#jgy being the worst but i still somehow want nice things for him UGH

[songofclarity]

Still thinking about that happy ending Nielan in post-canon post I made, and now with how Nie HuaiSang and Jin GuangYao are involved

(Although all of this could just be a general AU too, minus the end)

So Nie MingJue is reborn as the Crown Prince, which suits his no-nonsense behavior, his sense of justice, his morality, his refusal to be flattered, and his willingness to listen to opposite arguments. While he can't empathize with morally corrupt decisions that are at odds with his own, he is able to acknowledge their existence. He’s able to cool down his righteous anger. He is able to forgive. He is willing to pardon. All in all, the role suits him.

Nie HuaiSang was never dedicated to his cultivation, so he does pass away one night, warm and safe in his bed. The first Nie to go without a rain of bloodshed.

And he's reborn as Nie MingJue's beloved little brother once more.

As the youngest prince, Nie HuaiSang doesn't have to worry about fighting. He can enjoy the arts, collect his fans or whatever interest tickles his fancy this time around. He helps his oldest brother, who is still a little out of touch with hobbies outside his royal calling but he’s improving, as Nie HuaiSang would delight in court and all its finery. There is also no push for Nie HuaiSang to be a spare heir. There is another prince for that.

Let’s talk about Jin GuangYao. Poor, pitiful, conniving Jin GuangYao. In canon he grew up in a brothel and just about everyone made sure he never forgot it. As a child who should have been protected, he was the one trying to protect, and he was abused, and he was knocked down stairs for his mother and kicked down stairs for his father. He always felt like he had to climb and climb and climb, climb over people and climb over corpses, and even when he reached the top, all he could do was build more ladders. It was never high enough.

Which meant the fall was cataclysmic. He was caught in Nie HuaiSang’s net, cut open by Lan XiChen, and dragged back down to ground by Nie MingJue.

Jin GuangYao and Nie MingJue. You don't spend 100 years fighting and being torn apart in a coffin without that creating some sort of bond, wicked or no. Although his body was torn apart, Jin GuangYao's spirit is also one day suppressed and set free by the same music that frees Nie MingJue.

And Jin GuangYao is reborn -- as Nie MingJue's little brother. The second prince.

I know this might go against the karma cycle after all the wickedness Jin GuangYao pulled but LISTEN. Nie MingJue agreed to become sworn brothers with Jin GuangYao for two probable reasons: 1. Lan XiChen wanted it because they had a good, calming relationship once upon a time and 2. Nie MingJue got big brother powers over Jin GuangYao. Nie MingJue had wanted to guide Jin GuangYao back on the right path, but he failed.

So Jin GuangYao is reborn as Nie MingJue's little brother. And it's exactly the brotherhood Lan XiChen had wanted for them like those days at the Hejian front. The camaraderie, the peace, the support.

Nie MingJue, as his actual brother, now is the primary position to protect him, correct him, encourage him, guide him. No one is going to push Nie MingJue's little brother down the stairs or talk about him behind his back. Jin GuangYao isn’t throwing pity parties because Nie MingJue taught him to be strong and confident. Most of all, there's no Jin GuangShan for Jin GuangYao to seek respect from. Not even other conniving people at court can convince him into betrayal. Now there is only Nie MingJue, the most respectable person at court, even more respectable than their father. (Nie MingJue just radiates that confident Sect Leader authority that no one can identify and their father just can’t compare.) And Jin GuangYao earns Nie MingJue's respect without even trying because Jin GuangYao is, at heart, without years of abuse and greed and betrayal and revenge twisting him like a dirty rag, is actually be a good, intelligent, and hardworking person.

Jin GuangYao, the second prince, who is able to support his big brother Nie MingJue with official court matters. Nie MingJue listens to Jin GuangYao like no other. Their father has to recognize Jin GuangYao's capabilities whether he wants to or not (and why wouldn't he?) Even if Jin GuangYao is born to the second, third, or fourth wife, he’s still Nie MingJue’s little brother.

