Chapter Text
“Niang, Niang!”
Making final adjustments to the audio of the final video clip, Yanli hummed at the sound of her daughter’s call. “Yes, darling?”
The toddler’s solid weight slammed into her office chair. Well accustomed to rambunctious toddlers, Yanli’s hands were already off her keyboard. Still— “Careful!” she gently chided, looking down to see A-Yi’s chubby cheeks puffed out in a pout. “Niang’s working on something for your uncles.”
Her little girl’s pout quickly disappeared as she squealed with delight, chocolate eyes sparkling. “Jiujiu!”
“That’s right,” Yanli laughed. It was adorable how just the mention of her little brothers excited her children. “Would you like to see?”
“Please!”
With A-Yi settled in her lap, Yanli scrolled back to the beginning of the video in her editing app and hit the play button. Immediately, spooky intro music kicked off. Created using her own humble composition skills and soundbites from A-Xian’s flute recordings, she thought it appropriately set the tone for a paranormal show. She never imagined the skills she learned on a whim in college would come in use for an internet show hosted by her brothers, but she was very glad they had. After living on different sides of Jianghu for several years after college, she was afraid their lives were drifting apart, so when her brothers told her they were working on this project together, she was happy to offer her time and skills.
As the intro hit its climax, her brothers appeared on screen sat in lawn chairs outside of a quite "non-lawn-chair-appropriate" giant cave entrance.
“Da-jiu!”
Yanli couldn’t help but giggle as A-Yi stared, eyes riveted on her favorite uncle’s smiling face.
On the screen, A-Xian dramatically looked around at their surroundings, flashing a bright smile at the camera.
“Hey! Jiang Cheng, you should’ve told me we were going to a camping spot! I would’ve brought stuff for s’mores!” he pestered.
A-Cheng huffed. “You think this is an appropriate camping spot?!” He gestured wildly at their general surroundings and gave A-Xian a withering glare. “This is the Fairy Cave! Y’know, the massacre history one?”
“OooOOOoooh.” A-Xian wiggled his fingers in the air dramatically. “The fairy cave! I’m shaking in my boots!” To emphasize this, he lifted one of his Doc Martin clad feet in the air.
“You better be terrified, Wei Wuxian!”
A-Xian nodded solemnly. “Of course, I’m very afraid of the very real gui.”
“Shut up.”
A-Yi giggled, having heard very similar exchanges between her silly uncles for most of her life ("shut up" was one of the first phrases to come out of her mouth, much to A-Xuan’s dismay and Yanli’s amusement).
With a long-suffering sigh, A-Cheng began reading out the location’s history for the audience.
“The village of the Dafan Wen was founded roughly six hundred years ago, and its inhabitants quickly gained renown for their expertise with medicine, both physical and spiritual. An off-branch from the far more well-known and infamous Wen Warlords of the following century, they generally kept to themselves in this secluded mountain village.
“At this time, there were legends of a goddess in the mountains that favored the village; whether the shrine was built before the village was founded or after is up for debate among scholars. The Dafan Wen lived in relative peace, frequently going up to the cave shrine, which would later become known as the ‘Fairy Cave,’ referring to the massive statue of a dancing woman for whom the villagers would leave offerings.
“But this peace wouldn’t last forever. Only a hundred years after its founding, trouble began brewing outside this isolated branch of the Wen clan. The warmongering and known occultist Wen Ruohan became more active, sparking violence across the country.”
WWX: OOOOOOH SCARY. We love a good ol’ self aware villain. Like, violence AND the occult. Did he sacrifice children? Bathe in the blood of virgins?
