by foot it's a slow climb
:::
It took me three full weeks to extract myself from Jin Guangshan's sticky hands. He kept pushing Jin Zixuan at me with every opportunity.
Why?
First Lan Wangji and Lan Xichen, now Jin Guangshan - did I have 'good friend for clan heirs' stamped across my forehead? I was a nobody from a family of nobodies, totally unsuited to befriending your only legitimate child and heir! Please have mercy on me, Sec Leader Jin!
If I wasn't a boy in this life, I'd think Jin Guangshan was trying to see if Jin Zixuan could, like, woo me or something. As it was...
I think he was trying to recruit me.
During those three weeks, I fully embraced the head-shaker method. Selective obliviousness was where it was at. Jin Guangshan could hint at all the things he wanted, but until he said it straight out, I was immune. I was thick as a bag of bricks. I was as oblivious as a harem protagonist!
I don't know, I don't know, I really don't know.
On the third day of the second week, Jin Zixuan leveled me with a suspicious glare. We were taking tea together in the garden at Jin Guanshan's behest while he was off doing sect leader things, aka getting laid, which. Gross. Most of the girls I saw around were just barely older than me. I sat at the low table and fantasized about hopping the garden wall and making a break for it. While Wangji was the stronger of the two of us, I outstripped him in speed. I could be gone before anyone could say 'that was incredibly rude'.
"I know who you are," Jin Zixuan announced.
"We were introduced at your birthday, Young Master Jin," I said, voice despondent.
He flushed, and scowled at me. "I meant, I know who you are. Four of my cousins shaved their heads and became monks after they came back from the Cloud Recesses because of you. Just what the hell did you do to make all my cousins so weird? No one will tell me what happened."
Shaved their heads and became monks?
Geez. Talk about an overreaction.
Those sex-workers were perfectly nice young men, and the thing with the cats was just pure speculation. I admit the thing with the ghoul and the flower seller might have been a little traumatic, though.
"God wouldn't want me to repeat it, Young Master Jin," I pushed some of the sweets around with my chopsticks, disinterested. How the hell would I get out of here without sparking a sect war of some kind?
Jin Zixuan managed to step over the low, low bar of being more tolerable than his father, but I didn't exactly want to hang around him. Looking at a sixteen year old and knowing that he'd be dead before his son's first birthday…
Felt bad.
To put it lightly.
Ugh.
It didn't help that the poor kid had no real friends. He was an arrogant asshole, but he was also excluded from all the dumb things teenagers do by virtue of his position as the heir. He gravitated towards me, despite my being nearly three years younger than him because he wasn't ever going to be in charge of me.
My opportunity to get the hell out of dodge came with the arrival of Madame Yu, there to visit her friend. With the hustle and bustle of receiving an important lady - and her daughter, apparently - I used the excuse of getting out of the Jin's way to take my leave. I asked Jin Zixuan to give my regrets to his father for being unable to say goodbye in person. Jin Guangshan was… busy. Again. Some more.
Ew.
(So fucking glad I got my parents, you have no idea.)
At the news of Jiang Yanli's presence, Jin Zixuan's face went pale, and then incredibly stormy.
"You're going out night hunting for a year?" He asked. "Maybe I should escort you. Just to the border."
"Or," my mouth said without input from my brain. "You could stay here and actually get to know your fiance, instead of running away like a coward?" I said, you know, like a hypocrite. I was always running away. Big fan of cowardice, me.
He gaped at me.
"But that's not any of my business," I saluted quickly. "Goodbye, Young master Jin."
Then I booked it down the steps as fast as I could without breaking Gusu rules against running. I would've flown away if it wasn't considered incredibly rude to unsheathe your sword in towns or at sects you're not a part of. It'd be stupid to start a war on my way out.
I made it out of Lanling as fast as humanly possible, hopped on Sansheng, and fled until I was back over the border to Gusu territory.
I let out a long breath the second I crossed the invisible line into Gusu.
Please, I begged the universe. No more Jins.
:::
Yan Ruizhi uses denial!
It's super effective!
