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Chapter Text

The man who is standing amongst the ghouls remembers nothing. Nothing but wisps of his past and what destroyed him.

He remembers pain, pain he willingly submitted to.

(And why? For what reason did he need to endure that burning burning BURNING agony as he let a piece of his soul be cut out piece by piece– for what use?! He knows the use, for desperate, brilliant love. He did it out of love. A brother, he thinks. A best friend. The demons taunt him with memories all the same.)

A sudden stab, more white hot ripping through his wounds (a starlight–no, lightning bright– whip tearing through his skin... running, running, feAR— hUnGeR– and the neat little line that reminds him that no matter what, he’s never going to be the same, and by choice, standing the most vividly in his memory. Most of the rest is ground to a fine dust, littering the corners of his mind.

Who was that girl? That girl who he’d begged on his knees to, who sobbed even as she cut him open, who begged him not to ask her to do this—

She was in the red robes of his enemies. By all means, he should destroy her–

No.

He owes her. He owes her beyond just performing a miracle for him, achieving the impossible for him, moving heaven and earth for his brother. He knows that he owes her and he doesn’t know why he had taken this debt. He has an idea, and it is a grim one.

It doesn’t matter anyway. At the end of it all, for the sake of whatever man he had been, he won’t kill her.)

His wounds, marking his skin and reminding him that he was... he was something before that man with the ugly smile and his hanger-on woman had thrown him into here.

The spirits around him cackle with glee, thinking all that this man remembers is his own rage. He remembers flashes of other things, flowing white robes and a shattering bottle, dogs– he stiffens in fear at the word, for reasons he cannot explain– and he remembers soft robes and spicy soup, lotus flowers and the color purple, a song and a cold cave floor, the pain and relief as he watched a piece of his own soul, spinning like a miniature sun, be cut out and used for someone he loved. He remembers a trembling boy with a bow in the robes of his enemy but looking at him and smiling a soft, genuine smile— he was the one to hold him down. A severe woman who hid her softness behind needles and wit— it was her who performed a miracle. Another one, who hid her strength behind kindness and warmth— who he had known would cry for him if they ever know. A brother who expressed love in protective rage but was always by his side— and he is sure that it was for him that he did it. A mischievous friend who probably knew more than he was supposed to. He doesn’t know any of the people but he knows he should.

Looking over the rooftops, he hears whispers of the common people, of the foot soldiers.

This is the Sunshot Campaign, they say in hushed tones. This is the war of the sects against the tyrannical QishanWens.

(But what of the branches, some whisper, the uninvolved? None have answers to that.)

The YunmengJiang (a name accompanied by a painful burst of purple, creaky wood, and laughter) had been razed, they say. And it makes a part of him ache.

Talismans, corpse puppets, and blazing flames trail in his wake. The man knows nothing but this: the spirits who knew him before his memories shattered like a teacup and left fragments in day who-knows-what within those hills of rotting flesh and bone, knew he wanted these people gone.

(He doesn’t bother getting painful revenge, choosing to just let them die painful, humiliating deaths with no golden core to fight back. The despair in their eyes as he shattered them to dust and blew it away soothed something in him that he hadn’t realized was burning.)

It’s a purpose, the man decides. Rage for the him that is now dead, for whatever drove him to learn this dangerous skill that dares make him...

(Make him what? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t care.)

A mask, gifted to him by a craftsman he had saved from a wandering corpse, covers his face. So those who see him name him The Moonlight Demon. (The man would be flattered but the constant “fighting the sun” imagery is starting to grate on him.)

Two men, in purple and white, search the place he had massacred. They look weary, and some kind of grief twists their faces. Their distress is not for the mangled corpses of Wen soldiers, not for the self-important maid, not even for the brat heir or his weapon.

(Something in him had screamed with rage, with vengeance and with bloody grief upon seeing them, and a quiet part of him wonders if that grief was shared.)

He remembers flowing white silk, accompanied by flashes of shattered pottery, rabbits, and laughter. He remembers the purple brocade, with creaky-wood-floor sounds, spicy soup, water fights and the clanging of metal on metal, the sharp thwack of an arrow hitting its mark followed by young cheers, and warmth. Blazing heat of fires and too-hot soup and the soft warmth of knowing that you are loved spreading delicately within your chest. Every kind of warmth, and he realizes now the stark absence of it and feels cold. But the warmth of days gone by… without a doubt, he remembers it. He remembers that warmth. These two were special to him, at one point.

The Moonlight Demon, who no longer has a name he remembers beyond a moniker, suddenly desperately wants to know why.

“He’s not here either,” the man in purple laments. “Damn it, Wei Wuxian! Just where are you?!”

His white robed companion (fuddy-duddy, some quiet, fond part of him giggles) says nothing. The Moonlight Demon nearly trembles with the sheer force of his longing. He doesn’t know these people, and he shouldn’t taint their memories of… of whatever he was before.

He still finds himself following them back to their base camp.

A war is a war, and a young woman with soft eyes (his brain tears itself apart with flashes of good spices, hands linked in his, laughter, and brilliantly bright love) holds the man in purple as he tells her that they couldn’t find their brother. That he will never stop looking.

The woman looks concerned, scared even, but there is a quiet grief in her eyes.

He is sure now, more than ever, that these are the people he remembers in fragments. He savors the feeling of seeing their faces, knowing they’re safe.

And then he turns to go hunting. At camps, even surrounded by legions of soldiers, he creates an army. His own flute and voice grew tired, the wings of darkness and hatred wreathing him and in the haze of blood and screams, of pleading men and women forced to face their dead comrades fighting them alongside their victims, he realizes that maybe he truly had become a demon.

Fine, he’ll welcome it. Better to end this war as a villain than let it continue as a pure man. He does not stop often, sleeping little, eating even less. His trail of death is accompanied at times by cultivators, who are too busy with their enemies to deal with the demon aligned with them.

Their alliance, unspoken and unmarked, is fragile. But he does not touch them, and neither do his legions.

He is silent when they reconvene at their camps, entertaining no conversations. Oftentimes he leaves and just hunts down more Wens. He does not accept their provisions, opting to sleep outside and away from their tents.

The soldiers don’t say anything about it, but he knows they’re relieved.

His unsociable behavior angers some of the cultivators, particularly the oddly small gold contingent, but their leaders seem inclined to let him decide when he want to talk to them. The answer may be never (or at least, not until The Moonlight Demon becomes someone again) but they’ll let him choose that.

A man in white looks at him with something between confusion and pity. A man in grey, broad shouldered and holding a saber –very handsome– elects to glare at him instead. The men in purple and white look at him with something bordering on hopelessness and hope. Others watch him with undisguised disgust, or morbid curiosity.

He hears the whispers that call him coward, to hide behind a mask and demonic tricks. Others that wonder if he’s even human at all.

The Moonlight Demon wonders if he even knows the answer to that. And what a sad fate that is!

After a long battle, the remaining Wen soldiers retreat to lick their wounds and burn their dead (they hate him even more, those soldiers, for making them burn their comrades instead of bury) and the Sunshot campaign returns to their camps to do the same.

He sees the people he recognizes, the ones who have fragmented pictures in his mind.

Some run up to him, trying to flag him down. 

Something bordering on panic reminds him– they can’t see him now. Not when he cannot be the person they need, the person they loved.

The Moonlight Demon summons his wings and flees. He doesn’t know where, as long as it isn’t here.

He touches down outside a building, and hears worried whispers within it.

“Jie… what are we going to do?”

It’s the voice of that kind young man, with the robes of his enemy but the temperament of a friend. He doesn’t remember their names, but he remembers knowing them fondly.

“We won’t kill anyone. Our branch is a branch of healers,” the severe woman says. It’s her, the woman with the magical surgery. He opens the window and leans in, watching them startle.

They know who The Moonlight Demon is, how could they not? He’d preen at the fame, notoriety, really, but now isn’t the time.

“And what, I wonder, will Wen Ruohan do to you if you don’t?” He asks, voice scratching with disuse.

“Why are you here?” The woman narrows her eyes sharply. Her brother steps forward, startling even her.

“He has our branch of the family under his watch,” the man swallows nervously. “We’re not fighters. We’re doctors, farmers, weavers.”

They’re… they’re innocent.

(So were the people of that pier, fishmongers and weavers, kind and fascinated by cultivation and living right beside them as neighbors and friends. How can he do to them the carnage done onto his people?

The rage in him burns with more life than he does,  but he knows that they are not his enemy. The Moonlight Demon can not call himself the enemy of the innocent.)

“Where are they now? Are they somewhere safe?” They look at him, confused. The woman schools her expression, the man does not.

“Why,” the woman’s voice is hard. “What are you going to do to them?”

“I’m going to take them to Lotus Pier. There’s no shortage of refugees in this war. Seek refuge there.” Her eyes widen, still frightful.

“Wen Ruohan will-!”

“I’ll take care of that man myself if I have to, you should leave this pointless fight.” He takes her by the hand. “Nobody should involve themselves in this war. I can fake your deaths if you need me to.”

“I don’t think I can trust you,” she says warily. The Moonlight Demon smiles beneath his mask. He doesn’t explain any further.

“Take money, whatever possessions you can grab, your brother and run.”

“I’m going where my people are,” she says, brimming with the bearing of a leader. And he can’t deny her that. He can’t take her away from the rest of her family, he can’t subject her to a wanderer’s life away when she still remembers everything.

Her memories would consume her whole.

“I’m sure the refugees would welcome doctors. Let’s go, there’s not a moment to lose,” he takes them by the hands and rises to the sky.

“Put us down! We can use our swords,” she yelps.

Something in him, an ember of mischief, flares back to life.

“Hmmm, we have no time for that!” With a laugh, he pulls them along to their village. It’s small, with elderly and children. His eyes narrow, many of these people are not cultivators. They know of him too, he can tell, and they tremble in fear.

“Get on your horses, grab your children and stuff, we’re out of here!” He cheers, but the frightened civilians don’t match his enthusiasm.

“Have you considered that the mask and giant wings of darkness aren’t helping you look all too friendly?” Wen Qing, as the people have been calling, gives him a sarcastic glare. He shrugs.

“But what about the drama?!”

She rolls her eyes, but it borders on fond this time. They direct her eyes to her and she shrugs.

“I don’t trust him, but he’s better than Wen Ruohan,” Wen Qing says. And that’s good enough for them, but not for him!

“That doesn’t even say anything!” He whines slightly and she looks at him, unimpressed. With a sigh, he spends the next few days on the road, escorting the DafanWens to Yunmeng. Upon their arrival he turns to them.

“A word of advice before I go, you might get a little more traction if you change your names.”

They look at him, confused.

Then, with a slightly shaky voice, Wen Qing speaks up.

“What is your last name?”

He has to think for a minute. He remembers the man who he had definitely known looking for a– “ damn it, Wei Wuxian!”

“Wei,” he decides. She looks at him, expression softening with something he cannot name.

“Then that will be our name,” their matriarch, an old woman, decides.

“Be well then, Wei clan of Yunmeng.” The Moonlight Demon salutes and returns to Yiling.

He has bodies to fake.

He returns to the battlefields, finding that Wen Ruohan’s rampage has continued in his absence. The leaders of the campaign are in a meeting when he lands and is led in by a slightly nervous Ouyang disciple. A Nie, given the grey, glares at him.

“Where the hell were you?”

“Stopping a draft,” The Moonlight Demon says shortly. That makes them blink at him in surprise. The white-robed contingent is the first to recover.

“A draft?”

“DafanWens, innocents. Doctors,” he explains. “Most without a core or elderly.” Sect leader Nie, the broad-shouldered man with the saber who looks at him most days like he wants to rip his arms off and beat him with them, gives him a dry look. (A warning look, the spirits around him murmur.)

“Ah! Isn’t Wen Ruohan’s beloved doctor niece a DafanWen?”

“If you think a man the likes of Wen Ruohan is above threatening his family, then I have grave news for you,” The Moonlight Demon sighs. A cultivator in purple robes chokes. He doesn’t recognize his face, but the lines hold edges of familiarity. The Moonlight Demon is almost certain they whoever Wei Wuxian was, he was closely linked to the YunmengJiang.

“Did… did you just make a joke?!”

“If that’s what you want to call it. The point is, she agreed to disappear with her contingent of the family if I faked her death to the QishanWen.”

“I had heard reports,” a man in green murmurs. “Corpses in the Yiling supervisory office, indistinguishable due to acid but assumed to be Wen Ruohan’s niece and nephew destroying their faces for the sake of pride, to not let the Sunshot campaign parade their heads.”

“That’s just gross,” a Yao cultivator grimaces. “Why would we do that? Brutality doesn’t raise morale!”

They shoot wary glances at him after saying that. Ah, another subtle jab about the demonic cultivation. They also give sect leader Nie a look. Oh right, didn’t he do that to Wen Xu on the Hejian front or something? He doesn’t recall. Most of the other fronts are being maintained after The Moonlight Demon showed up and the Wens redirected all of their powers to dealing with him.

Fools, that was what he had wanted.

“We are not fighting this war to destroy the Wens. We are fighting it to destroy Wen Ruohan’s tyranny,” a man in white says somberly. The Moonlight Demon inclines his head in respect.

“Some won’t know the difference.” The man, seemingly interested in philosophy, of all things, looks at him with tired eyes.

“To some, will the difference even matter?”

Sect leader Nie looks particularly offended by that.

The Wen armies, still vast and powerful, are laying siege to this camp. And to end this war, he has to destroy them.

And to do that, he needs power.

“I can vow on behalf of the Nie sect that our vendetta against the Wens does not go beyond the main clan,” a Nie cultivator says, voice hard.

“I hope that vow holds,” he says, iron beneath the silk. If anyone notices, they don’t say anything.

“Do you think you can break the siege, Moonlight Demon?” A Lan cultivator, chafing under the sheer discomfort of talking to him, asks with the neverending politeness her sect instills. (How does he know this?)

“I can die trying,” he decides. Across the room an Ouyang cultivator coughs, they all turn to him.

“Sorry, sorry! It’s just… You can die?”

“I… think so?” He shrugs, the tone of the room lightening with the Ouyang cultivator’s incredulity. “I might be dead and not actually know it. I don’t recall. At this point, I don’t care.”

“Well, you’re definitely not completely an immortal, or dead,” a Lan cultivator says decidedly.

“We can puzzle out the mysteries of Moonlight-gongzi–“ The Moonlight Demon chokes back a snort at the address but it doesn’t go unnoticed, particularly by the purple and white robed duo who had been looking for (at least, who he thinks was) him– “at a later date. The priority is breaking the siege,” a Nie cultivator says firmly.

A report comes in from the other camps. The last vestiges of the Wen assults on other places (Gusu, Jingliang, Hejian, even Qinghe and Yunmeng) are being held in check. Right now, the main front is Langya. And here they are.

The sounds of yelling and fighting outside make the meeting attendees pause. The ones behind the siege are growing impatient, and skirmishes are starting to break out daily.

Chenqing in hand, he goes out to greet them. With more energy, more finesse and care than anything, he begins to play. There is a sort of coldness to losing who he was that dampens the backlash of using this much power at once.

Blood dribbles down his face, down his neck. His nose is bleeding, and so is his throat. Blood churns in his chest and he’s bending the laws of nature in ways nobody could possibly condone.

He wonders if he has done something like this before, if he had overshot his demonic cultivation and that was how his memories shattered. A selfish piece of him wants to hold onto the fragments of his past.

The wise one knows that he might just have to let go of them.

The cultivators of the Sunshot Campaign do not hesitate to take advantage of this. He does not know how much longer he can overextend his power, but he knows that they will be able to take down roughly half. And that would have to be enough.

He sees, with rapidly blurring sight, the glares and flashes of soldiers. The final blows as many are cleaved in two by Nie Mingjue’s saber. The resentful energy is a weapon of its own, enticing the corpse puppets but an arrow of itself, piercing through many. On shaky legs, he sees that most of the Wens are dead, and they’re being chased back. He… he’s done all that could.

If he just had more power–

No. That wouldn’t end well. He doesn’t need to be their next target.

This is more… more than he’s ever managed. And for good reason, he’s swaying on his feet.

Removing his mask is a foolish move, but his skin is cold to the touch and beads of cold sweat are collecting on his neck. His nose throbs and he realizes the flow of blood hasn’t stopped. The world is getting blurrier. He doesn’t quite think he’s standing anymore. And the blood…

It hasn’t stopped at all.

Oh, that’s definitely not good.

A searing pain builds in his chest and throat and he coughs. The last thing he sees is his hands stained with red.

Chapter Text

He wakes in the bush he fell asleep in. The good news is that he’s not bleeding out of his nose and mouth. The bad news is that he is both covered in blood and starving. His body is still weak. It’s weaker than it has ever been.

(The ghouls cackle beside him. And who made that choice?)

He debates going to the medical tents before remembering that he can’t let them see his face and try to regain the person they lost. Not when he doesn’t know what he was to them.

(Not when he can’t be the brother they remember. Not when he would have to watch them try fruitlessly to make him recall memories that had been broken into shards too small for him to piece into a full picture. It’s selfish, he knows. It’s so selfish to stay away and leave them grieving, but the person they loved has already been shattered. The Moonlight Demon is just the ghost left behind.)

For now, he will need to heal himself, hold his body together with resentful energy and pray.

He returns to the camps, still bloody and limping. At the rate he’s going he’ll have to stitch his skin together with resentful energy.

And he’ll do it, too.

In the days he had been indisposed, there was a surprise attack, a Nie cultivator informs him gravely.

There is a subtle accusation. Another “where were you?” in his words.

The Moonlight Demon pays that no mind. Terrible, terrible pain scorches through his body and it is the only thing keeping him awake.

In the middle of their conversation, another Nie cultivator bursts into the tent, and gleefully informs them that Wen Ruohan is truly dead. And that Jin Zixuan (the sect heir, the cultivator gossips with a mischievous grin) had been punched by sect leader Jiang for insulting his ex-fiancé, his sister, again. Apparently Wei Wuxian (him, he has to remind himself) had been the first one to do it and got kicked out of… something or other for it.

He tries desperately not to cling to these clues about who he once was.

And after that, the LanlingJin sweep him into their chambers as an exalted guest. They gift him women, and men when he refuses, clothes of luxurious silk and ornaments. They bring him food and he only eats when he’s alone. Truly, he’s just happy for the bath and clean clothes. He has to refuse their gold four times before they give him black, though.

He knows this– to wear the colors of a clan is marking yourself a part of it.

Such blatant attempts at politicking are not lost even on him.

But the banquets, opulent and refined, really explain quite a bit. Like the oddly small golden-robes contingent.

They are only playing up their involvement now, and everyone knows they did not spend much effort and retained much of their wealth and powerful cultivators. And they know but cannot say anything because the LanlingJin are funding their rebuilding efforts.

And the GusuLan and YunmengJiang contingents look particularly displeased by this. GusuLan’s young, far too young, leader keeps a genial smile but it tightened under the strain of staying on for the more obnoxious golden-robed cultivators. YunmengJiang’s doesn’t pay much attention, opting to scowl outright if necessary. But when he looks over at him…

GusuLan’s heir is looks at him with a matching expression. It’s something that hinges on hope. It makes him nauseous with the knowledge that they might ask The Moonlight Demon to find him “Wei Wuxian” and The Moonlight Demon, who was probably once was that person, would have to crush that hope. That fragile bright thing that has been steamrolled far too much by the war that stole their youths.

How could he possibly say that he is nearly certain that Wei Wuxian is dead?

Perhaps he’s too worried. Those of the righteous path don’t dare associate with him. He had tested the waters and found vitriol instead.

What else is there to say?

They hate him for being powerful, uncontrollable, not tied down to a sect. They hate him for being free.

He hates himself for being a coward. For hiding behind a persona, a grand identity. The Moonlight Demon was a moniker but… it’s still a bit much. A waiter looks at him nervously.

Many are craning their necks in subtle and significantly-less-so manners to see him. Perhaps that was why they had seated him beside GusuLan. To let the beauty of the Twin Jades distract from him. It’s probably political and not at all a favor, but he’s just slightly grateful for it.

He declines wine with a polite head shake at the same time the younger of the two does the same way. The waiter laughs a little.

“A- ah, Yueguang-jun, Hanguang-jun… you truly are similar in demeanor…”

He looks at the aforementioned cultivator. They’re both quiet.

He doubts the reason is the same. Hanguang-jun is mourning his… whatever Wei Wuxian was to him.

(They must have been friends of some sort. But such an austere and noble personage of Hanguang-jun alongside the once-heir and new leader of YunmengJiang? Just what was Wei Wuxian among the gentry? He cannot reconcile it with himself. The flashes were of a home, of people and love.

It certainly doesn’t fit these people. One in dull mourning-whites and one filled with blistering-hot rage. But that’s definitely his core in sect leader Jiang. Which means that he had been a beloved and friend to them.)

He actually itches quite a bit to say something ridiculous. Tell a joke. Fluster them.

It feels so much a part of his nature that it’s an empty experience without it.

But he can’t act like he feels he should, because he can’t afford to remind anyone of Wei Wuxian. That would be the dumbest possible choice after all that time spent on keeping them safe from the knowledge that Wei Wuxian has been splintered into sensations and his body is occupied by a shard. That Wei Wuxian may be dead or alive.

Maybe he isn’t actually Wei Wuxian, but logic indicates otherwise.

He hasn’t eaten very much and he’s still healing from the strain of the final battle he’s managed to take part in. Considering he has no golden core to make inedia a not-idiotic idea, his body is not pleased with him at the moment.

“So, this is the demon,” a man with the mark of the main clan and like… one lip laughs. Who is this guy? “I’m not impressed.”

The one who shouldn’t be impressed is The Moonlight Demon. He broke a siege for them and took out almost half of the Wen forces himself and this is the way the remaining four sects attempt to behave towards him?

“Why is the Jin sect acting like this? Shouldn’t they be trying to bribe him into joining or something? They’re just embarrassing themselves.” A Nie cultivator on his other side snorts. It’s quiet enough that the golden wart in front of him doesn’t notice, but The Moonlight Demon certainly does. He bows his head in thanks, trying not to cackle and failing.

The entire room turns to stare at him, but damn it! That was way too funny to not be acknowledged. Okay, it’s been decided. QingheNie is second best to YunmengJiang. All the other sects could go home.

“I don’t know what put you under the impression that I give as much as a third of a fuck about you, but I should disabuse you of such a notion. I don’t even know your name.”

“How- how impudent! I am Jin Zixun!”

“Cool. I’m apparently a demon.” He smiles under his mask as everyone around him begins to look distinctly uncomfortable. “That name means nothing to me.”

“Y- you!” Jin Zixun continues to sputter what may be threats until someone who… may be his brother(?) with an astonishingly ugly hat manages to persuade him to leave.

“A- ah, Yueguang-jun please excuse my cousin, I’m sure he didn’t intend-“ the ugly hat guy tries to placate him.

“What does his stupidity have to do with you?” He raises an unimpressed eyebrow even if they cannot see it. “You’re not the one humiliating your sect.”

That sends the room into roaring laughter. As for him, he absconds to a garden.

And promptly bumps into sect leader Nie. He frowns up at the man.

“Are you aware of the resentful energy wrapping you in a stranglehold?”

“Ah, yes. Thank you for your concern,” Sect leader Nie says, now looking like he would distinctly prefer to be anywhere but here.

“Do you want me to do anything about that?” It’s an offhanded offer, but sect leader Nie looks completely dejected.

“You can’t,” he says. The Moonlight Demon– Yueguang-jun?– levels him a look that sect leader Nie seems to sense without actually seeing.

“You’re talking to someone who manipulates resentful energy. If you want it kicked out, I can kick it out.”

“Thank you,” sect leader Nie quietly says. Shock is spread across his handsome features and it worries Yueguang-jun. Has nobody offered this before? “But I can’t.”

“This resentful energy has to do with a secret doesn’t it? You’d better not be dabbling in demonic cultivation,” he warns. Sect leader Nie laughs. It’s a deep, rich thing.

“Coming from you, of all people?”

“I had no choice,” he confesses. Sect leader Nie’s eyes widen.

“I apologi-“

“Don’t,” he says, tired. “Do you or do you want me to take the edge off?”

“I… would be willing to try,” sect leader Nie whispers. Lans do this too. Isn’t he friends with Zewu-jun?

“Cool,” The Moonlight Demon shrugs. He whistles sharply, and a startlingly dark fog comes off of sect leader Nie’s skin like he’s shrugging off darkness itself. It’s a little sudden, but they’re both more focused on the floating wisp of darkness making itself one with the shadows.

Sect leader Nie looks at him, something verging on alarm in his eyes.

“How did you do that, exactly?”

“Spiritual energy is energy. Resentful energy is energy. Resentful energy isn’t Yin the same way that spiritual energy isn’t Yang. Yin and Yang are counterparts but the other reflection in a mirror is still somewhat the same. They mostly follow the same rules. Barring some… minor differences,” he explains. The minor differences would be that misuse of Yin leads to your own mind being warped and your body falling apart. Or the fact that Yin is associated with the dead and Yin is what fuels resentful energy.

Okay, Yin energy gets a bit of a bad rap here.

“I see,” sect leader Nie murmurs quietly.

“You have an exceptionally strong Yang energy. I’m not too surprised it’s able to hold onto Yin so tightly,” Yueguang-jun shrugs nonchalantly. “That’s just down to energy science.”

“Ah?

“If you cultivate, you are fighting nature’s balance of energy down to your soul. Yin clinging to you is unsurprising if it’s able to get close enough.” It’s a hidden question: what is he doing that lets Yin energy that close to his core?

“It’s… involved with our saber style,” sect leader Nie admits. “ Sect secret ,” is what The Moonlight Demon hears.

“Ah. Well you can expect qi deviations if you’re using the Yang attached to whatever Yin you yank in and sticking it to your core.”

Sect leader Nie gapes at him. Had he accidentally hit the nail on the head a little too hard? Somehow, talking about energy sciences feels oddly right, like finding a well-worn but comfortable pair of shoes and putting them back on to find they’re mounded to your feet.

“Only immortals who have formed Yang cores large enough to surpass nature itself can mess with Yin energy,” he continues to explain. “Because even if they attract all of the Yin in the world they’re separate from the laws of nature by then and the law of attraction does nothing. Yin just burns off. But the more powerful your core gets… the wider your meridians get. Yin attracting Yang is a double edged sword. It works when you use it to drag in Yang and force it into your core– a brilliant bit of work, really– but the big meridians that are trained to not reject Yin can lead to Yin sticking around and rushing in nature’s fight for balance. Which pushes your qi places it isn’t supposed to be and… qi deviation.”

He briefly wonders if the sabers have something Yin in them to make the transfer work. And then remembers the weird string of… qi deviations in QingheNie’s leadership. And that suddenly makes far too much sense.

Sect leader Nie is frowning at him.

“So you’re saying that if you manipulate resentful energy… you can, what, turn it into a Yang energy delivery system?”

“Well, theoretically? But it would need to be pure Yin, unattached to resentment or death to be completely safe. You just use resentful beasts, which is what makes your technique so deadly to its practitioners. ‘Cause more often than not the Yin most definitely not pure. Yin is like the water to Yang’s fire. Including the fact that fire is difficult to dirty and water is sullied by a single grain of sand. That’s why ghosts and death are able to feed on Yin.”