And if Jin GuangYao can be said to have a punishment in this reincarnation, it’s that he has no choice but to help take care of and look after Nie HuaiSang, the third prince, who does NOT hesitate to run to him with ALL his worries and problems. At the same time Nie HuaiSang is the little spider at court who knows everything even if there are witnesses who saw him doing nothing but painting birds all day. Nie HuaiSang knows things and tells second brother. Jin GuangYao hears things and takes action for eldest brother. All of this happens before Nie MingJue learns there was a problem.

Even if Jin GuangYao wanted to be like his old self, there is no way with the Nie brothers on either side. A little voice from the distant past tell him that betrayal will get him nothing in the end. A louder voice tells him that this is his family, and they love him, and he’s empowered by them.

A funny little aspect about this reincarnation is that while Nie MingJue recognized Lan XiChen in some dreamlike, red-string-of-fate kind of way, he has not been able to recognize his brothers for who they are. They are his brothers, his family, and he loves them. He doesn't know that Nie HuaiSang had once killed for him, or that Jin GuangYao had once killed him.

(Now they’ll both kill for him, together, as a team, not that either of them would ever admit it.)

And just imagine Lan XiChen's surprise to see these three particular men standing in a group, being brothers, with Nie MingJue commanding order and Nie HuaiSang hiding behind Jin GuangYao and Jin GuangYao also cowering but grinning, in no way strained, in no way afraid.

Nie MingJue, noticing Lan XiChen's expression: What is it? What's wrong?

Lan XiChen: Hm?

Nie MingJue: You look like you want to cry.

Lan XiChen: I wasn't expecting... this. I'm happy for you. For all of you.

Nie MingJue: Do you know them?

(What he means is: do you know them like you know me, from the past?)

Lan XiChen, smiling: Yes. They are your brothers.

#nie mingjue #nie huaisang #jin guangyao #lan xichen #mdzs thoughts #not as much nielan in this one #but still very important #jgy being the worst but i still somehow want nice things for him UGH #subplot where jgy starts to veer off the right path #and nhs just smiles at him and is all what are you doing er-ge #jgy feels like someone just walked over his grave #nhs getting to be the sweet ill brother with the happy family he deserves #nmj getting all the support and softness he deserves #jgy getting all the healthy found family now actual family he deserves #lan xichen getting happiness and the happiness of his loved ones like he deserves

[neverdoingmuch]

Wait cql lawyer/law school AU

i got you my pal dont worry!!

law school, im gonna be honest and say i know like nothing about law or law school so pls ignore any inconsistencies or inaccuracies

lwj goes to law school and he is definitely the top student in his class. they’ve been there for like a month and everyone already knows he’s gonna be the best

his one and only competition is this dude called wei wuxian but lwj isn’t particularly worried about him

so far they’re still in the stage of the course where they do the fun things to sucker people into doing the class for the semester so there’s been some practise debates and arguments and stuff in their tutorial classes

wei wuxian has that Charisma and like yeah all of his arguments are perfect but also he has an amazing smile and people are like yes i can trust him 

(he’s definitely the sort to be like hm, the easy way to argue this case would be to quote some laws and use precedence to justify this but that’s boring)

lwj is also good at that sort of stuff because his arguments are perfect and everything is so perfectly researched that there should be no ground at all for someone to lodge a counterargument

(wei wuxian manages somehow and it makes lwj so mad)

but that’s whatever lwj thinks,, a lot of people join law thinking it’s gonna be like the tv shows and books and then get completely blindsided when it comes to the rote learning part or like the actual laws 

and for all of wwx’s confidence, lwj hasn’t actually seen wwx so much as touch the textbook/s and he always studies in the law library so he knows that wwx has probably never even been there bc he hasn’t seen him even once (why’s he looking? bc he needs to see which books wwx uses to study,, bc there has to be something going on there,, obviously)

then they do their first like proper written assignment and lwj and wwx tie for the highest scores and now lwj has a Rival and he refuses to lose to someone who thinks that putting a ‘-us’ sound at the end of a word makes it latin (did wwx say habeas corpus and then point at a soft drink and go  sprite-us can-us,,, maybe,,,,)

anyway! lwj and wwx are kinda rivals for the top spot and it’s one of those situations where one test lwj wins by a point but then the next test wwx gets full marks and they just keep exchanging the top spot in class

and this whole time wwx is like The Worst to have in class. he’s always interrupting to ask questions or just straight up not listening and spends the class doodling pictures of rabbits (they’re cute but wwx is terrible and he’s not allowed to make cute drawings)

so after a few months the most horrible thing happens.... they get put together in a project and lwj is like ugh. internally of course but his face is also saying ugh

the first time wwx and lwj get together to work on the project, lwj is prepared with a proper list of tasks to do all nicely split up between the two of them and a schedule for when they should get certain parts done by. 

