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Chapter Text

                 Wei Wuxian had recently developed a special talisman in which the evil energy as well as creatures could be directly sealed as opposed to the traditional method of sealing which required cleansing them and/or then sealing them in a Qiankun bag. However, for creatures that had a lot of resentful energy, restriction arrays still needed to be used before they could be sealed inside the special talismans and finally purged. There were a few flaws in using the restriction arrays taught within the Lan sect. The first one was that apart from a handful of seniors in the sect, like Lan Qiren, Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji, who had a solid and an extremely powerful cultivation base, most of the other disciples were unable to use these restriction arrays by themselves. The second one was that when they tried to set up the array in pairs or with three people for containing beings having a huge amount of resentful energy, the arrays would become unstable after a few minutes and the evil beings would easily escape from it before the next spell to seal them in the new sealing talisman made by Wei Wuxian could be used. Lastly, the incantations that needed to be cast for building a restriction array took up a lot of spiritual energy. Even if the size of the array depended on how big or small the evil existence that needed to be sealed was, since the array was supposed to be leak proof, it was very taxing to build up the pillars around which the spiritual energy could be woven. In order to solve this problem, Wei Wuxian had been working round the clock for the past few days in order to come up with an efficient design to distribute spiritual energy even if a single person was to cast such an array at as small expenditure of spiritual energy as possible.         

                 Since Wei Wuxian started this work, he hadn’t really interacted with Lan Wangji or any of his students much. He would hardly come out of the Jingshi to even just take a short break or leave his desk to have his meals. Lan Wangji didn’t stop Wei Wuxian from what he was doing, but due to his changed lifestyle since the past few days, he was very worried for him. He had been quietly watching over him and preparing nutritious meals for him to try and balance out his hectic research work schedule. When they had their meals, Wei Wuxian would just rush to finish eating and wouldn’t spare Lan Wangji a single glance. Lan Wangji of course felt very lonely that his love wouldn’t even spare a few words of casual talk with him. But he didn’t say a word about anything because he knew that Wei Wuxian needed his alone time and also the focused state in which he had been in these past few days. The only time Wei Wuxian would talk to him from time to time would be to discuss some aspects of the array design or the incantation needed for it. Wei Wuxian would sometimes gain momentum from their discussion or sometimes still get stuck at some points.

                 By tonight, Wei Wuxian had already produced as many as 50 different designs for building up the new restriction array. He was pretty tired and also in a bit of a bad mood since he had not been able to make any progress for an entire day. He was sitting at the study desk in the Jingshi, with his face cupped in his left hand. Lan Wangji was sitting beside him reading some old scriptures on restriction array designs used by various sects. He was helping Wei Wuxian by searching for some clues in these scriptures for an efficient design for the array.

 Wei Wuxian grumbled, “50 designs! Circular, triangular, rhombuses, squares, all sort of polygonal shapes, but none of them work! Most of them are unstable and every time I try these structures with my incantation they end up leaking spiritual energy after a few minutes. So frustrating!!”

Lan Wangji noticed Wei Wuxian’s bad mood, put down the scripture in his hand and softly pulled him in his embrace. Wei Wuxian was a bit startled at this sudden pull and by the time he realized it, he was sitting cozily on Lan Wangji’s lap. Lan Wangji warmly hugged him, trying to console him and gently caressed his face saying, “Don’t be upset like this. You will find a way soon”.

Wei Wuxian relaxed a bit from Lan Wangji’s consoling while Lan Wangji gave him a loving gaze and softly kissed Wei Wuxian on his lips a few times. He stroke Wei Wuxian’s hair gently and said, “Let us take a break for tonight. Let’s have dinner, go for a walk and sleep early. I am certain that you will have an idea about the design soon”.

Wei Wuxian realized that Lan Wangji was trying his best to cheer him up. He broke into a sweet grin and kissed Lan Wangji repeatedly on his cheeks a few times. Giggling sweetly, he hugged Lan Wangji tightly, “My sweet Lan Zhan~ Thank you~ You’re right. Let’s take a break for tonight and enjoy our meal”.

Lan Wangji hugged him tightly, lifted him in his arms and sat him in front of their dining table. They leisurely enjoyed the tasty dishes that Lan Wangji had prepared for his love. He kept glancing at Wei Wuxian many times secretly to see if he isn’t discomforted and if his mood is cheering up or not.

                 After finishing their meal, they went to Wei Wuxian’s favourite walkway. While they were walking side by side, Wei Wuxian kept glancing at Lan Wangji and noticed that he looked a little down tonight. He went closer to Lan Wangji and asked, “Lan Zhan, what’s the matter? You look a little sad. What happened?” Lan Wangji was a bit startled by this sudden question. He had been trying very hard to hide the loneliness he felt for the past few days, so as to not burden Wei Wuxian by making him worried. But he still somehow failed to do so completely. And something like this happening was quite obvious too actually. Lan Wangji had been yearning for Wei Wuxian’s love for a long time already and now that he was finally back in his life for good, if they were with each other, Wei Wuxian not talking to him for even a few minutes would make him very sad. Lan Wangji still had a very bad habit of never speaking up about what he really wanted and so he would just keep suffering silently by himself many times.

In response to Wei Wuxian’s question, Lan Wangji just shook his head to decline and said, “It’s nothing.” Wei Wuxian became suspicious and walked in front of him, turned around and stopped him. With a questioning look in his eyes, Wei Wuxian asked again, “You’re hiding something from me again, aren’t you? But you know, I can already make out that much! What’s the matter? Please tell me!”

Lan Wangji shook his head again to deny and tried his best to look cheerful. With a slight smile, he reassured Wei Wuxian again, “It really is nothing”.

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian raised his voice a bit as he was a little upset. Before he could say anything further, Lan Wangji pulled Wei Wuxian’s hand to pull him close to him and steadied him with his other hand hugging his waist. He kissed Wei Wuxian’s hand first and then his forehead. Gazing lovingly at him and caressing his cheek, he softly assured him again, “It’s nothing”.

Wei Wuxian was not convinced at all and just stared at him for a bit. It was a full moon tonight and Lan Wangji’s profile shone with a slight silver glow in the moonlight. The sad look in his eyes still hadn’t gone away and Wei Wuxian couldn’t bear to see him this way. He reached out his hand to caress Lan Wangji’s face gently and pulled him down a bit to kiss him. Since this was a path that no one took and it was also pretty late at night, they both didn’t need to mind about anyone catching them displaying their affection for each other in public. They kissed for a few minutes and while doing so, Wei Wuxian finally guessed correctly that because he had been ignoring Lan Wangji for the past few days he might have been feeling very lonely. Even after their lips finally parted, Lan Wangji continued giving little pecks on Wei Wuxian’s cheeks, on the tip of his nose, in the grooves between his eyes, he continued kissing him softly all over his face. Wei Wuxian also reciprocated with soft kisses all over Lan Wangji face. Lan Wangji took away his hand that was holding Wei Wuxian’s hand and put it gently behind Wei Wuxian’s head to pull him in for another long kiss and snugly held Wei Wuxian close to him. Wei Wuxian could easily make out from their kisses that Lan Wangji was pouring his heart out to him right now, just with his actions rather than with words. After they parted from their second long kiss, Wei Wuxian hugged Lan Wangji tightly saying, “Never again. I’ll never make you feel lonely like this ever again. I promise you, Lan Zhan.”

Lan Wangji’s heart was filled with warmth from his love finally showering him with so much affection after many days. He stroke Wei Wuxian’s head softly, his eyes filled with love and responded with another peck on his lips and called out to him in a really sweet tone, “Wei Ying”.

They both returned to their room and took a bath together.  Sitting inside the bathtub, they snugly hugged and showered each other with sweet tender kisses all over each other’s bodies. After all, their hearts were filled with love and happiness after many days of hectic work. They both just couldn’t help it.

Wei Wuxian urged Lan Wangji, “Lan Zhan, please hum our song once. It’s so sweet to hear~”

Lan Wangji nodded and started humming Wangxian in his deep yet gentle voice. Wei Wuxian swayed a little to the sound enjoying each note. After the song ended, Wei Wuxian praised, “Very sweet~ Very sweet~” and kissed Lan Wangji’s throat.

Lan Wangji loved it when Wei Wuxian gave him such sweet kisses. He just hugged him tightly and buried his face in between Wei Wuxian’s neck and shoulders kissing softly a few times. Wei Wuxian giggled from feeling ticklish from Lan Wangji’s kisses. He asked him, “Say Lan Zhan, since when were you in love with me exactly? You hummed this song for the first time when we were in the cave of that Tortoise of Carnage. You couldn’t have made this composition just then. You must have made it much before that. So when did you make it?”

Lan Wangji’s ears turned red on hearing this question. “I…”, he was still very hesitant.