JC: (wheeze) Not as far as we know hahaha, no no, apparently he had like, some demonic shit in his arsenal and stuff like that
WWX: Ah well that’s okay then
JC: NO??? Well. I mean at least he wasn’t sacrificing children. As far as we know. He did probably kill a lot of children though
WWX: Yeah I don’t think warlords traditionally care a whole lot about the age of their kills
JC: Yeah like an amusement park; you have to be at least this tall to be beheaded
WWX: (wheeze) Hahaha exactly—if you aren’t at least as tall as my sword I just can’t kill you—too much effort to reach down haha
JC: Wen Ruohan: occultist, murderer, and known couch potato
WWX: HAHAHA
Yanli heard a little huff from behind her. A-Ling was sitting a few feet away surrounded by crayons and half-finished coloring pages on the ground, glaring adorably at the cartoon mermaid he was holding up. It looked like he’d accidentally colored outside his meticulously neat lines and was trying to will them to fix themselves. Yanli grabbed her phone from the desktop and covertly took a picture (she’d have to show this to A-Xian later—A-Ling looked just like his Xiao-jiu when he found lint on his clothes).
The scene flashed to her little brothers standing in front of what looked like an old building foundation: stacked stones in a sort of low wall, covered in moss and overgrowth.
“Jiang Cheng. Are you sure there was a village here?” A-Xian looked skeptically at the pile of rocks.
Maybe he was trying to see how many times he could get A-Cheng to shoot him a death glare. So far she’d counted about five, and the video wasn’t even a quarter of the way done yet. It was kind of impressive, actually.
A-Cheng pulled out the little EMF detector and briefly explained how it could reveal paranormal presences through electromagnetic frequencies. Considering the lack of electric lines near their location, this was a perfect opportunity to use the device. However, when they turned it on, it immediately began beeping frantically, and A-Cheng took out his little go-pro camera to show the needle bouncing entirely in the red.
A-Xian looked over at it, humming idly. “It must be broken, right?”
Just as A-Cheng was about to answer, the little machine went quiet, its light abruptly going out. There was silence on the screen for a few seconds, and he tried shaking it, flicking the power button on and off.
“I literally just put new batteries in this.” A-Cheng frowned, and from experience, Yanli knew this was his "this is a little strange and I’m starting to freak out" frown. She saw that expression a lot back when Changze-shushu and Cangse-ayi were still alive. Occasionally, when A-Xian stayed overnight to play with A-Cheng, her Xiao-di would come knocking on her door complaining that A-Xian wouldn’t stop talking to the closet. Like now, he’d tried to disguise his terror with irritation, although back then he was even worse at hiding it.
A-Xian clapped a hand on A-Cheng’s back and smiled. “I guess the gui just didn’t like being prodded with electrodes today!”
“That’s not at all how this works—were you even list—”
“Do you wanna get out the toy? Y’know, the one we bought at a literal toy store?”
Alright, the withering glare count was up to about ten at this point. “You mean the ouija board?”
“Yes! The Hasbro toy!” He swung his backpack to his front and dramatically unzipped it with dancing eyebrows, pulling out the brand new boardgame box.
She could tell A-Cheng was hesitant to use it, and she even remembered hearing him say in high school that he wouldn’t ever be caught dead with one of those things. As usual though, a good goading from his big brother could make even A-Cheng at his stubbornest change his tune.
They settled down in what looked like a village center situated by the old remnants of a fountain or decorative pool long since dried up. They went through the motions of opening up communication with paranormal creatures around them, both gently placing their hands on the planchette—they set up a static camera at an angle above them so they didn’t have to deal with the go-pros while sitting down.
A-Cheng took a shaky (but trying very hard not to be) breath. “Okay. Okay, if there are any—wait no—Wei Wuxian, if you are moving this yourself I’m going to kill you.”
The accused looked up with wide eyes, letting out an affronted gasp. “I would never mess with this sacred ritual. I wouldn’t want to offend the gui after all.”
“You’d better not. I’m serious, the people who lived here were insane murderers, so don’t be an idiot.”
