak as Huaisang, he’d gotten his status by backstabbing a man, not by being a talented warrior.  Huaisang spent a few more blissful moments imagining the look on Meng Yao’s face as Sandu would slide into his heart.

But the fantasy always ended there.  Because after the Chief Cultivator’s death, even if Jiang Cheng made it out safely (and he probably would), it was always the same.  War.  Huaisang’s best-case scenario involved the Lans staying neutral, with the Nie and Jiang Sects teaming up to take down the Jins.  His worst-case scenarios ended with the entire cultivation world shattered and broken after decades of warfare.  And even in his best-case scenario, thousands of people would die.  Peasants, non-cultivators, innocents on both sides.  Students and disciples, soldiers and civilians.  Nie and Jiang and Jin too.

Nie Mingjue had wanted to go to war immediately after their father had died and had to be talked down by other advisers.  Jiang Wanyin and Wei Wuxian had gleefully slaughtered thousands in recompense for the massacre of Lotus Pier.  Huaisang sometimes wondered what it said about him, that he wasn’t willing to go to do the same just to avenge one man.  If this restraint would have been the straw that finally broke his brother’s love for him when loving the arts, failing at Gusu, and refusing the saber hadn’t.

Before he could fall too deeply into his dark thoughts, there was a knock on the door.  “Sect Leader Nie!  Sect Leader Jiang has arrived!”

Despite the lack of an audience, he raised one eyebrow in bemusement.  “Yes, he usually shows up around this time.  Go ahead and show him to his usual guest chamber and I’ll meet him as soon as I’ve finished my paperwork for the morning.”

“We really need you in the Reception Hall now, Sect Leader Nie.”

“But why?”

“The newest class of disciples was cleaning the Main Courtyard when he arrived.”

“Ah.”  Most of the inhabitants of the Unclean Realm had grown accustomed to Jiang Wanyin over time.  Despite the perpetual scowl on his face, they had learned he’s not actually going to decapitate them just for breathing the wrong way.  There was still a healthy dose of respect from the cultivators of the Nie Sect, but most of the fear had washed away.  But that certainly wouldn’t be the case with the newest class, who would only know Sandu Shengshou by reputation and was mostly filled with kids who hadn’t reached their double digits yet.  “Tears?”

“Lots of tears.  Quite a bit of screaming.  Two of them fainted.”  A heartbeat’s worth of time passed.  “He may have been smiling when he arrived.”

“Oh dear.  I’ll come immediately.”

#sangcheng #mdzs #nie huaisang

[aquadrazi]

Find Someone to Carry You

Chapter 43

………Cloud Recesses………

Wen Ning told the story from his point of view, the parts that he could remember.  When he was finished Lan Xichen gestured for him to go sit at a table that had been set up off to the side.  “Thank you, Master Wen.”

“So how did Su She gain control?”

“I still can’t believe that Jin Guangshan was keeping a weapon like that under wraps.”

Masters Xiao and Song stepped forward and bowed.  “Sect Leader Lan, I believe I can offer further explanation.”

“Please, continue Master Xiao.”  Lan Xichen bowed to them.

“We were present at the interrogation of Xue Yang, before his death.  We can bear witness to the assertation that he was in possession of a shard of the Yin Iron, and had given it to Su She to use to take control of the fierce corpses.  Also, Master Song personally witnessed along with Senior Lan, Senior Fu, and several Juniors, Su She using a teleportation talisman to grab the Yin Iron shard from Xue Yang and escape with it, prior to the order for Sect Leader Jin’s assassination.”  Xiao Xingchen explained.

“I did it for HIM!”  Su She snarled.  “I wanted to prove to him that I wasn’t useless.  I’m just as good if not BETTER than Xue Yang.  Besides, killing off that little brat was in his best interests.  They were never going to accept him as a legitimate Sect Leader unless that kid was dead.”  Su She snapped.  “I’d done it before, in Qiongqi Pass, when he had me kill off his BROTHER.  I figured the son would be easier.”

“Er-ge, he’s lying.  You have to believe me.  He has every reason to lie about this.”  Jin Guangyao said smoothly to Lan Xichen.  “I had no idea that Jin Zixuan was going to be there that day.  I would have done everything I could to stop him if I had.”

“That’s a lie.”  Jin Zixuan said as he strode in.

Gasps and cries of shock rippled through the crowd.

Jin Zixuan bowed to Lan Xichen.  “If I may, Sect Leader Lan.”

Lan Xichen smiled and motioned for him to rise, “Please continue.”

Jin Zixuan smiled, unkindly to Jin Guangyao, then continued.  “My BROTHER came to me upset, saying that he had overheard of a plot to kill Wei Wuxian before he could make it to my son’s one month celebration.  He convinced me to go and try to stop it, to keep the peace for the sake of my wife.  So I did, but I was intercepted by Nie Huaisang himself on the way.  He told me there was in fact, a plot to kill Wei Wuxian, but also myself.  He had sent a double in my place.  THAT is who you killed in Qiongqi Pass that day.”

“I didn’t KNOW he was going to try to kill you too!  You have to believe me Gege, I couldn’t have KNOWN!”  Jin Guangyao started to beg, realizing the danger he was potentially in.  With the direct heir of the Jin Sect alive, he no longer had the most legitimate claim to leadership.

“But you DID know you were killing ME.”  Nie Mingjue growled as he entered the main hall.

Jin Guangyao shrieked and tried to scurry away from the sight of the large and imposing figure heading towards him, but Jin Zixuan stopped him.

‘How- how is it possible?”

“He died of Qi Deviation.”

“Is he a fierce corpse?”

“The only one who could do that was the Yiling Patriarch.”

“He’s dead.”

“We’ve thought a LOT of people were dead who apparently are not.”

“You were my sworn brother, and yet, at the orders of your father, you killed me.”  Nie Mingjue accused.

“No-no, it wasn’t me-I didn’t…I couldn’t-“

“Sect Leader Lan, if I may.” Master Xiao was bowing again.

“You may.” Lan Xichen nodded towards him.

“Xue Yang also spoke as to the incident involving Sect Leader Nie’s death.  He confirmed that it was ordered by Jin Guangshan, and carried out by Jin Guangyao.  He said Jin Guangshan was hoping to turn Nie Mingjue into a fierce corpse, and upon the Jin Sect Leader’s death, Jin Guangyao kept the body, hoping his consciousness could be brought back like Master Wen’s was.”

Before anyone could say anything else, Wen Qing entered the room.  She bowed to Sect Leader Lan, “If I may.”

“You may.” Lan Xichen smiled at her.

“Jin Guangshan and Jin Guangyao lied to all of you.  There was no intention to rid the world of demonic cultivation, quite the opposite.  Jin Guangshan craved the power it could give him.  He kept myself and my brother, and Wei Ying as prizes that he could use to further cultivate his own knowledge of the use of resentful energy.  I was rescued by Nie Huaisang shortly before my supposed death, however my brother and Wei Ying were kept at Koi Tower for years, in the pursuit of gaining more power for the Jin Sect.  The proof that my brother was being used as a tool is obvious.  He was sent as an assassin to kill Jin Ling.  We have already heard testimony corroborating the statement that Wei Ying was being held for his expertise in resentful energy cultivation.”

“It looks like he succeeded.”

“So it WAS the Yiling Patriarch who brought back Chifeng-Zun”

“Are they still holding him in Koi Tower?”

“Sect Leader Lan,  my uncle knew about the demonic cultivation. He participated in the experiments with my grandfather.”  Jin Ling bowed.

Jin Guangyao looked thoroughly flustered.  “You- there’s no way…”

“I followed you one day.  I saw you and grandfather with the screaming man, experimenting with demonic cultivation.”

“And do you know who this, screaming man, was?”  Lan Zhan asked quietly.

Jin Ling nodded.  “He was also the person kept in the main hall as the Koi Tower Sex Slave.”

There was an uproar from the crowd.

“Wait, did he just say…”

“The Yiling Patriarch was ALSO the-“

“I can’t believe this.”

“The depravity”

“He should have been killed”

“-too dangerous to keep around”

“SILENCE!!!!” Lan Qiren bellowed, hushing the crowd once again.

“So, if I am to get this straight, Jin Guangshan ordered his son, Jin Guangyao to kill Chifeng-Zun, so he could have Wei Wuxian, someone he was keeping captive rather than having killed like he had said, turn him into a fierce corpse.  He was ALSO keeping Wen Ning to use as a weapon, even though he had said he had performed that execution as well.”

“And Jin Guangyao, sent Jin Zixuan to his death, and upon gaining control of the Jin Sect, he was using Wei Wuxian to try to find a way to return Chifeng-Zun’s consciousness.”

“And Su She took it upon himself to take the Yin Iron shard and use Wen Ning to assassinate Jin Ling, so Jin Guangyao could officially take control of the Jin Sect.  This is after he used it to take control of the fierce corpses from Wei Wuxian during the Qiongqi Pass AND the Bloodbath at the Nightless City.”

“Meaning, the real villain in all of this was Su She, and by proxy Jin Guangshan and Jin Guangyao, not Wei Wuxian.”  Lan Xichen stared directly at Jin Guangyao as he said the last part.

“No!  No.  It isn’t true.  I’m being set up!  The Yiling Patriarch is DEAD!  I saw it myself!  I SAW THE BURNED BODY MYSELF!”  Jin Guangyao was becoming unhinged.

The door to the main hall opened and in walked Wei Wuxian, holding onto Jiang Yanli’s arm to steady himself.  They were followed by a trail of Juniors, in two neat rows.  The sight of him in robes bearing the Cloud Recesses motif, and with the Lan Sect Ribbon prominently displayed on his forehead had the room in an uproar.

“THERE WILL BE SILENCE”  Lan Qiren bellowed again.

“Are you sure of what you saw, Jin Guangyao?”  Lan Xichen asked in a mocking way.

The Juniors formed a protective line between Wei Wuxian and the crowd.  They bowed in unison along with Wei Wuxian and Jiang Yanli to Lan Xichen.

“This one would like to give testimony.”  Wei Wuxian said in an uncharacteristically quiet voice.

“Please proceed, Didi.” Lan Xichen smiled warmly at him.  The familiar way he replied to Wei Wuxian causing a gasp to ripple through the crowd.

“Replying to the Qiongqi Pass ambush.  I could feel myself losing control of Wen Ning.  I did not intend to kill Jin Zixuan, I was trying to get him to leave so he wouldn’t be caught by any of the arrows and before I knew it, Wen Ning had killed him.  Or so I thought.”  He added, looking over at Jin Zixuan, very much alive.

“Replying to the Bloodbath at the Nightless City.  I knew I was fighting another demonic cultivator.  It was taking so much energy to try to maintain control of my corpses that I was distracted.  When my Shijie… well, I lost all control after that.  I am truly sorry for what my corpses did.  I was not in my right mind.”

“It is true that I did not die during the Siege of the Burial Mounds.  Jin Guangshan sent Xue Yang and Jin Zixun to…convince me…to turn Chifeng-Zun into a fierce corpse for him.  I refused.  It is true that I became what you all refer to as the Koi Tower Sex Slave.  It is my understanding that Sect Leader Nie found me and brought me to the Nie Compound to…recover.  That is where I, along with some help, was able to return Chifeng-Zun’s consciousness to his body.”

“Thank you, Didi.”  Lan Xichen said warmly, bowing to him.

Jiang Yanli helped Wei Wuxian exit the room after he bowed formally to both Sect Leader Lan, and the crowd of cultivators.  They were followed by the line of Juniors.  Before the doors were shut the room erupted in chaos.

The Juniors came back into the room in time to stop Jin Guangyao from running out.  Lan Jingyi managed to get him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him back to the center of the floor.  Lan Xichen launched himself from where he had been sitting onto the floor and joined the fray.

The crowd was quickly splitting into two groups.  One group against Wei Wuxian, and the other was apparently defending Wei Wuxian.  Lan Xichen caught the glint of a fan flying towards him out of the corner of his eye and spun just in time to see it deflect a blade that was heading towards him, then return to Nie Huaisang.  He nodded his thanks and continued into the fight.

Once the Nie guards entered the fight ended quickly.  Lan Xichen pulled out his xiao and pulled all the spiritual weapons to the ceiling, and allowed Nie Huaisang to pull out the people on his list from the crowd.  He divided them into the two groups, the people with stars next to their names were placed off to the side under guard.  Lan Xichen released the spiritual weapons.

“Now THAT’S out of everyone’s system,” Lan Xichen chided as he went back to his spot at the head of the room.  He motioned for the guards to place the people who were pulled out on their knees.  “You all have been found to have visited the Koi Tower Sex Slave.  You have committed a reprehensible act against a member of the Lan Sect.  As such, you will be punished by Lan Sect rules.”

Lan Xichen went down the line and asked each one how many times they visited Wei Wuxian when he was held prisoner.  Nie Huaisang took notes and handed it back to Lan Xichen when he was finished.  “All of you will be expelled from your parent Sects, and will not be welcome in any cultivation Sect from this day forward.  Furthermore, each one of you will receive a strike from the discipline whip for every time you violated a member of the Lan Sect.  The punishment will be carried out tomorrow morning, after breakfast.”

