as of last Friday I have graduated with a degree in animation... now all I need is a job

Lan Wangji narrowed his eyes but did best not show his anger at the implication. The only person who can reverse the spell is in most cases the caster or someone from the clan bloodline that cast in the first case and the idea that anyone in his family was involved- ludicrous!

"This is why I didn't want to bother you with this, but if it's Lan castings then only another Lan can meddle with it." Wei Ying huffed and turned to go inside. "I need your power and like you mentioned this body is weak."

Sadness. There is a bleed of mournful sadness that leaks in among the cocky playful tone.

"Do you truly believe this?" Does Wei Ying truly think that someone would be so awful as to do to his sect what happened in the Wens? That… if it's on purpose what of his son? What of his state?

"I wish I rather didn't, but sadly this one knows far too much and all too little," Heavy is the voice that beckons him inside and forced in the smile on that face. This body is very different from the Wei Ying of before but all the same, it feels very much like him. Wei Ying is still Wei Ying even as he keeps his phrasing coy and distant.

He almost wants to just call him out and say his name. Let it ring out into the air and break the tension being pulled with all of Wei Ying's incessant language dancing, but also it's not his place to do so. Wei Ying will finally break the chord when he is ready and not a moment sooner. So for now Lan Wangji sits patiently with his heart heavy at the thought of what might be said.

A kettle of tea brews as Wei Ying pulls out some paper and ink, "Lan Zhan, what do you know about the condition you're under?"

"That this a result of my own emotions; a fault in my morals. A consequence of having to make too many medicine bottles during the SunShot Campaign hurting my core."

"Both correct but wrong in an understandable way," Wei Ying's hands dip gracefully into the ink tray and strokes along the page, "There are no faults in morals in a jade so pure and white as you Hanguang-Jun. I can't see what you could ever do to deserve a statement like that."

I love you. That's my moral failing.

Lan Wangji fell for a man and not just any but one of unrepenting shamefulness and brilliance. A lovely black rabbit coloring a sea of white. It's an open secret that the elders and those who were around during those days are well aware of by now.

That Lan Wangji has been turning into a Baihu because of such unwholesome feelings and they'll tell their gossips that certainly don't exist; and yet have this funny habit of always ending up at his ears. If they are not old enough or were not close, they speculate it might have been from his fight with the Yiling Patriarch or that he holds some dark secret.

"No. I have failed in my morals and convictions."

I failed to protect you. To save you from yourself and the world. I failed to love you properly. For you, I was willing to be petty and jealous. For you, I was willing to break rules when I knew better.

Lan Wangji should have done more. He should have been stronger both emotionally and physically so that none of this would have happened to Wei Ying. So that night in Nightless City wouldn't have been needed.

"Even if you see it that way that is not the case." Those idle strokes along the page, "Your character does have an effect on your outcome but is more a fault of eating Rabbits than anything." Those grey eyes, not the brighter silver of his old body but more like the grey of storm clouds before the rain, droop and that smile falters. "That and the rage of a fool."

It's gone not a moment later, "But that's not what we should be focusing on for the moment." The paper is pushed forward. "Hanguang-Jun, I want to tell you some secrets that only someone as awful and depraved as I should hope to know."

On the paper are rudimentary drawings of a person and next to it a rabbit. "You ever wonder why in all these years no one has ever thought of a proper name for the spell? For something so dominant we never came up with a proper name for it. We say treasure, spell, curse, any manner of contextual synonym but never a name."

"And a name is power and purpose. Without a proper name one can't understand what it does. Why it exists."

The brush writes the character for Lan above the human figure, "If the name Lan is associated with rabbits its only natural to assume they will be a rabbit. The name and purpose- the mythology bleeds into the form our bodies shape as."

"Lan Zhan, why the Rabbit? Why that animal?"

He'll admit that as much as Lan Wangji knows and understands his family's history that aspect is often unclear, but he understands what they are good for. The only thing the rabbits are good for. "If we didn't have them then the panacea we craft would be worthless. It's ingredients without are highly poisonous."