A-Cheng’s narration of the history continued as the screen cut back to a timeline and old depictions of the village they’d been able to find in some record books at the library archives:
“In this time of unrest and chaos, the unimaginable happened. There are several leading theories as to the cause of the massacre, (WWX: MASSACRE?) but first let’s lay out the facts of the events we do have.
“One of the most prominent members of the village was a brilliant doctor named Wen Qing. She grew up in Dafan with her little brother Wen Ning, who was frequently ill and required a lot of help and attention. Little did they know that even the most innocent-looking people can be hiding the most evil of intentions.
WWX: That’s a bit judgemental
JC: They were murderers, Wuxian
WWX: Did they go to trial? Did they get a proper investigation?
JC: Shut up. Of course not. This was five hundred years ago
WWX: Right, before they invented justice. ARE YOU SAYING THEY DON’T DESERVE THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT??? INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY, JIANG CHENG!
JC: …Moving on
“By all remaining accounts, Wen Ning was a very shy and isolated youth, with no friends other than his sister. He learned medicine alongside her but evidently had much more trouble with the spiritual side of things. Some accounts say he was frequently possessed and required a lot of treatment both physically and spiritually because of this. Some say he was simply mad.
WWX: Well, that’s just sad, poor guy. How old was he?
JC: It doesn’t say, but probably like, old enough to murder people
WWX: What, so he got his murderer’s permit or something? Wait. MURDER? That sweet, sick, shy baby child??? Sounds suspicious
JC: We don’t know how old he was! He could’ve been our age or something. And we’re perfectly capable of murder
WWX: …We. WE. We are perfectly capable…do you have something to tell me, Jiang Cheng?
JC: WELL I MEAN HYPOTHETICALLY
WWX: HOW HYPOTHETICAL??????
JC: VERY
WWX: ARE YOU PLANNING ON MURDERING ME TONIGHT????
JC: …Moving on
WWX: JIANG CHENG!
The screen returned to the boys with their hands over the planchette.
“Stop accusing poor A-Ning of murder! He’s my bestie!”
A-Cheng sputtered. “B-Bestie?!” He punctuated it with finger quotes, then quickly put his hands back on the planchette as if scared it would fly off. “You’ve never even spoken to him!”
A-Xian gasped. “Oh, you’re right, Jiang Cheng!”
“What—”
“I haven’t even introduced myself properly!” His eyes focused on the ouija board. “A-Ning! You’re my friend, right?”
The planchette was still. Then—
“Chengcheng, stop moving it!”
A-Cheng’s face had gone completely white. Yanli chuckled.
“Niang! Niang! Xiao-jiu’s a ghost!”
“W-wh-what? N-n-n-o, you’re moving it!”
For a moment, A-Xian looked genuinely startled. The planchette was still moving.
“Who’s that?” A-Yi asked.
“Hmm? What do you see, darling?”
She pointed a chubby finger at the empty space between her two uncles. “That!”
Yanli narrowed her eyes at the screen, leaning closer to get a better look. It didn’t seem like there was anything…
“Can you describe it to me?”
“Ummmmmmmm,” she tilted her head adorably to the side, copying her mother’s look at the screen. “Big!” she finally said. “Scary! Sad!”
Yanli was about to respond as A-Xian barked a laugh.
“Ha! See, A-Cheng? He is my friend!” He pointed accusingly at the board with his chin. “It went over to yes!”
A-Cheng was silent for a moment, face still a shocking white. Then, he turned on A-Xian, probably in an effort to not seem scared. He could never fool his A-Jie though. “Of course you would befriend the anti-social murdering freak! The only person that could tolerate him was his sister!”
Just as he finished speaking, he yelped, ripping his hands away from the planchette. “What the fu—”
A-Xian’s hands flew off the planchette to cover the sides of the board, as if he was covering its ears. “Think of the children! We don’t know how old our audience is!”
Yanli couldn’t help but laugh, and A-Yi giggled along with her.
A-Cheng was already walking off the camera, hands high in the air. “Nope—nope! That thing just stabbed me or something! I’m done.”
