#he’s literally what the Lan clan NEEDS in a sect leader

[twistedappletree]

am i alone in thinking lan sizhui would not make a better sect leader than lan jingyi or nah

[poorlittleyaoyao]

DONGHUA LXC REPLACES HIS SWORN BROTHERHOOD IMMEDIATELY WITH JIN LING (13) AND NIE HUAISANG (USED HIM TO MURDER BY PROXY)???? DONGHUA LXC, WHAT??

Okay, so 1.) the donghua is not my jam so I've only watched a couple of episodes, so I am a poor source of information, and 2.) TECHNICALLY that is not what happens, but it's also not NOT what happens.

Basically, we get an ending montage about how everyone who isn't Wangxian is having the worst time (but that's fine because Wangxian are the only ones who matter!), and we see Jin Ling, Nie Huaisang, and Lan Xichen recreating 3zun's brotherhood oath tableau at the coffin-sealing ceremony.

Which I don't hate on its own, honestly! Immediately after this, the trio separates as a Voiceover Of Busybody Public Opinion speculates on the precarious position of Jin Ling/the Jin Clan itself (as Jin Ling himself bursts into tears upon being given Jiang Cheng's clarity bell)*, tells us LXC "needs some time to recover" (as LXC looks sad and sighs), and remarks how what a great job NHS did overseeing the ceremony (as NHS stands before the monument looking grimly satisfied).

So I think it's meant as "wow look at this fucked-up successor to the Venerated Triad" rather than something positive for anyone involved, but like. The fact that LXC is there at ALL, placidly following the lead of the guy who tricked him into murder, is... a pretty intense fumbling of the character? Even if he has zero regrets about killing JGY (a weird choice but, given that JGY tries to do an MCU villain skybeam at the temple IIRC, not fully incompatible with this canon), he's still going to feel fucked up about failing NMJ, grieve the MY that he once knew, and have zero faith in his own judgment. He's not going to be out here doing sect leader shit just a few days (days! the subs say so!) after all the temple shit goes down. It's weird! I don't like it!

*The choice to place the core reveal after the temple and have JC go into seclusion because of it is, IMO, a worse adaptation choice than literally anything in CQL on so many levels, and it has the unintended side-effect of making Donghua WWX the biggest douchebag of all time. With QS and JGY both dead and JC in seclusion, WWX is the only family Jin Ling has left in donghua canon. And yet! Donghua WWX abandons his 13-year-old nephew (who must now unpack his brand-new trauma and navigate political chaos with NO SUPPORT NETWORK WHATSOEVER BESIDES HIS THERAPY DOG) and skips merrily off into the sunset with LWJ without a second thought. Uncle of all time, truly~

[robininthelabyrinth]

The Other Mountain - ao3 - Chapter 8

Pairing: Lan Qiren/Wen Ruohan

Warning Tags on Ao3

———————————————————————-

“I still can scarcely bring myself to believe that you have concealed our marriage from the world,” Lan Qiren grumbled, going through his usual evening routine to prepare for bed.

Wen Ruohan sniggered.

“Is that what’s keeping you awake at night?” he asked, pulling out a piece of correspondence from the middle of the pile on his desk without looking at it.

His subordinates in charge of sect matters knew better than to send him anything less than critical, on pain of literal torture – unfortunately, matters pertaining to the running of his own sect or anything relating to the other Great Sects all fell in the category of critical, which meant there was always something to do. Wen Ruohan knew he’d been getting more and more unstable over time, but he wasn’t yet insane enough to totally abandon the business of running his sect to a subordinate. He wasn’t sure even insanity would be enough to make him do that.

Also, he’d noticed that doing his paperwork in anything other than the order it was in drove Lan Qiren out of his mind with annoyance that the other man tried very hard not to show.

Sure enough, there was a brief pause as Lan Qiren wrestled down his irritation at the sheer disorderliness of it all.

(It involved him very obviously reminding himself that it was against the rules to strangle his spouse, with relevant citations. Wen Ruohan enjoyed every moment.)

“I am not being kept awake,” he said testily, as if he wasn’t going to hit the end of xu shi and fall asleep like a stone, sure as clockwork. “It is merely – ”

“That it is completely unbelievable, yes, you’ve already mentioned that several times. Still, I’m a little offended that that was what you found most memorable about this evening…”

Personally, Wen Ruohan was more inclined to give the honor to the absolutely delicious fucking he’d managed to sweet-talk Lan Qiren into, right over his desk the way he liked it. He’d had him give it to him slow and relentless, dragging it out over the course of what felt like a full shichen, and, even better, he’d managed to convince Lan Qiren to continue talking over the situation with the Yueyang Chang clan almost the entire time. There was something particularly enticing about hearing Lan Qiren use the same dull monotone he used to drone on and on about his sect rules to analyze the most efficient means by which Wen Ruohan could and imminently was going to conquer four – four – cultivation sects in a single strike, all while pounding away at him without even the slightest hitch of breath or unsteadiness…

Wen Ruohan would have to see if he could get him to do it again in the morning.

“It would be one thing if I believed you had an actual political purpose behind your actions,” Lan Qiren said, ignoring him in favor of being stuck on a much less interesting part of the evening. He sounded aggrieved. “My brother, for instance, I can understand his motivations in keeping it quiet. He is undoubtedly gathering the resources for the war against Quanjiao Liu, for which he will need to convince the sect elders and any relevant allied sects that he may wish to get involved, and that will be difficult enough without also publicly airing a family issue. Being overlooked for as long as possible can only aid him. But you…you are just keeping it quiet for now so that people will talk about you.”

“And so I can see their faces when they find out,” Wen Ruohan corrected. “That part is key.”

Lan Qiren was far too well-mannered to throw his hands up in frustration, but it was close. In retrospect, Wen Ruohan was amazed that the other man hadn’t thrown something at his head yet. There had been one time when they were rival sect leaders where Wen Ruohan had managed to drive him to it, relatively early on, and it had been so unexpected that no one had believed it had actually happened despite witnessing it with their own eyes. Even Wen Ruohan, normally the first to take offense at a perceived slight, had simply let the whole thing pass by without comment, too taken aback to be angry, and Lan Qiren had never done it again.

Really, he should have known all the way back then that Lan Qiren wasn’t nearly as boring as he appeared on the surface.

“Tell me,” he added, since Lan Qiren was starting to visibly sulk again, “is it my motivation you can’t believe, or the fact that I’ve succeeded in keeping it quiet?”

Lan Qiren paused and thought about it, and then, very begrudgingly, admitted, “The latter.”

Wen Ruohan had thought so.

“The people that drove you here were my subordinates, sworn to silence on pain of being dismissed and sent to the Fire Palace. I’ve found that to be much more effective than imposing a rule against gossip.” Wen Ruohan smirked faintly at the now extremely aggravated but not necessarily disagreeing look on Lan Qiren’s face. “I’ve similarly instructed – ”

“Threatened.”

“ – instructed the servants assigned to attend to you to recall their discretion, and all of them have admirably kept their mouths shut. I admit it might have been a little more difficult to keep it hidden if you’d remained in your own courtyard…”

Or if Lan Qiren hadn’t had that delightful misunderstanding of his own position, which was only getting funnier and funnier as time went on.

A genuine first wife, particularly a new one marrying in later, would have made a point of making herself known to her new household upon her arrival – including, for instance, by summoning all the household servants for review in order to establish her power. When Lan Qiren had first arrived, Wen Ruohan had assumed he’d do the same, though he hadn’t quite decided whether it would be for purposes of espionage or simply for the sake of propriety, going through the motions. Lan Qiren had even asked him something or another about the servants, and he’d thought that was what he had been referring to, though it turned out he’d meant something completely different. In fact, Lan Qiren had instead merely treated himself like a somewhat more honored version of the guest he’d been as acting sect leader and left all matters of the household in the hands of his “wife”…

Wen Ruohan still couldn’t think about it without wanting to laugh.

He was looking forward to enlightening Lan Qiren about his mistake at some point, but he hadn’t figured out how to do so in a way that would maximize both his enjoyment and Lan Qiren’s mortification. At the moment, it was far more fun simply to imagine increasingly outlandish scenarios by which it could happen. Some of them involved women’s dresses…

“Of course me staying here is part of your plan,” Lan Qiren huffed, though very notably he didn’t get up to leave. “And here I was thinking that you had decided to breach propriety and custom by living together simply in order to be more efficient.”

“I breach propriety and custom simply for the pleasure of doing so,” Wen Ruohan said loftily. “But naturally everything I do serves more than one purpose – and having you easily available in the mornings is certainly an immensely pleasurable benefit. In fact, I forbid you to move back until I’m done with you.”

Lan Qiren rolled his eyes.

“Do you have a plan for how you intend to announce it?” he asked, already resigning himself to his fate. “Eventually word will get out, regardless of your threats.”

“I could have you locked up in a place known only by myself and my most trusted subordinates,” Wen Ruohan mused, just to see if Lan Qiren would jump or shudder at the idea of even more involuntary confinement – he didn’t, but he did glare. “That would keep it quiet for quite a long time.”

“I see your spies have told you about the time I spent in seclusion,” Lan Qiren said acidly. “You can stop making jokes at any time, Sect Leader Wen. You are not especially good at them.”

Wen Ruohan put down the letter – a fairly useless one from a relatively important subsidiary sect complaining about some monster or another that they didn’t feel capable of handling, just barely important enough to require the sect leader’s attention – and gave Lan Qiren a thoughtful look.

“What makes you think I’m joking?” he asked, arching his eyebrows. He had been, of course, but Lan Qiren was familiar with his sadism and his Fire Palace. He knew perfectly well that it wasn’t beyond Wen Ruohan to order such a thing without regret. “Do you think I wouldn’t do such a thing to a member of my family?”

He would, of course. There was very little he wouldn’t do to achieve his goals.

“Do not be absurd,” Lan Qiren said impatiently, as if he thought Wen Ruohan was playing coy. “You are cruel, not careless. If you wanted to keep my presence here silent by force, you would have implemented the idea as soon as I arrived, not waited until now.”

Hmm. That was a good point.

“Maybe I wanted to maximize your suffering by letting you enjoy some freedom first. How about that?”

That just got him a full-on scoff.

Wen Ruohan had to fight down his amusement again. Lan Qiren was just as bad at making jokes as he claimed Wen Ruohan to be, but he was quite often inadvertently hilarious.

“Somehow I’m getting the feeling that you’re not enjoying my Nightless City to its fullest capacity,” he drawled. “Have you considered – ”

“If your next suggestion is that you kept me out of a prison cell in order to take advantage of me sexually, I will throw something at you.”

Wen Ruohan choked down an actual laugh this time.

“Now, if it is not too great a strain, Sect Leader Wen, would you answer the question?”

“All right, all right,” Wen Ruohan said, conceding the point, too amused to keep quibbling. “I intend for it to be announced at the next discussion conference, the one being hosted by Yunmeng Jiang.”

Lan Qiren frowned and stroked his beard thoughtfully. “I doubt that Jiang Fengmian will mind being overshadowed. Still, that is a month and a half away. There will be leaks.”

“Leaks, yes, but no confirmation,” Wen Ruohan agreed. “The fact that you were previously in seclusion in the Lan sect is quite useful here – people will doubt any news they hear and seek to confirm it through your sect first, only to fail to find anything there. Even with an extraordinarily effective spy network, there’s no way they’ll be able to know for certain what happened before the discussion conference…and most sects don’t have spy networks like mine. Not even other Great Sects.”

He arched his eyebrows pointedly at Lan Qiren.

“Not all of us are like you,” Lan Qiren said. “My Lan sect does not need them.”

“And yet you always seem to know what’s going on…”

“I understand that the concept may be difficult to understand for so great a personage as yourself, but one of the reasons other sects enter into alliances with each other is to help each other understand what is going on,” Lan Qiren said dryly. “I regularly receive letters from my colleagues with updates – well, I used to receive – ”

“Same thing, different words,” Wen Ruohan said dismissively before Lan Qiren could get upset over his demotion. He had been getting increasingly antsy for lack of real work to do, these past few days; it was clear enough that the appeal of a vacation was already wearing off. Wen Ruohan was planning on holding out to see him squirm a little longer before turning over some of the less critical sect work to him.

(Obviously he wasn’t going to let one of the most talented sect leaders in the cultivation world sit around not doing anything when he could be applying those talents to the betterment of the Wen sect. He wasn’t stupid – and unlike certain other sect leaders, he wasn’t wasteful, either.)

“Having friends is hardly the same thing as having spies. Do you make the same complaints about the Nie sect?”

“No,” Wen Ruohan said, waiting for a half a beat before adding, “because the Nie sect does use spies.”

