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Ever since he and Nie Mingjue broke up, Jiang Cheng has only been going through the motions. He’s still fulfilling his duties as a Sect Leader—his pride in his Sect won’t allow him to do anything else—but that’s about it.
There’s nothing in life to take enjoyment from anymore and Jiang Cheng feels a lot like he did right after the war, except with less existential dread. But he’s lost and unmoored and he doesn’t know what to do.
He hates it a little bit that Nie Mingjue still has this kind of power over him, but mostly he’s just fucking devastated.
Now he understands his sister and her tears and her sad smiles a bit better.
Getting your heart broken really is the worse and Jiang Cheng guesses it doesn’t help that at least he knows that Nie Mingjue felt the same for him.
Jin Zixuan was a complete asshole to his sister, which must have made it a little bit easier Jiang Cheng hopes, because he wishes this for no one.
When he realizes that he lost himself yet again in his own head, he scoffs. It’s been happening a lot lately, and usually all of his thoughts turn to Nie Mingjue but he can’t afford to slack off.
No matter what his second in command keeps telling him on a daily basis.
If Jiang Cheng would take a day for himself, he wouldn’t do anything but wallow in his misery anyway, and he prefers working over doing that.
So he goes on, and on, one letter after the other, until he made a considerable dent into the stack that built itself up during his last weeks with Nie Mingjue.
Jiang Cheng grinds his teeth together when he realizes that he’s yet again thinking about the other man and he slams his hand on the table in his rage.
He really wonders just how long this will go on; how long he will be haunted by the thought of Nie Mingjue. Right now, he hears Nie Mingjue’s laugh echo in the hallways they frequently walked together, he feels Nie Mingjue’s phantom touch on his shoulder whenever he sits hunched over some work for too long, and he still feels all the love Nie Mingjue had for him.
But duty comes first, Jiang Cheng understands that. He doesn’t have to like it, but he understands.
“You can’t just—no, wait,” Jiang Cheng suddenly hears from outside and he lifts his head a second before someone barges into his study.
“You fucking asshole,” is what Nie Huaisang greets him with and Jiang Cheng knew that the break-up would throw a little bit of a wrench into their friendship, but he didn’t expect this.
“Huaisang,” he still greets his old friend, but he figures he shouldn’t have when Nie Huaisang glares at him, clearly too agitated to even get his fan out.
“Do not even dare,” Nie Huaisang hisses. “You absolute fucking asshole. You said you would love him!”
“I do,” Jiang Cheng says with a sigh, getting up to close the door behind Nie Huaisang, hoping that not all of Lotus Pier heard him yet.
“Yeah, I can tell,” Nie Huaisang sarcastically gives back. “It’s so very evident in the way you broke up with him.”
“Don’t be unfair,” Jiang Cheng whispers, but he can’t meet Nie Huaisang’s eyes.
It still hurts too much.
“Unfair. Unfair! The only one being unfair here is you!”
“Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng snaps, now slowly getting angry himself.
He can understand the protective instinct of a sibling, but this is really going to far. It’s not Jiang Cheng’s fault, and he didn’t actually want to break up with Nie Mingjue, but since it was what Nie Mingjue had wanted, he had done it.
And it seemed unfair to be attacked over this now.
“No. I’m going to ruin you,” Nie Huaisang lowly says and while usually Jiang Cheng wouldn’t give much thought to a threat like this, he knows that if Nie Huaisang really wants to, he will.
Going by the glare Jiang Cheng gets, Nie Huaisang really wants to.
“Why? It’s not my fault,” Jiang Cheng snaps at him and Nie Huaisang laughs right in his face.
“Right, not your fault. Of course not. How could it be? You’re just the guy who broke up with my brother.”
“Because he wanted to!” Jiang Cheng shouts at him, his heart still hurting so damn much and that at least is enough to shut Nie Huaisang up for a few seconds.
“He wanted to,” Nie Huaisang lowly repeats. “That’s what you’re going with? Really?”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Jiang Cheng asks, suddenly drained of all energy and he goes to sit back down at the table.
He doesn’t want to fight with Nie Huaisang and he doesn’t want to do it while standing up, and all he really wants to do is go crawl into bed with Nie Mingjue and curl up against his chest, but it’s not like he’ll ever be able to do that again.