“I… I see.”

Sect leader Nie’s eyes are wide and The Moonlight Demon doesn’t ask if it’s shock, horror, excitement, or hope. It may be all of them, to be honest.

“The system could be sustainable if you’re using both in your cultivation. But there’s only one way for that.”

“And what is that?”

“You need an anchor to draw out the Yin so it can’t interfere.”

Sect leader Nie looks at him, and he’s suddenly reminded of how young he is. Nie Mingjue is twenty three years old, after all. And isn’t that a horrifying thought? But with the eyes of a confused teenager don’t distract him from sect leader Nie’s response.

“Xichen plays Calming for me?”

“I suppose of all the orthodox techniques, that would probably be the closest? It suppresses instead of removes, at best it sucks out small amounts of resentful energy, which is like slapping a strip of cloth on a decapitated body.”

“Crude,” sect leader Nie scolds. But he’s hiding amusement, so neither of them comment on it further. “Do you have a name?”

“I had one, once,” he admits. “I don’t remember it.” (That’s a lie, sort of. He didn’t remember it on his own, he just figured out which missing person’s name was his.)

“I… see. Then I’m gonna call you Yue-xiong.”

“Yue,” he repeats. “I like it, sect leader Nie.”

(The moon, brilliant white robes and clouds, nights under the glow with his arms linked in those of his best friends, the back of a donkey and a woman who looks so much like him that it nearly startles him, laughing)

“Call me Mingjue-xiong,” sect leader Nie requests.

“Mingjue-xiong,” he tries. It fits.

“What do you think is the best solution for this?”

“Well, I suppose I can theorize some methods, but I don’t specialize in golden cores.” Mingjue-xiong laughs at that. “If it doesn’t disturb those statues up in Gusu, I’d say find something to concentrate resentful energy, which would drag the Yin along with it, and then draw it out your body. Maybe into something, make a nice pretty necklace of doom or something.”

And at that, Nie Mingjue lets out a bellowing laugh.

“N- necklace of doom!”

“It’s a nice name! The Nie Necklace of Doom! Alliteration and all!”

“That was on purpose,” Mingjue-xiong accuses.

“Maybe,” he replies. Then he remembers that he can’t act natural. This teasing, fun discussion of cultivation just felt like slipping into a warm bed. Comfortable and right.

He’d fucked up.

Nie Mingjue, as sect leader Nie, may have met Wei Wuxian. Or at the very least, he knew the new sect leaders Lan and Jiang. Which means that Lan Zhan and Jiang Cheng– no, Lan Wangji and Jiang Wanyin– could hear about his true demeanor and connect him back to Wei Wuxian.

If they had been that close, it’s a possibility, isn’t it?

Sect leader Nie notices his quiet, so he covers it up as if he’d been lost in thought.

“Dual cultivation, maybe,” he murmurs. “No, that would pass Yang back and forth and could confuse the Yin. You could hurt your partner,” he decides, “and not in the fun way.”

Mingjue-xiong chokes at the comment, afterthought, really.

“Yue-xiong!”

Yue laughs.

It is only upon his return to his rooms that he realizes how far he’s pushed his body. The resentful energy is so abused that his body snaps back in rebellion, rejecting it.

Yue cannot go to anyone, he knows. But he’s gasping for air and finds himself struggling with the strings of his mask once again to breathe.

He can’t go to their doctors for the same reason he couldn’t go to their medical tents. Especially not LanlingJin. He doesn’t trust them.

So who-

The Wens. Wen Qing, that girl who had looked at him with eyes too old for their ages and insisted on staying with her people, that girl who had done much more for him than he can ever thank her for. She would be discreet enough to not remove the mask unless it was an emergency. He… she didn’t trust him, but he could trust her.

Looking at the red, the drying blood. He knows that there is only one option. It’s desperately foolish, he’s almost two thousand li from Yunmeng. But there is nobody else he can go to.

Especially without a core. It’s nine days on foot, which is a non-option.

Shuddering with the effort, Yue draws a teleportation talisman into a piece of talisman paper. It’s odd for them to have that type of material lying around in the rooms of a guest, but he doesn’t look gift horses in the mouth. Looking up at his wall, he sees an artifact, carelessly hanging from the wall and brimming with spiritual energy. Could this replace his own lacking amounts?

This could be a disaster, but he has no choice but to experiment or let them find his corpse here. And Yue’s been trying to keep Wei Wuxian’s semi-death a secret.

He slams the talisman to the artifact, and the world flares with blue.

The light dies down and he’s in a hut in Lotus Pier. It’s only then that he remembers his mask isn’t on.

“Wei Wuxian?” Wen Qing’s eyes widen. He thinks that’s what his name was once. Yue is just the being occupying that body, left with splinters of who this person once was. Maybe he’s more ghost than person. But that doesn’t matter. If he does nothing, this body will cease to function. Half-truths and lies are something that burn in his chest to say. But he will make this exception because the truth would destroy them.

(And isn’t that a sentence that feels unnervingly familiar in his mind?)

“Wen Qing,” he responds. He lets her take whatever confirmation she needs from that.

And then he promptly passes out.

The sunlight shines gently in the room of Wen Qing’s wooden hut when he wakes.

“How messed up are your memories. I need you to be honest.”

“My- my memories?”

“I specialize in golden core theory, but I’m still a doctor. There isn’t anything wrong with your brain given the way your qi is flowing through your meridians, so it must be a different type of memory issue.”

“What do you mean?”

“The time it took for you to respond to me calling you Wei Wuxian was too long for it to have been an injury leading to hearing issues and too short for it to have been shock interfering with your processing skills or a mental debate on the value of lying to me about where you’ve been. I’m going to assume it has to do with the sudden influx of resentful energy in your meridians.” Wen Qing gives him a look dry enough to empty the wide, deep rivers he sees out the window. “Are you trying to cultivate a new core out of resentful energy? Because that isn’t exactly possible.”

“I don’t- I don’t know,” he rasps out. “I really don’t know. What- your family. How is your family?”

“You…” she looks away. “Yunmeng has accepted my family as Weis. And YunmengJiang certainly hasn’t had the time to look too closely at us, seeing as they haven’t done anything.” She would need the reassurance, that they’d be safe here. YunmengJiang (this time the thought is accompanied by a dizzying burst of bright purple lighting, well-spiced food, floating kites) was the sect closest to its people (lotus seeds, cheerful smiles, and playful, young laughter) and would not risk hurting those that had become a part of them.

(He knows that he was a part of something here. Wei Wuxian was a name that had held some kind of meaning here that he couldn’t possibly divine.)

“I told them, that you agreed to fake your death as long as your people wouldn’t be involved in the war. That you were protecting your family. If they recognize you, they shouldn’t say anything,” he finally manages to say. “I know it’s overstepping but-“

She puts a hand on his mouth, silencing him.

“Thank you.”

Someone could lament the fall of the mighty, seeing this scene here. Whoever Wei Wuxian had been, he had been loved. And powerful, based on that memory of the fluttering miniature sun that blazed enough to scorch his eyes. And then he’d become Yue, something other than human. Something that dances on the thin, thin line of living, immortal, and dead.

And here he lies, new name and gaping wounds beneath his skin and his brain still sorting through memories so splintered they could barely be more than faded sensations of time gone by. Here he lies, away from the people who he knows, given the way his heart blazes with a love so staggeringly powerful and unlike anything else just at the sight of them, are his family because he cannot be whoever he had been.

Beside him is a famed doctor, youthful genius and leader. Now a refugee, hiding her name and prowess and struggling to keep her family alive just one more day.

She takes his hand, a bit more gently now.

“I’m sorry…and… thank you.”

Yue swallows hard. The words feel far too much like a goodbye.

He sees the glittering silver of the needle before it strikes.

And when Yue opens his eyes again, he’s in a room in Lotus Pier.

Chapter Text

Yue should probably feel very betrayed. In fact, he wants to.

Come on, Wen Qing! After all they’d been through together?!

He knows why she’d done it. It was to make sure he had resources to recover. Maybe a bit of elder-sibling meddling. But he doesn’t have to appreciate it.

“A’Xian!” A woman’s tearful voice rings out as a woman in soft pinks runs into the room.

“Wei Wuxian!” Sect leader Jiang storms in. 

Their faces aren’t accompanied by the same painful flashes anymore, the memories only rising with a dull ache. Yue has an idea of what that means, but he isn’t going to test it. Not yet.

“Where the hell have you been? We found you lying outside of Lotus Pier with no core and forty fucking internal injuries!” Sect leader Jiang’s hands are clenched so hard there’s blood tricking down. He reaches out to pull the clenched fingers away, and sect leader Jiang lets him.

“I… don’t remember?” Yue tries. “I’m sorry, though.”

They accept that at face value.

He quietly eats soup as they fuss over him, it’s a taste that’s startlingly familiar and so damn good that he doesn’t bother to hide how hungry he is. The fussing differs in style, sect leader Jiang with angry mother-henning and Jiang-guniang with soft smiles and heaven-tier soup, but not in underlying love. 
Yue feels a stab of guilt. He isn’t actually Wei Wuxian anymore. He’s just not- but he’s still in his place. 

“The doctors say it wasn’t shattered. It’s just… it’s just gone,” Jiang Cheng– sect leader Jiang, he corrects– says carefully. “I don’t know what happened but… is it possible to go back to Baoshen Sanren and ask for her help once more?”

His core? The surgery- Baoshen Sanren?
Oh.

Oh-

And Yue’s world b
                             U
                                  r
                                      N
                                         s

He’s assaulted with the most vivid shard of memory he’s had thus far. It’s complete in its wretchedness. The irritating power-plays of the QishanWen’s hanger-on Wang, the fierce burn of Zidian, the fear of, then for, Madame Yu. Wen Ning saving them. Jiang Cheng’s core being crushed. His once-home in tatters. It being all his fault. The transfer. Wen Qing’s understanding of loving a sibling more than living. Their lie.

Wei Wuxian had died with that secret and Yue isn’t going to disrespect that. He can’t do that. 

“It can’t be fixed. Not the way this happened.” Jiang Cheng– sect leader Jiang– scowls.

“Who did this to you?”

“Wen-“

“Of course it’s a Wen-dog,” Jiang Cheng’s eyes narrow. He thinks back to Wen Qing and Wen Ning. It isn’t fair for them to be insulted for doing them a service. Yue cannot let them be insulted like this.

“Not all of those bearing the name Wen are evil. Be careful who you name a dog.”

Jiang Cheng levels him with a look.
“You’re talking weirdly. Get some sleep.”

And Yue finds himself alone.

Which is excellent, because he needs to get out of here. Whatever had been done to him, his body is healed. 

So, he’s a little sorry for imposing, but this is better for them. 

Carefully, he steps around the room, avoiding creaky boards with muscle memory that reminds him just how much Yue doesn’t belong here. 

This is Wei Wuxian’s body, Wei Wuxian’s home, Wei Wuxian’s family. Yue is just a pile of the sharpest shards and glittering dust left behind in the wake of his shattering. And at times like these he feels it deeply.

He’s so broken the spirits struggle to differentiate him from themselves. How can they possibly warp his mind if it doesn’t even look human enough to twist?

Shaking his head, he looks under the bed. There has to be something of value stashed there, right? Enough to purchase necessities and the like. Okay, luckily enough Wei Wuxian did have some foresight. There’s an entire bag of silvers just lying there. And another filled with talisman paper and cinnabar sticks. Yue ties them to his belt. 

Then he hears a floorboard creak in the hall. 

Fuck, he needs to move.

Yue tiptoes to the window and jumps out.

Just in time to see Chenqing coming hurtling towards him like an excited kid. He grabs it before it knocks his teeth out, of course, but still!

The flute vibrates in his hand, bordering on apologetic.

“Fine, I’ll forgive you,” Yue mutters. “But I don’t have to like that.”

The flute twitches. 

Yue snorts.

Then he buys the first mask he sees that isn’t ugly as hell (he needs to look the part of a demon, not be it) and gets on a boat with passage to Qinghe. 

(And by “gets on” he means “stows away” but that’s just semantics.)

Yue wanders about Qinghe for a while, startled by the sheer amount of porn the city boasts. It’s almost as bad as Lanling, and they have the excuse of Jin Guangshan. What do these people have to say?

But there is a lot of non-erotic art. And birds! A nigh-menagerie in the air. Beautiful furs, too. The markets bustle like there had never been any war at all. Yue finds himself glad for the civilians. Better they not find themselves trapped in the politics of cultivators. Who would want to be? Yue has rogue cultivator status of some sort and he exploits it to no end as he walks. It was so useful in battle too, to be able to look at a Jin and tell them how annoying they were being. 

He’s looking through a bunch of brightly painted fans with birds and bamboo when a voice catches his attention.

“Yue-xiong?”

Yue grins. He knows that voice!

“Ah, Mingjue-xiong! How are you?”

“Well, I had been… hoping to ask for you advice again,” Nie Mingjue smiles shyly. It’s a funny look on such a normally stern face, but Yue won’t comment on it. 

“I’d be honored,” he says instead.

Nie Mingjue leads Yue back to an office in his sect. There’s another cultivator in there doing paperwork of some kind. But before they can even speak further, the door slams open again.

“Wei-xiong disappeared again!” A younger man bursts into the room with a whine. 

“What?” Mingjue-xiong blinks. “Huisang, Yue,” he introduces briefly but then turns back to Huisang. “He’s gone? Again?!”

“I know! Wait- whatcha doing here anyway, Yue-ge?”

“Dropping by,” Yue shrugs. “Who is Wei Wuxian?”

“He is– was?– the ward of the Jiang clan and son of Baoshen Sanren’s disciple, Cangse Sanren. Smart kid, mischievous as hell as far as I remember.” Mingjue-xiong sighs. “He disappeared after The Massacre of Lotus Pier, and was never seen again. Most people assumed he was dead, and claimed Wen Chao threw his body into the Burial Mounds.”

“He was powerful, really powerful. Head disciple and a genius,” Nie Huisang says quietly. “And one of my best friends.”

Oh, fuck.

“So what happened just now?” Nie Mingjue frowns at his brother. Nie Huisang hides behind his fan, it’s a frivolous action, but from his vantage point, Yue can see it’s hiding welling tears.  He hates this. Maybe it would be better to let them know that Wei Wuxian can’t come back.

But that’s not true. Yue doesn’t know what will happen in the future. If he gets himself back, that would hurt them more. But even if he did… nothing could ever be the same.

“Jiang-xiong found him without a core and, like, a million internal injuries. But after he healed he stayed asleep for like, a week! And then as soon as he woke up he disappeared again!”

“I hope he’s okay. He seemed like a nice kid when I met him,” Nie Mingjue sighs.

“You’re four years older than us,” Nie Huisang deadpans. “Who are you calling a kid?”

“This is good news, isn’t it? Now they know he’s alive,” Nie Mingjue claps his hands together. Yue stares at Nie Mingjue.

“It… really isn’t,” he deadpans. Nie Huisang continues prattling on, but beneath his frivolous, gossipy tone is genuine concern.

“Somehow, the Wens stole his core. He didn’t know where he’d been for the entire campaign, and just… appeared on their doorstep with way too many internal injuries, a stolen artifact drained of spiritual energy, and a burnt teleportation talisman.”

“His- his core?! That’s… Yue-xiong, is that even possible?”

Well, he won’t lie to them.

“Cutting out a golden core? Yeah, it is. Why?”

“Have you seen him in any camps you raided?” Nie Mingjue continues. Ah, now Yue gets it. 

“No,” he says. 

“The Wens claimed they’d thrown him into the Burial Mounds,” Nie Mingjue murmurs. “Yue-xiong… nobody gets out of there alive. How would being coreless keep him alive in the Burial Mounds?”

He has to think about that. Then he recalls that bloody-mirror-shard that burns with flame and smeared with ashes and blood. Wen Qing’s books– Wen Qing’s books!

“It’s probably more of coreless-with-cultivator-meridians, really,” he decides. “Qi is typically classified as Yang, but there’s enough innate Yin that keeps a natural body functioning in equilibrium. Cultivators are only capable of deviation when they purposefully tip that balance and it becomes volatile. By returning his body to balance rapidly, a body would normally be at risk of qi deviation.”

Nie Huisang frowns.

“What about the core melting hand?”

“The shards of the core would shrivel the meridians back to those of a non-cultivator. It cripples, but doesn’t kill.” He remembers Wen Qing’s books clearly now, and her warning. “To cut out a core… it’s a fifty-fifty chance of immediate death because of the shock to your body.”

They pale.

“But how would that have caused him to survive?” A Nie cultivator that he’d forgotten was in the room– Nie Zonghui, if he’d have been allowed in here at all– speaks up.

“Well, considering he wasn’t a cultivator, the mounds would either been a tricky area to wade through but could be fixed with some cleansing method or an instant qi deviation, the core wouldn’t have weighed him down- it just wouldn’t have done him any favors either.”

“But the difference between him and a regular person would be that he still had wide meridians and whatever remained of cultivator muscles,” Nie Mingjue catches on. “Which would allow the resentful energy to flow through him but not harm him if he managed to channel it out. The only way he’d have managed to survive is minor Tu-Na alteration for Yin instead of Yang.” 

“Demonic cultivation,” Nie Zonghui frowns. “That’s not fair to complain about though. He wouldn’t have had a choice.”

“Have you ever been in the Burial Mounds, Yue-ge?”

“Yeah,” he says absently. “Strong resentful energy, and very few exits you can get through on foot. I think there’s one at the woods at the foot of Yiling. He might’ve injured himself finding it and then walked all the way back.”

“Wouldn’t he remember that?” Nie Zonghui frowns. “Seems like something he’d remember.”

“Not if it traumatized him,” Nie Huisang argues. “Wei-xiong doesn’t remember much of his childhood for that reason.”

So they really had been close. Yue winces.
“Or he he wouldn’t want to admit the Burial Mounds as the truth, or the steps he’d have needed to take to leave it,” Nie Mingjue points out.

“So there’s a baby demonic cultivator out there,” Nie Zonghui sighs. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Wei-xiong is a good person,” Nie Huisang insists. 

“I understand that… but I’m still unsure of letting him run wild. Shouldn’t we be concerned? Demonic cultivation warps the body and mind.” Nie Zonghui looks at him. “If done incorrectly,” he amends. He frowns at a document and puts it away.

“I’m going out to train,” he decides, and leaves. His exit is followed by an excited disciple’s entrance.

“S- sect leader!”

“Ah, yes?”

“Sect leader Lan has arrived to visit,” the disciple manages, out of breath. Nie Mingjue snorts.

“Xichen? What’s with the sudden courtesy? Let him in!”

“Da-ge,” the GusuLan sect leader greets gently, a warm smile that’s kinder than the genial one that normally rests there on his face. Nie Mingjue smiles back, equally soft.

“Xichen,” he greets. Nie Huisang waves.

“Er-ge!”

“Hello Huisang,” he turns to Yue. “Yueguang-jun.”

“Zewu-jun can call this one Yue,” he sighs. “The courtesy is appreciated but wholly unnecessary.”

“Then call me Xichen,” Lan Xichen decides. 

“Xichen it is.”

“How is Wangji?” Nie Mingjue asks. Lan Xichen’s face falls.

“About as well as you’d expect.”

“He’s head over heels for Wei-xiong and Wei-xiong wasn’t any better. Of course this sudden flash return is gonna upset him,” Nie Huisang sighs. “And he searched with Jiang-xiong so much too.”

Yue chokes.

Had he left behind a lover?!

Had he- no. He would definitely remember that. If he remembered Wei Wuxian’s brotherhood- but he hadn’t remembered everything. Is it-

“Were they lovers?” Yue finally asks.

“They could have been. I don’t know if they ever got that far. Wei-gongzi seemed determined to befriend my brother,” Lan Xichen muses. Nie Huisang laughs mournfully and shakes his head.

“He was obsessed with him, Yue-ge. It was ‘Lan er-gege this’ and ‘Lan Zhan that’ day in and day out. Wei-xiong’s oblivious when it comes to love; odds are he didn’t even notice he was obsessed!” Nie Mingjue frowns.

“Doesn’t that guy have a reputation as a serial flirt?”

“Yeah, a serial flirt. Not playboy!”

Yue feels like he should be a bit offended on his past-self’s behalf. But… yikes. Was he really that bad? Embarrassing.

“My brother’s composure even cracked. I thought it meant he’d finally made a friend,” Lan Xichen sighs. “Then I realized his ears were bright red.”

“Lan Wangji is capable of blushing?!”

“He’s human, Huisang,” Nie Mingjue scolds. But he’s hiding a laugh, so it’s obvious that it isn’t that offensive. But Yue is still stuck on this. It doesn’t add up with everything the people were saying about Wei Wuxian.

Jiang-guniang, who called him A’Xian, saw him as a sweet and mischievous brother.

Sect leader Jiang, who called him Wei Wuxian, seemed to see him as a troublemaking but loyal and good big brother.

Those at Lotus Pier who called him Wei-gongzi saw him as the friendly young master-ward of the YunmengJiang. A flirt but a helpful and playful boy.

The Wens saw in him a comrade, kind but goofy.

Where on earth does this desperate-to-be-noticed loverboy fit in with that?! Even the passing Jins, Yaos, Qins, Ouyangs, hell– Nies!

All of them spoke of a powerful genius but with mischief in his blood and a silver tongue. 
Yue is positively certain that this couldn’t have been him– Wei Wuxian, it couldn’t have been Wei Wuxian.

(Odd, it’s normally hard to put the ideas of Yue and Wei Wuxian together, but right now it’s almost difficult to separate them. Is it this? This way he’s falling into mischief and science and feasting? The way he’s doing something that feels natural enough to transcend his second lifetime as the shattered remains?)

“And… Wei Wuxian… he never… he never noticed? He never realized that it was more than friendly affection? A challenge to befriend?”

“Wei-xiong has like… this weird thing where he doesn’t ever realize how much people care about him,” Nie Huisang says softly. “That guy was always one to throw himself in the line of fire because it just… made sense to him. Like he didn’t matter as much.” The sect leaders in the room turn to Nie Huisang, confused. 

“What do you mean?”

“If disciples got scolded at Lotus Pier, Wei-xiong always made sure that he was the one who took the fall and the punishment. It’s just… who he is.”

It’s a sharp stab of guilt and for a moment he wants to pull off the mask and hold this guy to his chest and promise that he’s okay. But he isn’t really Wei Wuxian. 

He doesn’t think that’s his right.

“Yue-ge… distract me. Tell me about your adventures!”

“I don’t recall very much,” Yue admits. He can’t… he can’t tell Huisang everything. But he can tell him some things. It hurts him for the people who clearly meant so much to feel so left behind.

“Oh?”

“I was thrown in the Burial Mounds,” Yue whispers. “I don’t know what happened to me but my memories are… splinters? Shards? They’re rarely more than flashes.”

They’re all watching him, worried.

“I was there… I was there for a very long time. I only managed to escape when my memories were gone.”

“But Wei-xiong… Wei-xiong must have had his memories! Or how would he have gotten back?”

“Wei Wuxian must have focused more on getting out than surviving,” Nie Mingjue frowns. “Maybe there were subtle differences.”

“Is that truly all it would take?” Lan Xichen pales. 

“Maybe,” Yue decides. “It doesn’t sound impossible to believe.”

“I see…” Lan Xichen buries his head in his hands. “Oh, Wangji,” he whispers. “I don’t know what to do for you.”

“You’re a good elder brother,” Yue says in the suddenly quiet room. “It is good, to want to do everything you can for them.”

“Did you have a brother?”

“I think I did. A younger one, maybe. And I’d have given him the world.”

“Yep, you’re definitely an elder brother,” Nie Mingjue laughs. And just like that the room brightens. 

“Da-geeeeee!” Nie Huisang huffs. “I would burn the world just the same!”

“I’m sure Wangji would as well,” Lan Xichen agrees. But he’s smiling in a way that says he’s definitely of the opinion that Yue was an elder brother.

Well. He’s pretty sure he was an elder brother. So… a point to them, he supposes? 

But there’s a slightly more pressing matter.

How the hell had he never realized he was in a relationship?! Was it a relationship? What do you even call that? “More than friends but not quite lovers”? Idiots? Pining? “It’s complicated”? Semi-lovers? Halfway to a relationship? And why was everyone around them so certain of it before the people who were supposedly in love knew about it?!

Aren’t there a few steps missing from that equation?!

He frowns slightly at the floor, even if they can’t see it.

Damn it, Yue might not be Wei Wuxian anymore but he’s still embarrassed by that. What on earth?!

How is he supposed to talk to Lan Wangji is his past self was– unbeknownst to him but sure as hell known by everyone else– was in love with him?!

Chapter Text

The dreams he has that night are vivid, of a man who looks more like a slice of heaven than a human, shattering pottery, the playful clash of blades, and laughter.

Wei Wuxian seems to be rising to the surface when it comes to Lan Wangji, unable to resist the man’s pull. And Yue finds himself dragged along for the ride. Of course, fate laughs at his attempts otherwise. Like now.

Why can’t he seem to escape Lan er-gongzi? He’s sitting at a table, a teapot full of wine in front of him. Yue suppresses a wince. He can smell an herbal concoction in there.

Lan Wangji has totally been drugged. At least he’s unconscious?

Lan Zhan has pretty eyelashes.

Yue leans in, looking.

“Has your eyesight gone bad Yue-xiong?”

Yue falls over.

“Mingju- achk- ow!”

“What’s going on?”

“He’s drugged and in the room I’m staying in,” Yue mutters. “I’d like to know the same thing.”

“Just call it your room,” Mingjue-xiong sighs. “What do you mean drugged?”

“Smell this. I can’t tell if it’s an herbal tea covering the smell of the wine or he honestly just wasn’t paying attention and was slammed by two at once,” Yue says, lifting the pot. Nie Mingjue takes it, eyes darkening for a moment.

“Lans don’t drink. Their tolerance is…” He shudders, lost in a memory. Yue decides not to ask exactly what a drunk Lan Xichen entailed. Lans are made of inhibitions and alcohol destroys them. They’d be so unrestrained and wild…

“I’ll put him in bed,” Yue says, dragging Lan Wangji over and tucking him in. With a care he didn’t know he possessed, he places Lan Zhan’s hands on his chest and tucks him in.

He leans in and looks at him again.

He’s beautiful. And not in some pretty way the way he’s throw that word at a dress or a painting.

He’s beautiful in a majestic, breathtaking sort of way. Like a view from the highest mountain or of the rarest flower that blooms only once in a thousand years.

“When did Lan er-gongzi even get here?”

“Huisang volunteered QingheNie for a sect conference. Mainly about the Wen remnants and politicking. And finding the missing Wei Wuxian. The Jins took the remaining cultivators under their watch.”

“An obvious jockey for power after their unimpressive performance in the campaign,” Nie Zonghui says, tone derisive. He nods, letting resentful energy build around him as a slight warning. Three spying disciples yelp and run off.

“And I trust the DafanWens and other civilians are to be left alone?”

“Nobody even knows where they are. The only people left are cultivators. And besides, the only known DafanWens are Wen Qing and Wen Ning, who apparently aided the Jiangs and aren’t a threat,” Nie Huisang pats his back. When had he even gotten there? “Nicely done!”