Not in every generation, of course, and not very often, but Lao Nie certainly wasn’t averse to the practice on moral grounds the way Lan Qiren clearly was. Or perhaps the Nie sect was just better at being realistic.

Lan Qiren rolled his eyes again. He’d started up his evening round of physical activity, which tended to include less sword forms and more alternative forms of exercise – Wen Ruohan’s favorite so far had involved Lan Qiren spending the majority of the evening in a handstand, occasionally shifting over into a one-armed handstand so he could write down rules that he felt he hadn’t properly lived up to. Today wasn’t anything nearly so exciting, just stretches to improve flexibility, though there was a certain appeal in that as well.

“I assume you will want me to make an appearance at the conference?” Lan Qiren asked, as if there was any chance Wen Ruohan wouldn’t. He wasn’t Qingheng-jun, to throw away a valuable asset – Lan Qiren had been able to hold his own politically at the discussion conferences before, and nothing about marriage changed his capabilities. His insights would undoubtedly be valuable, and even more valuable would be the information he’d be able to glean from his connections with sects that would never speak directly with Wen Ruohan. “I will tell you now that I will not sign up to do anything absurd in order to indulge in your penchant for dramatics.”

Wen Ruohan snorted – as if the Lan sect weren’t equally inclined towards dramatic behavior, as long as their hearts were involved! – and looked away from the appealing sight and back at his desk. He glanced over the most recent correspondence he’d picked out, finding upon second glance that it was a letter from one of his subsidiary sects to the south, complaining of an unusual increase in vicious yao; it was the sort of thing he would usually forward on to the Nie sect as an invitation and implicit proposition for their sect leader. He put it aside for the moment and took the next one, a report from one of his spies in the Jin sect about the current health of their finances (still disgustingly healthy despite Jin Guangshan’s increasing mismanagement).

“Nothing absurd, no,” he said, ignoring the way that Lan Qiren immediately grumbled something about the two of them having different definitions of absurd. “You’ll be expected to wear something in my sect’s colors, of course. I suspect that’ll be shocking enough.”

He’d already commissioned something appropriate. Lan Qiren would undoubtedly hate it.

Lan Qiren already looked resigned.

“Additionally,” Wen Ruohan continued, very casually, “I was thinking that we could use the opportunity to revive those summer classes you were always teaching.”

Silence.

Wen Ruohan carefully didn’t look up from the report in his hands, though he wasn’t actually paying it the slightest bit of attention. Getting Lan Qiren to agree to this idea was far more important.

“My…classes?” Lan Qiren sounded – confused. Good, that was a better first reaction than an outright rejection. “What about them?”

“You enjoyed teaching them, didn’t you? I see no reason why you can’t continue.” Wen Ruohan made a show of putting down the report and shrugging. “You’ll have to hold them here, of course, but I can’t see how that would be all too different from what you were doing already. Your students were mostly guest disciples, weren’t they…?”

He allowed himself to look at Lan Qiren, who’d stopped his exercises and was now frowning at him.

“You are up to something once again,” he said flatly. “What is it?”

Wen Ruohan spread his hands. “Is it so difficult to believe that I would want to do something nice for you?”

“Yes.”

Wen Ruohan was surprised into a bark of amusement. Lan Qiren wasn’t out to win his heart through flattery the way his wives had tried to do, that was for sure…but then again, unlike his wives, Lan Qiren had been Wen Ruohan’s political opponent for ten years. He knew him well enough to be skeptical. “Not even as a wedding gift?”

“Even less likely. Try again.”

“We’re going to have to live together for the rest of our lives,” Wen Ruohan said. “It would make my life miserable if you were miserable, which makes it in my own self-interest to make sure you have things to do that you enjoy. Your other hobbies seem to be cultivation with the sword, cultivation with music, and cultivation through meditation and philosophy, absolutely none of which I can do anything about.”

“That’s not true. It’s said that you’re a fine swordsman yourself, is it not? We could spar.”

…that was an excellent idea and now that Lan Qiren had proposed it, Wen Ruohan couldn’t wait to try it out. He hadn’t actually bothered using his sword against anyone in quite a while – his preference in fighting had always been arrays, but he would be embarrassed to call himself an orthodox cultivator if he didn’t know how to use a sword. The last time he’d done so would have had to have been one of his early clashes with Lao Nie, before he’d allowed himself to be convinced to pit his arrays against the other man’s saber…though that actually gave rise to some interesting thoughts itself. Lan Qiren was primarily a musician, not a swordsman; he had to know how to fight offensively with music. It had been even longer since Wen Ruohan had tested himself against a musical cultivator than since he’d picked up a sword…

He dragged his mind back to the topic of discussion. Fighting was only fighting, getting Lan Qiren to buy into his plan to win the hearts and minds of the junior generation of the cultivation world was important.

Power would always be the most important thing to Wen Ruohan.

“We can certainly do that,” he said. “But why not revive your classes as well? Past half-month aside, we’re hardly going to keep each other company forever. It would be good for you to have something productive to do.”

“I am certain you could find something else for me to do if you so wanted,” Lan Qiren said, obviously not convinced. “Were you planning on waiting until I grew so bored that I would be willing to resort to begging before assigning me some duties here?”

No, but now he was sorely tempted. Damn Lan Qiren for being smart.

“Do you not want to teach your classes, then?” Wen Ruohan asked. “You make it sound as though I’m forcing you – ”

“I enjoy my classes, and would be very happy under most circumstances to resume them,” Lan Qiren said. “What I want to know is why you are interested in my resuming them. Nothing you have said so far has been even remotely believable.”

Lan Qiren was, in fact, too smart.

“Fine,” Wen Ruohan said with a huff, rolling his eyes. Perhaps the truth would work where polite fictions had failed, that seemed like a strategy that would work well on Lan Qiren. “I think what you’ve been doing is a fine idea, and I want in on it.”

“In on my classes?” Lan Qiren shook his head. “Why? You have no interest in teaching.”

“It’s not the teaching aspect I care about.”

“Then what?” Lan Qiren frowned. “Surely not the money.”

Wen Ruohan blinked, taken aback. “Money? What money? What are you talking about?”

Now it was Lan Qiren’s turn to look confused. “The classes bring revenue, of course. Only a nominal sum, of course, and we never ask for it, but everyone always insists on paying something to cover their children’s housing and feeding costs. It is almost a little insulting at times, really. As if a Great Sect like ours couldn’t handle a few extra mouths…”

“Wait, wait,” Wen Ruohan said, mind spinning with possibilities. “Are you talking about actual money changing hands? Not just rare treasures and paintings, the sorts of things that get brought as gifts for the teacher?”

“Naturally they also bring those,” Lan Qiren said. “But yes, they insist on paying. I have always assumed it started because some of them wanted to establish a level of distance between our sects, so that they did not feel as though we were looking down at them and doing them a favor for free, and then the rest of them just picked it up in time. Why? Does it matter?”

Your sect literally receives tribute from other sects with whom you are not affiliated! Voluntarily, and without coercion! Of course that matters! Even if they started it as an insult, pretending that they were hiring you like some teacher off the street, they are still doing it, and in doing so have set the precedent to encourage others to do so. It would be one thing if it was just presents, everyone expects that as part of the teaching relationship, but a sect in a lower position giving money to another in a higher position – that’s tribute, not payment.

I can barely get my own subsidiary sects to agree to open their coffers to me because of what that would mean about the relationship between us, setting them as subordinate and me as the master in permanent fashion – and those sects have already sworn loyalty to me!

“I suppose not,” Wen Ruohan said, though judging by the increased suspicion on Lan Qiren’s face he wasn’t doing a very good job of pretending not to be interested. “You’re right, that’s not why I’m interested. But what does my motivation matter? You like your classes, you want to teach them, I’m enabling that. Why be so suspicious?”

“Overly solicitous people hide bad intentions.”

“I already explained – ”

“Sect Leader Wen, please stop treating me as though I were an idiot,” Lan Qiren said firmly. “Anyone else could plausibly say that their own self-interest lies in having a happy household, but not you. If I were making you miserable by being miserable, your answer would be to either eliminate me from your sight or send me to the Fire Palace so that I could know what true misery was.”

Wen Ruohan started laughing.

“Good, good,” he said, finding himself delighted yet again to be so…known. “Fine, have it your way. The truth, then: I think that your classes are the seeds to a ripe harvest.”

“Harvest? Of what?”

“Respect.” Wen Ruohan smirked broadly. “You have dozens of children who have bowed to you as their teacher, promising to be filial to you: a teacher for a day, a father for a lifetime. If you were to ask them for help, they would be honor-bound to at least consider it, if not to affirmatively do it – ”

“Ask them for help? They are children. What could they even do?”

“Having friends is hardly the same thing as having spies,” Wen Ruohan mimicked. “Funny how it ends up reaching the same end, though, doesn’t it? Only no one will ever suspect yours. It’s brilliant, really, and I have no idea how you managed it.”

“You are being ridiculous once more. I have hardly managed anything. You make it sound as though I pulled off some scheme behind the cultivation world’s back – which is not even remotely the case. Anyway, you are simply incorrect. Most of my students do not even like me, much less remember me fondly years later.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure about that…”

Lan Qiren was shaking his head already, and Wen Ruohan hadn’t even gotten to the bit about how he’d suborned future sect leaders into a position of subservience to him. Not to mention the tribute!

“Ridiculous,” he announced. “Ridiculous and absurd and – ”

He was cut off by a yawn.

Wen Ruohan checked the time and smirked: sure enough, a Lan was better than a clock.

Lan Qiren could stay awake late into the evening, and often had, but it was a matter of willpower and, usually, of getting back up again. Wen Ruohan had found that even on days he’d decided to stay up late, Lan Qiren still usually fell asleep for at least a quarter-hour at his bedtime. On days he hadn’t decided in advance that he had business at night, like tonight, he fell asleep faster than a rock dropped off a cliff falling into the ocean.

“You have completely misunderstood the nature of my classes, and indeed of students. Possibly even children in general,” Lan Qiren said with dignity, pretending his eyes weren’t sliding shut. “We can discuss this further tomorrow.”

Wen Ruohan snorted and looked back down at his paperwork. “We undoubtedly will. I have no doubt that you won’t let me hear the end of this so easily…for the moment, go to sleep. I have more work to do, I’ll come to bed later.”

By the time he’d finished off the next letter, this one marginally more interesting as it dealt with a simmering situation between two sects that he’d been inciting into fighting with each other, and glanced back at Lan Qiren, the other man was fast asleep.

Wen Ruohan stood up and walked over to look down at him.

Lan Qiren had excellent sleeping habits, as one might have expected: he didn’t snore or toss around wildly, not even when he had nightmares, and he didn’t startle awake easily when there were noises or lights around him. Most of the time, he slept deeply, like the dead, and was impressively groggy if forcefully awakened prior to his official waking time.

You could be mine.

It wasn’t the first time Wen Ruohan had thought that.

Mine, really mine –

He couldn’t get the idea out of his head.

It had first come to him when he’d seen the note from Lan Qiren’s nephews, the one that had instigated his little fit of frenzy – one that was however inadvertently so wretchedly, wantonly cruel that it had knocked out even Wen Ruohan’s breath. He’d had the note preserved, of course, and it was even now waiting on the writing desk in Lan Qiren’s quarters for his return.

Naturally, Wen Ruohan was aware that that was the real reason Lan Qiren didn’t return, choosing instead to linger in Wen Ruohan’s rooms like a ghost, but as Lan Qiren had observed, it really did suit any number of his purposes that Lan Qiren stay in his rooms for now, keeping a low profile. It had even ensured that his wives hadn’t been able to cause a fuss, though he was sure that by now they desperately wanted to; he really was being shockingly inappropriate in keeping Lan Qiren with him like this. It was outrageous enough that he was favoring him every night (and sometimes during the day), but sharing a room like this was the sort of thing that only the poor or those madly in love might do.

Not that he cared.

You could be mine.

It had been the note that had revealed to him the depths of Lan Qiren’s suffering.

Wen Ruohan considered himself to be something of an expert on suffering, on the sorts of situations that could drive a man to break and shatter into a thousand pieces, irreparable, and Qingheng-jun in his revenge was clearly intent on achieving just that. He hadn’t just taken away Lan Qiren’s authority, which was always a blow to a man who’d grown accustomed to having it. No – he’d taken away Lan Qiren’s children, children Lan Qiren had raised and loved with all his heart, and based on the content of that note he was treating them without any concern as to their well-being, driving them to desperation.

Qingheng-jun had done it deliberately. Lan Qiren had to know by now that it was deliberate, and that meant that Qingheng-jun had also successfully stolen away Lan Qiren’s sense of security, his serenity, his peace of mind. He’d known that Lan Qiren would torture himself with his worries that his nephews would be suffering from his absence, whether from missing him or being mistreated or even punished, and that was why he’d done it.

