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“Your dad hated your mom, that’s why he left her and you!”
“Your mom was weak! She left you!”
“Orphan! Orphan! Orphan!”
Jin Ling threw his tanghulu on the ground and a piece broke, Wei Wuxian took the piece of tanghulu and looked at the little boy who was crying:
“Jin Ling.”
Jin Ling ran to a pavilion and looked at the portraits of his parents. Wei Wuxian sat next to him:
“They are lying.”
Jin Ling pouted:
“How do you know? Who even are you?”
Wei Wuxian thought for a bit:
“I’m your shishu.”
Jin Ling was shocked:
“Shishu?”
Wei Wuxian:
“Yes.”
Jin Ling:
“Did you know my a-niang?”
Wei Wuxian smiled:
“She was the most gentle, most caring, most loving person I ever knew. She gave the warmest hugs, her hugs always felt the safest.”
Jin Ling:
“How about my a-die?”
Wei Wuxian sighed, he didn’t have good memories about Jin Zixuan so he just said:
“Your a-die, he… He was a good man.”
That was the only thing he could tell about him as he held a grudge against Jin Zixuan for a long time, then he thought of how much he hated him… The next thing, everything was out of his control.
The scenery suddenly changed, the sky became red and the pavilion was collapsing,, Wei Wuxian shielded Jin Ling despite the fact that Jin Ling tried to kick and bite him:
“You are Wei Wuxian! You told you were my shishu! My shishu was Wei Wuxian! You killed a-die and a-naing!”
Wei Wuxian didn’t know how to react to this accusation, his mind wasn’t the clearest back then but just as he was feeling that he lost his ability to talk, he felt it, their souls, both were snatched from their bodies and now they were trapped in this illusion, in this hallucination. Wei Wuxian was still shielding Jin Ling and he felt the pain of the beam that fell on his back and cut him, simultaneously, back at the real world, Wei Wuxian’s back started bleeding. Wei Wuxian looked at Jin Ling and Jin Ling cried:
“Why did you save me? You scum!”
Wei Wuxian looked at him with tears:
“Jin Ling, I… I didn’t kill them.”
Jin Ling:
“You are lying! You must be lying!”
Wei Wuxian:
“The body lies, but the spirit can't. Those bully kids, they are your worst fear, aren’t they? You heard some people tell that your a-die hated your a-niang. You heard some people calling your a-niang weak. But your jiujiu… He told you that your a-niang was a nice woman and your a-die was a good guy.”
Jin Ling pouted:
“How do you know that you scum of a Wei!”
Wei Wuxian:
“When we go back, do all the torture, make Fairy bite me, but for now, Listen to my soul.”
Jin Ling:
“No, I won’t!”
Wei Wuxian:
“I will tell you anyways. I never intended to kill your a-die. When he showed up, I looked at him and thought how much I hated him, Wen Ning misinterpreted and killed him. Look, I’m not innocent, Wen Ning was my sword. But I didn’t order my sword to kill him, I just ordered my sword to protect me.”
Jin Ling pouted yet these words felt truer than anything he ever heard even from his own jiujiu so he shut up and like the angry lemon that he was, he continued listening to Wei Wuxian:
“Your a-niang came to Buyetian, I don’t even know how she reached there, that I can never wrap my mind around that. I was controlling some corpses but not all, I told them to not hurt anyone from Yunmeng Jiang Sect, I heard her shouting and I commanded my corpses to protect her as we made way to each other, there was a corpse behind her, I told the corpse to move away but the corpse was acting differently, so it injured her from the back. She collapsed and I caught her. Then someone, a cultivator came from my back, she saw him and pushed me away with explosive power. She got stabbed from her heart. Jin Ling, I am so sorry. I will help you get out of here, leave me behind.”
Wei Wuxian looked at the child who he was still shielding but now the kid was a crying teen who suddenly hugged him and shouted:
“WHY? WHY DID THEY DO THIS TO US?”
Wei Wuxian rubbed his back:
“Stupid kid, shishu is here. Listen, I will open way for you to get out. Jin Ling, get out and leave me behind, this way I can repay it to shijie, to Zixuan and to you.”
Jin Ling shook his head:
“No! You will come out too.”
Wei Wuxian sighed, his nephew was such a brat. The Lotus Lake was red and Wei Wuxian indeed created an opening but before Jin Ling could say anything, he pushed Jin Ling away just like Jiang Yanli once did for him when he was forcefully summoned into this body. Wei Wuxian was crying:
“I am sorry and thank you.”
Jin Ling woke up at Lotus Pier, but weirdly, Wei Wuxian was in the bed next to hi, Jiang Cheng was scowling:
“You are awake.”
Jin Ling:
“Jiujiu, why are we both here?”
Jiang Cheng:
“Whatever happened, when we separated you two, you both almost died, your hearts stopped at the same time, it was a hustle to restart.”
Jin Ling gulped and then he held Wei Wuxian’s hand:
“Shishu, thank you for getting me out of the lies that have been hurting me, even jiujiu lied to me. You were right, the body lies but the soul can't.”
Lan Wangji gulped, that was the reason why the spirit summoned by Inquiry was unable to lie. Jin Ling hugged Wei Wuxian’s arm and cried:
“I will get you out of there, I promise.”
Wei Wuxian was still in the hallucination, he was holding the bleeding body of Jiang Yanli in his arms, everything was dark, it was only the two of them and Jiang Yanli spoke to him:
“A-Xian, my Xianxian. You ran so fast that shijie couldn’t look at you. Listen, I never blamed you for what happened to A-Xuan, I knew they must have cornered you, that you felt in danger, that… That there was no way out. A-Xian, I know the feeling.”
Wei Wuxian:
“How?”
Jiang Yanli:
“My silly A-Xian, when I was seven, some bandits tried to kidnap me while I was out enjoying my time with a-niang, they knocked her out sneakily, same to Yinzhu, Jinzhu and other guards. I was alone and defenseless. In that moment, Zidian hopped on my finger and I commanded it but I overloaded my meridians, it impaired my spiritual energy so that’s why despite carrying a sword, I didn’t cultivate like you did. A-Xian, I was desperate and I damaged myself but I had no other way if I wanted to live. You did the same to A-Xuan, accept it. I never regretted sacrificing myself for you. I only regretted that they still came after you so much that you did something despite knowing that it would kill you. My Xianxian, stop lying to yourself. The corpse that hurt me wasn’t even under your control.”
Wei Wuxian bursted into tears, screamed and cried, until some strength pried him away from Jiang Yanli and he woke up at the infirmary of Lotus Pier, screaming, crying, begging to die:
“KILL ME! KILL ME! SHIJIE, I BEG YOU, KILL ME!”
Jin Ling rushed to him and immediately hugged him:
“You are back, it worked! Shh, you are back. And she would never do such a thing.”
Wei Wuxian was crying in his arms:
“Jin Ling I’m sorry!”
Jin Ling:
“It wasn’t your fault! It was a lie, people lied to you, to me, to everyone! They lied about all the things, even the Lans did!”