Lan Xichen waived his hand and the Nie Guards took away the group in the center.  They were replaced by the group that had stars next to their names.  “You all will be taken back to the Nie Stronghold for further interrogation to ascertain the extent that you were involved in the capture, torture, and violation of a Lan Sect member.”  Lan Xichen waved his hand and the group was taken away by the Nie Guards.  Jin Guangyao fought and screamed the entire way out of the Main Hall.

“Now, does anyone else have a problem with Wei Wuxian?  Let’s hear in now.”  Lan Xichen was clearly out of patience.

Lan Zhan heard Wei Ying playing WangXian as he walked up to the Jingshi.  Wei Ying was standing on the porch, his hair and ribbons blowing gently in the wind.  He stood for a minute, drinking in the sight of his husband, standing on the porch of their house, dressed in Lan Sect robes, playing their song.  Wei Ying turned and a wide grin spread across his face when he saw Lan Zhan.

“Missed you.” Wei Ying said as he tucked Chenqing in his waist band.

Lan Zhan pulled Wei Ying into a deep kiss.  “Wei Ying looks good in his new robes.”  He hummed. He hiked Wei Ying up onto his hips and Wei Ying wrapped his legs around Lan Zhan’s waist and his arms around his neck.  They continued to devour each other’s mouths as Lan Zhan carried him into the Jingshi.

#mdzs fic #the untamed #guess whos coming to dinner #jin guangyao is having a bad day

[aki-draws-things]

NaNoWriMo 2020 #08

Following yesterday’s prompt here the ending of the fic with a much more proper word countfor the challenge. i have great expectations for this year and I’m doing my best to succeed. The only proble is that I end knee deep into new AUs every time I write something so Now I really want to make those little details a canon for some of the others fics.

Also that means there will probably be more Wen Zhuliu angst too. And i don’t feel sorry.

Have fun reading~ And let me know what you think!!

Day: 08/11/2020

Prompt: enemy to caretaker

Ship: None official

Word Count: 1912

Wen Zhuliu knew the meaning of loyalty ever since childhood.

“Take care of your brother. Don’t stray from the righteous path. And remember, when the world will turn against you, and believe me, it will, your brother will be the one who will never betray you.”

Wen Zhuliu gave his outmost loyalty to his brother, and his brother did the same. Until the day he saw it for the first time, his father’s golden core. People around him thought he was greedy, and ambitious, and craving for power. People thought he killed his father and brother because he wanted to be better and stronger than them. His brother was only seven. Wen Zhuliu kept the truth hidden so well over the years that he almost began to believe the words going around, but none of them were true. He reached out when he saw the golden core shining bright, fascinated by its warmth, he wanted to brush his fingers on him, he wanted to hug his fatter and press his cheek against the bright light . But when he touched it, it changed. He felt power, a surge of energy rushing inside of him, burning and painful. He screamed and his screams covered his father’s. When his legs decided to work again he stood and ran dashing past his sleepy brother, with nothing but the clothes he was wearing. The pain subsided slowly, it took him three agonizing days before the superfluous energy dissipated and by then he couldn’t turn back and return home. So he wandered. Everywhere he went there were people with bright golden cores, every time he brushed against one he felt pain and energy flow from the person to him. It was Wen RuoHan who explained what he could do. Wen RuoHan who took his frightened hand and raised him to walk next to him. Wen RuoHan who gave him the Wen name. Wen Zhuliu knew that day where his loyalty now lay. There was a little seven years old boy back at home, scared and weeping in a dark room begging the wind to bring back his older brother.

When his eyes laid on Nie ZongHui he thought it was an illusion, an hallucination, because in the end the little, scared boy grew up resembling their father more than he could probably remember. But he was real, he was there, and old loyalties sparkled brighter than ever. “Your brother will never betray you.” Once their father said and he chose to believe. Blood called loyalty and he let him go. He almost reached out, not to his golden core, but to his face. He believed to a lie for so long that he wanted to feel it real. He let him run.

Looking at Nie MingJue forced on his knees and held by three soldiers, Wen Zhuliu wondered what ZongHui saw in him. He knew the Nie history, of course, just as he knew the history of all the Main Sects, Wen RuoHan taught him carefully and well before he went mad with power and poisoned the world around him, included his children, leading his wife he once claimed to love more than everything to take here own life. Wen Zhuliu wasn’t a murderer, he had never killed, not that he was aware of it. She grabbed his hand and pressed it on her lower abdomen before he could even think of what was happening, when he tried to move away, eyes wide in horror, it was too late. His power, the energy residing in his fingers, latched around her golden core and grasped it, pulled it, twisted it until it was his together with every drop of her spiritual energy. She fell and the door slammed open, his hands still glowing softly, his body readjusting at the new wave of energy.

Wen Zhuliu knew loyalty, and he knew fear and pain. He was unconscious before the hand of his Master reached him.

“What’s so special?” He used to be curious, he used to ask more questions than normal, he used to ask three questions, and then two more before the first one had been answered. He pushed this side of him deep deep down the more he lived in the Wen sect, the more he served a power hungry Wen RuoHan and his younger son. But Wen Chao wasn’t in the Unclean Realm that night and he could allow himself to wonder. “What does he see in there?” He looked over the bed Nie MingJue laid, his spiritual energy blocked and preventing him to heal faster, sweat covering his body as he fought through the pain and the infection from the branding mark.

Nie HuaiSang was on the bed closer to him, he leaned over and passed a soothing salve over the mark before covering it again, he moaned and opened his eyes, immediately trying to get away from him.

“What do you want? What have you done to us? Da-ge…?” He turned and looked at his brother before jumping down from his bed before Wen Zhuliu could advise him not to move too much and climbed next to him inspecting his not yet healed wound and the heat coming from his body.

“Your brother will never betray you. The world will. The world will be set on fire one day, and your brother will be the only one who would never throw in it to save himself.” His father had been right, in some way. He knew what he was talking about, a bond between brothers, no matter what, was always stronger than any loyalty. “I want that.” He thought surprised at how childish his voice sounded in his mind. “I want that back.” Still wen RuoHan had saved him that day. But he wasn’t the same Wen RuoHan he was now. “Maybe… Maybe I can ask. Maybe he would come with me. Or not. Maybe his loyalty to the Nies is more powerful and means more than me. Than the one who left. Maybe —”

“What have you done to him? His Qi —” Wen Zhuliu blinked, bringing the room back in his focus. No point in dwell on possibilities and past.

“I just blocked it. Wen Chao asked me to burn his golden core, I—” Disobeyed. That wasn’t going to end well. He swallowed and looked again at Nie HuaiSang who was now holding an empty cup as his only weapon. Wen Zhuliu smiled. “What are you going to do? Throw it at m—”

The cup flew next to his head before he finished the question and shattered on the wall behind him. He sighed.

“It was rhetorical. Believe me or not but I’m not planning on harming any of you. Your wind is almost healed, it will scar but there is nothing I can do to prevent it. His — I’m good at healing, but not enough apparently. Can’t unblock his energy, - “Yes, you can.” Nie HuaiSang pointed out and brushed a cold cloth over his brother’s forehead. “You don’t want to.” - Wen Chao will notice I didn’t follow his orders.”

He took a moment longer to think of what to do next before making up his mind. It wasn’t going to end well, why wasn’t he scared? He should have.

“But there is someone who will heal him for sure.”

It took Nie HuaiSang a couple of hours and many sighs before finally agreeing with Wen Zhuliu reluctantly. Carrying him to Yiling unseen wasn’t as easy as they hoped. Wen Zhuliu tried to block out the soft whispers coming from the back of the carriage, the movement had probably woke Nie MingJue up, his voice rough and low, pained; his breath hard.

“Where are we going?”

“Somewhere safe. To someone who can heal you.”

Nie MingJue hummed lightly.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m dead already.”

“That’s not true, Da-ge. It’s the fever talking, and we both know you don’t control your mouth when ill.” He tried to sound light, almost joking, Wen Zhuliu imagined his smaller arms wrapping around his brother and holding him closer.

“ZongHui… Where’s ZongHui?”

He tried, he really tried not to listen.

“I’m sure he’s safe to. You told him to go ask for help, remember?”

“Lotus pier… yes. Ah! No… no, we can't leave Qinghe. If he comes back and doesn’t find us—”

Lotus Pier. Wen Chao talked about the place. It was their next target. Maybe he could get there before him. He could try.

“He will be fine, Da-ge. You need to think about healing first.” The carriage fell silent for the rest of the ride.

“Why?” Wen Qing simply asked. He looked at Wen Zhuliu, and then at the Nie brothers, the older one slumped unconscious on the younger.

“They’re wounded. And you’re the best medic in Qishan.”

“Is it some kind of trap? Take them here, bring Wen Chao - She snarled the name in hate. - here and have him destroy everything? Great plan. It’s not going to work.” She was starting to turn and shut the doors when Wen Ning's voice attracted her attention.

“Jie… I don’t like his fever.” Blood was trickling down his lips.

“He won’t come. I’ll make sure he won’t. Just… Just take them in. - It was risky. That would forever compromise his loyalty. Wen RuoHan will certainly kill him. - Heal them. Keep them safe.” And with that he turned on his heels and ran.

He ran and he flew to Lotus Pier hoping to be on time. Hoping to arrive before Wen Chao did, before ZongHui could explain and set off to reclaim Qinghe.

He was on time, by mere minutes.

“They’re not in Qinghe.” It wasn’t the usual greeting, it wasn’t too ideal either, not after years of not even seeing each other. “You’ll have to prove you’re one of them, Wen Qing is not the most trusty woman. But she’s a medic, and she’s trustworthy.”

“Why?” Why? Why what? “Why are you doing that? Suddenly, after bursting into our sect with that Wen dog. After calling yourself a Wen. Why should I believe you.”

“You shouldn’t.” He thought.

“Because you’re the one I would never lie to not even if I wanted to.”

Nie ZongHui had one of his sabers in hand, still pointing at him cautiously. Maybe that was the way to keep his life. To make things right. It was worth a try.

“Stab me. Make it look real and then run.”

“What?” He widened his eyes and almost let go of the saber.

“You heard me. Stab me. There.” He walked closer, the point of the blade touching his chosen point. Nie ZongHui tried to take a step back. “They will think the Jiang attacked me. They won’t even see you escape.”

“But— why?”

Wen—Zhao Zhuliu caressed the side of his head and pushed the blade ZongHui still held deep in his body giving him a bloody smile before falling.

“Go. Go now. Go, g—”

Nie ZongHui ran for the second time in days. He ran to Yiling like he instructed him, he found the door being knocked shut in his face three times before HuaiSang came out and finally convinced the Wen girl to let him in. His sword’s blade still wet with blood.

“Zhuliu? Wen Zhuliu!” He blinked his eyes open tiredly, he stopped the bleeding almost as soon as the blade slid out of his chest.

“It’s fine… I just need some rest. I’m— fine…” He closed his eyes again.

#wen zhuliu #nie mingjue #nie huaisang #nie zonghui #zonghui and zhuliu are brothers #enemy to caretaker #the untamed #cql #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #mdzs fic #grandmaster of demonic cultivation #founder of diabolism #fanfic #nanowrimo 2020 #angst collection in cultivation #aki writes

[omgkatsudonplease]

恭喜发财! After reading your YP!LWJ posts, I couldn't help but want to ask for more. The way you wrote the concept makes me want to see this as a full fanfic.

it’s more likely to be a series of ficlets but I’ll probably put them in order on ao3 at some point! the nature of this story just lends itself better to ficlets because honestly most of the major canon events are more or less intact with slight variations on who’s saying or doing what depending on the change in their backstory. 

The arm is acting up again. The sound of breaking objects can be heard across Lotus Pier, as the arm crashes and wrecks things with almost comical amounts of wrath. Several cultivators attempt to subdue it, but only manage to get it still for about forty seconds before they have to get out of its way, lest it attempt to tear out their left arm in order to substitute itself.

“It’s almost restless,” Wei Wuxian remarks. “Restless with resentment. It wants to be whole again, with the rest of its body parts.” 

“A family reunion,” quips Jiang Cheng, crossing his arms. “I suppose that means once you’re ready, you’ll set out to hunt down the other parts?”

“Seems like that’s what it wants,” replies Wei Wuxian. “Can’t exactly say no to a corpse these days, you know.”

Over on the field, Jiang Sizhui and Jin Rulan have tackled the hand themselves, trying to force it back into the qiankun bag. Wei Wuxian steps forward, his flute in hand.

“I can calm it down,” he says, but the instant Jin Rulan touches the hand, it goes oddly still and docile. Wei Wuxian laughs. “Or not, I guess you’ve got it handled, Rulan.”

“Would you like… a hand?” teases Jiang Sizhui. Jin Rulan glares at him.

“The hand calms down near Jin Rulan,” remarks Jiang Cheng, tapping his chin. “Odd.”

