#there's absolutely nothing that could get xy to let go of xxc (and by proxy sl and aq) but death

[krispycreamsicle]

make me choose

@veliseraptor asked: dead xue yang or dead xiao xingchen?

[theuntamednarrator]

#3 for Story! (MDZS getting to know u asks)

questions from here

Bring back Jin Zixuan. Kill Jiang Cheng.

You can bring one character back to life, but you must pick someone else to die in their place. Would you do it? How would this effect the story?

Okay so I already brought back Cangse Sanren for a happy ending let's try for something a little more devastating. I am in the mood to hurt myself emotionally. Sorry friend, I don’t know if this is what you wanted.

JZX rushes off as per canon but this time JYL with her canon my-WWX-spidey-senses-tingling grabs JC's arm and asks him to go with her husband because she has a bad feeling

JZX is waiting with JC and JYL for WWX's arrival at JinLinTai, which is where JGY finds them after ugly cousin takes off with the Lan  and Jin disciples

JZX and JC arrive at Qiongqi Path just as UC and WWX are about to come blows

This time, when WN moves to strike, JC is close enough to act

He throws himself in front of the blow meant for JZX

JC gets JZX’s final words “a-jie is, is still, waiting for you”

JZX catches him as he collapses and it’s the Nightless City JLY-dying scene except with JZX as JC and JC as JYL. Also JZX doesn’t push WWX

◇◇◇

First way it goes is that the rest of the plot goes pretty much as it did in canon except JC is not at Nightless City so LWJ has nobody but himself to hate if WWX still goes over the cliff which he absolutely does if JYL somehow still manages to make it to Nightless City and dies

JGY still needs to find a way to kill off JZX so probably makes sure that happens at Nightless City as well (unless JZX has to stay alive in this hypothetical, in which case JGY probably pulls a post-canon LWJ where his older brother is SL but in such deep mourning that he takes over as acting Sect Leader and Chief Cultivator)

Jin Ling is raised entirely by the Jin and is therefore 50% more diplomatic and 90% more miserable

Without JC and with Lotus Pier still recovering it’s laughably easy for JGS and JGY to absorb Yunmeng Jiang into Lanling Jin’s territories

Their next sect leader is the closest thing to an heir that Lotus Pier has afterall!

There’s a lot more territory to go around and JGY could frankly use the help so MXY is treated very well and never feels the need to reenact the Yiling Patriarch to exact revenge

Possibly JGY marries MXY to a Jiang/Meishan Yu/Baling disciple and sends his brother to Lotus Pier as his proxy

NHS’s alternative revenge plot is betrayed, he is either executed or exiled and JGY seizes Qinghe Nie as compensation for their sect leader's treachery

LWJ stumbles across Yi City and the mess that is XY while going where the chaos is. He rescues a-Qing and XXC

This is a lot harder without the groundwork exposing all of JGY’s crimes and in the end they’re not successful

LWJ confronts LXC with his suspicions about JGY based on some things XY said beforehe died

LXC looks at what’s happening and decides they need to confront JGY

JGY locks LXC up the same way Qingfeng-jun locked up Madam Lan, which LXC agrees to provided JGY promises not to hurt LWJ

LWJ takes LSZ and LJY and flees, meeting up with XXC and a-Qing near Yi City

The five of them retire to Baixue Temple and start the orphanage/cultivation school songxiao dreamed of (SL will join them later)

They watch helplessly from afar while JGY governs the united sects

◇◇◇

Second way it goes is that WWX is so distraught over killing JC that he lashes out like he does against the minor cultivators outside Nightless City

Everyone within a hundred metres is pinned to the ground and slowly suffocating while WWX sobs over JC’s body

WN tries to get him to leave but WWX screams at him to go away “what should I do now? what should I tell my sister?”

WN goes back to Burial Mounds to get WQ in the hopes that she will be able to help

This is not a happy ending

Meanwhile LXC, LWJ, and JGY come looking for their disciples and stumble upon the scene

LWJ and LXC manage to dispel the resentful energy with xiao/guqin and in the process discover SS and the evidence of the hundred holes curse on him

From JZX they hear about how UC was attacking WWX and WWX was defending himself and lost control

Happy ending would be everyone realising that SS and JGY had planned the ambush and confronting him before it escalates

JGY realises this and has to think quickly. He announces that SS must be in league with WWX. He pulls an NHS and yells for LXC to lookout! and LXC stabs SS, who looks very betrayed for three seconds before he dies

WWX allows himself to be restrained but just laughs when they demand a lock on his spiritual power because there’s nothing to lock (he doesn’t have to worry anymore about revealing the core transfer because JC is dead and can’t find out)

Everyone is horrified but ofc JGY is just like “well but what about the stygian tiget amulet? that’s more powerful than a core you should hand it over.”

WWX agrees to give it to LXC. JGY eventually convinces LXC to give it to him to study

JYL collapses in grief when her brothers are brought in, one is chains, the other in a shroud

LWJ goes to the cell where WWX is being held and begs him to let him help but WWX is lost in his grief and tells him to “piss off”

LWJ leaves and goes to the Burial Mounds where he rescues not only a-Yuan but all the other Wen remnants as well. He takes them to Yunmeng since - with all the chaos over JC’s death - no one is likely to notice twenty civilians showing up out of nowhere

While he’s away there’s a trial and the Jin demand that WN and WQ surrender themselves as well. Much as in canon they announce that they’ve killed the three demonic scourges

LWJ loses it and nearly kills JGS, JGY, JZX, and a bunch of other people at the conference

He still gets the lashes and three years seclusion

By the time LWJ emerges from seclusion the Jin have taken over Yunmeng in Jiang Yanli’s name as Young Madam Jin. Granny and Fourth Uncle are worried about discovery so Lan Wangji takes on a-Yuan as a disciple except he’s much older now and the war is long over which means questions. He pulls it off with LXC’s help but it’s a close call

By the time NMJ dies and NHS hatches his revenge plot the Jin are far more powerful than in canon. Jin Guangyao has, by then, managed to bump off UC, JZX, and JGS

JGY has tried using threats against JYL and WQ to make WWX help with their experiments but he refuses

He doesn’t really need much help though since he has the amulet and XY

They probably end up killing WWX and WQ around the time JGY and XY successfully create their first fierce corpse OR they leave them locked up below JinLinTai for a decade and a half

If they live, NHS’s revenge plot basically relies on him and MXY somehow breaking WWX out of the cells while LWJ is around to find him and be pulled into the investigation

If they die, the resurrection and post-resurrection go pretty much as per canon except after the second siege of the Burial Mounds they go to Cloud Recesses not Lotus Pier, since Lotus Pier is occupied territory

This is also not a happy ending but less unhappy than the first one