"Alright xiao-jiujiu, where should we patrol first?" asked Jin Ling, trying to take the toddler's mind off of that disastrous breakfast.

Jiang Cheng cocked his head quizzically, "Why does Flower-gege call A-Cheng xiao-jiujiu?"

Jin Ling was caught unprepared. It was weird calling his uncle by his name even if he was now a child so he had simply been calling him xiao jiujiu or Young Master Jiang. He hadn't exactly thought of an explanation as to why he would be calling a child xiao-jiujiu. He panicked and looked to Lan Jingyi for help but he was equally at a loss.

"Ah, Young Master Jiang, that is because you remind him of his jiujiu," said Ouyang Zizhen, swooping in to save the day with his silver tongue. (Sect Leader Jiang himself did say that he had a silver tongue didn't he? ? Sure he was saying it to chastise Sect Leader Ouyang at the time but still…)

"His jiujiu?"
"Yes, don't you know, Young Master Jiang, you and your Flower-gege are both related to Meishan Yu."

"To Yu-popo?" he said, eyes wide.

"Yes to your Yu-popo. So Young Master Jiang resembles Flower-gege's jiujiu. And because he misses his jiujiu he calls you little jiujiu."

Ouyang Zizhen's silver tongue could come in handy after all, nothing he said was a lie.

A-Cheng hesitantly raised his arms for Jin Ling to pick him up. Usually his jiejie and niang would pick him up and he wasn't accustomed to others. But since he woke up and Wei-shushu was there, he'd gravitated towards him because he was the only one he knew and Wei-shushu had been very nice to him when he visited. Wei-shushu was always picking him up and pinching his cheeks and playing with him. Flower-gege had been nice to him too. He was glad Wei-shushu had come to stay with him while his family were away. He had missed Wei-shushu and the last time Wei-shushu had said he would bring his son A-Ying so A-Cheng would have a playmate. But he didn't bring A-Ying this time and A-Cheng made him sad by asking. He didn't want Flower-gege to be sad too.

Jin Ling quickly picked up his xiao-jiujiu. He couldn't deny he was really worried. He didn't want to let him out of his sight. Anything could happen while he was this tiny and defenceless.

A-Cheng put a small hand on his face and said solemnly, "Don't be sad. Flower-gege can call A-Cheng xiao-jiujiu. A-Cheng will be Flower-gege's jiujiu at Lotus Pier so Flower-gege won't miss his jiujiu so much."

Jin Ling felt like crying.

Jiujiu!

He said a watery okay to his little jiujiu and squished him to his chest, cuddling him and trying to control his emotions.

He was still his jiujiu even if he didn't remember.

And also now he could hug him freely when he was upset and nobody could say a thing!

But as much as A-Cheng liked being hugged (it wasn't something that anyone other than jiejie did often) he was impatient to show off his home for Flower-gege and the others. He started squirming and Jin Ling reluctantly put him down. But A-Cheng slipped his hand into Jin Ling's and tugged him along excitedly.

"Where are we going, Young Master Jiang?" asked Lan Jingyi.

"A-Cheng take Loud-gege to see the lotus!" he said brightly.

Lan Jingyi sputtered. Loud-gege?

Jin Ling smirked at him. Who's got the stupid nickname now?

But Jingyi, not content to simply accept being called Loud-gege by one of the loudest people he knew (those wails he woke up to were no joke, Sect Leader Jiang really had a remarkable pair of lungs), finally remembered his manners.

"Ah Young Master Jiang, before we see the lotuses I should introduce myself. This one is Lan Jingyi," he said, bowing appropriately.

Ouyang Zizhen caught on quickly, "And I am Ouyang Zizhen. Your Flower-gege over here is Jin Rulan."

"Flower-gege is really Flower-gege," A-Cheng said delightedly. Jin Ling screwed up his face at that. Did Zizhen have to introduce him as Rulan?

"Xiao-jiujiu can just call me Ling-gege," he said, shooting Zizhen a disgruntled look.

Jingyi, seizing the opportunity to get rid of his nickname too, "And you can call me Jingyi-ge."

"Okay," he said, nodding and looking expectantly at Ouyang Zizhen.

"Oh me, you can just call me Smart-gege," Zizhen grinned.

At the twin looks of annoyance he received from his friends he laughed sheepishly. "Okay okay just call me Zhen-ge."

Way to deprive him of his fun guys!

"Okay, so let's try and see if we can get this spirit to tell us exactly what it did," said Wei Wuxian.

Healer Zhang and SIC Pan had led them to a warded room where they could contain the spirit while it was out of the spirit trapping pouch.

Lan Sizhui had set up his guqin and when he got the go ahead he started playing Inquiry.

He started with simple but to the point questions, at first in qin language and then repeating everything out loud for his audience to hear.

"What is your name?"
"Shao Jianguo."

"How did you die?"

"I was stabbed by a Wen soldier."

Sizhui flinched slightly but ignored Wei Wuxian's concerned look. Wen Ning too had lowered his eyes, being unable to look at anyone. He couldn't grimace even if he wanted to.

"A-Yuan, ask him why he's possessing people only now. His death had to have been a very long time ago. The person responsible for his death would also be dead. What is the reason for his resentment?" said Wei Wuxian, "We should be liberating his spirit so we need to know, though we do need to find out what he did to Jiang Cheng first."