“I know this might be overstepping but considering LanlingJin’s track record of power jockeying… maybe QingheNie should keep an eye on those records? YunmengJiang and GusuLan have rebuilding on their hands, and YunmengJiang are looking for a missing clan member.”

(A part of himself revolts at being called a clan member. Apparently, Wei Wuxian did not consider himself as much. And actively, bodily, rejected the notion. Yue knows he needs to stop, at best, talking about himself in the this person. Of course, he’s at his worst like the disaster creature he is and is considering them separate identities.)

“Huisang, you’re good with paperwork,” Nie Zonghui smirks. “It’s good sect leader training as heir.”

“No,” Nie Huisang whines.

“I won’t bug you about saber practice for a week if you take this up,” Nie Mingjue offers. And just like that Nie Huisang changes his tune, blinking innocently.

“How many records are we keeping, Da-ge?”

Nie Zonghui leads him off, deep in conversation. And Yue turns to Nie Mingjue, who is staring at him with an intensity he doesn’t recognize.

For a moment, Yue thought Nie Mingjue was going to lean in and kiss him. But Nie Mingjue just pats his shoulder and laughs.

“Good night, Yue.”

Yue nods slowly, mind stuttering. He doesn’t think of Nie Mingjue like that. It was the odd intensity in his eyes that did it.

He’s hit with a memory of Lan Wangji- Lan Zhan. Lan Zhan looking at him with equal intensity. Nie Mingjue looks nothing like Lan Wangji, and he has to admit– sorry to his friend– that Lan Wangji is much more attractive. Nie Mingjue’s eyes are typically intense, but Lan Zhan’s burning intensity always seemed to double when focused on him.

And that night, he dreams.

There’s a shadow outside, and he knows it’s raining. He’s digging in a chest to pick out a pair of robes but there’s someone soaking wet outside.

Rising to his feet, Wei Wuxian crosses the room and opens the door. Standing there, soaking wet, is Lan Zhan.

He looks at Wei Wuxian with those dark, endless eyes and smiles. For a moment, neither of them move.

“Hey,” Wei Wuxian breathes.

“Hey.”

Lan Zhan wraps his arms around him.

“Aiyah, Lan er-gege, I’m dressing! And you’re soaking wet!”

Lan Zhan huffs a gentle laugh.

“Allow me,” he murmurs into Wei Wuxian’s neck. With a gentle hand, he ties his hair back.

Wei Wuxian shudders.

His robe is slipping from his shoulder and Lan Zhan wastes no time in leaning forward to press a kiss to his shoulder.

Leaning back, he catches the trailing end of his Lan forehead ribbon in his mouth.

Lan Zhan looks up and smirks, just slightly.

Oh, so that’s how they’re going to play it?

Gently, Wei Wuxian bites the metal part of Lan Zhan’s forehead ribbon. Lan Zhan looks up at him, eyes wide.

Then he stands to look at him, and the ribbon pulls loose, dangling from Wei Wuxian’s mouth.

Neither of them move for a moment, and then Lan Zhan dives in, taking his lips, the silver passing from Wei Wuxian’s lips to his own.

Well, two can play this game.

He grabs Lan Zhan by the chin, hearing his breath stutter and break into tiny gasping moans as he presses kisses to his Adam’s apple. The ribbon falls to the ground and Wei Wuxian cups Lan Zhan’s face in his hands and devours him .

He wakes that morning covered in sweat. Grimacing, he heads to the next day of conferences, which he’d been needed for. At least, according to Mingjue-xiong. He makes it to the main halls unseen before anyone speaks to him.

“Yueguang-jun?”

Lan Wangji. It’s Lan Zhan. Fuck.

Okay, double fuck.

He’s blushing.

“Hanguang-jun,” he manages.

“Your… neck?”

“It’s- it’s just hot out! Don’t worry!”

“Mn.”

Great, he’s a disaster. An absolute disaster. Wei Wuxian had a silver tongue and it died with him. Just bury him here.

Please.

He stands there. Lan Zhan stands there. They stand there together for an uncomfortably long period of silence before the Nie brothers and Nie Zonghui come over.

Yue could have cried with relief.

“I keep hearing people speculating Wei-xiong’s involvement in the Sunshot Campaign,” Nie Huisang is saying to Nie Mingjue.

“And I’m sure you’ve already found the most accurate gossip, haven’t you?” Nie Mingjue has an impressive raised eyebrow of doom, Yue must admit.

“Well, he saved the Jiangs, that’s known,” Nie Zonghui says. “But after that the campaign continued for five months and he only appeared a month after the campaign. That’s six months unaccounted for. So where was he?”

“Yue-ge, you said you didn’t see him anywhere in any of the camps you destroyed or took unwilling Wens from, right?” Nie Huisang clutches his fan nervously. “I want to know where my best friend is.”

“Nobody survives six whole months of real torture,” Nie Mingjue agrees. “The doctors said the toll on his body was five. At least it was according to the Nie doctors we sent.” Yue blinks.

“QingheNie sent doctors?”

“Every sect did. Wei Wuxian is the ward of the Jiang clan and he saved the lives, and according to sect leader Jiang, the cores of their heirs, that’s a huge contribution,” Nie Mingjue frowns. “But those five months… where was he for the other one?”

“Well, Wei-xiong doesn’t remember-“

“And what are the odds he was playing dumb? If he was tortured and dropped into the Burial Mounds like the Wens said he was, Yue said it would take him months to get out on foot. It probably took another to get back to Yunmeng,” Nie Zonghui argues. “Weren’t there those mysterious disappearances of Wen soldiers who were stabbed to death in Yunmeng? He did remember enough to fight, even without a core. It’s impressive.”

Those were probably the work of the DafanWen– well, YunmengWei, he guesses– but Yue can’t expose their location. Instead of answering, like they clearly don’t expect him to, he looks around the room. Like a lodestone, his eyes are drawn to Lan Zhan. Poor Hanguang-jun is being absolutely hounded.

“Wei Wuxian was a scoundrel,” a man in Jin colors is saying to Lan Wangji as they get close to Jiang Cheng. Lan Zhan immediately turns to his brother and asks like the man isn’t there.

“How is the search for your brother?”

Your brother, he says. Not Wei Ying. Jiang Cheng is filling him in and it’s becoming rapidly clear to the man that Wei Wuxian was in high esteem, ranking as highly as a clan member.

(A vivid flash of a woman– Madam Yu– calling him a servant and sect leader Jiang– Uncle Jiang– arguing against that. They never quite said what he was, but it wasn’t a clan member and it wasn’t a servant. A conundrum.)

But the man in Jin colors is looking more and more uncomfortable every second and then Lan Zhan starts talking up how strong Wei Wuxian was even without a sword. Like killing a Xuanwu of Slaughter, to which sect leader Jiang, realizing what he’s doing, says that Wei Wuxian didn’t even take credit and said it was Lan Wangji.

As nice as the compliments are, they’re not really for him, for things he remembers. But the man turns tail and flees pretty quickly after that. And if Yue isn’t mistaken, he sees Lan Zhan’s lip curl in the tiniest of smirks.

He shares a gleeful look with Nie Huisang.

That secret petty bitch! He’s a god and Yue wants to worship the ground he walks on.

And as things are, the way Jiang Cheng is tied so tightly to his heart, Yue has no choice but to accept that Jiang Cheng is his brother. And as his brother, seeing him like this really hurts.

Jiang Cheng looks more tired than usual, eyes sad. He’s mourning his parents and he’s missing (someone who promised! He promised to be) his right-hand man.

Wei Wuxi- Yue. Yue’s heart hurts to see it.

He wonders for a moment why he isn’t glad to have Wei Wuxian coming back.

“Yueguang-jun.”

“Hanguang-jun.”

It’s awkward. Fuuuuck it’s awkward.

Yue had been avoiding speaking too much to avoid people making connections between him and Wei Wuxian. But this is unbearable!

He wants to sob. Someone, anyone , get him out of this! It can even be a Jin, just let him get out of this!

“Truly, Yueguang-jun and Hanguang-jun are different sides of a bland mirror,” a Jin cultivator attending the conference as a part of (who he thinks is called) Jin Zixun’s entourage says snidely, watching them stand side by side in barely-companionable silence. His golden robed companion snorts derisively.

“How could a filthy practitioner of cowardly demonic tricks possibly compare to a peerless Jade of GusuLan? How funny!”

A nearby Nie cultivator, in the middle of a conversation about braided hairstyles with a nearby Jin maid with a sweet face, whips her head around to face them with a scowl.

“Mind your words. Yueguang-jun won us a war and is good friends with sect leader Nie,” she snaps. “Do you want to make things difficult between the sects?” The Jins laugh at her. Never a good thing to do to a lady. You might just end up on the business end of her weapons. A vivid flash of Wen Qing and her needles pops into his mind.

“Oh, please! Who would dare trifle with the mighty LanlingJin? And over a small fry like me?”

“Dare?” The Nie cultivator’s eyebrows raise as her voice turns sharp. “That’s quite a bold word for you to use. Don’t hide behind your low position as an excuse to talk shit,” the Nie cultivator warns silkily. Her friend, seeing the commotion, joins the Nie cultivator. And she’s a Jiang too!

“I’m sure sect leader Jiang wouldn’t appreciate any shit from someone like you,” she sneers. “Yueguang-jun isn’t a clan member and contributed more than any of the Jin clan.” The Jins smirk smugly at her. The one with the uglier nose shakes his head superciliously.

“Hah! And what about Lianfeng-zun? He gave information and was the one to land the final blow?”

“Congrats, an illegitimate son did more than anyone else,” the Nie cultivator rolls her eyes.

“And isn’t that what Wei Wuxian was? A bastard,” the Jin with the uglier eyebrows comments with the air of someone who knows everything. In reality he just looks like an idiot.

“Wei Ying was the son of Wei Changze and Cangse Sanren,” Lan Zhan says with a glare so cold it could freeze a flame. “Do not attempt to sully his name with falsities about his parentage.”

“And even if he was a bastard, that’s no fault of his own,” the Jiang cultivator glares. “If anything, he would be more impressive for rising above his status and being fourth on the list of young masters!”

“That’s beside the point,” the Jin with the uglier nose snips. “And he won’t be there for much longer if  the rumors about him are true. And where was he during the Sunshot Campaign, huh?”

“Being tortured for saving sect leader Jiang and Lady Jiang,” the Nie rolls her eyes. “And after escaping, killing hordes of Wen soldiers in Yiling and Yunmeng. Everyone knows that.”

The funny thing is that she isn’t technically wrong. She’s just not completely right either.

“That doesn’t change the fact that only one member of the Jin was worthwhile in the campaign,” the Nie cultivator snickers.

“The Jin clan made many contributions,” the Jin with the uglier eyebrows boasts. “Right, Hanguang-jun?”

Everyone is watching them. Hanguang-jun and Yueguang-jun? Conversing with Jin, Nie, and Jiang disciples? What a show of unity! How surprising that a Jade of GusuLan is even in a conversation at all! And Yueguang-jun? He’s there too?

They’re not particularly subtle in their eavesdropping. Or whispering.

“Mn,” Lan Zhan hums. It’s actually quite noncommittal sounding, but the Jin takes it as a confirmation. Well, Yue might just help them. Just a bit.

“Jin Zixuan was a great general for one with little experience,” Yue comments. “I commend his choice in mentor, as well.”

“Men…tor?”

“When unsure, he asked sect leader Nie and Xiongzhang for advice,” Lan Zhan explains.

“It is admirable to be humble and seek wisdom from a more experienced cultivator when in a position of power,” the Jiang cultivator nods seriously. The Nie cultivator grins at her. But the Jins look offended.

“He did more than just ask for help!”

“Wasn’t there that uh… soup drama?” The Nie cultivator asks, dripping in faux-innocence. The Jins glare at her.

“Let’s ignore that for now,” the Jiang cultivator whispers. The Jins are turning a curious shade of reddish-purple.

“Okay, but that does make two, you must admit,” Yue says. “What about the foot soldiers the Jin sent?”

“What foot soldiers? They sent an eighth of the Jiang contingent,” the Nie cultivator frowns, shooting her friend a wary glance. “You know, the sect that had been massacred and lost over half of their cultivators?”

Something in Lan Zhan’s face is pained and it seems that only Yue’s noticed. Oh. He misses Wei Wuxian. His heart clenches.

A part of him misses Lan Zhan too.

“Anyway, I have to ask, where is your sword?”

The Jin cultivator with the uglier eyebrows is watching him with the smugness of a cat watching prey. Not a new question. Or one that bothers him.

“I’m not a cultivator of the sword path,” he states simply. “I don’t have one.”

“Hah! You can’t be that powerful without a sword! What’s next, no core?!”

“Uh… shige… that’s Yueguang-jun… I don’t think he needs one. He’s not a human.”

The Jin cultivator with the uglier eyebrows pales to the color of a Lan robe.

It’s getting very hard for Yue not to laugh.

Unfortunately for him, a giggle escapes and turns to full-blown laughter.

The eavesdropping crowd stares.

And Lan Wangji looks at him with eyes that brim with a million painful questions.

“Wei Ying?” His voice is dropped to a whisper. A whispered, hopeful prayer.

Yue’s heart hurts.

Still, he doesn’t answer.

“I’m not technically sure what I am,” Yue says. “But I was human once.” The Nie cultivator gasps.

“Are you an immortal?” The Jins laugh at that. The one with the uglier nose sighs.

“Stupid! Immortals still have cores!”

“I’m sorta treading the line of dead and alive at the moment so take that immortal and make it ‘questionable killability status’,” Yue says. “I think I’m still human? Question mark?”

The Nie and Jiang cultivators burst into laughter while the Jins and Lan Zhan just look disturbed.

That disturbed face on Lan Zhan brings back a litany of fond memories. It seems Wei Wuxian’s memory is fighting to piece itself together. Yue doesn’t bother trying to fight his smile behind the mask.

Wei Wuxian wouldn’t mind living on as Yue, he thinks, if it meant being able to stay with people he cares about. A de-cored Wei Wuxian wouldn’t be able to. But Yue could.

“I’m supposed to be so disturbed by that, because you’re, like, saying you might be a fierce corpse but I’m just trying to picture an incorporeal ghost trying to pick up your flute or a clumsy fierce corpse trying to play it,” the Nie cultivator cackles. “It’s so dumb!”

“Hey, my fierce corpses aren’t clumsy!”

“All fierce corpses are clumsy. No exceptions,” she shakes her head.

It vaguely occurs to Yue that this could look like flirting. So he reigns in the Wei Wuxian a bit and turns back to the thing they have in common. Sciences!

“Well, it actually depends on how long the body’s been dead for. If it’s been less than two or more than thirty-six to forty-eight, depending on ambient temperature, rigor mortis would either not have set in yet or be done, meaning that all jerkiness has to do with with the inexperience managing limbs that aren’t your own.” Enough people have turned pale and returned to their own conversations. He’s finally being left alone, which is good. The staring and eavesdropping was getting to him. “You’d also be jerky in a non-stiff body if your arms and legs suddenly grew or shrank,” he adds defensively. Faintly green, the Jins leave. Lan Zhan stands next to him. Probably hoping for a clue to lead him to Wei Wuxian.

Well, sorry, Lan Zhan, but it’s science time!

(He’s also incredibly aware of how close Lan Zhan is to him and if he tilts his head just enough he’ll be leaning on him- lop that thought off at the kneeeeeeeees.)

“Then what about the weird open mouths and chewing?

“Uh… Liyin-jie, doesn’t rigor mortis start in the face?” The Jiang whispers. Wei Wuxian nods. She probably knows a fair bit from the talking of her lovely brilliant da-shixion- stop. Right. There.

“You’re oversimplying it, aren’t you?” The Nie cultivator accuses. Yue shrugs.

“Well, yeah. There’s also where qi and resentment end up, whether the person was a cultivator or not, those factors slow rigor mortis and making the muscles more powerful, and then there’s natural bloating after death,” he says. “Depending on when the fierce corpse rises, resentful energy will preserve it in that state.”

“So if it rose just after dying-“

“It can’t really do that,” Yue interrupts. “It needs to lose all of its spiritual cognition. Otherwise you can theoretically just bring back the person as a corpse. Normally it’s he cognition ends up in the ghost, but that needs time to separate. Otherwise you need to subdue the ghost.”

“That’s what you did,” Lan Zhan points out. He means raising after killing, but he’s also right on the ghost-subduing part. The Jiang cultivator is as curious as Wei Wuxian was. He must have trained her well.

“Oh! So by forcing the ghost back into the cycle and leeching resentment, you gain full control of their body, like a puppet!”

“You don’t force it into the cycle. Quite the opposite, really,” Yue says darkly. “Subduing the ghost means pushing the spiritual cognition all the way underneath the resentment and using that and the qi to power the body. There’s more power in it that way. The person can leave if the corpse is destroyed, though.”

“That’s- you’re trapping them in their own bodies!” The Jiang cultivator stumbles back, horrified. All eyes turn back to them, eager to see the show, like a carriage crash in motion. Lan Zhan is looking at him with complete disgust.

His heart tears to see it. This isn’t the annoyance of their Cloud Recesses days. This is disgust for a sinner that desecrates the dead and ties them to this world against natural order. (Like that’s not what cultivation technically is, going against the natural order.)

“It’s called demonic for a reason,” Yue sighs. “That’s why I prefer raising long-dead corpses. Means there’s nothing left but the anger and resentment from their lives. Souls leave all their troubles in their earthly body to rejoin the reincarnation cycle, after all.”

“Shockingly moral, for a demonic cultivator,” the Nie cultivator says softly. Like she’s thinking about something very different but far too similar.

Yue tries to ignore it the way he ignores the pang in his chest as Lan Zhan leaves with a cold swish of his robes. Yue walks the other direction, and the crowd parts for him nervously.

Being Yue has its own downsides too.

Chapter Text

He steps into the night air and finds that it’s suddenly easier to breathe.

Qinghe weather is always extreme, but the nights are beautiful. It’s not terribly surprising that the QingheNie are not doing very much in the way of landscaping under Nie Mingjue. But Nie Huisang gets his way enough for a few explosions of color.

The garden is quiet, the gentle trickling of a fountain making all the noise there. He steps closer to inspect a bright blue flower with petals that remind him of butterfly wings.

“O- oh, Yueguang-jun?”

His head snaps up.

Shijie. It’s Shijie.

Yue shouldn’t fight the memories of her. They’re still quite scattered, but they’re piercing back together. It’s actually quite painful, but he’s going to pretend his head isn’t splitting into to two and housing an identity separate from that of a dead man.

Yue… Yue isn’t Wei Wuxian. He doesn’t have the same personality, or even the same convictions. He has some pieces of memory and the same face. How are they the same?

“Jiang-guniang,” he greets and it feels wrongwrongwrong in his mouth. There’s something in her eyes that breeds a startling sense of hiraeth in him. They don’t have the same sort of warmth and seeing them directed at him like a stranger is a maddening, unwanted ache. Misery pools in the part of him that Wei Wuxian dwells in.

Wei Wuxian feels more like the memory now. You know! Just another exhausting episode of his life. Wei Ying is not a remembered part of it, really. Just flashes of a time with donkeys and dogs and scraps and sleeping in the cold, dirty, city. That’s what it was, to Wei Wuxian. Is that what Wei Wuxian is to become to Yue? A part of him not visited but that shaped him.

The only difference is that whoever Wei Ying had left behind hadn’t really been there when he was Wei Wuxian. But Yue has to see all the people Wei Wuxian had left behind.

But it’s not… is it really him?

Yue only had slices of memory for on his time as Wei Ying, but they did not cut when he picked them up. Wei Wuxian had splintered and shattered and the shards had made him bleed .

There is a weird helplessness that he feels when it comes to the people that meant something to Wei Wuxian. His fear of dogs– oh, that still makes him tremble– stayed an instinct. His need to reach out to these particular people is one that stays too. His stomach twists at the jarring absence of the tenderness that is reserved for Wei Wuxian. But Yue is not Wei Wuxian any more than Wei Wuxian was Wei Ying. It’s complicated as much as it isn’t. The shards are there, and there’s undoubtedly more of them, but he can’t be Wei Wuxian. When it’s a whole… person, a whole being, you can’t be only parts of it. Yue is too different from Wei Wuxian. (And fuck, he needs to stop referring to Wei Wuxian like he’s just a random dead man who he happens to be inhabiting the body of. There’s plenty of Wei Wuxian (the pieces of the memory that aren’t ground to dust have left more of him than the face of a dead man and  plenty of grieving people ) left in him. Too much for that to feel like an apt comparison.)

“The moonlight is lovely tonight,” Shijie finally says in weak attempt at conversation.

“It is,” he says. “But why do you look so… excuse me. It’s not my place to ask.”

He’s suddenly, painfully reminded of the distance that being Yue instead of Wei Wuxian demands. She smiles at him softly, always kind. 

“You’re asking why I look sad, aren’t you?”

“I will not lie to you, I was,” he admits to her.

“I can tell you. Sect leader Jin has been trying to pressure my brother into marrying me to his heir. And Jin Zixuan is a sweet guy–“ Wei Wuxian’s memory says otherwise but maybe she saw something in him that he hadn’t– “but we’re still looking for my brother. And he has… he has eyes a silver like the moon.”

“Oh,” he whispers.

He’s hit with an icy pang of utter loneliness. He’s lost his family two times. Last time it had been him who was grieving, lost. Now it’s them. Fate turns in cruel, cruel circles. Yue doesn’t want to submit to them. There’s a now-familiar wave of temptation to yank the mask from his face and expose himself to her.

He’s wanted to do it for Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan. And-

Fuck, doesn’t that open a floodgate? How can it not when he thinks about Lan Zhan.

Bewitching, brilliant Lan Zhan. Alluring, dizzying Lan Zhan. Stunning, agonizing Lan Zhan.

Who happens to have joined them in their party escaping. He can see the man through the leaves of a bush before his brother comes and takes him by the arm.

Yue finds himself hungrily taking in his image like a man starving.

Bitterly, he wonders what it is about this man to make Wei Wuxian flutter in Yue’s body. Hadn’t his romance been ended before it could blossom? Cut the flower before it blooms, but the stem steadfastly grows.

Being shattered and left to be a remnant of the past should have made the stem grow with languor, if not at all, but it seems his distance has left a growing bud.

Jiang Cheng is standing there, arms akimbo.

“What are you trying to do to my sister?” His voice is a growl and a part of Wei Wuxian shines with pride.

Good of him, to protect her in his absence.

Yue shakes his head slightly, refusing to stay in his daze.

“I apologize if I wasn’t supposed to speak to Jiang-guniang, I was not aware,” Yue says, bowing slightly to the irate sect leader who looks four seconds away from punching him despite the possible political repercussions and the fact that Yue is, you know, a demonic cultivator.

“A’Jie,” he asks softly. “Did he make you sad?”

“Oh, no,” Shijie says sadly. “I’m just… talking about A’Xian.”

“Oh.”

Jiang Cheng’s face crumbles as he says it. It’s a soft, punched-out sound. And it hurts terribly to hear.

“Yueguang-jun,” Shijie says, voice brimming with the hope that never seems to leave her. “Do you think… you’d be able to help us? The Nie sect has shared suspicions from conversations they’d had with you… do you think you’d be able to… well I know this sounds silly but… if you see anyone who has seen him… oh would you send them to Yunmeng?”

It’s a leftover instinct from a time spent traipsing creaky wooden floorboards, but Yue can’t refuse this woman anything.

“Yeah,” he says, throat dry. “I will.”

The smile she sends him is warm in the way coming home is, but it’s burdened with a terrible pain that Yue longs to soothe.

“What… was Wei Wuxian like?”

It’s weird to say it in the past tense, but Jiang Cheng and Shijie– his siblings– flinch. They don’t correct him, though.

“An idiot,” Jiang Cheng says bluntly. “But he was a damn brilliant idiot. Creative and talented in ways nobody could ever hope to reach.” His voice gets a little rougher. “He always threw himself into danger if it meant that someone else would be spared. If you see him… if you see him, tell him to get his ass home.”

Yue suddenly, desperately wishes he could be Wei Wuxian and remain Yueguang-jun. He doesn’t want to leave these people in the past.

He also knows it’s impossible.

Yue feels the distinct need of a drink when he finds his two fellow big brothers in the hall outside the room he’s staying. (There’s something that feels terribly off about calling the room his. So he doesn’t.) They seemed to both have been headed there and run into each other by accident.

“Da-ge,” Lan Xichen says gently to their shared friend. “Was tonight also terrible for you?”

“Ugh, yes! And do you want to know who is responsible?” Nie Mingjue sends him a spectacularly ferocious glare. “What the fuck, Yue-xiong!”

“They asked,” Yue shrugs. “It’s not like I don’t let them go once I’m done, anyway. It’s a one-way ticket to the cycle after that.”

“Trapping spirits in bodies aside – which, what the fuck, I shouldn’t even have had to ever say– you did absolutely nothing to dispel the panic. So who had to fix it? The host, me,” Nie Mingjue snaps. “YunmengJiang is too busy moping and GusuLan is trying to reel their heir in from disappearing to find his… whatever the fuck. Boyfriend? Lover? Fuck, they could be husbands. Wangji does strike me as the eloping type-“

“ Jue-ge! ” Lan Xichen looks horrified and it’s enough to make him drop the formalities. Needless to say, Nie Mingjue is probably intensely drunk. And that makes all of this so much funnier. Yue is laughing so hard he can’t breathe.

“But the Jins and minor sects? The Jins are already going to be scheming something now. And it’s not good. And also! If I have to hear another word from that Yao guy, I will have no issues annexing a clan and starting a war for the sole purpose of making him shut the fuck up. And Ouyang is only minorly better but that because he’s in new-papa mode and I swear if I hear one more comment about me getting my own… gross… “little ‘uns” I will vomit on him like a fucking “little ‘un” without an ounce of shame. I will! Try me bitch!”

Yue wheeeeeeezes.

“How drunk is he?”

“They emptied an entire storehouse in a drinking competition designed to make the minor sects and Jin sect calm down.” Lan Xichen winches. “At least he’s not out there with drunken antics? The Jins would… well I don’t know what they’d do but given the way I’ve heard Da-ge complain it wouldn’t be good.”

That’s probably against a Lan rule, but also probably true.

“Don’t get me started on those fuckers!” Nie Mingjue hollers. “Ugly unflattering vomit colored clothing that I have to listen to A’Sang make fun of is fine. But that attitude? Take that gold pedestal you put yourselves on and shove up your asses! You know what?! I’m gonna tell them that!”

“Do not!”

Lan Xichen finally decides to just knock Nie Mingjue unconscious and drag him inside.

“You said your night wasn’t good too,” Yue says quietly as they’re tucking Nie Mingjue into the bed on his side. “What’s wrong?”

“He wasn’t wrong about our sect trying to keep an eye on Wangji,” Lan Xichen whispers. “He had a very intimate relationship with Wei Wuxian.”

“Right. Uh, not-quite-something-but-definitely- something with Wei Wuxian ,” he recalls. “Is he okay?”