And he’d taken even more from Lan Qiren than that.

The seclusion Qingheng-jun had forced Lan Qiren into, the strict seclusion of the type that Wen Ruohan knew Lan Qiren both hated and feared, had wreaked genuine havoc on Lan Qiren’s state of mind. Lan Qiren had tried to conceal it, but it was impossible at such close quarters – close inspection had revealed that he was in fact notably skinnier than he’d been at the last discussion conference, skinnier than he properly should be, and his body was littered with the remnants of old marks, some clearly self-inflicted, and healing slower than they should. Lan Qiren was an exceptional cultivator, but the body followed the mind; he reflected on his skin all of his guilt and sorrow, his grief, his torment, his internal conflict. That the fingers Wen Ruohan had broken had already healed in full while some bruises from months ago remained really said everything that needed to be said about Lan Qiren’s mental state.

Even putting aside his body, there was his behavior, which was equally concerning. There was the way Lan Qiren would at random instances go quiet and distant, as if retreating from the world; the way he would instinctively flinch or shudder at some random turn of phrase; the nightmares he had at night, quiet moans of distress tearing out of him even as he remained immobile, and the way he seemed, upon waking, to find some strange sort of comfort in Wen Ruohan’s own presence there, no matter how subtle he thought he was being about it. Even that meltdown of his, a fit of such violence that Wen Ruohan had initially thought it to be a qi deviation…

That alone was enough to catch the attention of a genuine sadist like Wen Ruohan, but it was the fact that Lan Qiren had suffered all that and gotten up after that had really gotten under his skin. He’d even apologized for the fit, embarrassed, and had continued to try to…to adapt to the new life he’d ended up with. He was as stubborn a man as Wen Ruohan had yet seen, going through all of that trauma and suffering and forcing himself to keep going. To build himself new routines to replace the old ones. To routinely have sex, an activity which he seemed to enjoy well enough but not especially yearn for, with a man he didn’t especially like.

To try to make himself over into a good husband.

Wen Ruohan had to swallow down lust just at the thought of it.

There was something unbelievably compelling about the idea of corrupting someone as pure and intrinsically good as Lan Qiren – no, even better, about making Lan Qiren corrupt himself on Wen Ruohan’s behalf.

Lan Qiren had always possessed an almost astringent purity, unforgiving and inflexible, as immovable as a mountain. It was what had made him so boring, so predictable, in all those years where the only thing he was to Wen Ruohan was a rival and a stumbling block. It was what made him so trustworthy to others, who knew that his rigidity would never let him yield to whim or favor even when it would benefit him to do so. Everyone knew that as long as his rules demanded something, Lan Qiren would do it, and gladly. No matter the cost.

It was his very rigidity meant that Lan Qiren hadn’t even thought of any solution to his present situation other than compliance. It had never occurred to him that he might just try to run away, maybe even return to Gusu to kidnap his nephews and keep them for himself, nor even that he might try to convince Wen Ruohan to take them away from them for him – no, my Lan sect will go to them one day, he’d said, when trying to explain to Wen Ruohan why he couldn’t simply abandon all consideration for the Lan sect in favor of the Wen. The Lan sect was theirs, even if it was no longer his, and therefore he had to do everything he could to support it, and them, and with them being there, even if doing so meant accepting a marriage he did not want.

Even if it meant twisting himself into something new.

Even if it meant accepting that change he so thoroughly hated.

The only thing that could truly tempt Lan Qiren away from his implacable sense of order and rule was that radical Lan heart hiding within his chest. That irrepressible love and concern he had for his nephews, for instance, or the one time he had let slip his disgust for how his sister-in-law had been treated, leading him to vow to never treat his own wife the same.

And at the moment, he believed Wen Ruohan to be his wife.

Wen Ruohan had never had a Lan before. He’d never wanted a Lan before. Those terrifying madmen hiding behind their placid façades had always worried him more than all the other Great Sects put together. To the extent he’d ever considered it, he’d always thought that their insane devotion seemed more like a burden than anything else, something that he’d get tired of and want to shake off in time or which would end up with him waking up with a knife at his throat followed by an attempt at murder-suicide. But in this case, it felt less like a burden and more like…

It felt like power.

Wen Ruohan had always been attracted to power, whether his own or in others. It had been his wives’ cunning that had attracted him to them, an attraction that disappeared as soon as they were no longer able to wield that power except through him; it had been Lao Nie’s martial valor, his ruthlessness and frankly insane recklessness, that had first caught his eye. Lan Qiren had neither skill, being neither a consummate schemer nor an especially merciless warrior. If he was anything, it was only that he was always so genuinely himself: stern, rule-abiding, conservative, moralistic, abhorring any change.

And yet, for Wen Ruohan, Lan Qiren was willing to change. To change himself for him.

Lan Qiren had admitted freely that his first instinct in the Yueyang Chang matter was to think the deal was rotten simply because the Yueyang Chang sect had connived to accomplish their goals through dirty means – that if it were up to him, if the offer had come to the Lan sect, he would have rejected it on moral grounds without thinking twice. He would never have used his astonishing command of the facts or his ability to sort through patterns that others never even noticed to come up with a solution that involved conquest, much less a better solution than the one Wen Ruohan had been considering. A solution that was wholly anathema to his own natural inclinations and priorities.

If Lan Qiren were truly free, he would never have gritted his teeth and tried to find something to compliment in Wen Ruohan’s Fire Palace, which he so obviously despised with everything that he was. That, too, was something he was doing for Wen Ruohan.

All for him. Everything for him.

You could be mine. Really mine, truly mine.

By robbing Lan Qiren of his sect position, his nephews, and even the Cloud Recesses itself, Qingheng-jun had taken away Lan Qiren’s sense of home.

Wen Ruohan had the chance to give it to him again.

And if he did, if he somehow won that wild and crazy Lan heart for his own…then Lan Qiren really would be his, wholly and utterly, without reserve. That same rigidity that refused to let him do so much as lie even when it was for his own benefit would at once be turned into the most unbending loyalty, unflinching and unimpeachable. He would value Wen Ruohan more than anything, excepting only his nephews, who were the same as his sons, and that was an exception even Wen Ruohan found perfectly reasonable. If he won him over…

If he won him over, Lan Qiren could – he would – be a person that even Wen Ruohan, deeply paranoid and often justified in being so, might be able to trust.

Someone who he could trust to be by his side, rather than beneath his feet.

He’d never had that before. Not really.

When they had lived, his brothers and sisters had all had their own interests, even the ones he’d liked the most. Even today, despite his authority being unquestionable, his kinsmen still schemed against him, scrabbling for little bits of power wherever they could eke it out…it would be one thing if they were just trying to make their own ways in the world instead of just following his, but more often it was nothing more than greed and laziness, a feeling of entitlement to power without the willingness to put in all the work it took to get it.

His wives were untrustworthy and duplicitous, and although he liked that about them, it certainly didn’t allow for much faith in them; they would both happily stab him in the back if it got them what they wanted, just the way his first wife did. And just like the first time around, his children followed their mothers. Wen Xu and Wen Chao were at present too young to really evaluate, but from what he’d seen so far of them, they were simply too weak to really stand up beside him instead of merely cringing before him.

His subordinates and disciples…well, they revered him, as they should, but a sense of overpowering awe did not leave room for equality. They would never match him or challenge him, and neither did he want them to; it would only lead them to act like his kinsmen, seeking to scheme to undermine him for their own purposes.

For the same reason, he did not put any stock in friends or allies – he supposed there was Lao Nie, who as his lover was closer to him than most, but even Lao Nie had his saber and his sect and his own interests that he put above Wen Ruohan, not to mention those two wives of his that he’d married without so much a word of notice.

In fact, Lao Nie was a perfect example. Each instance of Lao Nie’s obvious carelessness had driven Wen Ruohan up the wall, infuriating him, and even now it itched under his skin like a scab not yet healed. How dare the other man treat him like that, disregarding him to the point of not even telling him of what was going on in his life? How dare he act as if it was none of Wen Ruohan’s business what he did? Never mind that they’d both agreed from the start not to take their liaison too seriously, each one there for nothing more than a good time; frivolity and lack of caring was Wen Ruohan’s prerogative, not Lao Nie’s. That was why they’d grown more distant these past few years, their encounters fewer and generally less satisfying, more fraught, even at times contentious. Wen Ruohan deserved his lover’s devotion, true devotion, and yet that was exactly what Lao Nie would never give him…

Lan Qiren, though.

If Wen Ruohan could get him, he could be everything that Lao Nie was not.

He could be mine.

Wen Ruohan wanted that. And what he wanted, he got. Only…how?

How could he convince Lan Qiren to devote himself to him and only him? Did he need to push him harder, make him break under cruelty and humiliation? Send him to the Fire Palace to forcefully remake him in the image he yearned for? Or did he need to take a softer touch, gently coaxing him into a sense of security and slowly, giving him all the things and experiences and maybe even people that he yearned for, but at the same time inexorably moving the pieces out from under his feet until he had no choice but to become what Wen Ruohan wanted him to be?

What was the key that would get it to actually work this time, where it hadn’t with his lost brother, where it hadn’t with his first wife, where it hadn’t with Lao Nie? How could he get what he actually wanted?

All good things ought to belong to him, after all. It was just a matter of figuring out the details and being patient – and Wen Ruohan was good at being patient.

He’d start off with the gentle approach, he thought, and shelve the idea of breaking Lan Qiren for now. Once a man was broken, there was no unbreaking him, but it was always easy enough to pick back up later if he needed to. He’d give Lan Qiren a chance to live up to what he wanted, and if not…well. He had other options.

The Fire Palace was always there.

Wen Ruohan reached out and ran his fingers along Lan Qiren’s forehead ribbon.

Do not allow those without permission to touch your ribbon, which is your self-restraint.

Wen Ruohan smiled.

[gentlegentian]

I feel like the true cruelty of the lan sect is a really overlooked topic in the mdzs fandom, because when you think about it...

they practically forced madam lan into marriage so she wouldn't be executed because she killed one of her teachers, but gave her no trial or chance to explain why, and once she was married they simply locked her away and that was that. qingheng-jun then locked himself into seclusion once he had a kid and that was that, had no business with the rest of the sect and left xichen and wangji to grow up alone.

not to mention the fact that wangji even being born is suspicious... xichens conception makes sense, as they would've needed a sect heir, but wangji? how would he have been concieved, if madame lan was trapped away and qingheng-jun was in seclusion. either this is a plot hole im looking way too deep into or theres something darker happening there

in any case, the twin jades most likely did not have a good childhood. like at all. their father was completely absent, and once their mother died they were practically parentless. sure lan qiren raised them, but he was also acting as the lan sect leader whilst qingheng-jun was away, so i doubt he held much involvement in their raising other than making sure they stuck to the rules and were fed etc

SPEAKING OF THE RULES. the punishments the kids in the lan sect had to deal with?????? the fact that nhs, wwx and jc were beaten for rule breaking whilst they were staying at the lan sect as pupils just makes me wonder how badly they treat their own lan disciples if thats how they treat special guests from other clans. they were fifteen when that happened, FIFTEEN, so clearly the lan sect has no problem with LITERALLY BEATING children to teach a lesson.

its basically just abuse to keep a system in place, and it makes me wonder just how many times the twin jades suffered like that as kids to be as 'perfect' as they are as adults

the lan are so corrupt in their ways and i hate how we dont fully see that in the story until wangji is whipped for protecting wei ying. the whole situation is so fucking cruel and unnecessary it makes my blood boil whenever i reread/rewatch that part, because yes wangji did wrong by injuring the elders but the only reason he did so was because they were refusing to listen to him and quite literally trying to murder his lover.

i get he committed treason or whatever by fighting the elders but 33 whip lashes all in one go with NO breaks or healing time?? with a magical cultivated punishment whip as well, its genuinely like they were trying to kill him. even if he didnt die from the lashings themselves he could've gotten an infection, or had severe blood loss, or hell they coulve broken his spine with the force of it. it took so long for him to heal from that, and it left him with so many scars both physical and mental. that level of injury would've likely left him with some form of chronic pain or illness as well, and it was just so cruel for a situation that didn't ever need to come to this.

they forced him into seclusion, just like his father, and punished him for defending himself, just like they did his mother. xichen ended up similarly as well, with his seclusion after the events with jgy. the lan elders had seen the horrific end qingheng-jun and madame lan had, and yet did nothing to stop their children from facing the same trauma, even making theirs worse.

the lans praise themselves as a sect that sticks to righteousness and principles, when realistically its just full of hypocrites holding onto power by means of fear and punishment. they say that lwj broke the rules by fighting to save wwx, and yet somehow torturing him was completely within the rules of the clan.

their rules and image are merely a cover up for the downright abuse and silencing of their disciples, and its just so fucked up. i could rant about this for so much longer, but also wanna see what other people think before i delve into some of the other topics i have in mind that relate

[violet-lotus]

Okay. Here's to the antis crying that Jiang Cheng should have done more for the Wen Remnants.