A-Xian started laughing again, leaning down closer to the board and stage-whispering theatrically, “Did you just stab my brother? Very good, A-Ning, very good. You have to learn how to stand up for yourself!” He paused for a moment, hands still in position. “But I should probably go after him, huh? I’ll talk to you later, bestie!”
He then took his hands off the board, unceremoniously stood, and walked off in the same direction as A-Cheng, whose muttered curses could still be heard off camera.
Yanli had almost missed it when she was first going through the footage, but as she zoomed in she noticed that the planchette began moving on the board only a few seconds after A-Xian left it. Unfortunately, the camera angle wasn’t the best (they’d have to work on that if they got approved for an official show). It was still interesting though and in spite of her own skepticism, a chill ran up her spine every time she watched it. Even sped up, the movement went on for a good thirty seconds almost non-stop. She’d decided it would be interesting to leave it in, uncut. Hopefully some of those amazing people out on the internet would be able to make something of it.
The screen flashed again and cut away to more timeline and photos as the narration voiceover continued:
“Wen Ning and his sister would frequently go to the Fairy Cave to make offerings for good health and prosperity. If only they had known just how fruitless their offerings would be.”
WWX: DUN DUN DUN!!!!
“One fateful day, they went up to the cave to make their usual offerings when Wen Ning began to act strangely. Legend has it that while standing in front of the statue, he became engulfed in a dark energy. Many people from Dafan were there at ground zero for what would happen next.
“There is a reason why Wen Ning is considered the mass murderer known as the Ghost General—he was the only one left alive in the entire village after that day. As the legend goes, after he saw the death he had caused, he returned to the Fairy Cave and hung himself from one of her raised arms, leaving a gruesome scene for the Wen Warlords who came too late to save even a single soul of the Dafan Wen.”
WWX: NOT WEN NING!! MY INNOCENT CHILD!!!
JC: Did you not hear a word I just said? He was the ONLY ONE alive and killed himself afterwards
WWX: I refuse to believe that my sweet child would do something like that. He was dead before their relatives got there right?
JC: Well, I mean, yes—
WWX: THEN THERE IS NO PROOF THAT HE KILLED THEM! Plus, wasn’t he like…really sickly? How could he have possibly subdued the ENTIRE village
JC: …Well shit. That’s a good point—but that brings us to the theories about how that happened
WWX: Slander!
“The first theory is that some dark creature possessed the highly susceptible Wen Ning in the Fairy Cave, and he was controlled by a malevolent force as he slaughtered the entire village and then himself.
WWX: Uh huh. The very real gui made him do it. For sure that’s a logical explanation
JC: Shut up
WWX: (wheeze)
“Theory number two is that there may have been some kind of mass hysteria similar to the infamous dancing illness from France, where the people all killed themselves, perhaps instigated by something that happened in the cave that day.
WWX: Huh
JC: What, you have something to say?
WWX: No, that actually doesn’t sound too unreasonable
JC: …
“Theory number three suggests that rather than Wen Ning, it was actually his sister Wen Qing who used her medical knowledge to poison everyone in the village in an attempt to spite Wen Ruohan’s attempts to use their expertise in his war efforts.
WWX: She does seem more suspicious to me
JC: W-WHY? What did she ever do to you?
WWX: I don’t know, something about her just seems like murder-y to me y’know? Like you?
JC: Wei Wuxian, I am not planning on killing you tonight!
WWX: What about TOMORROW?
JC: WOULD YOU SHUT IT?
WWX: ARE YOU GONNA MAKE ME? BY KILLING ME TONIGHT?
JC: NO
WWX: YOUR TONE SUGGESTS OTHERWISE!
JC: …(sigh)
“The last, and most realistic theory in my opinion, is theory number four; that it was not Wen Ning alone who killed the village, but rather in a frenzy of insanity and resentment, he betrayed the village and committed the massacre with a group of Wen soldiers.”