“No. Especially since…” Lan Xichen trails off. Yue cocks his head.

“Since?”

“Wangji confessed,” Lan Xichen admits. “He confessed to Wei Wuxian the very last time they spoke but Wei Wuxian was unable to answer. And he hasn’t seen Wei-gongzi since. The Wens massacred Lotus Pier and Wei Wuxian was declared missing.”

“It must be painful,” Yue says quietly, the words punching his chest in. “To have everything left on an unanswered question.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Lan Xichen says, something almost defeated in his voice. “But it must be. And I can’t do anything about it.”

“That must be what hurts you, though,” Yue points out. Lan Xichen shakes his head.

“It is. And it’s so selfish of me to even be hurt by it. It’s undisciplined of me.”

“It’s not,” Yue insists. “You’re hurting because someone you love is in pain and you can’t do anything about it.”

Lan Xichen looks at him with eyes more vulnerable than he’s ever seen on the First Jade of Lan, the honorable Zewu-jun’s face.

“It’s like watching a disaster in motion. You’re powerless to stop and you know how the story ends just by seeing where it’s going.”

There is something terribly raw in his voice. An old wound, Yue thinks. He doesn’t bring it up.

He hates all of the grief that has been left behind.

“If Wei Wuxian isn’t dead… well I don’t think he plans to return either,” Yue says. And when he puts the words into the air, he knows they’re true. Coming back isn’t simple. “Unless he wants to turn to full-on demonic cultivation, and I certainly don’t need anyone out there thinking I’m taking on disciples, he’ll have to live out his life seeing what he lost so viciously rubbed in his face. Can you imagine suddenly becoming powerless among your peers?”

“No,” Lan Xichen breathes, eyes widening in horror. “I can’t.”

Yue only sighs.

“I’m sure… I’m sure if someone could offer him a nice, broad road to walk on, to come back on… I’m sure he’d have taken it. A body only forms a core once. Trying to restart it could shatter a soul,” he murmurs. It’s as much a reminder to himself as it is an answer to sect leader Lan. Of course, cultivation discussion tends to be interesting and devoid of personal feelings about anything other than methods. A welcome distraction. If not for the reason that keeps them mired in their miserable state.

“Oh really? Why?”

“A core is technically an organ, but it’s tied with a part of the spirit. Sort of like an “extra piece” that forms when the rest of it is forming as a baby and exists as a halfway between spiritual and physical. That’s what forms the core. If it doesn’t exist, attempting to form a core will take a less-available piece of the spirit, and any damage to a soul can… well…”

“Completely destroy it,” Lan Xichen finishes, pale. “So Wei-gongzi… he’s probably gone forever.”

“He probably is,” Yue says. Knowing fully well that he isn’t. He’s just… not exactly a whole person anymore.

Bidding Lan Xichen goodnight, Yue finally finds himself just alone enough to cry.

The next morning, Yue steals a set of female robes from the halls, slips into the darkness and leaves. It’s better to have a backup plan.

Because now people are going to be hunting for Yue too.

The remnants of Wei Wuxian protest at the separation and it makes Yue wonder a little if Wei Ying had protested Wei Wuxian disappearing from the streets. Ah, probably not.

Why would he, when where he was going was better? Yue doesn’t know if it’s better or worse where he’s going.

It just can’t be here. It can’t be here where the past is alive and it tugs so harshly on the ghost of the person that lived there?

“So where are you going, Yue-ge?”

“Nie-gongzi,” he greets.

“Call me Huisang,” his once-upon-a-time friend says flippantly. “Now, more important matters: where are you going?”

Nie Huisang is many things. Goofy, a bad at studying weakling who loves porn, but obsessive over his interests. And Nie Huisang is a master of two things, people and art. He’s sharp. He’s cunning, and Yue knows he suspects him of being Wei Wuxian. He’s a scheming shit-stirrer.

“To look for Wei Wuxian,” he lies. It stops the scheming in its tracks, he knows. “Mingjue-xiong was complaining about being unable to work with the YunmengJiang or GusuLan because of his disappearance?”

Nie-xiong remains suspicious, he knows. Wei Wuxian would play his game of spinning rings around each other. Yue can’t right now. He’s suffocated in the ghosts of a past he can barely consider his own.

“So why are you looking for him now?”

“I’m bored,” Yue says flatly. If Wei Wuxian could play at a constantly happy, careless fool. Yue could do something similar.

“I’m coming with you,” Nie Huisang demands. And Yue isn’t stupid.

“Your brother will kill me,” he refuses. But his old friend is not deterred.

“Wei Wuxian is my best friend,” Nie-xiong says firmly. “I want to help.”

“Tell me about him then,” Yue offers. It’s practically placating, and they both know it.

“He’s funny, and brilliant. But you probably already knew that. Wei-xiong… he takes care of people. A protector. Wildly creative, comes up with new talisman ideas and stuff all the time.”

“So look for any newly successful places,” he deduces. It’s actually only half of what to think. If he actually were searching he’d look for a new cultivation tool. 

“Probably,” Nie Huisang says thoughtfully.

“Spread out your men, then.” Yue’s words make Huisang flick out his fan and assume the position of “incompetent wealthy idler” that he normally did when someone touched on him being sharp or clever. Part of being cunning is appearing unassuming. And cunning is Nie Huisang in a single word.

“Me? What men?”

Yue sighs, portraying body language of someone who isn’t buying it. Sorry, Nie-xiong, but Wei Wuxian knew you too well for that.

“Aren’t you the only Nie-gongzi of the main branch? You must have some degree of control,” he baits and Huisang takes it.

“I… yes. Okay.”

Yue nods and walks off. He needs to make a a few red herrings now and a bigger one for the bigger hook. How annoying. But that’s… fine enough, he supposes. There are some talisman ideas that the common people could use. Yue could appear in with hinting name and disappear again. Only to appear somewhere else with a completely random one. It’s risky, right after a conversation about this with Huisang. Even if it’s not completely the same thing, Huisang would take that route too.

Yue groans, taking off his mask to breathe in the dawn air. Why are so many choices in his life made because he didn’t actually have one?

He first appears in Gusu as Wu Ming with a clothes-washing talisman that even non-cultivators could easily activate. When he sees people catching the scent, he reappears in Langya as Wang Yuando, and gifts the farmers there a talisman for making the soil more fertile.

He dresses as a woman and makes his way to Yiling after that, as Lang Yingwu, and decides to work on something he’d actually been thinking about. A spirit lure. A rogue cultivator buys them and soon enough there’s a veritable swarm. Yue disappears quickly after that.

He spreads rumors to passing cultivators of other new developments from random geniuses. Men and women alike. A woman in Qishan with a binding talisman one day and a man in Lanling with a net talisman the next. Soon enough the rumors spread back, falsifying talismans even during Yue’s stay in Qinghe. Good.

Nie Huisang will suspect him again, but he’ll be alone in it. The other cultivators will be tracing “Wei Wuxian” and trying to figure out where he is next.

The course of a month, Yue has dodged a Nie trailing him far too many times to just be a coincidence. But right now, the ghosts are telling him he’s alone. So he unpins his hair and veils his face. The silver robes he wears are silky and airy, like a layer of the way-too-many Lan robes, not really fitting the Qinghe weather. He has no clue why it was in the Nie manor. Nevertheless, he twists his hair from the bun he’d begun using in war to a delicate braided piece.

“Wandering cultivator,” a man, very clearly a hired actor, greets him. “Do you have an invention to show to us?”

“Hah!” He plays up the spoiled mistress act, pitching his voice higher. “I, Wan Yuli, am the master’s favorite student! I would not be so unfilial as to give one of his works away and claim it my own like my ungrateful martial siblings!”

“Martial siblings? Master?” A Nie cultivator, probably one of Huisang’s, but clearly pretending to be night-hunting, comes forward. “I am from the QingheNie sect, guniang, and my sect leader would probably love to meet a creative cultivator. He is good friends with the fearsome Yueguang-jun, after all. What, pray tell, is your honorable master’s name?”

“Nobody knows master’s name,” she (he) snaps. “Master doesn’t deal in cultivation anyway,” she (he) sniffs. “He develops arrays and talismans and teaches us to do the same. Elegant and refined in the art of it.”

“Can you show us, guniang? If you are his head disciple…”

“Certainly,” she (he) sniffs. “I met master as a small child. Who couldn’t make a talisman if they’ve been learning how since the age of nine? Master said he was nine when he started too!”

Uncle Jiang did say that, and it sends a pang of loneliness through him.

Nie Huisang will want to know absolutely everything about this encounter, so she (he) says a few meaningless other praises for her (his) master. The people paid to catch the next “mystery inventor” are getting more impatient, and the real civilians more interested.

His eye catches a thin cut on one of the civilian’s hands.

“Who are you?”

“M- this one? This one is a farmer, guniang,” the farmer man bows lightly and she (he) stops him. Acts are acts but he’s not an asshole.

“And that cut?”

“I like to play the guzheng, guniang,” the old man says.

“I see.” Lan Zhan likes the guqin. But his hands… wouldn’t those precious, jade-like fingers be injured?

A disgrace.

When he gets the chance to have a proper whittling knife in his hand, he’s going to fix that. But now… the cover is the top priority.

Oh!

She (he) grins.

Chapter Text

She (he) has to make a model of the man’s hand with river clay, which nearly dirties the silvery dress until a lady from town offers her (him) a spare rough one to dirty, telling her (him) that her (his) beautiful robes shouldn’t see such labor. Then she (he) demands a pile of wood and a carving knife.

It’s so weird whenever he has to pretend to be a she. Frankly, it’s a bit annoying to find himself constantly correcting people in his head.

Unwilling to interfere with their mission of watching the apparent rise of inventions and mysterious inventors who appear and disappear as if into nothingness, the cultivators spying on her (him) don’t say anything. While she (he) could make anything to fit Lan Zhan from memory, this man is old and his fingers are hobbled.

So when she (he) makes a shape to pick the string the way a fingerpad could, it takes a lot of fine-tuning. It looks almost like a claw, but so be it. The discarded ones pile outside of the hut they gave “Wan-guniang” to work in. Children are beginning to play with the discards, pretending to be beasts with powerful claws. It’s adorable.

But the thing is, she (he) doesn’t want something that anyone but this old man could use. And for that, she (he) needs to make a personal medical talisman. Wen Qing’s books had enough information on those for him to have a general idea how they work.

His brain has stubbornly retained the information from Wen Qing’s books. He knows a way to make the qi flow that would make a hand feel more energized. Thinking through the runes and their positions, she (he) sets to etching madly in the dirt with a stick, making and scrapping designs.

“What is that refined lady doing?” A passing man snorts. His partner elbows him roughly.

“Hush, who even knows how cultivators work? She could be making something powerful enough to kill an entire army! Do you want to anger her into using it on us?”

“Such a temperamental young lady,” the other huffs. “Such a shame for such a pretty face.”

The way they talk about Wan Yuli is incredibly irritating.

But by the end of four days and six explosions, he has one to test on himself. He slides the pick onto his finger and picks at a string. The noise definitely isn’t musical. But it works, sending qi where he’d wanted it to go. It’s actually messing up his hand’s qi, but it fits the map of the old man’s hand perfectly.

She (he) presents it to the old man with a triumphant smirk.

The old man said that all their visiting friends (debatable, but a kind thought) should call him Old Man Wong like all the rest during the third day. He plays for what his amazed wife said was the longest and best she’d ever seen him do. (Yue decides that Wong would work for his next surname, if to honor these lovely people.)

The talisman is irritatingly designed for Old Man Wong’s hand. So they’d get no profit from it. But the actors know they’d done their jobs of watching a progress. Undeniably, the disciples of the nameless master are truly talented. But brilliant in a way that isn’t easy to replicate for their own purposes. They’d need one of these disciples. Or the master himself.

The greedy manhunts will begin by sundown.

A Nie cultivator approaches him, snapping him from his musings.

“Guniang… my master told us to ask you a question,” he begins nervously. Back in the skin of Wan Yuli after a few days of feeling uncomfortably in sync with Wei Wuxian is a relief. She (he) snaps at the Nie cultivator.

“A question? What do you want?”

The Nie aren’t a greedy bunch. Which means that Nie Mingjue is likely aiding the search for Wei Wuxian.

“Come with me, my master wants to speak to you,” he leads Yue to a pub, and in it sits Nie Huisang. A fan in his hand, painted with orioles, and a glint in his eye.

And Yue knows that it’s much worse than he’d thought. After all, Nie-xiong has always been a fan of symbolism.

There will be no escaping this kind of Nie Huisang. Not when this Nie Huisang has all the information in his hands– not that he normally doesn’t, but he normally doesn’t let you know it. He’s letting Yue know it.

“You’re not good at covering your tracks, Wei-xiong,” Nie Huisang says. He blinks slowly, appearing almost snakelike in the dim lighting. “You know, you almost had me. Until you started this little coverup, in a planted dress, right after we spoke. A little sloppy,” he tuts.

“I’m… not,” Yue sighs. He puts his hair up and tosses off the jewelry, he keeps what’s apparently Huisang’s (why does he even have this) dress on though. “I’m not Wei Wuxian.”

“Who are you then? A ghost? Are you currently possessing his body?” Nie Huisang asks the question with such a danger that it almost shocks him. Aggressive isn’t Nie-xiong’s typical method.

“I don’t think so? At least I don’t think I’m a ghost possessing anyone, even if seeing all these people who I apparently used to know all the time,” Yue admits. “I have… some memories of him? Of being him? Most of it’s been reduced to sensations, feelings towards people, and instincts. But he… well something reduced him to this and I’m just the person left behind by all of it.” Nie Huisang’s eyes narrow. He doesn’t quite believe him.

“Tell me honestly then, why did you leave?”

“Because I’m conflicted,” Yue admits. And he is. He doesn’t know if he wants to be Yue or Wei Wuxian or both. And he can’t have any of those. Nie Huisang’s face darkens with rage.

“Conflicted?! Conflicted about what? Lying to our faces and watching us grieve and mourn for you?!”

“Yes,” he says. Huisang freezes, eyes wide. His tirade dies in his throat, Yue can tell. An answer like that does tend to surprise a person.

“I can’t- I can’t be Wei Wuxian. It’s a pale imitation at best with the remnants that I can remember,” Yue admits. “Do you really think those instincts aren’t screaming at me to go to them?! Of course they are! But I can’t! Wei Wuxian as he is cannot live the life he once did and being Yue means that I’m, in the nicest possible words, a wild card to these people!” He takes a breath and looks at Huisang mournfully. “I don’t know if I’ll ever be Wei Wuxian again, but Wei Wuxian has no place among cultivators without a core.”

“But Yue does,” Huisang finishes gravely, anger seemingly forgotten.

“What will it mean for YunmengJiang, having me?” He poses the question rhetorically but Huisang pales. “I am only allowed to exist because I exist outside of their political pretensions of superiority over each other. As long as I stay within the narrow allotment they let me have on account of my giving them victory I am a bizarre genius, the one who values the good over morality, I am generally considered okay. If I overstep I will be a pariah, a danger, a wild dog on a loose leash. Will it be a manipulation, for me to have withheld my identity? Why did I not return to YunmengJiang from the start and begin working as an independent entity? You know that demonic cultivation isn’t… trusted, or well-regarded.” Nie Huisang’s eyes look sad. And he nods.

“You know, I thought I’d anyone could do it, it would have been you. That’s why I knew, somewhere, that you were my friend,” Huisang says softly.

And this is what Yue had been afraid of. Of someone looking at him and seeing Wei Wuxian when Yue isn’t him. He can’t be him, not when Wei Wuxian was drinking, playing, and cultivating. Wei Wuxian was wild and free but a man of his sword and a beloved member of the Jiang clan, despite not being of the family. Wei Wuxian was a genius, an inventor and a thinker.

Yue is an inventor out of necessity, not curiosity. Yue is well-aware of where he stands and what weighs him down and he’s far too busy trying not to disappear under the weight to fly freely.

Wei Wuxian is free of envies and political worries. Wei Wuxian is a delighted bird that can take to the sky and have no weight pulling him down.

Yue is a moon, heavy and burdened by the responsibility of duties in the mortal world. A moon is tied to its cycle. So too Yue is tied to his reputation. He needs to take care of his people, even if it hurts him too much to see them.

What happens if the moon searches for the sun it loves? What happens if it falls from the sky? The story will be a catastrophe and cautionary tale. Yue is a man bound.

“I’m not Wei Wuxian,” Yue sighs.

“That has nothing to do with it. You were my friend then and you’re my friend now.”

“Thank you,” Yue says. And he means it.

“What are you going to do, Yue-xiong?” Nie Huisang takes a long sip of his drink the way he always does when he wants to say more but is holding back for fear of offense.

“Run around until I know I can come back, maybe,” he says softly.

“You still need to help my brother,” Huisang says. “I need you to swear it.”

“I don’t swear anymore, it makes the ghost of Wei Wuxian tremble and ache,” Yue says, the words making him feel numb. But they’re the truth. Nie Huisang tries to choke down his cackle and fails.

“Is that what you’re calling it?”

“What else can I call it?” Yue laughs. “It’s everything he left behind.”

“It’s a terrible half-alive state to be in,” Huisang sobers. And it is, isn’t it? Living under a ghost and avoiding everything he wants because of a life previously led?

“Better than Wei Wuxian who expected to die,” Yue says gravely. And that grabs Huisang’s attention.

“How much of him is left in you?”

“I have his sentiments, his knowledge, flashes of sensations. But full, word for word memories? I don’t have many,” Yue sighs. But Nie Huisang keeps his grip on positivity.

“That’s… that’s a good start!”

“In the beginning, I think I was more dead than alive,” Yue whispers the admission. “It’s been nice, to feel alive again.”

He remembers being little more than emotions, than resentful energy blurring his thoughts into rage and bleeding pain. Little more than a ruthless weapon who hated.

Time has tempered the burning iron in his soul. He is better now. The Moonlight Demon is faded into the background alongside the confused, ever-shifting Yueguang-jun.

But there is still something about him that feels unfixable. Empty.

That’s not good to dwell on, Yue decides.

“One day, if you could get away with it… in a perfect world… if you could come back, would you?”

Yue doesn’t have an answer for him. But that alone says enough.

It’s raining in Nanyang. A thousand rumors are flying around and Yue has a deep-set suspicion that he knows the source.

He pulls the mask from his face and breathes in, feeling the rain gently patter on his skin. He stands there, for some time.

It’s some indescribable instinct, but he throws away Yue, throws away the person he’s become and has to be, and in that moment feels more like he used to. Surely enough, Wei Wuxian is forming at a faster rate than ever before, and Yue isn’t even trying to stop it. He should, he should stay away and resign himself to a life as Yue. But something buried deep in him is selfish, greedily clinging to memories of the people who once lived him and he still does love.

And maybe it’s foolish. Maybe that’s what love does to you.

That doesn’t mean it’s bad.

And it’s that way he thinks. How much is it a love? To cling to any remnants of a person? To love the broken pieces of the gifts with love and memory of the whole of it?

But when he steps into a teahouse and orders, he feels a pair of eyes on his back. He leaves the shop without paying or drinking, and the eyes don’t leave.

Someone is watching him. And following him.

He turns around, and there Lan Zhan stands, eyes wide. There’s something so soft and broken in his face.

“Wei Ying,” he murmurs, the words clearly unbidden. And in this moment, it’s not Yue’s fear of the past that he feels. It’s Wei Wuxian and the affection this man pulls.

“Hey, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian finally manages. Lan Zhan grabs him by the wrist.

“Wei Ying,” he says, more insistently.

“It’s me,” Yue says quietly. And a part of him is. He doesn’t know who he is anymore, but he’s definitely not completely Yue anymore.

Ugh.

Why is knowing yourself literally impossible?

Something seems to dawn on Lan Zhan, who has been softly staring at him.

“Why are you hiding,” he demands. And suddenly the air in room is simultaneously far too hot and completely gone.

Lan Zhan’s face is far too close to his neck and Yue– Wei Wuxian?– is breathless.

“Wei Ying… why?” Something warm and wet hits his neck and for a delirious second he thinks it’s Lan Zhan’s tongue. Then he realizes that Lan Zhan is crying. Lan Zhan is holding him, pressing their bodies so close, and refusing to let go. He’s practically shaking with sobs.

“Lan Zhan,” he says. And he can’t say anything else.

Lan Zhan, the composed second Jade of Lan, is holding him and openly sobbing.

“Wei Ying,” he repeats. “Wei Ying. Wei Ying. Wei Ying!”

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian says softly. Something is so warm in his chest it feels like it’s burning and oh– is this the feeling of loving someone with a terrible intensity or the guilt of a terrible lie? “I’m here, Lan Zhan.”

It’s weird, to know they’re somehow in love with each other. It wasn’t Yue’s fault but Wei Wuxian can’t help but feel a little awkward about it.

But his thoughts are completely cut off because in the next second, Lan Zhan is holding him even tighter.

“Why did you go?”

“It’s what I wanted,” Wei Wuxian says.

“And now? What does Wei Ying want?”

To go drinking, probably. Yue is fucking exhausted. Hey, it would be nice to see him drunk again. The humor might just make him forget how awkward this is. And let him escape while Lan Zhan is drunk.

“I want you-“

Lan Zhan grabs at the front of his robes and Wei Wuxian loses his voice. Lan Zhan’s eyes are twin suns, boring into him with more intensity than anything Wei Wuxian has ever seen in his life.

Was this what his caution to the wind had begotten?

“You have long since had me.”

The tease for cutting him off, interrupting– breaking a rule– dies on his tongue. The lapse in formality is– is what? It’s intense, so intense that he feels his knees tremble under the sheer force of Lan Zhan’s stare.

Fuck, his hands are trembling. Gently, with a care that betrays just how fucking scared he is of shattering this moment, of waking up from whatever dream this is, he reaches up to cup Lan Zhan’s cheek. Yue, the weight of everything, all of it isn’t there. This Wei Wuxian, what he once was. And he knows it.

“Then what is it... what is it that you want, Lan Zhan?”

They both know that there is nobody here to witness this. There are no theatrics or pretensions of austerity to put on. Lan Zhan cannot act, and he would not lie in this situation. Whatever he says will be the complete truth.

“I want you.”

And that settles that, no?

He’s impulsive, and so, so stupid. This is the worst decision he could have made. But he can’t help himself. He’s hit with a sudden wave of insatiable want and it’s so strong that nothing else matters.

“Then fucking have me,” he growls. The words hang between them like a promise.

The air between them feels heavy with it for a moment, and then there is none at all. The world tilts on its axis and Lan Zhan is kissing him.

The world slots back into place and Wei Wuxian refuses to let go.

Lan Zhan’s tears are in his face and he tastes like good Lanling tea and something indescribably Lan Zhan that he decides tastes like love. His mask is dirty and cracked somewhere, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care!

Finally, air becomes a necessity, and they pull apart, and he cups Lan Zhan’s face.

They stare at each other wordlessly, and Wei Wuxian kisses him again. This one is wilder, tongues dancing in an equal exploration of each other’s mouths. He’s dizzy with it, floating weightlessly. By the time his back hits a wall, he’s tempted. He’s tasted Lan Zhan and wants more. More than he should have.

And suddenly the world comes back to him.

Lan Zhan is holding him and Wei Wuxian doesn’t want to go. He doesn’t want to leave Lan Zhan.

But enough of him is still Yue, and he knows that he doesn’t have a choice.

Lan Zhan is unfairly good at kissing, and he bites at him in a way that makes him gasp. Lan Zhan swallows any noise he makes and Yue still can’t help but feel they’re too out in the open. And isn’t this a little abrupt?! Wei Wuxian may not care but Yue definitely does!

Lan Zhan grabs him by the hand and wordlessly leads him back to his room in the inn. Wei Wuxian doesn’t protest.

When they get there, Lan Zhan closes the door and something in him trembles with anticipation.

“Rest,” he rumbles, voice raspy with something he cannot name. “We must speak in the morning.”

Yue’s heart pounds. This isn’t fair to Lan Zhan. This isn’t fair to him at all.

They prepare to sleep, and Yue tells Lan Zhan about his own travels, pretending to be different people, offering more information. He’d tell Lan Zhan almost anything and everything about his life.

Anything and everything except that he’s no longer one person but the host of a persona that was born and kept him alive while Wei Wuxian was dust.

(Anything and everything except, "I think I love you," because there are still things he is too much of Yue to say.)

Lan Zhan is already asleep, hair a gentle river of onyx parting around him, perfect features in the pale moonlight lightly floating through the window, and blissfully asleep. Wei Wuxian– no, Yue– presses a kiss to Lan Zhan’s forehead and pulls away before he does something that will end badly for both of them.

Suns and moons are not meant to collide. An eclipse sends the world into darkness.

Chapter Text

Every step out of that inn feels weighted like nothing Wei Wuxian or Yue have ever felt. So much of him wants to be there. There with Lan Zhan. With the man he’d never been able to have for more than a fleeting breath.

Reconciling Yue and Wei Wuxian is getting easier and harder every day. Yue is starting to fade but his goals have stayed with Wei Wuxian. Or perhaps they’d never changed across lives.

In this life, how many people has he been? How many titles has he held? Wei Ying, Wei Wuxian of Yunmeng, The Moonlight Demon, Yueguang-jun, Yue. Wei Ying was a child, a survivor and the one sitting at his core, covered in layers of Wei Wuxian. A name only Lan Zhan used for him, Lan Zhan who he’d had always wanted to know closely. How close had they gotten, to see every layer until the very center?

Shaking his head, he walks far away. And picks up his mask.

Wei Wuxian would only ever be able to be a dead man. Even if he returns.

The entire cultivation world, rogues and sects alike, hears the news. Lan Wangji found Wei Wuxian and lost him like smoke drifting through his fingers.

The rumors vary. Some pertain a fight involving twisted demonic cultivation (no offense to the venerable Yueguang-jun, who seems to have secluded himself from mortal affairs until he must interfere for the good again) and some pertain exertion of a more… intimate kind.

He first hears one in a Lanling bar.

“I’ll bet he left after bedding Hanguang-jun for humiliation!” A man laughs as he knocks back another drink. “Those two must have had a sordid affair and left with shame!”

“What are the odds?” A gambling man giggles to a courtesan. She taps her chin coquettishly and smiles.

“Didn’t you hear? The rumor is that Wei Wuxian lost the thing that makes him a cultivator. Why would a cripple be worth bedding?” She wraps herself around the man, a Jin cultivator, with a kittenish smile. “You must be delicate and pretty, like me. Or strong and handsome, like this gongzi. Otherwise, what’s the use?”

Her sister whacks her with a fan.

“Love, of course!”

“But would a former cultivator believe that? He wouldn’t find himself worthy!” The Jin laughs harshly and the man who started the conversation flinches slightly. “That son of a servant has no place!”

“Weren’t there rumors of the shameless way Wei-gongzi chased Hanguang-jun? There was something once, for sure. But he’s powerless now! Staying with the cultivators will be a constant living pain,” their other sister says, obviously feigning a gentle heart in a way that makes the Jin with her squeeze her thigh. She giggles as the man continues to stroke her leg and think aloud.

“Yueguang-jun didn’t use his core… isn’t he powerful?”