Just no. WWX had already proclaimed himself an enemy when he intruded upon a conference at Koi Tower to threaten that he'd kill whoever dared to stop him from rescuing the Remnants. Anyone, especially YMJ would be committing political and literal suicide by aiding with WWX.

YMJ would not have been able to survive that. They had just survived a mass massacre and a long war. In a climate made on hierarchy, JC is in his young 20s. He has no allies.

His current Sect is made of a thrown together a collection of rouge cultivators and fresh disciples he had to train in less than a few months right after he survived watching his Sect burn, being tortured, and losing his core. Then, WWX was gone.

Still, JC went to war. To avenge his family, his people, his land, and to protect them from a tyrant. With WRH down, now JGS is the next. And we see the direct and very public pressure JGS puts on JC to distance from WWX.

Just because 'JC is a Sect Leader' doesn't mean he has more influence than JGS and the elders of the Jin Sect. Maybe the Lan's would have had that respect, but they had their own issues to resolve and their own alliances to maintain.

Speaking of which, YMJ needed their alliance with the Jin's. Only then would JC have more sway. As allies, there would be less incentive to destroy YMJ. There would also be public scrutiny cast on the Jin's should they openly damage their alliance with YMJ. Scrutiny that JGS and JGY do not want when they are conducting nefarious schemes to gain control (see Xue Yang in his extra with JGY).

With JC actively working to make peace with the Jin's, in addition to having JZX engaged to JYL, JC is able to take the attention and pressure off WWX and the Wen Remnants. The people don't want to focus on the threat that WWX is to their lives, their culture, and their loved ones (if they get raised from death and cut off from the circle of reincarnation). They talk about the grand wedding hosted between the Jin's & Jiang's. They talk about the birth of JL and his celebrations.

In fact, when JC tells WWX that he can't protect him if he defends the Wen Remnants, WWX flat out /rejects/ him. (So what are you crying to JC for?) WWX believes he can protect them himself. And he does. For almost a couple of years.

When does it go wrong? When WWX leaves BM and is on his way to attend JL's celebration.Jin Zixun ambushes & scapegoats him (endorsed by JGS!) WWX loses control of WN and WN murders Jin Zixuan.

JZX, who was the one to invite WWX despite knowing the opposition it would bring to him and DID cause.

Even in the ridiculous situation of JC housing the Remnants in LP (nvm his and his people's trauma of the Wen's), the Jin's scheming to murder would have happened to WWX regardless of where he was with the Remnants.

It's f*cked up. But does JC have control over JGS and JGY? No. So stop blaming JC for their downfall. It was on WWX to protect the Wen's and to control WN, no one else.

(Note, if JZX, his firstborn son and Sect Heir, could not persuade JGS and his clan to back off from WWX, what makes you think JC could?)

Afterwards, WN and WQ both decide on their own that in order to answer for the deaths at Qiongqi Path and JZX's murder, that they comply to the Jin's demand. They go voluntarily.

They tell WWX that they are grateful to him for the extra year of life and peace he gave them.

They leave with no regrets.

Again, I must ask you, why blame JC for their deaths?

JC knew that their ruin would eventually occur and tried to warn WWX. JC tried to stop it from happening by killing WN when he was uncontrollable and unpredictable, when WN had no conscience. But JC doesn't kill him. Bc WWX told him not to.

(WN nearly breaks out of BM but luckily LWJ happened to be there to help WWX subdue him and somehow restore his conscience, which WWX never knew would happen. So JC's concerns were not unwarranted.)

Forget and ignore at your convenience, but JC DOES speak up for WWX's actions and reasons for defending the Wen Remnants. No one else does. (Again, see my previous thread.) At the Pledge Conference, where the Sects are deciding what to do about WWX after JZX's death at Nightless City, it would not be hard to assume JC would try to not have them execute WWX. In the end we don't know, but we can say that he was unhappy with their decision to hunt down WWX for good.

After years of persuading others to not take offence to WWX's words & actions, of lessening the load of WWX's disciplinary punishment, of standing at his side & understanding WWX without needing words to be spoken, it would be absurd to say JC ever stopped trying to protect him.

But JC is only human. He could only protect WWX, and when WWX rejected his help, he could not do much else. He could only delay the inevitable.

He could not have protected the Wen Remnants even if he wanted to. Just like how WWX wanted to save them, but couldn't in the world that they live in where an eye for an eye is never enough, and the consequences of their actions never die no matter what their intentions are.

[thesummerstorms]

Okay, because I just commented this somewhere else but now I need it here:

“Who else could it be? Ain’t it his shidi, the little sect leader Jiang Cheng?"- official 7S English translation

“Who other than his shidi, Jiang Cheng, putting an end to his own relative for the greater good." - Exiled Rebels', the original/first English fan translation

“Who else could it be? His disciple-brother, Chief Jiang Cheng of the Yunmeng Jiang Clan!"- Fanyiyi's partial English fan translation, and my personal favorite

“Who else could it be but his junior, the Young Clan Leader of the Jiang Clan, Jiang Cheng”- The Taming Wangxian partial fan translation

Even though they all technically express the same thing, the way they choose to word things sound so radically different. 

“The little sect leader” vs “the Young Clan Leader” in S7 vs TW.

“Ain’t” which sounds highly informal/kind of low-brow to the English ear versus... literally every other translation.

“Lan Zhan, can’t you tell what I meant by all that chatter?” “No,” Lan Wangji replied. “You can’t?” Wei Wuxian said. “I was complimenting you, tryin’ to get chummy!”-  official 7S English translation

Wei WuXian, “You don’t even know about this? I was complimenting you, trying to become more casual with you.” - Exiled Rebels', the original/first English fan translation

“Really, you didn’t know? I was kissing up to you so you’d be my friend.”-  Fanyiyi's partial English fan translation, and my personal favorite

(I unfortunately only have the first 26 pages of Taming Wangian’s version, so I don’t have this bit. If someone wants to link me to a doc... that would be great. I bought all the currently available legal versions because I believe in paying MXTX for her work; I just have translation preferences.)

But again, it’s a matter of small bits of word choice making a big difference, at least for me personally. 

First off, why is Wei Wuxian dropping his ending “g”s? Like, I know that’s a real life thing; I’m Texan and talk that way IRL. But they do this here (and with the “ain’t” above and the repeated use of “li’l”) and it just comes out sounding jarring to me? It isn’t as if WWX has a specific English-speaking accent to transcribe. 

Is this a tone/dialect thing in Mandarin that the 7S team is trying to localize? I wouldn’t know, but if so, why doesn’t it show up in any of the other translations? And if it isn’t are they trying to make the speech sound more “colorful”? Because for me, it’s just distracting.

Also, the word chummy. Again, there’s a difference in formality levels, but I also just kind of hate this word (which is used four times in 7S’s edition). It might be because in my daily life, I’ve only ever heard this word being used sarcastically- “I saw them getting really chummy with X” is always used with a negative connotation. And I just think there were smoother ways to render this?

Wei Wuxian had wanted to shuffle closer and get chummy to loosen him up, but when he couldn’t and was snubbed, he still wasn’t upset.- 7S

Wei WuXian wanted to get closer to Lan WangJi so that it was more convenient for him to flatter the other. Even though he couldn’t go over and was given the cold shoulder, he wasn’t angered at all.- Exiled Rebels

Initially, Wei Wuxian had wanted to move closer to Lan Wangji so that it would be easier to talk to him and worm his way into a friendship. But not only was he prevented from approaching the boy, Lan Wangji’s responses also offered no amusement. However, Wei Wuxian wasn’t angry. - Fanyiyi

Again, I can’t read any Mandarin whatsoever, so I can’t make meaningful comments about how the different translations relate back to the original text. I will say that as an English speaker, I just flat out don’t enjoy a lot of 7S’s translation choices when seen in the frame of comparable fan translations. Their diction is distracting and odd in too many places.

(And of course, this is not to say you can’t like or prefer or support the 7S version if you so choose. This is my personal opinion.)

[mxtxfanatic]

Anyways, the Jin sect were able to become the powerhouse sect amongst the great sects purely because the other sects did not care to oppose them, and I can imagine that this is the very reason that the Wen were also a powerhouse sect. (Disclaimed: I’m coming at this purely from the angle of what the book tells us, not outside historical context. For one, I do not know said context, but two, as important as I think that context is to flesh out some elements of the story, I think it’s just as important to not brush off what the novel literally shows us even if it doesn’t perfectly fit said historical context, as this is not a historical novel.)

When we get to the pre-sunshot campaign flashbacks, everyone already knows about all the evils of Wen Ruohan. It’s openly known that he killed the Nie sect leader out of jealousy and that this is why Nie Mingjue hates him. Lan Xichen immediately pinpoints the blame for the waterborne abyss onto the Wen, to absolutely no one’s surprise. It’s even noted that the Wen have been attacking and subsuming smaller cultivation clans around it to bolster its power, which is why like half of all the cultivation clans are affiliated with the Wen. Not to mention, Wen Ruohan disrespects the great sect leaders to their faces, and they all just take it. The Wen demand that all sect heirs and 20 extra disciples be “taught” by them? Everybody sends their children. The second son of the Wen clan almost kills all of those heirs after weeks of mistreatment? Well, they didn’t actually die, so it’s all good. The Wen burn a great sect’s most prized possession, kill its sect leader, kidnap the second son, and have the heir on the run? Well, it didn’t happen to us, so no need for concern. War only breaks out because the one sect leader who actively hated the Wen was attacked, and even then, only 3 of the 4 remaining great sects fully participate.

Now, how do the Jin rise to power? They host a lot of banquets, they subsume the smaller clans that were formerly affiliated with the Wen, they disrespect other great sect leaders to their faces while cultivators cheer them on. And everyone allows them to because they simply do not care to fight back against the Jin; this is their status quo. The only fight they can muster is to massacre the remaining Wen clan members and the man protecting them, and then it’s back to petty bickering while ignoring the genocidal elephant in the room. The first real sign of discontent with the Jin’s power comes from the Xue Yang incident, which showed that 1) a great sect leader could successfully oppose the Jin if they so chose, 2) the Jin were not infallible because they did have to appease Nie Mingjue on the issue, something the Wen never had to do, and 3) that’s why Nie Mingjue had to be killed as the only one willing to oppose the Jin (in certain circumstances). What gets me, especially, is when all these crimes come to light in Lotus Pier and Guanyin Temple, Lan Xichen and the rest of the nameless cultivators’ biggest issues seem, again, to linger on Jin Guangyao’s personal culpability to his personal relationships but not the Jin sect whose overall greed for power necessitated these actions. (Like really, fuck the sex workers and the minor clans used for experiments, I guess. Fuck the entirety of Yi City, I guess.) There’s a reason Wei Wuxian is so uncomfortable by the way the conversation in Lotus Pier against Jin Guangyao goes to personal slander while everyone ignores the more far-reaching issues with the reveal (and even how the reveals came to them).

So yeah, the Jin rise to power comes out of the same place that the Wen rise to power did: passivity and status qo maintenance.

[canary3d-obsessed]

Restless Rewatch: The Untamed, Episode 32 part two

(Masterpost) (Pinboard)

Warning! Spoilers for All 50 Episodes!

Showtime

Now that someone has tried to kill Wei Wuxian -- and died, in a rapid demonstration of logical consequences -- it’s time for the flute portion of Wei Wuxian’s balance beam routine.

The assembled cultivators rush forward to take up battle positions on the stairs,  while literally every single clan leader just stands there looking upset. These guys clearly did not avail themselves of leadership training when it was offered in sect leader school.

Wei Wuxian, who is still like 50 yards away from the nearest opponent since they’ve all forgotten they can fly up to get him, laughs at them and starts playing Chenqing. 

He seems cheerful and confident here; not like a guy who has lost nearly everything, but that’s just how despair looks on him. Always a smiling face.

(more behind the cut!)

The lack of gruesomeness in most of this fight makes it look like nobody is dying, but Wei Wuxian freely admits, much later in the story, to killing a lot of people here. So I think we should read this black smoke as lethal to most of the cultivators it touches.

The resentment smoke attacks everyone at once, making no distinction between righteous warriors...

...and douchebags.

But the smoke blobs carefully avoid harming any of the Jiangs, even having a nice little Abyss-water-tentacle moment with Jiang Cheng.  

Note that the Jiangs are the only ones in the battle who get into a formation when they’re attacked, rather than running around wildly. Well done, Jiang Cheng. 

