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There is a Wei Wuxian clone running wild in Lanling.
Well, maybe running wild is too generous to say. The nasty doppelganger is painfully skittish and doesn’t have much of an appearance. He skitters across Jinlintai’s shadows like he doesn’t want to be noticed by any living soul; Jiang Cheng himself, for all his visits throughout the years and his heightened Wei Wuxian lookalike senses, has seen him maybe twice or thrice. But…
“What are you staring at?” the teenager snarls, at him, at the sect leader, when approached. His shoulders are hunched protectively, but his chin is raised defiantly. He has a bruise on his face, like he just got into a fight.
He is snarky like Wei Wuxian. He looks like Wei Wuxian. The hairstyle might be different, albeit bound with the red ribbon, and he is much smaller in height, but all the rest is so annoyingly familiar. The curls of his hair. Facial features. When the gray eyes meet blue, Jiang Cheng sees his brother, and immediately gets angry. At what, exactly, he doesn't know.
“Nobody taught you manners?” he growls, and Zidian crackles just a tiny bit. The teenager stares at him for a while, and then just…
Runs off.
Fortunately for him, Jiang Cheng is not a teenager anymore to chase after brats with no social etiquette. He is a sect leader and has an image to uphold. He has to carry himself with grace and all that. So he stomps away very calmly to do the thing he is mainly here for; finding Jin Ling. That’s all he comes to this rotten place for, anyway.
He is not one for gossip, but he can't help but be curious about this, so he asks around. Wei Wuxian's twin turns out to be called Mo Xuanyu, a result of one of the many Jin Guangshan's affairs. Apparently, he won some fucked up lottery of which bastard was to become a guest disciple in shining gold robe.
So, what a surprise, he turns out to be Jin Ling's uncle. Just like Wei Wuxian would be, if he hadn't fucked up everything and died. That, among everything else, like straying from the righteous path and ending up hated by the whole cultivation world. Even Jin Ling grows up to hate the Yiling Laozu, fueled by many sharp words directed at his parents’ demise, and Jiang Cheng can't find it in himself to disagree in any way. He is still angry, just angry, and doesn't have anyone to blame for the misfortunes that happened, so he will blame Wei Wuxian and his demonic cultivation he swore coul be controlled. Jin Ling, the kid that he is, most likely feels even worse, when the other kids make fun of him for being an orphan, a circumstance that he had no hand in.
***
Time passes, Jin Guangshan dies, Wei Wuxian’s clone still runs free around Lanling Jin - apparently an heir to their golden throne - but Jiang Cheng doesn't care about Jin sect’s mess of politics. Jin Ling wasn't a fan of his grandpa, and isn’t a fan of Mo Xuanyu, either.
"He is weird," he just says when inquired, and runs off outside, probably to play by himself. With a sigh, Jiang Cheng follows. Ever since Rusong has died - or been assassinated, but Jiang Cheng has long learned to be wary of what the Jins say - Jin Ling has no one to play with.
Jiang Cheng doesn't know what to do about that, really, other than offering to play with the kid himself when he is around. It’s not like he had signed up for the grandeur of a children’s caretaker role, that was all his sibling’s speciality. If they were in Yunmeng, he could easily order a disciple or two to play with this kid. He had already done that, actually, when Jin Ling visited, and he didn’t even have to be threatening! His useless disciples were keener on babysitting than practicing sword fighting. But well, that was only temporary, and whatever happens in Lanling is not his area of expertise.
They make kites. Kites haven’t been the endearing concept since that one Jiang disciple got taken away by the Wens over it. Jin Ling lives in a Wen-free world, though, so there is nothing to worry about. At some point, Jin Ling runs off with the kite, like the kid tends to do, and Jiang Cheng rests beyond the nearby tree.
That’s when he notices that the Wei Wuxian clone was there this whole time, most likely, watching Jin Ling from afar, too, hidden in the shadow of the tree. He looks like he is about to bolt when Jiang Cheng comes close, muscles rigid, but doesn’t run off this time around.