WWX: Ridiculous! He would never betray his family like that!
JC: …Why do you talk like you KNOW him? It’s always the quiet ones who are the crazies, you know that right?
WWX: Are you saying something about our SISTER???
JC: WHAT? NO, I—
WWX: JIEJIE WOULD NEVER MURDER ME!!
JC: I—I mean NO, bUt
WWX: That’s what I thought, you murderer
JC: Shut up
WWX: HAHAHA
A-Yi giggled wildly as she heard mention of her mother, jostling around in Yanli’s lap. Yanli squeezed her tighter, the bright laughter of her brothers and daughter shooting off fizzy sparks of warmth in her chest.
“In any case, beginning with whatever happened in the Fairy Cave, the bustling town of Dafan became a home for gui practically overnight.”
The screen returned once again to a static cam showing her brothers in front of the most intact structure remaining at the Dafan ruins. A-Cheng held out a little black box, not unlike the EMF detector he’d used earlier. Once again, he explained its function; it was called a “spirit box,” a tool that switched between radio signals rapidly, creating a white noise ghosts could theoretically use to communicate.
“Oh, so it’s like a white noise machine?” A-Xian asked, plucking it from A-Cheng’s hands in spite of the other’s protests.
“No, it is not ‘like a white noise machine.’” A-Cheng made a grab for the little device, and A-Xian danced back a few feet. “This is a serious paranormal investigation device, and you shouldn’t be treating it like a toy!”
“What? Like the very serious ouija board we bought at the toy store?”
Although it wasn’t on camera, Yanli could tell A-Cheng’s face was turning red as A-Xian let him snatch the little box back. He admirably ignored A-Xian’s comment. She was proud of him for his restraint.
He flicked on the box and a very unpleasant, pulsing white noise came out. A-Xian yelped, hands leaping up to cover his ears. “You’re right, this is nothing like my white noise machine at home! This is like the opposite of that. Somehow, I actually feel more anxious and less tired.”
Again, A-Cheng ignored him (good job!) and asked, “Ghost General, are you here?” The machine only kept up the same sound as before, interspersed with some unintelligible single-syllable sounds. A-Cheng sighed, closing his eyes for a second before glaring at the sky like it offended him. “What, you’re a murderer and a coward then, huh? I guess I should’ve expe—”
“A-Cheng! How could you! Stop bullying my favorite gui!”
“I’m not—I,” he took a breath, “I’m just trying to make contact and get a reaction, stupid. Do you really think being all ‘nice’ is gonna get these things to talk to you?”
“It did earlier with our board game!”
Yanli chuckled, knowing full well that A-Xian was doing everything in his power to make A-Cheng yell at him for twenty minutes about taking things seriously. He was having the time of his life, totally unburdened by superstition.
Poor A-Cheng had a look on his face like he was asking every deity in existence to give him a reason not to murder his brother. Finally, he looked back at the very loud little box. “Can you believe this shit. I deal with this every day. I can’t imagine my brother being my only friend—”
Suddenly, a very clear voice came through the device. “Tell me about it.”
A-Cheng gasped like a pure maiden stumbling across an intense makeout session, looking down at the box in shock. “Did you hear that? It just said something like ‘tell me about it,’ I think?”
Even A-Xian paused in his teasing, looking at the box with an unreadable expression. A moment later, he was back to his smiling self. “I can’t believe they would say something so mean to me when I’m being so nice. Why is everyone bullying me?! A-Ning, you love me, right?”
Shockingly, another clear voice came through the box, somehow managing to sound confused in spite of the interference. “Yes?”
A-Xian looked so pleased with himself that he didn’t even notice the actual horror on his brother’s face, who held the box like it was going to explode. “What the fuck?”
“What? You can’t believe someone would be my friend and love me? A-Cheng, I’m hurt! I have friends, you know—”
“No, idiot! We just got two intelligent responses in a row.”