The whole time this is happening Wei Wuxian is just chilling, playing his flute, not having any trouble with it, not getting tired, and nobody is coming for him at all. They need to put up a tank like Nie Mingjue to draw his attacks and then send a couple of high DPS (damage-per-second) fighters in after Wie Wuxian, but they have zero tactics, so they don't.

Boss Fight

Did I say high DPS? Here comes Hanguang-Jun, the only one of these fuckers with the stones to take on Wei Wuxian directly. [OP is speaking of metaphorical stones; don’t feel insulted if you lack literal gonads. OP’s ovaries were surgically sent back to hell where they came from, 9 happy years ago]

Lan Wangji floats in from the sky and lands on the roof, guqin primed and ready. Wei Wuxian gives him a look so sexy that a weaker man would drop dead on the spot. 

Wei Wuxian tells Lan Wangji that his little tunes aren’t going to work on him, so Lan Wangji pissily puts away his guqin. While it’s true that “Rest” won’t work on Wei Wuxian, chord assassination sure would, Lan Wangji. Maybe don’t put your weapon away so quickly next time. 

There’s an interesting thread of antagonism in their relationship that is part of their bond; they each crave a strong opponent and enjoy wielding power. Presumably once they get together this will get sublimated into, you know, fucking. But right now it’s fully unsublimated, at least on Wei Wuxian’s side, and he tells Lan Wangji it’s time for them to have a real fight. 

Wei Wuxian starts fluting and Lan Wangji draws Bichen and comes after him. 

This fight is full of strong emotion and intensity, which makes it easy to overlook a surprising thing about it, which is that Hanguang-Jun is getting his ass kicked.  Bichen can’t get through the shield of resentful energy that Wei Wuxian puts up,  and pretty quickly Lan Wangji is driven all the way back across the roof.

We know, of course, that Wei Wuxian can’t keep this up for too long without fainting, and Lan Wangji knows it too, but until that happens, he’s at a disadvantage, with the attacks coming as fast as he can handle. Chord assassination would probably work better in this situation, but without a pause button he can’t switch weapons mid-skirmish. 

What he does have, though, is Wei Wuxian’s trust. Even if it feels to Wei Wuxian like they’re enemies now, he knows Lan Wangji isn’t going to lie to him or try to trick him. So when Lan Wangji asks him to stop so they can talk, he stops. Lan Wangji is about to explain things--explain about A-Yuan, presumably--when Jiang Yanli arrives on the battlefield. 

*deep breath* ...How far away is Lanling from Qishan? Who is feeding the baby? Did her veil seriously stay on all the way here, only to fall off as soon as she arrived? How did the Jin guards and servants etc let her leave? Why didn’t some of them come with her? Why aren’t some of them guarding her now? 

Invisible Sister

What follows is an extremely irritating sequence in which Wei Wuxian, Jiang Yanli, and Jiang Cheng run around the exact same part of the plaza looking for each other. The only reason they don’t meet up instantly is that they are not being filmed at the same time. 

Episode 22 gave us this birds-eye view of the set, so we can see how everything is laid out. See how there is only one flight of stairs? Only one?  Here’s Jiang Yanli running up the center of the plaza toward the stairs, looking for Wei Wuxian.

Wei Wuxian flies down, lands at the bottom of the same stairs, and looks around yelling for her, unable to see her even when he moves forward into the plaza. 

Here’s Jiang Cheng, standing in the plaza with the stairs behind him, in basically the exact same spot as his siblings, unable to see either of them.

The rest of the sequence goes like this, with the background and camera direction changing whenever it feels like it, with no regard for the actual positions of the characters, and the Yunmeng trio yelling for each other about 100 times. 

While this is going on, Su She boots up his own flute and takes control of the resentment tentacles.  Su She is surprisingly talented for someone who got his sword eaten by rag mops back in episode 5. 

Su She starts turning cultivators into zombies (”kuilei” 傀儡, officially), which is meaner than just killing them with smoke tentacles like Wei Wuxian was doing. 

Wei Wuxian looks around while standing in the exact same spot as his sister and realizes that he’s not in control any more. 

Fortunately, when the zombies and/or live cultivators come to attack Wei Wuxian, they are knocked back by a sword-energy-blast from Bichen, and Lan Wangji flies in to defend him. 

Lan Wangji, so switchy. In battle, I mean. Switching sides. That kind of switchy. 

Eventually Jiang Yanli gets slashed in the back by a zombie dude, moments after she becomes clearly visible to her brothers. Here she is in the middle of the fucking plaza right in front of the fucking stairs.  

The thing is, when you’re looking at a film your mind is registering everything in the frame, whether you’re consciously paying attention to those details or not. So when those details are inconsistent, when camera direction changes arbitrarily, when characters switch positions on set, it all has the effect of breaking your immersion in the scene. This entire sequence is, for me, robbed of its emotional impact, because every time those stairs appear it reminds me that everyone is just pretending to be far away from each other.  

Anyhoo. Lan Wangji has come to Wei Wuxian’s side to try to make him stop the madness; they have a quick, very toothy, interaction and then Wei Wuxian throws Lan Wangji off so he can go to his sister. 

Now we have a whole other kind of questionable camera work, as this very emotional scene alternates between beautifully shot, heartfelt closeups...

and this weird-as-hell wide-angle shot of the trio with the battle comped in behind them. This has so much lens distortion, Jiang Yanli’s hand in the foreground is bigger than Jiang Cheng’s head. What. The. Fuck.

Jiang Cheng yells at Wei Wuxian for losing control, and Wei Wuxian freaks out because he doesn’t understand how this is happening. 

Jiang Yanli came all this way to talk to Wei Wuxian, and even though she’s injured and freshly widowed and in the middle of a battlefield, she still just wants to check in with him and make sure he’s ok and stuff. Girl, we need to talk about your priorities.

Unfortunately, since this battlefield is populated almost entirely with people who want to kill Wei Wuxian, one of them tries to kill Wei Wuxian.

Jiang Yanli pushes him out of the way and gets stabbed in the heart, and falls dead in Jiang Cheng’s arms. 

The voice actor for Wei Wuxian is terrific, but is not nearly as good at screaming as Xiao Zhan is. And they have him scream a long extended scream that sort of cracks in the middle. And they break the amazing closeup shot of Wei Wuxian screaming right at the apex of his scream and splice a chunk of the terrible distorted wide-angle shot into the middle of it. 

I’m so mad at the editing choices for this moment. If you’re going to sacrifice a female character to further the emotional journey of the male protagonist, at least make sure you don’t edit the emotional impact out of the scene. Let us feel what the characters are feeling, without creating weird artificial distance like this. It’s the least you can do to honor her sacrifice. 

To ease my frustration I swapped out the audio on the closeup clips for Xiao Zhan’s own voice, from the Tencent BTS video of the scene. Video here if you want to feel extra upset. 

Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng are both extra upset. Jiang Cheng is so shocked and sorrowful that he isn’t even angry...yet.

Wei Wuxian, on the other hand, is extra super duper angry.

Killer-guy tries to justify himself by saying he was trying to avenge his brother. Is that supposed to stop Wei Wuxian from avenging his sister, dumbass?

Wei Wuxian uses a Wen Ruohan-style move to jerk Yanli’s killer through the air into his hand, then chokes him to death, then flings him away, where he lands on the ground and spits up a bunch of blood. 

This actor just ejected liquid from his mouth directly into his nostrils and then did NOT ruin the shot by jumping up and yelling “oh gross ew my nose ew ew ew!” Amazing. 

[flautistsandpeonies]

Today i was thinking about that post by a JC stan that was like “Jiang Fengmian would be rolling in his grave about JC being a successful sect leader while Wei WuXian was a bum.”

And setting aside the fact that they believe the lie that Jiang Fengmian favored Wei WuXian.

Jiang Cheng is a horrible sect leader.

First and foremost, he didn’t get the position because of any real talent he had, he got the position because he’s the heir to the sect. Jiang Cheng could’ve been the most dog shit cultivator that ever lived and he’d still get the position because its his blood right.

The people of Yunmeng are so terrified of him that they fear going to Lotus Pier to ask for help. The YunmengJiang sect refuses to help people in cases where cultivators are needed if no one has died yet, sacrificing innocent civilians when no life had to be lost at all.

The disciples of YunmengJiang have turned into little goons that: 1. Set up a perimeter around an area so Jiang Cheng can torture people in peace. 2. Pay off anyone they can so that Jiang Cheng can torture people in peace 3. Have done this so many time that they immediately react to Jiang Cheng simply making a hand sign

None of the other sect leaders like or respect him. After the Second Siege of the Burial Mounds when they get back to Lotus Pier and Jiang Cheng goes to interrogate Sisi and Biaco, leaves everyone else waiting for a long time and pisses everyone off. Even before that Sect Leader Ouyang was literally terrified at what would happen to his sect if his heir talked in favor of Wei WuXian.

If Jiang Fengmian is rolling in his grave over anything it’s because Lotus Pier went from a place where civilian children could run in and play with all the disciples to a place where standing in the front gate you can see someone getting whipped to death.

And calling Wei WuXian a bum?

Firstly, if your reaction to a fictional person enduring homelessness is laughter and ridicule, I really don’t want to know how you react to real people enduring it.

But to laugh at Wei WuXian having no place to live. To laugh at him starving and having little money to feed himself.

To laugh at Wei WuXian having to leave Lotus Pier to protect the Wens because Jiang Cheng’s spine and morality was as strong as a pretzel stick. Like Wei WuXian didn’t build the houses on the Burial Mounds with his own hands, didn’t fashion a home out a cave, complete with doors and protection arrays. Like Jiang Cheng didn’t burn it all down when he led a siege to kill innocents.

Any talk of Wei WuXian having nothing in his second life as well is simply inane, like Wei WuXian isn’t the husband of the heir to the Lan Clan. Spouses share accounts all the time, so Wei WuXian using the money in Lan WangJi’s token is nothing out of the ordinary- that’s his money too.

JC Stans Don’t Clown on My Posts

[shanastoryteller]

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈Happy Pride🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈 Can I request you continue the Time Traveller Nie Huaisang? Either that or the 'free brother one's

a continuation of 1

Wei Wuxian's plan is so bad that at first Nie Huaisang thinks he's joking.

"Do you have a better idea?" Wei Wuxian asks. "One that doesn't end in a bunch of our clansmen dying for no reason?"

"If we manage to kill the Wens-"

"We're not killing a whole clan all over again," Wei Wuxian interrupts.

"Especially since that clan is mine," Wen Qing adds mildly. "You said you wanted a coup. We're going to give you one. But to do that we'll need some firepower that we don't have right now."

Nie Huaisang has to remind himself that they're both dumbass teenagers and he's the adult here. "Why are you letting him do this? You're a doctor. Don't you have some sort of oath about not letting idiots kill themselves?"

"Not really," she answers. "But I'm not worried about that. That's why I'm going with him."

He stares. He really hadn't thought that this plan could get worse, but clearly he'd been wrong. "You'll die. You'll literally die."

"I didn't die last time," Wei Wuxian points out.

That's not as compelling as argument as Wei Wuxian thinks it is, because after he hadn't been dead but he'd been something almost as bad. "You don't need to go to the Burial Mounds to learn demonic cultivation. You invented it."

"Yeah, while I was in the Burial Mounds," he says. "Don't worry, this time will be better, since I still have my golden core and haven't just been whipped half to death. And I'll have a doctor! Who I won't let die. I think this is pretty responsible of me actually."

The sad things is that for Wei Wuxian, it kind of is. "And how are you planning to explain disappearing for three months? We don't have three months! The Wens will have already started gathering power by then."

"I can probably do it in a month this time around," he answers, which would be an absolutely insane statement coming from anyone else. "My old notes that you copied out for me helped a lot, plus the whole not being half dead thing. I probably spent a lot of time in the Burial Mounds trying to not die, and I'll spend a lot less time doing that this time around."

"A month is still too long for you both to go missing," he says through gritted teeth.

Wen Qing grins. "Oh, don't worry about that. We're going to spread rumors that we're running off together to elope since our families would never agree to arrange a betrothal. By the time they figure out that's very much not what we've done, I'll be the Wen Sect Leader and it won't matter."

"Lan Zhan agreed to shelter A-Ning, although I obviously didn't tell him why," Wei Wuxian says, then his brow furrows. "It was actually a lot easier than I thought it'd be."

Nie Huaisang has a moment of silence for Lan Wangji. The only person who's going to have a worse month than the two idiots who are purposely dropping themselves in the Burial Mounds is Lan Wangji who’s going to think that the love of his life ran off to marry someone else.

Oh well. One bad month is probably preferable to sixteen years of them, after all.

[chocolatebanditplaidtoad]

Things that would have happened if wangxian did not exist in the book.

(A post dedicated to all the posts that have been saying that the book would still probably stay the same.)