A couple days earlier…

The array is drawn. Blood. Fire. A scrap of paper, from Lan Wangji’s book of the dead…

Mo Xuanyu looks down at his arms, streaked already with blood and revenge, and begins to chant. 

Justice. Justice shall prevail. 

I call forth… a vengeful hero! 

“Any news?” asks Regent Jiang Yanli, fiddling nervously with her fingers. At the table beside her, Jin Guangyao pauses in sipping his wine, mulling through her words. 

“Of my brother?” he asks. She nods, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “I’m afraid not. Every scout we can spare is on the lookout. There have been some issues at the border with Gusu, though. The Gusu Lan sect has become more insular in these recent years.” He pauses. “You don’t suppose they have something to hide?”

“Would they be the sort to hide my husband?” wonders Jiang Yanli.

“These days, it is difficult to know what a Lan is or is not capable of anymore,” replies Jin Guangyao, shaking his head. “Zewu-jun is entirely unlike himself now. You must have heard from your brother about his argument with him at the base of Dafan Mountain.”

Jiang Yanli nods, poking at her food. “Yes, the rumours of my shidi’s return have spread far and wide.” 

“What do you think, Mistress Jin?” wonders Jin Guangyao.

Jiang Yanli considers it. “I would like to throw a banquet in his honour,” she replies. “It is not every day that a loved one can defy death in such a way.” 

“You are not worried that he may have been returned due to demonic interference?” 

Jiang Yanli’s eyes narrow. “We cannot always predict when our loved ones will leave us,” she replies. “So when they return, no matter what, no matter how, we must cherish them.”

“i understand, Mistress Jin.” says Jin Guangyao. “Shall I begin banquet preparations?”

A week earlier… 

The xiao melody fills the air, discordant and chaotic. Lan Jingyi claps his hands to his ears, in a desperate attempt to let the cacophony fly over him instead. 

“I hate it when Sect Leader Lan does his demonic inquiries,” a younger disciple whines. Lan Jingyi doesn’t even have it in him to reprimand him for talking badly about the sect leader behind his back, as the music truly is atrocious today. “It makes me unable to concentrate on meditation.”

“I just feel so… strange whenever I hear it,” agrees another disciple. 

“Sect Leader Lan wishes to find his brother,” says Lan Jingyi, almost automatically at this point. “He is clearly doing everything in his power to track him. We must have faith.”

“We must have faith,” agrees the boys, and place their hands over their ears.

“Da-ge, you seem sad,” Nie Huaisang remarks as he approaches Nie Mingjue in the gardens of their residence. Sect Leader Nie usually has no use for flowers, but if it gives his good for nothing little brother something to do, then he’ll allow it, a little. 

“What’s it to you?” he grumbles. “Every time I see you I feel sad, too.”

“Sure, but this is a different kind of sad,” says Nie Huaisang, covering part of his face with his fan. “You’re sad about him again, aren’t you? Second brother?”

“He is not himself,” replies Nie Mingjue. “It is as if he is suffering his own qi deviation.”

“What do you think is causing it?” wonders Nie Huaisang. Nie Mingjue’s eyes narrow, and his hands clench on his saber. 

“I don’t know,” he replies. “But I have my suspicions.”

A couple days earlier… 

Lan Wangji sees the sign glowing before him, on the texts he’s been painstakingly rewriting from memory. The summoning array has been used. 

Who could it be? He picks a couple strings of his guqin, melodies moving swiftly through his ranks of undead. Everyone is accounted for. He broadens the search, and his stomach twists at the result.

Wei Wuxian. 

His soul is no longer among the dead. 

Lan Wangji has wanted to communicate with him for the longest time, but something placed on Wei Wuxian’s body had silenced his soul in the afterlife. Now, all of that has changed. Someone has done the thing he had feared to do – restore Wei Wuxian back to the living. Possibly just so he himself would follow, curious about the movements of his love. 

He checks the location of the sigil. It appears to be at the edge of the Lanling Jin lands, near the residence of the Mo family.

Without a second thought, Lan Wangji melds into the shadows, and heads for the direction of Mo Village.

“If you do not write to me about your adventures, I will personally break your legs so you don’t get to have any more of them,” warns Jiang Cheng as he hands Jiang Sizhui a qiankun bag of supplies. 

Next to them, Jin Rulan is pouting visibly as a couple guards lead his spiritual dog away. “But why can’t Fairy come with us?” he demands. “He’s perfectly trained, you know.”

“No reason,” says Wei Wuxian, his voice a little more high-pitched than usual. 

“This is a great honour, Jingyi,” says Lan Xichen, only the slightest smile gracing his lips as he ruffles the junior’s head. “Night-hunting with one of the Twin Heroes of Yunmeng. You’ll learn quite a lot, I imagine.”

“You sure you’ll be all right by yourself, Xichen-gege?” asks Lan Jingyi. 

Lan Xichen laughs, a little harshly. “Perfectly fine,” he says. “Please keep me updated on your progress.” 

Wei Wuxian watches Lan Jingyi nod enthusiastically with a somewhat sinking feeling in his heart. Now, the boys all tie their qiankun bags to their belts, ready their swords and talismans, and line up facing him.

“Let’s go, Master Wei!” they chirp, and Wei Wuxian leads the way towards the gate of Lotus Pier, heading towards the northeast where the hand being carried by Jin Rulan is currently pointing. 

The boys file after, bright grins on their faces at the prospect of more adventure.

A couple years earlier… 

“It isn’t fair,” whines Mo Xuanyu, wiping at his eyes with his sleeves. “I didn’t – I didn’t mean to do it, it was an accident, a slip of my tongue –”

“You remind me of someone I once knew,” says Jiang Yanli, sitting on the garden bench beside him. She looks up at the stars, beautiful in her role as worry-stricken wife. “My shidi, Wei Wuxian. He would frequently run his mouth, too, and it’d get him into all sorts of trouble.”

“Wei Wuxian!” breathes Mo Xuanyu, his eyes wide. “You mean… you really knew him? I remember he used to visit you, but I was too young for him to notice… What was he like?”

“He had such a strong sense of right and wrong,” says Jiang Yanli, smiling fondly. “If he knew someone was suffering, no matter how small, he would try to make things right. That’s why he trusted in the Master of Shadows for far longer than anyone else – Hanguang-jun was just the same, but with a different approach.”

“Was it true?” wonders Mo Xuanyu. “You know, that they…”

Jiang Yanli smiles. “I never asked,” she said. “But I know my shidi’s heart and core had always been Lan Wangji’s, even before their paths diverged. I don’t know if he ever knew that himself, though.”

Mo Xuanyu sniffles. “I think I’d like to know what he’d think of me, if he were to meet me,” he says. “Him and Hanguang-jun.”

“I do, too,” agrees Jiang Yanli. “He was taken too soon. Without him, the world just feels so much more unjust.”

“I wish I could talk to the Master of Shadows,” declares Mo Xuanyu. “He’d know how to bring Wei Wuxian back, and how to get my family to stop pestering me, and – and he’d make everything right again. I’m sure of it.”

Jiang Yanli sighs, closing her eyes, steeling herself. Quietly, she slips a folded paper from her sleeve and slides it across the bench towards him. 

“What if I told you, Master Mo… that there was?”

#魔道祖师 #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #lily's dabbles #yiling patriarch lwj au #red envelope ficlets #jae duhb #ask

[minty-marshmallow]

Legend of Yun Xi [Ep 24]

Recap:

Yun Xi wants to take revenge but Feiye stops her by knocking her out. Afterwards, he is informed that Xi Feng and Tang Li have put the guards on the right path of finding out the Crown Prince Tianmo has been making gu abetted men.

Qi Shao finds out from Qing Ge their plan failed and thus realizes he is going to have to use Yun Xi to get to Feiye. The Emperor meanwhile is informed of the Crown Prince's doings and also orders them to watch Prince Qin more closely. Qing Ge overhears all of this.

Yun Xi awakes to Ming Xiang telling her Feiye is driving her out of the palace. She refuses to believe it but Feiye confirms "there is no place for you here". She thanks him for taking care of her and bids him farewell. [Even up to them departing she still cares about him and thanks him for protecting her till now....oww my heart]

Yun Xi leaves in the rain. She sits outside her home but is gossiped about by her step mother and sisters and so she leaves. Qi Shao finds her. Meanwhile, Tang Le and NingJing quarrel and also Tang Li wonders where Yun Xi would have went and that the rain is too heavy.

Feiye laments about Yun Xi and reads her letters she had written about him. Tang Li asks if he's missing her. He also informs him that the Emperor has sent ment to catch Tianmo. He is sentenced to prison. But not after arguing with his father. He even asks his father to grant him death to reunite with his mother.

Queen Dowager tells the Emperor to start a rumor that Prince Qin is a fake and not a royal and actually a gu abetted man. So he does and the rumor starts to spread. They also discuss poking at Yun Xi to get at Feiye. As the rumors spread Tang Li and Ming Xiang suspect Yun Xi but Feiye trusts her. He says she's his wife even if she isn't there at the palace.

Ming Xiang is dying and Tang Li finds out about it and is worried about her. NingJing says that Yun Xi would help them and decides to go convince her to come back.

Review:

Okay first off I don't like Tianmo let me make that clear but I kinda felt sorry for him there for a minute. He really doesn't have anyone and his father doesn't care for him and he's really alone. I think his honest feelings came out there for a minute that he really believes death would be better than how his life is going right now; where he's not even sure if he has a future at all.

Qi Shao sure is happy to have Yun Xi but he's gonna go behind her back and use her and that's just so depressing. Because he also genuinely cares for her, but she doesn't come first. Feiye is cold but he's genuinely thinking of her well being first and that's why he drove her away. I don't think he realizes he pushed her closer to trouble than away from it.

NingJing is really a good friend I love her. Also I think Tang Li is maybe...a little bit...sorta...starting to like her. I'm not 100% sure though haha. But they are cute together with all their couple bickering. Even though they aren't actually a couple.

#legend of yun xi #asian drama #cdrama #chinese drama #asian drama recap #chinese drama recap

[modoue-blog]

When a woman falls in love with these seven kinds of men, it's really dangerous

Obviously knows very dangerous, obviously knows not to be supposed to approach, but always some men, always some occasions have met, the woman very much wants to love.

First, meet the old lover

Better laugh than cry, old is better than new. A married woman suddenly in a casual place to encounter once loved but sadly parted old lover, it is like a revolutionary party suffered the torture of the enemy, whether or when Jiang Fu when CHIGO depends entirely on the individual anyone. The "new" here refers to marriage in the real state. Reality the only true and revealing the shortcomings will be dissatisfied, they miss even fantasy that period not end the emotional journey to perfection, in-depth expansion of such a mental state is undoubtedly the best soil aventure flower is blooming. The old lover came, and the contradictions followed.

Critical condition:

(1) the husband has just beaten a married woman. (2) the old lover sophistication and forget old friends. (3) the two men had dinner together and drank some wine.

Two, the bar is a dangerous place

For men, the bar is a filter or camouflage instrument, it can make rough men seem elegant; for women, the bar has become the edge of the feelings of the rich, and there is no doubt that the high incidence of romance. From a woman's perspective, a man in a bar often performs the following classic performances: rocking half a glass of wine and smiling from one bar to another. Generally do not sit down easily, unless the game is indeed started. Even when talking to a woman who has not entered a choice, she is always patient and sincere. Mouth slightly magnetic voice, a faint smile on one's face, eyes still stare God - he was eager to a real affair. The women, though well aware of the performance, are still easy to get into. Bars where the women do not expect enduring as the universe, very sensual woman in the bar. There is no reason for such an affair to unfold.

Critical condition:

(1) the man has a Zhou Runfa smile. (2) or Ken Takakura's indifference. (3) or Ge You's humor.

Three attractive middle-aged men

The charm of a middle-aged man is a fake tans train to travel woman wants to ride. The young man is a middle-aged man is a green apple, red apple, some hardware is unique to the middle-aged man: a certain reputation and social status; be able to reason the world; a nuanced understanding of female psychology. All this makes women think middle-aged men are their favorite targets. Especially attractive middle-aged men.

Of course, this type of affair is more complicated than the other. Women may be passionately devoted, men are half water half of the flame. It is almost certain that conspiracy and ignorance are often grouped together in these emotional games. The last victim must be a woman, and the last blade must be the innocent middle-aged man. Women in love, I understand you, you must be vigilant!

Critical condition:

(1) the woman lost her father's love from childhood. (2) under 28 years of age. (3) the man talk rapidly or silence. (4) it is better to claim that the present marital situation is unsatisfactory.

Four male boss, male boss

A love affair between a female subordinate and a male boss is also a mode of affair. To be sure this affair has nothing to do with power, although the deterrent power like the United States and NATO missiles at some time; overbearing, arrogant and unreasonable, but after all the office romance or sexual harassment has nothing to do with. In fact, the measure of this special relationship is romance or sexual harassment standard only a woman angrily, you told me Clinton is "sexual harassment, otherwise it is laid. Of course not all male boss may become the female subordinate aventure object, this with the male boss and others regardless of marital status, personality is closely related.