“So?” A-Xian shrugged, smiling brightly. “Can we really call those responses intelligent? I mean, really it mostly just sounded like random noises to me. I didn’t even catch all of the first one.”
For a moment, A-Cheng looked at him with complete disbelief before shaking his head like clearing an etch-a-sketch. “Whatever, let’s just do our stupid solos before you chicken out.”
“Before I chicken out?!”
The scene switched again, now going between A-Cheng’s head and body go-pro cameras. Yanli felt a pang of sympathy as he tried to control his expression, putting on a brave face as he entered the dreadful cave itself. He idly chatted with the camera for a moment, talking about how it was ridiculous to be afraid and that if Wuxian could do it then he certainly could. It was adorable.
His solo mission was relatively uneventful, so most of the twenty minute session was cut, except a few pointed questions which still received no answers on the spirit box. By the end, he seemed more offended then scared, so she supposed that was a win of sorts, right?
When A-Cheng came out and passed the gear over, A-Xian practically skipped into the cave, stealing an unwilling high-five from his brother as though they were tag teaming a wrestling match. Immediately, he started chatting to the air around him, occasionally talking to the audience.
“Hello, gui, it’s me, A-Ning’s best friend! What a lovely cave you’ve got here! Very spooky, love the vibes. I’ve always adored Halloween. Did you know my birthday is on Halloween? It’s my favorite holiday, even though my proselytization efforts still aren’t spreading it fast enough in Jianghu. What’s your favorite holiday?” He paused in his stride, finally reaching the furthest depths of the big chamber. “I forgot to turn on the box, didn’t I? My head doesn’t hurt, so that’s a yes, sorry, sorry.”
He quickly took the box out. “I know you heard this earlier, but this is a very echoey cave, so apologies in advance to your ghostly ear drums.” He flicked on the switch, and again, white noise filled the space.
“Okey-dokey, let’s get this party started! Hmmmm…What’s your favorite color?” A moment later a noise came out of the box that sounded suspiciously like “green,” but it was still somewhat unclear. Yanli had put it in subtitles anyway.
“Hmm? I didn’t quite catch that, sorry. Maybe not a good question, huh? But, like, so many people come here and are like ‘tell me all about the worst trauma you’ve ever experienced’ and that can’t be fun, right?”
Surprisingly, a very clear, “yes” came from the box. Even A-Xian had to have heard it clearly, and he laughed out loud with delight.
“This is so fun! It’s like when you look at a pattern for too long and your brain creates faces! Why haven’t I done this before? Anyway, enough about me, although I’m sure you don’t get to meet many new people. But hmmm…questions, questions, questions…” He did a little spin looking at his surroundings with interest. “How about—”
“Yiling,” clear as day interrupted him. The box continued to pulse for a few seconds before seeming to continue: “Friend.”
“That’s right! I’m a friend! But what was that you just said? I didn’t quite catch it. Darn those crafty random radio babbles, huh?”
The next sound that came out wasn’t so much a word as an exasperated sigh breaking the consistency of the white noise. Yanli let out a little laugh at that, and A-Yi copied her.
“Okay, ummmmm, what else?”
Before he could ask another legitimate question, the box spoke again. “Brother—statue—”
A-Xian’s eyes darted up to the admittedly extremely creepy statue stretching up into the darkness of the cavern, made to seem even taller from the lower perspective of his chest cam.
“Huh? The statue? What about it—” A sudden noise cut him off, coming from somewhere in the darkness behind the statue’s shadow. For a second, A-Xian startled, but he quickly recovered, laughing a little nervously. “I swear if there’s some murderer who decided to squat here and kill us I’m gonna—well I don’t know, but I’m gonna do something.” He turned to the box. “Give me a moment, will you?”