I will mostly be talking about Wei Ying here.

1) If Wei Wuxian did not exist. Jiang Wǎnyín would have been the disgraced heir of the Jiang clan. Arrogant and self absorbed, he'd most likely make a very weak sect leader. Not that he's all good by the end of the canon.

His people are scared of him. We very well see that in the book. And I am pretty sure if wei ying did not exist, he would have taken over earlier and his people would have been scared of him and his powers. Even if Wei Ying did exist and remained in Lotus pier when Jiang cheng became the clan leader. The people of Yunmeng Jiang will certainly fear him and his reign of absolute terror.

Because that's just how he is. He might not realise it. But Jiang Cheng will not make a good clan leader. He believes in politics not righteousness or justice.

2) Wen Rouhan would have taken over the cultivation world and people wouldn't have been able to do shit. That'll pretty much be the end of the book. It'll end with the win of the Wen Rouhan lmao. The sunshot battle would have been lost.

Lmao I am sure that people would loveee to write the rise of their purple grape based off this thread.

3) If Lan Wangji didn't exist we wouldn't ever need a cloud recesses arc. The chances of winning the sunshot battle just gets reduced if Lan Wangji didn't exist. If there was no cloud recesses arc there would be no plot. Hence there would be no book. The book would most likely start with Wen Rouhan taking over the cultivation world and the entire plot will get over in page two.

4) The book is literally called the grandmaster of demonic cultivation. Mate. What do you think people will call it if there was no Wei Ying in it? 'The revenge of the purple grape?' or 'man in red taking over the cultivation world in two pages'

The book revolves around the grandmaster of demonic of cultivation my love. Why would you say something like that?

5) Read the God damn book. Watch CQL if you are too lazy go read. It ain't hard.

If both of them didn't exist. Nothing would make sense at all. A book is written with lots of thoughts and months of hard-work. Don't try to butcher it with your sensible thoughts.

Don't be an ass and take screenshots of this post to make fun of it because your insecure ass likes to chase clout and feel belonged among of crowd of 13 year olds. Tag me on it. If you want to talk smack talk about it with me involved in it.

I didn't want to make any mdzs related posts after leaving this fandom. But man I can't help but cringe at these dumb takes some people take.

[drwcn]

follow up to [post] exploring the crack au if lwj was a girl 

〒▽〒 ps im not trying to erase canon lwj representation, not at all, wangxian is mm in all my other fics, this is just stupid fun

in a ceteris paribus situation aka all other things staying equal: 

1) Lan Wangji 100% still has a resting bitch face, which probably would get her a couple of “Lan-er-guniang 美若天仙 (beautiful as an immortal/goddess) but would benefit from smiling more” comments but nobody is that desperate to die yet so, she’s spared. But damn... imagine the sheer number of thirsty boys who’d try to secure a marriage with LWJ. None of them is good enough for Wangji as far as Lan Xichen is concerned. Okay - maybe in Lan Xichen’s opinion, Nie Mingjue is good enough, but he couldn’t be less interested. I see her as I see Huaisang, Xichen please. 

2) Everything interaction between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian in Wei Wuxian’s first life is now 500% more scandalous. 

Exhibit A) Their first meeting at the gates; Jiang Cheng immediately felt his spidey senses tingling.  —“You’d sooner have immortals flying out of your ass than get with someone like her. The second jade of Gusu? The pearl in old man Lan’s eyes? C’mon.”  —“Shut up, A-Cheng.” —“Uh-huh.”  —“Also, she’s not that pretty. Her brother Zewu-jun is much better. There’s a reason he’s ranked first.” WWX is still a disaster bi.  — “LMAO, you? Zewu-jun? Please.” 

Exhibit B) Just because LWJ is a girl does not mean WWX grew more brain cells. 

WWX, straight up to Lan Qiren’s face, “Lan-meimei and I - we’re zhiji.” (he means it like we’re kindred spirits, peas of a pod, etc)  LWJ: *does not deny* Lan Xichen: ⚆_⚆ Lan Qiren: ಠ╭╮ಠ

Exhibit C) Lan Wangji getting drunk the first time. Wei Wuxian knew he crossed a line the minute he invited Lan-er-guniang for a drink. Really, WWX, even for you, this is inappropriate. When Lan Wangji fell face first onto the table, Wei Wuxian knew, he fucked up. “Hey....hey...Lan....Lan...-er-guniang,” He poked her. “Don’t...don’t sleep here! You can’t sleep here! If your Uncle finds out or if Jiang-shushu finds out...they’ll skin me alive and then...and then they’ll make me marry you! I don’t want to marry you; you don’t talk and I’m too young!” 

WWX, being a dipshit, “Hey Lan Zhan, call me Wei-gege.”  LWJ, drunk as fuck, “Wei..gege.”  WWX *((( heart )))* ??? 

Exhibit D) The Cold Pond. Okay, so I don’t think Zewu-jun would sabotage his sister’s virtue by sending a stupid teenage boy her way while she’s bathing, but doesn’t mean Su She is above all that. Wei “I didn’t see anything I swear!” Wuxian. Lan “I will gouge out your eyes.” Wangji. Somehow they still end up in the cave. Maybe WWX got in the water after LWJ got out and got sucked into the vortex and LWJ heard the commotion, turned around, saw WWX had disappeared. “Wei Ying?!” A panicked LWJ jumps back into the pond, “Stop fooling around, come out!” 

Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing 👀👀 when LWJ and WWX fall out of the cave together. Also the fact that Lan-er-guniang and Wei-gongzi went missing, together, for two days. Who knows what could’ve happened. I mean anything really. I mean... that’s gotta stir the pot a little were it not for the Yin Iron stealing everyone’s attention away from this bit of juicy scandal. 

Oh the whole story... so much to work with, so little time. 

3) Because Lan Wangji is a girl, now suddenly there’s a high ranking member of the Lan Clan who can host the girls at Cloud Recesses. I mean, Mianmian, Jiang Yanli, Wen Qing, Lan Wangji - SISTERLY FRIENDSHIP. Other than Mianmian, none of the girls are really talkers which suits Lan Wangji perfectly. Even Mianmian’s chatter is endearing.

4) Lan Wangji is absolutely still a powerhouse during the Sunshot Campaign. The inherent aesthetics of fem!lwj telling the Wen goons to “kneel” - no one will deprive me of this.  Also she will still cut off your arm if you cross her - Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao ya better watch out still. 

I am TORN between two options: Lan Wangji tol and kickass or Lan Wangji smol and kickass. On one hand, the aesthetics of willowy elf-like LWJ, on the other hand, 5′2′’ of whoop ass who can and will throw an unconscious wwx over her shoulder firewoman-style and toll him to safety.  

And amongst other things: 

A) Lan Wangji still becomes Chief Cultivator, because excuse me who else is left to clean up this mess? Jiang “Short-fuse” Wanyin? Nie “I won’t do what I’m not intended to do” Huaisang? Jin “13 year-old” Ling? Or Sect Leader Yao?  Technically, being a woman means that she was never Lan Xichen’s heir, but at the end of it, it’s not like Gusu Lan is left with a lot of choices.  Just the poetic justice of Gusu Lan pleading for Lan Wangji to come back when she fully intends to 隐居山野 (retreat into the mountains) with the resurrected WWX.

Lan Wangji being Chief Cultivator would echo Lan Yi’s tenure and rectify the fact that Gusu Lan’s only female head of family “failed”. Lan Yi had to face a mountain of prejudice because she was woman; someone has to say “up yours” to that. A woman as not only the sect master of Gusu Lan but the Chief Cultivator? Love that for Gusu Lans. (⌐■_■) ☞ ☞

B) Because of ~ sexism ~ I wonder if Lan Wangji would get titled “Hanguang” at all even after the Sunshot Campaign. Even Lan Yi, the SL Lan of her time didn’t have a title. Chances are LWJ won’t either. (Note: Violet Spider is not a title, it’s a moniker). So — say after the way Lan Wangji is still just “Lan-er-guniang”, and she does not obtain the title “Han Guang” until after she leaves Cloud Recesses and become rogue. (srsly how did they come up with these titles in canon, did gusu lan just look at 21 year old lwj and be like yah he’s lord light bearer *cue trevor noah stand up joke* why do you call yourself “great” britain? isn’t that a bit presumptuous? shouldn’t you go around doing good things and then let other people come to the conclusion: oh britain look how great you are? same logic with lwj.) 

Lan Wangji, a Jade of Gusu or a nameless rogue, still goes where trouble is, helping those who need it. After laying low for a year or two to heal, Lan Wangji began night hunting. Donned neck to ankle in white silk and tulle, and a weimao (wide brimmed veil hat) obscuring her face, she became known to the people as Hanguang Sanren, the lightbearing wanderer. Gusu’s highest power probably has some idea who she is - or at least they can guess - but the vast majority of people don’t. 

C) Lan Sizhui raised by rogue Lan Wangji as his mum would be different. Still cultured, respectful, but definitely with an air of keeping others at arm’s length. 

For instance, grown-up Sizhui running interference and saving a cohort of gentry disciples on joint hunts.

Jingyi: 这人谁呀？Who is this guy? Zizhen: 多谢兄台搭救之恩，小可看您眼生，敢问兄台尊姓大名，何门何派，改日当登门拜访. Many thanks for saving us. I don’t believe we’ve met, pray tell what is your name and sect, so we may visit at a later time to thank you for tonight. Sizhui: 在下无门无姓 ，单名思追 。举手之劳不足挂齿 ，怎敢劳烦各位名门子弟答谢。My name is Sizhui, belonging to no family and to no sect. As for tonight - I only did what anyone would; it bears no mentioning and requires no thanks. Jin Ling: 你这人，看你工力不凡，想和你交个朋友，可你怎么遮遮掩掩的。Hey you, we see you’re a talented cultivator and want to make your acquaintance. Why are you so dodge-y? Zizhen：金陵 — Jing Ling - Sizhui: 若是有缘，还会相见。告辞。If it’s fated, we will meet again. Farewell.  

Later:  Jingyi: 思。追。 思追谁？Si. Zhui. To recollect and long for whom?  Sizhui: 母亲的一位故人. Someone from Mother’s past.  Jingyi: 你父亲？...Your father?  Sizhui: 我不知。I don’t know. 

I thought about how cute it would be if sizhui and jin ling knew each other but guys...Jiang Cheng literally thinks he killed Sizhui’s biological father. Like he literally thinks he orphaned Sizhui before Sizhui is even born. And Lan Wangji would never accept anything from Jiang Wanyin, not that it would stop Jiang Wanyin from trying. 

A package of books here, a new robe for Sizhui there. Lan Wangji doesn’t know how Jiang Cheng keeps finding her. She and Sizhui are nomadic.  

D) The inevitable conversation after wwx is revived. 

You know what would be funnier than Jiang Cheng thinking Sizhui is a wangxian baby is if Lan Qiren thinks Sizhui is a wangxian baby. 

[crossdressingdeath]

I don't understand the argument that Lan Clan is somehow bad for WWX because they took part in the siege and then saying that WWX would have much better with JC in Lotus Pier...Like what??? Are we talking abt same grape, the one that literally LEAD said siege, the one that tried SO HARD to backstab his"brother"? Or some other character? Beside didn't text explicitly tell us that siege would have happened even if Lans and Nies weren't there?

Well, I don't think it's explicitly said that it would've happened without the Lans and Nies, but it is made clear that the Jins and Jiangs were very much the ones running the show and things like how they dumped all the Wen bodies in the blood pool instead of just leaving them where they fell or disposing of them in the proper manner (I don't know what that would involve in fantasy ancient China but I suspect pools of blood are not part of it) suggest to me that they were very much trying to hide who exactly they'd been killing from their allies; if they just didn't care they could've just left the bodies, and if they wanted them disposed of in a world where corpses can in fact come back I'd expect them to do it properly.

And yeah, it's always like... "The Lan clan, the only clan with members who tried to help WWX, is bad for him because they took part in the siege! He should return to the guy who convinced all the sects the Wen remnants were an army and WWX was planning to take over the world in order to raise an army to go murder him for absolutely no reason, not even personal benefit! That's better for him!"