“I’m starting to think Yueguang-jun didn’t exist at all,” the first courtesan says with a sigh.

When he heads elsewhere, he overhears another rumor in Yunmeng. But this one is strikingly different. Especially in the bars near Lotus Pier. After all, this place had been the only true home he’s ever had. And he wants to return. Someday, he thinks he will.

“Wei-gongzi… he was definitely close to Lan er-gongzi. Would he… um… Would he be…” A young girl trails off, looking into her drink. It’s tea, but the man with her takes an entire swig of wine before answering.

“But he loved flirting with girls! How could he be a cutsleeve?!”

“I knew a woman who liked both,” a waitress answers, setting down another pot of tea. The man gapes.

“That’s possible?!”

“Well if it is, then that explains it, doesn’t it?”

“They would suit each other, Wei-gongzi has always been a brilliant mind and good heart!” And old man laughs. “Hanguang-jun would be so lucky!”

“That’s right! He’s a Yunmeng’s no matter what! Gusu can’t steal him!”

“Well, their sleeping together must have ended poorly, if they parted,” a woman whispers to her husband who frowns.

“If Hanguang-jun hurt him… oh I don’t know what I’ll do!”

“How could he?! He should know how precious Wei-gongzi is! He wouldn’t dare.”

The conversation he hears in a Qinghe bar is more grim.

“They probably fought with spiritual energy against… what was it?” The man telling the tale pauses, before deciding on an answer. “That thing they call demonic energy.” His words send a shudder through the room. It’s actually Yin energy and some resentful energy. But he gets the gist.

“Demonic?!”

“I have some cousins in Yiling,” the man continues, drinking in the attention. “There’s no way he’d have made it out of the mounds alive as a mundane man! What did you think he did?!”

“So the virtuous Lan clan boy fought him for surviving, huh?” A woman with a ferocious glare snaps back. Her friend shakes her head, pale.

“Demonic energy is dangerous. Whatever it is, isn’t that used to raise walking corpses and ferocious ghosts?”

“But a sword is also dangerous,” another man says.

They’re silent for a minute.

“The lord of the Nie sect is friends with a demonic cultivator,” a man says wonderingly. “Wouldn’t that mean demonic energy isn’t bad?”

“It’s not our problem, as long as we’re left thoroughly alone by whatever goes bump in the night,” an old man decides. “Now, what were you telling me about trying to trade with that rich man from Lanling?”

That night, he gets so drunk he forgets everything but the wine in his cup.

Lan Zhan’s name is a velvet, maddening poison that constantly finds its way to him. Wei Wuxian can’t resist drinking it in when he finds it. It swoops him to a tainted valley of guilt. He finds himself trembling under the mountainous weight of a fragile almost-vow he’d made.

“Then have me,” Wei Wuxian had said. And then Wei Wuxian had left.

A honeyed gold of sunrise comes solemn as a psalm and he finds himself unsure of what to do among frail light of dawn washing away night like water on ink. Day after day the words trail after him.

Wei Wuxian is Lan Zhan’s nightshade, and Lan Zhan is Wei Wuxian’s belladonna.

Lan Zhan is pure and untainted. As Yueguang-jun, what could Wei Wuxian be other than foul?

The wind whispers and it evokes memories in full, vibrant color.

Long nights spent together, whispered words and silent secrets exchanged between them. Playful clashes and ribbing. The secret wonder of what it would feel like to link hands with the deceptively delicate looking jadelike hand.

He yearns. He yearns and the absence kills him.

Wei Wuxian still moves onward. It is easier, most days, to say he is Wei Wuxian. Yue fades the way Wei Ying did, the way The Moonlight Demon did. The way Wei Wuxian once did before returning with a strength he didn’t know his own soul possessed. Yue doesn’t even remember realizing what had happened.

But it’s painful to settle into himself. It’s painful to become the same person and know that Wei Wuxian will have to continue Wei Wuxian’s burdens with Yue’s.

The process is weirdly seamless. In the beginning, memories were flashes, they were sensations. He remembers the way they split his head open with creaking floorboards, love, rage, warmth. His head burst with old life when the flashes came. They were painful. Now they return when he reaches for them without even remembering they weren’t there.

Bitterly, he wonders if loving Shijie, Jiang Cheng, Lan Zhan, and Nie-xiong had made his mind return faster. Of course he’d only remember them when it was no longer possible to return to them. Of course.

The Moonlight Demon tread the line between living and dead, a shattered soul in a husk of a body, devoid of self. Yue stood witness to his own deaths and grew among the ghosts. Wei Wuxian was a dead man’s name and face that he bears.

He’s living and dead, through several lives that have died and lived in him.

The Moonlight Demon, the most dead of all of them, was the freest. And that was a sad thought, wasn’t it?

In his dreams, he sees Lan Zhan, stripped bare of his image of austerity, of his responsibility to be perfect. Here, he is not Hanguang-jun, a Jade of GusuLan. He is merely Lan Zhan. Just for him. And it dawns on him that nobody has seen Lan Zhan like this . Perfect and beautiful and his. It burns with a dark sort of desire in his heart, a possessive wish to have Lan Zhan all to himself. To rule Lan Zhan’s heart. Lan Zhan looks up at him, beautiful golden eyes glinting with worry.

“Wei Ying?” The words are a question, an offer to back out. They’re laced with an irrational fear that Wei Wuxian wouldn’t want him. Like that would even be a possibility. Because Wei Wuxian wants. He wants Lan Zhan to be with him, to love him. He wants it with such a burning, aching need that is so vast that he trembles with it. He yearns for this, to feel Lan Zhan’s skin against his in every good way. For Lan Zhan to feel his touch and know it’s him just by the love that rises to Wei Wuxian’s skin with their closeness.

“You’re perfect,” he murmurs quietly, and tilts his head down to place fluttering kisses on Lan Zhan’s jadelike, tempting neck. The gentle breathy gasp it draws spurs him on. “Perfect, lovely. You’re mine.”

“ Yours, ” Lan Zhan breathes, and pulls him into a deeper kiss than even the one they’d had that night. That night when Lan Zhan had almost given Wei Wuxian his ribbon, which holds such a weight that Wei Wuxian doesn’t even recall. That night that Wei Wuxian had disappeared against both of their wishes.

“And Wei Ying is mine,” Lan Zhan’s eyes are gentle and loving in their simple curve that speaks more words than the entire Gusu library. The sheer enormity of Lan Zhan’s intensity in the form of love is powerful and it’s so big that Wei Wuxian can barely contain that in his body.

“Yes,” he smiles, saying it aloud to make it more true. Because it could never be anything but. “I’m yours.”

The unflinchingly cheery daylight that rouses him is almost cruel in its brightness, cruel in its timing, and cruel in the way it takes Lan Zhan from his arms.

In another life, they could have been each other’s sun and moon. Lan Zhan with his golden eyes, Yang power, and stubbornness is a sun to him. It’s a sun the way his calmness and purity, his untouchable beauty and reliability make him a moon to Wei Wuxian. Lan Zhan is his sun, his moon, his stars.

Wei Wuxian has silver eyes to be a moon to his sun, Yin energy, and is as changing as the phases in his emotions and self. But he could be bright, cheerful, the very image of light.

He desperately wonders if he is Lan Zhan’s sky the way Lan Zhan is the sun, moon, and everything in between to him.

It would be better, he thinks, if Lan Zhan still hated him. It would be easier to see his back turned.

But… the memory of those lips on his, the way Lan Zhan’s eyes had looked like he wasn’t sure if his face was the image of reality or desperate dreaming, the way Lan Zhan pulled him closer with an intensity that still burns him to think about.

He wants to be Yue again. But it seems the positions have reversed once more: now he is the one bearing a dead man’s name.

He sees Lan Zhan again, playing inquiry by the Burial Mounds from a safe distance. And Yue doesn’t want a single word to continue passing between him and the ghosts who saw him sHaTtEr.

Something primal in him roars, The Moonlight Demon returns to the surface. It takes Yue to fight it down. Here, he Wei Wuxian retreats into shards, like he’d never reforged himself among the ghosts of his path and the flames of devotion. Yue lands lightly before Lan Zhan, stopping his music.

“You’re still looking for Wei Wuxian?”

Lan Zhan turns to him and nods impassively. And Yue finds himself irrationally angry. Wei Wuxian is not the same, he’s by certain accounts dead and revived. But whatever Wei Wuxian became, shifting between souls, he’s not what Lan Zhan wants to find.

“You might have considered he doesn’t want to be found,” he leans in close, feeling Lan Zhan’s anger spike. Because his love belongs to Wei Wuxian and right now Yue is anything but. “Haven’t you?”

“Then I will hear that from his lips.” Lan Zhan’s icy glare would cow a lesser man, but Yue and The Moonlight Demon are no true men. They’re monsters. And maybe Wei Wuxian has become one too.

“The ones you were too busy kissing to question? Perhaps I should inform the others the true… nature of your desperate search,” Yue laughs and laughs and each of them stabs his own chest. He needs to stop hurting them both like this.

“I am his, and he said he is mine,” Lan Zhan says, glare bordering on glacial. “I will search until the ends of the earth for him.”

Behind the mask, he wants. He wants so much that he aches.

“Quite a few words from someone so chronically silent,” Yue continues, laughing. It’s fake. “Don’t you think you’ve ruined everything now? He’ll never come back after you forced yourself on him.”

That’s a lie, it was hot. It was perfect and pulling and his lips still burn with the memory.

But it does what he needs it to. Lan Zhan pales and every drop of blood that drains from his perfect face bleeds from Wei Wuxian’s heart.

“He- he said-“ and Lan Zhan is unsure, now. Yue should continue bluffing, make Lan Zhan hate the idea of him and stay away. Stop hunting Wei Wuxian.

Or their resolve will break.

“Leave,” Lan Zhan finally bites out. “If you have nothing kind to say, leave.”

Yue sees it. Lan Wangji’s quiet, intense grief. It’s powerful, almost overpowering, and Wei Wuxian’s pieces vibrate like they feel unworthy of it.

“Perhaps you’ve forgotten,” Yue continues lazily, “that he has no core.”

“It does not matter,” Lan Wangji says stiffly. “Not to me.”

“And what about to him? He has two choices and he took the third,” Yue laughs callously. It’s light, airy, and made to hurt. It’s probably nothing like the image of erudite, slightly twisted but overall good, Yueguang-jun. He can tell it confuses Lan Wangji. “I have to admire him for that.”

“What were his choices,” Lan Wangji demands more than he asks. And who is Yue but to oblige him?

“Living a cripple’s life, forever miserable and watching his peers grow farther and farther from him or–“ Yue smiles darkly– “becoming something like me. And raised among the righteous of the sword path, would he take a road less traveled and scorned by all? Become a demon just to remain with those he loves even if his new state would hurt them more than anything?”

Lan Zhan’s eyes lose the hope they’d been holding. And the look on his face is utterly broken. He lets out a broken sound of denial, and Yue feels tears sticking to his wooden mask. They’re both hurting, in this game. It’s better to end this now, and make Lan Zhan stop. And Wei Wuxian will never be able to deny him, so some thing else must.

“I found him, you know,” Yue dangles in front of Lan Wangji. His head snaps up, eyes pleading.

“So did the Nie heir,” he continues. “We found him at the same time. But Mingjue-xiong always had admitted that his brother was sharper than he seemed. An endless source of frustration to him behind all those masks.”

What can he say? He’s petty that Nie Huisang found out. If he wants to be the oriole, he’s got a mistake in the order. And Yue won’t let him. After all, a few face changing talismans would be possible. They’d just require a fair bit of work. Perhaps before he returns to fix that Nie problem.

“He told us he wants to be left alone, and that it’s better that way. I understood. Nie Huisang didn’t,” Yue twirls his flute between his fingers playfully, with expert precision. “I was the one who had to explain. But the little Nie gave in.”

Lan Wangji glares at him. It’s something truly meant to never be seen, something the world should never show again, but there are tears trailing down his dusty cheeks.

“If you love him, well and truly love him,” Yue begins softly, his own heart bleeding into the words. “You have to let him go for his own good.”

Lan Wangji lets out a high, pained sound. It’s almost an animalistic keening. It’s like Yue’s words have wounded him to the most primal part of his soul. Like Yue is punching a hand into Lan Zhan’s chest and ripping his heart to shreds, only to find his own bearing matching tears.

He’s desperately trying not to cry. The sheer weight of it all in his chest is suffocating.

“Stop,” Lan Zhan more pleads than demands. Yue laughs and it’s empty. 

“Stop what? Telling truths?”

Lan Zhan sits, and continues to play, trying desperately ignoring him. But he can’t disguise the way his hands are trembling.

Thwang!

A whisper-thin stripe of crimson licks across snowy skin and stains Lan Zhan’s perfect finger. And Yue can’t look away.

The Moonlight Demon tilts his head. Loving is an instinct. A pull to another soul. And it fills him with rageragerage to see-

Stop. That’s regressing too far. There are too many versions of himself bubbling around under his skin.

Shaking his head, Yue turns away, trying not to stare at the qi pathways he’s long since come to know. The beautiful, marble-carved hands that inspired one of his most useless but brilliant works. He picks up the knife the Wongs had gifted him, handle worn with time, and dives into the resentful energy. The forest in the middle is thick, wood inky black or moonlight white. Snapping a branch from a tree, he flies out. Lan Zhan is still playing, bleeding across the strings, face twisting with concentration that feels wrong on his immortally peerless face. The ghosts curl around him, dripping in resentment and recognizing The Moonlight Demon as a master.

Respond? The ghosts ask so gently, like the pure Yin of the Burial Mounds tried to promise him every kind of power. The Moonlight Demon shakes his head curtly. Lan Zhan will have to stop eventually. He’s bleeding across every finger he’s using, cutting deeper, white strings dyed red. Some spirits curl around the strings and gently lap up the blood. Lan Zhan looks deeply uncomfortable. His face is twisting in pain and it’s twisting Wei Wuxian’s stomach.

Enough is enough.

He grabs the Wangji guqin and shoves it into a qiankun pouch by his waist.

“Stop,” Yue demands. “Or I will tell every soul in the mounds to never say a word to you.”

Limply, more dead than alive, drowning in grief, Lan Zhan lets himself be led. Yue pulls him, like his heart isn’t breaking.

Yue puts Lan Zhan on a bed and bandages his fingers. Lan Zhan’s eyes shut numbly and Wei Wuxian feels a matching ache. With trembling hands, he pulls the ribbon and accessories from Lan Zhan’s hair, the silky strands dangling in the air and falling back like feathers to the bed.

Lan Zhan’s lips are pale, his blue robes dirtied and ripped and everything the mourning robes he’d always called them.

The ribbon is a weight in his hand. He sets it down like it could shatter if he wasn’t careful, like it’s made of gossamer-thin glass.

With those hands he knows from memory, he carves the same music pick from the black wood, etching familiar runes over them. He places it on the side table and stands. 

In a reckless, stupid moment, he lifts the mask from his face and kisses Lan Zhan’s perfect nose.

Lan Zhan’s eyes fly open.

“Wei Ying?”

The words are begging, pleading, and a million things. Lan Zhan could overpower him easily.

“Sleep,” Wei Wuxian murmurs softly. Lan Zhan’s eyes shut gently and he places kisses on each of his eyelids.

“I want nothing more, than to be yours,” he admits into the quiet of the night. “But I’m a dead man walking. I can’t hold you back.”

Yue slides the mask onto his face and leaves again. 

Chapter Text

“Lans only love once.”

It’s a saying some utter with awe, and others with pity.

Lan Wangji knows who his heart is bound to. He will never love another.

He plays for him. He waits for him. He yearns for him and grieves for him in equal measure.

Lan Wangji has always been outwardly impassive but he is in truth a swirling maelstrom of feeling.

And right now, he is lost. Adrift at sea. Now, he is unmoored, feral, and drowning. Grief, heavy and inescapable, washes his world of color. Despair, too, makes his every breath come labored.

Morbidly, he wonders if it is his body deliberately eroding itself for his own greedy desire to see Wei Ying once more. But Wei Ying is not truly dead.

Grief shows him phantoms of him that whisper words he knows Wei Ying would not say. His own traitorous mind and heart conjure visions of a Wei Ying who wants nothing more than to come back home to him.

It is cruel. So cruel.

If it was resentment from Wei Ying’s ghost playing tricks, he could send it on. But the only demons here are those of his own design.

And on some nights, he can almost hear the mesmerizing synchrony of their blades clashing. He can recall being young and naive, living his, admittedly dull, routine within the Cloud Recesses, when Wei Ying explodes into his world in a riot of color and new emotion. Of contradictory elements that completely make sense, that are so perfect to him that Lan Wangji has no chance. And he remembers Wei Ying’s choice of him as an object of obsession. Just as he remembers the mortifying but easy descent into knowing that it was Wei Ying who held his heart.

He wishes, more than anything, to take back the angrily hissed vows he’d made in his foolish youth, that he could not be content until Wei Wuxian is gone. Indeed, a man’s vow is not trustworthy. Indeed, fate only listens with half an ear. Indeed, Lan Wangji is a man mourning something that never was. And it’s a special kind of heartbreak too.

Lan Wangji is a mere man, one who trembles beneath the weight of his own longing. It’s too much, he thinks at times, too big for even his own body to hold. But Wei Ying has inspired the impossible in him from the moment they had met that fateful night on the rooftops. He formed the repressed child who learned to hide his grief into a man who loved and longed for and lost.

Lan Wangji has not cursed fate. He does not curse anyone. But in these quiet moments, he wants to.

When Yueguang-jun had said that demonic cultivation, a ghost path always deemed untouchable, dangerous, and evil– something irredeemably selfish in him wonders.

If Wei Ying would do it, would fall to stay, he can picture himself remaining there to catch him. He does not copy texts for wishing.

Because he does not feel in the wrong for it.

He should, he knows. But he just does not.

Yueguang-jun is powerful without a core, unchanging and undying as the already-dead– or as an immortal.

Wei Ying could never lose his adoration, his esteem, his affection. It’s unthinkable.

Lan Wangji does not even think that taking a path less-traveled would change that. He could accept it, because, selfishly, greedily, he wants to stay by Wei Ying’s side. But he knows, as Yueguang-jun has warned curious Jins of so often: only the right circumstances and methods currently work. And everything else, the roads of other cultivators, would lead to the type of end resentful cultivation is notorious for. He wants it, but he would never ask of it. Because he knows the consequences. Lan Wangji wants the impossible: for his love to stay by his side and for him to be safe. But that is beyond the realm of possibility.

He knows, he cannot seek out Wei Ying. He cannot become his father, but for the first time he understands his father’s desperation. He cannot chase him, cannot trap him. But a dark part of himself wants with a certain danger that it terrifies even himself. This is unchanging. Unchangeable. He knows that at the merest sign of Wei Ying, he would still chase. He knows that he is not perfect, but he knows that at a mere symbol of his love he would come running like a lamb returning to its mother. With a stumbling eagerness and clumsy love.

And he grieves for it. He breathes in the grief and washed-out agony that he is resigning himself to. His love for Wei Ying breathes with him like it holds a life of its own. And perhaps it does.

But his love is undying, unchanging, too. And perhaps his love too will remain immortal, haunting his every footstep as his chances have long since died. But his love never will.

Chapter Text

“It’s a simple process, really,” Yue demonstrates with an wave. “Yang energy is like a fire in the way it spreads, you need to make it catch and it hurtles in the direction you choose. Provided there aren’t any obstructions, anyway. But Yin is like water. It flows downward easily but to make it move is a little more than gently prodding.”

“I see,” Nie Mingjue frowns, brow furrowing with concentration. “Xichen always described it as sticky. But I suppose water does stick to itself.” Yue nods. It’s a fascinating detail, considering people assumed it would be spiritual energy that moves like a stream. Spiritual energy is wilder than that, in this respect.

“Cleaning out Yin normally could be the Lan musical method. Or just forcing the Yin to attract more Yin the way you do with your cores. But we went over that,” Yue shakes his head. “And if you needed my advice it clearly didn’t help.”

“It didn’t help me… but it did help many of the others,” Nie Mingjue admits.

“Which method?”

“The modified Tu-na you said Wei Wuxian must have done… a disciple happened to pass by a member of the wandering inventor sect and get an outward version of the technique.”

Yue actually did remember that now. He’d forgotten, now. That night in Qinghe, he’d been rip-roaring drunk. A young Nie disciple had asked if he was one of the wandering inventors and he’d said yes. Ugh.

“We tested it, with Xichen’s assistance, and the disciples are at a much lower risk. It doesn’t clean everything but… it cleans almost all of it. The only one who it can’t fix is me.”

“Oh.”

A morbid part of himself notes that they’re truly kindred spirits in the most gruesome of ways. Destined and tied to being the one who dies first and many times after.

“So for the people who are already on borrowed time, it did nothing,” Nie Mingjue suddenly looks haggard. “Like me.”

“It has to do with being a sect leader,” Yue gathers. It must be a family secret deeper than even the truth of their cultivation method. Fascinating, but irrelevant. The two Nies nod.

“Yes.”

“Then as a sect leader, you need to do something else with the energy. But it’s more likely to make your sword rebel aganst you,” Yue shrugs. “But I don’t know much about this secret so I could be completely wrong.”

“Baxia is my partner, a pact-keeper, and we bathe in blood together,” Nie Mingjue states.  “I trust her.”

And Yue knows his friend means it.

That’s the word of a man with a deep connection to his sword, words of a sword-oath that vassals make to lords and lords to vassal knights. A partnership with spoken word between them. Wei Wuxian’s heart pangs with a sudden longing for Suiban. That still doesn’t change that he is only guessing the exact issue with the sect leader’s saber conundrum. Taking a deep breath, he puts a hand on Nie Mingjue’s pulse point.

“Observe,” Yue feeds the all of resentful energy in Nie Mingjue’s body into his sword. It’s not particularly difficult, just making sure to leave the natural Yin that a human body needs. But Nie Mingjue is looking at him like he told him the deepest secrets of the universe or handed him an manual with instant immortality guaranteed.

“How do you feel?” Yue has to gather his courage to ask, but Nie Mingjue’s eyes are still dazed.

“Like I can finally breathe again,” Nie Mingjue marvels quietly. “It’s all spiritual energy. I don’t- there’s no resentful energy in my body.”

“The aversion to actively manipulating resentful energy is the literal only reason nobody has been able to save you,” Yue snorts. Unable to look past their own boundaries. “If you’re not raising the dead or tormenting people and bathing in… what’s the latest rumor?”

“The blood of virgin maidens is the conduit for resentful energy cultivation and eternal youth,” Nie Zonghui supplies.

“Yeah. That.” Yue gestures with his hand. “Bathing in virgin blood or whatever. There really isn’t any problem with manipulating the energy. I don’t think people realize that all suppression techniques are… well they’re just flimsy forays into the practice as it is.”

“You… you’re right,” Nie Zonghui admits. “We are doing it, just to a lesser extent.”

“They just think it’s different because you’re making it go away instead of using it,” Yue shrugs. “I’m not surprised by the justification.”

“Wait, you might actually understand why they work instead of just how,” Nie Mingjue realizes. “What does a suppression technique do?”

“Well, one imbued with spiritual energy is like sending the energy on a suicide mission– it draws the resentful energy to itself and dissipates, taking the resentful energy with it,” Yue explains. “The talismans and things that don’t require spiritual energy? It’s flat-out manipulation of resentful energy.”

“So about that doom necklace,” Nie Mingjue jokes. They laugh at that.

“Honestly the saber spirit might like the Yin going back into itself like a feedback loop more,” Yue sighs. “Its a shame too, because the Nie emblem could have become that. It’d ward off weaker spirits, though. They’d be afraid of the stronger resentful creature they’d assume you are. But your beasts would appreciate becoming a stronger resentful creature. You did mention that they technically cultivate with you.”

The spirit in Baxia, well-fed and suddenly interested in him, seems to be pleased. That’s always a good sign. Harmony between weapon and wielder is key. Chenqing hums a bit at his waist.

“That’s true,” Nie Mingjue says. “So how do we do what you did?”

“Pass me a pen and I’ll explain,” Yue tells him.

Being back in the Unclean Realm is nice. It doesn’t quite feel like it could ever be a home to him, but he feels welcome here. The cultivators of the Nie sect recognize him and greet him with politeness if not outright friendliness.

Here, he can sleep better than he ever could on the road. Well enough to dream.

Some nights the dreams are of a future that never could be, could have been, where he has it all.

Lan Zhan’s arms are around him and they’re standing in Wei Wuxian’s favorite spot in all of Lotus Pier. He’s dressed in light purple robes, white forehead ribbon still there. And it’s a peaceful moment. Just him, his husband and cultivation partner, and a core that spins and is back. The phantom warmth fills him with memories and wanting. He loved his core.

Lan Zhan, as if sending his distress, plants a gentle, whispering kiss to Wei Wuxian’s lips.

“Alright. It’s time to go, Lan Wangji, Wei Wux- NO! I didn’t need to see that!”

And he can’t tell if Jiang Cheng’s wail of disgusted little brother despair sweetens or sours the moment. He laughs against Lan Zhan’s smile. Shijie walks up to them, laughing and smiling.

“A’Xian, Brother-in-law, let’s go.”

Jiang Cheng grumbles but it’s empty and affectionate. How could it not be? Jiang Cheng’s half-smiling as he does it.

And on those nights he cries when dawn’s cruel light reminds him of where he is. Of how that’s far beyond the realm of possible– which feels like a taunt now, under the Jiang motto. On other nights he sees where he’s going, and he doesn’t know if that’s even more cruel.

His ruin is as vast as the sea– who can heal him? He is so many souls living in one body. All of them dead and alive and feral in their love. Yue is their face and underneath it lies what had made them human. Once. A soul so far removed from peace that he would no longer know what goodness truly is. All he could do is help others until time lets him find a way to die. In this, he is a paradox. Is he immortal, in his inability to age? He can bleed, but he refuses to let his death be in blood. Not after so much of his life was. He will find another way and attempt the impossible– even as those words burn an empty ache in his chest.

People will wonder about him when those he loved are gone. Yueguang-jun, a demonic cultivator who raises those of the sword path. Delivers them to sects and promises them lives of safety. One who night-hunts as a rogue but makes his money in other ways. The masks would change over the years. Maybe a person would gift him a nice one that lasts a little longer than wood. Yue thinks he’d still hold on to the first one of wood and paint, though. The second one, if he’s honest.

He’ll struggle and find a way to let himself age, sicken, and die alone. In that, will be a final rest of a long-weary soul that has grieved and lost and clawed itself apart. And perhaps on his deathbed, he’ll recall the news of those he loved most.

Yue would have to have known of Lan Zhan’s wedding. Surely he’d marry, after losing him, at least for the sake of his family. He would have married some woman he doesn’t even love to pop out heirs. One of them is named Lan Ying, and Yue first hears the name on his travels. And Wei Wuxian knows that his Lan Zhan still mourned. Still waited. Still ached.

And so does he.

He would have to have seen his Shijie marry only the best man and stay at Lotus Pier. Everything he could have hoped for her. But she’s still unhappy until she dies. Because her A’Xian isn’t there. Her husband offers to name her son Xian and she cries when she accepts.