Wei Wuxian pushed him a little again, “Come on~ Please tell me~!”

Lan Wangji responded in an almost inaudible tone, “…Cloud Recesses…” and averted his eyes from Wei Wuxian.

Wei Wuxian found his reaction very amusing. And it really was funny too. Clearly, they both had been intimate, sharing so many deep kisses and hugs for so long now and were happily married. And yet when Wei Wuxian asked him a simple question as to when he started liking him, Lan Wangji would become this bashful. Wei Wuxian loved this part of Lan Wangji and of course just couldn’t help but tease him. Just now, he had clearly heard his inaudible reply, but still asked again, “Huh? Come on~ Say it louder. I didn’t hear it”. He cupped Lan Wangji’s face in his hand and tugged it so that Lan Wangji would face him again. “Ey, Lan Zhan, look at me. Why are you being so shy?” he chuckled.

Lan Wangji still being reluctant finally looked Wei Wuxian in the eye and said, “… In the Cloud Recesses, after you finished your one month of punishment to copy the sect rules”. His ears were now blood red with extreme embarrassment and his face too probably was blushing a little for the first time.

Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened and in a surprised tone he asked, “That long ago?! Wow! We were only 15/16 years old then!” He kept staring at Lan Wangji, his face showing an expression of surprise and extreme happiness at the same time. “You’ve hidden your feelings for so long?! We met so many times after that too! But you never gave me any hints whatsoever!”

Lan Wangji looked away once again and chose to remain silent. He had actually given him hints many many times after that with small gestures here and there, but Wei Wuxian was very very dense when it came to picking up on such things. Also, as he was growing up, because he had started cultivating the demonic path, he had being receiving harsh criticism from all around. And over the years, with all the turmoil going on in his life and the way people had started detesting him, he had somehow decided it in his head that no one would ever like him as a person. And Lan Wangji, being the stoic person that he was, would absolutely never even like him as a friend.

Wei Wuxian broke out in a hearty laughter. He pulled Lan Wangji close and kissed him again. “Oh my Lan Zhan~! Why are you so sweet?!” He couldn’t help but hug him tightly again while laughing. Lan Wangji of course surrendered to his love’s gestures and let him do whatever he wanted with him. He asked Wei Wuxian, “What about you? When did you start liking me?”

Wei Wuxian started thinking, “Umm… I can’t really make out since when. I’ve always liked you since the first time I saw you. You’re so handsome~ And you held this aura of “do not approach” when we were kids, so I couldn’t help but be attracted to you and wanted to tease you always. But I think, I’ve just wanted to always talk to you and be near you. But if I think hard about when I really started liking you seriously, it would be the same time as you. In the Cloud Recesses, when I was copying our Lan sect rules as punishment”.

Lan Wangji caressed Wei Wuxian’s face lovingly as Wei Wuxian spoke, “We are destined for each other. We even fell in love with each other at the same time. Hehehe~” Lan Wangji nodded with an “Mm” and kissed him a few times again on his lips.

                 After finishing their bath, they helped each other dry their bodies and put on their sleeping robes. Wei Wuxian called out, “Lan Zhan, come here. I’ll comb your hair. Lan Wangji obediently went and sat in front of Wei Wuxian with his back facing him. Wei Wuxian he carefully combed Lan Wangji’s silky hair and as soon as he finished, leaned in and kissed his hair and head a few times, “All done~”.

Lan Wangji got up and made Wei Wuxian sit down and combed his hair gently too. He then lifted him in his arms and took him to bed. Just when Lan Wangji put him down gently, Wei Wuxian pulled him suddenly, making him fall on top of him. Startled from the sudden pull, Lan Wangji called out, “Wei Ying!”

Wei Wuxian laughed, “Hahaha, my adorable Lan Zhan~ I’m not so fragile~ Don’t worry so much”, and kissed him on his lips a few times. Lan Wangji responded with tender kisses, his ears going red little by little with every kiss.

After exchanging their kisses, Lan Wangji tucked his Wei Wuxian in bed softly and then finally laid beside him facing towards his love and pulled over the blanket on both of them. Giving a sweet smile and gently stroking Wei Wuxian’s face and eyebrows, Lan Wangji spoke softly, “Have a good rest”.

Wei Wuxian gave him a sweet smile in return and pretended to fall asleep slowly. Lan Wangji finally closed his eyes seeing this and drifted off comfortably into a deep sleep after many days as he snuggled with his love while sleeping.

After some time, Wei Wuxian opened his eyes and gazed at Lan Wangji’s peaceful sleeping face. He thought about how he had been acting the past few days and how he had made Lan Wangji feel so down. He was angry at himself for making his Lan Wangji feel like this. Then a thought suddenly appeared in his mind. Chuckling internally, he thought, “Lan Zhan, oh, Lan Zhan, you’re so much like a rabbit. Getting depressed when you don’t get attention. You really don’t like to be apart from me that much?” He pulled out his hand from under the blanket and very softly touched Lan Wangji’s nose with a sweet grin on his face. It is unknown if Lan Wangji was really sleeping deeply at this point or not, because just when Wei Wuxian barely touched his nose, Lan Wangji pulled him close and hugged him tightly giving out a tiny moan. Wei Wuxian chuckled internally once again at this action from him and buried his face into Lan Wangji’s chest and finally fell asleep.

                 It was 5 A.M. and Lan Wangji had woken up as per his usual schedule. He had fallen into the habit of opening his eyes to see his love, the first thing in the morning. Wei Wuxian, as usual, was clinging tightly to Lan Wangji. Lan Wangji smiled sweetly and leaned in to give his daily good morning kiss to his love and called out, “Wei Ying, it’s morning” and kissed him again. Still quite deep in his sleep, Wei Wuxian pulled Lan Wangji and showered him with sleepy kisses.

Every morning, Lan Wangji would be really reluctant to pull away from Wei Wuxian like this, especially when Wei Wuxian snuggled and kissed him so adorably. But they both had to start their day and so Lan Wangji called out, “Wei Ying, we must report for the morning meditation session”, while stroking his forehead gently.

Wei Wuxian in a muffled voice, “You go. I’ll wake up in a bit”. Lan Wangji spoke again trying to wake him up, “Wei Ying”. Wei Wuxian, “Mmm~~”.

“Wei Ying, I’ll go ahead then”, Lan Wangji finally reluctantly pulled away from him.

                 Wei Wuxian finally woke up slowly and got ready. By the time he had finished taking a bath, Lan Wangji had already prepared his breakfast and kept it on their dining table. He had left a small note besides the dishes saying “I’m going for classes. Please eat all the dishes. —Lan Zhan.”

On reading the note, Wei Wuxian creased his brow, “He went without eating today as well, didn’t he? How many times must I tell him to not do this!” he grumbled. Ever since he was finally reunited with Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji had fallen into the habit of not eating or drinking anything till the time he was together with Wei Wuxian. Wei Wuxian had scolded him many times about this, but stubborn as he was, Lan Wangji would just give him a sweet smile every time and assure him that he’ll be all right. Wei Wuxian closed the lids on all the dishes grumbling some more, “Fine. I won’t eat either. Not until he comes back. He won’t listen to me and I won’t listen to him either. Hmph!”

                 We Wuxian sat down on his desk in between a messy spread of pages and pages of the designs and notes he had prepared for making the new sealing talisman and building the new restriction array. Just as he picked up one of the pages to go through yesterday’s work, he saw some notes neatly written by Lan Wangji on some designs for the restriction array used by other sects. In it was one from the Qin sect who used a combination of a star + circle for their restriction array, another from the Yongyang sect who used four irregular trapezoids arranged at angles of 90 degrees to each other. There were a few more that used other combinations. Wei Wuxian observed them carefully. None of the sects, to whom these array designs belonged to, were famous sects. But there was one pattern that Wei Wuxian noticed in all designs immediately. All arrays had been cleverly designed to push spiritual energy from outside to the inside. Such a pattern was probably adapted by all these sects since the designers of the arrays wanted to simplify their expenditure of energy since most sect members would have weak spiritual energy to begin with. Suddenly, a series of ideas quickly linked in Wei Wuxian’s head and he began scribbling a drawing while thanking and praising his Lan Wangji for aptly picking out these clever designs. Right now, he was drawing a cusp design (as shown in the figure below) which was basically an inward distorted diamond design.

In this design, the spiritual energy would be distributed along the inward curving (concave) lines with the bend of the central point of each curve pulled inside by about 60°. Energy would flow in the 4 sections in a clockwise manner, as shown by the arrows in the figure. The peculiarity of this cusp design was as follows- even if spiritual energy flowed to the outside in the first section, its flow in the adjoining second section would flow from outside in and so there would be no losses in energy via the edges throughout the hole array. As a result, the evil being trapped inside would always feel spiritual pressure from all 4 sections and would thus be confined completely without any chance of slipping from anywhere. In addition, the direction of flow of spiritual energy in each section actually helped to keep the array stable by itself.

