Nie Mingjue scowled down at the letter in his hand, fingers curling and nearly tearing the paper.
Xichen was his best friend; they had been best friends since they were children, and Mingjue was very possessive of what he considered his.
He was a Nie; it was in his blood.
Their lives were short, and their hearts were that much larger to make up for it – trying to fit a whole long lifetime's worth of passions into a shortened time frame. They fought hard, and loved even harder. They never forgave betrayal and they never forgot, and they had no tolerance for evil.
As a Nie, it was entirely expected that he would be greedy and possessive over the important things in his life. And a best friend was quite important.
But that meant that he was possessive over Xichen, who, well. Was a person. Not something Mingjue could own.
(Unfortunately.)
Normally he was satisfied with that; he knew he held an unassailable place in Xichen's life, and no one could usurp his place as Xichen's best friend.
The problem was, ever since Xichen had started writing to that blasted Jiang girl he just wouldn't stop talking about her! It was driving Mingjue crazy!
Every letter he got from his friend, it felt like the whole thing was filled with, "Jiang-guniang this" and "Jiang-guniang that".
It was obvious what was going on.
Jiang Yanli was scheming to steal Mingjue's best friend out from under him!
And of course, poor, naive Xichen was too innocent and pure-hearted to realise it!
The worst part?
It was working.
This means war.
Mingjue didn't care if he was being childish – Shut up, Zonghui! He was so an adult; he was a Sect Leader – and no scheming, sneaky, uppity little girl was going to swoop in and steal his best friend!
Not on Mingjue's watch!
He promptly began plotting how to use his status to visit Lotus Pier and take stock of the enemy himself.