“Creep. Watching kids from afar,” Jiang Cheng growls at him. He is a common enough of a visitor at the Jinlintai that he knows what the gossipers run their mouths about nowadays, blabbering excitedly about things they know nothing about. That Mo Xuanyu is a disgusting cutsleeve, they say with their eyes shining, and Jiang Cheng’s head just gets plagued with the cheerily sounding "Lan Zhan!~" in response that only he can hear. If not for the age difference, this would sign up for a documented reincarnation case, for sure. “What do you want?”
“Jin Ling doesn’t play with the other kids,” the clone states right away, fiddling with his fingers nervously.
“Yes? And what are you gonna do about it?”
Mo Xuanyu turns his gaze away, shuffling his feet.
“Well, you are not always around. So I could…”
“He doesn’t like you.” Jiang Cheng cuts him off bluntly. The teenager’s lip wobbles, and he reluctantly adds: “I don’t like you either. But Jin Ling is his own person and has more than one caretaker; if he actually wants to hang out with his other uncles, I don’t have much to say on the matter.”
Yes; Jin Ling has more than one uncle, even if Jiang Cheng would be glad to hog that role all for himself.
“Well, that’s why I got him a puppy,” Jin Guangyao smiles politely when they meet up and Jiang Cheng brings up Jin Ling’s lack of friends. “Fairy makes for a very good companion. But it is not like I can force the kids here to like him. I assure you from my experience, the result would be just the opposite.”
Jiang Cheng just sips on the tea angrily in response. Figures that such visit would be useless.
“Let us hope that when he grows up, he can interact more with kids from other sects, hm?” Jin Guangyao tries to placate after a moment of strained silence between them. Then, there is a knock on the door. The familiar mess of black hair pops in, but disappears right away upon seeing Jiang Cheng, without even closing the door properly.
“Ah, you will have to excuse my half-brother,” Jin Guangyao says as he gets up to close the door. “He is… He hasn't had the easiest childhood.”
“He is a weirdo, that’s what you wanna say.”
Jin Guangyao lets out an uneasy chuckle. “I guess it could be put that way.”
“He was asking about Jin Ling. He wants to try to play with him."
“He has a soft heart. I would wager he sees a bit of himself in our A-Ling. He doesn’t want him to be lonely,” Jin Guanyao hums, but doesn’t comment further on whether that would be a good idea or not. “While you are here, Sect Leader Jiang… I’m afraid my half-brother has fallen into the wrong crowd nowadays,” his smile turns strained, almost sad. “But I ask you to take it easy on him, Sandu Shengshou. I wouldn’t want to find my brother tortured at the hand of the Jiang sect, lest our relations fester.”
Ah. That sort of the wrong crowd. Jiang Cheng lets out a huff of breath through his nose and tries to relax a hold on his cup; he broke enough fine porcelain in anger in this lifetime.
“The almighty Jin sect has its own demonic cultivator now?” he scoffs. “How old even is that guy? 15?”
“18,” Jin Guangyao corrects. “I don’t think he is doing anything too, well, strenuous, I only found a couple of weird arrays and talismans in his room. But do not worry, I will take care of him to get off this path. He seems to trust me a fair lot.”
The esteemed Lianfang-zun took such good care of his brother that the next time Jiang Cheng hears about that Mo Xuanyu guy, he got kicked out of the sect.
“He assaulted shushu,” Jin Ling explains with a familiar hate ablaze in his eyes. It’s the same flame of hatred that the kid has whenever the Yiling Patriarch is mentioned. “That old ugly lady from the kitchen said so.”
“Brat. Don’t be so quick to believe gossip.” Such hate on a kid's face was unnatural. “They talk shit about everyone, you included.”
Jin Ling humphs loudly but doesn’t say anything else.
That should have been the end of the issue of Jin Ling’s weird uncle, but something about this mess doesn’t let him rest. Against all sense of normalcy, Jiang Cheng visits Mo Village a few months later under the pretense of a night hunt. People look at him with surprise when a leader of a major sect shows up in this dump of a village, but he doesn’t pay them any mind; he can tell the smiles plastered on their faces are fake and he knows they aren’t much more than worms.