                 Wei Wuxian prepared a clever incantation for casting this new cusp restriction array. In it, only a small quantity of spiritual energy was required. This was because he wrote the incantation such that one needed to only focus their energy at the four end points of the cusp and the incantation would direct the energy flow along the concave lines. In this way, even a single person with a poor cultivation base would be able to efficiently trap a being inside this array and use the new sealing talisman without much effort.

                 Wei Wuxian hurriedly wrote down all the notes and prepared the papers to show to Lan Wangji, Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren. As soon as he finished, he dashed out of their room to find Lan Wangji first. He had just ran a little when he saw Lan Wangji approaching. Full of joy, he sped up and leapt forward towards Lan Wangji as he neared. Lan Wangji let go of all the scrolls and notes he was holding and caught Wei Wuxian firmly. But the force of Wei Wuxian’s forward jump was so strong that they both fell down. Lan Sizhui, who was helping Lan Wangji carry some more books from the library, saw this whole thing and was startled speechless for a few seconds.

“Wei Ying! Be careful!” Lan Wangji spoke in a worried tone. Wei Wuxian hugged him tightly, “I found it, Lan Zhan!! I finally found it! The best design for the restriction array! And all thanks to the brilliant designs you carefully picked up!”

Lan Wangji was very happy to hear that Wei Wuxian had found the solution. It was a major breakthrough not just for them both, but for the Lan sect as well. He patted Wei Wuxian’s back, “Well done, well done”. Wei Wuxian just kept hugging him and laughing. Lan Wangji while still hugging him tightly got up and turned around to face Lan Sizhui.

Lan Sizhui was standing still from the shock of seeing all this and not really understanding about what breakthrough Wei Wuxian had reached. He awkwardly laughed, “Ah… Ha-Hanguang-jun, please go ahead. I’ll gather these scrolls and deliver them to your room”.

Lan Wangji thanked him with an “Mm”, turned around again and started walking towards his and his  Wei Wuxian’s Jingshi. Wei Wuxian mischievously buried his face in between Lan Wangji’s neck and kissed it a few times. Then, he turned to kiss Lan Wangji’s ear playfully. Lan Wangji was really enduring very hard to not kiss him back as Lan Sizhui was still there at some distance. He just nervously called out, “Wei Ying. Don’t be naughty.”

Lan Wangji carried Wei Wuxian to their room and put him down gently in front of their work desk. Just then, Lan Sizhui knocked on the door of the Jingshi and delivered all the scrolls and books. Both Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji thanked him. He bowed to the both of them and rushed out with his face turning red as he recalled what just happened a few minutes ago. While Wei Wuxian was gathering all the notes, Lan Wangji saw that on the other table, all the food that he had prepared was still intact. Wei Wuxian had not eaten a single thing. He turned to Wei Wuxian and asked, “Wei Ying, why haven’t you eaten? It’s almost lunch time now”.

Wei Wuxian creased his brow and asked back, “Have you eaten?”

Lan Wangji replied, “Yes”.

“You’re lying”, Wei Wuxian stared at Lan Wangji a bit upset.

Lan Wangji sighed and looked down. Wei Wuxian gestured him to come sit on the dining table and said, “Don’t absolutely move from here. I’ll be back in a few minutes”. Lan Wangji obediently nodded looking a bit sad because he had upset his love.

Wei Wuxian went with all the dishes to their kitchen, warmed up all the food, brought them back and set them on the dining table. “Lan Zhan, please don’t do this. I feel awful when you don’t eat anything. Why do you keep doing this every day? And how do you expect me to eat anything when my love is starving?”

Lan Wangji answered, “And how do you expect me to eat anything when my love is starving as well?”

Wei Wuxian, “You—!”, he sighed heavily, “All right. From tomorrow, I’ll get up early and we’ll have breakfast together. Force me to wake up, okay?”

Lan Wangji smiled, “Okay”.

He saw that among the dishes, there were a few extra dishes that had been specially prepared for Lan Wangji’s mild food palette. He gave a loving smile to Wei Wuxian. Wei Wuxian responded with a huge grin, “Eat up~!”

                 After they both finished eating, Wei Wuxian described the working of the cusp restriction array and the incantation for building this design to Lan Wangji. He was very impressed by Wei Wuxian’s genius ideas for coming up with such an efficient design. They both carried out some tests of casting the array and obviously got very good results. But only after casting the array multiple times and making sure that they both were satisfied with the results of these initial tests did they both go to meet Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen. Wei Wuxian once again explained all the details of his design to both of them. They listened to him attentively, with Lan Qiren making an occasional “Mm” sound in approval. After a series of questions and answers from Lan Qiren as well as Lan Xichen, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji both gave a practical demonstration of the cusp restriction array in front of these seniors.

Lan Xichen congratulated Wei Wuxian generously, “A-Xian, you have done a superb job in designing this array. From your explanation and demonstration, it is quite clear that this array is very user friendly, just like the new sealing talisman you have designed. The sealing talisman is not just helping our sect’s cultivators, but people from other sects as well. I receive many messages thanking you and our sect for this invention. Many congratulations to you. Keep up the good work.”

Wei Wuxian was very happy to receive such good words from Lan Xichen. He replied with a smile, “Thank you very much elder brother. Lan Zhan, also has played a part in this. If not for him searching and making notes on some specific unusual array designs, I would not have been able to connect the dots and come up with this design”.

Lan Wangji kept an indifferent expression on his face as they were in presence of Lan Qiren and just said, “I play no part. It is all Wei Ying’s original idea”.

Lan Qiren also congratulated Wei Wuxian, “Mm. Very good. Very good. Keep up the good work”.

Wei Wuxian was really happy to receive these words from the teacher who had always been pretty harsh in criticising him. He bowed to both Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren, “Thank you very much elder brother, Uncle. I will keep working hard to be more useful”.

Lan Qiren nodded and Lan Xichen held Wei Wuxian’s hands, “No need to be so formal, A-Xian”.

Lan Wangji bowed to both their elders too. Just when he and Wei Wuxian were about to leave, Lan Qiren suddenly spoke, “Wait. You don’t come to the morning meditation sessions, do you?” A sweat drop rolled from Wei Wuxian’s forehead immediately. “Don’t skip them”, said Lan Qiren. “Come to the sessions every day. They are good for your cultivation”.

Wei Wuxian bowed to him again, “My sincere apologies. I will definitely attend all sessions from now”.

Lan Qiren nodded with another “Mm”.

Both Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian were now walking back to their Jingshi. Lan Wangji assured Wei Wuxian, “Uncle doesn’t hate you. He is just a bit too particular about cultivation practices. He said that for your own good. He respects you and your talent”.

“I know”, replied Wei Wuxian with a smile on his face. “Even though reluctantly, he has still welcomed me into the Lan sect and hasn’t really caused me any hardships since I came here with you once again. He also has allowed me to teach all the students here. I realise that he has already fully accepted me as a part of the Lan family”. Lan Wangji nodded in agreement.

                 Over the next few days, Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian went together to night hunts to test out the new restriction array. In these night hunts, while using the array they sometimes suppressed their spiritual energy and sometimes used it in its full power in order to cast the array. The trapping of the evil creatures or even simply objects filled with resentful energy was achieved quite efficiently in this array as Wei Wuxian had explained before. Even if the creatures being trapped inside the array tried to bang on the edges, they’d just be pushed back hard due to the concave flow of spiritual energy of this cusp array. The success rate was 100 % till now without any mishaps. If Nie Minghue’s corpse was considered to have 100 % resentful energy, this cusp restriction array had successfully been able to trap creatures filled with a very small amount of resentful energy to those having almost about 70 % of the resentful energy that Nie Mingjue’s corpse had. Apart from Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, most of the students of the Lan sect had by now cast this array individually as well as in pairs or with three people or even five people at a time. After a night hunt ended, both Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji would write notes on the type of creature they had been able to trap in this new array and the amount of spiritual energy they had to expend while casting it. Wei Wuxian would use all this information to improve the incantation required to cast the cusp restriction array with higher efficiency.