He flicked it off, abruptly plunging the echoing chamber into unnatural silence. With some additional editing magic, Yanli made it feel even spookier by adding extra shadows, giving it the impression of a big horror movie monster reveal. A-Xian hesitantly crept towards the statue, leaning down to pick up a stray rock.
“Hello? I’ll have you know that I’m going to be an internet star in only a few months, mark my words, so if you kill me you’ll be depriving millions of my wonderful personality.” The darkness did not reply. A-Xian crept forward. The camera switched away from him to the static cam they’d set up surveying the larger part of the cave. Through the night vision lens, the audience could see a figure sneak out from behind the statue as A-Xian passed by.
The figure—now zoomed in and obviously A-Cheng—suddenly leapt at A-Xian, yelling at the top of his lungs. A-Xian flung around, eyes screwed shut and screaming in a rather high falsetto for a man his age.
“JIANG CHENG!”
The screen went black for a few seconds before it finally switched to their outro, both of them sitting stiffly in their lawn chairs again. A-Cheng sported what could be a black eye and A-Xian a purpling bruise on his jaw, scowling and smiling respectively.
“Tonight I found out that my dearest didi is willing to try and kill me by giving me a heart attack. He has no love in his heart and a soul as dark as—”
“You squealed like a little baby! Also, you punched me in the face!”
“It was self defense! You tried to murder me! The real murderer here is you!”
A-Cheng turned to the camera with a deadpan expression. “Well, I guess we’ll never really know who the real murderer was, will we?”
A-Xian smirked and nodded appreciatively. “Smooth outro, Didi. Real smooth.” Before A-Cheng could interrupt, he continued, flashing the camera another brilliant smile and a wink. “I still don’t believe in gui, but hey, who says we shouldn’t keep trying to search for the impossible, eh?”
A-Cheng just rolled his eyes, shaking his head at the camera exasperatedly. The screen faded to black, ending with the title card and question, “What would you like us to investigate next?”
A-Yi clapped clumsily, and Yanli looked down to see her smiling face.
“Your jiujiu did so well, didn’t they?”
A-Yi giggled, remarking, “They so silly!”
“You’re right, they are the silliest!" Yanli laughed, fondness and pride welling in her chest. “Do you think Yao-shushu will like it?”
A-Yi’s head tilted as she pondered this, pigtails brushing against Yanli’s chest. Finally, she shook her head. “No! Too silly!”
Ah, the honesty of a toddler.
“But, but—Da-jiu is the prettiest, like a ‘pire prince!”
“Vampire, dearest.”
“Vam-pire,” she repeated carefully, “and Xiao-jiu is very se-ri-ous.” Nodding firmly, she wiggled out of Yanli’s lap and ran over to pester her older brother.
Puzzled but fond—a state she often found herself in as a mother—Yanli wondered what sorts of stories her brothers had told A-Ling and A-Yi on their last visit. A-Yi had a fair point though; even if A-Yao usually considered anything related to the paranormal “the crazed superstitions of the uneducated masses,” her brothers were charming, entertaining, and took the material seriously (or un-seriously?) enough. In Yanli’s totally unbiased opinion, it was bound to be a popular addition to his media company if they chose to produce it.
She saved the video in her editing software, downloaded the final product, and pulled up her prepared email to A-Yao. Just a few more clicks, and it was on its way, hopefully to be approved and released for the viewing pleasure of the general public. As busy as she was with her catering business, it had genuinely been a delight to take a break and work with her brothers on this special project. It had been far too long since they’d worked together on anything, and if this first episode went as well as she hoped, perhaps they could finally be convinced to move back to Caiyi City.
They’d grown unacceptably distant from each other these past five years. With A-Xian working on his rollercoasters in Qishan and A-Cheng still living in Lian City as he designed clothing for their family’s fashion line, Lotus Silks, they rarely saw each other in person outside of Chunjie when they all returned to Lotus Pier. Of the two, she got to see A-Cheng much more often. Despite choosing to set up her family in Caiyi where they attended college and she and A-Xuan fell in love, she was still the heir to the entire family company, House of Jiang. She travelled back to Lotus Pier often, whereas A-Xian avoided their childhood home in a foolish attempt to assuage their mother’s and A-Cheng’s poorly hidden jealousy, which of course made their father all the more desperate to spend time with him when he did show up.