Which is to say that I just kind of pushed that whole disastrous trip to Carp tower so far down it fell out of my brain. Jin Guangshan? Never heard of him. Jin Zixuan? Pssh. Meng Yao? Suddenly I can't read!
If it works, it works.
I spent the remainder of my year on the outskirts of Gusu territory, juuuust far enough to be a month or two late getting back when the year ended. Six months after leaving Carp Tower, and a year and three months after leaving, I rolled back into Caiyi town.
It was all part of my brilliant plan of avoiding the hell out of the plot.
Wei Wuxian and Wangji needed to meet each other - I wasn't selfish enough to begrudge Wangji that kind of love, no matter how much pain it caused him. The two of them were a once in a lifetime kind of love.
I just didn't want to third-wheel their weird little not-love affair for three months.
It was still a relief to be back. I was tired and sore - in a good way. Constant night hunting forced my cultivation to grow, but didn't leave much room for rest. The food outside the cloud recesses was definitely better, but I missed the library. I had a few texts to add to it, and there were some things I wanted to double check .
But first, food.
I finished paying for some vegetarian buns when a huge ruckus went up. People whispered and glanced over at the lake. I approached a flower seller chatting with her neighbor. "Excuse me, sister, do you know what's going on?"
The middle aged woman smiled. "Such a sweet tongue on you boy. There's something going down at the lake. There's been some water ghouls making trouble, and the cultivators decided to take care of it today. Only something must have gone wrong, because the cultivators were fighting something and my cousin's boy was there when it started. He said it didn't look like any water ghoul he's ever seen." The woman laughed. "Of course, we don't have anything to worry about."
"Oh?"
"The Twin Jades of Gusu were present."
I blinked. What, both of them?
That was kind of overkill.
The woman continued on,"Of course those two young men would be able to take care of everything! Say, young man, have you ever seen our Twin Jades? They really are as beautiful as they say. Why, if I was twenty years younger -"
A woman across the way laughed. "You'd still be ten years too old, A-Yang."
The woman huffed, but she was clearly amused. "As if you aren't two years my senior!"
Had I... seen them? I glanced down at myself - right. I forgot I wasn't wearing my uniform. Turns out being a teenager means growth spurts. I woke up a month ago and found I could barely fit into any of my clothes. A quick stop at a tailor saw me with clothes that fit, if poorly, but without the white of gusu I looked like just another fifteen year old.
I thanked the flower seller, bought a bouquet of red and white peonies, and headed towards the river. On the way I started to absentmindedly braid the flowers into a crown. The crown goes on my head, and I start on a second. Could I get Wangji to wear it? Probably not. Lan Xichen might humor me though, and they look so similar it might as well be the same thing.
I made it to the lake in less than five minutes; just in time to see the whole class of cultivators take to the sky - and something massive rise up from the water.
I dropped the bouquet.
What the fuck was that? I could almost taste the resentful energy, even from the shore. It reminded me of the creature I hunted on my last night-hunt, only ten times worse.
Oh shit, that disciple was still down on the boats - where the hell was his sword?
I summon Senshang, but there was no way I would make it in time -
One of the people in the air dove down, his ponytail a black streak behind him, towards the boy in the boat. Two other figures dove down after him.
The creature reared back.
(Why was I getting deja vu?)
The first one snatched up the boy in the boat, took off into the air just as the creature crashed down on the boat. It splintered. I let out a breath of relief when they gain enough air to be out of the water monster's reach.
Then the boy who got saved pushed the other boy off into the water.
My body moved without input from my brain. Sansheng under my feet, I raced after the boy. The disciples still in the air were too far away. None of them would make it. I had a straight shot, and I was already halfway there. If I was fast enough, I could get myself underneath him in time.
I'm pretty fucking fast.
One split second before the boy hit the water, I was underneath him with my arms outstretched. I barely braced myself in time.
The boy crashed into me
Sansheng dipped when I staggered back, and the hilt broke the surface of the water. Something black twisted around it and started to pull.
Here's something a non-cultivator wouldn't understand. Holding another person up on your blade wasn't like holding someone up normally. The weight wasn't linear addition. The weight was exponential, and every second made it more and more difficult to hold the blade up.
With something pulling downwards at the same time, most cultivators wouldn't have been able to get any height with a second person on their blade.