                 Very recently, the Lan sect had also gained the ability to measure the amount of spiritual energy released by any cultivator. After developing the cusp restriction array, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji had jointly invented a small instrument to detect the percentage of spiritual energy used by a cultivator at a given time. The instrument worked as follows- whenever a cultivator cast any spell, the spiritual energy, which is nothing but a form of electromagnetic radiation, would generate a field around the cultivator as well as their surroundings. If the measuring instrument was held out in this situation, the generated field would exert pressure on a coil, made up of a magnetic material, installed inside the instrument and would cause it to twist. The coil was attached to a slider consisting of numbers from 1 to 10, where the number 10 corresponded to the maximum spiritual energy measured in the instrument. Based on the degree by which the coil twisted, a number would be displayed. Because the Lan sect had so many highly skilled cultivators, Wei Wuxian had requested a few of them to help him in testing this measuring instrument. He requested each cultivator to first suppress their spiritual energy completely and then release it by increasing their energy release one step at a time. And for each such round, he would record the number that his instrument displayed and also record the rough amount of energy that the cultivators thought they had released. In this way, he generated tables of the amount of energy and the corresponding output number given by his instrument and plotted these values against each other to get a relation between the two quantities. Thus, if a cultivator said they released 40 % of their energy, from the relation he had obtained from these experiments, he would be able to predict what number his instrument would give as output. In this way, he calibrated his instrument each time to make it accurately detect the spiritual energy released.

                 This instrument came to be used rigorously not just by the cultivators of the Lan sect but also by cultivators of other sects. Wei Wuxian’s name had once again risen to the peak of popularity along with Lan Wangji’s and people were showering them both with compliments for creating such easy to use and efficient tools. Night hunting had just gotten a lot safer thanks to inventions such as these.

*****

Chapter Text

          Wei Wuxian was finally able to relax after an intense spree of working on the restriction array and the device for measuring spiritual energy release. He spent a few days doing practically nothing- no taking classes, no interactions with his students, no discussions with the sect’s elders, no helping with any administrative work of the sect. He just loitered around in Gusu pulling Lan Wangji with him everywhere. Lan Wangji of course indulged his love every single time and would swiftly complete his workload in the spare time when Wei Wuxian was resting.

                 Tonight, Wei Wuxian had decided to go on a night hunt with his students for the first time in the last 3 months. It was around 8 A.M. now and Lan Wangji had to go with Lan Qiren to visit a small sect in the vicinity near Gusu. They would be returning back by 6 P.M. and so, Lan Wangji was unable to go with Wei Wuxian for this night hunt.

Just before Lan Wangji departed, with a heavy heart he spoke, “Wei Ying, please be very careful”.

Wei Wuxian chuckled, “Eyy~ Don’t worry so much! I’ll be careful. You have a good trip”.

Lan Wangji kept staring at him for a few seconds and seemed to have something to say.

Wei Wuxian inquired, “What’s the matter? Do you want to tell me something?”

Lan Wangji just shook his head to deny it and with a smile said, “See you in the evening”.

Wei Wuxian gave a sweet smile in return and waved to Lan Wangji as he walked away. He went inside the Jingshi to prepare for the hunt.

                 As evening was approaching, Wei Wuxian gathered all his students and went to the area for tonight’s night hunt. This was actually a request that the Lan Sect had received from a nearby village and the village chief had yesterday come to the Cloud Recesses and requested for Lan Xichen to send help. He had informed that their village was plagued by some powerful and very agile fierce corpses and had already killed about 50 people. He had also said that they had tried using the cleansing talismans that they had received from cultivators and had put them up on the walls of their main doors to keep these corpses away, but it had failed miserably. On hearing all this, Wei Wuxian had already guessed that since these corpses where agile, they must be controlled by a highly skilled demonic cultivator. During their meeting with the village elder yesterday, Wei Wuxian had tried to ask the village chief if he or anyone in their village had had quarrels with any cultivators recently. But the chief was very reluctant to answer such questions. He just kept dodging Wei Wuxian’s questions and kept pleading to Lan Xichen to send cultivators from the Lan sect to get rid of the corpses. Lan Xichen listened to his pleas and agreed to send out a few cultivators. Wei Wuxian already had a few ideas about how to tackle the situation and so he instead volunteered to go for this particular hunt and to take his student on top for this mission.

                 By the time Wei Wuxian and his student reached the village it was already night time. The moment they entered the village premises, the whole group was surrounded and attacked by these fierce corpses.

Wei Wuxian instructed his students, “Everyone! Stay alert and be on your toes! Keep your talismans ready and seal them as soon as you can!” and dashed away to subdue a few of the corpses.

While he was sealing away the corpses one by one, he sensed something in the shadows. It was a demonic cultivator as he had rightly guessed and he was controlling the corpses using a type of whistle inaudible to the human ear. In addition, he had cast a stealth spell on himself and so his presence could not be detected by any of Wei Wuxian’s students. Only a few including Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi where able to very vaguely make out this cultivator’s presence and movements. But they had to focus real hard for it. Wei Wuxian’s cultivation was higher and so he could make out how the demonic cultivator moved. But simply tracking the demonic cultivator was not enough. They all had to destroy these highly agile fierce corpses before they could get to the cultivator. These corpses had been altered by the cultivator and so the usual spells used to destroy them didn’t work. And so Wei Wuxian and his students all used the new cusp restriction array to freeze the corpses in place first and then seal them in the sealing talisman. But there was a problem in this, even if this new restriction array could be cast using a very small amount of spiritual energy, the person casting it still had to be stationed at one place till they could cast the next spell and seal the corpse inside in the new sealing talisman and purge it. This added delays in eliminating these corpses and the demonic cultivator somehow had a huge supply of these corpses that kept all of them too busy.

                 It had become a drawn out battle and the demonic cultivator was quite comfortably hiding and watching as Wei Wuxian and his students struggled to finish off the corpses. Things were starting to look grim and Wei Wuxian had to think of a solution soon as some of his students had come dangerously close to death during this hunt tonight. He instructed, “Sizhui, Jingyi, split in teams of 5 and lure the corpses around you to one spot. 4 in each group, cast the restriction array and one should seal the trapped corpse in the talisman”. Both Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi responded with a loud “Yes!” and scrambled to carry out the plan as per Wei Wuxian’s instructions. They were finally able to eliminate almost all of the corpses. In all this chaos, Wei Wuxian had lost track of the demonic cultivator and just as he finished destroying the last corpse on his side, he saw the demonic cultivator suddenly show up behind Lan Jingyi. Wei Wuxian’s heart skipped a beat seeing this and he shouted loudly, “JINGYI! DODGE!”

Jingyi had just finished using the sealing talisman and destroyed the last corpse on his side. Hearing Wei Wuxian’s shout, he was shocked but dodged at just the last second. At this moment, Wei Wuxian had already leapt in to shield him and had also successfully landed a fatal slash from his sword Suibian to finish off the demonic cultivator. All of this happened in a matter of a few seconds and most of the students who were just finishing casting the sealing spell to destroy the corpses hadn’t even realised that their fellow student had just been saved from a life threatening attack just now.

With the demonic cultivator gone, the remainder of the corpses froze in place and fell one by one. All students rushed to directly use the sealing talisman to destroy the fallen corpses.

Lan Sizhui rushed to where Wei Wuxian and Lan Jingyi were, “Senior Wei, Jingyi, are you okay?!”

Wei Wuxian grinned, “A-okay~!” while Jingyi was still standing there dumbstruck, trying to understand what just happened.

Wei Wuxian called out to everyone, “All right, everyone done destroying the corpses?!” Everyone replied with a loud “Yes!”

Wei Wuxian shouted again, “Everyone still having their hands and legs intact?” Everyone laughed loudly and replied with another loud “YES!”

All the students were pretty excited tonight since none of them had got injured and had safely and  successfully accomplished the mission they were given. They were all murmuring amongst themselves and thanking Wei Wuxian for teaching them so well and letting them have this practical experience. Wei Wuxian on the other hand had full confidence that his students would perform well and so he wasn’t really worried too much since the beginning.

All the students gathered around Wei Wuxian. “Let’s go meet the village chief. We must force out the full story from him”, he said and they all started marching towards the village chief’s house.

The chief of course welcomed them, showering them with words of extreme flatter and offering up as much money as he had been able to collect from all villagers and his own pocket. Wei Wuxian looked at the big bag of money the chief handed to him and took only half of the coins. He gave back the rest of the money and said, “We don’t need so much money from you.  Please use them to rebuild the damaged houses. But, there is other thing that we all want. You must tell us the full story about how these corpses started haunting this village”.

The village chief was very nervous now. He kept looking here and there trying to avoid making eye-contact with anyone. After a few minutes he reluctantly started to tell them the full story. He told them that there was a young man, about 23 years old, who used to work as a blacksmith in this village. He used to prepare iron tools such as knives, short swords, pickaxes as well as iron utensils and used to sell them in nearby villages. His earning wasn’t too good, but it was enough to get him by the day. The chief continued the story telling that there was a cultivator who had recently started coming to this blacksmith. He had been impressed by the blacksmith’s craftsmanship in making short and lightweight iron swords. The cultivator used to pay him handsomely in return for the deadly tools he commissioned from him.