The state he finds Mo Xuanyu guy is miserable, to say the least. He lives like an animal. Closed in a shed, sleeping in rags and fed scraps from the dinner.
“Why are you here?” The teen - well, not exactly a teen anymore, but he looks like one, especially in his scrawny state - seethes at him when he enters the shed. His hair is in disarray, and he is standing against the wall, shielding himself with his arms meekly. He probably thinks Jiang Cheng is here to torture him. It is a fair thought; he despises cocky demonic cultivators, who stroll around with his brother’s notes and talismans like they own the world.
The thing is, Mo Xuanyu just… Doesn’t seem evil. It's annoying, but Jiang Cheng sees his brother, someone soft-hearted but hated by the world, and…He hates it. He could ignore the issue like he did many, many times before, but…
“Ungrateful brat. I am offering you a place in the Jiang sect. Probably your only chance to get out of this dump.”
Mo Xuanyu stares at him like he grew a second head. “Um. Like a slave…?” He asks weakly, but seems to consider this option, which makes something in Jiang Cheng’s stomach churn.
“You learned cultivation or not?” he barks. “Jiang sect was rebuilt, but still needs more cultivators, strong golden core or not. Come.”
He quits the shed, not able to bear to look at that miserable place any longer. He doesn’t look back to see if Mo Xuanyu is following him or not. If the guy wants it, he will come; Jiang Cheng will not be bringing anyone to the Jiang sect forcefully.
***
To say Mo Xuanyu is blooming under the Jiang sect's guidance would be an overkill. But he is definitely improving on his mediocre cultivation. Jin sect neglected this guy; he is not overly talented, but not that weak, either. There is no sign of a rumored lunacy, and he keeps to himself, far from assaulting people.
Jiang Cheng stupidly decides to teach him swordsmanship properly. It would be a waste if he didn’t.
He hears what people say about this. Some disciples wonder; why take this cutsleeve lunatic in? It makes no sense.
“He looks like Wei Wuxian”, some others say, the rare ones who could remember their Da-shixiong, and they all nod sagely, throwing knowing looks in Jiang Cheng’s direction.
𝟸
“You look like the Yiling Patriarch”, people often uttered them when Mo Xuanyu passed them by. It was always like that, and the same thing happens here, at the Yunmeng Jiang. Xuanyu hates it. He hates it because it reminds him of how he is perceived by everyone. A madman, a demon, the source of all evil, a useless waste of space, you deserve to die like that Yiling Laozu guy.
At first he perceived these words in the same way as everywhere else. But then, he starts to have doubts if that's all there is to it.
Because Xuanyu finds a hidden stone tablet in the Jiang Sect's Ancestral Hall.
It’s not that he got there on the purpose of breaching privacy; he was just, well, cleaning. Xuanyu knows he is not a slave or a servant, but he tries to help around the sect wherever he can; cleaning is the only thing he is somewhat good at, yet it also means that he stumbles into places he stumble into. And so, he sees what signs are carved in the extra tablet behind the altar and freezes. People always say the Yiling Patriarch was evil, that he killed thousands, brought disaster onto the Lotus Pier and the cultivation world. They say that Jiang Wanyin hated him and killed him with his own hands.
Yet Wei Wuxian’s name is here, in the Jiang Sect's Ancestral Hall.
Nobody would miss Mo Xuanyu if he died. His mother was gone. His half-brother kicked him out. His nephew didn’t like him. His cousin and aunt despised him.
And yet the demon of a person he is so often compared to had a family; the proof is there, on this stone tablet, that someone took care to carve the most hated name in the cultivation world onto, hidden from the hateful stares, maybe to give the Yiling Patriarch a peaceful rest. The proof is in the eyes of people he meets in the Jiang sect, who probably remember better times, people who don’t see Mo Xuanyu but someone else.
