#and the sect members are all picked i think based on acting cause none are particularly oogleable

[mejomonster]

was the untamed an idol drama or just a drama that happened to cast a lot of young people primarily?

[ceescedasticity]

Jin Guangyao’s hoarding problem, version 2, part 2

This isn’t so much “not a fic” as a “tell-don’t-show” fic. Not sure there’s a word for that.

(This next section starts out very dark, but just remember: in a more canon timeline, every one of these add-ins died in agony!)

Tingshan He (per novel canon) is a minor sect; its leader He Su speaks against Jin Guangshan's appointment as Chief Cultivator, and for some reason the appropriate response to this is considered to be arresting the entire sixty- or seventy-person on fabricated charges of conspiring to kill Jin Guangshan and giving them to Xue Yang to be turned into animated corpses. (What the hell.) He Su tries to negotiate for mercy for the elders and children; when none is forthcoming, he calls Jin Guangyao That One Insult, and then Xue Yang cuts his tongue out and throws him in a cage of corpses in front of his screaming family. Jin Guangyao in canon is like "…I'll leave you to it," and goes back to one of his innumerable other tasks. May or may not be the same tongue Xue Yang serves later.

(Also, novel-verse, and I am still not over this, this is before Xue Yang wipes out Yueyang Chang. He's still the person who was willing to kill dozens of people over a finger, but we'll never know if he would have actually done it without this example of 'respond to insult by eradicating sect'. Anyway. This is drama-verse Xue Yang, who found his influences and made his choices a long time ago.)

Here, Jin Guangyao goes to put up some silencing talismans between this outer part of the Dizang and the inner part where his high-value prisoners are. He doesn't want to subject Wen Qing to listening to all that — he might someday, if he needs to prove a point, but that's all the more reason not to do it randomly. Besides, Wei Wuxian can't even sit up but he might still come up with something stupid to do if he heard too much screaming, since apparently he's so very concerned about random collateral damage.

He has a thought. He comes back. He tells Xue Yang to hold off on killing any of them for a bit, he wants to do a finer check.

Jin Guangyao picks out a few members of Tingshan He.

He Lei is a cousin of He Su's, and currently the youngest surviving disciple at ten. Hasn't spoken since her parents died in front of her.

He Jian is her older sister. She is twelve. Has a Jin brand on her cheek; missed her parents' deaths while passed out.

He Zhi is their older brother. He is fourteen. He doesn't have a functional tongue anymore. Was technically present when his parents died, but very distracted; also got his face clawed up a bit.

He Gangfen is in his sixties, and has been responsible for training Tingshan He's beginner disciples almost since there has been a Tingshan He. He sees almost all of them killed horribly before Jin Guangyao makes him an offer.

He can save these last three disciples. All he has to do is — voluntarily — give up his golden core. —And convince Wen Qing to do the surgery.

Wei Wuxian's agreement isn't necessary, obviously.

It's not a pleasant conversation.

He Gangfen is so far past caring about Wens or the Yiling Laozu it doesn't even come up. Wen Qing points out there is absolutely nothing guaranteeing Jin Guangyao will keep the kids alive past the surgery — that "saving" them might even mean killing them quickly. He Gangfen says there's everything guaranteeing they'll die horribly now if he refuses, so please. Please.

Wei Wuxian, who has been staring at the ceiling trying to pretend this conversation isn't happening across the room, has a moment of insight and blurts out his conclusion. There is something — not a guarantee, but there is a benefit for Jin Guangyao in letting the children live.

Because what's he going to do as is, if Wei Wuxian or Wen Qing start outright defying him? Kill them? Oh no. Terrible. Hurt Jiang Yanli and deal with Jiang Cheng's reaction? Maybe threaten to do experiments on Wen Ning oh wait. The children would be accessible, disposable hostages.

Which is better than what He Gangfen was hoping for honestly, that might even be long-term, so please.

Being in this situation with accessible, disposable hostages is not remotely appealing, but. But.

Wei Wuxian tells Wen Qing he won't ask her to do this but if she wants his consent she has it.

The surgery is a success.

(Jin Guangyao is polite enough to remove He Gangfen from Wen Qing's workroom before administering the coup de grace. He Gangfen thanks Wen Qing and Wei Wuxian first.)

The kids… well. Jin Guangyao had more criteria than just age — that was important, but he wouldn't have gone through with the idea if they hadn't met other requirements.

Not too proud to beg.

Not already trying to swear revenge.

Naive enough not to be instantly suspicious when he asked them if they'd like a chance to save their little/big brother/sister. (They don't know about He Gangfen, much less about their broader purpose as hostages. They think he couldn't come up with any easier way of obtaining menial servants for the Dizang.)

Not more scared of Wen Ning than Xue Yang. (You have to be an idiot to be more scared of Wen Ning than Xue Yang, but a number of people still manage it. Shocking.)

It doesn't hurt that the oldest one, the boy, can't talk.

The older two for sure should be able to remember Sunshot, and all of them should know the blood-curdling stories of the Yiling Laozu (they had better, Jin Sect spent money making sure those stories grew), but exposure to Xue Yang makes even that less frightening. They're cautious, and Wen Qing in particular is trying not to let them close, but — connection is happening.

All according to plan.