"But why medicine? Why rabbits?"

He looks to the first-quarter moon traveling slowly across the sky mocking him.

"Because we have no real Jade Rabbits to make the elixir of immortality like in the legend. We must make our own." That is what he's been told all throughout his life and that has what is understood in the sect. It makes sense to try and recreate it even as a pale shadow if it will let them help people and fight against the dark.

"And yet to make it you must kill the Rabbits themselves and it doesn't even grant immortality unless of course you drank bottles nonstop and given the flavor I can't see who would dare."

Wei Ying pours the tea and hands him a cup, "The ultimate goal of cultivation is immortality but it is a peak so few will reach. After all, life is messy and full of new desires and distractions. Elements that pull you away from duties and proper courses."

"Dogs in stories often accompany and guide heroes to glory and protect homes. A peacock's feathers are supposed to hold keys to enlightenment and wisdom. Three-legged crows are wielders of the sun and jewels and metals grant special magics."

He's wondering where the point is in this long speech. "Hanguang-Jun, what did you want to achieve? What were you wanting that put stripes on your skin?"

All he can do is look at Wei Ying with that lopsided-grin that always sets on his face. Lan Wangji goes to open his mouth but Wei Ying has already moved on. "When an animal develops enough of a core to become a human it starts to get bound in by our laws and rules. Its no longer just a rabbit; the child is a person and has earned the right to be a person. The only way you can reverse such a thing is to force the will of another."

"The weakest ones revert first. Isn't that normal?"

Wei Ying's gaze hardens; his voice turns coarse. "No. If anything it be the strongest. It be someone like Lan Sizhui or senior disciples. This isn't something brought on by weakness if anything it's a matter of being strong when it occurs naturally. You have to meddle to invoke it early and to make something specific. You have to cultivate a culture and an attitude to get results like this."

"What would you have me do?" Because for Wei Ying he'd do anything. For Wei Ying- Lan Wangji's head stings ever so slightly. Wei Ying is speaking but the words are- his head is swimming. His chest- it hurts and that look- why?

Why are your eyes so sad when you look at me?

Is it pity? Is it regret? He wants to know but all he gets is this. All he gets is this pounding in his head before finally it stops along with the spinning.

Mo Xuanyu is stepping away towards the daybed and inside he feels hollow. Empty.

Lan Wangji grabs him, "Hanguang-Jun, this one can't look westward towards a moon like tonight so his lips should clench before he breaks things of value finds himself like Pixiu. I'm heading east instead."

Lan Wangji decides to not point out the direction towards the daybed. "Please..."

Please- what? What were they- he was telling Mo Xuanyu about his suspicions. Yes. About his worry over Lan Sizhui and the state of the rabbits. About his fear that someone is doing wrong and his desire for help.

Mo Xuanyu is waiting for him to finish. To say something.

He lets go of that hand and the part of him that looks and sees the shadow of Wei Ying hurts inside. Hurts enough to break and say that name by mistake even though it's not him. His head aches thinking on it and he decides he too needs to curl into bed.

Since the fur started coming in he found that he sleeps less like a man and more like a beast. When Lan Sizhui had been younger and stayed here with him he'd curl around him till he was buried under the blankets and his weight.

"I want to be a tiger too!" Lan Yuan would say while snuggling into his chest and then he'd do his best attempt to growl. Curled up with his son he'd felt whole despite the empty pit of longing. When Mo Xuanyu had ended up in his arms that feeling had returned.

I want to hold him again.

That's not Wei Ying his pounding head screams and he knows that. He knows! But, Lan Wangji is also tired of the loneliness and the hole swallowing him up. Tired of not having anyone.

They smile the same.

Wei Wuxian felt sick inside. To do this to Lan Wangji- to make such commands with that power. He'd justified it to himself over and over. That if he manipulated this one little aspect it would make all of it feel like free will. Like he wasn't forcing anything.

That he was dead and the pain attached to being forced listen to someone Lan Wangji despised so much was gone.