That's always the thing that gets me. I can understand JGS and JGY needing the Wens dead to cover up what they'd been doing in the labour camps, and I can understand NMJ and LXC not challenging the insistence of their two fellow great sect leaders (either because they trusted them or—and more likely—to avoid causing fights among the sects so soon after a massive war), but JC? He gained nothing from the Wens' deaths. He lost his greatest asset with WWX. Odds are a good number of his cultivators died during the various fights; no matter how careful WWX tried to be about not murdering anyone from the sect most to blame for what was happening to him, with him losing control and also fighting for his life and the lives of the people under his care he wouldn't be able to prioritize not killing JC's thugs. Sure, JC got a reputation boost, but he pissed it down the drain immediately by becoming a serial killer. So the absolute best-case scenario for JC's actions re the Wen remnants and WWX is that he thought a boost to his reputation was worth the deaths of fifty innocent people and someone he grew up with and who had always served him faithfully (until he decided to fulfill JC's life debt when JC refused to...), a boost that he then threw away the moment he decided that he wanted to kill people more than he wanted to be popular. And of course worst-case is... it was pure spite. WWX decided that saving lives was more important than being JC's pet demonic cultivator, and JC was like "Fine, then you can die" and deliberately caused his death as "punishment" for his refusal to do whatever JC wanted. There's no way for JC to come out of this looking good. Hell, I don't think there's a way for him to come out of this looking not bad; remember, the best-case scenario is that he was so monumentally selfish that he decided 51 lives were an acceptable price to boost his reputation. Meanwhile the worst you can say of the Lans is that they didn't properly investigate JGS and JC's claims; that's a problem, sure, but that doesn't make them responsible. Certainly not as responsible for JC... the person the stans insist WWX should go to instead of the Lans... because the Lans played a part in the siege... because JC said the Wens were an army...

Yeah, the people making this argument seem to have missed a few salient points in the whole situation.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Prompt: someone of the (good-ish) mdzs cast is a serial killer. Why? Who else knows? Could be modern au, could be canon verse

Serial Killer - ao3

“So what are you going to do about it, Xichen?” Jin Guangyao heard Nie Mingjue demanding, and paused, tilting his head to the side to listen rather than proceeding to enter the room.

Nie Mingjue had gotten increasingly irascible as of late, no doubt in large part to the growing influence of the Song of Turmoil that he’d been playing for him, and much of his ire was (correctly, although unknowingly) aimed at Jin Guangyao. Most of the time, given Nie Mingjue’s straightforward nature, it was directly aimed at him, rather than through an indirect method, such as trying to convince Lan Xichen to turn away from him – and yet that was a method that Jin Guangyao was far more concerned about, given that Nie Mingjue had the benefit of a very old friendship with Lan Xichen that could be used to his benefit, if only he were a little less blockheaded about manipulating people.

Jin Guangyao absolutely refused to lose Lan Xichen, delighting as he did in the man’s faith and trust and benefiting from his influence and repeated interventions on his behalf; as a result, he would treat any such attempts by Nie Mingjue to drive a wedge between them very seriously. It therefore would be better to stay outside and listen, to figure out what argument Nie Mingjue was using and design appropriate countermeasures – to convince Lan Xichen that Nie Mingjue was, as usual, making a fuss when there was no reason, and that it was safe to simply ignore him or downplay his concerns.

Lan Xichen would believe him, as he always did, and never realize that he was helping push Nie Mingjue along the road to ruin – or indeed realize that he was pivotal to Jin Guangyao’s plan. Without Lan Xichen to support Jin Guangyao and make Nie Mingjue mistrust his own instincts, it would be much harder to isolate him from the few people he was willing to turn to for help, subtly influencing him not to believe his own symptoms, to doubt himself…to not realize what Jin Guangyao was doing to him.

“Da-ge…”

“Don’t da-ge me! He’s killing people!”

Jin Guangyao tensed.

How had Nie Mingjue discovered that?

Jin Guangyao had taken every precaution, going to great lengths to misdirect attention and cover up those deaths, whether it be the clans he’d fed into Xue Yang’s noxious experiments or else the ones he’d just had quietly executed somewhere no one would notice because they represented a threat to the rising power of the Jin sect. He’d known, of course, that he’d be held responsible for those deaths if anyone ever found out, there was no doubt that he would scapegoated by his father in that case, but he knew that it was especially dangerous to him if the person who discovered the truth was Nie Mingjue. Sure, he had his excuses ready in the event that Lan Xichen ever heard about it and found some evidence – he had a plan: to first deny convincingly, and then if that didn’t work, deny increasingly unconvincingly, and finally ‘give in’ and confess that he’d been driven to it by his father, that he’d been under duress, the sort of thing that Lan Xichen would happily swallow rather than believe that he’d been so fundamentally mistaken about Jin Guangyao.

Nie Mingjue, though – he’d been concerned that if Nie Mingjue ever found out about it, even the rumor of it without any evidence, he wouldn’t bother waiting for Jin Guangyao to explain or to blame his father. No, that brute would rather just take his saber and come and execute him on the steps of Jinlin Tower, if that was what it took to satisfy justice in his own mind, and never mind the consequences or costs. That Nie Mingjue would likely commit an honorable suicide thereafter for having misjudged and then executed his sworn brother was not, in fact, anywhere near as comforting as Nie Mingjue might think it was.

If anything, Nie Mingjue going to Lan Xichen with his concerns first was highly unexpected.

Jin Guangyao hated the unexpected.

“Da-ge, please, calm down,” Lan Xichen said, and his voice was – oddly calm, really. Jin Guangyao would have expected him to be a little more agitated, a little more demanding for details…was Lan Xichen’s faith in him really so strong? “Think this through before you do anything rash.”

“Rash!” Nie Mingjue fumed. “Rash..! Xichen, really.”

“You know he’s a good person,” Lan Xichen insisted, and Jin Guangyao smiled. “He has always meant well, strived to do good, regardless of whether it was commonly accepted – even you have to admit it.”

“I don’t have to admit anything,” Nie Mingjue grumbled, but Jin Guangyao could hear the rage dying down to something more of a simmer, rather than a roaring boil. Truly only Lan Xichen had such remarkable abilities, soothing the fierce beast with nothing but his presence and voice, no magic songs required – even Jin Guangyao found himself soothed by his presence.

There was a reason he wouldn’t give him up.

“You’ve known him for years, da-ge,” Lan Xichen said, voice soft, convincing, persuasive. Jin Guangyao didn’t have to be inside the room to imagine the scene he would see: Lan Xichen would be leaning forward, the slightest curve adding softness to the rigid posture required of Lan sect disciples, his eyes curved in a smile, his head a little dropped so that he could look up at Nie Mingjue with an expression of cheerfulness livened by a touch of mischief – full of charm, the way the women in the brothel practiced all day to do, but superior to any of their petty tricks. Lan Xichen was pure as a breath of fresh air in the lonely mountaintop, a benevolent god above the concerns of the world and yet determined to reach out his hands down to the needy – truly it was no wonder that Jin Guangyao was determined to take all that benevolence and joy and keep it all to himself. “For years, da-ge. And more than that, you know how hard he’s had it – how hard things have been, how much he’s suffered, all those things that other people don’t understand. You know that even when he’s strayed and been confused, he’s always returned back to the right way of doing things in the end.”

Nie Mingjue sighed, a great exhalation of breath.

“I suppose you’re right,” he conceded, and Jin Guangyao felt the sharp taste of joy on his tongue – there were few feelings in the world so great as this, to have started with nothing and risen so far, to have so thoroughly deceived these men, even Nie Mingjue who ought to know better after having seen him. “And yet, I can’t help but worry – this doesn’t seem like the rest of it. Isn’t he going too far this time?”

“Da-ge, if you have concerns, why not raise them with him directly?” Lan Xichen suggested, and Jin Guangyao nodded in approval. If Nie Mingjue came to him first with any concerns, he would be able to devise the appropriate response to those concerns – whether it was through coming up with some method of assuaging the concerns or in preemptively eliminated whoever had raised them, that was his business. Either way, it would be much easier to take action when he had prior warning, whereas some sort of unexpected public confrontation would be much more difficult to deal with.

“I don’t know, Xichen. You know he doesn’t listen to me.”

“That’s not true! Your opinion means so much to him – he’s always admired you, looked up to you. He wants you to approve of him.”

That was nonsense, of course. Jin Guangyao hadn’t cared one whit for Nie Mingjue’s opinion of him since the day the man had lost his usefulness – the Nie sect had been a necessary hurdle for him, the only Great Sect that allowed for promotion purely on the basis of merit without a thousand and one other rules, and Nie Mingjue himself was known to promote men quickly if they had skills he could use. Jin Guangyao had needed that back then, when he’d had nothing, and he’d been able to parlay it into additional use in the future: first, by getting Nie Mingjue’s recommendation letter to enter the Jin sect troops, although that hadn’t ended up working out, and then later, by using it to leverage himself a position with the Wen sect, courtesy of Wen Ruohan’s strange fixation on the Nie sect leader.

Would he like Nie Mingjue’s good opinion? Certainly, especially after he’d traded his somewhat dubious claim to a life-debt for Nie Mingjue swearing brotherhood with him; it would be extremely helpful if Nie Mingjue would support him the way Lan Xichen did. But since it didn’t seem likely that he’d be able to get on Nie Mingjue’s good side again, there was no point in expecting anything further from the man.

Well, no, that was wrong. He also expected great things from Nie Mingjue’s upcoming death, which would tally in quite nicely with many of his plans for domination in the cultivation world.

“I’d like to approve of him,” Nie Mingjue said. “I really would, Xichen, you know that. He’s smart and he’s capable and he has so much potential for goodness – I greatly admire him, really, I do. I would even go so far as to say that there are things for which I would trust his word over the evidence of my own eyes.”

Jin Guangyao couldn’t help but preen a little.

What an idiot, he thought, smiling. Truly there was nothing in that man’s brain but saber, and everything else had long ago rotted away – the Song of Turmoil boiling him alive until he was pickled with rage, leaving nothing else behind. Certainly not any critical thinking skills.

That final qi deviation must not be far away, now.

“But at the same time,” Nie Mingjue continued, presumably that last bit of self-preservation instinct trying to ring the alarms. “At the same time, I really do think that this is different in kind. It’s literally murder, Xichen. He’s murdering people. Not just killing, the way you do in wartime – actual murder. Premeditated, pre-planned murder. How can you just look away from that?”

Lan Xichen was quiet for a long moment, and Jin Guangyao tensed a little, his head tilting towards the door, awaiting the answer with both anticipation and fear.

“I think it’s a little more complicated than that,” he finally said, and Jin Guangyao’s eyebrows arched a little in surprise and wholly unanticipated pleasure. “It’s not just his actions that I look at, but those that died, too – we killed many people during the war, da-ge, didn’t we? Not all of whom had done evil against us, but who had to go because of the evil they represented…”

“Xichen!” Nie Mingjue cried, and for once Jin Guangyao couldn’t help but side with his reaction, his shock. “Are you suggesting that the victims deserved it?”

“Is that really so hard to believe?” Lan Xichen asked. Jin Guangyao had to admit that he was deeply impressed – he wouldn’t have thought Lan Xichen, the perfect gentleman, would have had it in him to side with him quite so deeply as that. “I’m with you, Mingjue-xiong. I’d believe him over even myself in just about every case – every time I’ve questioned what he was doing, he explained, and when he explained, I understood. It isn’t as black and white as all that.”

“I mean…I guess,” Nie Mingjue said, still sounding shocked and a little appalled. “But murder – so many murders…Xichen, are you sure it’s not some sort of qi deviation, something that gives him pleasure in taking lives? Are you sure each one is justified?”

“Those are two separate questions,” Lan Xichen said delicately. “I do think he takes pleasure in the act, and although I don’t understand it myself, I can understand that it helps him deal with…everything, really. Everything that’s happened to him. The tragedy, the senselessness of it…maybe it helps him feel better about it, helps comfort him. Maybe it’s some sort of sense that he’s evening the scales, perhaps? Some overall karmic balance?”

Jin Guangyao nodded along. He could certainly see Lan Xichen talking himself into believing something like that, and who knew? Maybe it was even a little true. He certainly enjoyed taking out the trash that had seen itself as above him, enjoyed stamping their lives into the mud – he wouldn’t have done it if it wasn’t a necessity, a part of his power play, and he wouldn’t have described himself as taking pleasure in it, but at the same time, he certainly didn’t regret any of it. If it made Lan Xichen feel better to think that he had some sort of complex psychology driving his actions, well, so be it.

As long as he continued to support him.

“But as for whether it’s justified…” Lan Xichen sighed. “I’m not perfect at telling good from evil, Mingjue-xiong, and neither are you. No one is. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Nie Mingjue grunted. It almost sounded as if he really were agreeing.

Was Lan Xichen really convincing Nie Mingjue that Jin Guangyao ought to be allowed to murder people with impunity as long as he came up with a good enough reason for it in advance? How delightful.

Jin Guangyao couldn’t help but wonder – although he’d never actually take the risk of it – whether he could convince Lan Xichen that Nie Mingjue’s death, too, had been justified. It was an amusing enough thought to make him genuinely smile, a smile full of all the bloodthirstiness he normally kept hidden deep down: truly, if he had his choice in the matter, he’d love to see Nie Mingjue’s expression if he ever found out what Jin Guangyao was doing to him, ideally once it was too late for him to do anything about it or alert anyone to what was happening.