(There is something Jin Guangyao has not planned for: Do you know who's not very scary at all even without Xue Yang for comparison? Who is also a prisoner of the inner Dizang, inasmuch as he's hardly ever allowed to leave, at least? Who is also doing a lot of menial chores, and who might end up providing guidance for someone else doing them? Who never had much power to act with cruelty or kindess, before, and who's seen a lot more cruelty than kindness, but who lately has spent a lot of time listening to Wen Qing and Wen Ning and Wei Wuxian? Who certainly wouldn't say no to a boy almost his age respecting him and wanting to spend time in his company?)

(Mo Xuanyu, that's who.)

Wei Wuxian meanwhile is experiencing mixed feelings about his new previously-owned golden core. He feels better. He feels much better. He can tell he'll feel better yet when he's healed more, which is happening, now. He also— Well, he's hoping even more that Jiang Cheng never finds out about the transfer, now, and he wouldn't have thought that was possible. It feels less strange and more his every day, but when he thinks about it— Well. It's upsetting.

So he hopes Jiang Cheng never finds out. He hopes Jiang Cheng can forget him, now. Maybe Jiang Cheng can be happy now. He knows that last one's a long shot, but he can hope.

(Jiang Cheng is… well, he'd not worse off than the usual universe, exactly. Jiang Yanli is alive! Just — he had to face her, with everyone saying he's the one who killed Wei Wuxian and he sort of was, and with his having left her lying there when she wasn't actually dead, and she didn't say anything that sounds like a recrimination but what must she be thinking. She must be so disappointed in him, she's just too kind to say anything. And he doesn't have the distraction of obsessing over Jin Ling, since Jin Ling is still with his mother.)

(As for Jiang Yanli… Jin Guangyao is not, in fact, trying to ensure she's seen as fragile and mad with grief, and not taken seriously, and that she's afraid to push back too much because they might take Jin Ling away, or Jiang Cheng might overreach trying to back her up. She's not on Jin Guangyao's agenda at all at the moment. It's just that very few people in Jinlintai have ever taken her very seriously, least of all the Sect Leader, and 'mad with grief' seems like a reasonable explanation for her turning up in Nightless City so most people are believing it with no extra effort necessary, and Madam Jin thinks she's terribly fragile and wants to protect her, and of course Jin Ling's welfare is everyone's highest priority so if it would be better for him to be elsewhere, well, that's an option. And Jiang Cheng would back her up in a heartbeat, of course he would, but Jiang Cheng is… well, Jiang Yanli thinks he's at least as mad with grief as she is, and she's not sure he'd be careful enough, if it came to any kind of confrontation.)

(Jin Guangyao is, really and genuinely, uninvolved with the incident wherein a Jin disciple attempts to treat Jiang Yanli's 'madness' with musical cultivation and succeeds only in causing heart palpitations. Well, he's involved inasmuch as the disciple's musical cultivation was based almost entirely on spying on Jin Guangyao, but he's unaware of that until the situation blows up. Happily everything is blamed on the disciple's lack of skill and hubris for attempting such a delicate feat as musical cultivation with no proper training. Since it's not like even the adulterated music is supposed to cause heart palpitations, it probably was lack of skill. And it's very embarrassing for Madam Jin, who decided to let an amateur try rather than ask Jin Guangyao, who would have been happy to help.)

(The most important consequence of that incident is how the cultivation world spends a while gossiping about the complexity and difficulty and potential dangers of musical cultivation, so a few months later, when Jin Guangyao proposes Nie Huaisang could play a little of the Song of Clarity, and Nie Huaisang says he's flattered by San-ge's confidence but he's much too poor a student for that. The trip to the Blade Hall doesn't go smoothly by any stretch of the imagination, but as many disciples come back as don't and they do get the sealing done, so… as well as could be expected, maybe.)

(It doesn't make much of a difference in the timeline of Nie Mingjue's decline. It makes a bigger difference in Nie Huaisang's emotional stability and interpersonal support network.)

(Back to the Dizang.)

As anticipated, as soon as Wei Wuxian is well enough to move around/work, he's ordered to work on reconstructing the Stygian Tiger Seal. As a safety precaution, any time Wei Wuxian has his hands on the half-Seal, at least one the Hes will be moved to some unknown location — usually He Lei, as He Jian and He Zhi both have enough facial scarring that people would be likely to take note of them, but He Lei doesn't even talk so Jin Guangyao can just leave her with the scullery drudges for a day or so, or even send her to Moling. So, using the half-Seal to immediately blast out isn't an option. Refusing isn't an option.

But that's okay, though. Wei Wuxian has a plan. He is going to reconstruct the Seal — with safety features this time. No one said not to do that. The whole process is so intuitive and hard to pin down not even Xue Yang can really tell what he's doing. And he is still depressed and mad about the whole situation so that shouldn't give anything away.

(Xue Yang suspects he's up to something of the sort… but telling Jin Guangyao would spoil the game. And CQL-verse he doesn't have any pressing revenge to get to at this point; might as well do some fun adversarial collaboration! In between sneaking out and making trouble just to keep anyone from getting complacent.)

Wen Qing doesn't have anything much to do at the moment. She decides to see if she can get Wen Ning a little more movement back in his facial muscles. If he can move all his fingers, there's no reason he shouldn't be able to move his face.

Mo Xuanyu sneaks a bunch of bamboo slips out of the supplies of the disciples guarding the outer Dizang so He Zhi has something to write notes on.

Jin Guangyao is only getting busier, really.

***

(Up next are Nie Mingjue’s last breakdown and JGY’s marriage, but I still can’t decide on the order.)