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Wei Wuxian felt a stabbing pain into his gut after leaving Jin Guangyao's residence. He'd been through many pains in his life (and deaths) so he brushed it off as nothing much until he actually looked down and saw Jin Ling's sword sticking out of his insides, a quarter of the way inside.
He nearly passed out from the shock and would've if it weren't for Lan Wangji catching him last second and transferring some spiritual energy to stop him from passing out with the added benefit that it helped dull out the pain a little. Propping himself up, Wei Wuxian searched Jin Ling's eyes for any sign of hatred or forgiveness but found neither. All he came out with was just a cold indifference to anything else he would do.
Everything he'd done before for him had been in vain the second it was revealed that he was the Yiling Patriarch. All the advice given, times he'd saved him had just turned to dust. Even if Wei Wuxian couldn't be the uncle that he wanted to be since being reborn, he at least wanted to fulfill his duties of taking care of the poor kid however he could.
It was the least he could do to repay for the lives he'd taken from him
The sword was withdrawn from his body, leaving a wide gash on his side, revealing the dark twists of his insides yet bright colour of fresh blood. Nothing he wasn't used to, both on others and himself.
Wei Wuxian didn't even feel hurt or betrayed, he'd felt those emotions too much. Instead he just felt more of a melancholic sorrow. A profound emptiness gnawing at his heart, or it was the feeling of sleep overtaking him as he slowly began to pass out.
Seeing this, Lan Wangji, hoisted him up onto his back and escaped by the hair of their neck, trying to find a small town for Wei Wuxian to rest in. While floating across, nearly exhausted almost all of his spiritual energy, he heard Wei Wuxian mutter one last thing before passing out. "Isn't it ironic that when I was at my peak when everyone praised and respected me, you were the only one who told me otherwise yet now when everyone is against me, you're the only one by my side?.."
After waking up, Wei Wuxian rubbed his eyes, yawning a bit before trying to roll out of bed but finding the same stabbing pain hit him again, somehow hurting more than the initial penetration. Hearing him grunt from the other room over his guqin, Lan Wangji walked over, relieved to find his partner awake now.
"Don't stretch or move yet, you wouldn't want the would to reopen again." Lan Wangji said before sitting down on the bed next to Wei Wuxian so they were face to face with each other.
Wei Wuxian sighed and nodded, this would be one long, long recovery period, "Ugh.. fine. Anyways, how long was I out for?" He questioned lazily, expecting an answer like just a few hours or a day, he was pretty strong after all.
"I think about.. three days?" Lan Wangji replied shocking Wei Wuxian to the bone that he moved again, almost reopening the wound. Annoyed at his constant movement and inability to lay still he threatened him a bit, "do you need me to tie you up or will you stop moving?"
This finally made Wei Wuxian freeze up and he shook his head and promptly laid flat as a board against the bed like Lan Wangji had requested. "Nope! I'm alright!"
Lan Wangji couldn't help but crack a tiny smile at his antics, fixing his expression back to the same stoic face he always kept before giving him another command. "Get some rest. It'll help you heal faster." Without another word, he swiftly turned around and made his way back to the other room to practice his guqin.
As Wei Wuxian laid there, contemplating the events that had happened before he'd passed out, his mind naturally drifted towards the stabbing and the way that Jin Ling's eyes hid the betrayal he'd felt deep down behind a mask of cold brutality.
He'd failed everything. He'd failed to be a son, a brother and now an uncle. The once great and powerful Yiling Patriarch was nothing more than an unloved being that didn't even deserve the hatred directed towards himself from the hearts he'd betrayed. Before long, Wei Wuxian could feel a wet drip falling down his cheek. He forgot that he was even tearing up. He shouldn't be moving much but just wiping a tear wouldn't do anything, right?
Reaching his right hand up to wipe the tear away, Wei Wuxian could feel the wound rip open slightly, sending a jolt of pain circling around his stomach area. He breathed heavily as he began to remove his clothes, not wanting to bother Lan Zhan with the problems anymore.
As he unwrapped his inner robes, the bandage beneath revealed the fresh blood staining them. They had to be changed soon and he'd have to call Lan Wangji for more bandages.. or he could get up and do it himself. Being Wei Ying, he obviously went for the latter.