***
Sect Leader Jiang taking him in was the last thing he expected, and something that probably wouldn't happen in any other universe.
He didn't know why he was taken in. He tried to do well. He cleaned after himself and other people, offered help wherever he could, and continued to study cultivation despite still being mediocre at it. Jiang Wanyin scared him, but considerably less so than in the years before. For some reason, he insisted on teaching him sword fighting personally. Xuanyu is bad at it, he always has been, but he found himself slowly, slowly improving under a new guidance, probably more than he ever did at the Jin sect, really. Jiang swordsmanship is so much smoother and easier to learn.
Once, when the Sect Leader didn't show up for their sword lessons, he found Jiang Wanyin asleep on the papers in his room. He decided to meekly offer his help in some easier paperwork, at least, to earn his stay. Sect Leader agreed; and so, Xuanyu became one in charge of sorting out the letters now. Sometimes he even writes people back if it’s not very important. “I will take your proposition into consideration.” “Please await further reply.”, simple things like that.
It was not much, but it was helping him not to feel so useless and out of place, so he continued to do so.
The Sect Leader also allowed him to spend time with Jin Ling now, whenever he visited. Mo Xuanyu has doubts that the kid likes him, always angry and lashing out, but at least he wasn’t running off anymore whenever he approached. Sometimes they painted together, sometimes they took long walks with Fairy along the lakes.
It was not perfect, but it was… Nice.
***
Now, people say he is the Sect Leader’s favorite, and Xuanyu still doesn’t understand. It makes no sense. He tries his best to pay off the debt, for being taken in, but he does not deserve any special treatment like that.
He doesn't understand.
Not until finding the stone tablet, and then a certain string of events.
“Do you still practice demonic cultivation?” Jiang Wanyin asks him one day when he comes over one evening to sort through the letters. He looks more tired than angry today, which is a rare sight; shadows under his eyes, arms shaky, so unlike the confident person people of Yunmeng got so used to.
“I, not really,” he says, but it churns up a worry somewhere in his guts. “It was just a one-time thing…”
“Good.”
For a while, they spend a tense silence together, while Xuanyu gets lost in memories. His half-brother showed him a lot of demonic cultivation notes, back in the day. Things most cultivators could only dream to set their eyes on. They were all gone by now, but he still remembers plenty. He never had use for them, though, never again, after what transpired in Lanling Jin.
He doesn’t notice Jiang Wanyin disturbed by his presence.
“It’s the anniversary of my sister’s death,” he explains with fist tightened on the table, startling Xuanyu out of his thoughts. “I would like to be left alone.”
“Oh. I understand.” Mo Xuanyu meekly says, takes a bundle of papers left, and quits the room.
He works on the documents late into the night. He doesn't like keeping something that important in his room, though, so he takes a peek into the Sect Leader's room later again, to see if he can leave the sorted out papers back in their place. Jiang Wanyin seems asleep on the table, with only an empty jar next to him for company. It’s a miserable sight, so Xuanyu tiptoes around, not wanting to disturb him, but the other still stirs and raises his head slowly when he approaches.
“Wei Wuxian…?”
Sect leader’s voice is slurring, and he is obviously not all there in a drunken haze, but something cold twisted in Xuanyu’s guts at these words.
Jiang Wanyin blinks slowly at him and realizes his mistake. "Fuck. Sorry. That's really unfair to you."
"It's fine." Xuanyu turns away.
"Mo Xuanyu." Jiang Wanyin says, more confidently, and Xuanyu freezes in the doorway briefly. "I lost both my brother and sister around that day. I am not good with words. But I hope you know that I appreciate your presence in our sect."
Xuanyu stays there for a moment, frozen in the doorway, and then leaves, without saying a word.
𝟹
Wei Wuxian wakes up in a stupidly familiar place to wake up after a bloodbath and all that mess that followed - his old room. Not the Demon-Slaughtering Cave, no, his room at the Jiangs, to add to the problem at hand.