No matter how much she loved and respected her parents, it was so much simpler when it was just the three of them together in Caiyi.
Yanli pushed back from the desk and stretched. As her back popped a few times, she stood and made her way over to A-Ling. He was still furiously staring at the slight blue streak outside the lines of the mermaid’s tail, brows furrowed. Beside him, A-Yi scribbled happily over the outline of a classic dracula vampire.
“Hey, sweetie! How’s your drawing?”
A-Ling jumped to cover it. “A-Niang, you can’t look at it!”
“Aw, why not? Is it a surprise?”
He blushed, eyes glaring to the side. “No.”
“Mm, then can’t I see it?”
A-Yi leapt up to shove her pink and orange vampire scribbles in Yanli’s face. “Look, look! I do so good!”
“Yes, you did very well! A-Ling?”
He ducked his head down, mumbling.
“What was that, sweetie?”
He finally looked up, blurting out, “It’s not perfect. It has to be perfect for you.”
Yanli felt her heart melt into a soppy pool on the floor. She barely restrained herself from actually cooing, saying, “Aw, my baby!”
“A-NIANG!”
Unable to resist, she grabbed him and rubbed their cheeks together. “That’s okay, sweetie! I love it!”
He wiggled in her grasp and gave in, hugging her back. A-Yi, ever the cuddlebug, pushed herself into the embrace.
“Yay! Yay!”
Yanli beamed. Soon, everything would be perfect.
VIDEO COMMENTS:
@ goldencanary_nhs: Hello everyone, and welcome to our first episode of “Spooky Boys!” I know, I know, quite a silly name, but I promise that our wonderful boyz are legit! We hope you’ll come back for another episode—please, please feel free to shout out suggestions for new topics and locations for our “expert”;) investigators to look into and enlighten us all with! Remember to smash that like button and subscribe to our channel if you liked the show!
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: first comment!
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: wtf this dude is hilarious
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: ouija boards are so fucking stupid sometimes for sure childs play
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: oh shit did y’all see that?!!!? hold on wait…they didn’t say goodbye???? and they call themselves professionals i love it hope something follows them home that’d be hilarious
@ idontknowanything: whacha see??????
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: idk gimme a minute
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: the planchette is moving i think they actually got something wtffff he doesnt even know
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: i think it looks like its saying fiend ooooooooh
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: hope they summoned a mo thatd be sick as fuck
@ idontknowanything: interesting thx
@ sugarspiceandeverythingknife: lmfaooooooooooo we love befriending murderers
@ purplelotusblossom: Congratulations on the launch of your first episode! Can’t wait to see what you do next:)))!
@ goldencanary_nhs: Awwww! Thank you so much! You’re so sweet!
@ coldasice_obviously: Actually though that planchette moving is legit right?
@ goldencanary_nhs: Yep, it was actually just those two that were out there for the filming of this (we do not have the kind of budget to pull tricks like that)
@ coldasice_obviously: hm. Kk cause I don’t think it’s saying "fiend" or whatever that other guy said. I think it’s saying "friend" which would make more sense given the conversation.
@ goldencanary_nhs: That’s a really good point! Maybe our Wei Wuxian actually did make friends with a ghost huh?
@ overthemoon: I think you’re right, this is amazing, and the rest of the video has even more interesting anomalies. Although spirit boxes can be kind of unreliable.
@ coldasice_obviously: definitely, there’s almost too much evidence?
@ overthemoon: for sure
@ tuzi1316: This was not faked.
@ whateveriguess: WOOHOO!!! Someone believes us! Hellooooo believer!!!!