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The incense had not yet burned out in the Jingshi when Lan Wangji’s eyes flew open.
His first sensation was not the familiar dull ache of the thirty-three whip scars that usually mapped his back, nor the cold and lonely silence of a man who had spent thirteen years waiting for a soul that refused to return. Instead, it was light—a terrifying, buoyant lack of weight as if he were a kite momentarily severed from its string.
He sat up abruptly, his breath hitching.
The room was wrong.
The Jingshi was smaller and more sparsely decorated. The guqin on the table was his but he could not feel the subtle spiritual resonance of the seals he had placed in the emperor’s smile hidden beneath the floorboards.
His hands, when he gripped the edge of his bed, were smooth. The calluses from years of war were gone. It was replaced by the softer, though still disciplined, hands of a teenager. These were the hands of a boy who had only ever known the strings of a guqin and the hilt of a practice sword.
Lan Wangji stood, his knees not clicking with the familiar stiffness of age and old injuries. He moved to the bronze mirror in the corner while his heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs—a rhythm he hadn’t felt since the sky turned red over the Nightless City.
The reflection that stared back was a ghost.
A fifteen-year-old Lan Zhan. His jaw was less defined and his shoulders not yet broadened by the heavy mantle of the Hanguang-jun who had led armies. But it was the eyes that stopped his heart. They were clear, gold-flecked pools, untainted by the blood of the Sunshot Campaign or the hollow lightless grief of a man who had outlived his soul.
He was back.
He didn't know how. He didn't know if this was a final mercy from the heavens or a cruel trick of a demon. But his eyes fell on the calendar sitting on his desk. The date was a brand against his mind: the first day of the Guest Lectures.
Wei Ying.
The name was a prayer, a wound, and a war cry all at once. If today was the first day, then Wei Ying was currently at the mountain gate. He was young. He was bright. He was alive with his golden core humming with a light that had not yet been extinguished by the dark arts.
In his first life, he had been a statue carved from Gusu ice, a creature of silence held together by three thousand rules and the suffocating expectations of an uncle who saw him as the perfect vessel for Lan prestige.
He looked at his forehead ribbon in the mirror—that strip of silk that supposedly dictated his purity. He thought of the blood he had seen soak into it. He thought of the fire that would eventually consume the Library Pavilion. He thought of the darkness that would swallow the boy who was currently standing at the foot of his mountain.
He will not be proper this time.
He didn’t waste time wondering if this was a dream or a trick of the Yin Iron. If the heavens had given him back his youth, he would not spend it staring at a wall in silent pining while the love of his life spiraled into a dark abyss.
Lan Wangji rose and dressed with a speed that would have earned him a lecture on undue haste. He simply grabbed Bichen and walked out of the Jingshi.
The disciples guarding the entrance to Cloud Recesses were startled to see the Second Young Master Lan—the paragon of Gusu Lan decorum—practically sprinting down the stone steps. His robes fluttered like the wings of a panicked crane.
“Young Master Lan!” one of the disciples stammered, bowing low. “Is something wrong?”
Lan Wangji didn’t answer. He reached the gate just as a group of disciples in the purple silks of Yunmeng Jiang were being turned away.
“Please, we really are from the Jiang Sect!” a voice rang out.
It was a voice that had been silenced for thirteen years. A voice that Lan Wangji had summoned in his dreams until they turned into nightmares. It was bright, melodic, and thick with that youthful arrogance that Lan Wangji had once mistaken for frivolousness.
It was a voice that Lan Wangji had played Inquiry for until his fingers bled and his guqin strings snapped.
Wei Wuxian was leaning against a pillar with a playful but frustrated pout on his lips. He looked so small and so dangerously young. His ponytail was messy with his red ribbon trailing in the mountain breeze, and his eyes—the eyes Lan Wangji had seen go cold and murderous—were sparking with life and mischief.
“Look. I’m telling you, we just forgot the invitation. If we just go back and get it, we'll miss the curfew. Can’t we just—”
“I am sorry,” the disciple said. “No invitation, no entry. Return when you have found it.”
“But it's sunset soon! Well, not yet, but it’ll take ages to go back!” Wei Wuxian groaned, kicking a loose pebble. “Is everyone here this stiff? Is there someone with a heart I can talk to?”
“I am here,” Lan Wangji said.
The disciple nearly jumped out of their boots. “Second Young Master!”
Wei Wuxian turned. His eyes traveled up Lan Wangji’s pristine white robes, lingering on the forehead ribbon with curious intensity, before landing on Lan Wangji’s face. He blinked, his pout melting into a look of genuine wonder.