I'm just a stranger now and that's how we should be.

They weren't friends. They weren't allies. They were a monster and a victim being strung along.

Anything he thought of me over those thirteen years is a lie

That nightmare stings under his skin and he tries to ignore how uneasy his sleep has been. It's fine. He's used to it. He's used to an uneasy sleep and nightmares haunting him with blood and familiar faces. Is it wrong that he'd love to curl up under Lan Wangji's warmth again?

You're being comforted by a lie

Wei Wuxian knows. He knows that too well! He knows he's spun too many lies and secrets till they choked him. They'll choke him again that much is certain.

But after the third night terror and waking in a cold sweat, he can't help looking at Lan Wangji's face. So peaceful and beautiful. "Lan Zhan, why did you stop?"

If Lan Wangji had been properly making medicine- if the person responsible had been feeding him- someone wanted Lan Wangji to become an animal. Someone wanted his suffering to be slow and painful.

Wei Wuxian had only been once, but he knew where the Warren was. Once was all he needed for the memory to stick with him.

That song and the feeling of his mind being smoothed over like river rocks. The Warren was far up the mountainside in a cave that could only be found if one spotted through the wards lining the trial. This late into the evening nobody was awake to catch him as he lurched into the cave.

His steps as he entered as quiet as they could till he spotted the rabbits cuddled up asleep.

All happy, warm, and white. Well, mostly. There were a few ones with spots of color mixed in but the thing that surprised him was the amount.

There weren't nearly this many when I was here

Wei Wuxian was also aware that with the SunShot campaign the Warren had been practically emptied. How many in here were spoils from those battles? Or how many were the generation that came after? How many were actually those from the Gusu Lan sect?

What became of the refugees?

He knows some died trying to protect their home but then he thinks of the warm faces he came to love. A-Yuan…

Even if there were people he knew among them after thirteen years any human part will be long gone. They wouldn't recognize him even if he had the same face. This number was far too high all considering.

Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren must realize this. Lan Xichen was such a kind soul so he couldn't imagine he'd do this of his own free will. As for the other, he was too bound up in rules and honor to consider something like this.

He took one of the Rabbits gently and hushed it as he cut open a wound. It was awful but per the nature of their near immortality, it would recover by morning. The blood pooled into the gourd he'd brought along with him and once the wound clotted, he let the Rabbit run back.

This should help Lan Zhan a little in the very least.

Jin Guangyao was working when the Dog came to his office panting. It had been a late night and after Lan Xichen's statement, he'd made orders to observe Gusu Lan closely. The Mo Xuanyu he knew of was a useless idiot and not someone that would catch the eye of Lan Wangji or even give a decent impression to Lan Xichen.

Too much was happening that displeased him all at once and he loathed what news this Dog brought. He had placed so many in Yunmeng Jiang once it became clear that Jiang Wanyin was immune to enthralling. He was the one last element of chaos in his plans and it wouldn't surprise him to find the man at the center.

"Speak."

"It's young master Jin Ling."

Jin Guangyao raised his brow, "What has happened?"

"He… he started turning into a monster. It was suppressed with the Lan Medicine and Sandu Sengshou is currently watching over him vigilantly."

The table cracks. So much going wrong in such a short amount of time. Jaded as he is by the idea of plans running smoothly he'd had so much go right over the years that it was boiling him inside that now of all times it was starting to fall apart. "Early. It's far too early for Jin Ling to have started changing."

He's yet to enact the next step in his plans that was crucial for how he would frame Jin Ling's place under him. "Take as many resources as you need to make sure he's fed."

"Sir?"

"This must stay quiet, understood. Make sure it's enough so that body of his stays human- this order is for all of you in Yunmeng." The Dog bowed vigorously muttering his obedience.

"Whoever fails is my next meal. Understood?"

I want you all to know that entire west joke took two hours to research so I could make a joke based off astrology, mythology, and an overly formal and still incorrect way of saying 'imma shut up before I say something that fucks everything over'