Maybe, if Jin Guangyao could arrange to be there to push him over the edge, he might even get to see it.

Maybe he’d even remind him of this little conversation, and ask if he found his own murder justified.

“All right, then,” Nie Mingjue finally said, exhaling slowly, and Jin Guangyao bit his lips to keep from laughing out loud. “I see what you mean, and…yes, I suppose you’re right, Xichen. I may not understand all the motives behind the murders, and I may not like the idea of just – trusting that he knows what he’s doing in killing them, but at the same time…”

He sighed.

“At the same time, I can’t disagree that if there’s one person I trust to have a good reason to kill someone in some deserted place for their undiscovered wrongdoings, it would be Wangji.”

Jin Guangyao’s smile faded away.

Lan Wangji?

What in the world were they talking about? How had Lan Wangji entered into it?

It wasn’t as if Lan Wangji were going around randomly killing people for, what, sport – killing them, and then justifying their deaths as having been deserved because they had supposedly done bad things –

A hand fell on Jin Guangyao’s shoulder, and he jumped a little, surprised: he hadn’t realized that anyone else was there with him in the deserted hallway or seen them come up behind him, much less close enough to touch.

He turned around: it was Lan Wangji himself, pale-faced and miserable the way he’d looked since the Massacre at the Nightless City, since he’d missed the Siege of the Burial Mounds on account of being confined – miserable, but upright, hale and hearty and righteous as always, his eyes bright with passion that verged on obsession.

He had his sword in his hand.

It was unsheathed.

“Wait,” Jin Guangyao said, taking a step back, his eyes going wide as he realized something. Surely he didn’t mean to – surely they hadn’t really meant – surely not – “Wait, Wangji, don’t..!”

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

I feel like wwx’s character arc across his two lives was about him transferring his allegiance from the Jiang sect to the Lan sect. Post-canon Ch3ngx1an fics that have him dump lwj for jc don’t really *work* for me because they undo all his character development.

Hi, hi!

Now, I don't think it was a case of Wei Wuxian switching allegiance to anyone, it was a matter of others needing to show their allegiance to him after the the utter failing of Jiang Cheng and the cultivation world helping him. The ones that stand by him, are not the Lan sect as a whole, it is Lan Wangji, his juniors and several outside sect juniors that do that.

However, I think what does make him stay is that the core ideals that raised Lan Wangji and what drew Wei Wuxian to stay with the clan and place himself in their midst as a teacher. He knows that LWJ teaches and he is able to extend hunts to the juniors into the mountains for experience. I think at that point during post-canon he has been accepted within the clan despite what may have been protests. You can't really do much anyways when the clan leader gives the okay to an impromptu marriage and have him at the banquets. Whatever personal opinion, socially, Wei Wuxian is a Lan and that can't be disputed.

Wei Wuxian is fine with his post-life, he does not miss anything about Lotus Pier, simple as that. It is headcanon that is wishful thinking for him to pine for Lotus Pier, least of all Jiang Cheng who he literally, turned away from for Lan Wangji at the end of Guanyin Temple.

[ouyangzizhensdad]

Do you think LWJ took the advantage of being a Young Master of a prominent clan to publicly display the people he hates? (We know who that is) I saw someone claim about it and It's haunting my head.

Hi anon,

I’ll start first by saying that I think the novel does, to a degree, understand that there are people who have, to use Bourdieu’s terms, forms of ‘capitals’ that others do not and integrate that into the narrative and character dynamics. LWJ has not only capital due to his position as a gongzi and the son of a Leader (then later, as heir-in-line) to one of the prominent clans, but also due to his stellar reputation and fighting abilities (and to a degree, the fact he is a man). All this allows him to have a wider range of actions that are considered ‘acceptable/legitimate’ versus another person with different or lesser forms of capital--think for instance of the reaction and consequences when LWJ challenges what powerful men are saying (making up) about WWX versus when daughter-of-a-servant MianMian does the same. However, I find it weird to frame that as LWJ “getting away” with something--with his character, it’s more like he is able to have an opinion or stand up against injustices with less chances of getting punished and ridiculed for it.

Now, if it is about Jiang Cheng, it is kind of a myopic argument to be saying that LWJ “gets away” with “publicly hating JC”. First because by that point JC is technically even higher in the social hierarchy, being a literal Sect Leader. But it’s also weird to phrase this as “publicly hating JC”: LWJ is not running around badmouthing JC or the Jiang sect--the pettiest we see him is when he doesn’t silence LJY when he engages in gossip about JC. Instead we see LWJ standing up against JC when the situation calls for it, which is not the same. Of course, as JC does, it can be considered as an inherent ‘insult’ since it makes JC ‘lose face’ but I think there is a difference. And it’s not like JC does not get away with being impolite towards LWJ and the Lan sect, something we see at Dafan Mountain.

We know with the MXY altercation that JC was ready to kill him on sight for using modao (”Do you have any last words?”/“Break his legs? Haven’t I told you? If you see this sort of evil and crooked practice, kill the cultivator and feed him to your dogs!”). After LWJ intercepts, we have this exchange showing JC being impolite to a degree that prompts LJY to call him out for it, only bringing more disrespect for the Lans from JC:

He raised one brow and spoke, “Hanguang-Jun, you sure live up to your reputation of ‘being wherever the chaos is’. So, you had time to come to this remote area today?” [..] Right now, Jiang Cheng really didn’t seem too polite as he said the words in such a tone. Even the juniors who came following Lan Wangji did not seem comfortable hearing it.

Lan Jingyi spoke straightforwardly, “Isn’t Jiang-zongzhu here as well?”

Jiang Cheng replied grimly, “Tsk, do you really think that you should butt in when your seniors are conversing? The GusuLan Sect has always been known for its respectful conduct. Is this really how it teaches its disciples?”

It is imo more true to say that, due to LWJ’s higher and respected position in society, JC is not able to use his usual means of responding to someone challenging his decisions and thus making him lose face.This is again something we see during this altercation.

LWJ silences JL after he dismisses his mistreatment of other cultivators with the deity-binding nets. LWJ destroys the entirety of the diety-binding nets JC and JL were using to give JL an advantage over the other cultivators competing, something they were only able to do because of the Jiang and Jin sects considerable power and wealth. Is it daring of LWJ? Sure. Would he be able to do so without consequences if he was someone else? Probably unlikely, especially when we’re talking about JC. But is that ‘getting away’ with something? It’s literally the opposite scenario: LWJ is using his own status and capital to make it so that JL (and JC) are not getting away with what they are doing (although there are, in actuality, no consequences for their behaviours; they are just forced to give up on JL’s unfair advantages. Hell, LWJ even offers to pay for the nets he destroys, which I guess can also be taken as a baller move). What’s more, the novel even takes the time to point out that, if LWJ were not such a strong cultivator, JC might have pushed aside the risks of offending LXC and physically confronted him (let’s appreciate how this also serves as well-integrated exposition for their weapons).

Jin Ling’s grim expression was exactly the same as his uncle’s, “What can I do? It was their own fault for stepping into the traps. I’ll solve everything after I finish capturing the prey.”

Lan Wangji frowned. Jin Ling was about to speak again, but he suddenly realized that, shockingly, he could neither open his mouth nor make any sounds.

[...]

The man spoke in a low voice, “Not long ago, a blue sword flew over and destroyed the deity-binding nets that you had set up.”

Jiang Cheng glanced at Lan Wangji harshly, his displease plastered all over his face, “How many were broken?”

[...]

Although four hundred deity-binding nets were a whopping price, it wasn’t too much for the YunmengJiang Sect. Nonetheless, losing the nets were a small matter, but losing face was not. With Lan Wangji’s actions, Jiang Cheng felt a whirlpool of anger at the bottom of his heart, rising higher by every second. He narrowed his eyes, his left hand casually stroking the ring on his right hand’s index finger.

[...]

However, after stroking it for a while, Jiang Cheng compelled himself to restrain his hostility.

Although he was displeased, as the leader of a sect, he needed to take more things into consideration, which meant that he couldn’t be as impulsive as Jin Ling. After the fall of the QingheNie Sect, among the Three Great Sects, the LanlingJin Sect and the GusuLan Sect were quite close due to the personal relationship between the two leaders. By leading the YunmengJiang Sect alone, he was already in an isolated situation among the three. Hanguang-Jun, or Lan Wangji, was quite a prestigious cultivator, while his elder brother Zewu-Jun, or Lan Xichen, was the leader of the GusuLan Sect. The two brothers had always been on good terms with each other. It was best to not openly dispute with Lan Wangji.

Also, Jiang Cheng’s sword, “Sandu (三毒, Sāndú),” had never made actual contact with Lan Wangji’s sword, “Bichen,” and it was not yet decidable whose hands would the deer die on. Although he owned the powerful ring, “Zidian (紫电 Zǐdiàn),” a family heirloom of his, Lan Wangji’s guqin, “Wangji”, was also known for its abilities. The thing that Jiang Cheng hated the most was to be disadvantageous during a fight. Without complete confidence in his success, he would not consider fighting with Lan Wangji.

Now if it is about Su She, again what does LWJ truly do?

He silences him in the Demon-slaughtering cave? Although we’d be hard-pressed to believe LWJ respects Su She after what he’s seen him do in the Xuanwu Cave, the guy is literally trying to get everyone there killed and being a smartass to WWX while at it. And if it had been extremely disrespectful of him, LQR could have lifted the spell--something once again that the novel points out. When it dissolves into a game of calling out between the MolingSu sect and the GusuLan sect, LWJ does not say anything, even if, as LJY points out, Su She was imitating him. It’s only when WWX starts going that LWJ takes part by acquiescing to the truths WWX lays out (which are, yes, damning for the Su She and the MolingSu sect). But again, there are layers to what WWX is doing: he’s not only trying to expose what is going on, but anger Su She into revealing he still has his spiritual powers as proof of what he has worked out. So while WWX and LWJ are being by some measures disrespectful, there is a point to how they are going at it.

Touching his chin, he grinned, “Well I was worried that you’d get mad if I asked him too many things in front of you, wasn’t I? But since you’ve told me to ask him already, I’ll go ahead and ask. Lan Zhan?”

Lan Wangji, “Mn.”

Wei Wuxian, “The MolingSu Sect was a sect that branched off from the GusuLan Sect, right?”

Lan Wangji, “Mn.”

Wei Wuxian, “Although it branched off, the MolingSu Sect’s techniques still used the GusuLan Sect’s techniques ‘as reference’, right?”

Lan Wangji, “Yes.”

Wei Wuxian, “One of the GusuLan Sect’s techniques, the Sound of Vanquish, has the effect of exorcising evil. Amongst them, the seven-stringed guqin was the most powerful, and so there is the greatest number of people who cultivate through the guqin. The MolingSu Sect did the same, and the guqin is the most common in their sect as well, is that correct?”

Lan Wangji, “That is correct.”

Wei Wuxian, “Although the MolingSu Sect’s leader left the GusuLan Sect with knowledge of its techniques when he founded his own sect, is own guqin skills weren’t anything special, and the disciples he taught often make many mistakes too, right?”

Lan Wangji answered with honesty, “Yes.”

Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji went on back and forth, speaking as though nobody was around. More and more people realized that they weren’t only mocking Su She, but rather taking something apart. Thus, they began to listen more carefully.

Next, Wei Wuxian slowed down, “… And that means, even when a section of the battle melodies that the MolingSu Sect played when killing corpses on Mass Grave Hill was wrong, the GusuLan Sect wouldn’t find it unusual, and only think that they made a mistake because of their inferior techniques and remembered the sheet music wrong, not taking the time to notice whether it was an accidental mistake or a mistake on purpose. Is this the case?”

Hearing the last question, Su She’s pupils shrunk. The hand he placed on the hilt of his sword was suddenly lined with veins. The blade of the sword was already half-an-inch unsheathed. On the other hand, Lan Wangji lifted his eyes at the same time. Both Wei Wuxian and he saw the sense of understanding in each other’s eyes.

He stated one word at a time, “This is the case.”

Su She unsheathed his sword with a clang. Wei Wuxian moved the blade of the sword to the side with two fingers and smiled, “What are you doing? Don’t forget. You’ve lost all your spiritual powers. Would threatening me like this do anything?”

Sword raised in his hand, Su She could neither attack nor put it down. He clenched his teeth, “Aiming at me for so long—just what are you trying to imply?”

As much as we love to talk about LWJ’s hidden sass and pettiness, he does not seem to ever be disrespectful without a reason, and it’s usually in the process of standing up for others. Reading his character as an illustration of a man in a position of privilege and power getting away with things is a little bit of a reach--particularly when JC is literally right there.