Yue would rarely see her after that. But every time he would he would see a nephew who looks just like her. The same kind smile.

A strong Jiang sect led by Jiang Cheng, but his little brother would be colder. Constantly grieving. More the image of his mother than any of his father that Wei Wuxian had known was within him. People would remember him for his strength, certainly, but none of his care. None of the secretly doting brother who his worry behind admonishments or named dogs with overly cutesy names. Perhaps they’d question the ban in Lotus Pier, in future generations. And Wei Wuxian’s ghost would hurt to see it. A similar pain as seeing Shijie mourn, as seeing Lan Zhan ache. Wei Wuxian would be be hurt more seeing his brother all alone than anything else. Because Shijie and Lan Zhan would have happy moments without him too. But Jiang Cheng would be well and truly alone without Wei Wuxian.

When he disappears the final time, he truly does not return often. He is better a recluse. But he does not know for whom it is better for.

Perhaps Yue could visit the Nie sect years down the line. And Nie Mingjue, blissfully, rule-breakingly alive, would ask him if he ever wanted to try to remember, if he did, if he wanted to seek out his family.

And Yue would lie.

And say no.

Yue wakes up every day to invent a little more. To craft a new thing for the QingheNie. He pictures Jiang Cheng demanding to know where his filial piety is, giving his inventions to another sect.

He’s comfortable, he realizes, as Nie Mingjue’s condition improves. The Jin boy with the ugly hat continues to visit. But his face grows darker when Nie Mingjue begins to decline his offers of Cleansing on account of no longer needing the Lan method and having other things to do. Clearly, Mingjue-xiong doesn’t trust him and, now that he doesn’t need Meng Yao’s intervention, he’s pleased to be rid of him. What an odd choice for a sworn brother. He ponders the politics of the choice the clearly scheming man is making in the two sect leaders when he stops. It’s a group of Jins. None of the family, but all as pretty as female Jin cultivators are.

In the moment, he sees a familiar girl surrounded by friends saying a familiar name. He approaches them with a smile under the wood of his mask.

“Mianmian!”

She turns around and he’s hit with a flash of that face twisted first in terror and then in resignation in dim cave light. And Wei Wuxian recalls her fondly. With her clever little scented sachets that held secret medicine. Now, she looks irritated. A look he’s much more comfortable seeing.

“What gives you the right to call me that?!”

“Everyone else did. Isn’t it your name then?”

She huffs. But then her face seems to soften, as if in memory. Suddenly, Yue feels her gaze becoming the familiar one of someone looking at him and seeing someone else.

(He had seen it Uncle Jiang, in Madam Yu, in Lan Qiren, in Lan Wangji, in Nie Huisang. He has seen it before. Sometimes for dead versions of himself. Sometimes for his own parents. It’s terrible every time because he only ever is whatever version of that person first their own narratives. And it hurts– really, it does. But Yue can pretend he’s not used to it.)

“That’s Luo-guniang to you,” she relents.

“Yes!” He gives a full military salute and it startles her into full-blown laughter.

It’s too much like Wei Wuxian in that moment. He’s dangerously close to the surface and Yue can feel his bubbling joy and friendship under his skin. It tingles, he thinks, with melancholy too.

Yue needs to get out of here. He needs to leave.

Before he forgets why he needs to.

He’s falling back into being Yue, and it’s not a bad thing, really. But every time he crosses Huisang’s path it’s… uncomfortable. A reminder that he’s not Yue alone anymore.

“Yue,” Nie Huisang approaches him one morning. Yue attends meals but only eats in private. Nie Mingjue understands that it’s because of the mask. Probably assuming some great scars on his face or an early error with resentful energy. Yue hasn’t bothered to correct him. So he takes his meals alone.

“Huisang,” Yue says back. He doesn’t even bother to put on his mask, just continues his way through his congee.

“Da-ge told me, you know. You’ve really done it,” Nie Huisang says quietly. Yue puts down his spoon.

“I’m almost offended you thought I couldn’t,” he says, delicately wiping his mouth. Nie Huisang laughs at that, before quieting somberly.

“I don’t- I can’t hold you back here anymore, can I?”

“I should leave eventually,” Yue says. “I’d been hoping to talk to you about that, actually.”

“I won’t hold you back,” Huisang sits slowly, deliberately, like he always has before asking something he’s almost sure the answer will be no to. “But… can I ask you to come visit? From time to time?”

“Of course,” he tells Nie Huisang. And it’s the truth. His old friend, from one lifetime to another, grins at him. There’s something like relief in his smile.

“Now go. And at least let Da-ge know this time?”

Yue does let Nie Mingjue know. And has to try to stop the man from sending him with money. But that’s beside the point.

If he disappeared now, he doesn’t know what trick Nie Huisang would play. It would involve his identity, for sure.

But for now, he intends to go after Jin Guangyao. Something about the way that man reacted to being turned down doesn’t sit right with him.

Lanling is its ever-bustling self. The copious well-paid whorehouses mark the streets as exactly what it is. A gilded rot.

Yue wants to get out of here. Immediately. But he spies the ugly hat from a distance and knows to follow. Face-changing talisman plastered to his skin, he matches Jin Guangyao’s footsteps. The esteemed Lianfang-zun doesn’t even notice. Even as he’s followed into deep Jin tunnels.

“Little bastard!” The very-familiar voice of Xue Yang cheers. Yue hides his heartbeat and stays. “How’s the old bastard?”

“You already-“

“Oh don’t even bother,” Xue Yang snorts and raises his voice a mocking octave. “‘Ever since Yueguang-qianbe’s arrival… well it hasn’t made father happy. He can’t seem to find and recruit him, or gain justification to imprison him to steal his work and maybe humiliate him in the process and make LanlingJin seem super great.’ Right? Did I get it right?”

“That’s not what I’m here for. I was asking if you could replicate the power that breaking the siege took in an object,” Jin Guangyao sighs. “You already killed off every Wen we have for your experiments as it is.”

There were more? More than the DafanWens? Guilt bubbles under his skin. There were more Wens and Yue could have saved them and now it’s too late-

“Weren’t you going to get that Wan Yuli chick here to make me something to… stick it in first?”

Yue’s blood runs even colder despite the bawdy joke about his person. So that’s why the Jins were more after his string of fake students than any other clan.

The Jins were attempting to replace the Wen. And in hindsight, this should have been obvious. But wasn’t the QingheNie supposed to be watching over that group of remnants? What happened there?

“Go and fake another report of the cultivators’ suicide,” Xue Yang spits, suddenly angry. “I’m still working on amassing that much power. If The Moonlight Demon-qianbe did this, then one thing is for sure,” Xue Yang pauses dramatically, suddenly brightening. “He didn’t use any objects. He passed it allll through himself! In fact, he probably almost died!”

The room is quiet for a moment. And Yue can’t help but admit that it’s true. He hadn’t used any objects and once he checked on his body after Wen Qing stuck his broken parts back together, he’d become even less… human. His body had started… preserving its own state. He doesn’t know when it started. And he doesn’t know exactly why it did either. He’s definitely not a fierce corpse, but he doesn’t think he can age for as long as he uses resentful energy. Actually, he’s sure of it.

What a joke. Immortality! Like he’d been striving for! And at the cost of everything he worked for!

He’s lucky he can feel himself bleed and be injured, or he’d have actually… that’s not the point.

“And what does that mean,” Jin Guangyao says, ever-polite and ever-shady.

“Meaning it’s going to take some research on his body to know how he did it. He might have made himself semi-immortal, you know? He can’t age, that’s for sure! Wow! Imagine me at a hundred with this gorgeous face!”

“So. How long will understanding the method take?” Jin Guangyao looks on the verge of losing his patience. You know, Yue decides, for an scheming asshole he seems to have a lot of patience. And that’s never a good combination. Xue Yang giggles.

“For fastest results, you can always just give me his corpse!”

Oh, gross.

But he knows what he needs to. The Jins have been attempting his path (against his advice! It’s one or the other! A golden core and resentful energy do not mix!) and hoping to control the entirety of the cultivation world. They want him dead and honestly– they probably want Nie Mingjue dead too. Mind running a few hundred li a second, he thinks he has a plan.

He supposes he can play at oriole one more time.

Next stop: YunmengWei.

Chapter Text

The road to Yunmeng is bright, and the veil hat he wears makes him seem like more of a traveling gossipy female cultivator.

“Have you not yet heard?” The gossip in the black veil giggles at every passerby with swords she sees. “There’s another inventor! Making something he thinks all the sects should see!”

“Yueguang-jun,” Wen– Wei?– Qing greets him warily as he touches down. “Is something the matter?”

“I need your help,” he says, pulling off the mask. “It’s big.”

“How big?”

“The Jins are messing with demonic cultivation. Which would be fine if they weren’t doing human experiments on other Wen civilians, trying to make a weapon to lord over the sects with, and working with Xue Yang,” he says.

Wei Qing whistles lowly.

“That’s not good.”

“I need your help,” he says. She frowns.

“Me?”

“It’s a… lot to ask of you,” Yue continues.

“You need me to expose my location,” Wei Qing surmises.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I need a Wen to confront the Jins. The Jins won’t care about telling you what they plan to do to you,” Yue explains. “If anything, they’ll enjoy it. Twisted fucks,” he adds, an afterthought.

“And you plan to be with a convenient entourage of sect leaders and heirs,” she catches on. “To hear about the actions of the Jins and execute judgement against them.”

“You know me so well, Wei Qing-jie!”

“Call me Wen Qing. It’s still my name.”

If he tips off a Jin that the would-be inventor the other sects heard of and were coming to see was inept and worth nothing more than a good show, who would dare say it was him?

“This is awkward,” Yue laughs from the rather spacious abandoned hall he’d been working on his setup in. The gathered sect delegations (because this was quickly beginning to look like a conference) sigh.

“I heard of an inventor interested in meeting with all the sects,” sect leader Yao sighs. Sect leader Ouyang, by his side, nods with a sigh.

“They mistook what I said,” Yue says awkwardly. The Nie brothers and Zonghui hide snickers, and the Lans brothers reply with polite nods, Lan Xichen smiling and Lan Wangji impassive. Oh.

The blanker Lan Zhan’s face is… the sadder his heart is. Yue shakes his head. Love is a game you lose when you love the other more.

(That’s not true and he knows it. He isn’t sure what about it isn’t. But it’s not true.)

“Well, it’s a shame that we had to pick between this and investigating the rumors of the Wen remnants, like the Jins chose to do,” sect leader Yao laughs. Sect leader Ouyang nods.

“I would be with my son otherwise! But I’ll ask this inventor to make my son a protection amulet!”

“Again with the son thing,” Nie Mingjue hisses lowly. Yue hides a snort.

“Some senior disciples are here. As well as from YunmengJiang. And I’m sure they’re also just rumors,” Lan Xichen says. Nie Mingjue laughs.

“So what message did they mess up?”

“I said I was inventing something but I didn’t want to show it to anyone in sects yet. Too late,” he shrugs. A Jin disciple jumps to his feet, greed glimmering in his eyes.

“Are you still working on it?”

“Of course. I can show you what I’ve been working on? I can’t promise it’ll do what it’s intended to.”

“What’s the purpose?”

“Well the hope was for nighthunting sects to see which case is most urgent by showing an image of the person who needs your assistance the most.

“That could save countless lives,” Nie Mingjue breathes. “You’re really saving people. All the time.”

Yue flushes and looks away.

“Triage can be incorrect,” Yue chooses to say. He drops a piece of glass and it shatters against the array. Immediately, a vision appears above the glowing runes.

“That- that’s Wen Qing!”

Indeed, Wen Qing is there. Her dainty form clad in peasant robes, she sits with the quiet dignity of an empress as she treats an elderly woman who thanks her and leaves.

“Another failure then I guess-“

“So you’re alone now, huh?”

Her head snaps up, eyes widening in something everyone recognizes: fear.

Those watching freeze. Nie Mingjue growls lowly.

“That voice…”

“Who are you?”

“Well, sweetheart, looks like we both found masters to go sniffing after huh?” Xue Yang steps into view. “I wonder what makes you so special a lay for a demon like Yueguang-qianbe to bother saving your family.”

“Don’t insult either of us like that. He offered us an out. We took it.”

Wen Qing stands and only from their point of view do they see her hands shaking.

“Sure,” Xue Yang laughs wildly. “There’s nobody of consequence! Come on in!”

Wen Qing takes a shaky step back, lifting a dagger she’d been using for herbs.

“What are you trying to do to us,” she demands.

“Hah, a Wen-dog dares question LanlingJin?”

“Shige?!”

They turn to see the Jin disciple who was shaking now.

“Shige was called by the sect leader for sect business this morning,” another Jin disciple explains numbly.

“Stop,” a smooth voice cuts in. “You know who Wan Yuli’s master is.” Wen Qing’s mouth twists into a sneer.

“And if I do?”

“Foolish, brilliant, brave girl,” a woman breathes. “She’s distracting him.”

“Wan Yuli? That haughty female disciple who made the artifact with wood and a talisman for an old man in passing? Her?!”

Yue thinks that guy might have been there for that. Huh.

“You will bring Wei Wuxian to me,” Jin Guangyao’s voice demands.

“The master of all those new inventing disciples who don’t use cultivation! We were so foolish- of course it would be da-shixiong,” laughs a young Jiang disciple (15, called A’Yan, he only lived because he had been on a supervised night hunt on That Day, Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop him from fighting in the campaign).

“But how did the Jin learn that?” Yue shoots a look at Nie Huisang, who shakes his head. “And what do they want with him?”

“You said I’d get to play with the little girl,” Xue Yang whines.

“What about a man made powerless?” Jin Guangyao appears on the screen with a genial smile as he offers it. “My father doesn’t care what happens to him once we’re done with him. We just need an amulet to hold the demonic cultivation.”

Several cultivators look faintly green.

“You must stop them!”

“I’m confirming this is real first,” Yue frowns, looking at the runes before jolting back in faux-surprise. Lan Xichen grabs his hand worriedly.

“Is it?”

“It is,” he admits with fake hesitation. “I need to go.”

Swiping a hand over the runes, he messes up the array. When it’s sufficiently illegible, he turns to them.

“Wait here.”

“Wait- that was Yunmeng!” A Jiang cultivator jumps to his feet.

“So the last Wens have been hiding in Yunmeng?!” The Yao disciple who said it looks disgusted. “The place they sacked, no less!”

“So that’s where the Wens were,” a Jin cultivator scowls. “Hiding like rats.”

“We could kill them all now without a single issue! The Wens will be gone!” A cultivator in Nie robes jumps to his feet as if to leave. Yue is in front of the exit in a flash, pleading.

“Do you even hear yourselves?!”

“I’ll avenge my shidi and shimei with the blood of the wicked Wens,” a Jiang cultivator that Wei Wuxian remebers being named Bai Jiahao (23, was to marry a female disciple who died in the massacre, endlessly loyal) snarls.

“No! They’re innocent! They weren’t involved,” he nearly begs. He knows that hatred, that feral desire to return the wrongs thousandfold. But there is no revenge in harming the blameless!

Lan Xichen delicately separates them with a wave of his hand.

“The purpose of the Sunshot Campaign was to stop Wen Ruohan’s tyranny. Not a genocide,” he chastises. The Lans step back, but the Jins takes their place.

“All Wens are evil! Lower than dirt and eaually disgusting!”

“We could kill them now!”

“Hah! What’s a demonic cultivator trying to do, standing in our way?!”

“He probably fancies himself some great hero and is so misguided that he’d protect the enemy of the cultivation world,” a Lan– a Lan, of all people– says into the rising hubbub.

“Yueguang-jun is an honorable man who fought and saved many cultivators. He nearly blew out his own power many times just to help us,” Lan Xichen cuts in, genial smile gone. Nie Mingjue joins him.

“He could have watched the entire campaign and done nothing but he chose to fight with us. He has earned a title from you. From you! And now you turn your back on him?!”

“Listen to me-“

The crowd rises to fight and Yue whistles sharply.

Everyone falls silent in poorly-concealed fear. He rolls his eyes.

“Isn’t Xue Yang a bigger concern?”

Just like that, the Wens are forgotten in the face of a new enemy.

“He’s right! That damn menace needs to be put down!”

“Let’s go,” the Jiang disciples nod at each other and lead them through the village streets with practiced footsteps. The ones he’d taught them.

With a crash, his foot hits the door and sends it flying. Wen Qing is going to be mad.

Oh well.

Xue Yang turns from the wobbling Wen Qing to face them.

With a mad cackle, he sends out a wave of resentful energy. Made to shock and infect. Yue dispels it.

“The Wen remnants and Xue Yang,” Jin Guangyao breathes out, when he sees them eneter. “They’re working together. I managed to get Wen Qing but…”

And then he falls over in a feigned collapse. The exhausted shaking would have had them fooled if not for two things:

The array, and Wen Qing’s state.

Bai Jiahao ties him with what Yue recognizes as his little nameless talisman from a lifetime ago. Binding or Bonding or whatever.

“Moonlight Demon-qianbe!” Xue Yang beams. “Hello! Come to take me as a disciple? Or tell me where to find Wei Wuxian?”

“No,” Yue says shortly. “If you had asked me before. Maybe. But now you’re unfortunately… supposed to be missing a heartbeat.”

Xue Yang pauses at that, before breaking into laughter.

“Damn,” he whistles. “And people thought you were like the lame-ass Lan lordling!”

The Lan contingent stiffens at that. Yue grits his teeth, Wei Wuxian’s rage burning in him.

“You’ve insulted the wrong person in front of me,” he hisses, whistling sharply. Resentful energy curls around him like an affectionate cat.

And then he shoots.

With a grunt, Xue Yang flies backwards. It’s not much a fight. Perhaps breaking the siege on his own had made him more powerful than Xue Yang could have thought.

“If you wanted me to teach you,” his voice is cold even to his ears, “you should at least have known that.”

Nobody insults Lan Zhan to his face. Nobody.

“Hah,” Xue Yang’s eyes narrow mockingly. “What’s the use of you protecting that man. Why? Do you love him?”

Yue glares under his mask. Xue Yang comes at him with a blade and a leer.

“What he is to me is none of your business,” Yue reaponds placidly, dodging.

“So you do!” Xue Yang crows. “Lusting after the second Jade. Well, I’m sure he’d still look very pretty after you sullied him.”

A note blasts from the Lan contingent. It’s Zewu-jun’s, and it has knocked Xue Yang off of his feet once more.

“That is my brother you are speaking of,” Lan Xichen says, voice colder than Lan Zhan’s ever was. “Make another comment on his honor and it will be your last.”

“Wow! And here I thought the Lans were even-tempered!” He looks up at Lan Xichen and smiles. “I’m sure you’re just as demanding like this under… oh I’m sure the little Nie lord has his fun with you.”

“Enough,” Yue says before Nie Mingjue can respond. He whistles a low tune and flattens the delinquent under a heavy ghost. Xue Yang tries to kick his way out. When he finishes squirming, Xue Yang glares up at Yue with those hateful eyes.

“Let me go!”

“I don’t think I will. Mingjue-xiong, he’s all yours.”

Nie Mingjue cuts his head off.

He’s tending to the injured and unconscious Wen Qing, who had– rather impressively– held Xue Yang off with a mix of her own wits, bufotoxin needles, and some very powerful talismans when a voice breaks the quiet chatter.

“I know now! It was you!” A voice in the back of the room hisses. Everyone turns to Jin Zixun, pointing an accusing finger at Yue. Yue blinks, Wen Qing still unconscious in his arms.

“Pardon?”

“You! You must have set up my father and cousin and now you intend to kill me!”

It’s obvious that Jin Zixun is playing up the familial ties to make himself seem more believable. He’s as much a pathetic liar clinging to his family name is as Wen Chao was. Laying Wen Qing on her bed while they watch him and take in the accusation, Yue feels his face twisting into a sneer under the polished wood of his mask.

“Now you call him your cousin?”

“That may be a son of a whore–“ Jin Zixun’s lip curls around the word with a satisfaction when Jin Guangyao, chained on the ground and now awake, flinches– “but he’s acknowledged by Jin-zhongzu himself! As an elder, too!”

Jin Guangyao looks oddly warmed by that. A dawning sliver of childlike wonder and hope flashes across his face before its shattered by bitterness.

“That’s not what it meant. And you know that.”

“H- hah! That’s not the point! The point is that this demon cursed me!”

“What?

“This,” the worthless brat snaps, tearing open his shirt.

Oh. It’s the hundred-holes. A whisper spreads through the crowd, ire turned from the Jins to the Wens to him. Hah, how fickle a man is. Indeed, praise is cheap. And ultimately, so is fame.

“One small problem, little friend,” Yue says dryly, at the end of his patience. “I don’t have a core,” he reminds. “Semi-dead, remember?”

“Wait. Yue-xiong?” Mingjue-xiong’s eyes widen.

“I could become the closest thing I can to fully alive if I wanted to,” he says and it’s petulant even to his ears.

“How?” A Nie cultivator asks, wary. Yue smiles sadly.

“Being who I was before,” he sighs. A Jin cultivator laughs derisively, ignoring the sword pointed at him.

“Then why don’t you? Is it power?! You could probably keep doing this if you were alive, huh?!”

“Sometimes memories are the worst form of torture,” he says, voice scraped raw with the sheer experience that it takes to know that. “I could stay cultivating this way even if I did go back to that life.”

“You remember, Yue-xiong?” Nie Mingjue looks at him with hurt eyes. He’d probably expected to be told. Him? Tell anyone anything? As if.

“I can recall enough,” he evades. A Lan shakes his head, almost pityingly.

“Then what’s stopping you from cultivating a core?! You could be on the righteous path!”

“I actually can’t. Considering that I cut it out myself,” he admits. What can he say? Shock value is shock value! And Jiang Cheng isn’t even here anyway. He’d never guess. Besides. He’s angry. He’s tired of them assuming he had a choice. He can say it until his lips and tongue bleed. And they’ll still never believe him.

“What?”

“Two days,” he hisses, “feeling every cut it takes to pull a core from a body.”

“What?

Is that all these people can say?!

“I did it for a reason. Of course I did, why else would I destroy that much work? I gave my core to someone who needed it more,” he says softly. They all stop and stare.

“What?”

Apparently so.

“The DafanWens!” A Jiang cultivator snaps her fingers. “Wen Qing is famed for her golden core theories!”

They turn to her. The mighty doctor, a genius who held positions of power. And here, asleep after fending off Xue Yang and the Jins from her family, she seems so small.

“That’s how you knew they wouldn’t want to be involved in the war. You knew them already,” a man in pale blue robes but wearing a Jiang clarity bell catches on. He must be a new member. Yue rolls his eyes and huffs in fake annoyance. They can’t see it but they can hear the sigh.

“How would I have known to look for them otherwise? Of course I did,” he says dryly. “They’re the ones who made sure Wei Wuxian ended up at Lotus Pier when they found him.”

Gasps around the room. Now the Lan and Jiang owe Wen Qing debts. Good. This should end the problem permanently.

“You said Wen Qing could cut out a core. And she was in charge of Yiling,” Jin Guangyao subtly insinuates from his chained position on the floor. Oh. What a snake. Trying to bite even while bound.

“You did say you never found him in a Wen encampment,” Nie Mingjue frowns warily.

“That’s how we knew what had happened to him. Wen Qing and I recognized the effects,” Yue half-lies. A Lan shakes his head angrily. Huh. A Lan. Angry.

“So who did it?! If not her?”

“She did leave her books behind,” an Ouyang cultivator admits. “We found them in the Yiling supervisory office.”

“So she left dangerous information just… lying around? That almost sounds intentional,” a Jin cultivator accuses.

“It had to be her! Given the timeline, that doesn’t make sense either. Wei Wuxian was in the Burial Mounds when she left Yiling!”

“You’re forgetting who he is. This is Yueguang-jun. A man who fought on our side in the Sunshot campaign, and who the QingheNie, as well as every other sect owes a debt of gratitude to.”

“He is a friend of both sect leader Nie and myself,” Lan Xichen agrees with the weight of sect leader Lan in his words. “Are you questioning our judgement?”

And in that moment, they’re suddenly closer. Yue flushes slightly. He may be a bit shameless, but he’s really glad to have made friends like them.

Jin Zixun’s mad cackle breaks the moment.

“It must have been you! What evil tricks are you using to hide the blowback?! Or did you make a Wen do it for you like a slave!”

“You need a core to cast the curse, Lan-gongzi,” a Lan cultivator says dryly.

Yue carelessly flicks out a wrist and several people touch him, recoiling when they see the energy flowing through him evenly, back around through a pooling mass in his chest– and bypassing an empty dantian without any issue.

“And who says he didn’t make a Wen do it for him?” A Yao cultivator frowns, eyes trained on Yue. Yue rolls his eyes.

“I did.”

The room falls silent.

“Now,” Yue’s voice cuts the tension and fills the room with a new one. “I think it’s time I got back to helping the leader of the YunmengWei clan. If you will excuse me.”

At that, pale-faced cultivators trickle out of the room. Yue sighs. Maybe they could move somewhere else? It’s dangerous to leave them like this. He watches them trickle out and waits to set off the ward, trapping any cultivators with ill-intent out.

Nie Huisang is the last to leave.

Chapter Text

Wen Qing wakes after two days. And as soon as she does, she calls her clan together.

“We need to leave,” she rasps. “They found us.”

A worried murmur spreads across the room.

“I’ll come with you. Let’s go,” he holds at a hand to his allies and friends. Wen Ning takes it.

“Together?”

“Together,” he assures. “And I’ll stay until you’re safe.”

“Then we’ll be relying on you,” an old woman with a child in her arms cuts in before Wen Qing can refuse. “Call me granny. This is A’Yuan.”

Yue’s heart melts.

“And isn’t he just the cutest little radish,” he coos. Granny laughs.

“Just be careful with the masks. He’s still little.”

“My masks aren’t scary!” His protest is met with laughter from the older men.

“After meeting you, it’s not. But a child might feel a bit differently,” an auntie agrees. Yue frowns at his mask.

“Ah, really?”

“Yes! I was carrying him past a man who introduced himself as sect leader Ouyang,” Uncle Four nods. “All baby chatter. New son, he said.”

Again with the baby-chatter. Poor Mingjue-xiong.

“And he was talking about how he has a decorative mask he took from the Wens and his son was scared of it… so we thought that A’Yuan might feel the same way,” he finishes. Yue groans. It’s true.

“Makes sense,” he sighs. “Where will we go?”

“I have an idea,” Wen Qing suggests quietly. “There is one place where no man dares tread.”

At the mention of its home, The Moonlight Demon rises to the surface a bit. The Burial Mounds. It’s risky, by some regards downright stupid. But what other choice do they have? Besides, he realizes glumly, he’s not quite that anymore.

“Good thing Yue-ge is no longer that, then,” Wen Ning agrees grimly.

The trek to the Burial Mounds is long. He counts himself lucky that A’Yuan is a sweetheart who has no qualms about tugging his clothing and not some noisy brat. But when they arrive at the base of the mountain, they all stop, almost uncertainly. Shaking his head, he turns back to the others.

“Let me clear a space first,” Yue says when they stop outside. “It’ll be dangerous.”

“Can I do anything to help?” Wen Ning is exhausted, clearly. But he’s a good guy. A little brother kind of guy, even if they’re only a year apart.