The black mass rose from the water again.
We were in the center of it.
I grit my teeth.
Flying was a matter of concentration.
I had roughly a metric fuck ton of concentration. I pulled the boy closer to me with one hand and focused on Sansheng, pulling up with all my will. Forget the monster. Forget the boy pressed against my chest, heart hammering so hard I could feel it against my skin. Forget I was coming off a difficult year of night hunting, and I was fucking exhausted. Forget the little voice in the back of my head screaming at me, and the weird feeling of deja vu. It wasn't important.
I
Was
Going
UP.
Sansheng strained. The black mass blocked out the sky - then began to fall down towards us.
A hand pressed against my chest and spiritual energy flooded my body.
"Go!" The boy shouted over the screaming mass.
It was enough. Sansheng jerked up, snapping whatever it caught on.
The black mass was still surrounding us, but so long as I was free, I could get us out.
"Hold on," I shouted.
"What - whoa!"
I poured my energy into Sansheng and took off like a rocket, water blasting apart behind us. The black tendrils snapped down, but I dodged them one after the other. It was a bit of fucking majestic flying, if I say so myself. I spiraled out of the center of the mass, into the open air, and out of the monster's reach.
"Huh," the boy said weakly, still leaning against my chest. His hair tickled my nose. "That was fun. You, uh. You fly well."
Ha.
I didn't get a chance to reply before a streak of white and black arrived.
Lan Wangji - oh, that was an unhappy look.
The boy and I spoke at the same time.
"Wangji, I can explain -"
"Lan Zhan, did you see what happened -"
I stopped, blinking at the boy. "Lan Zhan?"
The boy stared at me, grey eyes wide. "Wangji?"
Pony tail. Monster on the lake. Both Jades on the same night hunt, along with guest disciples. This boy, shamelessly calling Wangji by his personal name -
Wei Wuxian?
Did I just fucking damsel the protagonist?
Why does this keep happening to me?
Sansheng! Please! Just a little bit of luck, I'm begging you!
Wei Wuxian recovered quicker than I did, and shot a beaming smile at me. Oh, wow, that was a good look on him. Just like Wangji was prettier than all those stories could depict, Wei Wuxian was nice to look at. He really was handsome - Wangji had taste, at least. "You're Lan Zhan's imaginary friend? I didn't expect you to be so cute! Or so strong. Thanks for the save, A-Xi!"
Imaginary friend?
Cute?
I glanced at Wangji - to find him with a tiny crease between his eyebrows. What was he upset about?
That was when I realized that I still had Wei Wuxian pressed up against my chest. His hands were tangled in my belt, and my arm was wrapped around his waist. He was leaning heavily on me, despite being taller, and I could feel his breath on my neck -
NOPE. Abort, abort, abort!
"No problem," I said. "And don't call me A-Xi." Then I shoved Wei Wuxian off my sword and into Wangji's arms without any warning.
Wei Wuxian yelped, and latched on to Wangji instead.
Wangji blinked at his armful of protagonist. He glanced at me, an almost alarmed look on his face. "Ruizhi?"
"I'm tired," I said. It wasn't even a lie. I could feel the exhausting hitting me like a brick to the head. I used up most of my energy getting away, even with the infusion Wei Wuxian gave me. "I was flying all day just to get here, you know."
Wangji frowned at me. "Late."
Not late enough, if Wei Wuxian was still in Gusu.
I held up my hands in surrender. "There was a night hunt! I couldn't just leave it."
"Three months late."
"It was a big night hunt!"
Wangji appeared unimpressed. I don't know how - it wasn't like he was moving his face. He just projected it into the ether somehow.
Thankfully, Lan Xichen showed up to save me.
"Ruizhi! You're back!" He dropped down beside us, a smile on his face. Then the smile faded. "Don't ever do that again, it was incredibly dangerous."
I bowed to him. "Lan-shixiong."
Lan Xichen sighed, but I could hear the humor in it. "Haven't I told you to call me Xichen-ge?"
"That would be rude, Lan-shixiong."
It would also imply a degree of closeness I couldn't get away from. I had to keep myself from getting too attached.