needless to say, lwj does not expect wwx to be ready, but wwx is definitely on top of things

he rocks up and is like yeah let’s do this, this and this and have them done by this time - basically proposing to do everything that lwj has already written down

and lwj is pleasantly surprised and is like hm maybe i misjudged wwx and decides to like re-evaluate his opinion on him

in doing so he realises that when he’d never seen wwx studying, it wasn’t an exaggeration at all. he’s never seen wwx so much as touch a textbook or spend more than a minute on a laptop doing something that wasn’t minesweeper or solitaire

but wwx is also making all of their deadlines and even adds extra information and resources to their document that could be useful elsewhere and sometimes he shows up to their study sessions and he looks absolutely exhausted

eventually lwj manages to get the truth out and wwx is just like yeah it’s easier to get worse grades than a genius but if you both study and you still get lower grades, it’s not easy,, for jc or for me

so wwx usually studies at night when his brother is asleep and lwj is like that’s bad, you can’t keep that up and just when wwx is about to go off at him lwj is like you can come study at my place

and thus begins the wonderful time where everything is alright and lwj falls in love with wwx

they work really well together and wwx is strangely considerate and nice? when he finds out lwj likes rabbits, he goes out and buys bunny post-it notes for lwj and starts to always bring him a doodle of bunnies every time he comes over. he always gets his work done on time, early even, and his work is always so brilliant and every time wwx smiles at him, lwj feels warm inside etc etc

for a long while lwj is like yes (: this is friendship (: bc he’s never had a crush before but then on the day they submit their project wwx is like hey,, the two of us make a great team,, we should always work together,, now and next year and even when we graduate,, i want to help the innocent people who need our help and i think i’d like it a lot if you joined me and lwj has his oh moment

they get a perfect score on the project of course and even after it finishes, wwx keeps coming over to lwj’s place to study or just hang out and lwj is just falling more and more for wwx each day

they’re best friends now and everyone gets used to seeing them work together on projects and then turn around to try and decimate each other when they’re working one on one and lwj thinks that he might just be the happiest he’s ever been

but then one day wwx doesn’t show up to class. it shouldn’t be strange but wwx has never missed class even once and he ends up hearing from lxc who heard from jgy that wwx was caught sabotaging some other student’s work (the other student was jzxun, who had a fondness for playing devil’s advocate and other than wwx once telling him that his argument was shit, wwx never spoke to him or seemed to know who he was but lwj is a bit too angry to remember that)

he manages to find wwx outside of his dorms as he’s moving out and he’s just like why did you do that? and wwx is like oh y’know,, bc he’s not really sure what’s happening himself,, one second he was at the top of his class and the next he was being brought before a board and being told that he was being expelled but he’s not going to tell lwj that bc lwj would definitely try and stand up for him and then they’d both get expelled

but lwj is furious and just spits out well if our dreams meant so little to you then maybe it’s a good thing you failed now,, bc his mother was a lawyer who took all these little jobs that helped people who actually needed the help and lwj was looking forward to doing that with wwx and he doesn’t even seem to care that now they can’t do that 

wwx flinches and then smiles at him and just cheerily says, that’s me and leaves. he doesn’t look back and lwj doesn’t chase after him.