He doesn’t know for how long he has been dead. Must have been a long time; his room changed a lot, full of things and trinkets Wei Wuxian never owned. But he will always remember the ceiling and the scribblings on the bed, even after death; it is his old place, alright.
And it’s in huge disarray. Namely, there is blood and talismans everywhere. Then, he realizes that the body doesn't seem like his own, and combined with the red circle on the floor, it clicks.
Somebody offered their soul to bring the Yiling Patriarch back.
There is a cut on his arm, but he doesn't know what the wish was. It seems like whoever did it was rash and not very precise in what he was doing. Wei Wuxian sighs heavily. Of all the places to wake up in.
He gets up. The body is smaller than what he is used to, but he manages to stumble out of his room - or whoever this room could be said to belong to, now - successfully. Wei Wuxian knows he should clean the mess behind him up and investigate the person he has become, but it's still dark out, and he can't help himself.
He missed home.
He washes off the blood in the water nearby. His reflection is odd to look at. Whoever sacrificed himself was similar to Wei Wuxian in appearance, but still so much different. It feels off.
The nights aren’t exactly quiet here at Yunmeng, they never were. The lakes are brimming with life no matter the hour. Birds, frogs, a splash of a fish, the whistle of wind in the reed. Unlike Gusu, there is no rule against walking at night, but since most people take care of their beauty sleep anyway, Wei Wuxian passes the familiar hallways unnoticed. He watches the lakes he grew up with, wanders throughout the whole compound with nostalgia, walks until he reaches the Ancestral Hall unnoticed.
He isn’t sure if it’s right for him to be there at all. But it’s probably the last occasion he has to pay his respect properly to the people who took him in from the streets so many years ago.
Before he can do anything, though, there are footsteps behind him.
Wei Wuxian hides behind the altar.
Jiang Cheng comes in, shaking with what looks like anger. He sits in front of the altar, but does not bow like Wei Wuxian expects him to. "Wei Wuxian,” he snarls instead, and Wei Wuxian flinches in confusion. “I hate you. I despise you. I want you to stop plaguing my life. Whenever I make peace with something, you just come and take it away!"
Wei Wuxian doesn’t understand how the other knows of his presence, but then…
He sees the hidden stone tablet with his name.
Anger boils inside of him. How fitting of Jiang Cheng; to give him a place in the family after death, and then come in and lash out at the stone.
"If you are so angry, you can just be angry at me properly."
Jiang Cheng stands up, abruptly, hearing his words. He fixes Wei Wuxian sitting behind the altar with a long, hateful stare.
"Tell me you are still Mo Xuanyu," Jiang Cheng says very slowly. Dangerously. He pulls out Zidian, and Wei Wuxian realizes how much his brother hates him now, and how much of a mistake revealing his hiding place like that was.
“Ahaha,” Wei Wuxian laughs nervously. “I’m. Mo Xuanyu?”
“I hope this is funny to you,” he spats with a venom in his voice. “Wei Wuxian.”
Jiang Cheng steps closer to Wei Wuxian who tentatively takes a step back. He would bolt away, but… there is something like anguish in his brother's eyes. Jiang Cheng grabs him by the robes. He is angry, but Wei Wuxian knows him well. It’s a sad-anger. His eyes are red rimmed.
"Jiang Cheng…"
“Fuck this. Again. Again, again.” Zidian crackles; but they both know it wouldn't work here, not if the soul was offered willingly. "Give him back. Give A-Jie back. Give me my parents back."
“...I’m sorry,” he says, because it’s all he can offer. Jiang Cheng scoffs.
"That's all you have to say after all this time? After all the broken promises? After all the people that died because of you?"
"I never wanted it to happen! Do you think I wanted any of them dead?!"
"And that makes it fine for me?!"
Something clicks.
“You’ve been lonely.”
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng shoves him away.
"I left you here… Jiang Cheng, I…" he starts, again, but he doesn't know what to say, really. It’s something he didn’t truly realize, not until now.