No matter how futile it seemed.
If I didn't acknowledge the fondness, it didn't exist.
"Oh well. I'll wear you down one day, Ruizhi," He looked me over. "What happened to your uniform?"
"I had a growth spurt," I said with a shrug. A spike of pain in my left shoulder surprised a hiss out of me.
"Are you okay?" Wei Wuxian asked.
I touched my shoulder and my hand came away red and wet. A combination of the dark fabric of my outer layer and adrenaline kept me from noticing the wound at first. I rotated my shoulder. Yep, that hurt. Pretty badly, actually.
"I guess it got me," I said.
Lan Xichen looked alarmed. "It touched you?"
"Looks like it."
"Young Master Wei, please come here. Wangji, take Ruizhi to the healers as fast as you can."
Wangji frowned. "Brother?"
Lan Xichen glanced down at the water. "That's a Waterborne abyss - I don't know what sort of curse being injured by one would bring, but with that much resentful energy in one place..."
Both Wei Wuxian and Wangji looked alarmed.
I don't roll my eyes, no matter how much I wanted to. "I'm not cursed," and then, because I was drunk on fatigue, I continued: "I've been cursed before. I'd be able to tell."
Three gazes snapped on to me.
When would I learn to just stop talking?
"You what?" Lan Xichen asked.
"Oh, look at that," I said. "Time to go to the healers. Ow."
I took off towards Gusu.
"Ruizhi, you get back here this instant -"
La la la I can't hear you~
Ruizhi out.
:::
Wangji caught up with me half-way to the Cloud Recesses. I could feel his disapproval like a physical weight. With Wangji as an escort, I resigned myself to the healer's tender mercies. There was no way to get out of it now.
"I'm fine," I said.
"Mn."
"It was just a little curse. A tiny one. Barely took an hour to figure out how to break!"
Silence.
I sigh inwardly.
Yeah, I was in so much trouble.
:::
The healers were just as unimpressed with my defense of only being a little bit cursed as Wangji was. I don't know why everyone was making such a big deal about a wasting curse that I already broke. Sure it was "incredibly dangerous" and "almost 100 percent fatal, you idiot child", but I was fine! I'd been fine for nearly four months now! It was barely a curse!
Healers were so dramatic.
In the end, they deemed my shoulder wound small enough to heal on its own. The healers gave me bandages and salve to apply after bathing. They discharged me into Wangji's patient care, with the directive to "stop that idiot from doing anything else stupid and dangerous for a week at least".
Wangji gave a solemn nod.
Rude.
We ended up in the Jingshi. It wasn't unusual for me to be in the Jingshi, but Wangji was a pretty private person. I didn't go into his personal room unless I was invited. I glance around, but it looked the same as when I was last here about two years ago - with the exception of a few additions I recognized: a small glass rabbit figurine, a painting of a young man with a guiqin looking up at the moon, a pale blue rock that glittered in the light. A small smile crept up on my face. Those were the souvenirs I sent back for Wangji.
I'm glad he liked them.
Wangji had some of the servants draw me a bath, and left me too it. It was heavenly to sink into hot water and soak until my fingers pruned. My last hot bath was months ago - I wasn't in a place where they had inn's for my last night hunt, and it seemed rude and wasteful to make the villagers I stayed with use up their firewood just because I was a spoiled young master.
I was acutely aware of when I caused good people inconvenience.
Wangji was waiting for me at the table when I finally emerged, hair piece and outer layers removed. His eyes were closed, and it knocked the breath out of me. He looked like a painting come to life. Like a slender tree halfway over a mountain precept, graceful and untouchable. I studied my friend's face after a year away.
He truly was beautiful.
I paused in toweling my hair dry. Something in the air around Wangji made the hair on the back of my neck raise.
Oh no. This was going to be a serious conversation. Wangji might even express concern.
I was allergic to sincerity.
"Thanks for the bath. I should go back to my room - it's almost curfew," I tired without much hope of success.
Wangji looked at me. "Staying here for the night."
"I don't -"
"Healer's orders."
Ugh.
I knelt across the table from Wangji, carefully keeping my face blank and my heart steady. It was only Wangji. It was fine.