Lan Sizhui interrupted the chief, “Did the chief investigate the cultivator’s background?”

The chief replied, “Of course we did! That’s how we came to know that this cultivator practiced demonic arts and used the tools that our village’s blacksmith made for slaughtering people”.

The chief continued telling them that they informed the blacksmith about the cultivator’s background and discouraged him from associating with that cultivator. But this blacksmith had by now been completely brainwashed by that cultivator and had also started training under him. The chief said that he and the village elders often had huge quarrels with the blacksmith. They all had threatened to kick this blacksmith out of the village during one such argument and this sent him into a fit of rage. He angrily destroyed his own living quarters and threatened the village chief and the villagers to wait and watch.

The chief whimpered, “Who knew that he would himself become a full fledged demonic cultivator and slaughter our villagers?”

One of the students suddenly asked, “But was it just the arguments with you and the villagers that led him to take such an extreme action?”

The chief replied, “No. When we investigate a bit more, we found out that this blacksmith and that demonic cultivator were trying to gather dead bodies of people for experimenting on making highly agile fierce corpses. And that other cultivator had known that this blacksmith was having quarrels with us. So he had brainwashed him and made him kill our villagers to provide him with a fresh supply of corpses”.

The village chief was shaking at this point recalling all the horrible events that he and his villagers had witnessed in the past few months.

Wei Wuxian spoke, “Elder, so many terrible things happened with you all. You came to our sect to ask for help but would not reveal all these details. Why is that? Unless…”

Lan Sizhui finished Wei Wuxian’s sentence,” Unless the demonic cultivator had some ties with the village chief”.

The village chief was shocked and immediately stood from his seat sweating profusely. All the villagers were now looking at him with extreme suspicion.

Wei Wuxian had a huge grin on his face and patted on Lan Sizhui’s back, “Well done, Sizhui! You are improving by the day~! Hanguang-jun will be most delighted”.

Wei Wuxian spoke further, “Elder, would you mind revealing the details of this?”

The chief stuttered, “I-I-I…”

He was now in extreme panic. The villagers one by one now started demanding an explanation. The increase in the loudness of the villager’s voices sent chills down his spine. He suddenly fell down to the ground in a deep bow in front of all the villagers and pleaded, “PLEASE FORGIVE ME! PLEASE FORGIVE ME!! I was wrong!”

Crying like a little kid, he slowly revealed the full story. “You see, my child was not having a good health most of the time. I had been searching for a doctor who could cure my daughter once and for all. While searching for one in the nearby town, I happened to meet this demonic cultivator. He sold some medicines to me and assured me that my daughter would be cured within a month. But he had tricked me. The medicines that he had given me were some drugs that had a temporary soothing effect”. The chief continued talking while still crying, “My daughter took those medicines and died after a month. On realizing what he had done, I had a fight with him and threatened him that I will report him to the Lan Sect. He retaliated by setting our village’s blacksmith against us. The blacksmith had been trained in making poisons of different kinds by him. He initially killed a few villagers and then used their corpses to try and wipe out our village entirely just to provide more corpses for their experiments. That is why I rushed to the Lan sect as things had gotten fully out of hand by then”.

The whole picture was now clear. The chief, still crying, once again bowed deeply to his fellow villagers, “I am very very sorry! Please forgive me! Please forgive me for keeping this information from all of you”. He bowed down to Wei Wuxian multiple times, “Esteemed cultivator, please forgive my extremely rude behavior previously. I should have revealed all this information to you sooner”.

Wei Wuxian sighed, “You finally understand. If we had gotten all this information sooner, we would have also been able to take care of the other demonic cultivator who manipulated your village’s blacksmith. Anyway, it’s too late now. I will pass on this information to our sect leader for further investigation. Who knows how many more people that other demonic cultivator might have killed as we speak…”

The village chief bowed deeply to Wei Wuxian again and also bowed to all the students. All the villagers also thanked Wei Wuxian and his students profusely. Wei Wuxian signaled all his students and they all started their return journey to the Cloud Recesses.

*****

Chapter Text

           Wei Wuxian and all of his students had come to the foot of the Cloud Recesses and were pretty tired from the intense night hunt session. Wei Wuxian was surprisingly walking slower and slower and had actually fallen back to the tail end of the whole group. Just as they all started climbing the stairs at the entrance, Wei Wuxian felt a sharp pain in his stomach and swayed heavily. Lan Sizhui was walking besides him and seeing Wei Wuxian stagger like this, his heart skipped a beat. He shouted, “Senior Wei!” and caught Wei Wuxian to steady him. Lan Jingyi, who was also walking next to Sizhui also rushed to help, “Senior Wei!” All the other students turned their heads on hearing both of them shout and on seeing them both panicking like that, they all scrambled and gathered around their teacher to know what was wrong.

As Lan Sizhui caught Wei Wuxian, he noticed blood dripping ceaselessly from his stomach and his own blood went ice cold suddenly. In a state of extreme panic and sadness, he shouted with tears in his eyes, “JINGYI! Senior Wei! He’s bleeding badly! Hanguang-jun! Rush to Hanguang-jun!”

Lan Jingyi saw Wei Wuxian’s state and shouted, “Senior Wei! Hang on!!” and while crying, he rushed out from the group that had stopped in the stairs to inform Lan Wangji.

One other disciple also in a panicked tone shouted, “I’ll go inform Zewu-jun” and rushed out.

Yet another disciple shouted, “I’ll go inform the doctor to go to the Jingshi”.

Lan Sizhui nodded heavily at these shouts and along with a few other disciples, held Wei Wuxian in a sleeping position and started climbing the stairs fast but carefully at the same time. Just an hour ago, all of his students had seen Wei Wuxian confidently interrogating the village chief and he was looking fine throughout the whole interrogation, so suddenly seeing him in this state had depressed all his students and thrown their minds in a state of chaos.

                 Lan Wangji had returned from his trip by 6 P.M. As soon as he came back, he washed up and cleaned their Jingshi. Next, he went to prepare dinner for his love and rushed out to go to the entrance square in the Cloud Recesses just where the stairs ended. It was now 8:30 P.M. and he had been walking back and forth for almost an hour waiting for his Wei Wuxian to return. He suddenly heard a distant voice and soon saw Lan Jingyi running towards him. As Lan Jingyi approached closer, Lan Wangji saw that he was bawling his eyes out as he ran.

Lan Jingyi shouted, “Hanguang-jun! Hanguang-jun!”

Lan Wangji immediately understood that something really bad must have happened.

Lan Jingyi finally climbed the final step and while gasping for air, choking on his tears and coughing at the same time he spoke, “Ha-Hanguang-jun! Senior Wei! Senior Wei! Please go!”, and pointed down the stairs.

The moment Lan Wangji heard “Senior Wei!” his heart squeezed to the point of extreme pain. He dashed to go down the stairs. Lan Jingyi ran immediately after him. As he was running downwards, Lan Wangji saw a crowd of students trying to carefully hurry up the stairs. As soon as they all saw him, they called out “Hanguang-jun! Hanguang-jun! Senior Wei! Senior Wei!” and the students in the front gave way to him. Neither Lan Jingyi nor any of the other students were able to speak a full sentence throughout from the extreme shock, nervousness and deep sadness all at once.

Lan Wangji saw that at the very end Lan Sizhui and a few more students were carrying Wei Wuxian. His heart sank. He wasn’t able to sense anything on seeing Wei Wuxian now lifeless like this. He just started running even faster, tears falling incessantly from his eyes. The moment he reached close, he picked up Wei Wuxian in his arms, hugging him tightly and bowed to Lan Sizhui and all the students. He started running back. All students followed him closely, some informing that a few students have gone to inform Lan Xichen and also gone to inform the doctor to come see Wei Wuxian. But Lan Wangji was unable to hear anything. His head and heart were pounding very hard and hurting badly. His breath was in complete disarray, not from running fast but because his love was in a state he never ever wanted to see in. There was just one thought looping in his head- Wei Ying, Wei Ying, Wei Ying, Wei Ying, Wei Ying!!!

By the time he reached their Jingshi, Lan Xichen, Lan Qiren, a doctor and a few more elders from the sect were already present outside. Lan Wangji carried Wei Wuxian to their bed, gently laid him down and stepped aside to let the doctor check him. All the students were outside gasping for breath and crying silently. Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi were both in a state of trance and Lan Jingyi was shaking like a leaf as he had realized something.

The doctor examined Wei Wuxian carefully and was looking quite nervous. Wei Wuxian’s pulse had become very weak. Upon finishing his examination, the doctor spoke, “He has received a deep cut in his stomach from a sword and lost a lot of blood. He is having a fever due to his wounds”.