Critical condition:

(1) the male boss has just come in. (2) daily chin livid livid shaven. (3) basically have some mystery serious in speech and manner. (4) is in the right place for being ms..

Five husband indifferent or flower heart

The probability of such a husband's wife's love affair has been greatly improved. Some revenge, some sentimental, some eager. A phone call, a party, a chance encounter. It doesn't really matter what kind of means or means you take. What matters is that the wife is going to make a difference. The other party does not have to be very attractive, but must be understanding; not necessarily successful, but to know how to care; not necessarily to women, but must be single-minded. At this time women seek love, in fact, is looking for the ideal state of love or lover. Men in love are stressed; is it too heavy?

Critical condition:

(1) a woman loves her husband deeply. (2) husbands play games. (3) there was a man who was considerate and devoted.

Six love in a foreign land

In fact, this is a kind of romance that may occur in a particular time and space. For example, TV drama "100 Broadway", such as the golden master and poetry Ying qi. A pair of married men and women (lovers are not each other), in a foreign country under a roof, the time is three years, how can it not happen naturally? Men may be more solitary than they are psychologically, but women are just the opposite. Looking under the watchful eyes of the people of the female weakness Qi poetry Ying was firmly grasp the golden master painter. So women out of the country had better choose to live alone. But is it all right to live alone?

Critical condition:

(1) there's a student party. (2) time is mid autumn day, Lantern Festival or Valentine's day. (3) each lover is not around.

Seven bad boys, cool boys, alternative boys

They're guys with personalities. Such boys, young girls like, young women, even middle-aged women may like it. It is said that this is the new bad man age. New and bad men take responsibility when they are willing to take responsibility, and never let themselves go when they are not willing to take responsibility. Women feel this man is very kind, very real, do not pose as a person of high morals it may lead to a close desire. Cool boy is Douglas's brother or son, but full of energy than road vitality, is a woman "one night stand" aventure object -- but only for the night time, a long time cool into a paper tiger.

Another kind of man is playing art and playing edge feeling. It may be possible to have a pigtail, a job, maybe no job, a responsible person, or an irresponsible person -- at this point, there is no difference between an alternative boy and a bad boy. Women aventure on these personalized boy with a certain feeling or mood searching, ending probably not escape the "stop" four words.

Critical condition: women who are trapped may have some risk taking mentality. (2) may be unmarried. (3) may also be married, but married life is as plain as water.

[robininthelabyrinth]

If you're still taking prompts, what about something where LXC discovered that JGY had altered the song of Clarity/Cleansing, before NMJ died? Is JGY able to convince him it was a misunderstanding, or does he realize the betrayal?

sequel to this

“This is the worst kidnapping ever,” Nie Huaisang moaned.

Lan Xichen had given up on not smiling about ten complaints ago. “You’re doing very well,” he said.

“I am not.”

“You got me to come with you to the Unclean Realm, didn’t you?”

“You’re the one that flew us here.”

“Well, I’m better at flying on a sword than you are. Still, you did get me here. Against my will, even.”

“You said you thought it was a bad idea,” Nie Huaisang said gloomily. “Twice. And then you stopped protesting.”

Lan Xichen shrugged. “I still think it’s more likely that you remembered the song wrong.”

“And I’m telling you that I am far too incompetent to accidentally come up with a variation that causes the exact opposite effect to what it’s meant to do,” Nie Huaisang said stubbornly. “We’ll go to the room and listen and then you’ll see.”

“But there’s no need to sneak around – we could just ask A-Yao to pay it for us, and we’ll be able to see –”

“No! This is my honor at stake here, er-ge. I’m telling you: if you’re there listening, there’s no way san-ge won’t worry about doing it perfectly right, and that means he won’t make any mistakes. You have to hear him when he’s not thinking about it.”

Lan Xichen’s hand was covering his mouth and had been ever since Nie Huaisang had said the word ‘honor’ which – fair. It wasn’t exactly Nie Huaisang’s concern the majority of the time.

Nie Huaisang only kept invoking it because every time he did, it made Lan Xichen giggle-snort in such an embarrassing way that he entirely forgot that he’d been opposed to this little trip.

Kidnapping.

Whatever. No one would ever believe he could successfully kidnap anyone, anyway, and they were probably right.

“Here, er-ge, come through this way,” he instructed Lan Xichen, pushing open a wall.

“Should you be showing this to me?” Lan Xichen asked, following him in. “It’s not a family secret, is it?”

“Only in the most technical of senses?” Nie Huaisang hazarded.

“Huaisang…”

“Listen, if da-ge ever wanted to actually keep a family secret, he just wouldn’t tell me about it,” Nie Huaisang pointed out. “It’s a good system, and it works for us both.”

Lan Xichen was quiet for a moment. “What if there was a secret you had to know,” he finally said. “And he didn’t have a choice but to tell you –”

Nie Huaisang didn’t want to talk about the saber spirits, if only because his brother was much happier thinking he was ignorant of the whole thing.

“Shhhh, we’re almost there. San-ge should be getting started right around this time –”

Sure enough, by the time they arrived, Jin Guangyao was halfway through the opening chords. Lan Xichen settled down in the chair that Nie Huaisang had brought for himself, head tilted to the side to better listen, a soft smile on his face.

That smile slowly faded as the song went on, even though they hadn’t even gotten to the relevant piece yet.

Nie Huaisang really wanted to know why, but he couldn’t ask without giving away their presence – something he’d overlooked. If only he’d brought paper and ink! Then they’d be able to pass notes.

Or possibly he should really give in to his brother’s urging and learn some hand-signs for communication purposes…

Jin Guangyao finally got to the part of the song Nie Huaisang and Lan Xichen had been arguing about, and hah! Nie Huaisang had told him that he’d remembered correctly –

“Er-ge?” he asked, forgetting himself when Lan Xichen abruptly stood up and strode out of the room. “What –”

He ran after him, but he wasn’t fast enough to catch up before Lan Xichen burst into the room where Nie Mingjue was listening to the music.

“– are you doing, A-Yao?!” Lan Xichen was shouting. Actually shouting, which – wow. Lan Xichen never raised his voice; prior to this very moment, Nie Huaisang had honestly believed that his brother had laid claim to all three sworn brothers’ ability to speak at a high volume. “No spiritual power in the beneficial part, full power in the erroneous section –”

Jin Guangyao’s eyes were wide and frightened. “Er-ge, no, you don’t understand –”

“I don’t! A-Yao, why…?”

“I didn’t want to!” he shouted, his eyes darting quickly from side to side the way Nie Huaisang’s did when he was trying to come up with a good lie on the spot. “I didn’t – my father made me –”

“What exactly is going on?” Nie Mingjue said, rubbing his temples; he’d been meditating while listening to the music, and breaking the trance so abruptly had disoriented him. “And – Xichen. When did you even get here? And why are you here?”

Nie Huaisang stopped right before entering the door and abruptly reversed his steps as quickly as he could, even picking up his robes so he could better run away before –

“Huaisang!”

Shit.

Time to hide.

Nie Huaisang was never especially good at hiding; it wasn’t long before his brother had found him and picked him up by the collar – he felt and probably looked like a kitten being grabbed by the scruff of its neck – and dragged him back to the room, grumbling as he did.

Jin Guangyao was sobbing into Lan Xichen’s shoulder, and Lan Xichen looked upset.

“What happened?” Nie Huaisang asked.

“An excellent question,” Nie Mingjue said, and his face was black with anger, but that was pretty typical for him these days. “What was all that yelling about?”

Silence but for the sobbing.

“There was something wrong with the song,” Nie Huaisang volunteered, since no one else seemed like they were going to. “If you listen too closely, it has a negative effect rather than a positive effect. You see, I was eavesdropping and started coughing up blood –”

“You were what?! Have you –”

“The doctor said it’d be fine with some meditation!”

“Then you should go meditate!”

“Who says I haven’t?” Nie Huaisang protested, for which he got bodily lifted up and shaken like a disobedient puppy which…again, fair. “Okay, okay, I will, I will, I promise! But it doesn’t change the fact that he was trying to kill you!”

Nie Mingjue apparently hadn’t put that together yet and dropped Nie Huaisang like a sack of potatoes. “He was what?!”

“Not kill!” Jin Guangyao said immediately. “It was only supposed to disable you – to distract you –”

“Coughing up blood isn’t usually a symptom of distraction,” Nie Huaisang pointed out from the floor, a little skeptical. 

Jin Guangyao wasn’t stupid – even when he’d been Meng Yao, he had always been very smart, very quick to pick things up, to put things together. How could he not know what would happen if he played music designed to destabilize instead of stabilize to a man already prone to qi deviations?

No, it was definitely a murder attempt. It might not have been much of one, but he was going to have to pay.

“You were using it to attack me?” Nie Mingjue asked, his voice low; anyone who didn’t know him might think he was bubbling over with anger – and he was, but to anyone who did know him it was clear that he was hurt. “After all the oaths we swore –”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that,” Lan Xichen said.

Nie Mingjue snorted and turned his face away. “You always defend him.”

“I know that, but it’s different this time, I swear,” Lan Xichen said, and shook his head, his expression pained. “I believe him when he says he was acting under duress.”

“Er-ge…” Jin Guangyao said tearfully, his eyes starting to curve.

Nie Huaisang considered throwing his fan at him. Or possibly at Lan Xichen.

“But the consequences of his actions could have been serious, and that he did not consult us first – either of us – is indicative,” Lan Xichen continued, not looking at him. “Who knows what could have happened if I hadn’t listened to Huaisang’s wild story and even more wild idea of dragging me here?”

Nie Huaisang really wished Lan Xichen would stop giving him credit. Especially credit that might make his brother angry at his actions.

“The answer to that seems clear enough: he wouldn’t have repented even if I were in my grave,” Nie Mingjue said, crossing his arms; disappointment was writ large throughout his features. “Xichen –”

“You’re right, da-ge; and you’ve been right all along,” Lan Xichen said simply, and Jin Guangyao turned to him with an expression of shock. “Don’t look at me like that, A-Yao – we’re your sworn brothers. Even if your father was forcing you, you should never have lifted a hand against da-ge in violation of our oath.”

“But – I told you – my father threatened –”

“And I believe you, A-Yao, I do,” Lan Xichen said, sincerely, reaching out to put a hand on Jin Guangyao’s shoulder. “I’ve always believed you have reasons for everything you do, that the world has misunderstood you. But da-ge is right, too: I don’t know when or how, but somewhere you turned down a wrong path. Whether you thought what you were doing was justified or not, whatever reason there was to your actions, in the end you nearly killed da-ge..! That would have been unforgivable. For some things, it doesn’t matter what types of reasons you might have had.”

“I’m glad we agree on that,” Nie Mingjue said grimly.

“Da-ge swore to be your elder brother because he believed you needed instruction,” Lan Xichen said. “I thought he was being overly harsh with his assessment of you, but I realize now that he was right. We are your brothers; we will help you.”

“Help me how?” Jin Guangyao asked, his voice quavering. “What can the two of you do, one in Gusu and one in Qinghe, when I’m alone in Lanling and suffering? When my life is under threat, when my wife is under threat of even worse..? I have already accepted the name my father gave me, the position he has forced me into; I cannot disobey him without losing everything - what can I do?”

“It’s not what you can do, you – you idiot,” Nie Mingjue snapped. “We swore brotherhood. It’s what we can do.”

“We’ll need to consider the matter carefully,” Lan Xichen agreed. “Da-ge, come with me; I’ll play Clarity for you myself to help calm you, and then we will see about what must be done – both about A-Yao’s behavior, and about his father’s.”

Lan Xichen was probably the only person in the world who had the strength to pull open Nie Mingjue’s clenched fist, and the daring to do so; he led him away, still grumbling and shooting glares back towards where Jin Guangyao was standing.

Jin Guangyao in turn was left behind, gaping at the retreating backs of his two sworn brothers. In the end, he turned to look at Nie Huaisang as if he could offer some explanation.

“If you even think about doing anything to harm da-ge again, no matter what the reason, no matter how small, I will find your mother’s corpse and feed it to wild dogs,” Nie Huaisang told him with a bright smile. “And then you as well. In very small pieces. Are we clear?”

Jin Guangyao’s eyebrows went up, probably because he of all people could tell when Nie Huaisang was being serious, as he so rarely was.

His brother and er-ge might like Jin Guangyao enough to want to keep him around - Nie Huaisang couldn’t blame them, he rather liked the man too when he wasn’t trying to murder Nie Huaisang’s only living relative - but Nie Huaisang was going to make sure that he didn’t make the same mistake a second time.

He was going to make him pay - and then keep paying. 

“Anyway, you’d better come with me to help me find my saber,” Nie Huaisang said, even though he really didn’t want to. “Da-ge will start yelling soon enough; he hates it when I don’t have it around when there’s a war on.”

“But the war is over,” Jin Guangyao said.

“The Sunshot Campaign is over, yes,” Nie Huaisang agreed. “But the Jin sect leader just tried to assassinate the Nie sect leader, after having forced his son to participate against his own sworn oaths...did you really not realize that your brothers would go to war for you?”