Sitting up painstakingly slowly, Wei Wuxian forced himself to lift off the bed and began to walk slowly, trying not to reopen the wound but he found that even when he felt the same repeating stabbing pain, it gave him a sense of relief.
As hard as it was for him to admit such a sick thought, Wei Wuxian enjoyed how the pain was currently a torturous reminder of what he had done. It reminded him of who had caused the wound in the first place, his own nephew getting revenge for his family, and Wei Wuxian didn't even blame him. He was just doing what a respectable kid his age would do when meeting with the man who singlehandedly tore his family apart and kept him from having a normal childhood.
Once he finally reached the gauze, his pitiful form, slightly hunched over as he covered the wound lightly to stop it from bleeding out even more was now caught red-handed by none other than Lan Wangji. Being injured and all, that meant that Wei Wuxian would naturally be a bit off his game and couldn't sneak around quietly as he used to.
Lan Wangji while staring him down said in a calm but terrifying voice, "what are you doing out of bed?" Without even turning around, Wei Wuxian could already tell that he had a soul piercing stare waiting for him the second he did.
But it wasn't like he could just stand still forever without turning around or moving a muscle, so he slowly spinned around on an axis and gave him his signature look that he usually used to get out of trouble. "J-just getting gauze." Wei Wuxian said with a shiver present in his voice from how chilling Lan Wangji's silent gaze hurt. "I didn't want to trouble my favourite Lan brother after all." He added for comedic effect but Lan Wangji was none too pleased with this excuse.
Letting out a deep sigh, Lan Wangji used one arm to prop the other as he rubbed the bridge of his nose in disappointment. "First of all, it's my duty to look after you, second, it's bad enough that you're crying. It's fine, just let me do it." He said as a matter of factly walking past Wei Wuxian to get the bandage roll.
Hearing the second part of what Lan Wangji had said, Wei Wuxian panicked a bit. He never usually really cried about anything, just a few tears here and there but the first time he had cried in possibly over a decade had gone unnoticed for the time being. He reached a hand up again, wiping his eyes and noticing the clear liquid covering them. Wei Wuxian just used the sleeves of his outer robe to wipe them away, luckily they were dark so it wouldn't show much.
Setting Wei Wuxian down, Lan Wangji slowly and carefully removed the old bandages, used the unstained parts to wipe away some of the blood around the cut before putting them away and getting a damp towel to finish cleaning off the blood that had spilled over. After that, he wrapped the bandages around Wei Wuxian once more, carrying him back to the bed again.
"Do you want me to stay with you this time?" Lan Wangji suggested, sensing that Wei Wuxian seemed to be a bit different today "You look distant," he said before getting a pillow to kneel on so he could be face to face with him.
Lan Zhan truly knew him too well and before he knew it, Wei Wuxian was spilling everything to him, "yes.. I'd like that. It's just that I feel like I failed everyone that had trusted me before. Even you, but you're still dumb enough to forgive and stay with me." He said the last part jokingly before leaning in to give Lan Wangji a playful punch to the shoulder which earned him an icy glare that spoke a thousand words. "But as I was saying... I just feel like I can't help but deserve all the pain and backlash I'm getting now. It's just the karma I deserve for the lives I've taken and ruined."
Lan Wangji listened intently to his ramblings until he was done. Thinking for a moment, he came up with a way to explain his thoughts to Wei Wuxian for him to understand. "It's true that you've harmed and taken many lives but it wasn't like you wanted to do all of that, did you? They were all unexpected, some even proven to be sabotages so please don't take it out on yourself. All cultivation paths are paved in blood, old and new, the path of demonic cultivation isn't any different either, it just so happened to land on your shoulders is all."
As he let his words sink in for a few minutes, Wei Wuxian finally understood and couldn't contain the gratitude he had for having at least one genuine friend throughout this tumultuous, fake world, people waiting to get their chance to take a stab at him. There was still some good and truth in the world and those who believed in that within others like Lan Wangji and he was beyond overjoyed that one of those types people had found him when he needed him the most. Unable to hold back, Wei Wuxian leaned in and gave Lan Wangji a tight hug, not even noticing how this might tear his wound open even more.