The doctor suddenly stopped speaking and looked nervously at Lan Wangji who was shedding tears incessantly and then at Lan Xichen. Lan Xichen nodded to assure the doctor to speak further and so he continued, “We need to treat him fast. Let me bring more help to treat him better”. Saying this he rushed out to fetch some medicines and tools and bring more help to sew Wei Wuxian’s stomach wound and bandage him.

Lan Qiren could hear the sobs of all the students standing outside. He went to tell them the details and instructed them to go have some food and rest for the night. Lan Xichen was extremely saddened as he looked at Wei Wuxian and was devastated when he looked at Lan Wangji. Lan Wangji looked like a complete mess right now- crying, disheveled hair, clothes stained with blood all over and lifeless eyes. Lan Wangji slowly approached Wei Wuxian, took his hand in his and started transferring his spiritual energy to him.

This scene was all too familiar to Lan Xichen. Back then when Lan Wangji was hiding Wei Wuxian in the cave after his Shijie had died and he had slaughtered many cultivators in a fit of rage, when Lan Xichen, Lan Qiren and other elders from the Lan sect finally found the both of them, he had seen Lan Wangji do the same thing as he was doing just now. Lan Xichen was speechless. He just sat down besides Lan Wangji and pressed on to his shoulder to console him. Lan Wangji was trembling unbearably. Lan Xichen understood that Lan Wangji was in extreme pain right now, probably much more than Wei Wuxian was in. No one could really do anything to ease his pain, not now and not in the past either. Lan Xichen just prayed real hard that Wei Wuxian would recover from this fast.

Some time had passed and Lan Wangji was still transferring his spiritual energy to Wei Wuxian. The doctor called Lan Xichen out to tell him something. He said, “The wound that Young Master Wei has received is from a sword that was probably was dipped in a strong poison. There are slight traces of resentful energy implying that the cut was most likely made when he was battling a demonic cultivator or corpses. His pulse is very weak right now and he is barely breathing. I-I didn’t want to reveal all of this in front of Hanguang-jun, so please forgive me for calling you out like this”.

 Lan Xichen froze for a bit from the shock of hearing Wei Wuxian’s critical condition. He thanked the doctor for his kind gesture of not revealing this in front of his brother. With extreme nervousness he spoke, “I pray that A-Xian will pull through this difficult phase and become healthy soon, for both his sake and Wangji’s”.

The doctor replied, “I pray too. We will do our best to help him recover. After we have sewn his wound, we will have to see how he responds to the medicine. This case is especially tricky since the poison injected in his body is quite strong. So we will have to carefully prepare a medicine in which the herbs don’t conflict with the extracts from which the poison was made. The dosages will have to be given in very small quantities and so his recovery might be a bit slow initially. The one who has made this poison is quite skilled”.

Following this conversation, the doctor along with a few of his associates stitched Wei Wuxian’s stomach wound, bandaged it and gave him the first dose of the antidote and other medicines for healing his wound.

After Lan Qiren informed and instructed everyone, all the students had dispersed. But none had any appetite tonight. They all just went to their rooms and most cried themselves to sleep.

Lan Xichen went to talk to Lan Wangji, “Wangji… I had a talk with the doctor. A-Xian is heavily wounded so his recovery might be slow, but he will pull through and become healthy once again”.

Lan Wangji, who had finally stopped crying, just listlessly listened to his brother’s words and nodded slightly. Lan Xichen couldn’t really say anything more to him. He just patted him once again and said, “We’ll come to visit again tomorrow morning”. Lan Qiren just silently watched over and left with Lan Xichen after their conversation ended.

                 Lan Wangji was now alone in the Jingshi with Wei Wuxian. The moment he looked at Wei Wuxian face, he started crying again. With a choked throat, he just kept calling out “Wei… Ying…” softly and stroking his hair and face, his tears falling of Wei Wuxian’s sleeping face every now and then. The nightmares that Lan Wangji had suffered for 13 years after he learned of his passing were flashing before his eyes even while he was awake right now. He was finding it extremely hard to breathe. Throughout the whole night Lan Wangji had left Wei Wuxian’s side only once to change his robes so that the dry blood on the one he was wearing when he carried him here wouldn’t infect Wei Wuxian. For the whole night, he kept transferring his spiritual energy to him.

                 The next day, the doctor gave Wei Wuxian the second dose of the antidote. Thankfully, his body wasn’t rejecting the medicines and so the doctor heaved a sigh of relief. Lan Xichen came to visit and saw that Lan Wangji was sitting by Wei Wuxian’s bedside watching over him. He looked extremely fatigued with bloodshot eyes, not from lack of sleep but from the constant crying. Wei Wuxian was still having a high fever and hadn’t regained consciousness. Lan Wangji had sat beside him for the whole day without moving away for even a second. Lan Xichen didn’t say anything to him, but he was really worried that Lan Wangji would collapse any moment from the extreme fatigue.

                 It was the third day and the today too, Lan Xichen saw Lan Wangji just watching over Wei Wuxian, refusing to leave his. He had developed deep dark circles under his eyes and looked even more exhausted than yesterday.

Lan Qiren couldn’t stand by and watch any longer. He stormed into the Jingshi and cast a type of silence spell around Wei Wuxian so that any noise wouldn’t affect him. He then turned to Lan Wangji and in an angry tone scolded, “Wangji! How long do you intend to stay like this?! The doctors are doing their best. Wei Wuxian will definitely recover. You must have something to eat first, only then can you look after him properly. Why are you being so stubborn?!”

Lan Wangji was barely conscious right now and his head was pounding. He could hardly hear Lan Qiren but as soon as he was able to focus a little, he bowed to him speaking just one word in a very weak voice, “Uncle”.

 Lan Qiren wanted him to get up, leave the room for some time and make him eat something, but seeing Lan Wangji just greet him made him angrier. He shouted, “Wangji! Should I drag you out?! Look at how you’ve become! You’ll be the next sick person lying beside him very soon!” 

Lan Wangji just listened to Lan Qiren’s scolding and bowed to him again, not moving an inch from his place. Lan Qiren finally gave up, dispersed the spell on Wei Wuxian and left their room angrily.

Lan Xichen followed him out, “Uncle, please don’t be angry. I will talk to him too”.

Lan Qiren grumbled, “Hmph! That stubborn fool!”

Both Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji knew that Lan Qiren was just worried and they didn’t mind no matter how harsh a scolding they got from him.

                 On the fourth day too Wei Wuxian had still not regained consciousness. His students had come yesterday as well as today to ask about his well-being. Lan Xichen told them of his condition and asked them to return to their studies. He promised them that they could meet him after he wakes up. All the students returned to their studies and chores while constantly praying hard for their teacher’s health.

The doctor was quite worried today about his condition since his response was still very slow to the medicines he was administered with. The antidote dosage that the doctor had given him till now for expelling the poison had been substantial and so the doctor was expecting Wei Wuxian’s body to respond more than it had been. He had estimated that if his fever didn’t go down and he didn’t wake up today then there might be some more complications that might be difficult to cure. He especially feared a possible irreparable damage to his vital organs as a result of the spreading of the poison. He went and informed Lan Xichen about this possibility.

Very nervous thinking about this situation and extremely worried about his little brother’s condition, Lan Xichen sat beside Lan Wangji and spoke, “Wangji… You must get up. You’re in a very bad shape right now. Just—”

He was interrupted by Lan Wangji’s extremely weak voice, “Wei Ying… if Wei Ying doesn’t wake up… I will… close my eyes as well…”

Lan Xichen’s face lost all colour and his heart squeezed hard from the shock of hearing this. He turned his head to see Lan Wangji’s deadly pale face and his eyes fixed onto Wei Wuxian. Neither he nor the doctor had informed him about Wei Wuxian’s exact condition even once in the past 3 days, but from the words his little brother spoke just now, he had clearly understood and Lan Wangji had calready correctly gauged the danger Wei Wuxian was in. Lan Xichen realized that he should have dragged Lan Wangji away from Wei Wuxian on the first day itself. Seeing a lifeless Wei Wuxian for these past 3 days had caused a great deal of mental damage for Lan Wangji yet again and not eating, drinking or sleeping had cause considerable physical damage as well. Reminded of the horror of Lan Wangji’s extreme behaviour and suffering from when he had lost Wei Wuxian once before, Lan Xichen knew very well to what extent Lan Wangji would go this time as well. But hearing him directly say these words just now stirred a fear in him.

Panicking, Lan Xichen spoke in a raised voice, “Wangji! You can’t say such things! A-Xian will definitely recover!” Lan Xichen’s heart felt extreme pain seeing Lan Wangji in such a miserable state holding his Wei Wuxian’s hand tightly in his own and transferring his own spiritual energy with the last bit of strength he could gather. Just one thought kept looping in his mind, “When will this nightmare for these two souls end?!”