“My brother finally opens up to you about the qi deviations and your first instinct is to run away and break up with him? And now you’re trying to twist it like it was actually his idea? You’re really something else, Jiang-zongzhu. I thought better of you.”
“That’s not what happened, Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng says with a small frown, because Jiang Cheng remembers that conversation a lot differently, and he was actually present.
“Then enlighten me,” Nie Huaisang hisses. “What did happen?”
Jiang Cheng desperately doesn’t want to speak about it—the pain still too near and fresh—but Nie Huaisang is levelling him with a look that promises pain and absolute ruin if Jiang Cheng doesn’t start speaking like five seconds ago and so he sighs.
“He told me about the qi deviations,” Jiang Cheng says, because so far they are on the same page. “That he’ll die soon and young and violently.”
“And you left him for it,” Nie Huaisang says with a nod, as if there could be no doubt about it.
“I love him. Do you really think that low of me?” Jiang Cheng asks, a new kind of hurt finding its place in his chest.
Jiang Cheng thought he was long over being hurt by people being disappointed in him, but it seems like he was wrong.
“Seeing as he is back home, absolutely devastated and you’re going on like nothing happened, I think the only possible answer can be yes,” Nie Huaisang sneers at him and Jiang Cheng sees red.
“I have to do this,” Jiang Cheng yells and shoots up. “I have to because if I don’t keep busy, if I don’t distract myself, I’ll be a fucking shell. I want to do nothing more than to crawl into bed and cry for a good week but what good is that going to do me? It’s not going to get me Mingjue back and my Sect actually still needs me. I was miserable all through the war and for a good while after and I don’t want to feel like that again. And besides; he made his choice. What use is there for me to cry after him.”
“He made his choice? The audacity you have! And don’t raise your voice at me like that,” Nie Huaisang gives back, clearly unfazed by Jiang Cheng’s explosion and it cuts all of Jiang Cheng’s strings.
It doesn’t matter what he tells Nie Huaisang, he realizes. He has his mind already made up.
“He told me about the qi deviations and that his Sect must come first,” Jiang Cheng still mutters. “He needs an heir.”
Jiang Cheng barely gets the words out, and he hates himself a little for how his eyes well up almost immediately. It’s been almost a week by now and the words still hurt as much as they did when they left Nie Mingjue’s mouth.
In front of him, Nie Huaisang freezes.
“What?”
“He said he needs to prepare, that he needs someone to take over eventually. It’s not that hard to understand his meaning,” Jiang Cheng whispers.
Nie Mingjue needs an heir. And for that he needs a wife. It’s as easy as that.
“Did he say it like that?” Nie Huaisang asks and Jiang Cheng nods miserably.
“That fucking idiot,” Nie Huaisang mutters and finally sits down himself, slamming his fan on the table. “Listen here, Wanyin,” he says and Jiang Cheng wonders when he switched back to being Wanyin again.
“I’m listening,” Jiang Cheng says because clearly Nie Huaisang is waiting for a response from him.
Though he’s not quite sure he can take any more accusations today.
“My brother is an idiot,” Nie Huaisang solemnly says and Jiang Cheng fights the immediate urge to defend Nie Mingjue.
He’s not sure he still has that right.
“Why?” he asks instead, because it seems like the safer option.
“I am his heir,” Nie Huaisang tells him and Jiang Cheng goes very still. “When father died and da-ge decided to not take a wife, they wrote that down somewhere. I’m to inherit the Sect should anything happen to my brother.”
“He—it didn’t sound like that when we talked,” Jiang Cheng carefully says.
It makes no sense. Nie Mingjue had looked sad as he had said that he needs to prepare. Why would he look sad if he already has an heir.
“There was sadness on his face when he said it,” Jiang Cheng weakly goes on, because he still remembers that look and it cuts him just as much as it did then.
“It was probably regret. Da-ge wanted to give me an intensive few months of Sect Leader training, so that he could hand off the reigns sooner, before his qi deviations get really bad. He resolved himself to not see you during those months, because he said you distract him too much.”
“No, he—” Jiang Cheng starts, putting his head in his hands. “That’s not how that conversation went.”