lwj doesn’t see him again for years (you can do 13 or 5 or however long you feel like)

lwj is a fully licensed lawyer and he’s working for the family company and he spends half of his time working on cases and uses the rest of his time to do like outreach programs where he goes and visits schools and runs sessions on what it’s like to be a lawyer, how to apply, and to provide assistance to any students who decide to study law at uni

and then at one of these programs he meets this kid, wen yuan, who is ridiculously bright and enthusiastic and has a smile that seems oddly familiar

at the end of the second session he comes up to lwj and is like mr. lan, is your name lan wangji? and lwj just says yes, expecting the kid to be a fan of one of his cases or something but then wen yuan is like oh wow! i thought i recognised you from my dad’s photo!

and lwj isn’t expecting much but he asks what the photo looks like and wen yuan pulls out this photo from his pocket and lwj immediately recognises it,, it’s the only photo he has of him and wwx

your father is wei ying? lwj asks him and wen yuan is like yes, hesitates, and then asks, would you like to see him?

and that’s how lwj finds himself following wen yuan to some dinky little office that has a plaque outside that reads wen and wei

(wen ning is the nicest and sweetest person ever and lots of people underestimate him but then he’s an absolute monster on court. he gets up and completely decimates the opponent and then at the end is like (: it was so nice to meet you!! i am baby!! and all that,, you know our boy)

anyway they walk in and wwx turns to greet wen yuan but then he sees lwj and is like woah! you! and he’s not sure whether to hide or go and hug lwj so he just gives him a fist bump,, like a bro,, and immediately wants to shrivel up and die

anyway they get the reunion stuff out of the way, swelling music, tender wrist holding, lots of staring, lwj silently declaring his wholehearted love for wwx and refusing to believe rumours about him again even though he doesn’t actually know what happened, you know how it goes

from wwx’s side of things,, after he got kicked out he went to some small uni. good in its own right but not known for their law program and ended up specialising in family law

the first case he ever won was for the wens to have the right to keep custody of a-yuan and the first case wen ning ever won was to let wwx adopt a-yuan bc i’m soft like that

so wwx has just been kinda vibing,, being a single dad, living with the wens and helping to make that difference he always promised he would

now this isn’t gonna be some au where lwj goes oh my! i must give up my high salary job and work with wwx! bc lwj has been doing good stuff at his current job and for all of his family’s stuffiness, they run a fair and just company 

but! he does end up helping wwx when wwx gets a letter with a bunch of information about the jins and how they’re actually super corrupt and evil (big surprise,,) and how wwx was maybe definitely framed bc he was doing some casual work on the side and stumbled across some bad shit on the jins back in uni

lwj ends up being the one to take the case officially but wwx is definitely the guy leading it and so lwj ends up spending most of his time at the wen-wei office

lwj definitely bonds with wen yuan, who also wants to go into law, and writes him recommendation letters and helps him edit his applications and stuff

(and one day wen yuan is like leaving you was the hardest thing dad ever did and i dont think you appreciated how much he cared about you. he really did think that he annoyed you ‘til the end and lwj is like no! he didn’t! and wen yuan is like yeah i know but you gotta tell him and lwj really does mean to but the time is never right or something like that but also wen yuan is all but calling lwj dad at this point)

anyway they end up going to court, side by side, working as a team just as they promised to do and just as they finish their final day on the case, ended with the jury ruling jgy guilty and wwx’s reputation all but saved, wwx turns around and flings himself at lwj

is he crying? is he laughing? a bit of both tbh but wwx ends up confessing right then and there, still on record and everything (is that how that works??? idk! let’s say it does)

and what can lwj do but make out with him?

did a news crew come in to film the results of this massive court case just to end up with five minutes of wangxian kissing?? maybe! but when it played on tv it meant wwx and lwj didnt have to actually tell anyone they got together

(and does lwj eventually pop the question using wwx’s bad latinification? yes and wwx is too busy laughing to accept at first but he does and they end up being the worst possible tutors for wen yuan as he goes through law school bc they keep being all gross and lovey-dovey and acting like law school is the most romantic place in the world)

#mdzs #Anonymous #modao zushi #wei wuxian #lan wangji #wangxian #cql #the untamed #mo dao zu shi #all of my understanding of law comes from the pelican brief which i read over 10 years ago and one seminar on law courses at uni #so sorry if it's bad #): #lan sizhui #also i stand by wen yuan #let him keep his last name! #my aus #asks