                 The doctor and his team had been monitoring Wei Wuxian throughout the day and administering medicine dosages to try and reduce his fever as well as try to subdue the poison. It was late evening now and every single person associated with Wei Wuxian was just praying really hard for some miracle to happen and let Wei Wuxian wake up from his coma. The doctor was really nervous and checked Wei Wuxian’s pulse one more time. With a worried look and without talking to anyone he just left the Jingshi. Slowly, all the students who had come to visit their teacher also left one by one. Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi were the only ones still standing outside now in addition to Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen.

Lan Jingyi had been really depressed these past 3 days because Wei Wuxian had gotten injured while saving him. He started crying, “Sizhui, it’s all… it’s all my fault that Senior Wei… that Senior Wei is like this right now”.

Sizhui somehow pulled himself up and patted his back to console him, “Jingyi…”

Lan Jingyi continued, “That night… I wasn’t alert enough… I couldn’t make out when that demonic cultivator had approached me from the back. Senior Wei wouldn’t have gotten injured if I had shifted from that spot much sooner”.

Lan Qiren was already quite upset with how Wei Wuxian had gotten injured but was even angrier at how Lan Wangji was behaving and making himself miserable. Lan Wangji was the apple of his eyes after all. Seeing his deteriorating condition in the last 3 days had upset Lan Qiren a lot. And the doctor giving one bad news after other about Wei Wuxian’s condition just further angered him. He spoke, “Xichen, drag Wangji out from the Jingshi. He is probably going to kill himself at this rate. That stubborn fool!”

Lan Xichen hesitated a bit. Seeing this Lan Qiren raised his voice, “Mm?! Why are you just standing there?! Go on, drag him out now!”

Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi got scared hearing Lan Qiren shout like this. They whimpered and stepped back a little. Lan Qiren turned to them, “You two, go and help Xichen! Hurry up!”

They both scrambled and went inside. Lan Xichen also nervously went in. He stood near Lan Wangji and spoke, “Wangji… uncle is very upset right now. You have to come out of the room”. He tried to pull Lan Wangji up to stand, but he wouldn’t budge. “Wangji, don’t do this”, urged Lan Xichen.

Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi were actually really scared to even approach Lan Wangji right now. Gathering up all the courage they could, they tried requesting him to get up, “Ha-Hanguang-jun… Please… please come out. Teacher is very angry right now. Please talk to him just once”.

Lan Qiren was becoming impatient and stormed inside. Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi rushed outside at once and ran some distance away from the Jingshi. Lan Qiren cast the silence spell on Wei Wuxian once again. He then grabbed Lan Wangji’s arm and started to pull him while shouting, “Wangji! Get up right now!”

Lan Wangji started struggling to free his arm from Lan Qiren.

“Wangji! You must obey!”, shouted Lan Qiren while Lan Xichen tried to calm down their uncle.

With almost dead eyes and a face full of tears Lan Wangji just looked at Lan Qiren and spoke in an exhausted low voice, “Uncle… please… I can’t… I can’t leave him… I won’t leave him…”

Lan Qiren asked him in an angry tone, “What are you going to accomplish by being like this? The doctor is already giving him the proper medicines! Come out now! Let him rest by himself for some time”.

Lan Wangji finally struggled and successfully pulled his arm away from Lan Qiren’s grasp. He bowed deeply to him, “Uncle…” to apologize for his behaviour.

Lan Qiren shouted, “Do you want to die?”

Lan Wangji slowly replied, “If Wei Ying dies, I will too anyway”.

Lan Qiren was shocked. He froze in place for a few seconds, looked at Lan Wangji still bowing to him. He sighed heavily, removed the silence spell on Wei Wuxian and left the Jingshi. Lan Xichen followed behind silently.

Lan Wangji slowly dragged himself closer to Wei Wuxian and stroke his forehead slowly calling out in an exhausted tone, “Wei Ying… Wei Ying… Please wake up… Please… wake up… Wei Ying… Don’t… Don’t do this…” as his tears falling down on Wei Wuxian’s face once again. Lan Wangji tenderly traced his thumb across Wei Wuxian’s lips that were chapped from dehydration, “Wei Ying… Please… come back… come back… please… Wei Ying…”

About an hour later, Lan Wangji felt Wei Wuxian slightly move his hand which was held firmly in his own. His heartbeats quickened bit by bit. He stroke Wei Wuxian’s cheek, “Wei Ying… Wei Ying”. Wei Wuxian finally started regaining consciousness, slowly opening his eyes. Lan Wangji leaned in closer to him and his tear filled eyes widened, “Wei Ying! Wei Ying!”

Wei Wuxian’s vision finally focused, “Lan… Zhan…”

Lan Wangji’s lips were trembling unbearably from the extreme happiness his heart felt at this point. His love had finally shown signs of life and spoken for the first time in these 4 days to him. Unable to really breathe properly and in a very choked voice he replied, “Wei Ying, I’m here! Wei Ying!”

When Wei Wuxian finally regained full consciousness, what he saw made his blood run cold. The tattered mess that Lan Wangji looked like right now caused a sharp pain in his heart. He had never seen Lan Wangji like this – an extremely pale and exhausted face, crying miserably and having a look of utter desperation. He weakly extended his hand to grab Lan Wangji’s cheek, “Lan Zhan…”

Lan Wangji immediately grabbed his extended hand and kissed it multiple times while calling out his name repeatedly. He spoke again, “I’ll inform the doctor right away. Please wait for me”. Kissing Wei Wuxian’s forehead, Lan Wangji got up and steadied himself with great effort. Wobbling about as he dragged his fatigued body, he tried walking as fast as he could to inform the doctor and bring him here.

The doctor was delighted to hear that Wei Wuxian had finally regained consciousness. He rushed along with Lan Wangji to the Jingshi to check up on Wei Wuxian. He administered a fresh batch of medicines to him and instructed Lan Wangji to feed him a little water after some time. Lan Wangji attentively listened to the doctor’s words. After the doctor left, Lan Wangji fed Wei Wuxian some water by a mouth-to-mouth transfer as Wei Wuxian was still very weak right now and lying still in bed. Wei Wuxian caressed Lan Wangji’s cheek weakly and gave him a sweet smile. Lan Wangji gently pressed his hand on top. His heart finally settled after seeing that his love was finally awake and responding little bit.

Wei Wuxian called out in a low voice, “Lan Zhan… you don’t look well… Why…?”

Lan Wangji’s tears couldn’t stop. He just shook his head in denial and said, “I’m all right now” and kissed Wei Wuxian’s forehead.

“You’re lying… again…”, frowned Wei Wuxian.

Lan Wangji shook his head again to deny it. He couldn’t speak anything as he was really trying his best to look as okay as possible and didn’t want to let out choked words to worry his love. He stroke Wei Wuxian’s head, “Take some rest”.

Wei Wuxian smiled again and drifted off to sleep.

                 The next morning, due to the combined effect of the constant spiritual energy that Lan Wangji had transferred to him for the past 4 days and all the medicines he had received from the doctor, Wei Wuxian’s fever had finally gone down considerably and the poison in his body was now mostly gone. As he woke up, he saw Lan Wangji sitting by the edge of the bed beside him, resting his head on one hand and holding Wei Wuxian’s hand warmly in his other hand. Wei Wuxian shifted closer to Lan Wangji and stroke his head gently and kissed it a few times. Seeing Lan Wangji’s pale figure, the dark circles under his eyes and recalling how he was wobbly while getting up yesterday to call the doctor, he felt extremely sad. He had already guessed correctly that Lan Wangji had starved himself in these past 4 days, not leaving his bedside for even a little bit and would continue to torture himself just like this till he became health again.

Lan Wangji woke up and lovingly looked at Wei Wuxian. Caressing his cheek, Lan Wangji asked, “Wei Ying, do you feel a bit better now?”

Tears fell down Wei Wuxian’s eyes as he gave a choked, “Mm” and leaned in with effort kiss Lan Wangji’s forehead. Lan Wangji leaned in as well so that Wei Wuxian wouldn’t have to strain himself.

                 Throughout the day, all of Wei Wuxian’s students came to visit him one by one. But no one disturbed his rest. They all would just come inside the Jingshi for a minute, stand besides Wei Wuxian, bow to him and leave. Wei Wuxian definitely had become their favourite teacher since the past 2 years when he took up teaching in the sect. Lan Xichen was also delighted to know of Wei Wuxian finally regaining consciousness. As soon as he finished some paper work in the morning, he had rushed to see him. Lan Qiren also paid Wei Wuxian a visit during the day. The day went in peace.