“Clearly, it’s not,” Nie Huaisang says drily. “But we both know da-ge and we know you. Both of you tend to draw your own conclusions. Da-ge thought he made himself perfectly clear—asking for a few months with nothing but letters for contact—and you thought he was breaking up with you. I can see where you would get that idea from, don’t take me wrong—da-ge is horribly bad at wording things—but it’s not what he wanted. He’s moping and heartbroken at home. I didn’t even get any training yet.”
“You hate training,” Jiang Cheng mutters, his head spinning.
“I like logistics and getting people to do what I want,” Nie Huaisang corrects. “And I would like my brother to be happy again,” he tacks on, with a raised eyebrow.
Jiang Cheng swallows.
“He doesn’t want to take a wife?” he asks, just to make sure. “He doesn’t want to sire an heir?”
“He does want to adopt a kid with the guy he had been courting for a while,” Nie Huaisang says, absolutely nonchalant as if it’s not blowing Jiang Cheng’s mind to hear that Nie Mingjue thought about a little family of their own.
“Really?” Jiang Cheng asks, his voice full of hope and his heart hammering away in his chest.
“Really,” Nie Huaisang assures him, finally picking up his fan and flicking it open with the by now so familiar gesture.
“I think I have to cut your visit here short, then,” Jiang Cheng says, already scrambling to his feet.
“You go on ahead,” Nie Huaisang waves him off, draping himself over the table. “The flight here was way too exhausting for me.”
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng says, rolling his eyes, but not actually bothering to convince Nie Huaisang.
If he flies alone he can push himself as much as he wants, and then he gets to see Nie Mingjue sooner.
~*~*~
Jiang Cheng doesn’t bother to announce his arrival and Nie Mingjue’s disciples clearly don’t deem it necessary to do it, either, it seems, because Jiang Cheng simply barges into Nie Mingjue’s quarters without anyone telling him.
“What are you doing here?” Nie Mingjue asks him, his voice rough and Jiang Cheng sees the dark circles under his eyes and how pale he is.
It seems they both didn’t deal well with the temporary break-up.
“Huaisang invaded Lotus Pier,” Jiang Cheng tells him and Nie Mingjue immediately draws himself up.
“Whatever he said, don’t listen to him. I respect your choice,” Nie Mingjue reassures him and Jiang Cheng wants to go to him and hug him and kiss him, but for now he simply rolls his eyes.
“He said there was a misunderstanding.”
“A what?”
“You said you need someone to take over the Sect. You never mentioned Huaisang. I thought you meant you want to take a wife,” Jiang Cheng explains in as little words as possible, because he is dying with the urge to finally get his hands on Nie Mingjue again.
“A wife,” Nie Mingjue repeats and blinks. “If anything she would be the second wife, because I intent to marry you.”
Jiang Cheng flushes bright red at that, but his heart is dancing in his chest. With happiness, for a change.
“Yeah, I should hope so,” Jiang Cheng says and dares to step closer. “But I understand duty to your Sect and so when you said it like that—”
“You thought I would ask you to step back so I can focus on my Sect. You would have allowed me to take a wife?” Nie Mingjue asks and Jiang Cheng shrugs.
“Duty comes first,” he says because if he learned anything in his youth then it’s that. “I understand that. I didn’t like it, but it sounded sensible to me.”
“Nothing about that is sensible, I love you, what the hell would I ever do without you?”
Find someone else to love, Jiang Cheng wants to say, but Nie Mingjue doesn’t let him, because with two big steps he’s right in front of him and he doesn’t hesitate to crush Jiang Cheng to his chest.
“What would I even do without my heart?” he whispers again and Jiang Cheng’s resolve is broken.
He slings his arms around Nie Mingjue and presses himself as close as he can get, his breath leaving him in shuddering bursts.
“I didn’t like it,” Jiang Cheng chokes out. “I missed you so much. I love you.”
“Never think something like this again,” Nie Mingjue begs him. “I would never do that to you, not for any duty in the world.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng weakly says and Nie Mingjue presses a kiss to his head.
“Not for any duty,” he repeats and Jiang Cheng nods.
“Okay, alright,” he gets out, his voice choked up with tears.
For once they are tears of happiness because he’s finally back where he belongs.