“Don’t,” Yue throws his cracking mask to the dirt. “I can do this.”

“The last time you supposedly said that, you nearly blew out your meridians and I had to send you back to Lotus Pier,” Wen Qing points out. The tired but still standing Wen remnants laugh at that.

“No faith,” Yue pouts. “I can.”

“I know,” Wen Qing says primly. “But can isn’t always should.”

Wen Qing is like that, he’s realized. Like Jiang Cheng, afraid to risk anything by asking for help. The fact that she’s relying on him speaks more than volumes– it speaks libraries.

“I know that I can do this,” Yueguang-jun assures.

“And that is what scares me. Just go, you fool,” she sighs. “And… thank you.”

“There’s no need of that between us,” he laughs, and runs in without a second thought, Chenqing twitching under his fingers.

The Burial Mounds are wild, swirling with an energy that almost seems excited to greet him. Breathing in, he steps into a wide clearing. They can make a home here. Yin energy is energy, energy that he can manipulate like any other type. And resentful spirits are everywhere.

Parts of him warp and shift with every step he takes into this place, tempered by the flame of the sheer power this place holds. But The Moonlight Demon is stronger than that. He’s so many people at once, and this heap of energy and dead cannot counter that.

The Moonlight Demon marks off the edges with talismans and sets up a barrier with his own blood. The dust and the earth swallows his oblation, granting him a home. The yin energy obeys, sensing a dam. The flow of yin and resentful energy pools into a spring of water, dying it a bloody red.

The spirits seem to be less inclined to play nice with the new neighbors.

They converge on him, biting  and swallowing and tearing and trying to consume him— make him like them .

Sucking and lapping at his memories like beasts, tugging at images of family, smells of home, the sounds of laughter. Trying to pull it away .

The Moonlight Demon laughs. Foolish, foolish! How can a mere ghost consumed with petty hatred of  a single life compare to a monster made of many tortured men?!

With a guttural roar , he lashes out an arm and pulls . The energy that tied them to their hatred, how dare they try to hold it before its master ?! To attempt to attack him with his own blade?! Pathetic!

The Moonlight Demon is the only master of yin energy and the yin obeys him.

Satisfied, The Moonlight Demon returns to his people.

And promptly loses consciousness.

He comes to in a hut, Wen Qing standing over him. Yue shakes his head wildly. What kind of experience could he even have called that?

“A fool,” she murmurs. “You missed your sister’s wedding and for this? For us?”

His sister. Her wedding. She’s been wed and it was without him. Swallowing a shaky breath of air, he reminds himself that he isn’t Wei Wuxian. He doesn’t even have the right to attend. So instead, he answers. And tells her the full truth.

“I owe you,” Wei Wuxian says simply. “And more than that, you deserve to live.”

They both know what he’s talking about. About her helping him achieve the unthinkable.

“Don’t you dare think you owe me, not for that,” Wen Qing’s eyes fill with tears that she hastily wipes.

“Anyway,” Yue evades, “am I clear to go?”

“Yes,” Wen Qing declares, back still to him. Yue smiles knowingly, and leaves her be. As he steps into the sunlight, a certain melancholy takes over. The wedding that they had planned together, both jokingly and seriously, over tea and goofy hair braiding sessions had always seemed like a distant, faraway thing. And then it just appeared on the past and he’s missed it.

He knew something like this was coming, but he didn’t realize how quickly it would. A child runs over to him, breaking his reverie.

“Yue-gege!” It’s A’Yuan! He tries to push aside the thought of Shijie. (His big sister who is everything, in wedding robes in a ceremony with Jiang Cheng and he’s just… not there.) But the Jins… right after the incident with Jin Guangyao. Surely this is their coverup to the public. Did they pressure Jiang Cheng? His Shijie?

No. She loves that peacock. And Jin Zixuan isn’t actually that terrible. It’s better this way. The world is moving on without him. And isn’t that what he wanted? (It’s not, but that’s something Wei Wuxian is not selfish enough to say out loud, not with Yueguang-jun and Yue there.)

But her father-in-law… Yue will need to get rid of sect leader Jin soon. Even if he has to hold the knife himself.

“I heard the latest news on the Jins, the sect leader said it was an overly powerful underling,” Uncle Four shakes his head. “Who would argue against him? Especially now that he allied himself with the Jiang?”

“We don’t need to care. We’ll farm here and be well,” granny decides.

And surely enough, they build a home here. A’Yuan has his birthday and everyone scrapes together money for gifts, Wen Qing debates with him (read: yells at him) about the virtues of radishes versus potatoes, and Uncle Four brews a wine that gets everyone drunk enough to lead to a surprise baby on the way (Wen Liu and her husband are both incredibly awkward about it until the excitement takes over).

Life is good.

Things fall apart on a normal day. He’s minding (playing with, really) A’Yuan, and burying his their little radish in dirt while he giggles.

“Yue,” Wen Qing sighs. “Stop burying A’Yuan.”

“But then A’Yuan won’t get big,” the toddler protests. “Yue-gege said that radishes must be buried to get big!”

The entire settlement gathers to chime in their own opinions, but the false seriousness breaks when Wen Ning starts laughing. The voice of Nie Mingjue cuts through the moment like an arrow slicing the sky.

“What is this?”

Sure enough, great armies from the sects stand at the edge of the Burial Mounds. Many of them are staring at him. Some of them are trembling too. Lovely.

Uncle Four blinks at Nie Huisang.

“So… you aren’t sect leader Ouyang?”

“Ahahaha,” the Nie heir laughs. “I don’t know what you’re talking about! I don’t think we’ve met!”

One of the aunties tugs his sleeve and whispers something into his ears. Yue doesn’t catch it. But what he can do is connect the dots. Nie Huisang has set off something to lead them here. To see all of this. But he can’t remember what conversation they’d had. Not the first time he’s cursed his own memory. And Nie Huisang was playing on that, he knows. The man plays at inept but he’s sharp and more convoluted than his own could ever be. Though Wei Wuxian had been pretty blunt, only slipping into the realm of lying sparingly. Nie Huisang thrives in that. But he’s digressing! He glares at the smaller man who gave him a small smile and flicked open that damn oriole fan.

Nie Huisang! That scheming little-

Uncle Four’s eyes light up.

“Ah! My mistake, my mistake! Someone else said that. Larger nose, certainly! Beadier eyes, I think.”

“Hey!” Sect leader Ouyang calls out, offended. The apparent siege has come to a standstill.

“Ah, Wen-guniang?” Nie Huisang tiptoes out from his half-behind position his brother like he hasn’t set them all up. “Where is the rest of your group?”

“Rest of our group?” Wen Qing echos, eyebrows furrowed with confusion. “This is everyone.”

“Truly, you are just civilians,” his old friend frowns in confusion. “What are you doing in the Burial Mounds? Are you staying with family that intends to fight?”

“Yes, yes,” a Nie disciple agrees. “What are you all doing here?”

“Staying away from the likes of you,” Wen Qing bites out. “We stood out of the war but we know enough of what your kind planned to do to my family. Even after living in your territory and making our prominent members dead on paper, you still tried to chase us.”

“If you truly are civilians, LanlingJin is willing to take you in,” Jin Guangshan declares. There is a ruffle of anger that rises quickly among the cultivators standing there. Yue laughs, but it’s cold and mocking. The angry whispers peter out.

“After all, who can remain angry at the innocent, blame the blameless, and call themselves righteous without shame?” Yue’s voice dips with contempt. “You can act like the most pure-intentioned sect leader– man– in the world, but do not forget your own questionable history.”

“And what makes you think you can call me that, boy?” Jin Guangshan laughs carelessly. “Researching the acts of a wild card was meant for the good of all.”

“And colluding with Xue Yang?”

“You give me too much credit,” Jin Guangshan’s eyes narrow sharply. “That bastard of mine played with my name for his own benefit. I’ll admit, putting him in charge of the task with unfettered control of the resources was my mistake, but I am not involved with that.”

Oh, Yue admits that’s good. Admitting a fault to seem more believable.

“What’s going on here?”

“A man ran into a conference yelling about a hidden army Wen cultivators plotting a revenge with dark tricks in the Burial Mounds,” Lan Xichen explains. Yue nods. Paid actor, then.

“Well. That’s that. But to reply to your heartfelt apology–“ or lack thereof, he doesn’t say but everyone hears– “there are a small few clans I would trust with their lives. But LanlingJin is definitely not one,” he snips. “I am willing to pretend to trust you, but not your underlings.”

Jiang Cheng’s eyes narrow, blustering anger rising to his surface. Yue cannot imagine why.

“And is YumengJiang one?!”

“I thought I could,” Yue sighs. “That’s why I suggested Yunmeng. It was the first place I picked, you know? But then look what sight I see. Little disciples calling for the blood of the farming, powerless elderly.”

Jiang Cheng flinches, as if Yue had slapped him.

“GusuLan… I’m sure they’ll be welcome in Gusu,” Lan Xichen says haltingly, as if waiting for an insult. Yue doesn’t give it. Wen Qing opens her mouth to protest but is cut off.

“We will come with you,” Granny decides. The others nod in quiet support. “I’m going to assume your righteousness is more than a reputation. Don’t let us down.”

“We try,” Lan Xichen smiles. The Wen aunties laugh and smile back. “Shall we discuss logistics?”

“We shall,” Wen Qing says imperiously. He can tell by her eyes: she trusts none of these people. Granny comes with her as she ushers Zewu-jun to the Demon Slaughtering Cave. The rest of them stand there, almost awkwardly for the fifteen minutes it takes Wen Qing and Lan Xichen to come to an agreement.

“Alright,” Zewu-jun calls out. “Each disciple take as many civilians as you can carry.”

“Jiang, support,” Jiang Cheng snaps out, eyes still locked on Yue like he isn’t sure if he wants to punch or hug him. Wei Wuxian smiles sadly at the sight. Yueguang-jun turns away.

“Who here has an empty qiankun pouch,” he calls out. Several Jin cultivators raise their hands.

“I do,” a Jin cultivator offers.

“As do I,” another Jin disciple offers.

“And I,” a third adds.

“I wonder,” Yueguang-jun purrs, “what was the use of such a great number of empty pouches? Ah, well. A problem for later.” Wei Wuxian narrows his eyes at Nie Huisang, who finally realizes just how many times he’s played oriole to the sects the last few years. If they’re playing with poetry, he won’t mind… reminding his friend just why they’d become so close.

“I don’t like what you’re insinuating, boy,” Jin Guangshan rumbles. The Moonlight Demon laughs, feral and unrestrained . Then he sobers and looks the at sect leader with unblinking eyes.

“Take that worthless opinion and find something with legs to stick it in like you do your-“

“Anyway,” Lan Xichen coughs. “It’s nice to see you again, alive and well.”

“And I you,” Yue smiles brightly. Really, the Twin Jades of Lan are truly another type of breed. Otherworldly beauty like that of a deity, kinder and purer than anything he could imagine, brilliant and powerful. Icons to replicate.

He also waves to Nie Mingjue and Nie Huisang– who, by the way, he is going to get back at. He definitely has something to do with this. He just doesn’t know what yet.

“Hello!”

Nie Mingjue looks vaguely confused but smiles and waves back.

“I had wondered where you were,” Nie Huisang continues with his dramatics. “Of course it would be here, protecting the last Wens.”

“You already knew that,” Yue grits out. Nie Huisang snaps his fan open in front of his face, laughing nervously.

“I didn’t know! I really don’t know anything about that,” he cries. Nie Mingjue gives his brother a searching look.

No doubt, Mingjue-xiong is onto him. Good. Nie-xiong, have you gotten quite so deep in that you’ve forgotten your greatest facade? Nie Huisang can pretend he merely dabbles in scheming and gossip, but Wei Ying knows his friend is much more willing to go the extra mile into unsavory than he lets in. Nie Mingjue gives him another look, confused. And Yue just smiles placidly. Nie Mingjue is not one for recognizing the type, but he’s definitely on guard after Jin Guangyao turned out to be what he’d expected. The disowning announcement had been made with relish and everyone knows it. But the real point is the way he’s staring at an increasingly scared Nie Huisang.

3

2

1

“HUISANG?!”

See? Mantis, meet oriole.

“I’m going to make you a calligraphy,” Nie Huisang growls at him. Beat at his own game, Yue supposes. He smiles maliciously.

“Taking requests? I’m partial to that… oh, how did it go? Ah! ‘The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it.’”

Nie Huisang sends him a glare that makes Wei Wuxian laugh.

“Sore loser,” he ribs.

Nie Huisang sticks out his tongue and they start cackling madly. This is worse and bigger than anything they’ve ever done to each other before. They’d never been on opposing sides of a board, so it makes sense things would get bigger and bigger like this.

“Go talk to your brother,” he smiles, nudging one of his oldest friends forward. Nie Huisang sucks in a deep breath and takes a step forward.

“And… it’s nice to see you again,” Nie Huisang says with his back to Wei Wuxian. And Wei Wuxian laughs.

“You too.”

He turns back to the raging hubbub and whistles sharply without any power behind it. But they all shut up, so it works.

“There’s no time for this,” he sighs. “Jins, I’m borrowing those pouches. Let’s pack.”

Stumbling nervously, they follow.

“I didn’t realize you had the kind of power to do this,” one waves vaguely at the clearing, free of resentful energy. “Did… did you get… someone to help you?”

Who? Xue Yang?

“Of course not,” he snorts, offended. “Let’s go.”

Silently, he drags them from hut to hut and packs everything into the qiankun pouches. By the time they return, people are already flying off with the Wen remnants.

“Gusu built several villages for refugees after the campaign and constantly monitors them,” Lan Xichen explains to Yue like he hadn’t been the one to suggest it. “I’m sure they’ll be safe there.”

Is Lan Xichen trying to… what? Reassure him?

Seriously, these people are acting weirdly and, for the life of him, Yue can’t figure out why. Without a second thought, he steps onto Lan Xichen’s blade and looks at him over his shoulder.

“Alright then, prove it,” he goads. With a genuinely amused smile, Lan Xichen rises into the air. Lan Zhan’s eyes are boring into him with something… intense. It’s almost an angry look.

Perhaps he’d hurt him too badly the last time they had seen each other. But it had done what it had needed to. Even if what he said hurt him just as much as it did Lan Zhan.

After all, he remembers the realization and resignation to falling in love with someone like Lan Zhan. Who could possibly be more perfect, more lovable? He’s just so… good.

Not like the tainted monster Wei Wuxian turned into.

The Moonlight Demon really is a moniker that suits him more than the austerity of Yueguang-jun.

He’s changed faces so many times that he can pick and choose now. Is that it?

Wind curling through his hair, he stares at the rising efforts of the clans.

Who even is he, anymore?

He’s been content as Yue for so long, but that’s not him, is it? Not when the affections, the debts, the instincts– those are all Wei Wuxian.

He bites his lip.

How many names is going to create to run away from himself? How many schemes, masks, towers and webs of lies? All he’s been doing is borrowing flimsy time.

Wei Wuxian’s love and ease in choosing family is biting Yueguang-jun in the ass, but it doesn’t matter. The residents of the village accept the DafanWens, finally under their own name, with little fanfare.

Shaking his head, he returns to his priority. Can he trust the people who know who they are— what they look like, where they live— to leave them alone?

He looks at Wen Qing and realizes that… yeah, they will. With the way that Lan Xichen and Mingjue-xiong are talking between themselves, looking worried. He turns to her.

“Wen Qing?”

“I love you. You enormously stubborn pain in the ass,” she laughs, hysteric relief swallowing them whole. He grins madly. They’ll be okay.

Taking a moment to compose themselves, he turns to watch the fumbling Jins unsure of whether to obey their sect leader and take whatever they stole from his cave along with all the Wens’ belongings or act under the eyes of the Lans watching them closely.

“Go yell at some Jin disciples,” he dismisses. Wen Qing sighs.

“I will,” she agrees. “And… Yue?”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry… and thank you.”

Why did she need to say that?

“Nothing to forgive or be grateful for,” he says. Wen Qing just sighs with a slight smile and starts directing the Jin disciples, who don’t even think before following.

Wei Wuxian vaguely thinks they were Jin Zixuan’s entourage at the Wen indoctrination a million years ago, back when he was one person instead of cobbled-together pieces of too many. Many moments are blurry and stark in his memory, but he’s starting to think he’d always been that way. Wen Ning stands next to him.

“Jie told me to stay with you,” he explains. Yue ruffles his hair.

“Awesome! Does she not want A’Ning and his gege to see her in her scariest mode?”

“Ge,” Wen Ning giggles at the title. “You’re only a year older than me. And I don’t think she’s scary.”

“Boo,” he pouts. “Qing-jie is very scary!”

They lapse into silence, watching every movement of the disciples like hawks. His gravest concern are the Jins. The Nie and Jiang cultivators present have warmed up to these weak but strong old folks. And Wei Wuxian feels almost proud of them for putting aside hatred to do what is right. For recognizing that hatred has no reason to burn at these people. The Lan elders and sect leader have decided their morals and rules would have them protect these people, who are weak to face the hatred for a long-dead man who distantly bears their name, and in that he is satisfied.

But the Jins? Only those who seem to interact with the peacock aren’t half-bad. There are some he has to send talismans at to keep them from hurting the women.

“Zewu-jun,” he steps in with grace. “I believe the Lan do not tolerate such behavior on their watch?”

“We do not,” Lan Zhan answers for him. “Will take care of it.”

Yue finds himself smiling at him. Lan Zhan just looks at him with so many emotions that Yue wishes he had the time to parse.

“Thank you, Hanguang-jun.”

“Lan Zhan,” he corrects. In another situation, he’d have the time to realize how off that was. But he’s too busy to notice anything else right now.

Yue just laughs and shoos him off to deal with the Jins, who don’t dare touch anyone under the righteous eye of Hanguang-jun. He only realizes he’s staring when Wen Ning elbows him. A’Yuan runs up to him and hugs his leg.

Cutie.

Yue let’s him and he explains everything that’s going on to the toddler. The moment is broken by a familiar voice.

“So… Wei Wuxian was with you,” Lan Qiren says to Wen Ning, almost conversationally. Yue feels his spine straighten. Fuck! His mask! He’d forgotten about the mask!

And to make matters worse, the work of several cultivators means that everyone’s there and done. All eyes are on them right now.

“Yue-gege,” A’Yuan tugs his robes. “Who is Wei Wuxian?”

Yeah, there’s no recovering from this. Nie Huisang had him trapped from the start when he was so focused on something else. Well, he supposes Nie-xiong was never the type for fair play. Well, Wei Wuxian got him back. But Jin Guangshan pales as he steps closer to them.

“Child… what did you call him?”

“That’s my Yue-gege!”

And everything descends into chaos.

Chapter Text

“I’ll explain to Wen Qing,” granny whispers, eyes narrowed. “Now go. Quickly!”

The man doesn’t even let anyone come close, he draws a sigil into the ground and lets himself disappear.

Mind on autopilot, he runs to Yiling.

The Burial Mounds welcome him, sheltering him as cultivators in robes of a dizzying array of colors search the haunted lands. How ironic! The man they seek stands here! And they walk past him because he’s so cloaked in yin they can’t realize he is a living man and not a corpse.

The Moonlight Demon laughs at their foolishness, and Yueguang-jun sighs. A man who doesn’t want to be known, a man who doesn’t want to be found– why seek him out when all it serves is to make him unhappy?

The longer he stays, the longer they seem to bleed together. But that’s irrelevant.

What matters more is finding a way to get out of here unseen.

He can’t keep living on the scraps of food left behind by the Wen settlement. Lasting him two months is well beyond even his own expectations.

But none of it matters, he needs to find a place to go. The man, reforged and stronger once again, meanders the streets of Yiling. No, without a doubt, this place is too dangerous. But where to go? Qinghe is asking to be caught, and so is Qishan. Yunmeng and Gusu will be on high alert. Lanling? Forget about it. Who knows what kind of shit Jin Guangshan would try to pull.

Speaking of, he still needs to kill that man, doesn’t he?

Any assassination needs to be planned. And for that he needs to know what’s going on. But… everyone will be on high alert, looking for his face. Frowning at the dirt, he guesses that a mask won’t do him much good anymore. Weimaos will be suspect too. It takes him a disappointingly long time to realize that thick enough makeup can cover his face.

At that, the man heads to the closest flower house. The madame of the house takes one look at his bedraggled appearance and decides she hates him.

“Who are you? No loitering,” she snaps. “What do you want?”

The man bows lowly, a courtly bow that makes her falter.

“Madame, this one is a cultivator on a night hunt,” the man lies. “I need to ask one of your ladies to tell me how to obtain rouge and powder.”

The madame’s face drops from disdain to disgust. Typical, old madames of these flower houses don’t like any men who won’t buy their girls near the places.

“What?! Are you a cutsleeve or something?!”

“I need to look like a courtesan to lure out a resentful ghost,” the man says dryly. “I can take this elsewhere if you are unwilling to assist me.”

“Mama…” one of the girls whispers. “He has such a pretty face under that dirt. Oh, please, can we make him over?”

“You’ll have to serve tea for an evening,” the madame bargains.

“Deal,” the man sighs. The courtesans giggle and the next few minutes are a flurry of robes and oils.

“You’re as pretty as a girl!” One of them, Liu, giggles. “I’m so jealous of your skin! It’s so smooth and clear!”

“You’d better not steal any customers from this big sister,” another courtesan– Lanhua– laughs loudly. The man laughs awkwardly. The makeup itches on his face.

But he needs to hear the news.

“Ladies!” The madame rushes in. “The lord of a cultivation sect himself is staying here the night! Best dresses, everyone!”

Best dresses turns out to mean the ones that reveal the most skin. The man does have to admit that the slit (embarrassing as it is) makes movement much easier, though.

It just has the unfortunate side effect of gluing Jin Guangshan’s eyes to his thighs.

“The honorable lord sect leader seems interested in you,” Liu-jie giggles as he passes with a jar of wine. “I’ll bet he’ll give you some pretty jewelry and bed you with so much strength!”

“Oh, he’s a cultivator! That’s like an immortal, right? He must be above rough needs. I’m sure he’d be a gentle lover, caring for the pleasure of his partner-“

The discussion quickly turns to a debate on how Jin Guangshan is in bed. Which is… disturbing. But the attention of the sect leader irritates the madame enough to let him go.

“No scab workers! Jin zhongzhu must buy one of our girls. Now out! Out! Go lure that ghost or whatever!”

Jin Guangshan “notices” something out a window midway through the discussion and leaves. A few of his men come with him, but the rest are ordered to remain behind. And the man hides a bitter laugh.

Which other sect leader would come in such a performative display and choose to stay at a flower house over an inn? And here he’d only intended to gather information on the goings-on of the cultivation world. It appears luck is with him.

And in the most twisted of ways.

“Help!” A woman, married given her hairstyle, is running through the streets. Behind her, walking with the confidence of a man who can outrun, outlast, overpower, and claim her, is none other than Jin Guangshan. Seriously? Any of the girls in the flower house would love to have him, and he goes after a married woman? Stepping out, he draws Jin Guangshan back to himself.

The man feels dirty, like he’s doing something wrong. He’d hate to see how Lan Zhan would look at him now. Playing with carnal methods to murder a sect leader.

“Jin zhongzhu,” the man puts on his most affected voice, breathy with false lust. “P- please help this lowly one. I have been- ah! I’ve been drugged!”

“Oh?”

Target? Acquired.

“Would you let this one help you out, then?” Jin Guangshan’s breath is sour on his skin and the man feels sick. But they’re alone now, disciples respecting the privacy of their master far too much for his own good. So the act is useless.

“Please, do,” the man laughs. And then he attacks. Jin Guangshan stumbles back at the swipe of his knife, coated in a layer of resentful energy.

“Guar- argh-!”

Blood trickles from the sect leader’s mouth. Smugly, the man kneels to look at the fallen man’s face as his qi rebels and shifts in confusion. He revels in Jin Guangshan’s terror. But there is no point to it. This is to protect his Shi- to protect Jiang Yanli.

“There’s just one thing you should know about men who play with yin too much,” the man whispers. “Yin is water. All it takes is a little resentful energy to taint all of it.”

“Y- you- Wei Wuxian!”

“Oh no,” he promises.

“I’m something much worse.”

He walks away as Jin Guangshan qi deviates behind him.

(And what kind of beast has he become? Filthy, cruel, and scheming. A murderer. Just how many men has he ruined?)

The man nearly tears the robes off of himself to keep them there. A thrown-out robe with a tear at the sleeve lies in the mud and the man desperately pulls the too-short robe on.

Then he approaches the water, and sees his reflection. His once golden-skin had been paled by the circumstances now it’s as white as Lan Zhan’s. It looks wrong on him. As wrong as the delicately curled golden and red eye makeup and flower resting between his shaped brows.

He’s beautiful and that feels grotesque. Desperately, he reaches up and scrubs at the makeup until he sees himself again.

And then he runs.

First he lands in Lanling. A mistake. The cities are in chaos, disciples everywhere. The man finds the nearest farmer who looks like he has a bone to pick. He’ll be glad to rant to a listening youth.

“What’s going on?”

“The lord of the Jin sect is dead,” the man says indifferently. Then he gives the man a sidelong look. “Hey, haven’t I seen you before?”

His heart pounds, panic spreading through his limbs. But rather than freezing up, he just lies.

“I uh… this one used to work with a traveling opera? Maybe that’s it?”

“Ah,” the farmer frowns. “That must be it. Say, boy, don’t you want a better robe than that?”

“Well, yes,” the man laughs. “But I don’t have much money right now. I left the opera so… no income.”

“I have a robe I don’t need,” the man scowls. He thrusts a white robe at the man. “They expect us to mourn when they left us all to rot? Bah! As if!”

Jin Guangshan is- well, he was not a good man. That was no true secret among anyone. But for the people spoon-fed stories of the Jin clan’s greatness? For the people raised on tales of valor only to see another yoke? He’s been raised by both the world of having nothing and the world of having everything. Who does not know that the Jiang clan loves their people and treats those under their hands well? Seeing such a stark difference…

“He really was not a good man, was he?”

“No, child,” the old farmer grunts. “But I wouldn’t go saying that recklessly. If one of them disciples heard you, they’ll torture you to death like you insulted the emperor.”

He’s reminded of a farce of an indoctrination, the stupid Quintessence Of The Wens. Wen Chao’s stupid smug face. Is history really so cyclical that he’ll have to watch it repeat?

“Hah, and what makes them different from the Wen clan they warred with for their arrogance, then?”

The farmer considers him and laughs.

“Good question, kid. Good question.”

The man stares down at the fine robes of white in his hands, amazed at the gall of the Jins. This is how they display wealth? Forcing citizens to mourn? And spending all that on robes of white? The peacock’s shitty cousin must be behind this, no doubt. Even the peacock isn’t this awful.

The longer he looks at the white robes, the more his mind draws to Lan Zhan. The fuddy duddy, in his dour mourning robes and grim expression as they met under the moonlight. The glowing white as they braved danger in the Xuanwu’s cave together. The soft white as Lan Zhan held him like he was something precious and kissed him. The grieving white as Yue mercilessly ripped Lan Zhan’s heart (and his own) to shreds with his own two hands. It doesn’t take him a second thought to put them on.

