#in case it wasn't clear yet in this house we are entirely a-yao apologists. i have a cool mug as a proof

[leatherbookmarking]

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i’ve seen many theories on whether qin su really killed herself and/or how complicit jgy was in this event (and as usual with the murders jgy feels complicit in, many of those theories assume he did it with his own personal hands, when he takes great care not to), but 

there’s a woman whose entire life turned out to be a lie. her husband is her brother, as told by an anonymous letter, and there’s a chance he’s had their son murdered, and, perhaps worse of all, he doesn’t appear even half as shocked as he ought to, bdenies everything in a rather lukewarm way, and THEN swiftly gets from that to “please tell me who’s behind this”, parentheses: SO I CAN KILL THEM. where’s her fucking emotional support!! she needs emotional support!!

she won’t get it, because a, jgy had years to deal with it and he does not want to talk about it, b, he’d rather have no emotions about this situation at all, and c, he’s quite busy with the fact that someone’s out there, knowing.

notabene: he shows he cares about her still, in a way. he doesn’t only talk about his own position being compromised if this gets out, but also hers, and it’s not about horrible mcbadman only caring about power and privilege, but rather someone who’s been ridiculed and -- i’m gonna use the word -- abused for his family situation he had no control over, and he knows that it can destroy a person. he doesn’t want that for qin su! he wants her away from all this mess, to recover and forget about it (except she can’t, but what does he know).

and now, theories: if he wanted her dead, he could have easily done it and blamed, oh, whomever, really. mo xuanyu’s sudden comeback is too good of an opportunity for that.

so there’s that.

but again: there’s a devastated, rather unstable woman in the room. close to her, a dagger that’s been used to take so many lives that it’s dense with resentful energy.

WELL.

i’m one of those Horrible Apologists™ that believe jgy would rather, if possible, please, not kill people. unfortunately, on top of the fact that his life is really, just really bad, and he keeps on ending in unfortunate situations, life has shown him that killing people with your own physical personal hands attached to your body does not end well at all. so from now on, his murders

do not require him to use hands at all. he doesn’t even need to be physically present, really

theoretically, theoretically, have a slim chance of not happening. mostly talking about jgs, nmj and qs here. if jgs was strong enough, he might have survived (although he was either ill or weakened, i don’t remember rn). nmj -- well, it’s not like he had a gauge above his head and jgy knew exaclty when it would be filled. or maybe lan xichen could play for him sometimes. or maybe the effect of jgy remix would be neutralized by the song of clarity, and nothing would happen. who knows! as for qs, well, she did reach for the dagger, but, possibly, in another universe, perhaps she would not have. wei wuxian has approximately 0 ways of effectively proving any of those three murders.

speaking of: despite being furious and disgusted with jgy and hitting him, after “waking up”, she was more devastated than angry, and instead of lashing out at him, she directed the violence at herself. it only shows how well jgy knew her.

(another Despicable Apologist moment, but god, after rusong that must have been the one he regretted the most; they’ve done nothing against him, they were pure collateral damage. of sorts. of terrible sorts. and if we assume that he loved her -- i do! i like doing that! you could say that comphet and that she forced him, but personally i like to hurt myself, and -- jgy just keeps on killing people he loved, doesn’t he!!! and then a person he loves kills him. CRAZY, INNIT)

speaking of speaking of: a dagger. that’s used to kill people. and in the process, as i understand it, gains resentful energy of its victims, resulting in an emotionally unstable people to commit violent acts. wheeere have i heard of it? (to be precise, this is not me saying the nies are like, #bad. rather, you people should really stop using single-edged sharp things to kill a fuckton of people Because It Doesn’t End Well For You Personally)

people like to joke that haha meng yao said “it’s not me!”, holding a bloodied sword he’s just pulled out of the body of the man he’s murdered, haha! what an idiot!, which is very hilarious for exactly three seconds, however jgy actually kills in a very clever way, by what i mean that technically, he doesn’t, not personally. and he’s an incredible actor. the /only/ reason nhs managed to outsmart him was because he’s cultivated enough of a bumbling idiot persona (see, he’s good!) that jgy fell for it, like the rest of the world, and wasn’t expecting it. if jgy survived guanyin temple and presumably ran away, with or without xichen, nhs would have no way of reaching him; in fact, his “er-ge, watch out” stunt was rather risky and last resort precisely because it appeared jgy would live beyond the guanyin temple events, and with xichen, there was a chance he would live even beyond his eventual trial. surprise was nhs’ only weapon, and if jgy knew he was being targeted, even if nhs sent assassins after him, he would simply... not get killed...

conclusions:

- a-yao is so smart, i love him

- people (that are nie mingjue) keep on catching him kill people and concluding that he’s evil, and has been plotting all the time. so he’s like. ok. i will plot, then

- i am however very against the idea that jgy somehow planned for nmj to find him, eating dry bread alone in the forest, exactly to appeal to his just nature and make him promote him from a ?? helper??? disciple??? whomst the fuck was he?? to vice general? very important dude?? because a/ who the fuck could have predicted that nmj would be THAT horny, and b/ what, did he pay the dudes to say the things he loathed the most hearing? ya,

- one day i will sit down and write out a plan for an au where jgs dies early enough for meng yao to live a good life. probably shortly post-sunshot

- (cries into cola) they could have been cool incestuous siblings who do murder occasionally!!! alas