His brother turns away. "I know you don't want to stay around. You won't stay around. But say goodbye to Jin Ling, at least. You are in his uncle's body, after all. Enough people disappeared from his life already. Stop adding to that.”
"Jin Ling?" Wei Wuxian perks up. “Uncle?”
"You have no right to be excited about that," his brother says slowly and leaves.
Wwi Wuxian winces. Well, there was truth to those words.
Jiang Cheng didn't chase him out, which he takes as a small win. He pays his respects and then stays vigil on the docks for the rest of the night, waiting for the world to wake up. When he is ready to venture out to look for a kid in the Spark Amidst Snow attire, he finds just the kid showing up behind him.
"Uncle," Jin Ling greets him. He doesn't sound too happy, more wary, but he sits down next to him, and it still does something to Wei Wuxian, who smiles sadly.
"Jin Ling! Aiyah... You look just like your mother, you know?"
Jin Ling frowns, and stares at him suspiciously.. "How would you know her? Do not lie."
"I'm not lying. Jiang Cheng wanted me to lie to you, actually. Tell you that I'm leaving the sect. But… I'm not Mo Xuanyu, Jin Ling. Mo Xuanyu is… He is gone."
Jin Ling scowls. "That's a bad joke."
"Ah. It is not a joke, little one," Wei Wuxian thinks on how to explain this predicament, to this kid he doesn't know, yet he should. "You know, sometimes people just… Go away?" Jin Ling huffs. He obviously would know that. "You might miss them, and it's okay. But it is wrong to try to replace them with someone they aren't.”
"Who are you?"
Wei Wuxian stays silent.
"Can you give uncle back, now?"
Wei Wuxian shakes his head no. "I'm sorry."
Jin Ling, for all the emotionless kid he pretends to be, sheds a small tear, and it tugs at Wei Wuxian's heartstrings. When he reaches out to brush the tear away, the kid slaps him away and runs off. Wei Wuxian gets up with the sigh, but doesn't follow after him. It's… probably not the best time to try bonding with Shijie's child after all that he had done.
"Senior Mo," some disciples call after him on his way to the front gates, and it feels so… alien, yet not, at the same time. At some point, he was the Jiang sect's head disciple after all, but it feels like it happened a lifetime ago. He doesn't know the kids who ask him about the talisman work. He praises them - whoever taught them did a pretty good job - but they stare at him strangely, like they can feel that there is a wrong person behind the familiar face.
Wei Wuxian doesn't know what to do next. The gash in his arm isn't deep, but he doesn't know what Mo Xuanyu wanted from him. He didn't seem like a bad person; he seems to have been happy here.
Jiang Cheng is there at the front gates, almost like he is waiting for him. "Oh. You are still here."
"Do you know if there is someone out there that Mo Xuanyu hated?" he hums pensively. "I don't know what else his ritual could have been for."
"He is from the Jin sect, if you hadn't guessed already. They treated him like shit. Maybe that," Jiang Cheng shrugs.
"I see." There is a tense moment of silence between them. "I will be going to Lanling, then?" he asks carefully. It's hard to tell what Jiang Cheng wants from him now. He is not exactly friendly, but he is not lashing at him with Zidian, either.
His brother scoffs. “So you're leaving. Again.”
“Aiyah, how can I possibly stay? It would be a mockery of this young man, who built up a better life for himself here than I ever did after the campaign,” he smiles sadly. “And maybe if I look hard enough, I could find a way to reverse the ritual? Who knows.”
It was most likely not possible; the soul was said to completely disappear during the sacrifice, with no turning back. But Jiang Sect's motto was always to attempt the impossible.
Jiang Cheng looks away. “You could just stay here as yourself, then.” He looks thoughtful, for once, not angry. “I hope you know that I never wanted any of you gone,” he admits.
“Ah, Chengcheng, I know,” Wei Wuxian allows himself a small smile. But… It’s not time for that yet. “I will be back,” he adds on his way out, before stepping out onto the road ahead.
He can feel the cut on his arm healing; slowly, but steadily.