moved!

Nie MingJue scoffs.

“Why wouldn’t I?” He demands, and from the way Meng Yao’s eyes light up, he knows that he’s said something very, very strange. It’s been…very distracting since that day he woke up. With the Wen threat looming over them, he’d only had a cursory glance over the missives from the other Sects before digging into the affairs of his own sect.

Nie MingJue had just thought the absence of Lan XiChen’s name just meant that his sworn-brother-to-be had just been keeping safe and keeping to himself. Meng Yao tells him how they say there’s only ever been one Noble Jade of the Gusu Lan Sect, that Lan WangJi was the only son, and Lan XiChen?

Never heard of him. You sure you weren’t dreaming him up?

Nie MingJue stares at him dumbfounded, before inviting Meng Yao in. For a while, everyone is curious about the new aide, til the novelty of bonus drills wears off. HuaiSang is happy that his brother’s attentions are focused on someone other than himself, and Meng Yao is an efficient worker. Even more efficient than before, if Nie MingJie is being honest, and he’d taken him in this time more to keep an eye on this wayward third brother.  

They don’t really talk about the future, but he guesses the efficiency is something from then. They don’t talk about how they seem to be co-existing without much friction either; that they both stop more often before they talk, and Nie MingJue takes longer to reach for his cleaver, that Meng Yao stalls on his more questionable schemes. 

When the Sunshot campaign hits, it’s the same mess that it was last time - knowing what happens in the future only works out to so much after all, and Meng Yao doesn’t leave his side this time. They still win, and Wen RuoHan is still dead by their hands. Meng Yao still becomes Jin GuangYao for his efforts but lives in the Unclean Realm.

And there is a still a Lan XiChen shaped absence in their lives that only grows once they don’t have a rebellion to run. When they (even Nie MingJue) asked fellow cultivators about him, they’d all just shaken their heads. Lan WangJi, having heard about the inquiries at one point, had even come to confirm that no, he’s never had an older brother.

So they try to remember him instead. Set up an additional place when it’s just them eating. Make stilted conversation about someone only they remember. Jin GuangYao picks up the xiao, but only lasts a week before he stops. (He doesn’t touch the guqin at all.) Nie MingJue attempts to appreciate art a little more, to the baffled delight of his younger brother.

Bit by bit, the pain dulls. He’s still someone they remember, someone they miss - but…the void fills. They see him in the flutter of white fabric, in the smiles of those around them. They hear him in the notes of a song, in the whispers of a breeze. Bit by bit, the pain is replaced by comforting nostalgia -

and one day, they wake up, and…it’s alright.

[ In a future past, Lan XiChen makes a deal.

“There are things that even an immortal should not do.” it warns, but the man shakes his head.

“You’ve already said yes.” he points out and smiles. It huffs, before deflating.