                  The next day, Wei Wuxian was finally feeling a bit energetic now as his stomach was no longer hurting as much. Although this was the case, his body was still extremely weak and so he was instructed by the doctor to take complete bed rest. Lan Wangji helped him sit on the bed and cushioned Wei Wuxian’s back so that his stomach area would not get stretched or twisted while sitting upright. Since the doctor was in the Jingshi to check up on Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji asked him if Wei Wuxian could each something to which the doctor said that he could eat rice congee. He informed Lan Wangji that he is leaving for some time for some other work. Lan Wangji thanked the doctor. After the doctor left, Lan Wangji turned to Wei Wuxian saying, “Wei Ying, I’ll come back in a bit”.

Lan Wangji was still very fatigued and was just starting to recover from the shock of his love getting hurt this horribly. He got up, very unsteady this time and started walking. With a look of extreme worry on his face, Wei Wuxian was watching his every move very closely. He knew that Lan Wangji wasn’t feeling well at all. He had been lying to Wei Wuxian all this time so that he wouldn’t worry about him.

Lan Wangji was trying to force himself to be as firm as possible but his legs were giving out slowly. Just when he reached the entrance door of their Jingshi, he suddenly collapsed to the ground.

Wei Wuxian saw this and his heart stopped for a few seconds. He shouted, “LAN ZHAN!!!!” struggled to get off the bed and dragged his weak body somehow to where Lan Wangji had collapsed. His tears flowed instantly. With great effort, he lifted Lan Wangji in his arms, struggled up to the bed and laid him gently on it. In doing this, his stomach wound had reopened just now. He must have felt unbearable pain, but he forced his body to obey him and made the best effort to run out of the Jingshi. He wobbled and fell down multiple times on the way, but was finally able to reach Lan Xichen’s room.

Gasping for breath, he collapsed at the door, “Elder brother! Elder brother! Lan Zhan! Lan Zhan! He—!” He could no longer speak as his tears were choking him from saying anything further.

Lan Xichen rushed to him, “A-Xian! Don’t move!” He lifted him up and rushed back to the Jingshi.

Along the way, he saw one student and immediately instructed him to call the doctor to the Jingshi. The student ran to relay the message. Lan Xichen had seen Lan Wangji’s state in the last 5 days now and feared that he might collapse from exhaustion like this very soon. And his fear had come true just now.

Lan Xichen laid Wei Wuxian down on the bed beside Lan Wangji. The doctor had also reached there by now. Lan Wangji had opposed every single attempt by his own elder brother, the sect leader of the Lan sect as well as his uncle persuade him to rest. And so the doctor efforts in these 5 days repeatedly requesting Lan Wangji to have some food or to take some rest were of course falling on deaf ear. He had already anticipated that Lan Wangji would fall ill very soon by looking at his condition in the past 5 days.

The doctor checked them both. Wei Wuxian’s stomach had to be sewed again while Lan Wangji was given some medicines and juices to regain strength. He had been so fatigued that he slept for 2 days whole days. Wei Wuxian kept crying the whole time stroking Lan Wangji’s head and gently kissing his face. He kept thinking about how Lan Wangji had become suicidal because of his own injury. He was only beginning to really understand what he actually meant to this stubborn lonely rabbit of his.

                 Both of them finally recovered after a few days of forced rest. Lan Qiren scolded both of them harshly for their conduct in these past few days. The way they both recklessly acted had been heard by all other disciples in the sect and Lan Qiren was very upset that their actions would reflect badly and spread the wrong message among all.

                 Few more days passed and Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji both slowly returned to their daily routine. When Wei Wuxian came in to take his class for the first time after many days, all the students flocked around him asking about his health. Many had become too emotional and were in tears.

Wei Wuxian grinned and assured them all, “All right, all right crybabies, I’m A-okay now! Stop being so depressing! We have a lot to catch up on!”

All the students scrambled to their seats. Wei Wuxian was pleased to see his class all pumped up and so he asked, “So any interesting night hunts you guys went to in the last few days?”…

***

                 Wei Wuxian was going to the Library Pavilion to fetch some books when Lan Xichen, who was passing by, suddenly called out to him. Wei Wuxian hurried to go to where he was and greeted him with a bow, “Elder brother!”

 Lan Xichen smiled, “A-Xian, are you feeling better now?”

Wei Wuxian nodded with a grin, “A-okay!”

Lan Xichen spoke again, “We all had gotten very worried since you weren’t responding to the medication initially. Wangji took the worst mental blow among all of us”.

Wei Wuxian’s face became very serious suddenly. That scene of Lan Wangji collapsing in front of him flashed before his eyes and made his heart squeeze tightly.

Lan Xichen patted on Wei Wuxian’s shoulder, “A-Xian, please don’t take what I said the wrong way. I am not blaming you. Wangji has been really stubborn about many things since he was a child and when it comes to you, he gives up on everything else for you.”

Wei Wuxian lowered his head, “I understand that very well now. No matter how many times I fight with him on this, he still keeps ignoring his well being when I’m involved in anything”.

Lan Xichen replied, “This isn’t the first time he has acted this way though. He has done something similar before when he learnt about your death on the Burial Mounds. He dragged his tattered body and kept wandering around searching for you over there. He had lied to all the elders and to uncle and had been gone from the Cloud Recesses for 3 months. We have now come to know that during those three months he kept digging around most of the area of the Burial Mounds to search for you. Some people residing in the nearby areas would often see him in tool shops buying a shovel or a pickaxe. He had apparently broken 30 such tools while searching for you. Some people had started suspecting him to have gone mad. We got news of him being there only because some villagers identified his clothing and came to us to report. When I went to fetch him, he had become extremely thin and severely dehydrated. He probably wasn’t eating anything for those 3 months. I think he barely survived for those 3 months only because he had been practicing inedia since a very young age. His body was fatigued to the extreme, just like how you saw him just after regaining consciousness the other day. Most of the 33 whip lashes that he had received had become infected at that point, draining his body of blood constantly. When I found him in the Burial Mounds he was lying unconscious. The doctors said that he had probably been unconscious for a long time and this had damaged his brain functioning temporarily. When we brought him back to the Cloud Recesses, he had lost all of his senses and this continued for the following 2 years. He underwent a considerable amount of meditation sessions till he finally started recovering”.

Wei Wuxian was stunned listening to all of this and his legs where just about to give out from the extreme grief he felt on hearing it.

Lan Xichen stopped talking and patted on Wei Wuxian’s shoulder, “A-Xian, please forgive me. I didn’t mean to scare you like this”.

Wei Wuxian shook his head to convey that it was must for him to learn of these things.

He spoke, “Lan Zhan… he…” Wei Wuxian choked.

Lan Xichen consoled him by patting his back, “A-Xian, please take very good care of yourself. You are his world and his life. As long as you are safe, healthy and happy, he will be the happiest man to live on this Earth”.

Lan Xichen left him with these words on purpose. It was partly because he wanted Wei Wuxian to realise fully well how much he meant to Lan Wangji. And it was partly also because he wanted Wei Wuxian to realise his bad habit of jumping into some things without thinking and injuring himself to the point of self-destruction many a times.

                 Wei Wuxian stood there frozen for some time. He vaguely started recollecting the whole incidence of when Lan Wangji had hidden him in the cave after his Shijie’s death. At that point too, just like Wei Wuxian was exhausted from the constant fights, Lan Wangji had been too. And Wei Wuxian had said those hurtful words “Get lost!” to him. It was finally just now that he had finally realised how it might have hurt Lan Wangji then to hear these sharp words from the mouth of his love. He imagined himself in Lan Wangji’s place and felt as if countless knives were being screwed into his chest painfully. Just the thought of the imagining his condition in the 3 months that he had frantically searched for Wei Wuxian in the Burial Mounds made him feel like killing himself. He ran back to their Jingshi  and stood still at the door as he saw Lan Wangji sitting by their study desk. As soon as he saw Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji kept the book he was reading aside. Just when he was doing this, Wei Wuxian ran and jumped into his arms, hugging him as tightly as he could.

Lan Wangji could make out Wei Wuxian’s quickened heart beats and understood that he was very sad right now. Stroking his back and hair tenderly, Lan Wangji inquired in a soft voice, “Wei Ying, what happened?”

Wei Wuxian buried his face deep in between Lan Wangji’s neck and shoulder. He thought to himself, “Lan Zhan, I will never forgive myself for hurting you like this so many times”. He lifted his face and cupped Lan Wangji’s face with both hands, “Lan Zhan, I promise you with my life, I will never make you go through those horrible things and make you suffer like that”.

Lan Wangji caressed Wei Wuxian’s face tenderly and gazing lovingly at  him said, “Wei Ying is my prayer and my blessing. Do whatever you wish to me”.  He traced Wei Wuxian’s lips with his finger softly and kissed him many times. Wei Wuxian buried his face deeply into Lan Wangji’s neck once again as tears flowed incessantly from his eyes.

*****