Chapter Text
Being under water always made Jiang Cheng feel safe.
Born in a town surrounded by water was only a big plus for him.
It was the best feeling when only the dark, but welcoming liquid flew around him, making all the sounds disappear.
The older he got, the harder it was for him to find some time to go swim, which made him anxious and he would go as far as to say it made him depressed. Water was a part of him, and he was proud to be gifted with his abilities.
Right now, 16 years old Jiang Cheng swam around in a large lake behind the town. His shirt was left on the ground close to the water, together with his boots, bell and sword. He didn't need it in here.
Swimming in water, feeling his pants cling to his skin, the sun warming up his back as he made his way through the calm waters. Many people in Lotus Pier often came here; all of them knew how to swim really well. But Jiang Cheng was the best swimmer... Or at least, second best.
After years, he learned not to even flinch when he felt something gently touch his ankle. He smiled when he felt the water move, and small bubbles came from the depth of the lake. A few meters in front of him, a head peeked out and broke the surface.
Only half of the face could be seen, the nose barely visible. Big gray eyes stared back into his light-purple ones, a playful spark in them.
Jiang Cheng smirked, stopped swimming and as hard as he could, splashed water towards his brother. The other boy let out happy chirps, pleased that someone was paying him attention after a lonely night.
This was how half of their day went - playing in water like kids, the air filled with laugher and high-pitched giggles.
When Jiang Cheng became tired, he laid back on the water surface. His smiling brother swam closer, grabbed his legs and pulled his relaxed body behind him. Slowly, he brought Jiang Cheng back to the dry land, but stayed in deep enough water. However, Jiang Cheng stayed sitting in the shallow part of the lake with his legs stretched out in front of him. Leaning back on his hands, he looked up towards the sun that was now hidden behind some small clouds that appeared out of nowhere.
He could hear his brother moving closer. The other boy used his arms to pull himself out of water, strongly carrying himself while his hands buried more and more into the sand because of his weight. With his upper half lifted from the ground, he proudly smiled at Jiang Cheng. The smile was captivating, together with every other feature his brother had.
His long black hair could reach his waist - it would be much longer if Jiang Cheng didn't regularly cut it. It was a shame, considering his hair was silky and soft, but he could see the annoyed glare his brother had whenever those hair got into his way. He tried tying his hair into a bun like every Jiang discipline had, but that idea was thrown away after his brother showed his teeth in angry expression - he didn't like the bun either.
Now, some of his hair was tied with a red ribbon, so they wouldn't be in his sight. His grin grew wider when he saw Jiang Cheng watching him. The toothy smile would be scary if Jiang Cheng didn't see it so many times before - it revealed his pointed teeth, not quite like shark's, but definitely sharper than any human had, strong enough to tear raw meat.
His brother reached for hair that was covering one of his eyes, and brought it behind his ear, just like he tough him to do.
He could now see his ears, which were like half of a flower, almost translucent, the black fading into dark red at the end of his pointed ears. They looked soft, Jiang Cheng remembered how scared he was to touch them, in fear they would just melt. But his left ear was damaged - almost half of it missing. It healed well, but they were not sure if he could hear like before.
Jiang Cheng clenched his fists when anger ran through his veins, turning his blood into ice. There were still hunters out there, shameless and greedy enough to actually hunt down a spiritual creature - even when it was forbidden with cruel punishments.
Feeling his deep anger, his brother picked himself up from where he laid down on his belly, buried in sand. Hand with black claws grabbed Jiang Cheng's, making him look up.
Wei Wuxian, his dear brother, smiled at him so brightly, the sun looked dark in compare with that smile. He was careful with his claws to not cut his younger brother and brought Jiang Cheng's hand closer to his face. Then, he leaned into it, purring at the skin-to-skin contact.
Wei Wuxian was always like that, he liked to be pet, and loved hugs from people he trusted - which was mainly Jiang Cheng. Even when Jiang Cheng's personality wasn't the best, and he didn't think of himself as the best person to be around, Wei Wuxian still chose him and believed him the most.
It made Jiang Cheng's heart beat faster and warmth grow in his chest. He loved the creature like a sibling, and Wei Wuxian felt the same way - they were family, even when not quite by blood.
It made him think that maybe, he wasn't a bad person - a spiritual creature would not even breathe in his way if it felt some dark thoughts and energy coming from him.
He slowly stroke Wei Wuxian’s cheek, then petted him and ran his fingers through the smooth hair.
Behind Wei Wuxian was a movement – his tail was lazily going from left to right, barely under water, similar to when dogs waggle their tails from happiness. But Wei Wuxian was no dog (he was actually afraid of them), and his tail looked like the one of fish.
It was large, larger than the human part of his body, almost twice in size. The scales on his tail were the darkest black Jiang Cheng ever laid his eyes on, and similarly to his ears, the edges of the tail were dark red; the red was consuming the black until the end of his tail – the large fin – was completely red.
When Wei Wuxian brought himself up, he could see how his human skin slowly turned into scales around his torso.
There was also a bigger fin on the back of his tail, together with a pair of smaller ones on the left and right side. The back fin used to be larger, now it was cut into half of how it originally was – those damn hunters again. But Wei Wuxian didn’t seem to mind it at all; he was still the fastest creature in these waters, and as long as it didn’t become a burden for him, Jiang Cheng was trying to stay calm about it.