#mdzs #nie huaisang #lan xichen #jin guangyao #meng yao #nie mingjue #my fic #my fics #in which jin guangyao's attempt to cover his own ass ends up starting a war #thanks jin guangyao #becomingatruelady

[robininthelabyrinth]

Fic prompt: lxc pretends to be lwj. For a day? To fool... somebody? For fun?

…just run away.

Lan Xichen was not often given to bad moods. On the contrary, he had always been praised for having a sunny outlook and a pleasant demeanor, and it had become something he prided himself on. He preferred to greet people with a smile; even when he was insulted, he preferred to let it roll off his back, knowing it would never harm him. It was very hard for mere words to affect him – to get under his skin.

Unfortunately, irritating words appeared to be the one area in which Nie Huaisang excelled.

Nie Huaisang had come to Gusu for help with a problem at the most inconvenient moment, sobbing his heart as he always did, and Lan Xichen had had to send a letter to Jin Guangyao explaining that he would likely be unable to make their appointment as a result. It had been especially annoying because he’d hoped to use the opportunity to give Jin Guangyao a book for his birthday, which Lan Xichen would be forced to miss the date this year due to certain responsibilities at his sect; he’d mentioned in his letter that he would ask Lan Wangji, now more than a year out of his ‘seclusion’, to bring the book instead.

He hadn’t expected Lan Wangji to refuse outright to even consider going to Lanling.

Still, none of that was enough to seriously bring him down, and his mood cheered up even more when he realized that Nie Huaisang’s problem, which had been held out as the sort of sobbing, gasping, threatening to die type of problem, was in fact easily solved. That in turn meant that, if he hurried, he would likely be able to make to his appointment with Jin Guangyao – a few shichen late, yes, but it was better than not going at all.

He’d just been finishing up tea with Nie Huaisang, thinking happily about what a surprise his unexpected appearance would be for his sworn brother, when Nie Huaisang had said –

That.

Lan Xichen didn’t even remember how the conversation had gotten to that point, only that Nie Huaisang had been laughing, face bright and happy, when he’d said it.

“I wish I was more like er-ge, not concerned of what other people think; I take you as my role model! It would be so much nicer to think that whenever I encountered any serious problems, I would just run away!”

Just run away.

The words were like a thorn under his skin.

“What makes you say that?” he’d asked, fighting and failing to maintain his smile, not that Nie Huaisang noticed.

“Well, isn’t that what you always do?” Nie Huaisang asked, his eyes wide and innocent; he was still a child, even after years of sitting in the sect master’s seat. “You ran away after the Cloud Recesses to save the books, you ran from one place to another during the war, you ran away when da-ge died –”

Nie Huaisang had been sitting in Nie Mingjue’s favorite place, wearing clothing that looked just like Nie Mingjue’s, drinking from the tea cup that Nie Mingjue had liked, and he’d said that.

Lan Xichen had gone to get help, to find medicine, to do something. He hadn’t run away.

It wasn’t – it wasn’t running, during the war. He’d been a courier, taking news from one place to another; the Lan sect had been rallied to war very effectively by Lan Wangji, and he hadn’t wanted to step on his brother’s glory. It had been useful, necessary…

He had run away when the Cloud Recesses burned, though. He hadn’t wanted to, but his uncle had begged him to prioritize the saving of their sect’s most fundamental treasures.

Maybe that’s why it bothered him so much.

Nie Huaisang had moved on shortly thereafter, nattering about his birds; he hadn’t even noticed how effectively his words had stabbed Lan Xichen – but that was Nie Huaisang in a nutshell, wasn’t it?

Lan Xichen had taken his leave shortly thereafter and headed to Lanling, but it was still bothering him.

He kept going back to it, turning it over and over again in his mind, indignation warring with guilt; as a result, he wasn’t smiling the way he typically did when he landed at the entrance to Koi Tower.

It was also why he didn’t notice at first that people had started calling out “Lan-er-gongzi” to him instead of addressing him as Sect Leader Lan or Zewu-jun, just absent-mindedly nodding at them as he swept past the gateway and headed inside on paths he knew well.

He was already halfway to his destination when he realized – they thought he was Lan Wangji.

Lan Wangji, who’d already developed a reputation for having, and this was a direct quote Lan Xichen had overheard, “a bitter facial expression that made him look as though his wife had passed away.”

(Lan Xichen hadn’t liked hearing that. It was all the worse because it was true.)

It wasn’t actually funny – Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji looked alike, yes, but not that much – but at this point Lan Xichen was so desperate to think of something other than Nie Huaisang’s irritating words (just run away) that he seized on it at once, deliberately arranging his face in something a little like Lan Wangji’s cold-faced glare.

It was childish of him, of course. But wouldn’t it be even more of a surprise for Jin Guangyao, to come in with a resigned polite expression (he’d never understood why Lan Wangji so disliked him) and then to find the person he’d actually hoped to see? It would make him smile, and Lan Xichen could give him the book in person and apologize yet again for missing his birthday…

Yes, it would be perfect. Jin Guangyao’s joy would be the ideal balm for Lan Xichen’s unexpectedly hurt feelings.

Lan Xichen felt positively mischievous, even a little wicked. He hadn’t played a prank on anyone in years, certainly before the war started –

(Just run away.)

He wasn’t going to think about that.

Lan Xichen made it to the Fragrant Palace – it had been years now that it belonged to Jin Guangyao, since he had taken the place of sect leader, and yet it still seemed as though it were his ‘new’ quarters – and nodded to one of the door guards, announcing, “I will wait for Lianfeng-zun inside,” in a way he would never have done if he weren’t pretending to be Lan Wangji.

Of course, once inside, he found himself with a dilemma: the Fragrant Palace was a classic building, full of servants and Jin sect cultivators, any one of which could catch Lan Xichen in an unguarded moment and ruin the whole surprise. If only there was a better place to hide…

The bronze mirror in the corner caught Lan Xichen’s eye and he pressed his lips together to hide his amusement. He couldn’t do that.

Hiding in another sect leader’s treasure room would be offensive, after all, a trespass – though Jin Guangyao was always saying that Lan Xichen was welcome anywhere he was. And he could do it; after all, it had been he himself who had taught Jin Guangyao the trick of how to enter…no, he shouldn’t.

A high-pitched voice travelled through the hallway, and Lan Xichen abruptly remember that Jin Guangyao wasn’t the only person with free access to the Fragrant Palace – his wife, Qin Su, was equally the mistress here, and worst of all it seemed like she was heading straight towards the room he was in.

(It wasn’t that Lan Xichen didn’t like Qin Su – it was that she didn’t like him, her smile fading a little every time she saw him. He couldn’t hold it against her: it had been to Lan Xichen that Jin Guangyao had turned for comfort after the death of their child, not his wife, and Lan Xichen had indulged his sworn brother in his grief when he should have reminded him not to leave his wife to grieve alone. Lan Xichen was a painful reminder of that painful time, now, and he couldn’t blame her for not wanting to see him.)

Jin Guangyao would understand and forgive a small trespass, Lan Xichen decided. It would be easier to explain a little thing like that than to have deal with the fallout of making Qin Su cry again.

The mirror worked the way it always did, and he stepped through –

There was a blank period in Lan Xichen’s memories after that.

It was as if his brain had simply stopped working, refusing to accept the evidence his eyes were presenting him with. The sight filling his eyes, the smell filling his nose even through the scented incense that filled the treasure room, the feeling in his fingers as he lifted them to touch the cheek he remembered so well –

By the time the haze that had fallen upon him had lifted, Lan Xichen was far away from Lanling.

He wasn’t sure where he was – he vaguely recalled, as if remembering the actions of another person, that he had staggered out of the treasure room and gone to the window, leaping onto Shuoyue and flying straight out of Lanling in violation of all prohibitions on using a sword within city limits.

He hadn’t had a direction to his chaotic flight, he’d only been desperate to –

To run away.

I’ll do what er-ge does, and just run away – isn’t that what you always do?

He was still clutching Nie Mingjue’s head in his arms.

His da-ge, his friend – he should have been buried safely in Qinghe. Under Nie Huaisang’s lax supervision, yes, but still, he should be there. Not – not in pieces.

Not in Lanling, like some sort of sick trophy.

Trophy.

A-Yao, his A-Yao, he’d – was it just grave-robbing? Some sort of perverse triumph over Nie Mingjue, who had only ever wanted the best for him even if he were not very good at showing it? After all, Nie Mingjue had died of a qi deviation, in public, there could be no question…

He’d died in Lanling.

He’d been speaking to Jin Guangyao before he died, and his final rage had been aimed at him, and –

And Jin Guangyao liked to keep trophies.

Lan Xichen had always known this, of course, but it had been little things: wanting to pin up a flag from a battle he’d helped win, keeping letters of old correspondences, things like that. Not – not like this.

Lan Xichen’s mind was rebelling against him.

His A-Yao – Nie Mingjue was his sworn brother. He couldn’t have –

He could.

It wasn’t like he didn’t know all the things Jin Guangyao had done, after all. It was only that he’d always believed that there was a reason behind them, some justification that made sense.

Just run away. Isn’t that what you always do?

Nie Huaisang’s innocent words had been right. Lan Xichen ran away: from the facts, from the truth. He blinded himself because he didn’t want to believe it.

He couldn’t run away this time.

Nie Mingjue’s head is in his arms, but Lan XIchen can feel the pulse of resentful energy already – his sworn brother had died a violent death, betrayed by someone he should have been able to trust; there was no soul-calming ritual in the world that would keep him from becoming a fierce ghost. The head was already straining in his arms, as if seeking to fly off, seeking –

The other pieces.

Nie Mingjue’s soul was still there, divided into pieces and bound; Lan Xichen recognized the horrific array that had been painted on him. It was vile, ghastly, an abomination.

It called for an answer.

No, there would be no running away this time.

At least Jin Guangyao would have no choice but to confront Lan Xichen this time, now that he knew that Lan Xichen knew –

Lan Xichen’s entire body gave a sudden start, and a chill filled his heart.

He didn’t know.

Jin Guangyao – Lan Xichen had been pretending to be Lan Wangji, hadn’t he? He’d hidden Shuoyue’s hilt, he’d mimicked his brother’s expression, he’d wanted to give Jin Guangyao a surprise…

Jin Guangyao, who Lan Wangji had never liked and who had never especially liked Lan Wangji in turn, would have no reason to think Lan Xichen knew.

He would think Lan Wangji knew.

And after all, they had comforted each other over the death of one brother – why not another?

Lan Xichen had put Lan Wangji into terrible danger.

He had to find his brother.

He had to find him right now.

#mdzs #lan xichen #jin guangyao #nie huaisang #my fic #my fics #Anonymous

[robininthelabyrinth]

Three Gates - on ao3 (for content warnings check Ao3) - on tumblr: pt 1, pt 2, pt 3, pt 4, pt 5

- Chapter 6 -

When Nie Huaisang was five, almost six, his mother suddenly started to show an interest in him again.

It was all that awful Madame Yu’s fault, Meng Yao thought. It’d started right after the Jiang sect had come to visit, a nice official visit purportedly meant to introduce the two young sons that were about the same age – Madame Yu was Madame Jin’s friend, and therefore hated Meng Shi on her friend’s behalf, but she was so much smarter about it. She was as vicious and poisonous as the spider mentioned in her title, and Meng Yao’s mother was good and talented and sneaky but she was as susceptible to flattery and wiles as anyone else, especially since she’d never been the target of such poisonous words poured into her ear before, all designed to incite her into doing something she’d regret.

Meng Yao figured out what was going on pretty quickly, and even Nie Mingjue was wary of her belated interest in Nie Huaisang, although in Meng Yao’s opinion he focused a bit too much on the possibility of harm to Nie Huaisang’s feelings and not quite enough on the fact that the only thing standing between Meng Shi and the significantly more secure position of first wife was him.

Meng Yao had his first real out-loud argument with his mother over it.

Nie Huaisang didn’t care at all, indifferent as he was to Meng Shi after all this time, except of course in the sense that he was upset that Meng Yao was upset. Nie Mingjue was charmingly worried sick about their reignited and intensified cold war – so much so, even, that he went behind everyone’s backs and arranged for Meng Yao’s first mission with Chiwen to be a bodyguarding escort mission to take Qinghe’s current mistress on a shopping trip.

Sometimes Meng Yao wanted to strange him.

Irritatingly enough, it worked out just as Nie Mingjue must have planned. There was a limit to how much teenage sulking Meng Yao could get up to on an extended road trip that required a month’s travel in each direction, and his mother wasn’t so stubborn that she couldn’t be convinced regarding to exactly how underhanded Madame Yu’s instigation had been. Anyway, in the end, she did love him more than anything, and that made forgiveness easy.

Soon enough they were back to their old ways, living in each other’s pockets as they always had, only this time they had money in their pockets and the arrogance of having a Great Sect backing them up. They made a point to stop by Yunping again to rub their good fortune into the faces of the brothel owners and other prostitutes that had once so tormented them, and even ended up buying his mother’s old friend Sisi’s freedom at a much-discounted price, given what had happened to her face.