Eventually they found out that he had been a new father, his child not even a year old when Lotus Pier was massacred. He lived in Yunping City with his family. It was too close for comfort with all the Wen cultivators streaming in and out all over the place harassing people, especially while they were looking for Jiang Wanyin and Wei Wuxian. He was a rogue cultivator most of his life, but when his wife was having the baby they finally settled down. He was going to put his days of wandering behind him. But with no Jiang sect anymore to protect the civilians in the surrounding areas and the Wens who were brutalising anyone they thought had information (or really, just because they could) his wife was worried and scared for their future and so they decided to pack up and move a few towns away.

After a while though he'd heard that the sects had pooled together to take down the tyrannical Wen Ruohan and they were accepting anyone who wanted to help. He wanted to be part of the war effort. Their previous neighbours and friends had all been terrorised by the Wen cultivators who had taken over Lotus Pier and not everyone had the ability to pack up and leave like he did. It was just doing what was right. He had the ability to fight too unlike so many others so why not put his skills to use?

His wife had protested. Their child was still very young and he was the sole breadwinner for the family. If anything happened to him they would be in a tough position, but aside from that she didn't want to lose him and she didn't want their child to grow up without a father. He promised everything would be okay and he went anyway.

Everything was not okay.

The regiment he was a part of was supposed to be heading to Langya but Jiang Wanyin was going to retake Lotus Pier. If Lotus Pier was won and the Wens driven out of the Yunmeng area, his family would be safe. He had sneaked out of his group to try and catch up with the Jiang contingency. But that was his fatal mistake. Before he could reach them he was caught by a small group of Wen cultivators who, upon seeing the Sunshot insignia he wore as a patch on his robes, did not hesitate to end his life. He had fought back of course but he was one against many. He hadn't stood a chance.

His biggest regret as he died was that he couldn't see his child grow up and he broke his promise to his wife. If he had kept his head down like she had asked then he might have been able to go into hiding with them and they would be safe. He left his wife alone and he could not raise his child. All he'd wanted to do was keep them and other people safe.

"Ask him why he was kidnapping children if he wanted to keep them safe," said Healer Zhang.

Sizhui did as requested.

"He says the children were playing around unattended and they would get hurt. He would keep them safe with him. The parents were too irresponsible letting them be out there like that while…. While there's a war going on?"

They all shared a look at that.

"Mister Shao, if you're referring to the Sunshot campaign, it has been over 15 years since the end of the war."

The spirit was shocked and agitated. He insisted he had only just died, how could it have been so long ago?

"That's right," Pan An, murmured, "It has been a long time. But it's only recently that the reports about him abducting children started coming in. Something had to have changed."

"It's possible he was improperly buried and his remains may have been exposed sometime in the past few weeks," mused Wei Wuxian, "From what the reports said it seems he was moving from town to town, not staying in one place. Maybe he was looking for his family since he thought he just died. A-Yuan, didn't you say you all tracked him to Yunping?"

"Yes, that's where he was last."

"See if you can find out where he died, I'll send some disciples to look into it," said Pan An, "It's possible he simply started out looking for his family and couldn't find them and kept going all the way till he hit Yunping again. The longer he couldn't find them the more his regret and resentment grew and he probably started losing control and taking the kids then."

Lan Sizhui nodded.

"Speaking of resentment," said Wei Wuxian, "How have you managed to contain his?" He looked around the room contemplatively. "What wards can not only contain a strong spirit but lessen its resentment at the same time? I haven't seen such a thing before. With the amount of resentment he has within him he should not have been able to answer A-Yuan so clearly. I expected his answers to be confused and muddled."

Pan An smiled, "Ah, you noticed that. But I can't give out our Jiang Sect secrets that easily can I?"

Healer Zhang rolled her eyes. "It was Sect Leader's idea. We just use the same enchantments on our Jiang clarity bells together with the other wards. Unless you know them you can't replicate them anyway."

Pan An shot her a betrayed look.

As it turned out Wei Wuxian may have been tempted to try to do something similar himself but for two things: his colossally bad memory and the fact that Jiang Cheng probably wouldn't forgive him for using Jiang Sect techniques for the Lan clan (even though it wouldn't technically be for the Lans but well he lived there now). He hadn't really studied his Jiang clarity bell to that extent when he had it and it had been a long time since he owned one. He wouldn't have taken it apart to see how it worked anyway. It wouldn't have felt right.

All he could do was admit that it was a stroke of genius on Jiang Cheng's part. The Jiang clarity bell had a lot of properties to help balance your qi and clear your mind and heart. With some adjustments Jiang Cheng had really made it work for more than just that with this warded room.

"Pan-qianbei," said Lan Sizhui, interrupting Wei Wuxian's thoughts, "He said he thinks it was around a small town called River's End."

"River's End? They had some serious flooding a few weeks ago. It's possible the soil erosion exposed his remains. Finding it would take some time though. I'll address the sect after we finish here and then send out a team to locate and bring back whatever is left of him. We should give him a proper burial this time. If we can find his family, even better, though it's unlikely."

"Yes good idea, they deserve to know what happened to him at the very least," said Wei Wuxian.

They had Sizhui find out his family's last known details and then it was time to face the real problem.

"Mister Shao, when we captured you, what did you try to do to me?" asked Lan Sizhui.