Wei Wuxian swam away from him, laying on his back while slowly moving his majestic tail up and down, still facing the dry land. Jiang Cheng knew what it meant.
He was able to give his brother one last smile before the fish-man disappeared under the water without a sound.
“A-Cheng! What are you doing over there, young man?!”
He froze when he realized it wasn’t his father or sister – it was his mother.
Madam Yu was often called beautiful and it wasn’t a lie. But her personality was stick, almost cruel, and even her own son wasn’t able to escape her claws. And definitely not with Zidian by her side all the time.
He turned around, still sitting half in the water with most of his clothes off. Even if he wanted to make up an excuse, his mother definitely knew what was going on and nothing stopped her from throwing glares his way.
What he didn’t expect was for two other Yunmeng disciplines to follow her around while two unknown men stood by her side. He could see another three people behind the duo, also unknown to him.
They were strangers.
Oh.
Oh.
Jiang Cheng tried to act like he wasn’t visiting his half-fish brother, who was, by the way, the greatest secret of his Sect.
Those five strangers were all wearing white clothes with headbands. Did someone die? Jiang Cheng thought.
Clearly, the trio were just disciplines, but those two walking alongside his prideful mother definitely had to be something more.
He wasn’t aware they were supposed to have visitors. If he knew, he wouldn’t spend so much time with Wuxian, but would go back sooner to avoid this… situation. He was soaking wet, water dripping from every part of his body, and still sitting on the ground.
He reached for his inner robes and tried acting as calm as possible.
One of the strangers was watching him the whole time, which didn’t get unnoticed by Jiang Cheng. The stranger looked a little older than him, but still really young, with a small smile on his face. Jiang Cheng had to look away so he could properly dress up.
With Sandu and outer robes in hand, he stood up and walked through the plants that reached his knees. Ignoring the fact water was dripping especially from his now dirty pants, he got onto the road where their guests stood and his mother had purple sparkles flying around her hand. Jiang Cheng swallowed hard and tried to keep his collected posture while Madam Yu looked ready to beat him up.
The sound of a whistle was heard from the lake and all of them surprisingly quickly looked that way.
Jiang Cheng knew who it was, but the strangers had a confused look on their faces – expect for one of them, who looked to be around Cheng’s age, his face didn’t tell anything.
Madam Yu slowly looked back at her son. Even when she wanted to teach him some manners right here, the creature of the Yunmeng’s lake really liked him. And even if she wasn’t really fond of that creature (mainly because she thought it was supposed to be some all mighty being, not childish fish), she still respected Wei Wuxian as any other not human magical being.
So instead of letting her anger go all out, she cleared her throat to get the men’s attention.
“A-Cheng, our guests are members of the Gusu Lan Sect. This,” she looked at the smiling one of the duo, “is Lan Xichen, Zewu Jun, the next Sect leader.”
They bowed to each other, Lan Xichen didn’t stop smiling at him.
Was it just a trick? Was the man smiling all the time or only at him??
“And this is Lan Xichen’s younger brother, Lan Wangji, Hanguang Jun. Both of them, together with some of the Lan Sect’s disciplines, will be staying here for some time.”
Jiang Cheng frowned a little, but quickly hid it from his mother.
“May I ask why, mother?”
Instead of her, Lan Xichen spoke up: “Our disciplines who were staying in Yunmeng wrote a message to us about some creature living in these waters. They reported seeing a large shadow deep under the surface, so they weren’t sure what it was. That is why we were asked to help.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t look at Lan Xichen anymore. He couldn’t look at anyone.
The only water-being large enough to scare the cultivators was-
He almost threw up, but played it off as if nothing happened.
What would the Lans do if they knew about Wuxian?
Even when he was a spiritual being that needed more protection than harm, he was still a creature many people were afraid of, no matter how kind and calm he was. He knew Wei Wuxian was not able to stay in one place for too long, and that he traveled all around Yunmeng – but he still came back to Lotus Pier, which was his home for years. He never went further than that.
And Jiang Cheng made sure the childish and brave little fish-boy was being polite and didn’t disturb anyone.
For years, Wuxian didn’t need to use his instincts of a predator because he was safe – with family.
But how could he guarantee nothing would happen to unknown cultivators, who decided to pay a visit to his lakes?
If anything happened, would they hurt Wuxian?
It wouldn’t be his fault if he used powers, he would be simply defending himself and his home. But would these cultivators listen to his reasons?
Both Lans seemed to be kind, but in different forms. Jiang Cheng was sure Lan Wangji, even with that poker face, wasn’t coldhearted.
He panicked when he heard the Lans talking while he was lost in his thought.
“… that is why, please, stay away from the water, especially large lakes like this one.”
Jiang Cheng almost snorted.
They were here to haunt his brother. There was no way in hell he was staying behind the walls of Lotus Pier. From the group, he was the one who most likely wouldn’t even get a scratch if Wuxian decided he didn’t want any visitors.
But it wasn’t like he could say it out loud.
His eyes traveled toward the lake.
Wei Wuxian was definitely listening to their conversation, and Jiang Cheng would bet he was growling like an animal while his tail turned bloody-red. That was the reaction he would expect from his brother. He would have to calm him down later.
It wouldn’t be nice if Wei Wuxian somehow found a way to get close enough to take a bite of these brave little humans.