#unatmed au

Summary: An AU where Wei Wuxian is captured shortly after Jin Zixuan’s death. Hearing his beloved sentenced to death, Lan Wangji finally has the impetus to bear his heart and confess his true feelings to Wei Ying. 

But what happens when new love has no time? 

When everything you hold precious is shattered and scattered to the winds, how do you find the will to keep going? How do you even begin to conceive of tomorrow?

Title: Bring Me Tomorrow/Stay With Me

Prologue: The End

It hadn’t taken long for the word to make its way around the cultivation world. Wei Wuxian, the Yiling patriarch, the dark individual who had cast a shadow over the collective peace of mind of all the clans had been defeated. 

It was true.  

 Captured, beaten, stripped of his legendary weapon, Chenqing, and currently held in the dungeons of Lotus pier, the very place that he used to call his home, it seemed his reign of terror was finally coming to a close.

 People said he was in the process of being interrogated. Might as well glean whatever useful information from him while they could. With everything he’d done, the ravaging of virgins, the terrorizing of neighboring villages, the blood sacrifices, and such, there was no way the cultivation world would have suffered such a monster to live in the first place; Add to that the hand he played in the deaths of Sect leader Jin’s only son Jin Zixuan, and the other cultivators who he and his ghost general attacked at Qiongqi pass. It was apparent that he was a dead man walking. It seemed that the gods really did dole out justice for evil and that it was only ever a matter of time for the prideful to come to their fall. 

Lan Wangji could feel his fists clench every time such rumors met his ears. Despite having only paused at one or two towns on his rush to Lotus Pier after hearing the news, each place he stopped had been abuzz with everyone’s exaggerations and opinions on the matter. 

For his part, Lan Wangji had only heard the rough details of what actually happened. Thinking back on it, he still did not understand how so much could have gone so wrong, so rapidly. 

He had been at the Jin sect Koi Tower the day of Jin Zixuan’s death. Had been in the very room in fact, when one of the Jin clan sentries had rushed in, pale-faced and wide-eyed, to deliver the news. Jin Zixuan, his cousin Jin Zixun and at least twenty or thirty cultivators from various sects all torn to shreds by Wei Wuxian on his way to his nephew’s one-month celebration. Jiang Yan Li had nearly fainted on the spot, most likely only managing to keep herself upright due to the infant cradled in her arms---a child who would now never know his father. 

Lan Wangji could have cursed himself to damnation at that moment. 

He had been the one who had suggested Wei Ying be invited to the celebration. He had pushed for it. Insisted that Wei Wuxian deserved to have the opportunity to meet his nephew, especially as he had caused no harm since moving to the Burial Mounds with the refugees of the Wen clan.

 He had realized earlier something was wrong when a group of Lan clan disciples who had accompanied him to Koi Tower suddenly disappeared. He heard later that they were among the slain, having followed Jin Zixun who had planned to ambush Wei Wuxian.  

Apparently, they had gone along in an attempt to serve as potential mediators. 

They had been afraid of things getting out of hand. 

Then there was what had come after. All he could think about upon hearing of the tragedy was finding Wei Ying. He had rushed out of Koi Tower without a second thought. If he had only known of the horror that would occur afterward he would have never left--- though truly what had happened was unthinkable. 

Having just slaughtered his brother-in-law, the last place anyone would have expected Wei Wuxian to show up would be Koi Tower. In fact, Jin Gungshan had sent most of his available disciples out in wrathful pursuit of him. They had assumed, like Lan Wangji, that he would most likely have retreated to the Burial Mounds. 

But he hadn’t. 

Perhaps driven by guilt, perhaps seeking atonement, Wei Wuxian had arrived at Koi tower and snuck onto the grounds where he had been spotted by a disciple who sounded the alarm. After a mad scramble, he was eventually found in Yan Li’s quarters. Guards had reported finding him at her feet, kneeling with his forehead pressed to the ground, hands extended, Chengqing offered up in his palms. When the guards had burst into her room, Wei Wuxian had only gazed at them with hollow, red-rimmed eyes, appearing too stunned to even move much less resist. Chengqing had been knocked from his grasp and several guards had immediately grabbed him when another tragedy had senselessly taken place. 

Whether in a fit of elation or terror at finding the Yiling Patriarch in their grasp, one of the guards had drawn his sword and seen fit to draw the deed of execution right then and there. As soon as she had seen the man lunge forward, intending to run her brother through with his blade Yan Li had stepped in the way. 

People were convinced Wei Wuxian had killed her. 

They were unable to believe the alternative. Unwilling to comprehend the idea of Yan Li’s sacrifice, the depths of such selfless love. He had killed her husband, senselessly deprived her child of his father, and then had the gall to approach her so soon after, shamelessly begging for forgiveness. They didn’t understand that despite all of this, in the end, she had still only seen him as her little brother.

They said Wei Wuxian had wailed like one whose heart was being dug out of his chest but without his legendary weapon in his hands, what was there for him to do? Still, they say in those moments that Chengqing had pulsed with profound dark energy as if hearing its master’s despair and thirsting for the vengeance behind it. It was all the guards could do to restrain him. He had finally been subdued by Jiang Cheng of all people, who had similarly been residing in Koi Tower for the celebration, and who had stayed behind for the night to comfort his sister. Jiang Cheng had helped knock Wei Wuxian out and then laid claim to him. Ordering his men to take him back to Lotus Pier, something he could have only gotten away with due to the absence of Jin Gungshan and the majority of his disciples, still out and searching for the man who had practically delivered himself into their halls. 

Jin Gungshan had been outraged by Jiang Cheng’s actions. Demanding that Wei Wuxian be returned to him as penance for the death of his son. Jiang Cheng had retaliated with the notion that Wei Wuxian was also responsible for the death of his sister and furthermore had been a former member of the Jiang clan before his flight to the Burial Mounds. 

They were not the only two who had opinions on the matter either.

 Every clan who could speak had some sort of input on what they believed Wei Wuxian’s future should entail. A brief meeting had been held with a key group of clan leaders who finally decided that, regardless of his sentencing, before he was punished, they must force Wei Wuxian to hand over the Stygian Tiger Amulet. The item had not been on him when he was captured. 

Now Lan Wangji rushed to Lotus Pier, ready to throw himself at the mercy of Jiang Cheng for even just a few moments with Wei Ying. It was the only thing he could think of----the only thing that gave him even a sliver of hope of saving the one who he considered the other half of his soul.