He blinked. “Oh. Wow. You’re... you’re definitely the pretty one they talked about in the tea houses.”
In his first life, Lan Wangji would have felt a surge of indignation. He would have called Wei Wuxian frivolous and turned away. In this life, Lan Wangji simply stepped forward until he was inches away. He could smell the spice on Wei Wuxian’s clothes and the scent of lake water that had followed him all the way from the Pier.
“Wei Ying,” Lan Wangji said.
Wei Wuxian turned. His playful smirk didn’t vanish, but it faltered. He found himself looking at a boy who seemed less like a teenager and more like a statue carved from the very mountain they stood upon. The white robes were blinding in the sun, and the forehead ribbon marked him as royalty in this sea of clouds.
He spent the last three days in the tea houses of Caiyi hearing about the Twin Jades of Gusu. He’d expected old, stiff men with long beards and frowns carved into their faces. He hadn’t expected... this. A boy his own age who looked like he’d been fashioned out of moonlight and cold silk.
“Ah,” Wei Wuxian said, straightening his posture just a fraction, though he kept his thumb hooked in his belt.
“The Second Jade. Lan Wangji, I presume?”
He expected a stiff nod but instead, Lan Wangji looked at him with an expression so raw and devastating that Wei Wuxian felt the air leave his lungs. Those golden eyes weren’t cold but were burning with a grief so profound it felt like a physical weight pressing against the mountain path.
Wei Wuxian’s grin faltered. “You know me? Have we met? I'm sure I’d remember a face like that.”
The thirty five year old soul inside Lan Wangji’s chest shattered and remade itself in a single heartbeat. In his mind, he saw the blood on the rocks of the Burial Mounds and he heard the scream of “Get lost!” that had haunted his nightmares for over a decade.
“Oh well!” Wei Wuxian chirped, his face lighting up with that devastating, sun-bright grin. “You look like you’re in charge. Can you tell your friends here that we’re the Jiang disciples? We traveled a long way!”
Jiang Cheng hissed. “Wei Wuxian! Don’t be rude!”
Lan Wangji walked towards Wei Wuxian, his steps heavy with the weight of two lifetimes.
“The invitation,” the disciple began, “they don't have—”
“It does not matter,” Lan Wangji said.
His voice was deeper than it should have been for a fifteen-year-old, carrying the resonance of a man who had led armies and stood his ground against the world.
He stepped directly into Wei Wuxian’s personal space. In his past life, he would have cited Rule 14: Do not associate with the unruly. Instead, Lan Wangji reached out. His fingers trembled as he touched Wei Wuxian’s shoulder, confirming the solid, warm reality of him.
“Uh?” Wei Wuxian blinked, his grin faltering into a look of genuine confusion. “Are you okay? You look like you’ve seen a—”
Before Wei Wuxian could finish the sentence, Lan Wangji pulled him into a crushing embrace. One hand slammed into Wei Wuxian’s back, while the other reached for the center of his chest—the same chest that would one day be scarred by the branding iron and darkened by resentful energy.
He pressed his palm there, feeling the steady, rhythmic thrum of Wei Wuxian’s heart.
Alive. He is alive.
The silence that followed was absolute. The wind in the pines seemed to stop. Jiang Cheng, standing a few feet back, looked like he was having a stroke while the Lan disciples looked as if they were witnessing the end of the world.
Wei Wuxian was frozen, his arms hovering awkwardly in the air. “Uh... Gusu hospitality is... more intense than I heard?”
Lan Wangji buried his face in the crook of Wei Wuxian’s neck. He smelled of lotus seeds, wind, and the faint, sweet scent of youth. He was warm. He was breathing.
“What... what are you?” Wei Wuxian stammered, his face flushing a magnificent shade of pink.
“You are late,” Lan Wangji said, his voice low and possessive. “I have been waiting.”
“Waiting for... for the invitation?”
“For you.”
Lan Wangji pulled back just enough to look into Wei Wuxian’s eyes. The confusion there was plain, but beneath it, Lan Wangji saw a flicker of the same spark that had once ignited a sun—a curiosity that not even the Gusu ice could chill.
Lan Wangji then turned to the guards. His golden eyes, usually as cool as mountain springs, were now burning with a terrifying intensity. “They are my guests. They may enter now. If my uncle has a grievance, tell him to come to the Jingshi.”
“But Young Master, the rules—”
“The rules do not apply to him,” Lan Wangji said.
Without waiting for a response, he took Wei Wuxian’s hand and laced their fingers together with a grip that left no room for escape. He began to walk, practically dragging a stunned Wei Wuxian through the gates. He did not look back at the three thousand rules carved into the rock. He had already memorized the only law that mattered, and it was currently stumbling over its own feet beside him.