“Thank you,” he says. And he means it. The farmer just laughs bitterly and heads off to his home. A dilapidated building amongst a host of them. That feels wrong.

Whistling sharply, he lets legions of corpses who died of starvation here build up the other houses. A few people run screaming but they stop pretty quickly when they realize the corpses are doing them a favor. Once he’s gathered enough wood from a forest that probably belonged to the Jin and deposited it by the houses, the man leaves.

The man washes in the river and slips into the robes. And he marvels at the white, feeling almost innocent in it. Almost like he had been in his days playing around at Cloud Recesses a million years ago. He also feels the distinctly familiar feeling of being dead and gone in them. He is less a mourner than he is a ghost.

”That man… he just set a bunch of corpses to building our houses?”

“Wait! Isn’t the only one who can do that the missing Yueguang-jun, Wei Wuxian of YunmengJiang?!”

The man bolts.

He passes by other places but doesn’t stick around. Lotus Pier is on high alert, people milling everywhere with pictures of his face and asking after him. Search parties and rumors everywhere. Qinghe has Nie Huisang, so he doesn’t even bother going there. They can play their little cat and mouse game at another time. Qishan is still too close to the Nies. So he goes where his feet carry him.

Soon enough, he finds himself at the outskirts of Gusu. And someone is there before he was.

“Ah,” a ghostly woman looks up at him. She’s sitting at a table with a cracked pot of tea and and a jar of wine. The street around them is empty.

“Hello,” he says softly. She’s not resentful, so why is she still here? What worldly tie is keeping her here? She’s not haunting anything, just waiting in this empty street.

“Hello, young’un!” She smiles at him with so much warmth that the man almost waits for The Moonlight Demon or even Yueguang-jun to rise to the surface. They bloom most when he’s surrounded by the dead, the man has realized.

But, he realizes faintly, he hasn’t noticed either of them since he left the Burial Mounds for the last time.

“I have been many people,” she murmurs softly without the man needing to even say a word, reaching out stroking his hair gently. When had she even stood? “I think over time, you lose some of those people and others begin to bleed together.”

So this is what it truly means to be lost, to fade: they will never pass into the future beyond memory.

“I’m waiting for someone, you know,” the old woman chatters aimlessly. The man sits on the ground like a child waiting to be told a story.

“Why two drinks then?”

“Well, I don’t know if he’d want tea or wine when he arrives! So I have to make sure to bring both,” she laughs gaily. “I waited for him. Day after day. I still wait.”

The man faintly wonders what it takes to inspire such faith, such loyalty.

“He never came?”

“He will come,” she corrects with such a quiet conviction that the man finds himself unable to refute it.

“Who is he?”

“Someone very special,” she says. And what a cryptic answer that is! But the man chooses to not inquire any further.

“Are you looking for someone, dear?”

“What do you mean?”

“Is there someone out there waiting for you?” The old woman looks at the young man with a knowing look on her face. Ah. She knows he has a Lan Zhan in his life. A Lan Zhan, because how else can he even explain their relationship? They are not enemies or strangers, how could they ever be? They are not lovers, to say they are mere allies or even friends is a falsehood, and to call them soulmates seems almost crude to say. But perhaps a Lan Zhan is a soulmate. A soulmate dearly loved and impossible to stay by the side of.

(How could he? The man has become man of violence, bred of blood and bone and the cruelty of men. He has known himself to be a monster. One who wears so many faces he doesn’t know if there’s a real one. How could something like that be beside a person quite so perfect as Lan Zhan? Lan Zhan, who knows to value the good. Lan Zhan who is every good trait the man could call to mind and more: beautiful, strong, powerful, kind, brilliant. Can the man ever finish praising Lan Zhan once he began?)

“If he wants me, he can find me in his memory,” the man laughs bitterly. “I am no longer me. I don’t quite know what I am.”

“Well,” the old woman offers slowly, “who are you?”

“I was Wei Ying, once,” the man muses. “A child who fought to survive and still smiled and loved brightly. He faded into who Wei Wuxian was.”

“You speak of those parts of yourself like they’re gone,” she notes. And she’s right, some of them are gone.

“He was, for a long time,” the man says, throat suddenly dry. “He shattered and an almost feral half-being formed in the spaces where the dust didn’t lie.”

“And that half being birthed a warrior,” the woman intones, “and then someone in-between the feral, the youth, and the warrior formed. You named them separately, and made them different.”

“They are different,” the man insists.

“No. They’re you,” the old woman says simply. She smiles fondly. “And I understand what you are now now.”

“Understand?” Wei Wuxian looks at her, baffled.

“You’re not looking for someone waiting for you, you’re waiting for yourself,” she smiles. “I hope you at least know if he prefers tea or wine.”

“Wine,” Wei Wuxian answers immediately, suddenly sure of himself. She laughs merrily at that.

“Well then, I’d mention that to another young man instead of this old woman,” the old woman laughs. “Because I think he’s been waiting for you too.”

A caught breath, voice choking on air. Wei Wuxian whirls around to see him. Eyes a molten honey, hair a line of the darkest ink swirling over a page, skin a gleaming jade, lips two perfect flower petals amidst snow. A beauty by every definition of the word in flowing white robes that made him seem… separate from mortal desires.

Lan Zhan.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan looks at him with a million different words and burning pain in his eyes. “Please.”

How has he always put so many words into one? Like a lodestone, Wei Wuxian finds himself pulled forward. With trembling steps, he lets himself fall into Lan Zhan’s arms.

Suddenly, they’re alone and there is no one else in the world.

“Did you hear all of that?”

“Yes,” Lan Zhan nods. “Did not want to interrupt.”

He laughs at that. How cute, really.

“Did you know, Lan Zhan? That when you held me like this, I was me again?”

“Why, then,” Lan Zhan’s hands are gripping him tightly on his hips in a way that’s so tight it might bruise. Wei Wuxian is coming to appreciate it, it’s stability, the love in it. “Why did you run away?”

Oh. That’s true. They do need to talk about this. Wei Wuxian sighs, feeling the air leave his chest. Throat suddenly dry and heart pounding, he reaches up to touch Lan Zhan’s cheek.

“I thought you’d be better without me,” he rasps. “I thought- I thought it would be better if you never saw me again instead of seeing me when I wasn’t… complete. Coreless, missing parts of my memory, becoming a different person. What would that do to all of you? Seeing a different man wearing my face?”

“Still Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan takes his hands gently. “Core or no core, healing or healthy, I would love you.”

“But I wasn’t me,” he says softly. “I wasn’t me for a long time.”

“Then… are you back?” Lan Zhan stares at him with so much desperate hope that it shakes something in Wei Wuxian.

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian breathes. “I’ve come back to you.”

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan says. And Wei Wuxian can’t help but feel unworthy of the way Lan Zhan says his name like it’s holy, his lips unworthy of saying it.

“I’ve hurt you, Lan Zhan. I’ve promised you me and then left you, and then I said- I said all of those terrible things. And they’re not true, to know. I wanted it. I did! But I-“

“Stop,” Lan Zhan interrupts, eyes dark. “There is no need for sorry or thank you from Wei Ying to me. I know why. It is forgiven.”

It almost feels wrong, the easy way that Lan Zhan wipes his past misdeeds aside like this.

“You can’t just forgive every bad thing I do,”

“Want to,” Lan Zhan shakes his head. Wei Wuxian sighs.

“Why?”

“Because I love you,” Lan Zhan says simply.

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian murmurs, lost for words. Lan Zhan cups his face gently.

“Can I kiss you?”

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian gasps, suddenly finding his chest empty of air. “Yes, please, please kiss me.”

Lan Zhan growls, pulling Wei Wuxian into his chest. Wei Wuxian can feel the hands in his hair, tugging gently and crashing their mouths together.

Hungrily, he accepts all of it.

A tongue, warm and slick, claims Wei Ying’s mouth and Wei Ying lets himself be claimed. He wants to be claimed by Lan Zhan.

When they part, he realizes that they’re both breathing heavily– panting, really– and Wei Wuxian’s head is spinning.

Dazed, he presses a finger to his lips, feeling the aftershocks of where they collided.

“Who would ever think,” he teases, weaving his fingers into Lan Zhan’s soft hair, “that the perfect Hanguang-jun would be so rough of a lover.”

“Say that again,” Lan Zhan demands.

“Lover,” Wei Wuxian repeats obediently, tasting the word on his lips and feeling the thrill it leaves behind. “My lover.”

“Yours,” Lan Zhan agrees. “Only ever yours.”

He tilts his head back and laughs.

Lan Zhan pulls the ribbon from his forehead, and Wei Wuxian’s breath catches in his throat.

“Lan Zhan,” he says softly, the familiar syllables almost too big for his mouth.

“Will not wait any longer,” Lan Zhan promises with a kiss to his temple, hands gripping his robes like he’d plummet into the deepest ocean if he let go. “Will not make Wei Ying wait.”

“What does this mean for us?”

“That it will only ever be you, that it can’t be anyone other than you,” Lan Zhan promises.

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian barely manages to keep the name from coming out a gasp. “That sounds like you’re deciding to marry me.”

“One day,” Lan Zhan decides resolutely. Then his eyes look at him with a wide-eyed innocence that absolutely wrecks Wei Wuxian. “Soon?”

How dare he be this cute?! Wei Wuxian is going to die right here!

“Mn,” he whispers. “I’d like that.”

And just like that, his back hits a wall, wrists pinned under Lan Zhan’s strong hands. And Wei Wuxian doesn’t resist. He lets Lan Zhan take from him, lets Lan Zhan devour him, lets Lan Zhan have him.

He’s drunker than any wine could make him, higher than any mountain, flying on Lan Zhan’s kisses.

Parting to breathe, he looks up at Lan Zhan.

“Hey,” he murmurs.

“Hey,” Lan Zhan echoes. And Wei Wuxian’s mouth drags up into a smile at that. Lan Zhan just smiles fondly back.

Oh, wow, he doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to the way his heart pounds when his Lan Zhan smiles.

And Lan Zhan- Lan Zhan looks beautiful like this. Eyes darkened from a sunlight molten honey to a deep, carnal gold, cheeks ever so slightly flushed and ears and neck pink, kiss-bitten lips shiny and slightly puffy.

“I want you,” Wei Wuxian groans, head falling back. Lan Zhan doesn’t even bother to answer, kissing marks into his neck and tugging at the hair he leaves loose nowadays.

“Yes, yes-! Lan er-gege!”

Agonizingly, Lan Zhan pulls back.

“We must stop here. Wei Ying deserves honor, and I must take responsibility before we go further than this,” he murmurs, breath hot on the shell of Wei Wuxian’s ear. Wei Wuxian shudders.

“I don’t want to wait,” he admits.

“I do not either,” Lan Zhan says softly, eyes open and forehead bare of ribbon. Like this, he looks more human than ever. “But Wei Ying deserves a wedding with his family there.”

“You also want to show the world that you love me, don’t you?” Wei Wuxian grins mischievously.

Lan Zhan looks away, shy.

“Lan Zhan?”

“Lying is forbidden,” Lan Zhan manages. Wei Wuxian cackles. Oh, his heart is going to burst. Lan Zhan is so many things– beautiful, righteous, good, smart as a whip, powerful and strong. Cute is a rare word to describe him. But it fits so well right now, with his eyes open and innocent, hands earnestly clinging to him.

“Darling, love,” he coos. “Why are you so cute?”

“Wei Ying is cuter,” Lan Zhan pouts.

He’s been left high and dry but it’s worth it when he’s still holding Lan Zhan at the end of the night.

“Come with me?”

Wei Wuxian grabs Lan Zhan’s hand, raising it to his lips and pressing a kiss to Lan Zhan’s fingers.

“I’ll go where you lead, love.”

Chapter Text

“Wangji?” Lan Xichen stands at the gate when they arrive. “Everyone’s been worried sick. Where have you bee-“

And then he stops. And stares.

“Wei gongzi,” he manages. Wei Wuxian smiles awkwardly.

“And here I thought that we’d gotten closer than that,” he teases. Lan Xichen’s genial smile stretches into a real one.

“Wuxian-di?”

“Sounds good to me, Xichen-ge,” Wei Wuxian grins agreeably. Lan Xichen laughs lightly.

“Come,” Xichen-ge sighs. “Sit with us and start at the beginning.”

Xichen-ge leads him to a room and pours tea. It’s the type that would only ever be served to a Lan. Definitely tea, but tasting of little. It wouldn’t shock him if the Lans had stunted taste buds.

Wei Wuxian starts from what is decidedly not the beginning.

“Wen Chao threw me into the Burial Mounds. Somewhere in there my sense of self kinda sorta shattered.”

Lan Xichen, the First Jade of GusuLan, the venerable Zewu-jun, spits out his tea.

“Why?” Lan Zhan looks pained. “Why did you give Jiang Wanyin your core?”

“He needed it,” Wei Wuxian says simply. “He’s my little brother, and he needed it.”

Zewu-jun nods, a punched-out sound slipping past his lips.

“Makes sense,” he manages. Lan Zhan’s eyes widen, head snapping to face his elder brother.

“I’m a big brother, Wangji,” Xichen-ge says softly. Lan Zhan shakes his head, disbelieving.

“Speaking of elder siblings,” another voice cuts in and they turn. It’s Jin Zixuan and… and…

“A’Xian?”

Shijie.

She runs to him, propriety be damned, arms out for a hug. Awkwardly, he mimics the motion, arms out and unsure. She pauses.

“A’Xian?”

“I don’t think I remember what hugs feel like,” Wei Wuxian whispers. Shijie looks at him and there are tears in her eyes and arms around him and he’s breaking into her warm, small arms. She’s holding the pieces of him as he falls apart.

“Oh, A’Xian,” she murmurs into his hair. “You’re coming home now.”

“Yeah,” he promises. Lan Zhan rises to his feet.

“I will fly you,” he decides. And being pressed up against Lan Zhan for an indefinite amount of time? Yes, please.

“Ooh! Really! I haven’t gone flying like that in so long! You gotta pick me up, ‘kay?”

“How old are you,” Jin Zixuan wrinkles his nose at the coquettish flirting. Like that peacock wouldn’t fly an extra-long route to show it off if his Shijie asked. Idiot.

“Don’t you know? Xianxian is three!”

And his Shijie laughs and she cries and it’s at the same time.

“Three seems a little too big,” she croaks. “How about one?”

They’re going to be alright, he decides as they make haste to Yunmeng. Lan Zhan does pick him up bridal style and Wei Wuxian has exactly zero qualms about this. Lan Xichen gives him a knowing look, and he nods. They both remember that conversation in Qinghe what feels like a thousand years ago. His brother(-in-law to be) smiles widely.

Once they’re significantly far from Gusu, the peacock clears his throat.

“So… you were Yue?” Jin Zixuan is trying like the awkward bird he is to make conversation and it’s almost nice. Wei Wuxian will deign to answer.

“I mean, I never really bothered naming myself? I was more animal than human when I was The Moonlight Demon. Wei Wuxian was like… a memory? He was flashes of sensation and familiar faces. But then I joined the campaign and they called me Yueguang-jun to be polite like they weren’t the ones who named that incarnation of me too.”

“Yueguang-jun was… reserved, quiet. Until he wasn’t, and the Chifeng-zun and Zewu-jun were calling you Yue,” Jin Zixuan recalls. “People just assumed that he’d decided we were worth befriending and actually bothered to speak to us.”

“I was trying to be as unlike Wei Wuxian as possible. So nobody made the connection,” he shrugs. “But it got uncomfortable quickly.”

“It worked,” Shijie says lightly, daintily stepping from the sword to the wooden pier with endless Shijie grace. Wei Wuxian winces.

“Lan Zhan almost caught me,” he chuckles. “And now that I think of it… Nie Huisang probably knew the entire time. He definitely knew for most of it.”

“It was Wei Ying’s laugh,” Lan Zhan adds. “Thought I was dreaming.”

“I’m sorry, love,” he whispers, cupping Lan Zhan’s face in his hand. Lan Zhan leans into the touch, eyes locking with Wei Wuxian’s. They smile.

“This is the shit I have to see when we reunite?”

Jiang Cheng’s grouchy voice cuts through the conversation like a crack of Zidian. They all pause, on the edge of Lotus Pier’s docks, watching Jiang Cheng. The whip on his wrist crackles with purple light, making Jiang Cheng glow in the low light of evening. Jin Zixuan takes a step back and nearly falls into the water. Wei Wuxian is significantly less intimidated.

“Hey, can Jiang Cheng and I talk… alone?”

Lan Zhan’s grip on his waist grows tighter, concern in his eyes.

“Aiyah, baobei, stop that. We’ll be fine,” he whispers into his lover’s ear. Everyone hears it anyway.

“Gross,” Jiang Cheng mutters.

Relieved (Jin Zixuan), reluctant (Shijie), and very reluctant (Lan Zhan), they leave, two in Lotus Pier and one back to Cloud Recesses. He turns to his brother.

“I missed you.”

“I’m angry at you,” Jiang Cheng admits. “You… you didn’t ask- how could I possibly-“ Rage builds in Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian flops backwards onto the rebuilt boards of Lotus Pier. The dark sky glitters with the exact same stars. The treasures in the hall are the exact same heirlooms. But these boards have changed. They’re newer, lacking the musical creak under a full body’s sudden push. That will take longer to rebuild.

“You were dying,” he answers. “I’d rather you’d have hated me for the rest of my life than died when I had a solution.”

“I didn’t want it!” Jiang Cheng yells. “I didn’t want this- this isn’t mine. Why did you- is it because of my parents? That stupid fucking promise? Or your damned hero-complex?! Because fuck all of that! That was your core! Yours!”

“And you’re mine too,” Wei Wuxian says softly, sitting up. “You’re my little brother. I get to choose what’s more important.”

Jiang Cheng sits beside him.

“Don’t—“Jiang Cheng breathes— “don’t leave me again. And don’t do that again. I’ll break your fucking legs.”

“I don’t want to leave,” he sniffs. “Lotus Pier is the best place in the world!”

And it breaks a dam between them. Jiang Cheng punches him and then pulls him into a hug. Deciding to be merciful, he doesn’t comment on the rapidly dampening collar of his robes. He can tease Jiang Cheng about that later.

“I’ll kidnap Lan Wangji myself if it makes you stay,” Jiang Cheng mutters, muffled into his clothes. This brother of his… A’Cheng was never one for words, he showed his love like this. In blustering concern wrapped in anger and willing vulnerabilities to those who know to recognize them. It’s always been easy between them since Wei Wuxian realized how well-matched his brother’s heat is with his own lightheartedness.

“I’m sure I can convince him with… other means,” Wei Wuxian waggles his eyebrows.

“Why are you like this?!” Jiang Cheng jumps to his feet and chases after him.

“You love me!”

And he knows it.

“Who would love you?!” Jiang Cheng growls and Wei Wuxian laughs. He turns and lets Jiang Cheng crash into him with a little “oof!” When his brother disentangles himself, Wei Wuxian answers.

“You do! And Shijie! And Lan Zhan!”

“‘Fuck all knows why,” Jiang Cheng grouches. They sit at the edge of the pier for a moment, feet brushing the water.

“Why did you go?”

“Seeing my face with another person would have angered you so, ah!” Wei Wuxian tries to smile at that, and all he manages is a grimace.

“I would have rather had that than not know if you were even alive!” Jiang Cheng’s anger dies at Wei Wuxian’s melancholy.

“I wasn’t,” he says. Jiang Cheng grabs his wrist and when he finds a pulse, shakes him, demanding.

“What?!”

“I think I really did die in there, but I’m still… not completely sure what happened after that second month in the Burial Mounds,” he says. “But I’m back.”

They’re quiet for a moment before a soft sound rings as loud as a thousand gongs.

“Ge…”

“Jiang Cheng?”

“Ge,” his brother repeats, red-faced. “Don’t leave again. Even if you’re… even if you’re dead… you’d think you’d at least have the courtesy to give your family the right to bury the body.” The last bit is grumbled but the word family gives him pause.

“I’ll always come back if I’m welcome,” he swears. “Twin prides of Yunmeng, right? Sandu Shengshou and Yuguang-jun, even dumber titles than we would have thought. But we promised.”

“You-! You’d better! Where’s the filial piety to the Jiang, huh?!”

“Aaaaallll with you and Shijie, didi!”

“Who the hell is your didi, huh?!”

“You! You said so yourself!”

“Shut up! If I’m a didi then you’d better call A’Jie something a little closer than Shijie!”

Wei Wuxian tilts his head back and laughs and laughs. Oh, how good it feels to be alive!

“He’s right,” the distinctly amused voice of their sister rings out. “I think jiejie is perfect.”

They turn to see her walking up the dock. Alone.

“A’jie… where is-“

“A’Xuan is being accosted by our shidis,” she answers with a wicked Jiang clan grin. Even that looks perfect on her- she’s here and she’s alive and Wei Wuxian is definitely not holding back tears.

“He’s family, he oughta learn how it’s done,” Jiang Cheng approves.

“Jiejie,” Wei Wuxian says quietly, rolling the two syllables on his tongue. “Madam Yu would throw a fit.”

“I think she resigned herself to this, in the end,” Jiang Cheng sighs. “She made you swear to stick with us.”

They pause, remembering their last moments with her. Those hadn’t been her words, but she’s just like her son in that. She always had been prickly and sour… but she loved with the same intensity as she hated. They hadn’t understood that until it was far, far too late.

“She accepted you, in the end,” Shijie- no, jiejie- decides. “I’m sure of it. And I’m sure she’d also be pleased that we’re marrying such a prestigious gongzi into YunmengJiang for you.”

“She’d ask why we bothered,” Wei Wuxian snorts. Jiang Cheng sniffs haughtily.

“Because you don’t get to leave. I told you, I’ll kidnap the man myself if I have to,” he says. “What? Is YunmengJiang not among the Great Sects? Where’s the respect?!”

“Poor Zewu-jun, he probably wanted to make his brother his heir,” his sister giggles. “Oh well!”

“We can pay a mere brideprice,” Jiang Cheng snorts. Then he pauses, as if in thought. “Or would it be groomprice?”

“Groomprice,” jiejie decides. “I can’t wait to negotiate with Zewu-jun!”

“Oh that’s a terrifying expression,” Jin Zixuan comments, a very young and new shidi handing on his leg. He looks up at Wei Wuxian with wide eyes.

“Are you my da-shixiong?”

Oh his poor heart.

“And who is this?”

“That’s Li Xiang, new youngest,” jiejie laughs. “Now, lets pull together a proposal.”

“Can I just elope,” he groans. “Oh please, venerated jiejie of mine?” His sister, pouting, stamps her foot playfully.

“No! You’re giving me this. I always wanted to plan our Xianxian’s wedding!”

“Sh- jiejie, Lan Zhan won’t want too much formality, ah!”

“Well he’ll get it. Because if he even thinks of touching you without giving you honor…” Jiang Cheng tugs at the handle of Sandu with a… rather eager grin. It’s, quite frankly, terrifying.

“He didn’t! We haven’t slept together! Now put that away!”

Needless to say, they send the proposal gifts two days later.

Zewu-jun arrives immediately, with the Old Goat Lan Qiren and Lan Zhan in tow.

“Wuxian-di,” Lan Xichen bows. He returns it.

“Hi Xichen-ge!

“So you’re trying to pull Wangji from Gusu, huh?” It’s teasing… he thinks? But Jiang Cheng’s responding smirk is absolutely feral.

“If he wants to marry my older brother, well…”

“Lan Wangji is certainly very welcome in Lotus Pier,” jiejie says with the grin of the woman who will rule Koi Tower one day. Scary. Absolutely perfect on her! But his Shijie- his big sister is just always perfect so it makes sense!

“This is why I wanted to elope,” he whispers pointedly to Lan Zhan, who hides a laugh.

“Shameless!” Lan Qiren sputters. Their elder siblings laugh until their eyes meet. Their mouths fall into very… very political smiles. The ones with teeth even if none are displayed. Jin Zixuan takes a very cautious step backwards.

Smart man.

“These family discussions are meant to be had without you two present, so shoo!”

You know what? Wei Wuxian has decided that he doesn’t mind him.

“Let’s get out of here, Lan Zhan!”

Lan Zhan lets himself be pulled.

“How have you been?”

“Missed you,” Lan Zhan rumbles. Wei Wuxian giggles, pressing a kiss to his wrist.

“I missed you too, I’m sure Gusu’s glad to have their gem back,”

Lan Zhan tilts his head noncommittally.

“Hey, that’s your home,” he says seriously.

“Lotus Pier is your home,” Lan Zhan rebuts. This… this man.

“Ah,” he breathes. “What am I going to do with you, Lan Zhan?”

Lan Zhan lets him rest his head against his chest.

“Marry me, apparently.”

“And they don’t believe me when I say you’re funny,” Wei Wuxian pouts. “Look at you! Even have a sense of humor! What doesn’t our perfect Jade have?”

Lan Zhan presses their foreheads together.

“What I’m set to take,” he murmurs lowly.

Oh.

Well on that… on that note…

Oh, his brain’s gone and stopped. What was anything? Lan Zhan’s pretty. And his mouth is suddenly very, very dry.

“Wei Ying?”

He yanks Lan Zhan by the lapels and stares him in the eyes.

“Can I kiss you?”

“Mn,” Lan Zhan smiles, a hundred percent laughing at him but Wei Wuxian needs Lan Zhan’s lips on his yesterday .

It’s deep and hungry, devouring each other for anyone to see.

“At this rate, I’ll get addicted, you know,” he huffs a husky laugh into Lan Zhan’s flushed ear.

“Will take responsibility,” Lan Zhan teases.

“I’m expecting it,” he smiles fondly. Lan Zhan nips his ear.

“And if I get addicted?”

“The heavenly Hanguang-jun, addicted to this mere mortal? This one would be honored,” he breathes against the skin of Lan Zhan’s neck. “This one can only pray his oblations are accepted.”

“Wanted,” Lan Zhan growls and Wei Wuxian barely keeps back a groan of satisfaction.

“Da-shixiong’s being gross! Da-shixiong’s being gross with his boyyyfriend!” A shidi calls with a grin. Oh this little shit-

A crowd quickly gathers around them. Most of the shidis are new or older, what an age gap… but the youngest beams up at Lan Zhan.

“Who is this? Wow, he’s so pretty! Is this an immortal?”

“This disciple greets Hanguang-jun,” his er-shimei, Hai Haoran, bows. What a smirk she has! So naughty! He’s raised them so well!

“Hanguang-jun?” There’s a hushed whisper among the little ones. How cute!

“I’m so lucky, right?!”

“I’m the lucky one,” Lan Zhan says lowly into his hair and promptly stops his heart. The disciples titter at his reddening face. Wei Wuxian waves them off.

“Get back to your lessons, you brats! Or I’ll call a big yao for you to fight and laugh as it slobbers dirt in your hair!”

They run off laughing.

Lan Zhan’s fingers laced in his, they walk back to where a his siblings are wearing smug grins. Lotus Pier it is, then.

“You’re going to look so lovely in red,” Wei Wuxian grins.

It’s a wedding, a happy ending.

He didn’t even think he’d get to see one of his own.