“No one will notice in Qinghe,” Meng Shi assured her old friend, clutching at her hands with a smile brighter than anything Meng Yao had ever seen on her; it made her look ten years younger. “Half the women there have scars – scars, and sabers, too, if you look inside the main house. We’ll say you’re my maid so that you can stay with me all the time, but I won’t make you lift a finger – I promise!”

Meng Yao thought it was a good thing. His mother would have company which she’d lacked, especially since Lao Nie had stopped visiting her courtyard, and even better it was company she already knew she liked. They could sit together and play games, or music, do their hair and make-up and clothes, and never have to think even once about what a man would think of them.

Meng Yao was in a very good mood.

He probably should have realized that something terrible was going to happen.

He should have, but he didn’t, not until they rode straight back in through the gates of the Unclean Realm and Nie Mingjue rushed out in a panic to meet them. He had a black eye and bruises on his neck that Meng Yao identified at once as being caused by a man’s hand – he’d seen it before in the brothel, though not since – and although Nie Mingjue was ignoring it he favored one leg over the other in a way that suggested that his ankle was swollen and maybe even fractured under his robes.

“Da-ge!” Meng Yao cried out in pure shock at how wrong it was. Although there were spars every day in the Unclean Realm, even vicious ones that were only a shade away from true fights, no one should be able to lay a hand on the eldest young master of Qinghe like that without getting their head chopped off for it, and even a night-hunt surely couldn’t have gone that badly. “What happened –”

“I’ll tell you later,” Nie Mingjue said, and his voice was harsh, but with terror, not anger. “Come with me right now. He can’t be allowed to see you. Either of you.”

Meng Yao had many questions, but Nie Mingjue permitted none of them; he ushered them up to the guest quarters, the mediocre ones where neither honored guests nor hated enemies were housed, and hidden inside, wrapped in blankets and yet shivering, pale-faced with fright, was Nie Huaisang.

Meng Yao rushed to him at once, of course, and Nie Huaisang burst into relieved tears at the sight of him – silent tears, which was unusual for him; Nie Huaisang had always been prone to wailing.

“Don’t let him make noise,” Nie Mingjue instructed, and it was at once apparent why Nie Huaisang was doing his level five-year-old best to turn sobs into whimpers and heaving breaths into quiet pants. Meng Yao turned to look at Nie Mingjue – Meng Shi and Sisi turned, too, expressions of shock and confusion painted onto their features. Nothing like this had ever happened before, and they’d been here for years; there had to be a reason for all this panic.

“What happened?” Meng Yao asked, and “You need to see a doctor,” but Nie Mingjue shook his head, promised Later, and left, locking the door behind them – locking them in.

Nie Huaisang tugged on Meng Yao’s arm. “We have to move the table,” he said. “Da-ge said, as soon as you were here, we need to move the table.”

“Move the table…? Where?”

The answer, it turned out, was in front of the door. The table, and a bookcase, as if they were planning on resisting a siege.

“Are we hiding from a monster?” Sisi asked Nie Huaisang, trying to make light of a situation she clearly didn’t understand – that none of them understood, because Nie Mingjue hadn’t explained anything.

She was trying to make light, but Nie Huaisang nodded solemnly as if she’d only said the truth. “It’s not his fault, though,” he said, his lower lip quivering. “It’s not A-die’s fault that he’s a monster now.”

Meng Yao was so steeped in cultivation lore that he forgot himself for a moment, thought immediately of possession or demonifiation or a curse or something, and then his mother said, “When did he start hitting your brother?” and Meng Yao remembered that powerful men didn’t need an excuse to be monsters.

But no, that didn’t make sense either – perhaps it would have, if he hadn’t lived here for years, if he hadn’t known Lao Nie, but he had. Lao Nie had a fierce temper and a tendency to hold grudges, a heavy hand and a cold rationality in his heart that Meng Yao understood at first glance and that Nie Mingjue hadn’t quite figured out for all that he tried to parrot his father’s teachings, but he was generally speaking not a bad man. If he sometimes raised his hand to his sons, it was meant to teach them something – he wasn’t some customer at the brothel whose always-bruised children stayed home with shadows in their eyes.

Or at least, he hadn’t been.

Meng Yao got some broken parts of the story out of Nie Huaisang with some difficulty, being as Nie Huaisang was five and self-centered and had no tendency, as Meng Yao had at his age, to listen at doorways. There was a night-hunt, apparently, and it had ended badly – Lao Nie’s saber, Jiwei, had shattered, entirely unexpectedly, and the creature had taken advantage of the moment to gore him, with only Nie Mingjue’s quick reactions saving his life.  He’d been in a coma for three days.

Three days, and then he’d woken up, his eyes bloodshot with ceaseless rage, and he’d called for Nie Mingjue to bring him his saber.

“Qi deviation,” Nie Mingjue told him later that night, climbing in through the window with a few more bruises and a cut high on his forehead so new that it was still scabbing over. His eyes were dull with exhaustion. “He doesn’t understand that she’s gone, no matter how I try to explain it.”

It wasn’t that Meng Yao hadn’t heard all the stories about the Nie clan’s tendency towards explosive and early deaths, but this was too early – Lao Nie hadn’t actually been all that old, for all that he’d waited longer than most of his ancestors to have children, and weren’t there supposed to be warning signs about this sort of thing? And the saber breaking, a Nie saber breaking –

“It was Wen Ruohan,” Nie Mingjue said. “At the dinner party, some months back. You remember. They had that back-and-forth about that fancy new saber he got as a present.” He shut his eyes. “I was standing next to him when it happened. I felt the echo of Wen Ruohan’s cultivation right before it happened – he did something, weakened it somehow, unbalanced her. Shattered her.”

His hand had found Baxia’s hilt as he spoke, his fingers white with pressure of holding her; Meng Yao couldn’t say anything, his own fingers tight around Chiwen – Nie sabers were spiritual weapons, so tailored to their makers that one might almost think they were conscious, and there were whispers that if you cultivated enough they would really become so, rising to semi-sentience and maybe even full thought one day. A Nie disciple cultivated their saber using their own soul and spirit, making it part of themselves…even imagining such a thing was like a nightmare come to life.

Meng Yao took a deep breath and held it for several seconds before exhaling. “Okay,” he said, even though it wasn’t okay, not at all. “What happens next?”

“You stay here with Huaisang,” Nie Mingjue said at once. “I’ll bring you food, water, everything you need – there are servant’s passages in the walls, or I can fly Baxia to your window –”

Meng Yao reached out and caught his waving hand. “No, not – what happens next? We can’t cower here like trapped rats forever.”

But Nie Mingjue only looked tired, tired and afraid. “Meng Yao…”

“We can’t,” Meng Yao insisted. “And you – look at you, look what he did to you –”

“He’s still sect leader,” Nie Mingjue said. “And my father. He’s entitled to do as he likes.”

“There has got to be some sect law permitting the removal of a sect leader for madness!” Meng Yao exclaimed. “This isn’t a surprise; it’s hereditary – someone must have put in place measures –”

“Measures that require three-fourths of Nie sect elders to participate, enough to fill a quota, and an heir old enough to make a reasonable argument for inheritance,” Nie Mingjue said, and they both knew that he wasn’t. He was only fifteen; who would respect him? “There was some underhandedness a few generations back, someone trying to frame someone else for it in order to steal their position, so madness is a high bar to reach. I’ve sent letters to summon back everyone above the right age, as many as people as I can spare, but until they all come – we can’t let anyone know.”

Meng Yao hunted for words, but his silver tongue could not do what his mind knew was impossible; there really was nothing for it. Tensions with the other sects were too high. Even putting Wen Ruohan aside, there was Jin Guangshan in Lanling, always avaricious, and dozens of small sects dreaming of becoming bigger at the Nie sect’s expense. It was one thing to say that Lao Nie was injured and healing; yet another entirely to reveal that the Nie sect’s leader had gone mad, mad with anger, and that they were as rudderless as a raft on the open ocean.

They couldn’t openly demand that their traveling sect elders all come rushing back at once without alerting everyone to the problem – they couldn’t even ask the other sects to help find them.

No one could know.

“So, what are you suggesting,” Meng Yao said, his smile even gentler than usual in his rage. He might not show his fierce anger the way the Nie clan did, but that didn’t mean he didn’t feel it. “That we just put up with it until we gather enough people to do it right, or else until he dies? How long will that take?”

Nie Mingjue rubbed his face. “I’m not sure. A year, maybe?”

A year.

“That’s implausible,” Meng Yao pointed out. “Sect business still needs to get done.”

“I’ve been doing what I can,” Nie Mingjue said, because of course he was. He was the heir – he was the rightful sect leader, even though he was far too young for it. “Great-uncle says he thinks I can pull off being eighteen, so that my signature will be sufficient for most documents…”

“I’m going to help,” Meng Yao said, and held up his hand when Nie Mingjue tried to protest. “You know I’m ten times as good at household accounts and logistics as you, and it can be mostly done on paper, so there’ll be no need for me to go out of here to do the vast majority of it. You’re not stopping me. You need me.”

“Fine,” Nie Mingjue said, because he did and he knew it. “Fine. But for the few things you do have to come out for…listen, I tell you to run, you don’t argue, okay? I don’t know if he’s still angry at you about what happened at the Discussion Conference a few years back, but I’m not planning on finding out.”

Meng Yao shuddered. “He still – remembers?” he asked, because that was worse, somehow. So much worse to know that the monster that beat Nie Mingjue to limping, that wrapped his hand around his neck and tried to squeeze the life out of him, still had the same memories as Lao Nie, who used to look at his son like he’d been a star in the night sky that he’d placed there himself. Who’d never let his disagreements with Meng Shi affect the fairness with which he treated Meng Yao, who had once put his hand on his shoulder and told him he was doing well, that he was promising, that he was glad to have someone like him in his sect…

“It’s not so bad all the time,” Nie Mingjue told him. “Sometimes he forgets, for a little while, before it starts up again.”

That just made Lao Nie unpredictable, Meng Yao found, and he hated it – he hated the way Nie Huaisang cringed at doors, the way he’d started to wet the bed again, the way they’d had to let all his pet birds loose after Lao Nie destroyed one of their cages in a fit of unexpected fury. He hated the way his mother and Sisi both donned veils to hide their faces, lest they draw attention, and took to sneaking through the servants’ quarters; he hated the way Nie Mingjue stopped fighting about going to see the sect doctor the way he always had and started making a visit there every week like clockwork and sometimes in between, and didn’t even seem to realize anymore how bad it had gotten; he hated the way it almost seemed sometimes like Lao Nie was still in there, somewhere, confused about what was happening like a man lost in a fog that he thought might be on the verge of thinning and asking for someone to fetch his saber as if it were a lantern that could help guide him out of the dark.

But his saber was gone.

“I’m going to kill Wen Ruohan for this,” Nie Mingjue said one night, lying with the side of his head pressed against the cool stone wall to help reduce the swelling – Lao Nie had thrown something at his head again, trying to get at Baxia; he’d mistaken her for Jiwei again.

Meng Yao was sitting next to him, trying to compose a response to Lan Xichen’s latest letter – it was cheerful, talking about plum blossom tea and lessons in etiquette and a new guqin for Lan Wangji, the only sour note a reference to his mother’s illness not having yet resolved, though he hoped it would by the next visit they had scheduled. Meng Yao was having to wrack his brain to come up with some sort of fiction about what they were supposedly up to in Qinghe that would not bleed resentment through the lines.

Maybe he could say they got a dog? An especially rabid one, vicious and cruel, with a tendency to turn against everyone with teeth bared and no care for how they bled even though they loved him –

Maybe not a dog.

“You can add it to all the other crimes he’s committed,” he said absently, and he knew that Nie Mingjue would take it as referring to the man’s overall maliciousness – Wen Ruohan was an iron-fisted tyrant, vicious and mean, and he wasn’t quiet about his enjoyment of ‘punishments’ that were more torture than anything else; Lao Nie had vocally criticized him over it, and with him no longer there to rally disdain against it, Wen Ruohan would undoubtedly only get worse – but actually Meng Yao had meant the crimes Wen Ruohan had committed against them. Against the Nie sect, against the Nie clan.

Against Nie Mingjue.

Death was too good for the bastard, but for once Meng Yao would be fine settling for less so long as it happened.

Nie Mingjue huffed in agreement, as Meng Yao had expected, and finally closed his eyes to sleep the way Meng Yao had been on his case about doing for the last half-shichen. When he was deeply asleep at last, breath regular and easy for all that his brow was still furrowed in fear and worry that no longer went away, Meng Yao, who had been staring at the hypnotically beautiful sight of Nie Mingjue’s chest steadily moving up and down, alive and not too hurt, saw a shadow out of the corner of his eye.

“Huaisang,” he said, not even bothering to sound stern. “You should be asleep already.”

Nie Huaisang came up to him and put his head on his shoulder. “I want to help,” he said softly.

Meng Yao blinked. “With what?”