“Hey! Wait! My Shidi! My sister!” Wei Wuxian stumbled along, looking back at his confused sect mates.
“They may follow,” Lan Wangji conceded, but he didn't let go of Wei Wuxian's hand. Not even for a second.
The walk through the Cloud Recesses was a slow-motion car crash of social etiquette. Every Lan disciple they passed froze in their tracks. The Second Young Master Lan was walking hand in hand with a loud mouthed, messy haired boy from the Yunmeng Jiang sect.
Worse, Lan Wangji was carrying Wei Wuxian’s sword, Suibian, in his free hand. To a cultivator, carrying another’s blade was an act of profound intimacy or total subjugation.
“Lan Wangji! People are staring!” Wei Wuxian whispered, though he wasn't trying very hard to pull away. “I think your brother is over there, and he looks like he's seeing a ghost!”
Lan Xichen was indeed standing on a nearby walkway, his usual serene smile replaced by a look of profound, existential confusion. His fan was frozen mid-flutter.
“Ignore them,” Lan Wangji said. “They are irrelevant.”
“Irrelevant? Your brother is irrelevant? Your Uncle is also standing right behind us!”
Lan Wangji stopped. He didn't even turn around to face Lan Qiren yet. He already felt the familiar, stifling presence of his uncle’s aura—the aura of a man who believed that virtue could be forced through punishment. In his past life, this presence had made Lan Wangji’s spine straighten in fear and respect. Now, it only made his grip on Wei Wuxian’s hand tighten.
“Wangji!” Lan Qiren's voice boomed, vibrating with a mix of shock and fury that echoed off the mountain walls. “What is the meaning of this? Why are these people inside without clearance? And why are you... why are you touching him?”
Lan Wangji finally turned but he kept his grip on Wei Wuxian’s hand firm.
“Uncle,” Lan Wangji said. “This is Wei Ying. He is the ward of Sect Leader Jiang.”
“I know who he is! I do not know why you are acting like a common street ruffian!” Lan Qiren’s goatee was practically vibrating as he shouted frantically.
“I am courting him,” Lan Wangji stated.
The silence that followed was so heavy it felt as if the mountains themselves might collapse under the weight of the scandal. A bird chirped somewhere in the distance. Wei Wuxian made a small, strangled squeaking noise in the back of his throat, his eyes wide enough to fall out of his head.
“You... you are what?” Lan Qiren's face went from pale to a vibrant, alarming shade of purple.
“I am courting Wei Ying,”Lan Wangji repeated, his voice as calm as a man discussing the weather.
“Since he is a guest in our home, I will be responsible for his behavior. Any rules he breaks, I will answer for. Any punishment he earns, I will receive. Do not speak to him. Speak to me.”
“Lan Wangji!“ Wei Wuxian hissed, his eyes wide. “Are you crazy? We just met! I mean, I’m flattered, you’re gorgeous, but—”
Lan Wangji turned to Wei Wuxian. He reached up and with the practiced ease of a man who had done this in his dreams for years, adjusted Wei Wuxian’s red hair ribbon.
“You do not remember,” Lan Wangji murmured, his voice softening only for him. “But I have loved you for a thousand snows. This time, I will not let the world take you.”
Lan Qiren fainted.
Lan Wangji didn't even look back as his uncle hit the grass with a dull thud. He simply looked at Wei Wuxian who was now staring at him with a mixture of terror and absolute fascination.
“Now,” Lan Wangji said, his thumb brushing over Wei Wuxian’s knuckles. “Let us find you some dinner. I know you like spicy food and emperor’s smile.”
“I... I do,” Wei Wuxian whispered, his heart thudding so loudly it could be heard through his robes. “How did you know that?”
“I know everything,” Lan Wangji replied. “And I am never letting you go.”
He turned and led Wei Wuxian toward the guest quarters. His stride is unwavering as he stepped over the shadow of his uncle.
Lan Wangji had spent years being the perfect disciple, living by three thousand rules that only ever taught him how to be alone. He had been quiet and obedient for so long. But standing here now, with the heat of Wei Ying’s hand in his, he finally stopped caring about the Lan way. He didn’t care for the dignity of his sect or the look of pure shock on his brother and uncles face anymore. None of that mattered as much as the simple fact that Wei Ying was here, breathing and alive.
The long winter that had gripped his heart for two lifetimes was finally coming to an end. As the sun dipped behind the Gusu peaks, the cold weight of a thousand snows began to melt into a deep, restless tide. It was a flood that would wash away the rules and the blood of the future, and Lan Wangji was ready to let the world drown as long as he never had to let go.
