#which is valid

Nandor already knows how he feels about Guillermo.

He's not even repressing it. He's just made peace with it. Because Guillermo was never an option.

by the time he awoke, whole and healthy, without a single error to his cultivation despite without-a-cure's nature, his secret was known to most of the cultivation world. he reacts to this news in solemn air, but he does not panic, as others would have. but he does not respond to these rumors either.

as they spread, yue qingyuan continues to stay silent, refusing to address them. when it is brought to him directly, he allows his lips to thin and shamelessly changes them subject. even as the other sects circle, calling for a hearing to accuse him of demonic cultivation or cheating himself in some other manor, yue qingyuan says nothing.

even on the stand, where healers publicly gasp at the strange perfection of his meridians, when he is compelled by all to speak, he only says, "my cultivation is what it is, and cannot be changed. there is nothing else to say of it," which appeases none. they cry about intention and hidden motives, that transparency is the only way to cure corruption within the sect, which would always appeal to yue qingyuan's sensibilities on all other matters except this one.

everyone whispers of what to do, to take the cang qiong sect leader into custody despite his refusal to admit to anything concrete. they paint him as a sinister individual with intent to corrupt them all that must be dealt with.

At the same time, we need to have a distinct line on holding a character accountable for his actions and still liking the character or even not liking/ misreading the character when people have loved and excused other characters who have done way worse