“Whatever we have to do,” Nie Huaisang said. He was watching Nie Mingjue breathe, too. “Whatever we have to do to make it right.”

Meng Yao wasn’t sure what to say. “Huaisang –”

“I want to help, er-ge,” Nie Huaisang said, and there wasn’t any doubt in his voice, any uncertainty. “Da-ge may be stronger, but you’re meaner. If anyone’s going to kill the one who did this, it’ll be you, and I want to help.”

Nie Huaisang ended his pronouncement with a huff, a familiar sound, and for all that it was a sound more characteristic of the Nie than his mother, Meng Yao couldn’t help but smile because he knew what that sound really meant: it meant I hate him, it meant he hurt da-ge, it meant I don’t know how to care about the world, I only know how to care about the ones I love, and for them I will burn it all down.

Meng Yao knew exactly how that felt.

It seemed that Nie Huaisang was vicious thing after Meng Yao’s own heart, underneath it all, and Meng Yao marveled all over again at his luck at having a living brother of his own blood – not any of those hypothetical bastard half-brothers and sisters Jin Guangshan sowed like he was trying to grow grain for the harvest, but his mother’s child.

A monster, just like him.

“All right,” he said. “If I can, I’ll let you help.”

#mdzs #nie mingjue #meng yao #jin guangyao #nie huaisang #meng shi #lao nie #my fic #my fics #three gates #some of those content warnings now in effect

[girllovescomic]

Winter Begonia recap episode 29

Of course, the evil stepmother agrees to compete if he gets a chance to go up against his rival. He tries to dash out of there, but Jiang papa is like, Si Xi’er I am not done explaining what I want from you.  The evil stepmother is like, nah, I don’t want to hear it, I got some shopping to do.  Gotta look good when I face my rival. LOL, ok. Dengbao questions his father for using Si Xi’er in his plan against SXR. He’s like dad, we are not related to that evil stepmother, why are you wasting your time with that tired old queen to get at SXR! Besides, Ning Jiulang has many followers and patrons willing to pay for me, so there is not even a guarantee SXR will be selected, so what’s the deal? Jiang papa is like, son, I am not really supporting Si Xi’er, I just want that tired old queen to disgust SXR.  WHAT? HOW? Like, how is that going to work? Despite the animosity, Si Xi’er is not even on the same level as SXR in the nandan department! He claims that by having both of the names mentioned during the competition, it will make it a laughingstock.  WHAT? I am trying to follow the logic, but I can’t. No, Dengbao, your dad is not wise at all, he is as much of a dumbass as you. 

Meanwhile, my other favorite side couple are discussing the nominees for the Liyuan Competition. The names are Si Xi’er (really, they nominate that bish), Chen Renxiang, Jiang Rongshou (what?), SXR, Ning Jiulang, Hou Yukui... I don’t even know why Xue Qianshan bothers to ask Du Qi who he thinks will win, seriously, you should already know what your boyfriend is going to say. Don’t be jealous and choke on your pipe smoke tho (yall simmer down, I am not talking about that pipe). Indeed, Xue Qianshan, you clearly did not use your brain when you asked that question. He asks Du Qi for his prediction based on that list of those who will move on to the final round. Du Qi declares that Ning Jiulang will go through. Xue Qianshan is unimpressed, saying the fairy godmother hasn’t been around for a long time, how can he still be popular? Oh honey, bro, reputation alone can do wonders for a great performer. Mr. Xue predicts Chen Renxiang would advance. Du Qi smirks while Mr. Xue reads an article hyping Chen Renxiang.  Du Qi is unimpressed, repeating the words successful and brings up the competition against SXR.  Yo, Du Qi, to be fair Chen Renxiang rocked his performance, is just that our boy SXR was spectacular. He states that CRX was so beat by SXR he had to run away.  Well, he couldn’t perform for a year and wanted to be with his girlfriend. LOL, Du Qi asks if Mr. Xue hired someone to write this fake article. Damn, these two need to just get it on.  Mr. Xue reads one of Du Qi’s own article flattering SXR for leading the trend with new opera, winning even the younger people’s heart. Mr. Xue is like, damn that is a fine article, who wrote it. Bish, you know your boyfriend did, why you fronting? Du Qi recommends another name and I almost choked.  Jiang Dengbao!? Bish, what? Because of his name.  GTFO.  Ewww, just no. Hmm. Qian Qian seems to agree.  Oh well. 

Meanwhile, GAHHH, the annoying maid! Er Nainai is doing some accounting and asks if the annoying maid got any news from Lao Han about CFT mother. Sigh, I really do not like that she is the one looking for his mother. Well apparently, he hasn’t reported back from Fengtian, where Chun Xuan apparently lives. Er Nainai complains that her brother no longer comes to the house. LOL, why would he come to a house full of nagging women.  Geezus xrist, he is useless, but he is not dumb. Ugh, why doesn’t Fan Xiang’er just marry that annoying maid.  They make a better couple. 

Meanwhile, we now know where Fan Lian is spending his time.  LOL, just like his BIL, he prefers to hang with the performers.  I don’t blame him, they are far more livelier, especially our penguin, who is explaining to Zhouzi how to smize with his eyes. Fan Lian runs inside the courtyard to tell Rui Rui that he has made it in the final round of the competition.  Our confident penguin is like, of course, what else is new.  He asks who made it as well. Fan Lian informs him that Ning Jiulang, Jiang Dengbao, and...what? Si Xi’er.  THE FUCK.  How much did Jiang Rongshou pay to have that old queen move on?  Anyhoo, our penguin does not seem to care about that piece of news, LOL, in your face Rongshou. Fan Lian is the one who seems more rankled by that news along with some of the members, but not our penguin.  Nah, he is too excited to hear that his fairy godmother has made the cut and he would be competing against him.  LOL, he goes into a diatribe, wondering how he is going to win against his fairy godmother when even his dad couldn’t.  LOL, he has already ceded the title.  Oh my baby.  Dasheng is not too happy to hear his boss already conceding; Fan Lian tells him he must fight for this, having pulled a lot of strings.  Shit starter Shi Jiu is like, I saw you perform with your idol and you were as good as he was. Zhouzi seems to agree.  Ran Long is like, Ning Jiulang only performed once a year, while you are more popular throughout Beiping, so he should be the one to win. Oh, Rui Rui does not seem to keen on it, even Dasheng notices.  Seriously, Dasheng, has such a big crush on his boss, lol.  

Next day, the streets are buzzing as the troupe is passing flyers urging passerby to vote for SXR.  I love the music.  It was the same use when Du Qi was writing Hidden Tale and when the battle of the beautiful queens was under way.  LOL, is this Lao Ge getting involved?! Even the rickshaw driver is doing his part. LOL, Qian Qian, why do you bother asking your boyfriend about him writing articles only on SXR.  You should know better.  I really think he is jealous.  We see a large banner for SXR with hubby contemplating the picture.  He does some type of noise......yeah, I will leave it to your imagination.  We see our penguin jumping up and down, wanting to take down the banner.  Both Fan Lian and hubby are confused; Er Ye says this is not cheating, it is simply a banner for the campaign.  Penguin says, no, I don’t need it. Fan Lian misinterpret this to mean he is too confident in his chance of winning, but penguin is like, nah, I just don’t want to compete anymore.  Oh, Er Ye is puzzled by this, since the competition happens every five years and that is a golden opportunity, so why? Our penguin replies he doesn’t want to compete against his fairy godmother, who in his mind is the best performer. If he loses, it means he wasn’t good enough, and that would make him feel bad, but if he wins, how will he face his fairy godmother in the future.  OHHHH, honey, stop it! I am sure your fairy godmother would be fine if you win.  He loves you that much!  Hubby asks if he wouldn’t disappoint his father if he forfeits, but penguin states he is worried, since it almost his father’s death anniversary and he will go back to Pingyang to bow at his grave and admit his wrongdoing.  LOL, Dasheng blows the cover on the white lie, replying the anniversary is in two months.  BWAWAWA, the penguin stomps out defeated, declaring he can compete against anyone, but Ning Jiulang, while hubby smiles at his cute penguin wife leaving.  Fan Lian, do not get involve, bro!

My old gays are back. Qi Wangye calls out to his wifey, informing him that as soon as he returns to the stage, he is already nominated for Best Performer. Fairy Godmother replies that in the opera circle, people love to fool around for fun, meaning his nomination is just people playing around for shits and giggles.  He tell his hubby to not pay any mind to the circus.  Qi Wangye reminds that every competition, it was either him or Hou Yukui who won, with Shang Juzhen as runner-up. He mentions Jiang Rongshou winning once, after he became the chairman.  HMMMMM, did he buy his win?  Qi Wangye comments that this year may not be easy with Rui Ge. Fairy Godmother changes the subject, bringing up growing watermelons in the South Garden. LOL, smoooothhh. Qi Wangye gets the hint that Jiulang is scolding him for having some free time.  Qi Wangye is like, fine, I am going to be a socialite and go buy a newspaper to vote.  Fairy godmother, say, fine, go ahead.  Qi Wangye is like, you are not going to stop me and fairy godmother replies, no, just give your vote to my little penguin, that will be fine. Qi Wangye is like, what? and then they laugh.  I love my old gays.

At a voting station, a crowd is there to place their votes for SXR when a strangely looking man, with sunglasses, a hat and scarf wrapped around half of his face comes in to buy up 10 votes for Ning Jiulang.  Why does he sounds like our penguin? One of the voters outbid him with 20 votes for SXR.  He doesn’t have any money to up the ante.  One of the voters tells him that Ning Jiulang is too old to be competing he should be spending time hugging his grandchildren instead, adding how many years can he last if he becomes the Best Performer this year. The one who outbid him says Ning Jiulang shouldn’t be competing against a fresh face youngster like SXR, it is embarrassing.  The strangely disguised man is like, yo, I am here to buy votes why are you dragging Ning Jiulang through the mud.  The voter replies that fans are the reflection of the performer, chasing our disguised man claiming he is as eccentric as his idol.  LOL, if they only knew who that was!

Best girl Xiao Lai catches our penguin rifling through the drawers and sees him holding the bank book stamp.  She asks if he is going to pay tribute to the money god. Oh, is that we call doting on your hubby these days! Can I have a money god to pay tribute to as well?  She tells him that he’s been splurging too much on the spendthrift Er Ye, buy imported cigarettes, alcohol, paying up his gambling debt (bro!), milk formula, expensive dishes at the restaurant. LOL, penguin is not listening, except to correct her when she says it amounts to 100K, claiming it is really only 80K.  BWAHAHA, oh honey!  She’s like, boss, you are going to go bankrupt doting on your hubby, if he stays longer.  He replies that for all the things he’s done, why not, but she replies that Shuiyin Troupe is not Cheng Er Ye’s piggybank.  Penguin is like, yo, this is not for Er Ye and I think I have an idea what it is for.  Penguin wants to buy the votes for Jiulang. She tries to stop him, but he twirls his way out.  LOL, poor Xiao Lai. Novel Xiao Lai emerges again as she screams he will regret spending so much on Er Ye. 

It’s the day of the result and the Liyuan Opera Hall is filled the brim.  Boss Niu is on the stage waiting for the Jiang Rongshou to show up so he can start the count. LOL, Du Qi and Fan Lian are both there.  I ship these two.  LOL.  Finally, the douchebag father and son duo finally arrives.  Boss Niu announces the start of the competition. We see Si Xi’er and Xue Qianshan in the crowd. Why are you sitting from your boyfriend? The first vote is for Ning Jiulang, the next is for SXR.  Meanwhile, our fairy godmother is singing to his bird, trying once again to teach him that song from the first time we met him.  Qi Wangye comes in and compliments him, which makes Ning Jiulang stop singing. LOL.  Qi Wangye comments how hard it is to hear his wifey sing, if he had known he would have eavesdropped outside. He asks if his wifey is really not going to go to the Liyuan Association Hall to watch the count.  Jiulang informs him he sent someone in his stead.  Qi Wangye is like, don’t you want to receive the award yourself.  Jiulang smirks and asks if Wangye really believes he will win the award.  Instead he believes that penguin will win.  Wangye is like you really think that foggy Jiang papa is going to let him win. Jiulang seems to think about it for a brief moment, but then snickers, inviting Qi Wangye to take a look at their watermelon seedlings.  Yo, anyone who claims they are only friends, please stop right now.  They are planting freaking watermelons in their garden together.  Alright!