Nope. I still wanted to run away.
Ghosts and corpses and curses I could handle. Pain was bad, but tolerable. Before I got reborn, my body was sub-par; I was chronically ill. I could deal with being injured, or sick, or slow.
Pain didn't scare me.
People did.
There were things worse than physical pain.
"Ruizhi could have died," Wangji said, gold eyes spearing me through the heart.
My jaw clenched. The itch to run, to move, to be anywhere but here rose in me. My heart raced, beating out a tattoo of 'run run run' against my rib-cage. My palms started to sweat. Attachment to the young man before me kept me in place, like a rope wrapped around my neck.
This was the very reason I didn't want to get involved. Why couldn't I just be selfish in peace? A flicker of resentment in my heart like a lit candle. I resented having to care what anyone but myself thought.
"Breath, A-Xi," A calloused, kind hand cupping my cheek. A brusque but kind voice."It's alright to be scared. We love you away."
I took a deep breath to steady my cowardly heart, and smothered the resentment until it went out. Too late to worry about it now.
I'll try, Grandmother.
"I'm fine," I said. "Nothing happened."
This was apparently the wrong thing to say.
Wangji's whole body coiled even tighter. "Next time, something may."
I scoffed. "Something could always happen, Wangji. The world is random and strange, and there's never any guarantee that you'll live through it."
I would know.
One of my favorite things about Wangji was the fact that his face was so blank. He didn't emote all over people. For someone who's allergic to emotions, this was something of a godsend.
Of course, that just made the moments when he did use his face that much more devastating.
Like now - Wangji's face kind of... crumpled?
"Did not know if you were coming back." He said, voice low.
Ah.
I thought about a tiny Wangji, sitting outside his mom's door; a child waiting for someone who wouldn't ever come back. My heart felt like ice - like I'd been stabbed.
I can't promise not to die.
Life doesn't work like that.
I wouldn't leave without letting you know, I want to tell Wangji. Even if I die, I'd still wait around - when you played inquiry I'd say goodbye. Tell you not to wait, to move on, that it wasn't your fault no matter how I died. You're my best friend. I want you to be happy.
I couldn't say it. Even thinking the words made my throat go tight, and the prospect of saying them out loud, where anyone could hear them, made me want to curl up into a ball and die. What was I, a drama protagonist? I couldn't even watch dramas without getting secondhand embarrassment from the cheesy lines. My face was too thin when it came to stuff like this.
The worst part was every single word was true.
Ugh.
The ability to make me feel things must run in the family. Lan Xichen can do it with appalling regularity as well. Come to think of it, didn't Lan Qiren also make me feel things? Sure, he mostly inspires fear, but the point still stands.
Lan men are bad for my asshole reputation.
Please stop being out of character, Wangji! You're going to give me a heart attack. My legs itch to run, but I know that if I do, Wangji would just chase me down - and then he'd give me that disappointed look.
I - didn't want to disappoint him.
(Ghosts, zombies, and curses were a piece of cake to deal with compared to emotional honesty.
I'd rather not, thanks.)
With determination, I crawl around the table and settle myself at Wangji's side. I pick up his hand and put it on my chest, just above my heart.
"Wangji, I'm fine. I'm alive and I'm here," I said. "Quit borrowing trouble."
'What if's' never helped.
The crumpled look on Wangji's face vanishes like mist in sunlight - replaced by something I can't quite read. His pretty face went still. His hand flexed in my grip - not pulling away, but not pushing forward either. Long, dark hair fell in front of his face like a curtain when he ducked his head.
"Mn," He said, the tension finally easing from his shoulders.
I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and gave him a smile, relieved. "Now that I'm back, do you want to go on a night hunt together? I missed having you as backup."
Abruptly, Wangji stood up, jerking his hand out of my grasp. He turned his back to me.
I blinked. "Wangji?"
"It is almost nine," He said. "I will prepare your bed."
He was out of the room before I could reply.
...It was only seven thirty though?
Wangji was a mystery sometimes.
:::
happy birthday to me!
i am twenty six and have to deal with a stupid math test. school has been...
rough
;-; i have so much studying to do you guys have no idea.