The count continues.  Wait, someone actually voted for Dengbao! Evil stepmother asks about Ning Jiulang, to which Jiang papa ignores the question. Meanwhile, our couple is walking together overlooking the city.  Seriously, what a romantic setting.  Anyhoo, Er Ye is like, why aren’t you at the Association Hall instead of having a romantic walk with me. Rui Rui recalls the last time he came to this area, it was snowing; he was careless and took a fall, forcing him not to perform for days.  Wait, how is a penguin fall in the snow?  Er Ye responds the troupe members must be looking anxiously for him since he left without letting them know. He shows Er Ye a tree which has a large cut, apparently made by Qi Wangye out of anger.  Er Ye replies why is he telling him that when he was not the one chopped.  He brings the conversation back to Rui Rui not going to the Association Hall.  Rui Rui answers no; hubby asks if he is afraid.  Rui Rui answers yes, he is, especially of winning. He does that face that captures hubby’s attention (to be honest, it doesn’t take much, lol). He tells how he used to think his father was formidable, chasing him all over the street to beat him, which he couldn’t never outrun, until one day, he ran so fast, he saw his father leaning on the stick, panting while looking at him, realizing he had grown taller and stronger.  He wasn’t happy at the realization that his father’s age had slowed him down.  Er Ye asks who can outrun aging and Rui Rui answers who can stop time.  Er Ye replies that God gives everything an expiration date, when that date comes, it naturally degenerates, how can his fairy godmother be an exception? Rui Rui complains that time has come too fast, Jiulang is still high up in his heart.  Oh boo boo, honey bun, you are the fresh faced, the one the crowd clamor for.  It doesn’t mean Jiulang has sang his swansong, but since he doesn’t perform as much, it is normal for him to be upstage by some of equal talent like you! He claims he is not ready to replace him.  Boss Niu still counts and the last two votes are for our penguin.  Meanwhile, the evil stepmother only has one vote.  BWAHAHAHAHA.  He storms out, followed by his pretty boys army. They ask if they should leave like this and evil stepmother replies he doesn’t want to stay for fear of being mocked.  One of them asks didn’t one fan vote for you, but it turns out it was him.  LOLOLOL.  Best girl catches up to the couple and Rui Rui asks how she knew he was there. Bro, what is wrong with you? Of course she would know, she’s been with you for decades now! She’s your best girl! Oh wait, Er Ye reveals he sent Lao Ge to get her after dropping them off.  Ok, I take that back Rui Rui. She tells him to hurry up and go to the Association Hall, informing that even Qi Wangye’s people are there, it would not be a good look for him not to appear. Rui Rui asks if Jiulang is there, which stomps best girl, unsure how to answer, but does tell him that Jiulang assistant is there.  Hubby tells him that maybe he didn’t win after all, but since Jiulang is there, he needs to go.  Rui Rui is like, right, I should go, but he needs to change clothes. Best girl grabs his wrist, telling him she already arranged with Shi Jiu to get the clothes.  

Boss Niu thanks the crowd for the support and declare the competition has concluded.  It is time to announce the results.  Du Qi gets up on the table to see the results.  LOL, such a fanboy. Ning Jiulang of Qinyang Troupe has 3586 votes, Du Qi looks over at Jiang Rongshou to see his reaction, while one of the reporter tells Xue Qianshan that Ning Jiulang has been popular for two decades.  CEO Xue replies that Boss Ning has quite the pedigree, having worked for the Bureau of Imperial Operas before and was appointed by the Empress Dowager as Minister of Opera Circle, becoming a top guest at Qi Wangye manor.  Hmmm... you mean married to Qi Wangye. His connections and experience cannot be underestimated.  The reporter is like, oh so it seems like he is going to win.  CEO Xue following in his boyfriend footsteps respond not to jump to conclusion. Boss Niu announces the tally for Rui Rui and it is a tie with fairy godmother. The crowd is excited while Xue is like, see, I told you so. They announce that weasel Dengbao received 1257 votes. LOL, what?! Who the fuck voted for him? He gets up to greet everyone.  Whatever. Then it is Si Xi’er turn.  Why even announce it, it is so goddamn embarrassing. Boss Niu is about to announce the results, seeing this is God’s will or something like that, but someone in the crowd claims the vote must have been rigged in favor of Rui Rui.  Someone asks for a recount.  Yooo, really Jiang senior! You would sink that low? Du Qi throws a tea kettle on the floor, breaking it.  He tells the one asking for a recount he will rip his mouth if he continue to spew nonsense.  The guy is like try me, but Fan Lian stops him from making a fool out of himself. Ohhh, judging from weasel Dengbao smirks, he was the one who caused this ruckus.  Geezus xrist! A man enters the room and shuts up the crowd declaring he has one more vote to deliver.  It’s Ning Jiulang’s assistant, Mr. Tong. He exchanges pleasantries with Jiang senior, claiming he got lost on his way to the Association since he doesn’t get to come out as much due him not going out as much.  Jiang papa smiles profusely, thinking Mr. Tong is here to cast away Rui Rui chances in favor of his boss. Boss Niu invites him to bring his vote to the stage.  Meanwhile, Er Ye brings Rui Rui to front steps of the Association Hall, helping him dress.  AWWWWWW, like a good wifey taking care of his spouse! When did the roles reverse? I guess since Rui Rui is taking care of him, he has become the wifey, not that I am complaining.  Rui Rui says he wished there would be some fast beating drum rolls to announce the winner.  LOL, Er Ye is like, my baby is so weird, but I love him.  Inside Boss Niu looks at the vote and ask Mr. Tong if he is sure.  He replies that is Boss Ning’s order and go ahead in announcing the result. Boss Niu announces the winner of the Liyuan Best Performer Competition is.......our RUI RUI. Outside, Er Ye is still dressing up his husband when they hear the results, while Du Qi and Fan Lian are embracing each other. I SQUEAALLL. Mr. Ton announces he has brought a gift for Rui Rui for this occasion.  It is a plaque with Golden Stage Best Performer written on it.  LOL, Jiang Rongshou is pissed off and storms out of the Hall.  Go join the evil stepmom. CEO Xue tells his reporter that Boss Ning had planned this for a long time.  The dense reporter asks what he means by that and CEO Xue replies the Opera World has a new ruler.  Our penguin stomps inside the Hall with hubby in tow, seeing the gift from fairy godmother. Rui Rui states that Jiulang is not old after all and runs out, followed by his hubby. 

Rui Rui is facing the ancestor’s altar while Er Ye and Fengyi are outside, not wanting to disturb his bae.  Dasheng sees him and asks why he is not asleep.  The other members join in and Er Ye complains that Rui Rui could have done some reflections elsewhere besides his room.  I was about to suggest that he simply sleeps and stares at his bae, but apparently Rui Rui scares him by not moving nor blinking, just kneeling and mutter in front of the Ancestor Tablet. Dasheng suggest he sleeps in Rui Rui’s room and he replies that it looks like a doghouse. Sigh, these are moments I wished book Fengtai came out to play more.  Book Fengtai was far more willing to eat the same food as Rui Rui and sleep in the same room.  Ewww, delusional shit starter Shi Jiu, with Ran Long help (girl, what are you doing?!) offers her room to sleep in.  LOL, Er Ye is like, Nah, I will go to the doghouse. Yeah, glad Er Ye prefers to sleep with Rui Rui smells surrounding him than encourage the deluded Shi Jiu.  LOL, Dasheng is like, well, can I go to your room.  Shi Jiu is like hell no. 

Fairy Godmother brings the plaque with him and accosts Dasheng, asking the little brother where to find Rui Rui.  Dasheng tells him that Rui Rui slept in the Ancestor Teacher’s room. Dasheng is so excited to meet the fairy godmother, telling him to watch his steps.  Such eleganza in one figure! He enters the room where Rui Rui is sleeping on the floor and approaches the sleeping figure.  OMG HE IS SO CUTE, I CANNOT.  Our fairy godmother being the equessential fairy stands above the sleeping penguin and then stares at the plaques, back to the penguin, trying to wake him up.  The cutie pie opens his eyes and stares at the figure above him, telling his fairy godmother he was talking about him to the Ancestor Teacher and he suddenly shows up. He grabs the fairy godmother’s leg like a little toddler and say it was a great dream, feeling so real.  Awww, is he still dreaming? Ning Jiulang reproaches him gently, saying this kid is so immersed in opera that dreaming or not, he can’t differentiate what is dream to reality. Continues saying how naturally gifted a singer Rui Rui is and tells the penguin to take what he is about to say as a dream, while the baby is holding tightly his leg with his eyes closed. AWWWWWWWW.  Fairy Godmother wonders if the penguin will remember any of the things he is about to say, but still goes on.  He tells Rui Rui that whether he wants to admit it, he is already old, which limits some of the things he can do as an actor like bending or sing a high pitch.  When he was younger, he grew up in the palace raised by the eunuchs, thus learning by imitating their behaviors as an actor, making neither a master or a slave, which limits his potentiality.  Unlike Rui Rui, who can learn all the different techniques, gestures and behaviors onstage, he doesn’t have the capacity to comprehend them.  All he could do is follow his teacher and copy whatever he could, which made him fearful of making a mistake and upsetting the Empress Dowager.  He adds he couldn’t innovate like Rui Rui, adding his own ideas into the opera.  While he is saying that, Rui Rui again wins the award for the most adorable penguin of the year.  Just on that alone, Yin Zheng must win best actor award, I will riot China! Because of his need to be perfect in the stifling environment of the palace, he could only perform the classical operas from hundred years ago, despite being tired of performing them, but that is all he could do. Cutie pie penguin tells him he performed them well, which fairy godmother agrees, but he has reached his peak.  If he cannot soar past the palace wall, then he cannot elevate to a higher level. He thank God for letting him meet Rui Rui, who holds the leg tighter.  Fairy Godmother admonishes him gently for not obeying discipline while growing up, always asking questions when learning operas, doing as he wish and not being afraid of making mistake or getting a beating.  Since coming to Beiping, he became more unrestrained, changing plays as he wish, which reminds Jiulang of the revolutionaries who barged into the palace.  He admired their spirits, but he was afraid of following them since they destroyed the sheltered world he lived in, pushing him into the unfamiliar world of the civilians. Fortunately for him, he had Qi Wangye to stay by his side which made the transition between the two worlds easier, allowing him to survive.  AWWWW. He was aware they were the future he could not avoid.  For him Rui Rui is like the sky above, that no matter how thick the brick wall was, if there was a crack, the sky will peer through eventually to let the light shine.  He needed a person like him, just like Beijing Operas need someone like him. Rui Rui ask fairy godmother what he is talking about, bringing up revolutionaries, spirits, which confuses him.  Fairy Godmother tells him not to worry, simply remember what he said, he will understand in the future.  Rui RUi said he talks too much about the future, it makes him sleepy.  LOL.  He tells him it is just a dream, so he wants to only hug him and fall asleep. When he wakes up, he will talk to him. Fairy godmother says fine, I will go ahead and make your bed.  He calls out his men to bring the plaque.  Fairy Godmother brings Rui Rui to the bed where Er Ye has been sleeping and where the plaque is, and lays him down. Baby penguin wakes up and sees the white hair ion fairy godmother’s head, comments about it and pulls it out. LOL. Then falls back to sleep. Fairy Godmother watches him sleep for a bit, then steps out, as the crowd of actors pool in front of the house.  They comment about his grace and pose, yess, this queen is the ultimate MOTHER.

Baby penguin finally awakes and sees the plaque.  Shocked, he gets off the bed and screams out the plaque has turned into a demon with legs and came over the house.  LOL, this penguin! Best girl enters the room in a hurry asking what is wrong. He asks how the plaque came here and she tells him that Boss Ning delivered to him.  He is surprised to hear that Jiulang was actually here in the flesh and not in his dream and best girl is like, OMG, are your dazed and confused! Bro, you were talking with your fairy godmother for a while! It dawns on the penguin that his fairy godmother was really there and finds the white hair strand.  LOL. He runs to the courtyard where hubby is sitting with Fengyi, surrounded by the other actors.  He take the baby and gives it to shit starter Shi Jiu, so he can pull hubby back into the room for some naughty times (sigh, I wish).  He tells Er Ye to lay on the bed where the plaque is still on.  Er Ye finds it uncomfortable to do so, but still does it.  Rui Rui snickers and asks how it feels. Er Ye replies he would rather lay on the floor because it is very uncomfortable. He sat up while Rui Rui tells him that he does not know what is good. He informs him it is the plaque gifted by his fairy godmother, which is the highest of all favors, such high-level treatment.  OK GUYS, I need to warn you for the next sentence our Rui Rui is going to blurt.  You might melt, jump with joy, weep like a little bish, die a few deaths. I know I did. Alright, drum rolls... Our Rui Rui blurts out the most valuable things in ShuiyinLou are in this room:The Ancestor Teacher, his father, Jiulang’s plaque and HIM.  OMG, OMG, OMG, our Rui Rui just confessed his love for Er Ye!!!!!!  I have died, I am dead, I need a moment to reincarnate. Er Ye looks at him like he is the most beautiful thing in the world, and we all know he is.  He is moved, his heart pitter patter, his bae just declared his love for him.  He smiles upon the realization, although our Rui Rui is dense as fuck, not realizing the emotional wave coursing through his hubby’s mind and body. OMG, Er Ye’s smile!!!!!!! I am dead again. He tells him how touched he is to hear his bae declare his love.  Dense penguin says don’t be, just lecture me less. PENGUIN, your bae is far too happy right now to even do this. At the urging of the penguin, Er Ye lays down and looks far too happy, not uncomfortable at all. Seriously, the man is so happy, the bed could be wrapped with 100% Egyptian cotton.  OMG, Er Ye smiling profusely.